Story of Prahlad Mahraj - Part 1

Dear parents,
Below is the story I told the kids in the class. I got the story from Srimad Bhagavatam Canto 7


Hiranyakasipu's Anger:

Hiranyakasipu was very upset that Krishna killed Hiranyaksha his brother. He considered to kill Lord Vishnu and devastate the Vaikunthaloka kingdom. Exhibiting his terrible teeth, fierce glance and frowning eyebrows, terrible to see, he took up his weapon, a trident, and thus began speaking to his associates, the assembled demons.


He said Krishna is equal to both demons and devatas. But this time when devatas approached him he took their side and helped them. Thus he gave up his natural tendency of equality towards the demons and demigods. He also said Lord Vishnu was influenced by Maya, he assumed the form of a boar to please His devotees. So I will fight with Vishnu to please his brother Hiranyaksha



Thus saying these to the demons he instructed them to destroy everyone. So the demons went ahead and started putting fire to the cities, villages and pasturing grounds, agricultural forest and natural forests. Some of them burned the hermitages, protective gates of the palaces, cut down the trees, destroying the government buildings.

The devatas, were very sad and did not know what to do.

Hiranyakasipu's tapasya:

Hiranyakasipu wanted to do tapasya to attain immortality and not to suffer from old age and disease and not to be attacked by any opponents and wanted to become the ruler of the universe. With this desire he entered the mandara mountain and began praciticing a severe type of austerity and meditation.

Hiranyakasipu began his austerities by standing with his toes on the ground, keeping his arms upward and looking toward the sky. This position was extremely difficult. From the hair on Hiraṇyakaśipu's head there emanated an effulgent light as brilliant and intolerable as the rays of the sun at the time of dissolution. Seeing the performance of such austere penances, the demigods, who had been wandering throughout the planets, now returned to their respective homes.


Because of Hiraṇyakaśipu's severe austerities, fire came from his head, and this fire and its smoke spread throughout the sky, encompassing the upper and lower planets, which all became extremely hot

Because of the power of his severe austerities, all the rivers and oceans were agitated, the surface of the globe, with its mountains and islands, began trembling, and the stars and planets fell. All directions were ablaze.

Devatas approaching Lord Brahma:

Scorched and extremely disturbed because of Hiraṇyakaśipu's severe penances, all the demigods left the planets where they reside and went to the planet of Lord Brahma, where they informed the creator as follows: O lord of the demigods, O master of the universe, because of the fire emanating from Hiraṇyakaśipu's head as a result of his severe austerities, we have become so disturbed that we could not stay in our planets but have come to you

O great person, chief of the universe, if you think it proper, kindly stop these disturbances, meant to destroy everything, before all your obedient subjects are annihilated

Brahma seeing Hiranyakasipu:

Lord Brahma, who is carried by a swan airplane, at first could not see where Hiraṇyakaśipu was, for Hiraṇyakaśipu's body was covered by an anthill and by grass and bamboo sticks. Because Hiraṇyakaśipu had been there for a long time, the ants had devoured his skin, fat, flesh and blood. Then Lord Brahma and the demigods spotted him, resembling a cloud-covered sun, heating all the world by his austerity. Struck with wonder, Lord Brahma began to smile and then addressed him as follows


Lord Brahma said: O son of Kasyapa Muni, please get up, please get up. All good fortune unto you. You are now perfect in the performance of your austerities, and therefore I may give you a benediction. You may now ask from me whatever you desire, and I shall try to fulfill your wish.

My dear son of Diti, with your great determination and austerity you have done what was impossible even for great saintly persons, and thus I have certainly been conquered by you

O best of the asuras, for this reason I am now prepared to give you all benedictions, according to your desire. I belong to the celestial world of demigods, who do not die like human beings. Therefore, although you are subject to death, your audience with me will not go in vain.

After speaking these words to Hiraṇyakaśipu, Lord Brahma, the original being of this universe, who is extremely powerful, sprinkled transcendental, infallible, spiritual water from his kamaṇḍalu upon Hiraṇyakaśipu's body, which had been eaten away by ants and moths. Thus he enlivened Hiraṇyakaśipu

As soon as he was sprinkled with the water from Lord Brahma's waterpot, Hiraṇyakaśipu arose, endowed with a full body with limbs so strong that they could bear the striking of a thunderbolt. With physical strength and a bodily luster resembling molten gold, he emerged from the anthill a completely young man, just as fire springs from fuel wood

Seeing Lord Brahma present before him in the sky, carried by his swan airplane, Hiraṇyakaśipu was extremely pleased. He immediately fell flat with his head on the ground and began to express his obligation to the lord

Hiranyakasipu's asking for benediction:

Hiranyakasipu asked for the benediction for immortality - which means he does not want to leave this world. Brahma said he cannot do that, so Hiranyakasipu asked for benediction - not to be killed by the living entities created by Brahma, not die inside, outside the house , not day time or night time, not in ground or sky, no weapons, not by any demigod of demon, give me mystic power that these cannot be lost any time


Love and Regards
Nama Priya

Tulasi arati Video, lyrics and translation

Dear parents,

I did a small video where kids can watch, we will practice the song for a month.




