realist

<!-- BEGIN TEMPLATE: bbcode_quote -->Quote:

<TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=6 width="100%" border=0><TBODY><TR><TD style="BORDER-RIGHT: #666666 1px solid; PADDING-RIGHT: 3ex; BORDER-TOP: #666666 1px solid; PADDING-LEFT: 3ex; BORDER-LEFT: #666666 1px solid; BORDER-BOTTOM: #666666 1px solid" bgColor=#e0e0e0>Originally Posted by Suchandra

Good points, learning how to walk. Could be added, for those who know how to walk, learn to follow.

You might call learning to follow = learning to walk, but when Krishna sends His representative to give us knowledge it should be clear that Krishna's representative explains things in such a way that nobody has to stumble - it is clearly explained for all classes of sincere men to understand.

Interesting point below, bhakti starts when your heart is tuned to follow. Our mind says, no, this has to be changed. Just like Indians, they are so ashamed about the violence in Bhagavad-gita, they want it changed - it is all allegory - "there was no battlefield".

Without being able to actually follow the acarya and accept his words as they are, there is no question of bhakti.

Or like HG Sriman Amara prabhu is suggesting, "Prabhupada's books are a disgrace".

http://www.chakra.org/discussions/BMMay05_08.html

"So bhaktyā anuvṛtyā. Anuvṛtyā means following. Not that I have become more than my guru, I can invent something. No. Bhakti means, sādhu-mārgānugamanam.

You have to follow the sādhu, the ācārya. That is bhakti. Bhakti does not means that I am so learned I can manufacture something. That is rascal. Caitanya Mahāprabhu says, gopī-bhartuḥ pada-kamalayor dāsa-dāsa-dāsa-dāsānudāsaḥ.

That is bhakti.

You have to become servant of the servant of the servant of the servant. Not that at a point you become suddenly very learned scholar, and you do not remain a servant, but you want to become a master, to dictate the guru.

That is rascal.

That will not help us. Here it is said, bhaktyānuvṛtyā. Bhaktyā, bhaktyā, bhakti means sevā. Bhaja sevayā. When bhakti, bhajata sukti. Bhaja means

sevayā. Tad viddhi praṇipātena paripraśnena sevayā [Bg. 4.34]. So we have to understand this bhakti-yoga by bhaktyānuvṛtyā, not otherwise.

Not that I am very learned scholar, I can give a different interpretation and… No, that is not bhakti. Bhaktyānuvṛtyā vitṛṣṇayā dvandva-titikṣayā ca."

Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 5.5.14

by His Divine Grace A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupāda

Vṛndāvana, November 2, 1976

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<!-- END TEMPLATE: bbcode_quote -->Very inspiring prabhu

 

 

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Nrsimha was extremely happy to be part of the miracle of the birth of his beautiful daughter, Mia Vraja Rupa Conn, who was born on Feb.2, 1999. He doted on her like he was the mother, carrying her around for the first 6 months without hardly ever putting her down.

Whenever she even so much as made a little whimper he would rush upstairs to see if she was okay. He felt so much love for her because he saw that she was a special gift from the Supreme Lord for him to love and care for. Mia’s birth was probably the highest moment in Nrsimha’s life, and watching her grow gave him immense joy.

His drug use cycled again and again, and the mother of Mia also participated in drug use. Their family was doomed to fail, as the parents were two dysfunctional addicts unable or unwilling to stay away from the drugs they were addicted to. Both of them entered rehab, the baby was cared for by the maternal grandmother, and the chaos of lives in turmoil affected all of the family members on all sides.

Nrsimha was living in NYC for the last 3 years and part of his reasoning was to have access to the methadone clinics there. He suffered from PTSD, anxiety disorders, and mood swings which were diagnosed as Bi -polar. Was his state of mind due to drug use, hormonal imbalances, past abuses while living at the ashram, or because of a combination of all those elements together?

All I know is that when I look at the life of my oldest son and try to put myself in his shoes so that I can get a sense of what he experienced, I become enraged at myself for not protecting him when he was small, and not seeking counselling for him when he began living with us again.

His greatest wish and what he was always working towards was to set himself up so that he would be able to have his daughter come stay with him for visits. He had plans to go back to school and finish college, purchase a house somewhere close to NV so that his daughter who lives in PA, could come stay with him for vacations etc. and he wanted to provide for Mia so that she would never be without and she could have the chance to explore her connection and roots with the devotee community.

These things have not manifested yet and my son died tragically in NYC on April 2, 2005 from a suspicious fall down a series of outdoor, concrete steps. Detectives and forensics are still investigating the cause and scenario of what happened but they state that it looks as though Nrsimha was assaulted, robbed and then either fell or was pushed down the stairs.

He then succumbed to hypothermic conditions. He left his body while alone in NYC, a man suffering from the hellish conditions of this material existence. But he never gave up trying and I told him repeatedly, that I believed in him, and that if he wanted to do something and he stayed focused on what that was, that he could certainly do it.

Nrsimha was a loving person and I think that everyone who got to know him saw that sparkle in him. He was compassionate and kind. He cared for others deeply. There are many pictures I have of him laughing and having a good time with his Gurukula buddies. Not all of his life was miserable because there were many beautiful, sincere moments when he knew that his upbringing in KC, was a special unique experience.

He had not resolved how the abuses and neglect fit into the larger picture yet, and he compensated for the inner pain and anger by drugging himself until he was numb, but when he was lucid, he told me that I had given him something that he knew was for his spiritual advancement.

He just could not figure out though, if the movement was authentic and good, or if it was damaging to the growth of the individual spirit soul. I think alot of Gurukulis and their parents who suffer from past digressions, abuses, and failure of trust within the ISKCON structure, also are probably struggling with this dichotomy.

And so if anything can be learned from the tragic death of my son, I think he would want what is not right to be corrected, and for all abusers and power-mongers who are covered by the false illusory energy, to be removed, so as to let what is right and good, develop and flourish.

Parents, love and cherish your children and honor their unique spiritual personalities. Don’t hand then over to anyone else while they are young- they need you and all the love, hugs, smiles and encouragement you can give them. Children thrive on such loving exchanges and I saw this happen with my son. The first 4 years of his life, where I took care of him, loved him and encouraged him, he flourished and was a happy, vibrant child.

He had a sense of confidence and he felt safe. This is what children need as they grow up. Then when they get to the age where they can make inquiries as to the nature of the soul and one’s connection with the Supreme Lord, they will pursue this on their own, driven by their own spiritual desires.

We have to be careful that no further harm takes place, and somehow the movement will either falter or survive from the ill after-effects of the ugly hidden secrets, that emerged and revealed to the entire world, that something wasn’t right with the thinking and strategies of the movement’s Gurukulis and management.

Part of my nature is to be very blunt when things need to be stated. I usually am fairly tolerant but when my sense of justice gets riled, I will speak up. Part of my work now as mother to Nrsimha is to do whatever I can to correct past injustices to our children. As a social worker, part of my work is to protect children from abuse and neglect and I think part of that drive to do this work is based on the experience my son had while in the ashrama. I had a memorial service for him on April 7th in the town I live in and where my children and I have gone to school.

We had Nrsimha’s picture with his daughter put up in the front of the small church, and his brother Prahlad had brought a Deity garland all the way from WV, which I draped around his picture. It was a very moving service with the minister stating that God has many names and even though he may not understand all of them, ultimately they all point to one Supreme Lord, and I totally agree with him. The eulogy consisted of a letter I wrote entitled, “An Open Letter from a Mother to her Oldest Son” and then was followed by several prayers Nrsimha had favored and shared with me.

One was a prayer by Black Elk (Nrsimha’s great-great-great paternal grandmother is native American) and the other was a Sanskrit proverb he found one time at a NA meeting. A reading of a Bhagavad-Gita verse “For the soul there is never birth nor death, nor having once been” and purport by Srila Prabhapada followed this.

The final part of the memorial was the playing of George Harrison’s song “My Sweet Lord” because George was such an effective musician for introducing the western world to the love he had for chanting Hare Krsna.

There will also be a Gurukuli reunion and wedding (Bhimasena dasa) taking place in NV this July 9 and 10. On the 11th a Memorial service for Nrsimha dasa will take place, with some of his ashes being distributed in NV, followed by a feast in his honor. All Gurukulis, good teachers (they weren’t all corrupt) and parents who knew Nrsimha are welcome to come.

The NV devotees have welcomed me and my family to come to NV and they will host the memorial. Some of Nrsimha’s ashes are being distributed here in Maine where I live. There is a beautiful white-water fall nearby where people like to hike to, to feel the power and beauty of nature.

It is here that I will release the urn of ashes I have here with me. In addition, I would want some of his ashes distributed in one of the holy rivers in India. I don’t think I will be taking that journey, but I would like to ask Radhanatha Swami if he could do it for me when he makes his return to India in the fulltime.

