In that shloka⁽¹⁾ it has been said:

Trńádapi suniicena taroriva sahiśńuná;
Amániinaḿ mánadena kiirtaniyah sadá Harih.⁽²⁾

[You must be more humble than the grass and as tolerant as the trees. You must give respect to those whom no one respects, and always do kiirtana to the Lord.]

You are a spiritual aspirant. “You are to develop the spirit of brave tolerance, just like a tree; and the spirit of modesty, more than that of a blade of grass.” And you know, in this universe there are so many people who do not get any respect from others – the downtrodden, half-fed, half-naked humanity. “You are to pay respect to those downtrodden people.” You are to elevate their standard, their socio-economico-cultural standard. If you do not pay respect to them, how can you serve them? You are serving the downtrodden people by ascribing Godhood to them.

And the last but not of least importance [in the shloka] is that the mind cannot remain vacant, the mind cannot remain jobless. You are to engage the mind, and the object of your mind, that is, your psychic pabulum, should be either something psychic, or something psycho-spiritual, or something purely of spiritual nature. It must not be psycho-physical or pure physical. I said just now, the mind cannot remain vacant. Whenever there is no important job to do, do not waste your time in idle thinking, because idle thinking means mental deterioration, mental degradation, psychic degeneration. So utilize each and every moment of your life in doing something good, in thinking something good. When you are not physically doing something good, then mentally do something good. And the best mental work, the best mental engagement, is kiirtaniiyah sadá harih – “Do the kiirtana of Parama Puruśa.”

In Sanskrit, one name of Parama Puruśa is Hari. Hari means “who steals”, “who takes away all your sin without your knowledge”. In Sanskrit, the root verb hr means “to steal”. Now the relationship between the Lord and His devotee is very sweet, and extremely, purely, personal. Parama Puruśa loves His devotee, and the devotee also loves His Lord. Now the accumulated mountain of sin attached to the devotee is unbearable for the Lord. He wants to remove that mountain of sin from His devotees. He may say: “Oh, devotee, give your sins to Me.” The devotee will say: “No, Lord, I am ready to give You everything, I am ready to give You my soul, my spirit, everything, but how can I give my sins to You? I cannot.” But Parama Puruśa loves His devotee, so without the knowledge of the devotee, He takes away his sin. Now to take something from a man without his knowledge is stealing. So Parama Puruśa steals – that is, He takes away sin from His devotee. And that’s why He is called Hari. Hari means “He who steals”.

So kiirtaniiyah sadá harih – that is, you are not to engage your mind in any psycho-physical or physical pabulum. Utilize that time, utilize each and every aspiration of your existence, in doing the kiirtana of the Supreme.

Now you may do kiirtana.

Footnotes

(1) The first sentence of this discourse, though not clearly audible on the tape, referred to a shloka that the author had quoted the previous evening. This sentence is the second sentence of the present discourse. –Eds.

(2) Chaitanya Mahaprabhu. –Eds.