When Srila Prabhupada has written so many books why do devotees need to write any further books?
Relevant quotes of Srila Prabhupada:
“All students should be encouraged to write some article after reading Shrimad-Bhagavatam, Bhagavad-gita, and Teachings of Lord Caitanya. They should realize the information, and they must present their assimilation in their own words. Otherwise, how they can be preachers?” (letter to Brahmananda, July 1, 1969)
“I want all our students to write articles for our transcendental magazine.” (letter to Satsvarupa, January 11, 1971)
“Regarding articles for BTG, I have already issued instructions to all centers requesting my disciples to send articles every month, and I am going to repeat it again for the second time. ” (letter to Hayagriva, July 12, 1969)
“BTG should be full with our own articles, and there is no need for articles by outsiders.” (letter to Brahmananda, July 1, 1969)
“Realization means you should write. Every one of you. What is your realization? What for this BACK TO GODHEAD is? You write your realization—what you have realized about Krishna. That is required. It is not passive. Always you should be active. Whenever you find time, write. Never mind—two lines, four lines, but you write your realization. Shravanam kirtanam. Writing or offering prayers, glories—this is one of the functions of the Vaishnava. You are hearing, but you have to write also. Then, writing means smaranam—remembering what you have heard from your spiritual master. Shravanam kirtanam vishnoh. About Vishnu, not for others. Don’t write any nonsense thing for any nonsense man. Useless waste of time. Vishnu—write about Vishnu, Krishna. This is cultivation of Krishna consciousness. Hear, write, remember, try to understand. Don’t be dull—dull-headed. Very intelligent. Without being very intelligent nobody can have full Krishna consciousness. It is for the most intelligent man. So that intelligence will come if you try to understand Krishna. We have got so many books. Always try to understand Krishna. Then you are liberated …. You cannot understand Krishna in full—He’s unlimited, our knowledge is limited. But as far as you can, try to understand Krishna.” (lecture, Los Angeles, 1970)
Instructions from Caitanya-caritämåtaTranscendental literature that strictly follows the Vedic principles and the conclusion of the Puranas and Pancaratrika-vidhi can be written only a pure devotee. It is not possible for a common man to write books on bhakti, for his writings will not be effective. He may be a very great scholar and expert in presenting literature in flowery language, but that is not at all helpful in understanding transcendental literature. Even if transcendental literature is written in faulty language, it is acceptable if it is written by a devotee, whereas so-called transcendental literature written by a mundane scholar, even if it is a very highly polished literary presentation, cannot be accepted. The secret in a devotee’s writing is that when he writes about the pastimes of the Lord, the Lord helps him; he does not write himself. As stated in Bhagavad-gita (10.10), dadami buddhi-yogam tam yena mam upayanti te. Since a devotee writes in service to the Lord, the Lord from within gives him so much intelligence that he sits down near the Lord and goes on writing books.” (Adi-lila, Volume 2, pages 189-190)
“To write about the transcendental pastimes of the Supreme Personality of Godhead is not an ordinary endeavor. Unless one is empowered by the higher authorities, or advanced devotees, one cannot write transcendental literature, for all such literature must be above suspicion, or, in other words, it must have none of the defects of conditioned souls, namely, mistakes, illusions, cheating, and imperfect sense perceptions. The words of Krishna and the disciplic succession that carries the orders of Krishna are actually authoritative. To be empowered to write transcendental literature is a privilege in which a writer can take great pride. As a humble Vaishnava, Krishnadasa Kaviraja Gosvami, being thus empowered, felt very much ashamed that it was he who was to narrate the pastimes of Lord Caitanya Mahaprabhu.” (Adi 2, page 206)
“Anyone who attempts to write about Krishna must first take permission from the spiritual master and Krishna. Krishna is situated in everyone’s heart, and the spiritual master is His direct representative. Thus Kirsna is situated antar-bahih, within and without. One must first become a pure devotee by following the strict regulative principles and chanting sixteen rounds daily, and when one thinks that he is actually on the Vaishnava platform, he must then take permission from the spiritual master, and that permission must also be confirmed by Krishna from within his heart. Then, if one is very sincere and pure, he can write transcendental literature, either prose or poetry.” (Adi 2, pages 206-207)
