Sofia Airport Resounds with Ecstatic Chanting

There's nothing sweeter than arriving in a foreign country and being greeted with a joyful, exuberant Hare Krishna kirtan which is so attractive and enthusiastic that it draws the attention of everybody in the airport. This was our experience upon landing in Sofia the other day. The whole world should be like this: filled up with lively singing of the Lord's names along with ecstatic dancing. Nobody will have time for war anymore. They will be too busy chanting and dancing.

Sankarshan Das Adhikari

Ecstatic Arrival Kirtan--Sofia Airport-26 May 2011

Answers According to the Vedic Version:

Complaint: Your Limited Beliefs Spread Sickness

I have subscribed to your e-course and have been following the answers that you have been providing. Though some of the answers are good, I feel really apprehensive of certain other answers, and I feel some are dogmatic with the limited belief system you have in your mind.

As religion is a way of life and Christianity proposes a super-power as God and the mortals are sinners, they plant guilt in the consciousness. You too, in the name of Krishna, are spreading the same sickness from a Hindu point of view. Since belief systems and the emotional constituents vary from person to person, there are a lot of perspectives to look at: God as a friend, as a mother, as a father, as a master (in a master disciple relationship) not a master-servant as you state in your replies. This way of answers shows supremacy to something you shout as Krishna and instill fear, inferiority and guilt to your followers.

You wrote,
The second point is: There is no verse in the Bhagavad-gita which upholds the principle that Dr. Hawking and everyone else is a form of God. Rather we are all the tiny servants of God.

Need clarification here:
Please quote the verse that say we are all tiny servants of God. We are part and parcel of the same God (as the Gita says, we are within God (ref. Chapter 7 verse 12). Since a drop of the Infinite is infinite, a part of God is God stands true to each and everyone of us in our true essence is God)

I hope you reply and stop fooling people around with your views as the views of Krishna.

Hare Krishna.
Best Regards,
V.N.

Answer: If the Gita is Sickness, We are Surely Guilty

Thank you very much for chanting Hare Krishna. This has pleased me greatly. In regards to the philosophical issues you have raised, kindly consider the followings points which are offered to you in a mood of loving service:

We don't present our own views. We simply present the message of Krishna as He has so mercifully revealed in the Bhagavad-gita and as has been further confirmed throughout the Vedic scriptures and by all the great acharyas such as Devarshi Narada, Asita, Devala, and Vyas. If this transcendental knowledge is sickness, we are certainly guilty, as you say, of spreading sickness. Indeed we have spread it so much that we are now in danger of a global epidemic.

We admit that we teach that we are inferior to God because this is a fact as confirmed by Krishna in the Bhagavad-gita when He orders us to surrender to Him. If you think this is a wrong concept, then prove to us that you are as powerful as God by manifesting all the universes from your body.

Krishna consciousness is not a process of making people feel guilty and morose. It is a process of connecting everyone with the unlimited mercy of God so that they can enter into an eternal existence of blissful celebration.

Servant means one who engages in service to the master. In forty-six verses of the Bhagavad-gita Krishna directly mentions this service. In the 18th chapter, verse 66 He directly orders us to surrender to Him. This means that we are meant to give up serving maya or illusion and serve Him instead.

"Within God" does not meant that we are God. Just like a man who lives in India is within India, but this does not mean that he is India. Although he is Indian, he is not India. In the same way because we are within God we are "Godians", but we are not God.

You cannot find one point we make that is not confirmed in the Vedic scriptures because we do not present our own views. Our only business is to present the view of Krishna, which is, by the way, the supreme view since Krishna is the origin of all that exists, as confirmed in the Bhagavad-gita.

If you don't like Krishna's views, that is your free choice. You are entitled to have whatever views suit you. But a thoughtful man carefully analyzes what are the various results derived from various viewpoints and adopts that viewpoint which will deliver him from the cycle of birth and death. In this regard we wish you the very best.

Sankarshan Das Adhikari