Berkeley, George
Berkeley, George
Berkeley, George (Syamasundara)
Syamasundara: First discussing today George Berkeley philosopher, English, ah, Irish philosopher.
Prabhupada: Hm.
Syamasundara: And his idea was that, "Nothing exists outside of my perception." In other words reality or matter does not exist, it is simply perceived.
Prabhupada: Sūnyavadi, that called sūnyavadi.
Syamasundara: It's not exactly like sūnyavadi because he says that things exist, but they're not made of matter. Just like this table only exists in my eye, in my mind, it's an idea in my mind. So the table is made of immaterial substance which enters my mind, it is not made of matter.
Prabhupada: Then what is your mind?
Syamasundara: Mind is...
Prabhupada: Mind is also immaterial.
Syamasundara: Well the idea in my mind is immaterial.
Prabhupada: Then it comes to sūnya, you are zero, it is zero. It comes to zero.
Syamasundara: He says everything is spiritual, not zero but spiritual.
Prabhupada: Hm?
Syamasundara: He says, "everything is spiritual".
Prabhupada: That means he has no spiritual idea. That spiritual is not an idea, it is a fact. Just like that, what is his name, that, he was talking with?
Devotee: Oh Mahindra?
Prabhupada: Mahindra. He was astonished that I have written in my Upanisad, "blissful form." He was questioning, "How it is form, blissful?" So they can not imagine that a spirit has form. That is their defect. He has no idea, that it is a fact. Sac-cid-ananda-vigraha [Bs. 5.1]. They have no idea of the spiritual existence.
Syamasundara: He says that, "everything has form but it's not made of matter."
Prabhupada: That is nice. Everything has form, not necessary the form must be material. That's nice. We says that. That God has got spiritual form.
Syamasundara: But he goes so far to say that, "everything is made of spirit."
Prabhupada: Yes, that is nice. In the higher sense everything is spirit. Just like we are offering foods to Krsna and Krsna is standing there. So why I am seeing it is stone, I am seeing that I am offering the material fruits but actually it is not. Krsna can not take anything which is material.
Syamasundara: His idea is that...
Prabhupada: Neither Krsna is material, but I am seeing that it is stone, I am seeing that the fruit is material. Krsna is enjoying with the gopis, we are seeing that these are material girls, that is my vision because I am not perfect but in higher sense everything is spiritual.
Syamasundara: His example is for instance, I see a book…
Prabhupada: We always say that material means simply forgetfulness of Krsna-that is material. As soon as we dovetail everything with Krsna, that is not material, that is spiritual.
Syamasundara: His example is that if there is a book on the table and I see the book the only way the book exists is as a sense impression in my mind from seeing, an idea.
Prabhupada: And what is that?
Syamasundara: And that idea is not material because it's not... The book does not enter my mind, it doesn't come into my mind as matter but it enters my mind as spirit, as an idea, something immaterial. So that everything in that sense is immaterial because it only comes to me through my senses through an idea. I touch the book, well I have an idea of the book.
Prabhupada: Then what is the position of this book here on the table?
Syamasundara: Then it is spirit, it is made of spirit, immaterial.
Prabhupada: Hm. Immaterial does not mean spirit. Immaterial means… immaterial mean spirit? I don't think so.
Syamasundara: It means, "not matter."
Prabhupada: Ha?
Syamasundara: Not matter.
Prabhupada: Ha. Yes. If it is not matter then it is spirit. So if everything is spirit then why I discern between the idea of the book and the book?
Syamasundara: Well for him there is no such difference.
Prabhupada: No such difference…
Syamasundara: The only way…
Prabhupada:…but why he explains that this book is immaterial? The idea is nice, but there are two things, idea and the book.
Syamasundara: But he says the only way the book is perceived, the only way I know of it, that there is a book there, is through my idea.
Prabhupada: That's alright but if everything is spirit, your idea is spirit, the book is spirit, then why the distinction? Why you take the, make a distinction? Everything is spirit.
Syamasundara: Hm.
Prabhupada: Spiritual vision is there is no distinction, everything is spirit, sarvam khalv idam brahma [Chandogya Upanisad 3.14.1], "everything Brahman." Then why shall I make distinction, that this is idea and this is book? Why there is so much attempt to explain that what I am taking, if its idea, and what about the book? The book is also spirit so why shall I make distinction between this idea and the book?
Syamasundara: He says that God creates all objects.
