sumedh

Hare Krishna and dandavat pranam You have placed a good deal of faith in the NDE which is good but which most likely tells a small part of the whole story. Even the persons who directly saw Krishna or even those who attained enlightenment by seeing the transcendental form of the Lord as their SuperSoul know only a part of the story. Without attaining svarupa-siddhi (attainment of true nature) and attaining the strength of the internal potency of the Lord we are subject to illusions and errors; so we only take the words of the bona-fide acharyas as the Truth. What exactly do you mean by this? Yes, the crucification of Jesus was a most dastardly act committed by some ignorant persons. But what relation has it got to religion or laws of God. This attitude of "believe in the cross, believe in the cross" as if it constitutes some kind of religion in itself is what i fail to understand at all. Yes He will forgive our sins when we turn towards Him completely away from the material desires, so as to aid us in our desire to serve Him in pure love and come to Him (remember free-will); and no He will not forgive if we are not sincere in coming to Him rather cherish a desire to enjoy in these material universes whatever we may believe in, for that is not our true desire -- in fact we came to this place due to this very reason of wanting to enjoy independently of Him and no kind of such "beliefs" in themselves will change this fundamental fact.Elsewhere you said that the sacrifice of Jesus was the greatest act of love, and this only highlights an unneccessary emotionality. Jesus was crucified and in his compassion he forgave all those who did this; in fact he prayed to God to forgive them for God can easily forgive offences at His feet but not those at the feet of His devotees. It is as simple as that; there is no question of "belief in cross" as any sin reliever mechanism. If you read the history of India there have been many acharyas and saints who were subjected to grave tortures and some were killed by some Muslim rulers -- one of the Gurus of Sikhs was tortured and hanged, another Guru of a lesser known sect was tortured to break every bone in his body and still he kept on smiling and giving blessings to them, Kabir, Srila Haridasa Thakura, etc. I can go on and on about this but your conclusion along the lines that "Jesus' sacrifice was the greatest and so his teachings are too" is only ignorance of the history of mankind and the fact that this act itself is of little spiritual value (other than the grave offence by those people). It is this fixation with the crucification (similiar case with Muslims who "celebrate" the killing of grandson of Muhammad, if i am not mistaken, showing deep sorrow) which shifts the focus from the teachings of Jesus to unneccessary things; you will not find this attitude in vaishnavas/hindus -- on the contrary the passing away of great acharyas is considered to be a great transcendental event. They are different only superficially and with regards the current nature of the person. In truth they are one and the same, for the true nature of every soul is similiar. Sigh... either you do not want to understand or i have failed to convey this simple point. There is no question of "maybe"; no i must find out how the money will be spent or else if it is engaged in any wrong doing i will be a partner in that for it is the God's money in Truth. The vaishnava standard is that we must try and ensure that the person in question uses the money in God-consciousness. Similarly, if i find that my country is engaging in some wrong-doing on the expense of tax-money then it is my duty to protest to the best of my ability else i will be held a willing partner in that -- such are the laws of nature. Mere thoughts of God are not enough, we need to act in God-consciousness -- Hari-seva means in speech, thoughts and action i.e. we must try and let him hear the Holy Name, thinking of God and giving him things such as Prasadam or others to aid (directly or indirectly) in God-realization. This clears up a lot of issues. I will try to explain this from ethical, scientific and spiritual points of view but the important thing is that you must try to understand and not argue just for the sake of it. Rememeber that even a cannible can argue his guts out taking the stance that eating humans is not different from eating animals, and then you will have no logical position except for contradicting yourself.The Bible does say in places that meat is not the food for humans e.g. Genesis 2.19 "I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food". You should see this link for more. http://www.hknet.org.nz/Veg-christ-nomeat-page.htm If you still want to argue that meat-eating is allowed in Bible then all i can say is that it has been changed in places to fit the whims of Emperor (Constantine) etc. and so it has errors; same goes for liquour. Ethics point of view: Since we claim to be civilized beings with rational thought, we must stop this practise of eating of animals to fill our belly. Of course, as you said plants are also killed but their consciousness being limited, they have little pain or suffering (no nervous system bears testimony to this fact). Then again our own existence leads to killing of so