Hegel and the Nature of Religious Truth
А. Ч. Бхактиведанта Свами Прабхупада
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Divine origin and nature of dharma
And uh, we can go on to Hegel. Yeah. He did quite a bit of reading in Indian philosophy, but it seems to be confined to uh, impersonal, the Upaniṣads. Simply Upaniṣad is just the opposite: spirit is not matter.
That is instruction of opposition. He writes: "Spirit, insofar as it is the spirit of God, is not a spirit beyond the stars, beyond the world.
On the contrary, God is present, omnipresent, and exists as spirit in all spirits. God is a living God who is acting and working. Religion is a product of the, of the divine spirit.
It is not a discovery of man, but a work of divine operation." Man cannot manufacture religion. That is a very important part. That we say religion means the words, the order given by God.
Just like Krishna said, sarva-dharmān parityajya, you have manufactured so many religious systems. You give us kick-out. There is no value. Here is dharma.
And in the beginning He said, "I have appeared to re-establish the principle of dharma." And He says at last that, "Give up, kick out all this so-called dharma. Here is dharma: tyaktvā mām ekaṁ śaraṇaṁ vraja." This is.
And Bhāgavatam says, dharmaṁ sākṣād bhagavat-praṇītam, the order given by God, that is dharma. Everything is bogus. It has no meaning. The same example: law means which is given by the government.
You cannot say, "I prepare the law." Be careful. A small law: "keep to the right." That is dharma. If you say, "What is the wrong if I keep to the left?" No, that will not be accepted.
The "keep to the right" is dharma, and "keep to the left" is adharma. So religious, pious and impious, everything on the order of Krishna, Allah.
If you follow strictly the instruction of Krishna, then you are religious, pious, transcendental, devotee, everything. And if you defy Krishna, you manufacture your own ways, then you are asura. Asura.
Na māṁ duṣkṛtino mūḍhāḥ prapadyante narādhamāḥ. These are the ways. Lowest of mankind. Do not follow in the steps of Krishna. All right.
Spiritual energy and God's independence
He writes: "The lifting of the spirit to God occurs in the innermost regions of spirit upon the basis of thought. Religion as the innermost affair of man has here its center and the root of its life.
God is in His very essence thought and thinking, however His image and configuration be determined otherwise." This is nice. If God is absolute, His image is also God. If God is absolute, then His words are also God.
That is absolute conception. That is not different. So the image which we are seeing in the temple, if it is actually the image of God, then He is as good as God.
God is actually... God says that this earth, water, everything is My energy. So even if you say this image is made of stone, but the stone is God's energy.
So there is a regulatory principle, just like in a wire, a copper wire, it is carrying electricity. Although the copper wire is not electricity, but it is carrying electricity.
Similarly, if we take even material—otherwise spiritually everything is God. There is another thing. But material, if we distinguish today, copper wire, it appears that copper wire, but if you touch, it is electricity.
It is manipulated. Similarly, by the rules and regulations as enunciated by the experienced spiritual master and guru, then even if you think it is stone, it is God. The same example. You see, it is electricity.
Similarly, arcye viṣṇau śilā-dhīr guruṣu nara-matiḥ. It is... this has been warned. Don't think that śilā, stone, is God. That Caitanya Mahāprabhu, as soon as he saw Jagannātha, immediately fainted.
So we have to be trained now by the instruction of God, how to realize God everywhere. Hegel considered history and theodicy to be integral. He looks on history as a justification of God,
and he rejects the Vedic conception of history because he doesn't see it unfolding any particular meaning. That is, universes are created, maintained, and annihilated in an apparently meaningless way.
For Hegel, history has to tell the story of man's elevation to God. Apart from the history of man, God would be alone and lifeless. God seems to depend on human history.
God is not transcendental but is manifest in the world. But if he is dependent on history, how is he God? Nonsense proof. He's dependent on this? Does the history of mankind necessarily mean God is independent? Sva-tantra.
Janmādy asya yato 'nvayād itarataś cārtheṣv abhijñaḥ svarāṭ. Svarāṭ. Independent. It doesn't depend on anything. Still he is God. That is God. If he's dependent on anything, then he is not God.
But does the history of man necessarily make any sense? He saw it as progressing as man — here again as evolution. That's right. That's right, there is creation, that is history from the very beginning.
This is the point of creation and it will go on, history, until it is ended. Just like as soon as you are born, your horoscope is made. The history. Now throughout your whole life, there are so many activities.
