Yes, we can note here that Śrīla Prabhupāda, when he was giving class, and he was speaking, I guess it was from Bombay where he had had this fight, and he said that the devotees have to tolerate people they don't like as they chant Hare Kṛṣṇa. But the devotees have to tolerate, and he was raising his voice, "Tolerate, tolerate!" So, this is while engaged in preaching work he has to meet with so many opposing elements. Therefore, a sādhu, the devotee of the Lord, has to be very tolerant. "Someone may ill-treat him because the conditioned souls are not prepared to receive the transcendental knowledge of devotional service. They do not like it; that is their disease. A sādhu has the thankless task of impressing upon them the importance of devotional service. Sometimes devotees are personally attacked with violence. Lord Jesus Christ was crucified, Haridāsa Ṭhākura was whipped in twenty-two marketplaces, Lord Caitanya's principal assistant Nityānanda was violently attacked by Jagāi and Mādhāi. But still they were tolerant because their mission was to deliver the fallen souls. One of the qualifications of a sādhu is that he is very tolerant and is merciful to all fallen souls."
"He is merciful because he is the well-wisher of all living entities. He is not only well-wisher of human society, but a well-wisher of animal society as well. It is said here, suhṛdaḥ sarva-dehinām, to indicate all living entities who have accepted a material body. Not only does the human being have a material body, but other living entities, such as cats and dogs, also have material bodies. The devotee of the Lord is merciful to everyone: the cat, dog, trees, etc. He treats all living entities in such a way that they can ultimately get salvation from this material entanglement. Śivānanda Sena, one of the disciples of Lord Caitanya, gave liberation to a dog by treating the dog transcendentally. There are many instances where a dog got salvation by association with a sādhu, because a sādhu engages in the highest philanthropic activities for the benediction of all living entities."
"Yet, although a sādhu is not inimical to anyone, the world is so ungrateful that even a sādhu has many enemies. This is ajāta-śatravaḥ, that means he has no enemies. A sādhu has no enemies, but others are enemies towards him."
"So, this is a very nice verse. What is the difference between an enemy and a friend? It is the difference in behavior. A sādhu behaves with all conditioned souls for their ultimate relief from material entanglement. Therefore, no one can be more friendly than a sādhu to a conditioned soul. A sādhu is calm, and he quietly follows the principles of scripture."
"Sādhu means one who follows the principles of scripture, and at the same time is a devotee of the Lord. One who actually follows the principles of scripture must be a devotee of the Supreme Lord, because all the śāstras instruct us to obey the Supreme Personality of Godhead. Sādhu, therefore, means a follower of the scriptural injunctions and a devotee of the Lord. All these characteristics are prominent in a devotee. A devotee develops all good qualities of the demigods, whereas a non-devotee, even though academically qualified, has no actual good qualifications according to the standard of transcendental realization."
namas te sārasvate deve gaura-vāṇī-pracāriṇe
nirviśeṣa-śūnyavādi-pāścātya-deśa-tāriṇe
So, this goes very well with the previous verse in this chapter. The previous verse was sa eva sādhuṣu kṛto mokṣa-dvāram apāvṛtam, that a great attachment to a spiritual soul, the same attachment when applied to the self-realized devotee opens the door of liberation. So, then this next verse is describing a sādhu, that if one is attaching oneself to such a sādhu, then that opens the door of liberation. And what is liberation? That is to come above the modes of material nature and engage in devotional service to the Supreme Lord Kṛṣṇa. This is the real liberation. Unless one comes above the modes of material nature, one cannot actually serve Kṛṣṇa purely. So, it is very important that one is attaching oneself to a devotee like this. We living entities, we are attached in this material world. We are attached to our body and wives, if we have, our husband, or our children, and all other relationships with our friends. If you want to get rid of all these relationships, then you should not see the Supreme Lord Śyāmasundara in three-bending form playing flute at Yamunā. If we see Kṛṣṇa, if we understand Kṛṣṇa, who is so attractive, then actually we can leave the attachment to other things in this material world. And in order to see Kṛṣṇa, we have to surrender to a devotee. Jaḍa Bharata, he was explaining, I think it was from a question by King Rahūgaṇa, this king who was using him as a palanquin carrier. And Jaḍa Bharata said that a mahā-bhāgavata is a person who has gotten the mercy from another pure devotee. So, it is by the association with a pure devotee that one can also become a mahā-bhāgavata. So, this is a very important part of our philosophy. Actually, a person who is like the mahā-bhāgavata, is very advanced soul. There are three levels of advancement in God consciousness or Kṛṣṇa consciousness: kaniṣṭha-adhikārī or prākṛta-bhakta, then madhyama-adhikārī, and then uttama-adhikārī. And we are here speaking about a person who is uttama-adhikārī, a sādhu who has these wonderful qualities. And the verses are explaining very nicely, and Prabhupāda is elaborating on them, that such a sādhu is engaged in pure devotional service