Prajāpati: Śrīla Prabhupāda, there was a great philosopher or preacher among the Jewish people whose position is that "If there is God and He let so many Jews be killed by Hitler, ten million Jews, and God could have stopped it and He didn't, then I don't care for that God." They say like that.
Prabhupāda: So their God, Jesus Christ God, he could not even protect himself also. The reply should be, Christian, if Jesus Christ is God, then why he could not protect himself?
Karandhara: Well, the Jews say Jesus Christ wasn't God.
Prabhupāda: Well, but somebody said.
Svarūpa Dāmodara: It is just like the concept that if God is all-merciful, why He is so impartial, somebody making happy, somebody making suffering?
Prabhupāda: Yes, that is mercifulness. Just like when doctor says, "You don't take anything today. You fast," that is mercy. That is mercy. It is good for him. By starving, he will be cured. That is mercy. And according to Manu-saṁhitā, when a man is hanged, that is mercy. If he is hanged... He has committed murder. He should be hanged so all his sinful reaction finished. Otherwise next birth, he has to suffer. He has to be killed by somebody else.
Svarūpa Dāmodara: But the tendency is that the sufferer wants to complain.
Prabhupāda: No, that they will complain. Just like when a man is ordered to be hanged, he will complain, "Just see the police, judge. He has ordered me to be hanged." That complaint will go on. Just like a child. When the doctor says, "Don't eat anything." He will complain. He will cry, "Why doctor says like that?" But it has to be done.
Karandhara: Well, then they'll say, "Well, if you see somebody suffering, then why do anything about it, if it just what they..."
Prabhupāda: Yes, we are doing everything to stop his suffering.
Karandhara: They will say, "Why? If that's what they deserve, why try to stop it?"
Prabhupāda: No, because he has come here to suffer. You cannot expect in the prison life a very comfortable life. You must suffer. But if somebody goes there, that "Don't commit stealing anymore. Come out and don't come here again," so that is required.
Rūpānuga: Just because a man goes in the prisonhouse doesn't mean his thieving is cured. He will come out a thief unless he is actually rectified.
Prabhupāda: Yes. Yes. Yes. Otherwise again he will commit the same thing and again he will come. Bhūtvā bhūtvā pralīyate (BG 8.19). Therefore he requires instruction, good instruction. Sometimes government invites. We were invited that Ahmedabad jail. You remember?
Śrutakīrti: Yes.
Prabhupāda: Oh, there was big meeting of the prisoners. Kīrtana, everything, yes.
Svarūpa Dāmodara: So by lacking the understanding, they say that God is not merciful. The sufferers. People, who are suffering, but by not knowing that it is the mercy of the Lord, we complain that God is not merciful. But he is impartial.
Prabhupāda: No, God is merciful, but this fool does not know because he is ignorant. The same thing, mother says. One child, she is feeding very sumptuously. Other one, "Oh, don't take it. You go away." Does it mean the mother is merciful to one child and not to the other? The child does not know it, he cries, "Why shall I not...? Why I shall not eat? Why I shall not eat?" So these foolish questions will be stopped as soon as one becomes God conscious.
Karandhara: But unless they understand the difference between spirit and matter, they can't accept this logic.
Prabhupāda: Well, foolish men cannot accept any logic. Their logic is stick. "If you don't accept, I shall kick on your face. Accept it." That is the... That is wanted.
Karandhara: Like the example when Hitler killed the Jews. They will say, "Well, what should we do, just let Hitler go on killing the Jews because the Jews were sinful? Or should we try and stop Hitler?"
Prabhupāda: Well, Hitler was imperfect and everything was imperfect. That you cannot compare Hitler's action with God's action. God is all-perfect. That is first proposition. God is all-perfect.
Karandhara: That may be accepted in retrospection, but when it is happening, they don't accept that.
Prabhupāda: No, that is their ignorance, foolishness. Therefore a devotee will not say like that. A devotee will say, tat te 'nukampāṁ susamīkṣamāṇaḥ: (SB 10.14.8) "My dear Lord, I am suffering. It is due to my past mischievous activities, but you are rescuing me by giving little punishment. I would have been punished more, but you have given little punishment. Thank you very much." This is devotion.
Karandhara: Well, what if someone came here now to attack us, should I just sit there and watch him and say that...
Prabhupāda: No. Who said? You must fight.
Karandhara: Well, why? If we are attacked, then we must deserve it.
Prabhupāda: No, it may be that somebody is attacking even you do not deserve. So therefore you have got intelligence. You have got hands. You must try to protect. Just like one man is destined to be hanged, but still, he appoints a lawyer and tries to save him. He knows that "I have committed murder, I must be hanged."
Rūpānuga: And then God sanctions the judge. The judge can kill.
Karandhara: Well, that is why they say we must work to help poor people and starving people.
Prabhupāda: Why poor people? You starve. You are already yourself a poor people. How you can help them?
Karandhara: No, they say if we find poor and starving people, we must go and feed them.
Prabhupāda: So you feed them. But we also feed them. But we feed them with Kṛṣṇa prasādam. That is the difference. You do this. That will be actually beneficial. By distributing Kṛṣṇa's prasādam, you will be benefited, they will be benefited.
Prajāpati: If we see a group of demons fighting, killing each other, should devotees go and try to stop them from killing each other?
Prabhupāda: First of all you must know whether they are demons. But demons fight. Gentlemen do not fight.
Svarūpa Dāmodara: Let them fight.
Prabhupāda: Let them fight. (laughing)
Svarūpa Dāmodara: The devotees should wish that "O my Lord, please..."
Prabhupāda: Devotees must pray that "This great demon Hiraṇyakaśipu may be killed by You, my Lord." Therefore He comes. Just like Prahlāda Mahārāja passively... (break) ...father was being killed. He could have stopped it, but he did not. He did not. If Prahlāda Mahārāja would have requested, immediately it would have been stopped, but he did not. He said, rather, in his prayer, that "Nobody is sorry when a serpent or a scorpion is killed." He said like that. So he said, "My father was just like a serpent and scorpion. Now he is killed. So now You become pacified. No more need of becoming angry." Modeta sādhur api. Actually, I have seen. There was a snake in our Māyāpur temple. So Guru Mahārāja was standing on the..., while some devotees were waiting. "Yes, kill it." So at that time I could not understand that "Such a saintly person why he is ordering to kill a snake?" Then when I found in Bhāgavata, modeta sādhur api vṛścika-sarpa-hatyā: (SB 7.9.14) "A saintly person also becomes engladdened when a snake is killed." Because it is very harmful. He said that "He will do so many harmful activities. Better kill him." Because his business is to create harm. That's all.