many germs in our body but that does not mean that we can cut the throats of our parents, for example. In fact it is quite amusing to explain to a person who talks of love of God about trying to show some love and compassion to our fellow carnal beings. Imagine cutting off you hand and what immense pain it brings; now imagine the pain and suffering when the whole self (with the subtle body) is "torn" apart from this material body. Fact is that death is the most painful experience for normal conditioned beings and the pain of animals is only somewhat less than humans, and if we eat meat we are responsible for inflicting this to them. Then again the fact that everyone dies does not mean we can kill and eat a human. The point is that killing an animal is not much different from killing a human. Special status of cows -- we drink the milk of cow and consequently she is our mother. Thus from an unbiased point of view eating beef is akin to killing our mother. The cow is such a gentle animal which produces the miracle food milk from fodder, and to think of killing and eating it!! The vedic texts have given that every human has seven mothers viz. birth-giving mother, mother earth, wife of the spiritual master, wife of the king/ruler, nurse, wife of brahmana (knowers of brahman) and mother cow. Scientific point of view: I will not be talking about the health benefits of vegetarian diet, or how one pound of flesh requires 5-30 times grain to produce and upto 50 times water, which you can find aplenty elsewhere. Instead i will just be talking of the nature of foods, nature of consciousness and transmigration of soul. The consciousness of plants has been compared to "deep-sleep" and so they have little suffering if they are killed. This nature is voilent by design and as civilized beings we must strive to minimize this voilence in our lives. The consciousness of animals is much further developed e.g. they move, feel etc like ourselves, and the main difference in human consciousness and the animals' is capacity of rational thought. If we do not use our power of rational thought then by the kindness of God it shall be taken away and we shall attain the bodies of tigers/wolves so as to be able to eat flesh more freely. Additionally, if you see the jaws of human beings they resemble the herbivorous animals much more. However, true to the nature of human life we have been given a choice of being able to eat both meat and plants (both kinds of gastric juices are produced in our bodies) so we must make the correct choice. The soul in the lower stages of life gradually transmigrates up to higher stages automatically by the perfect arrangement of nature till the human (or higher) stage after which we attain to the stage as we develop our consciousness. Thus if we disrupt the natural development of consciousness then we must pay for the damages; of course the damages are in proportion e.g. compare germs to a human. Lord Krishna has grouped the foods as belonging to sattva, rajas and tamas categories. Milk, fruits, honey, vegetables etc are in the mode of goodness; excess spice, onion, garlic etc are in the mode of passion; food stored for long time which has been somewhat spoilt, mushroom (because it is a parasite and grows in the absence of sun) etc are in the mode of ignorance. Notably meat is not included because it is not considered an eatable at all; so it is to be considered in the mode of ignorance and worse. Whatever kind of food we partake of, it gradually affects to develop that kind of material mode in ourselves. Spiritual point of view: Ultimately, even killing the plants for eating is sinful however small it may be. Consequently in many disciplines of yoga at one stage the prescribed food is only fruits/milk, and even further only fallen leaves etc. However, nothing of this can actually prevent the "massacre" of germs that occurs in our bodies or when we prepare/eat food (the Vedic texts recommend specific procedures/prayers to beg forgiveness for those germs also). The correct conception is to offer our mind/body/soul completely to God. In the vaishnava disciplines, therefore, the food is prepared for the pleasure of God and God alone. Lord Krishna says that those who prepare food for their sense enjoyment verily eat only sin, and further says that when one offers a leaf, fruit, flower or water with devotion He accepts it. So we strive to eat only Prasadam which is remnants of food prepared for God and offered to Him. Just as eating remnants of food of someone with a contagious disease leads us to contract the disease, similarly eating Prasadam gradually leads to contracting Krishna-Consciousness. And we would normally only offer Prasadam to the needy and hungry so that they too can come to the devotional platform (ajnata-sukriti). Of course one can argue that why cannot one offer meat, but that is not what can be offered to the Lord for He asks only for vegetarian food. Everywhere animal sacrifices in the name of God have been heavily opposed by the Spiritual Masters; that is not even civilized human standard what to speak of "love" etc. In fact the strict vaishnava standard is that foods only in the mode of goodness can be offered to God and so even garlic/onion is normally not used in preparing the food.

