Prabhupāda: The example is given, śīta-uṣṇa. Śīta means winter and uṣṇa means summer. As the summer comes and go, winter comes and go, so these kinds of sufferings, they come and go. So Kṛṣṇa is advising, tāṁs titikṣasva bhārata. Therefore a brāhmaṇa's qualification is titikṣa. Śamo damaḥ śaucaṁ titikṣa, toleration. They're not very much bothered with the bodily pains and pleasure. They come and go. They're engaged in real business, how to realize Brahman. So if one is engaged in the prime business of life, Brahman understanding, athāto brahma jijñāsā, for him these bodily pains and pleasure becomes minor things. Therefore, we see such examples, that one saintly person is living in the Himalayan mountain. There is snowfall, there is no proper place, still they live. Still, there are many. But nowadays it is not possible. Voluntarily, they used to go to the forest, to the Himalaya, just to tolerate these pains and pleasure of the body equally and engage in their own business of spiritual understanding. That is human civilization. Human civilization, that is described, tapo divyam. For the supreme spiritual realization one should undergo tapasya.
Snow (Conv. & Letters)
Conversations and Morning Walks
1973 Conversations and Morning Walks
1974 Conversations and Morning Walks
Prabhupāda: Geneva is important town.
Devotee (2): Important, not very big though.
Prabhupāda: International town.
Devotee (2): Yes.
Prabhupāda: When I was going to London from Bombay..., no, no, when I was going to Switzerland, I think I stopped at Geneva.
Devotee (2): Zurich. You were in Zurich.
Prabhupāda: Zurich, before that I stopped at Geneva. I saw the airport, very big airport. Then I went to Zurich. And from Zurich I went to some Mount St....
Devotee (2): St. Hellish.
Prabhupāda: You have been there? You are right, St. Hellish. (unclear)
Devotee (2): (laughs) Śyāmasundara.
Prabhupāda: Yes, Śyāmasundara, "Oh, I have to..." He spent money for that. I thought "It is hellish." (laughter) Always covered with snow, I could not get out. Two days I was imprisoned in that hotel room. But people go there.
Yamunā: For health.
Prabhupāda: Eh?
Yamunā: For their health.
Prabhupāda: In Tokyo there is a park, this sound was there. (sound of birds chirping) Cement, no?
Dhanañjaya: Yes.
Prabhupāda: And fish combined.
Dhanañjaya: Yes, seahorse. Did such an animal exist, seahorse? Or is this man's imagination?
Prabhupāda: No, seahorse we have heard, there is. Sea elephant, seahorse, there are. (break)
Atreya Ṛṣi: ...fighting and all kinds of games. Four boys died that year trying to... (break)
Prabhupāda: ...and Roman climate the same? No.
Atreya Ṛṣi: Rome is a little warmer, isn't it?
Dhanañjaya: Yes.
Atreya Ṛṣi: Now the whole city is a little more humid.
Prabhupāda: Paris?
Satsvarūpa: It's sunny.
Atreya Ṛṣi: Sunnier than London. Very close to London.
Dhanañjaya: Not cold like London ever.
Prabhupāda: There is snow. (break) ...and Darjeeling. (break)
Prabhupāda: Viśvāmitra.
Yogeśvara: He also had to eat dog, I think.
Prabhupāda: Yes.
Yogeśvara: There's a story about that.
Prabhupāda: Yes, Viśvāmitra. How they exist in that open, and there was snow. For eating they... Eighteen days?
Yogeśvara: The plane crashed. Half the people were killed. So the other people, two of them left to go find help. They went to find out some people they could telephone or something. It took them eighteen days to find a house. So the other people, they all stayed close together inside the airplanes. They put on blankets and their coats. But there was no... They could not go outside. There was no food.
Puṣṭa-kṛṣṇa: They had... At first they had little chocolate and they rationed it out that "You get a little bit of chocolate," and little bit of liquid they had. And so they rationed it out until that was finished. Then they took a vote amongst themselves. "Well, what shall we do? Shall we eat human flesh or shall we simply starve to death?" So they voted amongst themselves that "Yes, we should do this." There were some men, one or two, that would not do it and they died. They refused to do it, and they died. Others, they did.
Yogeśvara: They made some... Afterwards they had to... There was some discussion, some philosophy. They were actually discussing. And there was one person there who was explaining to the others that "We must eat this flesh to stay alive but it's not so wrong since the soul has left the body." He said, "The spirit has left these bodies, so you shouldn't consider it to be quite so bad. We're obliged to do this."
