Bhakti Vikas Swami re: Radhanath's Book (re-post from 2013)

Re-posted by special request

[PADA: Yes, currently the GBC is promoting Radhanath swami left, right and center. Yet other GBC's think, his writings are bogus? Then, after writing the article below, one week later Bhakti Vikas swami issued and apology for criticizing Radhanath. Politics? Money? Position? Who knows, but it shows how all of them are corrupt. ys pd]

(BHAKTI VIKAS SWAMI is removing his critical comments about Radhanath swami from his web site, fortunately, we have the entire article posted here below) 

Bhakta Gordon says: Somehow today in the early morning hours google reported that the editor removed (the Radhanath swami) article above from their website. No explanation, no comment. Capriciousness? Mental imbalance? GBC notice? In any case, BVKS is a GBC approved ISKCON guru who wrote article below. If one week later he figures writing such an article was wrong then what is the value of his writing?

Prabhupada: You cannot expect perfect knowledge from imperfect person. (San Francisco, February 13, 1967)

============================================

“Journey Home” Issues -- Published April 24, 2013

By His Holiness Bhakti Vikasa Swami

And another question about this “I come across newer devotees who are more attracted to reading such and such a book, autobiography instead of Prabhupada’s books. This happened to me and I ended up discrediting that book and telling devotee to avoid such books and instead read Prabhupada’s book.

First, I have not read it, nor do I intend to, nor do I have the time but I have seen some excerpts in which so and so swami claims to receive the Hare Krishna mantra from the river Ganges before he met Srila Prabhupada. This looks very strange and sounds like self aggrandizement. Do you think it is wrong to openly discredit such a works in your devotees?”

“JOURNEY HOME” WILL NOT GIVE PROPER UNDERSTANDING OF KRISHNA CONSCIOUSNESS

Actually it’s not an issue but what happens is people come newly and they are given this book, which I say is an act of violence, to give people this book. They should give people Prabhupada’s books. If they get this book first they are going to be … it’s going to be very difficult for them to have a proper understanding of Krishna Consciousness either. He gets started in the wrong way but on the other hand what can we do.

HOW TO STOP IT?

1. Inform local temples to promote Prabhupada’s books

I would take it up with the local ISKCON authorities and tell them, that look, we should promote Srila Prabhupada’s books.

2. Tell them to read Prabhupada’s biography

Or you could tell them if you like to read biographies read Prabhupada’s biography. It’s a lot more Krishna Conscious. But you know what happens people come new and then there is this whole hype going on and they get carried away and new people how much they can understand philosophy.

3. Show people the difference in quality between “Journey Home” and Srila Prabhupada’s books

You can may be tell them, “Ok that’s very good. But if you actually want to understand what is Krishna Consciousness and get instructions and then read Prabhupada’s books.” And you could maybe read a little bit with them and just show them what is the difference in quality.

MY EXPERIENCE OF READING SRILA PRABHUPADA’S BOOKS

I mean I remember when I first started reading Prabhupada’s books… then and now also even after so many years I was just astounded by the quality of Prabhupada’s books. This is something … I read so many books by so many intelligent people, so many insights and religious books and scriptures, translation of scriptures but reading Prabhupada’s books was just really a revelation. Very clear that Srila Prabhupada is a person in touch with reality, actual reality. He is not speaking from this plane at all. He is completely different from anything else. Every word is just full of spiritual meaning.

It doesn’t appeal to the mind, to the senses, the ego, or even the mundane intelligence, completely from the spiritual platform. So you could just sit down and read … especially I often mention that first verse of Srimad Bhagavatam that just that one verse … of course it’s a long verse but there is so much in there.

That one verse of Srimad Bhagvatam has got more actual spiritual substance then all the Bible, Koran and Buddhist books and even all the Upanisads, and everything put together and then you read verse 2 and … the first three verses of the Bhagavatam are just … actually the first two verses especially … The third verse can be especially appreciated by very advanced devotees but the first two verses, they are just revelatory. So you could try doing that but don’t expect to have too much luck.

MAKE PROPER POLICY TO DISTRIBUTE SRILA PRABHUPADA’S BOOKS

You could say to the local ISKCON authorities that they should … just you could appraise them of your concerns about this and then some policy could be made that we distribute Prabhupada’s books. Actually as I said before Prabhupada himself didn’t say that we should only distribute his books but some temples like to do that because it makes it easy because then you don’t have to sort out all the good books from the not so good books written by others apart from Prabhupada.

The problem with that is that some of them are very good and should be distributed while some of them are not at all good and shouldn’t be distributed. But if you make such a distinction then out of sentiment some people get upset. And then you get some temples where you can’t even find Prabhupada’s books for sale. There are all kind of other books for sale, even books by non-devotees, there are karmi translations of sastra, all kind of strange books. And time to … or may be its not time, may be you have to wait for the time to offer ISKCON back to Prabhupada.