Just to strengthen my own lack of faith in some statements of gaudiya vaisnavism which are nothing more than sheer stupidity I am inviting posts of the most bizarre things heard in gv circles.

"The sea is salty because a muni urinated in it !"

Please help me maintain my sanity by posting bizzare statements of GV, I dont want to beat my intellect into the submission that I am not capable of understanding the truth and it is my tiny intellect that is at fault not the nonsense I've heard like "moon being further from the sun !"

These sorts of folk legend are present in every culture, the mythical origins of things, and I find them charming in their own way, just as I enjoy a good fairytale or a movie. It's only when people start turning them into absolute scientific truths that things get a bit wonky.

when a person becomes initiated by a bona fide GV guru it is like pulling the plug and the fan slows down

well, on second thoughts this isn't so stupid, because when the sh*t hits there's less damage

Hii hii haa haa! That slowing down is so true on many levels. I could mention many things that slowed down after the initiation process was completed.

One of my favourite funny memories come from the place nowadays called HK-center. There was a lecture or some sort of speach going on and Vegavan told us about the majestic Milk Ocean. One younger devotee raised his hand, wanting to ask about the milk. He was bothered about the milk, if it ever got sour . First there was a long silence. I quess people really thought about it for awhile, but finally Vegavan said to him angrily: "You fool! Of course that milk is transcendental!".

It is transcendental, of course. That explained so many things that we could not understand.

My ultimate favorite was the leprosy thing. I must admit that I don't know whether it is really shastric, or just a "Prabhupada said"... all in all, if someone drinks milk that has some salt in it, they will get leprosy, even if both the milk and salt was sterile.

I even held a demonstration once, mostly to disprove the infallibility of either the shastras or Prabhupada, by ingesting a glass of milk, with a liberal amount of salt mixed in it. Of course, I'm not leprous. My (karmi) mother, on the other hand, chastised me for doing so: "You really shouldn't experiment on your own health and body, my son. Better be careful." She had more faith in the scriptures than I had. Nowadays, I am far more permissive about the value of the scriptures than I was back then - if one carefully applies their critical intellect while studying them, one can find moral and spiritual development in them. Spiritually, they can be helpful. The contents regarding the material world are often better left aside though.

Most of the shastric cosmology is in this category, for example. If you want to learn geography or astronomy, better choose another book; if you want to go to preach on another planet, don't use the Bhagavata Purana as your navigation handbook.

I remember when I was teaching in Vrindaban and reading about Matsya Avatar with the teenage students I taught. One of them very thoughtfully asked, if the fish kept getting bigger and bigger and was finally so big that it was as large as the whole ocean, how could it be contained in the tiny pool and who could throw it back into the ocean? I said that I didn't know; that it was a good question, and that I'd ask Jagadisa. Of course, the predictable response was, that we had to take it on transcendental faith. Right. I bet that really helped solidify that boy's faith.

I remember one lady asking a question about love. Her worry was, that if our love for Krsna just keeps on increasing and increasing, would we not just blow up in the end?

Answer: Yes, transcendentally.

I really had to try hard to remember a few ISKCONisms, and nothing was coming up, so instead of feeling perplexed or worried about the sudden onset of Alzheimer’s … I realized that I’m finally letting go of this strange past experience, actually forgetting things I want to forget! Then, like a sudden thunderstorm out of the blue, there it was, a voice from the past saying “Oriental people were descendents of snakes.” NO, no—go away voice … then a shadowy whispering that said,” Mother Theresa was a rakshasa who drank the blood of her poor patients.” (must have been a jealousy thing for a Catholic wearing a sari to get so much do-gooder publicity?) So I immediately put on some Stooges music and cleaned my ears with a Q-tip dipped in hydrogen peroxide , exorcizing any other past ISKCONisms that lingered, ahh yes, those two did come up … but so many others have simply …. and happily … just faded away.

Yes please, you can happily and simply forget the nasty things, but do not forget the bizarre and funny, like the ones you shared here. It is, if nothing else, a good reality check.

