Jan 19, 2013 — INDIA (SUN) —
In response to Gadadhar dasa: I sympathize with many of your concerns and I am not an apologist for everything that ISKCON does, but the way you have phrased your "queries" is in the manner of "Have you stopped beating your wife?"
Obviously sastra does not state what the GBC should do, so it is silly to ask "Where does Sastra say that a group of GBCs can rubber-stamp Gurus?" In fact, sastra gives little or no guidelines for organization of religious groups. Nevertheless, all sampradayas and organizations that profess Vedic culture have procedures for choosing or appointing who will represent them as gurus. It is not that just anyone can claim to be a guru and be recognized as such in an established tradition. So in having a system, ISKCON is not unique or deviant from sastric tradition.
You have amply pointed out some of the severe problems with gurus and guruship in ISKCON. What is your formula for continuing the parampara?
Your concern with justice is laudable. Considering that ISKCON is (according to you) riddled with abuse, torture, molestation, and murder, you should inform civil authorities. Otherwise you will be guilty of abetment. You should be able to get evidence of at least one instance of these numerous crimes.
Your calling on me to "correct the situation" is childishly simplistic, as if correction could be done just by wishing it. You might consider that you are not the only one who knows that ISKCON has problems, and that various devotees are doing what they can to serve and reform Srila Prabhupada's mission. If you or anyone else has a practical plan for quickly rectifying the situation, let's hear it.
But don't bring in that Ritvik tripe. Apart from their appalling ideology (which DOR has thoroughly dismantled), the Ritvikites' inability to work together, their splintering into multiple groups, demonstrates that they have
no solution to ISKCON's troubles.
Your mention of chicken coups is alarming. Do you plan an insurgency of militant chickens?
Thank you for wishing me well. You might think that you are well, but your writing is laced with bitterness. Bitterness is not a Vaisnava quality. None of the numerous sastric accounts of devotees being mistreated describes them as becoming bitter. For instance, although the Pandavas had all reason to become bitter with Dhrtarastra, they didn't. Similarly, although he strongly criticized his godbrothers, Srila Prabhupada was never overcome by lamentation (socati iti sudra), nor did he let the misdeeds of others obstruct his service. Bitterness clouds the vision, saps the vitality, and means the end of bhakti.
You may take this letter as a generic response to any future points that you might address to me. I may not reply to any more.
