Source Code: The Emergence of Rittvikvāda

There Never Was a Rittvik Dispensation

by Kailäsa Candra däsa

“Never ascribe to conspiracy
what can be adequately explained by incompetence.”
Napoleon Bonaparte

The devotees and/or fanatics who have affiliated themselves with various Rittvik factions throughout America, Europe, and India would have you believe that His Divine Grace Çréla Prabhupäda intended their particular rittvik-in-absentia movement as a new bhakti dispensation, to be adopted by his organization after his departure from physical manifestation in late 1977. There is scant evidence for this contention, and whatever evidence there is for it is either weak or very weak. On the other hand, there is—both cumulatively and specifically–strong logical and traditional evidence that he never intended any such system to be institutionalized for his branch of the Gauòéya sampradäya. This article will present examples of that stronger and bona fide evidence.

All Emphases Added for Your Edification and Realization.

Rittvik did not emerge as some kind of conspiracy. Instead, it was and remains little more than a cent-per-cent reaction to the oppressive “ISKCON” imposition. The extreme inequality represented and fostered by the eleven pretender mahabhägavats throughout the late Seventies and most of the Eighties was also not the result of a conspiracy. Instead, it was the inevitable result of their aggrandizement and misuse of institutional power (for years), combined with their policies, especially in terms of their control of the governing body. Everything had been rigged for well over a decade previous to the emergence of the unauthorized Äcärya Board in the spring of 1978.

Not only was there never a broad reform of their self-serving monopoly, there was no reform to their policies whatsoever at any time. They had achieved a loose consensus by 1978, but their whole scam was battered in the early Eighties, and it was on the verge of cratering just before the emergence of Rittvik. The aforementioned inequality was not addressed in any fundamental way by the Second Transformation (led by The Professor) of the mid-Eighties, and the growth of the Hare Kåñëa movement continued to be crippled. As a result, on the scantiest of evidence, a Rittvik concoction emerged.

Despite running a course according to its own incompetent track record and biorhythms, it has nevertheless managed to establish some momentum that is still pulsing throughout much of the devotee community today. Before we can understand Rittvik in a comprehensive way, however, we first must understand the history and underlying principles of its emergence.

After understanding generically what Rittvik is, it becomes just as important to also understand how it became an ontological entity. Rittvik did not manifest in a vacuum. The reasons that Rittvik emerged from the ocean of nescience are manifold but not overly complex; they will be concisely covered in this article. Root misconceptions had—and continue to have–a lot to do with it, but Humpty Dumpty didn’t just fall off the wall–he was pushed. When something such as the Rittvik concoction emerges–something that had absolutely no influence whatsoever in Çréla Prabhupäda’s movement prior to his disappearance (and even for at least a decade after that)–we cannot simply dismiss or ignore the causes which led to its disturbing emergence.

A Post-Samädhi Rittvik Concoction

As most of you know, His Divine Grace Çréla Prabhupäda, in the Seventies, utilized rittvik-äcäryas or officiating äcäryas in the matter of conducting the ceremonial rituals of his initiations. Previous to that, he conducted all initiation fire sacrifices himself, as well as all of the other particulars involved in initiating new disciples. As his movement grew in size, this protocol became impractical and then, more or less, impossible. As such, he ordered senior disciples to conduct these ceremonies on his behalf. Sometimes he was present for these later initiation yajïas, but often he was not.

Those rittvik-äcäryas were never the center of attention nor were they worshiped. For example, your author was first initiated (receiving Harer Näma) in a mass initiation ceremony held at the Moundsville compound in September of 1972. An estimated fifty devotees were initiated at that time. There were two rittviks involved in it. After the fire sacrifice, the newly-initiated disciples formed a line (your author was approximately fortieth), and each disciple thus approached Çréla Prabhupäda on his Vyäsäsana, bowed, chanted Prabhupäda’s präëam mantras, and received his or her japa mälä beads. His Divine Grace only spoke to two of them, your author being one of those.

