Arrival in Dallas

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I remember the day well. It was the 14th of May, 1975 when I boarded my first jet plane. Iwas bound for Dallas Texas and this was my first trip out of the country. In those days ISKCON had just one school and it was in Dallas, the heart of the American bible belt. You could not imagine a worse place for a Krishna school.

In those days I was searching for a place within the society of devotees. After all the years serving the Toronto temple, I could see that it held no future for me. I was in third year of university and so I thought, “Let me go to Dallas for the summer and have a look at the Krishna School. Maybe I can find a place there.” My adopted parents, Gerard and Edith, had recently moved to Dallas and they would allow me to stay with them. So off to Dallas I went.

I remember stepping off that American Airlines flight and into the most incredible wall of humidity and heat. This was start of summer in Dallas. The snow had barely melted from the streets of Toronto and here I was four hours later in another world. I had never experienced such unrelenting humidity and heat. That first night I slept on the floor in the Dallas temple only to be awakened by the sound of a gun shot. Welcome to America! An intruder entered the temple in the night and had been spotted by a guard and shot at. America was a whole different world to me. Temple life was not easy. That first day I woke up at 3:45 AM took a shower went to mangal arati, which started at 4:30 AM. This was the first religious service of the day.

The assembly room in the Dallas temple was monsterous compared to Toronto. It could hold over two hundred children and a hundred adults and still be barely filled. The ceiling was high and massive. So on that first morning I arrived in the temple room all dressed up in dhoti and tilak. The school children were lined up in rows in their respective classes. The girls were on one side and the boys were on the other. The girls covered their heads with a kerchief. The children were assembled in the front and the adults were in the back, and like the students, the adults stood in rows, men on one side, ladies on the other.

I was jet lagged from the flight and the midnight gunshot. Four thirty AM felt like the middle of the night. As I entered the temple room the light was dim and the air was incense laden. Suddenly a conch shell sounded, the temple bells rang out, and the deity doors opened. Everyone fell to the ground at the appearance of the Deity, Kalachandji. And then, as my eyes gradually adjusted to the new light, I noticed the form of a most beautiful woman across the room. It was Kama Nagari, my first love and soon to be wife. She was dressed in a simple cotton sari, and to me she was the most stunning woman. It was love at first sight.

A Country Boy

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As you recall I spent the summer of 1969 as a forest worker in the Northern Ontario bush at Sultan. In those days I was inexperienced in life, and that summer spent away from home was good for me. It was a time to hardened up and develop my independence. This independence was tested in a battle of wills with my father. I recall that I came up with a scheme to take my summer’s paycheck, travel to Winnipeg, a thousand miles west of Sultan, buy an English touring bike and ride it home to Toronto. That meant riding a bike 2600 kms along the trans-canadian highway. This was not an easy or safe endevor. When my father got wind of this scheme he threatened to have the police pull me off the highway. I remember him yelling at me on the phone. In the end I backed down, but I did buy the touring bike with my summer’s earning when I returned to Toronto. I rode that bike for many years thereafter.

Previous to that I used to spend my summers at my grandfather’s cottage in Eastern Ontario. This was a beautiful place along the banks of the Trent River. In fact I spent most of my childhood days at this cottage. My parents loved the rural life and so I received a healthy dose of rural life as I grew up. My father was an outdoors-man and today my great love for the wilderness comes directly from him. My parents had their home in Toronto. This was where I went to school and where my father worked, but virtually every weekend and every summer was spent at the cottage. In this way I grew up as a country boy.

 

During the summers I would work on the farms: bringing in hay, stooking oats and wheat, and milking cows. It was a wonderful life. In the winters we played hockey on the river and snowshoed in the hills. In those days the winters were much colder than they are today and there was much more snow. January and February saw temperatures below minus 40 degrees Celsius. It was so cold that if you urinated the urine would freeze by the time it hit the ground. My cousin, Kenny and I used to have fun demonstrating this fact! I have even seen pigeons freeze up in mid flight and drop to the ground.

