​​Learning when and how to forgive

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Transcript

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Today I will speak on the topic of forgiveness and justice, the balance between the two. How is that to be achieved in the day-to-day conduct in life? In the Ramayana, Vibhishan is an extraordinary character because he has to give up everything that he is connected with for the sake of virtue. And Rakshasas are known to be very brutal.
So, if by any chance Ravana comes to know that Vibhishan has defected over and somehow if Ravana or the Rakshasas catch hold of Vibhishan and he would have been tortured and slaughtered. It’s a phenomenal risk that he took. The Rakshasas were so brutal that when the battle was happening in Lanka, every night Ram would stay awake after the battle was over and he would actually do the last rites of all the Vanaras who had been killed.
On the other hand, Ravana had told that whichever Rakshasas have been killed, just toss their body into the ocean. Why? Because he said that the Vanaras should not come to know how many Rakshasas have been killed. If they see so many Rakshasas have been killed, they will feel that we are winning.
So, this is the extent of ingratitude. Ravana is the example of use and throw culture. Literally, use and throw away.
This is for even soldiers who have attained martyrdom for fighting for his cause. And what to speak of for someone who has defected over to the other side. It would have been a very horrible feat, but Vibhishan took that risk.
And Vibhishan actually tried all possible means. When he was trying to persuade Ravana to hand over Sita, he actually took out his crown and he placed it at the feet of Ravana. He said, if you suspect me, I don’t want anything.
You can reject me, but don’t reject my advice. It will cause the destruction of our whole dynasty. But still, Ravana did not hear.
And then, according to later retellings of the Ramayana, it happened that in order to weaken Vibhishan’s resolve and to test the faithfulness of Vibhishan’s son, Ravana ordered Vibhishan’s son to kill his father. And formidable demon he was. Vibhishan was a demon, son was also a demon.
Now the son pitted against father. His son was torn, the father was torn. And both of them fighting, both of them were having tears in their eyes.
And Ravana was having a sadistic delight in this. And finally, one of the Vanaras came over and he challenged the Rakshasas. And Vibhishan did not have to fight with his son anymore.
But still Vibhishan had to bear the grief and he knew that his son was going to die. But it is one thing for his son to die, but it is another thing to have to kill a son once. So Ravana had practically no heart left.
Because he was so infatuated with his obsession for Sita that his whole emotion, the nature of attachment is that attachment constricts our scope of emotions. Attachment constricts our scope of emotions. That means, let us say when people eat meat, at that time, actually it is very paradoxical, especially in the western countries, children love pets.
And there is a dog, there are whole hospitals to take care of dogs. So people love the dogs very much. But then these same children may eat animals for their breakfast.
What has happened is the attachment to the food, the children, the parrots, everyone, that desensitises them to the suffering which the animals go through. So our attachment, because when they are looking at the food, all that they can sense is the taste of the food. So the suffering that those animals go through when they are slaughtered, just become unconscious of that.
So attachment desensitises us to everything except our object of pleasure. Sometimes people say that if you become too detached then you will become cold hearted, you will become insensitive. Yes, that’s possible if we have a misunderstanding of what detachment means.
Rather what makes us cold hearted is attachment, much more than detachment. We see this in the Mahabharata also when Dhritarashtra conspired to have his own nephews burnt alive. Killing is one thing, but burning alive is a very brutal form of murder.
And he knew what was going to happen when he told them that he is going to Anavata. So this is why for him the Pandavas treated him like a father. In fact, the Pandavas treated Dhritarashtra with more respect than what Duryodhana treated him with.
But still because his emotion was concentrated in Duryodhana because of his attachment there is a lot of emotion, but that emotion was only with respect to the object of attachment. And with respect to everything else there is no emotion. So what attachment does is it heightens to a feverish pace our emotion with respect to one thing.
And with respect to other things it just completely desensitises us. Recently there was a report that there was some cricket match and some cricket fan was going to the stadium to watch the match. And he was going in his car and he was so captivated with the idea of watching the match that he actually ran and took his car over three human beings.
Didn’t even stop because he wanted to get to the cricket match. So what happens is, this is the nature of attachment. The excitement is there, but it is in a very tiny scope.
I am excited about this, but everything else we become desensitised. So Ravana because of his attachment to Sita he became desensitised to everything else. And some people say that Ravishan betrayed his brother.
But actually Vibhishan did not betray his brother. It was Ravana who betrayed the Rakshasa dynasty itself. He was a Rakshasa king.
A king is meant to protect his citizens. But what Vibhishan did is for the sake of his selfish pleasure he was ready to endanger and cause the destruction of his entire dynasty. And Vibhishan decided that I have to make sure that there is not a complete destruction.
Those Rakshasas who are going to side with him they are going to be destroyed. But the remaining, they are not Ram’s enemies. And that’s why when Vibhishan came out to Ram’s side what did Ram tell? That he enthroned him as the king.
That means he told him, I am not going to annex the kingdom. I am not going to destroy Lanka. I am going to hand over Lanka to a more righteous ruler.
And after that, when Ravana was killed at that time the whole battle got over. Then Vibhishan was before he enthroned himself, Ram told him you should perform the last rites of Ravana. So at that time Vibhishan became thoughtful.
And he said, I cannot do this. He said, I cannot perform the last rites of this person who has caused so much bloodshed. Who has been your enemy.
And who has abducted your consort. He does not deserve any auspiciousness. When you do last rites for a person at least you are wishing some auspiciousness on them in their future.
He does not deserve any auspiciousness. At that time Ram told Vibhishan that the soul is always pure. Because of the soul’s conditionings the soul may sometimes act maliciously.
Act malevolently. When the soul acts like that that soul needs to be punished. But once the punishment is given, after that one should not bear any hatred towards the soul.
So whatever misdeeds Ravana did, he has got the punishment for that now. The sinfulness that was there in his body and mind with the death of his body that sinfulness has got the correct action. Now you do your duties for the last rites so that his soul will move onwards in the future journey.
And then Ram kept speaking. I told him basically Ram demonstrated in action what Jesus teaches in the Bible. Hate the sin not the sinner.
So Ravana, although he had to be killed because he was incorrigible. He was not ready to change his ways. But still Ram did not hold animosity towards him.
He defeated his enemy, destroyed his enemy but he did not dishonour his enemy. So the point is he honoured him by having him a royal funeral for him. So here we see that sometimes we may hear we should always be forgiving, we should always be tolerant and you may think forgiveness is, yeah it sounds good forgiveness but practically how does it work out? And if forgiveness itself are an ideal then we see both the scriptures, the Ramayana and the Mahabharata they centre on a war.
So if forgiveness itself is a virtue then why is the war fought? War is basically, things cannot be solved by forgiveness. That’s why war is to be fought over. So to bring about justice.
So what exactly is forgiveness and how is it practical? So to understand this I will talk about forgiveness in three parts. There is a forgiveness as an intention or forgiveness as an emotion within us in terms of our emotional disposition. There is a forgiveness in terms of action in response to a particular wrong.
And there is forgiveness as a social principle as a socially acceptable or socially implementable principle, what it means. Firstly, forgiveness as an emotion. Whenever someone has done something wrong to us it hurts.
And usually if we are fighting with someone and then they hit us. Then it hurts but if we are fighting we are tensed. We expect a punch at that, we expect to be beaten so we are more prepared.
But if we are with someone whom we love and whom we think they love us and we expect a pat and then we get a slap then the pain is increased not just because of the pain of the slap but the pain of the unexpectedness, the shock or that also comes with it. Similarly, the greatest hurts come usually not from our enemies because we expect our enemies to act anemically in one sense. But the greatest hurts often come from those with whom we try to have loving relationships.
And in that context forgiveness, how practical is it? That is what we will discuss. Firstly, forgiveness as an emotion. If we hold grudges against others then those grudges act like a mental blockage in our mind.
We just can’t think of anything else. So many people, if I go somewhere and look at someone, that person snubs me. They just deliberately give me a card neglect me and then I feel very angry.
For the next one hour, my mind is going around with revenge fantasies. How I will get back at them? I will snub them in a more public setting. Often, some things are trivial.
Actually, we may think they have snubbed us but they may have just been lost in their thoughts and they have not even noticed us also. But there are small, small translations which may be fairly unintentional. But at that time, if we hold on to grudges I am talking, why I gave this example is they may say that I was worried about something, I was thinking of something, I didn’t see you.
It’s possible, we can all be lost sometimes in our thoughts. So, at this time, we may hold grudge against that person. Why did they do like that? Why did they do like that? And actually, nothing was done.
There was no problem at all. So, grudges often waste our emotional energy. When we are angry with someone and we want to get back at them we cultivate, we nourish anger, we nourish hatred then quite often, it is we who hurt ourselves more than them.
Because cultivating revenge fantasies towards someone is like holding a burning iron coal in one’s hand to throw it at someone. Now, when that person comes in front of me, when I throw it whether I am going to hit them also, whether they will dodge it whether it will hurt them. But before that, all along the time I am holding it in my hand.
My hand is burning. So, usually resentment hurts us much more than it hurts others. Resentment, anger, hatred, hold keeping grudges it hurts us more than hurting others.
So, simply from the point of view of our own emotional sanity from the point of view of our own emotional health it is good to forgive. Whatever you have done, it’s done now. Let’s forgive.
