Culture of Respect
Бхакти Вигьяна Госвами · 2020
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Opening prayers and introduction
Namam Vishnu Padaya Krishna Pristaya Gutale, Srimati Bhaktividanta Swami Nitinamini, Namaste Saraswati Devi, Gurava Nipracharini, Nirviche Susuniavadepa Cha de Satari ne mancha kaupatarabesha kripa sindudevacha, patitanam
pavani biovaisnava biyonawana, justna Chaitanya Prabhuna Sya Dvaitatharasud Bhakti Vinda Hare Krishna Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna Hare Hare Hare Rama Hari Rama Rama
Rama Hare Hari, Ajana Ramita Bujokana Kavada Sankirtanai Kapita Malayaksura Pandey Jagat Priyakar Karnavata. Thank you very much, Devaki, for inviting me here and for arranging this program.
What I like about Mother Deck is that she is German and she keeps everything on time. Which is quite unusual for our ISCON culture.
Talking about the institute of spiritual culture, that's the first thing which we should probably do.
And she gave me the notes for this uh talk which I am supposed to give, and I think she's much better than I could give this talk, judging from the notes.
But I will share some of my observations and thoughts on this uh subject matter which I uh personally find uh the most important. Uh Culture
means environment, and the environment can be, as we all know, conducive for our spiritual development or can be not so conducive, can be counterproductive, can be not really nourishing to us.
And the culture of respect is the foundation of the proper culture. Without respect, there is no culture. Actually, when we say uh culture of disrespect, that's uh
uh Derwak's phrase and it's a fact we are born and we are grown up in this culture of disrespect, a model culture which is definitely nourishing, disrespectful attitude, egalitarian culture.
It's actually an overstatement because there is no such culture. It's something which is totally against any human culture.
The foundation of any culture because culture means the proper relationship, relationship with the environment, pr relationship with other human beings, other living entities, and ultimate relationship with God. That's the aspects of culture.
Scriptural faith as root of respect
And all these relationships are based on respect.
And if we are talking about spiritual culture as such, we have to be very clear that the culture of respect is coming not from some superficial convention, not because we are kind of you know convene together and we want to establish a certain respectful relationship. Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura says a very beautiful thing. He says that the culture of respect is coming from our Sraddha, from our faith in scriptures.
If we have faith based on Shastra, Shastriya Shradha, then the respect is coming automatically.
Because Shastra Shraddha, understanding of the basic structure of Shastra, understanding the basic logic of Shastra means to understand that God is present in every living entity. And God is present everywhere.
And if we have this understanding and means we have Shastra Shraddha, then the respect is very natural and you don't have to teach it more or less.
And uh vice versa, uh you know if you don't have uh respect to other living entities.
It's a very simple statement of non-existence of your Shraddha. You're not even on the first level of your spiritual development, on the first stage of your bhakti ladder. You don't have śraddhā.
So respect in this sense is not an option. It's not that you may have respectful relationship or you may not have respectful relationship.
If you are in a spiritual society and if you have some ABC understanding of spiritual science, then the respect has to be there. They are totally inseparable from each other.
And Śrīla Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura says that there are four levels of respect according to the four levels of the advancement of a human being.
He says there is a general respect for every human being, which has to be done because of the simple fact that God is present in everyone's heart.
When you see anyone, the first thing which you should see in this person is that he's ādhiṣṭhāna. Ādhiṣṭhāna means the shelter of God. God is there in his heart.
So if you see a human being or somebody who resembles human being. You know the first thing which the first thought which should come to your mind is that uh is somebody uh in whose heart God is. And therefore, I have to be respectful.
It's a very high position in the evolutionary ladder to be a human being. And we have to be respectful here regardless regardlessly of you know who you are, women or man or American or Donald Trump even, you know.
Believe it or not, he also has God in his heart. Everyone in this sense.
So uh we have to be respectful just because of the fact that uh this is the soul jiva, which reached a certain level of advancement and is you know dear to God, he's related with God.
Then Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura says that even greater respect should be given to dharmika jīvas. Those jīvas who follow principles of conduct, who know what it means to maintain this world.
