Srimad Bhagavatam | Divine & Demoniac | HG Chaitanya Charan Prabhu

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
Let’s recite this together. Thanks. Not responsive, but together in simple words.
Asatya Maha Krishna Dehe Jagad Aapura Krishna Aparasvara Sambhutam Himanyat Atma Medhutam Asatya Maha Krishna Dehe Jagad Aapura Krishna Aparasvara Sambhutam Himanyat Atma Medhutam Asatya Maha Krishna Dehe Jagad Aapura Krishna Aparasvara Sambhutam Himanyat Atma Medhutam Asatya Maha Krishna Dehe Jagad Atma Medhutam Asatya Maha Krishna Dehe Jagad Aparasvara Sambhutam Himanyat Aparasvara Sambhutam Himanyat Aparasvara Sambhutam Himanyat Aparasvara Sambhutam Himanyat Aparasvara Sambhutam Himanyat Aparasvara Sambhutam Aparasvara Sambhutam Himanyat Aparasvara Sambhutam Hare Krishna And this is the 16th chapter of the Bhagavad Gita. In this particular chapter, Krishna starts by describing the divine nature in a few verses. But after that, he spends a lot of time describing the demoniac nature and this particular verse is describing the worldview of the demoniac people.
Now in one sense, like I mentioned earlier, that in any scripture, there is a combination of the timeless and the timely, or we could say the universal and the contextual. So when Krishna is speaking over here, he is in many ways speaking at the universal level. He says this is the kind of mentality these people have, this is the kind of action that they do.
But sometimes when such words are spoken, have any of you heard of this term called plausible deniability? It’s a legal term, plausible deniability. So deniability means that you can deny, yeah, that’s not what I spoke. And it’s plausible, it’s reasonable.
Like say, sometimes you want to criticise someone, but there are laws against libel, libel means you try to criticise someone and you get pretty soon in court. So you criticise someone, but you don’t mention their name at all. However, you describe it in such a way that everybody knows who is being talked.
So at that time, it’s, we’re talking in abstract or universal principles. Now some people think like this, some people speak like this, some people do like this. And everybody knows who those some people are.
But there is no need to do it. So, there is, in that way, it is not that explicit, but it’s very clear who is being talked about. So actually this whole section of the demoniac nature, at the Krukshetra level, it is left in the Krukshetra level.
And we’ll see some of the later verses, where he says that, इदा पद्यमयालग्गम् इमा प्राप्से वनोरतु By my skill, I got this much wealth, and I’ll get this much more wealth. I got half of Pandava kingdom. Now I’ll get the whole kingdom.
So he, I got them to get into the barren wasteland. And now, I’ll try to get into their house. If they got a bigger kingdom, I’ll steal their kingdom, buy their kingdom.
So, he’s making वनोरो प्राप्से. And then when he gets wealth, what does he do after that? He forms his own notary of people, his own group of people. And he says, कर्मायः सो पवर्व, शाफल सो पवर्व। They’re all my people.
आज नोग भिजन्मान से, कोलने वासे सत्रुच्यो मया, Who’s there like me? And then, the Pandavas, they get a yajna. So, they get papers about yajna, I also want to do yajna. Now, the Pandavas’ purpose was to glorify Krishna.
So, they had some sacred purpose. His purpose is not sacred, it is very superficial, it’s a show-off. So, for example, the Durga Puja happens.
Now, there are some people who make the Durga Goddess. But some people do it just to flaunt their wealth and their position and their might. So, similarly, he says, I want to perform the Rajasuya Yajna.
And then the Brahmins say that, actually, the Rajasuya Yajna cannot be performed by any king if the previous king is still alive. The previous king will perform the Rajasuya Yajna. Because the Rajasuya Yajna is basically performed by someone who is like the world emperor.
So, then he says, but I want to perform it. He says, okay, there’s another yajna. So, that you can perform, and when you perform that, it is as good as the Rajasuya Yajna.
It’s very, very powerful. He says, what is the yajna? Vaishnava Yajna. Now, he has no interest in Vishnu, but he performs the Vaishnava Yajna.
And Karna goes on his behalf and challenges everyone. And Karna wins for him. Most people don’t want to fight with him also.
They know this is not going to last for very long. He’s not going to be a permanent emperor. So, they don’t antagonise him, but he performs the yajna.
But he has no interest in actually the purpose of the yajna. After the yajna, he’s still very upset. He says, I did not get as good gifts as Yudhishthira got.
But I was then receiving the gifts of Yama and Yudhishthira. So, he’s never satisfied. Kaam Ashritya Dushyapuram.
His Kaam is never satisfied. So, Yajante Naam Yajniste. He says, Yakshe Dasyami Modishya Ittyagyan Abhimokta.
I will do the yajna for what purpose? For the purpose of showing off to the world what a pious person I am. Yakshe Dasyami. I will do charity.
But Modishya. In this way, I will enjoy. So, it is not just they want to enjoy the pleasure of being powerful.
But they also want the pleasure of being seen as pious. Being seen as good. So, they try to buy that.
That’s why many wealthy people, they start doing charity after they get a particular level of bliss. Now, it could be that some of them really want to be connected to the good life. Some of them just want to be seen as good people.
It depends. So, when Krishna is describing the demoniac nature over here. He does not even devote even one verse for any physical characteristics.
Not that demons are people who have horns over their head and they have teeth coming out of their mouth. No. He does not describe that at all.
There is a difference between Asura and Rakshasa. So, Asura is a mentality. Rakshasa is a species.
So, now we could say that Rakshasas are primarily Asuras. But there could be people who are born in a Rakshasa dynasty but they are not Asuras. Who is the example of this? Prahlad.
Technically, Prahlad was in another dynasty. He was called as, not a Rakshasa, but a Daityana. Daityana, Prahlad, Shastri.
So, the example of somebody in the Rakshasa dynasty? Vibhishan. So, now there could be even Manavas included in this. Manav is what? Humans.
So, humans can also have a demoniac nature. If you see the war in the Mahabharata and the war in the Ramayana, there is a significant difference between the two wars. In the sense that the war in the Ramayana was actually between Manavas and Rakshasas.
They are two different species. But in the Mahabharata, what happens? Both sides are Manavas. Both sides are humans.
And both sides have Rakshasas on their side. Who is the Rakshasa on the side of the Manavas? Rathore. He is born of Bhima and Hridayan.
So, and there is a demon named Alambush, who is on the side of the Kauravas. So, basically, this was not like an inter-species war. It was what is called a familial war.
Both sides were people who were humans. But the Kauravas were led by the Asuras. Asuras means the person with the Asuric property.
So, that’s why this whole section is talking about Asuras, not in terms of physical characteristics at all. It is talking in terms of two things. Their nature and their behaviour.
When I say nature, it also refers to their worldview. So, generally, a person can be known by these two things. What they believe and what they pursue.
Now, the two are related. What we believe and how we act. Now, we have to pursue certain things.
So, not only what we pursue, but how we pursue those things. See, many people may want to pursue wealth. Everybody wants money in life.
And money is a necessity in life. But, people have their own ways. For example, we are in an office and we have a colleague.
And both of us are competing for the same promotion. Then you may say, okay. Because there is a routine in office politics, where you speak something about that person, and you speak something about that person.
Okay, that’s just a part of it. Not a good part, but it’s a part. We do that.
But, I’m going to say that, I’m not going to… Even if a person is in office politics, I’m not going to frame my competitor. I’m not going to plant some false evidence in that person’s file so that that person comes out as corrupt. No, I’m not going to do that.
So, people have a sense of boundaries. I’m not going to go that far. Like people go into office politics, I’ll spread some rumours about you, or you spread some rumours about me.
But, I’m not going to tarnish your family. No, I’m not going to spread rumours about your daughter, or your wife, or something like that. There are boundaries that are there.
And that is defining the difference between the divine and the demonic. If you see, when Krishna describes the demoniac nature, if you see, at one level, he says, By this scheme, I got this much money, and by that scheme, I’ll get much more money. That is a routine human mentality.
We all have schemes. We always say, okay, I can invest over here, maybe I can buy this property. So, that’s normal.
But you see, suddenly from there, where does it go? This enemy I have killed. And, that enemy I have killed. From being greedy, to suddenly being murderous.