There were two rittviks at the foot of Prabhupäda’s elevated seat. Each one handed up a set of japa beads to Prabhupäda, and, after giving the disciple his or her new name, His Divine Grace handed that set of beads to the newly-initiated devotee. One of those rittviks had also performed the fire sacrifice moments before, as Prabhupäda had looked on. No one was centering his or her attention on either of those two men; rapt attention by all of the new disciples was on His Divine Grace Çréla Prabhupäda.

This was also the case when these fire yajïas were conducted without Prabhupäda’s vapu or physical presence. Everyone knew that he or she then became the initiated disciple of Çréla Prabhupäda. It was also common knowledge that, upon the spiritual master departing manifest physical presence (sometimes referred to as the guru going into samädhi), he no longer accepted initiated disciples. This was and remains both standard knowledge and process in all Vedic and Vaiñëava lines. No one questioned this protocol immediately after Prabhupäda departed, although there were devotees who questioned the new arrangement (your author being one of those) that was instituted by the Governing Body Commission (G.B.C.) in March, 1978, four and one-half months after Prabhupäda withdrew his vapu.

Rittvik, however, does question the Vedic and Vaiñëava traditional process that the guru no longer accepts initiated disciples after he departs manifestation. Thus, this wing of the Vaiñëava paramparä—or, more specifically, this alleged wing of the paramparä—continues to have rittvik-äcäryas conduct fire sacrifices on behalf of new people, who are then led to believe that they are initiated into the Holy Name and as brähmins by His Divine Grace Çréla Prabhupäda. This is the essence of the post-samädhi Rittvik concoction.

No Successor Means Rittvik?

Interviewer: A question: You are now the leader and the spiritual master? Who will take your place?
Prabhupäda: That Kåñëa will dictate, who will take my place.
Interviewer: Kåñëa will tell you that?
Public Interview in New York City, 7-14-76

His Divine Grace Çréla Prabhupäda, in point of fact, did not name or recognize a Successor Äcärya before he departed physical manifestation on November 14, 1977. He also did not officially name even a regular guru, although he had mentioned the principle of regular guru in a crucial room conversation with his leading secretaries the previous May of that year.

Çréla Prabhupäda also discussed re-instituting rittviks (also known as officiating äcäryas) during that room conversation five and one-half months before he departed physical manifestation. Eleven of his senior men were then appointed as new rittviks (most, if not all, of them had been rittviks previously) in the second week of July, 1977. Those eleven men were later, in March of 1978, rubber-stamped to the post of uttama-adhikäré by the G.B.C. and given zones throughout the world, in which they were, for all practical purposes, the sole dékñä-gurus or initiating spiritual masters.

In other words, the G.B.C. believed that the eleven rittviks automatically became dékñä-gurus after the departure of His Divine Grace. Since the best guru must be an uttama-adhikäré (topmost devotee), those eleven men were thus designated mahäbhägavats and given geographical fiefdoms of total control. They were not considered regular gurus, and the term regular guru was not at all well known, because the tape recording of the May, 1977 room conversation was kept confidential, i.e., not divulged to the rank-and-file.

The Rittvik movement, generically speaking, contends that those eleven men were never anything more than rittviks, and furthermore, they should have continued initiating devotees as rittviks, just as they did prior to Prabhupäda’s disappearance. One of the reasons today’s rittviks jump to this conclusion is their belief that the dékñä-guru can only be an uttama-adhikäré, but such a mahäbhägavat would automatically also be a Successor Äcärya to Çréla Prabhupäda. Today’s rittviks do not accept the concept of regular guru, and this will be discussed subsequently.

As such, according to bad Rittvik logic, in the absence of a designated Successor Äcärya, there are no dékñä-gurus, but initiations must continue, nevertheless. So, the departed spiritual master, according to Rittvik philosophy, remains the Äcärya and initiating spiritual master, i.e., no Successor automatically means that rittviks continue to perform initiation ceremonies on behalf of the departed guru, who remains the sole dékñä-guru for all newcomers—until the next uttama-adhikäré emerges (not all of the Rittvik cults believe that there will be another uttama-adhikäré). This is very bad logic, but it is a key component in the belief system of today’s contending Rittvik factions. It is, more or less, an unprecedented idea, and it flies in the face of both çästra (in Vaiñëava disciplic succession) and Prabhupäda’s purports to those teachings.

