750804 - Lecture SB 06.01.51 - Detroit

Lectures by Date, 1975

His Divine Grace
A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada

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750804SB-DETROIT - August 04, 1975 - 24:57 Minutes

Nitāi: "The subtle body endowed with the five knowledge-acquiring senses, the five working senses, the five objects of sense gratification, and the mind, altogether sixteen parts, which is the effect of the three modes of material nature and is composed of very strong, insurmountable desires, causes the living entity to transmigrate from one body to another within the kingdom of human life, animal life or higher demigod life. When he gets the body of a demigod he is certainly very jubilant. When he gets the body of a human being he is always in lamentation. When he gets the body of an animal he is always afraid. In this way, in all conditions he is miserable. This miserable condition is called saṁsṛti, or transmigration in material life."

(break)

Prabhupāda:

tad etat ṣoḍaśa-kalaṁ

liṅgaṁ śakti-trayaṁ mahat

dhatte 'nusaṁsṛtiṁ puṁsi

harṣa-śoka-bhayārtidām

(SB 6.1.51)

This is called sāṅkhya-yoga, to understand the analytical process of this body. In the Bhagavad-gītā you have learned that,

dehino 'smin yathā dehe

kaumāraṁ yauvanaṁ jarā

tathā dehāntara-prāptir

dhīras tatra na muhyati

(BG 2.13)

So with this combination of sixteen elements, within that there is the soul. He is enwrapped in so many wrappers: mana, buddhi, ahaṅkāra and . . . Altogether twenty-four wrappers, and within that wrappers there is the living soul. The modern science, they cannot understand this. They are searching after the active principle or living force within this body, but they have no information. But here, in the Śrīmad Bhāgavatam, you get the full analysis. Tad etat ṣoḍaśa-kalam. The analysis is that the living entity is enwrapped first all with sixteen wrappers, ṣoḍaśa-kalam. What are those? Now, ten senses: ten working senses and . . ., five working senses and five knowledge-gathering senses. We are experience . . ., we are perceiving by using our five knowledge-gathering senses, just like eyes, ear, cakṣu, karṇa, smell, nose. Cakṣu, karṇa, nāsikā, jihvā, tongue, touch, hand . . . In this way we get knowledge experience. Sometimes we stress on the knowledge experienced by the eyes: "I want to see." But that is not the only source of knowledge. There are many blind men, who cannot see, but he has got full knowledge. There are other sources of knowledge. Just like a mango. You see the mango, but you cannot experience the full knowledge unless you use the tongue. Then you can say whether it is good mango or bad mango. Not by seeing.

So these are our knowledge-gathering senses, and there are working senses, just like hand, leg, the stomach, the rectum, the genital. These are working senses. In this way, ten senses and five sense objects. We have got eyes, so there must be object of seeing. Pañca-tanmātrā, rūpa, rasa. With eyes we can see the form. With tongue we can taste. Rūpa, rasa, śabda: with the ear we can hear the sound. In this way, five sense objects of three, five, means fifteen, and the mind. The mind is the center of directing the senses. Indriyāṇi parāṇy āhuḥ indriyebhyaḥ paraṁ manaḥ (BG 3.42). The senses are there, sense objects are there, but without mind it cannot work. Therefore the mind is the sixteenth item. And everything is being used by whom? By the soul. Therefore seventeenth. And in this gross body there are five elements and three subtle elements. Bhūmir āpo 'nalo vāyuḥ khaṁ mano buddhir eva ca (BG 7.4). In this way there are twenty-four elements which is covering the twenty-fifth—living entity—and he is packed up in this way.

Then, tad etat ṣoḍaśa-kalam liṅgam. Liṅgam means the form. Liṅgaṁ śakti-trayaṁ mahat. Just like we have got this microphone, so the machine is made of these elements. That is analyzed. Then how it is working? Śakti-traya. The sattva-guṇa, rajo-guṇa, tamo-guṇa, mahat-tattva, the material elements . . . In this way the living entity is under the full control of material nature. And everything is coming out swiftly by our desire. These desires are also being generated from the soul, but by the infection of three qualities: sattva-guṇa, rajo-guṇa, tamo-guṇa. So just try to understand how the nature's law is working very finely and immediately. Parasya śaktir vividhaiva śruyate (CC Madhya 13.65, purport). And above all these things, the nature's working, there is Kṛṣṇa. Prakṛteḥ . . . Mayādhyakṣeṇa prakṛtiḥ sūyate sa-carācaram (BG 9.10). The prakṛti, nature . . . Prakṛteḥ kriyamāṇāni guṇaiḥ karmāṇi sarvaśaḥ (BG 3.27). Everything is being done. Just like the big airship is floating in the sky, but the pilot is pushing the button, similarly, the whole cosmic manifestation is working, but the button-pusher is Kṛṣṇa. Parasya śaktir vividhaiva śruyate. His knowledge is so perfect, and He has made this machine so perfect. A man can make so nice perfect machine, so what to speak about God? So mayādhyakṣeṇa prakṛtiḥ sūyate sa-carācaram (BG 9.10).

