1. Sukadeva Gosvami was not an astronomer and neither am I

    We were walking in the park, Nitai had been telling us all about the.. He was travelling with Prabhupada as the Sanskrit, [editor] at the time. About the shape of the earth. So Visvakarma was really disturbed at that. And he said, “Srila Prabhupada! Nitai said that the Bhagavatam says that the world is flat.” Prabhupada says, “so the Bhagavatam says.” “But, but I mean what will we tell the karmis?” Prabhupada said, “tell them the world is round and give them a book.” [laughter].

    At the same time I asked Prabhupada some questions about the shape of the universe. “Srila Prabhupada it says in the Bhagavatam that there is this mountain called Meru, Sumeru and it is so tall and it is a golden mountain. So what if I get an aeroplane and fly over it? It’s supposed to be somewhere near China. What if I get an aeroplane and fly over it? Will I see it? He said, “no.” He said, “because you do not have the eyes to see, even if you go there.” And then I said to him about, “I mean the earth is.. I’m trying to understand the position of the planets and how this all works.” And Prabhupada said, “I don’t know,” he said, “Sukadeva Gosvami was not an astronomer and neither am I. Our businesses is to train up men and to send them all over the world to establish the preaching effort. We should always be thinking how this movement will be established in every corner of the globe. So men should always be going out.” I was very impressed by the fact that he was talking so expansively you know because I wasn’t actually thinking very expansively and I don’t think anybody else was and he was really talking about expanding.

    Told by Adi-Kesava Dasa