Chapter 15

After Hansadutta ahā d returned from India, he received a telegram from Śrīla Prabhupāda asking him to look after the temples in England. The local GBC man had become sidetracked with a dubious business venture, and the managers at Bhaktivedanta Manor and Bury Place faced serious problems.

Hansadutta liked the prospect of taking charge of the prestigious British yātrā. Prabhupāda had first visited London in 1969, just after his two-week Hamburg visit, and he had returned every year, sometimes even twice a year, for stays of several weeks. Besides that, London’s annual Ratha-yātrā festival was second only to San Francisco’s. And a few months earlier, George Harrison had donated a large estate outside London. Hansadutta wanted a similar place, a temple that would show the world that the Hare Kṛṣṇa movement in Germany had become respectable and solidly established under his leadership. He looked at various large buildings, one of them a famous castle, Schloss Rheinstein, on the shores of the Rhine River. But the local government became alarmed at the prospect of Hare Kṛṣṇa devotees occupying a historical building, and it took action by offering financial help to another bidder.

A country castle, Schloss Rettershof, was only a twenty-minute drive from Frankfurt, Germany’s financial capital. It nestled in the hills near KÎnigstein, a village in the Taunus, where many Frankfurt bankers and entrepreneurs had villas.

Although the rent was high and getting the place meant closing the city temples, Hansadutta was tempted. Money wasn’t a problem, and he had a long-term plan to establish a farm community. But for now he wanted to concentrate his forces, form strong saṅkīrtana teams, and over-flood the prosperous West German consumer society with Kṛṣṇa conscious books and records. So he rented the place.

BHAKTI GAURAVANI GOSWAMI: By the beginning of May, some devotees from Heidelberg moved into Schloss Rettershof. The place had been a boarding school. We translators quickly transformed a sunlit room on the second floor into an office, while the others began renovating the rest of the building. Their deadline was the second week of June when Śrīla Prabhupāda was expected to visit Germany for the first time since 1969. Within a month and a half the 19th-century castle was converted into a beautiful temple fit to receive the small Rādhā-Kṛṣṇa Deities presiding in Hamburg and Their pure devotee, Śrīla Prabhupāda.

Prabhupāda’s flight from Paris arrived in Frankfurt on Sunday, June 16, around 11 a.m. More than a hundred devotees from Germany, Holland, and England greeted His Divine Grace and escorted him to the VIP lounge, where he sat on a large, bright orange vyāsāsana brought from Amsterdam. In Germany, the only existing vyāsāsana, in Hamburg, was small and unimpressive, so it had been left in the reception room at the Schloss.

While Hansadutta poured a mixture of yogurt and warm water and rose petals over Śrīla Prabhupāda’s lotus feet, Gaṇanātha Dāsa held a huge multicolored umbrella over Śrīla Prabhupāda’s head. Himavatī and the girls had finished making the umbrella just the night before in a veritable sewing marathon».

ACCHEDYA DĀSA: On the morning of Prabhupāda’s arrival, I was very nervous and full of excitement; this would be the first time I would meet him personally. I had read his books and followed his principles of freedom. I had been chanting more than 16 rounds every day and loved the prasādam and the kīrtanas, but I also felt that this person had been sent to me by God.

This may sound silly or sentimental, but in a very intense moment in 1972, I had prayed to God to please help me find a spiritual master. I prayed: “Please, God, if you really exist and can hear me, then send me a bona fide master.” Shortly afterwards, in early 1973, I met the devotees for the first time.

In April 1974, Prabhupāda initiated me by mail. Now he would soon touch down on German soil, and I knew that wherever he walked, people would be blessed. This was overwhelming for my troubled heart. I was only 22 years old, and yet God had given me the chance to meet a very special soul—a liberated soul, someone only rarely found on this Earth. Why did I have such luck? I asked myself that many times.

But on that fateful morning, I had no time to think. I got up early and took a shower in the cold mountain water. My mind was racing, my heart was praying, and my soul was floating in a feeling of ecstatic anticipation. We worked the whole morning to put the final touches on Prabhupāda’s room and clean up the mess that the previous day’s renovation had left behind. The kitchen was like a factory production line: everyone was absorbed and fully concentrating on their service to prepare a huge feast for the more than one hundred devotees who were expected. We felt as if God himself was coming to visit us, since the visit of his dearmost representative carried the same meaning for us.

Later that morning, Hansadutta arrived with the car he had rented, a Mercedes 280 SE. When he came up to me and told me that he would like me to be Prabhupāda’s driver during his visit, I was stunned and at the same time full of joy. I had no time to ponder my good luck, because it was already late and I had to hurry to put on a fresh dhotī and kūrta. Ten minutes later, we were hurtling down the Autobahn at breakneck speed, like knights leaving their castle to meet their king. Despite racing at 200 km per hour, we made it safely to the airport, where I was able to park the big Mercedes in a special terminal for VIPs. With not a minute to spare, we ran up to the gate just in time, as only minutes later Prabhupāda came out of Immigration.

He appeared like an angel gliding effortlessly through the arrival hall. All the devotees immediately went into a trance of blissful ecstasy, shouting “Hare Kṛṣṇa” at the top of their lungs and falling on their knees to offer obeisances. Accompanied by a roaring kīrtana, we went with Prabhupāda into the VIP lounge where a vyāsāsana was already waiting. While Hansadutta bathed Prabhupāda’s lotus feet, a crowd of journalists stood staring at the extraordinary scene. They had never seen anything like it before. The next day, an article in a popular magazine stated that the devotees seemed to be on an LSD trip—only without LSD—but rather infused with the power of ecstatic God-consciousness.

NIKUÑJAVĀSIṆĪ DĀSĪ: The day that we drove from Amsterdam to Frankfurt I was in great anxiety. I had done something to my left eye while putting in a contact lens, and my eye was constantly tearing and impairing my vision. I had also sprained an ankle, and I had difficulty walking, what to speak of dancing in kīrtana.

My service in Amsterdam was to clean the temple room, and afterward, I would finish my rounds sitting beside Prabhupāda’s vyāsāsana. Often I would lean against it and feel completely sheltered at his feet. It was like being with my father and receiving his protection. Then this same vyāsāsana was sent to Germany.

We arrived a little late at the airport, and Prabhupāda was already giving an arrival address. When I first looked at him from a distance, I couldn’t see him well, but then as soon as I saw the vyāsāsana and Prabhupāda again, my eyesight returned. There were no more tears, and I could see clearly. It was as if my picture of Prabhupāda came alive, his picture on the vyāsāsana where I saw him like my father. What a wonderful experience! My “picture” was moving and talking; it was my same Prabhupāda. As soon as I saw him, although he was far away, I felt so close to him that I thought, “Here is my real father.” I felt completely at home, like a lost child who has found her father.

RAMBHORŪ DĀSĪ: I thought a spiritualist had to have long hair and a beard, like Jesus, so I felt a little disappointed when I saw in photographs that Śrīla Prabhupāda had no hair. Besides that, he was an old man and didn’t look at all romantic. I thought, “When I see Prabhupāda in person, I will be able to understand him.” I thought I was spiritually tuned in and would figure him out just by looking at him.

When Prabhupāda arrived, it surprised me how short he was. Still, I experienced him as big and important. But because I was puffed-up, I had no access to him. When I couldn’t penetrate him, I became embarrassed and thought, “If he sees me he will realize I am puffed-up.” So I devised a plan to hide in the crowd and at the same time get a good look at him. The vyāsāsana stood on a platform, and right in front of it, about ten meters away, was a couch for the reporters. The devotees had gathered around the couch in a semicircle. One devotee was fanning Prabhupāda with a whisk, another held a huge umbrella, Hansadutta was washing Prabhupāda’s feet, and I was hiding behind the couch and peeking over the edge. Prabhupāda looked around, recognizing devotees he knew. And every time he looked in my direction, I felt I was erupting inside, like when you pop a boil and all the gunk comes out. It was the first time anybody had humiliated me in a way that was really helpful. Prabhupāda purified and softened all the garbage in my heart, and I just started sobbing. In the end, I felt thankful.

CAKRAVARTĪ DĀSA: After the press conference we escorted Śrīla Prabhupāda to a rented white Mercedes. Our fleet of vans led the way, their lights on and horns honking. We’d mounted a speaker on one van, and from time to time a devotee announced Prabhupāda’s arrival. The rest of the time, a kīrtana tape filled the countryside with transcendental sound. To announce his visit, we had put up posters in the villages en route, and as we drove through those villages, people lined the streets or waved from their windows, just like during the visit of a head of state.

SATSVARŪPA DĀSA GOSWAMI: While riding to the castle, Prabhupāda felt happy. “My heart will become engladdened when I hear a mṛdaṅga in a German village,” Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura had said. He quoted Lord Caitanya’s statement that in every town and village the holy name will be heard. He said, “Our goal is a worldwide movement. Actually, we have communities all over the world, but our movement is still very, very small. It will expand, and the whole world can be united under Kṛṣṇa for peace.” Then he remained silent, but said later, “People’s only objection to us is that we are trying to prevent them from going to hell; therefore, they misunderstand us. It’s like when a man flies a kite on a roof and you see that he’s in great danger, about to walk off the roof. But he becomes angry when you tell him, ‘Look out! You’re in danger!’ Any gentleman will speak out if he sees another plunging into danger. But they object: ‘What? You have checked my movement?’ One world under Kṛṣṇa. We are not after domination, but we want to free people from death, old age, and disease”. ACCHEDYA DĀSA: After the press conference, I rushed back to the car and waited with the door already open. As Prabhupāda approached, tears welled up in my eyes. I tried to hold them back but was unsuccessful. I felt like a helpless child—clumsy and embarrassed—but there was nothing I could do. I navigated the car through a dreamlike daze.

We left behind the great crowd of devotees dancing around the car, cleared the terminal, and began the drive toward the hills of the Koenigstein Forest. During the ride, Prabhupāda had crossed his right leg over his left knee in such a way that I couldn’t help but touch his foot whenever I shifted gears. After a while, he withdrew his foot and looked at me with a smile.

By the time we reached the Schloss, I was drenched in sweat, relieved to have delivered him safely. Later, Hansadutta told me that I had actually received special mercy: I had touched the feet of a pure devotee and made my spiritual master smile. I felt as though all my sins had been washed away, blessed by the presence of my guru.

ŚACĪNANDANA SWAMI: When Śrīla Prabhupāda came for visits, devotees usually painted until the last minute, and we were no exception. The night before, I worked many hours scraping stains off the steps to the main entrance. I thought, “Prabhupāda will soon put his feet here, and everything has to be perfectly clean.” When finally all the steps were spotless, I felt really proud of my work. But the next day, my attachment got smashed because Śrīla Prabhupāda entered the castle through the side door. Nevertheless, my disappointment could not decrease the joy of finally having Kṛṣṇa’s pure devotee finally with us.

Prabhupāda immediately went up to his room, and we poured into the central hall to immerse ourselves in a resounding kīrtana. The waves of the kīrtana rose higher and higher, and after a while, Prabhupāda’s servant leaned over the wooden balustrade and waved us up.