If any of you would like to read my letter to my son that was read at his memorial here in Fort Kent, I can either post it or send it via email. I find that writing some of my inner thoughts is helping me to recover from the sense of loss I am experiencing by the death of my son. Thank you for listening to me and what I know and need to say.

AGTSP, Daksi dd

October 9, 2006 - Posted by chaitanyamangala | Gurukula, Gurukuli, Hare Krishna, ISKCON, New Vrindaban | | 2 Comments

Thank you for that.

I am the mother of four krsna kids so to speak. I joined in the early eighties so have been spared the torture of the peer pressures that resulted in giving up children to unqualified people. I have my resentments as is natural after 24 years but i know that there is something good in the texts, it is just the transmission is sometimes tainted by the , I hate to say it, unworthy.

I am hoping my children get a balanced view of community life and learn how to negotiate the complexities of contradiction by expecting them instead of experiencing stunned surprise. It is after all the reformation ground for the spirit soul and we are going to blow it here and there.

I read a novel recently about slavery in America. There is some real pain there if ever there was any. It is by Toni Morison, Beloved. Somehow in illustrating the human torture that is existence, our existence she is able to relieve and dissipate resentment.

I don’t know how she does it but the healing in the book is so profound as to push me to suggest you read it even if it isn’t technically scripture. I know Guru lies in many places so I choose to take from where I can. I am studying and was compelled to read it but I do not regret it.

I want to be relieved of the constant cycle of anger and resentment. We can’t really go on otherwise. We become as bad as the ones we consider bad and then what. Bit like a classroom of kids. Who struck first and where does it end? I was abused as a child too but in all fairness the statistics tell us an awful lot were and are. The horror is in the lie we told the children. All would be well in our house. I guess that is the real abuse. Pretending we were and are more than we really are.

Thanking you , gopapaptni. [ Aus]

Comment by gopapatni | September 15, 2007

I only just now read your whole letter. I am truly sorry for your loss and i hope you can find a way to ease or find whatever it is that makes a day more bearable in the living. I hope it is ok for you and your son. Words fail me but thank you for being so willing to share.

gopa. Comment by gopapatni | September 15, 2007

 

 

 

 

Currently there are 10 “high risk” Kulis from the 1970’s and 80s living in the Los Angeles area. Nearly half of them are considered “chronically homeless.” My guess is that there are similar situations in other parts of the world.

The ratio of people that grew up in ISKCON who are now experiencing mental difficulties seems unnaturally high when compared to other groups. Given the environment in which we grew up, it is disturbing, but not unexpected.

We’ve got to keep making this an important topic, both amongst our peers and throughout ISKCON.

Let’s honour the memories of

 

Nrsmha dasa,

Dhruva dasa,

Arjuna dasa,

Jiva dasa,

Ramanuja dasa,

Ananda dasa,

Abhimanyu etc,

by working together to help those who may be going through an extra difficult part of their lives. Let’s look out for some of the most vulnerable members of our Society.

 

 

 

 

 

”Nrsimha was a loving person and I think that everyone who got to know him saw that sparkle in him. He was compassionate and kind. He cared for others deeply. There are many pictures I have of him laughing and having a good time with his Gurukula buddies.

Not all of his life was miserable because there were many beautiful, sincere moments when he knew that his upbringing in KC, was a special unique experience.

He had not resolved how the abuses and neglect fit into the larger picture yet, and he compensated for the inner pain and anger by drugging himself until he was numb, but when he was lucid, he told me that I had given him something that he knew was for his spiritual advancement. He just could not figure out though, if the movement was authentic and good, or if it was damaging to the growth of the individual spirit soul.

I think alot of Gurukulis and their parents who suffer from past digressions, abuses, and failure of trust within the ISKCON structure, also are probably struggling with this dichotomy.

And so if anything can be learned from the tragic death of my son, I think he would want what is not right to be corrected, and for all abusers and power-mongers who are covered by the false illusory energy, to be removed, so as to let what is right and good, develop and flourish.”

Daksi dasi gives insights into a parent’s perspective on ISKCON’s Gurukula system in the late 70’s and early 80’s and her relationship with her son throughout the years. I include this article because a parent who sent her child to gurukula wrote it and because it discusses the untimely death of a gurukuli who struggled with his past.

I attended Nrsmha’s memorial service in New Vrindaban July 2005. I sat with many of his fellow Gurukulis, parents, former teachers, and community members. We cried hard and long. It is a sad time when we gather to mourn the loss of one of our peers. These are the times when the term “ISKCON Gurukula Veterans” seems most appropriate.

In Honour of My Son Nrsmha dasa (Elijah B. Long)

Daksi devi dasi

Posted April 19, 2005

It has been 16 days now since the passing away of my oldest son, Nrsimha dasa who was 30 years old. I feel that I can now sit down and write this memorial message in his honor.

The process of grieving is especially intense for mothers who have so many emotional ties to the children they have carried in their wombs and then nurtured and cared for. My son was 30 years old, but I still saw him as my child who needed my loving words and support. He sought me out to reveal his inner sufferings and I anguished with him as he fought to make sense of his human experience.

My family and I joined the movement in 1976 when we moved to the Boston temple from northern Maine. I moved there with my son who was one and a half years old at the time, and then a few months later my husband moved in.

When my small son and I moved to the temple, he did not yet have a devotee name and it took a few days of thinking about what name to give him. The temple president at that time was Aja dasa and his first wife was Vijaya devi and they had a 3 year old daughter Cintamani. In any regards, my little rambunctious boy had a big voice and so Vijayadevi said “why not call him Nrsimha dasa” since he could be heard loud and clear and was as bold and fearless as Lord Nrsimhadeva.

I loved the name and so my baby boy began his spiritual life at the tender age of 1 1/2 with the name Nrsimha dasa.

Nrsimha was at the age where children learn to speak and he quickly began singing and chanting. The temple room was set up so that the men were up front near the altar and the women were in the back, near the Vyasasana. Nrsimha as a 1 1/2 year old baby who had been walking since he was 10 months old, would run up front during arati and I would hold my breath, not knowing if he was going to do something he shouldn’t like step on the altar.

In fact I think he did once, and the brahmacaris up front quickly realized that they would have to take him under their wings and teach him to chant and dance with them, since he didn’t want to stay in the back with the women. He learned very quickly to jump up and down, dance, pass the flower around for everyone to smell and to pay humble obeisance when it was needed. It was a joy to watch him evolve into a little Vaishnava, who brightened up the atmosphere with his happy, vibrance.

Our family lived at the Boston temple for 2 years and when Nrsimha was 3 years old, we decided to move to a farm community where a Gurukula was already running. We were preparing for him to enter school when he was a little older.

New Vrindavan produced some Brijabasi Spirit newsletters, and we found stacks of them in a closet at the Boston temple. We read them and thought that NV sounded like an idyllic community- the perfect place to move and be a part of. We made our move and it was shocking at first, because the community was very rundown, the prasadam was of poor quality, and cleanliness for home and body was difficult because facilities were primitive and third world like.

But the spirit, strength, commitment, vision, and resolve of the Brijabasis was endearing. It is what kept me there even though I often would think that maybe we had made a mistake by moving there, giving up any personal monies we had in our possession, and committing ourselves to help in the growth of this community.

In the Brijabasi Spirit newsletters, the community had been touted as a dynamic thriving farm community with holistic simple living arrangements, but what we encountered was a community that was striving for that ideal goal, but had not yet actualised it.

I resolved myself to jumping into the mindset of the idea behind NV as a spiritual pilgrimage site, and before I knew it the months and years went by and I played my part in the community.

I took care of children, cleaned, cooked and then eventually was teaching academics for the second graders at our day-school. We all thrived on the wonderful experience of helping with Prabhupada’s Palace as it was being built and there were many intensely beautiful, enlivening times during the growth of NV into the dynamic spiritual epicenter it evolved into.

When Nrsimha was 4 years old, it was suggested that he was ready to join the other boys in the ashram, at the old Nandagram Boys’ School. Aycutananda (Chutie) had also turned 4, so the two of them went into the ashrama at the same time.

Both Meghamala and I had qualms and doubts about relinquishing our sons over to the brahmacari ashrama, but the philosophy of not being on the bodily platform and not being emotionally attached to our children, was engrained in our minds, and we did what every other parent did at that time, and that was to harden ourselves to the mothering instincts in our hearts, and bear the discomfort of sending them off, to live from that day onward, away from us.

We bolstered our mixed emotional state of mind by thinking that they were in good hands (brahminical teachers), that they were making great spiritual advancement, and that this was what Prabhupada wanted. We saw our children infrequently, maybe once a week for a few hours on Sunday, and sometimes not even once a week.

