Podcast transcription:
Sanity and Survival in a Pseudo-Spiritual Wasteland
by Kailäsa Candra däsa
HARIÙ OÀ NAMAÙ
etäà sa ästhäya parätma-niñöhäm
adhyäsitäà pürvatamair mahadbhiù
ahaà tariñyämi duranta-päraà
tamo mukundäìghri-niñevayaiva
“By becoming fixed in this service to the Supreme Paramatma, previously worshiped by great åñis and äcäryas, I’ll cross the insurmountable ocean of nescience by worship of the lotus feet of Mukunda.” 1
Can you guess my name?
I’ll tell you one time:
You’re to blame. 2
You cannot light the fire of self-realization by pouring the water of illusion on it. Conditioned souls, entangled in any of today’s three deviant bhakti groups, 3 do not become enlightened or liberated. Following the 1977 disappearance of The Founder-Äcärya Prabhupäda, each bogus Kåñëa cult falsely projects itself as a gateway to eternal life. It is anything but.
yady eñoparatä devé
mäyä vaiçäradé matiù
sampanna eveti vidur
mahimni sve mahéyate
“If and when the devé-mäyä has subsided, enriched with an enlightened mind full of knowledge, the living entity thus becomes cognizant of, and is situated in, his own glory.” 4
Mahimni sve mahéyate. As a self-realized entity, you are very powerful and very glorious. This is the only reason to join any acclaimed spiritual organization: It is to take assistance from that institution in becoming a siddha. A perfected being is who you actually are, free from the upadhis covering an eternal spiritual spark possessing a personal relationship (svarüpa) with the Parameçvara, the Supreme Controller.
Confidence that you are making progress in spiritual life is essential, and it has an intrinsic relationship with reliability. Guru, sädhu, and çästra are the sources of reliable spiritual confidence. However, being misled by a bogus guru creates cracks in such confidence, even though the person so misled wanted to be cheated. Believing someone to be a sädhu, when he is actually not a pious person, creates cracks, as does unreliable scripture containing mistaken knowledge.
Yet the powerful men of “ISKCON” have a vested interest of blowing out of proportion the necessity of, or so-called centrality of, their institution. There are a number of reasons and methods for this used by these pseudo-transcendentalists to sow this seed in their followers.
Some of the examples are obvious. A little over a decade ago, the Wikipedia page for ISKCON listed, as the Successor to His Divine Grace Prabhupäda the Governing Body Commission. It was so false and outrageous that it had to be taken down.
In an example already mentioned (of a somewhat subtler effort to implant the wrong idea that the institution is the only source of confidence and reliability) is the massive book changes. These subversive developments are not accidental, although the motives behind them cannot be recognized by devotees with a poor fund of knowledge.
If and when there are all kinds of egregious guru falldowns, 5 then a concomitant reaction will be that confidence cannot be placed in gurus anymore. You then get the emergence of rent-äcäryas, and this is what re-initiation was all about until Rittvik made it too dangerous to continue with the charade. Institutional guru means bogus guru. As such, the unfortunates who accept some guru who slips up badly in “ISKCON” never develop full confidence in him.
As far as holy men are concerned, stupid sädhus do not give anything to those who consult them, as is also the case with weak yogés. At least in the beginning, before being misled by the cult, people engaged in bhakti-yoga want more than what such so-called sädhus offer.
When all three legs of the triad—namely, guru, sadhu, and çästra—are thus broken, where is the shelter? Why, it must be the institution! And if you come to that conclusion, if you have entered the “ISKCON” wheelhouse to that extent, it is exactly where its leaders want you to be.
You must be a member in good standing in “ISKCON” in order to (allegedly) have any confidence that you will achieve the spiritual world via its facilitation. This is what they want you to think. And what does that entail? It entails being in good standing with the Governing Body Commission, of course.
This devolving plot still works upon some people, but there were many in the late Seventies and throughout the Eighties who rebelled against it. That defiance produced the two splinter groups. They allegedly offer you shelter free from the oppression of the “ISKCON” governing body, but that so-called shelter is nothing more than another deviant vortex which is just as unauthorized as “ISKCON.”
Something else besides the real seed of liberation (seed of vimukti) enters within you if you associate with, and believe in, any of those three deviant groups. You will never become enlightened in full knowledge, and you will never become cognizant of, and situated in, your own glory by such bad association. Each of them is absorbed in its own cult-mäyä with its own distinct version and projection of illusory energy. If you associate with any one of them, you will become contaminated by that particular cult mäyä in the name of Kåñëa consciousness.
