Room Conversation with Sannyāsīs – January 22, 1977, Bhubaneswar

Prabhupada: So I am anxious to receive report from Satsvarūpa Maharaja.

Satsvarūpa: The library party?

Prabhupada: Yes.

Satsvarūpa: He's bringing... I have a map of all that they've done very recently. Right now they're in Germany.

Prabhupada: Hare Krsna. We have received one telegram from where? Poland.

Devotee (1): Poland University.

Gargamuni: Tejiyas took it.

Satsvarūpa: Harikesa Maharaja has programs in all those countries: Poland, Hungary...

Prabhupada: He is very enthusiastic. [laughs]

Satsvarūpa: Oh, yes.

Prabhupada: Yes. Therefore I asked him that "You go there."

Ramesvara: Gargamuni Maharaja has sold 550 standing orders in six months.

Gargamuni: Those are delivered.

Ramesvara: Those are delivered.

Gargamuni: There's a hundred others that aren't.

Ramesvara: Pending. And he's got reviews coming in every day. He's already published a booklet just of reviews, which we want to reprint, both combined.

Prabhupada: Oh, yes. You print. It is very helpful.

Ramesvara: We want to reprint something very similar.

Satsvarūpa: I saw that , Indian.

Ramesvara: No, this is much better.

Satsvarūpa: So we have new reviews, too, from two professors in Finland.

Prabhupada: Accha.

Satsvarūpa: We have one who is a man in the Department of Nuclear Physics. He said the Indian astronomers... First... He read the Fifth Canto, with all its scientific descriptions. First he says that he did not think that they possessed instruments to measure distances. But anyway, he said their understanding is truly remarkable. Then he goes on to say... He compares it with Western astronomy. It's a long review.

Ramesvara: What did he say about Prabhupada?

Satsvarūpa: There wasn't much in that way.

Prabhupada: But they can measure the distance from one planet to another? Their astronomical measurement?

Satsvarūpa: No. Just by theory.

Prabhupada: So how they can...?

Ramesvara: Read it out loud.

Satsvarūpa: He wants that you... He said, "The translator frequently adds comments containing information from other Vedic scriptures, for instance, ancient astronomical calculations referred to by Srila Visvanatha Cakravarti Thakura. It would be highly interesting to have a compilation of such astronomical texts translated into English. One can only hope that the Bhaktivedanta Book Trust endeavors to do this to the great benefit of the historians of science."

Prabhupada: We shall do it. I am searching after some astronomer.

Ramesvara: There is also a review from one Indian professor, how this science...

Prabhupada: Anyway, they have become interested in our literature.

Satsvarūpa: Yes. Whether he completely agrees or not, he's fascinated by it.

Prabhupada: That is another thing. But...

Ramesvara: From Dr. Jagdish Sharma, he wrote that "This edition of Srimad-Bhagavatam will go a long way to help the scientists in rediscovering phenomena of the universe which is yet to be discovered."

Prabhupada: Yes.

Ramesvara: He's the university librarian cum professor of Library Science at Punjab University. And he's the author of nineteen books, including Encyclopedia Indica.

Satsvarūpa: This is a very good one, from the University of Helsinki. That's right near the Russian border, in Finland. He says, er... He's a professor of Indian studies, the Department of Asian and African Studies, Professor Extraordinarious, Penti Alto. "The Bhagavad-gita is no doubt the most important and the best known work in the whole of Indian literature. The magnificence of its spiritual concepts and the sublimity of its thinking have secured a great popularity everywhere. It has been edited and commented countless times. The meaning of the text, at least in its main lines, is obvious and clear. The justification of a new interpretation is therefore, in my opinion, dependent on the message conveyed by the commentary. The translator and commentator, Swami Bhaktivedanta, represents the Gauḍiya Vaisnava school, and thus interprets the message of the Gita 'from the inside.' For example, Shankara in Canto Two"-he means Chapter Two-"verse twelve, interprets the plurality of the beings enumerated to be only conventional. And according to the Mayavadins, the individuals after liberation merge into the impersonal Brahman. Swami Bhaktivedanta states that Krsna here authoritatively emphasizes the eternity of the individuality."

Prabhupada: Hmm.

Satsvarūpa: "The transcendental form of God can be immediately experienced by a person who is duly prepared, as it is told in Chapter Eleven. Just these two points are, I think, the reason for the interest in the Gita among persons with a searching spirit. Swami Bhaktivedanta's translation and commentary do deliver this message very convincingly indeed."

Ramesvara: Jaya!

Satsvarūpa: There was another one. I don't...

Prabhupada: He is a big professor.

Satsvarūpa: Yes, he's very important. At each university they find there's only one man who is very important in the Indian studies. So he's the biggest man there. I don't know whether this one was sent to you by a Dutch... State University of Leiden, in Leiden, the Netherlands, Dr. Schokker...

