Speculating (Conversations)

Expressions researched:
"speculate" |"speculated" |"speculates" |"speculating"

1971 Conversations and Morning Walks

Room Conversation -- January 17, 1971, Allahabad:

Prabhupāda: Now, the difficulty is don't try to invent something about God. That is not good.

Guest (1): No, not invention.

Prabhupāda: No, you have to take the version of the śāstras; then it will be possible. If you invent something, try to speculate on something, it will not be successful.

Guest (1): I'm not, you see... In the middle, I may be speculating or you see, trying to... Coming to the human aspect itself, now so many want happiness. Happiness is checked up because of...

Prabhupāda: That material coating.

Room Conversation -- January 17, 1971, Allahabad:

Prabhupāda: That you have to learn from the authorized Vedic literature. You cannot imagine. You cannot speculate. You have to learn from authority.

Room Conversation -- January 17, 1971, Allahabad:

Prabhupāda: That is another theory. But the process is, our Vedic process, tad-vijñānārtham sa gurum eva abhigacchet: (MU 1.2.12) "In order to understand tat knowledge one must approach a spiritual master." Gacchet. If you don't accept these principles, then how you can make progress? Tasmād guruṁ prapadyeta jijñāsur śreya uttamam (SB 11.3.21). If you don't accept this principle, there is no possibility. Then you can go on thinking in your own way. There is no question of going to anyone. You make yourself perfect by thinking, as many others are doing, speculating. That is possible but never to the perfectional point.

Room Conversation -- January 17, 1971, Allahabad:

Prabhupāda: Ah... Yes. It is to be learned, just like the electrician learns how to adjust the positive and negative wire, and as soon as it is rightly adjusted there is light. You cannot say, "No, no, why it shall be adjusted like this? It can be done like this." Oh, that will not give you light. You cannot speculate on the science. One plus... Two plus two equal to four. You cannot speculate, "Oh, can it not be three? Cannot be five?" No, that is not possible. You have to accept this two plus two equal to four. So the same example: so long it was not being adjusted to the right point, there was no light. So this adjustment... Suppose there is failure in my home. For this adjustment I have to call an experienced man. You may be a lawyer, you may be very nice thinker, but so far electricity is concerned, you have to call for a mistrī, who may not be learned like you but he knows the art, how to do it, expert. Similarly, such a vast subject to understand God, you do not require the help of an expert?

Room Conversation -- January 17, 1971, Allahabad:

Prabhupāda: Janmanā jāyate śūdraḥ saṁskārad bhaved dvijaḥ. Unfortunately there is no saṁskāra at the present moment. So therefore they remain śūdra. A śūdra means fourth-class. So how a fourth-class man can speculate on the science of God?

Guest (2): But śūdras are not allowed to upanayana-saṁskāra.

Prabhupāda: No. No, no, no. Now, don't take that way. One who does not take saṁskāra, he is śūdra, because janmanā jāyate śūdraḥ. Everyone is born śūdra. But if one does not accept the saṁskāras, he remains a śūdra, not that śūdras are not allowed to take saṁskāra. Then how it is, that janmanā jāyate śūdraḥ?

Room Conversation -- January 17, 1971, Allahabad:

Prabhupāda: Yes. It is already there but when you see, you see, you see that it is birth. The sunrise is already somewhere, and the sunset is also already somewhere but in your angle of vision there is no sun. That is going on. Similarly, Kṛṣṇa's birth, every moment; Kṛṣṇa's disappearance, every moment; Kṛṣṇa's existence, every moment. You have to learn that. Therefore Kṛṣṇa said, janma karma me divyam (BG 4.9), transcendental. Yo janati tattvataḥ. Anyone who knows it perfectly, in truth, he becomes liberated. If you have known Kṛṣṇa, then you are liberated. But Kṛṣṇa knowing is not so easy. Manuṣyāṇāṁ sahasreṣu kaścid yatati siddhaye yatatām api siddhānāṁ kaścid vetti māṁ tattvataḥ (BG 7.3). It is very difficult to understand Kṛṣṇa in truth. Then how one can understand? That is also stated: bhaktyā mām abhijānāti yāvān yaś cāsmi tattvataḥ (BG 18.55). Not by speculation of knowledge. Bhaktya. And what is that bhakti? Anyābhilaṣita-śunyaṁ jñāna-karmādy-anāvṛtam, ānukūlyena kṛṣṇānuśīlānaṁ bhaktir uttama (CC Madhya 19.167)(Brs. 1.1.11). So these things you have to learn. Then there is possibility of knowledge, tad-vijñāna. The difficulty is at the present moment the theory that everyone can invent his way of understanding God. He can speculate. Therefore there is chaos.

Room Conversation -- February 17, 1971, Gorakhpur:

Prabhupāda: No. Don't speculate. You should immediately refer the matter to your spiritual master.

Devotee: Then I would be asking you questions all day long and you'd have no time to do anything else. (laughter)

Prabhupāda: No. You are welcome. You are welcome.

Room Conversation with Dr. Weir of the Mensa Society -- September 5, 1971, London:

Prabhupāda: For example, for example, our boys, Europeans, American boys, they were addicted with illicit sex life. They were addicted to meat-eating. They were addicted drinking. They were addicted to gambling. Now they've given up everything. There is no illicit sex in our society. There is no gambling. There is no meat-eating. There is not even smoking, or taking, drinking tea. How it is possible? They were addicted to all these things from beginning of their life. Now they have given up. If you take this as good qualities, then they have already developed, besides others. Why? Because due to Kṛṣṇa consciousness. Sometimes in America the authorities they are surprised. They want to consult us on that: "How you people have given up this (indistinct)." They are spending so much money to stop this bad habit. How it is that your members used to (indistinct) Not only LSD, all kinds of intoxications. So if you take it as a good quality, that good quality is developing due to Kṛṣṇa consciousness. Therefore this is a fact: one who has no Kṛṣṇa consciousness, or God consciousness, he may go on speculating but he'll never come to the platform of goodness. That is our test.

Room Conversation -- December 11, 1971, New Delhi:

Prabhupāda: Therefore it should be concluded that the so-called scientists, astronomers, they are all imperfect, and they are passing off the scientists as learned. So you can challenge them, "What is the guarantee that your knowledge is perfect?" Actually it is not. They do not know how the stars are moving. They are always imperfect. Simply putting some theories. They say all this, Darwin's theory and this theory, that theory. They are simply speculating on imperfect senses, and therefore they're cheating, because the conditioned soul has got a tendency to cheat others. If one can cheat others, he thinks himself as very intelligent. The conditioned souls, they commit mistake, they are illusioned, they cheat, and their senses are imperfect. This is the, the four condition. Therefore, if we receive knowledge from the conditioned soul, there is no possibility of getting perfect knowledge. If by nature you are cheater, then how I can expect fair dealings? It is to be understood that we cannot have any fair dealings with this conditioned soul. And he'll protest.

1972 Conversations and Morning Walks

Room Conversation -- April 2, 1972, Sydney:

Prabhupāda:

ekale īśvara kṛṣṇa, āra saba bhṛtya

yāre yaiche nācāya, se taiche kare nṛtya

(CC Adi 5.142)

Kṛṣṇa is so kind. As Māyāvādī philosopher you want to do something, Kṛṣṇa will "All right, dance in this way. Dance, all right dance. You talk like this." Kṛṣṇa gives him capacity to talk. Otherwise, he cannot talk even. So Kṛṣṇa gives him intelligence, counterargument: "All right, let the rascal speak as he likes." Therefore, yāre yaiche nācāya, He is allowing to dance everyone as he desires. But He says that "You give up all this nonsense, you simply surrender unto Me." That is His verse. Otherwise, if you want to dance, "All right, I give you facility to dance." The karmīs are dancing. "All right, dance." The jñānīs are dancing. "All right, dance. Go on speculating, but you will never understand Me."

Interview -- July 5, 1972, New York:

Prabhupāda: Now, who is that person, or the authority, who is giving that law, who is controlling that law? That is divine search. But that divine search cannot be completed by the speculation of our imperfect senses. Our senses are imperfect; therefore whatever knowledge we gather by speculating our imperfect senses, that is imperfect. Just like the sun. The sun is very big, bigger, fourteen hundred thousand times bigger than this earth, but with our imperfect eyes we see just like a disk. If we remain satisfied with this imperfect knowledge, then we remain in darkness. We have to know the sun from the astronomer. They have calculated. They know. In this way knowledge, perfect knowledge, can be attained—when it is received through the perfect knower, not by speculation. That speculation means I shall speculate with limited mind and imperfect senses. So however carefully or expertly I manage with the instruments, they are themselves imperfect. Therefore Vedic sastra says that to understand the divine you must have divine mercy. You must possess. Athāpi te deva padāmbuja-dvaya-prasāda-leśānugṛhīta eva hi jānāti tattvaṁ (SB 10.14.29). One can understand the truth by the grace of... So searching after divine means we must search after the grace of the divine. Just like a very big man, just like President Nixon. So I am speculating that President Nixon is like that, like that, like this, his function is like that, he eats like this, he sleeps like this. That is speculation. But if I hear directly from President Nixon or his representative, very confidential representative, then it is perfect knowledge. I cannot speculate to know about President Nixon by my imperfect senses.

Interview -- July 5, 1972, New York:

Prabhupāda: They, although they are proud of education, but they do not discuss what is the constitutional position of the soul, how he is transferring from one body to another, how it is to be done. This science is unknown to the modern education. Is it not? They do not know. They simply speculate. That is the defect of modern educational system, and actually everyone is seeking for spiritual emancipation. Therefore in your country, in spite of so many big, big universities, you are producing hippies, hopeless population. Am I saying right or not? Your are university teacher. I have seen in so many universities.

Interview with the New York Times -- September 2, 1972, New Vrindaban:

Prabhupāda: When we speak of Kṛṣṇa, we mean God. Everyone has some vague idea of God, but no clear idea. Therefore God descends to show what He is. If we speculate on God, someone will think one thing and another person will think another. This is the result of speculation. But if God Himself comes and shows Himself as He is and speaks about Himself, that is perfect knowledge. This Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement is spreading that message. God Himself is speaking about Himself: "I am like this; I am like this; My form is like this; My activities are like this; My address is this and that—if you like you can come back to Me. This is the situation. Everyone can come to Me." All this information is there in Bhagavad-gītā As It Is. In Bhagavad-gītā God speaks about Himself and presents Himself as He is.

