SB 3.25.14 – The Vedic Culture as It Is

Giriraj Swami: 

oṁ namo bhagavate vāsudevāya
oṁ namo bhagavate vāsudevāya
oṁ namo bhagavate vāsudevāya

Reading from Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, Canto Three, Chapter Twenty-five, “The Glories of Devotional Service,” 

TEXT 14

tam imaṁ te pravakṣyāmi
yam avocaṁ purānaghe
ṛṣīṇāṁ śrotu-kāmānāṁ
yogaṁ sarvāṅga-naipuṇam

TRANSLATION

O most pious mother, I shall now explain unto you the ancient yoga system, which I explained formerly to the great sages. It is serviceable and practical in every way.

PURPORT by Srila Prabhupada

The Lord does not manufacture a new system of yoga. Sometimes it is claimed that someone has become an incarnation of God and is expounding a new theological aspect of the Absolute Truth. But here we find that although Kapila Muni is the Lord Himself and is capable of manufacturing a new doctrine for His mother, He nevertheless says, “I shall just explain the ancient system which I once explained to the great sages because they were also anxious to hear about it.” When we have a superexcellent process already present in Vedic scriptures, there is no need to concoct a new system, to mislead the innocent public. At present it has become a fashion to reject the standard system and present something bogus in the name of a newly invented process of yoga.

COMMENT

Lord Kapila is the Supreme Personality of Godhead, as stated in Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, tene brahma hṛdā ādi-kavaye. That the Vedic knowledge was first imparted by the Lord Himself into the heart of Brahma. Brahma is the first created being in the whole material universe. He had no one to receive knowledge from except the Lord, and the Lord imparted the knowledge to Brahma within the heart. Evam paramparā-prāptam imaṁ rājarṣayo viduḥ, the knowledge begins with the Lord and is passed through disciplic succession. dharmaṁ tu sākṣād bhagavat-praṇītam, the path of religion is directly enunciated by the Lord. No one can manufacture any system of religion. What is religion? People are so fond of talking about religion, but if I ask you, what is religion? Can you say? Bhakta Naresh.

Bhakta Naresh: To love God and serve God.

Giriraj Swami: Religion is to serve God and love God. That is the highest truth; that is the highest. But what is the general definition of religion? Krishna Kinkar.

Krishna Kinkar Prabhu: To follow the laws of God.

Giriraj Swami: Yes, to follow the laws of God. And of course, the ultimate goal is to develop love of God. Now, no one can create religion. Religion is given by God because religion means the laws of God. No one can create laws in the state also. Suppose some friends get together in a room and decide they want to enact a law that from now on there shall be no more tax. But they cannot do so; they are not authorized to do so. Law means the decisions made by the government or made by the parliament. So just as no ordinary person can create laws of the land, similarly, no one can create religion, which are the laws of God. Only God gives us the way; He shows the way, and He also does not invent new processes. God is eternal, the living entity is eternal, and religion is eternal— sanātana-dharma. So here, although Kapiladeva was competent to give any new system of religion, He did not do so. He explained the same yoga system that He had explained previously to the great sages who were eager to hear.

Here is the first qualification of the disciple, śrotu-kāmānāṁ: they should be eager to hear, eager to solve the problems of life, eager to attain the perfection of life. And because the great sages were eager to hear, Lord Kapiladeva was pleased to explain to them the yoga system. And now Devahuti is also eager to hear. She is also anxious to solve the problems of life, to become free from the sufferings of material existence, and therefore she also approached Kapiladeva. And now Kapiladeva will explain the same system to her that He explained previously to the great sages.

Now, someone may say that what was told hundreds of years ago or thousands of years ago or even millions of years ago is not practical now; we need something new to suit the modern conditions. But here, Kapiladeva says, yogaṁ sarvāṅga-naipuṇam, that the same system is serviceable and practical in all respects even now. Even though the same system was spoken very long ago, the same system is still practical and applicable now. Sometimes people argue that what Krishna spoke in Bhagavad-gītā was practical for people then, and they argue that so many of the Vedic principles are not practical now. And they have so many speculative theories about why the principles were appropriate previously but not now. Actually, they don’t accept the authority of the Supreme Personality of Godhead or the eternality of the Bhagavad-gītā. Ultimately, they don’t accept that Krishna is eternal or that Bhagavad-gītā is eternal, that sanātana-dharma is eternal. They think that they have to create something new which is appropriate for us now.

