Prabhupāda: Bilvamaṅgala Ṭhākura, in his previous life, he elevated himself to the loving stage of Kṛṣṇa. Not exactly, just previous, bhāva. It is called bhāva, ecstasy. But some way or other, he could not finish, so according to the instruction of Bhagavad-gītā, he was given birth to a nice brāhmaṇa family. (aside:) You can call that Bengali lady. She can hear. So very rich. Śucīnāṁ śrīmatāṁ gehe (BG 6.41), in that way. Rich family, at the same time, brāhmaṇa family. But richness, generally, sometimes glide down to wine, women, and intoxication. So by bad company he became woman-hunter, prostitute-hunter. So he was too much addicted to one woman, Cintāmaṇi. So his father died, and he was... He did not marry. In your country it is called girlfriend, and in our country it is called prostitute. So he was that about that prostitute, Cintāmaṇi. So he was performing the rituals, but he was thinking of his girlfriend, that Cintāmaṇi, "When I shall go there?" Bilvamaṅgala Ṭhākura? Yes. So he asked his servants, "Give me some food. I shall go to Cintāmaṇi." So anyway, he performed... Did not perform. His mind was there. He took some nice foodstuff, and when he went, there was a big river, and it was raining heavily, and the river was flooded.
Flood (Conversations)
Conversations and Morning Walks
1969 Conversations and Morning Walks
1970 Conversations and Morning Walks
Prabhupāda: He also went through in Maharastra by His chanting, (indistinct)
Haṁsadūta: And most important, Prabhupāda has presented Bhagavad-gītā. He calls it "Bhagavad-gītā As It Is." He explains in the introduction that till now there's been so many Bhagavad-gitas printed in all languages and all of them are misrepresenting. They have not presented Bhagavad-gītā as it is. They are trying to present Bhagavad-gītā without Kṛṣṇa. They want to leave out the speaker of Bhagavad-gītā and put themselves forward. So Prabhupāda has presented Bhagavad-gītā As It Is and therefore this movement has taken such hold because the real thing is being presented. This is in San Francisco, California. Then, the Nectar of Devotion, Rūpa Gosvāmī's book Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu, also there. This book is the lawbook of devotional service. Īśopaniṣad, word for word translation, then the complete English translation and purport by His Divine Grace. So these books are (indistinct) bhakti-yoga (indistinct) Kṛṣṇa consciousness (indistinct) explaining the chanting of the Hare Kṛṣṇa mantra. So we have so much literature. And in India we've introduced a program, our membership program, so that we can go on distributing these literatures. And that membership program, there are four types of membership. One is life membership. Life membership means the member is entitled to all the books that we have printed plus all the books we will print in the future, plus a lifetime subscription to our magazine, Back to Godhead. And the member is entitled to stay at any one of our branches throughout the world free and if he happens to travel abroad or in India. We will have our branches. So that life membership fee is 1,111 rupees. And then we have donor membership. The donor member is entitled to all the books that have been printed, a lifetime subscription to our magazine, but he does not get the books in the future. That is 555 rupees. And subscriber membership, lifetime subscription to our magazine, which is 222 rupees. Or there is membership, yearly subscription to our magazine. In this way we're trying to recruit members that support our movement. This movement is being supported just by literature. So in this way we can flood the whole world with Kṛṣṇa consciousness and then there'll be a change.
1972 Conversations and Morning Walks
Prabhupāda: He's Indian?
Bob: Indian, Indian, lives nearby. He speaks English fairly well. When he was young, said he worshiped Kālī every day very vigorously. But then the floods all came, and the floods came, and the people saw hardship. But now he has no religion, and he says he finds his happiness in trying to develop love among people. And I couldn't think of what to say to him to add religion to his life, to add God to his life. He says, "After the hereafter," he says, after he dies, "so maybe I'll become part of God, maybe not," he says, but he can't worry about it now. He says he's tried this religious experience; it didn't work. And one reason I ask this is when I go back to America a lot of people I come across are like this. They see that religion, like his worship of Kālī or other kinds of religion that they've experienced doesn't work.
1973 Conversations and Morning Walks
Prabhupāda: Yes, that is another bluff. Another bluff. The smaller plan, they could not make successful. Now they're attempting bigger plan. Bara bara goragere rasatala, beta gora katha jala.(?) Betagor... There is a story that there was river. You know, horse can swim over. So big, big stalwart horses, they waved, mean, they washed away by the flood. So one lean and thin horse is coming, "Can you tell me how much water is there?" It is like bara bara goragere rasatala, beta gora katha jala. (?) So these rascals could not reach even the moon planet; now they are planning to the Mars planet. Just see. And another rascal will believe him. That, What you have done for the, which is the nearest planet?
