My humble offering of the heart’s exclusive devotion at the holy feet of my affectionate and Divine Master.
(From The Harmonist As it is, edited by Srila Bhakti Siddhanta Sarasvati Thakur Prabhupada No.1 XXV page 203)
My Master, ON the occasion of this fifty-fourth anniversary of your advent into this world I lay at your holy feet this humble offering of my heart’s pure devotion. May the affectionate and Divine Master out of His infinite mercy vouchsafe to overlook its imperfections and be pleased to accept it.
My Master, What I owe to you I can only know and express by your Divine grace and through submission at your holy feet. The greatest of mercies that you have vouchsafed to me has been this that you have taught me to submit to your holy feet and have kept me bound to your holy feet not-with-standing my persistent efforts to run away from you. I do not know, you, alone know, how ready I have always been to willfully misunderstand and oppose all your efforts on my behalf, and to you alone is known, and very dimly to me through your grace, to what extremities of exertion you have been driven in order to find the device for the allaying of my disloyal inclinations and leading me back to the shelter of your holy feet. You know my inmost heart and, even as I confess it, I stand most in need of your mercy. In thus trying to make me submit exclusively to your holy feet what a storm of universal opposition and calumnies have you not quietly and cheerfully ignored:—that also you alone know. This exclusive submission which you are always trying to teach me I offer at your holy feet.
My Master, You have made me aware that this exclusive submission to your holy feet is the only true freedom. The emancipation of the spirit from the thralldom of this material world is indeed a mere secondary result of such submission.
My Master, In the spirit there is no limitation. In the spirit absolute submission is the eternal condition of the most perfect freedom. It is the eternal nature of the jiva-soul, when it is unhampered by material complications, unceasingly to serve the Guru, the Divine Master, who is identical with God Himself. Absolute submission to Hari, the Preceptor and the Vaishnavas —all of which are the one and the same thing—can alone lift the bound jiva to his own really natural level of free spiritual service of the transcendental Reality. Submission to the Divine Master is not to be compared with submission to any worldly object.
My Master, You are the Embodiment of the Word of God. The Word of God has been imparted by Sri Narayana Himself to Sri Brahma, by Sri Brahma to Sri Narada, by Sri Narada to Sri Yyasadeva and by him embodied in the Sattvata Shastras and most unambiguously, in the Srimad Bhagabata. It is Sri Vyasadeva who always and in every age teaches the Word of God to this world.
My Master, You are the spiritual successor of Sri Vyasadeva and therefore, identical with him. You have received the Word of God in the preceptorial succession from him and you are imparting the same “to all the jivas of this world. The mighty current of the Word of God flows on eternally. You have made the bounteous current available to us. You have cleared our vision and purified our hearts and having thus made us capable of receiving it given away freely the Word of God.
My Master, You are the Word of God. Those who do not realise that you are the Word of God naturally misunderstand our devoted worship of your holy feet.
My Master, The worship of Sri Vyasadeva is identical with the worship of the Word of God. The Word of God is identical with God Himself. God Himself can alone give us the Word of God. In the form of Sri Vyasadeva, in the form of the Acharyya, it is God Himself who gives Himself away to those jivas who cherish eternal aversion against the Lord. Submission to Sri Gurudeva is submission to the Word of God, submission to Sri Vyasadeva who is no other than the Lord Himself in the form of the Acharyya.
My Master, You are the living Word of God. You alone can give us the Word of God if we believe in the Word of God and, believing, submit to Him that is to your self, to Sri Vyasadeva, who declares the Truth to the bound jivas.
My Master, We, fallen jivas, led astray by our limited, unspiritual experiences of this world, in our ignorance, make a distinction between you and the sattvata Sastras. We wrongly imagine that we can serve the Word of God without submitting to your holy feet. This is a blunder to which we are un-avoidably subject so long as we happen to be in the bound state. Because in the bound state we cannot at all realise that in the spirit there are no dividing lines like those that exist in this material world. The Shastras are unanimous on this point. But in the pride of empiricism, and so-called rationalism which in its current sense is the same as empiricism,—of egoism, we cannot understand this fundamental fact of spiritual existence although we may profess to be deeply versed in the scriptures.
My Master, It is you alone who can free us from this ignorance of our real self. You are always trying to help us. But we in our ignorance, refuse to receive your offered help. We mistake abject slavery of the senses for freedom and freedom of the spirit for slavery. And, therefore, when you, out of your infinite mercy, offer us perfect freedom in the shape of exclusive devotion to your holy feet, that is to say, to the Word of God, to God Himself, we in the foolishness of our empiric wisdom refuse to accept the eternal and natural function of the jiva soul viz. the unceasing and free service of the Absolute, and prefer the state of perpetual bondage in the fetters of Maya. This is so because everything in this world, including our empiric knowledge is the perverted reflection of the Absolute.
