The Greatest Gain

July 11, 1973

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Guest (1) (young British woman): What was the meaning in that?Prabhupada: Thakura, they belong to ksatriya class. Brahmana... According to Vedic conception, there are four divisions: brahmana, ksatriya, vaisya and sudra. So next to brahmana is the ksatriya. So this Thakura title is given to the ksatriyas, administrator class. Yes. (pause, Prabhupada chants japa softly) So in your library you are keeping our books? No. All books?
Guest (2) (young British man): Well, not all of them. We don't have room to keep all.
Prabhupada: Hm. (pause) So you have known something about our movement?
Guest (2): Yes.
Prabhupada: You have also known?
Guest (1): No.
Prabhupada: No?
Guest (1): No, I came as a Christian, not knowing anything. I still don't know really anything.
Prabhupada: Our movement is to revive God consciousness. Just like a man is sleeping, and he has got some engagement, say, in the morning, at six o'clock. But still he's sleeping. So somebody is trying to awake him. "Get up, get up! You have got this engagement. You have..." Our movement is like that. The human society is sleeping. So we are just trying to awake them: "Get up. Get up. You have got this engagement." That is our business. It is not our manufactured business, but it is stated in the Vedic literature, uttistha jagrata prapta-varan nibodhata. "Now you be awakened." "Now" means "You have got this human form of life. You can now be awakened." In animal form of life there is no possibility. Therefore, in the human form of life, one should be awakened to Krsna consciousness, or God consciousness. And if he sleeps, then he loses his business. This is our mission, to awaken him. And when a man sleeps, how he can awaken him? Simply by vibration of sound. The sleeping man can be awakened simply by this process, allowing the sound to enter the ear. By no other process. He's sleeping. If you show him a stick, "If you don't get up, I shall strike you," that will not be effective. Because sleeping. If you say... So many things... There are other senses. There will be no action. But only through the ear, if you cry, "Please get up! Please get up! Now your time," that will act. So our process is that, to force him to hear. Then he'll be awakened, by hearing. Therefore Vedic literature is called sruti. Sruti means it has to be received by hearing. You may be uneducated. It doesn't matter. If you simply hear from the right source, you get right knowledge. There is no need of education. Simply by hearing.
Guest (1): You teach your children, don't you?
Prabhupada: Yes, all my disciples, they're taught.
Guest (1): No, I didn't mean disciples. I meant children, little ones.
Prabhupada: Oh yes. We have got children's school also.
Guest (1): They understand, do they not?
Prabhupada: Everyone will understand. Because hearing is there. Everyone, even a child, after hearing Hare Krsna mantra, he claps, he dances, he joins. That is practical. We have seen. Small child, say, four, five months old, on the lap of the mother, he's also moving, clapping. So this, this is also yoga system, bhakti-yoga. So it is so practical that even a small child can take part in it, without any advanced knowledge. Universal. Universal. Even dogs sometimes, they take part. We have got practical experience. They don't like to leave us. Yes, I have seen.
Devotee: I have too.
Prabhupada: Yes. They like this chanting and dancing. So we are, our business is to awake the sleeping man. Sleeping man means when you sleep you have no knowledge. If somebody kills you, you cannot protect yourself. Sleeping, that is sleeping stage, that we do not know what is happening. That is called sleeping stage. Even if you are so-called awakened, if you do not know the value of life, that is sleeping stage. That is sleeping stage. So in that sleeping stage, we are trying to awake the human society. A man, a human being, may be materially very qualified, but he does not know what is the value of human life, he's sleeping. He's sleeping. Can you distinguish...? You are all educationists. What is the difference between a human being and an animal?
Guest (1): Higher intelligence?
Prabhupada: Eh?
Guest (1): Higher intelligence, I think.
Prabhupada: What is that higher intelligence?
Guest (1): Speech and ability to compute what you hear.
Prabhupada: Oh, that, dog can also do. If you train dog that "If somebody, outsider comes, you bark," he'll do it.
Guest (2): The consciousness is...
Prabhupada: And so... Real intelligence is that to know "what I am." "I do not want to suffer. Why suffering in this world is imposed upon me?" This is intelligence. Take, for example, nobody wants to die. Why death is forced upon him? Nobody wants to die. If there is now news immediately, "Now this house will collapse," immediately we shall fly away. Because we don't want to die. If we understand that this house is going to be bombed immediately, we'll immediately leave. If there is earthquake... So many things. So nobody wants to die. But death is sure. So what solution they have made? I do not want to die, and death is forced upon me. So what solution we have made. What is, what is the scientists have done in this connection? Psychologically, if I do not want to die, then I must find out some way that death will not bother me. That is intelligence. You are talking of intelligence. Therefore I am explaining what is intelligence. Intelligence means "I do not want something, but it is being forced upon me. How to check it?" That is intelligence. Actually, the whole world is going on, we do not want to suffer. But suffering is there. Three kinds of suffering. One kind of suffering is called pertaining to the body and mind. I don't want to be diseased, but there is, all of a sudden, there is disease. Diarrhea. I don't want it, but it is imposed. This is suffering. Due to the body. Some discrepancies. Mind... Body's sound, but mind is not sound. Mind is "Oh, I don't feel today very nice." You see. This is one kind of suffering. Another suffering: other living creature gives you some pains. There are so many. Some of your friends, he turns to become your enemy. He puts you in difficulty. Or there are so many animals, so many insects. They give us trouble. This is one kind of suffering. Another kind of suffering: by nature's... All of sudden, there is drought. Now, just like, all, in India there is drought. They are suffering. No rain. All of a sudden there is earthquake. That is also suffering. There is some epidemic, pestilence. You cannot check it. So in this way, either of these three, sufferings going on. But those who are sleeping, they cannot understand that this is suffering. Just like animals. They cannot understand. That is sleeping stage. And when one is awakened, he will think "I don't want all these sufferings. Why they are imposed upon me? How I can avoid?" That is intelligence. So human being, unless he comes to this platform of intelligence, he is animal. The animal cannot do any remedy. You take one animal to the slaughterhouse. He cannot do anything. So sleeping means to remain in ignorance. And awakened stage means in knowledge. So intelligence means one must have knowledge. That is intelligence. So this division -- brahmana, ksatriya, vaisya, sudra -- means the highest intelligent class man is called brahmana. He knows. He's in knowledge. Brahma-bhutah prasannatma na socati na kanksati [Bg. 18.54]. Next intelligent, less, is the ksatriyas. Next, the vaisyas. And the sudras, they are like, almost like animals. They have no independence. Just like animal has no independence. A dog, without a master, he cannot live. His life is very precarious. So at the present moment, however one qualified may be, unless he gets a good job, he's just like a dog, a street dog. He may be very highly qualified, technologically, but if he does not get a job, then he's useless. He'll go. "Sir, can you give me any job?" "No vacancies." A dog like. Just like dog goes, moves the tail, "Can you give me some food." Somebody gives him, "Eh! Hut!" This is the position. Therefore in this age kalau sudra-sambhavah. In Kali-yuga, there is no brahmana, no ksatriya. There are some vaisyas. And all sudras. Because they cannot live without being engaged by somebody else. And the whole civilization is going on, big, big factories, big, big... What is that? Sudras. They are creating sudras. "People should be dependent." Unless you work... Therefore people are going fifty miles away, going... I have seen in New York. People are coming from the other side... What is that?
Hamsaduta: Connecticut
Prabhupada: No, no. Staten Island?
Hamsaduta: Staten Island.
Prabhupada: Crossing by ferry, one hour. Then waiting for bus, another hour. Then going to the office. Then after office, they're coming back. Again going. Whole day, they're dependent on everything. That is the condition in New York. It is to be supposed: the most advanced city. The same thing is everywhere. People are becoming dependent, sudra, just like dogs. A dog, unless he gets a nice master, he's not happy. So at the present moment, all the population, just like the cats and dogs, they're dependent. They are not intelligent. Intelligence means he must be independent. That is intelligence. And people are struggling for independence. That is their motive. Everyone is struggling hard for independence. Because that is the culmination of intelligence. So our problem is that we do not know what we are. Neither we know how to get out of the miserable condition of life. Therefore we have no intelligence. We are like cats and dogs. This is the conclusion. What do you think? Am I right or wrong?
Guest (1): I couldn't follow you.
Prabhupada: Eh?
Guest (1): I haven't followed you.
Prabhupada: No, what is your opinion, my description of intelligence and not, no intelligence?
Guest (1): I think you're right.
Prabhupada: Thank you. (laughter)
Guest (1): But you know, my thoughts must be really not worth very much.
Prabhupada: But we can give intelligence by which he can become independent. This is Krsna consciousness movement.
Guest (1): How can we in a money-orientated world?
Prabhupada: Hm?
Hamsaduta: How can we become intelligent or independent?
Guest (1): In a money-orientated world?
Prabhupada: Well, money you can get. That money does not mean independence.
Guest (1): No, I know.
Prabhupada: They are, while working, they're getting money, but they're not independent.
Guest (1): No, I understand that.
Prabhupada: Yes. So without money, if you become independent, that is intelligence.
Srutakirti: That was her question.
Prabhupada: Ah. That, if you can get Krsna, you'll...
Guest (1): But how do you, what I mean is how do you, how can you...
Prabhupada: That "how to," that we shall teach, as we are teaching others. In the Bhagavad-gita it is stated,
yam labdhva caparam labham
manyate nadhikam tatah
yasmin sthito na duhkhena
gurunapi vicalyate
 [Bg. 6.20-23]
Yam labdhva. You get something, which getting, you will be satisfied: "I don't want anything more." That is highest gain. Yam labdhva caparam labham manyate nadhikam tatah. Caparam. Another kind of benefit is not required. So yasmin sthitah. If we remain in that position, then even there is hardest difficulty of life, he'll not be disturbed. (pause) Where is Panditji?
Devotee: I'll get him. (pause)
Hamsaduta: Should I put on the light, Prabhupada?
Prabhupada: Yes. Sit down. (pause) He gets such thing, when he gets it, he'll consider that he doesn't want anything more. That is the greatest profit. And the result is that when one gets that thing, even he is in the greatest difficulty of life, he's not disturbed.
yam labdhva caparam labham
manyate nadhikam tatah
yasmin sthito na duhkhena
gurunapi vicalyate
 [Bg. 6.20-23]
Hm. Take that. Bhagavad-gita. Yam labdhva, yam labdhva caparam labham manyate nadhikam tatah. I think it is in the Sixth Chapter.
Pradyumna: Yam nam?
Prabhupada: Labdhva.
Pradyumna: Oh, caparam labham?
Prabhupada: Ah.
Pradyumna: Six-twenty-two.
yam labdhva caparam labham
manyate nadhikam tatah
yasmin sthito na duhkhena
gurunapi vicalyate
tam vidyad duhkha-samyoga-
viyogam yoga-samjnikam
 [Bg. 6.20-23]
"Established thus, one never departs from the truth, and upon gaining this, he thinks there is no greater gain. Being situated in such a position, one is never shaken, even in the midst of greatest difficulty. This, indeed, is actual freedom from all miseries arising from material contact."
Prabhupada: Purport.
Pradyumna: "By practice of yoga, one becomes gradually detached from material concepts. This is the primary characteristic of the yoga principle. And after this, one becomes situated in trance, or samadhi, which means that the yogi realizes the Supersoul through transcendental mind and intelligence, without any of the misgivings of identifying the self with the Superself. Yoga practice is more or less based on the principles of the Patanjali system. Some unauthorized commentators try to identify the individual soul with the Supersoul, and the monists think this to be liberation, but they do not understand the real purpose of the Patanjali system of yoga. There is an acceptance of transcendental pleasure in the Patanjali system, but the monists do not accept this transcendental pleasure out of fear of jeopardizing the theory of oneness. The duality of knowledge and knower is not accepted by the non-dualists, but in this verse transcendental pleasure, realized through transcendental senses, is accepted, and this is corroborated by the Patanjali Muni, the famous exponent of the yoga system. The great sage declared in his Yoga-sutras: purusartha-sunyanam gunanam pratiprasavah kaivalyam svarupa-pratistha va citi-saktir iti." This citi-sakti, or internal potency, is transcendental. Purusartha means material religiosity, economic development, sense gratification and, at the end, the attempt to become one with the Supreme. This "oneness with the Supreme" is called kaivalyam by the monist. But according to Patanjali, this kaivalyam is an internal, or transcendental, potency by which the living entity becomes aware of his constitutional position. In the words of Lord Caitanya, this state of affairs is called ceto-darpana-marjanam, or clearance of the impure mirror of the mind. This "clearance" is actually liberation, or bhava-mahadavagni-nirvapanam. The theory of nirvana -- also preliminary -- corresponds with this principle. In the Bhagavatam this is called svarupena vyavasthitih [SB 2.10.6]. The Bhagavad-gita also confirms this situation in this verse.
After nirvana, or material cessation, there is the manifestation of spiritual activities, or devotional service of the Lord, known as Krsna consciousness. In the words of the Bhagavatam, svarupena vyavasthitih: this is the "real life of the living entity." Maya, or illusion, is the condition of spiritual life contaminated by material infection. Liberation from this material infection does not mean destruction of the original eternal position of the living entity. Patanjali also accepts this by his words kaivalyam svarupa-pratistha va citi-saktir iti. This citi-sakti or transcendental pleasure, is real life. This is confirmed in the Vedanta-sutras as anandamayo 'bhyasat (Vedanta-sutra 1.1.12). This natural transcendental pleasure is the ultimate goal of yoga and is easily achieved by execution of devotional service, or bhakti-yoga. Bhaktiyoga will be vividly described in the Seventh Chapter of Bhagavad-gita.
In the yoga system, as described in this chapter, there are two kinds of samadhi, called samprajnata-samadhi and asamprajnata-samadhi. When one becomes situated in the transcendental position by various philosophical researches, it is called samprajnata-samadhi. In the asamprajnata-samadhi there is no longer any connection with mundane pleasure, for one is then transcendental to all sorts of happiness derived from the senses. When the yogi is once situated in that transcendental position, he is never shaken from it. Unless the yogi is able to reach this position, he is unsuccessful. Today's so-called yoga practice, which involves various sense pleasures, is contradictory. A yogi indulging in sex and intoxication is a mockery. Even those yogis who are attracted by the siddhis (perfections) in the process of yoga are not perfectly situated. If the yogis are attracted by the by-products of yoga, then they cannot attain the stage of perfection, as is stated in this verse. Persons, therefore, indulging in the make-show practice of gymnastic feats or siddhis should know that the aim of yoga is lost in that way.
The best practice of yoga in this age is Krsna consciousness, which is not baffling. A Krsna conscious person is so happy in his occupation that he does not aspire after any other happiness. There are many impediments, especially in this age of hypocrisy, to practicing hatha-yoga, dhyana-yoga, and jnana-yoga, but there is no such problem in executing karma-yoga or bhakti-yoga.
As long as the material body exists, one has to meet the demands of the body, namely eating, sleeping, defending and mating. But a person who is in pure bhakti-yoga or in Krsna consciousness does not arouse the senses while meeting the demands of the body. Rather, he accepts the bare necessities of life, making the best use of a bad bargain, and enjoys transcendental happiness in Krsna consciousness. He is callous toward incidental occurrences -- such as accidents, disease, scarcity and even the death of a most dear relative -- but he is always alert to execute his duties in Krsna consciousness or bhakti-yoga. Accidents never deviate him from his duty. As stated in the Bhagavad-gita, agamapayino 'nityas tams titiksasva bharata. He endures all such incidental occurences because he knows that they come and go and do not affect his duties. In this way he achieves the highest perfection in yoga practice.
Prabhupada: If you have got any question in this statement, you can ask.
Guest (1): Just, just how...?
Prabhupada: How, that you have to learn, but this is the process.
Guest (1): That is the end product.
Prabhupada: Hm. You learn... We have got this institution. You can come and learn how others are doing, others are learning. We have got class in the morning at seven. If you've got time, you can, you are welcome. We don't charge anything. You can come and join. There is no business. You can live with us. We don't charge anything. Or you can come and go, attend class. There is no charge. Krsna gives us everything. Just like this house. This is two hundred thousand pounds. George Harrison has purchased it, and he has given us. Similarly, everything comes from Krsna. None of our members go to office or factory. But we eat also, nicely.
Guest (2): Yes, but if somebody didn't go to the factory, you wouldn't, would you?
Prabhupada: Eh?
Guest (2): Somebody has to go and do the work to make the food, keep the country running.
Prabhupada: No. We don't hate to work. That is not our business. If we get work, we work for Krsna. The income comes to Krsna. But if we don't get work, we are not bothered, that "There is no work. Where shall I eat? Where shall I sleep? Where shall I go?" No, there is no such botheration. So all the members, I think, eighty, ninety percent, they do not go to work outside.
Hamsaduta: Ninety-nine.
Prabhupada: Eh? (laughter) But they get their food and shelter and everything. Even they live with a wife, children. So we,... Krsna gives. Not only that we are simply sannyasi, brahmacari. There are grhasthas, householders, husband, wife, children. They are also living. So that is not our problem. How to eat, how to sleep, that is not our problem. Our only problem is how to satisfy Krsna. That is...
Guest (1): Yes. That was the question that was puzzling me. What is...?
Prabhupada: That you have to learn. Not in a moment you can understand. Then you have to come to the schooling process. Otherwise how you can learn? In a moment? Such a big subject matter?
Guest (1): Yes.
Prabhupada: We are going to solve all the problems of life. Such a nice proposal. Don't you think it requires little patience to understand how to do it?
Guest (1): It requires a little bravery.
Prabhupada: Eh?
Guest (1): It requires bravery too.
Prabhupada: Yes. Because we have got background, Krsna, so bravery, personally we haven't got to practice. Just like a child is in the protection of an able father. He's happy. "Whatever happens, father will see." He's happy. He's confident. "My father is there; my mother is there. Who can do any harm to me?" He's confident.
Guest (1): There is so much that's wrong.
Prabhupada: So similarly, if you depend on Krsna, God, He'll take care of you. He says in the Bhagavad-gita:
sarva-dharman parityajya
mam ekam saranam vraja
aham tvam sarva-papebhyo
moksayisyami ma sucah
 [Bg. 18.66]
Yoga-ksemam vahamy aham. Tesam nityabhiyuktanam yoga-ksemam vahamy aham [Bg. 9.22]. Everything is there. And that you have to understand practically. (pause) You are all living in neighborhood, this village? No. You have come from distant place?
Guest (1): Yes.
Prabhupada: Oh. So whenever you find time, you can come, or, if you like, you can live with us. We have got ample place. Girls and ladies, they live separately. Boys and gentlemen, they live separately. Those who are married, we have got apartments for householders. And gradually, we are improving, I mean to say, arranging further facilities. First of all you try to attend our class in the morning and inquire all about your doubts. Have some clear idea what is this Krsna consciousness movement. Read our literatures as far as possible. You have taken some book, I see, I saw. And if you agree to this principle, we take charge of you. You haven't got any botheration, how you'll get prasada. We shall arrange for that...
Guest (3) (young British woman): Religion, meaning trying to serve God, is any more right than another?
Prabhupada: This is not religion. This is the only business. Religion is different thing. Suppose... Just like... I have already explained, that you are sleeping, and you have got a good engagement. And somebody's trying to awake you, that "You have to go there. Just get up! Get up!" So this kind of business is not religion. Religion is a, what is a kind of faith, a sentiment. That is different thing. It is the main business of human being. Because we are part and parcel of... Just like a boy, he's very rich man's son. Some way or other, he's out of his home, and he's suffering for want of food, want of shelter. And somebody's giving information that "I know you are such and such big man's son. Why you are loitering in the street? Why don't you go back to your home, back to your father?" So is it not the best business. So everyone is suffering. That I have already explained, how they are suffering. We are trying to save his suffering by dispatching him back to home, back to Godhead. This is our business. So it is not religion. It is the most important humanitarian work. What do you think?
Hamsaduta: Yes.
Prabhupada: Yes. We are giving the right information, how human being can be really happy. This is end. It is not a religious sentiment. Religion means kind of faith. Today I am Hindu; tomorrow I am Christian; next day I am Mohammedan. What benefit I may get by changing so-called faith? Unless I understand what is my constitutional position, why I am suffering, how to get out of it? That is real life. So Krsna consciousness movement is that. It is not a sentimental religious faith. It is not like that. It is absolutely necessary for the human being. We are talking of human being because without being a human being, nobody will be able... The cats and dogs, they will not be able to understand the problem. In the human form of life, you can make solution of all the problems of life. It is a science, how to make that solution. That we are teaching. We are not talking of religion. Religion... Somebody will say, "I believe," "We believe..." Another will, "We believe..." You believe, if it is not a fact, what is the use of such believing? We are dealing with facts, not the question of believing and not believing. Facts are facts. If you don't take facts, then you are missing the opportunity. (pause) You have got some visitors' book? To...?
Hamsaduta: Visitors' book, to sign?
Prabhupada: Yes.
Hamsaduta: No, I don't think so.
Prabhupada: Somebody told me they have got. You have seen all our books? You have seen?
Guest (2): Yes.
Prabhupada: You have seen?
Guest (2): Some of the little... (pause) (end)

 

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© 2001 The Bhaktivedanta Book Trust International.

