710903 - Lecture SB 05.05.05 - London

Lectures by Date, 1971

His Divine Grace
A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada

 Listen to a 'Nectar Drop' created from this lecture

710903SB-LONDON - September 03, 1971 - 24:39 Minutes

Prabhupāda: Parābhavas tāvad abodha-jātaḥ.

Pradyumna:

parābhavas tāvad abodha-jāto

yāvan na jijñāsata ātma-tattvam

yāvat kriyās tāvad idaṁ mano vai

karmātmakaṁ yena śarīra-bandhaḥ

(SB 5.5.5)

Prabhupāda: Hmm. This great science is unknown to the modern civilization. Parābhavas tāvad abodha-jāto yāvan na jijñāsata ātma-tattvam. What is the next?

Pradyumna: Yāvat kriyās tāvad

Prabhupāda: Yāvat kriyās tāvad

Pradyumna: Idaṁ mano vai.

Prabhupāda: Karmātmakam

Pradyumna: Yena śarīra-bandhaḥ.

Prabhupāda: Yena śarīra-bandhaḥ. People are working very hard, day and night. Karmātmakam. Karmātmakam means that "I shall work and make profit and enjoy." That is called karmātmakam, fruitive activities. Everyone is working for some profit. So in this way, according to different karma, or according to different association.

Everyone is engaged in different karma, or activities. Just like disease. Disease means different type of contamination. This is disease. Doctors, they have got different . . . they have to treat different types of diseases by different types of medicine. Why? Because the patient has contaminated a different type of infection.

So actually, spirit soul has nothing to do for livelihood. They are working so hard. That is māyā. Because everyone is working for economic development, this is māyā. Just like the newspaper reporter asked me, "the crisis." They created a situation that ultimately it has come to a crisis. The big, big oil tankers are now standing without any work, and they're feeling scarcity.

Actually, we haven't got to work for our livelihood. There are 8,400,000 species of living entities. Out of that, only 400,000 species of life are human form. Other 8,000,000's, they are bird, beast, trees, insect, aquatics, so many varieties. So they have no economic problem. The bird, beast, aquatic, they have no economic problem. They have sufficient . . . our material necessities are to eat, to sleep, to have sex life and to have protection from danger. These are our problems.

So living entities less intelligent than the human being, they have no problem of this field of activities. They are eating. They have no problem for eating. They have no problem for sleeping. They have no problem for sex life. And neither they have problem for any defense. That is already there.

A bird, early in the morning, chirps very nicely. He has no problem. He will go anywhere and get some fruits and eat, and sleeping accommodation is there on top of the tree. And the sex—the male bird, the female bird, they take birth simultaneously. And defense . . . they know how to defend themselves. They are in danger on the ground; they live on the top of the tree. So they know how to defend, how to enjoy sex life, how to eat, how to sleep. So there is no problem.

Now why human society has created this problem? If 8,000,000 living entities can have no problem, why the 4,000,000 group, the human society, they will have problem? That is māyā. Actually, there is no problem. They have created problem. By their advanced intelligence they have created problem. Why? Because the advanced intelligence is not being properly used. They are being used for these lower-grade activities: eating, sleeping, mating and defending. The human being, being advanced in consciousness, they should have used the advanced intelligence for self-realization. But that, they are . . . there is no such education in the universities.

That . . . I raised this question in the Massachusetts Technical Institution when I was asked to speak that, "Where is your technical department where a man after death can be alive again, injecting some . . .?" Just like motor stops, so a mechanical technologist go and makes the, I mean to say, machine correctly. Then it again runs. That I understand that there is technology. But when a man stops running, where is the technology to give him again the energy to go on?

Because it is Massachusetts Institute of Technology, this technology must be there. So I asked the university, "Where is your that department?" The rascal could not answer. (laughter) Yes. And they appreciated, the students. Later on, they surrounded me and they appreciated, "Actually, where is that technology in the university?" That is called parābhava.

This verse is there, parābhavas tāvad abodha-jātaḥ. These rascal, they are born fools and rascals, and they are working in rascaldom. Therefore, whatever they are doing, it is defeat. Therefore this crisis has come. Parābhavas tāvad abodha-jātaḥ. They are rascals and fools, and there is no proper education to understand, "What I am? What is my necessity?"