And after, we also believe next life, the history continues. But superficially we make history from the beginning to the end of this body, that's all.
God is not subjected to such rule that God is created at a certain point and he is ended at a certain point. Then where is the question of history? There is no history. History is for the small things.
For me, there is past, present, future. But for God, there is no such thing as past, present, future. The very history... History means past, present, future. God has no past, present, future. The very history...
He's got... nonsense. He doesn't know what is the meaning of it.
Human freedom and philosophical misconceptions
Hegel placed a great deal of emphasis on human freedom. But there's no freedom. That is another nonsense. He is subjected to birth and death always. What is his freedom? That is another nonsense.
He accuses the Orientals, namely the Indians. He says, "The Orientals do not know that the spirit is free in itself or that man is free in himself." Because they do not know it, they are not free.
But then, is he free? Why he died? The one who entered the accusation, why he died? He says they only know that the one, that is the one Brahman, is free. Therefore, such freedom is only arbitrary.
Then he says that human beings should be free. He says this one, supreme one, is therefore a despot, not a free man, not a man.
Only the Germanic nations have, in and through Christianity, achieved the consciousness that man as man is free, and that freedom of the spirit constitutes his very nature.
This consciousness arose first in religion, in the innermost region of that, the man either goes to heaven or goes to hell. So he has got the freedom. Either go to heaven or go to hell. This freedom he has got.
But who gives him hell or heaven? He has got the freedom to make choice. But when he is going to hell, then where is his freedom? Where is the distinction between hell and heaven?
If he is Christian, he should answer that the man is given chance once, either to go to hell or go to heaven. So all right, if he goes to heaven, it is all right. Then if he goes to hell, where is freedom?
This common sense also, that every citizen has got the freedom to live as free citizens or to go to the jail. But one who goes to the jail, where is freedom?
And who gives him the chance of free citizenship or prisoner's life? Therefore, his freedom is dependent on somebody higher. A prince gives him a chance to remain free or go to the... God is the supreme controller.
He gives the living entity freedom to make his choice, either go to hell or go to heaven, but he is not completely free as God is free.
He says the grandeur of Indian religion and poetry, as well as Indian philosophy, have been acknowledged especially in their rejection and sacrifice of the senses. His conception is typical.
He has no study of the Vedic literature, still he poses himself to remark on the Vedic literature. That is his... he considers the goal of Indian philosophy to be spiritual as well as physical extinction. Nirvana.
Everyone says that. Even Christian religion says you go to hell, go to heaven. So who goes to heaven? Who goes to heaven? What is the qualification? One who has given up his physical...
He says spiritual extinction as well as physical. But then he has no idea what is spiritual. Spiritual is eternal. Na hanyate... and spiritually and spirit is also annihilated.
Therefore, it's a difference between matter and spirit. Imperfect knowledge. And it's still that bit of scanty knowledge.
He sees the religion of India as a religion in which man is handed laws from a God who is exterior to man, from a will that is entirely foreign to man, and he sees this to be opposed to what he considers to be a more advanced religion in which the individual soul is lifted to the supernatural through the use of reason, internal sanction or subjective confirmation.
In other words, he sees the Indian religion as being a blind following of an exterior will. He says that man can only attain God through the exercise of his own free will. Then why the animals cannot?
Animal is given completely. He says animals have no will. There is another foolish thing. If you have no will, why you go to different direction? He says that animals have no right to life because they have no will.
Let's see. What is the symptom of life? How do you know? We can distinguish that this table has no life. That is small, and on the table there is life. How is this thing? But here is life. There is no life.
What is the symptom of life? If the symptom of life is there in the animal, that is life. Why does it say there is no life? What is it? Philosophy. That is life. He's eating, you are eating. He's sleeping, you are sleeping.
He is having sex, you are having sex. He's also afraid of anything you are not suffering. Then why do you say that you have life and he has no life? What is the symptom of life? This is the primary symptom of life.
So if he has got these primary symptoms of life, how do you say he has no life? That means you have no intelligence. He associates religion with... The table has no life. Because the table does not require to eat.
The table does not require to sleep. But another thing, a small ant, is anchoring at various little food and eating. That is life. He would see that as instinct.
The man has got these symptoms and the small ant has got this symptom. That is life. The table is still that big. He associates religion with art.
He says religion represents or pictures the absolute, whereas philosophy conceives or thinks of it. Yeah. So religion without philosophical basis is sentiment, all that.
And for him God is necessarily manifest in the finite. Therefore he places the incarnation of Christ, the incarnation of God, as central in the Christian religion.
