Dasha Mula Tattva 10 – Mayavada is the inversion, not contradiction, of Vaishnavism
So, everything in this world is, in this existence in fact, material and spiritual, is actually the energy of Lord Krishna, chit shakti and chit shakti, parinatihi, that's how it is to be understood. Now, while it is understood thus, vivartam, that is, there are two broad schools of thought, vivartavada and parinamavada, we will discuss them in new course, vivartavada, vivarta basically means illusion, so na satyam, there is no truth in the doctrine of vivartavada and shuddhim iti rudham, so it is actually, this doctrine is contrary to scripture, kalimalam, it is actually, resulting from the contamination of Kali Yuga, harer bheda bhedau, so these energies are bhedabheda, they have this relationship of oneness and difference, so shuddhi vihid tattvam, so this is the tattva that is established by shuddhi and this is suvimalam, so here it is contrasting kalimalam with suvimalam, this is an utterly spotless tattva and then when one understands this tattva, tatha premna siddhir bhavati, when one understands this tattva, then one can attain the perfection of love, nitharam nitya vishaye, when he understands that Lord Hari and devotion to him are nitharam nitya vishaye, they are eternal subjects, so essentially this tattva is focussing on how there is no merging, rather the devotion to Hari, love for Hari is an eternal principle, this is a very, as we have discussed this briefly earlier also, that the difference between bhakti, between the path of impersonalism and the path of bhakti or personalism is not so much of contradiction as of inversion, contradiction means the two are opposite, whereas inversion means it's upside down, so if we see the impersonalists do not reject the path of bhakti, when the Europeans came to India and they started studying the Indian religions, Hinduism especially, they had three main accusations, this is you are idolatrous, you are polytheistic and you are immoral, so idolatrous means you worship idols and in fact in the Abrahamic religions it is not just a matter of some religious extremism that idolatry is opposed, you know even in the Old Testament, Old Testament is the holy book which was written before Jesus came, what Jesus came was, he was a New Testament, so Old Testament is the book of the Jews, so right from the Old Testament down to Islamic rule, whenever any religious ruler conquers a world, conquers any kingdom, the first thing that they go do is go and destroy the idols, because they consider that this is in Quran, but Quran is the most extreme version of what is there in Bible and the New Testament and the Old Testament, so in the Quran it is said that Allah can forgive everything except the sin of idolatry, so those who commit the sin of idolatry they will never get forgiveness from Allah, so their idea is why are they so hatefully against idolatry, their idea is first of all there is in their scriptures there is no description of the form of God positively, so they believe that if any form is made of God that form will be an imagination, and they think that once people start worshipping an imaginary form, then even if initially they think that okay this is just a representation of the divine, over time people will forget that this is meant to be a representation of the divine, and what is supposed to be a representative of the divine will become an independent object of worship, people will start worshipping that particular idol itself without remembering that they actually wanted to worship God who is represented by that idol, and in due course of time that idol will become a competitor to God, so the worship that is meant to go to God will go to that idol, and in that way that idol worship will replace God worship, and therefore to destroy idol worship they consider it is a very religiously virtuous activity so that people will focus on the worship of the true God, so there are several problems with this logic, first is of course because they don't have knowledge of form of God, so they think that all forms, all depiction of God will be concoctions, and further they also have this idea that if there is a form that form will only be a representative of God, they don't have the idea that God can manifest as the deity, so the deity is not just a representation of God, it is a manifestation of God, and further if this is something which many serious Christians, serious Christians means those who are seriously trying to understand how to relate Christian theology with other world religions, so if they study Hinduism and they find that many of the saints in the Bhakti tradition, they have similar if not greater devotion to God as is what described in their own saints, among their own saints in their own tradition, so many of them acknowledge this level of intense devotion is it really possible for some imaginary God, for some imagination, so I have written a book called Idol Worship or Ideal Worship, where I explain that eventually one of basically they say this idol worship, this deity worship which they call as idolatry, this is all false, all false, but it is like ultimately they find it is like prescription wrong, patient cured, so one doctor say, say allopathic doctor says Ayurveda is all bogus, Ayurveda is all bogus, bogus, bogus, this doesn't work, this doesn't work, but the patient is already cured, so they say this idolatry is all, it's a blasphemy to God, it's an offence to God, it's unforgivable offence to God, but they also acknowledge the purpose of practise religion is to develop love for God, so by worshipping deities, if people are developing love for God, how do they explain that, they find very difficult to explain, so the point here is this idolatry was one thing, second thing was that they considered Hindus to be polytheistic, to worship so many different Gods, and then they considered also to be immoral, why immoral, because the idea was that Krishna performs immoral activities, apparently dancing with Gopis, and there were many sahajiyas, so sahajiyism is very peculiar, what happened is, this actually came from a form of Buddhism to Vaishnavism, it is present in Shaivism, but it came to Vaishnavism also, sahajiyism is not just imitating Radha Krishna's confidential pastimes, it is more than that, what these many sahajiyas think is, when they perform Rashtrila, they don't think that we are imitating Radha Krishna, they think that because of our bhakti to Radha and Krishna, Radha and Krishna