Waves of Devotion

Recently I was inspired by an article by Bhakti Vijñāna Gosvāmī titled “How Not to Turn ISKCON Into a Religion.” My initial desire was to write a review for this week’s Monday Morning Greetings. I soon realized that to do it justice was beyond the scope of a post. His article was very comprehensive. I thought it was better to just share my own realizations on the same subject and leave a link to his article so my readers can read it in full.[1]

First, a short introduction to his piece. His article is a detailed analysis of what the philosopher Max Weber calls “the routinization of charisma” as applied to ISKCON. The “routinization of charisma” is when a charismatic spiritual movement seeks to preserve its legacy by making the structure and organization (the routinization) more important than its initial spiritual inspiration and objectives (its charisma). In his article he outlines carefully how this adversely affects the spiritual depth and enthusiasm of its members, the vision and quality of its leadership, and its relationship with other spiritual and religious sects.

The purpose of an institution is to carry its culture—what is right, real, and of value—into the future.[2] What I would like to discuss in this post, inspired by Mahārāja’s article, is how the institutionalization of a movement fails in moving its objective forward if not done very carefully. I will do that through a brief analysis of the concept of empowerment and then briefly discuss my own plan to temper the over-routinization of a movement.

I define empowerment as recognizing, encouraging, and facilitating a person’s abilities and then setting broad parameters describing where that person’s service is to function. I describe disempowerment as when the single focus of those in charge is not someone’s abilities and initiative but the parameters in which one is to serve. This often manifests in an emphasis on bureaucracy which inevitably leads to the imbalanced focus on the structure and organization of the institution over the empowerment and support of its people. In this way, by not sufficiently recognizing and encouraging its members, such bureaucracy discourages and disempowers them, and most unfortunately, especially those with the charisma and initiative to carry on its initial inspiration and objectives. The institution thus meant to carry forward its culture loses it.

When I look back at my life, I see how I have also fallen into this same prioritization of the structure of an institution over service to its members, especially at the beginning of my devotional career. I want to do something different now. I just see too many qualified people without the encouragement and support needed to reach their potential. In that regard I started The Yoga Maya Fund: Build Devotees, Not Temples —started with a kind donation by Yudhisthira dasa, the former long-time secretary of Śrīla Tamal Krishna Mahārāja. It is not that I have anything against building temples. They also perform an important function in serving and expanding the bhakti movement. I just see exorbitant amounts of money spent on so many temples, when a miniscule amount could allow us to accomplish so much more by supporting qualified people who have the potential to share the path of bhakti with others.

This year I was able to bring four such devotees to India, two from South America and two from the Middle East. They are all dedicated to Śrīla Prabhupāda’s mission and gifted in sharing it with others. They could not, however, afford to come to the holy dhāma to get the inspiration they needed to achieve their full potential. With a little help, they made the trip, and they left India with renewed vigor to serve the mission of Śrī Caitanya. It was more than worth it to sponsor their pilgrimage.

“How Not to Turn ISKCON Into a Religion” is a comprehensive analysis of the challenges ISKCON faces in preserving the purity of and fidelity to Śrīla Prabhupāda’s original vision. Bhakti Vijñāna Gosvāmī concludes with a description of “things that can and should be done if we want to establish bhakti as the science of God and ISKCON as an international educational institution dedicated to teaching this great science.” I was much inspired by his article and within the confines of just a weekly post now share my own limited inspiration after reading it. I think we all should do our part according to our capacity to understand Śrīla Prabhupāda’s mission so his revolutionary movement never degrades into just another disempowering ‘religion.”

Build devotees, not temples!

[1] https://articles.goswami.ru/en

[2] Joseph T. O’Connell’s article on the subject, “Movement or Mission”—https://gaudiyadiscussions.gaudiya.com/topic_1446.html

I have written an article before about the genius of Sanātana Gosvāmī in presenting the mission of Śrī Caitanya in the first book of Bṛhad-bhāgavatāmṛta. The mission of Śrī Caitanya is to give spontaneous love for Krishna (rāgānugā-bhakti) to the world. I was in awe of how creatively Śrī Sanātana did this. First, he weaved the plot of the book to build a foundation to help us understand its esoteric subject. Then, he highlighted the spontaneous love of the gopīs for Krishna through various dramatic exchanges between the devotees of Dvārakā in the last chapter. I recently saw the same type of literary brilliance of highlighting an essential point in various creative ways in the first chapter of the Antya-līlā of the Caitanya-caritāmṛta by Śrīla Kṛṣṇadāsa Kavirāja.

