But their scientists would be mad ...
Srila Prabhupada met with Yadubara dasa and his wife, Visakha dasi, along with Svarupa Damodara, Rupanuga and Brishakapi prabhus at about four thirty. Yadubara and Visakha are expert photographers and Prabhupada gave them a special assignment. "I wanted both of you to take various detailed photographs of that Capitol."
"The Capitol Building." Yadubara nodded. "For what purpose, Srila Prabhupada?"
"We shall have a planetarium in Mayapur," Prabhupada told him. "To show spiritual world, material world, and so on succession of the planetary systems, everything. A building like that. We are acquiring three hundred and fifty acres of land for constructing a small township to attract people from all the world to see the planetarium. ... You take all details, inside, outside. That will be nice."
He relaxed back in his asana for a moment, beads clicking invisibly between the fingers of his cloth-covered hand, the maha-mantra on his lips, "Hare Krishna Hare Krishna ... "
He turned to Svarupa Damodara. "And you prove that sun planet is first. It is stated in the Bhagavatam." He has repeatedly brought this subject up for discussion during his travels. And whenever he does so, he invariably says that Svarupa Damodara prabhu has not answered him on it. Now he was able to address to him personally on the issue.
Svarupa Damodara gave a little laugh. "I was going to inquire about that. The order, Sunday, Monday, whether it has to do anything with the distance."
"Distance, whatever it may be. But the sun is first, then moon, then Mars, then Jupiter, like that. One after another. Otherwise, why Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, like that?"
Yadubara asked if the planets were ordered according to their distance from the earth.
"Yes," Prabhupada said, and he gave his calculations. "According to Bhagavatam the moon is situated 1,600,000 miles away, up, to the sun, upper. According to their calculation, 93,000,000 miles, sun is situated from the earth. And if the moon is plus 1,600,000 then it becomes 95,000,000. It takes at least seven months at the speed they are going, 18,000 miles per hour. So how they have gone in four days?"
He put forth another of his arguments. "They have brought some sand. Such a brilliant planet which is illuminating the whole universe, and they brought sand. All bluff."
Svarupa Damodara said he and the other members of the Institute would have to study it very carefully.
"All bluff," Srila Prabhupada repeated.
Slightly puzzled, Yadubara wondered whether the earth-to-the-sun distance Srila Prabhupada was using, 93,000,000 miles, was from the Srimad-Bhagavatam, since it is the distance given by modern astronomers.
"It is about," Srila Prabhupada told him. "The whole diameter [of the universe] is four billions. And sun is situated almost in the middle."
He paused for a few seconds and then stated deliberately, "It is my firm conviction that they did not go to the moon. Neither they'll be able to go to the Mars as they have planned it."
Svarupa Damodara began, "But their scientists would be mad ... "
"They are mad already," Srila Prabhupada declared easily. "They're talking all nonsense. Already they're mad."
Svarupa Damodara mentioned that the scientists were studying the rocks from the moon.
Srila Prabhupada reminded us that they are admitted to be exactly the same as those found on earth. He pointed out that the moon illuminates the universe with its brilliant shine, so if the rocks and sand are the same as on earth, why doesn't the Sahara desert illumine just as brightly?
Svarupa Damodara told him that the subject had already become a controversial matter in their college preaching. Some people had read about it in the Srimad-Bhagavatam, and our devotees also were telling college students. Thus, they had already been challenged whether they believed that the moon was further away from earth than the sun.
"So what did you answer?" Prabhupada asked him.
"We said yes, but our explanation was not solid in the sense that we said you have to study this more carefully. We had one explanation saying that now, the way we perceive knowledge, though we understand things, there is also a conditioning behind it. Actually this is a fact, but in mathematics, if we change the axiom, then we have a whole new understanding, it's almost completely upside down, but still we can interpret the result. Niels Bohr studied the structure of the atom. He had a mathematical equation to fit the phenomena of this atom, and actually you can perfectly describe this phenomena by this equation, but, now, at modern times, this quantum mechanics, it turns out whatever he did was completely wrong, but it can be described completely, perfectly well as his model, as is our present understanding. His theories, he could explain things on his own, but still it's completely wrong. So we are discussing about our limitations of our so-called knowledge-finding technique. So we said, 'One has to be a little open-minded and discuss these things.'"
Svarupa Damodara pointed out, "Actually especially astronomy is one of the most unscientific branches of study, knowledge. It's very, very little known. The techniques that they use, are very difficult to rely on."
We talked a little about how the sun orbits the universe and is not fixed in one position, with Prabhupada quoting the Brahma-samhita.
