How Do We Know that Krishna is God?

Last Saturday my wife and I met with an old friend who had helped the Krishna consciousness movement get started in Austin back in 1971. She, being a Christian, told me that did not accept that Krishna is God. So this raises the question, "How do we know that Krishna is God?" The answer is that He reveals Himself to be God in the Bhagavad-gita and through the purificatory process of bhakti yoga revealed by Krishna in the Bhagavad-gita to Arjuna we can also personally meet Krishna and directly experience with our own purified senses that He is indeed God, the source of all existence, just as Arjuna was able to personally experience that Krishna is God.

Krishna Reveals to Arjuna that He is God

Answers by Citing the Vedic Version:

Question: What Exactly Did Srila Prabhupada Say?

I read something horrendous and sacrilegious about Srila Prabhupada on Facebook yesterday. A statement that women enjoy rape was attributed to Srila Prabhupada. In fact, the person who has posted such an obnoxious thing on his wall is a journalist living in Delhi, and he was even my colleague. I have such a low opinion of him that I have kept away from him, and I happened to find the blasphemous statement on a common friend's wall. If you would issue your rejoinder, I would do my bit in posting that as a comment, of course, giving you the credit. Kindly let me know what exactly was Sri Prabhupada's statement, if he ever made any statement on the subject.

Radha Krishna

Answer: Straighten Out this Misinformed Journalist

Sometimes due to misinformation the teachings of bona fide spiritual masters like Srila Prabhupada are misunderstood and unduly criticized without any attempt to understand the context of what is being stated. Here is exactly what Srila Prabhupada states in his purport to Srimad Bhagavatam 4.25.41:

"A man is always famous for his aggression toward a beautiful woman, and such aggression is sometimes considered rape. Although rape is not legally allowed, it is a fact that a woman likes a man who is very expert at rape.”

So what is the proper understanding of this? Srila Prabhupada is not referring to what is ordinarily defined nowadays as rape. He is talking about a man who is expert at the art of seducing women. According the laws of Vedic culture, in additional to forcible rape, seduction is also considered to be rape. Vedic culture prescribes that sex can only be indulged in for procreation, not for recreation. Even now in material society, if a man seduces a girl who is not an adult, this is considered rape, statutory rape. The Vedic culture broadens the conception of rape to also include seducing an adult woman.

Research confirms that women do enjoy being seduced. So what Srila Prabhupada is stating is certainly a fact. However, when one awakens his dormant Krishna consciousness he is no longer interested in such low class material enjoyment, which karmically obliges one to become an animal such as a pig in this next life. This is because when one becomes Krishna conscious he relishes a much greater pleasure than sex in the constant association of Lord Sri Krishna, the Supreme Personality of Godhead, the reservoir of unlimited pleasure.

So kindly straighten out this misinformed journalist who has so grossly misrepresented India's greatest ambassador of Vedic culture to help him do his job properly.

Sankarshan Das Adhikari