That education is wanting. These rascals are accepting this body, "I am this body." And they are working for the bodily necessities of life. But that is being done by the lower animals, working day and night hard for the necessities of the body. That verse is here: parābhavas tāvad abodha-jāto yāvan na jijñāsata ātma-tattvam.

These rascals do not inquire also that, "I am working so hard for this body, but this body cannot be protected. And when the body is dead, nobody can help." They are technologist. When the motor stops, they can again run on by supplying something which is wanting. Why not this technology?

That means they do not know what is the need of the body. When the body dies, they cry simply like child, "My father has gone." Why your father has gone? It is lying there. Where he has gone? It is lying on the floor or on the bed, "No, my father has gone." He has not seen his father, he has seen the body. And now he says: "My father has gone." Body . . . you saw the father's body. The body is there. Why you are crying, "My father has gone"? He's lying there.

This is called defeat. What you are seeing, his father or his son, that is lying there, but he does not know who is his father, who is his son. This is called defeat. Abodha-jātaḥ. He remains the same fool and rascal as he was born. A born rascal. Otherwise, why children are sent to school? To become intelligent, to become men of knowledge, wise men. But where is the wisdom? Your technology is not there.

The whole world is working under this wrong impression that, "I am this body." Yasyātma-buddhiḥ kuṇape tri-dhātuke (SB 10.84.13). That is the defeat. It is practical. And they are simply meeting crisis after crisis, because they're rascals and fools. This is a civilization of rascal and fools. Parābhavas tāvad abodha-jātaḥ. Why rascal and fools? Yāvan na jijñāsata ātma-tattvam. There is no inquiry, "What I am? Why I am becoming befooled? I am trying so much. Why the problems are still there, or the problems are increasing?" These questions are not there. Simply blindly, like asses and cows, working and going to the slaughterhouse, cannot protest, cannot protect. Animal civilization.

So this animal civilization will continue so long one does not inquire what he is. That is real intelligence, "What I am? Am I this body? If I am not this body, then I am not American, I am not Indian, I am not black, I am not white, I am not brāhmin, I am not śūdra." So many things become "I am not." And when you understand what you are, if you work on that basis, then there is no crisis. You are working on the wrong basis of understanding, identifying with this body yourself. You are not this body.

Therefore unless one comes to the standard of inquiring, "What I am? Why I am forced to suffer? I do not like to suffer. I do not like to die. Why there is death? I do not like to become old man. Why I become old man? I do not want any disease. Why there is disease?" they are not making solution of these problems. They are after these temporary problems. Therefore they are working hard. Working hard means simply contaminating another kind of infection, and therefore the śarīra-bandha. Śarīra-bandha, different types of bodies I am transmigrating from one body to another. My problems remains the same: birth, death, old age and disease. And therefore whatever I am doing, it is all defeat. Parābhava.

So don't work for being defeated by the laws of material nature. Try to conquer over the laws of material nature. That we can do simply by Kṛṣṇa consciousness. Mama māyā duratyayā. What is that verse?

daivī hy eṣā guṇamayī

mama māyā duratyayā

mām eva ye prapadyante

māyām etāṁ taranti te

(BG 7.14)

Where is that? Bhagavad-gītā? Take Bhagavad-gītā. Find out this verse, Seventh Chapter. Mama māyā duratyayā.

So read books profusely and learn the problems of life and the solution of life. Everything is there. Read it.

Pradyumna:

daivī hy eṣā guṇamayī

mama māyā duratyayā

mām eva ye prapadyante

māyām etāṁ taranti te

(BG 7.14)

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Pradyumna: "This divine energy of Mine, consisting of the three modes of material nature, is difficult to overcome. But those who have surrendered unto Me can easily cross beyond it."

Prabhupāda: Purport.

Pradyumna: "The Supreme Personality of Godhead has innumerable energies, and all these energies are divine. Although the living entities are part of His energies and are therefore divine, due to contact with material energy, their original superior power is covered."