Because the word dharma means something, it's from the verbal root dri, which means to maintain, to support.
So basically, Dharma is something which helps you to maintain your own life, to maintain your own health, your own existence, your own integrity.
And Dharma is something which helps you to maintain relationship with others, to maintain the society together and to maintain the whole world together.
So dharmika jīva, who follow uh certain rules of conduct has to be given even more respect because of this dharma.
And it doesn't matter in reality uh you know like Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura he was very liberal, you know, there is uh Hindu dharma, but there is some other principles which people follow and there are somewhat overlapping with Vedic principles.
They may not be as consistent and as scientific as Vedic principles. Still, nevertheless, it's dharma. And if people follow certain religious ways and follow principles, that's fine. They have to give you even more respect.
Then he says the next level of advancement, just four levels, don't worry, it's not too long. So the next level of advancement is if somebody is brāhmaṇa, but he gives a very beautiful definition of who is brāhmaṇa.
He says brāhmaṇa is almost a Vaiṣṇava, vaiṣṇava-prāya. He is he is like a shadow of a Vaishnava. Brāhmaṇa is somebody who lives according to the brāhmaṇical principles,
which means that he values the knowledge, he values sattva-guṇa. But sattva-guṇa, of course, dharmika jīva is also valuing sattva-guṇa, but it's higher because the spiritual knowledge is there.
Uh the value of spiritual knowledge, understanding of spiritual knowledge is there.
And then he says that the highest uh and actually he says that uh Kaniṣṭha-adhikārīs, according to the classification of the eleventh canto of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, which Damodara Prabhu was quoting this verse? Bhagavatam, which Damadharma Prabhu was quoting this verse?
He says they are in this category. They're not Vaishnavas. They are Vaishnava prayers. Almost Vaishnavas. Almost Vaishnavas. Because they cannot enter into respectful relationship with other people. Because they don't value.
They don't really have respect to other people. They only have respect to God. Which is okay.
But, uh, and it basically means that they don't have śāstra-śraddhā. They don't have, but if you have śāstra-śraddhā, then you have to, uh, value them and respect them, and then the highest respect should be given to Vaiṣṇavas
because Vaiṣṇavas are those who have śāstra- śraddhā, who chant the holy name of God, and who are—and therefore, the most respect.
Respect as basis for shelter
And this is again not the option; we have to respect all Vaiṣṇavas very strongly.
And the point which I'm supposed to make is that respect is the foundation not only of the culture, but of the culture where people are capable of taking relationship, of taking shelter and giving shelter.
Because when we feel respect—and this respect is unconditional, and if we really clearly understand this concept that every human being has to be respected, and you know, Vaiṣṇavas have to be respected the most—uh, you know, the this unconditional respect which will be, you know, exchanged in the proper society, proper cultured society of Vaiṣṇavas, will make your heart open.
I'm sure, uh, we all have this experience: if somebody comes to you, uh, and you feel genuine respect from this particular person, you really feel that your heart is opening towards this person.
You want to give him something which you have, the most valuable thing; you want to share something. And vice versa: if there is no respect, when we are are, uh, uh, in the environment where this envious dealings between the devotees, or this envy and, you know, jealousy is there, and, uh, you know, this sort of thing, that the immediate effect is that your heart closes up.
You don't want to open your heart. You just want to, you know, be as far away from this society of devotees as possible. As, as Mahatma Prabhu said, respect from a distance. Respect them from a distance.
But the point is that, again, taking shelter and giving shelter means opening the heart. This is what Mahatma Prabhu was saying:
you know, that the counselor and counselee relationship or mentor and mentoring relationship is the relationship of open heart. But there is no question of opening the heart without respect. It's the very minimum, it's the very minimal foundation.
If respect is there, then the heart is there, everything else more or less follows automatically. And therefore, in any traditional culture, the respect is respect for seniors, elders, is the foundation of society.
I was born in Uzbekistan, this is an Asian country which was a part of the Soviet Union, which is separate now. And I could see how deeply ingrained this culture of respect, uh unconditional respect.
