Śrīpāda Kṛṣṇa-keśava Brahmacārī

[June 25, 2022 is the disappearance tithi of Śrīpāda Kṛṣṇa-keśava Brahmacārī in Vṛndāvana, India. The following is an article about his glories from 'My Beloved Masters' by Śrī Śrīmad Bhakti Vijñāna Bhāratī Gosvāmī Mahārāja.]

HEREDITARY DETERMINATION

Śrīpāda Kṛṣṇa-keśava Brahmacārī told me the following story about how he came to reside in Śrīdhāma Māyāpura and how his father, Śrī Dīpa-rāma dāsa Gāubuḍā, tried to bring him back home.

“When I was about eleven years old and in the seventh grade, I went with a group of people from my village to have darśana of Śrī Navadvīpa-dhāma. During our visit, I met Śrīla Prabhupāda. I was so enamored with him that I refused to return home. Instead, I decided to stay in Māyāpura and join the maṭha. Despite my young age, Śrīla Prabhupāda granted me harināma and mantra-dīkṣā.

“I was my father’s youngest child—his tenth. When word reached my village that I had stayed behind in Māyāpura, my father immediately departed for the dhāma to retrieve me. At the time, Śrī Navadvīpa-dhāma parikramā was under way, with thousands of pilgrims in attendance. When the in-charge of Śrī Caitanya Maṭha was informed that my father had arrived, he treated him very respectfully and arranged a place for him to stay in the maṭha.

“While at the maṭha, my father received darśana of Śrīla Prabhupāda. He was amazed by the behavior and bold hari-kathā of the sannyāsīs and brahmacārīs, and he was especially impressed by the fact that such erudite individuals born of elite families were firmly established in the principle of offering respect to others while expecting none in return. He told me, ‘I would never have imagined that a place like this exists, where everyone discusses only matters of the spiritual world, and never those of this material world; where no one harbors a desire for mundane indulgence, but rather cultivates the desire to serve; where people have renounced material pleasures to live according to a simple yet elevated philosophy; and where the mysterious truths of the soul are revealed one after another.’

“His heart swelled with gratitude. He said, ‘Keśava, my son! You have blessed me by showing me this place. What to speak of accepting it, I had never even heard that this human form of life is meant for worshiping Bhagavān. Now that I have come to know this in my old age, I will perform bhajana for the remainder of my life. I, too, will take shelter of your gurudeva’s lotus feet and, when he will mercifully agree to it, accept mantra-dīkṣā from him. Please convey my intentions to him.’

“I then told him, ‘You eat meat and fish, and you smoke tobacco. Beyond giving up these, one must give up even onions and garlic before accepting dīkṣā and harināma.’

“ ‘I will give them up this very instant,’ he replied. ‘These are small things to leave aside for the sake of something so exalted.’

“ ‘Are you sure?’ I asked. ‘It will be a grave offense if you accept mantra-dīkṣā simply out of excitement and again consume these things because of habit.’

“My father assured me, ‘I fully comprehend the gravity of making a vow to an exalted personality. Trust me when I say I am of sound mind and that I am not being emotional. I have thought this over carefully.’

“While I was waiting for the right time to supplicate at Śrīla Prabhupāda’s lotus feet on behalf of my father, explain his background and attest to his state of mind, my father saw a group of devotees who had shaved their heads and were waiting to receive mantra-dīkṣā. He immediately went to have his head shaved, after which he sat down with the prospective initiates. When a servant informed Śrīla Prabhupāda of the situation, Śrīla Prabhupāda said, ‘Determination is the most important attribute needed for receiving dīkṣā. I will certainly grant him his wish.’

“And so it happened that Śrīla Prabhupāda gave my father mantra-dīkṣā that very day. When my father left Śrīdhāma Māyāpura, he told me, ‘Keśava, although I came to bring you back, the opposite has happened—I have offered myself here. My body may go, but I will forever remain here by heart.’

