The Land, the Cows, and Kṛṣṅa
Chant Hare Kṛṣṅa And Draw a Plow
by Hare Kṛṣṅa Devī Dāsī
KṚṢṄA CONSCIOUSNESS is practical. For spiritual advancement, you don’t have to renounce everything, go to the forest, and simply chant Hare Kṛṣṅa all day long. In the Bhagavad-gītā Kṛṣṅa explains that all of us should continue to perform our duties according to our nature, but we should work with love and devotion as an offering to Him. Thereby every one of us can attain spiritual perfection.
The Vedic framework for organizing the work of a spiritual society is called varṅāśrama-dharma. As Kṛṣṅa describes in the Bhagavad-gītā, varṅāśrama gives each of us work to do that suits our natural qualities. This is known as the daivi-varṅāśrama system, which Prabhupāda distinguishes from the exploitive caste system of modern India, in which a person’s role in society is determined by what family he is born in.
A pure devotee of the Lord is considered to be above the varṅāśrama system. But as Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura states, “During sādhana-bhakti, or devotional service in practice, so long as one has material desires within the heart one should stay within the confines of varṅāśrama”** That is, unless one is a pure devotee one needs to keep working in society for his or her own purification. Simply, the work should be done to please Kṛṣṅa.
Śrīla Prabhupāda warned us that we can’t match the renounced life of the Six Gosvāmīs of Vṛndāvana, and he criticized bābājīs who make a show of piety by chanting Hare Kṛṣṅa yet still smoke cigarettes and keep loose relationships with women. “We can tell all these bābājīs they should be employed, chant Hare Kṛṣṅa, and draw a plow. Then it will be nice.”**
Śrīla Prabhupāda’s remark about the bābājīs is more than a dismissal of a group of showbottle spiritualists. The fact is, if these bābājīs would take up Prabhupāda’s instructions they could eventually attain the spiritual platform they now pretend to be on.
Prabhupāda’s remark is a valuable instruction for us, too. Like the bābājīs, we sometimes tend to be sentimental about Kṛṣṅa consciousness. We may want to enjoy intense devotional feelings from chanting Hare Kṛṣṅa, but we may forget that to please Kṛṣṅa we must offer Him our daily work as well: “Do it for Me.”**
So the principle embodied in Śrīla Prabhupāda’s simple instruction “Chant Hare Kṛṣṅa and draw a plow” speaks vitally to us. And if we follow it? We have Prabhupāda’s simple benediction: “Then it will be nice.” Our spiritual life will be successful.
In this column, I want to meditate on Śrīla Prabhupāda’s order to “Chant Hare Kṛṣṅa and draw a plow,” particularly as it applies to cow protection and agriculture.
We know we should offer our work to Kṛṣṅa, but sometimes it’s not easy for us to do it wholeheartedly, especially if our work has aspects displeasing to Kṛṣṅa.
In the sixteenth century that happened to Sanātana Gosvāmī when he was the minister in charge of the government secretariat for the Nawab of Bengal. Sanātana Gosvāmī’s expert management freed the Nawab from administrative duties so the Nawab could spend his time attacking other states. But when the Nawab at last prepared to attack Orissa, where the temple of Lord Jagannātha is located, Sanātana Gosvāmī resigned his post, and the Nawab had him imprisoned.
Most of us are not as strong as Sanātana Gosvāmī, and if our work puts us in a compromising situation it may keep us from fully taking up the devotional process or maintaining our devotional practice. Śrīla Prabhupāda realized this, and that’s why he pushed his followers to revive the pure system of varṅāśrama. That system naturally purifies the work we do because the whole system is designed to satisfy the senses of the Supreme Lord.
Prabhupāda explained that without this system Kṛṣṅa consciousness can be difficult to take up: “Our main aim is how to give them Kṛṣṅa consciousness. But if they are already disturbed in every respect, then how will they take it?” Therefore, Śrīla Prabhupāda said, to help them come to Kṛṣṅa consciousness, “this is the method—varṅāśrama.”**
Elaborating on this, ISKCON leader Jagadīśa Goswami cites three basic reasons Prabhupāda gave for using varṅāśrama within ISKCON: (1) to organize our society effectively, (2) to engage the psychophysical propensities of our devotees to keep them happy and advancing in Kṛṣṅa consciousness, and (3) to construct a house in which all the people of the world can live peacefully.**
Varṅāśrama serves as a preliminary means of bringing people to Kṛṣṅa consciousness, even if they’re not yet chanting Hare Kṛṣṅa. Śrīla Prabhupāda said, “We must pave the situation in such a way that gradually people will be promoted to the spiritual plane. … The chanting will go on. That is not stopped. But at the same time varnāśrama-dharma must be established to make the way easy.”**6
In the varṅāśrama system, it is the vaiṣyas, the productive class, who generate the wealth. And how are they to do this? Kṛṣṅa says, kṛṣi-go-rakṣya vāṅijyam—by farming, cow protection, and trade.**
The trade or business mentioned here is largely another aspect of farming or cow protection. Prabhupāda explains: “Business means if you have got extra grains or extra foodstuff you can sell where there is necessity, where there is want. That is business. We are not going to open mills and factories. … That is śūdra [low-class] business. The real business is that you produce enough food grains, as much as possible, and you eat and distribute.”**
Śrīla Prabhupāda further stresses the “cow protection” part of Kṛṣṅa’s instructions: “The Bhagavad-gītā specifically instructs us, kṛṣi-go-rakṣya: We human beings must protect the cow, our milk-giving mother. Go-rakṣya—protect the cow. Not go-hatya—kill the cow. This is most sinful.”**
In later columns I shall discuss how the modern economy depends on cow killing, and where this leads.
The leaders of ISKCON are determined not to simply let the world go to pieces because of ignorance and greed. They are working instead to help usher in the Golden Age of Lord Caitanya so that everyone may chant Hare Kṛṣṅa and live peacefully. An important part of this is to set up a varṅāśrama society. And crucial to varṅāśrama is cow protection and simple agrarian villages where everyone can advance in spiritual life.