Skull

Expressions researched:
"skull" |"skulls"

SB Canto 3

SB 3.18.5, Translation:

The demon continued: When You fall dead with Your skull smashed by the mace hurled by my arms, the demigods and sages who offer You oblations and sacrifice in devotional service will also automatically cease to exist, like trees without roots.

SB Canto 4

SB 4.2.14-15, Translation:

He lives in filthy places like crematoriums, and his companions are the ghosts and demons. Naked like a madman, sometimes laughing and sometimes crying, he smears crematorium ashes all over his body. He does not bathe regularly, and he ornaments his body with a garland of skulls and bones. Therefore only in name is he Śiva, or auspicious; actually, he is the most mad and inauspicious creature. Thus he is very dear to crazy beings in the gross mode of ignorance, and he is their leader.

SB 4.4.16, Translation and Purport:

Do you think that greater, more respectable personalities than you, such as Lord Brahmā, do not know this inauspicious person who goes under the name Lord Śiva? He associates with the demons in the crematorium, his locks of hair are scattered all over his body, he is garlanded with human skulls and smeared with ashes from the crematorium, but in spite of all these inauspicious qualities, great personalities like Brahmā honor him by accepting the flowers offered to his lotus feet and placing them with great respect on their heads.

It is useless to condemn a great personality like Lord Śiva, and this is being stated by his wife, Satī, to establish the supremacy of her husband. First she said, "You call Lord Śiva inauspicious because he associates with demons in crematoriums, covers his body with the ashes of the dead, and garlands himself with the skulls of human beings. You have shown so many defects, but you do not know that his position is always transcendental. Although he appears inauspicious, why do personalities like Brahmā respect the dust of his lotus feet and place on their heads with great respect those very garlands which are condemned by you?" Since Satī was a chaste woman and the wife of Lord Śiva, it was her duty to establish the elevated position of Lord Śiva, not only by sentiment but by facts.

SB 4.18.21, Translation:

Then the Yakṣas, Rākṣasas, ghosts and witches, who are habituated to eating flesh, transformed Lord Śiva's incarnation Rudra (Bhūtanātha) into a calf and milked out beverages made of blood and put them in a pot made of skulls.

SB 4.19.20, Translation:

The great sage Atri again pointed out to the son of King Pṛthu that Indra was fleeing through the sky. The great hero, the son of Pṛthu, chased him again. But when he saw that Indra was carrying in his hand a staff with a skull at the top and was again wearing the dress of a sannyāsī, he still chose not to kill him.

SB 4.19.22, Purport:

Since time immemorial, the sannyāsa order has carried the tridaṇḍa. Later Śaṅkarācārya introduced the ekadaṇḍi-sannyāsa. A tridaṇḍi-sannyāsī is a Vaiṣṇava sannyāsī, and an ekadaṇḍi-sannyāsī is a Māyāvādī sannyāsī. There are many other types of sannyāsīs, who are not approved by Vedic rituals. A type of pseudo-sannyāsa was introduced by Indra when he tried to hide himself from the attack of Vijitāśva, the great son of King Pṛthu. Now there are many different types of sannyāsīs. Some of them go naked, and some of them carry a skull and trident, generally known as kāpālika. All of them were introduced under some meaningless circumstances, and those who have a poor fund of knowledge accept these false sannyāsīs and their pretenses, although they are not bona fide guides to spiritual advancement.

SB 4.23.14, Purport:

The aim of this particular system of āsana, known as the sitting posture for liberation, or muktāsana, is to attain success in kuṇḍalinī-cakra and gradually raise the life from the mūlādhāra-cakra to the svādhiṣṭhāna-cakra, then to the maṇipūra-cakra, the anāhata-cakra, the viśuddha-cakra, and finally to the ājñā-cakra. When the yogī reaches the ājñā-cakra, between the two eyebrows, he is able to penetrate the brahma-randhra, or the hole in his skull, and go to any planet he desires, up to the spiritual kingdom of Vaikuṇṭha, or Kṛṣṇaloka.

SB 4.23.15, Translation:

In this way, Pṛthu Mahārāja gradually raised his air of life up to the hole in his skull, whereupon he lost all desire for material existence. Gradually he merged his air of life with the totality of air, his body with the totality of earth, and the fire within his body with the totality of fire.

