Srimad-Bhagavatam 10.5.3-4
Bhakti Vijnana Goswami · Bombay · 2011
Chapters
Recitation of Srimad-Bhagavatam verses
I'm going to say something like this, I'm going to say all the same. I'm going to still involve the world. Oṁ namo bhagavate vāsudevāya. Sudevaya Bhagavateva Sudeva Namaskri Kantatan
Chapter 5, The Meeting of Nanda Mahārāja and Vasudeva, verses number three and four. Nelunang rada, prada, viprebya, viprebya, samalankrite, samalankite Diva Adriadri Sapta Sapha Radna O Gasatar Adna Sat Kumba Ambaravritann.
Nanami Yute Pradam, Yute Pradad, Vitrebak samankrite, samalankrite, tiladin saptaratnoga, sadakumbh Sattakamritam. Sama trip, prepia samlandr, saptar nog, saptarat nog, sattakumbara pritam, sattakumba Ladringsattarathnaga,
Ladriksattaratnaga, um Baba Bamba, Satan Bam, Vindunami U te Pradham Venanam Venan of milk giving house. Two million. Two million. Pradat Prad giving charity. Give in charity. It prep unto the Brahmanas. Unto the Brahmanas.
Samalankrit completely decorated. Completely decorated. Tila Adrim. Heels of Rain. Heels of brain. Sap Sapta Sapta seven Ratnaoga Satakumba Ambra Abrita Sapta Kam covered with jewels with jewels and cloth and gold embroidered
with gold. Embroidered with gold. Translation. Nanda Mahārāja gave two million cows, completely decorated with cloth and jewels, in charity to the Brahmins.
He also gave them seven hills of grain covered with jewels and clothes decorated with golden embroidery. Text number four. Kalina Sana Shochabyam Samskarais Tha sejaa
Sodyanati Danaik Santosya Dravayana Atma Atmatma Vidya King of word translation. Karinana. By due course of time. The land and other material things become purified. By breathing, the body becomes purified.
And by cleansing, unclean things become purified. Uncleans. Samska by purificatory processes. Birth becomes purified. Tapasa by austerity. Austerity. The senses become purified. The senses become purified.
The Brahmanas become purified. Suddhyanti become purified. Become purified. Danay by charity. The wealth becomes purified. Santushtyana by satisfaction, by satisfaction. The mind becomes purified. The mind becomes purified.
Radyani all material possessions. All material possessions. Such as cows, land, and gold. Such as cows, land and gold. Atma Atma, the soul. The soul becomes purified. Becomes purified. By self-realization. Self-realization.
O King, by the passing of time, land and other material possessions are purified. By bathing, the body is purified, and by being cleansed, unclean things are purified. By purificative ceremonies, doors is purified.
By austerity, the senses are purified. And by worship and charity, offered to the Brahmans, material possessions are purified.
Vedic principles of material purification
By satisfaction, the mind is purified, and by self-realization of Krishna consciousness, the soul is purified. These are shasti conjunctions concerning how one can purify everything according to Vedic civilization.
Unless purified, anything we use will infect us with contamination.
In India 5,000 years ago, even in the villages such as that of Nanda Mahārāja, people knew how to purify things and thus they enjoyed even material life without contamination.
O King, by this passing of time, land, land and other material possessions are purified by pain, the body is purified by being cleansed, and cleansings are purified.
By purificative ceremony, his gross is purified, by austerity, the senses are purified. And by worship and charity, offered to the brāhmaṇa's, material possessions are purified.
By satisfaction, the mind is purified and by self-realization of Kṛṣṇa consciousness, the soul is purified.
Put it another way on the Krishna Chaitanya Prabhupada, Jesus, Bhagavad Bakhtamba, Pray Krishna, Ray Krishna Krishna Krishna Heli Hre Ram Pregam Ram Rambi Kana Kabadak Sankatana So it's your permission.
And with the emission of Mathira. And this whole screen out trying to speak something on this topic. This fourth verse which we read Basically has two intended meanings which are very important for us to understand.
