Tag: Srimad Bhagavatham Canto 2

KEY TAKEAWAYS FROM HH HARIVILAS MAHARAJ’S MORNING BHAGAVATAM CLASS ON SB 2.4.12:

1. Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa, being the origin of all viṣṇu-tattvas, is addressed here as paraḥ pumān, or Puruṣottama, as described in the Bhagavad-gītā (15.18). He is the complete whole. The puruṣāvatāras are therefore His plenary expansions.
2. Bhakti-yoga is the only process by which one can become competent to know Him. Because the empiric philosophers and mystic yogīs cannot conceive of the Personality of Godhead, He is called anupalakṣya-vartmane, the Lord of the inconceivable way, or bhakti-yoga.
3. “Lord Viṣṇu has thousands of heads, thousands of eyes and thousands of feet. Entirely encompassing the whole universe, He still extends beyond it by ten fingers’ breadth. He is in fact this entire universe. He is all that was and all that will be. He is the Lord of immortality and of all that is nourished by food.”
4. (BG 7.14) This divine energy of Mine, consisting of the three modes of material nature, is difficult to overcome. But those who have surrendered unto Me can easily cross beyond it.
5. (BG 7.19) After many births and deaths, he who is actually in knowledge surrenders unto Me, knowing Me to be the cause of all causes and all that is. Such a great soul is very rare.
6. In the beginning of spiritual realization, while one is trying to give up one’s attachment to materialism, there is some leaning towards impersonalism, but when one is further advanced he can understand that there are activities in the spiritual life and that these activities constitute devotional service. Realizing this, he becomes attached to the Supreme Personality of Godhead and surrenders to Him.
7. “In the body of a living being neither the power to speak, nor the power to see, nor the power to hear, nor the power to think is the prime factor; it is life which is the center of all activities.” Similarly, Lord Vāsudeva, or the Personality of Godhead, Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa, is the prime entity in everything. 
8. BG 9.2 – This knowledge is the king of education, the most secret of all secrets. It is the purest knowledge, and because it gives direct perception of the self by realization, it is the perfection of religion. It is everlasting, and it is joyfully performed.
9. BS 5.37 – I worship Govinda, the primeval Lord, residing in His own realm, Goloka, with Rādhā, resembling His own spiritual figure, the embodiment of the ecstatic potency possessed of the sixty-four artistic activities, in the company of Her confidantes [sakhīs], embodiments of the extensions of Her bodily form, permeated and vitalized by His ever-blissful spiritual rasa.
10. BG 8.22 – The Supreme Personality of Godhead, who is greater than all, is attainable by unalloyed devotion. Although He is present in His abode, He is all-pervading, and everything is situated within Him.

SB 2.4.12 TRANSLATION: 
Śukadeva Gosvāmī said: Let me offer my respectful obeisances unto the Supreme Personality of Godhead, who, for the creation of the material world, accepts the three modes of nature. He is the complete whole residing within the body of everyone, and His ways are inconceivable.

CLASS NOTES: 

Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa, being the origin of all viṣṇu-tattvas, is addressed here as paraḥ pumān, or Puruṣottama, as described in the Bhagavad-gītā (15.18). He is the complete whole. The puruṣāvatāras are therefore His plenary expansions. Bhakti-yoga is the only process by which one can become competent to know Him. Because the empiric philosophers and mystic yogīs cannot conceive of the Personality of Godhead, He is called anupalakṣya-vartmane, the Lord of the inconceivable way, or bhakti-yoga.

This is very important verse because it explains amazing point of God, Krsna, Who is acintya abeda beda taattva. Who is inconceivably simultaneously one and the same. Mundane people think that they can understand by academic study. It may help you understand few things in this world but very limited. You can only understand through bhakti yoga…
Bhakti yoga – Chanting, doing service, eat prasadam, sing and chant.
People who go to church say I go to church, eat meat, do some service,, …
Because the empiric philosophers and mystic yogīs cannot conceive of the Personality of Godhead, He is called anupalakṣya-vartmane, the Lord of the inconceivable way, or bhakti-yoga.
Bhakti yoga is inconceivable to mundane ppl, they do not think that bhakti yoga has anything to do with the truth. They go rounds in life. BHakti yoga is the truth of life…. Absolute truth can only be understood by Bhakti yoga. Absolute truth is a person. For Mayavadis it is nonsense. BUt actually they are nonsense. How can a person is perfect. Krsna is perfect in everyway.
It is explained in BG 8.20 

BG 8.20 –
Yet there is another unmanifest nature, which is eternal and is transcendental to this manifested and unmanifested matter. It is supreme and is never annihilated. When all in this world is annihilated, that part remains as it is.

Kṛṣṇa’s superior, spiritual energy is transcendental and eternal. It is beyond all the changes of material nature, which is manifest and annihilated during the days and nights of Brahmā. Kṛṣṇa’s superior energy is completely opposite in quality to material nature. Superior and inferior nature are explained in the Seventh Chapter.

No empiricist or materialist can accept this statement. 

BG 7.14
daivī hy eṣā guṇa-mayī
mama māyā duratyayā
mām eva ye prapadyante
māyām etāṁ taranti te

This divine energy of Mine, consisting of the three modes of material nature, is difficult to overcome. But those who have surrendered unto Me can easily cross beyond it.

Divine energy – eternal and spiritual…

BG 7.19
bahūnāṁ janmanām ante
jñānavān māṁ prapadyate
vāsudevaḥ sarvam iti
sa mahātmā su-durlabhaḥ
After many births and deaths, he who is actually in knowledge surrenders unto Me, knowing Me to be the cause of all causes and all that is. Such a great soul is very rare.

Why should we surrender to something mythological… they refuse it like that. That is the original cancel culture. People have been rejecting God from the beginning of Time. To know that Krsna as the cause of all causes and who has no cause is very gibberish for materialists.
Socrates and Plato accept that there is some spiritual realm but they accept it as static and not dynamic… 

 In the beginning of spiritual realization, while one is trying to give up one’s attachment to materialism, there is some leaning towards impersonalism, but when one is further advanced he can understand that there are activities in the spiritual life and that these activities constitute devotional service. Realizing this, he becomes attached to the Supreme Personality of Godhead and surrenders to Him. At such a time one can understand that Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa’s mercy is everything, that He is the cause of all causes, and that this material manifestation is not independent from Him. He realizes the material world to be a perverted reflection of spiritual variegatedness and realizes that in everything there is a relationship with the Supreme Lord Kṛṣṇa. Thus he thinks of everything in relation to Vāsudeva, or Śrī Kṛṣṇa. Such a universal vision of Vāsudeva precipitates one’s full surrender to the Supreme Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa as the highest goal. Such surrendered great souls are very rare.

Acceptance Culture / positive culture ( all these are negated today… )-
Supreme absolute truth is person
One can understand Him through devotional service
One has  complete surrender to the lord
Lord Krsna’s mercy is everything
Krsna is the cause of all causes
Material manifestation is not independent of Him
Everything is in relationship with God

What is the highest goal of life? Take care of my family, house, food, car, gadgets… clothes, jewelry, shoes… The more you have, the more people you have. It is the opposite in the Material world.
SP – Karmis everything backed…
How can I be free if I surrender to someone? That is the question they ask. They think they are rational. One person in billions, that is only 7 people in this world are great souls…

“Lord Viṣṇu has thousands of heads, thousands of eyes and thousands of feet. Entirely encompassing the whole universe, He still extends beyond it by ten fingers’ breadth. He is in fact this entire universe. He is all that was and all that will be. He is the Lord of immortality and of all that is nourished by food.”

“In the body of a living being neither the power to speak, nor the power to see, nor the power to hear, nor the power to think is the prime factor; it is life which is the center of all activities.” Similarly, Lord Vāsudeva, or the Personality of Godhead, Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa, is the prime entity in everything.   In this body there are powers of speaking, of seeing, of hearing, of mental activities, etc.  But these are not important if not related to the Supreme Lord. And because Vāsudeva is all-pervading and everything is Vāsudeva, the devotee surrenders in full knowledge. 

To understand this we need to go to Brahma Samhita – What is inconceivable in Bhakti YOga – 

(BS 5.37) WHAT IS INCONCEIVABLE IN BHAKTI YOGA
ānanda-cinmaya-rasa-pratibhāvitābhis
tābhir ya eva nija-rūpatayā kalābhiḥ
goloka eva nivasaty akhilātma-bhūto
govindam ādi-puruṣaṁ tam ahaṁ bhajāmi

I worship Govinda, the primeval Lord, residing in His own realm, Goloka, with Rādhā, resembling His own spiritual figure, the embodiment of the ecstatic potency possessed of the sixty-four artistic activities, in the company of Her confidantes [sakhīs], embodiments of the extensions of Her bodily form, permeated and vitalized by His ever-blissful spiritual rasa.

Although the Lord Absolute and His potency are one and the self-same existence, still They exist eternally as separate entities, as Rādhā and Kṛṣṇa. In both the ecstatic energy and the transcendental Lord Kṛṣṇa, there exists śṛṅgāra-rasa (amorous love) whose quality is inconceivable. The vibhāva (extension) of that rasa (mellow quality) is twofold, viz., ālambana (prop) and uddīpana (stimulation). Of these ālambana is twofold, viz., āśraya (supported) and viṣaya (supporter). Āśraya signifies Rādhikā Herself and the extensions of Her own form and viṣaya means Kṛṣṇa Himself. Kṛṣṇa is Govinda, Lord of Goloka.

BG 8.21
That which the Vedāntists describe as unmanifest and infallible, that which is known as the supreme destination, that place from which, having attained it, one never returns – that is My supreme abode.

The supreme abode of the Personality of Godhead, Kṛṣṇa, is described in the Brahma-saṁhitā as cintāmaṇi-dhāma, a place where all desires are fulfilled. (spiritual desires) The supreme abode of Lord Kṛṣṇa, known as Goloka Vṛndāvana, is full of palaces made of touchstone. There are also trees, called “desire trees,” that supply any type of eatable upon demand, and there are cows, known as Surabhi cows, which supply a limitless supply of milk. In this abode, the Lord is served by hundreds of thousands of goddesses of fortune (Lakṣmīs), and He is called Govinda, the primal Lord and the cause of all causes.

The Lord

1. is accustomed to blow His flute (veṇuṁ kvaṇantam).
2. His transcendental form is the most attractive in all the worlds –
3.  His eyes are like lotus petals, and the color of His body is like the color of clouds.
4. He is so attractive that His beauty excels that of thousands of Cupids.
5.  He wears saffron cloth, a garland around His neck and a peacock feather in His hair. 

In the Bhagavad-gītā Lord Kṛṣṇa gives only a small hint of His personal abode, Goloka Vṛndāvana, which is the supermost planet in the spiritual kingdom. A vivid description is given in the Brahma-saṁhitā. Vedic literatures (Kaṭha Upaniṣad 1.3.11) state that there is nothing superior to the abode of the Supreme Godhead, and that that abode is the ultimate destination (puruṣān na paraṁ kiñcit sā kāṣṭhā paramā gatiḥ).

When one attains to it, he never returns to the material world. Kṛṣṇa’s supreme abode and Kṛṣṇa Himself are nondifferent, being of the same quality. On this earth, Vṛndāvana, ninety miles southeast of Delhi, is a replica of that supreme Goloka Vṛndāvana located in the spiritual sky. When Kṛṣṇa descended on this earth, He sported on that particular tract of land known as Vṛndāvana, comprising about 168 square miles in the district of Mathurā, India.

BG 9.2
rāja-vidyā rāja-guhyaṁ
pavitram idam uttamam
pratyakṣāvagamaṁ dharmyaṁ
su-sukhaṁ kartum avyayam

This knowledge is the king of education, the most secret of all secrets. It is the purest knowledge, and because it gives direct perception of the self by realization, it is the perfection of religion. It is everlasting, and it is joyfully performed.

BG 8.22
The Supreme Personality of Godhead, who is greater than all, is attainable by unalloyed devotion. Although He is present in His abode, He is all-pervading, and everything is situated within Him.

It is here clearly stated that the supreme destination, from which there is no return, is the abode of Kṛṣṇa, the Supreme Person. The Brahma-saṁhitā describes this supreme abode as ānanda-cinmaya-rasa, a place where everything is full of spiritual bliss. All the variegatedness manifest there is of the quality of spiritual bliss – nothing there is material. That variegatedness is expanded as the spiritual expansion of the Supreme Godhead Himself, for the manifestation there is totally of the spiritual energy, as explained in Chapter Seven. As far as this material world is concerned, although the Lord is always in His supreme abode, He is nonetheless all-pervading by His material energy. So by His spiritual and material energies He is present everywhere – both in the material and in the spiritual universes. Yasyāntaḥ-sthāni means that everything is sustained within Him, within either His spiritual or material energy. The Lord is all-pervading by these two energies.

To enter Kṛṣṇa’s supreme abode or the innumerable Vaikuṇṭha planets is possible only by bhakti, devotional service, as clearly indicated here by the word bhaktyā. No other process can help one attain that supreme abode. The Vedas (Gopāla-tāpanī Upaniṣad 1.21) also describe the supreme abode and the Supreme Personality of Godhead. Eko vaśī sarva-gaḥ kṛṣṇaḥ. In that abode there is only one Supreme Personality of Godhead, whose name is Kṛṣṇa. He is the supreme merciful Deity, and although situated there as one He has expanded Himself into millions and millions of plenary expansions. The Vedas compare the Lord to a tree standing still yet bearing many varieties of fruits, flowers and changing leaves. The plenary expansions of the Lord who preside over the Vaikuṇṭha planets are four-armed, and they are known by a variety of names – Puruṣottama, Trivikrama, Keśava, Mādhava, Aniruddha, Hṛṣīkeśa, Saṅkarṣaṇa, Pradyumna, Śrīdhara, Vāsudeva, Dāmodara, Janārdana, Nārāyaṇa, Vāmana, Padmanābha, etc.

The Brahma-saṁhitā (5.37) also confirms that although the Lord is always in the supreme abode, Goloka Vṛndāvana, He is all-pervading, so that everything is going on nicely (goloka eva nivasaty akhilātma-bhūtaḥ). As stated in the Vedas (Śvetāśvatara Upaniṣad 6.8), parāsya śaktir vividhaiva śrūyate/ svābhāvikī jñāna-bala-kriyā ca: His energies are so expansive that they systematically conduct everything in the cosmic manifestation without a flaw, although the Supreme Lord is far, far away.

KEY TAKEAWAYS FROM HH HARIVILAS MAHARAJ’S MORNING BHAGAVATAM CLASS ON SB 2.4.11 TODAY (06/05/21):

1. The devotees of the Lord, while delivering speeches and describing the transcendental attributes of the Lord, do not think that they can do anything independently.
2. They think that they can speak only what they are induced to speak by the Supreme Lord, the master of the senses.
3. The senses of the individual being are not his own; the devotee knows that such senses belong to the Supreme Lord and that they can be properly used when they are employed for the service of the Lord
4. Whatever an individual can do, speak, see, etc., is under the direction of the Lord only. 
5. No one is free to act freely and independently, one should always seek the permission of the Lord to act or eat or speak, and by the blessing of the Lord everything done by a devotee is beyond the principles of the four defects typical of the conditioned soul.
6. A person in the divine consciousness, although engaged in seeing, hearing, touching, smelling, eating, moving about, sleeping and breathing, always knows within himself that he actually does nothing at all.
7. One’s activities depend on the will of the Supersoul, who is seated within the heart as a friend. The Supreme Lord is the supercause. 
8. He who is acting in Kṛṣṇa consciousness under the direction of the Supersoul situated within the heart is naturally not bound by any activity.
9. Those in complete Kṛṣṇa consciousness are not ultimately responsible for their actions. Everything is dependent on the supreme will, the Supersoul, the Supreme Personality of Godhead.
10. By the instruction of a bona fide spiritual master, a living entity can know of his spiritual position, his material body, his senses, how he is entrapped, and how he is under the spell of the material modes of nature, how he is helpless, being in the grip of these modes and by such an understanding he can become fixed in full Kṛṣṇa consciousness. 
11. Lord informs Arjuna that the desire not to fight arises from false ego. Arjuna thought himself to be the doer of action, but he did not consider the supreme sanction within and without. If one does not know that a supersanction is there, why should he act? 
12. But one who knows the instruments of work, himself as the worker, and the Supreme Lord as the supreme sanctioner is perfect in doing everything. Such a person is never in illusion. 
13. Anyone who is acting in Kṛṣṇa consciousness under the direction of the Supersoul or the Supreme Personality of Godhead, even though killing, does not kill. Nor is he ever affected by the reaction of such killing. 
14. When a soldier kills under the command of a superior officer, he is not subject to be judged. But if a soldier kills on his own personal account, then he is certainly judged by a court of law.
15. The Lord is the constant companion of the living entity as Paramātmā, or the Supersoul, and therefore He can understand the desires of the individual soul, as one can smell the flavor of a flower by being near it.
16. The Lord can fulfill all desires, and the Lord, being neutral to everyone, does not interfere with the desires of the minute independent living entities. 
17. However, when one desires Kṛṣṇa, the Lord takes special care and encourages one to desire in such a way that one can attain to Him and be eternally happy. 
18. “The living entity is completely dependent in his distress and happiness. By the will of the Supreme he can go to heaven or hell, as a cloud is driven by the air.”
19. Under the spell of ignorance, the living entity claims that the Lord is responsible for his conditional existence. The Vedānta-sūtras (2.1.34) also confirm this. “The Lord neither hates nor likes anyone, though He appears to.”

SB 2.4.11 TRANSLATION:
Sūta Gosvāmī said: When Śukadeva Gosvāmī was thus requested by the King to describe the creative energy of the Personality of Godhead, he then systematically remembered the master of the senses [Śrī Kṛṣṇa], and to reply properly he spoke thus.

CLASS NOTES: 

DEVOTEES THINK THAT THEY CANNOT DO ANYTHING INDEPENDENTLY

The devotees of the Lord, while delivering speeches and describing the transcendental attributes of the Lord, do not think that they can do anything independently. They think that they can speak only what they are induced to speak by the Supreme Lord, the master of the senses. The senses of the individual being are not his own; the devotee knows that such senses belong to the Supreme Lord and that they can be properly used when they are employed for the service of the Lord. The senses are instruments, and elements are ingredients, all endowed by the Lord; therefore whatever an individual can do, speak, see, etc., is under the direction of the Lord only. The Bhagavad-gītā (15.15) confirms this: sarvasya cāhaṁ hṛdi sanniviṣṭo mattaḥ smṛtir jñānam apohanaṁ ca.

No one is free to act freely and independently, and as such one should always seek the permission of the Lord to act or eat or speak, and by the blessing of the Lord everything done by a devotee is beyond the principles of the four defects typical of the conditioned soul.

This is an interesting purport, because it brings up the fundamental concept that no one is independent in this world. This is explained by Krsna in BG. 

