There is
presently difficulty finding consensus on implementing varnasrama
within the devotee community according to time and place. There are
different reasons for this but we won’t go into it in detail here.
Instead, we will look at why we need to start varnasrama with
urgency. We seriously need to introspect and consider what the
present is now and try to see what the future will be in twenty or
fifty years or more from now – and to act positively.
To look a
little into the future, we have to actually realize how degraded the
present generation is, and what it was like in the past. The present
young generation of Western women far surpass men in unfavourable
habits that once used to be considered mostly a man’s material
privilege. In the United Kingdom, and from my experience with London,
on any night of the week – with weekends being worse, one would see
half naked women stumbling or crawling on the side-walks, absolutely
drunk, some of them unashamedly vomiting and urinating on the
streets.
These are not isolated cases; it is a way of life now. There is no culture of marriage anymore; people instead prefer short term sexual relationships and it is rare to find people refer to someone as a husband or wife; instead the term “my partner” is common. Even worse, most relationships don’t last for even a year. People are afraid of long term marital commitments because it will get in the way of squeezing the maximum sense gratification from their bodies. Many people change partners every few months or even sooner, some every week – just like shopping for new clothing - at least clothes last longer. It is all about sex without the knots. Devotees may not have first hand experience; they only know what they read in the news. One has to live amongst the so called “normal people” to actually see this to know how society has degraded.
These are not isolated cases; it is a way of life now. There is no culture of marriage anymore; people instead prefer short term sexual relationships and it is rare to find people refer to someone as a husband or wife; instead the term “my partner” is common. Even worse, most relationships don’t last for even a year. People are afraid of long term marital commitments because it will get in the way of squeezing the maximum sense gratification from their bodies. Many people change partners every few months or even sooner, some every week – just like shopping for new clothing - at least clothes last longer. It is all about sex without the knots. Devotees may not have first hand experience; they only know what they read in the news. One has to live amongst the so called “normal people” to actually see this to know how society has degraded.
Due to the
natural mothering nature of women, there is the desire to have a
child at some stage in their lives. So when these women get a little
older, they have a child without the bondage of marriage. Then there
is varna-sankara, unwanted children. These unwanted children are kept
as pet dogs – with minimum emotional attachment. Because these
children get in the way of the parents sense gratification - they
lavish them with money, the latest electronic gadgets or anything
else they may need and encourage them to do as they wish, so long as
they just leave the parents alone. If the parents cannot provide the
latest gadgets or brand name clothing, they steal to get it. So these
children become lost and alone without emotional family support and
they take to the streets and join with other varna-sankara children.
These
unwanted children are a menace to society. Presently in the UK, in
the towns and suburbs, children aged ten onwards stand around street
corners and bus shelters and cause disturbance to grown ups. People
are afraid to leave their homes after it gets dark, for fear of what
these youths will do. Pockets of some cities live in fear. These
children are rough and most of the girls in these groups aged
thirteen onwards are sexually active if not outright promiscuous.
Their vocabulary is restricted to a few syllables, they do not care
for society, and they turn to drugs, alcohol and crime. The
government calls this “anti social behaviour.” These children
cannot be chastised in schools or by their parents, because they have
“rights”, human rights that is, applied the material way.
The reader
may wonder why more emphasis is on women’s behaviour, rather than
men. In Vedic culture, a chaste women stands for all that is sacred.
Men have their bad habits, and because they don’t give protection
to women anymore, they are also to blame. Actually, Bhagavad-Gita
states that when the women have no protection, chastity is lost and
there are unwanted children. So the initial problem started with men
not giving protection to women, then women got a taste for material
freedom and after the Second World War, women’s emancipation
started. The feminist movement took off and the degradation of
society accelerated. With this new found freedom, divorce and
remarriage gradually became easy; women could stay single and do
anything that a man could do, thinking this will bring more happiness
than what they already experienced through serving family.
But this
was not to be - instead of happiness, we see more anxiety, stress,
mental disorders, quarrel and always a distressed condition. Unlike
when there was the extended family, the mother’s happiness was in
seeing her children and family happy, and to make them happy, she
needed to serve them. Similarly, the husband needed to serve the
family as well and seeing them happy made him happy. So loving
relationships between extended families gave some sort of continuous
material happiness which is not possible to even dream of in the
present selfish ways people try to become happy - through maximizing
ones personal bodily pleasure, primarily through sex with all its
variants, and mind altering substances. The outcome of such a
lifestyle is this most unbelievable sight of women urinating,
crawling and vomiting on the sidewalks, wasted. Bewildered, they
cannot understand how this type of bodily pleasure brings almost
immediate misery only. At least extended family attachment brings
more constant material happiness, and it also helps in instilling
moral values, which is favourable for varnasrama.
