Operating with a material deck of cards

[Guest guest]

Here are three postings from the Vaisnava Council (sent separately):

It is not entirely imperative that all of the

disciples of Srila Prabhupada come to a complete

agreement. This is not the main goal of all our

guru-tattva research and discussions. This is because,

we CANNOT come to complete agreement. This is not

possible, and this forum certainly proves that out.

 

As I said in the last post I made, we are all still in

the category of materially contaminated souls, who are

operating with a material deck of cards. We see the

world with material senses, and material logic, and

thus we all come to a host of different and

contradictory conclusions. The pure souls, the pure

acharyas, they all come to the same conclusions. One

only has to read the posts on this forum from

beginning to end, and he will see that we all come to

a host of different conclusions.

 

Therefore, just because we have different conclusions,

that is not an amazing thing, or that the PL book’s

conclusions may not tally with our own conclusions,

that is not amazing either.

 

The point I was trying to make in my last post, is

that in material logic, all the conditioned souls,

they try to FORCE other conditioned souls to accept

their own logic and opinions. But this is never

possible here in the material world. How many Hitlers

and Napoleans does it take to make this a plain fact?

We cannot force other souls to conform to our own

opinion. The best we can do is just follow the exact

words of Srila Prabhupada.

 

Well, some prabhus say they are understanding Srila

Prabhupada’s words better than the other prabhus.

Well, we can all say that, and that is what we tend to

say. But it still doesn’t prove one particular opinion

over the other.

 

If we try to FORCE any certain position, then we only

further polarize the already greatly polarized reality

of our movement. A forced position means only a

displacement in the lives of so many devotees. That is

why the Iskcon devotees are so defensive, they are not

in agreement to a displacement of what they have been

in belief of. This is why some of them are not

inclined to listen to the evidence, which will

completely change their reality of what they think

gurus are. Change will have to come slowly and by

experience and Krishna’s will, it will come.

 

The value of the PL book, is that it has a great

overall effect. There is one prabhu who said that he

passed out 50 of the PL books, and he got great

overall effects, everyone appreciated the book to some

degree or another.

 

The virtue of PL book, is that it gives all devotees a

CHOICE in the matter of guru-tattva, provided that our

particular choice is tallied with the validation of

what Srila Prabhupada said on guru-tattva, namely what

he said on 5/28, when he said both “officiating

acharyas” and “regular gurus.” If one prabhu says he

chooses the “officiating acharyas” position, his

choice is validated by what Srila Prabhupada said, and

if another prabhu chooses the “regular guru” position,

his choice is also validated by what Srila Prabhupada

said. And I may add, the “regular guru” may be the

monitor guru, or some will insist, the diksa guru.

Both satisfy the words of “grand-disciple” as said by

Srila Prabhupada on 5/28. Both satisfy the desire by

some to be guru. It is just that the monitor position

is more realistic and practical when we look at the

whole picture of the track record of gurus.

 

The main point of the PL book, it that it is NOT

trying to FORCE all the devotees into one particular

conclusion on the guru-tattva, when it is plainly

apparent that NOT all the devotees will conform to

either the guru position or the ritvik position. PL is

sort of finding the middle ground, by rightly claiming

Srila Prabhupada to be the main guru of all followers

in his movement. But, if some disciples want to see

the Iskcon guru as his main guru, then that is his

CHOICE. If a disciple wants to accept the monitor guru

position, or the “officiating acharya” position, or

the ritvik position, then that is his CHOICE. And we

ultimately have to accept that all CHOICES are

validated by what Srila Prabhupada said.

 

The synthesis to our great antithesis, is the 3rd

verse of Lord Caitanya’s 8 verses, that is that we be

HUMBLE and realize that we may have to allow different

CHOICES in Iskcon, in order that we have unity in

diversity. Then we must be TOLERANT of the other

choices, and we must give all RESPECT to other

devotees, despite our diversity. This is the only way

that we can follow Srila Prabhupada’s PRIME DIRECTIVE,

which is to cooperate together and push on this

movement.

 

The main point of being followers of Srila Prabhupada

is that we come to a unified agreement to follow his

words, as they are, on what he said about guru tattva.

 

 

Some prabhus write to me and ask if I really believe

what I say sometimes, that both sides are valid. Well,

it really doesn’t matter what I believe. I would

rather live with the main point of the PL book and go

for unity in diversity, than to fight this fight for

another 10, 20 or 30 years or so. The reason is, that

we are working with a material deck of cards, and

we’ll never really come to a unanimous decision by

which all the devotees will work with, not very soon

in the future. We need to tolerate the different

choices, and then we will learn by experience, Krishna

will teach us the best choice, sooner or later.

