Adi-lila, Chapter 1 57
PURPORT

Those who are serious about the knowledge of the transcendental world, which
is far beyond the material cosmic creation, must approach a bona fide spiritual
master to learn the science both directly and indirectly. One must learn both the
means to approach the desired destination and the hindrances to such progress. The
spiritual master knows how to regulate the habits of a neophyte disciple, and there-
fore a serious student must learn the science in all its aspects from him.

There are different grades and standards of prosperity. The standard of comfort
and happiness conceived by a common man engaged in material labor is the lowest
grade of happiness, for it is in relationship with the body. The highest standard of
such bodily comfort is achieved by a fruitive worker who by pious activities reaches
the plane of heaven, or the kingdom of the creative gods with their delegated powers.
But the conception of comfortable life in heaven is insignificant in comparison to
the happiness enjoyed in the impersonal Brahman, and this brahmdananda, the
spiritual bliss derived from impersonal Brahman, is like the water in the hoofprint
of a calf compared to the ocean of love of Godhead. When one develops pure love
for the Lord, he derives an ocean of transcendental happiness from the association
of the Personality of Godhead. To qualify oneself to reach this stage of life is the
highest perfection.

One should try to purchase a ticket to go back home, back to Godhead. The
price of such a ticket is one’s intense desire for it, which is not easily awakened,
even if one continuously performs pious activities for thousands of lives. All mun-
dane relationships are sure to be broken in the course of time, but once one
establishes a relationship with the Personality of Godhead in a particular rasa, it is
never to be broken, even after the annihilation of the material world.

One should understand, through the transparent medium of the spiritual master,
that the Supreme Lord exists everywhere in His transcendental spiritual nature
and that the living entities’ relationships with the Lord are directly and indirectly
existing everywhere, even in this material world. In the spiritual world there are
five kinds of relationships with the Supreme Lord—santa, dadsya, sakhya, vatsalya
and mddhurya. The perverted reflections of these rasas are found in the material
world. Land, home, furniture and other inert material objects are related in santa,
or the neutral and silent sense, whereas servants work in the ddsya relationship.
The reciprocation between friends is called sakhya, the affection of a parent for a
child is known as vdtsalya, and the affairs of conjugal love constitute mddhurya.
These five relationships in the material world are distorted reflections of the original
pure sentiments, which should, be understood and perfected in relationship with the
Supreme Personality of Godhead under the guidance of a bona fide spiritual master.
In the material world the perverted rasas bring frustration. If these rasas are re-
established with Lord Krsna, the result is eternal blissful life.

From this and the preceding three verses of Caftanya-caritamrta, which have
been selected from the Srimad-Bhagavatam, the missionary activities of Lord
Caitanya can be understood. Srimad-Bhdgavatam has 18,000 verses, which are
summarized in the four verses beginning with aham evasam evagre (53) and con-
