Don’t let Prabhupada’s difficult statements become difficulties – The Monk’s Podcast 103 with Yogeshvara Prabhu
This one is the latest one. Hare Krishna Yogeshwar Puru. Thank you very much for joining the monk's podcast again.
For gracing us with your association wisdom. It's wonderful to have you. Thank you.
My pleasure. If you are okay, I might just make a few notes while you are talking also. I thought today we could discuss based on this article you had written on ISKCON news about this devotee who sent you a letter asking questions about some of Prabhupada's statements that can seem very inflammatory at times.
Very controversial. It's a delicate subject but at the same time it's an important subject. I found there are three things in the way you handled it.
We will post the link to the article in the podcast also. Because it is a personal narrative that itself brings a certain level of authenticity. You are talking from a perspective of that and then you also brought in sound logic and your experience with Prabhupada also.
Personal perspective means you come from one of the demographics who could potentially be offended by Prabhupada's words. And you also had personal interactions. And you also used logic.
So I found these three combinations it has a significant weight. Thank you for consenting to discuss on this topic. It's my pleasure.
It's an important topic and I thank you for having thought to bring it to the attention of your audience. So how would you like to go ahead with it? Should I should we just go along the flow of the article which you have or you would like to start with the incident where it started off with the letter or something? Let's give it a little background so that everyone shares the same information, same starting point. Yeah.
Srila Prabhupada's mission in the world now is past 55 years and over the course of these many years we have never systematically dealt with statements in his books and lectures that can on their surface be inflammatory or misunderstood or understood and if so insulting to certain people even offensive if taken in the wrong way. There are statements that Srila Prabhupada made about women, about people of colour about the role of different groups of people in my case having been born Jewish I've had many people approach me over the years asking for an explanation of Srila Prabhupada's statements about Adolf Hitler. Hitler was the founder of the National Socialist or Nazi Party which came to office in Germany in 1933 and over the course of the next 12 years was responsible for the death of 6 million Jews through torture starvation, dehumanisation and other abominable acts, so called medical experiments without use of any anaesthetic as well as tens of millions of other people during World War II.
This has come to be known as the Holocaust. Hitler was a rabid anti-Semite as far as he was concerned Jews were not fully human they were like bacteria who were infecting the social body and therefore needed to be destroyed. Srila Prabhupada on occasion made reference to Hitler and said Hitler was a gentleman or Hitler was not so bad this way or not so bad that way and many people were very troubled by this so I've had occasion to respond from my background as a researcher in the field of Holocaust history.
I've written books and done documentary films that have aired on public television that's my career as a Holocaust historian and it's not limited to Hitler and the Jews Srila Prabhupada said or wrote many things that are only now coming to focus. There's an effort currently underway. I'm not at liberty to talk about it at great length but there's a group of senior ISKCON officials who are undertaking a publication that will specifically address Srila Prabhupada's statements about women, sexuality, Hitler and the Jews and so on and that's admirable that finally it's taken a long time but at least we're finally coming to grips with statements that in the extreme can alienate people from Krishna consciousness if they think well this society and its founder have such extreme views I don't share those values and I don't wish to be a part of this so those statements risk actually alienating people from Krishna consciousness.
Instead of bringing people to Krishna consciousness we can push them away by such statements so that's some of the background here. You know if you permit I'd also like to give some background from my side that two ways. First when I was reading Prabhupada's books somehow we were never trained that there could be potentially a hierarchy of authority within Prabhupada's statements also and for me it was not so much of the offensive statements but the incomprehensible statements in terms of logic or common sense that were very troubling and so for example in the Leela Amrit even now there is a statement where Prabhupada says by 2000 no one will be able to live on the surface of the earth because there is so much pollution that everybody will have to live like rats underground and I read this in 2005-2006 so I asked a senior devotee about this question that devotee was one of my prominent guys and he wrote back to me a very heavy mail saying that the direction you are going is very dangerous.
You are doubting our Kondracharya this will be the cause of your fall down and he said we should have implicit faith in yesterday way Parabhakti that was we should have implicit faith in the Guru and in Krishna and then he said that he gave some explanation which just didn't make any sense to me. He said that I had gone on tour to America and I saw one country one city which is completely covered like a green house so Prabhupada's prophecy is coming true. Now I found it a very unreasonable explanation first of all very judgemental and very unreasonable and for some time it was a phase of intellectual torture for me not so much emotional torture but intellectual torture and later I came to know that it was a simple explanation Nagraj Prabhu BDG editor I was corresponding with him and he said that he went to Prabhupada's conversation and just a couple of days before that incident when Prabhupada spoke this some devotee in a morning walk had told Prabhupada that had read out some dystopian meteorological or like environmental report to Prabhupada in the 1960s and that report had said that by 2000 nobody will be able to walk on the surface of the land because there will be so much pollution and Prabhupada was simply quoting that so he explained to me that this is, now Prabhupada is not quoting Shastra over here, Prabhupada is simply quoting from some other source and we are not questioning Prabhupada when he is making any statements like this so in fact for some period I felt so enraged because this was just a flashpoint and there had been many statements like this which could be so easily understood if you understood this point that not everything that an Acharya speaks is necessarily from a Shastric source because Acharya is a human being also and they are also living in society, they are observing they are also forming understandings based on other sources so that was one understanding which helped me quite a bit and that's one background which I come from and another background is that in India also about 7-8 years ago there was a ghastly gang rape in New Delhi, it was all the world over and at that time some anti-Hindu or anti-religion campaigner put together a set of quotes of various Indian leaders with regressive views and in that he put some of Prabhupada's quotes about about this particular issue and in India to some extent I am one of the resources for many preachers to answer questions so I answer questions on my website and lot of people ask me this question and I had to answer that question I had to actually help people reconsider their understanding of how they understood Prabhupada but that time it was very damaging fortunately it didn't get too escalated but I am so grateful to know that this was being dealt at a serious level because at that time 2012-2013 I realised this could lead to a disaster eventually so thank you again I am also very deeply concerned about