Before I continue, a disclaimer: I like to write, but I am hardly an authority in literature. I suppose every classic has themes that are presented in various ways, often by telling, showing and dramatizing as found in Bṛhad-bhāgavatāmṛta and Śrī Caitanya-caritāmṛta. Still, I found these works exceptional. The authors not only insert their points through the texts in dramatic and creative ways but do it in verse form. The genius of their presentation certainly shone through to me and I’ll try to share some of that here with you.

The Antya-līlā of the Caitanya-caritāmṛta is the story of the last eighteen years of Śrī Caitanya’s life as he settles in Puri to fulfill the internal reason for his descent (his personal objective rather than his contribution to the world)—to relish the love of his topmost devotee, Śrī Radha, at the height of her love. It is the most esoteric subject in Krishna bhakti, and we are told throughout the book that it is impossible to grasp it simply by the force of one’s intellect. How then to enter the Antya-līlā , where this subject will be extensively discussed? We need the mercy of God and His pure devotees. Kṛṣṇadāsa Kavirāja establishes this point throughout the first chapter in a myriad of ways. I found the way he did it quite brilliant. Here are some of the ways he approaches the subject.

By direct declaration, as we are informed in the first verse that the impossible is made possible by mercy:

“I offer my respectful obeisances to Śrī Krishna Caitanya Mahāprabhu, by whose mercy even a lame man can cross over a mountain and a dumb man recite Vedic literature.” (Antya-līlā 1.1)

By his personal example:

At the beginning of the Madhya-līlā (the middle pastimes), only one third through the Śrī Caitanya-caritāmṛta, he decides to summarize the pastimes of Śrī Caitanya, which were practically known only to himself due to his direct service and access to Svarūpa Dāmodara, the Lord’s personal confidante. He begins composing one verse for each pastime, and having completed that, hopefully plans to unpack each verse to tell the full story of Śrī Caitanya’s life as far as he can go. His fear is that he is old, nearly blind and invalid, and that he will either die or become incapacitated before he completes the book. Imagine his daunting task. He had to create one verse after another in Bengali in his mind, encapsulating his subject within strict poetic parameters, and then having only one shot to put it to paper. Somehow, however, he completes the Madhya-līlā and now he is faced with an even more daunting task, to approach the Antya-līlā , which describes the most esoteric part of Śrī Caitanya’s life and philosophy in verse form. His hope:

“My path is very difficult. I am blind, and my feet are slipping again and again. Therefore, may the saints help me by granting me the stick of their mercy as my support.” (Antya-līlā 1.2)

Through the story line as he presents it:

Śrī Caitanya has just returned from Vrindavan to fulfill the internal reason for his descent. His devotees get word of his return and proceed on the long journey from Bengal to Puri to join him under the leadership of Śivānanda Sena. On their journey Śivānanda gives shelter to a stray dog who joins the party. It’s a long story about how this dog was cared for by Śivānanda, and the story ends with the dog going back to Godhead. The message is clear: The impossible is possible by the mercy of God’s devotees. We too can enter, or understand, the Antya-līlā by their mercy. Śrīla Prabhupāda’s commentary encourages us:

“We may conclude that even as dogs we must take shelter of a Vaiṣṇava. The benefit will be the same as that which accrues to an advanced devotee under a Vaiṣṇava’s care.” (Antya-līlā 1.24, purport)

I could continue how expertly this theme of entering Antya-līlā for Śrī Caitanya, His devotees, the author, and the reader are expertly woven into the text, but it’s beyond the scope of a brief post. I haven’t even recounted the epiphany of Śrī Rupa on his journey to Puri that reveals the essence of the Antya-līlā and our entrance to the subject through him. I wanted to give just a glimpse of the literary genius of Śrīla Kṛṣṇadāsa Kavirāja in giving us the method of entrance to the heart of Śrī Caitanya and what He has given us and the world. Without a doubt, he’s a kavirāja, a genius of wordcraft.

Joking. Not really. The story:

I was holding my fourth annual BIG (Bhakti Immersion Govardhan) Retreat. It was a motley group of devotees from a professional clown and a lead hard-core guitarist to the housewives of New Jersey—three middle-aged ladies with twelve children between them with at least one of their teen girls here to boot. Sure, we would have morning and evening program and daily parikramā, but this group, I thought, also needed “fun.”

Before the evening program I scheduled a get-together in my ashram in the downstairs apartment next to mine. I had our charming Middle Eastern lady and her beautiful and talented twenty-four-year-old daughter arrange teatime with the ambrosial brews of orange blossom and saffron infused teas they brought from their country. At least I thought such “fun” was needed. Their non-stop raucous cacophony of laughter pierced the Braja sky, and certainly the wall of my adjacent room, with what sounded like bhakti-killing “prajalpa” (idle talk).

