Love, Ego, Truth, Knowledge

LOVE

Our desire to love someone here in this earthly planet is a reflection of our original desire to love Krishna. Krishna is so kind; He has no reason to be hungry, He has everything and is everything, but based on our desire to serve Him, He becomes hungry. To awaken this desire we have the opportunity to serve Krishna always by preparing food for Him, dressing Him, offering flowers to Him and chanting His names constantly.

“You are what your deep driving desire is, as your desire is so, so is your will, as your will is so, so is your deed, as your deed is so, so is your destiny.”

Brihadaranyaka Upanishad IV.4.5:

‘Pure you’ = ‘pure truth’

The body, the mind, the intelligence, the ego: use your mind to control your body, use your intelligence to control your mind, and use “the ego” to control your intelligence. “Ego” is the real you, the eternal living spirit soul. True ego is: “knowing who you are and what your position is in the world around you.” ‘Pure you’ = ‘pure truth’. The false conception of ego is: “I am a man, I control all that I see, I can do this, I can do that” This is a false identification with the ego and this is “not” the true self. When you identify with your true self and you know who you are, then you know the real truth. The true ego is: knowing who you are = “you are Krishna’s eternal servant.” Not everyone is Krishna’s servant, but everyone is Krishna’s “eternal” servant. Those who deny the existence of God are trying to become God by default, but that is the one very constant impossibility.

There is always someone that controls something because that is how things get done. That’s how everything runs. A businessman owns a car factory, he has his general manager serve him to manage his business, supervisors serve the general manager, and workers work on the assembly line to get the job done. Everyone is serving someone: the factory has light bulbs, someone bought them at the store, a store merchant purchased them to sell, a manufacturer had them made, someone came up with the idea of a light bulb and consumers demanded supply, and finally the light bulb was made with supplies like tungsten, medal and glass. Someone used their intelligence to put these materials together in the right way to make the light bulb. The question is who gave the intelligence to this person? Who gave the intelligence to the businessman? The intelligence comes from the life force, the true ego. Where does life come from? Life comes from life. God controls everything by default and by definition that’s what God is. Just as a huge tree comes from a small seed, our small “true self” comes from Krishna’s infinite supreme self. In the Brahma-samhita it is said,

isvarah paramah krsnah sac-cid-ananda vigrahah anadir adir govindah sarva-karana-karanam

Karana means cause, cause of all causes, seed of all seeds. A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Srila Prabhupada says, “This is confirmed in the Seventh Chapter of Bhagavad-gita where para and apara prakrti are discussed (Bg. 7.4-5). The elements of nature–earth, fire, water, air, ether, mind, intelligence and ego–all belong to the inferior or material energy of the Lord, whereas the living being, the organic energy, is the para prakrti (superior energy) of the Lord. Both of the prakrtis, or energies, are emanations from the Lord, and ultimately He is the controller of everything that exists. There is nothing in the universe that does not belong either to the para or the apara prakrti; therefore everything is the property of the Supreme Being.” (Isopanishad, txt 1, purport, page 1)