this issue although I am not one of the directly affected demographics but I also have to deal with the challenges that come up like you said, people get alienated yes Guru well several things come to mind let me start by telling you a story I was with Shrila Prabhupada in Paris 1974-75 and I asked him his opinion about a book that I had read just before becoming a devotee in 1969 at the time it was a best-selling book called The Naked Ape by a palaeontologist named Desmond Morris and Professor Morris took the position in this book that humans are simply sophisticated animals everything they do is basically animal behaviour and even in our sophisticated way it's simply camouflaging behaviour like animals shaking hands is really nothing more than what apes do when they show hands to show another ape that you see I have no sticks, I'm not coming to attack you or we shave our underarms and then we put deodorant when the underarms are there to capture a scent that's for mating purposes anyway, I thought Shrila Prabhupada would say now he is a rascal and he doesn't understand anything about human nature when he heard the description of the book Prabhupada's eyes got fixed, he said this is very good he said you should use this book in your preaching how is that? Prabhupada said because we are animals without Krishna consciousness without an understanding of our higher nature we are nothing but animals he is correct he said you should use this book so I'm confirming the experience you had that sometimes Shrila Prabhupada would quote other sources as a way of indicating you might say secondary evidence Shastrik is primary but sometimes there will be secondary evidence that he would use as a way of reinforcing a particular position so that's one thing that comes to mind another thing that comes to mind is that you and I may have our particular values and points of view I'm sensitive to the fact that there are people who are we might call them literalists meaning that they their spiritual security is based on a literal reading of Prabhupada's teachings they take the words on the page for what is intended and they don't have an interest in interpretation on variable ways of understanding they are made secure by what we might call the codified wisdom the words on the page and because for many people that literal understanding is the foundation of their spiritual life I'm reluctant I'm hesitant to impose my values my understanding on them I think when we talk about Srila Prabhupada building a house in which everyone can live it means that there are many different perspectives and we have to be prepared to somehow accommodate those perspectives now that raises challenges how do you accommodate a perspective that says women are inferior to men or that you know blacks are ugly I mean there's some rather strong statements in the books and or they never went to the moon that's another controversy there are many statements like that that if taken on face value some people might find it well it's Prabhupada's word so I accept it as they are without interpretation I think you and I share a certain somewhat different perspective and this was in my response to that person who asked me to try to help him understand Prabhupada's statements about Hitler my experience I was one of those rare fortunate people who had a chance to know Srila Prabhupada, travel with him spend lots of time with him I was his personal secretary I was his translator whenever we went to a French speaking country I was his photographer sometimes I cooked for him I would do chores for him and sometimes it was just the two of us sitting there and I got to ask him whatever I wanted to ask him and so I'm very grateful to the Supreme Lord that he's given me that experience and so I could ask him things and he knew that people would say Prabhupada says this Prabhupada says that he made fun of it to my face I'd say Prabhupada said this Prabhupada said that he wanted us to exercise our discretion he didn't want us to be blind followers I'll give you an example I asked him one time Srila Prabhupada what should we do if we're in a situation and how to act on that situation is not described openly in your books if we don't see a clear direction when you're in this situation this is what you should do and he said what do you mean I said well this was in Paris by the way I said we have met with a friend of George Harrison her name is Regine now Regine back in the 1970s was a very well-known entertainer and she had open nightclubs she had two or three nightclubs in Paris and because she was a friend of George Harrison she met us and said you know I want to do a gathering for you in my home we'll call it a soiree indienne an Indian soiree well you'll bring Prachana I'll bring my friends and we'll raise some money so you can build your temple here in Paris it was a very nice offer I said okay what should we do well she said come to meet me in my club tonight and we'll talk about it which club New Jimmy at midnight now this was on a Friday here's what you need to know New Jimmy the New Jimmy club in Montparnasse on a Friday night was when all of these rich old guys would show up in limousines with these young women on their arms wearing mini skirts and the floor of the club was a big mirror the whole floor was a big mirror so it was a little dicey you know and she wanted us to come at midnight on a Friday night like at the height of all of the rock and roll or whatever I just wasn't sure so I asked probably what happened to have been in Paris I said what you know what should we do and he thought for a minute he said all right well go fishing just don't get wet laughing and that's when I asked him look there are times Srila Prabhupada when we if you're not here and we don't know what to do how should we act he said well there's two things there is Vediki and there is Lokiki Vediki means what it sounds like from the Vedas it's there it's codified it's words on the page you'll find your answer by referring to the texts Lokiki means according to Loka according to time and circumstances and place I said that you should use your intelligence you have God-given intelligence you have to be able to choose a path according to your best judgement now one person's this is interesting because one person's best judgement will be different from another person's best judgement he wasn't saying there is only one way my way he never said that he said use your intelligence now for some people that may be uncomfortable you know there are people they just want just tell me what to do you know my spiritual master says to do this my spiritual master is absolute he's always correct that's what I'm going to do what do you do when your spiritual master says use your intelligence then what do you do no so we have to be a little flexible there's so much of what you're saying speaks to my experience that what you earlier said I just do a little backtrack you said about the Prabhupada's home being big enough for people whose foundation of spiritual security comes by the literal understanding the codified words so I I met one young man a few years ago and he seemed very happy in Krishna consciousness I'm very happy all my anxieties are relieved really wonderful how did that happen he said now I don't have to think about anything I just follow instructions and my life is cured my life is secured that was not funny so now now I appreciate your compassion in saying that in some ways if that person is fortunate enough to get a good guide they'll be elevated but if they are in a situation where they don't get such a guide they could be in trouble but I appreciate your point that some people come to Krishna for that purpose they are just distressed so one form of distress that means top of four categories of people who come to Krishna is a distress you have to be very very careful you know to respect that you know we may not agree with someone but if they're trying to serve Krishna they deserve our obeisances and our encouragement and our support you can't just put someone down because they have a different point of view that's not