“A sentimentalist who has no Vaishnava qualifications cannot produce transcendental writings. There are many fools who consider krishna-lila to be a subject of art and write or paint pictures about the pastimes of Lord Krishna with the gopis, sometimes depicting them in a manner practically obscene. These fools take pleasure in material sense gratification, but one who wants to make advancement in spiritual life must scrupulously avoid their literature. Unless one is a servant of Krishna and the Vaishnavas, as Krishnadasa Kaviraja Gosvami presents himself to be in offering respects to Lord Caitanya, His associates, and His disciples, one should not attempt to write transcendental literature.” (Adi 2, page 215)
“This is the sum and substance of transcendental writing. One must be an authorized Vaishnava, humble and pure. One should write transcendental literature to purify oneself, not for credit. By writing about the pastimes of the Lord, one associates with the Lord directly. One should not ambitiously think, ‘I shall become a great author. I shall be celebrated as a writer. These are material desires. One should attempt to write for self-purification. It may be published, or it may not be published, but that does not matter. If one is actually sincere in writing, all his ambitions will be fulfilled. Whether one is known as a great author is incidental. One should not attempt to write transcendental literature for material name and fame.” (Adi 2, page 216)
(From the Back to Godhead Handbook)Disclaimer: This transcript was generated using AI and may contain occasional errors or inaccuracies.
Question, when Shrila Prabhupada has written so many books, why is there any need for ISKCON devotees to write any further books? Answer, thank you for this important question. There are several answers to this question. First and foremost is that it is Shrila Prabhupada's instruction to his disciples and followers in general, which will include grand disciples and grand disciples for many many generations, for the next 10,000 years as predicted by Lord Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, that they should write.
And here I have pasted several quotes from Shrila Prabhupada where he is explicitly instructing his disciples and followers to write. So when Shrila Prabhupada started Back to Godhead magazine, he asked his disciples to write. For example, Prabhupada is saying, all students should be encouraged to write some article after reading Srimad Bhagavatam, Bhagavad Gita and teachings of Lord Chaitanya.
They should realize the information and they must present the information in their own words. Otherwise, how can they be preachers? Letter to Brahmananda, July 1, 1969. I want all our students to write articles for our transcendental magazine.
Letter to Shri Regarding articles for BTG, I have already issued instructions to all centers requesting my disciples to send articles every month and I am going to repeat it again for the second time. Letter to Hayagriva, July 12, 1969. So Shrila Prabhupada, if you look at these three letters, first he is saying he is encouraged, second is I want, he is expressing his desire and third is request.
And Prabhupada is saying I am going to repeat the request. So what more does a disciple or follower need than such repeated and insistent statements from the founder Acharya? And Shrila Prabhupada did not just want his disciples to write articles, he wanted them to write books also. When Bhaktisiddhanta Damodara Maharaj wrote the Scientific Basis of Krishna Consciousness, Shrila Prabhupada was extremely pleased with that book and he said that this book should be distributed by all his devotees everywhere and he would even show his guests who would come to meet him.
This is my scientific disciple and he has written this book, Scientific Basis of Krishna Consciousness. So Shrila Prabhupada wanted his disciples and followers to write and in fact Shrila Prabhupada is emphatic here, not just some, he is saying all. So if you want to be literalist, we can say that everybody who is not writing articles and books is disobeying Shrila Prabhupada.
Of course, we don't have to be so literalist because Shrila Prabhupada also recognized that everybody would not be capable of writing and that's why he specially encouraged his disciples to, those who had some inclination to write, to devote themselves to writing. Giriraj Maharaj writes in his book Watering Our Seed, an incident which Shrila Prabhupada he had written an article in Back to God. Prabhupada read that article and appreciated and Prabhupada told him devote yourself to writing and then after some days when he met Shrila Prabhupada again, Prabhupada asked have you written some things, have you been writing and he said no.
So Prabhupada was disappointed and then Prabhupada said meet me afterwards. Then when he met him, he told him that because there's some urgent services in the temple, Shamsundar Prabhu who was the in-charge at that time had said you can write afterwards but do these services now. Arrange the pandal program now.
