Hare Krishna!
Please accept my humble obeisances.
All glories to Srila Prabhupada!
It seems very difficult to preach some people. Does any one know how to present our views so that they can be convinced.
YS,
Durga
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Hare Krishna !
All glories to srila Prabhupada!
All glories to all the devotees who kindly enlightened me by giving your valuable answers.
I would like to thank the devotee by the user name "Radhe" who suggested using the "back door approach" such as prasadam, at first, rather than starting with philosophy which can lead to arguments and counter arguments. I very much appreciate your views and it was very helpful.
I would also like to thank Maral mataji for giving such a wonderful example. By your attitude of compassionate behavior to your sister is very good example to learn. You preached her by acts. Also doing that makes the other person impressed with ISKCON, Srila Prabhupada and being Vaishnava. Thank you so much for sharing your wonderful example .
Ashwini Kumar prabhu, you are right that do not answer question if they are not asking out of their self-interest if they are not inquisitive. It is certainly a big point for me to adopt.
Rahul prabhu mentioned the conversation between Chand Kazi and Mahaprabhu. Wow! So nice of you.
And I thank all other devotees who mercifully replied to my question and enlightened me. Please forgive me if I could not remember to appreciate your participation.
YS,
Durga
affection.
My own sister was one. In the beginning my fanaticism and her fanaticism did not knew bonds. We used to be upset to each other...but slowly slowly i understood that i have to respect her view in life.
Her heart wants to chant the Names of God as Allah and i have to respect her for that. It is her free will and who am i to dislike her for doing so?
In order to be able to chant the Holy Names of God as Krishna one has to do many austerities for billions of life times. So not all will accept this path. Manushyanam sahasreshu ...Krishna says. Only few will search for absolute truth and among them only one will understand Me in reality.
So we need to be patient and keep respecting them not only them but all even atheists but of course keeping a distance.
As Ashwani Kumar Prabhu told we do not talk to them if they do not ask questions, but as Radhe Prabhuji told we can offer them Prasadam even if they do not ask anything. To offer food and accept food is a sign of love.
So we have to love everyone as children of God.
...
I started to assist my sister in her life even in a very tiny things. I used to ask if what she wants to eat for break fast i could prepare for her because anyways i wake up before You so i can make for You. She used to become happy and used to honor Prasadam happily. In this way whenever i used to be at home for vacations she used to eat Prasadam :D
Sometimes i used to ask if i can wash for her...she was really touched...in this way nowadays i easily chant near to her and she hears Maha Mantra. I easily offer food to Krishna and she sees how i pay obeisances...and it is not a shock for her now. Now she started to say that God is so cute ...........
So here comes acceptance of the Personality of Godhead....
In this way, let's try to see
----all as souls a small particles of the Supreme Personality of Godhead.
----And see their present position,
---and accept them as they are no matter bad or good, dirty or clean
---feel ourselves not better than them
---try to understand their simple problems and try to help them being honest no dualities and other selfish intentions.
Your servant,
Hare Krishna Mata Ji ,
Thankyou for sharing this ,
I was always interested very much in how can god have personal form ,it should be impersonal .
I used to read all sort of Vedanta Philosophy by Chinmayananda's disciple's Vivekananda ,OSHO .
But any philosophy can not understand god , god as he says in BG that he hides himself .
And as Bhagavatam describes only pure devotee of the lord knows it by conviction that lord has a form
which is the cause of impersonal brahman .
Your story says all , and i must respect what i thought ,
God have a form is only realized by Devotional service .
And those who are sincere and worshiping god as impersonal are attracted to beautiful form of Krsna .
But those who are not sincere and they are worshiping god as impersonal then they are not attracted
by Krsna , because they still believe in their intellect .
Hare Krishna Prabhu,
Why you think you can preach them about Krishna ,
Don't preach them , read their mind , if they are not asking question's by self interest
Talk about how ISLAM and KC have many thing's in common ,and how the deity worship is not bogus .
Don't preach everything , answer what they ask and in a manner that praises god not Krsna ,
because they are against anyone except Allah , so you preach by saying about God ,
talk about soul , Muslims don't believe in life after present life .
Try to explain logically the concept of soul and reincarnation .
Bhakti or about Krsna can only be preached when he have understood and accepted everything .
Don't preach what he did not asked , be specific to the point ,
Don't preach about ISKCON , they will start finding fault in Institution or in you .
So we always starts from the very basic .
If I were to preach to a Muslim friend, I would probably start out with prasadam :) everyone loves food, and I hear many westerners exclaiming that they would not have joined ISKCON if it were not for its delicious food. The taste of food offered to Krsna and the typical food is very much different. Then after a few meals, talk about what it means to pray to god. Ask them what they look for in Allah and Muhammad. It's very important to get to know their perspective. After that, take what they said for what they look for and see if KC offers something like that (it most definitely should because Krsna is everything, and everything applies to Krsna.)... Give them books to read if they want, and leave it at that. If they come to you for more info,then take them to the temple. I would say you can remind them of the books once, MAX. Don't seem too pushy, nor unfriendly, just bring it up NORMALLY
"Oh hey, how did you find that book I gave you? It was a very interesting , wasn't it?"
Cool and casual.
Krsna arranges for people to get a taste of his mercy, and we are all like that. Take for example Stephanie Celeste Mataji from this website, she was a Christian (i think?) and had a desire to know more about the true form of God. There s a nice discussion thread about how she saw Krsna in her dream. it's a good read and a very helpful KC booster