Bhāgavata: ...leaving the four sinful activities. Then one can develop Kṛṣṇa consciousness.
Prabhupāda: No, this is practicing. This is practicing. Unless one is... Yeṣam tu anta-gataṁ pāpam. Unless one is free from sinful activities, one cannot understand God. It is not possible. God is not so cheap.
Dr. Patel: Practice and vairāgya both are necessary, not only vairāgya. No?
Prabhupāda: Hm?
Dr. Patel: Practice and vairāgya both are necessary.
Prabhupāda: Vairāgya means when you are not addicted to sinful life. That is vairāgya. People have got attachment for sinful activities. (break) ...deve bhagavati bhakti-yoga-prayojitaḥ, janayaty aśu vairāgyam. That is the vairāgya way. You cannot practice vairāgya without Vasudeva's shelter.
Dr. Patel: Vairāgya generates by extreme bhakti or by extreme knowledge. Not otherwise. Knowledge is generated by bhakti, no doubt, but then you must have complete knowledge of what is this and what is that.
Prabhupāda: Without bhakti, knowledge is artificial, because knowledge means to accept the Supreme Lord as Supreme. That is knowledge.
Dr. Patel: That is knowledge. And then this is also... From that knowledge, when you know that this is all false, then it sort of, in a sense, generated within you, to be...
Prabhupāda: That knowledge is described in the Bhagavad-gītā, māyayāpahṛta-jñānā. The so-called knowledge is useless. It has no value. māyāyapahṛta-jñāna. What is the test? Na māṁ prapadyante: "If he had knowledge, he would have surrendered to Me," but he does not do so.
Dr. Patel: Jñānavan māṁ prapadyante. That is knowledge. Jñāna means knowledge. That knowledge is the Supreme.
Prabhupāda: But that knowledge means actually jñānavān. Otherwise it is false knowledge. māyāyapahṛta-jñāna. If you do not know what is God, then what is the meaning of your knowledge?
Bhāgavata: You explain in the Gītā that
- bahunam janmanam ante
- jñānavān mam prapadyante
- vasudevaḥ sarvam iti
- sa mahātmā sudurlabhaḥ
- (BG 7.19)
Prabhupāda: (aside) Hare Kṛṣṇa. That is knowledge. Therefore so many mahātmās, sādhus, yogis, they are all useless, all useless because they have no bhakti. Simply artificially cheating people. (break) This is a society of cheaters and cheated. If you want to be cheated, there are many cheaters who will come and cheat you. That's all.