Prabhupada: Yes. That's alright. Because God creates all objects therefore no object is untruth. You can not say from truth untruth comes, you can not say that, if God is truth then whatever is emanation from God, that is also truth. The Mayavadi philosophy is: brahma satyam jagan mithya, this is Mayavada philosophy, that what we are seeing it is all false.
Syamasundara: No, he says it is real. It is real because God perceives it therefore it is real.
Prabhupada: If it is real, my idea is real, then everything is real, why shall I make any distinction?
Syamasundara: Yes.
Prabhupada: There can not be any distinction. That is our philosophy. We don't make such distinctions. If the world is emanation from God how the world can be untruth, false? Mayavadi philosophy they say, brahma satyam jagan mithya, mithya means "false."
Syamasundara: He says everything that we perceive is real. It's real because it is perceived by us.
Prabhupada: That's alright, then the book is also real.
Syamasundara: Yes. But it is not made of matter he says.
Prabhupada: Therefore then matter is also real? Why should we distinguish matter? Why should we... If it is not then there is distinction, matter is something else. As soon as you say it is not matter that means matter is something separately existing.
Syamasundara: Hah.
Prabhupada: Is it not? That is duality. If you say it is not matter.
Syamasundara: [laughs].
Prabhupada: Eh?
Syamasundara: Yeah.
Prabhupada: Just try to understand.
Syamasundara: Ah. I see.
Prabhupada: That means you are making matter something is untruth. There is two, truth and untruth.
Syamasundara: Hm.
Prabhupada: But if there is no untruth then what there is distinction? If this pot is made of spirit and the table is made of spirit. Eh?
Syamasundara: Hm.
Prabhupada: Then I can not say this is matter this is spirit. How it is spirit?
Syamasundara: Yes. That is his philosophy.
Prabhupada: Eh?
Syamasundara: That is his philosophy.
Prabhupada: What is his philosophy?
Syamasundara: That everything is made of spirit.
Prabhupada: But why then, then why he sees matter? Then his vision is imperfect. Why does he say it is matter?
Syamasundara: No, he said, "it is not matter".
Prabhupada: Eh?
Syamasundara: He says, "it's not matter. It's not made of matter".
Prabhupada: Then "not matter" means there is matter. When he says "not matter" that that means there is…
Syamasundara: Somewhere…
Prabhupada: [Matter] somewhere.
Syamasundara: Hm.
Prabhupada: So whether…, he sees everything is spirit, where is the material existence? There is no existence of matter?
Syamasundara: [laughs]
Prabhupada: This is imperfect vision.
Syamasundara: Yeah.
Prabhupada: Speculator, no clear knowledge.
Devotee: Rascal.
Devotees: [laughter]
Syamasundara: For instance he says, "a stone is real only because it is capable of affecting our senses so that we can have an idea of it. A stone is there but it's reality is only there because it can affect our senses. If we could not sense it then it would not be existing."
Prabhupada: Hm. Then? Then again the same duality, that you are perceiving the stone by separate agent which are called senses, then duality, there is no oneness. As soon as you accept that everything is spirit then everything one.
Syamasundara: Hm.
Prabhupada: What I am getting by sense perception, that is also spirit and the thing of which I am getting perception, that is also spirit. Because there is no other existence except spirit.
Syamasundara: Yes. He says...
Prabhupada: Why should I try to take an idea and perception of a thing?
Syamasundara: Hm-m.
Prabhupada: If everything is spirit. Why should I try like that?
Syamasundara: He says that, "there are two types of things".
Prabhupada: Two types means duality.
Syamasundara: Yes.
Prabhupada: That means duality.
Syamasundara: But he says, "at the same time they are the same, they are both the same, because they are both made of spirit".
Prabhupada: Then, then, then what... How you distinguish, this is this type, this is that type?
Syamasundara: Well his distinction is there are those who sense and perceive things, experience things, in other words the living entities, and...
Prabhupada: That experience must be there.
Syamasundara: And there are those things that are sensed and are perceived...
Prabhupada: Hm.
Syamasundara: And are experienced, in other words inert objects.
Prabhupada: Ha.
Syamasundara: So his idea is that they are the same in the sense that they are made of spirit.
Prabhupada: Hah, no. That means he distinguishes between the sense, and the object of the sense.
Syamasundara: Yes, yes.
Prabhupada: But everything, if everything is spirit, you can, you can say that it is spiritual variety, you can say. The variety is spiritual variety, that's alright, that we can accept but the object and the sense of the object, they are all real.
