Letter to Madhusudhan Maharaj

Dear/Madhusūdan Mahārāj Date 03.05.2025

Daṇḍavat praṇām to you all.

The honey bee always sits on the flower to drink nectar, but there is also another insect which comes only to collect poison from the flower. Our burning question is which category you belong too?

We think that your Gurudeva has decorated you with such a beautiful name “Madhusūdan’ which clearly indicates that you are in favour of killing those demons who are against Śrī Gauḍīya Maṭh and Gauḍīya devotees (I mean our guru-vargas those who can be compared with honeybees).

śrī-caitanya-padāmbhoja-

madhupebhyo namo namaḥ

kathañcid āśrayād yeṣāṁ

śvāpi tad-gandha-bhāg bhavet

Let me repeatedly offer my respectful obeisances unto the beelike devotees who always taste the honey of the lotus feet of Lord Caitanya Mahāprabhu. If even a doggish nondevotee somehow takes shelter of such devotees, he enjoys the aroma of the lotus flower.

So, it is our honest request on behalf of the whole Sarasvat Gauḍīya Vaiṣṇava society--please don’t try to find any faults with such an exalted Vaiṣṇava like Śrīla Shyam Das Baba Mahārāj-- which will only result in your own ruin of bhajana. To take such a risk in your bhajana is not worthwhile. We think if you really look a bit closer into the life of Śrīla Baba Mahārāj then surely you will have a direct feeling that what kind of sacrifice he has done (or still is doing) to point out all those cheaters, antagonists and wayward nondevotees in the name of our Sarasvat Gauḍīya bhajana. So please try to justify with the name given by your Gurudeva and try to get the honey and not the poison. Because by saying that--“Today, there is no need to point out filth or to run a campaign of cleansing; rather, there is great need for living in devotion under the guidance of Śrīla Rūpa and Śrīla Raguṇatha, so that the soul may experience that ultimate truth”you are completely going against all our Sarasvat Gauḍīya guru-varga. If you really want to say that there is no need of pointing out the filth which has come into our Gauḍīya bhajana -field, then why Śrīla Saccidananda Bhaktivinod and Śrīla Sarasvatī Gosvāmī Ṭhākura Prabhūpada and Śrīla Bhakti Pramode Puri Gosvāmī Mahārāj and Śrīla Bhakti Pragayan Kesava Gosvāmī Mahārāj, and Śrīla Bhakti Rakshak Śrīdhar Dev Gosvāmī Mahārāj and Śrīla Sadananda Svami as well as Śrīla Baba Mahārāj etc. etc. they all wanted to identify themselves as sweepers of the Nāma-haṭṭa under the divine guidance of the seventh Gosvāmī Śrīla Saccidananda Bhaktivinod Ṭhākura which was originally opened by the original guru-tattva Śrīman Nityānanda-Balarāma to sweep out all garbage from the Nāma-haṭṭa where all those pure Gauḍīya devotees always busy with Nāma-saṅkīrtana yajña. All of them always felt it a most urgent task to keep the sampradāya pure and clean from any kind of contamination, so that those who walk behind those ācāryas can have a safe journey on their pathway to their Ultimate goal of life—kṛṣṇa prema. Also, we want to remind you about what Gauḍīya Goṣṭhī Pati Śrī Śrīla Bhakti Siddhānta Sarasvatī Gosvāmī Ṭhākura Prabhūpada has written in one article named “Ācāryera Asamordhva Mahattva” (Gauḍīya 6.28–33) the following—

Many people think that the path of bhakti is covered with a soft bed of flowers. Blind faith, indiscipline, whimsical behaviour, indiscrimination, sentimentalism, and emotional outbursts are all counted by them as being means of performing bhakti. But from śāstra and from the words of the ācāryas it is understood that, although the authorized path of bhakti is the only means of attaining the ultimate goal of life, it is full of thorns. Especially in this Age of Kali, the age of argumentation and quarrel, it is covered with millions of thorns.

The God-send ācāryas, who are oceans of causeless mercy, at the very outset warn those who are desirous of entering the path of bhakti about the millions of obstacles they will surely encounter, so that these travellers on the path of bhakti can safely and without hindrance reach the desire tree of Kṛṣṇa’s lotus feet and relish the fruit of prema. Such easily obtainable benevolence of the ācāryas is testimony to their liberal bestowal of non-malefic mercy upon the jīvas.

Despite knowing that one’s hands may get injured while uprooting thorny bushes, and that envious creatures like snakes residing in the bushes might bite, one engaged in such work does not lose enthusiasm for performing his duty; rather, so that travellers will not be harmed or inconvenienced by thorns and envious creatures, his endeavour and enthusiasm for removing all the thorns will progressively increase. Similarly, increasing enthusiasm for removing millions of thorns on the path of bhakti is always seen in the character of an ācārya.

Those who are selfish, desirous of their own happiness, overcome by sloth, or afraid of adhārmika people, withdraw due to the shouting of nondevotees. Or they think, “When I require my own self-interest, prestige, or personal happiness, why should I have to endure various conflicts by acting for others’ benefit? What is the necessity of hearing the abuse of nondevotees?” Another class of persons think that by becoming nirjana-bhajanānandīs they will suffer none of this trouble and will not have to hear the reproaches of others. But a paraduḥkha-duḥkhī ācārya is not selfish, idle, or simply desirous of his personal happiness. He is not afraid of others. He says:

Even if hundreds and hundreds of people—or even if all the godless people of the innumerable universes assemble and in one voice shout at me, I will accept it and loudly declare the actual truth. If the topics of reality enter the ears of even a single person among millions of people from millions of universes who are completely averse to Kṛṣṇa, and thus remove the contamination of the cheating propensity from his heart, then I will understand that I have been able to serve Mahāprabhu’s mano-‘bhīṣṭa—because I know that all the jīvas within the innumerable universes are coming and going because of their aversion to Kṛṣṇa. Therefore, all jīvas within the universe, beginning from Brahmā, are averse to the Supreme Absolute Truth. Hence not everyone will listen to the discussion about the truth. It is sufficient if even among a crore of jīvas we can find one who is interested in hearing the truth. That jīva can then become situated in the truth and preach the truth to others. Probably this is why Ṭhākura Bhaktivinoda said, “A preacher effects more benefit for the world than all those who become indifferent to preaching work because of their preferring to remain absorbed in the bliss of their own bhajana.”