If somebody is senior to you in any in any regard, then you know he has to be respected. Like Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura, he explains in, uh, Caitanya-caritāmṛta the many different grades of respect, how you should respect.
And actually, in the in the laws of Manu, it is said that brāhmaṇas among the brāhmaṇas, brāhmaṇas you should respect according to the level of their knowledge. Kṣatriyas you have to respect according to their power.
Among the vaiśyas, the one who is senior is one who has more money. Natural. And among śūdras is one who has, uh, who is older, then he should be respectful. There is no other criteria.
But Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura says all these considerations have to be there. If somebody is older you have to respect him. If somebody is richer than you you have to respect him.
If somebody is more powerful than you... And of course if somebody has more knowledge you have to respect him, in regard of his age. He may be not of such a great age, but if he's more knowledgeable, you have to give respect.
And the most destructive, the absolutely the most horrible thing which we can see in the modern society, which unfortunately comes from America is this destruction of this culture of respect, these egalitarian tendencies.
Egalitarian tendencies, everyone is equal. Nobody is equal. Everyone is the object of my respect. And you know, if if I only feel that we're all equal, we're all the same, it's impersonalism.
Actually, egalitarian culture is the culture of impersonalism. Nirviśeṣa śūnyavādi. Personal culture means everyone is respectable.
And uh I have to really work on myself to develop this respectable or respectful attitude towards him.
Impact of disrespectful digital culture
And in this way, uh you know the this uh relationship of giving shelter and taking shelter will take place.
And what we see in the modern society, we see all this social media, we see internet culture which is totally absolutely disrespectful. It's horrible what's happening. And it's killing the soul.
It's actually killing the prospect for our spiritual advancement. Because when this tendency is planted within our heart and it's planted subconsciously without even us willingly understanding this when we read all these comments, all these chats, all these things, you know, it kills the reverential attitude, it kills the spirit of own reverence and it destroys, it completely destroys our possibility for spiritual development.
Lord Kapiladeva, he speaks about this in his third canto of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam in the 29th chapter, and he says that there are four levels of disrespect. It's very interesting.
I uh, even though Mata Devaki didn't recommend me to do this, but still I will I will dare to say this.
Because Lord Kapiladeva in four consecutive versions verses which uh sound very similar speaks about this that if somebody sees some uh worships the deity in the in the temple but uh doesn't respect other living entities his worship is as if he is pouring ghee into ashes.
And one after another, he says practically the same things, but Viśvanātha Cakravartī Ṭhākura he explains beautifully that there are four levels of disrespect and four results of this four levels of disrespect.
He says that the first level of disrespect. Please listen very carefully because it directly relates to our spiritual future and to the prospects for our spiritual development.
He says that the number number one, the slightest degree of this respect is avajñā. Avajñā means well, avajñā ava means down. When we look down at somebody. Avajñā, you know, I just I am just a little arrogant.
And I look, you know, oh who says he thinks he is, you know, he's from Russia or you know, we know all these Russians or this you know Jews or Germans or you know yeah whatever you know whatever we whatever arrogance, whatever shape or form of arrogance we may have, you know, we exercise it when we deal with the devotees or you know he's from this China, oh my goodness, China.
You know, this is avajñā. Avajñā. Just little, you know, from top down we you know we look down.
And according to the annual beautiful analysis of Viśvanātha Cakravartī Thakur, the result of such attitude. We may not even show it.
It may be very subtle, just you know, just habitually because we all habituated in uh uh expressing this sort of uh disrespectful attitude uh on the basis of our birth or whatever it is, whatever else it is. So result of this is that we become more and more hypocritical.
Vidambanam, the specific Sanskrit word which is used you become more and more pretentious as a devotee.
You lose your simplicity and your simple heart, you know that yes, I am a devotee, everyone is a devotee, everyone is very elevated, and you know, you you start judging.
This judgmental attitude grows more and more and more within your heart without even you wanting it because you don't really you're not introspective enough not really conscious enough to cut down this attitude
Like avajñā. Like guru avajñā. Basically, avajñā means, you know, oh, you know, he's just he's just a no, you know, he's just uh, you know, human being, you know, who he thinks he is.