That is so crazy people actually believe and preach this kind of garbage it is enough to put some people in the hospital.
I also once heard that in mecca there is a shalagram sila and all the muslims once a year do parikram to it!

For a more on-topic post, for shyamasundaradasa:

How about eggplant as an anti-bhakti crop, having a stronger power than the Holy Name? It is said in Hari-bhakti-vilasa, that consumers off eggplant cannot have any devotion towards Krishna; eating it will remove any bhakti from the heart. It wouldn't bother me, being an ardent hater of all things eggplant - but I know some individuals with a way above average level of bhakti, not shown on sankirtan results tables, but apparent in every way they are doing things and speak - and yet, they do partake of the incriminated vegetable, even sharing it with the One who supposedly inspired the above statement.

Do you eat onions? Or, better yet, do you eat carrots? If you answer "no" to the first, you should be consequential by abstaining from the latter too - because both of these are sinful things to eat, along with - if I remember well - red lentils. The Puranic story has it that a muni's wife wanted to imitate her husband with the sacrifica thing and killed a cow (as it is done in sacrifices). But she didn't have the brahma-tejas to do it properly, so instead of the cow being resuscitated (as it should have been done) it just continued to bleed, and from this blood, onions, carrots and red lentils were born (as these species are not included in the 8.400.000 original species). So eating them is like eating cow blood.

I have split a number of posts into a topic called Dealing with Taboos of Sexuality in the Radha-Krishna tradition to give it the focus it needs, and to keep this one on topic.

One year I was helping out at Janmastami which meant that I finished my duties at 2am. I figured there wasn't much point in sleeping given mangal-arati in a couple of hours (4.30am) and the Nandotsava/Prabhupada birthday celebrations after that. So I went off to the bathroom for a quick shave and a shower.

While shaving, a brahmachari solemnly told me that it was inauspicious to shave at that hour because.. I forget exactly, but it was along the lines of being haunted by a ghost.

Needless to say, I ignored him and carried on shaving.

Taking a bath too early can get you snatched into netherworlds, as seen in Nanda's capture and rescue by Krishna. I think it's around 2:30 or wherever that some observe as the "allowed bath start time". As you can see, there are interesting permutations to the myth. Also food eaten before sunrise is known to lead to an unholy result.

Cutting one's nails inside will attract thieves always made me laugh and another one is if a woman conceives a child while on top of the man then the resultant child will be a homosexual.

Actually, for myself, the whole business of following the example of (mythical) personalities who lived centuries ago seems pretty stupid.

certainly as stupid as following the example of modern-day morons, which is also pretty popular these days.

I believe the correct wording is "latter-day".

Hey ... some of my best friends and family are morons, enough of this moron bashing!!!! Though I do like the idea of the Latter Day Morons, a fellowship in which when you die, you get to live eternally with your moron loved ones in whatever body you last had on earth.

Isn't it interesting on how the morons are always somebody else ... over there somewhere?

I am unsure what is happening here (Mr Jones) but I can't see my cursor and the art of typing below the quote has become a hit and miss affair.

As far as Latter Day Morons; I think Forest Gump got it about right.

That gives the term a nice scientific feel.

Blazing Saddles - What did you expect? "Welcome, sonny"? "Make yourself at home"? "Marry my daughter"? You've got to remember that these are just simple farmers. These are people of the land. The common clay of the new West. You know... morons.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=txrikNFX-8E

The grandaddy of them all - Devotees leave because they stopped getting the mercy; they offended the vaisnavas.

And how can the absolute worst sin against god and everything be offending a vaisnava?


Technical sidenote: I don't have the cursor problem when in Edit mode.

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Yeah! And Lentils are not vegetarian!

And for goodness sake, don't ever, ever, ever reheat rice!

I remember hearing that if the man has more fun during sex, that the child will be a boy, and if the woman has more fun, then the child a girl. However, i don't want to make too much fun of this one, cuz' i am still trying to have a boy.