The Great Soul

January 31, 1977

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Prabhupada: With determination. Otherwise, satatam kirtayanto mam [Bg. 9.14]. Satatam means twenty-four hours. Caitanya Mahaprabhu says, kirtaniyah sada harih [Cc. Adi 17.31]. Harer nama harer nama harer nama eva kevalam [Cc. Adi 17.21]. But that we cannot do. Therefore to keep drdha-vrata, we have fixed up a certain quantity. Chant that. Sankhya-purvaka-nama-gana-natibhih kalavasani-krtau. About the Gosvamis-sankhya-purvaka: "So many times." Not only chanting, also offering obeisances. Sankhya-purvaka-nama-gana-natibhih. Nati means pranati. "I shall offer obeisances hundred times." Gosvamis, they used to do that. Still in Radha-kunda, Vrndavana, you'll see many devotees. They offer, counting, flat, so many times. So we have to take some labor. It is not so easy thing that you realize (chuckling) God so easily. Sankhya-purvaka-nama-gana-natibhih kalavasani-krtau. The valuable time of human life should be utilized only for cultivating Krsna consciousness. That is perfect. No other business. Sarva-dharman parityajya [Bg. 18.66]. That is sarva-dharman. But if you cannot do that, all right, makeminimum: "So many times I shall chant. So many times I shall offer obeisances." Make some drdha-vrata. Then gradually it will be successful.
Guest (5): (Bengali)
Prabhupada: Yes. Hare Krsna, Hare Krsna, Krsna Krsna-twenty-four hours. Japa-tapa. Tapasya. Tapo divyam putraka yena suddhyed sattvam [SB 5.5.1]. Japa means tapa, tapasya. And that is drdha-vrata. Tapasa brahmacaryena [SB 6.1.13]. Tapasya begins with brahmacarya. There is no tapasya, there is no brahmacarya, there is no drdha-vrata, there is no understanding, and they are becoming guru. Just see these Europeans, Americans. Their life beginning was meat-eating. And they have given up everything. This is tapasya. And we shall eat everything, do everything... Yato mata tato patha. "Whatever I like, I do, and still a devotee." What is this nonsense? Jaya.
Guest (6): Visvasa first, faith strong.
Prabhupada: No, where is faith if we do not execute tapasya? Where is faith? Visvasa sudrdha niscaya. That is visvasa, the same thing. This is visvasa: "Krsna said this; I shall do." This is visvasa. And if you do not do anything, what Krsna says, where is visvasa? There is no visvasa. Krsna says, satatam kirtayanto mam: [Bg. 9.14] "Anyone who is chanting Me, Hare Krsna..." So Krsna says; I must do it. That is visvasa. If you do not do that, where is visvasa? What do you mean by visvasa? Visvasa means sudrdha niscaya. "Yes, Krsna has said. I shall do." That is visvasa. If you have no faith in the words of Krsna, where is your visvasa? What do you mean by visvasa? Hm?
Guest (6): Bhagavan's servant.
Prabhupada: Bhagavan is your servant. Whatever you like, you can do, and He'll serve you. You'll not serve Him. He will serve you. Is that visvasa? "Whatever nonsense I do, Krsna will support." Is that visvasa? Visvasa means "What Krsna says, I shall do." That is visvasa. That has been impressed at the modern age, that "Whatever I do, Krsna will accept it." Is it not? Do you mean visvasa means this, that "Whatever nonsense you do, Krsna will accept"? Do you mean visvasa means this? Then what is visvasa? Explain. "Whatever Krsna says, I will do," that is visvasa. Or "Whatever nonsense I do, Krsna will favor"? Which one visvasa? What do you mean...? Huh?
Guest (6): There is one pervading Supreme Soul.
Prabhupada: What is that pervading? What do you mean by that? Plain explain. What do you mean by visvasa? Explain.
Guest (6): Faith in God.
Prabhupada: Faith in God. Then hear what God says. That is... I am speaking that "What Krsna says, you do it." That is visvasa. And if you do otherwise, where is visvasa? Hm? Visvasa means... I say, "Mr. such and such, do this." If you have faith in me, you will do this. That is visvasa. And if you do otherwise, where is your visvasa? You have no faith in me. Now people have degraded so much that they think, "This is visvasa. Anything I accept as God is God." This visvasa is going on. "Any nonsen... [break] ...pravartate, iti matva bhajante mam budha bhava-samanvitah [Bg. 10.8]. Is it not? So if you take this, that Krsna is the beginning of everything -- iti matva -- by understanding this, if anyone engages himself in krsna-bhakti, bhajante mam, that is bhakti. Budha bhava-samanvitah. He has come immediately to the bhava stage. Means he's budhah. He is actual... He has actually understood the thing. So that is visvasa. In Caitanya-caritamrta it is said visvasa... Sraddha-sabde visvasa kahe sudrdha niscaya, krsne bhakti kaile sarva-karma krta haya [Cc. Madhya  22.62]. Krsne bhakti kaile sarva-karma krta haya. This is visvasa. Krsna says, sarva-dharman parityajya mam ekam saranam vraja [Bg. 18.66]. I am thinking, "I have got so many other things. Simply why shall I surrender?" That is not visvasa. Visvasa means "Krsna says, sarva-dharman parityajya mam ekam saranam [Bg. 18.66]. I'll accept." Krsne bhakti kaile sarva-karma krta. That is visvasa. Sudrdha niscaya. Sraddha-sabde visvasa kahe sudrdha niscaya, krsne bhakti kaile sarva-karma krta haya. That is visvasa. That visvasa wanted, not that I manufacture something. It is useless. Moghasa mogha-karmano mogha-jnana vicetasah [Bg. 9.12]. That is hopeless. What Krsna says, if you believe firmly, then it is visvasa. Drdha-vrata. And execute, determination. Then you get the result. Sa mahatma sudurlabhah. Such mahatma is very rare. And nowadays mahatma means one who does not know anything about Krsna, speaks all nonsense. He is mahatma. "Because we stamp somebody, mahatma, therefore he is mahatma." Find out this verse, mahatmanas tu mam partha daivim prakrtim [Bg. 9.13].
Satsvarupa:
mahatmanas tu mam partha
daivim prakrtim asritah
bhajanty ananya-manaso
jnatva bhutadim avyayam
 [Bg. 9.13]
"O son of Prtha, those who are not deluded, the great souls, are under the protection of the divine nature. They are fully engaged in devotional service because they know Me as the Supreme Personality of Godhead, original and inexhaustible."
Prabhupada: This is mahatma. Is there any purport?
Satsvarupa: Yes. "In this verse the description of mahatma is clearly given. The first sign of the mahatma is that he is already situated in the divine nature. He is not under the control of material nature. And how is this effected? That is explained in the Seventh Chapter. One who surrenders unto the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Sri Krsna, at once becomes freed from the control of material nature. That is the qualification."
Prabhupada: Mam eva ye prapadyante mayam etam taranti.
Satsvarupa: "One can become free from the control of material nature as soon as he surrenders his soul to the Supreme Personality of Godhead. That is the preliminary formula. Being marginal potency, as soon as the living entity is freed from the control of material nature, he is put under the guidance of the spiritual nature. The guidance of the spiritual nature is called daivim prakrtim, divine nature. So when one is promoted in that way by surrendering to the Supreme Personality of Godhead, one attains to the stage of a great soul, mahatma. The mahatma does not divert his attention to anything outside Krsna because he knows perfectly well that Krsna is the original Supreme Person, the cause of all causes. There is no doubt about it. Such a mahatma or great soul develops through association with other mahatmas, pure devotees. Pure devotees are not even attracted by Krsna's other features, such as the four-armed Maha-Visnu. They are simply attracted by the two-armed form of Krsna. Since they are not attracted to other features of Krsna, what to speak of the demigods, they are not concerned with any form of a demigod or of a human being. They only meditate upon Krsna in Krsna consciousness. They are always engaged in the unswerving service of the Lord in Krsna consciousness."
Prabhupada: Sa mahatma sudurlabhah. That is the... What do you think? What is your definition of mahatma?
Guest (1): Gita said, vasudevah sarvam iti sa mahatma sudurlabhah [Bg. 7.19].
Prabhupada: Yes. Gita says, but what you say? Recently I went to Wardha, Mahatma Gandhi's asrama. Nobody is there. And they are worshiping Mahatma's lantern, and Mahatma's cadara. Not a single picture of Krsna. (chuckles) There is not a single picture of Krsna. And here it is said, bhajate mam ananya-bhak. This is going on. So read Bhagavad-gita As It Is. Learn. Everything is there. Make your life successful. That is our proposal. Come here. We have developed this center in good quarter. Discuss Bhagavad-gita and try to do what Krsna says. Make your life perfect. (Hindi) We are misguided. Misguided... (Hindi) Everything is there in the Bhagavad-gita: "This mahatma; this is God; this is function; this you have to do." Do it. Man-mana bhava mad-bhakto mad-yaji mam namaskuru [Bg. 18.65]. Four things anyone can do. A child can do.
yoginam api sarvesam
mad-gatenantar-atmana
sraddhavan bhajate yo mam
sa me yuktatamo matah
 [Bg. 6.47]
First-class yogi -- one who is thinking of Krsna. (Hindi) There is no difficulty. Take Bhagavan prasada; chant Bhagavan's name; read Bhagavad-gita; try to understand. Very easy. What is the difficulty? Is there any difficulty? Hm? Do you think is there any difficulty? [break] ...Hindi.
Guest (7): (Hindi)
Prabhupada: (Hindi) ...asat-sanga-tyaga ei vaisnava-acara [Cc. Madhya 22.87]. You must give up the association of bad elements. And who is bad element? Asat eka stri-sangi krsna abhakta ara: One bad element is one who is too much attached to women, and the other bad element is who is not devotee of God. Give up their association. Then you will be steady. Mahat-sevam dvaram ahur vimukteh [SB 5.5.2]. If you actually associate with mahatmas, so that will open your door of liberation. Mahat-sevam dvaram ahur vimuktes tamo-dvaram yositam sangi-sangam. Those who are too much materially attached, if you associate with them, then you are going in the darkest region, not liberation, but in the darkness. Adanta-gobhir visatam tamisram [SB 7.5.30]. Those who are too much to material enjoyment -- they cannot control their senses -- they're going in the darkest region. Tamo-dvaram. Tamaso ma jyotir gamaya. This is Vedic instruction, "Don't go to the darkness; go to the light." Hare Krsna.
Satsvarupa: There is prasadam being served now.
Prabhupada: (Hindi) (end)

 

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The 'Good Of Humanity'

August 9, 1976

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Prabhupada: Yes, spiritual master, yes, must be there. That is Vedic injunction. Tad vijnanartham sa gurum eva abhigacchet [MU 1.2.12]. Spiritual, that I have already explained. Spiritual master, good father, good king, good teachers, they are required. That is defect. There is no guru, there is no spiritual master, there is no nice king, nice father, whole society... [break] (in room) If you find out sand and rocks, you must also (indistinct) there was water. And from water, vegetation comes. From vegetation, other life comes. What we speak, we don't speak unscientifically. It is scientific. How this rascal says all of a sudden in the sky there is rocks? Wherefrom the rock came?Hari-sauri: Well, they say originally from gas.
Prabhupada: Gas?
Hari-sauri: Gas.
Prabhupada: So gas, without water, there cannot be gas.
Hari-sauri: Gas and then it liquifies and then it solidifies.
Prabhupada: Liquid means water. So as soon as there is water, there is vegetation. You'll find everywhere. Water dries up, vegetable comes.
Parivrajakacarya: Today they are exploring Mars, and they are saying that they're finding water on Mars.
Prabhupada: Water's there. Everything must be there. Panca-bhuta, maha-bhuta. Ether, then fire, then water, then land. Everything is described in the Bhagavatam. They cannot speak nonsense. They can speak nonsense through the other literatures, but we cannot speak. Without water, how there is possibility of sand? Sand means it is salt.
Parivrajakacarya: If you go out here, there is big desert.
Prabhupada: That means there was water.
Parivrajakacarya: Yes, and under the desert always. I took a trip a few weeks ago, all over Iran, to the deserts, to villages, and always just forty feet, forty meters under the desert, lots of water. They would bring the water up and then there would be green, they would grow vegetables. So even here there's water.
Prabhupada: The water, sea, as it becomes solidified, the outer surface, by sunshine, they become, it is called sodium silicate. Salt is sodium chloride. So from sodium chloride, the sodium silicate. So cover(?) of the sea they can solidify by the sodium silicate. But underneath there is water. Just like our, this skin, bone, coming from where? We are eating liquid and or some vegetables or some whatever, they are becoming liquidified. And first transformation is blood. Blood is liquid, and from blood everything is coming. The muscle is coming, the bone is coming. The more the liquid portion becomes solidified by air, gas, then these things coming. The formation of this body beginning the liquid semina, liquid ovum, mix together. From liquid. Then they form pealike solid thing, from that liquid. And then the body forms. Wherefrom the solid body forms? The man injects liquid. Liquid inject, everything is coming. So wherefrom the solid molecules? By chemical composition the body forms, from liquid to solid. So as soon as you see some solid thing, you must know that it has come from liquid.
Parivrajakacarya: It got its form from liquid. The form, it had to come from liquid somehow.
Prabhupada: Whatever it may be. Yes, liquid. The discharge of semina is liquid. It is not solid. So how this body comes? You cannot bluff that a solid has come all of a sudden. There was liquid, or there is liquid.
Hari-sauri: Well, they'll accept that there was liquid.
Prabhupada: Yes, then there must have been vegetables. As soon as there is liquid there is vegetation.
Hari-sauri: Their argument is that because there's no atmosphere then there's no vegetation.
Prabhupada: Oh, that is... That is another bogus. The atmosphere is the same everywhere. Little more. Just like... [break]... say in the sun planet there is living entity, there is fire. So what do you mean by atmosphere if even in fire there is life? Dahati pavakah. Bhagavad-gita. Nainam dahati pavakah. Pavakah means fire. Does not burn the soul. So where there is fire only, he develops fiery body. Not that by the fire it is finished. Nainam dahati pavakah. Where there is gas, air, nainam... Find out this verse. Acchedyo' yam adahyo' yam.
Hari-sauri: Gita?
Prabhupada: Bhagavad-gita, yes. You do not read even. You should have reference immediately.
Parivrajakacarya: Even here on the earth, even ice in the South Pole of the earth, they find much life inside the ice.
Prabhupada: Just see. Here inside the ice there are life.
Parivrajakacarya: They are very surprised. They said how is this happening.
Prabhupada: Yes. Life is everywhere. This bogus theory there is no life, the atmosphere is different, it is bogus, simply bogus. Because spirit soul is never affected by any material atmosphere. That is the distinction between matter and spirit. It has nothing to do with this material atmosphere. They don't have knowledge, they are baffled. And those who have no knowledge, they are accepting.
Hari-sauri:
nainam chindanti sastrani
nainam dahati pavakah
na cainam kledayanty apo
na sosayati marutah
 [Bg. 2.23]
"The soul can never be cut into pieces by any weapon, nor can he be burned by fire, nor moistened by water, nor withered by the wind."
Prabhupada: So where is question of atmosphere influence? Suppose there is rock and sand and always hot weather. That does not mean there cannot be any life. The life is never affected by all these things. Make propaganda about this knowledge. People will understand that Krsna consciousness movement is not joking; it is something serious. That boy was saying that these scientist, they know me. What is this boy's name, this boy said about the so-called astronomer, scientist? Who was this boy?
Pradyumna: Who came last night?
Hari-sauri: One of our boys, American boy, that tall boy.
Pradyumna: Here in this temple?
Hari-sauri: Yes. Jnanagamya. He used to do some science research as well.
Parivrajakacarya: The scientists are like all materialists. They think if we have not seen it...
Prabhupada: You have to see from the book. Seeing from the book is real seeing. What you can see with these blunt eyes? I have seen in these navigators. They see in the different plans and books, and they direct their ship or airplane accordingly. How can he see where we are going?
Hari-sauri: Just like they land an airplane.
Prabhupada: Yes. They have got all plans and direction, and altitude, latitude, which direction is going on(?) in front of the pilot. So everything is there. In what position the plane is there, how high it is and how low it will be, where it is, everything. On that direction they can fly. Otherwise, what they can see with the eyes? At most ten miles, and it is running at six hundred miles? What ten miles will do them? So sastra-caksusa. Authoritative literature should be the eyes, not these blunt eyes. What is the value of these eyes? Here is authority: nainam dahati pavakah. You should go to the school, colleges, and from Bhagavad-gita give them rascal knowledge. The whole world is in darkness, and these rascals are guiding them. You have tasted the bada? Nim bada?
Pradyumna: This morning.
Prabhupada: Huh? Did you like it?
Parivrajakacarya: It tasted very healthy.
Prabhupada: Healthy?
Parivrajakacarya: Healthy. It tasted like it was good for me.
Hari-sauri: That means it didn't taste very nice, but we accepted it was good.
Parivrajakacarya: I know by my intelligence that it is good to keep eating, even though my tongue was saying "Stop."
Prabhupada: No, this nim is good. They say that if you eat at least two leaves of nim daily, you'll never lose your appetite, appetite will be continuing.
Hari-sauri: Who can eat two leaves of nim? (laughing)
Prabhupada: No, if you practice, it is not impossible.
Pradyumna: I ate them one time. Remember in Bombay I thought I had worms? You told me to eat nim?
Prabhupada: Effective? What happened?
Pradyumna: Well, I didn't notice anything happened, but it was very, very bitter, so bitter.
Prabhupada: So that worms cured or not?
Pradyumna: I don't know. Sometimes I think I have worms.
Prabhupada: You should not eat sweet.
Parivrajakacarya: You cannot get nim in Iran. I have never seen a nim tree in Iran.
Prabhupada: No tree. In the desert, where is tree? All desert. All this Middle East, desert. So they can be allowed to eat meat. Otherwise, what they'll eat? So everyone must eat something. So if there is no vegetation, if there is no sufficient, they can be allowed.
Parivrajakacarya: I visited some of these small villages in the south of Iran, and the tents of nomads who kept sheep, that was their life. They had a tent and they had hundreds of sheep, and they would move the tent every month. They would take the tent, for one month they would live here, next month they would move.
Prabhupada: Why they're changing?
Parivrajakacarya: Because they're desert people. The sheep eat all the little green, and then they have to move on.
Pradyumna: Same thing as the Bible. When the sheep eat up all the green in that place, then they have to go to another place with their sheep. In the Bible the same thing. All that Abraham, Joseph...
Prabhupada: Bible was produced here, in this desert. Jerusalem is not far away. Mecca, (indistinct), Arabia.
Parivrajakacarya: All they had to eat was the milk of sheep and goats and sometimes when they would camp near a farm they would have vegetables. Sometimes. And then the meat of the sheep.
Prabhupada: And these dates. In the desert the date tree grows. Sometimes they eat camel also. Do they not?
Parivrajakacarya: Yes. But I don't think if they...
Prabhupada: They cannot be strictly vegetarian; it is not possible.
Parivrajakacarya: It is difficult.
Prabhupada: But even they eat meat they can chant Hare Krsna, there is no harm.
Parivrajakacarya: But now they are farming in the desert. The Iranian government has started farms. They are irrigating the land with water, and when they put water on the desert they get all kinds of vegetables and grains very easily. So if they do that then they can become vege... They have no excuse. The excuse of the people is that "We have to eat meat."
Prabhupada: They can have rains from the sky by chanting. The rain will fall from the sky. Who can check it? Krsna gives the water from the sky. Yajnad bhavati parjanyah [Bg. 3.14].
Parivrajakacarya: They say in the books that this area used to be all forest with many, many trees two to three thousand years ago. It was a very thick forest. But since then it has become desert, the rain has stopped since then.
Prabhupada: Because the yajna stopped.
Pradyumna: The Sahara Desert used to be all trees, very fertile. Sahara Desert in Africa, it is the biggest desert in the world. Nothing...
Prabhupada: Sahara, Sahara.
Pradyumna: Sahara Desert. It used to be very rich thousands of years ago, but then became desert.
Hari-sauri: It's supposed to increase its size by ten miles every year.
Pradyumna: Desert growth. Formerly, that city Carthage used to be there. Carthage was fighting Rome. Carthage was very rich, all farms.
Prabhupada: Cartharian civilization was very big civilization. The thing is that the more people become sinful, they'll be disturbed by this natural atmosphere. Therefore I'm surprised that moon planet is inhabited by pious inhabitants, how there can be desert?
Pradyumna: But does moon planet have something to do with Pitrs? Does the Pitr..., Pitrloka is different?
Prabhupada: Pitr?
Pradyumna: Pita, Pitr?
Prabhupada: No, Pitrloka is different. That is downwards.
Hari-sauri: Does that Pitr, does that refer to the original progenitors?
Pradyumna: No, forefathers.
Prabhupada: Latest development they are finding water in Mars?
Parivrajakacarya: It is very difficult for them because they are using their eyes and other instruments. They have found places where there were rivers, and they are finding ice, other things. So, I don't know the latest about it. It is obvious to them there is life, different kinds of life.
Hari-sauri: The way of testing for life...
Prabhupada: Why you are spoiling your nails? It may come to a boil and then you'll understand. It is very dangerous habit. If there is little (indistinct) then it will become a boil.
Pradyumna: Jnanagamya said that on Mars they found something like a crater with a house. Looked like a... Or a bombed-out thing. This Jnanagamya was working with a, he works with some information service, U.S. Information Service. So he was in charge of designing something here for Fourth of July. Some program. So he got this information from this U.S. Information Service which generally..., sometimes it isn't made public. It's just in their U.S. service. They'd seen some kind of a crater with...
Parivrajakacarya: Roads in it as well.
Pradyumna: Yes, something with roads in it or something.
Hari-sauri: The way they test for life is they take some soil and mix certain things with it, and then they wait and see if there is some life development from that.
Prabhupada: That is nonsense.
Hari-sauri: Yes. They mix ammonia and...
Prabhupada: Chemical theory. Why do they not in the end mix something and see if life is coming? They are all rascals, speaking one after another, rascals.
Hari-sauri: That's their whole thing, that if...
Prabhupada: If by mixing something they can bring life, why not in the egg?
Hari-sauri: Yes, they can't even do it here.
Prabhupada: Simply for... But you rascals you cannot understand how they are speaking rascaldom.
Hari-sauri: No, I can see now. I've been with you so long I can understand now.
Parivrajakacarya: They have sent this one ship to Mars at a cost of one billion dollars. They are making these tests.
Hari-sauri: Now there's a second one going around as well. That's Viking 1 that's on there now, and they have another one, Viking 2, that's designed to orbit.
Pradyumna: Vikings were names of pirates. Viking means pirates. Pirate's a thief. Vikings, they used to be thieves. They named their spaceship Viking. (laughs)
Prabhupada: [break]...the idea going to the other planet? Colonization or what?
Pradyumna: One thing, they say, is security, that American and Russia are fighting. So it was a race to get to the moon because they think that from other planets they can control conditions on the earth. From another planet they can control weather or they can control different things.
Prabhupada: Just see how bogus.
Pradyumna: That is one thing they say, we must get to the moon first, for security.
Prabhupada: That is now failure. Now they'll do it from Mars.
Hari-sauri: Not so much from there for security, it's just...
Parivrajakacarya: Their pride, one country, just like children playing, one can say "I can fly higher than you," and so "We can go to the moon before you can." For no reason than just to show they can do it.
Hari-sauri: It's an excuse to spend money. It's for fun.
Prabhupada: They cannot settle up their misunderstanding here. By going to the moon planet, they'll do it.
Hari-sauri: That's one thing that they said they were going to do, actually. They had some Russian astronauts and some American astronauts, and they had them meet in space, and then they joined their spaceships together and then they had a meal together and did some experiments, and then they left again. So that was very much acclaimed as bringing the two nations closer together.
Prabhupada: We are afraid of these two classes of rascals. "Afraid of" means we don't want their association. It is very dangerous.
Pradyumna: You said in the Bhagavatam just that, that we are afraid of the materialistic men.
Prabhupada: Yes. Personally I feel, I have several times told. For a devotee to live with nondevotees is so obnoxious and troublesome, it is sometimes mentioned, better to remain within a cage surrounded by fire, and still, don't remain with nondevotees. You prefer to live within a cage surrounded by fire. That living is preferable than to live with this nondevotee class.
Hari-sauri: A lot of the devotees had that experience living with their parents before they joined the movement. It was so hellish they had to get out. Then they, some way or other, met...
Prabhupada:
tandera carana-sebi-bhakta-sane bas
janame janame hoy ei abhilas
Bhakta-sane bas, that is the essential part of progressing. Dayananda's daughter came today, in my lavatory.
Hari-sauri: When you were in?
Prabhupada: Yes, I was going... [break] Generally, this bada are made with patola(?) leaves, patola leaves mashed and mixed with this dahi.
Hari-sauri: Is that just as healthy as nim leaves? Patola leaves? Just the same.
Prabhupada: It is better. [break] ...the influence of the moon planet, the vegetation grows. Do they accept, the modern botanists, influence of moon planet?
Parivrajakacarya: All the farmers, they...
Prabhupada: They do believe?
Parivrajakacarya: They believe that. They plant certain seeds according to the moon.
Pradyumna: Even in the West they only plant certain things on the waxing moon, not on the waning moon. On sukla-paksa.
Prabhupada: And moon is vacant. By the influence of moon, other vegetation growing, and it cannot grow itself.
Hari-sauri: They admit that the moon rays have some kind of potency. They know that.
Prabhupada: No, it is stated in the Bhagavatam.
Pradyumna: In the Jyotisa it has, it controls liquids. And I think even in hospitals here, near Purnima, where some of the times they don't like to do the operations because there will be more..., the blood will run more. Something, they have some, somebody told me. The tides are also going according to the moon. The rivers are running according to the moon. In the Ganges, one time we went...
Prabhupada: The ebb tide, low tide, according to the moon.
Pradyumna: One day the Ganges was very peaceful, and then we went again and it was rushing. If you went in you would just be carried away. (long pause)
Prabhupada: You can do it here.
Hari-sauri: You don't want to go outside today?
Prabhupada: Outside is bright. (end)