Morning Walk Conversation -- September 28, 1972, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: Naturalist. Anyway, you can call him a philosopher. So the basic point is wrong. Starting is wrong. Starting point is mistake and illusion. Therefore, the next point is cheating. If you start from wrong conception of life, then if you distribute knowledge, that means cheating. You do not know, still you are distributing knowledge. But this rascal Darwin, he has no clear idea. He is simply theorizing, speculating, and misleading people. Therefore, he is cheating. So if I cheat you and you cheat me, then how you can expect perfection of life? It is a society of cheating, and that is actually going on. Everyone is thinking, "How I have gorgeous way cheated you." That is politics, diplomacy. If you can cheat your friend very cleverly, then you are supposed to be very big man. Big lawyer means the law is there, but if he can cheat the law, then he is big lawyer.

1973 Conversations and Morning Walks

Morning Walk -- April 25, 1973, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: Yasyāsti bhaktir bhagavaty akiñcanā sarvair guṇais tatra samāsate surāḥ, harāv abhaktasya kuto mahad-guṇā manorathena... Manorathena (SB 5.18.12). These rascals, they are simply speculating on the mental platform. That's all. Manorathenāsati dhāvato bahiḥ (SB 5.18.12). They are entrapped by the external energy, by mental speculation. They have no value. All these scientists, philosophers, they're on the mental platform, speculating. I am certi... I say this. You say: "No, I say this." You see.

Morning Walk -- May 2, 1973, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: What is their proof? What they go on, proof?

Svarūpa Dāmodara: They are just speculating that life started spontaneously. There was a time, they said, it started all spontaneously, only once.

Prabhupāda: That's all right. But life, whether begins from life or matter? That is the question. You are saying that life started from matter. We are saying life started from life. How to make solution of this question? For life starting from life, we can see practically. Birds, beasts, human beings, they are begetting children, eggs. The life from life, he's a living entity. That we have got proof. But where is the proof that life started from the matter? Where is that proof? Just give one instance that "Here is a life starting from matter." Where is that instance? Anyway, at least one audience protested. It will be recorded. And he said, "I do not know."

Conversation with Mr. Wadell -- July 10, 1973, London:

Prabhupāda: But if there is clear idea, why they should not take it? Why they should speculate "perhaps," "maybe"?

Mr. Wadell: But there are many things about which I cannot have any clear idea. I cannot...

Prabhupāda: No, you cannot have but if you get clear idea, why you do not take it.

Room Conversation with Reporter from Researchers Magazine -- July 24, 1973, London:

Prabhupāda: So this is government's duty, that you are claiming that everyone should be employed, everyone should be engaged, in his own occupation. That is called svadharmeṇa idanasya(?). Sva-dharma means the brāhmaṇa, kṣatriya, vaiśya, śūdra. By quality. Guṇa-karma. By quality and work. So it is the duty of the government to see that a śūdra is employed, is engaged as a śūdra, a vaiśya is employed and engaged as... Just like vaiśya. Vaiśya, it is said that kṛṣi-go-rakṣya-vāṇijyaṁ vaiśya-karma svabhāva-jam (BG 18.44). Now the vaiśyas, they are in the share market speculating.

Room Conversation with Indian Ambassador -- September 5, 1973, Stockholm:

Prabhupāda: Yes. Because everyone has speculated in his own way. Therefore we have presented Bhagavad-gītā As It Is. And if you have got time, we can read some of the portions, how we have presented as it is. So people are liking this As It Is. Otherwise, Bhagavad-gītā is well-known in the western country, all over Europe. But because it was not presented as it is, there was not a single devotee of Kṛṣṇa. You find out, the whole history. Bhagavad-gītā is meant for making the reader a devotee of Kṛṣṇa. Is it not?

Ambassador: That's true.

Room Conversation -- September 19, 1973, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: Yes. Bhajanti. Bhajanti means "engaged in devotional service." Bhaja sevāyām. Bhaj-dhātu, this verb, is meant for rendering service. Bhaj-dhātu, kti, bhakti. So bhakta. Bhakti, bhakta and Bhagavān. So these are the mahātmās. But these mahātmās, these bhakta-mahātmās... Actually, mahātmā is bhakta-mahātmā. But there are others, mahātmās; they are also called mahātmās, but they are not mentioned in the Bhāgavata. They have been mentioned anye. Anye means others. Is that verse there? Mahātmānas tu māṁ pārtha (BG 9.13)? No. Anye? Anye means others. The impersonalists, they are also sometimes called mahātmā. But the mahātmā who is kṛṣṇa-bhakta, that is very rare. That is described in the Bhāgavata, sa mahātmā sudurlabhaḥ. There are mahātmās, but the mahātmā who is the devotee of Kṛṣṇa, he is very rare. Sa mahātmā sudurlabhaḥ. Jñānīs they are also mahātmās, speculating what is the Absolute Truth.

Morning Walk -- December 3, 1973, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: Floating where. Wherefrom the sky came? They are all nonsense. Simply speculating and consuming cheap money from the government. That's all. This is their business. The government is exacting taxes from the hard-working men, and these rascals are devouring this money. That's all. And making theories. That's all.

Hṛdayānanda: There was one big scandal where they found out all the scientists were just taking money. Even by material standards it was unnecessary. It was a very big scandal.

Prabhupāda: It must be they are scandals. They are after money. That's all. Not after knowledge. And what knowledge they have got? Simply speculating and befooling other fools. Andhā yathāndhair upanīyamānāḥ (SB 7.5.31). This is their business. One blind man is befooling other blind men. That's all.

Morning Walk -- December 6, 1973, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: That, that we accept, that ataḥ śrī-kṛṣṇa-nāmādi na bhaved grāhyam indriyaiḥ: (Brs. 1.2.234) We cannot speculate about God with our imperfect senses. But that does not mean we should not know god. We cannot speculate, but there is process of knowing God. That is from God. When He says, "I am like this," that's all. You have to accept that. You cannot speculate. You cannot create. Just like a big man, a big master, nobody knows how many millions of dollars he has got. They are speculating. His servants are speculating, "Master may have so many millions. Master may have so many..." But that is all imperfect. When the master says, "I have got so much, so many millions," that is perfect. All other speculation, they're all imperfect. So our Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement, we are not speculating.

Morning Walk -- December 6, 1973, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: Confusion is not... Chaotic condition, confusion is not proper stage. That is a state of suffering. That is the position at the present moment. Otherwise, why they are fighting, nation to nation, man to man, group to group, community to community, diplomat to dip...? They're simply fighting like cats and dogs. This is not perfect society. Simply ca... They can say dogs. They can simply make barking, "Whowf! Whowf! Whowf! Whowf!" That is not perfect society. Human society should be sober. That is Vedic civilization.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: But one should follow the standard morality. When that standard set is lacking or it fails to understand, then people try to speculate their own thing.

Prabhupāda: Yes. No. Nobody's following any standard. Just like these Western people, mostly Christians. It is clearly stated in the Bible, "Thou shalt not kill." They're simply killing. Their only business is killing.

Room Conversation with Latin Professor -- December 9, 1973, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: I see. So... Oh, you have no seat? They are giving him? All right. So from Bhagavad-gītā we understand that Bha... Just like in this planet we are so many persons, or the President Nixon is the President. Similarly, in every planet there are living entities, and the President of the sun planet is called Vivasvān. So he was instructed by Kṛṣṇa long, long ago. In the higher planetary system, the time is different. That was proved when the Russian aeronautics were on the sky. In one hour twenty-five minutes, he went round the earth, twice or thrice, like that. So time is different. So the point is... Just like the sunshine is impersonal, the sun is localized, and the president of the sun globe is a person, similarly, the Absolute Truth is realized in three phases. Brahmeti paramātmeti bhagavān iti śabdyate (SB 1.2.11). The first realization is impersonal, then localized, and then personal. So ultimately, God is person. And that is Kṛṣṇa. So we are hearing directly from the Supreme Personality of Godhead about Godhead, and that is perfect knowledge. If you speak yourself about yourself, that is my perfect knowledge of yourself. And if I simply speculate that "Professor may be like this, like that," that is not perfect. I am speculating, but if you come to me, "Swamiji, I am like this," then my knowledge is perfect. Otherwise, I can go on speculating for millions of years. Still, my knowledge is imperfect. So we cannot manufacture God; neither we can speculate.

Morning Walk -- December 21, 1973, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: So these rascals will change every year their theology. So what is the value of their words? Childish. (break) ...changes, he is a rascal. That is our... We say, "Kṛṣṇa the Supreme." We never change it. And "Surrender is the only process." We shall never change it. In any circumstance we will not change it. That is the difference. And these rascals will change every year their opinion. They are rascals. (break) ...They are rascals. (break) Kṛṣṇa said that "I am the Supreme." So Arjuna accepted, the Supreme. All the ācāryas accepted the Supreme. Caitanya Mahāprabhu accepted, Supreme. My Guru Mahārāja accepted, Supreme. I am accepting, Supreme. I am teaching the same thing. So there is no change. Not that after a few years it will be changed. That never be. That is our position. (break) Changing means material. Anything material is susceptible to change. Like this material body. I am changing my body, but I am the spirit soul. I am not changing. That is the difference. So all these so-called theologicians, they have no idea what is spiritual knowledge. All rascals. They cannot understand what is God. That I have explained. Simply speculating.

1974 Conversations and Morning Walks

Morning Walk -- January 3, 1974, Los Angeles:

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.

Morning Walk -- January 9, 1974, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: And therefore, mental speculators, they have been condemned. Manorathenāsati dhāvato bahiḥ (SB 5.18.12). Because they carry on, or they are carried by the chariot of mind, manorathena. Manorathena asati. Manoratha, when you drive on the chariot of mind, you cannot get any fixed idea. Because mind is flickering. Saṅkalpa-vikalpa. Mind's business is "Accept this, and again reject it." So all these speculators are doing. Somebody is putting forward some theory, and after some years he will himself reject or somebody else will reject. So manorathena, by mental speculation, you remain on the material platform. You cannot get any spiritual idea. Therefore harāv abhaktasya kuto mahad-guṇāḥ. Anyone who is not in the spiritual platform... Spiritual platform means to be a devotee of the Lord. The Māyāvādīs, because they are not devotees of the Lord, they are not on the spiritual platform. They are on the material platform. They are speculating, spirit—"something negation of matter." That's all. That is mental speculation. It is bad. "Good means negation of bad."

Morning Walk -- January 9, 1974, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: No. Yes.

Umāpati: They just constantly speculate on the material nature.

Prabhupāda: Eh?

Umāpati: They speculate on the material nature.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Umāpati: And they can never be spiritual.

Prabhupāda: No, no.

Umāpati: Just always material.

Prabhupāda: Number of zeroes never make one. It is zero. You add thousands of zeroes, one after another, the value will be zero. Not one.