enter into us, so when we perform Rashtrila, actually Radha and Krishna are enjoying through us, so it is a very distorted ideology, and they say that, they claim that they have entered into a different world, yes they have entered into a different world, but that different world is a world of illusion, not of transcendence, so there is of course a tradition of performing dramas, but those dramas, and it is also said that when we try to perform dramas in a devotional way, then we can invoke to some extent the presence of those divine personalities whom we are depicting, but that, in the tradition there was never any, we were performing any of the intimate pastimes, it is just a depiction of the various other pastimes, and the purpose of the drama is primarily the absorption and recollection, it is not, it is never the differentiation between the physical activities and the transcendental activities that has to be maintained properly, so anyway why we are discussing all this is, that I was explaining the point that impersonalism is not a contradiction or impersonalism as it exists now, it is not a, so we have a contradiction as it is an inversion, so there was a very popular, another respect, spiritual leaders were respected, an impersonalist leader in mainstream India, so he said when some Christian missionaries criticised the immoral seeming pastimes of Krishna with the Gopis, he says, you know in your religion God is only thought of as a father, so what can you understand the greatness of the Gopis Bhakti for Krishna, he says only when you have a very remote conception of God, you think of God as a master, when you come closer to God, you understand him as a friend, when you come even closer to him, then you understand him as your child, when you come closer to him, you understand that he is your lover, and when you come closest to him, you become one with him, so the same hierarchy which is there, but they put impersonalism on top of that, so down to the uninformed, this can appear very convincing, so their idea is, they also accept Bhakti, but the idea is, why we say inversion, because the correct understanding Shastra says is, we have Shukadeva Goswami, who is attracted to the impersonal realisation, but from there he came to the personal realisation, so it is an inversion, so whereas Shantarasa is the lowest among the Rasas, and Shantarasa is not primarily impersonal conception, the Brahman conception is actually, is almost like below Shantarasa, so what is below in this hierarchy, they put it above, so where we understand Vaishya scripture that the impersonal realisation is a preliminary realisation by which we can eventually attain the personal realisation and pure devotion therein, their idea is that the devotion is a means to liberation, so they consider devotion as a preliminary, so it is in that sense inversion more than a contradiction, but of course there is a contradiction, because what they are teaching is misleading, so this was their attempt, see what is there in personalism, Advaita Vata that is there prevailing in much of India today, what is it actually, it is basically a Khichdi of four things, it is a Khichdi which is made of the grains that come from the Upanishads, it is heated in the fire of nationalism, and it is mixed with the spice of social service, so Khichdi has grains, it has to cook it, and then you need some spicing on it, so what happened is that impersonalism is definitely taught in the Upanishads, no doubt about it, but it is taught of more of the transitional realisation or the intermediate realisation, and definitely not the highest realisation, so what happened is when India was trying to, India was under British rule, and there were people who were trying to unite the Indians so that they could counter British rule, so now many of the Indian political leaders, what happened is when the British government arrested them and they were in jail, in jail they had nothing to do, they wrote commentaries on the Bhagavad Gita, and many of them right in their introduction they write, you know this is purely the product of our speculation, see we consider speculation to be a bad word, they consider speculation as a sign of originality, so he says this is simply my commentary, I have not referred to anyone in the tradition, so this is my original contribution, and they are proud of that, so now what happens is, now they were living as nationalist leaders, they wanted to free India from British rule, and they had the idea that Indians are getting westernised, Indians are getting converted to Christianity because Indians are doing so much, because so much Christians do some social service and they convert people, so they interpreted the Bhagavad Gita according to their concerns, which is fine, now Prabhupada's point was if you want to write a book, you can write a book, nobody is stopping you from writing a book, but if you are writing on the Bhagavad Gita, then you have to explain the Bhagavad Gita, you cannot just impose your own agenda entirely on the Bhagavad Gita, that becomes a problem, so what they thought is that actually if you want in India, religion is a very powerful force for uniting people, but it is so divided, there are so many Devatas, so there is a British thinker Mark Twain, he said, sarcastically of course, sometimes devotees are not very discerning, I saw in one youth programme, actually they had put a quote as if it is a proud quote, it is something to celebrate, Mark Twain has said, as far as religion is concerned, India is the only millionaire in the world, now what he is saying is, he is sarcastically saying, no other religion has millions of Gods like this, but sometimes what happens is, we just get some quote and we don't see in what context he has said it, and you think, oh, he is a famous British author, he is appreciating Indian culture, well, he is criticising, in a sarcastic way, so what he said is, India is the only billionaire, no other country's religious imagination has been so rich as to invent so many Gods, so that was his idea of the whole thing, so now what the Indian nationalistic leaders felt is that, this having so many Gods is going to divide Indians, so if you want to unite Indians, how can you unite them, they felt that if we consider all these Gods as acceptable, they are all parts to the one universal realisation that is the impersonal realisation, then we will do many things, so first thing is we will unite all the Indians, because all the Gods, whichever