Kulapavana

Apologies for my impertinence and dandabat pranams to you, prabhu. Some realizations are best kept for private meetings. Too many devotees misunderstand esoteric concepts and confuse themselves and others. That is why I'm convinced in preaching we must stress the differences between the guru and Krsna. Let alone the fact that so many pseudo gurus deluded themselves and others with the emphasis on oneness and engaged in materialistic exploitation of their position. That cheating is still going on here and there so we must not forget where it finds it's contorted justification.

sanatana dharma is FULLY based on dharmic action when it comes to practical activities. If and when Krsna will tell you face to face to abandon dharmic activities it is safe for you to do so, otherwise you MUST adhere to dharma. speaking of confused statements: "If A equals B and B equals C then A equals C" - in case of guru tattva A (individual guru) does not fully equal B (Krsna) so even if B equals C (Sri Guru), A does not fully equal C. it is a qualitative oneness and quantitative difference when it comes to the realm of divine knowledge. Once again: when it comes to "guru is one" principle, it is Krsna who is the Sri Guru, the ONE in innumerable manifestations of gurus, like our Srila Prabhupada, not the other way round.

devotees are not "whining" about it! it was an abhorrent, despicable behavior of people placed in charge of the future of our movement. it was people like YOU that made this abuse possible, because so many devotees knew about it and did NOTHING to stop it, paralyzed by bogus contortions of the Vaishnava philosophy, like the one you are presenting above. do you have the slightest understanding of what dharma is? the most important part of being an acharya is teaching by example, not playing God. when Narada Muni spoke to Kamsa, it was a part of the Krsna leela, where many dharmic rules are bent. Dont confuse that with child abuse that happened in our gurukulas. Yes, Krsna sanctions many horrible things happening to people, but He is not causing them to happen. how do you know whether someone is experiencing a reaction to their past karma or an action of someone creating a new karma? and does it even matter from the dharmic point of view? when it comes to your responsibilities - no, it does not - illigal, adharmic actions must be stopped. the attempts to present their guru as God by overzealous disciples are dime a dozen in India. dont cheapen Prabhupada with such thinly disguised attempts. when it comes to "guru is one" principle, it is Krsna who is the Sri Guru, the ONE in innumerable manifestations of gurus, like our Srila Prabhupada, not the other way round like you are suggesting.

my comment was to the original quote from conversation. Quote: <TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=6 width="100%" border=0><TBODY><TR><TD style="BORDER-RIGHT: #666666 1px solid; PADDING-RIGHT: 3ex; BORDER-TOP: #666666 1px solid; PADDING-LEFT: 3ex; BORDER-LEFT: #666666 1px solid; BORDER-BOTTOM: #666666 1px solid" bgColor=#e0e0e0>But even though he falls down, a devotee is never to be considered the same as a fallen karmī. </TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE> perhaps in that case falling down relates to externally abandoning sadhana and seva by a practicing devotee. altough acting just like a fallen karmi in life, such a devotee still has some feeling and appreciation for Krsna which a fallen karmi may be lacking.

just see...there are so many definitions, my point precisely. who cares what my definition is - we need to know what is Prabhupada's definition, as it is he who makes that statement... in terms of logic, how can you fall down if you were never really up? I think this is what Prabhupada means in that quote.

are we to understand that kanistha or madhyama devotees are false devotees? or devotees in training? these types of devotees are said to fall down sometimes. so you are either a real devotee who never falls down, or a fake who is prone to a falldown, nothing in between? also, what exactly is a fall down? quotes from conversations should always be seen in terms of time, place and circumstances. some people here just use two colors to describe reality: black and white...

