So when I was seventy years old I decided, "Now I must do and execute the order of my Guru Mahārāja. And thus this movement was started in 1965 from New York. And I was not very much hopeful because it is very difficult task, just opposite the European and Western culture. I came... When I first came, I had no money. So I got a free passage through some Indian steam navigation company. So I came by ship. So when I was on the ship at Boston port, Commonwealth port, I was thinking that "I have come here. I do not know what is the purpose because how the people will accept this movement? They are differently educated, and as soon as I will say, 'So, my dear sir, you have to give up meat-eating and illicit sex and no intoxication and gambling,' they will say, 'Please go home.' " (laughter) Because that was the experience of one of my Godbrother.
Western culture
Lectures
Festival Lectures
Arrival Addresses and Talks
So time is very bad at the present moment everywhere, especially in India. Of course, India's original culture is all right. But unfortunately, our modern leaders, they are killing the original culture. They want to introduce Western culture. Now it is openly there are beef shop, wine shop. So what can be done? It is Kali-yuga. Everything is possible. But those who are intelligent-kṛṣṇa yei bhaje sei baḍa-catura—they should take to this Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement and be successful of this human form of life. Hari hari bifale, janama goṅāinu, manuṣya-janama pāiyā, rādhā-kṛṣṇa na bhajiyā, jāniyā śuniyā biṣa khāinu. Anyone who is not taking to this Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement, surely he is taking poison knowingly. That is the fact. Everyone, harāv abhaktasya kuto mahad-guṇā (SB 5.18.12), no qualification. The so-called education has no meaning, no value. So it is not a whim that one may take to Kṛṣṇa consciousness and one may not. No. It is compulsory. One must take to Kṛṣṇa consciousness; otherwise his life is spoiled
Initiation Lectures
Kali-yuga means the age of quarrel and disagreement. So in this age people are embarrassed in so many ways. First disqualification is that they do not live for long time. The average duration of life in India is thirty-five years, and I do not know exactly what is the average age here, but in India the people are overcrowded. They have no such intelligence, or they did not care to go outside India, colonize. Everyone went there to exploit, but they never thought of exploiting other places. That is their cultural... They do not try to encroach upon others' property. Anyway, India's position is very precarious, because they have left their own culture and they're trying to imitate the Western culture, which they cannot due to so many circumstances, and therefore they're put into, between the horns of Scylla and Charybdis. You see.
Conversations and Morning Walks
1973 Conversations and Morning Walks
Prabhupāda: Any science does not depend on East and West understanding. Science is science.
Malcolm: No. I'm talking not of science, but of education which...
Prabhupāda: No, education is different. Education may be wrong or right, but science is always the fact. "Two plus two equal to four,"—that is equally good in the East and West, not that in the western countries, two plus two will be five. So similarly, any scientific knowledge, it does not depend on East and West understanding. It is good for everywhere. Similarly, to understand the science of God, it does not depend on the Western culture or Eastern culture. One must be serious to understand. Then it is equally available. Ahaituky apratihatā. These material impediments cannot check progress in the science of God, cannot. Apratihatā, without any checking. That we are experiencing, that Kṛṣṇa consciousness is not checked anywhere. We have got branches all over the world. Any country, there is no language difficulty. Wherever we chant Hare Kṛṣṇa, they join, "Hare Kṛṣṇa." There is no checking. Even Africa, they are also chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa. Even the child will chant. They clap. You have seen that a small child is...? I think he..., about six months old. So there is no checking. For spiritual understanding there is no checking. The child, six months' old child, clapping, that means he's joining with the system. He's not sophisticated. He's new child, but automatically... So there is no checking.
Dr. Arnold Toynbee: Yes, yes. But the people who rule India now have a western education mostly. The Indians who...
Prabhupāda: Yes. Perverted, converted. Just like Nehru. Nehru was western-educated. He was educated in London. But he hated everything Indian.
Dr. Arnold Toynbee: Yes.
