What Do We Mean by Varnasrama: 5 Models of Social Development

[Guest guest]

Wonderful post! Thank you.

 

> So to review, these are the three phases of Prabhupada's presentation:

>

> 1. Varnasrama is ideal, but not possible in this age.

>

> 2. We must introduce varnasrama as a way to bring non-devotees to Krsna

> consciousness, but our devotees will be transcendental.

>

> 3. We must introduce varnasrama within ISKCON with devotees participating

> at all levels -- and simultaneously, we must use varnasrama as a preaching

> tool to attract others.

>

> As I say, these phases mark the major thrust of Srila Prabhupada's

> presentation to the devotees over time. In different periods, it is

> possible to find statements which have a different approach but these are

> the three general periods.

>

***********

 

What came to mind while reading this was a similar breakdown of Srila

Prabhupada's approach to devotee marriages. I heard Satvsvarupa Maharaja

speak about this in his Appreciating Srila Prabhupada course, and I recently

saw the same analysis somewhere else, maybe on VNN. The phases were

basically:

 

1. Srila Prabhupada was initially enthusiastic

2. seeing the failure rate and difficulties, he began stressing that married

couples had to be prepared to live outside the temples, that they were

responsible for their own marriage

3. he became digusted and no longer condoned marriages

 

(Sorry, the breakdown and wording aren't so refined or well-researched, but

I think that is the gist.)

 

Do you think that there is a correlation between his loss of enthusiasm for

marriage within ISKCON and his rising emphasis on the third type of VAD?

Obviously VAD requires marriage, but perhaps he thought that engagement

according to one's propensity would make stronger marriage (varna first,

asrama later)?

 

Also, regarding the the first approach VAD (not possible in this age): Srila

Prabhupada makes a statement in "Renunciation Through Wisdom," (written the

1950s?) that Krsna doesn't stress VAD in the Gita because it is not possible

in this age; instead, Krsna stresses giving up the fruits of activities,

i.e. you don't change the activity but you sacrifice the results. I have

always thought that this was a pretty strong argument, and one that can be

supported from many angles, such as Caitanya Mahaprabhu's instruction to the

Kurma brahmana, that Srila Prabhupada so often used in preaching: you don't

need to change, you don't need to give up anything--just add Krsna. Thus

someone working in a factory (ugra-karma) can be considered a sannyasi.

Perhaps related to this is the idea that VAD is always existing in some

form. Thus we find that Srila Prabhupada in the First Canto classes poets,

philosophers, and scientists as brahmanas. Of course it's a misguided,

mundane VAD, but it could be argued that people *are* engaged according to

their psycho-physical nature in the "normal" world. And I think this may

touch on a point in Harsi's letter: ISKCON has, for many of its members,

failed to engage them according to their psycho-physical nature.

Furthermore, trying to introduce a classical, agrarian-based VAD, only seems

to further exacerbate this problem, as not only are most ISKCON members and

most of general society ill-equiped and non-desirous for such a lifestyle,

the prerequisite cultural and economic environment necessary for such a

system is largely non-existent.

 

Any thoughts on that?

 

(I'd like to clarify one thing though: my heart lies on the side of agrarian

VAD--some of my best friends are farmers! And no-one can deny that Srila

Prabhupada had that vision, especially in a letter to you.)

 

> 3. Srila Prabhupada's proposed strategy for introducing varnasrama was

> not to try to immediately convert the whole world, nor even all of ISKCON

> to a full-scale varnasrama society. Rather, he advised devotees to

> develop a "small unit of ideal community." Make the original model small

> enough to be ideal, then it will attract people. "They will be attracted

> by your training power."

 

You have written that the obstacles are huge, and that small steps such as

growing a garden are moves in the right direction. Do you see progress along

this path? Obviously not everyone attempting such a lifestyle in ISKCON is

on COM, but is it happening? Does ISKCON support or even provide a network

for devotees trying to implement such communities? (What I'm getting at is

one of my favorite spiels: we have a really lousy flow of information in our

movement. Present COM-pany excluded.) Is there any kind of newsletter or

journal where devotees inspired in this way can share their experiences and

practical tips? (I know about Practical VAD conference, but I think that COM

suffers from its fleeting nature and it isn't widely accessible or easy to

research.) What role should ISKCON the movement take? What role do you think

the members of this conference should take?

 

(Here's my good deed for the day. A devotee sent me a picture of the log

cabin he built by himself and I put into my devotee search engine site at

http://loibazaar.com. If you want to take a look at a devotee-built log

cabin, visit http://www.geocities.com/kiranasas/

If anyone here has a similar project, site or resource they'd recommend,

please send them to me or visit LoiBazaar.com and I'll add them.)

 

> Is the community isolated?

 

On a slightly different tack, but related to Harsi's letter: I think that

the deeper isolation many devotees have felt is due to not being happily

engaged, not doing something that they believe in, nor have passion. Somehow

a lot of us had our spirits killed or clamped. I heard that someone asked

Srila Prabhupada what their varna was,and he replied, "What do you like to

do?" (Or is that a myth? I seem to think it was Naveen Krishna) Often when

we discover that we still like our non-devotee families, that we can still

get a job or got to college and make friends, we look back and feel that we

were somehow cheated in our temple lives. But that was a mix of own and the

society's immaturity. Let's try to make sure others don't suffer needlessly,

while still respecting the practices and ideals given to us by Srila

Prabhupada. (Whoops. How did I get up here on this pulpit!?)

 

 

> So in the economic sense, Prabhupada's ideal is quite isolated. But in

> the practical, social sense, it is not at all isolated because people are

> drawn by their curiosity, and drawn by the purity of simple living and

> high thinking to find out how we do things.

> I realize that 99.9999% of our devotees think that it is not possible to

> attract people by demonstrating simple living -- but try to tell that to

> the Amish communities in Ohio and Pennsylvania. They have no machines or

> electricity. They farm with horses. But they can hardly get their work

> done because everyone comes from the big cities wanting to see how they

> can be so religious and live so simply.

 

Right. I think such a lifestyle is intuitively attractive. Perhaps because

it's the lifestyle that Krsna Himself chooses, and perhaps because the

system of VAD comes from Him.

 

And the rest of your letter was amazing, so I won't even sully it with my

comments. Truly excellent.

 

ys. brajajana