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Founder of ISKCON. His Divine
Grace A.C.Bhaktivedanta
Swami Prabhupada
Grace A.C.Bhaktivedanta
Swami Prabhupada
The Supreme Personality of Godhead said: Now hear, O son of Pritha, how by practicing yoga in full consciousness of Me, with mind attached to Me, you can know Me in full, free from doubt. (Bhagavad-gita 7.1)
Japa Talks 11.09.2010
Dear Vaisnavas,
Please accept my most humble obeisances. All glories to Srila Prabhupada.
In this place I want to invite you to join discussions about chanting the Holy Name. I am eager to read your postings, if you find anywhere some nice point about chanting ‘hare krsna’, please put it here. Then let us also have discussion, and post or reactions to what we read, comments and questions. I am eager to begin our “JAPA TALKS”, I am sure that in each others association we will find new inspiration to chant.
Your servant, Kadamba Kanana Swami
171 responses to “Japa Talks”
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and it would be so nice if somebody added some comment to this japa talk. almost half year nobody added anything. I keep comming here in hope to read some nice japa realizations but not so many posts are added. please be merciful and add some realizations and quotes 🙂 thanks :)))
Chanting early morning without any disturbance, with no other work or duties except chanting, became the most important part of my day. When sometimes later in the day there is too much pressure, too many demands, and I am just at the edge of collapse I think – “This is only temporary, this day will end soon and morning will come when I can focus only on holy name.” And this way I am instantly pacified and do not take so called problems and duties so seriously. So morning chanting became something like a harbour for me, and holy name became a good friend of mine who is with me anytime, when all others are absent. And it gives me feeling of security and steadiness. Certainly holy name is not dependent on some period of the day but still, in my conditioning, morning is the best time, because nothing and nobody disturbs me. When I chant later in the day, it is much harder to control my mind, because then it is like a wild horse. In the morning it is not so active, so it is easier. Yesterday I read CB and there is a beautiful chapter about Haridas Thakur. I think it is not possible not to be enchanted by his purity. So I beg at his feet to mercifully glance at me and give me a drop of his pure and extatic chanting.
Maybe it is not directly describing chanting, but I would like to add one of my most favourite verses from SB because if we had such deep remembering of Krsna then certainly our chanting would not be duty but pleasure:
“My sweet Lord, as the river Ganges forever flows to the sea without
hindrance, let my attraction be constantly drawn to you without
being diverted to anything else.”
Love of Krsna is the sadhya and congregational chanting the names of Krsna is the sadhana. Any questions that may arise in this regard can be resolved only by chanting the names of Krsna.
part of purport to 1.14.143 CB
The Vedas are unable to fully describe the glories of one who chants the Lord’s names day and night, while even eating and sleeping.
Caitaya-bhagavata 1.14.140
Part of purport (by Bhaktisiddhanta Maharaj) to this verse:
…even the Vedas are unable to properly describe the transcendental glories of a person who is engaged in chanting the holy names of the Lord. … The Vedas have nothing to prescribe or prohibit for those who are constantly engaged in hearing, chanting, and remembering topics of the Supreme Lord. … The holy names of the Lord are completely spiritual objects. The are not designations or sounds perceivable by the senses of the enjoyment prone living entities of this world.
Today I decided to make my japa a meditation. Some portion of the day that I want to dedicate only to Krsna and nobody else. Not the “quickly get it done japa” and let’s move to some other action which I hypocraticly call service. I think Krsna does not need the quantity of our service, he is not dependent on what we do or not do. I think it is time to really do it just for him. To offer quality and go deep. Even though my mind goes here and there still I keep trying to bring it back. I think it is time to get personal. I just thougt how it must be painful to Krsna when he sees that after so many years of trying to be a devotee I still want to get japa quickly done so I can do something else. As if to say – I don’t care, just go away as far as you can. So cruel, so heartless. At least for me it is painful if I try to do something special for someone and he just ignores me. And I am doing that to Krsna. And still he does not give me up. Still he supports me. Still he makes so many arrangements to wake me up. I definetelly can say I never experienced somebody would love me so unconditionally. And this fact is melting my heart and bring tears to my eyes. And it makes me feel humble. Yes, definetelly today I want to put all my concentration just on Krsna. And nobody and nothing else.
