Morning Walk , Vṛndāvana , 1975-08-27

Prabhupāda: Hey? Who is this?

Devotee: [over sound system] Jaya Jaya Jaya Prabhupada! [sings] nama oṁ viṣṇu-pādāya kṛṣṇa-preṣṭhāya bhū-tale...

Prabhupāda: Hare Kṛṣṇa [break] Hmm? Yes.

Upendra: The flies don't like nim.

Prabhupāda: Huh?

Upendra: They don't like nim? The flies.

Prabhupāda: That ask them. [laughter] You do not expect all answers from me, whether the flies like or not like. This is antiseptic. Nim is very, very antiseptic. Therefore it is natural, the flies and bugs, they are afraid of. Yes. [break] ...here?

Harikeśa: He's the purchaser.

Akṣayānanda: He does shopping.

Prabhupāda: Namaskar. Hare Kṛṣṇa. [Hindi conversation with man] Dandhariya. Where is he? [Hindi conversation] He knows how to capture. He is the... [long Hindi conversation about temples in different countries] Guṇārṇava, he has not come?

Akṣayānanda: No.

Prabhupāda: So he is going to Mathurā? You told him? Huh?

Akṣayānanda: He is going after breakfast.

Devotee: What is the purpose?

Akṣayānanda: To meet Prabhupāda's relative, I think?

Prabhupāda: Yes. You have told?

Devotee: Yes.

Prabhupāda: So from Mathurā he can bring that medicine. You can give him.

Devotee: Castor oil.

Akṣayānanda: I'll tell him, Prabhupāda.

Prabhupāda: No, no, castor oil can be had...

Upendra: Yogendra Ras and Rasanta-[indistinct].

Akṣayānanda: I'll have him bring it.

Prabhupāda: You can take the vial. There is, what is called? Sadhana Ausadhalaya.

Akṣayānanda: Ācchā

Indian man: Dakkha.[?]

Prabhupāda: Yes. Dakkha-da. [Hindi] From there you have to take it.

Akṣayānanda: Sadhana Ausadhalaya.

Prabhupāda: Sadhana. On the bottle it is written there.

Akṣayānanda: I'll have him do it.

Indian man: [Hindi]

Prabhupāda: [Hindi exchange with man] They will never take seriously your Māyāvāda philosophy. [Hindi] Kṛṣṇa aparādhī. They are offender to Kṛṣṇa, all these Māyāvādīs. And in Vṛndāvana this Māyāvādī philosophy has become very strong. Even the so-called Vaiṣṇavas, they are also... [Hindi] Buddhist, they say that there is no God.

Indian man: They can't believe God.

Prabhupāda: Whatever it may be, they deny. Therefore we call them atheist. But these Māyāvādī, they take the shelter of Vedas and they preach the same philosophy = "Yes, brahma-nirākāra." [Hindi] ...don't believe in God... [Hindi] For the time being, Śaṅkarācārya might have said something like that to turn the Buddhists again to Vedas, but that is temporary. But they have taken it all true. [Hindi] ...eighty-five years they are working. They have no position. [Hindi] What is that? TM?

Brahmānanda: TM, Transcendental Meditation.

Prabhupāda: And what is the items they say?

Brahmānanda: No philosophy, no belief, no restrictions.

Prabhupāda: [laughs] Just see. He is advertising. Mahesh Yogi.

Indian man: Mahesh Yogi, yes. Followers, they are taking everything.

Prabhupāda: He says, "There is no restriction, or no philosophy, no faith." [Hindi conversation] Recently one book was published by Professor Judah. He has studied this movement for five years. He came to India. So he has written one book, Hare Krishna and Counterculture, but scholarly. [Hindi] He appreciated. [Hindi] ...and the fifty books I have, four hundred pages each. And we are selling twenty lakhs' worth monthly. [Hindi] [break] ...it is up to that?

Akṣayānanda: Nobody knows your limit, Prabhupāda. Nobody knows your limit.

