Death Toll at Kuruksetra

[ancient_paztriot]

I basically accept Prabhupada's presentation(s) based on his authority. But those presentations themselves are more authoritive than Prabhupada. Prabhupada says God spoke this to Arjuna. Now God personally is speaking.

 

God can make all the claims he wants to and I accept whatever is in Vedic literature as spoken by or directly representative of God… on God's authority.

 

Because I liked what I've tasted, I buy the whole thing. Based on what I could verify, I accept the whole thing. I mean everybody does that type of association all the time. The scientists don't personally retest every experimental precedent; they accept the authority of predecessors. That's basically all I'm doing.

 

There is the qualified teacher, but there is also the qualified candidate for knowledge. Both have to be there for the exchange of knowledge and culture. We don't have the knowledge in the beginning, but we excercise our faith and that faith later transforms into something more substantial. There is so much we don't know but later discover through our excercise of faith.

 

I recognize my limitations in grasping the proper perspective here. There is a world of history (beyond my experimentation) between me and said event. I don't know what all that history is. And I certainly can't imagine these disputed descriptions in my brain as easy as I can you shopping at Wal-Mart for example.

 

But because these stories and events are presented as part of the Vedas, I accept them as real. Now as to the mechanics or the scientific description of these disputed events, I can't say any better than you or anyone else I know of. That takes more conficential knowledge. I mean we're just not privy to that info. We don't experience those social clicks. I often can't even tell if it is allegory or literal.

 

So being so full of ignorance, it is quite presumptuous of me to debate the merit of the Vedas. I just accept it all on a qualitative level as truth.

 

There is blind faith. There is also blind doubt.

 

I am comfortable with my position of not knowing these "details" based on the strength of the information in which these so-called exaggerated claims are found.

 

Now I'll repeat a question to you: What could be the possible reason for exaggerating exact numbers in Vedic scriptures? If you can't say, it's probably best just to let it be instead of giving directions to a place you haven't been.

 

I'll even offer a speculative answer to my question to you…

Perhaps these fantastic descriptions are there to test your faith.

 

What do you say? I want to hear your answer.

 

Are you somehow being cheated by these descriptions? I have found the Vedas capable of explaning just about everything, including infinity. So why burn the numbers? What do you say?

 

You don't understand God through numbers or speculation. When we approach Krsna on a personal level and have that dialogue, we are experiencing reality. And that experience verifies everything else. Other ways of information become inferior and trivial - possibly even the scriptures. On the other hand, that internal dialogue to ourselves is what crazy people do.

 

Now I still want to hear what you say. So I leave you with this direct question: What do you say?

 

You must have a "scientific theory" to account for the exaggeration of numbers in the Vedas because people generally contest positions when they think they have a better one.

 

You are questioning the very integrity of the Vedas. What do you say?

[Guest guest]

Srila Bhaktivinode Thakur clearly stated that many things in the scriptures a metaphorical:

 

In the common-place books of the Hindu religion in which the rajo and

tamo-guna have been described as the ways of religion, we have descriptions of a

local heaven and a local hell; the Heaven as beautiful as anything on earth and

the Hell as ghastly as any picture of evil. Besides this Heaven we have many

more places, where good souls are sent up in the way of promotion! There are

84 divisions of the hell itself, some more dreadful than the one which Milton

has described in his “Paradise Lost” . These are certainly poetical and were

originally created by the rulers of the country in order to check evil deeds of

the ignorant people, who are not able to understand the conclusions of

philosophy. The religion of the Bhagavata is free from such a poetry. Indeed, in

some of the chapters we meet with descriptions of these hells and heavens, and

accounts of curious tales, but we have been warned somewhere in the book, not

to accept them as real facts, but as inventions to overawe the wicked and to

improve the simple and the ignorant. The Bhagavata, certainly tells us a state of

reward and punishment in future according to deeds in our present situation.

All poetic inventions, besides this spiritual fact, have been described as

statements borrowed from other works in the way of preservation of old

traditions in the book which superseded them and put an end to the necessity of

their storage.

-- from The Bhagavat, a lecture given by Srila Bhaktivinode Thakura in 1867

 

<hr>

The message in the statement of Srila Bhaktivinode Thakur above is perfectly clear.

 

[theist]

"That blind following is condemned."- Prabhupada in the Gita

4.34?

 

I refer you back to the quote I offered which is one page one.

 

The timely post by guest from Bhaktivinode posted above.