Although Prabhupāda’s quarters were not especially spacious, we all squeezed in. Prabhupāda said that throughout his life he had always given his best to satisfy Kṛṣṇa: “Even in my old age, I’m pushing on. I was never like the servants in Calcutta, who during the day go into a park and sleep. And when they return and their masters ask them, ‘What did you do all day?’ they say, ‘I was busy. I served you the whole day.’” Prabhupāda laughed and added, “I was never like that”.

BHAKTI GAURAVANI GOSWAMI: After saying this, Śrīla Prabhupāda removed his flower garland and had someone drape it around a painting of Rādhā and Kṛṣṇa hanging on the wall. A short silence ensued while we sat there and looked at him expectantly. His secretary, Satsvarūpa Mahārāja, entered the room with a piece of luggage. Then he left and returned a few moments later with more luggage. Prabhu-pāda said, “You should always be busy like him.” That was the high sign: it was pointless to sit idly. So we offered our obeisances and went back to our duties.

NIKUÑJAVĀSIṆĪ DĀSĪ: That afternoon Śrīla Prabhupāda gave initiations on the lawn behind the Schloss. Hoping to be initiated I took a place among the many devotees who were sitting in front of plates with bananas and neck beads. My situation was a little unclear because we had just changed temple presidents. Pṛthu Prabhu, our new president, called me Nandā (my Western name is Nanya). Maybe he called me Nandā just to flatter me, but I think he had the impression I was already initiated, so he didn’t put me on the list. I didn’t know that. But when it came time to have somebody tie on my neck beads, one of the Dutch brahmacārīs put them on and I thought I was all right.’

The devotees were called forward by country, and Śrīla Prabhupāda was very strict about the procedure. He explained: First you offer daṇḍavats (even the women), not straight on from the front, but a little from the side; then you sit up and recite the regulative principles and “at least sixteen good rounds every day.” Prabhupāda corrected devotees’ mistakes. I thought, “When I go, I don’t want to make any mistakes.” I watched attentively as one devotee after another went forward. I didn’t realize it was going by temples, because Amsterdam was first on the list. Soon all the devotees from the other temples had been called. Then the initiations came to an end, and I realized I had not been on the list.

A Dutch devotee, Vidāṅga Prabhu, noticed my predicament and quickly informed Satsvarūpa Mahārāja that they had forgotten me. So I was called. I offered my daṇḍavats and recited the four principles. Then I handed Prabhupāda a bead bag I had made for him as my guru-dakṣiṇā. He had me hand it to Satsvarūpa Mahārāja and then said to me, “Your name is Nikuñjavāsiṇī [which I didn’t understand]. This is a very nice name. It’s the name of one of the gopīs.” I felt happy and thought, “Just see! I waited until the end and I got the best name.” I felt as though Prabhupāda had shown me a special favor. So I offered my daṇḍavats again and returned to my place.

But for days I didn’t know my name! Devotees kept asking me what my name was, but I didn’t know. I would tell them “it’s the name of a gopī.” Finally, three days later, a list of the initiates was posted, and I copied my name down on a piece of paper.

After giving us initiation Prabhupāda returned to his quarters and Hansadutta gave a talk. He said Prabhupāda had commented that a woman should be so well covered that not even the sun would see her. After his lecture, when we had held kīrtana, with the devotees running in circles around the fire in the hot afternoon sun, I tried my best to always cover my head. I thought it would please Śrīla Prabhupāda».

ŚILPAKĀRIṆĪ DĀSĪ: I had received second initiation, and after the fire sacrifice, the second initiates were asked to go up to Śrīla Prabhupāda’s quarters and receive the Gāyatrī mantra. Nobody told me what to do, and when Satsvarūpa Mahārāja called me in I was shaking with nervousness. After offering obeisances I sat on my knees next to the door and waited. I was alone with Śrīla Prabhupāda because Satsvarūpa Mahārāja had gone out. Prabhupāda looked up from behind his desk and said, “Come closer.” I moved a little forward on my knees. “More,” he said, and I moved another foot or two. “More!” he patiently insisted, and I moved closer again. After he had beckoned me once more and I was still only halfway to where he sat, he finally patted the floor next to him and said, “Come sit here.” So I got up and sat down by his side.

I thought it was wonderful to be so close to Śrīla Prabhupāda. But I immediately checked myself and considered, “He is a sannyāsī; you shouldn’t think like that.” Prabhupāda was sober. He showed me a sheet of paper with the mantras on it, pointed to each word, and had me repeat them after him.

After he showed me how to count the mantras on my fingers, he asked me whether I could bring him some sandalwood paste for his headache. Because I’d been helping in the kitchen almost every day, I knew we had no sandalwood, not even for the Deities. I told Prabhupāda. But he probably thought that I didn’t understand English well enough, so he asked me to get Himavatī.

I thanked him, offered obeisances, and ran out the door to find Himavatī. When I told her what had happened, she got upset with me. She was responsible for the standard of Deity worship, and my “inappropriate talking” had embarrassed her in front of Śrīla Prabhupāda. But then she became concerned for his welfare. In her room, she had a large japa-mālā hanging on the wall—carved from first-class sandalwood—which was both decoration and a way to give her room a pleasant scent. She sacrificed those beads. Prabhupāda got some paste to alleviate his headache, and Aṣṭaratha, the head pūjārī, got the rest of the sandalwood for the Deities. *** It had been an eventful day, but when Hansadutta told Prabhupāda that the devotees were eager to hear him speak he agreed to give a brief talk on the Bhagavad-gītā that evening. He selected the first five verses of the second chapter, wherein Kṛṣṇa and Arjuna discuss the value of fighting the battle. After Satsvarūpa Mahārāja chanted the verses in Sanskrit, Prabhupāda emphasized Kṛṣṇa’s instruction that everyone must execute some prescribed duty without consideration for personal loss or gain: This is the set-up of the Bhagavad-gītā, but the real purpose is to instruct Arjuna about spiritual understanding. Spiritual understanding means, first of all, to know what is spirit. If you do not know what spirit is, then where is your spiritual understanding? People are too much engrossed in the body. That is called materialism. But when you understand spirit and you act accordingly, that is called spiritualism.

The bodily conception of life is foolishness. No learned man takes the body into serious consideration. Therefore, in the Vedic literature, it is said, “One who is in the bodily concept of life is nothing more than an animal.” At the present moment, without knowledge of the self, the whole world is going on under the bodily concept of life. The bodily concept of life is there among the animals. The cats and dogs are proud of becoming a big cat or big dog. Similarly, if a man also becomes proud that he is a big American or big German, what is the difference? But that is actually going on, and therefore they are fighting like cats and dogs. So, we shall discuss more tomorrow.

The next morning, a group of disciples waited at the side entrance of the castle to accompany Prabhupāda on a walk. The mid-June morning air was still fresh, and Prabhupāda wore his hat and chadar during his first morning stroll past the wide cornfields stretching from Schloss Rettershof to the nearby village of Fischbach. The conversation focused on the theme he’d discussed the night before: the folly of accepting the body as all in all. This body, either living or dead, it is not a very important thing. Now see! And the whole world is after this body. Kṛṣṇa says, “The body, either dead or alive, is not a subject matter for serious consideration.” And for what is the world going on? Simply for bodily comfort. Body means senses. It is very difficult for the Western people to understand that the body is not an important thing and that the soul is the important thing.

He explained that without understanding the soul, it isn’t possible to understand God, because the soul is a minute part of God. Referring to modern scientists, he said: Simply they are trying to cover it: ‘There is no soul. There is no soul. Life is generated from matter,’ although they cannot prove it! A fool’s paradise. The fools explain the living force in some way, and other fools are accepting. This is the position of Europe and America. It is a fool’s paradise. It is paradise certainly—very, very big, big buildings and advancement—but all rascals and fools. Fool’s paradise.

The rays of the early morning sun gradually gained strength and evaporated the blanket of mist over the valley. Contemplating the rolling hills covered with corn, Prabhupāda denounced the foolish idea of overpopulation: If nature likes, it can produce three times, four times this production. Prakṛteḥ kriyamānāni gunaiḥ karmāni: after all, nature is producing. But we do not know how to deal with nature. Therefore there is some scarcity. And we say overpopulation. There is no question of overpopulation. There are so many hundreds and thousands of birds within this forest and other animals. They have no problems of overpopulation.

He encouraged Hansadutta to develop the Schloss into a showcase of simple living and high thinking: “This should be exemplary, that our community lives in this way and saves time for spiritual advancement. This example should be shown to the whole world. Is it possible?”

To Hansadutta’s positive reply, he said: The devotees do not do any industry. They do not kill cows. They do not go to the cinema. They do not have illicit sex. They don’t drink. No problems. Simply they are eating very nicely and chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa. Show this example at least in this fool’s paradise. They think it is paradise, and the paradise is lost every ten or fifteen years by bombing. Germany bombs France, and France bombs... This is their paradise. So let them understand, ‘You are all fools. Yours is a fool’s paradise. This is life, what we are doing.’ Teach them so that the fools will understand what is life. Mādhavānanda, who had come from England to see Śrīla Prabhupāda, mentioned that in Great Britain and America more and more people supported birth control to curb overpopulation. Prabhupāda exposed the real motive: “No, it is not overpopulation. They don’t want to take care of children. This is their problem. It is not a question of overpopulation. They want to remain free and enjoy life, that’s all. No responsibility. *** After breakfast, Hansadutta took Prabhupāda on a tour of the castle. The four-story building with over fifty rooms was filled to capacity during Prabhupāda’s visit and resembled a beehive early in the morning and at night. But now the place was quiet because most devotees had left for saṅkīrtana.

MAṆIMAÑJARĪ DĀSĪ: I came up the kitchen stairs just as Śrīla Prabhupāda and Hansadutta came down. I didn’t notice them until I almost bumped into them. When I suddenly saw Prabhupāda I dove to the floor and offered obeisances. I heard Prabhupāda chuckle and say, “Jaya!” When I got back to my feet he had already gone into the kitchen.

ŚACĪNANDANA SWAMI: I was tired from all the work and excitement, and I had to take a nap after breakfast. We translators stayed in a large room and worked at low desks. So I lay down behind my desk and was just about to fall asleep when the door opened and I heard Prabhupāda’s voice. The first thing that came to my mind was his words on his arrival: We should always be busy and not waste time sleeping all day.

And here I was, sleeping like a lazy, irresponsible fool. I felt really bad. I thought maybe Prabhupāda wouldn’t notice me, because I was behind the desk. But then I chastised myself: “Come on, you can’t fool Śrīla Prabhupāda.” So I sat up and saw that Prabhupāda looked amused. I felt relieved. Undoubtedly he knew I felt bad, but when he smiled I also smiled, and everything was all right.

