| Srimati Yamuna devi dasi had left this world Posted: 20 Dec 2011 07:55 PM PST I heard the news last night just before taking rest that Yamuna has left this world. I dreamt about it and woke up with it. She was one of Srila Prabhupada's most intimate and early disciples, an example of total dedication to him. One of the pioneers of this movement. Now her grace has left this world. She led Kirtana and Prabhupada was immensely pleased with her Govindam prayer, he ordered that it must be played every day in every temple. She learned how Prabhupada cooked and then more and more became an expert in Vedic cooking and became known through her award winning cook books. Quickly browsing to the letters that Prabhupada wrote to Gurudasa her husband, "I have great regard for her", and to Yamuna directly," I have full faith in you." Yamuna was on the team that first went to London, this is from her memories;
"By the enthusiasm that Srila Prabhupada had given us in Montreal we were able to make contact with George Harrison, who was a member of the Beatles at the time. And he was such a pleasant person to be with. He so much appreciated the Hare Krishna mantra that he immediately said, “Lets make a 45 record.” So we cut a record and he was very pleased with it.He did a little background music on it and it was released and Apple organized tours for us. We went to Germany and France and had television coverage.
And in this way the London Times, the Sunday Times, wanted to do a feature on us. And we were able to send the report back to Srila Prabhupada with the headlines,
“Krishna consciousness startles London.” Sila Prabhupada was her life and soul and I am sure that she is now with him and again a devotee has left this world, who can not be replaced. May her example give us the inspiration to dedicate our life to Srila Prabhupada. The servant of the servant of Srila Prabhupada,
Kadamba Kanana Swami  |
| If we are not serving the Lord Posted: 20 Dec 2011 03:50 PM PST (Kadamba Kanana Swami, Mayapur, November 2011) Lecture – Caitanya-caritamrta Part 2  "Anything religious, or irreligious, which is not pure devotional service to the Supreme Lord is sinful!"
As stated by Krishnadas Kaviraj Goswami. When you hear things like that then you think that he is a fundamentalist. Some might say that he is a bit on the fundamentalistic side every once in a while. But no, it is not at all about fundamentalism. Fundamentalism is a type of reductionism – it is a type of trying to simplify the diversity of arguments and reasons in an entire paradigm to just a limited number of elements, and therefore everything is made to be black and white – it is either good or bad. But that is not what Krishnadas Kaviraj Goswami was doing. When I read the verse: "Anything religious, or irreligious, which is not pure devotional service to the Supreme Lord is sinful!" Then I take that as a symptom of Krishnadas Kaviraj Goswami's ecstasy…. I think that he is in ecstasy! He is in ecstasy about devotional service and that anything that is not devotional service, then it is useless! What do we benefit from it? All right we are religious, but it is not devotional service. So we are acting according to pious standards and so on. We pray and give to the poor, but we are not serving the Lord. So what is the point?  |
| The bodily concept of life Posted: 20 Dec 2011 02:41 PM PST (Kadamba Kanana Swami, Mayapur, November 2011) Lecture – Caitanya-caritamrta Part 2  In the New Yorker cartoon magazine, there is a really good cartoon, which was on the cover of the magazine. The cartoon shows three ladies sitting on a park bench. A Muslim lady who is completely covered (all we see is her eyes) since she is wearing a purdah. And then a nun on the other side of the bench who is only showing her face – everything else is covered. So you just see the face and the eyes. In the middle there is lady sitting with a bikini on, and she is wearing big black sunshades! Isn't that good….that's really far out!
So this shows how immediately, when chastity is gone and one gets into the bodily concept of life, then the fear is there and one has to hide the eyes! So she hid her eyes, which I thought was very interesting!  |
| An oversexed world Posted: 20 Dec 2011 11:02 AM PST (Kadamba Kanana Maharaja, 20 December 2011, Cape Town, SA)  Sex life is not something which comes forth the soul but that it is simply imposed upon us by the body. Of course when one comes to that age then it goes on. I remember my father had a joke book and most of them were stupid but there was one joke and it was about an old man. So they asked him, 'what are you thinking about?' and he said, 'sex!' and they said, 'even at your age?' and he said, 'I'm always thinking about sex…' My father thought it was a joke and I thought it was serious! It's a serious case and there is an element of truth in it that even in old age the thought of sex life remains. When we speak about the train of thought then the image of the train of thought is that one thought is connected to another and so on…and the large coach on that train is inevitably sex life if you go down all the coaches. That is the tendency in material life. So it is very strong and very deep and very much at the roots of our existence. Some may deny that and say, 'naah, that's not at all true actually' but they are simply not aware of how much they are controlled by sex life. Brahmananda was also bringing this up to Prabhupada and is saying how a foolish professor at university and that once Brahmananda had written an essay about how people are inherently, deep down driven by spiritual interest. And this foolish professor couldn't see it and gave a low mark for the essay because he said, 'no, everything in this world is driven by sex.' 'Just see,' Brahmananda was trying to say to Prabhupada, 'just see how foolish these karmis are…' and Prabhupada said, 'your professor was right!' Prabhupada had his way of exposing things! Hayagriva had a picture of a girl in wallet, who was his previous girl friend and he said to Prabhupada that he was still attached to her and then he showed Prabhupada the picture and Prabhupada said, 'Oh, she's not very beautiful!' And like that, all attachment was finished, just like that!
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| Becoming sinless… Posted: 20 Dec 2011 10:58 AM PST (Kadamba Kanana Maharaja, 11 December 2011, Durban, SA)  No one can become sinless on his own. One cannot decide that, 'from today on I will be sinless.' It doesn't work like that. One might temporarily give up some sinful activities, like on the 1st of January, people have all these good promises like, 'I'll stop smoking, I'll stop this…and I'll start…' so many things. But on the 2nd of January it gets tough and if you make it to the 3rd then you're doing extremely good! So it is like that. Some people are extremely determined and they can give up some sinful activities. Someone can say, 'I'll stop smoking…' and then smoke the last and then finished! Very determined, but all this is not durable. Just by a good decision, good intentions and so on, one cannot become sinless. It won't work. Well many of us might of thought of many things we could do to become sinless. But the only real way to become sinless is to engage in constant devotional service. That's the only way to become sinless- to hear about Krsna, to glorify Krsna, to serve Krsna in some way or another- all the time! As we increase that devotional service, all the sinfulness is pushed out of our life, permanently!
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