So, by that, we say, how can I forgive? They have hurt me so much. How can I forgive? Yes, they have hurt us a lot but we don’t have to hurt ourselves more. They have hurt me but by holding grudges I am hurting myself.
They may get a wound, they may fall down and some scratch some wound is happening, some blood is coming out and sometimes if there is an itch, they may scratch it. And there is already a problem but by scratching they are making it worse. So, sometimes when we hold on to the revenge fantasies, we actually make the situation worse.
Simply from the point of view of our emotional health it is good to forgive. And this is where the philosophy of karma can help us because we understand that nothing happens by chance. So, even if someone else is hurting us they are simply instruments of our own karma.
The Prabhupada says that don’t be angry at the instruments of your own karma. That means if somebody is hurting me I have myself done something in the past because of which I am being hurt right now. So, by thinking this way about past karma coming back to us we can also get some philosophical impetus for not holding on to the grudge.
This is in terms of emotion that it is for our own emotional sanity, for our own emotional health we can visualise that actually this resentment, this revenge fantasy is like a big burden on our head and we envision Krishna you are in control, whatever you have done I accept it. And give me the strength to serve you. As we are surrendering to Krishna, as we are inviting Krishna into our heart all those bags, all those big big burden it falls away.
And as we prayerfully turn towards Krishna we will ourselves sense some relief. It’s a conscious act to be done. Now, this is with respect to our own dealing with ourselves.
That means how I respond to the situation in terms of my own attitude towards it. This is with respect to intention. Then there is action.
Now, in action there are different possibilities. One is that someone has done something wrong and they are genuinely remorseful. Second is someone has done something wrong and they just don’t know about it.
Sometimes it happens they do something wrong, they are just not aware of it. Third possibility is that someone has done something wrong and they are simply habituated to behave in that way. And fourth is someone has done something wrong and they delight in acting like that because they want to hurt us.
These are all different possibilities. So, the first is that they did wrong and they are themselves apologetic. They are themselves remorseful about it.
So, in such a situation if someone does something wrong they should be forgiven. There is no need to hold any grudges against them. Why? Because it is a momentary lapse.
Maybe it will last longer than a moment but it is a lapse. This is what is demonstrated. This kind of lapse is demonstrated in the Ramayan when after Sugriva is enthroned as the king at that time Ram says Sugriva invites Ram.
You also come and stay with me in Kishkindha in the palace. Ram says no. I have a sentence of exile.
And that doesn’t mean only exile out of Ayodhya. Ram is very meticulous. He says I cannot be in any kingdom.
He says I will stay in the forest. And you stay. And now the four months of rainy season is there.
Later Ramayan traditions say that if Ram’s wife has been abducted and you don’t even know where she is how can Ram just wait for four months just because rain is there? Four months is a long time. But actually in those days the rains were very heavy and at that particular time because Vali was Indra’s son so Indra, it was as if he took his anger because Vali had just been killed so because of Vali’s death Indra showered down with unusually strong rains and just couldn’t move during that time. So they had to wait for four months.
Now during this time Sugriva had also been a king. He was not exactly a king. He was a prince.
But he was living in royal comfort and luxury and suddenly he lost everything. Happened many years ago. And he had to live in a forest, in a cave practically constantly worrying about his life itself.
And then when he suddenly came back and he had so much royal luxury and comfort and enjoyment that he lost himself in revelry. And as he lost himself in revelry he forgot about his promise, about his obligation to Ram. And then by the time the four months got over Ram was waiting and there was no sign of Sugriva coming no sign of Sugriva doing anything.
And then Ram told Lakshman Sugriva, it seems he has forgotten his promise to us. We did our part for him but he is not doing his part. Now during this stay in the exile Ram’s agony was constantly there at not knowing the fate of Sita.
But Lakshmana was like a volcano. He was throughout very angry. He was first of all angry that the injustice against Ram was being sent to the forest itself.
And in the forest now this had happened. So he just burst out. He said, that ungrateful wretch.
He said, I will go and punish him. Ram said, cool down, cool down. He says, go and first find out what has happened.
And then when he went there actually he saw that Sugriva was lost in rebellion. But when he started chastising Sugriva, Sugriva came to his senses. Not only came to his senses but he also immediately deployed force.
Actually what happened before that Tara had warned him. Hanuman also warned him. And he had started sending messengers to call Vanaras from various parts of the world.
But while those messengers, while those Vanaras were coming that also took some time. During that time again he lost himself. So because he was surrounded by so much temptation.
And then when he told that actually the Vanaras are coming and then as soon as the Vanaras came, he took charge competently. And afterwards he was the primary commander of the Vanaras. The king, as the king.
And when Lakshmana heard about what all arrangements have been done and then they asked Ram to come and then he saw all the Vanaras were there and Sugriva very competently ordered the Vanara leaders to go in different directions. So after that when Sugriva redeemed himself, nowhere in the Ramayana is any aspersion caused on Sugriva. That you forgot your duty.
It was a lapse, in one sense it was a serious lapse. Because if two sides have made an agreement, if one side does the part, the other side also has to do their part. He forgot it.
But in this case he was genuinely remorseful. I just forgot myself. But he was alert.
In fact, later the test came when Ravana using his typical demoniac intelligence, he tried to create a split in Ram’s forces. And he told he sent a message to Sugriva saying that I had an agreement with Vali. So he says similarly we can continue our agreement now that you are the king.
He says I have done no wrong to you. And we can be friends. We are geographically also close to each other.
So we can be friends. Why do you want to fight against me? He offered him a pact on very favourable terms. Now he was tempted.
But at this point he was purposeful. Sugriva was purposeful. Sugriva was resolved.
And he flatly and furiously rejected the temptation. He stayed fixed in his service. So at that point he fell to temptation not because he was irresponsible.
Not because he was ungrateful. Not because he was insincere. But just because circumstance overwhelmed him.
So sometimes we may also find that in a particular relationship someone may act wrongly. But if their overall disposition is good. If overall they are basically a good character and there is a lapse.
Even if there is a serious lapse we should not hold it lifelong against them. Because it can be somebody has done something wrong 10 years ago and then after 10 years we keep beating them. You did like that.
You did like that. You did like that. So if somebody has done something wrong and they genuinely regret it then just forget it.
So forget and forgive both. This is with respect to if they are repentant. Now another thing is sometimes people do something wrong but they are not even aware that they did something wrong.
Am I audible behind? So they may not even be aware that we did something wrong. Suppose somebody comes and says I forgive you. Thank you very much.
What for? So if I tell someone I forgive you it sounds very super serious. You think that I deserve forgiveness? What have I done wrong actually? Sometimes people may not even be aware that something wrong has been done. So at that time we need to communicate.
A big problem comes in life because people talk about each other instead of talking with each other. That means A feels like B. Why did B do like that? In a calm non-judgemental way ask B what happened. But instead of A asking B they go and talk with C. He didn’t like that.
They do like that only. And then both of them gossip and what is a small spark becomes a big fire. So basically this is what happened with Kaikeyi.
Kaikeyi she actually loved Ram and when first Mantara came and told her that Ram is going to be appointed as the prince regent and then coronated as the king. Kaikeyi was very happy. Kaikeyi actually took out her jewel garland and said this is the best news you have ever given me.
And Mantara took it and flung it on the ground. You foolish lady! Although you were born in the Kshatriya dynasty you don’t understand the ways of kings. And she said what happened? Why are you speaking like this? Actually Ram is the eldest son.
He is meant to become the king. But if Ram becomes the king what will happen? His mother will get the privileged position and you will be reduced to a maidservant. Now Mantara did not speak this.
She said I will be reduced to a maidservant of a maidservant. She had her own selfish agenda. But she basically said I have seen how Ram and Bharata are so friendly with each other.
Ram treats me like his own mother. And Kaushalya has also been kind to me. So they had very amicable relationships.
But then Kaikeyi the seed of doubt was planted in her heart by Mantara. If everything is so up and straight forward why the haste in this coronation? Why is this being done without even Bharata’s presence? Why not wait for Bharata to come back? This is all a conspiracy to sideline Bharata and to sideline you. To marginalise all of you.
Now at this point this was a valid question. If there is a family ceremony then the whole family should be there. So this was a valid question and this is where Kaikeyi should have gone and asked Dashrath.
What is the urgency? But instead of asking him she fell into the web of lies that was spun by Mantara. So actually speaking Dashrath Maharaj had got a realisation that old age is coming, he had seen some inauspicious signs he had got some inauspicious omens in dreams and astrologers had told that now there is inauspiciousness coming in your life so whatever auspiciousness you want to do, you do it as soon as possible. And it was based on those omens and based on the guidance of the priests that he felt that this was a very auspicious thing which he wanted to do to have Ram coronated, let us do it as soon as possible.
Now if she had just gone and asked him the whole trauma the whole agony, the whole heartbreak of Ram having to go to the forest, of Dashrath losing his heart and losing his life thereafter and the whole of Ayodhya sinking into an ocean of lamentation, all of that could have been avoided. So why didn’t it happen? Instead of talking with others we talk about others. If we have a relationship with someone, just go and talk you know you did like this, I felt very hurt by that.
