-
8/8/2019 August 28 Akincana Prabhu 2
1/3
1
August 28, 2010
There is a small anecdote that can be recounted in relation to
the deities at Puri. There
was a family who had come for darshan of the deities at
Jagannath Puri. The family had
comprised of man, wife and a small child. The couple was outside
the temple and they
heard their child coming out of the temple crying. He complained
to his mother that the
deity to the left had reportedly slapped him. The deity was
understood to be of SriBalbhadra. When the mother inquired as to
why the child had approached the deities,
the child said that he had liked the decorations of the deity of
Subhadra Mataji and he
had gone there with an intention of snatching the garland from
her neck. Thus it can be
understood that Jagannath and his associates are very active in
Puri Dhama.
There was another well known event that happened in connection
with the Glories of the
Lord in Puri. There was a milkman who used to adulterate milk
with a large portion of
water. This was used as an offering to the Lord. This was a
regular feature and it so
happened that the Lord got angry with this miserly behavior of
the milkman. The milk
that the milkman used started to sour unabatedly in spite of a
lot of precautions taken by
the milkman. The milkman out of great frustration approached the
head priest and
requested him to give a solution. The priest was immediately
able to decipher that the
milkman was notorious for milk adulteration. When he questioned
the milkman
regarding this, the milkman readily accepted his folly. He was
asked to stop this unethical
practice and the milkman promptly gave up his nefarious
practice. The Lord immediately
withdrew his anger and the milkman never complained of milk
spoiling.
Another pastime was that of a king. The king was a pious king
and he had the habit of
accepting Lord Jagannaths Garland every time he visited the
temple for darshan. The
Glories of Lord Jagannath - 2
KalpatararuCo-operativeHou
singSociety
Com
munityHall
Sector8-B
CBDBelapurNaviMumbai
-
8/8/2019 August 28 Akincana Prabhu 2
2/3
2
temple priest would honor the king in this way every time. It so
happened that on one
day, the priest forgot to reserve the Lords garland for the king
and he himself wore the
offered garland. In the mean time the kings infantry arrived at
the temple gates. The
priest suddenly took note of his mistake. Out of extreme fear,
the priest put back the
same garland on the Lords body. This act in the classical mood
is an Aparadh or a
violation in the process of Bhakti. When the king arrived at the
altar, the priest put the
garland on the Kings neck. The King smelled the garland and
during the act, he observed
that the garland had strands of hair on it. The king could
immediately decipher that the
priest had worn the garland earlier and had incidentally put it
back on the Lord. The king
was extremely furious on learning this fact. However the priest
denied the incident andwas quite vehement about it. When the king
asked the priest as to how strands of hair be
found on the garland, the priest out of extreme fear said that
the hair was actually of
Lord Jagannath. The King was now sure that the priest was
bluffing. The king out of
compassion told the priest that he would spare the priest if the
priest could prove in one
day that the hair that was there in the garland was actually the
hair of Lord Jagannath as
the priest claimed. The king then left the scene. That night the
priest could not sleep .He
was crying at the altar of the Lord and was begging to the Lord
for His causeless mercy.
The next day when the altar was opened, to the astonishment of
the priest, he saw that
Lord Jagannath was sporting long hair. When the king came that
day and saw the hairunder the helmet of the Lord, the king was
further angered and he thought that the
priest had fixed false hair on the Lord to befool him. The king
ordered his men to pull the
hair of the Lord thinking that the hair was actually planted by
the priest. When this was
done, blood started oozing out from the Lords head. The king was
terribly pained by this
and was filled with remorse for having hurt the Supreme Lord.
Then Lord Jagannath
addressed the king and told him that the temple priest was a
great devotee of the Lord.
Although he had committed a mistake by lying to the king, he
should be pardoned by the
king taking into account the priests qualification of being a
sincere devotee of the Lord.
There is another Leela of the Lord during the lifetime of Srila
Prabhupada. Srila
Prabhupada had once ordered the Abhishekam of the Lord. Lord
Jagannath is actually
served flowers and bathed with them. There was a Mataji in the
movement who had
assumed that Abhishekam actually happens when the Lord is
cleansed with water
cleansing agents. So she took the wooden deities to the washroom
and started cleaning
the deities with water. Though this is not considered as the
right approach towards
honoring the Lord in the form of Sri Jagannath, the Lord did not
take offence to such act
since he is most merciful and just accepts the sincere
intentions of the devotee behind
such an act.
-
8/8/2019 August 28 Akincana Prabhu 2
3/3
3
The introduction of Rath Yatra in ISKCON happened after the
incident described below.
There was a Mataji who was an ardent follower of Srila
Prabhupada. Srila Prabhupada
had advised his devotees that one should offer the Lord, what
one feels fit to be offered
or also, we should treat the Lord in a way better than the way
we like ourselves to be
treated. There was a Mataji who liked going out. She had
remembered Srila
Prabhupdas words and she decided to take the deities to the park
since she liked to go
out to the park. She would carry the deities to the park and
would perform Kirtan there.
Once when Srila Prabhupada opened the temple Altar he saw that
the deities were
missing. He was told that this particular Mataji had been
carrying Sri Jagannath wherever
she went to give pleasure to Him. Srila Prabhupada then advised
this Mataji thatJagannath only leaves the temple on one day and
that is the day of the rath yatra. This
inspired Srila Prabhupada to introduce rath yatra in ISKCON.
This is now a worldwide
phenomenon.
When Srila Prabhupada was asked why Sri Jagannath yatra was
conducted by him outside
Puri , Srila Prabhupada replied that Jagannath means Lord of the
world and not only Lord
of Puri Dhama. Before Prabhupada nobody had attempted to give
the Sanatana Dharma
to Westerners. The Word Hindu does not appear in our Sastras.
Srila Prabhupada proved
to the world that Santana Dharma was all encompassing. Srila
Prabhupada explains why
it is necessary for Grihasthas to keep and serve deities at
home. Bhagawan is complete inall respects. However we offer him
Bhoga and take Prasad. Why is that necessary? An
analogy of a mirror can be given here. When a person shaves in
front of the mirror, it is
seen that the image in the mirror which is our own image also
gets cleanly shaved. Our
real form is actually the form of Krishna and we are merely his
infinitesimal parts. When
we serve the Lord with love, all our own requirements are
automatically fulfilled. When
we serve God we are truly benefitted and its not that the Lord
needs any advantage out
of our serving him. Thus we establish a relationship with the
Lord.
