KEY TAKEAWAYS FROM HH HARIVILAS MAHARAJ’S MORNING BHAGAVATAM CLASS ON SB 2.7.37:
- Lord Buddha incarnates at a time when the people are most materialistic and preaches commonsense religious principles. Such ahiṁsā is not a religious principle itself, but it is an important quality for persons who are actually religious.
- But before learning these principles of nonviolence one has to learn two other principles, namely to be humble and to be prideless. Unless one is humble and prideless, one cannot be harmless and nonviolent.
- In religious principles there must be God in the center; otherwise simple moral instructions are merely subreligious principles, generally known as upadharma, or nearness to religious principles.
- A pure devotee is never disturbed in any circumstances. Nor is he envious of anyone. Nor does a devotee become his enemy’s enemy; he thinks, “This person is acting as my enemy due to my own past misdeeds. So it is better to suffer than to protest.”
- Whenever a devotee is in distress or has fallen into difficulty, he thinks that it is the Lord’s mercy upon him. He thinks, “Thanks to my past misdeeds I should suffer far, far greater than I am suffering now. So it is by the mercy of the Supreme Lord that I am not getting all the punishment I am due. I am just getting a little, by the mercy of the Supreme Personality of Godhead.” Therefore he is always calm, quiet and patient, despite many distressful conditions.
- If one can mold his family life in this way to develop Kṛṣṇa consciousness, following these four principles, then there is no need to change from family life to renounced life. But if it is not congenial, not favorable for spiritual advancement, then family life should be abandoned.
- But if it is not congenial, not favorable for spiritual advancement, then family life should be abandoned. In all cases, one should be detached from the happiness and distress of family life, because in this world one can never be fully happy or fully miserable
- One can never restrict the coming and going of happiness and distress, so one should be detached from the materialistic way of life and be automatically equipoised in both cases. To reach that stage, we have to practice unbreakable devotional service. Devotional service to Kṛṣṇa without deviation means engaging oneself in the nine processes of devotional service – chanting, hearing, worshiping, offering respect, etc.
- These eighteen items combine to form a gradual process by which real knowledge can be developed. Except for these, all other methods are considered to be in the category of nescience
- University students today are not given instructions in the regulative principles of brahmacarya (celibate student life), nor do they have any faith in any scriptural injunctions.
- Śrī Īśopaniṣad warns us of this faulty type of education, and the Bhagavad-gītā gives instructions as to the development of real knowledge.
- ISO mantra 10 states that the instructions of vidyā (knowledge) must be acquired from a dhīra. The dhīras have come to know all these facts by hearing them from superior authorities and have realized this knowledge by following the regulative principles.
- One can become a dhīra only by submissively hearing from a bona fide spiritual master.
- Therefore , one must hear submissively from a dhīra in order to attain actual education.
SB 2.7.37 TRANSLATION:
When the atheists, after being well versed in the Vedic scientific knowledge, annihilate inhabitants of different planets, flying unseen in the sky on well-built rockets prepared by the great scientist Maya, the Lord will bewilder their minds by dressing Himself attractively as Buddha and will preach on subreligious principles.
This incarnation of Lord Buddha is not the same Buddha incarnation we have in the present history of mankind. According to Śrīla Jīva Gosvāmī, the Buddha incarnation mentioned in this verse appeared in a different Kali age. In the duration of life of one Manu there are more than seventy-two Kali-yugas, and in one of them the particular type of Buddha mentioned here would appear. Lord Buddha incarnates at a time when the people are most materialistic and preaches commonsense religious principles. Such ahiṁsā is not a religious principle itself, but it is an important quality for persons who are actually religious. It is a commonsense religion because one is advised to do no harm to any other animal or living being because such harmful actions are equally harmful to he who does the harm. But before learning these principles of nonviolence one has to learn two other principles, namely to be humble and to be prideless. Unless one is humble and prideless, one cannot be harmless and nonviolent. And after being nonviolent one has to learn tolerance and simplicity of living. One must offer respect to the great religious preachers and spiritual leaders and also train the senses for controlled action, learning to be unattached to family and home, and enacting devotional service to the Lord, etc. At the ultimate stage one has to accept the Lord and become His devotee; otherwise there is no religion. In religious principles there must be God in the center; otherwise simple moral instructions are merely subreligious principles, generally known as upadharma, or nearness to religious principles.