SB Canto 6

SB 6.18.47, Translation:

Kaśyapa Muni said: My dear wife, to follow this vow, do not be violent or cause harm to anyone. Do not curse anyone, and do not speak lies. Do not cut your nails and hair, and do not touch impure things like skulls and bones.

SB Cantos 10.14 to 12 (Translations Only)

SB 10.67.19-21, Translation:

Struck on the skull by the Lord's club, Dvivida became brilliantly decorated by the outpour of blood, like a mountain beautified by red oxide. Ignoring the wound, Dvivida uprooted another tree, stripped it of leaves by brute force and struck the Lord again. Now enraged, Lord Balarāma shattered the tree into hundreds of pieces, upon which Dvivida grabbed yet another tree and furiously hit the Lord again. This tree, too, the Lord smashed into hundreds of pieces.

SB 12.10.11-13, Translation:

Śrī Mārkaṇḍeya saw Lord Śiva suddenly appear within his heart. Lord Śiva's golden hair resembled lightning, and he had three eyes, ten arms and a tall body that shone like the rising sun. He wore a tiger skin, and he carried a trident, a bow, arrows, a sword and a shield, along with prayer beads, a ḍamaru drum, a skull and an ax. Astonished, the sage came out of his trance and thought, "Who is this, and where has he come from?"

CC Adi-lila

CC Adi 5.22, Purport:

At the critical time of death, one can place the vital force between the two eyebrows and decide where he wants to go. If he is reluctant to maintain any connection with the material world, he can, in less than a second, reach the transcendental abode of Vaikuṇṭha and appear there completely in his spiritual body, which will be suitable for him in the spiritual atmosphere. He has simply to desire to leave the material world both in finer and in grosser forms and then move the vital force to the topmost part of the skull and leave the body from the hole in the skull called the brahma-randhra. This is easy for one perfect in the practice of yoga.

CC Madhya-lila

CC Madhya 24.166, Translation:

“"Those who follow the path of great, saintly mystic yogīs take to the yogic gymnastic process and begin worshiping from the abdomen, where it is said that Brahman is located. Such people are called śārkarākṣa, which means that they are situated in the gross bodily conception. There are also followers of the ṛṣi known as Āruṇa. Following his path, they observe the activities of the arteries. Thus they gradually rise to the heart, where subtle Brahman, Paramātmā, is situated. They then worship Him. O unlimited Ananta! Better than these persons are the mystic yogīs who worship You from the top of their heads. Beginning with the abdomen and proceeding through the heart, they reach the top of the head and pass through the brahma-randhra, the hole at the top of the skull. Thus these yogīs attain the perfectional platform and do not enter the cycle of birth and death again."

CC Madhya 24.213, Translation:

“"Those who follow the path of great, saintly mystic yogīs take to the yogic gymnastic process and begin worshiping from the abdomen, where it is said that Brahman is located. Such people are called śārkarākṣa, which means that they are situated in the gross bodily conception. There are also followers of the ṛṣi known as Āruṇa. Following his path, they observe the activities of the arteries. Thus they gradually rise to the heart, where subtle Brahman, Paramātmā, is situated. They then worship Him. O unlimited Ananta! Better than these persons are the mystic yogīs who worship You from the top of their heads. Beginning with the abdomen and proceeding through the heart, they reach the top of the head and pass through the brahma-randhra, the hole at the top of the skull. Thus these yogīs attain the perfectional platform and do not enter the cycle of birth and death again."

CC Antya-lila

CC Antya 14.51, Purport:

In this verse, the outward activities of the kāpālika mendicants have been described, but not their actual life. The kāpālika mendicants are tantric materialists who carry skulls in their hands. They are not Vaiṣṇavas and have nothing to do with spiritual life; therefore they are untouchable. Only an outward comparison has been made between the mind and their activities, but their behavior should never be imitated.

Easy Journey to Other Planets

Easy Journey to Other Planets 1:

At the critical time of death, one can place the vital force between the two eyebrows and decide where he wants to go. If he is reluctant to maintain any connection with the material world, he can, in less than a second, reach the transcendental Vaikuṇṭha and appear there completely in his spiritual body which will be suitable for him in the spiritual atmosphere. He has simply to desire to leave the material world in both finer and grosser forms and then move the vital force to the topmost part of the skull and leave the body from the hole in the skull called the brahma-randhra. This is the highest perfection in the practice of yoga.