 

This may be an example of what I have been alluding to. If we hang our faith blindly on these statements when the facts are questioned in anyway that we are unable to deal with we feel our faith is being attacked. Large or small its internal crisis time and we may become angry with the questioner as a defesive measure.

 

I am only suggesting that it would be better concentrate on the incredible transcendental knowledge found in the Bhagavat and not become too much concerned with some of the surrounding stories. This is clear from Sukadeva's statements himself was the purpose he had in mind when he spoke. The stories of the kings and such are there to lend power and opulence, the essence is the transcendental knowledge and lessons on renunciation.

 

Interesting as this all is it's "nothing to get hung about..."

[ancient_paztriot]

As I said, there is blind doubt too. Is this not the 'ol 'frog in the well' philosophy?

.......................

 

"If we hang our faith blindly on these statements when the facts are questioned in anyway that we are unable to deal with we feel our faith is being attacked."

 

You obviously didn't find much substance in my last post. And you're still not answering my question to you.

 

Look, you're not doing anything special. As I said, anything can be subverted by simply saying I don't believe. And people accept their position as truth.

 

The point is that faith is very important - essential even. Devotees should build faith, not tear it down. You believe in God or you believe in hopelessness. Why indulge in counterproductive acts? You have your doubts, but why make them everyone's doubts? Why do you push until everyone accepts your "big brain" position?

 

This scientific process should be for everyone: be independently free to speculate in your own head or in your lab, but don't advertise your work until it can be scientifically proven. You also should not tear down ideas unless you have better ones. Anything can be subverted just being skeptical.

 

Even the extreme skeptic who denies all knowledge is a hypocrite because he has to 'believe' his own position of doubt.

 

I asked you for a plausible explanation as to why the Vedas would burn the numbers. You won't answer. Therefore, you don't really have any big insights, you're just sharing your doubts and limitations with others. Misery loves company?

 

I told you the process. If you pay more attention to Krsna personally, these kinds of doubts won't matter.

.......................

 

"Large or small its internal crisis time and we may become angry with the questioner as a defesive measure."

 

I wasn't feeling anger until I read your post here. Now I feel it a little. Who's having the crises here?

 

You are dodging my questions and infusing doubt. You act like many quests. It's really all a bluff because all you can say is "I don't understand." Well, maybe you're not qualified to understand as most of us are.

 

That doesn't put you in a position to start telling people to accept this or reject that in the Vedas or otherwise tell them what the essence of the Vedas is. You keep waving your doubt like this and I won't talk to you either. You want to act like Guest(s), I'll treat you like 'em.

 

Speculations can bring you down if you feel it has to be explained to you. Are you really in a postion to challenge? I say you need a better idea to challenge.

 

The Vaisnava tradition is not to pick apart and selectively accept this but not that in the Vedas, but rather to accept the Vedas as a whole. If you have better ideas, let's hear them.

 

Is our position really objective if it effectively compromises the authority of the Vedas? Are we acting as devotees?

 

One also cannot know God unless he accepts Him as inconceivable.

[theist]

What i have to say has already been said.

[ancient_paztriot]

I respect your space and faith. No hard feelings.

[theist]

Hare Krishna

[Guest guest]

Haribol. These numbers have always been fun, not frustrating. for me. I have never doubted the figures, as astronomical they may seem.

 

The theoretical physicists are on my side as well, with multi-dimensionalism, and inevitable earth changes, etc.

 

In the story of muchukunda, he reagrded the residents of dwarapa yuga as pygmies, yet some have stated that Krsna was 14 feet tall and arjung a whopping 16 feet. So how big was muchukunda, who regarded their stature as pygmyish? And how can the earth fit all these numbers?

 

Well, the answer may lie in the cyclic earth changes, and we all know a partial annihilation took place after kuruksetra and the Yadu dynasty meltdown. Shastra from that time speak of a great ocean to the north. Perhaps an understanding that present India is not the Bharatavarsa spoken of, a much larger place, perhaps the continental union prior to the shifting of the techtonic plates which sent India hurtling into the himalayas from afrika, with Sri Lanka following, and madagascar many miles behind, but on the same course. And what if the diameter of the sphere, instead of the present 8000 miles, was 12000. The sphere would then be able to support giants (of biblical proportions) and a whole bunch more, because the planet may have been as large as Uranus, Neptune, or even saturn and jupiter.