Backlash From Zonal Hubris

The Rittvik movement—now divided into many factions—was primarily, as aforementioned, a reaction to the zonal äcärya imposition, with all of its hubris. Rittvik could not have gained traction, however, until that particular deviation had not only run its course but was on the verge of a complete implosion. Rittvik should thus be seen as a reactionary deviation that abided its time. In no small part, it was a false return to the glory days of the movement, under the banner of re-establishing the “no change” motto, which it picked up from Çréla Prabhupäda’s Final Will and Testament. Yet, that “no change” inclusion in the document was put in there only in relation to the various governing body commissioners and trustees in control of ISKCON temples.

The hubris of the eleven pretender mahäbhägavats is now seen as not only egregious and outrageous but borderline unbelievable. They exploited to the max the devotees and temples in their zones. It was so over the top that one of them decided to pay his own follower, an initiated disciple of Çréla Prabhupäda—far more dedicated to that pretender than he was to his dékñä-guru—to assassinate a critic, Sulocan däs. The assassination was pulled off, and more than one pretender mahäbhägavat was involved in it. The Paramätmä arranged for the assassin—who now serves a life sentence without parole in a maximum security prison—to be apprehended in what can only be considered ultra-unlikely circumstances, just as he was about to leave America.

We could reproduce many anecdotes connected to the overreach of those eleven pretenders, but doing so would be tangential to the main theme. Your author vividly remembers speaking to, up close and personal at the Mount Kailäsa rural äçrama in the foothills of Lake County, one of eleven five years after he had been excommunicated from “ISKCON.” He summed up the whole escapade of what he and the ten others had attempted accurately and succinctly: “We went way too far.” Indeed, they did.

Such excesses, well-known to most of Çréla Prabhupäda’s disciples and followers now (and recorded for posterity in books like Monkey on a Stick), eventually reached the stage where everyone had to look at the thing and conclude: “Something is very, very wrong.” That moment occurred in May of 1986, when the news of Sulocan’s murder swept through the movement like a hurricane. Everyone knew who was behind it, although the details of the hit did not come to light for months. In point of fact, many of the details have not come out even at this time, and your author is aware of some of those.

Once an initiated disciple and malcontent (a brilliant fellow in his own right, who was not disciplined and not following properly at the time of his murder) could be executed in such cold-blooded fashion by a former Vietnam veteran, honed in the art of killing other human beings, then virtually all the movement’s devotees realized that they needed to ask deeper questions about just what was going on and why it had descended to such a depraved level.

When a devotee is shot in the head at point blank range while chanting japa in the driver’s seat of his own vehicle, and when it was an assigned hit from a pretender mahäbhägavat carried out by a paid assassin, then evil was seen clearly to have entered the “ISKCON” movement. Your author saw that it had done so eight years previous to that horrific event, but almost everyone was forced to realize the fact in the late spring of 1986.

The “ISKCON” movement went on a kind of life support and almost cratered in 1986 and 1987, but it survived due to two fortuitous events that came to its rescue. One was the inability of the temple presidents (at the Towaco, New Jersey conclave) to come to the ethical and right conclusion as to what must be done. The other was the emergence of Rittvik in 1989.

Now, some of you will counter in dismay: “How can you claim that Rittvik saved ‘ISKCON’?” A partial answer to that question (or challenge) will be presented a bit later in this article. However, to summarize it now, it is best to remember that Rittvik was and remains a cent-per-cent reactionary response to an imposed situation that was in its death throes. Rittvik did not hasten the annihilation of the zonal äcärya hubris; it was a product of it.

As far as its other source influences, there are a number of them. It was a reaction to zonal hubris, the egregious words and actions of eleven men who had no right to do what they did to Çréla Prabhupäda’s movement of Kåñëa consciousness. Rittvik was also heavily influenced by “Christianity,” and this is evidenced by how much their literature culls out (and generally misinterprets) what His Divine Grace had to say about Iesus Kristos. Some of the Rittvik leaders had a heavy-duty background and entanglement, previous to coming to Prabhupäda’s movement, with Catholicism. We are not going to go in-depth on this touchy topic, because that would be counterproductive to the realizations that need to be attained in relation to what is at hand.

