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University (Conversations 1973 - 1974)

Conversations and Morning Walks

1973 Conversations and Morning Walks

Room Conversation -- February 26, 1973, Jakarta:

Devotee: We will take that. (break) Yes. This is Mr. Ivy Mastram and he is in charge of the Hindu and Buddhist Department of the Department of Religion. And this is his next-in-command, director-general, Mr. G. Puja. He was educated in India also.

Prabhupāda: Oh, really. Which city?

Guest (2): Benares (indistinct) University.

Prabhupāda: Oh, Benares University.

Devotee: Actually, they have arranged by giving a letter, that we can stay in the country. They simply say, "We do not object," and then the immigration gives us a good visa. They especially like your books.

Prabhupāda: Oh, thank you. You have read some of my books?

Room Conversation -- February 28, 1973, Jakarta:

Prabhupāda: All over the world. It is called spiritual bankruptcy all over the world and leading men are thinking this catastrophe, and the only hope is Bhagavad-gītā. (indistinct) ...religion there is no science. There is no philosophy. Buddhist religion there is little (indistinct). Otherwise...

Devotee (1): They are bankrupt and we are billionaire in spiritual life. (pause) Tomorrow the professor of Sanskrit has made appointment, a lady from University of Indonesia. She speaks English very well also. (pause) I will go speak with them see if they can bring their altar. (offers obeisances) (break)

Prabhupāda: (indistinct)

Devotee (1): Yes. He's very nice. Actually he wants to become initiated but he can't chant. The only thing he doesn't chant rounds...

Prabhupāda: Why?

Devotee (1): He says that if I do that I can't do my business and he has many reasons. For some ten days he chanted sixteen rounds and then he just stopped and now he doesn't chant at all. But he's very sincere. He works very hard.

Morning Walk -- April 20, 1973, Los Angeles:

Svarūpa Dāmodara: Yes.

Prabhupāda: Anthropology. It is a false theory, and upon this so many universities are spending money, professors. Thousands. Rascal theory. You see. In this way, they're wasting money. Śrama eva hi kevalam (SB 1.2.8). Aviśuddha-buddhayaḥ (SB 10.2.32).

Karandhara: They always have to revise their theories because about every few years they find something new which contradicts everything they have said before.

Prabhupāda: Yes. That is their intelligence.

Brahmānanda: And they think that's progress.

Prabhupāda: Yes. Progress in one sense. Because they're rascals, making little progress.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: Advancing in the wrong direction.

Prabhupāda: But the real progress is that when they will understand that: "We are rascals." That will be real progress, when they come to understand that: "We are all fools and rascals." That will be real progress. Just like Caitanya Mahāprabhu presented Himself that: "My Guru Mahārāja found me a rascal number one. Yes." That is real progress.

Morning Walk -- April 20, 1973, Los Angeles:

Brahmānanda: They worship them.

Prabhupāda: Worship. That is their advancement of... After taking so much university education, they have learned how to love hogs. Just see the fun. (pause) They are living within the sand. How these rascals are speaking that because in the moon planet there is sand only there is no living entity. How we can believe? We see practically. They do not go to the garden. They live within the sand. How they are living? (pause—break) ...and they do some acrobatic feats, like that. Still they're in no condition.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: They're smart.

Prabhupāda: So that smartness you haven't got. Even of a small bird. And still you are proud of advancement. The vulture goes up and he can see everything but when you go up, aeroplane, up you cannot see where is your home. Is it not? They can find out, four miles, five miles away, where is a corpse. Immediately they flock. (pause) What is this building? Some...

Karandhara: An auditorium. We're going to have a festival here on, next month.

Prabhupāda: Oh. That's nice. What do they charge?

Karandhara: Well, if you don't charge anything, they don't charge you anything for using it.

Prabhupāda: Oh, they don't charge?

Karandhara: No. If you don't charge people for coming to the function, they don't charge you for using this place.

Morning Walk -- April 21, 1973, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: In my honors class, I had history. He was teaching us history.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: What is the standard of Calcutta University, Śrīla Prabhupāda, at the time when Śrīla Prabhupāda was in the University? How was the...

Prabhupāda: Oh, it was nice. Very nice students were coming out.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: The moral standard was very good?

Prabhupāda: Oh, yes. We respected our professors like our fathers. The relationship between the student and the professors was very good. I had one Scottish professor, Dr. W.S. Urquhart. He was my nice friend. He was professor of philosophy, psychology. Later on he became vice-chancellor.

Brahmānanda:Calcutta?

Prabhupāda: Calcutta, yes. A very perfect gentleman. Kind-hearted. Sometimes we joked. We were taking this, what is called, peanuts. So the professor was passing. So some of our friends remarked: (Bengali) So he thought that professor did not know Bengali. So immediately he turned: (Bengali). So we became very much ashamed. Yes. So all the professors from foreign countries, they were instructed to learn Bengali language, local language. That was the system. All officers, big officers, educate... (Aside) Good morning. ...big educationists, they were to learn the local language. And they used to learn Bengali. Especially in Calcutta. There was one professor, Mr. Scrimgeour. He was professor of literature, English literature. So while teaching one English literature, he was giving parallel passage from Bankim Candra Chatterjee. Yes. "Your Bankim babu says like this." He used to say like that.

Morning Walk -- April 25, 1973, Los Angeles:

Svarūpa Dāmodara: Just for argument...

Prabhupāda: That means the so-called education making them all rascals and fools. That's all. The education has no value. We therefore say that you close all these universities. You are simply producing rascals and fools. That's all.

Brahmānanda: Asses.

Prabhupāda: Asses, mūḍhāḥ. Unless one comes to the point of Kṛṣṇa consciousness, we don't give any value to so-called education, advancement of knowledge. We don't give any value. Our only formula is harāv abhaktasya kuto mahad-guṇāḥ. If one is not Kṛṣṇa conscious, he has no value. Immediately reject him. He has no value of his life. We are advocating Kṛṣṇa consciousness not on sentiment, on the value of life. That these men are being carried away by whims without any value of life. Let us save them. That is our mission. Just like a, a foolish person is going in, on the ocean. So it is: "Oh, why you are going that way? Where you are going? You are a madman." This is the duty.

Brahmānanda: Yes.

Prabhupāda: Similarly these rascals are going to hell and we are trying to save them. That's all. This is Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement.

Morning Walk -- May 2, 1973, Los Angeles:

Svarūpa Dāmodara: Yes. No, everybody was silent. Everybody was silent because everybody believes that life started from matter, all the, in the audience. So I said that "Your basis means life started from matter. That means..." He was saying that when the earth, before the life started, there was no living entities on earth. Then I said, "How do you know there is no living entities on earth?" Then he could not answer.

Prabhupāda: Just see. Very good. Yes. You have to go and lecture all the universities, calling these rascals fools. That will be our mission. They do not know anything and talking all nonsense. That's it. There was nobody to challenge till now. Now we are creating persons to challenge these rascals. That is our credit. Till now whatever nonsense they are talking, people thought, "Oh he is a big scientist." Now our scientist will protest against them, stop them talking all nonsense. That is what we want. If a lay man like me goes and protesting, he may say that "First of all you come to my level, then I shall talk with you." Now, he cannot talk with you like that. Because you are on the level. So challenge all this nonsense. Why they talk nonsense? So later on, other persons, they did not talk with you?

Svarūpa Dāmodara: No, the chairman of the department, he was telling later on that "About theology let us talk later on." So he dispersed the meeting after that. Theology, they thought, that I was talking on theology.

Prabhupāda: It is not theology, it is science.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: Yes, it is science. But he was assuming like that because his business is to protect the... This is outside speaker, comes from outside the university.

Prabhupāda: So how do you say it is theology?

Svarūpa Dāmodara: He was just commenting like that, that...

Prabhupāda: So you should have presented, "No, it is not theology. I am talking on the scientific basis."

Morning Walk -- May 2, 1973, Los Angeles:

Svarūpa Dāmodara: Because there is no solid background.

Prabhupāda: No. (pause, japa) You and Dr. Rao just make a combination, world-touring. I shall give you all expenditure. And go to the universities, scientists, and talk with them. Our kīrtana party also will go. We challenge all scientists, "Come on." We shall pay all expenditure. Ask Dr. Rao to come and join. Just like in Calcutta University, all the students... No, one leader student, he came. He talked about economic development, and he said that "Our students did not derive any faith by your theological statement." So I told them that "Because you are all rascals, therefore you could not." I told them freely. Because in the Bhagavad-gītā... Because they are student of Sanskrit. And in the Bhagavad-gītā it is said, na māṁ duṣkṛtino mūḍhāḥ prapadyante narādhamāḥ (BG 7.15). "So you are amongst these. You are duṣkṛtinas, sinful, lowest of the mankind, and the university is responsible for creating such rascals." So professors clapped and later on they said, "Swamiji, you have rightly said." All the professors said. And so far economic question is concerned, the birds, beasts, animals, they have no economic concern. Why you have got? You are less than bird and beast, you have created this economic problem. Harer nāma harer nāma (CC Adi 17.21). Where is the economic question? The small birds, tiny birds, they are solving their economic question, coming (makes sound:) "bup, bup," finished. They are not stocking, they are not thinking of tomorrow, but are satisfied. They have got eating, sufficient eating, sufficient sex, sufficient intelligence to defend. As soon as we go, immediately they fly away. That is defense. They know how to defend them. They immediately understand, "They are human beings, stronger. They may do some harm. Let us fly away." So these things are everywhere, eating, sleeping, mating and defending. There is no scarcity. Only scarcity is Kṛṣṇa consciousness. That we have to preach. Theology... Logy means science, is it not?

Svarūpa Dāmodara: Yes.

Morning Walk -- May 3, 1973, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: So you protest, write in book. You are scientist. Write in book. Prove scientifically. That will be your laurel of taking the doctorate degree. If you also become one of these rascal doctors, then what is the use of your Kṛṣṇa consciousness that whatever they say you silently accept? No. Just become Babhruvāhana, Manipur Babhruvāhana, that the fighting is faced. Take assistance, you have got. Ask Dr. Rao to come, join. Make plan. Go from town to town, all over the world. This has to be done. There was a poetry by Rabindranath Tagore. The purport of the poetry is that one who is mischievous, he is culprit. But one who tolerates mischievous activity, he is also culprit. If you are mischievous, you are criminal. But if you tolerate mischievous activities that is also criminal. Challenge these rascals. Stop their rascal theories. They have been described in the Bhāgavata as śva-viḍ-varāhoṣṭra-kharaiḥ saṁstutaḥ puruṣaḥ paśuḥ (SB 2.3.19). Saṁstutaḥ puruṣaḥ paśuḥ. The so-called modern leader, he is a paśu, animal. And who exalts them? Śva-viḍ-varāhoṣṭra-kharaiḥ: other lower animals like dogs, the hogs, śva-viḍ-varāha, camel and ass. So one big animal is being praised by these kinds of animals. So all the population without Kṛṣṇa consciousness, they have been described as dogs, hogs, camel and ass. So when they vote for another animal, big animal, so this is their position. They are big animal, praised by the dogs, hogs, camel and ass. They are not praised by any intelligent man. That is stated in the Bhāgavata. Śva-viḍ-varāhoṣṭra-kharaiḥ saṁstutaḥ puruṣaḥ paśuḥ. They are animals. These animals, they do not know the actual fact, and they are passing on as leaders, professors, scientists. Why they should be allowed? There must be some protest against these men. They have no real knowledge. They say, "I do not know," and still, they are passing as poet, er, scientist laureate. Why this should be allowed? Think over this matter seriously. You cannot tolerate this misleading. People are innocent. It is our duty to become merciful upon them, to give them real knowledge. And these people are misleading. There must be strong protests against these rascals. You can immediately write one article in some paper that "These rascals has earned, what is called prize, Nobel Prize, and he does not know." Immediately write one article. "His position is 'does not know, does not, do not, does not,' and he is getting this prize." So they are also dogs, hogs, asses, and he's a big ass, that's all. I have explained this in the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam. Take help. They are creating also dogs, hogs, in university?

Brahmānanda: Yes.

Morning Walk At Cheviot Hills Golf Course -- May 13, 1973, Los Angeles:

Svarūpa Dāmodara: Takes shower again and...

Prabhupāda: Yes. Hasti-snāna. Therefore, knowledge giving, that is the beginning of spiritual life. Kṛṣṇa gives Arjuna, knowledge giving, that "You are not this body." This is the beginning of knowledge. What is that knowledge, all over the world? Where is that university? This preliminary knowledge which Kṛṣṇa begins, Bhagavad-gītā, where is that university? Svarūpa Dāmodara, where is that chemical laboratory or university?

Svarūpa Dāmodara: There is none in the universities.

Prabhupāda: Yes. So this is the position of your education. There is no knowledge, and you are simply advertising, "Advancement of knowledge, university, PhD's, Nobel Prize holder." But they are all rascals. Fools' paradise. It is called, fools' paradise.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: If the scientists know that we are not this body, then definitely the whole outlook will be changed.

Prabhupāda: Yes. That we want to do.

Paramahaṁsa: They don't want to admit their failure.

Prabhupāda: That is another foolishness. If you are a fool and if you want to pose yourself as intelligent, that is another foolishness. You cannot make progress. Stubborn dogs. If you are seeking after knowledge, you must take the right knowledge. That is intelligence. And if you want to remain in ignorance and advertise yourself that "I am man of knowledge," how much cheater you are! You are cheating yourself and cheating others. That is going on. We want to stop this.

Morning Walk -- May 14, 1973, Los Angeles:

Devotee: We are trespassing.

Prabhupāda: Yes. Why shall I come to your country. I've come to Kṛṣṇa's country.

Śukadeva: Prabhupāda, there are many impersonalists in Seattle. We have many universities and I'd like to go there and try and defeat them. But sometimes I forget, I cannot remember the scriptures, so what would be the best clue to always defeat them?

Prabhupāda: Well, if you understand the philosophy without scripture, you can convince them. You can give so many examples.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: The weather is getting worse, Śrīla Prabhupāda.

Karandhara: It will get worse when you leave, Śrīla Prabhupāda.

Prabhupāda: When I will... It will get better, as soon as I go away. (devotees sigh)

Karandhara: No. No.

Prabhupāda: It will get..., that is natural. It will not stay. But I'm not going out for this weather, don't misunderstand me. My physicians asked me, therefore... I'm accustomed to this... (end)

Morning Walk At Cheviot Hills Golf Course -- May 17, 1973, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: That is warned by Śaṅkarācārya. Vivekananda lamented at the end of his life, that "I have simply wasted my life." He admitted, "I have not given anything." Bālakānām. He was after this body, and he was recorded, government record, as political sannyāsī. Yes. He had political purpose, but was acting as a sannyāsī. Just like Gandhi, "Saintly statesman." He is recorded, "Saintly statesman." He's a statesman, politician, but he was introducing some morality, non-violence, like that. Actually, his philosophy failed. He wanted Hindu-Muslim unity, but it was divided. The Muslim and Hindu divided. He wanted non-violence. He died out of violence. Therefore all his philosophy failed. And Indian independence was achieved not by Gandhi's non-violence method but (by) Subhas Bose's violence method. And he wanted to explain nonviolence from Bhagavad-gītā. Just see, another foolishness. Bhagavad-gītā is spoken in the battlefield, and he was screwing some meaning to prove his nonviolence.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: In one of the articles by Bharatiya... There's a man called Bharatiya, in... What is (indistinct) university? He was saying that Nirana Subhas Bose, he wanted to join Ramakrishna Mission. Is this true, Śrīla Prabhupāda?

Prabhupāda: For future. No. Might be. He wanted to join? Why he should join? Why he did not join?

Svarūpa Dāmodara: It was explained that he had a better, great mission, so he should not join, "You should do your..." By that time he was started, fighting for freedom. So he was not allowed...

Prabhupāda: So what was that greater mission?

Svarūpa Dāmodara: For independence, fighting.

Prabhupāda: No. Why he wanted to join Ramakrishna mission? What is the attraction of Ramakrishna mission? What they have done? Ramakrishna mission, what they have done? The Ramakrishna mission is working here in your country... (end)

Room Conversation with Krishna Tiwari -- May 22, 1973, New York:

Prabhupāda: The temple is very old temple. So the proprietors of the temple are brāhmaṇas, Tiwari. So the eldest member, old Mr. Tiwari, was a very nice, great devotee. At home he had Deity, Rukmiṇī-Kṛṣṇa. He was worshiping at home Rukmiṇī-Kṛṣṇa, Dvārakā.

Śyāmasundara: Mr. Tiwari is a well-known scientist. Biolo... Biologist?

Krishna Tiwari: Yes.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: Molecular biology?

Krishna Tiwari: Yes.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: Studying at U. C..., University of California at Irvine.

Krishna Tiwari: I don't know how famous, but... (laughs).

Svarūpa Dāmodara: Studying biology and molecular biology. You were in University of Southern California before, right?