to the Lord without deviation. So, that is the uttama-adhikārī. He is very advanced in devotional service to the Supreme Lord. He is tolerant, and Prabhupāda is explaining here, and also in his class, that a devotee must be tolerant because there is so much opposition to his preaching. He is very merciful, and he knows that there is only one thing in this world, and that is to preach Kṛṣṇa consciousness. This is explained in Nectar of Instruction, that when a devotee comes to the level of uttama-adhikārī, he starts to think only one thing to do in this world, and that is preaching the holy name of Kṛṣṇa. In Kali-santaraṇa Upaniṣad, it is explained that hare kṛṣṇa hare kṛṣṇa kṛṣṇa kṛṣṇa hare hare / hare rāma hare rāma rāma rāma hare hare is the mantra that in Kali-yuga will push away all problematic things. Counteract all the problems in Kali-yuga by just chanting this Hare Kṛṣṇa mantra. Prabhupāda is also saying here that he is very merciful to the conditioned soul. And he's also very tolerant, as I explained. And as was seen in that fight in Bombay, he was making so much problems and the police was for him, and not only Prabhupāda was mistreated but the devotees were very much mistreated. So, they had to tolerate all this. And then Prabhupāda also explained that Lord Jesus Christ was crucified, and Haridāsa Ṭhākura was whipped in twenty-two marketplaces, Nityānanda was violently attacked by Jagāi and Mādhāi. But still he was very tolerant, and he stopped Lord Caitanya to kill Jagāi and Mādhāi, but he wanted to save them. So, Lord Caitanya and Nityānanda, they are like that, very tolerant. And here it is also said that he's not only the well-wisher of human society, but he's also the well-wisher of animal society. We know this verse from Bhagavad-gītā, vidyā-vinaya-sampanne brāhmaṇe gavi hastini śuni caiva śvapāke ca paṇḍitāḥ sama-darśinaḥ. This is also symptom of uttama-adhikārī, the humble sage, by virtue of true knowledge, sees with equal vision a learned Brāhmaṇa, a cow, elephant, dog, dog-eater. So, that means that he is actually seeing the soul and is attracted to the soul. He sees that the soul in all these living entities, like the humble Brāhmaṇa, and the dog-eater, is the same, or the dog or elephant like that. So, he sees with equal vision. But is not that he's forgetting that a dog-eater is a sinful person and the Brāhmaṇa is a more pious person. So, he can see that the Brāhmaṇa, because he was using his minute independence in previous life in a good way, he has now a body of a Brāhmaṇa. And a dog-eater, he has misused his minute independence in previous life, and therefore he has a body of a dog-eater. So, it is not that the humble sage cannot see the difference between different bodies. But he sees that all souls are equal. One person is in the body of a woman, another person is body of a man, like this, and the soul is very attractive. So, therefore, that's actually the real person, and he is attracted to that person, to that soul, and therefore he wants to disentangle that soul from the bodily concept of life. The sage, he wants to help both, everyone, it doesn't matter in which body he is. He helps by making that person or that soul go towards liberation and Kṛṣṇa consciousness. So, it is also explained that Śivānanda Sena, a disciple of Lord Caitanya, gave liberation to a dog by treating the dog transcendentally. So, he was feeding the dog prasāda, and he was taking care of the dog. And at one point, the dog disappeared, and then Śivānanda Sena was very sad. And he was looking for this dog everywhere. But somehow or other, this dog had inspiration of the Supersoul, he was just going before Śivānanda Sena and all the devotees that were coming from Bengal to Orissa, Jagannātha Purī. And so the dog was coming to Lord Caitanya, and Lord Caitanya was feeding him with some prasāda and also the dog actually got liberated. And he was back to the spiritual world, it is explained. "The sādhu is calm, and he quietly follows the principles of scripture." So, this is a sādhu is a uttama-adhikārī. And we can see that Śrīla Prabhupāda was definitely an uttama-adhikārī. Because Prabhupāda was going to the West and preaching Kṛṣṇa consciousness among the hippies and dropouts and acid heads as he was saying, those who were there. And acid heads are those who take LSD. And they were so much in the mode of ignorance and also in the passion. But he was able to live, and actually he could see that when he was in this loft first with David Allen. David Allen, who was crazy, was not possible to save, because he was too far away from sanity. But so many others, he was just such a person that many persons became very attracted to him. He who has this equal vision of all living entities, those who are in the lower modes of nature can also feel this, and they become attracted. Some persons they have very good relation with the animals, and the animals can feel it, and they are very attracted to such a person who has this intelligence to deal with the animals. Prabhupāda, can any of you give an attempt how Prabhupāda is a uttama-adhikārī, seeing equally all living entities, although of course can also discriminate between those who are very conditioned by the lower modes of material nature? Q: I remember Nārāyaṇi told me a story of Prabhupāda seeing a slug. Govinda dāsī would be disgusted, "Ew!" And then Prabhupāda was looking, he said to Govinda dāsī that his eyes were big with compassion and almost tears, and he was saying, "Chant for the poor creature."
