Bhagavan Das and his daughter Manjari Ehrlichman

The Sun King

Bhagavan Das and his daughter Manjari Ehrlichman

Dear PADA: 

Manjari Ehrlichman is the daughter of Bhagavan das, and is a senior devotee who is 44 years old. She promised me in India to marry me to help me get USA CITIZENSHIP. I tolerated her craziness of flirtatious behavior for years, and even her bringing other men to our place.

We bought a van together, I put $2,500 she lent me the other $1,500. Later I paid her $500. Then when I finally had the $1,000 check in my hand to pay her off the rest, she told me not to worry, that was money I should use for going back to India. She refused to give me the van title. I told her I was bringing the van to Berkeley to SELL IT CLEARLY. 

I found a friend that was going to give me $4,000. She first accepted to put the title in my name, but she didn't. She changed her mind and started to request me to release the van to her or else she was going to report it as stolen, and then she took my name off the title despite knowing that I put forward 75% of the money for it.

She then blocked me from communication, and she said she took care of me for two years. Yet I also did a lot for her, and also I gave to her all the most youthful years of my life, and she never even started the paper work to apply for my green card, always giving excuses and going back and forth, then forcing me to go to the psychiatrist. 

I thus had to go all the way from the Bay Area to Sacramento because of her desires, and traveled multiple times. This time was all wasted because she was unwilling to help me. I still don't understand why she was so hesitant to marry me, and then later she wanted a divorce, and at the end it was all to make me waste my time. I simply didn't get what she promised, not only that, but she tried to sabotage my schooling with my dad. 

She was telling him that she was gonna press charges with the police against me, falsely accusing me of stealing her deities. She also try to sabotage the place where I was staying, by telling the devotees that I had naked pictures of me and him, when clearly that doesn't even exist. She made it up so I would not have a place to stay. 

The true extent of her cruelty has no measure. She claims to be a devotee but in all my years in her association, I noticed she doesn't chant her rounds and she smokes pot all day long. And she gossips about her sister marrying one of her 13 years younger boyfriends. And the reason she cared for him is, he was Gurudev's financial banker. Even Gurudev told her to back off, but she got with him anyway. She chases yet another man who is 20 years old, she takes advantage of younger people to extract the youth out of them.

She has no real ambition or discipline in spiritual life, its all a show. And her deities got stolen due to this by another guy, who she made come all the way to her place, and in the end she didn't give him what he was there for either. 

The van problem was also helped by Abhay, who wanted to buy my van over time, for a couple hundred dollars at a time. She stole my van to make me suffer, and she hasn't told me anything regarding our legal divorce status. She also legally wanted to deport me from this country but she couldn't, she is evil, cruel and crazy for attacking me like this after I did so much to help her.

She is a lesbian cougar, she and me engaged in coitus in 10 holy places while her guru was in the verge of dying. Her guru asked her, "Are you a manjari"? He couldn't recognize her swarupa either. She is a fake and needs to get taught a lesson, because she doesn't show respect at all to me, others or her own guru. She plays mind games to manipulate others for exploiting them. 

We were in a relationship for 6 years and she promised me a green card, and then she never went thru. Then she stole my van and tried to report it stolen to get me in legal trouble. She also tried to get me in trouble with other law enforcement, as well as my dad and with my devotee acquaintences.

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

PADA:

We have been contacted by the ex-wife of the daughter of Bhagavan das (Manjari Ehrlichman). Yes, according to this woman, Manjari had married another woman at one point. And apparently Manjari married this woman and further promised she would help her "new wife" get an immigration card for the USA, because same sex marriage is legal, especially in our San Francisco area. As it turns out, the legal help did not happen, instead the woman who married Manjari is now in a very distressful and semi-destitute situation. 

OK, she was a little naive, agreed, but that is not a license to exploit her and put her into a distressed situation. She herself feels that she was exploited and cheated, so she contacted me for some sort of help with her many problems. I decided to at least try to help, because a lot of her plight was created by so-called devotees, so she deserves at least some help from the devotee class. Of course this begs the self evident question, how does the daughter of one of the GBC's self-advertised "sum total of the demigods" messiahs end up marrying another woman? 