BG 15.15
sarvasya cāhaṁ hṛdi sanniviṣṭo
mattaḥ smṛtir jñānam apohanaṁ ca
vedaiś ca sarvair aham eva vedyo
vedānta-kṛd veda-vid eva cāham

I am seated in everyone’s heart, and from Me come remembrance, knowledge and forgetfulness. By all the Vedas, I am to be known. Indeed, I am the compiler of Vedānta, and I am the knower of the Vedas.

Devotee does not do anything, without the permission of the Lord within and without the spiritual master. However if a person acts independently without the intuition of spiritual master or the lord, they make many mistakes. Even many devotees do not confirm their decisions with the spiritual master aand therefore they make many many mistakes. Imagine the materialists how many mistakes they are making. 

(BG 5.8-9) A KRSNA CONSCIOUS PERSON KNOWS WITHIN HIMSELF THAT HE ACTUALLY DOES NOTHING AT ALL. 
A person in the divine consciousness, although engaged in seeing, hearing, touching, smelling, eating, moving about, sleeping and breathing, always knows within himself that he actually does nothing at all. Because while speaking, evacuating, receiving, or opening or closing his eyes, he always knows that only the material senses are engaged with their objects and that he is aloof from them.

A person in Kṛṣṇa consciousness is pure in his existence, and consequently he has nothing to do with any work which depends upon five immediate and remote causes: the doer, the work, the situation, the endeavor and fortune. This is because he is engaged in the loving transcendental service of Kṛṣṇa. Although he appears to be acting with his body and senses, he is always conscious of his actual position, which is spiritual engagement. In material consciousness, the senses are engaged in sense gratification, but in Kṛṣṇa consciousness the senses are engaged in the satisfaction of Kṛṣṇa’s senses. Therefore, the Kṛṣṇa conscious person is always free, even though he appears to be engaged in affairs of the senses. Activities such as seeing and hearing are actions of the senses meant for receiving knowledge, whereas moving, speaking, evacuating, etc., are actions of the senses meant for work. A Kṛṣṇa conscious person is never affected by the actions of the senses. He cannot perform any act except in the service of the Lord because he knows that he is the eternal servitor of the Lord.

Position of neutrality and equality
Neutrality – not affected by good or bad reactions, always dedicated to serving Krsna. Materialistic people are always affected by good and bad…
Devotional service is beyond the dualities, because one does not act whimsically, one always acts under the guidance of the Lord and spiritual master and therefore they are protected by  the 5 types of reactions. When a person engaged in activities without reference to Krsna, is always ruled by karma. A person who is krishna conscious is always relied by Krsna.

(BG 18.14) EVERYTHING IS DEPENDENT ON THE SUPREME WILL, THE SUPERSOUL, THE SUPREME PERSONALITY OF GODHEAD
adhiṣṭhānaṁ tathā kartā
karaṇaṁ ca pṛthag-vidham
vividhāś ca pṛthak ceṣṭā
daivaṁ caivātra pañcamam

The place of action [the body], the performer, the various senses, the many different kinds of endeavor, and ultimately the Supersoul – these are the five factors of action.

The word adhiṣṭhānam refers to the body. The soul within the body is acting to bring about the results of activity and is therefore known as kartā, “the doer.” That the soul is the knower and the doer is stated in the śruti. Eṣa hi draṣṭā sraṣṭā (Praśna Upaniṣad 4.9). It is also confirmed in the Vedānta-sūtra by the verses jño ’ta eva (2.3.18) and kartā śāstrārthavattvāt (2.3.33). The instruments of action are the senses, and by the senses the soul acts in various ways. For each and every action there is a different endeavor. But all one’s activities depend on the will of the Supersoul, who is seated within the heart as a friend. The Supreme Lord is the supercause. Under these circumstances, he who is acting in Kṛṣṇa consciousness under the direction of the Supersoul situated within the heart is naturally not bound by any activity. Those in complete Kṛṣṇa consciousness are not ultimately responsible for their actions. Everything is dependent on the supreme will, the Supersoul, the Supreme Personality of Godhead.

(BG 14.19) WITH THE ASSOCIATION OF A BONA FIDE SPIRITUAL MASTER, HE CAN SEE HIS REAL POSITION
When one properly sees that in all activities no other performer is at work than these modes of nature and he knows the Supreme Lord, who is transcendental to all these modes, he attains My spiritual nature.

One can transcend all the activities of the modes of material nature simply by understanding them properly by learning from the proper souls. The real spiritual master is Kṛṣṇa, and He is imparting this spiritual knowledge to Arjuna. Similarly, it is from those who are fully in Kṛṣṇa consciousness that one has to learn this science of activities in terms of the modes of nature. Otherwise, one’s life will be misdirected. By the instruction of a bona fide spiritual master, a living entity can know of his spiritual position, his material body, his senses, how he is entrapped, and how he is under the spell of the material modes of nature. He is helpless, being in the grip of these modes, but when he can see his real position, then he can attain to the transcendental platform, having the scope for spiritual life. Actually, the living entity is not the performer of different activities. He is forced to act because he is situated in a particular type of body, conducted by some particular mode of material nature. Unless one has the help of spiritual authority, he cannot understand in what position he is actually situated. With the association of a bona fide spiritual master, he can see his real position, and by such an understanding he can become fixed in full Kṛṣṇa consciousness. A man in Kṛṣṇa consciousness is not controlled by the spell of the material modes of nature. It has already been stated in the Seventh Chapter that one who has surrendered to Kṛṣṇa is relieved from the activities of material nature. For one who is able to see things as they are, the influence of material nature gradually ceases.


This is an amazing purport by SP. Exactly describes the difference between Materialist and devotees. As long as we are in this material world acting for sense gratification, we are not independent. When we act for the satisfaction of Krsna, we are under the protection of Krsna, independent of the dualities. Otherwise we are slaves, anger, lust, greed and envy… 

(BG 5.14)
The embodied spirit, master of the city of his body, does not create activities, nor does he induce people to act, nor does he create the fruits of action. All this is enacted by the modes of material nature.

(BG 5.15) MAN PROPOSES AND GOD DISPOSES.
Nor does the Supreme Lord assume anyone’s sinful or pious activities. Embodied beings, however, are bewildered because of the ignorance which covers their real knowledge.

He does not create a particular situation for any living entity, but the living entity, bewildered by ignorance, desires to be put into certain conditions of life, and thereby his chain of action and reaction begins. A living entity is, by superior nature, full of knowledge. Nevertheless, he is prone to be influenced by ignorance due to his limited power. The Lord is omnipotent, but the living entity is not. The Lord is vibhu, or omniscient, but the living entity is aṇu, or atomic. Because he is a living soul, he has the capacity to desire by his free will. Such desire is fulfilled only by the omnipotent Lord. And so, when the living entity is bewildered in his desires, the Lord allows him to fulfill those desires, but the Lord is never responsible for the actions and reactions of the particular situation which may be desired. Being in a bewildered condition, therefore, the embodied soul identifies himself with the circumstantial material body and becomes subjected to the temporary misery and happiness of life. The Lord is the constant companion of the living entity as Paramātmā, or the Supersoul, and therefore He can understand the desires of the individual soul, as one can smell the flavor of a flower by being near it. Desire is a subtle form of conditioning for the living entity. The Lord fulfills his desire as he deserves: Man proposes and God disposes. The individual is not, therefore, omnipotent in fulfilling his desires. The Lord, however, can fulfill all desires, and the Lord, being neutral to everyone, does not interfere with the desires of the minute independent living entities. However, when one desires Kṛṣṇa, the Lord takes special care and encourages one to desire in such a way that one can attain to Him and be eternally happy. The Vedic hymns therefore declare, eṣa u hy eva sādhu karma kārayati taṁ yam ebhyo lokebhya unninīṣate. eṣa u evāsādhu karma kārayati yam adho ninīṣate: “The Lord engages the living entity in pious activities so that he may be elevated. The Lord engages him in impious activities so that he may go to hell.” (Kauṣītakī Upaniṣad 3.8)

First we are put into ignorance by modes of material nature.. Then we becomes bewildered in our desires, then helps in fulfilling those junk desires… 

“The living entity is completely dependent in his distress and happiness. By the will of the Supreme he can go to heaven or hell, as a cloud is driven by the air.”

Therefore the embodied soul, by his immemorial desire to avoid Kṛṣṇa consciousness, causes his own bewilderment. Consequently, although he is constitutionally eternal, blissful and cognizant, due to the littleness of his existence he forgets his constitutional position of service to the Lord and is thus entrapped by nescience. And, under the spell of ignorance, the living entity claims that the Lord is responsible for his conditional existence. The Vedānta-sūtras (2.1.34) also confirm this. Vaiṣamya-nairghṛṇye na sāpekṣatvāt tathā hi darśayati: “The Lord neither hates nor likes anyone, though He appears to.”

EXISTENTIALISTS –
What are the 5 tenets of existentialism?
Terms in this set (9)
Existence before Essence. people are born as a blank slate create essence through unique experiences.
Impotence of Reason. Passion and emotion.
Alienation or Estrangement from. …
Despair or Anxiety. …
Nothingness or Death. …
Awful Freedom. …
The Absurd. …
Cope.

FAMOUS EXISTENTIALISTS –
Søren Kierkegaard (1813-1855) as an Existentialist Philosopher.
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900) as an Existentialist Philosopher.
Martin Heidegger (1889-1976) as an Existentialist Philosopher.
Jean-Paul Sartre (1905-1980) as an Existentialist Philosopher. – “existence precedes essence “
Albert Camus (1913-1960) as an Existentialist Philosopher – “The myth of sysophus”

Lets compare this to what Krsna says – If you reject krsna consciousness then your authority is lust, greed, anger, envy…

WHAT DOES AN EXISTENTIALIST BELIEVE?
Existentialism is a philosophical theory that people are free agents who have control over their choices and actions. Existentialists believe that society should not restrict an individual’s life or actions and that these restrictions inhibit free will and the development of that person’s potential.

WHAT IS THE MAIN IDEA OF EXISTENTIALISM?
According to existentialism: (1) Existence is always particular and individual—always my existence, your existence, his existence, her existence. (2) Existence is primarily the problem of existence (i.e., of its mode of being); it is, therefore, also the investigation of the meaning of Being.

WHAT IS THE THEME OF EXISTENTIALISM?
Existentialist Themes (Irvine) To be an existing human being means to be free. In contrast with most everything else in the world, a human being is not determined by ‘laws of nature. ‘ The human being has a unique freedom to determine his or her own behavior.

(BG 18.17) PERSONAL ACTIVITY AND RESPONSIBILITY ARISE FROM FALSE EGO AND GODLESSNESS, OR A LACK OF KṚṢṆA CONSCIOUSNESS. (EXISTENTIALISM)

One who is not motivated by false ego, whose intelligence is not entangled, though he kills men in this world, does not kill. Nor is he bound by his actions.

In this verse the Lord informs Arjuna that the desire not to fight arises from false ego. Arjuna thought himself to be the doer of action, but he did not consider the supreme sanction within and without. If one does not know that a supersanction is there, why should he act? But one who knows the instruments of work, himself as the worker, and the Supreme Lord as the supreme sanctioner is perfect in doing everything. Such a person is never in illusion. Personal activity and responsibility arise from false ego and godlessness, or a lack of Kṛṣṇa consciousness. (This is existentialism)  Anyone who is acting in Kṛṣṇa consciousness under the direction of the Supersoul or the Supreme Personality of Godhead, even though killing, does not kill. Nor is he ever affected by the reaction of such killing. When a soldier kills under the command of a superior officer, he is not subject to be judged. But if a soldier kills on his own personal account, then he is certainly judged by a court of law.

BG 13.20 (MYSTERY OF THIS MATERIAL CREATION)
Similarly, the living entities are also in Him, and because they are conditioned, they are averse to serving the Supreme Lord. Thus they are not allowed to enter into the spiritual sky. But with the coming forth of material nature these living entities are again given a chance to act in the material world and prepare themselves to enter into the spiritual world. That is the mystery of this material creation. Actually the living entity is originally the spiritual part and parcel of the Supreme Lord, but due to his rebellious nature, he is conditioned within material nature. It really does not matter how these living entities or superior entities of the Supreme Lord have come in contact with material nature. The Supreme Personality of Godhead knows, however, how and why this actually took place. In the scriptures the Lord says that those attracted by this material nature are undergoing a hard struggle for existence. But we should know it with certainty from the descriptions of these few verses that all transformations and influences of material nature by the three modes are also productions of material nature. All transformations and variety in respect to living entities are due to the body. As far as spirit is concerned, living entities are all the same.


Existentialist Themes (Irvine) To be an existing human being means to be free. In contrast with most everything else in the world, a human being is not determined by ‘laws of nature. ‘ The human being has a unique freedom to determine his or her own behavior.

KEY TAKEAWAYS FROM HH HARIVILAS MAHARAJ’S MORNING BHAGAVATAM CLASS ON SB 2.4.10

1. The Personality of Godhead, although one without a second, is infallibly expanded by innumerable forms nondifferent from one another, and although He is the original person, He is still ever young with permanent youthful energy. 
2. The innumerable expansions of the Lord are like lamps of equal power which kindle from one lamp to another. That is the transcendental potency of the Lord. 
3. The Vedas say that He is so complete that even though the whole complete identity emanates from Him, He still remains the same complete whole
4. He is very difficult to know simply by learning the transcendental science of the Vedas, but He is very easily realized by His pure devotees.
5. One cannot have any clear conception of the Lord or His holy name, form, attributes, pastimes, etc., unless one is engaged in His transcendental loving service.
6. One must become a pure, unconditional devotee of the Lord. Only then can one know Him by the strength of devotional service.
7. Brahmā says that the transcendental Absolute is beyond the reach of the Vedas. The Vedas originate in sound and sound originates in the mundane ether. So the Vedas cannot present before us a direct view of the transcendental world (Goloka). 
8. It is only when the Vedas are imbued with the cit potency that they are enabled to deal with the transcendental. 
9. But Goloka reveals itself to every jīva-soul when he is under the influence of the spiritual cognitive potency joined to the essence of ecstatic energy. 
10. BG 10.10 – To those who are constantly devoted to serving Me with love, I give the understanding by which they can come to Me.
11. Mahārāja Parīkṣit admitted in the previous verse that the Lord is inconceivable even for the greatest learned scholars. Why then should he again request Śukadeva Gosvāmī to clarify his insufficient knowledge about the Lord? 
12. The reason is clear. Not only was Śukadeva Gosvāmī vastly learned in the Vedic literatures, but he was also a great self-realized soul and a powerful devotee of the Lord. A powerful devotee of the Lord is, by the grace of the Lord, more than the Lord Himself.
13. The Lord is so merciful upon His pure devotee that He presents His beloved devotee as more powerful than Himself. 
14. For example – Supreme Lord Śrī Rāmacandra attempted to bridge the Indian Ocean to reach the island of Laṅkā, but Śrī Hanumānjī, the unalloyed devotee of the Personality of Godhead, could cross the ocean simply by jumping over it.
15. Another example – The Lord expressed Himself to be unable to save Durvāsā Muni, although the Muni was so powerful that he could reach the Lord directly under material conditions. But Durvāsā Muni was saved by Mahārāja Ambarīṣa, a devotee of the Lord.
16. Not only is a devotee of the Lord more powerful than the Lord, but also worship of the devotee is considered more effective than direct worship of the Lord. The Lord is extremely satisfied with those who offer worship to His pure devotees, and He rewards them accordingly. 
17. A serious devotee must first approach a spiritual master who not only is well versed in the Vedic literatures but is also a great devotee with factual realization of the Lord and His different energies. Without the help of such a devotee spiritual master, one cannot make progress in the transcendental science of the Lord.
18. And a bona fide spiritual master like Śukadeva Gosvāmī does not speak about the Lord only in the matter of His internal potencies but also explains how He associates with His external potencies.
19. Śrīla Viśvanātha Cakravartī says that Vaishnavas should not be interested in hearing only about the Lord’s activities (like rāsa-līlā), but must be keenly interested in His pastimes in His features of the puruṣāvatāras in connection with sṛṣṭi-tattva, creational functions. 
20. So one must follow the examples of Mahārāja Parīkṣit, the ideal disciple, and Śukadeva Gosvāmī, the ideal spiritual master.

SB 2.4.10 TRANSLATION: 
Kindly clear up all these doubtful inquiries, because you are not only vastly learned in the Vedic literatures and self-realized in transcendence, but are also a great devotee of the Lord and are therefore as good as the Personality of Godhead.

CLASS NOTES: 

In the Brahma-saṁhitā it is said that the Supreme Absolute Truth, Govinda, the Personality of Godhead, although one without a second, is infallibly expanded by innumerable forms nondifferent from one another, and although He is the original person, He is still ever young with permanent youthful energy. He is very difficult to know simply by learning the transcendental science of the Vedas, but He is very easily realized by His pure devotees.

This is a compendium of three different verses in Brahma Samhita. 
BS 5.1
īśvaraḥ paramaḥ kṛṣṇaḥ
sac-cid-ānanda-vigrahaḥ
anādir ādir govindaḥ
sarva-kāraṇa-kāraṇam
Kṛṣṇa who is known as Govinda is the Supreme Godhead. He has an eternal blissful spiritual body. He is the origin of all. He has no other origin and He is the prime cause of all causes.

BS 5.33
advaitam acyutam anādim ananta-rūpam
ādyaṁ purāṇa-puruṣaṁ nava-yauvanaṁ ca
vedeṣu durlabham adurlabham ātma-bhaktau
govindam ādi-puruṣaṁ tam ahaṁ bhajāmi

I worship Govinda, the primeval Lord, who is inaccessible to the Vedas, but obtainable by pure unalloyed devotion of the soul, who is without a second, who is not subject to decay, is without a beginning, whose form is endless, who is the beginning, and the eternal puruṣa; yet He is a person possessing the beauty of blooming youth.

The sum and substance of it is that though He possesses diverse and apparently mutually contradictory qualities, still they are in universal harmonious concordance by dint of His unthinkable potency. This is what is meant by cid-dharma (transcendental nature) as distinguished from the material.

HOW CAN THE JĪVA REALIZE SUCH UNPRECEDENTED EXISTENCE?

The limited intellectual function of the jīva is always contaminated by the influence of time and space and is, therefore, not in a position to shake off this limitedness. If the potency of cognitive function does not extend to the realization of the transcendental, what else can? In reply. Brahmā says that the transcendental Absolute is beyond the reach of the Vedas. The Vedas originate in sound and sound originates in the mundane ether. So the Vedas cannot present before us a direct view of the transcendental world (Goloka). It is only when the Vedas are imbued with the cit potency that they are enabled to deal with the transcendental. But Goloka reveals itself to every jīva-soul when he is under the influence of the spiritual cognitive potency joined to the essence of ecstatic energy. The ecstatic function of devotion is boundless and is surcharged with unalloyed transcendental knowledge. That knowledge reveals goloka-tattva (the principle of the highest transcendental) in unison with devotion, without asserting itself separately but as a subsidiary to unalloyed devotion.