What is real love? First there must be two egos in the equation to conclude the word love. You can love your self, but that is still two egos because it is the real you in love with your ideal ego: that is, your real ego in love with your conception of your ideal “false” ego. That, of coarse is not real love. You can be in love with another person, or so you think, but that’s not real love either because you are also in love with a false conception of the other’s ego: you think they are a type of person who looks a certain way, acts a certain way, moves a certain way, talks a certain way, and thinks a certain way. You are not in love with them; you are in love with a false notion. They are not their false ego, they “are” their true ego. They are not their body. Real love is love of the ultimate lover: Krishna. He is the ultimate Supreme Being. Everyone in this material world is infatuated with lifeless mater. I love this beautiful girl or this beautiful boy. A natural attraction is there because everything on material planet is a perverted refection of the life we have had in the perfect spiritual sky where Krishna resides in His supreme personal form. The Jewish philosopher Martin Buber called it the “I-Thou relation,” where the human being goes into a certain relationship with his innermost ego and whole being, in a encounter, in a real dialogue this is what both of the partners do. For Buber, interhuman encounters are only a reflection of the human meeting with God. But to really understand this is to know that true love is love in the purest form: love of the perfect being, Krishna and anything else is a perverted reflection of this. A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Srila Prabhupada says in the Brahma-samhita, “Krishna is the exalted Supreme entity having His eternal name, eternal form, eternal attribution and eternal pastimes. The very name “Krishna” implies His love-attracting designation, expressing by His eternal nomenclature the acme of entity. His eternal beautiful heavenly blue-tinged body glowing with the intensity of ever-existing knowledge has a flute in both His hands. As His inconceivable spiritual energy is all-extending, still He maintains His all-charming medium size by His qualifying spiritual instrumentals. His all-accommodating supreme subjectivity is nicely manifested in His eternal form. The concentrated all-time presence, uncovered knowledge and inebriating felicity have their beauty in Him. The mundane manifestive portion of His own Self is known as all-pervading Paramatma, Isvara (Superior Lord) or Visnu (All-fostering). Hence it is evident that Krishna is sole Supreme Godhead. His unrivaled or unique spiritual body of superexcellent charm is eternally unveiled with innumerable spiritual instrumentals (senses) and unreckonable attributes keeping their signifying location properly, adjusting at the same time by His inconceivable conciliative powers. This beautiful spiritual figure is identical with Krishna and the spiritual entity of Krishna is identical with His own figure. (Brahma-samhita, txt 1, prt 1, page 1)

Our desire to love someone here in this earthly planet is a reflection of our original desire to love Krishna. Krishna is so kind; He has no reason to be hungry, He has everything and is everything, but based on our desire to serve Him, He becomes hungry. To awaken this desire, which we have always had but have forgotten because we are infatuated with material life, we have the opportunity to serve Krishna always by preparing food for Him, dressing Him, offering flowers to Him and chanting His names constantly. Just as you may have a burning desire to be the best businessman on earth, if you understand your desire, you will attain that small position of best businessman on earth. If you desire to love Krishna, with a burning desire, so you will attain His love. This is not a false notion. This is a real notion because Krishna is the epitome of Truth. A falsity is putting your faith in something that will change, as if it would last forever. Krishna is the constant. You may say you love all those material possessions, but they will cease to be in the future. That beautiful girl in her next life will look different according to her karma. If she has good karma and a burning desire to love Krishna, she will remember Him in her next life and have the opportunity to be with Him in His abode, maybe even in this life. To love real truth is “true love” and you must have a burning desire for the truth in order to attain it.

Ego=Real Knowledge

The famous philosopher Socrates, when he discusses the different types of love in “Plato’s Symposium,” says that the greatest type of “love” is Philosophy because it concludes an eternal truth. The truth is: “knowing what your constitutional position is: your relationship with the Universe and of coarse God- who is the controller of the Universe.” There are different types of knowledge. One might know, for instance, that he has the body of a man or that she has that body of a woman. That is general knowledge or “Dead Truth:” something that you can see with the material eyes to make a certain judgment and then use that judgment to make a certain truth. For example, I see a tree, a rock, a stream, a woman, a man, a house. This is a type of false knowledge because when the body, which is operated by the soul, dies by disease or old age everything is forgotten, when the entity is under the conception that he or she is part of this material world: that he or she is the body. That type of truth that existed to that person when he or she was alive in that old body is irrelevant. That knowledge doesn’t cease to exist when the person’s body ceases to exist, but it ceases to exist to that person when he or she leaves the body and takes a new body on earth. “Real Knowledge” is: “knowing” what the position of the tree, rock, stream, woman, man, and house is. They are temporary in the big picture. In the “Real Truth” they are what scientist call “matter,” temporary material dead “lifeless” things. The body will get old and wither, the rock will become a mountain or get corroded by rain, and the house will fall apart and become dust. In the future they will become other material things and they never really exist, because to “exist” is to have consciousness, to understand, to know to be able to feel, to love, comprehend, discover, to live. You, the eternal living spirit soul, other eternal living spirit souls, and God will always exist. You are in one body in one lifetime and then another body in the next life. So “Real Truth” is Truth that exists eternally and the real you, the ego, is “understanding who you are.”