We come to Krsna with conviction and doubt also, but we had enough of the material world and are determined, we shall chant! We think, I will do it, what is this pride, are we the doer. When chanting is not based on pure love, then it is austerity, over time the weight of austerity increases.
So after time we stand before Krsna praying, that’s all there will be left. Then humility means admitting that we are bringing nothing of value, and that even to chant we depend on Krsna’s mercy .My dear Lord, please me merciful un to me, I have no taste for this chanting, how can I go on? I am praying, please grant me a drop of love for serving your lotus feet.”
(The lord Almighty says ) “For you who revere my name, the sun of righteousness will rise with healing in its wings. And you will go out and leap like calves released from the stall.” The Holy Bible Malachi 4:2
Today, I went to the beach with my kids. I found a sea shell and gave it to my 4 year old daughter and said “You can hear the ocean if you put this to your ear.” She put the shell to her ear and screamed. There was a hermit crab inside and it pinched her ear. She never wants to go back! LoL I know this is entirely off topic but I had to tell someone!
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My experience to chant the holy name is, as deeper I can think in Krishna- or as deeper i can take krishna in my mind, as better I am with Him.
If my chant is good I feel luck me with it and after it and my day seems save. I love it to go outside in this time, to see how the live is quiete at first in the town and later to see the begin of the sound in it.
At the begin the silence and later to see and feel this material world.
In order to lead the soul to its highest stage, devotees mutually discuss on NAMA and sing His glories. They believe Your Name to be Caitanya in person.
Nama-bhajana by Bhaktivinod Thakur
Our daily chanting of the Hare Krishna mahamantra on japa beads is the most significant event of our day. It is our daily opportunity to have a personal, private meeting with God. Therefore the mood in which we chant is of the utmost importance. If our minds are wandering somewhere else during our japa, it will be difficult to remember Krishna throughout the day, and our day will be a struggle. But if we fix our minds nicely on on the mahamantra during our japa meditation, it will be easy to remember Krishna throughout the day, and we’ll have a really blissful day. So the essential point is that you create what sort of day you will have every day by how you chant your rounds first thing in the morning. Chanting one’s rounds later in the day makes it more difficult to feel connected because one is beginning his day without tuning in to Krishna.
Sankarshan Das Adhikari
Take the prescribed medicine to be cured
The physician gives the patient the correct medicine in the proper dosage for recovering his health as soon as possible. The patient does not take the medicine for his enjoyment. Even if bitter, he takes that medicine simply for the purpose of regaining his his health. So are you chanting for your enjoyment or for your purification?
If you are chanting for your purification, you should accept the recommended mantra for this age, the Hare Krishna mantra. If you are chanting for your enjoyment, you can chant anything you like. But do not expect to get the same result which you will get by chanting the full Hare Krishna mahamantra:
Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna, Hare Hare
Hare Rama, Hare Rama, Rama Rama, Hare Hare
Taking this prescribed Hare Krishna mahamantra medicine will deliver you from the disease of birth and death. Chanting whatever you like, although perhaps seemingly easier, will not give you the same result.
Sankarshan Das Adhikari
Chanting is the nourishment for the soul, and food is the nourishment for the body. Even though you know that are not your body, every day you make sure to feed it. It is not that some days you do not eat. You know that your real identity is that you are a spirit-soul. So how can you feed the covering of the self while you simultaneously starve the real self within?
