Balaram Purnima

Spiritual master manifestation as Lord Balaram

0:01Yeah, it's um totally completely unprepared, improvised uh talk, but we were walking and we decided that uh today is such an important day and we should talk at least a little bit about Krishna and Lord Balaram.

0:29It's a huge topic, and definitely I will not be able to explain everything, but what I would like to start with is the reminder that Balaram is manifestation of the spiritual master.

0:58He is akhila-gurutva. He is the samashti-rupa or the universal manifestation of the principle of Guru.

1:15And that's why this day is so important, is so important for us aspiring Vaishnavas who are trying to become uh Vaishnavas, those who are trying to become uh servants of the Lord by serving our spiritual master.

1:39So let's try to understand or say a few words in in this connection uh about uh Baladev Tattva, Balaram Tattva, who is Lord Balaram.

1:56It's very beautifully explained by Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī Ṭhākura Prabhupāda, who is specifying the mood of Balaram. We know that Krishna is Swayamrupa. He is the original personality of Godhead.

2:24He is the original form of God. He is the original manifestation of this tattva of God. And uh he manifests in two ways. Uh he he expands himself in two ways. One is called uh He is His svayaṁ-rūpa.

2:52Then he manifests svayaṁ- prakāśa or prābhava-prakāśa and vaibhava-prakāśa. And prābhava-prakāśa is prakāśa means manifestation. And it's a very difficult science. We were talking with one devotee today.

3:14How it is difficult to understand how one personality is expanding himself into so many different forms. And whether he remains the one personality, or what does it mean, all these expansions?

3:31And sometimes people outside of Vaishnava religion are bewildered by this conception, how one God, we insist that God is one, how He manifests Himself in so many different forms, and how we worship so many different forms. And all these signs of expansion is very difficult to understand.

3:59And therefore, Chaitanya Mahaprabhu explains it in a lot of details to Sanatana Goswami.

4:07And he says that Svayamrupa Krishna, who is original Krishna, who is always with Srimati Radharani, his original energy, he manifests as Svayamprakasha, first manifestation, and then Svayamprakasha manifest as Prabhavaprakasha.

4:29This is the identical form of Krishna, like he manifested himself in Rasa-lila. In each and every gopi he manifested his prabhava-prakasha. And each and every prakasha manifestation of the Lord was dancing differently.

4:50It's not like Krishna manifested himself in different forms and all these forms, then mechanically dancing the same dance. Every prabhava-prakasha of Krishna was dancing differently according to the mood, reciprocating with the mood of the gopi.

5:10All the gopis, they are different expansions of Srimati Radharani, and they have different moods, and Krishna was perfectly reciprocating with their moods. Whereas Svayamprakasha Krishna was dancing with Srimati Radharani.

5:27So many prabhava-prakashas are dancing with different gopis, and Svayam- prakasha, the original prakasha original manifestation of the Lord was dancing only with Srimati Radharani, and this dance was the most perfect and the best dance.

5:46Because her mood was the most complete and, therefore Krishna could manifest himself in a more complete way.

5:56And then he manifests himself as Vaibhavaprakasha, and Vaibhava basically means vibhava. Vibhava means his bhava is slightly different from the original form or original bhava, original mood of the Lord.

6:15In prabhava-prakasha, it's the same mood. Still it manifests slightly differently according to time, place, circumstances, the gods with whom he dances.

Expanding feature of Lord Balaram

6:32But when he manifests as, uh, prakasha, uh his first manifestation as vaibhavaprakasha is of course Balaram. So let's talk a little bit about what is this different mood of Balaram.

6:50And Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī Ṭhākura Prabhupāda, he explains it very different, very beautifully.

6:58He says that Balaram manifests vibhu, vibhu feature of the Lord. Whereas Lord Krishna manifests his prabhu feature of the Lord. There are two terms which are basically identical, but still one is vibhu, his bhu,

7:27his existence is somewhat different, and another one is Prabhu. Prabhu means his existence is all powerful. So Krishna is Prabhu and Balaram is vibhu.

7:44And viphu basically means also all-powerful, but vibu means all-pervading. So Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī Ṭhākura Prabhupāda, he says that the specific function of Balaram is the function of expanding the Lord.

8:03He is that feature of the Lord who is unlimitedly expanding and expanding and expanding.