“ISKCON,” Neo-Mutt, and Rittvik are all deep fakes. They are all social engineered psy-ops and will work to have you become a fanatic (or an institutional loyalist) to and in your cult of choice. You can stick with it and put its blinders on . . . or you can choose to leave. However, if you stay in the thing for any length of time, you will then leave (if you break away) after being scammed, shafted, shattered, and scattered.
Rejection of any such cult is much better done in advance. By hearing and reading about the “ISKCON” deviations (and that of its two later splinter groups) and not joining any of them in the first place, you remain in much better shape on your spiritual journey.
Prabhupäda’s former movement is now cracked into different factions, and that negative resultant can directly be traced back to the zonal äcäryas of the late Seventies and early Eighties. The newcomers at that time were bamboozled by pretender mahä-bhägavats, allegedly Kåñëa realized and allegedly just as deserving of worship as Prabhupäda. Eventually, they were all exposed. However, the eleven played every card they could from both the top and the bottom of their deck of their heady scam before that era of pretension was overthrown.
With this as post facto context, there was a chance for the zonal deviation to have been eradicated in the mid-Eighties, but that required honesty. The previous fake had been upended, but the psy-op continued in a different way. By the mid-Eighties, dishonesty had been woven into the fabric of a compromised movement and those new “ISKCON” fundamentalists of the collegiate compromise representing it.
Its leaders and their acolytes forgot that a guru cannot have dishonesty within himself or acted upon without. Dishonesty is always a disqualification; no one can be a guru who possesses a mental quantum plagued by it. No one can be a guru while dishonesty is spoken and acted upon under the plea of the centrality of the institution.
Kåñëa consciousness is centripetal. On the contrary, the centrifugal momentum following both the zonal äcärya era and the collegiate compromise, The Second Transformation, is unmistakable. Although the leaders of both of those transformations 6 were not ordinary men, none of them were or are advanced devotees, either. Although hidden, some of them may have been either quasi-Mäyävädés or covert hedonists while conducting their spiritual master business. However, they were all skilled, to varying degrees, in manipulating people who came under their control, both materially and psychically.
That the zonal scam was reversed by The Second Transformation was due to a combination of scandals and infighting amongst and between the gurus, combined with the disgruntlement of the “ISKCON” temple presidents, who were supposed to be the real brähmins. The First Transformation was reversed gradually, then abruptly.
Led by Ravéndra Svarüpa, once the momentum shifted to the side of the North American Temple Presidents Association (NATPA), if those presidents were real brähmins, they should have had the foresight to confront the root issue: The legitimacy, or lack thereof, of all initiations previously conducted by the pretender mahä-bhägavats.
Unfortunately, the insurrectionists were not real brähmins. Despite damage control, The Second Transformation still kept Pandora’s Box open for others to be recognized as institutional gurus. It busted down the high flying gurus to madhyams, although that was illegitimate. Sahajiyäs do not become madhyams by simply admitting that they should never have imitated uttama in the first place.
Institutional guru means bogus guru, even when that new dispensation, The Second Transformation, served to break up the previous monopoly. Replacing one anachronism with another one, removing it from the narrative and dismissing it via paltry rationalizations, does not uproot deviation from the ordinary mix; instead, it solidifies it.
Massive deception entered the movement (and then dominated it) from the late Seventies up to the mid-Eighties. Only the biased do not recognize this now. Only dyed-in-the-wool Party Men continue to rationalize it. As such, was deception integral to the collegiate compromise?
Was The Second Transformation still loaded with dishonesty? In April of 1977, Prabhupäda indicated that there were no madhyam-adhikärés in his movement. We shall discuss this subsequently. With all of the hell that went down in the decade following that room conversation, was it to be so readily projected that madhyams were a dime-a-dozen in the movement by the mid-Eighties or before that even?
The madhyam-adhikäré is an advanced devotee. He is a vartma-pradarçaka guru. He is a çikñä-guru. He is qualified, even at his beginning stage, to receive the order from his guru-mahäräj to become a dékñä-guru. Then, and only then (in our branch) can he begin initiating his follower with the bhakti-latä-béja. None of those eleven pretenders were qualified to be madhyams. Instead, they were qualified only to scrub pots.
Did The Second Transformation actually overcome the root deviation? All the rot, nescience, and bogus propaganda of the zonal äcärya hoax would have to have been exposed and completely uprooted for The Second Transformation to have been successful. The argument was and remains as to whether or not the changes of The Second Transformation amounted to a real cleansing. Newcomers have never caught on to that. The chelas, kick-mees, space cadets, and simpletons have never deeply looked into anything regarding the history of “ISKCON.” They instead accept easy answers and one-liners as their narrative.
