Prabhupāda: What is the name of God in Christianity? Is there any name?
French Man: Jehovah.
Prabhupāda: Jehovah?
French Man: He has no name in Christianity.
Prabhupāda: Then take this name. (laughter) If you have no name, then take this name. Where is the harm? And they are taking Hare Kṛṣṇa, what is the harm? Every religion believes..., not believes; it is fact that there is God. Or any religion will deny the existence of God, is there any religion? I don't think. Is there any religion?
Bhagavān: Buddhist religion?
Priest: But you know, it's true, but you have got so many idea of God according to your own spiritual temperament.
Prabhupāda: No, God is one. There cannot be many ideas of God. That is not possible.
Priest: You have got many idea of God.
Prabhupāda: No, many ideas, that means he does not know what is God.
Priest: Because anyhow, when we say "God," we have to put into words, intellectual words, what is an experience.
Prabhupāda: Yes.
Priest: And this experience is different for many people.
Prabhupāda: You experience... Because your knowledge is imperfect, therefore your experience is also imperfect.
Priest: But who is to say...
Prabhupāda: That is... Yes.
Priest: ...what is a perfect experience?
Prabhupāda: No. Even we are imperfect, with our... As far as our knowledge goes, generally, just like the Christians, they say "God is great." Is it not?
Priest: That is rather the Muslims.
Prabhupāda: Huh? That is Muslim.
Priest: Allah.
Prabhupāda: Allah akbar. So what is the conception of God of the Christian?
Priest: As you said, it's impersonal, trans-personal, what we explain by that Trinity. It's a relationship. It's a pure relationship.
Prabhupāda: Yes, relationship means that He must be a person.
Priest: No.
Prabhupāda: Why? Otherwise how you can...
Priest: It is beyond a person.
Prabhupāda: Beyond the person... Just like we have got experience: when you call relation, then relation means we consider master and servant. This is also one relation.
Priest: Oh, yes.
Prabhupāda: So relation means two person—one master, one servant. Then relation, friendly relation, that is also person. Then relation, father and son, that is also relation. Then husband and wife, that is also relation. So relation cannot be used without person.
Priest: Yeah, but what we don't... We don't say that God is object of relation but He is the relation itself.
Prabhupāda: What is that, relation itself? Explain.
Priest: It's when you are two together, when the master...
Prabhupāda: Then two together means person. As soon as you...
Priest: Yes, but not God. God is beyond relation.
Prabhupāda: Why? Your experience of relation, as soon as a relation two, the two persons.
Priest: No.
Prabhupāda: No, why not? This is your practical experience. How you can say no?
Priest: You see, I have got relation...
Prabhupāda: We are two person.
Priest: ...with you. But I am not in relation with God, because God is relationship.
Prabhupāda: No, no, when you say relation, why not that relation as we have got relation?
Priest: Certainly.
Prabhupāda: As soon as you say relation, you cannot change it otherwise.
Priest: Yes, but I don't make God the object of relationship.
Prabhupāda: Then what...
Priest: Because I call my relationship God, not the object of relationship.
Bhagavān: A relation with who?
Priest: Relation with anything.
Bhagavān: That is God?
Priest: That is God.
Prabhupāda: What is that?
Bhagavān: He thinks relationship with anything means God.
Prabhupāda: Anything?
Bhagavān: Yes, anything.
Priest: Anything, anybody. When you are here, when I am (indistinct) relationship with you, then God is. You understand? But I cannot restrict God to a person with whom I could enter...
Prabhupāda: But in your Bible you say, "O Father." Relation is father and son. Why do you say in the Bible "O Father, give us our daily bread"? So that you make relation with God as father.
Priest: But...
Prabhupāda: But not anything, but father. As the father gives the maintenance, bread, so you go to God in that relationship, "Father, give us our daily bread." Just like the child asks the father, "Father, give me something to eat." So this is clear relationship father and son.
French Man: No, it's a very complicated system, the system for all these things in the (indistinct) of this country. There are two main conceptions—the Oriental conception of the Orthodox Church and the Western...
Prabhupāda: No, we are not talking of any particular church. We are just trying to understand the word relation. If you go to particular church, then another will give another church, another will give another church. But we are trying to understand the word relationship. So in the Bible it is clearly said, "O Father," so the relation is father and son.
Priest: No.
Prabhupāda: Why do you say? It is said in the Bible. Why do you say no?
Priest: You have to... I am not in relationship with any church or any dogma. This is what I have in my own experience, and I cannot speak of what others have experienced but what is my own experience.
Prabhupāda: No, no, God's relationship should be universal, not that... It may be a different relationship. Just like the relationship between husband and wife, relationship between father and son, relationship between friend and friend, relationship between master and servant, so these are relationship. We understand relationship means this. And it is particularly said in the Bible, "O Father." That means the relationship is as between father and son. So there is...
