cbrahma
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Posts posted by cbrahma
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Krishna is in our hearts and is always accompanying us EVERYWHERE, therefore He can also externally manifest here on the planet in the representative form of the Guru – if you really want.
He doesn't have to manifest externally. Bodily conception is ignorance.
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hmmmm. I didn't start out thinking it was about living in the temple, but I guess that's what is amounts to.Temple life is ok if you're in your twenties, thirties, maybe even forty. After that, the stress is way too much. Most presidents want to see productivity , money coming in etc...
It's really sad to see how many older devotees have been disenfranchised, even kicked out.
There is no retirement program - other than hitting the street. It's cold-blooded and scary. If you've spent most of your life in a temple without building a job resume, or retirement fund, you're basically homeless. Like I say, it's cold-blooded. I thank my lucky stars I didn't stay.
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Bodily conception is ignorance.
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It's magic you're talking - not reality. So many have a physical guru - so many have fallen due to religious arrogance. No thanks. Bodily conception is ignorance. ISKCON - the guru vendor.
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Oh goodie! I will wish really really hard
and POOF - a guru will appear!If it doesn't happen, it means I'm not sincere.
For what reason I don't know- since you don't need a guru to be physically present for so many reasons that have been repeated over and over again.
I will give you a hint - because they can't be two places at once - and eventually leave their body.
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What does he have special magic couriers that send gurus that are really bona fide? Do they just descend from some other planet? Cause I haven't seen any so far.
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To have an embodied initiating Guru is very important, in fact all of us must seek such initiation.
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So much discussion has taken place on the subject of formal initiation that I don't want to start it up again. The conclusion that is obvious from the evidence is that diksa does not have to be formal. In fact some people have claimed to have been initiated in a dream. Others have been initiated by 'proxy' (ritivik) etc...
So formal diksa aside, especially considering so many disciples have minimal interaction with their diksa guru, if at all, there really isn't a critical need to have a physically present spiritual master.
I stress this for two reasons.
1. There are almost no bona fide spiritual masters extant that I would trust as far as I could throw them.
2. Formal diksa is a religious obsession - that ties into traditional ideas of succession, the very ideas that Bhaktisiddhanta rejected.
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"Money is the honey" - (Prabhupada)
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One problem I have with the so-called sadhana, at least how it's taught in ISCON - is the claim that the 'minimum' sadhana is chanting 16 rounds and following the four regulative principles.
But nobody accepts that really - it's just what is publicized.
You find out after accepting that sadhana that you have to not eat bhoga, which means you either have to eat food prepared and offered by a devotee or do it yourself. That is not as simple as it sounds, if you lead a life in the working world.
Then there's the whole issue about ghostyanandi and bhajananandi, preaching over chanting.
That is time and money expense right there, since in ISKCON at least, it means selling (and therefore buying) books.
Over and above that we have the initiation pressure - etc....
So there is no mininum sadhana. Even though sadhana implies regularity, there isn't one that seems acceptable other than full second intiation preacher who chants all his/her rounds. of course, being in that state of life pretty much precludes very much else (like making a living in the working world).
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These are nice words and nice ideals -
Where are the 'real' gurus and 'real' disciples?
The one's who dish out and receive formal diksa?
O that's right, it's all about sincerity, isn't it?
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Jaya Radhe, all places pastimes and attributes and above all the Name -
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Association with sadhus means one must know 'who is sadhu', just as one must know 'who is guru'. It isn't blind following.
Given that knowledge I find that such people are very very rare. I see Prabhupada. He is sahdu and guru. What is the difficulty?
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Well then let's burn the witches and stone the heretics, gas the Jews and murder those with glasses, eat the rich and kill your television.
NO NO NO NO NO NO! Well, maybe your television.Coulds Arjuna's war have been figurative? Steeped in meaning or a literal story from a book?