My greatest friend growing up was Kenny. We spent a lot of time together at the cottage during the summers. We would work and play together on the farms. Most of the time during the summer we would stay with my maternal grand-parents. My parents would drop us off at the cottage and then return to the city to work. I would only see my parents on the weekends.

Alone, Kenny and I had a good time. We spent a lot of time hunting with bow and arrow and fishing on the river from a canoe. I also remember catching mud turtles from a punt in the swamp that was nearby. One of the our greatest times was to regularly steal a little wine or liquor from my grandfather’s alcohol cache until we had enough for a bash. We must have done this three or four times, but when we did it was a night to remember. I recall drinking this horrible brew of beer, wines, whiskey, vodka and God only knows what else. It took about a month to collect enough brew to get the job done. We would get drunk on those occasions. I can still see the two of us walking for miles along the dirt roads, ducking the headlights of cars as they came by. We never got caught, although I think my grandfather was made suspicious by his dwindling supply of liquors. But it was good time. We were good boys. We worked and played hard.

 

In fact, except for my one time Friday night drunk at Sultan this was the extent of my alcohol taking. My youth was tame compared to what the rest of the country was doing during the 1960s and 70s. It was sex drugs and rock and roll. I missed most of that.

My early sexual experiences were even more limited. It is hard to believe in today’s context, but I was a virgin until age 23 when I got married. All my friends were also virgins, well into their 20s. It was not that we did not think and talk about girls, but no one ever did anything. We would have secret crushes on girls, but no one had the guts to actually date a girl. In one of the photos you can see my girl friend, Karen. I spent two whole summers virtually alone with her at the cottage. We could have done anything together, but we did not. We just took walks, talked and swam together. But I have to admit that I was on a slow burn for both those summers. I think I kissed her once.

Mostly I was oblivious to the advances of girls. I remember that after I returned from my summer in Sultan, I learned that the mayor’s daughter had a crush on me. I received passionate phone calls and perfumed letters from her, but to this day I do not know her name or even remember what she looked like. I was oblivious. There was much missed opportunity for love. I sometimes think that I should have enjoyed love at this youthful time, but my involvement in Krishna Consciousness prevented such earthly pleasures.

Gerald and Edith and the Balance

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In the early years of Krishna Consciousness I felt that I was the sole lay member of Toronto’s Krishna temple. Visitors came and went–curiosity seekers, draft dodgers, hippies, fugitives, gays–people of every flavor. Most of them were from the street. I felt alone, but somehow I kept coming. I enjoyed learning the philosophy and listening to the

 chanting and singing. A few times I became discouraged and stopped coming altogether; then I would meet the devotees on the street and be convinced to return. The devotees did their best to encourage me to move in, but nothing worked, so eventually they gave up and accepted me as Bhakta Brian, the first member of Toronto’s Hindu community. The Hare Krishna temple was the only Hindu temple in Toronto at that time.

There was no middle ground in the early days of Krishna Consciousness. You were either a full time devotee or a casual visitor. All too often I witnessed the following scenario: a married couple would become interested in the temple, but only one spouse would show a keen interest, the other would have little or no interest. The temple devotees would encourage the interested spouse to move into the temple even if it meant abandoning their family. No concern was shown to keep the family together. The disinterested spouse was branded “maya.” Immediately a wedge was driven between husband and wife. Whole families were torn apart in this way. I saw many children left fatherless or motherless. I was shocked. Similarly, I met many run away teens who would come to the temple hiding from their parents. The devotees gave them shelter, and when the parents came looking for their sons or daughters, the devotees would shuttle these teens off to another temple and hide them from the parents. The parents were maya. The devotees showed absolute callous disregard for the parents or the law. In end end this cost Krishna Consciousness millions of dollars in court settlements and huge public relation losses for harboring minors and even kidnapping. For my part I could not understand why Krishna Consciousness had to be so extreme–so all or nothing. But I was young and I could not understand how to balance a spiritual life with the material necessities of life.

