26
THE SCIENCE OF SELF-REALIZATION
Bhagavad-gītā  [2.20]:  na jāyate mriyate vā kadācin . . . na hanyate hanyamāne śarīre.
Mike Robinson:  Do you often quote references?
Śrīla Prabhupāda:  Yes, we quote many references. Kṛṣṇa consciousness is a serious education, not an ordinary religion. [ To a devotee. ] Find that verse in the  Bhagavad-gītā .
Disciple:
na jāyate mriyate vā kadācin nāyam bhūtvā bhavitā vā na bhūyaḥ ajo nityaḥ śāśvato 'yam purāṇo na hanyate hanyamāne śarīre
“For the soul, there is never birth nor death. Nor, having once been, does he ever cease to be. He is unborn, eternal, ever-existing, undying, and primeval. He is not slain when the body is slain.”
Mike Robinson:  Thank you very much for reading that. So can you explain to me just a bit more? If the soul is undying, does everybody’s soul go to be with God when they die?
Śrīla Prabhupāda:  Not necessarily. If one is qualified—if he qualifies himself in this life to go back home, back to Godhead—then he can go. If he does not qualify himself, then he gets another material body. And there are 8,400,000 different bodily forms. According to his desires and  karma , the laws of nature give him a suitable body. It is just like when a man contracts some disease and then develops that disease. Is that difficult to understand?
Mike Robinson:  It’s very difficult to understand all of it.
Śrīla Prabhupāda:  Suppose somebody has contracted smallpox. So, after seven days he develops the symptoms. What is that period called?
Mike Robinson:  Incubation?
Śrīla Prabhupāda:  Incubation. So you cannot avoid it. If you have contracted some disease it will develop, by nature’s law. Similarly, during this life you associate with various modes of material nature, and that association will decide what kind of body you are going to get in the next life. That is strictly under the laws of nature. Everyone is controlled by the laws of nature—they’re completely dependent—but out of ignorance people think that they are free. They’re not free; they’re  imagining  that they’re free, but they are completely under the laws of nature. So, your next birth will be decided according to your activities—sinful or pious, as the case may be.