There are various grades of men, and out of many thousands, one may be sufficiently interested in transcendental realization to try to know what is the self, what is the body, and what is the Abso-lute Truth. Generally mankind is simply engaged in the animal propensities, namely eating, sleep-ing, defending and mating, and hardly anyone is interested in transcendental knowledge. The first six chapters of the Gita are meant for those who are interested in transcendental knowledge, in un-derstanding the self, the Superself and the process of realization by jnana-yoga, dhyana-yoga and discrimination of the self from matter. However, Krishna can be known only by persons who are in Krishna consciousness. Other transcendentalists may achieve impersonal Brahman realization, for this is easier than understanding Krishna. Krishna is the Supreme Person, but at the same time He is beyond the knowledge of Brahman and Paramatma. The yogis and jnanis are confused in their at-tempts to understand Krishna. Although the greatest of the impersonalists, Sripada Sankaracarya, has admitted in his Gita commentary that Krishna is the Supreme Personality of Godhead, his fol-lowers do not accept Krishna as such, for it is very difficult to know Krishna, even though one has transcendental realization of impersonal Brahman.

Krishna is the Supreme Personality of Godhead, the cause of all causes, the primeval Lord Go-vinda. Isvarah paramah krsnah sac-cid-ananda vigrahah/ anadir adir govindah sarva-karana-karanam. It is very difficult for the nondevotees to know Him. Although nondevotees declare that the path of bhakti, or devotional service, is very easy, they cannot practice it. If the path of bhakti is so easy, as the nondevotee class of men proclaim, then why do they take up the difficult path? Ac-tually the path of bhakti is not easy. The so-called path of bhakti practiced by unauthorized persons without knowledge of bhakti may be easy, but when it is practiced factually according to the rules and regulations, the speculative scholars and philosophers fall away from the path. Srila Rupa Goswami writes in his Bhakti-rasamrita-sindhu (1.2.101):

Devotional service of the Lord that ignores the authorized Vedic literatures like the Upanisads, Puranas and Narada-pancaratra is simply an unnecessary disturbance in society.

It is not possible for the Brahman-realized impersonalist or the Paramatma-realized yogi to un-derstand Krishna the Supreme Personality of Godhead as the son of mother Yasoda or the chario-teer of Arjuna. Even the great demigods are sometimes confused about Krishna (muhyanti yat surayah). Mam tu veda na kascana: No one knows Me as I am, the Lord says. And if one does know Him, then sa mahatma su-durlabhah. Such a great soul is very rare. Therefore unless one practices devotional service to the Lord, one cannot know Krishna as He is (tattvatah), even though one is a great scholar or philosopher. Only the pure devotees can know something of the inconceiv-able transcendental qualities in Krishna, in the cause of all causes, in His omnipotence and opu-lence, and in His wealth, fame, strength, beauty, knowledge and renunciation, because Krishna is benevolently inclined to His devotees. He is the last word in Brahman realization, and the devotees alone can realize Him as He is. Therefore it is said:

No one can understand Krishna as He is by the blunt material senses. But He reveals Himself to the devotees, being pleased with them for their transcendental loving service unto Him. (Bhakti-rasamrita-sindhu 1.2.234)

This is one of the famous verses of the Bhagavad-gita. Of course, all verses of the Gita are important but some convey greater philosophy then others. This chapter is called Knowledge of the Absolute and even in the opening verse of this chapter Krishna is in-structing us that we should work in the spirit of yoga or our mind attached to the Lord. Of course the whole purpose of understanding religion is to come to the platform of under-standing God. Religion means philosophy that enables you to understand God. You cannot have any religion without God and when you practice the principles or religion then to un-derstand God becomes easier.

Prabhupada has written a two-page purport to this verse and in the purport also he has quoted three very famous verses. This goes to show how important this verse is. Prabhupada would dictate these purpose very cautiously and slowly and when the verse was very im-portant he explained it in great detail. The bottom line of what Krishna is saying is, to understand Him properly and fully is not an easy job. Krishna says, Out of many thou-sands of men, one endeavors for perfection. Just like what is Moscow population? Thir-teen million? Out of thirteen million, how many are endeavoring for perfection? Russias population is 140 million, lets say. How many are aiming for perfection? Are people crashing in here, saying, Come on! I want to be Krishna conscious! Give me a Bhagavad-gita! Please give me japa-mala! Come on! Come on! Are they fighting for that?

