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HH Vipramukya swami speaks

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Aniruddha dasa (left), temple president of ISKCON Melbourne, standing with Vipramukhya Swami.

 

HH Vipramukya swami speaks

 

 

"I don't attend Hare Krishna temples. I might visit ocassionally if there was one around here, but the nearest temple is hundreds of miles from here. So I'm not a practicing Hare Krishna monk anymore. I'm just a correctional officer working for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice."

 

 

 

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Thanks Bhakta Eric for posting.

 

Bhakta Eric, USA : To retire or leave?

 

http://www.planetiskcon.com/

 

In recent memory there are two gurus within ISKCON who have “fallen down.” One guru covered it up and seemingly had ISKCON cover it up for awhile, then came clean and is now a retired guru/retired sannyasi. The other guru simply left and started a new life.

And so here I am, trying to figure out which is better. Clearly, neither ar We should question why we create a culture that not only allows this to happen, but sets up scenarios where it e ideal.

A guru is the person who will be taking you back to Godhead. S/he is a liberated soul and a pure devotee. Obviously, any fall down is pretty well proof (in my book) that this person isn’t presently qualified. Yes, there is certainly redemption and the healing power of bhakti is something not to be taken lightly. However, neither of these ex-gurus have sought redemption (and neither of them have gotten it).

In the first case (Satsvarupa), he lied for two decades, making one of his disciple’s lives hell just so he could be around her. He then had a sexual relationship with her. Yeah, he fell down and there is redemption that can take place, but he doesn’t seem concerned about it. Especially seeing how he covered it up for 20 or so years. Why? Wasn’t there another option?

In the second case (Vipramukhya), he stepped down. He simply stopped being a devotee. He met a woman (who is now his wife) online, started a relationship with her and then stepped down. Now, leaving the devotees is not a good thing, but it seems like he didn’t know what else to do.

While both cases had different outcomes, the situations were strangely similar. Each were in a role that they could not play. Each tried to maintain standards they could not maintain. And though one chose to stay and one chose to leave, they each did so for the same reason.

But here’s the thing. I don’t know what that reason is.

In Satsvarupa’s case, he’s clearly not much more of a sannyasi than I am. Yet there he is, in the garb of a sannyasi, being seen and treated as a sannyasi (even though he has the status of “retired”). Why didn’t he step down? Why didn’t he put on white (or just blue jeans), continue with his painting and writing and just be a normal devotee?

And in Vipramukhya’s case, I could tell that he wasn’t on the up and up by the way his web page was changing. He was doing things on it that weren’t quite what a sannyasi should be doing. Nothing “bad” of course, but just indicators. And soon after that, he announced that he was stepping down to get married and also leaving the association of devotees. Why couldn’t he just put on white and be a regular grhasta?

Why couldn’t these two supposedly pure devotees take the humble position and still remain devotees? I don’t know. But in both cases it’s sad.

It’s sad in Satsvarupa’s case because he’s still playing a role that he’s clearly not meant to play. And it’s sad in Vipramukhya’s case because he’s no longer a devotee.

Folks, we really just have to allow each other to be honest. If our gurus and sannyasis can’t be gurus and sannyasis, at least let them be devotees. It does nobody any good if our gurus and sannyasis are fake. And it does nobody any good if our senior devotees (who were once gurus and sannyasis) leave.

But this is the situation that we put them in. This is because of the pressure that we apply.

All that said, I believe I’ve got more respect for Vipramukhya in his decision. While he left the association of devotees, which isn’t good, he didn’t lie for 20 years, falsely initiating devotees who thought he was pure. He met a woman and decided to leave. He didn’t stick around to make a huge mess that we’d have to make lame ass excuses for. He didn’t put us, as devotees, in a position where we have to create a whole new institution (that of “retired” sannyasi and guru). And most importantly, I don’t feel that Vipramukhya lied to us. Satsvarupa did quite a bit and we still don’t know the whole story. Yet, the “honest” one is gone and the other one is still worshiped.

I don’t have any answers, and I apologize for this basically becoming a rant, but it’s really something we should take a look at.

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Suchandraji,

Sometimes it is hard to come out of the maaya. The true vairagya is very difficult.

I am not able to even stop arguing, because my ego tells me that i have to prove that i am right.

Now how do I come out of my self? I am not even consistently doing jaap.

I argue, and nag, and my husband is not happy. he tells me, if he finds a decent women he will leave me.

How can I lift myself up little bit of this wordly desires?

 

Please tell.

Regards,

Manaswini

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Suchandraji,

Sometimes it is hard to come out of the maaya. The true vairagya is very difficult.

I am not able to even stop arguing, because my ego tells me that i have to prove that i am right.

Now how do I come out of my self? I am not even consistently doing jaap.

I argue, and nag, and my husband is not happy. he tells me, if he finds a decent women he will leave me.

