muralidhar_das

31^st December, 1936 Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Thakura: "Form a Governing body of 10 to 12 persons for management of Mission work but Kunja Babu will manage so long as he lives. Kunja Babu’s sympathy for me brought me in connection with so many persons. His intelligence excelled all. His sympathy for me knows no bound. I advise you (Kunja Babu) to be courageous and callous (?) as I am callous to all. This should be your guiding principle. I told the other day and again I say Kunja Babu should be respected by all as long as he lives. Not to quarrel with one another. Vasudev should write something. Sundarananda and Proffessor Babu should also help him in this regard."

third paragraph Kunja Babu (KVV) or (Bhakti Vilasa Tirtha Maharaj) was far more than a manager within the Gaudiya Math. This misunderstanding of the position of Kunja Baju is quite surprising. Srila Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Thakura Prabhupada had this written on the surface of the temple about him "The secretary of the Sri Gaudiya Math, Sripada Kunjabihari Vidyabhusasa is The main pillar in the great temple of the Sri Gaudiya Math. The life-breath of the Sri Gaudiya Math’s institution of Service and the main cause for its flourishment. The original architect in the Sri Gaudiya Math’s creation. The principal minister for the awakening and development of Sri Jagabandhu’s service attitude. The central jewel in the Sri Gaudiya Math’s jewelled necklace of devotees. The very personification of Sri Guru-seva (serving temper) and the prestha-murtti of (dearest to) Sri Guru. The main pillar to fulfill the wish of Sri Guru. The foremost teacher of service to Sri Guru and the most tolerant servitor. The servitor of the servitors of Sri guru, who invites the world for service to Sri Hari and Sri guru. The greatest friend of the Gaudiyas."

Finn Madsen should have looked into things a bit deeper than this. WVA is a political group - they have given a stamp of approval to the Bagh Bazaar institution and other groups with sinful leaders. Why does Paramadvaiti Swami regard Anantavasudeva and his descendents as a proper sampradaya and not a sahajiya sampradaya? I wish somebody could give me an answer to that.

Second paragraph Kunja Babu and Paramananda Vidyaratna were close friends. When the Gaudiya Math GBC was formed they were members of that GBC. In the first meeting of the GBC, Kunja Babu said he should be Acharya. Not that he should be the only Acharya, but that Vasudeva could also be acharya. Kunja Babu was in favour of many acharyas. But Vasudeva and his supporters outnumbered Kunja Babu so he walked out. The Gaudiya Math GBC split in its first meeting and Kunja Babu, Bon Maharaj and Paramananda Vidyaratna went back to Mayapura from Kolkata. Madhava Maharaj (Hayagriva Prabhu) was also a member of the GBC and he also believed there should be many acharyas (he wanted to become an Acharya himself and he did become a guru with a few years. But to keep peace he sided with the majority, and agreed to accept only Anantavasudeva as Guru. My own Guru, Srila Sridhar Maharaj, was never a member of the Gaudiya Math GBC.

I never intended to say that. What I will say is that if you agree to believe in lies, things that are clearly lies, if you believe in propaganda instead of what you know to be real, then you follow a similar path to what the Nazis followed. Many people in the Bagh Bazaar community refused to acknowledge that there was something wrong with "the institution". They stuck with the status-quo. In a totalitarian regime people go along with the Authority and they agree to speak the propaganda the Authority tells them to speak. They become slaves of the Status Quo. And the people who followed this path in life - they are Masden's chief source of information for this thing he wrote.

After Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Thakur had passed on, Krishnadas Babaji (then a brahmacari) found the love letters of Anantavasudeva to his woman. He took the letters to Srila Sridhar Maharaj who at first refused to believe they were genuine. Then Srila Sridhar Maharaj, whom even Bhaktivedanta Narayana Maharaja said was the leader of the sannyasis and brahmacaris, this Srila Sridhar Maharaj (my Guru) went to Anantavasudev and confronted him with the letters. At that meeting Anantavasudev at first tried to defend himself. Then someone else (I will find the name later) quoted the Gita 9.30 "Even if a devotee engages in abominable behaviour he is considered venerable " Srila Sridhar Maharaj said that this applies in the case of regular devotees - we must not criticize them - but an Acharya must not commit any abominable activities. Srila Sridhar Maharaj and many, many others then left the Gaudiya Math. I will search for the date for this event. But I believe it was in 1940. Srila Sridhar Maharaj established Sri Chaitanya Saraswat Math in Nabadwip in 1942, so 1940 sounds about right. I will check.

