yasodanandana

may mulaprakriti dasi prabhu bless me from the spiritual world to join her and all vaishnavas in the eternal service of lord sri krsna

jaya mulaprakriti dasi prabhu

jaya prabhupada

jaya gurudeva

jaya sri vrindavan dham

1) What is saranagati/surrender?

surrender is to do our duty of practising vaishnavas that is chanting regularly hare krsna having taken shelter in a pure spiritual master

2) How do you surrender to your spiritual master?

essentially chanting everyday without distraction the number of mahamantra rounds assigned at initiation.. better if more

3) What are the symptoms of one who is surrendered to his spiritual master?

one who's really surrendered to a pure devotee is a pure devotee. I, having a materialist mind, cannot recognize purity... Maybe one who's really surrendered is steadily fixed in krsna consciousness. He has not moments in maya and moments in good consciousness. But only he, the guru and the pure vaishnavas can recognize his state.

4) How long does it take to surrender to the spiritual master?

if we execute our duty of chanting hare krsna avoiding more as possible the ten main offences we will be soon fully surrendered (and free from maya)

5) Even if one reads the purports and books of the spiritual master, but, somehow or another is not able to follow the injunctions, is this surrender?

no it is maya..

two points : 1)the spiritual master teachs general principles but he has also particular instructions for everyone of us. So, in doubt, we have to ask...... 2)when we chant hare krsna we are asking for pure devotional service.. so if we chant without offences we will be soon able to execute pure and effective devotional service pleasing sri guru and sri vaishnavas

6) Does surrendering to the spiritual master happen in stages or at once?

more often in stages, but depending exclusively by guru's mercy it is possible to be blessed to achieve the liberation in a moment

7) What are the steps towards surrendering to the spiritual master?

our quality of surrendering depends on the quality of our chanting...

(all this preaching is first of all for me)

http://www.harekrsna.it/

here you have the addresses of every iskcon temple in italy...

if there's problems, please write again

I saw your post before, I'm, still smiling that you called me Godbrother

prabhu i am also smiling because i am happy !

yasodanandana@tiscali.it

i offer my deep respect to such exalted godbrother....

jaya gurudeva!

(my name is ehem.. yasoda nandana dasa.. a servant of the dearest to mother yasoda

i ever wished to get at initiation a simple name of krsna easy to explain when "preaching", and i like very much to speak of personalism. So, talking about my name, having to explain that also god has a mum, i have automatically to (attempt to) explain, with my great pleasure, that god is a person)

if the guru is really authentic and he's a manifestation of supersoul, there's no difference in saying that he or supersoul has inspired the disciple

but all is started from personal inspiration and a promise made to the guru of chanting the rounds

the girls has not seen the harinama and she's gone home thinking "i will pray paramatma..", she liked harinama and contacted directly a guru, making the promise to chant....... from this, everything is started

surrendering to the guru then linking to krsna

diksa and siksa... but siksa is more essential and some steps of our sampradaya are only siksa

1)everything started from a personal contact

2)the girl asked for a spiritual name

3)the guru can say that he do not know .. also for humbleness

perfectly traditional.. what indradyumna maharaja has done is an initiation.. we do not call it initiation because of gbc laws on age of the disciple, round's number, fire sacrifice, promises on principles, waiting period, recommending of temple president and so on..

but it is a classic and traditional gaudya vaishnava harinama (first) initiation

prabhu

i accept the challenge for myself, i have to became pure and competent and i should be preaching

but you and other devotees are surely preaching in a very effective way, being or growing as nice vaishnavas in your everyday life..

so the preaching is surely going on

prabhu you are responsable of making me cry... hare krsna

the harinama is the greatest thing

Now externally it all might seem well but if that initial inspiration wasn't from God (I'm including guru when I say God) but rather just an impulse, an urge from the mind, wouldn't that be a false branch with only the semblance of life?

of course.. if he has no direct inspiration by god (=darshan), how can he teach others to search and find this inspiration?

his disciples surely will have benefit from the hare krsna chanting that does not requires any connection to be effective.. but they will not be able to go definitively back to godhead following such guru

he's not with krsna, he cannot bring others to krsna

... "Prabhupada said you could kick a ball around."

we italians have no problem... we are all ready for "Gaudya Soccer World Cup"

maybe some little problems from germany, brazil and argentina yatras... but not too much

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sorry but i am more secular humanist than you ... haribol

is there something i have said wrong that you are correcting with your message?

