To marry or not to marry?

This lecture was given recently in Salem Tamilnadu, Bharat by HH Bhakti Vikasa Swami.

"Good advice for brahmacharis is remain brahmacharis. Marriage is very difficult in the modern age, mostly. There are so many good grihasta couples, but it's troublesome and can be very troublesome, as we will hear in this letter. This is a letter from a lady devotee in Europe. I'm not going to give her name. She didn't request anonymity, but she might prefer that. She read the book and she wrote a lot about her own difficult life, her experiences in that and difficulties of others, and gave some questions, posed some questions to me also. So I'll read it and in between I'll comment also.

So, Dear Bhaktivikas Swami, Please accept my humble obeisances.

All glories to Srila Prabhupada. Something we can all agree on. All glories to Srila Prabhupada.

I just finished your book, Women, Masters or Mothers, which I found very enlightening. It cleared some doubts that I had about the traditional roles of women and whether all of them were applicable to the devotees in Srila Prabhupada's movement. It's an interesting statement right there.

Traditional roles of women, whether they were applicable to the devotees in Srila Prabhupada's movement. Well, maybe for many women in the West especially, it's unimaginable that they could live like that. Anyway, let's go on.

I was never one of the feminist women in ISKCON, being shy and serious by nature. I never had the desire to be able to do everything that the male devotees do. I was perfectly happy not having to give classes, do the arati for Srila Prabhupada in front of everyone and so on.

In the West it's common that lady devotees do the guru puja arati. But I never saw this until fairly recently. And I never saw this when Prabhupada was present.

I'm just making a comment here. Is that normal in Slovakia? Not yet. It's expected soon.

OK, get back to... Yeah, Gokul Chandra told me this morning that the ladies here in our temple in Salem and Tamil Nadu, they don't like to offer the flowers to Prabhupada until after the guru puja, when the brahmacharis go in front of the deities. Because they don't... That's what he told me, they don't feel comfortable going in front of all the men. It's a completely different outlook.

In the West the women want to push themselves up in front of everyone. And here they're shy, which Prabhupada says is a good quality for women. In fact, what is that? Laja Nari Bhushanam.

Chanakya, Prabhupada used to quote that. Shyness is the ornament of women. So they don't like to.

Here they don't like to. It's a different mentality altogether. But at least according to Shastra, the shyness is better for women in general.

Only during the two years I was living in the Belfast temple, where most of the devotees were female. I remember, including the temple president, I remember it was an all-women temple. And they were basically looking after the deities and life was going on.

Small center. There wasn't a huge amount going on in the matter of preaching, but it was all ladies. I remember I visited there once or twice during that era.

We all had to take turns leading the kirtan and sometimes giving classes because there was often no one else to do it. So at that time I did it out of duty. Still, because I'd been a devotee for almost 28 years, I'd been feeling the pressure to one day start giving classes and to be more in the front.

Even much younger female devotees seemed to be more confident than me. But reading your book was a relief for me and I realized I don't have to. I can serve in the background.

I can fulfill my duty as a mother and try my very best to give my son a Krishna conscious upbringing. I can preach, but I don't have to be in the front, even as an older devotee. My preaching can be to encourage the young devotees by giving them a good example, by being steady and serious in Krishna consciousness, listening to them and helping them, preaching to guests, etc.

I don't have to be a big lecturer, bhajan leader, etc. just because I've been a devotee a bit longer. I have the right to be shy and not outgoing and confident like so many women nowadays.

However, regarding Srila Prabhupada, for example, allowing women to live in the ashram, I, like probably most devotees, thought he wanted this forever. I didn't think there was anything wrong with it and didn't understand that Srila Prabhupada had plans to gradually get stricter. Well, I didn't explicitly state that in the book that women shouldn't live in the ashram, but it was a concession for the conditions in the Western world.

And if Krishna consciousness does take root on its own traditional cultural principles, then hopefully that wouldn't be necessary because if the women are protected in childhood, protected during married life and protected in old age, there wouldn't be any need for women's ashram. Prabhupada gave that facility because the women who wanted to be Krishna conscious, they couldn't do so at home. There was no proper atmosphere for them.

But traditionally, ashrams are for men or if they are women, they have their own. Traditionally in India, women don't have ashrams, but at least not in Hindu culture, maybe in Buddhist culture, which has now left India to a large extent. So they have nuns in Buddhism also and in Christianity.

But there are so many stories, I don't know about in Buddhist culture, but in the Christian culture, there are so many stories of when they go to rebuild the church, they find so many skeletons of babies from the nuns. They are not celibates. They are having sex and then their children get buried when they are born.

There are so many cases like that. Have you heard of that? In Slovakia also must be. There are so many cases like that.

So it seems that the idea of celibate, celibate life in general is not very easy, especially in Kali Yoga. Fully celibate life. But I realize that I have now fallen into the same trap as the proponents of Krishna West, who claim Srila Prabhupada says it's OK for sannyasis to wear western clothes in general, just because he allowed one sannyasi to do that in the very beginning.

Regarding Krishna West, it's very controversial at the present time. I've said this many times that if they can actually preach better by making some cultural adjustment, then let them do it. Great.

But let them not try to make it, force that on the whole movement immediately. OK. Continuing this lady devotee's letter.

My son and I are going to move to a temple community where the temple president is planning to start an ashram for men only. I don't really understand this. There is a temple community with an ashram for men only."

I mean she is going. I guess she means there will be a brahmachari ashram within the community. I guess that's what it means.

Maybe it's a farm community or something like that with a brahmachari. I guess that's what it means. In that temple the women are also more in the background, unlike in most temples nowadays, a bit like it was in 1988 when I joined.

I've been wondering if it's not a bit fanatic for the 21st century, for ISKCON has changed and become more modern regarding the role of women since I joined. Well, one thing definitely hasn't changed in all these years. The attraction between male and female.

pu?sastriya-m?tyu?ī-bhāvam etam tayoraho h?daya-grāntimāhu ato g?ha-k?etrasūtābdhivitāyajānāsyamoho ya maha? nameti

The basic principle of mature existence is the attraction between male and female, which becomes like a hard knot on the heart and from that expands attachment to, from the attachment to the wife comes attachment to property, home, country, money, relatives, society and so on. And in this way one is bewildered thinking in terms of I and mine. So the whole reason why there is separation between the sexes is to minimize this attraction which is a great obstacle in spiritual advancement.

It's a very clear, easy to understand principle. But as she writes, ISKCON has changed and become more modern regarding the role of women. And I was feeling somewhat uneasy about it, wondering if he was not going a bit too far.

I was thinking about it for many days. Krishna must have seen it, because suddenly a devotee came to me and just lent me your book as if sent by him, by Krishna. Reading it made things clear to me and made me understand the importance of introducing var?ā?rama-dharma and traditional roles for women.

Well, thank you very much for the encouragement in this letter because it's very polarizing, this book, and I haven't had so many letters from other books. But the letters are either very appreciative or very derogatory. It's a very polarizing issue.

Anyway, thank you very much. It does help because it's not easy to get so much adverse criticism. So, continuing.

One thing I'd like to add though, there is a huge lack of qualified men in ISKCON. Due to the effects of Kali-yuga, men are slowly getting weak and often do not possess the typical masculine qualities of wanting to protect and support a woman. This is forcing women to become stronger instead.

Even if there are lots of feministic women trying to compete with men, still most women, at least those I've spoken to, are tired of having to be the stronger one while the men don't want to take the responsibility, are unable to offer emotional support but rather expect the wife to be like a mother for them and often expect them to earn money, take care of the household, and be responsible for the upbringing of the children. What we're looking at here is a vicious cycle or a vortex. We're talking about society in general here now, not just among devotees.

Those of you in India are just beginning to see the effects of this, but in the West it's well established that the women demand equality and more and they want to take the role of men and then the men don't want to protect them. If a woman takes the submissive role then a man wants to protect her. So if she takes a dominant role then he doesn't want to be like a man.

He's not allowed to be. It's a funny thing, just like traditionally men, they would open the door for a woman. This is in Western culture.

I don't know about in India. In India they wouldn't even see the women much. Or on a bus they would give a seat to the woman.

Although I just read, Prabhupada in one conversation said, my mother and my wife, they would never go in public. My wife never went on a bus. They would hardly go outside and even if they went next door they would call a palanquin bearers, four men.

The wife would sit inside, they'd be covered with a curtain and they'd go next door. So she wouldn't even walk out just for one minute. She wouldn't be seen.

And she said, my wife also, never went outside without being covered. And Prabhupada said, and then that started from my daughter that they would go on the bus. But anyway the culture is there.

If the woman is standing, then you let the man stand. But now the women, they don't like that. No, why, why, why? Why are you treating as if we're weaker? I think I mentioned this last time that recently I was transiting in Dubai or somewhere on the bus in the airport.

