Daily Reading

The Way of Chanting and Knowing Kṛṣṇa

Hare Kṛṣṇa, Hare Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa, Hare Hare/ Hare Rāma, Hare Rāma, Rāma Rāma, Hare Hare. This is transcendental sound vibration. It will help us to cleanse the dust from the mirror of the mind. At the present moment we have accumulated so much material dust on the mirror of the mind, just as on Second Avenue (New York City) there is dust and soot over everything due to the heavy traffic. Due to our manipulation of material activities, a great deal of dust has collected over our mind’s clear mirror, and as a consequence we are unable to see things in perspective. This vibration of transcendental sound (the Hare Kṛṣṇa mantra) will cleanse away this dust and enable us to see clearly our real constitutional position. As soon as we come to understand “I am not this body; I am spirit soul, and my symptom is consciousness,” we will be able to establish ourselves in real happiness. As our consciousness is purified by this process of chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa, all our material miseries will disappear. There is a fire that is always blazing over this material world, and everyone is trying to extinguish it, but there is no possibility of extinguishing this fire of the miseries of material nature unless we are situated in our pure consciousness, in our spiritual life.

One of the purposes for Lord Kṛṣṇa’s descent or appearance in this material world is to extinguish the fire of material existence for all living entities by setting forth the dharma.

yadā yadā hi dharmasya
glānir bhavati bhārata
abhyutthānam adharmasya
tadātmānaṁ sṛjāmy aham
paritrāṇāya sādhūnāṁ
vināśāya ca duṣkṛtām
dharma-saṁsthāpanārthāya
sambhavāmi yuge yuge

“Whenever and wherever there is a decline in religious practice, O descendant of Bharata, and a predominant rise of irreligion – at that time I descend Myself. To deliver the pious and to annihilate the miscreants, as well as to reestablish the principles of religion, I Myself appear, millennium after millennium.” (Gītā 4.7–8)

In this verse the word dharma is used. This word has been translated into English in various ways. Sometimes it is translated as “faith,” but according to Vedic literature, dharma is not a kind of faith. Faith may change, but dharma cannot be changed. The liquidity of water cannot be changed. If it is changed – if, for instance, water becomes solid – it is actually no longer in its constitutional position. It is existing under a certain qualifying condition. Our dharma, or constitutional position, is that we are part and parcel of the Supreme, and this being the case, we have to dovetail or subjugate our consciousness to the Supreme.

This position of transcendental service to the Supreme Whole is being misused due to material contact. Service is implicit in our constitutional position. Everyone is a servant, and no one is a master. Everyone is serving someone or other. Although the president may be the chief executive of the state, still he is serving the state, and when his services are no longer required, the state disposes of him. To think to oneself, “I am the master of all I survey,” is called māyā, illusion. Thus in material consciousness our service is being misused under various designations. When we can become free from these designations, that is to say, when the dust has been cleared from the mirror of the mind, we will be able to see ourselves in our actual position as eternal servants of Kṛṣṇa. 

One should not think that his service in the material world and his service in the spiritual atmosphere are the same. We may shudder to think, “Oh, after liberation will I still be a servant?” This is because we have experience that being a servant in the material world is not very enjoyable, but transcendental service is not like this. In the spiritual world there is no difference between the servant and the master. Here, of course, there is distinction, but in the absolute world everything is one. For instance, in the Bhagavad-gītā we can see that Kṛṣṇa has taken the position of servant as the chariot driver of Arjuna. In his constitutional position, Arjuna is the servant of Kṛṣṇa, but in behavior we can see that sometimes the Lord becomes the servant of the servant. So we should be careful not to carry materialistic ideas into the spiritual realm. Whatever we have materially experienced is but a perverted reflection of things in spiritual life.