God you want to worship that is perfectly fine, because ultimately all Gods are representations of that one ultimate Brahman, and we have to attain that Brahman, so then not only would it unite Indians, they felt that we could go one up on the Christians also, because Christian, Muslim they say, we are the only way, so you say you are the only way, but what they say is that, you are also one of our ways, there are many ways to come to God and Christianity is also one of the ways, so in this way they tried to co-opt Christianity also within, they tried to take a morally higher position, you are exclusivist, we are pluralist, you say this is ours only, we say yours also, it is all right ways, so in all this from the political strategic point of view, it seems to make a lot of sense, but the problem is it was not based on scripture, and because it was not based on scripture, it was not really the scripture conclusion, and more importantly, if you are worshipping God, and if you are thinking that ultimately I have to go beyond this worship of God, then the Bhakti that one experiences is not really very deep, because one treats the whole concept of Bhakti as a convenient fiction, so devotion is in the impersonal path a convenient fiction, it is a fiction which will evoke higher emotion within your heart, and with that higher emotion we give up lower emotions, we go beyond the lower modes, once we come to goodness and we move towards transcendence, when we go beyond the object of devotion and we merge, so with that conception of devotion, one does not get much of a higher taste, the Bhaktivinoda Thakur calls the chanting of the holy names by the impersonalist as Pratibimba Namabhas, Namabhas is when we chant with distraction, but Pratibimba Namabhas means the sun is there in the sky, it gives a lot of warmth, the sun is just rising, there is just some light and a little bit feeling of warmth is there, but if I am looking at the reflection of the sun, how much warmth am I going to get by that, practically nothing, so those who chant this conception of ultimately wanting to merge in the object of devotion, they don't really get much spiritual growth, and thus they stay, they may seem to be religious, but they don't really become transformed by their religion, and this is what we see in modern day Hinduism, Indians are by and large very religious, they are fairly religious, but despite being religious, Indians are also very materialistic, their religion is primarily for promoting material gain, it is not for promoting any spiritual growth per se, so this is because when the impersonal conception is prevalent, one cannot get an authentic higher taste, some higher taste comes, some taste may come because one is chanting the names of God, and then what happens with this idea that there can be many Gods are there, whichever God you worship that is alright, then people can make up their own Gods also, you know my Guru is God, and in that way this also becomes more prevalent, so our Acharyas have recognised the many complex problems that come up because of this impersonal conception, that's why they are strong in countering it, so here it is saying that it is Viruddham, it is actually opposed to scripture, it is not the Shruti Viruddham, it is opposed to scripture, now what is opposed to scripture? Impersonalism itself is not opposed to scripture, impersonalism is a valid scriptural teaching, in the 12th chapter of the Gita, Krishna does talk about Arjuna asking which is better, he is not talking, he is not asking in 12.1, so he is not asking which is right, which is wrong, he is asking by which is one more intimately united with you, so that means both are good, both will take us towards transcendence, but which is better than Arjuna's, and Krishna clearly says the personal one is better, and then he says, Klesho dekhtarasthesha avyakta satshetasam avyakta hi gatir dukkham dehavad nirvapnate, in 12.5, he says that for the embodied souls, actually practising the impersonal conception is very difficult, it is Klesho, it is troublesome, so impersonalism is not scriptural contradiction, impersonalism is not contradictory to scripture, it is a part of scriptural teaching, what is contradictory to scripture is to claim that impersonalism is the highest teaching of scripture, and that the personal manifestation and the devotion to the personal manifestation is just a transitional tune, it is just a convenient fiction, and that is a lower realisation which ultimately one should transcend, that is a mistake, that is what seriously contradicts scripture. So now, going here to vivartavad and parinamvad, the word which is used over here is vivarta, so vivarta and parinam, the word parinam in Hindi or Marathi, what does the parinam mean? Effect, so when there is an effect that means there is basically a change, so when A changes to B, that is called as parinamvad, and vivarta is basically an illusion, so vivartavad means just like if a snake changes into a, if there is a rope and one thinks it is a snake, that is an illusion.
So now, what is the standard counter that our Vaishnavacharyas give? So they say that this world is actually false, all forms are false, but we mistake them to be real, so we are mistaking the rope to be a snake, so what is our Vaishnavacharyas refutation to this? It exists. That is good, very good, one more point is, first point is the rope has to exist, so that one will mistake it to be a snake, what is another point? You have to have some experience of something like a snake to mistake a rope to be a snake, so that means if A is mistaken to be B, what all is required? First of all, as I said, A should really exist, and we should have some conception of B because of which we will mistake A to be B, and actually the third point is, there has to be someone called C who is mistaking A to be B, isn't it, if there is no C, there is no mistaking of A to be B, so when they say everything is one, if everything is one, then where is A, B and C? So if everything is one, then there has to be some observer, there has to be some object and there has to be some other object which we are mistaking this to be. So what is all this if everything is one? So the Vaishnava understanding is that actually there is original spiritual form which is eternal and there is the material form in this world which is temporary and the mistake is that we are mistaking the original spiritual form to be the, or we are mistaking the form in this world to be that form.
