atha me deva sammoham
apakrastum tvam arhasi
yo 'vagraho 'ham mametity
etasmin yojitas tvaya
TRANSLATION
Now be pleased, my Lord, to dispel my great delusion. Due to my feeling of
false ego, I have been engaged by Your maya and have identified myself with the
body and consequent bodily relations.
PURPORT
Maya is the false ego of identifying one's body with one's self and of claiming
things possessed in relationship with the body. In Bhagavadgita, Fifteenth
Chapter, the Lord says, "I am sitting in everyone's heart, and from Me comes
everyone's remembrance and forgetfulness." Devahuti has stated that false
identification of the body with the self and attachment for bodily possessions
are also under the direction of the Lord. Does this mean that the Lord
discriminates by engaging one in His devotional service and another in sense
gratification? If that were true, it would be an incongruity on the part of the
Supreme Lord, but that is not the actual fact. As soon as the living entity
forgets his real constitutional position of eternal servitorship to the Lord
and wants instead to enjoy himself by sense gratification, he is captured by
maya. This capture leads to the consciousness of false identification with the
body and attachment for the possessions of the
body. These are the activities of maya, and since maya is also an agent of the
Lord, it is indirectly the action of the Lord. The Lord is merciful; if anyone
wants to forget Him and enjoy this material world, He gives him full facility,
not
directly but through the agency of His material potency. Therefore, since the
material potency is the
Lord's energy, indirectly it is the Lord who gives the facility to forget Him.
Devahuti therefore said, "My
engagement in sense gratification was also due to You. Now kindly get me free
from this entanglement." By the grace of the Lord one is allowed to enjoy this
material world, but when one is disgusted with material enjoyment and is
frustrated, and when one sincerely surrenders unto the lotus feet of the Lord,
then the
Lord is so kind that He frees one from entanglement. Krsna says, therefore, in
Bhagavad-gita, "First of all
surrender, and then I will take charge of you and free you from all reactions
of sinful activities." Sinful activities are those activities performed in
forgetfulness of our relationship with the Lord. In this material world,
activities for material enjoyment that are considered pious are also sinful.
For example, one sometimes gives money in charity to a needy person with a view
to get back the money four times increased. Giving with the purpose of gaining
something is called charity in the mode of passion. Everything done here is
done in the modes of material nature, and therefore all activities but service
to the Lord are sinful. Because of sinful activities we become attracted by the
illusion of material attachment, and we think, "I am this body." I think of the
body as myself and of bodily possessions as "mine." Devahuti requested Lord
Kapila to free her from that entanglement of false identification and false
possession. In asking this, Devahuti is
accepting her son, Kapila, as her guru. He consequently tells her how to solve
all material problems. Material life is nothing but sex attraction. pumsah
striya mithuni-bhavam etam (SB. 5.5.8). Material life means that men are after
women and women are after men. We find this not only in human society but in
bird, dog, cat and demigod society. As soon as people join to satisfy their sex
desire, the attraction becomes greater and greater. An apartment
is needed for privacy, and then one has to earn a livelihood and acquire some
land. Without children,
married life is frustrated, and of course the children have to be educated.
Thus one becomes entangled in material life by creating so many situations, but
at the time of death Krsna comes and takes away everything--house, land, wife,
children, friends, reputation and whatever. Then we have to begin another life.
It is not that we simply die and finish everything. We are living eternally;
the body is finished, but we have to accept another body out of the 8,400,000
forms. In this way, our life is going on, but we are thinking in terms of wife,
children, and so forth. This is all illusion. In any case, we will not be
allowed to stay here, and
although we are attached to all this, everything will be taken away at death.
Whatever post we are occupying--be it president or Lord Brahma--we are
occupying temporarily. We may be here five years, ten
years, one hundred years or five million years. Whatever, our position is
limited. Our position in the
material world is not eternal, but we are eternal Why, then, should we be
illusioned by the noneternal?
By nature we are part and parcel of Krsna, and Krsna is sac-cid-ananda-vigraha.
In order to transcend the
darkness of material life and go to the world of light, we need to approach a
guru. It is for this reason that Devahuti is approaching Lord Kapiladeva. In
the morning, when the sun arises, the darkness of night immediately goes away.
Similarly, when God or His incarnation comes, the darkness of material life
is dissipated. When Krsna, the Supreme Personality of Godhead, came, Arjuna's
illusion was dispelled. He was thinking, "Why should I fight with my
relatives?" Actually the whole world is going on under this
conception of "my" and "mine." There are fights between nations, societies,
communities and families.
People are thinking, "Why are you interfering with my business?" Then there is
a fight. Because of illusion,
we do not consider these situations temporary. On a train, people may argue and
fight over a seat, but one
who knows that he will only be on the train for two or three hours thinks, "Why
should I fight? I shall only
be here for a short while." One person thinks in this way, and the other person
is ready to fight, thinking
that his seat is permanent. No one will be allowed to stay within this material
world; everyone will have to
change his body and position, and as long as one remains here, he will have to
fight and struggle for
existence. This is the way of material life. We may temporarily make some
compromises,but ultimately the
material world is full of misery. We are very much attached to this material
world, but according to the
Vedic system, renunciation is compulsory, for when one reaches the age of
fifty, he renounces his family
life. Nature gives warning, "You are now past fifty. That's all right. You have
fought in this material
world. Now stop this business." Children play on the beach and make houses out
of sand, but after a while
the father comes and says, "Now, my dear children, time is up. Stop this
business and come home." This is
the business of the guru--to teach his disciples detachment. The world is not
our place; our place is Vaikunthaloka. Krsna also comes to remind us of this.
The dharma, or order, of the Supreme Person is to
become His devotee and always think of Him. Krsna says:
man-mana bhava mad-bhakto
mad-yaji mam namaskuru
"Engage your mind always in thinking of Me, offer obeisances and worship Me."
(Bg. 9.34) In this way,
Krsna opens the door, but we unfortunately do not accept Him. Krsna tells
Arjuna, "Because you are My
friend, I am revealing to you the most confidential dharma." What is that?
"Simply surrender unto Me."
This is the dharma taught by the Supreme Personality of Godhead, and Krsna's
incarnation and His devotee
will teach the same dharma. We are all after happiness, but we do not know how
to enjoy happiness.
We want to enjoy our senses, but it is not possible with these covered false
senses. The senses must be
opened, and that is the process of purification. We are thinking of ourselves
according to so many false
material identifications, but we should take Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu's advice:
jivera `svarupa'
haya--krsnera `nitya-dasa.' We must come to understand, "I am the eternal
servant of Krsna." After all, our senses are employed for the satisfaction of
somebody--either for ourselves or for someone else. That is kama,
krodha, lobha and matsara-- illusion. If we are not serving our own lusty
desires (kama), we are serving
anger (krodha). If I am the master of anger, I can control my anger, and if I
am the master of my desires, I can control my desires. In any case, I am a
servant, and my service should be transferred to Krsna. That is the perfection
of life. If we are situated in the transcendental position (bhakti), we can
understand Krsna, Krsna cannot be understood by mental speculation; otherwise
He would have said that He
could be understood by jnana, karma or yoga. However, He clearly says, bhaktya
mam abhijanati: "Only by
devotional service can I be understood." If we want to know Krsna as He is, we
have to accept the process of
bhakti. It is this bhakti process that Kapiladeva will reveal to Devahuti. FOR
THE COMPLETE BOOK 'TEACHINGS OF LORD KAPILA' WRITETO ME AT chanu15@xxxxxxxx
____________________________________________________________________________________
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