And we can see, you know, I remember very clearly even though I wasn't I was in Russia, and at that time, it was Soviet Union. Uh, it was quite closed, uh, under the behind the iron curtain.
Still we as big neophyte devotees, beginner devotees, we had tremendous respect to all the senior people, Prabhupada's disciples.
And somehow rather this innocent respect which was there in the society and initially when we first came to Maiapur, it was still there. It's lost now.
If somebody is a sannyāsī, you know, there is we know all these jokes about sannyāsīs and all this kind of stuff.
No, but uh result of it is that we're losing the simplicity of the heart, which is extremely necessary for our spiritual development.
This śālatā, according to Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī, śālatā uh means vaiṣṇavatā. Vaishnava means simple. Simplicity means, you know, I respect everyone.
You know, and because of this, because the pretense grows within our heart we think everyone is pretender we look somebody
he is in this brahmachari oh brahmachari means pretender yes we know we know and then we look somebody you, know, and she's a lady in the white sari, oh my goodness. Yet another pretender.
Somebody was done, oh my goodness, he is the biggest pretender. Why? Because you are pretender.
Because you develop this attitude, and as a result of this attitude, this pretense grows within your heart, hypocrisy grows within your heart, and then you you look at everyone as a pretender.
You you interpret everyone uh wrongly. And then what what is the question of taking shelter and accepting shelter? There is no question. To whom you will open your heart? Nobody.
Neglect and loss of spiritual faith
So that's the first level, that's the slightest, the most insignificant thing. The next level is Upeksha. Upeksha means uh neglect.
Means when you just you become so arrogant and so disrespectful that you just neglect. You pass by somebody. You know, like Mother Devaki said, the culture of Haribol. It's not such a bad culture. At least you say Haribol.
It may be not the, you know, the greatest culture, but at least you say Haribol, you know. It's it's already good. At least you recognize that somebody exists. Upeksha means you deny somebody's existence.
You pass by him, you don't see him, you just go by him as if he doesn't exist. And it's very painful when you when you see this. And uh, you know we we can see uh sometimes it happens.
And the horrible result of this, please listen, uh, to understand how, how really horrible results are there. The horrible results of this is a-shraddha. You lose your faith. You ultimately lose your faith in God.
Because the subconscious message which you give by this upeksha, by this neglect toward other living entities, but not properly respecting other living entities, recognizing that God is in their heart. Ultimately you're negating the existence of God.
You more or less extend amount of saying that God doesn't exist because you don't see the part and parcels of the Lord. With your gross eyes, at least you can see their existence.
But if you deny their existence, if you are so arrogant that you just neglect their existence, then ultimately you lose your faith. You lose your faith in God. That's what Lord Kapiladev says.
It's not so explicit in this verses in 29th chapter. But then uh the next uh level of disrespect is dvesha. Dvesha means hatred and when you start actively hating somebody.
And again, it starts from our attitude from the start, it starts rather innocently. If we don't cut down this tendency, if we don't check this tendency within
our heart, then inevitably it will grow up to the level of dvesha when you actively hate somebody, when you really hate somebody, Dvesha, uh, in the society of devotees. And uh Lord Kapiladev says a beautiful thing.
What is the result of such attitude? He says: the result of such attitude, you live in a very hostile environment.
If you have this dvesha in the heart, then you naturally look at everyone and you think that everyone else is hating you. You are living among the enemies. And we can see how it works, you know.
Sometimes I happen to have many relationships with many devotees and sometimes I hear horrible things like Mahatma Prabhu said, you know, that uh being a counselor you have to listen to some offensive statement.
And uh oftentimes, you know, people come to me and they started explaining, you know, describing the ISKCON society of devotees. And I I listened to this and I think, you know, what they're talking about?
They say everyone is so bad and everyone is hating and everyone is so inimical and this and that. And then I realized as as Mahatma Prabhu says, he's crying, he's he's describing his own state of consciousness.
Because this is the result of Dvesha. When you have dvesha within your heart, you will live among the enemies. Everyone will be inimical to you. And if you think that it's kind of like this, please look in your heart.
And please see if it's, you know, if everything is okay, if you really value this respect.
