Jahnava Nitai Das

I'm also considering making a video archive, but I'm not sure whether anyone would use it. Does anyone have fast enough internet connections to stream full length videos? We would put up all of Srila Prabhupada's recorded videos as well as a lot of other videos on Indian holy places and Hinduism. If anyone would find it usefull, tell me so I will move it up in the priority list.

Vishnu impregnates prakriti indirectly through His form as Shambu (Shiva).

We will be upgrading the server sometime over the next two weeks. The new server will be about 10 times more powerful than the present, so there shouldn't be any problems with slow pages once that is completed.

Sorry for the forum down time. One of the server's harddrives became full resulting the the database becoming corrupted. It took most of the day to get it working again. There shouldn't be any further problems.

Thank you for posting the above. You have brought up a lot of interesting things. I don't think you will get many answers, as it is a very rare form and not part of mainstream Hinduism. Vinayaka, besides refering to the particular son of Shiva, Ganesha, also refers to a species of life. The Vedic literatures accept 400,000 species of human beings inhabiting the universe, such as vannaras, kinnaras, yakshas, etc. One such category are Vinayakas, who have elephant heads and human bodies. Within that species you will find obviously both males and females. The particular deity you are asking about is not a high level deity, but just a leader among this vinayaka race. Shiva and Devi have thousands and thousands of lesser associates who also sometimes become objects of worship and who are sometimes identified with them. Generally worshipping lower level deities is considered within the lower modes of nature (passion and ignorance) and thus the result is not ultimately beneficial for the worshipper. Also the descriptions of this deity will be a big mixture of things referring both to higher beings as well as to lower regular Vinayakis (thus the stealing of babies, etc.). Since it is a rare form, people mistakenly identify any elephant headed deity as all the same person and fail to differentiate between different individuals. Generally if you were to worship this deity, an ordinary Vinayaki would accept the worship. Any worship we perform will be accepted by someone, sometimes by ghosts, yakshas, bhutas, etc. When the worship is not "up to standard" (in the sense of not perfectly following scriptural rules and regulations, and simultaneously not done with pure devotion) the worship is generally "taken" by a lower form. This is one of the dangers of worshipping rare or unknown deities.

This forum is for discussing Hinduism and Hindu philosophy, not for discussing which other religions are right or wrong, better or worse. There are other forums for that, and if anyone wants a recommendation where to discuss this, message me and I will send you links to such forums.

I would request you to post the verse number so we can get a better understanding of the question. I don't recall a verse where Krishna asks Arjuna to "kill selflessly". Krishna does ask Arjuna to rise and fight for dharma. But over all the Gita isn't about killing or not killing. It's a spiritual message that can be applied to any situation, including Arjuna's situation of having to fight to defend dharma. Krishna generally speaks in general terms, to "act selflessly", to "work selflessly", to "act without expectation of result", etc. Perhaps you can also specify your interest in this question. Is it a homework question for a class? Is it a personal interest that you are trying to apply in your life? Is it just for the sake of knowing what the Gita says? Different people want different levels of answers, so it will help us get to the point.

There is panchatattva in Laguna Beach. But I don't remember if they have additional deities on the altar.

It may be a very real possibility that he just drowned in the Ganga and was never found. Every year one or two devotees drown in India, even those who are expert swimmers. In the last six months I have heard of three devotees drowning so far.

How high resolution do you want? Are you looking for a desktop wallpaper (1024 x 768) or for printing quality (much higher resolution)? Krishna.com has some good desktop wallpapers.

Ghosts enter people's body when we are unclean, perform certain sinful actions, weaken our minds by intoxication, etc. What they do depends on how weak our mind is. Most of us are influenced by them in some way or another, maybe not fully possessed, but they push bad thoughts at you or give you nightmares. I think most cases of schizophrenia in the west are due to possession by ghosts. Interestingly enough, this disease doesn't seem to exist in India, mainly because it is diagnosed as ghostly possession and treated by traditional spiritual methods successfully.

