If everything is God’s will how do we have free will?

[Class at Bhakti Center, New York, USA]

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Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
I am grateful to be here amongst all of you today and I will speak on the topic today as was mentioned. I am a writer so I will rephrase it a little more precise. If everything is Krishna’s will, do we have free will? So this is a verse we will take from 9th chapter, the first canto of the Shambhagavatam, text 17.
Let’s recite this. This is Bhishma Pitamah speaking to Yudhishthira Maharaj and he is saying, O best among the descendants of Bharata, Yudhishthira, I maintain therefore that all this is within the plan of the Lord. Accepting the inconceivable plan of the Lord, you must follow it.
You are now the appointed administrative head and my Lord, you should take care of those subjects who are now rendered helpless. The popular saying is that a housewife teaches the daughter-in-law by teaching the daughter. Similarly, the Lord teaches the world by teaching the devotees.
The devotee does not have to learn anything new from the Lord because the Lord teaches the sincere devotee always from within. Whenever therefore a show is made to teach the devotee, as in the teachings of the Bhagavad Gita, it is for teaching the less intelligent men. A devotee’s duty, therefore, is to ungrudgingly accept tribulations from the Lord as a benediction.
The Pandavas were advised by Bhishmadeva to accept the responsibility of administration without hesitation. The poor subjects were without protection due to the battle of Kurukshetra and they were awaiting the assumption of power by Maharaj Yudhishthira. A pure devotee of the Lord accepts tribulations as favours from the Lord.
Since the Lord is absolute, there is no mundane difference between the two. So, here, this is where the Bhagavatam is addressing what in philosophy is called the issue of theodicy. Theodicy is, if God is good, why is there evil in this world? Why do bad things happen to good people is a more common way of phrasing it.
Yudhishthira is, we could say the embodiment of a good person, he is called Dharmaraj, very virtuous, and yet, tribulation after tribulation came in his life. And now Bhishma Pitamah is instructing him, saying everything is within the plan of the Lord. It is ordained by Him.
So, I will take this question in four distinct parts. First, let’s talk about this point of the plan of the Lord. Then we’ll talk about our free will.
Then I’ll talk a little bit about the role of the mind. And then lastly, I’ll talk about the role of bhakti. So the overall theme will be God’s will, free will, mind, and destiny.
How do these four interact in bhakti? So now, firstly, if everything is the plan of the Lord, does that mean that all the terrible things happening in the world are also planned by the Lord? So innocent people get killed, at least, or some small children are brutalised. So many bad things happen. What does it mean, everything is within the plan of the Lord? Here I would like to first differentiate between the Lord’s plan and the Lord’s purpose.
The two are not the same thing. I’ll give two metaphors to illustrate this. First is, say, a school.
In a school, there is the purpose that the students get educated, students learn and rise to a higher standard. The students failing is not what the school wants. But if a student fails to pass an exam, then what happens? There is a plan for those students also.
If you fail in the exam, then you can take the subject again, or you may have to take this level again. So the students failing and students having to take a particular subject again is within the plan of the school. But that is not the purpose of the school.
So purpose is what the school wants, plan is what all the school accommodates. So similarly, there is a purpose that Krishna has and that purpose is he wants all of us to be ultimately happy. He wants all of us to realise our spiritual nature and by realising our spiritual nature to become ultimately happy.
So that is his purpose. However, the soul has been given free will. And with that free will, the soul may sometimes misuse the free will.
So now it is by Krishna’s plan that he has given us free will. So Krishna, by his supreme will, chooses that he wants all of us to freely reciprocate love with him. And the reciprocation of love requires free will.
So here I am making the point, how do we understand the need for free will? So I will talk about three different frameworks. If we have free will, now if we misuse the free will and do something wrong, that doing wrong is not Krishna’s will. That is not Krishna’s purpose.
But Krishna allows that, just like a school accommodates a student feeling, that is within the plan. But let us look at the concept of free will first of all. That if, I said that the purpose of existence is the reciprocation of love and love requires free will.
If a boy goes to a girl and falls on his knees and proposes to her, please marry me. And then she says no and takes out a gun, marry me. Now if he is going to do that, there is no free will over there.
There is no love over there actually. So if somebody is forced to do something, there is no love. So love requires free will.
So Krishna, if the purpose of existence is the reciprocation of love, then free will has to be there. That is one way of looking at it. Second point is that, this is what our Acharya says, Vedanta Sutra commentary go in the Bhashya, that scripture tells us do this and don’t do this.
Scripture directives would become meaningless if we had no free will. What would be the point, do this and don’t do this, if already everything is ordained. They are just going to do what we are going to do.
No, but scripture is telling us, do this and don’t do this. And third point is, even if someone says I don’t have free will, to say that I don’t have free will, I need free will. The negation of the statement is the assertion of the statement.
In logic, these are called as self-contradictory statements. If I say, I don’t know even a single word of English, well I have already spoken 8 words. So I don’t know even a single word of English is an example of a self-contradictory statement.
So the very statement itself contradicts itself. So the fact that I can choose to say I have free will or I don’t have free will. So that means we do have free will.
Now, our free will is not unlimited. It is limited. So here I would like to go a little further and differentiate between free will and freedom.
We may equate the two, but they are not. For example, say a criminal, a person has done something wrong and has been jailed. Now, even a person in jail has free will.
But the person in jail does not have freedom. The person in the jail has to stay within the premises of the jail. So to make a more precise differentiation, free will refers to something internal.
Freedom refers to the external scope for the execution of the free will. So just as a person, if they commit some wrong, they do some crime, they are put in the jail, the external scope for the freedom, for the execution of the free will may be taken away. In the jail also they have free will.
Somebody can just become friends with criminals and they can become a worse criminal. Or they can go to library and study and learn something. So that they can have a career when they come, they can have some vocation when they come out.
So free will is there in the jail, but freedom is not there. So Krishna says, similarly there is that relationship between us and his divine plan. In 9.6 in the Bhagavad Gita Krishna says, यथा आकाश्यस्तितो नित्यम् वाहु सर्वत्रगो महान् तथा सर्वाणि भूतानि मध्धानित्यो पधारया He says, यथा आकाश्यस्तितो नित्यम् Just as the wind is always situated in the sky, similarly all living beings are always situated in me.
