Prabhupāda: If you chant sincerely this mantra, everything will be clear. It is the clearing process. Even if you have got some rascal ideas, rascal association, it doesn't matter. Simply if you chant . . . you know practically, everyone, that this chanting process is the only method that will make people advanced. So this is the method, chanting and hearing. Hear the lectures from Bhagavad-gītā or Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, try to understand, and chant, and follow the rules and regulation.
So rules and regulation later on. First of all, you try to hear and chant. Śṛṇvatāṁ sva-kathāḥ kṛṣṇaḥ puṇya-śravaṇa-kīrtanaḥ (SB 1.2.17). Puṇya-śravaṇa-kīrtanaḥ . Anyone who hears Hare Kṛṣṇa, he becomes pious simply by hearing. He becomes purified. So at a stage, he will accept. But people think that "What is this Hare Kṛṣṇa chanting?" You see? If you give them some bluff, kuṇḍalinī-yoga and all these humbugs, they'll be very much pleased. You see? So they want to be cheated. And some cheaters come, "Yes, you take this mantra, give me thirty-five dollars, and within six months you'll become God, you'll have four hands." (laughter)
So we want to be cheated. That is . . . cheating process is one of the item of conditional life. There are four defects of conditional life. One defect is that we commit mistake, and another defect is that we accept something which is not that. Just like commit mistake, that is not to be very difficult to understand. Every one of us know how we commit mistake, blunder. Even great men, they also commit blunder, you see. Just like there are so many instances amongst the politician, a little mistake or a blunder, great blunder . . . so mistake, "To err is human," mistake is there.
Similarly, accepting something as fact which is not fact. How it is? Just like everyone in the conditioned life, they think that, "This body is my self." But I'm not this. I'm not this body. So this is called illusion, pramāda. The best example is to accept a rope as a snake. Suppose in the darkness there is a rope like this, and you are . . . "Oh, here is a snake." This is the best example of illusion—accepting something which is not that. So this defect is there in conditioned life. And to make error and mistake, that defect is there.
And the third defect is that we want to cheat and we want to be cheated. We are also very expert. We are always thinking how I shall cheat somebody. And naturally, he's also thinking to cheat me. So the whole conditional life is the association of cheaters and cheated, that's all. So this is another defect. And the fourth defect is that our senses are imperfect. Therefore all knowledge that we receive, that is imperfect knowledge.
A man may speculate, but he may speculate with his mind. That's all. But his mind is imperfect. However he may speculate, he'll produce something nonsense, that's all. Because his mind is imperfect. It doesn't matter, that if you add thousands of zeros, it makes one. No. It is still zero. So this speculation process to understand the Supreme is nothing but zero.
Therefore with all these defects of our conditional life, it is not possible to come to the real life. Therefore we have to take it from personalities like Kṛṣṇa and His bona fide representative. That is real knowledge. Then you'll get perfection.
Devotee: Prabhupāda, what is the difference between an incarnation and an avatāra?
Prabhupāda: Avatāra is incarnation. Avatāra means . . . incarnation, in your dictionary, is "accepting some body"? Is that . . .? But avatāra . . . of course, there are different grades of avatāra. Avatāra means one who comes . . . the real word is avataraṇa descending.
Avatāra means who comes from a higher sphere, higher planet. They are not living entities of this world, this material world. They come from spiritual world. They are called avatāra. So these avatāra grades are different. There are śaktyāveśāvatāra, guṇāvatāra, līlāvatāra, yugāvatāra, so many.
So avatāra means one who comes directly from the spiritual world. And incarnation . . . of course, this avatāra is translated with the word incarnation, but I think real meaning of incarnation means "who accepts a body." Is it not? So that incarnation . . . everyone accepts a material body. But avatāra, there are avatāra of Viṣṇu and avatāra of devotees also. There are different grades of avatāra. You'll read it in the Teachings of Lord Caitanya, which is coming out. Yes.