For the original poster of the question, please see this article: http://www.indiadivine.org/hinduism/articles/39/1/

This is nonsensical and has been discussed in these forums before in several long, long threads. The very word for cow in sanskrit is "aghnya" which literally means "never to be killed", and this is what is found throughout the Atharva Veda. The very language itself establishes that the cow is sacred and cannot be harmed. The problem is when Hindus take information from Muslim websites pretending to be speaking about the Vedas. This is a very common recuring phenomena. It shows that in general Hindus, and especially young Hindus, know so little about their own religion that they get fooled by the most obvious misrepresentations of their own religion. I could never imagine Christians or Muslims being misled in similar ways. ("Didn't you know, Jesus was actually a lady.")

More explanations by Dravida: Who is to say that Jagannatha Das Babaji isn't the initiating spiritual master of Bhaktivinoda Thakur? Someone may have been initiated by a hundred false gurus, that does not stop him from receiving initiation from a bonafide guru when the chance comes. "Oh, I'm sorry Bhaktivinoda, you were already initiated by a caste Goswami, you will have to wait till next life till I initiate you." The entire change is based on their confused understanding of initiation, and their dependence on the ritual of initiation over the guru's divine will. Their arguments are: 1) Bipin Bihari had already performed a ritual initiation, therefore Bhaktivinoda could never again be initiated by a Vaishnava. 2) Initiation is only by the ritual ceremony, and Jagannatha Das Babaji never performed such a ritual for Bhaktivinoda Thakur. Prabhupada chose to specifically use the word "initiate". If we cannot understand how this is possible, then we should humbly admit we are fools who have no spiritual vision to see it. We should not claim Prabhupada was mistaken simply because of our own lack of spiritual vision. It should be noted that nowhere in Prabhupada's teachings (books, lectures, letters, conversations) does Prabhupada present the teaching that Bhaktivinoda Thakur was initiated by Bipin Bihari Goswami. Never once does he mention it. This is not one of Prabhupada's teachings. So these editors have found a teaching outside of Prabhupada's teachings, and with that they are changing and "correcting" Prabhupada's own words. If Prabhupada never taught that Bhaktivinoda Thakur was initiated by Bipin Bihari Goswami, and if Prabhupada never taught that Bipin Bihari Goswami was the guru of Bhaktivinoda Thakur, then why change Prabhupada's own words based on that faulty belief?! They are taking teachings from the caste Goswami's and erasing Prabhupada's beautiful words based on those outside teachings. This is why they are rascal editors.

It likely does not exist. If it was sold to get money for tea biscuits as the story goes, it would have been sold as waste paper. In that case it would have been used to carry peanuts or other items bought in a shop.

Good point. Dravid changed it specifically because he wanted a different meaning, he says so himself. He didn't care how it read or whether it "read better", he simply didn't like what Prabhupada said and felt it was not philosophically or historically correct. If the words really meant the same thing, like some have claimed here, then he could have left them as is. But he specifically didn't want the same meaning, he wanted a meaning that conformed to the GBC's policy on initiation. Jagannatha Das Babaji never performed any formal ceremony to "initiate" Bhaktivinoda Thakur, and Bhaktivinoda Thakur had received diksha from Bipin Bihari Goswami, a caste goswami. Thus the use of the word "initiate" by Prabhupada would indicate one can be initiated simply by accepting the siksha of the guru, something the GBC does not support. This is a concept supported by some devotees, such as the book "The Prominent Link". Dravida writes: He says it is fine to say a non-present guru "accepted" a person, but not correct to say he "initiated". Why? Who knows better what may have occured in the transcendental realm of the devotee's nitya-lila, Dravida or Prabhupada? He rejects it because it is inline with the Ritvik doctrine, as well as inline with the doctrine that initiation is by Siksha (following the teachings and instructions of the guru) not by formal ritual.

As far as the Srimad Bhagavatam goes, the editors claim it has not yet been edited. There is no way for people like me to know the truth unless we sit down with a magnifying glass.

Love of the spiritual master is dasya rasa, carrying out his instructions and orders, spreading his teachings, just like Hanuman-ji.

300 more games coming next week when I get time.

I was thinking to provide RSS feeds, but wasn't sure anyone would want them. Maybe I will work on it later.