our way so I really appreciate may I just also distress in Kali Yuga is direction less than confusion people just feel if I just get this that's enough that's all I need and then if they see confusion in the devotee circles in the direction that becomes very disorienting for them so what you are saying if I understood right is that Prabhupada while Prabhupada's house is big enough to include should be big enough to include people from this background also at the same time Prabhupada was aware of the danger that might come when people would quote him say out of context and that's why he said that you should use intelligence you should use your intelligence yes now of course it's a good idea when using your intelligence to consult the Vaishnavas of course because it may not be your intelligence it may be your imagination how do you know the difference so it's always a good idea to take counsel from the senior devotees but here's the thing my guiding rule in my life has always been what will support Srila Prabhupada's mission Srila Prabhupada was someone he was in favour of everything if it brought people to Krishna consciousness so my criterion my litmus test is will this support Srila Prabhupada's mission will it bring people to Krishna consciousness so that when evaluating certain statements I don't go on the strength of is the literal meaning correct or is the interpretive meaning correct I ask what will serve Srila Prabhupada's mission after all he came here for that what will bring people to Krishna consciousness and sometimes even if you are a literalist and you wish to take Srila Prabhupada's words on their face still you have an obligation to ask yourself what is the correct thing to do not what is the literally accurate thing to do but what is the correct thing to do to support Srila Prabhupada's mission now why do I say that well I'll give you an example Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Goswami Maharaj knew that when Europeans would come to India they came from meat eating cultures at one point he issued instructions to disciples serve them meat when they come here you serve them what they're accustomed to and Srila Prabhupada when we were in Paris we had our temple in the suburbs this was in the early days and we had converted the garage to the deity room and Srila Prabhupada said you let people come in with their shoes on can you imagine let them come in with their shoes on because the French people are not accustomed to taking their shoes off was this in the altar room in the temple room yes in the temple room now he said you can put a rope so they don't come too close to the deities but still he was saying don't force them to take their shoes off just let them come in so maybe we were fanatical or fundamentalist but he wasn't he was very flexible as long as it helped to bring people to Krishna consciousness and then later on you can get a little bit deeper or stricter or put more regulations you know in the beginning Prabhupada was so lenient with us so lenient Yamuna when she came to 26 2nd Avenue in 1968 68 67 she was still smoking Joan Campanella and Prabhupada had her cooking there was an initiation ceremony the next day and she said can I smoke in the kitchen he said no if you wish to smoke just step outside you know the question is what serves the mission what will bring people to Krishna consciousness can I interrupt you one minute over here I appreciate your point and I fully appreciate this foundational principle that that what will bring people closer to Krishna consciousness see with respect to ethical boundaries or even cultural boundaries there are examples of Prabhupada being very compassionate in extending them are there examples of Prabhupada extending intellectual boundaries that means because what the question comes up over here is that for many devotees this seems to be a different category if Prabhupada had not been culturally flexible he would not have been able to reach out to anybody in America if Prabhupada had not been culturally ethically flexible but it seems that at least the mainstream understanding in the movement is Prabhupada was intellectually very rigid and many so for example one of our previous podcasts also mentioned about Laukik now I have only read it in the Bhakti Rasamruth in Sindhu Prabhupada mentions at one place about Laukik Praman but that is a that is something which we as devotees need to use the only time I read it again was in your book Swami in a Strange Land and then you mentioned it so the idea that we have to also consider this as a as a relevant source of authority certainly not a supreme source that is that understanding while it's common sense it's absent so Prabhupada being intellectually accommodating where he was ready to say change or adapt his own positions, his own earlier statements that is the category where I have found a stumbling block because I find that cultural ethical flexibility many people don't accept that as an argument for intellectual flexibility regarding Prabhupada's statements Well if by intellectual flexibility you mean would he be polite to people who had different points of view yes for the most part he was always polite sometimes if people were being stubborn he would be a little bit stern with them but you know there's a difference I think between a willingness to discuss with people in a polite civilised way different points of view and people insisting on their point of view opposed to the Vaishnava Siddhanta Prabhupada was not very intellectually accommodating with people who were petulant if they were insisting on something he would put them down he would say that's foolishness are you a fool he'd be very strong with them and if someone was polite I'll give you some examples in Europe there were many religionists we scheduled meetings for Srila Prabhupada frequently and if someone came from the Christian church there was a Franciscan monk who came there were different people who came and if they were sincere and humble whatever their path may be if they were followers of Jesus Prabhupada was so respectful and so appreciative but if someone came and was a pretender not open-minded but adamant you know you Hindus you know dismissive of Krishna consciousness then he was not intellectually accommodating at all so very often it was a matter of the character of the individual same is true in science Prabhupada had nothing against science nothing that's a big mistake to think that somehow we are anti-science big mistake, huge huge mistake we had a whole course on the topic where you explained that yes thank you so the same is true he wanted us to exercise our brains he really really wanted us to think about things deeply so sometimes he would take a contrary position he would say things like there is no God now discussed it doesn't mean that he believes there is no God he was pushing us to be intellectually flexible if you will and the same is true when he said about Hitler Hitler is a gentleman now discussed well why was he a gentleman? well if you read the context of the discussion I think it took place in India it's there in the conversations book it was within the context of how Hitler never used the atomic bomb the Americans used the atomic bomb at a time when most historians and military experts would say it really was not necessary to drop bombs two atomic bombs on Japan the war was over it was not necessary to do that the same is true for example the bombing of Dresden Dresden had already surrendered there was no reason to subject the German citizens of Dresden to horrendous fire bombing it was just cruel so that was not being a gentleman so if Hitler never dropped an atomic bomb and that makes him a gentleman well he's challenging us to think about things it doesn't mean that he thought Hitler was a gentleman all the time and always Hitler liked dogs if Prabhupada says Hitler was compassionate to animals does it mean that he believed Hitler was compassionate to everyone all the time? we take something out of context and blow it up and all of a sudden it becomes absolute truth when it was never intended for