 

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The Doubt Doctor

July 10, 1973

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Prabhupada: My idea is that if we can connect this Kristo and Christ, that "love of Godhead," there is some meaning. Because we, our Krsna consciousness movement means we are teaching people how to love God. That is our...Mr. Wadell: To love is very difficult, is it not? It is very difficult.
Prabhupada: No, it is not difficult.
Mr. Wadell: Well, it is both difficult and not difficult.
Prabhupada: No. Everything, there is a Bengali word, yanra karya tare saje, anya loke lati baje. (?) Anything, if one is practiced to do, he can do it very easily. And for others, it is just like striking with a rod. Anya loke lati baje. Suppose if there is some difficulty in electricity, I do not know anything. It will be very, very difficult task for me. But anyone who knows, immediately he connects two wires, there is light. It is simply to know the art.
Mr. Wadell: Yes, I would say with respect, it is easy to feel love for people. It is not always easy to put this love into practice. Sometimes to love, you may have to be hard, apparently hard, to a person if you wish to help them.
Prabhupada: The thing is that we want to love people, we want to help them, but if we do not know the process... The same thing, love or hate. That's it. You should know the process how to love. So our process is according to Vedic injunction, that yatha taror mula-nisecanena trpyanti tat-skandha-bhujopasakhah [SB 4.31.14]. Just like if you pour water on the root of the tree, automatically the branches, the trees, everything, watered. Pranopaharac ca yatendriyanam. If you supply food to the stomach, the energy is distributed to the hands, legs, eyes, and everywhere. This is the process. But if you take the food and separately push on in the eyes and the ears and the hands and the fingers it is useless.
Mr. Wadell: Oh yes, I agree, but...
Prabhupada: Similarly, if you try to pour water to each leaf of the tree, it will be simply waste of time. Similarly, God is the root of everything. Our Vedanta-sutra says, janmady asya yatah [SB 1.1.1], Absolute Truth, wherefrom everything has come. So if we love the root, God, then we can love others. Otherwise not possible. Otherwise it is simply waste of time. They have tried. The so-called humanitarian work they have tried. Unity and fraternity and so on, big, big words. But it has not come to... Because there is no love of Godhead, it has failed. Even the United Nations. Central point is missing. So our Vedic injunction is that sa vai pumsam paro dharmo yato bhaktir adhoksaje: [SB 1.2.6] "That system of religion is perfect which teaches how to love God." It doesn't matter, Christian religion, Hindu religion, Mohammedan religion, it doesn't matter. But God minus, this is the present position. Everyone wants to make minus God everything. This is going on. They have no clear idea. If I want to love you, I must have a clear idea of you. On vague idea, I cannot love. But they have no clear idea what is God. So how they can love God? And because they have failed to love God, all the so-called love, humanitarian, philanthropic works and, you know, they have become useless.
Mr. Wadell: Yes. The problem is a very big one. We are, perhaps, sent into this earth to know or to learn how to love.
Prabhupada: No. I have got some objection. You cannot begin any scientific statement with the word "perhaps." (W. laughs) We don't accept. You must be assured, you must be assured.
Mr. Wadell: I am merely saying... I do not wish to be presumptuous, if you understand me.
Prabhupada: Well as soon as you say, "perhaps," "maybe," that is not... This has no meaning. Because it is not certain. You have no clear idea.
Mr. Wadell: But are there not things about which in the mortal life one can have no clear idea?
Prabhupada: But if there is clear idea, why they should not take it? Why they should speculate "perhaps," "maybe"?
Mr. Wadell: But there are many things about which I cannot have any clear idea. I cannot...
Prabhupada: No, you cannot have but if you get clear idea, why you do not take it.
Mr. Wadell: No, I mean even in the physical realm. I cannot at this moment conceive what it is like, say, to be in Sydney, in many cities in the world. There are many things, many bits of knowledge which I cannot have. I cannot be everywhere at once. I am here now. I do not even know what is happening in the place from which I have come.
Prabhupada: Yes.
Mr. Wadell: And I must accept that. I cannot be certain about that. Would you not agree?
Prabhupada: But if there is a process... Suppose you are not in Sydney, but if there is a radio message from Sydney, how do you accept it?
Mr. Wadell: Oh, well, I'd believe it.
Prabhupada: Then that is a question of belief.
Mr. Wadell: But that is not... Belief is not quite the same thing as...
Prabhupada: No that is not belief; that is fact. Suppose a radio message is coming from Sydney, we accept it-fact. Although I am not in Sydney. So it is a question of process, how to receive the message. If the process is perfect, then the message is perfect.
Mr. Wadell: But one has to believe the...
Prabhupada: Yes, if the process is perfect, one has to believe, one has to believe. Just like I will give you one example: Nobody knows who is his father; neither it is possible to know one's father by speculation. But there is a process. If you ask your mother, and if she: "This gentleman is your father," you accept the process and you get the perfect knowledge.
Mr. Wadell: One could look like one's brother. (laughs)
Prabhupada: What. I do not follow. What is...?
Mr. Wadell: You do not understand?
Syamasundara: Say it again.
Mr. Wadell: I have a brother, who is very like me, and, well, this helps me to believe that I know who my father was.
Prabhupada: No.
Mr. Wadell: In one sense.
Prabhupada: That is another thing. Because one gentleman resembles your features, you think that he is your brother. That is another thing. But here the process that if you want to know who is your father, the process is it should be known through the mother. There is no other process. It is not that suggestion: because somebody resembles my face, he is my father. Not like that. It is the perfect process.
Mr. Wadell: Oh, yes, I agree with what you say. I am just adding another explanation.
Prabhupada: Yes. And you cannot understand your father by any other process. This is the only process. That means things which are unknown, beyond our conception, you have to know it through the authority. Just like you know your father through the authority of your mother.
Mr. Wadell: Oh, yes, I agree. But...
Prabhupada: But you cannot say that things which are beyond our imagination cannot be known. You cannot say that. Can be known, provided you have got the real process.
Mr. Wadell: I'm afraid I must make, so far as I am concerned, a clear division between what I know and what I believe. There are certain things... It is maybe, partly a use of words, but whereas I know that I am here and that I have people in..., I am in the same room with other men...
Prabhupada: Do you think that this process, as I have suggested, to know one's father through the authority of the mother is not perfect?
Mr. Wadell: Oh, well, I think it's as near perfect as you can get.
Prabhupada: Why you say, "as near"? Why still doubt?
Mr. Wadell: Because it is not quite the same thing as my knowing that I am here. There's a famous French philosopher who began all his philosophy from the phrase "I am conscious; therefore I know that I exist." And he deduced everything, you know, starting from here.
Prabhupada: Yes. That's a fact. You are conscious, I am conscious, that's a fact. It is not the question of belief. It is not question of belief. Belief may be wrong, but fact is fact.
Mr. Wadell: Yes, agreed.
Prabhupada: So when one's... I say that I am conscious, you say you are conscious. We are conscious. That's a fact. And that consciousness is the symptom of the presence of the soul. Because from the dead body... Dead body means when the soul departs from the body, there is no more consciousness.
Mr. Wadell: This is something on which I think I am probably too young or too..., I have not thought enough about it to be able to tell you very clearly or to define very clearly what I think. This is very difficult I know. But I am conscious that I do not know about this. I can make certain... I mean I am inclined to accept what you say, but I cannot say that I know it.
Prabhupada: Therefore when we are in doubts, therefore we have to refer to the authority. Just like when you are diseased, so you go to the physician, "What is the cause of my this trouble?" Similarly, when you are in doubts, you have to approach an authority to clear the doubts. Otherwise you will remain in doubts, ignorance.
Mr. Wadell: Oh, yes.
Prabhupada: Therefore our Vedic injunction is tad-vijnanartham sa gurum evabhigacchet [MU 1.2.12]. Tad-vijnanartham, in order to clear the doubt, to be in perfect knowledge, one must approach the authorized bona fide spiritual master.
Mr. Wadell: Can we go back to the physician. It is possible for a physician to be wrong.
Prabhupada: Yes, we are always in wrong because we are born ignorant. Everything is wrong because ignorant, foolish. Madman's conception. This is all wrong, childish. Therefore we send our boys, children, to school, to correct the wrong ideas.
Mr. Wadell: But some of the teachers may not be correct.
Prabhupada: No. The process is you have to go to the teacher. But if the teacher is a cheater, then the whole thing is spoiled. A teacher must be teacher, perfect teacher. But if he happens to be a cheater then the whole thing is spoiled.
Mr. Wadell: But the human situation is often a sort of mixture of the two. Sometimes...
Prabhupada: No, mixture of two, that may be, but the process is that we have to approach the real teacher. Just like I approach the mother. Mother is supposed to be not cheater. But if the mother happens to be a cheater, then I am cheated. I am cheated. I don't get the information of my real father. But it is expected the mother should not cheat.
Mr. Wadell: Yes, oh I know that it is expected of the teachers.
Prabhupada: So it is my misfortune; if I get a cheater mother, then my whole life is spoiled.
Mr. Wadell: But the teacher may be wrong without wishing to be wrong.
Prabhupada: No, he is not teacher. If a teacher is wrong, he is cheater. That is our proposition.
Mr. Wadell: Well, I'm sorry, this is a point which we must surely...
Prabhupada: This is the real point. If you have to go to a teacher, you must go to a real teacher. You don't go to a cheater.
Mr. Wadell: But suppose I teach you something, a subject in which knowledge is not complete.
Prabhupada: Then you should not be teacher. Then you should not be teacher. Then you are cheater.
Mr. Wadell: But... No, because knowledge is...
Prabhupada: That is, that is, that is our... Teacher means... When I approach a teacher, he must be a bona fide teacher. He should not be cheater. If he has no sufficient knowledge, he should not pose himself as a teacher.
Mr. Wadell: Well, I am afraid I would be right out of court cause you see I have often to confess to my pupils that I do not know.
Prabhupada: Yes. That is going on, but that is not the system. If you do not know, you should not become a teacher. That is our proposition. (laughs)
Mr. Wadell: I see, well I am not at all sure that I could accept what you say. (laughs)
Prabhupada: You must be sure that whatever knowledge you are giving, that is perfect. Then you are teacher.
Mr. Wadell: Well, you see, what you are... In that case, I should have to pretend, you see. I would have to pretend to know something which I did not know at all. Then I should be a cheater, wouldn't I. And that would be wrong. And there must be many things which I do not know.
Prabhupada: Yes. It is better to become honest. If I do not know anything perfectly I should not be teacher. That is right thing. And if I have got doubtful knowledge, perhaps, maybe, why shall I be teacher. I should, "No, no I cannot teach. The subject is unknown." That is our process.
Mr. Wadell: Yes. I must say that I, there are many things of which I haven't got knowledge.
Prabhupada: Yes, that is going on. That is going on. Therefore people are misled.
Mr. Wadell: No. I would mislead them more if I said that I knew.
Prabhupada: No. No, no. If you do not know, why should you say you knew? That is another cheating.
Mr. Wadell: How do you mean?
Prabhupada: If... When you know...
Mr. Wadell: Oh, yes, I don't pretend. If I know something, I say I know, but...
Prabhupada: Then you say that..., you say, "I know."
Mr. Wadell: But when I do not know something then I admit that I do not know it.
Prabhupada: Yes. That admission, that's all right. But in that case, one should not take the post of the teacher. That is our Vedic injunction. One must know perfectly.
Mr. Wadell: You may well be right. (laughter) But actually, I think there are many things which, about which knowledge is changing. There are things...
Prabhupada: That means cheating.
Mr. Wadell: I see you have here, certain bits of equipment which didn't exist...
Prabhupada: That is described in the Vedic literature: andha yathandhair upaniyamanah: [SB 7.5.31] "A blind man is trying to lead other blind men."
Mr. Wadell: I suspect that that is as probably very near to the truth of human situation...
Prabhupada: Yes. Andha yathandhair upaniyamanah. What is the benefit? If I am blind and if there are hundreds of blind men, "All right, come on, I shall..."
Mr. Wadell: I think we are all partially blind.
Prabhupada: No, then there is no question of knowledge. Somebody must be with eyes. He can give knowledge. That is our proposition. As soon as you say blind, there must be somebody with eyes. It is a relative term. It is a relative term. You cannot say, "all are blind." Then there is no question of blind and with men eyes. As soon as you accept blind man, you must accept the other side, man with eyes.
Mr. Wadell: Oh, I see. You mean just as you distinguish from white, black because it is different...
Prabhupada: Yes, this is relative world.
Mr. Wadell: I agree, but I am using this in, as an example, not as an absolute description. I think my view -- may I explain this -- of the whole of which I am, as I say, I think, an imperfect part, a part which is trying to learn something which I am not even quite sure what it is that I am trying to learn...
Prabhupada: No, no, this is... You are perfect gentleman, means that you say that "I am imperfect." That is nice. But our point is that from imperfect man, imperfect knowledge is received. We cannot expect perfect knowledge from imperfect man.
Mr. Wadell: No. But where does your perfect knowledge come from and how do you recognize it?
Prabhupada: Yes, that is very important point, where to get the perfect knowledge. That is wanted. That is intelligence. Therefore the Vedas says, gurum eva abhigacchet: "You go to a guru." "Guru" means heavy, who knows better than you, or who knows perfect. That is injunction.
Mr. Wadell: But, you see, this is...
Prabhupada: We have to find out, we have to find out who can give the perfect knowledge.
Mr. Wadell: How do you know that you know? May I ask this? (laughter)
Prabhupada: Yes, yes.
Mr. Wadell: This is the point which, I would find, you know, without disrespect, this is something which is very difficult, whatever kind of faith you have.
Prabhupada: It is not the question of faith. Faith may be wrong, belief may be wrong. That perfect knowledge can be received from the perfect source. So God is perfect. God is perfect. And one who follows the path of God, he is also perfect.
Mr. Wadell: But he is different from God, is he not?
Prabhupada: Maybe. Just like...
Mr. Wadell: But this is important to me. Can, can...?
Prabhupada: The same process. The mother gives the perfect knowledge, and the son receives the knowledge. So the knowledge received from the mother by the son is perfect. The son may not be perfect, but because he has received the knowledge from the mother, which is perfect, therefore he is perfect.
Mr. Wadell: In what respect do you consider yourself different from God?
Prabhupada: Do you think I am also equal with God?
Mr. Wadell: If you, what I want to know is what you feel your relationship to God is.
Prabhupada: My relationship is just like father and the son. The son is not different from the father; at the same time, he is different from the father.
Mr. Wadell: Yes...
Prabhupada: The same relationship. We are all sons of God. Therefore, simultaneously, we are one and different. As son, the ingredient, the same. But he is father, we are son, we are different. This is called the philosophy of acintya-bhedabheda. Bheda means different, and abheda means one. So simultaneously one and different.
Mr. Wadell: May I ask you another question, which is, I have a mortal father, a man, who you know my parents, father and mother. Do you think that my father is in any way different in his parentage of me from God in His parentage of me.
Prabhupada: No, everyone. Not only your father, your grandfather, your, or grandson, the same relationship: simultaneously one and different... Because we are spirit soul and God is the supreme soul. All the souls have come, emanated from Him. He is the supreme soul and Paramatma. The exact word used in the Vedic language, Paramatma, Parabrahma, Paramesvara. This word param. Param means supreme.
Mr. Wadell: I accept that without any trouble. There's no...
Prabhupada: The difference is God... In the Vedas it is stated that God is just like a person like you and me. Just like we are persons, we are talking face to face, similarly, God is also a person. But... We are also persons. But what is the difference between these two classes of persons.
Mr. Wadell: Exactly.
Prabhupada: Yes, the difference is eko yo bahunam vidadhati kaman. God is the maintainer, the supplier of all necessities of the so many persons. That is God.
Mr. Wadell: Yes, I accept that.
Prabhupada: This is the difference. We are maintained, and He is maintainer. That is difference. Otherwise, God is also person, I am also person. One is maintainer and others, the plural number, they are maintained. In the Christian religion also, the same idea is: "God give us our daily bread," maintenance. So that is the difference. He is the bread supplier, and we are bread eater. That's all.
Mr. Wadell: He doesn't supply his bread to everybody unless...
Prabhupada: Everybody, yes, everybody. Beginning...
Mr. Wadell: People die, do they not?
Prabhupada: Die, that is another thing. People die even if he has got many things to eat, still he dies. Can you check it? That does not depend on eating. There are many men. They are dying. Although they are...
Mr. Wadell: I am taking you too literally. Let us forget about that point. It's not worthwhile.
Prabhupada: No, no, because you say, "They are dying, God is not supplying," that is a mistaken idea. God is supplying. God is supplying. He is dying natural death. It is not that because there is want of supply, therefore he is dying. That is a mistaken idea. Death is not dependent on supply of food. There are so many other causes.
Mr. Wadell: Oh, yes, I agree about that, but you cannot...
Prabhupada: And death is inevitable. Even if you have sufficient to eat, you cannot avoid death. So death is inevitable. That is the problem of material life. Birth, death, old age and disease. So you cannot avoid it. So long you are materially existing. This can be avoided when you are spiritually elevated. That is our movement.
Mr. Wadell: Yes, you cannot live without... You do not, as we say, live by bread alone. And in that sense -- it may be the sense in which you wish me to take -- the sense, what you are saying, that God supplies bread, because bread could be both bread for the spirit or soul...
Prabhupada: No, bread is material. Bread is material. To maintain your material body, you require material bread. But spiritual body does not depend on material bread.
Mr. Wadell: Could we go back to the relationship between you or all of us and God? What my own experience has suggested to me is that the language which I use and the language which has been used by others to describe what we think Him to be is not really capable of accomplishing this very difficult task. It is an impossible task in fact because we are describing something which is so immeasurably greater, more difficult to understand fully. We can have a relationship, but I find it, the language which we use, is of...
Prabhupada: Insufficient.
Mr. Wadell: ...of mortal things which are in our experience, and we apply those to something beyond the purely mortal realm, and sometimes the descriptions we use are to be taken only to a certain extent. They are useful as illustrations but they are not to be taken as necessarily a fact. I think this has misled many people when they think about God, that we use a description and it's rather like what we talked about to begin with, the question of names.
Prabhupada: Question of?
Mr. Wadell: Names. Yes, I wrote my name for my friend here, and we joked as we came in about how this name should be pronounced. And, of course, it depends how people, how well people know me, which name would apply to me. But I want to go one further than that and I want to say that to know a name or a large number of facts and to be able to make a large number of statements about people is not the same as really knowing this person. And this is our difficulty as I see it in relating ourselves to God, that although we make many statements about Him which are often picturesque ones. We say that He is almighty, that He can, in our religion, move mountains or all sorts of separate statements like that. If you take all those statements together, they wouldn't really describe him at all sufficiently.
Prabhupada: Now, suppose one man is engineer. So if I address him "Mr. engineer," what is the wrong?
Mr. Wadell: Oh, there is nothing wrong so long as you...
Prabhupada: No, this particular name, when I give to him, what is the wrong?
Mr. Wadell: The only thing is that it is not complete.
Prabhupada: Why not? That "engineer" word completes his situation. He is engineer.
Mr. Wadell: Well, you might say to me, "Teacher," but that would not be complete. That would not be a complete description
Prabhupada: No, it is complete.
Mr. Wadell: It is true, but it is not complete.
Prabhupada: But when it is true, it is complete.
Mr. Wadell: I don't think so. You see, I could... If I say, "This wall is white," that is a true statement, but it is not a complete statement. Because this wall is not like all white walls. There are many white walls which have not got curves in the corners or decoration at that particular point. Do you understand what I am trying to say?
Prabhupada: But when... Just like when we say God, Krsna, this word conveys the meaning "all-attractive." So what is the wrong? This Krsna means all-attractive. So unless God is all-attractive, how He can become God? It is not that God is for me God. God is for you also. God is for him also. Therefore He must be all-attractive. This is perfect...
Mr. Wadell: But not necessarily in the same way. Because....
Prabhupada: No. Just to understand what is God, if you try to understand in this way that "God is good," "God is all-attractive," is it not perfect?
Mr. Wadell: It is a partial statement.
Prabhupada: Yes.
Mr. Wadell: But it doesn't tell me...
Prabhupada: But then, when you go deep into the matter, you understand more and more. In the beginning...
Mr. Wadell: But you will never, I suspect, here on earth understand...
Prabhupada: No, no, that suspicion I have already answered...
Mr. Wadell: Not for me, you haven't.
Prabhupada: ...that you have to go through a process, right process. Then there will be no suspicion. The same example. But if you do not go through the process you will be always suspicious.
Mr. Wadell: When I say, "suspect," what I mean is not anything bad.
Prabhupada: No, no, I know that.
Mr. Wadell: You understand that all I mean is that I am not sure about this. I think it may be true. I'm not sure.
Prabhupada: That suspicion will continue unless you take the right process.
Mr. Wadell: But there are, I do not think that this God gave me my mind with my eyes and my sight, hearing, all these factors of the senses, and the intellect and the soul, if we are correctly speaking when we speak of it as something independently existing...
Prabhupada: Yes, yes.
Mr. Wadell: He did not expect me, I'm sure, not... to reject questions. In my religion, my, must be just as much a part of me as all that my intellect tells me. There must be no question which my religion cannot stand up to.
Prabhupada: First of all you say that God has given you the intellect. He can withdraw it also.
Mr. Wadell: Well, we say not, because...
Prabhupada: Why not? If He has given, He can withdraw also.
Mr. Wadell: Oh, I don't... Well, we have a rather strange view of God...
Prabhupada: No, you may have strange view. We are arguing. As soon as you say God has given you intellect, He can withdraw also your intellect.
Mr. Wadell: But you see, what we have also to explain -- why all men are not good. Now, if God chose, He could force all men to be good, but that is not the way.
Prabhupada: No, God has given you intellect to become good, but because you disobey God, you have become bad.
Mr. Wadell: But if God is all-powerful and He cared to use His power...
Prabhupada: No, He does not interfere with your little independence.
Mr. Wadell: This is the point which you were trying to...
Prabhupada: Yes. Just like in the Bhagavad-gita God says that "You surrender unto Me." That means, "If you like, you surrender." God is not forcing, "you must." He is not forcing.
Mr. Wadell: Well, that's exactly what I meant. We are agreed. And...
Prabhupada: Yes. So that He does not do. Otherwise, otherwise, there is no meaning of being part and parcel of God. God is fully independent, and we are minute part of God. Therefore we have got independence. That independence is minute, but there is. So if God interferes with your independence, then you are no longer part and parcel of God. Therefore God says that "You do this." Now, I misuse my independence. I do not do it. Therefore I am bad.
Mr. Wadell: Our positions do not differ on this point. We think exactly the same.
Prabhupada: Yes. We do not do it. Just like your father says, "My dear son, do like this," but you disobey. Therefore you are bad son. So my badness is creation of my misuse of independence.
Mr. Wadell: Yes. But it may not be entirely willful.
Prabhupada: Yes. Because God has given you the intelligence, and as I said, He can withdraw. Just like the same thing: The father said, "My dear son, do like this." But he is persisting in doing otherwise.
Mr. Wadell: Yes, and for the same reason that He would not force, would therefore, for the same reason, not withdraw my intellect, having given it to me.
Prabhupada: Yes, that is stated, that is stated, that is stated. Just like I... Withdraw my intellect means I have given you the intellect that "You do like this." but you are persistent, doing otherwise, "All right, as you like, you do." This is withdrawal.
Mr. Wadell: Oh, yes, but one may be...
Prabhupada: There is no force. There is no force.
Mr. Wadell: No, no. But what I want to go back to is the reason for disobedience. There are various possible ones. One may first not know what one is supposed to do. Secondly... Is that all right? Do you agree about that?
Prabhupada: Oh, yes. We do not know anything. We are to be considered all fools and rascals. That is our position. As soon as we come to this material world, accept a material body, we are all fools and rascals.
Mr. Wadell: Do you accept the whole of the material world? Do you think there are some things in it which are wrong?
Prabhupada: Just like as soon as you come to the prison house, you are all criminals. You may be very intelligent, but because you are in the prison house, you are criminal. Because you are in the prison house, that is the proof that you are a criminal. You may be very intelligent man.
Mr. Wadell: Oh yes, I'm not claiming... I haven't any claim to goodness. You must understand that.
Prabhupada: Similarly, any living entity, any living entity who is originally part and parcel of God, God is all-good, therefore the part and parcel of God is also all-good. But as soon as comes to the material world, he [break] As exactly like the same, that as soon as one is put into the prison wall, within, he is a criminal. Now he has to undergo the criminal laws. Similarly, because we have come to this material world, we have to undergo the material tribulations. We cannot avoid.
Mr. Wadell: Well this is a very long... We are now on a topic on which I should have to require or ask, if I put it more politely, much more time than I have. Now, I am a person with responsibility to my boys. I must go now and say our prayers in the Christian way, which...
Prabhupada: Yes, that's nice.
Mr. Wadell: ...Well, we profess up there, which not all believe, but some do, and they must be given their chance. (laughs)
Prabhupada: Oh, yes, that is nice.
Mr. Wadell: Will you please excuse me at this moment. I would very much like to come back and pursue this.
Prabhupada: Yes, you come often. Yes, you are welcome. Yes.
Mr. Wadell: If you feel it is of any interest or value to you.
Prabhupada: Oh yes, yes, After 4 o'clock you can come. You are welcome.
Syamasundara: You can come any night after 4 pm.
Mr. Wadell: Yes, well, we have a very busy week, because, as I say, we are correcting papers, we are ending our term.
Prabhupada: Oh, yes, you must be busy.
Mr. Wadell: But what we are talking about is something which doesn't change from today or tomorrow or yesterday. So when these things have been done, perhaps next week, I will come down.
Prabhupada: Oh, yes, you are welcome. I want that responsible persons like you should try to understand the scientific value of this movement. It is not a sentimental movement. It is based on philosophy, science, authority.
Mr. Wadell: Well, it's on this question of authority, in a sense, that we would have the greatest difficulty. But another time, please.
Prabhupada: Well, every religion is authority. That's a fact.
Mr. Wadell: It is, yes. That's true. But every individual is free and must find for themselves.
Prabhupada: No, we, we... Our proposition is, our proposition is that sa vai pumsam paro dharmo yato bhaktir adhoksaje [SB 1.2.6]. "That is first-class religion which teaches the followers how to love God." This is our proposal.
Mr. Wadell: Well, we shall see. We have a lot to... (laughs) It is quite possible that I too have been sent.
Prabhupada: Yes. Give him some prasada. Just wait little. Take prasadam. Our only fighting is against atheism, godlessness. This is our main fight.
Mr. Wadell: I agree.
Prabhupada: Yes. People say, "There is no God, God is dead. This is all humbug." And so many there are, atheistic proposals. We are giving fight against this atheism.
Mr. Wadell: Will you excuse me. I must go.
Pradyumna: He's just bringing little...
Mukunda: We are just bringing you a little prasadam.
Mr. Wadell: Oh, no, no, I must. I have my boys. They wait for me and I must be with them. (laughter)
Prabhupada: There is some prasadam.
Syamasundara: He is teacher just down the road in the school.
Prabhupada: You take little this. Yes. Just take little.
Mr. Wadell: May I take just.
Prabhupada: Just little. I am not giving you much. (lots of laughter)
Mr. Wadell: Oh, it's very good. Just a little.
Prabhupada: It is very good, tasteful.
Mr. Wadell: Thank you.
Prabhupada: All right. (end)

