Vera:
Hah! I forgot about the Immigration Fraud!
There is of course more-dare I post?
VVVD

Quote

There is of course more-dare I post?

VVVD

Guru Food Foibles - Share Your Stories

[forum.culteducation.com]

"Tell me what you eat and I will tell you who you are".

Jean-Anthelme Brillat Saverin -- author of the first modern book of on food psychology.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/21/2015 02:34AM by corboy.

Corboy note: The Bhagavad Gita is utilized by the many Krishna
bhakti sects, including those of Srila Prabhupada ('Hare Krishnas')
and Butler's Science of Identity, a scismatic faction of the Hare
Krishnas.

Tulsi Gabbard took her oath of office upon the Bhagavad Gita.

[www.google.com]

This text can and has been used to support a multitude of agendas
including to regard compassion as delusion and weakness if compassion
keeps you from doing your 'duty.'

"..The text of the Gita has been embedded in one political setting after another, changing its meaning again and again over the centuries."


Review by Wendy Doniger of The Bhagavad Gita: An Autobiography
by R.H. Davis

[webcache.googleusercontent.com]

Quote


How did Indian tradition transform the Bhagavad Gita (the “Song of God”) into a bible for pacifism, when it began life, sometime between the third century BC and the third century CE, as an epic argument persuading a warrior to engage in a battle, indeed, a particularly brutal, lawless, internecine war? It has taken a true gift for magic—or, if you prefer, religion, particularly the sort of religion in the thrall of politics that has inspired Hindu nationalism from the time of the British Raj to Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi today.

The Gita (as it is generally known to its friends) occupies eighteen chapters of book 6 of the Mahabharata, an immense (over 100,000 couplets) Sanskrit epic. The text is in the form of a conversation between the warrior Arjuna, who, on the eve of an apocalyptic battle, hesitates to kill his friends and family on the other side, and the incarnate god Krishna, who acts as Arjuna’s charioteer (a low-status job roughly equivalent to a bodyguard) and persuades him to do it.

In his masterful new biography of the Gita—part of an excellent Princeton series dedicated to the lives of great religious books—Richard Davis, a professor of religion at Bard College, shows us, in subtle and stunning detail, how the text of the Gita has been embedded in one political setting after another, changing its meaning again and again over the centuries.

For what the Gita was in its many pasts is very different from what it is today: the best known of all the philosophical and religious texts of Hinduism.

Quote


Bhakti and Caste

In the Gita, bhakti—the path of devotion to the God—lacks the passion that is the hallmark of bhakti in the later worship of a different sort of Krishna, the playful child Krishna and the erotic adolescent Krishna, who lived among cowherds and, more particularly, cowherd women (Gopis).

This Krishna, who first appears in the Sanskrit Bhagavata Purana in the tenth century, soon largely eclipsed the warrior Krishna of the Gita, who was well known to most Hindus. And this more passionate devotion to the God Krishna, which gave religious validity to low-caste cowherds and women, had a social inclusiveness that clashed with the Gita’s support of caste dharma, or duties entailed by being born into a particular caste.

For though, as Davis points out, the Gita says that if you love god you can neglect your duties (dharma), there is another famous passage that Davis does not mention: the duties of the four classes are distributed according to the qualities they are naturally born with. It is better to do your own duty (your sva-dharma, that is, the task assigned to your caste), even badly, than to do someone else’s well.

Krishna also says, “I created the system of the four classes, differentiated by their qualities and their inborn actions.” Class (varna, in Sanskrit) is not to be confused with caste (jati). Class is something that India shares with most other civilizations and that is, in India, largely theoretical, the first three of the four classes, called the twice-born, being roughly equivalent to the Three Estates in France—a clergy, a royalty/military class, a workforce (plus the fourth category of servants)—and therefore relatively fluid. Caste, by contrast, is unique to India, very real indeed, much more specific than class (there are hundreds of castes), and has always strictly governed the social and religious life of Hindus. The Gita verses on the need to adhere to one’s own sva-dharma—or inborn set of duties—have been interpreted for centuries in India to justify the caste system.

