Krishna's greatest favor is removing material attachments so devotees can see Him everywhere, within and without.Listen — Srila Prabhupada Uvaca
Lecture — April 17, 1969, New York 690417LE-NEW YORK [11:15 Minutes] Lecture_690417LE-NEW YORK Prabhupāda: Thank you very much. Everything all right? Devotees: Jaya. Prabhupāda: Hare Kṛṣṇa. [chuckles] Ārādhito yadi haris tapasā tataḥ kim [Nārada Pañcarātra]. [If one worships Lord Kṛṣṇa and considers Him the goal of life, then there is no need to execute severe types of austerity. And, if after executing all kinds of tapasya, one cannot reach Kṛṣṇa, then all his tapasya has no value, for without Kṛṣṇa consciousness different types of austerities are wasted labor.] Govindam ādi-puruṣa is known as Hari. Hari means "who takes away all your miseries." That is Hari. Harā. Harā means taking away.
Harate. So just like thief also takes away, but he takes away the valuable things, material consideration, sometimes Kṛṣṇa also takes away your material valuables just to show you special favor. Yasyāham anugṛhṇāmi hariṣye tad-dhanaṁ śanaiḥ [SB 10.88.8]. [The Personality of Godhead said: If I especially favor someone, I gradually deprive him of his wealth. Then the relatives and friends of such a poverty-stricken man abandon him. In this way he suffers one distress after another.] Yudhiṣṭhira Mahārāja inquired from Kṛṣṇa that "We are supposed to be very pious. My brothers are great warriors, my wife is exactly the goddess of fortune, and above all, You are our personal friend. So how is this that we have lost everything? [chuckling] We have lost our kingdom, we have lost our wife, we have lost our honor—everything." So in reply to this, Kṛṣṇa said, yasyāham anugṛhṇāmi hariṣye tad-dhanaṁ śanaiḥ: "My first favor is that I take away all riches of My devotee." Therefore people are not very much enthusiastic to come to Kṛṣṇa consciousness.
[laughter] But He does it. Just like the Pāṇḍavas were, in the beginning, put into difficulty, but later on they became the most exalted personalities throughout the whole history. That is Kṛṣṇa's favor. In the beginning, He may do like that because we have got attachment for our material acquisitions. So that is my personal experience.
In the beginning, when my Guru Mahārāja ordered me, I thought it that "I shall first of all become very rich man; then I shall preach." [laughs] So I was doing very nice in business. In the business circle, I got very good name, and with whom I was dealing business, they were very satisfied. But Kṛṣṇa made so trick that He broke everything, and He obliged me to take sannyāsa. So that is Hari.
So that I had to come to your country with only seven dollars. So they are criticizing, "The Swāmī came here with no money. Now he's so opulent." [chuckles] So they are taking the back side, black side, you see? But the thing is... Of course, I have become profited, profitable, or I have acquired profit.
I left my home, my children and everything. I came here as a pauper, with seven dollars. That is no money. But I have got now big properties, hundreds of children.
[laughter] And I haven't got to think for their provision; they are thinking of me. So that is Kṛṣṇa's favor. In the beginning, it appears to be very bitter. When I took sannyāsa, when I was living alone, I was feeling very bitter. I, sometimes I was thinking, "Whether I have done wrong by accepting?" So when I was publishing this Back to Godhead from Delhi, one day one bull thrashed me, and I fell down on the footpath and I got severe injury.