Суд над Бхагавад-гитой / Attempt to ban Bhagavad-gita

WHEN CAN A WOMAN LEAVE A FALLEN HUSBAND?

Prabhupada makes very clear in SB 7.11.28 the qualifications for a woman to leave her husband. That is the authoritative purport for this problem. It must be very carefully studied. First and foremost, Prabhupada says that he has to be a nondevotee. If he is a devotee, then despite his weaknesses, "he is sinless (but not a guru)." So, the primary qualification for leaving a husband is not his flaws, but whether or not he has faith in Krsna. If he has faith in Krsna, he is a devotee. To justify leaving a husband, he has to be a "naradhamah", a nondevotee, the lowest of men, and addicted to all the four sinful activities. Only when the husband is such a nondevotee, she can leave him, but she cannot remarry. She can live separately. (In one letter Prabhupada conceded that: "If both husband and wife agree, she may divorce and remarry." Prabhupada gave that instruction in disgust.) The GBC refers to this text also, but they do not mention that a woman who leaves such a degraded husband should not remarry. And, or course, they are implying that Sulocana is such a degraded person without knowing anything about Sulocana. And, of course, Sulocana's wife "remarried" a Kirtanananda man almost immediately after Kirtanananda broke up their marriage. And the character of the man he "remarried" her to....

THE REAL QUESTION??

So the real question is: Where do you draw the line in defining a devotee? Kirtanananda claims Sulocana is a demon. Sulocana claims Kirtanananda Swami is a demon. How to judge? At what degree of contamination is one considered not to be a devotee? Is subtle contamination not important? Many persons who were at one point strictly following the regulative principles, and considered advanced, even sannyasis, are now eating meat and blaspheming Srila Prabhupada. So were they actually advanced devotees while they were following strictly? If they were, how could they have fallen down so far? Is sincerity the only qualification for a devotee? If so, how do you judge sincerity? Does sincerity come and go on a daily basis? How long does one have to be strictly following the regulative principles to be considered sincere and advanced? Does artificially performing austerities mean one is sincere, or does it mean he is heading for a fall? Should ISKCON hire psychics to analyze a man's sincerity? Could astrology help? Can regression under hypnosis reveal a man's motives? These are worthwhile considerations. Instead the GBC asks: "Can a imitation sannyasi 'guru' advise a man's were to leave him because he is not following all the regulative principles which are actually only meant for the brahmins?" Only a fool or a demon could propose such a thing.

SINCERITY-COMPARING SULOCANA TO KIRTANANANDA

Sulocana's wife decided to take initiation on the grounds that Sulocana was not qualified to deliver her. She says he was not following the regulative principles strictly and therefore she assumed he was not sincere. He was chanting average 12-13 rounds daily and periodically he would go through a spell of getting intoxicated once a week. He frequently ate chocolate. At that tune he was 29 years old and just starting a Krsna conscious picture pendant business. Because he was not perfectly following everything, his wife thought he was not sincere. She thought she should take initiation from someone whom she was told was sincere. Makes sense, right? Wrong. She did not stop to consider that she knew absolutely nothing about this man. She did not know that when Kirtanananda was 29 years old, or Sulocana's age at the time she took "initiation", he was a full-blown, active homosexual, or second-cock in gay lingo, since he was the female counterpart of Hayagriva. We were tempted to vividly describe what such persons do in the evenings, but we will spare the // sensitivity" of the "brahmins" reading this rebuttal. Then, when Kirtanananda Swami was 30, a year after taking "initiation", he stabbed Prabhupada square in the back in an attempt to steal Prabhupada's movement for himself. Had Jane known these documented hard facts about this man, she may have thought twice about his sincerity, despite what Kuladri was telling her about following some external principles. In India, any upper caste man automatically follows those principles, so that alone is hardly any ultimate qualification. When Satsvarupa was this age, 29, he was a new devotee and was having sex with his wife every single night. At least Sulocana regulated his usage of the "concession" to twice a month. So, by comparing Sulocana with these two "big, big gurus" at age 29, Sulocana is far more advanced than both of them put together, and who knows where they wig all be 30 years down the road? Sulocana never claimed to be a saint, but it certainly isn't Kirtanananda's position to judge him. No one else ever attacked Prabhupada the way Kirtanananda did. Prabhupada condemned Kirtanananda in more letters than all the other bogus gurus combined.

PART TWO

JUDGING A MAN

These are points that the GBC should be considering. Instead they make these asinine statements that a diksa-guru does not have to be free of sex desire to take hundreds of women disciples, but a husband has to be completely pure to deserve to keep the devotion of his one wife. The "gurus" base all their claim of divinity of Bhagavad-gita 9.30, quoted below. They are all riding on the thin thread of this verse in hopes that no one will ever think about it. They claim a monopoly on using this verse to justify their behavior, but if anyone else exhibits weaknesses, they can-not quote this verse. "They are simply demons to be discarded." The following is an in-depth analysis of that verse.

