Page 31 - Sri Canakya Niti

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To spread this worship of Kṛṣṇa through the chanting of His holy

names, Lord Kṛṣṇa advented Himself in the fifteenth century in the
village of Māyāpur, West Bengal, as Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu. In this
divine appearance the Lord spread the movement of saṅkīrtana, the
congregational public chanting of the great mantra for deliverance,
the mahā-mantra.

There are many different kinds of mantras for different Vedic
sacrifi ces or yajñas such as marriage, laying foundations, and other
auspicious occasions. Many mantras exist also for the propitiation
of the devatās, resorted to by short-sighted persons in search of
material gain. Ultimately, however, all forms of worship are meant
for the adoration of the Supreme Personality of Godhead Śrī Kṛṣṇa as
indicated by Cāṇakya Paṇḍita here in the fi rst verse.

This Hare Kṛṣṇa mantra is known as the mahā (great) mantra because
in one fell swoop it settles the affairs of all other mantras. In The
Journey of Self-Discovery Śrīla Prabhupāda explains:

The Sanskrit word mantra is a combination of two syllables, man
and tra. Man means ‘mind,’ and tra means ‘deliverance.’ Therefore
a mantra is that which delivers you from mental concoction, from
hovering on the mental plane. So if you chant this mantra—
Hare Kṛṣṇa Hare Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa Hare Hare
Hare Rāma Hare Rāma Rāma Rāma Hare Hare

—very soon you’ll find that you are coming from the darkness to
the light.
Among all the eighty-four lakhs (8,400,000) species of life recorded
in the Vedic literature, man alone has a mind which he must use for
spiritual liberation. The soul encased in the form of a plant, insect or
animal species must wait many millions of painful births to once again
achieve this human form of life. Therefore, the blessing of a rational
mind means that we should energetically pursue the liberation of
Kṛṣṇa consciousness before our inevitable date with the Grim Reaper
catches us unaware.

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