Dear Srila Prabhupada,
Please accept my most humble obeisances in the dust of your lotus feet. All glories to you!
Today marks the 54th time I’ve celebrated your Vyasa Puja in my life. This occasion is the spiritual pinnacle of my year, a time when I reflect on the progress I may have made and the services I have rendered in your honor. You envisioned ISKCON as the primary vehicle for propagating the movement initiated over 500 years ago by Lord Caitanya and His immediate followers, the six Goswamis. When you visited temples in the early days of ISKCON, your inquiries were always the same: “How many books have you distributed? How many devotees have you made? What important people have you arranged for me to meet?” Since then, I have believed that answering these questions with tangible results is the key to pleasing you and thereby obtaining the boundless mercy that leads to the ultimate goal of life:
paraṃ gopyam api snigdhe
śiśye vācyam iti śrutiḥ
tac chrūyatāṃ mahā-bhāga
goloka-mahimādhunā
“The Vedas say that to a loyal disciple, one may speak the confidential secret. Therefore, O most fortunate one, now please hear the glories of Goloka.” (Sri Brhad Bhagavatamrta, Part 2, Chapter 1, text 6)
Srila Prabhupada, on this sacred day, I come before you with a solemn vow: I am prepared to take as many births as necessary to fulfill your desire to spread Lord Caitanya’s samkirtan movement during the 10,000-year golden age within this dark Kali-yuga.
In a conversation on June 5th, 1976, while driving back from a morning walk in Los Angeles, Ramesvara Swami asked you, “Srila Prabhupada, I was told that Lord Caitanya’s movement will rise like a moon and shine for 10,000 years. Is that true?”
You softly murmured in assent, and then said, “This movement will go on for 10,000 years without any impediment. Many fallen souls will be delivered back to home, back to Godhead. Demons that are trying to challenge us cannot stop our movement for ten thousand years.”
A couple of weeks later in New Vrindavan, you reiterated this prophecy to your disciples: “Literatures are selling, and they are being appreciated by the learned circles. It takes some time, but if we stick to our principles and do not compromise, our movement will never stop; it will go on. At least for ten thousand years, it will continue.”
Srila Prabhupada, it is clear to me that you possess the power to gradually transform the face of the earth. This is confirmed in the Visnu-dharma:
kalau kṛta-yugaṁ tasya
kalis tasya kṛte yuge
yasya cetasi govindo
hṛdaye yasya nācyutaḥ
“For one who has Lord Govinda in his heart, Satya-yuga becomes manifest in the midst of Kali, and even Satya-yuga becomes Kali-yuga for one who does not have the infallible Lord in his heart.”
The samkirtan movement as you have presented it is nothing short of miraculous. The word “miraculous,” of course, is derived from the word “miracle” which has its roots in the Latin word “mira,” meaning “to wonder at.” Miracles are extraordinary events that transcend natural laws and are attributed to a divine or supernatural cause. Historically, miracles have been viewed as evidence of divine power and have served as a profound source of inspiration for religious faith.
You hinted at the miraculous nature of this movement during a morning conversation with your disciples in 1970: “People are appreciating that in such a short time this Hare Krishna mantra is spreading all over the world. It is Krishna’s miracle. If Krishna desires, let there be miracles!”
You also wrote of the miraculous events that occurred during the pastimes of Lord Caitanya. For example Mahaprabhu revived the dead son of Srivasa Thakura, healed the leper Vasudeva, and cured the terminal cholera afflicting the son-in-law of Sarvabhauma Bhattacharya. He also revealed visions of His transcendental form to Sarvabhauma Bhattacharya and Ramananda Raya and influenced the Mayavadi sannyasis of Benares by manifesting a brilliant effulgence upon entering their assembly. He even simultaneously appeared in several different kirtan parties during the Ratha-yatra in Jagannatha Puri.
When someone once asked you about your own miracles, you smiled, waved your hand toward your disciples, and said, “My miracle is that I have made all these Western boys and girls devotees of Krsna.”
