Article from Sampradaya Sun (ISKCON) re: Dusyanta

Dusyanta's dasa's New Sampradaya


BY: ERNEST DRAS & MICHAEL GARNER

Oct 06, 2011 — UK (SUN) — The article, "Clarification and Statement to Date" by Dusyanta prabhu is proof of how far one can go from Srila Prabhupada's standards, all the while claiming to act in his name. The result of enacting the recommendations in the article would be a kind of pseudo-Vaishnava-neo-Christianity that would only further muddy the name of His Divine Grace.

[PADA: First of all, -- has anyone ever heard of the "preaching work" of these folks -- Ernest Dras and Michael Garner (EM)? Nope. Has anyone ever heard of these folks period? Nope. And we never will, they are personna non grata because they have no positive preaching platform. They are not distributing books, making temples, training people in deity worship, making masses of prasadam for poor children and so on -- and so forth like our people are doing. All they are doing, apart from nothing at all, is to try to bother and harass those of us who are doing something. Srila Prabhupada mentions this, his God brothers could not preach, but they criticized his preaching. So they are not just useless, they were harmful to the actual preaching effort.   

OK, we cannot worship the acharya Srila Prabhupada "now" -- because he is "a departed acharya." And if we do worship him, that is a deviation and will make us "Christians." Worship of His Divine Grace is now called "muddying the waters." (?) Wow, Srila Prabhupada has now become dirty mud? Of course, Srila Prabhupada says the opposite: -- That worship of Jesus is bona fide and importantly, that the teachings of Jesus have been the glue that is the foundation of Western civilization and culture.

Srila Prabhupada says that -- without Jesus -- there would have been no civilization in the West. In other words, the Christian's ideas taken from the Bible form the basis of Western civilization, and hence its laws, police, courts, justice system and so forth. OK, without the teachings of Jesus we would be un-civilized people who took delight in feeding their fellow citizens to the lions.     

So according to these Sampradaya Sun writers, no laws and no civilization is better than some civilization? No law and order is better than some law and order? These folks wanted no laws and instead criminal anarchy, and that is what they created with this antinomianism (lawless-ness in the name of God) idea in ISKCON. And then they wonder why there is so much criminality, child molesting, embezzling and so on, going on in ISKCON?

Perhaps its because these folks think the Western idea of having actual functioning society with rules, laws and taking direction from a "departed guru" is bogus. OK, their idea has lead to a lawless ISKCON society of ROGUE acharyas, there is no need to follow any rules from the previous acharyas, and worse, it is a deviation to follow the rules given by the previous acharyas. So what we ended up with under their plan -- was and is: a criminal mass molesting cult. Antinomianism, criminality in the name of religion. Sorry, the better plan is: to continue to follow the acharyas after they depart (the Christian's idea).]

EM: Dusyanta prabhu very well describes the flaws of "ISKCON" and the Ritviks. However, the conclusion he derives is misleading and ultimately falls into the same category as the groups he criticizes. It is somewhat shocking that no one has yet written something to counter his assertions. This is not to say that all of Dusyanta prabhu's points are dangerous.

[PADA: Are you kidding? What has been "dangerous" is your idea that we no longer need to follow a departed acharya, this has made ISKCON into a dangerous criminal molester cult. We are not supposed to follow the directives of the acharyas and worship them, ok, and that has lead to mass criminality.]

EM: He makes a very nice argument regarding the necessity of the spiritual master's vapuh (physical manifestation) in maintaining a rittvik system of initiating new disciples. He also made a very nice exposition and cited a number of wonderful quotes in praise of transcendental sound vibration. Dusyanta prabhu makes the case that one can become initiated simply by hearing the transcendental vibration of the spiritual master. In Kali yuga such an assertion is as absurd as saying that anyone who reads a few pages of Srila Prabhupada's books will become a devotee.

[PADA: Rocana has agreed with us and said that people can become devotees now by reading the books of Srila Prabhupada. The main thing here is, how will people become devotees if not through the books? Worse, we are making many new devotees of Srila Prabhupada and these EM people are simply saying all these new devotees are in illusion for worshiping Srila Prabhupada and Krishna. Worship of the pure devotee and Krishna is illusion, so this means -- worship no one and nothing? What alternate are they proposing? None!] 

