BY: ROCANA DASA
Aug 1, CANADA (SUN) — Studying Srila Prabhupada's conversations with ISKCON leaders.
Today's Talks is inspired by Srila Prabhupada's lecture on Srimad-Bhagavatam 7.9.31, March 9, 1976 in Mayapur. You can listen to the audio or read the transcript here.
As I've been choosing morning walks and classes that took place during the GBC meetings, focusing primarily in 1976, I've also found it interesting to refer to Hari-sauri prabhu's Transcendental Diary. I was personally in attendance during many of these classes and attended a lot of the morning walks. I was also part of the contingency of Temple Presidents who were simultaneously meeting together while the GBC meetings were going on.
This particular year was very memorable in the sense that there was a lot of tension between the GBC and the Temple Presidents, for various reasons. One of the major reasons was that Tamal Krishna Goswami and a number of other sannyasis were essentially trying to push the householders out of the temples. They had been trying to implement all sorts of new rules and regulations based on the principle that the householders were taking too much of the temple resources for their family maintenance. It was the brahmacaries who, to a large degree, were the ones that were going out collecting every day and contributing to the temple cash flow. Many of these brahmacaries were having their minds agitated by the preaching of the sannyasis, who were, by definition, against householders. Of course, most of these sannyasis, and especially Tamal Krishna, were living a far more opulent lifestyle than most of the Temple Presidents and householders. In truth, he and others like him were a bigger financial drain on the temple than any householders who were living very austerely. Many of the householder wives, regardless if they had children, were also contributing a great deal.
This dynamic was especially significant in Canada. At that point in time I was in charge in Seattle, just a few hours drive from Vancouver, and this situation didn't affect me as much as it did other Temple Presidents such as Bahudak and Nandikesvara. They were the undisputed leaders of their temples, and were doing a very commendable job in the sense that they had very big, dynamic communities, regardless of the fact that they also had a lot of children. So naturally they weren't happy when Tamal Krishna tried to push through a program where householders, regardless of all the responsibilities they had at the temple, were required to devise separate ways of making an income and supporting their family. This, while at the same time maintaining their responsibilities in the temple, which was basically a 24x7 engagement. There was never enough time in the day as it was, let alone adding a part-time job.
The sannyasis, who were primarily GBC members, had Srila Prabhupada's ear, and their side of the argument was being presented directly to him. Srila Prabhupada's main concern was that no big factions developed, but there was already serious discord developing. Again, this didn't affect us much in Canada because the GBC didn't come here and no sannyasis regularly came, which suited us just fine.
Srila Prabhupada was put in what appeared to be something of a dilemma. He himself was a sannyasi and his leaders on the GBC level were all sannyasis, so it might be problematic for him to directly support the householders instead. But at the same time he was fully aware of the fact that the movement was ultimately going on because the temples were functioning under the guidance of the Temple Presidents and householders. That's where the recruiting and training was actually going on, for the most part.
Srila Prabhupada rejected the idea put forth by the sannyasis that single women with children couldn’t join the temple. He stated that ISKCON should be prepared to take care of the children 100% once they start going to the gurukula. So the gurukula issue was another aspect of this whole equation, and there were many problems in Dallas with the government authorities. To come up to government standards would have required a lot of money, which the sannyasis weren't too happy about. In their minds, it took away from projects that they wanted to engage in, which were primarily with brahmacaries. So the plan was to shut down Dallas and de-centralize the gurukulas. This resulted in a lot of the students being sent to Seattle, the temple I was in. We took a lot of the students in on what was supposed to be a temporary basis, but it became permanent. There's a whole history of what happened there after Srila Prabhupada left, and I've written extensively on this.
The lecture that Srila Prabhupada is giving this day doesn't directly address the issues narrated above, although I find them to be an interesting aspect of the historical context. Srila Prabhupada stuck to the sloka that was being presented that day, which was from Prahlad Maharaja. Prahlad is speaking on the philosophy of how Krsna creates and maintains the material manifestation. Srila Prabhupada gives a brilliant presentation on this topic, using the classic examples given in the Srimad-Bhagavatam and by the other previous Sampradaya Acaryas. The first example is that of the seed, wherein from one's seed a huge tree can grow. But as soon as the tree starts to grow, the seed disappears. Then the tree produces many more seeds. The whole idea is that the original seed is Krsna. So it's interesting to see how, at this stage of Krsna consciousness and Srila Prabhupada's lila, the seed that he planted, namely the ISKCON tree, was growing like anything. Srila Prabhupada, although he appeared to be the seed, was pointing to Krsna, who is manifest in the Form of the Maha-mantra. So the whole of ISKCON, everything is a manifestation of the original seed - the chanting of the Hare Krsna Maha-mantra, although it may appear that Srila Prabhupada himself, as a pure representative of God, is the person who is planting the seeds.
