Dec 06, 2017 — FRANCE (SUN) —
Of course, I don't put everyone in the same bath. In ISKCON, there are persons who are more honest than others. But... it looks like, during Srila Prabhupada's time, all things were generally very clear for everyone because the acarya, naturally, is the perfect servant of Krsna and of his guru. And never puts his own personal interest as a goal. Nothing material is there. So, everything is generally transparent. From that, I guess and I heard that anyone serving Srila Prabhupada, when he was physically present on the planet, was feeling him (her)-self spiritually advancing. It was clear, and Srila Prabhupada wrote in Bhagavad-gita that a devotee, from the very beginning of his spiritual life, feels, inside of himself, an increasing bliss while practicing Krsna Consciousness. There is no question of ignorance or doubts about this point of feeling oneself spiritually advancing. Prabhupada even compared that to a hungry
person who starts to eat and gradually feels himself becoming satisfied. This person does not need anyone to tell him if he experiences that. Or not.
On contrary, if a "guru" is not a pure devotee like the acaryas are, and, because of his remaining material desires, focuses everything and everyone on him like some do, instead of focusing the people's attention mainly on the real pure devotee, the capacity of his disciples to spiritually advance will not be the same. Of course, than it would be with the pure devotee. There will be big material interferences which will disturb this advancement. Therefore, the disciples will also not be able to experience this permanent gradual progress in the way which Srila Prabhupada expressed it in Bhagavad-gita.
Consequently, if this "guru" wants to get and keep his prestigious position in relation to his disciples in spite of his own incompetence, he may be forced to only make his disciples believe that they are spiritually advancing, without, in fact, any real experience of it. That requires a strategy. If the disciples trust this make-believe that they are spiritually advancing, it will be sufficient for the guru to keep those disciples under his control, even if the only (material) real benefit in all this stuff is, in fact, mainly just for the guru alone. Very often, the disciple can stay only in stand-by while his guru's power, on contrary, is always
increasing. Real cheating! I know many disciples whose life is as gloomy as a winter night in Siberia while their guru is, at the same time, enjoying his own expansion.
All that (this make-believe), of course, absolutely requires that the estimation of the disciple's advancement and advancing must be said to be done only by the guru or his close associates. And never by the disciple himself. Which is exactly contrary to the exact genuine process and to what Srila Prabhupada said. It is therefore absolutely necessary for the "guru", in this case, to maintain the disciple in confusion, ignorance and complete dependence on this particular matter.
In Bhagavan's time (but I don't say that Bhagavan was necessarily directly the cause of it) I was told many times by intermediate authorities that I could not judge myself, not only if I was spiritually advancing but also if I was simply happy!!! Only an authority could tell me that! It looked a joke!
Therefore, this necessity, in order to keep them under complete control, to make the disciples confused and ignorant about their advancing in spiritual life,
requires some changes in the philosophy and, consequently, in Prabhupada's books. Which are a little too much clear by themselves in the opinion of some. That is probably one of the reasons why Srila Prabhupada's literature has been so much changed over the years by ISKCON.