EM: Undoubtedly there will be some isolated advanced souls who will take to the process sincerely and seriously after simply reading those books or hearing a Srila Prabhupada recording. When we review the pastimes of the Lord's associates in Sri Caitanya-caritamrita we may not find many descriptions of "ceremonial-diksa." However, these great souls do not require any kind of fire sacrifice formality to become dedicated to serving the Lord. They are mostly eternally liberated nitya-siddhas, after all.


[PADA: OK, the advanced associates of Lord Chaitanya are now the model we have to follow? Sorry, none of the current crop of devotees seems to have attained their levels. We are fallen and need to continue to worship the acharya Srila Prabhupada and not compare ourselves to the advanced associates.] 

EM: On the other hand, four virtues are described regarding the four ages and spirituality - austerity, cleanliness, mercy, and truthfulness. In Kali yuga, there is only a little truthfulness left in the inhabitants. This means it is very difficult for the people of this age to stick to the vows that are expected of an initiated devotee. Srila Prabhupada, therefore, engaged everything at his facility, including "ceremonial diksa," to keep his disciples serious about their responsibilities:

"So this is the process of bhakti-yoga. You surrender and, in the past, whatever sinful activities you have done, that is squared up, now account closed. Now you begin a new life, devotional life, and if you stick to the principle as it is instructed, that do not have illicit sex life, do not have intoxicants, do not eat meat, do not play gambling, speculate, you promise before Krsna and before the spiritual master, before the Vaisnavas, so many witnesses, and if you violate, then you can understand what you are doing. You promise with..., before the Deity. Krsna is not different, so when the initiation takes place we promise so many things. But if we do not follow, if we do not keep our promise, that is a great fault."
(Lecture on Bhagavad-gita 7.1 -- Melbourne, June 29, 1974)

[PADA: OK, and where does it say, after I depart -- this will all change and none of this will apply?]

EM: This assertion of Dusyanta prabhu that "ceremonial diksa" is an invention of the Zonal Acaryas or the "ISKCON" institution is patently false. If anything, in this regard they tried to copy every aspect of Srila Prabhupada's practices so that their deluded followers would think nothing had changed.

[PADA: Nothing has changed? Srila Prabhupada said this many times, after I depart, do not change anything (keep the ritvik system).]

EM: Dusyanta prabhu completely misleads the reader by giving the impression that Srila Prabhupada had actually been following his "initiation by sound vibration" process when he writes,

"In other words, the philosophy that abounded in ISKCON in 1978 was that to receive initiation and the process of diksa, there had to be a physically present Diksa Guru to administer it. So at that time, the ‘living guru' theory was borne, that a Guru had to be corporeal to be functional."

[PADA: Does not mention anything about Srila Prabhupada's relation to his guru?]

EM: If Srila Prabhupada had actually been implementing Dusyanta's sound vibration initiation concept all along, why did he make repeated statements like these:

"Krishna is the first spiritual master, and when we become more interested, then we have to go to a physical spiritual master." That is enjoined in the following verse:


[PADA: Many devotees of Srila Prabhupada in the 1960s and 1970s never even met him physically. EM thinks these devotees were never initiated. That is not what Prabhupada says, he says they are initiated and they did not need to meet him physically.]  

"Because Krishna is situated in everyone's heart. Actually, He is the spiritual master, caitya-guru. So in order to help us, He comes out as physical spiritual master. And therefore saksad-dharitvena sama... Spiritual master is representative of Krishna. Krishna sends some sincere devotee to act on His behalf, and therefore he is spiritual master."
(Srimad-Bhagavatam Lecture 1.2.4—Rome, May 28, 1974)

[PADA: And this is happening, Krishna is sending people Srila Prabhupada's books and they are becoming his devotees.]

EM: In the Srimad Bhagavatam and Sri Caitanya-caritamrita we always find disciples approaching a physical person as their guru. There may not always be a formal fire sacrifice, but there is never the idea that, "I can be initiated by Srila Vyasadeva by virtue of his sound vibration instead of this physically manifest person standing before me."

[PADA: Prabhupada said he is present in his books, and his books are physically present?]

