20180520 Question and Answer Session

mūkaṁ karoti vācālaṁ paṅguṁ laṅghayate girim
yat-kṛpā tam ahaṁ vande śrī-guruṁ dīna-tāraṇam
paramānanda-mādhavam śrī caitanya īśvaram
Harihi oṁ tat sat

Question: [inaudible]

Jayapatākā Swami: Since we offer items to the Deities so that is devotional. The 26 items we offer to the Deities. And then we touch the head of the Deity. So I think as we are doing worship of Kṛṣṇa, it would be part of devotional service. What karma-kāṇḍa has is more offering yajñas to Śiva or Brahmā. That is not karma-kāṇḍa, to offer to Kṛṣṇa.

Question: Three related questions. Śrāddha ceremony – if someone leaves the body in Puruṣottama month can we offer piṇḍa to the departed soul? If someone left the body in other months, can we offer the monthly śrāddha during Puruṣottama month? Generally, people say that offering mahā-prasāda is sufficient we do not need to do piṇḍa, is that true?

Jayapatākā Swami: Of course, I did not research it. Generally, the children should offer kṛṣṇa-prasāda to the forefathers. And in this way, one is offering piṇḍī. In the piṇḍī ceremony people offer what the person likes to eat that is particularly criticized but offering kṛṣṇa-prasāda is considered auspicious. So we just offer kṛṣṇa-prasāda.

Question: Difference between the different sampradāyas. I am preaching in a city in Sweden and in the city, there are two different temples one is ISKCON. And one is a disciple of Prabhupāda who has started his own temple. So it is impossible to try to stop the people from going to the other temple. But now we have tried to communicate a little more and because they initiate very fast, so it gives a wrong sign to the people we try to cultivate if people who get initiated there come to every program, so we say, when you get initiated come sometimes as a guest but don’t come regularly as it gives wrong signal to new people. I had to communicate this. On one level it is like a political border, how can we forbid somebody from coming to the temple? On another level, I feel it is a little bit of preaching in Prabhupāda’s mission. So it may be offensive to say that. So what attitude should we have, Guru Mahārāja?

Jayapatākā Swami: You see a gṛhastha can have his own temple and it seems that this gṛhastha has made a temple. (she says it is a sannyāsī disciple of Śrīla Prabhupāda who has made this temple). What is his name? (Parama Advaiti Swami. His association is Vṛndā). He is basically against ISKCON and generally we would avoid associating with him. It is not that he has a temple, he has many temples. In Columbia, in Peru, in Chile and so he has made a separate movement. It will be better to associate with devotees of ISKCON. I talked to him for about six hours to be part of ISKCON, but he did not want. In such a case it is not like some gṛhastha who has a house, he has made his own movement and we respect him but we don’t associate. We consider he is a Vaiṣṇava, but he is not following ISKCON’s rules that means he is not following Śrīla Prabhupāda. I did not know that he was in Sweden. He gets people to join up easy and we heard that basically anything goes in his temple. You can smoke marijuana, that is not following Prabhupāda’s system.

(She says, is it okay if we ask them to take darśana but not to come regularly because it disturbs our preaching?)

If they come to our program and they don’t talk to anyone, that is not a problem. You can tell them not to speak to anyone. Some of the disciples of Parama Advaiti wanted to rejoin ISKCON, so we asked that they get a letter from him. So that we don’t encroach on each other’s areas. I think that he is the only person like that. In Bangalore there are also ṛtviks, apart from that we don’t have so much competition.

Question: Does law of karma apply to only human beings, or does it apply to lower species? Does it apply to people in Brahma-loka, Svarga-loka and other places?

Jayapatākā Swami: The laws of karma apply particularly to the human beings. The animals follow their instincts and by their nature they act. Whereas the human beings have more free will so they can follow the laws of karma. It is said that animals in the species of cows, tigers and lions, and monkeys are born in their next birth as human beings in the modes of goodness, passion, and ignorance. So tiger is expected to act in a particular way and cows also act in a particular way. So the cows are in the mode of goodness, monkeys in the mood of ignorance and tigers and lions in the mode of passion. So when you see a tiger or lion, don’t say please don’t bite me because its nature is such! But a human may act accordingly, he can choose what to do, what not to do and therefore he is responsible under the laws of karma.

Thank you very much. Hare Kṛṣṇa!