 

Cyclic earth changes always involves a shedding of the skin. The earth could have conceivably lost a great deal of livable surface, over and over again. And who is to say the composition of the dwarapa Yuga human bodies was of the same earth and water composition as today's bio-beings? Maybe it is just too hard to find any evidence in grave yards if bodies had more fire, ether, and air than todays dirt and water bags?

 

No I dont doubt the numbers. There are too many things that completely blow my mind and destroy paradigms that shroud my intellect. Shastra even has clear evidence that Lord Narayana can easily thread elephants through the eye of a needle, and when the devotee he sent confirmed this, Sri Narada Muni was certain that the devotee indeed was visiting Lord Narayana.

 

There are thousands of different species of HUMAN BEINGS according to Srila Prabhupada. There is no need to try to place them in our world, they have their own to live in. The Valakhilyas are humans that are no bigger that the dust particles we see floating in the air, yet that can bring down Lord Indra, and even threaten Garuda. How many valakhilyas are presently living on earth? We dont know, they are not bound by any mundane census takers, they reject social security.

 

Try this, think of the movie, Men in Black, and that galaxy that was in the jewel around the neck of the kitten. Now think that this may be fiction, but fiction does not always translate as untrue. There is no difference in the vastness of discovery going outward with the hubble telescopes etc or going inward with elecron microscopes showing quarks and minute particles that make up an atom. And when we arrive on the most distant planet or on the smallest particle of anti-matter, we see it is just as vast going further than going back.

 

I think it is so cool, really. I heard that 18,000,000 died on the kaurava side just by hearing the conches blown by Krsna and Arjuna.

 

hare krsna, ys, mahaksadasa

[theist]

Srila Bhaktivinode Thakur clearly stated that many things in the scriptures a metaphorical:

 

In the common-place books of the Hindu religion in which the rajo and

tamo-guna have been described as the ways of religion, we have descriptions of a

local heaven and a local hell; the Heaven as beautiful as anything on earth and

the Hell as ghastly as any picture of evil. Besides this Heaven we have many

more places, where good souls are sent up in the way of promotion! There are

84 divisions of the hell itself, some more dreadful than the one which Milton

has described in his “Paradise Lost” . These are certainly poetical and were

originally created by the rulers of the country in order to check evil deeds of

the ignorant people, who are not able to understand the conclusions of

philosophy. The religion of the Bhagavata is free from such a poetry. Indeed, in

some of the chapters we meet with descriptions of these hells and heavens, and

accounts of curious tales, but we have been warned somewhere in the book, not

to accept them as real facts, but as inventions to overawe the wicked and to

improve the simple and the ignorant. The Bhagavata, certainly tells us a state of

reward and punishment in future according to deeds in our present situation.

All poetic inventions, besides this spiritual fact, have been described as

statements borrowed from other works in the way of preservation of old

traditions in the book which superseded them and put an end to the necessity of

their storage.

-- from The Bhagavat, a lecture given by Srila Bhaktivinode Thakura in 1867

 

----------------

 

I feel on solid ground. I wonder what Bhaktivinode means by "the religion of the Bhagavat is free from such poetry?"Especially considering he is speaking of statements from what we call the Srimad Bhagavatam itself. Could it be the Bhagavat religion itself is encassed in such poetry like a piece of fine fruit comes enclosed in a peel?

 

 

[Guest guest]

Srila Bhaktivinode Thakur clearly stated that many things in the scriptures a metaphorical:

 

In the common-place books of the Hindu religion in which the rajo and

tamo-guna have been described as the ways of religion, we have descriptions of a

local heaven and a local hell; the Heaven as beautiful as anything on earth and

the Hell as ghastly as any picture of evil. Besides this Heaven we have many

more places, where good souls are sent up in the way of promotion! There are

84 divisions of the hell itself, some more dreadful than the one which Milton

has described in his “Paradise Lost” . These are certainly poetical and were

originally created by the rulers of the country in order to check evil deeds of

the ignorant people, who are not able to understand the conclusions of

philosophy. The religion of the Bhagavata is free from such a poetry. Indeed, in

some of the chapters we meet with descriptions of these hells and heavens, and

accounts of curious tales, but we have been warned somewhere in the book, not

to accept them as real facts, but as inventions to overawe the wicked and to

improve the simple and the ignorant. The Bhagavata, certainly tells us a state of

reward and punishment in future according to deeds in our present situation.

