"nama om vishnu padaya krsna presthaya bhuthale srimate jayapataka swamin iti namine
nama acharya padaya nitai kripa pradayine gaura katha dhama daya nagara grama tarine"
Hare Krishna Guru Maharaj,
My worshipable Spiritual master and my beloved Spiritual father,
Please accept my humble obeisance unto the dust of your Lotus Feet.
All Glories to Srila Prabhupada
All Glories to you.
On this glorious day of your appearance on this planet I am trying to gather a few words to try and say something to glorify you. Although the best of the poems, best of the language will fall short to glorify the spotless jewel studded personality you have, still I would try to say a few words to glorify the colossal personality you are as this is your desire which is ultimately instruction and duty for me. Kindly forgive me for any mistakes I commit.
Srila Gurudev, I was tossed around into the dangerous whirlpool of the material ocean for billions of life until in this life I was fortunate to have been accepted by you as your disciple. I was fortunate not because I did something or I deserved this fortune. But I got fortunate due to your causeless mercy on this fallen soul engrossed in sinful way of living and trying to find pleasure in it. Srila Prabhupada once said to his disciples that it was he who created their good fortune, similarly it is you who created my good fortune by accepting me in your spiritual army. But unfortunately I haven’t been able to yet realize how precious this mercy of your is, how rare this opportunity is. You have been magnanimously giving me numerous opportunities and I have been stupidly wasting each and every opportunity you have given me, to the extent that you have fallen sick due to me and my karma. Time passed by so quickly that so many years have been wasted and yet I don’t feel the urgency to follow your instructions to serve Sri Gauranga Mahaprabhu.
You are so filled with love for both Srila Prabhupada and for us, that with one hand you are trying to push his movement forward while on the other hand you are holding on to us even though our karmas are clinging on to you like leeches sucking the life force out of you. Yet like a loving father you never let go of us. Actually you love your Guru so much that you have given up your life in dedication to him, but the rascal I am, I haven’t yet realized what Guru is let alone loving him and that is the reason I am so selfish that rather than giving up my sinful habits of still desiring pleasure out of this material world and dedicating myself to your words I am still clinging on to it tightly. My senses are so polluted that I trust the material world more than your words.
Srila Narottam Das Thakur says,
guru-mukha-padma-vākya, cittete koribo aikya, ār nā koriho mane āśā
But for me my heart desires for everything else other than following your instructions. This is such a grave offence unto your lotus feet for which a million lifetimes atonement would be less, yet you are so great that this year in your instructions to your disciples you very lovingly spared us from this atonement and just requested us to get back to our sadhnana properly which you will consider as an atonement from our side. This is the proof of how you are Nitai Kripa pradayine, how you reflect the mood of Srila Nityananda Prabhu of being so merciful of forgiving the grave mistakes we do just as he forgave Jagai & Madhai. A god sister of mine once told me that how you are exactly saving all of us from this dangerous material world by accepting all our sins just as Sriman Vasudev Datta did for all the living entities.
In Chaitanya Charitamrita its stated
guru krsna-rupe hana sastrera pramane
guru-rupe krsna krpa karena bhakta-gane
According to the deliberate opinion of all revealed scriptures, the spiritual master is non-different from Krishna. Lord Krishna in the form of the spiritual master delivers His devotees. This is further clarifies in
This is even furthermore confirmed in Sri Caitanya-Caritämrita (Antya 2.6) which explains the mood and method of Sri Caitanya Mahäprabhu: ‘
loka nistäriba’—ei isvara-svabhäva:
“‘I shall deliver the fallen souls.’
This statement characterizes the Supreme Personality of Godhead.” A few verses later ( Antya 2.13–14), we find a description of His method for delivering people who could not meet Him personally:
tä-sabä tärite prabhu sei saba dese
yogya-bhakta jiva-dehe karena ‘ävese’
sei jive nija-bhakti karena prakäse
tähära darshane ‘vaishnava’ haya sarva-deshe
“To deliver people in regions throughout the universe who could not meet Him, Sri Caitanya Mahäprabhu personally entered the bodies of pure devotees. Thus He empowered living beings (His pure devotees) by manifesting in them so much of His own devotion that people in all other countries became devotees by seeing them.” This passage describes how Lord Caitanya empowered you to deliver fallen souls like myself, and even after reading such instructions I don’t realize your value nor the value of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu’s mercy. This is definitely my incapability and establishes my unworthiness to be your disciple.
Before I end I beg you to kindly forgive me for all the knowing and unknowing mistakes I have committed unto you and once again requesting you to kindly pull my senses out from the attachment of worldly desires so I can see clearly the path of your instructions and follow it word by word considering it to be my life and soul.
Wishing to someday be the dust at the flower at your Lotus feet.
Your Insignificant servant,
Akinchan Dāmodar Dāsa