Prabhupāda: Yes, that is not unreasonable. It was a question of selection. Otherwise, to subsist, to eat the dead bodies, flesh, that is not very abominable. That can be accepted.
1975 Conversations and Morning Walks
Amogha: Śrīla Prabhupāda? When a spirit soul first falls from the spiritual sky into the material world, does he first go to the lowest of the 8,400,000 species of life, and then gradually come up, or can he fall to the middle or anywhere?
Prabhupāda: According to his desire. In the beginning it is not so fall down.
Śrutakīrti: In a purport in the Fourth Canto you say that usually they take human forms, because they are desiring to enjoy in that way. And then they begin falling down.
Prabhupāda: Yes, the more they enjoy, the more they become entangled. (pause) Does it snow here?
Amogha: No. In the mountains.
Prabhupāda: Mountains. (pause) ...it is said that sun is the source of everything within this universe. Maintenance of all living entities. The source within the universe is the sun. Therefore this Gāyatrī mantra is worshiping the sun, oṁ bhūr bhuvaḥ svaḥ tat savitur vareṇyaṁ bhargo devasya dhīmahi.
Gaṇeśa: Does that mean that Vivasvān is more powerful than Lord Brahmā?
Prabhupāda: No. Vivasvān was begotten by Brahmā.
rKim: No. (reads purport to) "...and Paramātmā or Supersoul realization is the realization of His sat and cit features." I don't understand that. I read the words, but...
Prabhupāda: It requires elucidation. "Complete whole" means, just like your body is complete whole, and there are so many other things, there are so many holes in the body, there are so many hairs on the body, there are so many hairs on the head, so many fingers, eyes, ears—so many things—but the body is a complete unit, working as a complete machine. And there are so many things. Similarly, the whole cosmos is complete, exactly like this body is a machine. Similarly the whole cosmos is a big machine. It is complete. One sun is there and keeping everything complete. The day and night, the seasonal changes, the equator, the temperature, the moonlight, the other planets, we living beings, the vegetables—everything is complete by God. And because the sun is there. Similarly, this body, machine, is complete. And the soul is there, it is working nicely. The body is also a creation, and the universe is also a creation, and the brain which has created these things, He is complete. Therefore He has created these complete units. That is the idea. Pūrṇam idaṁ (Iso Invocation). Pūrṇaḥ means complete. And because He is complete, the Creator, He has no defect; therefore He can create everything complete. Pūrṇam idaṁ, pūrṇam adaḥ, pūrṇāt pūrṇam udacyate. And He is so complete that pūrṇasya pūrṇam ādāya, from the complete, if you take the whole complete, still He is complete. Here is a glass of water; I am drinking. Drinking part by part. And when it is finished, the water is finished, no more complete. But He is so complete, that just like the sun, the temperature is being distributed for million and millions of years, still it is full of temperature. Here, unless the electric power is there, it is not complete. But there is power in the sunshine. It is a reservoir of so much temperature and light, that in history millions and millions of years it is distributing, the seasonal changes are going on, the green foliage is coming again, the snow and rain is coming, so many things are going on account of temperature.
Jayatīrtha: It's near Lyons, Orleans, Orleans.
Prabhupāda: Oh. How far it is from our palace?
Jayatīrtha: About half an hour, I think. It is between several big towns. And it's very centrally located for saṅkīrtana all over France.
Prabhupāda: Oh, we can go here and there.
Jayatīrtha: Yeah. They're going to use that as the saṅkīrtana base for our traveling saṅkīrtana all over France.
Prabhupāda: Very good.
Jayatīrtha: Parties will go out for a few weeks and then come back. So it's very good.
Prabhupāda: What is the climate now? It is cold?
Jayatīrtha: It's nice during the day and a little cold at night.
Prabhupāda: Oh.
Jayatīrtha: Europe is always cold.
Prabhupāda: Huh? Europe is always cold.
Jayatīrtha: Always cold. But this palace is in a fairly warm zone. It's got some sort of breeze coming from the Mediterranean Sea, I think. Anyway, it keeps it a little warmer than most places. And it does not snow very much during the winter, they say. Besides the palace, there are some other buildings also. One place they are going to use for a gośāla, and one place for a Gurukula. And then several householder houses.
Kuruśreṣṭha: In the winter it's very cold.
Prabhupāda: Oh. Very cold?
Kuruśreṣṭha: Very cold.
Prabhupāda: Oh, what is the temperature?
Kuruśreṣṭha: Zero to twenty, thirty.
Prabhupāda: Oh. Below zero?
Kuruśreṣṭha: Sometimes, at night. Ten below.
