View source for Isn't there also individuality and difference (soul, as spirit soul, pure soul, they are all equal. Even in animal)?

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{{compiler|Rishab|MadhuGopaldas}}
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{{first|15May11}}
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[[Category:Questions asked to Srila Prabhupada]]
[[Category:Questions asked to SP... 1972]]
[[Category:Questions On... Spirit Soul]]
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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="1972_Conversations_and_Morning_Walks" class="sub_section" sec_index="5" parent="Conversations_and_Morning_Walks" text="1972 Conversations and Morning Walks"><h3>1972 Conversations and Morning Walks</h3>
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<div id="TalkwithBobCohenFebruary27291972Mayapura_0" class="quote" parent="1972_Conversations_and_Morning_Walks" book="Con" index="5" link="Talk with Bob Cohen -- February 27-29, 1972, Mayapura" link_text="Talk with Bob Cohen -- February 27-29, 1972, Mayapura">
<div class="heading">Their individuality becomes different in accordance with the development of consciousness.
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<span class="link">[[Vanisource:Talk with Bob Cohen -- February 27-29, 1972, Mayapura|Talk with Bob Cohen -- February 27-29, 1972, Mayapura]]: </span><div class="text"><p style="display: inline;">Bob: Is the real goal of life to know God?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes.</p>
<p>Bob: So that is the real goal, to know God.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes. Go back to home, back to Godhead. That is real goal of life. Just like the water coming from the sea as cloud falls down as rain and the actual goal is to flow down the river and again go to the sea. So we have come from God. Now we are embarrassed in this material life. Therefore the aim should be how to get out of this embarrassment and go back to home, back to Godhead. This is real goal of life.</p>
<p>mām upetya tu kaunteya</p>
<p>duḥkhālayam aśāśvatam</p>
<p>nāpnuvanti mahātmānaḥ</p>
<p>saṁsiddhiṁ paramāṁ gatāḥ</p>
<p>BG 8.15</p>
<p>That is the version of Bhagavad-gītā. "If anyone comes back to Me," mām upetya kaunteya... Mām upetya tu kaunteya duḥkhālayam aśāśvatam, nāpnuvanti, "he does not come back again." Where? In this place, duḥkhālayam aśāśvatam BG 8.15 . This place is the abode of miseries. Everyone knows, but he has become fooled, befooled by so-called leaders. This is miserable life, material life. So duḥkhālayam... Kṛṣṇa says, God says, that this place is duḥkhālayam, it is a place of miseries. And that also aśāśvatam. You cannot make a compromise, "All right, let it be miserable. I shall remain as American or Indian." No. That you also cannot do. You cannot remain as American. You may think that you are born in America, you are very happy. But you cannot remain as American for long. You'll have to be kicked out of the place, and next life you do not know. Therefore it is duḥkhālayam aśāśvatam BG 8.15 . That is our philosophy.</p>
<p>Bob: But when you have some knowledge of God, then life is not so miserable.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: No, some knowledge will not do. You must have perfect knowledge. Janma karma me divyaṁ yo jānāti tattvataḥ BG 4.9 . Tattvataḥ means perfect. That perfect knowledge is being taught in the Bhagavad-gītā. So, we are giving chance to the human society to learn Bhagavad-gītā as it is and make his life perfect. That is Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement. What your science says about the transmigration of the soul?</p>
<p>Bob: I think that science cannot deny it, by scientific methods cannot deny it, or does scientific method show it. Science does not know of it.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Therefore I say, imperfect science.</p>
<p>Bob: Science may, though, say something. It is said in science that energy is never destroyed. It is just changed.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: That's all right, but how the energy is working in future, that science does not know.</p>
<p>Bob: Yeah.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: How the energy is diverted, how by different manipulation the energy is working differently. Just like electric energy, by different handling it is creating heater and it is creating cooler. Just opposite. But the same electric energy. So similarly, these energies, living energy, how it is being directed, which way it is going, how it is fructifying in the next life, so they do not know. They do not know. And in the Bhagavad-gītā it is very simplified. Vāsāṁsi jīrṇāni yathā vihāya BG 2.22 . You are covered by this dress, by this shirt. When this shirt is not workable you change it. Similarly, this body is just like shirt and coat, when it is no longer workable, we have to change.</p>
<p>Bob: What is the "we" that has to change? What is constant between one life to the next?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: That is soul. That is soul, "I", what you are speaking, "you", what I am speaking, identification, ātmā, or soul.</p>
<p>Bob: My soul is different than your soul?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes. You are individual soul, I am individual soul.</p>
<p>Bob: But you have removed yourself from karmic influences. If I was to remove myself from karmic influences, would our souls be the same or different?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Soul is the same. Just like you are under certain conception of life at the present moment. Just like your these countrymen. They were under certain conception of life. But by training they have taken another conception of life. So the ultimate training is how to become Kṛṣṇa conscious. That is perfection.</p>
<p>Bob: If two people are Kṛṣṇa conscious, is their soul the same?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Soul is always the same.</p>
<p>Bob: In each person. In each person is it the same?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes. (break) Soul, as spirit soul, pure soul, they are all equal. Even in animal. Therefore it is said, paṇḍitāḥ sama-darśinaḥ BG 5.18 , means those who are actually learned, they do not see the outward covering, either human being or animal. </p>
<p>Bob: Oh, then they are all equal and the same, or just equal? Are they equal and the same, or are they just equal?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: No, equal and the same. Qualitatively and quantitatively.</p>
<p>Śyāmasundara: I thought there was also a difference.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Huh?</p>
<p>Śyāmasundara: Isn't there also individuality and difference?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Their individuality becomes different in accordance with the development of consciousness.</p>
<p>Śyāmasundara: Oh. The soul before the development of consciousness...</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes. So therefore, when one comes to Kṛṣṇa consciousness, then there is no difference. (break) Because their aim is at that time how to... (break) ...and that is nice.</p>
<p>Bob: But they are the same because they are flowers.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes.</p>
<p>Bob: In that sense.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Same. That is acintya-bhedābheda philosophy. That everything is one and different simultaneously.</p>
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