All poetic inventions, besides this spiritual fact, have been described as

statements borrowed from other works in the way of preservation of old

traditions in the book which superseded them and put an end to the necessity of

their storage.

-- from The Bhagavat, a lecture given by Srila Bhaktivinode Thakura in 1867

[theist]

A very clear statement. Of course this is not license to start tossing out whatever we don't like as allegorical. Some things are rather obvious. Others maybe not so easily discerned.

 

Nothing worth arguing over. Some years ago, maybe ten, as I walked into Berkeley temple I over heard two bramacharis who were laughing about how they liked to challenge the students at UC Berkeley about the moon's position. They were just on their way out to more such preaching.

 

I think it would be better if we ignored such issues and stuck more to teaching people that the body is not the self and God is a person.

 

Other things may be interesting but shouldn't be our focus.

[Guest guest]

Haribol. Well, there is no use trying to tell someone that the earth has beings, even human beings, as well as gods, that live just an inch off the surface of the planet. I mean, Art Bell types might give us a little credence, but others will look at us as if we were nuts, thus nullifying everything else we may have to say.

 

However, relative truth is just that, relative. The ocean is blue, but is it?,, No it is not, there is no blue water, anywhere, unless it is polluted, nor is there blue sky. The sun is not yellow, and Ive never seen a black man nor a white man. Colors are relative to how the UV rays dispel over a certain object, and colors are also in the eyes of the beholder. So we can maybe patronize the scientist of relative truth with his doubts, but this is just a game. Scientists have no knowledge unless they become full like einstein and surrender to God in total failure that their science made more questions than answers.

 

Lord Brahma thought he knew everything, after all, hes god, the creator, for christs sake. Yet he was a whimpering child when his relative truth was exposed at the door of Lord Narayana as the other Brahmas came in an endless procession, some four-headed, some ten-headed, some with countless countenances. The great Lord Brahma whose day comprises the entire age of the cosmos came to understand that relative truth is not such a great thing to be so attached to.

 

But Im not arguin here, because preaching requires a bit of patronization. Only fanatics cannot move on from points that are only understood among like minded devotees.

 

But Ill never call any of it allegorical, not because it is not, but because this kind of stuff is the attraction to the entire science to me. Lord Varaha dukin it out with hiranyaksa, while the earth is sinkin in the bog that covers half the cosmic manifestation, and Varaha lifting the planet with his tusks to place it properly, now theres a ten-point-five earthquake for ya. If the time lines are said to be allegory, what of Lord Varaha?

 

Hare Krsna, ys, mahaksadasa

[theist]

 

Haribol. Well, there is no use trying to tell someone that the earth has beings, even human beings, as well as gods, that live just an inch off the surface of the planet. I mean, Art Bell types might give us a little credence, but others will look at us as if we were nuts, thus nullifying everything else we may have to say.

 

 

I don't recall anyone either accepting or rejecting this. No one challenged it at all. I don't post a lot of what I believe is happening presently on this earth.

 

 

But Ill never call any of it allegorical, not because it is not, but because this kind of stuff is the attraction to the entire science to me.

 

 

Understood. That is what I have been pointing to by posting and reposting this verse from Sukadeva.

 

 

TRANSLATION SB 12.3.14

Sukadeva Gosvami said: O mighty Pariksit, I have related to you the narrations of all these great kings, who spread their fame throughout the world and then departed. My real purpose was to teach transcendental knowledge and renunciation. Stories of kings lend power and opulence to these narrations but do not in themselves constitute the ultimate aspect of knowledge.

 

He is not saying that he made up the narrations of the Kings, just why he bothered using them. And in doing so MY PERSONAL BELIEF(nothing more) is that he used poetic license in doing so.

 

 

If the time lines are said to be allegory, what of Lord Varaha?

 

 

I have the same question but have been afraid to post it for fear of being even more disruptive than usual. But since you brought it up /images/graemlins/grin.gif it would interesting to hear what others think.

 

 

[Guest guest]

All Krishna Book is full of this magnific numbers!!!, not only the bodyguards of Ugrasena. Read about the palaces (900.000), the size of the dead body of Putana, mountains of 120 kilometers high, etc.

Thats for me only a poetic talk; but...where this poetry ends?. Maybe that the passtimes of Krishna are only this?. Is not my intention to offend devotional feelings, but only with a blind mind this can be take literally.

