Youth QA on bhakti philosophy

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
The first point to understand is that they are all one person It’s one person but many personalities Many personalities What this means is that Now we need to do the example of God and Govind Now the thing is that the same person cannot be simultaneously in Govind But God can be in the same person So with respect to objective You know the term objective and subjective Objective means what is measurable Oh this person is 5.5 feet tall, this person is 6.5 feet tall That is objective Oh this is such a lovely person I don’t like this person But like me this person is subjective So in the relationship with the God There is an objective aspect and that is the Tattva So in terms of philosophy Ram and Krishna and Vishnu They are all the supreme Lord And worshipping any of them Can give us liberation So in terms of Tattva all of them are supreme Now in terms of many personalities this is subjective And in this there is Rasa Rasa means it’s an experience Like say if you take Amaras Mango juice I remember I had a mango juice This is my favourite drink It’s nice but I have to drink something else That’s all subjectivity about it So in the Gita of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu There are pieces, there is a story of his great devotee He was completely devoted to Lord Rama And some of the devotees to Chaitanya Mahaprabhu Krishna is greater Krishna, I want to worship Krishna He says, I can’t my mind is fixed on Lord Rama He comes to Chaitanya Mahaprabhu Chaitanya Mahaprabhu is actually a priest This is how fixed you are in your devotion Glorious in the devotion to the Lord So Lord Chaitanya appreciated that So I don’t think we should go too much in the domain of Krishna is superior and Ram is inferior The thing is that both of them are supreme Lord Krishna is superior as such that Ram does not Does that make Ram, Krishna superior, Ram inferior? No, they both should be It’s just that these particular mellows It’s what Krishna animates So there is the bhed and abhed Bhed means there is a ripples Abhed means there are no ripples So it’s important that at our level So there is the abhed Abhed means no ripples And bhed means there is ripples So objectively there is no difference between all these manifestations So objectively there is a difference And the reality is both are there So if we find that Sometimes unnecessarily the bhed can be emphasised That is agitated in our mind So don’t focus too much on that Know that they are the same person And Lord Ram is also attractive, supremely attractive And those who worship him can also be attractive How to teach the materialist or relatives in our life To ask to give up To not offer to Krishna and do material things This is for all of us In our practise of bhakti In bhakti practise There are certain things which are non-negotiable And there are certain things which are negotiable Like for example Now all of you are there But you are going to call a GP or a surgeon at that moment It depends If you want you can But if you want to be a… That is not necessary We live in a particular cultural environment And we don’t know if people are going to go unnecessarily suspicious Or hostile or whatever Then there is no need to So now some of you can go people Some of you can take your time When you come to the sacred place It’s nice if you are in the holy book But it’s not that you stop in the holy book It’s not like that But if you say I don’t want to worship Krishna I am a devotee I don’t believe in Krishna but I am a devotee So there are certain activities If I am saying I am a Krishna devotee Then I say I don’t believe in Krishna So in bhakti there are negotiable and non-negotiable Activities And we would like to Follow Nadi Astrology as possible But we shouldn’t make some of the things Say if our relatives tell us This food is not our religion And then there is a big fight in the home And because there is a fight in the home Then they say you know you are being fanatical You are not taking the bhakti and you are not worshipping Krishna And everything becomes a huge mess Then that’s not required It’s better that you go and thank your Krishna And other things are negotiable So generally speaking If they are polite and respectful You say that I am born with the principles I am born with the tradition I offer my food to you You can go and offer the food Certain additions can be done So rather than simply saying that this is a material thing I am not doing We have to keep things in perspective So it’s like for doing a thing of second level importance We should not create such a big agitation of mind That we can’t go first level I hope this principle is clear Say like I was in Bangladesh with my parents Now in Bangladesh also we have devotees But now there are Hindu areas where we can go And we treat them nicely But if we go into Muslim areas and start treating them over there We will have to preach to them They are going to get very agitated And maybe they will become our attackers So then what will we do? We would like to preach to everyone But in that particular situation I am going to cost them their liberty So now if the Muslims themselves are interested That’s a good thing But we all have a function