So killing can be for the good of all in general!! Says Krishna? You condone this? I will not kill a fruit fly or eat a cow, but I can kill for the good of all when Krishna tells me? Very dangerous...
Makes me want to pray feverently.
Hare Krishna x 1000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000
Om shanti shanti shanti Om x 1000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000
Sarve bavantu tsukinah
Sarve shantu nira maya
Sarve vadra ni paschantu
Makaschit dukkavahk vavette
OM shanti, shanti, shanti OM
likely spelled wrong and translated to:
May all be happy
May all be healthy
May all see goodness
May there be no suffering
OM peace, peace, peace OM
P.S. Please forgive me for finding fault in the above quote and making such an outlandish offensive exaggerated statement in response. Peace.
Namaste
There are impersonalists who take the Gita as allegorical. God would not ask anybody to kill, they say. War is evil. How could God condone it? If you read the Gita, Arjuna is just as doubtful about killing as you. But Arjuna is a ksatrya - it is his duty.
gatasun agatasums ca
nanusocanti panditah
SYNONYMS
sri-bhagavan uvaca -- the Supreme Personality of Godhead said; asocyan -- not worthy of lamentation; anvasocah -- you are lamenting; tvam -- you; prajna-vadan -- learned talks; ca -- also; bhashase -- speaking; gata -- lost; asun -- life; agata -- not past; asun -- life; ca -- also; na -- never; anusocanti -- lament; panditah -- the learned.
TRANSLATION
The Supreme Personality of Godhead said: While speaking learned words, you are mourning for what is not worthy of grief. Those who are wise lament neither for the living nor for the dead.
PURPORT
The Lord at once took the position of the teacher and chastised the student, calling him, indirectly, a fool. The Lord said, "You are talking like a learned man, but you do not know that one who is learned -- one who knows what is body and what is soul -- does not lament for any stage of the body, neither in the living nor in the dead condition." As explained in later chapters, it will be clear that knowledge means to know matter and spirit and the controller of both. Arjuna argued that religious principles should be given more importance than politics or sociology, but he did not know that knowledge of matter, soul and the Supreme is even more important than religious formularies. And because he was lacking in that knowledge, he should not have posed himself as a very learned man. As he did not happen to be a very learned man, he was consequently lamenting for something which was unworthy of lamentation. The body is born and is destined to be vanquished today or tomorrow; therefore the body is not as important as the soul. One who knows this is actually learned, and for him there is no cause for lamentation, regardless of the condition of the material body.
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Prabhupada's representative you mean? Yes God representative will come to you in the embodied form if you want, if you pray, if you learn to have faith in Krsna in the heart. Why not? Why does it have to be Prabhupada? His embodied pastimes on this planet finished in 1977, you don't think Krsna also has other great devotees here waiting for us to attract them by our helplessness? Do we genuinely feel helpless materially exhausted like that boy did in the Church?
The young boy in the story previously found many ‘gurus’ but none of them found him. He eventually saw through them all and just kept praying and new His Guru (Prabhupada), who found him eventually, was the answers to his helpless prayers back then 36 years ago
It's a question of what one really wants. This may mean that one can only accept Prabhupada through his books because of ISKCON's recent Crisis but remember, that has nothing to do with Krsna in our heart.
The world is always in crisis but the Guru ALWAYS represents Krishna within our own hearts, and is always somewhere here on the planet. Krsna WILL send an embodied initiating Guru when we are individually ready, when we think we need such association and personal embodied guidance.
If we are presently happy with book guidance and worshiping a photo of Prabhupada, then he is your instructing Guru
If Prabhupada is my guru, he leaves his body so now I don't have a physically present guru. I really desire to have him present (like you say), so, if he doesn't appear, it means I'm not sincere.
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The point here is the embodiment of Guru does exist if you want. Krsna will sent him if you want. It all depends on us.
So if I want Prabhupada to appear physically and he doesn't I'm not sincere.
