What did Prabhupāda say about the origin of the soul?
While most of the time Prabhupāda avoided touching this subject, there are a few references where Prabhupāda directly tries to explain it.
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There are three references that anyone who has a curiosity about how the soul comes to the material world should get familiar with. The first one is the letter Śrila Prabhupāda wrote in 1972 to Madhudviṣa Prabhu, answering questions from Australian devotees about the origin of the soul. The second is a class Prabhupāda gave in Tokyo on April 23, 1972, and the third is a series of purports on the fourth canto of Śrīmad Bhāgavatam, chapter 28, the chapter about King Purañjana becoming a woman in his next life.
Most of the time, Prabhupāda avoided touching this subject, arguing that it’s not important to understand how one fell into the ocean; the important thing is to find how to get out of it. However, if one is curious, these are the three references where Prabhupāda directly tries to explain this topic.
A point that is interesting to notice is that Prabhupāda gives a consistent explanation in all three references, one of which is a letter, one a lecture, and the third part of his purports on the Śrīmad Bhāgavatam. This defeats the theory that Prabhupāda was giving different explanations according to the time and audience.
So, what does he say?
The first important point is that the soul has an innate relationship with Kṛṣṇa. The soul is called marginal because it has the free will to choose between living under the internal energy and the external energy of Kṛṣṇa, but Prabhupāda makes clear that the soul comes originally from the internal, spiritual energy. This defeats the idea that the soul comes from the impersonal Brahmajyoti or the causal ocean. In fact, Prabhupāda directly argues against this idea, saying that life in the Brahmajyoti is already a fallen condition, and thus not the origin of the soul. Prabhupāda goes as far as saying that, “Formerly we were with Kṛṣṇa in His lila or sport.”
How does the soul come in contact with the material energy, since there is no influence of the material modes anywhere in the spiritual world?
Prabhupāda argues that it is due to free will, an innate quality of the soul that Kṛṣṇa does not try to suppress. The soul does not leave the association of Kṛṣṇa because of the influence of material nature; rather, it leaves because of his own free will, and the influence of material nature starts later.
Different from Kṛṣṇa’s direct expansions as well as His Śakti expansions, which are directly part of Kṛṣṇa or His energy, the souls are separate expansions, which can choose between serving Kṛṣṇa or not. Although we have an innate relationship with Kṛṣṇa, we may choose to try to imitate Him instead of serving, if we so desire. The material world is exactly the place where we can do it.
How can the soul “fall” if Prabhupāda himself explains that no one falls from Vaikuṇṭha?
To explain this apparent contradiction, Śrila Prabhupāda uses the analogy of a dream. When we dream, we don’t leave our bed; it’s just a temporary mental situation from which we can wake up at any moment. If someone is sleeping and you ask, “Where did he go?” The answer will be that he didn’t go anywhere. In other words, no one leaves his bed while dreaming, although he may see many dreams in his delirious state. Similarly, no one falls from the spiritual world, although our attention may be temporarily transferred here. To think that we are in the material world and thus separated from Kṛṣṇa is just part of the material illusion. In reality, we are always with Kṛṣṇa, and as soon as we turn our attention back to Hi,m we realize we never left.
Prabhupāda also mentions this same idea in other passages, like in SB 7.7.27, for example:
“Therefore, if by good association, by the instructions of a bona fide spiritual master, one takes to Kṛṣṇa consciousness, his conditional life of material existence is vanquished, and his original consciousness, known as Kṛṣṇa consciousness, is revived. When one is Kṛṣṇa conscious, he can realize that material existence, whether one is awake or dreaming, is nothing but a dream and has no factual value. This realization is possible by the grace of the Supreme Lord.”