Some days ago, I mentioned one man in Madras who dressed his deity in black. You were not present; you seem surprised. All right. He dressed his deity in black because, as he later told us, if he didn’t dress the deity in black, the effulgence of the deity would blind him. And he also did not offer obeisances to the deity, and he later explained that the deity is his son, so he will not offer obeisances to his son. So the man was inventing, but he did not stop there. He later told us that he and his friends would get together from time to time and invent pastimes of Vishnu or Krishna. They would just invent them, and the implication actually is that the Lord is not real, the scriptures are not real, but the whole thing is just concocted, so they feel they have as much right to concoct as anyone else.

Some years ago, we received a letter from Orient Longman, a publishing house, that they were compiling a book about different gurus in India, and they wanted us to submit an article about Srila Prabhupada. So I wrote to Srila Prabhupada and told him about the proposal, and in the meantime, I began to write because we did not have so much time. Then Srila Prabhupada sent the reply that his unique contribution was the following: that he took the Vedic culture as it is and transplanted it into the Western countries as it is. He did not change anything. He said, just like if you want to transplant a tulasi plant, a young sapling, you have to be very careful not to disturb any part of the plant because the plant is very delicate and fragile, and if you disturb any part of it, the plant may become damaged and ultimately die. So Srila Prabhupada said that he had taken the Vedic culture as it is and he transplanted it into the Western countries, and he did not touch or tamper with any part of it, but he presented it as it is, and the Western people accepted it as it is, without any change at all. This is faith. This is faith, and whatever Krishna has said in Bhagavad-gītā is correct and true for all times. We don’t have to add anything or subtract anything or concoct anything; we just present it as it is. And this is also humility.

Srila Prabhupada often compared himself to a postman. A postman is a humble soul; he is not a great person, and he only delivers the mail, nothing more or less. So Srila Prabhupada gives the example that if a rich man sends you a draft for one million dollars in the post and the postman delivers it without adding or subtracting, you will be very happy. You will thank the postman; you won’t consider that the postman himself is only getting a salary of 500, that he himself is not a big person. But if he delivers to you one million dollars, you’ll be happy with him also. So Srila Prabhupada explained that he was like the postman who was delivering the message of Krishna without any addition or subtraction or alteration, and therefore what he delivered was perfect and pure and complete. So, this is humility. We just present the message of Krishna. We don’t try to invent something new. One disciple asked Srila Prabhupada that Lord Chaitanya wrote only eight verses called Śikṣāṣṭakam, but in bhakti, the spiritual master is so important. Is there any mention of the spiritual master in the Śikṣāṣṭakam prayers? And Srila Prabhupada said, yes.

tṛṇād api su-nīcena
taror iva sahiṣṇunā
amāninā māna-dena
kīrtanīyaḥ sadā hariḥ

If someone is actually humble, then he will not think that he can invent his own ways and means. He will think that he has to receive the authorized system coming from the Lord through the disciplic succession. Therefore, the humbleness of the devotee implies surrender to the Lord and the system of the Lord, which is paramparā and which comes through paramparā. Although Kapiladeva could have invented any new system, he did not. He gave the same system that he had given previously. Krishna also says the same thing in Bhagavad-gītā: imaṁ vivasvate yoga proktavān aham avyayam, that previously He spoke the same system millions of years earlier to the sun God. He didn’t change anything; he presented the same knowledge that he gave previously.

When bogus incarnations come or bogus followers of incarnations, we can challenge them that, you say that your God is the same as Krishna, the same as Rama, and so on, but then why does he not teach the same thing that they taught? Generally, they give the answer that now the times have changed, so therefore my God has come to give the new system for the modern age. But here we see from the example of Kapiladeva and from the example of Krishna Himself that when they come, they give the same system that they gave before, nothing new.

