Morning Walk Conversation
with His Divine Grace A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada
February 20, 1974, Bombay

Prabhupada: …and happiness also. That is my experience. I always said that “You are so much graced by God in so many ways.”

Dr. Patel: (Hindi)

Mr. Sar: What karma?

Dr. Patel: No, no. They, they (Hindi) …servant. [break]

Mr. Sar: …yad gatva, tam eva agaccha, mama tejo ’msa-sambhavam.

Dr. Patel: That is why they have got all these things. So God is there. He says.

Prabhupada: Yes.

Mr. Sar: Yad yad vibhutimat sattvam.

Prabhupada: At least, preliminary condition for being in touch with God is there. Because Krsna says, catur-vidha bhajante mam sukrtino ’rjuna. So they are taking to Krsna consciousness. That means they are pious.

Mr. Sar: Yes, sukrtinah.

Prabhupada: Sukrti.

Mr. Sar: Otherwise you cannot be bhakta.

Prabhupada: And, and the result of sukrti, piety, is janmaisvarya-sruta-sri. Janma, to take birth, to take birth in nice family. And aisvarya, riches. And… Janmaisvarya-sruta, education, and sri, beauty. All these four things are in America. There every boy, every girl is nicely educated, qualified, artist.

Dr. Patel: That last hundred years’ generation of America, very honest people.

Prabhupada: Oh yes.

Dr. Patel: Extremely honest and extremely righteous. That is why the generation is good. This last hundred years…

Prabhupada: Therefore they are taking to Krsna consciousness.

Dr. Patel: …we have been very fond of America. We have been taking great example of Americans during last hundred years. Now they have started degenerating. And that happens with everyone.

Prabhupada: But the…

Dr. Patel: British degenerated; so they must degenerate.

Prabhupada: Degenerating means…

Dr. Patel: Degeneration must come. (indistinct) It’s not so-called revolution.

Prabhupada: So they are…

Dr. Patel: (indistinct) they degenerate for others. So that (indistinct) degenerate. We degenerated. So the Muslims degenerated. Americans will degenerate. Somebody else will degenerate. Is that sort of a will? No?

Prabhupada: So janmaisvarya-sruta-sri, good birth, riches, education, and sri, beauty, these are the result of pious activities.

Dr. Patel: When you say the present education and all… But this education has created those boys, smoking carasa and ganja and bhanga…

Prabhupada: That is not a university education. That is due to their coming to India.

Dr. Patel: They are…? They come to India and… They don’t do it there?

Prabhupada: Yes. Yes, they come here for spiritual enlightenment, and they meet these rascals, ganja-eater sadhus. That is the beginning.

Dr. Patel: But they have introduced that in American universities.

Prabhupada: No, no, no. I know. This is the beginning. They learned this… They thought that this is spiritualism.

Dr. Patel: I thought they have taught us.

Prabhupada: No, no, no.

Jayapataka: No, they imported…

Prabhupada: Your ganja, ganja-smoker, these so-called sadhus and just like… They have done this. By following these rascals, they are doing it. But they do not know who is sadhu…

Dr. Patel: And LSD was invented by Indians, no?

Mr. Sar: (indistinct) …other thing, you know.

Guest (2): Oh. (Hindi)

Guest (1): (Hindi)

Prabhupada: (Hindi)

Dr. Patel: I thought all these things intoxicants, are universal. Not only Indians.

Prabhupada: No, no, no, no. In the…

Dr. Patel: Even, even, even, it…

Prabhupada: No, no, in…

Dr. Patel: It was inculcated into the civilization of China.

Prabhupada: No, no. This I know definitely. The hippies, the hippies came to India. The hippies… (Dr. Patel and the Indian men argue in background)

Dr. Patel: All these… No, no, no! These are all come from America, sir. If you say like that, I am not going back, sir, day!

Prabhupada: No, no. No, no. The ganja, ganja was not in America.

Dr. Patel: That, that is not! But…

Prabhupada: That I am speaking. Unless they… (everyone yelling at once)

Dr. Patel: He says that LSD has been invented in India.

Guest (1): No, no! I never said these things!

Dr. Patel: Don’t…! Don’t pervert the things! Swamiji, I am very hot on wrong things and lies! This is an utter lie if you even say so… That LSD was invented in America. I am a scientist.

Mr. Sar: That is right.