The Moral Culpability for Qana by Patrick J. Buchanan "Everyone in southern Lebanon is a terrorist and is connected to Hezbollah," roared Israeli Justice Minister Haim Ramon on July 27. "Every village from which a Katyusha is fired must be destroyed," bellowed an Israeli general in a quote bannered by the nation's largest newspaper, Yedioth Ahronoth. The Israeli paper then summarized what the justice minister and general were saying: "In other words, a village from which rockets are fired at Israel will simply be destroyed by fire." That was Thursday. Sunday, in Qana, 57 of Haim Ramon's "terrorists," 37 of them children, were massacred with precision-guided bombs. Apparently, Katyushas had been fired from Qana, near the destroyed building. "One who goes to sleep with rockets shouldn't be surprised if he doesn't wake up in the morning," said Israel's ambassador to the United Nations, Dan Gillerman. Today, we hear unctuous statements about how Israel takes pains to avoid civilian casualties, drops leaflets to warn civilians to flee target areas, and conforms to all the rules of civilized warfare. But Israel's words and deeds contradict her propaganda. As the war began, Ehud Olmert accused Lebanon, which had condemned Hezbollah for the killing and capture of the Israeli soldiers, of an "act of war." Army Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Dan Halutz publicly threatened "to turn back the clock in Lebanon by 20 years." Gillerman, at a pro-Israel rally in New York, thundered, "[T]o those countries who claim that we are using disproportionate force, I have only this to say: You're damn right we are." "His comments drew wild applause," said the Jerusalem Post. Though Israel is dissembling now, Gillerman spoke the truth then. No sooner had Hezbollah taken the two Israeli soldiers hostage than Israel unleashed an air war – on Lebanon. The Beirut airport was bombed, its fuel storage tanks set ablaze. The coast was blockaded. Power plants, gas stations, lighthouses, bridges, roads, trucks, and buses were all hit with air strikes. Within 48 hours, it was apparent Israel was exploiting Hezbollah's attack to execute a preconceived military plan to destroy Lebanon – i.e., the collective punishment of a people and nation for the crimes of a renegade militia they could not control. It was the moral equivalent of a municipal police going berserk, shooting, killing, and ravaging an African-American community, because Black Panthers had ambushed and killed cops. If Israel is not in violation of the principle of proportionality, by which Christians are to judge the conduct of a just war, what can that term mean? There are 600 civilian dead in Lebanon, 19 in Israel, a ratio of 30-1, though Hezbollah is firing unguided rockets, while Israel is using precision-guided munitions. Thousands of Lebanese civilians are injured. Perhaps 800,000 are homeless. Yet, whatever one thinks of the morality of what Israel is doing, the stupidity is paralyzing. Instead of maintaining the moral and political high ground it had – when even Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and Jordan were condemning Hezbollah, and privately hoping Israel would inflict a humiliating defeat on Nasrallah – Israel launched an air war on an innocent people. Now, 87 percent of Lebanese back Hezbollah, and the entire Arab and Islamic world, Shia and Sunni alike, is rallying behind Nasrallah. And how does one defend the behavior of the United States? When Gillerman was exulting in the disproportionality of Israel's attack on Lebanon, U.S. Sen. Hillary Clinton was smiling smugly beside him. When the UN Security Council tabled a resolution condemning Hezbollah's igniting of the war and Katyusha attacks, but also the excesses of Israel's reprisals, U.S. Ambassador John Bolton vetoed it. When a few congressmen sought to moderate a pro-Israeli resolution by adding words urging "all sides to protect innocent life and infrastructure," GOP leader John Boehner ordered the words taken down. Why? Because, says Zbigniew Brzezinski, AIPAC, the Israeli lobby, had prepared the resolution and wanted it passed the way they wrote it. Our Knesset complied. It sailed through the House 410-8. For two weeks, Bush seemed unable to find a word of criticism for what our friends in Israel were doing to our friends in Lebanon. He publicly sent more bombs to Israel. He and Condi emphasized that America did not want a cease-fire – yet. And because America provides Israel with the bombs it uses on Lebanon, and we refused to restrain the Israelis, and we opposed every effort for a cease-fire before Sunday, America shares full moral and political responsibility for the massacre at Qana. Rubbing our noses in our own cravenness, "Bibi" Netanyahu took time out, a week ago, from his daily appearances on American television, denouncing terrorism, to commemorate the 60th anniversary of the terror attack on the King David Hotel by Menachem Begin's Irgun, an attack that killed 92 people, among them British nurses. This was not a terrorist act, Bibi explained, because Irgun telephoned a 15-minute warning to the hotel before the bombs went off. Right. And those children in that basement in Qana should not have ignored the Israeli leaflets warning them to clear out of southern Lebanon. Our Israeli friends appear to be playing us for fools.

Correct me if I'm wrong, prabhu, but I always read that it is Krsna who is caitya guru, not Srila Prabhupada.

Remember the "hopsing" technique invented by the TM people to help in learning "levitation"?