It was really painful to go through this and I know that years later, my son told me that it was very scary for them- somewhat like being abandoned. (When he was in 8th grade, he had to read a book for English class called “They Cage the Animals at Night” about a family of little boys who were put into the foster care orphanages by their parents when they were small, and he told me, “mom, this is just like what it was like for us”. )

The boys learned that if they couldn’t have loving nurturance from the parents or teachers, then they would reach out to each other. When they were afraid or hurt or saw that something wasn’t fair (hypocritical ashrama teachers who preached hardened boot-camp philosophy and resorted to severe, abusive measures to try and train the boys to be enthusiastically submissive, and then smiled and patted the boys on the head when in the presence of the mothers and fathers)-

the boys emotionally bonded together and put their little arms around each other to comfort the other when one had been severely chastised, beaten, twitched, punched or humiliated. The boys became survivors in the sense that they figured out how to navigate the system set up in the gurukula, so that they could avoid getting the punishments.

They knew their parents weren’t going to come and save them, they knew the ashrama teachers presented a more holistic version of what went on at the ashrama to the parents than what was really going on, but it took years for them to finally have had enough and break free.

Two of the boys ran away from the ashrama and went to their parents and told them what types of things had been going on behind closed doors. The boys had all gone to Vrindavan India for one year when Nrsimha was 10 years old, and apparently the punishments and abuses were more severe there than what they had experienced in NV.

The parents on the other hand, thought that their sons were going to have the most elevated spiritual experience at the most holiest of dhamas. What went wrong?

All of this Gurukula atrocity has created an embarrassing horrific blemish, which has made all the world look at the movement and think what type of strange cult is this?

How could these people have sent their kids to these schools where all this abuse took place? These are the type of questions that are posed to me from people in the larger community around me, and from the world of academics while I work on my master’s degree in social work.

I look inside myself and I know that Srila Prabhupada had a beautiful heart and a wonderful vision of infusing the western world with the ancient, authentic Vaisnava tradition, and therefore I know that whatever happened was not meant to hurt anyone, but rather to create a sanctified holistic approach to the Bhakti-yoga pathway.

What I have concluded in my mind is that the men in the movement (and some of the women) became tainted with their inflated egos and they were intoxicated with a sense of status and power. This became their undoing as they abused the common devotees who worked so hard to attain some spiritual salvation and enlightment.

The children were not seen as beautiful Vaikuntha souls, but rather as not pure enough, and tainted with personal deficits that needed to be rooted out of them. The parents of the children saw their children as special gifts from heaven for them to love and care for, but when they turned their children over to the brahmacaris and sannyasis who headed up the schools, their status as devotees was put on a low rung of the hierarchal ladder.

My son came back to live with us when he was 12 years old and the schools were folding and closing down. The abuses the children suffered was circulating and surfacing. We moved away from NV in 1987 and a large part of that decision was because of a sense of living a false hypocritical life, and now the real truth of the matter was emerging, and it was ugly. Kirtanananda was becoming more crazy with power and denial and it was a nightmare.

I think, how could I have been so much under the illusion that he was a trustworthy advanced soul, carrying out Prabhupada’s vision? Instead I saw a mad man, a man who had fooled so many of us into dictatorial, unthinking adherence to his decisions and ways. That included the way the boys ashramas were run and the lack of good facility and status they placed on the value of the children of the movement.

Nrsimha finished grade school, high school and even went on to do 3 years of college at the Univ. of Maine at Fort Kent, majoring in Environmental Science. He constantly struggled with the past abuses he had suffered from in the ashrama for the 8 years he lived there from 4-12 years old.

I never sought counselling for him of which I now totally regret because there may have been a chance he could have recovered and been able to move forward with his life, making sense of all he had lived through. Instead I thought that our religious faith would give us the strength to work things out on our own, within our family setting.

Nrsimha rebelled against any adult authority at that point and he displayed behaviours that are consistent with adolescents who have been abused- juvenile infractions, alcohol and drug use, risk taking, etc. But when he reached his college years he began to understand and appreciate why people would follow a yoga path or undertake the spiritual journey inward to understanding the nature of the Supreme Lord and the nature of spirit-soul.

He seemed happier and when we took a trip to NV for our first reunion after being away from the community for 9 years, he told me that he wanted to take a break from college, and spend some time figuring things out about his life, but most especially to be back with his god-brothers, his gurukuli buddies, those guys that he was emotionally bonded to because they had formed their own family when they had lived in the ashrama together. Alot of the Gurukulis were raging about the abuses they had suffered and how nothing had ever been done to resolve the situation.

A big part of their rage was the fact that they believed the abuse was still going on with any of the younger children who might have been in any of the surviving gurakulas. They wanted to make sure no other children would ever have to go through what they had suffered from, and they wanted to make sure the older devotees in management positions wouldn’t just sweep away the mess and try to hide it away as though it could easily be dismissed.

All of this added fuel to the fire raging inside Nrsimha and created a more intense disgruntled, sense of identity. Most of the Gurukulis, who experienced abuse, turned to substance use of some sort. Especially the boys, because men tend to abuse substances to cover up their pain and discomfort, while many women learn to dull their pain with eating disorders.

By putting something in the mouth, the primal connection of some type of nurturance through oral gratification takes place and dulls the primal needs. It is totally dysfunctional and becomes first a disorder and later a compulsive disease. My son began using hard drugs when he was working in the big cities during his time away from us, and back with his old school mates. X1

It was his choice to seek out drugs and to take the chance of getting addicted, and being a risk taker, he plunged into the darkness of that world. He tried to recover and withdraw away from the drugs, but he relapsed many times.

This was a very scary time for his dad, his siblings and me. During one brief time of rehab clarity he met a young woman who worked at a devotee candle making shop in NV. They connected emotionally and she became pregnant almost right away early in their relationship.

Quote:

<TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=6 width="100%" border=0><TBODY><TR><TD style="BORDER-RIGHT: #666666 1px solid; PADDING-RIGHT: 3ex; BORDER-TOP: #666666 1px solid; PADDING-LEFT: 3ex; BORDER-LEFT: #666666 1px solid; BORDER-BOTTOM: #666666 1px solid" bgColor=#e0e0e0>Originally Posted by Theist

 

We don't climb our way into the sphere of the Absolute. That plane is beyond the reach of our towers, space ships and intellectual constructs.

 

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<!-- END TEMPLATE: bbcode_quote -->We cannot even see the material heavenly celestial worlds or the sub-space material hellish worlds with our advanced material technology that built the Hubble telescope and the Electron microscope, let alone Vaikuntha.

 

We cannot even percieve the subtle ethereal material body that is covered by the gross biological material body with such mundane primitive technology either.

 

And mundane science will never ever view even the subtle material universe with such mundane science

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• 'It's not just only the bad devotees who have caused all the problems in ISKCON, the blame and responsibility also must be shared by all those good hard working dedicated devotees with good intentions, who have stood by and did nothing, even when they KNEW wrong was being done, letting the bad things happen year after year after year and doing nothing about it!!!'. - Discribing ISKCON in the1980s in Australia and America. Devotees new what was going on in the 80s, but did nothing.

It is certainly not ‘all’ Bhavananda’s fault either; his Godbrothers lavishly glorified him first before he had any disciples

 

Also he never ever demanded respect and worship off me, although Ramai Swami always would DEMAND it with threats to kick you out of the Temple if you did not fall at his feet, he was very arrogant, demanding and secretive and no-one could ever get too close to him.

 

He always treated me impersonally and always patronised me and others. On many occasions he would say “get down and bow when you see me coming’, he would demand proudly. Sadly he was a clever bully to those who were not submissive to him.

 

Anyway I never experienced that impersonalism with Bhavananda. It’s like Ramai had this invisible shield around him. I travelled with him for years like this and his 'coldness' was very frustrating. Even now he remains aloof from everyone even if his with them right in the middle of all the GBC men. Bhavananda was not like that. His Godbrothers, including myself, are to fault by taking his worship way over the top.

 

Back then, we had the 'frog in the well' mentality, puffed up with the little knowledge we had, especially Ramai Swami, he thought he new everything, but now we can see how blind we all were back then, Ramai Swami had no idea how to lead and protect the lives of others. 'He new everything that was going on'

 

He did not know how to deal with or handle so many basic issues he new about, he new me better than I new myself at the time but still had no idea how too deal with me or anyone else for that matter. I was too insecure to not go along with it all, after all, ISKCON was my only family.

 

Personally Bhavananda treated me fine, over all the years he was always kind and encouraging to me, he never ever demanded worship off me; in fact in all fairness to him, it was his Godbrothers, including myself, who saw him as a substitute 'Prabhupada' so to speak, and then treated him like Prabhupada, building him up to be a 'Prabhupada' we called 'Vishnupada'. His Godbrothers gave him that name; he certainly never gave it to himself.

Once again, when Bhavananda was away from his disciples, he was a reasonable person; he never ever raised his voice in anger to me, even though he did to others.

