CORPSE OR TRANSCENDENTAL BODY

The following essay was written by Professor Sanyal for Sajjana Tosani under the direction of its Editor, Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Gosvami Maharaja.

When Srila Gaura-kisora Dasa Babaji Maharaj was pleased to disappear from the view of the people of this world, an attempt was made by those very persons who used to be in attendance upon him to commit a horrible offence against his holy transcendental body, which appeared to them to be a corpse, by causing it to be dragged along the streets of the town of Nabadwip by a rope fastened to the neck, in pursuance of a verbal instruction to that effect left to them by Babaji Maharaj himself It appeared that Babaji Maharaj had told them that as he had never served God his body would be purified by contact with the pure dust of Holy Nabadwip if his body was dragged through its streets by the hands of scavengers pulling it by a cord fastened round his neck.

Editor (Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati) who was at Sreedham Mayapur at the time of the disappearance of Babaji Maharaj arrived just in time to be able to prevent those rascals from carrying out their horrible sacrilege. He told them that Babaji Maharaj had lamented the fate of bad men like themselves by such instructions regarding the disposal of his own transcendental body and that none among them according to the Shastras was eligible to touch his body unless they had been uncontaminated by carnal association with loose women at least the previous night. This statement produced the strange effect of dissuading all those persons from laying their hands on the transcendental remains of the great saint.