If you envision the sky to be like an upside down ball, then that upside down ball, that will determine the scope within which the air can move. So it can move left, right, up, down, but it cannot move outside that ball. Similarly Krishna’s will is like that ball, is like the sky.
And we are like the air within that. So we do have free will, but our free will is presently limited. And it is not just presently limited, because we are finite, our free will is always finite.
So what is limited is not the free will, but the scope of the free will. Free will is always there, the scope is what is limited. Now Krishna by his supreme will decides to give us free will.
And how much the scope of the free will will be, that is determined by our karma. So for example, we human beings have the capacity to speak in a human language. So I can speak softly, I can speak harshly, I can speak in various ways.
But I can’t speak like a dog or a cat or I can’t sing like a peacock, a parrot. That, I don’t have the capacity. I can go here, I can go there, but I can’t fly like a bird.
So the scope of my free will is limited by my body. The body allows some capacity and the body creates some limitation. That is one level at which our free will is limited.
Going further, now we all have free will and there is a scope of the free will. What about some other person? Everyone has free will like that. So in this context, the Kauravas repeatedly committed atrocities on the Pandavas.
So where the atrocities that the Kauravas committed on the Pandavas, where all of them Krishna’s will? Did Krishna want that it happen? So I said if everything is Krishna’s will, then how do we have free will? So here I talk about how do we have free will? By Krishna’s arrangement, he has given certain scope for us to execute our free will. But another point is, everything is not exactly Krishna’s will. Everything is sanctioned by Krishna.
But everything is not necessarily intended by Krishna. That means, if a particular soul wants to do a particular thing, Krishna may allow that soul to do that. But that doesn’t mean Krishna wants that soul to do it.
Just like the earlier example, the difference between plan and purpose. The school accommodates a student failing. But that doesn’t mean the school wants the student to fail.
So everything is within Krishna’s plan. But everything that happens is not Krishna’s purpose. So in that sense, everything is not Krishna’s will.
So if a soul chooses to misuse their free will, then they have the scope to do that. And if they do that, there will be consequences for that. The consequences will be for them in terms of karmic reactions.
And for those who are in their vicinity, there will be consequences for them also. So for example, Hitler by his past karma was meant to become a powerful person. But then he misused his free will and he became powerful in an atrocious way.
So when somebody misuses their free will and hurt someone else, Krishna is not doing that. It is that person doing that. And it is that person who is responsible for that.
So when in Kunti Maharani’s prayer it says, भूतानाम् यन मिथाः कलिः That it is by the living beings’ interactions that distress happens in this world. The Supreme Lord is neutral. He gives everyone free will and based on their karma, he gives them freedom.
And if they misuse their freedom, there will be consequences for that. So for example now, if the Kauravas try to dishonour Draupadi, then that is not what Krishna wants. That is what Dushasan wants, Duryodhana wants, Karna wants.
And Krishna circumstantially allows them. By their karma, they have been given certain power and they can use the power they want. Now they will get the consequences for that.
So another example to illustrate this is say, if we are using Google Maps. Say if you are coming from your home to Bhakti Centre for this programme. Using Google Maps.
Now sometimes Google Maps gives us a particular direction, but we take a wrong turn. Now, the wrong turn is not what Google Maps is telling us to take. Now if I take a wrong turn, immediately what does Google Maps do? It readjusts and gives you the other right route.
From here, how can you go right? Now again if you take a wrong turn, again it will reroute and give you how to go. Now I can take unlimited number of wrong turns. And from all those wrong turns, Google Maps will give me a path to come back to the destination.
But each of those wrong turns will have consequences. I can still come back from there to my destination, but it will take longer and longer and longer. That means within the plan, whatever wrong turn I take, that is accumulated.
So from wherever I go, I can come to the destination. But my wrong turns will have consequences. Similarly, we can say Krishna is like the ultimate Google Map.
Whatever wrong turns we take, He is there in the Super Soul in our heart and He will tell us how to come to Him from there. He is ready to tell us. So in a sense, you could say Google has mapped out the whole globe and wherever we may go, from there how to get to a particular point, Google can tell us that.
Similarly, Krishna has mapped out all of reality with all possible trajectories. And whichever trajectory we choose, from there how we can come to Him, He is ready to guide us. But still every wrong choice we take, that does take us further away from Him.
So sometimes people say, does God know the future? Now, this is a complex philosophical question. But firstly, if you look at it, Atheists often argue that the whole idea of God itself is flawed. Why? Because God has two defining attributes.
He is omnipotent and He is omniscient. He knows everything and He can do anything. But Atheists argue that these two attributes themselves are contradictory.
Why? If God knows everything, then He knows what is going to happen in the future. If He knows what is going to happen in the future, that means the future is planned and this is what is going to happen, then can He change it? If at a future moment He decides, I want to change the future, then did He know that in the past? So if God knows the future, that means the future is all mapped out, then He can’t have the power to change it. Because if He changes it, then does He know it? So if He is omniscient, Atheists argue that He can’t be omnipotent.
And if He is omnipotent, He can’t be omniscient. See the problem here? If you don’t see the problem, you are fortunate. But the understanding is that actually Krishna is having many wonderful attributes, but He is not stuck with His attributes.
Some people are very tall. Being tall is an advantage, but sometimes if there is a load over, it becomes a disadvantage. But you are stuck with your height.
You can’t do anything about it. So Krishna is not stuck with His omnipotence or stuck with His omniscience. Krishna is a loving living God.
And His defining attribute is that He is loving. So He wants good for everyone. So He is omnibenevolent.
He is the well-wisher of everyone. So that means that His omniscience and His omnipotence, both are subordinate to His omnibenevolence. That whatever is good for others, He will do that.
And if for furthering that good He has to manifest His omnipotence, He will manifest that. And if He wants to manifest His omniscience, He will manifest that. So Prabhupada explains this in a well-known example.
Can God make a stone that He can’t lift? He says, yes, He can do it. He can do whatever He wants. So He is omnipotent in doing whatever He wants.
He can make a stone He can’t lift. But then what can He do? He will lift it. Why? Because He is not stuck with His omnipotence.
I have made a stone which I can’t lift. Now I can’t lift it. Now if He wants, He can lift it.