 

>>> Ref. VedaBase => Conversation with Mr. Wadell -- July 10, 1973, London

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© 2001 The Bhaktivedanta Book Trust International.

The Clear Conception of God

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Srila Prabhupada speaks on: "The Clear Conception of God"

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March 14, 1975 download  Players   Take a test Yoga Student: ...to chant the names of Nitai-Gauranga before we encourage them so much to chant the maha-mantra?Prabhupada: No. Why? Now, what is the difference, Nitai-Gauranga and Hare Krsna? Nitai-Gauranga and Hare Krsna, there is no difference. Nitai-Gauranga is also nice. Whatever he finds convenient, let him chant. Yoga student: This country, which was, once at one time followed the Aryan path of Zoroastrianism, which is now practices primarily Islam although having absorbed many of the original elements in it. Do you have a recommendation as to how people of this country might feel the grace of Krsna, perhaps even within the forms of their own traditional practice? Prabhupada: What is that traditional practice? Yoga student: They're in... Apart from Zoroastrianism, the majority of traditional practice now is Islamic of the Shiite sect. Prabhupada: What is that philosophy? Yoga student: That involves the prayer of three to five times a day of the Shiist... Prabhupada: Prayer five times? Yoga student: Well, it's the Islamic prayer five times a day, but the Shiist compress it to three times. It's the same prayer. Prabhupada: Why? Yoga student: Because they are permitted to say two of the prayers at noon and two of the prayers in the evening at one time, rather than spreading them through the afternoon and the... Prabhupada: So why they are disobeying the order of Muhammad? Yoga student: Yes. The... They follow... It's essentially the same practice as the... Prabhupada: No, you cannot amend on the words of Muhammad if you are a true Mussulman. Yoga student: I don't think they have to amend it. They're... Prabhupada: Why? There was five. Why they have made three? That is amendment. You cannot do that. Yoga student: It has been maintained that Ali..., that this was the practice of Ali. Prabhupada: What is that? Yoga student: That Ali prayed at noon, in the afternoon... Atreya Rsi: Ali, the representative of Muhammad. Yoga student: He's the brother-in-law..., the son-in-law... Hazrad(?) Ali. Prabhupada: Ali, Ali. Ali Hussein. No. Yoga student: Hussein is his son. Ali is the cousin and the son-in-law of the prophet Muhammad. But can they feel the grace of Krsna within this framework, within the framework of their dietary laws and their..., in opening up the experience of Krsna to them? Prabhupada: No, no. If one wants to follow Koran, let him follow strictly that. No halfway mixing. Yoga student: Then preaching in Iran should be essentially to those people who are fallen away from their traditional path. Prabhupada: Yes. Everyone is fallen. They are simply amending and concoction. That is not good. Why they should amend? [break] ...himself in what relationship with God? Yoga student: With God? He presented himself as the last expression of the divine revelation in the West. Prabhupada: No, what was his relationship? Just like Christ, he presented himself as the son of God. So what is the position of Muhammad? Yoga student: He presented himself as a man, as considered by Muslims as the perfect man. Prabhupada: Yes. Atreya Rsi: The disciple of God. Yoga student: And he was the perfect expression of the divine manifestation in human terms. He was not a divine figure as Christ or Krsna. He was simply a man, and who was the mouthpiece of the divine word. Prabhupada: What is the meaning of Allah akbar? Yoga student: It means God, the greatest. Prabhupada: Greatest. Yoga student: Yes. Akbar is being the superlative of kabirsh(?). Prabhupada: And Muhammad is the greatest? No. He is subordinate. Yoga student: No. And in fact Muslims object to their religion being called Mohammedanism because it implies that they worship Muhammad, whereas in fact they feel that they go straight to God, to Allah, which... and that Muhammad simply was a messenger. Prabhupada: That's good. Yoga student: And they regard... They call their religion Islam, which means submission. Prabhupada: That's very good. Yoga student: The Muslim is he who submits. Prabhupada: Then God is the greatest, and we are finite, limited. We are not greatest. And our business is to serve Him. What is that? Yoga student: Our business is to serve Him. Precisely as was said last night, our business is to satisfy Him. Prabhupada: That's it. Yoga student: There is a tradition, and there's a body of forty traditions, which are called the sacred traditions, one of which says that these are the words of God as enunciated through Muhammad, one of them saying that "The more you strive towards Me, the more you love Me, the closer I come to you." Prabhupada: Oh, that's it. Then the ultimate goal is how to love God. Yoga student: Yes. Prabhupada: That is very good. That is our philosophy. Sa vai pumsam paro dharmo yato bhaktir adhoksaje [SB 1.2.6]. Prema pumartho mahan. This is the highest goal of life, how one has developed his love for God. And Bhagavata says, "That is first-class religion which trains the followers how to love God and serve Him." That is first-class religion. Then Islam is Vaisnava dharma in a crude form like the Christian. So we can amalgamate them all if they are sane men. I suggested that there are many churches vacant. If they give us these churches we shall install Deity -- Gaurasundara, Nitai-Gaura and Panca-tattva -- and along with them we shall worship Lord Jesus Christ also. Similarly, we can do Muhammad. There is no harm. But they are against this Deity worship, eh? Mohammedans? Yoga student: Yes, they are. That sort of expression. And yet, amongst the Sufi poets... Prabhupada: Deity is also expression, form is also expression, but they do not understand it. Yoga student: But the Sufis do, because in the Sufi... Prabhupada: They have got form worship, Sufis? Yoga student: They don't worship form as such, but they speak of it in the poetry. They say... In one poem of Hafez(?) there's a meeting between Hafez and his spiritual master. And he asks the spiritual master (recites verse in Parsi). He asked, "I asked him, 'What was this current, this chain of idols that we must worship?' And he replied so that my heart might moan, lament about the dark night..." Prabhupada: "Dog night"? Yoga student: "...the dark night of ignorance of..." Prabhupada: Oh, "dark night." Yoga student: "...separation from God." So that he used the form of expression of worship, the expression... Prabhupada: Separation, how it is possible? Separation is expressed when there is separation between man to man or man to woman, person. Otherwise what is the meaning of separation? Yoga student: Separation from one's divine... Prabhupada: Divine? This means must be person. They do not believe in the Personality of Godhead? Yoga student: They believe... The Sufis see the personality of Ali... Prabhupada: No, I am not talking of the Sufis. I am talking of the original Islam. Yoga student: Well, the Sufis claim to be the original Muslims. Prabhupada: Do the all the Muslims accept them? Then? Parivrajakacarya: There are about 780 different schools of Islam and different ideas. Prabhupada: Then? We have to take the original. Otherwise misled. Yoga student: Well, I think the original path must be found in Sufism because that is the... Prabhupada: Then, if the original path is followed, why it is named Sufism? Yoga student: Because there are those who have fallen away from it, just as in... Prabhupada: Who has fallen, the Islam or the Sufist? Yoga student: I think the formalists have fallen away, like the jnanis in Hinduism. Just as there's a dispute between the Shaivites and the Vaisnavaites. Prabhupada: So who are fallen, the original Islam or the Sufist? Yoga student: The Sufis are the original Islam. Prabhupada: Sufis? What? I do not follow. Sufis? Nitai: Sufis are the original... Prabhupada: Original cult? Nitai: Yes, that's what he said. Prabhupada: Before Muhammad? Yoga student: No, springing from Muhammad. Prabhupada: Then how you can say it is original? Yoga student: It is original. All the schools of laws, they've developed... Prabhupada: No, if is the original, why they named differently? Yoga student: Because there are those who have fallen away from it, and they are the ones who use this name. The Sufis don't use the name about themselves. It's used by others who wish to... Prabhupada: What is the meaning of Sufism? Literary meaning? Yoga student: Well, Sufism in a sense is what bhaktism is in the Hindu context. Prabhupada: Bhakti means to offer service to the Lord. Does it mean? Yoga student: Absolutely. Prabhupada: So then if the Lord is to be served, then He must be a person; otherwise where is the question of service? Yoga student: Well, the Sufis do see that, the personal aspect of the Lord... Prabhupada: Unless one is person, how can I serve him? I cannot serve the air or the sky. I must serve a person. Love does not exist in the sky or in the air. It must be a person. Man or woman, it doesn't matter. Otherwise where there is love? Whom to love? Yoga student: The Sufis find love in these figures... For example, the Sufi Ib'n Araby(?), through of the face of a beautiful woman... Prabhupada: Through the face of beautiful woman? Yoga student: Yes. Prabhupada: So there the materialists also find. Yoga student: That is the material aspect, absolutely. Prabhupada: Therefore in Islam religion the form is rejected because it will come to that. As soon as they think of form, they think of this material form, beautiful face of woman. That is degradation. Therefore we are strict not to conceive material form. That is Vedic conception. Apani-padah javano grahita: "He has no legs and no hands." This is... means denying the form. And next he says, the Vedas say, javano grahita: "He can accept whatever you offer to Him." That means God has no material form, but He has form; otherwise how He can accept? How He can understand my love? So therefore in the original Islamism the form is not accepted. So that is Vedic description, form and formless. Formless means no material form, and form means spiritual form, simultaneous. Just like I am, you are. I am within the body, but I am not this body. This form not I am. But wherefrom the form of the body came into existence? Because I have got form. The sweater has got hand because I have got hand. The sweater is the covering. If I haven't got form, then how the sweater has got hand, the pant has got leg? So the pant practically is not the leg. The real leg is within the pant. Similarly, this is not my form; this is like pant, leg of the pant or hand of the coat. Real form is within, asmin dehe. That is not material form. If the real form I could see, you could see, then there was no controversy, the spirit. But they cannot see. Therefore they say "formless." If it is formless, then how the outer form comes out? How it can be? The tailor makes the coat because the man has got form. As the coat has got hands, so it is concluded that the man for whom the coat is made, he has got form. How you can say without form? The difficulty is that we can see the form of the coat, but we cannot see the form of the man. That is my defect with the eyes, not that the God is formless. God is not formless. Yoga student: God is seen in the form of the saints. Prabhupada: That is another. That is secondary. But God has got form. That is the conclusion. But we cannot see with our present eyes. That is described, atah sri-krsna-namadi na bhaved grahyam indriyaih [Brs. 1.2.234]. By your these blunt senses... The same thing. Just like I see you. What I see you? Your body. You see me -- my body. And when the body is there and the soul is not there, then it is lump of matter. You kick it out and nobody will protest. If a dead body you smash with your legs and boots, nobody will say that "Why you are doing this?" But so long the soul is there, if somebody is smashed like that, immediately there will be protest from all side, "Why you are doing this?" So the people have no knowledge about the real form. Therefore they say formless. Atreya Rsi: When the body changes, Srila Prabhupada, how is it...? When our coat, size of the coat changes because our body grows bigger, the size of the coat is bigger. Shirt is bigger. Prabhupada: Yes. That is spiritual form. It can take... It can become bigger, smaller, like that. Atreya Rsi: But the form is the same. [break] Prabhupada: This has been... Body has been described as the dress. So the form of the dress cannot be there unless there is form of the person who puts on the dress. How can you deny it? Because the dress has got form, the person who puts on the dress must have form. How can you deny this argument? You cannot say "formless." It may be, you cannot see it. That is different thing. But it must be form and individual. That is stated in the Bhagavad-gita, that Krsna says, "Arjuna, you and Me and all these persons who are here, they were existing like that in the past, they are now existing, and they will exist in the same way." Therefore all are individual. Yoga student: With Krsna can one say that Krsna is the form that presents itself, of Godhead, which presents itself to man, and Bhagavan is the essential aspect? Prabhupada: Bhagavan? Yes, in the original. Atreya Rsi: Same as Krsna. Prabhupada: Just like the sun. Sunshine is very big, and the sun globe is not so big. But which is important, the sunshine or the sun globe? Yoga student: But it's the glow which reaches man. Prabhupada: Eh, these are example. Yoga student: He can't touch the globe because he would be consumed. Prabhupada: That is another thing, the qualitative change. But it is... There are five elements, so it is made of fire, that's all. As your body is made of earth, that sun globe or the sun-god, the body is made of fire, that's all. There are other planets also; the body is made of air because you do not find more than these five elements, earth, water, air, fire, sky-gross; and subtle -- mind, intelligence and ego. So subtle, the same, but gross -- somewhere the fire is prominent; somewhere water is prominent, air is prominent; somewhere earth is prominent. So here in this world, in this planet, the earth is prominent. Yoga student: Distinct from being permanent, the eternal? Atreya Rsi: Is prominent. Yoga student: Oh, prominent. Atreya Rsi: Earth is prominent. Yoga student: It's the prominent form in this material world. Atreya Rsi: In this earth, in this planet, earth is the prominent of the five elements. Prabhupada: Whole world, whole universe, they are made of these five elements. Atreya Rsi: All the creation, the material creation, is made of five elements. Yoga student: What is the fifth besides earth, air, fire and water? Prabhupada: Ether. Yoga student: Ether. How does ether distinguish... Prabhupada: The sky. Ether is... Presence of ether by sound. Yoga student: How is ether distinct from air? Prabhupada: Ether you cannot feel touch. Air you can feel touch. Parivrajakacarya: Based on the sense perception. On this planet, the bodies are made of earth. But there are other places, other planets, where the physical body is composed of a different combination. So one is predominantly air, another can be fire, another water, ether. Yoga student: But is ether a gross element as well? Atreya Rsi: Ether is space. Prabhupada: Yes, space. Yoga student: So in that sense it's a gross element. Prabhupada: Yes. Parivrajakacarya: It's perceivable by the senses as sound. Yoga student: As sound. Prabhupada: Ether is perceived by sound, air is perceived by touch. Then... Ether, air... Then fire you can see by vision. And then next, water, you can taste, and the earth you can smell. These five senses are there to appreciate these five kinds of elements. All right. Hare Krsna. [break] Devotee: These are some of my friends here, Prabhupada. This is Kani Faizal(?). He is a director, theater director, and artist. He wants to do a play now from the Srimad-Bhagavatam, the story of Prahlada Maharaja. Prabhupada: Oh. Very good. Devotee: This is Carlos. This is Ali. I don't know your name. Maslud: Maslud. Prabhupada: So all cultural people. All cultural people. Devotee: Yes. Prabhupada: Nice. Where is Atreya? Devotee: He's coming. Prabhupada: Yes. India... Formerly your country was part of India, and you belong to the same culture. So far I understand, Iran means Aryan? So Aryan culture was practically all over the world. Aryan culture is based on God consciousness. So amongst the Aryans there is some conception of religion, either Christian religion or Mohammedan religion, Buddhist religion, Vedic religion, based on conception of God. So according to time, country, the ways of understanding may be little different, but the aim is God consciousness. That is Aryan civilization. So God is one; God cannot be two. So the features of God or angle of vision of God may be different. So they have been summarized in the Srimad-Bhagavatam. (Aside:) You can come forward. One feature of God is impersonal. Just like the sunshine. Sunshine is spreading all over the universe. It is impersonal. But the quality of the sunshine is heat and light. The heat and light means energy. So as in the material calculation, the heat and light is the cause of all creation. Just like at the present moment there is not sufficient heat; therefore the trees have no leaves. And as soon as there will be little more heat they will be all green. So you can take it that the creation of the foliage is due to the heat. Similarly light. So heat and light is the cause of all this material creation. And heat and light is coming from the sunshine, er, sun. Therefore heat becomes the origin of creation even in this material world. Similarly, there is another light. That is the original light. This is reflection. That is called brahmajyoti, spiritual light. So in this way one conception of God is like that. Another conception of God is: God is situated everywhere. Andantara-stham paramanu-cayantara-stham. Because God is situated within the universe, within the atom, therefore they are existing. Just like the atma, or spirit soul, is situated in you, in me, in everyone. This is called Paramatma feature. And at the ultimate end there is the person, God as person, the Supreme Person, the Supreme Being, a person like you and me -- we are person -- but He is almighty, all-powerful. This is the conception of Absolute Truth: God, Paramatma, and Brahmajyoti. Brahmeti paramatmeti bhagavan iti sabdyate [SB 1.2.11]. This is the Sanskrit word. He is realized as Brahman, Paramatma, and Bhagavan. Bhagavan is person; Paramatma is all-pervading, means localized, situated; and Brahman means all-pervading. All together-God. This is the idea. What is your idea of God? Young man: I find it very difficult to know the difference between truth and illusion. Prabhupada: God is truth; what is forgetfulness of God, that is illusion. God is truth. Just like the sun is present all the time, twenty-four hours. But we say now there is no sun, at night. But that's not the fact. The fact is the sun is there; I cannot see. That is illusion. Not that God is not there. God is there. As exactly, same example, the sun is there at night, but I cannot see under certain condition. Therefore it is illusion. Our senses are imperfect; therefore sometimes we cannot understand or see God. If our senses are purified, then we can see God every moment. So, what is your idea of God? Young man: I, I... Something that I see sometimes in everything, the sameness in everything. Prabhupada: No clear concept. Young man: I have no clear... Prabhupada: Yes. The clear conception of God is that originally He is person. Just like the same example, the sun. We can see every day the sun. (aside:) Can you give me that 7-Up? The sun is there always, but at night we cannot see. At night we cannot see. That does not mean the sun is not there. Young man: But sharpening the senses, how does one sharpen one's senses? Prabhupada: Senses are imperfect. Just like we are very proud of our eyes to see, but you cannot see what is beyond the wall. Therefore it is conditioned. You cannot see without light. That, how you can be sure that your eyes are perfectly seeing? That is not possible, because the eyes can see under certain condition. So if it is conditioned, then it is not perfect. But the conditioned sight can be purified. Just like one is suffering from cataract. By surgical operation the cataract can be removed and he can see. Similarly, our senses are imperfect. If we purify the senses, then it will be possible to see God twenty-four hours. That purification process is this Krsna consciousness movement. Young man: Are human beings the only creations that can have Krsna consciousness? Prabhupada: Yes. Krsna consciousness means God consciousness. The cats and dogs cannot be trained up. But a human being can be trained up. Especially the Aryans, they can be trained up. They are advanced. Young man: More advanced than other races? Prabhupada: By birth they are advanced. They have got intelligence. But for Krsna consciousness everyone can be purified, even the non-Aryans. It is without any check. Ahaituky apratihata. Apratihata means without any material check. It is not a disqualification that one is not an Aryan, therefore he cannot understand God. No. He can also be trained up. Because it is spiritual, and we are all spiritual identities, so it is not difficult. Even one who is not spiritual at the present moment, but by training he can also become spiritual. Young man: In other words, one has to make an intellectual effort or at least in order to... Prabhupada: It is not very highly intellectual. One has to understand first of all that he is not this body. That anyone can understand, that "I am changing my body, but I am there. Therefore I am not this body." Just like a child's coat, when he is young man, that coat does not fit him. So that young man means he has got another body. But the young man knows, he remembers, that he was a child. He was on the lap of his parents or his relatives. So that body is no longer existing. I have got a different body, but I who had the childhood body, I am existing. Is it very difficult to understand, any one of you? The body has changed. That's a fact. But I am the same. [break] What is that? Devotee: The demands of the body makes it... Atreya Rsi: The attachment to the body... Prabhupada: No, attachment to the body