751115 - Lecture Hindi and English - Bombay

Lectures by Date, 1975

His Divine Grace
A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada

 Listen to a 'Nectar Drop' created from this lecture

751115LE-BOMBAY - November 15, 1975 - 16:17 Minutes

(Hindi translated into English - final check pending)

(Hindi for much of lecture, translated here)

Prabhupāda: This land of India is for the welfare of humanity, not for looting others. This is Caitanya Mahāprabhu's mission. The persons outside India are only planning how to loot others. This is not the plan of India. India's plan is to do welfare for the humanity. But people outside India do not know what is the aim of life. This we have to make them understand. We have to make our own life successful, and how to do it is being disclosed by the Lord Himself and by the devotees of the Lord. So we need to hear that, work naturally on that, and make life successful. Then you go and tell others about this and make their life successful also. This is Caitanya Mahāprabhu's mission:

bhārata bhūmite manuṣya janma haila yāra

janma sārthaka kari karo para-upakāra

(CC Adi 9.41)

pṛthivīte āche yata nagarādi grāma

sarvatra pracāra haibe mora nāma

(CB Antya-khaṇḍa 4.126)

There is much to say, but we are requesting you. This Indian culture is being accepted by many. It is not that we are talking in the air. Actually they are accepting. So this Kṛṣṇa consciousness means that we take the message as spoken by Lord Kṛṣṇa, understand it nicely, and preach this message to the rest of the world. You will see how the glories of India increase. This is our request to you.

Thank you very much.

Devotees: Jaya Śrīla Prabhupāda. (break)

Audience member: . . . (indistinct)

Prabhupada: If you wish to come back, then you will. Because mukti, or liberation, means, just like I told you earlier,

muktir hitvānyathā rūpaṁ

svarūpeṇa vyavasthitiḥ

(SB 2.10.6)

This is called liberation. What is your constitutional position? Your constitutional position is jīvera 'svarūpa' haya—kṛṣṇera 'nitya-dāsa' (CC Madhya 20.108), to be the servant of the Lord. But if you do not want to be the servant, then after mukti also you have to return to this world to become the servant of māyā. We all will remain servants. Servitorship will not go away. But when we rebel that we will not be the servant of God, then become the servant of māyā. This is a fact.

Audience member: Once we get God, we will not come back?

Prabhupada: (laughs) What will happen if you meet Him? That is sāyujya-mukti. There are five kinds of liberation—sāyujya, sārūpya, sālokya, sārṣṭi and sāmīpya. This meeting Him is the merging into the brahmajyoti, the impersonal effulgence of the Lord. This merging is not the ultimate liberation. After this, we come back into this world. This is given in the scriptures: ye 'nye 'ravindākṣa vimukta-māninas. By merging with the impersonal effulgence of Lord, he thinks that he is liberated. Tvayy asta-bhāvād aviśuddha-buddhayaḥ. Because he does not have any experience about the form of the Lord, therefore his intelligence is impure, not pure. That is why, āruhya kṛcchreṇa paraṁ padaṁ tataḥ (SB 10.2.32). After performing many severe austerities, he merges with the impersonal effulgence of the Lord but again falls down. He again falls down. But if he goes back to God, lives with God, eats, drinks, walks with God, then he does not have to come back here. Yad gatvā na nivartante tad dhāma paramaṁ mama (BG 15.6).

But from the impersonal effulgence he has to return here, as he does not find any bliss there. Just like you may fly in an aeroplane in the sky for some time, but after some time you will be anxious to land the plane on the ground. So by going to the impersonal effulgence of the Lord he could experience eternity, sat, but not bliss. But to enjoy this bliss he has to come into this material bliss again.

So the sannyāsīs who give up this world, saying brahma satyaṁ jagan mithyā, they come back again to join politics or to open hospitals. Because they did not get anything there. This is the fact. Āruhya kṛcchreṇa paraṁ padaṁ tataḥ patanty adho. They again engage in material affairs, as they did not enjoy bliss by merging with the Brahman. That is why you should go to the abode of the Lord. Yad gatvā na nivartante tad dhāma paramaṁ mama. You should go there. Then the liberation is complete.

