Remembering Srila Prabhupada - Krsna is behind everything

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Krsna is behind everything

 

In the early evening, just on dusk, a few of the senior devotees and myself

were sitting with Prabhupada in his room, conversing. From a distance and

gradually drawing nearer, we heard the loud trumpeting of a conch shell

accompanied by bell ringing and the chanting of mantras. Bhavananda Maharaja

laughed and told Prabhupada it was Anantarama Sastri, an Indian devotee in his

mid-twenties who joined us last year with three other sastris. Unfortunately

the others left, but he has stayed on. As his name implies, he is very

knowledgeable in the scriptures and well-versed in the performance of various

types of puja. He can also quote practically any Sanskrit verse from memory.

 

Bhavananda explained that each evening as the sun goes down, he tours the

building, floor by floor, with a bell, conch, and a large, clay incense burner,

chanting various mantras to keep away ghosts and other subtle beings.

 

The sound grew louder and Prabhupada smiled in welcome as Sastri entered his

room in a cloud of frankincense, the reverberations of the conch temporarily

drowning out our conversation. It was an impressive ritual, made more so by

Sastri's ability to both blow air through his mouth and suck it in through his

nose at the same time, thus keeping the conch blowing uninterruptedly for

several minutes. He walked around both rooms, waving a bamboo fan over his clay

bowl to disperse the fragrant smoke. It also acts as an effective mosquito

repellent. After a couple of minutes he respectfully backed out the door and

continued his nightly round.

 

The puja triggered Prabhupada's remembrance of his time in Allahabad in 1945.

He told us he was paying only two hundred rupees for a whole house then. But

the place was famous as a ghostly haunted house. Nobody would rent it, but

Prabhupada took it. "I don't care for ghosts," he said, smiling. "Actually

there was a ghost, and all the servants, they were met. But I was chanting."

 

Later Madhudvisa Swami and I sat with Prabhupada as he talked about how the

British knew the art of ruling. By giving Indians control as supervisors they

were able to rule a large, populous continent with only a few thousand men. In

general the Indians appreciated them. But after innocent people were shot at an

anti-British rally in Amritsar, Gandhi's movement was able to gain momentum,

and the British lost their respectability.

 

Speaking about governments in general, Prabhupada said that even bad or demonic

governments are allowed by Krsna in order to punish people for sinful activity.

He explained that Krsna is behind everything. He emphasized this point by

playing back to us on his dictaphone some of his latest translation work from

the Seventh Canto, in which he was making the same point.

 

 

- From the "A Transcendental Diary Vol 1" by HG Hari Sauri dasa

 

 

 

CHANT HARE KRISHNA HARE KRISHNA KRISHNA KRISHNA HARE HARE

HARE RAMA HARE RAMA RAMA RAMA HARE HARE AND BE HAPPY

Your humble servant

radhabhava gaur das

 

 

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