So the basic principle . . . We are under these laws of material nature only for our desire. That is the basic principle. So the Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement means we have to change the desire. Anyābhilāṣitā-śūnyam (Brs. 1.1.11). Śūnyam means zero. As soon as we make all other desires . . . "Other" means there are two things: Kṛṣṇa and māyā. So this material world means māyā. Māyā means which is not fact. It is an illusion. Just like we dream at night: it is no fact, but it works. Similarly, this material world is called māyā, means it is not factually in existence, but it is working, hallucination. So if we want to be really . . . Because we are within this entanglement, twenty-four elements, as we have analyzed, within this, the result is that, being influenced by this māyā or mahat-tattva, who is working with the three modes of material nature, and I am desiring . . . My basic principle of my material existence is my desire, and as soon as I desire, by the order of Kṛṣṇa, immediately the instruments and facilities are given to me. In this way, dhatte anusaṁsṛtiṁ puṁsi. As I desire, immediately the instrument . . .

This body is instrument. Īśvaraḥ sarva-bhūtānāṁ hṛd-deśe arjuna tiṣṭhati (BG 18.61). (child making noise) (aside:) Stop this child. Īśvaraḥ sarva-bhūtānāṁ hṛd-deśe 'rjuna tiṣṭhati. Kṛṣṇa is situated in everyone's heart, and as I am desiring, He has given us full freedom—not full freedom, but freedom. Kṛṣṇa is so kind that just like father, mother gives the child little freedom and it moves here and there, but always looking after—may not catch up any fire, for . . ., may not fall down in the water, or some animal may not attack—so similarly, we are desiring and Kṛṣṇa is giving us facilities. But if we want to stop this repetition of birth and death and change of different atmosphere, as it is said, harṣa-śoka-bhaya ārti . . . This material existence means sometimes we are very jubilant: "Oh, I have got this. Now I have got in America, I have got so many cars." Now harṣa, jubilant. Then śoka: and you take birth in some other place, lamentation, scarcity, "This is not. This is not." And bhaya. So there are 8,400,000 species of forms of life, and by this process we are entering into different types of atmosphere and subjected to sometimes harṣa, jubilation, sometimes lamentation, sometimes fear. Even in this life we are undergoing such changes.

So if one is actually intelligent, then he should consider that "I don't want this lamentation. Why it is forced upon me?" It is forced upon me—on my desire. On my desire. It is not forced by any external thing. It is my desire. I wanted this position, and I got it by the grace of Kṛṣṇa. But when I got it, then again . . . Because the nature is like that, material nature. Duḥkhālayam aśāśvatam (BG 8.15). You can place yourself in any position—the whole thing is duḥkhālayam, it is miserable. We are simply changing, that "If I am posted in this position, then I will be happy. If I am posted in this position, then I will . . ." And we are changing different positions. Harṣa-śoka-bhayāpaha. But if we want to stop this, if we want to come to our original position . . . Original position means we are part and parcel of God. So qualitatively the same position . . . It may be small, but the position is sac-cid-ānanda-vigrahaḥ (Bs. 5.1), eternal life of bliss and knowledge. If we want to come to that, then the process is that we should not any more desire or manufacture some ideas for becoming happy in this material world. This is intelligence.

Therefore Rūpa Gosvāmī says, anyābhilāṣitā-śūnyam (Brs. 1.1.11). You have to make zero all material desires. Anyābhila-śūnyam means zero. So zero, that is Buddhist philosophy to make zero, śūnyavādī, to make everything void. No. That cannot be. I cannot make my desires zero. That is not possible, because I am living being. I may select what kind of desires I will have. That is intelligence. But desirelessness is not possible. Therefore the next item is that anyābhilāṣitā-śūnyam (CC Madhya 19.167): you make your material desires zero, void. "Then? What shall I do next? Shall I become void and finish?" No. Then your real life begins. What is that? Anābhilāṣitā-śūnyam jñāna-karmādy-anāvṛtam, ānukūlyena kṛṣṇānuśīlanam. Ānukūlyena kṛṣṇānuśīlanam.

