Tag: Srimad Bhagavatham Canto 2

KEY TAKEAWAYS FROM HH HARIVILAS MAHARAJ’S MORNING BHAGAVATAM CLASS ON SB 2.2.28 TODAY (04/25/21):

1. One who attains Brahmaloka or Satyaloka by dint of devotional service is specifically mentioned here, in relation to how he can penetrate into the different coverings of the universe and thus ultimately disclose his spiritual identity in the absolute atmosphere of supreme existence.
2. Śrīla Śrīdhara Svāmī confirms that a part of the material nature, after being initiated by the Lord, is known as the mahat-tattva. A fractional portion of the mahat-tattva is called the false ego.
3. A portion of the ego is the vibration of sound, and a portion of the sound is atmospheric air. A portion of the airy atmosphere is turned into forms, and the forms constitute the power of electricity or heat. 
4. Heat produces the smell of the aroma of the earth, and the gross earth is produced by such aroma. And all these combined together constitute the cosmic phenomenon. 
5. The extent of the cosmic phenomenon is calculated to be diametrically (both ways) four billion miles. 
6. Then the coverings of the universe begin. The first stratum of the covering is calculated to extend eighty million miles, and the subsequent coverings of the universe are respectively of fire, effulgence, air and ether, one after another, each extending ten times further than the previous.
7. The fearless devotee of the Lord penetrates each of the covering of the universe and ultimately reaches the absolute atmosphere where everything is of one and the same spiritual identity. 
8. Then the devotee enters one of the Vaikuṇṭha planets, where he assumes exactly the same form as the Lord and engages in the loving transcendental service of the Lord. That is the highest perfection of devotional life. Beyond this there is nothing to be desired or achieved by the perfect yogī.
9. It is very hard to comprehend what we just read and is seems very impossible for us to get liberated from the material world and attain Goloka. Only a pure devotee can understand it and be able to write it. 
10. By the mercy of Chaitanya, the very complicated process of getting liberated from the material world is simplified. Hare Krishna maha-mantra was brought down from Goloka by lord Caitanya & Nityananda for the salvation of living beings.
11. If we chant the mantra very sincerely, we can mitigate the extremely difficult process to get out of the material creation.
12. Both the living entities and material nature existed before this cosmos was manifested. Material nature was absorbed in the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Mahā-viṣṇu, and when it was required, it was manifested by the agency of the mahat-tattva. 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. 
13. 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. 
14. Forgetting Kṛṣṇa, the living entity has been attracted by the external feature from time immemorial. Therefore the illusory energy [māyā] gives him all kinds of misery in his material existence.
15. The living entity’s forgetfulness is described as anādi, which indicates that it has existed since time immemorial. One should understand that due to his desire to enjoy himself in competition with Kṛṣṇa, the living entity comes into material existence. 
16. 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.
17. Nature is said to be the cause of all material causes and effects, whereas the living entity is the cause of the various sufferings and enjoyments in this world.
18. His material happiness and distress are due to his body, and not to himself as he is. In his original state, there is no doubt of enjoyment; therefore that is his real state.

SB 2.2.28 TRANSLATION
After reaching Satyaloka, the devotee is specifically able to be incorporated fearlessly by the subtle body in an identity similar to that of the gross body, and one after another he gradually attains stages of existence from earthly to watery, fiery, glowing, and airy, until he reaches the ethereal stage.

CLASS NOTES: 

One who attains Brahmaloka or Satyaloka by dint of devotional service is specifically mentioned here, in relation to how he can penetrate into the different coverings of the universe and thus ultimately disclose his spiritual identity in the absolute atmosphere of supreme existence.

COSMIC PHENOMENON

Śrīla Śrīdhara Svāmī confirms that a part of the material nature, after being initiated by the Lord, is known as the mahat-tattva. A fractional portion of the mahat-tattva is called the false ego. A portion of the ego is the vibration of sound, and a portion of sound is atmospheric air. A portion of the airy atmosphere is turned into forms, and the forms constitute the power of electricity or heat. Heat produces the smell of the aroma of the earth, and the gross earth is produced by such aroma. And all these combined together constitute the cosmic phenomenon. The extent of the cosmic phenomenon is calculated to be diametrically (both ways) four billion miles. Then the coverings of the universe begin. The first stratum of the covering is calculated to extend eighty million miles, and the subsequent coverings of the universe are respectively of fire, effulgence, air and ether, one after another, each extending ten times further than the previous.

The fearless devotee of the Lord penetrates each one of them and ultimately reaches the absolute atmosphere where everything is of one and the same spiritual identity. Then the devotee enters one of the Vaikuṇṭha planets, where he assumes exactly the same form as the Lord and engages in the loving transcendental service of the Lord. That is the highest perfection of devotional life. Beyond this there is nothing to be desired or achieved by the perfect yogī.

This is an extremely profound purport, Prabhupada is explaining the cosmology of the universe. The devotee purifies himself from gross to subtle. Very detailed information. Only a pure devotee can write this. We can only understand a little bit of it. By the mercy of Chaitanya, the very complicated process of getting liberated from the material world is simplified.

Mahatattva – Total material energy.
Cosmic phenomenon  ——Mahatattava ->false ego -> vibration of sound -> atmospheric air ->forms ->heat ->smell of the aroma of the earth ->gross earth.
Mahatattava – false ego +vibration of sound
Hare Krishna maha-mantra was brought down from Goloka by lord Caitanya & Nityananda for the salvation of living beings.
If we chant the mantra very sincerely, we can mitigate the extremely difficult process to get out of the material creation.
We need to understand the diff bet material sound and spiritual sound.
The cosmic phenomenon is illusory because it is temporary. Is hearing the news gives us transcendental knowledge? No, it is entangling.
BG & SB – is transcendental knowledge. Going to focus on hearing.
Let’s take a walk of the dense jungle of material creation led by SP and Acharyas in CC.

(CC M 20.117) BY FORGETTING KṚṢṆA, ONE IS ENTRAPPED BY ILLUSORY ENERGY THAT GIVES HIM ALL KINDS OF MISERY
“Forgetting Kṛṣṇa, the living entity has been attracted by the external feature from time immemorial. Therefore the illusory energy [māyā] gives him all kinds of misery in his material existence.

Unless we understand this, we become victims of false airways.
The material explanation of why there is chaos in India – Kumbh Mela, not following social distancing, masks… But there is a deeper real cause.
The real cause is the people are committing so many sins in the land of Dharma. They are acting knowingly. They say they don’t know. Because you purposely avoided it. Every year Janmashtami is celebrated every year. People cant say they don’t know. They don’t want to know. SP, acharyas have been living on this land for thousands and thousands of years. 

When the living entity forgets his constitutional position as an eternal servant of Kṛṣṇa, he is immediately entrapped by the illusory, external energy. The living entity is originally part and parcel of Kṛṣṇa and is, therefore, the superior energy of Kṛṣṇa. He is endowed with inconceivable minute energy that works inconceivably within the body.

Constructing a Boeing airplane is a simple ABC compared to the Human body.  

However, the living entity, forgetting his position, is situated in the material energy.
In order to sin one has to forget Krsna. In the land of dharma, there is so much sin every day.

The living entity is called the marginal energy because by nature he is spiritual but by forgetfulness, he is situated in the material energy. Thus he has the power to live either in the material energy or in the spiritual energy, and for this reason, he is called marginal energy. Being in the marginal position, he is sometimes attracted by the external, illusory energy, and this is the beginning of his material life. 

We are coming to the temple, to remain in spiritual energy. There has to be a breaking point – That is it, I am not going to not longer be in material energy…. The goal of life is explained in BG 13th chapter which describes who we got here, how to get off here.
Before you enter, think about how you get out of here. Think about the exit policy. Looks how complicated it is to get out of this material nature.

(BG 13.20) MYSTERY OF MATERIAL CREATION – WHY LIVING ENTITY COMES INTO THE MATERIAL WORLD

Both material nature and the living entity are eternal. That is to say that they existed before the creation. The material manifestation is from the energy of the Supreme Lord, and so also are the living entities, but the living entities are of the superior energy. Both the living entities and material nature existed before this cosmos was manifested. Material nature was absorbed in the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Mahā-viṣṇu, and when it was required, it was manifested by the agency of the mahat-tattva. 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.

All of us are struggling in this material world. We are all trying to be happy in the place of misery. Everything is going to come to an end in this material world. Am I this body, no, but do you believe you are this body, yes I am made to believe so by modern education. 

(BG 13.21) THE LIVING ENTITY IS THE CAUSE OF THE VARIOUS SUFFERINGS AND ENJOYMENTS IN THIS WORLD.

Nature is said to be the cause of all material causes and effects, whereas the living entity is the cause of the various sufferings and enjoyments in this world.

Why does it say Nature and not say Krsna? Because He is transcendental to the material nature. He is controlling the material nature. But He is not doing anything. It is like Bezos is on vacation the factory workers are working in the Amazon factory. When you go there you hear about him, but you do not see Him. He is playing the flute. He is taking care of cows. He is not dealing with Machines… Even devas are also in anxiety, they are working hard managing this whole universe… They are all going to die. Krsna is not working, He is having fun…

The different manifestations of body and senses among the living entities are due to material nature. There are 8,400,000 different species of life, and these varieties are creations of the material nature. They arise from the different sensual pleasures of the living entity, who thus desires to live in this body or that. When he is put into different bodies, he enjoys different kinds of happiness and distress. His material happiness and distress are due to his body, and not to himself as he is. In his original state, there is no doubt of enjoyment; therefore that is his real state.

When he enters the material energy, he is subjected to the threefold time measurement — past, present, and future. Past, present, and future belong only to the material world; they do not exist in the spiritual world. The living entity is eternal, and he existed before the creation of this material world. Unfortunately, he has forgotten his relationship with Kṛṣṇa. The living entity’s forgetfulness is described herein as anādi, which indicates that it has existed since time immemorial. One should understand that due to his desire to enjoy himself in competition with Kṛṣṇa, the living entity comes into material existence. 

Our disease is forgetfulness. What we heard in the class we forget. We were all originally with Krsna. If you reject that we were not with Krsna then we go off track. 

KEY TAKEAWAYS FROM HH HARIVILAS MAHARAJ’S MORNING BHAGAVATAM CLASS ON SB 2.2.27

1. The Vedic wisdom guides us to understand our relationship with the Supreme Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa and to acting accordingly in order to achieve the desired result of returning home, back to Godhead. But materialistic men do not understand this
2. For false happiness, they try to reach other planets, either by Vedic rituals or by spacecraft, but they should know for certain that any amount of materialistic adjustment for becoming happy in a place which is meant for distress cannot benefit the misguided man because, after all, the whole universe with all its paraphernalia will come to an end after a certain period. Then all plans of materialistic happiness will automatically come to an end.
3. The intelligent person makes a plan to return home, back to Godhead. He surpasses all the pangs of material existence, like birth, death, disease, and old age. He is actually happy because he has no anxieties of material existence, but as a compassionate sympathizer he feels unhappiness for the suffering materialistic men, and thus he occasionally comes before the materialistic men to teach them the necessity of going back to Godhead. 
4. All the bonafide ācāryas preach this truth of returning home, back to Godhead, and warn men not to make a false plan for happiness in a place where happiness is only a myth.
5. Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa puts to the test many of His pure devotees just to magnify the sense of duty. The gopīs were put to such tests as well. Prahlāda Mahārāja also was put to such a test. All pure devotees come out successful in the respective tests by the Lord.
6. We have been discussing about the Sense of Duty
7. Occupational activities are useless if they do not provoke attraction for the message of the Personality of Godhead. 
8. The primary duty of a person is not serving the needs of a body but serving the needs of the soul. 99 percent of the people do not know what is the primary duty of their life and they are merrily wasting their time running after making attempts for better bodily comforts/ sense gratification.
9. One should not engage himself in any sort of occupational service for material gain only.  Nor should material gain be utilized for sense gratification.
10. Human life is meant for inquiry about the Absolute Truth. Nothing else should be the goal of one’s works.
11. In every sphere of life, therefore, the ultimate end must be seeking after the Absolute Truth, and that sort of engagement will make one happy because he will be less engaged in varieties of sense gratification.
12. Our primary duty is to hear about the transcendental activities of the Lord, as they are stated in the Bhagavad-gītā and Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam,
13. The more we hear about the transcendental activities of the Lord, the more we can know about His transcendental nature and thus make definite progress on the path back to Godhead. 
14. Our duty is to act fully under the direction of the Supreme Lord as a servant acts only on the order of the master. Now, one may argue that Arjuna was acting under the personal direction of Kṛṣṇa but when Kṛṣṇa is not present how should one act?
15. If one acts according to the direction of Kṛṣṇa in this book, as well as under the guidance of the representative of Kṛṣṇa, then the result will be the same.
16. One has no goal in life save and except acting in Kṛṣṇa consciousness just to satisfy Kṛṣṇa. And while working in that way, one should think of Kṛṣṇa only: “I have been appointed to discharge this particular duty by Kṛṣṇa.” This is perfect Kṛṣṇa consciousness. 
17. One should, however, note that after doing something whimsically he should not offer the result to the Supreme Lord. That sort of duty is not in the devotional service of Kṛṣṇa consciousness. 
18. One should act according to the order of Kṛṣṇa. That order of Kṛṣṇa comes through disciplic succession from the bonafide spiritual master.
19. Therefore, the spiritual master’s order should be taken as the prime duty of life. If one gets a bona fide spiritual master and acts according to his direction, then one’s perfection of life in Kṛṣṇa consciousness is guaranteed.
20. There is no time limitation for a pure devotee. He is always, twenty-four hours a day, one hundred percent engaged in activities under the direction of the Supreme Lord or the representative of the Lord, the bonafide spiritual master.
21. To a devotee who is thus engaged in Kṛṣṇa consciousness, the Lord is very, very kind. In spite of all difficulties, he is eventually placed in the transcendental abode or Kṛṣṇaloka. He is guaranteed entrance there; there is no doubt about it. In that supreme abode, there is no change; everything is eternal, imperishable, and full of knowledge.

SB 2.2.27 TRANSLATION
In that planet of Satyaloka, there is neither bereavement nor old age nor death. There is no pain of any kind, and therefore there are no anxieties, save that sometimes, due to consciousness, there is a feeling of compassion for those unaware of the process of devotional service, who are subjected to unsurpassable miseries in the material world.

CLASS NOTES: 

Simply by becoming an academic scholar one cannot understand the Vedic statements; one has to approach the real authority who has received the Vedic knowledge by disciplic succession, as clearly explained in the Bhagavad-gītā (4.2). 
A qualified brāhmaṇa, who has undergone strict training under the guidance of a bona fide spiritual master can interpret the Vedic knowledge.The Vedic wisdom guides us to understand our relationship with the Supreme Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa and to acting accordingly in order to achieve the desired result of returning home, back to Godhead. But materialistic men do not understand this. 

MATERIALISTIC MAN’S PLAN

For false happiness, they try to reach other planets, either by Vedic rituals or by spacecraft, but they should know for certain that any amount of materialistic adjustment for becoming happy in a place which is meant for distress cannot benefit the misguided man because, after all, the whole universe with all its paraphernalia will come to an end after a certain period. Then all plans of materialistic happiness will automatically come to an end.

