19860502 Śrīmad Bhāgavatam 7.12.11

The following is a class given by His Holiness Jayapatākā Swami on May 2^nd 1986 in Los Angeles, California. The class begins with a reading from the Śrīmad Bhāgavatam 7^th canto chapter 12 text 11.

Translation: All the rules and regulations apply equally to the householder and the sannyāsī, the member of the renounced order of life. The gṛhastha, however, is given permission by the spiritual master to indulge in sex during the period favorable for procreation.

Purport: It is sometimes misunderstood that a gṛhastha, a householder, is permitted to indulge in sex at any time. This is a wrong conception of gṛhastha life. In spiritual life, whether one is a gṛhastha, vānaprastha, sannyāsī or brahmacārī, everyone is under the control of the spiritual master. For brahmacārīs and sannyāsīs there are strong restrictions on sexual indulgence. Similarly, there are strong restrictions for gṛhasthas. Gṛhasthas should indulge in sex life only in accordance with the order of the guru. Therefore, it is mentioned here that one must follow the orders of the spiritual master (guru-vṛttir vikalpena). When the spiritual master orders, the gṛhastha may accept sex life. This is confirmed in Bhagavad-gītā (7.11). dharmāviruddho bhūteṣu kāmo ’smi: indulgence in sex life without disobedience to the religious rules and regulations constitutes a religious principle. The gṛhastha is allowed to indulge in sex life during the period favorable for procreation and in accordance with the spiritual master’s order. If the spiritual master’s orders allow a gṛhastha to engage in sex life at a particular time, then the gṛhastha may do so; otherwise, if the spiritual master orders against it, the gṛhastha should abstain. The gṛhastha must obtain permission from the spiritual master to observe the ritualistic ceremony of garbhādhāna-saṁskāra. Then he may approach his wife to beget children, otherwise not. A brāhmaṇa generally remains a brahmacārī throughout his entire life, but although some brāhmaṇas become gṛhasthas and indulge in sex life, they do so under the complete control of the spiritual master. The kṣatriya is allowed to marry more than one wife, but this also must be in accordance with the instructions of the spiritual master. It is not that because one is a gṛhastha he may marry as many times as he likes and indulge in sex life as he likes. This is not spiritual life. In spiritual life, one must conduct one’s whole life under the guidance of the guru. Only one who executes his spiritual life under the direction of the spiritual master can achieve the mercy of Kṛṣṇa. Yasya prasādād bhagavat-prasādaḥ. If one desires to advance in spiritual life but he acts whimsically, not following the orders of the spiritual master, he has no shelter. Yasyāprasādān na gatiḥ kuto ’pi. Without the spiritual master’s order, even the gṛhastha should not indulge in sex life.

Thus end the Bhaktivedanta purports on the Śrīmad Bhāgavatam ,chapter entitled The perfect society: Four spiritual classes. Canto 7, chapter 12, text 11.

Jayapatākā Swami: So is after describing the various responsible ways in which someone interested in spiritual life has to behave, part of which is how one should behave, in relation with the opposite sex. According to the varṇāśrama system , society has been divided into social orders and spiritual orders or āśramas. So Prabhupāda has many times mentioned that three of the spiritual order, sex life is completely forbidden. Brahmacārī, sannyāsa, vānaprastha restricted completely. In vānaprastha some association is allowed. Only in the gṛhastha āśrama is the license given. But here we can understand that the license is given is not simply an unlimited license but there is also certain stipulations, rules and regulations. One is that sex life should be for procreation and other that it should have the sanction of the spiritual master. The spiritual master is responsible to take the disciple back to Kṛṣṇa, so therefore increasing one’s family situation having more children, all these type of things should be consulted with the spiritual master. Someone may consider, this is very strict but the key is given here , is that if we follow this principles and act under the order of the spiritual master then we have shelter. In that case whether one is a sanyasi or whether one is a brahmacārī, one will be under the complete shelter of Kṛṣṇa.  The Gṛhastha is allowed to indulge in sex life but if he does so according to these principles then he will enjoy the same shelter of Lord Kṛṣṇa. We found that Lord Caitanya Mahāprabhu, He would treat differently His sanyasis and  His gṛhastha followers . We know that Chota Haridas simply by looking at on at a women with a wrong attitude, He rejected him, made a great example of him. On the other hand we saw that various grihasthas , Sivananda Sen and others , if they came, if they had children, He would sometimes name the children, bless them so on. So for grihasthas this was permitted and Lord Caitanya obviously  gave them  full shelter , otherwise He would not have gone to such an extent as a sanyasi  to name their children , to bless them as to see the child and so on. So by this Lord Caitanya thoroughly authorized grihasthas who are following the regulative principles, who are acting under the order of Guru , to have children and that they can enjoy the complete shelter of Kṛṣṇa . So the whole purpose of life is ultimately to achieve Kṛṣṇa. If don’t loose sight in that and if we keep that as our prime objective then everything fits into very , everything fits into place, everything makes a lot of sense. If we lose sight that in this life time we want to achieve Kṛṣṇa then we lose sight of this principles.  