Text COM:2516976 (544 lines) [W1]
From:      Harsi (das) HKS (Timisoara - RO)
Date:      30-Jul-99 10:36 +0200
To:        ICSD (ISKCON Commission social/economic development) [759]
To:        ISKCON India (news & discussion) [2457]
To:        (Krsna) Katha [2606]
To:        Varnasrama development [11623]
Cc:        Granddisciples (of Srila Prabhupada) [2947]
Subject:   Varnasrama and ISKCON - the Unfulfilled Mission -
------------------------------------------------------------
"Since the time Prabhupada began speaking extensively about implementing
varnasrama dharma, there has been much discussion in ISCKON on the way to
go about it. I can report that there is still little, if any, consensus."

"I also have my own views on the application of varnasrama-dharma, for I too
have thought about the subject, but I assure you, that whatever I speak or
write will not go uncontested by someone else in ISKCON."

"Nevertheless, I will venture here to propose the major reasons why ISKCON
is having such a difficult time coming to grips with this matter. The first
and foremost is that ISKCON put it starkly--has no brain. Or, at least the
brain it has is underdeveloped."

"A reporter asked, why have you come to the West? I have come, Prabhupada
replied, to give you a brain. Your society, he continued, is headless."

                    ISKCON and Varnasrama-Dharma:
                       A Mission Unfulfilled

                       Ravindra Svarupa dasa

A paper presented at the Conference 30 Jahre ISKCON-Deutschland (Germany)
Kln, 29 January, 1999

On the eleventh of July, 1966, in New York, Srila Prabhupada incorporated
the International Society for Krishna Consciousness. By then, Prabhupada had
already discovered an audience for his exposition of Srimad Bhagavatam,
which he characterized as a cultural presentation for the respiritualization
of the entire human society (S. Bh. Canto 1, preface). Now, in a further
step toward the culture of a respiritualization, he established ISKCON.
ISKCON was to be that exemplary society within which the culture of Srimad
Bhagavatam would be realized and by which it would be spread to the rest of
the world.

While this understanding of ISKCON has always been bedrock truth to its
members, it is a fact that over ISKCON,s thirty-three years, their ideas of
what exactly ISKCON is, in terms of its internal articulation, and of how it
should relate itself to the surrounding society have been fluid. The ideas
of its members have undergone changes. It seems that even Prabhupda,s ideas
changed.

The reason for this unsettled state has to do with the accommodations theory
must make to reality whenever it would actualize itself in practice.
Prabhupda,s own tradition recognizes the need for practical accommodation
by the maxim that even absolute truth must be fine-tuned to the relativities
of desa-kala-patra -- the circumstantial environments of place, object and
time (S. Bh.1.6.26-30, purport). The often hard-won expertise in doing this
is what we call a wisdom (in Sanskrit, vijnana). In the application of
principle to practice we frequently must have recourse to the method of a
trial-and-error. You learn from experience, Prabhupda is often quoted as
saying. And experience means you make mistakes.

We followers of Prabhupada have been trying to find ways to establish what
Prabhupda called an ideal society within the modern world. I hope to
acquaint you, in the time aloted me, with some of the history of our
experience and of our mistakes. I hope you will also find exhibited herein
the beginnings of a little hard-won wisdom. I also hope you will gain a fair
idea of some of the difficulties we are confronting.

In order for you to understand these matters, you need to become acquainted
with two contrasting social ideals or models transmitted to us by Srila
Prabhupada. The first is that of a society of Vaisnavas, of transcendental,
liberated devotees who conduct themselves spontaneously in accord with the
principles called santana-dharma. The second is that of a society of
materially conditioned human beings who strictly conducted themselves in
obedience to the injunctions of the Vedas under the system called
varnasrama-dharma.

To understand both systems, you need to be clear about what is meant when we
say that someone is bound or condition, on the one hand, and liberated or
transcendental, on the other. This is presented clearly in the
Bhagavad-gt. (The entire fourteenth chapter is devoted to this
exposition.) To be a bound or conditioned soul means to be bound or
conditions by the three gunas, or modes of material nature; they are termed
sattva-guna, the mode of goodness or purity; rajo-guna, the mode of passion;
and tamo-guna, the mode of ignorance or darkness.

