They do not know what is sattvic, rajasic, tamasic. Ignorance, simply ignorance. Defective human civilization. These things have to be learned if you want to make your life perfect, because this is the opportunity, human life. You don't think that the child which is being killed, we are laughing. No. You may also be put into that condition. You may be put into that condition. That we should know. But they do not know it.
So these things are prescribed, therefore, that to make your life perfect you should accept these processes.
- tapasā brahmacaryeṇa
- śamena damena ca
- tyāgena satya-śaucābhyāṁ
- (SB 6.1.13)
Satya means truthfulness; one should be very truthful. Truthfulness is prescribed; that is the brahminical qualification. Satya, sama, dama, these are all brahminical qualifications. So one has to become a brāhmaṇa. brāhmaṇa means anyone who is qualified with all these higher quality of human life, he's a brāhmaṇa. By birth one is not brāhmaṇa. As soon as in India they took it that by birth one becomes brāhmaṇa, the whole Vedic civilization has been spoiled. brāhmaṇa means this quality. They have taken it in India now by birth one becomes brāhmaṇa. No. In the śāstra it is not stated that. In the śāstra it is said Kṛṣṇa Himself says, jan . . .
- cātur-varṇyaṁ mayā sṛṣṭaṁ
- guṇa-karma-vibhāgaśaḥ
- (BG 4.13)
If you acquire these qualities, and if you work according to that quality, then you are either brāhmaṇa, kṣatriya, vaiśya or śūdra. They should be divided according to, I mean to say, quality and work. Just like a physician, he's a medical man. What is the symptom? He has passed the examination. That means he has got the quality or . . . and he is practicing as medical man. Then he is a medical man. Nobody goes to a medical man to ask him, "Are you brāhmaṇa? Are you kṣatriya? Are you śūdra?" There is no such question. You see what he is by his quality, and by his work you know that he is a medical man. So you understand that he is a medical man.