Someone who does not follow these principles, they may be devotees, but they may not achieve Kṛṣṇa in this lifetime , they may not go back to Godhead in this lifetime . But if somebody follows these principle then they are assured of success, provided  that they follow the other principles that the spiritual master has given. In other words, the grihasthas if they could strictly follow these principles, they could be assured of also going back to Godhead , although they are having sex indulgence under. So that is something very significant because in the Mayavadi sampradayas they say if one wants to achieve moksha, the Sankaracharya followers,they say you have to be sanyasi , unless you are a sanyasi you cannot achieve liberation, according to their philosophy. So that promotes sex indulgence for the non sanyasis . Just like when you make something too difficult to achieve , then the tendency is well, I can’t do it anyway , then don’t try it at all.  This way sometimes, so in this way the Vaiṣṇava philosophy is showing that, Prabhupāda said that actually devotion to Kṛṣṇa is so powerful, so attractive that it can attract people from their different situations. So even  a gṛhastha , a gṛhastha can also become completely attached to Kṛṣṇa and if they follow this principles then  they can also go back to Godhead . So that’s the difference between the Mayavadi philosophers and the Vaiṣṇava path. The people, generally Indian people don’t understand this. But actually if they follow the principles, as a Vaiṣṇava gṛhastha, they can achieve complete perfection, just like Mahārāja Ambarisa did . Just like so many other great vaiṣṇava , acharya , grihasthas did. Generally they consider, that, just they understand the Mayavadi philosophy , that’s the unfortunate thing, that since the time of Sankaracharya , Hinduism has been predominated by the Mayavadi philosophy. Lord Caitanya’s philosophy, we know, is supposed to replace the philosophy of Sankaracharya . That can only be replaced by the preaching of the followers of Caitanya Mahāprabhu. Doesn’t get, in other words, we know there’s a cycle when people were falsely claiming the  Vedic rules , to commit sacrifice , they are doing animal slaughter . The Budhha came , established the principle ahimsa but the people they were misusing Vedic regulations. To stop their animal slaughter and follow something which was much closer to the intention of the Vedic principles. But superficially He led them away from the Vedas. Then Sankaracharya came and he led the people back to fold of Vedic culture by preaching covered Budhhism. Then after that although various Vaiṣṇava acharyas had come and brought the people back to fold of Vaishnavism like Madhavacharya , Rāmanujacharya and others. But specifically Caitanya Mahāprabhu is meant to bring everyone back to the fold of Bhagavad Dharma. How is this to happen, this is to happen specifically through Lord Caitanya’s sankirtana movement . Śrīla Prabhupāda said that ISKCON is a branch of Lord Caitanya’s spiritual tree. ISKCON is representing Lord Caitanya. Therefore this responsibility falls clearly upon us, to preach in such a way as to replace the Mayavadi principle of life. To establish firmly the Vaiṣṇava principles, we know how Śrīla Prabhupāda , we pray to him everyday, namaste sarswati devai gaura vani pracharine nirvisesa sunyavadi paschattya desa tarine , that he is the nirvisesa , the voidist or  the impersonalist , sunyavadi, the voidist’s deliverer . He delivered all the people in the western world including the impersonalist  and the voidist. Prabhupāda was so concerned about negating this impersonal concept of spiritual life that it was actually the primeval thing which is focused upon in his basic pranam mantra . He wants us to vigorously preach and establish the principle of the Personality of Godhead. So a part of that is a person can perform yukta vairagya, Lord Caitanya never approved suksha or suksha vairya, dry renunciation. When someone simply he thinks, well I have to do renunciation, simply for renunciation’s sake , these are niyamagraha , rather a person has to perform devotion for the pleasure of guru and Kṛṣṇa and that means that renunciation in such a way that it is practically engaging in devotional service. This principle Lord Caitanya taught and that principle we can see is far more applicable in the western world, in the entire world today. First of all ,who can be a sanyasi in this age and follow strictly the principle, it is very difficult. Practically  hardly anybody can do it, very few, if any. It’s not  a principle which can be preached amongst the society at large but this principle of being a strict Kṛṣṇa conscious gṛhastha and engaging oneself in devotional service. Either he is a brāhmaṇa or kṣatriya or a vaisya or a śūdra externally but internally being completed dedicated to Kṛṣṇa, this is the real principle of daiva varnasRāma, and this is something which the entire society can practice. To become, we see how of the