Speaker: HG Ravindra Svarupa Prabhu
October 5, 2014
SB 11.23.35 — When he was sitting on the bank of a river about to partake of the food that he had collected by his begging, such sinful rascals would come and pass urine on it, and they would dare to spit on his head.
SB 11.23.36 — Although he had taken a vow of silence, they would try to make him speak, and if he did not speak they would beat him with sticks. Others would chastise him, saying, “This man is just a thief.” And others would bind him up with rope, shouting, “Tie him up! Tie him up!”
SB 11.23.37 — They would criticize and insult him, saying, “This man is just a hypocrite and a cheat. He makes a business of religion simply because he lost all his wealth and his family threw him out.”
SB 11.23.38-39 — Some would ridicule him by saying, “Just see this greatly powerful sage! He is as steadfast as the Himālaya Mountains. By practice of silence he strives for his goal with great determination, just like a heron.” Other persons would pass foul air upon him, and sometimes others would bind this twice-born brāhmaṇa in chains and keep him captive like a pet animal.
SB 11.23.40 — The brāhmaṇa understood that all his suffering — from other living beings, from the higher forces of nature and from his own body — was unavoidable, being allotted to him by providence.
SB 11.23.41 — Even while being insulted by these low-class men who were trying to effect his downfall, he remained steady in his spiritual duties. Fixing his resolution in the mode of goodness, he began to chant the following song.
SB 11.23.42 — The brāhmaṇa said: These people are not the cause of my happiness and distress. Neither are the demigods, my own body, the planets, my past work, or time. Rather, it is the mind alone that causes happiness and distress and perpetuates the rotation of material life.
SB 11.23.43 — The powerful mind actuates the functions of the material modes, from which evolve the different kinds of material activities in the modes of goodness, ignorance and passion. From the activities in each of these modes develop the corresponding statuses of life.
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