So ultimately, Krishna, this God has the attributes, but He is not stuck with His attributes. That’s a very important point to understand. God’s attributes don’t limit Him.
They, you could say, empower Him unlimitedly. So when Krishna knows the future, what does it mean? He has the whole future mapped out. Whichever choice we may take, what may be the consequence, that mapping out is there.
But which choice we take is up to us. So whichever choice we may take, that is within Krishna’s plan. But our taking wrong choices is not Krishna’s purpose.
Our taking wrong choices is actually our wrong choice and we have to bear the consequences for that. So now let’s, this is our free will and Krishna’s will. Now I will add one more factor in this.
Now to understand how things occur, this whole branch of philosophy which talks about causation, now how things happen, what is the cause of things, that is called as aetiology. Aetiology is the study of causation. So now there are three broad factors.
There is God’s will, there is free will and there is evil. Now what do I mean by evil? In Christian philosophy, they have the idea that there is some Satan who is making us do bad things. Now we understand that Maya Devi is not evil herself.
So what exactly is evil? Evil is simply the sum total, the accumulation of our past wrong choices which again impel us towards wrong choices. So now I am going to talk about how, as I said earlier that our free will is always there but our freedom is affected by our past karma. Just like a person who is a law abiding citizen is put in the jail, their freedom gets affected.
Now this happens at multiple levels. Say if a person is very powerful in this life, they do bad karma, they may become very powerless in next life. But even in this life, if somebody becomes alcoholic, then that person was initially free whether to drink alcohol or not.
But after sometime, he has become bound. There is a British playwright Mark Twain, he said that giving up smoking is the easiest thing in the world. I have done it over a hundred times.
So I gave it up but it didn’t give me up. So what happened, actually I was triggered to do that again and again. So here we see that person might have been sober and free.
Say this is their home, this is their office and there is a bar over here. They could just go by without even noticing the bar. But if they become alcoholics, then as soon as they pass by the bar, I want to drink, no I don’t want to drink, I want to drink, no I should not drink.
There is so much agitation there. And as they become more and more alcoholic sometimes, for some alcoholics, the first thought that they get on waking up is, I have to drink. And just before sleeping, I have to take a drink and sleep.
So it’s like they are almost so terribly bound by it. So here what happened, that action again and again, doing it, it actually restricted their free will. They may go from America to Russia to India to Australia, but wherever they go, their desires will pull them to alcohol.
So Krishna says, āśā pāśi satair vada. We become bound by our own desires. Now how does this happen? So this is also one example of our free will being present, but the freedom getting restricted.
How? By the misuse of the free will. Or the use of the free will in a particular way. So when I am talking about evil, the understanding which I am talking about evil is quite different from the say Christian idea of evil as being something which is, their idea is Adam sinned against God.
Adam and Eve sinned against God. And therefore they consider evil to be something like a genetic defect that it passed down all generations to all of humanity. So that is not what, the soul is pure, but the soul carries conditionings.
So when an alcoholic drinks again and again and again, certain impressions are formed in the consciousness. And those impressions prompt us to act in particular ways. So I will give you two examples to illustrate this.
Say somebody is a materialistic person, they want to enjoy material pleasures, and say they have gone to some website, say Bollywood.com. So they go to, I have repeatedly gone to Bollywood.com to look at new movies. Now they come to a spiritual programme and they hear about the Bhagavad Gita. Now they want to Google Bhagavad Gita.
And they type B. And what happens? As soon as they type B, what comes there? Bollywood.com. So here, the past choices, at one level, visiting Bollywood.com was a choice. But when the choice is done repeatedly, it becomes like a default option. And that’s what pops up automatically.
Now they can choose even then to not go to Bollywood.com. B, they can type Bhagavad Gita and go there. But that’s what will get prompted immediately. So similarly, for us, when we act in particular ways, initially those actions are choices.
But that’s something which I intend to choose. But then, after some time, they start coming up as default options within me. And initially, I choose to do that.
Later on, if I don’t choose, automatically I’ll do that. So I’ll have to consciously choose not to do that. I’ll have to consciously choose not to do that.
Otherwise, that option will pop up and it will take me in that direction. So similarly for us, when we act in particular ways, what happens? We could say, there’s a screen inside us. That screen is our mind.
And on that screen, inputs come from various sources. In the 15th chapter, 8th verse, Krishna says, śrotraṁ cakṣyo sparshanaṁ ca rasanaṁ grāṇaṁ eva ca adiṣṭhāya manas cāyaṁ viśayān upasevate So he says, the mind is like a monitor on which inputs from the various senses are coming in. The eyes, ears, nose, tongue, skin.
From all these, you could keep the Sanskrit. śrotraṁ cakṣyo sparshanaṁ So all these senses, we could say they are like sources for the input. So imagine there’s a high security building.
That high security building, there are five doors. And each of the doors has a closed circuit TV camera. And from all those cameras, inputs are coming in to this monitor.
Now, the security in-charge is looking at the monitor and deciding, Hey, someone suspicious over there. He clicks that and that window zooms up. They can look at that carefully.
So now, similarly for us, when we are functioning, there are, all these windows are open. So right now you are hearing me speak. You are also looking at me.
But the other windows are also there open. But they are not the focus. So if right now, suppose from behind, the smell of delicious halwa starts coming.
Immediately, the smell window will maximise. Hey, halwa, when will I get this? Will there be a second helping? How much can I take? It will start off and it will go in that direction. So now, in our, for our day-to-day functioning, all these windows, they are available and we choose which window to zoom.
And sometimes, it just happens by training. You know, if I’m driving a car and I’m talking with someone, I’m hearing them. But if I see in front of me, in the car, the person is slowed down or I can see a red light over there.
Then immediately I press the brakes. So I, my hand, my legs go down, legs press down and I press the brake. So this happens.
These, which window zooms up for how long, stays how long, all this happens at a very fast pace. And normally, it happens in a cohesive way, so that we can function properly. But when we become attached to something, then say, there’s a security in charge, who is looking at all the doors to see who is coming in over there.
But if there is someone whom they’re attached to, say their prospective partner or someone, and they see them coming in from a door, they start looking at that. And as they’re looking at that, looking at that, a thief comes in from another door. They’re so caught in looking at that, they don’t even notice this.