yes

First paragraph Bagh Bazaar and the temple at the Yogapitha were both paid for by one person. Sakhicaran Raya Sakhicaran Raya paid for numerous other temples of significance including the Imlitala temple of Bhakti Saranga Goswami at Seva Kunja in Vrindaban, and the original land purchase for Sri Chaitanya Saraswat Math in Nabadwip. The biggest mistakes in Masden's "history" are that he doesn't mention many of the key people in the Gaudiya Math, he doesn't note the significance of some of the key events that happened, and he speaks of "monks" in the Math as materialistic men who were only interested in retaining the property donated by gullible donors. Masden is ignorant of the spiritual depth of many senior devotees in the Gaudiya Math. He speaks of them as if they were all money-grubbing materialists. Masden got some second hand information from a few sources, but he is really only presenting the Bagh Bazaar Math's version of "history", with a few trivial exceptions. According to the Bagh Bazaar view, anybody who didn't follow Anantavasudev was a fool. The people who believed in Anantavasudev even after he stated that Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati was not a siddha-mahapurusha, they were the true fools. Anantavasudev admitted he had been involved in illicit sexual relations, and still the fools followed him: "If our gurudev has a girlfriend... we will still follow him."

Well said Others who follow your lead are very sensible.

Vikram Ramsundar, I've read the information you've given about yourself. I cannot help but think you are somebody other than who you say you are. The internet enables us to assume false identities very easily doesn't it? Fact is, I went through years of disturbance and unhappiness, feeling great anguish because of the lies being broadcast on the internet about Sarawati Thakura that were spoken by Lalita Prashad. Lalita Prashad's lies were told with the cunning intention of trying to seduce people like Gadadhara Prana, Subala and Jagat to come and follow LP. Look at the fruit of Lalita Prashad's parampara: Subala meditates on his "manjari" form and also eats beef steak. He likes sex with boys too. Jagat openly states that he is a sahajiya, not a regular Gaudiya Vaishnava. Gadadhara Prana seeks sex with young girls, and his wife won't allow him to be with the daughter. ... On another topic, I saw Finn Madsen's "history of the Gaudiya Math" a few years ago and it is a seriouly flawed document full of historical errors and unsubstantiated assertions. His research was badly flawed; if I were marking his work I would have strongly critiqued what he wrote. I haven't marked any essays for many years. But if you want to post his dissertation I will be happy to cut his work to pieces and expose all the rotten bits to everyone.

Bon Maharaj gave diksa to Sadananda as a ritvik in London, before Sadananda went to India. The Ritvik procedure was utilized by Bhaktisiddhanta Sarawati Thakura. 300 years earlier, Syamananda Thakura gave initiation through ritvik representativs. Syamananda Thakur had over 250,000 disciples. Bhakti Saranga Goswami, also in London in the late 1930's, gave diksa to one disciple. Bon Maharaj was authorised to be a ritvik. Bhakti Saranga Goswami was told by Bhaktisiddhanta Sarawati Thakura that he could give diksa.

This leela is described in detail in Sri Garga Samhita The birth of Giriraj Govardhana and other pastimes are also given there. Sri Garga Samhita says that when the flood came Sesa Naga wrapped himself around the bottom of Govardhana and stopped the waters from washing people away. Sudarshana stayed on top of Govardhana and burned up all the water and ice sent by Indra into steam. So Govardhana was not struck by any bad forces.

Oh a quiz! This will be fun! And as far as his teachings go, it is a fact that in his later years he did not worship the Lord as "Krishna" but as Gaura. He only chanted this Gauranga Mahamantra - Sri Krishna Chaitanya Prabhu Nityananda Sri Advaita Gadadhara Sribasadi Gaurabhakta Brnda

In the introduction to Sri Krishna Samhita:

An interesting section in the Jivani (life story of Bhaktivinode Thakura) The problem with this jivani is that it is edited by Lalita Prasad and maybe other people living in that house. I'm very skeptical of anything coming from Lalita Prasad. Very skeptical. The man is a proven liar - not white lies, but big black ones.

Hmmm... Here is one verse that has come from Jagannatha das Babaji to Bhaktivinode to Saraswati Thakura to us. It is Jagannatha das Babaji's own "mahamantra"

Hmm... is that reference to the Karta-bhaja in that biography that was "edited" by Lalita Prashad?