8:12So the Lord Himself, He maintains His original source of all powers, but the specific manifestation of the Lord, which is in charge of the expansion, is Balaram.

8:30And therefore, Gopi Paranandanaprabhu, while explaining this very inconceivable feature or the nature of the Lord and Lord Balaram, he had a very beautiful joke.

8:48He used to say that Krishna is everything, but Balaram is everything else. So therefore he is called Ananta Shesha. Shesha means reminder, remainder, not reminder, remainder, the something which remains after everything.

9:12Krishna is everything, but whatever remains is Balaram. So Krishna is everything and Balaram is everything else. So his specific feature as Balaram or as vibhu vibbu means all pervading.

9:30It means that he manifests all these manifestations and all the different things, and he expands and expense and expense unlimitedly, and ultimately all the living entities are expansion of Balarām because he is in charge of expanding the Lord's opulence and the Lord's personality.

10:01And when it comes to the minute manifestation of the Lord, it's the living entity, individual living entities. And that's exactly what Balaram is doing. He is expanding himself and we are all expansions of Balaram.

10:19And therefore he is the original spiritual master. And therefore, he has the plow in his hand.

10:27And the idea is that the plow is the specific tool by which you sow the seeds, by which you grow the seeds, by which you put the seeds into soil, and the seeds manifest themselves as individual plants.

10:53So that's exactly what Balaram is doing.

10:55He's holding the plow and by this plow he is working with the material energy and planting the seeds of the living entities within the material energy and ultimately, they manifest as individual living entities, but they are in reality the expansions of Lord Rāma. So that's what he is doing.

11:21And therefore, he is the spiritual master. Therefore, he is the original spiritual master because he is in charge of expansion.

11:31Ultimately, he is expanding into living entities and in the role of Rāma himself, who is the original source of all living entities, he is supposed to give the meaning of the life of individual living entities.

11:53What is the function of the spiritual master? The spiritual master is giving us the meaning of life. He is explaining us or giving us this truth or what we are supposed to do and what is the meaning of our life.

Meaning of Balaram's three names

12:11And that's why Rāma is expanding himself and uh uh uh uh in different kinds of services and he is uh by serving the Lord himself he is teaching uh us the living entities, he's engaging us the living entities to serve the original source of all existence which he is ultimately manifesting and expanding himself.

12:40So in this connection, uh again I I I'm not planning to give the complete uh description of Rāma-tattva, neither it is possible.

12:53But in this connection, I wanted to elaborate a little bit about the three names of Rāma which are given to him by Garga Muni. When Garga Muni in this seventh chapter of the tenth canto is giving, secretly giving the

13:16names to Krishna and to Rāma, he explains the meanings of these names. And he gives basically to Rāma three names. And he says that this uh son of yours, uh looking

13:36at Nanda Mahārāja, he will be called Bala, he will be called Rāma, and he will be called Sankarṣaṇa. And he gives his own explanation of this. He will be called Bala because he is so powerful.

13:52And we all know that Balaram was little chubby and was born to Rohiṇī on this full moon day, and because it's full moon, he was very white. It is said that whoever is born on the full moon day, his

14:17complexion is milk-like, his very white complexion. And again, Garga Muni says that he is called Bala, he would be called Bala because he is so physically powerful and he is protecting.

14:35He will be called Rāma because he will be giving joy to his friends by manifesting different qualities.

14:48Rāma means he is giving joy the joy-giving entity and therefore he is called Balaram. He is somebody who is very powerful and giving joy and he is Sankarsana because he connected the two families together.

15:08He connected the Yadavas and the Nanda Mahārāja together by being with Nanda Maharaj and being the son of Vāsudeva.

15:23So that's the explanation of Garga Muni, but let's try to meditate and try to understand the meaning of these three names of Lord Balaram in connection with his function as a spiritual master.

15:37Because this is exactly what spiritual master is supposed to do.

First name Bala and spiritual strength

15:43And these three names of Balaram are explanation of three functions of a spiritual master. So the first name of Lord Balaram is Bala, or Baladev is Bala, and which means the one who gives strength.

16:07And in connection with his function as a spiritual master, original spiritual master, Samashti Guru, and yeah. Uh uh and uh uh accordingly the uh minute manifestation of uh guru is supposed to do the same.

