Rocana Replies to Sri Mukunda dasa

October 25, 2003

Dear Sri Mukunda dasa,

Please accept my humble obeisances. All glories to Srila Prabhupada.

Thank you for your recent email. I've been traveling, and apologize for the delay in responding. You write that you are mystified by "The Church of Ritvik" paper, and cannot ascertain my conclusion. You indicate that you can't rebut or reply to the paper because it contains no "factual conclusion". I am surprised to hear of your difficulty, given that I elaborated extensively on my themes, which all ended with well-articulated conclusions.

Obviously, my opinions and conclusions are distinctively different than the diksa oriented ISKCON/Gaudiya Matha arguments. In fact, they could be considered just the opposite. I am including your camp in what I call, in simple terms, the diksa hoax. Your organization, along with these other diksa advocates, promotes the misconception that the only means available for being included in our parampara is by diksa guru initiating the neophyte. Therefore, your Rttvik pandits have advocated taking diksa from Srila Prabhupada after his physical disappearance in November 1977.

As Srila Prabhupada is the Sampradaya Acarya, it is not required that those wishing to connect with the Sampradaya through him do so through the standard Vedic methodology of diksa or any other category of guru. Srila Prabhupada's spiritual position as the Sampradaya Acarya is far more exalted than that of a "regular" diksa guru. The failure of his senior disciples to fully appreciate Srila Prabhupada's extraordinary lila prior to his departure has been at the very root of all our problems. The Rtvik solution only takes us halfway there and as such, clouds the issue. Your theorists have had to resort to exaggeration and misinterpretation of the so-called evidence (July 9th letter), conspiracy theories, poor logic and elaborate word jugglery (The Final Order) so as to convince poorly trained converts.

As for the reference to ritvik-ism being a "church", I presented many parallels between your philosophy and other methods containing the tell tale signs of a transformation towards religiosity from the original spiritual movement established by Srila Prabhupada.

Another mindset that your group seems locked on is that Srila Prabhupada definitively gave specific orders as to what he wanted to have happen around the initiation issue. You requested that I clearly answer the following question:

"What do you think was the system or specific arrangement which Srila Prabhupada made for Vaisnava initiations for his followers, for his society and movement, for the aftermath of his physical departure?"

The fact of the matter is that even when someone is presented with a 'yes' or 'no' question, they have three choices: 'yes', 'no', or a refusal to answer the question. With respect to Srila Prabhupada and the May 28th room conversation that was foisted upon him by the zealous, ambitious, soon-to-be Zonal-Acaryas, I conclude that Srila Prabhupada was annoyed or even disgusted with the "manipulators" in the room. Consequently, he purposely didn't take that opportunity to sanction, authorize, approve, or explicitly explain anything. In fact, he seems to simply touch on possible scenarios they could choose after he departs. I think he realized they were collective hopeless cases, predictably destined to deviate, exploit, and concoct. One-year later, that proved to be what unfolded. They had already refused to implement Srila Prabhupada's original GBC concept, and had instead created comfortable, powerful positions for themselves. They were constantly and insidiously pushing for centralization within ISKCON, trying to establish themselves as the absolute zonal controllers. Don't you think Srila Prabhupada could see, foresee, accurately observe and perceive the true character of his contaminated leaders? Don't you think he understood the reasons and rational behind his Spiritual Master, the previous Sampradaya Acarya's, refusal to leave detailed instructions on initiation?

I have gone to an elaborate extent outlining a proposal as to a practical system that would, in my estimation, work when applied to maintaining the preaching mission of the Sampradaya Acarya. I feel Srila Prabhupada wished us to produce the desired results. Why should we not take responsibility for gaining those results, rather than being so childish as to always depend upon Srila Prabhupada to come-up with solutions, even after he is not actively, physically participating? All this nonsense rhetoric pretending there isn't any change because Srila Prabhupada is always present, never dying, is borderline crazy. Consider the effect throughout ISKCON of knowing that Srila Prabhuapda was overseeing and had ultimate veto power, what to speak of the fear factor the leaders felt knowing that when Srila Prabhupada disapproved of their actions or words, he could unceremoniously take away everything they held dear and send them to China. So, that didn't change when Srila Prabhupada entered into Samadhi? To come to that conclusion, you would have to be unaware of the number of times Srila Prabhupada saved ISKCON from destruction during the brief period of his manifest lila. When any embodied soul leaves his mortal shell, everything related to his physicality changes dramatically and finally, even an exalted soul such as the Sampradaya Acarya.

As far as Puranjana is concerned, 'debate' isn't a word in his lexicon. His incessant barking about my use of the term 'post-samadhi' is juvenile and unproductive. Sincere readers know exactly what I am trying to say. Simply replace the term 'post-samadhi' with 'post-going-into-samadhi' if it makes you feel more technically accurate - or perhaps change it to post-poisoning, which might fit better in your overall context. Better yet, let's all move on to the important issues, which naturally Puranjana can't and won't begin to address. Rather than show willingness to debate, Puranjana perennially employs his well-known 'attack dog' technique. To actually debate would require far too much real work on his part.

I hope your organization won't reply to my papers Puranjana-style, repeating the lame, nonsense excuse about being so bewildered by the name of the paper, the term "post-samadhi", and my non-conclusive stand, that you cannot formulate a response. I see this as just another excuse to do nothing and avoid applying the time and effort that was definitely promised by Yasoda nandana dasa in the past. From what I've read, I don't expect anything to be forthcoming from your side. Yasoda nandana is so often heard stating that he is ready to debate anyone, but now that I've throw down the gauntlet, he's doing a duck-dive. This doesn't come as great surprise to me, and I register this reply as a defeat of Rtvik-ism.

Your servant,

Rocana dasa