 The three modes are most readily recognizable in the tripartite cycle of
nature: We see that things come into being, they endure for a while, and
then they undergo destruction. Then the products of destruction furnish the
raw material for a new phase of creation as the cycle begins again. In the
Vedic understanding, these three phases exemplify fundamental categories for
understanding the material world. When things are being created, nature is
said to be acting in the mode of passion, rajo-guna. When things are being
maintained, nature is acting in the mode of goodness, sattva-guna. And when
things are undergoing destruction, nature is acting in the mode of
ignorance, tamo-guna.

According to the Bhagavad-gita, these same modes also function to determine,
or condition, the human personality. Thus we have a three-fold psychological
typology. The mode of goodness is manifest by an attitude that is detached,
dispassionate and interested in knowledge for its own sake. The mode of
passion is evident in the hankering and longings that impel strenuous
efforts to obtain objects of desire. The mode of ignorance is manifest in
apathy, indifference, obliviousness, and bewilderment. When, for example,
consciousness is conditioned by sattva-guna, it will be alert and attentive
(toward nearly any subject presented) and, at the same time, detached and
disinterested. Consciousness condition by rajo-guna is excited and narrowly
focused upon the object of desire. Consciousness conditioned by tama-guna is
unaware, inattentive, easily distracted, and disposed toward chronic
misperception.

I suspect that most of us can recognizes these three psychological states
from our own experience. We have probably spent some time in each of the
modes. For all three modes are present in each person, and among them there
is always a competition for supremacy, as the Bhagavad-gita says (14.10).
Nevertheless, there is a tendency for a particular mode or combination of
modes to predominate naturally in a given individual, conducting him in its
own programmatic manner to its characteristic end.

Thus, the Bhagavad-gita says that the mode of goodness conditions a person
to happiness or satisfaction, and it results in knowledge. The mode of
passion conditions one to selfishly motivated activity, and it results in
misery (because passionate desires never cease multiplying and goading us
into action, never producing satisfaction). The mode of ignorance binds one
to delusion, and it results in systematic delusion or madness.

Prabhupada characterized the three pure types of the modes like this: One is
happy, another is very active, and another is helpless (Bh. G. 14.6,
purport).

We have all of us encountered various organized structures of thought
whether cultural, philosophical, religious, scientific, or
ideological--which present to us systems of abstract categories by means of
which we can apprehend and understand the world. When we school ourselves in
such a system often trying to get inside of it by the method of sympathetic
projection or "Hineinfhlung" (germ.) we sometimes find that the system
illuminates or makes intelligible certain areas of experience that we had
not before particularly noticed or considered relevant. If we then apply
that system to our practical endeavors and find ourselves newly enabled to
deal with the world in a manner that seems consistently fruitful and
productive, we award the system that highest of accolades, truth.

 Thus it was for me and many devotees with the Bhagavad-gita, as Prabhupada
presented it. I looked at society--and at myself--through the lenses of the
Bhagavad-gita, and, once the gunas had been pointed out, I could see them
plainly. While these categories might not be fruitful to the endeavors of an
atomic scientist or an agronomist, say, they were indeed germane to the goal
of most who were attracted to ISKCON: We were seeking liberation,
transcendence. And transcendence meant, concretely, to transcend the modes
of material nature.

This was possible, Prabhupada said, for anyone:

. . . if one wants, he can develop, by practice, the mode of goodness and
thus defeat the modes of ignorance and passion. . . . Although there are
these three modes of material nature, if one is determined he can be blessed
by the mode of goodness, and by transcending the mode of goodness he can be
situated in pure goodness, which is called the vasudeva state, a state in
which one can understand the science of God.
(Bh. G. 14.10, purport)

The initial result of the proper culture of Krishna consciousness should be
the disappearance in the practitioner of the symptoms of the modes of
ignorance and passion. Lust, greed, anger, and the like should vanish from
the heart. In this way, one becomes established in the mode of goodness. The
mode of goodness is the existential condition necessary for a person to be
able to understand and experience spiritual reality. Thus the mode of
goodness is the material platform, the launching pad, as it were, from which
one can make the final voyage into transcendence, where there is neither
creation nor destruction, but everlasting existence, or, in other words,
pure, unalloyed sattva.

