Srila Gurudev in London
All those who came in contact with Srila Gurudev, Srila Bhakti Sundar Govinda Dev Goswami Maharaj, across the world or at home in India, could clearly see his magnanimity, his beauty and his kindness. To try and describe his charm and affection feels like, how Sri Krishna Das Kaviraj Goswami said in the Sri Chaitanya Charitamrita, a dwarf trying to touch the moon. But we must still try and glorify Guru, mostly for our benefit, but also to try and give a testament on how beautiful our Gurudev is.
Hearing his master’s voice
Although he was the embodiment of kindness and affection, Srila Gurudev was always very serious about his service to his Guru Maharaj. He once said he remembered watching the RCA commercial in which the dog hears his masters voice through the gramophone, his master had died sometime before, but when the voice came out of the gramophone the dog became very attentive. Like that Srila Gurudev said, no matter what, we must always remember our Masters voice.
Srila Gurudev in Australia
The treasure of Srila Gurudev’s voice is kept in tapes and books, and all of his beautiful teachings live in the temple of his disciples’ hearts. No one can deny what he so sweetly repeated time after time; be humble, be tolerant and give honor to others. In my sad case whenever his conversations would turn into more eloquent matters all that would just slip away.
Yet in all of his loving exchanges with the devotees he tried very hard to impress in us the necessity of being a humble servant and maintaining a fertile heart where our little creeper of devotion could grow and be nourished.
And so by whatever force of destiny or mercy that brought us here, we have found ourselves at the feet of Guru. In Sanskrit Guru means heavy, as in immovable. This is a hard concept to grasp, since in our minds heavy is not precisely synonymous with pleasant. But Sri Guru’s teachings, as well as his presence, although very loving and affectionate, are not light. They are not meant to be light. It is a life changing experience if there was ever one. Your life will never be the same. Once you accept a spiritual Master, he is your master, you belong to him and he is your shelter. Abandoning all ego, or previous consideration of our accumulated knowledge, all of it, it is done. Ready to be thrown out the window because at the feet of our Master we will understand that love is not a concept but a verb, it is the action that, defined by our consciousness, should shape our life. To love is to be devoted to something. At the feet of Guru your life starts most hopeful. Srila Gurudev always told us, “You do not have to be perfect but your trying attitude must be perfect.” We must try, heart and soul, to fulfill that, to be a servant of a servant, to actively be that.
Srila Gurudev supervising the building of our Math in Govardhan
We hear again and again the phrase “die to live,” and it is hard to understand that, but Srila Guru Maharaj, Srila Bhakti Rakshak Sridhar Dev-Goswami Maharaj, said “…The search for Sri Krishna, reality the beautiful. But how should we search? Through devotion. And what is that? Dedication. And what is dedication? Surrender, self-sacrifice–die to live. And what is living? To live in love… and this may be understood through Sri Guru and His Grace.”
So, to remember our Master’s Voice is definitely to live in love, to carry on with the affectionate certainty that we are going in the right direction, that far from being abandoned we are living under Sri Guru’s shelter and under the shelter of those he trusted to carry the flag of our Math and all the glorious teachings of our Guru Varga. We may not be perfect disciples but we have a perfect master and as long as we listen to his voice and try with all sincerity to follow his instructions we will always live under our master’s shelter.
To hear Srila Gurudev singing Jaya Radhe Jaya Krishna Jaya Vrindabana click here…