And though, as Davis notes, the Gita says that God can rehabilitate sinners, he does not mention another passage in which Krishna says that he hurls people who hate him, and who sacrifice in the wrong way, into foul rebirths so that “they are deluded in rebirth after rebirth, and they never reach me.” Hindus who revere the Krishna of the Gita are often disdainful of the cowherd Krishna, who never consigned even the worst sinner to eternal darkness. Other Hindus are proud that Krishna was a cowherd. This has been the source of an enduring tension between different communities of Hindus.

Quote

Richard Davis’s book on the Gita is more than adequately respectful: he leans over backward to avoid offending Hindus who revere the Gita. But leaning backward is not always the best posture in which to do scholarship.

Admirably complete in every other respect, both rock-solid and fascinating (not an easy trick to pull off), Davis’s book is surprisingly silent on the issue of caste. Hindus nowadays who adhere to Sanatana Dharma and/or Hindutva are very sensitive about caste and often deny its existence; they have made serious attempts to remove any mention of caste from textbooks, in India and in the diaspora, and they go to great lengths to interpret the Gita in such a way that it does not support the caste system. And here is where “respect” gets in Davis’s way. Nowhere does he even mention the word “caste”; he speaks only of class, which is a very different matter.

One of the joys of Davis’s book is its rich quotation of the frequently memorable, often hilariously stupid, and more often politically incorrect things that people actually said in discussing the Gita; but when Davis writes about Ambedkar, defender of the Dalit caste, he abandons his usual practice of direct quotation and merely paraphrases him, so that Ambedkar seems to speak not about caste at all but about “the hierarchical class system favored by Brahmins” and “the brahmanic social order.” So, too, Davis’s only reference to the contemporary political use of the Gita is the statement that, in July 2008, Sonia Gandhi, president of the Congress Party, dedicated a statue of Arjuna and Krishna in the chariot (the standard icon of the Gita) in a park at Kurukshetra, which Hindus regard as the site of the great battle.

The great virtue of Davis’s book is that he evokes so vividly the wide diversity of historical responses to the Gita: the flaw is that he does not show how the cumulative and divisive tensions between the responses of two groups of very different sorts of Hindus go a long way toward explaining the role of the Gita in the rise of Hindutva in India today

[webcache.googleusercontent.com]

Wendy Doniger is one of the world's great scholars of Hindu texts and history.

She analyses material from a strictly evidence based perspective.

She, accordingly, hated by the (Hindutva) Hindu nationalists in India.

The Bharatiya Janata Party is of this faction. And the current Prime Minister
of India, Narendra Modi, was a BJP candidate.

[www.google.com]

Hindutva, BJP banning

[www.google.com]



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 05/22/2015 09:59PM by corboy.

Ha! Apparently Butler used to mock Jimi Hendrix for his face on the Universal Form on the album cover AXIS BOLD AS LOVE.

The artist Lori Klop, who drew this has no idea how offensive this PORTRAIT OF TULSI: BOLD AS LOVE is to them. I think it is hysterical. Click on the 4th portrait down to see. (Tulsi Gabbard, from the portrait series,
I Have Something to Say, 2013)

Tulsi Gabbard by Lori Klopp from the portrait series, I Have Something to Say, 2013

Flash

The Arrest of Joseph Bismark – Japa das

The arrest of Joseph Bismark on charges of fraud is not recent, but it is an important clue for those who “follow the money” in the Chris Butler cult, Science of Identity.





Patrick Bowler, convicted drug smuggler, follows Bismark on twitter.

I have posted before about cult member, Joseph Bismark, because he suspiciously purchased a Lanikai ocean-front home for Chris Butler’s use. And, I identified Bismark in the Visual Linking of the Usual Suspects

Chris Butler lives like a drug lord in his Lanikai homes, so it was no surprise when I learned that big-time drug smuggler, Patrick Bowler, is a devotee of Jagad Guru, Chris Butler. My research into Butler’s involvement in drug money and Ti-Leaf Productions led me to New Zealand reporter, Bevan Hurley (Deputy News editor, Herald on Sunday — New Zealand Herald).

