BY: ROCANA DASA
Nov 29, 2021 — CANADA (SUN) — Studying Srila Prabhupada's conversations with ISKCON leaders.
Today's Talks is inspired by Srila Prabhupada's morning walk of April 10, 1976 in Vrindavan. This morning walk took place on the day before Srila Prabhupada was to travel to Bombay and then go on a worldwide tour. There's are many interesting messages to be found here. The main characters joining Srila Prabhupada on this morning walk were Yasodanandana, Jayadvaita and Pusta Krsna. They were joined by Aksayananda, Nalini-kanta, Hari-sauri, Lokanatha, and an unnamed devotee.
At this point in his ISKCON career, Yasodanandana was cutting a Mr. Super-staunch sannyasi profile, and a South Indian mood was his claim to fame. To this day, he maintains his attachment and attraction to the South Indian brahminical mood, worshipping Nrsimhadeva and numerous Salagram silas.
Given the discussion taking place on this morning walk, it appears that Yasodanandana had submitted to the BBT a number of photographs he'd taken while visiting Ahobilam. Jayadvaita, who was the BTG editor, didn't know whether or not Srila Prabhupada would approve of him putting these pictures in the BTG. When Yasodanandana dasa asked Srila Prabhupada about it, Srila Prabhupada immediately focused on the philosophical aspect. He basically said, why are you creating some controversy over a holy place when the real philosophy is that we worship Nrsimhadeva? He's non-different than Krsna, and therefore He's everywhere. So what's the big deal about a particular holy site -- and especially if it creates some controversy? Srila Prabhupada said we should avoid controversy, particularly over issues such as this.
Today in ISKCON we find there's a growing a focus on visiting such holy places, going on pilgrimage, and learning about Vaisnava culture outside of Vrindavan, Mayapur and Jagannatha Puri. In fact, ITV put out a video about the very spot that Yasodanandana dasa is talking to Srila Prabhupada about, where Lord Nrsimhadev is the focus of worship.
Understanding who Yasodanandana and Jayadvaita were at the time of this morning walk helps us to understand the conversation. Basically we can read between the lines and see that the big sannyasi, Yasodanandana Swami, was trying to intimidate Jayadvaita, who was a brahmacari at that time. Yasodanandana obviously didn't like it that a brahmacari was giving him a hard time. Jayadvaita didn't take sannyasa until two years after this particular morning walk.
In the context of this disagreement, Srila Prabhupada brings up the tal fruit analogy. The brahmans got in a big fight about whether or not the tal fruit fell because the crow sat on it, or whether the crow flew away because the tal fruit fell from the tree. In other words, who cares what happened? Why fight about something as trivial as this.
Srila Prabhupada then noticed that Yasodanandana hadn't brought his shoes with him - a practice that went along with his profile at the time. The morning walk party had gone off the road through a forested area. Srila Prabhupada said it's not OK that Yasodanandana was not wearing shoes in the forest because it's dangerous, and he could cut his foot. Srila Prabhupada redirected the party and said we'll walk on the road, instead. He was kindly concerned about his disciple, and was also instructing him that it was foolish for him not to wear his shoes. Of course, only Srila Prabhupada could ever tell him that; you can be sure if it had been anyone else, he'd have bitten their head off.
At the time of this walk there was also a buzz around the temple that Pusta Krsna, somehow or other, had imported a Mercedes Benz car to drive Srila Prabhupada around in. Srila Prabhupada accepted this as nice, but he was wondering, now that they were preparing to go on a worldwide tour, what they would do with this car to protect it while they were gone. Pusta Krsna was very attached and attracted to the car, and of course he was the driver. As it happens, on the very next day after this conversation, on the way to Delhi in this shiny new Mercedes, Pusta Krsna became distracted while showing some other person in the car all the gadgets and buttons. He got involved in a traffic accident wherein he smashed the side of the Mercedes, right where Srila Prabhupada was sitting. He knocked the wheel off an ox cart, but he just kept going. He didn't stop, even though people in the ox cart fell out. Srila Prabhupada didn't say anything, and when they got to where they were going, Pusta Krsna apologized to Srila Prabhupada. But Srila Prabhupada gave him the heavy silent treatment and made it known that he was just so angry with him. He didn't say anything, but we can take this as a silent message about what fools we all were.
When you look back at it, we were all just a bunch of bungling fools. The sannyasis were always being exposed like this because they were right out in front. In this case it was Yasodanandana and Pusta Krsna, both of whom loved to really cut the sannyasi profile. Now, of course, both of them are householders.
In that regard, Srila Prabhupada was discussing that there's no such thing as over-population, and if you want to control population, just don't have sex. To this, Yasodanandana had to chime in with the comment that in our centers, it seemed that the householders were having lots of kids.
Then Srila Prabhupada says something very interesting - that the best place for devotees is not in the cities or the villages, but in the forest. In the forest you can be peaceful, and you only go the city to beg or preach. A devotee prefers living as simply as they possibly can without disturbance, just depending on Krsna. Srila Prabhupada stated that in America there's plenty of forests still there, and that would be an ideal place to execute Krsna consciousness.
Of course, Krsna and His cowherd boyfriends also preferred the forests, where they would take the cows and just play all day long. This is a program that not many of the devotees seem to be doing. There are a few rural communities such as Saranagati, where devotees are virtually living in the forest. Anyone who wants to follow Srila Prabhupada's program should consider Saranagati a good alternative and model.
