720312 - Conversation - Vrndavana

Conversations by Date, 1972

His Divine Grace
A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada

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720312R1-VRNDAVAN - March 12, 1972 - 20:30 Minutes

Prabhupāda: There is a book, perhaps you might have read, Aquarian Gospel. So in that book I have read there is a Greek word, Christo. Christo . . . sometimes we don't say Kṛṣṇa, we say Kṛṣṭa.

Dr. Kapoor: Kṛṣṭa, yes, in Bengali particularly.

Prabhupāda: Yes. So this Christo word means "anointed." Kṛṣṇa's face is anointed. And "love" also. And this "Christ" title was given to Jesus on account of his love for God. So on the whole, the conclusion is Kṛṣṇa or Christo means "Love of Godhead."

Dr. Kapoor: No, Bhandarkar has tried to argue that the entire Kṛṣṇa religion of Śrīmad-Bhāgavata has been borrowed from the West.

Yamunā: How is this possible?

Dr. Kapoor: Eh?

Yamunā: How does he do that chronologically? How is that possible? It's impossible to do that.

Dr. Kapoor: There was some exchange. Some people came from Greece here, and just . . .

Gurudāsa: But the Greek civilization was not developed five thousand years ago.

Yamunā: It wasn't even developed.

Dr. Kapoor: But he doesn't take it so back as five thousand years.

Gurudāsa: So anybody can say anything. (guest laughs)

Prabhupāda: Our authorities, they accept Bhandarkar is not as good as Rāmānujācārya, Madhvācārya, Śaṅkarācārya. We . . . nobody can give credit to Bhandarkar more than these ācāryas or Caitanya. So how his proposition can be accepted?

Dr. Kapoor: So he was knighted, you see, by the British government.

Prabhupāda: Yes, just see. (guest laughs) Just like Nehru bribed one Mukherjee, Radhakund Mukherjee, doctor, to write book where he has supported cow slaughter.

Dr. Kapoor: He supported. Hmm, hmm.

Gurudāsa: If I was the Western government and you handed the most perfect knowledge to me, I would knight you also, in the name of myself. Certainly I would knight you.

Prabhupāda: So Radhakund Mukherjee, he has supported cow slaughter. He was given a post, made a parliament member first of all. So the poor man, five hundred rupees per month, he accepted. Then he induced that, "You take more money, write like this." So if you pay money . . . British government's whole policy was that if the Indians are kept strict Hindus, it is next to impossible to govern them.

So therefore the . . . (indistinct) . . . this policy. They changed the whole policy how the Hindu will think everything mentioned in the śāstra is nonsense. They have trained up, and Nehru is the first-class trainee. Everything mentioned in the śāstra, the Ārya-samāj, they also wrote Satyartha . . . (indistinct) . . . so many. And Dr. Radhakrishnan also. All the scholars, they would never mention any śāstra more than once within one thousand years. That means . . .

Dr. Kapoor: Otherwise they would not be scholars.

Prabhupāda: No. Otherwise they will not be scholars.

Gurudāsa: At any rate, where it came from is . . .

Prabhupāda: Because according to Darwin's theory, your forefather was monkey. So their theory is that long before, there were monkeys only. How such high philosophical thoughts could come?

Dr. Kapoor: It is true that in England there were only monkeys there. (laughter)

Prabhupāda: On this theory, all their philosophy is going on. So if they give credit that Indians were so high scholars and philosophers, then the whole theory is spoiled. Because brain is developing, and the background of brain was monkey. So how such philosophical, highly moral scholarly work can be done? And this is going on. If Bhāgavata is accepted as we accept that five thousand years ago it was written, then their whole civilization becomes topsy-turvy.

Dr. Kapoor: About the Bhāgavata also he says that there is the mention of Buddha in Bhāgavata, and many descendants of Buddha who lived . . .

Prabhupāda: The Buddhists, they don't accept that verse. Kīkaṭeṣu bhaviṣyati, buddho nāmnāñjana-sutaḥ (SB 1.3.24), they do not accept. About Buddha, the . . . in Hindu literature, Vedic literature, there is mention, bhaviśyati, future. That is insult to them. Therefore, they do not accept this verse. Neither . . . we say Buddha is incarnation of God: keśava dhṛta-buddha-śarīra. They do not accept this. They think it is insult.