You have to stand in the back, there are few seats and you have to go out to the plane in the bus and one man, one Arab man was there with his son. His son was sitting down and he said, stand up for me. Then I know, then I know I'm getting old.

He must have thought I look very old because he told the young boy to. So that nice culture, but they don't want that. No, we're equal, we're the same, we're powerful.

And so the men, then, Prabhupada, he often used to quote Marshall's economic theory, which he studied at college, that the principle of economics is that the man should be married and then he works hard to look after the family. And Prabhupada said, he knew in his business life that the businessmen, they wouldn't hire a man unless he was married. Because if they know he's married, then he'll be responsible to work.

Whereas an unmarried man doesn't care. They take responsibility when they get married. Because they feel I have a cent and now I have to protect.

But the wife has to take the submissive role. Otherwise the man, why is he going to work hard all day every day if he comes home and the wife is shouting at him or she feels, well, I'm just as good as you. He wants to feel like a hero.

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But now they're brought up, there's a whole crisis, I'll talk about this a little bit more later, how the boys are growing up thinking that they're inferior, they're wrong and they themselves don't feel any confidence. So women are not like women and men are not like men. And when you join ISKCON, it's not that you suddenly change.

It's not that you pick up a bead bag and say Hare Krishna and all of a sudden, ding, there's some massive change, the conditioning remains. So lack of qualified men and lack of qualified women. Qualification, the only qualification seems is spiritual, but socially, we are a bit of a mess.

Bit of a mess, well, that's an understatement, isn't it? Unrealistic expectations. In marriage, often people have unrealistic expectations. Even if a woman agrees to stay at home, which I recommend, we find among the higher classes in India, their wives would not go outside to work.

Lower class people, they may go outside to be a maid. They might be a maid in someone's household or they might do farm work, labour work, or sell vegetables in the bazaar, but the higher class people kept their wives at home. But they'd be doing something to contribute to the, well, they'd be busy.

They may be, if they're in a farming family, they'd be busy with farming activities. They'd be busy looking after children, cooking, cleaning. Woman's work is never done, my mother used to say.

There's always so many things to do. So it's not that they're just sitting at home and they're all so busy. We find that in Vrindavan, the gopis, they're all, they say they're churning butter.

So it means they're busy at home. They're churning butter because it's said they'd sing about Krishna when they're churning butter. So, continuing this letter, women need strong, responsible and emotionally mature men who can take care of them and make them feel so secure, secure in love, which is so important for women.

This point she'll mention again and again about emotional, emotional sympathy and all this. In modern married life, there's a lot of emphasis put on emotions. But in traditional family life, there's a lot of emphasis put on duty.

Once you're married, you're married. That's it. The divorce law has spoiled everything.

It makes it too easy to walk into marriage and then just walk out again. As one of my departed uncles said when I was speaking about these things to him even before I joined the movement, in a typical Irish family, anywhere, you're married and you just stay married. There's no question.

No one even thought about divorce or separation. He said, well, you just have to accept your lot. Once you're married, that's it.

Finished. You like your wife, you don't like, or you don't like your husband anyway. That's it.?

Finished. Even Prabhupada, we see, he himself said, I didn't like very much like my wife. And she wasn't very cooperative.

But Prabhupada, he was responsible. And he didn't leave until his sons were old enough to look after the mother. So he wasn't very happy in his family life.

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I mean, this we understand from Prabhupada's own description, but he took the responsibility. So that's missing. And if there is that commitment to stay together, then the emotions will generally work out.

Also. Because you have to. I mean, I've discussed this many times.

I'm sorry, you're all Brahmachains here. You might not want to hear this. But it is important, because most of the people we're preaching to are grihasthas, and they have their own set of problems.

If we put emotions first, then it's going to fail. Practically guaranteed. Because men don't understand women, and women don't understand men.

And the very nature of life in this material world is that people don't understand each other, especially in Kali Yuga. So if we say that we want emotional compatibility, well, it will be there to some extent. For some.

And missing to a large extent, in many, it seems, in the modern age. But the first thing is the duty, that marriage is a sacred commitment, sacrament. Once you go in, you're in.

You're in for life. Or at least until the children are old enough to be, the males are old enough to look after the mother. Make them feel secure.

Well, security comes just by the commitment. And loved, well, that might be there or might not. I know from my own childhood, I've seen families where there's not, obviously there's not much love between the husband and the wife, but there's not any great hatred either.

And they're going on. I'll speak about that more later. But it's really, if you think, I've got to get my love and my emotional compatibility, you put all the emphasis on that, you're going to be disappointed.

And then you'll get upset, and then you'll make the husband more upset, and go on. If a man wants his wife, I'm reading from her again, if a man wants his wife to take care of him and serve him nicely, he needs to offer her his strong support and protection in return. On this subject matter, another book could be written.

Indeed, the male devotees of Iskcon wanting to get married should get educated about their traditional roles of men, just as the women should learn about their roles. Yes, very true. The men should be educated to be responsible.

But see, what we're getting here is, we often hear that, well, if the man is going to be like Ram, then I'll be like Sita. And the man is saying, well, if the wife is going to be like Sita, I'll be like Ram. And in the meantime, neither of them is like Sita or like Ram, and they're just arguing with each other.

I mean, even Ravana and Mandodari, she was faithful. He protected her. So, you're not perfect, so I'll complain at you, then you complain at me, and it's a downward spiral.

Now, Manusmriti, quoting from Manusmriti, Srila Prabhupada often quoted from Manusmriti, Nastriyam Svatantriyam Arhati, Women do not deserve, or they're not fit, for independence. It's stated there, why not? Because women are excessively lusty, it's said. They must be guarded against their evil inclinations.

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If they are not guarded, they will bring sorrow on two families, because it's considered shameful if women are adulterous. And then afterwards, just after this, it states in Manusmriti, Considering that the protection of women is the highest duty of all Varnas, even weak husbands must strive to guard their wives. Which is interesting, because it said the highest duty of all Varnas is to protect the wife, which suggests that women don't independently have Varna, because Varna is meant for men to protect.

It's a controversial discussion, which I won't get into now. But the Varnas, according to Manu, their most important duty, even for weak husbands, is to protect the wife. So definitely education is required in that.

But protection, according to the Vedic standard means, women are very much restricted. Now, are women prepared to accept this? So much restriction. You can't be protected and free also.

The two don't go together. So it is required a whole revamping of society. Now, even weak husbands have to protect their wives.

It's their greatest duty too. So, weak can be in the sense of physical strength, can also be maybe moral strength. Still he has to protect his wife.

It may be also economic strength. We find Sudama Vipra. He was very poor.

He was a brahmana, so he didn't go for work. He didn't go for begging, it seems, because that's stated to be a higher class of brahmana who doesn't beg. They're allowed to beg, but a higher class of brahmana doesn't beg.

And he was very, very poor. But the wife was still with him. She didn't leave him because he was very poor.

We find in the Bhagavatam also, that Devahuti, even though she was the daughter of a king and was raised in luxury, when she married Kardama Muni, she accepted the austerities that he undertook. So it's difficult to find husbands on that level. But they may be economically, or they may be weak in as much as they can't get a job, or they can't hold down a job.

But still the wife should be prepared to serve. That is her dharma. I'll tell a few anecdotes here.

Often women, they're not prepared to live in poverty. One anecdote of one devotee, he was a pujari in a temple, living a very simple life, Iskcon Temple in the West, living very simply because the temple would give him only minimal facilities. As Srila Prabhupada said, if grihastas, they may be supported to the minimum standard.

But then the wife wasn't very happy with that and she left for another man because she wanted a higher standard of living, increased sense gratification. She would criticize him, that, oh, I see you're doing all your bhakti, but what about me? I need looking after too. So she wasn't prepared to support him in that way.

So he was weak economically, but he was dutiful in as much as he did provide for the wife at a

certain level. Getting back to her letter, I have over the years spoken to several women whom I've met during festivals and their point is almost always the same, how to find a responsible, emotionally mature man in Iskcon who is also serious about practicing Krishna Consciousness and following the principles. Some ladies that were already in their mid-thirties and who still hadn't found a suitable husband within Iskcon were even considering trying to look for a husband outside our movement.

And that's possible. It could be. I know of two cases of devotees, women who have married men who are not devotees who they think are more solid and responsible.

So that's also possible. They have another set of difficulties if their husband isn't a devotee, but if he agrees to let them practice, they can go on with that. So, how to find a responsible, emotionally mature man is also serious.

But those who are practicing Krishna Consciousness, they are the best in society. That they're looking to get married, either the men or the women, means it is a material arrangement. It's not a fully spiritual arrangement unless you're on the level of Paramahamsas.