Krishna Tiwari: No, University of California to Los Angeles. UCLA.

Prabhupāda: So:

idaṁ hi puṁsas tapasaḥ śrutasya vā
sviṣṭasya sūktasya ca buddhi-dattayoḥ
avicyuto 'rthaḥ kavibhir nirūpito
yad-uttamaśloka-guṇānuvarṇanam
(SB 1.5.22)

So biology... Biology means the scientist dealing in living entities?

Krishna Tiwari: Right.

Room Conversation -- July 9, 1973, London:

Prabhupāda: External. Adhyaki(?). (indistinct) ...one is interested in the body not in the soul. So he is a fool. This, this sculptor, he is simply interested in the outward body, he has no knowledge of the soul. And he wants to become a very famous man, remaining in the category of asses. Because one who is in the bodily concept of life, he is an ass. Go-khara, khara means ass. Sa eva go-kharaḥ (SB 10.84.13). Yasyātma-buddhiḥ kuṇape tri-dhātuke (SB 10.84.13). Anyone who is in the bodily concept of life he is no better than animal. The cats and dogs, they are also in the bodily concept of life. Sa eva go-kharaḥ (SB 10.84.13). So he has not advanced beyond these cats and dogs because he is in the same conception, that I am this body. A dog cannot understand that you are not this body. So similarly, if the human being cannot understand that he is not this body, what is the difference between him and the dog? So śāstra says sa eva go-kharaḥ: (SB 10.84.13) he's no better than the cows and the asses. That's all. And actually it is a fact. The first instruction of Bhagavad-gītā, they cannot take it, and they're scholars. That is the most regrettable situation that these fools and rascals under the bodily concept of life, they are become authorities. Actually they are asses. Yes.

Revatīnandana: I used to observe when I was going to the university that all my professors, their intellectual business was just a profession like digging ditches.

Prabhupāda: That's all. For earning money.

Revatīnandana: For their pleasure they're going home to drink beer and eat steak. That's all they're really interested in. They're just working to make money. I could see it and I didn't want to follow their footsteps.

Prabhupāda: Just like a śūdra, he cleans in the road for money. They are going as professor but the category is the same. You don't make any distinction between that sweeper and this professor. Or a hog and cat and dog. The hog is also working hard, whole day and night for stool, eating. So this man is also working like that. Beyond that he has no other knowledge.

Room Conversation with Indian Guests -- July 11, 1973, London:

Prabhupāda: Otherwise, what is the miracle. I simply present that "Here is God, Kṛṣṇa. And just chant His name, holy name." And they're doing that. But Indians will not do that. They'll say, "Oh, this Hare Kṛṣṇa mantra, we have seen." And one, one student in Berkeley University, Indian: "Swamiji, what this Hare Kṛṣṇa movement will do? We want now technology." That's all. They take it as very trifle thing. Not seriously. Although in the śāstra it is said,

harer nāma harer nāma harer nāma eva kevalam
kalau nāsty eva nāsty eva nāsty eva gatir anyathā
(CC Adi 17.21)
kaler doṣa-nidhe rājann
asti hy eko mahān guṇaḥ
kīrtanād eva kṛṣṇasya
mukta-saṅgaḥ paraṁ vrajet
(SB 12.3.51)

They'll not take to it. So they purposefully remain ignorant, or by their misfortune, they remain ignorant. But those who are innocent, they take it, and they get the result. That's all. Fire is fire. Either you take it by understanding or not understanding, it is fire. It will act. And that is their advantage, that these European and American boys and girls, they have taken, accepted what I have said, and they follow. They're making progress. Ādau śraddhā tataḥ sādhu-saṅgo 'tha bhajana-kriyā tato 'nartha... (Cc. Madhya 23.14-15). These are the different stages. The śraddhā stage means faith. That faith is explained in Caitanya-caritāmṛta. Faith, the Indian vernacular is viśvāsa. So Caitanya-caritāmṛta author says, "Faith means viśvāsa sudṛdha-niścaya." Faith, this is faith. When one believes firmly, sudṛdha-niś..., and with confidence.

Room Conversation With Three College Students -- July 11, 1973, London:

Prabhupāda: Oh, then, then you are not very sane.

Student (1):. Yeah, but why, there's a thousand...

Prabhupāda: You do. You say, "I do not," but you do so. You are... By law you are obliged to do so. If you say publicly, then you will be something else.

Revatīnandana: It happened. In Scotland there is one university, Stirling University, and the queen visited there. And she was treated in a very insulting way by the students, and as a result of that, the university and those students, they were put into a great deal of trouble afterward. Of course, the queen is not supreme anymore, but she still is sufficient.

Prabhupāda: No, no, I am giving an example. No, officially, she is the supreme of England. That you cannot deny. If you do so, then your position, you know. Similarly, anything... "Call a spade a spade." If everyone says that this is electric lamp, and if you say, "No, I don't say," then what can be done?

Student (3): We can see an electric lamp, but we can't see Kṛṣṇa.

Prabhupāda: No, that... That is... You have to see through the śāstra. śāstra-cakṣuṣā. Just like you see the sun just like a disc, but when you go through the śāstra, authorized books, you understand that it is fourteen hundred thousand times bigger than this earth. So what is the value of your seeing? Why do you believe you're seeing so much? Your all seeing is defective. You cannot say that you are perfectly seeing. You cannot say that.

Room Conversation with Two Buddhist Monks -- July 12, 1973, London:

Buddhist Monk (1): Yes. I remember, there we took our car, and when we were coming there, they were waving to us. I think that the world is shrinking; not that any continents are going down to the sea, but people are moving about the place. I think the more we start thinking about one world rather than big barriers and get together and meet together and talk together in a spirit of loving kindness, with tolerance, radiating our love always, I think this is the only way I know of. And people are getting interested in the universities, and other, high schools. Not still by the millions, but certainly by the hundreds and thousands. And that's good enough for a start.

Prabhupāda: Some of our books were selected textbooks in many colleges, universities. You have seen our books?

Buddhist Monk (1): I have seen some of them, not all of them. Because I meet these boys and girls, and... I seen that book about...

Prabhupāda: Our..., this book, Nectar of Devotion, that is a study book in the Temple University, Philadelphia. Similarly, our Kṛṣṇa Book, and what other books? They are...? Especially Kṛṣṇa Book and Nectar of Devotion. Bhagavad-gītā also, As It Is. (pause) We consider Lord Buddha also as incarnation of God.

Room Conversation with Two Buddhist Monks -- July 12, 1973, London:

Prabhupāda: No, suffering, of course, nobody wants. That's a fact.

Buddhist Monk (1): That's it, that's it...

Prabhupāda: But in this material world, even if you become peaceful, does it mean that you are out of suffering? I don't think.

Buddhist Monk (1): Yeah. Well, I've been asking in all these universities, high schools, and all those, all those audiences, "What is the purpose of this so-called modern education? What is the purpose? If so, kindly define this purpose. Have people thought on this?" I just gave a broadcast at Southampton day before yesterday. Nobody, not many people appear to have seriously considered this question. Is it to fly to the moon? Is it to be a food taster or a noise lover? Or is it to build dreams and castles in the air? Or to soak one's self in the whirlpools of kāma, sensuality? What is this meant for? What is our education for? No one appeared... Very, very few people have appeared to ...

Prabhupāda: No, there is no aim of the education. Their only aim is economic development.

Buddhist Monk (1): That's right.

Prabhupāda: And that means a higher standard of sense gratification.

Room Conversation with Sir Alistair Hardy -- July 21, 1973, London:

Prabhupāda: But his literatures are not read by our... A section.

Revatīnandana: Mostly in Bengal. And because he was accepted in the West, therefore they are very proud of it. But otherwise...

Prabhupāda: The Russians read. I have heard that in your Oxford University there is study of Rabindranath's books? They study?

Sir Alistair Hardy: They study which books?

Prabhupāda: Rabindranath.

Sir Alistair Hardy: Oh, I think they produce some of them, yes. He gave a course of lectures in Oxford about 1923, or, '22 or '23, which were very well attended. I wasn't there, unfortunately, but I read them.

Prabhupāda: 1953?

Haṁsadūta: '23.

Prabhupāda: '23.

Sir Alistair Hardy: '23. (end)

Room Conversation with Lord Brockway -- July 23, 1973, London:

Prabhupāda: So work is required. But godly persons, they want to live a simple life and high thinking, save time for understanding of God. The demonic people, they are engaged in horrible activities. They have manufactured so many things. So in this way... There are so many descriptions. Actually, by the increase of demoniac people, people are not very happy, and they are missing the ultimate goal of life. That is the defect of the modern civilization. They do not believe that there is an ultimate goal of life, there is life after death, and what kind of body he's going to get next. These things are not, neither in the university education curriculum, neither people are interested. So at the present moment... This is called Kali-yuga. So people are being misled. Actually, the human being, the form of human life, is distinct from animal life. So if we live like animals, then we are missing the chance. At the present moment, this is the position. So we are preaching this Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement strictly on the basis of this Bhagavad-gītā. In the Bhagavad-gītā, there is everything explained. So if people take to it, if people are educated, then things will change in a different way. They'll be happy and they will be peaceful, nice. And above, over and above them, they will have next life very blissful, full of knowledge, and eternal. Yad gatvā na nivarta... These things are all very nicely explained. There is eternal life. There is another nature. Paras tasmāt tu bhāvo 'nyo 'vyakto 'vyaktāt sanātanaḥ (BG 8.20). This is material nature, but there is another, spiritual nature. There everything is permanent. Here everything is non-permanent. Just like my body, your body. It is now getting older. And it will vanquish. This body will be finished. It will never come again back. Never come. This exactly type of this body you'll never get.

Room Conversation with Lord Brockway -- July 23, 1973, London:

Lord Brockway: But there'll be too many today to be associates.

Prabhupāda: Yes. Yes. Now it has come to another platform. So anyway, the knights, they are respectable gentlemen of the society, leading men of the society. So our, this Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement is meant for enlightening people to the right standard of understanding the goal of life. Because after this life, after this body is annihilated, we do not know what kind of body we are getting next. We must prepare. Just like you are elevated to the position of lordship. So you had to prepare yourself. Not that this lordship is offered to anyone and everyone. One who is qualified, he is offered this position. Similarly, we should know how we are becoming qualified for the next life. But that education is lacking. There is no such education. In the university or anywhere, nobody thinks, "What we are going to become next life?" But we should be prepared. If, after becoming Prime Minister in this life, or President, like Mr. Nixon, and again, by his activities, he's going to be another animal, oh, that is not very successful proposal. But there is such chance. Because after death, after giving up this body, we are completely under the grip of material nature.

prakṛteḥ kriyamāṇāni
guṇaiḥ karmāṇi sarvaśaḥ
ahaṅkāra-vimūḍhātmā
kartāham iti manyate
(BG 3.27)

Find out this verse. Prakṛti, nature, will offer the body, and there are so many varieties of body. So one should know at least, what kind of body I'm going to get next. That is intelligence. And if he remains in the darkness, and if he becomes other than human being, that is not very good proposal. They should know. What is that? Prakṛteḥ kriyamāṇāni...?

Room Conversation with Lord Brockway -- July 23, 1973, London:

Lord Brockway: I think the only thing I'd say is this, that whilst the body that you have and I have is different from the body, the material body, when we were a child, it has been a continuous transformation. It hasn't been the ending of one body and the beginning of another. And in the process of change, a, an existence is carried on. It isn't like death, which means that at that point your personality becomes separated from your physical body suddenly, like that. It is different.

Prabhupāda: No. We become separated from the physical body, but we remain in the astral body, or subtle body, mind, intelligence... mind, intelligence and ego. That mind, material mind, material intelligence, you give up when you actually remain in your spiritual body. So this is also a great science. But unfortunately, there is no discussion on this point in any university of the world. But this is a science. So actual human civilization means they should study, they should inquire about this science and be well conversant. And that is the human... Athāto brahma jijñāsā. Therefore in the Vedānta-sūtra it is said that human beings should be interested to this science first. Because animals cannot inquire about this science. The animals, they are simply interested how to eat. So similarly, if a man also simply interested in economic development which means how to eat, how to sleep... That is also there in the animal kingdom. They are trying in their own way. But they have no problem. We have created problem. In the morning, we are thinking, "How to get such and such thing?" But a bird, beast, he has no such anxiety. Therefore the Vedic injunction is that you cannot get more or less. That is already destined. So don't spoil your time in getting more. Because... The example is given that nobody wants unhappiness, or some disaster. But the disaster comes, unhappiness comes. We have experience in our life. Nobody tries for that: "Let disaster come upon me. Let there be fire in my house." No. But the fire takes place. So similarly, because you are destined to some unhappiness and happiness, that will come, either happiness or unhappiness. You don't bother for that. There is already program, according to the material nature. Prakṛteḥ kriyamāṇāni (BG 3.27). You save your time. You simply try how to get out of this dangerous position of repetition of birth and death and go back to home, back to Godhead. That should be your endeavor.

Garden Conversation with Mahadeva's Mother and Jesuit Priest -- July 25, 1973, London:

Prabhupāda: But your educational system, in the western countries, the, you have got big, big universities. Why the university students becoming hippies?

Mother: Oh, well, there're always a certain amount becoming hippies, in America, anywhere. But we must...

Prabhupāda: No...

Mother: But we must develop...

Prabhupāda: I think the college students university students, they're all hippies.

Mother: Yes, but we must develop the good ones that have talent. We must develop them. You have the power to give these boys...

Prabhupāda: I mean to say that if the chance of education is there... In India there is no such big, big universities, facilities, but in your western countries you have got nice universities, nice teaching system. Why the result is hippie?

Mother: Oh, but you... We're talking of you. You have got the power. But people follow you because they believe in you. So you have the power to educate them. And you're not hippies, are you?

Prabhupāda: My point is that this simple, this education for eating, sleeping, mating and defending, this sort of education will not satisfy.

Mother: Well, you're educated, you see.

Prabhupāda: No, I am educated.

Garden Conversation with Mahadeva's Mother and Jesuit Priest -- July 25, 1973, London:

Prabhupāda: We don't say.

Mother: No, I think they must...

Prabhupāda: You can go on with your industries. You can go on with your university. But side by side, you become competent to know what is God and how to love Him. Then your life is perfect.

Mother: I could mention a lot of names that (are) still very close to God and brilliant men in science... Where would we be without our scientists, without our doctors, medicine? They all have to go to university and get a degree before they...

Prabhupāda: That I say. You get.

Mother: Yes, but we need them.

Prabhupāda: You get.

Mother: Yes, well, the some of your boys could be doctors.

Prabhupāda: But simply to becoming doctor at a medical science will not save me. Unfortunately, they do not believe in the next life.

Garden Conversation with Mahadeva's Mother and Jesuit Priest -- July 25, 1973, London:

Prabhupāda: But where is that education?

Mother: But we... You can also work and think.

Prabhupāda: No, I mean to say, where is that education in the university to prepare the student for the next life?

Mother: Oh, but he must fit it in.

Jesuit Priest: All the Catholic Universities all over the world are doing it. That's our main purpose, is to teach the young man and the young girl the success in this world, but above all,...

Prabhupāda: Then the next question...

Jesuit Priest: ...is the success in the next, which means union with God for eternity. That's top priority. And following Christ's words, "Seek ye first the Kingdom of God," then all the other things are of very minor importance. It's closeness to God and return to be one with the Beatific Vision in heaven. That's the top priority, that's our aim in education, and that's what Michael was taught when he was at Sunnyhurst. And that he does well and gets a degree, yes, very good thing. He could be a doctor or an architect or a leader in commerce, what have you, of which all of which are essential for the well-being of the world. This time last year I was dead. I was picked up as unconscious in the corridor, and the doctors said that I had experienced... I was as near death as makes no difference. Well, if it hadn't been for the skill of the man that...

Prabhupāda: So...

Jesuit Priest: ...looked after me, I wouldn't be here this afternoon.

Prabhupāda: So next life, how it will be ascertained? What kind of body I am going to next life?

Jesuit Priest: I don't think it matters very much. I couldn't care less what's happening after I'm dead. All I know, there's not annihilation. I'm going to be joined with almighty God.

Prabhupāda: No, it cannot be blind.

Garden Conversation with Mahadeva's Mother and Jesuit Priest -- July 25, 1973, London:

Prabhupāda: Yes. So your son, your son is not dependent on you. He's independent.

Mother: Yes, but he was...

Prabhupāda: You want independence. He's already independent of you.

Mother: He was snatched out of the university by your people going round the universities. He was in university.

Prabhupāda: But... That's all right. If some of our student goes to the university... There are many students...

Revatīnandana: Now wait a minute. We didn't snatch Michael.

Prabhupāda: We don't object to that.

Revatīnandana: Michael came to the temple in London, sat down, and didn't want to go away.

Mother: He'd been taking LSD, and he was very sick. And somebody took him in.

Prabhupāda: So,... So when he was taking LSD, what did you do for him?

