Life in the Womb
According to the 1973 United States Supreme Court decision legalizing abortion, only in the last twelve weeks of pregnancy does the growing fetus have a right to live despite the mother’s wish to abort him.
Renunciation: The Higher Taste
It’s difficult to understand how someone on the path of spiritual realization can reject the things most people find enjoyable. Renunciation of worldly pleasure is possible only if one experiences a higher satisfaction.
Delivering the Message Unchanged
The precious Bhagavatam has been handed down in disciplic succession, from guru to disciple, in an unbroken chain, and today Srila Prabhupada, spiritual master of ISKCON, is delivering it in turn to his disciples.
Secretary To a Pure Devotee
Srila Prabhupada has been extensively traveling. Satsvarupa dasa Gosvami traveled with him and kept a personal diary. These are excerpts from that diary.
Krishna’s Universal Form
The universal form is the form of the Supreme Lord in which one can see everything in the universe, all at once. In the universal form, one can see past, present and future. One can see all the demigods of the material creation, and all other living beings.
Initiation Into Krishna Consciousness
For a typical initiation, about one hundred devotees gather in the temple. The devotees to be initiated—perhaps a dozen of them—sit in two rows, facing the devotee designated to be the priest of the ceremony.
Gurukula
Gurukula, a school for children ages five to fifteen, was founded by ISKCON in 1971. It is the only school teaching one how to be eternal, blissful and full of knowledge.
Krishna’s Sixteen Thousand Wives
We should not be surprised if Krishna had married sixteen million wives, for Krishna, as the Supreme Personality of Godhead, is unlimited. Indeed, we may note with wonder that Krishna married only 16,108 wives.
Krishna Consciousness In The University
Many of us feel that this divorcing of the personal or devotional from learning, from wisdom, is a bad thing. And so I think we have a great deal to learn about the religions of India from people who have taken a direct, more involved and, I think, more complete and total approach to the things we read about in books.
The Killing of Kamsa
Kamsa heard the cries of the newborn child as his death knell, and he rushed in to kill him. But the baby flew up into the air and assumed the form of the demigoddess Maya. “You rascal,” she said to Kamsa. “The child who will kill you has already been born elsewhere. You cannot kill Him.”
The Reality of Krishna’s Appearance
Krishna’s pastimes go on as a kind of road show, visiting one planet after another. Not only does Krishna travel; He brings with Him His mother, His father, His cowherd friends, the gopis, the cows and the land of Vrndavana.
Classes in the Science of God
This beautiful Bhagavatam is sufficient in itself for God realization. As soon as one attentively and submissively hears the message of Bhagavatam, he becomes attached to the Supreme Lord.
The Education to End All Miseries
Human education must not merely instruct us how to prepare for a job or how to speculate upon the imperfect views of great thinkers. Rather, it must enable us to solve the problems of life.
The Glories of Sanatana Gosvami
Five hundred years ago, Sanatana Gosvami was a central figure in the government of Bengal, but by leaving his governmental responsibilities to surrender to Lord Caitanya, he fulfilled a far more important responsibility to both himself and humanity in the service of the Supreme Lord.
Mexico Takes to Krishna Consciousness
I asked Haihaya whether the people of Mexico City were taking Krishna consciousness seriously. He replied, “Many of them come with beads and chant Hare Krishna just like full-time devotees. After they buy books, they always read them and ask for more. Also, many of them take to a vegetarian diet after hearing our philosophy.”
Compassion Means Spreading Krsna Consciousness
Seemingly devout Hindus say, “Why are you teaching of Krishna in America? To follow the Vedas you have to be born in India.” Is Krishna’s message, then, just for a few?
Training Tomorrow’s Leaders
We all know that education is for training tomorrow’s leaders. But today’s schools are little more than training grounds for criminals. So where are we going to get tomorrow’s leaders? From among these students at ISKCON’s gurukula in Vrindavan.
Breaking the Bonds of False Fatherhood
Unfortunately many parents are not satisfied with this movement… However, we have no alternative other than to teach our disciples to free themselves from materialistic life. We must instruct them in the opposite of material life to save them from the repetition of birth and death.
Letters: Indian Family Upset About Son Joining ISKCON
I am staying here at the temple in Atlanta, and this has upset my parents very much. They started crying on the phone, and my mother even fainted once. Now I see what you meant when you told me that the family ties are much stronger in Indian families than in American families.
Of Men and Machines
Automation, in the form of computers is an attempt to exercise control, not only of the mechanical process itself, but of the human being who directed it, turning him from an active to a passive agent, and finally eliminating him altogether.