A: Yes, yes, excellent. So, this is a very good example of a slug, a kind of snail, and Prabhupāda is seeing that there is a soul there. This consciousness, higher consciousness, is sometimes possible even for neophyte devotees. When you're on saṅkīrtana distributing books, then you see everybody, if you are into it really, then you see the soul more or less. And I remember one time, you are intensely looking for persons who can take a book, and then you see a bird. You run to the bird and maybe, "Oh, no, okay, it's a bird." Anyway, yes, Aristaha d, you wanted to say something? Q: I was thinking, first of all, there are some people who can see the soul and they can still cook the animal, a dog-eater and the Brāhmaṇa. A cow is in much more high creation than a dog-eater. Can you repeat that? Q: A cow is in much more high creation than a dog-eater. A: Yes. Q: But still, uttama-adhikārī, he sees that even the meat-eater is a spirit soul, very much covered. For example, when Prabhupāda was speaking to, I think it was Kīrtanānanda, who was a meat-eater. And Prabhupāda was seeing through this heavy covering. And first, there is another instance where Prabhupāda was speaking to a Māyāvādī. And this Māyāvādī, he was parsing Māyāvāda philosophy. And Prabhupāda said, "This is a rascal dog!" And the man said, "I beg your pardon? What did you say?" And then Prabhupāda was repeating, "This is a rascal dog!" And then he was telling him why, and then the man got... because Prabhupāda was penetrating through his covering and he actually reached that person, and then they had a nice conversation after it. So, that shows how Prabhupāda can preach to anyone. He's very... as an uttama-adhikārī, he has very, very strong faith in Kṛṣṇa, so he knows exactly what to do with any person in front of him, in Kṛṣṇa's service. Q: Janeshvara? A: Yeah. Q: Once there was a dog barking outside Prabhupāda's quarters. And I think, if I remember right, it was Pradyumna who shut the door. And then the next day, Prabhupāda heard about this and he got really angry with Pradyumna. And he was really giving him the sauce, "You have no right to shut the door. He has a right to sit there."
A: Well, it's very strange, that his disciple had some weapon? Q: Yeah, I don't know. A: Yeah. Q: I just heard it. I heard it from many, many times. A: Okay. Q: And then there was some other person who asked him, "Can I kill, if I am afraid of malaria, can I kill the mosquito?" And then he said, "If you know exactly which mosquito it is..."
A: "If you know exactly which mosquito it is." Yes, that's what he said. Q: And then when we were in Māyāpur, we went to the Jagannātha temple. And there was, during Ārati, there was a cat coming and sitting down beside us. And then immediately somebody wanted to chase the cat away. And then they told, "No, no, this cat is allowed to come everywhere." So, they allowed the cat to sit there. I was there, so I saw the whole thing. And then after, on the side, there was a little table with mahā-prasāda. One Indian man was sitting giving out mahā-prasāda. But after, the cat went to the table and he was sitting there, and the man gave him some mahā-prasāda and then the cat went away. A: He came every Ārati. Q: He comes every Ārati. I was thinking if a cat can be here, what could we do? It's really amazing. A: Yeah, it is, because outside, it's a temple, there is no wall or door or something. A: Yeah, so, namely, so, Kṛṣṇa consciousness, that... Q: You know that in Vṛndāvana, they had many, many guards at the gate here, and they all had a big gun on their shoulders. You know this, all that? A: They had? Q: Yeah. A: The guards, yes, Indian guards, Indian men with a gun. Q: And Prabhupāda was pointing to one of the guards who shot the dog. Q: Shut the door. A: Yes. Any other reflection or comment? We read the verse again. "The symptoms of a sādhu is that he is tolerant, merciful and friendly to all living entities. He has no enemies, he is peaceful, he abides by the scriptures, and all his characteristics are sublime."