INTELLIGENT MAN’S PLAN

The intelligent person makes a plan to return home, back to Godhead. He surpasses all the pangs of material existence, like birth, death, disease, and old age. He is actually happy because he has no anxieties of material existence, but as a compassionate sympathizer he feels unhappiness for the suffering materialistic men, and thus he occasionally comes before the materialistic men to teach them the necessity of going back to Godhead. All the bonafide ācāryas preach this truth of returning home, back to Godhead, and warn men not to make a false plan for happiness in a place where happiness is only a myth.

(SB 1.19.24) DUTY OF EVERYONE

O trustworthy brāhmaṇas, I now ask you about my immediate duty. Please, after proper deliberation, tell me of the unalloyed duty of everyone in all circumstances, and specifically of those who are just about to die.

(SB 1.7.40) TEST FOR THE SENSE OF DUTY
Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa encouraged Arjuna outwardly just to test Arjuna’s sense of duty. It is not that Arjuna was incomplete in the sense of his duty, nor was Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa unaware of Arjuna’s sense of duty. But Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa puts to the test many of His pure devotees just to magnify the sense of duty. The gopīs were put to such tests as well. Prahlāda Mahārāja also was put to such a test. All pure devotees come out successful in the respective tests by the Lord.

Lord Krishna will test his devotees to see what his sense of duty is.

The purpose is to magnify the sense of duty of the devotees. This is further explained in SB.

(SB 1.2.8) OCCUPATIONAL ACTIVITIES ARE USELESS IF THEY DO NOT PROVOKE ATTRACTION FOR THE MESSAGE OF THE PERSONALITY OF GODHEAD

The occupational activities a man performs according to his own position are only so much useless labor if they do not provoke attraction for the message of the Personality of Godhead.

People who don’t like to hear classes, come to classes, more concerned about maintenance, family duties and all ignore duties of hearing and chanting. They will not know Krsna Consciousness. Quality hearing and chanting is absolutely necessary every day.

Gross materialists – occupational activities are limited to concentrated and extended selfishness.

Mental Speculators – hover aloft in the mental spheres, and their occupational duties involve making poetry and philosophy or propagating some ism with the same aim of selfishness limited to the body and the mind. 

Less intelligent – But above the body and mind is the dormant spirit soul whose absence from the body makes the whole range of bodily and mental selfishness completely null and void. But less intelligent people have no information of the needs of the spirit soul.

The primary duty of a person is not serving the needs of a body but serving the needs of the soul. The soul is the eternal servant of the supreme by constitutional position. 99 percent of the people do not know what is the primary duty of their life. They are wasting their time running after sense gratification, earning money, surrounded with gadgets, instruments meant for sense gratification and … and they never come to the primary duty of life. 

(SB 1.2.9) ONE WHO IS ENGAGED IN THE ULTIMATE OCCUPATIONAL SERVICE SHOULD NEVER USE MATERIAL GAIN TO CULTIVATE SENSE GRATIFICATION

 All occupational engagements are certainly meant for ultimate liberation. They should never be performed for material gain. Furthermore, according to sages, one who is engaged in the ultimate occupational service should never use material gain to cultivate sense gratification.

The cycle of occupational engagements

This cycle includes so-called religiosity followed by material gain and material gain followed by the fulfillment of desires. Sense gratification is the general way for all sorts of fully occupied men. 

One should not engage himself in any sort of occupational service for material gain only. Nor should material gain be utilized for sense gratification. How material gain should be utilized is described as follows.

(SB 1.2.10) Primary duty is to inquiry about absolute truth

Life’s desires should never be directed toward sense gratification. One should desire only a healthy life, or self-preservation since a human being is meant for inquiry about the Absolute Truth. Nothing else should be the goal of one’s works.

Without any anxiety of safety or our protection, we should engage in the service of Krsna. This is our primary duty. An example is –  Presently Covid is killing people at an amazing rate in India. The situation in India is very dire. Why is it more severe in India than in the west? India is the land of Dharma. Rama, Krishna, was there, Vyasadev is there even now writing Vedas for the next age. In such a land of dharma, when people are engaged in horrendous sinful activities, the reaction is much more severe. Do they realize it? They do not see the correlation between meat-eating, intoxication, gambling, illicit activities… and many more crimes.. 

If a sinful activity is performed in Vrindavan the reaction is 1000 times more severe than in other places. India is full of holy places. Vrndavan, Benaras, Mayapur, Srirangam… Because people are committing so many sinful actions, the effect is much more. In India tremendous amount of cow killing, abortion, what can be expected.When things happen, we should ask why this is happening? 

No one is serious about the problems of life. Even those who are on the path of salvation desire to become one with the Absolute Truth and desire to commit spiritual suicide for sense gratification.

Bhāgavatam says that one should not live for sense gratification. One should satisfy the senses only insomuch as required for self-preservation, and not for sense gratification

Seekers of the Absolute Truth are never allured by unnecessary engagements in sense gratification because the serious students seeking the Absolute Truth are always overwhelmed with the work of researching the Truth.

In every sphere of life, therefore, the ultimate end must be seeking after the Absolute Truth, and that sort of engagement will make one happy because he will be less engaged in varieties of sense gratification.

“Overwhelmed with the work of researching the truth” – Therefore you do not want to waste one second of your time focussing on things that are not connected to Krsna. However, you can make everything in your life connected to Krsna, work, spare time.. if you do not know how to do it you can seek the guidance of the siksha and diksha guru. This is called the art of work. 

Sense of duty is further explained in SB 1.18.11.

(SB 1.18.11) Duty is to hear about the transcendental activities of the Lord, as they are stated in the Bhagavad-gītā and Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam,

The good sages said: O grave Sūta Gosvāmī! May you live many years and have eternal fame, for you are speaking very nicely about the activities of Lord Kṛṣṇa, the Personality of Godhead. This is just like nectar for mortal beings like us.

When we hear about the transcendental qualities and activities of the Personality of Godhead, we may always remember what has been spoken by the Lord Himself in the Bhagavad-gītā (4.9).
janma karma ca me divyam
evaṁ yo vetti tattvataḥ
tyaktvā dehaṁ punar janma
naiti mām eti so ’rjuna

One who knows the transcendental nature of My appearance and activities does not, upon leaving the body, take his birth again in this material world, but attains My eternal abode, O Arjuna.

We must give premium to hearing about Krsna. That is the only thing that can save us. 

The more we hear about the transcendental activities of the Lord, as they are stated in the Bhagavad-gītā and Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, the more we can know about His transcendental nature and thus make definite progress on the path back to Godhead.

Hearing and chanting is the primary duty of our life, so we are always thinking of Krsna and putting that into actuality by offering the result of all our activities to Krsna.
The concept of amplifying the sense of duty is clearly understood, when we are put into difficulties. Just like so many people are put into difficulty in India. Everyone is put into difficulty in this material world. It is not a safe haven. Birth, death, the disease is present for everyone.. The time I am … Time is always pressuring us. We are experiencing time – past, present, future and it always puts us in deep anxiety.

1. Force of Time
2. 3 modes of material nature
3. Miseries – adhyatmika, adi bhautika, adi daivika
4. Lust anger greed envy illusion
5. Sleeping eating mating & defending
6. Birth death old age and disease

All these things are limiting us and conditioning us. These are the sources of problems. In all that, there is a test –

(CC Madhya 20.120) 
bhaktiḥ pareśānubhavo viraktir
 anyatra caiṣa trika eka-kālaḥ
(Bhāg. 11.2.42)

This is the test by which one can tell whether he is advancing in devotional service. One must be detached from material enjoyment. Such detachment means that māyā has actually given the conditioned soul liberation from illusory enjoyment. When one is advanced in Kṛṣṇa consciousness, he does not consider himself as good as Kṛṣṇa. Whenever he thinks that he is the enjoyer of material advantages, he is imprisoned in the bodily conception. However, when he is freed from the bodily conception, he can engage in devotional service, which is his actual position of freedom from the clutches of māyā. This is all explained in the following verse from the Bhagavad-gītā (7.14).

Everyone is under the spell of illusory enjoyment. Sense gratification is illusory enjoyment. Law of nature – Sense gratification is followed by suffering. People do not agree, but that is the law of nature, it is the truth. Just like the law of gravity cannot be ignored, this law also cannot be ignored.

(CC Madhya 20.122) Māyā’s business is to keep the conditioned soul forgetful of his real relationship with Kṛṣṇa.

“The conditioned soul cannot revive his Kṛṣṇa consciousness by his own effort. But out of causeless mercy, Lord Kṛṣṇa compiled the Vedic literature and its supplements, the Purāṇas.

A conditioned soul is bewildered by the Lord’s illusory energy (māyā). Māyā’s business is to keep the conditioned soul forgetful of his real relationship with Kṛṣṇa. Thus the living entity forgets his real identity as spirit soul, Brahman, and instead of realizing his factual position thinks himself the product of the material energy. According to Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam (1.7.5):

“Due to this external energy, the living entity, although transcendental to the three modes of material nature, thinks of himself as a material product and thus undergoes the reactions of material miseries.”

This whole thing is unnecessary, but due to bewilderment, we subject ourselves merrily to sense gratification and suffering, more sense gratification and more suffering.. 

You cannot be engaged in Sense gratification in India without being zapped, as India is the land of dharma. 

All these things are explained in Vedic literature which is given by the literary incarnation of the Lord – Vyas Dev. The purpose of vedic literature is to instruct us who is krishna and how to get out of this cycle of suffering and become determined by magnifying our sense of duty. The Sense of duty is explained in last part of BG 18.56

BG 18.56) Ultimate duty is to always act under the direction of the Supreme Lord or His representative, the spiritual master.

Though engaged in all kinds of activities, My pure devotee, under My protection, reaches the eternal and imperishable abode by My grace.

The word mad-vyapāśrayaḥ means under the protection of the Supreme Lord. To be free from material contamination, a pure devotee acts under the direction of the Supreme Lord or His representative, the spiritual master. There is no time limitation for a pure devotee. He is always, twenty-four hours a day, one hundred percent engaged in activities under the direction of the Supreme Lord. To a devotee who is thus engaged in Kṛṣṇa consciousness, the Lord is very, very kind. In spite of all difficulties, he is eventually placed in the transcendental abode, or Kṛṣṇaloka. He is guaranteed entrance there; there is no doubt about it. In that supreme abode, there is no change; everything is eternal, imperishable and full of knowledge.

We should not be afraid of difficulties when we are devotee. It is a test that we must pass. Krishna is testing the sense of duty. By that test, He wants to magnify our sense of duty. If everything is going alright, you slippery slope into the death valley of Sense gratification, your sense of duty is demagnified. When there are trouble devotees naturally become more sincere in their service to Krsna, chanting, attending classes.. They understand cause and effect. They can see the correlation between the reactions of the actions. The reactions will come very quickly for devotees. For others the reactions will come sometimes after lifetimes..The devotees’ sense of duty is magnified if they are willing to be serious in their service… We should never be afraid of difficulties..

(BG 18.57) Our duty is to act fully under the direction of the Supreme Lord as a servant acts only on the order of the master

In all activities just depend upon Me and work always under My protection. In such devotional service, be fully conscious of Me

When one acts in Kṛṣṇa consciousness, he does not act as the master of the world. Just like a servant, one should act fully under the direction of the Supreme Lord. A servant has no individual independence. He acts only on the order of the master. A servant acting on behalf of the supreme master is unaffected by profit and loss. He simply discharges his duty faithfully in terms of the order of the Lord. Now, one may argue that Arjuna was acting under the personal direction of Kṛṣṇa but when Kṛṣṇa is not present how should one act? If one acts according to the direction of Kṛṣṇa in this book, as well as under the guidance of the representative of Kṛṣṇa, then the result will be the same.

Sikha and Diksha Guru –
Prabhupada’s reply to the letter of Jaya Pataka Maharaj 1972 Dec 19th – Is this an inappropriate attachment to my service? SP replies with 14 points for success in Krsna Consciousness.

The Sanskrit word mat-paraḥ is very important in this verse. It indicates that one has no goal in life save and except acting in Kṛṣṇa consciousness just to satisfy Kṛṣṇa. And while working in that way, one should think of Kṛṣṇa only: “I have been appointed to discharge this particular duty by Kṛṣṇa.” While acting in such a way, one naturally has to think of Kṛṣṇa. This is perfect Kṛṣṇa consciousness. 

One should, however, note that after doing something whimsically he should not offer the result to the Supreme Lord. That sort of duty is not in the devotional service of Kṛṣṇa consciousness. 

This is what destroys one’s dev service – acting whimsically. One has to have a very high sense of duty and not act independently. 

One should act according to the order of Kṛṣṇa. This is a very important point. That order of Kṛṣṇa comes through disciplic succession from the bona fide spiritual master. Therefore the spiritual master’s order should be taken as the prime duty of life. If one gets a bona fide spiritual master and acts according to his direction, then one’s perfection of life in Kṛṣṇa consciousness is guaranteed.

KEY TAKEAWAYS FROM HH HARIVILAS MAHARAJ’S MORNING BHAGAVATAM CLASS ON SB 2.2.25 & 26

1. Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam gives us many clues about other planets far, far away from us which modern planes and spacecraft cannot reach, even by imaginary speeds. 
2. Lord Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu specifically accepts Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam as the spotless Vedic authority, and as such no sane man can ignore the statements of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam when it is spoken by the self-realized soul Śrīla Śukadeva Gosvāmī, who follows in the footsteps of his great father, Śrīla Vyāsadeva, the compiler of all Vedic literatures. 
3. We should not depend on the fragmentary authority of materialistic science for knowing things beyond the range of scientific purview. 
4. For a common man, both modern science and Vedic wisdom are simply to be accepted because none of the statements either of modern science or of Vedic literature can be verified by him. 
5. The Vedic way of understanding is more authentic because it has been accepted by the ācāryas, who are not only faithful and learned men but also liberated souls without any of the flaws of conditioned souls. Modern scientists, however, are conditioned souls liable to so many errors and mistakes.
6. Therefore the safe side is to accept the authentic version of Vedic literatures, like Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, which is accepted unanimously by the great ācāryas.
7. The knower of the Absolute Truth is convinced of his awkward position in material association. He knows that he is part and parcel of the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Krsna and that his position should not be in the material creation.
8. He, therefore, engages himself in the activities of Krsna’s consciousness and becomes naturally unattached to the activities of the material senses, which are all circumstantial and temporary.
9. He knows that his material condition of life is under the supreme control of the Lord; consequently, he is not disturbed by all kinds of material reactions, which he considers to be the mercy of the Lord.
10. According to SB, one who knows the Absolute Truth in three different features—namely Brahman, Paramatma, and the Supreme Personality of Godhead—is called tattvavit, for he knows also his own factual position in relationship with the Supreme.
11. Persons who are unknowledgeable falsely identify with gross material consciousness (False ego) and are full of material designations. 
12. Men who are ignorant cannot appreciate activities in Krsna’s consciousness, and therefore Lord Krsna advises us not to disturb them and simply waste valuable time.
13. Those who are, however, enlightened in spiritual life, should not try to agitate such materially engrossed persons. Better to prosecute one’s own spiritual activities silently.
14. But the devotees of the Lord are more kind than the Lord because they understand the purpose of the Lord. Consequently, they undertake all kinds of risks, even to the point of approaching ignorant men to try to engage them in the acts of Krsna consciousness, which are absolutely necessary for the human being.
15. Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa encouraged Arjuna outwardly just to test Arjuna’s sense of duty. 
16. It is not that Arjuna was incomplete in the sense of his duty, nor was Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa unaware of Arjuna’s sense of duty. But Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa puts to the test many of His pure devotees just to magnify the sense of duty. 
17. The gopīs were put to such tests as well. Prahlāda Mahārāja also was put to such a test. All pure devotees come out successful in the respective tests by the Lord.

