If people hold on to their beliefs, how can we elevate them?

Answer Podcast

Transcript

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So, if people are practicing religion according to their level, how can we elevate them? Because they believe in their own practices, their own principles.
Yes. So, elevate means that we have to see where they are and we have to take one step forward. Mr. Prabhupada would meet with Christians, he would talk about the commandment, thou shall not kill and encourage them to avoid eating meat.
It will help them to raise their consciousness. Now, of course, as you rightly said, they have their own interpretation of the commandment and they may not agree to that. But there are many Christians who do recognize that Jesus taught compassion.
Compassion means compassion to all the beings, even to animals also. So, there is an increasingly vibrant movement of vegetarianism within Christianity also. It’s a minority, no doubt, but it’s becoming increasingly present.
Vegan movement is there in the western world and vegetarianism is also there. So, basically whatever they are practicing, we encourage them to practice better, we encourage them to understand the philosophy more thoroughly. So, Prabhupada was once asked that, you know, if Jesus talked about the father and that father is Krishna, then why didn’t Jesus not talk about Krishna? Prabhupada replied, Jesus himself, whatever little he talked about, then he said that as much I have to tell you, but you are not the ears to hear.
Whatever little he told, Prabhupada said he told a little and you killed him for that. He was crucified for that. So, he couldn’t tell so much.
But the more important thing is, Prabhupada said, the conception of Krishna as God. Understand the definition. God is all-strong, all-wise, all-beautiful, all-famous, all-renounced.
So, these are attributes of God which are compatible with every religion, with history, religion and history. So, if we look at an objective criteria of the definition of God and then we have a conception of God. Prabhupada said, if you have a better conception of God, you tell us that conception.
But don’t have a specific conception of God which is ultimately going to be superior. So, it’s not that if a person is open-minded, they can learn from Krishna consciousness also. They can deepen their devotion to God by learning the principles of Krishna consciousness.
Now say, suppose somebody is studying in IIT here. And then they want to study computer engineering. And they come to know MIT in Massachusetts that has computer engineering very highly.
So, then if they get an opportunity to study there, then they say, no, I will study computer engineering only what is taught in IIT Kharagpur. I won’t study anything else. Then, if they start saying like that, we have to ask them, are you interested in knowledge or are you interested in college? The college is meant for knowledge.
The knowledge is not meant for college. So, like that, different religions, they are like colleges. They are meant to give us knowledge about God.
So, if some knowledge about God, some features is not available in a particular tradition, it is available in some other tradition. Why not take that and enrich yourself with devotion to God? So, there are open-minded people who will be open and will accept. And they will be ready to be illumined further.
Those who are not so open-minded, we just offer them our good wishes. And the interaction in a pleasant mood and move on. So, not everybody will be receptive.
When we say that we should try to elevate people from where they are, it also depends on whether they are ready to be elevated. If they are not ready to be elevated, we offer them our good wishes. And move on to other people who are more open to be elevated.