Redirection of consciousness is Krishna’s miracle – Bali Maharaj pastime reflection

[Bhagavatam class on Srimad Bhagavatam 8.22.29-30 at ISKCON, Juhu, India]

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Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
canto 8 the past time of wali maharaj shramad bhagavatam is meant to help parikshit maharaj prepare for his upcoming death and normally when we face adversities of various kinds the adversity of death is probably among the worst at least other adversities from this life’s perspective we can recover if we lose a job we can get a job back if we lose a loved one we can form other relationships if we lose our health we can gain back the health but when we lose life and we die it’s over so shukdev goswami helps parikshit maharaj prepare for death by narrating how great devotees have faced difficulties throughout history at least with respect to parikshit maharaj we could say there was some mistake on his part that he put a dead snake around the neck of shamik rishi it’s a very minor mistake but a severe punishment for that as the narratives of the bhagavata moves forwards the devotees who face difficulties for practically no fault of theirs that is depicted more and more if we see the previous canto the seventh canto is the story of prahlada maharaj normally when we think that okay this world is filled with problems and we go to god so that we can get some relief from the problems and we expect devotion to give us relief whether it is a material level by solving the problem or at a spiritual level by giving us strength to tolerate the problem but it is especially difficult when our devotion itself seems to be the cause of our problems with respect to prahlada if he just gave up his devotion he could have had a happy life he was a beloved son of the emperor of the universe it is only because of his devotion that he has been persecuted so the nature of this world is so complicated that the very thing which is the solution to this can appear to be the cause of our problems at least with respect to prahlada maharaj he was here is a the lord is in his heart and lord is his kingdom and he is trying to practise bhakti because of his bhakti he faces problems but balli maharaj faces an even tougher test it is because it is the lord himself who seems to be causing problems to him he wants to live a upright life be truthful and the lord himself causes him apparently takes away everything from him and that too by deception so how do you remain faithful to god in such a time in fact bishu kitama says that the test of love is when there is every reason for the loving relationship to be broken but it is not broken that is when the love is for real the love is very deep nowadays people talk about love mostly in the romantic context and the same two people who talk about love and they say we’ll fight with the whole world i can’t live without him i can’t live without her they fight against the whole world to come together and six months later they glare at each other i can’t live with you so what happens the emotions are so fickle so love is seen mostly as an emotion but sometimes i feel love sometimes i don’t feel love but the bhagavatam depicts love as action as intention as action even when now at this point when because of his devotion when this lord himself is persecuting him apparently how at that time to stay devoted to the lord this is a great challenge and this is a precursor to the greatest challenge that a devotee will face that is depicted in the 10th canto of the shuman bhagavatam that is when the gopis give up everything for krishna and then krishna gives them up gopis for them in the conservative society of thousands of years ago for a woman to alone go out of her house at night to meet some other man that means that woman would practically be condemned no it would be a permanent stain on her reputation a family may reject it the society may reject it there are religions in which adulterers are stoned to death that is not in our tradition but the point is that adultery that illicit relationships was considered even now it is reproachable but at that time they are practically renouncing everything for krishna but this the gopis pray that krishna we left everything for you and we have come out right in the night to meet you even an ordinary honourable person if a woman is alone in the forest the man will try to protect the woman if that woman has come just for him and then he leaves and goes away so the gopi gita which the gopis sing thereafter is the supreme expression of devotion because it is devotion amidst rejection it is devotion amidst rejection when the object of our devotion seems to have rejected us at that time to stay devoted is extremely difficult when i was in america recently in columbus i gave a seminar on overcoming fears so i had done a study of what were the prominent fears of people over various centuries 19th century 18th century 20th century 21st century there are some fears which are common but two fears have come in that top 10 list in the 21st century which were not there earlier one is the fear of terrorists and the second is the fear of rejection so people try to form relationship with someone and they’re always afraid what if the other person rejects me and goes away whether it is while they are dating or even after they are married there’s no guarantee that the relationship will be there so fear of rejection is a very deep rooted fear in today’s world so to maintain devotion amidst rejection is extremely difficult and bali maharaj’s pastime demonstrates that prabhupada writes the purport that actually it would be difficult to live in such a situation he was penniless friendless loveless powerless what did he have and you could say even he was guru-less and all this because of the lord towards him who wanted to act honourably so how does how does one tolerate this actually if you see there