SB 2.2.25 TRANSLATION

This Śiśumāra is the pivot for the turning of the complete universe, and it is called the navel of Viṣṇu [Garbhodakaśāyī Viṣṇu]. The yogī alone goes beyond this circle of Śiśumāra and attains the planet [Maharloka] where purified saints like Bhṛgu enjoy a duration of life of 4,300,000,000 solar years. This planet is worshipable even for saints who are transcendentally situated.

SB 2.2.26 TRANSLATION
At the time of the final devastation of the complete universe [the end of the duration of Brahmā’s life], a flame of fire emanates from the mouth of Ananta [from the bottom of the universe]. The yogī sees all the planets of the universe burning to ashes, and thus he leaves for Satyaloka by airplanes used by the great purified souls. The duration of life in Satyaloka is calculated to be 15,480,000,000,000 years..

CLASS NOTES: 

ŚRĪMAD-BHĀGAVATAM GIVES US MANY CLUES ABOUT OTHER PLANETS FAR, FAR AWAY FROM US

which modern planes and spacecraft cannot reach, even by imaginary speeds. Lord Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu specifically accepts Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam as the spotless Vedic authority, and as such no sane man can ignore the statements of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam when it is spoken by the self-realized soul Śrīla Śukadeva Gosvāmī, who follows in the footsteps of his great father, Śrīla Vyāsadeva, the compiler of all Vedic literatures.

In the creation of the Lord there are many wonderful things we can see with our own eyes every day and night, but we are unable to reach them equipped by modern materialistic science

We should not, therefore, depend on the fragmentary authority of materialistic science for knowing things beyond the range of scientific purview. For a common man, both modern science and Vedic wisdom are simply to be accepted because none of the statements either of modern science or of Vedic literature can be verified by him. The alternative for a common man is to believe either of them or both of them. The Vedic way of understanding, however, is more authentic because it has been accepted by the ācāryas, who are not only faithful and learned men but also liberated souls without any of the flaws of conditioned souls.

The modern scientists, however, are conditioned souls liable to so many errors and mistakes. Therefore the safe side is to accept the authentic version of Vedic literatures, like Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, which is accepted unanimously by the great ācāryas.

Are you going to believe Sukhdev Goswami, Vyasdev who are liberated souls or modern scientists, who drink has illicit connections etc.,
Our acharyas do not have the same 4 defects as modern scientists.
How do we know Vyasdeva has no defects. He is the incarnation of Lord Krsna. He produced the greatest literature in the entire history. No one can even produce something like that. SB is amala Purana. It is spotless. If you see a mistake or inconsistency in one part of SB, that is due to our defects or misunderstanding. This is not an ordinary book. There are many books, most of them are speculations. These NUNDITS write these books – they become outdated as soon as they are published.  “ We should not, therefore, depend on the fragmentary authority of materialistic science for knowing things beyond the range of scientific purview. For a common man, both modern science and Vedic wisdom are simply to be accepted because none of the statements either of modern science or of Vedic literature can be verified by him. “

Black holes – can they be verified. Can you verify that Sun is 93 million miles away..? Someone told Prabhupada that an element is discovered which exists only 1/30000 of a second. Prabhupada said how do you know it exists. You just need to believe what they say.
Riots, Cancel Culture, White and Black racists, Blacks are also racists within themselves. All Chinese look alike. They don’t look alike and there are many languages within themselves. Big Brushstroke – they are all the same… as long as people are forgetful of Krsna there will be problems, conflict, within the race,  all these problems of life.

As long as there is no war and no common enemy – People fight each other because they are all karmis, they all have material desires, they all want sense gratification, they all are breaking religious principles. What can we do about it. We read yesterday BG 3.27 that a person due to his engaging in senses in sense gratification for a long time, gets covered by false ego and forget Krsna which is the root cause of all issues. If one engages senses in serving Krsna, one revives his relationship with Krsna.

BG 3.27
The bewildered spirit soul, under the influence of the three modes of material nature, thinks himself to be the doer of activities, which are in actuality carried out by nature.

For due to his long misuse of the senses in sense gratification, he is factually bewildered by the false ego, which makes him forget his eternal relationship with Krsna. That is a very important statement

(BG 3.28) DIFFERENCE BETWEEN WORKING FOR SENSE GRATIFICATION AND WORKING FOR KRSNA
One who is in the knowledge of the Absolute Truth, O mighty-armed, does not engage himself in the senses and sense gratification, knowing well the differences between work in devotion and work for fruitive results.

This talks about the difference between sense gratification and working for Krsna. We should teach our children and we ourselves should learn it. 

The knower of the Absolute Truth is convinced of his awkward position in the material association. 

He knows that he is part and parcel of the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Krsna and that his position should not be in the material creation. He knows his real identity as part and parcel of the Supreme, who is eternal bliss and knowledge, and he realizes that somehow or other he is entrapped in the material conception of life. In his pure state of existence, he is meant to dovetail his activities in devotional service to the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Krsna. He, therefore, engages himself in the activities of Krsna’s consciousness and becomes naturally unattached to the activities of the material senses, which are all circumstantial and temporary. He knows that his material condition of life is under the supreme control of the Lord; consequently, he is not disturbed by all kinds of material reactions, which he considers to be the mercy of the Lord. According to Srimad-Bhagavatam, one who knows the Absolute Truth in three different features—namely Brahman, Paramatma, and the Supreme Personality of Godhead—is called tattvavit, for he knows also his own factual position in relationship with the Supreme.

This verse helps us in Realistically assessing our position in this material world in this temporary body that is always changing. 

What is the material conception of life – many years ago I was made president of the temple after 1 month of getting initiated. At one point young kids joined the movement. 14, 15, 16 years old. Jewish girl 16 yrs old which is thin showed up. Her mom came and was ranting, you brainwashed her, and put something in the food. She fell in love with a brahmachari and wanted to get married. The mother came and said my daughter cannot marry him. Your rules are bad. No sex…

Everything is changing in the material world. How can you hold onto something and make it permanent?  all the senses are pushing us for sense gratification.

When your spouse insults you –
Feel angry and feel insulted and take revenge (or)
Every time I am insulted, I will chant more rounds and control my mind.

Seeing everything positive – “He knows that his material condition of life is under the supreme control of the Lord; consequently, he is not disturbed by all kinds of material reactions, which he considers to be the mercy of the Lord.”

What is our position in this material world? is explained in BG 3.29

(BG 3.29) PERSONS WHO ARE UNKNOWLEDGEABLE FALSELY IDENTIFY WITH GROSS MATERIAL CONSCIOUSNESS 

(FALSE EGO) AND ARE FULL OF MATERIAL DESIGNATIONS. 

Bewildered by the modes of material nature, the ignorant fully engage themselves in material activities and become attached. But the wise should not unsettle them, although these duties are inferior due to the performers’ lack of knowledge.

Persons who are unknowledgeable falsely identify with gross material consciousness 

(False ego) and are full of material designations. 

Maintaining things is the hardest part. Our food truck engine went back to godhead.
We are unable to maintain one food truck, imagine how hard it is to maintain millions and millions of universes. You can bend wood without breaking. Loathe…
Our original position is – Love of Krishna it is bent to be lust, you can gradually get back to the original position.

Gross material consciousness is false ego. The sitting places of lust are – mind, intelligence, false ego.. 

This body is a gift of the material nature, and one who is too much attached to the bodily consciousness is called mandan, or a lazy person without an understanding of spirit soul. Ignorant men

1. think of the body as the self; bodily connections with others are accepted as kinsmanship;
2. the land in which the body is obtained is the object of worship, and the formalities of religious rituals are considered ends in themselves.
3. Social work, nationalism, and altruism are some of the activities for such materially designated persons. Under the spell of such designations,
4. they are always busy in the material field;
5. for them spiritual realization is a myth, and so they are not interested.
6. Such bewildered persons may even be engaged in such primary moral principles of life as nonviolence and similar materially benevolent work.
7. Men who are ignorant cannot appreciate activities in Krsna’s consciousness, and therefore Lord Krsna advises us not to disturb them and simply waste valuable time.

Those who are, however, enlightened in spiritual life, should not try to agitate such materially engrossed persons. Better to prosecute one’s own spiritual activities silently.

POSITION OF PREACHER
But the devotees of the Lord are more kind than the Lord because they understand the purpose of the Lord. Consequently, they undertake all kinds of risks, even to the point of approaching ignorant men to try to engage them in the acts of Krsna consciousness, which are absolutely necessary for the human being.

(SB 1.7.40) LORD ŚRĪ KṚṢṆA PUTS TO THE TEST MANY OF HIS PURE DEVOTEES JUST TO MAGNIFY THE SENSE OF DUTY.

Sūta Gosvāmī said: Although Kṛṣṇa, who was examining Arjuna in religion, encouraged Arjuna to kill the son of Droṇācārya, Arjuna, a great soul, did not like the idea of killing him, although Aśvatthāmā was a heinous murderer of Arjuna’s family members.

Arjuna was a great soul undoubtedly, which is proved here also. He is encouraged herein personally by the Lord to kill the son of Droṇa, but Arjuna considers that the son of his great teacher should be spared, for he happens to be the son of Droṇācārya, even though he is an unworthy son, having done all sorts of heinous acts whimsically for no one’s benefit.

Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa encouraged Arjuna outwardly just to test Arjuna’s sense of duty. It is not that Arjuna was incomplete in the sense of his duty, nor was Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa unaware of Arjuna’s sense of duty. But Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa puts to the test many of His pure devotees just to magnify the sense of duty. The gopīs were put to such tests as well. Prahlāda Mahārāja also was put to such a test. All pure devotees come out successful in the respective tests by the Lord.

All of us are beginning to experience this whether we like it or not. Duty is what you have to do whether you like it or not like it. Krishna wants to magnify the sense of duty. It is going to get harder and harder. When the test happens, we should not be devastated. The tests are going to be harder and harder…

How do we know it is a test. You are not going to like it at all. Everything is not going to be rosy…A little bit bothersome, immensely bothersome… you are not going to like it.. Krsna

KEY TAKEAWAYS FROM HH HARIVILAS MAHARAJ’S MORNING BHAGAVATAM CLASS ON SB 2.2.24

1. It is not possible for one to violate the conditions of nature. One is such a fool that one is conditioned in every step, and still thinks that he is free. This is called illusion.
2. Two persons, one in Kṛṣṇa consciousness and the other in material consciousness, working on the same level, may appear to be working on the same platform, but there is a wide gulf of difference in their respective positions. 
3. The person in material consciousness is convinced by the false ego that he is the doer of everything. He does not know that the mechanism of the body is produced by material nature, which works under the supervision of the Supreme Lord.
4. The materialistic person has no knowledge that ultimately he is under the control of Kṛṣṇa. The person in false ego takes all credit for doing everything independently, and that is the symptom of his nescience. 
5. The ignorant man forgets that the Supreme Personality of Godhead is known as Hṛṣīkeśa, or the master of the senses of the material body, for due to his long misuse of the senses in sense gratification, he is factually bewildered by the false ego, which makes him forget his eternal relationship with Kṛṣṇa. (this is the root cause of all issues)
6. The beginning point of spiritual knowledge – By his long use of the senses in serving Krsna, one becomes free of false ego, which makes him remember his eternal relationship with Kṛṣṇa.
7. The body can tolerate any condition, provided you practice it. It is not that, you are under certain condition, and if you are changed, it becomes so intolerable that you cannot live. 
8. For God-realization formerly people used to undergo such severe type of penances, and at the present moment we are so fallen, we cannot tolerate these four principles? Is it very difficult?
9. Tapa means painful condition. The Tapasya in Krsna Consciousness is “Don’t indulge in these things. No illicit sex, no intoxication, no meat-eating, no gambling.” These are the items of Tapasya for advancing in Kṛṣṇa consciousness. But the age is so fallen that even these primary tapasya we cannot execute. 
10. If you want to realize the Supreme, the Absolute, then you must agree to a certain type of Tapasya. Otherwise, it is not possible. 
11. Kṛṣṇa is so kind that He has appeared before us as we can see Him. Because we cannot see more than stone, wood, metal, therefore Kṛṣṇa has appeared as stone statue. But He is not a stone statue. That we have to understand.
12. Without understanding Acintya-bhedābheda tattva, one cannot understand Krsna.
13. Acintya-bhedābheda Tattva – “If the sunshine has entered my room, therefore sun has entered my room.” This is Māyāvādī philosophy. No. By the entrance of sunshine within your room, the sun has entered and has not entered. This is right philosophy. Acintya-bhedābheda. Acintya, simultaneously one and different.
14. Lord Kṛṣṇa is very eager to bestow His mercy upon the conditioned living beings, who are uselessly struggling with the Lord’s illusory energy, Māyā. 
15. The conditioned soul struggles for happiness through sense gratification and for knowledge through mental speculation. Both processes ultimately bring him to a morose and hopeless condition. 
16. If the conditioned soul surrenders to the lotus feet of Lord Kṛṣṇa and thus acquires even a trace of His causeless mercy, the whole situation is changed, and the living entity can begin his real life of bliss and knowledge in Kṛṣṇa consciousness.

SB 2.2.24 TRANSLATION

O King, when such a mystic passes over the Milky Way by the illuminating Suṣumṇā to reach the highest planet, Brahmaloka, he goes first to Vaiśvānara, the planet of the deity of fire, wherein he becomes completely cleansed of all contaminations, and thereafter he still goes higher, to the circle of Śiśumāra, to relate with Lord Hari, the Personality of Godhead.

CLASS NOTES: 

WAY TO BRAHMALOKA

The polar star of the universe and the circle thereof is called the Śiśumāra circle, and therein the local residential planet of the Personality of Godhead (Kṣīrodakaśāyī Viṣṇu) is situated. Before reaching there, the mystic passes over the Milky Way to reach Brahmaloka, and while going there he first reaches Vaiśvānara-loka, where the demigod controls fire. On Vaiśvānara-loka the yogī becomes completely cleansed of all dirty sins acquired while in contact with the material world. The Milky Way in the sky is indicated herein as the way leading to Brahmaloka, the highest planet of the universe.

In the 5th canto of SB lots of details about the cosmology is explained. What is interesting is – what Srila Prabhupada was talking about earlier, to understand these things which are complicated, one has to undergo tapasya. 

