Jagat

Originally posted on Vrindavan Today . Widows come to Vrindavan especially from Bengal. To help them live in the Dham is a service that will help your Braja-vasa sadhana. Previous 1.72 , "If you can't give up the world, then meditate on Vrindavan" introduces the subject that is continued in today's verse. vastuḥ koṭi-guṇaṁ śrutaṁ hi sukṛtaṁ vāso’nna-vāsādibhiḥ tīrthe vāsayituḥ svayaṁ hi tarati dvau tau sa yat tārayet | premānanda-rasātma-dhāmani pare vṛndāvana-vāsakas  tv  āścaryāṁ vṛṣabhānujā-priya-ratiṁ prāpnoty anāyāsataḥ || We have heard that one who serves those who live in a holy place by giving them housing, clothing and food has millions more pious activities to his credit than one who simply lives there. And one who helps others dwell in sacred Vrindavan, the abode that has the nectar bliss of pure love as its essence, easily attains the amazing feeling of love for the beloved of Vrishabhanu Raja’s daughter, for he not only crosses over himse...

The amazing Ed Bryant (Advaita Prabhu Das) just received here at Jiva the final proofs for his new book, "Yoga in the Krishna Bhakti Tradition" to be published by the same company that did his Yoga Sutra, Macmillan. He has promised to give me a few excerpts for Vrindavan Today, so look for them in the coming days. For all my friends in the AHYMSIN tradition, I will just say that Swami Veda Bharati wanted me to do something like this, research yoga in the Bhagavata Purana. He even had Ram Charit photocopy and paste all the relevant verses from BhP so that he could have it as a ready reference. And I even wanted to do it, and if I hadn't committed to Vrindavan  and the Sandarbhas project , I may have gotten around to it. Swamiji was planning projects that he knew he could never ever finish to his final day. Anyway, his desire has been fulfilled by a reputable scholar and, I may say, a great admirer of Swamiji's work. He relied on it heavily for his own Yoga Sut...

I am too split in various directions still. At my age, it is disconcerting to see me entering into the last phase of life with so many things unfinished. I have perhaps been too ambitious and now find myself in the unfortunate position of having bitten off so much more than I can chew that much of what I have done is inevitably going to remain incomplete. (1) Swami Veda Bharati's Yoga Sutra  Currently I am in Rishikesh working on the Yoga Sutra for Swami Veda Bharati. Comment: Swamiji is 82 and in poor health, going through period crises related to his heart condition. Yesterday after evening meditation he called me into his room and told me that he was not certain that he would be able to live to complete the Yoga Sutra project. In many ways I am indebted to Swamiji personally and I have given him my word that I will help him to finish his magnum opus, the four volume series of Yoga Sutra with reference to 22 commentaries and his own experience of the oral traditions...

I must make a disclaimer here with regard to the previous post, in which I made some hopeful comments about the affiliation of the Gaudiya Grantha Mandira to the Jiva Institute for Vaishnava Studies. This affiliation is an extension of my friendship and association with Satya Narayan Dasji Maharaj. Over the past two years I have also been working with Maharaj on the editing of the Bhagavat-sandarbha and Paramatma-sandarbhas , and in all likelihood will continue to work on the Sandarbhas project until it is finished. For these services I receive a stipend that is sufficient for my living expenses in India. In this and the Grantha Mandira affiliation, my relationship with Babaji and JIVS is purely professional. Any personal views expressed by me on this blog or elsewhere are entirely my own and have absolutely no relation to those of Satya Narayan Dasji Maharaj or the Jiva Institute. Whatever opinions I may have about the purpose and practice of Mahaprabhu's Prema-dharma, the...

To make a project like the Gaudiya Grantha Mandira function to perfection, money is important. Although we recently received two 100$ donations, the total amount donated since the inception of this site ten years ago comes to only a little over $1000, much of it from a single benefactor. Not having institutional backing is simultaneously a blessing -- one is free to work or not as one likes -- as well as frustrating if one has real goals set in mind. I have never approached GGM as anything other than a labor of love and I have been satisfied with my own continuing efforts to share books I discover and wish to go through on my own. Though the site has always had wider potential, I have at least been able to maintain its minimal purpose over the years, with the result that a fair number of texts (nearly 600) is now available, many of which are rare and interesting from both a scholarly and devotional point of view. Of course there is only so much one person can do, and my lack ...

As I mentioned in the previous post, I started an on-line newspaper a year and a half ago called Vrindavan Today . This post has been sitting here for more than a week, unfinished. As usual, when this happens the flow of time is producing changes, fluctuations of mood, and so does not truly represent the way I felt on January 1. On the whole, I am much less optimistic about the fate of this project. When I started this post, I had just posted an article on Vrindavan Today about Shripad Baba . While researching that, I read something about him that was on a blog by Hindi writer Karan Singh Chauhan . I did not have time to translate any of the interesting anecdotes that he wrote. But here is one: तो देखा आपने बाबा का प्रभाव । पैसे की क्या कमी है ? उनके इशारे पर लाखों आ जाते हैं । आप जानते ही होंगे देवराहा बाबा को । पेड़ पर जो रहते थे । बड़ी-बड़ी हस्तियां उनके दर्शन को आती थीं । पैसे की तो चाह नहीं फिर भी आने वाले बोरा भर कर रख जाते थे । आश्रम के चार कमरे नोटों की बोर...