The Role of the Guru in ISKCON

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The Role

of the Guru in a Multi-Guru Society

 

 

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The Role of the Guru in a Multi-Guru Society

Hrdayananda Dasa GoswamiPrint this Article

 

Our last issue featured a panel discussion hosted by the

American

Family Foundation, one of the major anti-cult groups in

the US,

entitled ‘Can Cultic Groups Change? The Case of

ISKCON’. Dr Rahul

Peter Das questioned Anuttama Dasa’s statements

about authority and

leadership in ISKCON. Dr Das particularly refers to

possible

contradictions with concepts of the divine guru that

underly much of

Indian philosophical systems. Here Hrdayananda Dasa

Goswami, himself

a guru in the Vaisnava line, attempts to resolve the

apparent

contradiction between tradition and democracy, explaining

the role

of the guru in a society with a collegial governing body.

On 15 May 1999, the American Family Foundation, which

monitors and

informs the public about ‘cults’, held its

annual conference in St

Paul, Minnesota, USA. Interestingly, ISKCON’s North

American

Minister of Communications, Anuttama Dasa, along with

Radha Dasi, a

legal consultant to ISKCON in North America, appeared on

a

conference panel entitled ‘Can Cultic Groups

Change: The Case of

ISKCON’.

The ISKCON Communications Journal (ICJ) then published

the

proceedings of the panel, and one of its academic

readers, the

distinguished Indologist Dr Rahul Peter Das, wrote to the

editors,

expressing his concern about some of Anuttama’s

statements. The

editors subsequently asked me to respond to this issue. I

will thus

present here Anuttama’s original statement, the

response by Dr Das

and my own observations.

Anuttama's statement:

ISKCON is new. Many of our organisational problems came

from the

fact that in the early years especially, most ISKCON

members were

young Western converts. Due to a lack of maturity and

organisational structure there was a vulnerability to

excess and

abuse of power.

Another issue, or tension, for us is the question of

authority and

leadership. The traditional model in most Indian

religious

traditions is a hierarchical organisation, with the

concentration

of power in the hands of one individual, the guru, or

acarya.

Shortly before passing away, my teacher, Prabhupada,

established a

Governing Body Commission, a group of people to oversee

the ISKCON

organisation. After his de ath in 1977, there was a

series of

crises with some of the topmost, hand-selected leaders

who had

been appointed as gurus. There was quite a struggle

between the

organisation and some of those individuals who argued

that as

gurus their position was above the authority of the GBC.

This struggle lasted for years. Many people argued that

the

tradition supports the guru as the absolute principal

of

authority, divine authority. This can be strongly

documented in

much of Hindu religious thought. Our organisation has

struggled to

solidly establish that, in our movement, no one is

above our

managing body and that there must be checks and

balances for all.

In 1986, there was a series of reforms limiting what is

known in

ISKCON jargon as the ‘zonal-acarya system.’

This year, 1999, there

was another series of resolutions passed at the

international

meetings giving more specific interpretation of

appropriate powers

and privileges for those in leadership positions.1

Dr Rahul Peter Das’s response:

As an outsider to any religion, but one interested in

ISKCON as a

manifestation of a stream of Indian religious thought

(which is a

major part of what I study), I see a theological

problem in a

statement by Anuttama Dasa on the question of authority

and

leadership.

It is, of course, commonplace that in many Indian

religious

traditions, including modern ones like the Ananda

Marga, there is

no difference between the supreme/divine principle and

the

sad-guru, the latter being but a corporeal

manifestation of the

former. This is obvious in your own tradition, too

(Caitanya).

To the outsider, it seems that the attraction of ISKCON

to many

followers is the application of this principle to

Prabhupada and

that one could justly speak of him being, within

ISKCON, a

manifestation similar to Caitanya (this is, I emphasise

once

again, the outsider’s view, but one confirmed by

much of what is

said and published within ISKCON itself and in its

iconography).