Are we prioritizing ourselves to dominate the forces of nature or do we prioritize uncontaminating ourselves? They are trying to violate the laws of God. Even if one does all pious things one is still in this material cycle, it is hard for people to understand this. 

SB 3.12.19 (https://vedabase.io/en/library/transcripts/750303sbdal/)

YOU CANNOT VIOLATE THE CONDITIONS OF NATURE. 

That is not possible. But they are thinking they are free = they can do whatever they like. That is called ignorance, mūḍha, rascal. This rascal civilization do not admit this. They are so fool that they are conditioned in every step, and still they are thinking they are free. This is called illusion.

(BG 3.27) SPIRIT SOUL, BY THE INFLUENCE OF FALSE EGO THINKS HIMSELF THE DOER OF ACTIVITIES
The spirit soul bewildered by the influence of false ego thinks himself the doer of activities that are in actuality carried out by the three modes of material nature.

Two persons, one in Kṛṣṇa consciousness and the other in material consciousness, working on the same level, may appear to be working on the same platform, but there is a wide gulf of difference in their respective positions. The person in material consciousness is convinced by false ego that he is the doer of everything. He does not know that the mechanism of the body is produced by material nature, which works under the supervision of the Supreme Lord. The materialistic person has no knowledge that ultimately he is under the control of Kṛṣṇa. The person in false ego takes all credit for doing everything independently, and that is the symptom of his nescience. He does not know that this gross and subtle body is the creation of material nature, under the order of the Supreme Personality of Godhead, and as such his bodily and mental activities should be engaged in the service of Kṛṣṇa, in Kṛṣṇa consciousness.

The ignorant man forgets that the Supreme Personality of Godhead is known as Hṛṣīkeśa, or the master of the senses of the material body, for due to his long misuse of the senses in sense gratification, he is factually bewildered by the false ego, which makes him forget his eternal relationship with Kṛṣṇa. (root cause of all issues)

We are forced to eat. sleep, to pass stool, to pass urine, to get old, to get sick, to die…. But still, people think they are independent.  We do not know how we are making blood, the heart is beating without breaking down, … the body is forcing us to do things that we may or may not know. Krsna is controlling it all.  

Big achievers, the industrialists think that they achieved everything without Government. The government says they can’t achieve anything without the government providing the infrastructure. Both points of view are right and wrong.  The actual controller, the maintainer is Krishna, the cause of all causes is Krsna. He is the one who is controlling and maintaining everything.
Everything is coming from Krsna they are not simply the fruits of the labor of people.

When we start understanding what we don’t know, then we will become knowledgeable.
It is very good to make a list of things that we don’t know,  probably we will never know.
How the body is produced in the womb
How the body is functioning
How is the universe functioning in an orderly way

Misusing the senses in achieving things that are against the laws is the cause of the forgetfulness of Krsna. 

The beginning point of spiritual knowledge
By his long use of the senses in serving Krsna, he becomes free of false ego, which makes him remember his eternal relationship with Kṛṣṇa.

(SB 3.12.19) WITHOUT TAPASYA ONE CANNOT REALIZE GOD

Therefore, to get that freedom you have to work for it. Freedom does not come so automatically.

Mayavadis say abandon work…

Tapa means painful condition.

But we can be trained up to any kind of conditional life. That capacity we have got.

“This body is,” means, “it can tolerate any condition, provided you practice it.” It is not that, you are under certain condition, and if you are changed, it becomes so intolerable that you cannot live

For God-realization formerly people used to undergo such severe type of penances, and at the present moment we are so fallen, we cannot tolerate these four principles? Is it very difficult? We are imposing some Tapasya, that “Don’t indulge in these things. No illicit sex, no intoxication, no meat-eating, no gambling.” These are the items of Tapasya for advancing in Kṛṣṇa consciousness. But the age is so fallen that even these primary tapasya we cannot execute. That is the difficulty.

Therefore yogis can live in himalayas even in winter.
We don’t realize what our body can do. Without tapasya you cannot achieve anything material or spiritual. Lord Chaitanya, made it easier by asking to follow 4 regs… But that is also hard for people to do it. 

But if you want to realize God, as it is said here, tapasaiva, only by tapasya, only by penance one can realize. Otherwise, it is not possible.  If you want to realize the Supreme, the Absolute, then you must agree to certain type of tapasya. Otherwise it is not possible

SO THE ARCĀ-VIGRAHA IS ALSO KṚṢṆA. 

Therefore, adhokṣajam. Adhokṣajam, adhah-kṛtaṁ, akṣajaṁ jñānam. Our knowledge is what we see. We can see stone. We can see metal. We can see other material elements, wood. So Kṛṣṇa has appeared as we can see Him. Because we cannot see more than stone, wood, metal, therefore Kṛṣṇa has appeared as stone statue. But He is not stone statue. That we have to understand. He is Kṛṣṇa, but He is so kind that He has appeared before us as we can see Him.

 ACINTYA-BHEDĀBHEDA TATTVA

“If the sunshine has entered my room, therefore sun has entered my room.” This is Māyāvādī philosophy. No. By the entrance of sunshine within your room, the sun has entered and has not entered. This is right philosophy. Acintya-bhedābheda. Acintya, simultaneously one and different.

We need to understand “Acinty a beda beda tattva… “ otherwise we cannot understand Krsna..
We should also understand that the deity is nondifferent from Krsna..
There are 64 offenses for the worship of the deity…
We should always see the presence of Him in the deity. Krishna is so kind that he is presenting Himself in the matter so we can see him.

(SB 10.14.29) ONLY ONE WHO IS FAVORED BY EVEN A SLIGHT TRACE OF THE MERCY OF THE LORD, CAN UNDERSTAND THE GREATNESS OF THE LORD
My Lord, if one is favored by even a slight trace of the mercy of Your lotus feet, he can understand the greatness of Your personality. But those who speculate to understand the Supreme Personality of Godhead are unable to know You, even though they continue to study the Vedas for many years.

Lord Kṛṣṇa is very eager to bestow His mercy upon the conditioned living beings, who are uselessly struggling with the Lord’s illusory energy, Māyā. The conditioned soul struggles for happiness through sense gratification and for knowledge through mental speculation. Both processes ultimately bring him to a morose and hopeless condition. If the conditioned soul surrenders to the lotus feet of Lord Kṛṣṇa and thus acquires even a trace of His causeless mercy, the whole situation is changed, and the living entity can begin his real life of bliss and knowledge in Kṛṣṇa consciousness.

The complete opposite is taught in school to always speculate,,,
Many people have written speculative translations of BG, people are misled. Only when SP has written BG ASITIS people started becoming devotees. Simply follow acharyas, SP,
We can understand – what do we understand – Matta parataram BG 7.7
Otherwise through speculation we can go on for millions of years and not understand anything. Gandhi made a statement that I never know that if a person called Krsna existed.  Even a little child can understand that Krsna is Supreme Personality of Godhead.  This is called the following the authority of parampara system..

If we understand Krsna in this lifetime, then that is success. This is what needs to be taught to our children, otherwise they will spend all their lives chasing after the

If we simply follow the process of KC we will achieve the perfection of life.

64 offenses in the process of worshiping the deity..
64 arts that gopis have mastered are all explained in NOD and BS

KEY TAKEAWAYS FROM HH HARIVILAS MAHARAJ’S MORNING BHAGAVATAM CLASS ON SB 2.2.23

1. The materialistic scientist’s endeavor to reach other planets by mechanical vehicles is only a futile attempt. One cannot even go beyond Svarga or Janaloka by virtuous, mechanical, or materialistic activities, either gross or subtle.
2. Whereas the transcendentalists are the unrestricted spacemen. They have nothing to do with the gross material body and can move anywhere within or beyond the material worlds. Nārada Muni is one of the examples of such spacemen, and Durvāsā Muni is one of such mystics.
3. By the strength of devotional service, austerities, mystic powers, and transcendental knowledge, everyone can move like Nārada Muni or Durvāsā Muni. 
4. Durvāsā Muni traveled throughout the entirety of material space and part of spiritual space within one year only. The speed of the transcendentalists can never be attained by the gross or subtle materialists.
5. It is very difficult for a person who is too materially affected to understand the personal nature of the Supreme Absolute Truth.  Such materialists cannot even imagine that there is a transcendental body which is imperishable, full of knowledge and eternally blissful.
6. They are too materially absorbed, the conception of retaining the personality after liberation from matter frightens them. When they are informed that spiritual life is also individual and personal, they become afraid of becoming persons again, and so they naturally prefer a kind of merging into the impersonal void. 
7. This is a kind of fearful stage of life, devoid of perfect knowledge of spiritual existence.
8. There are many persons who cannot understand spiritual existence at all. Being embarrassed by so many theories and by contradictions of various types of philosophical speculation, they become disgusted or angry and foolishly conclude that there is no supreme cause and that everything is ultimately void. 
9. One has to get rid of all three stages of material consciousness: attachment to material life, fear of a spiritual personal identity, and the conception of void that arises from frustration in life. 
10. To get free from these three stages of the material concept of life, one has to take complete shelter of the Lord, guided by the bona fide spiritual master, and follow the disciplines and regulative principles of devotional life. 
11. Simply by giving aural reception to this Vedic literature, the feeling for loving devotional service to Lord Kṛṣṇa, the Supreme Personality of Godhead, sprouts up at once to extinguish the fire of lamentation, illusion and fearfulness.
12. The ultimate result of devotional service is to develop genuine love for the Supreme Personality.
13. Loving devotional service to the Lord begins with hearing about the Lord. There is no difference between the Lord and the subject matter heard about Him. The Lord is absolute, therefore, hearing about Him means immediate contact with Him by the process of vibration of the transcendental sound. 
14. The transcendental sound is so effective that it acts at once by removing all material affections, complexities developed by material association, and the illusory encagement of the material body. 
15. By hearing the subject matter of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam this false complexity of materialism is removed, and real peace in society begins, which politicians aspire for so eagerly in so many political situations. 
16. Until we reach the stage of reestablishing our lost relation with Kṛṣṇa, the illusion of accepting the body as the self will prevail, and thus fearfulness will also prevail.
17. The conclusion is that simply by hearing the Vedic literature Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, one can have direct connection with the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Śrī Kṛṣṇa, and thereby one can attain the highest perfection of life by transcending worldly miseries, illusion and fearfulness. These are practical tests for one who has actually given a submissive hearing to the readings of the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam.

SB 2.2.23 TRANSLATION

The transcendentalists are concerned with the spiritual body. As such, by the strength of their devotional service, austerities, mystic power, and transcendental knowledge, their movements are unrestricted, within and beyond the material worlds. The fruitive workers, or the gross materialists, can never move in such an unrestricted manner.

CLASS NOTES: 

ONE CANNOT GO BEYOND SVARGA OR JANALOKA BY MECHANICAL OR MATERIALISTIC ACTIVITIES, EITHER GROSS OR SUBTLE.

The materialistic scientist’s endeavor to reach other planets by mechanical vehicles is only a futile attempt. One can, however, reach heavenly planets by virtuous activities, but one can never expect to go beyond Svarga or Janaloka by such mechanical or materialistic activities, either gross or subtle.

The transcendentalists who have nothing to do with the gross material body can move anywhere within or beyond the material worlds. Within the material worlds they move in the planetary systems of the Mahar-, Janas-, Tapas- and Satya-loka, and beyond the material worlds they can move in the Vaikuṇṭhas as unrestricted spacemen

By the strength of devotional service, austerities, mystic powers and transcendental knowledge, everyone can move like Nārada Muni or Durvāsā Muni. It is said that Durvāsā Muni traveled throughout the entirety of material space and part of spiritual space within one year only. The speed of the transcendentalists can never be attained by the gross or subtle materialists.

This is an interesting purport. SP is talking about incomprehensible unrestricted spacemen.. They have this concept of a man flying in the sky without any machine- They call him superman. But Superman never went beyond the sky of this earth.
But there are super spacemen like Narada muni, Durvasa muni who can go from one planet to another, spiritual world, and material world. Even with the best mechanical contraptions, we cannot emulate Narada Muni or Durvasa Muni. One must hear the message of Srimad Bhagavatam to understand the intricacies presented and how these unbelievable powers can be manifested by the spirit soul.  The spirit soul when connected to Krsna, just like if you connect an electric wire to an electric source you get the power, similarly when we connect our soul consciously with Krsna, all that powerful energy will flow into us and we can do incredible things like Narada muni. Therefore yoga is connecting our consciousness with the Lord. This is explained in a lot of detail in BG 4.10.

BG 4.10

vīta-rāga-bhaya-krodhā
man-mayā mām upāśritāḥ
bahavo jñāna-tapasā
pūtā mad-bhāvam āgatāḥ

Being freed from attachment, fear and anger, being fully absorbed in Me and taking refuge in Me, many, many persons in the past became purified by knowledge of Me – and thus they all attained transcendental love for Me.

As described above, it is very difficult for a person who is too materially affected to understand the personal nature of the Supreme Absolute Truth.  Such materialists cannot even imagine that there is a transcendental body which is imperishable, full of knowledge and eternally blissful.

Every living being has a transcendental body too which is covered by gross and subtle elements.
 In the materialistic concept, the body is perishable, full of ignorance, and completely miserable. Therefore, people, in general, keep this same bodily idea in mind when they are informed of the personal form of the Lord.
Projecting their own limitations on Krsna

For such materialistic men, the form of the gigantic material manifestation is supreme. Consequently, they consider the Supreme to be impersonal.

Most people can understand the concept of God through Virat Rupa. If you study Virat Rupa you can understand personalism through understanding all the different part of the virat rupa as the parts of the body. 

And because they are too materially absorbed, the conception of retaining the personality after liberation from matter frightens them. When they are informed that spiritual life is also individual and personal, they become afraid of becoming persons again, and so they naturally prefer a kind of merging into the impersonal void. 

The fear of having a body after liberation makes them not to accept Supreme personality of Godhead and are attracted to Mayavadi philosophy.

Generally, they compare the living entities to the bubbles of the ocean, which merge into the ocean. That is the highest perfection of spiritual existence attainable without individual personality. This is a kind of fearful stage of life, devoid of perfect knowledge of spiritual existence.

Furthermore, there are many persons who cannot understand spiritual existence at all. Being embarrassed by so many theories and by contradictions of various types of philosophical speculation, they become disgusted or angry and foolishly conclude that there is no supreme cause and that everything is ultimately void. Sunyavadis.

Such people are in a diseased condition of life. Some people are too materially attached and therefore do not give attention to spiritual life, some of them want to merge into the supreme spiritual cause, and some of them disbelieve in everything (Buddhism), being angry at all sorts of spiritual speculation out of hopelessness. This last class of men takes to the shelter of some kind of intoxication, and their affective hallucinations are sometimes accepted as spiritual vision. There are religions like – Mormonism, Seventh-day Adventists, Jehovah’s witnesses, all of them are somebody’s hallucinations.

One has to get rid of all three stages of material consciousness: attachment to material life, fear of a spiritual personal identity, and the conception of void that arises from frustration in life. To get free from these three stages of the material concept of life, one has to take complete shelter of the Lord, guided by the bona fide spiritual master, and follow the disciplines and regulative principles of devotional life. The last stage of the devotional life is called bhāva, or transcendental love of Godhead.