urgent need today is  for the vigorous preaching of Kṛṣṇa consciousness. There is nothing more important. Śrīla Prabhupāda said we should consider as if the house is on fire. If the house is on fire then somehow or another, the resident of the house whether he knows the language, whether he can express himself properly , he gets across , my house is on fire, you kindly come and help put  it out. He would scream fire or something, just through his enthusiasm. He gets people to come and help to put out that fire. So the entire world is on fire, especially wherever we go ,people ask us, what is the solution to terrorism, what is the solution to the world situation, especially in the third world , where people look up to India as a leader, it is very common to even have government officials come and ask what is the solution for these things. In America sometimes, people are a little bit proud so they don’t always ask the devotees the solution, they already think they know the solution. That’s even more dangerous  because they don’t know the solution. So they are misleading people, like the blind leading the blind. But Śrīla Prabhupāda specifically said that his mission was to purify the Americans and to establish the principle of God consciousness in America as the primal aspect and this way if there is any kind of detention , any kind of world ? on the world it  should be based on God consciousness versus atheism. It should be polarized , that is the duty that Śrīla Prabhupāda gave to his American preachers. Since Prabhupāda is and everyone in the whole world can see that the situation is depending upon America and Russia. So this crucial situation, actually then the whole situation is not polarizing on this basis, is polarizing on other basis, therefore the American devotees of Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupāda have this massive responsibility to fulfil his instructions. Whether he is a gṛhastha or sanyasi, the basic principle in spiritual life is to carry out the instructions as handed down through the disciplic succession. Our previous acharyas have given us the instructions , those are handed down ,those are further refined and applied the initiating gurus and acharyas , they give their disciples guidelines how to implement this but our responsibility is to the previous acharyas , to fulfil their instructions. Every member of the Kṛṣṇa conscious movement is obligated to try to fulfil Prabhuapada’s instructions, his orders, either, as soon as possible, as far as possible. You don’t have any other objective, this is what keeps us under the shelter of the disciplic succession. So of course, for this purpose we need empowered devotees, devotees who are willing to follow these principles. Someone maybe a devotee , be chanting, may not be following strictly the rules and regulations, may not be strictly adhering to these principles . So we may consider them as a devotee, Lord Caitanya said, we can offer them respect within our heart , we should not intimately associate with them ,except to preach to them . Someone who is following strictly the rules and regulation , who is initiated, we bow down to such people and call them  as prabhu and for someone who have personally understood  the conclusion of the Vedas and who is living those and teaching those to others, we offer them respect as acharyas and those who have not taken shelter, take shelter of such advanced devotees to progress in their spiritual life, this is our principle. So in order to preach, to be a second class devotee, at least to preach the movement of Lord Caitanya Mahāprabhu we have to become strict. Otherwise we won’t get the force to change the hearts of people. In this regard in the time of Caitanya Mahāprabhu, there was once a gṛhastha and his name was Caitanya Das, you probably heard about him and he was a bit old, he was maybe at fifties or so , don’t know the exact age but he was quite in an advanced  age , so they already practically accepted the vānaprastha. One day his wife said, maybe she was in her forties, I don’t know exactly the age , but they are a bit old, one day his wife said I think we should have a child, the husband Chaiatnya Das said , WHAT! This age , now we are ready to finish my gṛhastha responsibilities, now you are wanting to have  a child?! And so she said , I know what you are thinking, it’s not that, but actually, I sincerely feel in my heart that Kṛṣṇa wants us to have  a Vaiṣṇava child. I don’t think it’s just material desire on my part. So he said, he had a lot of doubt about this proposal. So somehow, in discussing, they came to the conclusion, alright  let us go and ask Sri Caitanya Mahāprabhu what does  He want for us. So they were living in a place near Katwa, where Lord Caitanya took sanyasa and they walked all the way down to Jagannāth Puri , at that time Lord Caitanya was in Jagannāth Puri. When they reached Jagannāth Puri , they entered into the town, they were approaching the Jagannāth Puri temple, just at that time, they were so fortunate that Caitanya Mahāprabhu with His associates Rāmananda Raya, Swarup Damodar, Govinda Das and others , they were just walking out of the main gate of the Jagannāth Puri temple. So immediately Caitanya Das and his wife Laxmipriya , they offered their immediate  obeisances. Just on the street there, offered prostrated obeisances he