Of course man is endowed with free will, and as such if he does not want to free himself of the material world he may enjoy the life of brahma-pāda (occupation of the post of Brahmā) and visit Siddhaloka, the planets of materially perfect beings who have full abilities to control gravity, space, time, etc. To visit these higher planets in the material universe, one need not give up his mind and intelligence (finer matter), but need only give up grosser matter (the material body).

Krsna, The Supreme Personality of Godhead

Krsna Book 12:

While the demon was trying to smash Kṛṣṇa and His companions, Kṛṣṇa heard the demigods crying "Alas! Alas!" and He immediately began to expand Himself within the throat of the demon. Although he had a gigantic body, the demon choked by the expanding of Kṛṣṇa. His big eyes moved violently, and he quickly suffocated. His life air could not come out from any source, and ultimately it burst out of a hole in the upper part of his skull. Thus his life air passed off. After the demon was dead, Kṛṣṇa, with His transcendental glance alone, brought all the boys and calves back to consciousness and came with them out of the mouth of the demon. While Kṛṣṇa was within the mouth of Aghāsura, the demon's spirit soul came out like a dazzling light, illuminating all directions, and waited in the sky. As soon as Kṛṣṇa came out of the mouth of the demon with His calves and friends, that glittering effulgent light immediately merged into the body of Kṛṣṇa within the vision of all the demigods.

Bhagavad-gita As It Is Lectures

Lecture on BG 2.46-62 -- Los Angeles, December 16, 1968:

Prabhupāda: Yes, it is imagination. If you just open your skull, you will find no lotus there. (laughter) So it is your imagination, that's all. These imaginations are prescribed for persons who are too much absorbed in this bodily concept of life. "Here is a lotus, here is a manaḥ sarovara, and here is ocean of bliss, here is... Oh, you have to find out." Just to make him concentrate. Just like a naughty boy, to make him stop nonsense doing, "Please sit down here. Stop this all." Our proposition, "I am not this body. Even there is lotus, I don't care for it." Do you follow? I am not this body. Even there is lotus, what I have to do with this lotus? My first proposition is I am not this body.

Guest/Devotee: But in, I think, in air, in the Bhagavad-gītā somewhere it says that at death you're supposed to, uh, concentrate on the air at the top of the head, which...

Prabhupāda: That concentration, in the Bhagavad-gītā I do not know where it is, but in the yoga system the concentration is to think of Him, Viṣṇu. Not of the lotus in the head. Yes?

Lecture on BG 6.11-21 -- New York, September 7, 1966:

Sometimes it is recommended that yoga system is meditation in the void. But we do not find in the Vedic literature that yoga system meditation on void. No. It is meditation on Viṣṇu. That will be explained in the Bhagavad-gītā. Now, after sitting in a secluded place, in a sanctified place, and according to the sitting arrangement, with tigerskin or deerskin and straw, as it is recommended, then one should sit down there. He should not change his āsana, sitting place. Then after sitting, what he has to do? He says, samaṁ kāya-śiro-grīvaṁ dhārayann acalaṁ sthiraḥ (Bg. 6.13-14). Now, one has to sit down straight. One has to sit down straight so that his skull, this head, and the body, and everything should be straight like that. Samaṁ kāya-grīvam. Grīva means this neck. The neck and the skull and the body should be in one straight line. Samaṁ kāya-śiro-grīvaṁ dhārayann acalam. And should not move. Sit down like this. Samprekṣya nāsikāgram. And one has to see the top portion of the nose. Not that one has to close his eyes completely. No. Then you cannot see. Samprekṣya nāsikā agram. You have to see the upper portion of the nose. That means if you... I have seen in some of the yogic societies, they close the eyes completely, and some of them, about fifty percent of them are snoozing, or sleeping, regularly.

