Morning Walk , Los Angeles , 1974-01-03

Prabhupāda: ...is that nṛpa-liṅga-dharaṁ śūdram. The śūdras, fourth-class men, they are on the government execute. This is one defect. And another defect is, ghnantaṁ go-mithunaṁ padā [SB 1.16.4], maintaining large-scale slaughterhouse. These are the two defects of modern civilization. They..., on the top of government there are śūdras, not kṣatriyas. Neither they are guided by intelligent class, brāhmaṇas. Parīkṣit Mahārāja's first beginning is dvija-varya-śikṣayā [SB 1.16.1]. The guidance was first-class brāhmaṇas, and he was a kṣatriya, first class. And there was no animal slaughterhouse. They are also suffering. They are bringing every day some problem = "What is the solution of this problem, what is this solution...?" But why the problems are coming? Because the defect is there that the..., on the head of the government there are śūdras and they are busy in cow-killing, maintaining slaughterhouse. This is the defect. And they are not guided by the first-class, intelligent class of men. [break]

Prajāpati: ...getting worse over these five thousand years,

Prabhupāda: Huh?

Prajāpati: ...but by a reintroduction, reintroducing Kṛṣṇa consciousness, the tide can be turned in age of Kali?

Prabhupāda: Oh, yes. That is the only remedy. That is the only remedy. Anyone who takes to this chanting of Hare Kṛṣṇa mantra, he'll be cleansed of all sinful activities, and then everything will come out nice. And it is practical. It is not story. Just see, all our disciples in Europe, America, they were habituated to so many bad habits, and because they are chanting, they are now cleansed. So it is small-scale. If you propagate it large-scale, everyone will be cleansed.

[break] ...disciples who were trained up from very beginning of their life = meat-eating. They are giving meat-eating. Here in your country, small children, they are fed with meat powder. Intoxication is also a daily affair. How they are giving up all intoxication? [break] Is there any arrangement for... Where is Karandhara?

Karandhara: Jaya, Prabhupāda.

Prabhupāda: That placard, poster?

Karandhara: Prajāpati and I discussed it yesterday, and we're trying to find an artist to do it.

Prajāpati: Nara-nārāyaṇa Prabhu's good wife is expert artist.

Prabhupāda: Ah.

Prajāpati: And she has... I guess she has agreed to...

Nara-nārāyaṇa: Yes.

Prabhupāda: Yes, she is very nice, good artist. Give her engagement like this.

Prajāpati: Maybe you could explain us a little more detail of the...

Prabhupāda: No, with very much detail it will be cumbrous. You... Symbolic representation.

Prajāpati: Those three figures in the center?

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Prajāpati: One is a devotee, one is a...

Prabhupāda: No, everyone is devotee.

Prajāpati: Yes, they are all three devotees.

Prabhupāda: But they're engaged in three departments.

Karandhara: We were thinking for the administrator there could be a judge.

Prabhupāda: Ah.

Karandhara: Could be a judge, a high-court judge.

Prabhupāda: Yes. That means administrator.

Karandhara: Yes. The other one could be the president.

Prabhupāda: Yes, president also administrator. No, one is in the religious order. That is also required. But here we see, persons who are in religious order, they're also addicted to these four sinful..., four sinful life. And he's presenting himself as religious.

Karandhara: On the one should we depict meat-eating or animal slaughter?

Prabhupāda: Eh?

Karandhara: Should we depict animal slaughter or meat-eating?

Prabhupāda: Animal slaughter.

Karandhara: Animal slaughter.

Prabhupāda: That will be still broader.

Karandhara: Yes.

Prajāpati: The three figures, and one is in a suit, one... They all have tilaka, neck beads and bead bag...

Prabhupāda: Religious man may be in saffron color, a sannyāsī, a tridaṇḍī sannyāsī. Our Gurukṛpā Mahārāja? Where is he?

Karandhara: Gurukṛpā Mahārāja.

Prabhupāda: Eh? Here are religious man.

Nara-nārāyaṇa: Oh! [laughter] Jaya!

Prajāpati: How will we distinguish between the other two men? They'll both be in suits.

Prabhupāda: Eh?

Karandhara: Well, the one man, the president, will be behind the presidential podium, presidential seal in the front. And the other man would be a high-court judge with...

Prabhupāda: Yes, yes.

Karandhara: ...with black robes on.

Prabhupāda: Yes, yes.

Nara-nārāyaṇa: With a..., two balls.

Prabhupāda: Make nicely this picture. Short-cut, at the same time very convincing. [break] Yes?

New devotee: I'm very new to this Kṛṣṇa conscious movement, and I'm not as firm as your devotees. Right now I'm being torn in half. Māyā is so strong, and I see so much of what you say. Is there...