Chaitanya Mahaprabhu also, whatever Chaitanya Mahaprabhu taught, although He is God Himself, he supported with reference to Vedic scriptures. He instructed the Gosvamis to research the Vedic literatures and give evidence from the Vedic literatures in support of the system that Chaitanya Mahaprabhu Himself gave. In Srila Prabhupada’s books, we find the same thing. In every important purport, there are so many quotes from scriptures in support of the principles. There is nothing new to be created, nor should we try to interpret something new. That is the other way that people take the same verses from Bhagavad-gītā or any scripture and give some new interpretation. In the modern age, there were so many in India. For example, one famous politician in India interpreted that Kurukshetra means the body. Kurukshetra represents the body, and the five Pandavas represent the five senses, and the hundred Kauravas represent a hundred sinful desires. Krishna represents the higher self, and therefore he is preaching to the lower self to bring the lower self under control. Now, the politician is highly regarded in India. He is considered a follower of Lord Krishna and Bhagavad-gītā, but actually, he has no faith in Krishna. He does not actually believe that Krishna exists because he thinks that Krishna just represents the higher self and Arjuna represents us, and Kurukshetra represents the body. He doesn’t actually believe that there was a battle at Kurukshetra and that Krishna actually spoke to Arjuna on the battlefield. So, actually, he is an atheist.

In his autobiography, he has written about his Krishna that he likes his Krishna speaking Bhagavad-gītā to Arjuna at Kurukshetra. He doesn’t like that Krishna who is dancing in the dead of night with the wives of other men. Then he writes that if, in fact, there actually was such a Krishna who did so many immoral things, then he would immediately resign from the Hindu religion. So, he actually has no faith that Krishna exists at all. He thinks that we are free to imagine our Krishna as we would like. He, as a mundane moralist, more or less likes Krishna speaking Bhagavad-gītā. He doesn’t like Krishna with the gopīs. The sahajiyās, they like Krishna with the gopīs; they don’t like Krishna on the battlefield of Kurukshetra. Actually, none of them knows Krishna or has real faith in Krishna. They simply imagine Krishna as they like and use Krishna as they like to suit their own purposes. We can just see how the world is full of atheists, in the guise of moralists, altruists, philanthropists, and in the guise of devotees also.

We can just imagine how difficult Srila Prabhupada’s job was to present Bhagavad-gītā as it is. It was almost impossible, especially in India, because India is the place where people got so many interpretations or misinterpretations of Bhagavad-gītā. Srila Prabhupada said that it was harder to preach in India than elsewhere. He gave the example of one music school in Germany where the students were charged, say, five hundred marks, meaning Deutschmarks, the German currency, if they had no previous experience with music. They were charged one thousand marks if they had previous experience.

Someone asked the principal of the school, why he was charging more to the students who already had experience. The principal replied that, “Because they have learned so many wrong things, we have to first teach them to forget everything they already learned, and then we have to teach them what is right. So, we have doubled the work.” Srila Prabhupada said that preaching in India was like that. People had so many misconceptions about Bhagavad-gītā from impersonal commentaries that it was so difficult for them to give up their previous conceptions, almost impossible in some cases. We want the original Gītā as spoken by Krishna, and not only as spoken by Krishna, but as accepted by Arjuna. We want the original instructions, and we want the original way of understanding the instructions and accepting them. Here, Kapiladeva says, sarvāṅga-naipuṇam. Aṅga means limbs. There are many limbs of devotional service or many parts to devotional service, and he says, sarvāṅga-naipuṇam, every part of the system is practical and serviceable. Sometimes people give the argument that some parts of the Bhagavad-gītā are appropriate now, but not all parts, and we can pick and choose the parts of the Gītā that we like.

