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ANNOUNCER: The following is a newspaper interview between His Divine Grace A. C. Bhaktivedanta
Swami Prabhupāda and the London Observer, recorded July 23rd, 1976, in London, England.
PRABHUPĀDA: So you are observing our movement? CLINE CROSS: Yes, really for the
first time at close quarters. PRABHUPĀDA: First time? We are here for the last seven years.
CLINE CROSS: I know a little about you, but it’s only in the last hour that I’ve really begun to
learn. JAYATĪRTHA: We showed him the movie…
PRABHUPĀDA: Your paper is Observer. Why did you not observe for the last seven years?
[laughter] MUKUNDA: We just showed him our film.
PRABHUPĀDA: How did you like? CLINE CROSS: Oh, it was very interesting. Again it taught me a
lot that I did not previously know. PRABHUPĀDA: We are trying to give real life. [splice] You are
religious observer. What is your idea of religion? CLINE CROSS: I would say much
the same as yours, from what I’ve seen in your writings—that there’s an underlying truth
behind all religion. Would you agree with that? PRABHUPĀDA: Religion, as it is
explained in the dictionary, “accepting a supreme controller.” Is it not? So do the people accept
a supreme controller? Do they accept? There are so many system of religions, but do they
actually know who is the supreme controller? That is my question. What do you think? Just like, this
is British government, and we know that the Queen is the supreme controller. Similarly, of
all creation, cosmic manifestation, there is a supreme controller, and who is that supreme controller?
Do they know it? That is my question. CLINE CROSS: I mean, what is
your attitude towards Christianity? PRABHUPĀDA: Don’t come to
Christianity. I’m talking on religion, the science of religion. The religion… When we speak of
religion, there is no question of Christianity or Muslim or Hindu. Just like when they speak of gold,
gold is gold everywhere. Gold cannot be Muslim gold or Hindu gold or Christian gold. We are
concerned with gold, not the country where the gold is produced. That is not very
important thing. Whether it is gold, that is our business. CLINE CROSS: I mean, would you
count Jesus Christ as gold? PRABHUPĀDA: Yes, why not? He’s speaking about the supreme
controller, God, so why should we not? [splice] Religion without science or philosophy is
sentiment. And philosophy without religion is mental speculation. So they must be
combined together. So far the controller is concerned, this is scientific understanding. Just like
the father… We consider… Why we? Everyone. Either he is Christian or Muhammadan or
Hindu, the conception of God is generally accepted as the supreme father.
CLINE CROSS: That is the fact. PRABHUPĀDA: It is fact. CLINE CROSS: Yes.
PRABHUPĀDA: Because, just like anything, creation means the mother, the father and the
children. That is our practical experience. Without mother, we are nowhere. We are given birth
by the mother. So the material nature is the mother. From the material nature, material
elements, everything is coming. From the water the fishes are coming, from the land the grass,
the worms, and then human being, they are coming. From the air also living entities are coming.
So therefore material nature is the mother, and we have come out of the material nature,
therefore we are children. Then there must be father, because without father, simply mother
cannot give birth. This is science. You cannot deny the existence of God simply by a false argument.
This is real argument. The mother is there, material nature, and we are children there. There must be
father. CLINE CROSS: In England, the Christian Church in recent years
or recent decades has been doing very badly and losing support. Your teaching could perhaps
provide a substitute for the more traditional type of Christian teaching.
PRABHUPĀDA: Yes, this is the science. Therefore I say religion without scientific idea, that is
sentiment. It has no value. This is basic principle of religion that the mother is there, the children are
there—there must be father. If you say “I do not see what is God,” it doesn’t matter.
Sometimes the child after birth does not see his father. But that does not mean that he has no
father, because without father there is no possibility of his existence.
CLINE CROSS: What impelled you personally, when you, at a fairly late stage in life, to come to the
West to teach? PRABHUPĀDA: I must be prepared to teach. Teaching is
not so easy thing. I was ordered to teach at the age of twenty-five years by my Guru Mahārāja. But I
was finding out the opportunity how to take up the work. So it took me so many years, so that at
seventy years I came out for teaching. CLINE CROSS: Why particularly in
the West? PRABHUPĀDA: Because my Guru Mahārāja ordered that “You go
and teach this gospel in the Western world.” JAYATĪRTHA: His teacher
instructed him to do this. CLINE CROSS: Yes. And are you surprised at the great success
you’ve had? PRABHUPĀDA: That is my Guru Mahārāja’s blessing. He ordered
me, I tried my best, so there is little success. When I see so many boys and hundreds of centers,
they are living very peacefully in a nice house, getting good prasādam, having good
knowledge in the books, and reforming their character, and getting some good home, that is
my success. Otherwise, they are loitering, no home, no character, no peace of mind. So at least this
is my success. I have given so many boys a life. That is my success.
CLINE CROSS: I’m very honored to have met you. I’ve read some of your work. I intend to read
more. PRABHUPĀDA: Yes. So we are trying to give the best service to
the humanity, human society, and this is the only service. People should come forward and
cooperate with us. It is not a sectarian sentimental religious system. It is a scientific
understanding of the value of life. CLINE CROSS: Well, thank you very much indeed, sir.
PRABHUPĀDA: Thank you. Hare Kṛṣṇa. Jaya.
Subtitles by Pratyatoṣa Dāsa, December 08, 2010. Segoe UI font used to calculate line widths.