is an evolution in the consciousness of bali maharaj initially bali maharaj sticks to his principled way of living but that is more out of truthfulness he says i have given my word i must keep my word i am a kshatriya a kshatriya should never refuse charity to a brahmana so he doesn’t see vamana as the lord and he sees him as a brahmana a falchion brahmana and he thinks himself as a as a king it’s a king’s duty a king it’s ingrained within the king’s sense of honour that they should never refuse charity so when shukracharya tells him don’t give charity to him he’s vishnu he will cheat you he says no i have given my word i must stick to my word so at this stage if you look at his speech he is not manifesting his devotion it’s mostly satyavahak now also it’s a satyaprataha he appreciated stuck to this word so he sticks to his word and that gets him into a huge amount of trouble so the lord manifests vamana becomes trivikrama and covers the whole universe and bali maharaj has to surrender not only all his possessions but himself also he puts forward his foot or his head on which to for the lord to put his foot so in the process his family members his relatives other demons they also start demonising him why did you give this charity his family members are upset with him his guru is already upset with him has cursed him so at that time how does one move on all of us have some purpose in life which gives us the inspiration to keep fighting life’s battles so for example if you are students you have a purpose you know i want to i want to get a good job i want to have a good career i want to have a nice family because of that purpose whatever difficulties come you know you may have college professors who are very demanding we may have some colleagues who are very troubling we tolerate that when we are we have our own families say at that time you’re taking care of a family taking care of children that gives us a sense of purpose so some people may have a purpose i want to win this olympic gold medal in archery and then they practise for months and years and decades to do that so all of us have a sense of purpose in life and usually to this purpose that helps us to overcome our problems but sometimes we may face a problem that takes away our very sense of purpose if somebody has lived to become a wealthy businessman and then in one stock market crash just lose all their business then they may think what am i living for if somebody is living to take care of their family and then say some earthquake happens some hurricane happens and the family is wiped out what am i living for if both happen simultaneously people get a sense of purpose from their profession and from their family if they lose both at the same time and then it is almost unbearable whenever i speak in universities whether it’s in india or america a common concern is that young people tend to be suicidal so what to do about it so broadly speaking actually when would somebody want to end their life when they feel that the purpose of their life is permanently thwarted whatever purpose if somebody had a purpose that oh i want to succeed in the exam i want to get this degree i want to get this marks and suppose they fail in that exam then what is the purpose of my life if somebody’s identity is that i want to develop this relationship with this person this person is my as people say soul mate that is the word people use around us i was in i have written a book on demystifying reincarnation so there is a journal which interviewed me recently in america about reincarnation so they asked me common question that comes up with this in fact i answer questions online on a website called quora so somebody asked me a question there that i want to marry a particular girl but somehow it’s not working out because her parents and my parents are not agreeing so what karma can i do by which i can marry her in my next life so the whole idea of reincarnation has been romanticised so when i was asked this question but what do you think about a soul mate i said that you know when talking about the soul mate it’s best to focus on the soul not the mate most people focus on the mate who is my partner who actually understand who you are first so people just think that oh i have a soul mate means i have a part of me which lives on and there is someone out there who will live on and we’ll both meet again but what is that part of me that lives on what is its eternal destiny people don’t talk about it at all so anyway the point i’m making is that if somebody lives to form a relationship with someone and somehow that relationship is thwarted then that person may become suicidal so here for Bali Maharaj you know he in a sense strived to live honourably he strived to live honourably and he was totally dishonoured for a king who rules over others you know as soon as everyone sees the king they offer respect to the king the king sits on a throne above everyone else and for that king to be physically bound in front of one’s own servants one’s own subordinates that is unbearably humiliating in the circle where one has been honoured it’s one thing to be dishonoured in private it’s another thing to be dishonoured in public and not just in some general public where nobody knows us the very same people who have respected us for our power in front of them if we are dishonoured it’s unbearable so at that time what what can a person do? Prabhupada says it’s difficult to live in such a situation so so for us when we face problems which challenge or which which devastate the purpose of our life how can we live on? It is possible only when we find a purpose for life that is bigger than the problems we have a purpose for life and we have problems if the problems become bigger than the purpose then we go into depression eventually we become suicidal what is the point of living? but if our purpose is very strong then no matter how strong the problem comes we’ll