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EDITORIAL December 25, 1998 VNN2739 Srila B.V. Narayan Maharaja Debate BY MADAN MOHAN DASA EDITORIAL, Dec 25 (VNN) — The Real Issues In The Controversy Surrounding Srila Bhaktivedanta Narayan Maharaja Dear IRG and VNN devotees and readers, Please accept my dandavat pranams. All glories to Sri Guru and Gauranga! This is the personal perspective of one disciple, not any kind of "official" or representative statement on behalf of anyone else. The disciples of Srila Narayan Maharaja form a full cross-section of the worldwide Gaudiya Vaishnava community. Mostly from Mathura, Vrndavan and Navadvipa dhamas and many other parts of India, there are also many westerners ranging from some of the first disciples of Srila Prabhupada to new devotees who have had no connection with Iskcon, as well as innumerable residents of other countries worldwide. There is no "typical" disciple or group of disciples. What we do all have in common is an aspiration for pure bhakti and a pure Vaishnava guru - an eternal resident of Goloka-Vraja - who is fully capable of injecting Krishna-prema into the hearts of sincere sadhakas. As a disciple of Srila Bhaktivedanta Narayan Maharaja for the past 7 years, I feel honour-bound to confront and address what I see as the underlying issues in the ongoing debates and controversies surrounding this exemplary and self-effulgent acarya whose life is totally devoted to practising and preaching pure Krishna consciousness. He has taught me the importance of making vital distinctions in order to avoid being distracted from the actual goal of attaining devotional service in Vraja, the topmost treasure that Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu came to distribute freely to all. Association, I understand, is our prime consideration. If we want prema-bhakti, we MUST go to someone who has it, who loves us and who is also willing to train us in devotional service. It is essential to have a direct relationship with such an uttama-adhikari Vaishnava - who is free from the tendency to criticise others - and to follow his directions carefully, serving him wholeheartedly. Without direct, continuous connection and service to pure devotees all activities with regard to practising and preaching what all the Gaudiya Vaishnava acaryas have taught can amount to little more than an empty pretense. That Srila Bhaktivedanta Narayan Maharaja is currently being criticised by many conditioned souls is a direct indication of the results of ignoring and/or refusing pure guidance, which Sri Krishna ensures is always available for His genuine aspiring devotees. Such ignorance is certain to lead anyone away from spiritual life. Continuous, direct guidance from a pure devotee and strict avoidance of non-devotee imitators and offenders are both neccessary at all times for anyone serious to succeed on the path of bhakti. If attaining pure sanga entails excommunication from or avoidance of an entire institution and a large number of it's members, we should know very clearly that this is part of the price Sri Krishna wants us to to pay in our journey towards His eternal home. It is His interests we are here to serve, not ours. The number of misguided pseudo-devotees who have avoided pure association has grown massively since the entry into nitya-lila of Srila Prabhupada 21 years ago. There is a very clear distinction between the faithful servants of Srila Prabhupada, who have obeyed his "prime directive" to accept pure shelter and guidance, and the rebel group who have evidently pursued some separate interests while pretending to be his followers. For the purposes of this article the distinction is made here between ISKCON and ImSKCON (The Imitation Society for Krishna Consciousness). This article in written in a spirit of service, especially to genuine seekers of spiritual truth bewildered by the calamitous barrage of abuse directed towards pure Vaishnavas all over the Internet. Your servant aspiring for the service of Sri Guru & Gauranga, Madan Mohan dasa. ISKCON or ImSKCON? Firstly, Srila Bhaktivedanta Narayan Maharaja on the subject of Vaishnava aparadha: "Those who are engaged in criticising Vaishnavas have not entered even the stage of kanistha-adhikari. "Whenever we criticise anyone, a bridge is formed between our heart and their heart. The bad qualities we point to automatically enter our own heart. If we criticise any Vaishnava our bhakti is immediately ruined. "If a disciple does not become angry when he hears criticism of his guru, he is not a real disciple. "But even if someone criticises our Guru Maharaja, we should not criticise them. We should speak very strongly against aparadha, apasiddhanta and other bogus activity, but never against any individual jiva. "Humility means that when we hear someoneone criticise any Vaishnava, we should immediately cut out his tongue. (Silence him by strong argument)" I would like to take this opportunity