Revatīnandana: Why was he taking LSD? He had wonderful education, happy home, so many things.

Mother: Well, he was experimenting. Now this is it...

Revatīnandana: So LSD is acknowledged a dangerous thing to experiment with.

Prabhupāda: You like that? You like that?

Mother: Well, he had a false... This was not...

Prabhupāda: When he was taking LSD, did you like that?

Mother: I didn't know, did I?

Room Conversation with Mister Popworth and E. F. Schumacher -- July 26, 1973, London:

Revatīnandana: And just like yesterday, Mahādeva's parents came here, his mother came here along with a Jesuit family priest, about sixty years old. And she accused us that we had come and kidnapped him out of the university. And we said, "Actually, we didn't kidnap him. He came to our temple and didn't want to go away," which is what happened. She said, "Well, that's because he took some LSD and he had a false religious experience." So then I asked the Jesuit priest, "If your religious experience is as pure as he had just been saying, then why was this boy, trained up in a Jesuit school, seeking after spiritual life from a false religious process? Why was he taking LSD in the first place if his religion was satisfactory?" And he couldn't answer it. He said, "Well, there seems to be some kind of a spiritual," what did he say, "a spiritual lack or a spiritual something at this time for some reason." But he would not define it that he was unable to fill that spiritual lack by his process. And yet, we have filled that lack, or our spiritual master has filled that lack for thousands of young people now, who are not only God conscious, but they're practicing it every minute of every day. And they're practicing it practically, in the city or in the community or in the farm or wherever they are. So it's not that we're contesting the origins. The origin from Christ may have been very pure, but its present manifestation appears to be lacking something. And the young people are seeing that.

Prabhupāda: Just for example, that in the Ten Commandments, the first Commandment is "Thou shall not kill." So when I ask any Christian gentleman, "Then why you are killing?" they cannot give me any satisfactory answer. (pause)

Room Conversation with French Journalist and UNESCO Worker -- August 10, 1973, Paris:

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Bhagavān: Tonight there's a meeting scheduled at six-thirty here. There's a big professor of philosophy, it's called the Sorbonne. Have you ever heard of this school? The Sorbonne? It's the big French University. So he called, he requested if you would see him tonight. So we set appointment for six-thirty.

Prabhupāda: So Śivānanda Prabhu, you are doing well? Your wife came to see me. (break)

Yogeśvara: He's named Maurice Rougemont. Śrīla Prabhupāda, notre maitre spirituel.

Reporter: Enchantez.

Yogeśvara: Mr. Rougemont is a journalist from Combat magazine, newspaper. Combat is the newspaper of the socialists of France. Political newspaper, and Mr. Rougemont had some questions about the political and government programs of the Society.

Prabhupāda: Very nice.

Reporter: You accept to answer my questions?

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Room Conversation with French Journalist and UNESCO Worker -- August 10, 1973, Paris:

Prabhupāda: ...your position there?

Dr. Inger: Well, now I am a consultant. I used to be a regular member of the staff for a long time. Now I do certain projects for them, and I'm a visiting professor, and I'm a writer, visiting professor at different universities. So I'm connected with, with UNESCO in a way that I can not be now a permanent member of the staff which I was... (break)

Prabhupāda: ...purpose is not to propose only. Because I wish that there are so many scient..., scientific men, philosophers and thoughtful men... Suppose even if I ask you, what is your answer, that what is the purpose...? The cosmic manifestation is there, the universe is there, and there are innumerable planets within this universe, and they are very organizely kept. Everything is nicely going on. The sun is rising in due time. The moon is rising in due time. The seasons, seasons are changing. There is nice organization. So is it not a bona fide inquiry to, "What is the purpose of this organization?"

Dr. Inger: Well, the purpose is to understand oneself in relation to the cosmos.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Room Conversation with French Journalist and UNESCO Worker -- August 10, 1973, Paris:

Prabhupāda: American, they cheated the Red Indians. They got the land. Now they are claiming, "It is my land." But where you got this land? You have cheated the Red Indians, and you claim now it is your land. "Nobody should come here." Everywhere that is there it belongs to... Napoleon, he thought, "France is mine." France is there. Where he has gone, the proprietor? Yes. And with this idea he fought so much. Now nobody knows what he has become, where he is living, either in France or in hell, maybe in heaven. But there are so many places and so many forms of life. And our Bhagavad-gītā says, tathā dehāntaraṁ prāptiḥ. Just like I am now in this body. Child is in this body. So all of us sometimes were in this body, childish. So where is that body? That body is not existing. But I am existing; you are existing. You know that you had such a body. You were also playing like this child. I also remember. So the body is not existing. I am existing. So I have got a different body now. So where is the difficulty to under-stand that when this body is also finished I get another body? Where is the difficulty? And Bhagavad-gītā says, tathā dehāntaraṁ prāptiḥ. As we are changing from one body to another, another, another, even within our experience, similarly, as soon as this body is finished, I get another body. Now I am working in this body as national, as Napoleon, as Gandhi, as you according to our own whims and ideas, and fighting in the UNESCO, everything, just like recently Pakistan representative, India... But as soon as the body is finished, just like Gandhi finished, Jinnah finished, now what kind of body he has got now? May not be Indian or Pakistani. Now in that body he is thinking according to his body, a dog is thinking according to the doggish body. A man is thinking according to the man's body. So thinking and everything is changed with the change of the body. Just like this child is. This child, she cannot concentrate because due to the body. Other gentlemen, ladies, they can concentrate. So she has to get a different body to have a different mentality. So in other words, with the change of the body the mentality changes. So in this body I am thinking of France, and if my next body, it is not in France or is not human, I will think otherwise. So the whole duration of my life which I thought in one way, that is simply wasted. Simply wasted. They do not know. This knowledge is lacking. There is no such knowledge in the university, any education, nothing. Simply they are wasting time. Simply. They have no perfect knowledge. They are wasting their time, and doing something just like childish, and going on as advanced in civilization, and so on, so on, so on. Now they should think. Simply on some utopian ideas they should not go. They should know, "What is the purpose of life, what is our connection with this cosmic manifestation, if... There must be some creator. Who is that creator? What is my relation with Him?" These... There are so many things. But they are neglecting. And still, they are passing on as scientist, as philosopher, as politicians and leaders.

Room Conversation with French Journalist and UNESCO Worker -- August 10, 1973, Paris:

Prabhupāda: Just see. And therefore I say, "Cheater and cheated." Yes. Similarly, scientists also. Recently in Los Angeles, California University, one professor, a big scientist came. He's a Nobel Prize owner. He described, gave lecture. He has written one book, on which he has got Nobel Prize, Evolution of Chemicals. He wants to prove by chemical, combination of chemical, life has come into existence. That is his theory, like Darwin's theory, that life is from matter or chemical. So after hearing the lecture, there is a professor also, a student, yes. He is also Doctor of Chemistry. He is my disciple. He inquired that "If I give you all these chemicals, whether you can produce life?" At that time he said, "That I cannot say." Just see. He is proposing that "From these chemicals, life has begun," and when he is questioned whether by supplying these chemicals he can produce a life, he said, "That I cannot say." This is going on. Then what is the... Then, if you cannot say, then why you are saying that from these chemicals life has come? So when they are caught up for practical purposes, they'll deny. And they are passing on as philosopher, as scientist, priest, and these things. Just see. (someone comes in) What is that?

Room Conversation -- August 11, 1973, Paris:

Prabhupāda: He's a rascal. He's simply bogus. He's trying to... There are so many parties like that. They're four or five, they make a group and imitate these Beatles. As if... Beatles have made money. They'll also make money. That is the... And speak all nonsense. That's all. These are crazy fellows. So independence means that you can do or not do. Just like you, as a nation, American nation, or English nation, you are all independent. But why you go to the jail? Is it government's fault that you go to the jail? Therefore government has fault? Why this nonsense question. When a man, instead of going to the university, goes to the police custody, is it government's fault? Is it?

Haṁsadūta: No.

Prabhupāda: Then? It is a common sense affair. The God has given you independence. If you do something wrong, against the will of God, then you must suffer. Therefore we find so many varieties of living entities. In different grades of life. That is due to misuse of independence.

Yogeśvara: Very popular today is the idea that if we are use, misusing our independence, it's because of our upbringing, our childhood, our society, something is wrong in our psychology. Not that it's the soul, not that it's a question of spiritual problem, but material one, that our parents were cruel or our society, our education was imperfect or something. But not spiritual problem.

Prabhupāda: So that is independence. Your parents were cruel. Therefore you have revolted against the parents. That is your independence. Why you revolted against parents? Because you have got the independence.

Room Conversation -- August 11, 1973, Paris:

Prabhupāda: Ceta etair anāviddhaṁ sthitaṁ sattve prasīdati. In this way, as the heart becomes cleansed, he revives his quality of goodness. And when he's situated in the quality of goodness, the other two qualities, passion and ignorance, cannot infect him. By this process. Rajas-tamo-bhāvāḥ. Rajas-tamo-bhāvāḥ. The example is kāma-lobhādayaś ca ye. When one is too much affected with the rajo-guṇa and tamo-guṇa, passion and ignorance... What is this kāma? Lusty and greediness. These are the symptoms of rajas-tamo-guṇa. So then therefore we see that all people are lusty and greedy. So as soon as he becomes cleansed, come to the standard of goodness, these two qualities cannot affect him anymore. Tadā rajas-tamo-bhāvāḥ kāma-lobhādayaś ca ye (SB 1.2.19). One has to take the process. And it is simple process. Simple... And that, that is actually happening, in our practical experience. They say, they say... They are all rascals, fools. They can say anything and everything. Pāgale kim abole chāgale kiṁ na khāoyā. In the Bengali it is said: A madman, what does he not speak? He speaks any nonsense. And a goat, what does he not eat? So if you keep a madman... They are keeping them mad... That is our protest, that why you are keeping all people mad, crazy, nonsense? And you are also teacher, university? They have no knowledge that what is the aim of life. That you have to protest. So as we gradually increase our strength, our number, we have to protest to the world that: "Why you rascal and fools, keeping the whole human society in darkness? You have no knowledge." Here God says that: 'Under My direction the prakṛti's working.' You have no knowledge. You are saying that there is no aim. Without aim, why God should create this, such a big gigantic manifestation. Why He should take responsibility? Is there no responsibility to maintain this gigantic... God has got immense power. He can maintain. That is another thing. But why He should take the responsibility? Just like government creates a big prison house. It is not for nothing. There is some aim. Otherwise, why government should keep such establishment, huge establishment? It is not something faith(?). They are to be given cloth and shelter and everything, the arrangement. Similarly such gigantic universal manifestation, millions and millions of living entities are there. They have to be trained up. They have to be provided with all necessities of life. This responsibility's there. And actually God is doing that.

Room Conversation with Sanskrit Professor -- August 13, 1973, Paris:

Yogeśvara: ...Sanskrit at the University of, at the Sorbonne University here in Paris.

Professor: No, in fact, in the University of Marseilles.

Yogeśvara: Marseilles?

Professor: In the southern part of France. Yes.

Prabhupāda: So you can show our books, how Sanskrit we have written.

Professor: What?

Yogeśvara: He says we can show you our books. These are some of the publications of our society.

Prabhupāda: Set all the books. Let him read the Sanskrit portion.

Guru-gaurāṅga: This is Śrīmad Bhagavad-gītā.

Professor: That's the translation of...

Prabhupāda: Yes. Each word. Just see how we have translated. You are Sanskrit scholar.

Professor: This is the first volume. Are you preparing more of them?

Prabhupāda: Yes, we are preparing sixty.

Professor: Oh, I see.

Prabhupāda: Sixty volumes.

Morning Walk -- August 30, 1973, London:

Prabhupāda: In which point the students may possibly object?

David Lawrence: Well I've mentioned a few points on which... You know, obviously, I've studied a bit more deeply than the average student, because of the university and all this sort of business, which gives a particular form of knowledge.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

David Lawrence: Let me think of one, yes, one that I asked which I know Mukunda has already answered for me, but we need it in the teachers' pack, of course, is the fact of the dating of the Vedas. You know, people like some of the archaeologists such as A.L. Basham and Mortimer Wheeler maintain that the Harrapa dig, so to speak, in the Indus Valley and Mahenjo-Daro and all those towns, show the dating of the Vedas in fact to be a great deal later, you know, and therefore to take away, some people would say this, to deprive the Vedas of a certain amount of authority because they no longer, according to these men, would appear to be the most ancient religious scriptures in the world. And that, that sort of question, which...

Prabhupāda: Veda means not religion, Veda means knowledge. So if you can trace out the history of knowledge, then you can trace out what is the date of Veda. Can you trace out? When...? Which is the date when knowledge began. Can you trace out?

David Lawrence: I wouldn't think they could.

Room Conversation -- September 2, 1973, London:

Prabhupāda: Therefore I say that these universities, educational institution, all over the world, they are simply concerned with this body. According to our Vedic culture, to remain satisfied with the bodily necessities of life is the business of animals. Sa eva go-kharaḥ (SB 10.84.13).

yasyātma-buddhiḥ kuṇape tri-dhātuke
sva-dhīḥ kalatrādiṣu bhauma-ijya-dhīḥ
yat-tīrtha-buddhiḥ salile na karhicij
janeṣv abhijñeṣu sa eva go-kharaḥ
(SB 10.84.13)

These are animal conceptions. So anyone who is accepting this body as the self, he is sa eva go-kharaḥ. Go means cows and kharaḥ means asses. So this civilization based on the bodily necessities of life is animal civilization. Because we are not this body, we are spirit soul, as it is explained in the Bhagavad-gītā: dehino 'smin dehe. Dehino 'smin yathā dehe kaumāraṁ yauvanaṁ jarā, tathā dehāntara-prāptiḥ (BG 2.13). The soul is within the body and it is transmigrating from one type of body to another. Even in this life. Just like I was in the baby's body, I was in a child's body, I was in a boy's body. Those bodies are gone. But I remember that I was in such and such bodies. But I am now in a different body. Therefore, although my bodies have changed so many times, I am cognizant, I know that I had such and such body. Tathā dehāntara-prāptiḥ. To transmigrate from one body to another. This is the authoritative statement of Bhagavad-gītā. There are so many serious students of Bhagavad-gītā. Just like Mahatma Gandhi, his photographs were always with the Bhagavad-gītā, standing. But he was not a leader of understanding what is soul. He was simply concerned with the body. This nationalism is concerning this body. Bhauma-ijya-dhīḥ. Bhauma-ijya-dhīḥ, ijya, ijya means worshipable. On account of this bodily concept of life they have taken that this earth or the place where the body is born, that has become worshipable. That is nationalism. Bhauma-ijya-dhīḥ. Sva-dhīḥ kalatrādiṣu. And from my body there is relationship with my wife, with my children, therefore they are my own men. There are hundreds and thousands of women, but one woman who has got bodily connection, she's my wife. I have to do so many things for her. Similarly children, the bodily connection.

Room Conversation with Sanskrit Professor, Dr. Suneson -- September 5, 1973, Stockholm:

Prabhupāda: So how many, all...? Sixty.

Professor: Sixty, sixty-five...

Prabhupāda: So, at least, fifty volumes like this.

Professor: Hmm.

Prabhupāda: So why don't you introduce in your university?

Professor: Yes.

Prabhupāda: You see.

Professor: Yes, yes. I like myself also to acquire this one.

Prabhupāda: Yes. You see how we have translated. I have given transliteration and word to word meaning. You are scholar, you can understand. So we want to introduce this literature in the Universities.

Professor: Hm, Hm, yes...

Prabhupāda: Everything, you can see.

Professor: Have you translated also the Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu?

Prabhupāda: Oh yes.

Room Conversation with Sanskrit Professor, Dr. Suneson -- September 5, 1973, Stockholm:

Prabhupāda: Oh.

Professor: Bernhardt, I know, I know...

Paramahaṁsa: He knows them. And both of these gentlemen have Śrīla Prabhupāda's literature in their universities, in their libraries.

Professor: Hm, hm.

Prabhupāda: This book is recommended in the Temple University as textbook.

Professor: Hm, hm. This one.

Prabhupāda: Nectar of Devotion. This is Caitanya-caritā..., I mean to say, Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu. Yes. "The summary study of Śrīla Rūpa Gosvāmī's Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu."

Professor: Hm, hm? So it's the complete text?

Prabhupāda: Yes. Complete. You can read from any portion; you'll find so nice description. Anywhere from, you can read. Yes.

Professor: But original text is not given.

Prabhupāda: Then it will be very big volume. Therefore we have given summary study. But if time we get, we shall give the original text also. (break)

Professor: ...is translating this Ṣaṭ-sandarbha. It is very voluminous.

Prabhupāda: Ṣaṭ-sandarbha.

Professor: Yaḥ.

Room Conversation with Sanskrit Professor, Dr. Suneson -- September 5, 1973, Stockholm:

Prabhupāda: So he can attend our meeting. He can introduce. That will be nice.