The question here and the context of these verses is that Nanda Mahārāja just received a beautiful child. The child was so beautiful that Nanda Mahārāja was completely mesmerized by the appearance of this child.
And all of a sudden instead of enjoying this bliss of watching and absorbing and seeing this beautiful child, he started all these frantic activities.
And the first verse of the śāstra said that he collected a huge amount of grains and he put all embroidered clothes over them and cows, millions of cows. It must have been quite a quite a festival.
And everyone who ever organized any festival knows it's a big head.
So nonetheless, immediately after getting the child, he started you know all these managerial activities, which we know very are detrimental for spiritual development.
Instead of meditating on this beautiful child, we started all this you know passionate activities and the question arises why? And the answer is given, it's very clear answer, because of the love for the child.
The love is never passive. Sometimes people have this contamination which is coming from beyond, from our understanding. The spiritual life is just meditation.
You just sit quietly in the corner and you meditate and this is the spiritual life. this conception of spiritual life is completely opposite to the understanding of bhakti.
Because bhakti means you run around because you are as busy like this.
You are completely, you know, externally you are doing all these passionate activities, but it's only external understanding because the motivation is love.
Nanda Mahārāja he was not meditating on the child but that was his real meditation on his newly born Krishna because due to this extreme attachment which immediately arose in his heart he started doing this.
Bhakti means that the meditation is there in the heart and because the meditation is there in the heart, the connection is there in the heart.
And the connection is so strong that you immediately want to do something, something practical. The meaning here is that love is never passive. Love, this again, this new age understanding of love, you know, I love you.
But what does it mean? You know, we had one um story, you know, one some at one point a group of people came to you know to our temple and
they were all impressive with my walk, new age kind of people, you know, they were very late and calling and then and then they wrote us a letter, we're sending your love. Very nice. What do we do with this love?
You're sending it to us. So the concept of bhakti is externally by some unintelligent people they they can't understand this. The concept of bhakti to them is seems to be something material.
You're doing something, you're engaged in seemingly material activities. But you're doing this not because of anything else but love to the Lord. And this is the example which we see in the case of Nanda Mahārāja.
And his first intention was immediately I have to make this a huge ceremony, a jatakarma ceremony, for my child.
Avoiding contamination through proper purification
Why? Because the verse has to be purified.
And this is the first meaning of this verse, first intended meaning of this verse, is that whatever we use, and Prabhupada explains this meaning in the purport, that whatever we use in our life has to be purified, otherwise, our consciousness, our heart will be polluted, contaminated.
Everything which we use, which is within our possession, whatever we encounter with in this life, has to be by specific procedure purified.
And Prabhupada explains that because people in India in Vedic culture know the art of purification. What is being purified by which means? They can live in this world without too much pollution.
This world and this world we're constantly associating with something which is polluting to the heart.
And in Bhagavad-gītā Krishna explains this, kāraṇaṁ guṇa-saṅgasya sad-asad-yoni-janmasu, that being born in this world in a bad and sanmasu, janmasuk, that being born in this world in a bad and good species of life due to the association with guṇas, kāraṇaṁ guṇa-saṅgasya.
And ultimately the art of living is to know how to live without being contaminated, without being polluted by this material association, which is you know we cannot avoid material association.
The material association will always be there, we always will one way or another associate with different gunas. And we know you know the vast how to say this, the predominant guṇa in this world is tamo-guṇa.
Basically this world is made of tamo-guṇa. So inevitably when we live in this world and we associate with this world, with the objects of this world, we interact with different things, the contamination will take place.
And unless you know the art of purification of everything which you are dealing with in this world, the contamination will be rooted more and more deeper in your heart. And this is what we see in the modern civilization.
The modern civilization is hopeless because of this one simple reason which is being explained by Prabhupāda in his purport. It's amazing, you know, in a very short purport, Prabhupāda gives a very deep, profound meaning.
Because people don't know this art how to purify things with which they interact, ultimately the pollution becomes more and more strong. And we see everything is polluted.
And this Kali Yuga, the pollution is all pervading. It's almost on the level of God, you know. God is all pervading, but in Kali Yuga the only all-pervading thing which is there is pollution. Everything is contaminated.
