Real Guru Always Available
BY: P.K. VIDYAVAN
Sep 27, INDIA (SUN) — If the posthumous initiation idea is non-Vedic, it is certainly a valid point that it should not be given prominence. Why advertise ideas that are erroneous? This point is being lost in the hot exchanges on the Sun recently.
Is posthumous initiation non-Vedic? With safety we can be sure for that answer. If we met someone in Mumbai and they said that I am “the disciple of Veda-Vyasa, who compiled the Vedas 5,000 years before,” then we would be thinking that he is either very old or in need of psychological treatment.
Before I met the ISKCON inmates I never heard such an idea. Where is the advantage? The guru is meant for the teaching of the disciple. How he can teach if he has disappeared from this world?
If we say the guru is in the heart, that is not satisfactory because many things are in the heart. Not all are good. In fact, many can be quite bad.
So a child needs a father to watch over and guide. This means the child is protected. No father means the child is less protected. The father must see that the bad things do not become prominent in the heart.
When Srila Prabhupada was present, the big ISKCON leaders were controlled, but when he left we know the story of many problems. When their spiritual father disappeared, then he was not there to control the bad items in the heart. The result was suffering for all involved.
So even if we take the normal face to face Vedic diksa, then there are more problems after the disappearance of guru, even after his training. But if we have no guru present right from the diksa, then the problems will start from the beginning. The disciple will speculate right from the beginning and go bad even more quickly.
In the Vedic culture the point is very simple: No guru means spiritual life is distant.
It is said that, “By mercy of Krsna, we get guru. And by the mercy of guru, we get Krsna.” It is not said, “By the mercy of Krsna, we get posthumous guru, and by the mercy of disappeared guru, we get Krsna.”
For Sri Krsna, nothing is a difficult task. If He wants to give us “guru”, then he can easily give us. We should not think that Srila Prabhupada is disappeared and so Krsna cannot find a guru. Krsna will have difficulty in giving a guru for me. Before or after Srila Prabhupada makes no difference for Krsna. If He decides to give guru, then that lucky soul will have real guru, not disappeared guru or imagination guru.
So this is the real business of the Vaisnavas. They should tell that guru comes from Krsna and it makes no difference that Srila Prabhupada is present or not. All that matters is the decision of Krsna; if He decides, then guru is certainly available.
“What is the difficulty?” Srila Prabhupada said.
The difficulty is that we really don’t want a real guru for surrender. We want to enjoy and have a guru that doesn’t interfere. That is “disappeared guru” – he is not even on this planet, just our imagination.
So the posthumous idea is non-Vedic, so why advertise and discuss over and over the same points of non-Vedic ideas. “Chewing the chewed,” the juice is long gone.
Better to tell people the Truth.
The Truth is that by grace of All-Powerful Krsna, real guru is always available without difficulty, any time any place.
Servant, PK Vidyavan
