Education and Rules

[Guest guest]

>

> I differ with the point put forth by Samba that rules are a botheration.

 

Somehow it seems that a lot of people seem to think that the cow standards

are a botheration, otherwise why would there be such a dismal response to

them? But I take your point, I was not clear enough and in principal you are

of course right.

 

> The vedic culture is based on rules. Every civilization is based on rules.

> Varnasrama is based on rules. Srila Prabhupada started our movement with

> rules. Without rules or laws there is chaos. It is common sence. To say

> that being expected to follow rules is unrealistic because basically rules

> are a botheration is "ruling" for an animal society (and I don't mean

> cows). To say that the cow standards are only rules and therefore a

> botheration and no wonder that they are not being followed is a

> shortsighted illogical statement.

 

Of course rules are required, and you are right that it would be illogical

and shortsighted to ignore them. Another text I sent should hopefully put

straight what I was trying to get across. As you know email is very limited,

and when one writes on complex issues it is not possible to address all the

concepts in one email. It would be way too long.

 

> The standards give an outline of the dos and don'ts of cow protection as

> briefly as possible. It is a brief education . In this format the

> beginning of education can be absorbed without too much effort.

 

The standards that were produced by the members of this conference are

invaluable and well presented. I was simply noting that despite that there

is a very dissapointing lack of response or apparent adherence. It is this

that I am trying to address, why that is, and what can be done about it.

 

I am sincerely trying to do something about it. Tejiyas prabhu comes here

and preaches to me for days on end about cow protection and varnasrama, and

I am deeply touched by his commitment to this preaching. I dont claim to

have all the answers, but I have been trying to dedicate my life to this

goal for several years now. I beleive that our Madhuvan Project is a ray of

hope. That ISKCON authorities have agreed to put aside 40 hectares of land

for the project is a real Godsend. We are getting good response to the

project, we are getting permissions to raise funds, and some families are

coming forward who want to participate.

 

> It would be nice to hear how the cow protection program is doing there in

> Spain. The standards and cow report are now in Spanish and can be acquired

> on www.iscowp.org by clcking the standards button.

 

I have mentioned about the cow program in a few texts. The New Vrajamandala

program is run seperately to our project and in Spanish. There are very few

cows now, who are very nicely maintained.

 

Getting the local cowherds to complete the cow reports is not at all easy. I

am hopeless at Spanish, and dont know enough technical Spanish to help them.

This is the land of manana. The cows get what they need, but getting some

paper work for some Americans who they dont know and cant communicate with

is a real problem. The fact that even now, many of Srila Prabhupdas books

are not translated into Spanish, gives you an idea of the difficulty.

 

I dont agree with the idea of ISKCON communal goshalla because as we know

normaly the cows are ignored and it becomes a problem. We are trying a

different model.

 

If the Temples cowherd where to leave, we could easily share the cows

amongst us in Madhuvan, there is plenty of land and we would welcome them.

 

Your servant

Samba das