| Sri Harinama Cintamani :: Chapter 4 (part 1) |
Page 2 of 5
"7) To instruct faithless persons on the glories of the holy
name.
To criticize a saintly person is offensive "Criticizing a saintly person is the first offense against the holy name; it completely disrupts one's spiritual life. You have personally described the qualities of a sadhu in Your incarnation as Lord Krsna, when you spoke to Uddhava as recorded in the Eleventh Canto of Srimad-Bhagavatam. Being unable to see past the labels to the person himself, we end up in a world of barriers and conflict. "The sadhu's qualities are as follows: he is merciful, tolerant, equal to all, performing penances without excessively inflicting injury to the body, truthful, pure-hearted, compassionate, free from lusty intelligence; master of the senses; voluntarily accepting material impoverishment; gentle; clean; regulated in eating; peaceful; apathetic to materialism; patient; steady; taking Lord Krsna as his only shelter; free from illusion; grave; a conqueror over hunger, thirst, lamentation, envy and old age; not expecting honor from others; offering respect to others; expert; not a cheater; and knowledgeable. Qualities are of two kinds: svarupa and tathasta "These qualities can be divided into two categories: svarupa, or the direct and indigenous qualities of any substance, and tathasta, qualities that are ornamental and which are visible when the substance comes in contact with something else. The sadhu's acceptance of Lord Krsna as his only shelter is his svarupa-laksana, and all the other qualities are tathasta. If by some good fortune one associates with a Vaisnava, he develops a taste for |