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  • E-Counselor

    Hare Krsna Prabhuji,

    PAMHO.

    The 10 aparadhs are:

    1. To blaspheme the devotees of the lord, who have dedicated their lives to propogate the holy name of the lord. 

    2. To consider the names of demigods like Lord Shiva and Lord Brahma to be equivalent to or superior to the name of the lord.

    3. To disobey the orders of the spiritual master and to consider him to be an ordinary human being.

    4. To find faults with the vedic literatures and scriptures.

    5. To consider the glories of chanting the mahamantra to be imagination.

    6. To think of holy name to be a philosophical ....

    7. To commit sins on the strength of the holy name.

    8. To consider the chanting of the holy name to be a ritualistic activity of karma kanda mentioned in the vedas.

    9. To preach to the people who have no faith.

    10. To continue to have attachment to material things inspite of hearing so many glories of the holy name. 

    Its also an offence to be inattentive while chanting. Every devotee who claims to be a vaishnava must carefully guard against these offences in order to quickly achieve the desired success which is Krsna prema. 

    THis is what I know to be the 10 offences. In most ISKCON temples of the world, these 10 offences are chanted in the morning after mangalarati.

    Haribol,

    Your servant,

    Radha Rasamayi DD

    • hare krishna. mataji i am very pleased with your answer. but i am not totally free from these above aparadhas. i was born in the mayavad society (led by adi jagadguru sripad sankaracharya). most of the spritualist in our society are from adwaita parampara. i also had got brahmin initiation from the gurus of this parampara 4 years ago. its just a few month that i have known about vaisnav parampara. so there are a lot of confusion to me and is very hard to believe that sankaracharya society is not authentic because i have read many vedc scriptures from adwaita guru parampara.

      but among all these condition i want to be a part of vaisnav parampara and wants to returns to godhead. i still have not got 100 percent faith over vaisnav parampara but still i want to be a devotee of krishna and a servant of vaisnavacharya. is it possible plz. help me. my sorrounding is against that. people will not believe this. even it was beyond my imagination that i am going to know about vaisnav parampara one day because there were no vaisnavacharya in my village all were from adwaita parampara. 

      • E-Counselor

        Hare Krsna Prabhuji,

        PAMHO.

        To be devotee of Krsna begins with a desire to do so. Since you have the desire, you already qualify to be a devotee of the lord. Simply chant Hare Krsna and be happy. Its as simple as that. Any religion teaches us to love God and to serve God. As long as we have sincere desire to do so, we are on the path.

        Let me clarify that I am not above the 10 offences I mentioned in my previous post. I would be an exalted devotee if I were. That is the reason I call myself a sadhaka and not a devotee. 

        Chant sincerely prabhu and the rest will fall in place. Vaishnava aparadhs, we read out in every temple before chanting, the purpose is to remember these offences and consciously try to steer clear of them in our daily dealings.

        Haribol,

        Your servant,

        Radha Rasamayi DD

        PS - Adi Shankaracharya wrote Bhaja Govindam at the end of his life. He established the 4 dhaams known to Hindus (Kedarnath-Badrinath, Dwarka, Rameshwaram & Jagannath Puri). All these dhaams have pastimes related to Krsna/ Ram. So please dont get confused. Chant in happiness and remain in happiness.

        • but why the guru parampara of sankaracharya is called adwaita parampara. why they are not interested in vaisnav parampara. i am in confusion. please help me clear my confusion.

  •  The most important thing  in the process is to remember the Lord and to faithfully and exclusively surrender to Him. Everything else is irrelevant. 

  • Pranams. The greatest aparadha that can ruin our bhakti is vaishnav aparadha i.e. to offend devotees of the Lord. To not be happy upon seeing a vaishnava is also an offense. Lord Krishna says in the Gita that one says he is his devotee is not his devotee but one who is devotee of his devotee is his devotee. 

    Lord Śiva simply advises his great wife that of all kinds of worship, the worship of Viṣṇu is the highest, and greater than that is the worship of a great devotee or anything in relation with Viṣṇu.