Dr. Patel: And it has been used by American boys. And a professor of American university is a friend of mine. And he has been taken horrible things about American boys. And you are talking LSD has been invented in India!

Guest (1): No! I am talking…

Dr. Patel: Don’t talk all these things!!!

Guest (1): No, I am talks, sir… I am only talking of…

Dr. Patel: No, this is very wrong. Untruth is as good as a daitya. Truth is God. Truth is Krsna. Truthfulness. So how it may be? What do you say, sir?

Prabhupada: No, no. When we say ganja was started from here, it is God or not?

Guest (1): That’s all…

Dr. Patel: Ganja is God. What is that? In ganja also you’ll get that, that, that state of samadhi those who get it, they get it. I mean, that is all right. But you said like that, that LSD is invented in India.

Guest (1): No! I never said LSD… Why you are putting…?

Prabhupada: No, no. When they started ganja… When they started ganja… They were scientific men. They wanted to make scientific chemicals out of it.

Dr. Patel: That’s right. That’s right. That is the right thing. I mean, truth you must have…

Prabhupada: But the…

Dr. Patel: Don’t talk all these things. I cannot tolerate a lie, falsehood of banias (?). I am a first-class enemy of falsehood. For truth I am prepared to get hanged. That is very wrong to tell that LSD was invented in India.

Guest (1): No, I never said that LSD…

Dr. Patel: Tum bola (?).

Guest (1): No, no, no, no, no. That is a… (Hindi) That is the mistake, you see, of the…

Dr. Patel: All right, I am quiet. Lay down now. (laughter)

Prabhupada: No, actually, this is a fact. This ganja smoking, they have learned from India.

Dr. Patel: No, but ganja, they say, some of the people say that you come in such trance. It’s an artificial trance.

Prabhupada: They say also like that!

Dr. Patel: Hm. These boys.

Prabhupada: They… These hippies, they also say that by marijuana… They call marijuana… They call marijuana? Or what is called?

Devotees: Marijuana.

Prabhupada: Marijuana. So they learned this ganja smoking… They came here for spiritual enlightenment, but they do not know who can give them spiritual enlightenment. They went to these rascals, ganja-smoker, having long beard…

Dr. Patel: But there is a great smuggling racket the whole world, Swamiji.

Prabhupada: No, no. When they… I know that Allen Ginsberg. He learned this…

Tamala Krsna: Yeah, in India.

Prabhupada: But he’s a great poet. He learned this ganja smoking from India.

Dr. Patel: The English boys, the French boys, the Germans, all of them have started in the… They don’t come here as hippies. This is an international disease.

Prabhupada: They learned from America. That’s a fact. The hippie movement started from America.

Dr. Patel: Now, hippie movement started from America. That means they started first. Not after coming to India…

Prabhupada: But they learned it from India.

Dr. Patel: No.

Prabhupada: They came here… I have got many students. They came here for spiritual enlightenment, but they learned ganja smoking and keeping high, big beard. You know. There is a sannyasa-asrama in Delhi. And people contribute them ganja. Not only they, I know… My father, he was also attached to so many sannyasis. So in Kali- ghata, there was a sannyasi…

Dr. Patel: Sannyasis, those naga-babas, they smoke.

Prabhupada: Not naga… He was a regular sannyasi, Mayavadi sannyasi. So my father was giving them the saffron cloth and ganja. People accept it that this is one of the items.

Dr. Patel: That ganja should be given.

Prabhupada: Yes. Yes, so badly impressed. So this ganja-smoking has spread all over the world as the hippie movement.

Dr. Patel: I thought that the hippies started from those, this (indistinct) part.

Prabhupada: No, no. The hippie movement was started from India. You see so many ganja-smokers, they are sadhus, baba-sadhu.

Dr. Patel: Babas also, those naga-babas, they all smoke…

Prabhupada: No, no. Naga and also “saga (?)” also. All of them ganja-… (laughs)

Guest (1): But, uh, but, uh…

Prabhupada: Eh? In Calcutta there was a big poet, Girish-chandra Ghosh. Perhaps you heard his name.

Dr. Patel: Yes.

Prabhupada: He started Indian state. He was a first-class ganja smoker.

Dr. Patel: They get in a trance, and…

Prabhupada: That, that… You have got appreciation for this trance.

Dr. Patel: They have got a trance. They get a trance…

Prabhupada: You are, you are smelling.

