Get any Gita besides "AS IT IS" and you are on the right track.

Get "AS IT IS" and compare the size of it to any direct translation... it is about 20 times bigger.

the extra pages in "as it is" are pure indoctrination, and clearly nothing to do with the origional work, which is very poetic and far more valuable.

You can also find the direct translations of the gita online for free.

I do believe that the Gita could be part of the push to Christianize Hinduism
(make it a mirror, if you will. different details and characters, same way of relating to life and "God".)a.k.a. Vaishnavism, or Gaudiya Vaishnavism.
These traditions are so alien to most of the creative and open systems and traditions within "Hinduism".

Hi Maui,

I find it interesting that you claim that Tamal and Kirtananda were not close disciples of Bhaktivedanta Swami when in June 1977 they ranked numbers 1 and 3 a mere 9 months before he departed ('passed away' in common language). So are you saying that these two were thrown out of ISKCON during this 9 month period for child abuse or other inappropriate behaviors?

Bhavanda whom you also claim was involved in child abuse was ranked no. 6 on this list and Jayatirtha dasa was a user of LSD. Kirtananda was accused of killing Sulocana das and Tamal has been accused of killing Bhaktivedanta.

You don't disagree with the unscrupulous behaviors of these disciples.

Here is this list:

1. Kirtanananda Swami 7. Harikesa Swami

2. Jayapataka Swami 8. Ramesvara Swami

3. Tamal Krsna Goswami 9. Hansadutta Swami

4. Satsvarupa Goswami 10. Bhagavan dasa

5. Hrdayananda Goswami 11. Jayatirtha dasa

6. Bhavananda Goswami

[www.gosai.com]

The above disciples were named by ACB as qualified to accept disciples of their own. So as a supposed external manifestation of the supersoul or holy spirit or Lord in the heart it seems that ACB was not able to see the hearts of his own disciples.

So would you like to explain since you Maui claim so strongly that these disciples were never close to ACB why they happen to be on the most important lists produced by the so-called pure devotee as successors to this most important role as Guru?

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emntk
Hi Maui,

I find it interesting that you claim that Tamal and Kirtananda were not close disciples of Bhaktivedanta Swami when in June 1977 they ranked numbers 1 and 3 a mere 9 months before he departed ('passed away' in common language). So are you saying that these two were thrown out of ISKCON during this 9 month period for child abuse or other inappropriate behaviors?

Bhavanda whom you also claim was involved in child abuse was ranked no. 6 on this list and Jayatirtha dasa was a user of LSD. Kirtananda was accused of killing Sulocana das and Tamal has been accused of killing Bhaktivedanta.

You don't disagree with the unscrupulous behaviors of these disciples.

Here is this list:

1. Kirtanananda Swami 7. Harikesa Swami

2. Jayapataka Swami 8. Ramesvara Swami

3. Tamal Krsna Goswami 9. Hansadutta Swami

4. Satsvarupa Goswami 10. Bhagavan dasa

5. Hrdayananda Goswami 11. Jayatirtha dasa

6. Bhavananda Goswami

[www.gosai.com]

The above disciples were named by ACB as qualified to accept disciples of their own. So as a supposed external manifestation of the supersoul or holy spirit or Lord in the heart it seems that ACB was not able to see the hearts of his own disciples.

So would you like to explain since you Maui claim so strongly that these disciples were never close to ACB why they happen to be on the most important lists produced by the so-called pure devotee as successors to this most important role as Guru?

That statement was written in 1978 and is no longer accepted by ISKCON. In the mid 1980's ISKCON underwent a "guru reform" period and they rejected their previous interpretation outlined in that paper. They called it a big mistake and they changed the system. That list is not in any type of order that is supposed to show closeness to ACBS, it wasn't written by ACBS anyways but by someone else. Kirtanananda was not close to ACBS after he was kicked out of ISKCON. But he had his own thing going on in west virginia and begged to be let back in ISKCON. Before ACBS even died he was like the guru of his kingdom there. Those 11 were people who were performing initiation ceremonies around the world for ACBS because ACBS was too sick to do them himself. They were close in the sense that they were managing the movement, but none of them were close in the sense of friends, they are all disciples and ACBS told them he was shutting down the GBC because he was disgusted with their mismanagment and fighting amongst themselves. I am not going to go into this topic any deper because it has been gone over ad nauseam in other places, just do a websearch for any info you like.