Lecture on BG 6.11-21 -- New York, September 7, 1966:

Here it is said that in order to keep yourself alive, you have to always see the upper portion of your nose. Samprekṣya nāsikāgraṁ svaṁ diśaś cānavalokayan. And you cannot see that who is coming there, "Oh, who is here? Some tiger is coming or something is coming?" No. No fear. Because you are put in a Himalaya, in a secluded place, and in a sanctified place. So you haven't got to, for any other reason, you haven't got to move your neck. That is not possible in the society. You must have to go in a secluded place. There are so many disturbance. At once, disturbance is there and I have to look, "Who is there?" This is the position here. But here it is said that you cannot move your head. You have to sit down straight, that your neck and skull and body should be in one straight line, and you have to see the upper portion of your nose always. That is the system. Praśāntātmā vigata-bhīr brahmacāri-vrate sthitaḥ (Bg. 6.13-14). Then one should be undisturbed in mind. A man who is always disturbed in mind, he cannot perform yoga. That is not possible. And vigata-bhīḥ. Bhīḥ means fearfulness. One who has no fear. If he has got fear, then how he can go out of home in the jungle? That is not possible. That is another qualification for executing yoga. Not only for yoga. Any person who is trying to elevate himself in the spiritual line, he has to become fearless. Vigata-bhīḥ.

Srimad-Bhagavatam Lectures

Lecture on SB 1.3.1 -- Vrndavana, November 14, 1972:

Therefore the sane man, one who has got good brain, su-medhas... Su-medhas and alpa-medhas. Medhas means brain substance. Su-medhasaḥ. Su-medhasaḥ. There is a word, the su-medhasaḥ. They... Yes. Saṅkīrtana-prāyair yajanti hi su-medhasaḥ (SB 11.5.32). Su-medhasaḥ. And there is another word: alpa-medhasaḥ. Antavat tu phalaṁ teṣāṁ tad bhavaty alpa-medhasām (BG 7.23). Su-medhasaḥ means good brain, and alpa-medhas means rascal, less brain substance. Sometimes we say, chastise, that "Your brain, your, this skull, filled up with cow dung. There is no brain substance." So those whose brains are filled up with cow dung, they want to exploit this material world. It is impossible. It is not possible. Under certain pleas only, that "This political party will give you better chance for exploiting." But you cannot do that. It is not possible. This is called māyā. In illusion, I'm thinking, "If I make certain more progress..." We see, in America, they're increasing the number of motorcars and the problem is road. One flyway above another flyway, another another. The flyway construction is going on perpetually. Is it not?

Lecture on SB 1.8.18 -- New York, April 10, 1973:

So meditation means concentrating the mind to find out God, where He is within my heart. That is real perfection of yoga. So people do not know this science. Here it is nicely explained that antar bahir avasthitam. The virāḍ-rūpa... Just like Arjuna wanted to see the gigantic form of God. He showed him. So we can see the gigantic form in this universe. That is described in the Bhāgavatam. You have read that the big, big mountains, hills, they are the bones of the gigantic form. So they are described. The highest planetary system, Brahmaloka, is the head, or what it is called? Skull? What is this portion? Skull. So the rivers are the veins. The seas are holes like here we have got. In this way it is all described, the gigantic form. So... And gigantic form, at the same time, He is within your heart, very small form.

Lecture on SB 1.8.30 -- Los Angeles, April 22, 1973:

Just like we have got in our body some part raised by the bones, similarly these big, big mountains and hills, they have been described as the bones. And the big, big oceans they have been described as different holes in the body, down and up. Similarly the Brahmaloka is the skull, upper skull.

So one who cannot see God, they have been advised to see God in so many ways. These are the instruction in the Vedic literature. Because you can simply conceive of God, the great... The greatness... You also do not know how great He is. So in your conception of greatness... Just like the very high mountains, the sky, the big, big planet. So the description is there. You can think of. That is also Kṛṣṇa consciousness. If you think that: "This mountain is the bone of Kṛṣṇa," that is also Kṛṣṇa consciousness. Actually that is so. If you think that big Pacific Ocean is the navel of Kṛṣṇa. These big, big trees, plants, they are hairs in the body of Kṛṣṇa.

Lecture on SB 1.8.30 -- Los Angeles, April 22, 1973:

Because you can simply conceive of God, the great... The greatness... You also do not know how great He is. So in your conception of greatness... Just like the very high mountains, the sky, the big, big planet. So the description is there. You can think of. That is also Kṛṣṇa consciousness. If you think that: "This mountain is the bone of Kṛṣṇa," that is also Kṛṣṇa consciousness. Actually that is so. If you think that big Pacific Ocean is the navel of Kṛṣṇa. These big, big trees, plants, they are hairs in the body of Kṛṣṇa. Then the head, the skull of Kṛṣṇa, is the Brahmaloka. The sole is the Pātālaloka. Similarly... This is mahato mahīyān. When you think of Kṛṣṇa as the greater than the greatest, you can think like this. And if you think Kṛṣṇa is both, smaller than the smallest. That is also greatness. That is also greatness. Kṛṣṇa can manufacture this gigantic cosmic manifestation and He can manufacture also a small insect, smaller than the point.

