Battlefield Bhajans Vol. VI

Dedicated to Srila Prabhupada savior if the fallen souls!

The days are counting down for us. At the moment we are at the ninety day mark. This is the time complacency creeps in. I am very fearful of this, but not that I will get comfortable in my material life. I am afraid I will get comfrtable in my spiritual life.

Sankritan Tradition: Working the Airport

On the 15th I received a skype message from HG Balaramacandra Prabhu and to my amazement HG Murti Prabhu. For those that don’t know, Balarama is the college preaching acarya. His vegan cooking workshop is bringing so many to this movement. Murti Prabhu is an amazing sankritan devotee. He lives, breathes, eats and sleeps distributing Srila Prabhupada’s books. We had such a nice conversation about preaching and Murti Prabhu offered to send to cases of books to me. I accepted and promise to somehow find a way to distribute them. By his mercy, the first annual Spring marathon began. Myself and a few bhakta’s grabbed some books on a hot Sat. morning, and made a goal of distributing these two cases of books. As the day went on, we met very nice people, some took books, some did not. As I was leaving the air terminal, I saw a small crowd. I walked over a little curious about the scene, and to my surprise I saw Bhakta Kristopher in the middle of a crowd with a huge smile on his face distributing books to everyone around him! I just sat back and watched and as each person grabbed a hold of the Bhagavad-Gita, I could feel Krsna grabbing a hold of them, and while He is doing that, grabbing a hold of Kris’s heart. Final scores: PsD/38, BK/27

” Our book disribution program is most important work. Anyone reading our KRSNA Book, TLC, NOD and Bhagavad-gita As It Is, is sure to become a Krishna Conscious person. Therefore somehow or other we must push on this literature distribution program, either through schools, colleges, libraries, life membership program or ordinary sales” SP letter to Jananivasa, 5 March 1971

Coming off a 16 hour long mission

Mantra Meditation Class

The Army believes in providing some recreation for the soldiers’ after missions. Here, there is a yoga class every Wednesday. I would go when not out and participate in the yoga classes. After sometime, I talked with the instructor and explained that I also follow a yoga process called Bhakti Yoga. She was very interested and when I told her I had some books that I give to people explaining the purpose of yoga, she insisted I bring some to her. Later in the week, I brought a Perfection of Yoga, Bhagavad-Gita, and Easy Journeys to other Planets and a few BTG’s. She promised she would be in touch if she found them interesting. To my surprise 2 hours later I received an email stating that she read one page of the Bhagavad-Gita and Srila Prabhupada’s purport made so much sense that she wanted to arrange a program for me to introduce this to her students. I jumped at the chance, and made all necessary arrangements for the following week. When Wednesday came, I could not hide my excitment. I arranged some rice and had some dahl left, scraped some semolina and sugar for halava and cooked all these preparations on a small one burner hot plate. Armed with a mrdunga, kartels, prasadam and Srila Prabhupada’s transcendental books, I arrived at the class. To my surprise about 15 people where there waiting and I quickly slipped into dhoti, and kurta. When I came out and sat down, I explained about Bhatki Yoga and why it is the topmost yoga system. The glories of the Maha Mantra and the importance of Srila Prabhupada’s books on humanity. They asked so many questions, why was I wearing “pink clothes”, how can chanting purify us, what is devotional service. As I explained I could see that these souls were mesmerized by this philosophy. I suggested we chant and since no one there knew how to play the kartals, I put them to the side. After I passed out the Maha Mantra sheets to the audience we started chanting, slowly with the tune Prabhupada made famous and as it speeded up, I changed the tune and I could sense the kirtan transforming, everyone was becoming more and more comfortable, and all their walls were broken down. At the peek of the kirtan, I heard the familar sound of kartels being played expertly and looked up and an Indian gentleman was absorbed in playing and chanting as loud as we could. And as after one hour, we stopped. I thanked everyone and served out the prasadam. Many stayed and honored this spiritually charged meal, others attacked the book table and soon one case of Perfection of Yoga books were gone. They were relishing the Lord’s mercy and all they were talking about is how cool this yoga is and as the last person left, I could hear them still chanting the Maha Mantra.

kåñëa-mantra haite habe saàsära-mocana

kåñëa-näma haite päbe kåñëera caraëa

“‘Simply by chanting the holy name of Kåñëa one can obtain freedom from material existence. Indeed, simply by chanting the Hare Kåñëa mantra one will be able to see the lotus feet of the Lord.” Cc. Adi 7.73 (Sri Caitanya quotes Isvara Puri to Prakasananda Sarasvati)

näma vinu kali-käle nähi ära dharma

sarva-mantra-sära näma, ei çästra-marma

“‘In this Age of Kali there is no religious principle other than the chanting of the holy name, which is the essence of all Vedic hymns. This is the purport of all scriptures.”Cc. Adi 7.74 (Sri Caitanya quotes Isvara Puri to Prakasananda Sarasvati)

Relaization from the Front Line

Kapila says to Devahuti in SB 6.45, ” The symptoms of a sadhu are that he is tolerant, merciful, and friendly to all…..” Sometimes I have to be heavy towards others in my service here, In this verse Kapila says a sadhu is peacful, his charactersitics are sublime. I am asking myself am I capable of developing these attributes? My life will take a drastic change in the next 120 days. For 11 years, all I have known is military heart, where you have to have a hard heart. Where you cannot always showed compassion. I am scared of the future, and pray to the Lord if I can reintergrate back into normal devotional life.

Sadhana:

25 rounds still going. I am attempting to increase my quality of chanting. To give my heart to each mantra Started to chant 64 every Sunday.

Reading the Cc, Madhya Chapter 8 Talks between Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu and Ramananda Raya

Seva is still the basis of my day. It is something to start your day with bathing and feeding the Lord, and even better to engage others in His service.

Less than 90 Days, we need all your prayers, this is the most dangerous time.

yours in the service of Srila Prabhupada,

Partha-sarathi Dasa

ISKCON Iraq