The Philosophical Root of the Problem
BY: ROCANA DASA
Dec 19, CANADA (SUN) — A response to Krishna das's defense of Hridayananda.
We have recently received another salvo from Krishna das, who has either been writing on Hridayananda's behalf, or is Hridayananda himself, writing under a pseudonym. Unfortunately, Krishna das's message and methods have slid beyond the point of our willingness to publish them.
A good portion of Krishna das's article was focused on chastising yours truly and the Sun readers for speculating as to his identity, suggesting that everything we've written in response is tainted because of that speculation, etc. We find this argument both childish and pointless. While we have been willing to accommodate the writer's anonymity, he/they have now abused and lost the privilege. In the future, we will only accept submissions from Hridayananda and his supporters that are published under their true names. We are not interested in wasting any further time engaging in the sort of 'churn' that Krishna das generated in his last submission, which goes unpublished. That churn is no doubt created in the hope of distracting us all from the real issues at hand – complaints about Hridayananda's fallen status as a sannyasa, diksa guru, and GBC member.
Much of the rest of Krishna das's last submission was his effort to further cast aspersions on the character of the Sampradaya Sun, HareKrsna.com, the value of our site content, our right to use the domain name, our poor service to Srila Prabhupada, etc., etc. All this, instead of any substantive response to what I've written, or to the concerns other devotees have put forward to Hridayananda, directly and through "Krishna das."
Because a little of what Krishna das wrote in his most recent submission had merit, we will respond to it. As quoted below, he reiterated his understanding that since 1986, the re-establishment of 'free-will' puts the onus on both participants in the guru-disciple relationship to be mutually responsible for whatever the outcome may be. They are consenting adults and as such, they deserve what they get: good or bad, spiritual or material.
Krishna das writes:
"You and your many readers have all taken my comments as dismissive and/or even supportive of anyone's misrepresentation of Krsna Consciousness; by precept or example. However I never did such a thing. I never once did that, nor could I do such a thing. I merely offered my simple affirmation that the entire matter was not truly germane to anyone save but them that are actually and coercively forced to endure any of this purported misrepresentation with no option provided them by Srila Prabhupada to remove such a purported impediment. I then stated that since 1986 no one has had to endure such and so all this public disclosure of supposed malfeasance and misrepresentation was essentially just introducing nothing more than "sensational" information that does little more than appeal to a very degraded appetite amongst a segment of "devotees" who appear to have little to do with their time other than to ingest and digest all "the news that is unfit to print".
The philosophical core of this perspective has been a recurring theme in ISKCON going back to 1978, from the time the Zonal Acaryas took over Srila Prabhupada' society. The key personalities who orchestrated that fiasco were fully aware that the seat of power actually lay in the guru/disciple relationship. In order to corral the power they so desperately desired, they could have just taken over complete control of the GBC, but instead, the conspirators pointed to the July 9th appointment letter as evidence of their rightful "inheritance" to Zonal Acarya guru-ship.
The now famous Letter was distributed to all the temples months before Srila Prabhupada's departure, and the question still remains as to why the Rtviks -- soon to be Zonals -- didn't act promptly upon their Spiritual Master's instructions? The obvious answer is that they anticipated Srila Prabhupada's entering samadhi. They had already received letters from all the temples recommending initiation for thousands of disciples, and that fact no doubt moved Tamal Krishna Goswami to have Srila Prabhupada sign the July 9th Letter.
If they had acted as ordered, then these recruits would have been Srila Prabhupada's disciples, not theirs. But they waited until Srila Prabhupada's departure, then as soon as they returned to their new zones after their mass coronation, they held mega-initiation ceremonies. The die was cast and their power was solidified. From that point onward, all circumstances and decisions were overshadowed by the "sacred guru-disciple relationship". And the very same argument is being presented here today, over 30 years later, by Krishna das in defense of Hridayananda's rights as a diksa guru.
