Link to purport by A C Bhaktivedanta Swami Srila Prabhupada

Transcript of Bhakti-Shastri class on this verse by Chaitanya Charan

Next we will discuss about speech in mode of goodness.

Bg 17.15

anudvega-karaṁ vākyaṁ
satyaṁ priya-hitaṁ ca yat
svādhyāyābhyasanaṁ caiva
vāṅ-mayaṁ tapa ucyate

Synonyms: 

anudvega–karam — not agitating; vākyam — words; satyam — truthful; priya — dear; hitam — beneficial; ca — also; yat — which; svādhyāya — of Vedic study; abhyasanam — practice; ca — also; eva — certainly; vāk–mayam— of the voice; tapaḥ — austerity; ucyate — is said to be.

Translation: 

Austerity of speech consists in speaking words that are truthful, pleasing, beneficial, and not agitating to others, and also in regularly reciting Vedic literature.

anudvega-karaṁ vākyaṁ, anudvega, to decrease the agitation 

anudvega-karaṁ vākyaṁ, those words which does not cause agitations in others.

satyaṁ priya-hitaṁ ca yat, satyaṁ, truthful, priya, pleasing, hitaṁ, beneficial 

svādhyāyābhyasanaṁ caiva, words that involves svādhyāyā, study and  ābhyasanaṁ, practice, Srila Prabhupada has translates as regular recitation of scriptures. 

All these are vāṅ-mayaṁ tapa ucyate, austerity of the speech.

We have discussed on Vacho Vegam, materialist have the tendency to talk hundreds and millions of things, and the spiritual inclination is to keep the speech chaste and focused on Krishna and things related to Krishna. 

Here Krishna is not talking about Bhaktas He is talking in general about austerities and He is talking how even from material point of view one should be able to discipline and regulate oneself. 

Sarcasm is often consider sign of intelligence where people hurt others and speak in such a way that the more they hurt others the more they think that they are cleaver. Sarcastic may require cleverness but that is not desirable use of cleverness. Desirable cleverness is to brings others to close to us and close to Krishna through us. Or closer to the right track in general even at the material level.

By agitating people we will alienate people instead of educating them. Sadhu cuts and the example given is Vidura speak strongly to Dhritarastra and cuts his attachments. That is good to detach some body but we can see that before that Vidura had a deep and strong relationship with Dhritarastra and then when he spoke those words those words penetrated. Otherwise the words don’t penetrate. Sometimes when we chastise people instead of cutting their anarths we end up in cutting there Bhakti Lata only. We may think that I have spoken Krishna’s message for other person’s good. But good intentions are not good enough, people should feel the trust in us, people should feel that we are their well-wishers then they will be able to see our good intentions, otherwise they will see us by default filter of suspicion and skepticism and then they feel our words harsh and insensitive and they may just close down and go away from Krishna by that. This is not only in KC but in normal human relationships.  Most of the conflicts in family and society comes up because of carelessness in speech, insensitivity in dealings.

We need not have to speak false but Krishna is putting Satyam as second first He is putting as anudvega-karaṁ, speak truth in a non-agitating way.

As it is said in Subhasita 

सत्यं ब्रूयात् प्रियं ब्रूयात् न ब्रूयात् सत्यमप्रियम् ।
नासत्यं च प्रियं ब्रूयात् एष धर्मः सनातनः ॥

सत्य और प्रिय बोलना चाहिए; 

पर अप्रिय सत्य नहीं बोलना 

और प्रिय असत्य भी नहीं बोलना यह सनातन धर्म है ।

Chanakya Pandit said if someone wanted to rule the world the most power for that person is the power of proper speech. 

Sometimes devotees say Srila Prabhupada said we should call spade as spade, that is true. But we can see that Srila Prabhupada was also very sensitive in his speech. He was able to distinguish between philosophical differences and cultural etiquettes. 

Srila Prabhupada was cooking for Dr. Mishra in New York although they have strong philosophical differences. And Dr Mishra acknowledged that he survived by Srila Prabhupada regulated eating habits otherwise he would fall sick and would not have survived.   

If we think preaching gives us license to speak harshly then we have completely mistaken what preaching is. Preaching means speaking in such a way that people should come closer to Krishna, sometimes we may have to speak things which are unpalatable to people but that doesn’t mean that we make mission of speaking those things. Feedbacks can be given in the formula of + – + which means positive, improvements and then again positive. By non-agitating speech we help people to calm down, we help people to open their minds, open their hearts. 

e.g. Doctors behavior should be such that patient feel comforted and reassured.

svādhyāyābhyasanaṁ caiva, memorization of verses in not burden for head but unburden for hearts, at the time of need we can take shelter of these verses.

Knowledge in books is like money in bank account knowledge in memory is like money in the pocket.

Purport: The process of speaking in spiritual circles is to say something upheld by the scriptures. One should at once quote from scriptural authority to back up what he is saying. At the same time, such talk should be very pleasurable to the ear.

End of transcription.