Now, it is known that in religious movements with such

a

background (Indian Sufism is a good example of this),

authority

often takes the form of transference of this divine

aspect to

another corporeal being, very often an offspring of the

original

guru (material transference is clearly important here).

This is a

form of leadership that has nothing to do with the

secular Western

democratic principles mentioned in the pages quoted. I

therefore

see here not a question of democracy or the like, but

of

fundamental theological doctrine, and I would be very

interested

in finding out how the ‘reformers’ within

ISKCON have actually

come to terms with this problem.

My response:

Let us keep in mind that Anuttama Dasa was speaking at an

‘anti-cult’ convention. Historically, one of

the main concerns of

such groups has been what they perceive to be the

tendency of

‘cults’ to invest absolute authority in a

human leader, who may then

abuse and exploit such power. Thus Anuttama attempts to

assure the

audience that ISKCON has taken positive steps to

subordinate the

power of the guru to a collegial, administrative board,

the GBC.

Anuttama does point out, however, that ‘many people

argued that the

tradition supports the guru as the absolute principal of

divine

authority’. He even admits that the absolute

position of the guru

‘can be strongly documented in much of Hindu

religious thought’. But

despite that fact, ‘our organisation has struggled

to solidly

establish that in our movement no one is above our

managing body and

that there must be checks and balances for all.’

The obvious problem here can be outlined as follows:

Hindu tradition seems to give absolute authority to the

guru.

ISKCON denies such authority to its own gurus. Y

et ISKCON claims to be an authentic part of Hinduism.

Das immediately perceived this problem, and I shall now

list and

reply to the three basic arguments of his letter.

Rahul Peter Das:

It is, of course, commonplace that in many Indian

religious

traditions, including modern ones like the Ananda Marga,

there is no

difference between the supreme/divine principle and the

sad-guru,

the latter being but a corporeal manifestation of the

former. This

is obvious in your own tradition, too (Caitanya).

Hrdayananda Dasa Goswami:

To claim that one’s sad-guru (spiritual master) is

identical with

‘the supreme/divine principle’ is to make an

ontological claim, a

claim involving the nature of being. Indeed, the great

theological

debates in India among such leading Vedantists as

Sankara, Ramanuja

and Madhva centred precisely on rival ontological claims

about the

nature of being. Specifically, the great Vedantists

disputed the

nature of the relationship between the Upanisadic

absolute, brahman,

‘the supreme/divine principle’, and the

material world with its

individual souls housed in physical and psychic bodies.

The claim that in the Caitanya tradition, ‘there is

no difference

between the supreme/divine principle and the sad-guru, or

authentic

spiritual master’, is only partially true. Sri

Caitanya taught the

ontological doctrine of bhedabheda-tattva, the

simultaneous

‘difference and nondifference’ between God

and the innumerable

individual souls who rest upon Him. Srila Prabhupada

explained that

individual souls are qualitatively one with Krsna, or

God, but

quantitatively different. In other words, our

consciousness, in its

original, pure state, is equal in quality to that of the

consciousness of God, but God’s consciousness is

infinite, whereas

ours, in comparison, is infinitesimal.

At present, we who are ‘conditioned souls’,

trapped within the

material nature, experience a covered, impure

consciousness, but in

Krsna consciousness, pure love of God, we experience our

original

divine awareness. To the members of ISKCON, Srila

Prabhupada is a

liberated soul, fixed in his original, pure

consciousness, and thus

able, in pure devotion, to transparently represent Lord

Krsna. Thus

a pure soul like Srila Prabhupada is ‘one’

with the Lord in two

senses:

Just as any authentic representative stands for, and

is, in that

sense, identical with that which he or she represents,

so the

genuine representative of God is identical with God.

For example,

if I purchase an airline ticket from an authorised

agent of the

airline, the airline must honour that ticket, even if

the agent

has made a mistake in my favour. Similarly, Srila

Prabhupada’s

assurance of spiritual liberation for his serious

followers will

be honoured by Lord Krsna.

