While Prabhupāda rode in his car to the park for his morning walk, he saw billboards and banners announcing that Sanjay Gandhi was coming to town. Sanjay Gandhi’s particular political platform was that everyone should become literate. Looking out the window at the poor, barren land, Prabhupāda said, “What is the benefit of literacy when the people are poor and starving?” He said that the local people were coming to the ISKCON evening program just to get a little kicharī – not because it was prasādam, but because they were hungry. So if after many years of education they learned to read but still earned little money and had the same employment, then what was the benefit? Life was not for such education. Prabhupāda lamented that so much land was lying uncultivated.

Seeing several men jogging, Prabhupāda commented that most people were hungry and poor while a few were living in big houses, overeating, and running to lose fat. “So he will educate the people,” Śrīla Prabhupāda said, “and after some time they will join the Naxalite movement and kill the rich man. No. Everyone should be engaged in working the land.” Prabhupāda said his ISKCON men should also work, because unless they were properly engaged they would gossip and fall victim to sex desire.

Since arriving in Bhubaneswar, Śrīla Prabhupāda had several times talked about going to Jagannātha Purī, about an hour away. Since he had hopes of one day building a big center in Purī, he wanted to see some plots of land for sale. He hadn’t been to Purī, he said, since 1958. Since his Western disciples were not allowed to enter the Jagannātha temple, Prabhupāda said he would not enter either. But he would go to Purī to see what land was available.

Early one morning Prabhupāda set out in his car for Purī, on the Bay of Bengal. He looked at several properties there, but either their locations were poor or the buildings were deteriorated, or both. Prabhupāda walked along the beach with his men, and the surf was pounding. “I was jumping here,” he laughed. “In 1920 or ’21 I came here. At that time I was married. I was married in 1918. I came after appearing for my B.A. examination. And because I was jubilant, I was jumping. When the waves came I was jumping. Now it is fifty-seven years after. They say we do not change bodies, but where is that body? Now I am walking with stick. Then I was jumping. I am still here. I remember. But the body has changed. What is the difficulty to understand? I am the same. Otherwise, how I am remembering all these things? But that body is now lost. Tathā dehāntara-prāptiḥ. Why this simple philosophy these rascals cannot understand?”

Śrīla Prabhupāda stayed a day at the beachside Tourist Bungalow, and one of his Godbrothers, Śyāmasundara Brahmacārī, from the local Purusottama Gaudiya Math visited. After he left, Sri Sevasiva Rath, a member of the pūjārī committee of the Jagannātha temple, also came to visit. Prabhupāda spoke to him about the possibility of ISKCON devotees entering the Jagannātha temple. To bar the Western Vaiṣṇavas from entering the temple was prejudiced and ignorant. Since the members of the Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement were fully engaged in spiritual life, they should not be considered unfit simply because of their birth status or race. Sevasiva Rath was friendly and agreed with Śrīla Prabhupāda; he promised he would do what he could to help. He also told Prabhupāda about a book he had just published and invited him to attend a small paṇḍāl meeting the next evening, at which the book would be inaugurated. Prabhupāda agreed.

Later, Prabhupāda was sitting on the veranda outside his room at the Tourist Bungalow. As he sat watching Shantilal preparing lunch in the back of Gargamuni’s van, he could smell the aromatic spices cooking in the ghee. He called to Gargamuni Swami and asked that a plate of Shantilal’s cooking be brought to him. Soon Prabhupāda was enjoying a meal of rice, dāl, purīs, spicy sabjīs, and chutney. He said that Shantilal cooked wonderfully and that all devotees in ISKCON should learn this art. If the meat-eaters could take such prasādam, he said, they would give up their sinful habit.

As Prabhupāda sat in his hotel room that evening with a few disciples at his feet, he reminisced about how he had come to America in 1965 and had suffered two heart attacks at sea. “They say that anyone who gets a third heart attack,” said Prabhupāda, “they must expire. I had two attacks on the ship, and then in New York a third one – paralyzed. Left side was paralyzed. I do not know how I was saved. And one girl, that captain’s wife, she studied astrology. She said, ‘Swami, if you can survive your seventieth year, then you will live for one hundred years.’ ”

Śrīla Prabhupāda and his disciples laughed.

