Real Story - By HH Indradyumna Swami Maharaja(Excerpt from a Lecture with HH Giriraja Swami Maharaja)I was remembering this evening one incident about how merciful LordCaitanya is to even the most fallen, sinful rascals. As Prabhupadamentions, Jagai and Madhai—they were not comical characters; they weredeeply sinful criminals. I remembered how once we were doing a Christmasmarathon in Paris and we would send our devotees to the train stations. Thegirls particularly would go on the trains and distribute books to thepeople just before the train left. As the train started to go, they wouldjump off. One young French girl, small girl, very pretty girl, verydelicate girl, I remember she was a very good book distributor, and shehappened to approach a man on the train in a compartment. She walked intothe compartment and gave him a Krsna book. He looked at her for a moment,then he took the Krsna book, and he was so strong that he tore it almost inhalf. Then he threw it on the ground, stood up, and began stomping on it.She broke down in tears. And he was such a demon that he grabbed her anddragged her by her hair through the compartment and literally threw her offthe train. The train had just started, and he threw her off the train. Shedislocated her shoulder, and she had blood coming from her hair down herneck. She landed on her face. She had this bruise for weeks. I think shefractured a bone there. I was somewhere nearby, and someone came to get me.So I came, and we had to carry her back to the temple. And we were cursingthat man. We were cursing him. Still, it was the marathon, and she was backon the marathon four days later.Anyway, what happened—it is quite a miraculous thing, in the mood of thepurport today. That man was a banker from Spain—a very wealthy banker—andhe had been in Paris doing business. The train went to Madrid. It took aday and a half or something like that. As a joke he kept that book to showhis wife, to show her what he did, how he had stomped on the book andthrown that nonsense girl, that beggar, off the train. He said, “See what Idid to the book,” and he put it on the kitchen table. What happened was themaid came that day, and the wife had gone shopping and the husband had goneto the bank. The maid came, and she took the book. She thought that it wasone of the family’s books and that somehow it had been damaged—a car hadrun over it or something. So she dusted it off and repaired it as best shecould and put it in the library in the man’s study.About a year went by, and unfortunately that man’s wife died in a caraccident. His son ran away, and his daughter got married to some low-classperson. He ended up all alone, and he was just so despondent. When his wifedied he went into a deep depression. His kids had left, and his wife haddied in a head-on car crash. He was just devastated, devastated. So, he wasin his study, contemplating suicide, and he happened to look up on thebookshelf. He was actually looking for the Bible, although he wasn’t a veryreligious man. As Krsna says in the Bhagavad-gita, four types of personsapproach Him—usually the person in distress. So he was looking for theBible, and he saw that book.Something compelled him to take that book out, and he opened it up andstarted reading it—the Krsna book—and he read the part where Vasudeva ispreaching to Kamsa. In that discussion Vasudeva mentions the principles ofreincarnation and how the living entity goes from one body to the next justlike the worm who carefully places the front part of his body, then picksup the next portion, and goes on. There is some analogy like that given byPrabhupada. And it gave the man some solace to think that his wife was notactually dead but that she had just changed bodies. It was nothing he hadever thought of in his life, but it gave him just enough faith not to killhimself.So, the man went to sleep, and then he awoke in the morning. He wassupposed to go to work, but somehow he was drawn back to that book, whichwas still on the table. So he went back and read it. For three days hestayed home—he didn’t go to work; he just read that book. And he had acomplete change of heart. The book gave him so much solace—that what hadhappened was his karma; that he had to be forbearing, had to be tolerant;and that his wife had only changed bodies. He was just ripe for thatknowledge. He thought about it a lot for a week. Then, you know what hedid? He looked in the back of the book, and he saw there was an address.The book was in French, but he spoke French. He found the address andcalled the temple in France and found out there was a temple in Madrid, andhe went to the temple.When the temple president opened the door, this man was in a business suit,and he was on his hands and knees. He was saying, “Please forgive me.Please forgive me.” The temple president was a relatively new devotee. Hesaid, “Excuse me?” He thought this guy was mad. The man said, “Pleaseforgive me for what I have done.” And the temple president said, “Well, doyou want to come in and talk a little?”—because he could see that he wasnicely dressed. So the man came in and talked in the office, and herevealed how many years before . . . He had the Krsna book with him, and hesaid, “I destroyed this book, number one. And I was very rough with one ofthe members of your society.” And he started crying. He said, “I just wantto apologize, because she was trying to deliver me and I treated her soroughly. I am just so sorry.” Then he said, “Is there anything I can do?”The devotee was new, and he didn’t know how to respond. So the man justsaid, “Let me write you a check.” He wrote out a check for a large sum ofmoney, gave it to the devotee, and left.That was Wednesday. On Sunday, the temple president was giving a lectureand he saw the banker sitting in the back of the temple room listening.Every Sunday the man would come to the temple, and he would listen. Sometime went by. He wasn’t old, maybe forty or so; he was fairly young andsuccessful. One day he told the temple president that he wanted to moveinto the temple and become a devotee. No one could believe it, because hewas so affluent. And guess what service they gave him? He was the templetreasurer for some time. [laughter] Then came the Christmas marathon, andhe asked if he could go on the marathon. He was kind of older, but thedevotees said, “Okay, you can go.” He went out, and he actually did quitewell. Then he asked, “I don’t want to be the temple treasurer. I just wantto distribute books.” So that’s what he did. He became a book distributor.Then we had a festival. I think it was in Italy, if I am not mistaken.There was some big festival, and that girl came to the festival, and thatdevotee came to the festival, and they met. And he was just crying andcrying, and he was begging, “Please forgive me.” Now, if a Vaisnava isoffended, a Vaisnava does not hold a grudge. So she said, “No, it is allright.” It was a pretty amazing story, and I told our GBC, Bhagavan dasa,and we discussed it sometimes, how amazing that story was!Srila Prabhupada's Transcendental Book Distribution Ki Jai!
Comments
What a fabulous story! It's true, Krishna's plans work in mysterious ways!
thanks for sharing. Haribol!