This fear of having personal spiritual identity is explained further  in SB 

SB 1.7.7

yasyāṁ vai śrūyamāṇāyāṁ
kṛṣṇe parama-pūruṣe
bhaktir utpadyate puṁsaḥ

śoka-moha-bhayāpahā

Simply by giving aural reception to this Vedic literature, the feeling for loving devotional service to Lord Kṛṣṇa, the Supreme Personality of Godhead, sprouts up at once to extinguish the fire of lamentation, illusion and fearfulness.

There are various senses, of which the ear is the most effective. This sense works even when a man is deep asleep. One can protect himself from the hands of an enemy while awake, but while asleep one is protected by the ear only. The importance of hearing is mentioned here in connection with attaining the highest perfection of life, namely getting free from three material pangs.

The Primary Symptoms Of The Material Disease.

Everyone is full of lamentation at every moment, he is after the mirage of illusory things, and he is always afraid of his supposed enemy. These are the primary symptoms of the material disease. 

And it is definitely suggested herein that simply by hearing the message of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, one gets attachment for the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Śrī Kṛṣṇa, and as soon as this is effected the symptoms of the material disease disappear. 

We have a disease worse than corona, that is lamentation, attachment to illusory things, fear of losing them..

KRSNA IS THE SUPREME PERSONALITY OF GODHEAD

Śrīla Vyāsadeva saw the all-perfect Personality of Godhead, and in this statement the all-perfect Personality of Godhead, Śrī Kṛṣṇa, is clearly confirmed.

THE ULTIMATE RESULT OF DEVOTIONAL SERVICE IS TO DEVELOP GENUINE LOVE FOR THE SUPREME PERSONALITY. Love is a word which is often used in relation with man and woman. And love is the only word that can be properly used to indicate the relation between Lord Kṛṣṇa and the living entities. The living entities are mentioned as prakṛti in the Bhagavad-gītā, and in Sanskrit prakṛti is a feminine object. The Lord is always described as the parama-puruṣa, or the supreme male personality. Thus the affection between the Lord and the living entities is something like that between the male and the female. Therefore the term love of Godhead is quite appropriate.

LOVING DEVOTIONAL SERVICE TO THE LORD BEGINS WITH HEARING ABOUT THE LORD. 

There is no difference between the Lord and the subject matter heard about Him. The Lord is absolute in all respects, and thus there is no difference between Him and the subject matter heard about Him. Therefore, hearing about Him means immediate contact with Him by the process of vibration of the transcendental sound. 

The ability to do miraculous things is possible if we are willing to hear everyday from the bonafide sources.. Sthane sthuthi… Hear the messages of Krsna from BG & SB. 

And the transcendental sound is so effective that it acts at once by removing all material affections mentioned above. As mentioned before, a living entity develops a sort of complexity by material association, and the illusory encagement of the material body is accepted as an actual fact. Under such false complexity, the living beings under different categories of life become illusioned in different ways. Even in the most developed stage of human life, the same illusion prevails in the form of many isms and divides the loving relation with the Lord and thereby divides the loving relation between man and man.

Let’s say you are associated with a communist and he will introduce you to the concept of communism. The dialectic struggle between classes of people – landowners and capitalists. Hagles way of analyzing the history of mankind. The communist may not understand the Hagles theory he will explain to you the struggles between the 2 classes of men, a Buddhist will explain to you about voidism, an atheist says there is no God and only one life. 

By hearing the subject matter of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam this false complexity of materialism is removed, and real peace in society begins, which politicians aspire for so eagerly in so many political situations. 

PEACE CONFERENCES BY POLITICIANS CANNOT BRING PEACE
The politicians want a peaceful situation between man and man, and nation and nation, but at the same time, because of too much attachment for material domination, there is illusion and fearfulness. Therefore the politicians’ peace conferences cannot bring about peace in society. It can only be done by hearing the subject matter described in the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam about the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Śrī Kṛṣṇa. The foolish politicians may go on holding peace and summit conferences for hundreds of years, but they will fail to achieve success.

People are avoiding hearing Srimad Bhagavatam every day.

Until we reach the stage of reestablishing our lost relation with Kṛṣṇa, the illusion of accepting the body as the self will prevail, and thus fearfulness will also prevail. 

AS FOR THE VALIDITY OF ŚRĪ KṚṢṆA AS THE SUPREME PERSONALITY OF GODHEAD,

there are hundreds and thousands of evidences from revealed scriptures, and there are hundreds and thousands of evidences from personal experiences of devotees in various places like Vṛndāvana, Navadvīpa and Purī. Even in the Kaumudī dictionary the synonyms of Kṛṣṇa are given as “the son of Yaśodā” and “the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Parabrahman.” 

The conclusion is that simply by hearing the Vedic literature Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, one can have direct connection with the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Śrī Kṛṣṇa, and thereby one can attain the highest perfection of life by transcending worldly miseries, illusion and fearfulness. These are practical tests for one who has actually given a submissive hearing to the readings of the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam.

https://youtu.be/qTo7nILUt3c?t=3100

KEY TAKEAWAYS FROM HH HARIVILAS MAHARAJ’S MORNING BHAGAVATAM CLASS ON SB 2.2.21

1. The process of giving up all material connections and returning home, back to Godhead, the Supreme, is recommended in the verse SB 2.2.21. The condition is that one should be completely freed from the desire for material enjoyment. 
2. One cannot be freed from material attraction unless one has a complete understanding of the nature of spiritual life. The devotees have full knowledge of the spiritual world, the Personality of Godhead and His transcendental association in unlimited spiritual planets. 
3. Only one who has his aim fixed upon that spiritual world and personal association with the Godhead can give up his material connections even while living in the material world
4. One who goes to the paraṁ dhāma does not return to the material world. This freedom is not possible even by reaching the topmost loka of the material world.
5. The propaganda by a certain class of impersonalists that spiritual life is void of all varieties is dangerous propaganda to mislead the living beings into becoming more and more attracted by material enjoyments.
6. The yogī blocks up all the seven openings so that the life air will naturally burst forth through the cerebral hole. This is the sure sign of a great devotee’s leaving the material connection.
7. Oneness does not mean that they have no individuality, but that there is no disunity. They are all agreeable to the purpose of the creation – “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.”
8. Everything is an emanation from the Supreme Spirit, and by His inconceivable power He can convert spirit into matter and matter into spirit. Therefore a material thing (so-called) is at once turned into a spiritual force by the great will of the Lord. The necessary condition for such a change is to employ so-called matter in the service of the spirit. 
9. That is the way to treat our material diseases and elevate ourselves to the spiritual plane where there is no misery, no lamentation and no fear. 
10. A sincere devotee of the Lord shuns all material sense enjoyment due to his higher taste for spiritual enjoyment in the association of the Lord. That is the secret of success. 
11. One who is not, therefore, in Kṛṣṇa consciousness, however powerful he may be in controlling the senses by artificial repression, is sure ultimately to fail, for the slightest thought of sense pleasure will agitate him to gratify his desires.
12. It is clear that to perform austerities or penances or, for that matter, any form of devotional service, one has to be guided by a spiritual master. This is the secret of success. 
13. After being initiated and receiving the orders of the spiritual master, the disciple should unhesitatingly think about the instructions or orders of the spiritual master and should not allow himself to be disturbed by anything else.  
    1. The order of the spiritual master is the life substance of the disciple. The disciple should not consider whether he is going back home, back to Godhead; his first business should be to always meditate and execute the order of his spiritual master. 

SB 2.2.21 TRANSLATION:

Thereafter the bhakti-yogī should push the life air up between the eyebrows, and then, blocking the seven outlets of the life air, he should maintain his aim for going back home, back to Godhead. If he is completely free from all desires for material enjoyment, he should then reach the cerebral hole and give up his material connections, having gone to the Supreme.

CLASS NOTES: 

ONE CANNOT BE FREED FROM MATERIAL ATTRACTION UNLESS HE HAS COMPLETE UNDERSTANDING OF THE NATURE OF SPIRITUAL LIFE

The process of giving up all material connections and returning home, back to Godhead, the Supreme, is recommended herein. The condition is that one should be completely freed from desire for material enjoyment. There are different grades of material enjoyments in respect to duration of life and sensual gratification. The highest plane of sensual enjoyment for the longest period of life is mentioned in the Bhagavad-gītā (9.20). All are but material enjoyments, and one should be thoroughly convinced that he has no need of such a long duration of life, even in the Brahmaloka planet. He must return home, back to Godhead, and must not be attracted by any amount of material facilities. In the Bhagavad-gītā (2.59) it is said that this sort of material detachment is possible to attain when one is acquainted with the supreme association of life. Paraṁ dṛṣṭvā nivartate. One cannot be freed from material attraction unless he has complete understanding of the nature of spiritual life

IMPERSONALISTS 

The propaganda by a certain class of impersonalists that spiritual life is void of all varieties is dangerous propaganda to mislead the living beings into becoming more and more attracted by material enjoyments. As such, persons with a poor fund of knowledge cannot have any conception of the param, the Supreme; they try to stick to the varieties of material enjoyments, although they may flatter themselves as being Brahman-realized souls. Such less intelligent persons cannot have any conception of the param, as mentioned in this verse, and therefore they cannot reach the Supreme. 

The devotees have full knowledge of the spiritual world, the Personality of Godhead and His transcendental association in unlimited spiritual planets called Vaikuṇṭhalokas.

Only one who has his aim fixed upon that spiritual world and personal association with the Godhead can give up his material connections even while living in the material world

One who goes to the paraṁ dhāma does not return to the material world. This freedom is not possible even by reaching the topmost loka of the material world.

SIGN OF A GREAT DEVOTEE’S LEAVING THE MATERIAL CONNECTION

The life air passes through seven openings, namely two eyes, two nostrils, two ears and one mouth. Generally it passes through the mouth at the time of an ordinary man’s death. But the yogī, as above mentioned, who controls the life air in his own way, generally releases the life air by puncturing the cerebral hole in the head. The yogī therefore blocks up all the above-mentioned seven openings so that the life air will naturally burst forth through the cerebral hole. This is the sure sign of a great devotee’s leaving the material connection.

This is an explanation of Ashtanga Yoga through which the yogi can move the life air through the 6 chakras and smash through the Brahma randra, the tiny hole at the top of the head.
Mayavadis, kevala advaitas, – denying Krsna, Vaikuntha, Goloka, Nanda Maharaj, … have denied the individuality with no body and merge into Brahma Jyothi … that pushes people to have sense gratification in this world. 

Concept of oneness – Oneness means oneness in purpose. If a son always refuses to follow the instructions of father, then there is no oneness. Always agreeing and following the instructions of the lord is oneness with the lord. 

(BG 15.16) ONENESS WITH THE LORD
Those who are in oneness with the Supreme Personality of Godhead, however, are called infallible. Oneness does not mean that they have no individuality, but that there is no disunity. They are all agreeable to the purpose of the creation. Of course, in the spiritual world there is no such thing as creation, but since the Supreme Personality of Godhead, as stated in the Vedānta-sūtra, is the source of all emanations, that conception is explained.

(BG 8.14) PURPOSE OF MATERIAL CREATION
 A pure devotee does not desire promotion to heavenly planets, nor does he seek oneness with the brahma-jyotir or salvation or liberation from material entanglement. A pure devotee does not desire anything. In the Caitanya-caritāmṛta the pure devotee is called niṣkāma, which means he has no desire for self-interest. Perfect peace belongs to him alone, not to them who strive for personal gain. Whereas a jñāna-yogī, karma-yogī or haṭha-yogī has his own selfish interests, a perfect devotee has no desire other than to please the Supreme Personality of Godhead. Therefore the Lord says that for anyone who is unflinchingly devoted to Him, He is easy to attain.

A pure devotee always engages in devotional service to Kṛṣṇa in one of His various personal features. Kṛṣṇa has various plenary expansions and incarnations, such as Rāma and Nṛsiṁha, and a devotee can choose to fix his mind in loving service to any of these transcendental forms of the Supreme Lord. Such a devotee meets with none of the problems that plague the practitioners of other yogas. Bhakti-yoga is very simple and pure and easy to perform. One can begin simply by chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa. The Lord is merciful to all, but as we have already explained, He is especially inclined toward those who always serve Him without deviation. The Lord helps such devotees in various ways. As stated in the Vedas (Kaṭha Upaniṣad 1.2.23), yam evaiṣa vṛṇute tena labhyas/ tasyaiṣa ātmā vivṛṇute tanuṁ svām: one who is fully surrendered and engaged in the devotional service of the Supreme Lord can understand the Supreme Lord as He is. And as stated in Bhagavad-gītā (10.10), dadāmi buddhi-yogaṁ tam: the Lord gives such a devotee sufficient intelligence so that ultimately the devotee can attain Him in His spiritual kingdom.

(SB 1.5.33) HOW TO TREAT OUR MATERIAL DISEASES

O good soul, does not a thing, applied therapeutically, cure a disease which was caused by that very same thing?

The threefold miseries of material existence cannot be mitigated simply by material activities. Such activities have to be spiritualized, just as by fire iron is made red-hot, and thereby the action of fire begins. Similarly, the material conception of a thing is at once changed as soon as it is put into the service of the Lord. That is the secret of spiritual success.

Everything is an emanation from the Supreme Spirit, and by His inconceivable power He can convert spirit into matter and matter into spirit. Therefore a material thing (so-called) is at once turned into a spiritual force by the great will of the Lord. The necessary condition for such a change is to employ so-called matter in the service of the spirit. 

 That is the way to treat our material diseases and elevate ourselves to the spiritual plane where there is no misery, no lamentation and no fear. When everything is thus employed in the service of the Lord, we can experience that there is nothing except the Supreme Brahman. The Vedic mantra that “everything is Brahman” is thus realized by us.

(BG 2.62) SECRET OF SUCCESS OF A SINCERE DEVOTEE

While contemplating the objects of the senses, a person develops attachment for them, and from such attachment lust develops, and from lust anger arises.

One who is not Kṛṣṇa conscious is subjected to material desires while contemplating the objects of the senses. The senses require real engagements, and if they are not engaged in the transcendental loving service of the Lord, they will certainly seek engagement in the service of materialism. In the material world everyone, including Lord Śiva and Lord Brahmā – to say nothing of other demigods in the heavenly planets – is subjected to the influence of sense objects, and the only method to get out of this puzzle of material existence is to become Kṛṣṇa conscious. Lord Śiva was deep in meditation, but when Pārvatī agitated him for sense pleasure, he agreed to the proposal, and as a result Kārtikeya was born. When Haridāsa Ṭhākura was a young devotee of the Lord, he was similarly allured by the incarnation of Māyā-devī, but Haridāsa easily passed the test because of his unalloyed devotion to Lord Kṛṣṇa. As illustrated in the above-mentioned verse of Śrī Yāmunācārya,

A sincere devotee of the Lord shuns all material sense enjoyment due to his higher taste for spiritual enjoyment in the association of the Lord. That is the secret of success. One who is not, therefore, in Kṛṣṇa consciousness, however powerful he may be in controlling the senses by artificial repression, is sure ultimately to fail, for the slightest thought of sense pleasure will agitate him to gratify his desires.

