asa(e) - Ontology, Yoga-ladder - Fall down from Vaikuntha.
PAMHO AGTSP!!
HK Maharaj!! how are you??
HpS - Many people ask us this question, no? Guess the best answer is, "Like Arjuna in the battle of Kurukstra". Shot full of arrows, not giving up returning the fight. Trying to accomplish Krsna's goals in the Sankirtan battle.
well here I'm writing you again, this time I'm having a doubt about Prabhupada statements which I would like to please ask you about.
Here are the verses which arose the questions:
So here I found this two statements.
Bhagavatam 3.16.26: "The conclusion is that no one falls from the spiritual world, or Vaikuṇṭha planet, for it is the eternal abode. But sometimes, as the Lord desires, devotees come into this material world as preachers or as atheists. In each case we must understand that there is a plan of the Lord. Lord Buddha, for example, was an incarnation, yet he preached atheism: “There is no God.” But actually there was a plan behind this, as explained in the Bhāgavatam."
Bhagavatam 7.1.35: "Therefore it is to be understood that when Jaya and Vijaya descended to this material world, they came because there was something to be done for the Supreme Personality of Godhead. Otherwise it is a fact that no one falls from Vaikuṇṭha."
And here I found this other one which seems opposite:
Transcript of a Srila Prabhupada's Bhagavatam Class on verse 1.8.23
https://vedabase.io/en/library/transcripts/741003sbmay/?query=fall+spiritual#bb296536
"The... We fall down, we, because we are very small, spiritual spark, and Kṛṣṇa is the whole fire. And the fire and the spiritual..., fire, sparks from the fire, their quality---the same = they can burn. As the big fire can burn, similarly, the small spark, if it falls down on your cloth, that portion, it will immediately burn. It will become back..., black. So the quality is the same. But when it falls down, its burning quality becomes extinguished. We have got practical experience. Burning quality becomes extinguished. So when we fall down from the spiritual world---we come to the material world---our spiritual quality becomes extinguished. That we have to revive. That we have to revive."
So I've heard in a class you gave here in Argentina that when a soul resides in Goloka Vrindavan and wants to forget about Krishna might descend to a less perfect loka, and you were describing, and please correct me if I'm wrong, how a soul might descend gradually from Goloka to Vaikuntha, then to the marginal position and finally to the material world.
So could you please tell how this knowledge can be combined?
Thank you very much again and please forgive if there was any offense in my letter,
Federico
HpS - AgtSP. It is a big topic, but as I understand, the basic principle is that no one has an accidental fall down from the spiritual world. Yet we always have free will, other wise we are slaves of pain or slaves of pleasure and then there us no question of giving our love to Krsna.
We become afraid of that, BG 4.10, because it is an absolute responsibility, but it is also a fantastic gift. We can actually give Krsna our free love!
This is one of the most compelling purports that I know: https://vedabase.io/en/library/sb/5/8/26/
We cannot have an accidental falldown from Vaikuntha or even Bhava, but we can use our free will and be offensive, not sinful, and fall down. The question, "Why did we do it?' has no meaning. "Why" means what caused us to do it. We have free will even though small, of the same character as Krsna (frightening), so when we chose to do it. It happens.
Same idea is right there in NOI: https://vedabase.io/en/library/noi/6/#bb5968
Yet the good news is that even though we put ourselves under the jurisdiction of the merciless but just judge, maya, the merciful Mother, Radha, is always looking for some way to get us out of this mess even though we don't want to.
Yet, we should help Her, no? Helps?