Hare Krsna,
In one of the earlier lessons, we studied that the forms of the Lord are all transcendental. In this lesson, we have learned that all the activities of the Lord are transcendental too – be they His childhood pastimes, His boar like pastimes, or His war pastimes.
Nowdays people are engaged in discussing the Ukraine-Russia war. These kind of discussions on man-made wars will not help conditioned souls cross over the ocean of material nescience. Only wars where the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Lord Sri Krsna, is involved, directly or indirectly, will the jivas get relief from material miseries. Hearers of such war pastimes of the Lord will be delivered.
Critics of Krsna consciousness movement accuse Krsna of being violent. They accuse Him of perpetrating the Kurukshetra war where millions of soldiers were killed. This is their gross ignorance. They do not know what Lord Krsna says in BG 4.8: To deliver the pious and to annihilate the miscreants, as well as to reestablish the principles of religion, I Myself appear, millennium after millennium.
Another interesting fact is that those who were killed on the battlefield of Kurukshetra also attained liberation. There is a beautiful verse in SB 3.2 that we had studied. It says:
SB 3.2.20: Certainly others who were fighters on the Battlefield of Kurukṣetra were purified by the onslaught of Arjuna’s arrows, and while seeing the lotuslike face of Kṛṣṇa, so pleasing to the eyes, they achieved the abode of the Lord.
In the purport, Srila Prabhupada explains: The Supreme Personality of Godhead, Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa, appears in this world for two missionary purposes: to deliver the faithful and to annihilate the miscreants. But because the Lord is absolute, His two different kinds of actions, although apparently different, are ultimately one and the same. His annihilation of a person like Śiśupāla is as auspicious as His actions for the protection of the faithful. All the warriors who fought against Arjuna but who were able to see the lotuslike face of the Lord on the battlefront achieved the abode of the Lord, exactly as the devotees of the Lord do. The words “pleasing to the eyes of the seer” are very significant. When the warriors from the other side of the battlefield saw Lord Kṛṣṇa at the front, they appreciated His beauty, and their dormant instinct of love of God was awakened. Śiśupāla saw the Lord also, but he saw Him as his enemy, and his love was not awakened. Therefore Śiśupāla achieved oneness with the Lord by merging in the impersonal glare of His body, called the brahmajyoti. Others, who were in the marginal position, being neither friends nor enemies but slightly in love of Godhead by appreciating the beauty of His face, were at once promoted to the spiritual planets, the Vaikuṇṭhas.
This, therefore, proves that the war pastimes of the Lord are completely transcendental. Simply by repeated hearing of them will awaken one’s dormant love for Krsna consciousness. Devotees relish hearing about the war pastimes of the Lord such as the fight with Hiranyaksa and Hiranyakasipu, the Kurukshetra war, etc. Come to think of it. The nectarian and eternal message of Bhagavad Gita were spoken by the Lord on the battlefield. Therefore, devotees should not make the mistake of thinking that the Lord’s war pastimes are mundane topic. They are as relishable and liberating as the other non-war pastimes of the Lord.
The sankirtana movement of Lord Caitanya Mahaprabhu is also a war pastime of the Lord. The war is against maya and Godlessness. The only difference is that the enemies are within each of us in the form of lust, anger, greed, etc. and the weapon is the Holy Name of the Lord. Simply by chanting and hearing the Holy Name of the Lord, we can win over maya and establish true Krsna consciousness all over the world. Then there will no longer be mundane wars such as Russia-Ukraine war. There will actually be peace and harmony everywhere.
All glories to Srila Prabhupada who is the commander (Senapati bhakta) of this war against Maya!
Krsna Katha 