So some material considerations are going to enter there. Traditional values require to be preached, which is why I'm making this book, Women, Masters and Mothers. So, I'm making the book, of course, that's not going to change anything overnight, but it is a start.

Firstly, it starts with education, or at least understanding the points. This book, I made also, Glimpses of Traditional Indian Life, that could also be helpful, just to give people the idea of how to live as human beings. OK, getting back to her letter.

The points you've made in your book are very good, and in my opinion, they should as soon as possible be introduced in our movement, before we become too much affected by Western values and the craziness of modern society. However, you seem to be assuming there are lots of qualified men in ISKCON for us women to marry, serve and look up to as our spiritual master. Unfortunately, this is not realistic.

Many men are simply not qualified. That's quite possibly true in the West, where we're not making many Western devotees at all. I would say most of the devotees who are coming newly to Krishna Consciousness in the world, most of them are either in India, India, Bangladesh, the Indian area, or in the West, most of them are Indians also.

So many of them, they do have the traditional values, but they do require to be preached also. When you say qualified, it's not very clear what she means by qualification. She says many men are simply not qualified.

We do have the example of Sukanya from the ninth canto of the Bhagavatam. She was a young, beautiful princess, and she was married to an old, irritable, ugly husband, who didn't offer sense gratification. It was just about the worst possible marriage she could have imagined.

But she was trained in the principle of pativartata, that whoever you marry, you just have to serve them. So she accepted it. This wouldn't be accepted at all by the modern age, that the father gives away the daughter".

How can you give away? A woman is not someone who's own, but that was, she was given away, she accepted that, and she served the husband, and she tamed him by her loving service. And Prabhupada wrote, this is victory for a woman, even if the husband is as irritable as, what's his name? Chavan, yes, Chavan. Then by her loving service, she can calm him down. Chavan, he didn't give his wife emotional support. He was just the opposite. He was very irritable. He wasn't loving. But she was able to tame him, as I said.

So it seems that according to Shastra, a lot of the responsibility goes to the women to bring out the best in the men, and that requires them to be trained from a young age. Or even older they can do it. They can pick it up, if they understand the principles. And she also writes about men who are not serious about spiritual life, men who will only drag them down spiritually instead of encouraging them.

Well, again, if they've taken to Krishna consciousness, then they are the best. Again, even if the man is not on a high level, then according to the story of Sukanya, as commented upon by Srila Prabhupada, then the wife, she has to try to behave in such a way that she's not dragged down, she maintains her duty, and the man, he becomes reformed by that. And there are actually several cases of this in the modern age. It's not just in some Puranic age that we've never seen.

One should do one's duty. This word duty is a forgotten word in the modern age. It's all about me and my, what I need. I need my emotional support. And okay, that's accepted. But the first thing is your duty. That comes first. That's the mode of goodness, to act as one is obliged to. Otherwise, if we're on the platform of the mode of passion, or even lower, the mode of ignorance, then we'll never be satisfied. It is not possible to emotionally satisfy us, because in the mode of passion, one is never satisfied. What we think makes us happy, ultimately makes us unhappy. What is the Bhagavad Gita? vi?ayendriya-sa?yogam yathadagre m?topamam parināme vi?amīva tatsukam rājasam sm?tam The happiness which comes from the contact of the senses with their objects, seems like nectar in the beginning, but eventually it transforms into poison. That is happiness in the mode of passion.

And the whole concept of happiness in married life, in the modern age, is based on this. That I will, we should be happy, but it's on the platform of personal happiness. It might not be gross, in terms of, it is gross also, sex, money, fashion, but even the idea that my happiness, that is the measure of how I live in family life, that is in the mode of passion. If we measure it by our own happiness, we're going to be disappointed. It's right there in Bhagavad Gita, it's best psychology.

Whereas in the mode of goodness, you just do your duty. That's all. And the happiness comes from that. Even if... In the beginning it seems like poison, but ultimately it turns to nectar. What's the next line, anyone? Anyway, you got the gist of it. It seems very difficult in the beginning. You got it there? Pariname. If you look up the word Pariname, Pariname means... Tad sukham sattvikam proktam, ātma-buddhi-prasāda-jam. And that gives, that gives, by endeavoring in the mode of goodness, that gives knowledge of the self, intelligence fixed on the platform of the soul, and actual satisfaction. ātma-buddhi-prasāda jam. So this idea of being emotional satisfaction, if we put that first, it's in the mode of passion, we may think even, oh, I got the right man at last.

But then it will turn to poison, because that's the nature of happiness, which is on the platform of the mode of passion. If you're thinking you're very happy with someone, it's very likely it's going to change. If the commitment to stay together, whatever, is not there, then it's going to change, because it's in the mode of passion. ?rīla Prabhupāda, the example is that, there was no question of him leaving his family. Actually, Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatāka, it seems he wanted him to immediately join the Gauriyamāt. When he first met Prabhupāda, I'm married and I have a child, there's no question. So Prabhupāda, he went on with that. Renunciation in the mode of passion. du?kham ity eva yād karma? kāya? kleshabhaya? tyajet sak?tvā rājasam tyāgam naiva tyāga phala? labhet If you give up your duty because you find it troublesome, that's renunciation in the mode of passion.

And you never get, or if you think it's too much troublesome for the mind, or for the body, or whatever, you never get the actual result. You don't get elevated by that. So there are instances, no doubt, even devotee husbands, they want to, she'll talk about this more, holding their wives back from K???a consciousness, afraid they'll get too strict, and not let the husband have enough sense gratification. But it works both ways. As long as this, of course in family life, a major reason one marries is for sense gratification. But one should understand these principles, and act according to these principles. Actually in traditional culture, you didn't even have to understand the principles, you just acted upon them because everyone did. But you got the result. So again, we do require a lot of preaching, and I'm not, it might sound like I'm blaming someone, but we're just all, we're just a big mess.

The whole society is var?a-sa?kara. As Arjuna said to K???a, the whole society becomes hellish when it's filled with var?a-sa?kara, children who are born out of lust. So we are all like that. And then we give birth to more children, and the problem increases, problems increase exponentially. Let's go on. So, I don't know if the women are actually that much more qualified than the husbands. Everyone's unqualified. We're not on the level of human beings. So, let's go on with her letter. Most men are also unable to follow the rule of sex only for procreation, and thus their wives have to agree more often than not to keep them satisfied, more than they would want many times even during menstruation or pregnancy. In this way, she is sometimes torn between pleasing her husband and her spiritual master by having sex once a month only for procreation.

Yes, definitely illicit sex is a major problem, but it's not a problem exclusive to men. Women also, just like I gave the example of that pujari's wife. He was living very simply and very strictly, and she didn't like it, and she ran off with someone else. So, she continues. There are also men who abuse their wives physically. She writes, and in response to this, physical abuse is undoubtedly improper, but if a man feels impelled to be physically abusive, what makes him like that? Is he just some monster? Maybe, but there is always two sides to the story. The wife herself has a responsibility to be agreeable. There is a letter from Prabhupada, in which he writes to a female disciple, that the wife doesn't have unlimited scope to be disagreeable until she gets what she wants.

Prabhupada writes, Please accept my blessings. I am in receipt of your letter dated September 8, 1972 and have noted the contents therein.

Marriage between husband and wife means that the husband must forever be responsible for the wife's well-being and protection in all cases. Yes, men, please hear this. Those who are going to get married. That does not mean that now there is agreement between us, therefore I am responsible, but as soon as there is some disagreement, then I immediately flee the scene and become so-called renounced. So this is a letter to a female disciple, and he is preaching to the husband, then he preaches to the wife, whether your husband likes to take responsibility as your spiritual guide or not, that does not matter, he must do it. So ?rīla Prabhupāda is taking the position of guru and saying, he wants to be responsible or not, that does not matter, he must do it.

?rīla Prabhupāda said, It is his duty, because he has taken you as his wife, therefore he must take full responsibility for you for the rest of his life, and you must also agree to serve him under all circumstances and assist him in every way, so that he may make advancement in K???a consciousness. By his making advancement in K???a consciousness, automatically the wife will make advancement in the husband's footsteps. But if you do not assist him and be very obedient to his welfare, then he may be disgusted and go away. So there must be mutual responsibility by both parties. And now that you are married couple, there is no question of your separation, but you must both strive very hard to serve K???a together in harmony.

Then ?rīla Prabhupāda writes, What are these nonsense emotions? So we are hearing so much about emotional compatibility and empathy and emotional support. Prabhupāda said, What are these nonsense emotions that cause you to go this way and that way? The real thing is your duty. So again, we have to put duty first. Nonsense emotions. Now you are a married couple, you know what your duty is. So the best thing is to perform your duty and always think of K???a. Never mind some temporary inconveniences, we must remain steady in our duty to K???a. So if our devotees would learn this, and guru-mukha, padma-vākya, cittaite kariya aikya, make it one with the heart. Now I am married, that's it, finished. Have to go through with it. Never mind some temporary inconveniences.

