First Deserve, Then Desire

Sarva gattah · August 22, 2008

Morning walk conversation, June 7, 1976

Tamala Krsna: There's another statement, I saw them, where it says, it's a quote, that you can treat Krsna, as your lover and Krsna will reciprocate.

Hari-sauri: And they underlined the two words "you can" treat Krsna as your lover. In this way they're taking your quotes out of context.

Ramesvara: This is one of their main, the main ideas in their philosophy is that the living entity can desire to have any relationship he wants with Krsna.

Prabhupada: That's all right, he can desire. I already explained: first deserve, then desire.

Tamala Krsna and Ramesvara: Deserve then desire, oh.

Prabhupada: You are rascal, how you can desire? You have no qualification, you desire to high court judge. What is this nonsense?

Ramesvara: But then they have an answer.

Prabhupada: What is that answer?

Ramesvara: That "Let me just try it anyway, to keep my mind thinking..."

Prabhupada: How you can try it? First of all, be qualified, a big lawyer. Then you become high court judge. Where is that qualification? You are after illicit sex and biDi and you want to be associated with the gopIs.

Ramesvara: They say that "In ISKCON, we do not..."

Prabhupada: Let them say all nonsense. They are disqualified. Sahajiya babajis, that's all.

Tamala Krsna: There's about forty of them in this temple. Fifty. There's fifty of them in this temple, Prabhupada.

Ramesvara: Oh, really?

Tamala Krsna: Oh, yes.

Hari-sauri: A women's group and a men's group.

Tamala Krsna: There's a women's group with about twenty-five or thirty.

Hari-zauri: The thing is that they're going around and they're soliciting for people to come and join their group, and then immediately they come, they immediately take them into all the details of the gopIs with Krsna.

Prabhupada: Then let them.... Unless they follow the regulative principles, there is no place for that in the temple. Let them go out.

Ramesvara: They are following.

Tamala Krsna: Yes.

Prabhupada: That is their fault. They want to utilize the love affairs of Krsna and gopIs for their debauchery. That is a support for their debauchery. That is sahajiya.

Tamala Krsna: That's the meaning of sahajiya.

Prabhupada: Yes.

Tamala Krsna: So that's on their minds.

Prabhupada: Yes.

Tamala Krsna: They're frustrated.

Prabhupada: We are restricting, "No illicit sex." They will put that "Here is illicit sex between the Gopis and Krsna."

Tamala Krsna: So we can also do it.

Prabhupada: Yes. That is their...

Tamala Krsna: Breaking the principles.

Prabhupada: Yes.

Hari-sauri: Because sadhana-bhakti is a gradual process, they immediately want the highest perfection quickly.

Prabhupada: That is the danger. But if they at once go to rasa-lila, because they are not trained up neither they are liberated, they'll think this rasa-lila is just like our young boys, young girls mix together, have sex like that. So it is supported our.... "Why should we restrict to no illicit sex, no this, no rules and regulations? We shall do all nonsense." That's all. And become a gopI. It is very good to aspire to become high court judge, but how you can become high court judge without qualification? That they are not thinking. They have no qualification, they have illicit sex, pregnant, going to abortion, and they're high court judge.

Ramesvara: They say Ajamila had no qualification and he just chanted.

Prabhupada: Ajamila had no qualification. Therefore they should have no qualification.

Ramesvara: They say...

Prabhupada: They say. Now you accept them as authority, "They say." What is they? What they are?

Ramesvara: Ajamila's qualification was he thought of Krsna at the time of death.

Prabhupada: Yes. But you cannot think.

Ramesvara: They want to think of the gopIs at the time of death.

Tamala Krsna: Then practice.

Prabhupada: What they will think of at the death, why you are conjecturing now? Their habits are rascal, they're making pregnant, illicit sex, what they will think? Anyway, if we give indulgence to these people, then this preaching work will be hampered.

Tamala Krsna: No, we're not going to do that.

Prabhupada: Or they should be separated. Otherwise, it will be bad example, and all restrictions will be broken.

Tamala Krsna: If they don't change their mentality, then they should live separately, do their own society.

Prabhupada: And they'll do that. (japa) That sahajiya tendency is very easy to take up.

Hari-zauri: It seems like it's an inherent thing in...

Prabhupada: Thinking of Radha-Krsna lila, that is in liberated stage, not in the conditioned stage.

Tamala Krsna: I could never understand, SrIla Prabhupada, why, I was always wondering why in all of your books you're always blasting so much time on the sahajiyas, and I was not.... Now I see why, because the tendency is so easy. I could never, I'd always think, "Why is Prabhupada saying so much? Because they're only in India."

Ramesvara: He's thinking that this is a small group.

Tamala Krsna: Yes, in India, but now I see it's an easy mentality for anyone's mind that can be adopted. That's why Prabhupada was stressing.

Ramesvara: And as our movement gets more and more members, there will be more and more people who will be exhibiting this sahajiya tendency.

Tamala Krsna: That's why it's in every book Prabhupada speaks about it without fail.

Prabhupada: Anyway, keep your movement very pure. You don't mind if somebody goes away. Don't mind. But we must keep our principles pure.

theist · August 23, 2008

I remember one devotee who considered himself an "orthodox" GV remarking he had a lot of problems with Prabhupada's statement, "first deserve then desire."

The idea being that spontaneous devotion is not dependent on qualifications or merits but springs spontaneously from the soul. With a superfical glance it appears he is right and Prabhupada wrong but we if look more deeply at what Prabhupada is saying here,

Prabhupada: How you can try it? First of all, be qualified, a big lawyer. Then you become high court judge. Where is that qualification? You are after illicit sex and biDi and you want to be associated with the gopIs.

it becomes quite clear what Prabhupada is really saying.

For the spontaneous devotional sentiments to be genuine one must be free from the desires for material sense gratification. That is what he means by being qualified. And that qualification is not based on merit because it is Krishna's mercy that liberates one from material desires/ When we are free from material desires we are then "qualified" to have spontaneous desires of love and devotion.

A sahajiya is someone who comes to accept his material sentiments as being spiritual sentiments and then acts out from such an imitationist platform. Sometimes such people, even impersonialists, dress themselves up as gopis and run through paths of Vrndavan crying "Krishna Krishna" and thinking they are experiencing the separation shown by Radharani. :rolleyes:

theist · August 23, 2008

Tamala Krsna: I could never understand, SrIla Prabhupada, why, I was always wondering why in all of your books you're always blasting so much time on the sahajiyas, and I was not.... Now I see why, because the tendency is so easy. I could never, I'd always think, "Why is Prabhupada saying so much? Because they're only in India."

Ramesvara: He's thinking that this is a small group.

Tamala Krsna: Yes, in India, but now I see it's an easy mentality for anyone's mind that can be adopted. That's why Prabhupada was stressing.

We should always be vigilante about tending our own garden. We have all seen individuals who are much more intelligent then ourselves get sidetracked in this way.

One way is not to get too involved in talking too far above our station. We need to question about and seek the realms higher than our present one, that is how we advance. But also we must remember Krishna consciousness advancement is measured in realizations and not just in housing spiritual concepts intellectually.