BHAKTI GAURAVANI GOSWAMI: «We had just received the galley proofs of The Teachings of Lord Caitanya. I was proofreading them when Prabhupāda and Hansadutta entered. Hansadutta introduced us and explained how we did translating, editing, and proofreading. Then Prabhupāda asked me what I was working on. “The Teachings of Lord Caitanya,” I replied. I showed him the proofs. “Read,” he said. I was a little surprised because Prabhupāda didn’t understand German. While I was reading for a minute or so, Prabhupāda listened with a huge smile. Knowing that a book was ready for publication was his greatest satisfaction. Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī Ṭhākura had ordered him to distribute Lord Caitanya’s message in English, but Śrīla Prabhupāda took his instruction even further. Through his disciples, he wanted to publish and distribute his books in all the major languages of the world. SATSVARŪPA DĀSA GOSWAMI: I had a high fever and a big boil on my leg. The day after our arrival I was massaging Śrīla Prabhupāda, and he noticed that my hands were very hot. When I told him I had a fever, he asked me to stop the massage and get someone else. So I recruited a young brahmacārī who was standing just outside the door.

ŚACĪNANDANA SWAMI: When Satsvarūpa Mahārāja asked, “Is there someone who can massage Śrīla Prabhupāda?” I said, “Śivānanda knows how to do it.” I tried to find Śivānanda, but he had just left for town. Mahārāja concluded, “Then you will have to massage Prabhupāda. He has sent me to take a rest because I have a fever.”

I had never massaged anyone. And I was really afraid to touch Prabhupāda. When I went into his room, I was red-faced, sweating, and shaky. Prabhupāda looked at me, a heap of misery, and said in a deep voice, “Just do your service.” He sat on a mat in his gamchā with a bottle of mustard oil next to him. He told me to begin by moving my hands up his back. In response to my timid squeezes, he demanded, “Push harder!” I pushed with my whole weight, and Prabhupāda seemed as immovable as a mountain. After a while, he looked at me and asked, “What is your service?”

“I’m trying to translate your books, Śrīla Prabhupāda.”

“What are you translating?” he asked.

“Kṛṣṇa Book,” I said.

“Oh!” Prabhupāda said. He seemed pleased and asked, “How many pages a day?” I immediately told him my best score: “Twenty pages, Śrīla Prabhupāda, on good days.” Prabhupāda moved his head in satisfaction. Then he showed me how to massage his arms, chest, and head. After some time, he stopped and looked at me, “You know, a devotee should be four things: a good disciple, a good master, a water carrier, and a good cook.” I thought I understood why one should be a good disciple, a good master, and a good cook, but why a water carrier? Later, I learned that in Indian villages, when water is needed, people go to fetch it. In this way they serve others. Similarly, devotees are meant to serve others.

It seemed that the massage lasted for a long time, and all the while my thoughts focused on one desire: Would Prabhupāda allow me to massage his lotus feet? It is a privilege to touch the feet of a pure devotee because from them all blessings can be obtained. As if knowing my desire, Prabhupāda put his feet on my lap. I massaged them with the greatest care but with full enthusiasm.

While I massaged his hands Śrīla Prabhupāda asked me to crack his knuckles. When I pulled the joints and they made a loud cracking sound, he simply smiled. Because his fingers were so delicate I was afraid, but he liked having them pulled a little forcefully. Then he indicated that the massage had come to an end. I offered daṇḍavats and left the room. I was elated and grateful that Prabhupāda had allowed me to come close to him. I was so happy that, for the rest of the day, I went into the forest and just chanted the holy name.

*** In the afternoon, a German lady visited Śrīla Prabhupāda and entered into a philosophical discussion with him. She began by explaining that in material life people have many duties and responsibilities, but that after death she wanted to attain peace—“to be situated in a peaceful condition.” Prabhupāda immediately took up her point: “After death?” When she confirmed this, he asked, “So everyone will get that peace?”

“Yes,” she replied, “everyone will attain it.”

Prabhupāda extended the question further: “The cats and dogs?

Everyone? The same?”

She hesitated and clarified her position. “No, human beings are different. Man has something spiritual within himself, whereas animals live only by instinct.”

“So what is that difference?” Prabhupāda asked. He pointed out that both humans and animals eat, sleep, mate, and defend themselves. “If the platform of activities is the same, why is there a difference?”

The lady responded that humans act with intelligence, while animals act by instinct. But Prabhupāda remained unconvinced: “But the activity is the same—eating. Where is the difference?”

She tried again, arguing that man had developed from a primitive state into an advanced civilization, whereas animals had remained primitive. “That shows,” she said, “that man has intelligence.”

Prabhupāda questioned this conclusion. “Because he can build a nice building, therefore he has intelligence?”

“Yes,” she answered.

“But the result is the same,” he replied. “You construct with intelligence, the animal acts by instinct, but the sleeping comfort is the same.” Then he added pointedly, “Such a nice building—and someone throws a bomb on it. The dogs do not do that. So who is advanced—the dog or the man?”

The lady admitted, “Yes, man misuses his intelligence. He creates things that are later destroyed.”

“So is that very good intelligence?” Prabhupāda asked.

She conceded that it was not.

“Then what is the use of getting better intelligence than the dog?” he pressed.

Now she shifted her argument. “Man has received his intelligence from God, but he misuses it.”

Prabhupāda immediately asked, “Has God given intelligence for this bad work?”

“No,” she replied. “That is the fault of mankind.”

“Therefore,” Prabhupāda concluded, “misuse of intelligence will cause suffering. Now suppose a tiger kills an animal, and a man kills thousands of animals daily in the slaughterhouse—is he not sinful?”

She acknowledged that this reflected evil in human nature.

“Then the conclusion is,” Prabhupāda said, “that the so-called intelligent man is simply misusing his intelligence. And when he misuses it, he is less than the cats and dogs. Then how will he be in peace after death?”

Despite this, she maintained her conviction: “Every man will get this peace—even the bad men.”

Prabhupāda looked at her in surprise. “Bad men also will get peace?” “Yes,” she insisted.

He rejected the idea, remarking that such thinking was nonsense. At this point, another lady entered the discussion and raised a question: “Then where does the bad man go after death?”

“He will become a dog,” Prabhupāda replied.

“That would mean there is a hell,” she objected, “but I do not believe in hell.”

“He may not believe,” Prabhupāda said, “but hell is there.” He then referred to the Vedic teaching that those in goodness rise to higher planets, those in passion remain on the earthly level, and those in ignorance descend to lower, hellish worlds.

“Where are these hellish worlds?” she asked.

“They are different planets,” Prabhupāda replied.

“How do we know this?” she continued.

“From the books,” he answered simply.

The discussion then turned to Christianity. One of the ladies argued, “Jesus came to save men, not to destroy them—even sinners.”

“Yes,” Prabhupāda replied, “but only if they follow his instructions. Jesus can save them if they obey him.”

She then cited Jesus’ teaching: “We should love our neighbor and not harm others.”

“But Jesus also said that the sinful will go to hell,” Prabhupāda pointed out. “Is it not?”

She admitted that such teachings exist, but still tried to reconcile them with her earlier claim. Prabhupāda therefore asked again, “Then why do you say that everyone will get peace?”

At this point she began to question the reliability of the Biblical accounts. “We cannot really know what Jesus said,” she argued. “Over time, things become distorted.”

Prabhupāda immediately challenged her: “Then why do you quote Jesus? If you do not believe in him, why do you give evidence from him?” She tried to explain that one must distinguish between what is true and what is not, that modern thinking rejects miracles and mythological elements.

Prabhupāda dismissed this approach. “Then there is no truth. It is all hodgepodge.”

She admitted that people tend to accept only what they like.

“Yes,” Prabhupāda repeated, “hodgepodge.”

Finally, when she insisted that truth must be extracted from what is unreliable, Prabhupāda concluded firmly, “This is nonsense. From untruth, how can there be truth?”

MAṆIMAÑJARĪ DĀSĪ: The next morning, while we were taking breakfast, Hansadutta came to the prasādam room and told us that Prabhupāda had asked about the devotees’ menu on saṅkīrtana. When told that we bought rolls and bread from the bakeries, he became concerned. He instructed Hansadutta to tell us that under no circumstances should we eat grains prepared by non-devotees. Rather, the temple should bake bread or make capātīs that the devotees could take with them.

We didn’t think about using yeast to raise the dough. Our first attempts at baking bread were unsuccessful. Because Germans can’t live without their daily ration of fresh-baked, crunchy bread, Śrīla Prabhupāda was consulted about our using yeast. When he heard that yeast is the dried form of a single-celled fungus, he said it was all right, but that we shouldn’t offer the bread to the Deities.

NIKUÑJAVĀSIṆĪ DĀSĪ: I was helping to make purīs and capātīs while Prabhupāda was at Schloss Rettershof. Himavatī and Kauśalyā were cooking for him. One day, they brought him capātīs that hadn’t puffed. He chastised them: “You are my older disciples, and you don’t even know how to make a chapati puff up? That means there is no qualification. How can you bring this to your spiritual master?” And he wouldn’t eat them». *** Each morning, after Prabhupāda’s breakfast and nap, Hansadutta escorted him to a small room that had been converted into a recording studio. It was connected to the adjacent room by a sliding window, where Uthāla had installed a mixing console and a pair of two-track Revox tape recorders. BHAKTI GAURAVANI GOSWAMI: Prabhupāda had readily agreed to Hansadutta’s request to spend half an hour each morning in the studio singing his favorite vaiṣṇava songs. He played a Laxmi Flute harmonium made in Agra; Hansadutta accompanied him on mṛdaṅga, and Himavatī, Cakravartī, Purujit, and I played karatālas. Later I added to each track the harmonic drone of a tanpura.

After each session, Prabhupāda entered the control room and heard the recording. He closed his eyes and sat silently, listening in deep meditation. Harernāmānanda came in a few times and took photographs. Two closeups of Śrīla Prabhupāda listening to the recordings were later used as the cover photos on the double album, Kṛṣṇa Meditation.

CAKRAVARTĪ DĀSA: Prabhupāda selected the songs himself. He had a small Vaiṣṇava songbook written in Bengali, and Akrūra turned the pages at his sign—a nod. Before each recording, Prabhupāda spent a few minutes on the harmonium warming up and creating the particular mood for the song he was about to sing.

BHAKTI GAURAVANI GOSWAMI: There was no comparison to usual recording sessions. Prabhupāda was not at all concerned with rehearsing to ensure a technically perfect result. Neither did he care whether extraneous sounds made it onto the tape, such as clearing his throat or his voice cracking. He would simply begin singing, and whatever sound spontaneously came out—that was it.

During one song Śrīla Prabhupāda stopped suddenly. He turned to Hansadutta and asked, “You do not know how to play mṛdaṅga ?” With a movement of his hand, he indicated to his flustered disciple that he wanted the drum, and then he showed him how he wanted him to play it. He played the classic combination of the beats that he had taught everyone in the beginning: ta ti, ri-ti-ri-ti ta, ka-ti-ta, ka-ti-ta, ge, dhin dha, dhin ta, ge-ta. “Like that,” he said, and handed the drum back.

This incident taught me a lesson. Hansadutta had not played wrong, technically speaking; he was an expert musician and played the mṛdaṅga better than any of us. But when he played in his own way, Prabhupāda didn’t like it. He made it clear that he preferred the standard accompaniment, even though it was simple, instead of intricate “drum fireworks” which might distract from the actual song.

In the afternoon of the third day of Prabhupāda’s visit, he held a press conference in the castle’s reception room. Prabhupāda sat on “the German vyāsāsana,” a simple wooden dais painted white and with no backrest. It was built to have his picture on it. Nobody had imagined that he would actually sit on it one day. Therefore, it was hardly wide enough to accommodate him.