First of all, this woman could not really work with the official ISKCON folks for many reasons, so she went off to the Narayan Maharaja (NM) camp. And that is where she ran into Bhagavan das and his daughters. The NM program really did not work out very well for her either, so now she's interested in another Yogi and his group, not really connected to general Vaishnava communities. So this woman is merely one out of tens of thousands who just cannot get into the ISKCON GBC's program, and / or who has been exploited by them. And she is another person who ran off to NM, only to find that his program was simply another source of troubles.  

Apparently a little history of what happened is, at least according to this lady, Manjari was trying to become married to a man who was a lot younger than she was. Manjari's younger sister also had a similar interest in the same younger man. And its self evident the younger sister was more suited -- being from a similar age group. Allegedly, Manjari became very upset that the younger sister was taking this man out of her grasp. Supposedly, the reason Manjari was so interested in this man is that he was (quote unquote) "materially together" so he could take care of her, because she is apparently in a precarious financial situation. 

According to this source, at a meeting of the NM folks some years ago, Manjari and her sister got into a big physical fight, and the police were called. According to this lady, the police arrested Manjari and there was allegedly a knife found. After that, she supposedly became suicidal, and there may have been an incident of her taking a lot of pills. We cannot verify any of this, but that is what Manjari's ex tells us. If true, how did Manjari come to such a sad state?

Then again, PADA does not blame folks like Manjari directly for all these problems and issues. We would rather say Bhagavan Das self evidently didn't raise Manjari very responsibly. First of all, Bhagavan Das was a person who was claiming to be God's successor / acharya / messiah, basically a person who could absorb sins like Jesus Christ of Nazareth. Then it turns out, he was unable to follow even the basic standards of the religion. In other words, he's a giant cheater. Imagine being the child of such an imperious and preposterous narcissist? This would create a troubled childhood for sure.

Worse, Bhagavan Das also is credited with bankrupting his entire FRANCE zone, for starters by apparently stealing money out of the safe when he departed. 
This action basically discouraged the congregation, because now congregation members realized that the entire GBC structure of ISKCON was bogus for promoting bogus people as their jagat gurus, acharyas and messiahs. Kaitava dharma. And this was very discouraging for the rank and file.

So they lost hundreds of supporters from the society. And some of these people from his former zone have cursed him ever since, for being such a cheater. Just imagine how hard it is for someone like Manjari to have to deal with having such a father like this? I know some ex-Bhagavan disciples who told me they just cannot wait until he is dead, and he is dispatched to hell, where he belongs. He has certainly made some major enemies. Then again, shastra says that false gurus are destined for the most obnoxious regions, so it appears these curses will not go in vain.  

Anyway! Yep, its hard being a child of a parent who creates animosity on this level, and he openly defies the most grave warnings of going to the lowest regions. Overall Bhagavan is not viewed very well in the eyes of the Krishna society. Anyway, then Bhagavan das said the real solution to all this is, to siphon everyone away from ISKCON and go off to Narayana Maharaja (NM), the chief "rasika guru" and cheer leader of Tamal Krishna's post 1977 bogus guru sabha. 

*** Notice, Bhagavan FIRST destroys the faith of hundreds of people with his guru scandals, and this takes hundreds and maybe thousands of folks away from the society. 

*** Then he says, our real shelter is NM, and this takes hundreds of more people away from the ISKCON society, and he siphons them off to NM. 

*** THEN, he sort of leaves all this behind, because he cannot live in any of these so-called societies he helped generate himself, and he becomes aloof from the whole mess -- which he co-created? Some devotees have said that a number of these senior leading people simply passed their own stools into ISKCON, and then they have had to leave because -- even they could not stand the smell -- they themselves created. 

