11.8
niskincanasya bhagavad-bhajanonmukhasya
param param jigamisor bhava-sagarasya
sandarsanam visayinam atha yositam ca
ha hanta hanta visa-bhaksanato ’py asadhu
SYNONYMS
niskincanasya—of a person who has completely detached himself from material enjoyment; bhagavat—the Supreme Personality of Godhead; bhajana—in serving; unmukhasya—who is eager to be engaged; param—to the other side; param—distant; jigamisoh—who is desiring to go; bhava-sagarasya—of the ocean of material existence; sandarsanam—the seeing (for some material purpose); visayinam—of persons engaged in material activities; atha—as well as; yositam—of women; ca—also; ha—alas; hanta hanta—expression of great lamentation; visa-bhaksanatah—than the act of drinking poison; api—even; asadhu—more abominable.
Greatly lamenting, the Lord then informed Sarvabhauma Bhattacarya, “ ’Alas, for a person who is seriously desiring to cross the material ocean and engage in the transcendental loving service of the Lord without material motives, seeing a materialist engaged in sense gratification or seeing a woman who is similarly interested is more abominable than drinking poison willingly.’ ”
PURPORT
This is a quotation from Sri Caitanya-candrodaya-nataka (8.23).
Thus Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu enunciates the principles for a sannyasi renouncing the material world for spiritual advancement.
Spiritual advancement is not meant for magic shows and jugglery but for crossing the material world and being transferred to the spiritual world.
Param param jigamisoh means desiring to go to the other side of the material world.
There is a river called Vaitarani, and on one side of this river is the material world, and on the other side is the spiritual world.
Since the Vaitarani River is compared to a great ocean, it is named bhava-sagara, the ocean of repeated birth and death.
Spiritual life aims at stopping this repetition of birth and death and entering into the spiritual world, where one can live eternally cognizant and blissful.
Unfortunately, the general populace does not know anything about spiritual life or the spiritual world.
The spiritual world is mentioned in the Bhagavad-gita (8.20):
paras tasmat tu bhavo ’nyo
’vyakto ’vyaktat sanatanah
yah sa sarvesu bhutesu
nasyatsu na vinasyati “Yet there is another unmanifest nature, which is eternal and is transcendental to this manifested and unmanifested matter.
It is supreme and is never annihilated.
When all in this world is annihilated, that part remains as it is.” Thus there is a spiritual nature beyond this material world, and that spiritual nature exists eternally.
Spiritual advancement means stopping material activities and entering into spiritual activities.
This is the process of bhakti-yoga.
In the material world, the via media for sense gratification is mainly a woman.
One who is seriously interested in spiritual life should strictly avoid women.
A sannyasi should never see a man or a woman for material benefit.
In addition, talks with materialistic men and women are also dangerous, and they are compared to drinking poison.
Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu was very strict on this point.
He therefore refused to see King Prataparudra, who was naturally always engaged in political and economic affairs.
The Lord even refused to see the King despite the request of a personality like Sarvabhauma Bhattacarya, who was the Lord’s intimate friend and devotee.