That is, in order to be manifest, God has to become finite. God has to become man. If God is man, if he's taken as man, then why is it that his instructions should be followed? Excuse me.
Why his instructions should be followed? You are man, I am man. Why you should follow my instruction? Well, he says you shouldn't, because there's no exterior will to be followed. This is Hegel's philosophy.
When he's godless, God has no will. And then he's godless and God has no will. Is it not? Then he is animal, and he says animal has no will. The God becomes exactly like animal.
Speaking of the body and the soul, he says the body, insofar as it is an uncultivated piece of external existence, is inadequate to the spirit.
The spirit must first take possession of it in order to make it its animated tool. But in reference to other people, I am essentially free even as to my body.
It is but a vain sophistry that says that the real person, the soul, cannot be injured by maltreatment offered to one's body. Violence done to the body is really done to me.
Since the body, he says, is the tool of the soul, if you injure the body of a person, you're actually injuring the person. Yeah. Because you're injuring his property. Yeah. But why is the Christian killing? How is that?
Why the Christian killing? Yes, if that's the case, why mistreat the animal bodies? The animals have no right to life, he says, because they have no will. That is his foolishness.
Proprietorship and social divisions by quality
Yes, but wait, when you take to this latter, how they protest. He says mankind has the right of absolute proprietorship. A thing belongs to the accidental first comer who gets it.
To a thing belongs, well, whoever comes first—say there's a gold mine, if I get there first, it's mine. Because I'm the first comer. Then might is right. Yes. But gold, uh, there is there.
If he says gold is there, whose gold is it? Says the first comer. First of all, you go and say, "First come, first served," you become proprietor. But who is the actual proprietor of the gold?
When you did not go, you may go first and claim proprietary, but the gold was there. Whose property is it? Gold was there. Who made that gold? Who kept that gold?
This cost then must be... He says, "It's mine because I put my will into it." That's all that. It is mine, you have first born there, accepted. But who kept the gold there? Who made the gold there?
And if somebody has made the gold and kept the gold, you go first and capture it, then you are a thief. Is it not? I have kept something there and somebody comes, "Mine, mine, mine." That is a thief.
Because the gold is already there, kept by somebody. And you did not take his permission. You simply claim, "Because I have come first, I am the proprietor." You are not proprietor.
But if the gold was kept there for taking part of it to enjoy it by everyone, and you take it by might, act on your part, then you are a thief. You are not a philosopher. You have no sense. Who kept that gold?
Who manufactured that gold? You do not take his permission. Because you have come first, therefore you become proprietor. Then you are not a philosopher. You are a thief, an ordinary thief. Might is like... I come here.
That's why I am putting... because, uh, I will it to be mine. He says, "Because I come first and will it to be mine, it is mine." That's all right. By force you can do that, you are doing that.
And I can relinquish it because I can will to relinquish it. But the thing is that if I've got will, but, uh, a reasonable... that first of all you have to think: who has kept this gold here?
I'm claiming proprietorship simply by coming here. But who has kept this gold here? Why don't you think like that? What kind of human being you are? Final point.
He believed that man should have the freedom to choose his occupation. He writes, "In the Platonic state, subjective freedom was of no account." Which means there are already different occupations.
And you have freedom to select one. But the occupation is already there, created by somebody else. You have the freedom to make a choice. And that is stated in the Bhagavad-gītā: cātur-varṇyaṁ mayā sṛṣṭam.
"I have created these four principles of occupation," and according to your qualification, you can make a choice. "I like this occupation." But the occupation is already there. Just like a shopkeeper.
He has got varieties of goods. As the customer goes, he can say, "I like this." "Alright, you can take it. This is the price." Similarly, the occupational duties are already there. The place is already there.
That is created by God. Now you can select one of them according to the price you can pay.
He thinks, he says, in many Oriental states this assignment—he says, Hegel—in the Platonic state, in Plato's Republic, the government assigns each individual his occupation.
In Oriental states, for instance in India, he says this assignment results from birth. The subjective choice, which ought to be respected, requires free choice by individuals. And he considers this the basic right. No.
The thing is, just like Bhagavad-gītā, Kṛṣṇa said, cātur-varṇyaṁ mayā sṛṣṭaṁ guṇa-karma-vibhāgaśaḥ. This is going on all over the world. The occupation is just like engineering occupation. So who can become engineer?
Guṇa-karma: one who has acquired the qualification of engineering profession and is actually acting as engineer. That is what guṇa-karma.
