Land of Pious Life

I remember Srila Prabhupada saying that to take birth in India is a very rare opportunity. It means that one is very high in the spiritual evolutionary cycle. We understand from the Vedic literature that the living being is not actually his material body; he is the spiritual soul within the body. That spiritual soul is eternal, but because of material desires, he's taking birth in one body after another, in various species of life. The body is temporary, and after the death of the body, according to one's consciousness, he takes a new body. In this way, the living being takes body after body, in 8,400,000 species of life, until gradually he comes to the human form. Then, in that human form, one gets the opportunity to cultivate spiritual consciousness, or God consciousness, and the perfection of that God consciousness is to get free from this cycle of birth and death by becoming a pure devotee of Krsna, God, and going back home, back to Godhead. But even if one doesn't achieve that perfection, if one makes only partial advancement on the path, he still gets to come back again in another human body and continue from where he left off.

It would seem, therefore, if we study the past, that to take one's birth in India would be an advantage, because India is traditionally a country of spiritual culture. It is called punya-bhūmi, or the land of pious life. Many great incarnations of God have appeared in India. For example, this city of Vrndavana is special because Lord Krsna appeared here. Therefore even today there are so many temples of Krsna here, the people chant Krsna's holy name, and they're always hearing and chanting about the activities of Krsna. So if you happen to be born in a place where you can see the places of Krsna's pastimes, hear and chant His holy names or take food that's been offered to the Lord, that's very auspicious. And Lord Caitanya said, bharata-bhūmite haila manusya-janma yara/ janma sarthaka kari' kara para-upakara: "One who has taken his birth as a human being in the land of India should make his life successful and work for the benefit of all other people."

JAYADVAITA DASA: So India is a good place to preach Krsna consciousness.

TAMALA KRSNA GOSVAMĪ: Yes, it's a very good preaching field. It's good because the people are still to some extent Krsna conscious here in India. Preaching here is not a question of teaching something completely new; it's a question of reviving something which is not very dormant. We say that Krsna consciousness is the dormant God consciousness within everyone. But here it's not quite as dormant. It's just barely sleeping. You go anywhere and start chanting Hare Krsna, and right away people join in with the chanting. You don't have to teach them these nonsectarian holy names of the Lord, because they already know how to chant them-Hare Krsna, Hare Krsna, Krsna Krsna, Hare Hare / Hare Rama, Hare Rama, Rama Rama, Hare Hare.