vande taà çrémad-advaitä-
cäryam adbhuta-ceñöitam
yasya prasädäd ajïo ’pi
tat-svarüpaà nirüpayet
I offer my respectful obeisances to Çré Advaita Äcärya, whose activities are all wonderful. By His mercy, even a foolish person can describe His characteristics.
jaya jaya çré-caitanya jaya nityänanda
jayädvaita-candra jaya gaura-bhakta-vånda
All glories to Lord Çré Caitanya Mahäprabhu! All glories to Lord Nityänanda! All glories to Advaita Äcärya! And all glories to all the devotees of Lord Çré Caitanya Mahäprabhu!
païca çloke kahila çré-nityänanda-tattva
çloka-dvaye kahi advaitäcäryera mahattva
In five verses I have described the principle of Nityänanda prabhu. Then in the following two verses I describe the glories of Çré Advaita Äcärya.
mahä-viñëur jagat-kartä
mäyayä yaù såjaty adaù
tasyävatära eväyam
advaitäcärya éçvaraù
Lord Advaita Äcärya is the incarnation of Mahä-Viñëu, whose main function is to create the cosmic world through the actions of mäyä.
advaitaà hariëädvaitäd
äcäryaà bhakti-çaàsanät
bhaktävatäram éçaà tam
advaitäcäryam äçraye
Because He is nondifferent from Hari, the Supreme Lord, He is called Advaita, and because He propagates the cult of devotion, He is called Äcärya. He is the Lord and the incarnation of the Lord’s devotee. Therefore I take shelter of Him.
advaita-äcärya gosäïi säkñät éçvara
yäìhära mahimä nahe jévera gocara
Çré Advaita Äcärya is indeed directly the Supreme Personality of Godhead Himself. His glory is beyond the conception of ordinary living beings.
mahä-viñëu såñöi karena jagad-ädi kärya
täìra avatära säkñät advaita äcärya
Mahä-Viñëu performs all the functions for the creation of the universes. Çré Advaita Äcärya is His direct incarnation.
ye puruña såñöi-sthiti karena mäyäya
ananta brahmäëòa såñöi karena léläya
That puruña creates and maintains with His external energy. He creates innumerable universes in His pastimes.
icchäya ananta mürti karena prakäça
eka eka mürte karena brahmäëòe praveça
By His will He manifests Himself in unlimited forms, in which He enters each and every universe.
se puruñera aàça—advaita, nähi kichu bheda
çaréra-viçeña täìra—nähika viccheda
Çré Advaita Äcärya is a plenary part of that puruña and so is not different from Him. Indeed, Çré Advaita Äcärya is not separate but is another form of that puruña.
sahäya karena täìra la-iyä ‘pradhäna’
koöi brahmäëòa karena icchäya nirmäëa
He [Advaita Äcärya] helps in the pastimes of the purusa, with whose material energy and by whose will He creates innumerable universes.
jagat-maìgala advaita, maìgala-guëa-dhäma
maìgala-caritra sadä, ‘maìgala’ yäìra näma
Çré Advaita Äcärya is all-auspicious to the world for he is the reservoir of all auspicious attributes. His characteristics and activities and name are always auspicious.
Purport
Çré Advaita Prabhu, who is an incarnation of Mahä-Vishnu, is an äcärya, or teacher. All His activities and all the other activities of Vishnu are auspicious. Anyone who can view the all-auspiciousness in the pastimes of Lord Vishnu also becomes auspicious simultaneously. Therefore, since Lord Vishnu is the fountainhead of auspiciousness, anyone who is attracted by the devotional service of Lord Vishnu can render the greatest service to human society. Rejected persons of the material world who refuse to understand pure devotional service as the eternal function of the living entities, and as actual liberation of the living being from conditioned life, become bereft of all devotional service because of their poor fund of knowledge.
In the teachings of Advaita Prabhu there is no question of fruitive activities or impersonal liberation. Bewildered by the spell of material energy, however, persons who could not understand that Advaita Prabhu is nondifferent from Vishnu wanted to follow Him with their impersonal conceptions. The attempt of Advaita Prabhu to punish them is also auspicious. Lord Vishnu and His activities can bestow all good fortune, directly and indirectly. In other words, being favored by Lord Vishnu and being punished by Vishnu are one and the same because all the activities of Vishnu are absolute. According to some, Mangala is another name of Advaita Prabhu. As the casual incarnation, or Lord Vishnu’s incarnation for a particular occasion, He is the supply agent or ingredient in material nature. However, He is never to be considered material. All His activities are spiritual. Anyone who hears about and glorifies Him becomes glorified himself, for such activities free one from all kinds of misfortune. One should not invest any material contamination or impersonalism in the Vishnu form. Everyone should try to understand the real identity of Lord Vishu, for by such knowledge one can attain the highest stage of perfection.