Kṛṣṇa never says... but later on, because an engineer trains his boy as engineer, so naturally he becomes also engineer.
Formally, as we understand from the history of Ajāmila, he was a son of a brāhmaṇa and he was being trained up as a brāhmaṇa. That was the system, not that because he has born in the brāhmaṇa family he becomes brāhmaṇa.
No. He has got the chance of being turned up as brāhmaṇa by the brāhmaṇa father. So it became later on as caste by birth. Because naturally a brāhmaṇa father trains his son to become brāhmaṇa.
But when the brāhmaṇa son becomes a cobbler, that does not mean he is still brāhmaṇa. Brāhmaṇa's son has become a cobbler, he should be called a cobbler.
And a cobbler's son has become a brāhmaṇa, he should be called a brāhmaṇa. Not by the birth.
But it became a qualification of birth because formally it was easy, because he's dealing with his father and father is brāhmaṇa, so automatically fifty percent he becomes brāhmaṇa.
And fifty percent by training, then he becomes complete brāhmaṇa. By association, by family. It is not that a cobbler cannot become brāhmaṇa.
If he also acquires the qualification of a brāhmaṇa, Nārada Pañcarātra clearly will be said. If he has already acquired the qualification of brāhmaṇa, then he should be called a brāhmaṇa.
Not that a brāhmaṇa's son becomes qualified as a complex tannery expert and he remains brāhmaṇa. That is not. He has no knowledge. That means if you have studied all the Vedic literature, he could not say like that.
The vidvān says, "Yad anyatrāpi dṛśyeta," this qualification. If you find elsewhere, then he should be designated by the qualification. A doctor's son, instead of taking up the line of medical line, if he becomes engineer,
so he should be called engineer, not doctor. So the Kṛṣṇa's plan, that "I have created four divisions according to quality and work." «Cātur-varṇyaṁ mayā sṛṣṭaṁ guṇa-karma-vibhāgaśaḥ». That is fine.
One must have the qualification and he must work. He must have the brahminical qualification and he must act as well. Simply theory will not do.
We are giving sacred thread to a person who is born in a low family, but we are training him also to act as well. Not that you take the sacred thread and go be what kind of cobbler. No.
He must be engaged in the duties of a brāhmaṇa's business. Then you are. Otherwise, you are not.
Receiving knowledge through the parampara system
In a very often quoted passage, Hegel writes, "God is only God insofar as He knows Himself. His self-knowledge is, moreover, His consciousness of Himself in man and man's knowledge of God, a knowledge that extends itself into the self-knowledge of man in God."
Then if we accept that, then why not man takes knowledge of God from God? Then his knowledge is perfect. Well, he should stick with it. He considers man to be essential to God. But he has accepted God and man. Yes.
So to possess the knowledge of God, the best duty of man is to take knowledge from God about God. I know myself, as he said, and that God knows Himself. So if God knows, that is natural. I know what I am.
So if you take knowledge of me from me, instead of speculating, that is perfect knowledge. So yes, in the Bhagavad-gītā, the God is explaining.
So if you simply take the knowledge given by God, then you are perfect in knowledge of God. Why you are speculating? We are wasting time. Take the knowledge from God about Him and then you have perfect knowledge.
Why should you speculate? Suppose I am studying you, I am speculating. Well, how great he may be like this, he might have so much money, he might have so much bank balance, he's living like that. This is speculation.
But if I say, I give what you are, you say, "I have got this, I do like this," that's my perfect knowledge. Well, then you wouldn't be able to write so many books. Huh? No.
And when I've got perfect knowledge, then I can write. Without that, whatever I write, that is nonsense. That is nonsense. That is the difference. Parampara system. All these philosophers are simply talking nonsense.
And whatever we are writing, there is meaning. Why? Because we are studying God from God. This is our perfection. We are not speculating about law. That is a difference.
Now I am expanding my knowledge so that you can understand. That is my writing. But my basic principle is that I have understood God from God. Not by speculation. That is my quality.
If I know God from God, then my knowledge about God is perfect. Then whatever I write, that is fact. Therefore, Viśvanātha Cakravartī Ṭhākura says, "Sākṣād-dharitvena samasta-śāstrair."
That therefore all scriptures accept the guru, spiritual master, as directly the Supreme Lord. Why? He does not speak anything nonsense. That is therefore his God service, God.
He is serving God the same knowledge as God has given to him. That is perfect. Sākṣād-dharitvena samasta-śāstrair, he would.