Professor: Yes.

Paramahaṁsa: Yes. We're having a meeting, as you know, tomorrow night, at the Stockholm University.

Professor: Yes, I'll probably be coming, yes.

Paramahaṁsa: If you would, would you be kind enough, perhaps, to give an introductory lecture or, you know, to...

Professor: Well...

Paramahaṁsa: ...say, praise, or your appreciation of our movement or Śrīla Prabhupāda's teachings in front of the audience.

Professor: I, I, I don't know exactly... I hope I can come, but I can't say for sure.

Paramahaṁsa: I understand. I understand. Well, you're kindly invited. That goes without saying.

Professor: Yes, yes, I'll try to come. That will be at the University.

Paramahaṁsa: Yes, tomorrow evening at seven-thirty.

Professor: No, I'll try to come. Do you think, this one, do you think I could...?

Prabhupāda: Yes, this is also available.

Room Conversation with Indian Ambassador -- September 5, 1973, Stockholm:

Prabhupāda: All over the world, they are expecting something spiritual enlightenment from India. That is a fact. But our government is callous in that respect. Therefore any so-called swami, yogis, come from India, they gather to receive him, to hear something from him. Yes. This is the tendency, that... The real thing is that people expected something... Still they are respectful to India on account of the spiritual enlightenment. That I have studied. Still they go to India to have some spiritual enlightenment. And actually we have got this in India. If anything has to be learned about spiritual, then it is only India. That has been admitted by one Chinese gentleman. He's a learned scholar. His book is recommended in New York University. I forget his name. He has written in his book that "If you want to learn something religion and spiritual, then you must go to India."

Ambassador: It must be Lin-yu-tang, no.

Prabhupāda: Eh?

Ambassador: Was it Lin-yu-tang?

Prabhupāda: I don't know.

Ambassador: Yu-tang. You see he's a very great admirer of (indistinct)

Prabhupāda: And that's a fact. But our Indian government is not very serious about it.

Interviews with Macmillan and various English Reporters -- September 12, 1973, London:

Prabhupāda: Oh. So you have seen our books?

Prof. Gombrich: Yes, I have, yes. You are travelling to India, I hear?

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Prof. Gombrich: You are setting up a university in India?

Prabhupāda: In... What is that?

Haṁsadūta: Are you establishing a university in India?

Prabhupāda: It is not so easy thing. (Hindi)

Prof. Gombrich: At Navadvīpa?

Prabhupāda: Navadvīpa, yes.

Prof. Gombrich: And, uh...

Prabhupāda: We have begun teaching, but I do not know when it will become a university. That is a big job.

Prof. Gombrich: I see, yes.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Prof. Gombrich: Who is teaching there?

Prabhupāda: Our students. We have got these books. That's all.

Interviews with Macmillan and various English Reporters -- September 12, 1973, London:

Prabhupāda: Up to my I.A., I regularly studied Sanskrit, and in my B. A., I gave up Sanskrit. I read history. (laughs) No. Not in B.A. B.A., my combination was economics and philosophy. In I.A. I was intermediate, I.A. I had history and Sanskrit.

Prof. Gombrich: That was at Calcutta University?

Prabhupāda: Yes. Calcutta University, Scottish Church's College.

Prof. Gombrich: Oh, I see.

Prabhupāda: You have been in Calcutta?

Prof. Gombrich: Yes, I have.

Prabhupāda: Oh, you know Scottish Church's College?

Prof. Gombrich: I'm afraid not. No.

Prabhupāda: Eh?

Prof. Gombrich: No, I'm afraid I've only been to Presidency.

Prabhupāda: Presidency?

Prof. Gombrich: Yes.

Prabhupāda: Yes. So the Scottish Churches College is also on the same standard, Presidency College.

Prof. Gombrich: Yes.

Prabhupāda: So you are teacher there? No.

Interviews with Macmillan and various English Reporters -- September 12, 1973, London:

Prabhupāda: Pali, yes. Pali is almost Sanskrit language.

Prof. Gombrich: It's not so different, yes. Derived from Sanskrit. And at Vṛndāvana you studied at a later time, then, did you?

Prabhupāda: Vṛndāvana, I studied the Vedic literature, Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, as I mentioned so many, Upaniṣads, Vedānta-sūtra.

Prof. Gombrich: Then that was after the university?

Prabhupāda: Yes, that was after my retirement.

Prof. Gombrich: I see.

Prabhupāda: But in student life I had knowledge in Sanskrit, and that was utilized later on.

Prof. Gombrich: Yes, of course. And do you return to Vṛndāvana often?

Prabhupāda: Yes. Every year I go there, during the month of October.

Prof. Gombrich: Do you have a particular āśrama there?

Prabhupāda: Oh yes. Yes. Now we are constructing our own temple also, very big temple. You had been in Vṛndāvana?

Prof. Gombrich: No, I haven't, I'm afraid. No. And do you think that the message of Kṛṣṇa consciousness or Kṛṣṇa Caitanya is very different from the message of realizing God which is promulgated in other religions, for instance the Śaiva religion or...?

Prabhupāda: No I don't think so. Any religion, you follow nicely. Just Christian religion, there is God consciousness. So actually it is not this religion or that religion. People have given up religion. All over the world they have no more interest in religion. And especially I see that in your London that so many churches are vacant. Nobody's going there. So thing is that there is no more regular teaching of religious system. It has become a profession like. Neither the teachers are serious, nor the students are serious. So our principle is that not this religion or that religion. Whichever religion you may like, you can follow, but we want to see whether you are God conscious. If you are not God conscious, then we take it simply useless waste of time, these so-called religions. Śrama eva hi kevalam. You understand Sanskrit.

Room Conversation with Banker -- September 21, 1973, Bombay:

Banker: Well, there are metaphysics departments in almost every university.

Prabhupāda: Metaphysics department is there. I was also a student of philosophy. That is theories only. Of course, they are trying, psychology, metaphysics, ethics. You were also a student of philosophy?

Banker: I took some courses. My major courses were in business. But I took some in philosophy, ethic, logic.

Prabhupāda: So apart from that metaphysical, from this worldly platform, there must be divisions. Just like in your bank, if everyone is manager, that is not possible. There must be clerks and other assistants. So that is required. The society must be divided into four classes. That is brāhmaṇa, kṣatriya, vaiśya, śūdra.

Banker: My question is how does one determine into which part he goes?

Prabhupāda: Yes. That is by tendency. Guṇa-karma-vibhāgaśaḥ (BG 4.13). By the tendency. Therefore one has to approach the spiritual master. He will give direction that "This boy is meant for becoming a brāhmaṇa." Everyone has got some tendency. From the tendency it should be designated. Or by work.

Lady: But originally it wasn't like that. Suppose if you are born into brāhmaṇa, fortunately, then you become brāhmaṇa.

Prabhupāda: No, no, that is not. No, no, no. No, that is not śāstra. That is a... Lately, this brahminical class, they made it. Just like he is a manager in the bank. His son does not mean that he is also manager. He must be qualified to become a manager. He has got the facility. Because he is son of a bank manager, so he can get some facilities, father's training. He can quickly become a manager. Others may take time. Similarly, a person born in brāhmaṇa family, if his father is actually brāhmaṇa, then automatically he is getting the brahminical training at home. This satya, śama, dama, titikṣā, ārjavam (BG 18.42), this qualification. Because naturally the children follow the father. So if the father is a real brāhmaṇa, then he naturally becomes. But if by chance he develops the śūdra quality, then he must be accepted as śūdra, not as a brāhmaṇa. That is the śāstra.

Conversation at Airport -- October 26, 1973, Bombay:
Prabhupāda: These rascals, lowest of the mankind and always engaged in sinful activities, such persons do not take to Kṛṣṇa consciousness. "No. There are so many educated MA, PhD's." Kṛṣṇa says, māyayāpahṛta-jñānāḥ. "Apparently they are very educated, but their real knowledge is taken away by māyā." Āsuraṁ bhāvam āśritāḥ. This atheistic civilization is very dangerous. People are suffering for this reason. But they are not very serious. Therefore they have been addressed by Kṛṣṇa as mūḍhāḥ, rascals. Na māṁ duṣkṛtino mūḍhāḥ. So we are trying a little bit to make these mūḍhas, mūḍha civilization, to come into light of spiritual life. That is our humble attempt. But it is already said, manuṣyāṇāṁ sahasreṣu: (BG 7.3) "Out of many millions of persons, they can take to it." Manuṣyāṇāṁ sahasreṣu kaścid yatati siddhaye. But that does not mean we shall stop. Just like in our school, college days, Sir Asutosh Mukherjee started some higher study, post-graduate study classes in the university. The student was one or two, but still, the class was maintained at the cost of many thousands of rupees, not considering that there are only one student or two students. Similarly this Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement must go on. It doesn't matter, the foolish people, they do not understand it or do not come to it. We have to make our propaganda. Thank you very much. Any question, we can answer. Is there any press representative here? No. No.
Morning Walk -- December 6, 1973, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: They can call anything. Just like... Just like...

Svarūpa Dāmodara: It's now taught almost over all of the universities now here.

Prabhupāda: Eh?

Svarūpa Dāmodara: They have...

Hṛdayānanda: But the, but the sincere people don't believe it. When we go to the colleges, many students come to us and say, "These people are cheating us." They know it.

Karandhara: They don't even talk about God, transcendental meditation.

Satsvarūpa: Creative Intelligence.

Bali Mardana: Psychological.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Hṛdayānanda: The intelligent students know they're cheaters.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: But it has been accepted all over the country.

Hṛdayānanda: Not by the intelligent.

Bali Mardana: They're tricking the government.

Prabhupāda: Not... I don't accept. We don't accept. Why do they say "all over the country"?

Svarūpa Dāmodara: No, I mean in schools, in colleges.

Prabhupāda: No.

Morning Walk -- December 8, 1973, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: Our, this attempt is for preaching, not for the post. If we get the post it is all right. If we don't get, we are not disappointed. Just like even Kṛṣṇa. He came to preach, sarva-dharmān parityajya mām ekam (BG 18.66). And did everybody do so, sarva-dharmān? So that it is so sublime... It is not possible. But if one or two men accept, then you are successful.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: It's just a form of preaching.

Prabhupāda: Yes. The ideal should be there. Just like sometimes university maintains some classes, spending thousands of dollars every month, but there is no student. Does it mean the university shall close that department? No, it must go on. If anyone is fortunate, he'll take advantage. This is process.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: Among those students, thousands of students, there are only very few who come out very good in society...

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: Not everybody.

Prabhupāda: Manuṣyāṇāṁ sahasreṣu, that is already spoken. Kṛṣṇa is speaking Bhagavad-gītā; at the same time, He says,

manuṣyāṇāṁ sahasreṣu
kaścid yatati siddhaye
yatatām api siddhānāṁ
kaścin māṁ vetti tattvataḥ
(BG 7.3)

"Out of many million of persons are trying to be perfect, and out of many millions of perfect, one can hardly understand Me." Then why He is speaking Bhagavad-gītā? Actually the formula is impossible. Nobody is trying for becoming perfect, and there is no perfect; then who will understand? And still, He is speaking. Still Caitanya Mahāprabhu is coming. So our endeavor should be there. Our endeavor should be. If one man can take it up, then there will be immense good for the human so... Therefore I say this is the only humanitarian work. This is the only humanitarian... All others, bogus. They cannot become success. They are opening hospitals, but there are many millions of persons there without any hos..., and even if you give good medicine, good hospital, is that guarantee?

Morning Walk -- December 11, 1973, Los Angeles:

Hṛdayānanda: They became disgusted with the...

Prabhupāda: Yes. It's simply, we can say, what is called? Stereotype, the church. Just like you said they want more pay. Payment... They have no knowledge, so what is the use of taking advice from such rascals? What is the use? But here it is not like that. We know the science of God. We know who is God. It is not a vague thing. Now you try to understand. Let there be educational institution. America has got so many universities. Let there be a department. There is already a religious department. So let the students learn the science of God. We have got so many books. Why they will not? They are actually appreciating. So this should be introduced in the university, in colleges, in schools. Why they should neglect such a, such an important scientific knowledge?

Devotee (1): When we try to introduce it sometimes, they very often say that it is sectarian.

Prabhupāda: Not sectarian. You do not know. Why do you say sectarian? How it is sectarian?

Devotee (1): They say that it represents...

Prabhupāda: We are preaching God consciousness. So is it not for everyone? God consciousness is sectarian? Is it meant for certain sect? Or it is meant for human beings?

Hṛdayānanda: The difficulty is that nowadays every common man has his own God..., theory of God consciousness.

Prabhupāda: No, no, every common man he says "I got my mathematics." Will he be accepted?

Hṛdayānanda: No.

Morning Walk -- December 12, 1973, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: (laughs) Nobody may vote but we must go on preaching. That I have already explained, some of the university. The whole country is illiterate. Does it mean university should be stopped? University must be there. One who is fortunate will come and take education. It is not an argument that "People are illiterate. They don't care for it. Therefore let the university be closed." This is no argument.

Yaśomatīnandana: Gradually they will develop attraction.

Prabhupāda: Yes, we have to work. That is preaching. You don't think preaching is so easy going. Eating, sleeping, and sometimes chanting, "Haribol," that's all. That is not preaching. We must be ready to implant Kṛṣṇa consciousness ideas, throughout the whole world.

Umāpati: That probably won't happen overnight, though.

Prabhupāda: The Deity worship program is meant for us to keep us safe. If we neglect Deity worship, we shall also fall. But that is not the all duty finished. Arcāyām eva haraye pūjāṁ yaḥ śraddhayehate. Arcā means Deity. If anyone is worshiping the Deity very nicely, but na tad-bhakteṣu cānyeṣu, but he does not know anything more, who is devotee, who is nondevotee, what is the duty to the world, sa bhaktaḥ prākṛtaḥ smṛtaḥ, he is material devotee. He is material devotee. So we have to take the responsibility to understand who is actually a pure devotee and what is our duty to the people in general, and then you make advancement. Then you become madhyama-adhikārī. Madhyama-adhikārī, advanced devotee. Just like these people, either in India or here, they remain simply churchianity, going to the church without any understanding. Therefore it is failing. It is now... Churches are being closed. Similarly, if you do not keep yourself fit to preach, then your temples will be all closed in due course of time. Without preaching, you'll not feel enthused to continue the temple worship. And without temple worship, you cannot keep yourself pure and clean. The two things must go on, parallel. Then there is success. In modern time, either Hindus, Muslim or Christian, because in these places there is no teaching of philosophy, therefore they are closing, either mosque or temple or church. They will close.

Morning Walk -- December 15, 1973, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: Then what kind of scientist you are?

Svarūpa Dāmodara: A rascal scientist. (Prabhupāda laughs)

Candanācārya: Śrīla Prabhupāda, may I put a question?

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Candanācārya: Yesterday I made the acquaintance of a theologist, a professor from the University of Montreal. He said that the Roman Catholic presentation of Christianity is that God came to share the suffering of man.

Prabhupāda: That is another rascaldom. Why God should share the sufferings of man?

Candanācārya: I asked him this, and he said, "So that man would accept more as reality, suffering."

Prabhupāda: Very good theologician. A rascal number one. You are trying for becoming happy, and his theory is that man will accept suffering. You see? The very proposition is rascaldom. Everyone is trying for to become happy. That is progress. Ātyantika. In Sanskrit it is called ātyantika-duḥkha-nivṛttiḥ. There is suffering, and our struggle for existence means to, I mean to say, mitigate the suffering, to minimize or to make it nil. That is our struggle. We are not submitting to suffering. Then what is the civilization? What is human civilization: We don't want suffering. That is our position. Why this rascal says that "We shall suffer"? Just see. The theologician is a rascal. Therefore we say everyone rascal.

Morning Walk -- December 21, 1973, Los Angeles:

Prajāpati: His name is Harvey Cox, and he's at Harvard University, and his books are read by millions of people. As soon as one of his books comes out, everybody looks. So in this new book, his basic thesis is that God is especially interested to the causes of the poor people, and the poor people are much closer to God than anyone else.

Prabhupāda: Another rascal.

Prajāpati: I was wondering if Your Divine Grace would like to comment on such a thesis.

Prabhupāda: He is a rascal.

Karandhara: Another very prominent... He's a psychiatrist and a theologian. His name is Menninger. So about ten years ago he wrote a book that the conception of sin and evil was unnecessary, and one should give up considering that some things are sins. Now he just wrote a book saying that he was wrong, that since he has promoted this theory everyone is degrading, and that the theory of sin and evil should be maintained to keep the people in good order.