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Very eloquent. If evolution is a vedic idea then why are hare krishnas criticizing it? For prabhupdas problem is that it was stolen from india and not about its correctness.
Hare Krishnas form the most confused religious group I have ever known.
Which 'Hare Krishnas' are criticizing it,(which I am not BTW)?
Prabhupada is criticizing Darwin and Darwinism, not the idea of evolution as such.
You are confused.
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Not only Prabhupada, but many mayavadis say the same thing. Am I trying to blaspheme all of them? If you claim evolution is a vedic idea, then please provide some evidence from the veda. And please enlighten us as to why it's demonic to conclude that life comes from matter.
Mayavadis say what? That evolution is vedic? I already explained that materialsim is not Vedanta. If you don't know why, that would take a whole education which is beyond the scope of one reply.
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really?? when prabhupada was criticized on this forum you and your friend were quick to label the critics as Prabhupada haters and vaishnava haters.
different standards, eh? prabhupada and his followers can label anyone as rascal but they cannot be subject to similar criticism.
Obviously blaspheming Prabhupada doesn't make you a Prabhupada-lover.
It isn't the fact of a label. It is the use of the word 'rascal' for the proper reason - that is, claiming a philosophy as one's own when it is not.
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Whoever thinks evolution is a vedic idea is seriously deluded. And I don't see anything demonic about asserting that life came from matter. One may or may not agree with it, but to call it demonic is quite silly, isn't it?
You seem quite determined to blaspheme Prabhupada. But spiritual evolution is a vedic idea whether you know it or not. If you don't see anything demonic about saying life comes from matter you don't understand the first thing about Vedanta.
Materialism is demonic - it is atheistic.
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Yet this indiividual calls himself goswami. He is just spouting platitudes, all material. According to Prabhupada, humanistic philanthropy is a fall down.
Pusta Krsna: Question fourteen. "It is said that the karma-kanda in the Vedas has almost gone out of use, except for a few rites which remain in vogue for marriage, sraddhas, etc. Is it advisable to revive the karma-kanda with its stress on the performance of various yajnas?"
Prabhupada: So that is not possible in this... Taking consideration of the time, circumstances, it is not possible. There are different kinds of karma-kandiya-yajna. It is expensive also and there is no expert brahmana to guide how to perform this yajna. So Kali-yuga, it is not possible to perform yajnas. Krte yad dhyayato visnum tretayam yajato makhaih [sB 12.3.52]. In the Treta-yuga yajnas were possible. Dvapare paricaryayam kalau tad dhari-kirtanat, that in this age of Kali-yuga the real yajna is hari-kirtana. Yajnaih sankirtana-prayair yajanti hi su-medhasah [sB 11.5.32]. Therefore those who are intelligent, having good brain substance, they take to this yajna, sankirtana-yajna. And practically we are experiencing, simply by sankirtana-yajna, even the lowest person in the sinful activities, he is becoming purified. So karma-kanda is, to revive them in this age is not possible. Neither jnana-kanda. That is also not possible. People are so fool and rascal that it is impossible. Therefore Narottama dasa Thakura said... He has condemned karma-kanda, jnana-kanda. Even it is properly done. Karma-kanda, by performing ritualistic ceremonies of karma-kanda, you can go to the heavenly planet. But what is the benefit there? You can enjoy there materialistic way of life in higher standard. That's all. You can live for a very, very long duration of period. But that does not mean that you become immortal. The demigods, they are called amara. Amara means they have got very long duration of life. Does not mean he is immortal. So by karma-kanda you can elevate yourself to the higher planetary system. Even it is properly done... And now it is not possible to do it properly. And even it is properly done, that is condemned. It is not required. Similarly jnana-kanda. Even it is properly done... You can merge yourself into the Brahman effulgence. But that is also not safe because in the sastra we see that aruhya krcchrena param padam tatah