View source for Would you be justified in doing something that society would consider criminal, like… stealing for Krsna, or killing for Krsna... Something that is judged by, say, the US government as criminal, would be still do it if it was for Krsna?

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[[Category:Questions asked to Srila Prabhupada]]
[[Category:Questions asked to SP... 1976]]
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<div id="Conversations_and_Morning_Walks" class="section" sec_index="5" parent="compilation" text="Conversations and Morning Walks"><h2>Conversations and Morning Walks</h2>
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<div id="1976_Conversations_and_Morning_Walks" class="sub_section" sec_index="9" parent="Conversations_and_Morning_Walks" text="1976 Conversations and Morning Walks"><h3>1976 Conversations and Morning Walks</h3>
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<div id="InterviewwithNewsdayNewspaperJuly141976NewYork_0" class="quote" parent="1976_Conversations_and_Morning_Walks" book="Con" index="212" link="Interview with Newsday Newspaper -- July 14, 1976, New York" link_text="Interview with Newsday Newspaper -- July 14, 1976, New York">
<div class="heading">Like stealing for Kṛṣṇa, or killing for Kṛṣṇa. No, we do not do anything which is harmful to the society. We do not do anything, not only to the human society. To the animal society, to the tree society, to the aquatic society, we do not do anything. We do not support the slaughterhouse, killing the animals. Kṛṣṇa consciousness means to see every living entity on the same level. Paṇḍitāḥ sama-darśinaḥ. We are not cruel to anyone. Either he's a man or animal or tree or bird.
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<span class="link">[[Vanisource:Interview with Newsday Newspaper -- July 14, 1976, New York|Interview with Newsday Newspaper -- July 14, 1976, New York]]: </span><div class="text"><p style="display: inline;">Interviewer: How important is it to look after physical life?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Physical life, so you must keep yourself fit to execute Kṛṣṇa consciousness. It is not our desire that you become sick and you cannot chant. But our purpose is to chant and we require the physical necessities just to keep ourselves fit, not more than that. Eating is necessary. Without eating, I will die. So we take Kṛṣṇa prasādam, not in the restaurant or hotel anything, no. We take nice vegetables, nice food grains, rice, wheat, sugar, milk, all vitaminous, full of vitamins. So there is no deficiency of food. Even from food value it is very nice. We do not unnecessarily kill animals.</p>
<p>Interviewer: You run farms as well, do you not?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes. Yes.</p>
<p>Interviewer: What do they...</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: So you try to...</p>
<p>Interviewer: Are they working farms, producing farms?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes, there are many farms in your country. Just now I am coming from New Vrindāban in West Virginia. They are living. If you go sometime, you can see how independently they are living. And there are other farms, New Orleans, and just now we are going tomorrow...</p>
<p>Rāmeśvara: Pennsylvania.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Pennsylvania. So we get enough milk, enough food grains, enough fruits. So there is no economic problem. Our purpose is to save time from unnecessary necessities of life, from unnecessary necessities of life, to save time and utilize the time for developing Kṛṣṇa consciousness. And so far the body is concerned, as much as it is required take and maintain the body. That's all.</p>
<p>Interviewer: Your devotees' health is looked after, then.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes.</p>
<p>Interviewer: By who?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: They are instructed in that way, plain living, high thinking.</p>
<p>Interviewer: Do you have arrangements with hospitals in case somebody gets sick, and do you watch diet carefully and...?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Oh, yes. Why not? Why not? Take care of the body. But we keep our habits in such a way that we don't fall sick very often.</p>
<p>Interviewer: You said before that with respect to achieving Kṛṣṇa consciousness, that the end was most important, that becoming God conscious...</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes.</p>
<p>Interviewer: ...Was the most important thing. Would that ever allow you to or any one of the devotees, to engage in practices that would be considered unjust or criminal in a broader society?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: That is his interest.</p>
