Mail Archive

Hindusm and Krishna Consciousness

• Subject: Hindusm and Krishna Consciousness
• From: Sumer C
• Date: Mon Dec 11 13:32:46 1995
• Message-Id: id641

Dear Sumer C,



Hello, Hare Krishna! thanks for visiting my home page and sending some feedback. I

am sorry about the delay in answering but I've been off the 'net for a while.



>I'm just wondering why is Hare Krishna under a seperate section than

>Hinduism on the Internet.



It is a completely different thing. Hinduism is a generic term that includes

people with a multitude of diverse beliefs: the Shivites, the Jains, the Shaktas,

etc, etc... We are Viasnavas, devotees of Vishnu, Krishna. It is not "Hindusm" at

all. If there is any common thread in Hindusm at all it is the Pancopasansa

worship established by Sri Sankaracarya, although he is an incarnation of Lord

Shiva, he has presented impersonal philosophy. So the followers of Sankara are not

Viasnavas or Hare Krishna's. We are personalists. We know Krishna is a person, the

Supreme Person. They worship the Deities, but ultimately they believe the

impersonal Brahman is supreme...



Of coures some Hindus are Vaisnavas... they are Hare Krishna's...



> I for all my years grew up with the Hare

>Krishnas and have been blessed to be in the company of His Divine Grace

>A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, so Gaudiya Vaishnav is no mystery to

>me. Why is there this seperation, I am presently the president of Hindu

>Student Council on the University of Toronto Campus and when the Hare



>Krishnas were either harassed by the U of T administration or anti-hare

>Krishna articles are written in the school newspaper they had to reckon

>with me. So, now as a Hindu I am asking you, are we different? Should my

>executive not invite the Hare Krishna to our functions, (believe me, we

>have had to fight with other Indians who don't accept Hare Krishnas as

>legitamite also and have lost their support but we've stuck to our guns)?



Many Hindus are not Hare Krishna's at all. So there is a difference. Only the

Vaisnavas are Hare Krishna's. For example there is a long-standing disagreement

between the Shivites and the Vaisnavas, but you would call them both "Hindus", but

the Shivites accept Lord Shiva as supreme, simmilarly the Shaktas accept Kali,

Durga, etc as supreme. We cannot accept this. Krishna is the Supreme Personality

of Godhead. Not all "Hindus" agree with this. In fact most do not. They will say

"Krishna is God", but they will also say "Shiva is God", "Durga is God", etc...

This is condemned in the Bhagavad-gita, but still they want to consider the

demigods and Krishna on the same level...



>So, now does this mean that when I bow to Krishna at the ISKCON temple I

>am in the dwelling of a foreign faith? Please reply soon, and if you

>don't remember me think about the time you were in Toronto when Shelter

>played at the Opera House on Queen St.. I was one of the Hare Krishna

>Guests in the crowd. I could say a lot more but I'll leave it at this.



I'm sorry, but I am not Ray, I'm Madhudvisa dasa in Australia and don't have

anything to do with the Hardcore scene at all. In fact I am a little bewildered by

it. The music is not very devotional... We have to encourage people to chant Hare

Krsihna... What do you think?



As for a "foreign faith". Krishna consciousness is sanartarn dharm, or our eternal

occupational duty. It is the universal occupation of all  living entities. We are

constitutionally individual small persons and Krishna is the Supreme Person, our

natural position is to serve Krishna. We have no other business. Krishna is the

supreme enjoyer and our natural position is to serve Him, to give Him pleasure...

When we come to the material world and are covered by maya we think we are the

enjoyers and work for our pleasure, that is our disease. This world is constructed

to frustrate all our attempts to enjoy seperately from Krishna. We can't be happy

independent of Krishna. We accept the material body as ourself and thus have to

accept so much suffering: birth, old age, disease and ultimately death. If we do

manage to achieve some material facilities in this life it it all taken away at

the time of death...



Krishna consciousness is a very rare thing. It is pure devotional service. It

means doing everything for Krishna instead of doing everything for ourselves. Most

"Hindu's" don't have this idea at all. They are like the Christians, they accept

God exists and He is very powerful so they pray to Him to get things from Him. The

usual program is dharma, artha, karma and moksa: dharma means people become

religous, artha means they do it to get some money, and why? for karma -- sense

gratifaction. Because ultimately all their sense gratification endevours end in

frustration they strive for moksa, liberation from the suffering... But Krishna

consciousness is completely transcendental to all of this... The devotees don't

ask Krishna for anything at all, they simply want to be engaged in His service,

that is all.



Please write again,



Chant Hare Krishna and be happy!



Madhudvisa dasa

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