Prabhupāda: What is this?

New devotee: Doubts.

Prabhupāda: What is your doubt?

New devotee: Mental speculation.

Prabhupāda: So you want to continue it or stop it?

New devotee: Stop it.

Prabhupāda: Then stop it. Take instruction from the śāstra. Don't speculate. That will not help you. The same example = a child's speculation, "Who is my father?" He will never be successful. But as soon as he asks his mother, "Who is my father?" immediately knowledge = "Here is your father." Finished.

New devotee: Association is very important.

Prabhupāda: Eh?

New devotee: Association?

Prabhupāda: Yes. One has to take information from the authority. That knowledge is perfect. And these rascals, philosophical, scientific speculation, all useless waste of time.

New devotee: I live in Long Beach, and I will be going to school soon, but I'm...

Prabhupāda: Hmm. We don't accept any speculative knowledge. We want final conclusion of the experienced person. Nṛpa-nirṇītaḥ, this word is used. Nṛpa-nirṇītaḥ, "it is concluded." Kavibhir nirūpitaḥ. Idaṁ hi puṁsas śrutas..., tapasaḥ śrutasya vā, avicyuto 'rthaḥ kavibhir nirūpitaḥ [SB 1.5.22]. Nirṇītaḥ. These words are... It is already concluded. There is no question of argument. In the Vedic literature, these words are used, nṛpa-nirṇītaḥ, nirūpitaḥ.

New devotee: I should abandon...

Prabhupāda: Nāsato vidyate bhāvo. Na asataḥ vidyate bhāvaḥ [Bg. 2.16]. [aside:] What is the next line? So, we take things which is conclusive. The scientists, they are making experiment, where is the beginning of life. Misled. They are thinking life is from matter. They have no experience. Still, the rascal Darwin gave a theory; they are persisting on it. They have no practical experience that life is coming from matter. That is called vṛścika-taṇḍula-nyāya. You have no experience in your country. We have got. Sometimes you'll find scorpion is coming out from the stack of rice. You have seen it?

Karandhara: I haven't seen it, but I have heard of the example.

Prabhupāda: Yes. So they are thinking the rice is..., rice is producing the scorpion. It is called taṇḍula-vṛścika-nyāya. But rice cannot produce a life. The real fact is a scorpion lays down the egg within the rice, and by the fermentation it comes out, just like eggs, and the small creature comes out. And foolish creatures, they think it that the rice is producing scorpion. That is not possible. So they are putting forward this evolution theory that man is coming from monkey. But no monkey is producing a man. Nobody has seen. There are so many things. They put forward some theory, but it is not fact.

New devotee: The quickest way to knowledge...

Prabhupāda: Quickest way to knowledge... That I told you = take the knowledge from the authority. The example I have already given, that you cannot make research, search out who is your father. But if you go to the authority, mother, immediately you understand. This is the quickest way.

New devotee: The thing that's tearing me apart is, um...

Prabhupāda: But just try to understand this. The principle is that if you receive knowledge from the real authority, that is perfect and quick. And if with your imperfect senses you want to acquire knowledge by searching out, it will never be successful. The modern method is to search out the truth by their imperfect senses. All these scientists, philosophers, they are doing that. They admit that their senses are imperfect. Still, they are trying to go to the perfect by the imperfect senses. This is their defect. They are hoping that "Our imperfectness will be perfect by this research work." That is not possible. Imperfectness will remain ever imperfect.

Prajāpati: They glorify such imperfections, Śrīla Prabhupāda, by saying...

Prabhupāda: Unless they glorify their imperfection, how they can stand? [laughter] They have no standing. If they do not glorify, then they are proved rascals. There will be no argument. They'll have to accept that "We are rascals." Therefore they have to glorify. The glorifying society. That is mentioned in the Bhāgavata. The glorifying society is consisting of ass, camel, hog and..., what is the other?

Devotees: Dog.

Prabhupāda: Dog. So we... Śva-viḍ-varāhoṣṭra-kharaiḥ saṁstutaḥ puruṣaḥ paśuḥ [SB 2.3.19]. They are all ass, camels, dogs, like that, and they are praising each other, "Oh, you have discovered this. Oh, how nice you are. [laughter] How nice you are." But we understand the praiser and the praised, both are dogs and cats. That's all. So we don't give any benefit. It is a mutual praising society of cats and dogs, so we don't give any benefit. Now, they can also accuse us in the same way, that "You are also the society of cats and dog, mutual praising society." So... Now, who will judge whether they are right or we are right? Who will judge? Eh? There must be some judgment. Everyone will say that "I am right." But who judges? There must be a judge, that two, both side, the lawyers is fighting, that "My case is right." Then who will give judgment? There must be one judge. So who is that judge?