So when we are attached, what happens? There are certain things which we pay more attention to. Not only we pay more attention to, but also those things tend to zoom out. They just tend to maximise in our consciousness.
And then we may start neglecting other things. So, in the Bhagavad Gita, when Krishna talks about lust, kama, lust is not just sexual desire. It is generic desire for material enjoyment.
Now, generally we can say, I’m angry. If I say, I’m angry, I’m greedy, I’m lusting, what does this mean? I’m feeling that emotion of anger. I’m feeling that emotion of greed.
I’m feeling that emotion of lust. So, lust, we could say, or anger, or greed, they’re emotions which we feel. But they’re not just emotions that we feel.
They’re also, we could say, dispositions we have. Because Krishna says that lust, anger, greed, lust is situated in the senses, the mind, and the intelligence. In 3.40, he says that, Indriyani manobandhir asyadishthanam uchyate.
The senses in the mind and intelligence, these are situated. So, now what does this mean? That means, is it like an object? Is it just a feeling that I get and it goes? Or is it an object that is actually there? So, this is where I’m leading all this section to the idea of evil. We have God’s will, free will, and evil.
So, what is evil in our understanding? If somebody, say, chooses to drink alcohol again and again and again. Choosing alcohol is a decision that they take. So, drinking alcohol is a decision that they take.
And wanting to drink alcohol is an emotion that they feel. But when they act on this emotion and take this decision repeatedly, then it becomes stored as a default disposition within. So, then it’s not just an emotion they’re feeling, it’s a thing, not a thing in a physical sense, but in a subtle sense, which gets stored.
Just like for us, if somebody visits Bollywood again and again, Bollywood.com again and again, that becomes stored as a preference. And for somebody else, when they type B, there is no Bollywood.com icon. Because that is not stored as a preference there.
So, similarly, somebody else, if there is an alcohol bar over here, somebody is not an alcoholic, they pass by, they may not notice it at all. They may not get the desire, let me drink, let me drink, let me drink. So, basically, our actions right now also affect our free will.
Why? Because certain prompts become very powerful. Just keep coming, keep coming very forcefully. Another example, so one example was this, things appear on the computer screen.
Another example could be, every action that we do, it forms an impression. And that impression, we could say, creates an inclination. So, if this floor were inclined that way, now if water falls on this floor, then by default, the water will flow in that direction.
If I say some electronic item over there, I don’t want water to touch there. Even if I say, I don’t want water to go over there, but still the water will go in that direction. Because the floor is inclined like that.
Similarly, when impressions are formed on us, in our consciousness, in our subtle body basically, those impressions cause the inclination of the inner floor. And by default, our consciousness will flow in that direction. So, if somebody is very attached to cricket, and then as soon as they have nothing to do, their mind will go to cricket.
Oh, cricket. Oh, this match happened like this, this match happened like this. If somebody is very attached to current affairs, as soon as there is nothing to think of, immediately they start thinking of that.
So, we have default tendencies. That is the direction in which our consciousness keeps moving. So, now, when these default tendencies are destructive and negative, we can call these accumulated inclinations, accumulated impressions, they can be called as evil.
And when there is evil, which is accumulated within our consciousness, that means there are unwanted impressions that are there, they will push us and push us very forcefully to go in particular directions. And it may appear as if we don’t have any free will at all. So, earlier I talked about free will and freedom.
So, free will is our inner capacity to choose. Freedom is our outer facility to act on that choice. A prisoner has free will, but a prisoner does not have freedom.
And in this case, it is easy to understand because the prison is outside the person. But what if the prison were inside the person? So, our conditionings are like a prison inside us. So, an alcoholic, if somebody is addicted to alcohol, do they have the free will to choose not to take alcohol? Or do they not have that? Are they forced to drink alcohol? Similarly, we have our conditionings.
Some of us are very short-tempered. And we decide I don’t want to be angry. I am not going to get angry.
I am not going to get angry. And the mind can get so subtle, – it can be so, not subtle, almost sinister – that I decide I am not going to get angry and then when I get angry, I get angry because I got angry. So I decide I am not going to be worried.
I am not going to be worried. I am not going to worry so much. I am not going to worry so much.
And then something happens and I start worrying about it. And then I start worrying. Why am I worrying so much? So we can just get so caught in the head that it appears we just get carried away in a particular direction.
So our conditionings are like an inner prison which restrict the scope of our free will. So now does an alcoholic, as I said, does an alcoholic have free will to act in a particular way? Here, let’s look at the inner dynamic of what happens. Say if we consider the inner screen, the mind is like an inner screen on which something pops up.
Hey, come on, let’s drink alcohol. But that may come because they may just go to a bar outside and they are passing by a bar and they see there is a bar over there. Or that desire might just come from past recollection.
Generally, when we get agitated, the start of that agitation, the stimulus for that agitation can come from external perception or it can come from internal recollection. So if somebody, if I get a snack attack, I get attacked by the desire to have a snack, I get a snack attack. Now that may happen, I may see somebody else snacking.
Hey, I want to eat a little bit. Or suddenly sometime in the mind from some recollection, I want to eat something. So basically, the images that pop up on our inner screen, on the mind, they can come either from the sensory pathways or they can come just from the mind, at the level of the mind through internal recollection.
Now, if you see, if you work on a computer, sometimes there are choices, do you want to instal a software update, a new software update is available. Now in some cases, there is yes, no or later, that option is there. And most, in some cases, the default might be no.
If you want to update it, you have to press yes. But in some cases, if the software update is very important, the default option is yes. And if within say 15 seconds, we don’t change it to no, it will start updating.
So if sometimes some softwares, they just force themselves to get installed. So suddenly a pop up comes up, you want to instal, you want to instal the software. And you say no, you look, there is no option no anywhere, look cross, where is the cross, I can’t see any cross.
And as you are searching for the cross, it just starts installing also. So like that, what happens when our past conditionings are there, the past conditionings cause some desires to pop up. Do you want to eat something? Yes, no.
Now, if that conditioning is very strong, the default option will be yes. And then yes, I want to eat something, I will eat it. But if the condition is not very strong, yes, no, no, I click no and it goes off.
