Everyone is born a śūdra, completely dependent. Saṁskārād bhaved dvijaḥ: but when he is initiated by purificatory processes, he is called twice-born. This initiation process means he surpasses the ordinary birth.
Ordinary birth is made by the father and the mother. That father and mother is there even in animal life. So to take birth from father and mother is not very important. Anyone, janame janame sabe pitā mātā pāya, in any birth, it doesn't matter human being, even in animal life or any life, there must be one father and mother.
So that birth is not very important. Janmanā jāyate. Therefore by birth by the father and mother, everyone is śūdra. But if he is purified, if he gets association of a spiritual master, if he approaches . . . for second birth one has to approach the spiritual master, the bona fide spiritual master. That was the system. The one . . . that is the injunction:
- tasmād guruṁ prapadyeta
- jijñāsuḥśreya uttamam
- (SB 11.3.21)
One . . . everyone is born śūdra, in the lowest status of life, but some way or the other if he becomes inquisitive, that "I want to know what is spiritual life, what is God, what is my relation with Him," if one becomes jijñāsuḥ—jijñāsuḥ means śreya, I, er . . . "inquirer." What kind of inquirer? Śreya uttama—the highest perfection of life. If he is inquisitive, that "What is the value of life?" then the Vedic literatures asking, tad-vijñānārthaṁ sa gurum evābhigacchet (Muṇḍaka Upaniṣad 1.2.12): then you must search out a bona fide spiritual master.
That is his business. If you want to . . . if anyone wants to satisfy his enquiries about higher transcendental subject matter, then this cannot be automatically achieved or performed. He must find out a spiritual master. That is the way.