16:34He gives the strength to uh the disciples or to his followers to serve. This is the first function of a spiritual master to give particular ego because the strength is coming from ego, from identity.

17:02The strength to perform certain functions is very much connected with our identity. Unless we know our identity, we will not be able to function or to act in this capacity.

17:19So this is the first uh function or the first role or the first duty of a spiritual master - to give us identity of a servant, and in this way give us ego of a servant, and in this way give us the strengths to serve.

17:41That's why exactly Śrīla Prabhupāda was always stressing this point again and again preaching that Jīvera svarūpa haya kṛṣṇa nitya-dāsa, we are nitya das, we are servant, servant, servant, servant.

17:59So we are not this body.

18:02Again, this preaching of Śrīla Prabhupāda is an extremely important function of a spiritual master to destroy the false identity which engages our energy in a wrong way, channels our energy in a wrong way.

18:20When we waste our energy in trying to enjoy this body, in trying to enjoy this world, and ultimately destroying ourselves in the course of this so-called enjoyment.

18:31So, the first duty of a spiritual master is to destroy the false identity and to give the real identity, and by giving the real identity, with the real identity, giving us the strengths to do the service.

18:50Because when somebody is established in his identity, he has the identity has the tremendous power in itself. The identity, established identity itself is a source of power and energy.

19:08I remember that once somehow or other in my very inconceivable career in devotional service, I was brought in the presence of Sonia Gandhi.

19:25It was uh I don't exactly remember what was the circumstances. I think she was just victorious in some elections. It was long back. And there was a lot of people around her, and I was one of these people.

19:44And the The amazing experience which I had at this moment is that she's extremely powerful, but not because she's powerful, not because this particular jīva is so powerful, but because she has the position of power, because she has this identity, and this identity uh inconceivably gives her power. There was, you know, really tangible aura of energy around her.

20:17Even though, I mean, who is she? She's just an Italian woman who has become by some uh you know uh karma has become very influential. But uh you know that this it was very, very extremely tangible, this power.

20:39She was emanating this power. And we have to understand that this is not her own power, this is the power which is given to us according to certain position.

20:53And you know, like again, not to contaminate anyone's consciousness in this moment of time, but you know, if we take the President of United States of America.

21:08He's powerful by the dint of being the President of United States of America. And he acts accordingly, or the if uh it's a leader of some other powerful country like Russia.

21:22You know, the power is uh is given, is attributed. Uh I remember uh also I had I have one disciple or follower, friend.

21:39He at one point of his career or his life, he had a very powerful position. He was very, very influential. Then he gave everything up and became a devotee and became a brahmacārī, and went to this extent of renunciation.

22:02But he explained to me, he said, this enjoyment which you have when you have the position of power, when you literally feel the power which is going through you, the shakti which is going through you,

22:18it's just indescribable enjoyment, and therefore people have very hard time to give it up. As soon as they get this position and they have the illusion that this is their shakti.

22:35They possess this shakti, which is actually not their shakti, but the shakti attributed to certain positions in this world.

22:46It's very difficult to give it up because you just enjoy this, you know, using this energy which is going through you. So again, what I'm talking about, I'm talking about the power of which is connected with identity.

23:07Which we have identity very strongly established, it gives us tremendous power. Why was Prabhupada so powerful? Also, of course, he was a powerful jiva, he is an incarnation shakti āveśa-avatāra, he was given this shakti.

23:25But again, he had very strong identity, and he always had this strong identity.

23:33His sense of mission and his identity was always there, and therefore, he was able and capable of performing these amazing things which he did.

23:46Like this, one of my favorite Prabhupada stories when he was living in Keśavjī Gauḍīya Maṭha and he was already—he was not sannyāsī yet, but he was in his vānaprastha, uh, life and he was preaching, going, uh, to late programs, and he came once after the late program back to Keśavjī Gauḍīya Maṭha, and of course the prasāda was already cold, and he was eating some cold rice and cold chapati and cold sabzi with some—so they came back late at night or maybe not so late, but the point was that Prasadam was cold. So chapatis were cold and one Indian family looked in the temple room and kind of glanced over two men

24:51eating cold prasāda and without any significance, and uh you know went away without paying any attention. And at this point of time, Prabhupada started chuckling.

25:03He was chuckling and chuckling, and then his companion—he asked, Why are you chuckling? What happened?

