The following is the class given by HH Jayapataka Swami on Dec 3rd, 1990 in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

The class begins with the reading from the Srimad Bhagavatam Canto 3, Chapter 31, Text 29.

SB 3.31.29

saha dehena mānena

 vardhamānena manyunā

karoti vigrahaṁ kāmī

 kāmiṣv antāya cātmanaḥ

Translation:

With the growth of the body, the living entity, in order to vanquish his soul, increases his false prestige and anger and thereby creates enmity towards similarly lusty people.

Purport:

In Bhagavad-gītā, Third Chapter, verse 36, Arjuna inquired from Kṛṣṇa about the cause of a living being’s lust. It is said that a living entity is eternal and, as such, qualitatively one with the Supreme Lord. Then what is the reason he falls prey to the material and commits so many sinful activities by the influence of the material energy? In reply to this question, Lord Kṛṣṇa said that it is lust which causes a living entity to glide down from his exalted position to the abominable condition of material existence. This lust circumstantially changes into anger. Both lust and anger stand on the platform of the mode of passion. Lust is actually the product of the mode of passion, and in the absence of satisfaction of lust, the same desire transforms into anger on the platform of ignorance. When ignorance covers the soul, it is the source of his degradation to the most abominable condition of hellish life.

To raise oneself from hellish life to the highest position of spiritual understanding is to transform this lust into love of Kṛṣṇa. Śrī Narottama dāsa Ṭhākura, a great ācārya of the Vaiṣṇava sampradāya, said, kāma kṛṣṇa-karmārpaṇe: due to our lust, we want many things for our sense gratification, but the same lust can be transformed in a purified way so that we want everything for the satisfaction of the Supreme Personality of Godhead. Anger also can be utilized towards a person who is atheistic or who is envious of the Personality of Godhead. As we have fallen into this material existence because of our lust and anger, the same two qualities can be utilized for the purpose of advancing in Kṛṣṇa consciousness, and one can elevate himself again to his former pure, spiritual position. Śrīla Rūpa Gosvāmī has therefore recommended that because in material existence we have so many objects of sense gratification, which we need for the maintenance of the body, we should use all of them without attachment, for the purpose of satisfying the senses of Kṛṣṇa; that is actual renunciation.

Thus ends the Bhaktivedanta Swami translation and purport toText 29  Chapter 31, Canto 3 of the Srimad Bhagavatam in the matter of allurements of the living entity

In continuation of the teachings of Kapila Muni , the movements of living entities on sankhya, the nature of the conditioning of the living entity is detailed in this chapter. What is false in the living entity to go from one body to the next, why the living entity the spirit soul gets conditioned in material life, it has been explained in the Gita. Srila Prabhupad mentioned in the Bhagavad Gita how Lord Krishna reveals that lust was the cause of our conditioning in material life. So, here this is further detailed. Srila Prabhupad portrayed the modern society, the society in the west which is more like a jungle and the competitors are like tigers or lions, where every competition is survival of the fittest. It is not an easy world. People become so frustrated that they commit suicide. On the stock market crash in America couple of years ago, some people jumped out of the window, they lost 150 million dollars in one hour, one month, 2 months. Like this , in this very heavy tension, very strong lust, so this also compels people to break the law. Recently some of these big multimillionaires were arrested by the security agencies for breaking the regulation, insiders tradings, various kinds of stock market regulations where they are misusing information for taking advantage and making more money. So, this is seen that people even in public places , where the Mayor of Washington DC was arrested for taking cocaine drugs. ______( inaudible 7.17- 7.27)

So strong desires, lusty desires are keeping people in this bodily concept of life. So Prabhupad states that you need to take this tendency and purify it by engaging them in the service to Krishna. The strong desire to satisfy, gratify your senses can be purified by service to Krishna. Instead of wanting everything for our senses, we should want everything for the satisfaction of the Supreme Personality of Godhead. Srila Prabhupad wanted to have all the nicest facilities for Krishna. Just like in Mayapur, he said we can have airport, we should have ships, one ship going between Calcutta and Mayapur, little boats, can have all such nice good facilities. Infact during the time of His Divine  Grace  Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Thakur, he had an automobile. Now, everybody has an automobile. But at that time, this was nearly the only the second or the third automobile. First with a private citizen in the whole of eastern India, apart from maybe the viceroy of India and the England and few other British rulers, he was the only one to have a car. So, when he drove down the street, everybody was like “Wow”.