in particular societies Particular societies, particular contexts So we have to use our intelligence To see how best we can function In a particular basis We don’t want to disturb Otherwise we can move on Is it finished? Any questions? You can read out I have a question I have a question Like in the past we have seen many gurus like Bhagwan Sahadev, Ramana Sahadev, Lord Buddha, Chaitanya Mahaprabhu So how can we infer that the philosophy Chaitanya Mahaprabhu gave is the best philosophy And if it is the best philosophy Then what about the gurus like Bhagwan Sahadev, Lord Buddha, Ramana Sahadev How will they get impressed by God? Ok See, there is a difference between Something being the best And something being categorically rubbish There are two differences It’s like If you consider Mahabharata This is spiritual consciousness at the top of the mountain This is material consciousness at the bottom of the mountain This is spiritual consciousness at the top of the mountain Now there can be different paths Up the mountain Somebody who says Only my path will take you up the mountain Well, not necessarily But somebody says all paths will take you up the mountain Not necessarily, some paths will take you down into the valley also Some paths will just go round and round the mountain So basically Basically in spiritual paths We can have two extremes One is what is called as exclusivist Exclusivist is the idea that We have exclusive rights to God If we don’t follow our path We are going to go to hell Now exclusivism is generally in power Because of an exclusivist They also become, some of them They become extremists Have you heard of extremists? So extremists are actually kinder than exclusivists They say, not only are you going to go to hell We’ll help you get there faster So this is exclusivism And the Vedic tradition is not exclusivist Krishna doesn’t say that The Mahayana or the Ayurveda says To all people of my past You know the other extreme is To say feudalist Feudalist means basically All paths are right Like we say, all paths are right A more common notion in India Is that all paths lead to the same goal Now if literally if I do All paths lead to the same goal Prabhupada will ask this question I don’t know the verse but Krishna says All paths lead to the same goal Prabhupada says, if that’s very true Then why does Krishna have to speak the Gita? Whatever Arjuna does, he will talk to Krishna Whether he finds it or not, whatever he does Krishna speaks the Gita The communists have to go for action And not the communists have to go for action So clearly Krishna is not the extreme So here basically what is happening is This goes down to relativism Relativism means you believe what you want And feudalism, often the Hindu tradition Is thought to be feudalism but it is not Now in between these two Is inclusivism Inclusivism means that there is One purpose That includes many paths Not all paths but many paths Like if you go back over here The one purpose is to go to the top of the mountain That one purpose can include many paths You can go up this way, you can go up this way So basically The broad Vedic tradition is inclusivist It does say for example There are certain actions which will take us away from God There are certain actions which will take us Towards various conditions It is not that all paths lead to the same There are different choices and they have different consequences That come with those choices So we do acknowledge that there are multiple paths of the mind And what does it mean by relativism? Outside the Vedic tradition Prabhupada said Jesus is our Guru Because he has so much love for God That he is ready to give up his life to save others So there can be spiritual growth That can happen through paths Outside the Vedic tradition also This is what he said So now when we are going up the mountain Each particular path Might have its features That there are 4 paths up a mountain Or 10 paths up a mountain Somebody wants to go to Mount Everest There are different paths And does that mean all paths are the same Not necessarily One path is more accessible in summer One path is more accessible in winter One path is more accessible in other places It depends So when we say that the Gopiyan tradition Viva Janan Mahaprabhu Is special That does not mean that people are not following the Shri Sankur Daya or Mahadasha Sankur Daya They follow a level of love for God completely At the same time this is a particular path of the mountain Where there are certain features Which are especially Which especially makes Duryodhana accessible There is the Mahashtra of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu By which we get a very clear view of the top Sometimes we are going up the top But the path is shrouded by heavy people You can’t see the top But here there is a clear vision of the divine Loving relationship of God That particular vision of divinity Is not so clear in other religions And in Harinam Sankirtan That particular way of worshipping the Lord Is clearly accessible to Ram Singh That is special when given by Mahaprabhu There are some special features that are there over there And they are important But that doesn’t mean that everything else is wrong Thank you How do we keep faith in Parampara Like Bhagwan Maharaj