How can I lift myself up little bit of this wordly desires?

 

Please tell.

Regards,

Manaswini

 

Tell your mind that the material senses can never be perfect so you cannot have the perfect confidence that whatever you percieve through your senses is perfect or even right.

Whenever you feel frustrated in a situation, leave it and do your japa. It will help calm your mind down considerably and you will be able to see things in a better light. You will be able to understand better what your husband is saying and you will be able to answer him properly and with a cool head.

Encourage your husband to chant with you that way both of you will be engaged in devotional service. The only way one can be successful in the grihastha ashrama is if they place Krishna in the center of their family life.

 

Hope this helps,

indulekhadasi

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Suchandraji,

Sometimes it is hard to come out of the maaya. The true vairagya is very difficult.

I am not able to even stop arguing, because my ego tells me that i have to prove that i am right.

Now how do I come out of my self? I am not even consistently doing jaap.

I argue, and nag, and my husband is not happy. he tells me, if he finds a decent women he will leave me.

How can I lift myself up little bit of this wordly desires?

 

Please tell.

Regards,

Manaswini

Let him read article below by Bharat J. Gajjar, and the poison of modern Western divorce "culture".

 

Let Joint Families Forge a Better Future

 

Fifty years spent encouraging nuclear families has only hindered India’s progress

By Bharat J. Gajjar

Right after the independance of India, in 1947, my father put four names outside

our house. At that time we lived as a joint family. Both my father and my uncles'

families lived in a big bungalow. l asked my father why he had put our names

outside the home. He told me that legally we were no longer a joint family. He

added that Jawaharlal Nehru's government wanted to give a tax incentive to

smaller families. If we kept a joint family, we would have to pay more taxes. I

asked him, why a joint family was not preferred. Wasn't it the Hindu way of living?

He said Prime Minister Nehru was a Westernized man who believed that India

was poor and non-industrial because the Hindus have a joint family system. He

wanted to break up this system in order to make material progress in India.

I did not understand what my father was talking about then. After living many

years in the West, I came to know what he really meant. In the West, family

means a father, mother and children, and children leave the family when they

become 18. In the East, family means parents, children, cousins, aunts and

uncles. All the children live with the parents. The Christian way of living is to have

individual small families, and their attitude comes from the Bible.

Jesus says, "Do not think that I have come to bring peace an earth. I have not

come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to set a man against his

father, and a daughter against her, mother, and a daughter in law against her

mother in law. A man's foes will be those of his own household. He who loves

father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; and he who loves son or

daughter more than me is not worthy of me. He who does not take his cross and

follow me is not worthy of me.

"He who finds his life will lose it, and he who loses his life for my sake will find it."

Luke 12:51:53

This passage means something in spirituality, but it is interpreted differently in a

mundane way. It leads one to live a free and more individualized life. A good

example of this is in the state of Kerala, India, where Hindus are converted to

Christianity. Churches have become strong, but families have become weaker,

resulting in a higher divorce rate.

What happens when families in the USA break up? The family suffers, but the

material world gains. Instead of one peaceful family, now we have two miserable,

broken families. They need two apartments and sell their home. The lawyers are

busy, the counselor and doctors are busy, fast food places are busy, dating

services and restaurants are busy. And on and on it goes.

When a person feels lousy and miserable, he embraces the material world to get

happiness. A loving person with a loving family will not and will be less motivated

to fight. Sadly, this is only partially true. Look at some of the Indian people in the

West. They have strong, loving families with well educated children and are

successful. But they tend to dote on the material world. The Japanese have

maintained a joint family system, and they are very suceessful. After 50 years of

independence, India has made poor progress, in spite of Nehru's policies to

divide families and push socialism. If India wants to make progress, she, should

keep the joint family system and enjoy an even more free and true enterprise.

United we grow, divided we lose.

BHARAT Gajjar, a disciple of Swami Vishnu-Devananda, has been giving

Seminars an yoga for the past 30 years in USA.

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Sometimes it is hard to come out of the maaya. The true vairagya is very difficult.

I am not able to even stop arguing, because my ego tells me that i have to prove that i am right.

Now how do I come out of my self? I am not even consistently doing jaap.

I argue, and nag, and my husband is not happy. he tells me, if he finds a decent women he will leave me.

How can I lift myself up little bit of this wordly desires?

 

Vairagya is easy--all things are vairagya as we work.

 

We must be good managers. Thus, we make dasily lists of tasks to be completed, Goals to be acheived --all with the long term overall schedule in mind, one step at a time, one task at a time. The Intelligence is the Boss and the mind is the sudra who must be overseen and enlivened to continue to work without complaint.

