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This is an institution to elevate people gradually

Expressions researched:
"This is an institution to elevate people gradually"

Conversations and Morning Walks

1977 Conversations and Morning Walks

This is an institution to elevate people gradually.


Room Conversation -- January 8, 1977, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: (woman answers in Hindi) Call Pālikā. (to Pālikā) Just teach her . . . take her in the kitchen and teach her how to make tilaka.

Pālikā: How to make tilaka, yes.

Prabhupāda: Tilaka, dvādaśa-tilaka. You just go and learn. (break) What is that? (break) Otherwise there is no death. Na hanyate hanyamāne śarīre (BG 2.20). Actually there is no death. This forgetfulness is death. We have forgotten who was our father, who was our mother, where I was born. That is death. And otherwise I am the soul, continuing. Just like in childhood so many things we did, but we have forgotten. The forgetfulness is death. The more one forgets, the more one is dead. Otherwise there is no death. Na jāyate na mriyate vā (BG 2.20): "Never takes birth, never dies." Then what is death? Death is forgetfulness. (pause) So you can begin now. (break) . . . big, big buildings, the same spirit as karmīs are doing. But this desire to construct very big building, when transferred for Kṛṣṇa, that is bhakti. So we have got this tendency, everyone, to possess money, to have very big buildings and so on, so on. You do it for Kṛṣṇa, then it will be bhakti. Otherwise karma. And karma means to be bound up by the laws of nature. So? What is . . . (break)

Gopāla Kṛṣṇa: . . . parāyanaḥ sudurlabhaḥ praśāntātmā koṭiṣv api mahā-mune (SB 6.14.5): "O great sage, out of many millions of materially liberated people who are free from ignorance, and out of many millions of siddhas who have merely attained perfection, there's hardly one pure devotee of Nārāyaṇa. Only such a devotee is actually completely satisfied and peaceful." (break)

Prabhupāda: This is devotee. It is not so easy. But we are giving chance to everyone to come to that position. This is our Kṛṣṇa consciousness. But otherwise it is very, very difficult. Muktānām. It begins from the mukta, liberated. Liberated means no more material anxiety.

Gopāla Kṛṣṇa: That stage is little far for us.

Prabhupāda: But if you follow the vow . . .

Gopāla Kṛṣṇa: The principle . . .

Prabhupāda: . . . then it will be possible.

Gopāla Kṛṣṇa: I find that as a gṛhastha only sometime it's a little difficult, because a gṛhastha has to worry about taking care of his . . .

Prabhupāda: Family.

Gopāla Kṛṣṇa: . . . family's needs, clothing, this, that. It becomes a problem, where to get the money from. But otherwise . . .

Prabhupāda: And that is also different standard. People are not satisfied with simple living.

Gopāla Kṛṣṇa: So they want . . .

Prabhupāda: Therefore there is certain age, that "At this age no more such ambition, material. Lead simple life and advance." That is after fiftieth year. This is our Vedic system. In the beginning it is not possible, but by practicing . . . so if one lives for hundred years, fifty years' extravagancy, "Now stop. Now be regulated and try to be mukta." This is the system. But they don't want even up to the point of death, even men like Gandhi and others. They do not want. This morning Indira Gandhi said that, "I am for the mass of people." And Vivekananda, "My country." The same feeling as a person, individual person thinking of his family, these people are thinking of his country, a big family, not for the whole living entities, jīva. That is Kṛṣṇa consciousness. Nobody is interested in the śāstric injunction. They've lost them all. Temporary. This is an institution to elevate people gradually. (break) If we follow our own authorized . . . (indistinct)

Gopāla Kṛṣṇa: It is not very difficult. I don't find it very . . .

Prabhupāda: Not at all.

Gopāla Kṛṣṇa: But I used to work in New York outside all the time, but I didn't find it so difficult.

Prabhupāda: No one will. It is not at all difficult. The principles, the regulation we have charted, it will automatically bring them to that stage.

Gopāla Kṛṣṇa: If one chants sincerely and attends all the temple programs, then automatically one . . .

Prabhupāda: (light switch flicking on and off) No electricity. Stop this fan.

Gopāla Kṛṣṇa: Stop the fan? Śrīla Prabhupāda, I may not be going to the Kumbha-melā. I'm going to stay in Bombay and later on go to Delhi and Vṛndāvana.

Prabhupāda: That's all right. There is Gurudāsa and there others.

Gopāla Kṛṣṇa: Yes. Because there's lot of work to do, and I'm printing lot of books now, so . . .

Prabhupāda: No, you stay here.

Page Title:This is an institution to elevate people gradually
Compiler:Visnu Murti
Created:12 of Jul, 2011
Totals by Section:BG=0, SB=0, CC=0, OB=0, Lec=0, Con=1, Let=0
No. of Quotes:1