“So,” Prabhupāda continued, “somehow or other I have survived my seventieth year. I do not know whether … . They say I will live for a hundred years. But seventieth year was severe. Three heart attacks and paralysis. And I was without any family. At that time none of you were with me. I was alone. I wasn’t dependent on anyone. But on the ship I saw that Kṛṣṇa was going to save me. I was going for His mission.”

Devotees were regularly bringing up the topics of brainwashing and deprogramming. That evening, one of the devotees mentioned that sometimes the opposition was taking the testimony of an ex-disciple of Prabhupāda’s, who would speak against the movement.

“Because he is a rascal,” Prabhupāda explained, “therefore he is excommunicated. My Guru Mahārāja kicked him out. So what is the value of his testimony? That is natural that someone will go out and speak against us. These things will happen in preaching. You cannot expect very smooth path.” The devotees agreed, and someone added that one of Jesus’ closest disciples had betrayed him.

Śrīla Prabhupāda compared the present trouble to the troubles he had encountered when he first came to America. He reminisced further about his near fatal illness in 1967 and his return to India, where he had recuperated. But even after returning to America, he commented, he had not been able to sleep at night because of a sound in his ear.

“As long as the body will be there,” Prabhupāda said, “there will be so many troubles. Kṛṣṇa has advised that they will come and go. Don’t care for it. Āgamāpāyino ’nityās tāṁs titikṣasva bhārata. So bodily troubles, mental troubles, and enemies – so many impediments will come. What can be done? We have to tolerate. That is the material world. We cannot expect smooth, very happy. That is not possible. Kṛṣṇa was advising that to Arjuna, what to speak of us. Kṛṣṇa never says, ‘I have made some magic. You will have nothing to suffer.’ He never gave Arjuna any tablet. So we have to follow that. The modern gurus say, ‘I will give you some magic ash. There will be no trouble.’ But Kṛṣṇa, what did He say? He said, ‘No, tolerate.’ He did not say, ‘You are ass. I will give you some ash.’ Neither did Arjuna ask, ‘Why do You ask me to fight? Give me some ash. I’ll throw it.’ He was not such a fool that he asked some magic from Kṛṣṇa to kill his enemies. Actually he fought. This is Bhagavad-gītā. So face things as they are, and depend on Kṛṣṇa. That is our duty. Don’t expect any ash, miracle, magic.”

The next morning, from the porch, Śrīla Prabhupāda was watching the devotees swimming in the Bay of Bengal. Calling Hari-śauri over, he said he would like to bathe in the ocean and asked him what he thought about it. Hari-śauri and the other devotees present all thought it was a good idea. Sea water was supposed to be very good for health, they said. Prabhupāda said he would try it and after taking his morning massage walked down to the seashore, wearing his gamchā and carrying a towel. The ocean shore was about a hundred yards from the hotel, and by the time Prabhupāda reached the water, all the devotees were running after him in their gamchās.

Some of the devotees were already in the ocean, and when Prabhupāda reached the water’s edge, they all gathered around him. As the waves glided in and swirled around Prabhupāda’s feet, Hari-śauri scooped palmfuls of water and began to bathe Prabhupāda’s body – his arms, chest, and head – washing away the mustard seed oil he had applied during the massage. Soon other devotees began reverently splashing handfuls of water onto Prabhupāda’s body. Standing almost up to his knees in water, the bright sunshine illuminating his golden-hued body, Prabhupāda laughed as the devotees joined in.

The devotees realized that this pastime was just like an abhiṣeka, or bathing of the Deity, and when Gurukṛpā Swami began to sing the prayers for bathing the Deity – cintāmaṇi-prakara-sadmasu – the other devotees joined in, singing and taking part in the abhiṣeka by the sea. Śrīla Prabhupāda enjoyed it, sometimes putting his head forward to indicate that he wanted water poured on his head, then closing his eyes as the devotees poured the water. When Prabhupāda lost his balance for a moment, Hari-śauri grabbed him. Prabhupāda’s feet had been sinking into the sand, and when he held one foot out it was muddy. As he wriggled his toes, a devotee poured water on the foot, washing it clean. Prabhupāda then bent over, put ocean water in his mouth, and spat it out. Only Gurukṛpā Swami was quick enough to catch some of the water and drink it.

