There are three references that anyone who has a curiosity about how the soul comes to the material world should get familiar with. The first one is the letter Srila Prabhupada wrote in 1972 to Madhudvisa Prabhu, answering questions from Australian devotees about the origin of the soul. The second is a class Prabhupada gave in Tokyo on April 23, 1972, and the third is a series of purports on the fourth canto of Srimad Bhagavatam, chapter 28, where is narrated how King Purañjana became a woman in his next life.
Most of the time, Prabhupada avoided touching this subject, arguing that it’s not important to understand how one fell into the ocean, the important is to find how to get out of it. However, if one is curious, these are the three references where Prabhupada directly tries to explain this topic.
A point that is interesting to notice is that Prabhupada gives a consistent explanation in all three references, one of which being a letter, one a lecture, and the third part of his purports on the Srimad Bhagavatam. This defeats the theory that Prabhupada was giving different explanations according to the time and audience.
So, what does he say?
The first important point is that the soul has an innate relationship with Krsna. The soul is called marginal because it has the free will to choose between living under the internal energy and the external energy of Krsna, but Prabhupada makes clear that the soul comes originally from the internal, spiritual energy. This defeats the idea that the soul comes from the impersonal Brahmajyoti or the causal ocean. In fact, Prabhupada directly argues against this idea, saying that life in the Brahmajoti is already a fallen condition, and thus not the origin of the soul. Prabhupada goes as far as saying that, “Formerly we were with Krsna in His lila or sport.”
How does the soul come in contact with the material energy, since there is no influence of the material modes anywhere in the spiritual world?
Prabhupada argues that it is due to free will, an innate quality of the soul that Krsna does not try to suppress. The soul does not leave the association of Krsna because of the influence of material nature, rather, it leaves because of his own free will, and the influence of material nature starts later.
Different from Krsna’s direct expansions as well as His Shakti expansions, which are directly part of Krsna or His energy, the souls are separate expansions, which can choose between serving Krsna or not. Although we have an innate relationship with Krsna, we may choose to try to imitate Him instead of serving, if we so desire. The material world is exactly the place where we can do it.
How can the soul “fall” if Prabhupada himself explains that no one falls from Vaikuntha?
To explain this apparent contradiction Srila Prabhupada uses the analogy of a dream. When we dream we don’t leave our bed, it’s just a temporary mental situation from which we can wake up at any moment. If someone is sleeping and you ask, “Where did he go?” The answer will be that he didn’t go anywhere. In other words, no one leaves his bed while dreaming, although he may see many dreams in his delirious state. Similarly, no one falls from the spiritual world, although our attention may be temporarily transferred to here. To think that we are in the material world and thus separated from Krsna is just part of the material illusion. In reality, we are always with Krsna and as soon as we turn our attention back to Him we realize we never left.
Prabhupada also mentions this same idea in other passages, like in SB 7.7.27, for example: “Therefore, if by good association, by the instructions of a bona fide spiritual master, one takes to Kṛṣṇa consciousness, his conditional life of material existence is vanquished, and his original consciousness, known as Kṛṣṇa consciousness, is revived. When one is Kṛṣṇa conscious, he can realize that material existence, whether one is awake or dreaming, is nothing but a dream and has no factual value. This realization is possible by the grace of the Supreme Lord.”
Could it be that souls have originally an immature relationship with Krsna, where we are with Him, but not in a position of service, and thus in a not completely stable position, from which we could fall into the material world? It’s difficult to tell, but in a few of his purports, Prabhupada appears to go all the way in, saying that we are originally in an eternal personal relationship with Krsna in one of the five rasas. One may like it or not, but that’s something he clearly states. Take his purport on SB 7.7.39, for example:
“On the other hand, our relationship with Kṛṣṇa, the Supreme Personality of Godhead, is eternal. Nitya-siddha kṛṣṇa-prema. The pure souls are eternally in love with Kṛṣṇa, and this permanent love, either as a servant, a friend, a parent or a conjugal lover, is not at all difficult to revive. Especially in this age, the concession is that simply by chanting the Hare Kṛṣṇa mantra (harer nāma harer nāma harer nāmaiva kevalam) one revives his original relationship with God and thus becomes so happy that he does not want anything material.”
A dream is real in a sense, but in another sense it’s illusory. It’s not false, but it’s not real also. It exists, but at the same time doesn’t. No wonder Prabhupada so frequently uses the analogy of a dream to explain our existence here in the material world. All it takes to end a bad dream is to wake up.
One can’t understand how he entered into a dream from inside it, but after he wakes up he can immediately understand. Therefore, although explaining the topic in these three references, Prabhupada at the same time warns us to not spend much time trying to understand all the details, since it’s ultimately impossible to fully understand it in our current situation. It’s not possible to understand what reality is from inside of a dream. All we can do is understand enough to wake up.
The priority should be to become Krsna Conscious. Once we get out of the influence of the material energy it becomes very easy to understand everything.
A bigger problem with the discussion about the falling of the soul, however, is that most of it is based on literature from caste Goswamis and Babajis from Vrindavana, which generally negates the eternal relationship of the soul with Krsna, something that is strongly challenged by both Srila Prabhupada and Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura, as well as Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura himself. Influenced by such conclusions, devotees try to rationalize, arguing that Prabhupada was just using preaching strategies to appeal to the sensibilities of the Western audience, which is both incorrect and offensive.
The first point to understand is that these lines are considerably different from ours in terms of philosophical conclusions. They also don’t accept Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura as being genuine (and as a consequence also Srila Prabhupada). It’s notable that when Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura visited Vrindavana in 1932, all the main temples, except one, closed their doors to him. Some even threw stones at the pilgrims.
While they do accept Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu and the Six Goswamis, their translations and interpretations of the verses are considerably different from what Srila Prabhupada gives in his books. In other words, they have certain incorrect conclusions about Sambandha and Abhidheya and interpret different scriptures according to these incorrect assumptions. As a result, Prayojana is understood, but there is not a proper path to reach it.
When Srila Prabhupada came to the West, there were many translations and commentaries of the works of the Goswamis written by scholars of these lines, including by his Godbrother Ananta Vasudeva, who joined one of these lines after his demise as a sannyasi. These incorrect philosophical conclusions infiltrated the different Gaudiya Maths, as many devotees were studying literature from these lines, following the example of Ananta Vasudeva and others.
However, Prabhupada did not recommend any of these books to his disciples. When a disciple accepted a proposal to exchange a set of these books for a set of Prabhupada’s own books, he showed displeasure and ordered the books to be returned, he didn’t even want to have them in his library. Nowadays of course many think they know better, but Prabhupada clearly didn’t have a very good opinion about these books, and we can practically judge it based on the results.