Prabhupada: I don't think

Ramesvara: No.

Satsvarūpa: He wrote a long review on the Bhagavad-gita.

Prabhupada: Indian?

Satsvarūpa: No. He's Dutch, Schocker, or German. It's a long review, all about the Bhagavad-gita.

Prabhupada: Read it. Let us hear.

Satsvarūpa: "The Bhagavad-gita, the Song of the Exalted God, is a very ancient philosophical, didactic poem on bhakti..." [break]

Prabhupada: Evam parampara-praptam [Bg 4.2].

Ramesvara: It's clear that for the first time these scholars are understanding the difference between the Bhagavad-gita and the Mayavadi conception. It's clear that now you have saved them. Previous to this, all they knew about is this impersonal concept.

Prabhupada: That is the business of acarya: sampradaya-raksana, to save the sampradaya from falling down. Sampradaya. Sampradaya raksana.

Ramesvara: After centuries of rascaldom you are giving them the first clear choice.

Prabhupada: Yes. That was the desire of my Guru Maharaja. I am just trying.

Satsvarūpa: Another professor that was met is going to, with ten students, is going... I have his name, a Professor Kalewart from the University of Leuven in Belgium. He's supposed to go to Krsna-Balarama Mandir on February lst with ten people.

Prabhupada: He has gone?

Satsvarūpa: No, on February 1st.

Gargamuni: He should stay in our guesthouse.

Prabhupada: So inform them, "You come."

Satsvarūpa: Yes. He's going to study at that place, that research place at Loi Bazaar, the Vrndavana Research Institute.

Prabhupada: Oh.

Satsvarūpa: He's some scholar of Rūpa Gosvami. But he has to stay at Krsna-Balarama.

Prabhupada: So take some breakfast.

Ramesvara: Without your activities this man could not have written that. He could not have had that understanding. If you had not started this movement, there would be no difference, no contrast. There would just be Mayavadi in the Western world.

Prabhupada: Yes. People heard that Indian philosophy is Mayavada. Mayavadam asac chastram pracchannam bauddham ucyate. [Cc Madhya 6.182] Caitanya Mahaprabhu repeatedly said, mayavada bhasya sunile haya sarva nasa [Cc Madhya 6.169]: "He is doomed." Mayavadi haya krsne aparadhi [Cc Madhya 17.129].

These are the direct charges against the Mayavada. My Guru Maharaja also, a staunch enemy of the Mayavada philosophy. And you are also singing nirvisesa-sūnyavadi. The sūnyavadi are the Buddhist, and nirvisesavadi are the Mayavadis. Pascatya, they are embarassed with this sūnyavadi and nirvisesavadi. Now we are trying to give them solid personification of the Absolute Truth. Here also, India, they are spoiled by these Mayavadi. Now it is in your hand, able hands. You are resourceful, intelligent. Please spread this Vaisnava philosophy and challenge this Mayavada and sūnyavada. Thank you.

Devotees: Jaya Prabhupada.

Prabhupada: Jaya. [devotees offer obeisances] Here is a would-be Vaisnava. [laughs] Very nice. He is a very nice child.

Ramesvara: This is also... This review is a great praise that your writing is so clear that they cannot miss the point. He has understood the dif... You are forcing them to see a difference...

Prabhupada: Yes.

Ramesvara: ...between the Mayavadi and the actual philosophy of Lord Caitanya. And that review is a credit that your writing is so clear that they cannot fail to understand the point.

Prabhupada: He has written that "Bhaktivedanta Swami has very convincingly presented." He said that.

Satsvarūpa: Yes. That was the first one.

Hari-sauri: He was writing how you were following strictly in the parampara.

Ramesvara: Some of these scholars write, "The message radiates and shines brightly from every page." They're writing like that.

Satsvarūpa: And after describing the whole tradition, he said that the Hare Krsna movement is the Western branch. So that's a good testimony for our movement, not just the...

Hari-sauri: Not something concocted.

Ramesvara: Yes. That's very good.

Prabhupada: Hmm?

Ramesvara: That's very important. He has given us historical...

Prabhupada: Place.

Ramesvara: ...perspective.

Prabhupada: That is wanted.

Ramesvara: Prabhupada said this past week that in the future, historians will study this period of world history, how this movement has changed the world. He said in the future they will just note this period, how the world is being changed.

Prabhupada: Yes, a new Renaissance. What is called? Renaissance?

Ramesvara: Yes. Renaissance.

Prabhupada: Historical Renaissance.

Ramesvara: Jaya Srila Prabhupada.

Prabhupada: Jaya. [devotees offer obeisances]

Gargamuni: So this mo... [break] [end]