patanty adhah [sB 10.2.32]. Even one merges oneself into the impersonal Brahman, he again falls down. Patanty adhah. We have seen practical, in India many sannyasis, they elevate themselves by jnana-kanda, but because they cannot stay, they again come to the karma-kanda, philanthropy activities and hospitals and schools. That is their fall down. So either in karma-kanda or jnana-kanda you cannot achieve the real purpose of life. Therefore Narottama dasa Thakura has said, karma-kanda jnana-kanda sakali visera bandha. Either you accept karma-kanda or jnana-kanda, they're different pots of poison. Amrta boliya jeba khai. If by mistake you take poison, death is inevitable. Similarly, by karma-kanda, jnana-kanda nobody can derive any actual benefit. By upasana-kanda, that is the... The Vedas, Vedic ritualistic ceremony means there are three kandas: karma-kanda, jnana-kanda, and upasana-kanda. So upasana-kanda, there are recommendation of many, worship of many demigods. But the best upasana is Visnupasana. Visnor aradhanam sarvesam. Visnor aradhanam param. Om tad visnum paramam padam. There are different types of upasana recommendation, but the visnor aradhanam, worshiping Lord Visnu, that is the Supreme. That is Supreme. So gradually, there is elevation to karma-kanda, jnana-kanda, upasana-kanda, but in the Kali-yuga all these things are not possible to revive. Best directly give him the best upasana-kanda, Visnupasana, bhakti, everything will be automatically achieved by bhakti-marga.
So some mention of Visnu, Krsna must be there, if one is a real goswami. Also, to all traditional 'Vedic' Hindus , please note - in the Kali-yuga all these things are not possible to revive.
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Who is the guy in this video?? I would like to look into researching him some more..
He calls himself Sri Bhagavan.
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Considering the hateful, bigoted speech above, is it any wonder that religious people aren't taken seriously? Calling someone 'rascal' is hardly the way to convince people...but then again, religion and tolerance don't go together.
I hardly see hatred in calling a spade a spade. Since evolution is originally a Vedic idea, then passing it as one's own is a sort of rascaldom, especially when it is mixed with the demonic philosophy that life came from matter.
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The jata-gosani are a hereditary caste of so-called spiritual masters. Their qualification to give initiation is too often limited to the boast of family connections to associates of Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu or to disciples of these associates. A famous example of such a family is the so-called Nityanandavamsa. They claim seminal descent from Lord Nityananda through persons who were actually disciples, not sons, of Lord Nityananda's only and childless son Sri Virabhadra Gosvami.
The jata-gosani use of "gosvami" as a family name is a deviation peculiar to this apasampradaya. Though sunken in mundane family affairs, they think themselves as important as the renounced gosvamis of the Gaudiya Sampradaya.
"One who is still in family life should not misuse the title gosvami. Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakur did not recognize the caste gosvamis because they were not in the line of the six Gosvamis in the renounced order who were direct disciples of Lord Caitanya -- namely, Srila Rupa Gosvami, Srila Sanatana Gosvami, Srila Bhatta Raghunatha Gosvami, Sri Gopala Bhatta Gosvami, Sri Jiva Gosvami and Srila Raghunatha das Gosvami. Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakur said that the grhastha-ashrama, or the status of family life, is a sort of concession for sense gratification. Therefore a grhastha should not falsely adopt the title gosvami. The ISKCON movement has never conferred the title gosvami upon a householder. Although all the sannyasis we have initiated in ISKCON are young, we have awarded them the titles of the renounced order of life, svami and gosvami, because they have completely dedicated their lives to preach the cult of Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu." (Caitanya-caritamrta, Adi 12.27, purport)
A popular superstition in Bengal, alluded to in the purport of Caitanya-caritamrta, Madhya 10.23, is that persons born in caste gosvami families are automatically uttama-adhikaris. Thus the title Prabhupada is theirs by birthright. The Gaudiya Vaishnava Sampradaya rejects this.
