Adi-lila, Chapter 7 67

krsna-nama-maha-mantrera ei ta’ svabhava
yei jape, tara krsne upajaye bhava

SYNONYMS

krsna-nama—the holy name of Krsna; maha-mantrera—of the supreme hymn; e/
ta’—this is its; svabhava—nature; yei—anyone; jape—chants; tara—his; krsne—unto
Krsna; upajaye—develops; bhava—ecstasy.

TRANSLATION

“It is the nature of the Hare: Krsna:maha-mantra that anyone who chants it
immediately develops his loving ecstasy for Krsna.

PURPORT
In Bhagavad-gita it is said:

aham sarvasya prabhavo
mattah sarvam pravartate

iti matva bhajante mam
budha bhava-samanvitah

“lam the source of all spiritual and material worlds. Everything emanates from Me.
The wise who know this perfectly engage in My devotional service and worship Me
with all their hearts.” (Bg. 10.8) In this verse it is explained that one who chants
the Hare Krsna mantra develops bhava, ecstasy, which is the point at which revela-
tion begins. It-is the preliminary stage in developing one’s original love for God.
A neophyte disciple begins by hearing and chanting, associating with devotees and
practicing the regulative principles, and thus he vanquishes all of his unwanted bad
habits. In this way he develops attachment for Krsna and cannot forget Krsna even
fora moment. Bhava is almost the successful stage of spiritual life. A sincere student
aurally receives the holy name from the spiritual master, and after being initiated
he follows the regulative principles given by the spiritual master. When the holy
name is properly served in this way, automatically the spiritual nature of the holy
name spreads; in other words, the devotee becomes qualified in offenselessly chant-
ing the holy name. When one is completely fit to chant the holy name in this way,
he is eligible to make disciples all over the world, and he actually becomes jagad-
guru. Then the entire world, under his influence, begins to chant the holy names
of the Hare Krsna maha-mantra. Thus all the disciples of such a spiritual master
increase in attachment for Krsna, and therefore he sometimes cries, sometimes
laughs, sometimes dances and sometimes chants. These symptoms are very promi-
nently manifest in the body of a pure devotee. Sometimes when our students of
the Krsna consciousness movement chant and dance, even in India people are
astonished to see how these foreigners have learned to chant and dance in this
ecstatic fashion. As explained by Caitanya Mahaprabhu, however, actually this is
not due to practice, for without extra endeavor these symptoms become manifest