“Amazingly, from that day forward, my father never consumed any of those forbidden substances. Instead, he spent the rest of his life chanting harināma, his dīkṣā-mantras, various prayers and hymns, and engaging himself in activities favorable to bhakti.”

The streak of determination his father embodied was visible in Śrī Kṛṣṇakeśava Brahmacārī’s life, as well.

ATTENTION IS THE KEY TO SUCCESS IN SERVICE

Immediately after Śrīpāda Kṛṣṇa-keśava Brahmacārī received harināma and dikṣā from Śrīla Prabhupāda, he began performing various services in the maṭha. He was particularly avid in assisting Śrīla Prabhupāda’s cook by cutting and preparing vegetables, shopping for ingredients, scrubbing pots and cleaning the kitchen.

Once, while Śrīla Prabhupāda and his preaching party, which included his cook, were en route from Mumbai to Kolkata, his cook became worried he would be unable to punctually provide Śrīla Prabhupāda with prasāda upon their arrival.

When Śrīla Prabhupāda and his entourage reached the maṭha, Śrīpāda Kṛṣṇa-keśava Brahmacārī had his meal cooked and ready to be served. When the cook saw all the items Śrīpāda Kṛṣṇa-keśava Prabhu had prepared, he was surprised beyond belief; they were nearly identical to those he usually prepared. After Śrīla Prabhupāda honored prasāda, his cook told him that Śrīpāda Kṛṣṇa-keśava Brahmacārī had prepared his meal that day. “Really?” Śrīla Prabhupāda asked. “I could not tell the difference. Did you teach him how to cook?”

“No,” the servant replied. “I never taught him to cook. But he does help me in the kitchen whenever he is around.”

Śrīla Prabhupāda summoned Śrīpāda Kṛṣṇa-keśava Brahmacārī and asked him, “From where did you learn to cook?”

“By carefully watching Prabhu cook every day,” he replied.

Śrīla Prabhupāda said, “You are sure to be successful in whatever you dedicate your full attention to or wish to learn. You should go on like this, learning the key principles of bhajana. By this, you will surely obtain auspiciousness.” After this incident, Śrīpāda Kṛṣṇa-keśava Brahmacārī would cook for Śrīla Prabhupāda from time to time, and would lovingly bestow Śrīla Prabhupāda’s remnants to whoever would ask for them. He used to say, “Śrīla Prabhupāḍa always ate very little. I noticed whenever I served him his meals, there always seemed to be the same amount left on his plate as I had brought him.”

GURU MAHĀRĀJA's RIGHT-HAND MAN

When the excessive disturbance that followed Śrīla Prabhupāda‘s disappearance caused the Gauḍīya Maṭha mission to split into two factions, Guru Mahārāja took possession of Śrī Caitanya Maṭha on behalf of Śrī Kuñjabihārī Vidyābhūṣaṇa Prabhu. Many of his godbrothers insistently requested him to take sannyāsa and start accepting disciples, but he deferred their numerous pleas.

It was largely Śrīpāda Kṛṣṇa-keśava Brahmacārī who influenced Guru Mahārāja to finally agree to his godbrothers’ proposal. “Śrīla Prabhupāda has left behind such a massive mission,” he told Guru Mahārāja. “How will its services continue on properly if a qualified person like you refuses to accept disciples? If you begin awarding initiations, I will accept the responsibility of bringing prospective disciples to you.” Having received his dear godbrother’s support, Guru Mahārāja agreed to accept disciples.

Sometime later, Śrīpāda Kṛṣṇa-keśava Brahmacārī took Guru Mahārāja to Āssām, where, by his tireless efforts, Guru Mahārāja’s preaching met with great success. Being attracted and inspired by Śrīpāda Kṛṣṇa-keśava Brahmacārī’s explanations of Śrīla Prabhupāda’s immaculate teachings, many people took shelter of Guru Mahārāja’s lotus feet. A good many of those new devotees became renounced and joined the maṭha, and later on, Guru Mahārāja even awarded some of them sannyāsa.