My Master, We have no option in this worship of Sri Yyasadeva. The worship of Sri Yyasadeva is the only function of the jiva-soul in the bound as well as in the free state. In this exclusive and continuous submission to the holy feet of the Acharyya who is the Embodiment of the Word of God lies our only hope of being restored to the state of grace while we are fallen and of continuing in it while we are free. It is not a mere complimentary ceremony performed for the nonce like the thousands of ceremonies of this world It is on the, other -hand absolutely and perpetually necessary for the attainment and preservation of our very spiritual-existence. It is verily a matter of life and death to us in the strictly real sense. It is not a tamasha. Neither is it an exaggeration.
My Master, This public demonstration on such a magnificent scale of our devotion to you is a duty that is most emphatically and clearly enjoined by the scriptures. You are as merciful as the Word of God itself. And, therefore, you have graciously offered us, fallen jivas, this unique opportunity of obeying God, and. by such act of obedience, regaining the consciousness of the only eternal function of the jiva.soul – viz. the exclusive. devotion to your holy feet. May your grace help us to realise your unparalleled and perfect kindness in this and in every act of-yours.
My Master, Between this worship of your holy feet and the God-less activities of fallen jivas there is all the difference that separates the worship of God from the worship of the ego. All ceremonials of this world are more or less the worship of the ego. We fallen jivas, have no taste for functions that do not minister directly or indirectly to the gratification of our senses. This worship of your holy feet holds out no prospect of selfish enjoyment. To bound jivas the function must, therefore, appear to be useless or even harmful. It seems to be harmful because such exclusive submission to your holy feet completely takes away the freedom for all sensuous activities. It is in fact diametrically opposed to the current of this world ; and this world is the limit of the vision of us, fallen jivas. This world provides ample gratification, in every gross and-refined form, to our senses. We consider it unprofitable to forego completely this excellent opportunity of selfish enjoyment. Anything that comes in its way appears to us to be opposed to our happiness and, therefore, harmful.
My Master, As soon as we submit to your holy feet we are immediately and completely freed from this fatal delusion. The scales fall from our eyes. We live again in the spirit. With your own hands you wash off every impurity that clogs our vision. And, lo! the spells of Maya are broken forever ! We are taken out of the dark dungeon and breathe again the pure and bracing air of freedom.
My Master, In proportion as our submission is complete and sincere this new vision that we receive from you becomes clearer. And, thereupon, you reveal yourself to us in an infinite variety of ways that are truely most wonderful. We meet you everywhere and in every act of our new life and on every occasion you wear a new form.
My Master, As soon as we submit to your holy feet we regain the consciousness of our eternal life. And thus we are at once and for ever freed from all fear of death. We realise our true relationship to God and the nightmare of this limited existence ceases to trouble us any further.
My Master, As soon as you are pleased to accept us as your servants we at once realise it is identical with the service of God. We also realise that in our true nature we are the eternal servants of God and that the service of God is eternally conditional on submission and obedience to you. You alone can give us the service of God and we can have it in no other way and can have it only just so long as we continue to be really obedient to you. We, therefore, owe to you not mere external and temporary obedience but exclusive and eternal obedience with mind, body and speech in return for the eternal service of God.
My Master, As soon as we submit to you we are freed from all worldly, all transitory and impure hankerings. The heart is thoroughly cleansed of all impurities and becomes a fit abode for the transcendental Lord. You are revealed to us by this absolute purity of the heart that results from submission to your holy feet.
My Master, You are not content with merely freeing your servant from the bondage of the world. You lead him by degrees towards the direct service, under yourself, of Sri Krishna Himself.
My Master, As soon as we submit to your holy feet you impart to us the spiritual understanding and all our doubts are cleared up. The Word of God is then understood by us. We find ourselves face to face with the Absolute Truth. The Scriptures no longer appear to be full of contradictions. Their true meaning is revealed to us and they present to us the infinite Absolute Truth through every word in them.
My Master, We are then enabled to realise, however dimly, the infinite mercy of Sri Krishna in sending you, His best beloved, into this world to save us, fallen jivas, from the clutches of Maya and restore us to our natural state of loving and free service of himself, relying on your help. The perfect wisdom of this Divine Dispensation is manifest in this that you enable us to serve the Lord by associating us in your service of Him. You make use of us as instruments in serving the Lord and you leave out none of us. We are purified by being thus used in the service of the Lord and as the crust of impurities is gradually softened and finally washed off the spiritual nature is laid bare and we are enabled consciously to serve the Lord. There could be no better method of carrying out the wish of the Lord to restore fallen jivas to the state of grace. The unconscious service of the Lord thus provided by you is the only method open to the bound jivas for regaining their lost spiritual freedom and the conscious service of the Lord.