Today we are celebrating the most auspicious appearance of Sri Advaita Acarya, who is glorified eternally as the greatest of all vaisnavas. It is said in Chaitnya charitamrit.
païca-tattvätmakaà kåñëaà
bhakta-rüpa-svarüpakam
bhaktävatäraà bhaktäkhyaà
namämi bhakta-çaktikam
That the Supereme Personality of Godhead descended in five pure transcendental forms. The Lord divided Himself in such a way, to perform the most wonderful of all His pastimes- the pastimes of Lord Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu. It is described in ChaitnyaCharitamrit by Krishna Das Kaviraj Goswami that Lord Krsna wanting to taste the sweetness of love of Srimati RadhaRani decided to descend into this material world.He also observed that it was the time for the yug avtaar to appear. In every age of Kali yuga the Lord appears to propagate the yuga dharma- the congregational chanting of the holy name. So the Supreme Lord with this in mind decided to combine both these purposes and descend to this material world. But first He sent many of His eternal associates; His expansions and incarnations to (let us say) set the stage for his glorious advent. Jagannath Misra, Sachi Devi, Madhavendra Puri, Parmananda Puri, Brahmananda Bharati, Isvara Puri, Nityananda Prabhu, ……………Srivas Pandit, ramay Pandit & Sri Advaita Acharya. Sri Advaita acarya as is explained here was the incarnation of maha visnu. Who is maha visnu? He is the original purusa. When the supeme lord decides to create this material cosmos, …………..Krsna who expands as Balaram later as the Chaturvyua- Anniruddha, Pradhumna, Sankarshan and Vasudeva. That Sankarshan, he expands as Narayana, Vasudeva, Narayan. And Sankarshan descends as Ananta sesa. And for the purpose of creation the Lord expands in such a wonderful, marvelous form- karanodakshaya Vishnu, who is so immense in size, that upon His exhalation, innumerable universes come from the pores of His body and that same Maha Visnu through His merciful glance impregnates each of these universes with the various jiva atmas or living entities and then Karanodakshaya visnu expands as Garbhodakshya Visnu within each universe, and from Him the lotus flower grows from the navel and lord brahma is born. And brahma empowered by the SupremePersonality Of Godhead, he creates all of the phenomena within this universe. So we can understand that Karanodakshaya visnu or Maha Visnu is the immediate cause of this entire material creation. And we should know what is the purpose of this material creation. The ultimate purpose is to be an atmosphere by which the independent jivas who have misused their freewill to want to enjoy separate from Krsna, to ultimately be frustrated and cry out for Krsna’s mercy, and again be reinstated in their original constitutional position of Bhakti- devotional service. Like a prison house, the actual purpose of the prison house is not simply to punish but to rectify to rectify the living entities through various punishments and ultimately bring them to their good common sense. And in this material existence when we take shelter of Krsna and His lotus feet, we can be freed from the cycle of birth and death we can be free from all of the entanglements and their threefold miseries of material existence. So it was Maha Visnu who is the immediate cause of this material creation, whose obvious intention is to do this for the sake of reclaiming the fallen souls. He descended within this material creation especially to fulfill the purpose of His creation, which was to beg the Supreme Lord to descend within this world, to propagate the ways and means by which everyone can be delivered and that is by chanting of the Holy names
Hare Kåñëa Hare Kåñëa Kåñëa Kåñëa Hare Hare,
Hare Räma Hare Räma Räma Räma Hare Hare.
It was indeed village of Navagram which is very close to place called Sri hatha in Bengal that Sri advaita acary appeared. He appeared within the womb of his blessed mother Nabhadevi and his father name was Kubera Pandit. In the Gauranga…………besides explaining Advaita Acarya as the incarnation of Maha Visnu, it also tells that he was incarnation of Sadha Siva, the original form of Lord Sankhar. Of course this is not a contradiction because both Sadha Shiva and Maha Vishnu are expansions of Lord Sankarshan- Balaram. It is said that once on Mount Kailash Lord Kubera, the treasurer of the demigods, was worshipping Lord Shiva and Lord Shiva granted him the benediction, and he desired that Lord Shiva would take birth as his son and that he could love him like a father. So to fulfill that desire Lord Kubera appeared as Kubera Pandit and Lord Shankar in his original form as Sadha Shiva appeared as Advaita Acharya.When he was born he was given two principle names Kamalaksha and Advaita. When he was very young. Only about 4 years old, his father and mother wanting to move close the river ganges, they left Nabhagram and moved to Shantipura, and arranged for the family residence there. When Sri Advaita Acharya was only about 8 years old, he was initiated with the sacred Brahman thread, Gayatri mantra. His family was a very highly esteemed learned family of brahmanas, and very very great devotees of Lord Krsna.
