At Mathura Gary and Richard (now Radhanath Swami) were hosted by a guru who had pleasing mannerisms and was refined and meticulous in his speech and movements. He offered Richard to share his own wooden bed for sleeping in the night. Richard felt it was an honour to sleep on the same level as the guru, but soon realized this guru was lusty. As the guru tried to grope Richard in his embrace, and started moving his hands in the private parts of Richard’s body, Richard shoved him away and jumped to his feet. Richard rushed outside and closely spied on the swami making sure he didn’t do this to Gary.
Later both Gary and Richard realized that once again their idealistic innocence was challenged by the real world.
What inspired me the most on reading this account was Radhanath Swami’s mood even as young Richard. He writes:
“…He was a scholar of scripture, the high priest of a temple, and the guru of many disciples who revered him. Yet he’d tried to exploit me to satisfy his own carnal desire. Real saintliness should be understood by a person’s behavior. Exerting one’s spiritual authority to exploit the innocent is a grave injustice. I prayed that this incident would not create doubt in my mind toward the sincere devotees .”
Radhanath Swami’s purity shines forth in this passage. Generally a normal person would be so outraged by acts of hypocrisy that it wouldn’t be surprising if he or she dismisses all gurus and all paths. However Radhanath Swami even as an inexperienced Richard prayed that the misdeeds of those in the guise of a saint but ravaged by lust, not disturb his faith in genuine gurus and sincere devotees of the Lord.
Lust has been the biggest stumbling block for many spiritual seekers. Even for those not interested in spiritual life, lust sucks the consciousness of millions searching for happiness. “Mistaking lust for love is the single greatest tragedy of the modern world”, says Radhanath Swami. Due to the influence of the movies most people think bodily contact and union is the essence of love. When we mistake ourselves to be physical bodies, whether male or female, we become lusty. Radhanath Swami explains that lust originates and perpetuates from the fundamental ignorance of who we actually are. When we indulge in lust, that overwhelming experience of subordination to the body for pleasure, seals our bodily misidentification. Lust creates within us a sense of incompleteness which we struggle to fulfil by exploiting another’s body for our pleasure.
Radhanath Swami is also quick to point out that love on the other hand is based on the true understanding of our spiritual identity. We are spirit souls, emanating from the complete whole. The self is complete in the natural, eternal relationship with the Supreme Lord. Radhanath Swami reminds us, “Unfortunately we have at the present moment forgotten this relationship with God. When we revive this divine relationship, the resulting love fills us with a sense of completeness.” A natural question that comes to one’s mind is does this completeness make us indifferent to all worldly relationships? “Not at all”, exclaims Radhanath Swami with the exuberance of a child, “if we reconnect with the Supreme Lord, then we form relationships with others, not to fill our completeness, but to share our completeness. That’s why the great saintly persons across the religious traditions were able to transform thousands of lives by radiating this spiritual love.”
Radhanath Swami speaks very fondly of his own guru who transformed thousands of drug-addicted hippies into ‘spiritually-satisfied “happies”. How? Because the hippies whose motto was to rebel against every authority found him(Radhanath Swami’s guru) to be a source of unconditional, divine love and so abided by his guidance to transform their lust into love.
How can we awaken this love for God? “All bonafide scriptures recommend chanting of God’s names”, says Radhanath Swami, whose formula is very simple, “If by chanting God’s names, we can shine with love, why should we choose to burn with lust?”
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Founder-acharya of the International Society For Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON)
“Go to India” a sweet but commanding voice; spoke up in the heart of young Richard (later Radhanath Swami) who was immersed in meditation, his search for meaning in life has brought him to the Isle of Crete. Today he was ordered to go to India. Born and raised in the middle class suburbs of Chicago, Radhanath swami grew up in the 1950’s and 60’s era when popular musicians protested war, prejudice and social injustice. Radhanath swami would listen to these songs again and again, but their lyrics referring to God stirred his soul. Peter, Paul and Mary- the folk trio from Greenswich village sang in their debut album
“Early in the morning, about the break of day
I ask the Lord, to help me find my way”
This simple prayer was to guide Radhanath swami in the coming years of his life........
