View source for Drinking tea and coffee also ("unless one gives up these four things he cannot understand what is God")?

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[[Category:Questions asked to Srila Prabhupada]]
[[Category:Questions asked to SP... 1974]]
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<div id="Conversations_and_Morning_Walks" class="section" sec_index="5" parent="compilation" text="Conversations and Morning Walks"><h2>Conversations and Morning Walks</h2>
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<div id="1974_Conversations_and_Morning_Walks" class="sub_section" sec_index="7" parent="Conversations_and_Morning_Walks" text="1974 Conversations and Morning Walks"><h3>1974 Conversations and Morning Walks</h3>
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<div id="ReportersInterviewJune291974Melbourne_0" class="quote" parent="1974_Conversations_and_Morning_Walks" book="Con" index="132" link="Reporters Interview -- June 29, 1974, Melbourne" link_text="Reporters Interview -- June 29, 1974, Melbourne">
<div class="heading">Oh, yes. It is also intoxication.
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<span class="link">[[Vanisource:Reporters Interview -- June 29, 1974, Melbourne|Reporters Interview -- June 29, 1974, Melbourne]]: </span><div class="text"><p style="display: inline;">Guest (3): Your Divine Grace, is there a Hare Kṛṣṇa Movement in India?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes.</p>
<p>Guest (3): How strong is it?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: How strong? As strong as you think because in every village, every town, every home, there is Hare Kṛṣṇa, still.</p>
<p>Guest (2): Your Divine Grace, do you see a time coming when all mankind will be united?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: That is very difficult to say, but we can be united on the spiritual platform not on the material platform. It is not possible.</p>
<p>Guest (2): Do you think that that is, that stage is possible within this generation?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: It is possible at any time provided people take to spiritual life, but they'll not take to it. For example, one of the items of spiritual life is no meat-eating. So do you think this philosophy will be taken by everyone? And this is one of the items of spiritual life, no meat-eating.</p>
<p>Guest (2): Is that a necessary...</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Oh, yes. Without... If you don't stop meat-eating, you cannot understand what is spiritual life. A sinful life cannot understand what is God, what is devotion. It is not possible.</p>
<p>Guest (2): And is that the same for others...?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: The sinful, yes. Four items we prohibit our students. They do not indulge. Illicit sex life, meat, fish, egg-eating, intoxication up to cigarette smoking, drinking tea, coffee, and gambling. These are the four pillars of sinful life. So unless one gives up these four things he cannot understand what is God, what is God's kingdom, what is our business. Nobody can understand.</p>
<p>Guest (2): Drinking tea and coffee also?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Oh, yes. It is also intoxication.</p>
<p>Guest (3): Your Divine Grace, in a lot of scriptures I read there is a lot of references to breath and the breath as being the...</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Breathing.</p>
<p>Guest (3): Breathing...</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes.</p>
<p>Guest (3): ...it's a source of God. And there are some yogas which concentrate on the breath.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes. There are different airs within the body and controlling the airs and putting this soul... Soul is already floating in the air. So the yogi mystic process can bring the soul from different places, and then they bring it here and they ascertain where he has to go, and then, from this hole... What is called, this hole?</p>
<p>Madhudviṣa: Brahma-randhra.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Brahma-randhra, we say.</p>
<p>Satsvarūpa: Skull.</p>
<p>Devotee: Cerebellum? Cerebral...?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: There is some hole. From that hole the soul goes out to any planet he likes. That is perfection of yoga. But here in your country the yoga means a certain type of exercise. Yes.</p>
<p>Guest (2): And this path of devotional yoga, bhakti-yoga, that is the path for this time, for this age?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes. Bhakti-yoga is the real yoga. You'll find in Bhagavad-gītā when yoga system is described the Lord says,</p>
:yoginām api sarveṣāṁ
:mad-gatenāntarātmanā
:śraddhāvān bhajate yo māṁ
:sa me yuktatamo mataḥ
:([[Vanisource:BG 6.47|BG 6.47]])
<p>"The first-class yogi is he who is always thinking of Me," or Kṛṣṇa, "within Himself." He is first-class yogi. So our, these students, they are being educated how to think of Kṛṣṇa always, twenty-four hours, without any stop. And that is first-class yoga.</p>
<p>Guest (2): If you are to think about something, don't you first have to see that thing?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes.</p>
<p>Guest (2): Well are you showing your devotees Kṛṣṇa?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Oh, yes, certainly.</p>
<p>Guest (2): Then what is...? Well, what is Kṛṣṇa?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Then ask them, who has seen already. Ask them. They'll tell you what is Kṛṣṇa. But the same thing. If he says something about Kṛṣṇa, you will accept it?</p>
<p>Guest (2): Yes.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: You will accept?</p>
<p>Guest (2): Yes.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Then see. Here is Kṛṣṇa.</p>