Morning Walk -- March 9, 1974, Mayapura:

Guest (2): Speculate...

Guest (4): They like to convey...

Prabhupāda: They do not know what is Bhagavad-gītā, but they can say it is added and subtracted. They're... But they do not know what is Bhagavad-gītā. Yes.

Morning Walk -- March 31, 1974, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: From all aspects. Yathā jñāsyasi tac chṛṇu. So Kṛṣṇa is speaking about Himself. We can speculate about God. That way we'll never be successful. Because we have got limited senses. Therefore you hear from Kṛṣṇa about Kṛṣṇa. This is called bhakti-yoga.

Room Conversation with Catholic Cardinal and Secretary to the Pope -- May 24, 1974, Rome:

Prabhupāda: Yes. Our movement is that, that is first-class religious system which teaches how to love God. This is the sum and substance of our movement. There is a Sanskrit statement in Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam,

sa vai puṁsāṁ paro dharmo

yato bhaktir adhokṣaje

ahaituky apratihatā

yayātmā suprasīdati

(SB 1.2.6)

If you want to be happy, then you must take to the superior type of religious system which teaches the followers how to love God without any motive, and which is never checked by any material condition. God's name is given here as Adhokṣaja. Adhokṣaja means beyond experimental knowledge. God has got many name according to different situation, and one of the name, for the materialistic person, adhokṣaja. Akṣaja means experimental knowledge. Akṣa means eyes or senses. Beyond sense perception. So we cannot speculate about God, but we can understand about God from authorities.

Room Conversation with Monsieur Roost, Hatha-yogi -- May 31, 1974, Geneva:

Prabhupāda: So bhakti school does not very much appreciate the speculative method. They surrender and they try to get knowledge directly from the Supreme Lord, as Bhagavad-gītā is being spoken by the Supreme Lord, or statements of the pure highly elevated devotees, just like Brahmā is speaking. This way. Hearing. The main purpose is hearing, hearing from the right source. That is... Especially in the western world, instead of hearing from the right source, they want to speculate about the Absolute. We have got about twenty books like this, but they are not speculation. They are simply by hearing. I am writing what I have heard, not that I am speculating. Mostly, the philosophers, they write as they speculate. They write their own opinion. But our process is not that. We don't speculate.

Room Conversation with Russian Orthodox Church Representative -- June 13, 1974, Paris:

Prabhupāda: Yes, the Absolute Truth is known by the absolute method which is called śruti, hearing from the Absolute. Absolute cannot be imagined or speculated.

Room Conversation with Professor Durckheim German Spiritual Writer -- June 19, 1974, Germany:

Prabhupāda: No, let them come here. (break) We are publishing all these books, what is spoken by Kṛṣṇa or His representative. We don't speculate, because already there is so much profound knowledge given by Kṛṣṇa and His representative. There is no necessity of researching. If we simply take advantage of things which are already there, we become perfect. I have published about fourteen books like this.

Morning Walk at Marina del Rey -- July 12, 1974, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: Not only one earth, but there are so many. (pause)

Svarūpa Dāmodara: They speculate that at the most the human form of life started about five thousand, about fifty thousand years ago.

1975 Conversations and Morning Walks

Room Conversation with Sanskrit Professor, other Guests and Disciples -- February 12, 1975, Mexico:

Prabhupāda: You simply surrender unto Me. That is real religion." What is the use of speculating on pretending religion. That is not religion at all. Just like pretending law. Law cannot be pretending. Law is law, given by the state. Similarly, religion means the order given by God. That is religion. If you follow, then you are religious. If you don't follow, then you are demon. Make things very simplified. Then it will be appealing to everyone. So this Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement is meant for making things very simplified. Accept God, accept your position as God's servant and serve God. That's all, three words.

Room Conversation with Woman Sanskrit Professor -- February 13, 1975, Mexico:

Prabhupāda: Our position is—I have already explained—that we are all imperfect. Therefore we have to take knowledge from the perfect. So God is perfect, or Kṛṣṇa is perfect, so we have to receive knowledge from Him. Then our knowledge is perfect. And so long we shall speculate, that is not perfect because you are speculating with imperfect instruments, what is the use? If I want to cut this table, I must have proper instrument. If I want to cut this table with this book, "Let me cut this," how it will be possible? You must know that for cutting this table it requires this instrument.

Room Conversation with Woman Sanskrit Professor -- February 13, 1975, Mexico:

Prabhupāda: That is called realization. Yes. First of all you receive the sound, then apply your instruments, and when you find it, it is correct—that is the realization. So our process is to receive knowledge from the perfect. That's all. We are not perfect. But the knowledge we are getting, that is perfect. So according to that perfect direction, if we mold our life, then we are successful. Otherwise you go on experimenting, speculating. Ciraṁ vicinvan. Ciram, you understand, "perpetually," vicinvan, "thinking." Ciraṁ vicinvan.

athāpi te deva padāmbuja-dvaya-

prasāda-leśānugṛhīta eva hi

jānāti tattvaṁ (bhagavan mahimno)

na cānya eko 'pi ciraṁ vicinvan

(SB 10.14.29)

What is the use of speculating with imperfect senses? Useless waste of time.

Room Conversation with Woman Sanskrit Professor -- February 13, 1975, Mexico:

Prabhupāda: You have to see... That... Vedic injunction says, śāstra-cakśuṣā. Śāstra-cakśuṣā: "Your eyes should be the śāstra." There is another crude example. Just like who is your father? How do you understand? Through the vibration of the mother. The mother says, "He is your father." You accept it. Otherwise there is no experiment. So things which are beyond your perception, beyond your defective senses, that should not be speculated. Na tāṁs tarkeṇa yojayet. Acintyā khalv ye bhāvā na tāṁs tarkeṇa yojayet. These are the injunction. What is beyond your perception, beyond your speculation, don't waste your time so-called argument and logic. What is argument? Mother says, "He is your father." Where is the argument? You cannot apply any argument.

Room Conversation with Professors -- February 19, 1975, Caracas:

Prabhupāda: The difference is transcendence is beyond our mind, bodily activities, mental activities or intelligence. The European philosophers and transcendentalists, they do not know actually what is transcendence. They understand that there is something, but they do not know what it is. Therefore they speculate by their imperfect senses. Gradually it becomes craziness. Therefore you find that defect.

Room Conversation with Professors -- February 19, 1975, Caracas:

Prabhupāda: No, we must first of all understand that our senses are imperfect. Just like we are sitting in this room. We have got our eyes, but we cannot see what is there, going on, beyond this wall. The sun is fourteen hundred thousand times bigger than this earth, and we are seeing just like a disc. So the eyelid is just near the eyes, but we cannot see what is the eyelids. If the light is off, we cannot see. So we can see under certain condition. Then what is the value of our seeing? If we, even if we manufacture telescope, that is also manufactured by the imperfect senses, so it is also not perfect. So anything understood by manipulating our imperfect senses, that is not real knowledge. So our process of understanding real knowledge is to take it from the person who has the real knowledge. Just like if we contemplate or speculate who is my father, it is never possible to understand who is my father. But if we receive the words from mother that "Here is your father," that is perfect. Therefore the process of knowledge should be not to speculate but to receive it from the perfect person. If we receive knowledge from a mental speculator, that is not perfect knowledge.

Room Conversation with Professors -- February 19, 1975, Caracas:

Prabhupāda: First of all we have to accept this truth, that perfect knowledge can be received from the perfect person. Just like I have given the example, who is my father. You can understand it from the perfect person, mother. If somebody speculates, "This gentleman may be your father, this gentleman may be your father," that is not perfect knowledge. The perfect knowledge is with the mother. Mother says, "Here is your father." That is perfect knowledge.

Room Conversation with Professors -- February 19, 1975, Caracas:

Prabhupāda: That is another thing, that you have to search out such person. Otherwise your knowledge is imperfect. Now that question will be: "How to find out such person?" The next question will be. But unless you approach such perfect person, you cannot have perfect knowledge. That is a fact. Therefore the conclusion is that we should not speculate about perfect knowledge, but we should try to approach the perfect person and receive knowledge from him. This is the conclusion.

Room Conversation with Professors -- February 19, 1975, Caracas:

Prabhupāda: Oh, yes. That psychology is perfect where there is clue. Otherwise you will speculate all your life.

Morning Walk -- March 1, 1975, Atlanta:

Prabhupāda: Yes, that is a fact. That authority I have got. That's a fact. Yasya deve parā bhaktir yathā deve tathā gurau, tasyaite kathitā hy arthāḥ prakaśānte (ŚU 6.23). They become manifest, all the meanings of the Vedic literature. Yasya deve parā bhaktiḥ. (aside:) Don't come very near. (break) ...explaining last evening. Don't speculate, hear. That is the qualification. All others, they are simply speculating. How long their energy will go on, limited energy? How speculating will help them? It is not possible. It is condemned. Athāpi te deva,

(athāpi) te deva padāmbuja-

dvaya-prasāda-leśānugṛhīta eva hi

jānāti tattvaṁ na cānya

eko 'pi ciraṁ vicinvan

(SB 10.14.29)

Ciraṁ vicinvan, speculating for millions of years, one cannot understand.

Morning Walk -- March 1, 1975, Atlanta:

"One who has received a little mercy of the lotus feet of the Lord, he can understand the truth. Others, even speculating for millions of years, they cannot understand anything." The speculation business is useless in spiritual advance. It may help Darwin to come to the conclusion that man is born from monkey. Because he is from monkey, he thinks others also from monkey. He has admitted that whatever he has given, it is simply a speculation. He has admitted. And all others also speculating. They are trying to manufacture life from chemicals, but they do not know that life is never manufactured. It is already there. Just like this grass is coming. The life is already there. In favorable circumstances it comes out. Udbhija. This is called udbhija. Similarly fermentation.

Room Conversation with Svarupa Damodara -- March 1, 1975, Atlanta:

Prabhupāda: That's all. Just like you cannot see actually what is beyond the wall, and there is some sound. You can simply speculate, "This sound is due to this. This sound is due to this. This sound is due to this," but you have no clear knowledge. This is called speculation.

Room Conversation -- March 2, 1975, Atlanta:

Prabhupāda: They can use some bombastic word but we layman, we see this is the position. And you do not know how it is being done but the energy is there in you. That is called acintya-śakti, inconceivable energy. That is there. Now you shave every morning and next morning, again millions of hairs. You do not know how it is being happening. But it is happening, and this is called acintya-śakti. From Kṛṣṇa such big, big things are coming out. Even Kṛṣṇa may not know but Kṛṣṇa has got the inconceivable by which it is coming. The same example.