In this way, the theory of the modes provided devotees a road map of the
material world, with the way out clearly marked.

The theory of the modes also provided the basis for another set of
categories, that of the four varas. Just as the human body is equipped by
nature with head, arms, belly, and legs, so the social body is constituted
in the same natural way by the four occupational groups: the brahmanas who
comprise the thinkers and teachers (head); the ksatriyas, the governors and
protectors (arms); the vaisyas, the producers and traders (belly); and the
sudras, the workers and general assistants (legs). Every society requires
the specific contribution of these specialists in thinking, governing ,
producing, and working. Krishna states in the Bhagavad-gita (4.13) that this
ordering is generated by God, such that each person is naturally disposed
toward a particular category by virtue of gua, or controlling mode of
nature, and karma, specialized activity and means of livelihood.

The system in which guna and karma thus determine varna Prabhupada calls
daiva-varnasrama-dharma, the divinely established system. This godly system
he explicitly contrasts to the standard Hindu caste system in which birth is
the sole determinant of membership; Prabhupada calls that
asura-varnasrama-dharma, or the diabolically created system (see, e.g., the
purport to Cc. Madhya 3.6). Prabhupada and his predecessor teachers
condemned this hereditary system as a corruption of the authentic system,
viewing it as the major source of social injustice and turmoil in India. In
several lectures Prabhupda even traces the cause of the partitioning of
India back to the injustices spawned by the degraded principle of ereditary
brahmanism (see, e.g., lecture on S. Bh.1.2.2: Rome, May 26, 1974).

 A brahmana must factually be in the mode of goodness, for varna is
determined by guna. A good way to think of the system is to imagine the
guas distributed along a continuum, with goodness at one end, ignorance at
the other, and passion in the middle. At a somewhat arbitrary line when
goodness become sufficiently mixed with passion the demarcation between
brahmanas and ksatriyas occurs. Similarly, when passion becomes sufficiently
mixed with ignorance, there is a demarcation between ksatriyas and vaisyas.
When ignorance sufficiently predominates over passion there is a division
between vaisyas and sudras. The individuals situated in the boundary regions
could, in principle, be occupationally engaged on one side or the other,
according to variables such as education, training, or aptitude.

The categories of the gunas and of the varnas are important in understanding
what Prabhupada conceived as a primary social mission of ISKCON. Once in the
early 70s I was present when Prabhupada was interviewed by  the press after
his arrival at a New York airport. A reporter asked, why have you come to
the West? I have come, Prabhupada replied, to give you a brain. Your
society, he continued, is headless. Using the analogy of the human body, he
explained the articulation of human society into four varnas. He then
asserted that modern Western society was malformed. There are a few vaisyas
and everyone else is sudra. In other words, those now engaged in research
and education, in government and defense, are, knowingly or unknowingly, in
the employ of a handful of vaisyas. (Prabhupada,s perception is perhaps
supported by the report that in America, five percent of the families now
control ninety percent of the wealth.) There are no proper brahmanas or
ksatriyas.

Prabhupada,s intention was to re-create a class of genuine brahmanas. This
would help rectify the deformities of modern society and ameliorate the
spiritual, psychological, social, political, and ecological problems spawned
by a hypertrophy of economic development and other outgrowths of
unrestrained rajo-guna. Prabhupda notes: Modern civilization is considered
to be advanced in the standard of the mode of passion. Formerly, the
advanced condition was considered to be in the mode of goodness (Bh. G.
14.7, purport). Genuine brahmanas, he hoped, would help reset the priorities
of advanced civilization.