Prabhupāda: Like New York? No, New York was never below zero. (break) Winter, how many months is continuing?
Kuruśreṣṭha: Four or five months.
Prabhupāda: Four, five months. Always snow?
Kuruśreṣṭha: Sometimes snow.
Prabhupāda: So why the temperature is so low unless there is snow?
Brahmānanda: The mountains, in the mountains there is snow?
Kuruśreṣṭha: At like eleven, twelve thousand. This is five thousand feet altitude, here in Denver.
Prabhupāda: Snow falls above ten thousand feet?
Kuruśreṣṭha: Oh, yes.
Prabhupāda: (break) ...Kashmir, that is sixteen thousand feet. (break) ...do not sink? Guarantee? (laughter) (break) ...glass building.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Śrīla Prabhupāda, When you were... Many years ago you used to have me send you eucalyptus twigs from San Francisco.
Prabhupāda: Hm, yes.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: So now that you're in America we can easily arrange for that to be done. They can be sent. They take only one day by air.
Prabhupāda: So wherefrom?
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Well, San Francisco is the best area for eucalyptus.
Prabhupāda: So arrange.
Jagadīśa: We have them already, Mahārāja.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: I'll arrange today.
Prabhupāda: Arrange that three corner, four corner, square.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Square set, yes.
Prabhupāda: Square side. That is good, square and green.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: And green. And as thick as the finger?
Prabhupāda: No, no, this much. Top of the little finger. (break) ...about forty miles off, there is a place known as Jneyo(?) Kali. There the Ganges is so vast. You have seen it? No. Eh?
Viṣṇujana: Yeah, I think so. I saw it three miles wide. One place where I was sailing on the Ganges it was three miles wide by Mangir.
Prabhupāda: Oh, Mungir. No, Mungir is far off. It is near Calcutta. (break) ...snowfall here?
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Snowfall?
Prabhupāda: Heavy?
Devotee (1): Oh, yes, it becomes very cold here.
Prabhupāda: Let people be engaged. Machine means one man or two man working... That will mean unemployment. Machine means unemployment. The principle should be that everyone is employed. Either brāhmaṇa, either kṣatriya, either vaiśya or śūdra. Nobody should become idle and gossiping, and sleeping, then utilize... This should be principle. Everyone should be engaged in Kṛṣṇa consciousness, then life is successful. And self-sufficient. If we have got spoiling living program, these are necessities. Growing, cultivating, producing, there will be not possibility of, and we don't want more than the necessity. If by God's grace we get more then you can make sale, we are not going to work for selling purpose. Then money will be there. How to get money, how to get money? And as soon as you get money, more than necessity, then sense gratification, then this, that, this, that, then you become implicated. Ato gṛha kṣetra sutāpta... ahaṁ mameti (SB 5.5.8). As soon as you become implicated with material want, gṛha, kṣetra, vittair, ato gṛha kṣetra sutāpta, children, wife, friendship, then the false ego, "I am this body and this is my property," will increase. For that is material world. People do not know the end of life, or the aim of life. They are misguided, hence the Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement to give them an ideal way of life. So this is very nice place. We have got small lakes also. Natural we have?
Nityānanda: No, you can make them.
Prabhupāda: How? How low is the water?
Nityānanda: Ten feet.
Prabhupāda: Ten feet, oh, just like Bengal. As soon as you dig ten feet there is water.
Nityānanda: No, it's ah, when you have a gulley, you build a dam at one end and it fills up with water from the rain, and it stays full.
Prabhupāda: Oh, the rain is sufficient here? How many months it rain?
Nityānanda: There is no definite rainy season, it rains all year round.
Prabhupāda: Oh, that's very good. Winter?
Nityānanda: No snow, it's always rain. We can grow vegetables in the summer, and different vegetables in the winter. So the cows they can stay outside all year. They don't have to stay in the barn, it's warm enough.
1976 Conversations and Morning Walks
Prabhupāda: I find this place is the best than all our places. Huh? What do you think?
Hari-śauri: Definitely.
Prabhupāda: Specially this building on the riverside. Water is there.
Mādhavānanda: Maybe, Śrīla Prabhupāda, you would like to stay a little longer this year?
Prabhupāda: I have got engagements; otherwise I would have stayed here. Already engagement is there. I want to return by fourteenth August in India. Otherwise, I would have stayed here and see things are nicely done. Anyway.
Jayādvaita: They've been after you for so long in New Vrindaban.
Prabhupāda: New Vrindaban climatic condition is not so good. Here the climatic condition is good. Four months this climate is very good. It is in the central part of America?