 

 

 

Ananda Prabhu should have been warned

 

I remember one time I became disturbed by what he did when I was Temple Commander of Vrndavana Temple in 1978. We used to go around to all the rooms in the Temple and Gurukula to see if they were clean in the morning, on this occasion, Bhavananda came for the inspection, all the Gurukulis were suppose to be in the Temple room chanting however, there was one room where two Gurukulis were still sleeping, Bhavananda went into a rage when he went into their room, picked one of the boys, Ananda Prabhu, who was 10 or 11 years old at the time, and threw him into the wall, then picked him up and did it a second time. I stood by and watched in surprise as I did not know nor experience that side of Bhavananda, after all his role as Guru had only just begun

What could I do, that’s just how it was in those days because that how we were treated when we went to school in the 50s and 60s. (I was 17 when I first went to the Temple in 1971) Bhavananda then turned to me and said “these boys need discipline, this place is not a free motel, make sure no one is in any of these rooms during the morning program”

In my mind I was thinking I should have warned the boys that Bhavananda was inspecting the gurukuli rooms with us as I new they were resting. Afterwards I went back to see if Ananda was alright, he had a hobby of reading books on airplanes and jets, which he was reading when I went into see him, he just carried on like nothing had happened’

Ananda Prabhu had a gash to his head that I treated and bandaged and some bruises on his body, I told him what had happened to him shocked me because I did not know Bhavananda could get so violent, as I was talking to him, Danavir, his school teacher, came in and yelled at him more for not attending the morning program.

 

• Later I took him down Loi Bazaar in Vrndavana and we had a kumba Lassi drink (the best place in the world to get this drink) and checked out all the shops, he new so much about Vrndavana, showing me the best places to buy dhotis, shirts and Deities, then we visited Prabhupada’s room at the Radha Damodar Temple, Ananda Prabhu told me how early in the morning Srila Prabhupada would translate Srimad Bhagavatam and then chant his rounds. Afterwards walking around the samadhis of Jiva Goswami and Rupa Goswami chanting Hare Krishna. We then went to Davanala Kund and swam with others boys, on the banks of the Kund was a Shiva lingum and Ananda Prabhu and an older boy Dvarkadisha das ACBSP explained how the young girls from the village came to worship the lingum. I remember thinking what the early British Christian missionaries must of thought on seeing such worship. I remember someone took photos of us all swimming at Davanala Kund, love to see those photos now

 

• Wakey wakey ISKCON

 

Quote:

<TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=6 width="100%" border=0><TBODY><TR><TD style="BORDER-RIGHT: #666666 1px solid; PADDING-RIGHT: 3ex; BORDER-TOP: #666666 1px solid; PADDING-LEFT: 3ex; BORDER-LEFT: #666666 1px solid; BORDER-BOTTOM: #666666 1px solid" bgColor=#e0e0e0>Originally Posted by AncientMariner

I hate to rain on everyones parade but the deity that you made of theist is not actually theist, it is Alfred E. Neuman.

 

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<!-- END TEMPLATE: bbcode_quote -->Thats the point, the internet identity of 'theist' our friend behind his computor at home has taken, is already a 'post' on the internet anyone can 'imagine' they are.

 

Actually this is just like the material vessels we are in presently within in this material world that is always a part and parcel of the mahat-tattva and owned by Maha-Vishnu.

 

The fact is in different manifestations of the mahat-tattva, any baddha-jiva can 'play' the role our present material bodies 'we are in' are now 'playing'

 

This means the material vessels we presently occupy and foolishly think is who we really are, is eternally repeated over and over and over again in trillions of maha-tattva creation with different baddha-jivas, that have also occupied the vessel we are presently in, and have played the exact same role, like we are now doing, down to every detail and action

 

We as our projected dreaming baddha-jiva consciousness, telecasted from the sub-conscious mind of our marginal body in Krsnaloka, have simply chose to 'play a role' on Maha-Vishnu's material stage and have taken a 'costume' from the props department to play that role in.

 

In this way the 'material body' we now occupy is a costume identity that many before us have passed through in another time and space, that we have now deserved, desired and obtained

 

These material containments are not us, we are not performing any of the activity they do, we are just in them for the ride that follows the script that Maha-Vishnu has already 'dreamed up'

 

Our material bodies are made from the mahat-tattva material energies and belonging to the mahat-tattva creation of Maha-Vishnu.

 

Just another twist how we are not this material body nor all the other material vessels around us we may of once been IN, in another maha-tattva creation.

 

The material body we now presently occupied is eternally up for hire in another time and place within another mahat-tattva creation.

 

To us it is a costume, a vessel we 'rent' off Maha-Vishnu. And yes, believe it or not

 

:D :D :D :D

 

Note - My present job is writing science fiction stories for Australian Television. An episode based on the above is being made for the up and coming Twighlights Zone episodes due on Australian and American TV in 2009

 

Hare Krsna

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Theist is the 'baddha-jiva' aspect of his personality in this 'second life hyper-space reality"

 

Hay Theist prabhu me good old mate, show us who you really are, your REAL IDENTITY as the 'nitya-siddha' at your computer projecting this nitya-baddha Theist identity into this 'second life' of the internet.

 

Now lets be clear here, I' m comparing the illusionary identity we know as Theist on the Web to the projected nitya-baddha conscious state that is broadcasted from Krsnaloka to the mahat-tattva

 

Living as a projected identity in 'second life' in hyper-space is like that. The illusionary identity of theist is like one's imaginary secondary conscious state that descends from Krsnaloka and enters the mahat-tattva.

 

And his 'real' identity' behind that imaginary mask of Theist, always sitting behind his desk at home is compared to as nitya-siddha body in Krsnaloka

 

The real identity behind the costume ofthe theist identity is always there behind his desk in the comfort of his own home just as ones REAL self is in Krsnaloka EVEN if one has 'consciously' entered the mahat-tattva or material creation.

 

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All us with snake mentality, we are not our 'imaginary' identities on 'second life' just like we are not our discusting material vessels within this MAD material world:bounce:

 

 

 

 

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anta-vat tu--limited and temporary; phalam--fruits; tesam--their; tat--that; bhavati--becomes; alpa-medhasam--of those of small intelligence; devan--demigods' planets; deva-yajah--worshipers of demigods; yanti--achieve; mat--My; bhaktah--devotees; yanti--attain; mam--to Me; api--surely.

 

 

 

Men of small intelligence worship the demigods, and their fruits are limited and temporary. Those who worship the demigods go to the planets of the demigods, but My devotees ultimately reach My supreme planet. </TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE> There is only one Supreme cause of all causes Krishna. In Vaikuntha He expands Himself as unlimited Vishnu's.

 

For the creation of the mahat-tattva He expands Himself as Maha Vishnu, then expands again into Garbodaksya Vishnu where Lord Brahma manifests as a post filled by a jiva tattva.

 

Also Lord Shiva appears and is also an expansion of Vishnu, as Vishnu tattva all put in place originally by Krishna but mananged by Maha-Vishnu and His expansions of Mayadevi and Shiva

 

The rest of the demigods are lead by Brahma and are jiva-tattva

 

There are 33 million demigods governing the mahat-tattva or material creation, all are jiva-tatta empowered with a paricular duty a government minister governing a country,all workng under the President.

 

Maha-Vishnu's creation is therfor autocratic, there is no such thing as democrazy on the level of the demigods in the matrial creation or for that matter, the Vaikunthas as well.

<!-- BEGIN TEMPLATE: bbcode_quote -->Quote:

<TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=6 width="100%" border=0><TBODY><TR><TD style="BORDER-RIGHT: #666666 1px solid; PADDING-RIGHT: 3ex; BORDER-TOP: #666666 1px solid; PADDING-LEFT: 3ex; BORDER-LEFT: #666666 1px solid; BORDER-BOTTOM: #666666 1px solid" bgColor=#e0e0e0>Originally Posted by realist31

So do u just want a yes man for all ur fantasy stories of dancing in GOLOKA after u die?

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Realist31 hear it from the real realist, ME - Chant Hare Krsna and find your nearest ISKCON Temple and woof HEEPS of Prasadam!!!!!!!!

An aspiring Vaishnava devotee following Lord Caiyanya, whether one is with ISKCON or the Gaudiya matha, should not tolerate or listen to mayavadi philosophy.

 

This thread is polluted by nonsense mayavadis and impersonalists with their bogus 'Hindu' understanding of the Vedas

 

I have put them on my ignore list and I suggest any serious devotee also put them on your ignore list now, don;t even bother seeing their crazy replies to this post I have written

 

Lord Caitanya forbid us to read or hear their garbage nonsense speculations and views.

 

Many of us within ISKCON and the Gaudiya matha are only interested in the teachings of Lord Caitanya and Krsna as taught by Srila Prabhupada and his Guru disciples, Srila Sridar Maharaj and Srila Narayana Maharaj.

 

Others can say what ever nonsense they like but I suggest that the followers of the above 'bonafide Guru' ONLY have on their list those who want discuss or even argue over THEIR teachings

 

Also what idiot would keep referring to the Hare Krishna's as the 'Hare Christians'? Thankfully I will never have to read that fool again because he is on my ignore list and blotted out where ever I go on this site.

 

The other 'w*****s' on this thread should go get a life.

 

Who am I writting about? well, if the shoe fits, THEN ITS YOU!!