Sankarshan Das Adhikari
Do you want to always feel inspired and enlivened? To do so is not difficult. All you have to do is reconnect with the eternal brilliant reality, which is always splendorously shining far beyond the dense, dark clouds of illusion. Beyond the delusional quagmire of this miserable material existence resides the most beautiful, wondrous, all-powerful, all-loving person named Krishna, who is beckoning you to return to your original, all-blissful, all-knowing identity in His eternal pastimes. To regain your identity all you have to do is call out to Krishna with this amazing mantra in a mood of sincere devotion:
Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna, Hare Hare
Hare Rama, Hare Rama, Rama Rama, Hare Hare
Do so and you will feel the most amazing ecstasy overflooding your heart. You will become completely inundated with divine bliss.
Sankarshan Das Adhikari
Question by a devotee:
If we have choice between kirtan or japa? which is best?
Answer from H.H. Kadamba Kanana Swami:
Both are essential. In Kirtan, we are chanting together, we are riding on each others energy… In this way, we push up each other in the association of the devotees. In japa, we are thrown back on ourselves. In japa, we are alone in front of Krsna. Now, we are simply chanting, making our offering to Krsna. And if Krsna is pleased, He is giving His darshan. So, in japa, we are trying to meet Krsna. In japa, leave everything behind,.. now forget who you are, it doesnt matter who you are, big or small. Now, in front of holy name, everyone is beggar. In japa, we have become beggars. in japa, we are brought back to the point where we realise that I have nothing, i have no assets, I simply….. to find Krsna, to get darshan of Krsna. In japa, we have to really make an endeavor in our offering.. Now in japa, we are just alone, everything left behind, concentrating to make nice offering. we are trying to pronounce the holy name nicely. We are trying to make sure we do not skip any beads, and we are trying to .. the most important of all, we are trying to hear what we are pronouncing. Because, Prabhupada said, attentive chanting means, hear oneself. In this way, in japa, we are completely focused on trying to make that quality offering to Krsna.
In kirtan, we are sometime swept up in music, sometime swept up in the dancing. …
So both are important. That external experience of throwing ourselves in a big kirtan and swept up ourselves. And, internal, that throwing back on ourselves. And just now, forget all other things. They are not important. Only offering to Krishna is important.
So both are important. Therefor, both must be done.
Room conversation with Hayagriva Prabhu, Kirtanananda and others, Montreal 1968-69:
“Now Krishna is giving you boys intelligence and bestowing his mercy upon you. Continue with your present attitude, and whenever you feel some difficulty, chant Hare Krishna. Pray to Krishna to help you, and there will be no difficulty. Rest assured.”
Prabhupada departing lecture at Matchless Gifts storefront, before going to Vrindavan from New York, 1967:
Then, for the first time in a lecture, we hear his voice break, and see tears in his eyes.
“Don’t throw away your lives. Human life is such… an oppurtunity. I beg you… take to this process. It is most sublime. It is… eternal.”
Although Swamiji quickly regains his outward composure, we all remain shaken – the boys on the verge of tears, the girls openly crying.
“We may come and go,” he concludes, “but this chanting of Hare Krishna remains.”
Quotes from “The Hare Krishna Explosion”, by Hayagriva Prabhu
Note: First quote mentioned, is of course from Srila Prabhupada.
Shelter means that I forget the burden of my own impurity and turn to the pure sound of Krsna’s Names, the kind friend who never turns away, regardless. On His strength the battered spirit soul can soar.
Hare Krsna dear devotees, I would like to add some nice extracts from the book I am reading now:
The simple truth is that Lord Krishna is far more easily attracted, pleased, and conquered by the cooperative group effort to congregationally petition His benevolence upon an assembly of individuals through the process of sankirtana than by an individual’s solitary or separatistic endeavor.
________________________________________________________________
As hari-nama-japa is required for strenghtening the individual devotee, so hari-nama-sankirtana is essential for strengthening, revitalizing, unifying, and purifying the Vaishnava community. Moreover, such cooperative group endeavor to uplift and enliven the Vaishnava community further enhances the breadth and depth of the Krishna conscious experience in the community’s individuals.