Syamasundara: Ha.
Prabhupada: He says that it is unreal.
Syamasundara: No, he says, "it is real but it is made of spirit". It's not real in the sense that it is made of matter.
Prabhupada: Ha. That means… So why he is trying to distinguish. I can not understand. If it is all spirit why he is making time [?] distinction?
Syamasundara: Why he is trying to understand? Objects…
Prabhupada: And by distinction.
Syamasundara: Ha.
Prabhupada: There is no such necessity of making such distinction. If he has really spiritual realization then there is no question of distinction.
Syamasundara: Well he is trying to...
Prabhupada: You can say, "These are the varieties."
Syamasundara: Ha.
Prabhupada: Just like Krsna says: bhūmir apo 'nalo vayuḥ [Bg. 7.4]. So if everything is, you say matter or spirit, but there is varieties. Just like water is not stone, stone is not water, air is not water, water is not air, but they are all material varieties or spiritual varieties.
Syamasundara: Hm.
Prabhupada: But in the essence they are all spirit, or matter, or whatever you call it. Just like this is table, this is glass, these are varieties, they are all made of earth. From earth this wood has come and from wood I have made a table. From earth the…, by sand, sand by mixing with caustic soda it has become glass. So essentially the ingredient is the same but we have made varieties. [break] You can say varieties. Not that this is object, this is perception, this is so. The exact word should be used is, "varieties-spiritual varieties."
Syamasundara: Hm.
Prabhupada: Savisesa, the Sanskrit word savisesa. The Mayavadi says nirvisesa, this is savisesa. Savisesa means, "everything is spirit but there is varieties." Just like everything is tree but there is varieties. Something is flower, something is leaf, something is twig, something is trunk-varieties, but altogether a tree.
Syamasundara: Hm. He says that, "if no one experiences a thing, not even God, then it can not exist." He says that everything, only those things which can exist… "Only those things can exist which are perceived by God."
Prabhupada: Hm. Perceived by God?
Syamasundara: Yes. That He can experience.
Prabhupada: Ha. That you are god or who is perceiving?
Syamasundara: No he says, "those things exist which are perceived by God." If God can see it then it exists.
Prabhupada: Yes.
Syamasundara: If He doesn't perceive it then it doesn't exist.
Prabhupada: Hm.
Syamasundara: So just like...
Prabhupada: That means in one word there is no existence except God.
Syamasundara: Yes.
Prabhupada: That should be the real word. That nothing exists except God.
Syamasundara: He uses as an example the...
Prabhupada: What is that?
[aside] In this way.
Devotee: Oh! Oh! [break]
Syamasundara: He uses as an example the far side of the North Star, we can not perceive it, we will never be able to perceive it from our point of view.
Prabhupada: Yes, yes.
Syamasundara: But because God can perceive it, it must exist.
Prabhupada: That's nice. That's nice, that everything does not exist, everything does not exist simply my perception, or no perception. I may not perceive so many things but that does not mean it does not exist. But he began like that, that this thing exists in perception.
Syamasundara: Ha ha.
Prabhupada: So if I can not perceive then this thing does not exist.
Syamasundara: Yes.
Prabhupada: That is contradictory?
Syamasundara: Yes. For instance he uses the example this book, when I leave the room, this book will continue to exist even though I don't perceive it.
Prabhupada: Yes.
Syamasundara: Because God can perceive it.
Prabhupada: Yes.
Syamasundara: That's his idea. He doesn't say: because I leave the room the book ceases to exist.
Prabhupada: But he says that, "this book exists only on my perception."
Syamasundara: Yes.
Prabhupada: In the beginning he said like that.
Syamasundara: Yes.
Prabhupada: That may be so many things you can not perceive, does it mean that it does not exist?
Syamasundara: Hm. Oh, but if God can still perceive it then it exists.
Prabhupada: God, God's perception is different.
Syamasundara: Yes.
Prabhupada: He is unlimited, you are limited. So His perception is unlimited. So therefore unlimited varieties of existence are there.
Syamasundara: Yes.
Prabhupada: Which you may not perceive…
Syamasundara: Yes.
Prabhupada: …and because you can not perceive. It does not mean that so many things does not exist.
Syamasundara: Yes… He says that things exist because of perception. Whether it's ours…
Prabhupada: Who's perception?
Syamasundara: … or God's.