to focus attention on the underlying issues that have caused many apparently sincere, articulate and intelligent devotees to pursue the suicidal path of Vaishnava aparadha. Vital distinctions need to be made between what constitutes genuine service to the acaryas in the Gaudiya Vaishnava bhagavata-parampara and mundane activity performed by conditioned souls in pursuit of wealth, power and adoration. ISKCON does not need reforming. ISKCON is an eternal set of divine precepts. ISKCON has existed since the beginning of time. ISKCON is one name for the entire succession of our pure acaryas including Lord Brahma, Narada Muni, Vyasadeva, Sukadeva Gosvami, Madhavendra Puri, Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu and the Six Gosvamis of Vrndavan, Srila Bhaktivinode Thakura, Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Prabhupada, right through to the present day and beyond. To contemplate reforming ISKCON is to suggest that conditioned souls can correct the "deficiencies" of the acaryas in the glorious Gaudiya Vaishnava line. It is the vision of conditioned souls that needs reforming. We must make positive discrimination, under the guidance of those who can see clearly, between what is genuine representation of the Brahma-Madhva-Gaudiya Vaishnava sampradaya - ISKCON - and what is not. The internal politics of any mundane religious institution, whatever names it may use or misrepresent, have no bearing whatsoever on the flow of pure bhakti in this world. "The idea of an organised church in an intelligible form, indeed, marks the close of a living spiritual movement. The great ecclesiastical establishments are the dykes and the dams to retain the current that cannot be held by any such contrivances. They, indeed, indicate a desire on the part of the masses to exploit a spiritual movement for their own purpose. They also unmistakably indicate the end of the absolute and unconventional guidance of the bonafide spiritual teacher." (Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Prabhupada, The Harmonist, January 1929) Some basic questions need to be addressed: 1) What is the motivation behind producing a list of "charges" against Srila Bhaktivedanta Narayan Maharaja? 2) Who is it that feels so threatened by a pure, maha-bhagavata devotee that they feel they must discredit him to protect their own selfish interests? 3) Does any sane person doubt that Srila Narayan Maharaja - a Gaudiya Vaishnava sannyasi since 1954 - has devoted his life to the propogation of the holy name or that criticising such a person is namaparadha number one? 4) Has Srila A.C.Bhaktivedanta Swami Maharaja or any pure Vaishnava ever instructed any disciples at any time to engage in namaparadha or Vaishnava aparadha for the sake of preaching or any other purpose? 5) Who is really carrying forward the mission of Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu? 6) Who is working to oppose that mission and why? 7) Where within our siddhanta is there any requirement that one acarya be identical to the previous or any other acarya in any respect other than their essential teachings? The glorious and exemplary preaching work of His Divine Grace Srila A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Maharaja, our Srila Prabhupada, made the International Society for Krishna Consciousness accessible to every conditioned soul on this planet. Since Srila Prabhupada's departure the political wranglings of a handful of ambitious men has not only obscured the beauty of Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu's mission, but has also succeeded in distorting the appearance and credibility of the Krishna consciousness movement into something that is rejected by the majority of decent, intelligent people worldwide. For most people the Hare Krishna movement is synonymous with cult brainwashing, money-making scams, corruption, drug-running, child abuse and even murder, among the more high-profile activities. Much hard evidence has surfaced over the past 20 years to confirm the dismal reality of all these things, performed in the name of propagating "pure love of God". At the end of the nineteenth century it had become neccessary for Srila Bhaktivinode Thakura to rescue the reputation and credibility of our sublime Gaudiya Vaishnava tradition from the misrepresentations of the mayavadis, sahajiyas and so many false gurus engaged in debased activities. It took several hundred years from the time of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu for such a decline to take effect. At the end of the twentieth century the single biggest enemy of Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu's preaching mission is the Imitation Society for Krishna Consciousness (ImSKCON), a nest of parasites that have fed on the body of the world's largest Gaudiya Vaishnava preaching institution. In just twenty years the insatiable lust of a few misguided men for wealth, power and prestige has dragged the