Krishna is right. He says, out of many thousands one may be endeavor for perfec-tion. Prabhupada said, in Kali-yuga it is not out of many thousands, it is out of many mil-lions. Krishna says, Out of many thousands, one may endeavor for perfection. And out of those who achieved the perfection hardly one knows Me in truth. By and large most of the population around the world is interested in the principles of eating, sleeping, defending and mating. You may travel to a village in India, a village in your country, a village anywhere or a big city, the trend, the habits are the same. As Prabhupada says in the pur-port, generally mankind is interested in the principles of eating, sleeping, defending and mating but those who are interested in self-realization will always be a small section of the society.

Krishna also says in the Gita elsewhere,

Such a person is very rare and after many-many births he understands that I am the cause of all causes. To understand Krishna may appear difficult but if you take to the proper approach it becomes easy. Some of you may say, for example, listening to the lec-ture and the verse that if it is so difficult to understand Krishna then why am I wasting my time here. It becomes easy if you take to the approved path and it becomes difficult if we take to a speculative path. The problem is you may have many people taking to so-called spiritual life but they again take to a speculative path. The impersonalists and the yogis cannot fully understand the Lord. It is said,

If you try to understand God by your mate-rial senses you will never succeed but if you take to the process of devotional service you can understand the Lord more and more. Just like we can practically see, you may have devotees sitting here in this room who may have had very little exposure to Krishna con-sciousness who were not born in this culture, but because they are practically engaged in devotional service and chanting and hearing they grow to be getting more and more con-vinced about the process of Krishna con-sciousness. To see Krishnas energy as we experience the manifestation of Krishna is not difficult. For example in the eighth verse of this chapter Krishna says, I am the taste of water. Isn't water very tasty? Water is very tasty, therefore nobody can live without wa-ter. So when you are drinking and there is a nice taste you should just think, Ah, this taste is Krishna. This is not a difficult thing.

Then Krishna says, I am the light of the sun and the moon. Can anyone live away from the sun and the moon? In some parts of the world you don't see sun for six months in a row. Many years ago in Canada I was in the city called Yellownight. In that area for six months you cannot see the sun and then for six months there is the opposite. But the either the sun or the moon, one of them will be al-ways there. Krishna says, I am the light of the sun. Just like we all love enjoying the sun, isn't it. When it is nice, sunny whether materialists love to go to the beaches. And the spiritualists, they love to go on harinama and enlighten the people, even those on the beaches. In Los Angeles there is a big beach called Venus Boulevard. It is a famous beach and everybody goes there to enjoy the sun and the nice beach but our ISKCON devotees or-ganize a Ratha Yatra there every year with three raths and thousands of people come on the Ratha Yatra. Krishna is saying, I am the light of the sun and the moon so when you see the sun or the moon, say, Oh, the sun and the moon are two eyes of Krishna and they give us light.

Everybody has some ability in life, am I right? Sometimes you may see a nicely con-structed building. Sometimes you may see a beautifully painted picture. Sometimes you may see a scientist accomplishing something significant. In other words, we all have some ability. He says, I am the ability in man. To see or feel the presense of Krishna is not so difficult if take to the powerful process of de-votional service. Sometimes a man becomes very powerful and he becomes proud. But Krishna says, I am the power of all powerful men. Then Krishna says, I am the intelli-gence of the intelligent. In the material world they give Nobel Prizes to different scientists and outstanding personalities. If some scien-tist comes up with some new chemistry, some new theory, some new finding he gets a Nobel Prize. But Prabhupada used to say that the Nobel Award should be given to Krishna, He is the greatest of all scientists. The scientists cannot even duplicate the craftsmanship that is there even in a one leaf.