What kind of offering was this before the sacred mount of Govardhan, just fifty yards before us and visible from their courtyard? A thought spontaneously arose in my cloistered Hare Krishna monk mind, a kind of, “Is this authorized, prabhu?” I thus happily broke up the party just in time for evening kirtan.

Young Satya, our middle eastern tea brewer, was designated to lead. She closed her eyes and for two hours with deep bhāva and a simple but melodious melody gradually built up the tempo. As I looked around the room, I couldn’t find a single devotee soul not deeply lost in the experience, all immersed in the holy name. Then suddenly the collective bhāva of the kirtan finally merited an explosion of the tempo and we all danced and danced. From the quiet male hairdresser to the former lady infantry soldier, we all danced without attachment and without inhibition. Parmananda of the old music band Shelter called the kirtan epic. For me it was arguably one of the deepest kirtans I ever experienced.

So I was wrong, “Teatime is an item of devotional service.” Well maybe not an item of devotional service, but certainly of value to our devotion. I guess I owe an explanation.

Day after day the devotees, mostly the ladies, joined for joyous teatime and shared their lives and thoughts and jokes, and more jokes. Each day the kirtan reached new heights. I saw a connection.

People today generally live in a lonely world, and if they are blessed with a community, their gatherings are too far and few between. A tight trusting community allows us to shed our self- interest for a spirit of common interest. It helps us to drop the self-centered and limited concept of “I” restraining us from the uninhibited and non-detached open heart required for full immersion in the nectar of the holy name. It’s thus a principle of rasa that shared bliss is higher than individual bliss, and thus saṅkīrtan, chanting with community, gives special feelings of heightened devotion. We did start with many people who had a deep connection already, but I don’t underestimate the power that our teatime had to bring everyone into the fold of community.

Wait—isn’t prajalpa one of the obstacles to devotion? Isn’t sense gratification antithetical to pure devotion? We are not against sense gratification. We just need to understand it’s not the goal. We take what we need to forge a peaceful mind for the higher endeavor of Krishna consciousness. Teatime may not be for everyone, and it wasn’t for me, but most people today desperately need community . It brought our group, from the clown to the housewives of New Jersey, together in the saṅkīrtan of the holy name with a depth and relish unimaginable weeks before, even for me.

Teatime anyone?

Years back, when I was giving seminars at yoga studios, I was always looking for a relatable definition of bhakti for my audience. One day I unexpectedly found one. I was walking through the flower gardens of Vrindavan when I came upon a calf being born. I watched as the calf immediately went to drink milk from the mother’s udder, and the mother began to lick its calf passionately in return. The calf didn’t have the capacity to analyze her situation, thinking “this is an udder, and it provides my sustenance. It is from a cow, my mother!” Still the calf, due to their natural relationship, spontaneously identified with and reacted to the cow as its mother.

Observing this, I had an epiphany—this spontaneous exchange between the calf and cow is a perfect template for love in general which is the spontaneous energy flowing between two people with a natural relationship. It also offers a perfect analogy for the natural energy of bhakti that flows between the soul and God. More important for me, it was the relatable definition of bhakti I was looking for: bhakti is the instinctive energy of love that naturally flows in the relationship between the soul and God.

This also gave me insight into the spiritual practice Śrī Caitanya performed to attain His goal—to experience the devotion of Śrī Radha, His best devotee, at the height of Her love. In the mood of His own devotee, He drew out this natural energy of affection between Himself and God by focusing on the Supreme Lord in the form of His holy name and He also recommended that same practice to all of us to awaken our true self. But there is more.

He also was day and night tasting the verses and songs of the person whose name He was chanting and He daily worshiped Lord Jagannath, the form of the person whose name He was chanting. By doing this, His sambandha or relationship with the holy name, and consequently his absorption in the holy name, deepened. And this increased the intensity of the flow of love between Himself and God to the level of prema, perfect love for God.

As soon as I saw the spontaneous and intense exchange of love between the calf and cow, I immediately understood that I had a powerful way to explain to relatively new practitioners what bhakti is and why chanting God’s names is such an effective method to awaken love of God in our hearts. It worked! What could be a more relatable concept of reality and our relationship with reality (God) than the concept that there is an energy of pure love that helps define the ultimate reality, and that our participation in that exchange of pure love is the goal of life. So yes, “love makes the world go round!”