overcome it if we are going on a motorcycle and some big elephant comes along the way the motorcycle hits the elephant nothing will happen to the elephant the motorcycle will fall down but if you are going in a bullet train and if an elephant comes in the train on the way of the train the elephant will move aside or the bullet train will knock away the knock away the elephant and move on so our purpose is what gives us momentum how strong or how big is the the problem is like the elephant coming in the way how big or how strong our purpose is determines how much momentum we will have and that’s how we will overcome the problems so here it is described that Bali Maharaj there is a dramatic evolution of consciousness that happens it’s not evolution it’s like sudden elevation what happens is he is living according very honourably but when all that he has lived for all the source of honour is suddenly lost at that time his latent bhakti bursts forth bhakti is there in the hearts of different people to different degrees and sometimes that bhakti may be dammed by our conditionings dam means like a dam is put around it because we cannot move forward so and then it may not move forwards but then sometimes when materially there is complete frustration then that bhakti just bursts forth just like in the gajendra if we see in the gajendra moksha chapter the chapters two three and four in the same kando in chapter two it is mostly described gajendra was very materialistic now he was he was the king of the elephants and he was delighting and revelling and there is no indication of his spirituality at that time but when whatever when the crocodile comes and it catches him and he’s not able to release at that time so if we consider the flow of our consciousness it normally moves in the direction of our attachments if somebody is attached to cricket when they have nothing to do they will start thinking about cricket somebody is attached to money when they have nothing to do they will start thinking about money they are attached to sensuality as soon as they have nothing to do their thoughts will go sensual pleasure so we could say that our consciousness normally goes according to the channel of our attachment so wherever so the consciousness is like a water it is flowing and normally it flows wherever our desires are wherever attachments are and when obstacles come depending on how strong the desire is how strong the attachment is the consciousness will flow in spite of that so when bellamangal thakur is very attached to chintamani so even if there is a storm even if there is no boat even if her house is locked all these are obstacles but his consciousness is flowing so forcefully towards her that he overcomes all these obstacles so our consciousness normally flows along the direction of our attachments but when some obstacle comes which completely blocks the flow of our consciousness in the direction of our attachments that means you just can’t do anything to get the object that we are attached to at that time either the consciousness stagnates chokes and the person becomes depressed self-destructive suicidal or the consciousness finds a spiritual channel so for gajendra the consciousness is going along directions now because of his past spirituality he did have some spiritual impression within him but that channel had become very small because it was from the past in the present the material elements were so much so if we consider that there is water is flowing this is a river which has come and this is a channel which is very thin and this is very broad water will actually flow direction some water may trickle in this direction but if this channel gets blocked then all that water has no way to move in this direction then it will move in this direction so for him when he was materially thwarted then his spiritual direction of his consciousness just zoomed off and that’s how jajaparamam jakyam prabhjan manya nukshikshitam the the devotion that he had cultivated in his previous life came back to him as the profound prayers which he offers the supreme lord that’s and that prayers is what draws the response from the lord in terms of his appearing and delivering him similarly for Bali Maharaj his ancestor Prahlad has prayed for him and Bali Maharaj has some latent devotion but wealth and honour has so captivated him that normally his consciousness is going in that direction and even when the lord comes he gives charity not so much to honour the he doesn’t even know that he is the lord he does it so that he can protect his honour but when his honour is lost at that time instead of the consciousness getting stagnated it gets redirected and that redirection is the miracle miracle because most people will get frustrated many people when they practise when they come to god or they come to some spiritual site they want to know are miracles for real can you perform miracles there are different kinds of miracles yeah somebody might be able to walk on water somebody might be able to get something from a distant place all those are miracles which might just have some sensational value oh oh you can do that how’s that it’s amazing but the miracle which matters the most to all of us is the miracle of the redirection of consciousness if when our consciousness is flowing in a particular direction which is the direction of material entanglement which is the direction of material distress if our consciousness can start moving towards krishna the miracle of the redirection of consciousness is the greatest miracle and how this miracle happens in the lives of many many devotees is depicted in the shiva and that is the inspiration by which parikshit maharaj can also redirect his consciousness of course parikshit maharaj at one level has already redirected his consciousness because he renounced the world and came to sit and hear but even then he needs inspiration and bhakti is not just about a one-time intention