Mādhavānanda: Little north.
Prabhupāda: North. So north is supposed to be cooler.
Hari-śauri: In the winter it's not so good. Winter's very bad.
Prabhupāda: Winter eight months? No. In winter this water becomes solid. You know that?
Satsvarūpa: Sometimes in Detroit there's three foot of snow, and the winter is, it's a very deep winter here, but the summer is nice.
Prabhupāda: You convince your countrymen that "It is a great sinful activity that you are killing your mother. You stop this. If you want to eat meat, you can eat some other, nonimportant animals. There are so many." The Chinese they are eating rats also. Cats, rats, everything.
Devotee: Monkeys.
Prabhupāda: That means our men were not experienced, Jagadīśa and Govardhana. Who else? Who was in charge?
Mādhavānanda: Govardhana was the president. If the lawyer knows you do not know, then he will take advantage. (break) He measured the two rooms, and the lecture hall length is forty-seven feet and twenty-seven feet wide. And the temple room length from the back to the altar, not including the Deities room, altar, is fifty feet.
Prabhupāda: Smaller.
Mādhavānanda: No, actually larger.
Hari-śauri: Three feet bigger. That's without a Deity room also.
Mādhavānanda: It's larger. And the width of the temple room is twenty-eight. So if we were to put in the altar in the top room, it would also take ten feet. So that would make thirty-five feet as compared to fifty feet downstairs. So because we don't have that extra space of the temple room, the downstairs actually is bigger. The only difficulty is because there is an upstairs walk we have to walk above the Deity. But if we put a nice domes there it might look very nice also, and then not walk up there. But the space is bigger.
Prabhupāda: I thought this space was bigger.
Hari-śauri: It looks bigger, but the temple room is actually very big. It's a good size. Actually, the only reason they need to go above the Deities is just to get into that room where tulasī is, although they open those doors sometimes.
Prabhupāda: There is another big room, so add it together. Two rooms, then it will be bigger. (pause) (break) ...with snow.
Satsvarūpa: I was thinking of that. About five months, it can even snow here in April, and it snows in December. From December to April. Not that every day, but when it comes, it doesn't go away either.
Prabhupāda: Because he has approached Kṛṣṇa.
Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: Even he may be in the bodily concept?
Prabhupāda: Oh, yes. That will be rectified. Kṣipraṁ bhavati dharmātmā. Huh? What is that? Kaunteya pratijānīhi na me bhaktaḥ praṇaśyati (BG 9.31). Api cet sudurācāro bhajate mām ananya-bhāk (BG 9.30). When one has come to the fire, some way or other, he'll be warm, gradually. That is the.... He has come to the right path. (break) ...kāmād bhayāt, krodhāt. Either.... Anyone who comes to Kṛṣṇa.... Just like gopīs, they were captivated. They were village girls. They did not know what is God, what is Brahman, nothing. But they were captivated: "Kṛṣṇa is very beautiful boy." That's all. Even they forgot their own husbands. (break) ...or other, we have to develop our intense love of Kṛṣṇa. Then life is perfect. (break) (in car) One who is accepting this body as self, sa eva go-kharaḥ (SB 10.84.13). They are making paper?
Devotee: Tar.
Prabhupāda: From tar, you find paper?
Viśvakarmā: Yes. All different types of packaging have (indistinct) as well.
Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: They keep salt in here for...
Prabhupāda: Salt?
Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: When it snows on the highways, trucks come and they pour salt so it keeps the snow melting. More friction on the road for the tires.
Kīrtanānanda: This is our farm up in here. Lord Jagannātha is staying there now while He is ill. Our big Lord Jagannātha is going to Cleveland tomorrow for Ratha-yātrā festival.
Prabhupāda: Oh. It is the first time?
Kīrtanānanda: Yes. They have a big cart, and they will go down the main street.
Prabhupāda: How far it is?
Kīrtanānanda: How far to Cleveland? About 130 miles. (break) Our land is on the left side.
Prabhupāda: Oh. So this land, how you are utilizing it?
Kīrtanānanda: We are growing a kind of grass, sudan grass. Then we cut that and put it in the tall silos for the cows to eat in the winter.
Prabhupāda: In the winter this is all covered with snow?
Kīrtanānanda: Most of the winter not. We get maybe six inches during the whole winter. (break) ...a lot of land now that's not our land. We are farming a lot of land now that is not our land. We lease it, or do it on shares.
Kulādri: They are getting water also, Śrīla Prabhupāda, from this well. Your well is also going to that side.
Prabhupāda: Yes. Have several wells in all places. That is nice. Is it very expensive?