So Vivartavada is that basically this world is an illusion. So the Vaishnava understanding is that the world is not an illusion, it is our conception of the world's purpose, that is an illusion. The world is real, but we think that the world is meant for our enjoyment, that is a mistake.
If we understand that the world is meant for Krishna's service, then In the Chaitanya Manjushya, which is in our Gaudiya Vaishnava Sampradaya, the first commentary on the Bhagavatam that is written, that is called Chaitanya Manjushya, written by an Acharya named Srinath Chakravarti and this is different from Vishwanath Chakravarti. Srinath Chakravarti, he writes that the senses are like dangerous snakes, but when one is filled with devotion coming from the mercy of Lord Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, then, दुर्दंत एन्द्रिय पत्ली प्रोथ्खाट दमिष्ट्रायते said, the senses become like snakes with their tooth broken, when the tooth is broken, snakes become harmless. So like that, the world and the world's objects and the senses which we are attracted to objects, all this no longer remains enduring for one who has become devoted to the Supreme.
Now moving onwards, the Parinama, Vivartavad has its problems, I discussed this one. Now Parinama is what? That there is actually change, there is transformation. Krishna has his energies and those energies are dynamic, the energies keep changing.
It's like a fire, a fire is a fire, whether it is this small or this big, it's still a fire. So now the fire, when it is burning, it keeps changing. It may be small, it may blaze, it may again become small, but even when it is changing in terms of while it is burning, how much it is blazing, but still throughout it all, it remains a fire.
So like that, there is one absolute truth and that absolute truth has energies which change, but the absolute truth as a whole remains the same. So the Vaishnava understanding is that the material world is also real, the spiritual world is also real and these are made of the energies of the Lord and these energies change. So the Parinama is a generic understanding, just like medicine is a general term.
In medicine we can have allopathy, we can have naturopathy, we can have Ayurveda, various kinds of, various forms of treatment we can have. Medicine is general term for all of them. So for all Vaishnava philosophies which accept the reality of the Lord's energies, the general term is Parinama.
And what kind of change happens, that specifically is explained in the Gaudiya Vaishnava Sampradaya and the way it is explained, that particular expression is called as Achintya Bheda Bhed. So Achintya Bheda Bhed, as Bhaktivedanta says in this verse, is actually the explanation of how the Lord interacts with his energies. And to the extent Parinama is a generic term, just like, what other category we could say? Okay, we can say devotee.
This is a generic category. Within devotee we can have Brahmachari, we can have a Grasta, we can have a Vastra, we can have a Sanyasi. Devotee or a Vaishnava could be a general term for all of them.
Or we could have Indian as general term and within that we can have Maharashtrian, we can have Bengali, we can have Kashmiri, we can have Andhra, like that. So, Vivart Parinambad is generic term for Vaishnava philosophy. The philosophy which accepts that the Lord has certain features of his which change.
And I explained earlier that how the Lord and his energies change or how the Lord has a changing and unchanging feature that is explained in different ways by different Sampradayas. So the Vaishnava understanding is, the Gaudiya Vaishnava understanding is that the Lord has his energies and the energies change. Just like earlier Bhaktivedanta has given the example, sun and its rays.
There are various examples, fire and its heating potency. In the Sri Vaishnava Sampradaya, the example that is usually given is of the body and the soul. The soul remains unchanging but the body changes.
So, like that different examples may be given to explain how the Parinam, how the transformation takes place. But, so Parinambad is generic term for the Vaishnava philosophy. The Vaishnava understanding of how, what is the relationship between the Jiva, Jagat and Jagdish.
And within that Parinambad, Achitya Mahidabheda is the way Gaudiya Vaishnava is the way it explains this. And it says, Tathaha Premnah Siddhir. So, it is when we understand the reality of the Lord and his energies that we can attain Prema.
That authentic, eternal love for Krishna is possible only when there is an understanding of the eternality of Krishna. Now, there are impersonalists who come up with such creative speculations that they can be very deceptive. I used to write articles in the speaking tree, the Times of India paper.
Times of India, it has a spiritual column. So, one time the editor over there, he wrote a mail to me that Janmashtami is coming. Would you like to write something on Krishna? And he said that you know you can write an article explaining why Krishna is black.
And don't tell them the usual story stuff. Then I, what is going on? Why should I ask him such a question? Then I did a little research. And then I found there is a well-known impersonalist Swami.
