Question : The intelligence of a devotee, the recalling capacity and memory comes from purva-karma. We need these assets for preaching. Can we do anything to increase this?
Answer by Romapada Swami :
Although one’s intellectual capacity may be determined by past karma, it is Krishna, seated in everyone’s heart, who is directly in charge of remembrance, knowledge and forgetfulness. (BG 15.15) Krishna is supplying the required knowledge and remembrance for everyone, but particularly so for His devotee. Krishna promises that for those who always worship Him with exclusive devotion, to them He carries what they lack, and preserves what they have. (BG 9.22) Therefore we can rest assured that if we simply continue to serve Krishna with exclusive attention to the best of our sincere efforts, without any extraneous effort Krishna will give whatever is necessary for performing and improving our service, including the appropriate intelligence. We need depend only on Krishna and fully execute His instructions. We should cultivate firm faith that there is no need for any other extraneous efforts to improve our skills/assets.
This ‘sincere effort’ includes our scrutinizing study of Krishna’s message (BG 18.70), with the aim of receiving transparently the gift of transcendental life which Krishna is so eagerly offering us.
If something can improve one’s ability or capacity to serve, a devotee does takes necessary measures to do so, without over-endeavor. But one could easily become side-tracked by a fruitive desire to learn many verses and anecdotes, and acquire more knowledge or some other such asset in the name of preaching — this prayasa will soon spoil bhakti.
This is not to discourage your efforts to memorize scriptural messages etc. Part of our sincere efforts to serve and please Krishna is to take the recommended steps to regularly study scripture, take notes and diligently apply oneself to memorizing and internalizing its messages. But one need not be overly concerned with success or failure in such attempts in terms of perceptible results. We can sincerely do our part to demonstrate our eagerness to serve Krishna by learning and trying to quote His messages, but leave the rest to Krishna as to how He might want to empower us.
I would like to mention that fine memory and the ability to quote etc are surely useful assets in service to Krishna, but are not absolutely necessary. Firm faith and devotion to Guru and Krishna are the real assets by which one can transplant bhakti into the hearts of others. There are many such examples of devotees in our disciplic line – e.g. Gaurakisora dasa Babaji who was illiterate but an incredibly powerful acharya, or the illiterate South Indian Brahmana from Sri Rangam who received the mercy of Lord Caitanya by devoutly trying to study the Gita on the order of his Guru.