Hare Krishna and dandavat pranam thank you for your blessings Yes lesser and greater in the sense of what features He manifests. But here the issue is different, in that He cannot come under the influence of material nature -- in fact He or His pure devotees never directly come in contact with the material nature for that is the illusory potency only meant for those who want to enjoy independently. If we consider their svarupa or true nature then Brahma is mostly a jiva, Lord Vishnu is God (or referred to as vishnu-tattva/para-tattva) and Lord Siva is between jiva-tattva and vishnu-tattva.

Hare Krishna and dandavat pranam Let me tell you briefly about the Vedic texts: Originally there was only one Veda (which literally means knowledge, and all kinds of knowledge including material) which was transmitted by hearing and learning. Before the start of the current age (Kali-yuga or the age of hypocricy and quarrel) Srila Vyasadeva (who was again a saktyavesha avataara) knowing that the memory of the people will degrade much put it into a written form and divided it into four: Rig, Yajur, Sama and Atharva, and his disciples further divided them into 1,130 divisions. Each division has 4 minor divisions, namely the Samhitas, Brahmanas, Aranyakas and Upanisads. Thus altogether the 4 Vedas contain 1,130 Samhitas, 1,130 Brahmanas, 1,130 Aranyakas, and 1,130 Upanisads. This makes a total of 4,520 divisions. These were passed on in disciplic successions but today due to the influence of time we can find only about 5-6% of these texts, but fortunately the ones relating to spiritual knowledge are well kept by the authorized disciplic successions. These are all called "sruti" meaning that which was received as the sound vibration from Lord Brahmaa (who received it from Krishna) and are directly the words of the Supreme Lord. In addition the Bhagavad-Gita is also sruti since they are the direct words of Lord when He manifested pastimes on the earthly plane. In addition to these Srila Vyasadeva compiled the Vedanta-sutra, eighteen puraanas (plus upa-puraanas) meaning historical references which were also manifest alongwith the Veda and which explain the meanings of Vedic texts; it is not possible to understand the Vedic texts without these and also wrote Mahabharata to further explain them. However, even after this he was not satisfied and then his Spiritual Master Narada Muni instructed him to describe the transcendental pastimes of Lord Krishna for the devotees. He then compiled the Srimad-Bhagavatam which is the ripened fruit of all vedic literature and crest jewel of all rasika shashtras. To give an idea of the sea of Vedic literature: consider the puraanas which were condensed to 240000 verses (from the original of billion verses) by Srila Vyasadeva. The Srimad-Bhagavatam is one of the medium sized one containing 18000 verses and comes in 12 cantos (the largest is Padma Puraana containing something like 55000 verses). In any case the authorized disciplic successions consider Bhagavad-Gita and Srimad-Bhagavatam to be complete for those who wish to study Vedic literature. Some more details can be found here: http://www.gosai.com/dvaita/madhvacarya/srimad-bhagavatam.html

Hare Krishna and dandavat pranam I think this number 10 is unnecessarily causing confusion. The ten are given as specific examples, but more incarnations are also mentioned. Srimad-Bhagavatam (written around the same 3100BC) contains twenty-four incarnations and also has specifically written that there are innumerable incarnations from the Lord in all the innumerable planets in all the innumerable universes all the time, since time immemorial. Jesus is considered to be a saktyavesha incarnation i.e. an empowered incarnation (just like Lord Buddha who is also a saktyavesha avataara, as opposed to Lord Rama or Lord Krishna who are directly the Supreme Personality of Godhead) meaning when a jiva is specifically empowered to carry out a particular mission -- no need to unnecessarily create a new list of the ten incarnations.

by Srila Vyasadeva around 3100BC on special leaves. Since then would be copied to new leaves and so on. Hare Krishna

Dear vishnu Hare Krishna and dandavat pranam Thanks for bringing this up. I have read these before and precisely for this reason we lay a greater "claim" on Jesus' teachings than christians who have changed the teachings to fit their convenience. He preached the vaishnava dharma among the smarta brahmanas who had digressed from the true path. We give him the full honors as our Spiritual Master, unlike many christians who treat him as worse than a servant to take up all their sins and suffer for them. Do you think that people just believing in Jesus disregarding his teachings and happily doing all kinds of nonsense, and letting Jesus suffer for them is anything but a rascal mentality? The main point of contention remains; it is that of your claim that Jesus is God Himself while in all these teachings he claims otherwise. You may be interested in seeing these links which provide more details. http://www.geocities.com/priitaa/christ_and_krishna.htm http://www.geocities.com/priitaa108/christ_and_krishna_pt2.htm http://www.geocities.com/priitaa108/christ_and_krishna_pt3.htm