His father and mother in his earliest childhood would be very anxious that the goal of their life as parents was that their son becomes a pure, unalloyed devotee of Lord Krsna. They were always teaching him the various scriptures by which he could understand the highest principles of Bhakti. When Sri Advaita Acharya was still quite young, both of his parents left this world. And upon the demise of his mother and father, he temporarily left Shantipura he travelled to Gaya to perform the sradha ceremony, and then he decided to go to various holy places throughout India. During this tirtha yatra, he met Srila Madhavendra Puri, the most exalted of all spiritual personalities, who embodied the highest ecstatic symptoms of love of God. And there he accepted Sri Madhavendra Puri as his spiritual master. One may ask why the Supreme Lord accepts a spiritual master, there are several reasons. One is when the Lord descends, he comes to show by His example how everyone should progress in life. Advaita Acharya appeared in the role of a devotee. And one cannot perfect ones spiritual quest without properly being initiated and taking shelter of a true devotee of the lord and accepting him as his spiritual master. And also the Lord accepts this relationship simply to give pleasure to his devotees. The lord takes great joy in being subordinate to His devotee, sometimes by being his son, sometimes by being his disciple. Sri Advaita Acharya was given in marriage to two sisters- Sita Thakurani and Sridevi. He gave birth to six sons through Sita Thakurani, the youngest of which and the most glorious was Achutananda. Sri Advaita Acharya wanting to; he was also very dear beloved friends with Sri Haridas Thakur. Haridas at one time was living in Fuliya. He came there especially so that he could reside next to Advaita Acharya, because Advaita Acharya at that time was considered the greatest of all the Vaisnavas, of all the devotees in the entire world. In fact in the Chaitanya Bhagavad, Vrindavan Das Thakur explains that in the whole creation of lord Brahma, Advaita Acharya was the foremost of all Vaisnavas. Haridas Thakur and Sri Advaita Acharya would take the greatest joy and pleasure in chanting the holy names together and discussing Srimad Bhagvatam, Bhagavad Geeta and other Bhakti Shastras. But Sri Advaita was very pained to see the condition of human society in this age of kali yuga. And there were practically no real devotees anywhere around to associate with. But one of the great great devotees of Lord was Srivas Thakur. He and his brothers, who were living in Navadip, would be regularly having wonderful kirtans in their homes chanting the holy name:
Hare Kåñëa Hare Kåñëa Kåñëa Kåñëa Hare Hare,
Hare Räma Hare Räma Räma Räma Hare Hare.
So Advaita Acharya setup a small bhajan kutir, on the banks of the river Ganges in Navadip, just close to the house of Srivas Thakur. And in that bhajan kutir he would each day give classes on Bhagavad Geeta and Srimad Bhagvatam. And all the Vaisnavas, they would come together at Advaita Acharya’s house each day to hear his wonderful wonderful descriptions of the glories of Lord Krishna. He was a great learned scholar and he would extract the essence of pure Bhakti from all the scriptures and he would completely annihilate all misconceptions; misconceptions that there is any real value in approaching the Lord with fruitive desires or with an impersonalistic conception. In this way he would exalt only the principles of Bhakti and he would kick every other idea out, and how he would glorify Krishna’s holy names. It was at that time that Sri Advaita Acharya and all the other Vaisnavas were becoming more and more and more depressed and despondent to see the conditions of people of Navadip Dham. See the nature of a true Vaisnava is he cannot be content simply by loving Krishna himself. Para dukha dukhi, Vaisnavas feels great distressed to see the suffering and ignorance of others. Although Advaita Acharya and the devotees, they were in great happiness hearing and chanting the glories of the Lord, they saw that the human society was suffering, but they didn’t know that they were suffering. They were simply wasting their existence. In those days navdvipa was the highest seat of learning in all of the world, and the residents of Navadip were very blessed by the Goddess of fortune and there was tremendous riches and therefore these people were simply utilizing their lives to enjoy their senses. They would worship the Goddess Chandi or the Goddess Durga for more and more and more material enjoyment. Some of them would worship Manasa, the Goddess of snakes, for all sorts of superstitious purposes. People would sometimes spend large amounts of money for crazy forms of enjoyment. They would gamble and bet and fighting of dogs or cats. They would spend lavish amounts of money on their sons or daughter’s marriages. And even the great Brahmans who had the highest titles, Mishra, Bhattacharjee, Chakraborty, they would be giving class after class after class on the scriptures, but they had no devotion. They wouldn’t even touch the principles of Bhakti in any of their explanations. In this way they were so completely immersed in material consciousness, that it was practically never that anyone would chant the names of Krishna, which is the only religious principle in this age of kali yuga. So upon seeing this, the Vaisnavas were feeling very grief stricken in their hearts. Srivas Thakur and Ramai and his other brothers, they would be having wonderful kirtans in their house crying out the holy names of the Lord, praying for the deliverance of all of these ignorant people. And although they were actually chanting for the benefit of the human society, people who are ignorant they cannot understand what is for their benefit.