But when the conditioning is extremely strong, like when the conditioning goes to the level of the addiction, it’s like the stimulus comes up, the window pops up, do you want to instal? And imagine if some software gives a option, do you want to instal the software? And that screen has yes selected on it, that pop up window has yes selected on it. And it gives only one second to choose. Yes, and before I can see, it’s already started installing.
So basically, there is a stimulus and there is a response. The stimulus comes from outside, the response is from inside. So the stronger the habit, the tighter the stimulus and the response are tied to each other.
The gap between stimulus and response becomes lesser and lesser by the habit. Now habit can be good, habit can be bad also. Habits are value neutral.
If somebody is a trained firefighter and a fire breaks out over here, most of us may panic and may want to run from here. A trained firefighter immediately, where is the fire extinguisher? How can I control this fire? And they go towards the fire extinguisher. They may not even consciously think about it, but they will do that.
So there, the stimulus and the response are very tightly tied together. And it’s constructive. But for bad habits, for conditionings, that stimulus and response are tied together very tightly and it is so rapid that we don’t even realise it.
So for an alcoholic, desire to drink alcohol comes in and they drink. So they have free will, but the scope of the free will has become so reduced that it’s almost like it is not there. So now, till now I was talking about internal.
That I get certain promptings and I act on them. And I may harm myself. But if we consider somebody who is a sociopath or a psychopath.
These people, they just by repeatedly acting in wrong ways, they have deadened their conscience. They don’t feel anything is wrong. And then they may go and brutalise others, assassinate others.
They can do all sort of terrible things. Now what has happened for them, that evil is a conditioning that is stored inside them. And it is so strongly stored that the option should I do it or not do it.
They can’t think of any reason not to do it at all. They just objectify other people and they do whatever they want with other people. So when this happens, then that person has become evil.
When evil catches, gets such a strong grip on them, the evil conditioning within them becomes so strong that they don’t even think whether I should do this or not. They just do it straight. That means that that person is so conditioned that it’s almost impossible for them to change.
Then at that time disciplinary action is the only way. So Duryodhana had become so evil that he tried to burn, when he was just a 10 year old boy, he tried to poison Bhima. 10 year old boy, what do they understand? He had hatched a whole conspiracy by which he could feed poison to Bhima.
Then he made a whole conspiracy to try to burn the Pandavas alive. Then he made a whole conspiracy to dispossess them of all their kingdom and to publicly dishonour Draupadi. And on top of it all, he had no remorse for it at all.
When Krishna came to petition peace, at that time what did he do? He said, Krishna said just give the Pandavas 5 villages. And what did he reply? Yeah, I will not give enough land to even put the tip of a needle through. There are different forms or different ways of saying no.
Somebody may invite them for a programme and they say, I can’t come because I have to go for this engagement. Okay, now that engagement actually might be an excuse. But at least they are saying in such a way, it’s a no to the request.
But it’s not no to the person. But if somebody says, even if I die, my corpse will not come to your programme. Then it is not just no to the request.
It is like a full on banging the door in the face of someone. No to the person itself. So Duryodhana, when he says, I will not give even the tip of a land, enough land to put the tip of a needle through, that is not just no to the request.
That is a slamming the door in the face saying no to the person. I don’t care for you at all. So he was incorrigible.
And for somebody who has become so incorrigible, then the only way to help them is to actually discipline them. So they have to be punished. That’s why the Pandavas had to fight a war to establish Dharma.
So now here, our actions are shaped, they are within the purview of Krishna’s will. Without Krishna’s will, nothing will happen. But within the scope of Krishna’s will, we have free will.
So it’s like say, I gave the starting example of a sky. Within the sky, the wind is moving. So Krishna’s will is like the sky.
It’s like the upside down bowl. Our free will is we are like the air. We can move here, we can move there.
But evil becomes like a conditioning. And that prompts us, pushes us to act in a particular way. So say, there is a little bit daft of wind is there.
And there is a hurricane going in a particular direction. Then that daft of air will have to move in that direction. It won’t be able to move anywhere else.
So our conditionings become like inner forces which push us in particular directions. And then it may appear as if we don’t have free will. But that restriction is not created by Krishna.
That forceful direction of our consciousness towards evil is not created by Krishna. This is how Dhritarashtra tries to, Duryodhana tries to justify. You are acting in such a vicious way.
And Duryodhana says, we all act according to our nature. And our nature is given to us by our creator. So if you have to blame anyone, don’t blame me, blame the creator.
I am simply acting according to my nature. But who made my nature? It is not that the creator made my nature. It is I who made my nature.
So an alcoholic is prompted to take alcohol. But that is not something which God gives the desire for alcohol to that person. When a computer comes, a computer doesn’t come with the, a manufactured computer doesn’t come with the default preference of Bollywood.com. It is by our choosing again and again that becomes like that.
So similarly, something may be our nature right now and it may be almost impossible to resist it. But we can’t blame Krishna for that. It is not that Krishna is responsible for our nature.
It is we who are responsible. But at the same time, Krishna does not leave us, abandon us with our nature. So I’ll conclude with an analysis of three verses from the Bhagavad Gita.
Then we can have some question answers. This is 18.59 to 62. So 18.59 is यद अंकारमाशृत्य नयोध्सेति मन्यसे मिठेषव्यवसायस्ते प्रकृतिस्त्वाम्नियोख्षते So Krishna is telling Arjuna, if you think you will not fight this war out of ego, यद अंकारमाशृत्य नयोध्सेति मन्यसे, you think you will not fight, then, मिठेषव्यवसायस्ते, that your determination will be misdirected.
प्रकृतिस्त्वाम्नियोख्षते and material nature will engage you. Some people say that, I just don’t have any determination. You know, I have such a weak will power, I don’t have any determination at all.
Alcoholic may say, I have no determination to give up alcohol. But actually, nobody can say, I don’t have determination. Because the alcoholic has the determination to keep drinking alcohol.
If I say, I don’t have the determination to wake up early in the morning, that means you have the determination to keep sleeping in the morning. So all of us, when we do a particular action, what does determination mean actually? Doing a particular action is difficult. It causes some distress, it causes some pain, it causes some inconvenience.
And in spite of that, we do it. That’s determination. So, if somebody is keeping drinking alcohol, they are spending a lot of money, they are disgracing themselves sometimes on social occasions, they are creating more and more complex, ruining their health, but still they keep doing it.
