Dear devotees,

You have touched my heart again with this encounter and by all the written things that I have received. I will not be able to pay my debt to my Guru. There is only one option: I have to manage that you, or at least some of you, become spiritual masters in the mission of Lord Caitanya, because this is the mission for which Srila Prabhupada sacrificed himself. Guru tattva is of such nature. Whoever serves in this line from the heart, becomes a guru by definition. By serving, by being half transparent of the truth. This is our topic today.

We have to take a risk

The topic is the responsibility to become a spiritual master. When receiving initiation, it is like becoming a fireman. You know, at one given moment he has to risk his own life to save someone. One who wants to get out of envy and lust, has to take a risk.

Once in Germany I received a person who was addicted to heroin, and he said: Save me! Help me! And i said, well, I will try to, if you are ready for it. One day I was giving a conference, and the guy was not there. I said, well, he is suffering, we have to let him sleep. Suddenly, by nine o'clock in the morning, he came down the stairs with a big box in his hands. We had caught him. Seeing this, he gave up the box. This box I had in an oak furniture, and as he had no tools to open the box, he used a screwdriver and broke the oak furniture in order to get the drug. I kept the donations in that box.

Now is the time

God is the Supreme Truth. One has to learn how to be a spiritual master now, and not wait till getting old. At old age we get very sick. By the way, the principle ingredients of my medicine is aloe vera, mud, ginger and breathing. There are wonderful things for curing, that medicine has invented, but when someone is sick, he must find the way to cure in Krishna consciousness. We want to cure the people who are contaminated by the illusion. Parvati Durga is an eternal servant of Krishna.

What is a spiritual master?

A spiritual master is one who teaches to love universally, to recover by love, because this is the path of love, spiritual love. Spiritual love, the love of the spiritual master, cures all deficiences, and as a disciple you learn to cure with Love. There is no other love. There is no German love, no Chinese love. Love is love. Truth is truth in all universes. Hate creates sickness, and love cures.

"Gu" means darkness, and "ru" means the one who take out or take away. The guru is the one who takes us out of the darkness. We are talking about being a guru. To take somebody out of the darkness. Nobody here is obliged to do this. My spiritual master never obliged me to do anything. However, as your brother I am obliged to talk to you about the best that I have found in my life, and Gurudeva Atulananda and the sannyasis is something of the best I have found. My life is to tell about all the beautiful that I have found according to the divine will, because we are all mantained by Him.

Slave of the Truth

The truth comes with freedom. The disciple becomes a slave of the truth, all his ideals, all his intellect. He devotes himself to the Supreme Personality. The spiritual master, alway full of love, says: Krishna says "Whatever you give to me, whatever you offer, do it with love". In everything, what Krishna wants is love. My spiritual master told me that everything that I hear from my spiritual master, I must tell to others. And this is what I am doing. The Vedic tradition was given by guru to disciple; first spoken, and later written. If you compromise with this message, it is already yours. Distribute it!

In the traditional India, it came from the Saraswati valley with the saraswati brahmanas, and they spread this knowledge to all parts of India. The South American cultures have much connection with this, and it is being proved. In schools they don't say everything, though, because there is a rivalry. They believe that all good has come from Europe, but the only thing that has come from there is blood bath; they decapitated society. Also in India this happened, they created blood bath. But in India there were gurus and disciples; they could not stop the Vedic culture. There were temples, well hidden, that nobody could find. As the famous president of the US said: To stop a country, you have to give them more MTV music where they teach about the naked body.

How to attain perfeccion

We are invaded by the anti-culture that makes us sick. The children are those who are affected by drugs and weapons, surrounded by rabble who rule in this world. One has to chant Hare Krishna not to feel sick in the era of kali yuga. All the spiritual values are massacred, but there is one advantage: Just by chanting Hare Krishna one can attain perfection in life. Such a profund science one can acheive by the infinite mercy of chanting Hare Krishna. It is not a dream. A mantra is a reality. The mantra makes a person so happy, that it enthuses him to sattvik life.

Make others happy

In order to be a guru, one has to be situated in the mode of truth, give oneself to God, and this means zero exploitation. One who accepts the divine will, where he becomes sensible and happy, he will give up being a passionate egoist. Vishuda sattva; one is good because he wants to make others happy. And one has to get detached to one's own happiness. One has to sacrifice himself to make others happy, like a mother sacrifices herself for her children. The governers never do this. Earlier, in old days, the governers went in the frontline in the war to defend their people.

In vishuda sattva, everything is manifested by the will of God. The processes that we are teaching, like alimentation and the yoga inbound, have the purposes to make others happy. For this we propose people to be situated in sattva guna. Meat is not eaten in this mode. It is our duty to tell this to others: You will be happier if you don't take drugs, if you don't eat meat, if you don't cheat, and if you dedicate yourself to chant Hare Krishna, you will agree with Bhagavad-gita. In the beginning we can say that what you agree to, is coming to the temple, where there is prasadam, and there is discoteque for free, where you can dance for God and eat healthy food.

Holiness

Since the very beginning, everything comes with a purpose, the alpha and omega, and this is the message: Make everyone happy. Holiness means that one is in harmony with the universal laws. This is the beginning of holiness. Spiritual life is what takes us to unimaginable dimensions, it can take us to our spiritual body, but still we have not reached there. We have a mind that seems like a fly, a body which is more or less like when he gets out of one danger, he accepts a smaller danger, and therefore he has to fight against the egoistic mind of a fly.

Give up financial egotism, and the medicine for this is mangal aratik. Get up at four thirty when the Lord gets up. The devotee becomes very happy when he sees the Lord. The devotee searches for this to have a happy day, and then go to sleep early to be able to get up early. There are many things you can discover at mangal aratik. There is for instance a saying in ayurveda that the healthy sleep is at 22:00 through 24:00. This is the quality sleep. Mangal aratik means to have a ceremony of gratitude, offering the specific elements to the deity; the process of earth, water, fire, ether, and offer your mind and intelligence.

Who can be a spiritual master?

Listening to the class is the most difficult part. This is to offer the the ego by the means of reverences and by putting one's forhead to the floor and surrender to the ideals of the spiritual master. Not only listen, but assimilate the message and be willing to practice it. A person who goes through this process and accepts it theoretically, is qualified to be a spiritual master. The spiritual master is the one who saves the living entities from repeated birth and death, the one who teaches what he has been taught, the one who has no prejudices towards anyone, the one who worships the universal love and respects the faith which is good for the living beings, considering all kind of faith.

To harm others is un unsane faith, and such a thing we do not support here. A basic principle is to not accept what is not favourable for Krishna consciousness. We don't have to reject someone if he is Christian or Jew, but if he does harm to others, the devotee of the truth cannot accept, and should reject him. For this reason we have the Spoon Revolution, the revolution of love.

An offering to God

The guru does not watch teve, but for sure he can appear on teve to give instructions. We are not against teve or other media, if it is not used for something bad. Everything has to be an offering to God, otherwise it is no use. If someone does not want to understand this, then he will not understand. As the saying: "Promise a lot, fulfil ne'er a lot". One must have the force of the will to fight with the demons within oneself. Follow what is correct, as you find convenient. As a guru of your family, if you don't teach this to your dear ones, then you become an obstacle.

The school of life is a university -- tests all day. This life is an opportunity to make a human life full of love. You are thirsty for love, thirsty to get out of the material world and to have a wonderful life of the devotees and the truth. Here I end my words today.

Always your well-wisher, B.A Paramadwaiti Swami

Translation:
Manah Siksa Devi Dasi