good name of pure Krishna consciousness down into the sewers of degraded, sub-human behaviour. This is our point of positive discrimination: to ascertain who is qualified, who is genuine guru-tattva, who is actually carrying forward the historic mission of the Gaudiya Vaishnava acaryas and who is not. It is only under direct, pure guidance that we can properly see, and serve according to the perfect guidelines laid down by all our preceptor acaryas. Anyone engaged in criticising Vaishnavas is clearly not: a) a qualified Vaishnava b) a guru in any respect c) performing any service for the mission of Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu The primary issue surrounding Srila Narayan Maharaja isn't whether or not he is a pure devotee giving perfect guidance and shelter to many thousands of aspiring sadhakas. Sincere devotees worldwide, including many, many disciples of Srila Prabhupada happily attest to the unarguable fact that they have once again found inspiration to revive their flagging devotional practises. Once again they feel the love, affection, guidance and shelter that only a pure Vaishnava can inspire from within the heart. The actual issue, the real underlying reason for all of the apparent controversy raging around this gentle, soft-hearted sadhu is the simple fact that he represents a threat to the ambitions of conditioned souls who want to be God rather than worship God. There is no more attractive situation to a materially ambitious person than the prospect of becoming "divine", most especially to hold the exalted position of a Gaudiya Vaishnava guru. No president, king or celebrity could even conceive of such unimaginable heights of adulation; absolute power, being worshipped on the same level as God, hundreds of adoring servants, access to wealth, luxury and all the attractions the mundane world has to offer. Absorbed in Krishna-bhakti and indifferent to all mundane pleasures, Srila Narayan Maharaja, situated on the absolute plane of pure guru-tattva, doesn't have to do anything to antagonise the false, would-be gurus of this world. His very existence highlights their positions as pretenders and conditioned souls on the relative plane. It is hardly surprising then, when for many years some very intelligent and capable men who have worked their up an institutional heirarchy into the topmost realms of absolute power and unquestioning adoration, suddenly find their ambitions cast into the shadows by the radiant presence of a simple-hearted renunciant monk whose only desire is to love and serve Sri Sri Radha-Krishna, while teaching others how to do the same. The ambition of the would-be-God candidates is such that they stoop to the lowest of tactics in trying to eliminate any possible challengers to the "absolute" positions they covet. "He is my enemy and I will kill him" is their underlying mood. But this is hardly the Vaishnava way. Nor does such mindless sectarianism succeed in attracting the lost souls of this world towards the path of bhakti. What good can possibly be achieved by the devotionally untenable activity of writing huge papers listing the "faults" of a pure, saintly sadhu, or any Vaishnava at all for that matter? The intention is transparently malicious. The effect is to divert many sincere souls away from devotional service altogether. On the positive side however, many others become drawn to the debate, enquire further about this "controversial" sadhu, recognise his purity and take to his perfect shelter anyway, relieved to escape from the manipulations of power-hungry men. But there is no positive value in any piece of work conceived in ignorance by blind and foolish men who would happily destroy the reputation of their own guru or even an entire sampradaya - for the sake of attaining temporary power, wealth and prestige. Such eloquent critiques are a gross misuse of human intelligence. It is the natural effect of Vaishnava aparadha that the deeper the unfortunate offender falls into the dark pit of ignorance, envy and malice, the more self-righteous he becomes in his determination to expose the "evil intentions" of those who stand between him and his ambitions. Such aparadhis persist way past their "fall-by" dates to humiliate themselves more and more through public displays of anger and frustration. We are very fortunate in determining who is or isn't a bonafide representative of Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu. Those who inspire bhakti to flow in the hearts of aspiring sadhakas are self-effulgent and self-evident by their exemplary activities. While those who are violently opposed to the presence of any genuine sadhu tend to advertise their demoniac tendencies (all over the Internet) as their insane pursuit for wealth, power and followers impels them into ever more suicidal strategies. It is a simple choice for us between between teachers of pure love and peddlers of sectarian hatred. Sweet-talking pretenders very quickly