Prabhupada: Ah, God's perception.
Syamasundara: God's perception.
Prabhupada: That he should be distinct.
Syamasundara: He makes that distinction that man's perception is very limited.
Prabhupada: Yes.
Syamasundara: And he ascribes to God the powers of perception. So that makes it...
Prabhupada: Perception means cetana, that is the Vedic language; nityo nityanam cetanas cetananam [Katha Upanisad 2.2.13]..., cetana means "living". God is also living, we are also living, but He is the Supreme Living, we are subordinate living. Our perception is limited, God's perception is unlimited.
Syamasundara: Hm.
Prabhupada: So everything exists on God's perception, that is admitted. But if you say, "If I can not perceive, the thing does not exist," that is nonsense.
Syamasundara: No. He says, "before a thing can exist it must be experienceable." It must be able to…
Prabhupada: Whose experienceable?
Syamasundara: By either man or by God, by the senses.
Prabhupada: No. That is already explained. Your senses are limited, you can not experience everything.
Syamasundara: No, by God. If...
Prabhupada: By God. Say God. But he says general, if it is not experienced. If it is not experienced, God? God? You have no... So many things not, not within your experience.
Syamasundara: Yes.
Prabhupada: So how you can say, "If it is not experienced."
Syamasundara: He says, "experienceable."
Prabhupada: Eh?
Syamasundara: Capable of being experienced.
Prabhupada: Capable of being experienced by whom?
Syamasundara: By God.
Prabhupada: That's alright. But if he says a person that is defective. He can not experience so many things. God experience, He says in the Bhagavad-gita, "I know everything-past, present and future." Nothing is beyond His experience. Nothing is beyond His experience.
Syamasundara: He says that the fact that God experiences all objects renders them potentially perceptible to human minds.
Prabhupada: That's alright because as you advance to your Krsna consciousness that is stated in the Vedas: yasmin vijnate sarvam evam vijnatam [Munḍaka Upanisad 1.3]. Therefore we have to experience through God.
Syamasundara: Hm.
Prabhupada: Not directly.
Syamasundara: Hm.
Prabhupada: Because He has got all experiences. So if we receive our experience from God-that is advancement.
Syamasundara: Ah.
Prabhupada: That we are preaching, get your experience, perception, through Krsna. Don't try to speculate, that will remain imperfect-always. You are searching after the original source of everything, Krsna says: aham sarvasya prabhavaḥ [Bg. 10.8]..., so take this experience that Krsna is the root of all emanations; all creations. [break] That is perfect. The conclusion should be that we should get experience through God.
Syamasundara: Hm.
Prabhupada: And therefore we get experience from the Vedas. Vedas2 means it is spoken by God. Experience given by God. Just like I do not know cow dung is pure but it is because it is stated in the Vedas, it is pure, so I get the experience, it is pure. My experience is that any stool is impure but the Vedas says, "No, cow dung is pure." So that is the right experience. My experience is anything. A bone is impure but Vedas says, "No, conch shell is pure." So therefore I must get experience through the Vedas. Vedas means "knowledge." That knowledge is perfect. The Vedic system is sruti-pramanam. As soon as there is the experience is corroborated or verified by Vedic statement it is perfect. There is no need of philosophizing. The perfect knowledge is there, apauruseya-Vedas. So instead of philosophizing myself just take the knowledge directly from Vedas, then it is perfect; and it is easier.
Syamasundara: [laughs]
Prabhupada: If there is a source where from I can get all knowledge perfectly why shall I speculate, take the unnecessary trouble? Srama eva hi kevalam [SB 1.2.8]. And my speculating is always imperfect because I am imperfect.
Syamasundara: Hm.
Prabhupada: So if we accept that theory, not theory, accept that statement that, we get experience from the perfect then there is no use of my speculating.
Syamasundara: I think that it's an inherent tendency in men to want to experience something first-hand rather than experience from someone else.
Prabhupada: No. He is experiencing from the beginning of his life from authority. It is not that he is... As a child he is getting experience by asking the parents. That is the law. A child's experience of fire, he has no experience, he wants to catch because it is red, but he gets experience from father, "No, no, no, don't touch, don't touch it. It is fire, it will harm you." So he understands, "I should not touch it." This is the law of nature. Therefore Vedic injunction is that in order to know the transcendental science one must approach a guru. He can not understand, he can not speculate on terms of God and spiritual world and spiritual life. That is not possible.