EM: If we follow Dusyanta prabhu's philosophy to its logical end, Srila Prabhupada should have humbly requested his disciples to become initiated by Srila Bhaktisiddhanta through the pure sound vibration of reading his books aloud.

[PADA: This is called speculation. What the writer is suggesting is that the current state of ISKCON, not following any acharya, and having a lawless condition, is the right idea. Of course these writers are saying they are waiting for the next messiah, which is of course followed by some Christians. Rocana is perhaps the most famous Christian writer on the planet, he always says he is awaiting the next messiah. Of course Srila Prabhupada never mentioned this next messiah, so what we ended up with was a criminal take over. So we are making thousands of devotees of Krishna whereas EM and Rocana are not, ... since they simply tell people to run off to another guru's mission and forget about Krishna's and Srila Prabhupada's mission.]

EM: Or is Dusyanta prabhu's great benediction only available to those who have taken birth after the divine intervention of recording equipment? Dusyanta's attempt to turn the teachings of Srila Prabhupada on end is ludicrous. He is saying that when His Divine Grace spoke about approaching a spiritual master, he was actually only talking about hearing from him. When Srila Prabhupada said these things he meant to follow the very procedures he had implemented for someone to become his formally initiated disciple.


[PADA: OK, except we are making new devotees of Prabhupada now, which is what he said we should do, he said go on preaching as we are now and do not change anything after I depart.] 

EM: Nevertheless, Srila Prabhupada's instructions on this topic were meant to be applied by anyone at anytime. This means now also. New people should find a genuine spiritual master.

[PADA: Oh oh, the problem is that people like you and Rocana already found a whole pack of bogus people as your gurus and you ruined ISKCON. First of all, you find your bona fide acharya, then advertise that you have one. To simply tell people to leave ISKCON and go elsewhere and find another guru is making ISKCON into a ghost town. Of course that may be what these writers want, no one in ISKCON, no worship of Srila Prabhupada and Krishna and so on, this is their apparent goal.]

EM: What formalities, or the lack of them, that such guru implements to initiate is his business. The key word here is genuine spiritual master. The "ISKCON" institution has deviated from the parampara by virtue of its "guru by GBC" nonsense, so anyone who claims to be authorized by their mandate proves him or herself to be actually outside the parampara. Similarly, those coming from Srila Prabhupada's godbrothers have, thus far, only provided proof of their envy of Srila Prabhupada by virtue of belittling him to the level of "swamiji." These so-called gurus either directly refer to him by this title or count among their associates people who do.

[PADA: And so now, by the process of neti neti, we cannot worship Srila Prabhupada, we cannot worship the GBC, we cannot worship the bogus God brothers, we cannot worshiup anything, this is called mayavada.]

EM: Finding a physically manifest spiritual master, surrendering, serving, and inquiring is the standard process. This doesn't change because the GBC or the Zonal Acaryas turned Srila Prabhupada's mission into a mockery. Dusyanta prabhu should be honestly repeating what Srila Prabhupada said and did about initiation, not trying to put words into his mouth. Srila Prabhupada's own pure sound vibration does not say what Dusyanta does.

[PADA: But you just changed it yourself by saying Srila Prabhupada is bogus to say he will live forever fromn his books?]

EM: Dusyanta's insecure process is mostly a drive on the mano-rathena, the chariot of the mind. Outside of this rudderless criterion, he provides no real confirmations that one has actually become initiated.

[PADA: EM clan are rudderless, we cannot worship the pure devotee, we cannot worship Krishna, we cannot worship the GBC, we cannot worship the Gaudiya Matha, there is no rudder here at all.] 

EM: Here we see the main current of his deviation.

[PADA: Worship of Srila Prabhupada is a deviation? Well this is what the atheists say as well.]

EM: Perhaps the main problem with Dusyanta prabhu's conclusions is that he has confused the post-samadhi GBC and their distortion of Srila Prabhupada's movement with real Krishna consciousness.

[PADA: Oh here we go again, the GBC calls Srila Prabhupada the posthumous, post mortem, post samadhi person, and this EM uses terms he borrows from the GBC deviants. Srila Prabhupada never calls the previous acharyas the post mortem dead and gone folks? Where do they get these terms, from Ravindra Swarupa and Satsvarupa, the people who invented these terms long before Rocana and EM were using these terms.] 