offered to Caitanya Mahāprabhu. Lord Caitanya walked, when He got up to them, He stopped. Here there are two people you know paying their obeisances, you know, so many people must be paying their obeisances to Lord Caitanya. He stopped and turned to Govinda Das and said these are two of My devotees , you kindly see that they are taken care of and later bring them to see Me and He walked on. So immediately because Lord Caitanya recognized this two devotees, they became, here Lord Chiatanya recognized two gṛhastha devotees, there are so many sanyasis and other very big devotees and associates, all of a sudden Lord Caitanya stopped and recognized these two devotees , no one ever have seen them before, so immediately they became object of great attention. You know, who are you, where have you come from , who are these people that got special mercy from Lord Caitanya Mahāprabhu. So they were given a place to stay, given Jagannāth Prasād , taken for darshan and they prayed to Jagannāth what was His desire and then that night they took rest and had  a dream. Lord Jagannāth came in their dream and told them it was His desire that they have a child. They went to see Caitanya Mahāprabhu , before they could say anything , as soon as they came in, they bowed down. Chiatanya Mahāprabhu said that I want you to go back to your village,  and to have ,you are going to have a child, who is going to be a great devotee of Mine. His name will be Srinivasa. So they could not even ask anything, before they asked anything, they already got the order. So nothing more needed to be said. They offered their obeisances and took the mercy of Lord Caitanya Mahāprabhu and then after remaining sometime in Puri,  they went back and they were blessed with  a son and they named him Srinivasa , according to Lord Caitanya’s instructions. So Srinivasa and Caitanya Das had a very close relationship. Chiatanya Das taught him all the principles of pure devotional service, whatever he had learnt. So one day his son asked that how did he get the name Caitanya Das. So then Caitanya Das started to explain that before he was Gangopadhaya and he was a brāhmaṇa and he had the name ,another name , so he was going and he decided to see Caitanya Mahāprabhu. On the way he went to Katwa, just at that moment , he saw huge crowds of people, he said what’s happening, they said, well Lord Caitanya Mahāprabhu is here. I am going to Navadvip to see Chaiatnya Mahāprabhu and Lord Caitanya is here? Said  Yes. What is he doing here in Katwa? He has he said never come to Katwa before, oh , he has come here to take  sanyasa from Kesava Bharati Mahārāja. So then he went there he saw Lord Caitanya seated, he saw the entire lila, he saw of how Lord Caitanya  had His hair cut. How the barber came.Lord Caitanya called the barber. He said cut my hair, all the people started crying. They could not think of how Lord Caitanya’s beautiful hair, His beautiful hair that be cut. The barber started shaking, he said , I can’t do it. Lord Caitanya got angry at him, He said, you must do it, you are the barber , cut the hair. So getting the order from Lord Caitanya, he again started to shave Lord Caitanya up. As soon as the hair was cut, he putting  the knife into the hair, all the people in the  back there, all the women there , they started , AH! NO! NO! they are just beating their heads, screaming, people fainting , they couldn’t they   just went completely uncontrollable just in thinking Lord Caitanya will go through this austerity, you see. Then Lord Caitanya went to the Ganges, He took a bath and He came to the kirtan  and everybody was chanting so ecstatically  and spinning around and tears were shooting from His eyes. Just like coming from a syringe, drenching the people, such ecstatic  symptoms were present. Everyone became very ecstatic and suddenly Lord Caitanya stopped , He called over Keshava Bharati and said you should give me initiation. Then He asked do you know the mantra, He said this one you are going to give me, then He pulls him over and gives him the mantra, the sannyāsa mantra in the ear. So technically Keshava Bharati was initiated into the Vaiṣṇava order of sannyāsa by Lord Caitanya before him and then Keshava Bharati offerd the Ganges water took the Ganges water  and gave  the mantra , gave it back again to Caitanya Mahāprabhu after giving the sannyāsa mantra then he had to give a name. So he said your name is Sri Kṛṣṇa Caitanya. So when he said that, the entire crowd started, you know just exploded with the kirtan and that time in the front just watching this whole thing , on his way to Navadvip was this brāhmaṇa Gangopadhhay  , he was seeing , the Bhattacharya, when he heard that Sri Kṛṣṇa ,he went into complete trance and for days he was wondering around Sri Kṛṣṇa Caitanya, Sri Kṛṣṇa Caitanya. He could not stop, so the whole experience it was so intense that he was in complete absorption. And  just said day and night he would say Sri Kṛṣṇa Caitanya and he got the name Caitanya Das. So while he was explaining this to his son, when he thought of that Sri Kṛṣṇa Caitanya, he is sitting there, he went again into samadhi. He was just feeling intense separation from Caitanya Mahāprabhu, tears pouring from his eyes. He just fell over in trance and then seeing his father, while his father was saying this, then Srinivas was feeling such separation, but his father