12. "The reverential mood puts a sort of screen before us."


“I need not go through the Vedas, I need not read the dharmaśāstra and Mahābhārata for the amelioration of my troubles. Let persons who are too much afraid of worldly troubles read the Vedas and so on. I am not at all afraid of such things. I do not think that the pessimistic trend of my mind should engage me in reading these books. These are lifeless transactions. I want a living thing. I see that Nanda, as father, has got the privilege of nurturing and fostering child Kṛṣṇa from the very beginning. So it is better for me that I should have Nanda as my preceptor instead of these śāstras.”*


The child Kṛṣṇa is found to be crawling in the corridor of Nanda’s house. I am also going to worship Him as His parent servitor. Therefore, the parent servitor should be my preceptor.


I should not ask Him to be my friend, but instead, I should befriend Him. That is, I should render service to Him as a friend. I should also like to be known as His confidential friend, not a reverential friend. Flatterers are used to flattering their masters while posing themselves as friends. I should not be His flattering friend. I should like to be His confidential friend. I won’t hesitate to offer Him any food which I have tasted beforehand just to see whether it is relishable or not.


If I find the food to be nice, then only shall I place it before the Supreme Lord. Our reverential friend would not allow such conduct, which is quite contrary to the ideas of the reverential worshippers of the Lord. Even Śrī Rāmānujācārya followed the rules of reverential worship. But Śrī Kṛṣṇa Caitanya has told us that we should be His confidential friends instead of posing as friends yet maintaining a reverential mood. The reverential mood puts a sort of screen before us.

__________________

* C.f. Padyāvalī (126) or Śrī Caitanya-caritāmṛta (Madhya-līlā 19.96) – “śrutim apare smṛtim itare”


- by Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī Ṭhākura Prabhupāda

Adapted from The Gaudiya Volume 27, Number 5
by the Rays of The Harmonist team



Rays of The Harmonist On-line, Year 3 & Year 16, Issue 13 “Taking Care of God” by Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī Ṭhākura Prabhupāda, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License to ensure that it is always freely available. You may redistribute this article if you include this license and attribute it to Rays of The Harmonist. Please ask for permission before using the Rays of The Harmonist banner-logo.


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