Conservative means

Expressions researched:
"Conservative means"

1972 Conversations and Morning Walks

Conservative means unnecessarily you catch some rules and regulation without any meaning or without any utility. That is conservative. In Sanskrit it is called niyamāgraha.

Room Conversation -- June 29, 1972, San Diego:

Ātreya Ṛṣi: Yes. That's the difference between Your Divine Grace and all these other bhogīs. They make it according to the taste of the people. They change. That's why this movement is so solid: no compromise.

Prabhupāda: No. Why compromise? My Guru Mahārāja never made any compromise.

Ātreya Ṛṣi: Compromise means you have some material attachment.

Prabhupāda: Yes. Compromise means you don't want real business, but you want some money by cheating and by bluffing. That's all. That is compromise. If I aim . . . just like this Mahesh Yogi is doing: "Yes, God has given you senses, why should you not enjoy? You simply enjoy. You simply give me thirty-five dollars, I'll give you a special mantra." (laughter)

And here, Allen Ginsberg told me, "Swāmījī, you are very conservative." I said that, "I am the most lenient. I'm not conservative. You are conservative. You cannot give up your bad habits. I am very liberal, and accepting everyone. But you are . . . because you are conservative, you cannot give up your bad habits; therefore you deny to come to my camp. I am very liberal."

Ātreya Ṛṣi: A Vaiṣṇava is conservative with Kṛṣṇa and liberal with everybody else.

Prabhupāda: That is not conservative. Conservative means unnecessarily catching something. That is conservative. If you try to protect your life, will anyone say: "You are very conservative. I wanted to kill you, and you want to keep your life"? Is that conservatism? Do you think?

Ātreya Ṛṣi: No.

Prabhupāda: And if the murderer thinks that, "You are very conservative. I wanted to kill you and you did not allow," that is not conservative. That is self-preservation, that is not conservative.

Conservative means unnecessarily you catch some rules and regulation without any meaning or without any utility. That is conservative. That is . . . in Sanskrit it is called niyamāgraha.

1977 Conversations and Morning Walks

Conservative means fanatical.

Room Conversation -- January 30, 1977, Bhuvanesvara:

Prabhupāda: That is good. The first, beginning, let them come. Let them sit down, chant Hare Kṛṣṇa and take prasādam. In Iran we are doing that. Gradually it is becoming interesting. You had been in our Iran, Tehran?

Pṛthu-putra: Yes I went there also some time, a long time ago. But Iran is a different concept. They're not so strict about following the Koran. For example, these Arabic countries like Algeria, Libya and Egypt and Tunisia, they don't recognize Iran like being part of them. Iran and Turkey and Afghanistan they think is another Muslim world. For example, in Iran there is much more Sufis, it is a different . . . but in these Arabic countries like Egypt, they're really conservative. They're very strict.

Prabhupāda: Yes. Conservative means fanatical.

Pṛthu-putra: Fanatical, yes, that's the word. So my idea, when I went there . . . because I have an Arabic boy who is translating. So I have one Śrī Īśopaniṣad completely translated into Arabics which can be printed.

Prabhupāda: So print.

Pṛthu-putra: But it's a very specific work. So my idea was to print something more like Topmost Yoga System for a first try, or Easy Journey to Other Planets for a first try . . .

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Pṛthu-putra: . . . to like approach. Because Śrī Īśopaniṣad is too specific for them.

Prabhupāda: Specific and little strict.

Pṛthu-putra: So I have one boy in Paris who is translating for me. He is coming regularly to the temple, he chants, and he's coming every Sunday or sometimes three or four times a week.

Prabhupāda: Somebody, some Arabian boy, translated?

Pṛthu-putra: Yes. (break)

Prabhupāda: . . . people do not know. So we are preaching for them, "It is fortunate that you accept God, you know God." So in this way. (chuckles) Actually that is the fact. Mostly, eighty percent of the population, they are atheists, all. The Muslims, they are not atheist.