They think that all the issues had allegedly been confronted, rectified . . . and must therefore be entirely dismissed. That is the cheat sheet presented by their “ISKCON” mis-leaders. All controversies of the Seventies and Eighties should not even be brought up—it is an offense to do so–and you, dear but foolish chela, should not have doubts about any of it. That’s what they are told; bottom line, they are told not to doubt.
If such cleansing had been the case, then the all-pervading deception that was endemic to The First Transformation would have been eradicated. Honesty would then, in the mid-Eighties, once again regain the fulcrum position it had in the Sixties, although even then it got shaky. It was especially rendered meaningless via the plainclothes pick.
There was no real cleansing. The new leaders of “ISKCON” had worked their way to the top of the turtle tank by the mid-Eighties, but they did not finish the job. Did they confront the root issues? Consider this: Can a disciple receive a proper initiation from a bogus guru? Is that disciple then genuine? Can an institutional guru, one who cooperates with and backs bogus gurus, be approved by his organization (after waiting in queue for years) and thus become a bona fide guru?
These questions answer themselves. In order for someone to receive a proper initiation, he or she must receive it from a bona fide guru. There have been none of those in “ISKCON” since November of 1977. This also means, logically, that a bogus guru only has improperly initiated disciples. Still, the deluded newcomers have a vested interest to believe themselves, somehow or other, to be initiated.
The guru is everything. Not the congregation. Not the institution. Not the governing body of the institution. The guru. And the guru must be a very perfect man. 6 He is far, far above all of the others. He is above the neophyte status. And he is obviously even farther above the miçra-bhakta, what to speak of the sahajiyä!
Let us consider the lead up to that zonal imposition. We could begin anywhere in the mid-Seventies, but let us instead consolidate the timeline leading to the cratering in March of 1978. As such, we are obliged to start with important room conversations. Obviously, the most important room conversation took place in late May of 1977 at Raman Reti in Prabhupäda’s quarters with the G.B.C. present. Nevertheless, something comparably important—and directly related to it–took place in the Bombay temple at Juhu Beach in April of that year:
Prabhupäda: What is the use of producing some rascal guru?
Leading Secretary: Well, I have studied myself and all of your disciples, and it’s a clear fact that we are all conditioned souls, so we cannot be guru. Maybe one day it may be possible . . .
Prabhupäda: Hmmm.
Leading Secretary: . . . but not now.
Prabhupäda: Yes. I shall choose some guru. I shall say, “Now you become äcärya. You become authorized.” I am waiting for that. You become all äcärya. I retire completely, but the training must be complete.
Leading Secretary: The process of purification must be there.
Prabhupäda: Oh, yes, must be there. Caitanya Mahäprabhu wants that. Ämära äjïäya guru haïä: “You become guru.” But be qualified. Little thing, strictly follower.
Leading Secretary: Not rubber stamp.
Prabhupäda: Then you’ll not be effective. You can cheat, but it will not be effective. 7
This exchange is loaded! It was between Prabhupäda and his leading secretary a mere five weeks before the aforementioned conclave at Raman Reti, and it is full of knowledge and realization.
We first find reference to “rascal guru.” Prabhupäda used bogus guru and rascal guru interchangeably. In the Folio, you find these references almost the same number of times. The rascal guru, in relation to this room conversation with a leading secretary at Bombay, 8 is in reference to someone who is not qualified, who is pretending to be an advanced devotee and pretending to be guru. This will be shown conclusively in the context of the full conversation.
T.K.G., in his patented, self-serving way, claims that he has studied all of Prabhupäda’s disciples (most certainly he had not) and has concluded that none of them are qualified to be guru. What he was actually saying in that ego assessment (disguised as humility) was that he was not qualified, so the others certainly could not be, either.
TATTVAMASI
Consider also that he may have been deceptive, and that he actually did consider himself qualified—or he wanted Prabhupäda to correct him and tell him that he was qualified despite his disclaimer. Either way, his statement is flawed–at least provisionally, it is spiked with either false humility or deception or both.
T.K.G. adds that one day it may be possible for somebody in Prabhupäda’s movement to be guru, as if that was a question in and of itself. Prabhupäda wanted that, and T.K.G. knew that Prabhupäda wanted his leading men to become guru, so why make it provisional?