So what is happening over here? That their free will is always there, but it is getting acted in a particular way. So Krishna is telling Arjuna here, you are a Kshatriya. You have a Kshatriya nature.
You are thinking that you will act like a Brahmana, you will not fight. But you cannot act like that. You will fight.
Next verse. He says, Arjuna, you have your swabhava, you have your nature. So you say that you will not fight, you will live like a Brahmana, you will ask for charity and beg charity and live.
But if you go and ask for charity and somebody doesn’t give you charity, then immediately you will take out your sword. How dare you refuse charity to me? So that is your nature. You can’t avoid that.
You will be helplessly forced to act. Now this would mean, Baldevidya Avishnu’s commentary over here says, this Krishna seems to be expounding what is called as swabhavavad, that we are simply slaves of our nature. We have to act only according to our nature.
But the next two verses point to something higher. 18.61 is, He says, we have got a particular body. That is like the yantra, which is the machine.
And we are not the controllers of this machine. It is Krishna who is the controller of this machine. We are riding on this machine and Krishna is directing our mandrakes.
So that means, if I and my conditionings, if the battle is between me and my conditionings, then if the battle is between me and material nature, material nature will sooner or later overpower me. But material nature is not supreme. Above material nature is Krishna.
Above material nature is Krishna. And what does the next verse say? 18.62 is, सर्वभावेन भारत तक प्रसादात परांशान्तिम् स्थानं प्राप्सिसि शाश्वतं He says, if you surrender to that Supreme Lord, then by His grace, you will attain peace. You will attain perfection.
So, to conclude now, what does this mean? Krishna is saying, Arjuna, you have your swabhava. You cannot resist your swabhava. But you can choose what you do with your swabhava.
You can choose what you do with your nature. So, if we fight against our nature, then we can’t do that for very long. If we fight for our nature, this is what my conditioning, this is what I do.
You know, I drink alcohol, that’s what I do. This is my nature. I mean, I cheat, I lie, I conspire, that’s what my nature is.
So, now, here what he is saying is, whatever be your nature, try to serve Krishna. So, now, in our nature, there can be two distinct things. There can be some good impressions, there can be some bad impressions.
So, for example, Vamana, Kshatriya, Vaishya, Shudra, each of these are propensities, which you can use in Krishna’s service. But somebody is, say, lusty, greedy, vicious, these are bad things. So, what do we do? Whatever good impressions that we have, whatever is our nature, which can be used in Krishna’s service, we use it in Krishna’s service.
Somebody likes to paint, somebody likes to sing, they use that in Krishna’s service. I was talking with one devotee, he was a psychologist, and he was telling about a well-known incident in diagnosis. Nowadays, many kids are diagnosed as having ADHD, attention deficit disorder.
So, then he was telling that there was this girl who could never sit at her room. When in class, she would be fiddling, moving her hands, moving her legs, doing this, doing that. And one doctor diagnosed her, she had got very advanced deficiency, and he had to give her a heavy dosage.
Went to another doctor. Parents said, no, no, we don’t want to give this. And then, what happened? This other doctor talked with her for a few minutes, and then he told her, you know, I told that girl, I want to talk with your parents for a few minutes.
You can just be here. And as he was going out, he just, he had a radio over there, just turned on the radio, and there was some music going on. And then they both went out, he along with the parents, and they looked out from the window.
And as soon as this music started, this girl just got up and started dancing. Now, she was playing with the music, moving her hands and legs, and dancing very elegantly. So, he, doctor told, your daughter does not have any deficiency.
She is a natural dancer. So, take her to dance school, and get her to dance. So, somebody has that bodily nature, you can’t stop that nature.
So, what we have to do is, we work with the nature. You tell them just be sitting, rest, just be still. Why can’t you sit calmly? They just can’t.
They can’t, somebody who has that kind of dancing nature, they experience life by moving their body. To tell them don’t move their body, means they can’t experience life. If somebody is an author, then they experience life through words.
Tell them don’t write, don’t speak. What do I do then? There is nothing you can do. So, for us, what is our nature, we experience it, we experience life through our nature.
So, what we have to do is, that nature we use in Krishna’s service. Krishna is telling Arjuna, you are a Kshatriya, use your Kshatriya nature to work for me. You cannot go against your nature.
But you can use your nature in my service. And as far as our negative conditionings are concerned, say if somebody is alcoholic, now what do they do about that? So, the alcoholic conditioning may be so strong, that when the urge comes, they just can’t give it up. So, at that time, what we can do is, if we consider the graph of our consciousness with respect to time.
So, there are some desires just shoot up. Sometimes the urge comes up, I have to do this, I have to do that. So, then at that time, to resist that urge is almost impossible.
But what do we do in between? That urge came, it made us do something, but after that, there is a relative period of peace. So, the nature of the mind is, first the mind will say, drink alcohol, drink alcohol, drink alcohol, drink alcohol. And then I drink.
And after I drink, the mind says, you fool, why did you drink? Why did you drink? Why did you drink? And during that sober period, I am simply beating myself up. Why did I drink? Why did I drink? And after sometime, the urge comes again. Drink, drink, I drank.
Why did you drink? Why did you drink? So, in both the cases, what is happening is, we are simply conscious of the mind. So, the mind here acts like a devil. Suppose, you know, we are just going along with our normal life, a friend comes and says, come on, let’s go and rob a bank.
What? Come on, let’s rob a bank, we can make a lot of money. No, no, I don’t want to. No, no, come, come, I know, I have a full plan.
We will get scot-free. No, no, come, come with me. Just push us, and go and rob the bank.
And then, when the police come, that person runs away. And then we are left alone. And then the police takes us to the court, and then when we go to the court, sitting there as a judge is that very friend.
So, the mind is like that. The mind makes us do wrong, and then judges us, you are just a fool, why did you do that? So, what do we do? We basically, when sometimes the conditioning is very strong, at that time, it may be almost impossible to resist it. Something may happen at that time.
But what happens in between the conditioning? In between the urges. If at that time, we try to be conscious of Krishna, if we try to purify ourselves, if we try to practise bhakti, then by that, we will become stronger. And when we become stronger, then, what will happen? In the morning class, I spoke about this, that Krishna’s mercy works in two ways.
