CB deeper thoughts

I haven't progressed with CB in the last two days due to taking care of my father and so on, and there may have been an element of laziness in there somewhere too. But tonight my memory went back to a verse about the dismal situation (of Kali-yuga) around the time of Mahaprabhu's imminent appearance. In verse 63 of Chapter 2, Sri VDT says:

kRSNa-rAma-bhakti-zUnya sakala saMsAra
prathama-kalite haila bhaviSya-AcAra

"The whole creation was devoid of devotion for Krsna and Balaram, and the future symptoms of Kali-yuga were manifest in the beginning of the age."

But the particular characteristic that made me wonder was Verse 71:

ati-vaDa sukRti snAnera samaya
'govinda' 'puNDarIkAkSa'-nAma uccAraya

"Only the most pious people would recite the names of 'Govinda' and 'Pundarikaksa' at the time of taing bath."

I was puzzled. I had heard that talking at the time of taking bath makes the bather lose the spiritual potency or energy that is gained from bathing, what to speak of the popular habit of singing in the shower that is widely prevalent in the West! On some occasions when I was showering, Sri Harinama danced around in my mind and I indulged it but I don't ever recall chanting it or singing it in the shower. For some reason my crazy mind stuck to that notion that to talk or sing during a shower would dissipate spiritual potency, hmmmm I think that qualifies as an offence to Sri Harinam Itself, eh?

Well, it surprised me when I read Text 71. It seems that while describing the pitiful situation of dharma in Kali-yuga, the author mentions that 'only' the most pious would chant the Names at the time of taking bath. The way it sounds as if this was one of the few good qualities of Kali-yuga at the time of Mahaprabhu's appearance. Well at least as far as this text is concerned, it seems to be a rather good activity to chant the Names at bath-time after all. What was I thinking all of this time?! Chanting the names at bath-time can only increase whatever potency you're getting from the bath. Man, do I need to get some queer ideas out of my head or what. I guess I know who I should blame, but let's not play that game here.

'prathama-kalite haila bhaviSya-AcAra' from Text 63 is also an interesting consideration. For a fuller explanation of this line, Srimat Kanupriya Gosvami has written an excellent treatise entitled 'The Dawn of The Age of Love' in which he mentions the reasons why the symptoms of Kali-yuga are so prominent in this Kali-yuga than it is in previous or future Kali-yugas. I have copied this text and uploaded this file somewhere on GD. I think I should update it and 'modernise' it with proper diacritics and all, as I just copied the original text in order to retain the flavour of the Bengali English. That's a project I can get along with. If only I could remember where I kept my copy of the original text....