coming from Himalayas And giving chanting other than Hare Krishna Mahavandhra like Radhe Radhe So how should I increase faith in Srila Prabhupada And understand which Parampara is authorised So Generally whenever there is Any particular spirituality There is a lot of For those who are here from that culture There is a lot of personal Emotion invested So my focus here would be on a specific feature And our principle Spiritual influence Cultural influence Devotional influence These are all different things There could be Some teacher Who sings very nice kirtans Who inspires people to work in their religion And in any way Some are fearing some of the chantings of Krishna That is good, that is to be ambitious In this world so many material things Someone is inspiring someone to chant the name of the Lord Or the words of the Lord So that is one perspective of the thing That People are being elevated Now the other perspective is That say A parent has two children One of them is very good This will get 90% marks The other is too aged too And gets 40% marks So now the results have come And both of them have got 65% Now what will happen is The parent will say For one who has come from 40-60% Well done Well done But the other child will say What have you done? Now why the difference? Both of you got the same marks Yes, both of you got the same marks But you come from different places But 90-65% is not very good But 40-65% is great So for somebody who is not chanting any name For them to chant the name of the Lord is great But anybody from 40-65% At the same time The challenge is that When somebody is Teaching something in many other traditions Across India A thing is often enriched Without going to the Lord So that means the same teachers Who talk about bhakti and chanting of the holy name And glorifying the Lord at one moment At another moment, at another session They talk that he is a Bhagwan and he knows nothing But he wants to give it to the Lord So that is not the nature of a bhakti tradition If the devotee doesn’t want to Merge with the Lord Bhakti means There is no urge to merge There is no urge to merge But unfortunately Many of the teachers They talk about bhakti But at another time they talk about impersonalism They talk about how we are all Bhagwans So the precise philosophical teachings We demand And in general If we focus on Shatrughna We get philosophical clarity And then if there are particular spiritual teachers With their families following them Then at a one to one level We can talk with our particular spiritual teacher And if they don’t know, we can talk with their senior We can ask them to tell us something Who knows their particular philosophical tradition And then we can talk specifically I don’t like to learn Shatrughna But I want to understand philosophy I don’t feel much enthusiasm studying scriptures Rather I enthusiastically do kirtan, dance Sir and Chand, are you enjoyed? What should I do? Well, if you are attracted to something In the Krishna Tantra, that’s fine Just make sure that what you are attracted to You do it steadily Somehow or other it’s going to happen If you are attracted to serving That’s suspicious So that will help us grow At the same time, in any relationship A part of the relationship Is that you put the other person first That means When we enter into a relationship with someone Sometimes we may have to do certain things Which we don’t like to do Which we have to do for the pleasure of that person The same principle applies here So, we don’t have to memorise the law of Shlokas But if you want to understand philosophy You need to study over here The key thing is, rather than thinking I don’t like Or I like their likes We don’t have to be like our likes What do I mean? That our likes can also go on We don’t have to be Our likes can also go on So rather than thinking I don’t like philosophy Or I don’t like Shlokas Try to associate with devotees who love Shlokas And try to understand what is the sweetness in that What do you get in that? And then what happens is Sometimes we think Say I am here And say a Shloka book is here So most of the time We think of desire As linear Linear means that we see an object And we get a desire from that object But quite often Desires are actually Triangular What does that mean? That if somebody else loves Shlokas Then seeing that We get the desire Goes in the direction of Shlokas So in most visible things Say if you pass by a sweet shop You get a desire to eat But in many things Desires don’t come immediately How many people pass by a gym And think I have to go work out But if they see a friend who is going to the gym And coming out as a person and become very fit There is nothing very healthy So the desire comes not just by seeing an exercise It is seen by somebody who is exercising So like that Try to see in your circle if there are any devotees who like Shlokas Try to see in your circle some devotees Who love the philosophy Especially if you can connect with those devotees Then it is not bad What is the reason you get into this? What is it that you are attracted to? And by that It is much easier for you To connect to that love that you have inside So It’s coming Is it coming now? Please go ahead How can we define 40%, 50% and so on On the level of Bhakti