Yadubara wondered if the scientists would dismiss our claims as simply myth.
Srila Prabhupada was dismissive of them. "Your claim also is myth. Who believes you? If you don't believe me, I don't believe you. Finished."
"So we should present our side," Yadubara said.
"Yes. That is our business," Prabhupada said. "If you don't believe me I don't believe you. Finished business. You have got your authority, I've got my authority. What is your age? You are all scientists within two hundred years. And our Bhagavata is written five thousand years ago. Why shall I accept yours? You have become all scientists, and everything within two hundred years. What is the age of your European, Western civilization? It cannot go more than three thousand years? Our Bhagavata is written five thousand years ago. And before that, Sukadeva Gosvami says, 'I have heard like this.' That's all. Millions and millions of years ago."
Brishakapi reiterated Prabhupada's statement that whatever they say we take it as wrong, and Srila Prabhupada agreed. He said the conditioned souls are all imperfect and everything they present is simply speculation; therefore whatever they observe with their imperfect senses is also imperfect. Thus one person puts forward a theory, and even though it is known that his knowledge is imperfect, still he wants to speak on it. Therefore, Prabhupada said it means he simply wants to cheat. Then a few years later someone else will give another explanation showing the first one to be wrong; then his idea in turn is replaced by another. Since all of them are wrong, he said they all belong to a "parampara of cheaters."
Brishakapi tried to grasp the implications of this statement. "But they cheated when they said they went to the moon."
"Yes," Prabhupada continued. "They're cheaters, those who have got imperfect senses, they're all cheaters. If they say something, 'Definitely this is like this,' that is cheating."
"But how can so many cheat?" Brishakapi wasn't disagreeing with Srila Prabhupada, but was simply trying to understand it. "Together they all cheat, they all say they went to the moon. One thousand scientists, all together in one room? They all say, 'We agree, this, they went to the moon, here's the ... "
Srila Prabhupada wasn't put off by the enormous implications of his statement. Rather he was very positive about it. "Therefore I say that if we can prove that the moon is beyond sun, then all these cheaters will be finished, by one stroke."
Svarupa Damodara said that all the speculation goes on in the name of intellectual exercise.
Prabhupada told a little tale to demonstrate how they take shelter in each other's folly. "A fool is accepted by another fool. They're getting Nobel Prize and so on, fool's paradise. All of them are fools and they have created their own paradise. Do you know that story? One was drinking, so his friend said, 'Oh, you are drinking, you'll go to hell.'
" 'No, why? My father drinks.'
" 'Well, he'll also go to hell.'
" 'Oh, my brother drinks.'
" 'so he'll also go to hell.'
" 'My mother ... ' In this way, the whole list was passed. Then he said, 'Everyone will go to hell then where is hell? It is paradise! If father is going, then mother is going, then I am going, then brother is going, then where is hell?'
"It is like that. There's no question of fool. If everyone, all of us are fool, then where is the question of intelligent? 'Hey, we are intelligent.' This is their conclusion. We can give credit to something, just like I can see up to this wall. But if I say, 'Now I am seeing beyond this wall everything, the forest and everything, I know everything.' That is going on. Cheating."
Svarupa Damodara informed Srila Prabhupada of two main problems for the scientists. "One is this astronomical problem and the second is the origin of life. So my feeling is that in about fifty years something is going to be settled."
Prabhupada laughed. "It's already settled. They should accept that they are defeated. It's already settled. But these rascals must admit. That's all."
Svarupa Damodara said, "It's settled in the sense that even the scientist will come around that, 'Oh, yes, what we taught was wrong.'"
Srila Prabhupada liked his optimism. "Yes. That we want. They have become unnecessary authorities and misleading people. That we want to expose."
Prabhupada chatted for a while, especially about the need for devotees to take charge and manage the affairs of the world. He said this was Krishna's desire, just as when He had personally arranged to have the Pandavas take charge.
Brishakapi prabhu, not a man for subtleties, asked, "Will this Movement take over the world, Prabhupada?"
Srila Prabhupada was measured in his response. "At least you keep one idea; there is possibility."
"I think it will be very big," Brishakapi said very positively.
"That is possible," Prabhupada agreed. "If we become serious and sincere, then it will go on, undoubtedly."
Brishakapi had visions of an expansive future. "See how big it grew just in ten years. Today is our ten-year anniversary. So in ten years we have gotten so big, by geometric progression in twenty years how big will we be? Thousands and thousands of people, chanting and dancing."
