Disappearance of Laksmipriya

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Hare Krishna,

 

PAMHO, AGTSP

 

Your servant in mission of Srila Prabhupada

 

Nanda Gopal Dasa

 

 

 

Sri Caitanya-bhagavata

Adi-khanda

Chapter Fourteen

The Lord's Travel to East Bengal and Disappearance of Laksmipriya

This chapter describes Gaura-Narayana's enactment of a householder's pastime of

serving guests, His visit to East Bengal, the offensive activities of some

sinful atheists who imitated the Lord and a brahmana-daitya of Radha-desa, who

were all contemporaries with the author of this book, the disappearance of

Laksmidevi, the inquiries of Tapana Misra to the Lord regarding the goal of

life and the process for achieving it, the Lord's reply and teachings, and the

Lord's return from Bangladesh.

Nimai Pandita was greatly honored by the wealthy people of Navadvipa as well as

by all those who were accustomed to perform religious rituals. In order to

establish an ideal example of the principles of household life, the Lord did

not encourage the fault of miserliness, rather He showed compassion towards

needy and distressed persons. Guests were always properly served at the Lord's

house in Sri Mayapur-Navadvipa. Though the Lord, who is the teacher of people

in general, personally displayed the pastimes of a poor householder, He

nevertheless constantly endeavored to serve renounced Vaisnava sannyasis. As

soon as mother Saci noticed a shortage of ingredients required for feeding the

sannyasis, Gaurasundara would immediately bring from somewhere the necessary

ingredients for the service of the Vaisnavas. Laksmidevi engaged in cooking for

the service of the Vaisnavas, and the Lord personally sat with the Vaisnava

sannyasis and fully satisfied them by feeding them sumptuously. The principle

duty of householdersis to serve guests; those householders who do not serve

guests are lower than animals and birds. Even if a householder is bereft of

wealth due to past karma, he should without duplicity serve his guests with at

least some water, a sitting place, and sweet words. Knowing that Sri

Laksmi-Narayana had appeared in Navadvipa, Lord Brahma, Lord Siva, Sukadeva,

Vyasadeva, and Narada visited the Lord's house at Sri Mayapur in the guise of

sannyasis.

>From early morning, Sri Laksmidevi continually engaged in various services in

the temple room, arranged the paraphernalia for worshiping the Lord, and served

tulasi. She gave more attention to the service of Sacidevi, her mother-in-law

and mother of her Lord, than to the service of tulasi. Sacidevi sometimes saw

blazing flames of fire under the feet of her son, and she sometimes smelled the

fragrance of lotus flowers throughout her house.

After some time, Nimai Pandita went with His students to earn some wealth in

Bangladesh, where He stayed on the banks of the Padmavati River. Overwhelmed by

the Lord's ingenious scholarship, innumerable students came to study from Him

and within a short time mastered various subjects.

At this point the author says that simply because the Lord went to Bangladesh,

the young, the old, and the women there are even today intoxicated in Sri

Caitanya's sankirtana movement. But sometimes in order to fill their stomachs

some atheists declare themselves to be Narayana, or the Supreme Lord, and they

thus ruin the people of that country. In Radha-desa also there was a great

brahma-daitya, who externally dressed as a brahmana but who internally had the

nature of a demon, declared himself to be "Gopala." Due to his cowardliness,

however, people called him a hated jackal. There are no greater offenders than

those sinful living entities who instead of declaring Sri Caitanya, the Lord of

innumerable universes, as the Supreme Lord, want to declare themselves or other

living entities to be the Supreme Lord. Moreover, even today it is found that

simply by remembering the servants of Caitanyacandra a living entity attains

all auspiciousness.

While the Lord was residing in Bangladesh, Sri Laksmidevi, being unable to

tolerate separation from the Lord, left this world from the bank of the Ganges

while meditating on the lotus feet of the Lord. When the people of Bangladesh

heard that the Lord was returning to Navadvipa, they brought various gifts for

Him. At that time one pious brahmana resident of Bangladesh named Tapana Misra,

who was unable to ascertain the goal of life and the process to achieve it,

received instructions late one night in a dream to approach Nara-Narayana in

the form of Nimai Pandita, who appeared in the age of Kali to deliver the

fallen souls. When Tapana Misra arrived before the Lord, Sri Gaurasundara

instructed him that the only religious process for the Age of Kali was the

congregational chanting of the holy names of Lord Krsna, which awards all

perfection and which is to be followed by all people of all countries at all

times. He further instructed Tapana Misra to give up all duplicity and always

chant the sixteen word, thiry-two syllable maha-mantra with full attention.

When Tapana Misra asked permission to accompany the Lord, the Lord ordered him

to immediately go to Varanasi and indicated that they would again meet there

and elaborately discuss the goal of life and the process to achieve it. When

Tapana Misra then related the topics of his dream, the Lord forbid him from

disclosing those topics to anyone.

Thereafter the Lord returned home from Bangladesh with His wealth and offered

everything to His mother. Many students accompanied the Lord to Navadvipa in

order to study from Him. Hearing about the disappearance of Laksmidevi, the

Lord imitated ordinary people by exhibiting grief for a short time and then

instructed His mother about the temporary nature of this material existence.