Hare Krishna and dandavat pranam A word in the material realm is material in nature whatever it may be. The question is how can word manifest before the existence of material realm. Again i say, yes if you desire i can try to provide the explanation from Vedic point of view; so that quote is not wrong but that most christians (if not all) do not understand it. No a material body is constrained under the laws of material nature and God never becomes "lesser" in anyway ever by taking on a body of flesh. The material bodies are made of the five elements (and three suble elements for the subtle body) but the vigraha (form) of God is complete and perfect with its nature being sat(Absolute eternity)-chit(Absolute Knowledge)-ananda(Absolute bliss). As i said His body is completely transcendental, though the non-devotees without the transcendental eyes/senses see only a material reflection with their material eyes. A correction: no material form. His Sri murtis are actually His archavigraha form (again non-devotees only see a material reflection); please read the links to the writings of Srila BhaktiSiddhanta. There is some confusion here. The Brahm (also written as Brahman) is the impersonal aspect of the Lord, while the one in trinity is Brahmaa (to distinguish the name from Krishna which is pronounced as Krishn) who is the main engineer of one particular universe. God/Vishnu is neither born from Brahm neither from Brahmaa rather the other way round; Lord Krishna says in Gita that "I am the basis of the impersonal Brahman". Thus God is simultaneously manifests both personal and impersonal features, but the impersonal feature is incomplete manifestation (same with His feature as the SuperSoul). Brahmaa and Vishnu as only as inseperable as any other jivas (sentinent beings) for Brahmaa is like a post which is taken by an appopriate jiva; additionally Brahma is a pure devotee and in His capacity as a Guru he is an empowered representative of God, and in addition he is also a guna-avataara (i.e. empowered with the material mode of passion). I am not sure where you got these quotes from. But the translator has again confused Prajapati Brahmaa with Brahman (pronounced in sanskrit as Brahm as i said before) who are completely different. The actual one in Vedanta-sutra is "Sabdäd anävåtti". Please read the link i provided here It is a different thing in the sense that it is a sutra (aphorism) which contains a big Truth in small words and its complete explanation is given in Srimad-Bhagavatam and in the commentries of our acharyas.

Hare Krishna and dandavat pranam It may be difficult to find a complete online version of Bhavishya puraana, so i am posting some relevant portions.

Hare Krishna and dandavat pranam I did read this and agree with most of it. However, i cannot say that i agree with all that he has written. Even at the risk of giving the impression of a fault-finder i will give important points where i disagree. The God is completely Perfect and there is no question of His experimenting and definitely no question of experiments going wrong. Additionally it implies that souls were created in some past in the realm of material Time (which is three-pronged as in past, present and future) which is not the case since the jivas are manifested in the realm of Absolute Eternal Time (only eternal present) i.e. they are eternally accomplished. If you want to know the Vedic position on this please ask and i will try to explain it to the best of my ability. The main confusion is that it preconceives that human bodies are a novelty in that they have been created for the first time when the Vedic timeline clearly delineates that all this (creation then dissolution) has been going on in cycles like the weather since time immemorial. The more important point is that he has not addressed the main issue at all. It is of how to develop pure love of God. He gives no analysis of how the Hare Krishna devotee actually developed so much love for God that he become situated on the transcendental platform of love of Godhead loving God more than his life, when we find love even on the mental platform as difficult to attain. This is the crux of the whole matter, and as long as we are not clear as to how to attain that love we will not make great progress. I fail to understand one thing. Do you mean to say that just believing in God and doing all kinds of nonsense otherwise is okay? If the God is omnipotent then why can He not make everyone believe Him just like this person and thus all will attain salvation thereby fulfulling His desire. No we have perfectly logical and complete answers to these, i am just asking your viewpoint.