Prabhupāda: No, generally. Who remembers?

Harikeśa: It was way back there.

Brahmānanda: It was back there by that... [laughter]

Prabhupāda: Huh? No, no. I remember.

Akṣayānanda: I think it was here somewhere. [break]

Prabhupāda: Ants are freely moving. They do not know it is dangerous. Similarly, all these living entities in material world, they think, "It is not dangerous. It is all right." Ant civilization.

French devotee (1): Śrīla Prabhupāda, is there some worship of God in the animal kingdom?

Prabhupāda: No. [aside:] Hare Kṛṣṇa. Hare Kṛṣṇa.

Harikeśa: Hut hut hut hut!

Prabhupāda: "Hut" will not do.

Brahmānanda: Stick will do.

Prabhupāda: At least show. [break] Trees and other lower animals, they are abiding by the order of Kṛṣṇa. That is worship.

Brahmānanda: But is it voluntary or involuntary?

Prabhupāda: By force. By force now this tree is standing. He has to stand up here. It cannot move an inch.

Brahmānanda: Would that be considered worship if it is...?

Prabhupāda: Yes, it is.

Akṣayānanda: Indirect worship.

Prabhupāda: Indirect worship, abiding. Just like you don't worship the government, revolt. But when you are put into jail you have to worship the government.

Akṣayānanda: We don't worship, yet we don't break the law.

Prabhupāda: You cannot break the law. Outside you break law. That you can do. But when you are put into jail, then you cannot. And jail means unless the government finds that you are now obedient to the government laws... [dog growling and barking]

Brahmānanda: Hut!

Devotees: Hare Kṛṣṇa.

Prabhupāda: He is taking our shelter, [laughter] the other dog.

Akṣayānanda: I've seen dogs follow saṅkīrtana party for many miles. Once a dog was following, and he had tilaka, he had a tilaka mark on his head.

Prabhupāda: No, no. Who? Who marked it? Somebody? No, no. You should not do it.

Brahmānanda: Did someone put tilaka on the dog?

Akṣayānanda: Oh, I mean to say the color of his body was such.

Prabhupāda: Oh, that is another thing. But you cannot put tilaka. Don't make tilaka so cheap. Natural tilaka, that is another thing.

Akṣayānanda: Yes.

French devotee (2): If a devotee step on the ant, does the ant receive some benefit?

Prabhupāda: Hmm?

French devotee (2): If a devotee step on a ant by mistake, the ant...

Prabhupāda: You should be careful. Why should you commit mistake? But if unconsciously by mistake it is done, that is another thing.

Brahmānanda: He wants to know does the ant receive benefit?

Prabhupāda: No. Then he will be lenient to kill them to give them benefit. [laughter] He'll be so...

Brahmānanda: Like they say "mercy killing," that "This is good for you. I will kill you and it is good for you."

Prabhupāda: Yes. You should always think that you are responsible for its killing. But it may be Kṛṣṇa may excuse you. That is another thing. Consciously you cannot kill. [break]

Akṣayānanda: ...people in India, Prabhupāda, are still pure vegetarians, but almost all of their children eat eggs and try to smoke cigarettes, and they don't stop them because they don't have any philosophy because of the Māyāvādī philosophy.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Akṣayānanda: Almost 90% of all the people we preach to, they are all influenced by Māyāvādī philosophy.

Prabhupāda: Yes. That I was talking. [break]

Brahmānanda: ...say that the egg is from God and the apple is from God.

Prabhupāda: So why don't you eat apple? [laughter]

Akṣayānanda: They are also envious of you, Śrīla Prabhupāda.

Prabhupāda: I know that. Do they say like that?

Akṣayānanda: Not directly. But when we explain how many things, what is being done, and we show photographs, how people have become devotees, they will say, "Yes, but have you heard of Swami So-and-so?" And we'll say, "Yes, we have heard of him. But our Guru Mahārāja has got thousands of devotees all over the world." "Yes, he has also got thousands of devotees." They'll minimize, even though it's there in black and white.

