690425 - Conversation - Boston

Conversations by Date, 1969

His Divine Grace
A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada

Listen to a 'Nectar Drop' created from this lecture

690425R1-BOSTON - April 25, 1969 - 12:07 Minutes

(transcription of the recording being played back as Prabhupāda listens to his conversation with students)

Prabhupāda: Yes. So if you have got any question, you can ask.

Student (1): My question, that one child . . . (indistinct) . . . Kṛṣṇa conscious . . .

(break) . . . I don't know . . .

Prabhupāda: I told you that I do not expect that everyone will be Kṛṣṇa conscious. That is not possible. But if there is one moon in the sky, that is sufficient to eradicate the darkness. You don't require many stars. Ekaś candras tamo hanti na ca tārā sahasraśaḥ (Hitopadeśa 25).

Even if there . . . if one man understands perfectly what is this Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement is, he can do tremendous benefit to the other people. So you are all intelligent boys and girls. You try to understand this Kṛṣṇa consciousness philosophy with all your reason or argument. But try to understand it seriously. Don't make it a farce. That is the object of life.

Student (2): When you've got that . . . (indistinct) . . . Kṛṣṇa consciousness, and then you become unconscious, and then you become conscious, and then you become unconscious. And it extended like that, backwards and forwards, for five minutes. Is that Vedic?

Prabhupāda: What is that? Unconscious? You are unconscious, or you answered?

Student (2): I have read and thought that . . .

Prabhupāda: To become unconscious.

Student (2): . . . that God, the force who made everything and more in this . . . (indistinct) . . . in making this, playing a game. And you play a game by playing hide and seek. The whole point of the game is that someone is hidden from you.

Prabhupāda: There is nothing hide and seek here. It is all open. Yes?

Student (3): At one time, years ago, everyone was Kṛṣṇa conscious.

Prabhupāda: Everyone was . . .? When?

Student (3): When? In the beginning.

Student (2): If you sit down and you look very closely into his eyes, and you get closer and closer and closer and closer . . . (laughter)

Prabhupāda: What is their doubt?

Student (2): You can go all the way, all the way, all the way, and what do you find? (laughter)

Prabhupāda: You can find. I cannot find.

Student (4): I wanted to know, material world, being in spiritual consciousness is to get . . .

Prabhupāda: Yes. We are trying that. Calling everyone, "Come and push your conscious." We are inviting everyone. There is no restriction. And it is very easy. Just try to dance and chant. That's all. In the treatment they are taking part. That child is taught something of Kṛṣṇa consciousness did you ask? He'll be a very good child. So it is open to everyone. There is no restriction.

Student (4): Those who having . . . (indistinct)

Prabhupāda: That I have explained, that changing of body, there are 8,400,000's of bodies. So after death, you enter in one of the bodies.

Student (4): And what happens?

Prabhupāda: As happens . . . as you enter the body, the happening is according to the body.

Student (4): But does this go on and on indefinitely, or does it stop? Do you just keep changing bodies indefinitely, or does it end?

Prabhupāda: Not indefinitely. If you become Kṛṣṇa conscious, then you haven't got to change this material body. You are transferred to the spiritual world. There is eternal body.

Student (4): Oh. Does everyone go there, or only some?

Prabhupāda: It is accepted that everyone goes. But if somehow you are stubborn to remain here, how one can help? (laughter) Just like the university is open for everyone. But somebody is stubborn to go to the prison department. So how the government can help? Government does not say that, "Some selected people come to the university, and others go to the prison department."

It is open for everyone, but it is the particular mentality— one is going to the university, one is going to the prison house. That is your individual independence. That is your choice. Just like so many students, they have come here. Others have not come here. So everyone has got little independence. So everyone can go to the spiritual world if he likes. But if he does not like, he will remain here. That is his choice.

Student (5): Why do you . . . (indistinct) . . . butter, cheese . . .

Prabhupāda: I do not know. No. We avoid.

Student (5): (indistinct) . . . is that part of the whole . . .

Prabhupāda: No. There is not part only, but we discourage killing. That is in the Bible also, "Thou shall not kill," but they are killing. What can be done? In the Bible, Ten Commandments, there is, "Thou shall not kill." But they are killing. What shall be done?

Student (6): (indistinct) . . . have you ever found what you believe to be your self? Have you ever found your inside, I mean, not physically or mental . . .

Prabhupāda: Yes. Yes.

Student (6): What?

Prabhupāda: Yes! (laughter)

Student (6): Could you tell us what you found, and what's impersonal?

Prabhupāda: Yes. I am prepared to tell you, and this center is open for telling you. Our books are there. It is not a paltry subject that you can understand immediately, but I can give you one instance, that is stated in the Bhagavad-gītā:

dehino 'smin yathā dehe

kaumāraṁ yauvanaṁ jarā

tathā dehāntara-prāptir

dhīras tatra na muhyati

(BG 2.13)

It is said in the Bhagavad-gītā, Second Chapter—those who have got Bhagavad-gītā, they will see to it—that "Within this body there is soul, and the body is changing every moment." That is a fact. We say: "The child is growing." Growing or changing—practically the same thing. Actually, it is changing, because the former body is no longer to be found. It has accepted . . . the soul has accepted another body. This is going on from babyhood to childhood, from childhood to boyhood, boyhood to youthhood, then old age.

So just like I am old man. I can remember my childhood body, my babyhood body, my boyhood body, my youthhood body. So the body is no longer, but I am there. I am thinking that, "I did do like this. I was playing like this, with my body." But that body is gone, but still I am there.

Therefore it is naturally surmised that when this body will not be existing, I will be existing. I will accept another body. This is very logical conclusion. As I am changing so many bodies, still I am there. I can understand that I changed my body. I was so little. Now I have grown up. I am old. But I am there. Similarly, it is concluded, when this body will not be there, but I will accept another body.

This is very easy to understand that, that "I" is . . . now, we can perceive, but when you are spiritually emancipated, you will see yourself, God also, and everything spiritual. That requires time. That requires practice. And we are teaching our students that practice, this Kṛṣṇa consciousness, to change the consciousness.

When you change your consciousness, you will see yourself, you will see God, everything. Yasmin vijñāte sarvam etaṁ vijñātaṁ bhavati (Muṇḍaka Upaniṣad 1.3). When you are in that spiritual platform, everything will be known to you. But before that, if you want to know, that is not possible. Yes?

Student (7): Do you use your body when you speak?

Prabhupāda: Yes. Why not?

Student (7): Tell me. You said, perhaps you said . . . that I am the soul that changed the body . . . (indistinct)

Prabhupāda: Yes. I change my body. Just like if I change this apartment, does it mean I shall stop speaking? Similarly, if I change this apartment of body, does it mean that I shall stop speaking? That's right. (laughter) All right. Let us now chant Hare Kṛṣṇa.

(listening to the recording ends, tape is turned off)

Prabhupāda: There is chanting? All right. There is chanting recorded?

Devotee: No.

Prabhupāda: Just see.

Devotee: Prabhupāda, it's twenty to eight now.

Prabhupāda: Huh?

Devotee: It's twenty to eight. (cut) (end)