Eventually a middle age couple joined the temple. They took to Krishna Consciousness with full enthusiasm, yet they expressed no desire to move in. I was stunned! This was Gerard and Edith, who later were initiated as Gadadhara and Brahmidevi. Gerard was French and Edith was British. Gerard had a job and together they owned a house. This was unheard of within the community of devotees. They were an actual family. I immediately “adopted” them as my parents. I seized upon their presence with fervor. Gerard encouraged me to stay in school and yet make the temple a part of my life. This was music to my ears. He also encouraged other “guest devotees” to stay with their families and take outside jobs. At last I could see a place for myself in Krishna Consciousness.

Before Gerard joined the temple, the devotees had developed an incense manufacturing business called Spiritual Sky. Unfortunately, it had mostly failed due to poor financial management. The temple devotees had no business skills. Gerard took it over and nursed it back to life. It soon became the financial back bone of the Toronto temple. As a result Gerard and Edit became important members within the community. They brought middle class values and credibility to the temple.

By taking over Spiritual Sky and making it a success, Gerard showed the devotees how to live a devotional life and at the same time run a successful business. He showed how to balance spiritual life with material life. The influence of Gerard and Edith encouraged a new way of Krishna Consciousness. It became the first step toward the establishment of a lay community of devotees. But this did not come without a cost. A clash of cultures soon arose within the temple community: Krishna Consciousness as a middle class religion or Krishna Consciousness as an ascetic religion. The approach of Gerard and Edith was viewed by many temple devotees as a “watering down” of the philosophy. This was maya. I was torn by this struggle and it hurt me deeply. The asceticism of Krishna Consciousness was both the source of its incredible taste and vibrancy, as well as its ineptitude. Without materialism the bills could not be paid and the devotees ended up in court! A balance was required. Eventually Gerard and Edith were forced to move away from the Toronto temple. There was simply no place for watered down Krishna philosophy within the Toronto temple. They moved to Dallas, Texas and with them went my hope. My need for middle ground soon forced me to leave as well. So in May of 1975 I followed Gerard and Edith to Dallas. It was my summer vacation and my first trip outside of Canada. My life was about to change beyond recognition.

* Mohandas Gandi


The Chasm

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I entered the University of Toronto during the fall of 1972 at Scarborough College. The U of T, as we called it, is made up of eight colleges, six of which are on the main campus in downtown Toronto and the remaining two are in the suburban areas. Scarborough College is the eastern suburban campus. I was not happy. It was just an over grown high-school and I had to take courses that bored me silly: English, geography, sociology, philosophy, psychology. I had to sit in a huge lecture hall with 150 other students and listen to some professor talk. You needed binoculars just to see him. What a waste. I particularly remember my philosophy professor showing up with a coffee cup in one hand and a cigarette in the other. He chained smoked through the entire class all year long. My youthful expectation was that philosophy was a matter of high culture and subtle thoughts and so I considered this kind of activity in front of 150 young students to be contrary to the ideals of philosophy. And I had to pay to watch this person tell me about Descartes! The only thing that saved my year was my one Sanskrit class that I took at the downtown main campus. It was held for three hours twice a week in the evenings. It took me two hours to travel there from the Scarborough campus, but it was worth it. Only eight students were in the class. Now this was education! The professor was Jeff Mason, a feisty opinionated man who breathed life into my university experience. I loved his class. He turned me on to ancient India.

During this year I transfered out of the boonies at Scarborough College and into the downtown campus where the real university was happening. I became a member of University College, the oldest and most prestigious college. Now I was finally at university! I loved the downtown campus with its cosmopolitan flavor. I became a full time Sanskrit specialist with a minor in art history. I was finally in my element and I never again received a grade less that A. I was determined to learn Sanskrit, so I spent hours and hours concentrating on this language. I especially loved to browse the library and immerse myself in books. This was the best time of my life. Meanwhile I had another life going on, the one at the temple. Once I had transferred to the downtown campus I was within walking distance of the temple. I could go there in the morning before school, catch some of the japa (chanting) period, have breakfast and then walk to the university. I could even stop in on the way home in the evening. The walk was only 20 minutes.