Prabhupāda: But where they are?

Brahmānanda: Yeah. Where are those thousands of disciples of these other swamis?

Prabhupāda: "Here we are, but where are the swami's disciples?" Ask them.

Akṣayānanda: Then they will become angry.

Prabhupāda: "No, no. Well, don't be angry. Well, Bhaktivedanta Swami's disciples, we are present here. Present anyone else. So how shall I believe you?"

Akṣayānanda: Then they will say, "We are doing the same as you. But we don't have to help you because we are already doing the same thing. We are feeding the poor, giving charity."

Prabhupāda: Yes. They do not understand.

Akṣayānanda: But yet their children are eating eggs, giving up. [break]

Brahmānanda: ...say that they are doing the same thing that we are doing, then that should be a reason to help us, not to not help us. If we're doing the same thing, therefore if you are helping one, then you must help the other also.

Akṣayānanda: Yes. That's what I tell them. They say, "We already helped the other, but you came too late, so therefore we can't help you."

Prabhupāda: "So you are so poor?"---[aside:] Hare Kṛṣṇa---"that you cannot help the second man? Then how you are charitable? You must be open to give charity to everyone." No use talking.

French devotee (1): They are very rich, Śrīla Prabhupāda. They are very rich.

Prabhupāda: Richer than us? [laughter] Do you think?

French devotee (1): No.

Prabhupāda: How many branches he has got of his business?

Akṣayānanda: So I usually tell them, "It is not for us that we want help, but so that we can help others." They like that. They can appreciate humanitarian viewpoint, material benefit. That's all.

Prabhupāda: So we are giving the best humanitarian service---to stop his repetition of birth and death.

Brahmānanda: The final solution.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Brahmānanda: This is the final solution.

Akṣayānanda: In India, now in the cities, wherever we go, there are so many big cinema houses being built. So if the young people are not yet tired of that, then how will we convince them of Kṛṣṇa consciousness? They all go by the thousands to the cinema house.

Prabhupāda: You approach the cinema proprietor and make him a member. We have got contribution from a very big cinema man.

Brahmānanda: Raj Kapoor has become a patron member.

Prabhupāda: You can show his letter, how he appreciates. So similarly, you can collect some money. So this money is coming from the cinema visitors, so indirectly they will be benefited. Yes.

Akṣayānanda: That is only indirectly, eh? Money is there, and they will give. Still they'll go on showing the nonsense, and all the young people are going and being corrupted.

Prabhupāda: That is going on everywhere, not only in the cinema. Karmīs. So our duty is to take some service; then they will be benefited by that. Kuruṣva tad mad-arpaṇam. Kṛṣṇa says, "Whatever you do doesn't matter. The result, give Me." [break]

French devotee (2): They go to cinema because they have no adventures in their life. So they go to cinema. If they become Kṛṣṇa conscious, so they don't need to go to cinema.

Prabhupāda: Kṛṣṇa conscious is not so cheap. Have you come to Kṛṣṇa consciousness? Don't take Kṛṣṇa consciousness so cheap that they will go to cinema and become Kṛṣṇa conscious.

Brahmānanda: No, he says that if they become Kṛṣṇa conscious, then they will stop going to the cinema.

Prabhupāda: Yes. That is the test. [aside:] Hare Kṛṣṇa. Jaya. This is the test. Bhaktiḥ pareśānubhavo viraktir anyatra [SB 11.2.42]. Advancement of Kṛṣṇa consciousness means he's no more interested with anything material. That is Kṛṣṇa conscious. There is a Bengali proverb, ami dugdha khaya eta mako khaya: "The children, they take milk, and adults, they smoke." So one is speaking that "I take milk and smoke also."

Brahmānanda: He thinks he's all right. "I'm okay."

Prabhupāda: Yes. "I go to temple and I do all nonsense also."

Hare Kṛṣṇa. Hare Kṛṣṇa. We shall go directly temple?

Brahmānanda: Yes. [end]