Karandhara: Well, they say they've done everything they wanted to do with the moon. They say they've accomplished everything they wanted to on the moon.
Prabhupāda: So you are not successful. That's a fact.
1974 Conversations and Morning Walks
Prabhupāda: So I have seen this instrument. Destiny is very strong. Karmaṇā daiva-netreṇa jantur deha upapattaye (SB 3.31.1). Therefore śāstra says that you try for that thing which was not possible in many other lives. In each life everyone gets father, mother, son, and the father's duty to son, son, that is going on. When you take birth as demigod-Indra, Candra, Varuṇa—or as human being or as animal the care-taking business is there. Even the small ant during rainy season, when there is so much flood, they take the eggs on the head—you have seen the red ant?—and finding out some place. The care-taking is there. Even the birds, a sparrow. So when their, the season for laying down eggs, they bring some straws, and keep like that to make a nest for taking care of the eggs. So this taking care by the father and mother, beginning from the ant up to the Indra, Candra devas, that is there.
1975 Conversations and Morning Walks
Prabhupāda: That's it. He has found out the original source. There is no conference needed.
Rūpānuga: This other question. During the day of Brahmā at the end of every Manu there's a partial devastation of the planets up to earth and celestial, right? Now, at that time there's like a flood, and the animals that are in their particular stage of transmigration of the living entities, their bodies are all killed. Now, at that time, when the end of that period is over, how are the bodies manifest? This is a question Richard Prabhu was asking.
Prabhupāda: There is no body. They are reserved in the Viṣṇu's body. And again, when there is creation, they come out. And therefore matter comes from the spirit. Matter is there, creation, matter. So take advantage of the matter. Just like the cloth is there. You cut it according (to) your body, and there is a coat. The spiritual body is already there. Now the matter is there. Now, from matter, you take.
1976 Conversations and Morning Walks
Prabhupāda: Yes, actually that is the fact, but let them appreciate, that's all.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Gradually I think they all will. Some are now...
Prabhupāda: No, they are intelligent. First...
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: The thing is, it seems to me, that we are flooding so many books that they must become Kṛṣṇa conscious.
Prabhupāda: (laughing) Yes, they have no alternative than to read these books.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Practically now it is commonplace that every day when our men go out, supposing each man meets in a day a thousand people or five hundred people, always, without a doubt, at least one or two of the people he's met, they already have another book, and they are taking a second or third book.
Prabhupāda: Yes.
Bhavānanda: We will immediately start.
Prabhupāda: Yes, cottage.... But make it little higher.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Yes. If it floods.... There should be a plinth.
Prabhupāda: Plinth should be higher.
Jayapatāka: See, right now there's no bricks available in the market.
Prabhupāda: Why?
Jayapatāka: Because they just started producing bricks in January, December 15th, and all the government has advance bricks. We wanted bricks.... Right now it's very little...
Prabhupāda: There are so many brick fields.
Prabhupāda: Seventeen hundred? That's all right.
Jayapatāka: We're buying those. So why they put the water here? To sabotage. There was no water when we came. Now they put more water here. Gosvāmī Mahārāja is taking water.
Prabhupāda: Hm?
Jayapatāka: They flooded.
Sudāmā: You cross here, Prabhupāda. (end)
Prabhupāda: Hm.
Hṛdayānanda: In my zone there are many countries that are always being hit by earthquakes, tidal waves, floods, repeatedly.
Prabhupāda: Yes. So what is to be done?
Hṛdayānanda: We'll go afterwards and preach there.
Prabhupāda: Eh?
Hṛdayānanda: We will go afterwards and preach there. There is another country right next to it...
Prabhupāda: Tell them that if you take to Hare Kṛṣṇa, then these things will not happen. Tell them.
Prabhupāda: ...if there is water. And if there is lowland, the whole water will go to the lowland. And that means you have two or three canals, there will be no more flood.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: So you need the land to make the canals.
Prabhupāda: That's it.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Emergency yajña.
Prabhupāda: Yes. You convince him like that.
Yaśodānandana: This is very clever.
Prabhupāda: And factually we have to do that in order to check the flood. Make scheme like Europeans and Americans. Why you are thinking in terms of Indian plan?
Sadāpūta: All they can do is base it on the similarity of what the animals look like. They have trouble counting species. Śrīla Prabhupāda? Are there different meanings, this day of Brahmā? Are there different creations and annihilations of species? Different Manus, they are sometimes flooding the whole earth.