was passed out in trance chanting Sri Kṛṣṇa Caitanya. He  just fell down at his father’s feet, grabbed his lotus feet and put it on his head and he was chanting Sri Kṛṣṇa Caitanya and hearing him phuu , fall over, hearing all these the wife came in to see, what is happening, there is the husband falling on the ground, completely in trance and seeing the son bowing down grabbing the father’s lotus feet. And this is the type of family life they were having. (laughter) So Srinivasa Acharya we know later on he went to search Lord Caitanya , that of course is a  history , how he just missed, how he could not find a spiritual master and was put into intense separation, finally he got the shelter of six goswamis, those were remaining of the six goswamis in Vṛndāvana. How he was the first one to start book distribution but that’s interesting because  here we could how Lord Caitanya personally ordered a gṛhastha to have a child and how He sent them such an empowered preacher Srinivasa Acharya, liberated soul to spread the Kṛṣṇa conscious movement. So similarly, we actually need such pure souls to take up leading responsibilities in preaching Lord Caitanya’s message. Certainly some of the devotees who don’t go back to Godhead, they would be very fortunate if they can take birth again in the family of devotees and get the opportunity. Those who are not born in the family of devotees, know how much time is wasted in materialistic activities and materialistic trainings , which is simply a distraction for our spiritual life, how fortunate it is to be able to be born in a Kṛṣṇa conscious family, we cannot imagine! How, what a great opportunity that is and especially if the garbadhana samskara is properly performed, if one is acting under the order of  guru, according to the principles. Then the door is open for such a Kṛṣṇa conscious soul to take shelter. Of course no one can guarantee that every soul is a pure devotee. But at least the door is open for that opportunity. Bhakti Vinod Thakur had, I don’t know if I am correct, had 13 children and of course, somehow they were all engaged in Kṛṣṇa’s service, he engaged everyone, in fact he was strict, so long as they were dependent upon him, minors, he said if you want me to feed you, you have to help me in my devotional service. This is, he wasn’t a sentimental in that way but of course he provided very nicely for his children. He also gave them, the best he had to offer. He gave them not only their material needs but he also gave them Kṛṣṇa consciousness. You find in India that all the people are devotees of Kṛṣṇa generally. They just think about getting their children a college degree, getting them some kind of education but they don’t give them the spiritual education. As a result, the modern youth in India is far more deeply engrossed into kali yuga than the previous generation.  And at first I had a disciple who wanted to become a devotee but his parents came and the mother was rolling on the ground , just crying, just let my son get his master’s degree. Already got bachelors, then after that there will be PhD. Just like that they say, this is for our society, must have education, has to get  a degree, without this everything is lost. And this is the thing, is that they think that we have to , we have to give, spiritual, education to our children. This is our responsibility, to bring up our children properly. This they have. The feeling they have, but they think this means getting them a degree, some institution. Whether they use it or not, simply, alright you have the degree ,it’s like  a status symbol or something. In this way they waste so much time. Since in some cases they don’t need such a degree or where they don’t. The real thing is that the parents should consider that not only material those who are going to be in the society,  working in society, they may need some degree, but the most important thing is that you need  a Kṛṣṇa conscious education.  That unfortunately they are not, although they are believing in Kṛṣṇa, they don’t understand this point. That’s our endeavor to make the gṛhastha, public of India , to feel responsible to giving  spiritual knowledge to their children, which is what they are really missing out, they are not getting.  In fact, you will be surprised that India if a person is wearing sikha and tilak to the school, the teachers more than anyone else criticize the student. They feel challenged or something that why this person is acting as a saint or something they all deride the student in many cases, so you think you are this or that and that encourages the other students  to also harass . So it takes a very brave student, to go to normal public school and wear tilak. In India, even, it takes tremendous. If in village someone wears  a neck bead, other kids will start pulling on him. You know when we think of India we have so many sentimental ideas but practically the situation is that you can do a little religion but if a person actually wants to do full on and do pure Vaishnavism then a lot of little demoniac people, who are there to antagonize and criticize and not to let go one forward. So like in our Namahatta preaching , now we have so many people practicing in their homes, sometimes they have to endure tremendous obstacles. One gṛhastha couple , brāhmaṇa by birth has a temple, when they took initiation from