    SB 3.14.26

    Pleasing devotees is the way to please Krishna. Blaspheming/ Offending devotee is a way to run bhakti. 

    • hare krishna.

      what to do if we did this aparadha unknowingly or unwillingly? 

      how one does vaisnav aparadh. please explain be briefly.

      • Vaishnava aparadha implies some type of deliberate ill intent— the desire to hurt someone, or find fault with them in order to make oneself feel better, or look better in the eyes of others, to get even, or retaliate. In each of these cases there's an element of envy and malice. Whether one knows about aparadha or not, if envy and malice are there then there will be a reaction. And yes, it also applies to nondevotees. In once sense, it applies mainly to nondevotees because real devotees don't commit Vaishnava aparadha.

        ‘The fools who defame Vaishnava-mahatmas fall into a place known as Maharaurava along with their ancestors. The six degrading acts against Vaishnava are (1) killing him, (2)  blaspheming him, (3) being envious of, or hating him, (4) not glorifying him, (5) being angry at him, and (6) not being happy upon seeing him.’”

        Sri Jiva quotes a verse from the Skanda Purana, delineating varieties of unbefitting acts in relation with a Vaishnava.

        1.To kill. This is obviously a heinous act bound to destroy the creeper of devotion. Under this heading, any and all acts of physical violence are also included. 

        2. To blaspheme. All verbal acts of defamation come under this category. Calling a Vaishnava names, speaking harshly to him or about him, speaking lies of him and so forth are considered blasphemy.

        3. To be envious or hateful. To be envious of a Vaishnava, to wish for his demise or suffering and to act towards this goal, and other thoughts, speech and deeds prompted by a feeling of malice towards a Vaishnava come under this heading.

        4. To not glorify. All Vaishnavas are worthy of respect. To not respect a Vaishnava in accordance with his qualification, or to refuse from recognizing a particular good quality or deed of a Vaishnava, is unbefitting. Everyone is to be given all the respect they deserve, regardless of their having different opinions from ours.

        5. To be angry. Whatever a Vaishnava does, we are not to display an outburst of anger towards him. It is permitted to display anger towards someone who is hateful towards the bhaktas, but this, too, is to be done in a civil, constructive way for the rectification of the wrong-doer.

        6. To not be happy upon seeing. Whoever has accepted the holy names of Krishna is a blessing to the world. To not feel happiness upon meeting a soul who has chosen to approach the Lord, regardless of his defects, is inappropriate.

        If one offends another Vaishnava, and is aware one has done so, the best thing is to go and beg for forgiveness, if this is not possible then sincere chanting of Hare Krishna, and begging the Lord for forgiveness is in order.

        If some devotee is behaving inappropriately and needs to be corrected, better approach his senior to instruct him.

        As Dean Prabhu mentions, we should focus more on Krishna worship than offenses. If some unintentional minor offense happens then the Lord is all merciful. However, we should not "deliberately" commit offenses.

  • 8 TYPES OF WAYS WHICH WILL SPOIL YOUR BHAKTI LIFE!

    8 Types of Prajalpa :-
    ------------------

    Srila Bhakti Vinod Thakur's Piyusa-varsini commentary on Sri Upadeshamrita.

    Prajalpa which spoils bhakti is categorized by Bhaktivinoda Thakura into the following 8 categories:

    (1) Useless talks
    (not about Lord Hari)

    (2) Arguments
    (godless quarrels like nyaya & vaisesika not based on the Vedas)

    (3) Gossip
    (talking about other people to establish one's reputation)

    (4) Debates
    (desire for conquest)

    (5) Fault-finding in others
    (imposing one's bad habits on others)

    (6) Speaking falsehoods
    (because of one's self-interest)

    (7)Blaspheming devotees
    (the worst)

    (8) Worldly talk
    (devoid of God consciousness)
    • hare krishna. will you please illaborate no. 7 point about blaspheming devotees. why it is the worst?

      i am also confused in point 2 i.e. about godless talk on nyaya and vaisesika.? please guide me.

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