“Easy journey to other planets”

(BG 6.24) SUCCESS FOR A YOGI
One should engage oneself in the practice of yoga with determination and faith and not be deviated from the path. One should abandon, without exception, all material desires born of mental speculation and thus control all the senses on all sides by the mind.

The yoga practitioner should be determined and should patiently prosecute the practice without deviation. One should be sure of success at the end and pursue this course with great perseverance, not becoming discouraged if there is any delay in the attainment of success. Success is sure for the rigid practitioner. 

(SB 4.24.15) SECRET OF SUCCESS FOR AN INITIATED DEVOTEE
When all the sons of Prācīnabarhi left home to execute austerities, they met Lord Śiva, who, out of great mercy, instructed them about the Absolute Truth. All the sons of Prācīnabarhi meditated upon the instructions, chanting and worshiping them with great care and attention.

It is clear that to perform austerities or penances or, for that matter, any form of devotional service, one has to be guided by a spiritual master. This is the secret of success. After being initiated and receiving the orders of the spiritual master, the disciple should unhesitatingly think about the instructions or orders of the spiritual master and should not allow himself to be disturbed by anything else.  

The order of the spiritual master is the life substance of the disciple. The disciple should not consider whether he is going back home, back to Godhead; his first business should be to execute the order of his spiritual master. Thus a disciple should always meditate on the order of the spiritual master, and that is perfectional meditation. Not only should he meditate upon that order, but he should find out the means by which he can perfectly worship and execute it.

The most successful person is a pure devotee.. Srila Prabhupada is more successful than anyone else. A disciple asked – What happens when you die, Srila Prabhupada said he will always live in his books…. Krishna has never died; he is living in His books.
Material success everyone is going to die and be forgotten. 

(BG 13.20) MYSTERY OF MATERIAL CREATION/ PURPOSE OF CREATION

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.

KEY TAKEAWAYS FROM HH HARIVILAS MAHARAJ’S MORNING BHAGAVATAM CLASS ON SB 2.2.20

1. The whole point of Yoga is to bring the mind into the service of the lord. The Lord and His service are identical, being on the absolute plane. But unfortunately, the meaning of present-day Yoga has no mention of Mind or Krsna, 
2. The functions of the mind are thinking, feeling, and willing. When the mind is materialistic or absorbed in material contact, it acts for material advancement of knowledge, destructively ending in the discovery of nuclear weapons. 
3. But when the mind acts under spiritual urge, it acts wonderfully for going back home, back to Godhead, for life in complete bliss and eternity. Therefore the mind has to be manipulated by good and unalloyed intelligence. Perfect intelligence is to render service unto the Lord. 
4. When one turns his intelligence to inquire about it from the right sources, he gets information of the transcendental loving service of the Lord. (That is what we do in the temple, we provide people the information of loving service and provide opportunities to engage in the service of the lord)
5. Instead of serving materially – the dictates of desire, anger, lust, illusion, insanity and enviousness, the different humors of the body, the living entity’s intelligence then becomes freed from the unhappy illusion of materialistic temperament, and thus, by unalloyed intelligence, the mind is brought into the service of the Lord. 
6. For the impersonalist the ultimate goal or destination is the brahmajyoti of the spiritual sky.  Because of his neglecting the association of the Lord, he does not develop a spiritual body for spiritual activity, but remains a spiritual spark only, merged in the effulgent spiritual rays of the Supreme Personality of Godhead. 
7. For the devotees, the ultimate goal is the Vaikuṇṭha planets. The devotees attain spiritual forms for activity in the transcendental loving service of the Lord. 
8. Apart from the class of impersonalists or nondevotees, there are also classes who pose themselves as devotees of the Lord but at heart maintain the idea of salvation by becoming one with the impersonal Brahman. They wrongly manufacture their own way of devotional service by open debauchery and mislead others who are simpletons or debauchees like themselves. Such nondevotees and debauchees are completely excluded from the list of transcendentalists by Śukadeva Gosvāmī.
9. All these impersonalists, non-devotees and debauchees – with a poor fund of knowledge cannot have any conception of the param, the Supreme; they try to stick to the varieties of material enjoyments, although they may flatter themselves as being Brahman-realized souls. They cannot reach the Supreme. 
10. There are so many of these misleaders and phony gurus who are not giving the right information to the people and with their theories, they are encouraging people to have more sense of gratification while in this material as there is no form beyond this material world… 
11. The devotees have full knowledge of the spiritual world, the Personality of Godhead and His transcendental association in unlimited spiritual planets called Vaikuṇṭhalokas.
12. Knowledge – Knowledge means knowing things as they are, and if by deliberation it is found that there are things which are at all unnecessary, naturally the person who has acquired knowledge leaves aside such unwanted things.
13. Detachment /Vairagya – When the conditioned soul finds by culture of knowledge that material necessities are unwanted things, he becomes detached from such unwanted things. This stage of knowledge is called vairāgya, or detachment from unwanted things.
14. Purification – So purification means getting free gradually from sex desire, and this is attained by meditation on the person of the Lord as described herein, beginning from the feet. (SB 2.2.12)
15. One should not try to go upwards artificially without seeing for himself how much he has been released from the sex desire.
16. Those who are still entrapped by sex indulgence should never progress to meditation above the feet of the Lord; therefore recital of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam by them should be restricted to the first and second cantos of the great literature. One must complete the purificatory process by assimilating the contents of the first nine cantos. Then one should be admitted into the realm of the Tenth Canto of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam.

SB 2.2.20 TRANSLATION

The meditative devotee should slowly push up the life air from the navel to the heart, from there to the chest, and from there to the root of the palate. He should search out the proper places with intelligence.

CLASS NOTES: 

There are six circles of the movement of the life air, and the intelligent bhakti-yogī should search out these places with intelligence and in a meditative mood. Among these, mentioned above is the svādhiṣṭhāna-cakra, or the powerhouse of the life air, and above this, just below the abdomen and navel, is the maṇi-pūraka-cakra. When upper space is further searched out in the heart, one reaches the anāhata-cakra, and further up, when the life air is placed at the root of the palate, one reaches the viśuddhi-cakra.

We see that we are trying to explore this planet, and other planets, but we have not explored our own bodies.  Yoga is an internal process and it is focused mainly on controlling the mind. Controlling the mind is more difficult than controlling the wind as Arjuna says in BG. How to control the mind –  Mechanical process & Spiritual process. Mechanical process is given in dhyana yoga – Yama, niyama, dhrana, pratyahara… This process practically cannot be done by anyone. However the spiritual process is taught by  Chaitanya Maha Prabhu – By chanting holy name, honoring the prasadam, nagar sankirtan -to fill the mind with the transcendental ecstasies of loving service to the lord. Yoga process is actually infused with Bhakti. But nowadays due to cancel culture, Krsna is completely removed from the Yoga process, as the dictionary meaning of yoga says. If you cancel Krsna, Vaikuntha, Goloka, Cows, Nand Maharaj, … then you end up keeping the minds of the people in Sense gratification in this material world. They are increasing the attention to sex life and sense gratification as there is no love in Goloka you might as well do it here. The Yoga practice is aimed at obtaining Krsna. If you infuse bhakti then it becomes Bhakti Yoga.

(SB 2.2.16) THE WHOLE POINT OF YOGA IS TO BRING THE MIND INTO THE SERVICE OF THE LORD
The functions of the mind are thinking, feeling, and willing. When the mind is materialistic or absorbed in material contact, it acts for material advancement of knowledge, destructively ending in the discovery of nuclear weapons. But when the mind acts under spiritual urge, it acts wonderfully for going back home, back to Godhead, for life in complete bliss and eternity. Therefore the mind has to be manipulated by good and unalloyed intelligence. Perfect intelligence is to render service unto the Lord. One should be intelligent enough to understand that the living being is, in all circumstances, a servant of the circumstances. Every living being is serving the dictates of desire, anger, lust, illusion, insanity, and enviousness — all materially affected. But even while executing such dictations of different temperaments, he is perpetually unhappy. When one actually feels this and turns his intelligence to inquiring about it from the right sources, he gets information of the transcendental loving service of the Lord. Instead of serving materially for the above-mentioned different humors of the body, the living entity’s intelligence then becomes freed from the unhappy illusion of materialistic temperament, and thus, by unalloyed intelligence, the mind is brought into the service of the Lord. The Lord and His service are identical, being on the absolute plane. Therefore the unalloyed intelligence and the mind are merged into the Lord, and thus the living entity does not remain a seer himself but becomes seen by the Lord transcendentally. When the living entity is directly seen by the Lord, the Lord dictates to him to act according to His desire, and when the living entity follows Him perfectly, the living entity ceases to discharge any other duty for his illusory satisfaction. In his pure, unalloyed state, the living being attains the stage of full bliss, labdhopaśānti, and ceases all material hankerings.

(SB 2.2.17) IMPERSONALISTS REMAIN AS SPIRITUAL SPARKS AND DEVOTEES GET SPIRITUAL FORMS TO PERFORM LOVING SERVICE TO THE LORD.
For the impersonalist the ultimate goal or destination is the brahmajyoti of the spiritual sky, but for the devotees the ultimate goal is the Vaikuṇṭha planets. The devotees experience the above-mentioned state of affairs by attainment of spiritual forms for activity in the transcendental loving service of the Lord. But the impersonalist, because of his neglecting the association of the Lord, does not develop a spiritual body for spiritual activity, but remains a spiritual spark only, merged in the effulgent spiritual rays of the Supreme Personality of Godhead. The Lord is the full-fledged form of eternity, bliss and knowledge, but the formless brahmajyoti is simply eternity and knowledge. The Vaikuṇṭha planets are also forms of eternity, bliss and knowledge, and therefore the devotees of the Lord, who are admitted into the abode of the Lord, also get bodies of eternity, bliss and knowledge. As such there is no difference between one and another. The Lord’s abode, name, fame, entourage, etc., are of the same transcendental quality, and how this transcendental quality differs from the material world is explained herewith in this verse. In the Bhagavad-gītā, three principal subjects have been explained by Lord Śrī Kṛṣṇa, namely karma-yoga, jñāna-yoga and bhakti-yoga, but one can reach the Vaikuṇṭha planets by the practice of bhakti-yoga only. The other two are incompetent in helping one reach the Vaikuṇṭhalokas, although they can, however, conveniently take one to the effulgent brahmajyoti, as described above.

This explains that there are many misleaders in this world, the phony gurus who do not give the right information to the people. There is a description in the next verse – They create artificial perplexity… 

(SB 2.2.18) MAYAVADIS CREATE ARTIFICIAL PERPLEXITY

Mayavadis, Mental Speculators and materialists

1. They create artificial perplexity in the matter of transcendental understanding by wasting time in discussing what is Brahman and what is non-Brahman, or māyā,
2. they falsely think of themselves as one with the Lord, or argue that there is no existence of the Lord separately, or that there is no God at all, or that living beings are themselves God, or that when God incarnates Himself He assumes a material body.
3. they concern themselves with many obscure speculative theories, which are in actuality so many stumbling blocks on the path of transcendental understanding.
4. Apart from the class of impersonalists or nondevotees, there are also classes who pose themselves as devotees of the Lord but at heart maintain the idea of salvation by becoming one with the impersonal Brahman. 
5. They wrongly manufacture their own way of devotional service by open debauchery and mislead others who are simpletons or debauchees like themselves.

DEBAUCHEES

 All these nondevotees and debauchees are, according to Viśvanātha Cakravartī, durātmās, or crooked souls in the dress of mahātmās, or great souls. Such nondevotees and debauchees are completely excluded from the list of transcendentalists by the presentation of this particular verse by Śukadeva Gosvāmī.

The debauchees – they follow the path of Caitanya, but they do not follow the math. They think everything ends up being One. They do not follow the Math – Matta – disciplic succession. This is like eight of nine deviations. They are the most dangerous type…

(SB 2.2.21) 
As such, persons with a poor fund of knowledge cannot have any conception of the param, the Supreme; they try to stick to the varieties of material enjoyments, although they may flatter themselves as being Brahman-realized souls. Such less intelligent persons cannot have any conception of the param, as mentioned in this verse, and therefore they cannot reach the Supreme. The devotees have full knowledge of the spiritual world, the Personality of Godhead and His transcendental association in unlimited spiritual planets called Vaikuṇṭhalokas. Herein akuṇṭha-dṛṣṭiḥ is mentioned. Akuṇṭha and vaikuṇṭha convey the same import, and only one who has his aim fixed upon that spiritual world and personal association with the Godhead can give up his material connections even while living in the material world. This param and the paraṁ dhāma mentioned in several places in the Bhagavad-gītā are one and the same thing. One who goes to the paraṁ dhāma does not return to the material world. This freedom is not possible even by reaching the topmost loka of the material world.

The propaganda that spiritual life is void of any relationships, individual persons, becomes an impetus for the people to enjoy at any cost while in the material body..

DEFINITIONS
(SB 2.2.12)
KNOWLEDGE – Knowledge means knowing things as they are, and if by deliberation it is found that there are things which are at all unnecessary, naturally the person who has acquired knowledge leaves aside such unwanted things.

VAIRAGYA – When the conditioned soul finds by culture of knowledge that material necessities are unwanted things, he becomes detached from such unwanted things. This stage of knowledge is called vairāgya, or detachment from unwanted things.

We have previously discussed that the transcendentalist is required to be self-sufficient and should not beg from the rich blind persons to fulfill the bare necessities of life. Śukadeva Gosvāmī has suggested some alternatives for the bare necessities of life, namely the problem of eating, sleeping and shelter, but he has not suggested any alternative for sex satisfaction.

When one has knowledge of Krsna they will begin to eliminate unwanted things – watching movies, playing video games, watching games… reading mayavadi books…
Sex is not an absolute necessity like eating, sleeping and shelter.. The suggestions made by Sukhdev Goswami may seem radical, but he is making a point that we dont have to over exert ourselves for the basic necessities of life. If you are married, when your children grow up you can down size a very very simple life and have plenty of time for spiritual activity.

RENOUNCED ORDER OF LIFE
One who has the sex desire still with him should not at all try to accept the renounced order of life. For one who has not attained to this stage, there is no question of a renounced order of life. So by the gradual process of devotional service under the guidance of a proper spiritual master, and following the principles of the Bhāgavatam, one must be able at least to control the gross sex desire before one accepts the renounced order of life factually.

PURIFICATION – So purification means getting free gradually from sex desire, and this is attained by meditation on the person of the Lord as described herein, beginning from the feet. (SB 2.2.12)

One should not try to go upwards artificially without seeing for himself how much he has been released from the sex desire.

IMPROPER HEARING OF BHAGAVATAM
The smiling face of the Lord is the Tenth Canto of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, and there are many upstarts who at once try to begin with the Tenth Canto, and especially with the five chapters which delineate the rāsa-līlā of the Lord. This is certainly improper. By such improper study or hearing of Bhāgavatam, the material opportunists have played havoc by indulgence in sex life in the name of Bhāgavatam. This vilification of Bhāgavatam is rendered by the acts of the so-called devotees; one should be free from all kinds of sex desire before he tries to make a show of recital of Bhāgavatam.