Rūpānuga: People will speculate so many theories as to why the hairs are coming out but then after some time they will see that theory is wrong they'll have to present a new one.

Prabhupāda: Yes, that is their rascaldom.

Room Conversation -- March 2, 1975, Atlanta:

Prabhupāda: Yes. We are not perfect. We can speculate only and that is not perfection. "Maybe," "perhaps," like that. No definite knowledge. The definite knowledge you can get from Kṛṣṇa, the perfect. Therefore all the ācāryas accept Kṛṣṇa. We have to follow the ācāryas, ācāryopāsanam. So in India all these ācāryas, Śaṅkarācārya, Rāmānujācārya, Madhvācārya, Viṣṇu Svāmī, Lord Caitanya, they accept Kṛṣṇa the supreme absolute.

Room Conversation with Yoga Student -- March 14, 1975, Iran:

If you simply speculate, it will never help you. You have to receive the favor of the Supreme Lord by your enthusiasm. Then it will be successful. Simply theorizing, speculation will not... Therefore it is said ciraṁ vicinvan. You can go on speculating for millions and millions of years. It will never be successful.

Interview with a German Girl and Assorted Devotees -- March 30, 1975, Mayapur:

Prabhupāda: Because they are rascals, they are speculating. They do not understand how knowledge is gathered. This is our charge. You refute it.

Interview with a German Girl and Assorted Devotees -- March 30, 1975, Mayapur:

Prabhupāda: Hm. Just like Temple University, they have got this Nectar of Devotion. And many universities, they are studying Kṛṣṇa book, Bhāgavatam. They are gradually accepting. At least the professors, teaching staff, they are accepting. They are studying as one side of views, not seriously.

Girl: (German)

Haṁsadūta: They speculate still.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Conversation with Devotees on Theology -- April 1, 1975, Mayapur:

Prabhupāda: That is speculation. If you want to study me, so you can do so either by approaching me or through one of my confidential servant. How one can understand me from outside by speculating? Why do they come to see me? Let them remain far away and speculate. But that is not possible in ordinary common sense also. So how they speculate about God? If you cannot understand even a common man, maybe very big in the society, you cannot understand a common man by hearsay, by speculation.

Conversation with Devotees on Theology -- April 1, 1975, Mayapur:

Prabhupāda: Yes. We say frankly that we know God, His father's name, His address, everything. Let anyone come and challenge. He cannot say that "No, this is not God," because he has not approached God. He does not know what is God. How he can challenge us that "This is not God"? Suppose we are presenting Kṛṣṇa as God, so how anyone can challenge? Because he has not approached God. He is simply speculating.

Conversation with Devotees on Theology -- April 1, 1975, Mayapur:

Prabhupāda: Oh, yes. Hare Kṛṣṇa. (break) It will take some time. But our line of action...

Devotee (2): Generally these type of people are... They're so mentally puffed-up that a process like chanting doesn't appeal to them. They want something for their minds to speculate on.

Prabhupāda: Why not process? Eh? Eh?

Devotee (2): The books are what actually attracts them. It attracts their minds.

Prabhupāda: Yes. We have got two process. One process is chanting. Another process: read books. That is also chanting.

Room Conversation with Carol Cameron -- May 9, 1975, Perth:

Prabhupāda: Then how you are going to speculate on anthropology?

Carol: Hmm.

Prabhupāda: If you cannot adjust, how you are wasting your time in the science, anthropology? It is a false science.

Room Conversation with Carol Cameron -- May 9, 1975, Perth:

Prabhupāda: The whole theory, Darwin's theory, is a false theory. It has no sound background. He says it is theory. Theory is not science. I can propose some theory, "It is like that." But that is not science. Science means observation and experiment. That is science. You observe how the rules are working, and when you practically bring them into experiment, then it is science. If you simply theorize, that is not science. Mental speculation. It has no benefit. You can speculate, constructing a castle in the air. That is not a very good thing. You should present something which will benefit the people, and practical. That is science.

Morning Walk -- May 10, 1975, Perth:

Prabhupāda: That means you do not know the truth. That is a fact. You do not know—simply speculating. You are accepting some spot—this is truth. And after some days, "No, no, this is not truth, this is truth." This is your position.

Morning Walk -- May 19, 1975, Melbourne:

Prabhupāda: What you have seen? You have seen your father and mother, that's all. What you have seen? You are still in the womb of your mother. What you you have seen? You can simply falsely speculate, that's all. What you have seen? Are you seeing the stars now? Why you are not seeing? The stars are there, why you are not seeing?

Morning Walk -- May 29, 1975, Honolulu:

Gurukṛpa: But the thing would be too simple. If they accepted there was God, they would be out of a job, and then there would be nothing more to speculate about.

Bali-mardana: They would lose their jobs.

Prabhupāda: (laughs) That is another poor fellow. If by bluffing like this, they can continue their office, that is another thing. In our childhood we were living in a quarter: there many thieves, pickpockets. So we... After all, they were neighborhood men, so they knew us. Although we had no connection, but we knew that "These are pickpockets, gundas." And they also knew us. So I remember, now, children, one pickpocket was taking, and as soon as he saw me... (laughter) He was afraid that "This boy may tell." We have seen it. He was doing... Similarly, these rascals are pickpockets, and they are asking us, "Don't expose us. Let us do."

Morning Walk -- June 2, 1975, Honolulu:

Prabhupāda: ...be superintend when the garden opens. (break) ... saw the question, but he cannot answer. So he began to write words like this, whole book, and the examiners saw that it has no meaning. But he has coined so many words. They said, "Very intelligent." They passed him. (laughter) Now, "upperfluous." You don't find all these words in dictionary. "Upperfluous rain of agua was dogbendikulali gondolized by lacticism of wine." It appears very gramatically nice composed, but it has no meaning. So he coined such words, a full book. Because he could not answer. So the time was there. He began to coin words. And he was passed, for his intelligence. Similarly, these people are putting words which you cannot understand, and they are getting their salaries, that's all. (break) ...invent something, that they will not die, there will be no disease, there will be no old age. That is something. What is this nonsense, simply speculating? (break) The cloud is standing there.

Morning Walk -- June 10, 1975, Honolulu:

Harikeśa: ...one place in Caitanya-caritāmṛta where Kṛṣṇadāsa Kavirāja says that "You mental speculators, put your speculation to Caitanya Mahāprabhu." He says something like that. If you were to speculate, speculate about Caitanya Mahāprabhu, the greatness of Caitanya Mahāprabhu.

Prabhupāda: I don't think there is anything.

Garden Conversation with Dr. Gerson and devotees -- June 22, 1975, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: But we don't follow that process. We follow one standard knowledge. That is Kṛṣṇa. That is our distinction between the ordinary scholars and our... And we are on the safe side because we don't manufacture, speculate. That is troublesome. If I have to defeat you, then I will have to speak so many things. I will have to find out the device how can I defeat you. But we have got one standard knowledge. I may be fool, rascal, but we repeat Kṛṣṇa. So our method is very easy. We are challenging everyone. Just like there are many scientific disciples. So I am not a science man. I have never studied science.

Garden Conversation with Dr. Gerson and devotees -- June 22, 1975, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: Yes, that is our duty, to give them knowledge. The knowledge is there. The candidates are there. Only the guardians should be sane, that "Save the children." Otherwise they will produce only hippies. That's all. (break) So long you will work on the mental plane, then the tendency will be that "Let me refute you, and I become prominent." And he will think that "Let me refute him. I become." This business will go on. But there will be no end of philosophy. So what is the use of such philosophy, simply continually go on mentally speculating, no conclusion? Philosophy means, "Here is the conclusion."

Room Conversation with Dr. John Mize -- June 23, 1975, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: Mind is there in the soul, but the mind is now polluted by material contamination. Just like a madman. He has got his mind, but his mind is contaminated. Therefore he requires treatment by psychiatrist. You cannot say the madman has no mind. He has got mind, but it is contaminated. You have to make treatment. So mind is there. Everything is there in the soul. And now the mind, contaminated by the matter, it is perverted. The same example: A madman has got mind, but it is useless. He is simply acting in madness. The same madman, when properly treated, he will act like a sane man. So mind is there always, in the pure soul or in the material body. Everything is spiritual. The soul is spiritual; the mind is spiritual; the intelligence is spiritual. But it is now contaminated. So you have to make treatment. When it is purified, Kṛṣṇa consciousness, then mind is controlled, intelligence properly acting, and soul is in his proper position. Therefore those who are under treatment, they must be strict observation—he may not do something wrong so that treatment may be hampered.

Jayatīrtha: Philosophers generally try to use their mind to speculate about the nature of the soul. But with the mind they can never understand...

Prabhupāda: Just like the madman is speculating. He is thinking, "I am president. Bas, finished." He is lying down on the street, "Oh, I am completely independent. Why shall I go on the foot path?"

Morning Walk -- July 2, 1975, Denver:

Prabhupāda:

ār nā koriho mane āśā

So guru, your guru has said that "You chant Hare Kṛṣṇa, observe these rules." Do that, don't speculate, and you will understand everything. (break) ...daily

guru-mukha-padma-vākya, cittete koriyā aikya,

ār nā koriho mane āśā **

No speculation, do it.

Devotee (2): Can you explain exactly what speculation means?

Prabhupāda: Speculation means thinking, "What will happen? Maybe like this, maybe like this." That is speculation. (break) ...speculate, "Kṛṣṇa may be like this. Kṛṣṇa may be like this." That is speculation. When Kṛṣṇa appears before you, you see, "Oh, Kṛṣṇa is like this." That is wanted. And if you speculate, "Kṛṣṇa may be like this," it is all nonsense. Come to the stage when Kṛṣṇa will appear before you, and you will see what is Kṛṣṇa. Be qualified to that position. Māyāvādīs, they are speculating simply, "God may be like this." Why "God may be like this?" God is factual, Kṛṣṇa. Therefore they cannot understand Kṛṣṇa.

Morning Walk -- July 11, 1975, Chicago:

Prabhupāda: No, no, he admitted that he speculated. He is not a philosopher, he is a speculator. He has admitted that "It is my speculation. I think like this."

Morning Walk -- July 14, 1975, Philadelphia:

Prabhupāda: Yes. So their "perhaps," "maybe," is going on. And that will continue.

Ravīndra-svarūpa: Why does the living entity wish to speculate in this way?

Prabhupāda: He has been given a special advantage to think of God, but instead of thinking God, he is thinking all these rubbish things, which he will never be able to fulfill. Misusing. The thinking power he is misusing.