Dr. Kapoor: Insulting them.

Prabhupāda: Yes, Hindu gods . . . but in one Buddha temple, I have seen in Penang, there is viṣṇu-mūrti. Yes. Four hundred years old. That is a Buddhist temple.

Gurudāsa: Dr. Chandra has found many.

Prabhupāda: Eh?

Gurudāsa: Dr. Chandra has found many viṣṇu-mūrtis in Buddhist temples.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Yamunā: Especially in Malaysia.

Prabhupāda: Malaysia.

Yamunā: Especially in Malaysia, so many.

Prabhupāda: Malaysia, I speak of Malaysia. Penang is Malaysia. Oh, Dr. Chandra has also told?

Gurudāsa: Yes.

Prabhupāda: So they worship Viṣṇu. And Buddha . . . Buddha dharma is an offshoot of the Vedic religion. That is the proof they accept Viṣṇu. Oṁ tad viṣṇoḥ paramaṁ padaṁ sadā.

Gurudāsa: But to this man, he says that's the proof that Vaiṣṇava is an offshoot of Buddhism, that Viṣṇu is in the Buddhist temple. He can say that.

Prabhupāda: Eh?

Gurudāsa: This Caitanya who has written this book can say that since Viṣṇu is in the Buddhist temple that this proves that Viṣṇu is an offshoot of Buddhism.

Prabhupāda: Yes, he can say like that. But offshoot he cannot say. Viṣṇu is long, long ago mentioned. Buddha is later on. Buddha can be from Viṣṇu, but Viṣṇu cannot be from Buddha.

Gurudāsa: So how do they speak of that chronologically? They don't accept that Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam as five thousand years old?

Dr. Kapoor: No. (break) This bundle . . .

Śyāmasundara: No, those are documents.

Dr. Kapoor: Documents?

Śyāmasundara: Yeah, photocopies.

Dr. Kapoor: You promised to give me a photo of Prabhupāda.

Gurudāsa: I'll give you one. I can give you one.

Prabhupāda: If you have got any colored photo, you can give him. So we have now increased, eighty-seven.

Śyāmasundara: More—ninety-two.

Prabhupāda: Ninety-two?

Dr. Kapoor: Ah, you don't know yourself. (laughs)

Prabhupāda: Yes, actually Kapoorji, I do not know how things are going like this. I tell you frankly. Because I have no credit. You see? But things are going on like this. It is something like—of course, I am not comparing exactly—just like Kṛṣṇa could not understand about His potency and therefore He became Rādhārāṇī's feature to understand Himself. So . . . of course, I . . . this is a comparison. Things are taking very wonderfully. Very wonderfully. Just see these boys and girls, how seriously they have taken.

Dr. Kapoor: Oh, yes, there is no doubt about their earnestness, and people have . . . this is just what strikes people—how can these people be so sincere and so earnest?

Prabhupāda: So I simply . . .

Dr. Kapoor: They are beating Indians. (laughs)

Prabhupāda: I simply advise them that, "You regularly chant the sixteen rounds. Not more, you cannot make . . . you cannot imitate Haridāsa Ṭhākura. But there must be one saṅkhyā." Saṅkhyā-pūrvaka-nāma-gāna. They are observing that, and the regulative principle: no illicit sex, no intoxication, no meat-eating, no gambling. And they are following other instructions. So they are wonderfully.

Dr. Kapoor: You know Dalmiaji's daughter-in-law, the wife of Vishnu Hari Dalmia, you see . . .

Prabhupāda: Vishnu Hari went to see me in London, perhaps with his wife.

Dr. Kapoor: Ācchā (I see). She told me, she said the movement is all right, but they are so strict, such strict rules and regulations are being imposed upon these people, how long will they be able to follow them?

Prabhupāda: That is a surprise.

Dr. Kapoor: "This is bound to fail," she said. I say: "It will succeed just because of this." (laughter) "The rules and regulations imposed upon them are like strong fences put around them to keep māyā away, you see?"