Therefore,
our mothers need to make the sacrifice and play their part and be the
home-makers, they need to give their men a chance to protect them.
Devotee men also need to become qualified grhasthas with brahmana
consciousness and know how to respect their women and not abuse them.
And they need to know that one of the unique qualities of the “daivi
varnasrama” of our acaryas is that women also have an equal right
to practice devotional service and go back to Godhead – within
their asrama. Harmony in grhastha life will make for successful
varnasrama and happy Krsna consciousness.
One may
wonder how the prediction that a golden age within this kali-yuga
will take hold, considering the present degraded society. And atheism
seems to be on the rise, because people want to enjoy their bodies
and not fear reactions from a Superior Being. But is atheism as big
as it sounds, or is it just media propaganda? There have been
numerous surveys done in Western countries showing that the majority
of people believe in something spiritual, actually most young people
say they are more spiritual than religious. They know something is
out there but don’t have faith in a particular religion and they
don’t go to church. Many take to atheism just to avoid being
accountable to someone – so they can enjoy their bodies to the
maximum without fear. But are atheists really faithless? Once,
Chandramauli Swami gave a class where he recounted how he was in a
helicopter in Vietnam during that war, problems developed and the
helicopter started falling from the sky. Maharaja was a staunch
atheist then but when facing death, he started to call out to God.
Where did this come from? Many people may find atheism temporarily
attractive to suit their lifestyles, but deep within their hearts,
they believe there is something paranormal out there.
Because
most people have an inherent spiritual belief, and many, especially
in the West, don’t really care about their inherited religion, the
ground for preaching is always fertile. However, with the degraded
situation the way it is in Western countries and with fanatical
religious governments and their people who will not tolerate other
spiritual ideas, not many will take to Krsna consciousness en masse.
The most likely way the golden age will kick-start is through a
cleansing process. With reference to the battle of Kuruksetra, Srila
Prabhupada said that “if you want to grow
paddy on the field, you have to destroy all the unwanted weeds. Then
you grow the seeds and it will come out nicely”.
He said “destruction is needed for
construction.”
In the
sastras, it is predicated that in the coming years during this age of
Kali, there will be wars, famine, pestilence, natural disasters and
other disturbances. This is the most likely way the golden age will
quickly take hold on a large scale; devotees need to plan for this
eventuality. We should always hope that sankirtana will change the
consciousness of our materialistic demonic leaders and their
followers but there are no signs of this happening soon and
sankirtana is not as big as it should be to have a major impact. We
are not on the level of Queen Kunti who prayed for calamities to come
again and again so that she could always have the shelter of Krsna.
Naturally, as less advanced devotees, we fear wars and disasters but
Krsna always protects His devotees. Calamities will be Krsna’s
special mercy towards us, so we can surrender more. And for the
demonic, He is death personified. Devotees hope for a peaceful
transition to the golden age and anything is possible for Krsna but
to not consider the very likely effect of some major calamity will be
short-sightedness. By Krsna’s arrangement, the demonic leaders
could destroy each other – just like in the battle of Kuruksetra,
it was arranged by Krsna for the irreligious to kill each other.
This verse
from Srimad Bhagavatam and Srila Prabhupada’s purport seems as if
it is meant for now. “Although the demons
who take possession of the government are dressed like men of
government, they do not know the duty of the government.
Consequently, by the arrangement of God, such demons, who possess
great military strength, fight with one another, and thus the great
burden of demons on the surface of the earth is reduced. The demons
increase their military power by the will of the Supreme, so that
their numbers will be diminished and the devotees will have a chance
to advance in Krsna consciousness”. SB
9.24.59.
This verse
and purport somehow seems to refer to the present phase in our
history, a prediction meant for the next ten or twenty years from
now. Srila Prabhupada did say that Krsna dictates what he writes. In
his purport to the above verse, he says “Demons
are very much interested in advancing a plan by which people will
labour hard like cats, dogs and hogs, but Krsna's devotees want to
teach Krsna consciousness so that people will be satisfied with plain
living and Krsna conscious advancement. Although demons have created
many plans for industry and hard labour so that people will work day
and night like animals, this is not the purpose of civilization”.
In the same purport, he also says “Demons
may falsely accuse the preachers of the Krsna consciousness movement,
but Krsna will arrange a fight between the demons in which all their
military power will be engaged and both parties of demons will be
annihilated.” These days, superpowers have
bunker busting bombs and in war, they target the leadership of other
governments. If they don’t finish one another off, and in the
aftermath of a devastating war, their rebellious citizens will.