bhakti is about consistent intention we made one moment i renounce the world but that renunciation of the world is not just something we do at one moment every moment we have to stay away from the world and stay going towards krishna so the continuous hearing of the bhagavatam is meant to give parikshit maharaj the inspiration to not only stay focused on his devotion in his hearing of krishna but to become increasingly convinced about being absorbed in krishna so what brings about this astonishing redirection of consciousness prabhupada says it is the mercy of krishna so now i’ll conclude with this as an analysis of this point when we say the mercy of krishna what exactly is the mercy of krishna there is some in many shops or homes in india people put something called the gita saar and in that gita saar they write whatever happened is good whatever is happening is good whatever will happen is also good now with all due respects to whoever composes gita saar i have read the bhagavad gita several hundred times but i have not found any words which comes anywhere near this it’s just it supposed to be the essence of the gita but it doesn’t have any presence on the gita only so how can it be the essence the gita is not about what is happening to us the gita is about how we are responding arjuna’s defining question is not why is this happening to me arjuna’s defining question is what is the right course of action for me purushaam itvaam dharmasamudh chetaha i am asking you what is good for me or what is my duty and the whole bhagavad gita is about what is the best course of action for us so the best course of action means that we have to understand that there are courses of action that are right and there are actions which are right and there are wrong or you could say that something which is very which is the best action is the okay action which is the wrong action which is terribly wrong action there are many many courses of actions and you say everything is god’s mercy well what exactly does that mean so if alcoholic is drinking alcohol is the alcoholics alcoholism god’s mercy if a terrorist is shooting down my people is the terrorist killing people god’s mercy what do we exactly mean when you say everything is god’s mercy basically i’ll explain this using two different frames of analysis one thing is whenever actions happen in this world there are three factors involved that is there is god’s will there is free will and there is evil god’s will free will and evil i write on the bhagavad gita everyday at my website gitadini.com just today i write an article on this very topic don’t attribute to god’s will that which happens because of free will or evil what do i mean by this like see krishna’s will is supreme but all of us are not like are not like robots who are forced to do who are who he orchestrates in absolute sense then we would not have any free will so our free will means that krishna has given each one of us by his supreme will he has given us freedom and then he has given us area in which to execute the free will the bhagavad gita gives the example 9.6 just as the wind is always situated in the sky similarly all living beings are situated in wind if we envision the sky to be like an upside down bowl then the air in the sky is free to move left right up down the motion of the air is not limited by the sky but the area of motion is limited similarly for all of us we have been given free will our free will is not unlimited we in human body we can talk but we can’t sing like a parrot we can’t sing like a cuckoo we can’t fly in the bird like a fly in the sky like a beagle we can’t swim in the ocean like a fish so we have free will but the scope of our free will is limited now within this scope we can do whatever we want to do and krishna allows us to do that and when we do that it is not krishna who is doing it it is we who are doing it sometimes nothing happens without god’s will a more appropriate section sentence will be nothing happens without god’s sanction it is not that god wills people to do bad things people want will to do it and god if they have the karma by the past allows them to do it so a dictator kills thousands of people it is not that god wants all those people to die rather the dictator has some perverse idea you know by killing these people i’ll show my power and because that person that soul had the karma to become influential so to have a certain sphere of influence god allows them to do whatever they want to do in that sphere of influence now so actions can happen because of free will and what is done by a person because of their free will is not god’s will when dushasan was disrobing draupadi it is not that krishna wanted draupadi to be dishonoured dushasan wanted to do that and krishna allowed that then there is free will so there is god’s will within god’s will there is free will and then there is evil evil is not like some satan some malevolent being existing out there making us do bad things evil is simply the accumulated impressions of our own past bad actions suppose somebody has drunk alcohol repeatedly then if they pass by a bar they immediately get the urge let’s drink let’s drink let’s drink and it may be almost impossible to give up drinking there’s a western playwright he said that giving up smoking is the easiest thing in the world i have done it over a hundred times so i have given up smoking 100 times but smoking has not given me up it keeps coming back so our past impressions come as our present propositions our past impressions come as our minds present propositions what a person has done in the past if they’re drunk then come on drink come on drink come on drink so that keeps coming and those propositions the stronger the impression the stronger more forceful is the proposition and these this forceful propositions within us which make us do wrong things this can be called as evil krishna for example says lust kama is situated