Prabhupāda: So these rascals will change every year their theology. So what is the value of their words? Childish. (break) ...changes, he is a rascal. That is our... We say, "Kṛṣṇa the Supreme." We never change it. And "Surrender is the only process." We shall never change it. In any circumstance we will not change it. That is the difference. And these rascals will change every year their opinion. They are rascals. (break) ...They are rascals. (break) Kṛṣṇa said that "I am the Supreme." So Arjuna accepted, the Supreme. All the ācāryas accepted the Supreme. Caitanya Mahāprabhu accepted, Supreme. My Guru Mahārāja accepted, Supreme. I am accepting, Supreme. I am teaching the same thing. So there is no change. Not that after a few years it will be changed. That never be. That is our position. (break) Changing means material. Anything material is susceptible to change. Like this material body. I am changing my body, but I am the spirit soul. I am not changing. That is the difference. So all these so-called theologicians, they have no idea what is spiritual knowledge. All rascals. They cannot understand what is God. That I have explained. Simply speculating. It will not help. (break) (Hindi) (some Indian people have joined the walk) Now we are talking of one theologician. Some years ago just... Narrate the... Yes.

Morning Walk -- December 21, 1973, Los Angeles:

Prajāpati: This basic thesis of the leading theologian in our country... He's saying that the poor people are closer to God and God is specifically looking on their cause more than anyone else. He's at Harvard University.

Prabhupāda: But the one thing is, who is poor? Admitting. We admit, of course, that God is specially interested with the fallen or degraded. But first thing is that who is fallen? Who is poor? That is to be ascertained.

Guest (1) (Indian man): But there is one more thing. I don't think God could be so partial that He would...

Prabhupāda: No, God cannot be partial.

Guest (1): ...that he would look only to the poor. But as there is a saying in Hindi that (Hindi) So they say, "When a man is poor, and he is miserable, then he remembers more God."

Prabhupāda: No, no, no. Not necessarily. That is stated in the Bhagavad-gītā. Catur-vidhā bhajante māṁ janāḥ sukṛtino 'rjuna, ārto arthārthī (BG 7.16). When one is distressed he remembers God, if he is pious. If he is not pious...

Guest (1): Then he won't remember. Then he will curse him. Then he will curse.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

1974 Conversations and Morning Walks

Room Conversation -- February 13, 1974, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: Ten years. Not ten years, nine years.

Dr. Kapoor: Nine years.

Prabhupāda: Yes, because when you were a student, at that time we were family man.

Dr. Kapoor: Yes, when I had just finished my university career, I think...

Prabhupāda: In Allahabad, when you were living at that...

Dr. Kapoor: Gauḍīya Maṭha.

Prabhupāda: Gauḍīya Maṭha, I think you were student then.

Dr. Kapoor: I had just, I think, I was a research student then. I had just taken my MA and I was working as a research scholar. I met Giri Mahārāja in 1931 when he did some (indistinct) at Nainital.

Prabhupāda: Oh.

Dr. Kapoor: He first introduced me to Mahāprabhu, you see, or introduced Mahāprabhu to me. You see before that I was a scholar.

Prabhupāda: But your teeth are very strong.

Morning Walk -- February 20, 1974, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: So janmaiśvarya-śruta-śrī, good birth, riches, education, and sri, beauty, these are the result of pious activities.

Dr. Patel: When you say the present education and all... But this education has created those boys, smoking carasa and gañjā and bhāṅga...

Prabhupāda: That is not a university education. That is due to their coming to India.

Dr. Patel: They are...? They come to India and... They don't do it there?

Prabhupāda: Yes. Yes, they come here for spiritual enlightenment, and they meet these rascals, gañjā-eater sādhus. That is the beginning.

Dr. Patel: But they have introduced that in American universities.

Prabhupāda: No, no, no. I know. This is the beginning. They learned this... They thought that this is spiritualism.

Dr. Patel: I thought they have taught us.

Prabhupāda: No, no, no.

Morning Walk -- February 20, 1974, Bombay:

Dr. Patel: And it has been used by American boys. And a professor of American university is a friend of mine. And he has been taken horrible things about American boys. And you are talking LSD has been invented in India!

Guest (1): No! I am talking...

Dr. Patel: Don't talk all these things!!!

Guest (1): No, I am talks, sir... I am only talking of...

Dr. Patel: No, this is very wrong. Untruth is as good as a daitya. Truth is God. Truth is Kṛṣṇa. Truthfulness. So how it may be? What do you say, sir?

Prabhupāda: No, no. When we say gañjā was started from here, it is God or not?

Guest (1): That's all...

Dr. Patel: Gañjā is God. What is that? In gañjā also you'll get that, that, that state of samādhi those who get it, they get it. I mean, that is all right. But you said like that, that LSD is invented in India.

Guest (1): No! I never said LSD... Why you are putting...?

Prabhupāda: No, no. When they started gañjā... When they started gañjā... They were scientific men. They wanted to make scientific chemicals out of it.

Morning Walk -- February 22, 1974, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: (Hindi) Now Americans are seriously considering about this movement. There are so many writings.

Dr. Patel: You are... As a matter of fact, you are improving their lot. The present boys, in American universities, they are all LSD smokers. The other day I said that, and that boy said that LSD went from India and so I became violent. Forgive me. I felt sorry later on. Because I should not have expressed my temper before you...

Prabhupāda: No, the...

Dr. Patel: But I held in a little more temper than that also. When somebody tells a wrong thing.

Prabhupāda: No, this gañjā, gañjā went from here.

Dr. Patel: That, because it is produced in India.

Prabhupāda: Yes. And they made a chemical composition of gañjā. That is LSD.

Dr. Patel: No, no. LSD is not chemical. It is a synthetic.

Prabhupāda: Therefore similar effect. Because they are scientific. So instead of importing gañjā from India, they invented some chemical composition...

Dr. Patel: (indistinct) out of these boys. They smoke even in the classrooms, in their residences...

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Morning Walk -- February 22, 1974, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: Therefore similar effect. Because they are scientific. So instead of importing gañjā from India, they invented some chemical composition...

Dr. Patel: (indistinct) out of these boys. They smoke even in the classrooms, in their residences...

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Dr. Patel: ...in their university camps and everywhere.

Prabhupāda: Now it is going to be legalized.

Dr. Patel: Smoking?

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Dr. Patel: Just like they have legalized the prostitution.

Prabhupāda: Yes. Anything... Because it is vote. Majority wants. "All right. Make it legalized."

Dr. Patel: All, they have...

Prabhupāda: Same thing here even. Majority wants to be godless. So government is following that. Therefore they are against our movement. (aside:) Hare Kṛṣṇa, Jaya. Namaskāra. Hare Kṛṣṇa. Now the vox populi. Majority wants to become drunkards. "All right, it is legalized." Majority wants prostitute hunters. "All right. It is legalized." This is government. No consideration of morality or religion. Majority wants, it must be given.

Morning Walk -- March 12, 1974, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: Eh?

Jagadīśa: Are the majority of citizens śūdras? In a varṇāśrama society?

Prabhupāda: Yes. The number of śūdras are always bigger. Just like in University education. The, the number of graduates and post-graduates, they're less. Others are big, number bigger.

Bhagavān: The whole idea is that at the end of everyone's life, everyone is required to leave home, perform devotional activities, but not necessarily take sannyāsa.

Prabhupāda: Devotional activities, either he leaves from home or not leaves, that doesn't matter. It must continue from the very beginning. For the management of affairs, we require to divide. Because there are different classes of brain, so those who have very intellectual brain, they should become brāhmaṇas. Those who are fit for management and protection, they should be trained as kṣatriya. And those who are fit for producing food, taking care of the cows, they should be trained as vaiśya. And the balance, they're all śūdras. This is the division. You... Everywhere you'll find this division, natural. One class of men, very intelligent. One class of men, very strong, good brain for management, administration. (aside) Jaya. One class of men, fit for tilling the ground, field, and produce food, take care of the cows. And the balance, śūdra. That's all. So in our society, this division should be there. The most intelligent class of men, they should be engaged in preaching, reading books and instructing, taking care of Deity worship, temple, and another class should be strong managers, that things are going on nicely. Everyone is engaged, not that eating and sleeping. Everyone must be engaged, employed. So, so if one is very much adapted for eating and sleeping, he should be engaged with plows. You see. He must be activity. Otherwise, there must be dysentery, eating and sleeping. He cannot digest. Yes. So in this way, our society should be managed. Not that "Give me second initiation, a sacred thread." And after getting it, business finished: "Now I'm liberated. Let me eat and sleep." This should be stopped. We have got fifty bighās of land, and I have calculated in Māyāpur, setting aside twenty bighās for the temple and grazing ground for the cows, thirty bighās of land. The production should be three hundred mounds of grains. And three hundred mounds of grain, I have calculated. How much you can...?

Bhagavān: Fifteen hundred.

Morning Walk -- March 27, 1974, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: They are now introducing. Now, when it is introduced, they'll be accustomed. They'll drink day and night. Don't bother.

Dr. Patel: I have not got that experience. When I was a student in London, in London University, the boys there, they drink but not that much as they drink here. They are abusing it.

Prabhupāda: Every, every few steps there is a wine shop.

Dr. Patel: Now, every few steps, now you can have that in your own home. Here. You give the minister ten thousand rupees of bribes for a license to... (break) ...have in your home. (break)

Prabhupāda: ...these four things which we are prohibiting: illicit sex...

Dr. Patel: And drinking, meat-eating.

Prabhupāda: Yes, intoxication, meat-eating and gambling. So these four things are encouraged by the government. Gambling, that, what is that? Lottery.

Devotees: Lottery.

Prabhupāda: And meat-eating: beef shop.

Morning Walk -- March 27, 1974, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: ...I was on the airport, they called police because they got, they saw one Bhagavad-gītā in my bags. You see. This is the position.

Dr. Patel: They are, they are translating Bhagavad-gītā in their own universities now. (break)

Prabhupāda: ...may be because it was Bhagavad-gītā, they stopped me.

Dr. Patel: This is a phase of the government. The government is not the people. (break) (Heavy wind noise throughout)

Prabhupāda: ...people everywhere good.

Dr. Patel: But the Russians are really good.

Prabhupāda: Only the... People everywhere, all over the world, they are all good. Only the leaders make them bad. That's all. That is my opinion. Misleaders. Yad yad ācarati śreṣṭhas tat tad evetaro janaḥ (BG 3.21). The so-called śreṣṭha, leaders, they... Just like in India. When Gandhi was there it was prohibition, and now there is wine shop every step. It is due to the leaders. People, people, what the innocent people, what they'll do?

Dr. Patel: You are talking of this, but I am the knower of the private character of so many businessman.

Prabhupāda: Why you know? Everyone knows.

Dr. Patel: They have got so many women outside, and some of them want every day new one. All sorts of rascals they are. (break) Raja should rule, and not these...

Prabhupāda: Asaṁskṛtāḥ kriyā-hīnāḥ.

Dr. Patel: (indistinct)

Prabhupāda: Everyone, all people, not only the ministers.

Morning Walk -- March 29, 1974, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: You may mean something, but actually, that is not the meaning. That is the difference. You may mean something. The point is that you may follow. In the Vedas there are different ways, but you cannot decry the authority of the Vedas. That is the point.

Dr. Patel: The ideal Vaiṣṇava will not say this. The ideal Vaiṣṇava. Even Vedas say to kill an animal anytime, I won't. I won't kill it, I won't eat it. I'll not eat even in England as a student of London University-meat.

Prabhupāda: I'm recommending you to eat meat?

Dr. Patel: No, you eat the..., indirectly so.

Prabhupāda: All right.

Dr. Patel: I'm very sorry.

Prabhupāda: It is very difficult to talk with you. Therefore you cannot take any lesson.

Dr. Patel: No, I'm not taking this lesson, going to kill an animal to eat it. That lesson in no way I will take.

Prabhupāda: That is meant for others!

Dr. Patel: Ācchā! Not for me.

Prabhupāda: All right.

Dr. Patel: Otherwise, as a Vaiṣṇava you can't...

Prabhupāda: I don't say that Vaiṣṇava. Why I'll say? Why you talk like that?

Dr. Patel: (indistinct) Swamiji told his disciples not to take meat.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Morning Walk -- March 31, 1974, Bombay:

Dr. Patel: Astadhā, that's the lower prakṛti of God.

Prabhupāda: Yes, so now the study, first study, begins from material point of view: Wherefrom the sky came? How the sky came into existence? First of all sky. Then, from sky, there is sound. Then, from sound there is air. From air, there is... Along with these creations... the sky creation means the air creation also, the reception of the sound. So in this way it is all described in the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam very nicely, how creation took place. Then, ultimately, we come to the land, where all the qualities of other elements are there. There is sound. There is touch. There is vision. There is smell. Everything is there. So... And the subtle matters. Mind, citta, intelligence, then buddh... intelligence. Then false ego. This is... At the present moment, everyone is thinking in the bodily concept of life: "I am American." "I am Indian." "I am brāhmaṇa." "I am kṣatriya." This is false ego. He's not, neither of them. Because he's spirit soul, a different identity. So these, how the subtle mind, intelligence, are working, one should know. How transmigration of the soul takes place? By the action of mind, intelligence and ego. They do not know. There is no such science. There are so many universities all over the world. But who is studying all these things? The psychologists, they have studied a little more about thinking, feeling and willing. That's all. But they do not know how he is working, how he is carrying the subtle soul to other body. That they do not know.

Mr. Sar: Apareyam itas tu...

Guest (2): Why do you not explain that?

Prabhupāda: Eh?

Guest (2): Why do you not explain that about subtle being carried forward?

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Morning Walk -- March 31, 1974, Bombay:

Dr. Patel: Article came. I read it.

Prabhupāda: Yes. "Chemical evolution." "From chemical life has come." Just see. And he has got Nobel Prize.

Dr. Patel: That is the Russians.

Mr. Sar: Is it?

Dr. Patel: No, that man has not got the Nobel Prize.

Prabhupāda: Oh yes. I know. In California University he was there. So one of, one of my students, he's also professor in the... Dr. Svarūpa Dāmodara. He challenged that "Suppose if I give you the chemicals, can you produce life?" That time he said, "That I cannot say." From that day, his meeting was not attended by the students. Yes. He theoretically said that "From chemicals life has come into existence."

Dr. Patel: As a matter of fact...

Prabhupāda: No.

Dr. Patel: ...life keeps the chemicals together. As soon as the life goes away, the chemicals dissolve.

Prabhupāda: Dissolve, yes. As a medical practitioner, you know. Where is chemical? Where is chemical? That is a fact.

Dr. Patel: Always fact.

Mr. Sar: So still we are researching it.

Prabhupāda: No...

Dr. Patel: There is no research...

Prabhupāda: That is... But when the fact is there, what is the use of your researching? When the fact is already there, what is the use of your so-called researching?

Guest (3): How can we see Kṛṣṇa?

Prabhupāda: That is being explained.

Morning Walk -- March 31, 1974, Bombay:

Dr. Patel: Man is also jantu.

Mr. Sar: No, no, we are... (break)

Prabhupāda: ...university does not teach anyone to steal, but he, he becomes a thief. Does it mean the university has taught him to become a thief? So he steals and goes to the jail. This is the position. Svabhāvas tu pravartate.

Mr. Sar: It's only the nature. (break)

Prabhupāda: ...association with the different qualities.

Mr. Sar: That he has taught within, so many adhyāyas, not only one. (break)

Prabhupāda: ...presents you instruction: sarva-dharmān parityajya mām ekaṁ śaraṇaṁ vraja (BG 18.66). That's all. If you simply surrender to Kṛṣṇa, then everything finished. Everything is finished.

Mr. Sar: He is (indistinct) nānyaṁ guṇebhyaḥ kartāram...

Dr. Patel: Ah, that... (break) ...ācaret. Then he goes beyond the guṇas.

Prabhupāda: Yes, yes, yes.

Dr. Patel: Guṇātītaḥ. Guṇātītaḥ pratyahe...

Prabhupāda: That guṇātītaḥ, that guṇātītaḥ is possible, that māṁ ca avyabhicāriṇi-bhakti-yogena yaḥ sevate, sa... (BG 14.26)?

Dr. Patel: Guṇān etān samatītyaitān...

Prabhupāda: Etān samatītyaitān.

Morning Walk -- March 31, 1974, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: Spiritual. Yes. (break) ...is, that is explained in the Bhagavad-gītā. Yoginām api sarveṣāṁ mad-gata-āntar-ātmanā (BG 6.47). That is the supreme samādhi, always thinking of Kṛṣṇa. (break) ...little by little.

Mr. Sar: Little by little.

Dr. Patel: And we, because we are dull students... (Gujarati) (break)

Prabhupāda: Why? Why do they go to the college and university? They could do it independently. (break) Therefore tad-vijñānārthaṁ sa gurum evābhigacchet (MU 1.2.12). Inquisitive, jijñāsu, they should go to the proper person who knows it.

Dr. Patel: He is, that... (break)

Prabhupāda: ...eighth time. No? Thirteenth time?