Are we to understand from this that NM says more or less: SP knew everything that was going on in the gurukulas he established in his institution and allowed it to happen because these kids deserved it? How do you then explain situations when SP was actually notified of the particular abuse cases and he got very angry, condemning the perpertrator of the abuse and calling for the punishment of the abuser in very strong terms? Not once did he say: Oh, I know about it... it's OK. It was their karma to be abused by my disciples... A king who allows robbers to harass citizens and claims "it's OK, it was their karma to be robbed" is not a king but a pretender. It may be their karma to be robbed, but it is his duty to protect them. I find the entire explanation of "guru omniscience" without real shastric or logical merit. Partial omniscience is an oxymoron - both in terms of language and in terms of logic.

it is merely my understanding and my mood of service, altough indirect references to such an approach can be found in BR Sridhara Maharaja's teachings.

if you have something to add here besides personal attacks feel free to post. or is your function on this forum to merely provide propaganda for Israel?

a couple of comments: 1. kusa grass here on Earth does not illuminate anything 2. "without flames there cannot be illumination" is not exactly true. there are various sources of light that do not involve flames, such as reflections of light, certain jewels (as worn by the Nagas for example), chemical or biological luminescence. perhaps the verse is speaking poetically about the kusa gras glowing like a flame. just as a field of a light colored grass often seems to glow here on Earth. Kusadvipa is actually illuminated by the Sun, just like all of Bhu-mandala islands. pay attention to the phrase: "we can make an educated guess" that SP is using here. Please.

What rasa do you have with Sri KRSNA: Friendly, brotherly, parental or conjugal? A devotee should think of himself as being in dasya rasa, untill he is forcibly elevated by Krsna to a higher relationship. I am most certainly in dasya rasa.

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3283720,00.html Yesha Rabbinical Council: During time of war, enemy has no innocents </SPAN> The Yesha Rabbinical Council announced in response to an IDF attack in Kfar Qanna that "according to Jewish law, during a time of battle and war, there is no such term as 'innocents' of the enemy." All of the discussions on Christian morality are weakening the spirit of the army and the nation and are costing us in the blood of our soldiers and civilians," the statement said. (Efrat Weiss) (07.30.06, 17:37) such rhetoric just a small step above islamic clerics advocating suicide bombing of Israeli civilians - a widely known and condemned problem. Cheating religions are ruining life for millions of people all over the world. In the age of Kali demons become religious leaders.

these people refuse to accept the obvious. they will also watch 8 pages of this discussion and still proclaim that statements like "sun is closer to earth than moon" do not adversly affect the preaching... what can you do? when one pretends to be asleep, nobody can wake them up. but if it keeps them happy in devotional service: who cares? yet, presenting such ideas to college kids while preaching seems naive and counterproductive to the extreme.

I'm not sure there is a need to look for similarities. The mood of Krsna's queens in that episode of Lord's pastimes is beyond our ability to understand. We can only marvel at the depth of this leela... love, separation, anguish, pain - pure heartbreaking stuff... what a wonderous and tragic story...

the solution is in a political process, not in military actions. that is true for BOTH sides! Israel is not SOLVING the problem of terrorism by bombing Lebanon and killing hundreds of innocent people. they are CREATING terrorism in that way. you judge by the results. but the moderate people in Israel face opposition from the Jewish religious fanatics. the same people who murdered Itzhak Rabin who tried to use the political process to solve Israeli problems with Palestinians. so the terrorists are on BOTH sides, holding BOTH sides hostage. THAT is the problem Israel fails to acknowledge.

defense? you kill the attacker, his family, his neighbours, destroy the city where they live... all in the name of defense? if tried to do a stunt like that where you live you would have been tried and convicted of mass murder and more. do apply some logic, not sentiments to these issues.