Priest: No.
Prabhupāda: You say no, but any man will understand that. You may have your own opinion, that is a different thing.
Priest: But we have to have the opinion which we experience.
Prabhupāda: What is that experience? You ask, "Father, give us our daily bread," and that is experience. God is giving everyone maintenance. That is our actual relationship. In the Vedas also it is said, nityo nityānāṁ cetanaś cetanānām eko yo bahūnāṁ vidadhāti kāmān (Kaṭha Upaniṣad 2.2.13). That is the God. God is also a person as you are person, I am person, but He is the chief person. Nityo nityānām, the chief, the Supreme. In the dictionary it is said Supreme Being. We are all beings, and He is Supreme Being. How He is supreme? Eka, that one; God is one. Bahūnāṁ vidadhāti kāmān. He supplies the necessities of everyone's life. That is very good experience, we are getting everything from God. And the Christians also pray, "Give us our daily bread." So I don't find any difference between the statement in the Vedas and the Bible. God is the Supreme Person, and you make relationship with Him any way—as master and servant, as friend and friend, as father and son, or as husband and wife. So somehow or other we are related with God, this way or that way. The husband also maintains the wife.
Priest: I don't think so. I mean...
Prabhupāda: No, no, that is your personal opinion. But...
Priest: Not opinion; experience.
Prabhupāda: So what is that experience? Tell me what is that experience?
Priest: That God is beyond all our experience.
Prabhupāda: Then what is your experience? You have no experience. If it is beyond your experience, then you have no experience.
Priest: Personally, of course, but...
Prabhupāda: Then you cannot explain. You cannot, because you have no experience.
Priest: But if you know what you can't explain...
Prabhupāda: No, no, if you can't explain means you do not know.
Priest: You don't think an illusion (indistinct) relationship.
Prabhupāda: No, no, not illusion. If you cannot explain, that means you do not know. If you know, you must explain. That is knowing, that is knowledge.
Priest: Yeah, but that knowledge is very (indistinct).
Prabhupāda: Then you cannot preach. As a priest you cannot preach because you do not know, it is not within your experience.
Priest: That's why I don't preach.
Prabhupāda: That's all right, then... (laughter) That is another thing. But as soon as you say "beyond your experience," that means you have no experience.
Priest: No.
Prabhupāda: So you cannot explain. That is all right.
Priest: That means I have the experience...
Prabhupāda: But...
Priest: ...that my experience is limited...
Prabhupāda: But that's all right.
Priest: ...and God is unlimited.
Prabhupāda: That is all right. That I admit.
Priest: Therefore, I cannot anyhow have experience of God.
Prabhupāda: No, no, no. Just like you know...
Priest: And nobody can.
Prabhupāda: ...you do not know me, you have no experience about me.
Priest: No.
Prabhupāda: But if I say, "I am like this," you will get experience.
Priest: No.
Prabhupāda: Why no?
Priest: If I live with you for some time...
Prabhupāda: Suppose if you are thinking of me, "Swamiji might have one thousand dollars," so you can imagine, go on imagining, and that is not correct. But if I say, "No, I have got one million dollars," then you get the experience.
Priest: No.
Prabhupāda: Why no?
Priest: I will get the experience of you when we are living together.
Prabhupāda: That means you cannot talk with God.
Priest: Of course not.
Prabhupāda: But if anyone can talk?
Priest: Well, if it is his own experience, I have no objection.
Prabhupāda: That's all right.
Priest: But my experience is that you cannot...
Prabhupāda: That's all right. Therefore, our experience is we take experience from God. We don't imagine. That is our process.
Priest: Yeah, that is your faith. You must have faith for that.
Prabhupāda: Yes. Just like Kṛṣṇa is speaking about Himself, so we are taking Bhagavad-gītā as it is. So direct experience. Taking experience "I am like this." Just like Kṛṣṇa says,
- ahaṁ sarvasya prabhavo
- mattaḥ sarvaṁ pravartate
- iti matvā bhajante māṁ
- budhā bhāva-sa...
- (BG 10.8)
Find out this verse.
Pradyumna:
- ahaṁ sarvasya prabhavo
- mattaḥ sarvaṁ pravartate
- iti matvā bhajante māṁ
- budhā bhāva-samanvitāḥ
- (BG 10.8)
"I am the source of all the spiritual and material worlds. Everything emanates from Me. The wise, who know this perfectly, engage in My devotional service and worship Me with all their hearts."
Prabhupāda: Just see. This experience.
Priest: Yeah, but who has written the Bhagavad-gītā?
Prabhupāda: God.
Priest: I mean, you need to have faith for that.
Prabhupāda: What is that?
Bhagavān: You must have faith to believe that God wrote the Bhagavad-gītā.