Sri Tulasi Kirtana
(1)
namo namaḥ tulasī kṛṣṇa-preyasi namo namaḥ
rādhā-kṛṣṇa-sevā pābo ei abilāṣī
(2)
ye tomāra śaraṇa loy, tara vāñchā pūrṇa hoy
kṛpā kori’ koro tāre vṛndāvana-vāsi
(3)
mora ei abhilāṣa, vilāsa kuñje dio vāsa
nayana heribo sadā yugala-rūpa-rāśi
(4)
ei nivedana dhara, sakhīra anugata koro
sevā-adhikāra diye koro nīja dāsī
(5)
dīna kṛṣṇa-dāse koy, ei yena mora hoy
śrī-rādhā-govinda-preme sadā yena bhāsi

Translation:
(1) O Tulasé, beloved of Kåñëa, I bow before you again and again. My desire is to obtain the service of Çré Çré Rädhä and Kåñëa.
(2) Whoever takes shelter of you has his wishes fulfilled. Bestowing your mercy on him, you make him a resident of Våndävana.
(3) My desire is that you will also give me a residence in the pleasure groves of Çré Våndävana-dhäma. Thus within my vision I will always behold the beautiful pastimes of Rädhä and Kåñëa.
(4) I beg you to make me a follower of the cowherd damsels of Vraja. Please give me the privilege of devotional service and make me your own maidservant.

Introducing Tulasi arati to kids

Dear parents,
Hare Krishna.

I could not attend the class because of my sore throat. I got the updates from Anuradha mataji.

Here is what she said:

The class did Bhagavad Gita sloka and at this point more kids know the sloka. If required we will go over it again. We started with Tulasi arati, I will post the sloka in next post.

We also discussed the story of Radharani making sweet laddu to Dhuruvasa muni on dhuvadesi. Also Srimati Radharani got blessings from the sage that what ever she cooks will be nectar.

Yashoda mayi will request Kirtida to send Srimati Radha rani home to cook for her son Sri Krishna. One day Yashoda mayi puts turmeric on Radha rani's hands but she washes off in a kund. Sri Krishna takes bath in that kund and he appears as Lord Chaitanya trying to understand the mood of Radha rani.

See you next week

Love and Regards
Nama Priya

Srimati Radha rani opening her eyes

Dear parents,

Hare Krishna.

Last week the kids had a blast in the egg hunt. They found lots of them in the prasadam hall. We waited for the kids to settle down and started with the bagavad gita sloka.

Nainam chindanti sastrani... We practiced the first line most of the kids got it.
We will finish the whole sloka next week.

In the story time we talked about why Radha rani did not open her eyes, who came to see her for the first time,how she opened her eyes and why she was not seeing, hearing and talking.

We also revised Bhima killing Jarasandha story and many kids answered the questions we asked.

In the last we practiced the bajan and finished by teaching the last two lines. We will revisit the bajan again

Thanks and Regards
Nama Priya

Rama navami dress up program

Dear parents,

Please enjoy the pictures of our program last week in the temple for Rama Navami

Bhagavad Gita 2.23

nainaḿ chindanti śastrāṇi

nainaḿ dahati pāvakaḥ

na cainaḿ kledayanty āpo

na śoṣayati mārutaḥ

SYNONYMS

na — never; enam — this soul; chindanti — can cut to pieces; śastrāṇi — weapons; na — never; enam — this soul; dahati — burns; pāvakaḥ — fire; na — never; ca — also; enam — this soul; kledayanti — moistens; āpaḥ — water; na — never; śoṣayati — dries; mārutaḥ — wind.

TRANSLATION

The soul can never be cut to pieces by any weapon, nor burned by fire, nor moistened by water, nor withered by the wind.

The purport is in http://vedabase.net/bg/2/23/en

Jarasandha story

Dear parents,
Hare Krishna.

After the nice saturday evening, we started our class on sunday evening with slokas and we revised the entire syllabus what we covered so far.

We also discussed about killing Jarasanda by Bhima under the guidance of Krishna. Below are the points we covered.

Why did Krishna build the Dwaraka city?
What is the birth story of Jarasandha?
How is Krishna related to Jarasandha?
Why did Jarasandha got jealous of Krishna?
What is the strength of Jarasandha?
What is the reason that Yudhistra did the Raja suya sacrifice?
Why did Bhima, Krishna and Arjuna dress themselves as Brahmana and went to Jarasandha's palace?
How many days did they fight?
What was the method they followed to kill Jarasandha?

I will reiterate these questions again next week, so kids remember the story.

I will upload the sloka in my next blog.

Love and Regards
Nama Priya