Bhagavad-gita begins with the spiritual instruction that one is not the body but is within the body. This consciousness can be possible only if one chants the holy name of Krsna, the Hare Krsna maha-mantra, and always keeps oneself in the association of devotees. This is the secret of success. Therefore we stress that one should chant the holy […]

They are manufacturing different ways of suffering. And there is no happiness. Simply the business is going on, manufacturing different ways of suffering. This is our material disease, and it is recommended that before the next death, if we come to the right conclusion how we shall become happy, then this process of continuously dying and again taking birth […]

Devotee (1): For someone whose determination wavers and slackens here and there, is there ever a point where the neophyte devotee is in danger of just forgetting everything and falling, tumbling completely backwards? Prabhupada: Everyone is neophyte. He should practice determination, that’s all. If he cannot practice, then why should he enter into this association? Let him remain aloof. […]

Syamasundara: He sees this happiness in a communal aspect. It must be for the greatest number. So he advocates a democracy where everyone is given unlimited individual freedom. Prabhupada: That is also another nonsense. In democracy nobody is happy. The so-called democracy does not give anyone any happiness. Otherwise in America, the greatest democratic country, why there are […]

Live with the minimum necessities. Don’t increase your necessities unnecessarily. This is Vedic civilization. And the modern civilization is ever increase your necessities — a machine for shaving your cheek. Another machine, another attention diversion. More machine means more diversion of attention. I have to take care, more technician, more technologies. Simply if one razor can shave, can make my […]

You should perceive your former life and the impressions from it as conducive to performing bhajana. In other words, you should realize that the unfavorable conditions of your past are in fact a platform for the manifestation of favorable ones in the present. It is the very calamities that arise in unfavorable conditions that subsequently give birth to favorable conditions […]

This craze for the gaudy baubles and trinkets of this world is responsible for the repugnance that is exhibited by the materialistic thinkers to any serious consideration of the real center of the principle that is distortedly reflected in the aesthetic enterprises of this mundane world. The attitude to condemn spiritual aesthetic without a hearing by infatuated reliance on its […]

Prabhupada: Why Christ was killed? What fault? What is his fault? Just see. Was there any fault in his words? He advised, “Don’t kill,” and he was crucified. We have to deal with such rascals. I may be representative, but he is directly son of God. People are so rascal that they did not believe even the son of […]

Without tapasya you cannot be purified. That little tapasya we have prescribed, that “Rise early in the morning at half past three.” But they are so downtrodden, they cannot do it. “Let me sleep five minutes more. I’ll enjoy.” You see? Such downtrodden. They were performing austerities, standing in the water in winter season, and we are recommending, “Please rise […]

You are working as a medical practitioner. So you earn lakhs of rupees. Give to Krsna. That is tam abhyarcya. Then you become perfect. That is also confirmed in Bhagavata. Atah pumbhir dvija-sresthah [SB 1.2.13]. Everyone is working according to varna and asrama. So svanusthitasya dharmasya. Anyone who is serving according to his dharma — an engineer, a doctor, […]

The wealth of the world actually belongs to Krsna, and every living entity, man and animal, has the birthright to use God’s property for his maintenance. When one takes more than his maintenance requires — be he a capitalist or a communist — he is a thief, and as such he is liable to be punished by the laws […]

I have seen in the airplane, they eat meat, a little piece, not a lump. But because everyone is eating little, little, we require huge number of slaughterhouses. But if one decides, “I have got so many preparations to eat, so why shall I eat a little meat? I shall forego,” immediately he is saved from so many sinful […]