So Prabhupada agreed with that. Prabhupada said that you can suspend the instruction of the spiritual master but you cannot reject the instruction of the spiritual master and Prabhupada said my spiritual master told me to preach in 1922 itself. I had it in my heart but I couldn't do it until I started doing it from 1955-1956 onwards.
Before that he started also but Prabhupada took one and then he focused entirely on his preaching. So Prabhupada said similarly that even if you're not able to write now, you should write in the future. So there are many incidents like this where Shrila Prabhupada has requested and insisted that his followers write.
So now when we see I want all our students to write that all is not necessarily absolute instruction for everyone but it is surely an indication of the intensity of Shrila Prabhupada's desire that we write. So that's the first point of view that Prabhupada has told us to write. The second point of view is that, second reason rather for writing is that people are attracted to a living tradition not a frozen tradition.
What is the difference between a living tradition and a frozen tradition? Living tradition has living exponents. People who are now are speaking about it, are practicing it, are sharing it, are writing on it. So the life of a tradition comes from all cultural activities.
So one of the most important activities of the culture of Krishna consciousness is writing. So people are not attracted to a frozen tradition and if we don't write like this then we will not have much contemporary influence. So I have a personal experience about this.
One time a devotee wrote to me and told me that there was a popular Hinduism site on which one verse had been blatantly mistranslated and he asked me whether we could do something about it. So then I wrote to the late author, editor of the website and I pointed out the deficiency to him. So the verse was from the ninth chapter of the Bhagavad Gita where Krishna is telling, Krishna is talking about demigod worship and the 23rd verse he's describing.
So here Krishna is telling that those who worship other gods with faith, they are worshipping me. They are also worshipping me. But how are they worshipping me? Not in the proper way.
Vidhi is the scriptural description and avidhi purvaka means not properly according to scripture. So avidhi purvaka means improper way of worship. So now in this particular translation on this Hindu website, this verse was there and its translation did not have any reference to avidhi purvaka.
So the translation was that those who worship other gods also worship me. Now this is a terrible misrepresentation of the essential import of the verse not just because the specific words from it are deleted, but also because if we look at the previous and the succeeding verses, that avidhi purvaka is the essential point of Krishna. Krishna is actually comparing the worship of the demigods by the demigod worshippers and pure devotional service to him.
So in 22, the previous verse is describing how those who worship him, he's saying that for my pure devotees or those who fix their minds on me, I preserve forever whatever they have and I provide what they lack. So Krishna is giving the glory of pure devotional service over here and the next verse he tells that those who worship the devatas, they worship improperly and then the 24th verse he describes, he describes that I am the ultimate beneficiary of all yajnas and I am the master of all the yajnas and those who do not know this, they fall down. So basically in this next verse Krishna is telling that how they are, how if this is like an explanation of the 23rd verse.
23rd verse is what? That those who worship the devatas are also worshipping me but they are improperly worshipping me. So now how is it, how are they worshipping Krishna? Because Krishna is the ultimate beneficiary of all sacrifices. So that's what is explained in this verse and the second part, why is it, how is it avidhi purvakam? Because they do not know Krishna is the ultimate beneficiary, because they do not know an eternal goal, so they do not attain eternal destination and they fall down.
So the avidhi purvakam is elaborated in, they do not know me so they fall back, they continue on cycle of birth and death and very explicitly Krishna describes that although he said in the ultimate sense everybody is being worshipped in the same way, sorry through the worship of the various devatas, it is Krishna who is being worshipped but Krishna makes it very clear that all paths do not lead to the same goal and 25th verse says that So those who worship the devatas go to devatas and like that those who worship the bhutas go to the bhutas, those who worship the bitras go to bitras, those who worship me come to me. So Krishna is here very clearly explaining that it's not that it's in a total sense that those who are worshipping devatas are worshipping me. So anyway my point for giving this one analysis is that skipping yajanti avidhi purvakam is a complete misrepresentation of the message of the Bhagavad Gita.
