(HH Kadamba Kanana Swami, Durban, South Africa, 22nd September 2012) Lecture: SB 11. 31. 24-28
The Srimad Bhagavatam enters in many ways. Even if we read and forget, the Bhagavatam enters in subtle ways within us. So even if externally we don’t seem to remember the Bhagavatam so much, it’s not a fact.
Yes, whenever we let our guards down for even a moment, the material influence seeps in. It seems to be so much in the forefront because we are already conditioned; we are already walking around with material desires. So then sometimes we let our guards down – we let it down because we want to let it down. ’Oh God! Just a little bit of maya! Just a little!’ We are holding on.
Sometimes it is said that material desires can be compared to a tree – we are holding onto that tree and embracing it with our arms locked and we say: ’Please let me go. Let me go!’ And we are the ones that are holding on!
So that’s us. That is our attitude and therefore the material influences that come in (when we drop our guards) are immediately awakening, or immediately feeding what is already there! But deep down below the surface the Bhagavatam enters, and deep down below the surface the Bhagavatam begins to create a transformation and re-awaken our faith in Krsna. First there is a little faith in Krsna, and then a desire to find out more about Krsna, and then we are in the association of the devotees and we want to hear more. At one point on a Saturday morning we take the trouble of getting up early enough to drive all the way to the temple to hear the Bhagavatam! It’s like:
‘Where are you going?’
‘I’m going to the temple.’
‘Really? How far is that?’
‘Oh, it’s about 45 minutes.’
‘Well, such a long drive. What’s going on? Must be something really good?’
‘Yeah, a lecture from the scriptures.’
‘Huh? A lecture from the scriptures?’
But somehow or other we develop a taste, so much so that we are listening again and again, and we become really interested in the lecture. So this is showing how it is penetrating, little by little and gradually destroying the roots of our material attachments. It just eats away at the roots! And one day, suddenly the material attachment is like a tooth that falls out. The roots get loose and fall out. That day will come – you can now smile and show me those teeth and one day they will get loose and they’ll just fall out! And Bhagavatam also pulls them out! If there is a particular rotten material desire, the Bhagavatam acts like pliers and just pulls it out, that rotten desire! So don’t worry, the Bhagavatam works. It works, but we are from this modern world, and everything is instant, instant results……
‘Where’s my ecstasy? It doesn’t work. I read it. You saw that I read it. You heard it. I read it out loud. Where is my ecstasy?’
Instant coffee, instant everything. No, it’s more like it gradually grows on you and it grows more and more until ‘pibata bhāgavataṁ rasam ālayaṁ’ — (SB 1.130) (CC Madhya-lila 25.151). Śrīla Viśvanātha Cakravartī Ṭhākura says,
’ Pralaya is the stage when you hear the Bhagavatam, then you just faint. You just hear the Bhagavatam until you faint!’
So then you can’t hear the Bhagavatam anymore. So Śrīla Viśvanātha Cakravartī Ṭhākura says:
‘Yes, then you come back to your senses and you hear it again, until you faint again, and again and again and again!’
This is ‘pibata bhāgavataṁ rasam ālayaṁ’ — (SB 1.130) (CC Madhya-lila 25.151) – drinking the nectar of the Bhagavatam until you faint! That day will come, just keep on hearing it!