Prabhupāda: There are different, when Brahmā goes to sleep, that is one kind of devastation, and when he dies there is one kind. And during Brahmā's days there are other devastations, manvantara.
Sadāpūta: After a devastation, do the...
Prabhupāda: Different classes of devastation. There are many devastations during Brahmā's day, and there is another devastation during Brahmā's sleep, and another devastation when Brahmā dies.
Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: Ice?
Prabhupāda: Ice, flood, every second.
Hari-śauri: Down the fall?
Prabhupāda: Yes. Not from Canada, somewhere else, the Atlantic. And it is falling in the Atlantic Ocean. That broke the Titanic.
Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: Yes, iceberg.
Prabhupāda: Yes, iceberg. Throughout the whole year, every second coming. (break) ...trees have fallen are grown like that?
Vṛṣākapi: Old trees, Śrīla Prabhupāda, dead ones.
Prabhupāda: So the fall goes that side?
Prabhupāda: Then it is all right.
Svarūpa Dāmodara: From here to here is the chemical evolution, there's a long gap.
Sadāpūta: I was wondering, perhaps these periods that they have here correspond with some of these floods, like this is between two Manus and there is a flood of the whole world, and that might pile up a huge layer of mud and rock. And I was thinking that might correspond with some of these layers here because they are filled with remains of fish that look as though they were buried, things like that.
Prabhupāda: That is also imagination. Again you are bringing imagination, speculation.
Svarūpa Dāmodara: So actually it's very subtle and critical.
Prabhupāda: As soon as you bring your imaginations, they'll bring their own imagination.
Prabhupāda: Yes.
Devotee: At the end of Manu's day, when there is flood?
Prabhupāda: End of the day of Brahmā. End of fourteen Manus.
Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: At that time is the earth destroyed, or is it simply covered by water?
Prabhupāda: Covered by water.
Svarūpa Dāmodara: That can explain many facts, because they're having great difficulty in finding these old fossils, in Siberia, and all these other places, they find some strange fossils, which are not supposed to be there according to their theory.
Prabhupāda: Hm.
Mukunda: You don't have a well in your place?
George Harrison: No, just, well, that (indistinct) pond. Originally the lakes all were filled just like this as well as flooding the drains, and when it rained off the house everything would go, and we have a big storage tank, and then there's ball cocks, and underneath that big bank of rhododendrons was like a room built there, which was a storage tank. Then any other water he must have used just from the mains. But these days, you know, they have meters on the mains, so you have to pay for every gallon.
Mukunda: What about getting those water diviners to come and find water?
George Harrison: Well, you can find it I think anywhere if you just bore a hole. So what we did was just bore at the end of the lake. But you have to go down to the depth of the riverbed, and there there's not much water because the rain, it's all chalk and limestone, so the rains.... That's the problem with watering in the summer, if you put water...
Prabhupāda: From your house the river is near?
Jayapatākā: Kiśora dāsa. He's also translating. He's a little more strong than Subhaga, although new. Very good boy, very humble. He's from a good family also.
Prabhupāda: What is the flood situation?
Gargamuni: Very mild monsoon this year. Almost drought. Almost. Very mild. Very little rain.
Prabhupāda: Rain is not very strong.
Gargamuni: No. Monsoon is not strong.
Jayapatākā: Our aus(?) crop has been hampered because of lack of rain and early monsoon. Only in the past week there's been a little rain. Otherwise, before, there was very little rain. Not fully drought...
Gargamuni: But less rain than previous years.
Jayapatākā: Everything is very green and nice, but so far as agriculture is concerned...
Prabhupāda: It requires more rain.
Prabhupāda: It requires more rain.
Jayapatākā: It requires more rain and early tide. Right now the river is full, but it is not flooding. It is full. See, Mr. Choudhuri, he was interested. At that time when the Chief Minister wrote that, then he wrote this, that "If you were to see the Chief Minister, then this type of letter could be submitted and he would definitely see you, "although it is not necessary to see him.
Prabhupāda: Do you think it is?
Jayapatākā: No, it's not necessary to personally see him. You might write... When you come to Māyāpur we'll write him invitation that he can come and see and visit you there. That was better. Mr. Choudhuri said that "Your Guru Mahārāja, he has got also the Vaiṣṇava pride not to see the politicians." He said, "This is a good stand. I respect this very much." Actually he mentioned once to Abhirāma confidentially that "If this project comes through, then you'll be requiring some liaison officer because there will be so many government things. At that time I can work for you as your permanent advisor and go to Delhi and here and there and do all the work." I think he wants a job.
Prabhupāda: Within the āśramas?