Syamasundara: He says that, "the world is real because if it was not real we could not experience it and because we can sense it the world exists."
Prabhupada: Hm. Well that is our version. The world is created by God, God is real, the world is also real.
Syamasundara: Hm.
Prabhupada: But the Mayavadi philosophers they say, "world is unreal, brahma satyam jagan mithya."
Syamasundara: So in that sense he is not Mayavadi.
Prabhupada: Hm.
Syamasundara: But he says...
Prabhupada: No. What he is, it is very difficult to ascertain.
Devotees: [laughter]
Prabhupada: He is speculator. You can not...
Syamasundara: Yes.
Prabhupada: That's all.
Syamasundara: Even though he says, "the world exists because we can sense it he says that the objects of the world are made of the same stuff as our experience," in other words...
Prabhupada: Yes.
Syamasundara: As I said before this table is made of the idea that enters into my mind.
Prabhupada: Hm. In that sense. Because first of all, table idea, I shall create a table, I make idea.
Syamasundara: Ha.
Prabhupada: Thinking, feeling, willing. So originally it is subtle table…
Syamasundara: Oh.
Prabhupada: …subtle table. Then I get the ingredients, I make it gross table.
Syamasundara: He said... Maybe I can explain a little more.
Prabhupada: Hm.
Syamasundara: For instance this table, the only way I know this table exists is by my senses, touching it, seeing it, feeling it, smelling it but all of these sense impressions are not material, they are subtle, they are immaterial. Even my sense of touch is just an impression which travels and somehow it makes an idea in my mind.
Prabhupada: Hm. No. Why not use the word "abstract"?
Syamasundara: Abstract.
Prabhupada: Instead of immaterial.
Syamasundara: Yes.
Prabhupada: Yes.
Syamasundara: Abstract. So in that sense everything is abstract because the only...
Prabhupada: From abstract concrete comes. You can say like that. Abstract is the original position. And the sūnyavadis, they can not understand the abstract therefore they say abstract is zero and from zero something has come. Everything has come from nothing. The abstract they say, "nothing." But abstract is not nothing.
Syamasundara: He says that if there were, say this table, if this table were composed of matter then we would not be able to experience it because the only object capable of entering our experience must be a sensitive substance.
Prabhupada: Hm. That we say, that we say, that if Krsna would not come…, be present here, then we can see Him.
Syamasundara: Ha.
Prabhupada: Krsna is non-different from everything, because everything is Krsna.
Syamasundara: Oh!
Prabhupada: But the rascals they say, "This Krsna, it is not Krsna, it is stone."
Syamasundara: Oh I see.
Prabhupada: But Krsna is kind because I can not see except stone so He appears like a stone, but He is Krsna. But the unfortunate atheists, they make distinction. The one is… While they will say, "Everything is Brahman, but not this stone." If everything is Brahman why not this stone? God is everywhere, but not in this temple.
Devotees: [laughter]
Prabhupada: That is their argument, the Arya-samajis. "Why should you go to worship God in the temple? God is everywhere." If God is everywhere why not in the temple? So therefore they are rascals. They have no clear idea. In Christian religion also they say, "heathens." They have no perfect idea of God. Why heathens? He goes and worships God in the form. So that man was talking, "formless". Where is formless? If everything is God there are so many things they have form and God has no form. So origin has no form. Not clear conception.
Syamasundara: He says that the only objects which can enter our experience must be sensitive, in other words they can not...
Prabhupada: Therefore if God appears in a sensitive way, is God incapable.
Syamasundara: No.
Prabhupada: So therefore this arca-mūrti is God Himself but He has very kindly, mercifully, appeared before me so that I can experience Him. At the present moment I can not form any spiritual form therefore I experientially material form. Of course ultimately there is no distinction between matter and spirit. But a still to my present perceptive way God has appeared. Therefore Bhagavad-gita says:
They are trying to meditate upon something imperson, simply unnecessarily laboring. Here is God, he'll not see. He meditates something impersonal therefore there is simply trouble, he has no sense, less intelligent or he has no idea of God. He says only superficially that, "Everything is God," but he can not see God in the temple in the form. They can not understand that all the acaryas, Ramanujacarya, Madhvacarya, they have all established temples but the fools, although the Deity worship is from time immemorial it is going on. So all of them are fools they become lorded upon. Just like there is a class of Arya-samajas they are vehemently protesting temple worship. The Brahma-samajas. There… Here is a Brahma-samaja?