Hurley’s articles and the subsequent follow up by Hawaii Free Press have heightened the awareness of the Cult Education Institute and my own humble blog. I’ve actually been researching Joseph Bismark, owner of one of Butler’s Lanikai homes, for a long time now and it seems an opportune moment to let the press and investigators tag along for the ride. You see, it was Butler’s apparent acceptance of Bismark’s arrest that made me wonder if Chris Butler “was in on it”. That, in turn, lead me to Patrick Bowler’s drug trafficking conviction, Allan Tibby’s land development in New Zealand, etc., etc. We are talking about millions of dollars in suspicious transactions. Does that sound like spiritual people or a criminal conspiracy?

Full story plus many, many links: [flashlightonroaches.wordpress.com]

corboy Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> "..The text of the Gita has been embedded in one
> political setting after another, changing its
> meaning again and again over the centuries."
>
>
> Review by Wendy Doniger of The Bhagavad Gita: An
> Autobiography
> by R.H. Davis
>
> [webcache.googleusercontent.com]
> he:LEQJbYFF2zUJ:www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/
> 2014/dec/04/war-and-peace-bhagavad-gita/&hl=en&gl=
> us&strip=1

Thanks Corboy, for the great info on the Gita.

I love the Gita. Even though I had left the fold, the Gita continues to be my guide and inspiration. But people who embrace the Gita as a holy book (attn. Tulsi) do not understand that the Gita today is very much different from the known original Gita:
[spiritualplanet.blogspot.ca]
[vimaln.blogspot.ca]
The Gita As It Was - Rediscovering the Original Bhagavadgita
Phulgenda Sinha
ISBN : 0-8126-9024-9
ISBN : 0-8126-9025-7 (paperback)

If the Bible has been adulterated from so many interpretations, The Gita's interpolations are much more. At least the Bible's narratives are pretty much intact; the Gita's narratives have been spliced to weave into India’s changing social and political fabrics, oftentimes slanted to fit a particular belief system, the worst of which is Bhaktivedanta's. My point is Holy Books are just books. In fact, they become more of a tool for manipulation and oppression when they are declared Holy. As soon as anything becomes holy, BE SKEPTICAL. When you hear the terms pure, absolute, supreme, etc. — stay away. The saying “if too good to be true, probably it is” applies to religion as well. Like in omniscient. If Bhaktivedanta was such, how come the young Siddhaswarup was able to con him big time, so easily? He came, surrendered his disciples, gave some money, in return received initiation (got away with the biggest franchise in cult business in the 70s; probably and some prasadams on the side), then returned to Hawaii with the same disciples plus more, haha. Suddenly he's LEGIT. They must be laughing at the poor, gullible old man, who himself was too greedy to accept bribes. Even Bhaktivedanta's disciples knew this; they'd been conning him left and right. The all-knowing Holy Man was clueless, probably senile and corruptible. The Gita and the Bible are great for their messages. Much like the stories of King Arthur and the Camelot, The Iliad or even Star Wars, Any great book need not be holy to inspire, even to change lives. Just take the message, discard the rest (especially the gurus).

(Disclosure: For pathological hangers on, like the Haribols, this fact and suggestion may not apply. You can declare a stone holy, they’ll chant and dance around it like crazy. Hey, stupidity is not a crime.)



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 05/23/2015 05:42PM by dharmabum.

If anyone has difficulty understanding the process of how people
become involved in the various groups discussed on this message board,
here is a creature which can function as a visual aid.

The Angler Fish

Pictures of the Angler Fish



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 05/24/2015 10:08PM by corboy.

The Hindu caste system is more than a belief.

It has political implications.

This is why Americans need to give this matter close attention.

We need to know if our political candidates solicit our votes, yet
secretly regard us as inferior to them -- unless of course, we are
wealthy and powerful!

Srila Prabhupada, Chris Butler's guru and founder of the Hare Krishnas, gave initiates the sacred thread of Hinduism.

Prabhupada, Chris Butler's guru, was Bengali, and this was an area where people were especially mindful of caste ritual.