Not to generalize and label an entire school of thought or set of practitioners is a very difficult task which Radhanath Swami could do at such a young age. Also, I learnt a very interesting and distinguishing feature of lust which makes it not just different but completely opposite to love – it senses incompleteness within us and misguides us to seek for completeness by exploiting others. And love makes us share the completeness (on relating to God) with others.
View CommentPersonal experience: it takes some spiritual practice to even begin to understand the difference between the two–lust and love.
View CommentRadhanath Swami makes a very compelling point about choosing love over lust.
View Comment“If by chanting God’s names, we can shine with love, why should we choose to burn with lust?”wonderful points by Maharaj.
View CommentRadhanath Swami has shown by own example, how love conquers the lust in other people’s heart.Its difficult pray for someone who has attempted to exploit you.
View CommentRadhanath Swami is teaching us that we should not fall pray to using our position for some selfish gains. Also specifically the mood of sadhu i.e a spiritual practitioner.
View CommentWonderful points on transforming lust to love. Although faced with so many dubious spiritual practitioners, Radhanath Swami still prayed to be able to distinguish the sincere devotees from the dubious ones, and to not lose faith. Wonderful lesson.
View CommentHere we find the root cause of all the problems in this world—-lust, and also the final solution—–chanting of the Holy Names of the Lord.
View CommentI came across a Hindi quote written on a truck,’Assi pratishat be-imaan, phirbhi mera Bharat mahan’,which means
View Comment‘80% people are untrustworthy, yet my India is great.’In spirituality also we come across many hoaxes, and we tend to
generalise and conclude that practice of spirtuality itself is not good.Here Radhanath Swami is teaching us by his example that we must seek out those 20% sincere ones and try to perfect our life.Very good lesson.
Any one meeting Radhanath Swami comes to know that he is ‘shining with love’- a perfect self realized sage.
View Commentthank you for sharing this
View CommentWhen will that day be mine when i will develop Love for god to the highest extent, which is the only solution for all the problems. Thank you maharaj for letting us know.
View Comment“Real saintliness should be understood by a person’s behavior” such a simple but powerful test to know who is who..
View CommentFrom ‘LUST to LOVE’ – In the word today Lust as transmigrated across boundaries of all kinds to such an extent that it manifest in unimaginable ways. The world is facing so much crisis due to this one aspect be it for power, fame, name, religion etc the list is endless. Amongst all these bitter realities the Lord always keeps the aspect of HOPE alive. Radhanath Swamis book ‘The Journey Home’ carries one through experiences and learning’s from which we can weigh the options to work out a positive outlook to life itself.
View CommentThanks
View CommentRadhanath Swamis book ‘The Journey Home’ carries one through experiences and learning’s from which we can weigh the options to work out a positive outlook to life itself.Thank you swamiji.
View CommentSuch a clear distinction between Love and Lust. And the formula for migrating to Love is also clearly delinated. Thank you Radhanath Swami.
View CommentMany times people move away from religion seeing hypocrisy but Radhanath Swami is showing us that there are genuine gurus and devotees of the Lord whose association can change the lust in our heart to pure love.
View CommentLust creates within us a sense of incompleteness which we struggle to fulfil by exploiting another’s body for our pleasure.
View Commentlove on the other hand is based on the true understanding of our spiritual identity.
Now I understand the difference between LOVE and LUST
Misidentifying lust as love is the biggest problem in the modern world, and the source of all anxiety… Once again Radhanath Swami hits the nail at the spot.
View CommentDespite been exploited Radhanath swami did not get disturbed and maintained his faith in genuine gurus and sincere devotees.
View CommentA very important aspect of Radhanath swami.
