by Satsvarupa dasa Goswami
On a warm summer afternoon in the small apartment at 26 Second Avenue, Swamiji sat on his thin mat behind the metal trunk that served as his desk. The windows were open to the narrow courtyard, letting in the humid city air and the faint rumble of traffic from Houston Street. Pointing toward the black telephone resting near his manuscripts, he used the ordinary instrument to explain the principle of yukta-vairāgya—engaging everything in the service of the Lord.
“Actually,” Swamiji said, “everything is spiritual if it is used in Kṛṣṇa’s service.”
To his young followers, spiritual life had long seemed an imperceptible realm, far removed from the noise and concrete of Manhattan. But sitting in the quiet room, hearing Swamiji speak with such calm authority, they began to see that the world was not a place to be rejected as dead matter, but Kṛṣṇa’s energy to be employed in His mission. A telephone, a typewriter, or a rented storefront—once used for the Lord’s pleasure, each lost its material quality and became spiritualized in devotional service.
Once, on a New York television show, a panel member asked Śrīla Prabhupāda, “If you have renounced material things, why do you mark your forehead with clay and play brass cymbals while you sing?” Prabhupāda replied that clay used for Vaiṣṇava markings and musical instruments used to chant the Hare Kṛṣṇa mantra were not material things, but spiritual. He said it is a question of one’s consciousness and that, factually speaking, everything comes from Kṛṣṇa, who is all-spiritual. Śrīla Prabhupāda’s answer met with a stunned, appreciative response. It defeated the idea that the spiritual world is made up only of air or noncorporeal light. The transformation of the whole material world into spirit suddenly loomed as practical reality when revealed by the words of Kṛṣṇa’s pure devotee.
As Śrīla Prabhupāda explains in a Bhagavad-gītā purport, “The material veil can be removed at once by Kṛṣṇa consciousness…. The Absolute Truth covered by māyā is called matter. Matter dovetailed for the cause of the Absolute Truth regains its spiritual quality.” (Bg. 4.24, purport)
The die-hard materialist rejects this transformation process by challenging that the devotee is simply exploiting matter for his own enjoyment like everyone else. Śrīla Prabhupāda refutes the materialist’s point in The Nectar of Devotion, where he explains “a secret of devotional service”:
“Sometimes people ask us, “Why are you utilizing material products if you condemn the advancement of material civilization?” But actually we do not condemn. We simply ask people to do whatever they are doing in Kṛṣṇa consciousness. This is the same principle on which, in Bhagavad-gītā, Kṛṣṇa advised Arjuna to utilize his fighting abilities in devotional service. Similarly, we are utilizing these machines for Kṛṣṇa’s service. With such sentiment for Kṛṣṇa, or Kṛṣṇa consciousness, we can accept everything. If the typewriter can be utilized for advancing our Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement, we must accept it. Similarly, the dictating machine or any other machine must be used. Our vision is that Kṛṣṇa is everything. Kṛṣṇa is the cause and effect, and nothing belongs to us. Kṛṣṇa’s things must be used in the service of Kṛṣṇa. That is our vision.” (The Nectar of Devotion)
Once the devotees took Śrīla Prabhupāda on a tour of the factory which produced incense for ISKCON’s newly prospering Spiritual Sky incense business. While looking through an office window down into a spacious warehouse, Śrīla Prabhupāda quoted this anāsaktasya viṣayān verse of Rūpa Gosvāmī. At that time none of the devotees knew the meaning of the Sanskrit, but they wrote it down as he spoke it and followed his advice to frame the verse and hang it on the office wall. Later, when Spiritual Sky produced a colorful advertising brochure, a skeptical disciple wrote to Śrīla Prabhupāda asking, “Isn’t this māyā?” Prabhupāda replied that anything which makes a million dollars for Kṛṣṇa is not māyā. Śrīla Prabhupāda challenged the skeptic, saying, “When will you learn this important point? Your idea is māyā, because you do not understand that everything may be used–including business and money–in the service of Kṛṣṇa.”
