Light of theLight of the

BhāgavataBhāgavataTranscendental Lessons from Nature

His Divine GraceA. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada

Founder Acharya of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness(rev. 29 Jan ’08)

Light of the Bhagavata was composed by Srila Prabhupada in Vrindavana, India in 1961 in response to an invitation to a Congress on the Cultivation of the Human Spirit to be held some time later in Japan.

He considered that lessons from nature, from the classic Srimad Bhagavatam, would appeal to the enlightened participants.

So he selected one chapter and illustrations were painted for the translation and purports.

George L. Harte, University of California

A Rapid Sanskrit MethodMotilal Banarsidass, Dehli, 1989

Preface“It [sanskrita]is, like Chinese, Arabic, Greek and Latin, one of the few languages which has been a carrier of a culture over a long period of time. Thus, the variety of writings in it, and the quantity of those writings are staggering. An incomplete list of subjects treated in Sanskrit, usually with great prolixity, is as follows:•The four Vedas

•The Brahmanas and Aranyakas

•The Upanisads

•Grammar

•Epic, puranic, literature - Including 18 major puranas, 18 minor puranas, and hundred of sthalapuranas.

•Works on Medicine•Logic•Astronomy & Astrology•Mathematics•Lawbooks•Architecture•Music…

On most of these subjects, there is an immense literature still extant. Indeed, a rough estimate of the works which will be listed in The New Catalogus Catalogorum yields a total of about 160,000 works… many so difficult that it would take years of study to properly understand them.…Sanskrit does have its share of great writers: Kalidasa ranks with the greatest poets, Panini is without question the greatest pre-modern grammarian, the Mahabharata ranks with the Iliad and the Odyssey, and the Bhagavata-purana is among the finest works of devotion every written, being equaled in my opinion only by other works in Indian languages.”

The 48 texts talk about three seasons:1

2

3

4

5

6

…

19

20

21

22

23

…

27

28

29

30

...

47

48

Dry Summer

Rainey Monsoon

Pleasant Autumn

From Light of the Bhagavata we can take many lessons:

The Nature of Society.

The Cosmos.

Hankerings of the Soul.

Greed and Wisdom.

Religion.

Let us just pick three texts, now.

Then later you chose for yourself.

Text 16Text 9 Text 23

Text 9

Verse 9

A picturesque scene of green paddy fields enlivens the heart of the poor agriculturalist, but it brings gloom to the face of the capitalist who lives by exploiting the poor farmers.

Text 16

Verse 16

At night, by the grace of the moonlight, the clouds in the sky can be seen moving. Yet the moon itself also appears to be moving, just as a living being appears to be moving because of false identification with matter.

Verse 23

The cows that followed the Lord within the forest moved slowly because of their heavy, milk-laden udders. But when the Lord called them by their specificnames they at once became alert, and as they hastened toward Him their milk bags overflowed and poured milk on the ground because of affection for the Lord.

Text Nine

A picturesque scene of green paddy fields,

Enlivens the heart of the poor agriculturalist,

But it brings gloom to the face of the capitalist,

Who lives by exploiting the poor farmers.

Text NineVarna-ashrama dharmaLaw of Gravity

•Brahmana – Intellectual - Priests•Ksatriya – Government, Kings•Vaisya – Merchants •Sudra – Artisans, Laborers

St. Francis Einstein

Text NineVarna-ashrama dharma

Napoleon

Mao Tung

Text NineVarna-ashrama dharma

Henry Ford Baron Edmund ‘d Rothschild

Text NineVarna-ashrama dharma

Text NineVarna-ashrama dharma

Bhagavad-gita - vaisyas• Agricultural• Animal husbandry• General traders

Agriculture is the noblest profession.It makes society happy, wealthy, healthy, honest, and

spiritually advanced for a better life after death.

Lord Sri Krishna VrndavanaVaisya family - Nanda MaharajaPersonal example.Nine hundred thousand cows.

God’s gifted professions for mankind are agriculture and cow protection.

Text NineVarna-ashrama dharma

Trade - Transporting surplus.

Traders - Greedy and materialistic. Large-scale commerce and industry. Allure the poor agriculturalist.

Unsanitary industrial towns.False hope of earning more money.

Real fact - Humanity must depend on agriculture.Big iron factories cannot produce rice and wheat.

Peace to All BeingsJudy Carmen, Lantern Books, 2003

•The time will come when men such as I will look upon the murder of animals as they now look upon the murder of men, Leonardo Da Vinci.•I have no doubt that it is part of the destiny of the human race, in its gradual improvement, to leave off eating animals, Henry David Thoreau.•One of the most dangerous things that can happen to a child is to kill and torture an animal and get away with it, Nancy Miner, “Linked Human and Animal Violence”, Speaking Out 1.3

THEY SHALL NOT HURT OR DESTROYVasu Murti, Vegetarian Advocates Press, 1999

According to Rabbi Jacob Shimmel, "We are reborn until we reach perfection in following the Torah...In Hebrew, reincarnation is called gilgul, and there is a whole section of the Kabbala entitled Sefer HaGilgulim. This deals with details in regard to reincarnation."

Text Sixteen

At night, by the grace of the moonlight, the clouds in the sky can be seen moving.

Yet the moon itself also appears to be moving.Just as a living being appears to be moving because of false identification with matter.

Text Sixteen

The spirit soul, or the living being, is the root of all the activities of the material body.

Text Sixteen

But because of illusion the spirit soul remains covered by the gross and subtle bodies.

Thus covered, the conditioned soul identifies with the material body and becomes subject to the sense of false ego.

Text Sixteen

This false ego obliges a living being to consider:

•His material body to be his self.

•The offspring of the body to be his children.

•And the land of the birth of his body to be an object of worship.

Text Sixteen

Thus the living being’s conception of nationalism is but another type of ignorance.

Text Sixteen

In fact, however, a living being does not belong to any nation or species of life.

He has nothing to do with the body, as the moon has nothing to do with the moving clouds.

Complete knowledge fixes the living being in the orbit of spiritual activities

Text Twenty-three

The cows that followed the Lord within the forest moved slowly because of their heavy, milk-laden udders.

But when the Lord called them by their specific names they at once became alert, and hastened toward Him.

Their milk bags overflowed and poured milk on the ground because of affection for the Lord.

Text Twenty-three

Brahma-samhita - Spiritual abode of the Lord•Houses - touchstone.•Trees - desire trees.•Lord tends many thousands of kamadhenu cows.

  

Text Twenty-three

Spiritual abode

Houses, trees, and cows are qualitatively nondifferent from the Lord.

Lord alone is the supreme enjoyer and beneficiary. All others are enjoyed by the Lord.

Material world

Paraphernalia for pleasures in life but all destructible at the end.

Text Twenty-three

When He descends at Vrndavana, it is with His personal staff of cows, cowherd boys, and cowherd maidens.

Hearing the Lord calling these cows were overwhelmed by joyous affection, just as the mother’s breast overflows with milk when the child cries for it.

Text Twenty-three

All of us living beings are differentiated expansions of the Lord.

But our affection for the Lord is artificially covered by the material quality of ignorance.

Spiritual culture is meant to revive this natural affection for the Lord.

How?

Text Twenty-three

Receive the messages of the Lord with a purified heart.

Knowing things in their true perspective.

Then the flow of one’s natural affection begins to glide toward the Lord.

This flow becomes more and more self-realized in various relations with the Lord.

El Cultivo del Espíritu Humano1. Un ambiente humano pacífico2. Liberación del alma de la materia3. El carácter del alma en la atmósfera inmortal

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Light of the Bhagavata

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