Pran ache tar, se hetu prachar -

This post is split off from the Rabindranath poem thread in the Pearls of Wisdom section.



How did he have disciples if he wasn't preaching already?

So, who can we blame for his taking sannyasa from a picture of his diksha guru?
If some disicple wanted to take credit for bringing him out of bhajan to preach, then he should be the one to blame for the unorthodox manner in which Saraswati Thakur took sannyasa.
However, we know that Bhaktivinode Thakur prayed to the Lord for a son who could establish a powerful preaching mission and that he instilled this concept into young Bimala Prasad from early childhood.
Saraswati Thakur might have indulged in intense bhajan for the purpose of purification to give him the power to accomplish the goals that Bhaktivinode Thakur had instilled in him. To say that some disciple dragged him out of Bhajan to preach is simply giving recognition to a disciple that eventually rejected Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Thakur and suffered a terrible life afterwords.

Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasawati was born to preach. Some disciple might have been the instrument of the Lord to convince him that NOW was the time to come out of bhajan, but we should hardly imagine that his whole preaching mission was inspired by some so-called disciple who eventually rejected him for the "traditional school".

Bhaktivinode Thakur groomed Bimala Prasad from the very beginning to take the Gaudiya mission to the world. His preaching mission was not inspired by some guru-tyagi who committed untold offenses.

I think it would be very unfair if this post gets censored and only one side of the story gets told in this thread.

This post is split off from the Rabindranath poem thread in the Pearls of Wisdom section.



There was some difficulty splitting this post for some reason.

Anyway, there is always a difference in the way we look at things AFTER they happen and when we try to look at the way people experienced them before or while they were happening. Thus a statement as "he was born to preach" is true when we look back on it. It may even have been true before it happened. Whether or not it was true for Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati when he sat down to chant 10 kroras or whatever number of Holy Names is another.

I think my PM to Jagat about a month ago in which we were discussing a previous post concerning Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakur being a sadhana siddha might shed some light on this:

Jagats response to this was also very insightful:

The point is that just as Sri Krishna puts Yashoda and others under the spell of Yoga Maya to allow them to love him with abandon and intimacy without the awe and reverence, Sri Krishna also puts his Nitya Parishads under another form of Yoga Maya which allows them to display certain human traits in the struggle for spiritual perfection that become the shining example to all of us struggling jivas on the path to spiritual perfection ourselves. Srila Saraswati Thakurs vow to chant 1 billion names of Krishna was to show us perfection doesn't come cheap. We will have to on one level earn this unconditional mercy of Guru and Gaura.

The disciple of Bhaktivinode Thakur who came to ask him to preach was Kunja Babu who eventually became Srila B.V. Tirtha Maharaja. Srila Saraswati Thakur used to see persons like this as His own Guru or as Srila Bhaktivinode Thakur himself coming to get him to preach. We should see the way they see. When some old man used to criticise Srila Saraswati Thakur for walking up and down the road in Mayapur with his Sannyas disciples the disciples were furious at this old man for his yelling across the road at Srila Saraswati Thakur but He never paid any attention to it. When this man died and all the disciple came to joyfully inform Srila Saraswati Thakur of his death Srila Saraswati Thakur cried and said who will now instruct me about my false pride. Srila Saraswati Thakur saw him as a siksha guru.

This is the way to see these events in our lives when someone comes to criticise or instruct us to act we should be thankful that our Guru Maharaja has come in this form to instruct us for our advancement. Just like Srila Prabhupada said in his glorification of Srila B.P. Kesava Maharaja that Srila Kesava Maharaja had fulfilled the order of his Guru Maharaja by forcibly making him take sannyas. Srila Prabhupada had this same vision this is my Guru Maharaja come to instruct me through my Godbrother. However, it is also important for us not to lose sight of the play of yogamaya and naravat lila. It is Achintya-bhedabheda!

I remain as always your most worthless servant

DASA

Of course, in the same poem refered to above, Saraswati Thakur says--

ohe mon ! tumi kisera vaiSNava
pratiSThAra tare nirjana ghare
tomAra harinAma kevala kaiTava

"O mind! What kind of Vaishnava are you?
You remain in this hermit's cubicle
hoping to attract the adoration of the masses.
Your chanting of the Holy Names is a trick."

I reflected on Abhaya's
one bleak moment of truth,
when he quoted the Bhagavata line:

"On him who Hari mercy takes,
his life, his wealth, his all he takes."

So I don't believe in gurus made in the sky.
Gurus are forged in the furnace
like every other finished thing.