Dr. Patel: Yes.

Prabhupada: Yes. You never condemn it.

Dr. Patel: I won’t condemn it if it is good, and if it is bad, I will condemn it.

Prabhupada: No, no. It is bad.

Dr. Patel: Every bad thing has good also. Some good quality must be there.

Prabhupada: (laughs) No, no, no.

Dr. Patel: So they have taken to it. I don’t…

Prabhupada: That is another thing. That is another thing. Just like opium. Opium, for common man, it is bad. But you are a physician; you can use opium, tincture opium for some certain use.

Dr. Patel: Therefore I say.

Prabhupada: That is another thing.

Dr. Patel: Same thing, I say. The same reasoning.

Prabhupada: But they are not physicians. They are ordinary men.

Dr. Patel: So it is bad for them.

Prabhupada: What is… What is… What is food for one is poison for another.

Dr. Patel: Yes. That is what I said. The worst poisons have got the best qualification in them for saving lives. That is my point and that is what I was speaking of.

Prabhupada: So when it is ruining life, how you can say it the best?

Dr. Patel: But it doesn’t save the live of someone?

Prabhupada: That I know also. But that is in different use. You cannot take. Just like even a snake poison, venomous, that is also used for saving lives. But that does not mean the snake is good.

Dr. Patel: I mean it is not good for majority.

Prabhupada: Yes. So I am talking of the majority.

Dr. Patel: Everything made by God is made with an intention of…

Prabhupada: No, no. We are talking of the majority, not of the small minority.

Dr. Patel: All is, everything is made by God with intentions of fulfillment of His lila or maya or whatever you call it. No? And all these, all these ausadhis, these caras, what do you call, the vanaspati-ausadhis, they have also venomous poison in them.

Prabhupada: Oh yes. Vanausadhi loke jayate paramam (?).

Dr. Patel: So many, so many plants are extremely poisonous. And the poisonous plants are the plants which give the best medicine. As for example, digoxen(?), digitalis, life-saving in heart disease. If you eat a leaf, you will die.

Prabhupada: Then, just like in your dispensary, you keep everything medicine. But it is to be given to different persons, different medicine. Not that because it is medicine you give to everyone.

Dr. Patel: No, what I mean to say is that this pan or ganja, they might have used used by some for a good aim. But it has been misused by a majority of men.

Prabhupada: So they are innocent people. They have imitated. Our, these so-called sadhu says that Lord Siva used to smoke ganja. That is their… So they have become Lord Siva. Lord Siva drunk the whole poison ocean and he kept it here. So you drink one drop of poison. But these rascals, they compare with Siva, with Krsna. “Krsna danced with girls. Therefore we must have.” These Mayavadis do that. I know.

Dr. Patel: You are… You have to… I’ve been… That is what I have, as one of the members of the Vaisnava family, think, that you have to worship God not with the body consciousness, but with the soul consciousness. Then there is no question of Krsna dancing with girls. It is a higher soul embracing the lower souls to him. Plain it has been…

Prabhupada: No, no.

Dr. Patel: That is what we have been taught from our early days.

Prabhupada: These rascals, they do not know what is Krsna or what is Krsna’s behavior.

Dr. Patel: And that is right. Even for them. I have no objection if you call me a Mayavadi.

r229 Prabhupada: Yes, a Mayavadi. I know.

Dr. Patel: I have no objection…

Prabhupada: I know! I know certainly. I challenge you. In Karachi, there was Om-sampradaya. And they were calling for young girls and your…

Dr. Patel: That is wrong.

Prabhupada: Yes! That, the Mayavadi! That Mayavadi. Because he thought himself that “I am Krsna.”

Dr. Patel: That is where we differ, Vaisnavas. Because we take Krsna’s lila…

Prabhupada: Just you hear me! He thought himself that “I am Krsna.”

Dr. Patel: That is wrong. Nobody is Krsna.

Prabhupada: So I am talking that. So he was a paka Mayavadi. And gentlemen were offering their daughters and their wives to dance.

Guest (2): (Hindi)

Prabhupada: (Hindi)

Guest (2): (Hindi)

Prabhupada: (Hindi) I’ll kick on their face!

Guest (2): (Hindi)

Dr. Patel: Because it has been wrongly explained, the whole…

Prabhupada: Therefore these kind of things are done by the Mayavadis.

