Why does Prabhupada glorify kaitava dharma by talking about how dharma produces artha?

Hare Krishna, question, why does Prabhupada glorify kaitava dharma by talking about how dharma leads to artha? He says that I started with 40 rupees and now I have more than 40 crore rupees. So therefore serving Krishna is very good business. So isn't this basically the material aparadharma of dharma, artha, kama, moksha and the Bhagavatam which is aparadharma, calls all this as kaitava dharma and gives it up, Bhagavatam is paradharma.

So why does Prabhupada talk about this? Answer, Prabhupada said that devotees are spiritual opportunists. That means they use every opportunity to serve Krishna and they use every opportunity to help people to come closer to Krishna. So this was simply Prabhupada's spiritual entrepreneurship, a spiritual opportunism being used.

Now opportunism is not necessarily negative sense because if people are suffering in material existence, they are brought closer to Krishna, they are inspired to take the devotional service of Krishna, then that is always auspicious, that is always beneficial and that's what Prabhupada was doing. And this is also according to scripture because येन केन प्रकारेण मनः क्रिष्ण निवेश येत that येन केन प्रकारेण, somehow or the other fix the mind on Krishna. So Prabhupada writes in his Nectar of Devotion, which is the rendition of Rupa Goswami's Bhakti Samvatsindhu that the spiritual master needs to invent new means to get people, invent the right means to get people to fix their mind on Krishna.

So now Prabhupada attracted people in this way because he wanted to get people to take Krishna seriously. You are interested in money, yes, you will get money also, why not take Krishna seriously? But if they came, if they started taking Krishna seriously, they would read Prabhupada's books and they would understand the Paradharma also. So this is, if we can somehow inspire people to practice Dharma, practice the Paradharma, then whatever means we use, they themselves may not be directly the supreme Dharma, but they will get people towards Paradharma.

We see this strategy, Prabhupada uses elsewhere also. He would inspire the American disciples to take to devotional service and he would say all of you are Americans, Americans are praised all over the world. Why don't you take to, why don't you take to Bhakti? Then everyone else will take to Bhakti.

So Prabhupada once told them that you are not the body, so you are not Americans, but then if their pride in being Americans can be used to inspire them to practice Bhakti, then why not use it? So now nationalism is at one level, you could say some level of Upadharma, but if that can be used, then why not the Paradharma of Dharma leading to Artha, that's Karmakand, that's Vedic actually, it's bona fide, although it's not the highest. And Prabhupada used the same thing in India also. When he would say, Indians, this Bhagavad Gita is your message, people all over the world are learning it, people all over the world are teaching it, but you Indians don't want to take it up, you don't want to teach it to others.

How regrettable, how unfortunate is it? And this is what actually Krishna also does. Krishna, we see that, he tells in 2.13, Arjuna, you are not the body of the soul. And then immediately in 2.14, he states that, He says, now he's using two words, Kaunteya and Bharata, both are connected with bodily designations.

You are the son of Kaunteya and descendant of, in the Bharata dynasty. So, just now Krishna has told Arjuna, you are not the body. Then why is he bringing this in immediately? Because we all have a sense of honor based on our connections with others whom we respect as honorable.

And those honorable connections inspire us to act honorably. So, Krishna is using, dovetailing Arjuna's sense of honor coming from his bodily connections to make him act in the way of his Paradharma. So, in terms of Siddhanta, the Paradharma is not being confused by Srila Prabhupada or by Krishna or by anyone else in the tradition.

But in terms of Sadhana, in terms of, not exactly Sadhana, but the means, the means by which people can be inspired to approach, to live that Siddhanta, that can vary according to time, place and circumstance. So, Srila Prabhupada is using as a starting impetus to get people to take Krishna to Krishna seriously. He is offering this example of the potency of devotional service.

That even from the point, even if you are interested in Artha, that will also work. Dharma, Artha, Kama, Moksha, that sort of thing. But then, if they come and read his books, then they will understand the real working is not getting Artha, it is getting Paramartha.

It is getting a Paradharma of Prema-Pumartha-Mahan. So, initially, for attracting and inspiring people to practice Dharma, their material conceptions, their material aspirations can also be utilized. So, otherwise, they will not even begin practicing Bhakti.

So, what Srila Prabhupada is doing is not compromising the Paradharma, not as he glorifying the Paradharma, but he is using people's interest in certain things to get them towards Krishna, so that they can practice the Paradharma. Thank you. Hare Krishna.