Back To Prabhupada, Issue 73, Vol. 2, 2022
In a recent lecture given on 4/5/22, GBC voted-in guru HH Jayadvaita Swami ("JAS") discussed the authority required to become a diksa guru. The quotes in shaded boxes are taken from this lecture. All emphases added.
"There's a section of people who have made a big point that in order to become a representative of Srila Prabhupada and initiate disciples, one must have received the order to do so"
JAS here refers to the IRM who repeat Srila Prabhupada's teachings that in order to become a diksa guru ("initiate disciples") one must have been ordered to do so by his guru:
"A guru can become guru when he's ordered by his guru. That's all. Otherwise nobody can become guru."
(Srila Prabhupada Lecture, 28/10/75)
However, JAS then continues on to claim:
"but they fail to observe that Srila Prabhupada ordered everyone to spread Krsna consciousness, this Krsna consciousness movement, and never indicated that there was to be some sort of specific order."
JAS thus claims:
a) That Srila Prabhupada's order to preach suffices as an order to be a diksa guru;
b) because Srila Prabhupada never stated there should be a "specific" diksa guru order.
Hence, JAS is claiming that to become a diksa guru does not even require an order to be a diksa guru, since the order to preach is already given. However:
1) It is possible to preach without needing to become a diksa guru, and thus the latter is not an automatic or necessary consequence of the former.
2) Srila Prabhupada's order to preach is clearly not also an order to become a diksa guru, since he clearly states that it does not require one to have any qualifications, such that even a child can do it:
"No qualification required. [...] Anyone can do it, even a child. [laughs] Our Syamasundara's daughter. She was preaching, "Do you know Krsna?" [...] Even a child like Sarasvati, she can preach. [...] But these three words, that "Krsna is the Supreme Lord; you are servant; and chant Hare Krsna" [...] Everyone can become guru by simply teaching these three words."
(Srila Prabhupada, Room Conversation, 26/1/77)
Whereas, to become a diksa guru does require one to be very qualified, at the very least to be self-realised, or liberated:
"Just try to learn the truth by approaching a spiritual master. Inquire from him submissively and render service unto him. The self-realized soul can impart knowledge unto you because he has seen the truth."
(Bg., 4.34)
Even in JAS's "edited" Bhagavad-gita, this verse states that the spiritual master must be self-realised.
3) JAS himself does not believe that just the order to preach means that one is authorised to become a diksa guru. For he only became a diksa guru after being authorised to become a diksa guru by receiving the required votes from the GBC. He also only allowed his own disciple, HH Kadamba Kanana Swami ("KKS"), to act as a diksa guru after KKS had also first been authorised by the GBC! If JAS believed that the order to preach was sufficient authority to become a diksa guru, then JAS would have acted on it and become a diksa guru. But he did not, as he accepted that authorisation to be a diksa guru was still required.
JAS's claim that Srila Prabhupada never stated that there needs to be a "specific order" to be a diksa guru can also be easily rebutted:
If the order for one action – preach – can be taken to mean something else – "become diksa guru" – then the concept of an "order" becomes meaningless, since you are not actually following the order given, but your own made-up version of the order. If the guru orders, "Give me milk", but you take it to mean to also cook him a feast, then you are not following the order the guru gave, but your own version of the order. Hence, it is stated that:
"The order of the spiritual master is the active principle in spiritual life. [...] Persons who strictly follow the orders of the spiritual master are useful in executing the will of the Supreme"
(Cc., Adi-lila, 12.10, verse and purport)
Thus, only by the order of the spiritual master can one be "active" or act. But then we can only act by following that order "strictly", which would mean that we cannot add to or subtract from this order. Thus, "order" means, by definition, a "specific" order, otherwise one could just concoct whatever one wanted the order to mean, and not be "strictly" following the actual order given.
To illustrate the point just made, Srila Prabhupada states:
"Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura, at the time of his departure, requested all his disciples to form a governing body and conduct missionary activities cooperatively. He did not instruct a particular man to become the next acarya. But just after his passing away, his leading secretaries made plans, without authority, to occupy the post of acarya, and they split in two factions over who the next acarya would be. Consequently, both factions were asara, or useless, because they had no authority, having disobeyed the order of the spiritual master."
(Cc., Adi-lila, 12.8, purport)
Here, Srila Prabhupada explains that:
a) Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura had given an order to "preach" – "conduct missionary activities";
b) But he had not given a specific order for a person to be the next acarya;
c) Therefore, those who went on to become acarya had disobeyed the actual order of the guru to preach.
This proves that:
i) The order to preach means only that – to preach;
ii) Therefore, to become an acarya, or diksa guru, would require a specific order for that.
Due to there not being an order from Srila Prabhupada for anyone in ISKCON to become a diksa guru, JAS has tried to get around this lack of an order by concocting that one does not even need such an order. However, this concoction has easily been defeated by both Srila Prabhupada and JAS himself.
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