Dr. Patel: Krsna-lila is not explained properly by any…

Prabhupada: Mayavadis!

Dr. Patel: …other thing than the Vaisnavas. All is wrongly understood by all other fellows excepting Vaisnavas, true Vaisnavas. That Krsna, as he was Supersoul…

Prabhupada: Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu has condemned these rascal Mayavadis: mayavadi haya krsne aparadhi. The greatest offender to Krsna is these Mayavadis. Greatest offenders.

Guest (3): (Hindi conversation)

Prabhupada: There are so many. Even in…

Dr. Patel: (Hindi)

Prabhupada: Even in… I do not wish to say. Even this Kalyana, Kalyana, Kalyana proprietor, that Goenka.

Tamala Krsna: Goenka.

Prabhupada: He was doing that. In Calcutta. Govinda Bhavan.

Dr. Patel: Goenka?

Prabhupada: Yes.

Dr. Patel: This Goenka.

Prabhupada: Not this Goenka. That…

Tamala Krsna: In Gorakhpur, Gita Press.

Prabhupada: He was a paka Mayavadi.

Guest (4): Gita Press?

Prabhupada: Yes.

Dr. Patel: Oh, that Goenka of Gita Press.

Prabhupada: Yes.

Dr. Patel: Yes.

Guest (4): (Hindi)

Dr. Patel: No. That is because of degeneration of the lower fellows. They are not understanding the real teaching of Bhagavata.

Prabhupada: Yes. I have heard about that, about the Vallabha-sampradaya. Yes. I do not know whether it is fact. I have heard.

Tamala Krsna: Oh, about?

Dr. Patel: He belonged to Vallabha-sampradaya.

Prabhupada: I do not know. I have heard that after marriage the girl was offered to guru.

Mr. Sar: No, that is not in Vallabha-sampradaya.

Dr. Patel: No, no, no.

Mr. Sar: No, on ours… Not on Gujarat side.

Dr. Patel: Nowhere, nowhere. It is all hearsay. I don’t think it would be possible.

Mr. Sar: You see it is a…

Dr. Patel: Maybe a lower community…

Mr. Sar: No, no. Ignorant folk may be decepted like that when they say, “Well, I am Krsna, you are gopis. So let us enjoy.”

Prabhupada: Ah! Ah!

Mr. Sar: So ignorant folks… No, no. I tell you, this is the ignorant folks. That is likely to happen in all religions.

Prabhupada: No. Our Bhaktivinoda Thakura punished one Visikisena. I’ll tell that story. It is a fact. One avatara came. And he was doing that in the village. And they complained to the police officer. And it went to the High Commissioner. And then Bhaktivinoda Thakura was that time Magistrate. So the Commissioner knew that he is a pious man. So he entrusted the matter. And it was a long story. I’ll tell you some time.

Mr. Sar: No, no. The founders were well-intentioned, but then, after these followers, you see, they only looked to the rituals and not to the spirit…

Prabhupada: No, I don’t…

Mr. Sar: You know, they forget that this will be sukrtina. Bhakta should be sukrtina first, and then bhakta. That they forget. So it happens, you see, in all the…

Prabhupada: No, this thinking, that “I am as good as Krsna,” this Mayavada philosophy has done so much havoc.

Dr. Patel: The highest philosophy of all is that you must give your ego. So there is no question of “I” remaining there. Even in bhakti-yoga and in jnana-yoga, the real jnana-yoga. Falsehood, anything can be… Even in bhakti-marga also there are rascals, you know, who have done all sorts of humbug things.

Yasodanandana: They are Mayavadis.

Prabhupada: They were Mayavadis. The bhakti-marga… They call bhakti-marga. They are actually Mayavadis.

Dr. Patel: So you can get that degeneration from anywhere.

Tamala Krsna: Prabhupada?

Prabhupada: Eh?

Tamala Krsna: What about the philosophy that Krsna actually never danced with the gopis, but Krsna’s the Supersoul and the gopis are souls, but there is actually no dancing; that is simply allegory.

Prabhupada: Who says that?

Dr. Patel: I say.

Prabhupada: That is also Mayavada.

Dr. Patel: I say it.

Tamala Krsna: He says it.

Dr. Patel: And I, I, I own it of Mayavadi. With your grace, I own it. (Prabhupada chuckles) I… I… Isn’t Krsna Supersoul? Isn’t you a soul?

