(Click to enlarge photo of Srila Prabhupada translating)
"So you European, American students, you take full advantage of this Vedic culture. I am therefore so much laboring hard that we..., before my leaving this body, I may give you some books who you can enjoy after my death. So utilize it. Utilize it. Read every śloka nicely, try to understand the meaning, discuss amongst yourself. Nityaṁ bhagavata-sevayā. That is our mission. Naṣṭa-prāyeṣv abhadreṣu nityaṁ bhagavata-sevayā (SB 1.2.18). Abhadra. We have got so many dirty things within our heart. So these dirty things can be cleansed simply by Kṛṣṇa consciousness. There is no other method.
śṛṇvatāṁ sva-kathāḥ kṛṣṇa
puṇya-śravaṇa-kīrtanaḥ
hṛdy antaḥ stho hy abhadrāṇi
vidhunoti suhṛt satām
(SB 1.2.17)
(Śrī Kṛṣṇa, the Personality of Godhead, who is the Paramātmā [Supersoul] in everyone's heart and the benefactor of the truthful devotee, cleanses desire for material enjoyment from the heart of the devotee who has developed the urge to hear His messages, which are in themselves virtuous when properly heard and chanted.)
naṣṭa-prāyeṣv abhadreṣu
nityaṁ bhāgavata-sevayā
bhagavaty uttama-śloke
bhaktir bhavati naiṣṭhikī
(SB 1.2.18)
(By regular attendance in classes on the Bhāgavatam and by rendering of service to the pure devotee, all that is troublesome to the heart is almost completely destroyed, and loving service unto the Personality of Godhead, who is praised with transcendental songs, is established as an irrevocable fact.)
This is the process. Śṛṇvatāṁ sva-kathāḥ kṛṣṇa. Kṛṣṇa is within your heart. Kṛṣṇa is trying to help you from within and from without. From without, He is presenting His form in this temple. You can take the advantage of serving Him. He is sending His representative, spiritual master, to speak you directly about Kṛṣṇa, and He is ready to help you from within as Paramātmā. Kṛṣṇa is so kind. He wants that you are all suffering in this material existence, Kṛṣṇa comes as He is, and He canvasses, sarva-dharmān parityajya mām ekaṁ śaraṇaṁ vraja (BG 18.66).
So bhāgavata-sevayā, nityaṁ bhāgavata-sevayā, cleansing the heart. Ceto-darpaṇa-mārjanam. This is the process. We are part and parcel of God, Kṛṣṇa, so we are pure. We have become impure on account of material contamination. So we have to purify ourself, and the process is to hear about Kṛṣṇa. That's all."
(Srila Prabhupada Lecture, London, July 6, 1972)
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