is not bad. Just like you have got a nice car. So you have got attachment for it. But you must know that you are not the car. That everyone can... A child can understand. But because I have got attachment for something, it does not mean I am that thing. I have got attachment for so many things. That is natural. Anything I possess, I have got attachment. But that does not mean I am that thing. But here the mistake is that because we have got attachment for the body, I am identifying myself as the body. That is ignorance, illusion. Young man: Yes, but one is egocentric... My egoism is very close to my body. Prabhupada: Yes. Everyone says "I am." But the mistake is: he is thinking "I am this body." That... When one is in knowledge, he understands that "I am not this body; I am spirit soul." The "I am" is there. But "I am" is now falsely identified with this body. That has to be cured. Then spiritual knowledge begins. Young man: When one is aware of that fact, that he is not the body? Prabhupada: As soon as he come into knowledge. Young man: But can one be egoistic and be spiritual at the same time, I mean, be proud of himself, not as a body, but proud of his state of the spirit? Prabhupada: Yes. Now we are bodily busy. Because I am identifying with this body, therefore my misunderstanding is there. But if I understand I am not this body, then my activities will be different. So first of all, you have to understand that I am not this body. That is the beginning of spiritual education. [break] ...with this body, we remain an animal, because animal cannot understand that he is not body. Try to understand that you are not this body. And what is the difficulty? When a...? Young man: The difficulty is that I fear that if this body leaves me I'll no longer be. That's the difficulty, because it's difficult for me to imagine that when my brain doesn't work, I can't live, if I can live when my brain stops functioning. That's the difficulty. Prabhupada: Difficulty is not there, but we have to understand from teacher. Just like the many subject of knowledge we do not understand in the beginning, but by hearing from the teacher, gradually we understand. So that teacher must be perfect, in full knowledge, and then we can understand from him. So we accept Krsna. Because He is God, He is perfect. So we receive knowledge from Him, and that is Bhagavad-gita. So knowledge from Krsna or His pure servant, both of them are equal. They can give us that knowledge. Young man: I'd like to know the relation... Prabhupada: Paramahamsa? Bring those ice. Put. That's all. Hm? Young man: I'd like to know the relation between Visnu and Krsna, how Visnu became Krsna. Prabhupada: Krsna is the Supreme Being, and He has got many expansion. So Visnu is also expansion. ramadi-murtisu kala-niyamena tisthan nanavataram akarod bhuvanesu kintu krsnah svayam samabhavat paramah puman yo govindam adi-purusam tam aham bhajami  [Bs. 5.39] This is in the Vedas, Brahma-samhita. Krsnah svayam sama... Krsna means the original. And He expands in so many forms, ramadi-murtisu: Rama, Nrsimha, Varaha, Visnu, Sankarsana, Balarama -- so many thousands. But the original person is Krsna. (Pause) Therefore I asked, "What is the idea of God?" I suppose you are all Mohammedan. Young man: We were brought up as Mohammedans. Prabhupada: So what is the conception of God in Islam? Young man: Even as a Mohammedan, I didn't have very good teaching. My teachers didn't know the Koran very well, and therefore they gave me no concept of God when I was a child. I don't know what the Mohammedan concept of God is. Prabhupada: Any one of you cannot explain? You have got? Young man: I think it's the all-powerful one who's omnipotent, the same as in all religions. There is one God. Prabhupada: So His form... What is the form? Young man: What is His form? He created the world... Prabhupada: That is His action. What is His form? Young man: A heavenly being. Young man (2): There is no form given for God. It's spiritual. Prabhupada: The description must be there. Girl: He's a human being. He's got a human form. Prabhupada: That I am asking, what is the form? Young man: Well, the only thing... It just says that He created man after His own image. So... Prabhupada: That is the Christian idea. Young man: Yeah. And the... Prabhupada: The Mohammedan, Islam is also same idea? Young man: Well, since the Old Testament, part of the Old Testament, is very similar to the Koran, I presume the creation of Adam, that bit, is also taken from the Old Testament. But He is projected as a great judge really, a supreme judge. Prabhupada: Yes, He must be the supreme judge because He is Supreme Being. So He is not only... Supreme judge means supreme knowledge. Young man: Yes. Somehow in modern religion they very much emphasize on the fact that He judges. And I could never accept that idea for example, that the Supreme Being judges, because judging is a low activity. It's a... Spiritual people don't judge. So how come... Prabhupada: Spiritual...? Young man: Leader. Prabhupada: They do not judge? Young man: That's what I thought. Prabhupada: No, judgment is there everywhere. Unless there is judgment, how you can discriminate, "This is spiritual; this is material"? Judgment must be there for intelligent person. Otherwise how you can distinguish? We are distinguishing every moment -- "This is good. This is bad" -- in the relative world. So there is judgment. So God -- the supreme judge. So as soon as there is question of judgment, then what is our position? There must be good and bad, so that if we have lived a very nice, good life, then by the judgment of God we get better position. And if we have not done so, then you get degraded position. Therefore, for human being it is very sanguine to understand how we are going to be judged by the Supreme. So if we are following the rules and regulation given by God, then the judgment will be better. And if we are not following the laws, the judgment will not be in favor. This is natural to conclude. Then we have to judge what is sin, what is piety, how to be pious, how one becomes sinful. So many things will come. Atreya Rsi: Do the laws of nature also make distinction, Prabhupada? Prabhupada: Laws of nature means laws of God. It is executed through the machine of nature. Atreya Rsi: And that machine also makes distinction, doesn't it? Prabhupada: No. Atreya Rsi: No judgment? Prabhupada: The machine... Just like I push certain button, it acts in a certain way. I push another button it acts in another way. Just like computer machine. It is a very complicated machine, but it does not act automatically. One man who knows, he puts the button and it acts. Young man: If the laws of nature are the laws of God, then how is it that sometimes they're even crueler than the actions..., they are more violent than the actions which ordinary men do, than that of a tyrant or a murderer? Prabhupada: No, no. Rules, God rules, are perfect, and it is being perfectly done. Sometimes we misunderstand. Young man: Then how do we take the meaning of earthquakes and natural disasters which could destroy the lives of pure people as well as impure people? Prabhupada: No, every life is pure. The body is pure and impure. So anyway, after destruction, the life is not destroyed. Na hanyate hanyamane sarire [Bg. 2.20]. The destruction of body does not mean that the soul is destroyed. No. He gets another body. The body is... one body is destroyed, and he transmigrates to another body. And so far your question about the earthquake, so suppose if there is plane crash, there are many good men, bad men, so everyone is crashed. But the good man gets a good body again; the bad man gets a bad body again. Young man: The good man gets a better body or a good body? Prabhupada: Good, better or worst, bad, according to his karma. Just like your shirt. You throw away on account of being old. Now you have to purchase another. But there are many varieties of shirt-coat. As you pay for it, you get. If you can pay nice price, you get silk shirt-coat. But if you cannot, you get ordinary cotton or jute. So your body will be according to your karma, or work. Why the other boys went away? Two, three boys? Parivrajakacarya: They said they had to go. Prabhupada: Oh. So these things has to be learned first, that "I am not this body, I am spirit soul. I am changing my body, and this is botheration." So if there is any way to stop this changing, that is required. That... That is possible to be done in this human form of life. Young man: Is there any chance to understand how the Absolute think? Prabhupada: Yes, this is the chance, human body. If you want to know, you can know. Here is the chance. Young man: Is there a way of knowing that the body you inhabited before was of a inferior quality than the one you're inhabiting now, or... Prabhupada: Inferior quality, just like cats and dog. That is inferior quality. Young man: Yeah, is there a way of knowing whether you're on the way up or you're falling? Prabhupada: Yes. You... Just like you infect some disease. Then it is sure that you are going to grow that disease. And if you don't infect, then you don't grow that disease. Do you know this, infection? Disease infection? Young man: Yes. Prabhupada: So, if you don't infect a certain disease, then you don't grow it. And if you infect... Therefore you must know or you must know the rules and regulation, how you can save yourself from infection. If you are ignorant and if you infect some disease, epidemic, then you have to suffer. If you remain disinfected, then you don't get inferior body, you get superior body, in other planets. Or you can go back to home, back to Godhead. Therefore I said that this Krsna consciousness movement is for purification so that you may not get infected by the material modes. Therefore we advise our student four regulative principles: no illicit sex, no meat-eating, no gambling, no intoxication. Plus chanting the holy name of God. Then you remain immune from the infection. And that you will feel practically also, if you adopt the means. Now it is up to us to decide whether I shall continue the life of infection or I shall remain immune from all infection. That is your decision. Better we should remain immune from all kinds of infection, and that is Krsna consciousness. Sa gunan samatityaitan [Bg. 14.26], find out this verse. mam ca yo 'vyabhicarena bhakti-yogena yah sevate sa gunan samatityaitan brahma-bhuyaya kalpate  [Bg. 14.26] Paramahamsa: mam ca yo 'vyabhicarena bhakti-yogena sevate sa gunan samatityaitan brahma-bhuyaya kalpate  [Bg. 14.26] "One who engages in full devotional service, who does not fall down in any circumstance, at once transcends the modes of material nature and thus comes to the level of Brahman." Prabhupada: This is the way. The purport? Paramahamsa: "This verse is a reply to Arjuna's third question: What is the means of attaining to the transcendental position?" Prabhupada: So everything is explained. One has to learn it very carefully. Young man: If one does not lose one's identity when one is returned to the Godhead, what is the nature of the relationship? Prabhupada: Servant. God is supreme, we are all subordinate. God is maintaining us just like father maintains. So it is the duty of the son to be obedient to the father, to act according to his order. Then everything is perfect. At the present moment on account of this bodily concept of life every one of us thinking nationality and duty of nation, duty of the community, duty of the family, so many duties. But actually we, being spiritual, our only duty is to serve God. We are serving; everyone is serving. That is our constitutional position, to serve. But at the present moment we are serving maya, illusion, and we have to be trained up to serve the Supreme Being. Then our life is perfect. [break] ...at the present moment, although there are many religious system, they have no clear conception of God, although religion means to approach God. There is no religion throughout the whole world which is not connected with the word God. So religion means to understand God. But if we have no clear conception of God, then the religion is defective. Do you admit it or not? Religion means to understand God or God's laws. That is religion. But if we do not understand what is God, then that religion is also defective. So far our position is, we are approaching directly God through His agent, and our conception of God is there in the temple worship or our working for God. But we have got no vague idea of God. We have got complete idea: Krsna. You want to speak anything? Young man: What is the Krsna conscious outlook on other world religions? Prabhupada: They have got simply an idea that there is God, but what is that God, they have no clear conception. Just like I asked, "What is the conception of God in Islam?" You could not give us. You simply described some of His activities. Young man: That's true. Prabhupada: Yes. Young man: All the religions that have been taught to me have not given me a clear view of God, a clear concept. They didn't seem to know it themself. Prabhupada: No, concept is there as you told me: "The God has made human being after His own image." Then we can get the idea that God is a person like a human being, He has got two hands, two legs, one head, because after His image we have been... Now, if we study ourself and increase that quality... Just like I am. I can eat. I can eat a certain amount of foodstuff, but God can also eat, but He can eat the whole universe. So eating is there. But the difference of eating is there also. I can create one airplane, but God has created very, very big airplanes like these planets, and they are floating in the sky without any power crisis. That is God's creation. Here we are floating the airplane or running the car with the power, petrol, given by God. You cannot manufacture petrol. Just like in your country there is enough stock of petrol. But you have not created it. So who has created? Your creative power is to drill and get the stock. So much creative power you have got. But you cannot create petrol. Then the Americans would not have come here to beg petrol. That is the difference. You can create something by the ingredients given by God. You can create this table. Because wood is given by God, the instrument is given by God, and the intelligence given by God, the hand is given by God, so in this way you create the table. Then whose property it will be, your property or God's property? Whose property? If I give you wood, instrument, your salary, and you create something, the ultimately the thing created, to whom it should belong? To you or to me? Young man: To you if you're... Prabhupada: Yes. Therefore everything belongs to God. The petrol belongs to God; the land belongs to God; we also belong to God. But because we have forgotten God, there is crisis. Therefore, if you want peace, then you must accept here this principle that everything belongs to God. That is Vedic information. Isavasyam idam sarvam. Isopanisad. You have read our Isopanisad? Young man: I have read some of it. Prabhupada: Here is the Isopanisad. Show him. Isavasyam idam sarvam. Read that verse. Srutakirti: isavasyam idam sarvam yat kinca jagatyam jagat tena tyaktena bhunjitha ma grdhah kasya svid dhanam  [Iso mantra 1] "Everything animate or inanimate that is within the universe is controlled and owned by the Lord. One should therefore accept only those things necessary for himself, which are set aside as his quota, and one must not accept other things, knowing well to whom they belong." Prabhupada: Explanation. Srutakirti:. "Purport." [break] Prabhupada: This is the summary of God consciousness. (Says something in Hindi) Young man: I am from Ananda-marga. My name is Acarya Sveta Kirtu Brahmacari. Prabhupada: Sveta-kirtu. Sveta. Young man: And the guru's name is Sri Sri Radha-Govindaji. Prabhupada: Hmm. You have got a branch here? Young man: I have been here for about three months. I am trying to lead the practices and the sadhana of the people here and trying to set up a unit here. Prabhupada: So you follow Vedic principle? Young man: We follow Tantric principle. Prabhupada: Tantric. Tantra, there are two kinds of tantras, sattvata, and there are sattvic, rajasic, anything. So your activity is on the material platform or spiritual? Young man: It's actually... Our motive is, our objective is atma moksa (Sanskrit). Prabhupada: Atma...? Young man: (Sanskrit). Self-realization and selfless service to humanity. So that's our principles. That's the objective of Ananda-marga philosophy. So that's a subjective approach to objective adjustment, both, side by side. Prabhupada: What is that ananda? Young man: Ananda means bliss, infinite happiness. Prabhupada: Infinite. But what is the platform of that ananda, material or spiritual? Young man: Of course, ananda means very much spiritual aspect. Prabhupada: But if somebody wants to derive ananda by sense pleasure, is that spiritual? Young man: Our practices has... Prabhupada: Tantra means they want to derive pleasure through the senses. So is that spiritual? Young man: Our gurudeva says that not only do we do vidya-tantra but both the Tantric practices avidya and vidya has to be practiced. So one has to go beyond... Prabhupada: Yes, that is spiritual. Young man: Even after vidya and avidya, you have to be beyond that stage. So our gurudeva teaches both the practices. When the time is proper, he says he will also teach avidya-tantra, avidya sara.(?) Prabhupada: Abhidheya. Young man: Avidya Indian man: Vaiddha and avaiddha. It may be avaiddha. Prabhupada: "Late"? Indian man: The one which is recognized and the one which is not recognized by the society. That is the (Sanskrit). Prabhupada: So society recognizes the sense gratification, whether it is bhidheya or abhidheya? Indian man: What is bhideya or abhidheya? Prabhupada: Bhagavad-gita says, sukham atyantikam yat tad atindriya grahyam [Bg. 6.21]. Bliss which is supreme, that is to be appreciated by atindriya. Atindriya means beyond the senses. So those who are indulging in senses, the Tantra indulges in senses. Is that spiritual? That is not spiritual. That is material. Indian man: You have to use the material, all the potential... Prabhupada: No. Atindriya. You haven't got to use this material [break] ...enjoy the spiritual senses, one has to not only stop, but undergo tapasya, tapo divyam. Just like a man is diseased, he wants to eat, but due to the disease he cannot eat. So first of all, you have to cure the disease, then your eating will be a pleasure. And if you want to eat in the diseased condition, then the taste will not be proper; you cannot eat. A man suffering from jaundice, if you give him sugar candy, he will taste it bitter. The same man, when he is cured, he will taste the sugar candy as very sweet. Tapo divyam yena putraka suddhyed sattvam [SB 5.5.1]. You have to purify your existence by tapasya. And tapasya means stops material sense gratification. (Hindi) (Someone enters room) Ah, thank you. So you have translated in Parsi? Dr. Movebhed: Yes. Prabhupada: So Bhagavad-gita... Krsna is speaking Bhagavad-gita. What is the position of Krsna? That you have mentioned? Dr. Movebhed: I have to listen to you. Prabhupada: Why you shall listen to me? The Bhagavad-gita is there. Dr. Movebhed: But you are an insider. Prabhupada: Yes, actually without listening, so many big, big men, they have committed mistake about Bhagavad-gita. Even Gandhi, he says that "I do not believe that there was a person, Krsna, ever living." Just see. What to speak of others. (Hindi) Without listening from the right source, even a personality like Gandhi will commit mistake, what to speak of others. Similarly, Dr. Radhakrishnan has committed so many mistake. So big, big scholars, they're trying to study Bhagavad-gita, but they cannot understand. Therefore Krsna says, tad viddhi pranipatena pariprasnena sevaya [Bg. 4.34]. You first prepare yourself to surrender, pranipata, pranipata-prakrsta-rupena nipata. Without any reservation, surrender, pranipatena, by the surrendering process, and pariprasnena, by enquiring from the authority. Because it is not very easy to understand Krsna. Manusyanam sahasresu kascid yatati siddhaye [Bg. 7.3]. Out of many, many million persons one try to understand, one trying to become perfect, siddhaye. Siddhi means perfection. So yatatam api siddhanam: [Bg. 7.3] "Those who have attained siddhi, perfection, out of many such siddhas," kascid mam vetti tattvatah, "maybe one man can understand Me." The first of all to become siddha. Then, after becoming siddha, one may understand Krsna or he may not. Actually it is very difficult to understand Krsna. But you can understand Krsna if you adopt this process: pranipatena, pariprasnena, sevaya-three things. You have to go to a person where you can surrender, not to a bogus person or one who is not competent to accept your surrender. And then you make question that "Krsna says like this. What is the meaning of this?" Manusyanam sahasresu kascid yatati... [Bg. 7.3]. And sevaya. Three things required: first of all surrender, and then question, and seva. You cannot question by challenging. You have to render service and surrender. Between the two, pranipata and sevaya, there is pariprasna. Then you will understand. Upadeksyanti tad jnanam jnaninah tattva-darsinah. Tattva-darsi, one who has seen the truth, he can enlighten you. This is the process. Otherwise, even Gandhi, Dr. Radhakrishnan, Vivekananda, all they have committed mistake. Aurobindo. Aurobindo has understood little to some extent, but not fully. But if we are fortunate enough, then we can understand Krsna very easily. What is that? Krsna says, mattah parataram nanyat kincid asti dhananjaya [Bg. 7.7]. "My dear Dhananjaya, Arjuna, there is no more superior truth than Me." So if we accept that, either you say blindly or conscientiously, then that is perfection. Krsna says, bahunam janmanam ante jnanavan mam prapadyate: [Bg. 7.19] "After many, many births of philosophical speculation, when one actually becomes wise, jnani, jnanavan, full of knowledge, then the result is mam prapadyate: he surrenders unto Me." Why surrender? Now, vasudevah sarvam iti [Bg. 7.19] -- he understands that Krsna is everything. Sa mahatma su-durlabhah: "Such mahatma is very rare." That I was... we were discussing that there are so many religious system in the world, but hardly they have got any clear conception of God. I have asked so many gentlemen belonging to different types of religion that "What is the clear conception of God?" So may I ask you also what is the clear conception of God? Dr. Movebhed: I prefer to listen to