Prabhupada: That’s all right.

Dr. Patel: Have you not to worship Krsna…

Prabhupada: But that, that, that…

Dr. Patel: …as a soul and not a as a body?

Prabhupada: That philosophy, that Krsna never danced…

Dr. Patel: That is wrong.

Prabhupada: That is wrong.

Dr. Patel: That is wrong. That is wrong. But you have to worship Him as a soul,…

Prabhupada: That’s all right.

Dr. Patel: …and not as a body. If you worship Him as a body, with a body consciousness, I would not associate. I would not associate with you.

Prabhupada: No, that is mudha. That is mudha.

Dr. Patel: Ah! But some of these boys have been thinking like that.

Prabhupada: Krsna says Himself that avajananti mam mudhah. He is never this body. He has no distinction between… That has been done, analyzed by Mayavadi scholar, Dr. Radhakrishnan. When Krsna says that man-mana mad-bhakto mad-yaji mam namaskuru, he, he, I mean to say, warns, “It is not to the person Krsna.” That means he is making distinction between Krsna and Krsna’s inside. So he does not know what is Krsna, and he’s writing comment on Krsna. This is going on. It’s going on. (Hindi) Hare Krsna.

Yasomatinandana: Actually, this is so true, Prabhupada, because even in the western world, they are Christians. They may be fallen Christians, but they don’t think they are Christ. They may be fallen. They may not follow the principles…

Prabhupada: They say “Christ is God.”

Tamala Krsna: Yes, they also make mistakes.

Prabhupada: They also make that mistake.

Yasomatinandana: No, they are mistaken. That is, they understand their position is servant, but…

Tamala Krsna: This, this philosophy, that there’s allegory, that Krsna never danced with gopis, that…

Prabhupada: That is…

Tamala Krsna: …directly leads to Mayavadi philosophy.

Prabhupada: That is Mayavadi.

Tamala Krsna: Yes.

Guest (4): (Hindi for couple sentences.)

Prabhupada: He knows also.

Guest (4): I know also. He spoiled so many girls, you see.

Tamala Krsna: We have gone to him so many times in Calcutta.

Guest (4): (Hindi) This is the story of before ten or fifteen years old.

Tamala Krsna: Yeah, and now he’s at the head of that Gita Press.

Prabhupada: Hiralal.

Guest: No, no, no, no, no. Not that Gunda (?). That is different. (Hindi)

Tamala Krsna: No, but Prabhupada was speaking of that one.

Bhava-bhuti: It was Gandhi who said that Arjuna was the soul, that it is all allegory, too. He also interpreted Gita like that.

Prabhupada: Yes, he interpreted like that.

Bhava-bhuti: So same Mayavadi concept.

Yasomatinandana: That is also Radhakrishnan who said that battlefield of Kuruksetra is just a battle of soul and something…

Prabhupada: Yes.

Yasomatinandana: The five Pandavas are the five senses, and the… Five Pandavas are the five senses actually. There is nothing like Mahabharata war.

Bhava-bhuti: All allegory they want to dismiss it as.

Yasomatinandana: They think that this is all idols.

Tamala Krsna: So then you should take your shoe and hit them in the face and say, “This is also allegory of how the material world slaps one.” Actually…

Yasomatinandana: He says that Vyasadeva is an imaginary character.

Prabhupada: And in India the Mayavada poison has overflooded.

Tamala Krsna: Yes.

Prabhupada: Everywhere. Everywhere.

Guest (4): (some Hindi conversation)

Bhava-bhuti: Just like they import ganja, they import Mayavadi philosophy also.

Prabhupada: In America.

Bhava-bhuti: Yeah. And all these books.

Tamala Krsna: Yes. Actually the Mayavadi philosophy was started with Vivekananda. Because I don’t find in the Christian faith that they are Mayavadis. Their belief is service to God. Of course, they are somewhat Mayavadis. But this real strong Mayavadi was brought from East with Buddhism and Vivekananda’s philosophy.

Prabhupada: Yes.

Tamala Krsna: When I was studying, you know, books…

Prabhupada: Nirvisesa-sunyavadi.

Yasomatinandana: Jaya, Srila Prabhupada! (Prabhupada chuckles)

Prabhupada: All sunyavadis, Mayavadis, yes. Impersonalists.

Bhava-bhuti: That’s why this Krsna consciousness philosophy is so unique. [break] (end)