How can we resist temptations?

Answer Podcast

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
So many times we hear that Shatrughna Parva is very rigid and it’s not a truth only how do we reconcile that with the fact that it must be spoken softly sweetly. One problem with with our understanding of Shatrughna Parva is that we often focus on only some aspects of Shatrughna Parva and quite often if you look at Shatrughna Parva’s teachings some of his most sensational forms, rascals, this, that that is what become very popular because they have sensational value but Shatrughna Parva is sober, is sensitive, is gentle often those pastimes are not heard so just like I told you on yesterday we say that, like I have seen some people they have a slogan that it is good, but it’s not necessary if you are meeting new people if you start speaking Hare Krishna then this can’t happen so somebody says Hare Krishna, there is nothing wrong with that that is what is required to approach you so Prabhupada in the morning walks if new people come, you just greet them good morning so there is some more cultural sensitivity that is there and often the picture of Prabhupada that you may get is an intuitive confrontation Prabhupada was confrontational but that was not everything about him he was nuanced see confrontation is an approach the preaching basically was three main approaches that are polemic, ironic and apologetic polemic means I try to prove that you are wrong ironic means that oh both of us are actually saying the same thing we try to bring peace and apologetic, Hare Krishna apologetic means that you are saying that I am wrong but I will explain to you how I am doing it so I am right, that is apologetic it has got nothing to do with apologetic apologetic means I am right, polemic means you are wrong and ironic means actually both of us are thinking similarly only let’s remove this perception and make a statement so these are all strategies and Prabhupada would adopt different strategies at different times so the important thing is which strategy works so faithfulness to Prabhupada doesn’t mean that we have to exactly use the same words that Prabhupada used faithfulness to Prabhupada means that we have to fulfil the purpose that Shri Prabhupada promoted for example, Shri Prabhupada uses words like cult the cult of Shri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu spreading far and wide now today we don’t use the word cult why? because the word cult has a very negative connotation which was not there when Shri Prabhupada was present the word cult just meant a group of people but now the word cult means a group of people who are sequestered, brainwashed, indoctrinated and that negative connotation is there and there are some cult leaders who actually exploited their people there was one American leader who considered himself to be sort of an incarnation of God and he had thousands of his followers in his own community he said now the moment of deliverance has come he had done some criminal activities, he was about to be arrested and he had 100 people, 1000 people with him they all, he told them if you are faithful to me you will all be delivered at this moment and he gave all of them answers and they all were poisoned so he died and 1000 people died with him and they were also brainwashed, they actually voluntarily took poison in them and from that time there was almost a decade of cult scare in America that people who are cult members they will be brainwashed, they will be destroyed and then the word cult will not have any negative connotation so now we have proper philosophy, we have systematic discussion we have so much question and answers by no means is what Prabhupada has given us in the cult so it is not cult in that negative brainwashing sense at all but people had that conception Prabhupada was cult when that word was having a particular connotation which was not negative now the word has a negative connotation you cannot use that word similarly Prabhupada earned his emulation in 1920 at that time the word rascal did not have the strong negative connotation but it has now the word rascal was basically like an affectionate word of reproach hey badmach what are you doing so now the word badmach it can be spoken in a very affectionate way also but today the word rascal has a very strong negative connotation there is one lecture of Prabhupada where he is saying in a devotee praise to Krishna these rascals they have all forgotten you and they are suffering because of this so I pray to you please Krishna give them intelligence by which they can come back so Prabhupada doesn’t know what rascal is but he is using it in not a judgmental sense in a very compassionate sense the word rascal has no negative connotation but today we use it with a very strong negative connotation so faithfulness to Prabhupada does not mean necessarily using exactly the same word that Prabhupada used faithfulness to Prabhupada means fulfilling the purpose that Prabhupada fulfilled and fulfilling that purpose was attracting people to Krishna so there were two famous musicians who attracted Krishna to Prabhupada one was Allen Ginsberg he was somewhat famous the other was George Harrison who was phenomenally famous now both