NIKUÑJAVĀSIṆĪ DĀSĪ: When I heard that Prabhupāda would hold a press conference and that we were invited, I went downstairs early. Only two or three reporters were in the room. In one corner stood Prabhupāda’s seat, and in front of it were rows of chairs. Feeling kind of shy I just sat on the floor in the opposite corner and waited, and as the devotees came in, they began occupying the chairs. Then Śrīla Prabhupāda entered the room. When he saw his disciples sitting on chairs, he indicated that they should sit on the floor, even though most of the chairs were empty because only a few more reporters had come. It was clear to me after this that a disciple should always take a humble position in front of his spiritual master and never sit on the same level. Naturally, I felt good that I was already on the floor and had acted in a way pleasing to Śrīla Prabhupāda.

In the evening, Prabhupāda lectured again on the Bhagavad-gītā. This time he chose text 13 of the second chapter: dehino ’smin yathā dehe kaumāraṁ yauvanaṁ jarā. As he started to explain the meaning, a child began to cry. Śrīla Prabhupāda chuckled. Generally, he became annoyed when interrupted while he was giving class. When the devotees saw their spiritual master take the disturbance in stride, they were relieved and also laughed. Prabhupāda used the child’s crying to make a point: So on one side, profit; on one side, loss. On one side, you get a child; and on the other side, you cannot hear. This is the material world. As soon as you get some profit here, on another side there is loss. As soon as you want to construct a big skyscraper, on another side there is digging earth. Śrīla Prabhupāda pointed out the foolishness of modern man, who engages in “digging and piling,” never questioning the usefulness of his endeavor. Man never considers that he will soon have to leave his body against his will, and he shows no interest in the message of the Bhagavadgītā that you are not this body, but the proprietor within. Then he explained that the word “occupier” is actually more appropriate than the word “proprietor: If you rent a house, the proprietor is a different man. The tenant is the occupier; no proprietorship. So I am the spirit soul. I am not the proprietor. I am simply an occupier. The rascal materialists do not know that the proprietor is the Supreme Personality of Godhead and that He is giving me a particular apartment according to my capacity for paying rent. This is my position; otherwise, why doesn’t everyone get a first-class body—a king’s body or rich man’s body? One child is born and immediately he is a rich man. So there is no arrangement? And another child born at the same moment is a very poor man. Why? Because if I am able to pay more rent, I transfer to another, very luxurious apartment. Or if I cannot pay the present rent, then I have to move to another, less expensive apartment.

Then Prabhupāda described how the environment affects our consciousness: A poor man living in a poor cottage or very unclean apartment, his mentality is one way. Another respectable gentleman living in a very nice house, his mentality is different. So according to the circumstances, the mental changes are there, but both men are human beings. Similarly, there are so many apartments, or different types of bodies: 8,400,000 types of bodies. The occupier, the living being or the soul, is of the same quality, but according to the apartment or body he has occupied, he has developed a certain consciousness and mentality.

He reminded his young audience that their birth in a developed country such as Germany was a testimony of past pious activities and offered them a great opportunity for self-realization: If you have done nicely to occupy a first-class apartment, then nature will give you a nice body. Therefore I say repeatedly that you Western boys and girls, you are given a very good chance by nature. Once upon a time, the European people were dominating all over the world, because they are very intelligent. They have got good resources, good, nice body, beautiful body. Everything is very good. But don’t spoil it; use it for understanding further good.

He said that misidentification with one’s land of birth should not let us forget that God is the creator and therefore the actual proprietor of everything: Why am I falsely identifying myself with the land? ‘I am German because I am born in this land of Germany.’ That is also false. No land is Germany or France or England. Land is land. You have falsely named it: ‘This is Germany.’ What is this Germany? Say two or three hundred years ago, there was no Germany. The land was created by God. So it is God’s property. Where is the difficulty to understand? You did not create anything, not even your own body. That proprietor is also Kṛṣṇa. Because as soon as Kṛṣṇa asks you, ‘Please vacate,’ you must vacate immediately. Can you remain in this body? The proprietor asks you to vacate. So you have to vacate. Or the proprietor does not repair it. Then you voluntarily vacate: ‘This is not useful anymore.

Returning to the Sanskrit verse Śrīla Prabhupāda illustrated another meaning, namely, the imperceptible nature of the bodily changes and how the soul, as an observer, is always the same: So it is to be understood that I existed in the past in a different body. As I existed, say seventy years before in a different body, I was jumping as a boy. Now I cannot jump; now I have to use the cane. This is a different body. If the same body still existed, then I could jump like a boy. I remember that I jumped. But now it is not possible. I have to take the help of three men. He laughed, and the devotees joined in. He was in a jolly mood, pleased to see many young faces. He hoped that they would take Kṛṣṇa consciousness seriously before their bodies dwindled with old age and the great opportunity to achieve perfection within this life was lost.

On the next day’s morning walk, Śrīla Prabhupāda further described transmigration: “Transmigration means, the first body you lose; you enter a second body, a third body, fourth. So your childhood body is not existing. Therefore you are in a youthful body or an adult’s body.” When he asked for possible objections, Satsvarūpa Mahārāja argued that a materialist doesn’t see how this applies to taking another body. “We can’t perceive how the change from one body to another takes place. We can perceive that we have changed from children to old men, but we cannot perceive what will happen after death. So who knows.

Śrīla Prabhupāda addressed the objection. He talked about dreams: “Some tiger is coming. You are crying, ‘Save me! Save me!’ It is an illusion— this body is also an illusion—but you are affected. That means you are experiencing. And when in a dream you see your beloved, there is no such thing, but still, there is discharge. Why? How you can say that you are not perceiving. It is perceiving. What is the answer?”

When none of his disciples gave answers, Śrīla Prabhupāda explained that the materialists tend to discard these subtle experiences as illusory, whereas they accept gross, tangible phenomena as real. “You are perceiving every night that you leave this body. You accept another body and do something else, which you see. If that is an illusion, then this world you see before you is also an illusion because in the daytime you forget the night’s activities, and at night you forget the day’s activities. So this is also an illusion. You are thinking: I am American, I am Indian, German. What is that? By one kick of nature you are out: Become a cat or dog! This is also an illusion. What is not illusion?”

Prabhupāda stated the only sensible conclusion: “Therefore the question is, Where is my real life? That is Kṛṣṇa consciousness. When one understands, ‘This is illusion, and that is also illusion, so where is my actual life?’—that is Kṛṣṇa consciousness.”

Hansadutta began to talk about the experiences mediums appear to have with the dead, but Śrīla Prabhupāda stopped him and refocused his attention on the point. “They may think like that,” he said, “but this is a practical thing. Try to understand that in the daytime you are illusioned by this gross body, and at night you are illusioned by the subtle body. So both of them are illusory. Therefore, if you are intelligent, your inquiry should be, What is my real life? That is intelligence.”

Mādhavānanda said that transmigration would eventually stop as a result of such inquiry, and Śrīla Prabhupāda elaborated: “Yes. A devotee’s understanding is that ‘I am the eternal servant of Kṛṣṇa. So let me surrender to Kṛṣṇa as He wants and serve Him.’ This is life. As soon as he is on this platform, then he is out of illusion. And if he is perfect, then just after giving up this body, he goes to Kṛṣṇa. This is the process. If he does not fall from this transcendental service of Kṛṣṇa, then immediately after death he is transferred, just as we are transferred from this gross body to the subtle body. Similarly, after death, a devotee is transferred immediately to where Kṛṣṇa is. Then he actually plays with Kṛṣṇa, dances with Kṛṣṇa, and talks with Kṛṣṇa.”

Mādhavānanda raised another point: “Śrīla Prabhupāda, once you said that to stop transmigration one has to become completely disgusted with the material world.”

When Prabhupāda confirmed this, Satsvarūpa Mahārāja asked, “What about Lord Caitanya’s prayer that ‘I don’t mind coming back again and again?’”

“That is a devotee’s sincerity,” Prabhupāda clarified, “that he does not go to Kṛṣṇa for some material profit. In any condition, he is Kṛṣṇa conscious. That is his humbleness. An actual devotee does not want it, but it happens; otherwise, how is it that Kṛṣṇa says janma karma ca me divyam? It will take place automatically. But he is not very concerned that ‘I must go to Kṛṣṇa and be saved from these material miseries.’ A devotee never says like that. He wants that ‘Never mind miseries. Let me chant Hare Kṛṣṇa.’ That is his position.”

Satsvarūpa Mahārāja added that for the devotee, the perfection is to be absorbed in preaching to others, not thinking, ‘I want to go and play with Kṛṣṇa.’ Prabhupāda agreed and explained unconditional devotional service: “A devotee does not bargain with Kṛṣṇa: ‘Kṛṣṇa will give me this benefit; therefore I want to become a pure devotee.’ That is a merchant: ‘You pay me this price; I will deliver this clothing.’ That is not devotion. Aśliṣya vā pāda-ratāṁ pinaṣṭu māṁ marma-hatāṁ karotu vā: In any condition I am your slave. Whatever You like, you can do with me. That is the sign. Not that ‘If it is favorable to my idea, then I accept You.’ That is not devotion. Anyābhilāṣita śunyam: no desire. Only ‘Please accept me as Your eternal servant again.’ Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura sings, mārobhi rākobhi jo icchā tohārā: ‘Now, if You like, You can kill me. If You like, You can keep me. Whatever You like, I am prepared.’ Mārobhi rākobhi jo icchā tohārā. That is surrender.

Meeting Professor Dürckheim That afternoon Śrīla Prabhupāda received Professor Karlfried Graf Dürckheim, a well-known author, who had studied Zen Buddhism in Japan after World War II and now headed a following of people interested in Zen in the Black Forest in Southern Germany. Even Catholic bishops sometimes visited him to discuss esoteric subjects.

PṚTHU DĀSA: In my school days, I had read several of Dürckheim’s books, and it was me who sent him a letter and invited him. When I called him a week later to follow up, he showed a lot of interest.

On the morning of June 19, I met him at the Frankfurt train station and drove him to Schloss Rettershof. When we passed through the villages, Dürckheim saw the posters we had put up to advertise Prabhupāda’s visit. Hansadutta had had the “brilliant idea” to borrow a famous Nazi slogan used to announce Hitler’s visits. The posters said in huge letters: DER FÜHRER KOMMT [“The leader comes”], and in smaller print: “der Hare Kṛṣṇa Bewegung” [of the Hare Kṛṣṇa movement]. When I saw the layout in his office, I had implored Hansadutta not to hang these posters, they were a great insult. But he had simply laughed at me and said, “Come on, the Germans like this sort of thing.”

As we passed, I saw that on numerous posters Prabhupāda’s face had been disfigured with little Hitler-like mustaches. When Dürckheim noticed the posters, he expressed disbelief. “Is this your guru?” I felt a cold sweat break out. “Yes,” I muttered.

“Are you serious?” he asked.

“Yes,” I repeated. “But these posters were not my idea. I fought against them, but it was not in my power to prevent them.”

“You people don’t know what you are doing,” he said, shaking his head. “You really don’t know what you are doing. I am almost thinking of going back, but now that I am already here, let us go on.”

