Drown (Letters)

Expressions researched:
"drown" |"drowned" |"drowning" |"drowns"

1971 Correspondence

Letter to Upendra -- Nairobi 9 October, 1971:

So far your question, the soul is fundamentally pure but he has an aptitude to come to the impure state of material contamination. He is therefore called tatastha or marginal. He has got the liberty of staying within the pure state or becoming contaminated. That is his choice. This marginal point can be understood in this way; just like you are standing on the shore of the sea. So you can remain on the land or sometimes you can jump into the water to enjoy as you will see on the beaches. So many young boys are enjoying. But that is dangerous at the same time. One who does not know swimming expertly well he may become drowned. Similarly the soul from the spiritual platform sometimes jumps over the material ocean of nescience. The Vedic knowledge gives him specific instruction how to swim over but if he is a rascal, he does not take the instruction through the bona fide representative, the spiritual master, and he becomes drowned. That is the position. The Vedic instruction is so nice that the soul, when he jumps over this material ocean, the Vedic instruction teaches him how to swim and come back again to the shore. This swimming process, according to Vedic instruction, is called sacrifice, charity and penance. One who learns these techniques of swimming over the ocean of nescience, he goes back to home, back to Godhead. One who does not take to this swimming process, he becomes drowned. In the Bhagavad-gita this is stated iccha dyesa samutthena . . . svarge yanti parantapa which means deluded by desire to enjoy the material world and becoming envious of Krishna, one comes to this material world. (Bhagavad-gita, 7/27). So read our literature profusely and you will get sufficient knowledge.