25:12And Prabhupada said, These Indian people, they looked at us and they saw one old man eating cold rice and cold chapatis.

25:24But they didn't know which miracle Lord Caitanya Mahāprabhu is planning to perform through this old man.

25:34So at this moment of time, when Śrīla Prabhupāda was kind of, you know, totally unknown and, uh, was not really, you know, manifested his real power, the power was there because of this sense of mission and identity. And we have when we have this mission and identity established in us, it gives tremendous power, sense of power, and tremendous energy,

26:04and we can do a lot if our identity is established. If we really will become servants of the Lord. If this identity will be strongly established, it will be source of power.

26:20And therefore, one of the names, the first name of Balaram, is Baladev. He is the source of power.

26:31And the first function of a spiritual master is to try to establish ourselves in this identity of a servant of the Lord, and in this way facilitate our, you know, facilitate the spiritual energy going through us and giving us some powers to do.

26:58So it's all coming from this identity.

Second name Rama and spiritual joy

27:01So this is the first function of the spiritual master, and the second function uh is uh reflected in the Lord Rāma. So he is Bala and he is Rāma, and as uh Garga Muni explained in his little purport to these names.

27:23He is called Rāma because he will be giving joy to his friends by his glorious qualities. So, in connection with his function as Samaṣṭi Guru, Universal Guru, or Kāraṇa Guru Tattva.

27:45And in connection with the individual functions of a guru, the second function which a guru has to perform is Rāma is Is giving joy by explaining the qualities of the Supreme Personality of Godhead and

28:08giving us a very clear picture of sambandha tattva. So that's the second function. The first function is to destroy the false identity, to establish our real identity as the eternal servant of the Lord being

28:28the expansion of Balarāma and ultimately the expansion of the Lord, and Balarāma is in charge of the expanding of the Lord up to the minute living entities. So his second uh function is

28:49to give us joy by explaining the qualities of reality, of absolute reality, the qualities of ultimately Krishna, and giving the picture of this sambandha tattva.

29:05And it's if we analyze ourselves or look back into our life as devotees, we

29:16all will confirm that this understanding of sambandha tattva and understanding to a certain extent at least, the qualities of Krishna, Supreme Personality of Godhead, give the immense sense of joy.

29:36We become joyful just by the fact that the Lord is there, that He is all-pervading, that He is in the heart of all living entities. Even these simple things makes us very happy.

29:54You know, just knowing these things that the Lord is there, that He is the person, that He is personally related with every living entity.

30:05So the second function of Guru, who is the manifestation of Balaram, is to give joy by explaining the nature of reality.

30:20The qualities of the Supreme Lord which manifest in this material world, you know, sometimes people and especially devotees they become very pessimistic. You know.

30:33This world is full of suffering and everything is just suffering. And they just reflect their mind into the reality. But actually, reality is very blissful. Because it's Krishna's reality.

30:53Because Krishna is there in this reality, and if we want to relate to Krishna, we have to understand the blissful nature of this reality.

31:02And we have to you know have this sense that this is Krishna's reality and therefore it's blissful and ultimately it's the source of joy. And we are blissful by nature.

31:19We have this bliss hidden somewhere and when our mind is distorted, then we cannot really sense or experience this bliss.

31:31But in reality that's the second quality of Guru is to give you joy while explaining the real nature of Krishna, of God, and this world.

31:48So, and this is the very real sense of joy which we experience when we hear spiritual master. When we hear spiritual master, we experience joy.

32:03Because we feel that's true, you know. He is telling us the truth, and the truth is blissful. The truth is blissful by its nature. So that's why he's called Ram. He's Bala because he gives strength.

Third name Sankarsana and eternal service

32:20And he's Ram because he's explaining the big picture of reality, the expanded picture of reality, which is ultimately blissful. And then the last again I didn't intend to talk so long, I'm really sorry.

32:44I will finish very soon. So the last uh the third name which uh Gargamuni gave to Balaram was Sankarson and he explained because Sankarṣaṇa he is attracting. He has the power to unite. He united the two families.

33:11But basically, and that's the third and the most important function of the spiritual master. Again, these three names they reflect the again three features of the Lord.

33:31You know, first you established in your real identity and you get the strengths to perform your functions in the service.

33:39Second, you get the picture of reality and you become very blissful by engaging properly with this reality.

