Krishna Temple at Home

A Temple of Kåñëa in Your Home

Guests visiting a temple of Kåñëa for the first time are often puzzled by the ceremonial offering of vegetarian dishes to the form of Kåñëa on the altar-and understandably so. After all, what does the omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent Lord want with our little plate of rice and vegetables? Has He suddenly become hungry? Hasn't He created countless tons of food? Isn't God self-sufficient? Does Kåñëa really need these offerings of food?

In fact, Kåñëa does ask for these offerings, not because He needs our rice and vegetables, but because He wants our devotion. In Bhagavad-gétä (9.26) He says, "If one offers Me with love and devotion a leaf, a flower, fruit, or water, I will accept it."

When Kåñëa asks us to offer Him food, we should understand that He is actually inviting us to reawaken our eternal loving relationship with Him. At first we comply in a mood of faith mixed with duty; later, as our realization matures, we do it with affection and love. Just as anybody naturally offers the best he has to his beloved, the devotee offers Kåñëa his wealth, his intelligence, his life, and his vegetarian food.

Kåñëa is the ultimate beloved of everyone, but how can we offer gifts to a beloved we don't yet know? The Vedic tradition can guide us. If you would like to try, but can't follow all the procedures, you can remember that when the great devotee Hanuman and his companions were building a bridge of large, heavy stones for King Räma, an incarnation of Kåñëa, a little spider also pleased the Lord by carrying the largest pebbles he could.

First, reserve a special place for the offering. It can be a tabletop or an entire room converted into a temple. Make an altar with a picture of Lord Kåñëa on it. On Kåñëa's left you will see Çrématé Rädhäräëé, His eternal consort. She is Kåñëa's pleasure potency, and it is She who awards love of Godhead to the sincere devotee.

If possible, put a photograph of a Kåñëa-conscious spiritual master on the altar. The spiritual master accepts the offering of his disciple and offers it to his own spiritual master, who in turn offers it to his spiritual master. In this way the offering ascends through a succession of spiritual masters, until it reaches Lord Kåñëa. The devotees of the Hare Kåñëa movement always have a photograph of Çréla Prabhupäda, the founder-spiritual master of the International Society for Kåñëa Consciousness (ISKCON), and if a devotee is a disciple of one of Çréla Prabhupäda's disciples, he also has a photograph of his own spiritual master.

A Kåñëa-conscious spiritual master who is visibly present in the world can personally guide you to perfection in spiritual life. Just before Çréla Prabhupäda left this material world, he asked some of his senior disciples to become spiritual masters and perpetuate the Vedic tradition. If you would like to find out more about these spiritual masters and how you can meet one of them, you can inquire at any ISKCON center.

From the shopping to the cooking, meditate on pleasing Kåñëa. Look for the freshest and best fruits and vegetables. Shopping in supermarkets requires care. There's more to it than simply avoiding obvious meat, fish, and eggs. Take the time to read every label. And don't assume that products stay the same; they change. Watch out for rennet (made from the lining of a calf's stomach and used to make cheese), gelatin (boiled bones, hooves and horns, used to set foods), and lecithin (if it is not marked "soy lecithin," it may come from eggs). Anything with onions or garlic is unofferable to Kåñëa, because these foods, the Vedas say, increase the mode of ignorance. Watch out for animal fat. Many products have it. And if a product has a blank label, don't buy it: the manufacturer doesn't want you to know what's inside.

You can also look into alternatives to supermarket shopping. Many cooperatives have inexpensive produce that is free from chemical fertilizers and pesticides. And, if you have a little space in your yard, why not grow something for Kåñëa yourself?

Now you are ready to cook for Kåñëa. Here's how we do it in our temples:

• The cook thinks about Kåñëa's pleasure, not his own. He thinks, "My Lord has kindly provided me with these ingredients, so let me combine them and cook them in such a way that He will be pleased." Chanting the Hare Kåñëa mantra or listening to devotional recordings helps him remember Kåñëa and he avoids mundane talk in the kitchen.

• Cleanliness is next to Godliness. The cook should have a clean body and a clean mind, and wear clean clothes in the kitchen. Hair should be tied back so it stays out of the food and out of the fire. The kitchen and cooking utensils should be spotless, so he takes a minute to sponge off the work areas before beginning to cook. "Kåñëa will accept a very simple offering from a clean kitchen," Çréla Prabhupäda said, "but He will not accept an elaborate offering from a dirty kitchen."

• Prasäda (food already offered) and bhoga (food not yet offered) are never mixed. We don't want to offer Kåñëa the same thing twice, so we keep prasäda in specific containers so that it won't be accidentally mixed with bhoga.