You “are” what your deep driving “desire” is. If you really desire Krishna and you “understand” it, then you will go to Him in the spiritual sky. If you desire to be the greatest businessman on earth and you really understand it, then that is who you think you are and that is what you will become. That conception of “businessman” is a false truth because if you attain the position of best businessman on earth, Krishna is the best businessman is the universe (always) and you can not top that. If you understand that these designations: businessman, Man, Woman, Animal, Rich, Poor, they are all false truths because you can never be “businessman, Man, Woman, Animal, Rich, Poor,” forever. Truth is the Truth that is always True, forever. The one constant that is always true: there is only one Supreme Personality of Godhead. If you understand truth, understand YOU, understand who Krishna is and you have understood everything.



By: Gadadhara das

Combination of Male & Female through Marriage

Krishna Plays on His Flute in the Forrest of Vrindavan and the Gopis are Attracted

In whole world there is combination of male and female, either… Any society, human society, or bird society or dog society or animal society. Why this male and female? Why? Female is the energy, energy of the male. Why a man takes, marries a woman and takes responsibility…? Of course, in your country they marry as a matter of joke, immediately divorce after week or after seven days. But marriage means to take full responsibility of a woman. That is real marriage, Vedic marriage.

Room Conversation
–
October 20, 1968, Seattle

Prabhupada: …the whole atmosphere, you should come and disturb. You are making… You cannot understand? And the whole attention is diverted to you. So hara, hara is the form of the word… Hare is the form of the word hara when address, when She is addressed. And Krsna, when He’s addressed, the form does not change. This is grammatical rule. So Hare Krsna means, “Oh, the energy of Krsna, or energy of the Lord,” and Krsna, “the Lord.” So Hare Krsna. Hare Krsna means I am praying not only to the Lord, but to the energy also. This is natural.

Just like a man and woman. In whole world there is combination of male and female, either… Any society, human society, or bird society or dog society or animal society. Why this male and female? Why? Female is the energy, energy of the male. Why a man takes, marries a woman and takes responsibility…? Of course, in your country they marry as a matter of joke, immediately divorce after week or after seven days. But marriage means to take full responsibility of a woman. That is real marriage, Vedic marriage.

We, when I get married our boys and girls, the boy takes this vow that “I take responsibility of your maintenance throughout your whole life,” and the girl promises that “I desire to serve you throughout my whole life.” So the woman, the female, is the energy. When a man comes at home, he sees that everything is nicely decorated, my wife is well-dressed and foodstuff is nicely prepared, he becomes encouraged. He can work more nicely. Therefore woman is the energy. The woman gives the energy and he can work. Wherefrom this idea came?

The idea came because it is originally here, janmady asya yatah [Bhag. 1.1.1]. Everything is coming from the Supreme; otherwise where do you get this idea? Sarvam khalv idam brahma. Without being in the origin? Bijo ‘ham sarva-bhutanam, Krsna says that “I am the root of everything.” So if this energy, male and female combination, is a necessity, so wherefrom this necessity came into existence unless it is there in the origin?

Therefore it is to be understood that the Absolute has energy. He has got different energies. By His energies He is acting, and that is confirmed in the Vedic sutra, parasya saktir vividhaiva sruyate. The Supreme Absolute Truth has multi-energies. Parasya saktir vividhaiva sruyate, multi-energies. And svabhaviki jnana-bala-kriya ca, and by His energies he’s working in such a nice way that it appears that it is being automatically done. Just like this tape recorder is working. How it is working? The electric energy is there. By the electric energy the machine is so nicely working that when it is replayed exactly I am speaking.

