Back To Prabhupada, Issue 47, Spring 2015, Quotes, Notes & News
If one wishes to drive a car, one first determines how it works, and then drives it. Otherwise, if one attempts to drive it without any knowledge of how it works, then one may crash. This is the rational and sane approach to any situation. To act in ignorance and attempt to figure out what should be done after one has done it is, of course, doing things back to front. Yet, this is exactly what the supposedly most spiritually advanced persons on the whole planet, the ISKCON gurus and GBCs, have been doing. After having run a guru program for almost 40 years, they are now going to figure out what they should actually have been doing all along! Can 50% of the population, females, be gurus? Should disciples be able to initiate in the physical presence of their gurus? How should diksa and siksa gurus work in ISKCON? The GBC, the majority of whom are also diksa gurus, admit that they have absolutely no clue what the answers to these questions are - but they do hope to figure them out some day, with progress to be reviewed at least "annually"!:
"Guru Related Research [Statement] Based on the sacred siddhanta of guru-tattva, and with a positive and enthusiastic spirit, the GBC undertakes the responsibility to provide for present and future generations of devotees, a comprehensive and inclusive understanding that delineates how diksa- and siksa-gurus unitedly work within the framework of ISKCON. In the meantime the existing resolutions and proposals concerning (a) Vaisnavi diksa-gurus and (b) disciples initiating in the physical presence of their initiating guru, are held in abeyance until these roles are defined within the above-mentioned comprehensive research. The progress of that effort as regards these resolutions will be reviewed annually until its conclusion, to which the GBC is steadfastly dedicated to accomplish."
(GBC Resolution 310, 2015)
This back-to-front approach is characteristic of the insanity that pervades the degraded age in which we live, called "Kali-yuga":
"Therefore, by the influence of the age of Kali, everywhere, politically, socially or religiously, everything is topsy-turvy, and therefore for the sane man it is all regrettable."
(SB, 1.16.22, emphases added)
The GBC's resolution stating that it will reverse its decision to allow disciples to initiate in the physical presence of their initiating guru was discussed in the last issue of BTP (please see "The Law of Disciplic Convenience - 1"; "The Law of Disciplic Convenience - 2"). And in BTP 44, in "Guru-Tattva Basics" ("Guru-Tattva Basics - 1"; "Guru-Tattva Basics - 2"), we had explained how ISKCON gurus are not even able to agree on the very basics of what it means to be guru, with some of them fighting over whether females should be allowed to become diksa gurus. This ignorance has now been made official with the GBC resolution stating that their previous resolutions on "Vaisnavi diksa-gurus" will also be suspended, until they have figured out what a guru actually is!
Yet, despite all this fundamental ignorance, the GBC still insists that they definitely know that Srila Prabhupada cannot be the guru, while many dozens of current ISKCON diksa gurus should definitely be gurus! No sane person would consider this guru program, built on such ignorance, as being based on knowledge. Yet, such an ignorant guru program has been allowed to continue, and will still be allowed to continue. For the desire to be diksa guru in ISKCON is stronger than the desire to act in knowledge and do the right thing.
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