Faith and Blind Faith

[Guruvani]

 

Sridhar Maharaja is responsible for disobeying this order of Guru Maharaja".

-Muralidhar das

 

The facts are that Srila Saraswati Thakur ordered Sridhar Maharaja to go preach in England, but Sridhar Maharaja refused and managed to talk his way out of it.

So, the charge that Sridhar Maharaja disobeyed the order of his spiritual master is not completely without merit.

 

If it was the will of Srila Saraswati Thakur that Sridhar Maharaja go preach to the English, then WHY did Sridhar Maharaja even hesitate?

 

Sridhar Maharaja also refused to cooperate with the Gaudiya Math GBC, which was the order of Srila Saraswati Thakur.

[muralidhar_das]

Letter to Rupanuga 28 Apr, 1974

 

I do not wish to discuss about the activities of my godbrothers, but it is a fact that they have no life for preaching work. All are satisfied with a place for residence in the name of a temple, they engage disciples to get foodstuffs by transcendental devices and eat and sleep.

 

They have no idea or brain how to broadcast the cult of Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu. My Guru Maharaja used to lament many times for this reason and he thought that if one man at least had understood the principle of preaching then his mission would achieve success. In the later days of my Guru Maharaja he was very disturbed. Actually, he left this world earlier, otherwise he would have continued to live for many years.

 

Still he requested his disciples to form a strong governing body for preaching the cult of Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu. He never recommended anyone to be acarya of the Gaudiya Math. But Sridhara Maharaja is responsible for disobeying this order of Guru Maharaja, and he and two others who are already dead unnecessarily thought there must be one acarya. If Guru Maharaja could have seen someone who was qualified at that time to be acarya he would have mentioned. Because on the night before he passed away he talked of so many things, but never mentioned an acarya.

 

His idea was that acarya was not to be nominated amongst the governing body. He said openly that you make a GBC and conduct the mission. So his idea was that amongst the members of the GBC who would be successful a self-effulgent acarya would be automatically selected.

 

So Sridhara Maharaja and his two associate gentlemen unauthorizedly selected one acarya and later on it proved to be a failure. The result is that now everyone is claiming to be acarya even though they may be kanistha adihikary with no ability to preach. In some of the camps the acarya is being changed three times a year. Therefore we may not commit the same mistake in our ISKCON camp.

 

Actually amongst my godbrothers no one is qualified to become acarya. So it is better not to mix with my godbrothers very intimately because instead of inspiring our students and disciples they may sometimes pollute them... They cannot help us in our movement, but they are very competent to harm our natural progress.

[muralidhar_das]

 

In the beginning, during the presence of Oḿ Viṣṇupāda Paramahaḿsa Parivrājakācārya Aṣṭottara-śata Śrī Śrīmad Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī Ṭhākura Prabhupāda, all the disciples worked in agreement; but just after his disappearance, they disagreed. One party strictly followed the instructions of Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī Ṭhākura, but another group created their own concoction about executing his desires. Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī Ṭhākura, at the time of his departure, requested all his disciples to form a governing body and conduct missionary activities cooperatively. He did not instruct a particular man to become the next ācārya. But just after his passing away, his leading secretaries made plans, without authority, to occupy the post of ācārya, and they split into two factions over who the next ācārya would be. Consequently, both factions were asāra, or useless, because they had no authority, having disobeyed the order of the spiritual master. Despite the spiritual master's order to form a governing body and execute the missionary activities of the Gauḍīya Maṭha, the two unauthorized factions began litigation that is still going on after forty years with no decision.

- purport to Adi-lila Chapter Twelve, Text 8.

 

 

In this quote we find that the secretaries being blamed for the break up of the Gaudiya Math.

 

Anantavasudeva, Kunjabihari and Paramananda Vidyaratna were the secretaries.

 

Srila Sridhar Maharaj was not a secretary to Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī Ṭhākura.

 

This quote in fact contradicts the things said against Srila Sridhar Maharaj in the letter to Rupanuga.

[muralidhar_das]

1) So Sridhara Maharaja and his two associate gentlemen unauthorizedly selected one acarya and later on it proved to be a failure.

 

Srila Sridhar Maharaj was not a member of the Gaudiya Math GBC. Srila Sridhar Maharaj said he would accept whatever decisions the GBC made in relation to the future directions of the Gaudiya Math. Srila Sridhar Maharaj was not present in the meeting where the GBC split (Anatavasudeva's group against Bhaktivilasa Tirtha). He did not vote when the majority voted to make Anatavasudeva the Acharya.

 

Why should Srila Sridhar Maharaj be criticized for something he did not do?

 

To spread false allegations about someone is what we call slander.

 

2) So his (Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Thakur's) idea was that amongst the members of the GBC who would be successful a self-effulgent acarya would be automatically selected

 

Note that Srila A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada said here that the self-effulgent acarya would be someone "amongst the members of the GBC". One of the GBC would be "self effulgent".

 

The GBC did select a person who they felt was "self-effulgent". The majority picked Anatavasudeva. Again, I repeat, Srila Sridhar Maharaj was not present in the meeting. Srila Sridhar Maharaj did not vote for Anantavasudeva.

 

3) Sridhara Maharaja is responsible for disobeying this order of Guru Maharaja, and he and two others who are already dead unnecessarily thought there must be one acarya.

 

Srila A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada takes the view that that there should not have been one acarya.

 

This position was argued in that GBC meeting by Bhaktivilasa Tirtha. When Anantavasudeva and his supporters refused to accept this, Bhaktivilasa Tirtha objected. Together with Bon Maharaj and Paramananda Vidyaratna, they walked out. This point of dispute was THE reason the Gauidya Math broke up.

 

Bhakti Dayita Madhava Goswami Maharaj was a Gaudiya Math GBC member who sided with Anantavasudeva. He also wanted to have many acharyas, but he sided with the majority. He voted with Anantavasudeva to maintain unity of the GBC. That was his decision.

 

But the fact remains, Srila Sridhar Maharaj was not a member of the GBC, he didn't vote, and he only told people "I will abide by the decisions of the GBC". Why is he blamed for breaking up the Gaudiya Math? That type of attack against him is totally unwarranted.

 

Anantavasudeva and his allies, who were a majority in that Gaudiya Math GBC committe, those men were not puppets controlled by Srila Sridhar Maharaj. Srila Sridhar Maharaj had no power, no vote, and no membership of the GBC. Anantavasudeva and his allies voted to make one person, Anantavasudeva the acharya. Why blame Srila Sridhar Maharaj for something Anantavasudeva and his allies did when they voted together in that meeting. This sort of slanderous attack is wrong.

[cbrahma]

The Gaudiya Math is pretty much history precisely because of the acarya debacle. The proliferation of gurus splintered the movement just like in ISKCON. The bottom line of course is that one doesn't get 'hired' by appointment to the post of guru like a CEO of a corporation. But it's great control mechanism, which is all this diska obsession is about.

[Guruvani]

Anyway, Srila Prabhupada was a disciple of Srila Saraswati Thakur and he was there to see everything that went on after the disappeareance of Srila Saraswati Thakur.

But, devotees like Muralidhar want to come in more than half a century later and piece together a story with information he gets through the SCSM camp.

 

That is hardly an objective way to gather information.

 

Srila Prabhupada was there.

He made his own observation and came to his own conclusionss.

 

For some reason or other he felt that Sridhar Maharaja had some responsibility in the break-up of the Gaudiya Math and so he made some statement.

 

More than likely his knows more than someone like Muralidhar who thinks he can go to SCSM more than 50 years later and get a better picture of what went on then than did Srila Prabhupada when he was right there to witness the whole thing directly.