Now Kaikeyi, the question is, when such a big ceremony is happening why should Bharat not be there, why can’t we wait? It is a valid question she could have asked and Dashrath had explained they could have come to some agreement. At least Kaikeyi’s doubt could have been allayed and there is nothing against me. So often we avoid talking with people because we fear that that may make things worse.
It is possible it may make things worse but many times not talking makes things even worse because there is a relationship between say A and B and A has some doubt about B at that time when A talks with C C has their own dynamic of relationship with A and with B and then they are going to tell everything from their perspective so often things become more complicated when too many people come in so just non-judgemental, respectful frank way, we clarify and by clarification but clarification also has to be done in a very non-judgemental way not that you are a liar, you are a cheater you are this, you are that then that itself puts them on the defensive and afterwards things become worse but this is what has happened and I felt very hurt by this why did this happen, why did you act like that? simply ask like that, don’t say you are a insensitive person you always act like this quite often there is an action and there is a motivation there is action and there is motivation now we can only see people’s actions and based on our opinions of those people we assume their motivations there is action and there is a motivation for action, every action has some motivation but we can’t know other’s motivations and based on the kind of opinion we have of them so suppose if I think somebody is a very lazy person very irresponsible person if I see them sleeping for a long time in the day he is a lazy bum if there is someone I like and I see them sleeping, he must be very tired it is the same action but based on our opinion we attribute an entirely different motivation for the action psychologists call this an attribution error attribution error means that we see actions and we ascribe motivations to those actions and those motivations can be often very wrong they may be completely wrong so it is best certain actions might be done but rather than asking 100 people, just go and ask them don’t tell them that this is why you did it just ask them, why is this happening this can go from very small small things to very big things once when I was in Radha Gopinath temple there was a film programme, festival after that I came for prasad 8-10 years ago this happened I had come a little late, so most of the prasad was over there was sweet in the bucket, the sweet was over so then I sat down, the prasad was there then I saw one senior devotee, another brahmachari he was sitting there, I could see in his plate there was sweet, it was almost over and then he was asking people, is there any sweet I started becoming, he already had one handpick he was asking everyone again and one person he asked, they said no problem, there is no sweet and another person he asked, is there any sweet is there any sweet now, because he was such a senior person and he was asking everyone, so it was becoming like a spectacle and finally some devotees, when you have met a devotee serve prasad, at that time when the prasad is getting over, they make their plates and keep so one devotee brought sweet from his own plate he started giving, I thought what is this this is the height of lack of culture and then as they were putting the sweet in his plate he says, no, not for me give it to him, and he pointed towards me he was asking for sweet for me, not for him and I just realised that if actually that devotee, that younger devotee had not brought sweet from his plate, I would never have come to know why he is asking that sweet normally if somebody asks for sweet, we think it is for themselves so there is action and there is attribution of motivation and that motivation may not be there at all so if somebody has done something which we find odd something which has hurt us this is not exactly an example for forgiveness, this is an example for attribution error but the same principle applies to forgiveness also somebody may have done something which may have hurt us but they have had no intention of hurting us at all, so clarify and then we understand their circumstances and in their circumstances they act in particular ways for particular reasons and then the whole thing can be resolved or sometimes they understand, I did not realise you would be hurt by it and they may apologise, they may ask for forgiveness and things get resolved at that time so do not assume, we should not assume that people are malicious just because they have done something which hurts us that is the second situation the third situation is where people they have done something wrong and then they apologise but we are not sure whether their apology is sincere or not whether they are just doing it for the sake of apologising so that they can continue doing the same thing again and in that case we also have to be careful and for dealing in such a situation we need to differentiate between forgiveness and trust usually we think when we forgive someone that means we trust them but forgiving and trusting are two separate things forgiveness is for the past trust is for the future so for whatever wrong people may have done we forgive them for that, forgiveness is important that is for our own emotional health, otherwise we hold resentment as I explained, that will hurt us but trusting is something different and whether forgiveness can be given but trust has to be earned trust has to be earned by the other people by behaving in a trustworthy way in the Bhagavatam, the 10th canto it is described how Kamsa when he heard that Devaki’s Ashtam Garbha the 8th child will be his death so he immediately imprisoned Devaki and Vasudev and he killed their first 7 children and the 8th child it turned out to be Devi and just disappeared into the sky at that time Kamsa was bewildered sorry, not the 8th child, the 7th child the 7th child the 8th child the 7th child basically it appeared as a miscarriage the 8th child, what happened was Nanda Maharaj interchanged he took Krishna to Vrindavan and then they brought back a girl from Vrindavan and then this girl turned out to be Devi so when she disappeared into the sky Kamsa was alarmed and what was Kamsa’s conclusion actually Devi told him that the person who is going to kill you has already gone elsewhere but he was so amazed by what had happened so intrigued that he thought in his own self congratulatory way that actually I killed so many people, I killed these children 7 children I killed and the 8th child turned out to be a girl so he said I was so foolish what was my foolishness he said, even the gods are not trustworthy the Akashvani was false I took the Akashvani so seriously and I killed 7 of my own nephews so actually after that that’s why he felt I had done something wrong and he went and begged for forgiveness from Vasudev and Devaki and then he actually in order to overcoat the ghastliness of what he has done he gave a lecture on philosophy he told them actually everyone is moved by their past karma so although I killed your children but actually it was their own karma by which they had to die this is a very astonishing rationalisation if everything happens by karma just when the Akashvani came and he is going to die he could have said everything happens by karma I am going to die by my karma why did he try to stop it at that time see what happens by past karma that is not in our control but how we act that is in our control so past karma leads to destiny and actually Vitrashtra also ties into the same reasoning he says in the Mahabharata and Vidura tells him stop Duryodhana otherwise Duryodhana’s obstinacy will cause a war which will destroy the whole Kuru dynasty so at that time Vitrashtra tries to rationalise similarly and Vitrashtra says that if it is the will of almighty destiny that our dynasty be destroyed then who am I a tiny mortal to stop the will of almighty destiny at that time Vidura cuts through his illusions and Vidura says destiny determines the consequences of our actions not our actions themselves destiny determines the consequences of our actions if a student doesn’t study at all and says by destiny I was meant to fail destiny determines the consequences of our actions not our actions themselves our actions are in our hands sometimes even after acting rightly still the result may not come that you can attribute to destiny but our not doing the action itself if we attribute to destiny that is a complete misunderstanding about destiny that is a rationalisation we are rationalising the spelling of rationalise is r-a-t-i-o-n-a-l-l-i-e-s rational lies rational lies so we are actually lying to ourselves by giving this sort of false arguments so essentially here this is a whole different philosophical concept of destiny that I am not going to write now but our main point of discussion is that Kamsa asked for forgiveness and he tried to cover up the ghastliness of his wrongdoing by saying that it was all destiny now interestingly over there Vasudev and Kamsa Vasudev and Devaki forgave him but Vasudev he forgave Kamsa but he did not trust Kamsa how do we know he did not trust Kamsa he did not tell him oh actually my son is there in Vrindavan immediately Kamsa who knows he would have revealed his true colours and he did reveal eventually he went back afterwards he begged forgiveness seemed to be very penitent but after that when he went back to his associates they said actually these Devatas are very cunning maybe your son is still alive maybe Vasudev’s son is still alive and then he started making conspiracies to try to have Vrindavan exalted, Vrindavan destroyed along with Krishna so the point is here Vasudev and Devaki did not hold any grudges against Kamsa they forgave him in the sense that ok he asked for forgiveness end it over there but still they did not trust him see somebody has done something wrong and if they ask for forgiveness we need to create a safe zone where we don’t hold animosity for them but we don’t immediately bring them in our internal circles because the closer we bring someone the greater power we give them to hurt us again so that closeness is something which the trust for this, the trustworthiness is something which they have to earn by their actions and so in this case if somebody has hurt us terribly and then right now we cannot be sure whether they have changed their ways or not so create a don’t hold resentment but at the same time don’t trust them trust is something which has to be earned gradually and sometimes they may redeem themselves sometimes they may like Sugrivahe he elevated himself to the higher level he actually showed that he was reformed and Ram fully trusted him afterwards whereas Kamsa later on when the fight happened he revealed that he was not at all trustworthy when eventually he started killing Krishna attempting to kill Krishna he revealed that he was not at all trustworthy so Vasudev was not telling him at that time that particular detail was very important so forgiveness is not just to be forgiving doesn’t mean that we let ourselves be hurt again and again that is not the meaning of forgiveness forgiveness essentially means that we don’t make things bigger than what they are that is a problem, we don’t make it bigger than what it is so we can make it bigger in two ways one is that we hold resentment in our heart that hurts us more and the second is that we become very judgemental and we label others in a particular way and we tell everyone he did like this, she did like that and that way we create problems for ourselves we create problems for them so forgiveness basically means it is not imagining that there is no problem at all we can’t say if something has hurt us to say it doesn’t matter it is also not being true, it does matter, it has hurt us so if there is a problem we acknowledge the problem is there but we don’t make the problem bigger than what it needs to be by labelling people, by backbiting behind people by being resentful we make the problem bigger than what it is but if the problem is there and we deny the problem that only leads to our being hurt more so we try to forgiveness is a means by which we see things in perspective and especially when there are close relationships in close relationships generally people are not people are not evil people are not badly motivated they may act badly but they are not badly motivated most of the situations in which we are expected to we are asked to forgive those are situations where there will be family members, there will be devotees there will be relatives, there will be friends so it is usually an overall close relationship in which sometimes some terrible wrong