Morning Walk -- July 16, 1975, San Francisco:

Prabhupāda: The same logic, "Cheerfully be hanged." That's all. As soon as there is some difficult subject, they give up. And they speculate on some nonsense thing. That's all. This is their education. Education means atyantika-duḥkha-nivṛtti, the ultimate solution of all unhappiness. That is education, not that after coming to some extent, "No, you can die happily." And what is duhkha, unhappiness? That is presented by Kṛṣṇa: janma-mṛtyu-jarā-vyādhi duḥkha-doṣānu... (BG 13.9). These are your unhappiness. Try to solve it.

Morning Walk -- July 25, 1975, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: Then why do you bother? Stop speculating. Everything is eternal. Why do you bother yourself to find out something new?

Rāmeśvara: To control. To gain control.

Prabhupāda: No, you cannot control because you are controlled. That is eternally you are controlled. You are controlled.

Morning Walk -- August 6, 1975, Detroit:

Prabhupāda: My Godbrother says-Tīrtha Mahārāja—that American government has given me two crores of rupees. They are supposed to be spiritually advanced, and they are so rascal. And he is the head of Caitanya Matha. Kṛṣṇa said, yoga-kṣemaṁ vahāmy aham: (BG 9.22) "I take the responsibility of his expenditure." Kṛṣṇa says, and they are preaching Kṛṣṇa consciousness, and they are thinking, "American government is doing, not Kṛṣṇa." Such fools and rascals, they are head of..., a spiritual head. Karmīs, jñānīs—everyone is envious of our... And they are trying to speculate how to admit: "Where he gets money? Where he gets money?"

Morning Walk -- August 24, 1975, Delhi:

Prabhupāda: Invented telescope?

Brahmānanda: So they could speculate about the stars and planets. (break)

Gopāla Kṛṣṇa: ...all the British names out and replaced them with Italian and Indian and other names.

Tejas: Many Muslim names they have replaced also. Because they are supposed to be historical. (break)

Prabhupāda: This is the road. This is the bus.

Morning Walk -- October 2, 1975, Mauritius:

Prabhupāda: Because God has created cyclone, therefore He is perfect because you are to be killed, blown away with your all paraphernalia, with your all scientific laboratory and instrument. Go. Go to hell. That is perfection.

Cyavana: They are eager to find a solution. Therefore they are forced to speculate because they have no other way...

Prabhupāda: No other way.

Morning Walk -- October 28, 1975, Nairobi:

Prabhupāda: Their function means recreation. That is not function. By that function they'll... But it is... Something is better than nothing. That is another thing. Arto 'rthārthī jijñāsur jñānī-four kinds of men, they take to Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement, the arto 'rthārthī. Ārtaḥ means distressed, and arthārthī means those who are in need of money. So they are arto 'rthārthī, and better than the rogues and ruffians, but their Kṛṣṇa consciousness, chanting Kṛṣṇa, means they want to get some money and to get out of some distress. That is ninety-nine percent people. And some of them are jñānī. They want to learn about Kṛṣṇa very seriously, not to fulfill their material desires. They are called jñānī. Jñānī and jijñāsu, inquisitive. So in jnani, those who are after knowledge, and inquisitive, they are better than this arta and arthārthī. But devotee is transcendental to all of them. They are neither arto, not distressed, nor in need of money. They do not want to speculate for knowledge or... They know, "Kṛṣṇa is the Supreme, and if I am part and parcel of the Supreme, it is my duty to serve Him to My best capacity." That is real bhakti.

Morning Walk -- November 1, 1975, Nairobi:

Harikeśa: But we don't know, so we're taking the known and speculating on that...

Prabhupāda: You do not know; therefore you have to learn. If you want to remain rascal, fool, and still you want to know, that is not possible. You have to know from the real source. Then you'll know. But if you keep yourself in the rascal platform, then how you will know? Just like you have to go to a school to learn things. So how you can learn at home? Tad-vijñānārthaṁ sa gurum evābhigacchet (MU 1.2.12). You have to go in order to understand that science. So how do you argue, keeping yourself in darkness? In darkness you cannot see anything. "Oh, I do not see anything; therefore there is nothing." Is that very good reason? You are blind, you cannot see the darkness.

Morning Walk -- November 1, 1975, Nairobi:

Cyavana: As soon as he says, "I think," he's disqualified. As soon as he's speculating.

Devotee (8): Prabhupāda? Some of the people I've met... Like in the later volumes of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, some of the information is so much against what the living entities are experiencing and being educated in, that I've noticed that some people have turned away from Kṛṣṇa who already had some attraction when they hear these different topics, like the situation of the universe.

Prabhupāda: Hm? What is that?

Brahmānanda: That because in Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam the knowledge there contradicts the mundane scientific knowledge, people who had some faith in Kṛṣṇa become discouraged and turn away from Kṛṣṇa.

Prabhupāda: Let him go away. Don't care for him. Let all the fools go away. There is Bengali proverb, "Instead of maintaining some bad cows, let the cowshed be vacant." We shall prefer the cowshed vacant, no cow, than keeping all bad cows who does not give any milk, create disturbance.

Morning Walk -- November 4, 1975, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: But sādhu... They are sādhu because they are Kṛṣṇa conscious. Sādhur eva sa mantavyaḥ (BG 9.30). Api cet sudurācaraḥ. Their case is different. But others, they are all asādha, asādhu. Kuto mahad-guṇāḥ. Harāv abhaktasya kuto mahad-guṇāh. A man may be materially, academically very advanced, but Bhāgavata says, kuto mahad-guṇāh. Because he is not devotee, harāv abhaktasya kuto mahad-guṇāh. "Why? They have got so many qualifications; still, they are not great personality?" No. "Why?" Mano-rathena asato dhāvato bahiḥ: "They will only act on their mental platform, speculate." No fact. The fact is that he is soul. He has to change this body. That they have forgotten, and making big, big plan. This is... Prahlāda Mahārāja regrets, śoce tato vimukha-cetasaḥ māyā-sukhāya bharam udvahato vimūḍhān: (SB 7.9.43) "I am thinking of these rascals, fools." māyā-sukhāya: "For māyā-sukha," means the false or illusory happiness, "they are making some huge, gorgeous arrangement."

Morning Walk -- November 14, 1975, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: (break) Copies. (break) They could not conclude when the battle of Kurukṣetra was fought.

Gopāla Kṛṣṇa: They are speculating, though. There is one school which says it wasn't fought in Kurukṣetra.

Prabhupāda: As soon as there will be one school and other school, that means all of them are rascals. Just like the sun rises from this side. There cannot be two schools. If somebody says, "No, no. Sun rises from this side," if that is school, he's a fool. Sun rises from the eastern side. That's all. That is knowledge. If somebody says, "No, sometimes in the western side, sometimes in the northern side," is that any value? So as soon as there will be many schools, that means the conclusion is not like that.

Morning Walk -- November 16, 1975, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: Ah. Niskiñcananaṁ mahiyasam. It has to be understood from the same thing, tattva-darśinam. Otherwise it is not possible. You cannot speculate. If you say, as Gandhi said, "My Kṛṣṇa is of my imagination," that kind of knowledge has no value. What you are, your imagination? Matir na kṛṣṇe parataḥ svato vā. Parataḥ svato vā. Vidya-bhāgavatavadhiḥ. If one reads Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, then he gets the ultimate knowledge of everything. That is the ultimate end, limit of knowledge.

Morning Walk -- November 30, 1975, Delhi:

Prabhupāda: Because in Vṛndāvana there are less rascals and here it is full of rascals. That is the difference. Harāv abhaktasya kuto mahad-guṇāḥ. Rascal means the nondevotees. They have no good qualification. Kuto: "Where is good qualification?" And "No, they are so civilized. They are educated." But the answer is, mano-rathena: "Whatever they may be, they are on the mental platform." Mano-rathenāsati dhāvato bahiḥ: "Because they are on the mental platform, certainly they will hover over the external energy. Therefore they have no good qualification." Bahir-artha-maninaḥ. Simply speculating on the external feature.

Morning Walk -- December 11, 1975, Vrndavana:

Devotee (1) (woman): They don't have enough power.

Prabhupāda: Huh? Then why do you say nonsense! If you have not enough power there must be somebody powerful than you—you have to admit that—who has made all these things. But you are rascal you have not... You are simply, ahh, what is called? Speculating. That in future we shall be powerful. But the powerful is already there. What is your credit? More powerful-) you cannot conceive even how powerful He a scientist. Huh? Is that alright? What is your value? The already powerful is there, who has manufactured these things. And you are expecting in future you'll be powerful; therefore you are more powerful. Just see their folly. If you are powerful then make it, another imitation sun.

Morning Walk -- December 12, 1975, Vrndavana:

Harikeśa: But the trend is, because Newton speculated the law of gravity...

Prabhupāda: No, no, first of all you settle up. Don't go away from the point. (laughter) The point is that there is no need of authority. Then why you quote this scientist, that scientist? You stop this nonsense. There is no authority. Hm?

Harikeśa: Yes.

Prabhupāda: Haṁsadūta?

Haṁsadūta: Hm.

Prabhupāda: If there is no authority, why do you quote so many rascals? Then come to reason, argument, that's all. If you quote authority, I have got my authority.

1976 Conversations and Morning Walks

Room Conversation -- January 8, 1976, Nellore:

Prabhupāda: No, there is no question of dialectic discussion. Suppose I am discussing, you are discussing something, but if I am imperfect, you are imperfect, what is the value of such discussion? That is the point. The party discussing something, whether he is perfect? If he is not perfect, then go on discussing. We first of all say that any conditioned soul is defective, and that is admitted. They say, "We are not perfect." "I think," they say. "In my opinion," they say. Never they say, the so-called scientists, "definite." And they cannot say it.

Mahamsa: That is like Dr. Frog's philosophy when they speculate.

Prabhupāda: Yes. Simply speculation. So that kind of discussion, what is the value?

Gopāla Kṛṣṇa: It's always a hypothesis.

Morning Walk -- February 4, 1976, Mayapura:

Prabhupāda: After all, understanding... Therefore they are mūḍhas. They have to understand. If they do not understand, they remain mūḍha. That is human life. The human being should understand that "I am mūḍha, so I'll have to learn." And the Vedas says, "Then go to guru." Tad-vijñānārthaṁ sa gurum evābhigacchet: (MU 1.2.12) "You must go if you want to learn." And if he remains mūḍha and speculates, then he remains mūḍha. He never gets the enlightenment. He remains continually... Mūḍhā janmani janmani mām aprāpyaiva (BG 16.20). He cannot get God. Life after life, he will go on like that, mūḍha. Asuriṣu-yoni. Asurika-yoni. He'll remain completely ignorant about God, what was his function, only function to understand God during this life of human form of life.