Srila Prabhupada gave the example of the hen that laid the golden eggs. One farmer had a hen who laid golden eggs, and the farmer was so happy to get the golden egg and he was so rich, but still, he had to feed the chicken or the hen. He thought that actually getting the eggs is very good, but feeding the hen is just troublesome. So, he had . . . then he could not get any more eggs. People have the same attitude towards Bhagavad-gītā. When they read the verse, karmaṇy evādhikāras te mā phaleṣu kadācana, they think this is very valuable, just like gold, because it says we can do our duty. What is our duty? They think that their duty is to work hard day and night like hogs and dogs and spend the money on the family and enjoy life. So, they say karma, karmaṇy evādhikāras te, that is very good, just like the golden egg. But when they come to the verse, sarva-dharmān parityajya mām ekaṁ śaraṇaṁ vraja, they think, What? We have to give up everything and surrender to Krishna? That is very troublesome. So, they cut that portion, the troublesome portion, and just keep the valuable portion.

For the karmis, the valuable portion is that you can do your duty, and for the jnanis, the valuable portion is that “I am in all beings and all beings are in me, I am everywhere.” They think this is very nice, this is very valuable. As soon as they accept one portion and reject one portion, everything is finished. Accepting Bhagavad-gītā As It Is means accepting it as Krishna spoke it and as Arjuna understood it. In other words, accepting Krishna as the Supreme Personality of Godhead and accepting as truth everything that Krishna says, and in the end agreeing to follow all of the instructions of Krishna. This is surrender. Now, sometimes Krishna or the representative of Krishna will give some instruction, and then later he will give another instruction, and the two instructions may appear to be contradictory. So here also, we cannot pick and choose the instruction that we want; we have to take the instruction that is meant for us, which generally is the later instruction. Just like once, Srila Prabhupada gave an instruction to a disciple, and the disciple said, “But previously you said the other thing.” And Srila Prabhupada replied, “Well, if you accepted my authority, then why don’t you accept it now?”

So, Srila Prabhupada said we have to accept the latest instruction of the spiritual master. We cannot choose some other instruction from the past that we like more. There are many elements in surrender, but the basis of surrender is faith—faith that Krishna is the Supreme Personality of Godhead, that we are the eternal servants of Krishna, and that the method by which we can attain Krishna or love of Krishna is given by the Lord Himself. It remains the same eternally and never has to be changed or compromised at any stage.

Srila Prabhupada had such faith, and therefore he presented the Bhagavad-gītā As It Is. He presented the teachings of Lord Chaitanya and the process of devotional service just the same as given by Krishna and later by Mahaprabhu and elaborated by Mahaprabhu’s followers—no difference at all. In Bhagavad-gītā, Krishna says, satataṁ kīrtayanto mām, that we should always engage in kirtan. And Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu in Śikṣāṣṭakam says, kīrtanīyaḥ sadā hariḥ. We should always engage in kirtan. So there is no difference, no difference at all. This is Krishna consciousness. There is no contradiction. Whatever the Lord says in any incarnation or in any age will ultimately be the same, and especially now in Kali-yuga, there is no question of any change. The process of kirtan, although there are so many aṅgas of bhakti—sixty-four aṅgas—but of all the sixty-four, the most important is chanting the holy name, which is so practical and serviceable. There is no need of concocting or inventing.

I see everything about Krishna consciousness as given by Chaitanya Mahaprabhu is very nice. Therefore, when one reporter asked Srila Prabhupada, “You are doing everything for Krishna—speaking about Krishna, working for Krishna, preaching about Krishna—but suppose in the end there is no Krishna, then what?” Srila Prabhupada replied that, “Even if there was no Krishna, I wouldn’t do anything different. I would do the same things that I’m doing now because everything I’m doing now is so nice—chanting, dancing, taking prasāda, speaking about Krishna, associating with devotees, working for Krishna. It’s all so nice that even if there weren’t any Krishna, I wouldn’t do anything different.” The same thing is stated here: yogaṁ sarvāṅga-naipuṇam, that it is serviceable and practical, and not only that, but it is enjoyable. So there is no need to change anything. We should accept it as it is, as given by Krishna and Mahaprabhu, and received through paramparā and Srila Prabhupada. Follow it and preach it. Hare Krishna.

Are there any questions or comments?

Srila Prabhupada ki jaya!
Nitai-Gaura premānande Hari Haribol!