That’s a huge boundary violation. Many people are competitive. But, it’s one thing to be competitive, it’s quite another to be destructively competitive.
India and Pakistan have a huge rivalry between them. But, at least till now, it has not happened that, before a match, Pakistan is trying to do good policy of Indian players, or India is trying to do good policy of Pakistani players. Maybe it will happen and not come out.
But, generally, the competition might be fierce, but it is not a destructive competition. That, I want to win. I want to be better than you.
But, it is not by pulling you down by some devious means. So, there are boundaries. And, generally, most people, I think I mentioned this earlier that, there are two deterrents to wrongdoing.
There is intelligence, and there is conscience. Intelligence tells us, at the level of reason, logic, you do this, so you will get into trouble. So, don’t do this.
Conscience makes us feel bad. After we do something, we feel bad. Say, we are rushing in a crowded road, or a crowded room, we are rushing for something.
Suddenly, we notice that, we stepped on someone’s foot. As soon as we realise, oh, I’m so sorry, we apologise. But, if I think somebody is here, they stepped on someone’s foot, they see the person, and they tell liberally, where is the person, and stab him in the heart.
What kind of person are you? So, normally, when we do something bad, we feel bad. Yeah, I shouldn’t have done this. That’s the deterrent.
Now, do you think Duryodhana had any regret when he did something bad to the Pandavas, when he tried to poison Bhima, or tried to burn the Pandavas? What do you think? He had regrets. His regret was, his plan was not successful. So, imagine this person like, the conscience is dead.
There’s practically no conscience over there. That’s why the next verse, what it says is, that not only does the person go about murdering people, but after that, what does it say? Ishwarohamahambhogi Siddho Ambalwansuki They see their deviousness, their viciousness, as a sign of their cleverness. Just see how clever I am, I did this, and nobody found out about it.
So, they see their wrong doing, not as something which causes their conscience to pinch them. They see it as a sign of their cleverness. And that is a deadly perversion of mentality.
In modern psychology, such people are called as psychopaths and sociopaths. Such people basically have no sense of conscience. Most human beings, when they do something bad, they believe it’s bad.
Some people just don’t. And it’s such people that Krishna is calling as the demoniac nature. So, the demoniac nature is basically what? It is that behaviour, let’s put it this way, that demoniac, the defining characteristic is not just that they have desires, but it’s desires without boundaries.
It is when Krishna talks about Kamaesha, Krodhaesha. So, this Krodha is explained differently by different commentators. One way to understand it is that it is the desire that rages against boundaries.
What is the rage? The Krodha. Krodha at one level can come when I try to fulfil a desire and I can’t fulfil it. But, it can also come who says I can’t have it.
I want to eat some food and I don’t have the money to buy it. Who says I can’t have it? Break into the house and take it. So, that is Kamaesha, Krodhaesha.
The anger that rages against boundaries. So, in Kolkata, there was this horrible rape case. Now, why did something like that happen? To say that it is simply lust is an oversimplification to the point of distortion.
Because, if it were lust, a person can just go to a hospital. Then, it is also about power. It is that, this person is forbidden and that’s why I want to dominate and objectify and use that person.
So, it is Kamaesha, Krodhaesha. That, whatever boundary is there, I reject the boundary. And, in rejecting that boundary and getting something that I want to get.
So, rejecting the boundary here means, reducing that person to simply an object. And, dominating that person and using and reusing that person. So, Kama itself does not necessarily make a person demoniac.
Even if devatas have Kama, they also have observes. But, it is within boundaries. So, Kamaesha, Krodhaesha.
So, what defines the demoniac people is that their desire does not respect the boundaries. Their desire rages against and rejects boundaries. Why would they make boundaries at all? I can do whatever I want to do.
And, who will stop me from it? So, this is what makes something demoniac. And, the verse that we recited, so, it starts from a worldview. So, I talked about Duryodhana being demoniac.
Did you see that? Like I mentioned earlier, Duryodhana tried to disrobe Draupadi in public. It’s one thing that at least some people have fear of law or fear of God. But, if you don’t have any of those things, if somebody has no fear of God, then what happens is such a person, we should have fear of them.
Why? Because, that person will have no boundaries at all. Now, I am not saying that all atheistic people are terrible people. No, not necessarily.
There are atheistic people who can also be satori in their lifestyle. They may also be in charity. They may be very polite.
But, their politeness and kindness is not because of their atheism. It is in spite of their atheism. See, the atheistic worldview itself does not give any reason for having boundaries.
You may say, okay, we are all sharing the same planet and if I destroy the planet, then we will be destroyed eventually. We are all neighbours. So, we should live together.
Yeah, all those are there. This concern for neighbours that doesn’t come from atheism. That comes from something else.
It might come from basic survival instinct. It might come from desire for comfortable relationships. So, atheism itself does not provide any boundaries.
Atheism itself So, atheism itself is not a very satisfactory worldview. I’ll talk about why it is not satisfactory shortly. But, so, there is behaviour that people have and there is the worldview underlying that behaviour.
Now, it is not that there is a one-to-one correspondence that this worldview will lead to this behaviour only. The same worldview can lead to different kinds of behaviours. And one kind of behaviour can come from different worldviews.
Like, somebody may believe in God and because they believe in God, they believe that whatever I am doing is what God wants me to do. And therefore, you know, they think that my enemies are actually God’s enemies. So, for example, jihadists what are they doing? They are like, they don’t have any hesitation in killing innocent people, even children.
They will bomb them. So, what happens is, it is, they believe in God, but belief in God can also be sattva guna raja guna tamod. So, they are believing in God, but actually speaking, they are not seeing everyone as a child of God.
They don’t see everyone as a part of God. Like, my God and my people and you have your God and your people, they are completely different. So, it is a fragmentary view that can lead to a lot of problems.
So, it is very important that the worldview alone does not determine behaviour. So, religious people can be violent and irreligious people, or non-religious people, irreligious generally can be some kind of immorality, non-religious people, they can be peaceful. But, there is a correspondence, not congruence, not that this will lead to this or that.
The normal tendency, and I’ll talk about how that tendency comes out, that worldview does affect behaviour. So, essentially, when Krishna is talking in this verse, he is talking about some three worldviews. Did we talk about these three worldviews? Or four worldviews? This world and the other world.
Did we talk about this? So, there are four. Broadly, all the philosophies in this world can be broadly divided into these four categories. That this world is real and the other world is real.
There is some other world that is real. So, if we start from one, two, three, four. So, the first worldview is, this world is real, the other world is false.
This is essentially the worldview of materialism. Specifically. Now, that matter is all that exists.
Now, of course, again, there is complexity. Some religions have the idea of other world, but that other world is also a materialistic worldview. I believe there is another world called Jannat.
But what is the enjoyment out there? It’s not being with Allah, it’s being with 73 virgins. So, that worldview is also… Now, Christianity also has a very similar worldview. They have a lot of problems because of that.
Their idea is that you know, heaven is like a perpetual family reunion. Your grandfather and your sister, your childhood, your cousin, your uncle, all of you will be reunited together. All of you will be happy.
And that’s why the Catholic Church has a big problem with divorce. Because it’s all… If a man and a woman and a man and a woman die, or they get separated, they marry. If all three are Christians, then all three are supposed to be together in heaven.
That’s going to be a big problem. Certainly. Certainly.
So, for a man to be with two women, certainly won’t be heavenly for those two women. Or for a woman to be with two men, those two men will be at each other’s throats for all eternity. So, the point is that sometimes the idea of the other world can also be materialistic.
But broadly speaking, there is some understanding. There are some commentators who try. In Bible also it’s said that there’s some difference between heaven and the kingdom of God.
But it’s not very clear over there. The kingdom of God is more like the spiritual world. But the point is materialism holds that this world is all that is real.
This world is not just the physical earth, but it also means what we think of as enjoyable in this world. People think of sense pleasure as enjoyable. People think of it as power and prosperity.
These things as bhoga and aishwarya. Bhoga aishwarya pasaktaam naam. So, this is material.
This is probably the most prominent worldview. This is what Krishna talks about. A, the 16th verse if you recite it.