reveal their entirely mundane aspirations when they enter into the perilous arena of Vaishnava aparadha. For the critics of pure devotees the danger of any offence being accepted does not come from the pure, maha-bhagavata Vaishnava. Krishna allows the fate of Vaishnava-aparadhis to be determined by the dust at the lotus feet of a pure Vaishnava - his disciples - who are unlikely to be quite so forgiving. I am a neophyte grhasta devotee struggling with my senses and my sadhana. All my hopes rest at the lotus feet of my Gurudeva, in whom I have developed implicit faith. He has gradually removed many doubts and misconceptions and has illuminated the teachings of the Gaudiya Vaishnava acaryas in a very inspiring, scientific and beautiful way. I know that it is certainly not by my qualification or ability but by his mercy alone that I will succeed on the path of bhakti. Unless I consciously choose to pursue Vaishnava aparadha as my sadhana I am certain that one day I will attain to my eternal service in Vraja under the perfect guidance and pure shelter of Srila Bhaktivedanta Narayan Maharaja. He inspires that confidence in all his disciples. Those who choose to make offensive public attacks against my beloved Guru Maharaja place their fate entirely in the hands of devotees like me. Claiming our rightful places as insignificant specks of dust at the lotus feet of our Guru Maharaja, if any of us choose to accept offense, then such foolish critics face certain ruin, as proven many, many times in recent years with the downfall of so many ImSKCON "gurus". Naturally I am angry. I am outraged that any conditioned soul could not only try to smear the pure character of my faultless Gurudeva, but also be so malicious as to actively prevent others from gaining pure shelter and ultimate success in bhakti, simply to further their own material ambitions. ImSKCON gurus and politicians watch out! However, I have had the benefit of perfect guidance over the last 7 years. My Guru Maharaja has shown me the purpose of Srila Prabhupada's mission and the real reasons why Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu came into this world. It's all in Srila Prabhupada's books, but it required the guidance of another pure devotee for me to see it. Many haven't admitted this yet and continue taking shelter of their own misguided minds. "The intellect of a man commits an offence against itself the moment it attempts to comprehend the incomprehensible by it's own resources. This type of aggressive intellectualism is the mother of atheism and is not less harmful than even deliberate stupidity." (Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Prabhupada, The Harmonist, January 1929) This type of aggressive intellectualism is all that the conditioned souls of ImSKCON are offering in their desperate efforts to gain power over innocent souls. When one pure ISKCON representative, Srila Prabhupada's foremost diksa disciple Srila Gour Govinda Maharaja preached the true Gaudiya siddhanta and guru-tattva he was opposed, harrassed and persecuted by the power-hungry pretenders of ImSKCON at every step. Srila Prabhupada didn't come to start an institution. He came to teach conditioned souls how to love and serve Sri Sri Radha-Krishna. Many appear to have missed or forgotten this. Srila Narayan Maharaja is representing him fully and perfectly in all respects. This is ISKCON - the dynamic flow of pure bhakti guided by an uninterrupted succession of divine acaryas, not some mundane institution that can rubber stamp any bogus nonsense with the name of Srila Prabhupada and call it "bhakti". Genuine gurus are not elected - they are self-effulgent, recognised according to sadhu, sastra and confirmation by other pure Vaishnavas. Gaudiya Vaishnava siddhanta is eternal - not something arbitrarily legislated to suit the whims and political aspirations of a worldly administration. The infallible system of establishing truth through guru, sadhu and sastra does not support imitation gurus or false institutions. ISKCON is flawless, perfect in every respect. ImSKCON is a grotesque pantomime of ruthlessly ambitious men masquerading in saffron cloth as spiritual authorities when they command no authority whatsoever. Only those who choose to be blind could fail to see the difference. The veil of spiritual blindness is gradually lifted when we acknowledge that the guidance of false gurus and our own mundane minds is inadequate and we actually take shelter of a pure, uttama-adhikari Vaishnava. To do less is to ignore the most fundamental teachings of Srila Prabhupada's books. Personally, I have reached safe ground in the ISKCON Srila Prabhupada came to give to the world, in spite of the best efforts of ImSKCON's bogus hierarchy to dissuade me from reaching it. I prayed to Srila Prabhupada, begging him to send me a guru like himself and he sent me straight to the lotus feet of Srila Narayan Maharaja. ISKCON and ImSKCON may even appear identical