Jagat

<font color=#669999>Dear Prabhus, Pita Dasji has been favoring us with his story on the Dharma Mela. I thought that I would cross post it here for everyone's enjoyment. I hope you're OK with this, Pita Prabhu.<hr></font> Dear Prabhujis, Hare Krishna! Please accept my humble obeisances! All Glories to Shree Shree Guru and Gouranga! I first heard the devotees clanking their kartals on Board Street in Philadelphia. My friends and I were invited to the Love Feast. We made it to the temple late Ekadasi during the Jhulan Yatra of Shree Shree Radha Krishna, accompanied by our dates and intoxicated. We swung Their Lordships, but were so stoned we didn’t even see them on the swing We took prasad of stir fried green pepper and tapioca puris and our taste buds exploded. We were given the Holy Name by Nayanabhiram Prabhu who told to just chant this Hare Krishna Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna Hare Hare Rama Hare Rama Rama Rama Hare Hare mantra and never stop. We became even more intoxicated on the Holy Name than the pot and when we got back to our dormitory, we excitedly told everyone that the Maha Mantra makes you higher than reefers. They told us we were fools and that we should never go back to that place again. “If you didn’t give them your address, you’re still safe,” was their advice. Time went by and I would see the devotees more and more whenever I went into town, but I never wanted to speak with them. My friends would always buy their books and give them to me. “Look at this art, it’s fantastic,” they would say and I had to agree. The books would then get lost somewhere in my messy pile of possessions. When I did pick them up, I noticed that they always smelled of incense. I would admire Shree Krishna and remember what was the devotees told me, that when Krishna plays His flute, the rocks melt and the birds fall from the trees in ecstasy. I could understand that these pictures of te cowherd boys running with Krishna through the groves of Vrindavan and Shree Shree Radha Krishna with their confidential maidservants were coming directly from Goloka. Gradually I had collected many such paintings and would continuously admire them. Time passed and I fell into a group of friends who were taking great amounts of drugs and mixing them with the occult to control each other. I gradually recognized what nonsense this was and so I left their association. Then I looked to the devotees as better friends. Rabindra Swarup Prabhuji spoke to me from time to time when I came to the Philly temple, where I often stayed overnight. I was so crazy that most of the devotees considered me a lost cause. They would go into the basement under the temple room and bang on the floor under me with hammer where I would sit in the yogic lotus position. But Rabindra would continue to show mercy towards me, feeding me Lord Jagannath’s Maha Prasad. One day, Rabindra gave me a flower and ask me to offer it to Srila Prabhupada one day, but I had reservations. Why should I offer a flower to a man? I thought. But then I thought he is helping me and all I’m doing here is showing appreciation. When I bowed down to His Divine Grace for the first time, I just became so happy -- my bad times in life disappeared and became only bad memories to be forgotten. I then traveled to a few temples to see if the mood was the same everywhere. I wanted to meet many devotees, but I didn’t see enough to really become a part of it. At the same time I certainly didn’t see much in life outside the temple that was at all interesting, as Krishna had given me a small transcendental taste. My goal was to meet His Divine Grace Srila Prabhupada personally. So in Miami after hearing Vishnujan Swami’s kirtans, I decided to join his band of kirtaniyas, but by mistake joined the Miami Temple, which wasn’t such a bad experience at all. Narahari and Raghava engaged me in many services to Their Lordships Goura Nitai, who were very kind to me. There was always service to do among the pots and pans of the Miami temple kitchen. That year Vishnujan Swami spent a few months in Miami and when he decided to travel I had to go with them. I left the temple to join the Radha Damodar traveling sankirtan party. There I met Brahma Dasji, who is part of this forum. He had a bus full of merry bhaktas. There were many different buses and many devotees on each bus. We distributed lots of Srila Prabhupada’s books. Each day we would hear Srimad Bhagavatam and take prasad and then go out to places where we distributed our books. Many kinds of places -- parking lots, bowling alleys, drive-in theaters, streetlights – basically, we went anywhere we could. Then came the chance to met Srila Prabhupada in Atlanta. I was personally introduced to him and my wish had come true. I saw Srila Prabhupada again after that time in the same year, when we were back in Philadelphia for the Rathayatra. It was an overcast day, but when His Divine Grace arrived, exited his car and walked towards the cart, the sun came out and seemed to shine on him like a spotlight. Srila Prabhupada told us how Lord Jagannath took on his fantastic form. After hearing His own pastimes with Radha described by Rohini to Rukmini, Krishna was stunned in remembrance of His eternal relationship and thus took the form of Jagannath Swami. We then visited New Vrindavan where we stayed for a few weeks working in the fields. The mood here was very rural and the devotees didn’t seem to have the same interest in Krishna consciousness as in the other temples. They were just as interested in communal life and farming, it seemed. So I left with a very nice godbrother, Vanudara Prabhu and we hitchhiked to San Diego together. In the San Diego temple we were asked to silkscreen women’s breasts on T-shirts. What is this? We were told, “Oh, it’s okay. We sell them to head shops and it brings money to the temple. Jayatirtha has told us we could do it.” I refused and left very shortly to New Dwaraka, the L.A. temple. It was there that I finally found very nice service that kept me very happily engaged. Somehow I was able to get authorized to leave the San Diego temple allowed to go up to New Dwarka. It was my greatest desire in those days