Prabhupāda: This attachment increases. The material attachment. The material attachment means "I am this body, and because I have got this body in a particular place, that is my country." And that is going on. "I am American," "I am Indian," "I am German," "I am this," "I am that," this bodily... "This is my country. I shall sacrifice everything for my country, society." So in this way the illusion becomes increased. So under this illusion, when he dies he gets another body. That may be a superior body or inferior body according to his karma. So if he gets superior body, then that is also entanglement. Even if he goes to the heavenly planet, that is entanglement. And if he becomes cats and dogs, then his life's lost. A tree. There is every chance. So this science is not known in the world, that how the soul is transmigrating from one body to another and how he's being entrapped in different types of body. This science is unknown.
Not Known (Conv. and Letters)
Conversations and Morning Walks
1972 Conversations and Morning Walks
1973 Conversations and Morning Walks
Svarūpa Dāmodara: That is what the research means. Research means to understand what was not known before.
Prabhupāda: Yes. Research means you admit that you are all fools and rascals. Research meant for whom? Who does not know. Otherwise where is the question of research? You do not know. You admit that. So so many mystic powers are there. You do not know how it is being done. Therefore you have to accept inconceivable power. And without accepting this principle of inconceivable power, there is no meaning of God. Not like that Bala-yogī became a God. So these are for the rascals, fools. But those who are intelligent, they will stress the inconceivable power. Just like we accept Kṛṣṇa as God—inconceivable power. We accept Rāma—inconceivable power.
Prabhupāda: But you cannot say that things which are beyond our imagination cannot be known. You cannot say that. Can be known, provided you have got the real process.
Mr. Wadell: I'm afraid I must make, so far as I am concerned, a clear division between what I know and what I believe. There are certain things... It is maybe, partly a use of words, but whereas I know that I am here and that I have people in..., I am in the same room with other men...
Prabhupāda: Do you think that this process, as I have suggested, to know one's father through the authority of the mother is not perfect?
Lord Brockway: But as I see so many men and women who are regarded as ordinary men and women, and their heroism in life, their sacrifice in life, their service in life, makes me small compared with them, even if they are not known, and even if they are not thought to be great. And so I don't think to be great at all.
Prabhupāda: (laughs) No big man thinks like that. He thinks always small.
Śyāmasundara: Yes.
Prabhupāda: So that is natu... That is good. Big, big man. Caitanya Mahāprabhu, He was lear... "I am fool number one." And the author of Caitanya-caritāmṛta, he says that "I am lower than the, a worm in the stool." So this is good attitude. Nobody... Sir Isaac Newton also used to say that "What knowledge I have got. I have simply collected..." They're... Every, every big man thinks like that. That is good attitude. But there is comparative study, that "Here is a big man, here is a common man." So our proposition is that it is a great science, great philosophy. So western countries, they are intelligent, especially the Britain, British people. They had very good opportunity. Still they have got opportunity. So my request is that let us study this philosophy and science and if possible introduce it in the human society. That is our proposal.
Svarūpa Dāmodara: So just exactly like that, the scientists, they're trying to learn something what was not known before.
Prabhupāda: No, what is not known? Barking was already known. Suppose if you can produce life, life is already there. What is your credit? Life is al...
Svarūpa Dāmodara: They say that's not enough.
Prabhupāda: Eh?
Svarūpa Dāmodara: They say that knowledge is not enough.
Prabhupāda: No, why not enough? Everyone knows that a man and woman combines and there is life again.
Prabhupāda: But why they have degraded? That is to be understood... Not known to them.
Karandhara: Yes. Actually they don't have the scientific analysis. They just have some vague understanding that things are falling apart.
Prabhupāda: Here are the causes. Sinful life. (break)
Prajāpati: ...the affair, Śrīla Prabhupāda. Oh, then the country could be...
Prabhupāda: No, no, I am already in charge, but who is following me? (laughter) That is the difficulty. (break) ...one who is to be followed, that is called ācārya. So who is following the ācārya? Nobody is following. Ācārya is there, but nobody is following ācārya. Ācaraṇa. Ācaraṇa means behavior. Ācārya. "This man is ideal. One should follow him." That is called ācārya. (break) ...to allow us one day to have chanting and speaking something about God consciousness.
1974 Conversations and Morning Walks
Indian Man (1): The same thing happens with so many other books also because it is not known properly to proper persons...
