731216 - Morning Walk - Los Angeles

Morning Walks by Date, 1973

His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada

731216MW-LOS ANGELES - December 16, 1973 - 50:24 Minutes

Prabhupāda: . . . need of God or not? Whether there is need of God?

Prajāpati: The scientists say no, Śrīla Prabhupāda.

Prabhupāda: That is rascaldom.

Prajāpati: They say there's neither need nor usefulness.

Prabhupāda: That is their rascaldom. What is your opinion, scientist? There is need of God.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: They may say that there is no necessity, but the fact is that there must be.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: Otherwise they . . . we cannot conceive of how things are going on.

Prabhupāda: Nityo nityānāṁ cetanaś cetanānām (Kaṭha Upaniṣad 2.2.13). Just like in the modern days, government, they have abolished monarchism, but still, why they elect a president? Why?

Prajāpati: Must be leadership.

Prabhupāda: Must be. That is the point. If you have abolished monarchy, then why you are electing another rascal to become a monarch? What is the answer? Why do you need it?

Svarūpa Dāmodara: Because they need law and order.

Prabhupāda: Yes, there must be. In our organization . . . just like in each temple we elect a president. Then we get GBC. Then above all, I am. So that is needed. It is not conventional; it is needed. Therefore above everything, there must be God. So if these people, they say: "There is no need of God. There is no use for Him," that means they are all rascals.

Karandhara: It means they themselves want to be that God.

Prabhupāda: Eh?

Karandhara: They themselves want to be that God.

Prabhupāda: (laughs) That doesn't matter. You become God. But our point is there is need of God.

Karandhara: Well, on that basis, on that logic, they would say: "Yes, there is need, but we can fill that need."

Prabhupāda: You fill, that's all right, but if you cannot . . . that is the question. (laughter) Our definition of God is that He maintains everyone. Can you maintain everyone?

Karandhara: They are thinking they are maintaining.

Prabhupāda: They again thinking. What is your present position? You are maintained. You cannot maintain. You are maintained by your boss. He gives you some salary and you fill up your bellies. You rascal, you want to be maintainer. You cannot maintain even a family of five heads. Therefore we say all full of rascals. Harāv abhaktasya kuto . . . (SB 5.18.12).

That is our śāstric conclusion. Anyone who is atheist, nondevotee, he is a rascal number one. Bās. It doesn't matter what post he holds. Our conclusion is that he is a rascal number one. That's all. He cannot have any good qualification. There is need of God. Who will maintain? Just like children: they require care of the parents. The people require the care of a head man, executive. This is essential. You cannot do without God. Who is maintaining that the moon is exactly in time rising, exactly in time setting?

Yaśomatīnandana: Only God.

Prabhupāda: Under whose order it is being done?

Svarūpa Dāmodara: They'll say: "By nature."

Prabhupāda: What you mean, "By nature"? That is another rascaldom. Why this wood is not moving by nature unless somebody comes and moves?

Prajāpati: They will say: "That is just the way things are."

Prabhupāda: But it stops. Your body is moving. But when it stops, you cannot make just the way it is going on.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: They also say: "That is also by nature."

Prabhupāda: What is that nature? Nature means an instrument. Instrument, there must be one player. Nature is instrument. Just like this is an instrument. It is not recording by itself. When you push the button, then it works. You cannot say that "It is working by nature."

Karandhara: They might say that by "nature," they mean it happens naturally. What's happening naturally, they mean it doesn't require anyone . . .

Prabhupāda: No. What things are happening naturally? Your father begets you, therefore you talk. Naturally you have not come. If your father would not begotten you through your mother, how did you come? Naturally your mother does not become pregnant. What things happening naturally?

Karandhara: No, but by the father impregnating the mother, that is natural, naturally.

Prabhupāda: Why naturally? If father does not pregna . . . there are so many now "bachelor daddies." Nothing can be took natural. Nature is an instrument.

Karandhara: Well, they say . . . some say that nothing was actually ever created, so there is no need for . . .

Prabhupāda: Everything is created. That is rascaldom. He is speaking; he is created by his father, the rascal who is talking like that. You were created by your father.

Karandhara: No, but essentially, he says, they are not created.

Prabhupāda: Why not created? I see that your mother became pregnant and you were created and you are . . . why you say . . . your natural . . . your mother did not become naturally pregnant. Everything is created. This table is created. You cannot say that it has come naturally.