to join with the artists who were painting for Srila Prabhupada’s books but this was never to happen. Instead I was made into an apprentice to the best artist that ever served in ISKCON, Bharadraj Prabhu. He was also a wonderful kirtan bhajan leader. Bharadraj and Adideva Prabhus had just returned from a long stay in Shree Dham Mayapur where they had learned the local Bengali art of doll making under Srila Prabhupada’s direction. Actually they were not dolls as we understand them, but figures made of straw and mud mixed with cow dung and rice husks. Srila Prabhupada wanted an exhibition of these dolls that were to be the sculptural counterparts of the paintings. These were to be exhibitions to teach Krishna consciousness. This was something that his spiritual master, Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Prabhupada had pioneered. Saraswati Thakur would spend all of the money his sannyasis collected and put it into these doll exhibitions. When the sannyasis asked His Divine Grace where all the money they had just given him had gone, he would say, “Oh, I spent that money on dolls. Go out and collect more.” Our Srila Prabhupada told us this story himself when he visited our studio in 1976. We worked at least eighteen hours a day, seven days a week, for two years to complete an exhibition of the introduction to Bhagavad Gita. We were grateful to be so nicely engaged in serving Srila Prabhupada in a way that he had personally requested us and wanted so much to see it happen. Some others, however, came and sneered at us, telling us we were in Maya, using all the society’s money to make such a useless thing as a doll exhibition, even they were well aware who had ordered and wanted it. This was the same person who had been with Vishnujan Swami when I joined the Radha Damodar party. His opinion was completely in opposition to Srila Prabhupada’s and I later saw how he has created more chaos in our society than I could ever calculate and he continues to do so from the sidelines, without restriction. I want to avoid as much as possible the bad guys and go over the wonderful experiences, as there is more than enough to tell about them. Over time, the bad elements will fade and their offences will be burned up. New Dwarka was, as Srila Prabhupada called it, our western world headquarters. There was the Bhaktivedanta Book Trust with its studio of devotee artists, the archives department, the different translation department, where books were translated into Spanish and German. The book distribution departments which we all time to time help to distribute. The temple Deity department and the devotees whom took care of their Lordships. There was also a sound studio Golden Avatar and the incense company, Spiritual Sky. In the three years I was there, the fourth to the ninth cantos of Srimad Bhagavatam and the complete Chaitanya Charitamrita were printed. As we worked in the studio making our exhibition, some devotees would be engaged in reading the Srimad Bhagavatam to us. We had all of Srila Prabhupadas books read to us during those doll studio days. Mangal arati was the high point of the day and I personally hated to miss them. New Dwarka also had a great selection of kirtan leaders. Kirtan with a hundred or more devotees was always very exciting. Rising up after cold showers and in clean cloth to see Shree Shree Rukmini Dwarkadish each day, I soon noticed they were smiling. Their Lordships were real and they were the center of our meditation as well our whole goal in service. The devotees all loved Rukmini and Dwarkadish and I soon became infected with their love. In New Dwarka there were always many festivals we celebrated that I have never seen celebrated anywhere in ISKCON, like the cleansing of the Gundicha Temple. One day after we read the lila in the Chaitanya Charitamrita, as the time was approaching, we all decided to cleanse the temple. The whole community came with buckets and we washed the temple room with a river of water pouring out. I remember our godbrother Guru Das taking a very big part but others, like always, criticized us and said we were Sahajiyas and that was the last Gundicha Cleansing festival in New Dwarka. It was in New Dwarka that I first heard many devotees the senior disciples of Srila Prabhupada preach Krishna Consciousness. I enjoyed very much hearing the classes of Hridayananda Maharaj, Nara Narayan Prabhu, Ramesvara, Jadurani Prabhu, Dravida Prabhu, Veda Vyas Prabhu, Jayadwaita Swami, and host of others too numerous to mention. The atmosphere was nice, but it became even nicer when Srila Prabhupada personally came. Preparations were made for weeks in advance. Recently, during Gour Purnima this year, I saw Bhakti Tirtha Swami. He kept saying that he wanted to instil the devotees under his care with the "Prabhupada is coming mood." He was also thinking that this was the best of attitudes, but is it really possible to instil it today? Bhakti Tirtha Swami thinks so. I thought it was a nice idea and a sweet memory. Srila Prabhupada did come while I was in New Dwarka, and he stayed at least a week. His Divine Grace came to our doll studio as I have said before. One of the things he did on that visit was to request certain devotees to stop reading his Chaitanya Charitamrita together in isolation. There was a group of devotees who got the idea that if they just read the parts of the Chaitanya Charitamrita that described Radha Krishna’s pastimes, they could become gopis in their next lives. For a few weeks they had been meeting after evening classes and reading these portions in the BBT offices. In ISKCON gossip, they became known as “The Gopi Bhava Club.” Srila Prabhupada was quite upset with them and told them to stop. Like many of these ISKCON heresy tales, the same person I mentioned above for opposing the doll exhibition took a major part in stirring up this witch-hunt and finding the culprits. He has been behind all the heresies in ISKCON and at the same time is their source and their cause. We need not say his name, as it is too sweet to use in relationship to himself, in my humble feelings. <font color=#dedfdf><small> [This message has been edited by Jagat (edited 07-04-2001).]