Prabhupāda: Therefore they are rascals. Why do they touch of writing books? They are foolish people. Why they should attempt to write books and mislead others? That is our protest. (break) ...Kṛṣṇa's life in two big, big volumes.
Indian Man (1): But these volumes are very short, sir.
Prabhupāda: Yes, no, the lowest. But they have not written even a page about Kṛṣṇa's life. And writing comments on Bhagavad-gītā. Just see how much rascal they are. Not even a page. Rather, they deny, "There was no Kṛṣṇa." Just see how much foolish they are, and they are writing comments on Bhagavad-gītā. That is our regret, that how these rascals dare to write on Bhagavad-gītā?
Cardinal Pignedoli: For all. Well, also we are for all. But I mean, you have not so many people. You have some thousand people. Do you prefer for this your people? Do you prefer they go to a place where God is not known, where spiritual values are not estimated? Or they go also to places where God is loved and God is present.
Prabhupāda: No, we go everywhere.
Cardinal Pignedoli: Everywhere.
Prabhupāda: Just like you go in the villages of Africa. They are almost aborigines, with their...
Cardinal Pignedoli: Local people. Local citizens.
Prabhupāda: Yes. So our process is so nice, that is recommended process in this age—the chanting the holy name of God. So we chant this holy name of God, perhaps you have seen. Hare Kṛṣṇa Hare Kṛṣṇa, we dance.
Prabhupāda: Yes, but one who is Kṛṣṇa conscious, he's all right. Teach him Sanskrit and English and let him read our books. Then perfect knowledge. He doesn't require to go to school. And so far mathematics and history concerned, everyone knows. Two plus two equal to four. It doesn't require much education. Even illiterate man who has never gone to school, he can also count. Eh? "How much money you are giving me?" He doesn't want to be cheated. Hare Kṛṣṇa Hare Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa Hare Rāma... So the fact is God cannot be unknown. If you are actually serious to know God, God can be known. This is no argument, that "God cannot be known."
Puṣṭa-kṛṣṇa: That is putting limitation on Kṛṣṇa, to say that you cannot see.
Prabhupāda: Eh? Eh?
Puṣṭa-kṛṣṇa: That is putting a limitation on Kṛṣṇa if one says that He cannot be seen.
Prabhupāda: Then you know God. Then why do you say, "God cannot be known"?
American Man: I say that "God" is a word.
Prabhupāda: You say, "light" or "word." What is the... What is the definite...
American Man: I believe in what I feel right here, and that is God for me.
Prabhupāda: That means you feel sometimes something else. That is God.
American Man: I feel the light here.
Prabhupāda: Anywhere you feel, the first of all let us know...
American Man: I feel the light here.
Prabhupāda: Yes, anywhere. Light is here also.
1975 Conversations and Morning Walks
Svarūpa Dāmodara: It's not known, natural sciences.
Mādhava: You gave one example of television.
Prabhupāda: Hmm?
Mādhava: You gave one example of television as showing that gross form comes from the ether. The transmission of television...
Prabhupāda: But that now, this television, yes, coming. Sound is coming, some ethereal vibration and so many things. That you have to see. But in the Vedic knowledge is already there.
Svarūpa Dāmodara: The question that Mādhava was raising that came up in the questions that all the forms of these living entities which... All the species, their forms, their gross forms...
Prabhupāda: No, no. It was not known to you, but what was the harm? And what is the benefit when you have known it?
Svarūpa Dāmodara: Because, they say, without knowing, it's not advancement of knowledge.
Prabhupāda: But you have not known it. You have not known it. You cannot claim that you are advanced. You are still foolish. Why you are claiming advancement? You have not known it.
Svarūpa Dāmodara: Yeah, but they are saying that "In due course of time we are going to know it."
Prabhupāda: Ah, that is another foolishness. That we do not accept. You have not known it till now. You are foolish still. That you have to admit. "In future you will be a rich man, and therefore you give me a post-dated check"—who will accept it? The foolish person will accept it, (laughter) that "I am giving you the check, ten million dollars. You can take it after three million years (laughter) when I shall become rich." It is a proposal like that. No intelligent person will accept that check.
Svarūpa Dāmodara: But they say that "About two hundred years ago, yes, we were foolish, about two hundred years ago."
Prabhupāda: You are still... Still you are foolish. (laughter) Why are you claiming intelligent? Admit it, that still you are foolish. "We have known the molecules." So what is the benefit of knowing?
Dr. Wolfe: And most of them not known to us. If we can say "most" about innumerable.
