Guest (2): I think Mahatma Gandhi followed the Gītā, all these. . .
Prabhupāda: But he did not believe in Kṛṣṇa and he followed Gītā. Just see.
Guest (2): But who did. . . Who gave him. . .
Prabhupāda: No, just try to understand the psychology. He says plainly that "I do not believe there was anybody Kṛṣṇa living, ever." And he's following Kṛṣṇa's instruction. Just see his position.
Guest (2): No, he must have also answered this question.
Prabhupāda: No, no, there is no questioning. If you do not believe in somebody, how you are reading His book of knowledge?
Guest (2): That's my point also.
Prabhupāda: Yes, so therefore. . . This kind of leader we are following, contradictory. That is our misfortune.
Guest (1): Swāmījī, we are not following any person, but we do see the realities all around the world.
Prabhupāda: Realities. . . If you have no knowledge, what do you know about reality? If you have no knowledge, then what is reality, what is non-reality, how can you know? If your knowledge is imperfect, then how you can say reality? Suppose beyond this wall you cannot see, and how you can speak of the reality beyond this wall? That is misfortune. You do not see what is there clearly, and you are speaking on the reality. Your senses are defective. What do you know about reality?
Guest (1): In the spiritual level, yes, we are very blind.
Prabhupāda: Just see. That is reality.
Guest (1): But at the material level, at the level where people eat their food and live their lives, I think. . .
Prabhupāda: That is also on account of presence of the spirit soul. Actually it. . . Whatever little you are doing on account of presence of the spirit soul, as soon as the spirit soul is gone then your body and senses are simply lump of matter. So you are working with that lump of matter on account of presence of the spirit soul. Therefore that is more important. To understand what is that spirit soul, how it is working, what is his position, that, that is real knowledge. Therefore Kṛṣṇa begins in the Bhagavad-gītā, first lesson, about the spirit soul, dehino 'smin yathā dehe kaumāraṁ yauvanaṁ jarā, tathā dehāntara-prāptiḥ (BG 2.13). So you are studying the deha, that we are discussing just now. One is studying the motorcar, but he has no knowledge of the driver.
Dr. Wolf-Rottkay: Śrīla Prabhupāda, may I venture very humbly to this opportunity of saying something I've experienced so much with people, that they would say, "Oh, yes, we are ready to respect the spiritual values, but we live in this real world, in this material world, and so we would rather not have the spiritual values interfere with it. Settle everything in the material sense."
Prabhupāda: No, they, what they are saying, "real world," that is unreal.