[books.google.com]

This thread marked ISKON initiates as Brahmins -- at least according to Prabhupada's interpretation.

So..was Chris Butler given that sacred thread?

How might this have influenced Butler's sense of self -- and that
of his disciples today?

The thread is worn by Brahmins (priestly class), Khstriya(warrors and ruler class) and Vaisyas(merchant class) -- aka the upper castes of Hinduism.

Sudras (farmers) and Dalits (the latter group regarded by upper castes as sources of pollution) could not wear the sacred thread -- and the latter two groups endured abuse from the upper castes who also exploited them and prevented them or limited them from
gaining ownership of land and thwarted their attempts to gain an education.

[www.google.com]

Why mention this?

Because Chris Butler's own guru, rila Prabhupada, founder of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKON), wore the sacred thread.

These upper castes are not merely of a higher social class. They are a superior spiritual class.

It is presumed that they deserve this privilege due to having accumulated good
karma from previous rebirths.

[www.google.com]

It appears that part of some of the initiation ceremony for male initiates
into ISKON was being given the sacred thread.

[www.iskcondesiretree.com]

Quote

Vaibhavi: When Prabhupada told me my name, I couldn't hear it and he had to repeat it a number of times. I still couldn't figure it out. Prabhupada's Bengali accent was so thick, that it sounded to me like "Boy Bubby", but I knew that couldn't be right. Halfway through the ceremony, we discovered that there were no sacred threads for the brahmana initiations. In actual fact, we didn't even know what sacred threads were, not to speak of how to make them.

I left the crowded temple and ran down the street to buy some string, and, while Prabhupada was initiating people, I was sitting there in the arena making sacred threads, copying the one that Bali-mardana had taken off himself.

One after another, the five devotees chosen to receive their second initiation came and knelt before Prabhupada, who instructed them in the art of counting and chanting the mantra.

Upananda: I was afraid of making a mistake, and watched scrutinisingly as the other devotees went up to receive their Gayatri mantras. Finally I was called up. I was so nervous my hands were shaking, and after Prabhupada showed me once, I got it wrong. Again he showed me, and again I got it wrong; such an apparently simple thing had become so difficult -- my fingers were moving haphazardly, and my mind was totally confused. Finally Srila Prabhupada said loudly: 'No!' Immediately my mind was focused and I was able to receive the mantra attentively.

Vaibhavi: I was called up to sit next to Srila Prabhupada. He started showing me how to count with my fingers, but I didn't know what I was supposed to do because I had been making the brahmana threads and hadn't been watching the rest of the ceremony. So Prabhupada kindly took hold of my hand and pressed my fingers down in the counting position with his fingers. He showed me how to count and repeat the Gayatri mantra, and asked me to repeat it word for word.

The devotees later told me: 'You're a brahmana now. You have to have a sacred thread too.' They told me to make one for myself, which I didn't, because someone told me that women didn't wear sacred threads. We didn't know much.

This meant that caste elitism was built right into the Hare Krishna sect, and this was what Chris Butler inherited.

The ugly truth about India is that these wearers of the sacred thread owe their support to the Dalits, who literally did the shit work that would contaminate the Brahmins.

The Bhagavad Gita, that text so beloved of the Krishnas, supports the caste system.

And this is the document on which Tulsi was sworn into office.

The problem is that the core texts that created the United States of America
presuppose that all men are created equal and have certain inalienable human rights.

This, friends and readers, is the opposite of what the Bhagavad Gita teachings, and is the opposite of the 'Vedic Society' so beloved by the
Krishna Sect -- and the fundamentalist Hindutva movement in India.

For some context, read here:

[webcache.googleusercontent.com]



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/30/2015 08:10PM by corboy.

James Kerr noted that some caste customs were being modified. But injunctions concering food and marriage remained in force.

Here he describes a society in Kolkata, Bengal. Prabupada was born in Kolkata and lived there much of his life.

[books.google.com]

Kerr noted on the previous page how the lower castes were forbidden to learn the Vedas (sacred texts)

[books.google.com]