Live the Bhāgavatam · SB 11.10.14-16
Ūti· What drives us to actFruitive Enjoyment Cannot End Material Misery
“My dear Uddhava, I have thus explained to you perfect knowledge. There are philosophers, however, who challenge My conclusion. They state that the natural position of the living entity is to engage in fruitive activities, and they see him as the enjoyer of the happiness and unhappiness that accrue from his own work. According to this materialistic philosophy, the world, time, the revealed scriptures and the self are all variegated and eternal, existing as a perpetual flow of transformations. Knowledge, moreover, cannot be one or eternal, because it arises from the different and changing forms of objects; thus knowledge itself is always subject to change. Even if you accept such a philosophy, My dear Uddhava, there will still be perpetual birth, death, old age and disease, since all living entities must accept a material body subject to the influence of time.”
What the purport teaches
- The followers of Jaimini claim that fruitive activity is the living entity’s natural position. They favor regulated sense gratification rather than renunciation and transcendence.
- Their philosophy treats the world and changing knowledge as perpetually existing through transformation. Lord Kṛṣṇa presents these claims as views that challenge His teaching, not as His own conclusion.
- Even accepting their claims for argument’s sake, material bodies remain subject to birth, death, old age and disease. The Supreme Personality of Godhead, Lord Kṛṣṇa, therefore shows that this philosophy does not serve the living entity’s true self-interest.
Try this today
Choose one pleasure you are pursuing today and briefly consider why obtaining it cannot free you from old age, disease or death.
Ask yourself
Do I mistake repeated opportunities for enjoyment for freedom from suffering?
Carry the question through the day, then answer it in your own words before sleep.
From Canto 10, chapter 14 onward, the translation and purports were completed by Śrīla Prabhupāda's disciples after his departure, and published by the Bhaktivedanta Book Trust.