 

When all is said and done, we are still left with the

5/28 statements of Srila Prabhupada, in which he sort

of gives validation for both sides. He sort of gave us

an inch, and we tend to take a mile on the diksa

position, but by his words, this is what many of the

Iskcon devotees believe. It is up to our education and

tolerance and experience to bear out the real truth in

the long run. In other words, Krishna will validate

the best choice in the long run, it will be apparent

to us, by Krishna’s will, which choice is better,

sooner or later, and many are see that this is sort of

apparent already, more sooner than later. But for

right now, we cannot force it.

 

Ys visoka dasa

 

 

 

[Guest guest]

Hare Krishna

 

I like Pragosh’s comment about how we love Krishna and

Srila Prabhupada and our godbrothers, [otherwise, how

can we cooperate]. Yes, and as hard as it seems

sometimes, we really need to love all our godbrothers,

gurus and leaders included. Otherwise, how can we hope

for any kind of change? Human form of life means the

capacity to change, only animals and plants can’t

change their mind or their karma. So we have to try to

love, or else the other person picks up on our vibes

and facial expression that we are harboring negative

feelings towards them, and communication is stopped at

that point. If there’s a chance for

godbrothers/sisters to love each other, then there’s

hope for some change, however long it takes.

 

Some will say- why bother with Iskcon? Some think it’s

hopeless, and all the people there are bad, that’s not

the truth. I live near a temple, and I go to the

Sunday feast and some morning program when I can, and

devotees are almost always good people, provided they

don’t get fanatical. It may be that the guru issues

have generated some really bad feelings, that can be

true, but it depends on how bad, or how fanatic a

devotee has decided to pursue the negative approach.

Just like we’ve seen with a recent falldown, the

devotee was a great ritvik basher, bashing on the net

all the time, and this kind of mentality causes

offenses to devotees of Krishna, and thus it will

always breed a materialistic mentality, [like in the

case of Ramachandra Puri] and such devotees will lose

taste for Krishna consciousness. These qualities of

disrespect to others are even lower than our common

decent human qualities, that we see that non-devotees,

are often more polite in dealings with people than the

ritvik bashers. It goes for the other side too. It’s a

science of cause and effect. This will happen every

time. You might say that some ritvik extreme haters

are still in their dhoties, but there is a reality of

staying in the movement with a blooped mentality. It

won’t last forever. Negative qualities increase and

multiply, and good qualities will increase

exponentially, and you cannot just stay in the neutral

position forever.

 

So how is it that there is hope in Iskcon? How can we

expect the guru system to become more honest in the

future? We see the hope in the younger generation,

that they are often becoming more intelligent than the

older leaders. They are somehow avoiding this negative

association, which causes the “punar musiko bhava”

phenomenon. Many of them have begun to see through the

problems, and are open to change and solutions. We

know this, because many devotees are open to the PL

book, and are saying so, meaning that they are open to

discussion on change. This is the critical quality,

one’s openness to talk about these problems and

issues. Reluctance or refusal to talk like

gentlemen/ladies only means that one has things to

hide, one is afraid, unsure of his grasp on the

subject, one is afraid of being defeated in a public

discussion.

 

Srila Prabhupada says, “punar musiko bhava” or again

become a mouse, and this is the ironclad law if

devotees are too fanatical in this guru issue. We see

time and time again how the hateful devotees will

eventually have problems. The younger disciples may

see that there are some material elements in the

gurus. They don’t hate the gurus for this, or

disrespect them, but they see qualities like fear and

intolerance, as being human qualities, and that

devotees can eventually overcome such bad qualities.

 

A main bad quality is intolerance for civil

discussion. A guru is supposed to be always fearless,

but some of them react to the holy word ritvik with

fear and abhorrence. They also display the material

quality of dishonesty. If they were really honest,

they would have . on the guru issues, on the

ritvik issues constantly, but they refuse to talk

about it. What they are really saying, is that they

are afraid, they cannot defeat it. One guru said this,

he said, “we can’t defeat the ritviks, we just know

Srila Prabhupada wants us to be gurus.” So if they

know this, then they can communicate it in words. If

they really know what they say they know, they would

settle this ritvik issue once and for all. They would

hold monthly public discussions [.] and they

would defeat the ritviks month after month, in every

temple, for a year. They would do an overkill, just to

establish that they are right. But since they refuse

to speak in public in the temples about the issue, it

only means that they know beforehand that they cannot

win. This is big time dishonesty, and young devotees

pick up on this. The leaders seem to think they are

winning by default, by not talking about it. But that

is all backfiring, and intelligent devotees see

through all that. So, we still try to love all our

godbrothers, and because we love them, we will try to

change them, and get them out of this pitfall of

dishonesty. We will try to do it in a loving way, not

a vindictive way. That is why we have a chance to

change Iskcon, no matter how long it takes. That is

why the PL book is having a good overall effect. That

is why it’s best to conduct level-headed talks and

., and we will sort this out eventually, as

godbrothers become more honest in their dealings with

each other.