The air is contaminated. The water is contaminated. The food is contaminated. Sometimes people think, you know, especially these people who are again from this new age,
if we take sattvic food we'll be you know there is no sattvic food in Kali. The food which we take is not sattvic. It's done with all this insectivities and uh pesticides and insecticide, and you know.
You have to kill so many living entities before you produce this food. So where is the question of it being sattvic? There is no question of sātvika food in Kali-yuga.
You know, no matter what you try, however, how you try, how much you try. So what we see in Kali-yuga is this total complete contamination. Some people they're environmentally minded people that are trying to purify this.
But the problem is that people don't really know how to purify the things with which they interact. And before their basic interaction is not clean.
Because their basic interaction is not clean, the heart becomes polluted, and because the heart becomes polluted by greed, by lust, by envy, because of this, everything else is polluted.
The only thing you know we recently we went to big institute in Delhi which is dealing with this problem of habitat of the environment. How to make the environment more friendly.
You know, it's a huge institution, big building, you know, so many people are giving pain. But actually, you know, they're not they're not going to solve this problem. There is no chance for solving this problem.
Because of this simple reason, if the heart is polluted, everything else will automatically be polluted and pollution will be increasing incrementally exponentially
you know that's what we see we see the in Kali-yuga we see the exponential growth of contamination. And there's no way out of it.
The only way out was offered to us by our ācārya and by Śrīla Prabhupāda. He could see the root of the role. And he explains here, you know, how to avoid this contamination because this verse is explaining this.
He says in the previous age, in the previous era, which is far gone. People knew this art of material interaction with this material world, how to do this without being caught in the vicious circle of contamination.
In Bhagavad-gītā it is explained that the transcendentalist he is not contaminated even while living in this world.
Also, of course, because of his constant meditation on the Supreme Lord, but because he knows the subsidiary or secondary art of dealing with this world properly. And this verse explains this.
Prabhupāda specifically says that this verse, again, seemingly, superficially, is not talking about very high subject matter. But it's a very superficial and scenic understanding and I will try to explain why a little later.
Purifying existence through samskaras and charity
But even this superficial, so-called superficial understanding is very important and what is being said here basically
Nanda Mahārāja because he knew this art of purifying he knew the child was born and the first thing, first beauty which I have to do, I
have to purify his birth by this jātakarma ceremony, by the saṁskāra. It is explained specifically here that your birth, your janma, the only way to purify your janma or to help the living entity to deal properly with the karma, with the residue of the karma which we all bring in this world, and the only way of dealing properly with this is to perform saṁskāras. We all come into this world with polluted heart due to previous contamination which was there.
There is no one who is completely pure, of course sometimes the pure devotee comes here, but that's an exception of the rule. The rule is simple, they're all how to say this little dirty.
We come with some tendencies which are not very healthy for our spiritual development.
You know, I I may be a little bold of saying this, but every one of us has some little lust in our heart. And every one of us has some greed and some anger and so many other things.
And mātsarya, the greatest pollution which is there, enemy.
Actually, according to the philosophy of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, all the pollution in the heart is coming from this mātsarya, from this envy which is there in the heart of everyone. And we come with these tendencies.
And according to Vedic culture, the only way to purify these tendencies or at least to help them keep under control.
When these tendencies are purified by the saṁskāras, what takes place is that these tendencies lose the power to overwhelm us. In a normal situations so to speak when people are born
with these tendencies they cannot really control these tendencies. The tendencies become so strong. So much so that even Arjuna says in Bhagavad-gītā, Krishna, you know what can I do?
I know that it's strong, but I cannot do anything about it. This kāma, this passion is so strong that it just overwhelms me.
So the saṁskāras, the meaning of the saṁskāras is to, uh, to a certain extent diminish this uh influence which is there in everyone's life.
And therefore, Nanda Mahārāja, being driven by this, by his love to the child, he started doing this ceremony. He wanted to purify his birth. And therefore, he started doing this.
And the way to purify births, what is jāta-karma? Jāta-karma is not, again, not just some ritual so to speak. The essence of jāta-karma is to give, to give up.
