Living in a Multi-Guru Universe - Workshop/Seminar

[Nitaidas]

Thanks for your kind words and encouraging comments. There is a wealth of information and reflection in the forum. I very rarely delete anything. As a side result it is not very well organized and some topics are still way underdeveloped. Those are for future discussions. Still there are a lot of interesting ideas and thoughts occupying the highways and byways of this forum. It requires a bit of searching sometimes. Even I have forgotten much of what is here.

I very much think that we modern members of the tradition need to forge our own ways based on firm knowledge of and taking our cues from the past tradition. That is what I hope we will achieve here. We cannot revive the past. All so-called revivals are really new creations. Still we can inherit the past and find in it some guidance for how we should proceed in the present.

[sita]

Mahaprabhu is so compassionate that he desended 524 years ago, He came and He went leaving such a mystery for us to comprehend. At the same time He never really left as there is a continuios flow of mercy. I could see and feel Him his spirit in my Guru Maharaja so clearly, and after I was contacted by the causeless mercy of Lord Jagadbandhu I could realise this bond is truly continuious. Forging a ray of Satyayuga in these dark times.

[maasikdharma]

"Yes, well that is another meme: that men are better than women. Unfortunately, with few exceptions that meme circulates among the mainstream Vaisnavas as well. It is a meme embedded in a system of memes related to the claim that Caitanya Vaisnavism is most at home among renunciants. Householders are often also excluded because of their contact with the vaginas of their wives. The other rasika Vaisnava traditions are not so adamant about renunciation. "

There seems to be an assumption that married women in Trad CV or (non-trad GV) have it better off than the single ones, or that being married somehow makes men less misogynistic.

My experience in India is that it's the opposite.

Having the option to remain single in pursuit of bhajan as long been a sort of feminist liberation for Indian women, even if they were shunned in traditionally all male ashrams or sangas - they could, and did and still do their own thing.

I've lived amongst traditional Indian CVs in India and there are very defined and restricted gender roles amongst these married and family oriented Vaishnavas.

I think I mentioned before the purdah that I've seen Radharaman Goswami Parivar wives living in.

They are not the only ones.

Moreover, in families like that, sons are groomed to be the "acaryas" - not daughters.

[maasikdharma]

Nitai bolen, "This attitude about not being able to teach the guru is a fine example of one of those memes that IGM promotes and that has to be flushed away once one joins the real Vaisnava world."

Longtime! Pranams Nitai!

Are you still under the impression that the "real" Vaishnava world in India amongst "trads" is any less authoritarian and more egalitarian than proceeding non-trad cults?

There is a tendency amongst western bhakta-gana to romanticise and idealize the exotic eastern other. What this does is set them up for disappointment and depression, which I have seen too many times to count.

[subala]

Oct 1, 2012 6:31:16 GMT -6 subala said:

There is a tendency amongst western bhakta-gana to romanticise and idealize the exotic eastern other. What this does is set them up for disappointment and depression, which I have seen too many times to count.

Many also wrap the frabic of GV around the skeleton of their Judeo-Christian background.

[maasikdharma]

"Many also wrap the frabic of GV around the skeleton of their Judeo-Christian background. "

Very true!

That's why "shraddha" gets translated as "faith" and "shrishti" gets translated as "creation".

[subala]

That's why "shraddha" gets translated as "faith" and "shrishti" gets translated as "creation".

There are more examples, but it's more than mere semantics. There's the wholesale grafting of GV unto abramanic tradition.

There's the turning the guru into a Christ-like figure. Listen to the two major GV cult groups, Iskcon and its clone IPBYS, and what they say about their guru and insert Jesus' name. There will be little difference in philosophy.

Satan's fall from heaven has become the jiva's fall from Vaikuntha or tatastha region.

Abramanic traditions are known for exclusivity as are the two major GV cults. Exclusivity impels its followers to preach in order to save the fallen. In the cults "sankirtan" is equated to preaching and is seen as the highest limb of bhakti.

I don't believe that many from abramanic traditions will fully see GV as our Indian friends do. At best, most western people will be become Vaisnava Christians or Jews.

In a similar vein check this out:

beingdifferentbook.com/


Now back to teaching my class...

[maasikdharma]

I'm already aware of that author and disagree with him on many counts and find his motives suspect.

Another quaint aspect of the oversimplification, idealization and romanticization of the exotic eastern other that western bhaktas partake in is the cheerleading of what they term "trad GV" or here it would be "trad CV", since they always want to "be different" even if it means copying and pasting another white dude, usually an American since we're such innovators (no offense to you Nitai).

Part of this cheerleading of course entails bashing Iskcon, or the conglomerate IGV and now IPBYS, with undulating praise being dished out to "gosais" and other sundry "trad" Indian vaishnavas, sans experience living in that culture (part of what fuels idealization is lack of experience).

The problems don't start and end with the sub-cults of GV that made it Westward.