Below we respond to the above podcast where His Holiness Sivarama Swami Maharaja has spoken further about 'Back To Prabhupada' magazine. Maharaja's comments shall be enclosed in speech marks thus " ", with our responses following underneath.
| "in this case, our Krishna consciousness movement really trains devotees in the topmost philosophy, the topmost theology, the topmost way of life, and cultivates intelligence so that the devotees can be discerning and know the difference from right from wrong, what's illusion, what's reality." |
- Why then does Maharaja have no faith in the Krishna consciousness intelligence of the Hungarian devotees, which would allow them to discern the different between illusion and reality, that he has organised people to go and collect back the 'Back To Prabhupada' magazine from devotees and forbade them to read it?
- And if he does believe that Hungarian devotees have this Krishna consciousness intelligence of discernment, why doesn't he allow them to exercise it by reading the literature and discerning for themselves what is right?
| "And then to accept something which is, I can't even say 'philosophy' because there's no philosophy, it's just zero, something which has zero logic, zero philosophy, no tradition, no sastra, Prabhupada never said that some ideology that hangs on a few words, like "henceforth" (sic) in Prabhupada's letter and in Prabhupada's Will - "my initiated disciple" - it's amazing." |
1) What is amazing, is that having declared here that our arguments have 'ZERO logic', he contradicts himself a few minutes later and says about the same arguments that:
"And when we see The Final Order and the arguments of the ritviks, this is sort of their technology, setting up a step-by-step logical process, but it's a step-by-step logical process that's built on quicksand, and even though the process may appear logical, the basis is completely fallacious."
So a 'step-by-step logical process', no matter what it is built on, cannot exist if there is ZERO logic.
2) What is also amazing is that he claims 'The Final Order' and our arguments 'hang' on words like "henceforth". Yet "The Final Order" actually states the exact opposite:
"Furthermore the argument that the whole ritvik system 'hangs' on one word -
henceforward - is untenable, since even if we take the word out of the letter, nothing has changed. One still has a system set up by Srila Prabhupada four months before his departure, with no subsequent instruction to terminate it. Without such a counter instruction, this letter would still remain intact as Srila Prabhupada's final instruction on initiation."("The Final Order")
Again Maharaja is able to get away with such blatant misrepresentation, since he will not allow the devotees to read for themselves what we are actually saying.
| "Another example, devotees can examine at their leisure, there's the "kiba vipra kiba 'nyasi" sloka where Caitanya Mahaprabhu says: 'Everyone should become a spiritual master'. And according to ritvik-vada, yes you can become a spiritual master, 'guru' means you just become a siksa guru, not a diksa guru - that's what Srila Prabhupada had intended for us." - |
Again we do NOT say this, but then when one is not allowed to read what we actually say, Maharaja may claim anything about what we say and get away with it. The 'kiba vipra' verse, and the purport to this verse, makes it clear that anyone who knows the science of Krishna consciousness, even if they are not born in a Brahmana family, can become a diksa guru:
 |
"Sometimes a caste guru says that ye krsna-tattva-vetta, sei guru haya means that one who is not a brahmana may become a siksa-guru or a vartma-pradarsaka-guru but not an initiator guru. According to such caste gurus, birth and family ties are considered foremost. However, the hereditary consideration is not acceptable to Vaisnavas." (Purport, C.C., Madhya 8:128, [the 'kiba vipra' verse] ) |
The IRM has never disputed this, otherwise our central point could not be that a person who did not take birth in a brahmana family, Srila Prabhupada, is our diksa guru!
However in regards to a completely different verse in the Caitanya Caritamrta, Lord Caitanya's instruction to the Brahmana Kurma to 'become guru' (Madhya 7:128), Srila Prabhupada states in the purports to this verse that this instruction means it is "best not to accept any disciples". Clearly therefore this is not an order to become a diksa guru, and we simply repeat Srila Prabhupada's explanation of this verse.
| "Srila Prabhupada makes it very simple: just take his teachings as they are, as it always was, as it always will be, and don't make anything, don't change anything, then we'll be protected from ritvik-vada, we'll be protected from all kinds of other vadas as well." |
As we have demonstrated time and time again, the only 'change' being made is that by maharaja, when he falsely represents what we say, by changing it to something else!
He has yet to demonstrate a single statement from us which differs from the teachings of Srila Prabhupada. Indeed this is why he has felt compelled to misrepresent what we are saying since he knows he cannot find fault in what we actually say, and also he hopes that most of the devotees in Hungary will never discover his blatant misrepresentation since they have been forbidden to read what we actually say.
| "or they don't want to surrender in the standard way, they concoct things like this, 'well yes, I won't/don't want to surrender to Prabhupada the way Prabhupada wanted me to, which is to surrender to his representative, I'll surrender to Prabhupada directly, and in the way that I want to' - which is really no surrender at all." |
Maharaja's mentor His Holiness Tamala Krishna Goswami Maharaja has explained that Srila Prabhupada had only ever appointed ritvik representatives, and that these ritvik representatives were never ordered to turn into gurus:
"Actually, Prabhupada never appointed any gurus. He didn't appoint eleven gurus. He appointed eleven ritviks. He never appointed them gurus. Myself and the other GBC have done the greatest disservice to this movement the last three years because we interpreted the appointment of ritviks as the appointment of gurus. [...] So it stands to reason that after Prabhupada's departure, they would go on, if they so desired, to initiate."
(HH Tamala Krishna Goswami, 3/12/80)
- So where is that order from Srila Prabhupada appointing diksa gurus to whom we are supposed to surrender?
Therefore until this order from Srila Prabhupada appointing Diksa gurus is produced, the only order we have is to surrender to Srila Prabhupada directly via ritvik representatives. We therefore ARE surrendering to Srila Prabhupada exactly how Srila Prabhupada wanted, and we will happily surrender instead to Diksa guru successors, if an order from Srila Prabhupada appointing such persons can be produced.
| "In other words, Krsna's saying that by the empowerment of the material energy you can come up with anything. You can come up with any philosophy, you can come up with any ideology, and there are so many philosophies and ideologies, and the material energy will give you so many arguments, so much support, so much intelligence to support that ideology." |
This is indeed true. But someone bewildered by the material energy is not going to present that we follow the orders of Srila Prabhupada. Maharaja has yet to produce a single instance where what we state differs from what Srila Prabhupada states. He has only presented many examples of what we do NOT state, and then claimed it as coming from us.
Thank you for taking the time to read this.
Your servants, The Publishers.
Back To Prabhupada Magazine, London, England