Morning Walk -- March 21, 1976, Mayapura:

Prabhupāda: Ah! (break).... Our Lalitā Cācā wants to do? You met him recently?

Jayapatākā: Oh. So his point is...

Prabhupāda: Does he want to do something or simply speculate?

Jayapatākā: He says that he wants to do something and so does some of his people.

Prabhupāda: Eh?

Jayapatākā: But he has a committee. He has a society. One Mr. Bhattacarya, who is a lawyer, and this Śacīnandana, who is a clerk.

Prabhupāda: But that's all right. What they want to do?

Morning Walk -- March 25, 1976, Delhi:

Prabhupāda: If you ask, "Father, I wish to see cinema," if father says, "All right, we'll go," that is not sinful. But you go in your own whims—that is sinful. Tena tyaktena bhuñjīthā (ISO 1).

Cyavana: Sometimes it's difficult as devotees for us to know whether we're doing the right thing or whether we're just speculating.

Prabhupāda: And therefore you have to consult your guru.

Morning Walk -- April 26, 1976, Melbourne:

Prabhupāda: Staunch adherent. (break)

Guru-kṛpā: ...in Bhāgavatam, Śrīla Prabhupāda, that when a devotee, he sees a banyan, fruit of a banyan tree, and there are so many seeds within that fruit, and each seed can mean one tree and one tree means millions of fruits, and in this way the devotee can appreciate Kṛṣṇa. But the jñānīs, they go on speculating, and they can never relish anything. The devotee can simply relish how Kṛṣṇa has done everything in the material nature.

Prabhupāda: We can go here? No. And no...

Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: Yes. It is a little distance there.

Morning Walk -- May 27, 1976, Honolulu:

Prabhupāda: Sarva-yoniṣu. All kinds of forms of life, 8,400,000 different forms of life. So "The material nature is the mother and I am the seed-giving father." Why they do not accept this philosophy? And everything is going on. Just like in the family the mother is there and the father is there. Similarly, Kṛṣṇa is the father, and material nature is mother, and we are all sons. If we accept this simple philosophy, everything will be all right. Why they do not accept this philosophy, so many rascal philosophers? This simple philosophy. And this is a fact. What is this body? This body is this earth. "Dust thou art, dust thou beest." So the mother is this material nature. I've got this body. And the father, He is Kṛṣṇa, or God. What is wrong in accepting this philosophy? If this simple philosophy is accepted, the whole world will be happy. But they'll not accept it. These rascals will come, and speculate rascal philosophy. (laughing) With this simple philosophy... United Nations is there.

Room Conversation with Reporter -- June 4, 1976, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: Yes. Certainly. If you want to know me, then you must know about me from me. You can not speculate about me. If you speculate that "Swamiji is so rich," or "Swami might have so much bank balance also," or.... This is all speculation. But when I say that my bank balance is such and such, that is right knowledge.

Reporter: I didn't understand you.

Prabhupāda: That suppose if you are speculating what may be the Swamiji's strength of bank balance. So how you can know it by speculation? But if I say that my bank balance is such and such, than you can understand what is bank balance. So by speculative knowledge you can not understand God. When God says what He is, then you can understand.

Morning Walk -- June 9, 1976, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: Christian religion is speculation. All these philosophers, talking on Christian religion, speculating.... No clear idea.

Hari-śauri: These church fathers that we've just done on the philosophy book, they are simply speculating about what was in the original Bible.

Prabhupāda: No clear conception, scientific idea. Therefore educated persons, they are not interested. "God, give us daily bread." They will say, "Why we shall go to church for begging bread? We can manufacture it, large quantity." (laughs) Why they should go? Formality: "God, give us our daily bread." "Just open a big factory and eat as much bread as we like. Why should we go to God?" (break) ...Jawaharlal Nehru, he took this view, that "For economic development why should you go to the temple, ask this demigod, that demigod, 'Give me this. Give me this'? Develop industry and get money to enjoy." That is his.... (break)...description of God in Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam begins: janmādy asya yato 'nvayād itarataś cārtheṣv abhijñaḥ sva-rāṭ (SB 1.1.1). This is God, the origin of everything.

Room Conversation with Mother and Sons -- June 13, 1976, Detroit:

Prabhupāda: So to remain in ignorance is animal life. To be enlightened is human life. And the topmost enlightenment is to understand God and to love Him. That is the topmost enlightenment. Unfortunately, there is no education to know what is God, and what to speak of loving Him. This is modern civilization. Ignorance. A civilization of ignorance. They do not know what is what. Simply speculating, wasting time, talking all nonsense. This is going on in the name of education, but actually they are in ignorance. They do not know what is what. They are reading so many philosophical speculation, horrible condition of the so-called philosopher, scientist. Simply "I believe," "In this believe, that believe." You believe.... Believe something.

Room Conversation with Mother and Sons -- June 13, 1976, Detroit:

Because he's learned it from the perfect father. This is our process. We don't speculate. We don't speculate whether there is father or not. That is not our process. We ask from the mother, "Mother, they say I have got father. I have never seen." So mother says, "Yes, my dear child, you have got a father." Then finish. Knowledge is perfect. And the child cannot challenge, "I have never seen my father. How can I believe you?" This is nonsense. Your mother says, that is fact. That's all, finished. You cannot challenge mother: "Mother, I have never seen my father; how can I believe?" That is nonsense! This is going on. "I have never seen God. Can you show me God?" This rascaldom is going on. First of all you must know you are a rascal. How can you see God? You hear from the authority who knows God. That is the injunction.

Garden Conversation -- June 14, 1976, Detroit:

Prabhupāda: What was that argument? (laughs)

Jayādvaita: He said that two fish are swimming in a tank, and one fish said to the other fish that there must be God because someone must be changing the water in the tank. So he was trying to ridicule that these fish are speculating something. But I just said to the students, "So this is a very good conversation. The fish is intelligent. There must be someone who is running the environment, nature." So he couldn't say anything against us, although he was trying to be a big atheist.

Prabhupāda: What was the point?

Jayādvaita: He was trying to show somehow that these foolish fish were speculating something just to make some story that would sound..., that this is a ridiculous thing to think. But it was a very sensible thing to think.

Prabhupāda: What is that sensible thing?

Jayādvaita: That the environment is being controlled by someone, not by us. So there is someone superior. So I just said that to his students, "So your professor is giving a good example."

Prabhupāda: In our favor.

Room Conversation -- June 18, 1976, Toronto:

Hari-śauri: They were speculating about.... They sent this spaceship to Mars, and they were speculating that maybe now the so-called smog that covers the surface of the planet, it could be fog. It could be made of ice and water particles. So now they..., so they were speculating like that. And then they said they were going to land the spaceship in a valley at a certain point that is four miles deep and that may..., it may have been filled with water fifty thousand years ago, and it could have fossils in it from the type of life that existed there, if it existed.

Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: Fifty thousand years ago. (laughter)

Prabhupāda: Scientist rascal. How ludicrous. Simply "maybe," "if it was" and "it will be." That's all. Simply "maybe."

Hari-śauri: Yes. They were speculating about, even they didn't know what the atmosphere was, and yet they know, yet they were stating that they were going to land this spaceship at a certain point just below the Martian equator in a valley which is just at the mouth of the valley, which is four miles deep.

Prabhupāda: And people are taking, "Oh, it is scientific research."

Room Conversation and Reading from Srimad-Bhagavatam Canto 1 and 12 -- June 25, 1976, New Vrindaban:

Prabhupāda: Only to such devotees do the pastimes of the Lord and their transcendental nature become automatically manifest by dint of devotional service. No one else can either know or describe the acts of the Lord, even if they speculate on the subject for many, many years. The descriptions of the Bhāgavatam are so precise and accurate that whatever has been predicted in this great literature about five thousand years before is now exactly happening. Therefore the vision of the author comprehends past, present and future. Such liberated persons like Vyāsadeva are not only perfect by the power of vision and wisdom but also in aural reception, in thinking, feeling and all other sense activities. A liberated person possesses perfect senses, and with perfect senses only can one serve the sense proprietor, Hṛṣīkeśa, Śrī Kṛṣṇa, the Personality of Godhead.

Garden Discussion on Bhagavad-gita Sixteenth Chapter -- June 26, 1976, New Vrindaban:

Prabhupāda: These are the regulations of the Vedic religious discipline. A man retired from household life must practice austerities of the body, mind and tongue. That is tapasya. The entire varṇāśrama dharma society is meant for tapasya. Without tapasya, or austerity, no human being can get liberation. The theory that there is no need of austerity in life, that one can go on speculating and everything will be nice, is neither recommended in the Vedic literature nor in the Bhagavad-gītā. Such theories are manufactured by show-bottle spiritualists who are trying to gather more followers.

Garden Conversation -- June 27, 1976, New Vrindaban:

Prabhupāda: They have not done. Has everyone got the president's power? How do they say that you have done. Everyone equal? That is not possible. These are imagination. Mano-rathenasato dhāvato bahiḥ Everything is there in the Bhāgavatam. Harāv abhaktasya kuto mahad-guṇāḥ. These rascals who are not Kṛṣṇa conscious, they have no value. They are simply speculating within the mind, mano-rathena, and they'll act all abominable, because they are on the mental platform. I'll say "I think like this," you'll say "I think like this." And nobody, none of us perfect. Then what is the use of your thinking like this or thinking like that? Both of them are imperfect. So if so many rascals sit together, or dogs, they simply bark, that's all. It has no value.

Garden Conversation -- June 28, 1976, New Vrindaban:

Prabhupāda: No, they are speculating. But why people are victimized by this speculation? That is the...

Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: That's the amazing thing.

Prabhupāda: They have already failed in one speculation. They went to moon planet with some speculation. That has failed. Why they are given chance, another speculation?

Rādhāvallabha: Everyone believes that they went.

Room Conversation -- June 29, 1976, New Vrindaban:

Hari-śauri: They get the lobsters sometimes alive, and they throw them in boiling water, and they can hear them screaming. But now they're speculating whether it's actually the lobsters screaming because it's being boiled alive or whether it's just air that's coming out from its body and making a squeaking noise.

Prabhupāda: No, that is, apart from that, they import lobster from India, Cochin. They are exporting lobster alive. I have seen. The same ship, they load it with lobster fat, and black creepers, and cashews, they exported. The big, big business firms are exporting. So these lobster, although they are kept in ice and so on, so on, they become decomposed. I've seen in the port, that Commonwealth Pier. There is store of lobster, and the lobster has become yellow and almost melted by decomposing. They are selling that.

Room Conversation -- July 1, 1976, New Vrindaban:

Prabhupāda: They hate Rāmānujācārya because he's Vaiṣṇava.