Kulādri: It's expensive.
Prabhupāda: It is more expensive than carrying water and consume petrol? That is laziness. Once you have a well, then you save so much trouble. Get one well in each, our house. It is here very deep, uh? To get well? Tube-well? But there are so many creeks.
Kulādri: We have what is called a springhouse. It's pure spring water, it's caught in reservoir.
Prabhupāda: Where is it?
Kulādri: At the other farm we have, as well as tube-well,
Prabhupāda: Water must be.
Devotee (1): Śrīla Prabhupāda, if in the spiritual sky there is no sex life...
Prabhupāda: You can store the snow. Yes. Big, big hole and collect the snow and put it here and cover it, it will stay. Is it not?
Kulādri: We have so much water, though, running off the hill, we can make lakes. We have three lakes now.
Prabhupāda: Then? Why don't you do it?
Kulādri: You saw the Rādhā-kuṇḍa in the movie, in the film.
Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa:
- puruṣaḥ prakṛti-stho hi
- bhuṅkte prakṛti-jān guṇān
- kāraṇaṁ guṇa-saṅgo 'sya
- sad-asad-yoni-janmasu
- (BG 13.22)
"The living entity in material nature thus follows the ways of life, enjoying the three modes of nature. This is due to his association with that material nature. Thus he meets with good and evil amongst various species."
Prabhupāda: We are practically seeing it, that material nature... Some infection, this is also material nature, and if you are infected with some contaminous disease, you must suffer. They practically see it. The nature will work. Puruṣaḥ prakṛti-sthaḥ. As soon as we are in this material world... I am living entity, spirit soul, and because I am in this material world, I have accepted this material body under the regulation of the material laws. Otherwise why there are so many varieties of life? Here is a tree. It is standing here. We are human beings; we are also here. But when there is cold blast, scorching heat, we can go into the room, but he has to be standing here for thousands of years. Why this distinction? It cannot move even an inch. It is also living entity. Why he is punished in that way? And when there will be snowfall, pinching cold, he cannot go. But a small ant, it can go from here to there. Moving and not moving, the two kinds of living entities... Some of them can move; some of them cannot move, sthāvara. Just like grass. We are trampling over with our legs. It cannot protest. Why these differences of grades of life? This is described here. Puruṣaḥ prakṛti-stho hi bhuṅkte (BG 13.22). What is that?
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Is it true that there were big dinosaur bodies?
Prabhupāda: If they were, it is still now.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Oh, wow.
Prabhupāda: We don't say it is extinct.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: But you've explained that even if not here then it must be on another planet.
Prabhupāda: Yes, another. This planet, what you have seen?
Rāmeśvara: That's the point, what we have seen about this planet?
Devotee (1): Could still be here. They found one in, where is that? In Ireland?
Prabhupāda: Cannot be extinct, that is not possible.
Devotee (1): In that lake?
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: But do you think they were on this planet?
Prabhupāda: No, no, may be on this planet, but it doesn't matter that it is extinct. You have not seen.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: No, that's a fact.
Rāmeśvara: Their idea is that at that time man was living in the form of half monkey, half man in a cave, and gradually he evolved to become more civilized.
Prabhupāda: That is still there. Kinnaras. Kinnaras means it is doubtful whether he is man or monkey.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Wow.
Prabhupāda: There is a Kinnara-loka. Kimpuruṣa. Kinnara. They are still existing. It is not that they are finished.
Hari-śauri: I was reading a magazine when we were on the plane, and it was describing this type of monkey man, that they are being called, they existed in snow wastes.
Prabhupāda: Or what is called? The big...?
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Orangutan, gorilla.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: I felt that it should be done in a very modern American style but very cultural with Vedic subject matter. Then gradually they would appreciate it. As well as the library party. If the library party, Satsvarūpa is thinking to go all over the world now, if they go to Japan they are expecting a good reception in Japan, that will be another advantage if your books are accepted by the professors there. I thought that a cultural presentation...
Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: We have to somehow or another get the local people to join there.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Well that's the way, see they're not going to join as Hare Kṛṣṇas because of the bad publicity. They're not going to join like that. You have to have a different method.
Prabhupāda: What is this church, big church.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Gurudāsa also called.
Rāmeśvara: Lutheran Church.
Prabhupāda: Where he is now?
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: He's in Detroit. He told me to book his ticket to London on the same flight that you were going on.
Prabhupāda: I came here in the evening, with umbrella and in the morning I saw the whole street is white.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: White-washed, you thought it was white-washed?
Prabhupāda: Yes.
Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: From the snow.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: He thought that someone had poured white wash.
Prabhupāda: When I first saw from the window that the street was all white, "How is that? One white-washed?" (laughter) Then when I saw in the street, "Oh!"
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: You never saw snow.
Prabhupāda: No.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Even in the Himalayas?
Prabhupāda: I saw in Kashmir, but that was not so white.
Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: From a distance?
Prabhupāda: No, on the street also, but not so white. That is ice, not snow.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Oh yes. Here it's snow.
Prabhupāda: This is Eighth Avenue?
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: No this is Central Park West. I used to live on this street. I was living here, Eighty-first Street and Columbus.
Prabhupāda: What is the rent?
Ātreya Ṛṣi: The rent now it is twelve hundred dollars. But of course everything is now much more expensive. So I was negotiating in New York for better arrangements, because in Iran price is going up and up and up. And I told my company that they should buy one house. And they have agreed. So there is going to be that house, we will buy something like this for Kṛṣṇa.
Prabhupāda: This is very nice.
Ātreya Ṛṣi: And also we have saved some money, we'll buy a temple also in addition to that.
Prabhupāda: No, this is very nice. Dayānanda, do you like it?
Dayānanda: Yes.
Prabhupāda: It is very nice place, private, everything is so nice. In winter, what is the temperature?
Ātreya Ṛṣi: Very cold.
Prabhupāda: Very cold.
Parivrājakācārya: Yes, it snows.
Ātreya Ṛṣi: Like Vṛndāvana. Isn't it like?
Parivrājakācārya: It's colder than Vṛndāvana.
Hari-śauri: It doesn't snow in Vṛndāvana.
Prabhupāda: Vṛndāvana I don't think less than fifty.
Hari-śauri: It sometimes gets colder, I think. Nowadays anyway.
Ātreya Ṛṣi: Here it gets ten, fifteen.
Prabhupāda: But there is no snow in Vṛndāvana.
Ātreya Ṛṣi: We have plenty of snow here.
Indian man: Answer will be one.
Prabhupāda: This is self-realization. The answer is one, that "I am not this body." This is self-realization. You cannot say that because there are many students, so there are many answers.
Indian man: But who am I? Every individual starts quest, asking himself, "Who am I?" And everybody is thinking in his own terms that "I am something, I am somebody." Somebody is attached to the upper garments.
Prabhupāda: So long he is student, student means he does not know.
Indian man: Yes, he is ignorant.
Prabhupāda: He is ignorant. So his question is what I am, but he is ignorant. He cannot give the answer. The master. The master will give one answer.
Indian man: His answer will be one, but to how the student understands, for making student understand, he will have to show in different ways. Suppose a person is coming from Himalayas to the Bombay, his path will be different. Greenery will be there, flowing rivulets will be there, mountain peaks scattered with snow will be there....
Prabhupāda: That is another thing. If you have to go to the Himalaya, you must go to the path which leads to Himalaya. You cannot accept a path which leads to Delhi. There is no different answer, the answer is one. Just like Himalaya is in the northern side. The answer would be, "The Himalaya is on the northern side." Nobody will say, "No, Himalaya may be in the eastern side or the western side or southern side." That is not the answer.
Prabhupāda: That is your study. That is foolish study. Therefore He says avajānanti māṁ mūḍhāḥ (BG 9.11). The rascals think that I am one of the human beings. If he is one of the human beings, how he can say mattaḥ parataraṁ nānyat kiñcid asti dhanañjaya (BG 7.7). In the human society, there are big men, you are big man, I am small man, he is still more, he is still more, he is still bigger. There are so many varieties. But He says "No more superior than Me." That is God.
Mr. Malhotra: No one is supreme than Him.
Prabhupāda: Yes.
Mr. Malhotra: That He says, of course.
Prabhupāda: He says everything but because we are foolish we do not hear Him. That is the difficulty.
Mr. Malhotra: We don't understand Him.
Prabhupāda: No, we understand. But we do not accept it. What is the difficulty to understand? God is superior. Everyone knows it. But I will not accept, he will not accept. Unless one is superior, how He can be God? (break) ...sevayā. Therefore you have to find out somebody who knows Him. Otherwise you will be in darkness. (break)
Mr. Malhotra: (Hindi) Over bridge. But where we are going, Ambleswar (?), from there Kṛṣṇā-nadī starts.
Prabhupāda: Oh. Kṛṣṇā-nadī is for us.
Mr. Malhotra: From Ambleswar. Then there is old, old mandira, very old mandira, temple, there are five nadīs are coming.
