His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Srila Prabhupada

His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Srila Prabhupada (1896–1977)

My Hero

In the 80’s, I read the book the Science of Self Realization by his holiness Swami Srila Prabhupada and the book had such a deep impact on my mind that I instantly fell in love with Swamiji, his explanations, his arguments and his thoughts had left a strong impression on me. I wanted to meet Swamiji and this led me on to know more about the Krishna Consciousness Movement. A few visits to the Hare Krishna Temple at Juhu confirmed my belief about the hero I had now started to worship and the greatness of the movement he had started. We are not alone and Krishna is always with us. The inclusion of the topic “Krishna Leela’s” in my blog is yet another tribute to my hero for through his teachings we learn about “Krishnaarpnam” (surrender to the lord), when we offer something to the lord (action, duty, work, even our thoughts) they will become pure, precious and everlasting.

I consider myself unfortunate that by the time I read about this great Swamiji, he was no more in this material world. The Acharya had died in 1977. It's sad that I couldn’t have the opportunity to meet or even see such a great personality in person. The search for the first ever hero in my life left me disappointed, I felt sad that I read about him only after his death. But now I realize that you don’t need to see your hero in flesh and blood, I have reconciled that the search for my hero His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Srila Prabhupada is in his preaching’s, his books, and within my heart. This is a tribute to my hero and I would want all the people who visit my blog to read about this larger than life personality and the great movement that he has left behind for all of us to nurture, understand and love.

(Below are the excerpts from another website which details the life of the divine Swamiji)

His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Srila Prabhupada was one of the foremost spiritual leaders of the twentieth century. The remarkable challenge that he undertook and successfully accomplished was the transformation of the most materialistic youth of the times not just a few, but literally thousands of them -- into the most godly personalities with the loftiest of spiritual and ethical ideals. This miraculous achievement has no parallel either in the past or in the present and very probably there would never be one in the future. This happened to be a marvel of just twelve years, precisely the last twelve years of his 82 years of life. It was all due to the fact that Prabhupada was an open book as an exemplary devotee of God, who would have been placed among the greatest of the Alvars or Nayanmars if only he had lived in ancient times. Coming in the lineage of Chaitanya mahAprabhu of the sixteenth century, he re-established the traditional bhakti school of Chaitanya in a totally modern context, by ‘building a house in which the whole world can live’. Till he was seventy he struggled alone to implement his master’s injunction of propagating the glories of Lord Krishna and transmitting the treasures of the SrImad bhAgavatam. But even in the land where these had been held, without any doubt, in superlative esteem by one and all, he could not succeed. Only three books were written by him. In the next twelve years he wrote sixty. Till he was seventy he initiated only one disciple. In the next twelve years a few thousands were initiated by him. . Till he was seventy the worldwide society of Krishna devotees was only in his dream. In the next twelve years not only did it come to fruition but it came to have more than one hundred centres all over the world. His unflinching and uncompromising devotion to the Supreme Transcendental Personality of Krishna made all this possible.

He was the Lord’s Gift to humanity at large.

Opulence, potency, fame, beauty, knowledge and dispassion are only some of the infinite qualities of the Supreme Personality that is Krishna , but each one of them is possessed by Him in infinite extent to the absolute degree. Not a leaf moves without the Will of Krishna. He is the Absolute Brahman. This declaration of the scriptures is the solid foundation for the movement now known all the world over as Krishna Consciousness, named as such by Prabhupada. Remaining faithful to the disciplic succession, that goes back to the days of Chaitanya, Prabhupada created a whole new international community of the young and old, male and female, scholars and laymen, all of them fully versed in the teachings of the Bhagavad-Gita and the Bhagavatam and all of them fully convinced that no man-made system can cure the ills of the world, it is only the eternal reality of Krishna that will do it. The logical conclusion is the unceasing chanting by this ocean of devotees, singly and collectively, of the classic mantra :

HARE KRISHNA HARE KRISHNA, KRISHNA KRISHNA HARE HARE

HARE RAM HARE RAM, RAMA RAMA HARE HARE

You can read about His Divine Grace on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A._C._Bhaktivedanta_Swami_Prabhupada