EM: Similarly, because somebody is angry and disgusted with "ISKCON," Gaudiya Matha's so called gurus, or so-called rittvik post-mortem representatives, one should not reject the need to contact a bona fide PHYSICALLY manifest spiritual personality and receive initiation from him. The initiating spiritual master is a phenomenal manifestation of the Absolute Truth. This was quoted above.


[PADA: Well there you have it, the pure devotees are now "post mortem" told ya!] 

EM: Others will say that if you want people to surrender to a physically manifest guru, then show us one. Otherwise we are going to stick with Srila Prabhupada. They say that waiting for the next genuine guru could go on for decades. What do we do until then? They say that real Krishna consciousness must be practical and have some means to initiate.

The results of such expedient posturing and concoction should be obvious. Why do yet another wrong thing? We should believe Dusyanta prabhu's conclusions about the power of transcendental sound vibration and pray that it can clean our hearts to the point where we deserve the association of a real spiritual master. As Srila Prabhupada said above, "The problem is if you are sincere."

[PADA: Right, worship of Srila Prabhupada is wrong, wait for the next messiah, but he told us not to wait for the next messiah and to continue his worship.] 

The point is that we are so polluted due to association with "ISKCON", what is left of the Gaudiya Matha, and with rittvik that we are no longer capable of contacting someone bona fide.


[PADA: But you are quoting the GBC and the Gaudiya Matha, they are the ones who refer to previous acharyas as post mortem.] 

EM: So, the only solution seems to be to separate ourselves from these bogus groups and engage ourselves in association with pure devotees.


[PADA: Now you are saying that Srila Prabhupada's books are not association with a pure devotee, but we are making new devotees from his books. Are you saying all these new devotees do not exist?] 

EM: But where to find such saintly personalities? There are many of them in Srila Prabhupada's books, devotees like Prahlada Maharaja, Narada Muni, Jada Bharata, Lord Rsabadeva, or Haridasa Thakura, and, of course, Srila Prabhupada. If somebody is seriously reading about all these souls, without simultaneously being in poisonous contact with the previously mentioned deviant groups, then his power of discrimination will become stronger.

[PADA: OK, so now you are saying he is present in his books? You are contradicting yourself. The only thing you seem to be saying is, he is not in his books, how do we know, read his books because he is in his books? No wonder nobody follows you people, you are contradicting your own statements left, right and center.] 

EM: If you will then wear these advanced personalities within your heart, then you will have a gauge with which you will be able to measure things that cross your way. You will know the taste and the characteristics of a spiritually advanced person, and you will not be cheated so easily by all the word-jugglers pretending to be spiritually elevated.


[PADA: So we cannot simply read the books, but we should simply read the books?]

EM: This is also in accordance with Srila Bhaktisiddhanta's teachings. He says that if somebody is serious about contacting a bona fide spiritual person, he should first get the idea from the scriptures:
"The plain meaning of the Shastras should, therefore, be our only guide in the search of the good Preceptor, when we actually feel the need of his guidance." (Initiation Into Spiritual Life)

His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada can be, and should be, accepted as siksa-guru by everyone who wants to take advantage of the teachings and process that he has given -- to make genuine advancement in Krishna Consciousness.

[PADA: Except it is an offense to consider that the shiksha guru and the diksha guru are different?]

EM: It is obvious that we are now in a period of such drought. In this present drought, we can still find some clean drinkable water in the shape of Srila Prabhupada's books. He left these for us to use for our advancement.

[PADA: There is no drought, we are still making devotees of Srila Prabhupada now. You are artificially making a drought. This is amazing, EM and people like Rocana are spending their whole lives preaching that no one should bother worshiping Srila Prabhupada and Krishna, while saying they follow Krishna! Anyway you folks are part of the GBC, they also think the previous acharyas are post mortem dead guys, and so do you. EM is simply proud that he is breathing, he thinks because he is living that makes him and authority and the acharyas have no authority because they are post mortem, in sum, he is envious of the acharyas and that is why he opposes their worship. ys pd]