It is utter nonsense to say that Prabhupäda was favorable to Christianity, which he sometimes denigrated as “Churchianity.” Again, we could reproduce quotes to substantiate this, but doing so would be tangential to the main point. How Rittvik is conducted–and how it thus parallels the way “Christians” are allegedly initiated in the various cults and sects of Christianity–is quite obvious and does not require detailed explanation.

Another source for the Rittvik heresy is a sahajiyä apa-sampradäya known as Kartäbhajä. It is one of the thirteen sahajiyä sects mentioned in the writing of Çréla Bhaktivinode Öhäkur and later by his illustrious son, Çréla Bhaktisiddhänta Sarasvaté Prabhupäda. Vaiñëavas in our line of disciplic succession are enjoined to have no association with it whatsoever. Rittvik is a downline, splinter faction of it, a second-order simulacrum, because Rittvik adopts its premise.

Çréla Prabhupäda specifically said that all thirteen sects are to be considered as one deviant group (known as sahajiyä, which, technically, is the name of but one of them), and he also said that Vaiñëava äcäryas condemn this apa-sampradäya as a cheating arrangement.

The Kartäbhäja sect was founded by Kartä Baba Aul Cand (1688-1779), a false but powerful renunciate, who had his followers believe and preach that he was the reappearance of Lord Caitanya Himself. Kartäbhäja sahajiyä scripture clearly hints at Mäyäväda. The Kartäbhäjas converted thousands of commoners in the past on the plea that the Gauòéya Vaiñëavas of that time had become spiritually bankrupt. Out of their ruins, a new dispensation had arisen, represented by the Kartäbhäjas themselves. They believe that everyone connected to their cult is initiated by Kartä Baba Aul Cand through rittviks, who are considered to be representatives of the founder.

Today’s post-modern version of Rittvik is not entirely the same as the original prototype, but quibbling about the differences cannot disguise the fact that, at root, they share the exact same misconception. The Kartäbhäjas are distinguished by their doctrine of guruväda, and today’s rittviks push rittvik-väda, which is similar to the prototype. The original deviant sect has a philosophy of guruväda, or veneration of the guru, and the Kartäbhäjas go to the extreme of proclaiming the guru to be God incarnate. Kartäbhäja guruväda arises from Mäyäväda absolute oneness, obviously.

Do not think for a moment that heavy-duty rittviks don’t have a similar attitude in relation to Çréla Prabhupäda. This is especially the case for their splinter group known as “Hard Rittvik,” which claims that Çréla Prabhupäda is the sole dékñä-guru for the remaining duration of the Golden Age, which is to run for approximately 9,500 more years. These deviations are based upon universal paradigms already put in place by the illusory energy, just waiting for the right time and circumstances in order to be actualized. That situation came about in the late Eighties, and how it did so will be described subsequently.

Tens Years After

The first Rittvik group emerged after a meeting of five initiated disciples of Çréla Prabhupäda held in southern Mississippi near the end of 1989. Previously, there were four of them living together there in a rural community (New Tälavän) that had functioned as part of ISKCON previously but had, by that time, completely broken away. At the end of the Eighties, just before the INTERNET rose to prominence, this group was monthly publishing a hard copy journal of quite good quality, entitled Vedic Village Review. The articles in it were bona fide and provocative, often questioning the legitimacy of what was going on in “ISKCON.” Your author possessed and read these magazines and was in irregular contact with the group’s leader, who had previously been temple president of the New Orleans yatra.

What precipitated the first Rittvik venture was the arrival (from Washington state) of a devotee who had been T.K.G.’s personal servant during the last year of Prabhupäda’s presence. In his capacity, he had quite a bit of (mostly indirect) association with His Divine Grace, as T.K.G. did not permit many visitors to personally meet Prabhupäda during those final months. In an informal session and setting—apparently when His Divine Grace was feeling a bit better than usual and sitting out on his veranda talking with T.K.G.–this personal secretary of the personal secretary claims that he overheard Prabhupäda describe how his line of disciplic succession would proceed after his (Prabhupäda’s) departure, which appeared somewhat imminent, although few of his initiated disciples actually knew of his condition at that time.