So then I wrote to this editor of the Hinduism website and he was quite intelligent and polite and he explained his rationale to me. So he said that the Gita has been interpreted by many people in different ways and we are here to give people an understanding of how the Gita is understood today by today's leaders. That means we are not concerned with an ancient form of Hinduism because there are so many interpretations in that we are concerned with the living Hinduism today and in the living Hinduism we want to tell people on our side how the leaders of today's Hinduism understand the Bhagavad Gita and he said we took several translations of the Bhagavad Gita and we included Prabhupada's translation also but we found that the majority of the translations and especially the majority of the translations of those who are the living teachers of Hinduism today they skip the avidhi purvakam verse and that's why we are representing the Hinduism that is living today.
So now from his perspective he's right. Of course Hinduism should ultimately be based on scriptures but from a neutral perspective how will a person find out what is the actual meaning of a scripture. So now the only way if we want to be representatives of the living tradition today you know we have to have living teachers, we have to have living writers.
So he said that you know after Srila Prabhupada there is no living authority on the Bhagavad Gita in ISKCON today. That's why we're not including any ISKCON representatives writings now which is quite unfortunate because few other organizations have propagated the wisdom of Bhagavad Gita as much as ISKCON but the point which I'm making through this is that for us to have respectability in the intellectual circles of society we need to have just we need to have living exponents, living experts, living teachers, living writers in each generation of our movement and if we don't have that our tradition will be seen by intellectuals as an artifact, as a museum piece, not as a living vibrant alternative to the mainstream materialist culture that is there in society today. So that is the second reason.
Third reason is that every tradition has to represent itself according to the contemporary way of looking at the world. So every generation has its own ethos, paradigm and idiom. Ethos means how one thinks, how one values things.
So ethos is about thinking, paradigm is about how one views the world and idiom is the language that one uses, the words, the usages that are normal and popular in that particular generation. So these three things change the ethos, the paradigm and the idiom change from generation to generation. So for example during maybe 50 to 100 years ago when Obama became the president of America he said that this was a testimony to the glory of America, of America's culture of liberty and equality that one or two generations ago a person who would not have been allowed to enter a hotel, a public hotel and would not have been served food in the hotel, a son or a grandson of that person has today become the president of America.
So he was basically referring to how the blacks were, blacks is of course a politically incorrect word now, the correct word is African-Americans and it is true, it's good to use that language by using how African-Americans were discriminated against for so long even after Abraham Lincoln freed them from slavery, still there was discrimination and only after the efforts of Martin Luther King about 40 years ago, 40-50 years ago that the African-Americans started getting proper rights. So the point is that 50 years ago racist ideas, they were a part of the ethos. In fact Rudyard Kepling wrote a famous poem, he said the burden of the white man, he said that all the other races are uncivilized and it is the burden of the white man to civilize all the other races.
Now today we understand it as an outrageous concept, the white man had his own idea of civilization, others had their own conceptions of civilization which were often more refined but the point is the white man's burden was seen as a very noble inspiring idea at that time but today it is seen as completely ethnocentric. Ethnocentric means that our race is the center of the earth and that sort of presumptuous arrogant idea is called ethnocentric. So now the racist ideas which were quite normal 40-50 years ago, they are not at all politically correct now.
In fact a few days ago there was a story in a newspaper about how one respected professor in America just used the word spooks for some African-Americans and for some students who were not coming to his class regularly, where are these spooks gone? The spook means the ghostly creatures were never visible and it was also a derogatory word used to minimize African-Americans earlier, it was not as severe as nerds or negroes but it was considered bad and this was a respected professor but just because he used that word, he was booked for using hate language and he had to go through several rounds of interrogation and his career was permanently stigmatized. So now when Shila Prabhupada wrote his books at that time, these sort of ideas were not common. So the point I'm making is that in Shila Prabhupada's books there may be certain references like I have answered a question over here earlier about how Shila Prabhupada says that a dark complexion is a result of bad karma and a white complexion is a result of good karma.
Now that is in a generic sense true because what is materially attractive is a result of good karma but Shila Prabhupada made those statements not in a sense that the blacks are permanently a lower race and the whites are a permanently higher race, nothing like that. Prabhupada was eager that devotees go and preach in Africa and he wanted that in Africa, not that Indians will settle in Africa, come to our temples, he wanted that even Africans become devotees. So the point was that Shila Prabhupada was not at all discriminatory in terms of his outreach, in terms of sharing his compassion with the world but still because the ethos was different at that time, so those sort of words are not at all considered jarring at that time but they are extremely jarring today and unless we clarify, we present the tradition in a proper way to focus on its essence, people can get lost because of this.