Karandhara: This form may be created or it exists at a certain state of time, but the energy is never created.

Prabhupāda: So that also we admit. That is another thing. But the . . . therefore we have got two departments: the spiritual world and the material world. In the material world everything is created. In the spiritual world, not created; it is ever-existing. And anything which is created, that is annihilated.

Karandhara: The energy is not annihilated.

Prabhupāda: No. That we also accept. But that energy belongs to whom?

Karandhara: Well, they say because it was never created, it didn't have to be created.

Prabhupāda: No, no. This material world is created. That you cannot say: "It is not created." Everything we see in our front, everything is created.

Karandhara: Well, they say: "Nothing is created."

Prabhupāda: No. Created in this sense: it is manifested.

Karandhara: In that sense. But that still isn't the creation of the energy itself.

Prabhupāda: That . . . what is that energy? That is spiritual energy. Therefore we divide material energy and spiritual energy. In the spiritual energy everything is manifested and non-manifested. And the spiritual energy, everything is ever-existing. Sanātana. Sanātana. Paras tasmāt tu bhāvo 'nyo 'vyakto 'vyaktāt sanātanaḥ (BG 8.20). Sanātana means ever-existing. There is another nature, but that is not this nature. That we admit.

Karandhara: But this energy was never created, then what is the need for a creator?

Prabhupāda: No. We admit the energy is not created. But energy comes from the energetic. Energy . . . just like you may become angry. So that anger energy is there in you, but it is not manifested. So there are certain energies which sometimes manifested, sometimes not manifested. So this energy, material energy, is of God. This energy is sometimes manifested, sometimes not manifested. But there is another energy, which is eternal. That is spiritual world. That is our . . . this is scientific study. (break)

Prajāpati: They will say that such talk may be of use in a religious sphere, but it has no use ultimately in terms of science.

Prabhupāda: Everywhere it is useful, because in scientific world also, you follow leader, Sir Isaac Newton, Professor Einstein. Why do you follow? There must be a leader.

Karandhara: Well, they just use the leaders as springboards. They don't accept them as absolute authorities.

Prabhupāda: No, it may be springboard, but you have to take their help. Because it is springboard, you cannot neglect. What do you think?

Svarūpa Dāmodara: No.

Prabhupāda: Yes, you have to take help.

Prajāpati: They feel great accomplishment when they can disprove something that these leaders are proposing.

Prabhupāda: No, if the leader is rascal, then it is accepted. But a leader required, that's a fact. But if you select a wrong leader, then you are misguided. But leader is required. Just like to get birth, there must be a father.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: Leader is someone whose words can be accepted. A leader is someone—or a scientist, it doesn't matter, anybody—whose words are followed by . . .

Prabhupāda: Yes, authority. Leader means authority. His instruction is followed, and actually it happens, that is leader. (japa) (break)

Svarūpa Dāmodara: . . . scientific community. It changes so often . . .

Prabhupāda: Because they are not leader, perfect leader. With imperfect knowledge they become leader. Therefore we . . . our process is to accept a leader who is perfect. That is our process. And the others, fools, they accept a leader who is not perfect. But either we or they, they must accept a leader. The only difference is that we accept the perfect leader and they accept the imperfect leader. Therefore they are cheated.

Prajāpati: They will not accept the conception of perfection. They say: "We do not accept this term 'perfection.' "

Prabhupāda: Yes. Because they are fools, therefore they are fooled. Unless there is conception of perfection, why do you change leader? Why do you make revolution?

Prajāpati: The lesser of two evils.

Karandhara: They accept the conception, but they don't accept the reality of it.

Prabhupāda: No. Reality, because they do not know. They have been always been misguided by rascals. Therefore they cannot think of that there can be perfection. This is called skepticism. Because everyone is faulty, therefore there is no knowledge. This is skeptism. But real knowledge is that as I see this man is intelligent that man, that man is intelligent than that man, therefore there is an ideal intelligent man, which we could not find. And that is God. Sarva-kāraṇa-kāraṇam (Bs. 5.1).

Karandhara: Just like when they go and excavate a city under the ground, an old city, they see that so many things were built, and they say: "Oh, these people were very intelligent." Although they never saw the person, they saw the civilization in the same . . .

Prabhupāda: Yes. By symptoms. By symptoms they can understand.

Karandhara: So they say: "Well, we cannot see God." But they could not see the people in those past days either.