16.8, C and D. aparas parasam bhuta ki manya kaam gayi to kaam. So, materialism, we talk about materialism slightly, but let’s look at the other worldviews. Now, the other worldview, the next worldview is, neither is this world real nor is that world real.
Nothing is real. So, this is asatyam. Nothing is real.
This is technically called in philosophy as nihilism. Or Prabhupada uses the word voidism. Nothing is real.
This is an extremely dark worldview. Because everybody needs some sense of meaning in their life. Everybody needs what is the point of living.
So, there is one philosopher. Philosopher. Self-history of coolness.
He he said that life is suffering. And the more you try to remove the suffering, the worse the suffering becomes. This is actually Shastra philosophy.
Dukha laya, Dukha ujanam takapi dukha. That this world is full of misery and the more you try to remove misery, the worse it becomes. The next part.
Therefore, the only philosophical question one is asking is whether to commit suicide today or tomorrow. This is Albert Camus. because if they have rejected the idea of another world, and if a person is a little intelligent, then they can see that the promises of the world of pleasure, they are superficial.
They don’t really give satisfaction. One doesn’t have to be an evolved spiritualist to realise this. A thoughtful person sees it to some extent.
They will still get captivated by it eventually because they don’t know anything in the other kind of religion. But the thing is, this is an extremely dark world. As one another philosopher said, every time I pass by a 5th story building, I have to resist the temptation to jump out and commit suicide.
Can you imagine what kind of life it was being? Because what is the point of living? So, nihilism is a very dark world. Now, so this is asatya. Now, apratishtham te.
That this world, it may exist, but it has no foundation. That means, this is impersonalism. That, what is happening is, that, actually speaking, aham.
This world, is it real? No, brahma satya, jagan vidya. This is actually, this is apratishtham. There is no foundation.
That means, that, there is no foundation, basically means, there is nothing real here, there is nothing. There is appearance, but under the appearance, there is nothing more. This world looks attractive, but beyond the appearance, there is nothing.
There is no reality to this world, there is no reality beyond this world. Now, impersonalism is asatya. Brahma satya, jagan vidya.
So, they are saying that this world is unreal. Now, this, actually, nobody can live in this world, because we have to function in the world. And, this can lead, this world can make people unnecessarily pessimistic, unnecessarily passive, and in many ways, now historians debate on the exact cause, but, one reason that India succumbed to so many invaders, one after another, was that many people, in general, the masters, became very apathetic.
Okay, if this world is ultimately maya, if this person rules us, okay, there is some suffering, if this other person comes, there will be some little more suffering, but it’s all maya. So, when what I mean is, that 2-3 times when British people were ruling India, there were famines and droughts and things like that, and several British observers, they said that I am shocked to see how Indians are not shocked by the conditions they live in. If this kind of drought had been there in UK, or in Europe, people would have immediately revolted.
But, Indians just accept it as it is. Now, this is not Sanskrit philosophy. Just accept it as it is.
And, for example, Pruthu Maharaj is approached by citizens, and citizens tell him that you know, we are all suffering, we are starving. And Pruthu Maharaj says, yeah, this world is dukkhaalai. So, what do you do? They already say, oh, it’s all maya.
Pruthu Maharaj is offering his maya. No, this is not the philosophy. Yes.
See, this world, Krishna considers it so important that he himself descends to the world to fix the world. Dharmasamsthapanathaya Sabhavami Dukhe Dukhe. Yes, this world is dukkhaalai.
But what it means has to be clearly understood. It means that distress is unavoidable. That we will never have a situation of perfect happiness in this world.
But that does not mean that there cannot be situations of greater distress and lesser distress. In Krishna’s yuktahara we have this. What does it say by that? Yogobhavati Dukhaha.
So, if this world is dukkhaalaya, then how can there be destruction of dukkha? The point is that yes, our bodies are going to grow old, get diseased and die. But if we eat healthy food, the distress will be much lesser. If we are eating unhealthy foods, if we are eating toxic foods, the distress will be much more.
So, the way we conduct ourselves in this world, the way we conduct the world to whatever extent we have the capacity to conduct it, that makes a big difference. So, if you have rulers who are sattvins, very rare in human history, but the difference between a rajasic ruler and a tamasic ruler can also be huge. A rajasic ruler may want material prosperity, but the rajasic ruler has to understand that if I become wealthy and I keep all the people poor, not only is it a bad thing from a moral perspective, but from an economic perspective it is bad.
People will constantly see the disparity in wealth and they will do it. So, if I am becoming wealthy, I have to share the wealth. So, but a tamasic ruler will just exploit people.
So, the point I am making is that this world is maya, therefore we shouldn’t care for it. That is also a very dangerous philosophy. Now, the bhakti world view, you can call it devotionalism, Prabhupada has used this word in his early life to boil it up.
Afterwards he did not use this word so much. But devotionalism is, this world is real and the other world is also real. Now, the other world is a bigger reality.
It is an eternal reality. But, it is also a reality. So, if this world is also real, that world is also real.
Both are real. And, by functioning in this world in a responsible, dharmic way, we can progress towards the other. So, now, when the demoniac world view comes up, now, Krishnaji is just saying, all these three, one, two, three, they all can be demoniac.
Now, presently, among these three world views, which is the most prominent? Materialism. So, we will talk a little bit. So, what I am doing right now is, I am going up and down like this.
So, I talk about Duryodhana as an example of the timeliness towards Krishnaji. Krishnaji is not mentioning Duryodhana, but he is clearly referring to Duryodhana. He considers the life of Duryodhana.
Then we talk about world views. We talk about how world views are, in one sense, timeless. There are different world views across them.
But now, we will talk about contemporary world view. So, how this same demoniac world view is seen in today’s world? So, the prominent world view today is materialism. But the problem is, materialism itself does not give much meaning to life.
Because, okay, this is existing and we are robots of protoplasm who come alive sometime and then we power a bank and we are finished. Everybody needs something higher to them. So, what could be that higher thing? If we have rejected the idea of any another world, science has rejected that as a, what they call as a pre-scientific mythology.
There is no world apart from this world. So then, now we could go into various world views. But I will focus primarily on science over here.
See, science is primarily the word science has many different meanings. But one is, it refers to a method and it refers to also the knowledge from that method. Like, you use the word the scientific method.
There is no universally accepted definition of sciences. Multiple definitions. But in a simple term, science can refer to a method.
What is the method? Okay, we make some observations. We try to find some patterns within those observations. Come up with a theory.
Then we do an experiment to see if the theory is right. So, this method is called a scientific method. And then, the knowledge that is developed by the scientific method is also called as science.
So, physics is considered a science. Biology is considered a science. So, science can refer to broadly these two things.
But, from science also comes a world view. And that world view is called as scientism. So, scientism… See, science itself is not a world view.
You could put it another way, science is a way of looking at the world. But scientism is the world view that holds that science is omniscient. What is the meaning of omniscient? All the way.
What the idea is that science can give us answers to all questions. And if there is any question that can’t be answered by science, then that question is not worth asking. The questions that are beyond science are useless.
Now, significantly speaking, there is no scientific proof for scientism. Isn’t it? Scientism is an ideological claim that science will give us some knowledge, but there is no experiment that science can do which will show that science will answer all questions. And even in our everyday life, we implicitly understand that science does not answer all questions.
Say, if a brain surgeon comes back home and his wife is very upset with him. He says, darling, what’s wrong? He’s not able to say. Okay, let me do a brain scan to find out what’s wrong with him.
He says, you better go and scan your own brain first. You know, we can’t understand people’s emotions by simply any scientific mechanism. Say, you go back home and your mother bakes her delicious birthday cake.
The delicious cake for you. And it’s not your birthday. Now, you can get the best scientists, chemists, neuroscientists, this, that.
Okay, study this cake and tell me why my mother baked this cake. You can do as many experiments as you want with the cake, you’ll not come to know. And then finally, the only way to know is to ask your mother.
And mother will say, you know, actually, today is the 20th anniversary of the day when you developed your first tooth. Now… Now only your mother will remember something like this. But, no amount of brain scan is going to tell that.
Isn’t it, sir? So, this is not to criticise science. It is to point out the problem with scientism. So, science and scientism are two different things.
So, why am I talking about scientism over here? See, this has led to world truths. Science as a tool for acquiring knowledge is very powerful. And it has transformed it in many ways.
