BT Swami latest letter
cos...@gmail.com
Bhakti-Tirtha Swami sets the stage for his final offering
Posted Apr. 26, 2005
Dear Maharajas, Prabhus, and disciples
Please accept my humble obeisances. All glories to Srila Prabhupada.
This is probably the penultimate special message of wisdom from the
ground hog aka the beggar aka spiritual warrior. So let this prepare
you for the ultimate message. (smile) You can see that this kind of
communication that I am doing must actually come to a stop. First
because it is natural, for I definitely have to get out of this body
some time in the near future, but also because if I am not careful,
this sort of communication could become my biggest failure.
Just consider how every time I send out some of these messages, so many
nice devotees all around the world write and call and offer me kindness
and praise. Yes, this is wonderful but can you see all the danger in
this? One of Maya's most special tricks is to get the devotee who has
acquired some little achievement to start thinking, "Just see, I am an
advanced devotee."
For instance, if I'm not careful and if I let myself start thinking in
this way, then when the helpers come to take me out of the body they'll
take me straight to Brahmaloka or some place of this nature. They'll
say, "This was your final test, and you accepted certain adoration and
glorification as your own, therefore go ahead and enjoy now for 311
trillion years managing your own planet or universe."
Isn't Maya just so tricky? (Smile) When Vasudeva the leper was healed
by Krishna he prayed very intensely, "Please do not let me become
proud." When the great devotee Madhavendra Puri was called out by the
pujari and the Deity Ksira-Cora Gopinatha, he was so eager to avoid
praise.
We've never heard of devotees like Narottama Dasa Thakur, Bhaktivinode
Thakur, or our Srila Prabhupada (we can go on and on and on) being in a
mood of arrogance. They were constantly writing and praying, addressing
how they do not have love of God and how they are unqualified in so
many areas, etc.
Anyway, what I'm writing now is for my own edification and purification
and maybe for yours as well. Devotees like me, in one sense have no
qualification in practically any area but have received blessings by
causeless mercy. However, pride manifesting as pratistha (a desire for
fame) is a serious enemy.
When I had my amputation I offered up a sacrifice. I offered that a
substantial quantity of pain that some of the women, children, elders,
brahmins, and cows, etc. in our movement had suffered, could be
absorbed in my extremely deteriorated leg and that when the leg was
amputated, as it was thrown away from my own body, that there would
also be some elimination of this unhealthy karma from the body of our
institution.
So now today in a similar spirit I want to offer in sacrifice all the
rest of what remains with this body. In other words, I fully want to
present myself to the Lord in the mood of Saranagati-full surrender.
"Thy will be done, so please use me in this last way to make an
ultimate sacrifice for those devotees, saints, and sadhus who are
having seemingly insurmountable obstacles in their own spiritual
journey."
I would like to also make it specific, particularly focusing on
forgiveness.
"The duty of a brahmana is to culture the quality of forgiveness, which
is illuminating like the sun. The Supreme Personality of Godhead, Hari,
is pleased with those who are forgiving." (SB 9.15.40)
All of us have so many people who we've interacted with who have hurt
us in different ways. Just to exist, or to be engaged in any type of
relationship means we're going to be hurt by someone and we're going to
hurt someone. We all have people who we need to forgive and there are
so many people who need to forgive us. Sometimes the person we have the
greatest difficulty forgiving is ourself.
Why am I bringing up forgiveness and resentment? Because I am noticing
that it is a very serious issue. I am especially sending this message
out to those children who've been abused. In the USA for example, the
statistics show that one in three girls and one in five boys have been
sexually abused, and unfortunately most of these kinds of abuse are
done by the people who are actually supposed to be their protectors or
overseers, etc.
So this is a global problem of people being abused and hurt by their
fathers, uncles, brothers, mothers, sisters, doctors, counselors, and
all other types of mentors. In other words, this is so unfortunate and
is never to be justified, but it has gone on everywhere on this planet.
And surely each institution, community, and family must find more ways
to minimize so much of the suffering that people are experiencing
through these abuses and traumas.
Some may ask what right I have to ask others to forgive, but I can
assure you that by being born in a minority body (without the active
presence of my father) and going through all the ranks of ISKCON, I
surely have my history of all kinds of abuses. Let's get right to the
point.
A) Forgiveness does not mean
i) That what happened to you was your fault;
ii) That you allow those who hurt you or any others to continue the
abuse;
iii) Not even that you have to forget, as sometimes we have to remember
the past so that it doesn't repeat itself and often we have to learn
from the past while we look and plan for the future;
iv) That what happened, as horrible as it was, really wasn't so bad
after all.
B) Forgiveness does mean
i) That you stop allowing whoever hurt you so much to continue to daily
hurt you by carrying this around in your mind every day and therefore
being attacked, disappointed, and hurt every day again and again;
ii) That you now live for the present and the future and you stop
bringing a wounded you into all of your present encounters. It is not
right for you to hurt yourself or those who come around you, who you
really want to give your greatest love, attention and full presence to.
But when you do not forgive you keep dropping a wounded you on others
day after day;
iii) That you're ready to stop giving up, denying yourself power every
day and being so faithless, for Krishna can use us and help us in so
many ways if we do not keep shutting ourselves down with resentment;
iv) That in spite of whatever else may be happening you are ready to
keep looking for and accepting Krishna's mercy, which cannot happen
without accessing a deeper level of compassion and sensitivity
ourselves. Isn't it true that the greatest achievers have had to deal
with the greatest obstacles, and in some cases they particularly turned
their obstacles into opportunities?
C) When we do not forgive
i) It is like carrying around in your hand a bunch of hot coals and
waiting for a chance to throw them at the person who hurt you. But look
how you burnt you own hand waiting for the opportunity. In essence
forgiveness actually does more for your own well being than for
another;
ii) We have to ask ourselves how much suffering do those who hurt us
the most have to undergo before we can release them? Must they be run
over by 10 trains, chopped in to a hundred pieces or even eaten up by a
pack of lions?
Let's just be honest. If we look at the lives of all the great
personalities in our sastra we will see the amazing ways in which they
forgave. If any of you have time, I gave a course in Mayapur in 2003 on
forgiving those who hurt you the most and we talked about over 40 or so
great personalities in our Vaisnava history and examined what we learnt
from the amazing ways they forgave.
So the groundhog aka the beggar aka spiritual warrior is praying that
the ultimate sacrifice he makes in having to walk away from his body
will act somewhat as a catalyst for helping us all to look closer at
resentment and forgiveness. The sad thing is that most of the time
we're prone to think that we have already forgiven others.
It can be a gradual process that has many levels. For example, think of
the person who has hurt you the most, and now think of all the most
wonderful things you can imagine happening to this person. If you are
very uncomfortable with this, or if you feel too angry or uneasy
hearing or seeing him or her, then more than likely you haven't
released this person from your consciousness. Remember that to see a
Vaisnava and not be happy is an offense. (Skanda Purana)
So that this beggar does not engender pride thinking that he has some
special sacrifice to make or some very special wisdom to offer, he will
try to particularly use some of these points to look deeper at the
subtleties in his own consciousness. I hope that if you listen to the
seminar on forgiveness-the wonderful pastimes about our great acaryas
and how they forgave and the amazing honest sharing amongst the seminar
participants-it will help you to help yourself to help others.
Yours in Srila Prabhupada's Service,
With Love
Bhakti-Tirtha Swami
If anyone would like to order the seminars on forgiveness please
contact MIHE directly. For UK or orders from Europe go to
www.btswami.com or go to www.ifast.net for orders from the rest of the
world.
More about BT Swami on www.btswami.com.