One evening in the temple, as Prabhupada concluded his lecture about Prahlada Maharaja, he asked if there were any questions. Himavati, one of the women disciples, raised her hand.
Prabhupada: "Yes?"
Himavati: "Prahlada Maharaja was such a great devotee that he said, "nothing is mine.' But then why does he say "my God'? How could God become his? Why does he say that?"
Prabhupada: "Then what shall he say?"
Himavati: "I don't understand. How can he say it? If you understand nothing belongs to you, then how can you say, "God is mine'?"
Prabhupada: Krsna is the Lord of everyone. Therefore everyone can say "my Lord.' That does not mean if somebody says "my Lord,' God becomes monopolized. You are speaking on the platform of monopolizing, "mine.' But God is never monopolized. He is everyone's. So everyone has the right to say "my God, my Lord.' In the material sense, when I say, "It is my wife,' that means she is not any other's wife. But God is not like that. I can say "my God,' but you can also say "my God,' he can say "my God,' everyone can say "my God.' This is the absolute "mine.'
"Krsna says, "All these living creatures are My parts and parcels.' Mamaivamso. Mama means "My.' So why the living creatures shall not say "my God'? Do you follow? Krsna says, "You are Mine.' Why shall I not say, "Krsna, You are mine'? Your husband says, "You are mine.' Why shall you not say to him, "You are mine'? But don't take it in the material sense. In material sense, as soon as I say, "This is mine,' then it belongs to no one else. It is my property. But Krsna is not like that. So you can say, "Krsna is mine.' There is no harm. Rather, if anyone wants to possess something as his, that position should be Krsna's. That is the ultimate conception of "mine.' That is the perfection of the word "mine.'
"So this is quite nice, quite fit. In the Bhagavad Gita Krsna says, "He is Mine, and I am his.' Krsna says. So this is not wrong. And what is your idea? That because everything belongs to Krsna therefore I shall not say "mine'? That's your idea?"
Himavati: "I didn't understand this, that Krsna is the Lord. So my Lord is everyone else's Lord."
Prabhupada: "Yes."
Himavati: "He is the controller, and that's why He is mine."
Prabhupada: "He's mine, He's yours, everyone's. That's all."
Himavati: "I can understand."
Prabhupada: "That's all."
Rukmini: "I feel so far away from you, you know, when you are not here."
Prabhupada: "What is that? I can't follow. Janardana?"
Janardana: "She is saying she felt so far away from you when you were not here."
Prabhupada: "Oh that you should not think. There are two conceptions, the physical conception and the vibration conception. The physical conception is temporary, and the vibration conception is eternal. Just like we are relishing the vibration of Krsna's teaching. So my vibration is also present. As soon as we chant Hare Krsna or chant Bhagavad Gitaor the Bhagavat, so Krsna is present immediately by vibration. He is absolute. Therefore vibration is more important than physical presence.
"When you feel separation from your spiritual master, you just try to remember his words and his instructions, and you will not feel separation. You will feel like he is with you. So we should associate by the vibration, not by the physical presence. That is real association-sabdat anavrtti-by sound. Just like we are touching Krsna immediately by sound. So we should give more stress on this sound vibration, either of Krsna or of the spiritual master. Then we will feel happy and no separation.
"When Krsna departed from this world, at that time Arjuna was overwhelmed with sorrow, and he began to remember the instruction of Bhagavad Gita. Then he was pacified. Immediately he began to remember the teaching which was taught to him on the Battlefield of Kuruksetra, and he was pacified. Krsna was his constant friend, so when the Lord went to His abode, Arjuna was feeling overwhelmed. But he began to remember His teachings. So whenever we shall feel separation, the best thing is to remember the teachings. Then it will be very nice. Is that clear?"
Rukmini: "Yes."
One of the girls asked, "Prabhupada, will you be our father eternally? Will you always be our spiritual master, eternally?"
Jokingly, Srila Prabhupada said, "Yes, I think so." Then he quoted a verse, cakhudana dilo yei janme janme prabhu sei, but Srila Prabhupada said, "njanme jan me pita sei. The one who has opened my eyes-he is my father life after life."
Prabhupada was concerned about the weak financial condition of the Montreal temple. Although some of the devotees were employed, their work wasn't very auspicious. One disciple had a job-at the No Sags Spring Factory-which Prabhupada called "ugra-karma," bitter, unwholesome labor. When Nanda-kisora told Prabhupada about his job as a busboy in a restaurant, Prabhupada replied, "Oh, a blind uncle." Nanda-kisora looked puzzled. Prabhupada told him the story of a boy who had no uncle. One day a blind man came to the boy's home and said, "I will be your uncle." "Well," the boy replied, "a blind uncle is better than no uncle." But when Nanda-kisora told Prabhupada the details of his work and that he was sometimes cooking meat, Prabhupada remarked, "Oh, but not so blind."
The question of financing the Montreal temple puzzled Prabhupada, and he carefully analyzed the situation. There were two paths of Krsna consciousness, Srila Prabhupada said: one for those who were renounced, eating fruits from the trees and living in caves; and the other for those who were married and honestly employed, like Krsna's friend Arjuna. Both paths were good, but the question for Prabhupada was which path his disciples should take. If they attempted to take the path of ascetics like Sukadeva Gosvami, they would probably remain hippies, and Prabhupada wanted many big centers with respectable guests coming to take prasadam. Yet if to maintain such temples the devotees had to engage in ugra-karma, then who would preach? It was a puzzle.