He has given an explanation why Krishna is black. He said that just think, throughout whichever tradition we have, black signifies darkness. Black signifies ignorance.
White signifies light. White signifies purity. White signifies wisdom.
So, why would the saints of the past describe God in the black form? He said the reason is obvious. Form indicates darkness. So, we need to go beyond the black form to the white light.
So, then what I did is, I took the same thing and wrote an article. I raised the same question. He said that yes, normally the dark colour is not exactly considered to be a symbol of enlightenment or beauty.
And why would the Bhakti tradition describe God in the dark? I said Krishna is called Shyama but he is called Shyamasundara. Why is that? That is because his dark complexion is utterly different from whatever conception of black we have. So, there is a transcendental form and Krishna's form is transcendental.
And his is transcendentally black. That's why it is Shyamasundara. So, you know, creativity we can also use in Krishna's service.
We can use it in a way that which we can try to, because people look for such new explanations. And they feel titillated by such new explanations. So, we have to present our philosophy in a way this is creativity in the creator's service.
So, the personal attributes of Krishna, only when we understand that Krishna is eternal, can we understand the eternality of love for Krishna and can we make that as our cherished goal. And ultimately achieve that goal. So, here Bhaktivinoda Thakur says that, परंप्रेम्नः सिद्धेर् विषिद्धी काम्स विन्नित्विषये When we understand that the object of devotion is eternal.
The object of devotion is not transitional, it's eternal. Then we can focus our heart and offer our devotion to him wholeheartedly. I'll summarise.
I started by talking about how the energies of the Lord, they are चिद-चिद-शक्ति and impersonal is not recognising the reality of the energies. So, impersonalism and personalism as they exist today, they are not so much contradiction as inversion. So, inversion why? Because impersonal is considered bhakti as a means to mukti.
And to explain that why this impersonal conception came about, it is not so much a scriptural teaching as socio-cultural, socio-political adaptation of scripture for contemporary national purposes. So, Christians had three main criticisms of Hinduism. Idolatry, I explained why they are so against idolatry.
Idolatrous, polytheistic and immoral. And Indian nationalist leaders, they wanted to unite India to counter western influence, Christian influence. So, they said that Indians will get divided with so many devatas, so many gods and goddesses.
So, let's unite them by making all these gods and goddesses as means to attain the one Brahman. And we could take a higher moral ground in Christianity also by that. He says, you are the only way.
I says, you know, there is only one way only. You are also one of that, one of the means to that one way. So, that's why they, now the problem is that there cannot be authentic devotion if one considers the object of devotion itself to be a convenient fiction.
So, that's why we have a lot of religion in India, but there is also a lot of materialism. The religion doesn't lead to a serious spiritual elevation for people. And then we discussed further about parinamamad and vivartavan.
So, vivartavan is the idea that the world is an illusion. So, we discussed the problem is, if somebody mistakes B to be C, then there has to be something which is real B. And there has to be something similar to C which you mistake it to be. It's like if I mistake a rope to be a snake, I must have some, some rope must be there which I mistake it to be a snake.
And there has to be some, I must have had some experience of a snake so that I will think it to be a snake. And there has to be someone to make the mistake. So, everything is one is just not defensible if you consider vivartavan because it has to have multiple things.
So, the Vaishnava understanding is of parinama, that is absolute truth and has unchanging essence but has also changing aspects to it. And the Gaudiya Vaishnava understanding is achintabheda, that has energies which change. And finally concluded by discussing about how there may be speculative creative explanations about various features of devotion.
But the transcendental explanation is what scripture gives us and that is what we need to focus on. And once we are situated in the platform of appreciating the eternality of Krishna, eternality of Krishnabhakti, then you can strive for it wholeheartedly and become purified and transformed by Krishnabhakti. Are there any questions? So, what attracts people to say convert to Islam if they don't even have a description of the personal form of God? Islam is in the mainstream media quite a vilified religion.
Vilified means it is often depicted very negatively and there are definitely undoubtedly many Muslims have done many barbaric things. And even now barbaric things are going on. But it is also very simplistic to judge all people according to the actions of some people.
It is a vision that lacks depth. Some people say that all Muslims are terrorists. This is such a superficial understanding because today in the world every fourth person is a Muslim.
So if every fourth person were a terrorist, there would be practically no peace in the world. Surely there is a lot of peace in the world. So it is a complete labelling of any group of people based on just superficial criteria.
That is wrong. So there are definitely extremists who do terrible things and they often quote the Quran to do terrible things. But is that what is the essential teaching of the Quran? That there are many other Islamic scholars who say it is not.
And they also have their reasoning for it. I have an online Muslim friend. There are some religious websites where we are in touch with various scholars.
So he told me that actually it is easier for me to communicate with moderates of other traditions than extremists of my own traditions. So we consider all Muslims to be of one level but it is not like that. Even among Muslims there are moderates, there are extremists.
