720518 - Lecture Arrival - Los Angeles

Lectures by Date, 1972

His Divine Grace
A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada

 Listen to a 'Nectar Drop' created from this lecture

720518AR-LOS ANGELES - May 18, 1972 - 18:35 Minutes

(kirtana)

Prabhupāda: (leads prema-dhvanī; "Los Angeles bhakta-vṛnda ki jaya!") Thank you very much.

Devotees: All glories to Śrī Guru and Gauranga. All glories to Śrīla Prabhupāda. (devotees offer obeisances) (break)

Prabhupāda: So, my dear boys and girls, about six years ago I came to your country single-handed, with these pair of cymbal. Now you are so many chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa. That is my success. It was the prediction of Lord Caitanya Mahāprabhu:

pṛthivīte āche yata nagarādi grāma

sarvatra pracāra hoibe mora nāma

(CB Antya-khaṇḍa 4.126)

Lord Caitanya desired that, "In all the towns, in as many towns and villages as they are on the surface of the globe, My name will be broadcast." He is Kṛṣṇa Himself, svayaṁ kṛṣṇa, kṛṣṇa caitanya-nāmine, simply changing His name as Kṛṣṇa Caitanya. So His prediction will never go in vain. That's a fact.

So my plan was that, "I shall go to America. America is the leading country of the world. If I can convince the younger generation of America, they will take up." I am old man. I came here at the age of seventy years. Now I am seventy-six. So my warning is already there. In 1971, I had a severe heart attack. You know, all. So the mission of Caitanya Mahāprabhu is now in your hand. You are, American boys and girls, very intelligent and graced by Kṛṣṇa. You are not poverty-stricken. You have enough resources, prestige. Everything materially, you are all well-equipped. If you kindly take this Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement seriously, your country will be saved, and the whole world will be saved.

The modern . . . the present human civilization is not in right order. I was coming here, and I was seeing one film, cinema, The Boyfriend. Of course, young boy, young girl making friendship, enjoying life—that is not condemned. Actually, that is life. Rādhā and Kṛṣṇa is young boy and young girl.

rādhā-kṛṣṇa-praṇaya-vikrtir hlādinī śaktir asmād

ekātmānāv api (bhuvi purā) deha-bhedaṁ gatau tau

caitanyākhyaṁ prakaṭam adhuna tad-dvayaṁ caikyam āptaṁ

rādhā-bhāva-dyuti-suvalitaṁ namāmi kṛṣṇa-svarūpam

(CC Adi 1.5)

This young boy and young girl trying to unite for happiness is the natural inclination of the living entity. It is there in the Supreme Personality of Godhead. In the Vedānta-sūtra it is said, janmādy asya yataḥ (SB 1.1.1). Everything that we see in this material world is there in the spiritual world. Janmādy asya yataḥ. Wherefrom everything is coming? The original source, the original source of this love, is there in the Absolute. Rādhā-kṛṣṇa-praṇaya-vikṛtiḥ.

It is the manifestation of the pleasure potency of the Supreme Personality of Godhead. So the thing as it is originally is perfect, but here, the same thing is only perverted reflection. Here, the boys and the girls meeting, because it is simply a reflection . . . just like a reflection of the tree on the river, it is just topsy-turvied; similarly, that reflection, reality, Rādhā-Kṛṣṇa love, is topsy-turvied here.

So our Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement is very scientific, factual, authorized. Simply intelligent person can understand it. Every human being has got intelligence better than the animals. If he simply tries to understand what is this Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement, his human life will be perfect. Here, we are trying to enjoy, but we do not know that next life, next chapter, may stop everything—at any moment.

Don't think because you are American—you have got material opulences, very comfortable life, cars, roads, buildings; that's all right—but any moment, you will be kicked out, and it may be that you will have to accept another body which is not at all American. It may be the body of a tree or a cat or a dog. That science we must know.

Don't be enamored by the flickering happiness. This happiness is there which is factual: this Rādhā-Kṛṣṇa. You see Rādhā-Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa, how He's jolly, with His cows, with His flute, with His comrades, with His boyfriend, girlfriend, how He's happy.

cintāmaṇi-prakara-sadmasu kalpa-vṛkṣa-

lakṣāvṛteṣu surabhīr abhipālayantam

lakṣmī-sahasra-śata-sambhrama-sevyamānaṁ

govindam ādi-puruṣaṁ tam ahaṁ bhajāmi

(Bs. 5.29)

Here, you are trying to enjoy the company of young girls, but Kṛṣṇa is also doing that in the spiritual world. Sahasra-śata-sambhrama, lakṣmī. Each girl there is a goddess of fortune. Not only one, but many hundreds and thousands. They're with great respect and reverence trying to serve Kṛṣṇa. Lakṣmī-sahasra-śata-sambhrama-sevyamānam.

So you can also enter in the company of Kṛṣṇa—as Kṛṣṇa's friend, as Kṛṣṇa's servant, as Kṛṣṇa's consort, as Kṛṣṇa's father. Anything. Everything . . . here also, there are five relationship: relationship between master and the servant, relationship between friend and friend, relationship between father and son, and relationship between boyfriend and girlfriend. All these relationships are emanating from Kṛṣṇa, akhila-rasāmṛta-sindhu: the ocean of all pleasure.

And Kṛṣṇa comes Himself to give you this message. Kṛṣṇa appeared five thousand years ago on this planet, and at Vṛndāvana He exhibited His real pastimes in the spiritual world, so just to give practical demonstration and to invite you there. Kṛṣṇa (is) canvassing: sarva-dharmān parityajya mām ekaṁ śaraṇaṁ vraja (BG 18.66).

So we have got this message from Kṛṣṇa, from Caitanya Mahāprabhu, from the six Gosvāmīs, later on, Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura, Bhaktisiddhānta Ṭhākura. And we are trying our bit also to distribute this knowledge. Now, tenth, eleventh, twelfth. My Guru Mahārāja is tenth from Caitanya Mahāprabhu, I am eleventh, you are the twelfth. So distribute this knowledge. People are suffering. They are simply fighting on some false thing, māyā. They should be given the real fact of happiness.

We have spoiled our life, many life, coming through the evolutionary process of 8,400,000 species of life. Here is an opportunity, human form of life, and here is the message of Lord Caitanya, Kṛṣṇa. Human form of life can understand, and especially in America you can understand. You have got better intelligence, better facility. We are not sentimental, simply chanting and dancing. We have got more than two dozen volumes of books. If you want to learn it through science, philosophy, it is also there.

Otherwise, the simple method—simply chant Hare Kṛṣṇa, Hare Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa, Hare Hare/ Hare Rāma, Hare Rāma, Rāma, Rāma, Hare Hare, and you'll realize the whole thing. The child can take part, the philosopher can take part, the scientist can take part, the politician can take part, the religionist can take part, the public can take part. It is so universal. And it is open; there is no secrecy. It is not that, "I shall give you some secret mantra, and give me some money, I go away." It is open.

So I especially appeal to the Americans, whose boys and girls are helping me so much: please take this philosophy, try to understand this philosophy. Make your life successful—your country and the whole world. You are helping other parts of the world who are not very much developed with money, with resources.

That is a very good idea. But in your country you do not see how the younger generation are going astray, how they're baffled and confused. You should take care of this. The flower of your country, they are becoming hopeless, confused. Try to save them. And this is the only remedy, Kṛṣṇa consciousness, that can save your country and the whole world.

Thank you very much.

Devotees: Jaya (cut) (end)