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EDITORIAL October 2, 1999 VNN4847 Comment on this story Vaishnava Institution And Vaishnava Tradition BY RAM-MOHAN DAS EDITORIAL, Oct 2 (VNN) — Or: Are religious institutions "doomed" to fight without end? "Did you see this new bhakta, he seems to be a better book distributor than 10 yearlong Sankirtan leader Revatinandana prabhu!" "This bhakta seems to be really intelligent, he should be temple commander immediately!" Did you ever question yourself why there are two categories in a Vaishnava institution to be investigated? First how your personal qualities fit into the hierarchy of an institution and second what is your actual spiritual situation! These two aspects of integration into an institution are rarely in balance! Why? The requirements of keeping the institution running is number one. Your personal spiritual needs for progress somewhere second! In Bengal 500 years ago we found pure devotees living on a little piece of land, in some little straw hut, with wife and children, producing clay pots or banana-leaf cups. Their only secret of success: natural sangha with a few godbrothers/sisters. Presently we find at the top 500 devotees, leaders who suddenly come out diverting like some Kali dasa! Why? Leading an institution is first of all a material qualification which millions of karmis or Sisupalas also have, with pretty perfect skill. In old Bengal or Vrindavana we found pure devotees who even didn't speak very much, who even couldn't read or write. But simply by watching that Vaishnava calling out Krishna's name your heart was influenced to detach from materialistic glamour and search for spiritual happiness. Simply seeing Srila Prabhupada was like that. He didn't have to say a word but your heart was moved and one became eager to attain that very spiritual happiness. Did we ever consider that institutionalized Christianity wouldn't be able to survive by its popes and bishops but rather by its individual "outside living" saints, who simply couldn't integrate their spirituality into an institutionalized religion. They were often banned, discredited or even threatened... Why do we see pure devotees like Prabhupada and Bhaktisiddhanta building up institutionalized Vaishnavism? We never read in all the vedic scriptures of "Vaishnava Societies" with a big institutional leader at the top, where presently everybody can only guess if he is really a pure devotee! Simply in order to implant Krishna Consciousness to the West, this had to be done! Bhaktisiddhanta started with a big army of getting ready to conquer the West. He showed all his followers how a real army, in the shape of a huge institution, was required to put into the door of Western "culture" and establish Krishna Consciousness. Prabhupada took up that strategy of forming a huge movement to attract the attention of at least 2 Billion Westerners! Today we see 100 million books are distributed, millions of people ate prasadam, heard the Holy Name, visited the temples, associated with devotees and at the same time many of us feel the institution seems to fade away, will never be like when Prabhupada was with us or is in never ending fights with other institutions claiming they have the better solutions and more purityÉ Has the time come to change from institutional Vaishnavism to non-institutional Vaishnavism? Or is it changing involuntarily anyway? Did You ever experience people feel attracted to come for a visit because that's an international institution or a World Wide Organization with bigger and even more bigger leaders? Maybe because they are enviously curious who is the biggest leader behind the whole circus! Did you ever say on Sankirtan, please come to our International Society which has its Headquarters in LA and is therefore most important and genuine? You say, come and visit me on Sunday! Me and my wife are preparing a nice feast for you and your friends and people feel attracted. In good old Bengal the same. No skyscraper buildings or glas-palaces, no artificial hierarchical Sadhu-Societies but simply personal small temples and meetings of devotees with natural respect toward "older" devotees. When something became big like Ratha-yatra in Puri it was spontaneous not institutionally controlled by copyright! Everything big, everything double, everything triple - it was the pioneer's fight and visionary-missionary spirit to step into Western culture to break open the heavy doors with to the Western fortress, with a rod only ten thousand Prabhupada disciples where able to carry. Now we shouldn't be afraid if institutional Vaishnavism gradually fades away and everything becomes small but personal and many, many, many... This fighting within our own tradition is nothing but delicious food for the demons! A philosophical religion like Krishna consciousness is very easily misused to end up fighting day and night! Or do present Vaishnava leaders aspire to enter the books of history as the brainy endless quarreling preachers of the "vedic scholar groups"? Comment on this story  Contact VNN about this storySend this story to a friend
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