Yamunā: They want religiosity watered down.

Prabhupāda: Actually, because they are following strictly, māyā cannot touch them. Yaḥ śāstra-vidhim utsṛjya vartate kāma-kārataḥ, na siddhim sa . . . (BG 16.23). Kṛṣṇa says vidhi. Bhakti-vidhi. Must be followed.

Dr. Kapoor: Must be followed.

Prabhupāda: Must be followed.

(aside) This is cut piece? Cut piece from the book cover? No. It is original photo?

Gurudāsa: A copy.

Prabhupāda: Copy.

Dr. Kapoor: It is fine. (break) (laughs) But now I changed, so there is a Rādhā-Kṛṣṇa photo in the background, which is cut.

Prabhupāda: Ah. You can give some of that. It is not very nice.

Yamunā: We'll give the nice ones.

Gurudāsa: We don't have any others.

Yamunā: We didn't bring so many things with us, but we'll give him very nice.

Prabhupāda: Here Rādhā-Kṛṣṇa photo is cut, it's not good. You have got any in your photo . . .

Śyāmasundara: Not color.

Prabhupāda: May not be color.

Śyāmasundara: Doesn't matter.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Dr. Kapoor: Give me afterwards, there is no hurry. And what about those photos you took in town that day? That lady inquires from me every time I go there.

Yamunā: Which one?

Dr. Kapoor: Mahāprabhu's photo, Maha . . . (indistinct) . . .?

Gurudāsa: Kṣīrodakaśāyī has those negatives.

Dr. Kapoor: Huh?

Gurudāsa: I think Kṣīrodakaśāyī has those negatives. I'll inquire. Kṣīrodakaśāyī?

Dr. Kapoor: Here?

Gurudāsa: He has those negatives. I'll inquire where they are.

Dr. Kapoor: If you give me the negatives, I will get them developed.

Devotee: You want to take massage now, Śrīla Prabhupāda?

Prabhupāda: So give some prasādam.

Dr. Kapoor: You are observing Ekādaśī today?

Prabhupāda: Eh?

Dr. Kapoor: Ekādaśī today?

Prabhupāda: Ekādaśī? Phalahar. (Eating fruits.)

Dr. Kapoor: So you are going for that piece of land, that . . .

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Dr. Kapoor: Garden?

Prabhupāda: Yes. You like that piece of land?

Dr. Kapoor: I like it.

Prabhupāda: Yes, it is nice. Two sides . . . three sides road.

Dr. Kapoor: Three sides road? Ācchā.

Prabhupāda: Yes. Three sides road, and good locality.

Dr. Kapoor: No, no. This one is all right, of course. This land that you have purchased is very well suited. No, but that orchard, you see.

Prabhupāda: Orchard, yes. That you can inquire.

Dr. Kapoor: If you want to expand afterwards . . .

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Dr. Kapoor: . . . this piece of land may not be sufficient.

Prabhupāda: No, no.

Dr. Kapoor: And that may not be available afterwards. So if you can go in for it just now . . .

Prabhupāda: Yes. So what actually he wants?

Dr. Kapoor: Subal dāsa Bābājī must have told you?

Prabhupāda: Subal dāsa . . .

Gurudāsa: He mentioned that he thought sixty thousand, but he was not positive.

Prabhupāda: Eh?

Gurudāsa: He was not sure, but they both said sixty thousand, but they were not sure.

Dr. Kapoor: (laughs) Since both of us say sixty thousand, I think you can get in touch.

Gurudāsa: But that is very nice plot. And it is about two times as large as Mr. Dalmia's land, and Mr. Dalmia was asking fifty thousand.

Prabhupāda: Asking.

Dr. Kapoor: No, he has purchased it for fifty thousand. Sixty thousand is his entire cost, including expenses and everything. I asked him, he told me. Sixty thousand. So from that point of view, that land is cheap.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Dr. Kapoor: You have more extensive buildings on it than Dalmia's.

Gurudāsa: What about the adjoining land? It is also available?

Dr. Kapoor: Which one?