The T.K.G. admission here could indicate something more than a bit off, unwarranted, and falsely motivated, so Prabhupäda replies “Hmmm,” which means that he was suspicious of the motive that was possibly hidden behing T.K.G.’s statement. Prabhupäda actually predicates T.K.G. in expressing this suspicion.
Then comes, at first, a one word reply from Prabhupäda: Yes. Prabhupäda is agreeing with T.K.G., namely, that none of his disciples, as of the fourth week of April, 1977, is qualified to be guru. Does this affirmation by Prabhupäda mean that he is saying none of his disciples can be the Äcärya in the true sense of the term, the Successor? It most definitely does not mean that. He is not referring to that level of guru.
Prabhupäda’s replies that he shall choose some guru. An initial response to this statement (in the minds of many) would mean that Prabhupäda was going to appoint either one guru, or more than one guru, in the future. This pre-supposition is not established, however. Furthermore, he will recognize the guru he provisionally may select by making it clear that he would officially appoint him. This appointment would not be covert or secretive. It would be official. That is the mukhya-våtti. 9
Prabhupäda then says: “You become all äcärya.” This corresponds to his later answer to a reporter that: “All my disciples will take the legacy.” That later statement was in the indisputable context that Prabhupäda was saying that he was not going to appoint a Successor, which he most definitely did not. The transcription of this Bombay room conversation (by the Folio) puts the first letter of “äcärya” in down case. That was the correct decision by those editors, as Prabhupäda was not referring to THE ÄCÄRYA, who would be the Successor, an uttama-adhikäré.
Prabhupäda then re-affirms what has already been stated when he said “Yes” at the beginning of this first reply: He is “waiting for that,” meaning that he is waiting for one of his disciples to man up and become qualified to receive recognition and appointment as a qualified guru. Then he adds to this a distinct restriction: “But the training must be complete.” This means, very obviously, that none of his leading men had fully taken the training he had given all of them—and all of his other disciples—in order to become a pure devotee of the Lord.
Prabhupäda goes on to affirm that he would retire completely once there was somebody (preferably, more than one) from his many disciples to be qualified to be guru. This logically means that the governing body commissioners had not done what they were supposed to do. One of the two most important objectives in creating the G.B.C. in 1970 was to facilitate Prabhupäda’s retirement. We recently dedicated a KCd Montly Audio to this topic, proving it beyond doubt . . . and that meant proving that the G.B.C. men did not accomplish that objective.
T.K.G. replies that purification must be there, meaning that neither himself nor his godbrothers were purified of mäyikä influence, which is obvious now, especially considering what went down. He affirms that Lord Caitanya wants that those who represent Him only be pure devotees. Prabhupäda expands upon it: “But be qualified,” obviously because none of his leading disciples were qualified. Prabhupäda needed pure devotees, but there were none to select from.
Then he adds four very important words: “Little thing. Simply follower.” Realize the meaning! As mentioned previously, the context of everything which preceded this was not uttama. It was not mahä-bhägavat. He was not referring to a Successor.
He was referring to madhyam-adhikäré.
That is confirmed by “little thing.” It is not, and never will be, a little thing to become a siddha, to become brahma realized in the true sense of the term. On the contrary, it is a very rare attainment. It is a very, very big thing! However, Prabhupäda was not referring to that level in any part of this Bombay room conversation. He was referring to “strictly following,” which begins at the madhyam platform.
It is a misconception to believe that a madhyam-adhikäré is not a pure devotee. He is preliminarily purified on the brahma-bhüta platform. He is niñöhä. He has firm faith. He is completely fixed up. He is a qualified sannyäsé even if still in the gåhastha-äçrama. And he is qualified to receive the order to become an initiating spiritual master.
In Prabhupäda’s branch of Lord Caitanya’s line, such a disciple must receive Prabhupäda’s direct order to become an initiating spiritual master. That is indirectly indicated in this room conversation. It is confirmed beyond any doubt during the G.B.C. conclave in Prabhupäda’s room at Raman Reti a mere five weeks later: “But by my order.” And he did not give the order in either of those room conversations.
Then T.K.G. adds: “Not rubber stamp.” Prabhupäda was not going to rubber stamp an unqualified disciple to become guru, so what is being referred to here? What can only be inferred by this reference to rubber stamping is the Governing Body Commission. Such a conclusion was evidenced in the years that followed 1977, because that was what the G.B.C. engaged in through repeated concoctions.