33:49Not just by trying to enjoy this reality but by serving the reality which is the manifestation of the Lord, you become very blissful.

34:00And Sankarsana is the last function of the last function of spiritual master, the most important function of a spiritual master is that he gives us the specific relationship with the Lord.

34:20He is uniting us with the Lord, and He is supposed to explain our specific function in relationship with the Lord by uniting us in a very specific way. Like first he just generally established our identity.

34:40Then he explains how we should function in connection with the Lord by explaining the nature of reality, and that's reflected in his second name, which is Ram.

34:56And the third name, Sankars, means that ultimately a spiritual master is supposed to give you specific service on the higher stages of spiritual development.

35:12The specific service which will connect you with the Lord and in this way fulfill your mission and in this way fill your life as meaning.

35:28Again, as I said, that's the duty of a spiritual master, to give us the meaning of life.

35:38So uh and it is being conducted in these three phases to give the general identity and the strength to perform our service to chant the holy name.

35:54Give us joy by engaging more properly and living in a more proper life in this reality and serving you know so many different manifestations of the Lord uh around us.

36:10And ultimately as Sankarshan he gives us uh very specific service. He's supposed to give us specific service.

36:19Like Naratam Das Thakur explains this in Prema Bhakti Chandrika: that you know, my my spiritual master will take me by hand and he will bring me to Rupa Manjari, and Rupa Manjari will tell me: this is you are the new little servant here, and this is your specific service. So he says that my spiritual master, who is Lokanand Goswami, will take me by hand, will bring me to Srila Rupa Manjari, who is Rupa Goswami in the spiritual world and will engage me in my eternal service.

Understanding Balaram's relationship with Duryodhana

37:02So that's the meaning of the three names which Gargamuni gave to Balarama in connection with his function as akhanda guru-tattva and that's um that's already much more than I wanted to say.

37:32Radha Pramod Prabhu is asking why Balarama is supporting Duryodhana and not supporting Pandavas, why his uh actions are a little contradictory in this sense. Well, Duryodhana was a good disciple.

37:52He was a very obedient disciple and he would please Balarama because he wanted to learn from him the club fighting and he was really a good disciple.

38:08He was he should also learn good qualities from what type of disciple he is. Well, he was very humble in front of Balarama and was trying to please him.

38:20And we know that, you know, when Duryodhana became proud, then Balarama became very angry with him and he wanted to throw the whole Hastinapura into Yamuna. He wanted to destroy the whole Hastinapura.

38:40Balarama was not, he was kind of, you know, supporting Duryodhana because, you know, he, this is the quality of spiritual master.

38:56Spiritual master has the vision of the spark in every living entity, even in Duryodhana. So he wanted to support, he saw the spark and he was trying to increase the spark by supporting him. What else can I say?

39:20He is so upset with Bhima when he hit Duryodhana, but upset with Duryodhana, he did so many atrocities and insulting Draupadi and that he's not considering that and he's only seeing Bhima now negatively.

39:37Radha Pramod Prabhu is criticizing Balarama, that he is supporting Duryodhana wrongly. He was upset with Bhima, but he was not as upset as Duryodhana. What shall I say?

40:02We are not supposed to criticize Balarama on his appearance day. He is uh inconceivable uh independent personality of Godhead.

40:16And he had his, you know, sometimes, you know, sometimes spiritual master may like somebody and some other devotees may become a little upset with the spiritual master. Why he likes this particular person so much, even though this person may be not perfect, but and maybe doing even some nonsense.

40:45But still the spiritual master may have some soft spot in his heart toward this particular person because he sees something in him.

40:57So don't let's try to glorify Balaram on his appearance day and try to justify his glorious actions. Actually, uh I have to finish this little improvised class now.

41:20I see Jaya Jagannatha Prabhu, thank you very much for attending this class.

41:25But maybe we can meet again uh maybe tomorrow uh around same time and then we can have question and answers for shorter uh shorter time because now it's getting a little late for me and so, Jaya Jagannatha Prabhu, if you getting a little late for me and so Jaya Jagannatha Prabhu, if you can kindly ask your question tomorrow uh at 6:30. Then we can continue this.

41:56I again I didn't prepare anything. I just thought few uh I had few thoughts on this matter and I shared it with you. So let's meet again tomorrow at 6.30. Hare Krishna. Thank you very much.