View source for Basically they and myself and others want to know how do we get this spirit into our own hearts and how does this then issue out into everyday living?

<div id="compilation">
<div id="facts">
{{terms|}}
{{notes|}}
{{compiler|MadhuGopaldas}}
{{complete|}}
{{goal|0}}
{{first|18Jul11}}
{{last|18Jul11}}
{{totals_by_section|BG=0|SB=0|CC=0|OB=0|Lec=0|Con=1|Let=0}}
{{total|1}}
{{toc right}}
</div>
<div id="Conversations_and_Morning_Walks" class="section" sec_index="5" parent="compilation" text="Conversations and Morning Walks"><h2>Conversations and Morning Walks</h2>
</div>
<div id="1975_Conversations_and_Morning_Walks" class="sub_section" sec_index="8" parent="Conversations_and_Morning_Walks" text="1975 Conversations and Morning Walks"><h3>1975 Conversations and Morning Walks</h3>
</div>
<div id="RoomConversationwithProfessorOlivierOctober101975Durban_0" class="quote" parent="1975_Conversations_and_Morning_Walks" book="Con" index="210" link="Room Conversation with Professor Olivier -- October 10, 1975, Durban" link_text="Room Conversation with Professor Olivier -- October 10, 1975, Durban">
<span class="link">[[Vanisource:Room Conversation with Professor Olivier -- October 10, 1975, Durban|Room Conversation with Professor Olivier -- October 10, 1975, Durban]]: </span><div class="text"><p style="display: inline;">Prof. Olivier: Apart from anything else, our Indian, our Hindu community here in South Africa seems to be very loose from any fixed idea of what constitutes Hinduism.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes.</p>
<p>Prof. Olivier: And especially the young people, they are therefore living in a complete vacuum. For various reasons they do not want to accept...and I come back to the word religion again because this is what they have about, or see around them. They cannot identify themselves with the Christian religion. They cannot identify themselves with the Islamic religion. They are largely ignorant.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: So they should be shown the right path.</p>
<p>Prof. Olivier: They should be.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: This is the right path, original, authentic.</p>
<p>Prof. Olivier: There were not very many great scholars in South Africa amongst our Indian community, you know. They came out by and large as workers on the sugar plantations. A few were Christian missionaries, a few were jewelers and tailors and so on. And then for the last hundred years they were occupied in resisting...</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Political struggle.</p>
<p>Prof. Olivier: Political struggles or resisting this transportation back to India, and they were fighting to make a living, you know, finding their own place in the country. And it's only, as I see that in the future as I've been telling them that we are privileged to have them here in this country with this background, and they mustn't cut themselves away from it and drift in a vacuum. They must give meaning to the essence of their own beliefs and faith. But they do not know to whom to turn.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: So this is the opportunity.</p>
<p>Prof. Olivier: You see, now, they turn...the senior ones turn perhaps to the ācāryas that you saw there.</p>
<p>Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: The youth are not attracted...</p>
<p>Prof. Olivier: They’re not...</p>
<p>Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: ...because they don’t have the answers. The youth want to know exactly. In other words, if a youth asks a question and you can’t answer it, he doesn’t want to hear from you anymore. But we can answer all questions on the basis of these literatures without any tinge of mental speculation. Scientific, that's a fact.</p>
<p>Prof. Olivier: Then basically they and myself and others want to know how do we get this spirit into our own hearts and how does this then issue out into everyday living.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes. That is all explained in the Bhagavad-gītā, how to live peacefully in this world and go back to home, back to Godhead. This is the whole thing is explained very nicely.</p>
<p>Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: It's not that everyone will become a monk.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: No, no.</p>
<p>Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: Not everyone will become a jeweler or a teacher. But all different occupations must be there in society. Simply they have to somehow or another become God-centered.</p>
<p>Prof. Olivier: Yeah. Well, this is the point, you see. Man only lives because God allows him to live. God has given him breath to live, and he's got to breathe God and speak God and live God now.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: That is wanted.</p>
<p>Prof. Olivier: How to get him to voluntarily make this experiment, because this is what you were saying. Any scientific development rests on experimentation. The challenge to experiment...</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes.</p>
<p>Prof. Olivier: ...is there. God does not deny anybody the privilege of experimenting.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes.</p>
<p>Prof. Olivier: And especially the youth at university, as I have always indicated and I tell them every year that they’ve got to experiment with the spirit to the same extent that they experiment in their laboratories with pieces of animal tissues or grass or what it is that they’ve got to analyze. But the real tragedy is that we have wandered away so far from the spirit and from the spiritual laboratory...</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes.</p>
