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What Happened to the Hare Krishna's?

• Subject: What Happened to the Hare Krishna's?
• From: Badrinarayan das
• Date: Mon Dec 18 14:13:59 1995
• Message-Id: id660

Dear Badrinarayan Prabhu

Please accept my humble obeisances, all glories to Srila Prabhupada!

>Hare Krsna. I received a booklet in the mail "What happened
>to the Hare Krsnas. I found it interesting. I am wondering
>"Is the 'Madhuvisa Swami` listed as the author the same Srila
>Prabhupad disciple who took sannyasa years ago, was GBC for
>Australia, and then got married?"

No. I joined in 1986 and observed first-hand what happens to devotees when the
"guru" they have surrendered to, and accepted as a representative of Srila
Prabhupada and Krishna, turns out to be unqualified. I was in London at
Bhaktivedanta Manor when Bhagavan fell down and also I was in Australia when
Bhavananda finally left. I saw many disciples of both of them devastated, and I
also saw the "show" of reinitiation. It's not the same the second time. Mostly
once burnt twice shy. They don't surrender a second time. And can you blame them?

I was in something of a quandary. I knew a spiritual master wasn't a cheep thing.
I was looking for someone who I could actually surrender to, like I had already
surrendered to Srila Prabhupada. I read in the Nectar of Devotion that one should
select someone recommended by the previous acarya and I read in other books that
the disciple should test his prospective spiritual master to see if he is really
qualified and also the spiritual master should test the disciple.

I looked at the remaining "Zonal Acharyas", but it was disappointing. They didn't
have Srila Prabhupada's mood or purity so I just took shelter of Srila Prabhupada
and didn't bother about the "guru business" any more.

At that time ISKCON in Australia was full-on into selling paraphenalia but I was
trying to distribute Srila Prabhupada's books. That was considered a disturbance
to the minds of the collectors so I wasn't welcome in the Australian temples. I
started a preaching center in Canberra [the capital city of Australia] -- ISKCON
didn't have a center there and there was lots of potential. Their Lordships Sri
Sri Jagannatha, Baladeva and Lady Subudra and Sri Sri Gour-Nitai arrived, so I
needed brahman initiation to worship Them. I asked one of Srila Prabhupada's
initiated disciples [Jaya Dharma Prabhu, he established the Colo River farm
community in Australia] to give me initiation on behalf of Srila Prabhupada and he
gave me first and second initiation close to Srila Prabhupada's disappearance day
in 1989 and gave me the name "Madhudvisa dasa".


>
>Also, there is the "shelter" band logo and the same name....
>is the USA band of that name a sponsor of the book.
>

No, they are not connected at all. I was in the states in '91 and met them but at
that stage shelter had broken up and Vraja Kishor (then Bhakta Vic) was going off
to start a band called 108 and Ragunnath was off to do something else as well. I
went back to Australia and didn't hear any more of Shelter for a couple of years,
so I though they had disbanded. I was no longer welcome at the ISKCON temples in
Australia towards the end of '93 [the Canberra center had become an ISKCON center]
so I went to Vrndavana and spent a few months there chanting and reading and
decided to go back to Australia and try and rejoin ISKCON.

The TP in Canberra let me stay there and I went to the Christmas marathon
festival. Brighupati Prabhu [who was trying to encourage the devotees to
distribute Srila Prabhupada's books] asked us to make pledges in front of the
Deities to distribute a certain number of book-points in the next year and mostly
devotees were saying 108 (bookpoints for the whole year!)... So I pledged 2,500
[which is still not much at all]. But towards the end of Janurary I was not
welcome in any temple in Australia and they were giving me a very hard time in
Canberra as well... So I was more-or-less thrown out but I had not distributed
anything like 2,500 book points... So I didn't know what to do, just a vague idea

I should somehow at least distribute the 2,500 book points I had promised before
Sri Sri Radha Govardhandari...

I tried to get books from the BBT, but there was no joy there.

I go a computer and a lazer printer and started making BTG's and distributing
them. I needed a name so I thought, "Why not use shelter?", thinking the band had
broken-up a couple of years ago...

I printed that "What Happened to the Hare Krishna's" and six issues of BTG and
distributed them in Sydney in '94. The Sydney devotees got a little upset towards
the end of '94 and more or less ran me out of town, but I had printed and
distributed 30,000 BTG's by then and preached to lots of people.

Sorry about all this, but it is rather difficult to explain.

Anyhow I was wondering about the internet. So I accepted the devotees running me
out of Sydney as Krishna's arrangement and decided to investigate it. I spent
about three months preaching in the news system and three months setting up a
world-wide-web site. (It is at http://www.peg.apc.org/~shelter)

It wasn't until I started reading some of the messages in the straight-edge
newsgroup I realized shelter was still a band and they were just about to release
a new record even... So I felt a little guilty for using the name and wrote a
letter to them apologizing and stopped using it.



>What are you suggesting for ISKCON's initiation system....
>rtvic....wait for an uttama adhikari to reveal himself....
>genuine madhyama gurus are acceptable but all we have now
>are kanishtas?....what is your recomendation?


Prabhupada set up a ritvic system, everyone accepts that. It's the only system he
established. He knew quite well Tamala & co wanted to be acharya's -- no matter
what he said -- and he knew they were not qualified -- so he didn't say that
much... It would be best to follow the system established by Prabhupada. Any other
system will fail.

Of course now there are so many gurus in ISKCON... And most are sincere too, and
they have disciples. So it is not a simple thing. But certainly ISKCON should
recognize Srila Prabhupada is not dead, he is still a "living guru" and still
capable of initiating disciples. It may be that many [or most] devotees will
choose to take one of the "physically present" gurus as their spiritual master,
but you can't stop people from taking initation from Srila Prabhupada...

At the moment I am living outside, chanting Hare Krishna and reading Srila
Prabhupada's books and preaching as much as I can. I don't know what the future
holds, but I know Krishna has some plan.

I always miss the devotees, the Deities, the temple program and am lamenting I am
not able to serve Srila Prabhupada and Krishna in ISKCON. However, I am Srila
Prabhupada's disciple, he saved me, he is living in his books, he is a "living
guru" still. So this puts me at odds with the current GBC doctrine...

Looking forward to hearing from you. Chant Hare Krishna and be happy!

Your servant

Madhudvisa dasa

>
>Please let me know about the above, and thank you.
>
>Your servant, Badrinarayan dasa
>
>
>

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