Thread 4: A prayer, ---honestly speaking

[Guest guest]

Thank you, Vaiyasaki prabhu, for brillantly enlivening us with your personal

comments on Srila Prabhupada's purports. that is most inspiring.

 

"I offer my respectful obeisances unto all the Vaisnava devotees of the

Lord. They are just like desire trees who can fulfil the desires of

everyone, and they are full of compassion for the fallen conditioned souls."

 

Your servant in Srila Prabhupada's mission, Krsna-kirtana dasi.

[Guest guest]

At 11:14 PM 9/8/00 +0900, Bhadra Govinda (das) JPS (Singapore - SG) wrote:

 

>>But since society means 99% grhastha,

>

>I do not know where you got that fantastic figure of 99%, but logically it

>should be 25% in a Varnashram society. Unless all our Grihasthas want to

>cling on to their administrative positions and decide to leave this world as

>Grihasthas. But according to Shastra they have to follow in the footsteps

>of Yudhisthira Maharaja.

 

Where so you get the fantastic figure of 25%? If only 1/4 of society were

grihasthas, who would support the other 75%? That's similar to the problem

the US faces in the near future, with progressively fewer workers

supporting more and more old pensioners. It's not going to work.

 

And we should note Srila Prabhupada's example of old age. He simply

dedicated his life to preaching, whcih did not preclude managing when

necessary. He personally told me that devotees and devotional service

cannot be stereotyped, and there is nothing that cannot be engaged in

Krishna's service. The only trick, he said is that we require guidance from

the expert spiritual master how to engage everything in Krishna's service.

 

Babhru das

[Guest guest]

In a message dated 9/10/00 10:14:00 AM Pacific Daylight Time,

Vaiyasaki.ACBSP (AT) pamho (DOT) net, responding to Bhadra Balaram, writes:

 

< If the GBC must resign immediately, then all the

>TPs who are above 50 must resign immediately. Can you please enlighten me

>how we can implement this immediately?

 

The resignation of the GBC was proposed due to failure in performing their

duty. It has nothing to do with age! Why do you not understand this simple

point?

Moreover, 50 is simply an arbitrary number. Srila Prabhupada, for example,

did not take vanaprastha until age 63, when he went to Jhansi. To try and

force people to take vanaprastha is not only unhealthy, it is fanatical. >>

 

I agree that a "bright line" mandatory retirement age is a bad idea, but the

basic principle that one should not remain entangled in worldly business

affairs (I'm not necessarily talking about ISKCON management here, which I

regard as more direct devotional service) until old age, is an important one.

 

As far as ISKCON management goes, I have heard young devotees and gurukula

alums complain that unfortunately the torch is not being passed to a new

generation (to paraphrase JFK's inaugural address), or at least not on a

sufficient scale.

 

To carry on with this theme of sannyasis getting more directly involved in

traveling and preaching and less involved in management, it also makes sense

that even older grhastas should be preparing for renunciation and should be

training their children and other promising young candidates to take on more

management responsibilities.

 

Just a thought.