Published on May 7th, 2001 | by visoka-dasa

On Saturday, May 5th, (check your calendar) we request all worldwide centers to observe the disappearance day of Sriman Jayananda das Brahmacari. This will be very auspicious for the world community of devotees, especially for 3 reasons.

Hare Krishna Vaishnavas,
Please accept my humble obeisances, and all glories to Srila Prabhupada.

On Saturday, May 5th, (check your calendar) we request all worldwide centers to observe the disappearance day of Sriman Jayananda das Brahmacari. This will be very auspicious for the world community of devotees, especially for 3 reasons.

There are 3 wonderful reasons for all Vaisnava communities to observe Jayananda day with enthusiastic kirtan and speaking or reading, and sumptuous feasting.

1) There are numerous testimonials from many senior disciples, in which they claim that Jayananda’s day is one of the most blissful of all observance days of the year. The readings and memories and kirtan are especially blissful, and especially the feast is very special. Everyone knows how Jayananda loved prasadam (which invariably comes out in the readings of his pastimes), and this Jayananda prasadam spirit permeates throughout the transcendental process of prasadam preparation and offering and honoring thereof, thus transcendentally infecting the cooks and pujaris and the devotees who honor the feast, and invariably everyone comments how special the feast is.
Most important, Srila Prabhupada wanted us to observe this day in honor of Jayananda. By the desire of His Divine Grace Srila Prabhupada, we are observing this day as the disappearance of a great Vaishnava. As Srila Prabhupada said, “Everyone should follow the example of Jayananda. I am very proud that I had such a nice disciple. If possible Jayananda’s picture should be hung in the Ratha of Lord Jagannath, and in all of our temples a day may be set aside for holding a festival in his honor, just as we do on the disappearance day of the other great Vaishnavas.”

2) And even more important, the Lord considers the worship of His devotee to be better than direct worship of Himself. As Lord Krishna says in Srimad Bhagavatam-“My dear Srutadeva, you may therefore accept all these great saintly persons, brahmanas and sages as My bona fide representatives. By worshiping them faithfully, you will be worshiping Me more diligently. I consider worship of My devotees to be better than direct worship of Me. If someone attempts to worship Me directly without worshiping My devotees, I do not accept such worship, even though it may be presented with great opulence.” from Krishna Book, chapter 86.

3) Therefore it will be especially pleasing to Lord Nrsimghadeva to see that His devotee is nicely honored the day before His appearance day. It seems there is no coincidence that Jayananda’s Day falls the day before Lord Nrsimghadeva’s appearance day, as The Lord will be attentive as to how His devotee is honored the day before Himself. If there is some neglect in this matter, we cannot guarantee that Lord Nrsimghadeva will be very pleased by the worship on His appearance day. Therefore to insure the auspiciousness of the Lord’s pleasure and Srila Prabhupada’s pleasure, and the resultant happiness of all Vaisnavas, we humbly urge all devotees to nicely honor Jayananda’s day on Saturday, June the 5th with great enthusiasm.

Such a festival is called an utsava, just like we talk about utsaha, or enthusiasm. So utsava means a celebration or a day of celebration. Just like when we talk about krishnotkirtana-gana-nartana-parau, we talk about the utkirtana performed by the Six Goswamis, that means that their kirtana was very enthusiastically jumping up and down. So similarly, we perform utsava by having kirtana, and traditionally the senior Vaishnavas speak on the qualities of the departed Vaishnava, and then there’s a feast, an offering of prasadam in honor of that personality. (this passage is from Adi-kesava’s memories)

Devotees may enter the Jayananda Web site, at this address–http://www.jayanandathakur.com/ And copy some pastimes of Jayananda for devotees to read on Jayananda day.

We are producing a book on Jayananda soon to be printed, “The Beautiful Life of Jayananda Thakur,” about 180 pages, and it is going through the final edit and then going to the printer. Five devotee editors have done uttama service of editing the book, going the extra mile to make this book a pleasing offering to Jayananda and all the devotees. We especially appreciate the hard work of Sriman Dasarathasuta dasa. The author has some laxmi for the printing, but volunteer devotees can offer an interest-free loan, or donation, to increase the printing quality and quantity. Especially such an offer would be auspicious on Jayananda’s day, June the 5th. You may go to the web site for information on how to make such an offering.

Hope to see you on the 5th!

Hoping this meets you in blissful service, your servant, Visoka dasa.

Please be sure to visit: www.jayanandathakur.com