These are mutually contradictory qualities. Mundane scholars cannot deal with them as it is not logical. But it is factual. Therefore there is no entry into transcendence for them.. They cannot see a person who is so powerful from whose body the whole Brahman is emanating… Unless we hear about the lord from the pure devotees we cannot understand the lord and we apply our own limitations to the lord. 

Knowledge devoid of devotion is zero… 

(BG10.10) ONLY THROUGH PURE DEVOTIONAL SERVICE TO THE LORD, ONE CAN ATTAIN THE LORD. 
teṣāṁ satata-yuktānāṁ
bhajatāṁ prīti-pūrvakam
dadāmi buddhi-yogaṁ taṁ
yena mām upayānti te

To those who are constantly devoted to serving Me with love, I give the understanding by which they can come to Me.

Just by reading Vedas expertly one cannot become a pure devotee of the lord. This includes all Vedic scholars who are experts in Vedic knowledge but until they meet a pure devotee they cannot become a pure devotee of the lord. Examples – Durvasa muni, Sarvabhauma Bhattacharya…. In order to glorify the devotee He lets the devotees do things which He appears to have not done, it is not that he cannot do those things, He lets the devotee do.. Lord Rama gives the chance to Hanuman..

In this one purport today we get an incredible view of Krsna’s inconceivable and panoramic view of His potencies. This is also explained in SB 11.19.20 -24

(SB 11.19.20 -24) PURPOSE OR GOAL FOR THE DEVOTEE
Firm faith in the blissful narrations of My pastimes, constant chanting of My glories, unwavering attachment to ceremonial worship of Me, praising Me through beautiful hymns, great respect for My devotional service, offering obeisances with the entire body, performing first-class worship of My devotees, consciousness of Me in all living entities, offering of ordinary, bodily activities in My devotional service, use of words to describe My qualities, offering the mind to Me, rejection of all material desires, giving up wealth for My devotional service, renouncing material sense gratification and happiness, and performing all desirable activities such as charity, sacrifice, chanting, vows and austerities with the purpose of achieving Me — these constitute actual religious principles, by which those human beings who have actually surrendered themselves to Me automatically develop love for Me. What other purpose or goal could remain for My devotee?

The Lord is extremely satisfied with those who offer worship to His pure devotees, and He rewards them accordingly. Because of the Lord’s generous appraisal of His pure devotees, worship of the pure devotees is described as superior to worship of the Lord Himself. 

1. Ordinary, bodily activities such as brushing the teeth, taking bath, eating, etc., should all be offered to the Supreme Lord as devotional service. 
2. whether one speaks in ordinary, crude language or with learned poetic eloquence, one should describe the glories of the Personality of Godhead.
3. One should spend one’s money for festivals glorifying the Personality of Godhead, such as Ratha-yātrā, Janmāṣṭamī and Gaura-pūrṇimā. One is instructed to spend money to assist the mission of one’s spiritual master and other Vaiṣṇavas. The wealth that cannot be used properly in the Lord’s service and is thus an impediment to one’s clear consciousness should be given up entirely.
4. One should give up The word bhogasya refers to sense gratification, headed by sex enjoyment, and sukhasya refers to sentimental material happiness, such as excessive family attachment.
5. One should offer to brāhmaṇas and Vaiṣṇavas first-class foods cooked in ghee. 
6. One should offer the vibration svāhā to Lord Viṣṇu in an authorized sacrificial fire along with grains and ghee.
7. One should constantly chant the holy names of the Lord.

We have to look at the motivation of the people before you accept them as teachers. By their body language and their way of things they teach the service of material lust, greed and anger.. They do not have any feelings for the Lord. People who know things about Krsna, they can also be nonsense. They divide Krsna from His activities in the Spiritual world and the material world. It is therefore important to know both His potencies.  Understanding is only manifested by the service of the lord. Ready to sacrifice everything for the service of the lord. The potential is there for everyone. It is not based on academics, it is based on loving devotional service of the Lord. There is inequality everywhere in the world. There are species with no legs and species with legs, they cannot be equal. But one who is surrendered to the Lord a pure devotee can rise above all the inequalities.. But it cannot be done artificially. Krishna Accepts even Hanuman, who is not even a human that is equity..

(SB 2.4.10) DIFFERENT EXPANSIONS OF THE LORD 

The expansions of different forms of the Lord are –  

from Kṛṣṇa to Baladeva to Saṅkarṣaṇa,
from Saṅkarṣaṇa to Vāsudeva,
from Vāsudeva to Aniruddha,
from Aniruddha to Pradyumna, and then
again to the second Saṅkarṣaṇa, and
from Him to the Nārāyaṇa puruṣāvatāras and innumerable other forms,

The innumerable expansions of the Lord are compared to the constant flowing of the uncountable waves of a river, are all one and the same. They are like lamps of equal power which kindle from one lamp to another. That is the transcendental potency of the Lord. 

The Vedas say that He is so complete that even though the whole complete identity emanates from Him, He still remains the same complete whole (pūrṇasya pūrṇam ādāya pūrṇam evāvaśiṣyate).

THE LORD IS BEYOND THE LIMIT OF CONCEPTION FOR MUNDANE LEARNED SCHOLARS, PHILOSOPHERS OR SCIENTISTS

As such, there is no validity in a material conception of the Lord produced by the mental speculator. Thus He remains always a mystery for the mundane scholar, even if he is vastly learned in the Vedic literatures (vedeṣu durlabham adurlabham ātma-bhaktau). Therefore, the Lord is beyond the limit of conception for mundane learned scholars, philosophers or scientists

HE IS EASILY UNDERSTANDABLE FOR THE PURE DEVOTEE

because the Lord declares in the Bhagavad-gītā (18.54) that after surpassing the stage of knowledge, when one is able to be engaged in the devotional service of the Lord, then only can one know the true nature of the Lord.

One cannot have any clear conception of the Lord or His holy name, form, attributes, pastimes, etc., unless one is engaged in His transcendental loving service. The statement of the Bhagavad-gītā that one must first of all surrender unto the Lord, being freed from all other engagements, means that one must become a pure, unconditional devotee of the Lord. Only then can one know Him by the strength of devotional service.

MAHĀRĀJA PARĪKṢIT ADMITTED IN THE PREVIOUS VERSE THAT THE LORD IS INCONCEIVABLE EVEN FOR THE GREATEST LEARNED SCHOLARS. WHY THEN SHOULD HE AGAIN REQUEST ŚUKADEVA GOSVĀMĪ TO CLARIFY HIS INSUFFICIENT KNOWLEDGE ABOUT THE LORD? 

The reason is clear. Not only was Śukadeva Gosvāmī vastly learned in the Vedic literatures, but he was also a great self-realized soul and a powerful devotee of the Lord. A powerful devotee of the Lord is, by the grace of the Lord, more than the Lord Himself. 

THE LORD IS SO MERCIFUL UPON HIS PURE DEVOTEE THAT HE PRESENTS HIS BELOVED DEVOTEE AS MORE POWERFUL THAN HIMSELF. 

The Personality of Godhead Śrī Rāmacandra attempted to bridge the Indian Ocean to reach the island of Laṅkā, but Śrī Hanumānjī, the unalloyed devotee of the Personality of Godhead, could cross the ocean simply by jumping over it. The Lord is so merciful upon His pure devotee that He presents His beloved devotee as more powerful than Himself. The Lord expressed Himself to be unable to save Durvāsā Muni, although the Muni was so powerful that he could reach the Lord directly under material conditions. But Durvāsā Muni was saved by Mahārāja Ambarīṣa, a devotee of the Lord. Therefore, not only is a devotee of the Lord more powerful than the Lord, but also worship of the devotee is considered more effective than direct worship of the Lord (mad-bhakta-pūjābhyadhikā).

NOT ONLY IS A DEVOTEE OF THE LORD MORE POWERFUL THAN THE LORD, BUT ALSO WORSHIP OF THE DEVOTEE IS CONSIDERED MORE EFFECTIVE THAN DIRECT WORSHIP OF THE LORD (MAD-BHAKTA-PŪJĀBHYADHIKĀ).
The conclusion is, therefore, that a serious devotee must first approach a spiritual master who not only is well versed in the Vedic literatures but is also a great devotee with factual realization of the Lord and His different energies. Without the help of such a devotee spiritual master, one cannot make progress in the transcendental science of the Lord. 

A BONAFIDE SPIRITUAL MASTER EXPLAIN ABOUT BOTH INTERNAL POTENCIES AND EXTERNAL POTENCIES

And a bona fide spiritual master like Śukadeva Gosvāmī does not speak about the Lord only in the matter of His internal potencies, but also explains how He associates with His external potencies.

Maya is always accompanying Krsna. As soon as we deviate from Krsna she enters. We should always be engaged in the service of the lord and fixed in our mind to serve the lord without deviating.. 

ONE SHOULD ALSO BE KEENLY INTERESTED IN THE WORKINGS OF THE LORD’S EXTERNAL POTENCY 

The Lord’s pastimes in the internal potency are displayed in His activities in Vṛndāvana, but the workings of His external potency are directed in His features of Kāraṇārṇavaśāyī Viṣṇu, Garbhodakaśāyī Viṣṇu and Kṣīrodakaśāyī Viṣṇu. Śrīla Viśvanātha Cakravartī offers his good counsel to the interested Vaiṣṇavas when he says that they should not be interested in hearing only about the Lord’s activities (like rāsa-līlā), but must be keenly interested in His pastimes in His features of the puruṣāvatāras in connection with sṛṣṭi-tattva, creational functions, following the examples of Mahārāja Parīkṣit, the ideal disciple, and Śukadeva Gosvāmī, the ideal spiritual master.

KEY TAKEAWAYS FROM HH HARIVILAS MAHARAJ’S MORNING BHAGAVATAM CLASS ON SB 2.4.8

1. The acts of the Supreme Lord, in the creation of just this one universe, appear inconceivably wonderful. There are innumerable universes, and all of them aggregated together are known as the created material world. And this part of His creation is only a fractional portion of the complete creation. 
2. The material world is only one part of His energy, the remaining three parts consist of the vaikuṇṭha-Jagat or spiritual world described in the Bhagavad-gītā as mad-dhāma or sanātana-dhāma, or the eternal world. 
3. Lord creates the material world and winds up the creation. Whereas, Vaikuṇṭha world, is neither created nor annihilated (eternal)
4. The Lord exists with His dhāma, or in other words with His eternal name, qualities, pastimes, entourage, and personality, which are all a display of His different energies and expansions. 
5. The Lord is called anādi, or having no creator, and ādi, or the origin of all.
6. All this is inconceivable,even for the great scholars and such scholars present theories contradictory to one another. 
7. They have no complete information even about this one universe, as to how far this limited space extends, or how many stars and planets are there, or the different conditions of those innumerable planets. 
8. “Russia’s well-known professor of astronomy Boris Vorontsov-Veliaminov said that there must be an infinite number of planets in the universe inhabited by beings endowed with reason. “It could be that life similar to that on earth flourishes on such planets.”
9. This adaptability of an organism to different varieties of planets is described in the Brahma-saṁhitā as vibhūti-bhinnam; Vibhūti means “specific powers,” and bhinnam means “variegated.”
10. Scientists who are attempting to explore outer space and are trying to reach other planets by mechanical arrangements must know for certain that organisms adapted to the atmosphere of earth cannot exist in the atmospheres of other planets.
11. One has to prepare himself to be transferred to a different planet after being relieved of the present body, as it is said in BG 9.25: “Those who worship the demigods will take birth among the demigods, those who worship ghosts and spirits will take birth among such beings, and those who worship Me will live with Me.”
12. Mahārāja Parīkṣit, being a great emperor, a descendant of the Pāṇḍavas and a great devotee of Lord Kṛṣṇa, was quite able to know considerably about the creation of the world, but that much knowledge was not sufficient. He said therefore that even greatly learned scholars fail to know about that, even after great effort.
13. The Lord is unlimited, and His activities are also unfathomed. With a limited source of knowledge and with imperfect senses, any living being, even lord Brahmājī, the highest perfect living being within the universe, can never imagine knowing about the unlimited. 
14. We can know something of the unlimited when it is explained by the unlimited, as has been done by the Lord Himself in the unique statements of the Bhagavad-gītā, and it can also be known to some extent from realized souls like Śukadeva Gosvāmī, who learned it from Vyāsadeva, a disciple of Nārada, and thus the perfect knowledge can descend by the chain of disciplic succession only, and not by any form of experimental knowledge, old or modern.
15. (SB 5.5.5) As long as one does not inquire about the spiritual values of life, one is defeated and subjected to miseries arising from ignorance.

1. (BG 7.17) Of these, the one who is in full knowledge and who is always engaged in pure devotional service is the best. For I am very dear to him, and he is dear to Me.
2. (BG 7.18) All these devotees are undoubtedly magnanimous souls, but he who is situated in knowledge of Me I consider to be just like My own self. Being engaged in My transcendental service, he is sure to attain Me, the highest and most perfect goal.
3. (SB 10.2.32) A person who doesn’t have knowledge of devotional service may think himself liberated, but actually he is not. 
4. The point is to know Kṛṣṇa, Vāsudeva, as everything and surrender unto Him. Karmīs do not know this, but a devotee who is one hundred percent engaged in the devotional service of the Lord knows fully what is karma and jñāna;
5. Therefore a pure devotee is no longer interested in karma or jñāna. Anyābhilāṣitā-śūnyaṁ jñāna-karmādy-anāvṛtam. The real bhakta is untouched by any tinge of karma and jñāna. His only purpose in life is to serve the Lord.

SB 2.4.8 TRANSLATION
O learned brāhmaṇa, the transcendental activities of the Lord are all wonderful, and they appear inconceivable because even great endeavors by many learned scholars have still proved insufficient for understanding them.

CLASS NOTES: 

THE ACTS OF THE SUPREME LORD, IN THE CREATION OF JUST THIS ONE UNIVERSE, APPEAR INCONCEIVABLY WONDERFUL. 

And there are innumerable universes, and all of them aggregated together are known as the created material world. And this part of His creation is only a fractional portion of the complete creation. The material world stands as a part only (ekāṁśena sthito jagat).

Supposing that the material world is a display of one part of His energy, the remaining three parts consist of the vaikuṇṭha-Jagat or spiritual world described in the Bhagavad-gītā as mad-dhāma or sanātana-dhāma, or the eternal world. 

HE CREATES AND AGAIN WINDS UP THE CREATION (ONLY MATERIAL WORLD)

This action is applicable only in the material world because the othe greater part of His creation, namely the Vaikuṇṭha world, is neither created nor annihilated; otherwise the Vaikuṇṭha-dhāma would not have been called eternal. The Lord exists with His dhāma, or in other words with His eternal name, qualities, pastimes, entourage and personality, which are all a display of His different energies and expansions

THE LORD IS CALLED ANĀDI, OR HAVING NO CREATOR, AND ĀDI, OR THE ORIGIN OF ALL.

We think in our own imperfect way that the Lord is also created, but the Vedānta informs us that He is not created. Rather, everything else is created by Him (nārāyaṇaḥ paro ’vyaktāt)

MODERN SCIENTISTS HAVE INSUFFICIENT KNOWLEDGE OF ALL THIS.

for the common man these are all very wonderful matters for consideration. Even for great scholars they are inconceivable, and thus such scholars present theories contradictory to one another. Even for the insignificant part of His creation, this particular universe, they have no complete information as to how far this limited space extends, or how many stars and planets are there, or the different conditions of those innumerable planets. Modern scientists have insufficient knowledge of all this. Some of them assert that there are one hundred million planets scattered all over space. 

“Russia’s well-known professor of astronomy Boris Vorontsov-Veliaminov said that there must be an infinite number of planets in the universe inhabited by beings endowed with reason.

“It could be that life similar to that on earth flourishes on such planets.

“Doctor of Chemistry Nikolai Zhirov, covering the problem of atmosphere on other planets, pointed out that the organism of a Martian, for instance, could very well adapt itself to normal existence with a low body temperature.

“He said that he felt that the gaseous composition of Martian atmosphere was quite suitable to sustain life of beings which have become adapted to it.”

THIS ADAPTABILITY OF AN ORGANISM TO DIFFERENT VARIETIES OF PLANETS IS DESCRIBED IN THE BRAHMA-SAṀHITĀ AS VIBHŪTI-BHINNAM; 

i.e., each and every one of the innumerable planets within the universe is endowed with a particular type of atmosphere, and the living beings there are more perfectly advanced in science and psychology because of a better atmosphere. Vibhūti means “specific powers,” and bhinnam means “variegated.” Scientists who are attempting to explore outer space and are trying to reach other planets by mechanical arrangements must know for certain that organisms adapted to the atmosphere of earth cannot exist in the atmospheres of other planets (Easy Journey to Other Planets). 

ONE HAS TO PREPARE HIMSELF, THEREFORE, TO BE TRANSFERRED TO A DIFFERENT PLANET AFTER BEING RELIEVED OF THE PRESENT BODY, AS IT IS SAID IN THE BHAGAVAD-GĪTĀ (9.25):
yānti deva-vratā devān
pitṝn yānti pitṛ-vratāḥ
bhūtāni yānti bhūtejyā
yānti mad-yājino ’pi mām
“Those who worship the demigods will take birth among the demigods, those who worship ghosts and spirits will take birth among such beings, and those who worship Me will live with Me.”

MAHĀRĀJA PARĪKṢIT’S STATEMENT REGARDING THE WORKINGS OF THE CREATIVE ENERGY OF THE LORD DISCLOSES THAT HE KNEW EVERYTHING OF THE PROCESS OF CREATION. WHY THEN DID HE ASK ŚUKADEVA GOSVĀMĪ FOR SUCH INFORMATION?

Mahārāja Parīkṣit, being a great emperor, a descendant of the Pāṇḍavas and a great devotee of Lord Kṛṣṇa, was quite able to know considerably about the creation of the world, but that much knowledge was not sufficient. He said therefore that even greatly learned scholars fail to know about that, even after great effort. 

THE LORD IS UNLIMITED, AND HIS ACTIVITIES ARE ALSO UNFATHOMED. 

With a limited source of knowledge and with imperfect senses, any living being, up to the standard of Brahmājī, the highest perfect living being within the universe, can never imagine knowing about the unlimited. We can know something of the unlimited when it is explained by the unlimited, as has been done by the Lord Himself in the unique statements of the Bhagavad-gītā, and it can also be known to some extent from realized souls like Śukadeva Gosvāmī, who learned it from Vyāsadeva, a disciple of Nārada, and thus the perfect knowledge can descend by the chain of disciplic succession only, and not by any form of experimental knowledge, old or modern.

Important point here is – anything about Krsna is amazing and inconceivable to mundane persons. The most mundane people are the scientists and philosophers. Because they try and understand the material world through speculation, They claim to be logical and rational, but they are not, unfortunately they are considered to be experts in understanding of this material world, but their understanding is very piece meal… very sketchy and very incomplete. 

