Tattva-viveka
Atmatattva prabhu's explanation of fall of jiva
Yamuna Dasi - March 24, 2010 10:10 am
I was always anxious to hear HOW ISKCON explains how is it possible the jiva to fall from Vaikuntha if at several verses in Gita Krishna says "na nivartnte" - "never returns". How could jiva's fall theory be defended without entering in direct contradiction with Krishna's words in Gita, this was always my question and I never heard any logical answer.
And today for the very first time I heard a kind of explanation maybe. It was in a lecture given in 1988 by Atmatattva prabhu. By the way who is this devotee? He speaks very eloquently, with a lot of shakti and charm!
In the lecture he just touches the topic of jiva's fall (because it's a sequence of lectures on Updeshamrita actually) and he says that in Gita Krishna says that if the jiva GOES to Vaikuntha then it never returns, but this does not mean that if the jiva WAS initially there it cannot come to material world. And he explains the difference of the Sanskrit words for "goes" and "is there".
Here is the link of the audio lecture and the explanation which I describe is in the very last few minutes of this record:
http://www.indiadivine.org/articles/622/1/...f-32/Page1.html
Since it's an audio record I cannot clearly hear the Sanskrit words and cannot recognize which is the verse from Gita which he discusses giving this example.
Can someone who knows more Sanskrit please hear these last few minutes of the lecture and comment on this explanation?
At least as logic it sounds OK and could explain how ISKCON believes in the fall of the soul without contradicting Krishna's words from Gita.
Citta Hari Dasa - March 24, 2010 5:46 pm
If the falldown idea were true then the whole concept of anadi karma would be meaningless, so to analyze one verse in one book (incorrectly at that) is insufficient to substantiate such a claim; the entirety of the teachings must be taken into account. By neglecting to do so he misses the fact that when Krsna says "going there" it's just a way of talking about the soul entering the lila. How else would one talk about it?
Incidentally, Atmatattva also believes that Srila Prabhupada is the founder of his own sampradaya.
Yamuna Dasi - March 24, 2010 8:48 pm
Incidentally, Atmatattva also believes that Srila Prabhupada is the founder of his own sampradaya.
I don't understand what you mean?
Isn't SP a great branch of the sampradaya to which we all belong? And a founder acharya of ISKCON? But sampradaya as far as I know is something bigger than a branch and much more ancient. Isn't it?
Yamuna Dasi - March 24, 2010 9:18 pm
I was thinking about what Shridhara Maharaj says regarding thesis, anti-thesis and synthesis.
And that maybe there could exist an point of vision from which it would be possible to see the synthesis of the 2 seemingly opposite visions regarding the soul (fall-down from Vaikuntha or never have been there).
Because the starting questions would be where the soul was "in the beginning" but as we know there was no beginning since the soul is beginningless (what was the Sanskrit term for this?) so such a question cannot even be asked. So maybe here we are entering the realm of achintya and most probably that realm is out of the range of logic, grasp and even discussion.
About your remark that Krishna is just talking this way, as we know he is talking in many ways about many things and many times is not quite sticking even to his own words. So... 
Shyamananda Das - March 26, 2010 9:06 pm
Srila Prabhupada has already given the synthesis. Swami quoted one of Prabhupadas letters in a discussion about this on Harmonist:
"Have the conditioned souls ever seen Krsna? Were they with the Lord before being conditioned by the desire to lord it over material nature? Yes, the conditioned souls are parts and parcels of the Lord and thus they were with Krsna before being conditioned. Just as the child must have seen his father because the father places the child in the womb of the mother, similarly each soul has seen Krsna or the Supreme Father. But at that time the conditioned souls are resting in the condition called susupti which is exactly deep sleep without dream, or anesthetized state, therefore they do not remember being with Krsna when they wake up in the material world and become engaged in material affairs."
To this, Swami commented:
"Here Prabhupada’s comments are also in concert with the previous acaryas and we should follow this example."