Historically throughout the human society we see that those who are the best well wishers who are trying to work for the benefit of someone become their worst enemies because of their ignorance. So the materialistic people, they considered Srivas Thakur and all the Vaisnavas to be such a disturbance, although they were only chanting for the purification of them. They don’t have wealth like us, and they are useless, and they are making so much noise, they are disturbing our sleep. And because they are chanting the names of God so loudly, the Muslim leaders will come and torture all of us. We should take the house of Srivas Thakur and with him and his brothers we should throw it in the Ganges and let it float some distant place. In this way they were responding to the loving prayers of Srivas and the devotees. When Advaita Acharya saw the condition, he understood that only the Supreme Personality of Godhead in His original form of Krishna can possibly deliver the fallen souls in this age of kali yuga. And with a heart over brimming with divine compassion, Sri Advaita Acharya in his little bhajan kutir on the bank of the river Ganges, he worshipped his beloved form of Krishna, the Shaligram Sheela and he would offer tulasi leaves and the holy river Ganges water and with loud cries he would plead, he would beg for Krishna to descend to deliver the fallen souls. And as he was crying out with a loud voice, which roared with such devotion, that voice would penetrate throughout the coverings of the material existence. It would bypass all the heavenly planets. It entered through the Brahmajyoti and into the spiritual world. And it is described that it reached the supreme abode, Vaikuntha and ultimately to Goloka Vrindavan, where the Supreme Personality of Godhead heard very clearly the loving cries of Sri Advaita. But of course we know that the various incarnations of the Lord who come to this world, come through Kshirodakashayee Vishnu who is lying in an ocean of milk. And it is described that as Lord Vishnu was resting on Ananta Sesa in the ocean of milk, the cries of Advaita Acharya woke Him up and He heard the loving appeals of his devotees: “Please my Lord, come to this world. It is only you that can distribute the holy name of Krishna to these most unfortunate souls in this age of kali. And as Advaita Acharya was crying, tears were flowing from his beautiful lotus-like eyes in compassion for all living beings. So many times Chaitanya Mahaparabhu would explain that he only came to this material world because of the prayers of Sri Advaita.
In response to the loving appeal of Sri Advaita Chandra, the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Govinda appeared within the womb of Smt Sachi Devi, in the house of Jagannatha Misra in Navadip dham. At that time, Advaita Acharya was living with Haridas Thakur in Shantipur. When Lord Gauranga appeared on that blessed night of the full moon of the month of phalgun during the lunar eclipse, everything became auspicious, the whole world became auspicious. And Sri Advaita and Haridas upon seeing auspicious signs all around and feeling an inconceivable ecstasy within their own hearts, they could both understand that the Lord had appeared and they began to dance together in ecstatic love. And the people around could not understand for what reason they began to dance so jubilantly. Sri Advaita Acharya sent his beloved consort Sita Thakurani to Navadip to bring special gifts for blessings of the new born child. Then Sri Advaita Acharya also personally came to offer his prayers and blessings to the child. And when they saw the infant baby they had the realization that this is none other than Lord Sri Krishna, the son of Nanda Maharaj who has appeared with the most beautiful effulgent golden complexion. His name was Gaura Hari. But by the divine arrangement of the Lord, remembrance and forgetfulness become part of the ecstasy of their leela. So, little Nimai, when He started getting older he became very mischievous and He really didn’t show much signs of interest in devotion that He became a great scholar in grammar. Although on rare and confidential occasions he would reveal his divinity. In general he would harass devotees. In very respectful and humble way he would approach them, and devotees they cannot tolerate hearing anything but Krishna katha. But Nimai would challenge them with all sorts of academic questions, and he would get them in arguments. But the devotees had no interest in these things. Some of our children, they go to school and they learn all these academic subjects, and although many of them are doing very wonderful, they really don’t like it. Because we found in the life of Nimai and His friends that the devotees just don’t; they have no interest in academic subjects unless they are specifically glorifying Krishna. It’s simply painful for them to hear. So we should understand when our children get a taste for Krishna Consciousness, this is great austerity to go to school and hear anything that’s not glorifying Krishna. But still it is an austerity that they must perform. But we cannot blame them when they don’t like it. If they like it, that means they have no taste for Krishna. Hari Bol. So it’s actually a good sign when they don’t like it. That means they are following the footsteps of associates of Mahaprabhu, but still they went. So the devotees would pray- if only this Nimai Pandit would become a devotee, he could make the whole world Krishna Conscious. Sometimes Vishwaroop, the elder brother of little Nimai, he had no interest in anything but Krishna Katha. When he would rise in the morning early, he would go to the river Ganges to take his bath and then he would go right to the house of Advaita Acharya who at that time was living in Navadip, and he would spend the entire day just hearing Bhagavat Gita and Srimad Bhagvatam from Sree Advaita. And sometimes Advaita Acharya would ask Vishwaroop to speak about the glories of Krishna, and although he was just a young boy, he was so pure, he was so humble, he was so learned, that when Vishwaroop would speak, all the devotees would just be struck with wonder.