In a previous article I indicated that I would share more of my personal stories pertaining to how the Zonals/GBC impacted me. Of course, HH Hridayananda was a member of that group, being one of the elite Zonal advocates and architects. As many readers know, my first experience was with Hansadutta, who self-destructed almost instantaneously. He was my first Zonal Acarya, when I was in charge in Seattle. After a few months of being exposed to his unadulterated insanity, which included collecting and shootings guns like a madman, taking intoxication in the form of so-called 'Ayurvedic tonics' that were actually 80 proof alcohol, etc., I informed the other GBC members about what I was experiencing. As a result of my report, the GBC convened an international emergency meeting in Detroit to consider what they were going to do about Hansadutta.
After patiently sitting in Detroit for a few days, waiting for the meeting to conclude, I learned that the revered GBC had concluded that all their godbrothers/sisters in Seattle and the gurukula should immediately vacate, and that Hansadutta's new disciples would take over the Seattle temple. This decision was philosophically based on the premise that the GBC could not interfere with the "sacred rasa" that Hansadutta had with his disciples. Naturally, they also didn't want to have the true facts broadcast throughout the movement, revealing that they weren't instant uttama-adhikaries, as they were preaching at the time. So we can see that the argument presented by Krishna das about the sanctity of the guru/disciple relationship is simply a recycled version of the Zonal Acaryas' same position.
The sequel to this reader's digest version of a Zonal Acarya falldown is that I was sent out of North America to the U.K. in order to prevent me from telling the truth about the mad Hans. A few short years later, Jayatirtha was on the verge of being excommunicated, at the Mayapur meetings of 1981 – this was a year after the Zonals had forced him to take sannyasa and put him back into power, hoping he would give up taking drugs. But like Hansadutta, he didn't or couldn't stick to his promises, and like Hansadutta, he was exposed.
Jayatirtha, knowing that the axe was about to fall, took some of his closest fanatic followers over to Sridhar Maharaja's matha, across the river. He cut a deal with the Sridhar camp, then sent Navanitacora dasa, who happened to be one of the biggest income collectors in the U.K., back to ISKCON Mayapur to order Jayatirtha's disciples to join their guru at Sridhar's matha. As fate would have it, I met him as he was walking through the gate. He was straightforward in revealing his intentions. I told him the devotees he was looking for were still out on parikrama, then I immediately went up to the penthouse rooms of the Mandir guesthouse, where I found many of the GBC/Zonal Acaryas, including Hridayananda, Tamal Krishna Goswami, Rameswar and Jayapataka. With great concern, I informed them of what I had discovered. But instead of responding quickly to short-circuit Jayatirtha's plan, the Zonals launched into a heated debate around this very same topic -- how these were Jayatirtha's disciples and no one had the sastric authorization to circumvent the order of the guru.
I became so upset that I challenged them to act! After all, I had developed a close relationship with many of these devotees, having been in charge of Sankirtana for several years at the Manor. I had lived with these devotees at the Manor, and many were on the sankirtana party or serving in my department. I naturally had great affection for these devotees, and I didn't want to see them coming under the control of another fallen Zonal. I had capitulated in Seattle, but I wasn't going to sit by and watch it happen again, on an even grander scale. So as Jayatirtha's disciples were returning from parikrama, I directed them up to the GBC meeting rooms. Rameswar and Hridayananda formed a tag-team, and they began preaching to these disciples, finally revealing to them the truth about Jayatirtha, which the GBC men had know for years. They finally convinced most of those present to remain in ISKCON, and Jayatirtha's devotees were instructed to become re-initiated by Bhagavan.
The reason I bring up these historical accounts is to demonstrate that this is essentially a philosophical debate concerning where the absolute power lies. Krishna das's position again brings the subject forward. Are the GBC, representing Srila Prabhupada, the ultimate dictator of truth in ISKCON, or is the traditional individual guru? Krishna das suggests that we should just leave well enough alone with Hridayananda. Of course, the same philosophical position must then apply to any and all authorized ISKCON gurus – no matter what nonsense they get up to, it is their business. Never mind if they are putting a dark spot on Srila Prabhupada's good name, or ruining the spiritual lives of their followers.