Although the first dawning of this realization inspired me, I sometimes failed to appreciate how auspicious it actually is to use everything in Kṛṣṇa’s service. In 1971, while attempting to purchase a large building complex in Dallas, Texas, for use as ISKCON’s gurukula, I faltered and thought I was becoming materially motivated. For half a year the purchase negotiations dragged on, during which time I became more and more involved in arranging for a down payment, studying the mortgage and interest rates, obtaining property assessments, title clearances, and so on. “Is this really spiritual life?”
I asked myself. Maybe I was trying so hard to succeed just so I could become famous for purchasing the biggest building in our movement. Maybe it was not good for my spiritual life to be involved in the real estate game. I conveyed some of this doubt and anxiety in a letter to Śrīla Prabhupāda. His reply set me back on the right course:`
There is no question of personal desires. You are a sincere boy and I give you all my blessings to go ahead with this project. Caitanya Mahaprabhu has said that “externally we may behave like ordinary men but internally we remain fixed in the service of Radha-Krishna.” The Mayavadi cannot accept this fact and they take Devotional service to be maya; therefore we call them Mayavadis. You should never, however, accept the Mayavadi philosophy, at any time.
This letter made me happy, but it startled me, too. Prabhupāda said I was becoming a Māyāvādī! With renewed zeal, I plunged back into the complex financial and legal exchange with the lawyers and real estate agents, and by Kṛṣṇa’s and Prabhupāda’s grace, we eventually secured the purchase.
Are there any rules or boundaries governing the transformation of matter into spirit? Can anyone do this and claim that he is spiritual and therefore perfect and beyond criticism? Can we do whatever we like just by saying, “It’s for Kṛṣṇa”? Śrīla Prabhupāda clearly answers these questions in a Bhagavad-gītā purport:
One should, however, note that after doing something whimsically he should not offer the result to the Supreme Lord. That sort of duty is not in the devotional service of Kṛṣṇa consciousness. One should act according to the order of Kṛṣṇa. This is a very important point. That order of Kṛṣṇa comes through disciplic succession from the bona fide spiritual master. Therefore the spiritual master’s order should be taken as the prime duty of life. (Bg. 18.57, purport)
Under the authorized guidance of guru and Kṛṣṇa, a devotee should be enthusiastic to engage all persons and all things in the service of the Lord. The more the activities of the material world are performed in Kṛṣṇa consciousness, the more the world’s atmosphere becomes spiritualized. Lord Kṛṣṇa declares, “By Me in My unmanifested form, this entire universe is pervaded.” (Bg. 9.4) Therefore, a devotee is not concocting out of his own sentiment when he attempts to make everything favorable for Kṛṣṇa’s service. Factually, it is all Kṛṣṇa’s energy, and all beings are His parts and parcels; but illusion covers everything in the material world. When Kṛṣṇa’s energy is again engaged in His service, then everyone can become peaceful and satisfied in the normal constitutional position as eternal servant of Kṛṣṇa.
The quality of utsāha, or enthusiasm in devotional service, is one of the prime factors for advancement in spiritual life. In explaining this quality, Śrīla Prabhupāda cites Rūpa Gosvāmī’s verse regarding the devotee who is working to dovetail matter into spirit:
Endeavor executed with intelligence in Kṛṣṇa consciousness is called utsāha, or enthusiasm. The devotees find the correct means by which everything can be utilized in the service of the Lord (nirbandhaḥ kṛṣṇa-sambandhe yuktaṁ vairāgyam ucyate). The execution of devotional service is not a matter of idle meditation but practical action in the foreground of spiritual life. (The Nectar of Devotion, Text 3, purport)
Thus the devotee works intelligently in the practical field to engage everything in Kṛṣṇa’s service. How such an attempt to in every way serve Kṛṣṇa leads a devotee into unusual adventures beyond the stereotypes of spiritual life, and how these devotional acts lead him to liberation, are explained in the next essay