Srila Prabhupada’s Answers- Part 2, (Vedic Culture: Varnasrama-dharma)

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Srila Prabhupada’s Answers- Part 2, (Vedic Culture: Varnasrama-dharma)

 

Bob: I've asked devotees about how they feel towards sex in their relations,

and I see the way they feel, but I can't see myself acting the same way. See,

I'll be getting married at the end of this summer.

 

Srila Prabhupada: Hm-m?

 

Bob: I'll be getting married at the end of this summer, in September or August

when I return to America. And the devotees say that the householders only have

sex to conceive a child, and I cannot picture myself at all in such a position,

and--What kind of sex life can one lead, living in the material world?

 

Srila Prabhupada: The Vedic principle is that one should avoid sex life

altogether. The whole Vedic principle is to get liberation from material

bondage. There are different attachments for material enjoyment, of which sex

life is the topmost enjoyment. The Bhagavatam says that this material world...

 

pumsah striya mithuni-bhavam etam

 

( Man is attached to woman, and woman is attached to man. Not only in human

society--in animal society also. That attachment is the basic principle of

material life. So, a woman is hankering or seeking after the association of a

man, and a man is hankering or seeking for the association of a woman. All the

fiction novels, dramas, cinema and even ordinary advertisements that you see

simply depict the attachment between man and woman. Even in the tailor's shop

you will find in the window some woman and some man.)

 

pravrttir esa bhutanam

 

nivrttis tu mahaphalam

 

So this attachment is already there.

 

Bob: Attachment between man and woman?

 

Srila Prabhupada: Man and woman. So if you want to get liberation from this

material world, then that attachment should be reduced to nil. Otherwise, simply

further attachment--You will have to take rebirth, either as a human being or as

a demigod or as an animal, as a serpent, as a bird, as a beast. You will have to

take birth. So, this basic principle of increasing attachment is not our

business, although it is the general tendency. Grha, ksetra, suta [home, land,

sons]. But if one can reduce and stop it, that is first class. Therefore our

Vedic system is to first of all train a boy as a brahmacari--no sex life. The

Vedic principle is to reduce attachment, not to increase it. Therefore the whole

system is called varnasrama-dharma. The Indian system calls for varna and

asrama--four social orders and four spiritual orders. Brahmacarya [celibate

student life], grhastha [married life], vanaprastha [retired life] and sannyasa

[renounced life]--these are the spiritual orders. And the social orders consist

of brahmanas [intellectuals], ksatriyas [administrators], vaisyas [merchants and

farmers] and sudras [ordinary workers]. So under this system, the regulative

principles are so nice that

 

even if one has the tendency to enjoy material life, he is so nicely molded

that at last he achieves liberation and goes back home, back to Godhead. This is

the process. So sex life is not required, but because we are attached to it,

therefore there are some regulative principles under which it is maintained.

 

[chanting starts somewhere in the background, with exotic mrdanga drumbeats

amidst laughing and the loud blowing of horns.]

 

It is said in Srimad-Bhagavatam that --

 

pumsah striya mithuni-bhavam etam

 

tayor mitho hrdaya-granthim ahuh

 

ato grha-ksetra-sutapta-vittair

 

janasya moho 'yam aham mameti

 

(Bhag. 5.5.8)

 

This sex life is the basic principle of material life--attachment for man or

woman. And when they are united, when a man and woman are united, that

attachment becomes increased, and that increased attachment will induce one to

accumulate grha (a home), ksetra (land), suta (children), apta (friendship or

society) and vitta. Vita means money. In this

way--grha-ksetra-sutapta-vittaih--he becomes entangled. janasya moho 'yam: this

is the illusion. And by this illusion he thinks, aham mameti: "I am this body,

and anything in relationship with this body is mine."

 

Bob: What is that again?

 

Srila Prabhupada: This attachment increases. The material attachment involves

thinking, "I am this body, and because I have this body in a particular place,

that is my country." And that is going on: "I am American, I am Indian, I am

German, I am this, I am that--this body. This is my country. I shall sacrifice

everything for my country and society." So in this way, the illusion increases.