As mentioned above, all living beings, pure or impure,

are held to

be, in an ontological sense, qualitatively one with

God. However,

a pure soul like Srila Prabhupada has realised his

divine nature

and acts accordingly.

We note here that certain monistic doctrines do, in fact,

claim that

the guru, and ultimately all souls, are one in all

respects with the

‘supreme/divine principle’. But Vaisnava

communities, such as the

Gaudiya Vaisnavas,2 although acknowledging that God

sometimes

incarnates in this world, in general fervently oppose

such monistic

ideas.

There are, of course, other groups that admit to a type

of

monotheism, but then claim that their guru is an

incarnation of the

one God. ISKCON makes no such claim for Srila Prabhupada.

Indeed, in

1970, Srila Prabhupada expelled four of his senior

disciples who

dared to claim that he was God. One may read of this in

the standard

biography Srila Prabhupada-lilamrta by Satsvarupa Dasa

Goswami.

In general, the members of ISKCON faithfully follow Srila

Prabhupada

because they recognise him to be a pure representative of

God, and

thus they are confident that by pleasing him, they are

pleasing the

Supreme Lord. For those diligently engaged in the

spiritual practice

of Krsna consciousness, this is not merely a theory or

belief, but a

practical, daily experience.

Rahul Peter Das:

To the outsider, it seems that the attraction of ISKCON

to many

followers is the application of this principle to

Prabhupada and

that one could justly speak of him being, within ISKCON,

a

manifestation similar to Caitanya (this is, I emphasise

once again,

the outsider’s view, but one confirmed by much of

what is said and

published within ISKCON itself and in its iconography).

Hrdayananda Dasa Goswami:

Undoubtedly people join ISKCON for a variety of reasons.

Indeed, in

the Bhagavad-gita (7.16),3 Lord Krsna states that people

approach

Him with four types of motives: to alleviate suffering,

to achieve

prosperity, to satisfy curiosity and to attain final

wisdom.

But one would expect all those who seek God, regardless

of their

motive, to be concerned with the quality of their contact

or link

with God. In that sense, the conviction of ISKCON

devotees of Srila

Prabhupada’s unique ability to purely represent God

is indeed a

compelling one. Again, however, this in no way implies a

monistic

perception of Srila Prabhupada as God Himself. In fact,

the

Vaisnavas claim just the opposite: that the more one

humbly

surrenders to the Supreme Lord, the more one can serve

and represent

Him purely. Thus ISKCON devotees glorify Srila Prabhupada

as divine

precisely because of his full submission to God, a

qualification

which Srila Prabhupada painstakingly taught them to

insist upon in a

guru.

‘I emphasise’, says Professor Das,

‘this is the outsider’s view.’

Thus we may say that from the ‘insider’s

view’, it is not merely the

‘application’ of a theological principle to

Srila Prabhupada that

attracts many to him but rather the direct experience of

ISKCON

devotees of Srila Prabhupada’s dramatic ability to

bring his

followers into close proximity of Lord Krsna.

Rahul Peter Das:

Now, it is known that in religious movements with such a

background

(Indian Sufism is a good example of this), authority

often takes the

form of transference of this divine aspect to another

corporeal

being, very often an offspring of the original guru

(material

transference is clearly important here). This is a form

of

leadership that has nothing to do with the secular

Western

democratic principles mentioned in the pages quoted. I

therefore see

here not a question of democracy or the like, but of

fundamental

theological doctrine, and I would be very interested in

finding out

how the ‘reformers’ within ISKCON have

actually come to terms with

this problem.

Hrdayananda Dasa Goswami:

Professor Das raises several points here, which I will

address in

order.

He refers to the general issue of the transference of

authority from

the guru to his or her successors.