Prabhupāda: Oh, Kaumuda, Kāverī...
Mr. Malhotra: Kṛṣṇā, Kāverī, Veṇā, five rivers flow from there. We will go there, tomorrow morning we'll go. (break)
Prabhupāda: ...just now. In the morning it was little cold. Now it is very pleasing.
Mr. Malhotra: It is. But since you have been going all over Europe and you must be accustomed to cold, it is severe cold.
Prabhupāda: Oh, yes. I was going to morning walk when there was snow fall. I was walking on snow.
Mr. Malhotra: Actually when snow falls it is not very cold but when there is breeze, then it is very unbearable.
Prabhupāda: Ah, yes. (break)
1977 Conversations and Morning Walks
Prabhupāda: Samo 'haṁ sarva-bhūteṣu (BG 9.29). God must be equal to everyone.
Dr. Patel: You are right. With that extreme faith, Jesus took to the cross. Huh? (break)
Prabhupāda: That is the greatness of the movement. (break)
Dr. Patel: We will be meeting with all people in the whole world. And you will be...
Prabhupāda: Yes, I am the oldest.
Dr. Patel: (laughing) Keep in my hand and walk. And I would say, sir, that you also should not take bath in cold water.
Prabhupāda: No, I don't take. I... Since 1970, 1966, '67, I am not taking cold bath. Before that, even in America I was taking twice cold water bath.
Dr. Patel: I have never taken cold water in my life.
Prabhupāda: Shower I was taking.
Dr. Patel: All these boys take cold water, required from them.
Prabhupāda: I never used hot water. In India the Delhi is the coldest part. In my business life, in the hotel I was taking cold water. Everyone was surprised. "How you can?" In Saharanpur, in bitter cold, I was taking cold water early in the morning.
Dr. Patel: This will be extreme cold in river. I have taken bath in the confluence four or five years back. It was not winter, but then it was... It is cold throughout the year because snow melt and keep water very cold.
Prabhupāda: Hare Kṛṣṇa. (break) ...gentleman will have a flag in the home.
Dr. Patel: During the times of Moguls you have seen all the pictures with the flag.
Prabhupāda: That was the system. Our Pandit Jawaharlal was keeping one flag also, always.
Svarūpa Dāmodara: Yes. They used to fight. The king of Manipur and the Burmese, fighting.
Prabhupāda: Still?
Svarūpa Dāmodara: They used to fight long ago.
Prabhupāda: Fighting between king and king, there is always. But what is the cause of fight? Vaiṣṇava should fight with the non-Vaiṣṇava. So I have already written you?
Svarūpa Dāmodara: Yes.
Prabhupāda: So you can arrange when it will be suitable to go there.
Svarūpa Dāmodara: Any time will be suitable. This is pretty cold at this time.
Prabhupāda: Then it is not so good.
Svarūpa Dāmodara: After Māyāpur I think it will be best, this Māyāpur festival. Then it will be very nice. It's getting warmer. Actually it was seven degrees this morning, but they have very little snow.
Prabhupāda: So...
Hari-śauri: Very little? (laughs)
Gargamuni: We should go after Māyāpur.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: We couldn't get to the Kashmir tourist office today.
Prabhupāda: Hm. Never mind.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: That place is not too high altitude? Someone told us that he was in Kashmir at eleven thousand feet altitude. That boy who was driving us today, he was there last year.
Prabhupāda: That is crossing. But...
Bhavānanda: The valleys.
Prabhupāda: ...the real Kashmir is the valleys. Five thousand.
Bhavānanda: Gargamuni says in those valleys it is very hot.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: He was there?
Bhavānanda: He was either in Kashmir or right next to it, same area, Sivagudhi, Simla or someplace.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Simla, yeah, he was in Simla.
Bhavānanda: Very hot.
Prabhupāda: No, Simla is not hot. This Srinagar is not hot. I know that. I went there. I know. When I crossed, there was snow on the road. So when Guru dāsa will send his report?
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: As soon as he meets Dr. Karan Singh. I told him to make detailed arrangements and give detailed report. You are eager to go there, I think.
Rāmeśvara: For now they are selling Bhagavad-gītā, Back to Godhead, and Satsvarūpa Mahārāja's book. That is also being sold. They are just now printing the first Persian Back to Godhead, and in three months' time the Bhagavad-gītā in Persian will be... Translation will be completed.
Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Who is doing the translation?
Rāmeśvara: One local man that joined us, very intelligent man.
Prabhupāda: So they are looking after a bigger place?
Brahmānanda: They're looking after a bigger place?