<p>Interviewer: In terms of, you know, "This is for Kṛṣṇa. This is for developing God consciousness..."</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: No, if you are interested in Kṛṣṇa, you are interested for everyone. And if you are interested for a particular person, society, then you are not interested in Kṛṣṇa. The example I can give you. Just like if you supply food to your stomach, then you supply food to your eyes, ears, hands, legs, everything. But if you supply food to your eyes, then you become blind.</p>
<p>Bali-mardana: He wants to know that would you be justified in doing something that society would consider criminal, like, say...</p>
<p>Rāmeśvara: Like stealing for Kṛṣṇa, or killing for Kṛṣṇa.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Killing?</p>
<p>Rāmeśvara: If it is... Something that is judged by, say, the US government as criminal, would be still do it if it was for Kṛṣṇa?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: No, we do not do anything which is harmful to the society. We do not do anything, not only to the human society. To the animal society, to the tree society, to the aquatic society, we do not do anything. We do not support the slaughterhouse, killing the animals. Kṛṣṇa consciousness means to see every living entity on the same level. Paṇḍitāḥ sama-darśinaḥ ([[Vanisource:BG 5.18|BG 5.18]]). We are not cruel to anyone. Either he's a man or animal or tree or bird.</p>
<p>Interviewer: Does that take on a positive aspect as well so that by not only do I not kill animals and I don't kill men, do I, am I obliged under your system, am I obliged to actively help...</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes, suppose if you are coming to kill me, then I must take advantage of killing you first.</p>
<p>Interviewer: I understand that, and obliged to go beyond.</p>
<p>Bali-mardana: Are you also obliged to help animals, to help other human beings.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes, we are maintaining animals, giving them food, giving them security of life in all our farms the animals are very free.</p>
<p>Rāmeśvara: We're obliged because they are all part and parcel of God.</p>
<p>Interviewer: And what about with people?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Every people. You come to stay with us, we give you all help. Anyone who comes to our society we give shelter, we give food, we give instruction, we give dress, everything. Without any condition. You please come and live with us. For such a nice building we have taken. Our farms are so nice, you can go and see how they are doing. We have got one hundred and two centers all over the world. You'll find they are living very comfortably.</p>
<p>Interviewer: How many centers in the United States?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: About forty.</p>
<p>Rāmeśvara: Forty or fifty.</p>
<p>Hari-śauri: Fifty with the farms.</p>
<p>Interviewer: How are those supported? Do they support themselves?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: That is Kṛṣṇa consciousness.</p>
<p>Interviewer: I beg your pardon?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: That is Kṛṣṇa consciousness.</p>
<p>Interviewer: The way they support themselves?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes, Kṛṣṇa supports.</p>
<p>Interviewer: Kṛṣṇa supports?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes. We do not know what we shall eat tomorrow, but we have no insufficiency. Rather, neighbors they are grudging that these people do not do anything and they live so comfortably. Sometimes they ask...</p>
<p>Interviewer: How does Kṛṣṇa support them?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: That is Kṛṣṇa consciousness.</p>
<p>Interviewer: He mediates through physical things, does he?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Everything belongs to Kṛṣṇa.</p>
<p>Interviewer: Yes.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: So Kṛṣṇa is within you. So if Kṛṣṇa dictates, "Give him three thousand dollars," you'll give me. That's all. That actually it is fact. Yesterday Mr. Coleman came? He gave me a check for three thousand. I never asked him.</p>
<p>Bali-mardana: Who? Mr. Coleman?</p>
<p>Hari-śauri: Coleman.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: So we are immediately depositing for our Vṛndāvana and Māyāpur scheme. So Kṛṣṇa sends money. We do not bother what will happen tomorrow. But we are very nicely maintained by Kṛṣṇa's grace. That is Kṛṣṇa consciousness. And Kṛṣṇa says teṣāṁ nityābhiyuktānāṁ yoga-kṣemaṁ vahāmy aham. Find out this verse.</p>