things happen so we have to see the broader picture and then act appropriately so when we say that others if they have done something wrong, they are the instrument of our karma yes, they are the instrument of our karma but at the same time they had no intention of being an instrument of our karma they did it because of their own selfish motivation or their insensitivity or their carelessness or whatever so if they are evil, they get away with it they may do it again and again and not only will we be hurt again others may also be hurt so that is why balancing the principle of forgiveness is the principle of justice balancing the principle of forgiveness is the principle of justice so I will conclude with one point here I am coming from Australia, there I gave a seminar on beware of the temptation to punish the temptation to punish somebody has done something wrong and if somebody has given me one slap I give 100 slaps in return and sometimes because I may feel you have done something wrong so I am going to hit back at you and hit back at you much harder that is wrong, that is the whole story in itself but I will summarise and I will tell the point and then we can have question answers so I gave the example of Ashwathama Ashwathama, he was furious at the Pandavas because he felt that they had killed Drona unfairly he naturally loved his father and actually speaking the Pandavas had not killed Drona unfairly Yudhishthira had spoken a lie but the purpose of the lie was not to kill Drona the purpose of the lie was to get Drona to put down his weapons and then they were planning to arrest Drona and they will have Drona honourably kept in house arrest till the war goes on and then they were planning to release him their plan was not to kill Drona but at that time when Drona put down his bow Dhrishtadyumna in a rush of blood rushed forward and actually Arjuna, Yudhishthira they all shouted to Dhrishtadyumna Dhrishtadyumna just rushed forward and killed Drona so that action was brutal and that was censured even by Arjuna now naturally because Drona had been killed unfairly Ashwathama had a right to be angry and Ashwathama wanted to take revenge and he did take revenge by killing Dhrishtadyumna which was fine but even if there is punishment, punishment has to be proportionate what did Dhrishtadyumna do? what did Ashwathama do? he did not kill Dhrishtadyumna he killed the Pandavas five times this is ghastly, this is like terrorists terror is basically like Kshatriyas Kshatriya principle is that you attack an enemy when the enemy is equal to you the enemy is equipped to fight and the enemy is alert to fight terrorists do exactly the opposite they attack civilians who have no weapons and who are not at all alert so it is the antithesis of actual Kshatriya principles that’s what Ashwathama did now to kill soldiers who are sleeping to kill Pandavas sons who are sleeping actually Pandavas sons are like his nephews for uncle to kill his nephews itself is bad but to kill them when they are sleeping completely unalert, completely unequipped is horrible and he did not just kill the Pandavas sons he actually killed all the remaining soldiers in the army so here he had cause to be angry and he had reason to punish but he should have stopped Dhrishtadyumna he should not have disproportionately killed everyone now later on when Arjuna captured Ashwathama Arjuna faced the same temptation to punish you killed my sons, I will kill you he could have been just as ruthless, as merciless and he would have been justified but he let his actions be guided by dharma not simply by impulse or anger and then he decided Bhagavatam itself talks about this in the 7th chapter, 1st canto and he decided that because he is a Brahmana because his mother does not have any of his sons because he is the son of our guru therefore he decided that I will not kill him this empowers him cuts off his crown and cuts off his hair so that he loses his power by that and then he lets him go the point is here he does not succumb to the temptation to punish so temptation to punish can actually come from a sense of righteousness you did wrong and I am right and you deserve to be punished so in this situation sometimes forgiveness is not what is required punishment is what is required but when the same uncontrolled emotions that may make us unforgiving they can also make us become excessively harsh so actually just as the uncontrolled emotions can make us unforgiving, the uncontrolled emotions can make us also unjust justice means there has to be proportionate punishment if there is disproportionate punishment that is not justice, that is atrocity so say if somebody is killed in a fight between two armies say one villager has been killed then that party comes and destroys the whole village where hundreds of people die that is atrocious so there is punishment which is sometimes required but that also has to be proportionate and for justice to be administered so sometimes justice and forgiveness may seem opposite because in justice we are punishing in forgiveness we are just letting people go but actually in justice and in forgiveness for both of them to occur we need self control we need a calm mind we need a clear intelligence if our mind is uncontrolled not only can we not forgive but we cannot also be just in some cases sometimes some disciplining is required for people but that disciplining also has to be proportionate and that is why we can hear all this analysis of how who acted in what situation and it is important to at least know the principles but along with knowing the principles in this situation act like this in this situation act like this this can go wrong this can go wrong but if suppose I go to a doctor and tell him I am feeling very weak the doctor says you have got anaemia go now no I have got anaemia what should I do give me a prescription we don’t go to a doctor just for diagnosis we go for a prescription when the doctor gives a prescription then we take the prescription and the anaemia is healed similarly all the analysis that we are doing right now is the diagnosis the prescription actually is purification the prescription is the practise of bhakti yoga when we chant Hare Krishna attentively when we study scripture properly when we worship the deities then that raises our consciousness that brings us to sattva guna and once we come to sattva guna then we can see things in perspective that in sattva guna all the senses senses are illumined with knowledge this is why Krishna uses metaphors metaphor is an example which is meant to convey sometimes and metaphors are usually they are characterised more by artistry than accuracy what does this verse mean senses are illumined with knowledge does that mean that a person in sattva guna from their eyes light comes out no it is illumination Krishna does not actually use the word knowledge Prabhupada uses the word knowledge in his translation he simply says the senses are illumined senses are illumined means what suppose this whole room is dark and there is a door over here but if everything is dark I will not know where the door is I will not know who is coming in who is going out if the person is coming in unfamiliar stranger we may not let them in if it is a friend we may let them in so if there is darkness we cannot know whom to let in and whom to not let in but if there is light then we can say this should not come in this can come in like that so when our senses are illumined that means we understand what to let inside our senses and what to let outside our senses what to speak what not to speak what to focus on what to neglect this comes by sattva guna now the problem happens suppose the doctor does not give the diagnosis and just gives the prescription doctor says take this medicine take this medicine why should I take it so most often when people practise bhakti simply out of tradition you should chant why that is what our family has always done then when people do not understand the diagnosis then they do not see the value of the prescription that is why we need to study the philosophy then we need to connect the philosophy with the practise then we need to connect the philosophy with the practise whereas the philosophy gives the diagnosis this is the problem and bhakti gives us the inner strength by which we can make the right decisions so ultimately in the specific situation that we are in when to forgive we are in which situation how we should act in that situation that is something which cannot be told by anyone else we have senior devotees whom we can take guidance from that is fine but still ultimately the decision has to be made by us and that is what Prabhupada writes in his lecture of instruction he says that if we practise bhakti and come to the mode of goodness then how to advance further will be revealed from within that is Krishna says in 10.10 if you practise bhakti then I will give you the intelligence by which you can come to me so that way by practising bhakti intelligently we will have the intelligence about how to forgive or what to do in practical situations and that is why we should not just I think my life has so many problems what is the use of chanting Hare Krishna chanting Hare Krishna will give us the intelligence by which we can deal with the various problems in our life and in that sense Prabhupada asks what is the best prayer that we can offer to Krishna Prabhupada said you should pray to Krishna give me the strength to serve you whatever be the situation I am in give me the strength to serve you still we are servants how should I serve in this situation I don’t know please give me the strength please give me the intelligence and then if we keep that focus then we will ourselves be guided from within how to take things forward so I will summarise I talked about the theme of forgiveness and how it is practical in our life so I discussed that forgiveness is firstly it means in terms of emotion it is for our own mental well-being resentment is like holding a cone in our heart and hand to hurt others but it hurts us more then in terms of practical implementation in this connection we discussed how Ram asked Bhishan to not hold any grudges against Rama but to in an honourable way do the last rites for him then we discussed four broad situations one is somebody has done something wrong and they beg forgiveness for that wrong they are truly repentant then to hold grudges is entirely undesirable entirely unwarranted in that we discussed the example of Sugriva forgetting and then when he remembered and he reinstated himself nobody held casting aspersions against him thereafter the second situation is if somebody has done something which has hurt us but they may not be aware of it also so we should clarify don’t talk about others, talk with others so you should just clarify with the truth why is this coronation being performed before Bharat comes back so the whole misunderstanding could have been avoided and in this connection we also discussed we can see people’s actions only and then we assume certain motivations for their actions and those assumptions are based on our preconceptions about those people so rather than assuming the motivation we can clarify and clarify in a non-judgemental way don’t make a judgement rather tell the action and tell how it hurts us and then they will clarify the third situation is they beg forgiveness but we don’t know whether they are sincere or not so in that case there is a differentiation between forgiveness and trusting we should always forgive, forgiveness is for the past misdeeds that they have done but trusting is something which we can only do when they have earned the trust by proper behaviour and for that the example was Kamsa and Vasudev Devki so Vasudev forgave Kamsa but he did not trust him and tell him where Krishna is in that connection we discussed that destiny determines the consequences of our actions not our actions themselves so that is the rationalisation which Kamsa tried to use and also Dhritarashtra also tried to use to try to excuse their own atrocious activities and lastly we discussed about there are situations when people have done the wrong and they have no remorse at that time between the second and third situation if somebody is in the third situation we don’t know then we may have to create a safe distance so that they don’t hurt us more sometimes people delight in doing the wrong at that time we may have to create a further distance and sometimes as a matter of social principle justice is also required otherwise people may keep doing the same thing wrong again and again and hurting others but even for justice to be done it has to be proportionate and when somebody has hurt us and we are seeking justice at that time also there is a temptation to punish that means to actually respond in a disproportionate way and we saw how