Japa Lesson

Swamiji used to sit with us in the morning and say, “Chant one round.”  Then he would give us a japa lesson.  This is what it was like to be with him.  In the off-moments when he wasn’t lecturing, he would simply sit with us, leaning over his table and allowing us to approach him to learn the art of chanting.

We didn’t have bead bags in those days, and when we chanted together, Swamiji took his beads out of his bag and held them in his hands.  We hung our beads around our necks as we chanted.  We wore them out on the streets too.  Those red beads became the mark of the Hare Krishna chanters.

In his lectures he implored the audience to chant.  He promised peace and prosperity, and he assured us that it didn’t cost anything.  He begged us to chant the holy name because Krishna is non-different from His name.  He told us we could chant anywhere – in the factory, in the subway, in hell.  How could we have chanted without Swamiji’s japa lessons?  He was happy to give them to us.  More than anything, he wanted us to chant.  This is how he hoped to satisfy his guru and all the acaryas.  It had to start with us practicing sadhana.