HH KKS: So with Krishna ..normal logic does not apply….We can see that in Prabhupada’s actions…... For example when he first came to New York, he had no place to stay ..he stayed in that loft with that crazy fellow…then he had to move out because it was getting dangerous and then somehow or other with the help of Mukunda and some others they got the store front ..Matchless Gifts and with the help of everybody in doing a collection ..they managed to scrape just the amount to get the money for the first months rent !
...That’s not a way to enter into a rental contract!..because the second months you are going to get less…..not everybody would help the second month …logically speaking you can’t enter into a rental contract on that…...but Prabhupada did not see it like that. “Krishna will help” and he did obviously because Matchless Gifts continued.
So here is an example of how Krishna just helped His devotee to carry on beyond the modes of material nature.Let’s take this story a little further. Matchless gifts then continued and of course some of the first people who became involved were: Keith and Wally and…Hayagriva became involved…..Kirtananada …and so on. It is said that a few hours after Prabhupada left the Jaladutta and took a bus to Buffalo that actually Kirtananada and Hayagriva , then Keith and Howard at that time boarded the Jaladutta to India to look for a Guru. They didn’t find one. They looked around ..couldn’t find one and since they were in India ..they bought some souvenirs and some things and got back on the boat and went back to America.
Then Howard met Prabhupada.. found the Swamiji…..met the Guru and so on and the whole Matchless Gifts started. So one day they wanted to surprise Prabhupada and they decided lets decorate the storefront because it looks so simple …so they made a raised platform, a seat, they had posters that they had bought from India and they put the posters on the wall and so on……….and Prabhupada came into the store front and couldn’t believe it …it looked like a temple ! It looked like a temple and when he looked at the posters there was a poster of a six armed form it was Sad Bhuja as Lord Chaitanya in that form with six arms: two arms of Krishna and two arms of Rama and two arms of Lord Chaitanya Himself ….Amazing! …..Directly relating to Gaudiya Vaishnava philosophy of Lord Chaitanya Himself! And then another poster Hayagriva asked “Who is this? Is he a cat?” and Prabhupada said, “No..this is Hanuman!”
So we can see how Krishna used them: Howard and Keith as instruments to assist Prabhupada and to somehow or other create the looks of a temple and it was all arranged …the first shopping party was sent to India ..right then by Krishna Himself …to buy supplies to create a temple in New york, in the west.
So this was an example of how Krishna was helping . It wasn’t Prabhupada’s arrangement…it was Krishna’s arrangement. In this way Krishna is empowering …making all kinds of things possible . Krishna can of course empower in many ways. There are many examples of Krishna’s empowerment …but before I go too deep in discussing empowerment …looking at the clock opposite of me ..which is five minuites fast! but I don’t want to just speak on that…let me speak about the opposite for a moment…disempowerment ….because we are here in this world in a disemepowered condition. Srila Bhakti Siddhanata Sarasavati Thakur said that when we are enquiring for Knowledge ..any other source than Krishna or His representative …then we find our selves poorly supplied …not only that but he said our capacity to retain knowledge will decrease ………….so this is exactly what happened to us! Huh! Since for a long time having enquired from all kinds of sources other than Krishna and his devotees ….gradually our capacity for retaining knowledge …has decreased and decreased and decreased…and thus we have sunk deep into ignorance …and our brains have became dull. It is difficult, it is difficult for knowledge to enter through our thick skulls!!!! .........(More in part7)
