What is the difference between the asrama and ordinary home?
Asrama means - the place where the spiritual culture is cultivated. And one who follows the regulative principles; he is situated in a asrama. Either it is grhastha asrama or sannyasa asrama, the same thing.
Ordinary home means the..., without any regulative principles,
Asrama means real purpose is self-realization, development of Krsna consciousness. But if one is unable to accept sannyasa asrama or brahmacari asrama, that is grhastha asrama. Not that animal asrama. (Srimad-Bhagavatam 5.5.8, Vrndavana, October 30, 1976)
Objective of the grhamedhi and grhastha:
kapila uvaca
atha yo grha-medhiyan ; dharman evavasan grhe
kamam artham ca dharman svan ; dogdhi bhüyah piparti tan
Translation: The Personality of Godhead said: The person who lives in the center of household life derives material benefits by performing religious rituals, and thereby he fulfills his desire for economic development and sense gratification. Again and again he acts the same way. (Srimad-Bhagavatam 3.32.1)
There are two kinds of householders. One is called the grhamedhi, and the other is called the grhastha. The objective of the grhamedhi is sense gratification, and the objective of the grhastha is self-realization.
Grhamedhi:
Grhamedhi means he has made his center the wife and family. The grhamedhis, live only for the benefit of the family members, extended or centralized, and thus are envious of others. The word medhi indicates jealousy of others because they are blind to the knowledge of ultimate truth. The grhamedhis, being interested in family affairs only, are certainly envious of others.
Therefore, one grhamedhi is not on good terms with another grhamedhi, and in the extended form, one community, society or nation is not on good terms with another counterpart of selfish interest.
They have many subject matters for hearing—political, scientific, social, economic and so on—but due to a poor fund of knowledge, they set aside the question of the ultimate miseries of life, namely miseries of birth, death, old age and disease.
Grhamedhis, being illusioned by the material nature, forget everything about self-realization. This person wants to remain in this material world. His activity is to enjoy material benefits by performing religious rituals for economic development and thereby ultimately satisfy the senses. He does not want anything more
Just like one cow is, I mean, tied with the rope and with a fixed up wood, and he is going round this way, and he is thinking that he is going round the world. Yes.
So grhamedhi means he has fixed up his center, the wife and children, and going round throughout the whole life, no ending. Grhamedhi-asrama nei.
Lord Kapiladeva is speaking about the grhamedhis, who have made their aim the materialistically prosperous life, which they achieve by sacrificial ceremonies, by charities and by good work. They are posted in good positions, and since they know that they are using up their assets of pious activities, they again and again perform activities of sense gratification.
Such a person works very hard throughout his life to become very rich and eat very nicely and drink. By giving some charity for pious activity he can go to a higher planetary atmosphere in the heavenly planets in his next life, but he does not want to stop the repetition of birth and death and finish with the concomitant miserable factors of material existence
It is said by Prahlada Maharaja, punah punas carvita-carvananam: [Srimad-Bhagavatam 7.5.30] they prefer to chew the already chewed. Again and again they experience the material pangs, even if they are rich and prosperous, but they do not want to give up this kind of life.
The grhamedhi, however, who is interested only in sense gratification, does not follow any Vedic instruction. The grhamedhi engages himself as an advocate of sex life and also allows his sons and daughters to engage in sex and to be deprived of any glorious end in life.
Grhastha:
Grhastha means grhastha-asrama. The grhastha is who lives together with wife and children but has no attachment for them He lives transcendentally according to the regulative principle for realizing the ultimate truth.
Grhastha works to find the ultimate solution to the problems of life that is to go back home, back to Godhead, and thus, as stated in the Bhagavad-gita (8.16), the miseries of material existence—birth, death, old age and disease—are removed.
So how householder can be a mahatma that is also described here?
ye va mayise krta-sauhrdartha ; janesu dehambhara-vartikesu
grhesu jayatmaja-ratimatsu ; na priti-yukta yavad-arthas ca loke
Translation: Those who are interested in reviving Krsna consciousness and increasing their love of Godhead do not like to do anything that is not related to Krsna. They are not interested in mingling with people who are busy maintaining their bodies, eating, sleeping, mating and defending. They are not attached to their homes, although they may be householders. Nor are they attached to wives, children, friends or wealth. At the same time, they are not indifferent to the execution of their duties. Such people are interested in collecting only enough money to keep the body and soul together.
Ye va mayi ise, their aim of life. They are living with... All mahatma means their idea is how to attain spiritual perfection. How to attain spiritual perfection. That is mahatma. So a householder, a gentleman or a person living with family, wife and children, his real aim is how to achieve the lost relationship with the Supreme Personality of Godhead.
Ye va mayise krta-sauhrdarthah. His only aim is how to achieve that perfection. And for that, janesu dehambhara-vartikesu na priti-yuktah. Ye va mayise krta-sauhrdartha janesu dehambhara... Therefore he’s not attached at all to persons who are simply interested in material advancement of life.
He prefers to live in family life rather than as a mendicant or sannyasi, but his chief aim is that of relevant inquiries to achieve self-realization i.e. to revive their relationship with God or to come to the standard of Krsna consciousness. That is the first qualification.