The situation with Hridayananda might be seen as a minor scenario compared to some of the other past Zonal falldowns. Satsvarupa is still hanging onto the same illusion, and some of his foolish disciples are still attached to him regardless of the undisputed facts of his fallen nature. The GBC simply invented a "retired guru" position for him, instead of being decisive -- all because of the same unresolved debate. I have expressed my opinions on this over the last 30 years, as have many of my Godbrothers/sisters, but to no avail.
There are now rumors that Hridayananda is going to resign his GBC position, but we have heard nothing official on the matter. His role as a GBC is a responsibility he never took very seriously. Of all his titles, his position as diksa guru obviously means the most to him. He believes that his followers truly love him, but this clearly is not a transcendental, bona fide guru/disciple relationship. It is more like a mundane family scenario.
Recruits who become disciples naturally believe that their guru relationship is according to Sastric definition, and is therefore spiritual. Hridayananda, the guru in this case, certainly is under the illusion that he is bona fide. But myself and many other qualified godbrothers of Hridayananda's share the opinion that these relationships fall into the category of cheating. And if the present day GBC had a clear understanding of their ultimate responsibility to protect Srila Prabhupada's movement from exploitive cheaters within their ranks, they would immediately do the needful.
It would be interesting to know the actual statistics as to how many of Hridayananda's original disciples, initiated while he was acting as a Zonal Acarya, still consider him to be their guru. My guess is the number of quite low. How many of the disciples of ISKCON's other fallen gurus remain, having managed to cope with the shock? We can also only guess, but the answer to both questions is probably "very few".
One of the main reasons this sad reality is a part of ISKCON history is due to the philosophical principle under discussion here. Many of the aforementioned victims could have been saved a great deal of hurt if the GBC hadn't been so bewildered by the very argument Krishna das has presented in his articles. The reader should be aware of the fact that the GBC members have always known well in advance of the actual public exposes of their fallen gurus, that they were in a fallen state. They always knew well in advance that these gurus were in serious trouble, but they covered it up. Whatever excuses for inaction the individual GBC members have come up with on these falldown cases, we know that their overall confusion has centered around the issue of the relationship between the guru and their disciples. But my point is that by the time the fall was imminent, the original relationship had already deteriorated into the mundane realm.
The sentimentality that prevails regarding such relationships between elite gurus and their disciples was recently demonstrated by Balavanta dasa in his article, "History of Hridayananda Maharaja. He left the GBC over 20 years ago, and we can only wonder at the misplaced "compassion" he holds for Hridayananda to this very day.
Of course, an expert, intelligent manipulator like Hridayananda can easily twang the heartstrings, and create a philosophical smokescreen in order to protect himself and his family members from interference coming from the only ISKCON body that has the power to step-in and do the needful – the GBC.
Srila Prabhupada has taught us to always look for the philosophical basis at the root of every problem. Krishna das has presented us with a chronic philosophical conundrum within post-samadhi ISKCON, wherein the GBC promote the idea that their approved diksa gurus are bona fide via mediums to the pure Gaudiya Vaisnava Sampradaya. As to ISKCON's many guru falldowns, in the absence of philosophically sound GBC guidance on the matter, we are left to decide for ourselves at what point in the downward slide the relationships between fallen gurus and their uninformed disciples are to be considered mundane, useless, and even harmful.
It seems apparent that in the past, the GBC have been too philosophically bewildered and too paralyzed to act because of the large percentage of sentimentalists among their members. In the case of Hridayananda, they are undoubtedly bewildered by the argument put forward by Krishna das, that such 'sacred relationships' are private, out-of-bounds, and essentially none-of-your-business.