And, it’s important to know that science doesn’t necessarily mean modern science. Ayurveda was also a form of science. Maths was there, and all Vedic mathematics.
Many of the things that were… Chemistry seems to have been quite advanced in the Vedic times also. modernity does not have a monopoly on science. Although, normally we use the word modern science nowadays.
So, science is a way of looking at the modern. And if you look at the Sushruta Samhita, there is a lot of research over there. There is a lot of observation and learning from observation.
These books have evolved. So, with time, depending on how the environment changes, what kind of place a person is living in, so what kind of treatments will work, there is a lot of observation that has evolved in these books. So, the point is that scientism is a world view.
So, what happens in this world view? There is no other world. You rejected the other world, but people in general are not satisfied with life as they experience it. We say, our daily life is a material world.
It’s like sometimes it is distressing. Now, this doesn’t work out, that doesn’t work out, but on a routine level, it is boring. Life is basically boring.
And actually speaking, the more one goes into Rajoguna, the more life becomes boring. Why? Because the more somebody goes into the mode of passion, the more their definition of pleasure becomes. Sense pleasure.
And sense pleasure can be had only for such a finite amount of time. Sense pleasure, how much can we eat? If somebody thinks sex is the biggest pleasure of life, okay. But then, how long can one enjoy pleasure? And when that pleasure is not available, then what do you do? Life just becomes unstimulating and boring.
Basically, all of a sudden, the remaining time just becomes a dry wind, while one can get to the next opportunity for pleasure. Rather than somebody in Satoguna, they can look at the beauty of nature, they can appreciate the beauty. Somebody in Rajoguna, they see the beauty of nature and they only think, oh, I saw something like that in a romantic movie, where is my partner going? They just can’t appreciate the subtler pleasures of life.
So, the more we go into Rajoguna, the more the sattvic pleasures, they just can’t, they just can’t appreciate them. So, there’s one Indian young man, he went to America with my brother’s friend, so he grew up watching T20 matches. In America, he got the brilliant voice, he went into a big company, he got a big post, and he said, in America, they go and play golf.
He says, I have not seen a more boring game than this. You know, all outdoor games, golf is the most sattvic. It’s like, you know, you hit one ball, and you walk so far, and then you have time to talk with each other, and then the action is very less.
So, the point is that, he said that after watching and playing T20, playing golf is like such a boring thing for me. I’m not a kind golf. I’m just pointing that even on games, there could be more sattvic, there could be more artistic, there could be more tamasic.
And now, actually, in America, they have like huge golf courses, and it’s quite, in one sense, it’s scenic, it’s like a very beautiful sport. But they keep it scenic, and you can actually talk with people. They say more corporate deals are signed in the golf course than actually in boardroom meetings.
But that’s where you make friends with each other. But the point is that, you cannot appreciate that if somebody gives you too much pleasure. So, what happens is that daily life, in general, is boring.
So, when it’s boring, what do we do? We have to make it better. Atheism does not remove the suffering of life. Life is still suffering, whether you are atheist or atheist.
But atheism removes the hope that our suffering may be for some purpose. That, okay, I am suffering in this world, but there is some higher plan, and I will be taken to a better place. So, atheism, it does not remove suffering.
Because even atheists have to grow old, even atheists have to adopt the Adi-Gothic-Atheist relations. So, atheism does not remove suffering. What does it remove? It removes the hope that suffering may have some purpose.
That the suffering is a part of a higher plan. So, that’s why atheism becomes a bit awkward. Now, of course, materialism and atheism are not entirely the same things.
There can be religious people who are materialists, and there can be atheists who may have some kind of spiritual ideas. It’s a complex thing. But there are some atheists who believe in meditation, and they say our consciousness is not limited to the brain.
But, in general, atheism and materialism are very closely related. So, what happens? That people want some hope, some meaning, something of value in their life. So, what has happened in science, through technology, when science rejected the idea of another world, then science through technology created the mythology that we will make this world into paradise.
There is no need for any other heaven because technology will make this world into heaven. In fact, there are some ritual scientists who said that Jesus will deliver us at the spiritual level, or rather God will deliver us at the spiritual level through Jesus and God will deliver us at the material level through science. So, they saw science as a gift given by God.
Now, okay, we humans have intelligence and we can use intelligence to make things better. Say, if it’s hot, we have a fan, we have air conditioning. In principle, we can always make things better.
But the problem is, we can’t make things into paradise. That science is what it decided was, that there is a paradise, what you can call as a religious or spiritual paradise, that, they said, it is just a myth. But they said, what we will do is, we will create a high-tech paradise.
We will transform this world, high-tech paradise, this world will become a high-tech paradise. But what has happened is, that has turned out to be a myth. Certainly, we have phenomenal progress.
Now, there are telephones and telecommunications and internet. I love AI. But the problem is, in spite of all this, the problem is, people are profoundly unhappy.
What happens is, at the physical level, we have comforts. Lots of comforts. But at the mental level, we have misery.
So, in the high-tech paradise, people are comfortably miserable. People are very comfortable. I may be sitting in the easy room, but in the easy room, I have depression.
I have a panic attack. I have… People have what they call as S.A.D. What is S.A.D.? Sad. Of course, it is sad.
If I were to ask you, what is S.A.D., that is a sad question on my side. What S.A.D. refers to, S.A.D. refers to three main mental health problems. Stress, anxiety, depression.
So, mental health problems are a great tragedy in this world. So, people are existentially lonely. In UK, they have created an official department called Ministry for Loneliness.
Now, how do you address… Loneliness is a social problem. You can’t have a governmental solution for that. What can the government do? Government appoint a person who can talk with all lonely people.
Well, it doesn’t work like that. Loneliness is not just because you don’t have anyone to talk with. It is because you don’t have anyone you can trust so that you can talk with them.
Isn’t it? The deepest loneliness is when we are surrounded with people whom we can’t trust. Or, we are surrounded with people who don’t understand us. So, if we feel that they don’t understand us, we can’t trust them.
They can’t trust us. So, these are serious issues. Now, the point, I am not saying here science itself has led to mental health problems or technology has led to mental health problems.
That could be a different thesis. We could argue in favour or against that. The point I am saying here is that the attempts to create a paradise in this world have not worked.
They have backfired that while at a technological level we have created a lot of comforts, there are a lot of problems. And at a basic level, we don’t have to talk about God. At a sociological level itself, there are huge problems that are happening.
So, we could talk at a sociological level about mental health problems. You know, happy people don’t commit suicide. Suicide, it’s not just one or two people.
It’s often very successful people. Very religiously successful people. There are one million people who commit suicide every year.
The Ukraine war has been going on for about more than a year or so. And in that, about 150,000 people have been killed. Or 180,000 people have been killed.
Everybody is talking about the social war is happening. But every year, that many people are killing themselves. The Covid pandemic has stopped the whole world because there is a fear that millions of people will die.
But even million people are killing themselves every year. It’s just going on. And there are attempts being made to provide people with mental health relief and things like that.
But it’s not working. Not just at the mental level, you can look at a familial level. One of the basic, even if you take science, science knows that we are nothing but biological creatures.
Not all science. One of the implications of say, one implication of the atheistic interpretation of theory of evolution. That evolution itself doesn’t have to be only materialistic.
But the atheists have used evolutionary theory to hoist atheism as the only scientific theory. But the basic functionality according to biology is reproduction. We survive and we reproduce.
That’s what all living beings do. So, all living beings fight to live. No other living being commits suicide.
Of course, some dogs have been known to commit suicide when they are spoiled by human association. Just like some dogs who start smoking and drinking. And they use it very seldom.
Have you heard of this word? Yoga? Obviously, you’ve heard of yoga. Have you heard of Doga? Doga is basically yoga with dogs. My dog is my best friend.
So, I will do everything with my dog. Actually, if you Google Doga, you’ll see that there are specialised Doga teachers and Doga teaching institutes. So, you know, I spread my hands and my dog also spreads his front paws.
I stand on one leg, my dog also loves to stand on one leg. And, oh, you know, I and dog we are yoga partners. And as in yoga, there is also Koga.
What is Koga? So, now the point I’m making over here is that basic biology has these two things. All living beings, they survive, they struggle to survive and they struggle to reproduce. So, now, what is happening in today’s world? People are ending their lives.