I liked this experiance of seeking sincere spiritualist than reject everyone all together .
View CommentThis is why most of the times even Real Saints are also critisized ….
View CommentVery nicely explained the difference between Love & Lust through this meditation.
View Comment“If by chanting God’s names, we can shine with love, why should we choose to burn with lust?” Just amazing!
View CommentLove is like gold and lowly lead is lust
Loving the supreme Lord is our duty first
When Love of supreme father stirs in our breast
Translate as sympathy to all creation, it must.
View CommentWonderfully Radhanath Swami explains how love leads to completeness and this further completeness leads to compassion.
View CommentThankyou Radhanath Swami for sharing this fact with us
View Commentradhanath swami’s ability to pray and have clarity in the midst of such bizarre events shows the substance he is made of even as a teenager. great story!!
View CommentThis article clearly shows HG Radhanath Swami’s genuine desire to seek a spiritual path at that young age. Even after having horrible experience with fake Guru, he prayed to not loose faith in sincere saints. JAI!
View Commentvery nice expereince and realization, eye opener for devotees who come to a conclusion very instatntly based on some facts and expereinces in their respective lives, regards, bhakti
View Commentwonderful realization and expereince of HHRM in his practise of spiritual path and with great wisdom HHRM at a very young age was able to understand the right and the wrong and continue with his path practicising spirituality, amazing, regards, rajesh
View CommentThanks a lot for sharing
View CommentFrom lust to love…beautiful!
View CommentThis clearly shows the difference between lust and love.thanks for sharing.
View CommentLike His Guru, Radhanath Swami by His unmotivated and unconditional love transformed millions of lives and saved them from lusty desires of this world. Thank you Radhanath Swami for taking care of us.
View CommentRadhanath swami so wonderfully through his book explains the cause of the problem and the right solution to tackle it
View CommentThis shows a very wonderful quality of Radhanath Swami. Even from negative incidents, he teaches how we should take lesson and go ahead on the true path.
View Commentthank you radhanath swami for this article, its really an eye opener, everything that glitters is not a diamond,
View CommentLust to Love, Iron to Gold
View CommentVery nice explanation Radhanath Swami has given here. If we contemplate on this, we will surely feel a great satisfaction and would be able to cure the disease of getting lusty not only for the physical pleasure, but for the material hankerings which are deep rooted in the heart.
View CommentNice article and liked the quote the most….”How can we awaken this love for God? “All bonafide scriptures recommend chanting of God’s names”, says Radhanath Swami, whose formula is very simple, “If by chanting God’s names, we can shine with love, why should we choose to burn with lust?”
View CommentA beautiful description of lust and love. Radhanath Swami Maharaj has given a sublime process of transforming lust to love through the chanting of the Holy Names of Lord.
View CommentBeautiful article.
View CommentThis is a pretty sensitive topic that is misunderstood too. Radhanath Swami is an expert at understanding and sharing the difference between this iron and gold.
View CommentRadhanath Swami has so nicely explained the real cause of lust and the difference betwwn love and lust.
View CommentRadhanath Swami clearly depicts the differences between Lust and Love. Even though both seem to be very close to each other, but there is a gulf of gap between them as one is on the material platform and love is on the spiritual side. Thanks
View CommentReally lust is so dangerous that it can manifest itself in many ways in this world in in various situation. But that doesn’t mean that the entire gamut of spiritual practitioners of a genuine spiritual path are wrong. But to really identify the right from wrong requires purity of heart which was exhibited by HH Radhanath Swami at a very young age when he was Richard Slavin. It is only through purity of heart that attracts the mercy of Lord to follow a path to reach him as God guided HH Radhanath Swami. This is a lesson for all of us how we must aspire for such purity of heart.
View CommentRadhanath Swami was just a realized person from such a young age.
View CommentVery nice explanation of subtle differences between love & lust/…….
View Comment