Rāmeśvara: Yes.
Prabhupāda: Hm. Very warm nowadays?
Rāmeśvara: During the day it is just like here-80, 85 degrees. In the early morning and in the evening sometimes a little chilly.
Prabhupāda: At night snowfall?
Rāmeśvara: No.
Jayatīrtha: Snow there starts around December. It starts to get snow in Tehran.
Rāmeśvara: This is the best time in Tehran, the fall, autumn season. Parivrājakācārya Mahārāja told me that the Indian ambassador to Iran spoke with him and told him, "You are the real ambassador of India."
Correspondence
1967 Correspondence
Please accept my blessings. I am in due receipt of your letter of the 7th February and am surprised to note that temperature of New York has gone down below Zero and there was a regular snow blizzard for two days. Certainly this situation would have been a little troublesome for me because I am old man. I think Krishna wanted to protect me by shifting here at San Francisco. Here the climate is certainly like India and I am feeling comfortable but uncomfortable also because at New York I felt at Home on account of so many beloved students like you. As you are feeling my absence so I am feeling for you. But we are all happy on account of Krishna Consciousness either here or there. May Krishna join us always in His transcendental service. I am very glad to learn that Eric has learnt Krishna Consciousness better than his parents. I thank him very much. This is the example of unsophisticated mind. The child is innocent and therefore he has taken the consciousness so quickly. And he appears to be previously practiced to such consciousness. Please help him more and it is the duty of good parents to help their children advanced in Krishna consciousness. I am glad to learn that devotees at New York are improving especially in the chanting on beads.
1968 Correspondence
The real thing is that you are feeling alone, and because you are so to say, child, you have become nervous. Otherwise for a preacher there is no difficulty anywhere, irrespective of climate and conditions. I came here in the month of December, and as my country is warmer to you, similarly your country is colder to me. I am also in diseased condition. When I first came to your country I passed through practically all the seasons. I came here in 1965, Sept., and I remained in the Northern portion of your country, namely N.Y., Penn., and Mass., etc., continually from Sept. 1965 to Dec. 1966. And you know how much severe cold is N.Y.; I passed through snow on the N.Y. street, so certainly I wasn't very much in comfortable situation. Still I had the strength of mind, and I continued to stay. Similarly, if you have strength of mind, you can stay always in India even in the most inconvenient condition. Another difficulty is that although you are four already in India, you cannot live together. Ramanuja left the camp as soon as I left you. You do not like Harivilasa. So you are living scattered. That is another difficulty. If you would have lived together with mutual cooperation, there would have been no trouble; but I think that is also not possible.
1969 Correspondence
The photographs you sent me appear very nice, but the house photograph is covered with snow. I have seen this house from the outside, and sometimes I was thinking that this is a nice house for a temple. So I shall be glad to hear from you how and when you are going situate a temple in this house. That is the most essential point. Hope this finds you in good health.
I understand that in New Vrindaban you have got electricity, and I shall be glad to know what is the condition of the atmosphere there. The other day, I saw in the paper that there was very strong snow-storms in New York and the airport service had stopped there completely. Is there any snow-storm in New Vrindaban also? If not, I can go whenever you call me there because here I have no serious business just now. In London, they have not yet been able to find out a suitable temple house, but their propaganda work is going on very nicely. They are attending almost every night somewhere in kirtana engagements, and five or six English boys have joined them already. So I was thinking of opening the London temple on the Birthday of Lord Caitanya which falls on March 4, 1969. I have already written to them about this, but if it doesn't take place, then why not make foundation stone ceremony on that date in New Vrindaban? If the climate is not too much obstructive, then we can hold a ceremony on that day on account of Lord Caitanya's Advent and lay down the foundation stone of our New Vrindaban construction work.
So far as Maya's activities are concerned, it will go on because we are in the kingdom of Maya. Just like in the snowfall season, especially in the Western part of the world, you cannot stop falling of the snow, but for your protection you have to take all possible precautions; similarly, in the kingdom of Maya you cannot stop the onslaught of her activities. The only protective measure is Krishna Consciousness. Otherwise there is no alternative. So we have to engage ourselves always in some sort of Krishna activity, and whenever there is some attack by Maya we shall not be surprised. Rather we should immediately remember that we are in Maya's kingdom.
| Page Title: | Snow (Conv. & Letters) |
| Compiler: | Visnu Murti, GauraHari |
| Created: | 17 of Aug, 2011 |
| Totals by Section: | BG=0, SB=0, CC=0, OB=0, Lec=0, Con=25, Let=5 |
| No. of Quotes: | 30 |