The grhastha asrama, or the shelter of spiritual family life, is as good as the life of a sannyasi, a member of the renounced order.
Grhastha-asrama is as good as other asrama, sannyasa-asrama. That is also not for all the time, only for twenty-five years.
(Srimad-Bhagavatam 2.1.2 purport, Srimad-Bhagavatam 3.32.1 purport, Srimad-Bhagavatam 4.25.39, purport, Srimad-Bhagavatam 7.6.6, lecture, Vrndavana, December 8, 1975, Srimad-Bhagavatam 5.5.3, Boston, May 4, 1968)
Role of wife in respect to grhamedhi and grhastha:
A wife should not only be equal to her husband in age, character and qualities, but must be helpful to him in his household duties.
The household duty of a man is not to satisfy his sense gratification, but to remain with a wife and children and at the same time attain advancement in spiritual life.
For a grhastha a qualified wife is an assistant in every respect for advancement in spiritual activities.
It is the duty of the wife to take charge of household affairs and not to compete with the husband. One who does not do so is not a grhastha householder but a grhamedhi.
For a grhamedhi, to accept a wife means to satisfy the senses. (Srimad-Bhagavatam 3.22.11)
Family life - a prison for the living entity:
Family life within the kingdom of illusory energy, maya, is just like a prison for the eternal living entity. Iron chains and iron bars in a prison shackle prisoner.
Similarly, a conditioned soul is shackled by the charming beauty of a woman, by her solitary embraces and talks of so-called love, and by the sweet words of his small children. Thus he forgets his real identity.
Actually, in the material world there is no love. Both the woman and the man are interested in their sense gratification. For sense gratification a woman creates an illusory love, and the man becomes enchanted by such false love and forgets his real duty. When there are children as the result of such a combination, the next attraction is to the sweet words of the children. The love of the woman at home and the talk of the children make one a secure prisoner, and thus he cannot leave his home. Such a person is termed, in Vedic language, a grhamedhi, which means “one whose center of attraction is home.”
Grhastha refers to one who lives with family, wife and children, but whose real purpose of living is to develop Krsna consciousness.
The grhastha’s concern is to get out of the family life created by illusion and enters into real family life with Krsna, whereas the grhamedhi s business is to repeatedly chain him to so-called family life, in one life after another, and perpetually remain in the darkness of maya.
One is therefore advised to become a grhastha and not a grhamedhi. (Srimad-Bhagavatam 3.30.8)
Pravrtti-marga, and Nivrtti-marga:
According to Vedic instructions, there are two paths for human activities. One is called pravrtti-marga, and the other is called nivrtti-marga. The basic principle for either of these paths is religious life. In animal life there is only pravrtti-marga.
Pravrtti-marga means sense enjoyment, and nivrtti-marga means spiritual advancement. In the life of animals and demons, there is no conception of nivrtti-marga, nor is there any actual conception of pravrtti-marga.
Pravrtti-marga maintains that even though one has the propensity for sense gratification, he can gratify his senses according to the directions of the Vedic injunctions. For example, everyone has the propensity for sex life, but in demoniac civilization sex is enjoyed without restriction. According to Vedic culture, sex is enjoyed under Vedic instructions. Thus the Vedas give direction to civilized human beings to enable them to satisfy their propensities for sense gratification.
Factually, however, pravrtti-marga is based on sex life. As stated in Srimad-Bhagavatam (7.9.45), yan maithunadi-grhamedhi-sukham hi tuccham. A householder who is too much addicted to pravrtti-marga is actually called a grhamedhi, not a grhastha. Although the grhastha desires sense gratification, he acts according to Vedic instructions. A grhastha enjoys sex life in this life as well as in the next, but a grhamedhi does not know what the next life is about because he is simply interested in sex in this life.
In the nivrtti-marga, however, on the path of transcendental realization, sex is completely forbidden. The social orders are divided into four parts—brahmacarya, grhastha, vanaprastha and sannyasa—and only in the householder life can the pravrtti-marga be encouraged or accepted according to Vedic instructions. In the orders of brahmacarya, vanaprastha and sannyasa, there are no facilities for sex. (Srimad-Bhagavatam 4.25.39)
Fate of grhamedhi and grhastha - Yamaraja instructs his messengers:
Paramahamsas are exalted persons who have no taste for material enjoyment and who drink the honey of the Lord’s lotus feet. My dear servants bring to me for punishment only persons who are averse to the taste of that honey, who do not associate with paramahamsas and who are attached to family life and worldly enjoyment, which form the path to hell.
After warning the Yamadütas not to approach the devotees, Yamaraja now indicates who is to be brought before him. He specifically advises the Yamadütas to bring him the materialistic persons who are attached to household life merely for sex. As stated in Srimad-Bhagavatam, yan maithunadi-grhamedhi-sukham hi tuccham: [Srimad-Bhagavatam 7.9.45] people are attached to household life for sex only. They are always harassed in many ways by their material engagements, and their only happiness is that after working very hard all day, at night they sleep and indulge in sex. (Srimad-Bhagavatam 6.3.28)