Open criticism damages spiritual growth
And ultimately, the gravest uh form of disrespect is Ninda. When you openly criticize somebody. When you hate somebody, you may not even say this, but you just have this energy of hate, hatred within yourself.
But when you openly criticize this, this is the worst thing. Facebook ki jayas. This is what's going on there in this all this social media. When people uh they just do this ninda.
You know there was Atmatva Prabhu I believe here he was giving this. He says that uh in one of the uh books of of the
sayings, uh Sanskrit saying there is a saying that there is different rasa like there's rasa of uh you know sugarcane or this uh khajura rasa of this palm and there is very special rasa, ninda-rasa. nectar of offense.
And you drink this nectar of offense.
You know, people they really enjoy when they uh they offend openly other people, they think it's some sort of enjoyment for them. And they get uh habituated to drinking this ninda-rasa all the time and they they sustain their life in this Ninda and this in this thing.
So basically, what I want to say is that disrespect is the killer, the murderer of our spiritual life.
If we want to develop spiritually ourselves individually, and if we want to develop the proper healthy society we have to be extremely careful about establishing this culture of respect.
And when I was listening Damadhar Prabhu and he was explaining about this competition among the boys when they were giving all these awards, Rūpa Gosvāmī Award, Haridāsa Ṭhākura Awards, Jīva Gosvāmī, Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura Award, they should also give uh Sanātana Gosvāmī award, whom uh Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu himself says that he is the embodiment of vaiṣṇava etiquette.
And he says: this is the decoration of a vaiṣṇava. This is the most brilliant ornament which can be there if we really follow this respect.
And Sanātana Gosvāmī is not by chance our uh uh uh ācārya and uh he is the ācārya of sambandha-jñāna. Sambandha-jñāna again as I said respect is the manifestation of sambandha-jñāna or your śāstrīya śraddhā.
If you have śāstrīya śraddhā, you will have respect. If you don't have respect, you don't have śāstrīya śraddhā. You do not understand śāstra. I'm sorry to say this.
I'm just following the footsteps of Mahāprabhu he said all these guys was danders, they are heavy guys and they're making you you know giving you some you know some psychological complexes develop you some hinnabs.
So but uh but that's true. Uh that if we have Shraddha, if we have faith, it means that we have to have respect.
And we have to be very strict about this towards ourselves, we have to be strict towards others, we have to demand that we should follow this culture of respect. That's the only possibility for us to have spiritual society.
If there is no respect, there is no spiritual society. There is no spirituality. It's just a joke. It's a joke at best.
So, and as far as the main topic, I already said that respect is the very minimum quality for opening the heart, taking shelter. Without respect, everyone will be just walking with closed heart.
Living culture of respect in Bangladesh
Very sad, and he will not find you know the solace in the spiritual society for his needs. He will not be able to confide to everyone, to open his heart, and ultimately he will be he will die, inevitably die without this spirituality.
So respect is the very necessary condition of our spiritual culture. And I'm very grateful to Mother Devakī for doing this institute of Culture. I was very impressed when I once came to Bangladesh and Bangladesh.
If you have not been to Bangladesh, please go sometimes, at least once in your life, because Bangladesh is an amazing place. It's a Muslim country and therefore it's a close country.
And therefore, Vaishnava culture is still there intact. If you go there, it's as if you are in Caitanya-caritāmṛta right there.
They give you at least 50 different kinds of prasāda and at least 20 different kinds of śāk preparation, and then you immediately remember all these, you know, stories about Lord Caitanya loving śāk.
And then they sit in front of you and then they start chanting bhajans and your heart melts and they will not let you go.
I I remember I was leaving the place where we had this seminar or whatever the festival which was there and the car couldn't move for at least half an hour because the voice they were just coming there and they were saying something and they just you know the car could not move because there was a relationship and because there was respect.
I could feel this genuine respect, uh, without any unconditional respect. And because of this respect the relationships are there. Without respect there's no relationship. No relationship. No relationship.
So under the guidance of Mātā Devakī and other our illustrious guides, let's try to establish this culture. It's extremely important. Thank you very much. Thank you very much, Maharaj, for your deep words of wisdom.