Whatever the difficulty is in family life, it's all temporary. Whatever any inconveniences in this mature world, it's all temporary. So Prabhupāda writes, Never mind some temporary inconveniences, we must remain steady in our duty to K???a. So this whole thing about emotional compatibility, which is promoted so much, it's from modern psychology, it's not from ?āstra. Definitely when arranging marriage, among the astrological considerations, well there is also emotional compatibility. That is a consideration, no doubt. But it's understood that there will be ups and downs and ins and outs, but if you make the emotional compatibility the main thing, then as soon as you get disturbed, then you blame the husband or the wife, and then they blame you, and it goes on and on and on. Swallow your emotions and go on with your duty. And you'll often find that things get better. I've found myself, I guess it's something about getting older or something like that, that many times you want to tell someone off or chastise them for this or that, and say, OK, don't bother. And then two minutes later, you don't feel disturbed by it anyway. But if you had said something to them, then they would have got upset, and then you get more upset at them.

Often, I've seen among married couples, often they argue back and forth over the most ridiculous petty things. Really ridiculous. Some of the men also are emotionally unstable, having different kinds of personality disorders, or even mental illnesses. Pretty black picture of the men here. Because nowadays, almost everything is a mental illness. They call it a mental illness. If you don't behave in the way which they consider to be normal, it means you're mentally ill. She goes on. ISKCON seems to attract such persons because devotees are kind and they feel welcome in our movement. Devotees are kind except the men who they get married to. Is it? I don't know. She seems to say that the men are all a bunch of jerks. Anyway, four kinds of people come to Krishna. In one class are the distressed. So, distress is rampant and everyone is distressed in the modern age because they put sex and sense enjoyment as the goal of life and it produces unhappiness.

Karma is the great enemy. Everyone becomes unhappy because of it. So, everyone is distressed. The children grow up in a family which is not really a family. The latchkey children, I discussed this in Women Masters or Mothers. The parents don't really care for them much or they're always fighting among each other. And the children themselves grow up traumatized. So, no wonder people are crazy. But Krishna Consciousness, we're supposed to introduce a culture whereby people can live peacefully and happily. Go to the farms. Live peacefully and simply on the farms. Accept that austerity. Living in the city, it'll drive you crazy. City life, it's so stressful. You have to work hard and it's full of stress. Even before you get to work, you get up in the morning, you're in a rush to go to work and you get in the traffic jam. You see in the bus people going to work, they didn't even get to work and they look totally drained even before they got to work. Absolutely miserable life. So, Prabhupada's solution, go to the farm. Live peacefully, happily.

Chant Hare Krishna. You have to be prepared to accept some austerities. We should promote this. Prabhupada wanted this so much. Go live simply on the land, peacefully, chant Hare Krishna. That will in itself solve so much of people's mental disturbance because the city life makes you crazy. Even if you're not crazy, you'll become crazy by that life. So, she says, recently I met so many devotees. She visited England where she used to live. I spoke to many old female friends, some of whom I hadn't seen for many years. I was very sad and disappointed to hear that about half of them had gone through difficult relationships with often abusive men and all of them were now alone.

Now, about this thing about abusive men, I made a note here. If someone is abusive, it means that they are disturbed. Now, one thing about being abusive, this term has become very much part of the vocabulary of modern man. But it used to be just accepted as normal that between husband and wife or between friends or between anyone, there's some level of calling bad names or something like that. And it's not taken too seriously. But nowadays, you can't even make a joke about someone at work or something like that. It's abusive, especially if a man says something about a woman. So, just if a man comes home in a bad mood, which is not surprising if he's been working all day and he says something a bit sharply, oh, he's being abusive. But a good wife will try to calm him down.

I heard so many times men come home from work and the first thing their wife... and he's just been working and he just wants to get some peace and he comes home. I've many times told this that... I mean distributing books in the West before I came to India in my early life. We met so many people. But there's just one particular scene I remember. We're in Birmingham, which is a major city in England. And in the evening hours, we were going in apartments distributing books. So I rang the bell at one apartment door and a woman opened it and she looked totally strained and stressed. And there's all this... this smell of meat cooking came out, so I could hardly breathe. And in the background, there's the sound of the TV blaring, the dog barking, and the man... the kids screaming and the man shouting at the kids. And the wife came out looking just totally stressed. Ah, poor people. Poor people. People are suffering so much. Unfortunately, I couldn't convince her to take a book. She couldn't listen to me. She said, I'm sorry, I just can't... I can't listen to you now. She just took me as a salesman, that's all. Salesman. Another harassment. A salesman. Poor people.

So, the Vedic solution is, let the... Of course, if the woman goes to work and she gets totally fried at work also, harassed. But if she becomes... if he's disturbed, and she becomes disturbed, then it becomes more and more... it becomes squared and cubed and quadrupled. No, cubed, what's that after? It's not quadrupled, it's raised to the power of five. Exponentially increases.

So, trinadapi sunicena. If you feel you're in an abusive relationship, it's a very good opportunity to practice trinadapi sunicena. It's a good policy even for domestic peace, what to speak of spiritual advancement. It's in the own interest of the woman to tolerate. And then, he's likely to calm down. It might take a few years for him to calm down. But modern marriage counseling doesn't teach this. It talks about trying to balance emotionally and do some kind of emotional juggling act. Even devotee counselors, they often... they recommend, oh, this is a useless relationship, just divorce.

They recommend like that. They shouldn't do that. They should recommend, go on, whatever happens. And in course of time, things will get better. So she talks about... getting back to her letter. Out of sixteen old friends I met in the manor, eight of them were alone after going through a difficult relationship. Eight of them were still married, of which all but two were Indian-bodied. That's interesting. It's a cultural problem also. At least, although in India we're getting a scourge of divorce, but still the culture is there enough that still most marriages... I don't know the way things are going, but it's still there. I mean, most of my disciples are Indian and most of them are... they just settled in their marriage, that's all. Even I'm looking at one of my disciples here, I know his brother is a very difficult person, but the wife has remained with him.

There's no question in her mind of separating from him, because that's the way the culture is. He probably wouldn't get away with being that difficult. Is he difficult to her also? I guess he must be. He's difficult with everyone else. Is it something among the āyās? They're not all like that. I mean, Nanda Kumar, his father is ideal in this. I mean, really very good. So, it is a cultural thing also, because in the West, they lost, if they ever... Well, they did have a culture of stable marriages, but they lost that. Now, an interesting thing, among Western men, many of them who want to marry, people from America and Germany, they want to get married, they find a wife from Ukraine or Philippines. There are agencies in these countries for supplying men with wives, who can be wives, because they know if they marry a girl from their own country, it's highly likely that it's just going to be hellish.

Just now Russia, their relationship, political relationship with Turkey took a very serious downturn, with Turkey shooting down a Russian plane, and then Russia closing the border. So, one of the effects of that is that many Russian women, so I'm told, Gokul Chandra told me, they like to marry Turkish men, because they'll be more responsible, more family-oriented. It's a cultural matter.

I read about a year ago, that one feminist woman in Russia, she said to her disciples, or whatever you want to call them, her followers, that Indian men make good husbands. They weren't very satisfied with the Russian husbands, but Indian men, they're family-oriented, they help to look after the children. So, it is a cultural thing also. So, in our movement, we need to set up this culture. Otherwise, we're going to have the same problem generation after generation.

Well, what do we recommend to the Western women devotees who want to get married? Maybe find an Indian husband, if they can. Indians generally don't want to marry Western wives. Some of them do, out of lust, but then they'd have to be prepared. I don't know if the Western women are prepared to live like Indian wives also, which is much more restrained than in the West. So, she's now going to give eight cases of people she met. First case. Her husband left her for another, probably pretty and slimmer woman. She presumes that he must have left her for a probably pretty and slimmer woman, and moved abroad, leaving her to take care of their two children and pay the rest of the mortgage and their house alone. Now, the thing is, in all these eight cases, she's blaming the husband, but the husband who, in this case, ran away with another woman, he ran away with a woman.

It means the woman she was also to blame by taking away someone else's husband. So, it's not that men are all rogues and the women are all saintly. There's always another side to the story. Another one. Engaged with plans to marry and start a family, started a company together. He ran away with a so-called devotee woman after getting attracted to the sexual pictures she posted of herself on the internet. So again, the devotee woman. If a man runs off with another woman, you just can't blame the man. The woman on the other side was doing something wrong. The whole thing, the intermingling of men and women, which traditional cultures restrict, as soon as that is removed, then we have problems. Prabhupada writes that shyness is the safety valve that controls the sexual impulse. Once that's removed, then all chaos takes place. So, the men are victims, the women are victims. Everyone is suffering. The whole society is a mess.

Case number three.