As Prabhupāda allowed the devotees to participate in bathing and gently massaging him, the devotees were carried away by ecstatic feelings. After about ten minutes, Prabhupāda came out of the water, changed his clothes, and walked back to the hotel, where two devotees escorted him to a comfortable chair, sat him down, and carried him up to his room for his afternoon rest.

In the afternoon, Sevasiva Rath came again to see Prabhupāda, accompanied this time by another Purī brāhmaṇa. They gave Prabhupāda some Jagannātha prasādam and sang the Jagannāthāṣṭakam. In silent appreciation Prabhupāda listened as the brāhmaṇas sang the famous prayers with each verse ending jagannāthaḥ svāmī nayana-patha-gāmī bhavatu me (“O Lord of the universe, kindly be visible unto me.”) When the two brāhmaṇas finished singing, Prabhupāda said, “So these European and American Vaiṣṇavas, they are hankering after jagannāthaḥ svāmī nayana-patha-gāmī bhavatu me. Now it is through your intervention that they may be able to see Jagannātha Svāmī. They are hankering like that – jagannāthaḥ svāmī nayana-patha-gāmī.”

Sevasiva Rath again expressed his sympathy about the devotees’ not entering Jagannātha’s temple. He also told Prabhupāda more about the book he had published, a compilation of select verses from Jagannātha dāsa’s translation of the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam into Oriya. Sevasiva had also written some commentary, and his book was to be inaugurated at a function that evening. Prabhupāda again promised to attend and address Purī’s brāhmaṇas and religionists.

That evening, Śrīla Prabhupāda was guest of honor at the outdoor paṇḍāl on the beach, and his disciples accompanied him to the stage with a rousing kīrtana. Prabhupāda took his seat. After the kīrtana ended, one of the managers of the Jagannātha temple came forward and garlanded Śrīla Prabhupāda. Sevasiva then announced, “We thank A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupāda, who has been kind enough to grace this occasion wherein we have assembled this evening to pay our respectful homage to His Holiness Jagannātha dāsa Gosvāmī, who was a contemporary of Lord Caitanya.” Suddenly, about five brāhmaṇas sitting on a platform rose and walked off the stage to join a kīrtana party in front of an altar in a nearby field. It seemed strange to the devotees that these men had to leave just when Śrīla Prabhupāda was going to speak.

“I thank you very much,” Śrīla Prabhupāda began, but then the sound system failed. Śrīla Prabhupāda paused, while one of his own disciples, an electrician, corrected the problem. Śrīla Prabhupāda resumed speaking, his voice amplified above the distraction of the nearby kīrtanas.

“So in our humble way,” Prabhupāda was saying, “we are trying to introduce Jagannātha Svāmī’s culture. Jagannāthaḥ svāmī nayana-patha-gāmī bhavatu me.” Sevasiva had invited Prabhupāda explicitly to speak about his new book, and Prabhupāda had already mentioned privately to his disciples that these people were inviting him to serve their own purpose. But now Prabhupāda took the occasion to speak about Lord Jagannātha, rather than about the Oriyan Jagannātha dāsa. He had a special message in mind.

“You will be very much pleased to know,” he continued, “that in the year 1967 I introduced Ratha-yātrā in San Francisco, and it has been going on continually for the last nine or ten years. And the government, they have fixed up a holiday for Ratha-yātrā. We have the twentieth of July as a government-fixed-up holiday for Ratha-yātrā. And people take part in the Ratha-yātrā. Not only my devotees, but even outsiders. Ten to twelve thousand people attend, and we distribute prasādam to all of them. They feel very much obliged. And the newspaper writes that people in general never felt such ecstasy as they are feeling in the Ratha-yātrā festival. The police say that the crowds in the Western countries, as soon as there is a big crowd, they create disturbance. But the police were surprised that this crowd is not a window-breaking crowd.

