Vyasa-puja Festival — New Vrindaban, 1973
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- This ceremony… Of course, those who are my students, they know what is this ceremony.
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- Those who are visitors, for their information, I may inform you something about this ceremony.
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- Otherwise, it may not be misunderstood. A outsider may see it that
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- “Why a person is being worshiped like God?” There may be some doubt.
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- So this is the etiquette. This ceremony is called Vyasa-puja. Vyasa.
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- Vyasa means the original author of Vedic literature. He is incarnation of Narayana.
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- He gave us all Vedic knowledge. He received the knowledge from Narada.
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- Narada received the knowledge from Brahma. Brahma received the knowledge from Krsna.
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- So in this way, by disciplic succession, we get transcendental knowledge.
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- So Vyasadeva… Formerly, before Vyasadeva, say, five thousand years ago,
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- before that time there was no need of written literature.
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- People were so sharp in their memory that whatever they would hear
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- from the spiritual master they would remember for life.
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- The memory was so sharp. But in this age-it is called Kali-yuga-we are reducing our bodily strength,
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- our memory, power of memorizing, our feelings of sympathy for others, compassion, age,
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- duration of life, religious propensities. In this way, in this age we are reducing everything.
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- Every one of you can understand very easily.
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- Formerly if somebody is attacked by another man, many persons will come to help him:
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- “Why this man is attacked?” But at the present moment if one man is attacked,
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- the passersby will not care for it because they have lost their sympathy or mercifulness for others.
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- Our neighbor may starve, but we don’t care for it. But formerly the sympathy for other living entities,
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- even for an ant… Just like Maharaja Pariksit, while he was touring on his kingdom,
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- he saw that one man was trying to kill a cow. Pariksit Maharaja saw.
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- Immediately he took his sword that “Who are you? You are killing a cow in my kingdom?”
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- Because the king is supposed, or the government is supposed to give everyone protection,
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- not that the government is meant for giving protection to the human being and not to the animals.
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- Because it is Kali-yuga, the government discriminates between two nationals.
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- National means one who has taken birth in the land. That is called national.
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- That is… You know, everyone. So the trees, they are also born in the land,
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- the aquatics also born in the land. The flies, the reptiles, the snakes, the birds,
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- the beasts, human beings-everyone is born in that land.
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- Suppose your land, America, United States…
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- Why the government should give protection to one class of living entities, rejecting others?
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- This means they have lost their sympathy for others. This is Kali-yuga.
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- Formerly, before Kali-yuga, unnecessarily even an ant would not be killed. Even an ant.
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- There are many instances that a hunter who was taking advantage of killing animals,
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- but when he became a devotee he was not prepared to kill even an ant.
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- So the Krsna consciousness movement is so nice that it makes a person perfect in everything:
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- perfect in knowledge, perfect in strength, perfect in age, everything.
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- We need so many things. So this perfection of life, the process how to make life perfect,
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- is coming down from Krsna. Krsna, He is the origin of everything.
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- Therefore the knowledge of perfection is also coming from Him, and periodically-
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- periodically means after millions and millions of years-Krsna comes.
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- He comes once in a day of Brahma. So Brahma’s days, even one day, the span of one day,
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- it is very difficult to calculate. Sahasra-yuga-paryantam arhad yad brahmano viduh.
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- The Brahma’s one day means about 433,000,000’s of years.
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- So in each day of Brahma, Krsna comes, once in a day.
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- That means after a period of 433,000,000’s of years He comes. Why?
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- To give perfect knowledge of life, how a human being should live to make his life perfect.
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- So the Bhagavad-gita is there, spoken by Krsna in this millennium, in this day.
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- Now Brahma’s one day we are passing through the twenty-eighth millennium.
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- No, twenty- eighth… In Brahma’s day there are seventy-one Manus, and one Manu lives for…
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- That is also many millions of years, seventy- two millenniums.
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- So we are not interested now about calculation the perfect knowledge.
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- This perfect knowledge comes from God, or Krsna, and it is distributed by parampara system,
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- by disciplic succession. The example is just there, a mango tree.
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- On the top of the mango tree there is a very ripened fruit, and that fruit has to be tasted.
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- So if I drop the fruit from up, it will be lost. Therefore it is handed over, after one, after one, after…
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- Then it comes down. So all Vedic process of knowledge is taking from the authority.
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- And it comes down through disciplic succession. Just like I have already explained,
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- Krsna gives the knowledge, perfect knowledge, to Brahma,
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- and Brahma gives the knowledge to Narada. Narada gives the knowledge to Vyasa.
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- Vyasa gives the knowledge to Madhvacarya. Madhvacarya gives the knowledge
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- to his disciplic succession, later on, to Madhavendra Puri.
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- Madhavendra Puri gives that knowledge to Isvara Puri.
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- Isvara Puri gives that knowledge to Caitanya Mahaprabhu, Lord Caitanya.
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- He delivers that knowledge to His immediate disciples, six Gosvamis.
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- The six Gosvamis delivers the knowledge to Srinivasa Acarya, Jiva Gosvami.
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- Then Kaviraja Gosvami, then Visvanatha Cakravarti, then Jagannatha dasa Babaji,
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- then Bhaktivinoda Thakura, then Gaura Kisora dasa Babaji Maharaja,
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- then my spiritual master, Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati.
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- Then we are distributing the same knowledge.
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- Jaya Prabhupada! Haribol!
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- We don’t manufacture knowledge, because how we can manufacture?
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- Perfect knowledge means I must be perfect. But I am not perfect.
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- Every one of us, when I was speaking, because…
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- We are not perfect because in our conditional life we have got four defects.
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- The first defect is that we commit mistake. Any one of us who are sitting here,
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- nobody can vouchsafe that he has not committed any mistake in life.
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- No, that is natural. “To err is human.”
Ratha-Yatra Festival — Philadelphia, 1975
Srimad-Bhagavatam 6.1.27 — Philidelphia, 1975