This former personal servant of T.K.G., who no longer had a favorable relationship with T.K.G. by the late Eighties, told the four brähmins of New Tälavän that he overheard Prabhupäda inform his personal servant (T.K.G.) that his movement would be carried on by rittviks even after he departed. As far as the details of this alleged statement by His Divine Grace are concerned, that remains ambiguous, although these five men in Mississippi concluded what one of the essentials would have to be the involvement of the G.B.C.

As far as “ISKCON” was concerned, the four Mississippi brähmins were already malcontents, and they were intent on creating something different from what ISKCON was offering; to their credit, they were not at all inclined to link up with Neo Mutt. They were initially creating an alternative, and your author was inclined toward cooperating with it—and had already done so, to a limited extent. However, that alternative took a radical turn in an entirely new direction after the servant of the servant came down from the northwest with his tale about a new dispensation, which, apparently, had been laying dormant for about ten years. The other four bought into it, completely.

This was the start of the Rittvik movement. Their magazine now pushed this alleged dispensation, and, not long afterward, a prominent former sannyäsé from Canada sojourned to New Tälavän and joined up, as well as a known Left Coast master of vilification, now a rittvik of notoriety. It quickly caught on and soon gained momentum.

Let us step back for a moment and take a cold, hard look at what was then promulgated by this group back in the late Eighties. First of all, their Rittvik initiative was based upon second-hand testimony (not long afterwards, T.K.G. adamantly denied that any such discussion with Çréla Prabhupäda ever took place). Secondly, eleven rittviks had been newly appointed to initiate disciples on Prabhupäda’s behalf in July of 1977; this discussion on the veranda undoubtedly transpired after that appointment. Could whatever the personal servant of the personal servant overheard simply have been only in the context of carrying on Prabhupäda’s movement while he was manifest? That would be a reasonable possibility (read, probability).

The veranda discussion was not recorded, there is no transcription, and the other witness (T.K.G.) denies it. Why should we accept and promulgate a new bhakti dispensation—which is entirely anti-Vedic and anti-Vaiñëava in terms of tradition, process, and siddhänta–on such a shaky testimonial?

Just as importantly, this new dispensation came down the pike a full decade after His Divine Grace departed physical manifestation. Is that how major changes in the sampradäya are bequeathed by the Supreme Lord upon aspiring humanity? Such a long interlude in which nobody was thinking or talking in these terms about rittviks, and, out of the blue, a devotee–who was lucky (in the association he was able to have with Çréla Prabhupäda), but not at all prominent or part of the management–informs us that he, and he alone, inadvertently came to know how Prabhupäda wanted his disciplic succession to continue.

Ten years after Prabhupäda departs (actually, a bit longer than that), and these five brähmin-pundits come up with this brainstorm—and almost nobody bothers to consider that the thing was held in complete abeyance by only one disciple, who never spoke up about it until he traveled to the Deep South in 1989. Isn’t that, in and of itself, more than a bit incredulous?

The new prep seemed tasty enough to starving malcontents hankering for some kind of alternative to “ISKCON”, and thus they ate heartily from this plate of Mississippi Masalä, served up with Rittvik Roti on a thäli loaded with all kinds of delicious but poisonous concoctions.

My Three Sons

In the late Fifties and early Sixties, a number of mundane, family oriented, weekly series dominated the American television scene. These featured a modern, well-meaning, and patenalistic influence overseeing a mostly rebellious family dominated by boys. Some of the more prominent of these televised series were Father Knows Best, Ozzie and Harriet, and Leave it to Beaver. Each featuring a different, catchy theme song, they pushed an American narrative that briefly remained in the ascendant until the assassination of President Kennedy and the rise of the Beatles and the Stones.

Arguably, the most popular amongst them was called My Three Sons, featuring Fred MacMurray as the tolerant, wise, and loving father. Each episode of My Three Sons was introduced, while its theme song played, showing three pairs of shoes—high-quality wingtips, penny loafers, and tennies—on the screen, indicating the stages of the three male children. They were very different from one another, they did not get along all that well, but they were all part of the same family with the same doting father having created them.

