Shouldering the Burden, Part Three
BY: ROCANA DASA
Jun 02, 2010 — CANADA (SUN) — Today we offer the third part in a series of commentaries on the recent paper, "Balancing the Roles of the GBC and the Disciple in Guru Selection" by the GBC appointed Sastric Advisory Council. In Part One and Part Two, I covered a few of the essential issues raised in the paper. Today we'll backtrack and address some of the other important points, and frankly, there is a great deal of disturbing content found in the paper.
The SAC is, by definition, a self-serving body. It's an institutional committee whose members were chosen by the GBC. The GBC obviously had a purpose -- an ulterior motive -- in going to the SAC on this issue. The GBC Executive Committee was clearly hoping that the SAC would offer advice in their paper that supports the GBC's way of thinking, but that's not exactly what we find in the SAC paper. And whether or not the GBC will actually take any of the SAC's proffered advice, we don't know.
By definition, SAC means "Sastric Advisory Council". The members were presumably chosen because they know sastra better than most devotees in ISKCON, including the GBC. Their paper indicates that they have studied the sastra and concluded that the GBC's policy goes against sastra, and they've actually provided sastric references to support that conclusion. On the other hand, they have compromised by stating that the GBC has a right to approve or control who's going to be a guru in ISKCON. Now they're caught in the awkward position of having to justify the GBC's right to approve or disapprove of someone giving diksa initiation, knowing full well that there are members on the GBC who are firmly against giving up this right.
Ultimately, the only thing that the SAC can suggest is that the GBC has to come up with a process that makes it easier for senior devotees 'in good standing' to be permitted to become diksa gurus. Nonetheless, the SAC admits in their paper that they cannot find any sastric references to support the GBC's process, except for some vague reference to the 'Vaisnava etiquette' of going to senior associates and begging permission to go ahead with some preaching program. The SAC admits that this does not refer to initiation.
In essence, the SAC report lets the educated reader know that they are forced to compromise in making their conclusions, and that they don't really have a workable solution that's inline with sastra.
The SAC paper begins by offering sastric evidence by way of a few quotes they've selected to give the reader some idea of where the paper is going:
"It is imperative that a serious person accept a bona fide spiritual master in terms of the sastric injunctions. Sri Jiva Gosvami advises that one not accept a spiritual master in terms of hereditary or customary social and ecclesiastical conventions. One should simply try to find a genuinely qualified spiritual master for actual advancement in spiritual understanding." (Srila Prabhupada, Caitanya-caritamrita, Adi 1.35 purport)
"Self-deceived persons sometimes accept leaders or spiritual masters from a priestly order that has been officially appointed by the codes of material life. In this way, they are deceived by official priests." (Srila Prabhupada, Caitanya-caritamrita, Madhya 17.185 purport)
What the SAC is basically trying to say is that the Acaryas -- Srila Prabhupada and Sanatana Goswami in his Hari Bhakti Vilasa -- are against a preaching mission devolving into an ecclesiastical institution. Although the whole process of guru and the disciple is an eternal and natural process for seeking spiritual advancement, in the case of ISKCON since Srila Prabhupada's departure, it has gradually devolved into the very type of organization that the Founder-Acarya advised against.
How far ISKCON has strayed from the original conception of the Acaryas, and most particularly Srila Prabhupada, is ultimately the main issue. Can it ever go back, or change its course of direction and act according to Prabhupada's original conception of a preaching movement that spreads Krsna Consciousness throughout the world, without introducing asiddhantic policies that would not be approved by the Acaryas?
The SAC makes it obvious in their paper that they feel ISKCON has strayed from the course, and not simply in the matter of giving approval to people who want to be gurus.