Advaita Acharya, who would sometimes be doing his puja in other forms of worship, he would simply have to stop to hear the nectarine ambrosial waves that were emanating from Vishwaroop’s lotus like mouth, as he would glorify the pure principles of Bhakti. One day mother Saci, she prepared lunch and she told little Nimai, Gauranga, that you go to Advaita Acharya house and you bring Vishwaroop your brother home for Prasad. So little Nimai with bare chest covered with dust from his playing, he ran to the house of Advaita Acharya. And when he came, they were all discussing Krishna katha, and Nimai was very pleased that they were discussing his glories, and he went into the house and when he entered, upon seeing his beauty the devotees could no longer even talk about Krishna. They just began to look at him with such love in their eyes. Their hearts were filled, swollen with ecstasy. They couldn’t even blink their eyes upon seeing this beautiful golden child. And Nimai would say “Vishwaroop, mataji is calling you for Prasad”. And he would grab him by dhoti and pull him and then they would both go running back to Saci Devi’s house. And Advaita Acharya and all the devotees, they couldn’t even move, they were stunned with ecstatic love. Advaita was thinking that this child, he is not an ordinary mortal. Who could he possibly be? When I see him I feel the same ecstasy as seeing Krishna. But by divine leela he was not able to recognize little Nimai’s true nature. Sometime later, the Lord went to Gaya dham and there he was initiated by Iswara Puri, and after that initiation ceremony, after his visit to the Gadadhar mandir in Gaya, Gauranga Mahaprabhu began to display his divine leela of spreading the holy name of Krishna throughout the world. For the first time he truly exhibited his inner ecstacies of Mahabhava, or the divine love of Krishna. And when he came back to Navadip Dham, he was like a different person altogether. He couldn’t speak anything but Krishna’s glories, and he was constantly immersed in the transcendental ecstasies of separation crying out where is Krishna? Where is Krishna? Where has he gone? Why has he left me? He was weeping ecstatic tears, and all the symptoms of ecstasy in its highest intensity were manifesting in his body. Upon hearing this Sri Advaita Acharya, he became very happy, he became ecstatic. He approached the devotees and told them that last night I had a dream. In that dream a great personality appeared to me and told me that you have gone to rest tonight in a depressed state because you were not understanding a particular verse from the Bhagavad Gita, but now I tell you this, there is no reason to be depressed ever again because the fulfillment of all of your desires have come about all of your prayers, all of your 45:20 is now revealing His pastimes in this world and after this wonderful dream Advaita acharya said: I saw the beautiful form of Vishwambhar and I could understand that yes this Gauranga Mahaprabhu, Vishwambhar is special personality, is Supreme Personality and then Advaita acharya told all the devotees that this is the greatest most illustrious moments of our lives that Vishwambhar is exhibiting the ecstasies of love of God and he will be the one to propagate the holy name of Lord in every town and village throughout creation , so let us all pray and give all blessings to Vishwambhar , Nimai Pandita ,for successful mission of spreading prema bhakti. On another occasion Sri Advaita acharya he was in his home in Nawadipa performing his puja. He was offering tulsi leaves and Ganges water and he was crying out Krishna’s name roaring like a lion with devotion Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna, Hare Hare , Hare Rama, Hare Rama Rama Rama, Hare Hare and at that time Lord Gaursundar and Gadadhar pandita came to Advaita acharya’s house and when Gaursundar heard Advaita acharya’s beautiful prayers of ecstatic love and saw how he was worshipping the Lord Chaitanya Mahaprabhu became so much ecstatic that he fell to the ground unconscious. That time sri Advaita acharya could recognized that yes this is the Supreme Personality of Godhead Krishna. This is the confirmation that the lord has answered my prayers and descended in this world and I will worship Him and Advaita acharya got all the 16 types of paraphernalia and chanting the beautiful mantra namo brahamanaya devaya go brahmana hitaya ca jagat dhitaya krsnaya govindaya namo namah and he began to worship the beautiful form of Vishwambhar with the five prong ghee lamp, with incense, with all different types of flowers and scents, he worshipped the Lord with great reverence and devotion and at that time Gadadhar pandita, he said: Advaita acharya you are a very elderly senior Brahman man. He said: Why are you worshipping this young child? It does not befit you and Advaita acharya said to Gadadhar pandit: you should know that this is the Lord of all creation, this is the Supreme worshipable object of everyone’s heart, this is the personality of Godhead Krishna and in this way he continued with his worship with great joy in his heart. You can imagine that for so many years he was praying to the Lord to appear and here was the first opportunity to worship that Lord. At that time Vishwambhar awoke from his ecstatic trance and he saw Advaita acharya in the process of worshipping him and chanting beautiful mantras so Vishwambhar very humble, he bowed down to take the dust from Advaita Acharya’s lotus feet and very humble He began to worship Advaita as a senior and Advaita acharya told him that I know who You are. In this way the lord became very pleased with Advaita acharya’s devotion and he returned to his home. But Advaita acharya wanted that the whole world to understand the glories of Nimai Pandit, so he said I will test him , I will leave this place and I will go to shantipur and if I have any real devotion then he will tie me with the binds of his love and he will bring me back to Navadweep. So Advaita acharya left and went to shantipur. One day Lord Chaitanya, he called for the brother of Srinivas Thakur, Ramaya and he told him that I want you to deliver a message to Advaita acharya in shantipur, tell him that with so many prayers of love he has called for me, he woke me up while I was sleeping in the ocean of milk, I have come to this world and now he has left ,tell him that his worshipable Lord –the fulfillment of all his desires my appearance is here in Nawadweep and he should come and he should worship me to his heart content.