It rubber stamped the eleven great pretenders, the zonal äcäryas. It then rubber stamped three other gurus to join them after the inimical split with Gouòéya Mutt. It then, very briefly, concocted a form of the rubber stamp via a no-three-blackballs procedure. Then, the party man who wanted to be guru had to secure recommendations from three gurus in order to receive the G.B.C. rubber stamp. And, since then, there has to be a wait in a queue for one or two or three years and—if the party man keeps his nose clean and does not engage in a scandal of any sort—he receives a No Objection Certificate to be an initiating guru.
All of these concoctions are but variations of rubber stamp. Was T.K.G. getting a flash of the future? And, if so, then notice the irony, because he was one of the first to receive that G.B.C. imprimatur or rubber stamp—although that fact was disguised by the deception that Prabhupäda had allegedly appointed the eleven as spiritual masters when he only appointed them as rittviks in the summer of 1977.
And there would be so much turmoil after they captured the gadi through that deception. So many egregious fall downs (although they were already fallen), and so many scandals. And the movement careened out of control, the train came off the track at high speed, and spiritual lives were lost or severely damaged or at least negatively impacted.
Prabhupäda, being tri-käla-jïä, knew this as a possibility if his movement fell victim to Fate after losing its connection to Providence. He tells T.K.G. that, due to lack of purification, if the institutional rubber stamp was the method, then such gurus would not have meaning. He says it would be cheating, and he concludes: “You can cheat, but it will not be effective,” which means there would be no spiritual sequence in anything done in his movement via cheap gurus and cheap disciples.
The situation of guru scandals and/or blatant fall downs became blatantly obvious in the mid-Eighties. Professor Blueblood distributed his initial treatise in the latter half of 1984, and that position paper spread. When three more institutional gurus were exposed for illicit sex with their disciples (one of the homosexual variety), the levee broke.
The whole thing was bungled. Do today’s newcomers to “ISKCON” even know anything about this? The Second Transformation proved ineffective. It was supposed to clean up the nescience of the zonal era, but simply busting down pretender mahä-bhägavats (read, who were already sahajiyäs) to madhyams is but another pretension.
Three sahajiyäs were removed from their dékñä-guru posts, but no one else was really disciplined at all. Bogus gurus were allowed to remain in good standing and keep their disciples, and those disciples were considered to still be genuinely initiated by the newly transformed cult . . .
. . . BUT THEY WEREN’T!
This is at the core of the problem with The Second Transformation. If it even had the potential to right the ship (and that is debatable), the collegiate compromise did not do so. Half truth means no truth, and that new dispensation did not actually turn things around. It changed the deck chairs, made some new arrangements, and the ship’s passengers were treated a bit better for awhile. By not eradicating the root nescience, however, it only increased the cult’s dishonesty.
History will establish that The Second Transformation must certainly be judged a complete failure. All of the great pretenders at that time would have had to have been removed for it to have accomplished anything of real value via institutional purification. All disciples initiated by the imitators would have to have been acknowledged as lacking standing, because they were improperly initiated. In the new dispensation of the mid-Eighties, however, they were again used to prop up another institutional delusion, along with the so-called uttamas who agreed to cooperate by being allegedly busted down to so-called madhyams.
In essence, the song remained the same, but the music was slowing. Many believed in the transformation superficially, but deep within only the dyed-in-the-wool fanatics believed any of it. Of course, “ISKCON” was quite expert (and remains so) at creating fanatics out of new people–insincere all of them–so true believers were and are not at all rare in the cult.
The Rittvik heresy of late 1989 would soon surface to disturb a short period of improved interface, but another internecine war then emerged. The Second Transformation brought in new dogma, and just like The First Transformation of the zonal scheme, it had to be accepted by all. Those who did not do so were then branded when “ISKCON” was forced to circle the wagons in order to fend off Rittvik.
This was especially the case in criticizing Rittvik leaders. The Mother Ship would realize the danger, but it had set the stage for its emergence. Rittvik was not advocating any kind of middle ground with “ISKCON.” It demanded that all initiations be recognized as only Rittvik initiations. All “ISKCON” conductors of initiation could only be rittviks. When it came to Hard Rittvik, that would mean ad infinitum, which is certainly fanaticism! Soft Rittvik is a different concoction.
Since just after Prabhupäda departed physical manifestation, there have been three major (all utterly unauthorized) transformations of what now only appears to be his branch of Lord Caitanya’s Hare Kåñëa movement. These transformations are all under the strong grip of deception, and “ISKCON” dishonesty is the most institutionalized.