You know, we're coming with these tendencies of lust and greed. And these two tendencies of lust and greed push us to take.
So the only way to counteract these tendencies, to diminish these tendencies, to reduce them, and to so to speak, to uproot the poisonous element of it. What is purification?
Purification is the procedure by which the poisonous element of the thing is being uprooted, being removed from the thing. So you know these tendencies of kāma and lobha, the passion, lust and greed is to take. So how to counter up this you give? There is no other it's a simple process.
You know, if you want to get rid of greed, you just give something, and then and it will be very painful to your greed. Your greed will scream in the heart, you know, you must be stupid of doing this.
But ultimately the greed will become less and reduced. So Nanda Mahārāja is doing this, and this is the essence of jata harmony. You know, in the West, it's very interesting how this thing is perverted in the West.
In the West, we have birthday ceremonies. And the birthday ceremony is what we're supposed to do, we're supposed to get, right? Everyone is coming and giving this. You wait for this day for the whole year.
Finally I will get some presents. But according to Vedic ceremony, uh, what you're supposed to do in the birthday ceremony to get rid of these tendencies, to purify your heart, to purify your karma, You have to give.
You have to invite everyone and give and give and give and give and give. And it is explained very beautifully and very importantly here that this is the way to purify the doors.
And there are so many other things which are mentioned here.
Methods for purifying senses wealth and mind
Like for example the first thing which is said here, Kalena. By the time all the words here, most of the words in this verse is in the instrumental case, Kalena, by time. What is being purified by time?
It is explained that the land is being purified by time. The meaning is actually very simple, you know, if you if you construct something, if you construct a road, you know initially it's very dirty.
The construction is a big mess. You know, whatever you construct, it's a mess. But how is it being purified? Just by time.
You know, if you make a road or if you make some building or you lay something, you know, by time it will become more or less normal. And it is said there that it's none, you know, by bathing you will purify your body.
And again, why? The reason is that purification is necessary to remove uh this contamination from the thing, you know, if we don't snāna, if we don't take snāna every morning you know it will be smelly
Because again uh if you don't do something, if you don't perform some certain activities, uh some active some act of purification,
then the pollution will take place, and it is explained here that snāna is necessary and, you know, sometimes even snāna is not enough. If the dirt is there, you have to scrape your body. You know sometimes people especially I know this is a devotee they think just you know water that's it.
But but it is said that you have to scrap. It's a it's a third item of this veros shoche, you know. If the pollution is or contamination is more, you have to scrap, and this is how you get purified.
But then some skies, of course uh that I already explained then tapasa tapasa and ninja uh by tapasa by austerity you beautify senses and that's also profound
knowledge because the modern civilization don't know this. Most of the people don't know how to purify senses. If you constantly use the senses, and we constantly use the senses.
There is only one way to purify the senses is to withdraw the senses from the sense objects, and that means tapasia. And the most important sense which have to be purified is the tongue.
Because this is the most polluting sense which is there.
We're getting pollution by taking this food, rajasic food and whatever, and we're getting polluted by speaking nonsense and you know everyone has this little tendency of doing this.
So and it is explained that the only way to uh purify the senses is tapasya to withdraw, therefore ekādaśī is there.
Periodically, you have to do tapasya, and this way the senses will be purified, and in this way, senses will lose the ability to pollute your heart.
Otherwise if you only do this, if you constantly eat, it, it, and eat, and eat and eat and eat and eat, you become an American. Politically interact. But at least there are many people.
The point is not to say this, but in the modern civilization people they don't know this. Periodically, you have to perform austerities. And then basic austerity is to fast.
The main austerity, the main element of tapasya is to fast. And that has to be an element of our life, more or less the constant feature of our life. Periodically we have to do this, otherwise, senses will be polluted.
And then it is said that dāna, your wealth. Everyone is constantly dealing with the wealth. All the people in this world are constantly dealing with this wealth. And wealth, money, is the most dirty thing in this world.
We're constantly dealing with this money. They're dirty. They're dirty on the physical level. And moreover, they're dirty on the on the subtle level.
