Unreleased Audio of Srila Prabhupada
BY: BHAKTA PHILIP
Feb 07, USA (SUN) — I greatly appreciate Ekanatha Prabhu's article, "Setting the Record Straight on Srila Prabhupada's Audio", where he has given some details about all the unreleased audio of Srila Prabhupada. I am sure the world is in great debt to Ekanatha Prabhu and the devotees that have worked very hard for so many years to organize and preserve the audio of Srila Prabhupada.
One thing I noticed that Ekanath Prabhu said in the article is:
"By Krishna's mercy we were given the charge to protect this invaluable collection of our dear-most spiritual master Srila Prabhupada, and make it available."
He goes on to say,
"Our preservation policy is to distribute the audio, the more the better."
In the Bhaktivedanta Archives' own posted mission statement called, "The Bhaktivedanta Archives - Our Inheritance…Our Responsibility. The Vision - The Goals - The Activities", under section 3 entitled "Strategies for Preservation" it is stated:
"At the Bhaktivedanta Archives we want to prevent something like this happening [a large disaster that could destroy the only copies of recorded material] by making copies of everything we have, available to as many people as possible, in as many places as possible, around the world."
Here the Bhaktivedanta Archives state that their purpose is to make everything they have available to as many people as possible around the world. I personally went to the Archives and offered to pay them to make me copies of whatever they have, but they bluntly refused. I begged again and again, but the reply was NO, and I was asked to leave.
So how are they making it available? When I go there and beg for Srila Prabhupada's words, ready to pay them for it, I am refused.
Ekanatha Prabhu appears to very diplomatically and expertly avoid the point of releasing Srila Prabhupada from being locked up in the Archives and allowing Srila Prabhupada to come out and preach to all his followers NOW, by saying in his post:
"The project to release the complete, unedited, original, audio archive collection is coming along, although much more slowly than we would like and anticipated...We want to make sure the metadata is right. And we want to make sure we leave behind us a clear picture of the provenance of the collection—that is, how we know that what's in the collection is authentic. We owe it to the future generations of devotees that they will be left with a complete collection of Srila Prabhupada's spoken words...We are determined to get it right, to pass on an accurate and definitive record of Srila Prabhupada's vani."
But unfortunately (due to the nature of this collection of audio – unlabeled inaudible fragmented parts of a lecture or conversation, etc.) some audio may never be able to be dated or found out where it was spoken or to whom, under what circumstances, (ie. the metadata may never be available), etc. That is to be expected with a collection of audio of this nature. So there is no reason to keep Srila Prabhupada locked up and not let him preach to the world, NOW, as he is! Also, here Ekanatha Prabhu says "how we know that what's in the collection is authentic". Well I thought that anything Srila Prabhupada said was authentic?
Ekanatha Prabhu's post is a classic example of the post-dated check. So let's hear what Srila Prabhupada has to say about this.
"We want immediately, we don't want blank check. (devotees laugh) Rascal blank check.... Postdated blank check. (devotees laugh) We don't believe."
(Morning Walk -- December 4, 1973, Los Angeles)
This is all nonsense. "Future." (devotees laugh) No future, sir. Immediately.
(Morning Walk -- December 4, 1973, Los Angeles)
That's all. It is cheating. Postdated check means he cheats.
(Morning Walk -- October 25, 1975, Mauritius)
That is another rascal point. Therefore I say, "Kick them on their face tomorrow." He's offering postdated check. (laughter) Eh? Even if you are coming of a very millionaire's family, but if you give me a check postdated, shall I accept it? A sane man? No.
(Morning Walk -- November 29, 1975, Delhi)
But we are not so fool that we are going to believe in your future postdated check. We are not so fool.
(Morning Walk -- March 16, 1976, Mayapur)
A foolish rascal will accept. (laughter) You are rascal number one. You can accept that check, we are not going to.
(Evening Darshan -- August 11, 1976, Tehran)
That is another foolishness. And we shall be misled by these rascals? They promise everything for the future. "Yes, in the future we'll do this. In the future we'll do that." Postdated check. "I'll give you a million-dollar check dated six months from now. Take it." Only the fool will be satisfied.
(A Less-Than-Doggish Civilization)
Ekanatha Prabhu concludes by saying:
"In light of the above, we have decided to hold off on releasing any more audio until it is all verified and straightened out to the best of our ability...for us to project a release date now would be irresponsible."
The question may be raised, that if the Archives release the audio now without editing and "verifying" it, devotees may complain about the audio quality and lack of labeling. So I will repeat what I said in person when I visited the Archives: simply put a disclaimer on the CDs stating that "the quality and labeling of much of the audio is unsure and some audio is only fragments of conversations". Then no one will complain, because devotees will know what they are getting.
With gratitude, humility, appreciation and respect for all the hardworking devotees at the Archives, it seems quite clear that Ekanatha Prabhu's post is a bluff. Put your audio where your mouth is! It's been over 30 years! This is serious!
I don't want it edited, I want it as it is! And I want it all, not just what you deem as appropriate for Srila Prabhupada's followers and the rest you keep hidden. I want the complete, unabridged, original Srila Prabhupada! As he is. Not a post-dated check. All I ask for is copies of whatever is there. For it is the mission statement of the Archives to be "making copies of everything we have, available to as many people as possible, in as many places as possible, around the world." Why not stand behind your own words?
I don't know what can be done. Maybe everyone can humbly call the Archives, email Ekanatha Prabhu (he gives his email in his post), petition the GBC and other persons in positions of management to release Srila Prabhupada and let him come out and preach. Then together we can be successful - Srila Prabhupada said many sticks together cannot be broken. So let's all come together under the one flag of Srila Prabhupada's vani. Why not? Impossible is a word in a fool's dictionary.
Also Ekanatha Prabhu says,
"We do not censor any audio, nor withhold audio from the devotees because of content".
But this appears to be false, because the audio is being withheld, and the reason he told me in person was "it's too controversial". But whatever the reason is, or isn't, this is not the point. The point is that the Audio is obviously being withheld. So how can anyone accept this statement?
Further he says, "We do not remove any of Srila Prabhupada's spoken words from the original audio. That is a given."
But I beg to disagree... In 1997 a Bhaktivedanta Archives tape was sent to a reputed forensic laboratory for analysis of tampering, post-recording, and the official results came back from the forensic laboratory as:
"This recording exhibits strong signs suggestive of falsification. I do not believe that these deficiencies might possibly be the product of some mechanical process or problem with the recording or duplication process and I believe that they exist at what is considered to be a higher degree than that of coincidence."
Furthermore in Rocana Prabhu's post, dated Dec 8, 2009, entitled "Srila Prabhupada's Audio Legacy, he wrote:
"They informed me that one of the reasons behind the chunks of missing audio was the fact that back in the days of the Bhaktivedanta Tape Ministry, the audio engineers clipped taped conversations down so they would fit onto off-the-shelf cassette tape blanks that were typically 30, 60 or 90 minutes in length. If a given conversation exceeded the tape length, they apparently snipped out a portion they deemed least important or most problematic. In other words, if I am understanding correctly, the tape engineers essentially served as the editors, and decided what was and wasn't important to be included on the Tape Ministry's finished product."
If there is nothing to hide on the audio, then why is the audio being hidden? The natural conclusion is that there is no reason to not release ALL of the audio.
It's simple, RELEASE SRILA PRABHUPADA NOW!
Hare Krishna!
Your servant,
Bhakta Philip