So Ramaya went all the way to shantipur and he delivered this message to Sri Advaita acharya. Advaita acharya , he looked at the Ramaya and he said “what nonsense you are speaking”. He says –according to the scripture where does it says that the Lord takes the birth with beautiful golden complexion in Nawadweep in the age of Kali yuga and Ramaya Pandit said that the lord and you no one can understand your pastimes together and Advaita was satisfied with the answer something like this and then he called for Sita his wife and when they heard this, Sita Devi began to cry in ecstatic love, weeping that the Lord is calling for them that he has appeared in this world to fulfill the prayer of Advaita. Advaita was crying ,Sita Thakurani was crying, little achutananda who just a young child upon hearing this message ,he began to weep and cry tears profusely. The whole family was weeping and crying in ecstatic love , somehow or other, they gain their composer and Advaita acharya collected all the ingredient of worship along with Sita Thakurani they went to Nawadweep. But Advaita acharya told to Ramaya that I will not go to the house of Sriwas but I will go to the house of Nandan acharya and I will hide there. Let us see if the Lord can find me. So he went Nandan acharya’s house and Lord Gouranga who was in Sriniwas Thakur’s house ,he told one of the devotees –you go to Nandan acharya’s house and tell Advaita to come. So, Advaita was very happy and he came and when he fell before the beautiful form of the Lord who sitting in the throne of Vishnu in Sriwas’s house. Lord Chaitanya, he manifested before Advaita, his beautiful supreme form ,the personality of Godhead, three-fold bending form, playing a flute and Advaita acharya saw right before his eyes that they were the beautiful, the beautiful land of Vrindavan with wonderful trees, the river Yamuna and in the another part of the room he saw all the demigods, showering flowers and offerings prayers to the Lord and in an another direction he saw all of the great saints and sages throughout the universe all with folded palms offering prayers to the Lord. In this way all of the space, there is no place where he did not see the wonderful manifestation of great personalities worshipping the supreme personality of godhead. So, in great love he fell prostrated at the feet of the Lord and right in front of everone’s eye the Lord’s placed his Lotus feet on Aadwaitacharya’s head and everyone in great Love began to cry ”Hari Hari”.So happy to see Adwaitacharya receiving mercy from the Lord. When Adwaitachary came up ,the lord asked him” please ask a benediction from me; any boon I will grant”. And Advaita acharya said that”You have already fulfilled all my desires, just by seeing you in this wonderful manifestation I have no any desire”. The lord said ”No you must ask for one boon”. So, Advaita acharya said “Give pure love of God through your holy name to even most fallen and sinful persons without regard whether they are woman or whether they are man , whether they are chandalas , whether they are sudras, even the lowest and most sinful give your mercy to even them, give them chance to chant the holy name
“Hare Krishna Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna Hare Hare,
Hare Rama Hare Rama Rama Rama Hare Hare.”
And he said only those puffed up so called learned scholar who offend your devotees, don’t give them your mercy. But everyone else you must give your mercy , give them love of Krishna. And the lord said because of your prayer Adwaita ,because of the benediction that you have asked the holy name of the lord will spread throughout the world
“Hare Krishna Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna Hare Hare,
Hare Rama Hare Rama Rama Rama Hare Hare.”