Some French devotees left holding the bag after their "Guru Maharaja" blooped said that Bhagavan has "totally devastated" the French Zone. Then, it only gets worse, he wants everybody to go to NM, which started yet another mass exodus from ISKCON to further divide and split up the ISKCON society, and destroy the integrity of ISKCON society. A lot of people apparently do not realize that it is people like TKG and Bhagavan Das who are the Pied Pipers that led everyone off to join the NM program. This was simply another way of exploiting and devastating ISKCON. 

Now when I visited Paris temple during the Bhagavan era, the men's shower was all clogged up, and there was 2 feet of dirty water in the sunken shower. I said, hey, how does Bhagavan take a shower here? And his people said, well he never comes here to stay, he stays at the five star hotel down the road. 

So we are paying Bhagavan a huge salary to maintain the society, but he cannot even get the shower fixed? And he instead spends temple money on a five-star hotel room, and a big BMW 740 luxury car? He's not maintaining the basics of the main program he's being paid to maintain? This is fraud. These big gurus are getting paid big salaries to maintain things, and many are not doing the job they are being paid to do. Fraud, plain and simple. 

And there was a lot of garbage downstairs in the temple hallway, probably because he was not paying the garbage bill. One UK woman left Bhagavan's zone with her baby, citing that she could not get diapers and female sanitary products. Two men came from Bhagan's zone to England and they kidnapped the baby back from her, and they punched out her mother in the process, and the men took the baby back to Paris. Then, the police were called, and a deal was made with the police where I was deputed to go to Paris to pick up the baby, a three-year-old little girl, and to bring her back to UK. Which I did. 

Anyway, all this was then in the major EU newspapers and media. And while this woman could not get basic supplies, Bhagavan Das was living like an opulent Saudi Prince, and in fact he became known as the Sun King because he was living so opulently. So obviously this created a very stressful environment for Manjari to grow up in. 

The upshot is, the ex-wife of Manjari has requested to get back the money that she invested in a van that Manjari allegedly stole from her. And she needs to find out if Manjari has actually finalized their divorce papers, and she needs a copy of those papers for legal reasons (she has immigration issues etc.). So we are hoping that Manjari will respond and help out her former partner. If we expect people to become purified, we cannot treat them badly in the name of Krishna, that is not going to help them make progress. 

Anyway! If there is anyone else who can help out here, write me @ 

angel108b@yahoo.com

Then again, ISKCON has been chock full of broken down marriages, friendships, relationships, and bitter cat and dog infighting, so this is an ongoing issue. And this is simply another example of these mid-day soap opera dramas we see all the time. Its very unfortunate that these things keep recurring. 

At the same time, we cannot always use the victim card, we are often victims for a reason, and we need to act responsibly and take credit for our own actions. As me and Sulochana used to discuss, all of us -- even devotees -- are in Krishna's prison, and sometimes the prisoners will turn on each other, and beat and slash each other, and steal from one another etc. just like in actual prisons. So its all part of the purification process on another level.

At the same time, shastra blames the victimizers as primarily at fault, because even if its our karma to be exploited, no other conditioned has the authority to exploit us. And in particular false gurus are always condemned, and they will have a hard time with their future. There is simply no excuse for being a false guru, because everyone in their orbit suffers, including their own children. And for that reason, we are very sorry for what happened to Manjari as well, and we wish her all the best and hope she too can heal from all this.

Anyway! Bhagavan Das is the main orchestrator of all this mayhem. His false guru posturing created most of these problems for Manjari, and us, and for thousands of others. Lets review a few citations on this issue from shastra:   

From Dhamaghosha dasa:

SB 6.2.5-6-- Translation-People in general are not very advanced in knowledge by which to discriminate between religion and irreligion. The innocent, unenlightened citizen is like an ignorant animal sleeping in peace with its head on the lap of its master, faithfully believing in the master’s protection. If a leader is actually kindhearted and deserves to be the object of a living entity’s faith, how can he punish or kill a foolish person who has fully surrendered in good faith and friendship?