Arrival Addresses and Talks

Arrival Address -- Paris, June 8, 1974:

This earth, water, air. Just like you have got your bones, the huge earth mountain, that is also another bone of this gigantic body. As you have got your hairs on the body, the millions and millions of trees and plants, they are also the hairs on the gigantic body. So as you have got holes in your body here, there, and the navel, similarly these oceans and seas, they are also different holes. So they are described—it is not my imagination—they are described in the Bhagavad-gī..., Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, Second Canto, to conceive the gigantic body. As you have got your skull, the round skull, the whole, I mean to say, hemisphere is also skull of this gigantic body. It is similar. As you have got a body and you, the soul, is the important thing, active principle within this body, similarly this gigantic body, the active principle is there, that is we call from the śāstra Garbhodakaśāyī Viṣṇu, the same comparison. But because they are mūḍha, rascal, they cannot understand. No brain. We have no brain, we are all not very intelligent. But we can understand if there is the active principle soul within this body, there must be a Supersoul within this huge structure of body. And that is called God. Mohitaṁ nābhijānāti mām ebhyaḥ param avyayam (BG 7.13). Those who are bewildered, narādhamāḥ. Narādhamāḥ, the lowest of the mankind. These things cannot be understood by the cats and dogs.

Philosophy Discussions

Philosophy Discussion on Arthur Schopenhauer:

Hayagrīva: As to the identity of life and death, he says, "The wisest of all philosophies, the Indian, expresses this by giving to the very God that symbolizes destruction, death, by giving, I say to Śiva, as an attribute not only the necklace of skulls but also the liṅgam, the symbol of generation, which appears here as the counterpart of death, thus signifying that generation and death are essentially correlatives which reciprocally neutralize and annul each other." So it's not death that is the solution.

Prabhupāda: Then what is?

Hayagrīva: What dies will be born again.

Prabhupāda: So what is the solution?

Hayagrīva: The solution is the annihilation of the will to live.

Prabhupāda: How it is possible? So long the living entity is alive, he, he will will, some sort of willing. So that means the willing party, the living being, he is eternal, and the willing, this activity, has to be purified. Then his life will be happy. Willing cannot be stopped, because he is eternal. But he is wrongly willing; therefore he is unhappy. When he will come to the position of willing rightly, then he will be happy.

1973 Conversations and Morning Walks

Morning Walk -- April 20, 1973, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: No, no. Anthropology. There's a department...

Svarūpa Dāmodara: Anthropologists study with the skulls and...

Prabhupāda: Oh, oh. This is...

Karandhara: Ecology?

Svarūpa Dāmodara: Yes.

Prabhupāda: Anthropology. It is a false theory, and upon this so many universities are spending money, professors. Thousands. Rascal theory. You see. In this way, they're wasting money. Śrama eva hi kevalam (SB 1.2.8). Aviśuddha-buddhayaḥ (SB 10.2.32).

Karandhara: They always have to revise their theories because about every few years they find something new which contradicts everything they have said before.

Prabhupāda: Yes. That is their intelligence.

1974 Conversations and Morning Walks

Morning Walk -- January 22, 1974, Hawaii:

Prabhupāda: But where they will get fossils of old intelligent men?

Satsvarūpa: Well, they say that they've found just skulls of very primitive men...

Prabhupāda: No, no, you cannot find because according to Vedic culture, the body's burned into ashes. Where you'll get the bones and fossils?

Bali Mardana: You only come up with the primitive ones who are not civilized.

Prabhupāda: We understand from the writings, not from the fossils and bones. The bones and fossils are already finished, but they kept their writing.

Bali Mardana: Only the uncivilized people were buried.

Prabhupāda: Suppose I am writing books. In future if you could not find my bones and fossils, but the books will prove what I was. So we have got the books. That is the real bones and fossils.

Bali Mardana: They try to disprove...

Prabhupāda: They cannot find out bones and fossils of Kṛṣṇa. Now, why they accept?

Room Conversation -- March 16, 1974, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: Oh.

Guest: You know, two serpent's heads are together like this, making her face, and then she wears a skirt of skulls.

Prabhupāda: Oh, skulls.

Guest: Skulls.

