Introduction to chapter 9

This chapter describes Śrī Gaurasundara’s sāta-prahariyā-mahā-prakāśa, or twenty-one-hour divine manifestation, His sitting on the throne of Lord Viṣṇu, the performance of His abhiṣeka by the devotees, the offering of prayers and the worship of Mahāprabhu with sixteen ingredients according to the rules and regulations prescribed with the ten- syllable Gopāla-mantra, the Lord’s eating foodstuffs offered by the devotees, Mahāprabhu’s narration of the previous histories of devotees headed by Śrīvāsa, the devotee’s performance of evening ārati, topics of the topmost devotee Śrīdhara, and the glories of Vaiṣṇavas’ characteristics.

One day Mahāprabhu came with Nityānanda to the house of Śrīvāsa. Understanding the mood of the Lord, all the assembled devotees began to perform kīrtana. Śrī Gaurasundara, who is the supreme teacher of everyone, regularly danced in the kīrtana in the mood of a devotee, yet in His own mood He sometimes sat on the throne of Viṣṇu as if unaware of what He was doing. On this day, however, the Supreme Lord Śrī Gaurasundara concealed His mood as a devotee, and with a desire to accept the service of His surrendered devotees, He sat on the throne of Viṣṇu for twenty-one hours and revealed that He is personally Lord Viṣṇu, the shelter of all devotees. In this mahā-prakāśa pastime, He manifested all the forms of Viṣṇu’s incarnations.

This day, in response to the Lord’s gesture, the devotees happily worshiped Śrī Gaura-Nārāyaṇa, who is the Lord of Vaikuṇṭha and full in six opulences, with various ingredients through the performance of the abhiṣeka ceremony meant for the King of kings. After worshiping Mahāprabhu with sixteen ingredients according to the prescriptions of the ten-syllable Gopāla-mantra, the devotees offered various prayers and described His transcendental qualities and pastimes by glorifying Him as the cause of all causes, the controller of all controllers, and the Lord who has accepted the mood of a devotee to manifest His own service for delivering the fallen souls. Thereafter, Śrī Gaurasundara spontaneously extended His lotus feet to be worshiped, and all the devotees worshiped His lotus feet with various accumulated ingredients according to their respective desires. With a desire to accept the service of His devotees, Mahāprabhu also happily ate various foodstuffs offered by them and began to describe previous experiences of the devotees headed by Śrīvāsa. Later, after the devotees finished offering evening ārati, Śrī Gaurasundara instructed the devotees to bring His dearmost devotee Śrīdhara in order to exhibit His pastimes of opulence to him. As the Vaiṣṇavas following the Lord’s instructions covered half the distance, they heard Śrīdhara loudly chanting the holy names of Hari, and by following that sound they came to his house. Although according to external characteristics Śrīdhara was extremely poor, since he was a transcendental devotee of Mahāprabhu, he was eternally enriched with the treasure of kṛṣṇa-prema. The extraordinary example of service to the Lord exhibited in this world by the destitute Kholāvecā Śrīdhara, who was as truthful as Yudhiṣṭhira, is meant to be followed by everyone. The atheists thought that Śrīdhara remained awake and chanted the name of the Lord throughout the night due to being afflicted by poverty and hunger. They did not know that Śrīdhara was constantly engaged in the service of the husband of Lakṣmīdevī, the predominating deity of the all opulences, therefore he can never actually be afflicted by poverty.

Śrīdhara did not pay any attention to the statements of the atheists but constantly remained absorbed in drinking the nectar of Kṛṣṇa’s holy names. At night he eagerly prayed to the Lord for the spiritual benefit of himself and the entire world. As soon as Śrīdhara heard the name of Mahāprabhu from the devotees, he lost consciousness out of ecstasy. The devotees then carefully brought him before Mahāprabhu. On seeing Śrīdhara, Mahāprabhu became greatly pleased, and Śrīdhara also became overwhelmed by seeing the Lord’s most enchanting transcendental form. During the Lord’s pastimes as a student, Śrīdhara passed his life by selling banana leaves, banana flowers, and banana stems. In order to establish that the Supreme Lord happily accepts the offerings of His devotees but does not even look at the offerings of nondevotees, Mahāprabhu would forcibly snatch those items from Śrīdhara and as a result even quarreled with him. Mahāprabhu reminded Śrīdhara about those pastimes and expressed His desire to award him the eight kinds of mystic perfection. Thereafter Mahāprabhu displayed His extraordinary opulence to Śrīdhara. As soon as Śrīdhara saw that display, he was struck with wonder and fell unconscious to the ground. When on Śrīman Mahāprabhu’s order Śrīdhara regained his external consciousness, Mahāprabhu instructed him to offer prayers. After Śrīdhara humbly expressed his inability to offer prayers to Mahāprabhu on the pretext of ignorance, the Lord ordered Śuddhā Sarasvatī to manifest on the tongue of Śrīdhara, and thus Śrīdhara began to offer wonderful prayers to Mahāprabhu. Being pleased by the prayers of Śrīdhara, Mahāprabhu asked him to accept any benediction he wanted. Śrīdhara asked for the benediction that He who regularly quarreled with him (Śrīdhara) over banana leaves and flowers may remain his Lord, birth after birth. When Mahāprabhu desired to make Śrīdhara the emperor, Śrīdhara did not accept but rather prayed for the qualification to glorify the Lord’s transcendental qualities.

The devotees of Śrī Gaura do not hanker for any material object, they simply pray for the transcendental service of the Lord. Persons who have received Gaurasundara’s merciful glance know that religiosity, economic development, sense gratification or the eight mystic perfections, and even liberation are most abominable and insignificant, and thus they simply desire the service of the lotus feet of Kṛṣṇa. They do not desire their own sense gratification. A Vaiṣṇava cannot be recognized by his external features. People who are intoxicated with pride due to material assets cannot understand the glories of the opulence and wealth of Śrīdhara, who is an exalted transcendental Vaiṣṇava. Although from the material point of view it may appear that the Vaiṣṇavas are deficient, they actually have no deficiency. Although Vaiṣṇavas appear in poor families within this world to teach the fallen and wretched living entities to worship Hari, they are not actually poor. The purpose of such pastimes is to demonstrate how one can worship Hari in spite of being born in a poor family. The characteristics of Vaiṣṇavas are incomprehensible to the materialists. If one surrenders to the Vaiṣṇavas with nonduplicitous simplicity, then by their mercy one can recognize them. It is the duty of every intelligent man to stay far away from the vaiṣṇava-aparādha of trying to measure Vaiṣṇavas with material knowledge. A person who is devoid of vaiṣṇava-aparādha can easily attain love of God by chanting the holy name of Kṛṣṇa even once, otherwise nāmāparādha in the form of blaspheming Vaiṣṇavas will create havoc in one’s life.