[Guest guest]

Usually the armour, swords etc. were made of martensitic steel (a heat-treated steel to make it hard). As you very well know that iron and steel are prone to severe corrosion in presence of moisture, air (oxygen), minerals (salts like sodium chloride etc.), heating and cooling cycles etc. Even stainless steels, the alloys of the 20th and the present century turn to powders in the presence of above corroding agents in a short period. Now we are talking of a bygone era of more than 7000 years (the period of Kurukshetra war has been calculated to be 5560 bc). How can we expect such artefacts to remain intact? As for bones are concerned, they are all made predominantly of calcium phosphate which would get mixed with the soil. Northern India experiences frequent floods either in rainy season or in summer due to melting of ice. Thus, the floods would have carried the bones to sea or scattered all over. Thus, in the end, no trace of such remnants would have remained.

[theist]

It gets embarrassing at some point. Consider this: King Ugrasena had ten million billion bodyguards in Mathura. Now how many of those bodyguards were married and how many children did they have? That brings us up to let's say fifty million billion human beings in Mathura. Some say the people in those days were ten feet tall. But we will leave that aside for now.

 

Now bodyguards make up a small percentage of any administration. So how many others were in Ugrasena's other branches of governmental service?

 

And since Ugrasena was one man what did all these extra body guards do all day when they couldnKt possivly have even gotten close to the king to protect him?

 

The governmental ruling class is itself not the whole of society. How many brahmanas were there? How many vaisyas How many sudras which as I understand are always more then the other castes?

 

Now how were all these people fed? Farmland? It would take a solar system just to grow the food for that many people. What about the needed water? What about the needed infrastructure like roads? Where are all the buildings they lived in? You know the ones that this entire planet could never accomdate let alone Mathura. How did they get rid of their waste and the waste for the rather large amount of cows that they must have had because the society was based on cows right?

 

And you mock the Hebrews for their Adam and Eve metaphor which many of them and the Christians assume to be an actual 3D event. Please, give me a break.

[Guest guest]

Any more that one can offer proof that Srila Prabhupada has ordered him or her to accept disciples of their own. Many have discussed the anomalies of the Fifth Canto, the positioning of planets, etc. Some have left the movement completely because of the moon (which is why we call them lunatics). But some do not blink an eye when presented with facts thay may not jive with what is expected, relative truth. I saw the positioning of planets from fifth canto clearly, and my only objection is that the pictures in the book, as well as the maps, are wrong. The facts are correct, and I know the Tala planets are underground, not below the earth which is still above us if you live in Australia. I know the meaning of subterranean, under the dirt, so I understand that the subterranean Tala Planets where the Nagas reside is under the surface of the earth.

 

As mentioned in my previous post on this topic, we must consider the unseen Valakhilyas. One hundred million of these people can fit on the tip of a pin, and they are human beings. Beings from other eras are composed of different combinations of the gross and subtle elements, as are beings that surround us that are unseen. Science does not do it for me, they cannot explain anything, even the stuff they claim authority over, like medicine, physics, astronomy, etc.

 

There was that story where Narada sent two devotees to see krsna. One came back with a fantacy that Narada knew that meant the person had not been there. However, the devotee who actually saw him told narada that he saw Lord Narayana threading elephants thru the eye of a needle. Narada accepted the authenticity of this persons claim that he actually was received and given realized vision by Lord Narayana.

 

Perhaps someone could repeat this story, as my brief display here doen not do this wonderful demonstration justice. Bottom line, though, in total deferrment to Theists points, this is not the stuff we should lose our devotion to the Supreme Lord over. I dont even have one servant, and if i did, my world would be way too crowded with all the botheration. I feel bad for king urgasena, for this as well as the misery he must have for having Kamsa as a son.

 

Hare Krsna, ys, mahaksadasa

[Kulapavana]

when someone is described as "invincible" in the Vedas - only to be described a few werses later as "one who was vanquished by Arjuna", the literal meaning is obviously distorted. such is the Vedic language. numbers and expressions are very, very relative there, and their purpose is to give us some idea of the situation. remember the 1/10,000 the tip of the hair to describe the "size of the soul"? it is simply to help us understand, and not taken word for word.

[theist]

 

Bottom line, though, in total deferrment to Theists points, this is not the stuff we should lose our devotion to the Supreme Lord over.

 

 

Of course not, that is my point. It is my position that if faith is misplaced eventually it will weaken and fade out altogether.