Dear Prabhus, Pita Dasji has been favoring us with his story on the Dharma Mela. I thought that I would cross post it here for everyone's enjoyment. I hope you're OK with this, Pita Prabhu.<hr> Dear Prabhujis, Hare Krishna! Please accept my humble obeisances! All Glories to Shree Shree Guru and Gouranga! I first heard the devotees clanking their kartals on Board Street in Philadelphia. My friends and I were invited to the Love Feast. We made it to the temple late Ekadasi during the Jhulan Yatra of Shree Shree Radha Krishna, accompanied by our dates and intoxicated. We swung Their Lordships, but were so stoned we didn’t even see them on the swing We took prasad of stir fried green pepper and tapioca puris and our taste buds exploded. We were given the Holy Name by Nayanabhiram Prabhu who told to just chant this Hare Krishna Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna Hare Hare Rama Hare Rama Rama Rama Hare Hare mantra and never stop. We became even more intoxicated on the Holy Name than the pot and when we got back to our dormitory, we excitedly told everyone that the Maha Mantra makes you higher than reefers. They told us we were fools and that we should never go back to that place again. “If you didn’t give them your address, you’re still safe,” was their advice. Time went by and I would see the devotees more and more whenever I went into town, but I never wanted to speak with them. My friends would always buy their books and give them to me. “Look at this art, it’s fantastic,” they would say and I had to agree. The books would then get lost somewhere in my messy pile of possessions. When I did pick them up, I noticed that they always smelled of incense. I would admire Shree Krishna and remember what was the devotees told me, that when Krishna plays His flute, the rocks melt and the birds fall from the trees in ecstasy. I could understand that these pictures of te cowherd boys running with Krishna through the groves of Vrindavan and Shree Shree Radha Krishna with their confidential maidservants were coming directly from Goloka. Gradually I had collected many such paintings and would continuously admire them. Time passed and I fell into a group of friends who were taking great amounts of drugs and mixing them with the occult to control each other. I gradually recognized what nonsense this was and so I left their association. Then I looked to the devotees as better friends. Rabindra Swarup Prabhuji spoke to me from time to time when I came to the Philly temple, where I often stayed overnight. I was so crazy that most of the devotees considered me a lost cause. They would go into the basement under the temple room and bang on the floor under me with hammer where I would sit in the yogic lotus position. But Rabindra would continue to show mercy towards me, feeding me Lord Jagannath’s Maha Prasad. One day, Rabindra gave me a flower and ask me to offer it to Srila Prabhupada one day, but I had reservations. Why should I offer a flower to a man? I thought. But then I thought he is helping me and all I’m doing here is showing appreciation. When I bowed down to His Divine Grace for the first time, I just became so happy -- my bad times in life disappeared and became only bad memories to be forgotten. I then traveled to a few temples to see if the mood was the same everywhere. I wanted to meet many devotees, but I didn’t see enough to really become a part of it. At the same time I certainly didn’t see much in life outside the temple that was at all interesting, as Krishna had given me a small transcendental taste. My goal was to meet His Divine Grace Srila Prabhupada personally. So in Miami after hearing Vishnujan Swami’s kirtans, I decided to join his band of kirtaniyas, but by mistake joined the Miami Temple, which wasn’t such a bad experience at all. Narahari and Raghava engaged me in many services to Their Lordships Goura Nitai, who were very kind to me. There was always service to do among the pots and pans of the Miami temple kitchen. That year Vishnujan Swami spent a few months in Miami and when he decided to travel I had to go with them. I left the temple to join the Radha Damodar traveling sankirtan party. There I met Brahma Dasji, who is part of this forum. He had a bus full of merry bhaktas. There were many different buses and many devotees on each bus. We distributed lots of Srila Prabhupada’s books. Each day we would hear Srimad Bhagavatam and take prasad and then go out to places where we distributed our books. Many kinds of places -- parking lots, bowling alleys, drive-in theaters, streetlights – basically, we went anywhere we could. Then came the chance to met Srila Prabhupada in Atlanta. I was personally introduced to him and my wish had come true. I saw Srila Prabhupada again after that time in the same year, when we were back in Philadelphia for the Rathayatra. It was an overcast day, but when His Divine Grace arrived, exited his car and walked towards the cart, the sun came out and seemed to shine on him like a spotlight. Srila Prabhupada told us how Lord Jagannath took on his fantastic form. After hearing His own pastimes with Radha described by Rohini to Rukmini, Krishna was stunned in remembrance of His eternal relationship and thus took the form of Jagannath Swami. We then visited New Vrindavan where we stayed for a few weeks working in the fields. The mood here was very rural and the devotees didn’t seem to have the same interest in Krishna consciousness as in the other temples. They were just as interested in communal life and farming, it seemed. So I left with a very nice godbrother, Vanudara Prabhu and we hitchhiked to San Diego together. In the San Diego temple we were asked to silkscreen women’s breasts on T-shirts. What is this? We were told, “Oh, it’s okay. We sell them to head shops and it brings money to the temple. Jayatirtha has told us we could do it.” I refused and left very shortly to New Dwaraka, the L.A. temple. It was there that I finally found very nice service that kept me very happily engaged. Somehow I was able to get authorized to leave the San Diego temple allowed to go up to New Dwarka. It was my greatest desire in those days to join with the artists who were painting for Srila Prabhupada’s books but this was never to happen. Instead I was made into an apprentice to the best artist that ever served in ISKCON, Bharadraj Prabhu. He was also a wonderful kirtan bhajan leader. Bharadraj and Adideva Prabhus had just returned from a long stay in Shree Dham Mayapur where they had learned the local Bengali art of doll making under Srila Prabhupada’s direction. Actually they were not dolls as we understand them, but figures made of straw and mud mixed with cow dung and rice husks. Srila Prabhupada wanted an exhibition of these dolls that were to be the sculptural counterparts of the paintings. These were to be exhibitions to teach Krishna consciousness. This was something that his spiritual master, Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Prabhupada had pioneered. Saraswati Thakur would spend all of the money his sannyasis collected and put it into these doll exhibitions. When the sannyasis asked His Divine Grace where all the money they had just given him had gone, he would say, “Oh, I spent that money on dolls. Go out and collect more.” Our Srila Prabhupada told us this story himself when he visited our studio in 1976. We worked at least eighteen hours a day, seven days a week, for two years to complete an exhibition of the introduction to Bhagavad Gita. We were grateful to be so nicely engaged in serving Srila Prabhupada in a way that he had personally requested us and wanted so much to see it happen. Some others, however, came and sneered at us, telling us we were in Maya, using all the society’s money to make such a useless thing as a doll exhibition, even they were well aware who had ordered and wanted it. This was the same person who had been with Vishnujan Swami when I joined the Radha Damodar party. His opinion was completely in opposition to Srila Prabhupada’s and I later saw how he has created more chaos in our society than I could ever calculate and he continues to do so from the sidelines, without restriction. I want to avoid as much as possible the bad guys and go over the wonderful experiences, as there is more than enough to tell about them. Over time, the bad elements will fade and their offences will be burned up. New Dwarka was, as Srila Prabhupada called it, our western world headquarters. There was the Bhaktivedanta Book Trust with its studio of devotee artists, the archives department, the different translation department, where books were translated into Spanish and German. The book distribution departments which we all time to time help to distribute. The temple Deity department and the devotees whom took care of their Lordships. There was also a sound studio Golden Avatar and the incense company, Spiritual Sky. In the three years I was there, the fourth to the ninth cantos of Srimad Bhagavatam and the complete Chaitanya Charitamrita were printed. As we worked in the studio making our exhibition, some devotees would be engaged in reading the Srimad Bhagavatam to us. We had all of Srila Prabhupadas books read to us during those doll studio days. Mangal arati was the high point of the day and I personally hated to miss them. New Dwarka also had a great selection of kirtan leaders. Kirtan with a hundred or more devotees was always very exciting. Rising up after cold showers and in clean cloth to see Shree Shree Rukmini Dwarkadish each day, I soon noticed they were smiling. Their Lordships were real and they were the center of our meditation as well our whole goal in service. The devotees all loved Rukmini and Dwarkadish and I soon became infected with their love. In New Dwarka there were always many festivals we celebrated that I have never seen celebrated anywhere in ISKCON, like the cleansing of the Gundicha Temple. One day after we read the lila in the Chaitanya Charitamrita, as the time was approaching, we all decided to cleanse the temple. The whole community came with buckets and we washed the temple room with a river of water pouring out. I remember our godbrother Guru Das taking a very big part but others, like always, criticized us and said we were Sahajiyas and that was the last Gundicha Cleansing festival in New Dwarka. It was in New Dwarka that I first heard many devotees the senior disciples of Srila Prabhupada preach Krishna Consciousness. I enjoyed very much hearing the classes of Hridayananda Maharaj, Nara Narayan Prabhu, Ramesvara, Jadurani Prabhu, Dravida Prabhu, Veda Vyas Prabhu, Jayadwaita Swami, and host of others too numerous to mention. The atmosphere was nice, but it became even nicer when Srila Prabhupada personally came. Preparations were made for weeks in advance. Recently, during Gour Purnima this year, I saw Bhakti Tirtha Swami. He kept saying that he wanted to instil the devotees under his care with the "Prabhupada is coming mood." He was also thinking that this was the best of attitudes, but is it really possible to instil it today? Bhakti Tirtha Swami thinks so. I thought it was a nice idea and a sweet memory. Srila Prabhupada did come while I was in New Dwarka, and he stayed at least a week. His Divine Grace came to our doll studio as I have said before. One of the things he did on that visit was to request certain devotees to stop reading his Chaitanya Charitamrita together in isolation. There was a group of devotees who got the idea that if they just read the parts of the Chaitanya Charitamrita that described Radha Krishna’s pastimes, they could become gopis in their next lives. For a few weeks they had been meeting after evening classes and reading these portions in the BBT offices. In ISKCON gossip, they became known as “The Gopi Bhava Club.” Srila Prabhupada was quite upset with them and told them to stop. Like many of these ISKCON heresy tales, the same person I mentioned above for opposing the doll exhibition took a major part in stirring up this witch-hunt and finding the culprits. He has been behind all the heresies in ISKCON and at the same time is their source and their cause. We need not say his name, as it is too sweet to use in relationship to himself, in my humble feelings. <small> [This message has been edited by Jagat (edited 07-04-2001).]</small>