that that's true so this is a very important point which you mentioned two points about intellectual flexibility the point I was making about intellectual flexibility is that Prabhupada allowing a re-examination of his own statements or a re-contextualisation of his own statements I said that but it was in that context and is there any example of that now? a couple I have heard at different occasions there is Harishauri Prabhupada told me this and this has not been implemented that there is a purport in the 8th canto where there is a fight between the devatas and the asuras and Prabhupada writes in the purport that the blood it said rose up to the sun and that's the translation Prabhupada says here that it said the blood rose up to the sun not to the moon and this shows that the sun is closer than the moon to the earth and Harishauri Prabhupada was in charge of he used to take the transcript recordings and then he was sent for transcription so he told Prabhupada that Prabhupada that I think I found a mistake in your purport when Harishauri Prabhupada told me this I was shocked and said how could you say that I had that relationship he said what is that? so he explained Prabhupada this battle is happening on the on the edge of the milk ocean where they had done the churning it is not happening on the earth oh oh Prabhupada said I thought it is happening on the earth and then he said that ok then you have it removed and then he had he opened the Bhagavatam and he checked it he said till now it was not removed but at least in the online Veda base that passage has been removed and also there is a GBC resolution which in conjunction with BBT they have decided that in future printing of the Bhagavatam it should be removed so Prabhupada sent me that and Harishauri Prabhupada asked for it so this is of course a major example but when we say that we use our intelligence the two distinct things use our intelligence to deal with a particular situation that is of course required but use our intelligence to say reconsider or consider the context of Prabhupada's statements that for many people seems to be like going toward a dangerous or offensive mentality and that is so I also know we need to be extremely cautious but my question was that when you gave a particular explanation of Prabhupada's statement about Hitler and that is a perfectly reasonable explanation and so the point that we should consider his statements in context and did Prabhupada in his personal example give us the the the room to do that was there any example like that in this in your interaction with him or in your knowledge of him all the time really? not just once or twice, all the time let me give you some background Achyutananda Swami in his book Blazing Sadhus tells a story about when he was with Prabhupada in the very early days at 26th Avenue and he was thinking if the spiritual master is absolute then he is supposed to know everything so he was challenging Prabhupada and said how many windows are there in the Empire State Building? Prabhupada looked at him and said how many drops of water are there in a mirage? I don't remember that yeah there's no answer to these questions it was maybe asked by Achyutananda in a innocent way but Prabhupada's point to him was don't try to impose some artificial definition of what is absolute only say that the spiritual master is perfect it means everything he's done is motivated by love motivated by love for Krishna and the condition of love even imperfections are perfect you know in the spiritual world Atreya Rishi wrote a letter to Prabhupada back in 71 I think or he was saying 72 I can't deal with the GBC anymore he says there's so much arguing and it's all very imperfect and everyone makes mistakes in their judgments Prabhupada said that's because we're human he wrote him back in a letter says we're all human therefore we make mistakes he said the difference is mistakes in connection with Krishna are all glorious he says in the spiritual world sometimes Krishna gets so distracted by Radharani becomes so distracted by Krishna she puts her sari on upside down and Krishna gets so distracted looking at Radharani tries to milk a bull you know mistakes are also glorious when they're in connection with Krishna so perfection isn't some artificial idea that you know the spiritual master knows how many hairs there are in your head or no well he knows everything meaning he knows everything to help you become Krishna conscious so you know in assessing definitions of absolute perfect you know infallible don't drag your material conception of these words into the spiritual realm it means something different in connection with Krishna consciousness so in terms of you are expert in flipping the paradigm you know sometimes some devotees may say some people may say that if we are questioning or contextualising Prabhupada's statements that is dragging our material conceptions onto the Prabhupada well that could be a danger but the same danger can come in the other way also that we are dragging our material conceptions of how an Acharya should be we would like an Acharya to be omniscient don't do that don't try to judge someone on the spiritual platform by your material standards if you see Nityananda Prabhu going into a liquor store don't condemn him don't judge him you can't tell the behaviour of a pure devotee you can't judge that and if you try if your standards are so strict you know you're going to get into trouble because as soon as there's a conflict and you don't understand it then you'll go away that's what happened when people tried to apply such material standards Prabhupada said we never went to the moon and then they blew they leave Krishna consciousness because they're judging Prabhupada's statements by their material standards how do you do that going to the moon means being able to go there and stay there you know there are interviews that Prabhupada had with reporters I've read this very carefully he leaves it quite open-ended you know he says even if they went to the moon they couldn't stay there because it's not an earth environment you know you don't have the proper body for living on the moon so it wasn't that he was making some kind of absolute judgement that anyway the point is you know if you get hung up with these things too much you can get into a lot of trouble about it and look I can reassure you from my own experience he was a warm wonderful transcendental human being who in this lifetime went through experiences and so he was very sensitive and compassionate to people knew from his own experience what marriage was like what it meant to be a father what it meant to work in a business he had all those experiences in his lifetime you know he would always ask me when I came to see him he said how's your wife I said good don't fight he said he said husband and wife should love each other otherwise the relationship becomes dry now you don't hear that don't be attached to each other left breast is anger and the right breast you know and here's my Prabhupada I have in my heart who is this beautiful beautiful person who above everything else was compassionate to people understood you know everyone this is a material world after all nobody has a happy story to tell so can you not be compassionate enough with someone to reach out a hand of love and support to them whatever your beliefs may be about the role of women or this or that how will you make any progress if you think you are better than anybody so now you are taking that ultimately whatever be the you could say the intellectual authority of Prabhupada's statements you can take it from a different perspective that is taking those statements the way we are taking them going to help us grow spiritually so it's not just help Prabhupada's mission grow but also help us grow so if you use those statements to become say if that makes us less less compassionate makes us heartless to the pain of others then there you have it you remember that story in the Krishna book when Krishna was pretending to have a headache and he says only the dust from the feet of my devotees will cure