He Gives Us Transcendental Light and Vision

I was asked to speak today although I actually have no qualifications and I am very fallen and immersed in māyā. For my own purification, by the mercy of Mahārāja, Param Pūjyapāda Bhakti Ballabha Tīrtha Gosvāmī Mahārāja, I remember the glories of this Uttama Mahābhāgavata.

I first met Mahārāja in 1977 when I was in Paharganj [Delhi]. I was living in Vṛndāvana for many years and when I was going to Paharganj (even though I didn't even know who he was) he had this power that  could attract you to go to him. I did not know where the maṭha was or anything but I was able to go and had my first association with him.

We have learned that gu means darkness; everything we can see with these eyes is actually māyā. This darkness is gu and ru is light. He who can give you that light, remove that māyā (ignorance) and give you that transcendental light and vision is guru. So guru is not always coming in our lives with the formalities of giving dīkṣā or externally teaching us Śāstra, but an actual guru is whoever can enter into your heart and give you that divya-jñāna, that transcendental vision and light. We can see this completely in such a transcendental personality such as Param Pūjyapāda Bhakti Ballabha Tīrtha Gosvāmī Mahārāja.

I want to share one beautiful experience because although I could not see him, he could tell me what to do internally. By his mystic power, he can control thousands, millions of people around the world just by his chit (thoughts). He made me open a songbook [to the page where] the song Vasatu Mano Mama Madana Gopāle [was written] and I started reading and meditating on it. This Prabodhānanda Sarasvatī Ṭhākura kīrtana is so beautiful. It says "May my mind dwell on the enchanting cowherd boy who relishes the rasa, a rather sublime love which extends to the highest limit of ever new, playful, and amorous pastimes." Mahārāja had this mystic power that [blessed me] to read these words over and over while meditating on Kṛṣṇa. Then verse number two: "May my mind dwell upon His mass of curly locks which are fully decorated with the crown of tail feathers of an intoxicated peacock. Oh mind, contemplate on Him. On account of hearing the vibration emanating from His mouth and through His bamboo flute, the multitude of young girls whose exquisite beauty is ever new and infinitely variegated, abandon all fearful social chastisement and chase after Him."

Mahārāja had this power of an Uttama Mahābhāgavata (a real guru) with which he could make your mind fixed for hours and hours on just one verse, singing over and over and over and meditating on Kṛṣṇa completely without any interruption. This is really the meaning of a pure transcendental Vaiṣṇava saint.

I have finished translating his book Affectionately Yours in Spanish. One teaching is there that says however God wants our independence to go towards Him, but He will not interfere with our independence. He wants us to voluntarily love and serve Him, but He does not force us. In the same way, Mahārāja explains that the Guru and the Vaiṣṇava will not interfere in one’s independence, whatever they want to do, He would allow. If one comes and wants to serve, this pleases God. So in the same way, he tells this story about a man who has a wife, but she does not obey him ever. So he has a friend who does a little magic spell that he can completely control her just by telling her to do this, do that. After some time, he was unhappy because she was like a puppet with no emotions. So God does not want it. He wants us to have free will. But what I understood with Mahārāja is that he has this transcendental magic spell that removes this māyā and he fixes your mind in the lotus feet of Śrī Kṛṣṇa.

Another time I went to see him in his maṭha and he was distributing rasagula prasādam. He gives everything through this prasādam. I remember [after I received the prasādam] that I was sitting down for one hour weeping. I was just tasting it I could not finish; I did not want it to end. He has so much prema situated in his heart. Through Kṛṣṇa, he is giving all this in the heart of anybody who comes and takes prasādam from his lotus hands. From this transcendental realm that he lives in, he is freely reflecting like a mirror in the hearts of anybody who would come near him. This was his greatest mercy.

I was always thinking that although many gurus are traveling and making so many disciples, he is not going here and there and not having so many disciples. I was always thought he is so powerful and so great, so why not? But in the letters book [I've been translating] he is saying that if you want quality, then you will have to sacrifice quantity. If you want a lot of quantity, you will have to sacrifice quality. And this is the answer to my question. He always kept it to very few quality disciples that could go deep into bhajana. So this is a very beautiful thing about Mahārāja. His great contribution is that he made his disciples very deep.

One time I also visited him in his temple in Puri and he was doing the parikramā of Tulasī Devī everyday. He is so powerful and his mind is not ordinary like ours. He is completely on the transcendental platform. And during this tulasī-parikramā in the morning, some devotees try to meditate on worshiping Vṛndā Devī through offering sevā such as decorating her in various ways. But that day when Mahārāja was doing it, by only one glance, he instructed that Vṛndā Devī was missing a crown of flowers. So, just seeing how a personality can know everything about everyone, what they are serving, what is lacking, and what should be increased is extraordinary. I have no words to say.

—Rādhā Kānti Dāsi, Costa Rica (disciple of Param Pūjyapāda Śrīla Bhaktivedānta Nārāyaṇa Gosvāmī Mahārāja)