730521 - Letter to Niranjana written from New York

Letters by Date, 1973

Tridandi Goswami
A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami
Founder-Acharya:
International Society for Krishna Consciousness
CENTER:CALCUTTA [handwritten]

DATE .....May..21.....................19.73

My dear Niranjan,

Please accept my blessings. I beg to thank you for your letter dated 10/5/73. Now I have come here to New York. My health is not keeping very well. I'm suffering from cold and cough. I am returning back to India for medical treatment.

I can understand your difficult position in preaching work. Not only you, but I also had the same difficulty when I wanted to start this Krsna Consciousness Movement from India. I approached many respectable gentlemen and requested that, "My dear sir, you have got four children, out of them can you spare one only under my guidance, because I want to make a brahminical society all over the world." Everyone replied in this connection, "Sir what benefit will there be in becoming a brahmin??"

The position is that the whole world is full of sudras. The sudra's business is to somehow or other catch up some nice service under some good master and get a nice wife and home. That is their success in life. This is the position of India especially. The whole of India is now under technological instruction which means to become sudras. Just like a carpenter can manufacture so much nice furniture by his technological education, but in our Vedic society, the carpenter is considered a sudra. Similarly a tannery expert was called a cobbler. So these things are now lost. Everyone is prepared to become a cobbler, a carpenter, a chemist, a physicist, an electrician and so many other things, but they do not know that after such education one has to depend on other's mercy. So-called highly qualified technologists cannot earn their livelihood without getting a suitable job. It is just like a dog, however stout and strong it may be, it cannot be happy without having gotten a wealthy master. Without being protected by a wealthy master it is nothing but a street dog and he is never happy. So all the students at the present moment are getting educated how to become first class sudras. How they can be interested in Krsna Consciousness, which is the business of high class brahmins and Vaisnavas? Still it is our duty to preach, and our sincere endeavor for preaching work will be appreciated by the Lord. That much we want. Our mission is to see that Lord Chaitanya is satisfied, never mind if we could not turn many of them to this cult. Here is a quotation from Chaitanya Mahaprabhu's instruction, "Yare dekha, tare kaha 'krsna'-upadesa/amara ajnaya guru hana tara' ei desa Chaitanya Charitamrta, Madhya-lila, 7:128." So our mission is, by the order of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, we shall try to teach people about the Bhagavad Gita and Srimad Bhagawatam, etc., without being depressed whether people are accepting them or not. This is our credit. We shall be judged by the quality of our work and not by the material return.

Yes, their arguments are quite reasonable. The aim of our education should be, whatever education we might have got, we must satisfy the Lord by such education. That is the perfection of life. I have therefore asked our chemist friend, Dr. Swaroop Damodar das Brahmachary to refute the theory that life comes out of matter. This is not the fact, rather, matter comes out of life. We have discussed this point very broadly and Swaroop Damodar is convinced that everything comes from life, Krsna-- aham sarvasya prabhavo/ mattah sarvam pravartate (Bhagavad Gita 10.8). So, I've asked Swaroop Damodar to invite Ramananda Rao to come and join him to present this revolutionary theory to the learned advanced scientists. We know it certainly that matter comes out of life. Simply we have to present this thesis in chemical, technological words. Swaroop Damodar has already written one small booklet, "Krsna Consciousness, Purely on a Scientific Basis." So this is the business of big, big, chemists and physicists to present the real facts in Krsna Consciousness. Then such education is valid,idam hi pumsas tapasah srutasya va svistasya suktacyacabuddhi-dattayo avicyuto'rtha kavibhir nirupito yad uttamasloka-gunanuvarnanam Srimad Bhagavatam 1.5.22. So, if they do not believe in Ramayana, Mahabharata, Bhagavad Gita, then they are called unbelievers, so how can you believe their words. Then we come to the platform of reason and argument. If they do not believe in Ramayana and Mahabharata, then we shall reply point to point by argument and reason. Of course, it is not possible to come to the right conclusion simply by argument and reason, tarkapratishtanat.
You mention that they have not even heard of Lord Gouranga. So that is their misfortune, and our misfortune also. Our big, big godbrothers in India, they could not preach Lord Gouranga's name all over India. They are simply inclined to criticize me, that my students call me Prabhupada. They could not do anything practical and tangible. They are satisfied with a temple and a few disciples begging alms for the maintenance of the temple.

So, we can understand that they have all become sudras. How can they have interest in Bhagavad Gita. Although some of them have been born in brahmana families, but by quality are all sudras.

You can do your best, that is very nice, never mind there is no good result. I have gone to the western countries, singlehanded. I tried my best and now people say it is successful. So you can do the same.

Hoping this meets you in good health.

Your ever well-wisher,

A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami

Sriman Niranjan Das Brahmachary
44 New. Tech. Hostel No. 2
B.H.U., Varanasi 221005
India

Calcutta 21/5/73 [handwritten]

ACBS/jda