Verse: Bramacharya
Brahmacharya is the topic I have chosen for this seminar. I haven’t seen many devotees discussing about this topic though it’s a very important one. Brahmacharya: “brahma aacharati iti”. Brahma means “spiritual reality” and aacharan means “conduct”. So Brahmacharya literally means to act in such a way to become situated in spiritual reality. In English, Brahmacharya means celibacy i.e., to remain single or unmarried. But, according to Vedic understanding, celibacy could be one aspect of it but not all.
We have two identities namely, material (body) and spiritual (soul). This body is basically a lump of matter and yet it has life in it because of the presence of the soul. Hence we understand that our real identity is spiritual. Brahmacharya is basically to become situated in that identity. When one practises Brahmacharya one automatically becomes a celibate. Therefore the Vedic understanding of Brahmacharya is far greater than being a celibate i.e., even householders can be Brahmacharis. Basically, this Krsna conscious movement is to make people Brahmacharis whether he or she is a man or a woman or a householder.
Now let us consider this spiritual identity. As stated before, this body (lump of matter) is alive as long as the soul is present. So, the soul is the source of consciousness. When we say “I”, it actually refers to the soul. But due to our misconception, we tend to misidentify it as our body which is the source of bondage. It is through this body that the soul is bound to the material nature. When the soul is projected through the body, one thinks oneself to be the body and consequently he acts in a way that is detrimental to his spiritual identity. One example is that when a mosquito bites a person, he thinks that the mosquito is biting “him”. In this way, the soul becomes subjected to the pleasures and pain caused by his body. In the Bhagavad Gita, this body is compared to a dress. Just as when one dress becomes old with time we give that up and accept a new dress, the soul also assumes different bodies in course of time. But one difference between the dress and the body is that the body has senses to perceive information. The senses carry the information and register it in the brain through the nervous system. Therefore, if somebody pinches or tickles you, you feel it through the lump of matter.
This body is subjected to different types of sense gratification namely, eating, sleeping, defending and mating. These propensities are even found in animals and in fact, it is stronger in them. For example, the animals generally wander in search of food and once they have found their prey, they rest. Yet they are always aware of the different threats from which they have to protect themselves by defending. And when the season is appropriate, they have the propensity for mating. Hence, according to Vedic scriptures, all these propensities are understood to be animal propensities. Man is also considered to be an animal but a civilized one. Man lives in a house while animals live in the forest. Animals defend themselves with their claws and fangs while man defends himself with mightier weapons. But in mating, there is a subtle difference. Mating in animals is controlled by nature’s arrangement whereas the man is allowed to mate whenever he wants. This freedom is endowed upon man to overcome the urges of his sex-desire and not to indulge in it indiscriminately. The urge is present in human being by the arrangement of nature. This is done so, in order to maintain the progeny by procreation.
Procreation is a very troublesome and painful experience. Nature awards some pleasure in it so that man and woman will mate which otherwise would not be possible. It is unfortunate that the present human society has given up this real purpose of procreation and indulges in it just for some sense gratification. Hence, it is important to act just for the purpose of it and not get deviated which can only be achieved by becoming aware of our spiritual practices. In the present society, the innocent people are getting drowned into sexual indulgence indiscriminately because of bad association. Sex-pleasure is believed to be the highest kind of pleasure in the material platform. But, one has to understand that everything in material-nature comes with a price-tag along with it. The price one pays for such ephemeral sense-gratification is loss of one’s vitality. This vital or life energy is Sanskrit is termed as “virya” or “shugra” popularly known as semen in English.
Semen is essence of life-energy which comes from soul. It is a combination of two processes. The matter is consumed by the living-entity in the form of food. This food is transformed into different elements of the body by the supervision of the spirit-soul which also activates different organisms. These organisms accordingly, extract different elements from the food. There are three critical systems necessary for the proper functioning of the different organisms namely, respiratory system, circulatory system and digestive system. Respiratory system helps in assimilating the oxygen as we breathe in the air, while the circulatory system carries this life energy and circulates it throughout the body. After the life energy has been delivered to different parts of the body, it comes back to the heart where the vital-energy is re-infused into it. The digestive system helps in burning the food (the fire in stomach is called “jataragni”) to extract the juice from it. The burning process is called the digestive process. According to Vedic-science, food is transformed in seven stages (saptha dhatus). First, the food or the matter we consume is transformed into juice (rasa), which is then transformed into blood (raktha). This blood is then transformed into flesh (maamsha), which again transforms into fat (meedha). The fat is transformed into bone, which in turn is transformed into bone-marrow. Finally, the bone-marrow is converted into semen. Semen is the finest element and storehouse of vital energy. In Sanskrit semen is called “veeriya “, which also means strength. Thus, the essence of a living entity is semen, just like the essence of milk is butter. When we churn the transformed milk, we get butter. Similarly, when a living entity is agitated with sex-desire, its life-energy comes out of a specific-organ. The milk whose butter has been churned out is practically of no use. The condition of living-entity which has lost its life-energy is analogous to that of the churned milk. Thus, we see that it is very important for a living entity to retain its vital energy. It is interesting to note that in modern day especially people who participate in Olympics are advised by their trainers to not to indulge in sex before the contest. Here we see that even materialists are recognizing the importance of the retention of vital-energy, what to speak of a spiritual enthusiast. Hence we conclude that only householders should indulge just for the sake of procreation. Then, even they are also Brahmacharis.