ISKCON, all the local brahmanas boycotted them and had their children surround the house and keep him under house arrest. They said you have now become a Cristian, because they took initiation from ISKCON and it’s a Christian’s, they are all Christians. (laughter) He was trying to preach to them that they are not Christian that they are devotees of Kṛṣṇa. They are universal, they are beyond these sectarian view point, they are pure vaiṣṇavas. They won’t listen to him because he is  a junior brāhmaṇa,so they said no no, you have become polluted, now you cannot go out, he cannot get his crops. So somehow, he gets the message out. Actually some devotee went to see him, he wrote a secret message, he said hide this, and take it out and give it to our namhatta preacher. So he got their letter, the namhatta preacher I am under house arrest, they are not letting me leave. All the local brahmanas here. Then our preacher had to go there, challenge them , pull out the sastras, quote all the references. Who is  a qualified guru? Who is qualified to ,what is the definition of a Vaiṣṇava? So and so. so they could not answer the points, presented by our ISKCON preacher. So gradually they started fading off. Although as soon as the preacher left they liitle tried to  restrict him , they  preached against our local Namahatta devotee there. But they didn’t keep, they didn’t have the guts to keep them under house arrest any more and then. So then I went there with a whole party ofpeople, we had a big pandal. We did a big program with dRāma, Yadubara prabhu’s movies, lectures, the whole, then I asked all the people to chant at least one round a day  of Hare Kṛṣṇa mahamantra, to sign the samskara patras, the little  cards that I give out to people who agree to chant one round a day. We got a few hundred people to agree to chant. Then I gave all those names to the person and  now you make this people a  part of your local  namhatta group, for your program. In this way, you can by, in this way , via coming in there , the few brahmanas who had gone  over there , warned ,they had to receive because every person in the village practically had already signed from me to chant Hare Kṛṣṇa and then  they got everybody to become part of that Namhatta. Now it’s one of the prosporous successful Namhatta groups there . Daily they have mangal arati, morning class, tulsi puja , they run the whole program ,  every day of the year, there in their village under this devotees supervision. He just came with a whole group of people for the Namhatta annual mela or congregation in Māyāpur . So like this although they are grihasthas, they are brahmanas but even in India , people are against Vaiṣṇava principle in some of the places , not everywhere but in some of the places, we meet this opposition. So there’s opposition everywhere for establishing eternal dharma principles  but at least there,you have  of course there you have to know the sastras , you have to argue, quoting  extensively from various scriptural references to establish this priority amongst the pandits. But the he most powerful thing is the Harinam sankirtan. So here in America also there are obstacles, if I hear of the obstacles other kinds of demons. Maybe here there are more heavy or  more different kind. In India we don’t expect that’s a  bit shocking but here we expect to find opposition because as this is as Prabhupāda, I was just reading this is, he said I have come to America to find the root of the material disease, it’s already spread to India so I am trying to find the root, where is it coming from. Where is the root of kali yuga as the string and so I have come here to America. Ha, here’s the root. So I want to  cut it at the root then the entire world can be very easily Kṛṣṇa conscious. So you are very fortunate to have this responsibility because you are here at the root where kali yuga is getting maximum strength and from this place you can also spread the maximum Kṛṣṇa conscious influence all over entire the modern world.  Everyone is looking one way or another towards America, whether in admiration or in hate, in someway or other everyone is looking. And of course they set the standard for material enjoyment in many spheres. So similarly if they actually take up, Prabhupāda’s dream was that the people in America take up this practice of Kṛṣṇa consciousness. If they take it up using Prabhupāda’s program of daiva varnasRāma. Brahmanas and preachers staying in our communities, those who cannot follow strictly or those who are living in the society and are trying to practice from there. They preach from there and support the preaching movement from their homes under the guidance and under the coordination of full time brāhmaṇa preachers who are working from our various temples. This program Prabhupāda has repeatedly  given us now if we can implement it through massive book distribution and include daiva varnasRāma program of engaging the people to chant the holyname then we can gradually see the face of America changing. I am always very inspired to see that how many programs usually a lot of the programs are initiated in new Dwarka and in  Southern California area . This is also inspiring, here of course the people are reputed to be open minded generally than say some other parts of the United states like Georgia and Alabama.( laughter)  Are there any questions?

