Q. Part 1: Krishna says in BG “Surrender unto me and I’ll take all your sins” but sometimes we see a devotee of Krishna also suffers. So please explain how karma affects a devotee (i.e. karma done in previous life, in this life and all future karmas).
Answer by Romapada Swami: Complete surrender to Krishna destroys all stages of karma, both a priori and a posteriori, just as Krishna promises. In other words, a fully surrendered devotee is NOT AFFECTED by karma.
How, then, are we to understand the devotee’s suffering? Srila Prabhupada likened this to a fan that is switched off, yet continues to rotate for a while due to previous momentum. Similarly, when a person surrenders to Krishna, he may continue to experience some of the effects of residual material conditioning for a while, but they are soon depleted and destroyed.
Further, the suffering of a surrendered devotee is not exactly a karmic reaction under the agency of the Lord’s external energy. Rather, Krishna Himself may give His devotee some token reaction just to purify him/her of any residual material attachment or to increase their dependence on Him. This suffering and the suffering of a non- devotee are not the same just as the suffering of an orphan is not the same as the apparent suffering/punishment a king’s son might undergo in the process of being trained by the king.
Because of their confidence in the Lord’s protection, a pure devotee actually never suffers, even if externally they seem to be undergoing difficulties. Being situated in transcendental knowledge by the Lord’s grace, they know that all suffering pertains only to the material body, which is simply a source of suffering in any case, and is illusory. In fact Queen Kunti, in her famous prayers, requests Krishna for more and more calamities because such calamities are an opportunity for her ecstatic remembrance of Krishna and taking shelter of His lotus feet! (SB 1.8.25)
Of course, to the degree one is surrendered, to that degree one becomes free from past material reactions. And as far as their present and future karma is concerned, a symptom of surrender is acting fully in accordance with the directions of the Supersoul through the medium of scripture / spiritual master and with the intention of serving Krishna. Therefore all such activities become Krishna-karma and therefore free of material reactions.
Q. Part 2) Please also explain what is the best method of surrender to Lord Krishna, so that a devotee can become free from his sins at the earliest and engage himself in the service of the Lord with full determination.
Answer by Romapada Swami: As you have rightly pointed out, one cannot engage in devotional service with full determination unless one is freed from sins. (Bg. 7.28) Yet the best process for getting relieved from sinful reactions, and tendencies, is devotional service! The process of surrender resolves this `chicken or egg logic’. Even if one is not yet freed from all sinful reactions, one should unhesitating accept Krishna as the supreme savior of all living entities. If one thus surrenders to Him with faith and love, saying: “My dear Lord Krishna, from this day I am Yours,” then that devotee is absolved of all past karmic reactions.
Our acharyas have identified the following six items as the specific characteristics of the above said mood of surrender. The six-fold process of saranagati constitutes: (1) becoming completely humble; (2) dedication of one’s self, body, mind and words and all one possesses to the Lord’s service; (3) accepting those acts favorable to pure devotion; (4) rejecting anything which is adverse to pure devotion; (5) having complete faith that Krsna will surely protect me and (6) seeing Krishna as one’s sole maintainer. It should be noted here that surrender is an ongoing process, not an event that happens in a moment. It is accomplished by a mental culture and continuous practice of living our day-to-day lives in these six ways of saranagati (Cf. Bhagavad-gita As It Is Text 18.66 purport)
All this is best accomplished by taking shelter of an unalloyed devotee of Krishna, a bona fide spiritual master and acting under their instruction. Our surrender to Krishna can be best expressed through our surrender to His instructions coming through His representatives, and by firmly acting under their guidance we become free from sinful propensities and attain full determination for devotional service.
