What you are asking is akin to questioning, “Did darkness exist before?”

Where there are devotees, there will be non-devotees. Where there is prosperity, there are thieves.

If you have listened to moola Bhagavatam, you will not have such questions. The Lord first created darkness or ignorance, expecting us to find ways to overcome this ignorance and reach Him. Unfortunately, people held on to ignorance!

They have to step over, and cross this hurdle called ignorance. These are His tests for us. If you see the movie ‘The 36th chamber of Shaolin’, you will understand. He created ignorance for us to win over it, but we are stuck to it for many births. Slowly, we will eventually learn to get over this darkness and come out of this cycle. There is no need to crib over this.

The reason you are having such questions is because you are surrounded by such people. It is your challenge to win over them, and then they will overcome ignorance. Do not worry about their ignorance. You win!

(Q&A Session 7 May 2017)