So, survival, certainly many people are going to exist. As far as reproduction is concerned, the reproductive rates in the western world are alarmingly down. Japan and South Korea, these are, in Europe and America, the population is not following a steep demographic cliff.
That’s primarily because they have immigrants coming in. So, the immigrants have children but the local people, most of them don’t have any children. And the immigrants also, when they settle down, one or two generations later, even their children no longer have any children.
Now, countries like Japan, South Korea, they don’t have any immigration. So, in South Japan, South Korea, it’s a big crisis now. And it’s going to happen because we just don’t have enough people to continue their industries.
So, generally about 2.2, 2.3 is what is the reproduction rate. That, there are two people. If their population survives, they have about the rate of 2.2. India, the problem we see is we have too many people.
Population is exploding. But actually, in the western world, population improvement is a big, big problem. So, happy people have children.
You know, taking care of children is a natural, natural instinct of human beings. But if somebody feels, you know, whatever reasons, you know, the world is so terrible. I don’t want to bring a child into this world.
I can’t take care of a child. And many people, it’s not that they don’t want to take care of a child. It is that just life is so complicated.
Having children, taking care of children is so expensive. And parenting is such a formidable responsibility. Because they just don’t want to have children.
And then, the result of that, now, I’m not blaming people who don’t have children, but this is all I’m saying is that where is progress? If the basic biological function for existence, that is becoming a huge problem. Then where is the progress? You can go into specific factors, which lead to this, and those factors are there. But overall, A, we say this world is, we have made it into paradise.
And what is the sign of paradise? Humanity is going to become extinct. Why? Not because somebody attacked you. Because people only are going to have children.
It’s going to be a huge problem. Actually, there are now, the fastest growing religion in the world is Islam. And there they have the idea, where Muslims do say that in the 14th, 15th century, something like that, there was a Muslim king who penetrated into Europe, but the French king stopped him over there.
And after that, they have been trying to penetrate again and again and again, but it’s not succeeded. They say, now, Allah has arranged for us to take over Europe without any war. Because it is simply through reproduction.
That is, now, and not just the Muslims alone, I’m not talking about a sinister conspiracy to take over the world through reproduction. All that I’m saying is that, actually, reproduction is a basic policy. Now, in London, I was just there one month ago, London, the white people in London are the minority.
So, immigrants are there. And not only immigrants, but for every, say, Hindu immigrant, there are about 50 Muslims immigrants. So, again, this is not a religious criticism.
I would say that Islam, to whatever extent it has, there is still a family culture within. Have children, take care of children, be responsible for children. So, now, if with all our progress, we stop reproducing, then what is the point? You know, what is the meaning of progress? So, Italy now, they have started that, that Italy is now fighting for religious families.
So, they have, like, they have the Pope and big, big bishops. They have said that any family which has more than two children, you know, the Pope or some religious head at that level will come for the re-engaging ceremony of that child. So, that way they are trying to use the religious impetus for people to have children.
Now, of course, not having children, it is not just like stunning children. There are many things over there. So, there is basically, like I mentioned yesterday, there is something called the sexual revolution.
Now, in our history, we don’t talk much about it. But sexual revolution, the idea of that was that, just like there is a political revolution. The French revolution was that the government is controlling all of us and we want to be free.
So, sexual revolution was the idea that society, culture, religion, whatever, it’s controlling us sexually and religion. And he said, we will just have free mixing and all kinds of things. So, there was a thinker called Sigmund Freud.
Some of you may have heard of him. Now, he was brilliant in his own ways. But he was also perverted.
So, he, in his childhood, he felt sexually attracted to his mother. And he writes about it in his books. And he, later on, felt a lot of guilt and remorse and conflicting emotions because of that.
So, he came to conclusion that actually, everybody, every boy feels sexually attracted to his mother and every girl feels sexually attracted to her father. And this attraction is natural. But social taboos, they force people to suppress those feelings.
And those suppressed feelings lead to mental health problems in the future. Therefore, if you don’t want people to have mental health problems, basically, all taboos should be removed from society. It is forbidden to forbid.
And whatever you want to do, you should do. And the sign of that was devastating in society. So, now, the multiple things are happening.
One thing was that technology has led to a lot of things. There are many blessings of technology. But we can look at some of the harmful effects.
So, we could say WODs. What is WOD? Anyone knows? Weapons of Mass Destruction. Nuclear weapons or whatever.
There are now biochemical weapons also. Now, was COVID virus itself a biological weapon? Maybe, maybe not. The lab leak theory is more or less widely accepted now.
Whether the lab leak in China and Wuhan was intentional or accidental, that is probably, nobody is going to find out. Because all the evidence will be wiped out from there. But biological weapons are used.
Anthrax was there before. So, there are weapons of mass destruction. WODs themselves.
People used to kill each other in the past. Now, we have created more and more sophisticated weapons to kill each other. So, this is a very dark technology.
You could say the dark products. So, Einstein was the person who actually came up with the idea that he wrote a letter to the American president saying that Germany may get new atom bombs. So, you have to make them first.
And then when the atom bombs were used by Yoshimitsu Nagasaki. So, he still debated whether actually America needed to use those weapons. They were winning the war anyway.
They could have won without it. But he himself regretted it. He said that this was a terrible discovery.
And it’s ironic that the greatest scientific insight of the greatest scientific brain of the last century led to the greatest destruction of the last century. The greatest single instance of destruction. Again, here’s the thing.
I’m being very careful about that. I’m not saying science or technology themselves led to the destruction of humanity. I’m saying that there’s a promise that came from science and technology.
But that promise has not been fulfilled. And something else has happened. We humans now we have so many weapons.
Now, another big discovery has been the internet. Now, the internet has of course connected people in many different ways. But one big result of this is distraction.
With weapons of mass destruction, there is distraction. The psychological level of people, they are emotionally distracted. And even normal functioning is becoming more and more difficult right now.
We have thousands of Facebook friends but they don’t even have one real life friend. And that’s a terrible situation to be in. So, I saw one cartoon where somebody said a man is studying his friend.
Yesterday my broadband wifi went down. So, I spent some time with my family. They seem to be very nice people.
Now, that may not have happened to that degree, but it is very much on the path. Because what has happened at the psychological level itself the virtual world seems to be much more stimulating than the real world. Especially in Rajoguna and Tamoguna.
In the real world, the real world relationship takes time. Making friendships takes time. In the virtual world, you start a friendship with a swipe, end a friendship with a swipe.
It’s just so cheap. There is no need to invest in it. I am not saying that online through communication people cannot find like minded people.
It’s possible. But in the majority, it doesn’t work like that. So, internet has given us great power, but there was a thinker, Carl Jung, he said that the more outer power we get, the more inner power we need.
The more outer power we get, the more inner power we need. Like say, America has this rule that anybody can legally possess guns. But in the government that is, if a gun owner is not a responsible person, then the person can just go out and badly shoot people.
You may have heard about school shootings in America. It’s tragic. I was giving a class in a university and I had not started using this.
So, I was writing something on a whiteboard. And suddenly I heard some alarm. I didn’t pay much attention.
I just continued writing. And I turned around. There was nobody in the class.
What happened? The organiser who was organising the programme, he was ducking under the desk. I said, you duck under the desk. What happened? He said, that alarm is of a gunman in the premises.
So, I went and hid under the table. And then, after that, there was a knock. I said, what gunman will actually knock here? And then, security over there, he came in.
He said, this is just a trial run. We are checking whether everybody does something. So, the point is that technology has astronomically increased the outer power that we have.
But, has the inner power increased correspondingly? Now, everybody has I can get angry with you. You can get angry with me. I can bat about you.
I can spread some rumours about you. You can spread some rumours about me. This is a normal human tendency.
Today, somebody can spread a rumour on social media. And that rumour can spread across the world. And, how do you counter something? So, that gossiping tendency, that backbiting tendency, it is there.
If you don’t have a mirror straight, then, it can lead to a huge amount of damage. So, basically, even from a material perspective, even only spiritual perspective, say, talk about people not having children, people not people monitoring their lives. This is simply from a biological perspective.