Prabhupāda: Yes. That was the res... Formerly, in our childhood we saw that any gentleman coming here in London and goes back to India, he no more mixes with the Indian soil. He... They were called "England-returned." So they made their own society. Then our Ram Mohan Raya, he formed a Brahmo Society. And so many things changed. Again, they are now topsy-turvied. So actually, India's position is that they have lost their own culture, and they could not assimilate the western culture. But in the western countries, if they accept this Vedic process of civilization, then they will again take it.
1974 Conversations and Morning Walks
Prabhupāda: ...our gṛhastha householders, how they are rising early, taking bath in Yamunā, coming to the temple.
Gurudāsa: Yes.
Prabhupāda: This is Vedic culture. (break) ...of eating. Western culture means: early in the morning tea. First of all tea, and, what is called?
Devotee: Coffee.
Prabhupāda: Coffee, tea, and so many other things.
1975 Conversations and Morning Walks
Guest (1): At this time I think India also needs as much spiritual movement as anybody else in the world.
Prabhupāda: Hm?
Guest (1): At this time I think India itself needs as much as spiritual needs.
Prabhupāda: Yes.
Guest (1): We are as much backwards as anybody else in the world, probably more so.
Prabhupāda: Because we have lost our original culture and we could not take the Western culture. So we are in the wilderness.
Guest (1): Because here the average man takes more interest.
Prabhupāda: Because they are fed up.
Guest (1): Whereas in India the average man doesn't even take interest.
Prabhupāda: No, he knows, "What is this Hare Kṛṣṇa? We know it, now reject it."
Guest (2): An average Indian, I think he will not be able to tell you how many chapters there are in the Gītā.
Prabhupāda: Yes, they have never been taught. But still they are Kṛṣṇa conscious.
Reporter: How does Kṛṣṇa consciousness relate to the Hindu religion? Because that is also based on the Bhagavad-gītā.
Prabhupāda: Kṛṣṇa is not meant for the Hindus, but Kṛṣṇa appeared in Hindustan. Therefore it is the duty of all Hindus to know Kṛṣṇa first. And they also conscious. Every Hindu knows Kṛṣṇa. Every Hindu observes the Janmāṣṭamī, Kṛṣṇa's birthday. But they are not very serious to understand Kṛṣṇa as a follower. Just like Christian. They admit they are Christian but don't follow the Christian principles. So that Hindus are also like that. Nobody is following Kṛṣṇa's instruction. Kṛṣṇa says, "I am God." Mattaḥ parataraṁ nānyat: (BG 7.7) "There is no more superior person or superior position than Me," Kṛṣṇa says. And "God" means that. In the dictionary "God" means the Supreme Being. Supreme Being means nobody is greater than Him; nobody is equal to Him. That is called supreme. So here God personally says that mattaḥ parataraṁ nānyat kiñcid asti dhanañjaya (BG 7.7). But this rascal will not accept. They will say, "No, here is another dini-kṛṣṇa." They will bring one competitor. That is going on. "God" means there cannot be any competitor. Nobody is equal to Him; nobody is greater than Him. But they will bring so many competitors. "Why Kṛṣṇa alone will be God?" This is the position of the modern Hindus. They have lost their own culture, and they wanted to imitate Western culture. That they could not do, neither they could maintain their own culture. Therefore in the wilderness, very precarious condition.
Prabhupāda: Kṛṣṇa said, "The four divisions are according to quality and work." Whether he is qualified, that will be proved by his work, not that he has taken the degree, and now he is smoking. That is going on. Academic means this. They get the degrees and after that they do all nonsense. That is academic. But this Vedic culture is not like that. He must act. Then it will be all right. (break) ...the western culture, the idea is "Never mind whatever his private character. We don't mind. He has passed Ph.D, so let him become teacher." This is western culture. "By privately, he may be rascal. It doesn't matter." That is not brahminical culture. There is no "private" or "public."
Prabhupāda: Now here is sand. You can say, "There are so many sands." And this is only a small beach, but you can say how many sands and atoms are there within the universe. You can become so qualified. But still, you are unqualified to understand Kṛṣṇa. Radhakrishnan, Dr. Radhakrishnan was a good man, brāhmaṇa, but he was victimized by the western culture. He got some money from Oxford University. Therefore he took the westerner—his father mother, that's all. That is his qualification. Whatever the westerners say, they will say, he will say, "Yes, this is science." Not only Dr. Radhakrishnan, all the big men of India, they thought like that.