Ashwathama succumbed to that and how Arjuna resisted that temptation to punish and although forgiveness and justice may seem to be opposite but actually both of them require the same maturity same self-control same broad intelligence without that we can neither forgive nor can we actually seek justice in a proportionate way and that cultivation of sattva guna happens through the practise of bhakti yoga so the analysis which we do about what is wrong and what is the right course of action and bhakti yoga is the prescription diagnosis alone without a prescription is not of much use similarly prescription alone without a diagnosis you may not feel inspired to take the prescription so like that we have practical problems in our life and we try to understand the underlying principles that are behind those problems and we also connect those principles with our daily spiritual practises then we will feel inspired to practise bhakti wholeheartedly and by practising bhakti wholeheartedly when we come to goodness then our senses become illumined at least we know what to do and what not to do and then Krishna will guide us from within about in what specific situations how we should act in dealing with the situation that we face in our life thank you very much are there any questions, comments thank you very much for the thought there is a question described about a situation where we need to do justice in that situation generally we see there is clarification required there is forgiveness but sometimes we also have another emotion called guilt that comes into the play because we are not that mature to do the justice or to balance between justice so sometimes guilt comes in so these four emotions plus our own maturity level sometimes is not at that level but we need to do so how does one take care of all these are you talking about guilt about our own wrong doing or guilt about what guilt about telling someone that this is wrong plus at the same time clarifying and doing the justice sometimes if we are not emotionally mature enough then we may hesitate to tell others that we have been hurt tell others that they have done something wrong and even to actually administer justice we may feel hesitant, we may feel guilty about it actually that is not guilt guilt is more of when we have done something wrong and we feel bad about doing something wrong but this is more of we could call reticence reticence means hesitation to express oneself it may be sensitivity, it can be hypersensitivity also sometimes we don’t want to hurt others and that’s why we endure our own hurts and now yes sometimes in relationships we do have to learn to tolerate but then there is no need to unnecessarily set ourselves up for hurt, if something is hurting us and we should communicate if we have difficulty in communicating it is often good that when things are at a boiling point that time don’t speak anything because that is the time when we speak also we don’t have control over our emotions and we may make things worse so at that time just take a step back because even if we are emotionally mature still circumstances in life are such that they can just throw us off our emotional balance so in the heat of the moment it is good not to act just calm down, let some time pass I try to follow a policy that if I am angry with someone I usually feel that that I can communicate better by writing so I write an email to them and then I make sure that for at least 24 hours I don’t send the email, I write it and keep it in my draft now what happens if I don’t write it all these emotions are festering within me it’s like a pressure cooker that is increasing more and more it needs a release but there are certain emotions which I need to express but that doesn’t mean they need to hear those emotions so there has to be a vent in between and I have found that this sort of thing helps once you get those emotions out, calm down ourselves and then we let a day pass and then we look at it here I am overreacting here maybe there could be some other factor this is a valid point, I think I can clarify this so once we have got the emotions out then we calm down then we can ourselves evaluate our feelings and then sometimes I just delete the whole mail and never send it sometimes I send the edited part of the mail on a few occasions, very few occasions because when we are angry we often express ourselves when we are angry we may feel that I am motivated by justice I want the right thing to happen but anger blinds us and when we are angry we may start off wanting the right thing but by the time the emotion of anger takes over our focus shifts on not on release on curing the hurt that we have had our whole focus shifts to hurting others you did this, you did this, you like that you like that, you like that so one devotee told me that once he was in an authoritative position and he just got very angry with some devotee and that devotee, he had come over I am coming to meet a single devotee so he had kept his mobile recording on and after that he brought this recording and he said when I heard what I had spoken I was shocked, how could I have spoken such things so that junior devotee had no intention of catching him there that way, but still he says that when we are angry, anger makes us strangers to ourselves like sometimes some persons I can’t recognise you, who is this I know who you are but you are not behaving like that person so its anger is almost like a ghost possesses us and makes us speak and act in ways which are very out of characteristic with who we are that’s why when we are driven by very strong emotions at that time we shouldn’t immediately take an action just calm down, let some time pass and when I said don’t talk about others that does not mean that we shouldn’t talk at all if we have some very close devotee who is not going to indulge in backbiting, who is not going to indulge in gossiping just taking a third person’s perspective can help but basically let time pass not long amount of time because then what we try to bury inside that will come out in ugly forms but don’t just let it vent out immediately and we can find out means by which we can express ourselves properly some devotees may find that writing things down and giving a letter to someone that might help meeting, talking one to one helps so we have to find out what is the best way but especially if you are going to talk about topics which are emotionally charged we should have proper time for that it’s not that just before we are going to office we just blast out at a family member and then when they are about to clarify I have to go to office whenever we express we have to express in a way that leads to some resolution of the situation and we give adequate time for resolving the situation also so basically we may not have sattva guna immediately but we can develop sattva guna by creating basically patience don’t express immediately calm down, evaluate and then act and we may not have emotional maturity but just by doing this process itself we will develop emotional maturity by trying to calm down, by trying not to express ourselves immediately by that we develop emotional maturity any other questions? yes in this whether this sattva guna sensitive towards others robust enough to not be affected by basically being robust but sensitive to others ok yeah so does sattva guna make us sensitive to other emotions and also at the same time robust in not being affected by small things actually we cannot have sensitivity half way if we can sense others emotions that means we are also emotionally tuned so we will also be affected but when we see the big picture then we don’t take the small things seriously that means it’s not that if somebody speaks hurtingly to an advanced devotee is it that because they are advanced they don’t feel any hurt no, they also feel hurt but because they are seen in the bigness of things yes, I have gone through many lifetimes many times people have hurt people and said this has come, this will go when we see the big picture we don’t take that thing very seriously but when we don’t see the big picture then the small thing becomes very serious so it’s not that just because somebody is advanced that does not mean that they will not be hurt by situations they also have emotions and in fact in sattva guna as one becomes more sensitive one can actually feel emotions more strongly that’s why what is that Hindi saying so for a wise people you don’t have to actually beat them in the head just gentle reproach also is enough they understand oh I did something wrong so as we come to sattva guna we become more sensitive to other sufferings and we also become sensitive when someone else speaks strongly or hurts us but by seeing the big picture we don’t take the small thing very seriously so if somebody justizes me if some senior devotee justizes me oh I think if I am in rajoguna or taboguna if I am in rajoguna I will try to hit back at them if I am in taboguna I think what is this nobody cares for me, I do so many things and you are just chastising me nobody cares for me, nobody loves me what happens is instead of humility we go into self-pity and feeling sorry for ourselves is actually simply an attack of the ego feeling sorry for ourselves is simply an attack of the ego so when somebody chastises me rather than trying to understand what I did wrong, what I can do right I just start making a judgement that nobody loves me, nobody cares for me and that way we hurt ourselves far more but if somebody chastises us also and we will naturally feel hurt but if we see from the broader picture yes I have a relationship with Krishna, I have a relationship with these devotees and life is a long thing the mind has a tendency to eternalise the present eternalise the present means the problem that I have right now the mind makes me imagine this is a problem I have to live with lifelong but nothing is eternal in one sense we talk about how nothing is eternal to become detached from worldly pleasures why are we pursuing this, nothing is eternal, everything is temporary but nothing is eternal also works positively for us because no problem is also eternal but if the problem is there we think that if somebody is angry with me how will I go on but no it is temporary so in sattva guna we can see the temporary to be temporary if I am told to carry 5 kg weight, I can carry it but if I am told to carry from here till the car I can do that but if while picking it up I think for the rest of my life I have to carry this 5 kg then I will be reluctant to lift it up for one step even taking a few steps will become too much of a burden so like that when we face problems the mind imagines this problem will be there forever and that way it crushes us but in sattva guna the 5 kg weight is a weight no doubt so like that a problem is a problem, a hurting word is a hurting word but we don’t take it out of proportion because when we see the big picture when we see the internality of our existence then we keep the temporary as small knowing that it is temporary does that answer your question? yes we talked about attribution error so this is also a kind of question of apparatus we think that it is kind of fault finding but this happens every day so if we immediately realise it and ask for forgiveness will it still count? so if we commit attribution error and we realise it and ask for forgiveness does it still count as vaishnavapra? first thing is we should not be paranoid about vaishnavapra it is not that we should think devote relationships I am going to offend this person it is not that we have to be fearful constantly while in the routine conduct of life there will be misunderstandings occasionally we may hurt each other also just like if we are in a crowded place our elbow may hit someone that is very different from we turning and slapping them in the face the two are very different things so this real serious vaishnavapra is when we are envious of a vaishnava and we deliberately do something to pull them down we deliberately do something to denigrate them that is a serious vaishnavapra but in the routine conduct of life there can be misunderstandings, there can be problems, there can be hurts as soon as we understand we seek forgiveness this is what I was thinking, this is what happened please forgive me if I hurt you we don’t have to get into too much worry about vaishnavapra so certainly we can try to become more and more sensitive unintentionally also we don’t hurt others but if something happens unintentionally something happens accidentally we shouldn’t think that Krishna is like a fault finding god wait a day you committed vaishnavapra and suffer now it is not like that Krishna cares for us and Krishna wants to elevate us so Krishna is a coach, he is not a critic now coach is aware of the faults of the athlete but the focus is on