Hari-śauri: Because he doesn't allow them to speculate.

Prabhupāda: He is very strict. He is a stubborn enemy of Śaṅkarācārya. All the Vaiṣṇava ācāryas. Caitanya Mahāprabhu said, declare it: māyāvādi-bhāṣya śunile haya sarva-nāśa (CC Madhya 6.169). If you hear the interpretation of Māyāvādīs, then you are doomed. You have no hope for spiritual advancement. This is the statement. Māyāvādi-bhāṣya śunile haya sarva-nāśa. Finished, your spiritual life is finished. You can write this also, that Caitanya Mahāprabhu's instruction is strictly to avoid the so-called Vedantists.

Room Conversation -- July 2, 1976, New Vrindaban:

Prabhupāda: That is another similar verse. Yes, you quoted me. And there is another verse by Bilvamaṅgala, in Kṛṣṇa-karṇāmṛta. The Muslim, he said "I was searching after the Param Brahma, and now I see here He is playing with the gopīs." What they will speculate? Everything is there in Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam. Where this picture is given? (Prabhupāda is being massaged)

Pradyumna: Which book is it in?

Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: It was on the cover of one Back to Godhead magazine.

Hari-śauri: But it's in one of the books.

Pradyumna: Lord Caitanya did the same thing. He did the same thing, and it was compared Kṛṣṇa also had done.

Prabhupāda: If there is no such acceptance, where is religion?

'Life Comes From Life' Slideshow Discussions -- July 3, 1976, Washington, D.C.:

Prabhupāda: Otherwise, it is not possible. That I explained this morning, panthās tu koṭi-śata-vatsara-sampragamyo vāyor athāpi manaso muni-puṅgavānām, so 'pyasti yat prapada-sīmny avincintya-tattve (Bs. 5.34). Without bhakti, if you go on speculating for many, many years with the speed of mind, if you want to go, still avincintya-tattve, it will remain inconceivable.

'Life Comes From Life' Slideshow Discussions -- July 3, 1976, Washington, D.C.:

Prabhupāda: They, simply like child, they are speculating. If he's imperfect, then what is the value of his speculation? There is no value.

Room Conversation -- July 5, 1976, Washington, D.C.:

Prabhupāda: First try to point out as many as you can. And our view is they are wholesale mistaken. They are imperfect, speculating.

Room Conversation -- July 5, 1976, Washington D.C.:

Prabhupāda: One, the origin of life, and the other, planetary system. There is no knowledge. They are simply speculating.

Rākṣana: It is correct that the illumination of the moon is caused by the movement of the vegetation on the surface?

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Conversation with Prof. Saligram and Dr. Sukla -- July 5, 1976, Washington, D.C.:

Devotee: There was an Indian man there and he was saying that, you were presenting, Śrīla Prabhupāda, the philosophy very nicely, but there are others who are presenting it in an impersonal way. And they are able through the scripture to support what they say. Prabhupāda (indistinct) now in our (indistinct) you can't actually substantiate that God is impersonal, because Kṛṣṇa is a person speaking to Arjuna, so where is the question of impersonal? (indistinct) So Prabhupāda said it's because they're speculating and cheating, that they're interpreting it in some devious manner, rather than taking what Kṛṣṇa said, literally, as (indistinct).

Guest: Well, I have given some thought to that. I found that whenever you take an impersonal view, it becomes a pure intellectual exercise, devoid of any feeling. And if you bring feeling into that, it becomes personal. Like, I don't believe that anything can survive without feeling. So...

Prabhupāda: It is in the Bhagavad-gītā, it is clearly said, bhagavān uvāca. It is never said Brahman uvāca. (laughter) People have no eyes to see. The absolute truth is realized brahmeti paramātmeti bhagavān iti śabdyate (SB 1.2.11). But in the Bhagavad-gītā it is never said Paramātmā uvāca. (laughter) Or Brahman uvāca. Bhagavān uvāca! Vyāsadeva, He does not say kṛṣṇa uvāca, because Kṛṣṇa will be taken, misunderstood. Therefore (Vyāsadeva) directly says, śrī bhagavān uvāca. So where is impersonal? There is no question of impersonal. He clearly says bhagavān. Ahaṁ sarvasya prabhavo (BG 10.8). Bhagavān says, "I am everything." So where is imperson? How they can bring in impersonal at all? It is simply dragging (?) the matter. This impersonal has killed India's Vedic culture.

Evening Darsana -- July 6, 1976, Washington, D.C.:

Prabhupāda: They say! What they say, they have no value. Because if it is a fact that one can understand God through bhakti, so whatever bhakta says, that is value. What a nonsense says, it has no value. It has no value. "They say." First of all, you have to think what they are. Are they speculator or bhakta? Just like beginning of Bhagavad-gītā Kṛṣṇa said bhakto 'si, "I am talking to you Bhagavad-gītā because you are My bhakta." So it is the subject matter..., bhagavān is the subject matter for the bhakta, not for others. Others, they will speculate only. They will never understand what is Kṛṣṇa.

Room Conversation With Scientists -- July 6, 1976, Washington, D.C.:

Prabhupāda: Why do they speak about seeing? What is the value of your seeing? I have seen the Atlantic Ocean, that means I have seen everything? This is ludicrous.

Rūpānuga: They may simply speculate from a distance, that "Here is the surface," like here...

Prabhupāda: That's all. Real business is speculation.

Room Conversation With Scientists -- July 6, 1976, Washington, D.C.:

Prabhupāda: Oh, that is "I am not stealing."

Rūpānuga: Twelve hundred miles above the surface. Now they want to speculate what is there.

Prabhupāda: Who asked him that who is stealing? But he said "I am not stealing."

Room Conversation -- July 6, 1976, Washington, D.C.:

everything they say is wrong.

Prabhupāda: Yes, because they are imperfect, they are speculating.

Devotee (1): Yes.

Prabhupāda: What is the value of your speculation? If you are on the wrong platform, then what is the value of your speculation? You have got imperfect senses, you cheat, with the microscope or binocular, but it is manufactured by you. How it is perfect?

Svarūpa Dāmodara: That is one of our reasonings, that the senses...

Prabhupāda: Yes. You are born imperfect, and you are manufacturing some measuring... So that is also imperfect. And you are depending by seeing through the binocular. How it is perfect?

Devotee (1): They've convinced us that these machines are accurate.

Prabhupāda: How it is accurate? It is manufactured by you. You are a fool.

Room Conversation -- July 6, 1976, Washington, D.C.:

Prabhupāda: So many are... Because they're speculating. No valid knowledge.

Viśākhā: It seems that since they have imperfect senses, they're unable to perceive...

Prabhupāda: It is impossible to say anything scientifically. So-called scientifically.

Room Conversation -- July 6, 1976, Washington, D.C.:

Prabhupāda: That's all. Manorathena. Asati dhāvato bahiḥ. Mental speculation.

Yadubara: It's all based on that. Because if you don't speculate mentally, you don't get a degree.

Prabhupāda: That's another thing. A fool is accepted by another fool. That is another thing. They're getting Nobel Prize and so on and so on. That is different thing. Fool's paradise. All of them are fools. And they have created their own paradise. Do you know that story? That one was drinking, so his friend said, "Oh, you are drinking, you'll go to hell." "No, why? My father drinks." "Well, he'll also go to hell." "Oh, by brother drinks." "So he'll also go to hell." "My brother..." In this way, the whole list was (indistinct). Then he said, everyone will go to hell. Then where is hell? It is paradise! If father is going, then mother is going, then I am going, then brother is going, then where is hell?" It is like that. They're all fools, then where is fool? Everyone is intelligent. That is (indistinct). There's no question of fool. If everyone, all of us are fool, then where is the question of intelligent? "Hey, we are intelligent." (indistinct) This is their conclusion. We can give credit to something, just like I can see up to this wall. But if I say, "Now I am seeing beyond this world, everything, the forest and everything, I know everything." That is going on. Cheating.

Room Conversation -- July 7, 1976, Baltimore:

Prabhupāda: The thing is that these persons, they are holding the... Andhā yathāndhair upanīyamānāḥ (SB 7.5.31). A blind man, he has no eyes, and still, he's leader of other blind men. Is it possible? A blind man, he is blind man, he has no knowledge, and still, he's leading other blind men. This is a very dangerous position. He has no actual knowledge, simply speculating, putting theories and formulas, and they are leaders of the society.

Evening Darsan -- August 10, 1976, Tehran:

Prabhupāda: Everything is explained there. If somebody comes to Kṛṣṇa even with material motive, ārto arthārthī... There are four classes of men: ārto, arthārthī, jñānī, jijñāsur. So jñānī, for the sake of knowledge, tries to understand what is God, what is Kṛṣṇa. Jijñāsur, inquisitive, actually what is Kṛṣṇa. And those who are less than them, when they become distressed, artha, or in need of money, they pray to Kṛṣṇa. Still, they have gone to Kṛṣṇa. Therefore they are called sukṛtinaḥ. And one who has not gone to Kṛṣṇa, simply speculating, that description, māyayāpahṛta-jñānā. These things are there.

Evening Darsan -- August 10, 1976, Tehran:

Prabhupāda: This is bhakti. So everything is there. If we don't misinterpret and take as it is, then we'll benefit. That is fortune. If somebody has one lakh of rupees and if he does not utilize it, then he is unfortunate. And if he's fortunate he can utilize it, he can make it millions of dollars. So the knowledge is already there, you haven't go to manufacture or speculate. You take it, you become perfect. We are preaching this Kṛṣṇa consciousness, we don't manufacture anything. Here is this knowledge, Bhagavad-gītā, just take it. Already it is there, everything. We haven't got to manufacture something, concoct something. Everything is there. You refer, you get knowledge, and be fortunate.

Press Interview at Muthilal Rao's House -- August 17, 1976, Hyderabad:

Prabhupāda: Kṛṣṇa is the origin of everything. If you have studied Bhagavad-gītā, Kṛṣṇa says aham ādir hi devānām (Bg 10.2). Ahaṁ sarvasya prabhavo mattaḥ sarvaṁ pravartate (BG 10.8). Mattaḥ parataraṁ nānyat kiñcid asti dhanañjaya (BG 7.7). So Kṛṣṇa is the Supreme. If you accept it that this is supreme name of God, Kṛṣṇa, Hare Kṛṣṇa, Hare Rāma.

harer nāma harer nāma harer nāmaiva kevalam

kalau nāsty eva nāsty eva nāsty eva gatir anyathā

(CC Adi 17.21)

This is the Vedic injunction. Caitanya Mahāprabhu, He said paraṁ vijayate śrī-kṛṣṇa-saṅkīrtanam. In the Bhāgavata it is said kīrtanād eva kṛṣṇasya mukta-saṅgaḥ paraṁ vrajet (SB 12.3.51). These things are there. It is not a manufactured program. It is based on śāstra. Kīrtanād eva kṛṣṇasya mukta-saṅgaḥ paraṁ vrajet. Kaler doṣa-nidhe rājann asti hy eko mahān guṇaḥ. These things are there. You have to accept some authority. If you don't accept authority, you speculate. That is your business, but we don't do. We accept the authority.