... because i completely agree!!

oh.. no war!!

surely i have the problem to consider these basic things about guru tattva... basic

i can gratificate myself thinking that the guru has make them simple in my mind.... but it is more likely that i am superficial and simplicistic....

haribol!!

The spiritual master is not just giving beads and a party. His duty is to give consciousness. If a disciple doesn't develop it, then he can hardly be said to be competent.

#i have already said that, for me , diksa guru/disciple and siksa guru/disciple relationships are exactly the same. Then, the guru can be competent and simultaneously the disciple cannot develope immediately or in a short time the pure devotion. The fact is that if one has taken shelter in a pure devotee, this step is definitely done and this will be the starting point of a new devotee life if the disciple fails to realize himself in one life.. so you are right but it can be difficult to judge

I hope your not insinuating that just because someone is initiated they must be more sincere

#we know how the things are going on in the spiritual realm.. from a point of view it's all krsna's mercy, from a point of view there's seriousness, desire.. crying, as srila gaura govinda maharaja says.. of course also these achievements are received by mercy (i have already said my position as dog..)

i think that surely pessimism about the existence of pure devotees does not help

.

The rest of us cannot be authorities on each other's conditioning or spiritual position.

#and i am following your useful instruction speaking essentially of general subjects not judging anyone personally

You think there will always be a pure devotee in Kali-yuga who is manifest for the "sincere"?

#we learn from gita and bhagavatam that krsna essentially came to this earth to kill demons and reestablish religion.. but mainly to please devotees.. and we see in bhagavatam that krsna comes himself or as avatara or sends his representative when he's requested by devotees. So sincere devotees have the possibility to call krsna or his representative. Chanting Hare krsna is actually calling krsna, and more we are serious, more krsna reveals to us.. directly or through the pure guru

Actually, it's the material world and the official succession breaks sooner or later. It has already broken many times from religious histories.

#i have a different opinion... but for now i would only express surprise if prabhupada prophetized 10.000 years of spreading the holy name and his books as law books and simultaneously no parampara succession... how can we spread the name and sustain and interprete the law books without proper guidance?

You may have a pure devotee for a spiritual master, that doesn't mean the succession is carried through you unless you become spiritual master.

#i do have a pure spiritual master (not the only one of course), many great vaishnava authorities say it... but, of course, i am simply a burden for him and vaishnavas and i have nothing to do with succession in parampara.. i agree with the fact that pure devotion is available.. but there's to make the effort to accept it

I think your answer simplistic.

#maybe you are right, but a simple statement like that without explanation does not help me to much in rectify my problem

I remember Prabhupada thinking his success would be in making just "one" pure devotee.

#so his success is million times more than he said to expect...

If one carefully considers that no liberated persons are available

..this si not true because krsna has granted to us the freedom to go away from him.. now, if he's not a cheater, he has to grant to us also the possibility to quit this material world.. and only through true and pure vaishnavas this can be done

so pure devotees are there

You can suggests otherwise, but he may not accept your opinion, right or wrong.

...in my opinion the perfect conciliation of the matter is that spiritual master comes by krsna's mercy who, basically fulfills our desire to be very serious, serious, not so serious, lazy in the spiritual life (of course i am "disciple" of a pure devotee only by his infinite mercy not because i have some good quality)

so krsna will surely fulfill the desire (predisposition) of the practitioneer.. we have seen that it is possible to take shelter in cheaters, average men, excellent men, very excellent men and so on.. and by logic we cannot deny that it is not possible that krsna sends us (as siksa or diksa....... that is is absolutely the same kind of relationship) a pure devotee if we deserve him

it has already happened with srila prabhupada and his young disciples in the 60/70

so.. who desires.. receives what he deserves

My ideas are from Srila Prabhupada, who stated "I am an old man, and am not perfect, but the science I present as I have received it from My guru maharaja is perfect, and this is my perfection."