Prabhupāda: No. Practically, because you have preached your culture in India; therefore they have lost their own culture. The Western, the Britishers were for two hundred years and they preached. Their policy was to kill the Indian culture. Because that report of Lord McCauley, after studying Indian situation, the report was to the Parliament that "If you keep India as Indian, then you will not be able to rule over them," so therefore there was regular policy to kill Indian civilization. And because they were on the governing power, they could do it. Therefore India lost its own culture and victimized by the Western culture. This is the position.
Prabhupāda: But you have, I mean to say, curbed down. This rascal civilization, they could not take the Western civilization, and they lost their own civilization. This is India's bad luck. The Britishers did not teach them how to take up the Western culture, but they killed the Eastern culture. You understand?
Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: Yes.
Prabhupāda: You have no position. You cannot take the Western culture properly, and you have lost your own culture. This is India's bad luck. They never taught Indians how to become actually Westernized. No. They were not giving them sufficient education. They were very much against higher education in the beginning. They wanted some clerks to conduct their activities, mercantile and government, some third-class, fourth-class men.
1976 Conversations and Morning Walks
Prabhupāda: So to become guru means to save a person from the conditional life of matter. So long you become a materialistic person, that means you are under condition of material nature. So you have to get your freedom from the laws of material nature. That is your perfect life. But people in the Western countries, they do not know much of this freedom. India knew it, or some of Indians, they know it. But at the present moment they, being conquered or influenced by the Western culture, they are also losing their identity. Therefore my Guru Mahārāja ordered me to do something about the spiritual life in the Western countries. On account of this I came here.
Prabhupāda: That was their policy. Because there was one Britisher politician, Lord McCauley. His report was, he studied the whole Indian situation. They were very expert politicians. He reported that "If you keep Indians as Indians, you'll never be able to rule over them. They must be trained up in such a way that they would think their own culture as useless; this Western culture is very good. That impression must be there. Otherwise, you cannot rule over them." So the education and everything was going on very silently on this principle.
Correspondence
1970 Correspondence
Western culture is monotheistic, but they are being misled by the impersonal Indian speculation. The young people of the West are frustrated because they are not dilligently taught about monotheism. They are not satisfied with this process of teaching and understanding. This Krishna Consciousness Movement is a boon to them because they are being really trained to understand Western Monotheism under authoritative Vedic system. We do not simply theoretically discuss, but we learn by the prescribed method of Vedic regulations.
1972 Correspondence
Emphasis should be given to the words of Bhagavat, they are spiritual and will have powerful effect if someone only hears them with attention, do not be very much enamoured by fancy costumes and stage-decorations, they will only distract. Real acting art is to know how to speak. The greatest dramas, even in your western culture, they can be played without any extra equipment. Just like your Shakespeare—sometime I saw they were playing one drama, I think Hamlet or something like that, and only two men were there on the bare stage and everyone was praising. So the art is catching their ears. Now in that spirit go on with your work and try to do something wonderful.
1976 Correspondence
Therefore the school should be moved to India, specifically to our new gurukula project in Vrindaban, where the facility will be just to our needs and the needs of the brahmacari to develop spiritually because it is based on authentic scripture. To live in Vrindaban is the highest perfection and to grow up in Vrindaban the greatest fortune. Who can compare Vrindaban to the nasty western culture? Even to live in Mathura-mandala for a fortnight guarantees one liberation. In Vrindaban no one will place restrictions on the school and it will be encouraged by the government. The people will see such a school and the example will encourage thousands to send their children there to be trained as human beings and devotees.
| Page Title: | Western culture |
| Compiler: | Visnu Murti, Matea |
| Created: | 30 of Nov, 2008 |
| Totals by Section: | BG=0, SB=0, CC=0, OB=0, Lec=3, Con=11, Let=3 |
| No. of Quotes: | 17 |