Prabhupāda: They're practicing Mahā-kālī.

Guest: Like Mahā-kālī, yes.

Prabhupāda: That is worship. That is (indistinct)?

Guest: Well before, when the Spanish were there.

Prabhupāda: Oh.

Guest: Name is Papinque(?).

Prabhupāda: Oh.

Morning Walk -- April 6, 1974, Bombay:

Bhāgavata: In 1972. His name is Professor Leakey. He is from, I think, America. And he has found in Kenya one skull two million years old. (break)

Prabhupāda: Hare Kṛṣṇa. When our book was published?

Girirāja: This was in about seventy...

Bhāgavata: 1970 it came out.

Prabhupāda: (break) ...you discover.

Girirāja: March 31st, 1970.

Prabhupāda: So? (break) ...civilization.

Bhāgavata: You are giving all the information, cent percent.

Prabhupāda: (break) ...win's theory is that from that lower animals to go to the higher animals, but in the creation we find Brahmā is the first creation. So he is the topmost intelligent man.

Reporters Interview -- June 29, 1974, Melbourne:

Prabhupāda: Yes. There are different airs within the body and controlling the airs and putting this soul... Soul is already floating in the air. So the yogi mystic process can bring the soul from different places, and then they bring it here and they ascertain where he has to go, and then, from this hole... What is called, this hole?

Madhudviṣa: Brahma-randhra.

Prabhupāda: Brahma-randhra, we say.

Satsvarūpa: Skull.

Devotee: Cerebellum? Cerebral...?

Prabhupāda: There is some hole. From that hole the soul goes out to any planet he likes. That is perfection of yoga. But here in your country the yoga means a certain type of exercise. Yes.

Guest (2): And this path of devotional yoga, bhakti-yoga, that is the path for this time, for this age?

Prabhupāda: Yes. Bhakti-yoga is the real yoga.

1975 Conversations and Morning Walks

Conversation with Devotees -- April 14, 1975, Hyderabad:

Brahmānanda: Very thick skulls and very small brains.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Almost like a ape.

Prabhupāda: That's all right. There was a big animal. So what is the difference? They are animals, big or small. You have seen a skeleton of pygmy man also. So where is that man now? You have seen pygmy man, you don't require archeological. So where is that man?

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: No, they don't live any more. Now we are more intelligent. Previously there were pygmy men, very less intelligent, small, not nice looking. Now we have got more...

Prabhupāda: According to our śāstra you are going to be pygmy men. That is, there is proof, because you are not as strong as your forefathers. That's a fact. You are becoming dwarfer, dwarfer. According to our śāstra you come to that pygmy, (indistinct) in due course of time. As it was before, so again the time is repeating, history repeating.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Then that means our pygmy men were from a previous Kali-yuga?

Prabhupāda: Yes. We say there was Kali-yuga. Four yugas are changing.

Morning Walk -- July 11, 1975, Chicago:

Prabhupāda: But then you cannot do that. If you have seen all the bones, then you can conclude. You say, "Some of the missing." So how it is fact? You did not see it.

Satsvarūpa: Just this year they found a skull that was millions of years older than any human skull they found before.

Prabhupāda: That's all right. But still, you cannot say that you have seen all the skulls. That is not possible.

Devotee: They will say they have not even found one skull from the Vedic culture.

Prabhupāda: Oh. No, Vedic culture do not keep skull, they burn it. Therefore there is no opportunity for you to see the Vedic culture. Then you become defective. Because you cannot see the skulls of Vedic culture. We burn it. So therefore your conclusion is defective.

Harikeśa: So the only bones they find are the bones of the fifth, sixth, seventh-class men.

Prabhupāda: Yes, of the monkey-class men. (laughter) That's all. Therefore you conclude that the man comes from monkey. That is the conclu... Human being, Vedic culture, they burn it. So they have no opportunity to see the human being skull. The monkeys, they do not burn. So he has seen only the monkey skull, and his conclusion is, "Man is from monkey."

Morning Walk -- July 11, 1975, Chicago:

Prabhupāda: Yes. Yes, he finds, (laughter) like that. So it is dog's philosophy. Hare Kṛṣṇa. (break) ...history in the I.A., intermediate. So a big professor, Dr. Kalidasa Nath, he began to speak, "There was stone age, simply stone there was," in this way. And I immediately..., that "What nonsense you are speaking, stone? There was nothing?" According to the anthropology of Darwin... From the very beginning, when I was a student, I did not believe this Darwin's theory. (break) ...study one after another, chronologically, as Darwin says, skull, it is not possible at all. For any single man it is not possible.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: 8,400,000 species.