:ananyāś cintayanto māṁ
:ye janāḥ paryupāsate
:teṣāṁ nityābhiyuktānāṁ
:yoga-kṣemaṁ vahāmy aham
:([[Vanisource:BG 9.22|BG 9.22]])
<p>Interviewer: A question: you are now the leader and the spiritual master. Who will take your place?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: That Kṛṣṇa will dictate who will take my place.</p>
<p>Interviewer: Kṛṣṇa will tell you that?</p>
<p>Hari-śauri: You want that verse, Śrīla Prabhupāda?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes, yes.</p>
<p>Hari-śauri: This is the translation of what the Sanskrit...</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: No, you can read the Sanskrit also.</p>
<p>Hari-śauri:</p>
:ananyāś cintayanto māṁ
:ye janāḥ paryupāsate
:teṣāṁ nityābhiyuktānāṁ
:yoga-kṣemaṁ vahāmy aham
:([[Vanisource:BG 9.22|BG 9.22]])
<p>"But those who worship Me with devotion, meditating on My transcendental form—to them I carry what they lack and preserve what they have."</p>
<p>Interviewer: They still have to go out and ask occasionally?</p>
<p>Bali-mardana: It's not that we sit back and wait for Kṛṣṇa to send it to us.</p>
<p>Rāmeśvara: No, we're very industrious.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: We don't sit down idly.</p>
<p>Bali-mardana: God helps those who help themselves.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: We are not idle preachers, we are working. All, very hard, more than the karmīs.</p>
<p>Rāmeśvara: These men, they go out to engage people in taking our books maybe twelve hours a day sometimes, ten hours a day, without any salary.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: I am now eighty years old, I am working twenty-four hours. I think I work more than my young disciples (laughter).</p>
<p>Bali-mardana: Oh yes, definitely.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: I work at night.</p>
<p>Rāmeśvara: It is hard to keep up with Śrīla Prabhupāda.</p>
<p>Hari-śauri: Very difficult.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: We are not idle creatures.</p>
<p>Rāmeśvara: We are publishing his books and sometimes he is ahead of us by seventeen volumes.</p>
<p>Interviewer: How do you spend your days? You do an awful lot of traveling I understand.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Traveling is going on throughout the whole world and wherever I go, at night I write books.</p>
<p>Bali-mardana: Translates.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Translate. And daytime I meet devotees.</p>
<p>Bali-mardana: Manage.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Manage.</p>
<p>Interviewer: You arrange the marriages?</p>
<p>Bali-mardana: Manage.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: They have to ask me, final decision is taken from me. From all over the world, from all over the world letters are coming some problem, some problem, some problem. Although I have got about twenty secretaries, still they have to consult, I have to give them advice.</p>
<p>Hari-śauri: In the evening Śrīla Prabhupāda goes to bed at ten o'clock and gets up at eleven-thirty to begin translating.</p>
<p>Interviewer: You just sleep a couple of hours, then?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: No, one and a half hour.</p>
<p>Interviewer: That's it?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: Yes. Of course in daytime I take rest two hours. So in this way altogether about three to four hours. Our philosophy is not that you sit idly and God will send everything, no, not like that. We know God will send everything, still we work. Without God's sanction nothing can come. But we must be qualified to receive the favor of God. That is our philosophy.</p>
<p>Interviewer: Are you surprised at the way this organization has prospered?</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: What do you mean?</p>
<p>Hari-śauri: Are we surprised at the way the movement has expanded and prospered in just a few short years.</p>
<p>Prabhupāda: No, it is not surprising, it is natural. If you do, just like if you do business in proper way there will be profit. Similarly, as it is enjoined in this book of knowledge, if you do like that it will expand, it will prosper. Two plus two equal to four. Mathematical calculation. If you make two plus two, it will become four. It will neither become three nor five. So here it is said, you have read the, that "One who is engaged twenty-four hours in My service, so I, yoga-kṣemaṁ vahāmy aham ([[Vanisource:BG 9.22|BG 9.22]]), I supply whatever he requires and I protect whatever he has got." So if you actually serve Kṛṣṇa, then everything you want, it will come.</p>
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