PURPORT

The Sanskrit word visvasta-ghata refers to one who breaks faith or causes a breach of trust. The mass of people should always feel security because of the government’s protection. Therefore, how regrettable it is for the government itself to cause a breach of trust and put the citizens in difficulty for political reasons. We actually saw during the partition days in India that although Hindus and Muslims were living together peacefully, manipulation by politicians suddenly aroused feelings of hatred between them, and thus the Hindus and Muslims killed one another over politics. 

This is a sign of Kali-yuga. In this age, animals are kept nicely sheltered, completely confident that their masters will protect them, but unfortunately as soon as the animals are fat, they are immediately sent for slaughter. 

Such cruelty is condemned by Vaisnavas like the Visnudutas. Indeed, the hellish conditions already described await the sinful men responsible for such suffering. 

One who betrays the confidence of a living entity who takes shelter of him in good faith, whether that living entity be a human being or an animal, is extremely sinful. 

Because such betrayals now go unpunished by the government, all of human society is terribly contaminated. The people of this age are therefore described as mandah sumanda-matayo manda-bhagya hy upadrutah [SB 1.1.10]. As a consequence of such sinfulness, men are condemned (mandah), their intelligence is unclear (sumanda-matayah), they are unfortunate (manda-bhagyah), and therefore they are always disturbed by many problems (upadrutah). This is their situation in this life, and after death they are punished in hellish conditions.

Isopanishad -12-purport

In other words, the path of salvation from the material clutches fully depends on the principles of knowledge and detachment gained from serving the Lord. The pseudo religionists have neither knowledge nor detachment from material affairs, for most of them want to live in the golden shackles of material bondage under the shadow of philanthropic activities disguised as religious principles. 

By a false display of religious sentiments, they present a show of devotional service while indulging in all sorts of immoral activities. In this way they pass as spiritual masters and devotees of God. Such violators of religious principles have no respect for the authoritative acaryas, the holy teachers in the strict disciplic succession. They ignore the Vedic injunction acaryopasana-"One must worship the acarya"-and Kṛṣṇa's statement in the Bhagavad-gita (4.2) evam parampara-praptam, "This supreme science of God is received through the disciplic succession." Instead, to mislead the people in general they themselves become so-called acaryas, but they do not even follow the principles of the acaryas.

These rogues are the most dangerous elements in human society. 

Because there is no religious government, they escape punishment by the law of the state. They cannot, however, escape the law of the Supreme, who has clearly declared in the Bhagavad-gita that envious demons in the garb of religious propagandists shall be thrown into the darkest regions of hell (Bg. 16.19-20). 

Sri Isopanisad confirms that these pseudo religionists are heading toward the most obnoxious place in the universe after the completion of their spiritual master business, which they conduct simply for sense gratification.

DD: So the two above verses and purports explain how dangerous can be this business of assuming the post of Acarya, spiritual master, priest, etc especially if one has not been authorized to take up such a task by his own spiritual master.
Srila Prabhupada explains it as “cheating” and “extremely sinful”. Not a very pretty picture for a person one has assumed, has taken up some spiritual path.

On the other hand, there is an actual path for us to become purified --

SB 6.4.26 Translation - When one’s consciousness is completely purified of the contamination of material existence, gross and subtle, without being agitated as in the working and dreaming states, and when the mind is not dissolved as in susupti, deep sleep, one comes to the platform of trance. Then one’s material vision and the memories of the mind, which manifests names and forms, are vanquished. Only in such a trance is the Supreme Personality of Godhead revealed. Thus let us offer our respectful obeisances unto the Supreme Personality of Godhead, who is seen in that uncontaminated, transcendental state.

PURPORT--There are two stages of God realization. One is called sujneyam, or very easily understood (generally by mental speculation), and the other is called durjneyam, understood only with difficulty. Paramatma realization and Brahman realization are considered sujneyam, but realization of the Supreme Personality of Godhead is durjneyam.