[blog.myspace.com]

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maui
That statement was written in 1978 and is no longer accepted by ISKCON. In the mid 1980's ISKCON underwent a "guru reform" period and they rejected their previous interpretation outlined in that paper. They called it a big mistake and they changed the system. That list is not in any type of order that is supposed to show closeness to ACBS, it wasn't written by ACBS anyways but by someone else. Kirtanananda was not close to ACBS after he was kicked out of ISKCON. But he had his own thing going on in west virginia and begged to be let back in ISKCON. Before ACBS even died he was like the guru of his kingdom there. Those 11 were people who were performing initiation ceremonies around the world for ACBS because ACBS was too sick to do them himself. They were close in the sense that they were managing the movement, but none of them were close in the sense of friends, they are all disciples and ACBS told them he was shutting down the GBC because he was disgusted with their mismanagment and fighting amongst themselves. I am not going to go into this topic any deper because it has been gone over ad nauseam in other places, just do a websearch for any info you like.

Do you realise how silly the above paragraph sounds? These 11 people who were initiating disciples around the world were not close friends of ACBS in the sense of friendship yet how were they qualified to initiate disciples on behalf of ACBS? You claim that ACBS was too unwell to initiate disciples but he was not even involved in choosing the disciples to represent him?

The above statement you just made makes absolutely no sense. Your desire not to discuss this issue anymore seems rather fishy as well. The link you posted doesn't work.

Your question of my spiritual ego is ridiculous as well. No where on this forum have I ever claimed to be a spiritual person nor a follower of any particular spiritual path. It is an interest of mine and I wish to question those who have been portrayed to me as spiritual teachers yet engage in particular behaviors. Further I have made very few claims of anything as a matter of fact on this forum. I have never once made any statement about Bhaktivedanta except I question the authenticity of his title 'pure devotee'. Mostly though I have questioned those who seem to have a reason to disrupt the 'Krishna group in Hawaii' thread. Which you seem to do. Many of your claims are totally unsubstantiated which makes me suspicious of you.

I get the impression you are totally evasive on questions put to you. Which is also suspicious.

If you are going to make silly, humorous statements such as the above that make absolutely no sense then I will argue you on how much of a fool you are making yourself appear.

Quote
emntk

Quote
maui
That statement was written in 1978 and is no longer accepted by ISKCON. In the mid 1980's ISKCON underwent a "guru reform" period and they rejected their previous interpretation outlined in that paper. They called it a big mistake and they changed the system. That list is not in any type of order that is supposed to show closeness to ACBS, it wasn't written by ACBS anyways but by someone else. Kirtanananda was not close to ACBS after he was kicked out of ISKCON. But he had his own thing going on in west virginia and begged to be let back in ISKCON. Before ACBS even died he was like the guru of his kingdom there. Those 11 were people who were performing initiation ceremonies around the world for ACBS because ACBS was too sick to do them himself. They were close in the sense that they were managing the movement, but none of them were close in the sense of friends, they are all disciples and ACBS told them he was shutting down the GBC because he was disgusted with their mismanagment and fighting amongst themselves. I am not going to go into this topic any deper because it has been gone over ad nauseam in other places, just do a websearch for any info you like.

Do you realise how silly the above paragraph sounds? These 11 people who were initiating disciples around the world were not close friends of ACBS in the sense of friendship yet how were they qualified to initiate disciples on behalf of ACBS? You claim that ACBS was too unwell to initiate disciples but he was not even involved in choosing the disciples to represent him?

The above statement you just made makes absolutely no sense. Your desire not to discuss this issue anymore seems rather fishy as well. The link you posted doesn't work.

Your question of my spiritual ego is ridiculous as well. No where on this forum have I ever claimed to be a spiritual person nor a follower of any particular spiritual path. It is an interest of mine and I wish to question those who have been portrayed to me as spiritual teachers yet engage in particular behaviors. Further I have made very few claims of anything as a matter of fact on this forum. I have never once made any statement about Bhaktivedanta except I question the authenticity of his title 'pure devotee'. Mostly though I have questioned those who seem to have a reason to disrupt the 'Krishna group in Hawaii' thread. Which you seem to do. Many of your claims are totally unsubstantiated which makes me suspicious of you.