The darker the weather:
I pick up ther shards
Of the heart that i dropped
A spilled hand of cards
A clock that has stopped
I wipe away the tears
Of an anger so old
Of sadness and fears
Told and retold
The cracks run so deep
Yet the core remains whole
Faith’s armored keep
Is the pure spirit soul
Prabhupada, strength!
And stay this fierce pride
Lead me up this last length
Following your stride
O Gaura Nitai
Lift me this day
Out of the swamp of my “I”
Into sankritan’s sway
Krishna put me together
I need so much repair
The darker the weather
The more you are there
Suhotra Maharaja
Amsterdam, The Netherlands
27 October 2003
The perfection of japa is to hear and chant each syllable and to call out to the Lord and His energy like a small child crying for its mother begging to be engaged in their pure devotional service. If you will totally absorb yourself in such a way, you will experience such a sweet taste from Krishna’s name that you will not want to turn your attention anywhere else.
Sankarshan Das Adhikari
The most powerful and effective means for cleansing ourselves of all negative energy is to constantly or as much as possible chant the Hare Krishna mahamantra:
Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna, Hare Hare
Hare Rama, Hare Rama, Rama Rama, Hare Hare
Sankarshan Das Adhikari
The perfected sages and the devatas respect those whose tongues are ornamented with the abundance of jewel-like verses of praise of Krsna.
Skanda Purana, foun in BRS 1.2.158
The quality of our relationship with Krishna is manifest in proportion to the quality of our japa. Sloppy, deficient japa means a sloppy, deficient relationship with Krishna. Perfect japa means a perfect relationship with Krishna. If we do not have perfect japa, we do not have a perfect relationship with Krishna. Imperfection in our relationship with Krishna means that we are still flirting with Maya, the material energy. Such a love affair with the material energy is suicidal for the eternal living being in that it relegates him to rotate perpetually in the cycle of birth and death. Therefore to be saved from the clutches of the material energy we have no alternative. We must perfect our japa by diving deep into transcendental meditation each time we chant our rounds.
Sankarshan Das Adhikari
By crying out the word “Krsna” one can at once transcend a fearful
situation:
The calves that were pasturing nearby entered into the deep forest, allured by new grasses, and gradually went out of sight. When the boys saw that the calves were not nearby they became afraid for their safety, and they immediately cried out, “Krsna!” Krsna is the killer of fear personified. Everyone is afraid of fear personified, but fear personified is afraid of Krsna. By crying out the word “Krsna,” the boys at once transcended the fearful situation.
Krsna, the Supreme Personality of Godhead
If one can chant and hear Hare Krsna and always remember Lord Krsna, then he is sure to become fearless of death, which may come at any moment.
The Nectar of Devotion
“When chanting the maha-mantra, we are completely safe, even in this most dangerous position. We should always be aware that in this material world, we are always in a dangerous position. Srimad-Bhagavatam confirms: padam padam yad vipadam na tesam [SB 10.14.58]. In this world, there is danger at every step. The devotees of the Lord, however, are not meant to remain in this miserable, dangerous place. Therefore we should take care to advance in Krsna consciousness while in this human form. Then our happiness is assured.”
from “The Path of Perfection”
So when chanting the Hare Krsna mantra, Caitanya Mahaprabhu has said not that you chant only one hour – no. One should practice, and that practice was shown by Haridasa Thakura (who chanted almost 24 hours daily). But because we cannot, therefore we have to engage always in the service of Krsna. That will make you remember Krsna.
Srila Prabhupada cited in Lilamrta
BG 2.16: Those who are seers of the truth have concluded that of the nonexistent [the material body] there is no endurance and of the eternal [the soul] there is no change. This they have concluded by studying the nature of both.
The most basic fundamental truth entry to any spiritual path of self realisation is TO SEER not as DOER. Whenever we are engaging in the service of KRSNA, WHEN WE TRY TO DO OURSELVES we get tired mentally and physically. The moment we take the shelter of divine force of KRSNA for any activity TO START, just ask for help or shelter from KRSNA. Observe or seer how much energy we get from within (KRSNA gives us all the energy).