Prajāpati: Śāstra, guru, sādhu.

Prabhupāda: Yes. Yes. That is the judge. Therefore we quote from Vedic literatures. As soon as we speak something, immediately quote Vedic literature. That is the way.

Karandhara: The trouble is there are so many phony gurus and śāstras.

Prabhupāda: Eh?

Karandhara: There are so many misrepresentations.

Prabhupāda: Because their folly is... They therefore do not take authority. Otherwise they'll be exposed. Yes. Śāstra-cakṣusā. Yaḥ śāstra-vidhim utsṛjya vartate kāma-kārataḥ [Bg. 16.23]. These are the injunction. [dog barks] Yes, come on. We have got your punishment. So there is an argument = pala bonatu haya[?]. "I'm not afraid of you. Although I'm..., I'm going away, I'm not afraid of you. [laughter] Don't think that I am afraid of you." This is dog business. They'll go, "Gow!" and go away, go away. They'll not come forward. Come on. [laughter]

[break] Well, our every day is a New Year. Nava-nava-ayuman[?]. Our Kṛṣṇa consciousness is so nice, the more you advance, you see new year, new year. That's all. Nothing is old. People are seeing that "They are simply chanting the old slogan, Hare Kṛṣṇa."

Devotee: Hare Kṛṣṇa.

Prabhupāda: But we are feeling new pleasure in every moment. Take any other chanting, you cannot chant more than few hours. But the Hare Kṛṣṇa mantra we can chant perpetually. So unless there is new enlightenment, how we can do that? [break] You can preach here, and then we are starting on the..., by the fourteenth. We shall go together to India. Is that all right? What do you think?

Karandhara: Are you bringing your boys over there?

Prabhupāda: Eh?

Gurukṛpā: They're going separate.

Karandhara: Oh.

Gurukṛpā: If we go the other way it's cheaper.

Prabhupāda: Which way?

Karandhara: Through New York. [break]

Prabhupāda: I cannot go there. You see? As if three hundred miles away. [break]

Gurukṛpā: We saw from the plane.

Prabhupāda: Eh?

Gurukṛpā: When we came on the plane from Miami we saw the comet.

Yaśodānandana: It was there for forty-five minutes.

Prabhupāda: Yes, a bad sign...

Yaśodānandana: As big as the sky.

Prabhupāda: How big?

Yaśodānandana: Big as the sky. It was flashing for forty-five minutes, this big...

Gurukṛpā: Flashing in horizontal directions.

Devotee: The four or five first flashes were very, very big, and regularly every thirty seconds it was big flash, bigger than lightning, brighter, very bright.

Gurukṛpā: Very brilliant.

Prabhupāda: One part like this?

Gurukṛpā: Yes, very fast.

Devotee: Across the sky, shoooot, shoooot, shoooot. Very fast.

Gurukṛpā: About forty-five min... We... It was still going, but the plane passed it and it stayed behind.

Prabhupāda: Uh, so this is bad sign. Constellation. According to astronomical calculations. Therefore we, we follow the astrology according to the constellation. The child born, everything has connection, the constellation of the star has influence on the child. So therefore the horoscope-maker takes the calculation of the constellation and then calculate what is his future. This dhūmaketu is described in Daśāvatāra-stotra, dhūmaketum iva kim api karālam [Daśāvatāra Stotra 10]. Dhūmaketum iva. Dhūmaketum iva kim api karālam. As soon as there is comet, there will be some disaster, very great disaster. In our childhood we saw the comet. Not this like; that was small comet. Still, the first world war was there declared. That we have seen in 1914.

Nara-nārāyaṇa: Halley's Comet.

Prabhupāda: Eh?

Nara-nārāyaṇa: I think they called it Halley's Comet. Halley's Comet.

Prabhupāda: Now the... You can expect at any moment disaster in this material world, but the comet is the sign that there will be some great disaster. It is... This material world, in every step there is disaster. Padaṁ padaṁ yad vipadām [SB 10.14.58]. But those who are taken shelter of Kṛṣṇa, the disaster is not meant for them. Samāśritā ye pada-pallava-plavam padaṁ padaṁ yad vipadāṁ na teṣām. So how big it is?

Gurukṛpā: Very big.

Prabhupāda: Eh?

Gurukṛpā: It was very spectacular. Something like twenty miles, at least.

Prabhupāda: Twenty miles?

Yaśodānandana: Maybe at least fifty, sixty miles the four, five first flashes, very big. Let's see. From this tree all the way to the end of this tennis court, all over the sky. Big white flashings. Like big, huge incredible lightning. Then afterwards it decreased, and then regularly, every thirty, forty-five seconds, there was big lightning. Not lightning; big flashes. Very uncommon.