Prabhupāda: No. You cannot see . . . you cannot see the government, but when things are going nicely, you must accept there is government. There is. When things are going on very nicely, regularly—the sun is rising regularly, the moon is rising regularly, the seasons are changing and the waves are flowing, everything—then you have to accept that there is government. And as we have got experience here in this material world . . . government is impersonal, but at the end there is a president. Similarly, the whole government, the complete government, may be impersonal in the beginning, but at the end there is a person, that Supreme Person, Bhagavān. Brahmeti paramātmeti bhagavān iti śabdyate (SB 1.2.11). Yes.

Paramātmā is representative of God. Just like the president has got so many representative governors, similarly, Paramātmā is the localized representative of God, and God is person, and the whole government is impersonal. This is the conception. When we say: "government," you cannot localize, that "Who is that person, government?" That is impersonal. But when we find governor, then localized person. And then above them, all of them, when there is president, he is supreme person. This is our practical example. Similarly, nature is working impersonally, but there are officers. They are called demigods. And above them all there is the Supreme Lord. He is Bhagavān. And this idea wherefrom has come, the president, the governors, and the government? Janmādy asya yataḥ (SB 1.1.1). It has come from there. Because of the origin, the same thing is there.

Prajāpati: They will say, Śrīla Prabhupāda . . .

Prabhupāda: They are rascals. They will say anything. (laughter) But this is the fact. (laughs) When a madman speaks, he speaks all nonsense. But we are not madmen. We cannot accept their version. What they will say?

Prajāpati: Even in a group of chickens, there is one who is the . . .

Prabhupāda: Mother chicken.

Prajāpati: The head chicken. The head chicken. Or monkeys. There is also what's called pecking order. One is the top, and then there's one at the end who gets the least, and all these gradations in between. In any group there is always like that. So they say simply the reason we have government with one man head is because that's the natural pecking order, like chickens.

Prabhupāda: Yes, that's all right. Why this natural order has come? It is needed.

Karandhara: They say chance. Chance in nature . . .

Prabhupāda: There is no chance. That is rascaldom. There is no chance. There is no chance.

Karandhara: That's their theory of evolution, selectivity, that whatever develops, develops out of necessity, but not out of design.

Prabhupāda: No, there is design. They do not know it. Mayādhyakṣeṇa (BG 9.10). It is said in the Bhaga . . . adhyakṣeṇa means, "Under My superintendence." That means under some plan. What is the plan of this material world? The plan of material world is that some rascals, living entities, they wanted to enjoy. So God has given this plan, "All right, you enjoy." This is the plan. And not only enjoy, "You enjoy; again come back." This is the plan. Pravṛtti-nivṛtti. First of all he is given that "All right, you take all facilities of enjoyment." Therefore Veda is that, "You enjoy like this, and after you have fulfilled your enjoyment, come back again." This is God mercy.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: It is a testing ground of the spirit soul, a testing platform, where we can experience what we wanted, and after that, we can . . . if we don't experience . . .

Prabhupāda: Yes. We wanted to enjoy. We wanted to enjoy. God has given full freedom to enjoy, but this enjoyment is not perfect. Therefore God comes. He says, "Now you have enjoyed, but you have not enjoyed; you have simply suffered. Therefore please come back again." Sarva-dharmān parityajya mām ekam (BG 18.66).

Svarūpa Dāmodara: If we don't experience, we may not know that we are suffering.

Prabhupāda: Yes. Because we have got little freedom. Therefore this freedom is given, "All right." So by freedom, sometimes we are becoming Lord Brahmā and sometimes the germ in the stool. This is going on. Otherwise, why there are so many different types of living entities? That freedom is acting under three modes: sattva-guṇa, rajo-guṇa and tamo-guṇa. And when they are multiplied, three into three equals to nine, nine into . . . eighty-one; therefore 8,400,000 species. They experience everything. That is evolution, coming down, again going up, coming down again. Bhūtvā bhūtvā pralīyate (BG 8.19). So when they become exasperated, "No more," they want to become merging into the Supreme.

When they are fatigued. After being karmī, then jñānī, "This is not good. What is actually our aim of life, let us search out." But because they make research in their teeny brain, they come to the conclusion voidism and impersonalism that, "Make it zero, this botheration." That is also imperfect. So when they come to Bhagavān and engage himself in the service, then it is perfect. Original.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: They want things by experimental knowledge, and when they fail it, they say it is nothing.

