SRILA PRABHUPADA’S VISION OF MAYAPUR
By the power of the blessing of His Divine Grace A.C. Bhakti Vedanta Swami Prabhupada, our most exalted and beloved acarya of the Brahma-Madhwa-Gaudiya parampara, we have gathered here in a place where Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu performs his eternal pastimes. Srila Prabhupada writes in the “Krishna” book that one cannot enter into a holy place simply by buying a plane ticket or railway ticket or renting a bus or a taxi or a chariot or a rickshaw or even walking or even crawling, because a holy dham is not a place of this material world. It is the spiritual world manifesting itself and the holy dham is non-different from Krishna. Krishna tells us in Gita –
ye yathā māḿ prapadyante
tāḿs tathaiva bhajāmy aham
mama vartmānuvartante
manuṣyāḥ pārtha sarvaśaḥ
According to the nature of our surrender, according to the quality of our love Krishna reveals Himself. Similarly Krishna reveals the holy dham according to the spirit of our prayerfulness, our humility and our sincere devotion.
Srila Bhakti Siddhanata Saraswati Thakur would say, “Don’t try to see Krishna, try to serve Krishna, to please Krishna in such a way that Krishna is happy to see you.” That is the way we approach Mayapur dham. Our acaryas teach us that in this age of Kaliyuga, the purifying sanctifying powers of all holy places are diminished. But Sri Navadvip is the special place of deliverance for this age of Kali. Therefore however much the people of this world become degraded, the powers of Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu in this holy land always increase.
Its very interesting to ask the question, why of all the places in this world did Srila Prabhupada deice to make Mayapur the international head quarters? Why in this place was he willing to dedicate and sacrifice most of his energies of his world-wide society? From a rationalistic mundane perspective it really didn’t make sense. Srila Prabhupada taught utility is the principle but vaishnavera kriya mudra bhigena bhujaya, what does that mean? It is a very deep subject. Srila Prabhupada had a magnificent skyscraper building on the island of Manhattan in New York – the center of the whole world, as far as the activities of humanity – with excellent telephones, excellent communications, all facilities, also few minutes from airport. Srila Prabhupada had a beautiful building. These were purchased buildings, a fantastic full city block of homes, and also a big church in LA just a few blocks away from the major production studios, where Hollywood movies are made, just a few seconds walk from one of LA’s main roads. He had a wonderful large building in Chicago, in London, one of the most important influential cities in planet.
Srila Prabhupada had center not only in downtown near the British museum, but he had a beautiful mansion with an estate and wonderful property with many acres of land given by George Harrison. He had a large church in Montreal, Canada. There was a wonderful temple in Paris. These are prime locations, super excellent locations as far as accessibility is concerned. Why he chose to make his international head quarters, a place where there was no electricity, no city plumbing, no telephones, and also to get here was hours and hours journey by road from Calcutta; that too Bengali roads! And all that was here was a straw hut, which was just surrounded by endless fields. During the monsoon, there would be so much rain. Practically all the neighbours were hostile, and there was no law to protect us from them. During monsoon, devotees would go on roof-tops, and sometimes their roommates were poisonous snakes, which were taking shelter in those straw roof-tops.
When he had so many facilities and so many prime material places in the world, why Srila Prabhupada very powerfully proclaimed that Sri Mayapur will be our International headquarters? He was not seeing with material vision, he was seeing Mayapur as the most powerful place in world. It is a place where people from all world can connect with deepest most profound manifestation of Krishna’s grace. There was hardly anything, but a straw hut. They had started to build a few rooms. So, once Srila Prabupada was in Gainesville Florida, it’s kind of out of the way, but still there is a beautiful airport and a nice highway. Srila Prabhupada said, “We are in this very remote place, so far from Sri Mayapur dham.” He was seeing Mayapur as the center of the universe as far as its relevance. As far people in west, even devotees, before Srila Prabhupada came, no body ever heard of Navadvipa or Mayapur. Since all the developments that been in the last 40years at Mayapur, it is hard to imagine what it was like at that time. Lord Chaitanya and Lord Nityananda along with Pancatattva performed their most beautiful intimate pastimes here in Navadvipa. The Supreme personality of Godhead appeared here.
ye yathā māḿ prapadyante
tāḿs tathaiva bhajāmy aham
mama vartmānuvartante
manuṣyāḥ pārtha sarvaśaḥ
According to the nature of our surrender, according to the quality of our love Krishna reveals Himself. Similarly Krishna reveals the holy dham according to the spirit of our prayerfulness, our humility and our sincere devotion.
Srila Bhakti Siddhanata Saraswati Thakur would say, “Don’t try to see Krishna, try to serve Krishna, to please Krishna in such a way that Krishna is happy to see you.” That is the way we approach Mayapur dham. Our acaryas teach us that in this age of Kaliyuga, the purifying sanctifying powers of all holy places are diminished. But Sri Navadvip is the special place of deliverance for this age of Kali. Therefore however much the people of this world become degraded, the powers of Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu in this holy land always increase.
Its very interesting to ask the question, why of all the places in this world did Srila Prabhupada deice to make Mayapur the international head quarters? Why in this place was he willing to dedicate and sacrifice most of his energies of his world-wide society? From a rationalistic mundane perspective it really didn’t make sense. Srila Prabhupada taught utility is the principle but vaishnavera kriya mudra bhigena bhujaya, what does that mean? It is a very deep subject. Srila Prabhupada had a magnificent skyscraper building on the island of Manhattan in New York – the center of the whole world, as far as the activities of humanity – with excellent telephones, excellent communications, all facilities, also few minutes from airport. Srila Prabhupada had a beautiful building. These were purchased buildings, a fantastic full city block of homes, and also a big church in LA just a few blocks away from the major production studios, where Hollywood movies are made, just a few seconds walk from one of LA’s main roads. He had a wonderful large building in Chicago, in London, one of the most important influential cities in planet.
Srila Prabhupada had center not only in downtown near the British museum, but he had a beautiful mansion with an estate and wonderful property with many acres of land given by George Harrison. He had a large church in Montreal, Canada. There was a wonderful temple in Paris. These are prime locations, super excellent locations as far as accessibility is concerned. Why he chose to make his international head quarters, a place where there was no electricity, no city plumbing, no telephones, and also to get here was hours and hours journey by road from Calcutta; that too Bengali roads! And all that was here was a straw hut, which was just surrounded by endless fields. During the monsoon, there would be so much rain. Practically all the neighbours were hostile, and there was no law to protect us from them. During monsoon, devotees would go on roof-tops, and sometimes their roommates were poisonous snakes, which were taking shelter in those straw roof-tops.
When he had so many facilities and so many prime material places in the world, why Srila Prabhupada very powerfully proclaimed that Sri Mayapur will be our International headquarters? He was not seeing with material vision, he was seeing Mayapur as the most powerful place in world. It is a place where people from all world can connect with deepest most profound manifestation of Krishna’s grace. There was hardly anything, but a straw hut. They had started to build a few rooms. So, once Srila Prabupada was in Gainesville Florida, it’s kind of out of the way, but still there is a beautiful airport and a nice highway. Srila Prabhupada said, “We are in this very remote place, so far from Sri Mayapur dham.” He was seeing Mayapur as the center of the universe as far as its relevance. As far people in west, even devotees, before Srila Prabhupada came, no body ever heard of Navadvipa or Mayapur. Since all the developments that been in the last 40years at Mayapur, it is hard to imagine what it was like at that time. Lord Chaitanya and Lord Nityananda along with Pancatattva performed their most beautiful intimate pastimes here in Navadvipa. The Supreme personality of Godhead appeared here.