In nature the egg is meant for fertilization. some aren't but it does not change the fact that the egg is the embryo of a chicken. Over the years we referred to eggs as abortions

Although a lot of older devotees are now getting the flu shot for winter and yes, the anti-viral is grown in eggs?

http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=dWzomlaEhJk

 

http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=Wkgt602vSno&feature=related

 

Plus the making of My Sweet Lord

 

http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=bPoBWq6se-A&feature=related

In 1973 Abhimanyu Das ACBSP worked for the military and on his shoulder was printed “Special Branch” although what he did exactly, he wouldn’t tell us. From time to time he would visit the temple near the British Museum. He told us how his fellow soldiers teased him because he didn’t smoke or drink, eat meat or gamble.

When Srila Prabhupada was visiting in 1973 a meeting was arranged.

Prabhupada asked him “What kind of work do you do?”

“I’m a British spy”

“You should become my disciple. You can continue your spying also.”

“I don’t follow the principles.”

Oh, what is your favourite one that you like to break?” (smiling)

“Well sometimes I have to kill people. I have already killed five men.”

But that is your job, that is alright, Arjuna also killed many men. Next time before you pull the trigger, just say Hare Krishna and you will not miss.”

Abhimanyu Das could blend in with any group of people and they would think he was one of them.

Interesting reading but is it all karmically our fault because of our naivety to have a ‘hero’ to worship even if he is not qualified? But remember Sridar Maharaj not only supported the zonal Acharays in ISKCON, but encouraged it. I was at his Gaudiya math Temple in 1978 when he glorified the new zonal gurus in ISKCON

Also1 remember way back in 1981 (Ramai Swami, who was just elected the head of the GBC in 2008), got up and praised his sannyas guru Bhavananda at his Vysa Puj by saying he had specially come from Vaikuntha to save the fallen souls, Ramai had tears in his eyes as he spoke fondly of Bhavananda and was clearly very moved, this was video taped and I still have it in storage.

Clearly Ramai Swami had seen Bhavananda in the same light as Prabhupada, a pure devotee put in that position by Krsna. Ramai's mood set the ‘example’ that would last until 1986, when the whole ‘guru’ thing came crashing down on our heads

I never ever went that far to see him specially sent from Vaikuntha because to me he was a Godbrother who represented Prabhupada that I blindly followed. Bhavananda never saw himself as that either although, as years progressed, he became more and more intoxicated by the worship his Godbrothers set up, supported and strongly encouraged.

To have a ‘hero’ to worship as a pure devotee, even if he is not qualified, was more important at the time than having no hero at all. I was too stupid and very insecure at the time to say anything, so I just went along with the 'chosen guru' thing for the ride, most of us Prabhupada disciples did. It’s a shame many tried to imitate Prabhupada back then rather than follow him.

You know, the preaching on the streets back then was way better and more effective than it is today, the devotees back then were very dedicated selling books, even the paraphernalia selling by devotee back them, like oil paintings, was nessassary as it assisted preaching. Those who critize such selling are wrong, so many preaching programs where financed by such selling, including the campaign to free Soviet devotees from jails. In 1987-8 we collected 140,000 signatures around Australia on our Bus, along with the Krsna kids campaign, it helped secure the religious freedom in the Soviet Union, granted by the Soviet Government in 1988.

Anway, back then I new exactly what was going on and how behind the scene, Bhavananda was struggling to handle the high level of worship, he certainly wasn't the pure devotee we all made him out to be to his disciples, but I was just struggling along myself, who was I to point the fingure? So I just glorified him like Ramai and all of my Godbrothers did. Back then they thought they new everything, but we all had the 'frog in the well' mentality, puffed up with the little knowledge we had, especially Rama Swami, he thought he new everything and prabably still does, but now we can see he was blind back then, he had no idea how to lead and protect the lives of others. He did not know how to deal with so many basic issues he new about. I was too insecure to not go along with it all, after all, ISKCON was my only family.

 

Personally Bhavananda treated me fine, over all the years he was always kind and encouraging to me, he never ever demanded worship off me; in fact in all fairness to him, it was his Godbrothers, including myself, who saw him as a substitute 'Prabhupada' so to speak, and then treated him like Prabhupada, building him up to be a 'Prabhupada' we called 'Vishnupada'. His Godbrothers gave him that name, he certainly never gave it to himself.

 

People can say what ever they like about him, but as far as I am concerned, I saw his love for Prabhupada and his sincerity. We have to take some of the blame for it all, as the saying goes, 'It's not just the bad people who cause problems in the world, but rather it is all the good peeople who stand by and do nothing, letting bad things happen'. It is certainly not ‘all’ his fault, he was lavishly glorified by his Godbrothers first before he had any disciples.

He never ever demanded respect and worship off me, although that Ramai Swami always would DEMAND it with threats to kick you out of the Temple if you did not fall at his feet, he was very arrogent, demanding and secretive and no-one could ever get too close to him, he always treated me impersonally. On many occasions he would say “get down and bow when you see me coming’, he would say proudly on many occasions.

 

Anyway I never experienced that impersonalism with Bhavananda. It’s like Ramai had this invisible shield around him. I travelled with him for years like this and his 'coldness' was very frustrating. Even now he remains aloof from everyone even if his with them right in the middle of all the GBC men. Bhavananda was not like that. His Godbrothers, including myself, are to fault by taking his worship way over the top.

 

This was happening all over the world with all the appointed gurus

 

Once again, when Bhavananda was away from his disciples, he was a reasonable person; he never ever raised his voice in anger to me, even though he did to others.

I remember one time I became disturbed by what he did when I was Temple Commander of Vrndavana Temple in 1978. We used to go around to all the rooms in the Temple and Gurukula to see if they were clean in the morning, on this occasion, Bhavananda came for the inspection, all the Gurukulis were suppose to be in the Temple room chanting however, there was one room where two Gurukulis were still sleeping, Bhavananda went into a rage when he went into their room, picked one of the boys, Ananda Prabhu, who was 10 or 11 years old at the time, and threw him into the wall, then picked him up and did it a second time. I stood by and watched in surprise as I did not know nor experience that side of Bhavananda, after all his role as Guru had only just begun

What could I do, that’s just how it was in those days because that how we were treated when we went to school in the 50s and 60s. (I was 17 when I first went to the Temple in 1971, Initiated 72) Bhavananda then turned to me and said “these boys need discipline, this place is not a free motel, make sure no one is in any of these rooms during the morning program”

In my mind I was thinking I should have warned the boys that Bhavananda was inspecting the rooms with us as I new they were resting. Afterwards I went back to see if Ananda was alright, he had a hobby of reading books on airplanes and jets, which he was reading when I went into see him, he just carried on like nothing had happened, he had a gash to his head that I treated and bandaged and some bruises on his body, I told him what had happened to him shocked me because I did not know Bhavananda could get so violent, as I was talking to him, Danavir, his school teacher, came in and yelled at him more for not attending the morning program.

 

All this kid wanted to do was read his books on planes. Other Gurukulis at the time would remember this, they where terrified of Bhavananda after this and so was I back then, why? Because I had nothing else. I was only a teenager myself when I joined ISKCON. The movement was everything to me and still is.

 

 

 

 

Yet Another suicide This one few know about as his parents left ISKCON after the Guru fiasco and the confusion must of had some influence on them. I only found out about this yesterday from his sister, a very nice girl who has been a devotee from birth (1987)

 

Did the confusion later contributed to the suicide of her brother, born in the movement in 1990 with devotee name? How many others have we not heard about because they left the movement years ago?

Being a guru, sannyas or GBC is a tremendously serious thing with so much responsibility AND CONTROL OVER OTHERS LIVES; those who take shelter of them are literally in their hands. It is a very life an death situation being a guru or sannyas leader.

 

When it was revealed Bhavananda (ex-guru) was travelling around having homosexual relationships, the next day after learning this, one of his New Zealand devotees committed suicide.

 

Others have left ISKCON in complete confusion; one girl just got kicked out of a Temple because Narayana Maharaj reindicated her. Is it really her fault she lost faith in ISKCON?

My question is, if Bhavananda never fell down, would the suicides have happened? I think the answer is obvious

Well. It goes deeper than that because out of the original 11 gurus, 9 have fallen down and I have lost count of the sannyasi's who have fallen down

So how do we understand this?

Should we see it as a young pioneering movement attempting to establish itself? Well one thing is certain, Sannyas, guru or GBC should not be given to anyone under the age of 45 unless it is a very special devotee, but how do you tell?

Wasn’t Bhavananda very special? Wasn’t Balarama das, ex Temple President and founder of Melbourne Temple very special, who was said to be the rock of Melbourne and will die in that position, yet also ‘blooped’ or left the movement suprising many.

How does this affect those who see them as roll models? If ISKCON never fell apart in the late 80's, this young boy (devotee name withheld but is from Melbourne Australia) WOULD NOT of committed suicide because simply no devotee commits suicide in a spiritual atmosphere, at least in these circumstances when it is children. The father of this boy has carried bitterness with him for years towards ISKCON, feeling betrayed by those he looked up to and worshiped.