In terms of the deviations that Prabhupäda’s disciples have been “treated” to after his departure, a similar situation has developed, although it was far more subtle than what was portrayed on the television. The (late) father of the three deviations that are prominent now is the same individual, although his three offspring do not get along, do not work together, and are often at each others’ throats. The three deviations are, in order of their appearance, “ISKCON,” Neo-Mutt, and Rittvik, with Rittvik being the strangest of the group.

How each of them were created could, in and of itself, be the subject matter for an entire article, but we shall simply summarize all of it as concisely as possible. The eleven pretender mahäbhägavats, in the spring of 1978, went to Swämé B. R. Çrédhar of Navadvépa in order to receive his blessing—and, just as importantly, his sage advice—as to how they would carry on the ISKCON movement after the disappearance of Çréla Prabhupäda less than five months previous. They got plenty of advice from this senior Gouòéya Mutt leader, much of it bad.

He advised them all to accept uttama-adhikäré worship. He advised them that they all should pretend to be uttama-adhikärés in order to deceive their disciples. He advised them all to simply put on the uniform and thus automatically become the soldier (guru) by so doing. He said that, since they had previously been appointed as rittviks, they were all now automatically dékñä-gurus after their spiritual master departed into eternity with the Lord.

The seeds needed a base, and Swämé B. R. Çrédhar provided them ultra-enriched soil with super-deviant fertilizer added to it. They ate up what he said, and one of them produced a position paper that informed the devotees of ISKCON of the new arrangement. In that document, it was stated that it was produced “in consultation with higher authorities.” No need for the plural: The higher authority so referenced was Swämé B. R. Çrédhar.

About one or two years later, the Navadvépa mahant was being brought news of how the zonal äcäryas (and, yes, he also introduced the concept of “the äcärya of the zone”) were conducting their movement(s), and he was aghast! He heavily criticized what they were doing, and malcontents with (formerly and currently, at that time) high positions in “ISKCON” then wanted to form an alternative which would be directly connected to him–and, as such, directly connected to the Gauòéya Mutt. They did so, and the initial organization was known as the Mahä-maëòala in the early Eighties. This was the second offspring from the Navadvépa Father, the eldest son (now in complete rebellion against its father) being “ISKCON.” Son Number Two was very dear to its father, and thus it is appropriately called Neo-Mutt.

The third offspring was more or less illegitimate and indirect. It was fathered by Swämé B. R. Çrédhar post-mortem, through his Will. It was thus created in a completely occult fashion, more or less unknowable, unless you have heard about or read that Will. It was fathered indirectly, but the initial seed is only ignored by those who wish to remain ignorant of it.

In his Will, Swämé B. R. Çrédhar named Govinda Mahäräj, his personal servant, as his successor. He stated in that document that Govinda Mahäräj would conduct initiations of new disciples not on his own account, but that these disciples would be the disciples of Swämé B. R. Çrédhar. In making this arrangement, he stated that initiations should be done just as “Swämé Mahäräj” had made the same arrangement; “Swämé Mahäräj” was a well-known reference to His Divine Grace A. C. Bhaktivedänta Swämé Prabhupäda, the Founder-Äcärya of ISKCON. Many of Prabhupäda’s disciples consider it to be a deprecatory reference, but that is another story.

Swämé B. R. Çrédhar left the scene in August of 1988, and Rittvik first reared its head in late 1989, only a little over a year after the aforementioned Will had been circulated to some extent. You may say that there is no connection, but there is a connection. It is occult, yet spiritual life (and its history) is not neccessarily traceable to mundane and manifest events on the physical plane.

In other words, “ISKCON” and Rittvik are ultimately one, not only in the pulse that circulates through them, but also in terms of their creation. The great sinister movement—referred to as such by Çréla Prabhupäda in 1970—got the last laugh; we now all have to endure the coverings that the aforementioned three groups impose upon us. Be assured that the so-called dispensation offered by the rittviks is not at all bona fide, in no small part since the particulars of its emergence give a very strong hint that it is not genuine.