"It is said, phalena pariciyate: one is recognized by the result of his actions. In vaishnava society, there are many types of vaishnavas. Some of them are called gosvamis, some are called svamis, some are prabhus, and some are prabhupada. One is not recognized, however, simply by such a name. A spiritual master is recognized as an actual guru when it is seen he has changed the character of his disciples." (Caitanya-caritamrta, Antya 3.143, purport)
In Vrindavan, many of the important temples are managed by caste gosvamis. The history of two such prominent families illustrates how the jata-gosani contamination can divert even highly-qualified persons from the path of the great acaryas. To avoid the unpleasantries of controversy, some names are omitted.
One clan has temples in Mathura, Jatipur, Gokul and Kaman. They descend from a brahmana who is a famous contemporary of Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu who, as described in Sri Caitanya-caritamrta, became formally linked with Gaudiya Vaishnava Sampradaya when he received initiation from Sri Gadadhara Pandita. Srila Prabhupada remarked that Lord Caitanya accepted him as a great scholar, but not necessarily as a great devotee. At Govardhana, he took over the management of a temple that had been established by a great Gaudiya Vaishnava acarya. During this time, the learned brahmana associated with the six Gosvamis, especially Rupa and Sanatana. Because his own men lacked training, Gaudiya Vaishnavas were appointed to do the puja under his supervision.
The brahmana had two sons; after he left the world in the year 1530, Srila Raghunatha das Gosvami requested one son to take over the temple management. The temple duties continued to be shared between Gaudiya Vaishnavas and the learned brahmana's disciples until around the year 1550, when an intrigue was begun against the Gaudiya devotees. Once, while they were worshiping the Deity, an envious disciple of the brahmana set fire to the homes of the Gaudiya pujaris and drove them out. Thereafter, the Deity was claimed as the sole property of the brahmana's clan. (In 1699, due to threat of Muslim attack, the Deity vacated Vrindavan and eventually came to Rajasthan.)
Though the brahmana's son was not part of the intrigue, he took no steps to heal the rupture with the Gaudiya Sampradaya. To block a challenge to his authority from among his father's disciples, he appointed his seven sons as acaryas and willed that only they and their descendants could use the title "Gosvami Maharaja" and give initiation. Later on, the family propagated a myth that the great brahmana's son was an incarnation of Krishna; the same pseudo-divinity was appropriated by succeeding generations and used as means of explaining away the "amorous pastimes" of some of the clan.
The second line of Vrindavan caste gosvamis under discussion was started by someone who took sannyasa from Gopala Bhatta Gosvami. As if in imitation of Lord Nityananda, he later married two sisters and claimed that he had been ordered to do so by Sri Krishna personally. The Gaudiya Vaishnava community disapproved both his deed and defense. In the year 1585, he established a mandira near Kaliya Ghat. The caste gosvamis who manage this mandira today are descendants of his first son. Descendents of his second son manage another famous Vrindavan temple.
This clan takes a dim view of what they think are the unnecessary austerities of the gosvamis of the Gaudiya Vaishnava Sampradaya. Krishna loves his devotees, they argue, and He becomes pleased when He sees them living a life of material comfort and sense gratification. They uphold their founder's example as superior to that of the Six Gosvamis. One Priyadas of this clan composed a work called Suslokamanimala in which he asserts that the founder was the spiritual master of Sanatana Gosvami and Jiva Gosvami. With this and other fabrications, they defend their apasampradaya as the genuine sampradaya.
Several historical accounts, including the biography of Srinivasa Acarya entitled Prema-vilasa, relate that the founder met his death by having his head chopped off, either by robbers or by a disgruntled pujari.