So Krishna says, I am the intelligent of the intelligent and I am the power of all powerful men. Krishna is making us understand how it is His presense that makes everything suc-cessful. The real challenge ahead of us is to understand Krishna fully or to understand Krishna properly. In this chapter Krishna es-tablishes, there is no truth higher then Him. When Krishna says, there is no truth higher then Him what does that mean? He means, What I am saying is the highest. This is the final verdict. Don't go beyond this. When we are engaging practically in the process of de-votional service one can begin to understand the Lord who otherwise is difficult to under-stand. Therefore the Lord is also known as Adhoksaja. Have you heard about the word Adhoksaja? Adhoksaja means difficult to understand. Then it is also said in the Brahma Samhita, vedesu durlabham adurlabham atma-bhakto, to try and understand the Lord just by academic study of the Vedas is impos-sible. But then how dos that become easy? What does Krishna say? If you become my devotee, atma-bhakto, than what is difficult becomes easy.

The path of bhakti is a path that is strictly based upon sruti and smriti, based upon scrip-tures and the sages. In the purport of this verse Prabhupada quotes that very famous verse from Bhakti-rasamrita-sindhu,

Very clearly Rupa Goswami says that that process of religion which is not based upon sruti and smriti simply creates a disturbance for society. Just like everything we do in Krishna consciousness is based on the scrip-tures and what the sages have explained. Even when Srila Prabhupada went to the Western countries he did not concoct or create some-thing to attract a cheap following. To know Krishna we must strictly follow the path as described in the scriptures. This point should be clearly established that the path of devo-tion should be strictly based on the scriptures.

In the purport Prabhupada quotes this fa-mous verse from Brahma Samhita where Lord Brahma says,

Lord Brahma is not an ordinary personal-ity. He is a creator but under direction of the Supreme Lord. Less intelligent people think Bramhaji is the supreme create but Brahma himself says, I am the creator under the di-rection of the Lord. Lord Brahma says, there are many controllers, many isvaras, but there is only one Supreme Isvara and His name is Krishna. He is the cause of everyone. This we should understand, therefore a devotee sees a hand of the Lord in everything. Even if a devotee has to undergo suffering he does not complain. He accepts it as a mercy of the Lord.

In the Eighth Canto there is very nice story of a king. His name was King Indradyumna. He was a very God-conscious king. King In-dradyumna after having ruled over a vast kingdom decided to give up his kingdom and go and practice deep meditation in the forest. He went in a deep meditation. Then a sage whose name was Agastya Muni came there. When the sage came there with his disciples King Indradyumna did not even look at him. He was just absorbed in his meditation. But Agastya Muni felt insulted. He said, Hey! You have the guts to completely ignore me! You, proud king! I curse you! What will you become? An elephant! So he became an ele-phant. But when he was being cursed he did not in any way get discouraged. He did not protest, Hey, why are you cursing me to be an elephant? I don't want to be an elephant! He accepted it with faith as the mercy of the Lord. Because he had so much faith in the mercy of the Lord and in the hand of the Lord in everything ultimate he saw the Lord.

The law of nature is whatever type of body you get that's the type of activity you will en-gage in. If you become a dog you act like a dog, if you become an animal you act like an animal. So having obtained the body of an elephant he was once going to a lake with she-elephants, with his trunk he was giving a bath to the females and his leg got stuck in the crocodile's mouth. Ultimately whom was he saved by? By the Supreme Lord. The elephant Gajendra tried his best to get his leg out of the crocodile's mouth for a thousand years. These were not thousand of our earthly years, but thousand of years of the demigods. Six months of our earthly years are equal to twelve hours of the demigods and for a thou-sand years Gajendra was unsuccessful. In fact he went on becoming weaker and weaker and the crocodile was becoming stronger and stronger. Why is that? Because the elephant is an animal of land and the crocodile is an ani-mal of water. And then Gajendra remembered the prayers from his previous life in which the Supreme Lord gets glorified. By reciting these prayers he attracted the attention of the Lord.