Los Angeles Dec 6th  1968 BG 2.26 

Srila Prabhupada talks about the Darwin’s theory. 

People who believe in Darwinism do not believe in the soul and they do not believe in the transmigration of the soul. They have their own theories which are not definite and scientifically proven. Darwin was quoted as saying  “there is nothing wrong with speculation in science. Science means observation, experimentation, finding a pattern and coming up with a theory. “ The atheistic theory is by the combination of matter, living symptoms become possible. There is no proof of it. They never were able to prove that by combining matter they can produce life or a living being .. Srila Prabhupada says –  “let them make one small ant.”  They convinced many generations of kids and educated in nonsense schools that there is no soul and matter is the origin of everything… There is no way we can except such phony knowledge. Even from the point of view of History, at the max they went only 3000 – years back and Darwin says life came into existence only 10000 years ago… SB says that  – 5000 years ago there was battle of kurukshetra,,,, millions of years ago there was battle between Rama and Ravana. Need to understand SB to learn history , species of things and races of people… 

Chemical theory of life.. Can they produce life, they have all the elements. SP asked Bhakti Swaroop Damodar maharaj /… “ Ask him if we give him all the chemicals, can he produce living being… “  He cannot do it but he is teaching a theory that life came from chemicals… 

BG 2.26 

If, however, you think that the soul [or the symptoms of life] will always be born and die forever, you still have no reason to lament, O mighty-armed.

Even if you accept that life is a bottle of chemicals, do you lament if the bottle of chemicals breaks. It is called Vaibhsika philosophy… in the olden days. OUr children are being trained in modern education, they are becoming stupid.. 

(SB 5.5.5) AS LONG AS ONE DOES NOT INQUIRE ABOUT THE SPIRITUAL VALUES OF LIFE, ONE IS DEFEATED AND SUBJECTED TO MISERIES ARISING FROM IGNORANCE.

parābhavas tāvad abodha-jāto

yāvan na jijñāsata ātma-tattvam

yāvat kriyās tāvad idaṁ mano vai

karmātmakaṁ yena śarīra-bandhaḥ

As long as one does not inquire about the spiritual values of life, one is defeated and subjected to miseries arising from ignorance. Be it sinful or pious, karma has its resultant actions. If a person is engaged in any kind of karma, his mind is called karmātmaka, colored with fruitive activity. As long as the mind is impure, consciousness is unclear, and as long as one is absorbed in fruitive activity, he has to accept a material body.

Very profound verse. We have lot of people who say, I do not believe in religion, I will just do good and stay positive. But they eat meat, they gamble, they do illicit sex, they are committing sinful activties through panchasuna.. How can they do good to others… Their aim is to go to heavenly planets for enhanced sense gratification… 

GENERALLY PEOPLE THINK THAT ONE SHOULD ACT VERY PIOUSLY IN ORDER TO BE RELIEVED FROM MISERY, BUT THIS IS NOT A FACT.

 Even though one engages in pious activity and speculation, he is nonetheless defeated. His only aim should be emancipation from the clutches of māyā and all material activities. Speculative knowledge and pious activity do not solve the problems of material life. One should be inquisitive to understand his spiritual position. As stated in Bhagavad-gītā (4.37):

yathaidhāṁsi samiddho ’gnir

bhasmasāt kurute ’rjuna

jñānāgniḥ sarva-karmāṇi

bhasmasāt kurute tathā

“As a blazing fire turns firewood to ashes, O Arjuna, so does the fire of knowledge burn to ashes all reactions to material activities.”

Unless one understands the self and its activities, one has to be considered in material bondage. 

Unless we are trained in SB & BG we will be stupid our whole life, even if we do pious activities. Pious or impious activities you cannot get out of birth and death life cycle… If one cannot attain the love of Krsna in this life… and get out of this birth death…

A person who understands who they are in relationship to Krsna they know that Devotional service is the essence and perfection of life. No knowledge only engage in Dev service you will make progress.. If you have knowledge and no dev service then it is Shrama evahi kevalam… Having knowledge and dedication to devotional service is the best.. It is described in BG 7.17, BG 7.18 

BG 7.17 

OF THESE, THE ONE WHO IS IN FULL KNOWLEDGE AND WHO IS ALWAYS ENGAGED IN PURE DEVOTIONAL SERVICE IS THE BEST. FOR I AM VERY DEAR TO HIM, AND HE IS DEAR TO ME.

BG 7.18 

ALL THESE DEVOTEES ARE UNDOUBTEDLY MAGNANIMOUS SOULS, BUT HE WHO IS SITUATED IN KNOWLEDGE OF ME I CONSIDER TO BE JUST LIKE MY OWN SELF. BEING ENGAGED IN MY TRANSCENDENTAL SERVICE, HE IS SURE TO ATTAIN ME, THE HIGHEST AND MOST PERFECT GOAL.

You get knowledge by sitting an hearing every morning SB as prescribed in vedic way… step by step… We should not waste even 1 moment, we should be enthusiastic in hearing the class, doing devotional service and enthusiastic in giving up illicit activities. 

In Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam (10.2.32) it is also said: ye ’nye ’ravindākṣa vimukta-māninas tvayy asta-bhāvād aviśuddha-buddhayaḥ. A person who doesn’t have knowledge of devotional service may think himself liberated, but actually he is not. 

This is the situation of Mayavadis, they think they are liberated by attaining Brahman, but that is not the case, as there is no devotional service. There Dev. Service in the material world and spiritual world and there is no Dev. Service in Brahman. It is worse than hell. Even in hell you can do DS but not in Brahman, although it is eternal… 

Āruhya kṛcchreṇa paraṁ padaṁ tataḥ patanty adho ’nādṛta-yuṣmad-aṅghrayaḥ: such people may approach the impersonal Brahman effulgence, but they fall down again into material enjoyment because they have no knowledge of devotional service. As long as one is interested in karma and jñāna, he continues enduring the miseries of material life — birth, old age, disease and death. Karmīs certainly take on one body after another. As far as jñānīs are concerned, unless they are promoted to the topmost understanding, they must return to the material world. As explained in Bhagavad-gītā (7.19): bahūnāṁ janmanām ante jñānavān māṁ prapadyate. The point is to know Kṛṣṇa, Vāsudeva, as everything and surrender unto Him. Karmīs do not know this, but a devotee who is one hundred percent engaged in the devotional service of the Lord knows fully what is karma and jñāna; therefore a pure devotee is no longer interested in karma or jñāna. Anyābhilāṣitā-śūnyaṁ jñāna-karmādy-anāvṛtam. The real bhakta is untouched by any tinge of karma and jñāna. His only purpose in life is to serve the Lord.

Even though there are so many yogis like durvasa muni there is nothing like Ambarish maharaj, Prahlad Maharaj, Narada muni… Even though Arjuna did not do any yoga asana yet he is called the greatest yogi. Yoga is not asanas physical postures, it is connecting with Krsna. 

This purport is very important , How He is unique and no one is equal or greater to Him. 

KEY TAKEAWAYS FROM HH HARIVILAS MAHARAJ’S MORNING BHAGAVATAM CLASS ON SB 2.4.7

1. The Supreme Lord is the chief eternal being amongst all other eternal individual beings (nityo nityānāṁ cetanaś cetanānām). He maintains innumerable other individual living beings (eko bahūnāṁ yo vidadhāti kāmān). 
2. All living entities, both in the conditioned state and in the liberated state, are maintained by the Almighty Supreme Lord.
3. Such maintenance is effected by the Lord through His different expansions of Self and three principal energies, namely the internal, external and marginal energies. 
4. The unconditioned marginal potency acts in the spiritual kingdom, and the Lord, by His different plenary expansions, maintains them in different transcendental relations displayed in the spiritual sky. 
5. The one Supreme Personality of Godhead manifests Himself in many (bahu syām), and thus all diversities are in Him, and He is in all diversities, although He is nevertheless different from all of them. (acintya-bhedābheda-tattva)
6. The process of thinking of Kṛṣṇa, is very easy. The Lord is puruṣa, a person – we think of the person Rāma and the person Kṛṣṇa. And whether one thinks of Rāma or of Kṛṣṇa, what He is like is described BG 8.9
7. BG 8.9 – One should meditate upon the Supreme Person as the one who knows everything, as He who is the oldest, who is the controller, who is smaller than the smallest, who is the maintainer of everything, who is beyond all material conception, who is inconceivable, and who is always a person. He is luminous like the sun, and He is transcendental, beyond this material nature.
8. Intelligent persons, avoiding useless argument and speculation, should accept what is stated in scriptures like the Vedas, Bhagavad-gītā and Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam and follow the principles they set down. This will lead one to understanding.
9. Pure devotees accept and know that Kṛṣṇa is the Supreme Personality of Godhead. Therefore they completely surrender unto Him and engage in Kṛṣṇa consciousness, devotional service of the Lord.
10. In conditioned life we are committing sins at every step, even without knowing it. The reason we are sinning unknowingly is that we have been in ignorance from our very birth. Despite so many big, big universities, none of them is teaching ātma-tattva, the science of the soul. 
11. The human being is given all facilities for a comfortable life by the laws of nature because the human form of life is more important and valuable than animal life. 
12. Why is man given a better life than that of the swine and other animals? Why is a highly placed government servant given better facilities than those of an ordinary clerk? The answer is that a highly placed officer has to discharge duties of a higher nature. Similarly, the duties human beings have to perform are higher than those of animals, who are always engaged in simply feeding their hungry stomachs.
13. This foolishness will continue until one comes to the platform of understanding self-realization. One continues to be foolish like an animal and is subjected to transmigration from one body to another in different species of life. This is the result of ignorance.
14. We are given this human form of life not to work hard like asses, swine and dogs but to attain the highest perfection of life.
15. We should work to dissipate our ignorance through the cultivation of transcendental knowledge. Whether you are pious or impious, you have to enter into the womb of some mother. And that tribulation is very severe. Whether you take birth in a very rich and aristocratic family or from an animal womb, the pangs of birth, old age, disease, and death continue.The Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement is meant to give you an opportunity to solve these four problems
16. The material world is sometimes compared to an ocean, and the human body is compared to a solid boat designed especially to cross this ocean. The Vedic scriptures and the ācāryas, or saintly teachers, are compared to expert boatmen, and the facilities of the human body are compared to favorable breezes that help the boat ply smoothly to its desired destination.
17. If, with all these facilities, a human being does not fully utilize his life for self-realization, he must be considered ātma-hā, a killer of the soul. Śrī Īśopaniṣad warns in clear terms that the killer of the soul is destined to enter into the darkest region of ignorance to suffer perpetually

SB 2.4.7 TRANSLATION: 
Kindly describe how the Supreme Lord, who is all-powerful, engages His different energies and different expansions in maintaining and again winding up the phenomenal world in the sporting spirit of a player.

CLASS NOTES: 

1. the Supreme Lord is described as the chief eternal being amongst all other eternal individual beings (nityo nityānāṁ cetanaś cetanānām) 
2. the one Supreme Lord maintains innumerable other individual living beings (eko bahūnāṁ yo vidadhāti kāmān). 

So all living entities, both in the conditioned state and in the liberated state, are maintained by the Almighty Supreme Lord. Such maintenance is effected by the Lord through His different expansions of Self and three principal energies, namely the internal, external and marginal energies. The living entities are His marginal energies, and some of them, in the confidence of the Lord, are entrusted with the work of creation also, as are Brahmā, Marīci, etc., and the acts of creation are inspired by the Lord unto them (tene brahma hṛdā). The external energy (māyā) is also impregnated with the jīvas, or conditioned souls. The unconditioned marginal potency acts in the spiritual kingdom, and the Lord, by His different plenary expansions, maintains them in different transcendental relations displayed in the spiritual sky. 

1. So the one Supreme Personality of Godhead manifests Himself in many (bahu syām), and thus all diversities are in Him, and He is in all diversities, although He is nevertheless different from all of them. 

That is the inconceivable mystic power of the Lord, and as such everything is simultaneously one with and different from Him by His inconceivable potencies (acintya-bhedābheda-tattva).

Yesterday we learnt that – “Only when one knows Lord Kṛṣṇa’s greatness can one firmly put one’s unflinching faith in Him; “ That is why this question is asked by Parikshit Maharaj to Sukhdev Goswami. Lord is maintaining both a phenomenal and numinous world. We can hear about the greatness of the Supreme Lord from BG 8 and 9th chapters

BG 8.9

One should meditate upon the Supreme Person as the one who knows everything, as He who is the oldest, who is the controller, who is smaller than the smallest, who is the maintainer of everything, who is beyond all material conception, who is inconceivable, and who is always a person. He is luminous like the sun, and He is transcendental, beyond this material nature.

The process of thinking of the Supreme is mentioned in this verse. The foremost point is that He is not impersonal or void. One cannot meditate on something impersonal or void. That is very difficult. The process of thinking of Kṛṣṇa, however, is very easy and is factually stated herein. First of all, the Lord is puruṣa, a person – we think of the person Rāma and the person Kṛṣṇa. And whether one thinks of Rāma or of Kṛṣṇa, what He is like is described in this verse of Bhagavad-gītā.

1. The Lord is kavi; that is, He knows past, present and future and therefore knows everything. 
2. He is the oldest personality because He is the origin of everything; everything is born out of Him. 
3. He is also the supreme controller of the universe, and 
4. He is the maintainer and instructor of humanity. 
5. He is smaller than the smallest. The living entity is one ten-thousandth part of the tip of a hair, but the Lord is so inconceivably small that He enters into the heart of this particle. Therefore He is called smaller than the smallest. As the Supreme, He can enter into the atom and into the heart of the smallest and control him as the Supersoul. 
6. Although so small, He is still all-pervading and is maintaining everything. 
7. By Him all these planetary systems are sustained. We often wonder how these big planets are floating in the air. It is stated here that the Supreme Lord, by His inconceivable energy, is sustaining all these big planets and systems of galaxies.
8. The word acintya (“inconceivable”) is very significant in this connection. God’s energy is beyond our conception, beyond our thinking jurisdiction, and is therefore called inconceivable (acintya). Who can argue this point? 
9. He pervades this material world and yet is beyond it. We cannot comprehend even this material world, which is insignificant compared to the spiritual world – so how can we comprehend what is beyond? Acintya means that which is beyond this material world, that which our argument, logic and philosophical speculation cannot touch, that which is inconceivable. 

Therefore intelligent persons, avoiding useless argument and speculation, should accept what is stated in scriptures like the Vedas, Bhagavad-gītā and Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam and follow the principles they set down. This will lead one to understanding.

BG 9.11
Fools deride Me when I descend in the human form. They do not know My transcendental nature as the Supreme Lord of all that be.

1. Supreme Personality of Godhead, although appearing like a human being, is not a common man. The Personality of Godhead, who conducts the creation, maintenance and annihilation of the complete cosmic manifestation, cannot be a human being. He is the original Supreme Personality, as is confirmed in the Brahma-saṁhitā.

1. He is the original Supreme Personality, as is confirmed in the Brahma-saṁhitā. 
2. Kṛṣṇa is the supreme controller; there are many controllers undoubtedly, both in the material and spiritual world, but Kṛṣṇa is the supreme controller (īśvaraḥ paramaḥ kṛṣṇaḥ), and His body is sac-cid-ānanda, nonmaterial.
3. His body is eternal, blissful and full of knowledge
4. Kṛṣṇa’s body is a symbol of complete knowledge and bliss, that He is the proprietor of everything that be and that He can award liberation to anyone
5. The appearance of the Supreme Personality of Godhead in this material world is a manifestation of His internal energy. He is the master of material energy.
6. The material energy, although very powerful, is under His control, and whoever surrenders unto Him can get out of the control of this material energy.
7. controller of all the atoms and of the gigantic manifestation of the universal form
8. a form like that of a human being can simultaneously control the infinite and the minute.
9. although He is controlling the infinite and the finite, He is apart from all this manifestation

Although the foolish cannot imagine how Kṛṣṇa, who appears just like a human being, can control the infinite and the finite, those who are pure devotees accept this, for they know that Kṛṣṇa is the Supreme Personality of Godhead. Therefore they completely surrender unto Him and engage in Kṛṣṇa consciousness, devotional service of the Lord.

LAWS OF NATURE
BREAKING THE BONDS OF KARMA

REASON FOR SINNING – IGNORANCE FROM OUR VERY BIRTH 

In conditioned life we are committing sins at every step, even without knowing it. The reason we are sinning unknowingly is that we have been in ignorance from our very birth. This ignorance is prominent despite so many educational institutions. Why? Because despite so many big, big universities, none of them is teaching ātma-tattva, the science of the soul. Therefore people remain in ignorance, and they continue to sin and suffer the reactions.

SB 5.5.3 – As long as one does not inquire about the spiritual values of life, one is defeated and subjected to miseries arising from ignorance. Be it sinful or pious, karma has its resultant actions. If a person is engaged in any kind of karma, his mind is called karmātmaka, colored with fruitive activity. As long as the mind is impure, consciousness is unclear, and as long as one is absorbed in fruitive activity, he has to accept a material body.

THIS FOOLISHNESS WILL CONTINUE UNTIL ONE COMES TO THE PLATFORM OF UNDERSTANDING SELF-REALIZATION. 

Otherwise, all these universities and institutions for imparting knowledge are a continuation of that same ignorance and foolishness. Unless one comes to the point of asking “What am I? What is God? What is this world? What is my relationship with God and this world?” and finds proper answers, one continues to be foolish like an animal and is subjected to transmigration from one body to another in different species of life. This is the result of ignorance.

we do not know what kind of miseries we will have to suffer in our next life because of our sinful activities. So if one does not begin cultivating transcendental knowledge, then one’s life is very risky.  we should work to dissipate our ignorance through cultivation of transcendental knowledge.

You cannot get transcendental knowledge at schools. They think it is bogus and they are laughing at it… BG 13.8 – Amanitvam… adambitvam… “Anything beyond these is ignorance.. “ Humility; pridelessness; nonviolence; tolerance; simplicity; approaching a bona fide spiritual master; cleanliness; steadiness; self-control; renunciation of the objects of sense gratification; absence of false ego; the perception of the evil of birth, death, old age and disease; detachment; freedom from entanglement with children, wife, home and the rest; even-mindedness amid pleasant and unpleasant events; constant and unalloyed devotion to Me; aspiring to live in a solitary place; detachment from the general mass of people; accepting the importance of self-realization; and philosophical search for the Absolute Truth – all these I declare to be knowledge, and besides this whatever there maybe is ignorance.”
This is a serious indictment of modern civilization. 

ANYTHING YOU DO OUTSIDE THE FIELD OF KṚṢṆA CONSCIOUS ACTIVITIES ENTANGLES YOU IN THE MODES OF NATURE. 

But one who performs pious activities is also entangled. But whether you are pious or impious, you have to enter into the womb of some mother. And that tribulation is very severe. That we have forgotten. Whether you take birth in a very rich and aristocratic family or from an animal womb, the pangs of birth, old age, disease, and death continue.

The Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement is meant to give you an opportunity to solve these four problems – birth, old age, disease, and death. But if you continue to act sinfully and eat sinfully, then these miseries will continue. Otherwise, you can nullify your sinful reactions by surrendering to Kṛṣṇa, as He states in the Bhagavad-gītā (18.66)

Part of surrendering to Kṛṣṇa is being careful not to eat anything that has not been offered to Him. That should be our determination. Even if we have committed some sin, by eating prasādam, food offered to Kṛṣṇa, we will counteract it. If we surrender to Kṛṣṇa in this way, He will protect us from sinful reactions. That is His promise.

This is also explained in
ISO Mantra 3 & 12 of ISO
Mantra 3

The killer of the soul, whoever he may be, must enter into the planets known as the worlds of the faithless, full of darkness and ignorance.

HUMAN LIFE IS DISTINGUISHED FROM ANIMAL LIFE DUE TO ITS HEAVY RESPONSIBILITIES.

Those who are cognizant of these responsibilities and who work in that spirit are called suras (godly persons), and those who are neglectful of these responsibilities or who have no information of them are called asuras (demons).

INTELLIGENT HUMAN BEINGS MUST ALWAYS REMEMBER THAT THE SOUL OBTAINS A HUMAN FORM AFTER AN EVOLUTION OF MANY MILLIONS OF YEARS IN THE CYCLE OF TRANSMIGRATION. 

The material world is sometimes compared to an ocean, and the human body is compared to a solid boat designed especially to cross this ocean. The Vedic scriptures and the ācāryas, or saintly teachers, are compared to expert boatmen, and the facilities of the human body are compared to favorable breezes that help the boat ply smoothly to its desired destination. If, with all these facilities, a human being does not fully utilize his life for self-realization, he must be considered ātma-hā, a killer of the soul. Śrī Īśopaniṣad warns in clear terms that the killer of the soul is destined to enter into the darkest region of ignorance to suffer perpetually.

Darkest region of ignorance – Universities… Feminists are the crazy people – who support the abortion of foetus… anti manism, Men are taught to be irresponsible… the more sex you have the more man you are… that is the opposite of the truth. Where can you get the real education… of the soul… 

THE HUMAN BEING IS GIVEN ALL FACILITIES FOR A COMFORTABLE LIFE BY THE LAWS OF NATURE BECAUSE THE HUMAN FORM OF LIFE IS MORE IMPORTANT AND VALUABLE THAN ANIMAL LIFE. 

Why is man given a better life than that of the swine and other animals? Why is a highly placed government servant given better facilities than those of an ordinary clerk? The answer is that a highly placed officer has to discharge duties of a higher nature. Similarly, the duties human beings have to perform are higher than those of animals, who are always engaged in simply feeding their hungry stomachs. Yet the modern soul-killing civilization has only increased the problems of the hungry stomach. When we approach a polished animal in the form of a modern civilized man and ask him to take interest in self-realization, he will say that he simply wants to work to satisfy his stomach and that there is no need of self-realization for a hungry man. The laws of nature are so cruel, however, that despite his denunciation of the need for self-realization and his eagerness to work hard to fill his stomach, he is always threatened by unemployment.

WE ARE GIVEN THIS HUMAN FORM OF LIFE NOT TO WORK HARD LIKE ASSES, SWINE AND DOGS BUT TO ATTAIN THE HIGHEST PERFECTION OF LIFE.

 If we do not care for self-realization, the laws of nature force us to work very hard, even though we may not want to do so. Human beings in this age have been forced to work hard like the asses and bullocks that pull carts. Some of the regions where the asuras are sent to work are revealed in this mantra of Śrī Īśopaniṣad. If a man fails to discharge his duties as a human being, he is forced to transmigrate to the asurya planets and take birth in degraded species of life to work hard in ignorance and darkness.

KEY TAKEAWAYS FROM HH HARIVILAS MAHARAJ’S MORNING BHAGAVATAM CLASS ON SB 2.4.6 :

1. For every unknown thing, we have to learn and inquire from a learned personality. 
2. The spiritual master, therefore, must be one who is sarva-jña.
3. All inquiries on God which are unknown to the disciple may be made from the qualified spiritual master.
4. Maharaj Praikshit already knows that everything we see is born out of the energy of the Lord. So, he wanted to know the process of creation. 
5. Foolish people say that creative energy is independent and acts automatically, as electrical energy works. But the intelligent man knows that even the electrical energy is generated by an expert engineer in the localized powerhouse, and thus the energy is distributed everywhere under the resident engineer’s supervision.
6. It is clearly said there that material energy is a manifestation of one of many such energies of the Supreme (parāsya śaktir vividhaiva śrūyate). 
7. The so-called scholars and philosophers of the world may, by mental speculation, present so many utopian theories about the impersonal creation of the universe, but an intelligent devotee of the Lord, by studying the Bhagavad-gītā, can know that behind the creation is the hand of the Supreme Lord, just as in the generating electrical powerhouse there is the resident engineer.
8. The research scholar finds out the cause and the effect of everything, but research scholars as great as Brahmā, Śiva, Indra and many other demigods are sometimes bewildered by seeing the wonderful creative energy of the Lord, so what to speak of the tiny mundane scholars dealing in petty things. 
9. One can compare the long duration of life of the inhabitants of Brahmā’s planet, which is inconceivable to the inhabitants of this planet earth, to the categorical value of the brain of Brahmājī, also inconceivable to any great scientist of this planet. 
10. And with such high brainpower, Brahmājī admits Lord Kṛṣṇa to be the supreme cause of all causes. But persons with tiny brains within this petty planet earth think of the Lord as one of them.
11. Persons with a poor fund of knowledge do not know this, and therefore they have the audacity to deride Him because He comes before us by His causeless mercy occasionally as a human being. 
12. The Lord is not like a human being. He is sac-cid-ānanda-vigraha, or the Absolute Personality of Godhead, and there is no difference between His body and His soul. He is both the power and the powerful.
13. Mahārāja Parīkṣit did not ask his spiritual master, Śukadeva Gosvāmī, to narrate Lord Kṛṣṇa’s pastimes in Vṛndāvana; he wanted to hear first about the creation of the Lord.
14. Neither the king nor the great speaker of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam Sukhdev Goswami jumped up like the organizers of Bhāgavatam; both of them proceeded systematically so that both future readers and hearers might take lessons from the example of the procedure of reciting Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam. 
15. Those who are under the control of the external energy of the Lord, or in other words those who are in the material world, must, first of all, know how the external energy of the Lord is working under the direction of the Supreme Personality, and afterward one may try to enter into the activities of His internal energy.
16. The author of Caitanya-caritāmṛta has warned the neophyte devotees to be seriously on guard against the pitfall of neglecting knowledge about Kṛṣṇa in regard to how great He is. Only when one knows Lord Kṛṣṇa’s greatness can one firmly put one’s unflinching faith in Him; otherwise, like the common man, even the great leaders of men will mistake Lord Kṛṣṇa for one of the many demigods, or a historical personality, or a myth only.
17. The transcendental pastimes of the Lord in Vṛndāvana, or even at Dvārakā, are relishable for persons who have already qualified themselves in advanced spiritual techniques, and the common man may be able to attain to such a plane by the gradual process of service and inquiries.
18. Therefore , the neophyte devotee, instead of jumping at once to the platform of transcendental pastimes presented by the internal energy of the Lord, may know how great the Supreme Lord is by inquiring about the process of His creative energy.

SB 2.4.6 TRANSLATION
I beg to know from you how the Personality of Godhead, by His personal energies, creates these phenomenal universes as they are, which are inconceivable even to the great demigods.

CLASS NOTES: 

FOR EVERY UNKNOWN THING, WE HAVE TO LEARN AND INQUIRE FROM A LEARNED PERSONALITY. 

The question of creation is also one of such inquiries to be made to the right person. The spiritual master, therefore, must be one who is sarva-jña, as stated hereinbefore in connection with Śukadeva Gosvāmī. Thus all inquiries on God which are unknown to the disciple may be made from the qualified spiritual master, and here the practical example is set by Mahārāja Parīkṣit

MAHARAJ PRAIKSHIT ALREADY KNOWS THAT EVERYTHING WE SEE IS BORN OUT OF THE ENERGY OF THE LORD. SO, HE WANTED TO KNOW THE PROCESS OF CREATION. 

It was, however, already known to Mahārāja Parīkṣit that everything we see is born out of the energy of the Lord, as we have all learned in the very beginning of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam (janmādy asya yataḥ). So Mahārāja Parīkṣit wanted to know the process of creation. The origin of creation was known to him; otherwise he would not have inquired how the Personality of Godhead, by His different energies, creates this phenomenal world. The common man also knows that the creation is made by some creator and is not created automatically. 

WE HAVE NO EXPERIENCE IN THE PRACTICAL WORLD WHERE A THING IS CREATED AUTOMATICALLY. MATERIAL ENERGY IS A MANIFESTATION OF ONE OF MANY SUCH ENERGIES OF THE SUPREME. 
Foolish people say that creative energy is independent and acts automatically, as electrical energy works. But the intelligent man knows that even the electrical energy is generated by an expert engineer in the localized powerhouse, and thus the energy is distributed everywhere under the resident engineer’s supervision. 

It is clearly said there that material energy is a manifestation of one of many such energies of the Supreme (parāsya śaktir vividhaiva śrūyate).

The so-called scholars and philosophers of the world may, by mental speculation, present so many utopian theories about the impersonal creation of the universe, but an intelligent devotee of the Lord, by studying the Bhagavad-gītā, can know that behind the creation is the hand of the Supreme Lord, just as in the generating electrical powerhouse there is the resident engineer.

The research scholar finds out the cause and the effect of everything, but research scholars as great as Brahmā, Śiva, Indra and many other demigods are sometimes bewildered by seeing the wonderful creative energy of the Lord, so what to speak of the tiny mundane scholars dealing in petty things. 

As There Are Differences In The Living Conditions Of Different Planets Of The Universe, And As One Planet Is Superior To Others, The Brains Of The Living Entities In Those Respective Planets Are Also Of Different Categorical Values. 

As stated in the Bhagavad-gītā, one can compare the long duration of life of the inhabitants of Brahmā’s planet, which is inconceivable to the inhabitants of this planet earth, to the categorical value of the brain of Brahmājī, also inconceivable to any great scientist of this planet. And with such high brain power, even Brahmājī has described in his great saṁhitā (Brahma-saṁhitā 5.1) as follows:
īśvaraḥ paramaḥ kṛṣṇaḥ
sac-cid-ānanda-vigrahaḥ
anādir ādir govindaḥ
sarva-kāraṇa-kāraṇam
“There are many personalities possessing the qualities of Bhagavān, but Kṛṣṇa is the supreme because none can excel Him. He is the Supreme Person, and His body is eternal, full of knowledge and bliss. He is the primeval Lord Govinda and the cause of all causes.”

BRAHMĀJĪ ADMITS LORD KṚṢṆA TO BE THE SUPREME CAUSE OF ALL CAUSES. BUT PERSONS WITH TINY BRAINS WITHIN THIS PETTY PLANET EARTH THINK OF THE LORD AS ONE OF THEM.

Thus when the Lord says in the Bhagavad-gītā that He (Lord Kṛṣṇa) is all in all, the speculative philosophers and the mundane wranglers deride Him, and the Lord regretfully says:

“Fools deride Me when I descend in the human form. They do not know My transcendental nature and My supreme dominion over all that be.” (Bg. 9.11)

PERSONS WITH A POOR FUND OF KNOWLEDGE DO NOT KNOW THIS, AND THEREFORE THEY HAVE THE AUDACITY TO DERIDE HIM BECAUSE HE COMES BEFORE US BY HIS CAUSELESS MERCY OCCASIONALLY AS A HUMAN BEING. 

The Lord is not like a human being. He is sac-cid-ānanda-vigraha or the Absolute Personality of Godhead, and there is no difference between His body and His soul. He is both the power and the powerful.

MAHĀRĀJA PARĪKṢIT DID NOT ASK HIS SPIRITUAL MASTER, ŚUKADEVA GOSVĀMĪ, TO NARRATE LORD KṚṢṆA’S PASTIMES IN VṚNDĀVANA; HE WANTED TO HEAR FIRST ABOUT THE CREATION OF THE LORD. ŚUKADEVA GOSVĀMĪ DID NOT SAY THAT THE KING SHOULD HEAR ABOUT THE DIRECT TRANSCENDENTAL PASTIMES OF THE LORD.

The time was very short, and naturally, Śukadeva Gosvāmī could have gone directly to the Tenth Canto to make a shortcut of the whole thing, as generally done by the professional reciters. But neither the King nor the great speaker of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam jumped up like the organizers of Bhāgavatam; both of them proceeded systematically so that both future readers and hearers might take lessons from the example of the procedure of reciting Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam. Those who are under the control of the external energy of the Lord, or in other words those who are in the material world, must, first of all, know how the external energy of the Lord is working under the direction of the Supreme Personality, and afterward one may try to enter into the activities of His internal energy.

DURGĀ-DEVĪ IS BUT THE SHADOW ENERGY OF THE LORD.
The mundaners are mostly worshipers of Durgā-devī, the external energy of Kṛṣṇa, but they do not know that Durgā-devī is but the shadow energy of the Lord. Behind her astonishing display of material workings is the direction of the Lord, as confirmed in the Bhagavad-gītā (9.10). The Brahma-saṁhitā affirms that Durgā-śakti is working by the direction of Govinda, and without His sanction the powerful Durgā-śakti cannot move even a blade of grass. T

THE NEOPHYTE DEVOTEE, INSTEAD OF JUMPING AT ONCE TO THE PLATFORM OF TRANSCENDENTAL PASTIMES PRESENTED BY THE INTERNAL ENERGY OF THE LORD, MAY KNOW HOW GREAT THE SUPREME LORD IS BY INQUIRING ABOUT THE PROCESS OF HIS CREATIVE ENERGY.
In the Caitanya-caritāmṛta also, descriptions of the creative energy and the Lord’s hand in it are explained, and the author of Caitanya-caritāmṛta has warned the neophyte devotees to be seriously on guard against the pitfall of neglecting knowledge about Kṛṣṇa in regard to how great He is. Only when one knows Lord Kṛṣṇa’s greatness can one firmly put one’s unflinching faith in Him; otherwise, like the common man, even the great leaders of men will mistake Lord Kṛṣṇa for one of the many demigods, or a historical personality, or a myth only. 

The transcendental pastimes of the Lord in Vṛndāvana, or even at Dvārakā, are relishable for persons who have already qualified themselves in advanced spiritual techniques, and the common man may be able to attain to such a plane by the gradual process of service and inquiries, as we shall see in the behavior of Mahārāja Parīkṣit.

This purport and verse are extremely important for us. Because we are trying to follow what it says. We are proceeding in a systematic way. This is the way to recite SB. It goes from beginning to 9 cantos before we hear the 10th canto. It gives us a chance to understand fully up to our limit.
Maharaj Parikshit is an examiner… is always trying to see Krsna. He knew that Krsna is the origin of everything, but not how. He is in front of Sukhdev Goswami spiritual master he wanted to ask and hear… Pariprasnena sevaye… Now we are learning how to become KC. History of SB teaches us who to be KC. It is a slow gradual procedure.. We should not jump to the intimate past times.. We become a joke… The workings of material nature has to be learned first… otherwise, we become victims… the laws of nature cannot be overcome..
Most people believe by scientific development human being becomes immortal
It is impossible to overcome material nature by material means. BG 7.14… Mama Maya duratyaya…

This is why modern education is dangerous, misleading, and is killer of the soul. There is no Krsna Katha in the universities.

There are 3 modes of material nature – goodness, passion, ignorance..
When you make a thread or rope you start with 3 strings… you twine them…you take 3 threads and make a rope… 3, 9, 27… the same way the 3 modes of material nature they get mixed that it is hard to untangle them…

Pa –  Hard labor, struggle…
Pha – Phena  – foam due to hard work
Bha – Bhaya – Fear
Ma – Entanglement that you cannot go


Modes of material nature is called guna… guna means rope… This is entanglement, struggle existence. You get caught up in the horrible way of life.. What happens when you have a human body and you waste human life just in sleeping, eating, mating, and defending…? One has to go through the 8.4 m species of life again…
Bitcoin – biggest fraud. Look at the anxiety people who bet on bitcoins go through…

KC is aPavarga… no hard work, no foaming, no entanglement, and no fear…
If we forget Krsna we are in APAVARGA… It is Durgajis realm… 

(ISO Invocation) IF YOU WASTE YOUR HUMAN LIFE YOU WILL HAVE TO GO THROUGH THE BIRTH AND DEATH IN THE 8.4 M SPECIES AGAIN.
Here is a chance you can become Kṛṣṇa conscious and make your life solve all problems. If not, then again go to the cycle of birth and death again, 8,400,000. It will take many, many millions of years again to come back. Just like the sunshine, you will see after twenty-four…, twelve hours, twenty-four hours, morning. Everything is a process. Process. So if you lose this opportunity of elevating yourself, then again you come to the process. Nature’s law is very strong. Daivī hy eṣā guṇamayī [Bg. 7.14]. The sooner you surrender to Kṛṣṇa, mām eva ye prapadyante māyām etāṁ taranti te. Such a person is able to overcome this process of material nature.

The prayer of an atheist is “my only prayer is there is nothing after death…”
Everything in this nature moves in a cycle – BG 9.10 is very important… They say that there is only one energy – material energy, but it is one of the energies of the lord.

BG 9.10
mayādhyakṣeṇa prakṛtiḥ
sūyate sa-carācaram
hetunānena kaunteya
jagad viparivartate

This material nature, which is one of My energies, is working under My direction, O son of Kuntī, producing all moving and nonmoving beings. Under its rule this manifestation is created and annihilated again and again.

PAGE 1,2,3,4 OF LAWS OF NATURE… TAKEN FROM THE LECTURES OF ISOPANISHAD..

