Venu Gopal Goswami

Jagat · April 27, 2002

I went to see Venu Gopal Goswami last night at the Sivananda Yoga Centre here in Montreal. Venu Gopal Goswami is from the Radha Raman family in Vrindavan. He is the son of Purushottam Goswami and brother of Srivatsa Goswami.

About 100 people showed up, paying a 15$ entry fee, though I and probably many others were there on freebies. I met about five devotees I recognized from the Iskcon temple who also came, mostly young ones without strong connections to the “old” Iskcon, though there was at least one Prabhupada disciple, the grizzled Sahasramurdhna Das.

Goswamiji travels with a three-man group of musicians, one playing tabla, another harmonium and the third playing flute and shanai. They also have a recording of the tamboura drone sound. These musicians open the program with about a fifteen-minute classical recital with the flute soloing. This was not the traditional small bamboo flute, but a large instrument with a lower, richer sound. The musicians are professional and the music set a nice atmosphere, though I found myself getting somewhat fidgety long before its conclusion.

There is an elevated seat where the speaker will sit. To its right, a beautiful Radha Krishna yugala in ashta dhatu on an altar with a simple dress in the Indian style. The classical Indian poster of Krishna playing the flute alone hangs behind the raised dias. The lighting is good and the walls of the small hallway yellow

Goswamiji comes in after the long warmup, pays his dandavats to the Deities, takes his place on the seat. He is dressed in a yellow colored cloth and his Radha Raman urdhva-pundra is effulgent. He sits down, open his “Bhagavata bag” unwrapping a couple of framed pictures and his Bhagavatam, which he places before him. He performs a perfunctory puja, being supplied with garlands, etc., by one of the Yoga centre swamijis.

Then he starts a long mangalacharana beginning with barha-pidam nata-vara-vapuh, which for me was highlighted by the recital of ceto-darpana-marjanam and sri-rupa sanatana bhatta-raghunath sri-jiva gopala bhatta das raghunath.

This is followed by a long kirtan, amazingly, of Radharani’s names, which for me was definitely the highlight of the evening. Venu Gopal has a fine singing voice and the mere sound of Radha’s name was thrilling, like receiving a ripe mango after a long fast.

With the end of the kirtan, Goswamiji began speaking. This was the sixth day of a Bhagavata saptaha, so he was on the eleventh canto (though normally, I believe eleventh and twelfth are both seventh day subject matter). The discourse was in fact pretty vague and I had some trouble finding a theme or even paying attention before he started in on Dattatreya Yogi’s twenty-four gurus. I thought this was a good subject matter for a public discourse to a generally non-Vaishnava group. He mixed in a few amusing anecdotes, but the twenty-four gurus subject is an ambitious project and even though he went through them quickly, the lecture was much too long. After an hour and a half I was finding it difficult to sit still. At one point he broke up the lecture to start another kirtan, getting my hopes up that it had come to an end, but he began to speak again afterwards, going on for another half hour.

All the while that Goswamiji spoke, the tamboura drone tape was playing, and the harmonium and occasionally flute player punctuated or highlighted certain statements that he made. For instance, twice during the lecture Goswamiji recited the full Maha Mantra, which was followed by a tastefully brief flute riff. Though I thought the sound effects were sometimes on the loud side, it was effective in maintaining a generally quiet and calm atmosphere. In fact, Goswamiji’s speech seemed to be hypnotic rather than truly appealing to the intellect or even the heart. The audience was good and there was no disruption of the proceedings by people walking in and out or children crying.

On the whole, the purport of Goswamiji's lecture was on the level of becoming detached, but I found that it was poorly structured and no clear themes came out. As a narrative it did not carry. It was only given life by the occasional anecdote, two of which I can recount by way of example:

<blockquote>Akbar was a king who was known for his learning and his love for debate. One of his ministers impressed the king with his wisdom and wit, so Akbar was curious to meet his father, who he thought must be a wise man to have engendered such a son. However, in truth, the minister’s father was uneducated and something of a fool. Nevertheless, the minister told him to come and meet the king, but to keep his mouth shut and let the king do the talking. This is indeed what happened and the king went into a long discourse while the minister’s father sat silently. Finally, Akbar turned to his minister in frustration and asked, “Why does your father not speak? I have been talking for two hours and he has made no comment.” The minister then replied, “Your majesty, my father has taken a vow never to utter a word in the presence of fools.” </blockquote>

This anecdote was told to glorify the virtues of silence.