 

What is the answer to this so confused devotees can be helped instead of ignored, shunned and pushed away?

 

Obviously intelligence tells me it is all a test to see if we can stay with Krsna even if everyone around us, including those we worship and admire, falls away.

 

But how is a child expected to understand that?

 

What do others think on this subject?

 

 

 

 

 

The story of Ananda das

I am saddened by the news that my friend Ananda committed suicide last Thursday, May 18, 2006. Although I had not been in contact with him recently, he was the only gurukula survivor who would allow me to tape record an interview when I was studying the situation in the late 1990s. In his memory, I would like to share some of what he told me.

Ananda was born in 1968, in Maui, to a devotee mom. He attended Dallas gurukula from 1973 - 1975; L.A. gurukula from 1975 - 1977; and Vrindavana, India gurukula 1977 - 1982. He was among the most severely abused, made to stay in India for five years without being able to go home or see his mother.

Of his gurukula experience, he told me: "I had it worse than anybody else in Vrindavana. Every other gurukula kid can tell you that. . . . Danudhara and Naragadev were very vindictive people. They would do whatever they could to break you, no matter what it was.

 

(Bhavananda GBC for Vrndavan, would also come in the gurukuli rooms for inspection. In 1978 he found two boys were not chanting japa with the other gurukulis, Bhavananda become furious and picked up Ananda prabhu by the scruff of the neck and throw him against the wall - I {realist}witnessed that in Vrndavna Gurukula at the time when I was Temple commander. Ananda dasa was 10 or 11 at the time.)

From our interview:

NM: To your knowledge, did your parents make any attempts to get you out?

A: My mom made a lot of attempts. A lot.

NM: How come she couldn't get you for five years?

A: Because x-das went into her room at four in the morning and stuck a .38 in her mouth and took my brother and sister from her, and said if she didn't keep her mouth shout it was her brains on the wall.

NM: Do you know approximately when that happened?

A: Yeah. It was 1979. . . . My mom told me about all of this like in the last few months of her life. And I'll tell you, it was hard for me not to just go and blow the entire Watseka Avenue off the face of the earth.

[Editor's note: Ananda alleges that x-das kidnapped his younger brother and sister, frightening his mother into silence. Due to her status within the group, she was powerless to rescue Ananda from the gurukula in India.]

After India, Ananda was sent to several temples, landing in Denver, where he witnessed a beating. As a result, he feared for his safety and went to the police to have himself removed from the organization. He lived in foster care until tenth grade, then a boys' home until the end of high school (approximately 1986), then he joined the Army in December 1988.

He told me that he was doing okay until 1993, when he attended a gurukula reunion in Los Angeles. Reconnecting with ISKCON brought a flood of emotions that tormented him, probably for the rest of his life. Also in 1993, his mother died. I asked if his mother ever got her other children back. He said: "No, she didn't see them from that time [1979] until one month before she died. I drove her up north to see them."

Here are a few more excerpts from our interview:

NM: Did you ever have a chance to talk to your mother about what you had been through? Do you think she understood?

A: No. I tried to tell her but no matter what I'd say she would start saying, "I'm so sorry that that happened."

NM: She would block it out?

A: Yes, she just wanted it to go away.

NM: When you were growing up did you ever have any toys?

A: Not one that I remember.

NM: Did you ever have time to play?

A: In the afternoons, in Dallas.

NM: What would that consist of?

A: It was a free-for-all in the back yard. There were a lot of rules. It's funny because I was really young then, but it's like it's right there. From what I remember the afternoon time that was your time for like an hour, or sometimes they would load us up in the van. They'd take us out to this old park somewhere that had an old merry-go-round. There's actually a picture in some of the magazines of us on the merry-go-round. You can see me right in the front.

NM: How was the rest of the day structured?

A: Morning time get up, same routine devotees follow. Get up, go to mangal-arotik, then they'd give a class after that. But for us, hopefully, especially at the end of mangal-arotik, we would try to fall asleep in class. The older kids, Jagaman and them, used to say, that's the time to get some sleep. Try to sit in the back of the class, and some of them would try and teach themselves to fall asleep with their eyes open. Like if you nod off, that was dangerous. That meant that they would come up either behind you or on the side of you, and they would cup their hand like that and slap your ear. That was there in Dallas. My ears bled once.

NM: Did you ever have your ears twisted or bend as discipline?

A: Ripped back. My neck choked so hard from my beads that it cut into my neck. That's what that scar's from. He pulled so hard on my beads it cut into my neck.

NM: Did they take your ear like this and bend it?

A: No, they would twist it and pull it back. Or they drag you by it. Or they pull you by your ear and your sikha.

NM: Do you feel the authority figures ignored the kids' suffering?

A: Put it this way, I think we all pretty much gave up the idea of somebody coming around the corner any day to save us.

NM: So you felt helpless?

A: Yeah, I tried to run away from there once. They used to do this thing they would call "dog week." The thing you had to do for your punishment was you had to walk around on your hands and knees like a dog. They spoke to you; you couldn't speak in return, you had to bark. You couldn't eat with everyone else. You had to wait until they were done, then they sent you out, you had to go on all fours and lick their plates clean.

NM: You had to do it for a week? Did that happen to you?

A: About seven or eight times. I was a little kid back then, so I don't remember everything. I do remember that it was enough to where I tried to run away from there.

NM: Do you think some of the people on the staff at the schools disliked children?

A: Have to be, otherwise they wouldn't have an M.O. of handiwork as they dished it out.

NM: Do you think ISKCON in general had a bad attitude toward children?

A: The still do.

NM: Can you describe that?

A: They didn't care one bit. It didn't start out real punishing, it kinda got that way as more kids showed up. The parents would show up, I remember that. My mother came out to Dallas once. About a week before they got there, they kind of prep you up for it. They say, "If you say anything you're going to get it," or a week before they would make an example out of somebody, so you knew for a fact to just keep your mouth shut. That was a time when the bruises heal up or the black eye goes away, or your ear doesn't bleed after a while. The parents still showed up and the GBC (or not the GBC, but sannyasis) and whoever else came into Dallas still showed up. Either they suspected it and didn't do anything about it or they didn't care either.

NM: So they would hide it from the parents and others by coercing and intimidating you?

A: They'd find somebody to make an example out of and they'd say, "If you tell them this, this is what's going to happen to you."

NM: Were you ever made an example?

A: Yeah, I was kind of rebellious as a kid. That's why even throughout Dallas and India I took the brunt of a lot of their anger. I actually used to take beatings for other kids in India. I would stand up in front of them when the teachers would hit them. I'd stand there and I'd look at the teacher and they'd say, "Oh, so you want some too," and I'd just stand there and look at them and they'd come over and bam, hit me. They were bigger than all of us little kids that were there.

NM: So the parents were tricked into thinking the schools were safe for children?

A: Yeah. They got money for each kid, I found that out from my mom. Each parent was required to send a certain amount of money to gurukula to pay for the school each month. So they were making their money, so you lose money whenever kids leave.

NM: Do you think people in ISKCON protected the child abusers?

A: They still do to this day.

NM: Are a lot of the child abusers still around?

A: The most prominent ones are. Now they have titles like "maharaja."

NM: How does that make you feel, that someone who was an abuser now has some big title in the organization?

A: Not so good. It's almost to the point where I need to walk away from this thing or I need to take it into my own hands. I'm sure that's not what they would want because I don't think they'd like it.

NM: How often did you have to fear for your life, or fear that one of the teachers would seriously hurt you?

A: In India, a lot. I ran away a whole bunch of times. But I wouldn't run far, I would just go and sit by the Jamuna River. I'd always go back because there was nowhere else to go. This one guy who was there in the ashram, his name was Dr. Sharma, he was this Indian guy, and he took a real liking toward me. I guess he really saw how rough it was for me there, so he actually tried to get me out of there at one point. He was really fed up with it, I guess. So he lived up in Hardwar, he had a house up there, so he took me out of there one time and took me on the train up to Hardwar with him, and they sent people back out to take me back. That was the time where me and another kid were in the train station in Delhi and they had sent Naragadev to collect us. Naragadev had epilepsy and so he started having a seizure and he fell down in the train station and he busted his head open on some stairs. I remember he was just bleeding everywhere and I remember we just stood there staring and we just laughed at him. But of course his response to that was as soon as we got back to Vrindavana, after that it was just like a year of sheer brutal terror from him. That was '79. . . .

NM: Do you remember seeing Srila Prabhupada?

A: Yes, I have pictures of me next to him. I remember him very well.

NM: Do you respect him?

A: Only man on this earth, or who was on this earth, that I say I put my head on the ground for. No one else.

NM: When you were in school in ISKCON, do you remember studying Sanskrit?

A: I remember when I came back from India, I actually spoke Hindi fluently, and Sanskrit, too, but no matter how hard I try I can't remember more than a few words to save my life. I've never been able to figure that one out.