So, the knowledge, if we take God, what is God, if we understand from God, then our knowledge of God is perfect. Simply by speculating, it cannot be done. That is not possible. So he is Mr. Hegel. Yes. He's Hegel or not?
What is he? Hegel. Hegel. So if he accepts God and he does the man, the man should take knowledge from God about God, then his knowledge of God is good. He should not speculate.
And if he has no such source of taking knowledge from God, then his conception of God is also false. If he has God, actually, the conception of God, then he should take knowledge from God, what He is.
That is perfect knowledge. You are talking Oriental knowledge. This, this is Oriental knowledge. They know who is God and they take knowledge from God about God. But here, Occidental, they speculate about God.
What they know about God? What about the speculate that is imparted? Because he is in part. He, he equates idea, reason, God and the absolute. Very much like the Greeks. Everything is there.
But if you take knowledge from God, then that is perfect. And if you make your own ideas, you do not take the ideas of God, that is imperfect.
He does say reason is also infinite form, that which sets this material in motion. That I am imperfect, limited. How I can speculate on the unlimited? So better, uh, let me learn from the unlimited about the unlimited.
That is what we say. One final point is that he sees the worship of animals and plants to be a form of pantheism.
Realizing God through instructions and training
He refers to Indian religion. But in that he does not know, he's still his speech. That is the most regretful situation. God says that, uh, among the plants I'm this plant: Tulasī. Tulasī. What do I mean? Yes.
So the Hindus follow God's lesson. That is their God-consciousness. God has said that among the plants I am this plant, so I worship it. They're not worshipping every plant.
This isn't, then this differs from the pantheists who would worship. But here it is God-consciousness. God has said that I am this. I suppose. That is God, God-consciousness. God has said. He has complete faith in God.
It's like praṇava-sarva-vedeṣu. All Vedic knowledge and the Oṁkāra. That would be following Paramātmā. Every mantra is followed by Hari, as known. Oṁkāra is God. But God has said: «praṇavaḥ sarva-vedeṣu».
So God is giving instruction how He should be realized. So that's following them. They realize, they realize actually. And what is the use of speculating? He'll never understand God.
Because he is speculating with his limited knowledge. So God is unlimited.
So although God is all animals and all plants, that is, although God is everything, we concentrate on these particular—that is especially primitive. «mat-sthāni sarva-bhūtāni na cāhaṁ teṣv avasthitaḥ». Everything is in Me.
But I am not there. That's like the body of a dog. The body is of the soul. The platform is the soul. Otherwise there is no meaning of the body. So, the body of the dog is depending on the soul of the body.
But that does not mean the dog's body is God. «na cāhaṁ teṣv avasthitaḥ». «paṇḍitāḥ sama-darśinaḥ». «mat-sthāni sarva-bhūtāni, na cāhaṁ teṣv avasthitaḥ». They are taking just as «daridra-nārāyaṇam».
The body of this daridra, poor man, is resting on God, Nārāyaṇa, but he is taking the body as Nārāyaṇa. That is his knowledge. Imperfect. He's saying «daridra-nārāyaṇa». God has become daridra.
And he's taking the consideration of the body, that he is thinking God has become daridra. The body of this daridra, poor man, is depending on Nārāyaṇa, but he's taking the body and he said the poor. And he's going on.
I'll read. «mayā tatam idaṁ sarvaṁ jagad avyakta-mūrtinā mat-sthāni» «sarva-bhūtāni na cāhaṁ teṣv avasthitaḥ». Translation. By Me, in My unmanifested form, this entire universe is pervaded.
All beings are in Me, but I am not in them. On service. He is on his, on his majesty's service. Mm-hmm. What is that? On his majesty's service. Uh, that does not mean that Her Majesty is there.
The Majesty, Her Majesty's power, order is everywhere. The government is acting with the seal "On Majesty's Service", but that does not mean Her Majesty is there.
This is simultaneously, commonly find... acintya-bhedābheda. Majesty is there because the order is there. But still, personally she is not there.
So another, that being another thing is that, uh, daridra, if daridra-nārāyaṇa is there, but not that daridra is Nārāyaṇa, but he has no vision. He is talking of this: "daridra is Nārāyaṇa." This is mistake.
Nārāyaṇa is there undoubtedly. But not that daridra is Nārāyaṇa. This is impersonal, is Māyāvāda mistake. That is pantheism. Pantheism.
So, uh, when Krishna says, "I am sex life according to dharma," then this means that He can be perceived in this way. Yes.