And another occasion there was a beautiful kirtan in the courtyard of thehouse of Sriwas thakur and Sree Adwaitacharya began to dance very ecstatically .He was actually in the mood of gopis feeling ecstatic depression in separation from Krishna. And he was dancing in such a wonderful ways, so unique,his dancing was most beautiful. Actually I forgot onething when Lord Chaitnya was at Srivas’s house before he asked Adwaita to ask for a boon ,afterAdwita saw this whole manifestation and the lord put his leg on his head, Lord chaitanya told Adwaita “ I want to see your dance”; Adwaitcharya began to dance and he danced so wonderfully, so beautifully, so gracefully, so ecstatically that everyone was completely satisfied. Then the Lord asked ask a benediction from me and actually what Adwaitacharya said is “the fact that you allowed me to dance in front of you is the fulfillment of all my desires” but then he insisted an another benediction, then he asked to deliver all living –beings. So,on this day which happened shortly after Adwaitacharya began to dance in the courtyard of Sriwas thakur and he was dancing in such a trance of love that nobody could stop him, he danced for hours and hours and all the devotees were exhausted .So somehow or the other they calmed Adwaitacharya down from his ecstatic love and he sat down and he seemed peaceful ……1.16 ,so Sriwas and Ramai and other devoteessdecided to go to Ganges to take their bath. And Adwaita was sitting alone, at that time Lord Vishwambar decided that he will give special mercy to Adwaitacharya. So, Lord Chaitanya Mahaprabhu came to the house of Sriwas thakur and met Adwaita who was sitting there peacefully and he took his hand and brought him to the temple of Sriwas and he said “Adwaita Please ask a boon from me and Advaita acharya ,he said “ All right I want to see that wonderful universal form that you showed Arjuna in the battle-field of Kurushetra and at that time Lord Chaitnya created a wonderful vision and Advaita Acharya saw that right before him was the battlefield of Kurushetra and he saw the beautiful chariot of Krishna and on the chariot was Krishna with four arms holding the counchshell, the chakra, the lotus flower and the counchshell and the club,the club and he saw Arjuna standing with folded palms and around he saw all the armies ,millions and millions of soldiers then he saw the beautiful form of Krishna manifesting to the virat rupa, the universal form was so big,it was covering all directions he saw all the planets, all the stars, everything within this form, all the mountains, all the rivers, all the oceans of the whole universe of the whole cosmic manifestation and then he saw all the great demigods and he saw in this universal form there were millions of heads and millions of eyes and millions of mouths and then he saw all the evil, atheistic and materialistic people being devoured by those mouths, what was the form of eternal time.Upon seeing this Sri Advaita acharya he became very much ecstatic in love and bow down before this wonderful universal form. At that time Nityananda prabhu within his heart he knew that Gaurang mahaprabhu was showing his virata rupa to Adwaita ,so he also came right into the house of Sriwas thakur and closed the door and there he saw right before him lord chaitanya revealing the virata rupa and Adwaita acharya and Nityananda prabhu upon seeing it in great awesomeness they began to dance in ecstatic love.
Then when Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, he appeared again in his original form both of these great devotees feeling very much satisfied they worshipped the lord. In this way we can understand that Sri Advaita Acharya was so much loved by the lord. It’s becoming late so I will not go on too much longer but there is another beautiful story I would like to tell because Advaita acharya was the spiritual uncle of lord Chaitanya he was actually the god brother of lord Chaitanya’s guru. Lord Chaitnaya who generally was in the mood of a devotee, he would very carefully follow the etiquettes of vaishnavas and the etiquette of vaishnavas is that you must treat the god brothers of your guru with the same type of respect as you show to your guru. So he would always be very very humble and and address Advaita Acharya like his own spiritual master and Advaita Acharya he didn’t like this at all because he knew that Nimai was his worshippable lord and he wanted to accept him as a servant not as a master. He used to call him Adwaita prabhu, prabhu means master. He would treat him like a superior so Advaita Acharya as the days were going by he was becoming very much depressed that unless the lord accepts me as a servant how can I find any peace in this world and he decided I will force him to accept me as a servant and I know just the way how. So Advaita Acharya left navadweep and went to shantipur and he began to preach the philosophy of the yogavasishtha, yogavasishtha means the interpretation of bhagvad-gita which is mayavad, impersonal. He was preaching mayavad philosophy. He was preaching to everyone that bhakti really has, bhakti is alright but without speculative knowledge and impersonal realization bhakti really has no meaning at all, that ultimately the lord is impersonal. His eyes, his hands, his legs, his form, his pastimes they are all maya, they are all illusion, they are all temporary , we must go beyond bhakti and enter into gyan , enter into Brahman, the highest realizations of the supreme. Advaita Acharya was boldly preaching these things and Haridasa Thakura he would listen and he would simply laugh because he knew that this is some sort of a trick that the lord that Advaita acharya is doing. Anyways Chaitanya Mahaprabhu had heard that Advaita acharya is preaching mayavada philosophy so he said to Nityananda prabhu:”let us go to Santipur”, and they began to walk from Navadvipa to Santipur. On the way they came to the house of one sanyasi. [to a devotee:you know the story, want to tell]They came to this one sanyaasi’s house and Nityananda prabhu and Lord Chaitanya they were both very young. They offered respects to the sanyaasi and this sanyaasi gave them benediction. He said: “May you have great wealth, and high learning and may you have a beautiful wife and wonderful pleasures of this world”, and Lord Chaitanya looked at the sanyaasi and said “what type of benediction