Prabhupāda: Yes. Has he gone down the water? Then what is the...? simply speculation.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Factual scientific study would mean to study all 8,400,000 species?

Prabhupāda: Yes, that is scientific study. But that is not possible. Therefore your theory is always imperfect because you cannot say that "I have studied all." You simply guess, "There is some gap, millions of years." So this is not study.

Brahmānanda: They say even there's a missing link, a part that they cannot explain. So they admit...

Prabhupāda: So that is not science.

Harikeśa: It's the most important part too.

Prabhupāda: Therefore we say they are rascals. And rascals will believe.

1976 Conversations and Morning Walks

Garden Conversation -- September 7, 1976, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: Monkey brain?

Caraṇāravindam: Yes. They cut the skull off a live monkey. They cut the skull off like egg and drink the brain through straw. I read in magazine how they do this. It's very common practice now.

Prabhupāda: Where they get this monkeys?

Caraṇāravindam: The monkey's alive and as you drink its brain it dies. They think this is also sport to them. Big horrible demons.

Devotee: In New York, I heard...

Hari-śauri: Andy Warhol. Now... Before I joined the movement I was working on a mining camp and they used to serve out sheep's brains every day. It was a big favorite with the Yugoslavs. Sheep's brains and...

Caraṇāravindam: Hearts.

Prabhupāda: Living sheep and cut?

1968 Correspondence

Letter to Himavati -- Montreal 14 June, 1968:

And offer the same to your good husband. I was so glad to receive the two caps which are very nicely made fitting to my skull, and I am enjoying it everyday in the morning, and when I walk on the street they all look at me due to your cap. Not only your cap but also I am enjoying the shirt made by you. And Lord Jagannatha is also enjoying similarly with cap and ghagara. So Krishna has given you a very good talent and you are sewing expert.

Regarding Kirtana party, I find that the Montreal temple is very suitable for training. So I am trying in Canada for visa, and if it is successful then I shall call you both, husband and wife, for beginning a training class of Kirtana. In the meantime ask your husband to accumulate some money on this account because my next program is to proceed to London with a Kirtana party. It is my duty to help you always in the matter of understanding Krishna Consciousness and whatever I am trying to bestow upon you all is the gift of Lord Krishna directly—I am just doing the work of a bearer. There is nothing of my personal contribution and I ask all your mercy so that I may be able to distribute Krishna's message as it is without any deviation. That will make Krishna, myself, and all others eternally happy. It is so nice, sublime and easy to perform.

1974 Correspondence

Letter to ISKCON Artists -- Bombay 2 May, 1974:

Yes, the inhabitants of a particular Vaikuntha planet have the same arrangement of symbols in the hands. Nanda and Sunanda should hold as follows: lower right: conch, upper right: disc, upper left: club, lower left: flower.

13. Pracetas should be not clean shaven, but with beards as mendicants.

Siva is different colors. Not always yellow. There are eleven kinds of Rudras.

14. No, Siva should not be wearing a garland of skulls. Yes, he can be wearing a short dhoti. 15. They should all be standing around the fire at the sacrificial altar. Do not show the horse there. 16. Yes, although you may not know what Maharaja Prthu or Sita look like, they are present in your paintings due to your consciousness.

I am always pleased and looking forward to seeing more beautiful pictures in our books. In India we make life members simply from the high quality and appearance of our books with illustrations. Our society is unrivalled in this respect and this is your credit who are working so selflessly to illustrate my books.

1976 Correspondence

Letter to Radhavallabha -- Mayapur 3 February, 1976:

There should be no effulgence around Prahlada. Hiranyakasipu should not be shown with a pipe. He was a non-smoker.

3. Krishna killing Sisupala took place inside, not outside.

4. To illustrate Prahlada being protected when he is thrown of the cliff, there should be a semi-visible Krishna waiting below, as if to catch.

5. Yes, you can show dead bones, skulls, and snakes in the dungeon. Prahlada was not actually attacked with the tridents, just threatened.

Please also inform Ramesvara that in future any transfers to Bank of America, Bombay, he should send me a photocopy of the bank advice to wherever I am.