Indian man (3): And temple.
Pradyumna: Our temple is all right. Raman Reti is not flooded where we are. It's almost up to Fogel Ashram in the back, Yamunā, but it has not come to our Raman Reti.
Indian man (3): And now you will remain here in India for some time?
Prabhupāda: That I do not know. I, actually, now it is little troublesome for me to travel all the year.
Indian man (3): You are just gone from (indistinct).
Prabhupāda: No, no, it is dropping.
Hari-śauri: No, it's raining.
Prabhupāda: Oh. Then we cannot sit. (break) ...book is going on. (Bengali) This is our childhood song. (Bengali) The small drops of rain falling, now their will be flood in the river. (Bengali) (break) We know even in October sometimes there are rains. Because the Durgā Pūjā takes place in October. From our childhood we have experience. During Durgā Pūjā there was raining, fog.
Hari-śauri: We haven't got rid of those monkeys.
Gopāla Kṛṣṇa: They've gone?
Hari-śauri: No. There's some on the roof.
Prabhupāda: The (indistinct) is there? In the open?
1977 Conversations and Morning Walks
Rāmeśvara: "We must therefore tell our story to them in great number, and in this way the world will hear of it. As of this date, HK," short for Hare Kṛṣṇa...
Prabhupāda: They're chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa. (laughter) They're chanting Kṛṣṇa. Yes.
Rāmeśvara: They say, "As of this date, Hare Kṛṣṇa has been able to flood both the media and the District Attorney's offices with support for their side..."
Prabhupāda: They're admitting. That's good.
Rāmeśvara: "...and they are way ahead of those on our side who believe that it is not a religious issue. Sun Yung Moon"—this is that Reverend Moon—"has been largely exposed in the Press. But not the Kṛṣṇas."
Trivikrama: Haribol.
Prabhupāda: So the more they expose, the more implicated. (laughter)
Prabhupāda: Yes. So the real legal thing is: some way or other, introduce books. Therefore... And it will be beneficial in the long time let us see. Read it.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: "We're very happy to see that by your divine mercy the whole world is flooded with Kṛṣṇa consciousness. Just by printing and distributing your books the whole world will change. We can see the tremendous effect that your books already caused in the Communist countries of Eastern Europe. The people are mad after your books. Many of them can see that this is the only solution to get out from the miseries that are caused by the materialistic way of life and Communism. Please let me quote from a recent letter sent by a boy in Hungary." The boy's name is Yedi Peta. " 'According to the advices now, I am chanting daily on beads I made at home. I also have purchased the Bhagavad-gītā As It Is, although I can only speak Hungarian.
Svarūpa Dāmodara: Took the projector. And it has been raining so much, from Calcutta, Assam, and Manipur, it's almost flooded for the last three weeks, almost continuous rain.
Prabhupāda: Ācchā?
Svarūpa Dāmodara: Looks like the rainy season has come, but very untimely, a little too early. But it has been almost flooded.
Prabhupāda: It is cool now.
Svarūpa Dāmodara: Yes. But now the rain has subsided now. It's very cool. Calcutta was very pleasant. It's very comfortable. (laughs) And Manipur is especially nice because...
Prabhupāda: It is good that so much rain has fallen.
Prabhupāda: So our book prospect is very nice future. So BBT must be very careful for distribution like this. Such reception, who is that author, he'll not be engladdened all over the world? Against odds. Against odds. It's simply Kṛṣṇa's arrangement.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Śrīla Prabhupāda, I just have to see if my room is being flooded.
Śatadhanya: I'll go see.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Can you just check and have that boy start mopping? As soon as it... See, that's why they were banging yesterday. And they'll have to bang some more tomorrow. The room becomes flooded as soon as it rains, due to the faulty pipes.
Prabhupāda: Now rectify the fault.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Yes, Śrīla Prabhupāda.
Prabhupāda: The whole...
Bhavānanda: They had their disappearance day of Ṭhākura Haridāsa. They distributed prasādam, and five thousand people came. We sent a party of men down.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Five thousand.
Bhavānanda: Now the flood waters have recessed. We're preparing for the planting, plowing. Everything has been flooded. Just now it's dry enough to plow for planting wheat. We planted 170 coconut trees. (pause)
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Your pulse is nice and strong, Śrīla Prabhupāda.
Prabhupāda: What is the attitude of our Godbrothers?
Bhavānanda: Favorable and helpful.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Which ones?
Bhavānanda: Mādhava Mahārāja, Kosan Math(?), Madhusūdana Mahārāja.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Mādhava Mahārāja was there?
