Lord Nityananda
By: His Divine Grace A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada
Bhubaneswar, February 2, 1977
So today, the appearance day of Nityananda Prabhu… Nityananda Prabhu is Baladeva, Baladeva-tattva — vrajendra-nandana yei, saci-suta haila sei, balarama haila nitai.
“Who was formerly the son of Nanda Maharaja, He has appeared as the son of Sacidevi.” Caitanya Mahaprabhu’s mother’s name was Sacidevi. So Krishna… Krishna is Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu, and Balarama is Nityananda Prabhu. Now, vrajendra-nandana yei, saci-suta haila sei, balarama haila nitai.
So Balarama… In the Vedic literature it is said, nayam atma bala-hinena labhyah, na bahuna srutena. So bala means strength. Sometimes some rascal philosophers, they take it that bala means bodily strength. They propagate this philosophy that “Unless you are bodily stout and strong, you cannot achieve spiritual salvation. You must be very strong and stout and eat meat and fight, and then you’ll get next spiritual birth” No. This bala, this strength, is different. This is spiritual strength.
The difficulty of the present situation is that actually we are moving on account of spiritual strength, but they have no information of the spiritual strength. They are thinking of material strength. That is expressed here, that
ahankare matta hoiya, nitai-pada pasariya, asatyere satya kori mani
This is due to ahankara. Ahankara-vimudhatma kartaham iti manyate [Bg. 3.27]. Those who are vimudha, especially rascal… Mudha, rascals, and vi means visesa, visesanam, particularly. Ahankara- vimudhatma. The same thing which is spoken in the Bhagavad-gita, Narottama dasa Thakura says the same thing in a plain Bengali language.
Ahankare matta haiya, nitai-pada… By the spell of maya—ahankara-vimudhatma kartaham iti manyate [Bg. 3.27]— they are thinking that “We are independent. We can do whatever we like.” This is called ahankara-vimudhatma. Under false pretext, false prestige, everyone is thinking that “We are independent. We can find out the solution of the problems of life by material adjustment,” so on, so on. So that is our material disease. Ahankara-vimudhatma.
Bewildered, they do not understand that the real strength is spiritual strength. We see daily, see daily that a very strong man, very powerful man, very good brain, very good scientist… So where is the strength? The strength is atma.
As soon as the atma, or the soul, goes out of this body, so intelligent, so strong, and so many things, that is nothing. That is the difference between dead man and the living man. A living man is very powerful, very good position, everything. As soon as he lies down, he is lying down on the floor, and if you kick him on his face, he’ll not protest. So where is that strength?
The strength is gone. That is spiritual strength. On the spiritual strength, the body moves. Suppose you have got a very good car, Mercedes car or Rolls Royce car.
But when there is no petrol, how the car will move? It is not possible. There is spirit, petrol spirit. Similarly, real strength is spiritual strength. That spiritual strength is Balarama. Bala means strength. Therefore we have to take shelter of the lotus feet of Balarama, guru-tattva.
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