Swami Shivapadananda on motiveless love for God
SWAMI SHIVAPADANANDA
DAILY READINGS
Selected from Mother Radha's recordings of Swamiji.
Day 460
Swamiji speaking about Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu:
When God's name is taken sincerely it brings about motiveless love. We read that when Chaitanya sang the Maha Mantra [literally: great mantra] even the most learned, dry intellectuals would cry and weep and roll on the ground.
People asked these learned men why they were crying and rolling about on the ground, they just said, "We don't know. We get caught in a sort of magnetic field. We don't know why we cry, we don't know why we call on God." The motiveless, pure heart of Chaitanya and his disciples caught hold of those who were not even concentrating on God – they did not even believe in Sri Krishna. Even the saivites [Shiva worshippers] and the shaktas [Divine Mother worshippers] became affected by this magnetic, pure, motiveless love for the Supreme Being – God.
Another great thing Chaitanya did was he actually showed the area in which Sri Krishna was born and performed the rasa lila. Now some people, especially the dualists, will argue that Chaitanya was not God. That may be so but God's Spirit was inside him. If the devil can get into you, why can't God get into you? When God gets into a body, that body and God are identical. If you leave a piece of iron in the fire for some time and then take it out, the iron itself will burn you. The iron becomes fire and the fire becomes iron. Incarnations like Chaitanya were in the fire of Brahman, and the knower of Brahman becomes Brahman. In that way, up to this day, Chaitanya's Maha Mantra goes on.
There are many speculations on why he gave the maha mantra as:
Hare Krishna Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna Hare Hare,
Hare Rama Hare Rama Rama Rama Hare Hare,
While Lord Brahma gave it as:
Hare Rama Hare Rama Rama Rama Hare Hare,
Hare Krishna Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna Hare Hare.
Either way God's name is always most powerful. What does it matter whether you say Krishna first or Rama first so long as you realise It? If Valmiki the great thief, the man with no love or devotion, could realise God by saying Mara Mara Mara [Rama in reverse] then it does not matter if we say Rama first or Krishna first. We must also remember that Chaitanya's Ishta Devata was Sri Krishna and therefore he repeated Hare Krishna first.