Coconut Tree
The hard sweets made of coconut, mukuta nārikela, the sweetballs, the many kinds of sweet drinks and all the other preparations were at least a month old, but although they were old, they had not become tasteless or stale. Indeed, they had all stayed fresh. That is the mercy of Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu.
(CC Antya 10.125-126)
Some brought paiḍa [a coconut preparation], some brought sweetballs, and some brought cakes and sweet rice. The prasādam was of different varieties, all very costly.
(CC Antya 10.109)
Prabhupāda: The coconut trees makes the place paradise—palm trees.
(770107 – Conversation A – Bombay)
Once the child, Caitanya Mahāprabhu, chastised His mother with His soft hand, and His mother pretended to faint. Seeing this, the Lord began to cry. The neighboring ladies told Him, “Dear child, please bring a coconut from somewhere, and then Your mother will be cured.” He then immediately went outside the house and brought two coconuts. All the ladies were astonished to see such wonderful activities.
(CC Adi 14.45 – 47)
Furthermore, Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu was throwing remnants of green coconut pulp to the dog. Smiling in His own way, He was saying to the dog, “Chant the holy names ‘Rāma,’ ‘Kṛṣṇa’ and ‘Hari.'” Seeing the dog eating the green coconut pulp and chanting “Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa” again and again, all the devotees present were very surprised.
(CC Antya 1.29 – 1.30)
The example is given sometimes in the coconut skin when it is dried up, the fruit within the covering of coconut is hard. And if the coconut is shaken, it is found that the coconut fruit is moving within. Because it has dried up and broken away from the inner walls of the coconut skin. So it has nothing to do with the outer skin, even though it appears that it is within that skin. Similarly, when one is purely in Krishna Consciousness, it may appear that he is within the material existence, but actually he has nothing to do with it. He is dried up, like the coconut fruit; and that process of drying-up is forgetting all sense gratification, and executing Krishna Consciousness full time. So, when one is purely in Krishna Consciousness, his present life and in future life are identical.
(680601 – Letter to Upendra written from Boston)
The round thing which we see in the sky, that is the covering. Just like a coconut shell: a coconut shell, within and without. Within the coconut shell it is darkness, and without it is light. Similarly, this universe is just like the coconut. We are within. As in within coconut there is water, half water, similarly, within this universe there is half water. On that water, Lord Viṣṇu, Garbhodakaśāyī Viṣṇu, is lying. And from His navel, a lotus stem is sprouted. Just imagine within the coconut there is water, and somebody’s lying, and there is some stem out of the navel. Exactly this universe is like that. But outside the universe there is light.
(710824 – Lecture SB 01.02.03 – London)
Similarly, if you don’t accept the substance, simply if you are busy with the skin . . . in Bengal it is called cavara nia tanake. Cavara means skin. You have seen coconut. The coconut is covered by heavy, what is called, fibers. So if you give up the coconut and simply quarrel with the fibers, what profit is there? There is no profit.
Similarly, if you give up God, or Kṛṣṇa, who is the essence of everything, and you make your advancement in scientific knowledge, in physics and chemistry and so many departments of knowledge, so according to Bhāgavata this is simply waste of time. Simply waste of time.
(670120 – Lecture CC Madhya 25.19-30 – San Francisco)
Long, long ago I was talking with one Ārya-samajī friend. So he did not believe that a lotus stem can grow on the navel of Viṣṇu and there is Brahmā born. Everyone says like that, “Mythology.” It is not mythology; it is fact. I asked him that “Here we see one coconut tree, and about sixty feet above, there is coconut and there is water, there is pulp, and it is being carried from the ground. Where is the pipe? Where is the pump? How the water is there within the coconut? Can you explain?” So he could not explain. And I said that “Even in material things which is in front of you, you cannot explain. How you will explain the spiritual position? How the lotus grown from the navel of . . .?” Therefore it should be accepted as inconceivable. Acintyāḥ khalu ye bhāvā na tāṁs tarkeṇa yojayet (Mahābhārata, Bhīṣma parva 5.22). Don’t try to argue; it is foolishness. It is inconceivable.
(761118 – Lecture SB 05.05.31 – Vrndavana)