Jayatīrtha: The scientists say that it's eighty-three million miles long...

Prabhupāda: Eh?

Jayatīrtha: The scientists, they say that it's eighty-three million miles long, the comet.

Prabhupāda: Eighty-three miles?

Jayatīrtha: Eighty-three million miles.

Karandhara: The tail.

Prabhupāda: Eh?

Karandhara: The tail is eighty-three million miles. It's going fast, very forward, so it's emitting a tail of gases.

Prabhupāda: So who is supplying the gas? [laughter] The Arabians?

Jayatīrtha: There's no shortage.

Gurukṛpā: When it comes to doing the kīrtana, there's no energy shortage for us. We have unlimited stock.

Prabhupāda: By presence of the comet, the atmosphere is also polluted. Last time, what I saw, it was like this---round and then tail. It is like that?

Gurukṛpā: No.

Prabhupāda: No.

Gurukṛpā: A long streak. It was behind the clouds. There were many clouds, and you could see it through the clouds.

Prabhupāda: What is the speed? If it is eighty-three million miles, very heavy thing, then the speed must be also.

Karandhara: Well, the speed is very great. I don't know exactly what it is, but it's millions of miles per hour. Perhaps not millions of miles; hundreds of thousands of miles per hour.

Prajāpati: There must be living entities then on the comet, yes, Śrīla Prabhupāda?

Prabhupāda: Oh, yes. Everywhere there are living entities.

Jayatīrtha: Scientists are very excited about the comet because they think that it's made of the primordial substance of the universe, and they think they'll be able to find out some clue how the solar system was created by examining the comet with their telescopes. [laughter]

Prabhupāda: Let them talk all nonsense. We say in Bengali, pāgale ki nā bole, chāgale ki nā khāya. The goat can eat everything, and a madman can speak anything. [laughter] Pāgale ki nā khāya..., pāgale ki nā bole, chāgale ki nā khāya.

Prajāpati: Are the living entities on the comet, are they very demoniac or intelligent or...?

Prabhupāda: Not necessarily demoniac. Two classes of men are always there = intelligent and demon. [break]

Karandhara: ...comet. They just discovered it one or two years ago. They said that if it ever passed by the earth before, it was the time of the dinosaurs.

Prabhupāda: Dinosaur?

Karandhara: Yes. Over fifty thousand years ago.

Prabhupāda: [chuckles] He cannot say what happened yesterday, and he's speaking fifty thousand years ago. Is there a statement in any śāstra, or his own statement?

Karandhara: No, that's by mathematical calculation of the trajectory and speed.

Prabhupāda: Oh, mathematics...

Karandhara: It's going at a certain speed in a certain orbit. So they calculate that it would complete that orbit once every fifty to two hundred thousand years.

Prabhupāda: That is there in astrology, astronomy. That is not discovery.

Karandhara: No, actually, one scientist just looked at a telescope and saw it coming. And that's what they call discovery. And of course, he got the comet named after him.

Prabhupāda: Who?

Karandhara: The scientist. His name was Kohoutek. So he discovered it. So the comet is named after him.

Prabhupāda: And if it is mentioned elsewhere?

Karandhara: I'm sure he'll want to keep his claim.

Prabhupāda: Eh?

Karandhara: I'm sure he'll want to keep his claim.

Prabhupāda: No, if... In some astrological book, if it is mentioned there?

Karandhara: Scientists probably won't accept it. They think if they don't discover it, then it's not bona fide.

Prajāpati: Unless one of them discovers it in the book.

Karandhara: Ah. Yes.

Prabhupāda: Ah?

Prajāpati: If one of them discovers it in the śāstras, then, oh, then they'll...

Karandhara: They say they've looked through all the old books and old records and they haven't found any mention of it.

Prabhupāda: I think in the Indian astronomical calendar there must be mention. [break]

Nara-nārāyaṇa: ...effect of comet?

Prabhupāda: No, generally we know when there is comet, there is very bad effect.

Prajāpati: The comet doesn't really bring the bad effect; it simply is a symptom. Is that it?

Prabhupāda: Eh?

Prajāpati: The comet doesn't bring the bad effect; it is a symptom.

Prabhupāda: No, yes, bring, bring.

Prajāpati: It does bring it.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Prajāpati: Does such a comet affect consciousness as well as matter?

Prabhupāda: Eh? Comet is just like a planet. It is a vehicle carrying so many conscious beings. It is just like if some policeman all of a sudden comes before us, it is to be surmised that someone is criminal, he's searching. Like that. [end]