The "famous Brahmin Cook" and The Prostitute.
Once, near the peaceful village of Vrndavana, the transcendental place where Krsna manifested His pastimes on earth, there lived a scholarly very proud Brahmana (priest) and servant of Krsna.
Opposite his home, there lived a lowely prostitute who earlier in her life, grew up in terrible poverty, neglect and abuse, leaving her emotionally and pschologically damaged.
This led her to committ many offenses, including sexual favors for money due to being exploited and scared by men at an early age.
Unfortunately, many NEVER saw the difficult life she had as a young girl, and how she was sexually abused at 12 years of age old that scared her deeply.
Nor did many, especially the proud arrogent famous Brahmin cook, had the wisdom and humility to see this and hate her sinful life style instead of hating her.
All through her struggles over the years, she remained an aspiring devotee of Lord Krsna who always tried to remember Krsna regardless of her sinful life.
Across the road, the proud local arrogent puffed up brahmana priest, known as a very famous cook who wrote many books, hated her so much he could not stop thinking about her and made sure everyone knew her exploitive sinful nature by always belittling her and ridiculing her to others.
The famous brahmin cook could not see beyond her external material body that he was disgusted and repulsed by.
Despite his vast learning, he could not see nor understand she was not the troublesome bodily vessel, but the soul within.
Therefore his show of spiritual advancement immitating a saint in devotional dress, was like stage acting and pretending.
He was never really advanced to begin with, even though he was expert at chanting thousands of Vedic slokas ot Texts, marking his body in Tilak and dressing so nicely while organizing devotee renunions and festivals.
Over the years, the scholarly Brahmana continued taking great pleasure in the fall downs of others, and then loved ‘gossiping’ about those fallen souls.
In fact a day would never go by where the Brahmin would not remark on how disgusting the prostitute across the road was.
But secretly he had his own problems and had been married many times and had many affairs with many young girls.
And now at 62 years of old, the Temple authorities forced him in a big cover up, to marry one of those girls he abused and took advantage of at one of his cooking classes.
The Brahmin used his famous cooking credentials and name to achieved this and satisfy his lusty desires.
The young girl he was forced to marry by the Temple authorities was half his age and seemed digusting to many senior devotees who knew what was really going on.
Therefore a few devotees new the real truth about this arrogent puffed up Brahmin cook taking advantage of young girls in his cooking classes.
However, most of his activities were not known by the general devotees, pushed under the rug, hushed up and "covered up" by Temple authorities.
The prostitute across the road on the other hand, always remained humble and genuinely felt embarrassed, humiliated and forever repentant for her forced youthful exploitations and past fall downs, caused by being neglected as a child.
Therefore she was never proud or puffed up and always remained humble.
Sadly, the proud Brahmana never showed such honesty and humility.
Even though she was very fallen and new it, she prayed to Lord Krsna everyday with genuine prayers.
Unlike the self centered Brahmin cook, who hid his real diqusting secret life of lusting over young girls, just so he could continue getting his cheap aderation and fame from both his cooking classes, and his self glorifying book writing that purposely left out the achievements of those he never liked.
As a daily observance, the Brahmin would sit in his room and recite the Bhagavad Gita, Brahma-Samhita and Srimad Bhagavatam, then cook offerings to the Deities in the Temple and even give classes.
He was expert at externally imitating Prabhupada and other saints.
However, his ego was always swollen with pride, arrogence and great bitterness he used to proudly bully others.
The Temple authorities knew all along what he was like and what he was doing, but never did a thing about it, only to cover it up.
In the meantime, across the street the prostitute would keep trying her hardest to leave the past behind, as she was now entering old age and leading a good life and even chanting 16 rounds a day of the Hare Krishna Maha Mantra.
But the arrogent puffed up brahmin refused to acknowledge her advancement, he always demanded and petitioned that she be banned from the Temple and any reunions, and that she should always be punished for her degradation and influence on others, no matter how much time passes.
To achieve this, the Brahmana spread many nasty rumors and lies about her, even one devotee friend of the Prostitute offered to beat him up and break his legs and even ambush him and kill him.
But she strongly protested that such violence will not solve anything and insisted that her prayers to Lord Krishna was enough and was her ONLY source of protection.
Anyway, it seemed his punishment was - "he always thought about the fallen prostitute and all her faults more so than thinking of Lord Krsna and listehingbto his expert chanting of slokas".
As the years passed, the Brahmana grew ever more bitter towards the prostitute everytime her presents is near him, knowing all her faults.
He continued for years belittling her and always trying to distribute her.
The brahmana would say -
“Just see how lowly and "disgusting" she is, how can such a low life ever leave her disgraceful body in the beautiful land of Vrndavana and associate with REAL "advanced" devotees of Krsna like me?”
Then hypcritically continued with his parrot like recitation of mantras while cooking various preparations.
Eventually it just so happened that both the Brahmana and the prostitute died (left their material bodily vessels) at the same time.
To the Brahman’s surprise, the Vishnuduttas (the Lord of Vaikuntha’s messengers) came to deliver the prostitute from her material body while the terrifying Yamadutas (the Lord of Death’s messengers) came for the proud Brahmin.
"What is this?"
The arrogent brahmana protested to the Yamadutas.
"There must be some mistake!" He angrily added.
The Yamadutas replied -
"My dear Brahmana, there is no mistake. While you were busy meditating on the lowly "disqusting" activities of the prostitute, she listened to you recite the Gita, Brahma Samhita and Srimad Bhagavatam and prayed that she could one day elevate herself to pure devotional selfless service and be forgiven for her sinful life.
Therefore her humility allowed her to achieve liberation because she was always thinking of Krishna and immediately went back home back to Godhead, while YOU only degraded yourself because of your fault finding and petty jealousy.
For that, your reward will be taking birth again in the material world on a planet of prostitutes, sex abusers, paedophiles and perverts."
This story in similar versions, is found all over the internet as a lesson to others, our Prabhupada tells a shorter version of the same story.
ReplyDeleteHow are young devotees suppose to learn, if these arrogent self righteous Brahmins, who criticizes a sincere struggling devotee like the prostitute, are NOT exposed as fault finding fools?
Still, out of fear of retribution, some have said the Brahmin should not be criticized for his hash treatment of the Prostitute.
Such comments are nonsense and turning a blind eye to the Brahmin's continuous fault finding and bulling of the fallen prostitute.
Only the proud Brahmin in the story would use such hash bullying tactic in an attempt to silence his critics who complain he only sees the faults in the fallen prostitute and not her attemps of trying to be a good devotee in her later life.
The end of the story makes a very important point, please read it.
Hare Krishna.
So many other devotees never cared and turned a blind eye to the arrogent Brahmin cook's continuous fault finding and bullying of the fallen prostitute.
ReplyDeleteSuch ignorance among the devotees, by choosing to believe rumors and, in truth, never really cared one way or the other, was just as bad and impersonal, even worse than the Brahmins constant abuse and bullying of the Prostitute as she attempt to rehabilitate her self.
Evil flourshes in Society because good people see it but do nothing.