is that, I don’t want a material benediction, why don’t you give me the blessing that I will become a good devotee of Krishna “ and the sanyaasi became very upset. He said: “Look at these two children, they think they can tell me what a benediction is ? you are like immature young people I am giving you the best benedictions of prosperity and pleasures of this world and you are rejecting it ungrateful. Do you think you know ,you know more than me. All the years I have been in this world I am a sanyaasi”. Anyway they had little argument, Lord Chaitanya started explaining how all the things of this world they are all temporary they are all an illusion and this man was becoming very much disturbed “who are you to tell me what is reality?”He said ,” without nice beautiful wife, without nice pleasures and money no one can become happy in this world. So upon seeing this Nityananda prabhu interviened. He said to the sanyaasi, “actually you are very senior to us, you should not take our immature statements very seriously, you should forgive us for our arguments”and then ……. said ‘‘You are very learned, You are very renounced” and this sanyaasi said “yes that is correct”, he said: ‘why don’t you have some nice fruits and some nice prasada at my house and now you can take bath in river Ganges and when you return I will arrange” so they went to take their bath and they came back to take prasada and then as they were just finishing the prasada the sanyaasi said to Nityananda: “can I give You some happiness?” and Nityananda prabhu, he already had travelled to all holy places, he knew what this meant, that this sanyaasi was an alcoholic, he was a drunkard and happiness meant liquor. “Can I give You some happiness, please take some happiness and be happy and then the sanyaasi’s girlfriend came in and anyways Lord Chaitanya and Lord Nityananda, Lord Nityananda explained to Lord Chaitanya “this is his girlfriend and he wants to drink liquor” so Lord Chaitanya and Lord Nityananda humbly excused themselves and went to the river Ganges to take bath. Why does the story appear in Chaitanya Bhagvat ? It wanted to show how Lord Chaitanya Mahaprabhu; even a fallen sanyaasi, who is a drunkard,he will give his mercy to. He will give His mercy to even such a person. It is explained that this person because he rendered some service to the Lord he would have take another birth but his next birth would be an auspicious birth. Lord Chaitanya is willing to be kind and generous even to the most fallen degraded but as we are about to see he would not show such mercy to those who are misconstruing the Vedic knowledge, any impersonalistic, according to impersonalistic conclusions He would not associate with them.
Vrindavan das thakur said , “this fallen sanyasi who was a drunkard and a woman hunter ,lord chaitanya stayed at his house and accepted some fruits”. But the mayawadi sanyasis in varnasi , even though he lived in varanasi for a month ,he would not even look at them ,even though they would constantly inviting him , he would never go to where they were. Anyways they floated down the ganges all the way to shantipur and then nityanand prabhu and Sree chaitanya mahaprabhu came out, and they went to Adwaitya Acharya house and as they came in Adwaitya Acharya was just giving a class from yogvashishtha and when he heard that Nimai pandit ,Vishwambhar and Nityananda had arrived , he wanted to really make sure lord chaitanya understood he was a mayawadi so he was , he just more enthusiastically than ever he was just extoning with a loud voice mayawad conclusions. And when lord chaitanya came in and he heard this ,his eyes became red with anger, and in loud voice he said Adwaita “are you propounding speculative knowledge or devotion , of the two which is better”. And adwaita acharya said – “it is an obvious fact supported by all the scriptures and everyone knows it that speculative knowledge is superior to devotion “. When lord chaitanya heard this he jumped on the raised platform , he grapped Adwaita, he brought him to his outside courtyard ,he threw him to the ground and he began to beat him , and he was beating him and beating him and beating him and Sita thakurani , she was crying out stop , he is an old man , if you will beat him anymore , he will die,save this old man , leave him alone and lord chaitanya was beating him and after he beat him very sufficiently, Adwaita Acharya became very happy.He began to dance in ecstatic love and he was crying out, today you have accepted me as your servant,today like a thief I have stolen the position of servant . He said “ previously you were worshipping me and honouring me like a senior but today you have punished me and accepted me as your servant, today my desires are fulfilled” . And lord chaitanya mahaprabhu became very embarrassed .And in this way the loving reciprocation continued and Adwaita Acharya and Chaitanya mahaprabhu and Nityananda prabhu they all had wonderful kirtans and they had nice Prasad together. Just as Sri Adwaita Acharya called lord sri chaitanya mahaprabhu to appear ,in the same way towards the end of lord Chaitanyas pastimes , Sri Adwaita Acharya sent a message to the lord which indicated that you have fulfilled your mission and lord Chaitanya mahaprabhu replied that “Sri Adwaita call me to this world and now he is sending me back to the spiritual world” . Chaitanya Bhagawat,Chaitanya Charnamrita ,Chaitnya Mangla are full of wonderful wonderful stories of the loving reciprocation with Sri Adwaita Acharya and Sri Chaitanya mahaprabhu.We will discuss further this evening in our centre . We will have a wonderful celebration of Sri Adwaita Acharya’s appearance day . Sri Adwaita Acharya prabhu ki , jai(chorous). We will do harinam sankirtan tonight temple.During the rath yatra we hear in jagannath puri , Sri Adwaita Acharya was one of the leading dancer.His beautiful dancing was most pleasing to the lord and all of the devotees. So tonight we will all beautifully dance at carstation for the pleasure of Sri Adwaita acharya prabhu. We will continue our narration, at this time we will have a few minutes kirtan and then we will have nice Prasad . The brahmacharis headed by Srimant Sanat kumar prabhu have arranged a wonderful feast in honour of this auspicious day.
Nitai Gour Premanande…
Hari Bol!!!
Hari Bol!!!
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