Anna, do you know what religious literalism is? It is the belief that whatever is written in scripture must be accepted as literal fact. When the Bible says that God created heaven and earth in seven days, it means that God literally created the world in seven days, each day being 24 hours. Even within Hinduism religious literalism exists. There is a famous book called the Ramayana that describes the life of Rama. In this epic there is a monkey called Hanuman, who is the son of the Wind god. Hanuman was the power to expand himself to the size a mountain and fly in the sky, or to make himself as tiny as a mustard seed. According to religious literalism we are to take the story literally, that Hanuman really was a magical monkey who could fly in the sky and assume the proportions of a mountain, etc. In this country many Christians are religious literalists, the most notable of which is President Geoge W. Bush. You may have heard of the struggle between creationism and evolution. This fight is still going on here in American. Religious literalists reject the scientific notion of evolution. They believe that God created the world in seven days. Like these Christians the members of the Hare Krishna movement are strict religious literalists. A more common name for religious literalism is religious fundamentalism and it is an important part of American religious life today.

It is interesting that Krishna Consciousness and Christian Evangelics are of the same mind set. Of course, the Christians flatly reject Hinduism as the work of the devil, but still, the black and white, either/or, literal mind set of the two groups is identical. Even the mind set of Jewish or Islamic fundamentalism is identical. It is all based on a literal interpretation of scripture. Fundamentalism is basically the same across the religious spectrum.

What I was learning in the university through my Sanskrit studies was diametrically opposed to what I was learning at the temple. One was based on modern rationalism and the other was based on religious fundamentalism. And there is a huge chasm that separates the two. As a result I suffered inscrutable intellectual and emotional agony that would take decades to resolve. You know that Hare Krishna devotees reject evolution, but did you know that they also deny that man went to the moon? Did you know that the sun is closer to the earth than the moon according to Krishna Consciousness? Krishna Consciousness is even more extreme than modern religious fundamentalism. It is medieval fundamentalism. This will become apparent as my story proceeds.

*Source: http://www.archives.gov.on.ca


Straddling the Chasm

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Even though I attended the Toronto Krishna temple regularly, a lot actually, I never joined the temple. In fact, I never fully joined Krishna Consciousness

even in later years. Part of me always remained in the outside world. When I was 18, just before entering University, was the closest I ever came to becoming a full time member. I define full time membership more in terms of intellectual and emotional commitment than in physical presence. I was never full time in either category. Kama Nagari and Sukulina, on the other hand, did become full time members. Believe me, I tried my best to make that commitment, but something inside never allowed me the luxury of such commitment. Consequently, I lived in hell, straddling two worlds. When I attended the university I came to the altar of modern rationalism, and when I put on the dhoti I stepped back in time and entered the world of mediaeval Vaishnavism. The gulf between these two worlds is unbridgeable.

I mentioned the creationism-evolution differences and even such bizarre notions that man never went to the moon, or that the sun is closer to the earth than the moon, but these were minor in my mind. The real difference between modern rationalism and Krishna Consciousness is something more basic than discrepancies over beliefs. The two realms operate according to different world views. It is epistemology that separates Krishna Consciousness from the modern world.

In Krishna Consciousness the most reliable means of knowing anything in this world is through the direct word of God coming in the form of sacred scripture and guru. In Sanskrit this is called shabda, which literally means “word.” Shabda is the same approach that all forms of religious fundamentalism accept whether Hindu, Christian, Jewish or Islamic. In other words, whatever the Gita says, whatever the Bible says, or whatever the Koran says must be accepted as infallible truth even if it appears to contradict sensory knowledge. According to this approach, knowledge is primarily obtained through a descending process, from God, through scripture, to man. The least reliable means of knowing is sense perception. This is the basis for the world view of Krishna Consciousness and religious fundamentalism in general.