As we say if we finish as 40% in this life And we start from 41% in the next life Yes We cannot define like that It’s just an example given Bhakti is not mathematical But mathematics can give us some pointer The examples given are Shakha, Chandranya Shakha is basically branches Chandra is moon So Shakha, Chandranya means This small child here And mother wants to give the child a tree Sorry a moon Now there is a tree over here and maybe there are branches here Forgive my drawing So now if there is a moon over here Now what happens is The child is shown this branch And in between the branches Can you see the shining object Now the child says I will climb on that tree Well no Although the moon appears to be between the branches The moon is very far away So like that material metaphors can be used They point us towards the ideal The principle is that If we have developed an attraction for Krishna That attraction will not be lost We will find attraction manifesting rapidly In the next life and will continue from that point onwards How to deal with juniors, peers, seniors and spiritual masters With juniors we try to be kind to them We try to help them as much as we can With peers we try to share and learn We try to share realisations With seniors we take guidance Generally with respect to the spiritual masters We offer them our respects And we look forward to that opportunity Next question In which ashram is it easy to develop The aim of Krishna’s asceticism That’s all In Ajamila’s story Yantra das came to take soul to hell For punishing the soul because of his sinful activities What is the purpose of punishment What is the purpose of punishment Some of you may take this question As a punishment now Generally speaking The Mahabharata describes That whenever there is a punishment There are three purposes of the punishment So if you consider Say there is a victim There is a victim There is a victimiser And there are other people So these are the three stakeholders In any activity that is involved So generally speaking Say any crime happens So there are three purposes For the victimiser There has to be some retribution Retribution means That you hurt someone You need to be punished I’ll explain why For the victim there has to be some reparation Reparation means you were hurt So there is a compensation for that And for the society There has to be regulation Regulation means If one person commits crime And they get away with it Then what will happen Others will be closed to crime So society has to be regulated So the purpose of punishing Around the world Is to broadly serve these three purposes That when the ghost of ghosts Doesn’t listen to what you say You try to translate this into English What happens? The ghost of ghosts don’t learn by words It doesn’t make any sense But the point is that There are some people who just don’t learn by words So they are not being punished So the purpose of hell Is to give one particular purpose Retribution For those who are not going to learn They are taken away from the rest of society So that they don’t become a bad influence for society They don’t become a bad example for others They don’t continue to harm others And then the consequences of their actions are given to them That becomes a part of their learning process And that alone will not be enough But that’s an essential part of their learning process If it is for purification Does our soul come back to the material world And forgets everything Then what is the purpose of punishing our souls in hell? Well The whole universe Is like a university And the whole purpose of this university It’s a university of adversity Adversity means distress, pain So in this It is adversity that makes us turn towards God Makes us think, what am I supposed to do? Is there some other purpose to life? So university of adversity Now, while this world is a place of trouble And everybody is adamant to go towards Krishna But There are some people who cause More trouble than others in this world Krishna wants order to be established in this world also So If you consider the world to be like a hospital And the purpose of a hospital is that everybody should be discharged Then they become healthy and they go back But if somebody is disruptive in a hospital Then what will happen is They will be taken out of the hospital They also will be treated But at that particular time, maybe they have to put in a restricted ward You know sometimes If the mental health care centre is there And some people are just going mad and panic and all violent Then they are put confined In particular places Where this is not common So, hell Even that is within the hospital Like solitary confinement or solitary cell Or whatever you need is there That is also in the hospital But that is for patients who are so violent That is a normal function in the hospital So, hell is like that So, they have to come out of that The doctors are giving normal treatment And gradually they become weak and they come out So, thank you very much for your patience I guess we have any more questions If any So, we will have sessions in the future also And we can talk at that time So, thank you very much for your helpful participation Shabnam Gopal Nithyanandam Jai Jai Jai Jai Jai Jai Jai Jai Jai Jai Jai Jai Jai Jai