“Next we introduced Ratha-yātrā in London. And in London, Trafalgar Square – it is the most famous square within the city – there is a big column called Nelson’s Column. Our ratha was so high that The Guardian newspaper criticized this Ratha-yātrā as a rival to Nelson’s Column. Next we introduced Ratha-yātrā in Philadelphia. And last year we introduced Ratha-yātrā in New York. And we also have Ratha-yātrā in Melbourne and Sydney and in Paris.

“So in the Western countries Ratha-yātrā is being introduced one after another, and Jagannātha Svāmī is attracting the attention of the Western people.” Suddenly some of the men on the stage began talking loudly among themselves in Oriya. Prabhupāda stopped, turned, and said, “What is that?” The talking subsided, and he continued.

“So people will come in your Jagannātha Purī now from all parts of the world. That is beneficial from various points of view. From the point of view of the tourist program, the government will benefit. When people are attracted to see Jagannātha Purī, Jagannātha Svāmī, that is good. But unfortunately you do not allow these foreigners to enter the temple. How it can be adjusted? This stumbling block should be dissolved, that you want Jagannātha Svāmī to be compact within your home and you do not expand the mercy of Jagannātha.

“He is Jagannātha.* He is not only just Purīnātha or Oriyanātha. He is Jagannātha. Kṛṣṇa declares in the Bhagavad-gītā, bhoktāraṁ yajña-tapasāṁ sarva-loka-maheśvaram. That is the definition of jagannātha – sarva-loka-maheśvaram.* So why you should deny the inhabitants of sarva-loka the darśana of Jagannātha? Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu never approved such things. Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu said pṛthivīte ache yata nagarādi grāma / sarvatra pracāra haibe mora nāma. When the thing is being done and when they are eager to come here, why you should restrain? What is the cause? This is not very good.”

* Lord of the universe.

* Kṛṣṇa is the proprietor and controller of everything.

Śrīla Prabhupāda continued to argue that foreigners who had taken to Vaiṣṇavism should be allowed to enter the temple of Lord Jagannātha. Offenses to the Vaiṣṇavas, he said, were condemned by Lord Caitanya. Therefore, Prabhupāda declared, he had come to Purī specifically to request the leaders to remove this offensive restriction and be friendly to the foreign devotees. He invited Purī’s leaders to come and see the Jagannātha and Rādhā-Kṛṣṇa temples all over the world and see how the foreigners had actually become pure Vaiṣṇavas, strictly avoiding sinful life. “No illicit sex, no meat-eating, no fish-eating, no egg-eating, no intoxication, no gambling,” said Prabhupāda.

“Why you should not receive them as Vaiṣṇava and give them proper reception? That is my request. I hope there are many learned scholars and devotees present here. They should endeavor to remove this restriction of shortsightedness, and let us combinedly work with Jagannātha to preach the bhakti cult for the benefit of the whole world.”

As Prabhupāda finished his lecture, Hari-śauri leaned forward and asked Prabhupāda if he wanted to answer questions. But Sevasiva came quickly to Prabhupāda’s side and said, “No, don’t put their questions.” Sevasiva picked up the small paperback volume which was supposed to have been the topic of the evening’s presentation. “The Bhāgavata of Jagannātha,” said Sevasiva, and he handed it to Śrīla Prabhupāda, requesting him to now speak, as expected, about the merit of the book and its inauguration. Śrīla Prabhupāda looked indifferently at the small book in his hand. Speaking over the microphone he said, “So what shall I do? Of course, I do not know the Oriya language, but it is said that it is Bhāgavata of Jagannātha. So it is inaugurated today.” Prabhupāda placed the book down and stood up to leave. The audience applauded.

Śrīla Prabhupāda then walked off across the sands in the dark, followed by his disciples, and entered a nearby Gaudiya Math temple, where the devotees held kīrtana. They then went to another Gaudiya Math temple, Purusottama Math, and again held kīrtana.

