If anyone is always full in Kṛṣṇa consciousness, always trying to understand Kṛṣṇa, always trying to engage himself in the service of Kṛṣṇa—that means fully absorbed in Kṛṣṇa consciousness—he is sure to get next body just like Kṛṣṇa.
What is the difference between Kṛṣṇa and your body? That is said in the Bhagavad-gītā also. When Arjuna inquired from Kṛṣṇa, "Kṛṣṇa, You say that You spoke this yoga system of Bhagavad-gītā to sun-god, but I know that You are born just like me. Your age and my age is similar. You are my friend. How can I believe that You spoke this philosophy to sun-god, which means some millions of years ago?" So what was the reply of Kṛṣṇa? The reply was that "Your birth and My birth, there are many, many times. But I remember them all, and you forget. That is the difference."
Why we forget? Because we get a different body. Just like you remember you had been a child. Just like here is a small baby, he (she) has got a small body. But when she'll be grown up girl she'll forget, because the body has changed. Forget. So because we change our body, therefore we forget. This is a fact. Just like when you, at night, you are in dream. You forget your body. You are dreaming that you have got a body of a bird.
You are flying in the sky and you have forgotten completely that you are Mr. and Mrs. Such-and-such, lying in a room. You have forgotten. So in daily experience we can understand that due to change of body we forget. Death means change of body and forgetfulness. That is death. So Kṛṣṇa said that, "You forget, you have forgotten, but I have not forgotten." That means indirectly Kṛṣṇa says that, "I do not change My body, but you change your body." So we are all changing our body.
So Prahlāda Mahārāja says that this person who is very much proud of his intelligence, his aristocracy, his wealth, his education, he can become a proud, but by that prideness he cannot purify himself. But this person, even if he is born in the family of a dog-eater, because he has engaged his everything—mind, words and body—in the service of the Lord, he can purify not only himself, but his whole family. That is the prerogative of a devotee. If there is a pure, sincere devotee in a family, then that family, up to seven generation up and down, they are also liberated. That information we have got in the Vedic scripture.
So Prahlāda Mahārāja says that proud man who is simply proud of his qualification of this body, he cannot even purify himself, and what to speak of purifying his family. But this man who is born even in the family of a dog-eater, but because he has engaged himself fully and solely in the service of the Lord, he not only purifies himself, but he purifies his whole family. Sa-kulam. This very word is prāṇaṁ punāti sa-kulaṁ na tu bhūrimānaḥ.
Yata bhakti-hīnasya trai-guṇa garbhayoḥ bhavanti. Here is a very nice commentary by Śrīdhara Svāmī, that the difference between a devotee and nondevotee is this—that a nondevotee is simply proud of his acquisition. That's all. He has no other qualification. But a devotee, because he is humble and meek, he thinks that, "All these nice qualifications which Kṛṣṇa has given me, or God has given me—so much wealth, so much education, so much beauty—oh, let me engage these things to the service of Kṛṣṇa."
That is the difference between a devotee and nondevotee. There is a very nice verse of Cāṇakya Paṇḍita, the difference between a great soul and a poor soul:
- ahagata caritrāṇi
- vicitrāṇi mahasanam
- lakhhim traya tucchanti
- tad bhareṇa namanti ca
The difference between devotee and nondevotee is that if a devotee is rich man, then he will think, "Oh, Kṛṣṇa has entrusted me with so much money. So it is Kṛṣṇa's money. Let me spend it for Kṛṣṇa."
There are very . . . Prahlāda Mahārāja, Bhisma Mahārāja and Yudhiṣṭhira Mahārāja, and many, many great kings, they were very rich, but they engaged their money for the service of Kṛṣṇa. Similarly a devotee, if he is educated, he tries to apply his educational qualification in describing Kṛṣṇa by so many literatures, so many publications. That is the proper use. And Bhāgavata says, as I have several times explained before you, that svanuṣṭhitasya dharmasya saṁsiddhir hari-toṣaṇam (SB 1.2.13). If you want to see the perfection of your acquisition, if you want to take . . . suppose you are a very great, learned man. Now you think over whether by becoming such learned man your life has become successful. That test is when you will see that you have engaged your learning in the service of Kṛṣṇa, then it is successful. Otherwise it is finished with this body.
Similarly, take anything—learning, beauty or wealth or anything, whatever you possess; there are many good things to possess in this material world—but if that good thing is engaged in the service of Kṛṣṇa and God, then it is success. Otherwise it is simply burden, or it is finished as soon as this body is finished.
Thank you very much.