Prabhu: For a devotee, is astrology important, and if yes, how much importance should we give to the astrology?
His Holiness Bhaktividyā Pūrṇa Mahārāja: First, we should be very clear that activity is performed in a particular environment, situation. Like we are in this temple room, that’s the situation, then you perform an activity within that. Do you understand the difference? Environments and activities that are performed in that environment. So, you have a street corner in a busy city. Someone is walking through that street there, he is going to work. Someone else is going to go meet their boyfriend. Somebody else is just drunk and they don’t know what corner they are, and they just happen to be walking through there. And then, there is a devotee standing there, selling books. So can we tell the difference between the situation and the activity, the free will in that activity we do? Yes? No? Okay.
Astrology can define what situations will be there, okay? It can’t tell you what you are going to do in that situation. That’s your free will. So, by understanding the situation, astrology can give some light on that, that will be some benefit, it’s useful. But if not, it’s not useful. Do you understand? It defines situations, not what you are going to do with them. So if we have this idea that astrology will tell me what to do, it won’t, it will just tell you the situations. So it’s not important if through astrology you understand the situation, or you are there in the situation and you figure it out, it doesn’t matter. The point is is, do you connect that situation to Kṛṣṇa or not, that’s all. In other words, through the known you try to understand the unknown. Through śāstra that’s known, you try to understand what you don’t know. In applying it through the senses, you can see what’s known, you understand what should be done, which is unknown. But the point is is that that unknown should be engaged in Kṛṣṇa’s service. Does that make sense?
Prabhu: Just to make it clear, if we use astrology just to seek guidance…
HH BVPS Mahārāja: Seek guidance in what?
Prabhu: Guidance to become Kṛṣṇa conscious.
HH BVPS Mahārāja: How does astrology tell you how to be Kṛṣṇa conscious? No, it will tell you what the situation is, it doesn’t tell you how to make that situation Kṛṣṇa conscious. What defines how to be Kṛṣṇa conscious in any situation, that’s called Bhagavad-gītā. That’s parā-vidyā, or transcendental knowledge. Jyotiṣa is material knowledge. If it is connected to Kṛṣṇa, it becomes aparā-vidyā, or dovetailed knowledge. It’s not dovetailed in Kṛṣṇa’s service, then it’s called avidyā, or ignorance, material knowledge. So astrology is not going to tell you what to do. It’s going to tell you the situations that you’ll be in. What you do with that, you have to read Bhagavad-gītā. Vyāsadeva says in his 100 verses describing 100 types of fools, one of the fools he describes is that person that bases their life on astrology.
Prabhu: Mahārāja, but in another sense, astrologers advice something to do, to counteract some bad things. They not only describe the situation, but give some advice on how to resolve things.
HH BVPS Mahārāja: But what will you make an adjustment in? What will be adjusted? You have a bad situation, they say, okay, do this Mṛtyuñjaya-homa, what will it adjust?
Prabhu: Let’s say…
HH BVPS Mahārāja: No, no, not let’s say, just give a direct answer, what will it adjust?
Prabhu: Maybe I should…
HH BVPS Mahārāja: No, no, no, what will it adjust? The situation is bad, you do this homa, what will it do? It will correct the situation. It’s still you are left with the situation, what are you gonna do with that situation for Kṛṣṇa? That no astrologer is going to tell you.
Prabhu: Not about Kṛṣṇa consciousness, but…
HH BVPS Mahārāja: No, but they’ll just tell you how to adjust the situation. It’s like this, you have a kitchen. And somebody comes in and says, “Oh, hey, over here, you don’t have enough pots, you get some more pots, then there’ll be a nicer kitchen.” So now you have a nicer kitchen, so what? You still don’t know how to cook. [Everyone laughing] You still don’t know how to cook. So that’s the point is, that’s why Vyāsadeva said you are a fool. Because you think, if I adjust the situation, now everything is perfect. Does that make sense?
The point is, is we have to distinguish between situations and what you do with the situation. Because once you have the better kitchen, now what? The point is is, when the kitchen wasn’t so good, you cooked for Kṛṣṇa, when the kitchen is better, you cook for Kṛṣṇa. But if you were not cooking for Kṛṣṇa before, there is a good chance you won’t be cooking after it’s better.
HH Bhakti Viśrambha Mādhava Mahārāja: One comment on the astrology-kathā. A devotee tries to see everything as an arrangement of Kṛṣṇa. One devotee astrologer put it this way. That it’s like a blueprint, the construction blueprint of a devotee’s life. So like Mahārāja says, it predicts the situation. It is up to the devotee to take that situation and use it favorably for Kṛṣṇa or not. Sometimes Kṛṣṇa even uses a devotee’s karma as an agent for change. There was a Godbrother of mine that was really an avadhūta. And he left in Vṛndāvana on Varūthinī Ekādaśī a few years ago. Now, everybody sees their Godbrother, Godsister as a relative die. He would leave on Ekādaśi, and on Varūthinī, you are liberated. So the argument of using astrology for Kṛṣṇa is like anything, using anything for Kṛṣṇa. We just take it a science, we are looking at it, it describes the situation. Now, you could use it for Kṛṣṇa, to your advantage, to serve Kṛṣṇa or make it not happen that way. Just like retirement and death is there for everybody.
HH BVPS Mahārāja: Nothing is certain except death and taxes.
HH BVMS Mahārāja: So in any case, so one devotee astrologer, sannyāsī, friend of mine, he said, “This period, the period of twenty years from now, it will be a very good period for you to renounce everything and do nirjana-bhajana, very good time. Wow, that’s really nice, I would like to do that,” he said. The reality is, I am already so disturbed in the lifestyle and difficulties, that I am ready to give it up ten years before that. [Laughter] Of course, I am going to do meet him later on, in the south Russian festival. So I want to present him the new idea, my idea is that I am should give it up ten years earlier. [Laughter] He’ll tell me whether that situation is auspicious or not. The reality is, by the time I get there, maybe we’ll want to grab a tape, you wanna practice ten years of gravitating towards renonciation, toward retiring. But maybe our followers, maybe our friends, maybe people won’t let you retire, that’s another thing.
So like Mahāraja was saying, it’s a situation. Now, whether it’s gonna happen or not, we can gravitate that direction, try to use it favorably for Kṛṣṇa. But it’s up to Kṛṣṇa whether it will happen or not. We use it as an idea, rough idea. But the plan is probably in Kṛṣṇa’s hands. We may decide to do something, but circumstances and Kṛṣṇa’s will may dictate differently, and you are forced to something differently. We use the science, but our argument is whether it’s favorable for Kṛṣṇa. And we use the astrology or any science as to help that. But like Prabhupāda was saying, when the astrologers were predicting about his departure and when there was a whole this and that, Prabhupāda said, “Ok, none of these astrologers can do anything, we are just going to use caranāmṛta and Harināma, forget about that.” [Laughter] It was funny.
I was talking to one devotee astrologer about departure. And he laughed, he said he went to some Bhṛgu Saṁhitī śāstra walas. And before they met him, they had predicted 5 peoples’ death. When he asked them, they looked at him, and they laughed, they said, “Oh, come on, you are a sādhu, Bābā, all your life is in Kṛṣṇa’s hands, we can’t say anything.”



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