During the chanting at Purusottama Math, Prabhupāda sat in a chair. When he was ready to leave, he began to stand, using his cane as a support, but suddenly, as he was about halfway up, he dropped down again onto the chair. Hari-śauri had to lift him to his feet by holding him under the arms. Prabhupāda said nothing, but walked slowly out of the hall and got into the car. Not everyone had noticed Prabhupāda’s momentary collapse, but Hari-śauri, on returning to his room, anxiously wrote of it in a letter to a Godbrother as “yet another sign that Śrīla Prabhupāda’s health is very quickly dwindling away.” Certainly none of the Purī paṇḍitas had noticed any dwindling from Śrīla Prabhupāda’s presentation on behalf of Lord Jagannātha, Lord of the universe.

In Bhubaneswar, just before three A.M. on the morning of January 30, Śrīla Prabhupāda began dictating the Tenth Canto of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam. One of his servants in the next room heard through the wall and became so excited that he awakened the other devotees. The dividing wall between the two rooms was about six feet high, with an opening above the wall up to the thatched roof. Light from Śrīla Prabhupāda’s room shone into the next room through that opening, and his voice, although faint, could be clearly heard. He was dictating a short description of each chapter of the Tenth Canto.

“The first chapter, which has sixty-nine verses,” he began, “describes Mahārāja Parīkṣit’s eagerness to learn about the incarnation of Lord Kṛṣṇa, and it also tells us how Kaṁsa killed the six sons of Devakī because of his fear of being killed by her eighth child. The Second Chapter contains forty-two verses …” Prabhupāda’s patient description of each of the ninety chapters was the epitome of faithful rendering of paramparā knowledge – without concoction, interpretation, addition, or subtraction. Therefore, he spoke with the same full faith that the original speaker of the Bhāgavatam, Śukadeva Gosvāmī, had spoken with five thousand years ago to Mahārāja Parīkṣit.

“Simply by chanting or repeating kṛṣṇa-kathā,” Prabhupāda was saying, “one is liberated from the contamination of Kali-yuga. This is the mission of Kṛṣṇa consciousness: to hear about Kṛṣṇa and thus be liberated from material bondage.” Sitting up on their blankets, the devotees listened; they would not return to sleep. It was an important, historic moment.

The Tenth Canto begins five thousand years ago, when the entire world was oppressed by demonic rulers, and Prabhupāda was comparing the situation then to the present situation. His words were faint, but not weak. He was unhesitating, sure. “Without reference to the supreme power of the Personality of Godhead,” Prabhupāda dictated, “demons assert themselves to be independent kings and presidents, and thus they create a disturbance by increasing their military power. When such disturbances are very prominent, Kṛṣṇa appears. At present also, various demonic states all over the world are increasing their military power in many ways, and the whole situation has become distressful. Therefore Kṛṣṇa has appeared by His name in the Hare Kṛṣṇa movement, which will certainly diminish the burden of the world. Philosophers, religionists, and people in general must take to this movement very seriously, for man-made plans and devices will not help bring peace on earth.”

Śrīla Prabhupāda was like a field general in his tent, and his disciples were like his infantry men. They knew they were hearing his battle strategies even before the information was disseminated through the chain of command. They were thrilled. With faith they heard that just as Kṛṣṇa had defeated the demonic rulers, so the Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement would counteract the demonic culture of the present age.

Later, on the morning walk, one of the devotees mentioned to Prabhupāda that they were planning to put his name on a sign on the door, saying that on January 30 at 2:50 A.M., Śrīla Prabhupāda began the Tenth Canto. Prabhupāda was pleasantly surprised that they had heard him.

“Kṛṣṇa’s flute can be heard in the Tenth Canto,” said Prabhupāda, “and the chapters Twenty-nine through Thirty-four are the smiling face of Kṛṣṇa.”

