Srila Gurudeva: Gurudeva always takes away all the ignorance of all the jivas who surrender themselves at the lotus feet of Gurudeva. All bona-fide Gurudeva’s are manifestations of Baladeva Prabhu or Nityananda Prabhu. So if we surrender ourselves at the lotus feet of any bona-fide Guru who is the manifestation of Nityananda Prabhu or Baladeva Prabhu, at once he will come and help us and he will destroy all kinds of ignorance. What is ignorance? That we don’t know that we are part and parcel of Krsna, that we are eternal servants of Krsna. There are so many specialties of donkeys, which represent ignorance. When a donkey sees any lady donkey, he follows her. He never sees, “She is my wife.” A donkey will run after any she-donkey he will see and while crying, will call out to her and follow her. Then the she-donkey will kick him so much with her hind legs, but he happily tolerates it. Still he will never stop following the she-donkey. The male donkeys are always beaten but are never taking any lesson from this because they are foolish. So, those who don’t know that we are eternal servants of Krsna, who have no taste for this, they are leaving their owner, going here and there, being kicked so much by this illusionary maya. He has no intelligence or common sense to serve Krsna. The owner puts such heavy loads on the donkey. He will put so much rotten and dirty clothes of all people on him. Then the owner takes the clothes to the river, washes them, and again puts them on the donkey’s back. But the donkey himself cannot wear any of the clothes. So many beautiful precious clothes are there but he cannot use any of these things.
In hilly countries, where there are so many hills, any car, truck, or cart cannot go there. So rice, sugar, ghee, and so many delicious things are kept on the back of the donkeys, and very easily they can carry them. But they cannot taste anything of these things. While carrying these things, they are also beaten by the owners. But they will be only their owner’s, the owner will not set them free. So this is ignorance. Those who cannot think, who cannot use their intelligence to determine what is good and what is bad. They cannot determine what is pure hari-katha, where you should go to associate, or who is a qualified Vaisnava. They cannot judge these things and they will only follow blindly, here and there. They are like donkeys. So Baladeva Prabhu removes this ignorance. But only from those who are sincere—not from everyone. Then He makes a platform for the service of Krsna. After Baladeva removed all these things, like the donkeys, the Talavana forest became a platform for the service of Krsna. Baladeva Prabhu always lives there and He serves Krsna. We should take some lessons from this.
[Spoken by Srila Gurudeva on January 26th, 1998, Bali, published as part of the Bhakta Bandhav Anthology, Volume 24]