Krishna is Adhoksaja, difficult to under-stand but through the medium of devotional service what's difficult becomes easy. Those who engage on the path of devotional service they can gradually understand the Lord de-pending upon their degree of surrender. In the purport Prabhupada makes a reference to the point that through the process of jnana and yoga you cannot understand the Lord. As you know there are different stages of self-realization: impersonal, localized and per-sonal features. Krishna is the Supreme, as Prabhupada quotes from Brahma-samhita, isvarah paramah krsnah, He is eternal, full of knowledge and blissful. He is the cause of all causes. Anything good that a devotee sees, he thinks, this is due to Krishna. Tomorrow you become a big preacher, don't take the credit, give it to guru and Krishna. Whenever we would go to Prabhupada and thank him and glorify him for the service he has done he would say, I have done nothing. This is all happening due to the mercy of my Guru Ma-haraj and Krishna.

Krishna is known as Acintya. What is the meaning of Acintya? Inconceivable. The Lord is inconceivable. Just like about two weeks ago you celebrated Nrsimha Caturdasi. I was in Mauritius on that day. There was a big celebration there, nice drama In that story of Nrsimhadev you see the Lord appear-ing as half-man, half-lion. Isn't it inconceiv-able? Can anybody ever visualize that the Lord is capable of doing that? No. There was once a court case in America and the other side wanted to show that we are not following a bona-fide religious process. So they brought a picture of Lord Nrisimhadev in the court room and said, My lord, look at this! This is their God, half-man, half-lion, and they say it's God. Is that possible? The average mate-rialist's conception is God with a beard. They said, No, no! Impossible! But Krishna is in-conceivable. He can appear from anywhere in any form.

In the purport Prabhupada also talks about the six opulences of the Lord.

Parasara Muni, the father of Vyasadeva de-scribes Bhagavan as one who is in possession of six opulences to an unlimited degree. He is the wealthiest of all. Can anybody be wealth-ier then God? He is the strongest of all, the most famous, the most beautiful, the most knowledgeable and the most renounced. One who is in possession of these six opulences in unlimited degree all at the same time can be called Bhagavan. In the Bhagavatam you read a story of the great sages having a discussion as to who is Supreme: Brahma, Siva or Visnu. Whom did they send to experiment? Bhrigu Muni, and what was Bhrigu's conclusion? That Visnu is actually Supreme.

The Supreme Lord, though difficult to un-derstand can be understood through the proc-ess of devotional service. In the Seventh chapter Krishna says, To overcome this illu-sory energy is not easy but one who surren-ders to Me, he can over come the influence of the illusory energy. Surrendering to Krishna  that is the real challenge ahead of each one of us. We all accept that yes, we have to sur-render but what is the difference? The differ-ence is the degree of surrender. Some may want to surrender 5%, some want 10%, some want 20%, some 90% and some may be more. That degree of understanding that we have is dependent on the degree to which we surren-der. Krishna says that in the Bhagavad-gita, ye yatha mam prapadyante, All of them as they surrender unto Me, I reward them ac-cordingly.

In the association of devotees one gets in-spired to surrender more and more. Strength to surrender also comes from the execution of devotional service in the association of devo-tees. You may recall that when you first came to Krishna consciousness and you heard about the spiritual requirements you may have said, That's impossible for me. Or maybe all of you were pure devotees from birth? Normally, our experience is that people when they hear about the spiritual standards and requirements they say, This is not for me, it is too much. But the same people who said, difficult, not for me, six months later are preaching to oth-ers. How does that happen? They take advan-tage of the process in the association of devo-tees and thereby execute the process.

In this chapter and it is the theme of the en-tire Bhagavad-gita that whatever we do ulti-mately we should get attached to Krishna. The mind has to get attached to the Lord. The mind is the key player in our spiritual en-deavor. But though difficult it becomes possi-ble with the execution of devotional service in the association of devotees. Just like Rupa Goswami says how by execution of the proc-ess of bhajana-kriya one can eliminate differ-ent anarthas. Krishna is in everyone's heart and is directing us according to our desire. Krishna is a silent observer and the ultimate sanctioning authority. Caitanya Mahaprabhu displayed to us the mood of humility in all His dealings. Even when He was told that be-ing a Sanskrit scholar why isn't He reading the Vedanta and just chanting the holy name like a madman, what did He say? He said, My spiritual master thought I was totally un-fit, I was a fool. So he said, just chant Hare Krishna.