I get the impression you are totally evasive on questions put to you. Which is also suspicious.

If you are going to make silly, humorous statements such as the above that make absolutely no sense then I will argue you on how much of a fool you are making yourself appear.

Look, I could go into all the details of what ACBs did and why he did it, but what would be the point? I really don't feel like rehashing all of this, it's long and boring. I don't care if you don't think ISKCON or ACBS or anyone else for that matter are or are not kosher. You follow your own heart, I'm cool with that. You asked a question and I was kind enough to take my time to answer, but anymore on this topic would take too much time and energy when you can read all the answers to your questions by people who have written volumes on this topic already. Just do a web search with the keywords you want to learn about and you will find a ton of stuff, umkay? There ya go, relax and chill homey, you guys take this stuff wayyyyy to personal.

To whom it may concern:

Maui was banned from this board.

Maui was apparently an Internet troll, attempting to subvert this thread and harass contributors.

See [curezone.com]

Quote

"A troll is someone who inspires flaming rhetoric, someone who is purposely provoking and pulling people into flaming discussion. Flaming discussions usually end with name calling and a flame war.

A classic...is divisive and argumentative with need-to-be-right attitude, "searching for the truth", flaming discussion, and sometimes insulting people or provoking people to insult him. Troll is usually an expert in reusing the same words of its opponents and in turning it against them.

While he tries to present himself as a skeptic looking for truth ... his messages usually sounds as if it is the responsibility of other forum members to provide evidence that what forum is all about is legitimate science."

Well I'd been waiting a while now for this topic.

It is scarcely suprising that this highly contentious issue has been discussed as regularly and repeatedly as Maui claims. It would take a lifetime to excuse the fact that at least over 1/3 of disciples given the position of representing their spiritual master and initiating other disciples would be engaged in activities such as murder, child abuse, drugs and other inappropriate behaviors criminal or otherwise not acceptable in this religion. How do you believe, defend or resolve such a revelation? What to speak of the other disciples in the eleven I have not even bothered to look into.

The following is a definition of what a pure devotee is and how ACB and Siddha are descirbed and you will note how absurd this claim is when applied to these two men:

For those who don't understand what this means a pure devotee is not considered to be an ordinary man. The supersoul mentioned is considered to be the Supreme Person (God) residing within everybodies heart. The pure devotee is someone who has pure love of the Supreme person and therefore no longer a permanent resident of this material world. They are now completely at one with the Supreme person and have a personal relationship with God. Their body is no longer material but is a spiritual form and everything they touch is purified. Anything offered to the pure devotee: a flower, leaf, water or fruit, is also purified and purifying.

So the statement that the guru, who is a pure lover of God, is an external manifestation of the Supersoul means they are able to see and communicate with the supersoul within everybodies heart and therefore know everything about a person's motives and desires. The Supreme Being is not bound by time and therefore is able to know all of the future and all of the past. The Supersoul imparts this knowledge unto his pure devotee and then as guru they supposedly impart this knowledge unto their disciples.

So as you can see claiming that someone is a pure devotee in no way is a small or cheap claim.

For someone to state, as Maui did, that these disciples were not close in friendship to the spiritual master is absurd as the spiritual master does not need to know you for any period of time to know your heart as he has direct knowledge of you via the Supersoul. For Maui to suggest that one can be initiated under a pure devotee as a disciple and not be a friend of this person is also absurd. For Maui to suggest that the pure devotee elects representatives and doesn't have the slightest clue what they are up to is aburd. His claim that the pure devotee dies is also highly offensive to ones guru as it is taught they never die they decide to leave their body.

So here we have a supposed pure devotee choosing or having someone else choose for him 11 disciples to represent him and initiate others on his behalf. We have already discussed the atrocities that these disciples engaged in.

So of course I would not doubt that there are those still attempting to explain and excuse away these facts.

Iskcon reform movements alledge that he was the victim of murder by poisoning and conspiracy among his followers while Iskcon on the other hand relies on claiming that authority as spiritual masters was abdicated by ACB on his impending departure from this world and try to justify the current guru status by suspect documents written by ACB and scripture which it has been documented that Iskcon as the owners of the BBT and therefore the bulk of english translations has been significantly altered in the past 20 years. Ironically both sides claim to be following the same religion and trying to protect the image of ACB when neither is supported by their own religion. A pure devotee would not have initiated disciples that would murder them or would he be allowed by Krishna to be murdered unless it was Krishna's will that he be murdered for some devine purpose and therefore should be something that is accepted rather than challenged.