"I have either to stop this brahminical system," Srila Prabhupada said, "or I have to have brahmanas work." He thought of starting his own business; he had had a little capital, and there was organization. Then he thought of enlisting the support of the Indians in Montreal.
Montreal had a large Indian community and families were already attending the Sunday feast at the temple. Of those who came forward to meet Prabhupada, the most promising was young Gopal Khana, a business major at McGill University. Although raised in an orthodox Hindu family, Gopal knew little of the Vaisnava philosophy.
The day before Srila Prabhupada had arrived in Montreal, Gopal had received an invitation card from a devotee. Because for the past year Gopal had been seriously wanting to understand God, he had been interested. In his spiritual search he had been attending services at a Hindu temple in Toronto as well as visiting various other churches and temples; he had given up meat-eating and smoking. On coming to the temple and seeing the excitement of the devotees in preparing for Prabhupada's arrival, Gopal had asked to help, so one of the devotees had instructed him to help clean Prabhupada's apartment. Prabhupada had taken an interest in Gopal, who, although he had never met a sadhu before and didn't know what to think at first, respected Prabhupada.
A friend of Gopal's, a Mr. Mukerjee from Calcutta, also began attending Prabhupada's lectures. Mr. Mukerjee, who claimed to have spiritual knowledge, told Gopal that, although he had touched the feet of many Indian sadhus throughout India, never had he met anyone as saintly as Prabhupada. Gopal took his friend's endorsement of Prabhupada very seriously, and soon he was attending all the lectures in the temple and chanting Hare Krsna on his beads, acting like a regular devotee. He would usually be the only Indian to remain through the kirtana and lecture in the temple. Then afterwards he would stay and have hot milk with the devotees, returning home around nine-thirty.
Associating with the devotees and being of the same age as they, Gopal automatically included himself among the intimate disciples who regularly visited Prabhupada at his apartment. Prabhupada asked Gopal about his family and background in India and encouraged him to take up Krsna consciousness. When Gopal told Prabhupada that he had been chanting om, Prabhupada explained that by itself om was incomplete. If he wanted to chant om, Srila Prabhupada said, then he should chant om krsna.
One night Gopal was present as Prabhupada discussed the financial problems of the Montreal temple. Although the temple rent was only $150 and expenses were minimal, the devotees were struggling. At one point in the discussion Prabhupada turned to Gopal and asked, "So, Gopal, what is your solution to this financial problem?" Guessing that Prabhupada might be hinting for him to contribute money, Gopal said he didn't have a solution.
Prabhupada lectured at a nearby Christian school, and Gopal and his friend Mr. Mukerjee attended. When, after the kirtana and lecture, Prabhupada asked if there were any questions, Mr. Mukerjee raised his hand, stood up, and, to the shock of the devotees, began insulting Prabhupada.
"It is not a fact that Krsna is the Supreme Personality of Godhead," Mr. Mukerjee said before the hall filled with Christian students and ministers. "You should not speak like this in a church. Why do you say that Krsna is the supreme and that we should surrender to Him?"
Prabhupada remained calm. Although the attending devotees, looking furiously at Mr. Mukerjee, could barely restrain themselves, Prabhupada didn't even speak. He simply called on someone else in the audience and allowed the unpleasant event to pass.
Some days later Prabhupada asked Gopal about Mr. Mukerjee, who hadn't come by recently. To Gopal's surprise, Prabhupada asked to see Mr. Mukerjee again. Gopal, considering Mr. Mukerjee too envious and blasphemous, advised Prabhupada against it. "No, it does not matter," Srila Prabhupada said. "I must have done something against him in my past life, and now he has taken his revenge. Please call him."
Gradually some of the Indian visitors responded to Srila Prabhupada and began to give money to support the temple. Most of them, however, were reluctant to spend money or time apart from their careers and families. Indian culture, Srila Prabhupada said, had completely fallen, due partly to foreign invasions into India and partly to India's leaders' madly abandoning their original culture in favor of Western materialism. "But still," Prabhupada told the devotees, "if there is any civilization left any where, it is in India. In India they are all originally Krsna conscious, and with a little chanting and taking prasadam their material covering can be removed."
Prabhupada compared modern-day Indian civilization to a dead elephant. An elephant is such a valuable creature that even when dead, because of its tusks and hide, it remains almost as valuable as when alive and working. Similarly, although the Indian culture was practically dead, India still had great potential. Most Indians in the villages still retained a simple faith that their present suffering was due to karma of their past lives and that they would have to transmigrate to another body in their next life. That basic transcendental knowledge, commonly understood by the Indian masses, was unknown in the West even to the most sophisticated and advanced members of society.
But Prabhupada was sorry to see the Indians in the West abandoning their piety and taking the cheap life of sense gratification. He compared the Indian immigrants to the "new crows." When crows eat garbage, after a while they are full. But if a new crow arrives, he becomes especially eager. Similarly, many Indians, newly arrived in the West, were more eager for material advancement than the Westerners. Yet despite Prabhupada's criticism of Indians, whenever he met anyone of Indian birth-in the temple, in his room, or elsewhere-he seemed to become especially sympathetic and friendly, conversing with them in Hindi or Bengali as if talking with old, familiar friends.
Biographies and Glorifications of Srila Prabhupada Gita-nagari Press- Prabhupada-lila-Satsvarupa dasa Goswami-A Summer in Montreal, 1968
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