Divorced from her first husband, no children, had a second relationship, thought she had found the right person, got abused physically and emotionally. OK, we're hearing it all from the women's side. If we hear it from the man's side, we might hear another story. I've heard many stories of difficult relationships from the male side. She's telling it from the... If the women speak to the women, they'll always hear about how the men are so bad. But I tend to hear it from the men's side.

One devotee I know, Western, he was almost crying in front of me. He was, as she says, he was really upset. He said, my wife beats me every day and hurts me physically. He said, I can easily hurt her because he's a black belt in some martial arts. But he said, I won't touch her because she's a woman and she's the mother of my children. And he said, I won't separate because we have the kids. But he said, I don't know. I just don't know what's wrong. What's wrong with her? Because every day she attacks me with kitchen implements and hurts me. And he was asking why. He was really almost crying, which in the West, men, they don't... So he was being physically and emotionally abused. Another case, a devotee, his wife was actually... Before they married, his wife had been a devotee longer than him. He was quite new devotee. So she knows more about bhakti than he does. But she just treats... He's out working all day and she's looking after the kid. But she treats him just like some kind of idiot. And she says, this is what I hear from him. She's always belittling him. She thinks she knows so much better and it's very difficult for him.

Another devotee I know was married for many years. And when the wife was about 45, they didn't have any kids. Probably because... She just said, I don't want to be married to you anymore. I have no complaints. But I just don't feel like being married to you. And she married some... She went off and married someone else. Another devotee, he's... I know he's worked so hard for many years. Working very hard. Running a restaurant. He's in Mayapur now. He's from the West. His family is there. But his wife, maybe due to association with other women there, has this very superior feeling. All you know how to do is work. You don't know about the high things of bhakti. She thinks she's on a very high level. He's been working so hard all these years. You're just a shudra. All you can do is work. And it's very, very difficult for him. He won't stop working because he thinks he has a duty to do so. But she is, from what I've heard from him, emotionally abusive to him. So it takes two hands to clap, as the saying goes. I'm hearing these stories from this lady devotee about how the men are so bad and they're treating the women so badly.

But it can be around the other way also. And maybe the women should think that, OK, now my husband is like this with me. What do I have... Why is he behaving like this? What do I have... How can... If she's so much better, then what do I have to do? How do I have to behave in such a way that he doesn't behave like this? Why is he being like that? And if you think that, well, if I speak like this and then he becomes like that, if you think about it, stop the chain of animosities. Stop it. Cut out of it. Don't behave like that.

Case number four.

Divorced from her first husband who was abusive. Abusive. Just label abusive. We don't know. One child. Had a second relationship with an abusive man. Had a third relationship. Thought she found the right person. The man was outward sweet and humble, but abused her both physically and emotionally. Sounds like a parade of rogues. Sweet and humble, but then why did he become like that?

Case five.

Her first husband died. Her second husband was a kind and humble person outwards, but was abusive in their relationship. She had a third relationship. Thought she had found the right one. Got abused physically and emotionally.

This is great for Brahmacharis. If you hear the horrors of family life. Very sorry to hear all of this, how people are suffering in family life, even our devotees, but I would contend that it's because we don't know how to live as human beings. That's the real problem. People may be mentally imbalanced, but if we have some basic culture, then we can live with that. And then the problems won't get exacerbated.

Case six.

She and her husband were known as a good grihastha couple. They had one or two children. Now they're divorced. I just said divorced, but it's just presumed that it's the man's fault. Seems like that. Prabhupada wrote in one purport that divorce is mostly due to womanly weakness. Srila Prabhupada also said that you cannot expect a favorable situation. He said that in relationship to preaching, but that can be applied in this case also. You cannot expect a favorable situation. You have to create one. He said that when he came to the West, people weren't interested. He created a favorable situation. So if the situation isn't favorable, you have to create a favorable situation.

Case seven.

Divorced. Two children. I just met her briefly. Didn't have time to speak more about it. Case eight. Divorced. No children. Met her husband, who told me they're no longer together. You see, even that, the very fact that she met the husband, I mean, in traditional culture, you don't do that. The wife doesn't just walk up to someone else's husband and talk. There's no question of it. The whole culture, we don't know how to live. Man and wife, man and woman meet together, there's going to be some attraction. It shouldn't be done. Women, they want to be protected, but then you're not allowed to walk up to other people's husbands, and they're not allowed to, you're not allowed to mix. You can't have both. You can't have the free, open society, and have chastity. And without chastity, that means lust will increase. And when lust increases, anger increases, kāma e?a, krodha e?a. Anger follows lust. So in a society that promotes lust, there must be anger and abusiveness. So we have to work on the, we really, Prabhupāda wanted this Vāna?rama, he wanted to introduce all these things. Many women, it seems in particular, are very disturbed by this book Women, Masters or Mothers, because it thinks we want to curtail the freedom of women. But it is required. We need a massive social change. We need to preach this. Otherwise, generation after generation, people are just going to suffer. I'm going to take a five minutes break. I'll be going on for another half an hour or hour probably. It's a big topic. Practically, I've said all these things many times before, but I thought as this lady wrote me a long letter, it's too much to reply to by writing, so I'm replying to it by speaking. And I hope that some benefit will be there. At least maybe her life is messed up to a large extent, but maybe others can learn from it. We can start to consider all these things, so we can work toward a better society. Okay, I'll just take five minutes break. Everyone settle back for the next session of our horror story. Yeah, it's easy to joke, but people are suffering. Well, better laugh than cry. One couple, proper disciples in America, they're married all their life. They're in their old age now. And I asked them, what's the secret of you staying together all these years? And they said, because we don't take each other seriously. He said, we're always joking. If anyone says anything, then you just joke with them. They don't take things... In other words, often couples, they get upset with each other over little things, but they instead, their policy is just to joke over it. That's what they told me. That's Naikatma Prabhu. I just can't remember his wife's name. And his brother is Swavash. And his wife's name is, Swavash's wife is Tarit. I just, I don't remember. But both, they're actually Czech, the men of Czech background, and Czechs are known for this kind of sarcastic joking. So they make these kind of jokes. And they go on, and they're happy, they're always laughing and jolly. Brahma Bhuta Prasannatma. That's part of being Krishna conscious, is to be happy also. This trauma...

She writes here, the woman who got abused told me it's taken them years to get over it, and they're suffering from low self-esteem. They went through periods of depression, feeling totally alone, didn't want to come to the temple for many years, months or even years. This trauma and depression, they're serious problems in the modern age, many people suffer from them, but ultimately it's all egoism. Because we're thinking, why has this happened to me? It's putting our self in the center. I should be happy. If we are to be pure devotees, we have to rise above this. We can't be victims of our circumstances. We have to come to the philosophical platform. Of course, we are emotional, but we have to see things in a philosophical way. We have to rise above this. As long as we're being traumatized and depressed and this and that, and bitten by mosquitoes, then we can't be a pure devotee. It's known that women are expected to be more emotional, that's why they're said to be less intelligent. It's an obstacle in spiritual advancement, because one can't discriminate clearly as to what is in one's self-interest and what isn't. But you can rise above it. Otherwise, to be on the platform of, oh, I wanted to be happy in marriage, and it didn't work out, and the husband abused me, and probably he's thinking she abused me, then it's all on the platform of the mode of passion, and you can't make spiritual advancement. In that situation, we can't think clearly in terms of Krishna consciousness, if we're in the mode of passion.

We should see through the eyes of Shastra. If we see through the eyes of my emotional needs, then we're on the platform of the mode of passion. It's very self-centered, actually. It's a type of laziness, even, that we don't try to see, we just see through the eyes of, how Kamis see things, instead of seeing through the eyes of Shastra. In the modern world, especially, people are very much covered by the lower modes of nature. There's no idea of responsibility within marriage. The very idea of responsibility within marriage is symptomatic of the mode of goodness. Otherwise, if it's just for, I will be happy together. I may say we want to be happy together in Krishna consciousness, but then you have to know the basis of it, which is duty and commitment. And if we ourselves are unwilling to see ourselves as being contaminated by the lower modes, well, I want to be a devotee, but my wife or my husband, they're not up to it. They're not Krishna conscious enough for me.

But we have to see our own contaminations also. A major problem in our society is that of devotees thinking they're more advanced than they really are, and trying to act on a platform that they're not really fit for. And that's, not only in sannyasis falling down, which we hear a lot about because it creates a big disturbance, but so many of our devotees, they take initiation and they don't live up to their initiation vows. Then why get initiated in the first place? They think they're on a higher platform. And many devotees, they think, well, I'm Krishna conscious, but my Tamil president doesn't treat me properly, or my wife doesn't treat me properly, or my husband doesn't treat me properly. It's always someone else to blame.