Devotee : yeah, so what is dry renunciation?

His Holiness Jayapatākā Swami Mahārāja: Dry renunciation. Well, in terms of how to preach to different people, I mean, every person ask a question according is to kala, desa and patra. When you are talking to the person then Kṛṣṇa inspires one to how to preach to the person so you don’t turn them away at the same time give them the maximum amount of Kṛṣṇa consciousness , they can take. We are not prove this one or prove that one, we are simply preaching Kṛṣṇa consciousness. From one point of few the whole situation is such, as  Prabhupāda said that it is  a hopeless situation. That the terrorists they are not acting according to any principles as far as the retaliation. This is the reaction and a  counterreaction because people have lost their consciousness of God. In the name of religious things, they are actually, they are doing so many political movements. The Palestinian movement is not a religious movement. They are political activists who are trying to get a homeland or whatever according to whatever that I have been to understand about their thing. They don’t have any where to live as such their own place. It’s not a Muslim matter, it’s not a jihad, it’s not a sacred war but it’s a political, they need a place, it’s a political fighting for their land. It’s a normal kind of a political thing. But somehow all these struggles have brought down , you find in Lebanon the Muslims versus Christians versus Jews and the whole thing is brought  to a religious sectarian view point. But actually it has nothing to do with religion. There’s nothing to do with service to God. Simply religious sentiment is being exploited by leaders in the world to engage people along certain political ends. Or even local leaders or local people. The local leaders in Northern Ireland, some want to be a part of Ireland they exploited people’s sentiment they said you are Catholics. Some people they wanted to be part of England. They exploited other’s sentiments you are Palestine. And the people they hate each other, they are trained up from their birth Catholics hate Palestine. The Palestine in Northern Ireland to hate Catholics and Catholics to hate Palestine and so on.  So you see in the basic thing in South Africa it is political. It’s not a question of black or white, it’s a question of political , survival for certain people that they have created all these various ideologies. So in this way whether religion or various other system we find that for certain political purposes people sometime they use religion as a scrape gold or  use it as their means to achieve their end but in actuality where is the real religion where is god consciousness. If there is God consciousness if there’s human life then this things don’t happen. Prabhuapada said in response to solution for terrorism, he said there is no solution , so long as people are not human beings, as long as they are not trained  to actually be human beings in the real sense of spiritual understanding then in the jungles so many animals fight with each other. If one tiger attacks one deer or one hyena attacks a rodent who is going to complain? Who worries about that? Practically speaking the human society is going down to the animal level. Therefore innocent people are just slaughtered in the airports or therefore people can indiscriminately do other things, where other innocent people might also be injured. According to the, actual culprit is now the , they passed the resolution, the American government, that you can’t kill another head of the state. But if you study Chanakya, the head of state is actually held for fault. They don’t want people to assassinate them so  they made a rule that everyone can assassinate other head of the state. But if the head of state is responsible, we found that sometimes the kings would not want to fight and the two head of states would fight or  sometimes Chanakya he directly went for the head of state. Or just like in the Mahabharata  we find that Bhima, he went challenged the Jarasandha. He is the actual culprit, what is the use of killing his army twenty one times. The actual guy who is starting all these is Jarasandha. Ravan sent out his whole family gets everyone killed , but actually the whole thing is simply Ravana. So finally Rāma just gives one right in the heart of Ravana. Then the whole thing is finished. So if they really think some one person is responsible whether whatever he maybe. According to kṣatriya codes there’s a lot of things  that you can do when you are, the codes of ethics that they followed are a little bit compared to the code of ethics given in the Vedas.  