The fact that a new candidate is told he must search out a guru within ISKCON is in itself evidence of the fact that ISKCON has become a church, an ecclesiastical organization. The ISKCON institution has approved dozens of unqualified people to be gurus, and there are literally thousands of disciples who've been disappointed as a result. The institution basically tells candidates for initiation that one can test the guru, but one should never test ISKCON, or ask them embarrassing questions. In an ecclesiastical manner, ISKCON has covered-up their history in this regard. There is absolutely no mention in the SAC paper of all the fallen gurus that the GBC had already approved. And of course, if these gurus hadn't fallen down and everything was going according to Srila Prabhupada's original program, no one would have fallen down. Everyone would have been happy. But obviously, that's not the real history.
Under the "Introduction" heading in the SAC paper, they give us a little history, introducing the fact that Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Thakur was directed by Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakur, his own father, to take initiation from Gaurakisora das Babaji. On one hand, they admit that this is a rare example of a disciple being directed to a particular guru, but on the other hand, they say such advice is not contradictory to the instructions found in Hari-bhakti-vilasa, and they use the example as a way of condoning or authorizing the GBC's guru approval process. They write:
"Even if advice is received from others, the aspiring disciple still has the full responsibility of making the ultimate decision."
Of course, this is a very poor example. Not only is the story itself not properly presented or documented, the conclusion they draw from it, namely that some higher authority can dictate or determine who you accept as a guru, does not apply to the situation at all. This particular pastime took place between two Sampradaya Acaryas, as part of a lila that was orchestrated by Sri Krsna Caitanya Himself in order to make a distinctly different philosophical point – that Gaurakisora das Babaji was the only surviving representative of the actual sampradaya. So this does not apply to diksa gurus in ISKCON today, or to the GBC approving of diksa gurus.
The SAC even goes all the way back to the real founder of the Brahma Gaudiya Vaisnava Sampradaya, Lord Brahma himself, who at the beginning of creation told the demigods to take initiation from Visvarupa. Again, this example offers no help whatsoever to any new candidate who's trying to find out who their guru is.
First of all, the SAC is saying that the GBC should have little or nothing to do with the initiation process, but then they say that the only place you can gain insight or get advice in this regard is from within ISKCON, from persons who are classified as being senior devotees 'in good standing'. But who determines whether a senior devotee is 'in good standing'? What does that really mean? It means they accept the GBC as the ultimate managing authority, and they're in good relationship with the senior authorities. So the SAC really disqualifies its own advice in this regard. The GBC should have little or nothing to do with the process, but in fact, they have everything to do with the process, because their approval is required – approval of who is and who is not 'in good standing'.
The SAC is saying that you can accept anybody as diksa guru, not just people who already got GBC approval, but anyone in good standing. But not only do you still have to deal with what it means to be 'in good standing', both the candidate and prospective guru also have to wait for the institutional process to unfold before initiation can be given. The SAC goes on to recommend that anyone in good standing should put their name forward to be guru, so that they can be put in the queue for accepting disciples. They suggest that one of the reasons things are not working according to sastra in ISKCON is that there are not enough gurus, not enough options, but this is obviously a contrived conclusion.
Personally, the way I see it, ISKCON has gone far too far in the wrong direction – in the direction that the SAC is indicating in this paper they should not go. They've already gone there, and it was decades ago. They have never, ever addressed the most important issues in ISKCON history since Srila Prabhupada departed, and that is whether or not the disciples of the Zonal Acaryas – a system they finally admitted was a huge philosophical mistake – are bona fide disciples. But neither the GBC or the SAC address the critical issue of whether or not the disciples of the Zonal Acaryas should have been told that according to sastra, they are actually not bona fide disciples -- that the Zonal Acaryas deviated from sastra. The individuals who instituted the Zonal Acarya program did so in order to corral all the power, which they succeeded in doing.
Besides the fact that they can't undo all the damage they caused, they won't even provide new disciples with this historical information. Instead, they now just say, "Don't blame the GBC if your guru falls down." This is the essence of what the GBC would like to say -- that they cannot guarantee, explain or justify why they chose a certain person in the past to be a Zonal Acarya/Guru, and why they permitted them to take disciples and supported them, what to speak of covering up for them, when they knew full well that they were unqualified to take disciples.