Is there something wrong with netiquette? I have no control, so how can I be a control freak? That is for Jahnava and JNDas. >Is it working? Did you notice how nicely Pita Dasji made his paragraph breaks in his last post? It really warms the heart when you see the good you are doing for the world!

<h3>Here, father doesn't know best</h3> WHAT MAKES US DIFFERENT: Patriarchal attitudes are flourishing south of the border, but Canadians are showing a marked divergence of opinion, says pollster MICHAEL ADAMS MICHAEL ADAMS Wednesday, July 4, 2001 The fear of American popular culture's influence has been growing for decades. American movies and television programs, which spilled over the invisible Canadian border from the outset, began to make inroads into Europe in the 1950s. Coca-Cola was an international brand for decades, but in the 1980s it was joined by McDonald's as a ubiquitous icon of Americanization. Now the Internet promises to dwarf the impact of U.S. movies, television and fast food. Are we all destined to be Americanized? Is it just a matter of time? Atop the list of countries seen as merging into American cultural hegemony is Canada, particularly English-speaking Canada. In his book, Star-Spangled Canadians,Jeffrey Simpson writes: "Canadians, whether they like or acknowledge it, have never been more like Americans, and Canadian society has never been more similar to that of the United States." I, too, see signals that Canada is being absorbed into the American economy and culture. However, I also see evidence of Canadians remaining different from Americans in the ways we think, live and behave. There's some evidence that the differences are getting larger as the cultures diverge. Nearly 20 years ago, my colleagues at Environics in Toronto and CROP in Montreal began a study of Canadian social values. In our first survey of Canadian values in 1983, we asked Canadians if they strongly or somewhat agreed or disagreed that: "The father of the family must be the master in his own house." We posed more than 100 such questions to respondents that year. Our intention was to track these 100 items over time, dropping some, adding others; we hoped we'd measure what was important to Canadians or what was changing in our values and perspectives on life. The "father must be master" question has become legendary at Environics. We love it because it measures a traditional, patriarchal attitude to authority in our most cherished institution: the family. Sons inherit the land, starting with the first -- primogeniture prevents estates from being subdivided like amoebas. Sons inherit the family business as in Smith and Son. Sons, not daughters, are named "Junior" in the hope they will prove worthy of their father's aristocratic seed. That first time, a total of 42 per cent of Canadians agreed that the father should be master, 15 per cent strongly so and 27 per cent somewhat so. Twenty-six per cent disagreed strongly, 31 per cent somewhat disagreed, and zero per cent had no opinion (this was one of the few topics on which everyone had an opinion). We reported that the country was split on the subject, but that the figure probably represented a decline from the past. In Canada, the decision about what car to buy might not be dad's prerogative; mom and the kids might also have a say. Every year thereafter a smaller proportion of Canadians agreed. By 1992, the year before Kim Campbell became our first female prime minister, only 26 per cent of Canadians still said dad should be on top -- a drop of 16 per cent in less than nine years. Our colleagues in France had been tracking this question since 1975 and they, too, were finding the same kind of systematic decline in the preference for patriarchal authority. So, too, in other European countries. Nineteen ninety-two was the first year we began conducting social-values research in the United States, the world capital of individualism and egalitarianism, of civil rights movements and affirmative action (remember, an American was the first to deflower the feminine mystique). We speculated that the United States would be ahead of Canada and France on this trend. We found to our surprise that 42 per cent of Americans told us the father should be master, while 57 per cent disagreed and 1 per cent had no opinion. The gap between the two countries was a substantial 16 per cent. Many, including veteran U.S. analysts, found our research hard to believe. We kept doing our annual polls in Canada, which continued to show erosion in support for patriarchal authority. By 1996, Canadian support had dropped to 20 per cent. But the 1996 U.S. numbers showed a two-point increase in the proportion who thought dad should be boss. In our 2000 Canadian survey, only 5 per cent reported being strongly in support of patriarchal authority, down from the 15 per cent we found in 1983 (bad news for Stockwell Day). This decline was an authentic social revolution. Despite unremitting attacks on boomer values by people like David Frum, political conservatism has not translated into cultural conservatism in Canada. The proportion in France favouring patriarchal leadership had also declined from 61 per cent in 1975 to 30 per cent in 2000. The Bastille of French chauvinism was also crumbling. In Canada, almost everyone was part of this revolution, even men, who by 2000 had only 23 per cent of their numbers in support of dad being boss at home. The 60-plus group showed the largest drop: In 1992, 40 per cent thought father should be master, but by 2000, only 26 per cent of this age group said so. The highest-income category was also the most progressive (only 12 per cent of those earning $60,000 or more believed dad should be king of his castle). Married and single people were exactly the same. Meanwhile, we found that where 42 per cent of Americans believed the father should be master in 1992, the number increased to 44 per cent in 1996. We wondered if this was a statistical anomaly. We went back into the field in 2000 to find out if the frontal assault on patriarchal authority by U.S. president Bill Clinton and television icon Homer Simpson would bring U.S. numbers more into line with those in Canada and France. This time, 48 per cent of Americans said the father of the family must be master in his own home; 51 per cent disagreed and 1 per cent had no opinion. We were stunned. The details were even more stunning: Forty-three per cent of American women agreed with the statement -- up nine points from 1992. And among baby boomers aged 35 to 44, 48 per cent said dad should be boss, up 12 points over 1992. This was the biggest increase of any age cohort. (Only 15 per cent of younger Canadian boomers take this position -- meaning that the gap between younger Canadian boomers and Americans in this cohort is an astounding 33 points.) As in Canada, better educated Americans are less likely than their less educated peers to adhere to traditional patriarchal notions. Yet the college or university educated Americans are three times as likely as their Canadian peers to believe the man should be boss (38 per cent in the United States; 13 per cent in Canada). And in the United States, higher-income groups are only slightly less likely to defer to paternal leadership. In Canada, singles (17 per cent) are no more likely than married folk (16 per cent) to embrace patriarchy. By contrast, U.S. singles (51 per cent) are more likely than their married peers (47 per cent) to think guys should be superior. On this issue there's a consensus across Canada. Regional differences are barely outside the margin of statistical error: Quebec, at 15 per cent, is least likely to think father should be master, followed by British Columbia (17 per cent), Ontario and Atlantic Canada (18 per cent) and Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta, all at 21 per cent. But the United States is regionally divided: New England is least chauvinistic at 29 per cent, followed by the Plains states (36 per cent) and the Midwest (46 per cent). Above the national average are Texarkana (54 per cent) and the Deep South, where 71 per cent believe the gentleman of the house should be master. Most likely to favour the notion of the traditional father are residents of small towns in America (54 per cent). However, Canada shows more homogeneity of social values. In cities of a million or more, 17 per cent think father knows best. The figure is 16 per cent in small towns and cities of 5,000 to 999,000 people; in hamlets and rural areas the proportion is a whopping 18 per cent. I suspect many Americans will doubt our findings and question our methodology. Yet in each country we use exactly the same question and poll representative samples of people aged 15 or older. Others will suggest that groups within America, such as Hispanics and African-Americans, may skew the results (it's presumed that they descend from more macho cultures). But at most, Hispanics account for 1 or 2 per cent of the large difference between Canada and the United States. The same is true for other American segments thought to be paternalistic in orientation: Sixty-two per cent of born-again Christians think father should be master, but 36 per cent of fundamentalists disagree. The same proportions of African-Americans (62 per cent) and Baptists (62 per cent) say dad should be on top, but significant minorities of each (36 per cent and 38 per cent, respectively) disagree. The 34.5 million African-Americans could only skew the Canada-U.S. comparisons by 1 or 2 per cent at most. Besides, if the immigrant factor were significant, then Canada (where 17 per cent of the population is foreign born) should be more patriarchal than the United States (where 10 per cent is foreign born). Interestingly, the difference between America's religious skeptics, the atheists (34 per cent), and the least skeptical, who are the born-again Christians (62 per cent), is 28 points. That's a big gap and evidence of the larger culture divide in America. In Canada, the gap between groups is less extreme. The group least likely to think father should be master -- women (10 per cent) -- is just 17 points lower than the group most likely to agree -- those earning $10,000 a year or less (28 per cent). We're seeing distinct cultures on either side of our almost invisible border. American culture is divided on the issue of patriarchal authority and the divisions of opinion among various groups are wider than those in Canada. The 49th parallel, the world's longest undefended border, is certainly the world's most porous border. For more than a century, Canadians have been inundated with U.S. products, movies, music, TV, sports, brands and icons. And yet, in the face of this flood, Canadians remain distinctly Canadian. In fact, our distinctness from the country that so dominates our economy and popular culture is growing in at least one important aspect of our value system: our concept of the authority that goes with being a man, a woman or a child in the family. It's no leap to assume the natural leader in the house is also the natural leader at work, in the church, in politics. In 1976, Canada's Progressive Conservative Party elected a new leader, Joe Clark, whose wife, Maureen McTeer, kept her maiden name. Despite this, Mr. Clark became prime minister. Now Mr. Clark once again heads the Conservative Party, and has just served as marshall of Calgary's 2001 Gay Pride parade. Can you imagine U.S. President George W. Bush leading a Gay Pride parade in Houston? For cultures that fear "going the way of Canada," of being inevitably absorbed into the U.S. cultural juggernaut, there's hope in these numbers. Those who think that the "globalization" of commerce, culture, and communications will inevitably lead to the Americanization of values and lifestyles may have overstated the case. The opposite may occur, not as an ideological reaction or an act of public policy, but because we all have different roots and we react to globalizing forces in different ways, sometimes unconsciously. There is certainly evidence, both empirical and anecdotal, that people, money, ideas, and images are moving faster and more ubiquitously than ever. But perhaps American pop culture passes through our systems like the contents of a bottle of Coke. Having tasted it, we remain ourselves.

