(Click to enlarge photo reprinted from Back to Godhead magazine No. 36, 1970)
"As, as you chant the name of Hare Kṛṣṇa, so gradually you relish some transcendental pleasure. Just like these boys and girls, while chanting, they're dancing in joyfulness. Nobody could follow them. But they are not crazy fellows, that they're chanting. Actually, they're getting some pleasure, transcendental pleasure. Therefore they're dancing. It is not the dog dance. No. It is really spiritual dance, the soul's dance."
(Srila Prabhupada Lecture, Stockholm, September 8, 1973)
"Prasannātmā means jubilant. You'll find all our boys and girls, they're always jubilant. Unless they are jubilant, they cannot dance in this way. It is not dancing dogs. They are not dancing dogs. They're feeling jubilant, and therefore they are dancing. This is the position of brahma-bhūtaḥ prasannātmā. Prasannātmā, unless one is very satisfied, he cannot be jubilant."
(Srila Prabhupada Lecture, Stockholm, September 7, 1973)
"We are trying to solve all problems by this one stroke, Kṛṣṇa consciousness. Practically, you can see. Here, while you are chanting, dancing, the boy is dancing, the father is dancing, the black is dancing, the white is dancing, the young is dancing, the old is dancing. You can see practically. The woman is dancing. A man is dancing. So dancing everyone. They are not artificially dancing like dog, but by spiritual ecstasy. That is the dancing platform. They are not dancing here for some monetary purpose. No. It is automatic, automatic, realizing God, in relationship with God. Even it is not realized... It is realized, but even if you say that they are not realized, but they are feeling ecstasy, that 'We are all servant of Kṛṣṇa.' That is wanted."
(Srila Prabhupada Lecture, Philadelphia, July 11, 1975)
"Unless you become blissful, very happy, you cannot dance. It is not... Artificially, you cannot dance. These dances, they are not artificial. They feel some transcendental bliss; therefore they dance. It is not they are dancing dog. No. They dance from the spiritual platform. Vaditra-mādyan manaso rasena. Romāñca-kampāśru-taraṅga-bhājo. And there are sometimes transformation of the body with spiritual symptoms— sometimes crying, sometimes there is, I mean to..., swelling on the end of the hairs. There are so many symptoms. These are later. These are not to be imitated. But when one is spiritually advanced, these symptoms are visible."
(Srila Prabhupada Lecture, Stockholm, September 9, 1973)
"The body will be finished, everyone knows, but body being finished, you are not finished; nobody is finished. Na hanyate hanyamāne śarīre (BG 2.20). Then he has to accept another body. So if we do not work according to the rules and regulation of nature, then we have to accept another body, and we do not know what kind of body you are going to accept. But it will be a gift by nature. Prakṛteḥ kriyamāṇāni (BG 3.27). Eh? Kāraṇaṁ guṇa-saṅgo 'sya sad-asad janma-yoniṣu (BG 13.22). So they do not know these things, the rascal civilization. Just like dancing like dog, that's all. This is rascal civilization. They have no responsibility of life, and dancing like dog."
(Srila Prabhupada Lecture, New York, July 15, 1976)
"If you dress a dog very nicely, does it mean that he becomes a human being? A dressed dog, that's all. Dog dancing. So śāstra says that if one is still in the bodily concepts of life, then he's no better than animal."
(Srila Prabhupada Lecture, New York, July 10, 1976)
"At the present moment we are giving up one material body and accepting another material body. Tathā dehāntara-prāptir dhīras tatra na muhyati (BG 2.13). This is our conditional life, but we are kept in such dense darkness of knowledge that we are thinking that 'We are free. We can do whatever we like.' This is very dangerous civilization—no knowledge of the spiritual life, no knowledge how the soul is transmigrating from one body to another, no knowledge what is the future, no knowledge what is the goal of life. Simply like cats and dogs, you dance, eat, drink, be merry and die, that's all. This is not good life."
(Srila Prabhupada Conversation, London, July 25, 1976)
"So therefore, real business of human life, to understand oneself, that is called self-realization, brahma-bhūta (SB 4.30.20), and find out the remedy and act accordingly. That is the mission of human life. Not like to dance like cats and dogs with a nice dress. That is not human life."
(Srila Prabhupada Lecture, Hyderabad, April 27, 1974)
"So here is life. They appreciated. What the American boys have got to dance for Kṛṣṇa unless it is from the heart? They are not dancing dogs that I have trained them and they are dancing."
(Srila Prabhupada Conversation, Delhi, August 31, 1976)
"You can also join with Kṛṣṇa and dance with Him. Why you are forgetting that? But you have to qualify yourself. You cannot dance with the dog and God at the same time. If you want to dance with the dog, then remain here. Go on perpetually dancing with the dog. But if you want to dance with God, you can prepare yourself and go there and dance with Him."
(Srila Prabhupada Lecture, Los Angeles, January 6, 1969)
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