So the GBC has put itself in a very awkward position. They want to maintain the power, they want to maintain their position as the ultimate in everything – managing every aspect of ISKCON including the siddhantic aspect, not just the management. Yet here they are, telling new disciples, "You have to take full responsibility in finding yourself a Spiritual Master within ISKCON."
What we essentially have is the SAC, trying to give the impression both to those who commissioned them (the GBC) and to their readers, including many new potential disciples, that ISKCON and the present GBC are completely in line with the Founder-Acarya, even though the contents of their own paper show that they're not. Under the heading, "The Responsibility of the Disciple to Test the Spiritual Master", they're saying that ISKCON is Srila Prabhupada, and he had his own special vision. Therefore, if you want to have the blessings of Srila Prabhupada, then you've got to take initiation from someone who is in good standing in ISKCON. And the GBC ultimately determines who is and is not 'in good standing'.
Now, this policy is, in itself, a restriction. They're restricting Krsna, Who is the ultimate guru – Chaitya Guru in the heart. The GBC and the SAC are telling Krsna that a potential disciple has to choose from within the confines of the ISKCON institution, which is the only collective agency representing Srila Prabhupada. But in fact, there are thousands of Srila Prabhupada's disciples who the GBC do not consider to be 'in good standing' in ISKCON. To say that Chaitya Guru cannot direct an initiate to one of these persons as diksa guru is to restrict Krsna, which is an asiddhantic notion. The SAC says that the initiate has to have the same vision and mood as Srila Prabhupada, and the only qualified guru candidates to be found are in ISKCON. What the SAC is subtly saying in this regard is that the candidate should not go outside of ISKCON, e.g., to the Gaudiya Matha or B.V. Narayana. But what they do not clarify is how this policy applies to Srila Prabhupada's disciples who may not be considered to be 'in good standing' by the GBC, based on institutional politics, but who, in fact, may be fully inline with Srila Prabhupada.
The whole concept of testing also needs to be carefully considered. Srila Prabhupada seldom used the word 'testing' in this context, but more often used the word, 'examine'. In the SAC paper, the whole idea of 'testing' is left open. They don't explain, in practical terms, what kinds of tests a new disciple should put a prospective guru through, other than the things the SAC and the Acaryas say you shouldn't do, namely, asking questions like: "How many disciples do you have? How long have you been initiating? What kind of a zone do you control?"
The SAC writes:
"Or the testing may extend to more personal requirements. A disciple may wonder, "Will this guru deal with me personally? Will this guru respond to my letters? Will I have a chance to personally serve this guru?" These considerations should be tested in advance."
These questions that the SAC suggests the candidate should pose are actually material in nature. If we had applied these questions to Srila Prabhupada during his lila period, then we wouldn't have chosen Srila Prabhupada. What the SAC does not do is advise the initiate as to what spiritual qualifications one should look for in a guru.
In reality, most initiates today are looking at the superstar gurus in the institution, but here's what Srila Prabhupada says in that regard:
"Blind following and absurd inquiries. These things are condemned in this verse. Blind following means: "Oh, there is a svami. So many thousands of people are following. Let me become his disciple." This is called blind following. You do not know what is that svami, whether he is a svami or a rascal. You do not know. But because everyone is going, "Oh, let me become his disciple." This is blind following, without any knowledge, blind following." (Prabhupada BG lec. 4.34-39, 12 Jan. 1969, LA)
The SAC has included the above quote in their paper, knowing full well what the actual circumstance in ISKCON are. The GBC also know very well that one of the big problems in ISKCON is that newcomers are being attracted to the super-gurus. But neither the GBC or the SAC have been willing to say specifically what the problem actually is. They understand Srila Prabhupada's comments about blind following and absurd inquiries, but they will not address the fact that in ISKCON today, these super-gurus have become super-expert at attracting disciples, and they're never going to comply with sastric or institutional restrictions in terms of giving advice to newcomers. Candidates for initiation are approaching them on the basis of nonsense, material inquiries, and taking diksa initiation on that basis.
