….but is always planning how to capture the master’s post. There have been many instances of this in history. Especially in India during the Mohammedan rule, many servants, by plans and devices, took over the posts of their masters.
It is learned from Caitanya literature that one big Zamindar, Subuddhi Rāya, kept a Mohammedan boy as a servant. Of course, he treated the boy as his own child, and sometimes, when the boy would steal something, the master would chastise him by striking him with a cane. There was a mark on the boy’s back from this chastisement. Later, after that boy had by crooked means become Hussain Shah, Nawab of Bengal, one day his wife saw the mark on his back and inquired about it.
The Nawab replied that in his childhood he had been a servant of Subuddhi Rāya, who had punished him because of some mischievous activities. Upon hearing this, the Nawab’s wife immediately became agitated and requested her husband to kill Subuddhi Rāya. Nawab Hussain Shah, of course, was very grateful to Subuddhi Rāya and therefore refused to kill him, but when his wife requested him to turn Subuddhi Rāya into a Mohammedan, the Nawab agreed. Taking some water from his waterpot, he sprinkled it upon Subuddhi Rāya and declared that Subuddhi Rāya had now become a Mohammedan.
The point is that this Nawab had been an ordinary menial servant of Subuddhi Rāya but was somehow or other able to occupy the supreme post of Nawab of Bengal. This is the material world. Everyone is trying to become master through various devices, although everyone is servant of his senses. Following this system, a living entity, although servant of his senses, tries to become master of the whole universe. Hiraṇyakaśipu was a typical example of this, and Brahmā was informed by the demigods of his intentions.
Srila Prabhupada speaks on: Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 6.1.6
Bombay, Nov. 6, 1970
From the daily subscription service of Prabhupada Vani
https://prabhupadavani.org/transcriptions/śrīmad-bhāgavatam-616-b/
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Similarly, people are suffering, undoubtedly, but they have to undergo the prāyaścitta process. In the śāstras there are prāyaścitta process. Formerly, even our childhood days, we have seen in Calcutta there is a special quarter of the bhaṭṭācārya brāhmaṇas. The bhaṭṭācārya brāhmaṇas’ business is that if you have committed some sinful act, you should immediately go and consult the bhattācārya: “What is the process of prāyaścitta?” Just like you go in case of disease, consult a physician, and take his prescription and diagnosis, similarly, that was the Vedic system.
You have read in the Caitanya-caritāmṛta that one Buddhimanta Khan, he was formerly… He was very rich man, and Nawab Hussain Shah was the servant when he was not Nawab. So he was menial servant. So he stole some money, as servants are generally habituated. So he whipped him with his cane. So that whipping stripe was on his back side. When he was Nawab, so his wife saw it and inquired, “What is this scar?” So he replied the whole story, that “I was formerly a menial servant to this Buddhimanta Khan and I did something wrong. So as my father, he punished me. That’s all. He was treating me as my son.” So he admitted that he was so kind.
But his wife said, “Oh, this scar is a defamation. If somebody sees and you explain, then it will be known that you were a menial servant previously.” So the Nawab did not mind. He: “What is that? I may be… Now what I am, that’s all.” So his wife requested that “This man should be killed so that he may not disclose the secret of your life, that you were a menial servant in his house.” And “No, no, no. This is… This cannot be. He is just like my father. How can I kill him? This is not possible.” And just see. Then she advised, “At least make him Muhammadan. Convert him to be a Muhammadan.”
In those days it was not very difficult. If somebody, a Muhammadan, takes water from his water pot and simply sprinkle in somebody’s body, he becomes Muhammadan. The Hindu society was so rascal. Still they are. Simply by sprinkling water from the pot of a Muhammadan he becomes Muhammadan.
So this Nawab said, “All right, I shall sprinkle water. Let him do what he likes,” [chuckles] to satisfy his wife. So he did it. When he did it—then the society was so strong—he went to the bhaṭṭācārya to consult: “Oh, sir, I have been sprinkled water by a Muhammadan. So what prāyaścitta?” What is called? What is the English of prāyaścitta? Compensation?
Revatīnandana: Some penance.
Prabhupāda: No, no. Atonement. “So what kind of atonement I have to do?” So the bhaṭṭācārya advised him that “You take one kilo of lead and melt it and drink it, and that is your atonement.” You see? So he said, “How it is possible?” “This is the atonement for such sinful activity. Yes.”
Just see. For the last five hundred, six hundred years… Why…? For thousands of years the Hindu society is so fallen. Therefore so many Muhammadans have increased here. They are not imported. In this way the Hindu population, they have been forced to accept Mohammadan religion, you see, by the Muhammadans. Just like Aurangzeb. He imposed one tax for the Hindus. So all the poor men class, to avoid the tax they become Muhammadans. And there was so much punishment by the Hindus. And so he became a Muhammadan, so-called Muhammadan, by the diagnosis of the bhaṭṭācārya.
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“So the bhaṭṭācārya advised him that “You take one kilo of lead and melt it and drink it, and that is your atonement.” You see? So he said, “How it is possible?” “This is the atonement for such sinful activity. Yes.”