We have desires, many types of desires, jñāna and karma. Karma platform is foolishness. Just like everywhere they are very busy, karmī, but they do not know what is the aim of life. That is called karma: acting something and suffering again. This is called karma. And jñāna means one who understands that, by analysis, that "These wrappers, material wrappers, these fifteen—five, five, five; five sense organs, five object of sense enjoyment—in this way twenty-four wrappers, so how I am to get out of these wrappings?" That is intelligence. That is jñānī. But a jñānī does not know that "I get out from this entanglement. Then where I stay?" That they do not know. So that information is given by Kṛṣṇa, that "Give up this, and take up Me." Negative and positive, both. Sarva-dharmān parityajya (BG 18.66): "Give up this nonsense desires." Then? What to do? Now, mām ekaṁ śaraṇaṁ vraja: "Come to Me, under Me." This is required. Ānukūlyena kṛṣṇānu. Mām ekaṁ śaraṇaṁ vraja. That is not variety-less, that "I surrender unto You, then business finished." No. Śaraṇaṁ vraja means ānukūlyena kṛṣṇānuśīlanam (CC Madhya 19.167): what Kṛṣṇa says, you do that. Just like Arjuna. Arjuna was not willing to fight, but when he listened Bhagavad-gītā from Kṛṣṇa, then he agreed to fight.

So our first business is that if we want to stop this repetition of birth and death—and sometimes we are very happy, sometimes we are very unhappy, sometimes we are in fearfulness, sometimes in so many other calamities—then our first business is that we shall stop all these material desires. Anyābhilāṣitā-śūnyam (Brs. 1.1.11). To stop means . . . The desire cannot be stopped. Because we are living entities, life, we are not dead stone, that desires will be stopped. No. Desires are to be purified. Sarvopādhi-vinirmuktaṁ tat-paratvena nirmalam (CC Madhya 19.170). Desires to purified. Everyone is working under some impure consciousness, just like nationalism: "I am American," "I am Indian," "I am Englishman," "I am German." This desire is polluted, because I am spirit soul, part and parcel of Kṛṣṇa. What is the benefit, my identifying with America or India or . . .? This is called purification of the desire. Everyone is working under national, and they are fighting with one another because the desire is impure.

So the problem, the whole problem of the material world, can be solved only when we purify our desires. Anyābhilāṣitā-śūnyaṁ jñāna-karmādy-anāvṛtam, ānukūlyena kṛṣṇā. Ānukūla, what Kṛṣṇa says. Kṛṣṇa is not dead. Therefore ānukūlyena. What Kṛṣṇa says, we have to do that. Kṛṣṇa says to Arjuna to fight. So we have to meet the situation as Kṛṣṇa desired by. Sometimes He may say, "You sit down." So we have to carry out only. The Kṛṣṇa is not dead. He can give us varieties of order, and our position is that we shall simply carry out the order. That is life. Otherwise we are under the clutches of māyā, or material nature. Prakteḥ kriyamāṇāni guṇaiḥ karmāṇi sarvaśaḥ (BG 3.27). We are thinking that "I am the lord of everything." That is not the fact. The fact is that we have to work under somebody. That is our real position. Jīvera 'svarūpa' haya nitya kṛṣṇa dāsa (CC Madhya 20.108-109). We are worker. We are not enjoyer. But unfortunately we are trying to take the position of enjoyer. That is māyā. That is māyā. And if we agree to work under the direction of Kṛṣṇa, then our original life is revived. That is wanted.

The Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement means that we are trying to educate people to change the consciousness. We have got so many desires under different consciousness. So one desire, that "I am eternal servant of Kṛṣṇa," this is called mukti, as soon as . . . Kṛṣṇa says, sarva-dharmān parityajya mām ekaṁ śaraṇaṁ vraja (BG 18.66). This is mukti. If we give up all other desires and agree to accept Kṛṣṇa's desires, that mām ekaṁ śaraṇaṁ vraja, "You surrender unto Me," that is mukti; that is liberation. Otherwise, under the influence of these twenty-four elements and the material nature and the three guṇas, infection, dhatte anusaṁsṛtiṁ puṁsi harṣa-śoka-bhayārtidām, you go on changing any body. The subject matter is very difficult, but we have to learn it from śāstra what is our position. Otherwise, to realize these things, it is not very easy. But if we accept the direction of the śāstra, that this is our position . . . We cannot know what is my disease, but if I go to a doctor, physician, he can feel the pulse and he can recommend, "This is your disease. You do like this."

So if we want to avoid the tiresome, troublesome, miserable condition of this material world, then we have to accept the direction given in the śāstras. But we are so dull, we cannot even understand what is the miserable condition of our life. (break) . . .dead stone life or animal life. The animal cannot understand. But there is possibility. Sometimes when the miserable condition is very acute, we feel, "How to get out of it?" That is intelligence. But if we take the direction of the śāstras—sādhu guru śāstra vākya; guru mukha padma vākya, cittete kariyā aikya, āra nā kariya mane āśā—then there is possibility of getting out of these clutches, entanglement, and become free again and go back to home, back to Godhead.

Thank you very much.

Devotees: Jaya Prabhupāda. (end).