In reality, these super-gurus work not through the GBC or some institutional process, but through their own disciples. The people that new candidates for initiation ultimately have to rely on are the local devotees who either recruited them or are training them, or managing the centers they go to. The likelihood that these individuals are disciples of a particular popular guru is pretty high, and as disciples, they're definitely going to push a new person in the same direction that they went -- to their guru. These 'middlemen' devotees who are instructing the new candidate as to who they should take shelter of, are themselves past the point where they can actually test their guru. After taking initiation, they're expected to be totally subservient or surrendered to their guru, which means they'll try to push any prospective disciple in the direction of their own guru. So this phenomenon exists, regardless of sastric evidence that's presented by some committee.
Another interesting aspect of the SAC paper is the fact that the person who did the translating of Hari-bhakti-vilasa, namely Gopiparanadhana dasa, is also a member of the SAC, and several of the verses he translated are used as evidence in this paper. Gopiparanadhana dasa uses the word 'test' in his translation, referring to the disciple testing the guru, but as I mentioned above, Srila Prabhupada preferred to use the word 'examine'. Of course, the Hari-bhakti-vilasa, composed by Sanatana Goswami, was not spoken in the context of a western-style institution like ISKCON, but rather in the context of Indian culture and society, within the Vaisnava community.
As as we know from history, during the time of Sanatana Goswami, the process of accepting a bona fide guru within our sampradaya had broken down. Not surprisingly, this is not explained by the SAC, nor is it explained by the GBC. The SAC infers that such breakdowns in disciplic succession only occur in other sampradayas:
"We should also be aware from the history of other sampradayas and religions of the real danger of gradual corruption. Even if apparent purity were maintained for some time by a bureaucratic regulating system of authorization, the eternal temptations of misusing the status of guru for self-aggrandizement could ruin the system and the institution. In future generations we, like other sampradayas, could become burdened with gurus who collect disciples mainly for money and power. Such corruption could occur even while maintaining the external appearance of bureaucratic purity. Therefore SAC suggests that the GBC shift their oversight to mainly after-the-fact. Exactly how this is to be implemented should be decided by the GBC."
In fact, at the time when Lord Caitanya Mahaprabhu sent Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakur to fulfill His prophecy of Krsna Consciousness being spread around the world, He was dealing with a practically defunct parampara system that was represented by only a few individuals, such as Jagannatha das Babaji and Gaurakisor das Babaji.
So this phenomenon that we are all presently involved in, ISKCON, came after Lord Caitanya Mahaprabhu sent three nitya-siddha Sampradaya Acaryas in order to accomplish His prediction. Without understanding the position of these three Sampradaya Acaryas, it's hard to understand our own position in relationship. But this is not presented by the SAC or the GBC. The candidate is instead given the false impression that the decline towards religiosity, or the decline towards ecclesiastical tradition happens in other sampradayas, not ours, but that is not a fact. The fact is that Srila Prabhupada himself was very critical about the fact that his Spiritual Master's institution deteriorated in this particular way, and that the whole disciple/guru process is part of that deterioration in the sense that as soon as this strict process, which has been enunciated in sastra by the previous Sampradaya Acaryas, is not followed, it deteriorates into what is presently happening in ISKCON. This is what happened in the Gaudiya Matha, what happened in the history of our sampradaya.
Being part of our sampradaya is the ultimate issue here. The newcomer can avail himself of sastra, the books written by the previous Acaryas, and in Srila Prabhupada's case, a lot of other valuable content (lectures, letters and so on). Yet nowhere do we see the SAC saying that first of all, in order to determine who is a bona fide guru, the candidate must study very, very thoroughly, the teachings of these past Acaryas in order to properly examine whether a personality they are drawn to, or who they feel Chaitya Guru is indicating to them, is actually in line with the previous Acaryas and sastra. And if you don't know whether or not the guru is qualified, then how are you going to find out?