NM: The adults in ISKCON often preached that the demigods are lining up to take birth in ISKCON, and that all you kids who were born into ISKCON were actually demigods. You remember that? What did you think of that, did you think you could have been a demigod in a past life?

A: Yeah, actually I do remember that. I don't know if I was, I don't see how I could have been. I think if that's the case, then the biggest joke was on us. These supposed saints come, so let's get together and kick the shit out of them all the time. If that's the case and that's our welcoming party, it doesn't say much for us.

NM: Do you feel that ISKCON has in any way made up for what happened to you?

A: No. I've never even gotten a letter of apology from them, but I see why. It's kinda like plausible deniability. "We know about it, but if we don't say it, then we didn't know about it."

NM: Do you think you would ever turn to ISKCON or any of ISKCON's gurus for spiritual advice?

A: Never.

NM: Do you think that ISKCON treats you better now?

A: No.

NM: Do you see Krishna consciousness as your religion?

A: No. I don't call it a religion, that's why. I call it taking some of the theory that makes the most sense to me and just try to incorporate that into my life.

NM: Do you think that you got anything positive out of it, or did anything about your experience make you a better person?

A: Yeah, I don't take shit from anybody, but that's not exactly the kind of strength that was taught in the right fashion.

NM: Do you consider yourself a victim?

A: Do I consider myself a victim? Um, it's an interesting question. Not a victim, more or less as somebody who was in the wrong place at the wrong time. . . . I'm all that I've got left and I think I'm worth something. I'm tired of being taken from. Everything has been taken from me. Everything. By Nori J. Muster Also author of 'Betrayal of the Spirit'

 

 

 

 

 

 

AN ISKCON CONCLUSION

 

 

It is natural that if we cannot understand something like the origin of the jiva soul, we bring up something to support our inability to understand.

There are many in ISKCON that will always quote the ‘Crow-And-Tal-Fruit Logic’ letter Prabhupada sent to his Australian devotees, of which I was one of them way back in 1972.

Just a few days ago I had a discussion with an ISKCON regional secretary, Atmarama Prabhu ACBSP, a very nice dedicated disciple of Srila Prabhupada and Godbrother I have known for over thirty years, who just unassumingly repeated the ISKCON line when this subject is brought up.

He said these things couldn’t be understood until we go back home back to Godhead. Although he did make it clear that the jiva originates directly from Krsnaloka and NOT the Vaikuntha planets and certainly NOT from the impersonal Brahmajyoti.

We both agreed on this however, where he thought I was becoming a little argumentive, was when I said that the letter, ‘Crow-And-Tal-Fruit Logic,’ was not the only time Prabhupada discussed this issue. Srila Prabhupada also discussed the jiva's origin in Mayapur, where he had said that this is something we should try to understand because it is important to appreciate we were once with Krsna and DID NOT originate from the impersonal Brahmajyoti, even though we all have probably visited that ‘dreamless dormant’ place on many occasions.

Humbly Atmarama Prabhu explained it in this way – “Most devotees cannot understand such things and it is best to just get out of this material world instead of trying to figure out where we came from”.

Adding further, “We know we came from Krsnaloka because Prabhupada has told us so and he’s our authority, we are not interested in what others say on this subject, so for us, there is no argument, we don’t bother getting into arguments because we already know where we come from. In any case, it is best to just get out of this material world rather than waste our time arguing the point with others over where we came from and how we fell down, only when we get out, will we truly understand and apreciate who we really are, because by then, we will be back with Krsna”.

Atmarama Prabhu concluded, “For me, this is not important, first we must explain Krsna and his wonderful pastimes to others and how we are not these material bodies, everything else will be revealed to us when we are ready, when we go back home, back to Godhead.”

I thanked Atmarama Prabhu sincerely for sharing his realizations on this subject

Well, this post should make Theist Prabhu happy, as what Atmarama Prabhu has said is what he has said all along

 

I for one, might take Atmarama's advice and stop arguing with the Impersonalists

 

This isn't endorsed by sastra. .

 

Your understanding is complete nonsense, what bogus impersonal version of the shastra are you reading?

 

Thank God ISKCON just ignores people like you.

 

"The Virajā, or Causal Ocean, is the border between the spiritual and the material world. The material energy is situated on one shore of that ocean, and it cannot enter onto the other shore, which is the spiritual sky". Śrī Caitanya Caritāmṛta Madhya 20.269

 

"That original Personality of Godhead, named Sankarshana, first lies down in the river Virajā, which serves as a border between the material and the spiritual world. As Kāranābdhiśāyī Vishnu, He is the original cause of the material creation". Śrī Caitanya Caritamrta Madhya 20.268

 

Srila Prabhupada - "In the Padmottara-khanda (225.57) it is stated that the material energy and the spiritual energy are separated by water known as the Viraja River. That river flows from the perspiration of the first purusa incarnation. On one bank of theVirajais the eternal nature, unlimited and all-blissful,called the spiritual sky (or Personal active aspect of the Brahmajyoti known as the Vaikuntha planets and Goloka-Vrndavana.), and this is the spiritual kingdom, or the kingdom of God". TLC 9

 

Srila Prabhupada - "In the effulgent rays of the spiritual sky there are innumerable planets floating. The Brahmajyoti emanatesfrom the supreme abode, Krsnaloka, and the anandamaya-cinmaya planets, which are not material, float in those rays." BG Intro

 

Comment -"The Spiritual Sky or Brahmajyoti is divided up 3/4 Vaikuntha planets headed by Goloka Vrndavana and 1/4 material planets (mahat-tattva) There is also the impersonal aspect of the Spiritual Sky or Brahmajyoti made up of a collective of souls who have become dormant or inactive"

 

Srila Prabhupada - "My Lord, You are unlimited, and no one has estimated the extent of Your potencies. I think that even You do not know the range of Your potential energies. Unlimited planets float in the sky just like atoms, and great Vedantists, who are engaged in research to find You, discover that everything is different from You. Thus they finally decide that You are everything." (Bhag. 10.87.41)

 

Srila Prabhupada - " The spiritual world has been calculated to comprise three-fourths of the energies of the Supreme Lord, and the material world is said to comprise one-fourth of His energy, but no one can understand what this three-fourths is, since even this material universe, which comprises only one-fourth of His energy, cannot be described.

 

Trying to convey to Sanatana Gosvami something of the extent of one-fourth of Krsna's energy, Caitanya Mahaprabhu cited an incident from Srimad-Bhagavatam in which Brahma, the lord of the universe, came to see Krsna at Dvaraka.

 

When Brahma approached Krsna, the doorman informed Krsna that Brahma had arrived to see Him. Upon hearing this, Krsna inquired as to which Brahma had come, and the doorman returned to Brahma and asked, "Which Brahma are you? Krsna has asked." TLC

The Spiritual Sky or Brahmajyoti is divided up 3/4 Vaikuntha planets headed by Goloka Vrndavana and 1/4 material planets (mahat-tattva)

There is also the impersonal aspect of the Spiritual Sky or Brahmajyoti made up of a collective of souls who have become dormant or inactive.

 

This is also the case of the Virajā, or Causal Ocean that is also full of dormant baddha-jivas that have entered into a temporary state of inactivity inbetween the Vaikunthaand the material worlds."

Srila Prabhupada- "The supreme knowledge of Krsna is exhibited in three different energies -

 

1. internal,

 

2.marginal

 

3.external.

1. By virtue of His internal energy, He exists in Himself with His spiritual paraphernalia.

 

2.By means of His marginal energy (tatastha sakti), He exhibits Himself as the living entities.

3.And by means of His Lifeless external energy which includes all bodily costumes or vessels the marginal living entities wearswhile choosing to be ignorant of KRSNA, He exhibits Himself as material energy. (also known as the mahat-tattva)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Vishnu-Tattvas or Krsna's expansions are eternally present in both the Vaikuntha Planets and Goloka, just as ALL marginal living entities are perpetually present there as their nitya-siddha bodily form serving Krishna

 

The marginal living entities, whose full expression and potential is nitya-siddha in Goloka, can also manifest from their own marginal identity, due to choice and free will, an echoed or extended secondary consciousness called nitya-baddha.

 

This 'dreamlike' consciousness is confined under the cover of matter within the mahat-tattva creation of Maha-Vishnu (contained there in material bodily vessels that belong to the external energies of the Lord known as the mahat-tattva

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It is totally absurd to think that the jiva cannot come down to the material world from Goloka Vrndavana or Vaikuntha due to free will.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

At times Srila Prabhupada said it was a waste of time to understand and at other times he said it was important to understand.

 

 

 

 

 

Aparently Hari Sauri Prabhu is also printing a translation that deals also with the many comments Srila Prabhupada made on this subject for the ISKCON society.

Why didn't Sridhar Maharaj explain it that way?

