Dāmodar-
Advaitaji, please forgive me for a stupid question. I want to ask if the creation of a time machine is possible from the Vedic point of view?
Advaitadās-
No. It is not a stupid question. Time travel is not possible. One can go to swarga and then come back after a moment and then find 1000s of years have passed, that is all. One cannot go back and forward in time - that is a science fiction adventure only.
Dāmodar Das
Advaitadās
“Not too many questions at once. All Kṛṣṇa’s līlās are eternal, including the birth-līlā.”
Advaitaji, please forgive me for a stupid question. I want to ask if the creation of a time machine is possible from the Vedic point of view?
Advaitadās-
No. It is not a stupid question. Time travel is not possible. One can go to swarga and then come back after a moment and then find 1000s of years have passed, that is all. One cannot go back and forward in time - that is a science fiction adventure only.
Dāmodar-
Like with Mucukunda. Why is it not possible?
Advaitadās-
Time is final and irreversible, so is history. Everything only happens once. You see on Startrek that they fear 'history will be changed' if they travel in time. That shows.
Dāmodar Das
In the spiritual world there is no kāla (time)?
Advaitadās
na ca kāla vikrama (Śrīmad Bhāgavat 2.9.10). Jīva Goswāmī comments on this that time is there, but it does not cause decay - yatrāsau ṣaḍ bhāva vikāra hetuḥ kāla vikrama eva na pravartate tatra teṣām abhāvaḥ. “The six transformations like birth, growth, decay, death etc. are not there.”
Dāmodar Das
Why Bhagavan created the material world with its miseries?
Advaitadās
There is no beginning to this - it was never ultimately created - prakṛtim puruṣam caiva viddhy anādi ubhau (Bhagavad-Gītā 13.21). There is no beginning to prakṛti.
Dāmodar Das
Why it exists? Why Kṛṣṇa wants to see us suffering adhidaivika, adhibhautika, adhyātmika miseries?
Advaitadās
Please, I have given you the answer already. Why ask again? He did not create this. He does not want to see us suffering. The material world was never created, nor were we or Him – see Bhagavad Gītā 2.12, na tv evāhaṁ jātu nāsam na tvaṁ neme – ‘Never did I not exist, nor you nor all these kings’ and 13.21 (see above).”
Dāmodar Das
“But we were created by the Lord in some moment.”
Advaitadās
“No, never.”Dāmodar Das
jīvasyānyasya sargena nare muktim upāgate
acintya-śaktir bhagavān jagat pūrayate sadā
brahmana saha mucyante brahma-lokam upāgataḥ
sṛjyante ca mahā kalpe tad-vidhāscāpare janaḥ
This is from the Viṣṇu Dharmottara Pūrāṇa in the purport to Śrīmad Bhāgavat 10.87.30 – “when one jīva becomes liberated, Bhagavān creates another.”
Advaitadās
“There can be no contradiction with Bhagavad Gītā, which is Śruti and the highest pramāṇa. jīva, kāla, prakṛti, bhagavān, karma and avidyā - all are without beginning. karma and avidyā may end, others are also ananta or endless. These verses you quoted explain that liberated souls are replaced with the stock of sleeping souls. These souls exist within Mahā-Viṣṇu.”
Dāmodar Das
“When I thought about reasons of existence of material world, I thought that here, and only here Bhagavān can manifest his Karunika nature, in the spiritual world there is no one to save, but here, in material world, His heart can melt from compassion towards us. So when he wants to fight, like with Hiranyakaśipu, the only eligible place for such a fight is the material world. I remember from Bṛhad-Bhāgavatāmṛta, that in spiritual world there are no demons with whom He can fulfill His desire to fight.”
Advaitadās
“No, that is not right. He fights demons also in the spiritual sky. It is both in Bṛhad-Bhāgavatāmṛta and in Bhakti Sandarbha. One of my first blogs was about that. But on the karuṇā-point you are right.”
Dāmodar Das
“Also I thought that in the Spiritual World Kṛṣṇa always in the age of yauvana, He is never born there, but all Vrajavāsis know that he was born from the womb of Yaśodā, so the material world is a place where Kṛṣṇa is actually born. Kṛṣṇa lifts Govardhan only in the material world? He has done it at the age of 6 (?). But in Spiritual world he is 16.”Advaitadās
“Not too many questions at once. All Kṛṣṇa’s līlās are eternal, including the birth-līlā.”
Dāmodar Das
“So the material world is a place where Kṛṣṇa can play līlās which cannot be played in the Spiritual world?”
Advaitadās
“Kṛṣṇa’s līlās never begin and they never end. In paravyoma Kṛṣṇa has all ages up to 16, eternally. Kṛṣṇa can save conditioned souls only here - any other līlā he can do anywhere.”
Dāmodar Das
“So there is a loka in Spiritual sky where Kṛṣṇa is eternally Bāla Gopāla?”
