Without following God's laws through varnashrama, material progress creates only chaos and suffering.Listen — Srila Prabhupada Uvaca
Lecture at World Health Organization — June 6, 1974, Geneva 740606LE-GENEVA [71:46 Minutes] Lect_740606LE-GENEVA Prabhupāda: So you can give some introduction. Then I'll speak. Guru-gaurāṅga: So we are very honored to be able to address here today. Our spiritual master, His Divine Grace Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupāda, not only is the founder of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness, which is a cultural organization with branches throughout the world, one hundred branches, but he's also an eminent writer. He has presented single-handedly, so far, six volumes of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, which are going to be completed within sixty volumes, and other such books as Bhagavad-gītā As It Is.
The monthly magazine of the Society distributes some one million copies per month. And the aim of this International Society for Krishna Consciousness, of which Śrīla Prabhupāda is the founder, is a cultural respiritualization of society. We have made so much progress in technology, in science, and yet there is a certain disparity in the society. The point of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam and the Vedic scriptures is that any type of technology without fundamental spiritual technology cannot succeed.
So it is in the hope of complementing the work of this World Health Organization by deepening its knowledge of the spiritual technology, which is equally important, if not more so, that we have requested this opportunity to speak to you. [break] [01:54] Prabhupāda: So Ladies and Gentlemen, I thank you very much for your participating in this meeting. Our Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement is based on the authority of this Bhagavad-gītā. Bhagavad-gītā, I think most of you know, Indians or foreigners.
And some of you must have read Bhagavad-gītā. We have published Bhagavad-gītā as it is, without any malinterpretation. In the Bhagavad-gītā, the author of the Bhagavad-gītā is announced as the Supreme Personality of Godhead, and the Hindus, especially the Vaiṣṇava... Vaiṣṇava or not Vaiṣṇava, Kṛṣṇa is accepted as the Supreme Personality of Godhead.
We... Our Indian spiritual life is guided by the ācāryas, sampradāya ācārya, the Rāmānujācārya, Madhvācārya, Viṣṇu Svāmī and Nimbārka. There is... Whole Indian spiritual culture is dependent on the guidance of these ācārya.
And in the Bhagavad-gītā also, in the Thirteenth Chapter, it is advised, ācārya upāsanam: "One should follow the instruction of the ācārya." That is our Vedic civilization. And in the Bhagavad-gītā also, it is said in the Fourth Chapter, evaṁ paramparā-prāptam imaṁ rājarṣayo viduḥ [Bg. 4.2]. The science of God... Imaṁ vivasvate yogaṁ proktavān aham avyayam [Bg. 4.1].
This is a yoga system, this Bhagavad-gītā. So Kṛṣṇa says that "Formerly, this yoga system was spoken by Me to the sun-god, Vivasvān." And visvasvān manave prāhur, then the sun-god, whose name is Vivasvān at the present moment... We get all information from the śāstra. Each and every planet has got a predominating personality. Just like we have got on this planet a few presidents.