Morning Walk -- August 31, 1976, Delhi:

Devotee: Does this mean Śrīla Prabhupāda, we should not speculate about the future. Like if someone says, "Next year we should do this," and so forth. And "Next month we'll go here and we'll do that." And people are always making arrangements for the future and what they are going to do. With nothing in mind that death will take them within a flash. And they're making all these speculative arrangements.

Indian man (3): I personally feel that when you buy anything in the market, for example you buy a dress. Sometimes it wears for ten years, sometimes you are cheated and it wears only for two years. So this is also same way, you know. Sometimes early death means...

Prabhupāda: That is for the dress. What about the man who's using the dress? You are identifying the dress with the man. That is foolishness. As soon as you say "dress," you should have to find out the man who has got the dress. Then it is perfect understanding. But if you understand the dress and the man the same, then you are foolish. Dress is not the man.

Garden Conversation -- October 14, 1976, Chandigarh:

Prabhupāda: Wherefrom he has drawn? He has speculated only, like a rascal. That's all. Wherefrom he got this thing? He has said that "It is my speculation." Speculation is no knowledge. You can speculate in your own way. Knowledge gathered from the authority, that is real knowledge. Hare Kṛṣṇa. (break) We have published even in Chinese language. European.

Room Conversation with Indian Man -- December 22, 1976, Poona:

Prabhupāda: Yes. And that Kṛṣṇa is explaining. Where is the difficulty? Kṛṣṇa is explaining Himself. There is no difficulty to understand Kṛṣṇa. Suppose you have no knowledge about me, what is Swamiji. You may speculate, "Swamiji may be such and such, such and such." But if I explain myself, that "I am like this," then where is the difficulty? You haven't got to speculate. Because I am explaining. So you take that. You understand Kṛṣṇa.

Room Conversation with Indian Man -- December 22, 1976, Poona:

Prabhupāda: Yes. Therefore he cannot understand. Athāpi te deva padāmbuja-dvaya-prasāda-leśānugṛhīta eva hi, jānāti tattvam (SB 10.14.29). One who is fully surrendered... Not fully, even little surrendered, he can understand. (bell rings) Otherwise, ciraṁ vicinvan. He can speculate for long, long years, for long long years. Still he cannot. Athāpi te deva padāmbuja-dvaya-prasāda-leśānugṛhīta eva hi, jānāti tattvam. He can understand. Na ca anya eko 'pi ciraṁ vicinvan. Others, even one of them, simply by speculating they cannot understand.

Press Interview -- December 31, 1976, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: Yes. If your mother says, "Here is your father," that's all right. You don't require any other. And that is paramparā. Mother knows how you were created by your father. So she is the ultimate evidence. That's all. You cannot speculate. If you disbelieve your mother, then there is no question of understanding your father.

Press Interview -- December 31, 1976, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: Yes, this is jñāna. But the jñāna must be received through the right source. Jñāna is not speculation. The modern rascals, they create jñāna by speculation. That is not jñāna. That is ajñāna. The same example. If you don't receive jñāna from your mother, there is no jñāna of father. If you millions of years go on speculating who is your father he'll never be revealed. That is not jñāna. That is ajñāna. So these rascals, they are creating jñāna. That is not jñāna. Jñāna means you should receive jñāna through the right source.

1977 Conversations and Morning Walks

Room Conversation -- January 2, 1977, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: Huh? That is the truth. Actually they do not know, and they cheat others, speaking about God. That is the difficulty. All rascals are doing that. And if I say, "All rascals," it is little harsh, but it has to be said. They do not know what is God, and they speak of God. Let them say frankly that "I do not know what is God." That is answered in the Bhagavad-gītā, bahūnāṁ janmanām ante (BG 7.19). If they are sincere, then after many, many births... Kleśo 'dhikataras teṣām avyaktāsakta... (BG 12.5). They do not know, and they will not accept ācāryopāsanam. The ācārya says, Rāmānujācārya says, Madhvācārya says, big, big ācārya, Caitanya Mahāprabhu... They will not believe them. They will speculate in their nonsense speculation. This is the difficulty. Without going to the ācārya... Tad vijñānārthaṁ sa gurum evābhigacchet (MU 1.2.12). This is the Vedic process, how one can know. But they will speculate. Ciraṁ vicinvan. Athāpi te deva padāmbuja-dvayaṁ jānāti tattvam... Athāpi te deva padāmbuja-dvayam, leśānugṛhīta eva hi jānāti tattvaṁ na cānya eko 'pi ciraṁ vicinvan (SB 10.14.29). One who has little mercy of God upon him, he can understand, but others, they can speculate for many, many births; still, they'll never be able.

Conversation on Train to Allahabad -- January 11, 1977, India:

Prabhupāda: Then you have no religion.

Rāmeśvara: They do not know the answer. They'll speculate.

Prabhupāda: Therefore there is no religion.

Room Conversation -- January 27, 1977, Puri:

Prabhupāda: That... What is your science nonsense? You cannot explain actually what is the position. You are simply speculating—"There is no life," "Somewhere there may be life. Let us take photograph. Let us go." What is your knowledge? We have got some knowledge from the śāstra that they're all full of living entities. And what knowledge you have got? We have got some śāstric evidence, Veda-śāstra. Is full of life, but you have no evidence. You simply speculate. So what is the value of your knowledge? Admitting that you are defective, I am defective, but I have got some authority. You have nothing. You are in the darkness.

Room Conversation -- January 27, 1977, Puri:

Prabhupāda: Practically everything. But these two we challenge. We can challenge. They know. Therefore they want to bluff. They know that it is not possible for them to know. They know it perfectly well. It is not possible for their so-called science to understand what is the situation of this planetary system and what is the origin of life. They do not know. They admit. Two things unknown. Everything is unknown, but especially these two things. Simply speculate and bluff and... Mūḍha. And we consider them as rascals. That's all.

Room Conversation -- January 27, 1977, Puri:

Prabhupāda: I say "These rascal scientists are brainwashing," and they say, "These rascal Kṛṣṇaś, they are brainwashing." (laughs) This is the position. But so far us, we have got some support and we have got authorities, and these rascals, they have no authority. They simply speculate. So even we are rascals, they are... Among these two rascals, we are better rascal, (laughs) not they are better. That's all.

Room Conversation with Ratan Singh Rajda M.P. 'Nationalism and Cheating' -- April 15, 1977, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: I have got tendency to cheat, so people unnecessarily poses himself as very big man even by ideas that you will consider him very great man, although I am nothing. So many gurus, they are doing that. Our business that we want to speak what Kṛṣṇa has said. If Kṛṣṇa has cheated, then we are cheater. Otherwise honest. If Kṛṣṇa is honest, we are honest. If Kṛṣṇa is cheater, so our position is safe. Yāre dekha tāre kaha kṛṣṇa-upadeśa (CC Madhya 7.128). Other gurus, they are manufacturing how to cheat. That is the difference. We are not speaking anything new. So if Kṛṣṇa has originally cheated you, then I am cheater.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: That's a... A big cheating is going on in the form of speculating. Just like the, all of the teachers, professors... I was reading Satsvarūpa's book. Satsvarūpa was presenting that there's three ways of acquiring knowledge, you know. First way is by sense perception. But that's cheating, because...

Prabhupāda: Hm, pratyakṣa, parokṣa aitihya.

Morning Conversation -- April 23, 1977, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: It is very insignificant thing, personal. And it is said, personal, if you keep long hair, it will look... But it has been made here, it is said that "People will think like that, that he has become more beautiful." The psychology. Lāvaṇyaṁ keśa-dharaṇam. They rejected all other things. Simply they'll think that "If I keep long hair, I'll be very beautiful." This psychological study is there. And five thousand years before, prediction. How much authoritative the book is, just imagine. Is it not fact? Vyāsadeva's authority, try to... How perfectly authorized he is. They're stating psychological effect of people five thousand years ahead. Not only that, there are many descriptions what will be the name two thousand, three thousand years... Generally said, "This name will be like this. This name will be like this. Your son, grandson, great-grandson, what will be their names, this is..." So why shall we not believe just that statement of planetary system? If they are so correct... Planetary system is already there, but they are foretelling what in future, it will happen. That is my conviction. Therefore I do not believe anyone except Bhāgavata, Bhagavad-gītā. That is my science. They speculate. I don't believe it.

Discussions with Devotees and Conversation with Dr. Ghosh -- June 1, 1977, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: But they have no background. They are simply speculating. In the first place they have no background. Child. Doesn't know what... Do you think they are knowing?

Svarūpa Dāmodara: I saw just little hint. I met an Indian physicist in Emory University. He's quite well known physicist, and he actually liked the idea that we wrote on. He said it's very genuine and very scientific. We have developed this the laws of consciousness from trying ātmā and Paramātmā. The Paramātmā, we say, is the source of all these laws of nature.

Prabhupāda: That is stated in the Bhagavad-gītā. Mattaḥ smṛtir jñānam apohanaṁ ca (BG 15.15). Jaya. (Bengali) Or if you like, you can travel with him, but your translation must be main work. If you like, you can go to the foreign countries along with him. (Bengali) So that program you planned, he can come.

Room Conversation about Mayapura Attack Talk with Vrindavan De -- July 8, 1977, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: So then there is clue. Then others should be arrested.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Actually... I'm actually speculating... Gopāla said Bhavānanda shot two of them, and he's in jail for shooting two of them. I'm saying that they're in the hospital. Maybe they're not. He's arrested for shooting two of them.

Prabhupāda: Unless they are in hospital...

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: How could he be arrested? Right.

Prabhupāda: Bengal has become ruined.

Room Conversation -- November 2, 1977, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: So when he will come?

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Yes, I am also beginning to wonder. He was supposed to come by at least four or five o'clock. I'm sure he'll have a good reason, but until he comes I cannot speculate on why he's late.

Prabhupāda: It will be late. The other person, whether they will come at night?

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Well, that's probably why he is late, because they would only come at night. That's my... Last time this was also done at about this time, Śrīla Prabhupāda. These men work all day in the court, and they can't come until the evening.