Sex-desire as already stated is the nature’s arrangement to make man and woman mate. It’s a very strong desire and most difficult hurdle for a spiritualist. Among the four regulative-principles it is very easy to follow the three regulative-principles namely, to avoid meat-eating, gambling and intoxication, the propensity for which gradually fades away with time. On the other hand, the more one restricts his sex-desire, the more it becomes strong. According to Vedic scriptures, it is by this desire a living-entity is chained to material-nature. As long as we have this desire, we will not be free from the bondage of material-nature. This bondage is created by Maya-devi. The more one elevates, the more he is subjected to it. For example, the arrangement for mating is much sophisticated in upper-planetary systems compared to Earth planet. When a living entity is about to leave the material-nature, Maya-devi Herself comes and tries to hold it back. Our acharyas have pointed out what ought to be done in that situation. One example is that when Bhakta Kumar was about to leave Earth planet, Maya-devi Herself came and stopped him. Bhakta Kumar replied “Please bless me so that I can serve Your Brother”. Thus, one should always pray to Maya-devi to be engaged in Krishna’s service. Srila Prabhupada pointed out that the jnanis and yogis try to artificially suppress this desire, whereas the real conquest is to shed this desire. One such example is, when a husband and wife beget a child, all their lust is transformed into love for their child. Therefore a living entity should develop a love for Krishna(higher taste)so as to conquer his sense-gratifying desires.
In reality, this process of procreation is disgusting and yet necessary. This is the basis of illusion. First of all, we misidentify ourselves to be the body and as a result a male body is enamored by the female body and vice versa. In actuality, we are part and parcel of Krsna. We are connected to him by love which is energy. When this energy is diverted on something, the tendency of the spirit-soul is to become united with it. When it is directed on material object, it wants to become one with that and is called Lust while when it is projected towards Krsna, its called devotion. To express this love, we perform activities called devotional service. This love is two-way traffic. Krsna also reciprocates multifold times which lead to a loving exchange. This causes one to become joyful which is actually what a living-entity is hankering for all his life-time. So, when one follows this path, all other desires become secondary. Just as a child is very much interested in building a castle with sand, while it grows up all these desires become insignificant. Similarly, when one grows out of material platform and develop spiritual consciousness, all his sense-gratifying desires become immaterial. In this regard, men have a very important responsibility to learn and respect women. The onus is on men as they are the natural aggressors. Unfortunately, the modern society doesn’t know how to respect women which only leads to complete degradation. But Srila Prabhupada established this society where men give the highest respect to women. It is our duty to establish and spread this spiritual culture.
Thank you all very much. All glories to Srila Prabhupada. Does anybody have any question?
Question: Is there copulation relationship in spiritual world?
Answer: No. One has to get rid of this desire to enter spiritual world. Doesn’t it sound illogical if it exists there? But there is love for Krsna, which when we develop inundates our heart with joy. Material world is perverted reflection of spiritual world. Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu is Radha-Krsna together, who came to distribute the highest love of spiritual sky and not lust. Apparently, they may look alike but they are completely different as sunrise and sunset though looks alike, in reality are the opposite things.
Question: Initially, it is easy to conquer one’s sex-desire but eventually it becomes stronger. Comment.
Answer: It is mentioned in Srimad Bhagavatam that one can conquer these desires by devotional service. That’s what I had earlier pointed out as well. Initially, one doesn’t have strong desire. But when one restrains from that the vital energy keeps increasing in his body. And as it increases, the urge becomes greater. But when one develops Krsna consciousness he experiences some joy, but not attracted. Because he is elevating from material platform where the highest pleasure is sex-desire to spiritual platform where the highest pleasure is the loving exchange. So, one should try to be situated in spiritual platform.
Question: When sex desire is suppressed can it come out as some other desire like overeating?
Answer: Good point. Yes. That’s why the artificial suppression is discouraged. One must follow the natural process that is Krsna consciousness. And in Krsna consciousness one can eat as much as he wants. There is no restrain on that.
Question: How do you explain the appearance of little infants in spiritual world?
Answer: They don’t appear but manifest. It is not that those infants manifested day-before- yesterday. It is by Krisna’s will that everything manifests. Also everything in spiritual sky is eternal.