(translated by Swami B.V. Giri)<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>
Many make great endeavors to show their religiosity externally. People will call them devotees, they will call them pious, and the desire for this is strong within them. Indeed, there is very little religiosity within them internally, for truthfully, when they have no feelings towards Bhagav\u0101n, they introduce themselves externally as supremely pious. It seems that they are not doing much. But what a grave offence it is to be at the feet of Bhagav\u0101n, not realising even once how far one has fallen. There is one song in which Bhagav\u0101n says:<\/p>\n
aha\u1e45k\u0101r\u012b p\u0101p\u012b y\u0101ra<\/em> (“Those who are arrogant sinners do not see Me and never attain Me. Everyone knows Me as the friend of the fallen.”)<\/p>\n But what kind of pride (aha\u1e45k\u0101ra<\/em>) do we have? If the purpose is to attain the feet of Bhagav\u0101n, then will we be successful if religion is shown externally as hypocrisy? It matters little whether people call us a devotee or not, or if they say we are pious or not \u2013 that is what will come to us. \u015ar\u012bman Mah\u0101prabhu told the devotees:<\/p>\n t\u1e5b\u1e47\u0101d api sun\u012bcena taror api sahi\u1e63\u1e47un\u0101<\/em> (\u201cConsidering oneself as lowly as a blade of grass and being as tolerant as a tree, without any personal pride and giving respect unto others, one can chant hari-n\u0101ma <\/em>constantly.\u201d – \u015aik\u1e63\u0101\u1e63\u1e6daka <\/em>3)<\/p>\n If there is a desire to attain the feet of Bhagav\u0101n, if there is a desire to relish that pure bliss, O men! Then be lowly, be lowly, and chant \u015br\u012b-n\u0101ma<\/em> with a pure heart. Prema<\/em> will arise in you, perform k\u012brtana<\/em>, and those who think in this way should sing k\u012brtana<\/em> loudly! There are many types of k\u012brtana<\/em>. The Vai\u1e63\u1e47avas say:<\/p>\n nitya-siddha k\u1e5b\u1e63\u1e47a-prema s\u0101dhya kabhu naya<\/em> (“The s\u0101dhya<\/em> of k\u1e5b\u1e63\u1e47a-prema<\/em> is eternally perfect and cannot be achieved through any other means; it awakens in a heart that has been purified through hearing, chanting etc.”- Caitanya-carit\u0101m\u1e5bta<\/em>, Madhya-l\u012bl\u0101<\/em> 22.104)<\/p>\n That s\u0101dhya-vastu<\/em> (desired objective) which is attained through s\u0101dhana<\/em>, is temporary, therefore the pure prema<\/em> of k\u1e5b\u1e63\u1e47a-d\u0101sya <\/em>(servitorship to K\u1e5b\u1e63\u1e47a) cannot be the s\u0101dhya-vastu.<\/em> It arises from within you.* The sun is eternally perfect, but it cannot be seen when covered by rain-clouds, similarly the pure prema<\/em> of k\u1e5b\u1e63\u1e47a-d\u0101sya<\/em> in our heart is covered by the clouds of m\u0101y\u0101<\/em>. When the rain-clouds go away, the pure love of k\u1e5b\u1e63\u1e47a-d\u0101sya<\/em> manifests like the sun. If you chant \u015br\u012b-n\u0101ma-k\u012brtana <\/em>etc. with a pure heart, then when the heart becomes pure, that is, when the clouds of m\u0101y\u0101<\/em> disappear from the heart, then that sun-like pure prema<\/em> will arise, but if you simply make an external show of religion, you will never relish pure bliss.<\/p>\n May the devotees bless us so that we can become free from offences and chant \u015br\u012b-n\u0101ma-k\u012brtana<\/em> etc with a pure heart.<\/p>\n *In other words, one cannot gain bhakti<\/em> through the performance of s\u0101dhana<\/em> because bhakti<\/em> is already inherent within the heart of the j\u012bva. Through hearing and chanting without offences, that bhakti<\/em> becomes awakened. Dharm\u0101\u1e0dhambara (A Display of Religion) was a short article published in Sajjana To\u1e63a\u1e47\u012b, Vol.9, issue 4 in 1897. Bhaktivinoda \u1e6ch\u0101kura targets those persons who make an external show of religion and briefly explains the verse \u2018nitya-siddha k\u1e5b\u1e63\u1e47a-prema\u2019 from Caitanya-carit\u0101m\u1e5bta.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":3037,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[2022,647,560],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bhaktivinodainstitute.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3036"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bhaktivinodainstitute.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bhaktivinodainstitute.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bhaktivinodainstitute.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bhaktivinodainstitute.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3036"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/bhaktivinodainstitute.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3036\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7820,"href":"https:\/\/bhaktivinodainstitute.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3036\/revisions\/7820"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bhaktivinodainstitute.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3037"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bhaktivinodainstitute.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3036"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bhaktivinodainstitute.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3036"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bhaktivinodainstitute.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3036"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n\u0101m\u0101ra dekh\u0101 p\u0101ya n\u0101 t\u0101r\u0101<\/em>
\nd\u012bna-janera bandhu \u0101mi sakale j\u0101ne<\/em><\/p>\n
\nam\u0101nin\u0101 m\u0101nadena k\u012brtan\u012bya\u1e25 sad\u0101 hari\u1e25<\/em><\/p>\n
\n\u015brava\u1e47\u0101di-\u015buddha-citte karaye udaya<\/em><\/p>\n
\n<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>(‘Dharma\u0304d\u0323hambara – A Display of Religion’ by \u015ar\u012bla Bhaktivinoda \u1e6ch\u0101kura was first published in Sajjana To\u1e63a\u1e47\u012b, Vol. 9, issue 4 in 1897.\u00a0 This was translated into English by Swami B.V. Giri)<\/em><\/h6>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"