The supremely merciful credit of Lord Caitanya Mahaprabhu

If one finds himself in a position of receiving in an unexpected manner a credit that can change their life instantly, one surely may be amazed by this act of causeless mercy. It is this causeless mercy that is manifesting via Lord Caitanya, the most merciful incarnation of the Lord.

In all the other incarnations, Krsna places a condition in front of all the recipients of His mercy: “You take it or be doomed.” As Lord Caitanya, He simply delivers the message: “Please, take it!”

The love of Godhead is rarely manifested in the history of the conditioned souls living in this material world, as it requires realised knowledge. That kind of spirital knowledge is manifested through a pure representative of the Lord, a pure devotee.
It is only through Srila Prabhupadas mercy that we can get a glimpse of the amazing mercy of Lord Caitanya.

But even receiving a credit leaves one question open: how does one spend it?
A wise person will be aware that such an unexpected gift has to be valued, and they will actually feel the responsibility to spend it carefully. A drunkard of his own false ego may, in an ungrateful manner, simply take it and use it for the propagation of his own concocted identity. The result for both recipients of the same mercy may be very different. One may strive spiritually, but the other will soon exhaust his credit and become a lunatic. A real devotee verifies his actions via guru, sastra, and sadhu. A home-made pseudo-spiritualist will take the mercy he received and establish himself, directly or indirectly, as the cause of the mercy himself.

As one of Srila Prabhupadas followers, realising how easily love of Godhead is obtained by the mercy of Lord Caitanya, he said to Srila Prabhupada, “It is amazin; this process of Krsna Consciousness is so simple!” Srila Prabhupada answered in the form of a stern warning: „Yes, I said the process is simple, but I never said it is easy.“.

It is here exactly where many go wrong. By identifying the process of purification one may receive in Krsna Consciousness, it is not only easy but also cheap.
It is this sahajiya cheapness that ruins the way of becoming purified for oneself and others. It is this cheapness that Bhaktivinoda Thakura and his son Bhaktisiddhanta Maharaja fought so vigorously, and it is the spirit Srila Prabhupada inherited, preaching in the same way. Tolerant to the weaknesses of others but uncompromising in principle was his policy.

Lord Caitanya Himself exhibited amazing tolerance to the public, but in his own domain, surrounded by his most intimate followers, he was strict behind our imagination. Not one word besides pure krsna katha was tolerated. Being a sannyasi, the total absence of women, regardless of their devotion, was the rule.
When one of his sannyasi followers only looked in a supposively lusty manner at a woman, he was rejected from association with the Lord instantly, ultimately committing suicide. There is no record of Lord Caitanya giving a public lecture to an unqualified audience. His gift was public chanting of the Holy Name, but even here firm restrictions were in order, addressing the ten offences one can commit against the Holy Name. Even great worshippers of the Lord were rejected by Lord Caitanya when suspected of being associated with poisoness mayavada or impersonal doctrines.

Indeed, Lord Caitnya was very merciful, but He wasn't cheap.

As soon as he departed for the spiritual world, hordes of imitators appeared, imitating simply the symptoms of his devotional ecstacies but not following the rules and regulations they were based on. The same thing happened when a great acharya like Srila Prabhupada left this planet. There are always those who dare to imitate his tolerant and merciful attitude in order to introduce a cheap and commercially more acceptable version of “Krsna Consciousness.” Regardless of how many of them came and went again, new ones are coming again and again, only to leave again and again.

In order to become a real practitioner of Krsna Consciousness, a strict following of the principles Srila Prabhupada based his presentation of Love of Godhead on is in order. „First serve and then deserve“ was his policy.

When Caitanya Caritamrita was in total marathon spirit when it was published (I remember well), the devotees were simply amazed. It was clear that, at that time, there was not one single member of the Hare Krsna Movement who could understand this amazing book.
Srila Prabhupada was asked what should be done with such an amazing publication.
Even though he did not establish Caitanya Caritamrita as the main distribution item, his answer was typical for his whole service to the mission of Lord Caitanya: “My spiritual master told me whenever I get some money I should publish these books, and so I do follow him blindly.”

“Blindly,“ of course, means, in Srila Prabhupadas understanding, “with absolute faith.”

Once I visited a prominent indiologist at the University of Berllin with the desire to present him with a whole set of Srila Prabhupadas books in German. He was a kind man and listened carefully to my presentation, only to tell me that he already has a set of Srila Prabhupadas books in English, as the university was already visited by a party of devotees from the US who presented Srila Prabhupadas works in these circles.
The man even learned Bengali to understand Caitanya Caritamrita better. Still, he asked me a simple question: “Who was this Caitanya really?” After all, in his university dictionary, it was stated that Lord Caitanya was an Indian saint who went mad, jumped into the ocean, and drowned.

I explained to this man that in order to understand Lord Caitanya, one has to be His devotee and follow in His footsteps without envy.
He understood that, at least theoretically, and so we parted in well-wishing spirits.

It is this mood that can make us qualified to receive and harvest great benefit from the magnanimous credit that Lord Caitanya has extended to us. First understanding our fallen condition, then placing ourselves in the right position along the varna and guna we acquired along our material body, and then sincerely following the Founder Acharya, A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, can make us eligible to get the mercy we so badly need in order to obstain from self-invented illusions generated from our mind and false ego.

In this way, we may worship Lord Caitanya as He is and not as we want Him to be.
The mercy is unconditional, but the process to get it is not.

All glories to Lord Caitanya, who bestowed upon us something not any of the Krsna incarnations bestowed before!