my headache so his messenger goes to the Shastric Brahmins you know and they say oh we cannot do put the dust of our feet on Krishna's head we'll go to hell the gopis immediately give the dust aren't you afraid to go to hell we'll go to hell and the Brahmins realise our knowledge is is condemned it's useless because we don't have the love that our wives have for Krishna so your knowledge you may be able to quote a thousand Sanskrit verses your knowledge is condemned it's hellish if you have not developed compassion and love for all of God's parts and parcels your knowledge is a stumbling block on your spiritual path to hell with your knowledge don't quote verses to me show me how big your heart is you are applying the principle of the gopis and the Brahmins and their love for Krishna you are expanding it to all living beings in relationship with Krishna also that love for Krishna is not exclusive it is inclusive and so if I love this point that you know maybe how many verses we quote will show how big our heart is our head is but it is how we act but how we act will actually show how big our heart is that's a profound point so now if I just understand your point clearly so you are saying that if someone is encountering a statement of Prabhupada that has hurt them then it is our compassion to help them to help them to heal them from their wound and to help them refocus on developing their relationship with Krishna if we insist on the absolute authority of those statements which they find hurtful then we are actually being uncompassionate is that the point you are making in this? if your goal is to prove a point of view I am insistent on this point of view this is the way it is well good luck to you I wish you all success I think of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu who went to see the Mayavadis and sat down where their shoes were he sat in the most filthy place most humble place where they kept their shoes and immediately won them over just by his humility didn't have to say anything philosophically he was so humble that they were all attracted to him look I don't know maybe I don't think I am overly sentimental I think this is a defensible point of view that the rules and regulations are there to guide us but ultimately you reach a point where you go past the literalism of Krishna consciousness you go to the heart of Krishna consciousness the verse in Bhagavad Gita where Krishna tells Arjuna Arjuna is quoting the Shastras say we have to do this and I cannot fight because it will cause distress Krishna says when your intelligence has passed out of the forest of ignorance you will become indifferent to all that Prabhu you are helping me see things that I have never seen in those light that verse Krishna says that the Moha, the illusion is caused by the Vedas so that itself is radical that the Vedas can cause illusion but now you are extending it further to say that sometimes even Prabhupada statements can cause illusion for us so if you are too literal about them and if you don't understand the spirit if you don't go deeper into an understanding of the context context, context, context never forget the context you can't understand Bhagavad Gita if you forget the context of two armies on a battlefield you'll lose the understanding of what's being said Prabhupada statements didn't take place in a vacuum that's why it's so dangerous to say Prabhupada said this Prabhupada said this when, where to whom with what intended effect under what circumstances why was it said at that time context is everything even the changing of a comma is everything the teacher said the student is a fool the teacher, comma said the student comma, is a fool exactly, one comma exactly the opposite meaning so don't tell me Prabhupada said this Prabhupada said that give me the context so now when we talk about going beyond literalism so at one level we could say that those who want a literal understanding they can also be in the movement but if our movement is actually going to expand at least as far as the face of our movement is there those who are going to present its teachings they do need to have a broader understanding otherwise we'll make it far more difficult than is necessary for people to come to Krishna well I'm going to make it a little more even real than that if you don't mind just bear with me I want to tell you something it's a little difficult to talk about but I think it's relevant to this discussion I mentioned to you before we started that I lost my mother a few months ago she was 95 she was ready to go she said to me straight out she said I'm tired of just trying to repair this broken machine all the time so she was ready to go after she left I have not experienced such pain, such agony of loss ever in my life I have to tell you honestly even Srila Prabhupada's passing didn't hit me so hard because I didn't grow up with Srila Prabhupada my mom was a single parent I was her only child we lived in a very small apartment so she was young when she had me, so we were like best friends my whole life and so losing her was very, very difficult for me after she left I went down to the basement of her building and she had a storage area and there I found in an old box Prabhu, hundreds of letters it was every correspondence she and I had had since I was 5 years old she kept everything, every letter including all the letters I sent her when I first moved into the temple and became a devotee hundreds and hundreds of letters so I've been organising all these letters, I'm having a chance to relive my life through my mother's collection of all of our postcards and letters, everything and I'm getting a sense of myself getting a clearer picture of a young boy who had a sad childhood, my mother and father were divorced, I was less than 2 years old she remarried briefly when I was maybe 5 and that also did not last more than a year so it's like I lost a father twice really and I grew up feeling very protective of her that you know, she doesn't have a husband so I have to be the man of the family so to speak, and that's an unfair burden on any child so there are things about myself that I'm learning from this, losing my mother so why am I telling you all this it's because I think sometimes we posture ourselves as Vaishnavas and we forget to be warm-blooded human beings we're complicated creatures our attitudes, our values our perspectives the way we process information the way we interpret Prabhupada's teachings, it's all autobiographical if you grew up with an abusive childhood where your father was beating you or where you were abused by your family members you'll have a very different kind of relationship with authority than if you grew up in a family where you were respected where the parents were very good role models very very different interpretation of authority same is true for sexuality if the partnership that you have as your model was a healthy one, you'll have one perspective on partnering and relationships with someone on the other hand if it was very awkward or sad, you'll have a different idea of relationships and the way we interpret things is very much coloured by our personal history and I noted for myself for example that when I moved into a temple, I was 19 years old and I think in some respects reading all of these hundreds of letters I moved into a temple at age 19, dropping out of college not because I had some deep philosophical understanding of you know the Vaikuntha planets and the Vedanta conclusions and Krishna the supreme personality I didn't know any of that stuff I moved into a temple because I saw a ready made family I had no brothers or sisters here was young boys and girls my age you know living an exciting life here was Prabhupada a father who would not go away like the other fathers I had had in my life went away so on one level psychological level you might say, a psychic level, I came to Krishna consciousness not through a positive attraction to philosophy but from a negative response to a problematic life that I'd had when I was younger now I meet with a lot of young people today many of them are