According to the Vedas the kṣatriya can do a  lot of things which present public opinion would say is not proper. Violence at certain cases is possible, now for us ,we don’t go into this judging. That’s very difficult for us because the whole issue is, what we have to base it on. To newspapers, you know who can believe what the newspapers say, anyway. We can’t rely on them, we know how are they. If you read the newspapers in India,  If you read the newspapers in America, If you read the newspapers in Malayasia . I just came through the three , you will find three different news and depending on which newspaper you get, if it a leftiest newspaper in India, there are left right middle everything , they have got everything. Well in America if somebody is a hero, in another place somebody is described as the second mad dog, you know how, complete different perspective according to various political outlook and so on and so forth. So rather than getting into the jungle of trying to defend or  counteract . A king or head of state has the right to defend people. Who is the aggressor? If somebody is an aggressor they have the right to defend according to the code book of Manu. So then you have ascertain who is the actual aggressor and get the aggressor. If he is an aggressor and tagging then you have the right to defend yourself against that aggressor. If innocent people get killed then of course that’s not the, that’s not supported by Vedic principles. In fact there only the ksatriyas would fight. The idea of gorilla warfare terrorism is completely against the Vedic principles. You go and just start bumping indiscriminately  people,  just to get your point of view put in newspapers, it’s another form of world insanity that we are seeing. People have no respect for God, they have no responsibility for human life. So the thing to preach is that the whole problem in the world is the lack of Kṛṣṇa consciousness is the real problem. Whether a person ask you. I generally try to do is take it off of the specific issue , which is like  a trap , they just want to get you into discussing their , they want a  chance of discussing their political movement and taking it into a higher level and discuss it again.  Unnecessary finding of good and bad of both the sides. Once we  have firmly established that there is a higher principle which is being neglected in the world today and then we can analyze from the principle  , everything becomes very clear but from their point of view everything is very relative. But in general you can say someone has the right to do something against aggression but I have to define who is the aggressive ,whether what is done is proper thing. That’s another thing. Regarding your question what is suksha vairagya. Sukshma vairagya, dry renunciation is that when someone simply renounces something. Just that someone thinks I have to be suffering, some people think unless I am completely like in a austere situation this is hurting me, then you know I am not properly situated. So they do this type of excessive austerity. You give someone a big feast , the janamasthami, the day after janamsthami. Then they think I can’t , I have to , I can’t enjoy it because I have to be in vairagya. I have to be suffering or something. No, we take it as Kṛṣṇa’s mercy. For us fasting and feasting is the same. One day we fast, next day we feast. We take we don’t do austerity just for austerities sake without, without any higher purpose. You see there are some who are over attached, there are others who are over whimsical , over loose. So we have to find the middle point. Not simply to be austere for the sake of austerity alone and not for any higher purpose or a higher benefit. It’s not that a person has to dislike what he is doing rather Kṛṣṇa consciousness sukham kutam abhyaam it is very joyfully performed. So someone is performing devotional service, they should get some transcendental happiness from that. It’s not that you have to dislike it, although sometimes we may have to do some things what we don’t like to do for the  purpose of achieving Kṛṣṇa consciousness that is vairagya. That doesn’t mean everything we do , we have to dislike it by definition otherwise you may take it to an extreme fanatical definition. For some people , always they are trying to be very very austere in their eating, or the sleeping and various things rather we have to be regulated and do things in a more sensible manner that is what Lord Caitanya recommended. Rather than just doing something, like someone says I have to walk up to the mouth of Ganges, one side of the Ganges and circumambulate  and come back down to the other. One disciple of Bhakti Sidhhanta Saraswati Thakur did that Bhaktisidhanta rejected him. what’s this ? this is dry kind of. You know, we do something, because it is for Kṛṣṇa not because just we are doing something for being renounced. What’s pleasing to Kṛṣṇa that we do, what’s not pleasing that we avoid. It is our renunciation, is that clear? Hare Kṛṣṇa!

Transcribed By: Snigdha Mataji

Transcribed On: 20-Oct-2020