(Srila Prabhupada and devotees dancing at Rathayatra, San Francisco 1974—click to enlarge)
Prabhupāda: Be happy and make all others happy. That is Kṛṣṇa consciousness. Sarve sukhino bhavantu. That is Vedic idea. Everyone be happy. That is the benediction. Sarve sukhino bhavantu. Caitanya Mahāprabhu says also the same thing, that let this Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement be preached in every village, in every town of the world. People will be happy. That is His foretelling. So any missions, any high ideals, should be preached just to make everyone happy. Because in the material existence, there is no happiness. That is a fact. There cannot be any happiness. This place is not meant for happiness because in the Bhagavad-gītā you'll find the Lord Himself says this is a place, duḥkhālayam aśāśvatam (BG 8.15). It is a place of miseries, this material world. And aśāśvatam, and temporary. Everything is temporary. Even if you accept, "All right. Whatever miserable is there, I'll accept this," that is also, has no value. Even if you accept, nature will not allow you to accept it and remain there. Aśāśvatam. You have to leave. So Kṛṣṇa says, mām upetya kaunteya duḥkhālayam aśāśvatam nāpnuvanti mahātmānaḥ saṁsiddhiṁ paramāṁ gatāḥ: (BG. 8.15) "If somebody comes to Me, then he hasn't got to return back to this miserable condition of life which is not only miserable but temporary." So we should understand that.
Nature is so cruel. In America, President Kennedy, he was thought to be the most fortunate man, happy man, young man, was elected President, nice wife, children, honor all over the world—(snaps finger)—within a second, finished. Temporary. Now what is his condition? Where he is? If life is eternal, if living entity is eternal, where he has gone? What he is doing? Is he happy or he is distressed? Or he's born in America or China? Nobody can say. But it is a fact that as living entity, he's eternal, he's existing. That is the beginning of Bhagavad-gītā philosophy. Na hanyate hanyamāne śarīre (BG 2.20). After destruction of this body the living entity is not destroyed. He is there. That we can understand. Just like in your childhood, you had a small body. That body is no more, but you are existing. So it is natural, when this body will not exist, I will exist in another body. It is not very difficult to understand. So this theory that body is eternal..., soul is eternal and body is temporary, that's a fact. Therefore this life, this present life, is meant for manufacturing the next body. That is Vedic knowledge. We are creating...
Just like a boy. He is studying very nicely. So he's creating next body, a very educated young body. By education he can get nice job, nice place, nice position. So he's creating his next body. Similarly, we are creating our next body according to our karma. So Kṛṣṇa says that "You create a body so that you can come to Me." Mad-yājino 'pi yānti mām. The whole Vedic philosophy is that if you want to go to some planet—just like people are trying to go to moon planet. So you have to create a body like that. You cannot go in this body. They're attempting to go with this body. That will be failure. It will be not possible. In every planet the atmosphere, the..., everything is different. So you have to create a different body to go to a particular type of planet. There are millions and thousands of planets. Moon planet is one of them. Kṛṣṇa says,
yānti deva-vratā devān
pitṛn yānti pitṛ-vratāḥ
bhūtejyā yānti bhūtāni
mad-yājino 'pi yānti mām
(BG 9.25)
Mad-yājino: "Those who are in Kṛṣṇa consciousness, they'll come to Me." And what is the benefit of going to Kṛṣṇa? He says, mām upetya: "If anyone comes to Me," mam upetya kaunteya duḥkhālayam aśāśvatam (BG. 8.15), "he does not come back again to this miserable condition." And aśāśvatam, temporary. Why? Samsiddhim paramam gataḥ. Oh, he has attained the highest perfection, to go back to Kṛṣṇa, mad-yājino 'pi mām, "one who comes to Me." So this is the greatest benediction to the human society, to train them to go back to Kṛṣṇa and dance there with Kṛṣṇa in rasa-līlā. You have seen Kṛṣṇa's rasa-līlā dancing? You have not seen?
John Lennon: Which? This picture?
Devotee: Rasa-līlā dancing with the gopīs. That's the..., with Rādhā. Dancing with Rādhā. Pictures like that.
John Lennon: Walls of the temple room?
Devotee: Yes.
Prabhupāda: So we can go there. Join with Kṛṣṇa and dance happily without any botheration.
Devotee (2): Haribol.
(Srila Prabhupada Conversation with John Lennon, Yoko Ono and George Harrison, London, At Tittenhurst, September 11, 1969)
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