Q: I'm thinking about this "enemy" that "he has no enemies, but there is many who are enemies of him", or make the sādhu their enemy. So, I'm thinking a little bit like because the sādhu speaks the truth and it's sometimes painful to hear the truth, right? It's something inside there. So, but if you find a sādhu that maybe only pleases people, or is it even, should he have enemies, or could one say that he should have people who are against him because he's preaching devotional service and this world is... A: Yeah, Prabhupāda has said that if there is opposition, heavy opposition, that means that you are doing the right thing. So, there is no, of course, to acknowledge that, yes, that is what's said in the purport that people don't want to hear the truth, and therefore they are opposing. But if you are very... if you are very, focus... you just go along with the Kṛṣṇa consciousness, diplomatic... if you're very diplomatic, then people will understand what you are saying in a way. So, you don't say anything, and therefore there's no opposition on their part. But nothing is also happening. There is this saying from an author in Norway, I have forgot his name, but he said that, "If a person is taken away his lie of his life, he has nothing more to live for." There is this, if people, if they hear that, that one should actually follow the principles, no illicit sex, no meat-eating, no intoxication, no gambling, then they think that there is nothing more, there is nothing left to live for, because they are so attached to these things. So, if people are taken away their lie of life, that is the lie of life, that you will be happy by sense gratification, so if somebody is trying to take away that, what they are holding very dear to themselves, they become angry. So, people don't want, they don't want that. What did you ask? Q: I was speaking, should the sādhu have enemies in the world to kind of prove his...? A: Yeah, it's not that he's endeavoring for it, but it's just because he's doing his preaching work, then naturally there will be persons who are enemies. Also, for example, Śrīla Prabhupāda's godbrothers, they were enemies in Prabhupāda's... Prabhupāda was pointing out this. It's not that they were Prabhupāda's enemies, but they became very envious because he was pointing out some things on them, so to say. And then at the end, he excused himself to some of his godbrothers, but they said, "No, no, no, you did the right thing, godbrothers." So, we should be assisting the pure devotee in preaching, and helping all living entities, both cows, dogs, and people. Yeah. Q: And there was a story of a king who was visiting the sādhu living in the mountain and came to the sādhu. And then the king said to the sādhu, "I'm also king." And then, because you are sādhu, you don't have enemies, so the king said, "If you're a king, where is your army?" And then the sādhu said, "I don't have enemies, so I don't need the army."
A: Yes, I think it's a nice answer. If you have, in this world, there are so much military force, but a saintly person has no enemy, so he doesn't need any army, is it? Q: Do you mean that nobody will have the sādhu as an enemy, but there is... it sounds like a person called Bhajananandī who is sitting in some cave somewhere and not preaching. We are, in our line of paramparā, there is preaching. We are preaching, and then there will be some opposition. Q: We create enemies of the physical body but, physically, we have army of... Pardon? Q: We create enemies physically, but spiritually, we don't have enemies. A: No, yeah, I mean in... also, a devotee, he thinks that if somebody is attacking him, he takes that as Kṛṣṇa's mercy or something like that. He takes all oppositions also as Kṛṣṇa's arrangement for his purification. So, but, the one who is opposing, the one who is criticizing the sādhu, he does that because he doesn't want to hear the truth of his life. Do we have something to add? The sādhu has no enemy, but others have the sādhu as their enemy. And the word here is called ajāta-śatravaḥ. Ajāta-śatru. And we know Mahārāja Yudhiṣṭhira, he was also, another name of his was Ajāta-śatru. And we have a devotee also in our movement who was, I think it was Aristaha d. A person who has no enemy, but others were enemy to him, Duryodhana was an enemy to Mahārāja Yudhiṣṭhira, he wanted to kill Yudhiṣṭhira. Okay, yes, we turn. Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam kī jaya! Śrīla Prabhupāda kī jaya! Gaura-premānande hari haribol!