you. Prabhupada: But we are speaking the same thing, Bhagavad-gita. We are not manufacturing anything. Clear conception of God you can take from Arjuna. Arjuna associated with Krsna personally. What he says about Krsna and what he understands about God, that you read from the Tenth Chapter. Param brahma param dhama pavitram paramam bhavan, purusam sasvatam divyam [Bg. 10.12]. Nitai: "Arjuna said: You are the Supreme Brahman, the ultimate, the supreme abode and purifier, the Absolute Truth and the eternal divine person. You are the primal God, transcendental and original. You are the unborn and the all-pervading beauty. All the great sages such as Narada, Asita, Devala, and Vyasa proclaim this of You, and now You Yourself are declaring it to me." Prabhupada: Then? Purport? [break] Next verse? Nitai: "O Krsna, I totally accept as truth all that You have told me. Neither the gods nor the demons, O Lord, know Thy personality." Prabhupada: Now here is the Arjuna's understanding, that "I accept You in total." Now some rascals are proclaiming that all the Bhagavad-gitas, they are, most of them are interpretation. But Arjuna says that "I accept everything what You have said." So whom you will accept, Arjuna or some rascal who is speaking that "There are so many interpolation. They can be rejected"? Whom you will accept as authority? Arjuna says that "I accept whatever You have said in toto." If you accept Arjuna because he has heard from Krsna, then you accept Krsna or you understand Krsna. Dr. Movebhed: I said I think the question you put, the clear concept of Krsna, or God... The God for me is not a conceptual thing. It cannot be subject to concept, and to understand God, you have to identify yourself with the truth, and otherwise it's not the way to... Prabhupada: No, if you accept Krsna as the teacher, authority, just like Arjuna accepted. Arjuna said, sisyas te 'ham sadhi mam prapannam: [Bg. 2.7] "Now I accept You as my teacher." Sisya. Sisya means disciple. Sisyas te aham: "I am Your now disciple. Don't accept me as Your friend." Friend to friend talk, it is not very serious. So when one is accepted as the master, then you have to accept his statement. There is no question of argument. That is the relationship between guru and disciple. Therefore the process is: before accepting a person as guru, one must study his position. And guru also, before accepting a disciple, must study his position. In this way the relationship between guru and disciple is established. Now, Arjuna is a friend of Krsna, so he has studied Krsna, and therefore he submits, Arjuna, "Krsna, although we are friends, now I accept You as my spiritual master." Sisyas te 'ham sadhi mam prapannam: [Bg. 2.7] "I am now surrendered." "Surrendered" means "As I accept you as my teacher, I'll not argue." So first of all this is required, that before accepting somebody as teacher one must be convinced that "The person whom I am going to accept, my teacher, is perfect." Then the knowledge will be nice. If we approach a perfect person and submissively hear from him, then the knowledge is perfect. So Krsna is accepted as the supreme authority, as Arjuna quoted. What is that? Nitai: Ahus tvam rsayah sarve. Prabhupada: Ahus tvam rsayah sarve: "All the rsis, great saintly persons, they have accepted You." And some of them are named: Asita, Devala, Vyasa. They are very great authority, rsis: Vyasadeva, who has compiled the whole Vedic literature; Narada, the spiritual master of Vyasadeva; similarly, Asita, Devala, very, very big, big stalwart, they have accepted. So apart from all these rsis, recently, within, say, thousand years, great acaryas just like Sankaracarya, Madhvacarya, Ramanujacarya, Nimbarka, Visnu Svami, Lord Caitanya, they have all accepted Krsna as the Supreme. And India's Vedic culture is practically dependent on all these acaryas. So we are follower of these acarya, so we accept, following the footsteps of the acarya. Acaryavan puruso veda. One who has acarya, guidance... Just like if anyone is going to be doctor of philosophy, he is guided by three acaryas. That is the system in India. I think the same here, is it not? Anyone who is going to present some thesis, he is guided by three experienced professors, is it not? Dr. Movebhed: Yes, more or less. Prabhupada: That is acarya. So acaryavan puruso veda. Without following the acarya, if we simply theorize, that is not good. Just like the same example: if you want to put some thesis, the university regulation is that he must be guided by three experienced professor. You cannot simply put forward your thesis without being guided by the experienced professors. That thesis will not be accepted. Similarly, here Arjuna directly hears from Krsna. So he says that "You are Parabrahma. Now I understand." Now people may say that "You are accepting Him Parabrahma. Where is your authority? You are friend. You can say Parabrahma or anything -- out of love. That is not final." Therefore he quotes that... What is that? Ahus tvam rsayah sarve: "All the big, big rsis, they have accepted You." Svayam caiva bravisi me: "And You, the Supreme Person, You are also speaking to me. And so far I am concerned, I have realized now that You are the Supreme Lord, Parabrahma." So if we follow Arjuna, then there is no difficulty. Accept Krsna as Parabrahma. So Arjuna has heard it from Krsna directly. This is the process. Now Krsna says that "I accept your statement in toto." What is that language? Nitai: Sarvam etad rtam manye [Bg. 10.14]. Prabhupada: Sarvam etam rtam manye yad vadasi kesava: "My dear Kesava..." Kesava, the another name of Krsna... "Whatever You have said I accept them cent percent." Sarvam etam rtam. Rtam means fact, truth. This is understanding. So if we accept in that way, then our knowledge is perfect. And if we accept in a different way... Just like Gandhi says that "I do not believe that Krsna ever lived." Just see. He does not believe in the acaryas. All the acaryas, Ramanujacarya, Madhvacarya, they have written big, big comment on Bhagavad-gita, even Sankaracarya. He does not believe anyone. He believes himself. And that kind of belief is not help. And our process is: because Krsna has been accepted by all the acaryas, all the great sages, Arjuna has accepted -- we accept, that's all. We have no difficulty. If I am child, I ask my father, "What is this, my father?" The father says, "My dear child, it is called coconut." Then, if I distribute this knowledge, "This is coconut," then my knowledge is perfect. I may not be perfect, but because I have heard it from my father, who is perfect about the knowledge of this fruit, so I have taken that word from my father, and I am preaching, "This is coconut," and this is perfect. So our, this Krsna consciousness movement is like that. We are simply repeating the perfect statement of our predecessor. That's all. So there is no difficulty. We haven't got to write thesis on Krsna. The perfect knowledge is already there. And supported by the acaryas. And we are simply submitting that "This is Krsna. This is God." That's all. All over the world we are placing this statement that "Here is Bhagavad-gita, and Krsna spoke. He is the Supreme Personality of Godhead. He is like this. He is the original source of everything." Krsna says, aham sarvasya prabhavah: [Bg. 10.8] "I am the origin of everything." And Krsna also says, "After many, many births one come to this understanding that vasudevah sarvam iti: [Bg. 7.19] 'Vasudeva is everything.' " Krsna says, "I am everything." And when one understands that Krsna is everything, sa mahatma su-durlabhah, that mahatma is very rare. So my point is that simply replacing... not replacing, submitting the same statement as the great saintly person, acaryas have accepted, we are getting the result very nice, instead of theorizing in my own way, although it is not very difficult. Krsna says that "You always think of Me," man-mana bhava mad-bhaktah. So we are teaching people the same way, that "You always think of Krsna. Chant Hare Krsna." That is thinking of Krsna. So that is being effective. We are getting good result all over the world. Anyone who is thinking of Krsna, he is becoming Krsna conscious, fully convinced, dedicating his life for Krsna. Nobody can change him. Now any of my students, you ask them to change his position from Krsna consciousness to something else. I don't think they will agree. They are not fools; they are all qualified, educated. They are firmly convinced about Krsna consciousness. And all of them will explain how they are convinced. If you ask them, any one of them will explain. They have not blindly accepted. So this is the process, that if you accept the pure path as accepted by the authorities, then it will be effective. Svayam eva... That is the Vedic principle. Svayam eva sphuraty adhah. Spiritual realization is revealed. That is also stated in the Bhagavad-gita. Buddhi-yogam dadami tam yena mam upayanti te. So if we adopt the right principle, then other things will automatically come and help us. And the process is very simple if we accept it. Man-mana bhava mad-bhaktah. Find this verse. Nitai: man-mana bhava mad-bhakto mad-yaji mam namaskuru mam evaisyasi yuktvaivam atmanam mat-parayanah "Engage your mind always in thinking of Me, offer obeisances and worship Me. Being completely absorbed in Me, surely you will come to Me." Prabhupada: A simple formula. Anyone can think of Krsna always. Anyone can offer obeisances. Bhava mad-bhaktah. Anyone can serve Krsna. Krsna is open to everyone. So four principle: man-mana bhava mad-bhakto mad-yaji mam namaskuru. Even a child can do that. And by doing these four things he becomes perfect. And the other verse, mam hi partha vyapasritya ye 'pi syuh papa-yonayah striyo vaisyas tatha sudras te 'pi yanti param gatim  [Bg. 9.32] It is open for everyone. Mam hi partha vyapasritya ye 'pi syuh papa-yonayah. Even born in low-grade family, it doesn't matter. If he accepts these four principles, te 'pi yanti param gatih, they also become transferred to the supreme goal. And Krsna is not meant for any particular type of men or nation or country. No. Krsna says... Find out this verse, sarva-yonisu kaunteya sambhavanti murtayah... Nitai: sarva-yonisu kaunteya murtayah sambhavanti yah tasam brahma mahad yonir aham bija-pradah pita  [Bg. 14.4] "It should be understood that all species of life, O son of Kunti, are made possible by birth in this material nature, and that I am the seed-giving father." Prabhupada: So He is the father of all species of life, origin. Actually every one of us, we are part and parcel of Krsna. So Krsna is not for a particular person. For everyone. Yes? Ananda-marga woman: When you asked what is the true form of God, I've seen the true form of God in myself. It's the purest life, it's the life I cannot reach through my mind. And nobody has experienced in material world. I have listened to it. It is a beautiful sound, the celestial music. And you cannot reach it through material world. I've tasted it as the purest water, and it's always inside me. And you can get it in the spring water even. And it is something I cannot reach through my mind because it is beyond my mind. I can reach by surrendering myself, by being a devotee. And I have experienced the true form of God. Prabhupada: No, what is that form? Ananda-marga woman: It's the purest light. It's the magnificent light. I have listened to it. It's the music. And I have tasted it. Prabhupada: No, if you have realized God, you must know what is His form. You must explain. Ananda-marga woman: The energy of light does take the form of everything which exists. It is the creator of worlds. Prabhupada: But He has a form. Ananda-marga woman: He has all the forms. And the purest form, the most beautiful form, has shown itself to me inside of me. It's the light and it's the music and it's the water. I cannot name it Krsna because I do not believe in names. Prabhupada: Do you know what is the meaning of Krsna? Ananda-marga woman: I believe Krsna was one form of God. You said something about extension of Krsna. It's the same. Prabhupada: Krsna means "the all-attractive." As you say that God is so beautiful, so that is, in other words, all-attractive. So if you have realized God, then you have become perfect. Ananda-marga woman: No. Prabhupada: No? Ananda-marga woman: Whenever I realize God I receive it through my mind and not perfect. But if I meditate and surrender, then there is no distance between me and God. I reach God and I become one with God. And that's the only time I can call everything true meditation. And that's the only time I experience this life in me. And I cannot talk about it as "me and God" because it was the same as God, because I became one with God. And there was no distance really. Prabhupada: Then you are God? Ananda-marga woman: I am not God. I am just... I truly experience this God through me all the time. Prabhupada: You say that you and God, one, and again you say that you are not... Ananda-marga woman: If I meditate, then I become surrendered to God. And I'm trying to do that by trying to take this distance away. Prabhupada: That means when you surrender to God, then you become God, that you are surrendered God, and He is the person to be surrendered. There are two Gods, why not? You say, "I surrender to God." Ananda-marga woman: I said when I surrender to God... Prabhupada: Yes, that means God is different from you; otherwise how you can surrender to Him? Ananda-marga woman: Right. When I am out, off in the world, when my mind is working, then I'm separate from God. I have made myself separate from God by the senses, by my mind, thinking. But then, when I... Prabhupada: Then you have to accept that you are one and different from God simultaneously. That is the conclusion, that you say sometimes that you are one, and at the same time you say different, therefore the philosophy comes to this point, that you are simultaneously one and different from God. Ananda-marga woman: The whole thing is that the God is inside of me... Prabhupada: Yes. Ananda-marga woman: ...and for me to realize it, to become one with it, to realize it, not to be away from it, I have it... Prabhupada: Then who will realize? You are different to realize. You say the God is within you. Therefore God is different from you, but He is within you. You require to realize. Therefore you are different from God. Otherwise there is no question of realization. Ananda-marga woman: You see. What I have experienced, I believe it's my home. I believe it's where I have come from, because it is beyond whatever I have experienced in this worldly life. And so I see that I have a different shape. I have a body and I have a mind which distract me from my true nature, which is God, which is godly and which is beautiful, which is light. But when I surrender myself I become one with it again, I go back home. It is like taking a trip, you know. And you always want to go back home, but you take a trip because there is this wanting to go back home, and it's very beautiful. And this body is like a trip, you know. Taking a body of human being is like a trip. You're going to go back home, and you realize it, and you try to go back home. Prabhupada: That I can understand, that sometimes you realize that you are one, and sometimes you realize that you are different. That means simultaneously you are one and different from God. This is the conclusion. Acintya-bhedabheda. This is the philosophy, acintya, inconceivable, one and different, one because we are one in quality, and different in quantity. That is our position. Nityo nityanam cetanas cetananm. The Vedic information is like that, that He is the Supreme Being amongst all beings. He is also being, we are also being, but He is the Supreme Being. So as being, we are one, but as Supreme and subordinate, we are different. This is the conclusion. As being, living being, we are one. That is not very difficult. Just like in your country the king, the Shah, he is also a being and you are also a being. But he is the supreme being in this country. Although as human being you are equal, but so far his power, his position is concerned, he is different. Similarly, as being, we are one with God, but so far the power and position is concerned, He is too big, the great. We are subordinate. This is our position. That is the right conclusion. Dr. Movebhed: Is that really the right conclusion? Prabhupada: Yes, this is the right conclusion, that God is also Supreme Being and we are also being, so as being, we are one, but as Supreme, He is different. That is the right conclusion. You are not Supreme Being. You are being controlled by the Supreme Being. You cannot say that you are independent. Therefore you are not Supreme. You are dependent on Him. Eko hi yasya vidadhati kaman, bahunam vidadhati kaman. He maintains. Just like this coconut. God has given us this coconut fruit to enjoy or to live upon it. But I cannot create this coconut. It is not possible. Therefore, for my maintenance He has sent this coconut. So He is maintainer; I am maintained, although He is being; I am also being. He is maintainer being; I am maintained being. This is the right conclusion. No scientist... He can talk so many things about this coconut, but unfortunately he cannot manufacture this coconut. That is not possible. He can manufacture something subordinate-chairs, table -- but not this coconut. Not possible. Guest: They... some scientists they manufactures this coconut. Prabhupada: Where is that foolish scientist? Guest: No, let us see. Someday some scientist manufactures this. Prabhupada: "Someday"? Where? Where? Where? Guest: No, I am assuming. Prabhupada: Assuming. Guest: One day he manufactures that. Then what? All this theory is gone? Prabhupada: No, we say he cannot. Guest: No, that is now, today. But you also said we can't... Prabhupada: That you can say, today or tomorrow, but we know in the history nobody has manufactured in the past, and nobody is manufacturing in the present. How can I believe in the future? Guest: I think many things that were not done in the past are being done today. Prabhupada: No. In the past there was winter season. In the present there is winter season. Therefore I can say next January will be winter season. That is nice. But if it is not happened in the past or present, how you can say? That proposition is not accepted. In the past there was birth, death, old age, and disease, in the present there is birth, death, old age, and disease, and in the future there will be birth, death, and old age and disease. This conclusion is all right. In the past there was birth, death, old age, and disease. At the present there is birth, death, and old age, disease. How you can say in the future there will be no birth, no death, no old age...? That proposal is not very sound. You can say whimsically; that is another thing. But factually it is not possible. Indian man: Guruji, according to the bhakti-yoga, a person starting at least in the elementary way of bhakti-yoga... Prabhupada: Huh? Indian man: In the elementary way, if he starts... Prabhupada: What is that elementary way? Indian man: Half-heartedly. Prabhupada: No, no what is that process elementary? Indian man: In the dvaita way. In the dvaita way, not in the advaita way, assuming that He is different and I am different. That is the elementary way of starting worship. Prabhupada: Yes, that is always. Why elementary? Indian man: He is considering in that way. Indian man: No, no. Assuming there had been, supposing bhakti-yoga... Prabhupada: Bhakti-yoga... First of all try to understand what is bhakti-yoga. Indian man: In the beginning it's relatively easy to be... Prabhupada: No, no. Explain what is bhakti-yoga. Indian man: No, what we have understood from the chapters only... Prabhupada: So what is that? What you have understood? Indian man: Just surrender yourself first... Prabhupada: Yes. Indian man: And then depend upon one God or one Deity in whom you have a sort of immense belief or confidence. Prabhupada: No, you cannot create God. God is one, already there. Indian man: No, no, but then I can create in the form of Rama as one. Prabhupada: That is not creation. Indian man: No, not creation, but I can have my own concentration in the Rama-murti. Prabhupada: That's all right. Indian man: Instead of Krsna murti, I can... Prabhupada: That's all right. Indian man: That way. Prabhupada: That's all. Guest: Ah, that way. So that way is two devatas, you see. Prabhupada: Hm, yes. Indian man: So supposing I start simply chanting Ramesvara... Prabhupada: Rama. Indian man: Rama or Krsna. Prabhupada: Yes, that we are chanting. Indian man: Any God's name, any divine name... Prabhupada: That's nice. Indian man: You see? And then why is it we are again getting breaks now and then and we trace back our steps? Prabhupada: No, you can... If you are following rigidly, there will be no break. Indian man: No, but rigidity is again a relative term. Rigidity again... What is rigid? Prabhupada: No, no, you said that you begin chanting Rama. Indian man: Yes. Prabhupada: So follow it. Indian man: Yes, but then there are breaks. Prabhupada: Why break? If you are serious... Indian man: I don't get... Prabhupada: No, no, if you are serious, there will be no break. Indian man: Ah. Then serious is also... Prabhupada: Then you are not serious. Indian man: No, no, no, it is not the question of... No. Excuse me, Guruji, that I am not able to explain to you properly. The point is... Prabhupada: Then hear me, that if you chant Rama, then gradually you will get attachment for Rama. Then how you can give it up? Indian man: Ah, that is what I am lacking. Prabhupada: That means you haven't got the attachment. Your procedure has been failure. Indian man: Ah, but sir, what is lacking? Prabhupada: Lacking, there are so many things. But one who is actually chanting Rama, the result will be that he will get attachment. That is the process. Adau sraddha tato sadhu-sangah atha bhajana-kriya, tato anartha-nivrttih syat tato nistha tato rucih tatha asaktih tato bhavah. This will increase. Just like if you have gone to school -- you have learned, began to learning -- then your learning will increase. And one day you will come to the stage of passing M.A. examination. And if it fails, that mean you did not go to school very seriously. Otherwise the general process is you make progress and come to the standard of passing M.A. examination. Then if you have gone to school and you have not followed the rules and regulations, you have not attended the teacher, the lessons, then you failure. That I am saying, that that is not very seriously taken that "I am going to school. I must