Dr. Patel: Thirteenth time. Now you must time, describe the fourteenth time because thirteen is a bad number. (Prabhupāda chuckles)

Prabhupāda: Yes, I have got the translation. All my secretaries, they have got. (break) (kīrtana, Acyutānanda singing) (end)

Morning Walk -- April 17, 1974, Bombay:

Indian man (1): That is the purpose and duty (indistinct) of saints who have already realized...(?)

Prabhupāda: Yes. Another... That is said,

bhārata bhūmite manuṣya janma haila yāra
janma sārthaka kari karo para-upakāra
(CC Adi 9.41)

Paropakāra. Yes, that is India's duty. (break) ...nonsense, that sitting at, very comfortably at Haridvara. (break) ...says, everything... Īśāvāsyam idaṁ... Everything has got control of the Supreme. Īśāvāsyam idaṁ sarvam (ISO 1). How you can say it is material when it is, it can be used... There is another verse. What is called? Prapañcikatayā buddhyā hari-sambandha-vastunaḥ. Everything has got relation with the Supreme because it is a production of the supreme energy. So everything is connected. So

prāpañcikatayā buddhyā
hari-sambandha-vastunaḥ
mumukṣubhiḥ parityāgo
phalgu-vairāgya kathyate

If we do not take everything in that relation, that "Everything belongs to Kṛṣṇa. Everything has got relationship with Kṛṣṇa," and if we simply give it up, "Oh, this is material. This is material..." (break) ...has got relation of Kṛṣṇa. Therefore everything should be dovetailed in the service of Kṛṣṇa. And that is real understanding. (break) You'll find simply drunkards lying down on the street. I lived there for some time.

Girirāja: "Nowhere in the Newsweek article is the quackery of these signs..."

Prabhupāda: But they were very much respectful to me. On my door they are lying down and passing urine. As soon as I will come, "Come on. Come on. Come on, sir. Come on," respectful. They were very respectful. Hm. Hare Kṛṣṇa. (break) ...grudge because I am presenting Kṛṣṇa the Supreme Personality of God. That is their grudge. That is the grudge of the all impersonalists.

Girirāja: "This allegation, however, betrays such a profound lack of knowledge that the so-called swami sounds more like one who is learned at Hinduism at New York University than an authentic scholar of the Vedas." (break) "Supreme Brahman, the ultimate..." (end)

Morning Walk -- April 20, 1974, Hyderabad:

Prabhupāda: We are making all over India members with these English books. Why do they not say, "No, no, no, I cannot accept English book." Why they are accepting English books? It is my fault that I have written in English or it is their fault? Why they are accepting? Everywhere we are making life members but why do they accept these English books? They could have refused, "No, no, no, I cannot accept English book." Why they are accepting? I know one boy. He is about forty-two years. But he was practically my first student. He is a very big scholar in Sanskrit. But because he does not know English, he is useless. He could not make any, prosper in any way. He is taken as half-educated. He was appointed as vice-chancellor of the Darbhana(?) Sanskrit University. Maybe it is only name. Anyway, now his teaching period is over. Now he is useless. He does not get any service. Although he is a very big Sanskrit scholar. The only defect, that he does not know English—he does not get any responsible position.

Pañcadraviḍa: He does not want to learn?

Prabhupāda: No. He was trying to learn but he could not learn it. If he is serious, he can learn, but he is not serious.

Indian man (1): If we learn English perfectly, the local priests will (indistinct) those others don't speak English anymore.

Prabhupāda: No, local language is required.

Morning Walk -- April 29, 1974, Hyderabad:

Gargamuni: Yes. He has not sold any.

Prabhupāda: No, he has sold some, but still lying in the store. He published only one thousand copies. Our Nectar of Devotion, the translation of the same book, is selling like hotcakes. Yes. In the university, Temple University, they have made a textbook. And everywhere they like it, Nectar of Devotion. I think... What is our edition at the present moment? Fourth or Fifth edition. And we don't publish less than ten thousand copies. So we have to depend on Kṛṣṇa sincerely. Serve Him, everything, what is required, that will come, some way or other. That is miracle. Why should we try to cheat others, that "I can manufacture gold"? This rascal, if he can manufacture gold, then why he is doing himself business? That is simply jugglery. Even the magicians, they can do. They create so much money. But he is a poor man. Why he remains poor? And everyone thinks of us, that we have got unlimited wealth. You know that?

Gargamuni: Yes. In Māyāpur, when I bring over the karatālas, they are very heavy, two hundred sets of karatālas. So the boatmen say, "Sona, sona." They are thinking it is gold, the karatālas.

Prabhupāda: Everyone... Even government... In the parliament the question was raised, "Wherefrom they get money fabulously?" These men, in our country, they may be fools. In your country also, Los Angeles, I mean, neighboring storekeepers, they are wonderful, that "These people do not work and they have got so many cars and live so nicely?" (laughing) They inquire that "How do we get all these things?" They actually see that they are not ordinary working. They have no working or bank balance or business. Still, they have got so many cars and they eat nicely and they maintain such a nice house. And six, seven house they have purchasing. The realtors, they also know in America that we are very rich men. As soon as there is some property, they offer, because they know that we are very rich men. Because we have purchased some properties, so all the realtors, they have taken it for granted that we have got immense money. Here also, the members are thinking like that, that "Swamiji has got immense money."

Morning Walk -- April 29, 1974, Hyderabad:

Gargamuni: Allahabad is an important place?

Prabhupāda: Oh yes, Allahabad, very important. The UP high-court is there. Therefore all enlightened... University is there. All educated men of UP are in Allahabad. This Jawaharlal Nehru, Motilal Nehru, they were Allahabad men. Sarte(?) Bahadur Satru(?), big, big, well-known men, they are all... Pandita Madana Mohana Mahalabdha. All big, big politicians, they were Allahabad men. (break) ...times to print the books here. No action was taken. In the last five years, everyone tried and there was no result. Otherwise we can print all the books here.

Gargamuni: No, but the quality is better.

Prabhupāda: Quality is better, but it will be cheaper. It doesn't matter. But to get books there, it takes so much time and the book department is not being managed nicely. But if we print here, the all problems will be solved. Here that gentleman, he has got press. Why not let him print? Yes. Why don't you call him immediately? If he can print. We can reprint all the books here.

Room Conversation with Catholic Cardinal and Secretary to the Pope -- May 24, 1974, Rome:

Prabhupāda: Yes. Our movement is that, that is first-class religious system which teaches how to love God. This is the sum and substance of our movement. There is a Sanskrit statement in Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam,

sa vai puṁsāṁ paro dharmo
yato bhaktir adhokṣaje
ahaituky apratihatā
yayātmā suprasīdati
(SB 1.2.6)

If you want to be happy, then you must take to the superior type of religious system which teaches the followers how to love God without any motive, and which is never checked by any material condition. God's name is given here as Adhokṣaja. Adhokṣaja means beyond experimental knowledge. God has got many name according to different situation, and one of the name, for the materialistic person, adhokṣaja. Akṣaja means experimental knowledge. Akṣa means eyes or senses. Beyond sense perception. So we cannot speculate about God, but we can understand about God from authorities. This is the conception of Bhāgavata-dharma. So the human life is especially meant for understanding God. That is the version of the Vedānta-sūtra, Vedānta philosophy. The Vedānta philosophy teaches, athāto brahma jijñāsā, "Now this human form of body, which is above the lower grades of forms..." There are 8,400,000 forms of body. The soul is transmigrating, evolution. But when we get this human form of body, our main business is to inquire about God. Athāto brahma jijñāsā. Now, if somebody inquires what is God, the immediate reply is, God is the source, original source of everything. Janmādy asya yataḥ (SB 1.1.1). So the human form of life is meant for understanding God, and according to our philosophy, if human body is not utilized for understanding God, then it is misused. If we simply spoil our life like the animals, eating, sleeping, sex life and defending, then the human life is spoiled like animals. The real necessity of human life is to understand God. Not only to understand God superficially, but to understand our eternal relationship with Him, and then prayojana, the ultimate goal of life, is to go back to home, back to Godhead. That is ultimate goal. And if you simply try to understand God, as we get it from the revealed scriptures, then after giving up this body, tyaktvā dehaṁ... Deham means this body. After this death... There are many deaths in many bodies, but after this death, tyaktvā dehaṁ punar janma naiti (BG 4.9), he does not enter again into the material body. In his original spiritual body he goes back to home, back to Godhead. So this is sum and substance of our Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement, and we have got many Vedic literatures about it, especially the Bhagavad-gītā and Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam. So we have published Bhagavad-gītā As It Is. The publisher is Messrs. MacMillan and Company, and we are selling. It has already gone fifth edition. And each edition they have published fifty-thousand copies and this is the preliminary study book, to understand God. And then, when one is passed of this knowledge, then he can be given the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam which we have published like this, sixty volumes, all original verses from Bhāgavatam, and explained. Then... This is graduate study. Then after this there is post-graduate study, this Caitanya-caritāmṛta. This book is in twelve volumes, and other book, Bhāgavatam, is sixty volumes. There are many other corollaries, just like Science of Devotion. Have you got this book? No. Nectar of Devotion. So we have already published about two dozen books of this nature. So people are accepting, especially in the western countries. Recently we have received report. Some of the learned scholar professors, they have ordered all the books. They have introducing in their class. Yale University, Temple University. And they are enlisting my books in the bibliography, of Indian philosophy, and they are distributing to the learned circles. And last year we have sold four millions pieces of literature in the western countries. So we are encouraged. And these boys, young boys, they have encouraged me by joining this movement. And one priest in Boston, he issued one pamphlet that "These boys are our boys. How is that? Before that, they did not come to church. They did not inquire what is God. And now why they are mad after God?" This was his remark. And some of the American public, they inquire from them, "Are you Americans?" So this movement is getting ground all over the world, Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement. And amongst the higher scholarly section also. This is sum and substance of our movement. Our principle is to become sinless. Because in the Bhagavad-gītā you will find this verse.

Room Conversation with Catholic Cardinal and Secretary to the Pope -- May 24, 1974, Rome:

Prabhupāda: You have not brought by the fruit?

Nitāi: Yes, Satsvarūpa Mahārāja did.

Monsignor Verrozano: We have here one translation of the commentary of Professor Zehner(?) from Oxford.

Prabhupāda: Here is my foreword by Professor Dimock.

Yogeśvara: This is a professor from Chicago University who wrote the foreword to this edition. He makes an interesting comment.

Prabhupāda: You read, read it.

Dhanañjaya: Yes.

Prabhupāda: Professor Dimock's.

Cardinal Pignedoli: It's very strange and famous. That's the gospel.

Prabhupāda: Read it.

Dhanañjaya: (reading) "Swami Bhaktivedanta comments upon the Gita from this point of view. And that is legitimate."

Prabhupāda: Yes. That is legitimate.

Room Conversation with Catholic Cardinal and Secretary to the Pope -- May 24, 1974, Rome:

Dhanañjaya: "In this translation the western reader has the unique opportunity of seeing how a Kṛṣṇa devotee interprets his own texts. It is the Vedic exegetical tradition, justly famous, in action. (reads rest of foreword of MacMillan edition of Bhagavad-gītā As It Is)" This is stated by Professor Edward C. Dimock, Department of South Asian Languages and Civilization, University of Chicago. Please take this.

Cardinal Pignedoli: Thank you. It will be a source also for unprofessionals, also to give true interpretation yes, by devotees.

Prabhupāda: The trades manager of Messrs. MacMillan Company, he has reported that this book is selling increasing, and other editions, they are decreasing.

Monsignor Verrozano: A great sign of interest.

Cardinal Pignedoli: Thank you. Well, may we be united in hopes and prayer and...

Prabhupāda: Yes, kindly pray to God.

Morning Walk at Villa Borghese -- May 25, 1974, Rome:

Prabhupāda: That is their misfortune. Mūrkhāyopadeśo hi prakopayati na śamyati (?). A mūrkha, a rascal, when he is given good advice, he becomes angry. He becomes angry. He does not take for solution of the problem, but he becomes angry. Mūrkhāyopadeśo hi. Payaḥ-pānaṁ bhujaṅganaṁ kevalaṁ viṣa-vardhanam (?). Because they are miscreants, like snakes, if you give him milk, his poison will increase. Payaḥ-pānaṁ bhujaṅganaṁ kevalaṁ viṣa-vardhanam.

Yogeśvara: When I was at the university, there were two kinds of strikes. One was by the students and the other one was by the professors.

Prabhupāda: (laughing) And what about the clerks? They also strike sometimes.

Yogeśvara: They took advantage of the two.

Prabhupāda: Everyone dissatisfied—that's a fact. This is a bad civilization.

Yogeśvara: Jyotirmayī is giving a course in Paris at one university, and there we can't always have our classes. We are scheduled every week, but we've only had two or three. The whole rest of the time the university has been closed because the students were striking. Practically the whole year.

Bhagavān: (car screeches as passing by) So fast and they go nowhere.

Prabhupāda: He is proud that "How fast I can drive!" Just see. And where you are going? "I am going to hell, that's all. Never mind." That is described in the Bhagavad-gītā Just like the flies. They are coming very forcefully. Where? In the fire. Pat! Pa! Pa! Pa! Pa!" They are very busy. And as soon as on the fire, finished. Just see. Very busy. Without inquiring, "Where I am going so forcefully?" But they are going to the fire.

Morning Walk -- May 28, 1974, Rome:

Dhanañjaya: It's called "streaking."

Prabhupāda: Whatever it may be, the nonsense education, result is like that. Is that education? I first, when I saw in Honolulu University—all hippies, all the students, half naked and niggardly dressed. Why so many? They are all students. You see? It has become a fashion. This is the education. And one commissioner has... You have not seen our Harmonist prepared. Collapse.

Satsvarūpa: I saw it yesterday. The president of Temple University, he said this was good, this running naked.

Prabhupāda: And another has that "education has collapsed."

Dhanañjaya: They have lost all sense of moral values.

Prabhupāda: Animals. The whole material civilization is based on animalism. Therefore now they are coming as naked animals. The basic principle of the civilization is animalism. Now... It was covered by the progress of time. Now they are coming to be naked animals, that's all.

Yogeśvara: So this is another problem for Bhagavān's book.

Prabhupāda: No, no. That... You have created this animal civilization. Now they are coming out as naked animals. This is the result. Now you have to reform them. That reformation is Kṛṣṇa consciousness. So you have to make an example, what is actually human life. Then others will see. You cannot stop them. But some of them, those who are intelligent, they will see, "Yes, here is life." As they are coming to nakedness, they will come to this, our mode of life. So you have to become an ideal society. You live locally, and be self-sufficient. They will see that it is possible to live locally without movement, and still highly cultured men, self-sufficient. That is required.

Morning Walk -- May 29, 1974, Rome:

Prabhupāda: There cannot be. How a man and woman can be equal? The woman has to give birth, she has to become pregnant. Why the man cannot be pregnant. Why? Why this inequality? To take care of the child, to become pregnant, so much responsibility, the man does not take, especially in this country. He impregnates one girl, and he goes away. And all the responsibility is for the girl. Therefore he (she) wants to get rid of it. He (She) takes the course of abortion. Kill it. This is the psychology. Where is equality? You put her into inconvenient position, and she commits another sin. She is obliged. Where is equality? And you go away. So this rascaldom philosophy may go on. We have got answer for all the rascals. They are all rascals.

Haihaya: The communists, they kicked us from the university in Mexico, because we were always defeat there in the philosophy. It is very easy to defeat communists with this philosophy.

Prabhupāda: Yes. We have to do. There may be opposition, but what can be done? We have to speak the resu..., that "There cannot be equality sir. You are talking nonsense." Challenge them, and let them prove that "Here is equality." Where is equality? Where is equality? You are human being. You are trying to live very comfortably. Why don't you make comfortable life for other living entities? Why you are sending them to the slaughterhouse? Where is equality?

Haihaya: If we have a world day every month, fasting world day. If we can fast, all the world can fast, all inhabitants of the world...

Prabhupāda: No, no, you cannot expect that the whole world will become Kṛṣṇa conscious. That is not possible. You keep your standard. Don't be bewildered by these rascals. That is our proposal. We should not be misled by this rascal philosophy. We shall stick to our own philosophy. That is required. Because we know all their philosophy are defective. That is not perfect. So why shall I be misled by their philosophy? We shall stick to our own principle, Kṛṣṇa philosophy. That's all. Everyone should stick to the right philosophy. That is human sense. Not be biased and carried away by some whimsical way.

Room Conversation with Mr. C. Hennis of the International Labor Organization of the U.N. -- May 31, 1974, Geneva:

C. Hennis: You see, my organization represents all the states in the world practically, all the states of any importance in the world, with the exception of a few like Monaco and San Marino and Andorra and that kind of place. And through my organization, the states of the world, and that doesn't only mean governments, express their concern and endeavor to improve the lot of all of the people who are active in some way in the economy and in modern society, these may be professional workers. We don't deal with medical doctors because that is the problems of the World Health Organization. We don't deal with teachers and university professors and philosophers and so on because that is more the problem of UNESCO, and they deal with it very thoroughly. We don't deal by any means fully with the actual production of foodstuffs. This is the FAO, the Food and Agriculture Organization who does it. What we do do, we look after the rewards the people get for the work they do in the ordinary way of life as employees in offices, in banks, in commerce, in shops, trading. We are very interested in developing rural areas and in improving the lot of the rural worker so that the rural worker will no longer be under a disadvantage by comparison with the workers in the towns, so that they will have proper facilities, proper leisure and proper opportunities for self-improvement.