Yet Prabhupada,s mission of creating brahmanas was in a sense derivative, a
kind of automatic by-product of the primary mission of producing Vaisnavas.
The word vaisnava in the strictest sense denotes a pure devotee of God, one
who is accordingly transcendental to all the modes of nature. Brhmanas,
however, are conditioned by the mode of goodness, and Prabhupada wanted to
produce liberated souls. Such liberated Vaisnavas are more advanced than
even brahmanas. Nevertheless, his Vaisnavas would function socially
primarily as brahmanas.

It should be recognized that historically speaking the Vaisnava traditions
in India all have propagated a socially and spiritually radical teaching.
Vaisnavism fostered the spiritual enfranchisement of previously
disenfranchised groups, and, in so doing, undercut the spiritual (and
social) prerogatives of the hereditary brahminical caste. Hence in the
Bhagavad-gita (9.32) Krishna cites groups traditionally considered
unqualified for spiritual advancement he mentions women, vaisyas, and sudras
and says that by practicing devotion to Him they can attain the supreme
destination. In the Bhagavatam it is stated that even an outcaste (candala
dog-eater), if engaging in devotional practices, becomes immediately
qualified to perform Vedic sacrifice (traditionally, of course, the monopoly
of brahmana males)(S. Bh.3.33.6).

Such statements reflect the conviction that devotional service to Krishna,
or bhakti-yoga, is so spiritually powerful that it can quickly uplift even
the most morally and spiritually debased people. Thus facilitated, one does
not need to spend many lifetimes transmigrating up the caste hierarchy to
reach the brahminical platform. Bhakti-yoga can take dras and those even
less qualified and transforms them into Vaisnavas and brahmanas.
Prabhupada,s own Bengali Vaisnava tradition, as reformed by Caitanya at the
beginning of the sixteenth century, paid great respect to this spiritual
egalitarianism. So schooled, Prabhupada came to try this principle out in
the West--in the United States in the 1960s. It was, of necessity, a kind of
experiment.

 Prabhupada discovered, rather to his surprise, that the main audience for
his teachings tended to be drawn from the counterculture, and Prabhupada was
not impressed by the counterculture. He described hippies in various places
as morose (S. Bh. 4.25.11, purport), distressed, wretched, unclean, without
shelter or food, (S. Bh. 4.25.5, purport), irresponsible and unregulated (S.
Bh. 5.6.10, purport), lying idle, without any production, (Bh. G. lecture,
1976), and so on. We should recognize this as a precise catalogue of the
characteristics of tamo-guna, the mode of ignorance. When in 1971 Prabhupada
remarked to Kenneth Keating, the then american ambassador to India, that his
service to America was Aturning hippies into happies (Letter to Damodara: 3
December, 1971), Prabhupada was in a witticism stating that he was taking
people in the mode of ignorance and elevating them to the mode of goodness.

Early after his arrival in America, Prabhupada wrote of his mission in these
terms:

Though a person be even the most sinful man, he can at once be purified by
systematic contact with a pure Vaisnava. A Vaisnava, therefore, can accept a
bona fide disciple from any part of the world without any consideration of
caste and creed and promote him by regulative principles to the status of a
pure Vaisnava who is transcendental to brahminical culture. The system of
caste, or varnasrama-dharma, is no longer regular even amongst the so-called
followers of the system. Nor is it now possible to reestablish the
institutional function in the present context of social, political and
economic revolution. Without any reference to the particular custom of a
country, one can be accepted to the Vaisnava cult spiritually, and there is
no hindrance in the transcendental process.
(S. Bh. 2.4.18, purport)


Here, Prabhupada expresses his doubts about the feasibility of a varnasrama
system. Yet even without it, he thought he could produce Vaisnavas who could
perform the brahminical function of spiritual guide to the people. He makes
the same points emphatically in a early Bhagavad-gita lecture:

So at the present moment, there is no possibility of persons following the
principles of varnasrama-dharma, either here or anywhere. . . . .Therefore
this is the panacea, to engage everyone in Krsna consciousness, chanting
Hare Krsna. He comes above the highest principle of brahmanism. This is the
greatest gift to the humanity, that even [if] he is in . . . the most
degraded position, he can be raised to the highest position simply by
chanting. This is the only remedy. Now you cannot again introduce this
system of varnasrama. It is not possible. But if one takes to Krsna
consciousness, automatically he becomes immediately a brahmana and above the
brahmana. A Vaisnava is above the brahmana.
(Lecture on Bh. G. 3.18-30: Los Angeles, 30 December 1968)

It is also clear that by 1974, Prabhupda had changed his mind about
instituting the varnasrama-system. One major reason for his doing so is
clearly disclosed in this 1977 conversation concerning a sannyasi who had
fallen down from his celibacy vows:

Prabhupada: Just like our (name withheld). He was not fit for sannyasa but
he was given sannaysa. And five women he was attached, and he disclosed.
Therefore varnasrama-dharma is required. Simply show-bottle will not do. So
the varnasrama-dharma should be introduced all over the world, and--
Satsvarpa: Introduced starting with ISKCON community?
Prabhupada: Yes. Yes. Brahmana, ksatriyas. There must be regular education.
Hari-Sauri: But in our community, if the--being as we're training up as
Vaisnavas--
Prabhupda: Yes.
Hari-Sauri: --Then how will we be able to make divisions in our society?
 Prabhupada: Vaisnava is not so easy. The varnasrama-dharma should be
established to become a Vaisnava. It is not so easy to become Vaisnava.
Hari-Sauri: No, it's not a cheap thing.
Prabhupada: Yes. Therefore this should be made. Vaisnava, to become
Vainava, is not so easy. If Vaisnava, to become Vaisnava is so easy, why so
many fall down, fall down? It is not easy.

And later in the same conversation:

Hari-Sauri: Where will we introduce the varnasrama system, then?
Prabhupada: In our society, amongst our members.
Hari-Sauri: But then if everybody's being raised to the brahminical
platform--
Prabhupada: Not everybody. Why you are misunderstanding? Varnasrama, not
everybody brahmana.
Hari-Sauri: No, but in our society practically everyone is being raised to
that platform. So then one might ask what is---
Prabhupada: That is-- Everybody is being raised, but they're falling down.
(Room Conversation: Mayapura, 14 February 1977)

It had become clear to Prabhupada, after some years of experience in the
West, that the elevation of his followers to the brahminical platform of
goodness, what to speak of the Vaisnava transcendental platform, was not
going to happen universally or swiftly. His earliest hopes were unfulfilled.

Since the time Prabhupada began speaking extensively about implementing
varnasrama dharma, there has been much discussion in ISCKON on the way to go
I also have my own views on the application of varnasrama-dharma, for I too
have thought about the subject, but I assure you, that whatever I speak or
write will not go uncontested by someone else in ISKCON.

Nevertheless, I will venture here to propose the major reasons why ISKCON is
having such a difficult time coming to grips with this matter. The first and
foremost is that ISKCON put it starkly--has no brain. Or, at least the brain
it has is underdeveloped.

 You will recall that Prabhupada originally thought that ISKCON would
perform the brahminical function for the rest of society I have come to give
you a brain. Prabhupada based this effort on books. By books he could
transmit the Vedic heritage, and through books he could instruct and train
large numbers of followers, who, by studying his writings systematically and
practicing their teaching, could advance to the mode of goodness and beyond.
At the same time, by having those same followers distribute the books to
others, Prabhupada would engage them in preaching and teaching to the
general public. Book distribution is one type of sankirtana, congregational
glorification of God, and sankirtana is described in scripture as the
particular form of sacrifice authorized for this age. Moreover, devotees
would be able to maintain themselves and their activities by donations
received though book distribution. In this way, ISKCON members would
performed the six engagements enjoined upon a brahmana: yajana, yajana,
pahana, paihana, dana and pratigraha. A brahmana performs sacrifice and
engages others in sacrifice, studies the Vedas and teaches the Vedas,
receives in charity and gives in charity.