It was clear he was upset and disappointed by our immaturity. But when he met Śrīla Prabhupāda he quickly appreciated and respected him, and they developed a cordial relationship.

The meeting began around five o’clock. Fortunately, Graf Dürckheim spoke fluent English. He briefly explained his background and how he was trying to help people discover their real self. Prabhupāda got right to the point of Kṛṣṇa consciousness. He mentioned the three aspects of the Absolute Truth—Brahman, Paramātmā, and Bhagavān—and said that we devotees cultivate our relationship with the third aspect, the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Kṛṣṇa. Then he asked his guest which aspect he cultivated.

The professor said, “You can’t help but cultivate all three in the long run,” and Prabhupāda agreed. All three were one; only one’s angle of vision differed. He gave the example of a mountain seen from far away (as a hazy cloud), midway (something green), and nearby (an elevation with animals and houses). Prabhupāda said most people see the Absolute Truth impersonally, without variegatedness.

Dürckheim said that Zen Buddhists had that conception, but Prabhupāda pointed out a distinction between impersonalism and voidism. Buddhists strive to stop all realization and become zero or void, he said. At this point, the professor presented his understanding of nirvana: “Well, zero from the point of view of the alter ego, but this zero is everything from the outside. From the point of view of the natural ego, it’s zero, but once you touch it, it’s the plenitude—everything. But it’s beyond something and everything, as far as I understand it.”

“Yes, it is beyond,” Prabhupāda said. “That ‘beyond’ is realized, as I explained to you, from different angles of vision: impersonal, without any variety; localized Supersoul; and the Supreme Being. As you are sitting and I am sitting and we are talking, so the Absolute Truth is a person, the Supreme Person, and we approach Him, talk with Him, sit with Him, and play with Him. That is Kṛṣṇa realization.

Śrīla Prabhupāda then analyzed why most philosophers are impersonalists and negate material varieties. He gave the example of a diseased man who feels pain while eating, sleeping, and evacuating and therefore wants to nullify all activities. When told that in good health he will again eat, sleep, and evacuate, he thinks it will be as painful as in his diseased condition. He doesn’t know that healthy life is different.

“Some philosophers are trying to negate this diseased condition only,” Prabhupāda said, “without any realization of healthy life. So I think Buddha’s philosophy is negation of this diseased condition of life, pain and pleasure. Am I right or wrong?”

Dürckheim agreed but added that illness or dying could also serve as a threshold to a different reality. When Dürckheim used the term “dead person,” Prabhupāda could understand that his visitor lacked understanding of the difference between matter and spirit.

“Just like this microphone is made of iron,” he said, pointing to the microphone on his desk. “It is iron. When it is working, responding, at that time it is also iron. And when it is out of order, it is also iron. Similarly, this body is working on account of the living force within. When the living force is out, the body is called dead. But actually, it is dead always. The living force is the important thing. That is keeping the body alive. Actually, alive or dead, the body is dead matter. But the living force is the active principle. That is the beginning instruction of Bhagavad-gītā.”

Professor Dürckheim was intrigued. One of his main concerns was to transmit a similar truth to his followers, but he had achieved only limited success. Now he had an opportunity to get expert advice from an experienced guru. Philosophical conviction was one thing, realization, something else.

“How do you teach your disciples to become aware of this force that is not matter?” he asked.

“It is a very simple thing,” Prabhupāda replied. “Just like one body is moving, and another body is not moving. There is an active principle that makes the body move, and when it is absent, the body is not moving. Now, the question will be, What is that active principle? Let him distinguish the difference between a dead body and a living body. If a student is unaware of it, he can at least see that on account of the active principle, the body is changing, the body is moving, and in the absence of the active principle, the body neither changes nor moves. Just like in our childhood, we used to think that in the gramophone box there is a man, and he is speaking from the box. This is a childish suggestion only, but similarly, anyone can think that within this body something is making the body move. It is not very big philosophy.

Dürckheim readily agreed, but he was looking for a clue on how to make a seeker feel the reality of spiritual truth, not just understand it with his rational mind. He said, “I realize that on the inner way, it becomes more and more important to feel deeper and deeper realities. That’s why, in my little work, I make a distinction between the body you have and the body you are. Usually, if you go to a doctor, he sees only the body you have. He tackles it like a machine. If somebody with stooped shoulders comes, he says, ‘Well, you must do exercises.’ If somebody with shoulders like that comes to me, I say, ‘The body you have shows that you have no confidence. So get an attitude of confidence.’ So he gets to know the body he is, not only the body he has, which doesn’t at all touch on wisdom.”

Śrīla Prabhupāda avoided getting drawn in by the professor’s jargon. He simply repeated the first lesson of the Bhagavad-gītā: that the real self is the active principle within the body. Then he elaborated: “When one is self-realized, then he is jolly. Prasannātmā: he is never morose; he is jolly. Na śocati na kāṅkṣati: he has no lamentation, no hankering. Samaḥ sarveṣu bhūteṣu: he is equal to everyone—man, animal, and everything. And mad-bhaktiṁ labhate parām: then devotional life begins. So, without self-realization, there is no question of devotional life. Just like these boys, my students, they are trained up how to be always in devotional service. One who is engaged in devotional service is supposed to be already selfrealized because he has understood what he is. Yes. And then he sticks to devotional service; otherwise, he cannot. If one thinks, ‘I am this body,’ then he cannot be engaged in devotional service, or he cannot stick. If he knows, ‘I am part and parcel of God, so my duty is to serve God,’ this is self-realization. And then he engages himself in devotional service.” Dürckheim repeated his concern that this knowledge was based only on rational understanding instead of experience. Śrīla Prabhupāda disagreed and asked Satsvarūpa Mahārāja to read text 26 of the Fourteenth Chapter of the Bhagavad-gītā: “One who engages in full devotional service, unfailing in all circumstances, at once transcends the modes of material nature and thus comes to the level of Brahman.”

Referring to his disciples in the room, Prabhupāda said, “They are always engaged in devotional service. So unless there is some realization, how they can engage their time in this way?

Then he gave another example to show how the devotees have both theoretical knowledge and realization. “Why should you kill animals? Why should you give trouble to others? This is self-realization: ‘Here is another self; the same active principle is working there. Just the body is different. Why shall I kill him?’ So they have realized it. Samaḥ sarveṣu bhūteṣu: equal vision toward all living entities. The self, the active principle, is working in the fish, in the insect, in the tree, in the plant, within the animals, within the birds, and within me. That active principle is the soul, and the soul is migrating from one body to another, as you are migrating from babyhood to childhood, childhood to boyhood, boyhood to youth. This is selfrealization. So the soul is the same. The body is different. The body is material, and the soul is spiritual. When one comes to this understanding, that is self-realization.”

Dürckheim still seemed preoccupied with finding out how to teach and monitor spiritual advancement. He continued, “On the way, there should be progress, inner progress. How to realize that there is progress? I would say one thing is very important. There are three sufferings in the world of mankind: fear of annihilation, despair if you are taken by something absurd, and loneliness.” He went on to explain how, in his opinion, a person makes progress if he realizes a greater meaning amid the calamities. “I always see with my disciples,” he said, “as soon as they learn to go through some kind of death, they awaken on a new level. They realize there is a different principle at work from that which they usually see in their natural mind.”

Śrīla Prabhupāda put the idea immediately into a Kṛṣṇa conscious framework: “So that different principle for a devotee is already realized. Because a devotee never thinks ‘I am this body.’ He thinks, ahaṁ brahmāsmi: ‘I am spirit soul.’ Everyone in this world is concerned with this body, dead or alive. When it is alive, they dress it very nicely—nicely groomed, nicely everything on account of this body—and when dead, they erect a statue, a tomb. That’s all. But they are missing the active principle.” Dürckheim told Śrīla Prabhupāda about his experience during World War I, when he fought for four years on the front lines and saw many people next to him die. He said that in these situations he realized something that had nothing to do with death, and this realization marked the beginning of his inner way. Prabhupāda acknowledged that this was indeed self-realization, and he explained that one of the symptoms of a selfrealized soul was fearlessness in all circumstances.

The professor returned to his question about self-realization as a sequence of inner experiences, especially painful ones, and gave the example of people who experienced the war and the nights of bombing and suddenly realized the temporary nature of bodily existence.

Prabhupāda wryly interjected, “That we can experience every night. At night I forget this body, and in the daytime, I forget the dream body, but I am existing. Therefore I am not this body.”

Dürckheim then asked a question about the meaning of time and eternity. Prabhupāda explained that time is eternal, but that we perceive past, present, and future according to our temporary material existence in a certain type of body. His guest agreed. “Exactly!” he said. “It is concerned with this body and with this ego, with regard to which there is a before and an after, up and down, and if you take away this ego—what is there? What’s left?”

“That is pure ego,” Prabhupāda said.

Dürckheim responded, “But without this body, you wouldn’t become conscious of what is beyond the body.”

“I am always conscious,” Prabhupāda pointed out. “Now our consciousness is impure on account of contact with this temporary body. So when you come to pure consciousness, that is Kṛṣṇa consciousness.” Professor Dürckheim still did not understand. “But the pure consciousness, as an experience, has to have a background which is not pure consciousness; otherwise, it could become...”

Śrīla Prabhupāda interrupted him. “No. Pure consciousness is actually what you are. Just like water. Water is pure. When it comes from the sky, it is crystal-clear water. But as soon as it touches the ground it becomes muddy. Similarly, we spirit souls are pure. As soon as we come in contact with matter, material existence, we become impure.” Prabhupāda then gave an unusual example to illustrate the meaning of pure consciousness. “Just like sometimes the artists manufacture some naked statue. In France, I saw—naked. They take it that this naked statue is pure art, not dressed. Similarly, when you come to the nakedness of spirit soul, without the designation of this body—I am American, I am German, I am this, I am that—that is purity.”

Dürckheim reasoned like a Zen Buddhist. “But the meaning of the impure is to be the background of the consciousness of the pure, without experiencing the suffering in the impure.

“The consciousness is covered by impurity just like your health is covered by disease,” Prabhupāda explained. “And the symptom is fever. But that is a covering. That is not your healthy state. Similarly, when I think that I am American, or I am German, that is impurity. And when I think that I am neither German nor American nor this, nor that, but that I am part and parcel of God, that is pure consciousness.”

Dürckheim remained doubtful. He argued: “But to get there, to feel that one is neither this nor that, one must have suffered by first having thought that one is this or that.” Prabhupāda shook his head. He pointed out that suffering on account of the material body was in itself a kind of dream caused by ignorance. He repeated that our real task is to get free from all designations and realize our actual identity as sons of God and serve Him. Again the professor said that for him there was a gulf of difference between believing something and actually feeling or experiencing it. For him, the question of how to prepare a disciple to feel the truth was still unanswered. Śrīla Prabhupāda told him that the answer was simple. He gave the example of a child who has not seen his father but who believes that he has a father because otherwise, he would not exist. Quoting a verse from the Bhagavad-gītā Prabhupāda explained that Kṛṣṇa is the seed-giving father of all living entities, and material nature is the mother who provides the bodies. Consequently, all sons are spiritually equal, but because they identify with their bodies, they are in difficulty. The only solution was self-realization: “I am not this body.”