DRINK ONE KG OF LEAD??? Holy Smoke: dead. Lead poisoning. And people today are so contaminated by sinful activities they would have to drink 10 kg of lead. Is this what it’s all about?
Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 6.1.6
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Nellore, January 5,
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Prabhupāda:
adhuneha mahā-bhāga
yathaiva narakān naraḥ
nānogra-yātanān neyāt
tan me vyākhyātum arhasi
[SB 6.1.6]
This is from Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, Sixth Canto. This is our latest publication, Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam. Therefore I am taking advantage of this publication to present before you. So in the Fifth Canto of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam Śukadeva Gosvāmī has given a vivid description of the naraka planets or the hellish condition of life. Fifth Canto, Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, Śukadeva Gosvāmī has given a vivid description of the naraka planets, or the hellish planets. So this verse I am quoting from the First Chapter, Sixth Canto, that Parīkṣit Mahārāja is asking Śukadeva Gosvāmī “How the people suffering in hellish condition of life can be delivered?” [break] Let him… [break] This is the beginning of the Sixth Chapter of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam…..
…..So Buddhimanta Khan took it that he has now become a Mohammeddan, so he went to the brāhmaṇa for consultation. So when Buddhimanta Khan went to a bhaṭṭācārya, he said that “The,” what is called, “prāyaścitta is that you melt one kilogram of,” what is called, “lead, and drink it.” So he, being helpless, he went to consult another brāhmaṇa bhaṭṭācārya. He said, “All right, if you cannot drink molten lead, then you can drink one kilo of melted ghee.” So in this way, when he was helpless, he went to Caitanya Mahāprabhu. So Caitanya Mahāprabhu knew the situation of the then society. He therefore advised him that “You better give (up) your family life. You go to Vṛndāvana.” So He advised him that “Go to Vṛndāvana, live there and chant Hare Kṛṣṇa.” So the difficulty is, in the śāstras there are atonement for prāyaścitta of so…, not like that—you drink hot ghee or hot lead—but there are prāyaścittas. So one has to execute that….
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https://prabhupadabooks.com/classes/sb/6/1/6/nellore/january/05/1976
Srila Prabhupada speaks on: Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 6.1.7
Honolulu, June 15, 1975
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….So these things are all gone. In Caitanya Mahāprabhu’s time there was misuse also of this… Just like sometimes the physician does not give him the proper medicine. Just to keep him under treatment and take money from him, he continues. Similarly, in this age things are being deteriorated. So even you go to a learned brāhmaṇa, he does not give you the proper instruction; he wants to exact some money from you. Therefore things have gone, everything, very bad. Even in Caitanya Mahāprabhu’s time, when Caitanya Mahāprabhu was there, one gentleman, he was made into a Muhammadan. This is a long story. The shortcut is he was very rich man, and the Nawab of Bengal, Hussain Shah, when he was a boy, he was his servant. Later on he became the Nawab, the king.
So one day the Nawab was being massaged, and his wife saw that there is a stripe on the back. So [s]he asked the Nawab, “What is this?” So he stated that “When I was a poor boy, I was servant of Buddhimanta Khān, and I committed some wrong, so he whipped me with a cane.” “Oh? Then it is a sign that you were a servant of Buddhimanta Khān sometimes before. If people will see and you will explain, that is an insult for you.” “Oh, what is that? He was just like my father. He chastised me. I don’t mind.” “No, no, no, no. You should kill him so that he may not say to anyone that you were sometime his servant.” So Nawab disagreed. Nawab said, “No, no. He treated me just like my son, and I accepted him as my father. It is not possible to kill him.” Then the queen suggested that “At least you make him a Muhammadan. Then that will be the punishment.” So the king, or the Nawab, said, “All right, I shall make him.” Because in those days, to make a Hindu a Muhammadan, it was very easy. The Muhammadans, they have got a pot, it is called badna. So if the Muhammadan takes little water from the badna and sprinkles upon a Hindu, then Hindu community will immediately reject him, “Oh, he has become Muhammadan.” This was the Hindu community. Therefore so many Muhammadans were there in India, and ultimately, by the British policy, they divided. They were not actually Muhammadans coming from Turkey or from West. They were lower-class Hindus. But the Hindus were so foolish that if a Muhammadan sprinkled some water in this way, so he becomes Muhammadan and he is rejected. In this way the Muhammadan population was there.
Anyway, that was done in the case of Buddhimanta Khān. The Nawab called him one day and took little water from his pot and sprinkled, and it was the law, “He has become Muhammadan, he has become Muhammadan.” So he went to a bhaṭṭācārya, “So what is the atonement? Now I have become Muhammadan.” Just see the conception. And the bhaṭṭācārya said that “You drink one pound of molten lead.” “How it is possible?” “That is the atonement.” So in this way he was baffled. He went to Caitanya Mahāprabhu. He was very respectable man. And Caitanya Mahāprabhu laughed, that “This the condition of the Hindu society.” So He said that “I tell you that you give up your family life. You go to Vṛndāvana and chant there Hare Kṛṣṇa. That’s all. That will be the…”
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https://prabhupadavani.org/transcriptions/750615sbhon/