Preaching, strongly, with humility, tolerance, and respect.
Śrīla Prabodhānanda Saraswatī Ṭhākur composed this verse in his Śrī Chaitanya-chandrāmṛta (90).
dante nidhāya tṛṇakaṁ padayor nipatya
kṛtvā cha kāku‑śatam etad ahaṁ bravīmi
he sādhavaḥ sakalam eva vihāya dūrāt
chaitanya-chandra-charaṇe kurutānurāgam
“Holding straw between my teeth, I fall at your feet, and with hundreds of supplications, I say, “Dear sirs, throw away everything and devote yourself to the feet of Śrī Chaitanyachandra.‘”
The following is a translation of Śrīla Bhakti Siddhānta Saraswatī Ṭhākur’s Bengali translation and commentary on this verse.
The tridaṇḍi-goswāmī’s method to preach devotion to Gaura: having abandoned all dharmas (sarva-dharma parityāga), devotion to Gaura’s feet is our one and only duty—
dante nidhāya tṛṇakaṁ padayor nipatya
kṛtvā cha kāku‑śatam etad ahaṁ bravīmi
he sādhavaḥ sakalam eva vihāya dūrāt
chaitanya-chandra-charaṇe kurutānurāgam
dante tṛṇakaṁ nidhāya–Holding very thin straw between my teeth (hereby the tridaṇḍi-goswāmī preacher’s tṛṇād api sunīchatā [being humbler than a blade of grass] is indicated because they have held between their teeth very thin straw amidst the straw that people of this world walk over and cover with the dust of their feet, that is, the tridaṇḍi-goswāmī preacher has shown the greatest respect even to the common people); padayor nipatya–falling at your feet (hereby the amānī dharma [pridelessness] of a tridaṇḍi-goswāmī preacher of Gaura’s glory has been indicated—they do not become mad with ego and consider themselves Nārāyaṇ like the Brahma-sannyāsīs or become attached to mundane conceptions of the gross body, such as junior and senior, brāhmaṇ and outcaste, and remain deprived of seeing the true nature of the souls of the world like the materialistic smārtas, and thus they are ready to preach the truth, being prideless (amānī) before all); kāku‑śatam kṛtvā cha–with hundreds of supplications (hereby the tridaṇḍi-goswāmī preacher’s taror iva sahiṣṇutā [being tolerant like a tree] is indicated (the averse souls in this world will not listen to the truth whatsoever, yet tridaṇḍi goswāmīs are eager to supplicate and induce even them to listen to discussion of the Lord); etad ahaṁ bravīmi–I say this; he sādhavaḥ–O sādhus (hereby the tridaṇḍi-goswāmī preacher’s mānada dharma [respectfulness] is indicated); sakalam eva vihāya dūrāt–throw everything away (you are all sādhus, but throw away everything you consider within or is thought in the world to be characteristic of a sādhu: karma [worldly endeavours], jñān [speculative knowledge], sāṅkhya-yoga [theoretical analysis], phalgu-vairāgya [false renunciation], chatur-varga [dharma, artha, kāma, mokṣā—piety, wealth, enjoyment, liberation], religious and non-religious practices, and all good or bad endeavours or desires unfavourable to the satisfaction of Kṛṣṇa’s senses); [and] anurāgaṁ kuruta–devote yourself; chaitanyachandra-charaṇe–to Śrī Chaitanyachandra’s lotus feet.
“Dear sādhus, holding straw between my teeth, I (a tridaṇḍi-bhikṣu) fall at your feet, and with hundreds of supplications, I say only this (I beg you), ‘Throw away (reject with disdain) everything (all of your mentally concocted notions of dharma or being a sādhu) and devote yourself to Śrī Chaitanyachandra’s feet.”
Note
Insertions in round brackets are part of the commentary. Insertions in square brackets are editorial additions.