The bahirmukha jivas, the living entities, those who have become
averse to Krishna and as a result of that fallen under the influence of
the illusory energy of the Lord, they are getting a chance to rectify
their perverted mentality in this material nature. And through proper
guidance, they ascertain how to rectify their perverted mentality and
become free from their suffering condition. And the process is very
simple, just surrender to Krishna. And the process of surrendering to
Krishna is? By offering everything to Krishna. And the process of
surrendering is? To engage the senses in order to give pleasure to
Krishna’s senses. This is the very simple consideration of devotional
service. Devotional service is not a very difficult thing to execute.
Other spiritual activities are very difficult: austerities, penances,
sacrifice, even deity worship, difficult. But devotional service is very
simple. And devotional service is? Devotional service constitutes just
these two considerations: [BG 9.27]
yat karosi yad asnasi
yaj juhosi dadasi yat
yat tapasyasi kaunteya
tat kurusva mad-arpanam
That is one aspect of devotional service, the other aspect of devotional service is: (CC Madhya-lila 19.170)
sarvopadhi-vinirmuktam´
tat-paratvena nirmalam
hrishikena hrishikesa-
sevanam´ bhaktir ucyate
Jai Sri Sri Gaura Nitai ki jai! Jai Sri Sri Radha Rasabihari ki jai!
Jai Sri Sri Sita Rama Lakshman Hanuman ki jai! Jai Jagadguru Srila
Prabhupada ki jai!
So, Srimad-Bhagavatam, time and time again reminds us of this
principle. Srimad Bhagavatam and Bhagavad-gita are giving us a very
simple
understanding of devotional service. And devotional service means our
constitutional activity or our constitutional position. Bhagavad-gita
time and time again has pointed this principle out that ultimately
coming to the conclusion of “Surrender unto Me. Just surrender unto Me.”
Surrender whatever you have, surrender yourselves, surrender your
senses, your activities, everything ultimately. The result will be, “I
will take care of you in all respects.”
You surrender, and Krishna will take care. You don’t surrender,
Krishna will provide, but He won’t take care in that sense. He’ll
provide out of a sense of duty. But when you surrender, then a loving
relationship will develop and that love is a source of joy.
So Krishna made all the arrangements through material nature,
especially this planet earth and then Mother Earth actually surrendered
to Krishna, she actually explained why she did withdraw all the grains
and herbs and plants and medicinal plants, herbs, which actually provide
for the living entities’ survival. Because she saw that those assets,
those gifts were being exploited by the demoniac people.
So from that we can understand that Mother Earth is actually able to
provide everything that one needs, but if we are not careful, if we do
not offer it to Krishna, if we do not accept them with a sense of
gratitude, which is the principle of sacrifice: [ BG 3.10]
saha-yajnah prajah sristva
purovaca prajapatih
anena prasavis yadhvam
esa vo ‘stv istva-kama-dhuk
Saha-yajnah, when the prajas, the progeny, was procreated, when the
living entities were brought into this material nature, this system has
been established. A kind of rapport between the human beings and the
demigods. So the human beings are receiving the gifts from the demigods
in the form of different necessities being supplied. The demigods are
supplying everything that we need. There is a need of water, the
demigods are supplying. Indra is supplying water, in the form of rain.
Pavandeva is supplying the wind. Suryadeva is supplying the sun rays,
rays of the sun, light.
And in this way different demigods are responsible, in charge of
different departments and they are providing for us, they’re supplying
for us and we are supposed to pay them something in return for the
service we are taking from them, the facilities we are taking, and that
is called yajna. And Krishna is saying by establishing that relationship
you live happily. The living entities are meant to live happily. And
it’s a common sense consideration, we see in our day-to-day lives, we
get facilities and in exchange we have to pay the price. We get
electricity, at the end of the month the bill comes and we have to pay
the bill. We get the supply of water, the bill comes at the end of the
month and we
have to pay. We get nice facilities for roads, we have to pay the bill.
We have an education system, we have to pay the bill. We have the
ability to earn money, and we have to pay the tax.
So in this way there are different facilities that we are receiving and
in exchange for that we have to pay the bill. In our day to day lives we
see… Now if we don’t pay then what will happen? Those supplies will be
cut. We won’t get that supply anymore. So that is the primary
consideration, initial consideration. In the material nature we are
getting different facilities, we are being provided with different
facilities, and who are supplying those facilities? The demigods. And we
have to pay the price. What is the price? The price is yajna. Whatever
you are getting from them, a part of it is given back to them for their
pleasure.
