Janus

>>>>How about this? In my college days I remember my professor once asked our philosophy class our opinions on various controversial issues (drug legalization, abortion etc...). We didn't know what he was going to do. Once we gave our opinion, he then had us debate taking the other side. So we could have reps from Iskcon debating why Narayan Maharaj should be invited to speak at Iskcon temples, and disciples of Narayan Maharaj explaining why not. That would be soooooooo cool. Never would happen, but would be interesting reading Gauracandra It would not only be "soooooooo cool" Gaurachandra prabhu, but it also would be more in keeping with the methodology which Sri Jiva Goswami established for attaining to the understanding of the Absolute Truth. Srila Narayana Maharaja has commented that there may be a few middle class, or madhyama devotees about, but no uttamas. The inference is that every else one of us is a kanistha, and Srila Bhaktivinode Thakur has commented in his Sri Krsna Samhita that the kanistha class devotee is entirely controlled by his prejudices. Your professors trick neutralized (or minimized rather that prejudice, forcing peoples minds to observe that which otherwise they would have been unable to see. Heresy is simply not tuned in when one has certainty. Anyway, Sri Jivas methodology for establising the Absolute Truth included arguely strongly (purvapaksa) against his own postulates (visaya). This is (as Sri Jiva recognized) necessary simply because doubts (samsaya) arise automatically towards the validity of any postulate and are recognized by the objective observer (I consider Sri Jiva to be objective). Supporters of SNM and his detractors will not even recognize that doubts arise as in most of all cases they are proceding from an emotional need, rather than from a philosophical justification. I too would find it "sooooo cool" and also very useful for SNM's defenders and detractors to argue each others positions but I also agree with you on the lack of likelyhood of that happening. Hari bol

"But it should be from those who are top level from each respective group." Not only "top level" persons are being impacted by the issues and that is only one reason that I consider that limiting such a debate to "top level" persons may be a mistake. What does "top level" refer to anyway? I know that it seems apparent, but is it? Are the "top level" members of ISKCON, the Rtviks (who cannot be excluded in any invitation to devate), or Srila Narayana Maharajas disciples necessarily the most qualified to debate the claims made of SNM for or against him? If they are not, and supposing one side looses the debate simply because the topmost person that they offer is not capable of succesfully challenging the opposition, might that not only serve to further increase confusion, or worse? How bout opening the debate up to anyone who has a stake in this, to the lowliest person to SNM himself?

Melvin Janardhana is on the mental platform and is criticizing you for what he cannot relish in that state, the wisdom of the heart, a far closer position to the Supersoul than is the cold and arid mind. Hari bol

PS Janardana I see that your from Vancouver B.C. If Partha das is still there, or Pasupati das you might avail yourself of their good association.

Melvin isn't a fool, and your speculation that Srila Prabhupada would call him that shows your own ignorance. Thay you think that you have any comprehension, and full comprehension of what Srila Prabhupada thought, why your just presumptuous. Melvin has some attachment to Srila Prabhupada, you have an attachment to supposing that you know who Srila Prabhupada would criticize. Why don't you start with yourself? Why don't you say that you are fool number one, because you don't think that you are? You think your better than Lord Caitanya? Hari bol

Of course "lite" is a relative term.Aperson in a lite tracnce can be certified dead my a qualified physician, buried, and then dug up and still be in a lite trance by anothers consideration, although the person experiencing this trance is very deep, completely overcome. This is practiced in some of the Carribian countries by the natives as a strong form of social protest, usually against some money grubbing swindler and disruptor of family traditions and violator of the rules of good social behavior. Hari bol

“Through various processes of meditation one's mind is expanded and the understandings of matter become much greater." Most Westerners think of meditation as only consisting of attempts to clear the mind or some intellectual exercise, they do not think of it as penetrative but as entirely receptive. "All matter is based on sound, so through sound it can be manipulated." Sound creates electro-magnetic fields, etc. "Further more, the physical realm of our experience exists on the subtle mental realm.” How profound. A single sentence yet its implications are staggering. Everything that we see, the sun, the moon, the entire universe appears before our conscious perception nowhere else except there inside of our own tiny heads. We often mistake what appears thus within our minds eye as empty images, vacant of substance but this is not truly the case. We of the West have been conditioned to think of the physical realm as entirely distinct from the mental realm, the Cartesian split, but the mind is also a material realm, possessed of subtle substance, subtle elements. “ Those who have conscious access to that realm can know and do things that we would consider to be mystical. In Western occultism this trance state condition is referred to as semi-comatose lucidity, where one is conscious during the dream state and where dreaming is directed. Hari bol