<TABLE><TBODY><TR><TD vAlign=top>Source: Fairness and Accuracy In Reporting</TD></TR><TR><TD> </TD><TD vAlign=top>Published: July 28, 2006 Author: staff</TD></TR><TR><TD> </TD><TD vAlign=top></TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE> <!-- Israeli contribution to conflict is forgotten by leading papers -->WASHINGTON - July 28 - In the wake of the most serious outbreak of Israeli/Arab violence in years, three leading US papers—the Washington Post, New York Times and Los Angeles Times—have each strongly editorialized that Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon were solely responsible for sparking violence, and that the Israeli military response was predictable and unavoidable. These editorials ignored recent events that indicate a much more complicated situation. Beginning with the Israeli attack on Gaza, a New York Times editorial (6/29/06) headlined "Hamas Provokes a Fight" declared that "the responsibility for this latest escalation rests squarely with Hamas," and that "an Israeli military response was inevitable." The paper (7/15/06) was similarly sure in its assignment of blame after the fighting spread to Lebanon: "It is important to be clear about not only who is responsible for the latest outbreak, but who stands to gain most from its continued escalation. Both questions have the same answer: Hamas and Hezbollah." The Washington Post (7/14/06) agreed, writing that "Hezbollah and its backers have instigated the current fighting and should be held responsible for the consequences." The L.A. Times (7/14/06) likewise wrote that "in both cases Israel was provoked." Three days and scores of civilian deaths later, the Times (7/17/06) was even more direct: "Make no mistake about it: Responsibility for the escalating carnage in Lebanon and northern Israel lies with one side...and that is Hezbollah." As FAIR noted in a recent Action Alert (7/19/06), the portrayal of Israel as the innocent victim in the Gaza conflict is hard to square with the death toll in the months leading up to the current crisis; between September 2005 and June 2006, 144 Palestinians in Gaza were killed by Israeli forces, according to a list compiled by the Israeli human rights group B'tselem; 29 of those killed were children. During the same period, no Israelis were killed as a result of violence from Gaza. In a July 21 CounterPunch column, Alexander Cockburn highlighted some of the violent incidents that have dropped out of the media’s collective memory: Quote: <HR>Let's go on a brief excursion into pre-history. I’m talking about June 20, 2006, when Israeli aircraft fired at least one missile at a car in an attempted extrajudicial assassination attempt on a road between Jabalya and Gaza City. The missile missed the car. Instead it killed three Palestinian children and wounded 15. Back we go again to June 13, 2006. Israeli aircraft fired missiles at a van in another attempted extrajudicial assassination. The successive barrages killed nine innocent Palestinians. Now we're really in the dark ages, reaching far, far back to June 9, 2006, when Israel shelled a beach in Beit Lahiya killing eight civilians and injuring 32. That's just a brief trip down Memory Lane, and we trip over the bodies of twenty dead and forty-seven wounded, all of them Palestinians, most of them women and children. <HR> On July 24, the day before Hamas' cross-border raid, Israel made an incursion of its own, capturing two Palestinians that it said were members of Hamas (something Hamas denied—L.A. Times, 7/25/06). This incident received far less coverage in US media than the subsequent seizure of the Israeli soldier; the few papers that covered it mostly dismissed it in a one-paragraph brief (e.g., Chicago Tribune, 7/25/06), while the Israeli-taken prisoner got front-page headlines all over the world. It's likely that most Gazans don’t share US news outlets' apparent sense that captured Israelis are far more interesting or important than captured Palestinians. The situation in Lebanon is also more complicated than its portrayal in US media, with the roots of the current crisis extending well before the July 12 capture of two Israeli soldiers by Hezbollah. A major incident fueling the latest cycle of violence was a May 26, 2006 car bombing in Sidon, Lebanon, that killed a senior official of Islamic Jihad, a Palestinian group allied with Hezbollah. Lebanon later arrested a suspect, Mahmoud Rafeh, whom Lebanese authorities claimed had confessed to carrying out the assassination on behalf of Mossad (London Times, 6/17/06). Israel denied involvement with the bombing, but even some Israelis are skeptical. "If it turns out this operation was effectively carried out by Mossad or another Israeli secret service," wrote Yediot Aharonot, Israel’s top-selling daily (6/16/06; cited in AFP, 6/16/06), "an outsider from the intelligence world should be appointed to know whether it was worth it and whether it lays groups open to risk." In Lebanon, Israel's culpability was taken as a given. "The Israelis, in hitting Islamic Jihad, knew they would get Hezbollah involved too," Amal Saad-Ghorayeb, a professor at Beirut’s Lebanese American University, told the New York Times (5/29/06). "The Israelis had to be aware that if they assassinated this guy they would get a response." And, indeed, on May 28, Lebanese militants in Hezbollah-controlled territory fired Katyusha rockets at a military vehicle and a military base inside Israel. Israel responded with airstrikes against Palestinian camps deep inside Lebanon, which in turn were met by Hezbollah rocket and mortar attacks on more Israeli military bases, which prompted further Israeli airstrikes and "a steady artillery barrage at suspected Hezbollah positions" (New York Times, 5/29/06). Gen. Udi Adam, the commander of Israel’s northern forces, boasted that "our response was the harshest and most severe since the withdrawal" of Israeli troops from Lebanon in 2000 (Chicago Tribune, 5/29/06). This intense fighting was the prelude to the all-out warfare that began on July 12, portrayed in US media as beginning with an attack out of the blue by Hezbollah. While Hezbollah's capture of two Israeli soldiers may have reignited the smoldering conflict, the Israeli air campaign that followed was not a spontaneous reaction to aggression but a well-planned operation that was years in the making. "Of all of Israel’s wars since 1948, this was the one for which Israel was most prepared," Gerald Steinberg, a political science professor at Israel's Bar-Ilan University, told the San Francisco Chronicle (7/21/05). "By 2004, the military campaign scheduled to last about three weeks that we’re seeing now had already been blocked out and, in the last year or two, it’s been simulated and rehearsed across the board." The Chronicle reported that a "senior Israeli army officer" has been giving PowerPoint presentations for more than a year to "US and other diplomats, journalists, and think tanks" outlining the coming war with Lebanon, explaining that a combination of air and ground forces would target Hezbollah and "transportation and communication arteries." Which raises a question: If journalists have been told by Israel for more than a year that a war was coming, why are they pretending that it all started on July 12? By truncating the cause-and-effect timelines of both the Gaza and Lebanon conflicts, editorial boards at major US dailies gravely oversimplify the decidedly more complex nature of the facts on the ground.