Prabhupāda: Yes, (laughs) that is voidism. First of all they try to enjoy. When they fail . . . the jackal in the orchard first of all tried to get the grapes, jumping, jumping, jumping. When he could not get, then he say: "It is sour. Don't require." (laughter) They will say, brahma satyaṁ jagan mithyā: "This is all false. Let us go to Brahman." This is their philosophy. First of all they try as karmī "brmmmmmmm". (laughter)

When all these "brm-brm-brm", life after life, when he finds that there is nothing, "Oh, it is all false. Grapes are sour." Jackal jumping. There is need of God. You can write article.

Prajāpati: Need of God.

Prabhupāda: Yes, there is need, absolute need.

Prajāpati: And need to trust in God.

Prabhupāda: Yes. Exactly like that. A child needs parents and absolute surrender to parent. That is natural.

Prajāpati: He needs parents to be born at all. He need parents that he can rely on.

Prabhupāda: Yes, so that he may grow. That Upendra's wife and child, the child is so restless, not for a single moment. And the mother has to take care, "No, no, no, no. No, no, no, no." She requires a mother to take care.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: But the child is automatically taken care of by the parents.

Prabhupāda: Yes, but he does not know. Child is foolish. He does not know. Similarly, everything is taken care by God. He is supplying food, He is supplying seasons, He is supplying lights—everything I require. But we are so rascals, we are denying Him. You see?

Karandhara: Well, they say there is discrepancies in that supply. Some people starve to death and freeze to death.

Prabhupāda: Yes, that is not discrepancy. Just like a mother, when the child is diseased, "Ah, don't take. You cannot take. You must starve." If he thinks it is discrepancy, that is his foolishness. That is foolishness.

Karandhara: Well, just like if a big tornado comes and kills a thousand people . . .

Prabhupāda: Yes, because on account of their sins. Because they do not know. Why government hangs one person? Is there government discrepancy? When government says, the judge says: "This man must be hanged," is it discrepancy? It is justice.

Karandhara: Well, just like that one Indian chemist Svarūpa Dāmodara brought. He said that philosophy is killing India. People just sit by and watch each other die instead of trying to help each other.

Prabhupāda: No, that he is rascal. No Indian is dying. We are going three times, four times India. Who is dying? Everyone is dying natural death. This is all propaganda, to make their position secure. That's all. I have never seen anyone dying for starvation. I have pointed out so many times that fifty years ago this class of men lying on the footpath . . . now the food grains have risen price fifty times. Still he is living. Still he is living. But he has to live in that condition—although he must have increased his income, otherwise how he is purchasing foodstuff, fifty times? But in spite of his increasing income, he must live like that. Apart from India, why, in your country or in Europe, so many hippies are lying? Why? They have no want.

Karandhara: But not as many.

Prabhupāda: Oh, you have not seen Amsterdam. Full, one big park, hundreds and thousand hippies are lying on this ground. Hundreds and thousands. You have been in Amsterdam? I have seen it personally.

Devotee: Yes.

Karandhara: But not like India, where there is millions of people . . .

Prabhupāda: No, no, India you will not find that in the park hundreds and thousands are just lying. You never find.

Karandhara: Well, you'll find them living in sewer pipes.

Prabhupāda: Anyway, our proposition is that one class of men must lie down like that.

Rūpānuga: That is their business. That is their business, that is their bus . . . their nature.

Prabhupāda: That is their business. They must.

Karandhara: Just like here they build big buildings for them and let them . . .

Prabhupāda: But they do not go. In Bombay also, Municipality has constructed big buildings, but they do not go. They hire it, yes, they get, to some gentleman. They get some fifty rupees and "All right, you take." And he lives in a hut. Yes. This is practical. They don't like. Just like a worm with the stool: you take it away; he will again, again go. (laughter) Again go there. You are very philanthropist: "Oh, my dear friend, why you are in the stool? Come on, here." "No, no, sir, I will go there again." How can you check it? Nature's law.

Karandhara: Well, they say it can be checked by time and education.

Prabhupāda: Oh, that time . . . you wait for time, by that time you will die.

Karandhara: Well, just like a hundred years ago in the United States all these . . .

Prabhupāda: No. These discrepancies will go on because this whole material world is being conducted by three qualities. You will have three qualitative person.

Karandhara: Well, they think they are making progress by conquering over those qualities.

Prabhupāda: That they are making progress . . . everyone knows what kind of progress they are making.