One is, that it gives, it increases our conviction. Means, if I want to do the right thing, this urge is coming, no, I am going to do the right thing. One instalment of Krishna’s mercy, our conviction to do the right thing increases.
The second instalment of Krishna’s mercy is, that the force of the conditioning, which makes us do wrong also decreases. So, next time the urge comes, if I practise bhakti seriously, no, I will not do this. We will fight more forcefully.
We may succumb still. But through the practise of bhakti, we are becoming purified. And when we become purified, eventually, what will happen is, we will become strong enough, to resist that conditioning.
And if we still keep practising bhakti, that conditioning itself will start becoming weaker and weaker. And ultimately, we will become free. It’s like, the prompting comes, but I can say no to it.
And after sometime, if I just, if I say 100 times now, I have visited bhagavad-gita.com, then, and I never visit bollywood.com, the next time I type B, again bhagavad-gita.com will come, automatically come. So, we will be creating new impressions within us. So, for us, as devotees, beyond our conditionings, beyond our limitations, beyond our power of our mind, is the power of Krishna.
And our greatest weakness, when I talk about God’s will, free will and evil, our greatest weakness, is not the evil conditioning that are present there. Our greatest weakness is not lust, anger, greed, or pessimistic thinking, or whatever, ego or whatever. Our greatest weakness, is, our unwillingness, to believe that Krishna loves us, even now.
No matter, what conditioning I am in, Krishna loves me even now. If by the association of devotees, if by the study of scriptures, if somehow we can get this faith, that Krishna loves me even now. It’s like, in the google map, I have made 100 wrong choices, and I have gone far, far away.
But still, there is a path back for me. No matter how many wrong choices we have made, Krishna still loves us. If we can just get that faith, then that will inspire us, to start making the right choices.
If Krishna loves me even now, what can I do to reciprocate with Krishna’s love right now? I may not be able to do the whole thing, but at least this much I can do. When the conditioning comes up, I can’t say no to it. When very terrible circumstances come up, I just get carried away.
But what about the remaining time? Let me do what I can at that time. So when we start with that, we talk about surrender, at one level, Krishna I surrender to you, I give up everything to you. That is one level of surrender.
But another way of surrender is, I will do what I can, with what I have now. Surrender means, to do what we can, with what we have now. Krishna, I have got these terrible conditionings, I have got these terrible complications in my life.
No, I can’t do the full bhakti programme. This is what I can do. What I can do, I will do.
So if we keep resenting, why do I have a mind like this? Why are there these kind of people in my life? Why is this situation there? Then, we are losing the opportunity to be conscious of Krishna at that time. So the more, with whatever capacity, whatever freedom, little freedom we have, if we use it to serve Krishna, that will purify us. And by that purification, ultimately, that small purification will become bigger and bigger and bigger, and that is how we will become healed.
We will become purified, and ultimately, we will be united with Krishna. So the hope that we need to have, is that Krishna is always with us. There is nothing that we can ever do that can stop Krishna from loving us.
We don’t have the power to do anything that can stop Krishna from loving us. No matter how many wrong turns I go, how far away from the destination I go, still there is a path back for me. So rather than repenting our wrong choices, or even rather than lamenting our past wrong choices, or even lamenting or resenting our present conditionings, resenting our present situations, just focus Krishna, how can I connect with you right now? So whatever little free will I have, I use it.
If I use that free will, from there, that will expand, it will expand. The evil conditioning that are there, they will start going down, they will become weaker and weaker, and thus will become purified, will become elevated. So these promptings are always there within us.
But we can become empowered to resist those promptings by the practise of bhakti. When first time I had come to America, about few years ago, I had gone to a college. And there in that college, one boy, I gave a programme on regulating our mental diet.
And I talked about how we need to be careful about what inputs we give to the mind. So after that a boy came to me, American boy, and he told me that just before this class, he was contemplating suicide. He had been in a relationship with a girl and that girl had broken up with him.
And he was very depressed. But as I was going along, he just, in the hostel gloomily, he saw a poster of this programme. He came for the programme, and he says, now I understand that it is not I who wanted to commit suicide.
It’s my mind which is telling me to do this. He said, yes. He says, understanding this difference is vital.
I had to encourage him to read the Bhagavad Gita, to connect with the local Bhagavata programme that was there. I also have a website called Gita Daily where I write every day on the Gita, 300 words. I told him to read that.
So every year when I come to America, I keep meeting him. So, last time when I had come, again he met me. And he told me, I faced a similar situation.
I was in a steady relationship, and suddenly, unilaterally, that girl just broke up. And when I got that text, he said, I am breaking up with you and blocking you. I don’t want to talk with you.
So he says, I just went straight to my room, I closed my door, closed the windows, pulled down the curtains, switched off the lights, and he loved music. So he picked up a violin, which he had, and he said, for six hours, I was just singing the Hare Krishna mantra. Six hours of continuously singing.
He said, I felt myself comforted by something which I can’t describe in words. He said, I felt as if I was bathing in some sublime light. I felt as if I was enveloped in a very sweet blanket.
He said, that which could have been a very depressing experience for me, it became one of the most enriching experiences of my life. So, this is the transformation that bhakti can bring. By whatever past karma, past conditioning that might be there, by that, that painful situation came in the life.
And, previously, by some past conditioning, that painful situation had also prompted a dangerous reaction. But by the power of bhakti, that dangerous reaction, that negative conditioning that was there, that was wiped out. So although, the external level reaction came, the internal level response was different.
And that’s how he was protected. Similarly for us, we always have the free will to choose Krishna. And whatever be the situation, if we choose Krishna, by that, we’ll move steadily onwards, and one day, we will be, by Shri Prabhupada’s mercy, by the Vaishnava’s mercy, by spiritual master’s mercy, we’re united with Krishna.
So, I’ll summarise what I spoke today. I spoke on this verse of how everything is within Krishna’s plan, Yudhishthira Maharaj says. Sorry, Peeshma Pitamah says to Yudhishthira Maharaj.
So, I talked about the difference between Krishna’s plan and Krishna’s purpose. The school’s purpose is that the student get educated and promoted to a higher standard. But the school’s plan includes the student’s failing also.