Amazing verses. Rockets are not something new.. They existed millions and millions of years ago. Great Scientist Maya built them.. In the cycles of time.. Satya, Treta, Dwapara yuga, Kali yuga.. V imp to understand the concept of time. It is tremendously expanded when you read BG and SB. We think we are so important.. We are a little speck in time.. It gives us a perspective and helps us to not get puffed that we are unique and make plans.. The only uniqueness is to become a devotee of Krsna.. otherwise everybody else are specks.. In the gigantic universes among billions of universes.
Buddha;s teachings are a small step towards self realization.. He came to teach people who are hell bent on Violence.. Scientific advancement is only helping to kill people in masses and take control of other countries.. Nothing more than that.
He who lives by the sword dies by the sword..
One should be strict with oneself and be tolerant with others. But most people are viceversa..
Simplicity of living – One should be a Minimalist . Self controlled and not overindulge and should have sense gratification according to KC. Not according to materialists like freud.. If you have problems in marriage and go to psychologist they suggest to get divorce after couple sessions.
Tolerance is also explained BG 12th chapter..
BG 12.13-14 (READ THIS VERSE IF YOU WANT TO BE DEAR TO KRSNA AND BE A PURE DEVOTEE)
One who is not envious but is a kind friend to all living entities, who does not think himself a proprietor and is free from false ego, who is equal in both happiness and distress, who is tolerant, always satisfied, self-controlled, and engaged in devotional service with determination, his mind and intelligence fixed on Me – such a devotee of Mine is very dear to Me.
Coming again to the point of pure devotional service, the Lord is describing the transcendental qualifications of a pure devotee in these two verses. A pure devotee is never disturbed in any circumstances. Nor is he envious of anyone. Nor does a devotee become his enemy’s enemy; he thinks, “This person is acting as my enemy due to my own past misdeeds. So it is better to suffer than to protest.” In the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam (10.14.8) it is stated: tat te ’nukampāṁ su-samīkṣamāṇo bhuñjāna evātma-kṛtaṁ vipākam. Whenever a devotee is in distress or has fallen into difficulty, he thinks that it is the Lord’s mercy upon him. He thinks, “Thanks to my past misdeeds I should suffer far, far greater than I am suffering now. So it is by the mercy of the Supreme Lord that I am not getting all the punishment I am due. I am just getting a little, by the mercy of the Supreme Personality of Godhead.” Therefore he is always calm, quiet and patient, despite many distressful conditions.
This is real KC, real lakshana of a pure devotee.. This is if you want to be a devotee. If you do not want to be a devotee then you sleep in.. dont listen.. So you grow up to a be a nonsense. No one can say you did not know.. What do you mean you do not know.. Prabhupada has given everything. You did not try to know. No over eating, over sleeping, no over talking, not playing with gadget all around. You should be self controlled. If you know this 18 points of knowledge, then we will avoid most problems in life. BG 13.8-12 and ISO 10 both places, SP describes 18 points of knowledge.
ISO 10 –
(13) DETACHMENT – One should not be attached to more than the necessities of life required for spiritual advancement.
(14) FREEDOM FROM ENTANGLEMENT WITH CHILDREN, WIFE, HOME AND THE REST – One should not be more attached to wife, children and home than the revealed scriptures ordain.
One should develop spiritual vision. In the body there are 2 souls, jiva and paramatma. DEvotee does not see the body he sees the soul in everyone and in relation to Krsna. He helps everyone at home and outside to remember Krsna. As long as your family members are not inimical to KC,one should be always respectful and do their duty. Doing duty means not sense gratification. Doing duty is making everyone in the family KC by making things comfortable and freeing them from anxiety, to do that you have to be Humble, prideless, tolerant, non violent, and simple . Have a Minimalist life in the family, It is better to have few good things that are much more satisfying than a whole lot of junk.. If you go to Mayapur everyday they eat Kichidi.. They make their own Kichiri and put a lot of ghee.. This is a simple life and very healthy to eat a few things everyday.. That are very well made. Experts cook do not put too many things they use very few ingredients, but they are well dosed and they are very delicious.. With a very few good things a person is very satisfied. Make life very simple.. One should have a lakshman rekha for the sense enjoyment.. TRain senses to be control.. One should follow 8 regulative principles..
