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Post by Nityānanda dāsa on Apr 21, 2021 8:45:48 GMT -6
Gotcha! So many Goswamis  I do have his books, as well as a huge bibliography of works about him or that mention him. I can share with you by email if you're interested. Radhe Radhe! I actually have most of his printed books, all of them maybe? My favorite (and the only one I've read) is 'Initiation Into Yoga'! Such a fantastic book! I am interested in reading what you're putting together about him. Please share it when you're done. I'm sure others here on the Symposium would also enjoy reading it. |
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Jon
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Post by Jon on May 30, 2021 2:09:04 GMT -6
Just thought I'd share here this short quote from Krishna Prem's foreword to New Light on Sri Krishna & Gita by Mohan Singh:
“Do you then think that Krishna was historical? What a question? What height of full-blown folly! History is but the dim echo of the tinkling anklets on His dancing feet. Past and Future are but the two wings of that Garuda on which His manifested emanation Maha-Vishnu rides. In a flash those wings are opened out, in a flash they are closed up. That is history. As Dr Mohan Singh has had the rare courage to say: ‘Only when history becomes mythology does its full meaning reveal itself.’ History indeed! History and future are the illusions of those who have no present.”
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Post by meeno8 on May 30, 2021 15:38:16 GMT -6
And those wings of Garuda flap at faster than light speed (in a flash) according to Einstein's relativity.
I am reading Michio Kaku's 'The God Equation'. He discusses Einstein therein.
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Post by Nitaidas on May 31, 2021 10:42:57 GMT -6
Just thought I'd share here this short quote from Krishna Prem's foreword to New Light on Sri Krishna & Gita by Mohan Singh: “Do you then think that Krishna was historical? What a question? What height of full-blown folly! History is but the dim echo of the tinkling anklets on His dancing feet. Past and Future are but the two wings of that Garuda on which His manifested emanation Maha-Vishnu rides. In a flash those wings are opened out, in a flash they are closed up. That is history. As Dr Mohan Singh has had the rare courage to say: ‘Only when history becomes mythology does its full meaning reveal itself.’ History indeed! History and future are the illusions of those who have no present.” One wonders if he (Krishna Prem) is serious or just trying to say something radical and shocking. It sounds rather Advaitic, in a pseudo-Sankarite way (jagan mithyA). As a tradition we are, of course, both Advaitic and Dvaitic in the same way and at the same time (ie, acintya). It is not folly to wonder if Krsna was really present in history. The folly is suggesting that that question is folly. Krishna Prem is just engaging in rhetoric here, "full of sound and fury signifying nothing!" (like Macbeth's "Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow"). Nice metaphors though. Is Krishna historical? Of course not, with the possible exception of the Krsna Vasudeva mentioned in the Chandogya U. and the one identified as the rsi of six hymns in the Rg Veda. But he is not the Krsna of the Mahabharata, or the Harivamsa or the Visnu Purana or the Bhagavata Purana or the Govindalilamrta. This Krsna is mythological, but not necessarily unreal. He exists in our minds and thus is real. |
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Jon
Junior Member
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Post by Jon on Jun 1, 2021 1:36:30 GMT -6
Just thought I'd share here this short quote from Krishna Prem's foreword to New Light on Sri Krishna & Gita by Mohan Singh: “Do you then think that Krishna was historical? What a question? What height of full-blown folly! History is but the dim echo of the tinkling anklets on His dancing feet. Past and Future are but the two wings of that Garuda on which His manifested emanation Maha-Vishnu rides. In a flash those wings are opened out, in a flash they are closed up. That is history. As Dr Mohan Singh has had the rare courage to say: ‘Only when history becomes mythology does its full meaning reveal itself.’ History indeed! History and future are the illusions of those who have no present.” One wonders if he (Krishna Prem) is serious or just trying to say something radical and shocking. It sounds rather Advaitic, in a pseudo-Sankarite way (jagan mithyA). As a tradition we are, of course, both Advaitic and Dvaitic in the same way and at the same time (ie, acintya). It is not folly to wonder if Krsna was really present in history. The folly is suggesting that that question is folly. Krishna Prem is just engaging in rhetoric here, "full of sound and fury signifying nothing!" (like Macbeth's "Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow"). Nice metaphors though. Is Krishna historical? Of course not, with the possible exception of the Krsna Vasudeva mentioned in the Chandogya U. and the one identified as the rsi of six hymns in the Rg Veda. But he is not the Krsna of the Mahabharata, or the Harivamsa or the Visnu Purana or the Bhagavata Purana or the Govindalilamrta. This Krsna is mythological, but not necessarily unreal. He exists in our minds and thus is real. A lot of Krishna Prem's writing, I've found, were it not for the word "Krishna" sprinkled throughout could be mistaken for that of an advaitin. He seems to reject "dry" advaita but seems to lean more towards the non-dualist side of acintya bheda abheda. "Do not vex yourself with disputes as to personality and impersonality. Personality has no meaning apart from its polar opposite Impersonality and vice versa. They are mental terms and must always be linked together in thought. To overstress one in consciousness is to be haunted by a malignant ghost of the other." (Yogi Sri Krishnaprem) He also emphasises the paramatma more that one might expect from an initiated Gaudiya Vaisnava. From the same text (New Light): "It is … in the heart of Man all the Gods exist together in all the almost infinite variety of their Divine modes of being. There in the heart are all the great Elemental Powers…" |