The professor still insisted on the need for experience, not just theoretical knowledge. And Prabhupāda made it clear that everyone already had the experience because everyone changed his body many times within one lifespan. Everyone knew that he once had a child’s body, but that his body was now different. Only on account of foolishness, this insight was clouded.

He pointed out that the best way to gain experience was to receive higher knowledge: “The more you are highly elevated in knowledge, your experience is perfect.”

“I would like to say it’s the other way around,” Dürckheim said. “The more you advance in experience, the more you have higher knowledge.” “But experience may be slow,” Prabhupāda countered. “Higher knowledge you can get immediately. Kṛṣṇa says that you are not this body. So instead of my experience for years and years that I am not this body, we take the knowledge from Kṛṣṇa, the Perfect, and my experience is now received.”

When Dürckheim nodded in agreement this time, Prabhupāda went on to explain the Vedic process of receiving knowledge from a spiritual master in disciplic succession and distributing the knowledge unchanged. He reminded the professor that our power of understanding is very minute, but that we can experience things beyond our grasp by hearing a description from a proper source. “We have to receive knowledge from the Perfect, not through the ascending process, experiencing failure, experiencing failure, experiencing failure, not like that. That will take a long time. But if you actually want to be perfect, just approach the Perfect, take knowledge from Him, and you become perfect.

Graf Dürckheim had no objection, and the matter was settled. Eager to discuss more topics, he described to Śrīla Prabhupāda the condition of Western civilization. People were showing signs of rebellion against their so-called leaders in science and technology, who reduced them to mere objects and ignored their real needs as persons. Śrīla Prabhupāda agreed with his analysis and pointed out that the same observation had already been made five thousand years ago in the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam (7.5.31): na te viduḥ svārtha-gatiṁ hi viṣṇum. Materialistic people do not know that the aim of life is God-realization, because they falsely think they can achieve happiness by enjoying the external features of material nature. And owing to their leaders’ blindness, the whole society is misguided. The solution was Kṛṣṇa consciousness because it treated the root cause of the disease—forgetfulness of God. Dürckheim agreed and noted that separation from the innermost reality is unique to the human being; animals did not suffer from such a disease.

The mention of animals prompted Prabhupāda to bring to his guest’s attention the degraded condition of a society that indulged in the unnecessary slaughter of animals for food. He explained that wars and abortion were karmic consequences of cruelty to animals, and he reminded his guest that no religion allowed unnecessary animal slaughter. In response, Dürckheim asked about plants. Didn’t they also suffer when taken for food? Śrīla Prabhupāda confirmed that they had sensations, but he said that a devotee takes the fruits of a plant and avoids cutting the plant itself unless absolutely necessary, as in the case of vegetables. Even that was the law of nature: one living being eats another living being. But then he made it clear that a devotee’s main concern is whether or not his food has been accepted by Kṛṣṇa and has become prasādam.

“We don’t advocate vegetarianism or non-vegetarianism,” Prabhupāda said. “We advocate: ‘Eat Kṛṣṇa’s prasādam, the remnants of foodstuff offered to Kṛṣṇa.’ This is our philosophy. And apart from this philosophy, just because one living entity is food for another living entity, it does not mean that I shall eat my children also. There is discretion. Human beings should offer fruits, vegetables, milk to God, Kṛṣṇa, as prescribed in the śāstra, and then take. That is human civilization. Not that for the satisfaction of the tongue we have to maintain a big, big slaughterhouse and eat animals. No, that is not human civilization. The main business of human society is to understand God, and as soon as we understand God, we understand that every living entity is part and parcel of Kṛṣṇa. Then how we can eat? Because Kṛṣṇa eats, Kṛṣṇa allows, then we eat. So the responsibility is Kṛṣṇa’s. That is our philosophy.

The conversation had been going on for almost two hours, but Śrīla Prabhupāda didn’t feel tired; rather, he was enlivened. Preaching was his life and soul, and he appreciated having a thoughtful listener with meaningful questions. While he showed Professor Dürckheim copies of his books in different languages, a devotee brought in more visitors: three professors of theology and philosophy from Frankfurt University and an Indian man who headed the Society for Yoga and Integral Philosophical Studies in Germany. Prabhupāda welcomed them warmly, and after they had made themselves comfortable, he asked a devotee to give each guest some prasādam.

He then informed them about his conversation with Professor Dürckheim, how they had discussed the goal of life, and he told them that there could be only one goal: to understand God. Prabhupāda said that all his writings were focused on this one goal of life: Kṛṣṇa.

When he paused, Dürckheim raised a concern, shared by the other professors. It was the same topic he had tried to clarify all evening. “May I come back to my question about the relationship between belief and experience, because this is a great question for us today, especially in religious circles?” One of the theologians confirmed that this was a fact. Encouraged, Dürckheim formulated his observations more concretely than before. He described a crisis of faith that many priests had undergone and their longing for a tangible spiritual experience, not mere formalism and traditional belief. One professor remarked that a religious renewal was underway, and that priests and monks were looking for a new source and a new beginning in their hearts.

Śrīla Prabhupāda didn’t dismiss their concern as speculative or sentimental, but he said that no one could avoid believing. The question was who to believe. “If the person I believe is perfect, then my belief is perfect. And if I believe a person who is not trustworthy, then there is no meaning to that belief. Therefore we have to find out the person or the statement which we are to believe.”

Professor Dürckheim pointed out that belief or understanding depended on the mind, whereas he was referring to another, deeper level. “You see, there is a natural way to look at God, which is lost as soon as people go through the rational mind. And then there is no other way out but to have a personally initiated experience. We talk about initiation when people are capable of going through a certain death to discover another level. The great wisdom that you are talking about, I am sure it also touches people on two levels. There is the ordinary man, and he might believe, but there is a deeper level, where things start to change you, to transform you in deeper experiences.

Śrīla Prabhupāda didn’t get involved in an esoteric discussion. He had Satsvarūpa Mahārāja read Text 13 of the Second Chapter of the Bhagavad-gītā, then said, “This is the basic principle of knowledge: ‘I am not this body. I am the active principle within this body.’ Then further knowledge can be understood.”

At this point, Dürckheim voiced a common doubt among Christian thinkers: “It seems to me that there is a difference between Eastern wisdom and Christian thinking in that in the Eastern way, we have to get rid of our body, be liberated from our body, whereas Christian thinkers feel we have to realize the spirit within the body.”

In response, Śrīla Prabhupāda said that all our suffering was due to being imprisoned in the material body, and therefore our aim should be to become free from it. One theologian objected. He found this view too negative and felt we should accept our human existence even though it is imperfect. When Prabhupāda repeated that we should strive for perfection, the man challenged: “As human beings or spirits?” He added that he was seeing only human beings; therefore, the problem was how to become perfect—as human beings. When Prabhupāda asked him what he liked so much about the imperfect human body, the professor said the body is an instrument to communicate with other people. Prabhupāda pointed out that the birds and beasts also communicate, and that the purpose of human life is to inquire about the Absolute Truth.

Dürckheim tried to reconcile the differences. He said that there are three types of bodily consciousness: one concerned with health, one with beauty, and the third with the Absolute Truth. All three went together. Śrīla Prabhupāda welcomed his analysis but also noted that the bodily appreciation of beauty, or anything related to the body, was false because we are not actually the body. Quoting Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam (1.2.10) he said we should not waste our time with the body like birds or beasts but use it for inquiring about the Absolute.

The theologian disagreed. “Think of the smiling of a child,” he said. “It’s the first communication with man. Is it a waste of our energy if we try to do good to others, if we smile and be kind?”

“But you cannot do good to others, because you do not know what is good,” Prabhupāda argued. “You are thinking of good in terms of your body, but the body is false. It is not you. It is false in the sense that you are accepting this body as your self. But you are not that. Therefore this conception of goodness is also false.” A moment of silence ensued. “But I live my identity with the body,” the professor reasoned. In an effort to clarify the man’s misunderstanding, Prabhupāda gave the example of a person being different from his apartment. But his guest thought the example was inappropriate because an apartment remained unchanged after one left it, whereas the body did not. Prabhupāda responded that it was a question of hours and years only; after a certain time, the apartment would also be destroyed. He repeated that the soul is different from the body, but the theologian insisted that an intimate connection, a kind of oneness, existed between body and soul.

Then the yoga teacher joined the discussion. He noted that it made a difference whether one thought “I am spirit, and I have a body,” or “I am the body, and I possess a soul.”

Prabhupāda appreciated his comment: “Yes, yes! That is his mistake: to think that he is the body and possesses a soul. But no, he is the soul and is covered by a body.” Then he compared a coat covering the body to the body covering the soul.

Dürckheim changed the subject. He asked, “How to realize the ultimate truth, and what do you mean by realizing the eternal truth?” Before Prabhupāda could answer, one of the theology professors presented his understanding: “In the Bible, it says that our whole life should be dedicated to knowing the Father.”

Dürckheim said to Prabhupāda, “That is exactly what you say, that real life, eternal life, means nothing but to recognize the Father in the son.” When asked about the method to realize the Absolute Truth, Prabhupāda replied, “The simplest method is to associate with the Father, or the Absolute Truth.” He explained the absolute nature of God and the spiritual world, and that therefore by chanting the holy name of God one could associate with God. Dürckheim suggested that he was referring to the holy name of Kṛṣṇa, but Prabhupāda corrected him: “Holy name of God. If you don’t like to chant Kṛṣṇa, you chant in your own way. Chant the name of God. If you know the name of God, chant it. If you do not know, then take it from me.”

The devotees chuckled. There was no escaping Prabhupāda’s logic. He explained that God has millions of names, and therefore it is sometimes said that He has no name because one could not say, “This one name is God’s only name.” When he mentioned that Jesus also prayed, "Hallowed be Thy name," a theologian objected that Jesus didn't specify a particular name, because actually, God had no name.

Prabhupāda looked at him with surprise and said, “How can He have no name? It says, ‘Hallowed be Thy name.’ He has a name.”

The visitor argued that there was no name in the Bible, but Prabhupāda said, “Jesus might not have mentioned, or you have not noted, but when he says, ‘Hallowed be Thy name,’ there must be the name. Therefore I said, ‘If you don’t know the name, you take it from us.’ That is intelligence.” Then one of the guests asked Śrīla Prabhupāda to describe the process of chanting. Prabhupāda explained that the first step was to hear. For that reason, he was writing so many books—to give people a chance to hear. Only after hearing properly was it possible to chant, then remember, worship the Deity, pray, and so on. One theologian said that prayer was important in Christianity, and Prabhupāda acknowledged that it was a form of bhakti. But he noted that people did not like to follow a standard method; everyone formed his own opinion and therefore the result was dissension, a symptom of Kali-yuga. Society needed a class of qualified men who understood the Absolute Truth and could teach the rest of the population.

The discussion then focused on the qualifications needed to pursue the process of self-realization, and Prabhupāda had Satsvarūpa Mahārāja read the brahminical qualities from the Bhagavad-gītā. He said it made no difference whether one followed the Bhagavad-gītā or Jesus Christ, but the problem was that people did not follow either. One professor objected that these were only material qualifications, but Prabhupāda cut him off: “First of all acquire these material qualifications. Then talk of spiritual. Just like in the university—if someone wants to study law, he must first graduate from a lower college.”