But we ourselves are influenced by the lower modes of nature. Prabhupada writes in the introduction to the Bhagavad Gita, as it is, As the soul thus migrates, he suffers the actions and reactions of his past activities. These activities can be changed when the living being is in the mode of goodness, insanity, and understands what sort of activities he should adopt. If he does so, then all the actions and reactions of his past activities can be changed. So, as is typical of Prabhupada's writing, in a few lines, he gives so much information, which can help to improve our lives. If we don't come to the mode of goodness, which means to see through the eye of Shastra, and act accordingly, then it's not even sane.

Prabhupada says the mode of goodness is sanity. That means if we go below that, then, nūna? pramatta? kuru?e vikārma, we go to the lower modes of nature. It's insane. We act in a way that is not conducive to our own well-being. That's what everyone is doing in marital relationships which are not based on a sense of duty and acting in such a way that instead of thinking about my own emotional needs, both spouses should think about the other's emotional needs. And if you think like that, then your emotional needs will automatically be taken care of. And even if they're not, you're doing your duty. So in the mode of goodness, one understands what sort of activities he should adopt. But if you don't act in the mode of goodness, you don't know what sort of activities you should adopt, that means you're blundering along in the modes of passion and ignorance. It's got to be a disaster. So we should see ourselves as the problem. If we get married and divorced one times, two times, three times, maybe there's a problem with me. It's not just the others. There's a problem with me. Once, maybe. Even once is not good. Twice, three times. Well, maybe my dear Prabhu or Mataji, there's a problem with you also. It's not just the whole world is against you. There's also this we should consider.

How does a devotee consider? If he says, I'm being abused, devotee thinks, well, thank you very much. You're helping me to understand how miserable this world is. And, tathenukampansu samikshamano bhu?jāna evāpmak?ta? vipāka? h?d-vāg-vabhūpye vedotā? namaste. Jīvait, what's the next line? Jīvait yo mukti-pade?a dāyābhāk. One who always thinks like this, that whatever is happening to me, favorable or unfavorable, I'm getting the reactions of my sinful activities. So let me suffer them, but let me go on doing my service to Krishna. A devotee thinks, I deserve to be punished more. This devotee or this person is mistreating me.

Actually a devotee doesn't think I'm being mistreated. That means, devotee thinks that I should be punished more. You can't, if someone thinks, oh, they abused me, that means you think you have a high position at your work. But if you think that, well, I'm only fit for punishment, I should be beaten, I should be flogged in the streets for all the sinful activities I've done, even in this lifetime, not to speak of previous lifetimes. That's how a devotee thinks. But if you think, well, I've been abused, well, of course, it's a very high platform to think like this, but this is the devotional platform. That means they think that, well, I'm so low, I deserve to be punished in various ways.

They may think that someone is helping me to see the misery of this world. So, thank you very much. That's how a devotee thinks. So, the women are blaming the men. The men are blaming the women. You could say, well, the men are so bad, how did they become like that? Well, blame their mothers. Then it's the women's fault again. Blame the whole society. See, the whole society is to blame, because it's not my fault. Whatever it is, it's not my fault. There's no end to the blame game. We should blame ourselves. What am I? I'm suffering because I caused suffering to others, either in this life or previous lives. That is the Vaishnav outlook. Just changing, going a little bit to another topic.

In the Western world now, many young, I think I said that, many young men, they don't want to marry at all. They say that the whole generation is all messed up. They don't want to marry. They say marriage is dead. Why do you want to marry someone who you marry and then they divorce you and then you have to pay so much money, even if they can just divorce you. What's it called? No fault divorce. You don't have to give any reason. You just say, I want to be divorced. And then women themselves, they don't want to, in general women in the West, they don't want to just stick with one husband. They'll be married and they'll be running off with someone else. We see that in India now also. So why bother to marry at all?

In France, if you're married, if a man is married, or even if he's living without, live in relationship, without marriage, and during that period the woman has a child and then they split up. He has to go on paying for the child, but he's not even allowed to make a DNA test to find out if it's actually his child. He can do so only if he gets permission, special permission, which generally isn't given. Isn't it insane? So young men are saying, why do you want to marry? There are so many cases.

Men, they build up a business, this, that, and then the wife divorces them and just takes away the home and everything. There was a case, one big famous boxer, Mike Tyson I think it was, he described how he went in a hotel and the hotel maid came and she just, she provoked him to sex. She wanted to do it as quickly as possible. And then she made a rape case and then took so much, she did it to get money, because he's rich. So men in the West in general, many of them, then they don't see that women are interested in serious steady relationship, raising a family or any such thing. They don't want to take the risk. So they just don't get married. They go to prostitutes or whatever. It's a major social disaster in the Western world. And out of our movement, we're supposed to be setting a better example, but we're going to have to preach about these things. Sometimes I'm blamed.

Why am I a sannyasi? Why are you talking about these things? You just talk about Krishna Leela. These things are very relevant. We do require to discuss them, because we have a major social disaster on our hands. And if we say that traditional roles should be taken, then we're told that we're anti-women. But what's better, for a woman to be submissive and have a fixed husband, or to be independent and go from one man to another and be miserable? And then they'll be abused? So she says, it's going on with the letter. Just another few more pages. The men turn up at the temple. No, sorry, the women come to the temple after being divorced. They don't get the sympathy and support they would have needed, but often had the feeling that devotees were looking down on them. They didn't believe what they'd been through. And the abusive men are still looked upon as serious devotees and allowed to carry on preaching without getting any kind of punishment. Wow, I don't know what kind of punishment you want to give them.

Again, it's one side of the story. I don't know what the other side is. If the men are trying to do some preaching, it suggests that they're not just total demons. It's something glorious. So, I don't know. I don't know what goes on behind the walls. But again, it takes two hands to clap. The men are raised in a very bad society and the women also. When they come together, then it's a disaster in many cases. It doesn't have to be like that. So, she says, I find it outrageous and very sad. I feel that in the same way women should be educated about their female roles and learn chastity, male devotees should be educated about how to take care of a woman nicely by being responsible, etc. Yes, very good.

Agreed, definitely. If she gets the love and care she needs, she'll be glad to serve him and do anything for him. You be like this, then I will be like that. I don't know. It sounds a bit like the way Arjuna said that he had his perspective on it, but it's not the Shastra perspective. He was thinking in terms of what he thought would be better for his own spiritual advancement. He saw the situation is not good, so, I want to cut out of it. It would be good for everyone, but Krishna didn't see that. Ultimately, we have to do unconditional devotional service. And actually, family life is a very good training for that. Because the man has to serve the family and the wife has to serve. Actually, in modern life, the woman's role as servant is even very much reduced. Previously, the women had to serve the parents, not only the husband, but his parents, many children, one after another, and there'd be a big family, and their role as servant was much more than it is today.

So, women actually, even if they are to be submissive and servants, they actually have much less to do. Much less servitude to do. So, you can't expect a favorable situation, but even if the situation is difficult, we have to, if we are to be Krishna conscious, we have to accept that there will be difficulties, and be prepared to go on whatever. I feel one of the major difficulties here is unrealistic expectations. Because the man may be very nice on the outside, but inside he's also been messed up all his life, like everyone else. So, be prepared to help him. And the man also, he can't expect that the wife is just going to do whatever he says, just like some kind of slave. So, yes, education is needed. And also, we have to, whatever situation we are in, we should, instead of lamenting about what happened, well, we still have a chance in the human form of life, do whatever we can in the bad situation to come up.

So, another point she says, regarding chastity, my experience in ISKCON is that serious male devotees appreciate when female devotees dress and behave in a chaste way, they treat them with much respect, but when they're looking for a marriage partner, they look for someone who's more exciting. It may be, not in all cases. I know several cases of, well, I've just, one devotee I spoke from Europe, I spoke to for a long time this morning, he was happy to marry his wife because he thought that she'd be a good, stable wife, even though she might not have been the most bouncy or exciting, but he chose her for that, he was happy to marry her for that reason. Other, yeah, I know cases like this also. Oh, there's another case I know, I see there are so many cases. I need not go on now. Yeah, I didn't tell, I just thought of another case of a man who, the wife actually, she was always, he's very quiet by nature, but she was always harassing him, and this and that, he never said anything, never chastised her, and one day he just vanished, ran away. Then she realized, eventually he came back, but she realized herself that what was her fault.

