When Krishna disapproves renunciation as it will disturb people’s minds how can we understand Prabhupada’s giving sannyasa to young disciples?

Answer Podcast

Transcript

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Hare Krishna. Question from Vishal Gupta Prabhu. In the Bhagavad Gita, Krishna says, do not disturb the minds of people.
And he says to Arjuna that, Arjuna says that I am doing this, I want to renounce for a higher cause. Krishna says, still don’t do it because people will misunderstand. So, then in this context, how can we understand that Krishna Prabhupada gave sannyas to very young people? Answer.
Whenever any direction is given in scripture, we have to look at the context. In the case of Arjuna, he was a responsible member of the ruling dynasty. He was the foremost warrior among the Pandavas.
And his responsibility, the way he could establish dharma best was by fighting the war. So, rather than thinking whether action is right or renunciation is right, we have to see what is the best way in which dharma can be established. What is the best way in which a particular person can best establish dharma? So, if you look at the Bhagavatam, we could take the same logic of the Bhagavad Gita and say that Parishad could have countered the curse of Shringi and by that he could have fought off Kali and Kali Yuga could be stayed off.
He could have done that. But for him at that particular point, the important thing which the Lord wanted him to do was that Kali’s influence cannot ultimately be averted because Kali Yuga is going to come. At a material level, Kali Yuga’s influence is going to come.
But at a spiritual level, through the sound vibration of Krishna Katha, one can transcend the influence of Kali. And that was the lesson that the Lord wanted him to teach. So, what is dharma? There is an essential principle that dharma means to ultimately do that which raises ours and others consciousness and takes us towards Krishna.
But specifically how that will happen in different situations, that will vary. So, if we consider the time when Krishna Prabhupada started the Krishna consciousness movement. So, it was an emergency.
Prabhupada was already 69 and he felt that he has to do what it takes to make sure that Krishna consciousness spreads far and wide. So, for that purpose, he empowered some of his young disciples by giving them sannyas. Now, could this disturb their minds? Could this disturb the minds of others? Yes, that’s possible.
But Prabhupada knew that he was taking a risk and he took it as a risk. He was guided by Krishna and he adopted the strategy that based on the availability of resources for him, he felt was the best. So, we see that in the 10-11 years that Srila Prabhupada was with us, from 1966 to 1977, since his con started, it has experienced an astonishing growth.
And much of this growth was actually by the inspiration of Srila Prabhupada under his leading disciples, most of whom were sannyasis. So, that was a strategy. Now, Prabhupada, if we see, Prabhupada did many things at his time which are different from what he has told in his books.
So, one example is giving sannyas to young people. So, he did that because that was what was required. So, we have to look at an acharya both in terms of their, what they have taught, what they have done and then understand how dharma, the principles of dharma are not static.
They are dynamic. So, scripture gives us certain principles and scripture gives us different applications of those principles at different times. And the acharya gives application of those principles in their times.
So, based on all this, we have to internalize the essential principle of dharma and apply it according to our circumstance. In this way, we can actually move onwards towards Krishna. So, the principle of not disturbing the minds of others, that is true and the other principle is also that one has to do what it takes to carry on the Lord’s mission.
And in the case of Srila Prabhupada with his young followers, empowering them to preach vigorously all over the world, that was the way by which Srila Prabhupada created the foundation for the global Krishna consciousness movement.