Dear vishnu Hare Krishna and dandavat pranam No cross is not another way. Love for God can only be have had by surrender to Him, Jesus says the same things. As long as we cherish some other desires, we will stay in the material worlds to accomplish them -- this is the infallible law. We can only get atmost what we desire; this is true even in these material worlds what then to speak of the spiritual realm. Since the spiritual realm is eternal, to be able to attain it for eternity there cannot be any desire separate from serving and loving God which is steady and coming from the transcendental plane of soul, otherwise we will need to fulfil our temporary desires coming from the mind which are not related to God in these material worlds. Just believing in Jesus, cross and diregarding the commandments and other instructions would be really just fooling ourselves. The other thing was not regards the methodology (abhideya) rather of the nature of a devotee who has actually reached the transcendental platform. He wants us to act according to our true nature, viz. of pure love for Him which has been clouded by our ephemeral desires coming from the mental plane. We have a free will of our own, and on account of incorrect use of that we landed up in these material worlds and God in His Supreme kindness has been fulfilling all our legitimate/illegitimate desires since time immemorial. Yes we need neither book knowledge nor intelligence of the worldly kind; but we need true knowledge that we are His eternal infinitesemal parts, that everything belongs to Him including my own self, and that service in pure love for Him is my only eternal function. The thing is indeed simple but the most important point is how to develop love for God. Srimad Bhagavatam says "that religion is first-class which makes one a lover of God", and this is the whole deal as to how to develop the love for God. When even a droplet of rasabhasa (reflection of attraction of Godhead) appears by His mercy then we automatically love all the sentinent beings and all the good qualities appear in us for that is our true nature. But we have to follow all the commandments and other instructions of our Spiritual Master to be successful. If we engage in meat-eating (disobeying "Thou shall not kill") or engage in illicit sex or violating any of the other instructions then it is impossible to develop love for God whatever we may think/feel otherwise. The test for our own love for God is simple -- whether we acutely solely desire God and never ever anything else, and every sincere person should be aware of his/her own position in this regard. We cannot accept only the parts which appeal to us and ignore other parts. No, this has been described dispassionately by the Lord in Bhagavad-Gita already that we should give in goodness i.e. we should be really and completely aware if we are doing the good of that person or his/her harm. Do you think that wasting the money on someone who will squander the money is a good proposition? The basic problem is that we think it is my money; think of the money as belonging to God which is the true fact. Can one waste something belonging to the dearest one in that manner which is helpful to neither the person who receives nor to one who gives. The correct conception is not that we are giving to God, for He requires nothing, rather what we consider as belonging to ourselves is actually His and should be used in His service alone (whether by serving other sentinent beings or otherwise). That's right, but we must be careful else in neophyte stages we can easily mistake our feelings for the voice of the SuperSoul. Additionally, the Lord as our SuperSoul instructs us to fulfil our own desire (good or bad) so we must purify our desires first. For this reason all the scriptures lay down rules and regulations and disregarding them would only show our arrogance. In the words of Srila Prabhupada "if you do not follow all the instructions of God as in scriptures then your love is not true". We need to follow these instructions to the core before they manifest themselves as the unadulterated function of the soul. I agree and therefore we shall not show only the usual wordly kindness rather strive to bring them to the platform of devotional service so that they somehow taste even a faint reflection of that ultimate attraction, God; if giving them physical comforts is conducive to that end then we do it else we do not for otherwise we will only be aiding their entrapment in the material worlds. The difference is due to the differences in outlook; in the vaishnava philosophy we look at the fact that the jivas have been in the material worlds since time immemorial trying to search happiness separate from God which is factually impossible and so only giving material boons will be only further detrimental. but the donar and receiver do not gain anything out of serving the external material worlds. You have a point in that sometimes even those who we think as not worthy of receiving charity may be highly elevated, and so we must unbiasedly determine the true case; to this end the foremost is that we must develop purity of desires so that we may listen to the voice of the Eternal Companion. In any case the situation is simple -- the money belongs to God and we must not let it go waste if we actually claim to love God; additionally we must not give charity for any personal benefits (direct or indirect) of any kind or if it leads to bolstering of our ego etc.