KEY TAKEAWAYS FROM HH HARIVILAS MAHARAJ’S MORNING BHAGAVATAM CLASS ON SB 2.4.5 TODAY (05/31/21):

1. The transcendental topics of the Lord act like injections when received by the sincere devotee from a person who is perfectly uncontaminated by material tinges
2. The action of Devotional hearing is felt by sincere hearer by the experience of the gradual disappearance of ignorance.
3. The crucial test of hearing Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam is that one should get positive enlightenment by such an act.
4. Devotion, direct experience of the Supreme Lord, and detachment from other things — these three occur simultaneously for one who has taken shelter of the Supreme Personality of Godhead, in the same way that pleasure, nourishment and relief from hunger come simultaneously and increasingly, with each bite, for a person engaged in eating.
5. A person who is eating not only becomes uninterested in other activities but increasingly becomes uninterested in the food itself, according to his satisfaction. 
6. On the other hand, according to Śrīla Jīva Gosvāmī, although one who is experiencing the blissful Personality of Godhead, Kṛṣṇa, becomes uninterested in anything other than Kṛṣṇa, his attachment to Kṛṣṇa increases at every moment. 
7. Therefore it is to be understood that the transcendental beauty and qualities of the Supreme Lord are not material, since one never becomes satiated by relishing the bliss of the Supreme Lord.
8. Virakti means “detachment,” whereas tyāga means “renunciation.”
9. According to Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī Ṭhākura, the word renunciation can be used in a situation in which one considers giving up an enjoyable object. But by considering everything to be potential paraphernalia in the service of Lord Kṛṣṇa one need not give thought to renunciation, for one uses everything in the proper way in the service of the Lord. Yukta-vairāgyam ucyate.
10. One should not make an artificial show of renouncing the material world; rather, one should systematically train the mind to see everything as an expansion of the opulence of the Supreme Personality of Godhead. 
11. A hungry man busily consuming a sumptuous plate of food is not interested in anything else happening around him. In fact, he considers any other topic or activity a disturbance to his concentration on the delicious meal. 
12. Similarly, as one advances in Kṛṣṇa consciousness one considers anything unrelated to the devotional service of Kṛṣṇa an obnoxious disturbance. 
13. Such concentrated love of Godhead has been described in the Second Canto of the Bhāgavatam by the words tīvreṇa bhakti-yogena yajeta puruṣaṁ param (Bhāg. 2.3.10).
14. Just as a hungry materialistic man, upon seeing sumptuous food, immediately desires to put it in his mouth, an advanced devotee of Kṛṣṇa, upon seeing a material object, immediately becomes eager to use it for the pleasure of Kṛṣṇa.
15. Without the spontaneous hunger to engage everything in the service of Kṛṣṇa and to dive deeper and deeper into the ocean of love of Kṛṣṇa, so-called realization of God or loose talk about so-called religious life is irrelevant to the actual experience of entering the kingdom of God.
16. the path of bhakti-yoga is so joyful and practical that even in the stage of sādhana-bhakti, in which one follows rules and regulations without an advanced understanding, one can perceive the ultimate result.
17. As soon as one surrenders to the Supreme Lord, Kṛṣṇa (prapadyamānasya), giving up all other activities (viraktir anyatra ca), one is immediately to be considered a liberated soul (jīvan-muktaḥ).
18. The Supreme Lord, Kṛṣṇa, is so merciful that when a living entity understands that the personality Kṛṣṇa is the source of everything and surrenders to the Lord, Kṛṣṇa personally takes charge of him and reveals to him within his heart that he is under the Lord’s full protection.
19. Thus devotion, direct experience of the Personality of Godhead, and detachment from other objects become manifest even in the beginning stage of bhakti-yoga, since bhakti-yoga begins at the point of liberation.
20. If one surrenders to Kṛṣṇa one is immediately liberated and thus begins his career as a transcendental devotee with complete confidence in the Lord’s protection.

SB 2.4.5 TRANSLATION:
Mahārāja Parīkṣit said: O learned brāhmaṇa, you know everything because you are without material contamination. Therefore whatever you have spoken to me appears perfectly right. Your speeches are gradually destroying the darkness of my ignorance, for you are narrating the topics of the Lord.

CLASS NOTES: 

transcendental topics of the Lord act like injections when received by the sincere devotee from a person who is perfectly uncontaminated by material tinges

Devotional Hearing 

In other words, reception of the messages of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam from professional men, heard by a karma-kāṇḍīya audience, never acts miraculously as stated here. Devotional hearing of the messages of the Lord is not like hearing ordinary topics; therefore the action will be felt by the sincere hearer by the experience of the gradual disappearance of ignorance.

yasya deve parā bhaktir
yathā deve tathā gurau
tasyaite kathitā hy arthāḥ
prakāśante mahātmanaḥ
(Śvetāśvatara Upaniṣad 6.23)

When a hungry man is given food to eat, he feels satiation of hunger and the pleasure of dining simultaneously. Thus he does not have to ask whether he has actually been fed or not. The crucial test of hearing Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam is that one should get positive enlightenment by such an act.

It is hard to repeat and present the matter of truth as is. It is easy to speculate and tell what one thinks. Unless one is completely dedicated to their Guru and Krishna one cannot repeat as is. 

BG 4.20
Abandoning all attachment to the results of his activities, ever satisfied and independent, he performs no fruitive action, although engaged in all kinds of undertakings.

This freedom from the bondage of actions is possible only in Kṛṣṇa consciousness, when one is doing everything for Kṛṣṇa. A Kṛṣṇa conscious person acts out of pure love for the Supreme Personality of Godhead, and therefore he has no attraction for the results of the action. He is not even attached to his personal maintenance, for everything is left to Kṛṣṇa. Nor is he anxious to secure things, nor to protect things already in his possession. He does his duty to the best of his ability and leaves everything to Kṛṣṇa. Such an unattached person is always free from the resultant reactions of good and bad; it is as though he were not doing anything. This is the sign of akarma, or actions without fruitive reactions. Any other action, therefore, devoid of Kṛṣṇa consciousness, is binding upon the worker, and that is the real aspect of vikarma, as explained hereinbefore.

BG 4.21
Such a man of understanding acts with mind and intelligence perfectly controlled, gives up all sense of proprietorship over his possessions and acts only for the bare necessities of life. Thus working, he is not affected by sinful reactions.

A Kṛṣṇa conscious person does not expect good or bad results in his activities. His mind and intelligence are fully controlled. He knows that because he is part and parcel of the Supreme, the part played by him, as a part and parcel of the whole, is not his own activity but is only being done through him by the Supreme. When the hand moves, it does not move out of its own accord, but by the endeavor of the whole body. A Kṛṣṇa conscious person is always dovetailed with the supreme desire, for he has no desire for personal sense gratification. He moves exactly like a part of a machine. As a machine part requires oiling and cleaning for maintenance, so a Kṛṣṇa conscious man maintains himself by his work just to remain fit for action in the transcendental loving service of the Lord. He is therefore immune to all the reactions of his endeavors. Like an animal, he has no proprietorship even over his own body. A cruel proprietor of an animal sometimes kills the animal in his possession, yet the animal does not protest. Nor does it have any real independence. A Kṛṣṇa conscious person, fully engaged in self-realization, has very little time to falsely possess any material object. For maintaining body and soul, he does not require unfair means of accumulating money. He does not, therefore, become contaminated by such material sins. He is free from all reactions to his actions.

BG 4.22
He who is satisfied with gain which comes of its own accord, who is free from duality and does not envy, who is steady in both success and failure, is never entangled, although performing actions.

BG 4.23
The work of a man who is unattached to the modes of material nature and who is fully situated in transcendental knowledge merges entirely into transcendence.

Becoming fully Kṛṣṇa conscious, one is freed from all dualities and thus is free from the contaminations of the material modes. He can become liberated because he knows his constitutional position in relationship with Kṛṣṇa, and thus his mind cannot be drawn from Kṛṣṇa consciousness. Consequently, whatever he does, he does for Kṛṣṇa, who is the primeval Viṣṇu. Therefore, all his works are technically sacrifices because sacrifice aims at satisfying the Supreme Person, Viṣṇu, Kṛṣṇa. The resultant reactions to all such work certainly merge into transcendence, and one does not suffer material effects.

One is never satisfied, one is never peaceful, there is never cessation of hunger… we should aim for detachment from entanglement. 

SB 11.2.42

bhaktiḥ pareśānubhavo viraktir
anyatra caiṣa trika eka-kālaḥ
prapadyamānasya yathāśnataḥ syus
tuṣṭiḥ puṣṭiḥ kṣud-apāyo ’nu-ghāsam

Devotion, direct experience of the Supreme Lord, and detachment from other things — these three occur simultaneously for one who has taken shelter of the Supreme Personality of Godhead, in the same way that pleasure, nourishment and relief from hunger come simultaneously and increasingly, with each bite, for a person engaged in eating.

Śrīla Jīva Gosvāmī has explained this analogy as follows: 

1. Bhakti, or devotion, may be compared to tuṣṭi (satisfaction) because they both take the form of pleasure. 
2. Pareśānubhava (experience of the Supreme Lord) and puṣṭi (nourishment) are analogous because both sustain one’s life. 
3. Virakti (detachment) and kṣud-apāya (cessation of hunger) may be compared because both free one from further hankering so that one may experience śānti, or peace.

A person who is eating not only becomes uninterested in other activities but increasingly becomes uninterested in the food itself, according to his satisfaction. On the other hand, according to Śrīla Jīva Gosvāmī, although one who is experiencing the blissful Personality of Godhead, Kṛṣṇa, becomes uninterested in anything other than Kṛṣṇa, his attachment to Kṛṣṇa increases at every moment. Therefore it is to be understood that the transcendental beauty and qualities of the Supreme Lord are not material, since one never becomes satiated by relishing the bliss of the Supreme Lord.

The word viraktiḥ is very significant in this verse. Virakti means “detachment,” whereas tyāga means “renunciation.” According to Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī Ṭhākura, the word renunciation can be used in a situation in which one considers giving up an enjoyable object. But by considering everything to be potential paraphernalia in the service of Lord Kṛṣṇa, as described in the previous verse, one need not give thought to renunciation, for one uses everything in the proper way in the service of the Lord. Yukta-vairāgyam ucyate.

The very pleasant analogy of a good meal is given in this verse. A hungry man busily consuming a sumptuous plate of food is not interested in anything else happening around him. In fact, he considers any other topic or activity a disturbance to his concentration on the delicious meal. Similarly, as one advances in Kṛṣṇa consciousness one considers anything unrelated to the devotional service of Kṛṣṇa an obnoxious disturbance. Such concentrated love of Godhead has been described in the Second Canto of the Bhāgavatam by the words tīvreṇa bhakti-yogena yajeta puruṣaṁ param (Bhāg. 2.3.10).

One should not make an artificial show of renouncing the material world; rather, one should systematically train the mind to see everything as an expansion of the opulence of the Supreme Personality of Godhead. Just as a hungry materialistic man, upon seeing sumptuous food, immediately desires to put it in his mouth, an advanced devotee of Kṛṣṇa, upon seeing a material object, immediately becomes eager to use it for the pleasure of Kṛṣṇa. Without the spontaneous hunger to engage everything in the service of Kṛṣṇa and to dive deeper and deeper into the ocean of love of Kṛṣṇa, so-called realization of God or loose talk about so-called religious life is irrelevant to the actual experience of entering the kingdom of God.

According to Śrīla Viśvanātha Cakravartī Ṭhākura, the path of bhakti-yoga is so joyful and practical that even in the stage of sādhana-bhakti, in which one follows rules and regulations without an advanced understanding, one can perceive the ultimate result. As stated by Śrīla Rūpa Gosvāmī (Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu 1.2.187):

īhā yasya harer dāsye
karmaṇā manasā girā
nikhilāsv apy avasthāsu
jīvan-muktaḥ sa ucyate
As soon as one surrenders to the Supreme Lord, Kṛṣṇa (prapadyamānasya), giving up all other activities (viraktir anyatra ca), one is immediately to be considered a liberated soul (jīvan-muktaḥ). The Supreme Lord, Kṛṣṇa, is so merciful that when a living entity understands that the personality Kṛṣṇa is the source of everything and surrenders to the Lord, Kṛṣṇa personally takes charge of him and reveals to him within his heart that he is under the Lord’s full protection. Thus devotion, direct experience of the Personality of Godhead, and detachment from other objects become manifest even in the beginning stage of bhakti-yoga, since bhakti-yoga begins at the point of liberation. Other processes have as their final goal salvation or liberation, but according to Bhagavad-gītā (18.66):

sarva-dharmān parityajya
mām ekaṁ śaraṇaṁ vraja
ahaṁ tvāṁ sarva-pāpebhyo
mokṣayiṣyāmi mā śucaḥ
If one surrenders to Kṛṣṇa one is immediately liberated and thus begins his career as a transcendental devotee with complete confidence in the Lord’s protection.

KEY TAKEAWAYS FROM HH HARIVILAS MAHARAJ’S MORNING BHAGAVATAM CLASS ON SB 2.4.3-4 TODAY (05/30/21):

1. The three activities of religion, economic development, and sense gratification are generally attractive for conditioned souls struggling for existence in the material world. 
   Such regulated activities prescribed in the Vedas are called the karma-kāṇḍīya conception of life.
2. Householders are generally recommended to follow the rules just to enjoy material prosperity both in this life and in the next.
3. By his slight association with Sukadev Goswami, Maharaj Parikshit renounced all modes of Vedic karma-kāṇḍīya activities and fixed his mind firmly upon Krsna.
4. Mahatmas give up all karma-kāṇḍīya conceptions of life, solely and wholly depending on the Supreme Personality of Godhead Kṛṣṇa. 
5. Śrīla Mādhavendra Purī said – “Now I have decided to free myself from all reactions to sins simply by remembering anywhere and everywhere the great descendant of Yadu and the great enemy of Kaṁsa [Lord Kṛṣṇa]. I think that this is sufficient for me. So what is the use of further endeavors?”
6. Prahlāda Mahārāja said – “Religion, economic development, and sense gratification are celebrated as three means of attaining the path of salvation. Of these, īkṣā trayī especially, i.e., knowledge of the self, knowledge of fruitive acts and logic and also politics and economics, are different means of livelihood. All these are different subjects of Vedic education, and therefore I consider them temporary engagements. On the other hand, surrendering unto the Supreme Lord Viṣṇu is a factual gain in life, and I consider it the ultimate truth.” (Bhāg. 7.6.26)
7. Accepting transcendental loving service to the Lord as the prime duty, free from fruitive reaction is the absolute path to perfection. 
8. The highest perfection of Kṛṣṇa consciousness is renunciation of the material conception of life. This state is automatically achieved by progressive Kṛṣṇa consciousness.
9. A person in Kṛṣṇa consciousness is the rare good soul who knows perfectly that Vāsudeva, or Kṛṣṇa, is the root of all manifested causes. By acting in Kṛṣṇa consciousness one can render the highest service to everyone – namely self, family, society, country, humanity, etc. If Kṛṣṇa is satisfied by one’s actions, then everyone will be satisfied.
10. One who is not firmly fixed in mind is diverted by various types of fruitive acts.
11. To be well versed in Kṛṣṇa consciousness one has to act firmly and obey the representative of Kṛṣṇa, and one should accept the instruction of the bona fide spiritual master as one’s mission in life.
12. SB 9.4.63 – The Supreme Personality of Godhead said to the brāhmaṇa: I am completely under the control of My devotees. Indeed, I am not at all independent. Because My devotees are completely devoid of material desires, I sit only within the cores of their hearts. What to speak of My devotee, even those who are devotees of My devotee are very dear to Me.
13. Without being a devotee of a devotee, one cannot be released from material entanglement.
14. If one very sincerely serves the spiritual master, Kṛṣṇa certainly becomes favorable to such a devotee. Following the instructions of a devotee is more valuable than following the instructions of the Supreme Personality of Godhead directly.
15. The Lord certainly tries to give all protection to His devotees who have given up everything for the sake of serving Him.
16. Attachment to dārāgāra-putrāpta — home, wife, children, friendship, society and love — is not the way to achieve the favor of the Supreme Personality of Godhead. 
17. Sometimes a pure devotee may have a habit or attraction for wife, children and home but at the same time want to serve the Supreme Lord to the best of his ability. For such a devotee, the Lord makes a special arrangement to take away the objects of his false attachment and thus free him from attachment to wife, home, children, friends and so on. This is special mercy bestowed upon the devotee to bring him back home, back to Godhead.
18. SB 9.4.66 – As chaste women bring their gentle husbands under control by service, the pure devotees, who are equal to everyone and completely attached to Me in the core of the heart, bring Me under their full control.

SB 2.4.3-4 TRANSLATION: 
O great sages, the great soul Mahārāja Parīkṣit, constantly rapt in thought of Lord Kṛṣṇa, knowing well of his imminent death, renounced all sorts of fruitive activities, namely acts of religion, economic development and sense gratification, and thus fixed himself firmly in his natural love for Kṛṣṇa and asked all these questions, exactly as you are asking me.

CLASS NOTES: 

KARMA-KĀṆḌĪYA CONCEPTION OF LIFE, 

The three activities of religion, economic development, and sense gratification are generally attractive for conditioned souls struggling for existence in the material world. 

Such regulated activities prescribed in the Vedas are called the karma-kāṇḍīya conception of life, and householders are generally recommended to follow the rules just to enjoy material prosperity both in this life and in the next.

BY HIS SLIGHT ASSOCIATION WITH SUKADEV GOSWAMI, MAHARAJ PARIKSHIT RENOUNCED ALL MODES OF VEDIC KARMA-KĀṆḌĪYA ACTIVITIES AND FIXED HIS MIND FIRMLY UPON KRSNA

As a great emperor of the world, Mahārāja Parīkṣit had to observe such regulations of the Vedic karma-kāṇḍīya section, but by his slight association with Śukadeva Gosvāmī he could perfectly understand that Lord Kṛṣṇa, the Absolute Personality of Godhead (Vāsudeva), for whom he had a natural love since his birth, is everything, and thus he fixed his mind firmly upon Him, renouncing all modes of Vedic karma-kāṇḍīya activities. 

THIS PERFECTIONAL STAGE IS ATTAINED BY A JÑĀNĪ AFTER MANY, MANY BIRTHS. 

The jñānīs, or the empiric philosophers endeavoring for liberation, are thousands of times better than the fruitive workers, and out of hundreds of thousands of such jñānīs one is liberated factually. And out of hundreds of thousands of such liberated persons, even one person is rarely found who can firmly fix his mind unto the lotus feet of Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa, as declared by the Lord Himself in the Bhagavad-gītā (7.19). 

Mahārāja Parīkṣit is specially qualified with the word mahā-manāḥ, which puts him on an equal level with the mahātmās described in the Bhagavad-gītā. In the later age also there have been many mahātmās of this type, and they also gave up all karma-kāṇḍīya conceptions of life, solely and wholly depending on the Supreme Personality of Godhead Kṛṣṇa. 

It is very very very rare for one to become a real Mahatma. Their mind is thoroughly fixed on Krsna 24 hours a day without any deviation.

LORD CAITANYA, WHO IS LORD KṚṢṆA HIMSELF, TAUGHT US IN HIS ŚIKṢĀṢṬAKA (8):

“Lord Kṛṣṇa, who is the lover of many devotees (women), may embrace this fully surrendered maidservant or may trample me with His feet, or He may render me brokenhearted by not being present before me for a long duration of time, but still He is nothing less than the Absolute Lord of my heart.”

ŚRĪLA RŪPA GOSVĀMĪ SPOKE THUS:

“O Lord of the poor, do what you like with me, give me either mercy or punishment, but in this world I have none to look to except Your Lordship. The cātaka bird always prays for the cloud, regardless of whether it showers rains or throws a thunderbolt.”

