...Natural conclusion is when there are so many varieties of life in our presence and they are, although in the same place, they haven't got the same facility, so there must be somebody who decides on this point.

Luck and Chance

No such thing as chance

PRADYUMNA: "Chance." It's a noun and adjective. "1. The way things fall out. Fortune, undesigned occurrence, opportunity, possibility, probability. Especially in plural, as 'the chances are against him.' Absence of design or discoverable cause. Course of events regarded as a power, fate. 'By chance': as it falls or fell out; without design. 'On the chance': in view of the possibility. 'Take one's chance': let things go as they may. Consent to take what comes."

PRABHUPADA: So it can be adjusted with the meanings of chance and necessity. I want something; that is my necessity. And it will come by chance? Or I have to endeavor for it, and then I get it? Shall I depend on chance? I have a necessity for something. So should I wait for the chance?

SHYAMASUNDAR: We've always been taught, "No. You must work very hard toward..." PRABHUPADA: So where is the waiting for chance? There is plan. If I have to work, to get the thing, then it is plan.

PRADYUMNA: If they follow their philosophy to the conclusion, they would have to be completely dependent, if they followed the philosophy to the conclusion. PRABHUPADA: If the chance comes as soon as the necessity is there, then we have to admit immediately God.

SHYAMASUNDAR: Yes. Oh.

PRABHUPADA: Because in the Bhagavad-gita we hear, mattah smritir jñanam apohanam, that God is in everyone's heart as Supersoul. Now, I am thinking of getting something. So God knows immediately that "He wants to have this," so He gives me the necessary thing which appears to me as chance, without knowing God. The things are supplied by God because He is giving me all facilities to enjoy this material world to my heart's content by supplying all the ingredients. That is the material condition. So these foolish persons are taking as chance, but it is not chance. God is omnipotent. As soon as He understands that I want this, He gives me some facility so that I get it. So it is not chance. It is by arrangement of superior authority. But because they are atheists, they have no sense of God consciousness, they are taking as chance, that necessity creates that chance; automatically it is coming. Not automatically. Chance does not mean automatically. I cannot see something, but all of a sudden falls... Just like I am hungry, I want some food. So Krishna knows it that you want some... Some way or other, the food comes to me. So it is the arrangement of Krishna, but I see it is chance: "I was hungry and by chance the food has come." That is my less intelligence. It is not chance; it is plain. Otherwise you cannot adjust the meaning of chance in that way, that as soon as there is necessity, immediately the opportune chance comes before us.

SHYAMASUNDAR: They say, "Well, it's my luck," or "My bad luck."

PRABHUPADA: Yes. They say. So this "luck," as soon as you say, "luck" there must be somebody who is giving you the luck, good luck or bad luck.

SHYAMASUNDAR: One man may desire something very badly, and his whole life long he will not get it. He will always say, "I am so unlucky."

PRABHUPADA: Because he is not fit to get it, so God does not supply it. So we do not take anything as chance. We take everything as plan. But because God's omnipotency is so subtle, we cannot see how things happen. Therefore we say "It is a chance, chance of physical arrangement." Just like in the airport, as soon as I step on the door it becomes opened. It is not chance. A child will see it is a chance: "Oh, how it is? I wanted to go and the door is already open." He takes it a chance. That is poor fund of knowledge. There is arrangement, nice arrangement, electrical arrangement. So to a poor fund of knowledge it becomes a chance, and to the sober mind it is not chance; it is arranged by higher authority. Another opposite point is nobody wants to die. Why the chance of death comes? Nobody wants to die. If that argument is taken, necessity—I want to die, and the death comes—then it is applicable. But I do not want to die. Why death comes? There is no necessity of my death, but why the death comes? Then where this argument will be?

SHYAMASUNDAR: Oh, there's no necessity. There's no necessity for death?

PRABHUPADA: Yes. Nobody wants to die. So why death comes?

SHYAMASUNDAR: But they will say that because it is physically worn out, finished, material is finished, then it will die.

PRABHUPADA: That's all right. It is a question of chance and necessity. Nobody feels the necessity of death. Why death comes unless it is planned?

SHYAMASUNDAR: Oh, I see.

PRABHUPADA: Their argument is that physical necessity creates a chance, and we take advantage of the chance. But here there is no necessity. Nobody wants to die, nobody wants disease. Why these chances are coming to us without any necessity?

SHYAMASUNDAR: If, for instance, in nature they saw a tree growing, they would say that by necessity this tree must die in order to replenish the soil so more trees can grow.

PRABHUPADA: Then there is plan. As soon as you say that more trees can grow, that means there is plan. You cannot say chance.

SHYAMASUNDAR: Nature can't be chance. If so many plants...

PRABHUPADA: That plan is Krishna's. That is said in the Bhagavad-gita, mayadhyakshena prakritih suyate sa-characharam: [Bg. 9.10] "Under My plan, under My superintendence, the nature is working. The changes of the world is going on for that reason." Hetunanena kaunteya jagad viparivartate: "All these changes are taking place on account of My supervision." So there is no question of chance. It is all planned, planned by the Supreme, daiva netrena, by superior arrangement.