Whenever the issue of the transmission of divine

authority arises,

Vaisnavas generally quote Lord Krsna’s description

in the

Bhagavad-gita (4.1–3) of the parampara, the chain

of disciplic

succession that begins with the Lord Himself. Lord Krsna

states here

that He has chosen to speak this spiritual knowledge to

Arjuna,

since this middle son of Pandu is the Lord’s

devotee (bhakta) and

friend (sakha). Similarly, Lord Krsna states elsewhere in

the Gita

(13.19), ‘My devotee [mad-bhakta] realises this

[divine knowledge]

and thus attains to My nature.’4 It would not be

difficult to argue

from the vast array of Vaisnava literature that

possessing

spiritual, and specifically devotional, qualities, rather

than a

mystic family connection, qualifies the disciple to

become a guru.

Indeed, in normal education, a good student gets the

chance to

become a teacher, not merely a child of the former

teacher.

He also mentions that ‘very often’ the

guru’s authority is

transferred to the guru’s child (or, presumably,

another relative).

In writing my commentary on the Srimad-Bhagavatam. verses

11.1.5, I

quoted Srila Prabhupada’s spiritual master, Srila

Bhaktisiddhanta

Sarasvati Thakura, who in his own commentary on these

verses spoke

directly and thoroughly on the issue of awarding

spiritual authority

to one’s material offspring. The context is a

discussion of the

famous incident towards the end of Lord Krsna’s

life on earth, in

which almost all of the members of the Lord’s own

Yadu dynasty

killed each other in a fratricidal battle. I give below

my

commentary on those verses, which is based on that of

Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura:

Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura has made a very

important

comment on this verse. He states that since the

intentions of the

Supreme Lord, Krsnacandra, are always perfect, it was

certainly in

consideration of the greatest benefit for the entire

world that He

destroyed His own family on the pretext of a curse by

brahmanas.

In this connection, Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura

has shown a

parallel in the pastimes of Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu,

who is Krsna

Himself appearing as His own devotee.

Lord Caitanya appeared along with His first plenary

expansion,

known as Lord Nityananda Prabhu, and with Lord Advaita

Prabhu. All

three personalities — Caitanya Mahaprabhu,

Nityananda Prabhu and

Advaita Prabhu — are accepted by Vaisnava acaryas

to be in the

category of visnu-tattva, the full status of the

Supreme

Personality of Godhead. These three Personalities of

Godhead

perceived that in the future Their so-called seminal

descendants

would get undue recognition and thus, being puffed up,

would

commit grave offences against those who were actually

Vaisnava

gurus or representatives of the Lord.

Every living being is part and parcel of the Supreme

Lord, as

stated in the Bhagavad-gita (mamaivamsah). Every living

entity is

originally a son of God, yet to execute His pastimes

the Lord

selects certain highly qualified living entities whom

He allows to

take birth as His personal relatives. But those living

entities

who appear as descendants of the Lord’s personal

family may

undoubtedly become proud of such a position and thus

abuse the

great adulation they receive from ordinary people. In

this way

such persons may artificially get undue attention and

divert

people from the actual principle of spiritual

advancement, which

is to surrender to the pure devotee who represents the

Lord. The

last eight verses of the Twelfth Chapter of Bhagavad-

gita give a

description of the pure devotees the Lord permits to

act as

acaryas, or spiritual leaders of mankind. In other

words, simply

to take birth in the personal family of Krsna is not

the

qualification for being a spiritual master, since

according to

Bhagavad-gita, pitaham asya jagatah: every living

entity is

eternally a member of the Lord’s family. Krsna

says in

Bhagavad-gita, samo ‘ham sarva-bhutesu na me

dvesyo ‘sti na

priyah: ‘I am equal to everyone. No one is My

enemy, and no one is

My special friend.’ If the Supreme Personality of

Godhead appears

to have a special family, such as the Yadu dynasty,

such a

so-called family is a special arrangement of the

Lord’s pastimes

in order to attract the conditioned souls. When Krsna

descends, He

acts as if He were an ordinary person in order to

attract the

living entities to His pastimes. Therefore Krsna acted

as though

the Yadu dynasty was His personal family, although in

fact every

living entity is a member of His family.