So the idea of valuing all races equally is a noble idea and it is very much in accordance with the Vedic scriptures also because the Vedic scriptures also understand that the body is superficial covering and the soul that is there in the body is the actual person and the souls, all souls are essentially equal because all are equally the parts of Krishna. So when the ethos changes from generation to generation, that generation's devotee writers have to be responsible enough to present the tradition's message according to the ethos of their times. Similarly, there are paradigms.
So paradigm would mean the way of looking at the world. So Shila Prabhupada himself was very alert. Shila Prabhupada addressed Darwin's theory of evolution quite extensively in his writings, although the previous Acharyas didn't do that because that was not required, that had not become a prominent part of the paradigm of society at that time.
So because it had not become a prominent part of the paradigm, so Bhakta Sudhanshu Thakur and Bhaktanath Thakur did not spend too much time addressing Darwin's theory of evolution. Shila Prabhupada addressed it because he saw that it had become a part of the paradigm. So now today when we come to our times, modern times have largely been considered outdated in America and Europe.
They say that we now live in post-modern times and post-modern times are characterized by an absolute rejection of authority. So to such an audience who has a paradigm that all authorities are bad, presentation of Krishna consciousness based primarily on authority will be alienating. Now Krishna consciousness also gives great experiences of purification and those experiences are what post-modern people love.
So that's why we need books which share experiences of people in Krishna consciousness. That's why Indira Gandhi Maharaj has written a book called the Diary of a Travelling Preacher and that is one of the most popular books not only among devotees but even among non-devotees who are at least interested or inclined towards spirituality and they find those experiences fascinating and that is what gives them faith. Even within ISKCON, when devotees write articles how I came to Krishna consciousness, those in accounts of experiential spirituality are widely appreciated and loved by not just the devotee community but even by new readers.
So experiences which are based on scriptures need to be presented that way. So that's why some ISKCON leaders or ISKCON devotees may write books about their own experiences, their autobiographies and their other experiences and these are important because they are the primary way in which people can be reached out to and so that is the paradigm. So we have to address the paradigm.
For example, in the Bhagavad Gita itself, Krishna never goes about systematically proving the existence of God because God himself is speaking. There is no need for him to prove his own existence there but Shri Prabhupada went to good effort of effort to prove the existence of God. So the point is that the paradigm of the times when Prabhupada was preaching was largely atheistic.
So similarly, we need to be sensitive to the paradigm of our times and present Krishna consciousness accordingly and thirdly, every generation has its idiom. Idiom means the words that are used, the style, the language. Now during Shri Prabhupada's times, the way in which language was used was very different from the way the language is used today.
Significantly different, not very but significantly different. One standard example of the way usage has changed is say 30-40 years ago, the word gay meant just cheerful. Somebody said I went to a gay party.
I said oh it was a jolly party. Today the word gay means something entirely different. So Shri Prabhupada frequently uses the word cult in his writings.
Now the word cult during Shri Prabhupada's times was having a very value neutral connotation. It just meant a group of people and Shri Prabhupada would say that the cult of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, the cult of Krishna consciousness. Now actually speaking, the word cult today has extremely negative connotation and if actually we come to the temple and associate with devotees, we will see that it is not at all a cult.
It is a culture but still the idea is that Shri Prabhupada used the word cult in his writings and many people can misunderstand that. So we need to present everything in a contemporary language. If not everything, at least those things which are likely to be misunderstood.
So the presenting in the contemporary idiom is extremely important. So for example, today if somebody uses the male pronoun in their writings, that is considered sexist writing. It is considered ethnocentric writing.
It is considered as male centric writing and no publisher worth his might will publish any book or any writing which uses gender specific writings. So if you want to use, refer to humanity, we have to refer not he but we have to use he or she or one or we have to refer we and people who do not do this are considered either male chauvinistic or hopelessly outdated. So we need to present our writings in contemporary language.
So contemporary language would mean using gender neutral rough pronouns. So that is very important. So in this way the meanings of words has changed.