Society is going down a very dark path. So, what can be done about this? Krishna himself talks about this whole demoniac nature. And, this demoniac nature that is there, there is a whole philosophy that has come, especially in Silicon Valley.
It is called as trans-humanism. Trans-humanism is that humanity will transcend its limitations through technology. So, what is the idea here? Actually, we are, we grow old.
So, we will find out the gene which causes ageing. And, then you switch off that gene. And, then nobody will grow old.
And, there are so many I don’t have to do that. Come on. You buy this.
You hear this. You eat this. This is anti-ageing.
Well, yes, the World Aortic Aortic Association issued a directive in public interest. There is no medicine, no treatment, no mechanism available right now that can reverse, slow, or stop the ageing process. You can’t reverse.
And, you can’t grow old. And, becoming old, we can’t slow it down. We can’t stop it.
What can we do? We just give a facelift. So that there are wrinkles. We can pull them down.
So, they don’t see. So, we can’t do anything about this. But, there is a huge road ahead.
One of my friends, in America, he turned 50. And, he said, from somewhere I bought like so many advertisements. He says, life begins at 50.
He said that. Actually, before you were 50, you have professional responsibilities. You have family responsibilities.
Now, you have earned. You have got a career. You have settled in life.
Now, is the time to enjoy. Somehow, actually, he said, we have various new problems. I don’t think we have got this remedy.
If you have got packing problems, you have got this remedy. If you have visual problems, you have got this remedy. He was telling me, I was thinking, is there some Maya remedy over there? So, the idea is that transhumanism, it promises a lot.
But, it does not deliver. Have any of you heard of this field called eugenics? So, eugenics was a field that came, again, I am not blaming Darwinism for this, but this is, this is really the idea of social Darwinism. Social Darwinism was the idea that, just as there are different species across nature, and the fittest species survive, and unfit species die.
So, like that, they applied it to humanity, and they said, certain human races are fitter than others. So, for example, the white Caucasian, they are the fittest of all races, because they have become the most prosperous. And everybody else is unfit.
So, they have their own creed about who is fit, who is unfit. So, that idea was taken by Hitler. And Hitler said that among the hierarchy of species, we, the Germans, we are the original Nazis, sorry, we are the original Aryans, and we are the best.
And the Jews are the worst. So, they said, by nature’s own arrangement, the Jews will be eradicated. The survival of the fittest, they will become extinct.
But now, we humans have advanced through technology. So, we can help nature on its feet. We can help nature on its feet.
So, he started by, you know, anybody who is mentally, who is, now we don’t use that word, mentally retarded, he says, somebody has patient needs, somebody has, you know, all such people, first thing, he had them, thousands and thousands of people physically sterilised. And these are words of humanity. We should not let them reproduce.
Then he did that for all physically handicapped. Somebody has a device, somebody has lost a limb, somebody has lost, can’t hear, he first sterilised all of them. Then, after sterilising, he said, why, don’t let them reproduce, why don’t you let them live? And so, two sides he went.
One side was that, according to him, see, there have been many mass murderers in human history. And Jagdish Khan is said to have been, he went across Europe and he killed millions, how many millions, we don’t know. But the holocaust was the first time in recorded human history, where industrial efficiency was brought to mass murder.
That is, mass murder, but industrial efficiency. Industrial efficiency is what, you can kill people, you can chop off their head, you can hang them. All that takes so much time.
Just have a gas chamber and just put it in a gas chamber. Kill them and kill them with industrial efficiency. That is, among any kind of mass murder, this was the most famous.
And again, I am not saying that science or Darwin liked this. I am saying that it was used as a justification. So, on the negative side, the negative side was social Darwinism.
On the positive side, not positive about it, but the positive side was, these genes and eugenics, we try to find out what are the best characteristics among all people. And we take the genes, somebody is brilliant, somebody is specifically powerful, somebody is good looking. So, find out what are the genes or what are the characteristics that bring those, that make that person like that.
And we try to add the machine together. And by that, they said, we will create a super human being. And then we will have a race of super humans.
But the point is, that this has never worked out. And more importantly, who is going to decide who is a super human? The people who will decide that, they will say, we will eliminate everyone else. And it isn’t working quite.
So, again, eugenics is slowly being to come back. It is not mainstream science, by any means. Eugenics was highly discredited after the… See, at that time, Germany was the most advanced scientific country.
More than America was. America really gave a boost to its scientific advancement because Germany was advancing. That’s why Einstein was not a fool.
When Einstein said, the Germans will develop an atom bomb. It was because they were investing so much in science and technology. But he had his agenda and his dues.
And many of the prominent scientists were Jews. They went to America. And then they helped America.
So, this whole idea of eugenics, it can be very easily misused. So, again, see, the problem is maybe well-intentioned. You know, people are diseased, people are prone to this, prone to that.
So, we will change that. How? We will genetically engineer a new species. That’s evolution aided by science.
Well-intentioned. This is exactly what they have done in real life. So, the demonic life, see, what is demonic over here? It is actually, like, say, whoever developed a weapon for the first time.
Maybe they developed a bomb. They were definitely demonic. They witnessed wars do happen and we need weapons to fight wars.
But the point is, when the outer power is developing and there is no inner power that can control it, then what will happen is, it can be a disaster. So, unfortunately, when these two wars are happening, where do you credit where it is due? Nobody has used weapons of mass destruction till now. It’s like Russia has the biggest stockpile.
They won’t use it. So, to some extent, there is a prevailing. But how long? We don’t know.
So, this whole idea that we can make this world into paradise, that idea itself is at its core a demonic idea. Like, now, should we try to make things better? Of course. Doesn’t mean we have to stay suffering.
Say, Ayodhya was a place of prosperity. Lanka was also a place of prosperity. But Lanka, the whole purpose was, Ravana wanted to be God and Ravana wanted to make Lanka into heaven.
So, the idea is, in the service of God we can act. Then, when there is a service of God, there are wantonness. I’ll go back and come to the same point.
In the demoniac worldview, there are two possibilities. In the demoniac worldview, see, there are, in any activity, there are means and there are ends. So, the ends might, the best situation is, the ends may be good and the means are also good.
But the ends may be good, the means may be bad. Then, the ends may be bad and the means may be good. This is very rare.
But the ends are bad and the means are also bad. So, put it this way, there are means and ends. So, we may say, making this world into a paradise, what is the problem with it? Well, the point is, this world cannot be a paradise.
Ecology, if you consider, ecology is a big concern. Political answer, I won’t go into that. But in the past, it was implicitly understood that nature is far bigger than us.
And we need to live in respect and harmony with nature. But as the industrial revolution started going, as science and technology started going, then, what happened was, the idea changed that nature is not a mother that nourishes us. Many of us may quote that Francis Becker’s quote, knowledge is thought.
Now, it has some wisdom in it, but actually, Francis Becker, when he said that, his idea was that, actually, science through technology will give us power to control nature. So, this vision, and people of this time, the vision was, nature is not like a mother. Nature is a stepmother.
And she is wicked. She causes drought. She causes famine.
She causes natural disasters. So, she is whimsical and cruel. And, just like a wicked stepmother needs to be controlled, so, technology is the means by which we will control this wicked stepmother of nature.
And, with that, we went about doing many things. Now, we started realising that nature has far more complex factors at work than what we can think about. Now, we are thinking about how we can have more environmental consciousness, how we can have harmony with nature, and the others.
Many people are realising now, a theistic worldview. Like, we have NGOs. Now, there is a whole genre which United Nations called FBOs.
FBOs are faith-based organisations. Because, what they found is, you need to tell people how environmental disasters are going to come about. But, still, people don’t stop.
They keep enjoying, keep indulging, keep consuming. They say that the only thing we can protect the environment is if people can find some non-material satisfaction. And, the non-material satisfaction primarily comes from a religious or spiritual worldview.
That’s why they are encouraging religion and spirituality. They cannot leave religion and spirituality the conclusions of that. But, still, they are encouraging that.
So, like, in the West, people are turning to meditation, to yoga, towards spiritual practises for calming the mind. Why? Because we are realising that technology does not bring about calmness in the mind. So, that inner power, outer power can come through science and technology.
But, inner power comes primarily through philosophy and spirituality. It is through practise. First, we have a worldview.
