Audio

Prabhupada: ...If they do not change the body,er, dress one day, immediately they are moist in the shirt. Because they do not know how to keep clean. So in India there is no question how to keep clean. They do not know. They'll not take bath for days together. And he likes stop bathing, so many germs carrying. And he's a first-class person, sahib, on account of the wealth. Last maybe. First-class.[?] Don't take bath, neither wash their mouth or hand. And that is...

Hari-sauri: That habit is spreading. I've seen in India. Even the Indian businessmen that come to see you...

Prabhupada: They are imitating.

Hari-sauri: Yes. It's laziness.

Prabhupada: But you see. I take little medicine and I wash hand. But you don't learn it. You remain the same. You have to... [indistinct-microphone moving] I show example, but you don't do it. What can I do?

Hari-sauri: We're learning.

Prabhupada: I do not know how long you'll learn.

Hari-sauri: [laughs] It's like you said in Mayapur, it's a little artificial for us. It's very... It's not...

Prabhupada: Cleanliness unknown to the Western countries.

Hari-sauri: That's a fact.

Prabhupada: Saucam. Satya-saucabhyam. Saucam means cleanliness. The Western people, they do not know what is cleanliness. And therefore brahmana's another name is suci, "always clean." Three times bathing, three times changing cloth. It doesn't matter, loin cloth, but cloth must be changed.

Pusta Krsna: Outer cloth?

Prabhupada: Yes.

Pusta Krsna: Dhoti, like that?

Prabhupada: No, you take bath, you have to change your cloth; it becomes wet. This is cleanliness. Satya-saucabhyam. Samena damena brahmacarya, tapasa brahmacaryena [SB 6.1.13]. Tapasya, the first beginning of tapasya, is brahmacari. Yamena niyamena va tyagena satya-saucabhyam yamena niyamena va. This is human life, tapasa, brahmacaryena, samena, damena va [SB 6.1.13], then truthfulness, cleanliness, controlling the senses. So these things are required. Otherwise what is the difference between dog's life?

Pusta Krsna: People don't see what the gain will be. If one... People don't see, in Western countries, or appreciate what the gain will be by exerting much effort in these ways.

Prabhupada: That they do not know, what is the real gain. They think this body is the gain only. And beyond this body there is another gain. That is not known. They do not know even. That is the defect of their civilization. Na hanyate hanyamane sarire [Bg 2.20]. They are taking care of the body, but beyond the body there is something else, which is eternal. Even after the annihilation of the body, it does not become destroyed. That they do not know. There is no education. There is no research. There is no college. There is no science to understand. And that kind of taking care of the body, a dogs know. Sometimes the dogs, they rub their body on the ground like that. That... That makes them rejuvenated. Horse also do that. So how to take care of the body, they know in their different method. But that is known to them. If before the horse you give them some meat, they'll not take. And give them peas, they'll take immediately.

Pusta Krsna: Give them milk?

Prabhupada: Huh?

Pusta Krsna: Milk?

Prabhupada: No, meat.

Pusta Krsna: Meat. He will not take.

Prabhupada: And the dog, you give fruit, he'll dislike. Give him rotten meat, he can take. So there is difference between dog's life, horse life, even in animals.

Hari-sauri: They know how to look after their bodies.

Prabhupada: Yes.

Pusta Krsna: So then the argument that animals have no intelligence...

Prabhupada: And what is your intelligence? You are using the intelligence for the same purpose. And what is the use of your intelligence?

Hari-sauri: It's just a waste.

Prabhupada: No, no. If animal has no intelligence, you have no intelligence. What you are doing more than the animals? That we are protesting, that "Why you should remain in the animal intelligence?" That is our propaganda.

Hari-sauri: If you can't prove yourself capable of taking use of better facility, then again you get less facility.

Prabhupada: Yes.

Pusta Krsna: You explained very nicely how these boys and girls, they will sit on the floor. What is the need to manufacture chair? So a civilization which is geared to unnecessarily increasing the necessities is simply glorified...

Prabhupada: Wasting time.

Pusta Krsna: That is not the real business of human life.

Prabhupada: But they are thinking, "This is advancement. To sit on the floor is primitive, but to sit on the chair is civilized."

Hari-sauri: Well, when we were on the plane in the first class, we were eating with our hand, and I could see, these men, they were eating with knife and fork, and they were looking like this. And they were... I could see what they were thinking. They were disgusted: "Here are these men, sitting in first class, eating with their hands, very primitive and crude." And they're eating with knife and fork, and I was thinking, "What are they eating? Some beef or some meat preparation, like this." But they're thinking they're civilized.

Prabhupada: Knife, fork, wine.

Hari-sauri: Yes. "Because I have knife and fork, now I'm civilized."

Pusta Krsna: I remember when I first went to Vrndavana and I saw in the villages how they were using dirt and charcoal to clean their pots and pans...

Prabhupada: Yes, they use it.

Pusta Krsna: I thought they... It was my condition... I have never seen before. I thought, "What is this? They are making their pots and pans dirty?" Because, you know, we're so accustomed to detergents and soaps, and you have to have so many things to clean.

Prabhupada: That is not also properly clean.

Pusta Krsna: No.

Prabhupada: The down side of the pan remains black. But if you take some dirt and rub it nicely, it become glisten.

Hari-sauri: Dirt is very first-class for cleaning.

Prabhupada: Utensils for cooking purpose must be very, very clean. The... If the black portion remains, in India they will not touch.

Pusta Krsna: Even on the bottom?

Prabhupada: Yes.

Pusta Krsna: On the outside?

Prabhupada: They'll not touch: "Oh, it is still dirty." But our going on. What can be done? Where there is no cleanliness, little rubbed with soap, that is sufficient. What can be done? But that is not cleanliness. If there is a black spot on the..., it has to... It will immediately be rejected. My mother used to see every utensil, whether there is any spot. The maidservant had to examine. Then it is no spot, then it is finished. Otherwise she has to do again. Everything should be neat and clean. The kitchen should be very neat and clean, washed twice daily, opened nicely and smeared with water and gobar. And if you see the kitchen, immediately you'll feel comfortable. It is very cleansly prepared, then offered to the Deity, then you take, automatically your mind becomes cleansed. [pause] [end]