 

Faith in the position of the moon or this thing with the outlandish number of bodyguards for Ugrasena is not faith in the Supreme Lord. Once that is understood then we see how it can have no effect either way on faith in the Supreme Lord.

 

It is not that those who take a staunch "I believe it to be *literal*" stance have more faith in God than someone who takes it as literary license.

 

The way it hurts faith is to demand that someone believe this in a certain way or they get marked as faithless and then stop chanting. That I have seen.

 

My view on all this is a little different than most. Just my view I know. But I don't care if Krsna "literally" walked on the planet 5,000 years ago or not. I don't care if He "literally" lifted Govardhana Hill or not either. By literal here I mean in the 3D sense.

 

Literal to me could be having His devotee write down some wonderous thing that devotee perceived in sahaj samadhi. I see no difference in Krsna's appearing in story form to any other way. Haven't we been told SB is the literary incarnation of Godhead?

 

Similar to Deity worship. First Krsna enters through the heart of His devotee then the Deity form as I understand it. So if Krsna entered in literary form through the mind of His devotee I take that as literal.

 

And what is the difference? This so-called solid material world is just a wispy dream anyway so what does literal mean?

 

Which is literal; Krsna entering in story form through the mind of His devotee or New York city?

 

I say New York city is the dreamlike apparition, despite it's place on the map and presence in current and past space/time, and the Krsna story would be literal. Literal meaning genuinely real. "It really happened" or "It literally happened" like that. Whatever pastime Krsna plays out in His devotees mind is literal it is *not* imagination.

 

When Krsna dances the rasa dance in the forest of Vrndavan in the mind of His devotee, that is literal and it doesn't become non-literal when that devotee speaks it or writes it. It becomes genuine or literal Krsna-katha.

 

So in that sense I accept as literal that Ugrasena had ten quadrillion bodyguards. Or seen from a more mundane viewing point,it's literary license.

[Guest guest]

http://www.swami.org/sanga/QA/PlayofViolence.html

 

Excerpt of the article written by Sripad Tripurari Swami

 

It is said that 640 million warriors died(24) in the 18-day battle on a tract of land 80 miles in circumference.(25) And what were the weapons of the war? Bows and arrows empowered by mantras that produced extremely sophisticated nuclear-like weapons of mass destruction.(26)

 

This constitutes the largest human carnage in the history of the world, in which eight times more people died than the number of civilians and soldiers lost in all of the wars of the modern world combined.(27) Furthermore, the weaponry of the war is said to have been superior to anything known to humanity at this time, yet we have no war memorials to remind us of the tragedy, no burial grounds, no weapons to replicate, nothing whatsoever to remember or document the war by but the immortal Bhagavad-gita itself. Did it really occur?

 

Yes and no. The battle is not a historical event that can be documented with modern methodology, nor is it something that could have have taken place within the realm of human possibility. Yet if the war is merely a myth, then either there is no play of God within the human drama or the Bhagavad-gita and the Battle of Kuruksetra are not part of God's play. According to the Gita, neither of these two are an option. Thus we are left with the conclusion that the battle did and did not occur. Its violence is nonviolence.

 

The history of this war is the inconceivable history of the larger circle of God's play coming with the smaller circle of the human drama. How can it be documented? Through the practice of bhakti-yoga, the yoga of love. In the consciousness of pure love for God, mature devotees hear Krsna's conch heralding victory for the dharma of love as he enacts the drama of the Bhagavad-gita and commands Arjuna to take part in the yogic battle of Kuruksetra--an event infinitely more real to realized devotees than the illusory, mythic drama of humanity's misidentification with matter. It opens for them the door to a realm of possibility that cannot be found within the confines of matter. In the homeland of the soul nothing is impossible. It is here that Krsna's play, with all of its theological and philosophical ramifications, is eternally performed.

 

The play of Krsna is as human as it is divine. In the drama of Krsna's play, many things occur under the influence of his magical primary potency that do not quite fit into material calculation. Just as in drama things happen that do not happen in the "real world," things happen in Krsna's play that do not tally with our sense of possibilities. The play of Krsna is carefree, which at the same time is wonderfully filled with knowledge, lessons by which humanity can realize its own potential for love.

 

Krsna plays, and through this play he teaches and attracts us. Arjuna is encouraged by the most loving God to be instrumental in the killing of 640 million people, and if that is not bad enough, some of them were his own relatives. Why didn't Krsna stop the war and convert Duryodhana by other means? Certainly he had the power to do so. The reason is that this was his play, his personal drama in which no one is really killed, and through it he teaches everything we need to know to be absolutely nonviolent.