Ordinary people, however, not understanding the higher

principles

of spiritual knowledge, easily forget the actual

qualifications of

a bona fide spiritual master and instead give undue

importance to

people born in the Lord’s so-called family. Sri

Caitanya

Mahaprabhu, therefore, avoided this impediment on the

path of

spiritual enlightenment by leaving behind no children.

Although

Caitanya Mahaprabhu married twice, He was childless.

Nityananda

Prabhu, who is also the Supreme Personality of Godhead,

did not

accept any of the natural sons born of His own son, Sri

Virabhadra. Similarly, Lord Advaita Acarya divested of

His

association all of His sons except Acyutananda and two

others.

Acyutananda, the chief faithful son of Advaita Acarya,

had no

seminal progeny, and the remaining three of the six

sons of Lord

Advaita fell from the path of devotion to the Lord and

are known

as rejected sons. In other words, the appearance of

Caitanya

Mahaprabhu allowed little facility for continuing a so-

called

seminal family to create confusion. The respect shown

to the

conception of seminal lineage in deference to the ideas

of the

smartas is unfit to be accepted by one who actually

understands

the supreme truth from Vedic authority.

Other acaryas, or spiritual masters, have also

demonstrated this

point in their own families. His Divine Grace A.C.

Bhaktivedanta

Svami Prabhupada, our own beloved spiritual master, who

is the

mighty author of this Srimad-Bhagavatam series, was

born into a

family of pure devotees, and he himself exhibited all

the symptoms

of pure devotional service from childhood. Srila

Prabhupada

eventually came to the Western countries and exhibited

unprecedented spiritual potency in establishing the

Krsna

consciousness movement all over the world. In a few

short years,

he translated more than fifty large volumes of Vedic

philosophy.

By his practical activities he is certainly understood

to be a

most empowered representative of the Lord. Nonetheless,

his own

family members, although devotees of Krsna, did not

come up to the

proper standard of devotional service and are therefore

not given

attention by the members of ISKCON. The natural

tendency for the

members of the International Society for Krsna

Consciousness would

be to offer all reverence and worship to the members of

Srila

Prabhupada’s immediate family. But since by

Krsna’s arrangement

these family members are not on the platform of pure

devotional

service, the members of ISKCON give them scant

attention, and

worship instead those who actually exhibit the

qualities of highly

advanced Vaisnavas, regardless of their birth. In other

words,

birth cannot constitute the qualification for a

respectable

person, even when one is born into the Lord’s own

family or into

the acarya’s family, what to speak of an ordinary

wealthy or

learned family.

In India there is a class of men known as nityananda-

vamsa, who

claim to be direct descendants of Lord Nityananda and

therefore

worthy of the highest respect for their position in

devotional

service. In this regard, Srila Prabhupada has written

in The

Nectar of Devotion, ‘In the Middle Ages, after

the disappearance

of Lord Caitanya’s great associate Lord

Nityananda, a class of

priestly persons claimed to be the descendants of

Nityananda,

calling themselves the gosvami caste. They further

claimed that

the practice and spreading of devotional service

belonged only to

their particular class, which was known as nityananda-

vamsa. In

this way they exercised their artificial power for some

time,

until Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura, the

powerful acarya

of the Gaudiya Vaisnava sampradaya, completely smashed

their idea.

There was a great struggle for some time, but it was

successful,

and it is now correctly and practically established

that

devotional service is not restricted to a particular

class of men.

Besides that, anyone who is engaged in devotional

service is

already a high-class brahmana. So Srila Bhaktisiddhanta

Sarasvati

Thakura’s struggle for this movement has been

successful. It is on

the basis of his position that anyone, from any part of

the

universe, can become a Gaudiya Vaisnava.