Each of us, regardless of which varna or asram we may belong to, should be inquiring how can I make spiritual advancement. Just like when you have disease you are constantly inquiring how I can be cured. You are ready to travel to any corner of the world to get your disease cured. Our concern should be how can I make spiritual advancement. Just like Rupa Goswami also describes how one advances. He said, first take shelter of the spiritual mas-ter. Then take initiation and serve him. Then inquire how I can make spiritual advance-ment. And then give up what is unfavorable for spiritual advancement. Rupa Goswami said, inquire how you can make spiritual ad-vancement and give up what is undesirable for spiritual advancement. That's the problem we run into. We don't want to give up any-thing. You want Krishna and you want maya. You want to have your cake and you want to eat it too. It is a nice cake, you don't want to disturb it. The icing is very beautiful. But you also want to taste it So if you want spiritual life you have to give up what's undesirable.

Krishna is establishing in this verse that to understand him is not so easy but if we take to the process of devotional service then you can actually understand Him. This verse is not being discouraging this verse should not mean, Oh, out of millions there is one who is trying to understand Krishna and out of such thousands hardly one does know Him. So what is my chance? I am not going to try. No, what Krishna is trying to say and Prabhu-pada very carefully elaborates in the purport is, It's difficult, but you can come to Me if you follow the path. Just like Krishna says very clearly, To overcome this illusory en-ergy consisting of three modes is not easy. But if you surrender to Me, then you can.

Krishna also says in the seventh chapter, four types of people surrender to Him and four types of people do not surrender to Him. Who are the four types that surrender to Krishna? Genuine seekers of knowledge, in-quisitive, those who want money and those who are in distress. And Krishna says, there are four types of people who do not surrender to Him. Who are them? The hard-working individual, works hard like an ass. Then the lowest of mankind. He may be the head of state but if you ask him about the goal of life, they will say, eat, drink and be merry. Then mayapahrita-jnana, those who are materially very qualified and they misuse the material knowledge to interpret the words of God. And finally those who are openly atheistic. You ask an atheist, who gave you the sun and the moon. He will say, nature. Who gave you the nature? Nature. They have no answer.

So, Krishna is difficult to understand but through the medium of devotional service He can be understood and in this seventh chapter we are going to read how all these different opulences of the Lord are manifested in Krishna's energy. We should endeavor on this path with firm conviction that if we stay on this path we will be able to succeed spiritu-ally. And if we stay on the path with firm conviction Krishna will help us. Krishna is anxious to help us. Few days ago we cele-brated the disappearance day of Ramananda Ray. We, Vaisnavas, celebrate both the ap-pearance and the disappearance days of great personalities because even they may disap-pear from our physical sight they are still per-forming their pastimes somewhere else. When Lord Caitanya was in Jagannatha Puri Sar-vabhauma Bhattacarya had told Him that on His tour of South India He would meet a great personality whose name was Ramananda Ray. Materially, he was holding a very important position but at the same time he was a great devotee of the Lord.

Caitanya Mahaprabhu asked him a series of questions. One of the questions He asked was, what is the greatest distress. What did he say? Being separated from devotees of the Lord. And if you are not careful on the devo-tional path there is danger of getting separated from devotees. If you are not careful and if you do a Vaisnava-aparadha then there is a danger of getting separated from devotee as-sociation. It is the greatest distress that one may experience. Then He wanted to know, what is the chief object of remembrance. What should one constantly meditate on? We need to meditate on some thing or the other. If we don't meditate on something positive then we meditate on something negative. What did Ramananda Ray say? Meditate on the names, the pastimes and the glories of the Lord. Meditate that the Lord is so kind that He in-vested all His transcendental energies in His holy name but I am so unfortunate, I have no attraction.

Meditate on the holy name. It is our great-est weapon against maya. You read about these stories in the scriptures such as how Ha-ridas was saved. He was absorbed in chanting and the prostitute also failed. Someone may say, But I am not Haridas. I an in twenty first century, it is not going to help me. We may not be a Haridas but the potency of the holy name is as powerful today as it was five hun-dred years ago. You have to have full faith that this chanting is our principle weapon for making spiritual advancement. Therefore at-tentive chanting is the most important. And meditate on the Lord's transcendental pas-times, qualities. By doing this we will keep making spiritual progress.

