How do sages like Kardama Muni enjoy material things despite being great spiritualists?
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Transcript
Disclaimer: This transcript was generated using AI and may contain occasional errors or inaccuracies.
So, how do great sages like Kardam Muni say that they enjoy material opulences and still they are serving the Lord without motivation? Sometimes we have an oversimplified conception of the separation between the material and the spiritual. We think everything material is bad and everything spiritual is good. But things are not so simple.
If you see, Krishna tells Arjuna in 2.13, you are not the body or the soul. And yet, right in the next verse, 2.14, twice he refers to Arjuna using his bodily connections. So, just now Krishna has told you are not the body and why is he referring to bodily connections? So, the bodily connections, we can't deny them.
Now, we may say philosophically I am not the body, but practically we cannot just wish away our body. We have to take care of our body and we have to recognize that, okay, my body is in a particular way. I have to mold myself in that way.
And accordingly, I can serve Krishna. So, the material is not just to be rejected or denigrated. Within the material also there is, we could put it as pro-spiritual, non-spiritual, anti-spiritual.
Roughly it can correlate with sattva guna, rajo guna, tamo guna. And within the material, that which is pro-spiritual can and should be used in Krishna's service. So, for example, Prabhupada explains in the 2.14 purport that these two designations remind Arjuna that he belongs to a great dynasty and belonging to a great dynasty brings great responsibility with it.
And therefore, he should act in a dharmic way, that means he should act in the knowledge of atma. So, now dharma, artha, kama, moksha, these four are Vedic purusharthas. And they are in no way sinful.
It is a pious and virtuous way of life. From the perspective of prema, they are very small. But sometimes, if we jump to the too exalted perspective too prematurely, then we may misunderstand things.
So, for example, the Bhagavatam says how a husband who is attached to his wife and who is busy earning a living and taking care of children, is a person, is a condemned person. Not condemned, but Bhagavatam approaches as a person, as an attached householder. And Bhagavatam says, become renounced.
Now, in today's culture, a big problem in society is that people are so irresponsible that they don't even take a family responsibility. And for people who are irresponsible, they use spirituality to rationalize their irresponsibility. So, there are children who are not carers, the children are maya.
Children are not maya. So, the thing is that when we talk about rejecting the material for the spiritual, it assumes there that one has already an understanding that the material is also important. And one is making the material over important and giving up the spiritual.
But in the course of living in this world, you cannot just simply reject the material. So, for somebody who is a grahastha, at that time artha and kama are parts of one's life. And there are different devotees who can function in bhakti with different definitions of success.
So, for example, if one somebody, one grahastha devotee asks me that in the morning, how important is it for grahasthas to come for a morning program? So, I give an elaborate answer. Yes, it is nice if you can come. But if the grahastha says that if I come for the morning program, then I cannot do any other service.
Because that's all I can do. And that grahastha is having a preaching program at home. And the grahastha is doing wonderful preaching over there.
I will close down the preaching program and I will come every day for morning program. Is that desirable? Well, I won't say yes or no directly. Again, we have to see if that grahastha is himself feeling weak and feels inspired by morning program, fine.
But we shouldn't think that for a grahastha, coming to the temple morning program is the only definition of success. So, there are many devotees who are fabulously wealthy and they went to their spiritual master and said, we are ready to give, you know, we would like to give all this wealth to Krishna. Spiritual master told them, keep the wealth.
Because with the wealth, you have a position in society. And that position will attract people to you. And when people see that somebody with this much, this kind of affluence is still devoted to Krishna and is so devoted to Krishna, in fact, that can also attract a lot of people.
If you see in the Bhagavatam and in the Mahabharata, actually even in the Bhagavatam, whenever kings are described, a huge amount of opulence is described with them. You may wonder, they are devotees, why do they need such opulence? But the thing is that a king, certain standard is expected of a king. And when people, people won't take the king seriously if the king doesn't have that standard.
And when the king has that standard and then people see, oh, this is really the king and he is so devoted to God, then people take that seriously. So, sometimes the Bhagavatam does demonstrate a principle that a person who becomes devoted to Krishna is not deprived of Artha and Kama also. So, for that purpose, a devotee may also be blessed with Artha and Kama.
And a devotee's test is not necessarily the renunciation of Artha and Kama. It is the connectedness with Krishna. See, what happens for us, we can think that Artha is something which can be used in Krishna's service.
But Kama we think it is very bad. But within Kama also there is various things. Krishna himself uses the word, generally we use the word Kama for lust.
But Kama when it is talked about as Purushartha, it is not just lust. It is the whole family life where one fulfills one's desires in a dharmic way. Because dharma has come right in the beginning over here.
Dharma, Artha, Kama. That is proper over there. In fact, we see another place where Krishna uses the word Kama is nityo nityanam chetanas chetnanam eko bahunam yo viddhadhati kama.
It is one supreme being who is fulfilling the desires of all other beings. So, if Krishna himself is fulfilling those desires, that doesn't necessarily mean it is bad. So, a devotee can enjoy material opulences in various, with various consciousness.
One is that the devotee is demonstrating how, Krishna is getting the devotee to demonstrate how devotees are not deprived of material opulences. Either the devotee is using the position from that in Krishna's service. Another could be that right now the devotee may still be attached.
But despite the attachment the devotee is still serving Krishna. And by that gradually the detachment will develop. So, it is important for us that we not judge great devotees.
Simply in terms of their capacity or their capacity to reject material things or in their visible rejection of material things. So, sometimes some devotees may be very devoted to Krishna but at the same time they may be surrounded by material things. It's not that renunciation alone is a sign of devotion.
Renunciation can be a sign of devotion. But Chaitanya Mahaprabhu and most of his associates were brahmanas and they were exalted devotees. So, that's how we can avoid judging and recognize that within bhakti many things can be used in Krishna's service.
And having opulence is not necessarily bad. Many times, if from a practical perspective, suppose if all the grahasas in temple were living very simply then they would live in a locality which would also be very relatively simple. And people also have their sense of class.
So, people who are high class they may not come to a low class person's house. Low class not in a judgmental sense but in a financial bracket sense. If a house is very simple they may not feel inspired to come there for a program also.
So, material things are important for various purposes. And the principle of bhakti is that whatever is attractive in this world if we use it to attract people towards Krishna. So, we build big temples and similarly we can have attractive venues.
So, devotees can also use material attractive things. And even if somebody is initially attached, by using those things in Krishna's service gradually the attachment will come. And for exalted devotees, when we say they enjoy material opulence it simply means that they see them as Krishna's gifts to be used in His service.
So, we should not put, like just as when you get delicious food. Now we can be grateful to Krishna, such delicious food Krishna has given me and we can release the taste of the food. Is it that to avoid sense gratification I should deny the taste? I will take sweet rice but I will not taste sweet rice.
It's not like that. So, we see even the taste of that pleasure as Krishna's mercy. So, Krishna also says, dharma viruddho bhuteshu kamosmi bharatarsheva.
He says, I am sexed like that without contrary to religious principles. So, the scope of Krishna consciousness, Prabhupada writes in the 7th chapter, purport that the jurisdiction of Krishna consciousness extends everywhere. So, it extends even to the realm of artha and karma.
And even those activities can be done in a mode of devotional service. Does it answer your question? Yes. But unfortunately my problem is that I am putting myself in Karnataka issues.
Yeah.