Professor Sanyal goes to great pain to explain in detail the difference between Leela and history. I started typing out some sections but it will take me hours and I don't have the time. By the way, this is from Volume 2 of Sri Krishna Chaitanya (I have Volume 1 as a text file). Professor Sanyal raised the issue that when Mahaprabhu publicly revealed he is Visnu the first manifestation he displayed was as Varahadeva. This avatara, Sanyal explains, is considered with disdain by brahmins and their disregard for a "pig" because of their own "pure" status makes them unable to realize that God is not just "transcendence" but that he is, indeed, every thing. Sanyal: A person possessed by a mentality like this will naturally hate a creature like a pig. Hiranyaksa then is a person who tries to promote the philosophy of utilitarianism - everything in the world exists for man. Hiranyaksa felt he was doing humankind a favour by destroying superstious cult worship of Visnu and the process of Yajna. Professor Sanyal goes on to say that this problem that Varaha faced was again faced by Sri Nimai Sundara. He also had to deal with the same "utilitarianism" and skepticism of "intellectuals" whose eyes see things from the viewpoint of "gold". I was an academic, a University lecturer, at one time. I believe most academics are primarily interested in the golden lifestyle they enjoy and that the matters they study are in most cases trivial pursuits in comparison to the main pursuit of their life - the experience of ENJOYMENT. When Gaurasundara appeared on Earth all the avataras were within him, and in his pastimes the Varaha-leela was also manifest. But people can only appreciate that Varaha Leela was manifest again on earth 500 years ago if they have been given the eyes to see things properly. Leela is not History.

I agree with almost all of this. The only thing I'm not sure about is the idea that his accepting of diksa from Bipin Bihari Goswami was a formality. My understanding is that he had great faith in Bipin Bihari initially but later realized that Bipin Bihari was compromising himself by supporting the anti-Mayapura brahmins from Prachin Mayapura. Jagannatha das Babaji had envisaged the Yogapitha in his transcendental vision when he first came to Mayapura, and Bhaktivinode Thakur had faith in Jagannatha and in his own vision. A Vaishnava can sometimes be more advanced than his Guru. As for example Sukadeva, who explained Bhagavatam in such a wonderful way that Narada (his param guru) and Vyasa (his Guru) found what he said had more sweetness (ananda) that what they themselves had experienced.

Thanks for those verses. Do you know where this is written in Amrita pravaha bhasya? I have it here with me.

What verse is that? I once had an unpleasant quarrel with JNDas on this forum where JNDas said that Bipin BIhari was not the guru of Thakur Bhaktivinode, since it says this in the introduction to CC Also: The view that the Leela is not on the physical plane at all is explained in great detail (maybe 20 pages or more) in Sri Krishna Chaitanya by professor sanyal, with an introduction by Saraswati Thakura. Fact is, Saraswati Thakur didn't preach the "literalist" view of stories in Puranas and shastra. He taught that you need to enter into the deeper view of Reality before you can appreciate divine Leela.

Let me get this right. Do you suggest that Sri Chaitanya did not really say the words in Chaitanya Charitamrta that Kaviraj Gosai says he spoke? None of the things Sri Chaitanya said in CC were really his actual words? This is an interesting idea. Please elaborate on that for the stupid Hindus like me who cannot understand real philosophy.

OK, I will rephrase what I said. Krishnadas Kaviraj said that the devotees in the sankirtan of Mahaprabhu are Hindus.

Lowborn you need to look more carefully at the real history of what happened. Lalita Prashad was proven to be "cunning and malicious". He knew that Bipin Bihari Goswami cut his connection with Bhaktivinode Thakura but nevertheless Lalita Prashad deceived people like Jagat and made them believe that he (LP) was linked through Bhaktivinode and Bipin Bihari to the parampara of Jahnava Mata. It was a trick. The man is like Kaliya. As far as Saraswati Thakur's teachings go, what makes you think he didn't push the ideas in Sri Krishna Samhita? I've many books and articles of Saraswati Thakur and in those books I've seen him repeating the things said by Thakur Bhaktivinode in Sri Krishna Samhita. Practically every thing. And besides that, Saraswati Thakur printed Sri Krishna Samhita in two editions and promoted it to be studied amongst his disciples. Srila Sridhar Maharaj was THERE and he read Sri Krishna Samhita and told me to read it too.

Sivaya Subramaniyaswami pointed out that Srila Prabhupada had said that ISKCON is not Hindu. It is true. ISKCON is not a part of Hindu society. But who is Hindu? In Sri Chaitanya Caritamrta http://vedabase.net/cc/adi/17/en you see that Sri Chaitanya Himself said his devotees are Hindus.