 

There is an American Book "Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus", by Dr. John Gray. The author [a marriage counselor] has explained that men have the trait of solving problems by, "going into a cave while pondering a given dilemma--and not returning until he has attained a resolution that he has confidence in. And only then does he pronounce his plan of action."

 

But on the other hand a women, the author has explained, has the trait of solving problems by, "Talking aloud the mental train of thoughts, thus she is thinking-aloud the calculas of resolving a problem--and when she has come to the concluding plan of action her 'thinking-aloud' ends."

 

I agree with this assessment of methods of problem solving ---I think that the two methods are done by both genders and thus it is simply a maxim of types of "problem-solving-thinking" that is pointed to in the above book, but I do think that as a good manager one must recognize these ways of tackling problem solving and use this in-side knowledge to our advantage.

 

ys,

Bhaktajan

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9acs9c.jpg

Aniruddha dasa (left), temple president of ISKCON Melbourne, standing with Vipramukhya Swami.

 

HH Vipramukya swami speaks

 

 

"I don't attend Hare Krishna temples. I might visit ocassionally if there was one around here, but the nearest temple is hundreds of miles from here. So I'm not a practicing Hare Krishna monk anymore. I'm just a correctional officer working for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice."[quote]

 

What point are you making Suchandra??

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Just reporting without comment. Don't have the details what kind of drama actually happened there behind the scenes.

 

What is amazing though how it is presented as the most normal thing. Today officiating as sannyasi and diksa-guru on the vyasasana of the Brahma-Madhva-Gaudiya-Sampradaya and tomorrow, hi folks, I'm doing fine, got a job in Texas, don't feel offended, I love my girl-friend.

 

And this is basically the mood of present Vaishnavism what we have to get accustomed to. Something what reminds and explains why Srila Prabhupada as a young man hesitated at first to go and meet Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Maharaja.

 

What Prabhupada had seen throughout his youth and childhood was mainly 99% saints hooked to kali-yuga. Same what we obviously have today.

 

Just like the other day an ex-disciple told me, "well, I went to the marriage ceremony of my fallen guru who left the Vaishnava institution and the order of sannyasa, it was so nice and I saw him for the first time really happy. I wish him all well, actually I still feel like being his disciple."

 

You cannot say anything except, yes, nice wedding, wise decision to leave institutionalized Vaishnavism, in order to not being labeled as embittered. Basically this is where we're presently living in, people are emotionally caught to get cheated but demand from you to cooperate, tolerate and work with this kind of spirituality.

 

Essay by Citraketu prabhu,

 

A Brief Expose of the Rubber-stamped Spiritual Master

BY: CHITRAKETU DAS (ACBSP)

 

Mar 12, UK (SUN) —
I want to address an issue that has become somewhat of a burning issue within ISKCON. This issue is whether or not it's okay for a neophyte devotee to become a spiritual master. Obviously, it is not ideal that a neophyte devotee becomes a spiritual master. Anybody in their right mind would want to have a pure devotee as a spiritual master. Why? The answer is completely obvious: only a pure devotee spiritual master can give the most expert guidance. The guidance of a neophyte devotee will naturally be imperfect and insufficient, due to the imperfect vision of such a neophyte spiritual master.

 

A neophyte may become attracted to his female disciples, or he may be bewildered by monetary considerations. He may have insufficient knowledge of the scriptures or be motivated by false prestige, desire for worship and adoration. Even so-called advanced devotees fall prey to these obstacles in devotional service, what to speak of neophyte devotees. If such a neophyte spiritual master falls down, he brings discredit upon his own spiritual master and on the sampradaya in general, as well as causing a loss of faith amongst the general mass of devotees. Gradually devotees will become cynical about taking a spiritual master, and they will lose faith even in the great acharyas.

 

People often argue that in the absence of a great acharya, it's okay or even necessary for a neophyte devotee to take on the role of spiritual master. First, however, one must check to make fully sure that there aren't senior devotees who are actually qualified to be spiritual masters. Before the neophyte devotee jumps in, he must make fully sure that he is not committing the offence of
maryada-vyatikrama
, or being insolent in front of a senior personality. Being a spiritual master is not a game for everyone to play. It is not something that everyone gets a turn at. "Now it's my turn." This is not the mentality in which one becomes a spiritual master. On the contrary, such a competitive mentality leads one to becoming a spiritual monster.

 

There are numerous references in scriptures to the importance of accepting a pure devotee as a spiritual master, such as in Kapiladeva's instructions on devotional service, Srimad Bhagavatam Canto 3, Ch. 28, Text 2, wherein Kapiladeva instructs His mother Devahuti.

 

Lord Kapila says:
  • "One should execute his prescribed duties to the best of his ability and avoid performing duties not allotted to him. One should be satisfied with as much gain as he achieves by the grace of the Lord, and one should worship the lotus feet of a spiritual master."