the potential of the athlete and the coach wants to bring out the potential more and more similarly Krishna also focusses on our potential and if we commit some mistakes Krishna will do the needful to help us get over the mistakes but we shouldn’t be paranoid and as soon as we become aware we correct ourselves Roji in the beginning of the lecture you were saying attachments to a particular thing desensitise us from the other things so in the day to day context like suppose we are practising bhakti yoga and there are so many other things happening in the society like protecting cows and then other faith people they are destroying the faith so how much you have to focus on how to handle these things when you are practising bhakti attachment to one thing he says I said it desensitises us to other things so then sometimes as devotees we think that we should focus simply on practising bhakti but there are so many things which are going on in society there is cow protection, intolerance among religions there is violence, there are so many issues in society so how much should we be involved in them or is it that if we become desensitised to them is that positive or is that negative so here this is a matter of individual inspiration there is broadly the central activity of bhakti which we practise as sadhakas but along with that while practising bhakti each of us is individual and how we feel inspired to practise bhakti that will vary from person to person so usually we have to focus we have to what in military terms it is called choose your battles army cannot fight 100 places at the same time others will go and fight in that place so like that there are many things which are wrong in society from the point of view of spiritual culture also there are 100 things wrong million things wrong but we have to see what we are inspired to do and what we are equipped to do and we focus on that some devotees may be inspired for goseva and that is very good but that does not mean everyone has to do goseva and just because somebody is not doing goseva then they are not doing anything that is within bhakti there can be different definitions of success so for example somebody is doing book distribution and I have distributed so many books that is a definition of success but somebody else may be doing preaching and inspiring people to understand the philosophy and become devotees of Krishna that is also another definition of success somebody else may be focussing on building a temple and their primary purpose is raising funds and building a beautiful temple for Krishna and that is also a definition of success somebody may work a little further out somebody may be doing food for life somebody may be networking with a broader faith community and somebody may be starting hospitals with a devotional inspiration somebody else may be trying to reform the educational system or offer an alternative model of educational system say either through gurukuls or within the mainstream itself penetrating so now here all these are ways in which we are doing our part in sharing Krishna’s message so these are different definitions of success and we need to recognise that bhakti accommodates various definitions so to think of one definition of success as the only definition of success that is fanaticism to think of one definition of success as the only definition of success I think we have to do book distribution and if you are not doing book distribution and you are deviating you are not faithful to Prabhupada, you are good for nothing, you are useless no, it is not like that book distribution is important but Prabhupada gave us so many other things to do also so if we feel inspired by doing something we should definitely do that and in general it is important to associate with like-minded devotees Rupa Goswami says in the Bhakta Samasindhu that we need that means like-minded devotee association so if I am doing say college preaching and I am associating with devotees and doing fundraising then if I associate only with them they will say actually what fundraising are you doing what is the use of what you are doing it will appear as if it is of no use so if you want to be encouraged you have to associate with those devotees who have similar definitions of success by the same time you should also appreciate other devotees who have other definitions of success so the amount of hard work that is required say college preaching requires one kind of hard work fundraising requires one kind of hard work book distribution requires another kind of hard work all services if we actually start doing them they require hard work and we can appreciate them first I talked about different definitions of success now another thing is that success itself can be in terms of increasing concentric circles that means we could say that all these are ultimately whether you are building temple, whether you are distributing books whether we are doing college preaching they are all meant to help people become devotees but even devotion is not just necessarily in terms of a particular standard when Srila Prabhupada was preaching in India he saw that most Indians were not ready to become serious devotees following revolutionary principles was more or less part of Indian culture but to come to the level of sadhana bhakti they were not ready so Prabhupada created a facility for them to stay connected with Krishna in the form of life membership so one inner circle is 16 round of initiated devotee but another much broader circle is become a life member where people feel some level of connection with Krishna and they are at that stage not ready to come to this circle but create a circle by which they are connected so like that there are many people who are inspired to do go-seva I am not talking about devotees outside there are many people who are inspired to do go-seva and if we network with them then we give them some way by which they are also getting connected with Krishna some people who are inspired to say so much conversion is happening and we need to stop the conversion we need to give some help to the villagers so that they don’t get converted that is also a mission if they feel inspired to do that that is also a broader circle so if that is what one is inspired to do one can and one should do that but it is not that anybody who is not doing that is negligent or irresponsible it is just that that is not what everyone needs to do we are all inspired in different ways and we all contribute to Krishna’s mission in different ways so if we start there are two different things there is desensitisation and there is detachment desensitisation means we are ourselves actively involved in activities that are hurting others but because of our attachment we don’t sense that Dhritarashtra was actually himself a part of the conspiracy to kill the Pandavas to burn them alive but he did not take care, he did not bother about that he did not feel any compunction also while doing that that is desensitisation but detachment means that we recognise that I am a finite being I am a limited being and there is only so much I can do so what I can do I will concentrate my energy and I will do that and other things I don’t know that Krishna is in control actually even what I am doing also Krishna is in control only but there is something which I can do in the service of Krishna so we should not be desensitised in terms of yes there are many terrible things happening in society and a devotee has a sensitive heart but we cannot just be thinking about things which we can’t do anything about that will just fill us with negativity so there is darkness so much darkness suppose suddenly the power supply goes off and the whole city is in darkness at that time what do we do we may take our phone and turn on the flashlight that flashlight is not going to illuminate the whole city but just because we can’t illuminate the whole city doesn’t mean that we have to stay in darkness and we illuminate our corner of the city and others will illuminate their corner of the city so like that there is a lot of darkness but if you just think oh so dark it’s so dark it’s so dark well do your part to remove the darkness so whatever we are inspired to whatever we are equipped to we do in Krishna’s service and other devotees will be inspired and equipped in other ways and they will act in their ways and in that way we all contribute in our own small or big ways to share the light of Krishna’s love the light of Krishna’s wisdom in different aspects of society does that answer your question? any other questions? the Matajis have any questions? if you want you can write on sheets also sometimes we give ideas of suggestions to some people which have worked for us but when we implement it does not work because we have invested too much time and implemented it so we get grant dollars so what should we ask for forgiveness because we know that it’s not ours it was working for us but for him it didn’t work so somebody has a problem and we share with them something that acts as a solution for us but when it doesn’t work for them they start being resentful of us so should we ask for forgiveness and what should we do in that situation yes the shoe that fits one person bites another person different people have different leg sizes so like that I remember this happened with me whenever I go in front of the deities I always recite some verses and by reciting the verses by meditating on the verses I think this is the same law manifested over here so I feel connected you can also memorise verses and you can pray to the deities after a few days he came back he told me time to recollect the words that causes me so much tension but whatever bhakti is there it goes away so whatever is a conducive spiritual stimuli for me may not be for them therefore there are principles and there are practises the principles are universal the practises are specific they are individual so while we are prescribing to people also we are telling something if we are in a position to guide others we should tell the principle but the practise that has to be something which has to be individually adapted so if we insist on certain specific practises only like some devotees they may chant 64 rounds that is very good but others they may find that 64 rounds it’s just that I can’t concentrate at all well others can serve in other ways it is not necessary that just chanting 64 rounds is good or not chanting 64 rounds is good it varies different people have different ways in which they can connect with Krishna so when we are guiding others and a very important principle is to invoke in them a sense of responsibility for their spiritual growth ultimately every individual’s spiritual growth is their own responsibility when they blame others for something which when we did work in their life it is as if they are holding us responsible for what has happened in their life and by guiding itself we have to be very clear it’s your life, it’s your choice I am as an aid but it’s up to you to do this Krishna also says I am God you follow me deliberate deeply and then you decide what you want to do so taking responsibility for one’s spiritual life also means that we have to evaluate what works in our life we have to ourselves find what is it that attracts us towards Krishna Rupa Goswami Bhaktira Samudra Siddhu calls this as Uddhipan Uddhipan means spiritual stimulus so that which stimulates our thoughts towards Krishna that which triggers devotional emotions within us what is the Uddhipan for me may be different from what is the Uddhipan for you so rather than telling that you just do this thing we can encourage people to take inventory of their heart and find out what is it by which they can connect with Krishna find out their Uddhipan and then by that they can connect with Krishna so we say somehow or other fix the mind on Krishna what does somehow or the other mean here somehow or the other means that the different people will be able to fix their mind on Krishna in different ways so we have to encourage people to find that we can also observe them, you can do this nicely you are good at this and we can try to encourage them accordingly but essentially it is every individual’s responsibility and yes if they felt that their time got wasted we can definitely seek forgiveness but we can also give a proper explanation this worked for me and that’s what I thought it will work if it is not working that’s fine, you can try what works for you and if you need any assistance from me I am there to assist we can ask for forgiveness because yes they had some faith, they had some trust because of which they came to us and when they asked something it didn’t work but it’s not that we have to dig ourselves into a hole for that it’s a practical process and the whole process of bhakti involves not just surrender to