In 1932, the caste gosvamis of Vrindavan opposed the Vraja Mandala Parikrama of Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakur and his Gaudiya Matha disciples on the grounds that he had deviated from the Vedic system by offering the sacred thread to persons not of brahminical parentage. Srila Prabhupada explained the fallacy of the jata-gosani in this regard in a letter to Acyutananda Swami: "Regarding the validity of the brahminical status as we accept it, because in the present age there is no observance of the garbhadhana ceremony, even a person born in a brahmana family is not considered a brahmana, he is called dvijabandhu or unqualified son of a brahmana. Under the circumstances, the conclusion is that the whole population is now sudra, as it is stated kalau sudra sambhava. So for sudras there is no initiation according to the Vedic system, but according to the pancaratrika system initiation is offered to a person who is inclined to take Krishna consciousness."
In Bengal, besides caste gosvamis who at least have a valid genealogical link to some vaishnava of the past, there are even pretenders whose claim to the name "gosvami" lacks any foundation whatsoever. Many of the important temples and holy places connected with Lord Caitanya's pastimes remain under jata-gosani control. Up until the early part of this century, they held the lower-caste vaishnavas in an iron grip of ignorance and exploitation.
Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakur challenged the jati-gosani in such works as Jaiva Dharma and Hari Nama Cintamani by proclaiming that it is not enough to accept a spiritual master merely on the basis of his caste. Before initiation, the candidate must be completely satisfied that the initiator is fully conversant with the scriptures and can lift his disciples out of ignorance. The guru must be of spotless character: if he is addicted to sinful acts, even those he may have already initiated must reject him. Bhaktivinoda's books unleashed a wave of reform in Bengal that pushed the jata-gosani into a defensive stance. But the confrontation came to open war when his son, Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati, took over the Gaudiya mission.
In 1912, he was invited to attend a samminlani (assembly) of vaishnavas sponsored by the Maharaja of Kossimbazar. But some jata-gosani and their sahajiya supporters prevented him from giving a public lecture; in protest, he fasted for four days straight. According to the account of his disciple Sambidananda das, Acarya Siddhanta Sarasvati refuted all the arguments placed before him by the caste's proponents in a discussion separate from the main program. The jata-gosani thus learned to fear Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati as the singlemost threat to their privileged existence.
After taking sannyasa in 1918, Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati mounted a concerted effort to smash the influence of the jata-gosani even in their strongholds. He fearlessly toured Jessore and Khulna (now in Bangladesh), the home turf of Priyanath Nandi, who was the leading spokesman of the caste gosvamis. Priyanatha met defeat in a public debate held at the village of Toothpada.
Things came to a head in February-March 1925, just as the Gaudiya Matha began nine days of a Navadvipa parikrama leading up to that year's Gaura Purnima festivities. The party of devotees, numbering several thousand and personally lead by Srila Bhaktisiddhanta, was viciously attacked by goonda hirelings of the jata-gosani when it entered the city of Navadvip without paying a tax for maintenance of caste gosvami temples. Armed with brickbats and other weapons, the goondas charged the elephant procession, injuring many pilgrims. The shocked public sided with the Gaudiya Matha devotees and the pilgrimage continued under police protection. This incident permanently tarnished the reputation and influence of the jata-gosani. Overnight, their stubborn opposition to Srila Bhaktisiddhanta's preaching lost all force.
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Perhaps by creationist?
Good bet
such as a community; if the collective association benefits the 'life to continue' an evolved association develops.
Ever notice how birds clean tics from the various beast? Or how bees, pollinate the flowers; the association 'evolved'
But what makes the most sense in reasoning and comprehensive understanding:
creation or evolution?
Do we look at dinosaur bones and simply believe God put them in the ground to employ people?
Where did dinasours come from? Who came from dinasours? The earth is silent as a tomb. There are no traces of neo-dinasours or dinasours-on-their-way-to-becoming-bird skeletons etc...
the minimum that isn't
in Spiritual Discussions
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One has to be practical, live in a normal state of life. It's not about the 'taking over' so that practical living becomes impossible and I never believed it was about living in the temple. Beyond the sixteen rounds and the four regs, everything becomes impractical.