As for detachment from children, wife and home, it is not meant that one should have no feeling for these. They are natural objects of affection. But when they are not favorable to spiritual progress, then one should not be attached to them. The best process for making the home pleasant is Kṛṣṇa consciousness. If one is in full Kṛṣṇa consciousness, he can make his home very happy, because this process of Kṛṣṇa consciousness is very easy. One need only chant Hare Kṛṣṇa, Hare Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa, Hare Hare/ Hare Rāma, Hare Rāma, Rāma Rāma, Hare Hare, accept the remnants of foodstuffs offered to Kṛṣṇa, have some discussion on books like Bhagavad-gītā and Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, and engage oneself in Deity worship. These four things will make one happy. One should train the members of his family in this way. The family members can sit down morning and evening and chant together Hare Kṛṣṇa, Hare Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa, Hare Hare/ Hare Rāma, Hare Rāma, Rāma Rāma, Hare Hare. If one can mold his family life in this way to develop Kṛṣṇa consciousness, following these four principles, then there is no need to change from family life to renounced life. But if it is not congenial, not favorable for spiritual advancement, then family life should be abandoned. (Not right away… After the children are grown)
One must sacrifice everything to realize or serve Kṛṣṇa, just as Arjuna did. Arjuna did not want to kill his family members, but when he understood that these family members were impediments to his Kṛṣṇa realization, he accepted the instruction of Kṛṣṇa and fought and killed them. In all cases, one should be detached from the happiness and distress of family life, because in this world one can never be fully happy or fully miserable.
Biggest mistake – marry, have children and then abandon.. You have to wait until they grow and are independent and take permission from the wife to take sanyas.. Best is if you make everyone KC you need not take Sanyas.
(15) EVEN-MINDEDNESS AMID PLEASANT AND UNPLEASANT EVENTS – One should not be happy or distressed over desirables and undesirables, knowing that such feelings are just created by the mind.
If you have lot of sugar in Blood if you go to India it attracts mosquitoes.. They know what they want.. In India Jayapataka Swami.. would give us small balls of neem to eat.. Fresh leaves.. Made into pulp and made into balls.. Eat a lot of need make your blood bitter.. And mosquitos wont bite..
Happiness and distress are concomitant factors of material life. One should learn to tolerate, as advised in Bhagavad-gītā.
Law of nature – If we engage in sense gratification, misery will come right away!
One can never restrict the coming and going of happiness and distress, so one should be detached from the materialistic way of life and be automatically equipoised in both cases. Generally, when we get something desirable we are very happy, and when we get something undesirable we are distressed. But if we are actually in the spiritual position these things will not agitate us. To reach that stage, we have to practice unbreakable devotional service. Devotional service to Kṛṣṇa without deviation means engaging oneself in the nine processes of devotional service – chanting, hearing, worshiping, offering respect, etc. – as described in the last verse of the Ninth Chapter. That process should be followed.
Happiness and distress come together always.
BG 5.22 (SENSE GRATIFICATION IS ALWAYS FOLLOWED BY MISERY)- Therefore, those who are true yogīs or learned transcendentalists are not attracted by sense pleasures, which are the causes of continuous material existence. The more one is addicted to material pleasures, the more he is entrapped by material miseri
Naturally, when one is adapted to the spiritual way of life, he will not want to mix with materialistic men. That would go against his grain. One may test himself by seeing how far he is inclined to live in a solitary place, without unwanted association. Naturally a devotee has no taste for unnecessary sporting or cinema-going or enjoying some social function, because he understands that these are simply a waste of time. There are many research scholars and philosophers who study sex life or some other subject, but according to Bhagavad-gītā such research work and philosophical speculation have no value. That is more or less nonsensical. According to Bhagavad-gītā, one should make research, by philosophical discretion, into the nature of the soul. One should make research to understand the self. That is recommended here.
(16) CONSTANT AND UNALLOYED DEVOTION TO ME – One should become an unalloyed devotee of the Personality of Godhead, Śrī Kṛṣṇa, and serve Him with rapt attention.
That is the most important of the 18 points..
Real beginning of spiritual life..
(17) ASPIRING TO LIVE IN A SOLITARY PLACE; DETACHMENT FROM THE GENERAL MASS OF PEOPLE – One should develop a liking for residence in a secluded place with a calm and quiet atmosphere favorable for spiritual culture, and one should avoid congested places where non devotees congregate.
Asat sanga tyaga.. – One who gives up the association of unholy people and only associates with the devotees is a real devotee..
(18) ACCEPTING THE IMPORTANCE OF SELF-REALIZATION; AND PHILOSOPHICAL SEARCH FOR THE ABSOLUTE TRUTH – One should become a scientist or philosopher and conduct research into spiritual knowledge, recognizing that spiritual knowledge is permanent whereas material knowledge ends with the death of the body.