There may be dozens of questions that one has accumulated over the course of studying Srila Prabhupada's books and observing the ISKCON institution, and getting an idea of what is the actual history of ISKCON, and the true history of our sampradaya going back at least as far as Lord Caitanya Mahaprabhu and the Six Goswamis, is very important. But one would have to go outside of ISKCON to get an accurate historical perspective on these matters. In other words, the GBC and the authorities have made sure that the newcomer does not have easy access to the embarrassing, sordid mistakes they've made, which includes all the falldowns of gurus, Zonal Acaryas, and people still in power in ISKCON. They don't want the disciples to hear this.
Of course, in order to make an educated decision, as the SAC paper suggests one should, the candidate for initiation would have to know such information. They should also know that Srila Prabhupada… Bhaktivedanta Thakur, Bhaktisiddhanta Thakur, and Bhaktivinoda Thakur, are all nitya-siddha Sampradaya Acaryas, and that their preaching is what the candidate has to come in line with. Their guru candidate has to be tested against the position of the Sampradaya Acaryas, not the position of the present-day GBC or ISKCON leaders.
It may be the personal opinion of the prospective guru, for instance, that the GBC's policy on approving gurus is wrong. So you're going to join an organization wherein those who are managing the institution have maintained in the past many policies that are against the teachings of the previous Acaryas, and against the understanding of the guru candidate, yet the initiate is expected to follow the GBC and the SAC paper, and rely simply upon the qualification of 'in good standing'.
Then we have the whole question, what if your guru falls down? The GBC's whole philosophy on re-initiation comes into play. But what if one of the persons that the initiate goes to for advice – the senior devotee 'in good standing' – is found to be against this whole policy, even though it is the law of ISKCON? This puts the disciple into a huge dilemma. Of course, those who have been attracted to Krsna Consciousness are usually attracted due to the teachings of the Sampradaya Acaryas, and to a lesser degree, by association with those who purport to represent them. But the degree to which they're actually representing the Acaryas is what the disciple ultimately has to decide on. And that's made very, very awkward, and very complicated in ISKCON today. This in itself is maya, and it is against the philosophy, being that the truth is simple.
I've previously mentioned the Chaitya Guru aspect of this whole phenomenon, that Krsna is in the heart and He knows how sincere the disciple is. What we can do is provide that disciple with some valuable information that Chaitya Guru can direct them to, and that's why I'm writing this article. That's why ISKCON should reveal, in all honesty, its past mistakes. ISKCON should not only reveal exactly who fell down and how many disciples they had, but these falldowns should be honestly and openly analyzed for the sake of the disciples. Why was it that this person actually fell down, other than just 'not following the sadhana process', which in some cases doesn't even apply. Some fell down because they'd committed big offenses, but we aren't told how they committed such offenses.
We also never hear from the ex-gurus who were previously part of this ISKCON program who fell down, in many cases from sannyasa and from being guru. Yet some of them are still involved in ISKCON, and in some cases, are still being promoted as bona fide authorities. We've never heard any revelations, realizations or insight from these persons as to how it was that so many people were depending on them as gurus, and they just let them down. So a lot of introspection and a lot of honesty on the part of these individuals is needed.
ISKCON is not providing the information a disciple would need, not even with respect to the leaders they put forward as authorized gurus. We don't hear any negative history, which has all been filtered out of their official ISKCON history. So what is a candidate to do? I'm glad I'm not in that position. For my part, I can only try to follow the order of my Spiritual Master, and of Lord Caitanya Mahaprabhu, the Yuga Avatar, to be a guru -- to go out and just present the philosophy as its been told, without making any alterations, and to live the life that is ordered by the Acaryas. This is what preaching means. If you go out preaching, you'll inevitably have to take on the position of a teacher and you're going to have a responsibility to the students. It's as simple as that. It's very simple.
The way that ISKCON is going, and has been going since the departure of the Sampradaya Acarya, I frankly don't have much hope that any changes will take place to reverse the trend towards ecclesiastical function and religiosity.
(To be continued…)
