[quote]ISKCON Governing Body Discusses Gurus qualification

Being a guru is one of the cushiest jobs a neophyte can get, you don't even need a high-school diploma! You can't really blame them. Is there an application I can download from somewhere ?

In Gaudiya Vaishnavism I think anybody who has enough knowledge and insight and is in a disciplic succession coming from persons like Sri Nityananda Prabhu, Advaita Prabhu or Gadadhara Pandita, can become guru. If the aspiring disciple likes what he sees and hears, he can ask for initiation. ISKCON has invented many rules and bureaucratic stuff that isn´t relevant imho.

Yes I agree, but the problem comes when ones aspires for guruhood and then does their best to attract disciples. Unfortunately I have seen this scenario more than the opposite.

I agree though, Iskcon will have more laws and rules than the UN before too long. They are indeed already way to heavy on the bureaucracy.

Yes, that is the problem. And many do try to become gurus, and aren´t qualified for it. But I think that if the disciples of those gurus see that they have become involved in guru business they will leave and be more careful hopefully in the future.

In any case, the most important thing is to be surrendered to the Lord and be aware of one´s eternal nature and position in this world. The grace of Lakshmi Narayana is the end and the means to attain moksha. This is what Sri Vaishnavism is about. Give up all attempts to reach the Lord and rely on His grace. It is called saranagati or prapatti. I think it is the safest path.

Wow. Very interesting! Where have you found this text, Jatayu?

Do you have a list of SAC members right now? Your mention of Suhotra Swami surprises me. Is he considered "in good standing" enough?

haha I never liked the constant use of the word intelligence as it is widely used to say things like, intelligent people will do this or do that, all centering on practising the precepts of a designated path, as though to make the insiders feel so much more intelligent to be doing what they are doing, this sort of double-agent pride. But I haven't heard of intelligence correlated to one's station in life until now! To use your term, you will find drug-addicts more 'intelligent' than professors, and what does intelligence have to do with bhakti anyway. I guess being cerebral is bad if you are a mayavadi with all that focus on jnana, but intelligence is such a virtue when the occasion suits it!


I agree with that Bhakti Vikas Swami quote it is true in many ways. I think this desire for some devotees to be made to look like productive people conforming to the expectations of current society has a lot to do with being part of a cult that was ridiculed as ridiculous in general society. However, I don't think that the way to heal the mockery is by modernizing into a paradigm that would more suit those who judge you.

I think this desire to spread the name of krsna to certain people more than others is not very Caintanyaesque but that -is- how it goes in actuality, despite preaching-in-prisons or whatever, people who appear a certain way are treated with less enthusiasm, but watch out of you are a young male student! I don't think having politicians, professors and prominent people join your cult makes it any more attractive, look at scientology and these other cults who target 'high class people.' I think the impetus behind critisizing a movement because it attracts 'derelicts' or whatever one likes to call them, pertains to the same mood of why things have declined post-prabhupada.



I love Prabhupada and maybe this is true for people who joined the Hare Krishnas, but this insular comment is the sort of thing that makes people think hare krishnas are out of it. Most people who know about re-incarnation and the like today have no idea who Prabhupada is. They do not owe the existence of this knowldege in the West to Prabhupada either. This sort of comment is so out of left-field. There has been a whole world of indian religion practise in the west way before and after Prabhupada, and the majority of people involved in it then and now did not learn it from him. If you want to say that Prabhupada made the hare krsna mahamantra a popular element of western culture, that is another story and I agree.

Angrezi became an Iskcon devotee and he's rather intel... aw, forget it. You have a point.

The whole guru business in ISKCON is a big and at the same time dangerous joke. Their approach follows exactly the cheating tactics they ascribe to modern greed-driven economy. First they create an artificial need (did anybody pre-ISKCON think that all their problems are due to not having found a bona fide ISKCON guru?), then they offer a substandard and overpriced product to fulfill that need, and when people realize what's going on, they are offered the proverbial expired check or another useless product or blamed for buying the much advertised initial product.

Where did you see fine print, they don't even provide one. They combine Indian style advertising (remember the hyperboles on the label of Chyavanprash or any Indian shampoo) for their Western goods of dubious nature.

This is an interesting and important point. I have met two spiritual leaders who to my eyes have this quality. They both glowed with an inner light. It completely bowled me over. One was the late cardinal Archbishop of Westminster (in England) Cardinal Basil Hume. The other is a person presently in ISKCON with whom I was fortunate to have a long frank discussion. I have since discovered that he is in fact an initiating guru. I am sensitive to these things. This quality is pretty rare. I have not seen it in any of the other ISKCON gurus I have met.

It is kinda meaningless, because they don´t even have a disciplic succession. Not even according to the Gaudiya tradition.

I tend to not think of my pre-Iskcon adolescence self as being a runaway, ex-con, ex-drug addict etc.,
but rather as a delicate flower whose tender petals and tendrils were scorched by the rays of a heartless worldly sun.
Thus seeking in the inner recesses of my soul the loving glance of God, and the soothing balm of His descriptions.

Besides, my criminal record was expunged when I turned 18, nearly a year before I joined Iskcon .

I was going to say you were rather intelligent and his idea of Iskcon guru's preaching directed towards street urchins, druggies, criminals and those of seeming less mental abilities was not true. To set the record straight, acbsp actively preached and associated with these types and prided to others that he had brought dirty drugged-out hippies to the brahminical platform and was engaging them in devotional service.

I was not aware of your past. You've come a long way. Congrats! Bravo!

Thank you Babu. I am about to begin my magnum opus, which outlines my opinions on everything from pasteurized apple juice to the moon landing. So I still have a long row to hoe.

[Editted out negative recountings about selective preaching!]

haha i was going to say that too, babu.

I recall a story prabhupada happily dragged in an alcoholic rolling on the temple floor passed out drunk, so that he can hear some bhagavatam! Jaya Prabhupada!

It is against our policy and rules to discuss disputes over the lineage of any Gaudiya Vaishnava tradition (ie the Bhaktisiddhanta initiation controversy).