An initial anomaly was injected by the asära Goudiya Mutt via a man who had no influence whatsoever in Prabhupäda’s branch of the Hare Kåñëa movement. Hardly anyone active in the movement even knew about him. Besides that, this Prabhupäda godbrother was not well known even by the majority of Prabhupäda’s leading men. Yet, all of a sudden, he became prominent in 1978, providing fertile soil for the group (and individual) apotheosis of the eleven seeds sprouting from it.
They all became massive enjoyers. They were confident that their dishonesty in securing their statuses (as alleged mahä-bhägavats and even Successors) would not be spotted by most of the devotees in the movement, particularly in the short run. They were right about that, and such confidence and audacity on their parts proved warranted. This principle–of the vast majority of cult members not seeing things as they are within the movement, one which they compulsively and foolishly serve–is still going strong today.
However, the short run of The First Transformation ended long ago. Toppling the zonal scam and replacing it with another deep fake has many devotees condemning the eleven great pretenders. Yet, they still remain bamboozled. The INTERNET will continue to provide a means to spread the message that any new transition in the future is nothing more than a resultant of past factors. It will be nothing but a continued neglect to rectify the embedded dharmasya-gläni and to confront the root issues of deviation still underlying and active in “ISKCON.”
You cannot make progress in becoming a devoted siddha in any of those major deviations (“ISKCON,” Neo-Mutt, and Rittvik), but the fanatics in each of them are aggressively paranoid in their shaky confidence that they are right. They are true believers that their particular group, although deviated from guru-paramparä, is bona fide.
If you come into contact with any of them, you will find this out for yourself. You need protection from this mud of Kali-yuga, so you need not intentionally walk into it. If you do enter it, you will find out just how contaminated and layered in mäyä each of the three major deviations is. That may astound you. It may shock you. The whole of “ISKCON” is led by former fifth-class men who did not take spiritual training but still posing as advanced devotees and spiritual masters.
Instead, they are only advanced in cult manipulation, running a psy-op experiment—from which they benefit in many obvious and unseen ways—as they control their chelas in order to exploit them. This is described in some detail in the Twelfth Canto of the Bhägavatam, but it was also described a bit earlier in that great work:
kalkiù kaleù käla-malät prapätu
dharmävanäyoru-kåtävatäraù
“May the very great incarnation of Kalki, the protector of religious principles, protect us from the dirt of Kali-yuga.” 10
The colossal hoax known as the fabricated, so-called “ISKCON” confederation, is a pseudo-spiritual scam. Those who run that show-bottle have a trump card which they can always play when one of their chelas finally discovers where his so-called guru is really at.
If you want to survive and remain sane, it is incumbent upon you to come to some rather harsh and painful realizations. It is a spiritual wasteland out there. It is so primarily because deviant cults are degrading Kåñëa consciousness in the name of spreading it. This is mostly being carried out by wizards who pretend to be advanced Vaiñëavas. It is your duty to break away from their psychic grip and everything related to the black hole that they want to suck you into.
At that time, when you leave them, you will come to know what your glorified leader’s actual name is. It does not contain any of those great brandings, such as Swämi, Goswämi, Çré, Çréla, or Gurupäda, or Äcärya-deva. He is only a master of cult manipulation and nothing more than that . . . but he has a trump card he can play at the end.
As such, the follower breaks away and no longer considers or calls himself a disciple of that man. Maybe he even has the stones to call his former leader according to his real name, which is BOGUS GURU. The improperly initiated disciple may choose to blame him for all of the physical, psychic, and social turmoil which he has to undergo in the wake of his escape, and all of it is both substantial and enduring.
That is when the guru–if there is a confrontation between the two–will play his trump card. He will tell his disciple only once (because there is no need to repeat it) that he wanted to be cheated. It’s on him, not on the bogus guru. He will tell him: YOU’RE TO BLAME!
Most unfortunately, there is truth to that. Think about these things.
SAD EVA SAUMYA
ENDNOTES
1. Çrémad-Bhägavatam, 11.23.57, translation by Kailäsa Candra däsa;
2.The Rolling Stones, “Sympathy for the Devil”;
3. Çrémad-Bhägavatam, 1.3.34, translation by Kailäsa Candra däsa;
4.The adjective “egregious” is employed here, because those who are deviants from the guru-paramparäare automatically in a fallen state;
5. Eleven leaders for the first one; one leader for the second one;
6.Stated in those exact words by Prabhupäda on 3-2-66;
7.Room conversation, 4-22-77 in Bombay, India;
8.T.K.G.;
9.The mukhya-våtti is the direct and obvious interpretation;