It has been pointed out in this chapter that the grains are actually
meant to be offered in sacrifice. Not all the grains, part of the
grains, with the milk in the form of ghee. These are the two essential
things we are getting from Mother Earth: cows’ milk which is ultimately
transformed into the essence, the ghee, and the grains. And when it’s
offered for the pleasure of the demigods, that is sacrifice.
So in this way we can see that the food grains that are actually
provided by the Mother Earth have three aspects, three purposes. One is
our personal survival, for our food. The other is in the form of seeds
to continue the process of production. And another part is offered to
the demigods in the form of sacrifice. And then by getting that the
demigods will provide. The demigods means the devotees so here it is
pointed out these are non devotees. Mother Earth has pointed out she
didn’t say a special demon, she said the non devotees. That means those
who do not accept the authority of Krishna and the arrangement made by
Krishna.
So because they are exploited and today’s world situation is like
that, that’s why we can very easily conclude that what’s going to happen
to this earth planet in a few years’ time and if we do not rectify the
situation. Like we are seeing there are so many natural calamities
taking place. One natural calamity is the weather pattern is changing.
Then there is excessive heat, the heat waves, all the climactic
conditions are changing so much. The places which were hot, they’re
becoming extremely hot. The places that were cold, even they are
becoming hot. And although we have not seen, we are seeing the rain is
becoming scarce, the water is becoming scarce.
I remember when we used to travel in India, even twenty, thirty years
back we used to see the rivers even in winter, even in early summer,
they were full and rivers didn’t become dry the way they are becoming
now. Yamuna, the way Yamuna changed the last thirty years. I remember
when I used to come to Vrindavan in the seventies, the Yamuna was full,
nowadays it is becoming dry. Most of the rivers are becoming dry. When
we travel we see, we are going over a bridge, but we are not actually
going over a river, we are going over some dry riverbeds.
So rivers are becoming dry, the sky is not generating rains. So what
is going to happen? It is probably only a matter of a few years when the
earth planet can actually become a desert. And then on top of that they
are doing so many things, like hybrid seeds. Then such intense, heavy
fertilizers are being used, they’re burning out the soil. And this
civilization is a very, very destructive civilization. And what they are
doing? They are causing these calamities for themselves. Due to their
reckless activities, the human society today is causing such a
calamitous situation for themselves in the near future.
They are simply concerned about their temporary pleasure. That is
what materialistic was of life is. Just for a momentary pleasure, we are
prepared to sacrifice anything which begins with sex life. Just for a
momentary pleasure, they are prepared to undergo any kind of damage and
loss. And in the broader scale, the human society is running after a
similar kind of attitude, “Let us enjoy, even if it is for one day, one
month or one year, doesn’t matter. Just have it. What will happen? We
don’t care.” They are not concerned with… At least they may survive,
they may go through their generation but what about their children? How
they are creating the future for their children? What kind of future
they are creating for their children? Their children will probably not
have any food to eat, they won’t have any water to drink, they won’t
have any pure oxygen to breathe.
It’s happening, like thirty, forty years back no one could even think
that water could be polluted so bad that we have to drink only bottled
water. We won’t be able to drink tap water, nobody ever thought of that.
Prithu Maharaja simply wanted the grains and seeds. And he used
Svayambhuva Manu to become the calf. Mother Earth in the form of a cow,
she admitted that, “You come, you present me a calf and I will provide.”
Because the cow gives and provides for the sake of the calf but
everyone else benefits. The cow gives milk for the sake of the calf, the
calf only drinks a little bit but the rest of the milk is used for
human beings. So that is the nature of the cow and that is the nature of
Mother Earth. She said, “Present a calf, approach me in the proper way,
I will provide.” So then Prithu Maharaja made Svayambhuva Manu into a
calf and he got the grains and seeds and all the wealth of mother
nature. That was his need, to establish the principle of sacrifice,
yajna. And then different living entities, different creatures came and
fulfilled their needs. Like Brihaspati was made a calf by the sages
because he is the best of the sages. So best of the community was made
into a calf and they fulfilled their needs. And what was their [the
sages'] need? Their need was to control their senses. The demigods made
Indra into a calf. And what was their need from Mother Earth? Soma-rasa,
nectar.
And this verse is describing the demons, what is their need? Their
need is intoxicants. The demigods, the devas, thrive on nectar and the
demons thrive on intoxicants, and Mother Earth provided those
intoxicants for them, like alcohol and other such intoxicating
beverages, that comes from the earth. So in this way, Prithu Maharaja
established the proper standard of receiving things, the gifts from
Mother Earth for the sake of prosperity of different communities. The
needs are not the same. The needs are according to one’s nature. Those
who are in the mode of goodness, the demigods and their need is in the
mode of goodness. Those who are in the mode of passion… Rather I should
say that the demigods are not exactly in the mode of goodness, the
rishis are in the mode of goodness, the sages are in the mode of
goodness
and their need was according to their nature and it was provided by Mother Nature.