 

Haribol

MLO

 

[Guest guest]

Haribol, I got your point exactly. To utter the holy name even once without offense is to have full knowledge of everything there is. Nothing else matters, and certainly a faith of a person is not adequately judged about his grasp of hyperdimensional physics (what is the real issue here) or his acceptance of the common societal views. Its cool to talk aboput, that all.

 

Like how many died in New Orleans. 50? 500? 5,000? 50,000? How many died in WTC on 911? 3,000? Or 30,000?

 

Maybe "yojana" should be translated as "really far".

 

Hare Krsna, ys, mahaksadasa

[gHari]

There are two kinds of energy--material and spiritual. JIvas, or individual souls, belong to the superior energy of KRSNa, but because they are prone to be attracted to the material energy, they are called marginal energy. But actually there are only two energies. All of the planetary systems and universes are resting on the energies of KRSNa. Just as all the planets in the solar system are resting in the sunshine, everything within the creation is resting on KRSNa-shine. All of these potencies of the Lord give pleasure to a devotee, but one who is envious of KRSNa rejects them. When one is a nondevotee, the statements of KRSNa seem to be so much bluff, but when one is a devotee, he thinks, "Oh, my Lord is so powerful," and he becomes filled with love and adoration. Nondevotees think that because KRSNa says, "I am God," they and everyone else can say the same. But if asked to show their universal form, they cannot do it. That is the difference between a pseudo god and the real God. KRSNa's pastimes cannot be imitated. KRSNa married over 16,000 wives and kept them nicely in 16,000 palaces, but an ordinary man cannot even keep one wife nicely. It is not that KRSNa just spoke so many wonderful things; He also acted wonderfully. We should not believe one thing that KRSNa says or does and reject another; if belief is there, it must be full belief.

 

In this regard, there is a story of NArada Muni, who was once asked by a brAhmaNa: "Oh, you are going to meet the Lord? Will you please ask Him when I'm going to get my salvation?"

 

"All right," NArada agreed. "I shall ask Him."

 

As NArada proceeded, he met a cobbler who was sitting under a tree mending shoes, and the cobbler similarly asked NArada, "Oh, you are going to see God? Will you please inquire of Him when my salvation will come?"

 

When NArada Muni went to the VaikuNTha planets, he fulfilled their request and asked NArAyaNa (God) about the salvation of the brAhmaNa and the cobbler, and NArAyaNa replied, "After leaving this body, the cobbler shall come here to me."

 

"What about the brAhmaNa?" NArada asked.

 

"He will have to remain there for a number of births. I do not know when he is coming."

 

NArada Muni was astonished, and he finally said, "I can't understand the mystery of this."

 

"That you will see," NArAyaNa said. "When they ask you what I am doing in My abode, tell them that I am threading the eye of a needle with an elephant."

 

When NArada returned to earth and approached the brAhmaNa, the brAhmaNa said, "Oh, you have seen the Lord? What was He doing?"

 

"He was threading an elephant through the eye of a needle," NArada answered.

 

"I don't believe such nonsense," the brAhmaNa replied. NArada could immediately understand that the man had no faith and that he was simply a reader of books.

 

NArada then left and went on to the cobbler, who asked him, "Oh, you have seen the Lord? Tell me, what was He doing?"

 

"He was threading an elephant through the eye of a needle," NArada replied.

 

The cobbler began to weep, "Oh, my Lord is so wonderful, He can do anything."

 

"Do you really believe that the Lord can push an elephant through the hole of a needle?" NArada asked.

 

"Why not?" the cobbler said, "Of course I believe it."

 

"How is that?"

 

"You can see that I am sitting under this banyan tree," the cobbler answered, "and you can see that so many fruits are falling daily, and in each seed there is a banyan tree like this one. If, within a small seed there can be a big tree like this, is it difficult to accept that the Lord is pushing an elephant through the eye of a needle?"

 

So this is called faith. It is not a question of blindly believing. There is reason behind the belief. If KRSNa can put a large tree within so many little seeds, is it so astounding that He is keeping all the planetary systems floating in space through His energy?

[Guest guest]

Hairs are standing up along my spine, and I fall down to offer you my obiesancies, All glories to the assembled devotees, ys, mahaksadasa