In a dream we see so many things that have nothing to do with us. This is our nighttime dream, and we recognize it when we wake up. Unfortunately generally we go back into our daytime dream. “I am this.” “I am that.” “I am white.” “I am black.” “I am American.” And so forth.
Indians in the West can succeed materially. But the challenge remains: will they be able—and willing—to retain their cultural origins?
Confusing “cast” with “caste” is an innocent error, but mistaking Lord Krsna’s varnasrama system for an oppressive, hereditary class structure is a far more serious blunder. By Mathuresa Dasa Baseball, to most anyone’s mind, has little in common with the Indian caste system, which rigidly divides society into four hereditary classes. But for me there’s […]
Today, for the majority of students attending universities and institutions of higher learning, the question of the end of knowledge, the destination of the long pursuit, hardly ever comes to mind. One’s eyes are usually fixed on graduation day and the diploma that signifies entrance into a good-paying job. For most, the goal of knowledge is money and the material pleasures it buys.
Jesus Christ is our guru. Christ is preaching consciousness of God. So he is our guru, our spiritual master. That’s a fact. Don’t take him otherwise. He’s our guru.
Reading the newspaper this morning: Officials at the University of Nevada have OK’d a site in Reno for a sheepherder monument. Two young female tourists have drifted ashore in their disabled motorboat near Jakarta, Indonesia, after living for twenty-two days on short rations and rainwater.
William James’s “Soul Theory” seemed imposing at first—as imposing as William James Hall must have looked to my grandmother. As it turned out, James was pretty close to home. by Mathuresa Dasa Gammy, my grandmother, had a passing acquaintance of sorts with William James, the great American psychologist and philosopher. She owned a two-century-old white […]
Satyaraja dasa addresses a gathering at the Whole Life Expo in New York City. Thank you for allowing me to speak at the 1985 Whole Life Expo. I would like to ask you all to reflect for a moment on the implications of the word whole. What does it mean to be truly whole? That […]
Americans tend to scorn India’s recent national ban on cow slaughter. We have difficulty appreciating the Hindus’ view that the cows are holy, and most Americans have little knowledge of how a rural economy like India’s is dependent on the life of the cow and her by-products.
History’s fair-haired flower children have passed … and in their place comes a changeling generation that may be the most disturbed and demoralized in this century.
It is all cheating. You have left God out. That is the height of cheating. So naturally the rest of your so-called schooling must also be cheating.
In spite of working so hard, there is frustration. No one is satisfied. We are always wondering what danger is coming next. This is material life: You work very hard, so hard, and still you feel frustration and are always fearful, and then one day you die.
There is a movement afoot to correct the worldwide abuse of the English language. Reformers claim that our abuse of words is crucially linked with the moral decline of our society.
My first impression of the Hare Krsna temple was, “Here is something that is very beautiful and lovely.” As far as the worship was concerned, it was the happiness of it, the joy of it, that I noticed.
In America and India and so many countries all over the world, they have a “secular state.” The government leaders say they don’t want to favor any particular religion, but actually they are favoring irreligion.
There are many philosophers. Some of them think the Absolute Truth is impersonal, and others say it is personal. In India the impersonalists are known as Mayavadis and the personalists are known as Vaisnavas. So, here Lord Krsna resolves the controversy about whether the Absolute Truth is impersonal or personal.
Do we have free will? Are we all on the same path? Are we going in the same direction? Will we all reach the same destination?
This so-called modern civilization is keeping all humanity in misfortune. This civilization is cheating us out of our opportunity to understand God and surrender to Him; rather, it is keeping us trapped in the cycle of birth and death.
Our modern society, with its emphasis on science and technology, would certainly seek to view itself as being rooted in reason rather than in faith. Faith, after all, connotes unquestioning belief and seems at variance with the “scientific method.”
It will be settled at death. That’s all. A rascal may think foolishly that life is absurd—but death will not be absurd. Lord Krsna says, “Everyone must finally accept Me—as death”