How can we know that deceased devotees go back to godhead?

Anwser Podcast

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
Pandit Ramachandran asked me a question in the afternoon. So, I said that is an important question.
So, I’ll answer now. So, he has said that when some devotees they practice bhakti throughout their life and how can we know for sure that they go back to Godhead? This is the question? Actually, firstly, if we are looking for empirical proof, in terms of observational proof, what to speak of going back to Godhead? We cannot even have empirical proof that Godhead exists. Isn’t it? We can’t even have that empirical proof that the soul exists.
Empirical in terms of observer. So, the word proof has different meanings. Now, what to speak of the soul exists in terms of empirical proof or proof in the terms of language of science or mathematics.
Even you and I exist, it cannot be proven. Your body and my body exist, it can be said. It occupies certain space, it occupies certain mass.
But you as a personality, you as a person, where does it exist? Is it here? Is it here? From the point of material analysis, the whole idea of personality itself is not provable. So, the idea of proof, strict proof, which we apply, then we will disprove ourselves out of existence. What to speak of disproving Godhead? So, there is a different way to infer this.
What is that way? That is actually, even in science, this method is used. Sometimes, we just say science is about experiments. And we do the same thing repeatedly, experiment, and by that we come to a conclusion.
But not all science is experimental. When science also goes to talk about origins, how the scientists cannot make the universe come about again to show or to do experiment. So, there, they don’t use the method of repeated experimentation is called as induction.
In mathematics, when there is mathematical proof that is offered, that is called as deduction. The 3 plus 4 is 7. That is simply a mathematical rule. We don’t need experiments to do it.
It is just simply, by definition, it is like that. But if I drop a stone, it will fall. This is a matter of experimentation.
So, we do experiments again and again, and when the same thing happens again and again, we say, this is what will happen. That is called induction. But, when science talks about origins, we can’t do induction over there.
We can’t say, we can’t do any experiment to show how the universe came about or how life came about. Scientists use a different form of reasoning called as abduction. Abduction doesn’t mean kidnapping.
It is a different meaning. Abduction actually means, it is an abductive form of reasoning. It means inference to the best explanation.
It is inference to the best explanation. Say that, this is what is actually done in most crime novels or detective novels. Say there is a room in which you find that there is a person who has been murdered.
At 3 o’clock in the afternoon, the person was alive. 9 o’clock somebody went in, they found he was dead. You find out who all came in that room.
You have a camera at the door. There is a 4 year old boy who came in. He could not have pushed the knife into that person’s belly.
There is a 70 year old grandmother who came in. She also did not have that strength. There is a 25 year old butler who came there.
Probably he must have killed her. So, now you cannot, when detection is done, again we can’t repeat. You can’t tell the butler, please kill him again so that we can catch you on camera.
Can’t do that. It is an inference to best explanation. So, same way, inference to best explanation means from different ways of reasoning we come to one concurrent conclusion.
And by that we understand this is what is likely to happen. So, same way, if we consider, Baldevidya Bhushan actually analyses this in the last verse of the Govinda Vahasya commentary on the Vedanta Sutra. The last sutra is Anavrtti Shabdad.
Anavrtti Shabdad. Shabda means scripture. He says Anavrtti.
Avrtti means to come back. Anavrtti means one will never come back. Shabda, scripture says that one will not return.
And there he gives analysis of various kinds. He says that actually the Lord is so eager for the devotee to come back, to come to Him, that the Lord accompanies him in this world and is constantly waiting to help the devotee turn towards Him. So, if that Lord who has not forsaken the soul, even when the soul has forsaken the Lord, for so many lifetime we turn away from Krishna, but Krishna doesn’t abandon us.
So, that Lord who has not forsaken the soul for so many lifetime the soul has forsaken, if that soul now turns towards the Lord and practices bhakti towards that Lord, how can that Lord forsake such a soul now? If He had to forsake, if He had to give up, He would have given up earlier. Why now? So, He will never forsake the devotee. Then second point he says is, what is the purpose of this world? The purpose of this world ultimately is to help us to direct our love towards Krishna and attain Krishna.
It is not that Krishna wants to keep us in this world. It is our own desires to enjoy in this world that keep us in this world. So, if a devotee has practiced bhakti diligently, a devotee has shown Krishna the desire to attain Him, then the purpose of this world is already served.
Why would Krishna keep a devotee in this world? Krishna doesn’t want to, Krishna’s whole purpose in being in this world is to help us to come from this world to Him. It’s a poor game. And another point is that Krishna has directly promised this in His scriptures also that if you practice bhakti diligently, you will come to Him.
So, beyond that, we have that famous pastime of Ramanacharya that suppose a devotee is not able to remember the Lord at the time of death, then what will happen is the Lord will remember the devotee and the Lord will give remembrance. So, we shouldn’t think of the remembrance of Krishna simply as a mental function. When you talk about remembering Krishna, it’s like say, you know, I sit here and I remember India.
That’s a mental function. That is also done, but when it comes to the practice of bhakti for a devotee, the remembrance of Krishna is a spiritual manifestation. If we think of remembering Krishna simply as a mental function, sometimes people may say that I will just do all kind of worldly enjoyment throughout my life and when I’ve had enough enjoyment, then I’ll take a gun in my head and Hare Krishna and shoot the gun.
I’ll remember Krishna and go back to Krishna. It’s not that simple. We can’t trick Krishna like that.
Because we may say Hare Krishna, but if throughout our life we have cultivated mental attachment, we’ll not be able to remember Krishna. And the whole point of recollection, it’s not again just an action. It’s a disposition.
It’s a spiritual manifestation. That’s why when Krishna says, first in 8.5, if you remember me at the time of death, you’ll come to me. In 8.6, he gives general principle.
Whatever you remember at the time of death, you’ll attain that. And 8.7, he again gives the application of that. Therefore, he says, throughout your life you try to remember me.
tasmat sarvesu kaaleshu ma manasmargad vichyam ayarpitmano buddhir ma me vaisyasya samshaya Always remember me, you’ll come to me. So, we understand that Krishna is a God of mercy. And if we do our part in trying to practice bhakti diligently as well as we can, Krishna will do his part.
So, we don’t have to worry too much about what will happen at the time of death or what will happen to us after death. What is important is what we do before death. If we keep practicing bhakti diligently, Krishna will always do his part.
And the way we understand that some devotee has gone back to Godhead or not, it is simply by looking at the life of that devotee. The devotees practice bhakti diligently. Then what reason does Krishna have to keep such a devotee in this material world? And if Krishna wants that devotee to do some service in the material world, then that devotee is there by Krishna’s desire, not one’s own desire.
And in somebody’s by Krishna’s desire, then that person is so surrendered to Krishna, they are already practically in the spiritual world itself. So, this is how we, with respect to the post-mortem destination of a devotee, is the inference to the best explanation. Is that, from the point of view of seeing of the purpose of the material world, from the point of view of Krishna’s always being with us as a super-soul, from the point of view of Krishna’s explicit assurance, from the point of view of the the soul’s natural attraction towards Krishna being developed, the purpose of life being served.
From all these points of view, you can conclude that a devotee who has devoted one’s life to Krishna, will attain Krishna. Does that answer your question?