What is the spiritual perspective on death due to dowry harassment apart from past karma?

Answer Podcast

Transcript

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so if someone has been killed because of violence related to not giving dowry at that time we as devotees and especially if we knew that person how should we respond in that situation generally some injustice has happened some atrocity has happened bringing up past karma at that time can be very insensitive we can come off as terribly insensitive at that time because the whole feeling among people at that time this is a gross injustice and it is an injustice and if we say it is because of past karma it has happened then in a sense we are blaming the victim and that is very bad so the argument about karma something which has to be very carefully employed it is nobody say when Draupadi is dishonored or Sita is abducted nobody tells them that all this happened because of your past karma because at that point the concern is not what is the past karma the concern is what is one dharma so Ram doesn’t think that Sita was abducted because of her past karma Ram says what is my dharma and my dharma as her husband is to protect her and he does whatever it takes to protect her so generally we are not meant to deal with people based on some conceptions of what their past karma was we are meant to deal with people based on what our present dharma is so standard give that if a thief has robbed a person and then that person goes to a king and reports the robbery and the king says because of your past karma you were robbed that would be dereliction of duty for the king the king should be concerned what is my dharma now if despite the king’s best efforts to locate the thief and regain the wealth if the wealth doesn’t come then the victim can consider because of my past karma that I lost this wealth so they can accept that it is inevitable say if a small child is crying the mother should not think child is crying because of past karma child is thinking what is my duty I have to comfort the child I have to pacify the child I have to take care of the child so similarly when some kind of terrible atrocity has happened say some somebody has been killed because of not giving dowry it’s a brutal crime against humanity and to bring past karma over there is wrong what we can talk about is at that time it largely happens because of excessive materialism so now there is a big confusion in India about what is Indian tradition the essence of India’s tradition is the spiritual knowledge is the process for raising one’s consciousness to the spiritual level there are various yoga traditions yogic process culminating in bhakti yoga now that the yogic practices for the spiritual knowledge and the spiritual processes they are the most essential gift of the Indian tradition but Krishna says that with the passage of time the pure spiritual knowledge was lost similarly with the passage of time the spiritual essence has been obscured and a lot of practices have become fossilized fossilized means they have become very rigid like fossils and fossils usually are objects which are at one time alive, active, usable but the fossils are not of much use so the caste system is an example like that the original purpose was division for cooperation division of labor so that everybody would cooperate but now it has become a system for discrimination and it trips people apart nowadays similarly dowry it had a particular purpose originally but that purpose has been largely lost now so it just becomes a money extortion tool and this by no means is is a central part of the tradition nor is it a part of the tradition dowry was just a voluntary gift that was given and not only was it just a gift it was entirely voluntary you know when Bhishma goes to seek goes to Madra Madra kingdom to seek the hand of Madri for Pandu at that time Shalva, who is his brother Shalva or Shalya Shalya one of them one of them is a demon and the other is a nice person so he says that our tradition in our family the tradition is that when a girl gets married the boy gives a gift to the girl so other than the girl’s family giving a gift to the boy the boy’s family gives a gift to the girl and Bhishma says I know about it so I have come prepared and he gives a handsome gift to and then they agree to the proposal marriage takes place so in that sense in the Mahabharat there was deference to difference in traditions there is a particular tradition was like this there is a particular tradition was like that there is a difference, not that this is right and that is wrong so by no means was dowry mandatory and by no means and certainly it was not to be extorted and nobody was to be exploited for that so the form of dowry the word dowry or the form of dowry may have come from the Indian tradition and it may have a past in which it has come not the form, the principle that dowry is given that may have come from the past but the form in which the dowry happens now that has got nothing to do with the essence of the tradition which is actually spiritual, is simply materialistic and it is because of excess of materialism and the greed that has come because of that because of which this is happening so to the extent people are greedy, to that extent this kind of abominable things will happen and these for countering these there is in the Vedic culture there was for countering any kind of wrong doing there is a combination of Shastra and Shastra so Shastra is used by the Brahmanas to educate people so that they can make right choices and Shastra is used by the Kshatriyas to discipline those who don’t make the right choices so broadly speaking in Krishna Consciousness Movement we focus on Shastra so that we can get, give, share spiritual knowledge, share the spiritual processes by which people become empowered to make wiser choices, to avoid materialistic greed, lust, anger, envy and another like that but when people commit wrongs, commit crimes like this, then Shastra is needed and that is where the rule of law is required to penalize people who do this kind of atrocities so that’s what in such a situation we should not directly label someone as guilty unless a fair trial has been done but we can definitely say that we fully support taking legal action so that the proper facts are uncovered and the action is taken against them and there is absolutely no need to bring in past karma, at least in a public forum at an individual level if we know the relatives of somebody who has been victimized and we want to offer them some consolation then we can tell them about how Krishna is with everyone and that how ultimately we have relationship in this world which are there but we have all a lasting relationship with Krishna and wherever that soul has gone now, Krishna is there with them, with that soul and if we pray to Krishna then Krishna will comfort that soul wherever that soul is there so rather than getting into the cause of why something happened bringing karma as a cause see karma is in the sense of a dispassionate analysis when we are doing the expression of karma, it makes sense but it doesn’t make emotional sense when a person is suffering and when a person is in a trauma at that time it’s the emotions that are turbulent so I don’t see anywhere in scripture where somebody is distressed and karma is talked about when Abhimanyu is killed unfairly by the Kauravas Krishna, Arjuna is devastated, he is shattered and while consoling him I don’t think Krishna uses anywhere the argument that Abhimanyu’s past karma because of which he died or it was because of your past karma that you lost a son this reminds him that this is a world where calamities happen everybody has to die and wise people people who are made of stone stuff they do not let themselves be overcome by adversity like this they remember their duty and rather than by their own grief increase the grief of others they act in a way by which they can decrease others grief so that way we can try to whatever is appropriate at that level generally we present some connection with Krishna as a shelter amidst that distress if they pray to Krishna they will feel some shelter if they pray to Krishna Krishna will shelter that person but what has happened to get into the cause of that, it’s a very dicey thing to do at that time at that time it’s simply it’s a serious atrocity that has happened it needs to be investigated proper action has to be taken that’s what we can tell