We should always check whether I perform pure devotional service or not, because we have a lot of desires, therefore it is so easy to perform bhakti with the idea of achieving something else. Suddha-bhakti or pure devotional service is extremely powerful, but often we do not experience this power in reality, because there is some power within our bhakti which is blocking the power of bhakti. This power is called offense or aparadha.
We don’t perform pure devotional service, we perform some mixed form of devotion, therefore we don’t experience the real power of bhakti in our heart. The nature of pure bhakti has double effect: we clearly understand what is pure bhakti, and our ignorance will be gone. We are also protected from the mixed forms of bhakti. We perform mixed forms of bhakti because we reflect our different material conceptions into the area of bhakti and we try to practice bhakti according to our material conceptions.
The concept of suddha-bhakti comes from Sri sampradaya, they only worship Narayana. Caitanya Mahaprabhu took this pure devotional service from Sri sampradaya to the Gaudia sampradaya. Bhakti is always pure. It is svayam sakti of Bhagavan Himself, so we need to know what are the foreign elements which can be mixed with bhakti. The essence of bhakti is that you have to do something, which is favorable in the service to the Supreme Lord. The essence of pure bhakti is this mood of service. Seva means I do, I speak and I think only what is pleasing to Krisna. We are always anugas, the followers of Krisna, we are never independent.
Silanam has: cesta-rupa, you do something practical, and bhava-rupa, the emotions, which you experience by practicing bhakti. We should not artificially enter into some emotional state while practicing bhakti. We have to know how to do cesta, so that the real bhava will be invoked in our heart. The object of suddha-bhakti is only Krisna, not anyone else, because if you practice pure bhakti, the most powerful form of Bhagavan will be revealed to you.
The process and the object of pure devotional service are inseparable. Svayam Bhagavan has two forms: aiswarya-mayi-rupa, four-armed form of Narayana and madhurya-mayi-rupa, two-armed form of Lord Krisna. In the material world aiswarya always overshadows madhurya, but in the spiritual world madhurya is more powerful than aiswarya. If we want to practice suddha-bhakti we need to understand that I worship only Krisna and I need to know what He likes and what He does not like. For that I have to follow the spiritual master. Sometimes we can do bhakti, but we don’t experience the bliss of bhakti, it means that we have some material desires. Bad feeling towards somebody, because of material desires, is totally against the feeling of love. Material desires eat up the bhakti within our heart. But if we associate with somebody, who has ruci for hari-bhajan, then gradually the desire for material enjoyment will melt, the heart will become pure and we will practice devotional service.