Another of Śrīla Prabhupāda’s G.B.C. men, Satsvarūpa dāsa Goswami, had recently replaced Rāmeśvara Swami as Prabhupāda’s secretary for the month. “Śrīla Prabhupāda,” Satsvarūpa asked one evening while sitting with Prabhupāda in his quarters, “when I first came here Rāmeśvara Mahārāja said that you had been speaking of how Kṛṣṇa consciousness would rise to power in the United States, and I find it hard to have that vision, since now it is just the opposite.”

“It is true,” said Śrīla Prabhupāda, “but now it has only taken its roots. You have to water and protect it, then you will get fruit. You have to give it protection. People must hear about us by our books, and we have to talk about the books.”

“So it is not that it will happen overnight?”

“No,” said Śrīla Prabhupāda. “Gradually it will grow. The seed is there. Now protect it by introducing more and more books in every house.”

Again, Prabhupāda referred to the upcoming New York court case. “At least tell them to read our books,” he said. “This is our statement. Our defense is that you first of all read these books and then give your statement. Finish this, and then give your judgment. Give them all these eighty-four books!”

Śrīla Prabhupāda became excited by the thought of the judges and lawyers reading all his books. He was completely serious, and he insisted the devotees get the authorities to read the books as legal evidences. Śrīla Prabhupāda continued, “Kṛṣṇa says, sarva-dharmān parityajya, ‘Surrender to Me and give up all other religion.’ Now the question may arise, ‘Why we shall surrender?’ Then you can argue and go on for three years. The whole thing will come out: What is God? What is creation? What is your position? Why you should surrender? And so on, and so on, so on. What do you think?”

“Yes, we should introduce the books as much as possible,” said Satsvarūpa. “I’ll write a letter to New York and tell them to emphasize this.”

“Bring all these books in the court,” Prabhupāda said. “One time in Calcutta there was a big lawyer named Mr. Ghosh. So on one case he brought so many books for argument. The judges were friends, so they very mildly criticized him, ‘Oh, Mr. Ghosh, you have brought the whole library?’ ‘Yes, my lord,’ said Mr. Ghosh, ‘just to teach you law.’ ” Śrīla Prabhupāda laughed and repeated, “ ‘Yes, my lord, just to teach you law.’ ”

Prabhupāda wanted his disciples to apply the same logic in the New York case. If the judge objected and said, “Why have you brought so many books to bother me?” the devotees should reply, “You have to hear. It may take twelve years to hear, but you have to hear. This is the law.” It sounded difficult, but the devotees knew they would have to try. This was Śrīla Prabhupāda’s specific instruction for handling the case.

“We have to say,” said Prabhupāda, “we never tried to brainwash. We have done exactly according to śāstra, authority. Here is the evidence. We have not manufactured anything. So they must read all the books. I think you should take defense in that way.”

“Our defense statement is already written in your books,” said Hari-śauri. “Certain sections?” asked Satsvarūpa. “Or should we say that they have to read all the books?”

Prabhupāda shouted, “All! Line to line. Our defense is eighty-four volumes.”

“But they’ll say,” said Gurukṛpā Swami, “ ‘If we read all these books, we’ll become brainwashed too.’ ”

“That is my duty,” said Prabhupāda, “ – you are trying to brainwash me, and I am trying to brainwash you. This is going on. That is the tussle. It is wrestling. You are trying your strength. I am trying my strength. Otherwise, where is there fight? You have got right to not agree with me. I have got right to not agree with you. Now let us settle.”

In Bhubaneswar on February 2, the appearance day of Lord Nityānanda, Śrīla Prabhupāda held the cornerstone-laying ceremony. About a thousand people came during the day to take prasādam. Sevasiva Rath attended and spoke. Prabhupāda’s disciple Svarūpa Dāmodara also spoke, as did Prabhupāda himself. Later, Prabhupāda discussed with his disciples about how to manage the Bhubaneswar center. Some of the sannyāsīs admitted to Prabhupāda that they did not see much potential there.

“Why not?” questioned Prabhupāda. “This is the capital of Orissa. People are coming here. We have to have centers in every town. Even if it is not a big center, some have to work and stay here. Even if the people are coming every night only to eat the kicharī, that is also preaching.”