Prabhupāda: I may say in this connection, in America, the laborer class is very highly paid. Anyone, any labor class man can earn $25, $50, daily, very easily. But because there is no direction of the brain, these labor class of men—I have seen—they—especially these Negroes—51%, they are drunkards. They spend their money in drinking. They do not know how to utilize the money. Because the brain is not giving direction. Or they have no brain. "I have got so money. How I shall utilize it?" As soon as he gets money, he use it, he uses it for drinking. You may think that you are sufficiently paying to the labor class, worker class, but because he is not guided by brain, he is misspending the money.

Room Conversation -- June 5, 1974, Geneva:

Yogeśvara: Mr. Roche-dieu is a specialist in Hindu religion.

Prabhupāda: Ah. (French)

Yogeśvara: Mr. Morrel, who is the Dean of the Theology University in Geneva and who directs all of the religious activities for the university.

Swiss Man (2): (French)

Yogeśvara: Theology student. Our spiritual master, A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupāda.

Prabhupāda: So you have shown our books?

Yogeśvara: (French)

Prabhupāda: Sixty volumes of these books.

Yogeśvara: (French-Yogeśvara showing books)

Prabhupāda: And Caitanya-caritāmṛta.

M. Roche-dieu: Whose are those pictures?

Yogeśvara: Our students. We have our painting workshop in New York City. All of these books have color illustrations.

M. Roche-dieu: Indian students?

Yogeśvara: No. He asks if our students are Indian. He likes the paintings. He was wondering whether they were done by Indian students.

Prabhupāda: No. American students under my direction.

Room Conversation -- June 5, 1974, Geneva:

Yogeśvara: Eliage, Professor Eliage...

M. Roche-dieu: Eliade. Eliade.

Yogeśvara: Eliade. Chicago University?

Prabhupāda: No, I have never gone to Chicago.

Yogeśvara: Is not Professor Dimmock from Chicago?

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Yogeśvara: Professor Dimmock, perhaps you are familiar with Professor Dimmock. He's head of which department?

Satsvarūpa: East Asian.

Yogeśvara: The East Asian Studies Department of Chicago University has written the preface to this Bhagavad-gītā.

M. Roche-dieu: I have seen it, yes. Chicago University Department

Swiss Man (1): (French)

Swiss Man (2): (French)

Yogeśvara: He says he hopes we excuse if he has some basic questions that he wanted to ask. And his first question was regarding tilaka. What is the symbolism, significance?

Prabhupāda: It is just like your cross, amongst Christian. It is temple of Viṣṇu. Not only here, we have got twelve place: here, here, here, here, here. Twelve place. The idea is being protected by Viṣṇu from all sides.

Room Conversation -- June 5, 1974, Geneva:

Prabhupāda: I have got better instruction than Aurobindo. Why shall I go to Aurobindo, waste my time? People don't know anything. Nobody has become a devotee of Kṛṣṇa in reading Aurobindo's literature. And here, as soon as they saw our literature, immediately police officer said, "Oh, you are so high." Immediately. Where is the record, the professors and universities eager to purchase Aurobindo's book and Vivekananda's books? There is no record. But here they are eager "All sixty books, please, sir." "All twelve books, please, sir."

Puṣṭa-kṛṣṇa: Why are they so attracted to humanitarianism?

Prabhupāda: That is false pride. This has been taught. In the Christianity they have taught like that, giving medicine, open hospital. That is Christianity.

Yogeśvara: He admitted it himself. He said himself, "It's a false pride to think..."

Prabhupāda: That's all.

Yogeśvara: "...think we can do something."

Prabhupāda: You cannot do anything. But they show. They make a collection, that "We are doing such nice work." The Vivekananda also imitated like that and could not do anything. It is not possible. Swami Nikhilananda said... He belongs to the Vivekananda group. Because they raise funds from America, huge funds, that "We shall feeding the poor in India." And they eat meat and big, big become fat, these rascals. So the Americans asked them that "You are taking away our money somewhere to feed the poor. But when we go to India, two sides we see all poor men are lying on the street. What you have done?" So this is a slogan. They cannot do anything. Thinking of poor... Now, those who have accepted voluntarily povertyism, the hippies, what you are doing for them? Why don't you make arrangement for their gentlemanly living? They are not poverty-stricken. Why they are living like wretches, lying on the street, no program for eating, no for sleeping, no for bodily comfort, just like animals? What you have done for them?

Morning Walk -- June 6, 1974, Geneva:

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Puṣṭa-kṛṣṇa: And his question was that those in the mode of passion and ignorance, do they have any choice?

Prabhupāda: Everyone has choice. Everyone has choice. Choice, but under the control. Exactly like that. By your choice, you go to the prison house. By your choice, you go to the university. There is supreme control, government. But it is your choice, whether you want to live in the prison or in the university. that is your choice. Government does not say that "Oh, this man will come to the university, and this man will go to the prison house." No. You make your choice, you work according to that, and government sends you either to the prison or to the university. You cannot say... One man is condemned to be killed for murdering, another man is rewarded some prize, you cannot say government is partial. You have made your choice, and government is giving you the result. (pause) Once you make your choice to steal, then you are under prison house. Immediately.

Puṣṭa-kṛṣṇa: Choice to...?

Prabhupāda: To steal.

Puṣṭa-kṛṣṇa: Steal.

Prabhupāda: Then immediately you are under prison. It will take some time only. Just like if you infect some disease, It will take some time to manifest, but it will be manifested. Kāraṇaṁ guṇa-saṅgaḥ. So in the, in the... Ordinarily, you can steal and hide yourself, but in the eyes of God, you cannot steal and hide yourself. That is not possible. You have stolen; you must suffer. (end)

Room Conversation -- June 11, 1974, Paris:

Prabhupāda: Jātu. What is...? Even for some time, they did not hear. Purport?

Nitāi: "The general mass of people, unless they are trained systematically for a higher standard of life in spiritual values, are no better than animals, and in this verse they have been particularly put on the level of dogs, hogs, camels and asses. Modern university education practically prepares one to acquire a doggish mentality to accept the service of a greater master. Like the dogs, after finishing so-called education, the so-called educated persons move from door to door with applications for some service,..."

Prabhupāda: At least, we have got this experience in India. There are so many unemployed, educated. Because they have been educated as dog, they must find out a master. Otherwise, they have no independent power to work. Dog, unless he finds out a very nice master, it is street dog, loitering in the street.

Bhagavān: There's a report that there's so many Ph.D's who are graduating from school now that there are not enough jobs for them. So they have to take jobs as truck-driver and taxi driver.

Prabhupāda: Where?

Bhagavān: In the United States.

Prabhupāda: Just see.

Puṣṭa-kṛṣṇa: And that is supposed to be the brāhmaṇa class too, the professors. They're the educated class of people.

Prabhupāda: No, no. They are not brāhmaṇas. Those who give education in exchange of money, they are not brāhmaṇas. Just like we are lecturing, educated, educating people. We don't say that "Give us salary." We simply ask them, "Please come." Therefore we are making food. I'll give you food. I'll give you good seat. Please come and hear. We are not asking money, that "First of all pay the fees. Then you come and learn Bhagavad-gītā." We never say so. So those, these so-called teachers, they first of all set up salary, "What salary you'll give me?" That is dog's business. That is not brāhmaṇa's business. Brāhmaṇa will never ask. Brāhmaṇa is eager to give lesson only. That's all. Brāhmaṇa is eager to see that people are educated. "Take free education and be educated. Be a human being." This is brāhmaṇa's business. I came here not to ask for any money. But I want to give lesson. This is brāhmaṇa's business.

Room Conversation -- June 11, 1974, Paris:

Yogeśvara: I can remember now. When I was in college, there were so many groups trying to reform the young people, the Y.M.C.A, the church groups, so many different social-working groups, trying to make young people become more, not so restless, not so much wild, but no, nothing. Couldn't do a thing. I remember I used to go to school when I was in college once a week to take care of one young boy because he was making so much trouble. They asked if some student from the university would come to see with him and talk with him once a week, to go out and go to the park and so on. So I used to see him, and he would be in school, and when I would come, all of the children would be the same way. I couldn't distinguish him from the others. They were all wild. And then they said, "Oh, he's the one, there."

Prabhupāda: Is there any other meeting?

Jyotirmayī: Yes. It will be later. It will be at six-fifteen, in forty-five minutes. The man coming, will be a psychiatrist.

Satsvarūpa: So we can take your leave until then.

Puṣṭa-kṛṣṇa: Jaya. All glories to Śrīla Prabhupāda Hari-haribol. (devotees pay obeisances.)

Puṣṭa-kṛṣṇa: Should I distribute this to the devotees?

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Bhagavān: Maybe we should save some for the next guest who comes.

Prabhupāda: Or you keep it for the guest, and devotees may take down. (end)

Room Conversation with Monsieur Mesman, Chief of Law House of Paris -- June 11, 1974, Paris:

Yogeśvara: Last year, you were received by the Mayor at Hotel De Ville.

Prabhupāda: No, but in America we have reception from highly scholarly people, university heads, like that. Our books are being read in universities, colleges, and they're accepted in big, big libraries. Not only accepted what is published, but they have forward order for all the publications that will come. Yes? Hmmm. (someone comes in with a plate of prasādam)

Pṛthu-putra: (explains about prasādam)

Prabhupāda: They have learned this preparation, these girls. We have taught them. We are strictly vegetarian. From grains, from milk and sugar, and just two three, things, we require, and we can prepare thousands of preparations out of that. From milk and grains and sugar... And? What else?

Pṛthu-putra: Fruit, vegetables.

Bhagavān: Fruits.

Prabhupāda: Fruits, vegetable, we can prepare thousands of preparations, very palatable. Some of them you can taste. Yes, take. Whatever you like, take.

Yogeśvara: Maybe you can also explain that this...

Prabhupāda: What is this preparation, explain. You explain.

Yogeśvara: This is burfi.

Bhagavān: This is cake, cookie.

Prabhupāda: No, not cookie. It is burfi like... What is this made of?

Bhagavān: This is...

Girl: This is sandeśa.

Prabhupāda: Oh, sandeśa. It is milk preparation. Give him one more. No, no. This sandeśa, you give him one more. So our recommendation is, "Don't kill cow." Take milk and make thousands of preparations, all nutritious and very healthy. They do not know how to use cow. Instead of killing, if we take, let the animal live and give us milk, and from the milk, we make hundreds of preparations. The milk is nothing but blood, transformation of blood. So we take the blood by killing the animal, but we do not wish to kill such an important animal, but they take the blood in form of milk and make preparation. And those who are flesh-eaters, let them wait for the death of the cow. Then let them eat the flesh, not living condition. So we are making preparation that keep the cows, protect the cows, and when the cow dies, the flesh-eater may take it away.

Room Conversation with Russian Orthodox Church Representative -- June 13, 1974, Paris:

Prabhupāda: He was professor in Lucknow University. His name was Mr. Nixon.

Guest: Lucknow?

Prabhupāda: Nixon.

Guest: Yes, his name was Nixon. (break)

Church Representative: Professor?

Prabhupāda: Kotovsky.

Church Representative: Kotovsky.

Prabhupāda: He is the director of Indology in Moscow.

Church Representative: I see.

Prabhupāda: So my talk with was published in some...

Church Representative: Yes, I have this book in my office in Paris.

Prabhupāda: But he does not believe in incarnation and he still, he is professor of Indology. (French)

Karandhara: He doesn't believe in the soul. Professor Kotovsky, he doesn't believe in the existence of soul.

Church Representative: But I think that he is a Marxist.

Room Conversation with Professor Oliver La Combe Director of the Sorbonne University -- June 14, 1974, Paris:

Bhagavān: This book is being published in twelve volumes.

Professor La Combe: Yes. (indistinct)

Bhagavān: Yale University. I think you are familiar with Yale University in the United States. They have already placed advanced order for all these volumes. (French)

Prabhupāda: We are translating the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam and other Vedic literature. You have seen the sample, original verse, word to word meaning, then translation, then giving a purport.

Professor La Combe: You wrote the commentary.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Professor La Combe: What is the paramparā from Caitanya?

Prabhupāda: From Caitanya Mahāprabhu? Yes. The Six Gosvāmīs: Rūpa, Sanātana, Bhaṭṭa Raghunātha, Śrī Jīva, Gopāla Bhaṭṭa, Dāsa Raghunātha. The Six Gosvāmīs. Then from the Gosvāmīs there is Śrīnivāsācārya. Then from him, I think, this Kṛṣṇadāsa Kavirāja Gosvāmī, and then Narottama dāsa Ṭhākura. Then Viśvanātha Cakravartī Ṭhākura, then Jagannātha dāsa Bābājī, then Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura, then Gaura Kiśora dāsa Bābājī Mahārāja, then my Guru Mahārāja. Next we are. I am the tenth or eleventh, eleventh from Caitanya Mahāprabhu.

Professor La Combe: And you have come to a round visit to the west now?

Prabhupāda: I have come several times.

Room Conversation with Professor Oliver La Combe Director of the Sorbonne University -- June 14, 1974, Paris:

Prabhupāda: Any man walking on the street can be killed. It was the situation.

Devotee: Especially any rich man or politician.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Professor La Combe: The Vice Chancellor of Jadavpur University was killed the day before I arrived in Calcutta.

Prabhupāda: Old gentleman?

Professor La Combe: Yes. And he was retiring. He was still in activity, but he was soon retiring, and he was walking from the University campus to his home, not far, a short walk. And he was killed by one of these...

Prabhupāda: Naxalites.

Professor La Combe: Naxalites or somebody of the same kind. I don't know exactly. And he was not a politician at all. He had no political activities.

Devotee: Still, nowadays, they are having strikes every day, big marches, processions.

Professor La Combe: Oh, strikes, perhaps, yes, but no killings.

Devotee: And just before I left there they had a big strike where some of the younger communist kids, they got out in the street and they stopped all the buses, traffic and told the drivers to leave their cars. They burned a couple of cars and buses. But it is not as bad as it used to be.

Professor La Combe: Now it is better.

Prabhupāda: Actually, there was no government.

Room Conversation with Professor Oliver La Combe Director of the Sorbonne University -- June 14, 1974, Paris:

Prabhupāda: All right. Thank you very much.

Professor La Combe: Thank you very much.

Prabhupāda: Jaya Hare Kṛṣṇa. (break)

Yogeśvara: ...on a book. It is accepted as being authentic. All the universities use his texts. And he has a big office in the Sorbonne. The Sorbonne is the most famous French University.

Prabhupāda: He is a big man.

Bhagavān: Actually, it's not famous. It's infamous.

Prabhupāda: No, why infamous. They are famous. Why do you say infamous?

Bhagavān: Well, I thought fame is to be referred to for devotee.

Prabhupāda: That is your sentiment, but practical world, he is a scholar, he is a head man of a department, a university. He must be famous.

Devotee: I just saw... Maybe you knew the latest headlines in the newspapers today were "President Nixon is found innocent."

Prabhupāda: Oh, ācchā?

Devotee: They said he was found innocent.

Prabhupāda: In the court?

Devotee: Yes. Because, you knew about the Watergate case. He was caught...

Yogeśvara: Prabhupāda knows the story. He knows the incident. He was found innocent by who? By court?

Devotee: Yes, by the whole government. He had done some cheating and campaign making secret tape recordings against the other party.

Prabhupāda: He did? And still he is innocent?

Devotee: Yes.

Room Conversation with Professor Oliver La Combe Director of the Sorbonne University -- June 14, 1974, Paris:

Devotee: Yes, I spoke with him in San Francisco, and he said, "Swamiji will not be successful because he does not allow free love in his movement." He says, "That is why I had to leave because there was no place for me and my boyfriend." Even he was not attracted to having a girl, but he had a boy. That boy used to be also your typist. He was from Harvard University.

Prabhupāda: That Neil.

Devotee: Yeah, Neil.

Prabhupāda: Oh.

Devotee: And he told me that "Swamiji will not be successful in his movement because he will not allow free love." I just saw him in San Francisco before I went to India two and a half years ago. We were trying to get him to come back to the temple.

Prabhupāda: No, he cannot give up these bad habits.

Puṣṭa-kṛṣṇa: You said in Geneva that no one has died from giving up cigarettes or illicit sex. So it is not so hard to do.

Prabhupāda: No, it is not hard. Now the Christian church is giving liberty, man to man marriage. Most unnatural.