children of Indian families and in confidence they reveal to me that they're having a terrible time trying to reconcile their life as devotees they say I was born into this I didn't ask for it so I have my friends I have my school, I have my buddies I can't bring them to the temple what are they going to see a big pile of shoes and who knows what they can't put it together having a very hard time with it my parents are always putting me down because I'm not chanting 16 rounds very difficult situation that they're living through it has absolutely nothing to do with the proper interpretation of Shastric verses or Prabhupada's statements about going to the moon or any of that stuff the real difficulties, the real challenges progressing in Krishna consciousness are not these issues they're issues of us not really understanding ourselves well enough to know what are the obstacles impeding us from making solid spiritual progress so while I appreciate this conversation very much what do we do about Prabhupada's statements about Hitler, about women, about sexuality these are very important statements and important issues rather to discuss the background behind those issues is not about Prabhupada, it's about us how is it that one person interprets Prabhupada's statements literally this is it, he's the authority take this that's it, words on the page, that's all you need to know and somebody else says no wait, wait, there's another way of approaching this, how is it there are different points of view, if the teachings are absolute, shouldn't everybody be able to accept them on the same level but we don't, why not because each of us is an individual with our own personal history, our own childhood our own experience with parents our own experience with family our own experience growing up perhaps financial poverty perhaps some physical difficulty some health challenges, legal challenges, every one of us is an individual and our relationship with Krishna consciousness is predicated not on whether Prabhupada's statement about sexuality is this way or that way, it's on what's in your heart what is the real issue that's standing between you and reawakening your love for God I'm humbled and honoured that you shared such a personal experience today thank you for that and it's such an important point that that actually how we seek everything in Krishna consciousness is affected by our upbringing recently I have in this lockdown at least I have tried to reconnect with my father and I have not travelled, I travel 9 months a year in different parts of the world so I'm realising that there is so much, I used to earlier think that you know okay that is a material relationship, if he becomes a devotee it is good if he doesn't then I'm just having mundane talks but actually by talking with him not only I'm, as I said we are warm blooded people who need relationships but also I'm understanding so much about myself when he speaks about himself because the way he raised me I also was touched by earlier statement that this is a material world, nobody has a happy story so it's true for everyone and so this whole point of we using certain sometimes we are using certain statements of Prabhupada to actually run away from confronting the issues that keep us going Now you are saying something Thank you for that Thank you Also not only do we avoid confronting avoid going toward Krishna but when we emphasise on those issues we actually end up creating obstacles for others also from going toward Krishna and confronting the real issues I'll even go farther, thank you, you said the right thing I'd even go farther and say that we grow up and when we are young we have experiences that we are not able to process, a child going through trauma doesn't have the intellectual or emotional tools for processing trauma so the body and the brain know to suppress those dangerous emotions the mind is, the work of the mind and the tool of the mind is the brain is to protect life so if there is something not just if a car is coming at you but if an emotion is coming at you the work of the mind through the brain is to protect you and sometimes it's by shutting down we are not going to deal with that it's too dangerous but they don't disappear they don't evaporate those emotions get suppressed and they live within the cells of the body so you are carrying around those issues from early life and you may not be consciously aware of them because they can be repressed and suppressed very deeply but there are triggers there are things that let me give you an example, let's say as a boy you went to a funeral a cremation or a burial and there was someone you loved very much and somebody comes up, your uncle comes up and grabs you on the shoulder and says how are you doing maybe from that day on for the rest of your life whenever somebody touches you on the shoulder you think about death and you don't even remember why there are triggers like that that can revive those feelings and I've seen in my career as a devotee now I've been in Krishna consciousness more than 50 years more than a half century I've known many many people sincere people but they had these triggers in them, they had these unresolved issues and things would occur in temple life that clearly they were responding to something much deeper than whatever the issue was that we were discussing, it was very very clear so I would just ask your viewers your listeners, people who may be hearing this conversation to take a deep breath and step back away from their situation and remember a few things remember that Krishna consciousness is such an amazing blessing we are being given a lens a spiritual lens through which to view all of the experiences of our life we can filter our entire lifetime through that lens and understand it as stepping stones toward reawakening of our love for Krishna and if we do that if we allow room to recall very difficult very painful experiences it just may be that that is the reward for your chanting hear me out on this now what is the proof that you have been chanting nicely it's not that all of a sudden Radha and Krishna are going to come before you and start dancing don't wait for that to happen it may be that your sincere effort at chanting the holy names will be rewarded by some insight into your own nature that will give you this moment ah I understand now I've been responding to something from the past I need to step back and open my horizons broader and stop being so fearful for myself maybe that's the reward that you will get for chanting sincerely this is profound this is amazing I've seen two radically different approaches two looking at one's past and in fact I grew up with the first approach that is our past life is just like Maya and forget it now you have come to Krishna so it's like a dream after you wake up from a dream whether it is a bad dream or a good dream it just doesn't matter your comfortability those letters that my mother kept all of my letters to her starting in 1969 when I moved into the temple it was party line party line we're not our bodies in this lifetime you're my mother but we are eternal souls you know it's like that's Maya it was all propaganda it may have had some reality but it wasn't very realised knowledge and it was very hurtful to her someone who had given her life to trying to raise me properly it was a big mistake I regret that and now looking back I can see that she was very polite she handled it really well I asked her one time I said did I ever hurt you by joining a temple she said no I figured you'd come around someday yeah yeah in our Bhaktivinoda Thakur in his Bhagavad talks about himself when he was younger and he didn't like the Vaishnavas at all they were just sentimentalist you know until he finally read Bhagavatam the life of Mahaprabhu and he realised what it meant to be Vaishnava he said oh it's so hard to overcome the prejudices of our youth it's like that for all of us so Guru again you are flipping the script there he is saying that the prejudices of his youth stopped him from understanding Vaishnavism in his youth but you are saying that it could