Written by; Gunaavatar das
Just recently we met HH Kavichandra Swami Maharaja in Siem Reap and we spent few days with Maharaja at Yashodapura Asram. There was nice conversation with Maharaja regarding what is actually we as devotees and general society need, and Maharaja mentioned a simple thing “Now what we need is Food” exactly Maharaja voice was very clearly mentioning about this. “Instead of building big temple we even need more to grow our own food” said Maharaja, because the food that we are consuming now is not an ideal food for Vaisnavas and general mass of people. Nowadays food is produced by industrial farming methods using all kinds of chemicals and hybrids seeds is actually violating the soil and also our bodies. Maharaja also talked about what we call Ahimsa food, so not only Ahimsa milk but also Ahimsa food, meaning that we have to consume only Ahimsa food produce naturally from our own farm community. So Maharaja strongly emphasized that “we need pure food”.
At the same time we all know not everyone is interested to go to the village, live and grow food, most of people in the world were brought up with modern life style and very difficult for them to jump forward to the natural village life style although they are actually experiencing the struggle of city life.
Especially nowadays with the global economic problem and also global epidemic of Corona Virus Disease, now almost the whole globe are panicked with this global epidemic. HG Kala das (ACBSP) said “it‘s time to move forward to chant and plant“.
“The Coronavirus situation is creating worldwide panic in many ways including financial problems for many people. Now energy should go into planting crops for sustenance of essential goods because food prices will increase dramatically for too many reasons to get into here. Chant and plant should be our immediate moto for Devotees everywhere including Cambodia and India” (HG Kala das ACBSP, March 2020)
Right now the world is on the verge of a complete chaotic situation, most of the people have given up the land and chasing the illusory happiness of city life and forgetting their dependence on agriculture, but now this Corona virus has them locked up in the city homes and the store shelves are going empty. No land to plant.
”chant and plant “ yes! chant for peace by connecting ourselves with God and plant for sustenance.
We at Cambodia Village wish everyone nothing but well. Plant seeds for food wherever possible and chant wherever possible ”Chant and Plant”
So as the sun has two Energies heats and light, so also our two sources of energy as devotees are chanting and planting. Those who might not yet interested with the Vedic life style simple living high thinking they should be given chance to participate in the chanting of the Holly name and by being gradually purified they will understand our real basics identities is to serve Krishna and also live as how Krishna have shown to us. Live in Harmony with nature and to every living entity by learning , loving and serving each other and developing a spiritual culture and rural Vedic community life style.
Chanting is definitely the main practice of every ISKCON center around the world and we also have some farm community in few parts of the world but still need more people to take up this great mission of producing our own food. Even Srila Prabhupada nicely said “Use only what you produce and produce only what you need“.
Even during Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu’s time, people from Navadvip used to spend a lots of time in Jaganath Puri to be with Lord Chaitanya. Why? Because they have sufficient food from their fields simply by working for 3 months in planting season and after that they will go to see Lord Chaitanya in Puri.
So we can see how nowadays because of Corona Virus people have to go to purchase all kinds of foodstuff at the stores and super markets and suddenly all the price may go up to doubled because everyone needs food stocks at their home during the city lock down.
In Siem Reap, Cambodia, people become sorrow because the situation is so bad, especially the poor people, they lost their job because no tourists and no income, the economy has fall apart.
This is kind of partial annihilation because hundreds of people died and thousands of people lost their jobs. Prabhupada used to say “City will be collapsed”. So seems to be this is already partially collapsed just because of Covid-19.
Growing food and encourage ourselves and others to take up more serious chanting are the only way. Growing food in natural way means we need cows, because cows are the basic need of having ideal Vedic agriculture, from cows we can get compost, bulls are used for ploughing the land. But as we know now cows and bulls are being separated with the land and also sometimes separated with the farmers, no sense of community. Only agriculture base on economy profits and industries, only machines are there in the field, and no more cows.
HH Bhakti Raghava Swami Maharaja once explained “… according to the Vedic scriptures farm production is not meant for sale, same as cows, land and knowledge are not meant for sale. So food are to be offered and given free to whoever needs, this is the Vedic standard. In ancient time, people who help the farmers will get few bags of grain, fruits or vegetables as the exchange of their work …”
So such a program of chanting and planting need to be encouraged everywhere both in the villages and cities, Srila Prabhupada wanted that every city temple should have Varnasrama College to educate our future generation in the science of Krishna consciousness and natural art of living. This is the only hope to save the humanity and world.