<p>Prof. Olivier: ...that we don’t know where to start. I was telling them the other day that when the Americans sent their first man to the moon, they had a laboratory of about four thousand men at the controls. The one was doing this and the other one was doing that, but this was a huge human laboratory. That is only while they experiment, and then by that... (break)</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: He is my student. He practices like him.</p>
<p>Prof. Olivier: Yeah, but now would he have what is normally in the Western world called a theological degree?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: He has...theological degree, he has studied all these books. This is theological. But there is no such thing at the present moment.</p>
<p>Prof. Olivier: Yeah. I can see your problem. But now our problem on this side is, of course, that you...</p>
<p>Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: Just as in America, I remember at the university...</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: No, you can give an experiment. We don’t charge anything. You see how he teaches. Then if you like, you can appoint.</p>
<p>Prof. Olivier: He would have to be acceptable to the Hindu community because it would be for them only, not for the Christians or for the Muslims.</p>
<p>Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: Well, the Hindu community accepts our movement. Every program we have, we have at least...we’ve seen at City Hall we had full house, last night (?) full house, and they very much appreciate our movement in particular. They come to us with many questions. So any representative of our movement is pure in his activities and his understanding of the philosophy is comprehensive, so they have no objection. But they see practically that the big men in the Hindu community here, in Johannesburg and Durban...</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: You can ask the Hindu community.</p>
<p>Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: They will testify to our character. They accept. They accept.</p>
<p>Prof. Olivier: You see, the...South Africa has had to import its priests, its Hindu priests.</p>
<p>Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: Even the young girls who join our movement, they cover their heads. And the Hindu ladies are so impressed that they practice such chastity, even to the extent always covering their head as a sign of chastity. They very much appreciate.</p>
<p>Prof. Olivier: Perhaps I can give you one or a couple of application forms that you could post to one or two people if they’re interested to apply. But this would be...</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: The Hindu community, I think they will accept us. I don’t think they will deny.</p>
<p>Prof. Olivier: But this would be a wonderful opportunity to bring the essence of Hinduism because from what I gather here from what you have said, this is not only the essence of religion from here but it is also the essence of Hinduism.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes. The essence of Hinduism is Bhagavad-gītā As It Is.</p>
<p>Prof. Olivier: Yeah. Therefore, one would like to see that the foundation of any course which is given here in Hinduism is a pure foundation, unadulterated. Therefore, based on the Gītā and the Upanisads and the Veda, all the Vedic literature, because that's all that's available. But the trouble is, you see, as it is, whether it is Christianity or whether it is...I don’t want to speak about Islam because I don’t know enough about them, but there is always the danger that you will get intellectual expositions...</p>
<p>Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: Well, this is the idea of presenting...</p>
<p>Prof. Olivier: ...without the faith.</p>
<p>Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: ...presenting as it is. In other words, let them draw their own conclusions. In other words, it's not simply that you’re trying to flatter some people that they know so much if they don’t know. You’re trying to educate, which means uplift. So simply we present the principles that are here and let the people become elevated, educated.</p>
<p>Prof. Olivier: Well, are your book lists in here?</p>
<p>Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: Yes.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes.</p>
<p>Prof. Olivier: And you’ve got another copy of this?</p>
<p>Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: Oh, you can keep this.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: You can take.</p>
<p>Prof. Olivier: Are the prices in here?</p>
<p>Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: No, the prices...</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: No, price is there.</p>
<p>Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: I can give you...</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: No, no, price is there.</p>
<p>Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: The American prices.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: That doesn’t matter. Price is there.</p>
<p>Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: Some of them are here.</p>
<p>Prof. Olivier: In case we want to order them for our...</p>
<p>Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: Yes, yes.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: So you can order here. You can get it.</p>
<p>Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: All of these books we have available at this point.</p>
<p>Prof. Olivier: These are introductory?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes. I think in the beginning Bhagavad-gītā As It Is.</p>
<p>Prof. Olivier: Well, thank you very much, sir...</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Hare Kṛṣṇa.</p>
<p>Prof. Olivier: ...for sacrificing the afternoon for me like this, and God bless.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Thank you, yes, for your...(chuckles)...thank you.</p>
</div>
</div>
</div>