760512 - Lecture SB 06.01.11 - Honolulu

Lectures by Date, 1976

His Divine Grace
A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada

Listen to a 'Nectar Drop' created from this Lecture

760512SB-HONOLULU - May 12, 1976 - 15.21 Minutes

Prabhupāda: Oṁ namo bhagavate vāsudevāya. Oṁ namo bhagavate vāsudevāya. (devotees repeat) Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, Canto Six, Chapter One, verse number twelve.

Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: Eleven?

Prabhupāda: Thirteen? Eh?

Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: Eleven?

Prabhupāda: Eleven. No, eleven I have discussed. Yes. You have got eleven there?

Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: Yes.

Hari-śauri: We did ten yesterday.

Prabhupāda: All right. (leads devotees in chanting)

śrī-bādarāyaṇir uvāca

karmaṇā karma-nirhāro

na hy ātyantika iṣyate

avidvad-adhikāritvāt

prāyaścittaṁ vimarśanam

(SB 6.1.11)

(break) (01:28)

. . . and I have several times said that what is the use of? That is the same, hasti-snāna. If he does not know how to keep, the elephant, how to keep neat and clean, if he has no this knowledge, repeatedly he'll take bath and throw dust.

So Bhāgavata, Parīkṣit, Śukadeva Gosvāmī, the next step. Next step means to become cultured. First of all prāyaścitta: "You have done this wrong; you should be punished." But the punishment will not rectify him. And that is practical. There are so many rules and regu . . . punishment. In common cases . . . Just like every day the police is giving a ticket to the motor driver; still, the same thing is going on. So to keep oneself in darkness and makes rules and regulation will not help. Just like your government has admitted that they have spent millions of dollars, they could not stop the intoxication habit of LSD. That's a fact. But in our Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement one who joins, he gives up immediately. That's a fact. What is the difference? The difference is that to stop one kind of karma by karma will not help. Therefore it is said, karmaṇā karma-nirhāra. One kind of activity is criminality, and one kind of activity just to punish him, this will not stop criminality. This is the real fact. He must be in knowledge. Cultivation of knowledge required. He must come to the senses, that "I am suffering. Every time I commit some criminality, I am punished. This is not very palatable. So why I cannot stop it?"

This is the beginning of human life, that unless you come to this knowledge . . . Athāto brahma jijñāsā (Vedānta-sūtra). This is called brahma-jijñāsā. So that is possible in the human form of life. A dog cannot. A dog comes within your room, and you drive him away, you punish him, and still, with some plea he will come. So therefore Parīkṣit . . . Śukadeva Gosvāmī suggests that we have to make him free from the avidyā, ignorance. That is Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement. Everyone is under the spell of māyā. Punaḥ punaḥ. Bhūtvā bhūtvā pralīyate (BG 8.19), it is going on. But we do not inquire that "Why I am repeatedly accepting the cycle of birth and death?" That is avidyā. They are, rather, supporting, "Suppose if I become dog, what is the wrong there?" They say like that: "What is the wrong there?" So this means avidyā, ignorance.

So for eradicating ignorance from life, it requires culture, cultivation. That is suggested in the next verse:

nāśnataḥ pathyam evānnaṁ

vyādhayo abhibhavanti hi

evaṁ niyamakṛd rājan

śanaiḥ kṣemāya kalpate

(SB 6.1.12)

Just like if you go to the physician and the physician is giving medicine, and he's taking the medicine and cured, again he is affected with the disease, again going. So why it is happening? It is happening because he does not follow the rules and regulation given by the physician. Therefore it is happening. The physician . . . As soon as you go to a physician, you have to accept something "do not" and something "do." That is called regulative principle. Without regulative principle you cannot correct yourself. So that regulative principle also cannot stay if you are not a devotee. This is the gradual process. Simply if I say, "Follow the rules and regulation," it will not stay unless you become a devotee. That is the test of devotional service, or Kṛṣṇa consciousness. Because it is so powerful, devotional service, that as soon as you become a devotee, gradually, immediately, all the good qualities of your original position . . .