Advaitadās
“paravyoma is one loka and yet innumerable lokas. loka means world, not location. Bāl Gopāl is also eternally manifest in the paravyoma. It is said in Bṛhad Bhāgavatāmṛta that Kṛṣṇa goes over and over again to Mathurā to kill Kaṁsa. All of Kṛṣṇa’s pastimes are eternal. Sanātan Goswāmī explains in Bṛhad Bhāgavatāmṛta (2.6.357):
tatratyās te tu tāṁ sarvām apūrvāṁ manyante sadā
śrī-kṛṣṇa-parama-premakālakūṭa-vimohitāḥ
śrī-kṛṣṇa-parama-premakālakūṭa-vimohitāḥ
"But the residents of Vraja, completely bewildered by the kālakūṭa poison of their supreme love for Śrī Kṛṣṇa, never think that any of these events has ever occurred before." (sarvām api apūrvāṁ pūrvam ajātām iyaiva manyante - ṭīkā)
Dāmodar Das
“There are a lot dimensions? This is difficult to grasp with the material mind.”
Advaitadās
“It is impossible to conceive. Vaikuṇṭha means ‘no contraction’. acintya khalu ye bhāvāḥ na tams tarkena yojayet “One cannot argue on inconceivable matters.”
Dāmodar Das
“But in the Caitanya Caritāmṛta is given a size of the equator of Vaikuṇṭha - billions of kilometers .”
Advaitadās
“Yes, in the Purāṇas too. But that is for glorifying and visualizing the paravyoma only. How can innumerable persons fit in a few billion km? Innumerable persons need unlimited space. In some Purāṇas it is said that paravyoma is just a few thousand miles away – don’t take that literally.”
Dāmodar Das
ReplyDeleteIn the spiritual world there is no kāla (time)?
Advaitadās
na ca kāla vikrama (Śrīmad Bhāgavat 2.9.10). Jīva Goswāmī comments on this that time is there, but it does not cause decay - yatrāsau ṣaḍ bhāva vikāra hetuḥ kāla vikrama eva na pravartate tatra teṣām abhāvaḥ. “The six transformations like birth, growth, decay, death etc. are not there.”
If time exists in the spiritual world, how can we say that in the spiritual world not even the leaves fall? There's a philosophical inconsistency there.
You have to define time. See if you are better than the physicists who have a few concepts on what "time" really is. Some even say the time is an illusion because the past, present and future are all within the same universal block.
However, if time just means "change" and "the six transformations like birth, growth, decay, death etc." then time does not exist in the spiritual world as even the leaves do not fall in the spiritual world, if I may reiterate.
However if time is defined as a power within the first cause then of course, time exists in the spiritual world as all other potentialities and concepts.
Maybe we can glean from the Srimad Bhagavatam, just what time is.
Volume 1, Chap. 5, verse 26: The Lord possessed of the Power of consciousness, and manifesting as Purusha, cast his seed (reflected consciousness) in His Maya, whose constituents of the three gunas are agitated by the power of Time.
verse 27: Out of the inchoate (rudimentary) state of Maya, prompted by Time, came into being the Mahattattva (the all-comprehending entity). Mahattattva, which is self-conscious luminosity, dispelled the covering of darkness (tamas) and revealed the universe which was existing in himself.
verse 28. That Mahattattva, which consists of the Lord's part (amsa), the Gunas of Prakriti, and Time-spirit, being subject to the Lord;s look, desired to create and transformed himself into another condition.
V 29: Evolved from the Mahattattva came into existence the "I-category" (aham tattva).
So really, it's in how you define time.
Malati, in Vaikuntha not even the leaves fall is the title of a book, which aims at a completely different point than the time factor in the paravyoma. Time exists in the material realm in a very different way than in the spiritual realm, as in the material world, which is a constantly mutating place, it causes old age and ultimately death. These things do not exist in the spiritual realm. Spiritual time is continuous, which it also is in the material realm, minus the destructive power of decay. The quotes you cited from the Bhagavat all describe material time. The quote I cited, 2.9.10, is about Vaikuntha, however. Spiritual time does not mean that everything in the spiritual realm is static. There is motion, but no destructive power of time.
ReplyDeleteI agree, prakriti or "nature" has no beginning but the universe which was always existing in himself has to be agitated by time to be known, as explained by verse 27.
ReplyDeleteAnd I think at that juncture is what we simply term as being created, which Damodardas might mean.
Malati, creation is taking place in a cyclic manner, though ultimate creation, a primeval beginning, does not exist for either the spirit souls nor for material nature. That is clear from the Gita verses 2.12 and 13.21 which I quoted in the blog.
ReplyDeleteYes, of course. I was just pointing at a single point in a circle and I think that is what Damodardas meant. Of course we have the concept of pralaya in which the appearance and dissolution of the lokas take turn endlessly. But all reside within the Mahattattva.
ReplyDeleteI don't see that I'm saying any different. I have explained what I think time means in the material world and what I think time means in the spiritual world.
When I say that leaves in the spiritual world does not fall symbolises that there is no decay or destruction there. Imagine a leaf, it's green at first then becomes yellow and then decay. That process is exactly what the six transformations is like birth, growth, decay, death. Now you can come back to me and say that the leaves decay in the spiritual world so how do square that with your definition of time in the material world which entails the 6 transformation.
I think we have a different way of reading things and that "the leaves does not fall in vaikuntha" is not just a title of a book for me, it has a philosophical dimension for me.
Of course , the spiritual world is not static. There's a whole lot of activities going on there. How else can the sports between Krishna and the jivas be enjoyable?