Syamasundara: Hm.
Devotee: We spoke, yeah.
Prabhupada: They also.
Syamasundara: Hm.
Prabhupada: Impersonalists or sūnyavadi, nirvisesa-sūnyavadi, that's all.
Syamasundara: He says that, "spirit is the only genuine substance." That there is no substance which exists without thinking. That this, everything is, there is no unthinking substance. In other words even objects like this table, there is thinking involved in the substance, they are made of.
Prabhupada: Hm.
Syamasundara: Because they are made of spirit and spirit is thinking and thoughtful.
Prabhupada: Hm. That that's right: sarvam khalv idam brahma [Chandogya Upanisad 3.14.1]. The same thing, everything is Brahman. Thinking is also Brahman. So the, now the conclusion is that everything is Brahman, at the present moment I can not perceive spiritual so God, out of His unlimited kindness, if He comes to me in a small form, tangible form, concrete form, I can dress, I can feed, I can handle. So it is…, I can not say that it is not God, God is different from it. How can I say?
Syamasundara: Yes. Hah. Yes.
Prabhupada: Therefore the warning is, experienced warning is, arcye sila, arcye silabuddhi… arcye sila. What is that verse? Hm. Arcye sila gurusu nara-mati vaisnave jati-buddhir. Arcye sila buddhir, arcye: "The worshipable Deity," if somebody thinks, "It is wood, it is stone," gurusu nara-mati. A spiritual master and all spiritual master, predecessor, if they think ordinary human being, gurusu nara-mati, arcye siladhir gurusu nara-mati, vaisnave jati-buddhir [Padma Purana]. If some rascal thinks, "Oh they are Europeans, Americans, how they can become Vaisnavas, we are different?" Just like India, some rascal thinking like that, these things are forbidden, that you should not think like that. The worshipable Deity as stone or wood, spiritual master as ordinary human being, Vaisnava as belonging to some class. Vaisnave jati-buddhir, Sri Visnu caranamrta, or thinking that, "it is water". Similarly so many things, they are forbidden. "Don't think like that then you will go to hell." Naraki. It is warned. Arcye sila; sila the arca-mūrti should be immediately accepted, "that is God." In the same respect, therefore you say, "don't sit in this way, don't talk in that way." Always we should think that Krsna is present here. If I think that, "He is stone, He can not hear, I can talk all nonsense, He can not hear because He is a stone." If I show disrespect He can not see, it is stone. Therefore there are sixty-four kinds of seva-aparadha in the Nectar of Devotion.
Syamasundara: Hm.
Prabhupada: In the…, before Deity you should talk very properly, sit very properly, we should always know that Krsna is present here, you must be respectful, in that way. Arcye, otherwise you will think that silabuddhi, "a stone". Arcye siladhir gurusu nara-mati, we are chanting every day saksad-hari, "He is directly Hari." But, but after I am thinking he is a man, he is ordinary man, like me, or like that.
So: arcye siladhir gurusu nara-mati vaisnave jati-buddhir. And all the, officially I am offering namaskara, but unofficially I am thinking, "Oh he is coming from Europe, he is coming from Africa, he is black, he is coming from sweeper class," or like that. "He is a brahmana class".
Just like our Sridhara Maharaja is writing, deva-gosvami, deva-gosvami. He is trying to distinguish himself that he is brahmana, others are not brahmanas. Vaisnave jati-buddhir. His all other godbrother's they are not brahmanas and he is brahmana. Bon Maharaja also thinks like that. That vaisnave jati-buddhir. So these things are very subtle things, you see?
Even Tirtha Maharaja, for acquiring his property in the court, he once said that Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati can not make disciples. Just see, for their personal ambition they can do anything and everything, everyone knows, in the court he declared that Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati, he can not make any disciples, because he was not a brahmana. You see? And he wants to be the prime disciple of Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati. They are so culprits. The clearly said that, "If you say this, then you'll win the case." "Alright then I shall say." He is such a man. I must get degree [?], so this is recorded in the court. Sometimes if you meet him you can ask him, "Did you say like this, that Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati can not make any disciples, in the court?" This is going on. Arcye siladhir gurusu nara-mati, vaisnave jati-buddhir [Padma Purana].
Syamasundara: This Berkeley has two arguments for the existence of God, they are rather cleaver. He says, "number one, because the things that we perceive are more vivid than those things that we dream about therefore there must be a superior mind activating them because when we dream something…"
Prabhupada: That's alright, we accept that.
