How much importance should devotee-parents give for the material education of their children, especially preparing them for competitive exams etc?

Transcript

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Question How much importance should devotee parents should give to the material education of their children? Especially in terms of preparing them for competitive exams.
This answer this will largely depend on the individual parents. But there are some broad principles which we can consider. First is that we look at Shila Prabhupada’s example.
Shila Prabhupada although he strongly spoke against the limitations of material education modern material education. Still he recognized its value and its utility and he wanted devotees to preach in centers of education in colleges, in universities and whenever well-educated people would become devotees he would consider them as a great asset for the movement. Why is that? Because whatever the limitations today, intelligent people many intelligent people today though going, most intelligent people if not all, they are going for material education and those who are well-educated, they are at least in some ways well-competent.
They are in some ways intellectually developed, of course in some ways they are not at all developed. But the point is that material education definitely has its value and utility in material life and it also has a value and utility in spiritual life. Not in terms of directly contributing to our spiritual knowledge or spiritual advancement but working hard to succeed in material education also develops a culture of responsibility and hard work and diligence which stands a person in good standing even when a person comes to spiritual life.
So we will see many of the leaders in our movement are also from well-educated backgrounds. That’s not by any means necessary but it is something which is a fact to be observed. Especially the second generation leaders are often well-educated and they are helping in the spreading of the movement in quite an effective way.
So even if we want our children to prosper in their spiritual life generally some level of stability in material life is definitely required and if there is respectability in material life and that adds as an impetus that is a bonus for eventually sharing Krishna consciousness. So that’s the first point. Material education is necessity and it has utility also.
Secondly with respect to the unfavorable things in material education. There is the environment and there is the education. So the environment often is very materialistic.
The campus culture is quite sensual and immoral and degrading and also extremely taxing in cases because of competitive exams and pressure cut-throat pressure often. So this can be quite damaging for a person and some people fall prey to bad habits and even depression and suicidal urges. So in such a situation as devotee parents how do we deal with this? The best way is we offer samskaras, we offer knowledge of principles and everybody has to make their own choice.
Now regarding preparation for competitive exams one important thing is that there is a huge amount of pressure especially in Indian culture today that children should take particular streams maybe I shall become an engineer or a doctor or some sort of grammarized fields and that pressure can choke sometimes the children because they may not have interest in those directions and then their actual interest may get choked and they may become warped because of that. So it is at least we cannot literally implement varnashram in today’s society that will then require a huge amount of insight and change but at the individual level the principle of varnashram is that we that everybody is engaged according to their nature. So the parents can observe the child carefully and then look at the interests of the child and help the child also think then as the child grows up then to some extent whatever interest the child has, whatever talent the child has that can be an improvised way of working according to one’s varna.
So to some extent astrology can help in this but there should not be an over reliance on astrology there is a good astrologer good devotee astrologer that you don’t have to consult whether my child will pass this exam and that exam and that exam but basically the propensity if the parents want the child to become a doctor and the child has a propensity of an artist there is going to be a complete mismatch. So if the varna is not obvious that can be a, varna cannot be inferred by the behavior by varna I am not specifically meaning brahman, kshatriya, vaisya, shudra I am just referring to what is the inclination of the child that cannot be inferred by observation then maybe that sort of consultation might also be helpful but at least devotee parent should not, there is no need for them to just follow the path where everybody forces their children to take up some glamorized vocations but if the children have their talents then they can be given some freedom and creativity freedom to use their talents and choose a vocation or a profession that is according to their talents and that is an improvised way of implementing varna ashram now in ISKCON Prabhupada ultimately wanted that devotees should have alternative educational systems wherein they can get proper education from in spiritual as well as material subjects some attempts are going on within ISKCON in small small pockets and when the children are small and there are value education classes and there are sometimes sometimes some Sunday schools which are associated with the temples those sort of facilities are available they can definitely be used and that will create some samskaras but overall ISKCON has had in the early one definition of success that we withdraw from the society and we live around the temple community in the temple itself and even children are withdrawn from the outside world so ISKCON has changed over the years and now ISKCON is not a temple based movement, it is a congregation based movement and congregation devotees are staying in different places the temple may still be the center of the community but it’s not the center of residence for the community and that’s why the community is distributed so the one definition of success which was largely used earlier was that we withdraw from the whole society and we build our own alternative culture the other definition of success could be that devotees with strong principles they penetrate into the mainstream culture and gradually work by setting a good example to change it from there so education can help in that also so that way although in some ways the education can be unfavorable for devotional service in other ways it can also help a person to move forward in the journey towards Krishna and even the journey towards sharing Krishna’s message with others this is a complex subject and we hope in the future that ISKCON will itself be able to fulfill Srila Prabhupada’s vision for alternative education and through the alternative education also devotees will be able to have sufficient sufficient skills by which they can earn and live respectfully after their education so till then as Prabhupada would say we have to make the best of a bad bargain so making the best of a bad bargain means first of all recognizing that modern education also has its utility and then the dangers are there so we have to protect children from the dangers there can be excessive competitiveness excessive materialism excessive fitting children into just the same mould of going for glamorized professions so if we protect them from these pitfalls which are common then overall the children can be guided so that they can become educated and intelligent representatives and messengers of Krishna in the world so they can do good for themselves and they can do good for others also thank you