• Email to a friend • •

H.H. Satsvarupa das Goswami: 195

www.sdgonline.org.

It snowed in the early hours of the morning and built up to about three inches and then stopped. Still, there is a considerable accumulation out there. The municipal trucks have not come and scraped the roads yet. School is closed. I woke up thinking that it was the day before my colonoscopy and that I couldn’t eat today, but Baladeva came and told me it was only Tuesday, not Wednesday. I’m still anxious whether it will snow more today or tomorrow and cancel my appointment after I’ve fasted. I’ve been lying in bed and dreaming and not able to dictate the journal.

I like to tell the John Steinbeck war stories, but I have to connect them with the Krishna Book. He had a nice chapter in which he was telling about soldiers carrying lucky amulets. They do it to protect themselves from getting wounded or killed. The Catholics, or even non-Catholics, carry St. Christopher medals. And rabbit’s feet are very popular. Snipers carry American Indian pennies, and they hold them on the outside of their rifle. They say it gives them better aim. In the Krishna Book we’re reading of one of the biggest wars of all. It’s the battle between Lord Krishna and Lord Siva. The demon’s daughter Usa fell in love with Aniruddha, the son of Pradyumna and grandson of Krishna. He was whisked to her chambers by the mystic gopi Citralekha, and Aniruddha made Usa pregnant. When the demon found out, he went to his worshipable deity, Lord Siva, and asked for war against Krishna. Siva and Krishna personally fought hand to hand. They would use counterweapons. Siva would use a water weapon and Krishna would counter it with a fire weapon. In this way they would use all counterweapons, but Krishna always came out triumphant. Finally Krishna used the yawning weapon, which made Siva fall asleep and lose his desire to fight. Then Krishna didn’t have to pay attention to Siva and could pay attention to the demon Bhaumasura. Bhaumasura had a thousand arms, and he was always looking for someone who would be worthy of his combat. He found his worthy combatant in Krishna, who cut off all his arms. Even Krishna’s commander-in-chief, Kartikeya, was wounded in the battle. It was such a big war that demigods like Lord Brahma hovered above to watch the debacle. Krishna defeated the demons, and Usa and Aniruddha ran off together to be married. There is no mention of lucky amulets, but they all took shelter of Krishna’s lotus feet and that was their good luck.

I am not chanting so nicely but chanting with a rushed attitude and silently. If I want an amulet, I should pray with inner mood and ask Krishna that there not be a snowstorm and that I can go to my medical appointment without a hitch and with benign results. Of course, a devotee should not even pray for good results but just take whatever Krishna sends him. But I am a devotee with attachments, and so I dovetail my attachments with prayers to Krishna. May He protect me. As Prabhupada wrote on a piece of paper to me, “May Krishna protect you from dilemmas.”

Perhaps I should carry a lucky rabbit’s foot in the form of a little Nsrimha statue, Jagannatha statue or something I can keep in my pocket. Some devotees keep kavacas around their neck, and some keep little lockets which contain sand from Vrndavana, and these are their good luck charms. Jayadvaita Maharaja wears a string around his wrist which he was given several years ago at a Jagannatha Ratha-yatra in London. He asked a devotee who is expert in these things how long he should wear the string. Dr. Kenneth Valpey told him to wear it as long as he wanted, and he’s been wearing it for several years just because he feels like it. Religious and magic houses sold many amulets during World War II, but the soldiers preferred their homemade magic pieces to the store-bought ones. In the stores they used to sell steel New Testaments, which were meant to be worn over the heart to give you religious protection and protection from a bullet. But the soldiers preferred to keep their cigarettes in their breast pocket, and if they carried a New Testament, they carried it in their pocket. One soldier carved an insert in his revolver where he kept a picture of his children. I know a devotee who carries a locket with a picture of Radha and Krishna in it, and another who carries a picture of his wife and children. The soldiers say they should not call upon the magic of these amulets too often because they can become exhausted. They keep them just for special occasions of extreme emergency. One man kept a small wooden duck but prayed to it only on certain occasions. During big bombings he would say to the duck, “If this bomb gets me, it gets you too.” When the teenage hoodlums used to rattle our front door and bang on our wooden shutters in the first storefront in Boston, I used to keep a little stone statue of Hanuman and sing to it, “Sri Rama, Jaya Rama,  Jaya Jaya Rama, Sri Rama, Jaya Rama, Jaya Jaya Rama.” When Srila Prabhupada was a little baby, his mother used to put the spit from her mouth on his forehead, and there is a rumor that she used to let blood from her breast for the same purpose.

 

• Email to a friend • •

More Recent Articles

• H.H. Satsvarupa das Goswami: 194
• H.G. Sankarshan das Adhikari, USA: Wednesday 19 January 2011--For a Devotee Every Day is Bliss as Usual--and--What is Your Stage of Advancement?
• ISKCON Melbourne, AU: Daily Class - Devamrita Swami
• Japa Group: Japa Seminar - Candramauli Swami P1
• ISKCON Melbourne, AU: Hindu Community Council of Victoria