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According to the Gita, <\/i>we all are souls encaged in material bodies, and these bodies are themselves testimony of our being \u201ccontaminated\u201d by the three modes of material nature. In his purport to Srimad Bhagavatam <\/i>4.11.25, Prabhupada states, \u201cThat we have a material body proves that we are infected by the three material modes of nature.\u201d In one way, all of us are already <\/i>contaminated, since the state of being \u201ccontaminated,\u201d or \u201cinfected,\u201d is a state of being that all souls in the material world share. <\/p>\n
Furthermore, Krishna declares this world as \u201c<\/span>a\u00e7\u00e4\u00e7vatam<\/span>,\u201d temporary (8.15) – a place of misery \u201cwherein repeated birth and death takes place\u201d (8.16). Seen from this angle, death is not surprising down here. We all have to die, one way or other. Therefore there is no need for a conditioned soul to be surprised by the possibility of dying, including dying from cononavirus. All of us will <\/i>die, one way or other. <\/span><\/div>\n Krishna says, \u201cI am all-devouring death\u201d (10.34). In this respect, Srila Prabhupada once recalled the time when, during World War II, bombs were falling on Kolkata. Prabhupada said, \u201cI was in the bomb shelter, and the bombs were falling; and I was thinking as I was chanting Hare Krishna that if I had to die now, it would be wonderful to die while chanting Hare Krishna.\u201d<\/span><\/div>\n When I read the news this morning, I got scared. People all over the world are starting to brace themselves in fear of the coronavirus epidemic. \u201cWhat if coronavirus spreads really far and wide? What if devotees get coronavirus? What if I get coronavirus? What if I die?\u201d I started to think. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[118],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-83764","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-recent-media"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83764","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=83764"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83764\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=83764"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=83764"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dandavats.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=83764"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Krishna also says, \u201cYou have a right to perform your prescribed duty.\u201d In the same verse, Krishna adds, \u201cBut you are not entitled to the fruit of action.\u201d<\/span><\/div>\nAs a practicing Bhakti yogi or Bhakti yogini, It is your duty to take care of your material body as intelligently as possible. It is your duty to take all necessary precautions to avoid catching the coronavirus (or any virus,<\/i> for that matter). But you should also be detached; you should think \u201cIf I catch the coronavirus, so be it.\u201d <\/p>\nPrabhupada was teaching by his own example that if one is Krishna conscious (or even trying to be Krishna conscious), then one should see death as a form of God and should be confident of God\u2019s care, remembering His promise in Bhagavad Gita <\/i>(8.10) that if one, at the time of death, engages himself or herself \u201cin remembering the Supreme Lord in full devotion,\u201d then he or she \u201cwill certainly attain to the Supreme Personality of Godhead.\u201d<\/span><\/div>\nIf we therefore continue living our life in the spirit of dependence on the Lord, all the while being detached from the result of our efforts to avoid diseases of all kinds, we will live a relatively peaceful life, and – if the words of the Gita <\/i>are true, chances are that Krishna will take us back into His kingdom after our death – a place free of viruses and full of love of God. <\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<\/p>\n