Of the Bhagavata “gurus,” in connection with the lotus and the bee (the bee is so eager for nectar that he remains in the flower, which closes with the setting of the sun, trapping him within), Goswamiji told the following “true” anecdote—

<blockquote>A old woman in Delhi was miserly in nature and kept her money for safekeeping in a vault box in one of the city’s banks. It was her wont to go every Friday and lovingly count the bills in her safety deposit box. One day, due to the neglect on the part of the bank employees, the vault door was closed while the woman was still there. It was a long weekend and the unfortunate woman was not discovered until the following Tuesday morning. When they found her, she was chanting the names of God. So she had started the weekend counting her rupees, but ended it it counting the Holy Names.</blockquote>

This was a good little story and elicited laughter, but Goswamiji did not in my mind press the point with any great effectiveness, simply pushing on to the next “guru.”

The evening then finished with a kirtan to Shiva, which surprised me, though I remembered vaiSNavAnAM yathA zambhuH and participated respectfully. Even so, I was personally displeased that he should conclude his discourse with a kirtan to Shiva after having led two kirtans dominated by Radharani’s name.

The evening concluded with an arati in which everyone got a chance to wave the flame before the Yugala deities. I noticed that the Iskcon women were eager to participate in this ceremony, as were many of the Yoga ashram people and Indian guests. Maharajji distributed prasad, which in this case was nice baklava sweets, to people who passed in front of his vyasasan, as is done in traditional Indian context. In India, this is usually a chance for guests to touch the speaker's feet and to ask for blessings and exchange a few words, but the Western audience took the prasad silently.

I had the chance to speak with Maharaj for a few minutes afterwards. I had promised to ask a devotee on these forums about the possibilities of finding lodgings in Vraja for retiring Westerners who did not particularly wish to remain within the Iskcon compound, but were still worried about security, etc. Unfortunately, I did not find him overly helpful, but simply stated that he was sure that arrangements could be made and that interested people should come to Vraja. I asked him whether they could come and consult with him or Shrivatsa Prabhu for help and he said that he would certainly help.

I complimented Maharajji for his kirtan of Radha’s names rAdhA-nAma-sudhA-rasaM rasayituM jihvAstu me vihvalA, but asked Maharaj why in his long mangalacharan he had not included at least one verse of prayer to Chaitanya Mahaprabhu. He answered that he had chanted ceto darpana marjanam, but I pointed out that this was a glorification of the Holy Name and that he really should include a verse like AjAnulambita-bhujau kanakAvadAtau. I then asked him for his blessings, as his body is made of Vraja-raja, that I may find the road back to bhajan, and he was kind enough to place his hand on my head.

I did not get a chance to talk to many of the devotees after the lecture, so I don’t know how they reacted to it, though I did get the definite impression that they responded favorably to the Radha kirtan. The non-Vaishnavas seemed to find Venu Gopal’s discourse inspiring and spiritually enlivening. I talked to the Swamiji in charge of the Yoga ashram, a pleasant Mexican woman, and she was bubbling with enthusiasm. Evidently, Venu Gopal Maharaj has found a formula that appeals to this particular audience and is achieving some personal success traveling from one Sivananda Yoga Center to another giving his Bhagavata Saptahas. As a Vaishnava, I found his lecture pretty insipid, lacking punch, much too long, and unfortunately often filled with confusing misusages of English. To what extent he will attract a personal following interested in practicing devotion to the Divine Couple of Vrindavan remains to be seen. Certainly he will familiarize a certain sector of Western population with aesthetic aspects of Vaishnava culture, and that is to be appreciated.

Nevertheless, there was much to learn from the experience.

<UL TYPE=SQUARE><LI>First of all: Bhagavata Puja. I have noticed in the few Iskcon house programs that I have had the good fortune to attend, is that Bhagavata katha is always done in an overly informal fashion. Whenever devotees give Bhagavata discourse in someone’s house, they should always perform a brief puja to the Bhagavata after kirtan. They should always chant a meditative mangalacharan, by which everyone’s attention is focussed and placed in the mode of goodness in preparation to hear.

<LI>Second, the addition of a drone sound is a useful innovation to help keep the audience’s attention in a long lecture of this sort. But I would strongly recommend against Fidel Castro length lectures, especially if they are not rhetorically particularly strong.

<LI>Third, the professional kirtan and excellent singing voice of the speaker are extremely effective in adding an professionalism to the program, which whatever weakness it had in my mind in terms of transmitting meaningful spiritual messages, still was effective as a ritual, which was carried out in a clean and organized fashion. The attention to aesthetic detail is something that local Iskcon leaders could learn from.

Gauracandra · April 28, 2002

Nice description. A number of years ago one of the Radha Raman head priests was visiting a number of Iskcon temples and giving a slide presentation of Vrindavan. I can't recall his name, but I don't think it was this Venu Gopal Goswami. He was relatively young, I'd guess in 40s-50s. Thanks for the run down.