<h3>Mass deaths at Falun Gong camp</h3> Beijing - Fourteen imprisoned followers of the banned Falun Gong sect committed suicide in a north China labor camp, making ropes from sheets and hanging themselves from bunk beds, a government official said Wednesday. Falun Gong, however, blamed camp authorities, saying in a statement Tuesday that at least 15 women followers were tortured to death at Wanjia labour camp in the northeastern province of Heilongjiang on or around June 20. The statement cast doubt on the official claim of a mass suicide, saying the victims were watched around the clock. The reported suicide at Wanjia would be the most deadly involving Falun Gong practitioners confirmed by the government since it banned the spiritual movement in July 1999. Lan Jingli, director of the Heilongjiang government's judicial bureau, said that another 11 followers were rescued by camp guards. In all, 25 Falun Gong members tried to kill themselves on June 20 in Wanjia labor camp, he said. Mr. Jingli said guards watched the practitioners closely, patrolling every five minutes. But the followers took advantage of a gap in patrols to hang themselves from their cell beds with sheets, he said. "One minute is enough to kill," Mr. Jingli said. "While 11 of them were immediately rescued by the camp guards, 14 others died." China's government says Falun Gong is a cult that has led more than 1,600 followers to their deaths, mostly by encouraging practitioners to use meditation instead of medicine to cure medical ailments. Officials claim followers also have killed themselves in the belief they will to go heaven when they die. Falun Gong, however, says its teachings forbid all forms of killing, including suicide. The group disputed government claims that five people who set themselves on fire on Tiananmen Square in Beijing earlier this year were Falun Gong practitioners. The meditation sect says the government is running a smear campaign against it and that hundreds of practitioners have died of torture and abuse in police custody during the crackdown on the group. It said the Wanjia labor camp used torture to make practitioners renounce Falun Gong. Guards doused one practitioner with water and shocked her with an electric baton, and threw 50 female followers into cells with male prisoners after they refused to sign statements denouncing the group. In Hong Kong, Falun Gong members staged a sit-in protest Wednesday outside China's representative office to call on the United Nations to investigate the deaths. The sect members accused the Chinese government of "inhumane and beastly crimes" and denied that the 14 had tried to commit suicide. "S.O.S.: Save Falun Gong practitioners from being killed in China," said one banner displayed during the protest as members practiced their slow-motion exercises. Mr. Jingli accused Falun Gong practitioners overseas on having a hand in the suicide. "Those organizations are using all possible channels to pass on the so-called `instructions' to the practitioners in the reform camp in order to make them believe that going to heaven after their death is the highest level of practicing," he said. "The mass suicide of June 20 could also be caused through this way." The government denies that imprisoned Falun Gong practitioners are mistreated. Mr. Jingli said Beijing officials ordered labor camps to improve surveillance of imprisoned Falun Gong practitioners following the suicide. Falun Gong followers would now be watched 24 hours a day, he said. AP

In my work on Jagannath Puri, I have had to think a little about Shankaracharya, mainly because in the Madala Panji, he is involved in the establishment of the Jagannath temple during the reign of Yayati Keshari. This king is generally given dates much later than those of Shankara (788-820), ca. 900. So please explain the difference between Adi Shankara and Abhinava Shankara. Who's who and when. ====== But these extraordinarily old dates for Shankara are a bit disingenuous, don't you think, JN? There is a tradition of trying to throw things back into the more ancient past as a way of legitimizing one's own tradition. Just think of the "Bhagavata is 5,000 years old" statements that are bandied about in Iskcon. There is almost nothing that can substantiate these claims. I admit that the verse quoting business is a little like trying to cross a stream on stepping stones that sink as soon as you put your foot down. So little in Indian history is clearly dated. Nevertheless, a fabric of Indian history has been built up. For the most part, there are fairly clear mileposts which help us to approximate the times of events, people and works -- even though occasionally a century or two is the closest we can get. As far as your argument about the Chanakya-niti and Garuda-purana are concerned, there are certain problems. First of all, an idea may be eternal, but its expression requires specific words. Though an infinity of monkey typing on an infinity of keyboards may eventually produce the Chanakya-niti or the Garuda-purana, it is usually accepted that there was a specific individual human who composed any given verse. Chanakya-niti is a grab bag of wisdom sayings. It is very unlikely that they were all written by a single individual. I suggest you look at Sternbach's critical edition when trying to assess the history or provenance of a particular verse. Nevertheless, most of the Puranas are not quite as purana as they would have you believe. They too are full of interpolations and borrowings. In this case, I would spontaneously be of the opinion (even without seeing the texts in question) that the GP borrowed from Chanakya, by which I mean a dispersed pool of mostly anonymous wisdom literature that includes works of the Panchatantra-Hitopadesha genre. The Bhagavata has several verses from the Upanishads, Mahabharata and the Gita in it. Do you think that it did not borrow from those sources? Jagat <small><font color=#dedfdf> [This message has been edited by Jagat (edited 07-04-2001).]

We seem to be going through another version of the "don't offend my guru" syndrome. There is little doubt that there is much in all the major religions that can be subjected to criticism, ridicule and rebuke. But if these things are handled incorrectly, then people take the criticisms personally. There are few people who like to be called misogynist, yet all the major religions have misogynistic elements. Is it possible to reform a religion? If I am a Christian-Hindu-Muslim, do I have to be a misogynist because the Bible-Purana-Quran make misogynistic statements? This places all of us in a quandary. If we are in a position of defending our Faith simply because it is our Faith, it is just another upAdhi. If we interact dynamically with our own faith, then we won't fall prey to senseless criticism. The only thing that we can condemn is blind hate. And there is plenty of that. But if Ambedkar had problems with Hinduism, I can appreciate it. I consider Ambedkar to be a great man, and I believe that there are a great many Hindus who feel the same way. Casteism is something of a scourge. Ambedkar was looking for a way out of the bind, and he couldn't find one in Hinduism. Unfortunately, Buddhism has not proved to be a magic bullet, either. But the Dalits have gained a voice through Ambedkar's leadership. Perhaps one day they will gain true social equality in India. Until then, expect no sympathy for Hinduism from the Dalits. Give no respect, expect none in return. Islam is a mystery for most non-Muslims. There seems to be no way to penetrate the Islamic mind. Intransigeance and non-compromise seems to be the password everywhere around the world. I can't really say anything here without the appearance of prejudice. Let's just say that Islam is taking a long time to come into the modern world. Militant Hinduism is in part the result of militant Islam. It is a mirror image. Perhaps it is a necessity. Muslims have always considered the Hindus (and Pakistanis even the Bangladeshis) as weak and effeminate. A strong, military powerful India keeps Pakistan on its toes. I think that India was correct to take the secular track, but made a major error when they compromised on Sharia law and other things. Haribol, Jagat

“Raja Prataparudra was a staunch supporter of Hinduism. We learn from Stirling’s “Orissa” that although the followers of Buddhism were at first received with favor and treated with marked consideration by Prataparudra Deva, they were afterwards persecuted by his court. It was the dread of persecution by the king that compelled the Buddhist priests to seek shelter in concealment. And to evade these persecutions and avoid incurring the displeasure and disfavor of the Brahmins, the common Buddhist people played the hypocrite by adopting the religious observances and practices of the Hindus. The enormous influence of Buddhism began to wane.” Sahajiya Cult of Bengal and Pancha Sakha Cult of Orissa. Paritosh Das. Calcutta: Firma KLM, 1988. p. 182.