• This may surprise you: the cook never tastes the food before offering it-not even to test it. Kåñëa must be the first to relish it. Experience teaches the cook to judge the correct amounts of seasonings. If something is taken before being offered to the Deity, the entire preparation is polluted and can no longer be offered.

When the meal is ready, it is time to offer it to Kåñëa. In our temples we arrange portions of the food on diningware kept especially for this purpose. (No one else eats from these dishes). The rest of the food stays in the pots until the offering is finished.

Put a small glass of cool water by Kåñëa's plate, along with a spoon and a tiny plate with a little salt and pepper. You might also light one or two sticks of incense to provide a pleasant atmosphere. After putting the plate on the altar, recite the Hare Kåñëa mantra:

Hare Kåñëa, Hare Kåñëa, Kåñëa Kåñëa, Hare Hare
Hare Räma, Hare Räma, Räma Räma, Hare Hare

Recite the mantra three times. Then leave the offering on the altar for a few minutes. The Hare Kåñëa mantra is a prayer: "My dear Rädhäräëé and Kåñëa, please engage me in Your devotional service."

The more our consciousness is fixed on pleasing Kåñëa, the more He enjoys the offering. We can offer Kåñëa the best dishes we can but what really attracts Kåñëa is our sincerity. Our love and devotion are the essential ingredients. Lord Kåñëa is also called Bhavagrahi-janardana, which means "One whose pleasure is the devotional attitude of His devotee." Once, when Kåñëa was present on earth five thousand years ago, His friend and pure devotee Vidura was offering Him bananas. But Vidura was overcome with devotional ecstasy because of Kåñëa's presence, and was inadvertently discarding the fruits and offering the skins, which Kåñëa ate with relish because they were offered out of love. Another great devotee, Sanatana Gosvämé, was so poor that he could offer only dry chapatis to Kåñëa; but to Kåñëa they tasted like nectar because they were offered with love.

After the offering, remove Kåñëa's plate from the altar and transfer the prasäda to a serving plate. Wash Kåñëa's plate and bowls and put them away. Now the prasäda can be served. The prasäda that comes directly from the Lord's plate is called mahäprasäda (mahä means "great," prasäda means "mercy") and is extra special. The person serving should see that everyone gets some mahä-prasäda.

The proper mentality for eating prasäda is described by Çréla Prabhupäda in the Çré Caitanya-caritämåta: "Prasäda is nondifferent from Kåñëa. Therefore, instead of eating prasäda, one should honor it. When taking prasäda, one should not consider the food to be ordinary preparations. Prasäda means favor. One should consider prasäda a favor of Kåñëa. Kåñëa is very kind. In this material world we are all attached to tasting various types of food. Therefore, Kåñëa eats many nice varieties of food and offers the food back to the devotees, so that not only are one's demands for various tastes satisfied, but by eating prasäda one makes advancement in spiritual life. Therefore, we should never consider ordinary food on an equal level with prasäda."

In other words, if while eating prasäda one thinks of it as a manifestation of Kåñëa's mercy, he is considered to have actually stopped eating; now his eating has become honoring. By thus honoring Kåñëa, who has come in the form of prasäda, one pleases Kåñëa, and when Kåñëa is pleased His devotee is pleased.

This is real yoga, linking with the Supreme Lord. The simple process of offering food makes us aware of an essential teaching of the Vedas: everything comes from Kåñëa, and everything should be offered back to Him for His pleasure.

So every day when you cook, cook for Kåñëa and offer the food to Him. Before long, your home will start to feel like a temple, and you'll be well on your way back to Godhead.

If you are new to offering your food to Kåñëa, we suggest the recitation of the Hare Kåñëa mantra as the easiest method. However, if you like, you can recite the same prayers that the devotees use. Acknowledging that it is through the mercy of the spiritual master and Lord Caitanya that Kåñëa accepts our offering, every devotee recites three times the pranam mantra to his own spiritual master (you can use the pranam mantra of any of the present ISKCON spiritual masters) and the following two prayers in glorification of Çré Caitanya Mahäprabhu and Lord Kåñëa.

namo-mahä-vadanyaya krishna-prema-pradaya te
krishnaya krishna chaitanya-namne gaura-tvise namah

"O most munificent incarnation! You are Kåñëa Himself appearing as Çré Kåñëa Caitanya Mahäprabhu. You have assumed the golden color of Çrématé Rädhäräëé, and You are widely distributing pure love of Kåñëa. We offer our respectful obeisances unto You."

namo brahmanya-devaya go-brahmana-hitaya ca
jagat-hitaya krishnaya govindaya namo namah

"I offer my respectful obeisances to the Supreme Absolute Truth, Kåñëa, Who is the well-wisher of the cows and the brähmaëas as well as the living entities in general. I offer my repeated obeisances to Govinda, who is the pleasure reservoir for all the senses."