Audience member: Once we go Vaikuṇṭha . . .

Prabhupada: Yes. Once we go to Vaikuṇṭha, Vṛīndavana, then we don't have to come back here.

Audience member: Your Holiness, I would like to be enlightened on the etymology of "brahmacarya." There is lot of confusion. Brahmacarya is equated with celibacy, being a life-long celibate.

Prabhupada: Austerity means brahmacarya. Tapasā brahmacaryeṇa (SB 6.1.13). This austerity begins with the brahmacārīs. If the brahmacārīs do not perform austerities, then they will not be able to remain steady. You can perform any kind of austerity, jñāna, yoga, meditation; you need brahmacarya in that. It is not possible to indulge in unrestricted sense gratification and also become a big yogī. This is not possible. That is why tapasā brahmacaryeṇa. It is written in the scriptures: tapasya, or austerity, begins with the brahmacārī. Yajña-dāna-tapaḥ-kriyā na tyājyaṁ. The Lord says we should not give up sacrifices, charity and austerity. I have taken sannyāsa, but I should not give up my sacrifice, charity and austerity, although I have given up my home. Yajña-dāna-tapaḥ-kriyā pāvanāni manīṣiṇām (BG 18.5). This should not be given up. So these regulations for the brahmacarya increase the intellectual prowess quickly. So that is why these regulations are needed.

Audience member: Sarvaṁ khalu idaṁ brahma. If the whole world is Brahman, then all the anomalies like corruption, cheating propensity, gambling, drunkenness, lies, etc. are also emanating from this Brahman.

Prabhupada: Yes, just like in a house there is a toilet also. So we should not go there. We should go only to the room where the Deities are kept. Do you understand? Can you live in the toilet, saying that is also the part of the house? Is that a good idea?

Audience member: But we need to go once in a while.

Prabhupada: Yes, we need to go, but we must get out quickly. (everybody laughs and claps) If your mentality is such, then stay there. Who is stopping you? (laughter)

Audience member: Mahārāja, the rules and regulations of Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement are very nice. There are a lot of Life Members of your movement in Bombay. What are you doing for them to follow these regulations . . .

Prabhupada: Why don't you come? We have big houses built there for you. Come and stay. Why don't you come? After so many fights we are developing the Hare Kṛṣṇa land. Is it for us to stay? Do we not have a place to stay? We are making it for you. Why don't you come?

yad yad ācarati śreṣṭhas

tat tad evetaro janaḥ

sa yat pramāṇaṁ kurute

lokas tad anuvartate

(BG 3.21)

You are all respectable people of Bombay, come and see, stay. We have written so many books. Read them, understand them, and then all things will work out. If you stay so far, then how will it work out?

(09:53 - English spoken from here to the end)

Brahmānanda: Śrīla Prabhupāda? Here's one question.

Prabhupada: Yes?

Brahmānanda: (reading question) "In your first chapter of Bhagavad-gītā, I read we have to detach ourselves from worldly life and then surrender to God. Instead of concentrating on the emphasis to detach, should we just concentrate on the Almighty? Then, with His grace, the attraction towards worldly life will die out. Is that not enough? Or should we constantly struggle to kill the attachment with the māyā?

Prabhupada: Attachment and detachment. Paraṁ dṛṣṭvā nivartate (BG 2.59). Unless you get a better thing, you cannot give up your attachment for the inferior thing. Therefore you have to increase your devotion to Kṛṣṇa. Then you will be able to . . .

vāsudeve bhagavati

bhakti-yogaḥ prayojitaḥ

janayaty āśu vairāgyaṁ . . .