authority which is important but it also involves taking individual responsibility even when a patient goes to a doctor the patient has to follow the doctor’s prescription but at the same time the patient also has to observe oneself ultimately we all have to become our own doctors this works for me, this doesn’t work for me this is good for me, this is not good for me we of course take guidance from the spiritual master but we also have to cultivate individual responsibility does this answer your question? yes our ashram has done a lot of commentaries on our Shri Ashram and Puranas apply our Shri Ashrams in our practical life and the entire discussion was made for that out of the outer world which has one disconnection with the complete culture of Sanskriti they take this lesson and connect it with the Bihagan proving them as stories created just for deriving this lesson by somebody’s critical mind and they do not accept the existence of the God Ram himself and I am not talking about the people from the other faith it is our own people whose forefathers were actually following it and they have not realised it so how to present the existence of Lord Ram existence of Lord Krishna I believe we have a talk coming up on 17th of May we can share some of the events for that I have a similar question recently Dalai Lama has interviewed and he mentioned about the peace and he said that the peace in India tradition and culture it is much beyond the Naranda times it is much beyond 200 years and above so Indians are basically more compassionate so as Prabhu is saying in India like heritage people have lost all those traditions and values so how to imbibe those values if I come to the Hindu religion itself so how to imbibe those values and Buddhists are known as the peacemakers but they are also referring to the old traditions beyond their time so when we study the scriptures and we explain some practical lessons from them some people take that the scriptures are just for those lessons and they don’t take them as a historical reality they don’t accept the existence of Ram so how do we deal with that so now we have to decide which battle we are fighting when we cannot fight 100 battles at the same time so that means that for certain people if they are people of scientific disposition we start first with the rationale for the existence of God for the existence of soul and we take things systematically from there for other people who are already brought up in the culture and for them Ram’s historicity is not really an issue and for them they have already most of the time said you know the Ramayan but then they like to hear the Ram katha and if they get some moral lessons from that that is fine so Madhvacharya talks about how in his Brahma Sutra Bhashya he says that scripture can be understood at three levels he says this is literal ethical and metaphorical so literal means these are just the pastimes of their lord and hearing those pastimes itself purifies us ek ek kaksharam pumsa maha pata kanashanam it is said in the Ramayana stuti that one more letter can purify us just hear the pastime that is purifying the second is ethical ethical means we learn lessons about right and wrong from these pastimes so in the literal it is understanding that this actually happened I am just hearing what happened over there in the ethical we focus on the principles that we can learn from it and metaphorical means that it means that they symbolise something so just like we say that when Lakshman drew a Lakshman Rekha around Sita that represents the regularity principle the instructions that we get from Guru Swami Shastra as long as we are within them the Ravana of wicked desires cannot take us away these are symbolic and now what Madhavacharya says is that the metaphorical should not be at the expense of the literal Prabhupada often strongly spoke against the metaphorical because that was used against the literal as a substitute for the literal some people would say that Kurukshetra war did not take place only that actually it simply symbolises that Kurukshetra is the body it symbolises the battle between the lower and the higher desires but that symbolism is valid but that symbolism is not a substitute for the literal so different people may approach scripture in different ways and whatever way they approach we should kindle their interest and we can bring them closer so if somebody is approaching scripture for moral instruction at that time to try to bring in an argument about the historicity of scripture that may be irrelevant for most people and we also have to know where people are coming from say for example somebody is coming from a rational logical background for them to accept that Krishna lifted Govardhan hill or Ram built a bridge across Lanka across the ocean these are things which are going to take some time so if we demand that they approach scripture with an attitude of absolute faith and everything is literally historically true then we are making too much of a demand of their faith so one of the offences to the holy name is to instruct faithless people about the glories of the holy name now often we think of this in terms of these people are faithless they should not hear about the glories of the holy name but the other way is the responsibility of the teachers that they should not speak those things which people cannot be expected to have faith in it is our responsibility also that we don’t make people offensive by forcing them to believe in things which they can’t believe there is a conversation of Srila Prabhupada where one day one disciple asked that in the Bhagavatam it is said that Maharaja Ugrasen had some millions of bodyguards so some scholars when we tell the scholars that they had millions of bodyguards they ask how could they have that many bodyguards where were they staying, where were their toilets so now Prabhupada said that among all the thousands of verses in Bhagavatam was that the only thing you found to tell the scholars so Krishna is omnipotent and Krishna can do anything but that is not the forum to talk to people about that so we don’t have to necessarily bring forth controversial points of scripture and demand people to have faith in them so if they consider some things within scripture as exaggeration as poetic ornaments, scripture also has poetic ornaments it is, say Ramayana or Mahabharata they are not literal history in the sense of a linear historical account of things they are actually the whole idea of literal history as we understand it, it is a post-Newtonian western conception of history whether we look at, whether in Greek in Greece also if you see the way Homer was a famous historian Homer wrote some history of the ancient Greeks even Augustine wrote some history in the past, history was not a tool for factual for recording facts history was a tool for moral instruction that means what not that the historical facts were not there but that was not the primary purpose of history that’s why the primary focus was on what we can learn from history this is not to say that it was not historical but that was not the primary purpose of keeping historical records it was only after Newton when science started focussing on numbers and numbers became very important in the language of mathematics and science then history also started adopting a scientific approach that’s why facts started becoming more important if you look at the way history is kept today most of the study of history is actually without any moral lessons in it so then history simply becomes a record of the lives of dead successful people they were successful in some way and they died, what is the real learning through that so we cannot if somebody demands that we take the post-Newtonian standard of history and evaluate the itihasas through that it is not only the itihasas, no ancient scripture, even the bible will not stand as scrutiny what to speak of religious books even non-religious books like the books of Greek philosophers they will also not stand as scrutiny because it is a different way of looking at things that’s the first point so we can’t insist that scriptures are literal itihas at the same time when we talk about now within scripture there are certain things which are difficult for people to understand as I said that how Krishna could have lifted Govardhan somebody may ask how did Krishna if he lifted Govardhan on his little finger how did he find the centre of gravity of Govardhan he put his finger rightly at that point so that he could balance everything Krishna doesn’t have to find the centre of gravity because he is the source of gravity by his will by his will gravity acts and by his will if he wants he can suspend gravity but this is something which people will take time to understand so therefore if we are doing a cultural outreach or where the focus is more on giving moral instruction then focus on that if we are doing a more philosophical scientific kind of outreach then we shouldn’t introduce Krishna’s past tense first first understand the definition of God understand the position of God and then move forwards and then after understanding the position of God then we say how could he have done this he can do it, he is omnipotent and when we mix these two so then it becomes a problem now it is quite likely that things will get mixed because we can’t judge who is going to come where but in principle we shouldn’t hold people who can’t accept the historicity of some of Ram’s or Krishna’s activities they may say exaggeration we should not think automatically that they are envious or they are malicious, they are faithless no that is their level right now so it is our responsibility to present things in a way that their faith can be elevated now if we want to know about the past how can we know about it how can we be sure that something happened in the past broadly there are four ways one is that do we have some direct artefacts from that time some archaeological remains some artefacts which show that there was a person Ram and he ruled over here and this was his palace or this is what it is, that is one way the second way is books books if they describe those things and not only they describe those things they describe it in a not in a glorificatory way necessarily, in an objective way as far as possible the third is that are there any so the first is archaeological remains the second is more of circumstantial remains that means not exactly directly that event but the events associated with that event I will explain what I mean by this and the last is a sophisticated field is called archeoastronomy archeoastronomy means that say the Ramayana Mahabharata describes that there was an eclipse like this and there was a stars that formed like this so with archeoastronomy we can go back whenever this sort of star formation there so for example the Mahabharata says that there was an eclipse at this time and after that there was another eclipse at this time so within 13 days if two eclipses are occurring when did it happen in the past so there are mathematicians who have done that and they have found that it happened around 5000 years ago there is a documentary called Krishna fact or fiction Krishna history or myth rather it is there on YouTube, quite a good documentary which gives various evidences for Krishna’s historicity while doing this also similar things can be applied to Ram and basically it is important to know that when we are talking about the historicity of Ram we need to talk, historicity means historically was he existing and secondly whether he performed supernatural activities that is something which you cannot prove by any historical record even if you say there is Govardhan, how can you prove that Krishna lifted Govardhan the supernatural activities to understand, to get people to accept them they need philosophical education that is a separate thing, we cannot prove them historically but their existence itself can be proved, yes we definitely can one of the strongest evidences for this is if you look in the Indian tradition, Jains Jains are now culturally very similar to Hindus but historically, philosophically they were often at loggerheads there is a whole history of books which Jains and Buddhists wrote in which they criticised some of the Vedic values and interestingly there is a whole book called Jain Ramayana what they do in Jain Ramayana the main storyline is the same, there is Ram, there is Sita, there is Ravana but throughout when Ram goes to the forest he keeps meeting Jain sages and the Jain sages keep giving him wisdom and finally when Ram is when Sita is taken in by the earth and Ram is left desolate, Jain Ramayana says at that time Ram becomes enlightened and becomes a Jain so basically it is a complete distortion of the Ramayana storyline but essentially despite doing such distortion no Jain thinker has ever