<p>Guest (2): But that's a painting.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: That is painting. Suppose your painting is there. Can I not say that "Here is Mr. such and such?"</p>
<p>Guest (2): Yes.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Then what is the wrong there?</p>
<p>Guest (2): Well, the artist would have been looking at me to paint the picture of me.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: No, no, your photograph is not yourself?</p>
<p>Guest (2): Yes it is.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes, similarly, it is Kṛṣṇa's painting. But the difference is that you cannot talk with your photograph, but we can talk with Kṛṣṇa's photograph. That is the difference.</p>
<p>Guest (2): But some of these pictures are slightly different. They show different...</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: No, no, on principle it is, as Kṛṣṇa's color is there, Kṛṣṇa's flute is there, Kṛṣṇa's peacock feather is there, these things... These are described in the śāstra. Veṇuṁ kvaṇantam aravinda-dalāyatākṣaṁ barhāvataṁ samasitāmbuda-sun... (Bs. 5.30). So Kṛṣṇa's... Suppose even a painting of yourself. One man paints a little different from your face. Another man paints. But on the whole, it is the same. In that way Kṛṣṇa is not depending on the painting but on the features of His description as it is in the śāstra. Kṛṣṇa's color is described there. Kṛṣṇa's peacock feather is described there. Kṛṣṇa's flute is there. Kṛṣṇa's ever eternal consort... Praṇaya-keli. In loving mood always, Kṛṣṇa... Praṇaya-keli-kalā-vilāsam. He's always in enjoying spirit. So we get idea. Idea of Kṛṣṇa and Kṛṣṇa being Absolute, the idea of Kṛṣṇa and Kṛṣṇa is nondifferent.</p>
<p>Guest (2): But if a painter was to paint a picture of me or of Allen or of anybody, first they'd take the subject, and the subject would be a living person, and then they would paint the picture and the picture would be in...</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes. Subject is there, that "Kṛṣṇa's color is bluish, Kṛṣṇa has got in His hand a flute, Kṛṣṇa has got a peacock feather on His head, Kṛṣṇa stands, little curving." Tri-bhaṅga-lalitam. Tri-bhaṅga means in three ways He is curved. You see. Tri-bhaṅga. Three, three times He is curved. Śyāmaṁ tri-bhaṅga-lalitaṁ niyata-prakāśam (Bs. 5.31). These are the description of the Vedas. Just like my students, they have painted so many pictures, so I have given simply the hints that "This picture should be like this." So they take note and make the picture, and people very much appreciate our picture. So you can paint pictures by taking hints from the authority. That is going on. So if you are intelligent, you can make almost like that.</p>
<p>Guest (2): But still, somebody must have seen Kṛṣṇa...</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes.</p>
<p>Guest (2): ...to actually paint Him.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes. Seen Kṛṣṇa. Just like Kṛṣṇa, when He was present on this earth, so many people saw Him. And since then, there are so many temples of Kṛṣṇa's Deity, Kṛṣṇa's form. The same thing, as it is stated in the Vedic literature, they saw also personally, and they made statues, and they are being worshiped regularly. There are thousands of thousands of temples of Kṛṣṇa. So they are worshiped.</p>
<p>Guest (2): But has anybody actually seen Kṛṣṇa?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes.</p>
<p>Guest (2): Today?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes. Just like your grandfather has seen your father, or your father has seen your grandfather. You may not have seen, but your father can describe about your grandfather, "My father was like this, like this, like this." What is the difficulty?</p>
<p>Satsvarūpa: He asked if anyone now has seen Kṛṣṇa.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: How now one can see? He has to see through the paramparā, succession. You have not seen your great-grandfather. How do you know that he was? How do you know? Great-grandfather or his father, you have not seen. How do you believe?</p>
<p>Guest (2): By your parents telling you.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes. So therefore you have to receive the knowledge from the authorities, paramparā.</p>
<p>Guest (2): But supposedly, Kṛṣṇa is eternal or, that is, indestructible. So surely He must be existing today.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes, Kṛṣṇa is existing. Just like at night the sun is existing, but you have no eyes to see him. That does not mean sun does not exist. It is your deficiency. You cannot see.</p>
<p>Guest (2): So we need divine sight.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Whatever it may be, you require qualification. Similarly, Kṛṣṇa is always existing. You require the qualification. That is described in the... Premāñjana-cchurita-bhakti-vilocanena santaḥ sadaiva hṛdayeṣu vilokayanti: (Bs. 5.38) "Those who are saintly persons and in ecstatic love with Kṛṣṇa, they are seeing twenty-four hours Kṛṣṇa." That is not very difficult to understand. If you love somebody, you are seeing him or her always. Is it not?</p>
<p>Guest (2): That's so.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: That's it. It requires the qualification of love. Then Kṛṣṇa will be visible twenty-four hours. He'll talk with you. These things are described. Teṣāṁ satata-yuktānāṁ bhajatāṁ prīti-pūrvakam, buddhi-yogaṁ dadāmi tam ([[Vanisource:BG 10.10|BG 10.10]]). That means talks. "I give him intelligence." That means unless He talks, how He can give intelligence. "You do this?" So you have to qualify yourself to hear Kṛṣṇa, to see Kṛṣṇa. Otherwise Kṛṣṇa is always present.</p>
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