(SB 1.2.7)

As soon as you engage in devotional service, devotional life to Vasudeva, janayaty āśu vairāgyaṁ, very soon you will be detached with this material world. Bhaktiḥ pareśānubhavo viraktir anyatra ca (SB 11.2.42). The vivid example is yourself (Brahmānanda). You are American; your father is a great industrialist. How you have been able to give up everything and join Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement? This is attachment and detachment. If you become attached to Kṛṣṇa, then naturally you will be detached to material things. The more you become attached to Kṛṣṇa, the more you become detached. That is the test. Just like if you are hungry, the more you eat, the hunger is finished. Similarly, we have got this tendency for enjoying this material world. The more we become attached to Kṛṣṇa, then we forget this material world. This is attachment and detachment. You cannot remain simply detached. Then āruhya kṛccheṇa paraṁ padaṁ tataḥ patanti adhaḥ, then you will again fall down. There must be some positive attachment. That positive attachment is Kṛṣṇa. Then you will be able to be detached with this material world. Otherwise, it will be not possible.

mām eva ye prapadyante

māyām etāṁ taranti te

(BG 7.14)

Two things: if you want to get out of this māyā, then you have to surrender to Kṛṣṇa and become more attached by devotional service. Ādau śraddhā tataḥ sādhu-saṅga. The processes are there.

. . . tato bhajana-kriyā

ato 'nartha-nivṛttiḥ syāt

tato niṣṭhā tato rucis

athāsaktis tato bhāvas . . .

sādhakānām ayaṁ premṇaḥ

prādurbhāve bhavet kramaḥ

(Brs 1.4.15-16)

So the summary is if you increase your attachment for Kṛṣṇa. Just like Arjuna. Arjuna had already attachment for Kṛṣṇa, but when he listened Bhagavad-gītā from Kṛṣṇa, he understood what is Kṛṣṇa. Then, in the beginning, he was not listening to the order of Kṛṣṇa, that "You must fight." But when he understood that "Kṛṣṇa is my friend. Kṛṣṇa is my life and soul," then he said, kariṣye vacanaṁ tava (BG 18.73): "Yes. I shall do now. I shall kill. Never mind." This is attachment and detachment. First of all he had attachment to the family, and when he understood that "My real attachment is Kṛṣṇa. Whatever He is saying, I shall do it . . ." This is attachment, detachment.

Audience member: Your Holiness? Our Hindu sages from times immemorial have enjoined the four puruṣārthas—dharma, artha, kāma and mokṣa. How do you . . .

Prabhupada: To become Kṛṣṇa conscious you have to transcend even the dharma, artha, kāma, mokṣa. Therefore in the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, in the beginning it is said, dharmaḥ projjhita-kaitavo 'tra paramo nirmatsarāṇāṁ vāstavam vastu vedyaṁ atra (SB 1.1.2). So we have to . . . Śrīdhara Svāmī is giving his comment in this connection, atra mokṣa-vāñchā api nirastam. You have to go beyond mokṣa-vāñchā; then there will be attachment for Kṛṣṇa. Satyaṁ paraṁ dhīmahi (SB 1.1.1). So this is ordinary things, dharma, artha, kama, moksa. And kṛṣṇa-bhakti is beyond mokṣa. So you have to go beyond that. How you can go? That is by kṛṣṇa-bhakti.

māṁ ca 'vyabhicāreṇa

bhakti-yogena sevate

sa guṇān samatītyaitān

brahma-bhūyāya kalpate

(BG 14.26)

brahma-bhūtaḥ prasannātmā

na śocati na kāṅkṣati

(BG 18.54)

So this is the way. Māṁ ca yo 'vyabhicāreṇa. If one takes to Kṛṣṇa consciousness seriously, sa guṇān samatītyaitān brahma-bhūyāya kalpate, he very easily transcends the influence of the three modes of material nature, and immediately he becomes identified with his Brahman realization. That is wanted. (pause)

Now let us chant Hare Kṛṣṇa.

Devotees: Jaya. (end)