Could it be that souls have originally an immature relationship with Kṛṣṇa, where we are with Him, but not in a position of service, and thus in a not completely stable position, from which we could fall into the material world? It’s difficult to tell, but in a few of his purports, Prabhupāda appears to go all the way in, saying that we are originally in an eternal personal relationship with Kṛṣṇa in one of the five rasas. One may like it or not, but that’s something he clearly states. Take his purport on SB 7.7.39, for example:
“On the other hand, our relationship with Kṛṣṇa, the Supreme Personality of Godhead, is eternal. Nitya-siddha kṛṣṇa-prema. The pure souls are eternally in love with Kṛṣṇa, and this permanent love, either as a servant, a friend, a parent or a conjugal lover, is not at all difficult to revive. Especially in this age, the concession is that simply by chanting the Hare Kṛṣṇa mantra (harer nāma harer nāma harer nāmaiva kevalam) one revives his original relationship with God and thus becomes so happy that he does not want anything material.”
A dream is real in a sense, but in another sense it’s illusory. It’s not false, but it’s not real either. It exists, but at the same time doesn’t. No wonder Prabhupāda so frequently uses the analogy of a dream to explain our existence here in the material world. All it takes to end a bad dream is to wake up.
One can’t understand how he entered a dream from inside it, but after he wakes up, he can immediately understand. Therefore, although explaining the topic in these different references, Prabhupāda at the same time warns us not to spend much time trying to understand all the details, since it’s ultimately impossible to fully understand it in our current situation. It’s not possible to understand what reality is from inside a dream. All we can do is understand enough to wake up.
The priority should be to become Kṛṣṇa-conscious. Once we get out of the influence of the material energy, it becomes very easy to understand everything.
A bigger problem with the discussion about the falling of the soul, however, is that most of it is based on literature from caste goswamis and babajis from Vṛndāvana, which generally negates the eternal relationship of the soul with Kṛṣṇa, something that is strongly challenged by both Śrila Prabhupāda and Śrila Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī Thākura, as well as Śrila Bhaktivinoda Thākura himself. Influenced by such conclusions, devotees try to rationalize, arguing that Prabhupāda was just using preaching strategies to appeal to the sensibilities of the Western audience, which is both incorrect and offensive.
The first point to understand is that these lines are considerably different from ours in terms of philosophical conclusions. They also don’t accept Śrila Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī Thākura as being genuine (and as a consequence also Śrila Prabhupāda). It’s notable that when Śrila Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī Thākura visited Vṛndāvana in 1932, all the main temples, except one, closed their doors to him. Some even threw stones at the pilgrims.
While they do accept Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu and the Six Goswamis, their translations and interpretations of the verses are considerably different from what Śrila Prabhupāda gives in his books. In other words, they have certain incorrect conclusions about Sambandha and Abhidheya and interpret different scriptures according to these incorrect assumptions. As a result, Prayojana is understood, but there is no proper path to reach it.
It’s also worth noting that the caste goswamis were defined as an apasampradāya by Śrila Bhaktivinoda Thākura, an unbonafide philosophical school; therefore, although they have produced much literature over the centuries, the conclusions found in it are often not correct.
When Śrila Prabhupāda came to the West, there were many translations and commentaries of the works of the goswamis written by scholars of these lines, including his Godbrother Ananta Vasudeva, who joined one of these lines after his fall as a sannyāsi. These incorrect philosophical conclusions infiltrated the different Gaudiya Mathas, as many devotees were studying literature from these lines, following the example of Ananta Vasudeva and others.
However, Prabhupāda did not recommend any of these books to his disciples. When a disciple accepted a proposal to exchange a set of these books for a set of Prabhupāda’s own books, he showed displeasure and ordered the books to be returned; he didn’t even want to have them in his library. Nowadays, of course, many think they know better, but Prabhupāda clearly didn’t have a very good opinion about these books, and we can practically judge it based on the results. Prabhupāda had the potency to spread Kṛṣṇa consciousness all over the world and genuinely transform the consciousness of his disciples, while others couldn’t do much apart from trying to steal disciples and followers from him.
If you are interested in going deep on this topic of the “fall” of the jīva, you can check my book on this topic: The “Fall” of the Jīva, as Explained by Śrīla Prabhupāda
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