Gurudāsa: There is some adjoining land behind . . .

Dr. Kapoor: Adjoining which . . .

Gurudāsa: That sixty thousand . . .

Prabhupāda: Bon Mahārāja bought this land very cheap.

Dr. Kapoor: Oh, yes. He got it for nothing.

Prabhupāda: Only thirty thousand?

Dr. Kapoor: No, even less, I think. About ten thousand.

Prabhupāda: Ācchā?

Dr. Kapoor: I remember. But he . . .

Prabhupāda: He had to spend much money.

Dr. Kapoor: He got it . . . it was requisitioned for the college, you see. It was requisitioned.

Prabhupāda: Vṛndāvana University, Vaiṣṇava Institute. It was acquired by the government.

Dr. Kapoor: Acquired by the government. That's how he got it cheap. And then he had to go into litigation.

Prabhupāda: Oh, yes. Much litigation, and he was in danger.

Dr. Kapoor: He was in danger.

Śyāmasundara: Still it's not finished.

Prabhupāda: Not yet finished.

Dr. Kapoor: Not yet finished? That litigation is still going on?

Śyāmasundara: No, I mean the building.

Dr. Kapoor: Building, huh. The construction is going on?

Prabhupāda: Now he is getting money.

Dr. Kapoor: Now he is getting money. The institution has been recognized by the government.

Prabhupāda: He is not here. I inquired.

Dr. Kapoor: Perhaps not. I don't know.

Prabhupāda: He's gone to . . . Delhi?

Dr. Kapoor: He was trying to force me . . .

Gurudāsa: Bombay, I think.

Dr. Kapoor: . . . force the professorship of his college upon me.

Prabhupāda: Eh?

Dr. Kapoor: When I came here after my retirement . . .

Prabhupāda: Yes, yes. I know that. (break) If you want, you can come sometime to European country to our different branches.

Dr. Kapoor: Why you make me leave Vṛndāvana now? (laughs)

Prabhupāda: No, because you have got some background, so you can have very good chance to speak in big institution.

Dr. Kapoor: That's all right.

Prabhupāda: And if our movement is supported in that way, that will be nice.

Dr. Kapoor: I was out from Vṛndāvana for about a month and a half, that I told you. (laughs)

Prabhupāda: Yes. That was also painful.

Dr. Kapoor: I am . . . (indistinct) . . . the hell. Although I was with my children, you see, small kiddies, lovely people, you see. And still, you see, I didn't like to stay with them.

Prabhupāda: That I can understand.

Dr. Kapoor: I came away. And as I was returning to Vṛndāvana, you see, I think it was by way of punishment, you see, for being . . . for remaining outside Vṛndāvana for such a long period that a strange thing happened, you see. And Rādhārāṇī made me undergo a prāyaścitta before I came back. (laughs)

Śyāmasundara: A what?

Dr. Kapoor: You see, what happened was, it was the . . .

Prabhupāda: Prāyaścitta. Intonation, what do you call?

Dr. Kapoor: No.

Prabhupāda: Prāyaścitta, what is the exact English?

Dr. Kapoor: Penance.

Devotee: Atonement.

Prabhupāda: Atonement.

Dr. Kapoor: Atonement, yes.

Prabhupāda: Atonement.

Dr. Kapoor: Atonement. So I was made to undergo atonement, you see. (chuckles) I was coming to Mathurā. I had to drop down some . . . (indistinct) . . . at Mathurā, and I had a trunk and bedding with me. (break) Sanatana-shiksha padh raha tha, Govindanatha tika . . . (I was reading Govindanatha's commentary on Sanatana-shiksha . . .) a big volume, about one thousand pages. That he had given to me for revision. So that thing was there. There was one . . .

Prabhupāda: Bengali?

Dr. Kapoor: Hindi.

Prabhupāda: Hindi.

Dr. Kapoor: Hindi. One more manuscript. And of course there was some jewelry also, because my son has been recently married, you see, and there was some jewelry also. That was not so material as this manuscript.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Dr. Kapoor: You see? So I went to the stationmaster, he failed to do anything. Then I ran back to the train. (break) (end)