Diametrically opposed to this way of knowing is modern rationalism. According to modern rationalism the most basic way of knowing is through sense perception. In Sanskrit this is called pratyaksha. The knowledge obtained through sense perception is used in conjunction with logic to expand human knowledge of the world. Sense perception and logical analysis form the basis of modern science. Science is at the very foundation of the modern world view. In this system sacred scripture takes a low priority or is disregarded all together. The modern approach is an ascending method of knowing, starting with sense perception.

Mainstream religion attempts to balance the two approaches, but Krishna Consciousness is extreme. In those days Krishna Consciousness would never comprise with rationalism, but I could not understand this. I was torn. Anna, I could not escape my need for rationalism, nor could I avoid the taste of devotion that came from the temple. It took me years to understand what was happening to me, and eventually my academic studies drove me into the chasm. How I stepped out of that chasm is the topic of my first book, Hindu Encounter with Modernity.During this year I transfered out of the boonies at Scarborough College and into the downtown campus where the real university was happening. I became a member of University College, the oldest and most prestigious college. Now I was finally at university! I loved the downtown campus with its cosmopolitan flavor. I became a full time Sanskrit specialist with a minor in art history. I was finally in my element and I never again received a grade less that A. I was determined to learn Sanskrit, so I spent hours and hours concentrating on this language. I especially loved to browse the library and immerse myself in books. This was the best time of my life. Meanwhile I had another life going on, the one at the temple. Once I had transferred to the downtown campus I was within walking distance of the temple. I could go there in the morning before school, catch some of the japa (chanting) period, have breakfast and then walk to the university. I could even stop in on the way home in the evening. The walk was only 20 minutes.

Anna, do you know what religious literalism is? It is the belief that whatever is written in scripture must be accepted as literal fact. When the Bible says that God created heaven and earth in seven days, it means that God literally created the world in seven days, each day being 24 hours. Even within Hinduism religious literalism exists. There is a famous book called the Ramayana that describes the life of Rama. In this epic there is a monkey called Hanuman, who is the son of the Wind god. Hanuman was the power to expand himself to the size a mountain and fly in the sky, or to make himself as tiny as a mustard seed. According to religious literalism we are to take the story literally, that Hanuman really was a magical monkey who could fly in the sky and assume the proportions of a mountain, etc. In this country many Christians are religious literalists, the most notable of which is President Geoge W. Bush. You may have heard of the struggle between creationism and evolution. This fight is still going on here in American. Religious literalists reject the scientific notion of evolution. They believe that God created the world in seven days. Like these Christians the members of the Hare Krishna movement are strict religious literalists. A more common name for religious literalism is religious fundamentalism and it is an important part of American religious life today.

It is interesting that Krishna Consciousness and Christian Evangelics are of the same mind set. Of course, the Christians flatly reject Hinduism as the work of the devil, but still, the black and white, either/or, literal mind set of the two groups is identical. Even the mind set of Jewish or Islamic fundamentalism is identical. It is all based on a literal interpretation of scripture. Fundamentalism is basically the same across the religious spectrum.

What I was learning in the university through my Sanskrit studies was diametrically opposed to what I was learning at the temple. One was based on modern rationalism and the other was based on religious fundamentalism. And there is a huge chasm that separates the two. As a result I suffered inscrutable intellectual and emotional agony that would take decades to resolve. You know that Hare Krishna devotees reject evolution, but did you know that they also deny that man went to the moon? Did you know that the sun is closer to the earth than the moon according to Krishna Consciousness? Krishna Consciousness is even more extreme than modern religious fundamentalism. It is medieval fundamentalism. This will become apparent as my story proceeds.

*Source: http://krishna.org/manifesto-of-krsna-consciousness/

**Source: http://www.wornthrough.com/2008/11/19/today-in-history-man-and-the-moon/

What Luck to Be Born in Toronto

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Toronto is a great city in which to grow up. Every culture on this planet is represented on the streets, buses and subways. Consequently, its universities reflect the cosmopolitan nature of the city. Of all the universities, the University of Toronto is the greatest. In addition to the the usual courses: english, philosophy, geography, medicine, engineering, computer science, the University of Toronto also boasts departments of Mediaeval Studies, Ancient Egyptology and Hieroglyphics, Hebrew, Chinese, Japanese, Islamic studies, and even a department of Sanskrit and Indian Studies. What a great place to study!