I too, that is not a secret thing, that the Garbhādhāna ceremony is that "I am going to beget a child, I'm going to have sex with my wife, but begetting it is not called such child." The Krishna is remembered.
While having sex, he remembers Krishna: "Give me a child who will be Your devotee." That is the duty of dharma. So this kind of sex is Krishna. And if we have sex for enjoyment, that is, that is the one.
There is, Krishna is present nonetheless. Krishna is always present.
But when you hold a ceremony, Garbhādhāna ceremony, that, uh, "I'm going to have sex with my wife for begetting the Krishna conscious child," then you remember Krishna.
And at the time of sex, the mentality of the father and mother, that is acquired by each other. There is rules and regulations of Garbhādhāna-saṁskāra.
And in the Bhagavad, as soon as, uh, the one gives up the dharma ceremony, he's a śūdra. So, who is observing this dharma ceremony at the present? Therefore, everyone is śūdra. Kalau śūdra-sambhavaḥ.
Everyone is born as śūdra. The father and mother gave birth as śūdra. So this birthright of brāhmaṇa is no longer existing.
Even if they falsely claim, "Because I am born of a brāhmaṇa father, I am brāhmaṇa," the śāstra does not support it. Whether Garbhādhāna ceremony or nowadays, especially, who knows? That is savarṇa-brāhmaṇa.
The whole world is intermingling with everyone. When giving birth to the child, that is actually a brāhmaṇa's child, that's what the child—who knows it? So how can we claim by birthright brāhmaṇa? That's not possible.
Therefore, everyone is śūdra. But he can be trained as a brāhmaṇa. That is pāñcarātriki-vidhi. We are following this pāñcarātriki-vidhi, not vaidiki. Vaidiki-vidhi. Pāñcarātriki-vidhi.
If he has got a little tendency, a little fire to become Krishna conscious, alright, fan it. Make the fire bigger and bigger. Well, if he gives up the fanning process, it remains fire-catching one thing.
So long it will stay, then a small seed, you sow it. And regularly water it, like Govinda Dāsī introduced this Tulasī. She is responsible for introducing Tulasī in Western countries.
So the Tulasī, the actual—to get back to the original point—the actual philosophy behind reverence for the Tulasī plant or the cow or the sacred ceremony, the basis then would be remembrance of Krishna.
That these can bring remembrance of Krishna.
Constant consciousness versus mental speculation
Because Krishna says so. Krishna says: satataṁ kīrtayanto mām. Always thinking of Me. That is the process of consciousness. Kṛṣṇa-bhāvana. Satataṁ kīrtayanto mām. Man-manā bhava mad-bhakto, all these things coming.
Samādhi means that you think of Krishna, then you become Krishna conscious. But you shouldn't think of Krishna in another way, for instance, a palm tree. That would be pantheistic.
Then He is giving indication that "among the trees I am this." So you take it. Raso 'ham apsu kaunteya. He said that "I am the taste of the water." You are drinking water always.
The taste which quenches your thirst and you feel satisfaction, that is Krishna. Now if you follow Krishna's instruction: "Now I am drinking water, now I'm feeling satisfaction." Hegel mistook this for pantheism.
Hegel mistook this for pantheism. He has mistaken in so many ways. That person... if somebody has boils all over the body, then he will feel the opposite. But kill this body. So he has got so many boils. Again, again, all.
Because they are speculators. They have no definite knowledge. Speculators cannot have definite knowledge. Therefore, our Professor Dimock has said, "Here is a definitive edition of Gītā." What is that? Just see. Tell it.
Yes, appreciate it. You cannot see... can you put two lines of what he said? It says this. Yeah. That is his word. Oh.
"A definitive English edition of Bhagavad-gītā, by bringing us a new and living interpretation of a text already known to many, A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupāda has increased our understanding manyfold."
Not speculative. That is the difference between my translation and others. And therefore I am giving the reality. So no scope for speculation. As soon as you speculate, you are rejected.
And therefore others are seeing some danger. With Bhaktivedanta, everybody wants to speculate. We have stopped it. They cannot regulate. And the words are: that is our mission. Won't allow you to speculate.
You are finite, imperfect; how you can, by speculation, reach the unlimited, infinite? How it is possible? That is reasonable. Waste of time, misleading others. And the hazard is that you are blind.
How you can show others, blind men? They are already blind. You open your eyes, then take the leadership of the life. Ajñāna-timirāndhasya jñānāñjana-śalākayā. That is the process.