Hare Krishna and dandavat pranam He forgives the sins when we surrender to Him; on this topic of surrender (saranagati) books and books have been written and it takes quite sometime to actually do it. Factually it means getting rid of our conception that we are body/mind/intellect/false-ego and letting go of our false ego, after which we gradually rise to the platform of vishuddha-sattva from the material modes. This is irrevelant to the discussion at point. Lord Krishna has already described any charity as being either in goodness or passion or ignorance, and when it directly relates to God it is above the modes of nature. So yes if you give charity to a poor man who misues it for drinking alcohol, then it is in ignorance and we are liable for doing him harm. We need to help, but we need to learn what actual help means otherwise we may end up doing more harm than good. Srila BhaktiSiddhanta Saraswati says: So the real kindness is only when we help the needy with a view to arousing their devotion to God and making them serve God to this end, and any other kindness with a view to serve their bodies has no real value for it is serving only the external energy of Hari. You may be interested in reading these writings of Srila BhaktiSiddhanta Saraswati: http://www.harekrsna.com/philosophy/bmgs/acaryas/bhaktisiddhanta/writings/sct1.htm http://www.harekrsna.com/philosophy/bmgs/acaryas/bhaktisiddhanta/writings/colloquies7.htm http://www.harekrsna.com/philosophy/bmgs/acaryas/bhaktisiddhanta/writings/colloquies8.htm which touch upon the basics of vaishnava philosophy. p.s.: these are quite difficult to understand in the beginning and the only way to actually understand them is to read them again and again with a submissive and humble attitude.

Dear friend Hare Krishna and dandavat pranam In my opinion the main problem with yourself and many other christians (also muslims/hindus etc.) is that you take love for God to be a very cheap thing. It is the most expensive item and we have to "pay" by surrendering ourselves completely to gain that. Mearly making a mental thought has no value. It would be instructive for you to look up in vaishnava texts for the symptoms of that love, when that true love actually arises from the soul. It is so powerful that the whole body itself changes its nature from material to spiritual due to its touch!! If you would like to read them then i can provide you with references to them but i believe we are still not qualified to read them (i can present the quotes pertinent to the discussion if you wish). This is necessary so that we may not be in any kind of illusion as to whether we actually love God or not, or whether our "love" is only a mental passion to save ourselves from going to "hell" or whatever. Please try to take this in a positive sense, for i am only trying to convey to you the basics of what i have learnt and experienced to a very minute degree.

Hare Krishna and dandavat pranam Please don't avoid the issue and keep on repeating the same things as if they are any kind of explanations. What is the meaning of Word? If you consider the definition it means a sound vibration, and then you will have to explain how a sound vibration is a person and in particular God meaning possessing all the potencies. Next you will have to explain that how the Word can become flesh, and thus you will have to explain that how can God ever come under the influence of material nature which He has created by taking on a body of "flesh". The Bible and all other scriptures say that God created these innumerable material universes (directly or indirectly), so He is existing before it and His form has no relation to the material worlds i.e. it is not in flesh. Fact is that scriptures other than Vedic texts dearly lack in any kind of explainatory power (which was appropriate for that time and place). Then read the Vedic text Bhavishya Puraana where Jesus is mentioned as Isha-putra i.e. son of God and not as incarnation of God/Vishnu. Then read all the quotations by our Spiritual Masters who say that Jesus is not God but His empowered representative; and read the quote by Srila Prabhupada where he says that Jesus came from Brahmaloka (and find out where Brahmaloka is). Then if you believe you know more than all these pure devotees and Vedic texts and Jesus himself, keep on claiming that Jesus is Krishna etc. As for the usual claims of the texts from Bible regaring Word came in flesh or "I and my Father are One", the correct meanings of these have already been given in this forum HERE and HERE

Dear friend Hare Krishna and dandavat pranam Please read the post more carefully; there is no mention of hypocrite nor did such a thought even crossed my mind. Unfortunately you read what you wanted to in accordance with your preconceived notion of myself. Only that i would not consider the general rule of "fearing" africans/spanish a logical proposition, what to speak of scriptures.

Hare Krishna Before trying to reach fantastic conclusions please give your understanding of the statement of Bible that "word was God" and the "Word" came in flesh. What is the nature of Word? and how is Word God? After that we can talk of your other conclusions.

Hare Krishna Where is the question of defending? The standard sanskrit dictionary meanings of mlechha and yavana are meat-eater and one who does not follow vedic principles respectively. Sometime later it was also applied to people living in certain regions for almost all of them "fit into" the definitions, but that is not the correct meaning of the terms. The Vedic scriptures nowhere mention race as we understand the term today, only sometimes dynasties or people living in certain areas. Point is that these terms apply to the qualities and behaviour of a human being and the race is nowhere in picture. It were the british who first introduced the race term in their interpretations of Vedic scriptures to create a north-south and other divides in india (and of course germans used it to their own end). Consequently, Jesus is told to a vaishnava by our Spiritual Masters for in his character we find all the vaishnava qualities; same is the case for Prahlada Maharaja, or Mrgari or Valmiki etc. as given in Bhagavatam. In fact we find so many more such examples in the scriptures. I have no idea of this spanish/african fear factor, but it has nothing to do with race rather with culture; i would rather say that arab countries are much worse as far as tolerance towards other spiritual practises is concerned.

