Monday, July 18, 2016

ANYTHING WITHOUT KRISHNA IS USELESS

Sivajvara has been dispatched by Lord Siva to burn up Lord Krishna but is offering prayers as he realizes he needs to surrender to Krishna or else be frozen by Narayanajvara.
This is a part of his glorification of Krishna that jumped out at me:
"A material thing might be very powerful, but without the touch of knowledge or consciousness it cannot act. A material machine may be very gigantic and wonderful, but without the touch of someone conscious and in knowledge, the material machine is useless for all purposes." KB 2.8
That goes for an institution or an organization also. It may be very big and powerful but without consciousness is useless.
After a very intense experience of hopelessness, I jumped out of the paintings sales van in Pittsburgh somewhere. I had no money and no idea where I was even. I just kept walking and chanting and meditating on Lord Jagannatha. I did not stop to ask directions but just kept walking and chanting. After 4 hours I found myself at the Pittsburgh temple (which has since been closed). I went into the temple room and there were three vyasasanas there. It was in the early 80's right after Srila Prabhupada disappeared. Satsvarupa (Gurupada) was sitting on one vyasasana , Kirtanananda (Bhaktipada) was sitting on another and Srila Prabhupada was in the middle. All the seats were the same and all of them had framed pictures of the respective "acaryas."
I sat on the floor and silently went into some sort of trance. They weren't pictures on the seats, Srila Prabhupada and the two devotees were actually there. They were discussing something.
I asked a question. "What do you want? Do you want money?"
Srila Prabhupada looked at me and said, "Yes, we can use money."
I said, "There is better way to get money than selling these paintings."
He said, "If you know of a better way that is good. But just remember," Then He looked at Satsvarupa (Gurupada) and said, "There are many, many books, but without Krishna they are all useless."
Then He looked at Kirtanananda (Bhaktipada) and said, "There are many, many big buildings, but without Krishna they are useless."
And then He looked at me and said, " money without Krishna is useless."
Evidently that was my lesson in karma yoga.
So a big, big institution without Krishna is useless.

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