And under this illusion, when he dies he gets another body. That may be a

superior body or inferior body, according to his karma. So if he gets a superior

body, then that is also an entanglement, even if he goes to the heavenly

planets. But if he becomes a cat or dog, then his life is lost. Or a tree--there

is every chance of it. So this science is not known in the world--how the soul

is transmigrating from one body to another, and how he is being entrapped! in

different types of bodies. This science is unknown. Therefore when Arjuna was

speaking--"If I kill my brother, if I kill my grandfather on the other

side..."--he was simply thinking on the basis of the bodily concept of life. But

when his problems could not be solved, he surrendered to Krishna and accepted

Him as spiritual master. And when Krishna became his spiritual master, He

chastised Arjuna in the beginning:

 

asocyan anvasocas tvam

 

prajna-vadams ca bhasase

 

gatasun agatasums ca

 

nanusocanti panditah

 

( "You are talking like a learned man, but you are fool number one because you

are talking about the bodily concept of life." )

 

So this sex life increases the bodily concept of life. Therefore, the whole

process is to reduce it to nil.

 

Bob: To reduce it over the stages of your life?

 

Srila Prabhupada: Yes. Reduce it. A boy is trained as a student up to

twenty-five years, restricting sex life. Brahmacari. So, some of the boys remain

naisthika-brahmacari [celibate for life]. Because they are given education and

they become fully conversant with spiritual knowledge, they don't want to marry.

That is also restricted--he cannot have sex life without being married.

Therefore in human society there is marriage, not in animal society.

 

But people are gradually descending from human society to animal society.

They are forgetting marriage. That is also predicted in the sastras. Dampatye

'bhirucir hetuh: in the Kali-yuga [the present age of quarrel], eventually there

will be no marriage performances; the boy and the girl will simply agree to live

together, and their relationship will exist on sexual power. If the man or the

woman is deficient in sex life, then there is divorce. So, for this philosophy

there are many Western philosophers like Freud and others who have written so

many books. But according to Vedic culture, we are interested in sex only for

begetting children, that's all. Not to study the psychology of sex life. There

is already natural psychology for that. Even if one does not read any

philosophy, he is sexually inclined. N! obody is taught it in the schools and

colleges. Everyone already knows how to do it. [He laughs.] That is the general

tendency. But education should be given to stop it. That is real education.

[There is a long pause, filled with the sound of bicycle horns, children

playing, and throngs of people calling to one another]

 

Bob: Presently, in America, that's a radical concept.

 

Srila Prabhupada: Well, in America there are so many things that require

reformation, and this Krishna consciousness movement will bring that. I went to

your country and saw that the boys and girls were living like friends, so I said

to my students, "You cannot live together as friends; you must get you! rselves

married."

 

Bob: Many people see that even marriage is not sacred, so they find no desire to

marry. Because people get married, and if things are not proper, they get a

divorce so very easily--

 

Srila Prabhupada: Yes, that also.

 

Bob:-- that some people feel that to get married is not meaningful.

 

Srila Prabhupada: No, their idea is that marriage is for legalized prostitution.

They think like that, but that is not marriage. Even that Christian paper--what

is that? Watch--?

 

Syamasundara: Watchtower?

 

Srila Prabhupada: Watchtower. It has criticized that one priest has allowed a

marriage between two men--homosexuality. So these things are all going on. They

take it purely for prostitution, that's all. So therefore people are thinking,

"What is the use of keeping a regular prostitute at such heavy expenditure?

Better not to have this."

 

Syamasundara: You use that example of the cow and the market.

 

Srila Prabhupada: Yes--when the milk is available in the marketplace, what is

the use of keeping a cow? [Everyone laughs.] It is a very abominable condition

in the Western countries--I have seen it. Here also in India, gradually it is

coming. Therefore we have started this Krishna consciousness movement! to

educate people in the essential principles of spiritual life. It is not a

sectarian religious movement. It is a cultural movement for everyone's benefit.

 

Please Chant :

 

 

Hare Krishna Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna Hare Hare

Hare Rama Hare Rama Rama Rama Hare Hare

 

 

And Be Happy.

 

Brahmatirtha dasa Adhikari

 

(Bob Cohen)

 

Houston, Texas

 

(To be Continued)……..

 

 

 

 

NB – ‘Excerpts of Hare Krishna Literature’

 

 

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