Good qualities means we are part and parcel of God, so God is good, so we are also good. Otherwise how can I be part and parcel of God? If God is gold, then I am gold. So why I become iron? I am not iron, but I am covered with dirty things; I look like iron. This is the position. Actually I am not iron; I am gold, because I am part and parcel of God. If God is good, then I am good. So because I am covered by the material dirty things, I look like not gold. So this is the test. As soon as you become God conscious, your original all good qualities will manifest automatically.

yasyāsti bhaktir bhagavaty akiñcanā

sarvair guṇais tatra samāsate surāḥ

harāv abhaktasya kuto mahad-guṇā

mano-rathenāsati dhāvato bahiḥ

(SB 5.18.12)

That "One who has got unflinching faith, devotion to the Lord," yasyāsti bhaktir bhagavaty akiñcanā, "without any motive, then the all the good qualities of God will manifest in him very soon."

kṣipraṁ bhavati dharmātmā

śaśvac-chāntiṁ nigacchati

kaunteya pratijānīhi

na me bhaktaḥ praṇaśyati

(BG 9.31)

api cet su-durācāro

bhajate mām ananya-bhāk

sādhur eva sa mantavyaḥ . . .

(BG 9.30)

These things are there. The devotional service is so nice, if you simply take to devotional service, then all good qualities will come. You don't have to educate him, to send some reformatory school or this or that. That will be explained. The devotional service, Kṛṣṇa consciousness, is so nice. If you simply take to Kṛṣṇa consciousness, then all your . . . Because originally you are good. You have become bad on account of the material association. Therefore devotion means to be purified. This is a purificatory process from material contamination. Sarvopādhi vinirmuktaṁ tat paratvena nirmalam (CC Madhya 19.170). If you think . . . Vimarśanam. If we think little soberly, that "I am thinking 'I am American' or 'Indian.' Am I American or Indian? This is upādhi, designation. By accident or somehow or other, I have got this body in America. Therefore I am American. But next time I may not take the American body. I may take another, Chinese body or something else." So one has to understand that "I am neither American, neither Chinese, nor Indian, nor white, nor black." Ahaṁ brahmāsmi: "I am spirit soul, part and parcel of God." That is knowledge. We have to come to that. That is brahma-bhūtaḥ.

brahma-bhūtaḥ prasannātmā

na śocati na kāṅkṣati

samaḥ sarveṣu bhūteṣu

mad-bhaktiṁ labhate parām

(BG 18.54)

So this Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement is to purify the designation. And so long we are in the darkness of this designation, that "I am this," "I am that," "I am this," "I am that," that is ignorance. Suppose a thief, he is thinking that "If I do not steal, I cannot exist. I'll die. So I cannot stop stealing. I must go on." So this is ignorance. But if he thinks over, that "The cats and dogs and the birds and beasts, they are very nicely eating. They are not stealing anyone's . . . Whatever he gets by the grace of God, he is happy," this is knowledge. Vimarśanam. Vimarśanam.

Īśāvāsyam idaṁ sarvam (ISO 1). Everything God's property. And we are all part and parcel, sons of God, so the property is for us; it is not for others. Just like father's property is meant for the son's enjoyment. That's a fact. So "If other sons, without any labor, without any endeavor, they can get their food, why I am stealing?" This is knowledge. This is knowledge. "Why I shall steal? There is enough food." But because I haven't got this knowledge that "God is the proprietor. I am His part and parcel, son. So if He has provided food for the elephant, who eats at a time forty kilos, he can eat, and I eat only, say, half a pound, I cannot eat?" This is knowledge. "Why shall I steal? I shall depend on God." This is knowledge.

So this is Kṛṣṇa consciousness. I am part and parcel of Kṛṣṇa. I am God's part . . . Why shall I starve? There are so many . . . Out of 8,400,000 forms of life, eight million forms of life are less than the human being. Human being, only 400,000. Out of that, civilized men very few. Out of that, Americans are very few, Indians are very few. So "If so many, 8,300,000 forms of life, they can get without stealing, why shall I steal?" This is knowledge. Prāyaścitta vimarśanam. As soon as he becomes in quite perfect knowledge, then whole problem solved.

So this is the instruction of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam. If we take seriously, then there is no problem. Otherwise the problems will go on, and the so-called rascal scientists will give us bluff, that "We are making solution of all problem." It is never solved. It will never be solved in the future also, unless we take to Kṛṣṇa consciousness. That is a fact. If you like, you can take it; otherwise suffer.

Thank you very much.

Devotees: Jaya. (end).