In the purport Srila Prabhupada writes:
  • "In this verse there are many important words which could be very elaborately explained, but we shall briefly discuss the important aspects of each. The final statement is atmavic-caranarcanam. Atma-vit means a self-realized soul or bona fide spiritual master. Unless one is self-realized and knows what his relationship with the Supersoul is, he cannot be a bona fide spiritual master. Here it is recommended that one should seek out a bona fide spiritual master and surrender unto him (arcanam), for by enquiring from and worshipping him one can learn spiritual activities."

Srila Prabhupada clearly says here that one cannot be a spiritual master without being self-realized and knowing one's relationship with the Supersoul. These are very high qualifications indeed, but Srila Vishvanatha Chakravarti Thakur gives even higher qualifications for the spiritual master in the
Gurvastakam
, which we sing every day. According to the
Gurvastakam
, the spiritual master is the assistant of the gopis. A neophyte spiritual master obviously cannot claim such a qualification, even by association, and to imagine that such prayers as the
Gurvastakam
or
Sri-guru-carana-padma
, which is sung at guru-puja, can also be addressed to neophyte devotees is a great mistake. It is clear that such neophyte spiritual masters cannot be ranked on an equal level with genuine, or as Srila Prabhupada refers to them, bona fide
atma-vits
.

 

The Bhagavad-gita is also clear as to the qualification of the spiritual master: he must have seen the truth. Lord Krishna Himself does not recommend that we enquire from or surrender to anyone with lesser qualifications than that:
  • tad viddhi pranipatena pariprasnena sevaya

    upadeksyanti te jnanaà jnaninas tattva-darsinah (Bg. 4.34)

Again in the scriptures, Lord Krishna Himself declares that
  • acaryam mam vijaniyan nava-manyeta karhicit

One should not treat the spiritual master as an ordinary human being, for he is the substitute for the Supreme Personality of Godhead (Bhäg.11.17.27). One should treat the spiritual master as the Supreme Personality of Godhead and never be envious of him or consider him to be an ordinary human being.

 

Conversely, an ordinary human being should not impersonate a bona fide spiritual master, for such is merely cheating. If a spiritual master cannot direct his disciples to become free of sinful activities, he becomes responsible for their sinful acts. These subtle laws of nature are obviously unknown to the present leaders of ISKCON who wantonly encourage neophyte devotees to become spiritual masters, as if it were some kind of promotional step in the management of the society.

 

The spiritual master is a representative of Narayana, the Supreme Personality of Godhead. Can a representative of God be chosen by a mundane body made up of speculative individuals who are not self-realized? The answer to that is "No!" The representative of Narayana is chosen by Narayana Himself. Such is as it should be, and no amount of material wrangling will change things. God chooses his own representatives, and to imagine that a representative of God can be chosen by a mundane body is another form of atheism.

 

Currently the GBC maintain, so I am led to believe, that their rubber-stamp of approval is not actually a stamp of authorization but more of a "we have no objection", in other words "take him at your own risk." Such a stance is not only irresponsible, but also relativistic. In other words, the GBC are saying that the spiritual master may be an ordinary man, we can't guarantee that you won't be cheated. What then, we may ask, is the value of their stamp of approval? And, what has been the success rate of those who have been officially approved by them? If your spiritual master steals your money or rapes your wife, you cannot come back to the GBC for redress, because they have conveniently sidestepped any real responsibility.

 

This kind of guru-lottery makes a mockery of the divine sampradaya consisting of such great and inimitable spiritual personalities as the Six Goswamis, Srila Visvanatha Cakravarti Thakur, Srila Narottama dasa Thakura, Baladeva Vidyabhusana, Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura, Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati and His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, the mere mention of whose names purifies one's very existence.

 

Since I entitled this paper a "brief" expose, I shall keep it brief, but there is sufficient scriptural evidence to completely demolish the GBC standpoint, which is evasive and unclear. Their arguments shift from year to year, indicating that they have no foundation. Srila Prabhupada often makes it clear that institutionalized spiritual masters, who become spiritual masters on the basis of convention alone, such as Sukracarya, should be rejected in favour of genuine self-realized souls. If you happen to be in the unfortunate position of having been rubber stamped without possessing the requisite qualifications, my suggestion to you is as follows: don't try to kid your students that you are what you are not, and refer them to the genuine guidance and instruction of those who are genuinely qualified. Otherwise, your fate will definitely be to hit the ground, which is Krishna's supreme mercy upon you, since the ground is the most sobering place to be. So all you would-be gurus, be warned!!
  • gurur na sa syat sva-jano na sa syat

    pita na sa syaj janani na sa syat

    daivam na tat syan na patis ca sa syan

    na mocayed yah samupeta-mrtyum

One who cannot deliver his dependants from the path of repeated birth and death should never become a spiritual master… (Bhag.5.5.18)

 

 

 

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