 

Ys visoka dasa

 

 

[Guest guest]

Obe-Wan is more powerful?

 

I was in a temple in 1994, and a younger devotee had a

little disagreement with me and suddenly screamed in

my face, with beet red face, that I “was a ritvik.” I

am still perplexed to this day why he said that,

because I never said like that, and I told the TP that

I stopped talking about guru-tattva years ago [true

back then.] But I was amazed at the shear hatred that

devotees feel towards these so-called ritviks. I

noticed this hatred in several other devotees, and I

made a vow to get to the bottom as to why this

happened. I vowed to research the facts on the

problem, and later I got on the Internet and found out

for myself. Vaisnava bigotry is an oxymoron. You

cannot have the words “hate” and “Vaisnava” in the

same sentence.

 

A Vaisnava never hates anyone, but sees everything as

Krishna’s plan and mercy. Hatred in the heart of a

Vaisnava, especially a young Vaisnava, is very

detrimental to the spiritual advancement of such a

devotee. We never hear of any of our acharyas

recommending hatred towards some other philosophy,

such as mayavada, but they only recommend that we

completely understand such philosophy, and we are able

to philosophically converse with and counter such

issues. We can only do this through open ..

 

The Judeo-Christian mindset and old mental habits-

 

Sometimes it seems that devotees are stuck in a

Judeo-Christian mindset, or they tend to think in that

way because of their Christian or Jewish [or Muslim]

upbringing and old mental habits. The Judeo-Christian

[and Muslim] edict is that all other religions are

evil, and only my religion is right. They all three

think that way, and they start long bloody wars over

such sectarian thinking. Srila Bhaktivinode

specifically says to respect all other religions,

saying, “Oh, they are worshipping my Lord so nicely”

and Srila Bhaktivinode respects them, and wishes them

to advance to Krishna consciousness. So according to

Srila Prabhupada and the acharyas, we are to respect

other religions and try to elevate them. But some

devotees fall into the ritvik bigotry mode, and can’t

even respect the so-called ritviks, who are

worshipping Krishna and Srila Prabhupada, and they

cause hatred over some discrepancy of different

viewpoints of what Srila Prabhupada said. The whole

conflict is based on erroneous concepts of what Srila

Prabhupada said and did.

 

Obe-Wan is more powerful?

 

Also due to our Judeo-Christian mindset, sometimes

devotees doubt that Srila Prabhupada is still in

control of his movement, they doubt that he sees our

every action, that he’s still here, and that he can

still order someone to be guru. George Lucas has more

realization than this. Obe-Wan-Kanobe became more

powerful after his death, after he left his earthly

incarnation and entered the spiritual realm. But our

Judeo-Christian mindset tells us that people become

inert and powerless in the spiritual realm, or they’re

a great distance away and can’t see us, or that their

earthly body holds more power and cognizance than a

spiritual body [they think we’re our bodies]. They

think that people pass from this world and are

stumbling in the dark, or go to heaven and play harps,

or hell and burn. But our Vaisnava reality tells us

that the acharyas never really disappear, for them

appearance and disappearance are the same. Srila

Prabhupada said this on the disappearance day of Srila

Bhaktisiddhanta. The acharyas are just as powerful in

any stage of existence, before and after the earthly

realm, Srila Prabhupada is fully aware of our

movement, he’s still with us, and able to order anyone

to be guru, or do anything he did before.

 

Room enough in Goloka?

 

Some day we will all surely go back to Godhead. When

we all get there, are the ritviks going to be on one

side and the ritvik haters on the other? Are they

going to serve Krishna and simultaneously glare at

each other? Are they going to “kick out” the ritviks?

What’s that? Oh, I see, the so-called ritviks aren’t

going back to Godhead? Their punishment is repeated

birth and death in the wheel of samsara? They follow

Srila Prabhupada and worship Krishna, but they don’t

see eye to eye with the GBC, [all because of a non

communicative attitude] therefore they are to be

punished with samsara? Well, Srila Prabhupada said

that our temples are non-different than Vaikuntha, we

have Goloka right here on earth, but we see some

kicking away of older Srila Prabhupada disciples, with

no discussion or ., which Srila Prabhupada

never authorized. He wanted us to have . and

talk things out. Most of us are willing to do that,

and that would solve the whole problem. Devotees

shouldn’t be afraid of going to the LA temple.