Inaudible (9.6 to 9:11)

So, he was actually using that for preaching. Actually when some of his sanyasis were going down to the drug store or something, then he brought a letter which said, ordering  that for preaching you can use the vehicle to preach. But if you want to just go down to the market to get something, then just walk.  So, the vehicle was there and it was a valuable thing then, not like now, you can’t live without a vehicle practically. Everything is so spread out. Srila Prabhupad mentioned that the modern society we think that this is a luxury because we have a vehicle but actually, before everything was compact, people lived together with their family members, all the places were in walking distance. Now if we just have to meet a friend, we have to drive 10, 20 miles, if we want to do some shopping, so everything is so spread out.____(10.18 not clear) A little bit of inattentiveness and you can have an accident. Actually life becomes more dangerous because of  expansion of the mode of passion.

So, what we think is the advancement of civilization is actually putting us into many more hardships. To counteract the hardships we have the machines. But then to maintain those machines is another hardship and so on. So things become very complicated unnecessarily. But sense gratification just becomes a headache. When we use that for Krishna, when we use anything and everything for Krishna, then it becomes a source of our deliverance. So the devotee wants the best for Krishna. One time Srila Prabhupad mentioned that there were some yogis or some professional (11.20) or Gurus in India, they refuse to touch money. They don’t touch money. Actually they collect lacs of rupees every night, check account and they sign cheques, but officially they don’t touch money. Their secretaries handle it. So Srila Prabupad said that I don’t have any problem.  I can take money with two hands. (Devotees Laugh). I’m not using it for myself. I’m only using it for Krishna. He wanted to do so many things for Krishna. But when devotees, even when they give a million dollars or greater, he would spend it all for Krishna, building nice temples, building nice facilities or serving in Krishna consciousness, to build nice facilities for the Lord, for propagating His message. So here in a country where 15, 16% of the population is basically Hindu, there shouldn’t be any difficulty in convincing them of the importance of spreading the vedic culture, of devotion in its pure form, in a form which can reach the masses.  There’s some kind of difficulty in convincing people to give for renting their house, but to give for starting this kind of a public facility which would be their asset, the asset of their community. Not only the Hindus, but every member of the society could do that. So, naturally, this has a wide appeal to many people in this particular society. There is a need to convince people to engage  their energy in spiritual pursuits. People are generally convinced that we need material and social welfare work and so they are putting their energy in that. But they don’t realize that if adequate spiritual purification of the society is not performed, then people will go on creating bad karmas, go on creating this type of material situation. So there is no end to the social welfare work that has to be done. So long as people are eating meat, there is going to be suffering various kind of cancer and other diseases which creates toxins in the blood. As long as people are overwhelmed by lust and engage in illicit sexual activities, there is going to be many diseases like AIDS and so many other problems of that nature. As long as people are ignorant of their internal self and the spiritual purpose in life, there might exist all these anxieties of this trans culture, (not clear 14.6 – 14.18)

 People of Malaysia, the poor people, they take shelter of this intoxication. So, for instance, when I was preaching there, some Chinese chap would say, I can follow the principle of vegetarianism, no problem. I can handle that. And intoxication, alright, but no  gambling- that’s impossible. There is a very big Chinese community to gamble. So in different countries and different places could be attached to different illicit  activities. In America, may be gambling is  the easiest thing to give up. But meat eating and intoxication may be more difficult. But in other countries, people may be more attached to gambling.

So in the Srimad Bhagavatam, the Kali is depending on these four activities for his strength. If you stop these four activities, then the influence of Kali is curtailed. Then it is possible to establish a society based on higher spiritual values. So generally people in this part of the world appreciate, although they may  not be able to practice,  atleast they appreciate that this type of high, pure standard of living is something very laudable, something very important. I know that in Thailand, where there are 200,000 monks, when the people hear about our principles, immediately they appreciate that this is the highest principle. ___ not clear.(16.02-04) That’s why they appreciate Krishna consciousness as abiding the highest principles not only of vedic culture but also Buddhistic culture. There is a very wide appeal. We can simply project our own image, what we actually stand for, purest standard of living. Srila Prabupad wanted us to make that sacrifice of not compromising on our principles.

There are so many Mayavadi groups who say Jagat mitya, Brahma satya, the world is false, only the absolute is eternal, real. But in practicality, they simply open hospitals, open clinics, open different welfare activities, they talk of the world being false, but  they simply engage in worldly activities. Srila Prabupada said that in the world, there is only one organization which is based on pure spiritual principles, one organization that people can know that this organization is uncompromising the pure spiritual nature and although initially there may be many materialistic attached people who may not appreciate that. But as our books are distributed, as we properly explain to them what is the real purpose of life, what is the nature of life, those who are intelligent, Srila Prabhupada said, they will appreciate.