There are several stories of such events. I have not collected them. There were also persecutions of Jains in South India, which I understand led them to move to Gujarat. But I was particularly interested by the story that King Prataparudra, Mahaprabhu's devotee in Jagannath Puri, is said to have persecuted Buddhists in Orissa. This is found in the Madala Panji, but unfortunately I didn't note the secondary source. Perhaps K. C. Panigrahi. Orissa was one of the last outposts of a rather folk or popular Buddhism in the 16th century. There are still vestiges of this Buddhism in the Jagannath cult. This is most significantly discernable in the writings of the Pancha Sakha, the Orissan Vaishnavas, who claimed to be followers of Chaitanya, but are considered an apasampradaya by all Gaudiyas. There is an Orissan Chaitanya Bhagavata, written by Ishwar Das, where he says that Mahaprabhu is an incarnation of the Buddha! Jagannath Das and others often say that Jagannath Deva is the Buddha, and inside the temple itself, there is a painting of the Das Avatar that shows Jagannath in the ninth position -- that of the Buddha! All this leads me to think that perhaps Prataparudra's persecution of the Buddhists led many of them to take to Vaishnavism, and insinuate their doctrines (Shunya-vada and certain Vajra-yana ideas) into it. == There is also Gopal Singh, the famous Bengali king of Vishnupur, a descendant of King Bir Hambir, who was converted by Srinivas Acharya. There is a Bengali expression, "Gopal Singher begar", which means basically "Gopal Singh's corvée." Gopal Singh ordered every male in his kingdom to chant a lakh (perhaps that is an exaggeration) of Harinam every day. So now the expression is used in a variety of ways to indicate religious activities that are done under duress, or just basically any useless activity. Haribol!! Jagat

But surely not only.

Brahma Prabhu, I hope that you would not stop posting. You have usually been a voice for good sense and I can't think of any posting that you have made that I have not enjoyed. I was a little perplexed by your comments on this thread, however, as I was trying to reach a kind of theoretical basis for understanding how theologies might change in different contexts. I did not feel as though I was challenging anyone's faith, especially since I was trying to understand and explain a text that Prabhupada often used and must have found meaningful. I don't consider myself a faith-breaker. I posted something a while back on faith as dialectic. (I couldn't find it on my hard disk, so I don't know what I did with it.) Beliefs change. Faith is a process. Anyway, if I find it, I'll repost. In friendship, Jagat

Actually the reason that "servicing" got my dander up is because the term is often used to mean sexual activity, as in "servicing one's wife." Although your meaning was obvious, my vulgar understanding of your sentence made me look the word up in the dictionary. I was pleased to see that this meaning was not listed in either Websters or (the small) Oxford. Now that Jagannath Das has clearly explained that it means fertilizing the temple flowers, it seems as though my uneasiness was not altogether misguided. Curious, though, that you should take offense, since it was not you that used the word in the first place. If I corrected everyone's grammar and spelling, I wouldn't have much time for anything else. If I sometimes correct and repost someone else's badly spelt text, it is because I think it has valuable content and I would like to make it easier for others to read and enjoy. I realize that no one is asking me to do it, and editing is often a thankless task, but I consider it a kind of service (not servicing). Hey BB, I wouldn't want to put my ego in a weight contest with yours. I declare no contest. Your Idaho potato would squash my Quebec blueberry in a moment.<small><font color=#f7f7f7> [This message has been edited by Jagat (edited 07-03-2001).]

"Service" as a transitive verb means to repair, or to maintain regularly, as in "service a car." I don't think it applies in this case. Perhaps you mean "serving" or "rendering service."

New PADA newsletter out. For those interested in gossip. [This message has been edited by Jagat (edited 07-03-2001).]

Today's Salon website, http://www.salon.com/,has a big picture of devotees chanting and dancing, and a smaller, inset picture of Nirmal. Under the picture it says: "Dylan Hickey, inset, grew up in Krishna boarding schools. At 16, he suffered an injury that left him a quadriplegic. Holy abuse Five years after the last U.S. Hare Krishna boarding school closed, 79 former students are suing, claiming widespread physical and sexual abuse. By Peter Brandt" When I go to the article, all I get is a tiny article. (see below). It seems to just be stuff they got off the internet. It then says; "Want to read more? This article is Salon Premium content and only available to Premium rs." They want people to pay them to read the complete article! The article says; "Any day they could learn whether the suit will be knocked out of federal court." It looks a decision is imminent and the abuse issue is about to be in the news again. Here is the free part of the article from http://www.salon.com/people/feature/2001/07/02/krishna/index_np.html : "How do you compensate an adult who, as a child, felt bones in her hands shatter while she vainly tried to shield herself from a violently abusive teacher? Seventy-nine former students of Hare Krishna boarding schools, known as gurukulas, are seeking $400 million from the religious sect in compensation for enduring a range of physical, sexual and emotional abuse -- abuse the Krishnas have acknowledged in the past. The plaintiffs' attorney, Texas trial lawyer Windle Turley, filed suit last year in federal court using the civil Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) statute; it is a bold gambit that, if not dismissed, could put the former students in a good position to financially ruin the Hare Krishna movement. Any day they could learn whether the suit will be knocked out of federal court. If that happens, former students will have no choice but to pursue individual abusers and criminally negligent gurukula administrators rather than the entire Krishna establishment. "I was a three-and-a-half [year-old] girl, mother away in India," reads one anonymous posting on a Web site for former students. "He [a teacher] took me into the boys shower room, stripped off my clothes and beat me until I was unconscious." The allegations are horrific. Turley describes the Krishna students' suffering as "the most unthinkable abuse and maltreatment of little children which we have seen. It includes rape, sexual abuse, physical torture and emotional terror of children as young as 3 years of age." According to the Turley legal complaint, there were beatings with boards, branches, clubs and poles. In some cases, children were stuffed into trash barrels for two to three days, with the lid on, as punishment for their "sins." In a few schools, children were forced to lick up their vomit from any foul food they may have thrown up."