Prabhupāda: You can... Then you know from us. We can... There is Viṣṇu-sahasra-nāma. Then Caitanya Mahāprabhu also. Nāmnām akāri bahudhā nija-sarva-śaktiḥ. Nāma... Nāma means the name and the person. There are many hundreds and thousands of names, and each name is as good as the person. Because it is absolute, there is no difference between the person and the person's name.
Dr. Judah: If God is known by many different names, though, is it not possible, then, to know God then in many different ways, in many different traditions?
Prabhupāda: No. Just like you are the same person, either as professor in the university or at home before your wife, you are the same person. Your wife may address you in a different name, and the students may address you in different name, but you are the same person.
Prabhupāda: When you understand that this place is Kṛṣṇa's place, so you can worship Kṛṣṇa, glorify Kṛṣṇa. But if you don't realize that it is Kṛṣṇa's, then you talk nonsense, madman. "This is American property," "It is African property," "It is this. It is that," so many madness. But the śāstra says, iśavāsyam idam, everything Kṛṣṇa's. And the materialists, they'll pro... "No. Why everything? It is my country. It is my place." That is material. Similarly, anything coming from Kṛṣṇa—Kṛṣṇa is supreme spirit—it is spiritual. The devotees, they understand that "This fruit has come from Kṛṣṇa. The flower has come from Kṛṣṇa. Therefore it must be offered to Kṛṣṇa. It is for use." Otherwise how the fruit becomes spiritual? We take prasādam. How it becomes..., the same fruit? No. Because the Kṛṣṇa consciousness is there, it is spiritual. It is spiritual, but it was not known. When one comes to Kṛṣṇa consciousness, he understands that everything belongs to Kṛṣṇa. Hari-sambhandhi vastūnaḥ. Everything has got relationship with Kṛṣṇa.
1976 Conversations and Morning Walks
Prabhupāda: That they do not know, what is the real gain. They think this body is the gain only. And beyond this body there is another gain. That is not known. They do not know even. That is the defect of their civilization. Na hanyate hanyamāne śarīre (BG 2.20). They are taking care of the body, but beyond the body there is something else which is eternal. Even after the annihilation of the body, it does not become destroyed. That they do not know. There is no education. There is no research. There is no college. There is no science to understand. And that kind of taking care of the body, a dogs know. Sometimes the dogs, they rub their body on the ground like that. That.... That makes them rejuvenated. Horse also do that. So how to take care of the body, they know in their different method. But that is known to them. If before the horse you give them some meat, they'll not take. And give them peas; they'll take immediately.
Prabhupāda: That means you have to analyze different bodies. But that is described in the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, which apartment is better than the other apartment, there is description. Just like a dog's body is so made that two furlongs away some newcomer is coming, immediately he will bark, he can immediately understand, perceive. He can smell that "Somebody is coming who is not known to me." Is it not? So he has got that special quality. Even in animals we will find. A fish in the water, two miles away there is some enemy, they can understand by touch.
Svarūpa Dāmodara: Science calls those chemical senses.
Prabhupāda: These are described in the Bhāgavata, the different perception of different senses, how one is prominent in one animal body. That is described.
Rūpānuga: That is coming? That is not yet printed? I don't remember that description.
Rūpānuga: We were not going to advertise ourselves as a research institute.
Prabhupāda: Research means that it is not known; you are trying to find out. But our, Kṛṣṇa's position is not. It is already known.
Svarūpa Dāmodara: And another aspect of the Institute at the beginning phase is that Your Divine Grace also instructed a few days ago that we also get some, try to give some lectures to colleges. We can present as members from the Bhaktivedanta Institute, the higher learning section of ISKCON. That can also be part of the... So we can go to colleges and universities. We don't have to go every month or so, but maybe once a month or twice a month.
Prabhupāda: Whenever there is opportunity.
1977 Conversations and Morning Walks
Prabhupāda: Foolish.
Guest (4): ...God's creation is so huge and vast and unfathomable. If they are able to unravel even a small part of it which was not known to human beings beforehand. So they are so proud. They don't say that they can do what God can do.