Arranged Marriage:

Yeah, arrange marriages, arrange very carefully, we don't have that in the modern age, we should, well within ISKCON we do it, generally the parents do, here in India we try to do also, we try to arrange it, people have many demands, even myself as a sannyasi, Prabhupada writes more than once, he writes that sannyasis have nothing to do with marriages, traditionally, although actually Ramanuja, he arranged the marriage of one of his disciples, as a sannyasi he did that. But the sannyasis move around and they meet different people, and the disciples are, can you see, for my daughter, if there's anyone, and it's also a kind of anxiety for myself, because I have young women disciples and you want to see that they're married properly, it's a big anxiety, for a man with a young unmarried daughter, it's a great anxiety, that she gets married to a proper partner. It's no doubt, it's very difficult in the modern age, this lady is writing in such a way, I guess that she, anyone would think that after telling so much horror story, the horror story isn't over, there's more to come, but I just be completely sympathetic, oh, so sorry, but we have to see philosophically also. Simply saying that, yes, yes, I sympathize, it's so bad, we have to rise ourselves, mentally above our situation, otherwise if we're just stuck in it, then we'll have to take birth again and again and again. We really do require this, arrangements for marriage, for devotees, and then guiding them after marriage, otherwise what happens is, boys and girls, they just go hunting each other, and unfortunately, the main places for this are Mayapur and Vrindavan, it's quite visible, devotees from the west especially come, and it's a situation where, it's known, if you want to get married, go to Mayapur, Vrindavan, or at festivals in the west, Rathi Atra, people come from all over the neighborhood, or the country, or the state, and then it's a chance for everyone to come together, or Kirtan Melas, or whatever. But that's, I mean even in the church and everything, in childhood we used to see that the young boys, and it's a place where everyone, the whole community comes together, so the boys are looking at the girls, and the girls are looking at the boys, it's the social extension of the, the social aspects of religion, they overlap into such things. Yeah, and then marriage, marriage based on good looks, again it's in the mode of passion, she points this out, definitely, you're absolutely right, but we should say ourselves, we are also influenced by the lower modes, it's, it's a very important point to understand, our own, our own involvement in the problems that we create, this is Bhagavad Gita, puru?a-sukha-du?kha-nam bhukti-dvaihītu-rucita, who is the author of our distress?

We ourselves, we just can't blame others, Now, she has some questions, she writes that, Prabhupāda says that if a chaste woman's husband is fallen, it is recommended that she give up his association, but then he says that remarriage equals prostitution, she should not however remarry, and in this way become a prostitute, Srila Prabhupāda writes. However, however he also says that women should be married and protected, how can it work? What happens then, an older woman with grown up children, she can move into the temple and thus be protected, without having to remarry, this is in the West, but what about a younger woman, with a child, or with the desire to have a child, not ready to renounce, who will protect her and her child? In the early days of the movement, Prabhupāda said that if a woman has a child, even if she is young, she shouldn't remarry, and there was a case of a woman, she married at the age of 17 or 18, and about the age of 20, Prabhupāda gave her husband sannyāsa, she was still very young, and she said to Prabhupāda, look I am very young, I need protection, Prabhupāda didn't agree to it, so he expected his disciples to come to a higher level, but practically they haven't been able to, and after Prabhupāda left, she remarried, actually. In the early days, Prabhupāda was very hopeful, he just put devotees together, okay, you marry this one, you marry that one, he was very hopeful that they could just, on the basis of K???a consciousness, they could come together and stay together, he was very, quite enthusiastically organizing marriages, but after a short time, he wouldn't have anything to do with it, he refused to get involved, because he saw, he thought that, okay, their devotees are getting married, and they'll stay together and be devotees, but so much problem. So, what are the practical ramifications of this? She asks, who will protect her and her child? She will have to struggle alone to earn an income, not having enough time to take care of her child and household, or be dependent on the government, and in this situation, it will also be very difficult to maintain a good sādhana, because of material anxieties and struggle for existence, wouldn't the best thing be to remarry? Apart from this, having one's desires for family life, children and service to a good husband, unfulfilled in this life, isn't there a big risk of being born again to fulfill these desires? So she's stating here, there's a dilemma, that Prabhupāda says, a woman should, she should not serve a husband who's fallen, but then if she leaves such a husband, although actually, practically Prabhupāda didn't encourage women to leave their husbands, unless, in most cases, his own sister was with a, what we'd say a bad husband, she tolerated, and eventually she reformed him, just by being very tolerant. So Prabhupāda said, they shouldn't remarry, but on the other hand, every woman should be protected, so in the Indian system, if the man and woman separated, there was no divorce, in the higher castes, then the wife would have to go back to her father, but it was considered disgraceful. There's no such thing. So she could marry again, but then again, what was that, Tejas Prabhu, last week, told me, one of our god sisters, she had seven children, from seven men, hardly a good, and she was white-bodied, and the last child was black. So when the children asked her about this, is what Tejas told me, she said, well, on that, just before, I had lots of chocolate. So if you remarry, it's against dharma, it's adharmic. But then if you are, you may become a prostitute in another way. There's a woman, who's a young woman, who's not married, she may at any time, fall down. Although to remarry is also considered, so it may be better to be adharmic, in one way or another, but unless, she has to have the proper attitude, otherwise it's not going to work. And the man has to have the proper attitude, otherwise it will be one divorce after another. It's just chaos. It's not just chaos in the individual lives, but our society. How can we show to the world a better example?

One reason why, Islam is said to be the fastest growing religion in the world, and among the Christians, Mormons and fundamentalists, they're expanding. One reason is that, they emphasize very much, family life, they're against feminism, they have traditional roles for men. So people, for whatever reason, it may be social reasons also, they want to have a stable fixed life, and they see that, Muslims and Mormons, and fundamental Christians, as they call them, they emphasize traditional family values. So this whole idea that in ISKCON, we have to have gender parity for women, otherwise our movement won't expand. Well, it's just the opposite.

The fastest growing religions in the world, are those which are against feminism

The fastest growing religions in the world, are those which are against feminism. And one reason is because, they create an atmosphere, which is suitable for stable families. Whereas in ISKCON at the present time, we don't. We don't preach these things. We talk about how, women should have all opportunities, the same as men, but then that works against stable families. Okay, another question. She writes, I'm asking this on behalf of myself, and many of my friends, who are alone after failed marriages. We are not ready to totally renounce, although we are in our late forties, or early fifties, and we would like to find a kind, and Krishna conscious husband, to give us protection. In my own case, I am embarrassed to say, that I've been married twice. My first marriage was a bad arrangement, by the authorities at the temple. It was made quickly, in a few minutes, without considering compatibility, astrological charts, etc. And unfortunately, ended in divorce after three years. That's how not to arrange a marriage.

If marriages are going to be arranged, they should be arranged very carefully, not in a few minutes. Doing the right thing, in the wrong way, can also be a disaster. Doing the wrong thing, is definitely a disaster, but doing the right thing, in the wrong way, is like multiplying by zero. It comes out, however big the number is, it comes out as zero. So, she says, After living outside the temple for some time, he got into drugs, and lost his interest in Krishna conscious, and I went through a very traumatic time, trying to be a devotee, despite difficult circumstances. For a year, he didn't allow me to visit the temple, afraid I would get too strict. Later, I convinced him, to move elsewhere, to take care of the cows there, but after some time, he ran away with a local woman, and in the end we divorced. So again, we need to get our social life together. She is just saying one case about herself, and a few of her friends, but there are so many. Our failure to introduce Varnashram, is causing a social disaster in our movement. Or rather, we are just partaking in the ongoing social disaster of modern society. We don't have a social alternative. So she said, that after her divorce, for five years I was single, longing to find a good devotee husband, and feeling a bit out of place in the ashram. Then finally in 1998, I married a Serbian godbrother. In 1999, we moved somewhere else. Then she went again, through the same thing. My husband became very critical toward Iskcon, and his own guru, didn't want me to visit the temple too often, called me a fanatic, when I wanted to chant my rounds. In other ways, he always tried to hold me back from practicing Krishna Consciousness. On top of this, he treated me roughly, shouted at me, and a few times even hit me. After nine years, we separated and then divorced. Personally, I'm also called a fanatic. But I'm trying to create among the devotees, in my care, an atmosphere of strict Krishna

Consciousness, which you might call fanatic. But if we subscribe to the general atmosphere in our society, where, take it easy, don't be too strict, then we'll get this, that devotees, they float off into bad association. There's no clear discrimination between right and wrong. Don't be too fanatic. You can go to the movies also, then they get infected by wrong ideas. Don't be so fanatic about men not mixing with women, and then there's illicit sex. So, I'm trying to create an atmosphere, which, in the modern world, would be called fanatic, but it's the only hope. There's no hope. If we go on trying to live by the values of modern society, we're going to get all the same problems as modern society. Then there's no hope. And then we're going to get these problems generation after generation. So, sometimes we hear that we're all spirit soul, we should all just act, we're all transcendental, why are you making the difference between men and women? But the fact is, that these problems are going on, and the Shastric prescribed solution to this is not to artificially consider ourselves on a higher platform, but to recognize our conditioning, and to act according to Shastric prescriptions, understanding that this sexual attraction is very dangerous, and to organize society accordingly. she and the men, who are also, if the man is beating you, that means he's suffering also.