So he says for me as a moderate Muslim I can communicate better with a more easily the moderate Hindu or a moderate Christian or a moderate Jew than I can communicate with an extremist Muslim. So now ISIS is a big threat in the world today. But what is often overlooked is that the maximum number of people whom ISIS has killed is Muslims.
ISIS, they are one group of Muslims and they have killed so many Muslims. So it is rather than considering Islam itself as bad, we have to recognise that there are people who are quoting Islamic sculptures and they do follow Islam. They claim to follow Islam but whether that is the essential Islam, that is a question which we as third party don't have a right to judge that.
Because somebody can very well quote Hindu scriptures and say that you know there is so much discriminatory caste system and this and that, so many things have been talked about based on the, if you want to look with a fault finding eye, there is a lot of fault finding that can be done, lot of mudslinging that can be done on our tradition also. So in general we need to recognise that our shastras, teachers should classify based on goodness, on the modes, goodness, passion and ignorance. And goodness, so this classification is there in all religions.
This goodness, passion, ignorance is there. So ultimately it depends on how well the people of a tradition present their teachings. So Islam in its own way offers people some level of order, some level of, Muslims in their own way are quite diligent in practising their religion.
They do namaz properly, regularly and they go to the mosque and they experience God in their own ways. Prabhupada, Prabhupada is actually not very critical of Islam. He would say that I have seen so many Muslims, whenever they earn a lot of money, if they earn a lot of money they say we will build a mosque.
But he says how many Hindus do that? He says I have seen small small Muslim children, they are taught to recite the Quran. He says how many Hindus are taught to recite the Bhagavad Gita? So as far as cultural adherence is concerned, many Muslims are quite rigorous about that. And by following that they do get some experience of something higher.
So in general the following of certain level of rules and there are definitely Muslims who do devote themselves to God. And there are Muslim saints, there are Sufi saints who have, there is one devotee who has written a book called Muslim Devotees of Krishna. In the Indian tradition itself there are many saints who were from Muslim background and they were devoted to Krishna.
So the, there are, so Islam is also, Prabhupada says that Muhammad was also a messenger of God and he came to help people elevate their consciousness. So by following that path properly people are elevating their consciousness. And that's how they are getting attracted.
So this is from the philosophical perspective. From the, if you want to look at it from a practical perspective, actually every religion is ultimately as good as it is presented. So Muslims have done, although there are extremists who lead to the vilification of Islam, but there are many articulate Muslims who have written books, who have made presentations and various ways and they have presented Islam fairly, very well.
So, you know, if one company, this is commercial, but this is how things work in life. You know, if one company says, oh, we have been existing for thousands, if there is an old company, say there is one car company, which was the car which got extinct and went out of the market? Maruti Suzuki, not Maruti? And you take any old car? Toyota? Okay, any old car which is now not there, which has become obsolete? Maruti 800? Okay, fine. Some old car, they will say, you know, we were the original brand, now we have gone out, now why are people not purchasing it? But you didn't market yourself then.
Somebody else came and marketed and that's how they got it. So people in general want something which will give them meaning in their life, which will give them purpose for their life, give them some direction for their life. And whichever religion presents, whichever religion presents itself, people will take that.
So it is, it is very sad actually. Now if, to many of the holy places, if we go, if we go to Tirupati, if we go to Puri, if we go to many of the holy places, they are so disorderly that the Pandas are there who are trying to extract money. You know, the worshippers who are going there, they are treated, they are treated quite disrespectfully.
You stay for hours to take darshan and within five seconds you have to go. In contrast, if you go to a church, if you go to a mosque, you are dealt with quite homely. Not in all mosques and all churches.
But people are dealt with quite homely. So if the teachers of a tradition, if the representatives of a tradition present themselves properly, people will get attracted. So there is some spiritual substance in it.
But along with that there is also relatively positive presentation of it. And apart from that, of course, there is what is often not acknowledged is that Islam's spread is one of the most spectacular events in world history. That means Islam started in the 7th century and within just four to five centuries, it had spread all over the world.
It started from the Middle East and just came, all of India was conquered. And there is one king who was able to stop it. Otherwise they would have conquered Europe also.
So now we may say they were unfair or whatever. But credit has to be given where credit is due. Just a small number of people and the way they spread and the way they conquer.
I am not talking about their ethics. I am simply talking about the principle of it. That they were inspired by that mission.
Yes, that it is. God was empowered us. And we are sharing God's message.
We are conquering on behalf of God. So that is something which is, they were inspired, they were convinced, they were jealous. So although even India's fall to Islam, we may say, it is a matter of sadness for us that Indian culture was destroyed at that time, so many temples were destroyed.
But at the same time we have to recognise that they were invaders, a few in number. This was our home. How many soldiers can come and attack? They have come, tracked us at that time.
And India had so many kingdoms, so it was supposed to be so big. And yet what happened? So they were heroic. Now many of them were cunning.
But cunningness is a part of warfare. And you have to be prepared for that. So Krishna himself demonstrated in the Mahabharata, Shatoshatya.