With Iskcon there is no such thing as more than one person in disciplic succesion or any basis for abdicating the position or authorisation given by anyone other than the Supreme Being himself. Both sides of the argument are wrong. So the only simple logical conclusion must be that ACB was not a pure devotee in the first instance.

Further it is an error to suppose that the chain of disciplic succesion [b:165ccfa317]must[/b:165ccfa317] be either ACB or another guru from the GV line simply because they exist because otherwise the chain of disciplic succession and the religion of Krishna Consciousness would be broken. The chain of disciplic succession can and has been broken, which is the prelude of the key text of Krishna Consciousness, the Bhagavad Gita. It is wholly conceivable, and highly probable based on examination of the shortcomings of ACB and his legacay of Iskcon, although unpalatable to adherents of KC that a bonafide guru has not existed on earth for quite some time. It is unpalatable because Iskcon, and the various off shoots of former Iskcon devotees who have started their own branches, has become based on the worship of men rather than God.

According to ACB the moon that you see at night time is four times the distance from the earth than the distance of the earth to the sun. This is simply not a fact and logical science proves that the moon we see revolves around the earth once every 28 days as a satelite and that is why we see the fazes of the full moon to the new moon.

Logical analysis and science disproves ACB. I wished to discuss this as there are many ACB followers around but at least I finished the discussion. :P

So umm.. These eleven discipls/Ritviks (Initiating disciples) were all involved in corrupt behaviors. This does not instill one with faith that ACB was a pure devotee, given that he appointed such degraded men into such an important role, and then these men took this role to suggest that they are bona-fide gurus.

[www.harekrsna.org]

Then you have Jayapataka Swami, Tamal Krishna Goswami, Bhavanda Goswami, Bhakti Caru Swami and Bhaktivedanta were in the room whilst a whisper is heard on a tape "Let's put poison in his milk". Jayapataka was speaking to Bhaktivedanta at the time so it has to be one of the others in the room saying this. Shortly after Bhakti Caru Swami offers Bhaktivedanta milk.

Later Bhakti Caru Swami states if anyone poisoned him it must be himself, as he was in charge of Bhaktivedanta's food and medicine. Big surprise.

Bhaktivendanta stated that he was being poisoned and that his spiritual master was also poisoned. He was also kept in a small room with no fresh air and not allowed to leave when he requested to. His followers were denied any visitation with him.

ACB's ayuravedic doctor has stated that there was arsenic and mercury in his medicine and that he was taking it for 10 months.

Bhaktisiddhanta also formed a Governing Body for the Guadiya Math which acccording to Bhaktivedanta motivated a disciple to kill his master in order to claim the assests and the title of living guru successor.

So it is not like Bhaktivedanta, even without the all-knowing insight coming from Krishna, couldn't have seen it coming. He had the exact same experience with his guru. According to another site that I had read Bhaktisiddhanta had given his disciples the right to take on the title Swami. Now we see that these successor gurus took on the title Swami. Is this history repeating itself - Karma maybe? But it certainly shows that Bhaktivedanta was a source of his own undoing and that of ISKCON by offering the Ritvik role to such terrible disciples.

Of course ISKCON then puts the blame of this poisoning onto Gaudiya Math. Even Jayapataka Swami has been witnessed as stating that Gaudiya Math, when they offered prashadam to ACB, that it must have been poisoned.

Those who sincerely seek to take up, or continue to follow, the path of Krishna Consciousness, without accepting the obvious corrupt and demoniac nature of ISKCON typically fail to accept the clear difference between the example of ACB and the example of Lord Caitanya.

The obvious failure is in thinking of Lord Caitanya as a man and therefore postulating that he was setting the example of following and worshipping men. The outcome of this is clear. Caitanya's life and teachings have been recorded in the writings and works of His disciples. There has yet to be any dispute from any adherent to KC that Caitanya's character was ever anything other than the perfect example. The example of AC Bhaktivedanta Swami is ISKCON.