ISKCON Corruption / New People Decide Guru? / Divorce 07 18 24

PADA: First of all, what is common in most sampradyas is that the seniors, elders and leaders promote the person they believe is the acharya. They don't start a peanut and shell game with various conditioned souls acharyas and then have "the new people" decide who among the GBC's hand selected and "2/3 show if hands" elected gurus is the acharya, as has been done in ISKCON since 1978. We elders should decide who is our guru and then tell the new people who that is, and not have the new people tell us who they think it is -- which is called mental speculation. 

Srila Prabhupada never said that the new people should decide who is qualified to be a guru, he wanted us seniors and elders to make that clear, and then present that to the new people. The newcomers also did not decide to make these false gurus in actuality, since the leaders of ISKCON misguided them by having them select from among their maybe 100 gurus -- that the GBC hand selected and elected. 

And they elected often highly conditioned beings as their gurus, not the new people. The good news is that our Prabhupadanuga process is growing nicely, with us training more "new people" to offer their bhogha to Srila Prabhupada, and not conditioned souls, and etc. The whole idea that conditioned souls can be "2/3 show of hands voted into the parampara" -- by other conditioned souls -- is not bona fide. Conditioned souls elected and voted in other conditioned souls as gurus after 1936, and Srila Prabhupada said this is not authorized. 

A bona fide disciple cannot emerge from a process where he is forced to select from voted in conditioned souls as his guru. The GBC also kicks out any people who worship the bona fide acharya Srila Prabhupada, but the good news is that they seem to have lost their $20,000,000 lawsuit trying to remove the Prabhupadanugas in India. 

So the whole idea that the new people coming to Berkeley should select either Gopal Krishna or Vaisesika or others from their group as their guru, and not Srila Prabhupada, is why these temples are now largely empty ghost towns. And thus the Prabhupadanugas had to make their own seperate program here and be independent of ISKCON, because they are not welcome as soon as they announce they are going to worship the bona fide acharya. As long as ISKCON removes anyone who worships the bona fide acharya, it will continue to be a ghost town, and we will keep making progress by helping independent programs. ys pd

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Yogesvara: So here's a practical problem. People would be interested to know our position on divorce. Here in Rome they just passed a divorce law.
Prabhupada: That is also animalism. Just like a dog having sex intercourse with another female dog, and another, another, another. It is also animalism. So that is your decision. They are animals, and different way they are coming to be naked animal, that's all. The divorce is also dog's business. Dog is having sex intercourse with this female dog and another, another, another, another. It is animalism, that's all.
Yogesvara: But people are objecting, that "If we cannot get divorced, then we are forced to live with each other even if we hate each other."
Prabhupada: But hate each other, that's all right. We say what is the use of your sexual intercourse? That is animalism. You avoid it. Our Vedic civilization is to avoid it. Therefore they remain brahmacari, naisthika-brahmacari, no sexual intercourse in the whole life. That is perfection.
Yogesvara: But that's not possible for the mass of people.
Prabhupada: No, why not possible? We have got so many. Just like Sukadeva Gosvami: he remained completely brahmacari, although naked he is, even he is. He doesn't require, and neither he is agitated. Just like when he was passing, the girls were taking bath. They did not take care, because they knew that he is not at all affected by any woman. And when his father was going, they covered. So father inquired, Vyasadeva, a personality like Vyasadeva, said, "Why you covered? I am old man, and my young son, he was passing naked." They said that "He is paramahamsa. He has no agitation of the mind. But you are grhastha. You live with woman. You have got distinction, man and woman." So this is civilization. What is the use of sex life? It is simply entanglement. Therefore, at the last stage, one is supposed to become sannyasi. What is sannyasi? Vanaprastha, sannyasi, brahmacari -- no sex life. Out of the three..., four different status of life, the brahmacari has no sex life, the vanaprastha has no sex life, the sannyasi has no sex life. Only the grhastha. That means it is prohibitory. It is allowed -- it is a simply concession to the person who cannot remain without sex life. It is simply a concession. Otherwise, according to Vedic civilization, there is no need of sex life. Because it is entanglement, simply entanglement. Yan maithunadi-grhamedhi-sukham hi tuccham kanduyanena karayor iva duhkha-duhkham [SB 7.9.45].
Morning Walk -- May 28, 1974, Rome