So that is why actually speaking now for example the meaning of the word cult. Now there are historical events that happened. There was one so-called Christian preacher named Jim Jones who got 900 of his followers to commit mass suicide in Guyana in Jonestown and that whole community was completely cut off from the whole world.
So from that time, so his organization was considered to be a cult and from that time, from that event and events like that, the word cult has acquired a very terribly negative connotation. So there are many words like that which need to be clarified and contextualized so that people are not put off. For example, actually Prabhupada uses the word rascal.
Now if you look at 1920, 1930th century English, rascal was not a very strong word of derogation. It was basically sometimes in Hindi, so it's basically affectionate way of chastising a person. So like a rascal, what are you doing? But today if you use the word rascal, it's considered a aggressive and offensive profanity.
So therefore, now this word comes frequently in Sri Prabhupada's books. So we need to present the message in a way that is sensitive, relevant and appealing to the contemporary generation and doing this is the responsibility of the writers of that generation. If we don't do this, then we as representatives of Sri Prabhupada are failing him in continuing on his legacy, in continuing on and presenting and representing the message that he has given us to spread.
So therefore, we need to do this. So I mentioned three reasons over here. First is Prabhupada's instruction.
Second is to be considered a living tradition and third is to properly present and represent our message in the contemporary generations. Ethos, paradigm and idiom. Now another point here is that the idea that Prabhupada is the last writer is an idea that freezes the parampara.
When Prabhupada came not to terminate or freeze the parampara, Prabhupada came to perpetuate the parampara. So ultimately speaking, there is very little difference essentially between the idea that Prabhupada should be the last writer and the idea of certain group of his con devotees that Prabhupada should be the last guru. So why? Because Prabhupada alone is pure enough to be a guru.
Then we can say Prabhupada alone is pure enough to be the only writer. Then why we stop at writing? You know, if every activity requires purity, then Prabhupada alone is pure enough to give classes. So let's stop having all Bhagavatam classes in the temples.
Let's have only every day, only the recordings of Srila Prabhupada. First of all, Prabhupada did not want that. Prabhupada wanted his disciples to give classes just as he wanted his disciples to write books.
But try doing that. If you try doing that, how many people will come for Bhagavatam classes? Or even those who are regularly attending, how many of them will be enlivened? Because a tradition continues on through its, it gets its inspiration from its predecessors, but it's a substantial amount of the inspiration comes also from its living practitioners. Or we can go further and say that, oh, you know, even to sing the holy names, you need purity.
So who is pure enough to sing the holy names? Therefore, all kirtans should be only by Prabhupada. All the guru puja, mangal aarti, all the aartis, all the kirtans, we should have only Prabhupada dhun. No other dhuns except those sung by Prabhupada and no other kirtans.
We can go forward and then we can say who is pure enough to worship the deity? Only Prabhupada. So what do we do? Do we stop worshiping the deity? And then we can say actually who is pure enough to practice devotional service? Only Prabhupada is the devotee and all of us are. We cannot be devotees because we are not pure enough.
We cannot practice devotional service also. And what do we do? We stay materialistic. So it would lead to a disaster, this reasoning, this kind of reasoning.
And it is very antithetical to the spirit of the tradition. The spirit of the tradition is that there are certainly the priya satcharas exalted and their position should never be minimized or they should not be displaced. So when devotees write books, they never have the idea that their books are better than Prabhupada's books or their books are going to replace the Prabhupada's books.
Their idea essentially is that they are writing books to help souls of their generation come to Shilaprabhupada's lotus feet. So they are building bridges so that Prabhupada's message can reach out to people and people can reach out to Prabhupada's shelter. And as scorned devotees, we should be trained, we should be training ourselves and we should be training those whom we come in contact with and they need to maintain a balance between reading Prabhupada's books and reading other books.
Our primary reading should be Shilaprabhupada's books and according to our specific need, if we are going to do scientific preaching, then we may need to read some books by devotee scientists. If we are going to do some management seminars, now what is better? Is it better that devotees read books by non-devotees on spirituality and leadership and management or is it better that devotees themselves write some books on this topic and other devotees can use that? So as our tradition grows, what should be done is that all the subjects on which devotees need to interact with the non-devotional world, devotees should have books on all those topics. So tomorrow, if somebody has to speak to an audience of biologists, of say gynecologists, then devotees should have books on systematically explaining how abortion is wrong and how scientifically and logically established that the embryo in the womb is alive and that way those who are interacting there will be able to be able to get deeper into that sort of area of preaching.