My Master, In fact, God Himself stretches out His own right hand to lift us from the abysmal depths of this mundane existence. The Absolute Truth is ever coming down to us in this way as we are unable, unaided by God Himself, to attain to it, Sri Vyasadeva tells us of this descent of the Absolute Truth in the Brahmasutra, in the Geeta and most unambiguously of all, in the Srimad Bhagabata. He tells us to believe in the Acharyya, to believe in Himself, to believe in the spiritual perceptional succession, as the channel provided by God Himself for the descent of the Word of God to the bound jiva. This is the Srauta method.
My Master, Those who pretend to think that the Word of God,—the Brahmasutra, the Geeta, the Srimad Bhagabata,—can be understood without complete submission to your holy feet, disbelieve the clear injunctions of those very spiritual scriptures. To those who are devoid of reverence for the scriptures the Word of God is not revealed.
My Master, There is no injustice or irrationality or whimsicality in this. The word of God is identical with God Himself. How can those who really profess the desire to serve God refuse to believe in the Word of God? It is this duplicity that clouds their understanding and shuts it out from the vision of the Truth.
My Master, The jiva is part and parcel of God Himself. The will of the jiva is allowed as perfect freedom as that enjoyed by the will of God Himself. The nature of the jiva is spiritual like that of God, Himself. The difference between the two is that God is great and all powerful whereas the jiva is a tiny part of God and powerless, and also liable to succumb to the fatal and deceptive allurements of the illusory energy of God which is nothing but prostitution of the free will in souls. The jiva is a tiny particle of spirit exposed to the opposing influences of the spiritual and nonspiritual powers of God. It cannot stand on its own legs but must place itself under the protection of one or other of these two powers. The spiritual power is the Divine power proper. The illusory power, Maya, is the correlative of the real power. The spiritual power is superior to the illusory power which stands in much the same relation to the former as darkness does to light. The jiva-soul is free to choose to serve the spiritual or the illusory power of God. As it possesses no power of its own, it can never be itself the master. The spiritual power of God offers the jiva the direct service of the Lord which is the natural function of the jiva. But Maya offers to serve the jiva and promises it the enjoyment of all her treasures.
My Master, Those jivas who prefer their own selfish enjoyment to the service of God fall into the meshes of Maya. For the fall of those jivas God is not responsible. The jivas are tiny and powerless particles of Spirit. They can properly function in the Kingdom of God only, so long as they behave in accordance with their eternal nature as servants of the Lord upheld by the spiritual power of God in the performance of the service of the Lord under your direction. But if being tempted by Maya they forget their relationship to God and their own real nature and become averse to the service of God under His own direction, they are at once endowed with limited material bodies and minds which obscure their vision of the Kingdom of God and substitute in its place this material world and make them think that they do ever belong to this material world of which they supposed themselves to be masters,—a pseudo-notion and creation of Maya by the will of the Lord. The belief induced by Maya that the jiva is the lord, is utter delusion. As a matter of fact, the bound-jivas are not the masters but the slaves of their material senses, the gift of Maya to her victims.
My Master, But we are so enchanted by Maya that we never cease to hops for acquiring some day the real mastery over her and becoming like God, by our own effort. These Fancies give rise to two rival schools of thought. The duller people expect, as the sequel, unlimited material enjoyment of both gross and refined varieties. But those who are more logical find that the enjoyments provided by Maya are always of a limited character and more than balanced by positive misery and disappointments. They discover that the pursuit of such enjoyment is more a disease to be got rid of than a blessing to be cherished. They accordingly endeavour to attain a state in which they will be free from both pleasure and pain, and from all hankerings after worldly enjoyment. To the first group belong all communities of utilitarians. The second group is made up of all emancipationists who work up to their position by following the chain of negative reasoning described above. Both agree in their desire for an ideal existence for themselves built up by their constructive imaginations on the experience of this world. Both are really worshippers of the ego. Both regard the jiva in his present condition as the centre of all existence and everything is valued by reference to its present, selfish and temporary needs. The idea of God is necessarily secondary or even superfluous or the jiva himself is actually identified with God. My Master, This indifference or aversion to God, aversion to the service of God, aversion to submission to God, which the Almighty Father out of His infinite mercy is pleased to permit because He has ordained the eternal freedom of the choice of function for the jiva, is however, in the nature of things, necessarily and rightly overtaken by the terrible nemesis of his incarceration in the prison house of Maya. This disaster cannot be really prevented without taking away from the jiva all freedom in the choice of function.
(To be continued.)