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Mahat-tattva (Conv and Letters)

Conversations and Morning Walks

1968 Conversations and Morning Walks

Room Conversation -- October 27, 1968, Montreal, With First Devotees Going to London On Evening of Their Departure:

Prabhupāda: Seven kinds of subtle, and these five covering is gross. So subtle should be taken also.

Janārdana: Yes. Is pradhāna subtle matter?

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Janārdana: So the subtle is moving the gross like the miller's wheel. The potter's wheel moves the pot. So the pradhāna... So the mind is moving the body. So the pradhāna... They simply put pradhāna...

Prabhupāda: If it is mentioned, five, then it is five gross, and seven means subtle. So five or seven... Of course, seven is more explicit than the five.

Janārdana: I never see anywhere where it is mentioned that there's an earth covering. It's always water as the first. Water is the first layer that's given. So there are four of the elements.

Prabhupāda: Then above water there is air.

Janārdana: Air, fire, ether. Water, fire, air, ether, and then this pradhāna. So pradhāna is split up into the three: ahaṇkāra, mahat-tattva and... What's...?

Prabhupāda: Pradhāna is material ingredients, material cause.

Janārdana: Material cause.

Prabhupāda: And prakṛti...

Janārdana: Is the efficient cause.

Prabhupāda: Efficient cause.

Janārdana: That is in the Brahma-saṁhitā.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

1974 Conversations and Morning Walks

Morning Walk -- March 30, 1974, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: Cause and effect. The mahat-tattva... Mahat-tattva is cause, and this cosmic manifestation is the effect. So beyond that, beyond that. Therefore Kṛṣṇa is said: mahat-pādam. The mahat-tattva is lying at His lotus feet. Samāśritā ye pada-pallavaṁ plavaṁ mahat-pādam. Mahat-tattva is lying on the lotus feet of Kṛṣṇa.

Dr. Patel: Mahat-tattva is nothing but the beginning of the...

Prabhupāda: It is the total, sum total of material energy.

Dr. Patel: Of cosmic energy, yes.

Prabhupāda: Yes. That is mahat-tattva.

1976 Conversations and Morning Walks

Room Conversation -- July 6, 1976, Washington, D.C.:

Svarūpa Dāmodara: Prabhupāda? Today I want to discuss about the manifestation of the matter from pradhāna. Now Lord Kapiladeva describes that pradhāna is the undifferentiated sum total of material elements.

Prabhupāda: Mahat-tattva?

Svarūpa Dāmodara: No, pradhāna. Then from pradhāna, by the action of time this mahat-tattva is generated. Now we were a little confused about that. He said by the impregnation of the Lord's internal potency there is hiraṇmaya, is produced within mahat-tattva, and this hiraṇmaya is self-effulgent.

Prabhupāda: Hmm?

Svarūpa Dāmodara: It's effulgent.

Prabhupāda: Hiraṇmaya?

Hari-śauri: Effulgent.

Prabhupāda: Oh, effulgent, yes.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: Now our point is whether this hiraṇmaya... In the mahat-tattva, the relationship between these two and pradhāna, how does that relate each other? It's not very clear in the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, you're not very clear, this point. It said from pradhāna, by the impregnation with the Lord's internal potency, the hiraṇmaya is produced. That's actually the beginning of the injection of jīvas within these material modes.

Prabhupāda: Yes, it is little complicated. So is it not clear from the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam?

Svarūpa Dāmodara: It is little difficult to understand the phenomenal descriptions.

Prabhupāda: In the Caitanya-caritāmṛta? Nityānanda-tattva? You can read it, you'll get some clue.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: We also get some clue from First Canto, Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, in the puruṣa incarnations, where it explains about tattva. But there is a difference between... Now our understanding is this: pradhāna, both pradhāna and mahat-tattva, they are eternal, though they are material manifestations.

Room Conversation -- July 6, 1976, Washington, D.C.:

Svarūpa Dāmodara: (indistinct) ...with this hiraṇmaya, the relationship between mahat-tattva and the hiraṇmaya is clear, then I think we can have some idea. So we are little confused on this very point. It is also said pradhāna is the twenty-four elements that doesn't contain time.

Prabhupāda: Pradhāna is the ingredient.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: Yes, it is the sum total of the unmanifested material elements. Now from pradhāna actually mahat-tattva is manifested. In mahat-tattva there is a basic difference that there is some, already some manifestations in mahat-tattva.

Rūpānuga: Categories.

Prabhupāda: Total material elements, mahat-tattva.

Rūpānuga: Is that differentiated?

Prabhupāda: Mahat-tattva is differentiated.

Rūpānuga: Different categories?

Svarūpa Dāmodara: The time element is there in mahat-tattva, so it is already twenty-five elements there including time. At this stage also, the impregnation of the Lord's internal potency means that the jīvas are already impregnated here from pradhāna. So here the living entities are in pure goodness.

Prabhupāda: The living entities are always in pure goodness. This material covering is separated. The living entities can be freed from material covering at any moment. Just like water and oil, it is always separated, it does not mix. The Vedic mantra also says asaṅgo 'yaṁ puruṣaḥ. Actually, it is not mixed, but it is covered. That covering can be taken away at any moment simply by Kṛṣṇa consciousness.

Room Conversation -- July 6, 1976, Washington, D.C.:

Svarūpa Dāmodara: It's said in the mahat-tattva when the Lord glances or impregnates, that the glancing...

Prabhupāda: That is spiritual. That glancing is spiritual. So matter itself cannot do anything. Aja-jala-stana, aja-jala-stana. The nipples in the throat, neck. As there are some nipples, nipples useless, that is not milk-giving nipples. So nature is creating. They, generally, they say "by nature," but nature has no power. It is matter. When there is glance of Saṅkarṣaṇa or Viṣṇu, that will do.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: In that state, when a living entity's impregnated in this state, it is also said that it is in pure goodness.

Prabhupāda: Pure goodness always, it is simply covered.

Correspondence

1969 Correspondence

Letter to Bhagavan -- London 9 November, 1969:

Regarding your second question, the 24 elements are the five gross elements, the three subtle elements, 10 senses, five sense objects, and the total material cause, (Mahat Tattva). Above these there is the situation of the spirit soul, which is the 25th category, and above this is the Supersoul, or Supreme Personality of Godhead. The mind is a subtle element, therefore it is in the body. Generally, the brain is accepted as the location of the mind.

1971 Correspondence

Letter to Jadurani -- Bombay 31 December, 1971:

The Mahattattva may be shown underneath the lotus if it is required for design purposes.

1974 Correspondence

Letter to Satsvarupa -- Bombay 3 November, 1974:

In the beginning there was no Brahma, no Siva, only Krishna. The cosmic manifestation is from Mahat Tattva, and before the Maha Tattva there is Narayana. Sankaracarya is a Lord Siva worshipper and an incarnation of Lord Siva, and he admits that Narayana is the master, and Narayana is the Supreme. narayanah paro 'vyaktat. This is the best authority. What more evidence you want? This is in his Sanka Bhasya on Bhagavad-gita. This is not even the statement of the Puranas but of Sankaracarya's own writings. How can you deny if the incarnation of Lord Siva says that Krishna is Supreme?

Page Title:Mahat-tattva (Conv and Letters)
Compiler:Labangalatika
Created:11 of Apr, 2010
Totals by Section:BG=0, SB=0, CC=0, OB=0, Lec=0, Con=5, Let=3
No. of Quotes:8