So the fact is that Muslims, once they are convinced about something, they are ready to work for it. So that is something which we don't see. There are Christians who come from America, from comfortable families.
I had gone for a conference, I met this Christian who had come from America. Even when we become Brahmacharis, we are still living in relative comfort. There are Christians who come from America, from prosperous families and they go to one village in India and they dedicate their life.
Throughout their life they stay in that village. And they convert. We can have a negative vision of conversion and people like Hindus are getting converted.
But the fact is Christians do have dedication. Today the Bible has been translated into more languages, languages, dialects. In India there are different dialects.
So the Bible has been translated into more Indian dialects than what the Bhagavad Gita has been translated. So this is, they work hard. There was one Christian missionary, he learned 27 Indian languages just to translate the Bible into those languages.
So they do work hard when they are dedicated. They may sometimes use unethical means. Their philosophy may not be as lofty as ours is and they may be to some extent narrow minded.
But they do work hard and they do present themselves. So again we have to look at Sattvic, Rajasic, Tamasic. There are Tamasic conversionists, people who are violent, who are intolerant and all that.
But there are Sattvic people and there are Rajasic people. So there is a whole continuum. And ultimately religion is like a marketplace.
Ultimately is not in the sense of ultimate meaning but ultimately in the way things work functionally. That it's a marketplace. Whoever goes forward and presents the product, the people will get attracted.
If the product has some level of substance and if nobody else is presenting anything, nobody else is presenting anything then why not? Why not? I met one at one conference. I had gone. There was a conference on AIDS and religion.
So it was supposed to be organised by Christians. And then I went there. This is Father Joseph from Malegaon.
Father Peter from Nandgaon. Father this from this. From all the talukas they were there.
And when I went and saw them, they were all this Father Peter, Father Joseph, Father John. They were all typical Maharashtrian villagers. But they had been converted.
And not only had they been converted, they had become missionaries. They had become fathers over there. So I talked with some of them afterwards and they said that we want to be searching for God.
And in our own villages, in our own temples, we were not even allowed to enter the temples. The Christians came and they not only allowed us to enter the temples, when we took it up, they said we will build a church for you. And you can become the priest over there.
So now for somebody who is not even allowed into a temple, that person is allowed to become a priest. So it is, the ego factor is always there. We can't expect, even devotees are not free from ego.
What does it mean for non-devotees? How can we expect them to be free? So they do their work well. And that's how, so we as devotees, if we present Krishna Bhakti properly, we can, rather than blaming that these people are doing like this, these people are doing like this, why are they spreading? If we look from the point of view of history of religions, the way Krishna Consciousness is spread, actually the way Krishna Consciousness is spread in the last 50 years, it is extraordinary. If Krishna Consciousness keeps spreading like this for the next 500 years, Krishna Bhakti will be the world's biggest religion.
Of course, it has to spread like that. And relatively speaking, if we see the way Krishna Consciousness spread in the first 10 years, if it had spread like that, within 100 years we would have become the world's biggest religion. But then no religion spreads at that pace.
When the initial charismatic founder is there, at that time there is a phenomenally fast spread. But afterwards, many organisations actually crumble and collapse after the founder departs. But ISKCON has not only survived that phase, but actually stabilised and has prospered also.
So there is, there are good prospects for us in future if we keep sharing Krishna Bhakti properly. One question. We will have more questions tomorrow.
So you have mentioned the point about the Sahajiyas. So compared to this, there are people who are doing such kind of things. And what I have seen is, like 4 years back, a devotee who was practising Krishna Consciousness in ISKCON for a long period and got trapped into Upashanta life and went there.
So my question is, what are the things which they are falling prey to and what should we have to take care of so that they will not be trapped? Sometimes some devotees who have been practising Krishna Bhakti for 10-20 years, they may go into some Appasampradaya. So why does such a thing happen? See firstly, we have to check whether it is actually an Appasampradaya. If somebody goes to Gaudiya Math, that's not necessarily an Appasampradaya.
If somebody goes to, is practising Gaudiya Vaishnavism, Gaudiya Math is not the only organisation that is practising Gaudiya Vaishnavism. There are followers of Bhakten or Thakur who are also practising Gaudiya Vaishnavism. So just because somebody leaves ISKCON and starts practising Vaishnavism somewhere else, or even Gaudiya Vaishnavism somewhere else, we should not immediately judge them as Appasampradayik.
We have to look at what they are practising. And certainly ISKCON is the most vibrant among all Vaishnav organisations right now. Not just Gaudiya Vaishnav organisations, among all the Vaishnav organisations in the world, ISKCON is the most vibrant, working a lot to share Krishna Bhakti.
And sometimes some devotees may have some issues with some aspects of ISKCON. Some devotees may want to study Shastra very deeply and they may feel ISKCON, the philosophy, all kinds of basic classes keep happening. Don't get deep philosophy.