SHYAMASUNDAR: Doesn't necessity mean plan?

PRABHUPADA: Necessity means for a foolish person like me, I want something. That is my necessity and God supplies me. "Man proposes, God disposes." And that reception, or that, my achievement, being without explained by me, I take it as a chance. Because I cannot explain it, therefore I take... Just like the same example: the flower is fructifying. We are saying because we do not see how the working is going on.

SHYAMASUNDAR: Like you defined miracle like that before once.

PRABHUPADA: Yes. So there is nothing like miracle. Everything is done. But it is done so subtle way that we cannot understand. We take it chance. The same example: just like a child steps before the door; it opens. He thinks, "Oh, by chance the door is opened." But it is not by chance. It is a plan.

SHYAMASUNDAR: By necessity.

PRABHUPADA: Yes. No. Necessity you have to go and it is already done. And as soon as you step on the floor, the door opens. So those who are less intelligent, they are taking it as chance that "I came here. I wanted to go out. The door is by chance open." That is less intelligence.

SHYAMASUNDAR: Oh. So before the necessity there is a plan. Previous to the necessity there is a plan. I see.

PRABHUPADA: No, before the necessity, whoever we feel necessity, the chance is there. The arrangement is there. He knows that... Just like there may be hundreds and thousands of necessities, and for each necessity there is a planned performance.

SHYAMASUNDAR: There is that saying, "Where there is a will there is a way."

PRABHUPADA: But we... You can think of this willingness in different hundred and thousands of ways. That is known to God, and there is already plan. If somebody wills like that, the chance is given. This is plan.

SHYAMASUNDAR: Oh. That's right. PRABHUPADA: Because God knows beyond this willing orbit, nobody can think of. Just like Hiranyakashipu. He thought that "I can save myself by this way. I shall not die night, in daytime, or I shall not die in the sky. I shall not die in the water. I shall not die on land. No man can kill me. No animal can kill me. No demigod can kill me." In this way he thought, "Oh." But still, keeping all the promises, he was made to die. So there is no such thing as chance without plan.

SHYAMASUNDAR: This dictionary gives a definition of necessity. It says that it is "a constraint or compulsion regarded as a law prevailing through the material universe and governing all human action".

PRABHUPADA: Yes. Governing all human action. God knows how many necessities you can create. And for all of them the supply is there. But you do not know, you take it as chance it has come. It is your foolishness that whatever necessities may be... God knows that so many necessities can be. It may be millions types. And for all of them there is immediately supply. So this rascal does not know that it is already planned.

[break] The proprietor is living there. The servants are living there. The cats and dogs are also living there. The trees and plants are also living there, and insects and microbes and snakes and rats. So many living entities in the same building. Why they are different? What is the answer? They have been given the same chance of living in the same house, born in the same house. As the proprietor's son is born in the same house, these also, they are also taking birth the same place. Why they are denied the same advantage? And if they are denied, who has denied it? What is the answer to this question? They are all living entities.

BHURIJANA: The difference is that the human living entities have higher intelligence because of their body.

PRABHUPADA: That is the question, that "Who has given you high intelligence and not to the rats and cats?"

PRADYUMNA: You said in one place, "Man is the architect of his own happiness and distress."

PRABHUPADA: Yes. Yes. That is an axiomatic truth even by the modern man. Yes, that "Man is the architect of his own fortune." So as soon as there is work to make your fortune, then there must be a person to decide to give you a fortunate position. Just like in an establishment, so many men are working, but there is a president. He is considering the work file, "How this man has worked?" And he is being promoted, his salary is being increased, and somebody is degraded, no promotion, rather, transferred in some other place. So natural conclusion is when there are so many varieties of life in our presence and they are, although in the same place, they haven't got the same facility, so there must be somebody who decides on this point. So how you can deny God? Our point is the Supreme Person, the president, who decides on this fact, He is God. What is the opposite answer?

PRADYUMNA: They would say that you are in your position and they are in their position just by chance, just like...

PRABHUPADA: That is nonsense. This is sheer nonsense. There is nothing by chance. What is that chance? By chance one is becoming millionaire, and a chance, one is becoming cockroaches. What is that chance? Explain that chance. It is evasive. It is most foolish reply, "Chance." We have got this nice apartment. Is it by chance?

PRADYUMNA: No.

PRABHUPADA: Then?

BHURIJANA: There's never an example of chance.

PRABHUPADA: This is all nonsense. People are befooled by all this philosophy.

BHURIJANA: Albert Einstein, he said that "I cannot believe that the highest material principle is chance." He's a material scientist. He said, "I cannot believe..."

PRABHUPADA: Yes. Yes. Oh, yes. Actually, if one is actually learned, scientific, he must admit. He must admit, unless he is a lunatic, rascal. He will say all these nonsense things, "Chance." Why chance? What is taking place within your practical experience by chance? If by prearrangement we would not come here, then who would care for it? Even on the street we could not lie down. Nobody allow. the police will arrest. "Who are these men?" How do you say chance? Everything is done by prearrangement. The chance is an explanation given by the rascals and fools. They are not sane men. There cannot be anything by chance.