"Shall I tell you the secret of the true scholar? It is this: every man I meet is my master in some point, and in that I learn of him." Ralph Waldo Emerson, writer and philosopher (1803-1882)

Dear Brahma Prabhu, I was waiting to see if my correction would lead you to revise your comments, as they seem to have been colored by a perception that I was being unduly critical of Srila Prabhupada, which I wasn't. I am accustomed to being accused of this, but I won't get into another defense of myself. Anyway, you didn't write anything, so I will try to respond, despite being a bit confused. In many ways what you have said echoes what I posted recently in a response to the latest kerfuffle over Satyarajji, both here and on the Mela. I assume you have read those, so you can see that we agree there. As far as it being my mission to provide "critical objectivity," I think I see it as my mission to be myself, which I agree is not particularly edifying, but it is all I can be. My nature tends to make me more intellectual than emotional. That will not come as news to anyone, but I have had my moments of religious transport. I think that there is nothing quite so educational as to put oneself in a radically unfamiliar situation. Spiritual practices are often that -- disciplines of sensory deprivation, etc., that force us inward. Though for some these become a way of life, for most people they cannot. Most of us are incapable of living at the psychological edge all our lives. This is not only true of householders, but of sannyasis as well. Professional athletes go into coaching after their careers are over. We may shift the center of gravity of our lives -- so that sense gratification and the pursuit of wealth don't quite occupy the looming center stage it once may have. At any rate, I was not trying to do anything more than discuss my experience of the KCM in the light of the ideas of balance and extremism, looking at the issue from different angles, particular that of the female/male duality. By the way, I notice that according to Tripurari Maharaj's newsletter, you are working with him these days. Keep us posted on how things are going. Haribol, Jagat [This message has been edited by Jagat (edited 07-03-2001).]

<h3>It's all about her, isn't it?</h3> Andrea Yates killed her children, but to our pundits she's a really harassed housewife, not a multiple murderer Mark Steyn (National Post) What do you have to do to get a bad press these days? By her own admission, Andrea Yates of Houston killed all five of her children. Not in a burst of gunfire, but by methodically drowning them in the bathtub. Anyone who's tried to give an unwanted hair-wash to a kid will appreciate the effort involved in holding five struggling youngsters under water. The oldest, seven-year-old Noah, was the last to die. He ran, for his life. But she caught him and dragged him back to the bathroom, and forced him under, legs kicking, arms flailing. He was old enough to know, as he looked up and fought against the weight of her hands, that his own mother was killing him. What we're dealing with here is a sickness. Not Andrea's, but everybody else's. The husband, Rusty, set the tone. "I'm supportive of her," he said. "The woman here is not the woman who killed my children ... That wasn't her; she wasn't in her right frame of mind." You can say that again. In fairness to Mr. Yates, as he showed off the happy family snapshots to interviewers, he was either in a state of shock or covering his ass. Andrea had been not just on antidepressants but also on Haldol, a very strong antipsychotic drug. To be just the teensy-weensiest judgmental about these things, if your wife's on Haldol, you probably shouldn't leave her at home all day every day, alone with five children under the age of eight. You don't have to be a rocket scientist to figure that out, though by strange coincidence Mr. Yates is: He's a computer expert at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston. According to Officer Frank Stumpo, who found the bodies, the house was filthy. Mr. Yates was used to the mess: Offered a drink of water by Officer Stumpo, he said he doubted the cop could find a clean glass. But he evidently didn't think the domestic chaos portended anything more significant. And, once he'd given the thumbs up to stick by the missus, everything else fell into place. Andrea's family insisted she'd always been a wonderful mother until the "postpartum depression" thing got out of hand. The usual mound of memorial teddy bears piled up on the lawn. And the media scrambled for their rolodexes to get hold of the experts. It turns out the expert on postpartum depression is Marie Osmond. As in Donny and Marie. Miss Osmond is the author of Behind the Smile: My Journey Out of Postpartum and, appearing with Katie Couric, she was full of insights: "She loved her children, she was a caring woman," said Marie. "How else could you explain something like this ...? The fact is, Katie, you know, men come home to the wife, not the house, children come home to the mother, not the toys ... We're just expected to do all of it nowadays, and I think by trying to do all of it, I think stress could be a big factor -- lifestyles, diet, nutrition ..." The trick with this kind of story -- some nobody kills some other nobodies -- is to figure out what the big picture is -- or, more crudely put, what's in it for me. For Ted Kennedy, it's about the "Patients' Bill of Rights" he's trying to get through the U.S. Senate. "We've all been reminded in this country, in these 24 hours, like never before, about the challenges of depression," he announced at a press conference for his bill, "and what it means not only for an individual, but what it means in terms of families." Under Ted's bill, the Andreas of this world would be able to sue their HMO for prescribing and/or not prescribing the right and/or wrong medication. That way Andrea could collect millions, move to another state, maybe start a new family! One in 10 women suffers from postpartum depression, one in 1,000 suffers from postpartum psychosis. But that doesn't mean you -- yes, you, at the back, with the frazzled look and the nursing bra -- aren't on the verge of killing your kids. As Newsweek's Anna Quindlen sighed on behalf of mothers everywhere, been there, almost done that. Anna knew what it was like to be "tired" and "hot" after she'd "been up all night throwing sheets into the washer because the smaller of her two boys has projectile vomiting." "She could have been me. Or you," pronounced Susan Kushner Resnick of Salon. "She didn't want to kill her children. No sane person would." But motherhood'll do that to you. It's a tragedy -- not that the children died, but that it took their deaths to draw attention to the pressures mothers are under. As they say in her husband's line of work: Houston, we have a problem. Not Andrea Yates' problem, but a much wider one. "Postpartum depression" certainly exists, though whether in most instances it's just a fancy name for an entirely natural discombulation by a life-changing event is another matter. But, as Thomas Szasz writes in his book The Untamed Tongue, "What people nowadays call mental illness, especially in a legal context, is not a fact, but a strategy; not a condition, but a policy; in short it is not a disease that the alleged patient has, but a decision which those who call him mentally ill make about how to act toward him." That's well put. You hunted your seven-year-old through the house, pulled him back to the bathroom and drowned him? Must be postpartum psychosis. "No sane person" would kill her children. You killed your children. Therefore, you're not sane. Human action is gradually being medicalized -- to the degree that a harassed housewife and a multiple killer are merely points on the same continuum. Or as Newsweek headlined Anna Quindlen's column: "Playing God On No Sleep. Isn't Motherhood Grand? Do You Want The Real Answer Or The Official Hallmark-Card Version?" Okay, you want the real answer? By comparison with the lives of their grandmothers and great-grandmothers, women today are living in the peachiest Hallmark version of motherhood. Even Anna. Why, she was "throwing sheets in the washer"! A century ago, there would have been no washer to throw 'em into. And she wouldn't have had a mere two boys, but thrice that number. And don't bleat on about how in those days there was a far greater support structure of extended family. More likely, aside from the 10 kids, the Anna Quindlens of the 1800s would have had an aged relative or two adding to their burdens -- some 14 people living in a quaint old farmhouse that today's realtors would advertise as a "three-bedroom home." And the work they had to do wasn't a little light Newsweek punditry but brutal and back-breaking and unending -- which is why so many of the worn, grey-haired rural wives in early photographs prove on close examination of the dates to be in their early thirties. Poor Anna with her top-loading washer: the most cosseted generation of American mothers ever, and life's still a bitch. And infanticide is merely an understandable by-product of the stresses of domesticity. No wonder Andrea's lawyer is upbeat about her prospects of beating the rap. If she was as loving a mother as her family claim, she would, now the alleged psychotic raptus has passed, accept the evil she has done and plead guilty, period. But instead she's working out strategy with counsel, because in the end it's all about her, isn't it? And, in that sense at least, the solidarity of the sisterhood is genuine: truly, the narcissism of our age knows no bounds.

That's a misunderstanding. What I mean is "That is what Prabhupada means when he refers to fanaticism in his dictum, 'Religion without philosophy is sentiment, or sometimes fanaticism.'" Sorry if that wasn't clear.