Of course many pure spiritual life activities are real life welfare activities like  Food for life programmes, our counseling to people, to get them out of these  influences of Kali, get them rehabilitated from drugs and from other bad habits. Many of our members had bad habits before they came, but we help them get cured, some came without any bad habits. The percentage of Srila Prabhupad’s cure was about 99%,. To get good results, if you follow completely, you get 100% (18.04)

This way, Srila Prabhupada was very concerned that we maintain the purity of our presentation and the purity of our image. He said that Krishna conscious philosophy should be known as very honest and 18.17 people. They are the watch dogs to show that ISKCON is pure. ( not clear 18.24 to 18.53)

So this is the trick of Kali. Parikshit maharaj, did a little mistake, he put a snake on the shoulder of the sage who was in meditation being overwhelmed by hunger,thirst thinking that the sage was just ignoring him (19.12) . When the son of the sage heard that, then he cursed Parikshit to die saying what type of ksatriya is this. When the father heard it, he didn’t take it seriously at all.(19.24) Even in this modern society, if you had to do something like that, putting a snake on the shoulder, you go to the police, it would not be a major crime, you probably have to pay a fine. It is certainly an offence, but not (19.43). Certainly Parikshit maharaj felt out of place doing such a foolish thing, at the time,he had become overwhelmed showing how under extreme circumstances, even a great person can become affected. Of course, in this circumstance, we know that Pariksit was brought under by the direct will of (20.11)Krishna to enable the Srimad Bhagavatam to be spoken. In Kaliyuga, an opportunity to enter the span and  for a little offence, Pariksit was given a death sentence. So Srila Prabhupad explains that we should be very careful about ____(not clear - 20.24)

Lord Chaitanya said that even a small defect on the part of a person will get picked up just like in a white sheet, a black dot would get picked up.If you are wearing a black sheet and you have a black spot, nobody will see it. White sheet, it is clear. Those who are practicing spiritual standards, even a small thing can look big, so our preachers have to be very careful, such bad spots can create a bad image.

Not clear (21.00 to 21.42)

Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, he was preaching Krishna consciousness personally. The supreme personality of Godhead, he told his followers to avoid this type of sense gratification. In the siksastaka, He also espouses complete dedication to Krishna, non desire for the attractive features of material sense gratification.

Na dhanam Na Janam Na sundharim kavitam va jagadisa kamaye

mama janmani janmanisvare bhavatad bhaktir ahaituki tvayi

We want no wealth, don’t have desire for accumulation of a lot of wealth, have no desire for any material powers or create material followers. Some times you see that some devotees have a musician bug. There want to be the famous musicians. When they become famous musicians, that time they can preach to their followers. But actually, modern fans, material followers, they are not so flexible. We heard one time, George Harrison was playing Indian music and he wanted to present spiritual soft music and his followers threw shoes at him, telling him to play rock and roll. We don’t want to hear all that. We personally had Balasubramaniam, Jesudas, they were big south indian singers. So in a programme at Madras, Jesudas would play the kannada, Karnataka, classical music and his fans would start shouting out the names of cinema songs, different singers songs because it is part of charity, he just told them that that I have come to sing this particular type of song. Devotees Laugh.

Not clear (23.45 to 23.59)

They weren’t happy. The next Balasubramaniam, he surrendered. He just started singing nice cinema songs. Janmastami gala, he cannot maintain the poor spiritual mood because everybody wanted it that way of sense gratification. Once they get money, they want to grab the (24.28) Once you do free drama, free program, then people appreciate. (24.38) So these big people are actually at the mercy of their fans. The material followers are all full of anger and gratification. If you see in India, the follower of the political leader would ask for many clarification. So the relationship is actually not pure devotional relationship at all or not very much a relationship at all, very much a relationship of mutual gratification vis a vis at Santipur, the birth place ashram of Srila Advaita Goswami for the release of one movie on Advaita Acharya. One of the famous Bengali actor who had featured in more than 200 featured films Mr Kalidarji, famours film, screen. He is quite old now. He was going to play Adwaita Goswami. Not audible (25.39)They didn’t advertise. They didn’t tell anybody. But somehow the word got out, so hundreds and hundreds or may be thousands or more of Indians watched that out. Cinema actors, stars, they all appeared out of nowhere, trying to have like a patch stick ______ (not clear 25.50 to 26.00)

So the head of the ashram he wanted to speak something but what was happening was that when the actress, the star who was going to play Vishnupriya, she came out and the bad or the little hooligans there you know whistling, cat calling, people standing up and jumping over each other to take a glimpse of the star and the actor and then there is chaos.

Not clear ( 26.29 to 26.39)

Everyone was jumping Oh movie star!! Then they had to take the actors to the back stage or lock them in cage. People were clamouring and beating on their chests ( not audible 26.50 to 27.15) They quiet for a minute and then again they go back and again screaming and get beating and all. (Devotees laugh)

So later that ashram Guru ( not clear 27.18 to 27.40) ( Devotees laugh)

In the west, one of these rock and roll woman singer was molested by the fans and they got wild. Not clear (27.48) So it is very dangerous and they have to have high security. (Not clear 27.57 to 28.02.)