I find it literally amazing that you can, 1) read Prabhupada's many statements not to change his books and to return them to the original form, 2) see Dravida admit that they changed Prabhupada's own original words because it didn't fit in with the GBC's definition of initiation, 3) read the bogus claims that they are "bringing it closer to Prabhupada's original" by removing Prabhupada's own words, and not see anything fishy. To you, "hey, it reads better. I've been cheated by you stupid rascals for pointing all this out." Literally amazing. It seems when you like someone there is no limit to how blind one can make oneself in their defense. There is a long, long history of people blindly defending unqualified leaders for their improper actions in ISKCON, going back years and years. This is nothing new. Anyone who points out such things are rascal offenders. Keep the propaganda going. And then to top it off you try to smoke screen the issue with deception: Your claim above, posted directly after I asked you to explain this particular change, implies that we are arguing against Srila Prabhupada's actual dictated words, when in fact it is the opposite. Prabhupada's original version, which he himself wrote was using the word "initiated". So your relply that we are somehow "arguing against Prabhupada's actual dictated words" is just a smokescreen to divert attention when there is no logical reply. What we have shown is the claim that they are "returning things to Prabhupada's original version" is a lie. And the claim that they are "giving us more Prabhupada" is another lie. What they are actually doing is removing Prabhupada's personal words and replacing them with their own politically motivated phrases. Your defense of this shameful act with "it reads better to me" is equally shameful. Are we now to change all of Prabhupada's books to make them "read better". Those are the rascal editors that Prabhupada was talking about. Simply changing Prabhupada's words that were personally inspired by Lord Krishna with their mundane political propaganda because it will "read better".

Why the smoke screen? Dravida has already publicly admitted that the following was changed away from Prabhupada's words to better fit the present view of guru in ISKCON: Prabhupada's Original Edition: "Srila Visvanatha Cakravarti Thakura accepted Srila Jagannatha dasa Babaji, who initiated Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura, who in turn initiated Srila Gaurakisora dasa Babaji". Jayadvaita Swami's Edited Version: "Srila Visvanatha Cakravarti Thakura accepted Srila Jagannatha dasa Babaji, the spiritual master of Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura, who in turn accepted Srila Gaurakisora dasa Babaji"

Kalachandji means "black moon" and it's another name for Krishna. In the Gita Krishna says the best offering is love, and to symbalize that love you can offer him fruit, flowers, water, and other things. patram puspam phalam toyam yo me bhaktya prayacchati tad aham bhakty-upahrtam asnami prayatatmanah "If one offers Me with love and devotion a leaf, a flower, fruit or water, I will accept it." - Bhagavad Gita (9.26)

If you feel cheated its only because you want to feel cheated. Srila Prabhupada states throughout that conversation do not change anything, again restore the books to their original form, and that those who make unauthorized changes are rascal editors. If you have the document from Prabhupada authorizing Jayadvaita Swami or any of the BBT editors to change Prabhupada's personal recorded words for Caitantya Caritamrita from "initiated" to "accepted as his disciple" then I guess we can all be quiet. Who should feel cheated and by whom? Those devotees who try to read Prabhupada's Caitanya Caritamrita but instead get Jayadvaita Swami's and Dravida's Caitanya Caritamrita are the one's who have been cheated. Unless you can explain how it is fine to remove Prabhupada's original words from the Caitanya Caritamrita verse below everything else you say is just a smoke screen to divert the focus. Prabhupada's Original Edition: "Srila Visvanatha Cakravarti Thakura accepted Srila Jagannatha dasa Babaji, who initiated Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura, who in turn initiated Srila Gaurakisora dasa Babaji". Jayadvaita Swami's Edited Version: "Srila Visvanatha Cakravarti Thakura accepted Srila Jagannatha dasa Babaji, the spiritual master of Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura, who in turn accepted Srila Gaurakisora dasa Babaji" Go ahead and give your explanation of why they changed this verse simply for personal political reasons. As I said before, it was only because Jayadvaita Swami had a feud with the Ritviks that they changed this verse AWAY from Prabhupada's version, AWAY from the manuscripts, and AWAY from the original printing - and in it's place they just made up words from the blue sky and inserted them. Now how would you explain that in relation to the 1977 conversation where Prabhupada called his editors rascals for changing things without any authorization form him. Now we know who has a right to feel cheated.

I find it very offensive how this person tries to brush aside the entire matter by pretending its no big deal. They fail to see the severity of going against Prabhupada's direct order.