And because we're dealing with this, inevitably the heart will be polluted. And there is a way of purifying our wealth, whatever is coming to us, we have to give.
A certain portion of it, and Prabhupāda was of course very impractical by insisting that 50% of it should be given in the next. Nobody intended it. Prabhupāda's duty is to say that what he's supposed to say.
And he says that you know if you want to again remove the poisonous element from the wealth, you have to give donations. You have to give.
It may not be 50% whatever you can give, but the intention, the understanding has to be there because unless you give, it will contaminate your heart, it will pollute your heart, it will pollute your consciousness.
So that's uh as Krishna says that yajña dāna tapas caiva pāvanāni manīṣiṇām, even the most intelligent people in this world, they have to perform these three things: yajña, dāna and tapas. They have to give, they have to perform yajñas, they have to perform rites. Even even the wise people, sages have to do this. Not to speak about ordinary people like us.
This is a must, this is not an option. Because otherwise the consequences will be very bad and running out of time. And samtuṣṭi, samtuṣṭi means by satisfaction your mind is being purified.
There is the only way to purify the mind is just to say that you know you're okay. You have enough. You know this is again the lost art of purifying the mind.
People are trying to purify the mind by very artificial means, you know, especially again in this new age, it's a very big concern for them.
But at the same time, they don't know this simple formula that there is a very simple way to purify the heart is to say that I have enough. Whatever I have is enough. I don't need more.
People they have this mantra nowadays. This is the mahā-mantra for the Kali-yuga. More, more, and more. There was the richest man in America. He was the richest man in the whole world.
And one reporter came to him because he's he was, you know, if you're richest you're famous automatically because done means you're famous. Done means you're intelligence, done means if you have this wealth, it means you're beautiful, it means you're you know you may be the ugliest creature in the world, but if you have if you have wealth, you know people will say, oh, you're so nice and so beautiful, so pretty.
But anyway, so the reporter came to him, and the reporter asked him, and that was two or three days before his death. And the reporter asked him, what is the slogan of your life? And he said, I have only one slogan, more. This is the mantra.
And uh this is what is contaminating the mind. And the mantra, the proper mantra, if you want to keep the mind clean, is very simple. I have enough. I don't need. You know, whatever Krishna sends to me, that's fine.
You know, I'm happy with this. You know, when we were living during the Soviet regime, the communist regime in Russia,
that was also the mantra of the government because government couldn't provide with the goods, so they were constantly saying that's enough, you know, we are happy as it is and it worked it really worked people they had very little and of course you know some people who were listening, Western radios, they were little polluted in their minds.
But the rest of the country was very peaceful. That's enough, you know, we have a little bread and a little water, that's enough. I don't need more.
What do you need for being headed, some little water and some little bread.
But anyways, so the point is, uh, is set here. It is set very clearly here that you uh you can satisfy or you can purify your mind by this satisfaction.
Self-realization and the essential nature of the soul
And the last statement is the most important in this verse. And this last statement is actually the key for the second meaning of this verse. As I said in the beginning that there are two intended meanings of this verse.
First intended meaning of this verse is that Nanda Mahārāja was completely in a hurry to perform this purificatory ceremony because he loved his child and he knew. This is my duty as a father to do this saṁskāra.
Because saṁskāra is the way to purify the heart, and this is what I am supposed to do. But the real meaning is always at the end.
And at the end of this verse, it is said, and this is the secret meaning of this verse which is of course quite obvious. It is said that ātmā, you can purify ātmā by ātma-vidyā.
The only way to purify the soul of Of the most subtle tendencies which are there in the soul. And the most subtle tendencies which are there in the soul is to lord it over, is to be separate from the Lord.
And the only meaning, the only way, the only means to purify the soul is ātma-vidyā, is the understanding of the constitutional position of this one.
And basically, the meaning here in this verse, why did I say that this is the important meaning of this verse, is that ultimately what, Śukadeva Gosvāmī wants to tell us is that because the ātmā, the supreme soul of the universe, came or appeared in the house of Nandamarat.
And in this way, the Atma Vidya, the real vidya, or the real knowledge of the Atma, of the Supreme Soul of the universe appeared in his heart immediately.
