Devotee (3): You said that all things are created out of the water of origination. There's an ocean, the Kāraṇodaka, by which all these worlds are generated, (indistinct) the primeval ocean, from which (indistinct) the ocean...
Prabhupāda: Wherefrom the ocean has been generated? Everything is generated from the breathing of Lord Viṣṇu. Viṣṇu is lying in that ocean, that's all. So I'm lying on this bed, and something is coming out of my breathing, that does not mean it is coming from the bed. That's all.
Devotee (3): That is the reference to the ocean of the womb.
Prabhupāda: (indistinct) You can say like that. (indistinct) And the child is floating in that water.
Śyāmasundara: Well, are there not certain characteristics that are particularly male and certain characteristics that are particularly female?
Prabhupāda: Male is only God. That is the characteristic. Male means enjoyer and female means enjoyed. So except God, except Kṛṣṇa, nobody is enjoyer. Therefore He's God.
Śyāmasundara: So it's a false idea to think that anything is masculine besides God.
Prabhupāda: Masculine is a different (indistinct). Masculine gender. So that is called (indistinct), symbolic. But a real male is Kṛṣṇa.
Śyāmasundara: So what is masculine?
Prabhupāda: Masculine, that means the symbolic representation in the material body is called masculine. Just like we (indistinct)... Just like in Bengali it is said, when you see cow, whether you see male or female, you just raise up the tail and you will understand. So a cow, I mean to say, vagina is covered by the tail, so if you raise on the tail of a calf by, simply by raising the tail you can understand whether it is a male calf or female calf. So this science is a representation of the mentality.
Śyāmasundara: So the mentality of God.
Prabhupāda: Not God—of the particular living entity.
Śyāmasundara: So to say that, for instance, the ocean is a female, has female characteristics, and the mountain has masculine characteristics...
Prabhupāda: (indistinct) I do not know why the ocean has female characteristics (indistinct).
Śyāmasundara: Well, they say "mother ocean." They sometimes say "mother ocean."
Prabhupāda: Yes, yes. That is just like because ocean keeps within, her cover, covering element. (indistinct) element. As the female keeps the child covered within the abdomen, so in that comparison you can say "mother." But similarly in the mountain also, there are so many minerals, so many gems, and so many nice stones. Simply by saying it is very strong. So generally male is strong and the female is weak. In that sense you can give a terminology.
Śyāmasundara: So he gives a definition of the cell. He says that "The cell is a center or an organization within the personality which seeks to develop towards a goal of maturity and integration, the harmonious bonds of conscious and unconscious disposition." So he says that within the personality there's a center, which strives to organize the personality in such a way that anything is integrated, unconscious and unconscious. Unconscious and conscious states are all integrated, in harmony. This is the cell.
Prabhupāda: What is the explanation, unconscious?
Śyāmasundara: Well...
Prabhupāda: Soul, soul at the present moment as we take it, that is... Present moment his real consciousness is covered. That we are always discussing.
Śyāmasundara: He doesn't see a soul, per se, he sees that a personality or a...
Prabhupāda: What is that personality? As soon as we come to the personality... Entity, that we call soul. Individual entity, adding personality, that is soul.
Śyāmasundara: He would call personality a set of behavior which is organized...
Prabhupāda: Wherefrom the personality comes? Because you are a living entity, you have got separate identity, therefore I recognize your personality. So without individual soul, how you can think of personality? There is no question of personality unless there is that individual living entity.
Revatīnandana: Is he saying that the self is an entity that tries to coordinate the conscious and unconscious?
Śyāmasundara: Yes.
Revatīnandana: Or is the self the interaction of the conscious and unconscious.
Śyāmasundara: No. He says that the self strives for an integration and a harmonious balance of the conscious and unconscious dispositions.
Prabhupāda: That, that can be explained in this way. Just like a soul who is now in sleeping state, he can be taught into Kṛṣṇa consciousness. So that unconscious, if he says unconsciousness, sleeping state, that is integrated. So in that way you can explain. Just like Caitanya Mahāprabhu says,
- jīv jāgo jīv jāgo gauracānda bole
- kota nidrā jāo māyā-piśācīra kole
"You are living entity, just get up, get up, get up! How long you shall sleep in this way under the lap, of the lap of māyā?" Jīv jāgo.
- bhajibo boliyā ese saṁsāra-bhitare
- bhuliyā rohile tumi māyā-piśācīra bhare
- enechi auṣadhi māyā nāśibāro lāgi
- hari-nāma mahā-mantra lao tumi māgi
So this is the process, hari-nāma, gradually bringing the sleeping man to the real consciousness of life. And that is education. (indistinct).
Śyāmasundara: So actually he is defining the soul but he doesn't call it the soul.
Prabhupāda: He has no idea of the soul. Poor fund of knowledge.
Śyāmasundara: He calls it the center.
Prabhupāda: Yes. He is missing the point.