The atmosphere had become tense, so Dürckheim struck a positive note. He complimented Śrīla Prabhupāda by saying that in his opinion the message of Kṛṣṇa consciousness would be much appreciated by the youth in the West, who were more concerned with realizing their real selves than with dedicating their lives to economic development. But the theology professor, dissatisfied with Prabhupāda’s explanation of how to attain selfrealization, asked whether it was necessarily a gradual process and an impossibility to become illuminated at once by God’s grace.

“Chant Hare Kṛṣṇa, that will do,” Prabhupāda said. Then he added, “Not that you chant the name of Kṛṣṇa. You have got your name of God. You chant that.” But the man remained unsure that a particular name was actually a name of God.

“Why you are doubtful?” Prabhupāda asked. “There is the name. If you do not know, take it from us.” He chuckled.

The professor admitted, “I’m not convinced that it is the right name.” “That is your misfortune,” Prabhupāda said, and the devotees couldn’t hold back their laughter. “That is your misfortune. How can I help? You do not know the name. If somebody is informing you, ‘Here is the name,’ you still will not take. That is your misfortune. What can be done? An unfortunate man cannot be helped.”

The man explained his reasons. He had been in Africa and seen people chant names in a similar fashion, and he felt that it was difficult to know the right thing. Prabhupāda gave him a clue: judge by the result. His guest acknowledged that this would indeed be a valid criterion for him. One of his colleagues noted that he had seldom seen so many happy faces as when observing the devotees. Prabhupāda told them that once a priest approached him during a flight from Los Angeles to Hawaii and asked, “How is it that your disciples look so bright?” Prabhupāda gave more examples of how people had appreciated Kṛṣṇa consciousness, and how his disciples, though still young, had sacrificed their comfortable lives and given up everything in search of God.

“Unless it is something sublime, how are they accepting it?” he asked. Concluding his presentation, he appealed to his visitors: “So I think you are all learned gentlemen. You should give us support and cooperate with this movement. It is a very nice movement. That is my request to you.” Satsvarūpa Mahārāja felt that it was the right moment to end the conversation because it was already late. “May we take your leave, Śrīla Prabhupāda?” he suggested.

Prabhupāda waved his hand in disapproval. “No. You sit down. I can talk all night.” The devotees laughed in appreciation. “Because it is Kṛṣṇa’s talk: satataṁ kīrtayanto mām. Why stop? Satatam. Go on.

Continuously.”

When one guest asked how he could support the movement, Prabhupāda replied, “That is simple. You chant Hare Kṛṣṇa. That’s all.” Hansadutta explained that anyone could become a life member. The yoga teacher said that he could remove prejudices by speaking on behalf of the devotees. Prabhupāda appreciated all their suggestions; whatever a person wanted to offer was welcome and would be for his ultimate spiritual benefit.

With the atmosphere now relaxed, Śrīla Prabhupāda enjoyed showing his visitors his dictaphone and explaining how he wrote his books at night. In 1973 alone, he said, four million copies were sold worldwide. His guests were amazed to see books in Spanish, Arabic, Japanese, Hindi, French, and Italian. Prabhupāda talked about the need for self-sufficient farm communities, Kṛṣṇa conscious education, and the ISKCON Food Relief program in India. While Hansadutta played a tape of the morning’s recording, “The Prayers to the Six Gosvāmīs,” the yoga teacher asked about yoga exercises while chanting the names of God.

“Yes,” Prabhupāda said, “but we are exercising by dancing.”

Soon after, everyone left, and Prabhupāda retired to his bedroom for a short rest. Within a few hours, he would again sit at his desk and continue to preach by dictating his Bhaktivedanta purports.

PṚTHU DĀSA: During the walk the next morning Śrīla Prabhupāda followed up on the topic of chanting the name of God.

When Graf Dürckheim presented the Christian concept that the word “God” is the name of God and that nothing more is needed, Prabhupāda shook his head and said, “This is not a very sensible argument.” But Professor Dürckheim didn’t feel offended. In fact, at the end of their conversation the night before he had bowed down to Śrīla Prabhupāda and said, “Please accept me as your younger brother.”

When I brought him to the train station later that morning, he told me, “I am very impressed. This is the first time I have met a man like this. He is through.” By this, he meant that Śrīla Prabhupāda had already “gone to the other side” and reached the perfectional stage of life.

One evening, as Prabhupāda continued his lectures on the Second Chapter of the Bhagavad-gītā, he discussed Text 14. He explained that while birth, death, old age, and disease are common to all, distress and happiness vary according to the body. He described death as the moment when pain is so severe and unbearable that you are forced to leave your body even though you don’t want to. Then he spoke about an acquaintance in Allahabad who was only fifty years old when he was on his deathbed. The man had desperately implored the doctor to let him live for four more years so he could execute his unfinished plans.

“What can the doctor do?” Prabhupāda asked. “That is not possible, sir. You must get out!”

To the devotees’ amusement, he then described the misery a child experiences when he has to go to school. “At least I was like that,” Prabhupāda said and laughed. “I never wanted to go to school. And my father was very kind. He said, ‘So why are you not going to school?’ I would say, ‘I will go tomorrow.’ He would say, ‘All right.’ But my mother was very careful. Perhaps, if my mother would not have been a little strict, I would not have gotten any education. My father was very lenient. So she used to force me. One man would take me to school. Actually, children do not want to go to school; they want to play. Against their will, they have to go to school. So, you study life. From the beginning of this body, within the womb of the mother, it is simply troublesome. Against my will, so many distresses are there. Then as you grow, the distresses grow and grow.” He described how miseries disturb us constantly, and he said that a sane man’s duty is to stop accepting a material body. “Now realize that you are changing your condition of distress and happiness, being forced to accept some kind of gross and subtle body. That is the cause of your pains and pleasures. And if you get out of this gross and subtle body and remain in your original, spiritual body, then you are free from these pains and pleasures.

KṚṢṆA-KṢETRA SWAMI: When Prabhupāda asked for questions, I raised my hand. I really wanted to know how to give up material desires once and for all and how not to accept another body. And here was the perfect opportunity to learn from a person free of all material desires. So, in a tight and nervous voice, I asked, “Śrīla Prabhupāda, how does one develop his desire to get out of this body?”

His response was immediate and clear: Simply think of how to push on this movement. Have that desire and no other desire. Anyābhilāṣita-śunyam: no material desire. Śunyam: make zero all material desires. Simply desire, “How shall I push on? How shall I serve Kṛṣṇa? How shall I decorate this” Therefore we have given so many engagements—to divert the desire. Desires cannot be stopped. That is not possible. Foolish persons say become desireless. That is not possible. Desireless means I am dead. No. Purify desire. Purify desire. You have the desire to drive a motorcar. Just drive a motorcar for preaching Kṛṣṇa consciousness.

The devotees burst out laughing because I was the temple driver. It is unlikely that Prabhupāda had been told that this was my service, so it amused us that he mentioned driving as a way to please Kṛṣṇa and overcome material desires. I felt rewarded for my sincere inquiry by Prabhupāda’s thorough answer.

*** The next morning, Śrīla Prabhupāda returned to the topic of transmigration. He left no doubt how important it was to him that his disciples understood the philosophy. While walking gaily toward Fischbach, he tested them the way a professor examines his pupils. “Explain how transmigration takes place,” he asked, with his cane in hand, his head held high.

Mādhavānanda spoke first. He quoted from the Bhagavad-gītā: dehino ’smin yathā dehe...

Śrīla Prabhupāda dismissed his attempt. “That is a śloka. You explain how it takes place.”

Next Satsvarūpa Mahārāja answered. He explained step by step how the soul obtains a body according to his desires and takes another body according to his previous actions. But it wasn’t what Prabhupāda wanted to hear.

“That’s all right,” he said, “but how do you transmigrate?”

“According to the mental condition at the time of leaving this body,” Hansadutta said.

Prabhupāda was still unsatisfied. “But what is the process?”

Satsvarūpa Mahārāja gave it another try. “The subtle body carries the soul.”

“Yes!,” Prabhupāda exclaimed. “That is the main point. The subtle body carries the soul.”

Then he repeated some examples he’d used several days before: “Just like in a dream, we are carried by the subtle body and placed in different conditions. But as long as this body is capable of working, then when my dream is over I come back to this body. And death means that because this body is useless, I go to another body instead of coming back to this body. That is transmigration. Just like when you vacate an apartment, then you do not come back to that apartment but you enter another apartment. Is it clear?” He paused. His disciples had time to reflect on what he had said. “Anybody can understand,” he continued. “I am coming and going, but when it is a question of vacating, I go out of the apartment and never come back again. I will enter another apartment.

Śrīla Prabhupāda then said he deplored the pitiable condition of modern civilization because even Nobel Prize-winning scientists and philosophers were unable to understand such a simple concept as the transmigration of the soul.

Satsvarūpa Mahārāja brought up a common argument. “I won’t mind transmigration if I become a cat or a dog because I will forget completely. So it doesn’t matter. I won’t even suffer.”

Prabhupāda challenged, “But if I say, ‘I will turn you immediately into a dog,’ will you agree to become one?”

“No,” Satsvarūpa Mahārāja admitted.

“This is a childish, foolish proposal,” Prabhupāda concluded. “If I say, ‘I will turn you immediately into this grass and you will stay here for one hundred years,’ will you agree to stand like that for one hundred years?” After a silence, he shook his head and said, “Hare Kṛṣṇa. In the Western countries actually there is no philosophy.”

KṚṢṆA-KṢETRA SWAMI: Every morning, Prabhupāda used to walk from Schloss Rettershof down the hill to the village Fischbach. One morning he hardly spoke; rather, he softly chanted japa. We followed his example. Entering the village and passing a butcher shop Prabhupāda asked for the translation of some signs in the window. Upon hearing about the meat, he gravely walked on.

Although we anticipated an animated discussion on meat-eating, we were instead exposed to another side of our spiritual master. It reminded me that we are his servants, not that he is ours. Still, being with Śrīla Prabhupāda, we naturally began to see things through his eyes. When he looked with sadness at the butcher shop, we also felt sad, but we knew our sadness was not as deep as his.

Meeting Father Emmanuel On June 21, Father Emmanuel Jungclaussen, a Greek Orthodox monk, visited Śrīla Prabhupāda. He explained that in his Benedictine monastery, both Roman Catholic and Greek Orthodox rites were observed. He had been chanting on a rosary for many years, “Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy upon me!”, a Greek Orthodox rite.

It pleased Śrīla Prabhupāda that a Christian monk was chanting. He told his guest that the original Greek version of the word “Christ”— Christos—is a broken version of the Sanskrit word “Kṛṣṇa”, which is also pronounced “Kṛṣṭa” and means “the all-attractive person who draws everyone near,” or God.

Prabhupāda said, “Therefore, God’s name is Kṛṣṭa. So when Christ says, ‘My Father, the Lord, hallowed be Thy name,’ that name is Kṛṣṭa or Kṛṣṇa. What do you think?”