As described here, one attains the ultimate realization of the Personality of Godhead when one gives up the activities of the mind—thinking, feeling and willing—or, in other words, when mental speculation stops. This transcendental realization is above susupti, deep sleep. In our gross conditional stage we perceive things through material experience and remembrance, and in the subtle stage we perceive the world in dreams. 

The process of vision also involves remembrance and also exists in a subtle form. Above gross experience and dreams is susupti, deep sleep, and when one comes to the completely spiritual platform, transcending deep sleep, he attains trance, visuddha-sattva, or vasudeva-sattva, in which the Personality of Godhead is revealed.

Atah sri-krsna-namadi na bhaved grahyam indriyaiḥ: [BRS.]

“No one can understand the transcendental nature of the name, form, quality and pastimes of Sri Krsna through his materially contaminated senses. Only when one becomes spiritually saturated by transcendental service to the Lord are the transcendental name, form, quality and pastimes of the Lord revealed to him.” (Bhakti-rasamrta-sindhu 1.2.234)1.2.234] as long as one is situated in duality, on the sensual platform, gross or subtle, realization of the original Personality of Godhead is impossible. 

Sevonmukhe hi jihvadau svayam eva sphuraty adaḥ: but when one engages his senses in the service of the Lord—specifically, when one engages the tongue in chanting the Hare Krsna mantra and tasting only Krsna prasada with a spirit of service—the Supreme Personality of Godhead is revealed. This is indicated in this verse by the word suci-sadmane. Suci means purified. 

By the spirit of rendering service with one’s senses, one’s entire existence becomes suci-sadma, the platform of uncontaminated purity. Daksa therefore offers his respectful obeisances unto the Supreme Personality of Godhead, who is revealed on the platform of suci-sadma. In this regard Srila Visvanatha Cakravarti Thakura quotes the following prayer by Lord Brahma from the Srimad-Bhagavatam (10.14.6): tathapi bhuman mahimagunasya te viboddhum arhaty amalantar-atmabhiḥ. “One whose heart has become completely purified, my Lord, can understand the transcendental qualities of Your Lordship and can understand the greatness of Your activities.”

BG 15.7-purport-

It is clear, however, in this verse, that the conditioned soul is covered by the material body, with the mind and the senses, and when he is liberated this material covering perishes, but his spiritual body manifests in its individual capacity. The following information is there in the Māahyandi-nayana-sruti: sa va esa brahma-nistha idam sariram marttyam atisrjya brahmabhisampadya brahmana pasyati brahmana srnoti brahmanaivedam sarvam anubhavati. 

It is stated here that when a living entity gives up this material embodiment and enters into the spiritual world, he revives his spiritual body, and in his spiritual body he can see the Supreme Personality of Godhead face to face. He can hear and speak to Him face to face, and he can understand the Supreme Personality as He is.

SB 1.8.4 purport-

As long as we are in the material world, our duty is to follow the orders of the Lord, and if by the grace of the Lord we are liberated from the clutches of the material world, then in our liberated stage also we can render transcendental loving service unto the Lord. In our material stage we can see neither ourselves nor the Lord for want of spiritual vision. But when we are liberated from material affection and are situated in our original spiritual form we can see both ourselves and the Lord face to face. 

Mukti means to be reinstated in one's original spiritual status after giving up the material conception of life. Therefore, human life is specifically meant for qualifying ourselves for this spiritual liberty.

So the above nicely describes the position of liberation or mukti, now let us take a quick look at the position of a pure devotee, spiritual master who also must be by definition a mukta or liberated person.