in the senses mind and intelligence that means there are certain impressions situated within us which make us do certain things so even if we have a computer and computer say we have visited a particular site repeatedly say if somebody has a computer and they have visited bollywood.com repeatedly and then now they come to a spiritual class they hear about bhagavad-gita and then they want to know about bhagavad-gita so they type they want to type bhagavad-gita in their browser as soon as they type b what happens bollywood.com comes up so that setting which is already stored as a preference in their computer that is like evil evil is the stored impression which are there within us so when people act it is not god’s will it is their free will their free will which is conditioned by evil so why are we talking about all this right now in this context that we are trying to understand what do we mean by god’s mercy so when people do bad things is that god’s mercy actually what about when we do bad things is that god’s mercy no krishna’s everything is krishna’s mercy means if alcoholic drinks that is also krishna’s mercy no that’s not krishna’s mercy krishna’s mercy is what is krishna’s mercy that in every situation he gives us the path to come to him so i’ll give one example to illustrate this nowadays while travelling many of us may use google maps so if you’re driving by car and google maps takes a take a left turn here now if google map is telling me to take a particular turn it tells me to take a right turn i take a left turn what happens google immediately reroutes and tells me how to get to the restriction from there if again i take a wrong turn again google will reroute and again give me a path from there even if i take a hundred wrong turns still google has the whole earth mapped and it will show me from wherever i have gone how to get back so krishna is like the ultimate google no matter how many wrong turns we take krishna is there in our hearts to guide us from there to him now but the wrong turns are not what google wanted in the vishma past in the departure of vishma that section 1.9 yudhishthira is told by by krishna yudhishthira is told by vishma and prabhupada translate that as everything is within krishna’s plan it’s a very significant wording prabhupada doesn’t say everything is krishna’s plan he’s saying everything is within krishna’s plan see our taking a wrong turn is not google’s plan google wanted to take us right turn so that we could get to destination but even if we take a wrong turn how to get from there to the destination that is within krishna’s plan so when people do bad things to us it is not that krishna wants us to do those bad things so those bad things happening to us they may be krishna doing it directly they may be we ourselves having done something foolishly they may be some people using their misuse misusing their free will doing something so what happens to us it’s just the nature of this world we can’t necessarily say that as if somebody becomes alcoholic they’re becoming alcoholic is not krishna’s mercy if some alcoholic runs over someone and injures them terribly that alcohol that alcoholics running over someone that is not krishna’s mercy but how we respond the wisdom to respond properly that is krishna’s mercy if i take a wrong turn from there also google shows me how to get to the destination so everything is within krishna’s plan means that no matter how many bad things may we may do or bad things may happen to us still krishna gives us the opportunity to come to him and so that means krishna’s mercy comes in two ways one is that no matter what has happened to us krishna gives us the path to come to him that is his mercy and second is krishna gives us the strength to choose that path so at this particular time when bali maharaj has been totally dishonoured by the very person whom he tried to do a good turn to so at that time he could have he could have been he could have become defiant he would have cursed krishna of course nobody has power to curse krishna but he could have ranted on krishna i would have complained against krishna but he didn’t do that he saw he later on in his in his responses he says actually also says this that when his opulence of wealth is taken away that is the time when he took shelter of devotion so he saw this opportunity that that this is the time for me to surrender to the lord and then he actually surrendered so we facing particular situations may or may not be krishna’s but our response to the situations is krishna’s mercy now we can an absolute sense say that oh draupadi was put in that situation that is also krishna’s mercy that’s that’s one way of looking at it but sometimes life may put us in such situations that we can see this person is doing like this why are they doing like that so actually prabhupada here itself in when we had to get the juhu land there was mr n who was trying to take the money and cheat people of the land also so when when mr n was persecuting the devotees scheming against them there’s no evidence that prabhupada said that mr n’s actions are krishna’s mercy prabhupada did not say that but the devotees under prabhupada’s guidance acted acted shrewdly and they managed to turn the whole battle around and when they won when they eventually got the land prabhupada said this is krishna’s mercy this is krishna’s mercy prabhupada came here itself and when radha in a small shed he told them i will build a temple for you i’ll build a temple for you please come and stay here so i was just in america i was in carpenteria i met his own he told me he’s almost he’s now completed his book about the juhu project and he’s he said he’s written the book he’s given the title it is he he’s calling it i will build you a temple that’s the name of the temple a good fight and a promise fulfilled so when prabhupada actually got the land to build the temple he said it’s a good fight somebody should