just think about Krsna's queens who were left by Him only to be captured by the barbarians... I'm not sure our situation is so bad materially or spiritually. I think we don't deserve even what we have.

one thing that comes to mind in that connection: if we came here from the shore (tatastha) of the Viraja river than it is hard for us to think that bhakti is our original mood and seva our original activity. perhaps that is one of the main reasons for SP to hint that we fell from Goloka. lets face it: WE NEVER HAD BHAKTI. we should serve true Vaishnavas to get it.

this thread was not started to discuss all things Evil. I just posted an article about a current event. are you the same guest who claims the Israeli law as posted above is no longer in place? if so, I'm not sure that is true. as far as I know it is still very much in effect as the original "deadline" was extended indefinitely. the death toll in Lebanon and Gaza from Israeli attacks surpassed 800, mostly innocent people, about a third of them children. Israelis lost about 50 people, about half of them soldiers. these people died as a direct result of Israeli actions. Israelis by their own admission planned this campaign for years. the capture of Israeli soldier was just an excuse. they capture and kill Hezbollah people ALL THE TIME. That is Evil at work. On BOTH sides. Dont be a part of Evil in any way. by supporting Evil the blood of all these people is on your hands too. It is called karma. In Vedic times king was sharing the good and bad karma of his subjects. In our times people share the good and bad karma of the leaders they elect. Bush has on his hands the blood of well over 100,000 innocent people in Iraq. Make sure YOUR hands are clean. At least reject all such demonic leaders. Hare Krsna!

another half truth at best. <TABLE><TBODY><TR><TD vAlign=top>Source: http://www.nytimes.com</TD></TR><TR><TD> </TD><TD vAlign=top>MacFARQUHAR</TD></TR><TR><TD> </TD><TD vAlign=top></TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE> <!-- Tide of Arab Opinion Turns to Support for Hezbollah -->DAMASCUS, Syria, July 27 — At the onset of the Lebanese crisis, Arab governments, starting with Saudi Arabia, slammed Hezbollah for recklessly provoking a war, providing what the United States and Israel took as a wink and a nod to continue the fight. Now, with hundreds of Lebanese dead and Hezbollah holding out against the vaunted Israeli military for more than two weeks, the tide of public opinion across the Arab world is surging behind the organization, transforming the Shiite group’s leader, Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, into a folk hero and forcing a change in official statements. The Saudi royal family and King Abdullah II of Jordan, who were initially more worried about the rising power of Shiite Iran, Hezbollah’s main sponsor, are scrambling to distance themselves from Washington. An outpouring of newspaper columns, cartoons, blogs and public poetry readings have showered praise on Hezbollah while attacking the United States and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice for trumpeting American plans for a “new Middle East” that they say has led only to violence and repression. Even Al Qaeda, run by violent Sunni Muslim extremists normally hostile to all Shiites, has gotten into the act, with its deputy leader, Ayman al-Zawahri, releasing a taped message saying that through its fighting in Iraq, his organization was also trying to liberate Palestine. Mouin Rabbani, a senior Middle East analyst in Amman, Jordan, with the International Crisis Group, said, “The Arab-Israeli conflict remains the most potent issue in this part of the world.” Distinctive changes in tone are audible throughout the Sunni world. This week, President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt emphasized his attempts to arrange a cease-fire to protect all sects in Lebanon, while the Jordanian king announced that his country was dispatching medical teams “for the victims of Israeli aggression.” Both countries have peace treaties with Israel. The Saudi royal court has issued a dire warning that its 2002 peace plan — offering Israel full recognition by all Arab states in exchange for returning to the borders that predated the 1967 Arab-Israeli war — could well perish. “If the peace option is rejected due to the Israeli arrogance,” it said, “then only the war option remains, and no one knows the repercussions befalling the region, including wars and conflict that will spare no one, including those whose military power is now tempting them to play with fire.” The Saudis were putting the West on notice that they would not exert pressure on anyone in the Arab world until Washington did something to halt the destruction of Lebanon, Saudi commentators said.

yes, that is my approach as well. If you want to see the Lord you must be humble. Trinad api sunicena...