"And there is chance," Prabhupada assured us. "Simply by chanting you can attract so many people."
Svarupa Damodara informed Prabhupada that the chairman of religion at Emery University had told him that in about thirty or forty years ISKCON will have a great impact on the world's social life.
In his usual modest way Srila Prabhupada did not attribute his success to his own genius and brilliance. "We are giving all round enlightenment. Bhagavad-gita is full of information from all standpoint. Yada yada hi dharmasya glanir bhavati. We are now in such a downtrodden position, the whole human society. He must accept. There is [need]. The civilization is doomed."
There was more talk about the origin of species, and Svarupa Damodara prabhu told Srila Prabhupada that in his own preaching he intended to use Prabhupada's example of how the chicken can produce life in a few days, but the scientists tell us to wait for millions of years, so therefore the chicken is better than the scientist.
Yadubara said that the scientist will object that he can also produce life within a short period by having sex.
Srila Prabhupada had the answer. "But that is not your laboratory children. That is God's children. That is another thing. You want to produce children in laboratory? Then do that. That is our challenge."
Yadubara asked permission to collaborate with Svarupa Damodara to make a movie showing that life comes from life. This could be shown in universities and colleges. Srila Prabhupada liked the idea and encouraged him to do it.
Although Svarupa Damodara fully accepts whatever Srila Prabhupada says, he was still a bit reserved about all the criticism Srila Prabhupada was heaping on the heads of his fellow scientists. When another negative comparison was made he politely asked if things weren't being over done. "Aren't we going a little too far? The scientist says, personally I also feel that they are not all that bad ... "
Srila Prabhupada of course, was not attacking them per se nor did he want the sensibilities of his disciple to be offended. He immediately gave his reassurance. "No, no. They're badly trained up. Not all [bad]."
"There are many good things that they have done," Svarupa Damodara vouched for the scientists.
Srila Prabhupada still stuck nicely to his point. "That we already admitted. That I can see ten feet, let me credit for that. But why shall I say, 'I can see the whole universe.' What is this nonsense? Speak the truth. 'Now we have manufactured machine, and this, I have calculation that ... ' All talking nonsense. I say it is not possible for you to see beyond ten feet. Why you are claiming that you can see the whole sky? That is our protest. You can see ten feet, take that credit, that much. If somebody manufactures the electric lamp, all right. But if he says, 'I can manufacture the sun.' Then he is to be beaten with shoes. Talking nonsense. That is their claim, defying God. Because we are explaining God consciousness, therefore we have protest. Otherwise let them. But we cannot tolerate when they challenge God. We must act on it."
Svarupa Damodara seemed satisfied, but he could not resist the temptation to comment when Srila Prabhupada inquired from me what time it was. "That is made by science, Prabhupada. This watch is a product of science."
Srila Prabhupada smiled. He wasn't going to give them credit beyond their due. "Science means craftsman, that's all." Everyone laughed. "We say mistri. You know, in our Indian language? Any craftsman, we say mistri. So mistri has no position. In our Vedic civilization a learned brahmana is honored, not a mistri. Is it not?"
Svarupa Damodara conceded it was so, and Srila Prabhupada went on. "A learned brahmana is not expected to manufacture a watch, but he's more honored than one who is. This modern age is: if he manufactures watch he is honored. Not the learned brahmana. That is Kali-yuga. They do not know whom to honor. You kill so many souls, and if you have a great big skyscraper building, then you are successful. And those who constructed the skyscraper, they are going to become dog; never mind, the skyscraper building is there. That's all, that is success. This is modern civilization. After they constructed the skyscraper building all the mistris are going to hell. That doesn't matter, the building is there. Is it not? This is civilization.
"Long ago, in 1917 perhaps, in our college, Scottish Churches College, we saw one magazine, Scientific American. So there the picture was that one skyscraper building is constructed and so many men are working, carrying the beams and so on. So there was, I remember still, that all for some material construction, so many living entities they are being sacrificed.
"Actually that is a fact. This human being would have been released from this materialistic way of life, back to home, back to Godhead. No, instead of giving them the chance, they are engaged in constructing huge skyscraper building. They're spoiled. So it is little difficult to understand our philosophy. And Prahlada Maharaja said, this kind of activity should stop; it is simply wasting valuable life. But they do not know how they're wasting. They're in such an ignorance. They are thinking that these people, crazy people, chanting Hare Krishna, are wasting time, they're thinking like that. They do not know what is the value of life."
Reference: Transcendental Diary Volume 3 by Hari Sauri Dasa
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