learn it." If one is serious, then... That is recommended, utsahat dhairyat niscayat tat-tat-karma-pravartanat sato vrtteh sadhu-sange sadbhih bhaktih prasidhyati These are the process. First of all the first process is utsahah, enthusiasm: "I must advance in spiritual life." That is required. And if you are failing enthusiasm, then in the beginning it is failure. Indian man: No, but then our attention is towards that thing. Prabhupada: No, there no attention. You have failed. That is the proof that you had no attention. Indian man: Yes, but then God should help us to keep us... Prabhupada: God is always helping, but if you do not accept it... God says, sarva-dharman parityajya mam ekam saranam vraja: [Bg. 18.66] "You give up all other engagement and take My shelter," but you are not doing that. That is your fault. So it cannot be failure unless you are negligent. You have no utsahah. This is the process. Utsahah dhairyah niscayah tat-tat-karma-pravartanah, sato vrtteh. How these boys are advancing? They have got enthusiasm: "Yes, we must make progress in Krsna consciousness." They have given up everything. They are young men. They have got... Every young man has to satisfy senses in so many ways. But no. They are so enthusiastic, but... For understanding Krsna consciousness they have given up everything. They are Europeans, Americans. They have got so many allurement. But I have told them that "You must give up illicit sex," they have given up; "You must give up meat-eating," they have given up; "You must give up intoxication up to drinking tea and cigarette," and they have given up, these young men. So they are utsahah. There is enthusiasm: "Yes, we must do it." That is wanted, not theoretically on the armchair of devotional service. That will not be successful. Armchair theory will not help you. You must be practical and there must be enthusiasm. Then it will be successful. You are sitting in the same position and you are thinking that you are making progress. That will fail. You have to come out with enthusiasm. Then it will be successful. That is required. Ciram vicinvan. There is a verse, athapi te deva padambuja- dvaya-prasada-lesanugrhita eva hi janati tattvam na canya eko 'pi ciram vicinvan  [SB 10.14.29] If you simply speculate, it will never help you. You have to receive the favor of the Supreme Lord by your enthusiasm. Then it will be successful. Simply theorizing, speculation will not... Therefore it is said ciram vicinvan. You can go on speculating for millions and millions of years. It will never be successful. Ciram. Ciram means perpetual. That will not help. This is the process, adau sraddha. By sraddha, "Oh, here is God consciousness, very nice. Let us come and see what they are doing." This is called sraddha, faith, little faith. Then in order to increase that faith you have to associate with the persons who are executing devotional service. That is called sadhu-sanga [Cc. Madhya 22.83]. The devotees are called sadhu. Therefore we are opening centers, why? To give chance people to make association with the devotees. Sadhu-sanga. And then sadhu-sanga, after sadhu-sanga one who has properly made sadhu-sanga, the next stage is bhajana-kriya: how they are executing devotional service. Then anartha-nivrttih syat. Then this anartha. Anartha means unwanted things. Just like illicit sex, meat-eating, intoxication, these are unwanted things. It is not necessary. People have learned them by bad association. When one has got his wife, why he should indulge in illicit sex? This is sinful. When we have got so many things to eat, why shall I go to kill an animal, eat it? So these are anartha. Anartha means "without any meaning." So these things become vanquished. If one is actually engaged in devotional service, the first symptom will be that he is not interested in things which are unwanted, artificial. These are the stages. Then nistha. Nistha means firm conviction. Then rucih, taste. Then asaktih, attachment. Then bhava, and then prema. So as a student is serious, he gets promotion to next higher class, higher class, higher class, higher class, gradually to the M.A. class. That is natural. But if in the beginning he is not serious, no enthusiasm, then what is the reason that he will be promoted to the higher section? That is not possible. Indian man: No, enthusiasm is there, but there are breaks. Prabhupada: Breaks means he is not serious. Indian man: No, but there may be so many other things over which he has no control. Prabhupada: Other things, that is anartha. If you are really enthusiastic, these anarthas will be vanquished automatically. Param drstva nivartate [Bg. 9.59]. They are all Europeans, Americans, they are from the childhood accustomed to meat-eating. How they have given up? Param drstva nivartate: they have got better things to eat, therefore they have given up meat-eating. So the rules and regulation are there; if we follow them strictly, then everything one after another will come, the stages. Indian man: Then it is not necessary that one should join the Krsna conscious movement for that type of helping. Prabhupada: You cannot understand. I have said sadhu-sanga [Cc. Madhya 22.83]. Indian man: That's all. Prabhupada: That is... Krsna consciousness movement should be associated; otherwise how you can understand Krsna? Indian man: But this is not the only association where one can go in for... Prabhupada: This is the only association for understanding Krsna throughout the whole world. Indian man: But can you prove that? Prabhupada: Yes. Find out another association like this. Indian man: No, but then... Prabhupada: No, you find out another association like this. Indian man: No, association may not be as pompous as this association is. Prabhupada: Therefore there is no second. Indian man: No, no, no. Prabhupada: You said that association may be as pompous. That means there is no another association. Indian man: No, pompous is different from the real purpose. Prabhupada: Then I do not know what is your real purpose. You say, "There may not be. There may be." Again you say... Indian man: No, Guruji, you yourself have quoted the acaryas. Prabhupada: So one who is following the acaryas... Indian man: Were they not Krsna conscious? Prabhupada: Yes, they say. Therefore I am giving their proof. Indian man: So that means those mathas also are Krsna conscious. Prabhupada: Oh, yes. Indian man: We can join them also. Prabhupada: Oh, yes. That is Krsna conscious. Indian man: Oh, I thought Krsna conscious only for this... Prabhupada: No, no, no. Any association which is Krsna conscious, you can join. Indian man: Thank you for the enlightenment. But I have got one other doubt. You had told that some great scholars like Mahatma Gandhi had confused and they did not believe in the Krsna living, He ever lived, and Dr. Radhakrishnan and another also were not clear in enunciating the theory of Krsna. I would like to know whether Krsna living or not living, is it very important? And will the movement depends upon one Krsna living, positive... Prabhupada: No, no. No, no. Krsna is never not living -- He is living. Otherwise how He can be Krsna? But if you do not know whether He is living or not living, that is your lack of knowledge. Indian man: Do you believe Krsna... Prabhupada: No, first of all settle up this one question, that Krsna is always living, and if you do not know whether Krsna is living or not living, then your knowledge is imperfect. Therefore your knowledge will not be accepted, because you are imperfect. That is the point. Indian man: When we speak of Bhagavad-gita, do we mean... Prabhupada: You cannot say, "Krsna is living or not. That doesn't matter." No, it matters. Indian man: It matters. Prabhupada: Yes. Because Krsna is living but you do not know; therefore your knowledge is imperfect. Indian man: OK. Taking for granted that is the basis, does this movement believe in Krsna Bhagavata or Krsna who preached Bhagavad-gita, only this much or that much. Krsna Bhagavata... Prabhupada: You cannot say that Krsna Bhagavata, Krsna as described in the Bhagavata, should be rejected, and Krsna in Bhagavad-gita should be accepted. You cannot say that. Indian man: No, just I wanted to separate Them together because... Prabhupada: Why? Indian man: Some people take Krsna of Bhagavad-gita. So far as Bhagavad-gita was preached by a philosopher like Krsna, all other things are not so pertinent. But when people associate Krsna with Bhagavata, Krsna of Mahabharata and Krsna of Bhagavad-gita, Bhagavad-gita being a apart from Bharata, if they all take together there's a lot of confusion. Prabhupada: Krsna of Bhagavad-gita, Krsna of Bhagavata and Krsna, Mahabharata -- the same. Indian man: Thank you. I know a little about that, but still, if you we take Krsna of Bhagavata, and if you want to say, explain all the things that had happened pertaining to Krsna, it would be very difficult to explain the same thing with Krsna of Bhagavad-gita. That Krsna of Bhagavad-gita will be separate to everybody.(?) Prabhupada: No, therefore... No, therefore... Therefore we say that first of all you understand Krsna of Bhagavad-gita. That is the ABCD of Krsna. Then you go to Bhagavatam. Dr. Movebhed: I feel... If I am not wrong, I feel that what others have done, that Mahatma Gandhi, Dr. Radhakrishnan, etc., etc., they have taught that Krsna of Bhagavad-gita is very much important for us. Whether He was living or whether He did not live, or anything which was in the name of Krsna, that is quite (sic:) impertinent. We want to have the philosophy of Krsna as enunciated in Bhagavad-gita, is just enough to tell others who are in need of... Prabhupada: That's all right. But if you do not believe in that person, how do you understand his philosophy? Dr. Movebhed: That's where... I think I may be wrong. Please correct me if I go wrong. That's where people have taken little, two to three steps, as my friend has told, first advaita. She wanted to have two... Prabhupada: No, no, why advaita, dvaita? First of all you take the preliminary things, that you are accepting the philosophy of Krsna, Bhagavad-gita, but you have no knowledge of the person who has spoken Bhagavad-gita. Then where is your understanding? You do not understand the person who has spoken the Bhagavad-gita. Then what is the meaning of your understanding Bhagavad-gita? Indian man: No, we have to try... Prabhupada: No, no. Try, try, another thing. Indian man: We have to understand it. Prabhupada: No, you have to understand it... First of all you have to understand Krsna, the person who is speaking. Indian man: Oh, you mean Krsna the person you must understand, then Krsna of Bhagavad-gita you must understand. Prabhupada: Yes, that is the way. You read any book; you learn first of all about the author, his life, his everything. Indian man: Sometimes we need not... Prabhupada: No, it is needed. It is needed. No, that is the way. Indian man: We need not approach the guru. What he speaks that is enough sometimes. Prabhupada: No, that is the way. You read any book. You try to understand, to know something about the author. That is natural. Indian man: When He rips up (unclear) partha, that's enough, just we will start out. Then when He say, mam ekam saranam vraja, again we will go to Him. But we need not go through... Prabhupada: No, no. That is needed. That is needed. That is needed. If you do not understand what is Krsna, when Krsna says, mam ekam saranam vraja, how you will accept it? Indian man: I will accept, but not as Krsna of Bhagavata. I may not know anything about Him as of... Prabhupada: No, no, this is not very good theory. You do not know anything about Him, and you surrender to Him. What is this? Indian man: We may have our own idea. Prabhupada: No, we don't accept that. If we surrender, we must know Him first of all, what He is. Then we surrender. We are not blind. Suppose you tell me that "You surrender unto me." Shall I do that? Why shall I do it? Indian man: But... Prabhupada: No "but." First of all answer this. If I do not know anything about you and you demand from me, "You surrender," shall I do it? Indian man: I will be knowing what He has preached, if I... That preaching itself is enough and we need not look anything about Him. We can surrender. Prabhupada: That He preaches... Indian man: That preaching is enough. Prabhupada: That's all right. Indian man: We need not know what He is. Prabhupada: That's all right. You accept His preaching? Indian man: If it is accepted, then we can surrender. I was questioning only this point, whether the Krsna of Bhagavata is necessary to accept... Prabhupada: No, no, set aside Bhagavatam. I have told you that first of all you try to understand Krsna from the Bhagavad-gita. Indian man: If that is enough, it's enough. Prabhupada: Enough. But if you say that you don't believe in the Krsna, whether He was living or not, then you have not understood Bhagavad-gita. Indian man: I know the living Krsna will come in Bhagavad-gita, I hope. Prabhupada: No. He says... He says that mattah parataram nanyat kincid asti dhananjaya: [Bg. 7.7] "There is no superior authority than Me." Then if you do not understand what is that Krsna, then how you accept Him as superior authority? Guest: I think we have to define the concept of God first, and then only... Prabhupada: No, no, concept of God is there in the Bhagavad-gita. Guest: What is that concept first, please? Prabhupada: That He says, mattah parataram nanyat [Bg. 7.7]. God means the Supreme. So He says, "There is no more superior supreme than Me." Then He is God. And if you accept the teachings of Bhagavad-gita, then you have to accept He is God. Otherwise what you have understood, Bhagavad-gita? You have manufactured your own way. He says... If you study Bhagavad-gita, He says, mattah parataram nanyat kincid asti dhananjaya [Bg. 7.7]. So God means the Supreme. So He says, "I am the Supreme. There is no more superior supreme." Then you have to accept Him God. Indian man: OK. Prabhupada: Then? Indian man: We have accepted, but Krsna need not be one form as somebody else has written... Prabhupada: That... Just like... That form is God also. Indian man: That is also an imagination of Krsna. Prabhupada: No, no. That form is also God. Accepting your theory that there are many forms of God, so that form is also God. Indian man: That form, OK, I agree... Prabhupada: So we accept Him, God, either way. Indian man: But need not be a definite form. He need not have a definite form. Prabhupada: No, no, no. There may be different form. But that form is God. Then you have to accept Him God. Indian man: Yes, OK. And when I say one form, it may be formless also, and I may... Prabhupada: Whatever it may be, that form is God. You have to accept. Indian man: OK, I will accept. Prabhupada: Then if you accept God, the whole thing is finished. Indian man: We accept God, but just I was telling... Indian man: No, same thing as that lady was telling, she sees that God is a light. Prabhupada: Whatever it may be... That we accept. God is light, God... There are many forms, but that form is God. Indian man: Therefore, definition is "a supreme." Prabhupada: Yes, that form is supreme. That you have to accept. That you accept. Then there is no quarrel with you. Krsna may have many forms, God may have many forms, but that form is God. That you have to accept. That is understanding of Bhagavad-gita. Dr. Movebhed: Well, I think, sir, when they say that comment, Radhakrishnan, when they say that, it's not important to know whether... Prabhupada: But Radhakrishnan says, "It is not to Krsna." When Krsna says, man-mana bhava mad-bhakto mad-yaji mam namaskuru [Bg. 18.65], Radhakrishnan says, "It is not to Krsna." Then if he accepts Krsna as God, why does he say, "It is not to Krsna"? Indian man: This is God. Some may accept Him as Krsna, some may accept Him as some other thing. Prabhupada: That is accepted. But that form is God. Indian man: God, he accepts it as God. Prabhupada: That he does not accept. Indian man: God, he will say. Prabhupada: No, no. He doesn't accept that. That is the difficulty. Nitai: He says, "It is not to Krsna." Prabhupada: And if he has accepted Krsna as God, why does he say "not to Krsna"? Guest: No, he may not call that Krsna. He will call it "to the Supreme," what you said now. Prabhupada: Why not Supreme? Then he has not accepted Bhagavad-gita. Indian man: Guruji, Guruji, even acaryas, Sankaracarya, when he wrote commentaries on Prasthana(?) prayer... Prabhupada: No. Sank... Indian man: ...he would think towards his own philosophy. Prabhupada: No, no. No, no, no. He... Indian man: Sankaracarya, when he writes on this Bhagavad-gita, he gives... Prabhupada: Sankaracarya says sa bhagavan svayam krsnah. You refer to the commentary of Bhagavad-gita of Sankaracarya. So in the beginning he says, sa bhagavan svayam krsnah. Narayanah parah avyaktat avyaktad anya-sambhavah. So he has explained. Sa bhagavan svayam krsnah. And what to speak of other acaryas, Ramanujacarya... They accept, all, Krsna. Madhvacarya... They worship Krsna. So Krsna may have many forms, that is accepted. But that form, Krsna, He is God. That you have to accept. You cannot deny that. Guest: He was asking something. Your question was? Guest (2): I thought when some people say that it wasn't very important to know whether Krsna was living or not, they talk to Krsna as a historical fact, as an individual, as a person who lived within the framework of time and space. Krsna as an individual, as a historical person, might not even important, as they said Asoka(?) or Christ or... Prabhupada: (Aside to devotee:) You come here. I do not follow the accent, you hear and tell. Guest: What would be important was Krsna teachings. One must, could not be confined to any one period of time. He is incarnation of God and somebody who was talking for the truth and in the name of the truth, and... [break] Prabhupada: ...fact is that if you have got different views about Krsna, then you cannot prove that from the Bhagavad-gita. That you cannot prove. If you take Bhagavad-gita, then you must present it as it is. Don't distort it. You may have got some idea, but you explain that idea in your different book. But don't place it as the explanation of Bhagavad-gita. That is not very good. If you have got different theory, you can write in a different book. But we cannot permit or do not like that as the commentary of Bhagavad-gita you will place something different. That is not very honest. You put your own theory. Why should you try to put your theory through Bhagavad-gita? That we protest. Therefore we are presenting Bhagavad-gita As It Is. And in the Bhagavad-gita it is clearly said that "There is no superior authority than Me." Therefore He is the God. Mam eva ya prapadyante mayam etam taranti te. Aham sarvasya prabhavo mattah sarvam pravartate [Bg. 10.8]: "I am the origin of everything." And if you have got different idea, that somebody else is the origin, that you can explain differently. But you cannot keep it as explanation of Bhagavad-gita. Then it is distortion, because in the Bhagavad-gita it is said, aham sarvasya prabhavo mattah sarvam pravartate He becomes final, iti matva bhajante mam budha bhava-samanvitah  [Bg. 10.8] Iti matva: "One who knows this perfectly well that Krsna is the origin of everything, he becomes a devotee." Iti matva bhajante mam budha. Budha mean very learned. Bhava-samanvitah: "Oh, here is the supreme cause, or Krsna." The philosophy means to search out the supreme cause. That is philosophy. Find out the ultimate cause. That is darsana. In Sanskrit it is called darsana, find out what is the supreme cause. So here it is explained, aham sarvasya prabhavah [Bg. 10.8], sarvasya, including whatever you know. Sarvasya means including everything. "So whatever you know, the cause of everything, that cause is also I am." And that is confirmed in the Vedic literature, sarva-karana-karanam [Bs. 5.1]. isvarah paramah krsnah sac-cid-ananda-vigrahah anadir adir govindah sarva-karana-karanam  [Bs. 5.1] And the Vedanta-sutra, the Absolute Truth, janmady asya yatah: [SB 1.1.1] "the origin of everything." Now, here it is. Krsna says, "I am the origin of everything." You are making search, but here is the origin here. Now you study Krsna, whether actually He is the origin of everything. At least we know that this universe, the origin is Lord Brahma. But we know that the Brahma is also emanation from Krsna. Brahma's knowledge also comes from Krsna. That is stated in the Srimad-Bhagavatam. Tene brahma hrda adi-kavaye muhyanti yat surayah, om namo bhagavate vasudevaya. And Krsna says. Arjuna accepts, sarvam idam rtam manye: "Yes, I accept." So that should be the process of understanding Krsna. If you manufacture your own way, that is different thing. Mahajano yena gatah sa panthah [Cc. Madhya 17.186]. All the acaryas... Take all the acaryas. At least in our country we are guided by the acaryas. Take any acarya. They have accepted. Brahma has accepted. So in this way you have to understand. We cannot manufacture our own way. Guest: There is some our acaryas. How about Christ or Muhammad and Zarathustra, all these people? Prabhupada: They accept God, that's all. But God is here explained. They cannot give an explicit idea of God. But here is God speaking personally. They have got "There is God," "God is great." That's nice. But who is that God, how He is great, that they have to learn further. Simply a vague idea, that "God is great..." One should know how He is great and who is that great. That is perfection. So that is explained here. They accept God. That is... They are also our brother because they accept God. They are not atheist. Atheists, they don't accept God. "There is no God" -- that is atheist. But here they are theist. They accept God. They want to please God. They go to the church, go to the mosque, offer prayer. Prayer is also bhakti, devotional service. Sravanam kirtanam visnoh smaranam pada-sevanam, arcanam vandanam dasyam... [SB 7.5.23]. Sravanam kirtanam visnoh smaranam..., arcanam vandanam. Vandanam. The Christian way or the Muslim way, to offer... The Muslim offer obeisances and offer prayer. So that is also bhakti. The Christian also do that, so that is also bhakti. And they accept God; we accept God. So there is no difference. But the only point is who is that God. Guest: They accept as supreme power. Prabhupada: No, supreme power must be that... Behind the power there must be powerful. Guest: They say powerful but what about... Prabhupada: Yes, then we have to know this powerful, not only the power. That is stated in the Bhagavad-gita. Mayadhyaksena prakrtih suyate sa-caracaram [Bg. 9.10]. In another