We have to understand that Bhagavad-gita is not just an academic study. Like there are many schools around the world and courses on Hinduism, philosophy etc. that teach the Bhagavad-gita. Good! We are happy they are teaching the Bhagavad-gita. But to practically take advantage of it we have to apply the Bhagavad-gita in our day-to-day life. Bhaga-vad-gita advises us get free of the dualities of happiness and distress. We gave you the story of King Indradyumna, how he was undis-turbed even when he was being cursed. Parik-shit Maharaj was cursed but he was undis-turbed. Rather he prepared for his departure by inviting the great sages.

In the association of devotees we are get-ting strength to practice the Bhagavad-gita and when we apply the principles of Bhaga-vad-gita in day-to-day life we will be able to make spiritual advancement. And the conclu-sion of the Bhagavad-gita is to bring us to the point that we surrender to Krishna. As there is a saying, God helps those who help them-selves, so we should keep endeavoring, fol-lowing the principles of bhakti-yoga and suc-cess is guaranteed. Sridhara Swami, the great acarya said, the path of devotional service is so safe that even if you run on this path with both your eyes closed you will not fall. Try and Krishna will help. Hare Krishna!

Q: What is the minimal degree we have to surrender to?

A: We should surrender 100%. That will be the best. But if you cannot do 100% do as much as you can. At least chant the Hare Krishna maha-mantra sixteen rounds atten-tively and try to follow the regulative princi-ples and then you will make advancement automatically. If you chant sincerely then automatically you will make advancement.

Q: When living entity come to the material world they all have the same nature but why then some of them accept divine nature and some take to demonic nature?

A: Krishna gives everyone the choice and it is also depends on our karma. Just like Prabhupada said when he started this move-ment, all the devotees who were joining this movement at that time, they have all done de-votional service in the past. You see children being born in Krishna consciousness. From the beginning they are exposed to prasadam, seeing Krishna, no nonsense. It depends upon our free will, our karma and the mercy of sad-hus. How Narada Muni said, he was so fortu-nate that he got the mercy of the great sadhus. They were so kind, they would leave prasa-dam for him.

Q: How can we develop humility?

A: Humility does not come just by chant-ing the mantra humility. Humility comes by understanding the philosophy because as you understand the philosophy and chant your false ego gets crushed. And as your false ego gets crushed you become humble. And then if you keep chanting then you surrender more and more.

Q: To which degree does our spiritual ad-vancement depend on our effort and to which degree does it depend on the mercy of devo-tees.

A: It is better to think that it depends on our effort. Otherwise you will just wait for mercy. In English there is a saying, God helps those who help themselves. Krishna also says, All of them, as they surrender unto Me, I re-ward them accordingly. So the key is atten-tive chanting. That is the key for everyone whether you a grihastha or a brahmacari.

Q: I heard somebody said that now we should not preach directly, rather we should preach through Astrology, Ayurveda etc

A: We should preach directly. In certain situations we may use Ayurveda etc. But we should preach openly. Things are not so bad here. In some countries like China you may have to do that. In China religion is banned but not in your country.

Q: In the end of your class you quoted Sridhara Swami saying that the path of Krishna consciousness is so safe that you can run on it with both your eyes closed. But on the other hand it is said that this path is like a razor edge. How to reconcile these two state-ments?

A: What Sridhara Swami said means that devotional service is so potent that even if you do unconsciously a little bit you will still get the benefit. And on the path of devotional service no one can get misled. The name of Krishna is so powerful that even if somebody says, look at these creasy Hare Krishnas, he will still get benefit.

Q: You mentioned four types of people who never surrender to Krishna. When we meet such people while preaching should we spend any time trying to convince them?

A: Yes, devotees try to convince everyone. A devotee hopes against hope.

Q: Can we consider that Lord Caitanya improved the situation which is described in the today's verse, that there are very few people

A: Lord Caitanya simplified the process, made it very easy. So He did improve the situation. Therefore He is described as the most merciful of all incarnations.