Material Association - an essential subject

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Human beings, by long material association, life after life, have a natural inclination to endeavor to lord it over material energy. They have no sense of the responsibility of human life. Due to the contamination of material association, through many millions of births, one's heart is covered with the dust of materialism. Love of God is in a dormant state in everyone's heart but it is contaminated by material association. The heart has to be purified from material association so that the dormant, natural love for Kṛṣṇa can be revived. When one engages in devotional service and constantly chants Hare Kṛṣṇa, the dust of materialism quickly clears, and one is elevated to the platform of pure knowledge.

Srila Prabhupada's books, lectures, conversations and letters offer a comprehensive presentation of this essential subject as seen in the Vaniquotes Material Association category. An introduction from his books is given below in the following 15 quotes.

Quotes from Srila Prabhupada's books


vanipedia.org 		A living entity develops a sort of complexity by material association, and the illusory encagement of the material body is accepted as an actual fact. Under such false complexity, the living beings under different categories of life become illusioned in different ways. Even in the most developed stage of human life, the same illusion prevails in the form of many isms and divides the loving relation with the Lord and thereby divides the loving relation between man and man. By hearing the subject matter of Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam this false complexity of materialism is removed. (Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 1.7.7)



vanipedia.org 		The instructions of vidyā (knowledge) must be acquired from a dhīra. A dhīra is one who is not disturbed by material illusion. No one can be undisturbed unless he is perfectly spiritually realized, at which time one neither hankers nor laments for anything. A dhīra realizes that the material body and mind he has acquired by chance through material association are but foreign elements; therefore he simply makes the best use of a bad bargain. (Sri Isopaniṣad, Mantra 10)



vanipedia.org 		One can compensate for a life of frustration by becoming a dhīra, or leaving home for good without communicating with relatives. A conditioned soul is already degraded by the material association, and still in the Kali-yuga the good qualities of a man will deteriorate to the lowest standard. (Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 1.13.28)



vanipedia.org 		Any activity, good or bad, performed in this material world—they are all contaminated, faulty actions because of material association. The foolish conditioned soul may think that he is offering charity by opening hospitals for material benefit or by opening an educational institution for material education, but he does not know that all such work is also faulty because it will not give him relief from the process of transmigration from one body to another. (Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 3.27.3)



vanipedia.org 		Sometimes it is found that a person interested in spiritual advancement gives up the company of material society and goes to a secluded place as recommended for the yogīs especially, but that will also not help a person in spiritual advancement, for in many instances such yogīs also fall down. As far as jñānīs are concerned, generally they fall down without taking shelter of the lotus feet of the Lord. The impersonalists or the voidists can simply avoid the positive material association; they cannot remain fixed in transcendence without being engaged in devotional service. The beginning of devotional service is to hear about the glories of the Supreme Personality of Godhead. (Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 4.22.23)



vanipedia.org 		Since materialistic people are concerned with the tongue, belly and genitals, if anyone wants to advance in spiritual life he must be very careful about associating with such people. To associate with such materialistic men is to commit purposeful suicide in the human form of life. (Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 3.31.32)



vanipedia.org 		By material association and education, we learn simply to concentrate on flimsy things, but yoga is the process of forgetting them altogether. Modern so-called yogīs and yoga systems manifest some magical feats, and ignorant persons are attracted by such false things, or they accept the yoga system as a cheap healing process for diseases of the gross body. But factually the yoga system is the process of learning to forget what we have acquired throughout the struggle for existence. (Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 1.13.53)



vanipedia.org 		If anyone has reached the stage where he must become free from this material contamination, then he has to seek the association of devotees, wherein Krsna consciousness is exclusively cultured. One can thereby become freed from all material association. (Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 3.25.24)



vanipedia.org 		Mahārāja Parīkṣit freed himself from all sorts of material association and meditated upon the lotus feet of Lord Kṛṣṇa, and that is the way of liberation. To be free from all material association means to cease completely from committing any further sins. To meditate upon the lotus feet of the Lord means to become free from the effects of all previous sins. The conditions of the material world are so made that one has to commit sins willingly or unwillingly, and the best example is Mahārāja Parīkṣit himself, who was a recognized sinless, pious king. (Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 1.19.7)



vanipedia.org 		A devotee is freed from all contaminated material association, he is not affected by the miseries of material existence. Even though he appears to be in the material world, he is not affected by the miseries of the material world. How is it possible? There is a very good example in the activities of the cat. The cat carries her kittens in her mouth, and when she kills a rat she also carries the booty in her mouth. Thus both are carried in the mouth of the cat, but they are in different conditions. The kitten feels comfort in the mouth of the mother, whereas when the rat is carried in the mouth of the cat, the rat feels the blows of death. (Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 3.25.24)



vanipedia.org 		When a pure devotee always fears material association, his real position of bhakti is manifested, and he naturally becomes uninterested in material enjoyment. (Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 10.2.8)



vanipedia.org 		The Lord is so kind that even if a devotee of the Lord cannot fulfill the complete course of devotional service unalloyed and uncontaminated by material association, he is given another chance in the next life by being awarded a birth in the family of a devotee or rich man so that without being engaged in the struggle for material existence the devotee can finish the remaining purification of his existence and thus immediately, after relinquishing the present body, go back home, back to Godhead. (Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 2.7.49)



vanipedia.org 		Devotional service which is based on the foreground of full knowledge combined with detachment from material association, and which is fixed by dint of the aural reception of the Vedānta-śruti, is the only perfect method by which the seriously inquisitive student can realize the Absolute Truth. Devotional service is not, therefore, meant for the less intelligent class of transcendentalists. (Caitanya-caritāmṛta, Ādi-līlā 7.102)



vanipedia.org 		By spiritual realization, disintegration of our material affinity naturally begins, and the more we become spiritually developed, the less we are affected by the happiness or distress that arise out of sense perception in contact with material association. (Message of Godhead, Chapter 2)



vanipedia.org 		The sound incarnation of Lord Kṛṣṇa, the Supreme Soul (i.e. Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam), enters into the heart of a self-realized devotee, sits on the lotus flower of his loving relationship, and thus cleanses the dust of material association, such as lust, anger and hankering. Thus it acts like autumnal rains upon pools of muddy water. (Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 2.8.5)


Material Association - explore more within this category.

Vanipedia has now over 903 introductory articles compiled from Srila Prabhupada's books under the series titled Essential Subjects. All these articles can be seen in the Table of Content on the right side of this article and also here in this Umbrella Category. Browse through them to relish the breadth and depth of Srila Prabhupada's teachings - There is a subject for everyone.


   
 

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