Prajāpati: Śrīla Prabhupāda, there was a great philosopher, or a preacher, among the Jewish people whose position is that, "If there is God and He let so many Jews be killed by Hitler, ten million Jews, and God could have stopped it and He didn't, then I don't care for that God." They say like that.

Prabhupāda: So God . . . their God, Jesus Christ God, he could not even protect himself also. The reply should be, Christian, if Jesus Christ is God, then why he could not protect himself?

Karandhara: Well, the Jews say Jesus Christ wasn't God.

Prabhupāda: Well, but somebody said.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: It is just like the concept that if God is all-merciful, why He is so impartial, somebody making happy, somebody making suffering?

Prabhupāda: Yes, that is mercifulness. Just like when doctor says: "You don't take anything today. You fast," that is mercy. That is mercy. It is good for him. By starving, he will be cured. That is mercy. And according to Manu-saṁhitā, when a man is hanged, that is mercy. If he is hanged . . . he has committed murder; he should be hanged so all his sinful reaction finished. Otherwise next birth, he has to suffer. He has to be killed by somebody else.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: But the tendency is that the sufferer wants to complain.

Prabhupāda: No, that they will complain. Just like when a man is ordered to be hanged, he will complain, "Just see, the police, judge, he has ordered me to be hanged." That complaint will go on. Just like a child. When the doctor says, "Don't eat anything," he will complain, he'll cry, "Why doctor says like that?" But it has to be done.

Karandhara: Well, then they'll say: "Well, if you see somebody suffering, then why do anything about it, if it's just what they're . . .?"

Prabhupāda: Yes, we are doing everything to stop his suffering.

Karandhara: They will say: "Why? If that's what they deserve, why try to stop it?"

Prabhupāda: No, because he has come here to suffer. You cannot expect in the prison life a very comfortable life. You must suffer. But if somebody goes there that, "Don't commit stealing anymore. Come out and don't come here again," so that is required.

Rūpānuga: Just because a man goes in the prison house doesn't mean his thieving is cured. He will come out a thief unless he is actually rectified.

Prabhupāda: Yes. Yes. Otherwise again he will commit the same thing and again he will come. Bhūtvā bhūtvā pralīyate (BG 8.19). Therefore he requires instruction, good instruction. Sometimes government invites. We were invited that Ahmedabad jail. You remember?

Śrutakīrti: Yes.

Prabhupāda: Oh, there was big meeting of the prisoners. Kīrtana, everything. Yes.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: So by lacking in the understanding, they say that God is not merciful, these sufferers, people who are suffering. But by not knowing that it is the mercy of the Lord, we complain that God is not merciful. But He is impartial.

Prabhupāda: No, God is merciful, but this fool does not know because he is ignorant. The same thing, mother says. One child, (s)he is feeding very sumptuously. Other one, "Don't take it. You go away." Does it mean the mother is merciful to one child and not to the other? The child does not know it, he cries. He cries, "Why shall I not . . .? Why I shall not eat? Why I shall not eat?" So these foolish questions will be stopped as soon as one becomes God conscious.

Karandhara: But unless they understand the difference between spirit and matter, they can't accept this logic.

Prabhupāda: Well, foolish man cannot accept any logic. Their logic is stick, "If you don't accept, I shall kick on your face. Accept it." That is the . . . that is wanted.

Karandhara: Like the example when Hitler killed the Jews. They will say: "Well, what should we do? Just let Hitler go on killing the Jews because the Jews were sinful? Or should we try and stop Hitler?"

Prabhupāda: Well, Hitler was imperfect and everything was imperfect. That you cannot compare Hitler's action . . .

Karandhara: But what should I do if I see that happening?

Prabhupāda: . . . is God's action. God is all-perfect. That is first proposition. God is all-perfect.

Karandhara: That may be accepted in retrospection, but when it is happening, they don't accept that.

Prabhupāda: No, that is their ignorance, foolishness. Therefore a devotee will not say like that. A devotee will say, tat te 'nukampāṁ susamīkṣamāṇaḥ (SB 10.14.8): "My dear Lord, I am suffering. It is due to my past mischievous activities, but You are rescuing me by giving little punishment. I would have been punished more, but You have given little punishment. Thank You very much." This is devotion.

Karandhara: Well, what if someone came here now to attack us? Should I just sit there and watch him, and say that . . .

Prabhupāda: No. Who said? You must fight.

