In Praise of the Guardian of Devotion
We are very fortunate to hear His Divine Grace, Om Vishnupada Paramahansa Parivrajak Acarya Bhakti Raksak Sridhara Maharaja. By age and by experience, in both ways, he is senior to me. I was fortunate to have his association since a long time, since perhaps 1930. At that time he had not accepted sannyas, but had just left home. He went to preach in Allahabad, and on that auspicious occasion we were connected.
Sridhara Maharaja lived in my house for many years, so naturally we had very intimate talks. He has such high realizations of Krishna that one would faint to hear them. He was always my good advisor, and I took his advice very seriously because from the very beginning I knew that he was a pure devotee of Krishna. So, I wanted to associate with him. Krishna and Prabhupada, Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Thakura, liked him to prepare me. Our relationship is very intimate.
After the breakdown of our spiritual master’s institution I wanted to organize another institution making Sridhara Maharaja the head. Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Thakura told me that Sridhara Maharaja is one of the finest preachers of Krishna consciousness in the world, so I wanted to take him everywhere. This was my earnest desire. But since he could not go around the world and preach, at least the people of the world should come to hear from him.
For spiritual advancement of life we must go to someone who is actually practicing spiritual life. So if one is actually serious to take instructions from a siksa guru, or instructing spiritual master, I can refer him to one who is the most competent of all my Godbrothers. This is B.R. Sridhara Maharaja. I consider Sridhara Maharaja to be even my siksa guru, so what to speak of the benefit that others can have from his association.
Too bad this information was kept from the masses until the publishing of Our Affection Guardians by Guru Maharaja and associates. It may have saved many from their departure from Krishna Consciousness.
I just hope I may help with its further dissemination with your blessing Guru Maharaja.
Thank you. I remember when I first heard a recording of the conversation from which this is excerpted, in 1974. Reading a transcript is wonderful; hearing the emotion in Srila Prabhupada and Srila Sridhara Maharaja’s voices makes is something altogether different. Since hearing that, I never had any douby about the intimacy and profundity of their relationship.
Because my association with ISKCON is decades-old and “easy” based on geographic proximity, I am steeped in the rhetoric they espouse through their numerous channels and means. They would have me (and others) believe time and again that such a relationship between Srila Prabhupada and B.R. Sridhara Maharaja was/is non-existent and impossible. Clearly, this is/was not the case.
Thank you for posting this brief piece which serves to reconcile an ongoing conflict of the heart (mine), and reaffirms that I may associate with both “camps” without committing offense to either.
The fact is that their relationship is something more profound than most of us can fathom. As Prabhupada told one of his disciples when he asked what he and Sridhara Maharaja had been speaking about (in Bengali) while visiting Sridhara Maharaja’s math, “If I told you, you would faint.”
If you are interested to know the history in detail, you can read Our Affectionate Guardians, here.