write a book about it so the intelligence to fight the determination to fight and the eventual victory that comes that is krishna’s mercy some people acting malevolently well they’re acting malevolently we have to deal with them so the focus is krishna is always merciful to us that doesn’t necessarily mean that things happening to us are krishna’s mercy but giving us the intelligence to respond wisely that is krishna’s mercy and then giving us the strength to choose that wise response to act out that act on that wise response that is krishna’s mercy and we can always pray to krishna that krishna please give me the strength to serve you that’s what prabhupada said was the best prayer we can that means please whatever form your mercy takes please give me the strength to stay connected with you to accept that mercy and to keep serving you and for this bali maharaj is a sterling example for us of how amidst unbearable adversity he receives krishna’s mercy and stays on the path of pure devotion and is therefore therefore glorified as the eternal glorified eternally as the emblem as the example of surrender so i’ll summarise i spoke about the bali maharaj past time and theme i took is that when difficulty is come it is very difficult to choose the right response but when difficult the whole bhagavatam is meant to help us help and through image to prepare to focus on the lord to surrender to him no matter what happens so for parikshit maharaj at least there was some small mistake on his part but it was unjust the magnitude of the reaction that he got for prahlad there was no mistake it was his devotion that seemed to be causing problems to him for bali maharaj it was his desire to honour his word to lord that caused problems to him for the gopis it is their lord himself who seemed to be causing the problem that the gopis demonstrate devotion amidst rejection in today’s world fear of rejection is a very great fear because people become sometimes commit suicide when they experience rejection in their relationships then i discussed that all of us have some purpose which helps us to face problems and when the purpose is big or strong then that gives us the momentum and whatever problems come as obstacles we overcome them but sometimes problems may come we just take away our purpose itself somebody lives to build a business and that business is permanently lost somebody used to take care of the family the family is permanently lost at that time either we just become disheartened depressed and suicidal or we find a bigger purpose and the bhagavatam describes events in which people found a bigger purpose so normally our the purpose that we live for the direction where our consciousness flows is determined by our attachments and even as devotees sometimes our attachments may cause our consciousness to flow in a particular direction material direction but when those attachments are parted as it happens say with gajendra because there was a spiritual impression so the spiritual channel was very narrow the material channel was very broad but when the material channel was blocked then the consciousness flew along the spiritual channel and then he manifested the devotion from the past similarly for prahalad for Bali Maharaj here when the when the sense of honour for which he was living that was completely lost and he was dishonoured in front of his own followers he lost his guru his wealth his position his family members his friends that time instead of becoming resentful instead of he redirected his consciousness towards Krishna so the greatest miracle is the redirection of consciousness and this redirection of consciousness is Krishna’s mercy so discussed that whatever happens is it good that’s not what the bhagavata says it can bhagavata says that it is our response which determines whether it is good or not so well whatever actions happen in this world they are not just due to god’s will there is also free will and evil free will means that we have we have a certain sphere of influence in which you can free will and if we misuse it we may hurt ourselves or hurt others and alcoholics drinking is not god’s will and alcoholics running over others in a car after being drunk that is not god’s that is their own misuse of free will so evil is simply the accumulated impressions of our past which come as forceful propositions so now when bad things happen to us and if they are not Krishna’s plan if they are because of our misuse of free will or others misuse of free will but everything is not Krishna’s plan but everything is within Krishna’s plan everything may not be Krishna’s plan or maybe we don’t know but everything is within Krishna’s plan just like Google has mapped out all the territory no matter how many wrong turns we take Google can show us the path back similarly how many bad things we do or how many bad things happen to us Krishna always shows us the path back so Krishna’s mercy is that no matter how terrible our situation firstly he shows us the way to him and secondly he gives us the strength to pursue that way so when enemies offer of opposed to the Prabhupada Prabhupada did not see the enemies as Krishna’s mercy but he saw the determination to fight which he had and the victory that he won eventually that as Krishna’s mercy so by seeing Krishna’s mercy in our choosing right action responsibly we can all grow towards Krishna thank you very much do we have time for questions okay one question okay yes one question one or two questions you can speak i’ll repeat why God can’t stop it why did not God stop it why is everybody getting killed okay so if God could have stopped a dictator for killing innocent people why does God not stop it this takes us to the fundamental question why do we exist at all God has given us free will by which we can all reciprocate love and rejoice in the reciprocation of love many parents sometimes when the children disobey them the parents feel frustrated