ŚRĪLA MĀDHAVENDRA PURĪ, THE GRAND-SPIRITUAL MASTER OF LORD CAITANYA, TOOK LEAVE OF ALL KARMA-KĀṆḌĪYA OBLIGATIONS

“O my evening prayer, all good unto you. O my morning bath, I bid you goodbye. O demigods and forefathers, please excuse me. I am unable to perform any more offerings for your pleasure. Now I have decided to free myself from all reactions to sins simply by remembering anywhere and everywhere the great descendant of Yadu and the great enemy of Kaṁsa [Lord Kṛṣṇa]. I think that this is sufficient for me. So what is the use of further endeavors?”

ŚRĪLA MĀDHAVENDRA PURĪ SAID FURTHER:

“Let the sharp moralist accuse me of being illusioned; I do not mind. Experts in Vedic activities may slander me as being misled, friends and relatives may call me frustrated, my brothers may call me a fool, the wealthy mammonites may point me out as mad, and the learned philosophers may assert that I am much too proud; still my mind does not budge an inch from the determination to serve the lotus feet of Govinda, though I be unable to do it.”

AND ALSO PRAHLĀDA MAHĀRĀJA SAID:
“Religion, economic development and sense gratification are celebrated as three means of attaining the path of salvation. Of these, īkṣā trayī especially, i.e., knowledge of the self, knowledge of fruitive acts and logic and also politics and economics, are different means of livelihood. All these are different subjects of Vedic education, and therefore I consider them temporary engagements. On the other hand, surrendering unto the Supreme Lord Viṣṇu is a factual gain in life, and I consider it the ultimate truth.” (Bhāg. 7.6.26)

The whole matter is concluded in the Bhagavad-gītā (2.41) as vyavasāyātmikā buddhiḥ, or the absolute path of perfection. Śrī Baladeva Vidyābhūṣaṇa, a great Vaiṣṇava scholar, defines this as bhagavad-arcanā-rūpaika-niṣkāma-karmabhir viśuddha-cittaḥ — e3

So Mahārāja Parīkṣit was perfectly right when he firmly accepted the lotus feet of Lord Kṛṣṇa, renouncing all karma-kāṇḍīya conceptions of life.

Significant points.
From Yesterday’s verse –

Mahārāja Yudhiṣṭhira and householders like him can turn everything to light by dovetailing so-called material assets in the service of the Lord, but one who is not trained or is unable to turn everything to the service of the Lord (nirbandhaḥ kṛṣṇa-sambandhe) must give up all material connections before he can be fit to hear and chant the glories of the Lord, or in other words, one who has seriously heard Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam for even one day, like Mahārāja Parīkṣit, from a fit personality like Śukadeva Gosvāmī, may be able to lose all affinity for material things.
There is no utility simply in imitating Mahārāja Parīkṣit and hearing Bhāgavatam from professional men, even for seven hundred years. To take Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam as a means of maintaining family expenditure is the grossest type of nāmāparādha offense at the feet of the Lord (sarva-śubha-kriyā-sāmyam api pramādaḥ).
Both the hearer and communicator should be qualified for the real SB to be transferred…
Many think this is the goal of life
Mundane religiosity, economic development & sense gratification

(BG 2.41) BY ACTING IN KṚṢṆA CONSCIOUSNESS ONE CAN RENDER THE HIGHEST SERVICE TO EVERYONE
Those who are on this path are resolute in purpose, and their aim is one. O beloved child of the Kurus, the intelligence of those who are irresolute is many-branched.

A strong faith that by Kṛṣṇa consciousness one will be elevated to the highest perfection of life is called vyavasāyātmikā intelligence. The Caitanya-caritāmṛta (Madhya 22.62) states:

‘śraddhā’-śabde – viśvāsa kahe sudṛḍha niścaya
kṛṣṇe bhakti kaile sarva-karma kṛta haya
Faith means unflinching trust in something sublime. When one is engaged in the duties of Kṛṣṇa consciousness, he need not act in relationship to the material world with obligations to family traditions, humanity or nationality. Fruitive activities are the engagements of one’s reactions from past good or bad deeds. When one is awake in Kṛṣṇa consciousness, he need no longer endeavor for good results in his activities. When one is situated in Kṛṣṇa consciousness, all activities are on the absolute plane, for they are no longer subject to dualities like good and bad. The highest perfection of Kṛṣṇa consciousness is renunciation of the material conception of life. This state is automatically achieved by progressive Kṛṣṇa consciousness.

The resolute purpose of a person in Kṛṣṇa consciousness is based on knowledge. Vāsudevaḥ sarvam iti sa mahātmā su-durlabhaḥ: a person in Kṛṣṇa consciousness is the rare good soul who knows perfectly that Vāsudeva, or Kṛṣṇa, is the root of all manifested causes. As by watering the root of a tree one automatically distributes water to the leaves and branches, so by acting in Kṛṣṇa consciousness one can render the highest service to everyone – namely self, family, society, country, humanity, etc. If Kṛṣṇa is satisfied by one’s actions, then everyone will be satisfied.

BG 2.70
A person who is not disturbed by the incessant flow of desires – that enter like rivers into the ocean, which is ever being filled but is always still – can alone achieve peace, and not the man who strives to satisfy such desires.

To be well versed in Kṛṣṇa consciousness one has to act firmly and obey the representative of Kṛṣṇa, and one should accept the instruction of the bona fide spiritual master as one’s mission in life.

most people including many devotees are simply interested in mundane spiritual life, economic development, sense gratification. Even though they chant and do all things they are not happy and the mind is restless….. they are entangled by the obligations of maintaining, big homes, gadgets, family members… all that is interfered with hearing and chanting. However, if you learn the art of work under the guidance of Siksha and Diksha gurus they know how to come over the slippery slope of these entanglements.. 

The whole process, however, depends on perfect knowledge of the soul beyond the conception of the body – not theoretically but practically, when there is no longer a chance for sense gratification manifested in fruitive activities. One who is not firmly fixed in mind is diverted by various types of fruitive acts.

(SB 9.4.63) THE SUPREME PERSONALITY OF GODHEAD IS FULLY UNDER THE CONTROL OF HIS DEVOTEE WHO IS COMPLETELY DEVOID OF MATERIAL DESIRES AND HAS THE ONLY DESIRE TO SERVE AND PLEASE THE LORD.

The Supreme Personality of Godhead said to the brāhmaṇa: I am completely under the control of My devotees. Indeed, I am not at all independent. Because My devotees are completely devoid of material desires, I sit only within the cores of their hearts. What to speak of My devotee, even those who are devotees of My devotee are very dear to Me.

How many devotees you know who are completely devoid of material desires – Only Srila Prabhupada…

All the great stalwart personalities in the universe, including Lord Brahmā and Lord Śiva, are fully under the control of the Supreme Personality of Godhead, but the Supreme Personality of Godhead is fully under the control of His devotee. Why is this? Because the devotee is anyābhilāṣitā-śūnya; in other words, he has no material desires in his heart. His only desire is to think always of the Supreme Personality of Godhead and how to serve Him best. Because of this transcendental qualification, the Supreme Lord is extremely favorable to the devotees — indeed, not only the devotees, but also the devotees of the devotees. Śrīla Narottama dāsa Ṭhākura says, chāḍiyā vaiṣṇava-sevā nistāra pāyeche kebā: without being a devotee of a devotee, one cannot be released from material entanglement. Therefore Caitanya Mahāprabhu identified Himself as gopī-bhartuḥ pada-kamalayor dāsa-dāsānudāsaḥ. Thus he instructed us to become not directly servants of Kṛṣṇa but servants of the servant of Kṛṣṇa. Devotees like Brahmā, Nārada, Vyāsadeva and Śukadeva Gosvāmī are directly servants of Kṛṣṇa, and one who becomes a servant of Nārada, Vyāsadeva and Śukadeva, like the Six Gosvāmīs, is still more devoted. Śrīla Viśvanātha Cakravartī Ṭhākura therefore says, yasya prasādād bhagavat-prasādaḥ: if one very sincerely serves the spiritual master, Kṛṣṇa certainly becomes favorable to such a devotee. Following the instructions of a devotee is more valuable than following the instructions of the Supreme Personality of Godhead directly.

(SB 9.4.64) THE SUPREME PERSONALITY OF GODHEAD IS SELF-SUFFICIENT, BUT TO ENJOY HIS TRANSCENDENTAL BLISS HE REQUIRES THE COOPERATION OF HIS DEVOTEES

O best of the brāhmaṇas, without saintly persons for whom I am the only destination, I do not desire to enjoy My transcendental bliss and My supreme opulences.

The Supreme Personality of Godhead is self-sufficient, but to enjoy His transcendental bliss He requires the cooperation of His devotees. In Vṛndāvana, for example, although Lord Kṛṣṇa is full in Himself, He wants the cooperation of His devotees like the cowherd boys and the gopīs to increase His transcendental bliss. Such pure devotees, who can increase the pleasure potency of the Supreme Personality of Godhead, are certainly most dear to Him. Not only does the Supreme Personality of Godhead enjoy the company of His devotees, but because He is unlimited He wants to increase His devotees unlimitedly. Thus, He descends to the material world to induce the nondevotees and rebellious living entities to return home, back to Godhead. He requests them to surrender unto Him because, unlimited as He is, He wants to increase His devotees unlimitedly. The Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement is an attempt to increase the number of pure devotees of the Supreme Lord more and more. It is certain that a devotee who helps in this endeavor to satisfy the Supreme Personality of Godhead becomes indirectly a controller of the Supreme Lord. Although the Supreme Lord is full in six opulences, He does not feel transcendental bliss without His devotees. An example that may be cited in this regard is that if a very rich man does not have sons in a family he does not feel happiness. Indeed, sometimes a rich man adopts a son to complete his happiness. The science of transcendental bliss is known to the pure devotee. Therefore the pure devotee is always engaged in increasing the transcendental happiness of the Lord.

(SB 9.4.65) THE ATTACHMENT TO DĀRĀGĀRA-PUTRĀPTA — HOME, WIFE, CHILDREN, FRIENDSHIP, SOCIETY AND LOVE — IS NOT THE WAY TO ACHIEVE THE FAVOR OF THE SUPREME PERSONALITY OF GODHEAD.

Since pure devotees give up their homes, wives, children, relatives, riches and even their lives simply to serve Me, without any desire for material improvement in this life or in the next, how can I give up such devotees at any time?

That is exactly what Srila Prabhupada did. 

The Supreme Personality of Godhead is worshiped by the words brahmaṇya-devāya go-brāhmaṇa-hitāya ca. Thus He is the well-wisher of the brāhmaṇas. Durvāsā Muni was certainly a very great brāhmaṇa, but because he was a non-devotee, he could not sacrifice everything in devotional service. Great mystic yogīs are actually self-interested. The proof is that when Durvāsā Muni created a demon to kill Mahārāja Ambarīṣa, the King stayed fixed in his place, praying to the Supreme Personality of Godhead and depending solely and wholly on Him, whereas when Durvāsā Muni was chased by the Sudarśana cakra by the supreme will of the Lord, he was so perturbed that he fled all over the world and tried to take shelter in every nook and corner of the universe. At last, in fear of his life, he approached Lord Brahmā, Lord Śiva and ultimately the Supreme Personality of Godhead. He was so interested in his own body that he wanted to kill the body of a Vaiṣṇava. Therefore, he did not have very good intelligence, and how can an unintelligent person be delivered by the Supreme Personality of Godhead? The Lord certainly tries to give all protection to His devotees who have given up everything for the sake of serving Him.

Another point in this verse is that attachment to dārāgāra-putrāpta — home, wife, children, friendship, society and love — is not the way to achieve the favor of the Supreme Personality of Godhead. One who is attached to hearth and home for material pleasure cannot become a pure devotee. Sometimes a pure devotee may have a habit or attraction for wife, children and home but at the same time want to serve the Supreme Lord to the best of his ability. For such a devotee, the Lord makes a special arrangement to take away the objects of his false attachment and thus free him from attachment to wife, home, children, friends and so on. This is special mercy bestowed upon the devotee to bring him back home, back to Godhead.

(SB 9.4.66) PEOPLE SUFFER FROM MATERIAL DISTRESS BECAUSE THEY ARE NOT ATTACHED TO THE SUPREME PERSONALITY OF GODHEAD.

As chaste women bring their gentle husbands under control by service, the pure devotees, who are equal to everyone and completely attached to Me in the core of the heart, bring Me under their full control.

In this verse, the word sama-darśanāḥ is significant. The pure devotee is actually equal toward everyone, as confirmed in Bhagavad-gītā (18.54): brahma-bhūtaḥ prasannātmā na śocati na kāṅkṣati/ samaḥ sarveṣu bhūteṣu. Universal brotherhood is possible when one is a pure devotee (paṇḍitāḥ sama-darśinaḥ). A pure devotee is actually learned because he knows his constitutional position, he knows the position of the Supreme Personality of Godhead, and he knows the relationship between the living entity and the Supreme Lord. Thus he has full spiritual knowledge and is automatically liberated (brahma-bhūtaḥ). He can therefore see everyone on the spiritual platform. He can comprehend the happiness and distress of all living entities. He understands that what is happiness to him is also happiness to others and that what is distress to him is distressing for others. Therefore he is sympathetic to everyone. As Prahlāda Mahārāja said:

śoce tato vimukha-cetasa indriyārtha-
māyā-sukhāya bharam udvahato vimūḍhān
(Bhāg. 7.9.43)

People suffer from material distress because they are not attached to the Supreme Personality of Godhead. A pure devotee’s chief concern, therefore, is to raise the ignorant mass of people to the sense of Kṛṣṇa consciousness.

KEY TAKEAWAYS FROM HH HARIVILAS MAHARAJ’S MORNING BHAGAVATAM CLASS ON SB 2.4.2 TODAY (05/29/21):

1. To become liberated means to become free from dehātma-buddhi, the illusory attachment for personal bodily coverings and everything connected with the body, namely wife, children and all other entanglements.
2. Devotion for Lord Kṛṣṇa means negation of all material attachments
3. A pure devotee is able to give up all connections with bestowed material attachments by the grace of the lord. Example – Parikshit Maharaj. 
4. A devotee always executes his duties on behalf of the Lord.
5. A devotee of the Lord never thinks of his household paraphernalia as his own, but surrenders everything for the service of the Lord. 
6. Thereby living entities under a devotee’s care get the opportunity for God-realization by the management of a devotee-master.
7. Attachment for household paraphernalia and for Lord Kṛṣṇa go poorly together. One attachment is the path of darkness, and the other attachment is the path of light. 
8. An expert devotee can turn everything to the path of light by an attitude of service to the Lord, and the best example here is the Pāṇḍavas.
9. Mahārāja Yudhiṣṭhira and householders like him can turn everything to light by dovetailing so-called material assets in the service of the Lord. 
10. But one who is not trained or is unable to turn everything to the service of the Lord (nirbandhaḥ kṛṣṇa-sambandhe) must give up all material connections before he can be fit to hear and chant the glories of the Lord. 
11. One who has seriously heard Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam for even one day, like Mahārāja Parīkṣit, from a fit personality like Śukadeva Gosvāmī, may be able to lose all affinity for material things.
12.  Dormant devotional service to Kṛṣṇa is within everyone. Simply by associating with devotees, hearing their good instructions and chanting the Hare Kṛṣṇa mantra, dormant love for Kṛṣṇa is awakened. In this way one acquires the seed of devotional service. Guru-kṛṣṇa-prasāde pāya bhakti-latā-bīja.
13. devotional service cannot be utilized for any material purpose. Devotional service is meant only for the Supreme Personality of Godhead and is it is beyond this material range.
14. The bhakti-latā has no shelter in the material world, nor has it shelter in Brahma-loka, although Brahma-loka is beyond the material world. The bhakti-latā grows until it reaches the spiritual sky, where Goloka Vṛndāvana is situated.
15. Goloka Vṛndāvana is the highest planet in the spiritual world. In order to go to the spiritual world after penetrating the covering of the material universe, one must penetrate Brahma-loka, the spiritual effulgence. Then one can come to the Goloka Vṛndāvana planet.
16. The five rasas are fully exhibited in the spiritual world in one’s relationship with the Lord. Therefore in the spiritual world the bhakti creeper finds its resting place at the lotus feet of Kṛṣṇa.

SB 2.4.2 TRANSLATION

Mahārāja Parīkṣit, as a result of his wholehearted attraction for Lord Kṛṣṇa, was able to give up all deep-rooted affection for his personal body, his wife, his children, his palace, his animals like horses and elephants, his treasury house, his friends and relatives, and his undisputed kingdom.

CLASS NOTES:

LIBERATION:

To become liberated means to become free from dehātma-buddhi, the illusory attachment for personal bodily coverings and everything connected with the body, namely wife, children and all other entanglements.

Devotion for Lord Kṛṣṇa means negation of all material attachments

POSITION OF A PURE DEVOTEE.

By the grace of Lord Kṛṣṇa, Mahārāja Parīkṣit was awarded all material amenities and an undisputed kingdom in which to enjoy the undisturbed position of king, but by the grace of the Lord he was able to give up all connections with material attachment. That is the position of a pure devotee

Mahārāja Parīkṣit, due to his natural affection for Lord Kṛṣṇa as a devotee of the Lord, was always executing his royal duties on behalf of the Lord, and as a responsible king of the world he was always careful to see that the influence of Kali would not enter his kingdom. A devotee of the Lord never thinks of his household paraphernalia as his own, but surrenders everything for the service of the Lord. Thereby living entities under a devotee’s care get the opportunity for God-realization by the management of a devotee-master.

Expert devotee can turn everything to the path of light by an attitude of service to the Lord, and the best example here is the Pāṇḍavas.

There are 2 points here that should be understood. –

Everything belongs to Krsna, a Devotee dovetails everything, job, wife, children, house, car in the service of Krsna. 24/7 engaged in Krsna’s service, act for Krsna. They are already renounced in positive way.
One who does not know the art of dovetailing and one who is attached to body and bodily relations, should leave everything and become detached. It is very hard for them to renounce.
We need the help of bonafide guru, hearing,
Change of heart  – whatever is the dear most we hold in the heart like fame and name we need to remove it,… Natural way is always staying in contact with bonafide pure devotees… daily process, we have to hear BG and SB on a daily basis…
Consciousness of the person from whom you are hearing is important. ..

CC M 19.151
brahmāṇḍa bhramite kona bhāgyavān jīva
guru-kṛṣṇa-prasāde pāya bhakti-latā-bīja

nitya-siddha-kṛṣṇa-prema ‘sādhya’ kabhu naya
śravaṇādi-śuddha-citte karaye udaya
Dormant devotional service to Kṛṣṇa is within everyone. Simply by associating with devotees, hearing their good instructions and chanting the Hare Kṛṣṇa mantra, dormant love for Kṛṣṇa is awakened. In this way one acquires the seed of devotional service. Guru-kṛṣṇa-prasāde pāya bhakti-latā-bīja.

