When staying silent amidst injustice is wrong, why did Yudhishthira passively accept the Kauravas’ atrocities?
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Transcript
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Hare Krishna right and wrong are not just matters of black and white sometimes we think of morality as categorical categorical means this is right and this is wrong this is the category of right this is the category of wrong but morality is not categorical it is contextual it means between truth and truth is right but if some rioters are coming kill someone that person hide them in our house and the rioters ask should we speak the truth at that time no that will be wrong so the Mahabharata explains that right and wrong are determined not predetermined as categories there is intent there is content and there is consequence all three determine what is right and what is wrong intent, why am I doing it content, what am I doing and consequence, what is the result of that all these three determine all these three combine to determine what is right and what is wrong so yes at one level maunam samprati nakshatam when somebody is doing something wrong and we stay silent at that time we also become participants in doing that wrong so yes we can also become culpable by that that is true at one level but at another level we all have to choose our battles choose our battles means that we have to decide which battle is going to be productive otherwise there are so many things which are going wrong in life if we try to fight and correct every wrong that we see our energy can dissipate so we all have to choose our battles this is what I do this is what I aspire to do I have the resources to do it and I can be effective in this I can make a tangible contribution of my life so choosing our battles is vital to be productive otherwise we dissipate our time and energy Yudhishthir is actually choosing his battles so Yudhishthir he when the wrong is happening he is thinking not just of what is good for him but he is thinking of the greater good of the whole good dynasty and he says yes they are trying to kill us right now they are trying to do so much wrong but if we just step out of their way at least there will be avoidance of animosity and violence amongst our families Yudhishthir, he tried to lead as well as he could so that he there was not aggravation of violence sometimes something we may say is right but even that right leads to wrong consequence and isn’t he right you see that in the Daksha Yajna when Daksha Bajapati disrespected Shiva at that time Shiva has cursed the followers of Daksha and the whole arena became curses and counter curses and everything was devastation so now sometimes we say if my spiritual master is for the followers of Shiva Shiva is the spiritual master but he was insulted we have to counter it yes we have to counter it but countering doesn’t mean that we just have unnecessary reactions we should respond in a way that makes things better not worse somebody will say is is having some misconception say somebody says that oh you say that Chandra Mahaprabhu is Krishna but Krishna is known to everyone Krishna is understood to be God Chandra Mahaprabhu is God how can you say Chandra Mahaprabhu is God and somebody just says Brahma says anyone who sees any difference between Gaurachandra and Krishna that person will burn in the fire of hell for one million years Brahma doesn’t say this suppose somebody goes like this now what is happening is the consequence will be positive no that person needs understanding from them so what is right or what is wrong has to be decided according to the consequence and sometimes like Prabhupada once he was asked why do you people carry sticks because people were completely ignorant in the west they had no idea so why do you carry sticks Prabhupada said to keep away the dogs Prabhupada would go on morning walks in America when he would walk around he would greet people good morning they would say why don’t you say Hare Krishna they would not understand Hare Krishna they would wonder what is this so if you are greeting people can you see that other person you don’t have to say good morning you can say Hare Krishna so what is right and wrong so Krishna was basically acting in a way which he felt would minimize the probability of the aggravation of the conflict so yes being passive about his injustice is not a right thing to do but just being reactionary about his injustice that may also not be the right thing to do because that will lead to further aggravation so in content his action was to be passive but in intent his intent was that he wanted to minimize the chances of aggravation of the conflict and that time he was trying to deal with that situation because he found that Pandavas are not changing their ways and he also resorted to violence