These eighteen items combine to form a gradual process by which real knowledge can be developed. Except for these, all other methods are considered to be in the category of nescience. Śrīla Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura, a great ācārya, maintained that all forms of material knowledge are merely external features of the illusory energy and that by culturing them one becomes no better than an ass. This same principle is found here in Śrī Īśopaniṣad. By advancement of material knowledge, modern man is simply being converted into an ass. Some materialistic politicians in spiritual guise decry the present system of civilization as satanic, but unfortunately they do not care about the culture of real knowledge as it is described in the Bhagavad-gītā. Thus they cannot change the satanic situation.
Maharaj has been invited as a guest speaker .. what am I going say.. I have to speak the truth.. Not too brutal nor too soft.. A medium approach has to be taken..
In the modern society, even a boy thinks himself self-sufficient and pays no respect to elderly men. Due to the wrong type of education being imparted in our universities, boys all over the world are giving their elders headaches. Thus Śrī Īśopaniṣad very strongly warns that the culture of nescience is different from that of knowledge. The universities are, so to speak, centers of nescience only; consequently scientists are busy discovering lethal weapons to wipe out the existence of other countries. University students today are not given instructions in the regulative principles of brahmacarya (celibate student life), nor do they have any faith in any scriptural injunctions. Religious principles are taught for the sake of name and fame only and not for the sake of practical action. Thus there is animosity not only in social and political fields but in the field of religion as well.
Nationalism has developed in different parts of the world due to the cultivation of nescience by the general people.No one considers that this tiny earth is just a lump of matter floating in immeasurable space along with many other lumps. In comparison to the vastness of space, these material lumps are like dust particles in the air. Because God has kindly made these lumps of matter complete in themselves, they are perfectly equipped with all necessities for floating in space. The drivers of our spaceships may be very proud of their achievements, but they do not consider the supreme driver of these greater, more gigantic spaceships called planets
There are innumerable suns and innumerable planetary systems also. As infinitesimal parts and parcels of the Supreme Lord, we small creatures are trying to dominate these unlimited planets. Thus we take repeated birth and death and are generally frustrated by old age and disease. The span of human life is scheduled for about a hundred years, although it is gradually decreasing to twenty or thirty years. Thanks to the culture of nescience, befooled men have created their own nations within these planets in order to grasp sense enjoyment more effectively for these few years. Such foolish people draw up various plans to render national demarcations perfectly, a task that is totally impossible. Yet for this purpose each and every nation has become a source of anxiety for others. More than fifty percent of a nation’s energy is devoted to defense measures and thus spoiled. No one cares for the cultivation of real knowledge, yet people are falsely proud of being advanced in both material and spiritual knowledge..
Śrī Īśopaniṣad warns us of this faulty type of education, and the Bhagavad-gītā gives instructions as to the development of real knowledge. This mantra states that the instructions of vidyā (knowledge) must be acquired from a dhīra. A dhīra is one who is not disturbed by material illusion. No one can be undisturbed unless he is perfectly spiritually realized, at which time one neither hankers nor laments for anything. A dhīra realizes that the material body and mind he has acquired by chance through material association are but foreign elements; therefore he simply makes the best use of a bad bargain.
The material body and mind are bad bargains for the spiritual living entity. The living entity has actual functions in the living, spiritual world, but this material world is dead. As long as the living spiritual sparks manipulate the dead lumps of matter, the dead world appears to be a living world. Actually it is the living souls, the parts and parcels of the supreme living being, who move the world. The dhīras have come to know all these facts by hearing them from superior authorities and have realized this knowledge by following the regulative principles.
To follow the regulative principles, one must take shelter of a bona fide spiritual master. The transcendental message and regulative principles come down from the spiritual master to the disciple. Such knowledge does not come in the hazardous way of nescient education. One can become a dhīra only by submissively hearing from a bona fide spiritual master. Arjuna, for example, became a dhīra by submissively hearing from Lord Kṛṣṇa, the Personality of Godhead Himself. Thus the perfect disciple must be like Arjuna, and the spiritual master must be as good as the Lord Himself. This is the process of learning vidyā (knowledge) from the dhīra (the undisturbed).
An adhīra (one who has not undergone the training of a dhīra) cannot be an instructive leader. Modern politicians who pose themselves as dhīras are actually adhīras, and one cannot expect perfect knowledge from them. They are simply busy seeing to their own remuneration in dollars and cents. How, then, can they lead the mass of people to the right path of self-realization? Thus one must hear submissively from a dhīra in order to attain actual education.