How can spiritual knowledge address today’s burning social issues?

Answer Podcast

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
How can we use spiritual knowledge to deal with big social issues which are present in the world today? Yes, in the UNESCO charter it said that a war begins in the minds of people.
That’s why war ultimately can be ended only through the minds of people. So on the 60th anniversary of the finding of the United Nations, I was invited to a world peace conference. And there the India head of the United Nations is saying that since the starting of the United Nations, they had 60 major sister organisations.
There are millions of people working, billions of dollars spent. And yet in all those 60 fields which United Nations has worked, things have become worse. Things have not become better.
So what is the cause of this? Specifically there are individual causes which need to be addressed. But actually whether it is India or whether it is the West, ultimately the more the consciousness becomes materialistic, the more people become self-centred, then the more they are going to be exploited. And the more things are going to become worse.
So at a broad level, if you just keep looking at the news and see this problem is there, that problem is there, you can just feel powerless. You can just feel as if we can’t do anything. But if we see that, yes, there are specific problems which are caused by specific factors.
But yes, there is violence against women, there is corruption, there is terrorism. All these problems are there. But if we see what is the cause? The violence against women is caused by lust.
Corruption is caused by greed. Terrorism is caused by anger. And these three are qualities which increase when people are unspiritual, when people are materialistic.
When people become spiritual, then naturally these decrease. So in the Vedic culture there are two means of bringing about welfare in society. There is Shastra and there is Shastra.
Shastra is weapons. So Kshatriyas, those who are the martial guardians of society, those are the administrators, they are meant to use weapons to curb the wrongdoers and to discipline them. So now if we are in a position where we can influence governmental decisions and we can ensure that the rule of law is maintained, that is what we can do.
But if we don’t have that, the second thing is what is always accessible to us, Shastra. So Shastra is for punishing the wrongdoers. Shastra is for educating people so that they don’t become wrongdoers.
Or educating people that there is a better way to live, a better way to happiness than by exploiting others. Now that is what the Brahmanas do. So Vishnu Prabhupada founded the International Society for Krishna Consciousness primarily for sharing spiritual knowledge.
And through the sharing of spiritual knowledge gradually as more and more people become spiritual, so they spread out and they make changes. And over a period of time there are Kshatriyas, people who have influence in society, they become spiritually minded, they will also bring out a change. So the change that is brought from a grassroots level, that is what is going to be a lasting change.
Most of us we live with the expectation that maybe some leader will come who will clean up the system. Yes, if a good leader comes that is good. But all of us, if the change is sustainable, it cannot be dependent on one good person to come.
It has to be a change which comes from the grassroots level. And the spiritualization of consciousness which each one of us can do and each one of us can share with others, that is the change in the grassroots level. So although it may not seem to have any immediate effects, but over a period of time it has a substantial effect.
The river like Ganga which is so flowing very powerfully, if you look at the origin of it, there is a small trickle. Just many many trickles when they come together, they become a tributary. Many tributaries come together, they become a river.
That river flows and becomes a powerful force eventually. So each of us can be like a one trickle. And as we come together, as we inspire others to become spiritual, that becomes a tributary.
And many tributaries come together and that becomes like a river that can bring about change. So rather than getting obsessed over big social issues, changing which is not within our power, we can focus on changing ourselves and helping others change by the sharing of spiritual knowledge. And that addresses the problems at the root.
The American thinker Henry David Thoreau said that one hacking at the root of evil is more effective than a thousand hackings at the shoots of evil. So the shoots of evil, you see many problems, many criminals are there, they are wrongdoers, some of them are going scot-free. They need to be punished.
But even if the wrongdoers are punished, as long as the culture remains something which triggers lust and anger and greed within people, no matter how many wrongdoers are punished, others will come. But if the culture is made more spiritual, that is like hacking at the root of evil. And that is what will be a substantial change.