Bhavānanda: He was there two weeks back.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Anybody met him?
Bhavānanda: Jayapatākā Mahārāja went over, but he was out that time. That Hṛṣīkeśa Mahārāja in Caitanya Maṭha was also there. All favorable and helpful. That big nagara-saṅkīrtana on Pūrṇimā, that was very successful. It healed a lot of misunderstandings between the temples.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Everyone could see also that there was so much support.
Bhavānanda: Oh, yes.
Prabhupāda: Floodwater entered our new house? No.
Prabhupāda: Bengalis have no money. (laughter)
Bhavānanda: Now that the flood waters have receded, in about three-four weeks it will be time to send the boat out again. Nice program. Tapomaya Prabhu will take charge of the boat. The boat is very popular. Up and down the Gaṅgā from Calcutta to Māyāpur everyone knows the Hare Kṛṣṇa Naukā.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Hare Kṛṣṇa Naukā. That's what they call it. What does that mean?
Bhavānanda: Boat.
Indian devotee: (indistinct) ...one boat is passing through the river like that.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: How is the translation work going? How is the publication going?
Bhavānanda: That is Bhakti-caru Swami's work.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: They're doing nicely?
Bhavānanda: Yes. Subhaga is here.
Prabhupāda: No. In Māyāpur.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Oh. In Māyāpur people are coming?
Bhavānanda: Yes, Śrīla Prabhupāda. Now the flood waters have recessed and the crowds are coming again. And winter season is coming up. Everything is back to normal. Busloads. Especially from Balrampura.
Subhaga: Almost every week one or two busload of people coming, and they want us we should do program there. Two days ago one professor came and talking to Bhakti-caru Mahārāja and Bhavānanda Swami regarding that. And also from Calcutta and other places.
Bhavānanda: Busloads of people, all respectable. Everyone at Māyāpur is expecting you to come for the winter season. The sweet sunshine in Māyāpur in the winter is the nicest, and the prasādam is the nicest. Everything is...
Prabhupāda: What did you do with food? (?) (break)
Śatadhanya: Prasādam. And they have kīrtana. They are so-called communists. Actually Bengalis are devotees, Śrīla Prabhupāda. Simply that they know your name is enough to purify all of Bengal, what to speak of if you remain present, the whole world will become completely flooded by kṛṣṇa-prema. That is why we are begging you, Śrīla Prabhupāda, that you remain with us for some time longer, because we are very weak and are still attached to material sense gratification. But if you are present, it is like a transcendental ocean.
Prabhupāda: There is some strain here. Why not make big or...? (soft kīrtana in Prabhupāda's room)
Upendra: You have some pain.
Prabhupāda: Not pain, but veins straining.
Prabhupāda: Pralaya-payodhi-jale dhṛtavān asi vedam. This is a song sung by great Vaiṣṇava poet Jayadeva Gosvāmī. The purport is that when there was devastation, the whole universe was flooded with water. The ultimate dissolution of this material world will be, first of all, there will be no water, all water on the earth will be dried up by scorching heat of the sun. The sun will become twelve times stronger as it is at the present moment. In that way, evaporate all the waters, the seas and the oceans will be all evaporated. Therefore all living creatures on the Earth will die, and then, due to scorching heat, practically everything will be turned into ashes. Then there will be rain for a hundred years, torrents of rain, like the trunk of the elephant, and thus the whole universe will be filled with water. That is called pralaya-payodhi.
Prabhupāda: Śrī-gauḍa-maṇḍala-bhūmi. Gauḍa means West Bengal. Lord Caitanya appeared in West Bengal, Navadvīpa, and He especially flooded that part of the country with the saṅkīrtana movement. That part of the country has special significance, for it is nondifferent from Vṛndāvana. It is as good as Vṛndāvana. Living in Vṛndāvana and living in Navadvīpa are the same. Narottama dāsa Ṭhākura says, śrī-gauḍa-maṇḍala-bhūmi, jebā jāne cintāmaṇi. Cintāmaṇi means the transcendental abode. Tāra hoy braja-bhūme bās. If one simply understands that this land of Navadvīpa is not different from Vṛndāvana, then he actually lives in Vṛndāvana. One should not think that he is living in Bengal or any material country; the places where Lord Caitanya had His pastimes are as good as Vṛndāvana.
| Page Title: | Flood (Conversations) |
| Compiler: | Visnu Murti, RupaManjari |
| Created: | 27 of Jun, 2012 |
| Totals by Section: | BG=0, SB=0, CC=0, OB=0, Lec=0, Con=31, Let=0 |
| No. of Quotes: | 31 |