 

Sarva's been saying that based on Prabhupadas teachings and personal association, since he came on this forum and was bagged by everyone, so really there is no arugument if we understand the concept of time. well at least you understand, many others still don't comprehend. Just a bit of advice, break up you quotes with paragrahs for easier reading. Also which translation are you using? There is one being done now and this debate is influencing that translation

 

There is no Gaudiya Math conspiracy to drag us back into impersonalism. This is an old ISKCON myth.

 

Lets pray that is so on both accounts. Then please explain how you get around Sridar Maharaj's comments that we were not previously in Krishna lila because we came from a plain sheet of consciousness, that is also always growing with new individual jivas? With all due respects, his understanding is clearly incorrect. Can you answer this question? Anyway the understanding below is very clear and IS Prabhupada's teachings -Quote:

 

<TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=6 width="100%" border=0><TBODY><TR><TD style="BORDER-RIGHT: #666666 1px solid; PADDING-RIGHT: 3ex; BORDER-TOP: #666666 1px solid; PADDING-LEFT: 3ex; BORDER-LEFT: #666666 1px solid; BORDER-BOTTOM: #666666 1px solid" bgColor=#e0e0e0>Originally Posted by Sarva gattah

No one sleeps like this in Vaikuntha or Goloka then dreams they are in the material world. No, it is not like that.WHY??

 

A living entity to transmigrate through the lower species to again reach the human body, this means the living entity has FIRST chosen to fallen down previously from Vaikuntha as their baddha-jiva consciousness to the heavenly planets, then further to the middle planets, then the hellish planets and the then to lower species of biological life.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Could this be a dipiction of one of the many billions of non Krishna Conscios heavenly worlds within the mahat-tattva, a material world on a higher celestal dimensional plane than our gross secular world, where the bodily vessel is ethereal, without the gross biological covering we are further trapped in.

 

Their the life span is 10,000 years, other heavenly material planets offer a life span of 10 million years, but it's still the material world on that higher mystical lever and therefore only a temporary and frustrating exitence for the living entities who go to the heavenly planets

 

http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=AuPsKwRaMt0&feature=related

 

 

 

 

 

 

No one sleeps like this in Vaikuntha or Goloka then dreams they are in the material world. No, it is not like that.

 

Suchandra, the answer is firstly no one sleeps like this in Vaikuntha or Goloka then dreams they are in the material world. No, it is not like that. WHY??

A living entity to transmigrate through the lower species to again reach the human body, this means the living entity has FIRST chosen to fallen down previously from Vaikuntha as their baddha-jiva consciousness to the heavenly planets, then further to the middle planets, then the hellish planets and the then to lower species of biological life.

Some also take shelter in the dormant aspect of their own baddha-jiva consciousness that, along with other nitya-baddha souls, is a collective of souls known as the impersonal Brahmajyoti or Brahman however, that 'inactive' state of individual consciousness is also temporary and one falls down from there.

Unfortunately many foolishly believe that this impersonal Brahmajyoti is their origin, but it is really just another dream state (A DREAMLESS DREAM IN THIS CASE) of the baddha-jiva.

Secondly, the photo of the Sadhu laying down sleeping, in no way represents how the living entity comes down 'sub-consciously' from their perpetual nitya-siddha body to the material creation as their baddha-jiva dreaming conscious state.

Actually because of the ‘concept of time’ there is really no two states of consciousness which means there is really no sub conscious secondary self, even though it is explained that way. What is really going on is to do with time, the time that separates the ‘eternal present’ in Goloka from the divided time of ‘past, present and future of the mahat-tattva. This sentence is very important to understand.

There is no 'laying down sleeping in Vaikuntha or Goloka, and then dreaming' ones material existence, it is not like that.

 

What actually happens is the non-Krishna conscious desire and imaginations happen on the sub conscious level out of sync with the 'eternal present' that is eternally existent in Goloka.

Therefore the ONLY thing that happens is that the living entity leaves the spiritual Vaikuntha atmosphere of eternal time that is devoid of past and future.

The marginal living entity, as its secondary inferior baddha-jiva self, that only appears as a secondary manifestation of the self due to the altered state of time, then enters the divided time of past, present and future of the mahat-tattva.

 

 

The paradox here is no one never really leaves Goloka, they only imagine they do by falling out of sync with the 'eternal present'.

 

 

What’s more is, it's almost as if the awareness of the living entities nitya siddha body is suspended (at least to those who have fallen) but actually from the point of view of Goloka, everything is still going on in the service of the Lord in relationships with Krishna and His associates. The only thing that has changed is the ones awareness of 'eternal time' in relation to 'divided time'

In this way it is incorrect to think a nitya-siddha devotee lays down and sleeps and dreams their baddha-jiva material existence, no it is not like that.

Actually when one again becomes aware of their eternal nitya-siddha body and relationship with Krishna, it will be as if their baddha-jiva dream state never existed. On return to the 'eternal present' it will be as if they never left because nothing has changed in Goloka.

 

 

 

 

Theist contribution to this website is fantastic, the amount of people he has encouraged, including myself, is enormous, so many people have been introduced to Prabhupada because of his selfless dedicated preaching about Krsna and Lord Caitanya whom he is only devoted to share with others. Being a devotee, he is not interested if the topic somehow does not relate to Krsna. He will be known historically as one of the first pioneers to recognise the enormous preaching power and potential of the Internet

Glorious to Theist Prabhu who has realized something even many ISKCON Temple devotees HAVE NOT REALIZED - THE WORLD WIDE WEB OF PREACHING TO THE MANY NON DEVOTEES.

For this reason of allowing questions and debates to help refine our understanding of Prabhupada’s books, Vaishnavism and the gripes of devotees, aspiring devotees and seekers of truth, this site is a better preaching tool than Dandavats.com that only allows one to write a blog that preaches to the converted. A great website regardless

THE WONDERFUL ADMINISTRATORS OF Audarya Fellowship ARE RIGHT ON THE FRONT LINES OF PREACHING WITH THE AMAZING DEDICATED BBT BOOK DISTRIBUTORS

It would be nice for more advanced ISKCON and Gaudiya math devotees, other than the ones sharing their realizations on this site, to also leave their often proud egos at the Temple and also share their wonderful association and realizations (like Krsna) on this site as well

<TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=6 width="100%" border=0><TBODY><TR><TD style="BORDER-RIGHT: #666666 1px solid; PADDING-RIGHT: 3ex; BORDER-TOP: #666666 1px solid; PADDING-LEFT: 3ex; BORDER-LEFT: #666666 1px solid; BORDER-BOTTOM: #666666 1px solid" bgColor=#e0e0e0>Originally Posted by gHari

Do we think 'marginal potency' is a place?

 

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Originally Posted by Sarva gattah

Srila Prabhupada- "The supreme knowledge of Krsna is exhibited in three different energies -

1. Internal,

2. Marginal

3. External.

 

1. By virtue of His internal energy, He exists in Himself with His spiritual paraphernalia.

2. By means of His marginal energy (tatastha sakti), He exhibits Himself as the living entities.

 

3. And by means of His Lifeless external energy which includes all bodily costumes, He exhibits Himself as material energy. (also known as the mahat-tattva)

 

Srila Prabhupada -"It is the living entity’s constitutional position to be an eternal servant of Krsna because he is the marginal energy of Krsna and a manifestation simultaneously one with and different from the Lord, like a molecular particle of sunshine or fire. (anology only) Krsna has three varieties of energy" Sri Caitanya Caritamrta Madhya 20.108-109

It is important to understand how we all originally came down from Vaikuntha by clearly studying the following -

 

The three varieties of energies of Lord Krishna are therefore

 

Superior - Krishna and His unlimited expansions. Within the immensity of Krishna’s perpetual abodes is also where the marginal living entity in their perpetual svarupa form reside serving Krishna or a Vishnu expansion. It is important to undertand that even though the marginal living entities are associating with the superior energies of Krishna, they are never one with the superior energy, they always remain marginal or jiva tatastha.

 

Marginal - The living entities or jiva-tatastha's (of whom their full potential is nitya-siddha in Goloka) are perpetually independant and eternally have free will. This means they have the choice to be with Krishna as who they really are (nitya-siddha) or manifest their own imaginary world as nitya-baddha in the mahat-tattva. Having choice as a marginal living entity (jiva-tatastha) is what it really means to be inbetween the Superior and inferior. It is not a place or plain, the individual jiva's ARE the marginal 'so called' marginal energy where one can choose to serve either Krishna's perpetual creation, or chase their own selfish desires, thoughts and imaginary worlds within Maha-Vishnu's temporary DREAM perishable creation or mahat-tattva.

 

Inferior - The mahat-tattva or lifeless material energies that include the ethereal and biological vessels or costume bodies. The life force from the Superior plain (Krishna and His expansions like Maha-Vishnu) and the marginal plain (the jiva-tatastha in their secondary nitya-baddha DREAMING conscious projection [except of course a nitya-siddha devotee in Krishna's lila in the mahat-tattva like Srila Prabhupada]) ALL move the inferior energies (material) that has no life.