Sorry guys for my stupid questions.
When GM talks about the siksa guru giving instruction for personal bhajana, what exactly is meant by bhajana? I always think of singing. Thanks.
That's not a stupid question, Margaret, because bhajan(a) does mean "religious song" in many modern Indian languages. In Sanskrit, bhajana means more generally worship, but in our sampradaya it means especially advanced, internal worship, in contrast to arcana, outer, ritualistic worship. When a disciple is advanced enough, the siksa-guru will give him or her instructions pertaining to this kind of bhajana -- which of course may very well include singing for Krishna! :Big Grin:
it means adoration, but interestingly from the root bhaj come also bhAjana (partaking), bhAgya (fortune), bhagavant (God, he who has all opulences), and of course bhakti.
Your bhajana is constituted of all those activities and attitudes that help you coltivate, consolidate and "share" (bhAj) your relationship with God (bhagavant), who is the receptacle (bhAjana) of your bhakti.
Wow that came out pretty swell, I hope it's accurate, too, otherwise Bhrigu will be the next poster :Big Grin:
Finally a juicey anecdote. I went to the Bergamo Iskcon temple at the end of February. I had seen the sandhya arati through webcam the week before and developed a desire to see Radharamana again, but I didn't want to go uninvited. It just so happened that a devotee friend called me once back from India and asked me to go to the temple with her, on the outer excuse that Hrdayananda maharaja was there. I thought maybe there will be more devotees around and I won't be noticed.
Anyway during the Bhagavatam class in the morning the verse under analysis began with bhago, so maharaja started to give all the meanings of the root bhaj. He quoted Brahma Samhita (tam aham bhajami), and Gita, where Krsna says:
ye yatha mam prapadyante
tams tathaiva bhajamy aham
He said chuckling that in that verse of course bhajami means he rewards or reciprocates with his devotees and not that he worships them, but I chuckled to myself thinking "Yes he does!" Of course inasmuch as they surrender to him; in the gopis' case they gave everything to Krsna and in reward he had to give all of himself, so at the apex of bhakti it's not clear who surrenders to whom, and who is reciprocating. I thought maharaja was going to make this point next, since it was a morning class and there were no outsiders, but I guess this kind of knowledge is familiar to, and prerogative of our lucky (bhagayavan) group, and I hope a few others.