be for us the impressions from our youth may actually affect our understanding of Krishna consciousness now so why do you think someone would actually believe that women are less intelligent than men I mean what would compel someone to actually believe that is it Shastric is that really what it's based on or is it something that comes from some other influences what would possibly compel someone to actually believe Prabhupada thought Hitler was a good person a gentleman is it really because Prabhupada said it so many times that it was indisputable or is there something else going on in terms of needing to believe in the absoluteness of the Guru's teachings I mean come on let's get real here beautiful I was reading a book recently about say how people learn so when people read a book what they remember from a book tells not so much about the book as it tells about the reader also so ok so there are now if I understand three different things which we have brought up till now a lot of things but just to bring it all back to our topic you know one is that certain statements of Prabhupada can be very hurtful for people and we need to take responsibility to understand and present them properly that is the first statement first point which broadly and we discussed a lot of things in relation to that second point you made is that Prabhupada was a Prabhupada was a living person who loved everyone and as you know he never wanted to speak any statement that was hurtful in the sense that he was loving for everyone so he was not prejudiced and third you broadly made the point that if we are harping on some of Prabhupada's statements we are taking some of Prabhupada's statements very seriously or insisting on a particular reading of some of Prabhupada's statements that is because of us not because of Prabhupada so I think it's a very comprehensive structure that has been built so if we actually assimilate the compassionate mood of Prabhupada then we will form the right bridge between say people who are hurting because of certain statements of Prabhupada and we will as you said the criteria is the main principle is how can we further Prabhupada's mission so we will help them understand Prabhupada's statements in such a way that it clears their path to Krishna so very nicely summarised yes I agree with that yes so two more how much time had you planned because I have a few things to raise on this and it's been a very deep and fulfilling discussion if you have a couple more questions okay so now going to going back to that point of what we read or what we highlight tells about throw the light on us isn't that at one level natural as an individual so where it becomes a danger is when we don't attribute it to our individuality but we attribute it to the authority that rather than I find these statements of Prabhupada inspiring or important and I said this is what Prabhupada is so that is where it becomes a problem because how can we ultimately give up our past history we will see through that so probably the only thing we can do is just become aware of our filters it only becomes a problem if you insist on forcing your point of view on somebody else against their will you know it's a big world out there I mean think of when Krishna entered the wrestling, Kamsa's wrestling arena every person in that arena in the audience saw Krishna in his or her own very personal way if there was 10,000 people it was 10,000 different ways of seeing Krishna you know this one saw him as a beautiful young boy this one saw him as a supreme personality this one saw him as a great wrestler everyone had a particular perspective and the kingdom of God is broad enough that it can accommodate unlimited different perspectives the guiding principle is Vaishnav behaviour you know we're respectful of others of course we cannot allow harm to be done that we cannot allow but if someone I was just reading in Chaitanya Charitamrita where Murari Gupta was praising Lord Ram and you know Chaitanya Mahaprabhu tried to convince him to convert to Radha Krishna worship and Murari Gupta said what can I do I love Ramchandra so Mahaprabhu wrote on his forehead Ramdas he said you are the true devotee of Ramchandra yeah so he didn't put him down oh well you haven't understood the highest thing is Radha Krishna he didn't do that he so appreciated that you have your way of worshipping the Supreme Lord I'm so inspired by you Bhaktivinoda Thakur writes when I go into someone else's church I see how my God is being worshipped by these people in their own way and that inspires me he didn't put them down oh they don't understand Vaishnav Siddhant no they are worshipping God that inspires me so what's our problem that we have to be so fanatical that everyone has to think the way we do yeah here the problem comes that we don't think this is the way I think we think this is what Shastra teaches I'm not giving my opinion I'm giving scriptural teaching but it is scriptural teaching as understood through my individual perspective so best of luck to you I wish you well you too and just a couple of more things I mentioned this two ways of looking at our past that is seeing that it is a dream from which we wake up or it's like I just said a progressive thing which has affected us so and it is continuing to affect us in some ways so you made this remarkable point that sometimes better understanding our past so that we can understand where we are right now and how we have come to Krishna that may be the reward of our chanting so this is again quite a radical understanding so it's not that chanting may lead to ecstatic love for Krishna but may also lead to a deeper self understanding and that self understanding will help us to overcome or at least notice our prejudices or our impressions that are biassing us in a particular way and if just to extend this further so if someone is still insisting on their perspective as the scriptural teaching then could we say that they haven't yet got that insight as a reward of their chanting or whatever else? No, I don't think you can make that kind of broad statement.
Their understanding may be very wonderful. You know here's the thing physician heal thyself you know this saying? Yes. We have our point of view.
I think if there's any hope for the world Chaitanya Charan Prabhu it's not going to come from anyone insisting this is the way. It's by coming to the mature position of saying I have my covenant with God and I'm secure in that. Let me now step outside my own certitude of my perspective long enough to be able to listen with open ears to what other people have to say who have their covenant with God as well.
You know the goal of Krishna consciousness is not to get everybody to dress in dhodis and saris and chant on Japa beats. That's not our purpose in this world. Our purpose is to move forward a vision of divinity that provides for every man woman and child and non-human form of life an opportunity to progress spiritually and that comes by being able to instil inspiration in others and I think if we can just relinquish some of our very tenacious grip on this idea that no success looks like this not like that and we come to this broader perspective maybe then there's hope for the world.
That's going to take some growing up. We have some growing up we have to do and we have to do it really quickly now. Things are at a critical turning point in the world on so many levels and there's need for mature self-aware men and women of good character to move forward with the agenda of Srila Prabhupada's mission.
I hope that your viewers listeners will take seriously this call. We are compelled by our participation in Krishna consciousness to calm down take a more dispassionate look at our own behaviour our own attitude and relationships with others and ask some difficult questions challenging questions. There's a say I like what Carl Jung psychologist Carl Jung once said he said what if the worst of all offenders those who are in most need of compassion and help turn out to be me turn out that that is what is within me what do I do then? We never think like that at all really.