Um so what do we do? Shall we have a little more discussion or or are there any questions? Or is everybody kind of giving yes strategy.
How do we both have respect and also be realistic about some some situation. How we can have respect and at the same time be realistic.
Sometimes people find these two things as a contradictory notions to be realistic and uh usually in the modern concept it means to be disrespectful because you see the reality. And at the same time to have respect.
In my humble opinion, there is no contradiction because uh you should see the reality, we should not be blind, we should see the f shortcomings of people.
We shouldn't artificially try to, you know, blind ourselves to the deficiencies and faults of other people.
But we should not allow ourselves to all this false to overshadow the other side of the people and we should relate with their vaiṣṇavatā with their vaiṣṇava personality,
so to speak, and at the same time see in a very realistic way their shortcomings and perhaps faults, but not relate to them because
when uh due to disrespect we attack their faulty side, their so to speak human side and uh we concentrate on them first of all uh it's very bad because we're meditating on their bad qualities and we're developing the same qualities because we develop the same qualities which we meditate upon.
And at the same time we're strengthening, we're more or less making them defensing and you know we're strengthening their bad qualities and the whole society becomes the whole atmosphere becomes poisoned.
Whereas if we still respect them as Vaishnavas and try to relate to their Vaishnava side, then it will be very easy for them to kind of overcome
their attitude, as Mahatma Prabhu said about Jainanda Prabhu, how he transformed this. Because you know, we don't have to be blind, but uh at the same time, we don't we don't have to be blind to their good sides also.
And uh and again if they feel respect, uh if they feel that uh they're hurt and they're that you know, if they feel that they're human beings, uh when When we feel respect from others, we also develop dignity.
And dignity means we behave in a certain level. We don't go below. What is happening in the modern society? Very sad thing, you know, people are losing their dignity and therefore they behave in a very bad way.
So respect is actually the way to establish in the people their proper dignity. When we respect your human being, your Vaishnava, you know, they then they will It means that I have to behave this this way.
So there's no contradiction.
Envy behind the faultfinding mentality
Actually very often we hear this that we think that we can only respect a person if that person is exemplary in all regards. And if a person is not perfect in the exemplary, you would think, oh, how can I respect this person?
But I dare say there is actually envy behind it. Because as soon as we see somebody who has some shortcomings, we evaluate who is better.
And in order to put the other person down and establish our superior superiority we disrespect.
And so I dare say behind this tendency of disrespecting a person because he has some shortcomings, there is actually envy behind it. Because as Marj was saying, we we are meant to respect every living entity, not only devotees, but also non-devotees.
Not only persons, but also animals, plants, and and and and also I connected with the level of sense gratification. That as soon as the level of sense gratification rises,
there is that culture of disrespect coming in because sense gratification means we use others for our enjoyment. Exploit, yes. Yes, we exploit. That's right.
So there has to be disrespect there, otherwise we would never ever use others or Krishna's creation for my enjoyment. So sense gratification and disrespect they go hand in hand and
also there is a very beautiful uh analysis of uh Viśvanātha Chakravarti Ṭhākura in the fourth canto of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, where Sati is speaking about Lord Shiva and Daksha, how Daksha found faults in Lord Shiva.
And Viśvanātha Chakravarti Ṭhākura says that there are five levels of sādhus and five levels of asādhus.
And he says that asādhus are those who see little fault or who even don't see any fault, but you know can find a fault where when it doesn't exist. This is asādhu. And sādhus are opposite to this.
They may see faults, but they will interpret it as a as good qualities even. So there is this gradation of uh uh sādhutva and asādhu, this quality of sādhu. Sādhu he sees good qualities in other people and uh asādhu the
tendency of uh an asādhu is to magnify we all have this magnifying glass within ourselves and we see some little fault and we magnify it and it's easy, you know.
Rāmacandra Purī he saw some ants near the room of Lord Caitanya and he says, Oh, this sannyāsī must be eating sweets. Look, ants are crawling there. So, you know, he found faults in Lord Chaitanya, so to speak about us.
Anyone can find faults in us.