Father Emmanuel said that the name of God had been revealed by Jesus and that God could be called Christ.

When Prabhupāda mentioned that in the opinion of one of the theology professors he had spoken to a few nights earlier God has no name, Father Emmanuel put forward the common Christian understanding: “We have a name for God. We say ‘Father.’”

Prabhupāda shook his head and said, “‘God’ is the general name, but still He has got a particular name, and that name is Kṛṣṇa. That is accepted by Jesus: ‘Jesus, the Christ’ or ‘Jesus, the son of Christ, or Kṛṣṇa.’ He identified himself as the son of God. Therefore, the name of God is Kṛṣṭa or Kṛṣṇa or Christo. It doesn’t matter.”

Prabhupāda then emphasized that the important thing is to chant God’s name, any genuine name, and thus pray to Him: “Kindly transfer me from the service of the material energy to the service of the spiritual energy.” That was the meaning of the Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement, he said. God being absolute, His name is non-different from Him. Therefore chanting His name means associating with Him. By associating with God, the devotee becomes godly and eventually qualifies to live with God in loving service in His spiritual realm.

At this point, Father Emmanuel voiced a resentment often felt by Christians. “You know that we Christians are also preaching love of God, and we seek to fulfill the love of God and serve God with all our heart and soul. Why then do you send your disciples to the Christian countries to preach love of God when the gospel of Jesus Christ is also preaching love of God?

Prabhupāda excused himself for having to be blunt; he told the priest that Christians were not obeying the orders of God. When he asked him whether or not he agreed, Father Emmanuel at first said yes, but then he demanded an explanation of which laws they were disobeying.

Prabhupāda mentioned the commandment, “Thou shalt not kill.” He pointed out that many innocent animals are killed in slaughterhouses. Father Emmanuel again agreed at first, but then he presented arguments in defense of his Christian brethren. He questioned how important a concern animal killing really was. In reply, Prabhupāda gave the analogy that because of one little mistake in a calculation a result must be faulty. Next, the monk argued that the commandment referred only to the killing of humans. Śrīla Prabhupāda reasoned that this meant Jesus was not intelligent enough to use the proper word, “murder.” He insisted that there is no need to interpret the word “kill”. This prompted Father Emmanuel to ask the same question Professor Dürckheim had asked: “Don’t you kill the plants you eat?”

When Prabhupāda asked whether vegetable killing and animal killing were the same, his guest answered, “It’s not the same. But human killing and animal killing are also not the same.”

Śrīla Prabhupāda took up the challenge with ease and gave the same answer he’d given to Dürckheim and the student at Uppsala University: “We are not killing. Our vaiṣṇava philosophy is that we do not kill even vegetables. Because Kṛṣṇa says patraṁ puṣpaṁ phalaṁ toyaṁ, ‘Give Me this foodstuff,’ we offer the foodstuff to Kṛṣṇa, and then we take it. Therefore, if for killing this flower or leaf there is a sin, that is Kṛṣṇa’s sin, not my sin.” He further explained that Kṛṣṇa is supremely powerful and cannot be touched by sin, just as the sun isn’t contaminated by shining on a filthy place and purifying it.

But Prabhupāda wasn’t interested in winning a debate. He hoped that some influential men would comprehend the immense benefit of Kṛṣṇa consciousness. If they agreed to cooperate, his mission would be a success. He, therefore, wanted to put his guest at ease, and he struck a conciliatory note. “I have not come to teach you but to request you. Your Christian religion prohibits meat-eating and encourages chanting of the name of the Lord, so you kindly do it, that’s all. We are also chanting. Christ or Kṛṣṇa, the same thing. So let us join together and chant. If you have any objection to chanting Kṛṣṇa, you chant Christ or Christo.

When Father Emmanuel said he had no objection, Śrīla Prabhupāda continued, “I think those who are Christian priests should cooperate with this movement, chant the name of Christ or Christo, and stop animal killing. This is according to the Bible. This is not according to my philosophy but their Christian philosophy. Simply let them do it and see how the situation becomes nice.”

Father Emmanuel assured Śrīla Prabhupāda that he agreed completely, but added that he knew it was difficult to find an open ear in the established Church circles. He thanked Prabhupāda and bowed before him.

The next morning Father Emmanuel joined Śrīla Prabhupāda on his walk. Prabhupāda again urged him to propagate the chanting of God’s name in Germany. And he explained why devotees stressed refraining from killing animals: You at least introduce in your country: ‘Chant Christ’s name and stop animal killing. This is from the Bible. It is not that I am asking. The Bible says, ‘Thou shalt not kill,’ and it glorifies the name of God. ‘Thou shalt not kill’, that is the beginning of religious life. The animal killers cannot understand God. It is not possible. There is a statement in the Bhāgavatam, vinā paśughnāt: ‘Who can remain aloof from the chanting of the holy name of God unless he is an animal killer?’ Yes, animal killers cannot understand God or God’s name. That’s not possible.

After the morning walk, Father Emmanuel had breakfast and was taken to the train station in Frankfurt to return to his monastery in Bavaria. He acknowledged to the devotees that he was impressed by Prabhupāda’s sincerity and fervor in presenting the message of Kṛṣṇa consciousness. He also appreciated his suggestions but admitted that it was highly unlikely, as he had mentioned, that the Church would be willing to consider any of them, what to speak of putting them into practice.

HANSADUTTA DĀSA: While we were walking through the fields the next morning, we suddenly heard a helicopter over our heads. Prabhupada looked up, and one of the devotees commented, “That’s a helicopter.” Prabhupada said, “Yes, I know,” and he began to laugh. “Syamasundara once took me by helicopter from Heathrow Airport, but I had to pay.” Then he told a story to illustrate that although he was taken by helicopter by-passing all the London traffic, which was very nice, in the end he himself had to pay for that.

The story is about a guru and his disciple. The guru had entrusted all his money to the disciple, and the disciple organized all these nice programs and made all necessary arrangements for him. Each place they go, the arrangements are first-class, the food is excellent, and each time the guru is very pleased and praises the disciple, “Oh, you have done such a wonderful service.” And the disciple responds, “It’s all your mercy.” When they finally complete the tour and the guru wants to access the money, he had entrusted to the disciple, the disciple said, “I used it to arrange all these programs. I told you, it was all your mercy.” And Prabhupada burst into this enormous belly-laughter.

CAKRAVARTĪ DĀSA: For several of Prabhupāda’s public engagements we rented a hall in a hotel in Bad Homburg, and as usual we accompanied him with a resounding kīrtana. Not many people came, so there were almost as many devotees present as guests.

KṚṢṆA-KṢETRA SWAMI: Śrīla Prabhupāda preached in his usual, determined, dignified way. Despite meager attendance and a noticeable mood of mild hostility against him and his followers, he lectured with all his energy, as though every cell and muscle of his transcendental body were focused on delivering the transcendental message. As on other occasions, I was struck by Prabhupāda’s timeless character. His face seemed to exhibit ages of seasoned wisdom. To the casual observer, he may have looked unhappy or even angry, but I knew he was beyond displaying superficial moods. He was beyond that because he had an urgent and beneficial message for people. Prabhupāda would simply deliver his message with full vigor.

CAKRAVARTĪ DĀSA: When Prabhupāda asked for questions, one guest said that he felt it was a contradiction that Prabhupāda preached renunciation, simple living, and detachment from worldly things, but that he sat on a throne. So Śrīla Prabhupāda instructed us to remove the vyāsāsana and provide a simple white cushion the next time he lectured there. He explained that if people get annoyed by such external things, it is better to remove the cause of the annoyance.

BHAKTIVAIBHAVA SWAMI: “Referring to the sparse attendance, Śrīla Prabhupāda told us we should mainly distribute prasādam in Germany so that people become purified and enabled to understand the philosophy. ŚACĪNANDANA SWAMI: My father had come all the way from Hamburg to meet Prabhupāda and see for himself what his two sons had gotten into. When the time came for questions, he stood up and asked: “How can you expect to benefit people by transplanting a foreign culture like the Indian culture to a country like Germany? We are Germans. We need the occidental culture. It’s just as if you were to take a crocodile from the Nile and put it into the river Elbe. It will die miserably.” Prabhupāda looked at him and simply said, “No. You can become Kṛṣṇa conscious in tie and suit. My father probably expected a more sophisticated and philosophical answer, but Prabhupāda’s point was simple. Kṛṣṇa consciousness is not limited by cultural considerations, because it is universal and absolute. Anyone can become Kṛṣṇa conscious in his own culture.

The next day my father talked to several devotees about Prabhupāda’s answer. He came to the conclusion that it might be worthwhile to investigate Kṛṣṇa consciousness in more detail. Although the answer in itself didn’t give him a lot of information, it led to my father experiencing a transformation. It made a lasting impression on him.

Another public engagement took place in KÎnigstein. The lecture had been advertised under the title “Life After Death.” Prabhupāda described how we gradually develop different bodies and different types of consciousness. Our natural tendency to improve our situation and even go to better planets is flawed by the four universal principles of material life: birth, death, old age, and disease. He said that perfection is to develop Godconsciousness and go beyond the material world to the spiritual sky. At the present moment we are in dress consciousness. “I am a German dress, I am an Englishman dress, I am an Indian dress, I am a male dress, I am a female dress. This is called conditioned life. So in this conditioned life, we are accepting one type of body, and we are dying. Dying means giving up our present body and being transferred to another body by the laws of material nature. It is not under our control. You cannot say, ‘After giving up this German body, I shall again accept another German body.’ That is not in your hands, sir. It is under the laws of nature.

About one hundred people had come to hear Śrīla Prabhupāda. All had paid the entrance fee of 5 DM. The devotees had charged a fee to ensure that only serious persons would come, and the crowd consisted mainly of doctors, lawyers, and other established people.

Prabhupāda continued: Therefore, if we are actually intelligent, we should try for being awakened, or placed in our original body, the spiritual body. That will stop this constant change of body. So the simple process, as we are preaching in this Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement, is to try to understand Kṛṣṇa. Kṛṣṇa or Christ, the same thing. Then you get your original spiritual body. Kṛṣṇa consciousness can be awakened simply by chanting the mahā-mantra Hare Kṛṣṇa, the holy name of God. Not only Hare Kṛṣṇa. You can also chant the holy name of Christ. Christ is the same as Kṛṣṇa. So do it. There is no expenditure, but the profit is very, very great. Keep yourself aloof from the four kinds of sinful life and keep always in touch with Kṛṣṇa, or God. Then you go back home, back to Godhead.

After a week in Germany, Śrīla Prabhupāda prepared to continue his preaching tour. He gave his last instructions to Hansadutta. He liked Schloss Rettershof and suggested that the devotees buy the castle and the surrounding land. An important part of his mission was to establish selfsufficient farm communities and show the world how to depend on the land and cows while cultivating spiritual life.

On the evening of June 23, 1974, a group of devotees accompanied Prabhupāda to the Frankfurt airport and saw him off to his next destination, Australia. Five years had passed since his first visit, and they would have liked him to stay longer. They consoled themselves with the thought that he would surely come back the next summer. No one could foresee that this was Śrīla Prabhupāda’s last visit to Germany.