I disliked high-school; it bored me. Had it not been for the wrath of my father I would have quit high-school and never entered university. Thank God for fathers! The only redeeming feature of my high-school days was my dream to enter college and study something that captured my imagination. I had friends who were going to study computer science, engineering, law and even medicine, but this was not for me. I was determined to do something different. I contemplated studying Greek, Latin, Chinese, Hebrew and even Egyptology. I spent hours pouring over the academic catalogue of the university, dreaming of what courses I could take. I read through this catalogue like my mother read through the Sears catalogue or Woman’s Week Magazine. By age 14 I acquired my first Bhagavad Gita. I remember my high-school librarian presenting me with an edition of the Gita. It was the famous Edwin Arnold translation. No way could I understand the translation, but I was enthralled with the visual appearance of the Sanskrit words. When I saw those exotic devanagari letters I was captivated. Turning those pages of the Gita opened new worlds for me. I decided right then that I would make Sanskrit my object of study when I reached university. This was my driving force. Anna, one thing you must know about me: I am possessed of a bull headed determination. Once I fix my mind, nothing can stand in the way. I am a fanatic in this regard. My determination to study Sanskrit saved my life, for without this I would most certainly have quit high-school and joined the temple. That would have been the end of my academic career and a big disaster. In fact my involvement with ISKCON fueled my desire to learn Sanskrit, but at the same time set me up for a crisis of faith.

Krishna Consciousness, My Early Days

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In the early days of Krishna Consciousness I was known as Bhakta Brian. Shukavak did not appear for many years. Brian, of course, was my given name and in the temple I became known as “Bhakta” Brian. Bhakta means devotee. The devotees could not understand me. Generally, when someone visited the temple they either liked it so much that they moved in immediately, or they only visited once or twice and were never seen again. There was no middle ground. I liked the temple. In fact, I loved the temple, but I never moved in, and the devotees simply could not comprehend this behavior. There was no congregation in those days; you were either a casual visitor or a full time devotee. I have the dubious distinction of being the first member of Toronto’s Hindu congregation. The real congregation, however. did not develop until years later when Indians started to take an interest. Only non hindus came in those days.

The missionary zeal of the devotees was paramount, and I suffered greatly at their hands. The moment they sensed my seriousness they forever badgered me to leave my family, quit school, shave my head and move in. I was told that my parents were maya and that my school was simply a slaughterhouse for the soul. This kind of aggressive preaching was not done out of meanness, but out of misplaced enthusiasm. After all, they had found Krishna and wanted to share Him with the world.

Most guests visited the temple on a Sunday afternoon for the weekly “love feast.” I always hated that term because it reminded me of the hippie movement that was prominent during those day. I did not like the association of Krishna Consciousness with hippies. After the program I liked to spend my time washing the cooking pots, This made me an easy preaching target because I could be found in front of the sink down in the basement. All “sugared up” with sweet rice, a few gung-ho brahmacaris would inevitably corner me in front of the sink and compel me to hear their testimonials. It was done in a friendly way, but still I felt the pressure. I was in a quandary. I loved the feelings of devotion I received in the temple. I was eager to learn the philosophy and I enjoyed the chanting. I dearly wanted to become a devotee, but I could not tolerate the association of these zealots. They were street people. A lot were draft dodgers running away the America-Vietnam war. Some were hippies, and others where just outright crazy. Quite a few had been in jail or were running away from the law. In general most were societies’ misfits. I was also much younger than most of the them. They were in their early to middle twenties; I was in my late teens.