Guru Mahārāja regarded Śrī Kṛṣṇa-keśava Brahmacārī as his right-hand man, and he had particular affection for him. Devotees who have taken shelter of Śrī Caitanya Gauḍīya Maṭha shall remain forever indebted to Śrī Kṛṣṇa keśava Brahmacārī.

A FITTING RESPONSE TO CRITICISM

Once, Śrī Śrīmad Bhakti Vilāsa Tīrtha Gosvāmī Mahārāja, Śrī Kṛṣṇadāsa Bābājī Mahārāja, Śrīpāda Sundara-gopāla Prabhu, Śrīpāda Atulānanda Brahmacārī and other disciples of Śrīla Prabhupāda were at the Sealdah station in Kolkata. Śrīpāda Kṛṣṇa-keśava Brahmacārī, who was then residing at Śrī Caitanya Gauḍīya Maṭha, was also present at the same station, but was situated a little further away. Some of them called for Śrīpāda Kṛṣṇa-keśava Brahmacārī to come close to them, and asked “Keśava! How are you?”

Śrīpāda Kṛṣṇa-keśava Brahmacārī replied, “I am very well.”

They again asked, “Keśava! How are you?”

“I am extremely well,” he replied.

A number of his godbrothers then audibly said among themselves, “Just see! Although he has left the maṭha established by Śrīla Prabhupāda, his own gurudeva, he says that he is very well.”

Hearing their words, Śrī Kṛṣṇa-keśava Brahmacārī calmly said, “Had I continued to stay with you, I would have only ever heard that you alone are engaged in bhajana, and no one else is capable of properly serving. I would have been compelled to label all others as non-devotees, and would have become expert in vaiṣṇava-nindā, criticizing devotees.

“Fortunately,” he continued, “I have been saved from all such wretchedness by staying with Śrī Mādhava Mahārāja. With him, I remain immersed in practicing the principle of considering everyone else as honorable and myself as worthless. So, to reaffirm, yes, I am extremely well. What have you to say about that?”

Someone said, “Listen! Śrīla Prabhupāda blessed Śrī Tīrtha Mahārāja by saying, ‘May you attain abundant auspiciousness.’ Did he ever give such a blessing to Mādhava Mahārāja?”

Śrī Kṛṣṇa-keśava Brahmacārī replied, “No one blesses a recipient of a Master of Arts degree by saying, ‘I bless you to acquire a Master of Arts degree.’ Such blessings are for those who have not yet attained some particular qualification. Therefore, the reason Śrīla Prabhupāda did not bestow the blessing to achieve abundant auspiciousness upon Śrī Mādhava Mahārāja is because he had already achieved abundant auspiciousness. By sincerely reflecting on the situation of the ‘blessed,’ one can easily understand why Śrīla Prabhupāda would have felt it necessary to bless them in this way.”

AN INCOMPLETE POINT IS A MISUNDERSTOOD POINT

At Guru Mahārāja’s invitation, many disciples of Śrīla Prabhupāda gathered to attend the annual festival at the Kolkata branch of Śrī Caitanya Gauḍīya Maṭha. One day, at the very end of the assembly, Guru Mahārāja asked Śrīpāda Kṛṣṇa-keśava Brahmacārī to speak. In his address, he said, “According to the philosophy the Vaiṣṇava speakers have expounded today, I can say that no one here, whether sitting on the dais or the ground, has attained Bhagavān. The scriptures state:

ĵadi haya saṁyoga tabe nā haya viyoga

ĵadi haya viyoga tabe nā thāke prāṇa

If there is meeting, there cannot be separation. If there is separation, then one cannot remain alive.

“Therefore, the fact that everyone assembled here today is showing signs of life is proof they have never met Bhagavān. If they had truly met Him, they would be unable to maintain their life in separation from Him.”

After prasāda that night, Śrī Śrīmad Bhakti Vikāsa Hṛṣīkeśa Gosvāmī Mahārāja, a disciple of Śrīla Prabhupāda, admonished Śrīpāda Kṛṣṇa-keśava Brahmacārī in front of their godbrothers. He said, “It was improper to question whether the persons seated on the dais have attained Bhagavān. We all accept disciples now. It was unwise to proclaim such ideas in front of our followers.”