Syamasundara: …it's not...
Prabhupada: It is superior mind.
Syamasundara: Yes.
Prabhupada: That is stated in the Vedas, "because God sees that we see, because God works therefore we work."
Syamasundara: He says for instance, the things we dream about, they're not vivid, they're subtle, they change, they're not manifest so the things that we see are more vivid therefore God must have activated them.
Prabhupada: Yes.
Syamasundara: Just like the things that we dream about, they're not very substantial.
Prabhupada: That is admitted by us in Brahma-samhita: yasya prabha prabhavato jagadanḍa-koti [Bs. 5.40]. "On account of effulgence of Krsna, bodily effulgence, so many universes come out." So many universes means so many varieties. In each and every universes there are so many planets and in each and every planet there are so many trees, so many varieties. Therefore originally all the varieties, all everything, is coming from Krsna.
Syamasundara: Hm. And then his second proof or argument for the existence of God is that, the things that we perceive do not obey our personal will, the dreams that we have obey our personal will, they follow what we will, but what we perceive does not. So that follows, it obeys the will of God. What we see obeys the will of God, whereas what we dream obeys our own will.
Prabhupada: Hm. Better always obeys the orders of God?
Syamasundara: Yes.
Prabhupada: Then it is a perfect position. If that is the position then why not always obey what God says? Then you are perfect. There is no doubt. That is our process.
Syamasundara: So he bases his proof of God first of all on...
Prabhupada: Basis of proof. Basis of principle... Basic proof of God is God, nothing else. There is no need of speculation.
Syamasundara: No.
Prabhupada: If basic proof of God is God, therefore Krsna says, "I am God" and Narada accepts, "Yes, You are God," Vyasa accepts "Yes, You are God," Arjuna accepts, "You are God," so we accept that Krsna is God. We save so much labor.
Syamasundara: Ha, hm. [chuckles]
Prabhupada: Why shall I speculate? So he can not teach us anything.
Syamasundara: No.
Prabhupada: [laughs] But we can study how far he is a philosopher.
Syamasundara: Yes.
Prabhupada: He is not very advanced.
Devotees: [laughter]
Syamasundara: No, he bases, he bases his argument for the existence of God on dreaming, on human dreams, because our dreaming is so imperfect. And this is the only way that we manipulate ideas or objects, is through our dreams, so what if we see there are other objects being manipulated they must be being manipulated by a big mind, better than ours. Because ours is so imperfect. Our dreams are so imperfect, so the dream of God must be more vivid, must be perfect.
Prabhupada: Yes. Just like God is sleeping, Maha-Visnu, and He is sleeping, all these creations are coming, so it is His dreaming.
Syamasundara: Oh!
Prabhupada: Because He is sleeping and in sleep the universes are being created, not sleeping, by inhaling and exhaling, so many universes are coming out, going out. But… So and He sees that all the universes are created and so many planets are created and so many planets are created, so many things created and again it is [annihilated]. Just like dream.
Syamasundara: Ah.
Prabhupada: In dream we create so many things, again it vanquishes, similarly this whole creation, material creation is dreaming of God-Maha-Visnu.
Syamasundara: Hah. So that's his idea, that because our dreaming is so imperfect and when we open our eyes we see that everything is so perfect then there must be a perfect person.
Prabhupada: Then that when you open your eyes, what you see perfect, that is also dreaming.
Syamasundara: Yes. But it's by a perfect dreamer.
Prabhupada: Hm.
Devotees: [laughter]
Syamasundara: And he says that when we...
Prabhupada: That means that dreaming of perfect is perfect also.
Syamasundara: Oh!
Prabhupada: That is the absolute. That is absolute. Unless we accept Absolute how we can say dreaming is perfect? But dreaming by the Absolute is also perfect.
Syamasundara: Yes. And he says that, "when we dream our dreams obey our will, our personal will, but when we open our eyes we see that objects of nature do not obey our personal will."
Prabhupada: No.
Syamasundara: So that they must have been obeying the will of God.
Prabhupada: Yes. That's nice. Yes. So why don't you obey? Why don't you obey? [chuckles] Eh? The orders of God, why you are speculating?
Syamasundara: He was a bishop of the Anglican Church, English church. He was a church man. He says he, he...
Prabhupada: Somehow or other he has given prominent place to God.