Prabhupāda: We have to work under some energy. This is our position. We are also energy. Just like two energy, the negative and positive, works on electricity, similarly . . . there are varieties of energies. We are also one of the energy of God. So our position is marginal energy. We can work under spiritual energy, we can work under material energy. We have to take shelter of another energy.

Therefore our position is marginal. We can take shelter of the material energy or the spiritual energy, as we like. If we take the shelter of material energy, then we become entangled. Therefore it is called daivī hy eṣā guṇamayī mama māyā duratyayā (BG 7.14). Without knowledge, without identification, if we take the shelter of material energy, then we become in darkness. Tṛtīya karma-saṅga anya śaktir iṣyate. This third energy, material, I mean to say, human being, or living entity . . .

Therefore at the present moment . . . there are different atmosphere. Just like here, in this house, in this temple, the spiritual energy is acting. Outside this house the material energy's acting. What is the difference between this house and the next house? Here the material energy is not working; the spiritual energy is working.

The other house, the same pattern—there is no difference between this house and that house—the only difference is the other house, they are interested in material energy, and here, in this house, the inhabitants are interested in spiritual energy. So that is explained here, that if we work under material energy, then there will be problems of life. And if we work under spiritual energy, there will be no . . . all problems will be solved. This is Kṛṣṇa consciousness.

What is the purport? Go on.

Pradyumna: "Being thus covered by material energy, one cannot possibly overcome its influence."

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Pradyumna: "As previously stated, both the material and spiritual natures, being emanations from the Supreme Personality of Godhead, are eternal. The living entities belong to the eternal, superior nature of the Lord. But due to contamination by the inferior nature, matter, their illusion is also eternal."

Prabhupāda: Just like a citizen is supposed to remain free, but sometimes is put into the jail because he has worked under different criminal energy. So therefore he is put into the jail. But when he becomes perfectly civil, so there is no jail for him—he is free to move. So we have preferred to act under material energy—therefore we are suffering, there are problems. And if we prefer to act under spiritual energy, then we'll be happy. This is the difference.

So what is difference between material energy and spiritual energy? Material energy means one works for his own sense gratification, and spiritual energy means one works for sense gratification of Kṛṣṇa. That's all. There must be some sense gratification, working. But when we work for our personal sense gratification, that is called māyā. He cannot be personally be satisfied without Kṛṣṇa.

Just like in this body, different parts of the body, they cannot enjoy independently. If you get nice cake, you have to put it to the stomach; then you'll get the energy. And if you want . . . this finger caught the cake and want to utilize themself, that is not possible. It must give it here. And then the energy will be distributed. This is the difference. The materialistic person, they are simply taking things for enjoying themselves. That is māyā. They cannot enjoy themselves. But if you take through Kṛṣṇa, then it is spiritual life. That is the difference between material and spiritual.

ātmendriya-prīti-vāñchā—tāre bali 'kāma'

kṛṣṇendriya-prīti-icchā dhare 'prema' nāma

(CC Adi 4.165)

When you try to satisfy your own senses, that is lust. And when you satisfy . . . when you try to satisfy the senses of Kṛṣṇa, or God, that is called love. Here in this material world so-called love is personal sense gratification. A girl loves a boy, she has got the intention for personal sense gratification. Or the boy loves the girl, he has also the same, personal sense gratification. But the gopīs' love for Kṛṣṇa is not for personal sense gratification, but for Kṛṣṇa's sense gratification. That is the difference between gopī's love and people's lust.

So love cannot be possible within this material world because everyone has got the intention to satisfy his senses. Therefore love is not possible in the material world. Love is possible only in the spiritual atmosphere. When we know how to love Kṛṣṇa, or God, then our life is . . . yenātmā suprasīdati. By that love you'll be fully satisfied. Ahaituky apratihatā yenātmā suprasīdati. Sa vai puṁsāṁ paro dharmo yato bhaktir adhokṣaje (SB 1.2.6). So this Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement is to train people how to satisfy the senses of Kṛṣṇa. Then all problems will be solved.

Thank you very much. Hare Kṛṣṇa. (devotees offer obeisances) (end)