Yes, this is one of the many other things I couldn't get my head around. Red lentils = masoor dahl. Seriously, masoor dahl? This is arguably the best dahl ever, and one of my favourite foods. Whoever drew up this rule obviously never tasted it, and must also have had a colour-blindness problem as well to describe as red something which is orange.

I don't want to exclude other bonafide morons though, should they happen to not be mormons. Any people that try to ban alcohol are the same people that need to hit the bottle. or be hit with a bottle.

I never heard these. Orientals descended from snakes? Oy! Where the hell did they get that one? My brain hurts.

Let's create a society based on book sales. The books will be so great that they will sell themselves. What an ideal society of salespeople it will be who can explain how everyone else should be divided by occupation.

Ah, what a superb spiritual avatar, ras! I knew you had the higher taste.

I dig this series, and have always hoped someone would fill in the rest. Below is a less-known illustration based on the same theme. Reincarnation illustrated.

Click to view attachment

Wow, I would have never thought there were more illustrations on the topic. This is very uplifting. The series is indeed 1 of favorites 2. Truly, only a descendant of the mus ogre line of otigoc munis (apropos binary backwards) could have found this long missing original.

Now I have a sincere question to the munis, sages and wisdom diggers on board:
From where comes the idea that a lusty person becomes a tree in her/his next life?


Is there any reference to this in the holy scriptorium?
Or was it a divinely inspired insight of the Swami Master of Pad?
Or was it not divinely inspired but scientifically reasoned by him - like so:

"When one is lusty his body is hard, all, I mean to say the limbs get stiff. Ergo, therefore stiff they will be. They must become tree! This is also confirmed by direct experience in many ways. Like when I go in the forest I see tree. The tree can sometimes often be seen in many much bent posture. Like (aside) what is that called? Yes, exposure mag - like in the exposure mag. In the forest I often see bent tree in the shape of woman. There it must be supposed they become tree because they want to stand still and exhibit their body so men get attracted. This is the psychology."

On the other hand, if the trees in the forest are actually lusty women, why then is the forest a place recommended for them sages to meditate in celestial celebrated celibacy?
On the other hand, if the trees don't bring you down, there are plenty Apsaras waiting to mop you from the forest floor. Wasn't it in the forest where Purvacitti met Maharaja Agnidhra, loitering as it were, she just so happened to be? An excellent piece of Vedic soft p0rn.

It comes from the fact that trees are born naked and never wear clothes at all (unlike the other 8,399,998 species of life).

Is that right? Are trees not born with their clothing (bark) on and never take it off? But I almost suspect that perhaps this really, simply, was the reasoning.

Nonono, you are mistaken over the subtlety off the causal projection at work. To become a tree, you need to enjoy being still and naked in an exposed posture, like a Playboy model for example. Someone who likes to move about in sexually explicit ways, like a pr0n movie star, can on the other hand become for example a sexy gopie girl humping about the bushes with the transcendental sexocrat, if only they receive the mercy of a pure rasika devotee. (Again, if a Playboy model receives the blessings of a pure devotee, she may become a desire tree in her next life.)

Besides Bhaktisiddhanta was born with a brahmin thread around his neck, or something, and promptly put kaupinas on after he popped out, so we humans are clearly a superior species with our inherent inhibitions.



This is because it's important to become tolerant like a naked tree exposed in a provoking manner. I have to say, though, that if the sages begin seeing trees as naked women posing for them, it may be that they have not quite mastered the sublimation of the sexual urges of the mind, even if their balls are well-busted into place with tight-knotted strings.



My favorite is when Kardama and Devahuti left off in the aerial mansion to have seven years of sex, or was it seven thousand years, and the Muni then expanded into nine forms to keep her super happy. I remember I was quite disturbed when I first read it at the age of 16 as a fresh young celibate brahmacari. Still, the pervert in me forced me to read on, and not skip the canto.