His heart was purified, and because of joy of this appearance, of this video, of the knowledge, when his soul was completely purified, of course, he was always purified, he performed this ceremony.
The meaning of this verse, the second meaning of this verse, that he felt so happy, and because of the happiness of this Atma Vidya, in the highest possible extent, Atma Vidya descended into his heart and into his understanding and to his mind in the form of a child.
So because of this he became completely joyous and by being joyous he performed this Jatakarma ceremony. And that's the most important understanding which is there, and this is the essence of Bhagavad, basically.
This simple statement at the very end of this verse that Atma Atma Vidyaya, that you can't purify your heart, the consciousness by Atma Vidya is ultimately the essential message of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam.
In the very beginning of Shrimad Bhagavatam, said Dharma Kaitabata projita dharma proja kaitavatra paramodir matsaranam satana. The essential the Silabyasadev explaining this verse doing this book, doing Mangala Charantra, this book, he says that what is the essence of this book, the essential message of this book, the essential message of this book isere all the kaitavadharmas or the dharmas which do not properly, accurately really describe the position of the soul, the nature of the soul, are kicked out from this book.
All other dharmas, including the glorious dharma which is you know propagated in Indian many cultures, the material dharma, kama, artha, moksha. I kicked out from this book. Why? Because of a simple reason.
Because all these other duties which are there in the very culture and sometimes people take it as as in itself when devotees say this but it says essential message of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam all other things they do not properly, accurately describe the nature of the soul.
Because Dharma, Arta, Kama, and Moksha, including glorious moksha, which is so prominent in Vedic culture, they all uh ultimately have some understanding behind them, all these goals of human life, they have this understanding behind them which is kaitava, which is incorrect, which is improper, which is artificial.
They all have this understanding that the soul is independent on God. But the reality, the truth is that the soul is always a dependent part of God, and therefore, the only real dharma, parama dharma, the highest dharma for the soul, for the part is to serve the whole.
If the soul is a part of the whole, then the only dharma, the only nature, and this is the nature of the soul. Śrīla Prabhupāda explains that the word, the very word dharma means nature, the essential nature.
And if the essential nature of the soul, of the atom of consciousness is to be the part of the whole, the supreme consciousness, then the essential duty of the soul is to serve the whole.
And therefore, uh, Bhāgavatam is about this. And this is the knowledge which can purify you. The only thing which can purify the soul is this understanding that we are never independent? We are always dependent.
It's not a question of whether I like to surrender or not. Because you know, we are dependent on God. It's not a question of our choice.
You know, sometimes people think, you know, whether I should surrender or not. But it's not a question of choice. I'm already surrendered, I'm already part of God.
The only thing which I have to do is to recognize this fact. This fact is undeniable. But people by the means of dharma, artha, kāma, and mokṣa trying to deny this simple fact.
Even moksha is nothing else but the declaration of that we are not recognizing this fact. We are more or less rejecting this fact that we are part of God.
If we recognize this fact, if we accept this fact, the only thing which we have to do is to serve the Lord. And that's exactly what is going on here, because the Lord appeared in the house
of Nanda Mahārāja. And by seeing the Lord who is Paramātmā, Nanda Mahārāja, he recognizes and confirms his constitutional position.
And therefore his ātmā is completely purified. And this is of course a subject matter of the 14th chapter of the
tenth canto Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam where Śukadeva Gosvāmī will explain that the real understanding of ātmā is to understand of me, is to understand that I'm a part of Paramātmā, the highest soul.
Because sometimes people have this again incomplete understanding of ātmā. That ātmā is just a particle of consciousness. But the complete understanding of ātmā is that we are part of Paramātmā. And here we see that Nanda Mahārāja is receiving this gift of ātmā-vidyā, the real understanding of ātmā, who I am. I am eternally a dependent part of the Lord. And my only duty, my only dharma, my only thing is to love him. So there's no option.
We are we're very fanatical, you know, set. It's it's a fact. But it's coming from better yes, so there's some justification to this fanaticism. And he says, Dharma Kaitav approach it and he says everything else is lie.