So here we are talking about especially for, if we have that tradition, consider the tradition as a circle, then outside the tradition is the contemporary generation and in all the areas where the tradition interfaces with the contemporary generation, all those areas devotees should have books written from a devotional perspective having got inspiration from Srila Prabhupada's books. So we can have books on self-help, we can have books on health and spirituality, self-help and spirituality, science and spirituality, management and spirituality, politics and spirituality, economics and spirituality, history and spirituality, culture and spirituality, diet and spirituality and by spirituality we are not referring to some generic vague spirituality, we are referring to Krishna consciousness here. So actually our tradition should become richer and richer in terms of offering people more and more avenues to come to Krishna through food, through culture, through medicine, through science, through history, through geography, whatever, different ways like that.
So that is one genre of writing that is very important. Another genre of writing that devotees may do is that they may also take systematic concepts within our tradition, take specific concepts within our tradition and explain them more exhaustively. For example, the essential teaching of Bhoj Chetana Mahaprabhu is Achaitya Veda Veda.
Now what exactly is Achaitya Veda Veda and how it compares with other schools of thought, that can be explained systematically. So one could be that one kind of books are that for the tradition to spread outwards further. Another kind of writing could be for our tradition to, for our contemporary generation of devotees to understand our tradition better.
So that kind of books are also needed. For example, Bhoj Chetana Mahaprabhu wrote a book on Bhagavad Gita called Surrender Unto Me and that has helped many devotees to understand Bhagavad Gita better. And similarly, different devotees may write different books.
So Shivaram Maharaj has written a series of books called Krishna in Vrindavan and that is helping devotees to understand the beauty and the sweetness of Krishna in a more intimate and appealing way. Of course, that is an advanced book and that should be read after one has read the basic books of Prabhupada and after one is taking guidance from one's senior devotees. But the point is, we are, this is making the tradition accessible to the practicing devotees also and this is also important.
So in this way, writing is extremely essential and rather than discouraging writing and writers, we need to train devotees that they should not become nectar hunters who are just searching for new stuff or which is the new book that has come out, which is the new article that has come out. Yes, they can read new books and new articles but they should also have some specific standard time which should actually be the major time of their reading for reading Shilpa Prabhupada's books and along with that they can read others also. So if some devotees get inspiration from a particular speaker or a particular writer, we cannot legislate or outlaw inspiration.
Yes, if that devotee gets inspiration from a particular writer, from a particular speaker, that's wonderful but that inspiration should also be channelized to study Shilpa Prabhupada's books because ultimately that devotee, writer or speaker is also getting his inspiration from Shilpa Prabhupada's books and in this way, we can actually preserve the legacy that Shilpa Prabhupada has given us both in the form of the books that he has given us that the books stay the central focus of study for the practicing devotees and also that the message within the books becomes more available to a larger number of people through bridge books that the devotees of the current generation write. Actually speaking, if we look at the Christian tradition, Christian authors write thousands and thousands of books and by these thousands of books which they write, what happens is that it doesn't cut into their Bible distribution. More people who would never have read a Bible, if they read a book about Bible and science, then they get to read on.
Bible contains some scientific also, let me read the Bible also. So when generally speaking, the writings of these authors don't cut into the reading of the Bible, actually it expands the reading of the Bible. Similarly, when devotee authors write books, it doesn't cut into the reading of Shilpa Prabhupada's books, rather it expands the reading of Shilpa Prabhupada's books.
So that's why we do need to have every generation of devotees writing books. So that we are following Shilpa Prabhupada's instruction, our tradition remains respectable in the eyes of contemporary intellectuals and our message is presented in a way that is sensitive, relevant and appealing to the ethos, paradigm and the idiom of the contemporary generation and along with that we need to train devotees so that they don't go about nectar hunting, they focus on Prabhupada's books and they use other books either to understand specific concepts within the tradition or to find out specific ways by which they can reach out to others in the tradition, reach out to others in the contemporary world using the tradition. Thank you.