to the untrained eye. But making a clear distinction will be vital to the progress of any new and aspiring devotees. A swan can separate milk from water, and so too can the guidance of a paramahamsa Vaishnava help us make the distinction between genuine Gaudiya Vaishnava practise and the ambitious posturing of shameless imitators. One test of sincerity on the path of bhakti is in submitting oneself humbly at all times before the omniscient gaze of a pure Vaishnava, ready to be chastised and corrected. Srila Narayan Maharaja is a loving guide and friend to aspiring sadhakas who approach him honestly with relevant enquiry and a service mood, but a fearsome, all-conquering opponent in the eyes of ambitious men who covet his superior status. Thanks to pure devotees like Srila Narayan Maharaja, Srila Prabhupada's house stands firm, with it's doors open wide, giving free access to many bona-fide Gaudiya Vaishnava preachers and institutions worldwide, in it's unlimited rooms. What happens inside the few small rooms of ImSKCON temples under small-minded ImSKCON administration is an irrelevance to the progress of the Krishna consciousness movement. Until such time when the ImSKCON law-books are abandoned in favour of the eternal ISKCON precepts of Gaudiya Vaishnavism, when pure Vaishnavas will be followed rather than feared. Srila Prabhupada's ISKCON is alive and well wherever his pure precepts are being taught and practised. No-one following any imitation guru engaged in criticising pure Vaishnavas or ignoring his clear instructions to take direct shelter of an uttama-adhikari Vaishnava has any claim to be called a follower of Srila Prabhupada. I have been taught not to judge or criticise any individual, but to speak strongly against apasiddhanta, aparadha and all bogus activity. It is the suicidal, downward-spiralling nature of all conditioned souls and their insane activities in the absence of pure guidance that I am emphasising and challenging here. In the face of unlimited abuse, deceit and treachery from many so-called "gurus" and "Vaishnavas", Srila Narayan Maharaja remains their well-wisher in all respects. His feelings have been hurt, certainly, but he sees that his critics are just like babies passing stool and urine in the lap of an ever-affectionate mother. If it were a simple case of justice, then I would be inclined to call for such offenders to be punished. Certainly they would experience the ultimate death - exclusion from the association of pure Vaishnavas and any success on the path of bhakti. But I have been taught that mercy is a higher principle than justice. It would be hypocritical for me to demand that justice should be done to others when I have been dealt with according to the most magnanimous considerations of causeless mercy. I too would deserve to be exiled from the realms of pure devotional service for my innumerable offenses if I were to be made answerable to justice alone. In response to the mountain of offensive statements made against my beloved Gurudeva I want those very statements simply to be used as marker flags to identify the miscreant ImSKCON non-Vaishnavas making them, who would obstruct the progress of honest, aspiring sadhakas who search for pure shelter. The choice, now clearly polarised between darkness and light, has been made very much easier by the insane public rantings of the ImSKCON pretenders: "Follow me! I've lost my intelligence due to aparadha..." As for the offenders, they are conditioned souls stumbling blindly in the darkness of ignorance. The only difference between me and them is that I have somehow or other received some causeless mercy and they are currently separating themselves from that same ever-flowing current of mercy by their calamitous activities. My Gurudeva does not accept offenses. In aspiring to follow at least something of his mood I am trying to think of them as jiva souls suffering blindly, whose eyes will be opened the moment they acknowledge their errors and start praying for forgiveness. If there is a grain of humility or intelligence left between the offenders they should make their apologies at least as publicly as their aparadhas. They can then start to serve the glorious ISKCON mission of the Gaudiya Vaishnava acaryas instead of defaming it by their every word and action. My Guru Maharaja is utterly devoid of malice or envy, the well-wisher of every living entity. I can not pretend to share his totally magnanimous and merciful perspective. But I want my anger to be articulated into an appeal for sanity, a call for the crystal-clear teachings of the true ISKCON acaryas to be set apart from the vile, sub-human activities of ImSKCON "gurus" and pretenders to power in the name of Srila Prabhupada. It is appropriate that the dark shadow cast by ImSKCON serves also to contrast the brilliant light of the pure ISKCON precepts propounded by Srila Prabhupada, Srila Gour Govinda Maharaja, Srila Bhakti Promode Puri Maharaja, Srila