Prabhupāda: Why faith? God is God. Why faith?
Priest: Because, you know, I have been living in...
Prabhupāda: No, no, you have no experience you have said. You have no experience.
Priest: No, I have not said. You said I did.
Prabhupāda: No, you said that God is beyond your experience, you said.
Priest: A real swami listen first if he wants to (indistinct).
Prabhupāda: First of all let us consider ourself. You said that God is beyond your experience.
Priest: That's right. That is my experience.
Prabhupāda: That's all right, that's all right. That means I am talking with you. Therefore, you have no experience.
Priest: Yes, I have.
Prabhupāda: You say God is beyond your experience, you say.
Priest: Yeah, and I have that experience that God is beyond experience, because I found out that all my experience does not mean God.
Prabhupāda: But if you say God is beyond your experience, that you have no experience of God. This is clear meaning. Why do you go round about?
Priest: No, you don't..., you see...
Prabhupāda: Then it is a bit difficult.
Priest: I have always told that the duty of the swami is to listen and to understand, and you don't seem to listen and to understand. You misunderstand.
Prabhupāda: No, no, I use... First of all let us... Why misunderstand? You say that you have no experience of God.
Priest: No, I never said that.
Prabhupāda: Then tell me your experience. That I want to know.
Priest: That every time I had an experience of God, and first I went through the bhakta, and I was a bhakta for a long, long time, then I found out that God was beyond my experience.
Prabhupāda: That means you have no experience. How can I talk with you?
Priest: That the image of God, whether you call it Kṛṣṇa or Rāma or Nṛsiṁha or any of the avatāra... And you know, near our place in Poona in Amenagar(?), there was a swami who called himself an avatāra, and...
Prabhupāda: That anyone can say. I can say third avatāra, he can say fourth avatāra.
Priest: So if anyone can say...
Prabhupāda: That is another thing. That is another thing, because everyone can say "I am avatāra."
Priest: Exactly.
Prabhupāda: So...
Priest: So how can we have faith of anyone who said he was an avatāra?
Prabhupāda: No, no, we don't accept anyone as avatāra. We have got documents who is avatāra.
Priest: Kṛṣṇa.
Prabhupāda: No, Kṛṣṇa is... Kṛṣṇa is avatārī. He is the origin. That is stated here, ahaṁ sarvasya prabhavaḥ (BG 10.8). You know Sanskrit? What is the meaning of ahaṁ sarvasya prabhavaḥ? "I am the source of all avatāra."
Priest: Yeah, but who has written that?
Prabhupāda: Hm?
Priest: Who has written that? Śrīla Vyāsa.
Prabhupāda: Anywhere he has written. Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa has written. Kṛṣṇa has spoken, Vyāsadeva has written, and it is accepted.
Priest: But this is what the Christians say about the Bible, and I don't believe it (inaudible).
Prabhupāda: No, no, you don't believe anything, that is another thing. That is another thing. Without belief, you cannot make progress.
Priest: Ah, you have to go beyond.
Prabhupāda: As soon as you... Just like you learn who is your father. You take the version of your mother and you believe that "He is my father." Otherwise there is no other way. How can you know your father? The only means is his mother recommends, "My dear boy, he is your father." And that is perfect, that's all. Otherwise you cannot know who is your father.
Priest: Yeah, but you know...
Prabhupāda: If you say, "Mother, I don't believe it," you don't believe it, but you cannot know.
Priest: The trouble, you know, is that so many people are coming either in India or (inaudible)...
Prabhupāda: No, no, I mean to say...
Priest: ...that "I am an avatāra" or "I am Guru Mahārāj-ji" or "I am," so to say, "Meher Baba or Satya Sai Baba," so many bābās exist, you know as well as I do. Now, who has to say this one is really bābā. They are all abusing us. Now, if so many people today pretends to be avatāra and they have many disciples.
Prabhupāda: But we don't believe them.
Priest: No, but they have many disciples.
Prabhupāda: Many disciples, that is another thing.
Priest: Millions.
Prabhupāda: Millions, trillions, that is another thing. But we have to see what is the disciple. That we have to see. Simply if somebody... So many disciples by number, we have to see the quality. What is the quality, not the number, not the quantity.
Priest: And if I had said that...
Prabhupāda: It is stated in the Bhagavad-gītā,
- manuṣyāṇāṁ sahasreṣu
- kaścid yatati siddhaye
- yatatām api siddhānāṁ
- kaścin vetti māṁ tattvataḥ
- (BG 7.3)
Kṛṣṇa does not say that "millions and millions of people know Me." No. Out of millions and millions of people, one is perfect. And out of millions of perfect person, one may know Him. That He says. So we cannot accept because one is accepted by millions, therefore he is God. We don't accept it.
Priest: That's right.