So, this was completely in the mood of passion and ignorance. So who wants it? What’s the use of that kind of followers? These are mad kind of people.

Lord Chaitanya Mahaprabhu told

Na dhanam, Na Janam na sundarim

Even Life after life I simply want to engage in your devotional service. So, the Hussain Shah, emperor of Bengal , he couldn’t  appreciate that Lord Chaitanya, he had many followers. He had hundreds of thousands of followers. What Hussain Shah did not understand was that Lord Chaitanya’s followers were of a different kind. Lord Chaitanya was not desiring any material followers. But people came to him to get spiritual blessings. So one time when Lord Chaitanya was just few miles from the capital of the empire, he met Rupa and Sanatana Goswami. That time the Emperror heard that Lord Chaitanya was there and he was intelligent. He asked his ministers, who is Chaitanya mahaprabhu? So the ministers were very shy to speak, because they thought, may be Hussain Shah, how puffed up he is,  he may get envious or something and may kill him in one way or other. So they said, he is a mendicant, he just goes around, he doesn’t have any money, he has no material possessions. Hussain shah said, no I don’t agree. So they asked Hussain shah who do you think he is? You are the emperor. You are the representative of God on Earth. You protect the people. You can say better who he is. So  Hussain Shah replied that he is non different from God, non different from Allah, non different from Quran. Everyone was shocked. How could a Mohamedan say that Lord Chaitanya was non different from allah?

Then they asked, Lord, how is it that you have come to this conclusion? He said, all of you , why are you working for me? You are my material followers. Why you are working for me? Why my generals are working for me? Why my governors are working for me? Because I am paying all of you. If I didn’t give you money, you wouldn’t be working for me.  I think if I didn’t give any material gratification to my wife, she may also leave me. Everybody is working because I am paying them, because I have the treasury of the king. ( not audible 30.40) If I don’t have that, who will work for me? I am the emperor, but nobody wants to work for me. They all want something.

But Lord Chaitanya mahaprabhu has nothing. He has no material facility. Definitely he must have the spiritual potency why everyone is going after him , even big ministers, big people, society lords, they are surrendering unto him, working for him, serving him without any remuneration , completely, free of all gratification, giving up everything (31.18)and they are satisified. They are staying with him. Lord Chaitanya has demonstrated by representing Krishna consciousness truly. There was actually no lack of followers. There was no lack of public support. Similarly, the six goswamis, they lived in Vrindavan. They had no material facility. They just had a little kaupina and little pot. But the biggest temples in India , Northern India, till today, although some of them have been knocked down by the invaders, are those in Vrindavan. But they all have (32:00))shalagram sheela Krishna , Deity of Krishna(Not clear 32.01 to 32.20)

So you want spiritual type of followers, those followers who can understand the importance of engaging their energy in Krishna’s service. Those people who are actually degratified, not clear (32.30 to 32.46)

So then, Bhakti Siddhanta Thakur named him “Babaji”not clear (32.50 to 33.00)

All the previous acharyas saw that somebody has wealth and they give it in the service of Krishna. Devotees remain in the same simple life style. They don’t need to increase their own liabilities, but for Krishna, they can do something. Here, Malaysia is a country, where people are advanced country. This is what they call it – newly industrialized country – NIC , one of the riches countries of South East Asia. Here its nice to have a fabulous multi functional preaching temple. Its not gigantic, but its very functional, it’s a very good example of practical service oriented facility where people can assemble and practice Krishna Consciousness.

Chant

Hare Krishna Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna Hare Hare

Hare Rama Hare Rama Rama Rama Hare Hare

Have meditation. Chinese people like meditation. So we can introduce ot clear 34.20) Tai chi . It is known among all meditations, among all yogas, Bhaki yoga is the best. Taichiya yoga. (Devotees laugh)

Japanam janma japa asmi - out of all types of meditation, all type of sacrifice(japa), meditating on the name of Krishna, we should introduce that. (Devotees laugh) Time, place and circumstance, we have to present this chanting.

People who get to chant, then they can quickly get results.  Somehow or other we have to get them to chant. They need to read Srila Prabhupadas books because if they read, they can immediately understand the need of chanting. If they don’t have taste for chanting, but if they have taste for prasadam, prasadam also will give one taste for chanting by purifying their senses. So, process is very complete.

So we can see here in this verse, how the spirit is vanquished by false prestige, anger,lust. The same thing, if we use it in Krishna’s service, then we can liberate the soul. 

Transcribed by: Medhavini Sakhi dd 

Date of Completion: 27 Sep 2017