The demigods are in the mode of passion, and their needs are rather
passion and goodness. Their needs were provided by Mother Earth. The
demons are in the mode of passion and ignorance, passion in ignorance,
and their needs were also provided, according to their demoniac nature,
by Mother Earth. And according to their nature, their activities have
also been prescribed. The demigods’ activities are to give and the
demons’ [sages’] activities are to restrain their senses.
Jai Sri Sri Gaura Nitai ki jai! Jai Sri Sri Radha Rasabihari ki jai! Jai Sri Sri Sita Rama Lakshman Hanuman ki jai!
So in this way different living entities have their different nature
and accordingly their activities have been prescribed and their
necessities have been prescribed, just according to their nature. And
varnashrama means to be engaged in our activities according to our
propensities, and then it becomes easy, it becomes joyful. But when the
varnashrama is not there, then people become engaged for other purposes.
In varnashrama, it is according to one’s propensity and tendency.
Those who are in the mode of goodness, they act; they are engaged in a
certain way and being engaged in that way they feel happy. The people in
the mode of passion become engaged in a certain way; they feel happy
doing what they are asked to do and so forth. But when the varnashrama
system is not there, then some other factor, some other consideration
becomes the motivation for the activity and as a result of that, they
are not happy, they suffer. Like in today’s society, people are not
engaged according to their propensity, not according to their nature,
but people are engaged in different activities for the sake of money.
The criterion is money, not whether one likes to do or not. The
consideration is? How much money I will earn, this job will fetch me
more money, let me go for that. And as a result of that, no one is
happy. Everyone is suffering, because they may get money but it doesn’t
fulfill their inner cravings which is set according to their
characteristics, according to their modes.
So this is how the whole society today has become so misguided that…
Now to rectify the situation, Prabhupada has given this ISKCON movement,
Prabhupada has created the International Society for Krishna
Consciousness. So we have to bring in the right understanding and
educate people with the right information and engage people according to
their right, according to their propensities. And the ultimate
objective should be not just sacrifice, the ultimate sacrifice.
The initial concept of sacrifice is yajna, is to please the demigods.
But the ultimate consideration of yajna is to please Krishna. This
point can be explained in this way that in the yajna, or offering it to
the demigods, is like giving the tax, paying the bill to different
departments in the
government. The different departmental heads collect the funds, but then
what do they do? They offer it to the King, the head of the state. And
he decides what’s to be done, because he is the ultimate consideration
for collection.
The initial stage of yajna is for the sake of the demigods’ pleasure
but when the demigods receive those gifts, what do they do? They don’t
keep it themselves, they offer it to Krishna. And that’s a devotee, he’s
like a via medium. He is not holding, like the departmental heads they
are not…they are collecting the money but not spending it themselves,
they are just offering it to the central treasury. And from there they
get the budget. They offer everything to the head of the state and then
the head of the state gives them the necessary budgets for them to
spend, to fulfill their purposes.
So similarly the demigods are actually departmental heads, but the
Supreme Personality of Godhead is Krishna. And everything is ultimately
meant for Him so when you offer it directly to Him, there is no need to
go through the via medium of the demigods, we can directly go to
Krishna, especially when Krishna is giving us that opportunity. In other
ages, Krishna did not give that opportunity to have direct access, but
in Kali-yuga He gives that opportunity: [BG 18.66]
sarva-dharman parityajya
mam ekam´ saranam´ vraja
aham´ tvam´ sarva-papebhyo
moks?hayisyami ma sucah
yat karosi yad asnasi
yaj juhoshi dadasi yat
yat tapasyasi kaunteya
tat kurushva mad-arpanam
That is the ultimate consideration. The ultimate consideration of
yajna then again in this age of Kali is sankirtan-yajna. We don’t have
to offer grains in the sacrificial fire. If we do it that’s all well and
good, but even if we can’t do that, doesn’t matter. A special yajna for
this age is:
Hare Krishna Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna Hare Hare Hare Rama Hare Rama Rama Rama Hare Hare
[Kali Santarana Upanishad from the Krishna Yajur Veda]
You just chant the Hare Krishna Maha mantra and everything will be
provided by Krishna. And we are seeing that time and time again how it
happens. Recently I had an experience. In Ujjain there was an acute
water shortage, I mean, it became actually world news. When you go to
different countries and you hear, “I’m from Ujjain.”
