Kṛṣṇa: The Single Object of My Service
— SRIDHAM MAYAPUR (SUN) — A lecture given by Śrī Śrīmad Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī Gosvāmī Mahārāja Prabhupāda in Vṛndāvana delivered during Kārtika 1927 and featured in the July 1928 Harmonist (26.2.33–36) The Bengali original appears in Śrīla Prabhupādera Boktṛtābalī 3.59–63.
I have no capacity to tend the feet of the denizens of this holy place, yet by the grace of Śrī Gaurasundara and urged by your good wishes, I stand here to speak only if thereby I may serve the servants of Śrī Gaurāṅga. Indeed, if we can truly serve the feet of His devotees, by whose graceful glance alone all desires, hopes, and aims in life are easily fulfilled, then that will be a crowning achievement.
We are proud of our egos. We are given either to judge sinful and pious acts, or scheme how we can dominate others by acquiring power. These are all base self-glorification. But one devoted to Gaurāṅga says that all desires actuating every object, from a clump of grass to the highest being, Brahmā, all labor for worldly possessions, all longing for enjoyment, and every kind of renunciation after satiety are all pseudo-existent and evanescent, being subject to change and time. When we lose anything so acquired, life seems vacant and useless, yet such being the end of all enjoyments in the fourteen spheres, it is quite futile to try to straighten the tail of a dog.
All pleasures acquired as the fruits of worldly work are transitory. Carried away by sense perceptions of eye, ear, touch, taste, and sound, we turn into ego worshipers. In this state the pure activity of the soul lies dormant. Then we desire pleasure in heaven. And when such ideas are strong in us we err by identifying ourselves with this mind, which seems to be the enjoyer of the things of this world. This propensity for selfish enjoyment deadens the pure function of the soul. But the soul knows that Śrī Kṛṣṇa is the one Supreme Absolute Truth, and that Śrī Nārāyaṇa is the embodiment of His majesty.
By His display of sweetening beauty the transcendent designation, form, qualities, and sportive activities of Śrī Kṛṣṇa excel Śrī Nārāyaṇa’s majesty. In Kṛṣṇa the fullest majesty is mellowed by the most delicious sweetness, mādhurya, which predominates. When we do not know all this and forget our true selves, we cannot understand the activities of a Vaiṣṇava and the transcendental truth underlying such activities, and so give ourselves up to worldly enmity and friendship, taking things transitory and illusory to be eternal and real.
Secondly, Kṛṣṇa is completely all-cognizant. Material objects are not conscious of their existence. God is ever existent. In error we consider ourselves Brahman. It is only then that such useless arguments for the effacement of all super-sensual diversity or variety in the Absolute Truth take hold of us. Then the function of the spirit is clogged and our minds race after worldly enjoyment.
The materialized mind thinks that sensual pleasure is obtained at Kṛṣṇa’s feet. But at Kṛṣṇa’s feet everything is spiritual, not objects for gratifying our senses. When truth is obscured in us who are carried away by egotistic tendencies, we take things material to be of the spirit. Kṛṣṇa is bliss. In Him dwells perfect joy; He is the embodiment of it. Sensory knowledge or joy is not perfect; therein all our longings are not realized. Under the spell of sense perceptions we imagine that there may be unalloyed happiness in ego worship or in the kaivalya state of Patañjali.
Seeking after joy is the function of the soul. When the desire for joy awakens in our minds we commit a blunder by running after worldly objects and enjoyment. Only when we receive a spiritual sight of Kṛṣṇa do we recognize that His service must necessarily be the sole aim in life. As long as we hanker after our own pleasures, we try to enjoy the world through the senses and are given to hollow argumentation. Yet this world is not made for our enjoyment.
When spiritual bliss appears in us like the incessant flow of oil, then we shall be truly tied to the feet of Kṛṣṇa. Numerical variety such as one, two, or three exists only in worldly diversity. This diversity acquires a certain inexpressible sameness in the spiritual world. There we can appreciate that Kṛṣṇa alone is the eternal Absolute Truth.
When the very existence of truth and sentience in our own selves is understood as relative solely to Him, then only are we established in our real, normal state. At present many false meanings have been imported into the word bhakti. Regard for one’s parents, loyalty to man, obedience to the teacher, etcetera, pass as bhakti.
But the linguistic root bhaj means “to serve.” If we do not clearly judge as to what must be the medium of that service then it is sure to be misapplied. As Caitanya-candrāmṛta sings: kālaḥ kalir balina indriya-vairi-vargāḥ śrī-bhakti-mārga iha kaṇṭaka-koṭi-ruddhaḥ hā hā kva yāmi vikalaḥ kim ahaṁ karomi caitanya-candra yadi nādya kṛpāṁ karoṣi; We live in the Kali-yuga, an age of strife. The self-luminous path of pure devotion is completely covered by millions of thorns in the form of foolish argumentation and wordy wrangling. In these circumstances, without the mercy of Caitanya-candra it is absolutely impossible to acquire knowledge of pure devotion. *
Śrī Caitanya-candra is Kṛṣṇa Himself. He is the Godhead. We cannot know God by the exertions of our senses. As the Kaṭha Upaniṣad states:
na medhayā na bahunā śrutena
yam evaiṣa vṛṇute tena labhyas
tasyaiṣa ātmā vivṛṇute tanuṁ svām
Godhead is eternal. We cannot attain Him unless we realize that He is bliss Himself. One confined in a hundred ways within his psychic range cannot know what God is, and so acknowledges things other than God as objects of worship. Unable to understand either the true subject and object of enjoyment, or the nature of enjoyment itself, he imagines that the world was created to afford him every kind of pleasure.
This materialized mind strives only after selfish enjoyment. By this fleshly form we cannot serve Kṛṣṇa; it is possible only in spirit. The atomic theory knows nothing of that service. In the variety of His manifestations, the Absolute Truth Himself is to be determined from Nārāyaṇa. In Kṛṣṇa exists Nārāyaṇa, His majestic form. Baladeva is the manifestation of His self; He is the all-pervading Paramātmā.
When the function of supreme knowledge is revealed to the soul, we come to know that Kṛṣṇa is the Absolute Truth and perfect bliss. Reverence does not stand in His way. Intimate service cannot be rendered if one is actuated by reverence. Kṛṣṇa is the eternal object of the devotee’s wholehearted service, and is to be served with the ever-existent senses of the soul. We cannot serve Him through imagination or sentiment.
Super-sensuous knowledge of our relationship with Him is essential. There is nobody whom I can call my own except one solely devoted to Kṛṣṇa. Kṛṣṇa alone is the single object of my service. This fidelity is the unique glory of the Vaiṣṇava. That is the highest necessity of life. Material fame full of the idea of selfish enjoyment is never desirable. Time is running short. The evening ārati is drawing nigh. I must no longer encroach upon your time. Should it be Kṛṣṇa’s wish, I shall again try to serve you. A thousand prostrations at the feet of Kṛṣṇa’s devotees.
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