In other words, the essence of spiritual knowledge is

that every

living being, regardless of his present status in life,

is

originally a servant of the Supreme Lord, and it is the

mission of

the Lord to reclaim all of these fallen living

entities. Despite

his past situation, any living being who is willing to

surrender

again at the lotus feet of the Supreme Lord or His bona

fide

representative can purify himself by strictly adhering

to the

rules and regulations of bhakti-yoga and thus act as a

high-class

brahmana. Nonetheless, the seminal descendants of the

Lord think

themselves to have acquired their ancestor’s

character and

position. Thus the Supreme Lord, who is the well-wisher

of the

entire universe and especially of His devotees,

bewilders the

discriminatory power of His own descendants in such a

contradictory way that these seminal descendants become

recognised

as deviant and the actual qualification to be a

representative of

the Lord, namely unalloyed surrender to the will of

Krsna, remains

prominent.

Finally, I will address Das’s claim that in normal

Hindu tradition,

the transmission of divine authority ‘has nothing

to do with the

secular Western democratic principles mentioned in the

pages

quoted’.

We may first note that ISKCON does not follow the

principles of a

popular ‘Jacksonian’ democracy, but rather

invests ultimate managing

authority in a body of senior leaders. Traditionally, the

members of

the governing board appoint new members, and thus one

might more

reasonably accuse this system of being an

‘oligarchy’, a term that

seems to be somewhat infected with negative connotations

in

contemporary culture. To be fair, there is a growing

trend in ISKCON

to insist that even GBC members be elected by senior

members of the

spiritual communities they are to govern. Indeed, the

largest ISKCON

community in North America, in Alachua, Florida, has

recently

declared its intention of electing its own GBC

representative to

whom the international GBC may or may not award voting

rights.

Yet the basic issue remains: can the ‘Hindu’

or ‘Vedic’ guru

authentically function under the authority of a governing

body,

however constituted? I will argue that he or she can, to

some

extent. I base my argument on a rather broad overview of

Vedic

civilisation, in the traditional, not the academic, sense

of the

term ‘Vedic’.

The most influential Vaisnava scriptures, such as the

Srimad-Bhagavatam and the Bhagavad-gita, and foundational

texts,

such as the Mahabharata, state that the universe is what

I call a

‘cosmic village’. Important people throughout

the cosmos know, and

know about, each other, and have regular mutual dealings.

Thus, the

celestial gods, the semi-divine Gandharvas and Apsaras,

the

celestial ‘bad guys’ known as Asuras, Daityas

or Danavas, the human

beings on earth, the great Naga serpents, etc., are all

intimately

acquainted with one another and regularly interact.

Within this

‘cosmic village’, there is a universally

recognised code of

behaviour known as dharma. Of course, the theistic

Vaisnavas claim

that dharma is the ‘law of God’, but even the

decent nontheists, and

at times even the demonic, recognise the power of dharma

and the

dangers of adharma. My point is that the guru, as he

appears in

ancient scriptures, functions within and for this cosmic

village

ruled by dharma.

It is necessary here to make a distinction between a

‘mere’ guru and

the acarya. The Monier-Williams Sanskrit dictionary

defines acarya

as ‘knowing or teaching the acara or rules; a

spiritual guide or

teacher’. In Hindu tradition, one may call

one’s spiritual preceptor

‘acarya’, but the term has another, larger

sense in which it denotes

the great teachers who have guided the destiny of Indian

religious

civilisation. It is in this sense that the mighty Sankara

is

Sankaracarya; that the great Ramanuja is Ramanujacarya;

that Madhva

is Madhvacarya; that Vallabha is Vallabhacarya, etc.

We find a distinction between acarya and guru in Rupa

Goswami’s

Bhakti-rasamrta-sindhu, as rendered by Srila Prabhupada.

There, in

the sixth chapter, Rupa Goswami lists as one of the

‘basic

principles’ of bhakti-yoga, ‘following in the

footsteps of great

acaryas (teachers) under the direction of the spiritual

master’.

Thus the ‘great acarya’ is distinguished from

the ‘spiritual master’

(guru) in the sense that the guru guides the disciple in

the

programme or discipline of teaching established by the

great acarya.

Hinduism has actually functioned this way for many

centuries.

Indeed, in the Mahabharata, great acaryas occasionally

declare a new

dharma, an example being the injunction of Sukracarya

that brahmanas

were no longer allowed to drink liquor (Mahabharata,

1.71.52–5), or

that of Svetaketu that women must be monogamous

(Mahabharata,

1.113.15–20).