It is aligned with reality. And, then, eventually, there is a there is a purification that comes with spirituality. So, the Gita concludes this particular chapter by saying, Therefore, which Shastra understand what is to be done and what is not to be done.
And, then, mould your life accordingly. So, it is that scripture is not just meant for, like, religious veneration. Oh, this is a sacred book.
We believe in the sacred book. Like, we should believe in the Bhagavad Gita as it is and keep it as it is. So, that is not it is actually to bring about a personal transformation.
The transformation happens at two levels. First is in terms of our worldview. And, then, in terms of our behaviour.
So, there are many people who are visualising the shortfalls of materialism, shortfalls of the current worldview. And, they are trying to bring about a change. And, some are working at some level.
But, you know, the integration of a solid worldview, a well-reasoned, a time-honoured worldview, and a time-honoured way of living that can actually help raise human consciousness is very much important today. Prabhupada says that there is no use of crying for world peace unless there is an awakening of divine consciousness in the individual. So, when we are chanting Hare Krishna, when we are coming here to this earth surface, and then we feel we are going to other world, the world has so many problems, India has so many problems, what do you think about it? There is severe fanaticism, there is corruption, there is this, there is that.
Yeah, there is sexual violence, that is there, that is true. But, that, the way it is going to be solved is not just by political activism or wars. The cause of these problems are typically lust, anger, and greed.
And, they all can be combined in various ways. So, anger leads to violence, lust leads to sexual violence. No, I am saying it is not only lust.
Lust can be combined with anger, it can come and go. Greed leads to corruption. So, now, if there is execution at the external level, if there is greater inner power at the internal level, then at the external level, the crime will go down.
So, there is, in our scripture, there are two things. There is Shastra, and there is Shastra. Shastra is wisdom, and Shastra is where? Generally, the Brahmins, they focus on Shastra, the Kshatriyas focus on Shastra.
Both have to work together. Not everybody is going to listen to Buddha’s wisdom and change themselves. There needs to be proper law and order.
There needs to be a proper military for defending the country. Shastra is required. But if there is only Shastra, without Shastra, it doesn’t work.
If there is only Shastra, then, what happens is, it is knowledge, but without much social power. If there is only Shastra, then what happens is, it is without much wisdom. So, as Prabhupada said, we want Brahmanas and Kshatriyas.
We want those persons who are either a seer and an outer doer. Brahmanas are seers, we have proper vision. Kshatriyas are doers.
We don’t just want seers who don’t care for the world, and we don’t just want doers who don’t have a bigger vision of the world. When we have both of these, the scripture, the Shastra, can offer all of us that wisdom and that opportunity. Each one of us, how can we be a seer and a doer in our particular field? It could be our family, it could be our home, it could be our preaching Kshetra, wherever it is.
So, this influence of the demoniac worldview that is there, that can be countered. Some people need force to be countered, but without wisdom, any imposition of force will simply be seen as trampling on people’s rights, and people will reject it. So, there has to be a change in the worldview, and along with that, a supporting social structure.
How exactly it will work out, we don’t know. Yesterday, we talked about Shraddha Gopal. Now, 50-60 years before, nobody would have thought that all over the world, there will be people who will be adopting this scripture, and practising bhakti.
It’s not just in terms of chanting Hare Krishna and asking his help. It is, of course, non-materialistic. But along with that, people are pursuing a more and more life.
People are living a life of higher values. So, we are not alone. Krishna has a higher value.
And we are parts of Krishna’s plan. We have the opportunity to be parts of Krishna’s plan. So, each one of us, we try to develop our own combination of becoming a seer and becoming a seer.
We see how much, what Krishna has in store for us, what Krishna can do to us, if we become ready as students. And it is like this. So, as an artist, you’ve been on quite a long journey with.
I first started by talking about how there is the demonic nature and there is the specific at that time that is timeless and there is timely. So, I started with the timely in the past. Example of Guruji.
That he had greed but lower without wantonness. From wanting money to be ready to kill for money. So, Kama or Krodha.
Kama and Krodha. The Krodha is the raging, the anger against wanderers. That’s what characterises the demonic nature.
Just having Kama lower doesn’t take on demonic nature. Having Kama and lower that rages against and rejects wanderers. Then in terms of the timeless aspect, I discussed about the four worldviews.
Four worldviews are this world, real and the other world, real. So, which are the four worldviews? First is materialism. Second is voidism, nihilism.
Third is impersonalism. So, we discussed the problems with nihilism is it’s completely hopeless. There’s no hope.
Impersonalism makes us too passive in the system. Devotionalism. This is the Gita.
Then we especially spent a good amount of time looking at the materialism. I talked about how materialism is associated with scientism. Science is both a body of knowledge and a methodology for getting that body of knowledge.
But scientism is an ideology. That is not justified by science. There’s no room based on science.
So, scientism, what it led to is that we will make this world into a high tech paradise. But the problem with that is we have become comfortably miserable. And when we say miserable, we are not even getting to the moral dimension here.
We’re talking about simply sociological or biological parameters that are basic characteristics of any species according to biological senses. That is, they should survive and they should reproduce. So, both of these are decreasing.
People are not able to or not willing to not reproduce. So many people are committing suicide. The population would have fallen off.
The more this scientistic world is adopted, the more people are not having children. It’s only because of immigration that there’s still populationless. The rest of the world has some population.
So, the paradise has not turned out at all. But rather, it seems that we have got a nightmare-ish situation. And there is a part of the nightmare.
I talked about several things. Weapons of mass destruction are there. And there is distraction with technology in terms of internet.
Now, again, the weapons of mass destruction can serve a positive purpose. They can act as deterrent. So, I’m not saying it’s all bad.
It’s very clear. I’m trying to make this point that it is not that science or technology can be blamed for the problem that arises. All that we are saying is, science and technology came with a promise.
That promise is not being fulfilled. And the reason we understand is that there is power, there is outer power that technology is providing. But who is providing the inner power? Inner power is not that we are discussing about genetics over here.
How the idea that somebody may think, oh, we want to create a superhuman species. But in that case, who will decide whom to eliminate? So, without the inner power, outer power can be terribly misused. So, what we need to do is that this inner power has to get to Shastra, basically.
The combination of Shastra and Krishna. So, we all want to become seers and doers. We all should be empowered by Krishna to be in our own small way, far larger way than Krishna wants, be a part of the solution.
Until then, Hare Krishna. Thank you very much. Do we have any questions? In the evening, we will have a Q&A session.
So, we can have questions at that time. Any one question anyone has? Yes, sir. You mentioned about the other world and the current world.
So, many times when we are trying to speak certain aspects of the other world to people who do not have enough faith in the other world. To what degree science can aid us in doing that? And how much should we rely on scientific methods to help people understand? How much science can realise the spiritual world? No, no. Many times, people who do not have enough faith in the other world, how much can science be used to help them develop their faith? To what degree should we use it? Good point.
See, what is science essentially? There is no universal definition or accepted definition of science. But in general, science is associated with natural explanations for natural phenomena. By natural, we could use the word material, but that’s the word that they use.
So, for example, when Newton saw the apple falling, or he felt the apple falling, whatever version of the story we accept. And Newton believed in God. When he wanted to know what made the apple fall, he was not interested in explaining what made the apple fall.
Why? Because he was looking for a natural explanation for natural phenomena. So now, can God be an explanation? He can be, of course. When he discovered the principle of gravity, he said the planets are moving according to gravity.
Now, he said, this has been arranged by God. But he was still looking for a… If any event that happens, you can have a mechanical explanation. And beyond that, you can have a personal explanation.
A mechanical, but personal. Let’s say, for example, there’s a India-Pakistan cricket match. The last ball is there.
We need a six to hit. And there’s a bottom setter. Gradually, he hits the six.
And then there’s the match. Everybody’s celebrating. Otherwise, the post-match conference is there.
And the press conference is there. The interviewer asks, how did you hit the six? And they’re all pulling the plug. And Newton draws out the mission.
Now, is that a correct explanation? Well, you can say, yes. The ball came at this place. It swung the bat at this place.
The ball in the back met at this angle. The bat hit with the top edge. Then the ball went on to the fielder.
You can include a law of motion. But that’s not the relevant explanation over there. The question of, you know, did you anticipate it with the bouncer? Had you met the stop? How did you manage to work out? There’s a personal attitude.