We talk about humility as a important virtue but this perspective of humility as confronting our own issues confronting our own conceptions it is such a vital conception. Now I just reflect what you said this has been till most of the times in my Krishna consciousness also what I observed although I was never really a pushy person telling people chant more rounds or do something like that but that was a definition of success for people so quite often it is you know we look at outreach as what people are not doing and what people should be doing but now as I in the last 4-5 years I started I was travelling extensively and in the last one year I had some time to reflect on my experiences in travelling and what struck me is that not just looking at what people should be doing is while interacting with people we need to look at what God is doing in their lives it is wherever they are God has not abandoned them and it is not just theory whatever events they have gone through so if we actually understand where God has brought them till now in their lives when they come to interact with us then as you said we can instil inspiration and take them forward otherwise if we go with a preconceived agenda this is what I want to tell people to do then we may actually not be able to we may not only not help them advance we may actually become a cause of their regressions well we inadvertently we may actually alienate people from Krishna consciousness by taking an adamant point of view you may be right but you have failed miserably to understand the true purpose of Srila Prabhupada's mission right in terms of say logically arguing based on Prabhupada's making an argument based on Prabhupada's statements but we will be simply you want to be correct be correct and God bless you I really don't care for your association give me the association of pure hearted souls who understand that everyone is a better devotee than they are Prabhupada once said thousands of stars cannot light up the sky one moon can light up the sky the night sky give me one disciple one moon like disciple I will sit with him under a tree and teach him all of Krishna consciousness we are looking for that pure hearted devotee who is humble like a blade of grass more tolerant than the tree giving all respect to others without expecting any for oneself now you can chant the holy names thank you so can I try to summarise in a few minutes if you don't mind or you would like to add I think we made a big journey from specific statements to a broad important issues should I try to summarise or you would like to add something including no no please yes so we discussed today about understanding some of Prabhupada's difficult statements say for example statement about that Hitler was a gentleman so you started by talking about how we after many years have actually as a movement started taking serious account of some of those statements which may alienate insult people and how we can deal with them at a personal level so you talked about Prabhupada's statement about Hitler in a context Prabhupada's specific context was Hitler's gentleman was that he didn't use weapons of mass destruction whereas others America and America bombing Japan or UK bombing they did so it is in that limited context and he said based on your personal association with Prabhupada where you got to be alone with him asking him any kind of questions so you understood him in a very close way and regarding Prabhupada's how Prabhupada surprised our conceptions you talked about that book called naked ape how Prabhupada said you can use this in your outreach normally you would think this is just a mundane book by a scientist proposing a theory that Prabhupada contests but Prabhupada was very resourceful Prabhupada was very resourceful and compassionate and then so context is critical and you flipped the script several times one way was that when we insist on a literal reading of Prabhupada's statements yes Prabhupada's house is big enough to include literalists also and people they can be secure in that understanding but over a period of time we need to mature and understand that Prabhupada also wanted us to use our intelligence and you talked about how when you had to go to a night club to meet Prabhupada said go there, fish but don't get wet that is specifically a question about what to do when we don't have directions directly in your books in dealing with the situation there is the shastra pramana and vedic pramana and the loka pramana and loka pramana is based on one's is based on one's judgement, one's intelligence and Prabhupada didn't insist that it has to be our, that there will be only one judgement which will be absolute in that context, so different people can use their best intelligence and act accordingly in that connection he says if those who insist on the literal understanding it is they may be imposing a material conception of perspection of how an acharya should be Prabhupada didn't claim to be omniscient, he talked about how many windows are there in the empire state building, how many how many atoms are there in a drop of how many drops of water are there in a mirage so Prabhupada debunked that and he also made this very striking point that Prabhupada was aware that devotees would say Prabhupada says and he would be quoted out of context and he wanted us to use our intelligence so that was one category elaborately discussed about how Prabhupada himself was a very his purpose was to bring people to Krishna and we need to we need to consider all of Prabhupada's statements based on whether they are going to fulfil further that purpose or not and then that brings us to second point that if we are truly compassionate then we won't be insisting that this is the right thing but we will be considering what is right for the audience to come closer to Krishna. Now people are in pain and they need Krishna just as the Gopis were in were in pain to hear about Krishna in pain we should also be in pain to see those who all of Krishna's parts in pain and try to relieve their pain and if their pain is caused by some statements of Prabhupada then we need to be mature enough to give the understanding that can help them relieve that pain and if we don't do that we will alienate many people and then you talked about if we are insisting on particular understandings of Prabhupada that could be because of our own baggage you could say we bring from the past and you shared your personal story about how now psychologically the reason you joined the temple was not necessarily philosophical but also psychological and so we need to, so in fact that self understanding of how our past brought us to the level of coming to Krishna that self understanding could be a gift of our chanting also and with that self understanding we will we may not necessarily we will always be individuals but we will stop insisting that our individual perspective is the scriptural truth and toward the conclusion you said that the world if the world is going to improve it's not by anybody saying that this is the I have the truth and you accept it rather it is by we being secure in our covenant but with God but also stepping out of that certitude to understand how how people are acting in their particular covenant with God and the world very urgently needs such mature self aware individuals who are ready to say maybe confront the issues in their heart the issue is not what is the right statement what is the right understanding of Prabhupada statements but the issue is you know what is stopping me what are the issues in my heart stopping me from moving toward Krishna and how I can address them and how what is it that is stopping others from moving to Krishna and how we can address that so Prabhu it's I feel that to conclude I'll say that you shifted you started the analytical perspective which is logical but from that you expanded it to a very compassionate perspective for becoming for us to become vehicles of Prabhupada's compassion so thank you very much for your time and your wisdom any concluding remarks Prabhu? My favourite part of our discussions I always look forward to your summaries at the end because you do such a beautiful job of distilling down so many things we talked about more than an hour and a half and you bring it all down just to one or two minutes of summary it's wonderful I'm just so amazed at how you are able to do that I'm very grateful for your association also Prabhu and I look forward to having you again in future sometime it's been very uplifting I'm sure the reader viewers will also be uplifted by that Thank you Prabhu Thank you Krishna Thank you all.