Śrī Viśvanātha Cakravartī Ṭhākura clearly defines the import of purification as cessation from sex indulgence. He says, yathā yathā dhīś ca śudhyati viṣaya-lāmpaṭyaṁ tyajati, tathā tathā dhārayed iti citta-śuddhi-tāratamyenaiva dhyāna-tāratamyam uktam. And as one gets free from the intoxication of sex indulgence by purification of intelligence, one should step forward for the next meditation, or in other words, the progress of meditation on the different limbs of the transcendental body of the Lord should be enhanced in proportion to the progress of purification of the heart. The conclusion is that those who are still entrapped by sex indulgence should never progress to meditation above the feet of the Lord; therefore recital of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam by them should be restricted to the first and second cantos of the great literature. One must complete the purificatory process by assimilating the contents of the first nine cantos. Then one should be admitted into the realm of the Tenth Canto of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam.

The gradual development of KC is very important. Trying to skip steps is a great blunder in spiritual progress.

Caitanya Maha Prabhu says –  If you take the trouble to hear and try understand Mayavadi philosophy, you will never understand Srimad Bhagavatam and BG


Asat sangha tyagas, …
These purports are so profound when we hear we think that we understand, but later on when we look back we see that we forgot everything and that there are so many important points…


People follow the path of Chaitanya and not the math… – Sahajiyas.

KEY TAKEAWAYS FROM HH HARIVILAS MAHARAJ’S MORNING BHAGAVATAM CLASS ON SB 2.2.19

1. Material desires are based on the false ego of the living being and are exhibited by his childish and useless activities to conquer the laws of material nature and by his desire to lord it over the resources of the five elements.
2. An absolutely self-realized soul becomes completely aloof from all material desires.
3. The well-situated self, or Brahman-realized soul, perfectly understands that the Supreme Brahman, or the Personality of Godhead, is the all-powerful Vāsudeva and that he (the self-realized living being) is a part and parcel of the supreme whole.
4. His constitutional position is to cooperate with Him in all respects in the transcendental relation of the served and the servitor. Such a self-realized soul ceases to exhibit his useless activities of attempting to lord it over material nature. Being scientifically well informed, he fully engages himself in faithful devotion to the Lord
5. The concentration of the mind is more easily attained in Kali Yuga by the chanting of the holy name of the Lord. The results are more effective than those derived from the inner exercise of the life air followed by the yogis in the previous yugas.
6. (BG 18.54) One who is thus transcendentally situated at once realizes the Supreme Brahman and becomes fully joyful. He never laments or desires to have anything. He is equally disposed toward every living entity. In that state, he attains pure devotional service unto Me.
7. One who is engaged in pure devotional service to the Supreme Lord is already in a state of liberation, called brahma-bhūta, oneness with the Absolute. Without being one with the Supreme, the Absolute, one cannot render service unto Him. In the absolute conception, there is no difference between the served and the servitor; yet the distinction is there, in a higher spiritual sense.
8. Moha refers to that which is opposed to knowledge. Actually real knowledge is the understanding that every living being is eternally a servitor of the Lord, but instead of thinking oneself in that position, the living entity thinks that he is not a servant, that he is the master of this material world, for he wants to lord it over the material nature. That is his illusion.
9. To become free from the illusory energy is to understand Kṛṣṇa, the Supreme Personality of Godhead, and agree to act according to His order. To study Bhagavad-gītā is to understand Kṛṣṇa factually. When a person is in full knowledge, he naturally surrenders to Kṛṣṇa.
10. Kṛṣṇa consciousness is acting according to Kṛṣṇa’s order.
11. Supreme Lord is the master who is full of knowledge and who is the proprietor of everything. One who does not know Him is under the spell of illusion; he does not become a devotee, but a servitor of māyā.
12. Self-realization means becoming indifferent to the needs of the gross and subtle bodies and becoming serious about the activities of the self.
13. Gross and subtle body coverings are never effective in the person of the Personality of Godhead. Knowing this convincingly is called liberation, or seeing the Absolute. 
14. By ignorance, self-interest is calculated in terms of the gross and subtle bodies, and therefore a whole set of activities is spoiled, life after life. 
15. When, however, one meets the self by proper culture, the activities of the self begin. Therefore a man who is engaged in the activities of the self is called jīvan-mukta, or a liberated person even in the conditional existence.
16. This perfect stage of self-realization is attained not by artificial means, but under the lotus feet of the Lord, who is always transcendental.
17. By the culture of transcendental knowledge, when the living being prays to the Lord for deliverance from the clutches of forgetfulness, the Lord, by His causeless mercy, removes the living being’s illusory curtain, and thus he realizes his own self. He then engages himself in the service of the Lord in his eternal constitutional position, becoming liberated from the conditioned life.

SB 2.2.19 TRANSLATION:

By the strength of scientific knowledge, one should be well situated in absolute realization and thus be able to extinguish all material desires. One should then give up the material body by blocking the air hole [through which stool is evacuated] with the heel of one’s foot and by lifting the life air from one place to another in the six primary places.

CLASS NOTES: 

DURATMAS – 

There are many durātmās who claim to have realized themselves as Brahman and yet are unable to conquer material desires. In the Bhagavad-gītā (18.54) it is clearly explained that an absolutely self-realized soul becomes completely aloof from all material desires. Material desires are based on the false ego of the living being and are exhibited by his childish and useless activities to conquer the laws of material nature and by his desire to lord it over the resources of the five elements. With such a mentality, one is led to believe in the strength of material science, with its discovery of atomic energy and space travel by mechanical vehicles, and by such tiny advancements in material science the false egoist tries to challenge even the strength of the Supreme Lord, who can finish all man’s tiny endeavors in less than a second. 

Self Realized Soul
The well-situated self, or Brahman-realized soul, perfectly understands that the Supreme Brahman, or the Personality of Godhead, is the all-powerful Vāsudeva and that he (the self-realized living being) is a part and parcel of the supreme whole. As such, his constitutional position is to cooperate with Him in all respects in the transcendental relation of the served and the servitor. Such a self-realized soul ceases to exhibit his useless activities of attempting to lord it over material nature. Being scientifically well informed, he fully engages himself in faithful devotion to the Lord.

The concentration of the mind is more easily attained in Kali Yuga by the chanting of the holy name of the Lord. The results are more effective than those derived from the inner exercise of the life air followed by the dhyana yogis in the previous yugas. 

We can understand that it is impossible for almost all of us to follow this method. When we tell them about the bhakti-yoga they say it is easy, when it is easy why they don’t do it?  They can’t do the hard thing and they don’t want to do the easy process.
They are too harassed with the mobile phones, social media etc.,.

(BG 18.54) One who is thus transcendentally situated at once realizes the Supreme Brahman and becomes fully joyful. He never laments or desires to have anything. He is equally disposed toward every living entity. In that state he attains pure devotional service unto Me.

Who is the supreme brahman. Each of the following say –
Empiricists/ Materialists – Heavenly planets
Mayavadis – Brahma Jyothi  – Sat, Chit
Devotees  – Krishna – Sat, chit, Ananda

Mayavadis have some sense of satisfaction, they experience the lack of suffering as happiness, but they do not have the full bliss. 

one who is engaged in pure devotional service to the Supreme Lord is already in a state of liberation, 

called brahma-bhūta, oneness with the Absolute. Without being one with the Supreme, the Absolute, one cannot render service unto Him. In the absolute conception, there is no difference between the served and the servitor; yet the distinction is there, in a higher spiritual sense.

1. In the material concept of life, when one works for sense gratification, there is misery, but in the absolute world, when one is engaged in pure devotional service, there is no misery.
2. The devotee in Kṛṣṇa consciousness has nothing for which to lament or desire.
3. Since God is full, a living entity who is engaged in God’s service, in Kṛṣṇa consciousness, becomes also full in himself.
4. He is just like a river cleansed of all dirty water.
5. Because a pure devotee has no thought other than Kṛṣṇa, he is naturally always joyful.
6. He does not lament for any material loss or aspire for gain, because he is full in the service of the Lord.
7. He has no desire for material enjoyment because he knows that every living entity is a fragmental part and parcel of the Supreme Lord and therefore eternally a servant.
8. He does not see, in the material world, someone as higher and someone as lower; higher and lower positions are ephemeral, and a devotee has nothing to do with ephemeral appearances or disappearances.
9. For him, stone and gold are of equal value.
10. This is the Brahma-bhūta stage, and this stage is attained very easily by the pure devotee. In that stage of existence, the idea of becoming one with the Supreme Brahman and annihilating one’s individuality becomes hellish, the idea of attaining the heavenly kingdom becomes phantasmagoria, and the senses are like serpents whose poison teeth are broken. As there is no fear of a serpent with broken teeth, there is no fear from the senses when they are automatically controlled.
11.  The world is miserable for the materially infected person, but for a devotee the entire world is as good as Vaikuṇṭha, or the spiritual sky.
12. The highest personality in this material universe is no more significant than an ant for a devotee. Such a stage can be achieved by the mercy of Lord Caitanya, who preached pure devotional service in this age.

The idea of pure devotional service is the position of liberation. Oneness with the lord means not what Mayavadis says. It means that one is always following the orders/ instructions  of the lord. 

(BG 18.73) CONSTITUTIONAL AND ETERNAL POSITION OF THE LIVING ENTITY. VIMP VERSE AND PURPORT
Arjuna said: My dear Kṛṣṇa, O infallible one, my illusion is now gone. I have regained my memory by Your mercy. I am now firm and free from doubt and am prepared to act according to Your instructions.

WHEN A PERSON IS LIBERATED, HIS ILLUSION IS OVER, AND HE VOLUNTARILY SURRENDERS UNTO THE SUPREME TO ACT ACCORDING TO HIS DESIRES. 

The last illusion, the last snare of māyā to trap the living entity, is the proposition that he is God. The living entity thinks that he is no longer a conditioned soul, but God. He is so unintelligent that he does not think that if he were God, then how could he be in doubt? That he does not consider. So that is the last snare of illusion. ACTUALLY TO BECOME FREE FROM THE ILLUSORY ENERGY IS TO UNDERSTAND KṚṢṆA, THE SUPREME PERSONALITY OF GODHEAD, AND AGREE TO ACT ACCORDING TO HIS ORDER.

 MOHA REFERS TO THAT WHICH IS OPPOSED TO KNOWLEDGE. Actually real knowledge is the understanding that every living being is eternally a servitor of the Lord, but instead of thinking oneself in that position, the living entity thinks that he is not a servant, that he is the master of this material world, for he wants to lord it over the material nature. That is his illusion. This illusion can be overcome by the mercy of the Lord or by the mercy of a pure devotee. When that illusion is over, one agrees to act in Kṛṣṇa consciousness.

KṚṢṆA CONSCIOUSNESS IS ACTING ACCORDING TO KṚṢṆA’S ORDER.

SUPREME LORD IS THE MASTER WHO IS FULL OF KNOWLEDGE AND WHO IS THE PROPRIETOR OF EVERYTHING.

A conditioned soul, illusioned by the external energy of matter, does not know that the Supreme Lord is the master who is full of knowledge and who is the proprietor of everything. Whatever He desires He can bestow upon His devotees; He is the friend of everyone, and He is especially inclined to His devotee. He is the controller of this material nature and of all living entities. He is also the controller of inexhaustible time, and He is full of all opulences and all potencies. The Supreme Personality of Godhead can even give Himself to the devotee. One who does not know Him is under the spell of illusion; he does not become a devotee, but a servitor of māyā.

Arjuna, however, after hearing Bhagavad-gītā from the Supreme Personality of Godhead, became free from all illusion. He could understand that Kṛṣṇa was not only his friend but the Supreme Personality of Godhead. And he understood Kṛṣṇa factually. So to study Bhagavad-gītā is to understand Kṛṣṇa factually. When a person is in full knowledge, he naturally surrenders to Kṛṣṇa. 

The living entity can take 2 paths  –
Follow the orders of Krsna
Refuse the orders of Krsna
We were studying the Psychology of the human being – To understand this, we need to understand the constitutional position of the lord. The two choices that the living entity has – serve Krsna/ Serve Maya. If we serve Maya we are in misery. 

(SB 1.3.33)
Whenever a person experiences, by self-realization, that both the gross and subtle bodies have nothing to do with the pure self, at that time he sees himself as well as the Lord.

GBC is currently discussing sanitizing the Statements made by Srila Prabhupada – which come across as offensive. They want to sanitize the statements made by him on Black people with the artificial emergency- that we cannot preach in South Africa, due to SP statements that are sensitive to black people.  Instead of preaching, we are not the body, they are saying you are the body.

Now it is black people, next it will be about women, going to the moon, politicians…

Maharaj used to go to people’s park in Berkeley to preach. He used to preach and give them prasadam. Do you know my God is black.. lightening black..

Any decision GBC makes has to be based on Sastra. It cannot be made based on feelings. This verse should be the basis for the comments made on Black people.
No statement made by SP is wrong, even the ones which seem to be wrong. He very carefully chooses every word. It is the question of being patient and asking the right people. Every question has been answered.

THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN SELF-REALIZATION AND MATERIAL ILLUSION

is to know that the temporary or illusory impositions of material energy in the shape of gross and subtle bodies are superficial coverings of the self. The coverings take place due to ignorance. Such coverings are never effective in the person of the Personality of Godhead. Knowing this convincingly is called liberation, or seeing the Absolute. This means that perfect self-realization is made possible by adoption of godly or spiritual life. Self-realization means becoming indifferent to the needs of the gross and subtle bodies and becoming serious about the activities of the self.

The impetus for activities is generated from the self, but such activities become illusory due to ignorance of the real position of the self. By ignorance, self-interest is calculated in terms of the gross and subtle bodies, and therefore a whole set of activities is spoiled, life after life. When, however, one meets the self by proper culture, the activities of the self begin. Therefore a man who is engaged in the activities of the self is called jīvan-mukta, or a liberated person even in the conditional existence.

This perfect stage of self-realization is attained not by artificial means, but under the lotus feet of the Lord, who is always transcendental.

By the culture of transcendental knowledge, when the living being prays to the Lord for deliverance from the clutches of forgetfulness, the Lord, by His causeless mercy, removes the living being’s illusory curtain, and thus he realizes his own self. He then engages himself in the service of the Lord in his eternal constitutional position, becoming liberated from the conditioned life.


Vibhishan – demon body – surrendered to Lord Rama
Ghatotkacha – rakshasa  – devotee
Jambavati – bear – Lord married her
Hanuman – Half man, half-monkey
Narasimha – Half man, half lion
Samba – son of Jambavati –
Krishna incarnates in every species – Tortoise, Boar,
Ananta Sesha – thousands of heads

We have plenty of ammunition to explain to people
The beauty of a devotee is based on – 26 qualities of a devotee, 20 factors of knowledge
This is the platform for preaching and not to delineate the statement made by SP.

Cancel Culture – They cancel Krsna as supreme personality of Godhead. Now they are trying to cancel the statements made by Prabhupada. He is explaining things as they are.