The personal and the mechanical can both go together. They can. But there are two different levels of explanation.
So, in science and spirituality, we try to bring them together. So, one is there are different ways we can do it. We can say that science itself should be expanded to look for non-natural, non-naturally normative explanations.
That’s one approach that science in terms of its its ontology. Ontology is the nature of study of nature of reality. That in terms of it should consider non-material explanations or non-material causes.
So, for example, where does consciousness come from? Science should be open to the idea that there’s something beyond the green. Non-material causes. Now, the reservation that science has to do is this.
If we start opening up to non-material causes, then that will completely stop the progress of science. So, for example, when the Black Plague had occurred in Europe, almost one-third of Europe died because of the Black Plague. So, there was a local belief that this is caused by some evil spirit possessing and the church was being exorcised and things like that.
But scientists said, we didn’t believe that stuff. We studied it. We found jokes.
So, the idea is that if we look for material explanations, we find an explanation that we can do something about. So, many scientists consider that looking only for material causes and not looking for non-material causes is a bedrock principle of science. So, and they say that if you want to talk about the soul, if you want to talk about God, these are extraordinary explanations and they require extraordinary evidence.
And that level of evidence is not easy. That’s their argument. So, in terms of ontology, science should consider non-material factors.
So, that’s the approach that we try to take nowadays. In our classes in D.V.I.S., we try to use scientific evidence for the existence of soul. We use scientific evidence for the existence of God.
Now, that’s one approach. The other is in terms of functionality. Functionality means that rather than trying to say that the soul exists, can in terms of the functional aspects of human life, can we see the effects of spirituality? Say, for example, if somebody does meditation, then at a subjective level, we can say meditation leads to people feeling peaceful.
But at an objective level, are there some changes in the wiring in the brain? Do we see something which resides for the tangible, the measurable, the repeatable? If somebody says that I saw God, I meditated. Can it be repeated? You cannot control that. That’s not exactly repeatable.
That’s why much of what we call, what we consider as central planets of spirituality, they are not repeatable for science to investigate. So, the thing is, this functional aspect that is to a large extent repeatable. One person does meditation.
Now, we don’t know what mystical experience they have. Two people go to meditation and they have different mystical experiences. But can both of them have similar neurological effects of their experience? Does their brain circuit become calmer? They have this phenomenon called crosstalk.
Crosstalk means that whenever any brain signal goes through the brain cells, the synapses occur at the end of the dendrites. So normally, the synapses occur in a desirable way. Where they should be occurring, then the attention is moving.
And then the comprehension is moving. But in unwanted, synapses start occurring. So right now, we are talking and saying I am moving the fingers over here.
At A, if you see these fingers moving, you remember some movie star who moved the fingers like that. And then it starts moving with that finger. So that’s what the unwanted connection is like.
So distraction results because of the synapses firing either arbitrarily or in an unwanted way. So this functional aspect of spirituality can science measure the effects of spirituality? And there is a lot of success in this field. There are many many surveys that have been done.
Just like people go to prayer meetings, whether in the church or mosque or temple, they go regularly for some prayer meeting. It seems that somebody has a heart attack and chances of recurrence of the heart attack go down. There is a Oxford Handbook of Religion and Health.
There are about 3000 meta-studies. 3000 studies, they are combined together. And they say there is no medicine.
If there is a significant religion in the opium of the masses. So there is a study that if there is opium, then this is an opium that is very healthy. At least as a physical thing.
So the functional aspect can be studied. And scientists may try to come up with a reductionist explanation. This is again science and scientists have come together.
So what they are trying to do now, they have like, there is a big research, Harvard or Stanford has got a $90 billion grant to create a meditation helmet or a meditation cap. What they say is that they have observed people who do meditation and they have found that their brain states are in particular way. That certain areas of the brain are more active and certain areas of the brain are less active.
So they say, can we create a cap? You wear that cap or helmet and that will electronically or electrochemically stimulate the brain in such a way that your brain state will become similar to a meditative state. This is a shortcut to meditation. There is a shortcut or simply a cut.
So this is the problem with reductionism. That we may be able to see the neurochemical effects of meditation. And that can give you faith that meditation really makes a difference.
But if we reduce meditation to neurochemical effects only and there is nothing more to that, then that will not work. So the ontological aspect, that is quite difficult to try to mathematically, try to scientifically build up a case for reincarnation or for past life memories, for near-death experiences. It can be done.
But it takes a lot of effort. The sheer number of studies. We had a general level.
I have been to the Mukundalini Foundation also. And I have worked on 25 cases. But what happens is if you really want to do a real scientific study, there has to be a large sample.
There has to be control cases. How do you do a control case for a past life memory? Can you have two people exactly in the same condition and one is remembering the past life and the other is not? It’s difficult. So at an anecdotal level, you can call it scientific research.
But you cannot really call it a real scientific research. So at an ontological level, maybe it is possible with a large amount of funding. Near-death experiences have received far, far more funding than reincarnation studies.
Because near-death experiences confirm the Christian worldview. Past life memories, they don’t. Because Christianity has that in another world.
There is heaven. There is Jesus. But they don’t accept another life time.
So Christians will never fund reincarnation research. Who are going to fund it? Either Hindus. Hindus don’t do anything like that.
Hindus will fund building of big temples. So then there are Western people who have adopted the Hindu worldview. And some of them are philanthropic.
Some of them are wealthy. They give endowments for reincarnation research. So the reincarnation research funding is less than 1% of the near-death experience research.
And that’s why near-death experience research is much, much more. But what happens? If we focus on meditation research, then that is something which is tangibly beneficial for everyone. So there is a lot of funding available for that also.
So as long as we are clear about what implications we are trying to draw from it. So, one of the tips to the holy name is to give a mundane interpretation. So one devotee, senior devotee was doing research in this field.
The first person to do research in mantra meditation. And he showed, we quote that David Graham on his research. And how this study can be found in depression and other things decreased for people who practise meditation.
It was only one research. One unpublished research. One unpublished thesis.
It’s not very critical. But then I asked him, I met him in Florida. I said, you know, isn’t this a mundane interpretation of the holy name? To say that chanting, we can see the behavioural effect.
He didn’t know social neurology. But he said, his understanding and I tend to agree with him is that if we are saying this is all that there is to meditation. It is.
To give a mundane interpretation means to reduce the spiritual to the material. Like the ladies. Are the ladies material? Well, the ladies are definitely made of material stuff.
But we have to reduce. It’s one thing to say the ladies are made of some matter. But that doesn’t mean everything that the lady is material.
Like a currency note. Is it made of paper? Of course it is made of paper. But is it paper? No, it is so much more than paper.
So, like that, that functional aspect of meditation, the functional effects of spirituality, they have a potential for a huge amount of promising research. So, neuroscience coupled with the functional effects of spirituality. Not just neuroscience, other physiological factors.
So that can definitely be used to enhance the faith. But what I found, just to conclude this answer quickly, is that times are changing. And many people don’t really worry so much about science nowadays.
Because what has happened is that while people do want technology, and technology has a… People want little gadgets. But the idea of science will help us understand what is right or what is true or what is good. There is a lot of scepticism about that nowadays.
That if you consider three phases in history, there is pre-modern, there is modern, and now mostly it is post-modern. So, in pre-modern times, scripture was the source of authority. Whether in India it was the Vedas, in Europe it was the Bible, in the Middle East it was the Quran.
Scripture was the source of authority. In modern times, science is the source of authority. Now, in post-modern times, it is largely experience.
If something works for me, I will do it. So like yoga, there has been some study pointing out the benefits of yoga. But there has been no exhaustive research of the benefits of yoga.
Millions of people are practising yoga. Because experientially, it works for them. So that way, experience is what benefits most for many people in today’s world.
Whether something is scientific or not. Many people don’t try meditation. I haven’t found, like I share some study about this, this, research people say that meditation is good for you, therefore practise meditation.
That really doesn’t convince many people. They are like, hey look here, let me try it out. Many people who say that meditation is helpful, you try it out, it helps people continue it.
So, to summarise, scientific study towards spirituality can go to functional and ontological levels. See, the functional level is much easier. And that’s much more relevant for people today.
Okay?