On the Sixth day after God commanded the land to bring forth living creatures He looked out over the horizon and noticed it was filled with naked trees. Then on the seventh day God ended His work which He had made; and He rested on the seventh day from all his work which He had made and watched Adam Bangs Eve and decided "Let them become trees".

Is that Daniel Dey-Lewis clanging the kartals there?

It always seemed to me, in the "tree plate," that the sole impetus for the transformation was the leaf she used to cover her breasts. As if the leaf were an integral part of the consciousness involved. It suggests that her sexuality is inextricably linked with botany. An interesting fetish.

Being a professional swimmer will not make you a fish in your next life. Drinking like a fish, however, will. Beware.

*Believing that a person is more 'connected' then you are to god and can help to connect you to god.

*Believing that eating food without offering it to god is a sin.

*Believing that wearing a necklace made from a devotee's body will stop the Yamaduttas from taking your soul.


I am having a difficult time posting as I can't see my cursor and I can't insert type. Is this only happening to me?

At least I will have a lot of company in hell as a leper with all the women and many others who did not appear half-naked while offering mangala-aratik!

Alas, and I thought I would be safe and away from pictures of naked bodies and all those lusty people by wandering carelessly in the forests! Now it seems that the racetracks in cyber space where I mostly spend my meditative and alert hours is the only safe haven in this dangerous world. Always follow your instincts.

Just see. Simple, stupid and safe. Complete mindfulness and no naked distractions. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mVDu2gPwwPM

If you wear special underwear and never ejaculate semen eventually it will rise up your spinal column and enter into your brain which makes you understand god.

Ha! Looks great. You're welcome to join me in my world anytime. Nice distractions too!

This is one of the chief ideas of Kundalini Yoga, and I was familiar with this idea and many others from my pre-ISKCON past. In fact, I was very surprised to find mention of it in Prabhupada purports/Bhagavatam ideas, and initially wondered what Kundalini Yoga had to do with Vaishnavism.

Nice to see your return here, Mr Brainiac.

As time passes I find myself embarrassed by my dalliance with GV and all things religious. The only way I could tolerate the depravity of the devotees around me was to busy myself with making music and to associate with a very select group of devotee friends who also could see that the GV philosophy was inflaming the passions of the mentally unstable.

As for this thread – the whole of the GV teachings are 'sheer stupidity' in my eyes. The strange idea that we need to be reconnected with god by another human is nothing more than a business plan.

Take the idea that eating bhoga is a sin, for example. If I give my two-year old a grape I am pleased and happy to see him enjoy the delicious fruit. Why would I expect him to offer it back to me? If one believes there is a god, and that god supplies everything, why would he curse his own children for enjoying what he has provided for them?

If the only lack is Krishna Consciousness then why do the enlightened ones' have such a need for money?

In this connection I just happened to be watching a documentary on the Darlington Raceway. In the words of one NASCAR veteran; "this track ain't called the Lady in Black for nothin'. It will slap you to the ground as soon as you think you have it figured out".

Now, whenever you meet someone who has an answer for everything you know their fate. (But who on earth could that be?)

From Adi Sankara's Gita (Alladi Mahadeva Sastri 1897 version);

"The righteous, who eat the remnant of the sacrifice, are freed from all sins; but sin do the impious eat who cook for their own sakes". In a footnote it's explained that "for their own sakes" means without satisfying the Gods by sacrifice, study of scriptures and by offspring.

Sounds to me like if you just sacrifice your two-year old to the Gods you're a free man. After all, I already made you study the scripture!

The sacrifice routine is common in so many religious traditions. Have a look through the bible and this blood sacrifice theme appears to be the chief method of worship; stipulated by god, himself. This reminds me of farming folk who would sacrifice a virgin and sprinkle her blood to appease the gods and to make the soil fertile. If I were god, I doubt I would be pleased by brazen bribery.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8624269.stm

“The severed head and torso of a man has been found in a temple in the Indian state of West Bengal in what the police say is a case of "human sacrifice"...”