Syamasundara: Yes.
Prabhupada: That's nice.
Syamasundara: Yes. He has a doctrine of divine arbitrariness. He says that, "God's will is arbitrary in that we can not predict what will happen", because God's will is arbitrary.
Prabhupada: Yes. We can not say what will happen therefore a Vaisnava says, "If Krsna wills." He never says that, "I shall do it." "If Krsna desires then it will be done."
Syamasundara: But it is not malicious arbitrary, it's divine arbitrary.
Prabhupada: Yes. But whatever you wish somebodys there, there is purpose [?]…
Syamasundara: Yes.
Prabhupada: Therefore we shall depend.
Syamasundara: Yes.
Prabhupada: That is called saranagati. Always thinking himself helpless without God: atma-niksepa… karpanye [Madhya 22.100]. "I am always incapable."
Syamasundara: He says that repeated experience will discern the regular activity or will of God that by experiencing nature we can understand that God's will is regular.
Prabhupada: Hm.
Syamasundara: That it is His habit, that these are His habits.
Prabhupada: Hm. What is that? God's?
Syamasundara: That God's habitual ways are the law of nature and we can understand that everything is regulated in nature, that this is God's arrangement, that these are His habits.
Prabhupada: Yes. That is stated in the Bhagavad-gita:
"Under My superintendence the nature is working."
Syamasundara: Hm.
Prabhupada: So nature is not blind. Nature is under the direction of God -therefore it is perfect.
Syamasundara: Ah, his idea of cause, of something that causes something, is that it is only connected with the effect as a matter of sequence or in order of time. That there is nothing really causal. Nothing really causes anything else but the effect follows the cause as a matter of sequence. [laughs]
Prabhupada: But if there is nothing as cause why does he say the effect follows the cause? What is this.
Syamasundara: [laughs]
Prabhupada: He says nothing as cause but why does he take shelter of cause that effect follows the cause.
Syamasundara: But he says that, "the effect is not logically necessary", does not logically necessarily follow the cause.
Prabhupada: Why?
Syamasundara: He says it's rate [?]… [indistinct], regularly in sequence but it is not necessarily.
Prabhupada: You can... Then cause and effect they are all existing, simultaneously.
Syamasundara: Oh, cause and effect exists simultaneously.
Prabhupada: Hm.
Syamasundara: Hm.
Prabhupada: So the Supreme Cause is Krsna, that's all, cause of all causes.
Syamasundara: Hm.
Prabhupada: In that sense he can not say there is no cause. The cause, the ultimate cause is the Supreme. To Krsna there is no difference between cause and effect. He is the Supreme Cause and everything is effected from Him.
Syamasundara: Hm.
Prabhupada: So in absolute sense there is no difference between this cause and effect.
Syamasundara: To give some example, for instance the example of the rock falling in the water. He would say that it is not logically necessary that the water will splash when the rock hits the water.
Prabhupada: Yes.
Syamasundara: But that it regularly follows that the water will splash, when the rock hits it it will... It regularly follows observable that the water parts.
Prabhupada: Hm, but we say that [if] God does not like it, it will not happen, it will not be so.
Syamasundara: Yes.
Prabhupada: That is Supreme Will.
Syamasundara: Yes. That's his idea that it's not logically necessary that the rock will splash.
Prabhupada: Hm. Yes. Yes. It is not necessary. It is not compulsory.
Syamasundara: Yes.
Prabhupada: It may remain floating.
Devotee: It may remain floating?
Prabhupada: Yes.
Devotee: If God desires.
Syamasundara: Yes. That's his idea.
Prabhupada: That is admitted by us.
Syamasundara: That the will of God is arbitrary…
Prabhupada: Supreme.
Syamasundara: Supreme.
Prabhupada: Because everything is being affected by the will of God. If He wills that the stone may not go down then it will stand on the water.
Syamasundara: Yes. Everything obeys the will of God.
Prabhupada: That's it.
Syamasundara: That's his idea.
Prabhupada: So best thing is to depend on the will of Krsna. [laughs] Why shall I bother?
Syamasundara: He says that, "the Supreme Mind is operating in a world which is not of our own making."
Prabhupada: That's it. The Supreme Mind means God's mind.
Syamasundara: And that's his philosophy.
Prabhupada: Oh, yes.
[End]
|
Link to this page: https://prabhupadabooks.com/classes/philosophy/with-syamasundara-dasa/berkeley-george
|