And that's when they look for, looking for some deeper philosophy, they go elsewhere. Or sometimes they may find that they may be attracted to certain things, which they feel are not so much available within ISKCON. So if somebody wants to study Shastra deeply, now gradually as our movement is stabilising, then we are having forums for deeper Shastric study openly.
Not just some, like we have Bhagavad Gita here, we should study Bhagavad Gita. But there are other forums also and facilities need to be created for the devotees who want to specialise in certain things. So maybe ten years ago, if somebody wanted to read the books of previous Acharyas, you know, people would label them as deviants.
You are unfaithful to Prabhupada because you want to read previous Acharyas' books. Well, this is ridiculous. You know, Prabhupada wanted us to read the previous Acharyas' books.
Yes, we shouldn't jump over Prabhupada, but we have to take his blessing and move onwards. So there has been to some extent narrow-mindedness among ISKCON devotees also. Which has driven people away from ISKCON.
So firstly, we shouldn't just blame those people alone. There have been mistakes. They are the natural part of the growth pains of our movement.
There have been mistakes from our side also, from the ISKCON leadership side. And many of these devotees are now slowly coming back. Sometimes there are relationship issues.
Many devotees leave because they feel that ISKCON devotees are too hardline, too fanatical. And especially for many Prabhupada disciples, you know, it was the time after Prabhupada departed, it was very difficult for them. Because imagine all of you are living as equals and tomorrow one of you becomes a guru.
And all of you have lived equally and now you have to do Vyasa Puja for him. One of you. Whenever you see him, you have to offer him Nandavar Pranam.
And you can see all his faults. So it was very difficult. And suppose that person also becomes, you know, very high and mighty.
And thinks, you know, now I am the successor of Prabhupada or I am the successor of my spiritual master. All of you have to bow down to me. So they also found it very difficult.
So many Prabhupada disciples and senior devotees, even those who just missed an ECG from Prabhupada, you know, they came in 1978 or they took ECG in 1978-79, they had a lot of difficulty. So gradually those sort of things have now decreased. So in general, if devotees don't find what they are looking for, different devotees within Bhakti itself have different needs.
And if they feel that those needs are not being fulfilled within ISKCON, they may go elsewhere. So rather than going elsewhere, we need to recognise that in Krishna Consciousness Movement itself, there are different devotees are practising Bhakti in different ways. So we should try to associate with those devotees and align with those devotees and get those needs fulfilled.
So if somebody wants to do more bhajan, then somebody feels that, you know, what is the need to do all this preaching? I want to chant 64 rounds. I want to sing Vaishnav songs. It's okay.
It can be Sahajyayik, but it's not necessary that it's always Sahajyayik. Some devotees may make Vaishnav song itself into a singing Vaishnav songs, you know, very beautiful. They can make that as a cultural presentation and through that they may attract certain different kind of people.
They are also preserving culture. So there are some devotees now, one of my devotee friends, he is a scholar, you know, he spent something like six and a half years. He said that he must have gone to something like 70,000 houses in Bengal, just knocking on people's houses to ask, to check if in their old libraries or in their old attics, there are any Granthas of Bhaktivinoda Thakur, Bhaktasaheb Thakur or even the Acharyas.
That was what he felt inspired to do. Now if somebody asks, evaluates from the perspective, how many devotees did you make? How many books did you distribute? He is working at a completely different level. So now there had to be, if somebody is inspired to do that, why do you need, Prabhupada's books are there, everything is there, why do you need to go into Piyush Bachara's books? That's our tradition, it needs to be preserved.
So if somebody wants to do that, the leadership needs to be broad minded enough to facilitate that. So these are all very important things. They are not immediately, they may not give immediate results in terms of the definitions of success that are considered most important in our tradition.
But they have their influence. So rather than blaming those devotees, we can recognise that it is our movement which needs to become more accommodating, by which they can be accommodated. At the same time, there are some devotees who feel that, oh, this is from the institution's perspective, from the individual's perspective also one should be cautious.
There are some devotees who feel that, oh, you know, here, there is this, there is no shortcut to spiritual advancement. Some devotees may feel, it is gone, you know, you stick to basics and then I'll just jump to higher things. So preliminary jumping to higher things is of no use.
There is no shortcut. So if some people feel that by going to some other organisation I'll get a shortcut to spiritual advancement, then they are mistaken. And that feeling can come sometimes.
So overall, if we study Shastra carefully and recognise that there is no shortcut to spiritual advancement and also recognise that if we have particular interest, Prabhupada's house is big enough that we can fulfil those interests within Prabhupada's house itself, then we don't have to go out of the movement. That's how that thing can be avoided. It's a big subject.
I think I'll answer from the perspective of the individual and the institution. Thank you very much. Krishna Prabhupada ki Jai.
Jai Gurudev Bhakta Vrindaki. Jai. Jai.
Jai. Jai. Jai.
Jai. Jai Krishna.