Devotee: Previously they didn't allow divorce. The first principle was there is no question of divorce. Then so many people began leaving the Catholic Church. So then they allowed divorce. And then they did not allow abortion. So again so many people left the religion. Now they allow abortion. And now they are allowing man to man marriage.

Prabhupāda: Just see.

Room Conversation with Professor Oliver La Combe Director of the Sorbonne University -- June 14, 1974, Paris:

Prabhupāda: And that is freedom. So Rāya Rāmānanda left because such freedom is not allowed here. So we have to allow this freedom like the church? (laughs)

Bhārgava: There was one survey done by a college, a university, Michigan State, and Rūpānuga Mahārāja researched it and said 94% of the people in America, they believe there is a God, but only 35% will go to church. They are not very much interested in the churches anymore. They don't trust them. But 94% believe there is God.

Prabhupāda: Because the church could not help them in understanding God. The Christian church has no idea what is God. Therefore there is no name of God. Actually, they have no idea about God. Is there?

Devotee: I was raised up a very strict Catholic, going through Catholic school till I was fifteen years old, but I could not... They were trying to teach love of God, but I could not see that they were also loving God. Even the head priest, he was found having illicit sex relationships with one of the young nuns, and she became pregnant by that and he had to leave. They quietly sent him away without anybody knowing, but later on it came out.

Prabhupāda: That is going on everywhere.

Morning Walk -- June 17, 1974, Germany:

Devotee: ...as their means to conquer over the so-called over-population problem.

Prabhupāda: No, it is not over-population. They don't want to take care of children. This is their problem. It is not the question of over-population. They want to remain free and enjoy life, that's all. No responsibility. That is the hippies. That is the hippy movement.

Devotee: I have seen in all the big colleges and universities in England that I have been to, that this, amongst the students, the boys and girls, it is becoming so free. It is just like a hippy commune, the universities and colleges.

Prabhupāda: Yes. They are indebted in so many ways. Therefore human being should be responsible. But the modern civilization is teaching to become irresponsible.

Haṁsadūta: (break) ...there, on the sun.

Prabhupāda: So suppose if your heat increases, what happens to you?

Haṁsadūta: I get sick.

Prabhupāda: That's all. (break) ...samudvigna, always full of anxiety. Sadā samudvigna-dhiyām. Intelligence is always absorbed: "Enemy may not come. Let me discover this, discover this atom bomb. This will save me. This will save me." This is their position. Sadā samudvigna-dhiyām asad-grahāt (SB 7.5.5). Why this anxiety? Because they have accepted something false as truth. Asad-grahāt. They have accepted sense gratification is the truth. Indriyāṇi parāṇy āhuḥ. Indriyāṇi means senses. Parā, supreme. This is supreme. And then, if somebody is little advanced, indriyebhyaḥ paraṁ manaḥ. Then the mental speculators, psychologists, philosophers, another, better class of rascals... This is the third-class rascal, and they are second-class rascal. Indriyāṇi parāṇy āhur indriyebhyaḥ paraṁ manaḥ, manasas tu parā buddhiḥ (BG 3.42). Then the intelligent class. They consider, "What is this nonsense? They are all suffering here." In this way, one who becomes actually intelligent, wise, then he understands, "Kṛṣṇa is everything." Bahūnāṁ janmanām ante jñānavān māṁ prapadyate (BG 7.19). So that highest position we are giving by Kṛṣṇa consciousness. We are not training them to be first-class fools, second-class fools, third-class... No. First-class intelligent. Kṛṣṇa yei bhaje sei baḍa catura. Without being first-class, intelligent man, nobody can take to Kṛṣṇa consciousness (break) ...drink everything. And why they fight? What is the cause? Suppose father gives all necessities of life to the children.

Room Conversation with Professor Durckheim German Spiritual Writer -- June 19, 1974, Germany:

Prabhupāda: You can put this side.

German devotee: Śrīla Prabhupāda, these gentlemen are professors from the Theological Philosophical University. And this is Doctor Zara (?). He is the leader for the society of yoga and integral philosophical studies in Germany.

Prabhupāda: Yes. It is very fortunate to see so many big men at a time. So we were also talking to this doctor about this philosophy, how human civilization should be conducted. I was explaining to Professor that at the present moment, not at the present moment, always in this material world, we do not know what is the goal of life. We have got different philosophies, different mode of life, because we do not know what is the goal of life. If the goal of life is... (break) ...then everything is solved. Now it is very good fortune that you are all present. What is the goal of life? That is my submission. Human life is there, human intelligence is there. So what is the goal of life to achieve? The goal of life cannot be different. That is one. That is, we take from Vedic literature, this goal of life is to understand what is God. In the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam it is said, na te viduḥ svārtha-gatiṁ hi viṣṇum (SB 7.5.31). (aside:) That is one. You serve it out. So we are missing the point, that we do not know what is the goal of life. Different persons, different philosophers, they have got different proposition of the goal of life. Similarly, different politician also. But we think the goal of life is one, to understand God. Then everything is solved. Self-realization. (pause) And we are writing all these books. These books will be finished in eighty volumes. And already we have published fourteen volumes only. And small books also, many, about two dozen. But our only writing is the goal of life, Kṛṣṇa.

Room Conversation with Professor Durckheim German Spiritual Writer -- June 19, 1974, Germany:

Prabhupāda: That's it. Otherwise either you follow Bhagavad-gītā or Bible as they are, then you become gradually perfect. The difficulty is they do not follow. And still they're claiming "I am Christian." "I am Hindu." "I am this." "I am that." Rubber stamp. No qualification but rubber stamp. This is the defect. (German) (break)

Vedavyāsa: ...qualifications on the material platform.

Prabhupāda: First of all acquire this material qualification. Then talk of spiritual. (German) Just like I think in the university if one wants to learn about law he must be graduate first of all.

Dr. P. J. Saher: In India. Yes.

Prabhupāda: So you, first of all become graduate then talk of law books. Similarly, you first of all become a brāhmaṇa. Then you understand about Brahman, Absolute Truth. Without becoming brāhmaṇa how you can understand? (German) (break)

Satsvarūpa: (reading from Bhagavad-gītā) "...three modes of material nature and the work ascribed to them, the four divisions of human society were created by Me, and although I am the creator of this system, you should know that I am yet the nondoer, being unchangeable." (German) (break)

Professor Durckheim: Your message, I think, will be very much appreciated by the youth of today in the western part of the world who says to the adults, "You have educated us to go to maintain our position in the world, to do something useful for the community and to behave nicely. But you never, but you never asked us who we are and who we should become (indistinct)." This is the problem.

Prabhupāda: That is the beginning of our talk, that you are spirit soul.

Professor Durckheim: I beg your pardon.

Prabhupāda: You are spirit soul, not this body. That is the beginning of our talk.

Room Conversation with Professor Durckheim German Spiritual Writer -- June 19, 1974, Germany:

Prabhupāda: Four million copies.

Prof. Pater Porsch: May I please put a question before I forget. I heard from our, or I read in the invitation that this center is not only a center as such but something more. It should also be an āśrama and also a forest university in the tradition of the ancient times.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Prof. Pater Porsch: A kind of a university also.

Prabhupāda: Oh, yes. Yes.

Prof. Pater Porsch: Like Indian and allied sciences, Vedic sciences.

Prabhupāda: My idea is that all our centers should be self-supported. We do not like that idea that for your support you have to go 100 miles to get your bread. That is a very dangerous drawback. You produce your food locally and then support yourself. The main problem is what to eat, where to sleep. So we get some place and support ourself by producing our own food. We have already begun in New Vrindaban, New..., West Virginia, Virginia, and similarly in other centers, we are producing our food, grains, vegetables, fruits and milk. That is sufficient. But we don't kill any animals. That we don't do.

Room Conversation with Professor Durckheim German Spiritual Writer -- June 19, 1974, Germany:

Prof. Pater Porsch: But, perhaps, that could be also a question, that Graf Durckheim has in mind, I think, perhaps, when he asked the question about belief, etc. Perhaps he also thinks that we are living in a period of, where, because of the technological construction of society, rational knowledge is appreciated and, for example, ten years ago non-rational knowledge in Germany, actually, or in Europe was highly suspected. We had lived through a period of positivism, and people in our universities even wanted to abolish the word consciousness. They even wanted to abolish the word psychology on the basis, on the presumption that there is no such thing as a (German).

Professor Durckheim: But this time is over.

Prof. Pater Porsch: Yes.

Professor Durckheim: The modern times are not modern anymore.

Prof. Pater Porsch: I agree with you but just think how the world was only a few years ago.

Professor Durckheim: Yes. And especially if you talk about the rational (German), the really German tradition is the irrational. So now this is coming back now, rediscovering their own past slowly.

Prabhupāda: So long they do not come to the standard platform, they will accept this sometimes and that sometimes. This will go on, changing.

Prof. Pater Porsch: No, but I meant it differently. Can it not be that average man in the street... I don't mean... Yes, it was, of course, in Germany. Man in the street now is infected from the...

Professor Durckheim: Absolutely, yes.

Prof. Pater Porsch: And he thinks that in order to give a rational presentment, (German) (break)

Professor Durckheim: ...I realize that the closer members engaged, really, in this work of distributing books and chanting, wearing the white robes and shaving the heads, they are the closer participants I suppose. And then have you also members of your movement which are simply in their work, in the community, in the world? Or is...

Prabhupāda: No, we invite everyone.

Morning Walk -- June 21, 1974, Germany:

Prabhupāda: What these theologicians think about God? It is already 1,500 months' substance to read. What they will discover? Teeny discovery? We have already stock for 1,500 years' understanding. So what we have to understand from them? (break) ...anādir ananta-rūpam. This is only for Kṛṣṇa. But Kṛṣṇa has got expansions—unlimited. Advaita, acyuta, ananta. Ananta means unlimited. God, His one feature is Kṛṣṇa, and He has unlimited features. If a gentleman simply reads the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam quietly at home, he will be fully conversant, fully aware of what is God. Just like a scholar. He is not limited in one university or in one book. He reads various books to understand the subject matter of his research. Similarly, those who are actually serious about understanding God, they should not stick only to a particular scripture. They should read all others where the information of God is there. Just like we sometimes quote from Bible, but the Christians, they cannot quote from Bhagavad-gītā or Bhāgavata. They cannot do that. But they do not read. Even they do not read fully their Bible.

Professor Durckheim: No, they don't.

Prabhupāda: Just see. And still, they want to be masters of understanding God. I have seen many scholars in the western countries. They are well known as Sanskrit scholar. But they cannot quote even a verse.

Morning Walk -- June 21, 1974, Germany:

Professor Durckheim: All the night or do you at the day sometimes?

Prabhupāda: No. At night I get up at one, at half past one, sometimes half past twelve. But I take a little rest, one or two hour in the daytime. So two hours at night, two hours at day, or three hours at night, two hours in day. In this way, altogether five hours, not more than that. Our predecessor gurus, Gosvāmīs, they were taking rest not more than two hours or 2-1/2 hours. So we should come to that standard, yes. Nidrāhāra-vihārakādi-vijitau **. About them this description is: they reduced their sleeping, nidra. Nidra means sleeping. And āhāra. Āhāra means eating and collection. Collection is also āhāra. Yes. So they were mendicant. They had no collection. And they had no preaching mission. They were simply writing books. Nānā-śāstra-vicāraṇaika-nipuṇau, very expert to study different scriptures just to get the essence of scripture and give to the people. Lokānāṁ hita-kāriṇau. So their life was engaged for the benefit of the whole human society. What these people are talking philanthropy and humanitarian? They dedicated their life for... Just like we are doing. It is not for any sect or any person. For the whole human society. So that should be the mission. Lokānāṁ hita-kāriṇau tri-bhuvane mānyau. Therefore their literature is honored all over the world, all over the universe. Just like our books. We are selling all over the world, all universities, all school, all colleges, all gentlemen. It is not sectarian. Lokānāṁ hita-kāriṇau tri-bhuvane mānyau śaraṇyākarau. This was their hard labor, and rādhā-kṛṣṇa-bhajanānandena mattālikau, and they were very much pleased in worshiping Rādhā-Kṛṣṇa Deity. All the Gosvāmīs established a Rādhā-Kṛṣṇa temple. In Vṛndāvana each and every Gosvāmī established one temple in the beginning. Then others followed. Rūpa Gosvāmī established Govindajī's temple. And Jīva Gosvāmī established Rādhā-Dāmodara temple.

Room Conversation with Pater Emmanuel (A Benedictine Monk) -- June 22, 1974, Germany:

Pater Emmanuel: Ah, yes. From India.

Prabhupāda: Yes, he is in Cali... His description is there in the last page, his photograph.

Pater Emmanuel: Oh, yes, I see. Vaiṣṇava, Manipur.

Prabhupāda: He (indistinct) his MS from Buffalo University and his Ph.D, chemistry from California University. And he graduated himself from Gauhati University. Very learned scholar.

Pater Emmanuel: Yes, yes, I see.

Prabhupāda: You are coming from?

Pater Emmanuel: Near Passau, say, I think five hundred kilometers from here, with train, yes. I am coming yesterday in the evening to Frankfurt. In the morning I came to here.

Prabhupāda: Oh. You can stay here. We have got place.

Pater Emmanuel: Yes, tomorrow, till tomorrow.

Devotee: He has a room upstairs.

Pater Emmanuel: Yes, yes, thank you very much. I am Benedictine monk in a monastery.

Prabhupāda: You are Roman Catholic?

Pater Emmanuel: Yes, Roman Catholic. But I follow the eastern rite of the Greek Orthodox church. In our monastery you get the two rites, the Roman Catholic and also the customs of life... It's like the Greek Orthodox monks. We also have the rosary.

Prabhupāda: Like us.

Room Conversation with Scientists -- July 2, 1974, Melbourne:

Prabhupāda: Nature. Nature is giving us different body. I am the spirit soul. Because I have accepted natural, the material nature's protection, I am getting different types of body. This life I have got this body, next life I may get another body. That is explained. Tathā dehāntara prāpti. We have to accept another body. Now you are scientist, next life you may be different. You may have a different body. Where is that science? Here is the information. But where is the science cultivated in the universities, education. There is no science, but this is a fact.

Guest (2): Well, it's just on five. Do you want to sneak in one?

Madhudviṣa: These are preparations which is prepared from Australian milk.

Prabhupāda: Let him take. Yes.

Guest (2): Oh, thank you.

Madhudviṣa: Give a napkin. It's a sweet preparation called gulab jamin. It is all prepared just from milk which has been made into curd, and then the curd has been fried in ghee, cooking ghee, and then after it has been fried, it has been soaked in sweet water and it is very palatable. It's called a gulab jamin. It is a very famous delicacy of Indian cooking. It requires great skill and art to prepare these. And as our spiritual master said, there is actually hundreds and hundreds of food which can be prepared from this, like the cheese you have there. Even cooking cheese and spicing it with asafoetida and ginger, meat taste can be simulated very, very nicely.

Prabhupāda: This cheese as it is you take, it is as beneficial as meat.

Room Conversations -- September 11, 1974, Vrndavana:

Brahmānanda: Who?

Prabhupāda: (break) Caitanya-caritāmṛta and Bhāgavata is being accepted everywhere. Big, big libraries, universities. University, Bombay University. As far as possible (indistinct) all colleges. (break) There is no (indistinct) word meaning, word-to-word meaning (indistinct). When there is word... (break) You should be clear of all questions possible. Then you will be able to push very forcibly. You must be prepared to answer all the questions.

Brahmānanda: Prabhupāda, one question: You say that Kṛṣṇa consciousness will solve all problems. But factually, there are so many problems in the world that aren't being solved.

Prabhupāda: Hm?

Brahmānanda: So many problems in the world, and many say that they can solve all the problems. So what is the proof?

Prabhupāda: They could not. The problems are there.

Brahmānanda: Sometimes we are criticized. They say, "Oh, you say you can solve all problems. That is utopian, that is..."

Prabhupāda: Not utopian. You do not know. Because just like when you are diseased, there is problem. So to solve that problem, where do you go? Hm?

Brahmānanda: To the doctor.

Prabhupāda: To the qualified physician, not to the storekeeper. Similarly, first thing is, when you want to solve the problem, you must go to the right person. First of all you have to select. So we understand that Kṛṣṇa is the right person. So therefore, it is guaranteed. He knows everything. Others, they do not know. May know to some extent, not perfect. The first thing is that we have to select from whom. Tad-vijñānārthaṁ sa gurum evābhigacchet (MU 1.2.12). In Vedas it is stated in order to solve the problem or to understand the situation, you should go to the guru. So who can be better than Kṛṣṇa as guru? He taught, He gave lessons to Brahmā, the original living creature in this universe. Tene brahma hṛdā. He gave lessons to Brahmā how to create.

Page Title:University (Conversations 1973 - 1974)
Compiler:Visnu Murti, Mayapur
Created:29 of Dec, 2011
Totals by Section:BG=0, SB=0, CC=0, OB=0, Lec=0, Con=99, Let=0
No. of Quotes:99