This missionary zeal of the devotees eventually cost the movement millions of dollars in legal fees and court fines, not to mention a ton of negative media attention. The devotees were not evil brainwashers as the media liked to portray them, they were just excited and “fired up” about their newly acquired closeness to God. They wanted to share their feelings with anyone who would listen. But in a few temples, children who were legal minors were encouraged to join without parental consent. Such enthusiastic preaching landed the devotees in court and cost them dearly. All over North America the media had a field-day with the devotees. Today such missionary tactics are not employed. Things have changed a lot.

I recall two occasions when I just could not tolerate this pressure anymore and stopped going to the temple entirely for months on end. But inevitably I would meet the devotees on the street and Bhakta Brian would be convinced to return. It was my destiny. I soon resumed my weekly routine, visiting the temple on Friday evenings and Sunday afternoons. Soon this evolved into weekday evenings and even morning visits, sometimes as early as 5:00 AM. I always carried a dhoti in my book-bag and whenever I arrived I went upstairs to the men’s quarters, took a shower and put on my dhoti and tilaka. (A dhoti is the bottom cloth worn by male devotees and tilaka is the clay markings worn on the forehead.) Anna, to this day my parents have no idea how close they came to losing their first born son to the Hare Krishna movement. I came to within a hair’s breath of shaving up and moving in when I was eighteen. I was saved by Sanskrit.

 

*Source: http://www.flickr.com
**Source: http://www.prabhupadaconnect.com/PhotoAlbum38.html

Diksha

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I often meet groups of students in our temple and I am asked how I became a priest. They want to hear if I was ordained. In Hinduism we do not use the word ordination. The dictionary defines ordination as the act of setting apart, the act of appointing, the entering of a holy order or the conferring of sacred orders. In Sanskrit the word that best captures these ideas is diksha which we translate as initiation. So I tell them yes I have been ordained, but in fact I have received diksha.

Hinduism is a loose conglomeration of spiritual groupings called sampradayas and each includes a vast number of gurus and their respective students. The word guru just means teacher and in this context it means religous teacher. To receive diksha means to submit to the teachings of a guru and to receive acceptance as a disciple through the process of initiation, diksha. Diksha is viewed as the mystical process of being accepted by the guru and in turn by God. In fact it is said that the guru accepts the karma of the disciple at the time of initiation and takes personal responsibility for the salvation of the disciple. Long lineage chains of gurus and their disciples have consequently developed within each of these sampradayas. These lineage chains are called paramparas, disciplic successions.

In ISKCON the process by which one received diksha, at least in the early days, meant that a devotee would move into a temple and, in the case of a man, shave his head, and gradually learn the theology and lifestyle. After sometime, maybe a year, the student was considered eligible for initiation. Each temple was run by a temple president who could recommend the devotee for diksha. In the early days there was only one guru who would accept the disciple and give the diksha. This was the founder of ISKCON, known as Bhaktivedanta Swami or Prabhupada for short. Prabhupada passed away in 1978. Today there are many gurus, but if one has received diksha from Prabhupada that is considered very special.

In order to receive diksha the devotee had to agree to five basic vows:

1. To refrain from meat eating, including eggs, fish, onions, garlic and mushrooms
2. To refrain from gambling, including lotteries and horse racing, etc.
3. No use of intoxicants including alcohol or even tea and coffee
4. No illicit sex, which even included sex within marriage except for procreation
5. And to chant 16 rounds of the Hare Krishna mantra daily

The chanting of 16 rounds took about 2 hours each day. The process of diksha also had a second part that was given another year or so later. This included the receiving of a special series of mystical mantras that relate to certain subtle aspects of the theology called rasa. We do not need to discuss rasa at this time. It might be useful to know a little about the lifestyle of the devotee in those days. Men were required to keep their heads shaven and to wear the shikha. You know shikha! And both men and women were required to bathe 3 times a day.

A devotee would rise from bed around 3:30 AM, bathe and then attend a prayer service at 4:30 AM called mangala arati. The arati lasted until 5:00 AM at which time the japa period would begin. Japa means chanting, so this was the time set aside to chant the 16 rounds. The japa period usually lasted 1 and half hours. Some temples gave a two full hours for this period. At 7:00 AM or so the daily Bhagavatam class was held, which was a scripture reading and theology class that last for an hour. At 8 AM a communal breakfast was served. After breakfast devotees went to their “job.” In the evening there another program of arati and scripture reading. The evening program was shorter than the morning program and the public was invited to attend.