“Oh!” Because there has been so much broadcasting on the TV that the
scarcity of water which is in Ujjain. And so when that happened, the
district magistrate met with me and told me about the crisis, that there
is going to be an acute water shortage because the reservoir of water
that they have for the city supply, it dried out, only in April. Not
April, say late March it dried out. So rain wouldn’t be there until
July, so that meant April, May, June and half of July, or practically
end of July. So four months without water. No proper supply of water.
So I told him that the water actually comes by the mercy of the Lord,
so if we do the sankirtan-yajna, the Lord will provide. So and then I
proposed that, “Let’s have a three day harinama,” and we did that, he
arranged, he was very supportive and the newspaper came and we had a
press conference and big publicity was there and so we had a three day
long sankirtana. Right in front of the temple we made a big pandal,
blocked the road [laughs], we had three-day long kirtana, non-stop, 24
hours a day, 72 hour long kirtana. And then some of them were asking,
they were expecting that right after the third day there would be
torrents of rain. And in the middle, actually some of the press people
came and asked me, “Do you think because of that there will be rain?”
I said, “I don’t care. I don’t know whether it’ll come in the form of
rain, whether it will come from the top or from the bottom, but the
point is the Lord will supply.”
And then the acute shortage was there, and sometimes people came and
said, “Oh you said that will happen and this will happen, didn’t
happen.” Then my question to them was, “Did you come and participate in
the sankirtana? You didn’t.”
Then do you know what the reality was? That everywhere there was a
huge shortage. But in our temple there was no shortage. We had three
wells. Those three wells were full of water and I literally saw, when we
told the press, I kind of casually told them, “Whether the rain comes
from the top or the bottom, that’s not the consideration, the
consideration is: the Lord will provide.”
And so then not only we had sufficient supply, we had so much water
that every day we were giving out twenty to thirty tankards of water to
the city. So this is how Krishna actually responds, Krishna
reciprocates. And another thing that happened is there was one village,
which was about 14km away from Ujjain city, and those village people
came, practically the whole village came. That person who led them is a
schoolteacher, he’s also like the landlord of that area and he is very
well-respected and because he has become a devotee, they’re also
following him. And he reported that after the village people
participated and when they went back in their village there was rain and
their village didn’t have any scarcity of water.
So we see that our temple didn’t have any scarcity, even at the
driest condition we had enough water, so much so that we could provide
twenty-five to thirty tankards, you know those big trucks with those big
tanks? We had been supplying thirty tankards every day to the village.
And the water would go down; some tankards would go down to one foot or
two feet, just water. And the Temple President, Ganganarayana came and
reacted, “Oh, what will happen if the water dries out?” But next morning
you see that the water level went up again. [laughs]
So this is how Krishna actually reciprocates and increases our faith.
This is the way to do, this is how to act. You render devotional
service, Krishna will reciprocate. And as a result of that, our faith
will become established.
Thank you very much, all glories to Srila Prabhupada! Gaura Premanande, Hari Hari Bol!
Does anybody have any question or comments? Yes?
[Devotee asks question:] Though Prahlada is born in a demon family,
he is a great devotee of the Lord, why did he milk from the earth
liquor?
[HHBCS:] Because that is their nature. You see the demoniac nature
means those who are in the mode of ignorance, they need that. Just like a
tiger needs meat, it’s his nature. And Krishna made that arrangement.
According to one’s nature, he will get what he wants, whatever he needs.
Just like you know a person in the mode of goodness will act a certain
way, a person in the mode of ignorance will act in another way. Right?
Like a cow will act in a certain way and dog will act in another way. A
lion will act in another way.
So Mother Nature provides. Well, if that is your constitution, fine,
take, drink. But don’t stay in that situation, that’s the thing. Become
elevated. The purpose of tamasic tantra will actually elevate from
ignorance to passion, passion to goodness and from goodness,
transcendental goodness. And Prahlada Maharaja, because he is born in a
demoniac family, I mean, he has been born for some reason also in that
family.
That has been described in Hari Bhakti Vilas. In his previous life,
Prahlada Maharaja acted in a certain way, and as a result of that he had
to be born in a demoniac family. But although he took birth in a
demoniac family, he did something also in his previous life, like
worshipping, unconsciously fasting on Narsimha Chaturdashi, cleaned the
temple and stayed up the whole night. As a result of that, although born
in a demoniac family, he became devotee of Lord Nrisinghadev, but
because of ajnata-sukriti.
OK, thank you very much. All glories to Srila Prabhupada! Gaur Premanande, Hari, Hari Bol!
Srila Gurudeva would like to start the following weekly teleconferences,