Even in these two examples, however, adjustments are made

to ethical

codes, for even the acarya cannot change the sanatana-

dharma

(eternal dharma). Thus the same Sukracarya who declared

the new

drinking law lost his status as acarya when, as described

in the

Srimad-Bhagavatam, Canto 8, Chapter 19, he instructed his

disciple

Bali Maharaja not to obey the Supreme Lord, who had

appeared before

them as Vamana.

Returning to our cosmic village, we find that even the

great

acaryas, what to speak of the ‘ordinary’

gurus, must obey the law of

God. Even a disciple, as in the case of Bali, may detect

a

discrepancy in the guru. A striking confirmation of this

principle

is found in a statement by Bhisma to Yudhisthira in the

Mahabharata

(12.57.7):

guror apy avaliptasya karyakaryam ajanatah

utpatha-pratipannasya parityago vidhiyate

‘One is enjoined to renounce even a guru who is

contaminated, not

knowing what is to be done and what is not to be done,

and who has

taken to a deviant path.’

The phrase guror api, ‘even a guru’, surely

refers to the high

status traditionally awarded to a spiritual preceptor.

There is a further consideration. Srila Prabhupada taught

the

traditional view that one should confirm spiritual

teaching through

three authorities: guru, sadhu and sastra —

one’s own guru, other

saintly persons, and sacred scriptures. Thus the guru

functions

within a cultural economy of checks and balances.

Srila Prabhupada institutionalised these checks and

balances by

establishing the GBC, and indeed the body of senior

Vaisnavas, as a

sadhu-force within ISKCON. It is our practical experience

that

individual gurus may, and sometimes do, deviate from

ISKCON’s

spiritual standards, but the greater body of senior

devotees has

been able to keep ISKCON basically on track. Of course, a

similar

function is given to the community of the faithful in

Sunni Islam

and in various other historical religious traditions.

Finally, I will state what should be obvious, but often

is not: that

one may go off on either side of the road. Thus, there is

a real

danger for ISKCON, in its zeal to avoid the high-profile

fall-downs

of the recent past, to sanitise and restrain the position

of guru to

a point where it is no longer recognisable and, indeed,

no longer

functions as a real spiritual force for good in the

Society.

Last year a desperate father wrote to me explaining that

his

unmarried daughter had ‘moved in’ with a

young male devotee who was

my initiated disciple. He asked that I order my disciple

to separate

from his daughter. I sadly replied that in today’s

ISKCON, the guru

can do less harm, but less good as well, and that I did

not have the

authority to so order my disciple.

I conclude that the guru in Gaudiya Vaisnava culture is

ideally a

soul surrendered to Krsna and is thereby qualified to

lead the

community by purely representing the Lord. The guru is

also one with

Krsna in an ontological sense, as are all other souls,

but always as

the subordinate servant of the Lord. Within the cosmic

village of

Bhagavatam culture, the guru, and even the great acarya,

functions

within a system of constraints established by dharma,

sastra

(scripture) and the examples and teachings of recognised

saints

(sadhus). Thus, ISKCON’s system of requiring the

guru to abide by,

and within, a social reality governed by the GBC does not

intrinsically violate the tradition in which the Society

finds its

legitimacy.

Notes

1 ISKCON Communications Journal, Vol. 7, No. 2, December

1999, pp.

43–4.

2 ISKCON is a Gaudiya Vaisnava society.

3 catur-vidha bhajante mam janah sukrtino ’rjuna

arto jijnasur artharthi jnani ca bharatarsabha

'O best of the Bharatas, four kinds of pious men begin

to render

devotional service unto Me — the distressed, the

desirer of

wealth, the inquisitive, and he who is searching for

knowledge of

the Absolute.’

4 The term mad-bhakta, ‘My devotee’, occurs

in six other places in

the Gita: 7.23, 9.34, 11.55, 12.14, 12.16, 18.65.

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