Live the Bhāgavatam · SB 11.25.21
Ūti· What drives us to actThe Modes Shape Future Births
“Learned persons dedicated to Vedic culture are elevated by the mode of goodness to higher and higher positions. The mode of ignorance, on the other hand, forces one to fall headfirst into lower and lower births. And by the mode of passion one continues transmigrating through human bodies.”
What the purport teaches
- Those in goodness hanker after perfect knowledge and are called brāhmaṇas. They may rise as high as Brahmaloka, the supreme material position.
- Those in ignorance mistake the gross material body for the self and gradually fall into lower births, including unmoving species.
- Passion fosters desires for wealth, prestige and power. A person satisfying material desires within Vedic culture is allowed to remain in human society.
Try this today
Write down one desire you pursued today and consider whether it was for knowledge, wealth, prestige or power.
Ask yourself
Am I more eager for knowledge or for wealth, prestige and power?
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.