Śrīpāda Kṛṣṇa-keśava Brahmacārī replied, “This happened only because I was allocated as much time as it takes you to recite the invocations before your lecture. I had presented only one aspect of this multifaceted subject when the karatālas chimed and indicated I should conclude. I had not finished explaining. If I am given sufficient time tomorrow, I will explain the rest.”

The next day, when Guru Mahārāja asked Śrīpāda Kṛṣṇa-keśava Brahmacārī to speak, Śrīpāda Kṛṣṇa-keśava Brahmacārī narrated a story: “Once, a painter was told to paint a sign on a wall that read ‘ekhāne peśāba kôribena nā—do not pass urine here.’ He had painted the first three words, ‘ekhāne peśāba kôribena—pass urine here,’ before night fell and forced him to stop painting. Naturally, people started urinating there the next morning, thinking they had express permission. The employer chastised the painter, who replied, ‘Sir, this was not my fault. It got dark before I could finish. Do not worry. Now that the sun has risen, I will immediately paint the last word nā and complete the sign.’

“A similar incident occurred when I spoke yesterday, so I will now conclude my unfinished point. The devotees seated on the dais before you today are like modest wealthy persons who claim they have no money. Although they say, ‘na prema gandho ’sti—I have not a scent of prema,’ do not think they have not obtained bhagavat-prema. Conversely, we should understand a poor man’s claims of poverty to be not an expression of humility, but the truth, and we should sincerely try to help him. The people sitting on the dais today have certainly met Bhagavān. It is solely through the Lord’s inconceivable potency that they are able to survive such fatal, unbearable separation from Him. Bhagavān personally maintains their lives so that they may continue bringing Him endless pleasure by serving Him in this world. This principle, that living is evidence of an absence of bhagavat-prema, cannot be applied to realized personalities; it is meant only for conditioned souls like us.”

THE PASSING AWAY OF HIS PURE-DEVOTEE FATHER

In 1956, a year after I took shelter of my Guru Mahārāja and joined Śrī Caitanya Gauḍīya Maṭha, Guru Mahārāja took me to Vraja for Śrī Vrajamaṇḍala parikramā. There, I heard from Śrīpāda Kṛṣṇa-keśava Brahmacārī that his father had passed away and that his brother had sent him fifty rupees to serve the Vaiṣṇavas in their father’s memory. With that money, Śrīpāda Kṛṣṇakeśava Brahmacārī ordered and distributed forty kilograms of rabaḍī, a sweet made from condensed milk.

That day, I witnessed devotees who normally snubbed anything served in remembrance of the deceased happily eating that rabaḍī with great relish, saying, “Eating something served in honor of a non-devotee’s passing implicates one in the sins of the departed. However, according to the blessings Śrīman Mahāprabhu bestowed on the occasion of Śrīla Haridāsa Thākura’s disappearance festival, one incurs offense by not accepting the prasāda distributed in honor of a pure devotee’s passing. In fact, one’s devotion is increased by eagerly accepting such prasāda.”

The way I saw Śrīla Prabhupāda’s brahmacārī and sannyāsī disciples lovingly honor the rabaḍī-prasāda that day confirmed that they indeed recognized Śrīpāda Kṛṣṇa-keśava Brahmacārī’s biological father as a pure devotee of Bhagavān.

RELIEVING THE DOUBTS OF A NEW MAṬHAVĀSĪ

When my godbrother pūjyapāda Bhakti Vallabha Tīrtha Mahārāja and two of his schoolmates took shelter of Guru Mahārāja’s lotus feet and began living in the maṭha, they overheard Śrī Śrīmad Bhakti Hṛdaya Vana Gosvāmī Mahārāja express, “Even though I have associated with sādhus, resided in the dhāma, performed nāma-saṅkīrtana, surrendered myself at the lotus feet of my guru, preached all over and performed countless other activities that are favorable for bhakti, I have gained no benefit.”