|
In this work, His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, the foremost Vedic scholar and teacher of the modern age, and author of more than sixty volumes of authoritative annotated translations and summary studies of the philosophical and religious classics of India, presents a vision of a spiritual society. Criticizing a modern society based on industrialism, materialism and a callous disregard for the workers who support it, Srila Prabhupada calls for a spiritualized social structure. Citing Bhagavad-gita, he advocates varnasrama dharma, a social institution in which people gain spiritual satisfaction and spiritual advancement by doing their daily work as an offering to God.
Though his vision is based on the Vedic scriptures of India, Prabhupada faults the modern caste system as a perversion of scriptural injunction. But India is not alone, he states, for materialistic social structures around the world impede spiritual progress. Thus, in the forty conversations, lectures and interviews in this volume, we hear him present a society where occupations are determined by character and training, nit by birth and wealth; a society based on opportunity and maximizing human potential rather than on stagnancy and oppression; one based on mutual appreciation and cooperation between classes rather than suspicion and disdain. We hear about a society which is inclusive rather than exclusive, a society based on simple living and high thinking rather than on wealth and greed. Above all, the varanasrama society Prabhupada describes is consciously organized to bring each kind of person closer to the actual goal of human life, attaining a loving relationship with the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Lord Sri Krishna.
|