Prabhupāda: No, it is known. It is known. Kṛṣṇa says, mamaivāṁśo jīva-bhūtaḥ: (BG 15.7) "This life is my part and parcel." As soon as you study what is this life, you understand Kṛṣṇa, quality, what is Kṛṣṇa. So here is the hint, that Kṛṣṇa said mamaivāṁśo jīva-bhūtaḥ (BG 15.7). So it is very small particle. That is also mentioned in the śāstra:
Pradyumna: Yes, Śrīla Prabhupāda. There is just one more point on that verse. He says there are some verses that say upaniṣada puruṣaḥ namo vedānta vedyāya kṛṣṇāya.(?) So Śrīla Baladeva Vidyābhūṣaṇa has raised a question that it says Kṛṣṇa is not seen by the Upaniṣads, but then there's some verses that say He is known by the Vedas, He is known by the Upaniṣads. He says it is proved that the Absolute is able to be known by Vedas, veda-gamyatvam kintu... Then he quotes other verse. It says sakalyena avedatvam, He cannot be known completely through Vedas, only through devotional service
Prabhupāda: Yes. When one is purified by Vedic knowledge, then mad-bhaktir labhate param. Then he is allowed entrance in devotional understanding. Bhaktyā śruta-gṛhītayā. There is a...? Eh? In Bhāgavatam?
Correspondence
1968 Correspondence
You may use the facilities available to you if there is no risk of making trouble. But so far as stealing is concerned, one should not steal except in the rarest circumstances. Moral principle is recommended in all scriptures as prerequisite for spiritual culture. If the conduct of the pure devotee crosses the lines of ordinary morality it is because he acts on the plane of Absolute Morality which is not known to the conditioned soul and cannot therefore be imitated. So generally we should be careful to observe good moral conduct.
Please clear any doubts you may have about what is to be done. You may begin work of transliterating as soon as possible.
So Karna was known as the son of a carpenter; nobody knew that he was the eldest son of Kunti, and a Ksatriya. This was not known until he died, and Kunti began to cry. Yudhisthira asked her why you are crying, he is the enemy, and she said, he was my first son. He was born out of her ear, so he was called Karna. When she was very young, she got some mantra which could be used to call any demigod, so just to try it, as experiment, to see if it worked, she called the sun god. He immediately appeared there before her, and said, I will give you the benediction of one son; she replied that she simply was experimenting with this mantra, that she did not want a son, and she became afraid as she was unmarried girl. He said I shall give you a son anyway, and it will be born out of your ear.
1970 Correspondence
I have already advised Brahmananda to send you books and magazines by surface freight, and that will be easier to distribute our books and literatures locally.
You have written to say that they must also write to Madhava Maharaja. I cannot understand what do you mean by this. They are not known to Madhava Maharaja, so how they can write directly to Madhava Maharaja? Neither I wish to overburden Madhava Maharaja with further addition of my disciples in his temple. This is a very delicate point. Better you can ask Madhava Maharaja whether he is willing to receive further members of our camp in his temple.
This is called Parampara system. This Bhagavad-gita is spoken by God Himself, and that is the best source of knowing about God. He cannot be known by our limited exercise of the senses. The difficulty of understanding God as person is that as soon as there is conception of person we think of God as a person like us. Therefore, in the Vedas, the personality of God is described in different ways which are distinct from our personalities.
The Veda says that God has no legs or hands, but still He accepts all the sacrificial offerings. He has no eyes, but He can see everywhere—past, present, and future. He has no ears, and still He hears everything that you are talking. He knows every nook and corner, but nobody knows Him, what He is.
1975 Correspondence
So, if you like, you can translate our books into Hindi and I shall be glad to hear from you in this connection. I do not know whether you shall receive this letter because your house number is not known to me. I have simply given an idea of your address on the envelope. I am asking somebody in our temple to go to you with the copy of this letter.
"No one can understand the transcendental nature of the name, form, quality, and pastimes of Sri Krishna through his materially contaminated senses. Only when one becomes spiritually saturated by transcendental service to the Lord are the transcendental name, form, quality, pastimes of the Lord revealed to him." Krishna cannot be known by the materially blunt senses. When you utilize your tongue in the service of the Lord then Krishna reveals Himself. You cannot order Krishna please come and I will see you.
So you are a learned scholar, and you have tried to use your energy for the service of the Lord. That is your success. I thank you very much for your endeavor in spreading Krishna consciousness.
| Page Title: | Not Known (Conv. and Letters) |
| Compiler: | Mayapur, RupaManjari |
| Created: | 11 of Oct, 2011 |
| Totals by Section: | BG=0, SB=0, CC=0, OB=0, Lec=0, Con=20, Let=6 |
| No. of Quotes: | 26 |