Karandhara: Well, why? If we are attacked, then we must deserve it.

Prabhupāda: Huh?

Karandhara: If we're being attacked, then . . .

Prabhupāda: No, it may be that somebody is attacking even you do not deserve. So therefore you have got intelligence. You have got hands. You must try to protect.

Karandhara: No, but how can anything go on without God's sanction?

Prabhupāda: Just like one man is destined to be hanged, but still, he appoints a lawyer and tries to save him. He knows that, "I have committed murder. I must be hanged."

Rūpānuga: And then God sanctions the judge. The judge can kill.

Karandhara: Well, that is why they say we must work to help poor people and starving people.

Prabhupāda: Why poor people? You starve. You are already yourself a poor people. How you can help them?

Karandhara: No, they say if we find poor and starving people, we must go and feed them.

Prabhupāda: So you feed them. But we also feed them. But we feed them with Kṛṣṇa prasādam. That is the difference. You do this, that will be actually beneficial. By distributing Kṛṣṇa's prasādam, you will be benefited, they will be benefited.

Prajāpati: If we see a group of demons fighting, killing each other, should devotees go and try to stop them from killing each other?

Prabhupāda: First of all you must know whether they are demons. But demons fight. Gentlemen do not fight.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: Let them fight.

Prabhupāda: (laughs) Let them fight. (laughing)

Svarūpa Dāmodara: The devotees should wish that "O my Lord, please . . ."

Prabhupāda: Devotees must pray that "This great demon Hiraṇyakaśipu may be killed by You, my Lord." Therefore He comes. Just like Prahlāda Mahārāja passively . . . (break) . . . father was being killed. He could have stopped it, but he did not. He did not. If Prahlāda Mahārāja would have requested, immediately it would have been stopped. But he did not. He said, rather, in his prayer that, "Nobody is sorry when a serpent or a scorpion is killed." He said like that. So he said: "My father was just like a serpent and scorpion. Now he is killed. So now You become pacified. No more need of becoming angry." Modeta sādhur api.

Actually, I have seen. There was a snake in our Māyāpur temple. So Guru Mahārāja was standing on the . . . while some devotees were waiting. "Yes, kill it." So at that time I could not understand that, "Such a saintly person, why he is ordering to kill a snake?" Then when I found in Bhāgavata, modeta sādhur api vṛścika-sarpa-hatyā (SB 7.9.14): "A saintly person also becomes engladdened when a snake is killed." Because it is very harmful. He said that, "He will do so many harmful activities. Better kill him." Because his business is to create harm. That's all.

Rūpānuga: A snake attacks without discrimination.

Prabhupāda: Oh, yes.

Rūpānuga: He is mean.

Prabhupāda: Yes. Simply if you are passing by . . . just like dog. Without any fault, bark, "Owf! Owf! Owf! Owf!" This is the animal nature. Without any fault, I am passing, I am not entering his gate; still, the dog will bark. Similarly, the snake . . . you simply pass through. He will feel pleasure, biting you. That is snake's business. Therefore nobody is merciful upon snake.

Karandhara: Because of his poison.

Prabhupāda: Yes. (break) There was a snake. He was living under my bed. So you know kaṭiyā?(?) Kaṭiyā. Kaṭiyā. The rope, kaṭiyā? So I saw something is hanging like snake tail. So I called my servant, "There must be some snake. Some tail is hanging." So the servant, they called all their friends. They came with stick, about a dozen. And as soon as the mattress was taken, there was snake. So I told them, "Don't kill it. No, no." "Nei saheb, yei nei hatya" (Hindi: No Sir, It is not possible.) Ah, immediately.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: Once there was a big cobra, Śrīla Prabhupāda, in home in Manipur, in our kitchen. He was just coiling and just sitting there, but he was very mild, because he was about to skin his skin. By that time, he doesn't bite anything; very tame.

Prabhupāda: No, sometimes the serpents are tamed.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: Yes.

Prabhupāda: That's a fact. But still, they are dangerous. That is said by Cāṇakya Paṇḍita. The serpent is so dangerous. That, Caitanya Mahāprabhu said. The serpent is so dangerous that even one imagines there is a serpent, he is . . . becomes afraid. You see? When Mahārāja Pratāparudra wanted to see Him and Sarva Bhaṭṭācārya and others requested that, "He is a devotee." "But I know that he is a devotee, but because he is king, therefore I cannot see him." He gave this encou . . . "The serpent even by imagination is also fearful." He said like that. And Cāṇakya Paṇḍita said, manina bhujitaḥ sarpa kim asau na bhayaṁkaraḥ. A serpent . . . you know, sometimes they have got jewel.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: Yes.