of them had some spiritual affiliation before they met Prabhupada so Allen Ginsberg when he met Prabhupada he said I have been to India and I am a spiritual teacher and Prabhupada said oh he is a foolish monk it is annoying thing so Allen Ginsberg was very shocked and this is mentioned in Ramayana also and other publications also he said before that all spiritual teachers must be very good but the result of this was Prabhupada took me away but the result was that he became sceptical not just of other spiritual teachers he said he became sceptical of Prabhupada also and although he appreciated Prabhupada he never committed himself to Prabhupada then he met Prabhupada few years later he came to London and met George Harrison George Harrison was very good and there is one extract of that conversation in Chandra and Shrandi if you go to the book and look at the full conversation when George Harrison spoke to the spiritual leaders Prabhupada does not make any judgment Prabhupada takes some point from there and keeps speaking his message so Prabhupada does not reproach most of the leaders that he spoke to that George Harrison spoke to is Mayavadas but Prabhupada does not criticize those leaders at all he takes whatever is good and he continues speaking and he goes focused on his own message so there are three points I have made over here the point is that the words themselves we have acquired certain conceptions of Prabhupada and quite often the sensationalized soundbites are what are discussed the most but there is a new and subtle sensitive side of Prabhupada that is not depicted second point is even in the confrontational side at Prabhupada’s time the words did not have as pejorative, as negative a connotation as the words have now and thirdly Prabhupada’s strategy so he used a particular strategy in the early days of his work and it didn’t work, Prabhupada did not insist on that strategy George Harrison, he did not criticize any spiritual leaders he just spoke his own message and George Harrison became a commentary so we do not have a very external conception of the experience of Prabhupada Prabhupada was a warrior and a warrior means the warrior goes to fight and win the war in the war which strategy works that will change according to the circumstances we should not be like warriors fighting a war that is already over fighting yesterday’s war in the first world war there was trench warfare trench warfare means that the two armies would be facing, both armies would dig trenches and they would go and stay over there anybody who comes on the surface will shoot them and especially Germany and France at the border of France at the opposite of Palestine it was a stalemate for many years so the armies had to be living in the trenches so now that is another very effective strategy in the first world war in the second world war trench warfare was introduced because by the time of the second world war aircrafts had become a major player in any fight and soldiers would go to the trench because a bomb would come from above and the trench would become their tomb so somebody might have said in the previous war we used trench warfare and we were so successful it doesn’t matter, you will not be successful so the world has changed and strategies, the purpose of sharing Krishna’s message that remains consistent but some certain strategies may not be applicable at all and if you see, within India also Krishna Prabhupada, when he came Prabhupada also said that I can speak like this but you can’t because he was a German he had a spiritual structure and he also had aim on his side so if we see Prabhupada’s primary target in America target audience were Hindus and Hindus were people who had already rejected the mainstream culture the mainstream education the mainstream religion the mainstream politics and Prabhupada came along and we have philosophical justification for rejecting it all they already had, oh this is nonsense, this is nonsense yes, I will tell you why it is nonsense so that’s time gel but if you look at our world’s history when Prabhupada came to India he has grown western people, western people have become people they have created a sensation but not many Indians became committed to Hinduism many Indians became like Hindus you see, it’s called leading to coffee in India from 1985 onwards almost 10 years after Krishna Prabhupada departed because initially, you know, many Prabhupada disciples simply followed Prabhupada’s strategy fools, rascals, fools, rascals and Indians couldn’t digest it the Indians have a particular culture and expectation of what spiritual leaders should be and these are young, non-Indians, Americans they are coming and they are telling this established Hindu leader is a rascal this is Hinduism and they couldn’t digest it so, it is only when the Indian, when the it’s called liberalism in India started attuning to the Indian cultural ethos and President played Bhakti accordingly that people started becoming democrats so, faithfulness means using the strategy that works so, Prabhupada used Brains studying at different times and he should use that strategy which enables people to come closer to Krishna and that, for most cases, for us most of us, it will be being sensitive to Krishna