Pusṭa Krsna: Are the prajapatis responsible for propagating human species or all species of life?

Prabhupada: Human.

Pusṭa Krsna: Are there different prajapatis for the different species?

Prabhupada: Yes. Brahma is the origin. [break] ...a class of men, they are called vaidyas (doctors). They know all these herb, which herb is medicine for certain disease, and they sell in the market. Every one of these is meant for some medicine. They know it.

Hari-sauri: Is that kind of information given in the Vedas?

Prabhupada: Yes. Yes. Ayur Veda. There is a book. Dravya-guna. All kinds of herbs, metals, even different kinds of flesh of different animals, they are mentioned. Hundreds of different kinds of animals flesh, how it can be utilized for certain disease, the descriptions are there.

Hari-sauri: They use flesh for curing things?

Prabhupada: Hmm?

Hari-sauri: They use flesh for curing diseases?

Prabhupada: Yes. Animal-killing is only allowed when it is absolutely necessary, for medicine. Suppose by killing one animal hundreds of lives are saved, so that is allowed. One preparation is chagalaka-ghrta. It is prepared... A live goat is put into the ghee with other ingredients, and that is a good medicine for tisis(?).

Hari-sauri: For?

Prabhupada: Tisis(?) Tuberculosis.

Hari-sauri: Oh.

Pusṭa Krsna: They actually cook the live goat in the ghee? Maybe we should withhold this science from the Western world for a while.

Prabhupada: No, you are expert already. (laughter)

Hari-sauri: There were some mantras they chant... Just like the sacrifices where they would give new life to the sacrificed animal. They would do the same thing?

Prabhupada: To test, to test the Vedic mantra.

Hari-sauri: So that goat would get a new life, or...?

Prabhupada: Who? No, this is used for medicine.

Pusṭa Krsna: Many, many of the Western medicines are taken from different glands from animals.

Prabhupada: Yes. [break]

Devotee (1): They had an Ayur-vedic doctor in New Vrindaban, and he was prescribing mung and rice diet for the...

Pusṭa Krsna: He's the one who told Ramesvara prabhu not to take any sugar when he had hepatitis. He told them that for hepatitis one should take—what was it?

Devotees: Mung and rice.

Devotee (1): Mung and rice, and no sugar.

Prabhupada: So it was taken?

Dhrsṭadyumna: Ramesvara was taking, but then he heard that Your Divine Grace said he should take papaya and sugar.

Prabhupada: Sugar candy.

Dhrsṭadyumna: So he immediately stopped the other prescription and followed your prescription.

Prabhupada: It was beneficial?

Dhrsṭadyumna: Ramesvara? Yes, he recovered.

Pusṭa Krsna: I also got over hepatitis following Prabhupada's prescription.

Syamakunḍa: Prabhupada, yesterday in this book it said that when a cow gets so old, the most economic solution to do with it is not to waste the meat, that it should be slaughtered.

Prabhupada: Hm?

Syamakunda: The karmis, they say that its... When you have this cow that won't give any more milk and its teeth are rotten where its going to die—it can't hardly eat properly—that it's a waste to not use that meat to feed people. It should be slaughtered.

Prabhupada: I have written?

Pusṭa Krsna: No. He's saying in a karmi book.

Syamakunda: They say that the economically proper thing to do is to kill the cow after it, er, and not waste the meat.

Prabhupada: And who will take? When he'll die, who will take his meat? That is also economical. Why don't you give it to the animal-eaters instead of wasting it? Why they bury in the ground? Why? Let it be thrown eating by the jackals or anybody else.

Syamakunda: The people should eat their..., the people, then, according to that philosophy, right?

Prabhupada: No, when man is dead, why the economic calculation is not taken? Hm?

Devotee (2): Because they think it is animallike.

Prabhupada: Animal or a man, when it is dead, then it is the same value. Is there any difference of value between the animal body and man's body?

Devotee (2): They think it is barbaric.

Prabhupada: "They think," but you think like human being.

Pusṭa Krsna: But the animal has no soul.

Prabhupada: Soul or not soul, when the body is dead, is there any difference of value?

Syamakunda: Well, it doesn't seem human to eat a human.

Prabhupada: This is nonsense, the rascal's nonsense.

Hari-sauri: It's too horrifying for them to contemplate that they may start eating each other.

Pusṭa Krsna: Or their family dog.

Dhrsṭadyumna: Or their grandmother.

Syamakunda: But if it was wrapped up in a package and they didn't know it was the dog or their mother, they could probably eat it.

Prabhupada: Yes, they can eat by packing.

Hari-sauri: They eat their pets sometimes. I used to have a pet rabbit, and one day I came home from school and my father had killed it and eaten it for dinner. (laughter) He said I wasn't looking after it properly, so he...

Prabhupada: Chant Hare Krsna.

Pusṭa Krsna: This business of simply taking economics into consideration...

Prabhupada: They do not. Rascals... How to live, they do not know. Animals. There is a class of men in India, they take, I told you, the dead body of a cow.

Pusṭa Krsna: Cobblers.

Dhrsṭadyumna: Mucis?

Prabhupada: Muci, yes. Their business is shoe maker. So when the cow is dead, they take it, they eat the meat and take the skin and the hoof. They make business without any, what is called, investment. Harer nama [Adi 17.21]. That is economic. He gets the skin without any price, and he makes shoes and gets full profit. But that is for a class of men, not for all. Economic gain for a cobbler is not the economic gain for a brahmana. "One man's food another man's poison."

Pusṭa Krsna: Is considered, Srila Prabhupada, that when a brahmana is engaged in the activities of plowing and cultivating, that he has become a vaisya?

Prabhupada: No. If there is nobody to help, he can do.

Hari-sauri: As long as he keeps up his brahminical standards.

Prabhupada: Huh? Yes. This is our car?

Pusṭa Krsna: Yes, Srila Prabhupada.

Prabhupada: Hare Krsna.

Devotee (3): Srila Prabhupada? It says in the Caitanya-caritamrta, jaya jaya nityananda, nityananda-rama, yanhara krpate painu vrndavana-dhama. That means he has somehow achieved the shelter of Lord Nityananda because He sent him to Vrndavana. Is this also true for the residents here in New Vrindaban? They have achieved the shelter of Lord Nityananda?

Devotees: Jaya. (end)