So, similarly, Krishna wants us to be spiritually elevated. That is his purpose. But if we choose wrongly and become spiritually degraded, Krishna’s plan includes that.
It’s like if you’re travelling, Google Maps gives you the path by which you can get to destination. If you take a wrong turn, still, Google Maps gives you the new path. Similarly, we can make wrong choices.
No matter how many wrong choices we make, Krishna’s plan includes the possibility for us to come towards him. So, this is what the topic was. If everything is Krishna’s will, then how do we have free will? We have free will because Krishna has arranged that.
That just as air can move within the sky, similarly, we can move. Our free will is given to us so that we can experience the reciprocation of love. We have free will because otherwise scripture would become meaningless.
And even the rejection of free will is an assertion of free will. So, we have free will but we may not have freedom. Free will is the inner capacity to choose.
Freedom is the external facility to execute the choice. The prisoner has free will but not freedom. So, for us also, our external situations are determined by our past karma.
So, I cannot fly like a bird. That is the limitation I have. But along with that physical restriction, we also have psychological restrictions.
And for that, I talked about to understand how we act, there is God’s will, there is free will and there is evil. Evil is not some force out, some evil being out there causing us to do wrong things. Rather, it is the impressions created within us which impel us forcefully to act in particular ways.
Just like if I keep visiting a particular website, if I keep visiting Bollywood.com, even if I want to go to Bhagavad Gita, Bollywood comes up over there. So, if the floor is inclined in a particular way, even if I want the water to go this way, it will go in that direction. So, our past choices limit our present choices.
If somebody is drunk alcohol repeatedly, then the urge for drinking alcohol becomes so forceful that saying no becomes difficult. The stronger the habit, the lesser is the gap between impulse and response. When we are thus trapped by our past conditionings to impel certain actions in particular ways, how do we break free from it? I talked about how there are certain aspects of our nature which are constructive.
Like this girl was analysed to be having attention deficit disorder, but she was actually a dancer. So, Krishna says, you are a Kshatriya, you cannot fight against your nature. But you can use your nature to serve me.
So, there are certain aspects of our conditioning which can be used in Krishna’s service. So, we use them in a service. And certain aspects of our conditioning which work against our good, work against our spirituality, we may not be able to give them up.
But they are like urges that come up periodically. In between that period, if instead of being disheartened and just beating ourselves up, why did I do that? Why did I do that? We focus on serving Krishna. The mind is like a person who prompts us to rob a bank and then becomes like the judge who punishes us for that.
So, rather than being mind conscious, we become Krishna conscious. And being Krishna conscious doesn’t just mean chanting Hare Krishna or coming to temple. It means having the faith that Krishna loves us even now.
Our greatest weakness is the unwillingness to believe that Krishna loves us. And our greatest strength is our willingness to accept that Krishna loves us. And with that faith we start acting.
Whatever little freedom we have, we use that in the service. And by that we’ll become more and more better situated. First we’ll get the conviction to make the right choice strongly and then by purification, the wrong choices will start prompting us.
And thus, we’ll become elevated. So, just as this boy who wanted to, when a bad, when a relationship breakup happened, initially he was thinking of suicide. But, by the practise of bhakti, when that breakup happened, again he thought of Krishna and took shelter of Krishna.
So, bad things may happen to us by destiny. But, if we take shelter of Krishna, he will take us, he will guide us to go beyond those bad things. So, I put it this way that, whatever karma may get us through, Krishna will get us through.
Whatever karma may get us through, Krishna will get us through. Thank you very much. Hare Krishna.
Thank you. Applause Applause Applause We have time for one quick question. Okay.
Yes, please. Thank you so much for the wonderful class and sharing the knowledge. As I understand, the free will which we have is limited.
But, if we depend more on Krishna, does it mean that free will will increase? Is it an inverse relationship or is it our goal to just be completely dependent and not think about Krishna? Is it that if our free will is limited, should we just become completely dependent on Krishna? No. Our free will is eternally limited. Our free will is never infinite.
What can increase or decrease is our freedom. Freedom is the external facility or even the internal psychological facility or lack of facility. So, whatever we can do right now, we are meant to do.
And surrender to Krishna can be in two ways. One is through dependence on Krishna and the other is through diligence for Krishna. Draupadi embodies surrender.
She raises her hand in helplessness. Krishna, I surrender to you. At the end of the Bhagavad Gita, Krishna tells Arjuna, surrender to me.
Arjuna says, yes, I surrender to you. But at the end of the Bhagavad Gita, Arjuna is not raising his hands in surrender. Arjuna is picking up his bow in surrender.
So, for Arjuna, the surrender is through diligence for Krishna. So, surrender can have both these aspects. So, broadly speaking, there are certain things which are beyond our control and certain things which are in our control.
So, for the things which are beyond our control, there is dependence on Krishna. And for the things that are in our control, there is diligence for Krishna. So, whatever we can do, we should do diligently.
About 20-25 years ago, the first time I started giving classes and that time a senior devotee gave me some 10-point guidelines how to speak. So, the first point was, depend on Krishna. But in bracket, but only after you have prepared.
So, if I don’t prepare for a class and I have to depend on Krishna, that is not dependence, that is a responsibility. So, after I prepare, then how much I’ll remember or what kind of questions will come, I don’t know that. That is dependence.
So, we have to be diligent for Krishna to do what we can do. And we have to be dependent on Krishna for the things that are not in our control. The balance of these two images, you know, Arjuna is raising his bow and Krishna and Draupadi is raising her hands.
The balance is what Prabhupada sings in Markandeya Bhagavad Dharma. Just as a puppeteer makes a puppet dance, make me dance. Now, what does it mean? That when the person is going to dance, Prabhupada is not simply a doll.
He is not asking that I become an insensitive doll. He is saying that according to your will, make me dance. So, the dancing is happening by Krishna’s will, but the dancing is done by Prabhupada.
And to do the dancing, Prabhupada also has to be expert. So, we will do what Krishna wants, but what we have to do, that we have to do well. So, unless I do my part well, my surrender to Krishna is not proper.
So, I will surrender to Krishna about the things that are not in my control. This is what I have to do. I’ll do it.
But I’ll do it well. So, we have to be diligent for Krishna in doing what is in our control and dependent on Krishna for that which is not in our control. Thank you very much.