Being
conditioned, most of us don’t pay much attention to the influence
of time as a reality. We only think about what happens now –
without any future vision. Ten years in relation to one hundred years
is minimal and in relation to ten thousand years, insignificant. Lots
can happen in ten years, that won’t alter the time factor of ten
thousand years much but will have a big influence in establishing the
golden age within Kali-yuga. The global political relationship
between countries is at a dangerous level of intolerance and with the
economic problems and the distrust of people with their governments;
wars, anarchy and rebellions are the likely outcome and the aftermath
will create a favourable setting to bring in the golden age within
this kali-yuga.
The true
soldiers then will not be those fighting for their countries but the
devotees on the true battlefield, preaching to the masses of
distressed (one of the four types of people that take to spiritual
life) and helping to bring in the golden age. Presently, people are
too attached to their televisions, phones, gadgets and bodies for
maximum material pleasure. When they loose all this and are faced
with famine, they will become very distressed. Preaching to the pious
distressed will quickly convince them that Krsna consciousness is the
only alternative – especially after losing trust and patience with
everyone else and all other religions, since some of their distress
would be caused by religious wars.
In
relation to the time factor, just yesterday there were no television
or other electronic gadgets, and tomorrow they will be gone. Srila
Prabhupada said that Sanjaya was seeing within himself everything
that was going on in the battle of Kuruksetra and giving Dhrtarastra
real time updates so there was something higher than television then.
We may be attached to television or computers and think this is so
great but compared to the mystic potential of the living entity,
these inventions are laughable. Communication technologies work
through satellites and now countries have the capability to knock out
each others satellites, and in a major war, and by Krsna’s
arrangement, it could all be gone soon. Devotees need to consider all
this and plan for the future of the golden age. Material inventions
are just additional impediments to spiritual life, although according
to time and place, we may use it in Krsna’s service. But without
it, the situation for spiritual life and varnasrama will be more
favourable. It is just a matter of the time factor, could be in ten,
twenty, a hundred or two hundred years, it has to go.
Also, how
quickly time goes by. A hundred years ago, people still believed in
marriage and extended family. Fifty years ago, the nuclear family was
becoming prominent and divorce and single parenting was becoming
common but people still raised an eyebrow to immoral activities. Now,
talk of marriage is rare in the West, but peoples talk about their
latest sexual exploits and addiction to degraded reality shows are
normal. There is still some culture in countries such as India but if
you compare to what it was twenty years ago, it has degraded so much
and so quickly. And in another ten years, due to television and
Western influence, it will become just like most of the world, unless
Krsna does something and we use our intelligence to see how He wants
us to act. Many devotees are indifferent to varnasrama but the time
is fast approaching when it will be the only solution for the problems
to come. Devotees should act now!
In the
coming golden age, all other religions will fall away. We can know
that varnasrama and vedic influence will spread all over the world.
In the twelfth canto of Srimad Bhagavatam, there are predictions for
the period after the golden age within this Kali-yuga, where it
states how religion deteriorates, and there is mention about false
brahmanas, and how towards the end of this age, varnasrama religious
principles will be ruined and the vedas contaminated. So from these
descriptions, we can see that in the latter part of this age of Kali,
there will be remnants of a Vedic civilization and varnasrama system
that existed all over the world, and these are not just predictions
for within India. In the Brahma-Vaivarta Purana, during a
conversation with Mother Ganga, Lord Krsna said that there will be a
golden age of ten thousand years within this Kali-yuga so this must
come to pass. Krsna consciousness will be the predominant religion
for ten thousand years.
In the
beginning of Srila Prabhupada’s preaching in the West, he
emphasized the four regulative principles and he had hoped that his
disciples would follow sincerely and become advanced very quickly.
But the culture in the West was different than in India. The
simplicity of “just chant Hare Krsna and take prasadam” was
actually more complex and did not work. So Srila Prabhupada, to
fulfil the desires of Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura and
Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura, always desired to introduce varnasrama as
the only way for most devotees, but the time was not right. Now, it
is up to us to fulfil their desire. A varnasrama setting is just like
living in a temple, it will encourage devotees to follow the four
regulative principles attentively. When destruction happens, we
should have some model alternative ready, so people, in a distressed
state and suffering famine, which is a natural consequence of major
wars and disasters, will reach out to learn how to become happy and
produce their own food. This is how varnasrama communities could
expand all around it. I am sure most devotees have seen pictures of
people in famine ravaged countries, especially North Africa, with
eyes pulled into their sockets, their skeletons visible through their
skin and the only thing on their minds is food. If someone placed a
bowl of rice together with the latest electronic gadget in front of
such a person and gave them a choice, which do you think they will
choose? We take our food supply for granted.