Feb 18 1969 LA-

Prabhupada: Every being is, just like if I see somebody, that this boy is the son of such and such gentleman. That means I see such and such gentleman in this boy. Is it clear? If I see every living being is son of God or Kṛṣṇa, then that means I see God in every beings. Is there any difficulty to understand?
Visnujana: Is this an association or this a vision?
Prabhupada: No, this is a fact. (laughter) It is not an association or vision, this is a fact. When you see a cat, when you see a dog, you see Krsna in him
June 29 1974 Melbourne
Guest (3): So, Śrīla Prabhupāda, have you realized God?
Prabhupāda: What do you think? What is your opinion?
Guest (3): I can't say.
Prabhupāda: Then if I say, "yes," then what you will understand? If you are not yourself expert, then even if I say, "Yes, I am God realized," how you will take it as truth? If you do not know what is God realization, then how you can ask this question and how you will be satisfied by the answer? You do not know.
Guest (3): Well, what is God realization?
Prabhupāda: Then... Then you were asking, "Are you God realized?" If I say, "Yes," then how you'll believe it? You do not know what is God realization. Then why do you put this question? You do not know yourself. If I say,"Yes," how you'll understand that I am right? Therefore you should not put all these questions. It has no value. You do not know yourself what is God realization. Now, just like a medical man, if he asks another man, medical man, so if he says, "Yes," then medical man will understand him by technical terms whether he is medical man. So unless one is medical man, what is the use of asking another man, "Are you medical man?" Unless you are prepared to take the answer whatever I give. Are you prepared?
Guest (3): Yes.
Prabhupāda: Then it is all right. I am. I am seeing God every moment. So unless we are prepared to take the answer, we should not put ourself...
March 6 1968 letter-

Yes, whoever you tell the chant to, it is effective. You have heard it from me and my disciples, similarly I have heard it from my Guru Maharaja, and so on, and on. Because you have heard it from a pure devotee of the Lord, therefore it is transmitted from you to another. Just as an aerial message, is transmitted from one place to another, similarly, this Guru parampara system is working. My disciples are my agents, my representatives, so by hearing it from them, you are receiving it from me. And because you are a sincere soul, those who are hearing the Mantra from you are receiving it in disciplic succession, from Lord Caitanya and from Lord Krishna.

Dec 16 1967 letter SF--

When I left your country on the 22nd of July, I had very little hope to come back again. But Krishna informed me that I'm not going to die immediately; therefore, I have come back again to get inspiration of Krishna Consciousness from you all good souls.

Jan 29 1973 letter-

Yes, the spiritual master is also present in his picture, though more importantly he is present in his teachings. I think this is explained in one letter that has already been distributed. If you have further questions try to get them resolved by your GBC man, Karandhar, because now I wish to spend all of my time for translating my books like Srimad-Bhagavatam, so I may give them to you.

June 21 1970 letter-

Yes So far I am concerned, I cannot say what I was in my previous life, but one great astrologer calculated that I was previously a physician and my life was sinless. Besides that, to corroborate the statement of Bhagavad-gita "sucinam srimatam gehe yogabhrasta samyayate" [Bg. 6.41] which means an unfinished yogi takes birth in rich family or born of a suci or pious father. By the grace of Krsna I got these two opportunities in the present life to be born of a pious father and brought up in one of the richest, aristocratic families of Calcutta (Kasinath Mullick). 

The Radha Krsna Deity in this family called me to meet Him, and therefore last time when I was in Calcutta, I stayed in that temple along with my American disciples. Although I had immense opportunities to indulge in the four principles of sinful life because I was connected with a very aristocratic family, Krsna always saved me, and throughout my whole life I do not know what is illicit sex, intoxication, meat-eating or gambling. So far my present life is concerned, I do not remember any part of my life when I was forgetful of Krsna.

Some conclusions- In the above texts and purports we have seen that to willingly betray those under our care is a greatly sinful activity and is punishable by Yamaraja the lord of death. We have also seen that anybody who assumes without authority or qualification the post of Acarya or spiritual master and thereby betrays his disciples is clearing his path to hellish life. Also clearly shown was the actual state of consciousness of one who is beyond the body mind and intelligence platforms, or one who is on the Suddha sattva platform of God consciousness. 

This is not an easy thing to attain. And finally we have seen that Srila Prabhupada is on this platform of Krsna or God Consciousness where as he says there was never a time in his sinless life that he was forgetful of God or Krsna and we also mentioned several other “proofs” of his direct contact with the Lord of Vrndavana.

Hare Krsna--damaghosa das