place, srsti-sthiti-pralaya-sadhana-saktir eka chayeva yasya bhuvanani bibharti durga [Bs. 5.44]. Durga is power. Power is in... What kind of power? Srsti-sthiti-pralaya-sadhana-saktir eka. She can create, she can maintain and she can destroy, so powerful. But this power, srsti-sthiti-pralaya-sadhana-saktir eka chayeva [Bs. 5.44], is working just like shadow. Just like here is shadow. I am moving this hand; the shadow is moving. Shadow is not independently moving. Therefore this gigantic power, material energy, is working under the direction of Krsna. That is stated in the Bhagavad-gita, mayadhyaksena: [Bg. 9.10] "under My superintendence." So we are allured with the power, but who is manipulating this power we do not know. That is God. Guest: Well, sir, this is a point which I really fail to understand because... Prabhupada: But that is everyone's dilemma, that "What is this power?" The scientists, the (sic:) physists, they are seeing the power. The power is working and energy is working. But how it is working, that is further enquiry. Guest: I have three points. First of all I have nothing... I have seen nothing in Bhagavad-gita, although it is a work of the most beautiful of all these books which are attributed to God and are supposed to be speaked in the name of God. It is one of the beautiful book among these (Parsi?). But sincerely there is nothing in Bhagavad-gita about God which you cannot find similar passage, a passage similar to it in Koran or in other teachings. That's my first point. The second point is that if we believe to God and we believe that the God has spoken only through Bhagavad-gita to, thus, a people who live in a given country, then we are going to have a very narrow-minded God who doesn't love all human beings... Prabhupada: No. No there. Here, here I impress... Guest: He has bestowed all His love to a given people. And my third point is that if we believe God as a life force or who must be discovered by a human being and the human being who has to proceed toward this truth, then also we have no reason to confine this into one people. Indian man: Swamiji, I may take your leave. Prabhupada: (Hindi) Why you are going soon? Indian man: I have to go still far off. Prabhupada: Oh, all right. Jaya. Jaya. Guest: So I think what we have in Islam is... They say that the road, the way towards God, the ways are many, as many as the human beings, that is said. So in the number of human beings you have ways towards God. So everybody, each person, has his own way towards God. And it's really hard for me, difficult for me to believe that there's only one way and there is only one book and one school, one way of teaching. Prabhupada: Yes. Guest: And when Muhammad said that God is great, he simply said God is great, and he adds nothing to it for somebody who is well acquainted with Islam culture and he who knows well about Koran's teachings, it cannot be understood and accepted. It is the same with somebody who is well acquainted with Christianity and the truth spoken through Christianity. It is the same with the Buddhism or other ways which are designed, which are... Prabhupada: So your point is that God is understood in different ways. That is not point? Atreya Rsi: That's one of his points. Prabhupada: And what is the other point? Atreya Rsi: That all the scriptures speak of the same truth. Scriptures coming from God speak of the same truth that is in Bhagavad-gita. And all the scriptures give a real path to God, and that there..., as many as individuals as there are, there are ways of getting to God, and that God could not be fair if He just gave one book at one time to one group of people. Being just, He has given the scripture... He should have... Prabhupada: No, just like dictionary. The small pocket dictionary is also dictionary, and the international dictionary, (sic?) Webs, that is also dictionary. So both of them are dictionary, but they are not equal. One dictionary is meant for children and one dictionary is meant for the higher scholars. So although are dictionaries, they are two kinds of dictionaries. Guest: Do you know, sir, that it is exactly the same way of thinking which we have in our people who believe to Muhammad? They think that the teaching of Muhammad is the most superior one. And others... Of course, Muslims do believe to others' religions, to Moses, to Christ, and so on. They have the same way of thinking. They think that they are elementary stages... Prabhupada: The point is... Yes. Guest: ...and Muhammad's teaching is supposed to be the superior one. So everybody thinks that his way or his way of thinking, his theory, his religion is the most superior one. Prabhupada: That's all right. That is all right. If you accept progress... Just like you are seeing the sun, I am also seeing the sun, the boy is also seeing the sun, but the understanding of the sun may be different. Everyone is seeing the sun. The objective is the same. But a child's understanding of sun and an elderly man's understanding of sun, a scientist's understanding of sun, or one man who has actually gone to the sun planet, there are different categories. Do you accept or not? The sun is there. God is accepted in every scripture. That is a fact. But in the same way, how far He is understood, that is different. That is different. The same example, that everyone is seeing sun: "Here is sun," there is no doubt. But a child's understanding of sun, his father's understanding of sun, or a scientist's understanding of sun, or a person who has gone to the sun planet, his understanding of sun is different. The objective is the same. And everyone is right. Either you understand fully sun or not, as soon as you come before the sun you get the light. The child is getting the light, the scientist is getting the light, and the ordinary person getting the light. Everyone is getting light, heat and light. But their understanding different, of degrees. [break] ...sun-god or sun, no, we don't say that. Guest: From what you have said in the answer to this gentleman, I thought you meant, sir, when the only perfect... Prabhupada: No. Guest: ...teaching about God is provided through the sun. Prabhupada: No, just like if you want to understand sun, say... what is called? Geography? Then you have to learn from the person who knows geography. You cannot learn from a person who has superficially studied. Then you have to go to the person who knows scientifically, astronomically, that sun is fourteen hundred thousand times bigger than this planet. You have to go to the astronomer. How far the sun is situated from us? So you have to go to the particular person who knows it. You cannot say that his knowledge and the child's knowledge, who is seeing the sun as a disc is the same. That you cannot say. If you want to know further enlightenment of the sun then you have to go to the person who is studying sun scientifically. So one who has studied the sun scientifically, his knowledge and a casual person seeing the sun, his knowledge is not the same. That you cannot say. Although everyone is seeing the sun, that's all right, but the knowledge of the sun, there are different. Devotee: That seems to answer all of your three points at once. Atreya Rsi: One thing here is that we are not talking about religion or designation. Guest: In that case I think we have no (indistinct). Atreya Rsi: Yes, it's not a religion. Prabhupada: No, if you want to study something, and suppose you are sometimes from India, the same subject he's going to study in foreign country, farther enlightenment, it is also not necessary that to study a subject matter more and more, we have to remain in the same jurisdiction. If I am actually anxious to know more and more, it doesn't matter whether I get the knowledge from Mohammedan or Hindu or Christian, it doesn't matter. Knowledge is knowledge. When a student goes from one country to another to get farther enlightenment on a subject matter, he does not think that "I'll have to learn it from here, from my university." For knowledge, progress of knowledge, you can go to any university. Because knowledge must be scientific. It is not restricted within the jurisdiction of a particular university. So, sun we are seeing, everyone, the sun, getting heat and light but if anyone is interested (to) know how the heat is coming, how the light is coming, what is the situation of the sun globe, whether there are living entities or not. They're also subject matter. So if you can get enlightenment of the sun, we should not restrict ourselves that we have to study with this jurisdiction of my university, or my country, or my society. If the knowledge is there, we should be prepared to go forward. Mm. Lady: If we believe in God as the Supreme Being... I have a question. Why do we wish to God, to Krsna movement in chanting worldly name because the name of God is something which is eternal. If Krs... Prabhupada: Hold on, then, what is the name of God? Lady: Right, in Christianity there is write: "In the beginning was the word, the word was with God, and the word was God." Prabhupada: That's all right. But what is the name of God? Lady: In Islamic religion, they say... Prabhupada: No, what is the name of God? Islam is the system of religion, but what is the name of God? Lady: The name of God is something which is always with God, constantly with God... Prabhupada: That means you do not know that. You do not know that. Lady: I do know that... Prabhupada: Then why don't you say? Lady: ...experience the name of God... Guest: It's very similar to what we have got in Bhagavad-gita. He says, "You call it Allah..." Prabhupada: That's all right. Guest: "...or you call it atman, whatever name you call it, He has all nicest names." So all nicest name are His. Prabhupada: Yes. Guest: That's what we have got in... Prabhupada: Well, I accept, I accept that all the, that's all right, all the nicest name. So Krsna means all-attractive. Is it not very nice? Just reply whether this Krsna name is nice or not? Guest: Yes, of course. Nobody is against Krsna. Prabhupada: Then chant it. Then chant it. Guest: Everybody loves Krsna and... Prabhupada: No, no, if you accept Krsna name is nice, then chant it. Guest: I don't think that point is... Prabhupada: No, you say God has got the nicest name. Guest: Yes. Prabhupada: I say... Guest: But the name is just an indication, the name is something we call it, it is for us to have a word. Prabhupada: But that I ask you, that what is that name? As I have... We have got the nicest name, Krsna. Now you suggest that this is the nicest name in Mohammedan, Krsna. You say me that. Atreya Rsi: Allah. Prabhupada: You say, "What is that name?" Guest: First of all, this man is talking (indistinct) any difference to call it Allah. Prabhupada: No, no, I don't make any difference but I want to know, I want to know what is that nicest name. I don't make any difference. Guest: Well, it's called (indistinct) they call it Allah. Prabhupada: That's all right. Then our request is that you chant the name of God. So if Allah is the name of God, you chant Allah, don't chant Krsna. We say that. Lady: The name of God is not something could be spoken to (indistinct), it is unspoken. Prabhupada: No, we don't accept that. Name means it can be spoken. (guests all speak at once) Not commentary, name means that... When I call you by your name, it is spoken. It is spoken. I know your name... If I say I cannot speak it. (laughter) This is... Guest: ...is for me to designate me because it is... Prabhupada: No, you have said that God's name is Allah, that is accepted. Very good. And we request you... Guest: ...means of communication. Prabhupada: Eh? Guest: Just, not that, no, a word Allah is not to God, it is a means of communication. Prabhupada: Whatever it may be, you have accepted the name of God as Allah, is it not? Atreya Rsi: But he's saying that their name is material, it's different... Prabhupada: No, no, then you have no idea of God. God is not material. God is not material. Guest: Well, you have said though have a lion, lion who lives in the forest and you write lion. Prabhupada: That is material, that is material. Guest: What you write here is not the true lion. Is, is a way of communication, you put it here in words. Prabhupada: Lion is, lion is material, and his name is also material, but God is not material. God is spiritual. Therefore His name is spiritual. Guest: We accept that. Prabhupada: As spiritual... (two of the guests speak at once) Guest: What do you think about the spirit? Guest (2): Soul, human soul, soul is not material, but when you write it, it's a word, a material word. Atreya Rsi: Yes, but the name of God, we accept as the same quality as God. If it is a concocted name, then it's not the same quality. But if it is the name of God, given to us by God, or by His representatives, we accept that as good as God and that is the philosophy behind chanting. Otherwise why chant? Guest: Well, it's a very old teaching. We have got it. Atreya Rsi: I know you have it, accept it. Accept it. There is no question, just accept it. It doesn't matter if you have got it, or I have got it. Guest: You attribute some sort of mysterious attributes to word, to certain word. Atreya Rsi: None. There is only... Guest: They are created by the human being. Atreya Rsi: It is not created by human being. Guest: It is because it does..., it differs from one country to from one language to other language. Atreya Rsi: God, God has many, many names like it says in Koran. Guest: Yes, but one name in Turkish when you say Tamgri, Tari (?) in Arabic when you say Allah, in French, in English, in Sanskrit. So these are different words. Prabhupada: But... Atreya Rsi: Those are names. Guest: These different things are created by human beings. Atreya Rsi: We are talking about one name which is to describe the concept of God. When we are also talking about the name of God. When we are talking about the name of God... In other words, if I don't know who you are, I have to ask somebody, "What is his name?" That is your name. Guest: But my name is my name in Turkey, in English, in Arabic, in anywhere you go. Prabhupada: That's all right, then let the Turkish chant the name of Turkish name. Guest: But God, the name is different. Atreya Rsi: Yes, But if you find what his name is,... Prabhupada: But the name must be chanted that is our program. It may be Turkish name, it may be Arabic name, it may be Sanskrit name. Whatever he knows let him chant. That is our program. Atreya Rsi: But the concept of name of God is separate than designation, which you are talking about. Man-made designation. And this concept, if you don't accept this concept, how do you accept the concept of chanting in Islam. These are the points. Bhagavad-gita also. There are so many concepts in there, but we want to interpret them all, we don't want to accept them. We want to accept our mind. Prabhupada, what he has been saying all evening is: "Let's accept Bhagavad-gita as authority. Let's accept Koran as authority. Let's accept an authority." Because we want to go by our senses. We want to go around modern... Guest: Yes, (indistinct) as authorities. Prabhupada: Yes. Atreya Rsi: But let us accept it. Let us accept it. It's not they... I accept them and they are still the victim of my interpretation. If we accept them, what is this? That let's not interpret that God's name is just a designation just like my name. It's just a word. Guest: Name cannot be perfect(?). Name of name cannot be perfect. Atreya Rsi: Well, then we are talking about the difference... Guest: Something is something else. Atreya Rsi: What is it? Guest: You are entitled to chant the name of your beloved, that is something else. It does not mean different stages with the name... Atreya Rsi: But who is this beloved? Who is this beloved? Who is this beloved? Who is this beloved? Guest: In our case, God. Atreya Rsi: So this name of God is diff... If God is transcendental, if God is spiritual then how could His name be committed to our relative conceptions. [break] Prabhupada: ...indicates God, then it is not bad. That is our point. If we indicates to God... Just like Allah. If this name indicates to God, then it is this Allah word as good as God. There is no difference. Namnam akari bahudha nija sarva sakti. The Allah, the conception of Allah means The Great, is it not? So God is Great. So by chanting Allah, I am meaning God, the Supreme Person, so it is as good. And actually in Mosque, they chant Allah-u-akbar, like that, so far I've heard. So that prayer, if it is not God's name, then what is the use of this prayer? That is God's name. Similarly, the Hindus may chant Hare Krsna, they're indicating to the same personality. It may be different language; therefore, it is as good as God because God is absolute. But this, this name is authorize because Muhammad said that you chant, "Allah." So it is authorized, because he is God's representative. Therefore my request is, or our request is that you chant the name of Allah. We don't say that you chant Krsna. You chant the Holy name of God. If Allah is approved name of God, you chant it. That is our request. We don't force you that you chant the name of Krsna. No, we don't say that. If somebody says Jehovah is the name of God, that's all right, you chant Jehovah. Allah is the name of God, that's all right, you do it. We simply request that you chant the holy name of God. That's all. If you have got it, we don't force you that you chant the name of Krsna. That is not our way. We accept: if Allah is God's name, it is as good as the name Krsna. We are not so sophisticated that you have to chant this Krsna's name. No, we say: Harer nama. That is the sastra, harer nama. The name of the Lord. So there are many thousands of names, that's a fact. So you actually chant the name of God. Pick up of the millions of God's name, whatever you like, you pick up and chant. That is our propagation. harer nama harer nama harer nama eva kevalam kalau nasty eva, nasty eva, nasty eva gathir anyatha  [Cc. Adi 17.21] In this age of quarrel and disagreement, God realization is very difficult; therefore, you chant the Holy name of God, then you'll gradually realize Him. This is our program. So we don't force you that you chant this name Krsna. No, sastra says, harer nama, the holy name of God, chant. That is our program. Lady: Before you ask with something else. I ask, how could you meet the Supreme being by chanting... Prabhupada: By chanting, yes. Lady: ...by chanting of worldly name, tuned on prayer... Prabhupada: That is not worldly name. Why do you mistake that? God's name is not worldly. Lady: Because if you, if you really know the tuning of God... Prabhupada: Do you think Allah is wordly name? Lady: We recognize that it is before Krsna... Prabhupada: That's all right, you recognize it. Allah, Allah is not worldly name. It is given by the authority Muhammad so you have to chant it, who knows God. Lady: But he didn't really mean Allah is the name of God. Prabhupada: If... Why do you say he didn't mean? Lady: Because... Prabhupada: That is you say. Muhammad did not say that "What I say, I did not mean it." Lady: No, the name of God. He didn't mean Allah. Prabhupada: You say, you say. Who cares for your word? Muhammad said this is the name of God. We have to accept, that's all. Lady: So why... Prabhupada: You cannot say he didn't mean. You are not a private secretary of Muhammad. (laughter) Lady: So then how do they say that the name of God rests in God. Prabhupada: No, these things are not accepted. Lady: Was before God. Prabhupada: Don't talk childish. Lady: Was God. Prabhupada: Muhammad said. That is authority. That we accept. We accept Muhammad as the representative of God. Whatever he says, we accept, that's all. What you meant, that is his business. But he is authority, he said that "This is the name of God. You chant, you pray." Allah or God. That's all. That is authority. Guest: Is it also good to chant the name of a person who is holy, who is one with God, not the name of God. Prabhupada: That you have to find out, but here it is already there. Why should do trouble to find out a holy man, another holy man? The holy man says, Muhammad never said that "You chant my name." Then how one can be holy man if he says like that? We have to test whether he is holy man or not. Here is the perfect holy man. He never said that "You chant my name." He said "Chant Allah's name." That is holy man. That is test of holy man. He does not become God, he serves God. That is holy man. Devotee: (indistinct) Prabhupada: All right. Take, give prasadam. All right. Devotee: We have a feast. Prabhupada: All right. Devotee: Thank you Srila Prabhupada. Prabhupada: Thank you very much. (devotees pay obeisances, and some guests leave) Jaya, Hare Krsna. Jaya. [break] Devotee: Jaya, Srila Prabhupada. Prabhupada: We accept Muhammad's authority. That's a fact. He's authority. Devotee: Yes. Prabhupada: Yes. Atreya Rsi: Yes, this girl is a follower of Guru Maharaji. Prabhupada: Oh. Devotee: (indistinct) this way. Atreya Rsi: So she thinks she has experience. Prabhupada: Very nonsense. Atreya Rsi: She speaks sweetly to attract other people's mind, and when people are not really sincere, they think, "Ah, she has..." Prabhupada: Some realization. Atreya Rsi: So many, they don't realize that spiritual life is not so cheap. Prabhupada: Therefore I said that you, your person cannot (indistinct). So is Guru Maharaji came here? Atreya Rsi: No, they came. Devotee: They're his representatives. That's his philosophy that there is no, you cannot speak the name of God. It's too sacred to speak it. You can only feel it inside. And he never... His disciples they look at each other and say, "You can feel the name of God, eh?" And the other one says, "Oh yes," and another one says, "Yes, me too." But actually, they call it the sixth principle. Prabhupada: But if he says, "No, I don't feel," is that difficulty? Devotee: Then he'll be cast away. Atreya Rsi: What they don't have really, is the practice of devotional service. They don't have... Prabhupada: That is finished, I think. Their propaganda is already finished. Nobody cares for them. How they are...? You can cheat all people for some time, and some people for all time, (laughter) but not all people for all time. That is not possible. This is their policy. Some fruits are there? Devotee: Yes, Prabhupada. Some juice also. Atreya Rsi: Shall we make some fresh juice? Prabhupada: No, no. That's all right. (end)   >>> Ref. VedaBase => Room Conversation with Yoga Student -- March 14, 1975, Iran HOME © 2001 The Bhaktivedanta Book Trust International. 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