Bhagavad-gita - Another New Translation
BY: KRSNA DASA
Mar 23, UK (SUN) — On Lord Caitanya's Appearance day, I spied a "new" translation of Bhagavad-gita for sale at Bhaktivedanta Manor book shop, Srila Prabhupada's temple. Amongst Srila Prabhupada's supreme books was a new translation by WHO..!!!? I felt quite disturbed…
I asked Indriyesha dasa about this and his reply was, what was my problem with the book? My problem is that this is Srila Prabhupada's temple, and who is the guy anyway? I found the Intro quite averse to Srila Prabhupada's style. I further added that I wasn't happy with "Lilamrta" minimizing Srila Prabhupada, to which Indriyesha shockingly answered that he felt too many people place Prabhupada on an unreal platform, i.e., on the level of Krishna. This from a rep from ISKCON educational services.
As per usual when confronting authority, I was asked how many rounds I'm chanting and what I'm doing to spread Krishna consciousness... I then understood why/how these people could associate Srila Prabhupada, the messenger from the spiritual world, with mundane Mayavadis, etc.
Check out the presentation of Srila Prabhupada on the ISKCON "Heart of Hinduism" webpage.
Apparently the author of the new Bhagavad-gita, Graham Schweig, is 'aka Garuda das' and because he's preaching to intellectuals, has to hide his identity to "attract" (?) them. I doubt there's mention of Srila Prabhupada in his work. It's madness, as evident below, that he cannot bring himself to recommend Srila Prabhupada's greatest Bhagavad-gita As It Is, but is persuaded to compose his own sanitized translation for his colleagues teaching Gita:
"A collegue of mine approached me about his teaching a Bhagavad-gita class at the University and, because I am somewhat considered the resident expert on the subject, inquired as to what translation of the Bhagavad gita he should use? After standing there for about an hour, casually discussing the pros and cons of various editions, he said, "Well, why don't you do one?" and I queried back, "Do one what?" "A translation of the Bhagavad-gita" I thought that that was interesting and wondered if Princeton, who had just published my book Dance of Divine Love had it on their list to publish. But I didn't really think of it seriously.
I happened to write to my editor at Princeton and asked, "Do you folks have the Bhagavad-gita on your list? That was all I said about that. She wrote back, "That's a wonderful idea. I'll send this over to Fred. Send a proposal in immediately."