accused Ram of being non-existent no Jain thinker has ever accused Krishna to be just a figment of the imagination they accept the story and they try to retell the story in their own ways the point is that in the past some people say that the story of Ram was just created for moral instruction it is just a figment of imagination Lalit Vistar is a famous book by Buddhist scholars and in Lalit Vistar they talk about how some of Krishna s actions are immoral but they don t criticise that Krishna did not exist they also accept that Krishna existed but he did not act properly so here I am taking the sceptic s role so if Krishna is a figment of imagination why is it that in the past that argument was not ever levelled against Krishna there were opponents of Krishna s teachings in the past there were critics of Krishna s characters in the past but they did not level that accusation why is that accusation coming up now? because now we are looking at things from a different filter so for examining any political activity we need the appropriate apparatus if I try to measure my weight by putting a thermometer in my mouth I cannot do that, the apparatus is wrong so as far as the historicity of Krishna Ram is concerned there is abundant archaeological evidence there is abundant literary evidence in terms of literature which talk about Ram extensively positively, negatively, ambiguously both positive and negative but throughout the history nobody has raised the accusation that he was non-existent so that itself is a strong evidence and unfortunately in India as far as archaeology is concerned archaeology is a very underfunded enterprise and because of that the potential for archaeological evidence for the historicity of many of the ancient things in Indian history that potential has not been tapped even 50 to 70 years ago many of the cities that are talked about in the bible they were thought of by historians as mythological but excavations in the middle east have found out many of those cities they literally have been brought out from mythology to history by excavations so like that archaeological excavations to the extent they have been done so Ram existed much before Krishna so around 30 to 50 years ago most historians considered Krishna himself to be fictional but the Dwarka findings the underwater findings by professor Ram and others of the coast of Dwarka they have more or less confirmed, now most mainstream historians also accept that Krishna as a person existed now they may not accept Krishna as god, they may not accept that he did supernatural activities but the historicity of Krishna is now more or less accepted by all scholars, all mainstream scholars similarly with subsequent research more and more findings can be made to establish the historicity of Ram also, but at present the archaeological remains especially in the area of Ayodhya and more importantly the literature which talks about Ram in various ways but never considering him non-mythological non-historical, all these are strong pointers to his historicity and much more potential for further historical research is there which needs to be tapped and then the historicity can be proven much stronger, so rather than rejecting those who are drawing moral lessons what we can focus on is let them accept what they can and gradually by that acceptance they will become more sympathetic and if they denigrate Ram as non-historical see the more important thing is rather than saying that he is historical or he is not historical, the important thing is that we focus on developing a connection and that connection itself can be explored and expanded later so if people get rational explanations many of the scholars who say that Ram is non-historical they are intelligent people they are not necessarily blasphemous people but just that they have not been exposed their exposure to Krishna and Ram if it has been primarily in terms of stories which seem like fairy tales to them then they are going to take it in a particular way so we need to give them an understanding of the profound philosophy and internal logical coherence of the worldview in which Ram and Krishna are considered to be supreme then by that their attitudes will change does that answer your question? so now regarding the question about restoring the broader values of Vedic culture which were there in India, say forgiveness, tolerance, peacefulness and now they are being lost even in the Hindu community what to speak of being appreciated in the rest of the world how can their appreciation be enhanced? yeah, every culture is only as good or as bad as its practitioners are so unfortunately India for various reasons one reason is of course that historically India has been under foreign rule for many centuries now, almost a millennia because of which much of the much of the profundity of that culture has been lost as a famous American scholar who came to India he read the Vedas, he read the Upanishads he read the Bhagavad Gita, he was very attracted and he came to India and he saw total chaos filth, poverty, starvation, death so many beggars he wrote in his memoirs I just can’t digest people who are so lofty in their thoughts how can they be so filthy in their living there is complete disconnect between the two and the reason for that is it’s easy to blame others Muslims attacked India and destroyed India the British did so much damage to Indian economic system all that is true but ultimately it is we who need to reform ourselves and actually speaking, Indians also they made a lot of mistakes, strategically speaking whenever the Muslim invasion was there, the Indians were caught up in their own internal fights, they did not realise the magnitude of the threat and similarly when Britishers came also, at that time also the lot of problems were that Indians themselves were at fault so if you see, even in the Bhakti culture the Bhakti saints, quite often they were persecuted by others within the Hindu tradition itself. Now Haridas Thakur was punished by the Qazi, but he was punished because the Brahmins only complained against him and like that if you look at the many Bhakti saints they are often persecuted by the caste Brahmins the caste Brahmins became very self-righteous that we are Brahmins and we deserve to be respected and they did not care for people Prabhupada says in a lecture that the Brahmins did not care for the people in general, so the missionaries came and converted others and they got converted because they felt basically when we want to talk about religious values we have to know that people are attracted to religion not just because of there is something called religious capital this capital means how much a person has invested in a particular religion if they are invested in a particular religion they cannot give that religion very easily but if they are not invested much in that religion, they can give it up very easily so for example if there are people who were of lower caste and the only thing that they got as a part of the Hindu Dharma was discrimination against them in the lower caste then they are not invested in that religion at all when somebody else comes and offers them a better alternative, they take that up now whether that is really better or not that is a different question but for them it appears better so primarily it is Varanashram originally was very good but the caste system as it existed it was horribly discriminatory and it has caused a lot of atrocities and people have just become alienated because of that so now in such a situation it is very easy historically to blame others Christians, they blame other people if you see Christians in India often they portray we are always being persecuted, we are the minority religion over here Muslims in America they say we suffer from Islamophobia people always think that we are all terrorists but we are not all terrorists and that is true, we are not all terrorists basically playing the victim game doesn’t work so Hindus may say Hindu culture is being destroyed those who blame others it doesn’t work at all it is simply acting like a victim it doesn’t attract any attention we have to take responsibility for ourselves so Christians are able to attract, Muslims are able to attract materialists are able to attract, atheists are able to attract why? because the original substance that is there in the spiritual culture that is not being made accessible to people if we make that accessible, if we share Krishna’s message if we share Krishna’s wisdom as much as possible according to our capacity, we will attract people so our focus should not be on so much on what others are doing it should focus on what we are doing in India I was shocked to hear that actually the Bible has been translated into more Indian languages than the Bhagavad Gita can you imagine, there was one biblical, one Christian scholar he came to India and he learnt 27 Indian dialects, just to translate the Bible into those 27 languages there is a lecture of Prabhupada in Mumbai and Prabhupada is speaking to Indians, he said Bhagavad Gita is your culture, it is your book but to teach the Bhagavad Gita in India I have to get Americans so this is your message, take this, share it with the whole world is waiting to hear this the point is, we ourselves for various reasons, especially because the Brahmanas became just power conscious and did not keep sharing the wisdom so Indians themselves have become alienated and they are looking for other sources of wisdom so if we present the wisdom properly it is still possible to attract people and rather than blaming others for having caused the damage in their understanding, they are working in a dedicated way they are working in a very many people of other faiths they work in a tireless way to share their message they may be manipulating, they may be exploiting, that is a part of it but still they are doing their part our focus should be on our part and sometimes by seeing their dedication if there is too much agitation then we need to know that this is not anukul to my bhakti whatever inspires us to stronger practise bhakti more strongly, we do that so the values of tolerance and peacefulness which were there in the past they are true, it is there in the past but the past, we cannot live on the glory of the past oh we were good, we were good some people say, actually there was surgery in India also there was this medicine, there was Viman also in India all those things, well most intelligent people don’t find that very impressive what is their practical right now so India has a lot to offer practically but if we keep speaking too much about our past glories we keep speaking too much about the past injustice that has happened against us that simply alienates people rather right now we focus on what we can contribute and do that as much as possible not in a mood of criticising others, but in a mood of presenting what we have to offer and Prabhupada was asked how did you arrive to spread Krishna consciousness all over the world Prabhupada simply said that Krishna is all attractive I simply presented him, he attracted me so we have to be intelligent in presenting Krishna but the thing is all those values, they came from a culture that was very, from a wisdom that was very inclusive and sometimes when we see that other religions are doing this, other religions are doing that and then we come down to their level and you did like this, we will also do like this we don’t have to come down to their level that means, there are people who may do wrong things even atheists, materialists, they are in Rajoguna Tamoguna we don’t have to come down to Rajoguna Tamoguna to counter them we have to be in Satoguna and through Satoguna we share Krishna consciousness so our goal is, somebody might be a Hindu materialist and that person becomes a Christian materialist that doesn’t really make much difference, they are still materialists so yes, a Hindu materialist might be more sympathetic towards Hindu culture but sometimes they may be more antithepathetic also, we don’t know our purpose should be to offer people the path to rise from the level of materialism to the level of spirituality whatever way they feel inspired to rise whatever pace they feel inspired to rise that we need to accommodate so some people may become serious devotees, some people may just become sympathetic to practises some people may be supportive but not themselves practising it will all vary there is a pyramid and the pyramid at the top is very narrow but afterwards its circumference becomes bigger and bigger so like that there will be serious devotees at the top but there will be a pyramid where many others are practising at different levels so rather than criticising what others are doing we facilitate people to practise at whatever level and at whatever pace they can practise thank you very much