So energy is working. I am speaking, my speaking energy is acting, electric energy is helping. This machine energy is accepting and a nice thing is coming. Similarly, the whole cosmic manifestation is the manifestation of the energies. The rascals, they do not understand. And when it is stated that everything is Brahman, that is to be understood that everything is working under the energy of the Supreme Brahman. That is real meaning. But this is simultaneously one and different. When this tape recorder will play, it will play exactly I am speaking to you. There will be no difference of voice.

If somebody hears from other room, he’ll understand that Swamiji’s speaking, but still, that speaking is
different from me. Because my energy is working there. Similarly, there are two kinds of energies. Just like when I am speaking, this is my real energy, and when this tape recorder will speak, that is also my energy, but that is separated energy. Similarly, this material manifestation is separated energy, and there is direct energy. The direct… This material energy, separated energy, is the reflection of the direct energy. Just like when this tape recorder will be replayed it is the reflection of my original speech. Similarly, this material manifestation is a reflection of the original energy, internal energy. Therefore in the Bhagavad-gita it is stated that perverted reflection. urdhva-mulam adhah-sakham [Bg. 15.1], perverted, a tree. This cosmic manifestation is compared just like a tree with root upwards. That means perverted. Have you seen a tree upwards, root?

Jahnava: I’ve heard an analogy to that before.

Prabhupada: Yes. So this material world is perverted reflection of the original energy. So this “Hare” means we are directly approaching the original energy of the Supreme Lord. “Please accept me, under You. Now I am under reflection. I am trying to get substance from the reflection.” Suppose a tree is reflected by the bank of a river, the exact. So if somebody dives into the river and tries to take fruit from that tree, it will not be possible because that is reflection. One has to go to the real tree. So we are hankering after life, we are hankering after pleasure, but we are seeking pleasure in the reflection, maya.

Therefore we are frustrated, confused. Therefore this prayer is to the original energy. Without energy, without energy the Lord is not without energy. Radha-Krsna, Laksmi-Narayana, Sita-Rama. So God is always with energy. Without energy, he is incomplete. Sun without sunshine is incomplete. Is it possible? Can one think of sun without sunshine? Similarly, the Mayavada theory that the absolute is without energy, there is no energy, absolute is… They have misunderstood. The energy is not different from the energetic. Just like sunshine is not different from the sun, neither the sunshine has got any existence without the sun, nor the sun can exist without sunshine.

They are so intimately related. Similarly, the Lord and the energies are so intimately related, they cannot be separated, but they are not one. This is the whole philosophy. So we are praying to the original energy, Hare Krsna. Because energy and the energetic, Radha-Krsna. Radha-Krsna, They are not separate, but it is pleasure. When They are separated, Radha and Krsna, that is energetic, that is giving impetus. Just like the man and the woman, they come from the same source, but one body is energetic to the other. Man is energy to the woman. Woman is the energy to the man. Why the creation is not one kind of? Why there is fair sex? They’re coming from the same womb of the mother. Why not one, boy only? Why girl? Why nature has provided like that? Let simply boys come. No. It is required.

But the whole thing is perverted reflection. Here the man, woman, the energy… It is simply… But by this, one can understand the reality. Just like the shadow, the five fingers. One person who is not misled, he can understand that the original palm has five fingers, although he cannot see it. From the shadow. Similarly, from this energy, work of the energy in this material perverted reflection, one can understand that there is a reality.

In the reality, in the abode of Krsna, the same things are there, the same trees are there, the same things are there, but they are original, personal energy. And here, they are simply imitation or perverted reflection. Not imitation. The exact word is perverted reflection. The same example. Just like a tree on the bank of a river is reflected obverted, the root upwards and the branches downwards. So this world is like that, and that is described in the Fifteenth Chapter of Bhagavad-gita. So one has to learn all these things. Everything is there. (end)





Source: krishna.org