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Post by Nitaidas on Jun 2, 2021 11:02:07 GMT -6
One wonders if he (Krishna Prem) is serious or just trying to say something radical and shocking. It sounds rather Advaitic, in a pseudo-Sankarite way (jagan mithyA). As a tradition we are, of course, both Advaitic and Dvaitic in the same way and at the same time (ie, acintya). It is not folly to wonder if Krsna was really present in history. The folly is suggesting that that question is folly. Krishna Prem is just engaging in rhetoric here, "full of sound and fury signifying nothing!" (like Macbeth's "Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow"). Nice metaphors though. Is Krishna historical? Of course not, with the possible exception of the Krsna Vasudeva mentioned in the Chandogya U. and the one identified as the rsi of six hymns in the Rg Veda. But he is not the Krsna of the Mahabharata, or the Harivamsa or the Visnu Purana or the Bhagavata Purana or the Govindalilamrta. This Krsna is mythological, but not necessarily unreal. He exists in our minds and thus is real. A lot of Krishna Prem's writing, I've found, were it not for the word "Krishna" sprinkled throughout could be mistaken for that of an advaitin. He seems to reject "dry" advaita but seems to lean more towards the non-dualist side of acintya bheda abheda. "Do not vex yourself with disputes as to personality and impersonality. Personality has no meaning apart from its polar opposite Impersonality and vice versa. They are mental terms and must always be linked together in thought. To overstress one in consciousness is to be haunted by a malignant ghost of the other." (Yogi Sri Krishnaprem) He also emphasises the paramatma more that one might expect from an initiated Gaudiya Vaisnava. From the same text (New Light): "It is … in the heart of Man all the Gods exist together in all the almost infinite variety of their Divine modes of being. There in the heart are all the great Elemental Powers…" Hi Jon (Sleepingjiva), Thanks for the commentary. I have not read Krishna Prema extensively, but what I have read I have generally liked. I love his comment, for instance, on the Bhagavad-gita: "Though the author is unknown (for we can hardly accept the view that it was, as we have it, spoken by the historical Krishna on the battlefield of Kuruksetra) ..." Does the fact that Krishna did not really speak the Gita disqualify it as a source of spiritual wisdom? Of course not. Perhaps, Krishna Prema and I are saying the same thing. His remark seemed to me dismissive of history or of interest in historical fact, but perhaps it was only critical of the belief that nothing is real that is not an historic fact. The Krishna we know is trans-historical, the product of the imaginations of hundreds of bhaktas dating back some 2500 years. The Krishna of the Mahabharata is different from the Krishna of the Harivamsa or from the Krishna of the Bhagavata, yet there is also a continuity between them. I doubt that Krishna Prema ever read much of the Goswami literature. His source texts were the Gita and the Upanisads, maybe the Mahabharata. Maybe he was primarily a Santa bhakta, more Advaitic than Dvaitic. Today we are more Dvaitic than Advaitic. It is hard to strike an even balance. It reminds me of the rock song through which Krsna first entered my consciousness: "You Get Brighter Everyday" by the Incredible String Band (1960s): "I know you belong to everybody, but you can't deny that I'm You (Krsna)." I've always been a little ruffled by that last bit, but it is true! We are him, just not the totality of him. |
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Post by meeno8 on Jun 18, 2021 14:45:09 GMT -6
Considering the multiverse or parallel universes theory, which physicists are currently taking quite seriously: Perhaps that 'history' of the Ramayana, Mahabharata, et al is actually happening 'somewhere else', and those seers with the power to see them have transmitted the accounts of those events to us here in our slice of the multiverse. Food for thought, or should I say 'prasad for the soul'?
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Post by meeno8 on Jun 19, 2021 8:32:13 GMT -6
From The God Equation by Michio Kaku:
Perhaps the three-dimensional world we experience is just a shadow of the real world, which is actually ten-or eleven-dimensional. When we move in the three dimensions of space, we experience our real selves actually moving in ten or eleven dimensions. When we walk down the street, our shadow follows us and moves like us, except the shadow exists in two dimensions. Likewise, perhaps we are shadows moving in three dimensions, but our real selves are moving in ten or eleven dimensions.
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So, perhaps there is our 3 dimensional history across the 4th dimension of time in space/time, and the higher history in 10 or 11 dimensions. More things to ponder, I suppose. BTW: 10 and 11 dimensions are an integral part of the string theories of physics currently in the conversation and waiting to be supported by actual experiments (or not).
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Post by meeno8 on Jun 19, 2021 8:38:23 GMT -6
I don't see this as some sort of curve-fitting exercise to make beliefs a reality (or making the mental Krishna someone more concrete and a person that incarnated on earth millenia ago). Rather, just looking at the question from multiple angles in an attempt to penetrate the mysteries it evokes for us. Nor is my view an attempt to contradict that of Nitaiji's on the subject. It could be both points of view are actually valid simultanously (acintya).
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Jon
Junior Member
Posts: 51
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Post by Jon on Apr 26, 2022 1:20:43 GMT -6
A quick piece of shameless self-promotion copied from the Nitai's World thread: I've just created a Facebook page for my ongoing biography of Sri Krishna Prem, to which I have yet to invite any Facebook friends, so it's just me and my wife who have "liked it" for now! If there is any interest in following it, please do: www.facebook.com/srikrsnaprema |
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