but no matter how how harried how troubled a parent may be if we ask those parents instead of having a child would you like to have a robo who always obeys you no parent will want that so Krishna has not made us like robots he’s given us free will and free will has no meaning without the facility to execute that freedom if the government says i give you free will and i put you in this cellar in this jail small narrow chamber you have your free will what is the meaning of the freedom so free will means there has to be the capacity to execute that free will so that capacity when it is there Krishna allows people to act the way they want can Krishna stop yes does he stop it depends on what what that particular person’s karma is so if they have a particular karma then Krishna allows them to do that now what about the victims we understand that ultimately this world is a terrible place and bad things happen in this world so God is the cure for our suffering sometimes he may cure the suffering by removing the external source of suffering or sometimes he may cure the suffering by giving us inner strength to deal with that suffering so if God started intervening whenever anyone started doing anything wrong then he would have to stop he would have to take people’s free will away or the free will would basically become a mockery because you’re not allowed given the facility to execute the free will so therefore God does not do that now of course that person is also under karma and eventually when their good karma runs out they will not only not be able to do whatever atrocious things they were doing but they will also not be able to to continue so they will also have to bear the karmic reactions for all the bad that they have done so Krishna allows us to act for as long as our karma allows us to act for as long as our karma is there but beyond that his he checks us and then he makes us go through the consequences of our actions so that’s how it works okay yeah speak in the mic please so when terrorists kill innocent people are the people who are killed dying because of their own karma so generally we have to understand that the philosophy and there is purpose of philosophy so when something bad happens it is we are see this is really bad if a thief robs a person and the person goes to the king and I’ve been robbed and the king says it’s your karma you’re also well what is the king’s duty then the king is going to protect the citizens and we could just say that that let what is what is there is a need for any law at all and if any thief robs anyone it’s their karma if they’re walking along the road and somebody steals from us it’s our karma no what is important is what is our dharma the king’s to protect the citizens ram could have said when sita was kidnapped it must have been our karma that she was kidnapped ram did not say that he said my dharma as her husband is to protect her so basically there is a philosophical perspective and there is a practical perspective from the philosophical perspective we do understand that whatever happens to anyone even to us it is by our past but actually the things that happen in this world are not just because of past karma there is past karma present karma it all comes together in a complicated combination that’s why krishna says in our interactions with each other we are not meant to judge people by their past we are meant to look at things from this life situation and respond so if a thief has been if a person has been robbed the king has to understand this is wrong the king has to do his dharma and try to get the cash the people get the money back the king will be failing in his dharma he doesn’t do that so similarly we could say from a philosophical perspective that yes people who people who are victimised by terrorists it was because of their karma but that is not the primary meaning should be looking at things we should be looking at this is a failure of dharma the government should be working to protect there are brahmins and there are kshatriyas and the kshatriyas are meant to be very resourceful in protecting people so rather rather than thinking even if people are innocent from this life’s perspective we have to be sensitive we don’t have to justify what has happened by that may be one part of the explanation we may give to help people rebuild their lives but that is not the primary thing the primary thing is yes this has happened from this life’s perspective it is terrible so let us see how we can best deal with it maybe have better law enforcement better have anti-terrorist and more vigilant anti-terrorist departments that we can prevent the recurrences of such things so generally when a person is in distress especially when we are dealing with them at a practical or emotional level it’s best not to talk about karma focus on just acknowledging that this is a terrible thing and why particular terrible things happen we don’t know even if we say it’s karma we don’t know what is the karma because of which that has happened so it’s it’s it’s very now if tomorrow you go to office and you are fired and you don’t know why you are fired or tomorrow you go to your home and you are evicted from your home and says you know this is because of your debt which debt says no we don’t we won’t tell you that but because of a debt you are evicted it will appear very unfair even if somebody has a debt so when the way things happen it’s very difficult to process them sometimes and we should be there to help people amid their difficulties so from this life’s perspective it is terrible such things happening and we should see that this is because of the failure of the dharma of the law administrators and therefore the law lawmakers the law administrators they have to become more vigilant to prevent such recurrent such occur such things from occurring so should we stop here or should we have to go okay so maybe we can talk personally afterwards Krantarashram