We have already noted Prabhupada,s disappointment when many devotees turned
out to have great difficult in steadily following the strict principles of
Krishna consciousness. Another, related, difficulty, was also noted by
Prabhupada. For example, this exchange took place during a 1972 lecture:

Prabhupada: Similarly, the GBC member means they will see that in every
temple these books are very thoroughly being read and discussed and
understood and applied in practical life. That is wanted, not to see the
vouchers only, "How many books you have sold, and how many books are in the
stock?" That is secondary. . . . . Now, suppose you go to sell some book and
if somebody says, "You have read this book? Can you explain this verse?"
then what you will say? You will say, "No. It is for you. It is not for me.
I have to take money from you. That's all." Is that very nice answer?
Devotee: No, Srila Prabhupada.
Prabhupada: Then? "We have written this book for your reading, not for our
reading. We are simply collect money." That's all.
(Lecture on S. Bh. 2.9.2: Melbourne, 5 April 1972)

Prabhupada often brought up the point when a devotee seemed ignorant of
verse:

Do you remember, any one of you, this verse from the Bhagavad-gita? Eh? But
you don't read. So I am writing all these books simply for selling, not for
reading. This is not good. And if somebody asks you, "You are so much eager
to sell your books. Do you read your books?" Then what you will say? "No,
sir, we don't read. We sell only. Our Guru Maharaja writes, and we sell."
That is not good business. You must read. Why I am writing so many books?
(Lecture on S. Bh. 1.16.24: Hawaii, 20 January 1974)

And, in an exchange in which Prabhupada implicitly links karma and guna in
his student:

Prabhupada: You do not read Bhagavad-gita, you are publishing for selling.
It will be read by others. We are simply to make money? These [the qualities
of a brahmana] are in the Bhagavad-gita. Don't you read it?
Devotee: Yes I read it. The qualities of a brahmana is given, along with the
qualities of all the other varnas.
Prabhupada: We have [in ISKCON] taking sacred thread [who] has qualities
less than sudra. Camaras, cobblers. Camara means expert in skin. I am white,
I am black, I am this, I am that. That is camara. Expert in skin.
(Morning Walk: Vrndavana, 16 March 1974)

 I know from my own experience how sankirtana in America tended to become
less and less of a brahmincal preaching activity and more and more of a
vaisya commercial activity, with books eventually being replaced by secular
paraphernalia. This shift from preaching to fund-raising after Srila
Prabhupada,s demise has been well documented by E. Burke Rochford in Hare
Krishna in America (New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1986). While
the movement prospered financially, it declined spiritually. Prabhupada,s
misgivings proved sound.

In 1987 ISKCON in America fortunately changed course. The North American
leaders resolved to stop all sales of secular items by the temples and to
return them to what was, in effect, a brahminical mode of maintenance,
depending mainly upon donations from the congregation and working residents.
All the temples in North America quickly went broke.  However, there has
been since then a slow but steady recovery, both spiritual and financial.
Both depend, in my view, on turning the temples into exemplary brahminical
institutions. The brief history I have recounted illustrates the truth and
the prescience--of Prabhupada,s perception.

Let me note another important indication of ISKCON,s failure to organize
brahminical training. In 1976 Prabhupada ordered a gradated system of
examinations to be instituted in ISKCON. To this day this order is
unfulfilled.

This is from a letter Prabhupada had his secretary send out the GBC members
to conveying Prabhupada,s directions:


Re: Examinations for awarding titles of Bhakti-sastri, Bhakti-vaibhava,
Bhaktivedanta and Bhakti-sarvabhauma.

. . . .Srila Prabhupada has requested me to write you in regard to the above
examinations which he wishes to institute. Here in India many persons often
criticize our sannyasis and brahmanas as being unqualified due to
insufficient knowledge of the scriptures. Factually, there are numerous
instances when our sannyasis and brahmanas have fallen down often due to
insufficient understanding of the philosophy. This should not be a point of
criticism nor a reason for falldown, since Srila Prabhupada has mercifully
made the most essential scriptures available to us in his books. The problem
is that not all the devotees are carefully studying the books, the result
being a fall down or at least unsteadiness.