Everything else is black lie or white lie it doesn't matter. It may be a little whitish lie, you know, moxa yes, right. But it does very subric lie. But it's a lie.
Ultimately, in the ultimate understanding of the things, it's a lie. And therefore, this very extremist and fanatical book, which is also fanatic. It's declaring from the outset that yes,
we are extremists and people in Russia they know what they're doing.
They wanted to declare Bhagavad Gita, but the real history is book is Śrimad... The author himself admits this dharma-kaitalava project, kick out all other darkness. There is no other darkness.
There is no other duties in this life. There is only one duty is to serve God. By your heart, by your body, by your mind, by your speech, by your money, by everything. There is nothing else to do in this world.
And that's the central meaning of this verse of Śrimad- Bhāgavatam and then read it. And that's it.
Strategic significance of the Russian court case
Can we have two more minutes for the questions? Thank you very much Mahārāja for that wonderful class. It is said that we can see the hand of Krishna in all the situation like come to us.
So how do you see the hand of Krishna in the recent episode of Mary of Oh I can give another class for this But simply speaking, uh Krishna arranged this whole thing.
I have not a trace of a doubt that it was all arranged by the Supreme Power of Krishna. And as everything what Krishna does, he you know he achieves many goals by one stroke.
And in this particular situation, he of course he reminded the devotees the importance of Prabhupada's books because the audience were on the verge of practically being separated from Prabhupada's main book. You know, because ultimately you would not be allowed to distribute this book.
Of course you could read it, but and the audience could really by this whole story understand what it would mean, you know, if they didn't have Śrīla Prabhupāda's books in their life.
Because sometimes we take it for granted. You know, I remember when we it was the Soviet Union, the books were not available at that time. People were paying half of their salary to get Bhagavad-gītā.
Really, half of their salary, monthly salary they would pay to get this Bhagavad-gītā in the former Soviet Union. And now we take it for granted so she you know all these books are everywhere.
Let me read Bosha or something else. Maybe she will say something which I still don't know. So this is one of the understanding of this.
And of course Prabhupāda, you know the Śrī Kṛṣṇa by arranging this whole situation, he glorified Prabhupāda, not only to the devotees, he glorified this was the biggest advertising advertisement campaign that we ever had in Russia. And all over the world, you know.
Everyone was speaking about Bhagavad-gītā. In Moscow, all the Bhagavad-gītās were finished within two days. What is annoying? You know the people they ask me where is this Bhagavad-gītā?
How we how we can get these Bhagavad-gītā?
People, you know, uh the millions of people read Bhagavad-gītā because of this kind uh arrangement of the law done through some not very well-intended people, not people have people have you know we even seriously
consider to give a special kind of uh how you say special uh uh Who propagated Bhagavad-gītā you know more than anyone else? Nobody could do this.
The one who started this, he glorified Bhagavad-gītā and mm, you know, propagated the message of Bhagavad-gītā more than anyone else. And you know, and of course the vote is became stronger because of this.
Uh it it was a very learning experience for everyone. So many other reasons are behind this. And I think there is another hidden meaning behind this. We are planning to start the construction of the big temple in Moscow.
And that's a very essential project for the whole society. I'm completely convinced about this. This is not only for Russia, this is not only for the former Soviet Union, this is for the whole world.
This temple in Moscow will play a very significant role in development or in establishing the Krishna consciousness movement all over the world as an important spiritual movement.
And it's a big struggle from the beginning to end. And especially, of course, financial struggle because it's a very expensive project and we don't have these resources at hand.
So next year we're supposed to start within a couple of months, we will start the construction of this temple.
And I think that one hidden reason why Krishna arranged this glorious campaign to glorify Prabhupada and Bhagavad-gītā is to bring public awareness of this future project.
And so many people get emotionally connected with uh Russian ISKCON you know due to this.
All over the world in India and I really hope that one of the reasons behind this is that to help us to also raise uh finances and uh uh get some resources to build this very important project in our humble service to Śrīla Prabhupāda's, my understanding vision of this question.
Anyway, thank you very much. Śrīla Prabhupāda. But if you get my marriage, you can't even see how you're going to be able to do that.