Speed (Books)
Bhagavad-gita As It Is
BG Chapters 7 - 12
I see all people rushing full speed into Your mouths, as moths dash to destruction in a blazing fire.
BG Chapters 13 - 18
As soon as a living entity is placed in a particular type of body, he has to work under the spell of that bodily situation. A person seated in a high-speed motorcar goes faster than one seated in a slower car, though the living entities, the drivers, may be the same. Similarly, by the order of the Supreme Soul, material nature fashions a particular type of body to a particular type of living entity so that he may work according to his past desires. The living entity is not independent. One should not think himself independent of the Supreme Personality of Godhead. The individual is always under the Lord's control. Therefore one's duty is to surrender, and that is the injunction of the next verse.
Srimad-Bhagavatam
SB Canto 1
Aśvatthāmā, the murderer of the princes, seeing from a great distance Arjuna coming at him with great speed, fled in his chariot, panic stricken, just to save his life, as Brahmā fled in fear from Śiva.
Perfection of yoga means attainment of such supermental states as to be able to leave the material body as desired. Yogīs can also reach any planet within no time without a material vehicle. The yogīs can reach the highest planetary system within a very short time, but this is impossible for the materialist, whose attempt to reach the highest planet will fail even if he travels for millions of years at a speed of millions of miles per hour. This is a different science, and Bhīṣmadeva knew well how to utilize it. He was just waiting for the suitable moment to quit his material body, and the golden opportunity arrived when he was instructing his noble grandsons, the Pāṇḍavas. He thus prepared himself to quit his body before the exalted Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa, the pious Pāṇḍavas and the great sages headed by Bhagavān Vyāsa, etc., all great souls.
SB Canto 2
The materialistic scientist's endeavor to reach other planets by mechanical vehicles is only a futile attempt. One can, however, reach heavenly planets by virtuous activities, but one can never expect to go beyond Svarga or Janaloka by such mechanical or materialistic activities, either gross or subtle. The transcendentalists who have nothing to do with the gross material body can move anywhere within or beyond the material worlds. Within the material worlds they move in the planetary systems of the Mahar-, Janas-, Tapas- and Satya-loka, and beyond the material worlds they can move in the Vaikuṇṭhas as unrestricted spacemen. Nārada Muni is one of the examples of such spacemen, and Durvāsā Muni is one of such mystics. By the strength of devotional service, austerities, mystic powers and transcendental knowledge, everyone can move like Nārada Muni or Durvāsā Muni. It is said that Durvāsā Muni traveled throughout the entirety of material space and part of spiritual space within one year only. The speed of the transcendentalists can never be attained by the gross or subtle materialists.
It is indicated herein that the residents of Maharloka, where the purified living entities or demigods possess a duration of life calculated to be 4,300,000,000 solar years, have airships by which they reach Satyaloka, the topmost planet of the universe. In other words, the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam gives us many clues about other planets far, far away from us which modern planes and spacecraft cannot reach, even by imaginary speeds. The statements of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam are accepted by great ācāryas like Śrīdhara Svāmī, Rāmānujācārya and Vallabhācārya. Lord Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu specifically accepts Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam as the spotless Vedic authority, and as such no sane man can ignore the statements of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam when it is spoken by the self-realized soul Śrīla Śukadeva Gosvāmī, who follows in the footsteps of his great father, Śrīla Vyāsadeva, the compiler of all Vedic literatures. In the creation of the Lord there are many wonderful things we can see with our own eyes every day and night, but we are unable to reach them equipped by modern materialistic science.
As the sun rays are concentrated in the sun disc, the brahma-jyotir is concentrated in Goloka Vṛndāvana, the topmost spiritual planet in the spiritual sky. The immeasurable spiritual sky is full of spiritual planets, named Vaikuṇṭhas, far beyond the material sky. The mundaners have insufficient information of even the mundane sky, so what can they think of the spiritual sky? Therefore the mundaners are always far, far away from Him. Even if in the future they are able to manufacture some machine whose speed may be accelerated to the velocity of the wind or mind, the mundaners will still be unable to imagine reaching the planets in the spiritual sky. So the Lord and His residential abode will always remain a myth or a mysterious problem, but for the devotees the Lord will always be available as an associate.
SB Canto 3
The time factor is also explained by modern men in various ways. Some accept it almost as it is explained in the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam. For example, in Hebrew literature time is accepted, in the same spirit, as a representation of God. It is stated therein: "God, who at sundry times and in diverse manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets...." Metaphysically, time is distinguished as absolute and real. Absolute time is continuous and is unaffected by the speed or slowness of material things. Time is astronomically and mathematically calculated in relation to the speed, change and life of a particular object. Factually, however, time has nothing to do with the relativities of things; rather, everything is shaped and calculated in terms of the facility offered by time. Time is the basic measurement of the activity of our senses, by which we calculate past, present and future; but in factual calculation, time has no beginning and no end. Cāṇakya Paṇḍita says that even a slight fraction of time cannot be purchased with millions of dollars, and therefore even a moment of time lost without profit must be calculated as the greatest loss in life. Time is not subject to any form of psychology, nor are the moments objective realities in themselves, but they are dependent on particular experiences.