Prabhupāda: So "A serpent with jewel, does it mean that he is not fearful?" Even with jewel he is fearful. Therefore the demon, even with high educational qualification, he is rascal. He is rascal, fearful.

Prajāpati: That high education is just like the jewel.

Prabhupāda: Yes. But still fearful.

Prajāpati: But Haridāsa Ṭhākura, he had a serpent in his cave that he was not so much fearful of.

Prabhupāda: No, I said that, that sometimes serpents are tame, friendly, everything, with jewel. But still they are fearful. Still, they are fearful. They cannot be trusted. A demon may be your friend, but you cannot trust him. Manina bhujitaḥ sarpa kim asau na bhayaṁkaraḥ. Just like (laughing) your sky in the Western world. However clear it may be, you cannot trust. At any moment there will be cloud.

Jaya-hari: Yes.

Is that all right?

Jaya-hari: Especially in London.

Prabhupāda: Yes, I am therefore speaking, Western world. So what is the London news, Jaya-hari? (break)

Prajāpati: . . . in what sense is the First Canto His lotus feet?

Prabhupāda: Lotus feet because we worship Kṛṣṇa by worshiping the lotus feet first. We offer flower to the lotus feet. So one must go from First Canto to Second Canto, Third Canto, gradually make progress, not all of a sudden want to see how Kṛṣṇa is smiling. You see? That you cannot understand. So the sahajiyās, they go, immediately jump to the Kṛṣṇa's rāsa-līlā, without worshiping gradually. Therefore they misunderstand. (break) Just to understand Kṛṣṇa.

Prajāpati: But Kṛṣṇa's disappearance, about having a māyā body that He left behind, a māyā body, is that anything to do with Māyāvādī?

Prabhupāda: Yes. Māyāvādī means those who are in māyā, those who are thinking Kṛṣṇa as one of the human being, for them, to delude them, He left the body. But actually He departed in His own body. There is no question of . . . here is another . . . but just like this is also, this material world, this is also Kṛṣṇa's body. But this is interesting to the Māyāvādīs, the so-called scientist, so-called philosopher. But it is not interesting to the devotees. They are thinking, "This is all." Is not that? The scientist, the philosophers, they are thinking, "This is all. There is nothing beyond this." This is illusion. This is only reflection of the reality.

Viśvareta: Śrīla Prabhupāda, what about process to understanding? Scientists, they have their mental process, but what is our process to understand this knowledge?

Prabhupāda: Ascending. Ah, descending, not ascending. We have to take knowledge from superior. We should not try ourself to know. That will be imperfect. Avaroha-panthā. Just like we're receiving knowledge from Kṛṣṇa. We are not researching. Those who are researching, they cannot understand Kṛṣṇa. They understand Kṛṣṇa as ordinary human being, maybe little learned. That's all. The Dr. Frog's calculation of Atlantic Ocean. That's all. Avajānanti māṁ mūḍhāḥ (BG 9.11).

(break) . . . automatically. You see? But he does not know that behind this automation there is brain. He'll see, "Oh, how nice." That's all. Similarly, childlike scientist, they will say: "Everything is going on automatically." (break) . . . but there is brain behind that.

Karandhara: But for the child, the presents do appear automatically.

Prabhupāda: Huh?

Karandhara: For the child, the presents at Christmas do appear automatically, by the grace of the parents. So the fruits appear automatically by the grace of Kṛṣṇa.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Rūpānuga: The main thing is their leaders have no qualifications. Our leader has all qualifications. Our leader has all qualifications.

Prabhupāda: Oh, yes, because they are perfect.

Prajāpati: Therefore all auspiciousness appears by your presence, Śrīla Prabhupāda.

Prabhupāda: Yes, provided you accept it. You have got independence also. Acceptance and rejection.

Jaya-hari: English car, Prabhupāda?

Prabhupāda: Rolls-Royce. Not only English; you could not. (laughter) You could not, but he has done. Sometimes Śyāmasundara is envious of Karandhara. Now, just see what is the difference. He has taken twenty thousand dollars. He cannot pay.

Devotees: Jaya. All glories to Śrīla Prabhupāda. (end)