Hare Krishna and dandavat pranam As subuddhi prabhu writes that in the neophyte stages of vaidhi bhakti there is reverential attitude, which is necessary also. But when the love comes from the real platform of soul then the love is causeless without any reverence. Srila BhaktiSiddhanta explains:

Hare Krishna Really silly, anything in the name of scriptures!! This person makes one vague statement supposedly from srimad-bhagvatam and then goes off to tangent to express his/her own attitude as if backed by scriptures. If anything the scriptures use the terms yavana/mleccha etc. for persons not following vedic principles (which will include almost all europeans,americans etc., as well as indians who do not follow them). Quite meaningless, supposedly "informing" us of statements of scriptures while lacking even a single scriptural reference.

Hare Krishna and dandavats I guess you are talking about the Babaji mentioned by yogananda and his followers. But how do you come to the conclusion: No living entity ever dies for it was never born. Those who choose so from the human platform are on the way to "higher consciousness" whether on the earthly platform or in other lokas, wherever they live. Then what can it prove. All the pure devotees have the "same level of consciousness" if one wants to compare that way. You seem to imply that no human on the earth is a God realized soul, but that is not true. For me it suffices that their philosophy is not in line with any of the four vaishnava sampradayas or Chaitanya Mahaprabhu etc.

Hare Krishna Simply because he isn't; even he says so many times in Bible apart from our Spiritual Masters who have confirmed it many a times. Equating a jiva to Krishna is an offense; however we do think of him like a Spiritual Master and in that capacity an empowered representative of God.

Hare Krishna No the philosophy as presented by Srila Prabhupada does not say there is only one Spiritual Master, rather that the Spiritual Master is One (being an empowered representative of God) who appears in many bodies. Read the comments by BruzWayne prabhu better.

Hare Krishna and dandavats Really you believe that Lord Krishna is subject to laws of karma?? I have nothing to say to this apart from that this is not vaishnava philosophy albeit resembles advaita philosophy in that respect.

Hare Krishna and dandavat pranam Prabhu wonderful that you have taken to it so seriously, hope i could find such sincerity. This is very normal, in fact i have not known anyone who does not experience it. From my experience when we take to it seriously then in some periods we may experience increase in hunger, or increase in drowsiness etc.; other devotees may share more of their experiences. The example given is that when we clean the dust with a broom then the dust fills the whole room in the beginning; one may understand it as a "backlash" of our material nature.The crux of the matter is that the way forward is only one: that of being steadfast in chanting with regularity, associating with devotees and reading the transcendental books. Sometimes we may take to some temporary measures (to the best of our understanding) to help us to divert our mind which is very fickle by nature so that it does not give up the basic principles. So the Lord has said that we should control our mind by our intellect.

The article is misleading either by the newsreporter(s) or by the researchers or both. I think most devotees don't much care for such thoughtless comments as in this news report, only that when will (sections of) scientific community understand that matter cannot feel -- even their own definition does not allow for any such possibility. What they are trying to do is conceptually not much different from electronic sensors which will make a robot react the same way. Its like saying a dead man or separated parts of body can feel for it has chromosomes etc.; there is still not an unambiguous scientific definition of (the moment of) death and talking of life??

Hare Krishna and dandavat pranam It is hard sometimes and as josh prabhu says it happens sometimes. The satisfying fact is that when we have been actually "bitten by the bug", it is not possible to leave Krishna at least He will not. Ups and downs come as long as we are in material consciousness, but we have to hold fast -- there is no choice. The way, of course, is to be in the company of nice devotees and keep on chanting. If anything such a down can only lead to a greater steadfastness. In response to your feeling "missing the real connection with God" the only response that comes to me is how is it possible. The connection to the blue one is always and has always been real, more real than we can ever imagine with our material minds. Why else would He chase us as the SuperSoul in our hearts since time immemorial though we apparently forgot Him completely; why is He satisfying our legitimate/illegitimate desires since time immemorial causelessly. The reason is that our relation with Him is too deep which we cannot understand or feel presently.