The ṛṣis, the four Kumāras, reached Vaikuṇṭha by becoming lighter than the lightest and thus passing over the space of the material world. Modern mechanical space vehicles are unsuccessful because they cannot go to the highest region of this material creation, and they certainly cannot enter the spiritual sky. But by perfection of the yoga system one not only can travel through material space, but can surpass material space and enter the spiritual sky. We learn this fact also from an incident concerning Durvāsā Muni and Mahārāja Ambarīṣa. It is understood that in one year Durvāsā Muni traveled everywhere and went into the spiritual sky to meet the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Nārāyaṇa. By present standards, scientists calculate that if one could travel at the speed of light, it would take forty thousand years to reach the highest planet of this material world. But the yoga system can carry one without limitation or difficulty. The word yoga-māyā is used in this verse. Yoga-māyā-balena vikuṇṭham. The transcendental happiness exhibited in the spiritual world and all other spiritual manifestations there are made possible by the influence of yoga-māyā, the internal potency of the Supreme Personality of Godhead.
One yojana is calculated to be eight miles, and he has to pass along a road which is therefore as much as 792,000 miles. Such a long distance is passed over within a few moments only. The subtle body is covered by the constables so that the living entity can pass such a long distance quickly and at the same time tolerate the suffering. This covering, although material, is of such fine elements that material scientists cannot discover what the coverings are made of. To pass 792,000 miles within a few moments seems wonderful to the modern space travelers. They have so far traveled at a speed of 18,000 miles per hour, but here we see that a criminal passes 792,000 miles within a few seconds only, although the process is not spiritual but material.
The statement in this verse that Kardama Muni's household affairs were envied even by persons who travel in outer space refers to the denizens of heaven. Their airships are not like those we have invented in the modern age, which fly only from one country to another; their airplanes were capable of going from one planet to another. There are many such statements in the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam from which we can understand that there were facilities to travel from one planet to another, especially in the higher planetary system, and who can say that they are not still traveling? The speed of our airplanes and space vehicles is very limited, but, as we have already studied, Kardama Muni traveled in outer space in an airplane which was like a city, and he journeyed to see all the different heavenly planets. That was not an ordinary airplane, nor was it ordinary space travel. Because Kardama Muni was such a powerful mystic yogī, his opulence was envied by the denizens of heaven.
SB Canto 4
The Lord says, yad gatvā na nivartante tad dhāma paramaṁ mama: "The planet from which, once going, no one returns, is My supreme abode." (BG 15.6) Dhruva Mahārāja was reminded, "You are going in our company to that planet from which no one returns to this material world." Material scientists are attempting to go to the moon and other planets, but they cannot imagine going to the topmost planet, Brahmaloka, for it is beyond their imagination. By material calculation, traveling at the speed of light it would take forty thousand light-years to reach the topmost planet. By mechanical processes we are unable to reach the topmost planet of this universe, but the process called bhakti-yoga, as executed by Mahārāja Dhruva, can give one the facility not only to reach other planets within this universe, but also to reach beyond this universe to the Viṣṇuloka planets. We have outlined this in our small booklet Easy Journey to Other Planets.
The Vaikuṇṭha airplane does not move by mechanical arrangement. There are three processes for moving in outer space. One of the processes is known to the modern scientist. It is called ka-pota-vāyu. Ka means "outer space," and pota means "ship." There is a second process also called kapota-vāyu. Kapota means "pigeon." One can train pigeons to carry one into outer space. The third process is very subtle. It is called ākāśa-patana. This ākāśa-patana system is also material. Just as the mind can fly anywhere one likes without mechanical arrangement, so the ākāśa-patana airplane can fly at the speed of mind. Beyond this ākāśa-patana system is the Vaikuṇṭha process, which is completely spiritual. The airplane sent by Lord Viṣṇu to carry Dhruva Mahārāja to Śiśumāra was a completely spiritual, transcendental airplane. Material scientists can neither see such vehicles nor imagine how they fly in the air. The material scientist has no information about the spiritual sky, although it is mentioned in the Bhagavad-gītā (paras tasmāt tu bhāvo 'nyaḥ (BG 8.20)).
Saint Maitreya continued: My dear Vidura, descendant of Kuru, as a herd of bulls circumambulates a central pole on their right side, all the luminaries within the universal sky unceasingly circumambulate the abode of Dhruva Mahārāja with great force and speed.
Each and every planet within the universe travels at a very high speed. From a statement in Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam it is understood that even the sun travels sixteen thousand miles in a second, and from Brahma-saṁhitā we understand from the śloka, yac-cakṣur eṣa savitā sakala-grahāṇām that the sun is considered to be the eye of the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Govinda, and it also has a specific orbit within which it circles. Similarly, all other planets have their specific orbits. But together all of them encircle the polestar, or Dhruvaloka, where Dhruva Mahārāja is situated at the summit of the three worlds. We can only imagine how highly exalted the actual position of a devotee is, and certainly we cannot even conceive how exalted is the position of the Supreme Personality of Godhead.
| Page Title: | Speed (Books) |
| Compiler: | Visnu Murti, Priya |
| Created: | 08 of May, 2011 |
| Totals by Section: | BG=2, SB=44, CC=4, OB=15, Lec=0, Con=0, Let=0 |
| No. of Quotes: | 65 |