Then Srila Prabhupada goes into explaining how Krsna creates by expanding Himself. He explains that Krsna really has nothing to do -- he's just in Vrindavan dancing with His friends and having a good time. He leaves the creation up to His expansions. In the same way, we can see that Srila Prabhupada created the GBC. He had his leaders, and he left the expanding of the Krsna consciousness movement on a day-today basis, creating and maintaining the temples and so on, to his expansions. And that's how he imaged the GBC to be. In other words, as Srila Prabhupada said, just be like me. Just preach and encourage people to chant.
Similarly we have the case like Lord Brahma, who doesn't appear to be doing a lot of the work yet he's the undisputed representative of Krsna and the head of our Sampradaya. In the same way, Srila Prabhupada as the Sampradaya Acarya is Brahma's representative. If one were to study Srila Prabhupada's day-to-day activities, one would wonder how he is controlling everything without using a great deal of organization. He never used the telephone, and basically he just preached in the form of writing and associating with his 'expansions'. And that's what was taking place right then, during the Mayapur meetings.
Srila Prabhupada also inserted what appears to me to be some warnings or philosophical considerations that those present in the class should take seriously. That is, that Krsna is the Supreme Isvara, but because he is the Supreme Controller then we, as tiny jivas, want to be Isvaras also. And for some temporary time, he says, we may be controlling some little children, some disciples, or some kingdom. Of course, we could also think of that as a zone. Many of the sannyasis in the GBC were anticipating that they would have disciples, which they did just two years from this very moment. They created their Zonal Acarya system, but for most of them, it was very temporary. A few have lasted until today, but in the end they're all going to die. Srila Prabhupada says that we have this power of controlling, but it's very minute and temporary. So we should always keep that in mind.
Srila Prabhupada gives another example of how the material world works. He said that when you pick up a cloth, you don't notice the thread. It has disappeared and all we're seeing is the cloth. But when we just have thread and it hasn't yet been turned into cloth, then all we're seeing is the thread and not the cloth. So everything in the material world is temporary. You can't see Krsna woven into everything, due to illusion, but we have to use our philosophy to see that everything is a temporary manifestation. He gives the example of his microphone, that in due course is going to be just thrown away. And unless that microphone is in the Archives, we can assume that by this point in time it probably has been thrown away.
We have to identify with the spiritual world all the time. Srila Prabhupada states a number of times that it's our Krsna consciousness movement that is here to deliver people from this illusion. Of course, the illusion is that I am the body, and I am this country, these are my family members, and so on. And that was basically what was going on in the GBC meetings -- his disciples were thinking this is my zone, this is my temple, this is my country, etc. But this was a temporary situation. In hindsight, we can see that's definitely the case. Both the GBC's at the time and the Temple Presidents, for the most part, are no longer are in charge of these temples. The situation that we were disturbed about has long gone. We never would have guessed at that time that the situation would be what it is today.
Srila Prabhupada is warning us here not to be bewildered by temporary things, because that is ignorance. The only thing we can do is develop the understanding that everything is Krsna's. He gives the example of fire: from fire, both light and heat comes. So if one party is thinking I own the light and another party is thinking I own the heat, that's dividing us, although everything is really just coming from the fire. In this case everything is coming from Srila Prabhupada, and we should all be in the mentality of seeing that it's coming from him. We should just be serving Srila Prabhupada as the Spiritual Master. If we did that and we all had that mentality, then there wouldn't be any problems.
Next Srila Prabhupada points out to his leaders that just like all the plants in the garden are variegated, there are so many different colors, shapes and purposes, but they are all manifested from the earth. So the whole concept of variegatedness is that Krsna is the source of all variegated energies. Even though the material world is a condemned place, still it's very beautiful because it's coming from Krsna. Within our society, we have to have us much appreciation for the beauty that's being manifested in the form of variegatedness as possible. For example, we should have sannyasis, householders, women and children in the temples… this is what makes Krsna consciousness so attractive. Of course, the sannyasis wanted to have all the flowers in saffron, and they wanted to cull out the weeds, in white.
Srila Prabhupada reminds us that there are no accidents in the material world. He says that:
"A rose flower seed-rose will come. Why not by accident, lemon? No. There is no such things as accidents. This is all rascaldom. Everything is going on... Parasya saktir vividhaiva sruyate sva-bhaviki jnana-bala-kriya ca. In the energy there is automatic knowledge and activities, and they are being manifested."
Srila Prabhupada states that really advanced devotees, which he was hoping that we would be, they don't see anything… simply they see Krsna. When a devotee sees a tree, he sees that it's a manifestation of Krsna's energy, therefore he's thinking of Krsna. He ends the lecture by saying, very prophetically, that we should follow in the footsteps of Prahlad Maharaja. Of course, Prahlad is one of our Sampradaya Acaryas, who's now represented by Srila Prabhupada. You shouldn't speculate nonsensically, you should simply follow the mahajanas, and you'll be successful.
We should consider whether or not all the problems we've had since Srila Prabhupada's disappearance can really be traced back to the message Srila Prabhupada ended this class with - if we just followed the mahajanas, we'd be far more successful than we actually are, and all the problems could be solved. You can't have any factions if you see what the source of everything is. In our case this is Srila Prabhupada, and ultimately Krsna.