CC M 19.153
“As one waters the bhakti-latā-bīja, the seed sprouts, and the creeper gradually grows to the point where it penetrates the walls of this universe and goes beyond the Virajā River, lying between the spiritual world and the material world. It attains brahma-loka, the Brahman effulgence, and penetrating through that stratum, it reaches the spiritual sky and the spiritual planet Goloka Vṛndāvana.

A creeper generally takes shelter of a big tree, but the bhakti-latā, being the creeper of spiritual energy, cannot take shelter of any material planet, for there is no tree on any material planet that the bhakti creeper can utilize for shelter. In other words, devotional service cannot be utilized for any material purpose. Devotional service is meant only for the Supreme Personality of Godhead. Sometimes men with a poor fund of knowledge maintain that bhakti can be applied to material things also. In other words, they say that devotional service can be rendered to one’s country or to the demigods, but this is not a fact. Devotional service is especially meant for the Supreme Personality of Godhead, and it is beyond this material range. There is a river, or causal ocean, between the spiritual and material natures, and this river is free from the influence of the three modes of material nature; therefore it is called Virajā. The prefix vi means vigata (“completely eradicated”), and rajas means “the influence of the material world.” On this platform, a living entity is completely free from material entanglement. For the jñānīs who want to merge into the Brahman effulgence, there is Brahma-loka. The bhakti-latā, however, has no shelter in the material world, nor has it shelter in Brahma-loka, although Brahma-loka is beyond the material world. The bhakti-latā grows until it reaches the spiritual sky, where Goloka Vṛndāvana is situated.

CC M 19.154
“Being situated in one’s heart and being watered by śravaṇa-kīrtana, the bhakti creeper grows more and more. In this way it attains the shelter of the desire tree of the lotus feet of Kṛṣṇa, who is eternally situated in the planet known as Goloka Vṛndāvana, in the topmost region of the spiritual sky.

In the Brahma-saṁhitā (5.37) it is said:

ānanda-cinmaya-rasa-pratibhāvitābhis
 tābhir ya eva nija-rūpatayā kalābhiḥ
goloka eva nivasaty akhilātma-bhūto
 govindam ādi-puruṣaṁ tam ahaṁ bhajāmi

“I worship Govinda, the primeval Lord. He resides in His own realm, Goloka, with Rādhā, who resembles His own spiritual figure and who embodies the ecstatic potency [hlādinī]. Their companions are Her confidantes, who embody extensions of Her bodily form and who are imbued and permeated with ever-blissful spiritual rasa.” In the spiritual world, the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Kṛṣṇa, has expanded Himself by His spiritual potency. He has His eternal form of bliss and knowledge (sac-cid-ānanda-vigraha). Everything in the Goloka Vṛndāvana planet is a spiritual expansion of sac-cid-ānanda. Everyone there is of the same potency — ānanda-cinmaya-rasa. The relationship between the Supreme Personality of Godhead and His servitor is cinmaya-rasa. Kṛṣṇa and His entourage and paraphernalia are of the same cinmaya potency. In this way the Supreme Personality of Godhead is expanded throughout the spiritual world, and when that cinmaya-rasa potency expands through the material potency, it becomes all-pervading. The idea is that although the Supreme Personality of Godhead exists on His own planet, Goloka Vṛndāvana, He is also present everywhere. Aṇḍāntara-stha-paramāṇu-cayāntara-stham. He is present within all the universes, although they are innumerable, and He is also present within the atom. Īśvaraḥ sarva-bhūtānāṁ hṛd-deśe ’rjuna tiṣṭhati: He is also present within the heart of all living entities. This is His all-pervasive potency.

Goloka Vṛndāvana is the highest planet in the spiritual world. In order to go to the spiritual world after penetrating the covering of the material universe, one must penetrate Brahma-loka, the spiritual effulgence. Then one can come to the Goloka Vṛndāvana planet. There are also other planets in the spiritual world, called Vaikuṇṭha planets, and on these planets, Lord Nārāyaṇa is worshiped with awe and veneration. On these planets śānta-rasa is prevalent, and some of the devotees are also connected with the Supreme Personality of Godhead in dāsya-rasa, the mellow of servitorship. As far as the mellow of fraternity is concerned, in Vaikuṇṭha this rasa is represented by gaurava-sakhya, friendship in awe and veneration. The other fraternity rasa, exhibited as viśrambha (friendship in equality), is found in the Goloka Vṛndāvana planet. Above that is service to the Lord in vātsalya-rasa (parental love), and above all is the relationship with the Lord in the mādhurya-rasa (conjugal love). These five rasas are fully exhibited in the spiritual world in one’s relationship with the Lord. Therefore in the spiritual world the bhakti creeper finds its resting place at the lotus feet of Kṛṣṇa.

KEY TAKEAWAYS FROM HH HARIVILAS MAHARAJ’S MORNING BHAGAVATAM CLASS ON SB 2.4.1 TODAY (05/28/21): ()

1. Maharaj Parikshit continuously concentrated his mind upon Lord Kṛṣṇa, which made him perfectly chaste in devotional service.
2. He was a chaste devotee of the Lord, and when he further heard from Śrīla Śukadeva Gosvāmī that one should worship the Lord only and no one else, even though full of all desires or desireless, his natural affection for Kṛṣṇa was strengthened. 
3. To become a pure devotee of Lord Kṛṣṇa, two things are very much essential, namely
   having a chance to be born in the family of a devotee and having the blessings of a bona fide spiritual master. 
4. By the grace of Lord Kṛṣṇa, Parīkṣit Mahārāja had both opportunities.
5. In the Caitanya-caritāmṛta (CC 19.151) it is said that a fortunate person, by the mercy of the spiritual master and Lord Kṛṣṇa, achieves the path of devotional service. 
6. (CC M 19.151)Out of many millions of wandering living entities, one who is very fortunate gets an opportunity to associate with a bona fide spiritual master by the grace of Kṛṣṇa. By the mercy of both Kṛṣṇa and the spiritual master, such a person receives the seed of the creeper of devotional service. 
7. Kṛṣṇa is prepared to bestow His mercy upon all living entities, and as soon as a living entity desires the Lord’s mercy, the Lord immediately gives him an opportunity to meet a bona fide spiritual master. Such a fortunate person is fortified by both Kṛṣṇa and the spiritual master. He is helped from within by Kṛṣṇa and from without by the spiritual master. Both are prepared to help the sincere living being become free from material bondage.
8. One such example is Narada muni. By serving the Vaiṣṇavas and obeying their orders, the boy became the object of their sympathy, and by the Vaiṣṇavas’ unknown mercy, he gradually became a pure devotee. In the next life he was Nārada Muni, the most exalted of Vaiṣṇavas and the most important guru and ācārya of Vaiṣṇavas.
9. Following in the footsteps of Nārada Muni, this Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement is rendering service to humanity by giving everyone a chance to come in contact with Kṛṣṇa. If one is fortunate, he becomes intimately related with this movement. Then, by the grace of Kṛṣṇa, one’s life becomes successful. 
10. Dormant devotional service to Kṛṣṇa is within everyone. Simply by associating with devotees, hearing their good instructions and chanting the Hare Kṛṣṇa mantra, dormant love for Kṛṣṇa is awakened. In this way one acquires the seed of devotional service. Guru-kṛṣṇa-prasāde pāya bhakti-latā-bīja.
11. (CC M 19.152)“When a person receives the seed of devotional service, he should take care of it by becoming a gardener and sowing the seed in his heart. If he waters the seed gradually by the process of śravaṇa and kīrtana [hearing and chanting], the seed will begin to sprout.
12. To live with devotees or to live in a temple means to associate with the śravaṇa-kīrtana process. Neophyte devotees cannot continue the śravaṇa-kīrtana process without worshiping the Deity.
13. The methods, rules and regulations by which one is perfectly trained in devotional service constitute the bhakti-latā-bīja, or seed of devotional service. This bhakti-latā-bīja is received from the spiritual master by the grace of Kṛṣṇa.
14. The bhakti-latā-bīja can be received ONLY through the mercy of the spiritual master. Therefore one has to satisfy the spiritual master to get the bhakti-latā-bīja (yasya prasādād bhagavat-prasādaḥ). 
15. The bhakti-latā-bīja is the origin of devotional service. This bhakti-latā-bīja is received when one is initiated by the bona fide spiritual master
16.  After receiving the spiritual master’s mercy, one must repeat his instructions, and this is called śravaṇa-kīrtana — hearing and chanting. 
17. One who has not properly heard from the spiritual master or who does not follow the regulative principles is not fit for chanting (kīrtana)  or for preaching the cult of devotional service. 
18. One has to water the bhakti-latā-bīja by receiving instructions from the spiritual master

SB 2.4.1 TRANSLATION
Sūta Gosvāmī said: Mahārāja Parīkṣit, the son of Uttarā, after hearing the speeches of Śukadeva Gosvāmī, which were all about the truth of the self, applied his concentration faithfully upon Lord Kṛṣṇa.

PURPORT: 

The whole Vedic adventure is to draw one’s attention entirely unto the lotus feet of Lord Kṛṣṇa without any diversion, as instructed in the Bhagavad-gītā (15.15).

CLASS NOTES: 

Fortunately, Mahārāja Parīkṣit had already been attracted to the Lord from the very beginning of his body, in the womb of his mother.

In the womb of his mother he was struck by the brahmāstra atomic bomb released by Aśvatthāmā, but by the grace of the Lord he was saved from being burnt by the fiery weapon, and since then the King continuously concentrated his mind upon Lord Kṛṣṇa, which made him perfectly chaste in devotional service. So by natural sequence he was a chaste devotee of the Lord, and when he further heard from Śrīla Śukadeva Gosvāmī that one should worship the Lord only and no one else, even though full of all desires or desireless, his natural affection for Kṛṣṇa was strengthened. We have already discussed these topics.

To become a pure devotee of Lord Kṛṣṇa, two things are very much essential, namely

1. having a chance to be born in the family of a devotee and
2. having the blessings of a bona fide spiritual master. 

BY THE GRACE OF LORD KṚṢṆA, PARĪKṢIT MAHĀRĀJA HAD BOTH OPPORTUNITIES.

 He was born in a family of such devotees as the Pāṇḍavas, and just to continue the dynasty of the Pāṇḍavas and show them special favor, the Lord specifically saved Mahārāja Parīkṣit, who later on, by the arrangement of the Lord, was cursed by the boy of a brāhmaṇa and was able to get the association of such a spiritual master as Śukadeva Gosvāmī.

 IN THE CAITANYA-CARITĀMṚTA IT IS SAID THAT A FORTUNATE PERSON, BY THE MERCY OF THE SPIRITUAL MASTER AND LORD KṚṢṆA, ACHIEVES THE PATH OF DEVOTIONAL SERVICE. (CC 19.151) 

This was perfectly applicable in the case of Mahārāja Parīkṣit. By way of being born in a family of devotees, he automatically came in touch with Kṛṣṇa, and after being so contacted he constantly remembered Him. Consequently Lord Kṛṣṇa gave the King a further chance for development in devotional service by introducing him to Śukadeva Gosvāmī, a stalwart devotee of the Lord with perfect knowledge in self-realization. And by hearing from a bona fide spiritual master, he was perfectly able to concentrate his chaste mind further upon Lord Kṛṣṇa, as a matter of course.

The verse referred here is

(CC MADHYA 19.151) BY THE MERCY OF BOTH KṚṢṆA AND THE SPIRITUAL MASTER, ONE RECEIVES THE SEED OF THE CREEPER OF DEVOTIONAL SERVICE. 
brahmāṇḍa bhramite kona bhāgyavān jīva
guru-kṛṣṇa-prasāde pāya bhakti-latā-bīja

“According to their karma, all living entities are wandering throughout the entire universe. Some of them are being elevated to the upper planetary systems, and some are going down into the lower planetary systems. Out of many millions of wandering living entities, one who is very fortunate gets an opportunity to associate with a bona fide spiritual master by the grace of Kṛṣṇa. By the mercy of both Kṛṣṇa and the spiritual master, such a person receives the seed of the creeper of devotional service. 

There are millions and trillions of living entities everywhere, and they are engaged by māyā in suffering and enjoying the results of their fruitive activity, life after life. This is the position of the materially conditioned living entities. Out of many of these living entities, one who is actually fortunate (bhāgyavān) comes in contact with a bona fide spiritual master by Kṛṣṇa’s mercy.

GURU-KṚṢṆA-PRASĀDA

Kṛṣṇa is prepared to bestow His mercy upon all living entities, and as soon as a living entity desires the Lord’s mercy, the Lord immediately gives him an opportunity to meet a bona fide spiritual master. Such a fortunate person is fortified by both Kṛṣṇa and the spiritual master. He is helped from within by Kṛṣṇa and from without by the spiritual master. Both are prepared to help the sincere living being become free from material bondage.

 NARADA MUNI IS ONE SUCH FORTUNATE LIVING BEING

How one can become this fortunate can be seen in the life of Śrīla Nārada Muni. In his previous life he was born of a maidservant. Although he was not born into a prestigious position, his mother was fortunately engaged in rendering service to some Vaiṣṇavas. When these Vaiṣṇavas were resting during the Cāturmāsya period, the boy Nārada took the opportunity to engage in their service. Taking compassion upon the boy, the Vaiṣṇavas offered him the remnants of their food. By serving these Vaiṣṇavas and obeying their orders, the boy became the object of their sympathy, and by the Vaiṣṇavas’ unknown mercy, he gradually became a pure devotee. In the next life he was Nārada Muni, the most exalted of Vaiṣṇavas and the most important guru and ācārya of Vaiṣṇavas.

FOLLOWING IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF NĀRADA MUNI, 

this Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement is rendering service to humanity by giving everyone a chance to come in contact with Kṛṣṇa. If one is fortunate, he becomes intimately related with this movement.

 THEN, BY THE GRACE OF KṚṢṆA, ONE’S LIFE BECOMES SUCCESSFUL. 

Everyone has dormant kṛṣṇa-bhakti — love for Kṛṣṇa — and in the association of good devotees, that love is revealed. As stated in the Caitanya-caritāmṛta (Madhya 22.107):

nitya-siddha-kṛṣṇa-prema ‘sādhya’ kabhu naya
śravaṇādi-śuddha-citte karaye udaya

Dormant devotional service to Kṛṣṇa is within everyone. Simply by associating with devotees, hearing their good instructions and chanting the Hare Kṛṣṇa mantra, dormant love for Kṛṣṇa is awakened. In this way one acquires the seed of devotional service. Guru-kṛṣṇa-prasāde pāya bhakti-latā-bīja.

Main points you need to understand –

KC is naturally existing the heart of every living entity
Simply associating with the genuine devotees and hearing the discussions of BG & SB the dormant KC in the heart is awakened.
The seed of Bhakti is planted in the ear. When there is the seed you need to take care of it very carefully. Put the seed in the wet towel and sprout… then leaves, plants, flowers, fruit, whole plants growing. This is the seed of devotional service.  The tree grows beyond the material world and penetrates the spiritual world and flowers and fruits at the lotus feet of Krsna.
How important is hearing and chanting every day…  Morning afternoon and evening
Without Shravan kirtan, deity worship is not complete. Without deity worship, Shravan kirtan is not complete.
The goal is to be KC 24 hrs a day.

(CC Madhya 19.152) SOWING THE SEED OF BHAKTI IN THE HEART AND WATERING IT WITH SHRAVANA & KIRTANA

“When a person receives the seed of devotional service, he should take care of it by becoming a gardener and sowing the seed in his heart. If he waters the seed gradually by the process of śravaṇa and kīrtana [hearing and chanting], the seed will begin to sprout.

SHRAVANAM AND KIRTANAM WITHOUT DEITY WORSHIP IS NOT POSSIBLE FOR NEOPHYTE DEVOTEES

To live with devotees or to live in a temple means to associate with the śravaṇa-kīrtana process. Sometimes neophyte devotees think that they can continue the śravaṇa-kīrtana process without worshiping the Deity, but the execution of such śravaṇa-kīrtana is meant for highly developed devotees like Haridāsa Ṭhākura. This is not possible for neophyte devotees.

GURU PRASADA 

The word guru-prasāda indicates that the spiritual master is very merciful in bestowing the boon of devotional service upon the disciple. That is the best possible gift the spiritual master has to offer. The spiritual master trains his disciples to render devotional service unto the Supreme Personality of Godhead. This is called guru-kṛpā. It is kṛṣṇa-prasāda, Kṛṣṇa’s mercy, that He sends a bona fide spiritual master to the deserving disciple. By the mercy of Kṛṣṇa, one meets the bona fide spiritual master, and by the mercy of the spiritual master, the disciple is fully trained in the devotional service of the Lord.

BHAKTI-LATĀ-BĪJA MEANS “THE SEED OF DEVOTIONAL SERVICE.”

Everything has an original cause, or seed. For any idea, program, plan or device, there is first of all the contemplation of the plan, and that is called the bīja, or seed.

Spring is a program with billions of functions working perfectly

The methods, rules and regulations by which one is perfectly trained in devotional service constitute the bhakti-latā-bīja, or seed of devotional service. This bhakti-latā-bīja is received from the spiritual master by the grace of Kṛṣṇa. Other seeds, called anyābhilāṣa-bīja, include karma-bīja and jñāna-bīja.

 If one is not fortunate enough to receive the bhakti-latā-bīja from the spiritual master, he instead cultivates such seeds as karma-bīja, jñāna-bīja, or political, social or philanthropic bījas. ….

Bill Gates – has software bija, social welfare bija, ……he does not have bhakti lata bija therefore he cannot control himself.. He will not listen to a bonafide spiritual master. He will go to scientists and others to get more bijas..

However, the bhakti-latā-bīja is different from these other bījas. 

THE BHAKTI-LATĀ-BĪJA CAN BE RECEIVED ONLY THROUGH THE MERCY OF THE SPIRITUAL MASTER.

Therefore one has to satisfy the spiritual master to get the bhakti-latā-bīja (yasya prasādād bhagavat-prasādaḥ). The bhakti-latā-bīja is the origin of devotional service. Unless one satisfies the spiritual master, he gets the bīja, or root cause, of karma, jñāna and yoga without the benefit of devotional service. But one who is faithful to his spiritual master gets the bhakti-latā-bīja. 

ONE HAS TO WATER THE BHAKTI-LATĀ-BĪJA BY RECEIVING INSTRUCTIONS FROM THE SPIRITUAL MASTER.

This bhakti-latā-bīja is received when one is initiated by the bona fide spiritual master. After receiving the spiritual master’s mercy, one must repeat his instructions, and this is called śravaṇa-kīrtana — hearing and chanting. One who has not properly heard from the spiritual master or who does not follow the regulative principles is not fit for chanting (kīrtana). This is explained in the Bhagavad-gītā (2.41): vyavasāyātmikā buddhir ekeha kuru-nandana. One who has not listened carefully to the instructions of the spiritual master is unfit for chanting or for preaching the cult of devotional service. One has to water the bhakti-latā-bīja by receiving instructions from the spiritual master.