we have not to think that the spiritual master is not perfect or that he cannot be perfect, prabhupada says these things because he's supremely humble

he says it in this way also to state that the purity of the guru has to be judged seeing his service, behaviour and following of tradition and parampara.. and not because he is born in a caste or another, or because someone give some revelation about some siddha svarupa of the guru or something like that

it is not, imho, "the guru can be not perfect".. it is "see if the guru is perfect by the fact that he's following perfectly his spiritual master"

in my opinion one has to be a pure devotee to understand perfectly another pure devotee... and to follow perfectly it is necessary to understand perfectly the instruction, siddhanta and so on

and if we want to follow perfectly we have to find a perfect one........ of course it is very hard to find such guide, but if we arrive at the point to theorize that is is so difficult that the only guru possible in this age is a half-guru, or someone better than us but not necessarily transcendental.... it is a great victory of maya

so let us follow more expert devotees, let us give advices each other as friends, let us continue our process following srila prabhupada, but let us not stop the hope to have before or after the guru that we deserve... one who is perfect like prabhupada.. maybe without his tremendous shakti to spread krsna consciousness all over the world and change the history.. but with the same pure connection with the lord

(i am simply thinking and writing, not opposing to you )

(i feel myself very fortunate because i think to have taken shelter in a real pure devotee... so i want to encourage everyone to believe that it is possible, that krsna does not leave us without pure devotees, that we have to pray krsna and krsna will fulfill our desire)

i am almost sleeping.. haribol!!

do not forget that srila prabhupada, in his books, explain to take a present spiritual master to make questions and be guided and chastized

In reply to:

------

we just need to remember that proper initiation is a very important part of our tradition as well...

------

Why?

simply because personal guidance by a pure devotee is essential, and naturally (phisiologically??!?!?) if this pure devotee has a present master he brings us to him to take initiation, if his guru maharaja is gone in the spiritual world he himself gives us initiation...

i would say, as a perfect ignorant of the english language, that initiation can be a "side effect" of the teaching

what do you think?

i am not able to see the order to chant hare krsna as something secondary, something that it is not worth to die for, to breathe for and so on... of course i am not against special orders or missions, simply i think that every devotee has already the special mission to chant hare krsna without offences and in this way go back to godhead

"Did your spiritual master tell you to preach in ISKCON,for example?"

not specifically, i simply follow a natural tendence, if i know something good i like to tell it to others too.. and my spiritual master tells to me many good things

(from my spiritual master i have received mainly corrections and chastizements not being attentive in the class and for my distract and offensive chanting.... and the direct instruction: "when you have not to speak for job or other relationships, when your mouth is idle.. chant hare krishna", he said also : "you in vrindaban see only escrements, pigs, dogs, broken walls, dirt and difficulties because you are not attentive when you chant hare krishna.. if you do it, you will soon see krsna, radhe, the gopis, gopas, yasodamata, nanda maharaja....", "hare krsna is the only medicine.... if you do not take it, i have nothing more to give to you"

jaya srila gurudeva)

Without such intructions,how can you say that you have truly received the spiritual master's mercy?

i think that "chant at least n. rounds of mahamantra every day and go to the point to make it without offences", the main instruction of all gaudya vaishnava gurus in the world give at the moment of initiation, is the most difficult and valuable instruction that can be given to a disciple.... and this instruction is direct, because it is given by our paramatma who is manifested in the spiritual master

for most of us a life is not enough to fulfill the promise and to repay our debt

other services, even materially huge and important, are only expansion of the service who emanates all the other ones... hare krishna, hare krishna, krishna krishna.....

i completely agree with kulapavana...

one can have power and distinction because he's guru or because he's the ritvik of the guru

if he's not pure the result is the same

(and if he's pure... he's a real guru, not only a simple officiant)

i have understood that you are speaking of implementation of some varna system in the temple managing or the activities of congregation... i think that the varnashrama implementation spoken by prabhupada is more on the side of spreading krsna consciousness in the general society through teaching to devote our activities to krsna without changing them externally

then

then i find unreal and maybe useless to have someone at the local temple telling to adult people "you are a ksatrya, you a sudra, you a vaisha .. " and so on.

Maybe this can be done with the gurukula children, but actually it is the thing that the parents are doing all over the world choosing or giving advices to their sons and daughters about the kind of school and university

"who can remedy the situation in our temples?"

the fact is that we have built and bought temples in the mode of passion, believing that all the people who joined in the 70s and 80s would remain there forever frustrating their real propensities... and now we pay the karma