His Divine Grace therefore wishes to institute examinations to be given to
all prospective candidates for sannyasa and brahmana initiation. In addition
he wishes that all present sannyasis and brahmanas also pass the
examination. Awarding of these titles will be based upon the following
books:

Bhakti-sastri - Bhagavad-gita, Nectar of Devotion, Nectar of Instruction,
Isopanisad, Easy Journey To Other Planets, and all other small paperbacks,
as well as Arcana-paddhati (a book to be compiled by Nitai Prabhu based on
Hari-bhakti-vilasa on Deity worship)

Bhakti-vaibhava - All of the above plus the first six cantos of
Srimad-Bhagavatam

Bhaktivedanta - All of the above plus cantos 7 through 12 of
Srimad-Bhagavatam

Bhakti-sarvabhauma - All the above plus the entire Caitanya-caritamrta

Anyone wishing to be initiated as a brahmana will have to pass the
Bhaktisastri exam and anyone wishing to take sannyasa will have to pass the
Bhaktivaibhava examination as well. This will prevent our Society from
degrading to the level of so many other institutions where, in order to
maintain the Temple, they accept all third class men as brahmanas. Any
sannyasis or brahmanas already initiated who fail to pass the exams will be
considered low class or less qualified. Anyone wishing to be 2nd initiated
will sit for examination once a year at Mayapur. Answers will be in essay
form and authoritative quotations will be given a bigger score. During the
exams books may not be consulted.

 Srila Prabhupada wishes to begin this program at this year's Mayapur
meeting. He requests that you all send your opinions and comments here
immediately so that everything may be prepared in time.
       (Letter to all Governing Body Commissioners: Nellore, South India, 6
January 1976)


A Bhakti-sastri examination was held in Mayapura in 1977 (a year late), but
after Prabhupada,s demise later that same year, the examinations soon
disappeared. Only within in the last five years or so have Bhakti-sastri
courses and examinations been regularized in some places in ISKCON. To this
day neither curricula nor examinations exist for the other three degrees.

Finally, let me briefly note a second  major reason ISKCON has had
difficulty understanding and instituting varnasrama-dharma. This is the fact
that the system can neither be understood nor practiced within the material
and conceptual framework of an industrial society. Prabhupada taught that
the modern industrial economy was artificial, unnatural, and  harmful to the
human and non-human world. In one way or another it would one day have to be
sized-down and scaled back. Humanity would have to develop a new economy in
which the family would be restored as a unit of production and in which
local self-sufficiency most importantly in the matter of food supply--would
become a major value. Therefore, from the very beginning Prabhupada wanted
ISKCON to establish self-sufficient, rural communities, not only to
construct the material basis necessary for varnasrama-dharma, but also to
provide working examples of an alternative when the inevitable transition to
a neo-agrarian economy began to impose itself upon the industrialized world.

ISKCON has established a number of these rural communities in advanced
industrial countries. Many devotees have moved to them to learn to live off
the land and practice plain living and high thinking. Yet over the course of
time these projects have evolved largely into suburban-style Hare Krishna
communities. We still await the self-sufficient agrarian community in
practice. Although there are social and economic reasons why this ideal has
failed in practice, I suspect a necessary condition for its future success
will be the contribution of genuine brahmanas, whose creation is still
ISKCON unfulfilled mission.

My proposal, therefore, for establishing varnasrama-dharma in ISKCON, and
even in the society at large, is first of all to take the first step and do
everything needed to form a proper community of brahmanas. According to
Bhagavad-gita (18.42), two of the traits evinced by brahmanas are jnana and
vijnana, that is, they have genuine knowledge of  the Absolute Truth and
they posses the wisdom to apply that knowledge appropriately. If this first
step is taken, and ISKCON is thus given a brain, then I am sure we shall be
in a better position to know where to go further.

As I speak today I am happy to report that a movement is gaining strength
among the leaders to make ISKCON an organization primarily dedicated to
education and training. If we continue in this way, I am sure we will become
eligible to receive Prabhupada,s legacy and empowered to convey it to the
rest of humankind.
(Text COM:2516976) -----------------------------------------