Part V Now I am sorry to have left so many strands of thought leading in different directions. And certainly this philosophical excursus will not satisfy my dear Jaya Radhe Dasi, who already finds me too dry for her taste and would like to see me become a little more emotional and soft-hearted. I started by saying that we naturally seek balance, yet that sometimes the organism takes extremist steps to find balance. This is often overcompensation. I gave the example of the sociopath who kills or rapes. Though the act of conversion is not nearly as radical an act as that of the sociopath, it is nevertheless pretty radical, especially when it takes the form it does in Krishna consciousness. This is not necessarily a bad thing. As a matter of fact, it is possible to argue that extreme steps are often a necessary prerequisite to religious experience, which can be defined as an encounter with the "totally other." If we leave our predispositions and preconceptions entirely untouched, how can we create the type of contrast that puts us face to face with the divine? In the case of KC, there were many other positive things that came out of our experience that do not strictly fall into any particular category - religious or cultural. They are simply human. Nevertheless, I suggest to you that the entire Krishna conscious experience is something of an overcompensation. Even for the most mystical individuals, it is rare that after undertaking the mystical journey, the saint does not make the "return journey" to the "world" where he finds harmony and imparts that harmony to his society. Since the mystical search is a kind of overcompensation, the pendulum needs to swing back in the other direction until it finds equilibrium. If there is an imbalance at present, it is in the overly emotional character of our religion. In our own rigorous efforts at self-understanding, we must be able to understand the irrational (or aesthetic, sentimental, emotional) motivations in our taking up certain religious practices. This does not mean we have to jettison them, but it does mean we may have to relativize some of our exclusivistic claims. Such exclusivism is, I believe, the "fanaticism" of Prabhupada’s dictum. <small><font color=#dedfdf> [This message has been edited by Jagat (edited 07-02-2001).]

Part IV The above considerations also call into question cultural differences in Krishna consciousness. This question was raised on another thread here recently. Can our adopted culture overcome the deep-rooted culture of birth and upbringing? As mentioned above, Buddhism in its purest form deconstructs totally to the point of negating all attributes, and so it has had a great deal of success in implanting itself in the Western context. So much so, that there is much talk of “American” Buddhism – which though it borrows from its Zen and Tibetan roots, is growing organically into something totally new in its western soil. Is the same thing possible for Krishna consciousness? If our “philosophy” is so strongly contextualized, then how can it cut itself off from its cultural springboard? This entire discussion is a very Westernized approach to Krishna consciousness. It is certainly not the kind of discourse we would expect to find in traditional Vaishnava circles. I am taking my experience as a Vaishnava and subjecting it to analysis according to tools developed by western intelligentsia. In other words, something organic is going on. I, as a Western individual, am interacting with Vaishnavism to produce something that has not yet been seen before in either East or West. I do not know whether the question of organic union of East and West has been formulated seriously in Iskcon in these terms or not, but Iskcon is definitely moving in the direction of an occidentalized if not Americanized version of Krishna consciousness, simply by virtue of having cut itself off from Gaudiya Vaishnava influences. The GBC body is the final rule-maker, and it is dominated by Westerners (or Westernized Indians), who remain so whether they are conscious of the fact or not, despite their Indian dress. Let us say that the Westernization is not altogether unwelcome, as Prabhupada himself intimated. But is “American” Vaishnavism a Western soul in an Indian body or an Indian soul in a Western body? I know that Tripurari Maharaj is seriously considering this question, and he does so with a great deal of self-awareness, though he is no doubt fully conscious of the fine thread that has to be trod when dealing with his companions. Any Westernization of Vaishnavism will be considered dangerous innovation by the most conservative class of Vaishnava. A Westernized Vaishnavism will have to begin with a dynamic concept of revelation. It will also have to be able to find a creative hermeneutic that will allow itself to keep its legitimacy through some form of faithfulness to Vaishnava tradition.

Good for you, Atma Devi.

T.O. is Canadian for Toronto, Ontario.

Part III If religion is about sentiment, it is also about taste. There are many imponderables where our choices in religion are concerned. These are certainly not all entirely philosophically based. Most theistic religions talk about serving God, dedicating one’s life to His service, etc., but the ways in which they conceive of that service is different. The choice of Krishna consciousness as a religion is essentially an aesthetic one – it is born out of a taste for prasad, an appreciation of the beauty of the deities and Krishna, the Holy Name and sadhu sanga as much as on anything philosophical. [This, by the way, is why I find the neglect of the <u>beauty</u> of kirtan to be such an aberration.] It is also true that even philosophy is practically speaking never divorced from feeling. This is why ever since Marx, philosophers have constantly been “deconstructing” ideologies. Belief systems have social and psychological bases – we believe what we want to believe, no matter how sophisticated our rationalizations. Thus even “the philosophy” for devotees is charged with an attraction to aesthetic elements – the battlefield of Kurukshetra, Krishna on the chariot with Arjuna, the exoticism of the Vishwarupa, the exoticism of the Sanskrit terminology, etc. As such, though it seems trite when sociologists say that people who join the Krishna conscious movement have a predisposition to Indian culture, it is nevertheless a truism. This aesthetic tendency or predisposition is fortified by the cultural experience of participation in the movement. Now, all true religion or search for mystic experience also requires self-deconstruction, which is what all talk of reducing ego is about. Self understanding is the beginning point of spiritual life. To understand what we are, we must also understand what we are not, though a personalist will begin from the premise that he or she is something. "Neti neti" is deconstruction in its original form. But pure philosophy is essentially negative and tends to reduce variegatedness. They leave one with the tendency to relativize cultural particularities. This makes conversion particularly difficult, because conversion usually means adopting new cultural forms, even in cases less radical than Krishna consciousness. Conversion is essentially an emotional act. This is why followers of Ramakrishna and Vivekananda in the west were essentially “armchair philosophers.” They had no need to adopt any Hindu cultural values because their philosophy told them that any kind of cultural attachment – forms and names – was relative and therefore inconsequential. To a certain extent, the same applies to Buddhism, though similar emotional factor and cultural features also play a big role in the rise of Buddhism in the West. It is important to recognize this non-rational element in the conversion experience. We as Vaishnavas may vehemently deny that Krishna’s form and name are like all the rest, but this argument is faith-based, not rational. In recent threads, where the question of Chaitanya’s validity as an avatar according to scripture has been raised, we see that devotees find themselves in a quandary. They have been told scriptural proof is a necessity, so what are they to do when there is none, except for a few dubious references from the Bhagavata and a barrel of manufactured evidence that would be thrown out of any court? The counterfeit evidence has the further bad effect of making us distrust the good faith and ethics of its manufacturers. But, we continue to believe anyway. This is another example of the heart leading the head; another example of the contradictions of faith. But I digress. So, the two components of religion and philosophy are like the body and soul of religious practice. The problem is that in their pure forms they are mutually destructive. Just like the body and soul need to find a modus vivendi that makes life livable, reason and religion need to find harmonious unity. <small><font color=#dedfdf> [This message has been edited by Jagat (edited 07-02-2001).]

I have just sent the following letter: Dear Prabhu, I have been asked by Atma to ask you NOT to post the article I sent you. I am sorry for the trouble, but I must respect her wishes. I hope that you will too. Your servant, Jagadananda Das. If you wish to write to them personally, it is news@vnn.org <small><font color=#dedfdf> [This message has been edited by Jagat (edited 07-02-2001).]