Anna, as I write this I am wonder struck that I went through this process for years. This was a serious lifestyle and it took great dedication to follow. Gradually I will explain what this did to me, both good and bad, and how I reacted to such discipline. But I think I will add just one more feature about the life style that I think you will find interesting. As I mentioned sex was restricted except for procreation. Well there was one more feature about making babies that I have not mentioned. If a couple wanted to “make that baby” they were both required to chant 50 rounds of japa before having sex. If you recall, I stated that 16 rounds took 2 hours. You do the math!


Hari Nama

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Hari is a name of Vishnu and, if you have not already guessed, nama means name. In fact the English word “name” comes from “nama.” According to Vaishnava theology the name of God is most sacred. This is also true in Judaism and Christianity. Most religions have some idea that the name of God is special. In Vaishnavism this idea is paramount. In fact the name of God IS God, literally. This is why you have seen ISKCON devotees singing and dancing to the names of God in the streets. By calling out the names of God they are spreading the names of God and thus “spiritualizing” themselves, the people who hear and even the street itself. Chanting the names of Hari is the main religious practice of ISKCON. Everything is built around this principle. In ISKCON chanting the names of God is done in two modes, one publicly and the other privately. When it is done publicly devotees sing the names accompanied by various musical instruments that may include all kinds of traditional instruments such as small hand cymbals, a harmonium (an organ type instrument), and tambourines. But non traditional instruments may also be used including guitars, conga drums, pianos and so on. There are no restrictions, other than what suits the situation. Private chanting involves a single devotee softy chanting on a set of beads called a japa mala. This is the same as a rosary. The principle behind chanting, whether in public or in private, is that the name of God is God and therefore by vibrating the names of God in sound, the devotee as well as all others who are in the vicinity of this sacred vibration, become spiritualized by associating with God in sound. Hari nama is the greatest form of purification. You may consider hearing the names of Gods as taking a spiritual bath. The heart and mind become cleansed of material thoughts.

*Image Source: http://bhajanbrasil.blogspot.com/2010/06/mantras-e-pranamas.html

The Face of Maya

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Asceticism is the most powerful force in the world. Well almost. There is one force more powerful. It is called maya.

There is a famous poet in India named Kali Dasa and his most well known poem is called Shakuntala. In his poem he tells the story of a great sage named Vishvamitra, who lived long ago during a golden age when human beings lived a hundred thousand years. But a hundred thousand years was not enough for Vishvamitra. He desired to become a god himself and to live as an immortal. So to achieve his goal he became an ascetic. Vishvamitra immersed himself in the water of a lake up to his head and began to meditate. He denied himself everything and remained in trance for sixty thousand years. After so much time you can imagine the immense power that Vishvamitra was developing. Eventually the austerities of Vishvamitra came to the attention of Indra Deva, the king of heaven. Indra became concerned that Vishvamitra might become so powerful that he may take over heaven and remove Indra himself. So the god decided to put an end to Vishvamitra’s asceticism.

Indra called for the help of a heavenly society girl known as Maya. Maya dressed herself in her most beautiful clothes and perfumes and went to the place where Vishvamitra was engaged in austerities. At first Vishvamitra was unaware of Maya’s presence. After all, his eyes were closed. He was deep in meditation on the Supreme Brahman. But as Maya drew closer the sound of her ankle bells gradually began to be heard. This sound gently entered the ears of the sage and caressed his mind. Eventually Vishvamitra’s meditative trance, which had lasted sixty thousand years, broke and the sage rose up from the water to embrace Maya. This union resulted in the birth of Shakuntala, the fair maid who became the object of Kali Dasa’s beautiful poem. Indeed, woman is the most powerful force in the universe.

*Image Source: http://www.thehindu.com/arts/dance/article2369219.ece