"Even if one commits the most abominable action, if he is engaged in devotional service he is to be considered saintly because he is properly situated in his determination." (BG 9.30)

Purport by Srila Prabhupada: "...Now in the conditioned state, sometimes devotional service and the conditional service in relation to the body will parallel one another. But then again, sometimes these activities become opposed to one another. As far as possible, a devotee is very cautious so that he does not do anything that could disrupt his wholesome condition.... No one should deride a devotee for some accidental falldown from the ideal path, for, as explained in the next verse, such occasional falldowns will be stopped in due course, as soon as a devotee is completely situated in Krsna consciousness.... The words 'sadhur eva, "he is saintly', are very emphatic. They are a warning to the nondevotees that because of an accidental falldown a devotee should not be derided; he should still be considered saintly even if he has accidentally fallen down. And the word 'mantavyah" is still more emphatic. If one does not follow this rule, and derides a devotee for his accidental falldown, then one is disobeying the order of the Supreme Lord.... On the other hand, one should not misunderstand that a devotee in transcendental devotional service can act in all kinds of abominable ways; this verse only refers to an accident due to the strong power of material connections.... As long as one is not strong enough to fight the illusory energy, there may be accidental falldowns. But when one is strong enough, he is no longer subjected to such falldowns, as previously explained. No one should take advantage of this verse and commit nonsense and think that he is still a devotee. If he does not improve in his character by devotional service, then it is to be understood that he is not a high devotee."

WHAT IS AN ACCIDENTAL FALLDOWN?

Note: The word accident must be defined in order to understand what Prabhupada is saying in this purport. Generally an accident is accepted as being something that suddenly happens and is beyond our control. In that sense, it would be impossible to accidentally have illicit sex or accidentally get intoxicated. In the next purport Prabhupada says: "either by accident or intention." Actually, there is no such thing as an accident since everything is controlled by the Lord, and all activities are either one's karma, or Krsna's special mercy on a devotee. So when Prabhupada says "accident" he means engaging in abominable activity by force of habit. Prabhupada uses that phrase, "force of habit," in numerous places to describe ones occasional indulgences in illicit activities. So, we feel safe injecting that phrase here in place of the word "accident," which is confusing to many devotees, including "gurus." They tend to abuse this verse to commit their abominable activities. Prabhupada did not make a mistake in his wording. The devotees simply fail to understand the real meaning. So it is important to clearly define it. The translation to this verse does not in any way imply an accident. Prabhupada uses the word accident to mean an act done without malicious intent and/or blatant disregard for authority. In other words, by force of habit. ISKCON's "gurus" say that, "if a devotee does something illicit more than once, then it cannot be an accident. So, if not an accident, the man must be a demon." With this argument they justify taking his wife and children away and getting her in bed with himself or one of his own men.

JUDGING A MAN'S SINCERITY

So this is a critical verse and purport and must be studied at great length. It is a subtle thing, something the gurus know little about. It means judging between one who remorsefully engages in base activities due to his past habits, and one who sinfully does so because he just plain doesn't care about any authority. That is the all important question. Determining the sincerity of one's heart is the essence of judging a devotee and that can be very misleading if one is not extremely perceptive. There are a class of sahajiyas today who claim that it is not good to judge others. That is simply foolishness. One absolutely has to make such judgments daily if he wants to avoid bad, and accept good association.

ILLICIT SEX

This is the most common problem devotees face. Say for example one spends his whole life, from puberty onwards, in gross illicit sex, but then later he meets a pure devotee like Srila Prabhupada and he wants to give up this bad habit. But due to the strong influence of material energy he cannot do so very easily. Still, he tries to regulate his sex life and makes strict vows to gradually decrease it. Such a person, who honestly and responsibly lives with his wife, and does not look at or pollute other women, can be considered sincere even though he may be having sex with his wife too often to be considered a disciple or a brahmin. The sex to him is like a material conditioned necessity or habit just like sleeping and eating. He cannot abruptly give it up, but he does not like being under its control either, and so he tries to gradually reduce it. Such a person may be considered sincere or even saintly as long as he is sincerely trying to serve Krsna. He is certainly not a pure devotee, yet, and he should not be treated as though he were. He may be respected, but only from a distance by those who want to advance quickly (NOI).

But then you take someone else who comes to Krsna consciousness for ulterior motives and has sex, gross or subtle, with one woman after another, even other men's wives. Such a person should not be considered saintly or sincere, but on the contrary, he should be publicly condemned so that sane persons can avoid his contaminated association. One perfect example of this is Sruti Kirti. He polluted at least half-a-dozen married women that we know of personally, destroying their marriages. Because he had this extremely demoniac tendency, he should not have been considered saintly just because he chanted Hare Krsna. But, out of ignorance he was considered saintly and so nobody wanted to publicly expose him. Thus he was able to pollute one women after another. He should have been publicly condemned after the first one. Instead, Ramesvara continued to support this debauch right up through the sixth married woman he polluted. He even took Prabhupada's money and sent Sruti Kirti to India so the last husband who swore to kill him would not be able to. This is not an isolated incident. It is going on everywhere with the full blessing of the "gurus".