Bhakti Raksak Sridhar Dev Gosvami Maharaja, Srila Narayan Maharaja and the many other pure devotees who have dedicated their exemplary lives to the true mission of Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu. The contrast has never been more stark and the materially ambitious opponents of pure bhakti have never before made such embarrassingly high-profile spectacles of themselves across the Internet for all devotees and aspirants worldwide to consider and reject. I see my Guru Maharaja smiling like Krishna between two armies, knowing full well that all opposition will serve ultimately to glorify the genuine Gaudiya Vaishnava acaryas and accelerate the progress of the topmost conception of divine love within the world. All arguments against Srila Narayan Maharaja have served only as a smokescreen for the ambitions of conditioned souls who seek to exploit a religious institution for mundane, personal profit. Appropriately, the smoke has blown back in the faces of the ImSKCON pretenders as they have unwittingly spread his name, fame and glories even further worldwide by banning his books, his pure sanga and seeking to defame and discredit him. All of the religious institutions, ImSKCON especially, have crumbled under the weight of their own hypocrisy. But even in spite of so many pseudo-religions and brainwashing cults, the spirit lives on in the hearts and homes of genuine aspirants and practitioners of bhakti, who have understood the absolute neccessity of pure guidance over and above all mundane considerations of institutional membership. The path of bhakti is a progression from the conditioned to the liberated state, right up to the attainment of Krishna-prema, through the practise of devotional activities under perfect guidance. Bogus gurus, redundant institutions and deviant teachings must neccessarily be identified and eliminated in the course of that process, especially when the true and the false appear so often side by side, or even intertwined. Anyone seeking ultimate success in bhakti - wishing to gradually refine the sadhana process down to to specific practises and meditations - must accept specific guidance from an eternal resident of Goloka Vraja. To do less would be to reject the very treasure that Chaitanya Mahaprabhu came to distribute freely to all, to reject the very essence of Srila Prabhupada's teachings. Srila Narayan Maharaja is reminding all devotees of the actual goal of bhakti through strong emphasis on hearing lila-katha from pure Vaishnavas and gradual progress towards chanting suddha-nama, the primary processes by which success on this path is achieved. He is fully honouring his unique friendship and promise to Srila Prabhupada to continue his work by giving help and shelter to aspiring devotees everywhere. "Our relationship is certainly based on spontaneous love. That is why there is no chance of us forgetting one another." "Because in all the Gaudiya Maths, I think that you are the real guru-sevaka, so I always correspond with you and I always give my full love and affection to you." (Excerpts from letters sent by Srila Prabhupada to Srila Narayan Maharaja, dated 28th September 1966 & 17th May 1967. From "Letters From America" 1997) It should also be noted that the most auspicious ceremony of placing a pure devotee into samadhi is invariably performed by the seniormost disciple. In the case of Srila Prabhupada, this most sacred and confidential ritual was performed by none other than Srila Narayan Maharaja. It is absurd to suggest he doesn't know Srila Prabhupada's desires, or to suggest that any of his junior godbrothers might understand better. In contrast to the predominant Western mentality of competing to rise to the top of any corporate or institutional hierarchy to attain personal power and wealth, Srila Narayan Maharaja is not in competition with anyone. He simply wishes to preach about Vraja-bhakti to anyone that wants to hear and is unquestionably one of those exceedingly rare souls who can actually plant the bhakti creeper in the heart of any sincere sadhaka and take them all the way to eternal perfection in Goloka Vraja. He never fails to give full credit to Srila Prabhupada for facilitating the preaching opportunities now open to him worldwide. Nor was he ever needed more than now to restore so much lost faith. Both the credibility and motivation of those who oppose his preaching activities on the basis of shallow criticisms, unfounded allegations and the pedantic observation of external differences between one acarya and another, should be examined very carefully. Such opponenents immediately establish themselves as envious and malicious non-Vaishnavas, but nonetheless serve as a clear contrast for aspiring sadhakas to ascertain who is pure and perfect in both preaching and personal conduct and who is woefully lacking in the magnanimous, loving qualities of a genuine Vaishnava. Come on, all you ambitious and envious men, all you