By Dhruva Maharaja dasa (author of Jaya Jagannatha! The Culture and Worship of Lord Jagannatha East and West)
The recent controversy over proper dates for holding Jagannatha Ratha-yatra brings into question the motives for holding such a festival. Adherents to the concept that Ratha-yatra must be held on the second day of the waxing moon in the month of Ashada, as it is done in Puri, stand on the shastric foundation of the Purusottama-ksestra-mahatmya of the Skanda Purana. Therein, in the later part of the text, Lord Jagannatha Himself advises King Indradyumna for the date of this procession. Thus, it’s quite clear why devotees in Puri want to hold the festival on that date only.
However, earlier in the text when King Indradyumna and Narada Muni go to Brahmaloka to request Lord Brahma to install the new deity, there are further insights as to why the deity of the Lord manifests in the first place. The assembled demigods question Lord Brahma, “Previously we worshiped the deity of Lord Nilamadhava in the forest of Nilacala, but now that same Lord Nilamadhava has appeared in a wooden form after the sacrifice of King Indradyumna. What is the reason for this?” Lord Brahma, who is fully conversant with Vedic knowledge, answered, “This secret has never been revealed to anyone, but now I will disclose it.
The arca-murti forms of the Supreme Lord are manifest throughout the entire universe. The Lord has distributed Himself all over the universe to give pleasure to the devotees, to give the common man facility to eradicate his sins, and to establish religious principles in the world. “For the first half of my life the Lord appeared as Lord Nilamadhava. The first half of my life is now over. From this time on, the Lord will be worshiped in the wooden forms of Lord Jagannatha, Balarama, Subhadra, and Sudarshana chakra.” This section of the Purusottama-ksetra mahatmya text reveals the Lord’s inner motive for His appearance in a deity form: “The arca-murti forms of the Supreme Lord are manifest throughout the entire universe.
The Lord has distributed Himself all over the universe to give pleasure to the devotees, to give the common man facility to eradicate his sins, and to establish religious principles in the world.” Taking this consideration as the Lord’s primary motive for appearing before the world, it’s not hard to understand that He will be more pleased to bestow His mercy on countless conditioned souls throughout the planet without considering the secondary, less important motive of holding the festival on only one particular date. He is not offended when His devotees take Him on procession in cities throughout the world, regardless of what day it is. Rather, He is merciful and is bestowing His mercy when He rides before them in various Ratha-yatras. When His Divine Grace A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada began Ratha-yatras around the planet, he did so to benefit the fallen souls rotting in this material world, not to change or challenge the tradition of Jagannatha dharma.
Srila Prabhupada desired to hold Ratha-yatras for the same reason the Lord appears as a deity; to give pleasure to the devotees, to give the common man facility to eradicate sins, and to establish religious principles in the world. With this understanding, the act of rebellion or revolt against Ratha-yatras being held around the world, no matter what the date, reveals an immature, or perhaps even ill intent or motive on the part of those who present such negative ideas. However, we’d like to quote Srila Kedarnatha Datta (Bhaktivinoda Thakura), a District Magistrate in Puri from 1871-1876 for a more clear understanding: “Subjects of philosophy and theology are like the peaks of large towering and inaccessible mountains standing in the midst of our planet inviting attention and investigation. Thinkers and men of deep speculation take their observations through the instruments of reason and consciousness, but they take different points when they carry on their work. These points are positions chalked out by the circumstances of their social and philosophical life, different as they are in the different parts of the world. Plato looked at the peak of the Spiritual Question from the West, and Vyasa made the observation from the East.
So Confucius did it from further East, and Schlegel, Spinoza, Kant, and Goethe from further West. These observations were made at different times and by different means, but the conclusion is all the same in as much as the object of observation was one and the same. They all hunted after the Great Spirit, the unconditioned soul of the universe. They could not but get an insight into it. Their words and expressions are different, but their import is the same.
They tried to find out the absolute religion and their labors were crowned with success, for God gives all that He has to His children if they want to have it. It requires a candid, generous, pious, and holy heart to feel the beauties of their conclusions. “Party spirit—that great enemy of truth—will always baffle the attempt of the inquirer who tries to gather truth from the religious works of his nation, and will make him believe that the Absolute Truth is nowhere except in his old religious book… But Truth is eternal and is never injured but for a while by ignorance.”