We're all victims of modern society, and we're also victims of this wishy-washy kind of preaching, that don't be too strict. As Jaya Vedaswamy famously said, no one ever fell down by being too strict. Okay, she goes on, we have a 12 year old son, that's from her second husband, my ex-husband and I have maintained a friendly relationship, and my son sees his father at least every second weekend. Friendly relationship, why don't you just get together, work it out. She says, the boy needs a father, just work something out, make some arrangement. If you're not killing each other, then make some arrangement, get together again, let the father live with the child. Okay, maybe he's not so serious, but he is a father. I don't know if he's married to someone else or whatever. But her situation, she describes, I have to maintain my son, I have to work, although I would like to stay at home and spend more time in the home, bringing up my child. My son would also like to have a man in the house, and a male role model, someone who gives him guidance and acts as a guru for him. His real father doesn't make an effort to give him Krishna Conscious, although he teaches him other things, and they don't have a very close relationship. That's why I feel that remarrying would be beneficial for both of us. But it's not easy at my age, age 49, to find someone who is responsible, emotionally mature, and serious about spiritual life, and also willing to be like a father of my son.

What do you think? She's asking me.

I think at age 49, just accept the reality and go with it. Who's going to marry you? Even at this age, I wouldn't recommend any man to marry at 50 plus. Just forget it. You're close enough to death. Don't get entangled anymore. Make the best use of a bad bargain.

You've got Krishna Consciousness. You're serious about it. You've stuck with it through so many difficulties. Okay, question number three. When you speak about polygamy in your book, it seems to me that it's mainly an arrangement to satisfy the bodily needs of his husband, his sex desire, and his belly, by having two or three wives that are cooking for him. And if one of the wives is pregnant or off the alter menstruating, there's always someone to have sex with. This seems to be a common misunderstanding. But my understanding of polygamy from what Prabhupada says, well, it may be that a man has a lot of sexual desire, but the main reason, he says, is that there are so many women who need husbands, so the man may accept extra wives to protect them. That's the point. Not that he's... If he's so lusty, he doesn't have to marry. In the modern age, you don't have to marry. You can have any number of girlfriends. So it's someone who's very responsible, who has got the financial need, ability to do so. He may marry extra women just so that they get protection and a husband and religiously born children. That's the point, which Prabhupada also said.

He said, if there are extra women in our society, then the man can take more than one wife. If it's conceived of as simply for sex, then it's not a good arrangement.

So I think she's got a... Why I'm talking about this and why Prabhupada spoke about it and why it is in the shastras, marriage is not primarily an arrangement for sex. That's definitely a major factor. But the major... Well, from the Karmakanda point of view, which Prabhupada quoted from Manu, it is, Putrar te kriyate bharaya Putra-pinda-prayojanam That one should marry for the sake of having a son. And the son can offer pinda, some offering to the forefathers. And we find in the Mahabharata and other shastras it's stated about Agastya, his forefathers were falling into hell and said, Why? Because you're not married. You're not able... You don't have anyone to... We're going to fall into hell because you're not able to offer the... You don't have any son who can offer the oblations, the pinda, the rice balls. And so he made this beautiful woman called Lopamudra and married her just for that. That's more spiritual relationship in which the man and woman discuss philosophy together, preach together. Yeah, but in marriage, it's not just some kind of quixotic relationship. There's a lot of practical stuff also. OK. And then how can a man follow the standard of sex only once a month if he has more than one wife? I don't know. I don't want to get into it too much. That you can work out, that the householders can work it all out. There's no perfect solution to all these things. Then on page 38 I wrote, It is not the dharma of a barber to do business. His son automatically has a fixed profession. Oh, she's... Because I... OK, let's read the whole quote. Yeah, she says,

According to our philosophy, our varna is decided by our qualities, not our birth in a certain family. So, OK. Let's read the quote. So I wrote here, Despite its perversions, the caste system, as it was widely practiced until only recently, still retains some of the advantages of pristine varnashram dharma. The potter was simply a potter. He didn't aspire to become a movie star. The barber was a barber. His duty was to... His duty was clear. There was no need for him to speculate or think, Well, now I should start a business. Business is not the dharma of a barber. He cuts hairs and nails and performs some functions at weddings. That is what barbers do and that's all. His son automatically has a fixed profession with no anxiety about his future means of sustenance.

The procedure was easy to understand and to follow. People understood that their place in society was determined by their previous karma and they were more or less satisfied with that. And she's saying, Well, isn't it by birth? Yeah, it is. But generally, it would be by birth. And we see that to some extent, even now. Even now, in India, we see it to some extent that people are born in Brahmin families. Their culture is quite different from that of Shudras or Vaishyas. Vaishyas have a very strong cultural tendency for making money and this and that. Here in India, we can see it to some extent still. But it doesn't mean that you're limited to that. But it is the general factor because you get placed, a soul gets placed in the, according to his mentality that he's developed in a previous life, he gets placed in the particular family where he continues with that kind of consciousness. So it's not that you're forced. It's not that you're forced to remain in that situation. There is allowance to change. But generally it would be, the caste system means it became rigid. That's all. But in Varnashrama, generally it would be like that. And the main point is that everyone thinks I have to do my dharma. It's not whether you're a barber or a potter or a priest. Whatever you're doing, you have to do your dharma. You have to do what is required of you. And then you're satisfied with that because whatever I'm doing, it's proper for me to do it.

By performing his prescribed duties and worshipping the Lord, everyone can achieve perfection. And that's true for women also. They don't have to be great preachers running all over the world and this and that. If they follow their stree dharma and worship Krishna, they can achieve all perfection. So, what does our society do about Varanashram? Well, either we can give up on it and say it's hopeless, just forget it, go on with the world as it is nowadays.

That wasn't what Prabhupada said to do. We can work on trying to establish it, which is what Prabhupada told us to do. It is a massive endeavor. It's not an easy thing. Much education is required. The basic principles are simple. Prabhupada, he wanted to re-establish Varanashram beginning with going to the land and growing our own food. And if we just do that simple thing, apart from chanting Hare Krishna, that will help us very much to be more sane. Because we are chanting Hare Krishna within the household as they are going out and doing some job and associating with non-devotees. So we must, as our duty to Prabhupada who wanted this, we must endeavor to establish this. It's not easy. It's much easier to go along with the flow of modern society, but then the result is case after case after case of this, which she's describing here. I think it's probably a somewhat one-sided description, but even if it's completely true, or even if it's only partly true, it's a disaster. And we as a society, it is our duty to Prabhupada and to Krishna to really make an endeavor to try and establish Varanashram. It may take time, but we have to make a start. Otherwise there's no hope. We may say that, well, we try to establish Varanashram and then the men, they mistreat the women. Anyway, they mistreat them. We have to try.

Oh, just one point I overlooked in my notes here. One of the men told me that he was arguing with his wife and it was hopeless, so he just stopped and thought, OK, I'm not going to argue with you. OK, whatever you say, I'm not going to argue. And then he wouldn't respond, or he'd just say yes, no. Why aren't you talking to me? You're neglecting me. If he talks to her, then this is from his side of the story. If he talks to her, then she just blames him. So, OK, all right, whatever you say, you're right, I'm a rascal, I'm useless, this, that, OK, I'm not going to argue. And why aren't you talking to me? So you can see, the men also may be just bewildered. They don't know what to do. Hare Krishna, what a mess. We have to begin somewhere. I just spoke to one of my Guihasta disciples whose kids are almost grown up. I said, I was hoping that you and your wife in future you could... They're Indian, but they've been part of the modern world also. I was hoping in future maybe you could go round to different parts of the world and just give people some idea of how they should live. Indian culture is not just a matter of wearing dhotis and saris. There's a lot more to it than that. Dhotis and saris are also good, but there is a lot more. OK, Hare Krishna. I hope all this might be helpful. No easy solutions.

We're living in a very difficult age. Hare Nama, Hare Nama, Hare Nama, Eva Kevalam, Kalona, Steva Na, Steva Na, Steva Gathiranyatha. The Holy Name is the only solution. But then we're not so advanced that we just immediately take full shelter of the Holy Name. And we need some social arrangement. So it's our duty to strive for that also. I'm very sorry if some women especially, it seems they're very disturbed by my writing about these things and speaking about these things, but I feel it's my duty to do so. I'm not deliberately trying to be offensive, but I also feel, just as they feel very strongly that I'm misleading or so, well, I also feel they're misleading by trying to de-emphasize these traditional roles which Prabhupada very much emphasized. So, Hare Krishna. Anything, any questions, anything? If not, we'll finish there. Only two and a half hours. A little briefer than last time. Okay, Hare Krishna. All glories to His Divine Grace, Srila Prabhupada. Hare Krishna"

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Lecture by HH Bhakti Vikasa Swami