petty critics and pedants out there! Most of your colleagues have crawled out onto the deck of the sinking ImSKCON ship to be unavoidably exposed in the glaring light of truth. The ISKCON rescue ship, under the expert guidance of the Gaudiya Vaishnava bhagavata-parampara, is picking up all survivors who've chosen to make a fresh start. It's your choice. Can anyone possibly be so foolish as to believe they will succeed in dragging a pure devotee down while establishing themselves as inspiring, trustworthy and credible spiritual authorities, fit to lead their unquestioning followers into the land of pure bhakti? Yes, apparently; "We accept Srila Narayan Maharaja as a pure devotee, but ..." There was never so much glaring evidence to underline the need for pure guidance at every step. On the Internet, the biggest communications medium on the planet, the ImSKCON pretenders appear more determined than ever to portray Krishna consciousness as a totally sectarian religion practised by cult extremists who will sacrifice any principle in their ruthless struggle to climb to the top of their corporate ladder. Genuine seekers of spiritual truth are forced to look elsewhere. This is the legacy of 21 years of avoiding guidance from any pure Vaishnava, most noticeably ignoring the perfect teachings of Srila Prabhupada, that has spawned ImSKCON, a veritable possee of pretentious parasites. Fortunately, there is an alternative. The choice was never so clear; follow the upward path of pure bhakti, Srila Prabhupada, Srila Narayan Maharaja and all the genuine ISKCON representatives or slide down the slippery slope with the offenders and imitators of ImSKCON. No intelligent, credible person can seriously continue the pretense that Gaudiya Vaishnavism and the activities of ImSKCON are one and the same. It is a choice between life and death. ImSKCON is dead. Long live ISKCON! Srila Bhaktivedanta Narayan Maharaja, by whose presence alone the integrity of ISKCON, the Gaudiya Vaishnava siddhanta and the continuance of the pure message of Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu is assured, has without complaint endured insults and offenses from innumerable ImSKCON idiots across the Internet. He is, thereby, entitled to a few closing words here, to be etched into the memory of his miserly detractors. On meeting a group of vociferous ImSKCON opponents who challengingly asserted: "We are the body of Srila Prabhupada!", this gently spoken Vaishnava saint declared boldly: "Yes, and we are his soul." * * * * * Thanks to all the devotees and aspirants who have had the patience to read this long, rambling article. I hope this will serve as some use to any aspirant who is serious to connect with the true flow of bhakti known as ISKCON, so mercifully bestowed upon us by Srila Prabhupada on behalf of the entire Gaudiya Vaishnava bhagavata-parampara. ISKCON is so much more than the temples, managers and followers of any religious institution. ISKCON is the potential life of every conditioned jiva soul, waiting to be lived. Please forgive any unintentional offenses made in the course of this very personal declaration of faith, in response to the barrage of aparadha swilling round cyberspace and the much-divided and misguided community of devotees and aspirants to the path of bhakti worldwide. The present situation is too unbearably tragic and this subject matter too close to my heart to avoid strong and honest expressions of my feelings. If nothing else is achieved I feel happy to have publicly expressed rejection of the pseudo-devotees and my loyalty to Srila Prabhupada's ISKCON and all the true representatives of Gaudiya Vaishnavism. "The effective silencing of the whole race of the pseudo-teachers of religion is the very first clear indication of the appearance of the Absolute on the mundane plane. The bonafide teacher of the Absolute heralds the advent of Krishna by his uncompromising campaign against the pseudo-teachers of religion." (Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Prabhupada, The Harmonist, January 1929) Srila Narayan Maharaja relishes opposition as stimulus to his preaching. There remains an open invitation to anyone wanting to challenge him in a public debate concerning any aspect of Gaudiya Vaishnava siddhanta, etiquette or preaching practise. To date not one of his sniping ImSKCON critics has risen to this challenge. Could it be that their criticisms are totally lacking in truth or substance? Please send any comments, responses or further enquiries to Madan Mohan dasa at: 106650.1421@compuserve.com - - - - - * * * RADHA-KRISHNA PREMA * * * A Magazine for the Worldwide Gaudiya Vaishnava Community is now online at: http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Olympus/2469/RKP.htm (in association with the Temple of Understanding website) Comment on this Story This story URL: http://www.vnn.org/editorials/ET9812/ET25-2739.html
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