Krsna has incarnations – red, green, white, black, golden body, which Krsna are you going to look at. Original form of lord – brilliant, blackish-blue body…
If we are following the people who pander to the bodily conceptions of life, we will never make spiritual progress.

Definition of illusion – To believe something is true that was never true.

It is never true that I am black, I am blue, I am this, I am that.. the real truth is I am the soul, part of the supreme soul and the purpose of the part is to serve the whole…

KEY TAKEAWAYS FROM HH HARIVILAS MAHARAJ’S MORNING BHAGAVATAM CLASS ON SB 2.2.18

1. Pure devotees of the Lord are Absolutely in harmony with the Personality of Godhead, or in other words, they always think of the Lord as their only dependable friend and well-wisher.
2. A pure devotee of the Lord no longer wastes valuable time in discriminating the Brahman from non-Brahman because he knows perfectly well that the Lord Parabrahman, by His Brahman energy, is interwoven in everything, and thus everything is looked upon by a devotee as the property of the Lord.
3. The devotee tries to engage everything in His service and does not create perplexities by falsely lording it over the creation of the Lord. He is so faithful that he engages himself, as well as everything else, in the transcendental loving service of the Lord. 
4. In everything, the devotee sees the Lord, and he sees everything in the Lord. 
5. With our material eyes and senses, we cannot see the Lord, who is all spirit. We cannot even detect the spiritual spark which exists within the material body of the living being. We look to the outward covering of the body or subtle mind of the living being, but we cannot see the spiritual spark within the body. So we have to accept the living being’s presence by the presence of his gross body. 
6. Similarly, those who want to see the Lord with their present material eyes or with the material senses are advised to meditate on the gigantic external feature called the virāṭ-rūpa. However, the correct way of seeing is seeing with our ears and not eyes. We can see the lord with our ears, by  hearing from the bonafide sources about the description of the lord.
7. The Lord is eternally existent in His transcendental form, which is neither gross nor subtle like that of the living being; His body is never to be compared to the gross and subtle bodies of the living being. All such conceptions of God’s body are imaginary.
8. The living being has his eternal spiritual form, which is conditioned only by his material contamination.
9. Whenever a person experiences, by self-realization, that both the gross and subtle bodies have nothing to do with the pure self, at that time he sees himself as well as the Lord.
10. Self-realization means becoming indifferent to the needs of the gross and subtle bodies and becoming serious about the activities of the self.
11. By ignorance, self-interest is calculated in terms of the gross and subtle bodies, and therefore a whole set of activities is spoiled, life after life. 
12. When, however, one meets the self by proper culture, the activities of the self begin. Therefore a man who is engaged in the activities of the self is called jīvan-mukta, or a liberated person even in the conditional existence.
13. This perfect stage of self-realization is attained not by artificial means, but under the lotus feet of the Lord, who is always transcendental.
14. The Lord covers the living being in the mystery of forgetfulness, and thus the living being misinterprets the gross body and subtle mind to be his own self. And by culture of transcendental knowledge, when the living being prays to the Lord for deliverance from the clutches of forgetfulness, the Lord, by His causeless mercy, removes the living being’s illusory curtain, and thus he realizes his own self. 
15. He then engages himself in the service of the Lord in his eternal constitutional position, becoming liberated from the conditioned life. All this is executed by the Lord either through His external potency or directly by the internal potency.

SB 2.2.18 TRANSLATION: 

The transcendentalists desire to avoid everything godless, for they know that supreme situation in which everything is related with the Supreme Lord Viṣṇu. Therefore a pure devotee who is in absolute harmony with the Lord does not create perplexities, but worships the lotus feet of the Lord at every moment, taking them into his heart.

SPIRITUAL ABODE
In the Bhagavad-gītā, mad-dhāma (“My abode”) is mentioned several times, and according to the version of the Supreme Personality of Godhead Śrī Kṛṣṇa there exists the unlimited spiritual sky, wherein the planets are called Vaikuṇṭhas, or the abode of the Personality of Godhead. In that sky, which is far, far beyond the material sky and its sevenfold coverings, there is no need of the sun or the moon, nor is there the necessity of electricity for illumination, because the planets are self-illuminating and more brilliant than the material suns.

PURE DEVOTEES OF THE LORD ARE

1. Absolutely in harmony with the Personality of Godhead, or in other words, they always think of the Lord as their only dependable friend and well-wisher.
2. They do not care for any mundane creature, up to the status of Brahmā, the lord of the universe. Only they can definitely have a clear vision of the Vaikuṇṭha planets.
3. Such pure devotees, being perfectly directed by the Supreme Lord, do not create any artificial perplexity in the matter of transcendental understanding by wasting time in discussing what is Brahman and what is non-Brahman, or māyā, nor do they falsely think of themselves as one with the Lord, or argue that there is no existence of the Lord separately, or that there is no God at all, or that living beings are themselves God, or that when God incarnates Himself He assumes a material body.
4. Nor do they concern themselves with many obscure speculative theories, which are in actuality so many stumbling blocks on the path of transcendental understanding.
5. A pure devotee of the Lord no longer wastes valuable time in discriminating the Brahman from non-Brahman because he knows perfectly well that the Lord Parabrahman, by His Brahman energy, is interwoven in everything, and thus everything is looked upon by a devotee as the property of the Lord.
6. The devotee tries to engage everything in His service and does not create perplexities by falsely lording it over the creation of the Lord. He is so faithful that he engages himself, as well as everything else, in the transcendental loving service of the Lord. In everything, the devotee sees the Lord, and he sees everything in the Lord.

DEBAUCHEES OR SAHAJIYAS
Apart from the class of impersonalists or nondevotees, there are also classes who pose themselves as devotees of the Lord but at heart maintain the idea of salvation by becoming one with the impersonal Brahman. They wrongly manufacture their own way of devotional service by open debauchery and mislead others who are simpletons or debauchees like themselves. All these non-devotees and debauchees are, according to Viśvanātha Cakravartī, durātmās, or crooked souls in the dress of mahātmās, or great souls. Such non-devotees and debauchees are completely excluded from the list of transcendentalists by the presentation of this particular verse by Śukadeva Gosvāmī.

Debauchee – excessive indulgence in sensual pleasures

THE IMPERSONAL BRAHMAJYOTI IS ALSO CALLED THE PARAṀ PADAM
So the Vaikuṇṭha planets are factually the supreme residential places called the paraṁ padam. The impersonal brahmajyoti is also called the paraṁ padam due to its being the rays of the Vaikuṇṭha planets, as the sun rays are the rays of the sun. In the Bhagavad-gītā (14.27) it is clearly said that the impersonal brahmajyoti rests on the person of the Lord, and because everything rests on the brahmajyoti directly and indirectly, everything is generated from the Lord, everything rests on Him, and after annihilation, everything is merged in Him only. Therefore, nothing is independent of Him. The specific disturbance created by a durātmā, or crooked soul, is due to his maintaining that the transcendental form of the Lord is something material.

This purport is especially pertinent to what we started yesterday, that is – what differentiates Krsna from other living entities. This is a  science extremely important and it takes a lot of time and effort to understand what is the position of Krsna, and once we understand it helps us to build our faith in Krsna and always praise the lord, preach about the lord.

 
Today we are going to see how Srila Prabhupada is an expert psychologist. This psychology of living entity is fully explained in SB 1.3.31

(SB 1.3.31) HOW TO SEE THINGS CORRECTLY
Clouds and dust are carried by air, but less intelligent persons say that the sky is cloudy and the air is dirty. Similarly, they also implant material bodily conceptions on the spirit self.

Very philosophical verse. This verse is about seeing things correctly and understanding what is an incorrect version. The word philosophy in Sanskrit is darshan. SB corrects us to see things as they are than seeing things what we think they are.

It is further confirmed herein that with our material eyes and senses we cannot see the Lord, who is all spirit. We cannot even detect the spiritual spark which exists within the material body of the living being. We look to the outward covering of the body or subtle mind of the living being, but we cannot see the spiritual spark within the body. So we have to accept the living being’s presence by the presence of his gross body. Similarly, those who want to see the Lord with their present material eyes or with the material senses are advised to meditate on the gigantic external feature called the virāṭ-rūpa. For instance, when a particular gentleman goes in his car, which can be seen very easily, we identify the car with the man within the car. When the President goes out in his particular car, we say, “There is the President.” For the time being we identify the car with the President. Similarly, less intelligent men who want to see God immediately without necessary qualification are shown first the gigantic material cosmos as the form of the Lord, although the Lord is within and without. The clouds in the sky and the blue of the sky are better appreciated in this connection. Although the bluish tint of the sky and the sky itself are different, we conceive of the color of the sky as blue. But that is a general conception for the laymen only.

Slime of material existence … We need to have a clear understanding of things as they are and not as somebody’s speculation and is not contaminated.
SP entered the garden and he said this is illicit art. SP explained that if a man is standing there like a statue naked, the police will come and arrest him. You see how we are being reconditioned by our mind from being spiritual to material. Therefore people study naked bodies. When they are tired of the gross body they go to studying the subtle body through poetry, philosophy…
If we cannot see with the eyes, we can see with the ears. A significant way of seeing is through hearing from bonafide sources. Therefore we have to understand the Virat rupa expertly to help the 99.9 percent of the people in this planet who cannot see the Lord.
What does it mean by the sky is blue? – “The colors we see in the sky come from sunlight that is scattered by molecules in the atmosphere. This process is called Rayleigh scattering. Nitrogen and oxygen make up most of the molecules in our atmosphere, but any gas or aerosol suspended in the air will scatter rays of sunlight into separate wavelengths of light.”
The general conception of layman is – when they see there is dirt in the sky, they say the sky is dirty, the sky is cloudy, but the sky itself is not that.  When they see Krsna with 2 handed body playing a flute. They cannot understand. This verse is the epistemology. 

(SB 1.3.32) SUBTLE CONCEPTION OF FORM
Beyond this gross conception of form is another, subtle conception of form which is without formal shape and is unseen, unheard and unmanifest. The living being has his form beyond this subtlety, otherwise he could not have repeated births.

As the gross cosmic manifestation is conceived as the gigantic body of the Lord, so also there is the conception of His subtle form, which is simply realized without being seen, heard or manifested. But in fact all these gross or subtle conceptions of the body are in relation with the living beings. The living being has his spiritual form beyond this gross material or subtle psychic existence. The gross body and psychic functions cease to act as soon as the living being leaves the visible gross body. In fact, we say that the living being has gone away because he is unseen and unheard. Even when the gross body is not acting when the living being is in sound sleep, we know that he is within the body by his breathing. So the living being’s passing away from the body does not mean that there is no existence of the living soul. It is there, otherwise how can he repeat his births again and again?

The conclusion is that the Lord is eternally existent in His transcendental form, which is neither gross nor subtle like that of the living being; His body is never to be compared to the gross and subtle bodies of the living being. All such conceptions of God’s body are imaginary. The living being has his eternal spiritual form, which is conditioned only by his material contamination.

We dont see the soul, but we see the effect of the soul which animates the gross and the subtle body. If we are self realized, then when the soul leaves the material body it attains the spiritual body. We must hear SB and BG everyday to clear the misconceptions.
Because we have subtle and gross body and when we see Krsna, we transpose that to Krsna and consider Him to be like us. 

(SB 1.3.33) SELF REALIZATION – SEEING SELF AND SEEING THE LORD

Whenever a person experiences, by self-realization, that both the gross and subtle bodies have nothing to do with the pure self, at that time he sees himself as well as the Lord.

The difference between self-realization and material illusion is to know that the temporary or illusory impositions of material energy in the shape of gross and subtle bodies are superficial coverings of the self. The coverings take place due to ignorance.

This means that perfect self-realization is made possible by adoption of godly or spiritual life. Self-realization means becoming indifferent to the needs of the gross and subtle bodies and becoming serious about the activities of the self.

The impetus for activities is generated from the self, but such activities become illusory due to ignorance of the real position of the self. By ignorance, self-interest is calculated in terms of the gross and subtle bodies, and therefore a whole set of activities is spoiled, life after life. When, however, one meets the self by proper culture, the activities of the self begin. Therefore a man who is engaged in the activities of the self is called jīvan-mukta, or a liberated person even in the conditional existence.

This perfect stage of self-realization is attained not by artificial means, but under the lotus feet of the Lord, who is always transcendental.

 Srila Prabhupada with one word decimates the material allurements..

Om tad param padam… you have to go to the lotus feet of the lord to understand who you are and why you are here. You do not go to the mall, theatre…

 In the Bhagavad-gītā the Lord says that He is present in everyone’s heart, and from Him only all knowledge, remembrance or forgetfulness take place. When the living being desires to be an enjoyer of material energy (illusory phenomena), 

Phenomenon – the object of perception
SB teaches us how to see correctly
School teaches us how to see incorrectly.
Whoever repeats Krsna’s words is a guru.. 

The Lord covers the living being in the mystery of forgetfulness, and thus the living being misinterprets the gross body and subtle mind to be his own self. And by culture of transcendental knowledge, when the living being prays to the Lord for deliverance from the clutches of forgetfulness, the Lord, by His causeless mercy, removes the living being’s illusory curtain, and thus he realizes his own self. He then engages himself in the service of the Lord in his eternal constitutional position, becoming liberated from the conditioned life. All this is executed by the Lord either through His external potency or directly by the internal potency.

This is the real psychology, real truth, are we ready to learn it. When we learn the real truth there is no more sense gratification in this illusory world. This is the study in the psychology. The real definition of it. 

Today everyone is trying to feed the needs of the gross and subtle bodies. The way you see it is in the airport shops. In order to get to the immigration, you need to get through the shops of perfume, liquor, book shops, dates… all these are for the gross body and subtle body sense gratification. The whole thing is illusory, all being planned to take us away from Krsna. 

PROJECT 2 – UNDERSTANDING OF THE REAL DEFINITIONS OF WORDS GIVEN BY SP.

1. Self-realization – means becoming indifferent to the needs of the gross and subtle bodies and becoming serious about the activities of the self.
2. Jivan Muktha – a man who is engaged in the activities of the self is called jīvan-Mukta, or a liberated person even in the conditional existence. Bhakti-rasāmṛta-Sindhu (1.2.187) describes this as follows

īhā yasya harer dāsye

karmaṇā manasā girā

nikhilāsv apy avasthāsu

jīvan-muktaḥ sa ucyate

“A person acting in Kṛṣṇa consciousness (or, in other words, in the service of Kṛṣṇa) with his body, mind, intelligence and words is a liberated person even within the material world, although he may be engaged in many so-called material activities.” He has no false ego, for he does not believe that he is this material body, or that he possesses the body. He knows that he is not this body and that this body does not belong to him. He himself belongs to Kṛṣṇa, and the body too belongs to Kṛṣṇa. When he applies everything produced of the body, mind, intelligence, words, life, wealth, etc. – whatever he may have within his possession – to Kṛṣṇa’s service, he is at once dovetailed with Kṛṣṇa. He is one with Kṛṣṇa and is devoid of the false ego that leads one to believe that he is the body, etc. This is the perfect stage of Kṛṣṇa consciousness.