Unplugged Ice

Cave Glow Worms

Wed, 16 Nov 2011 02:05:18 GMT

The cave glow worm hangs silken fishing lines made of its own mucus from the roof of its cave to catch its prey. It then literally hangs from a mucus hammock and waits. There is a chemical reaction in a capsule at the end of its body that emits a blue glow. So, literally, the light shines out of its ass. When you stand at the bottom of a cave and look up at the mass of lights a colony of these glow worms make, there is little to distinguish one from the other. Each is insignificant in relation to the whole mass, let alone to the sun outside of the cave. But when you zoom into one of these unfortunate creatures, you will find an individual who thinks that the light shines out of its ass. Thus, the whole colony is made up of an en-mass unfortunate notion that the light shines out of my ass.

Somehow or other, insects are uncontrollably attracted to that glow worm ass-light and are snared before being eaten alive. The glow worm thus gains its audience and subsequently devours it. And so it subsists on the misfortunes of others who have uncontrollable senses that drag them to its ass-light. But in the end, it is unable to do anything that is of benefit for anyone while it maintains the notion that there is a light that shines out of its ass.

The analogies that can be drawn from this are eerily pertinent. For example:
“These so-called glow-worms, they'll not be able to do anything. That's a fact. Don't remain a glow-worm. Just become a sun and moon.” [SP: SB 1.15.1 Lecture NY 29/11/73]

I have a question:

Wed, 05 Jan 2011 23:33:57 GMT

A "truth act" is a term that refers to a situation that is found many times throughout the Vedas and their corollaries and is performed by a variety of men and women. An instance of a truth act generally involves an individual who states a situation that he or she is in, that always tends to be an exemplary situation in respect to that person's dharma or something that has happened as a result of that person following his or her dharma, and, from that basis, that person makes a statement to the effect that he or she implores or expects something to happen to fulfill a certain wish. This wish can include the reversing of events or can be the desiring of a miracle. Since the wish is made in respect to dharma, it is very powerful and always comes to fruition. The question is whether the reason for the person performing the truth act is solely for the purpose of fulfilling his or her dharma or whether it is just a selfish desire that, by divine providence, becomes dharmic? Or whether each situation is different?

An example of a truth act is in the story of Damayanti who wants to marry Nala in the Mahabharata. To cut a long story short: Indra, Yama, Agni and Candra have disguised themselves as Nala and, standing with the real Nala, ask Damayanti to choose one from between them. Damayanti then states how she has followed her dharma as a woman and then basically tells all the Nalas in front of her to reveal their true identities. This truth act was so powerful that they do what she says.

The art of successful preaching, or not

Fri, 26 Feb 2010 08:40:18 GMT

Try asking someone the following two questions:

1. Answering yes or no: will you answer this question in the same way that you will answer the next question?

2. Will you chant Hare Krsna?

Either way, if they answer, they will have to agree; or they will call you names unmentionable on this forum.

the ism of monotheism

Thu, 25 Feb 2010 03:49:29 GMT

My tendency has been to emphasize "monotheism" whenever i explain KC to anyone new to or ignorant of Vaisnava culture and philosophy. I'm not saying that this is wrong but i do wonder whether my use of the word is due to my being overly influenced by my Christian roots and Christianity's absolute abhorrence of anything other than that particular ism. So i checked the Vedabase and noticed that "monotheism", "monotheistic", "monotheist" and "monotheists" only have 7 hits in SP's writings, lectures, conversations, and letters....

SB 2.1.3 - as an explanation of what the verse talks about
Renunciation Through Wisdom - in regard to one religion and one creed
Lecture: Bg 9.15-18 NY Dec 2, 1966 - as an ism
Lecture NY Sept 8, 1966 - in regard to different types of philosophers seeing pantheism and monotheism
3 times in a letter to Prof Staal 30 Jan - in reference to Western monotheism

Srila Prabhupada didn't seem to bother too much with the ism of monotheism. He was more interested in connecting with Krsna in loving and personal service. There are so many isms and they do more to confuse than they do to enlighten. Once you label something you can easily put it aside and forget it. It's almost as if it has been conquered. So my emphasis on monotheism is ok, but it's not the essence of what Prabhupada taught. It's more the essence of what Christians and atheists have taught me.

the academy

Tue, 22 Sep 2009 04:16:34 GMT

I'm taking a seminar on Bhakti this semester. Part of the course involves reading the Bhagavad Gita's twelfth chapter and commentaries by the four Vaisnava sampradayas. The translation we are using is by someone who hails from a branch of the Sri Sampradaya. It's much better than the standard nirvisesas and sunyavada renderings that permeate the academy, so i'm not grumbling. But, still, i always go back to Prabhupada's Gita so that i can understand what is being said. Even on the simple level of just being clear about what each verse of the Gita means, Prabhupada's translations and purports far surpass any others that i have read.

Now that's what I call music!

Fri, 27 Feb 2009 03:49:18 GMT

The Cult

Sun, 28 Dec 2008 02:53:49 GMT

Modern day academia is like an organized religion. It has its hierarchy, its dogmatic teachings, its rituals, its rites of passage, and its cosmology. It reacts to criticism from outside in the same way religious fanatics defend their faith -- with no consideration of logic or objectivity. It upholds its own values and, even though it abhors cultural relativity, it considers itself the sole guardian of truth. Actually, "truth" is not allowed. It has been banned. And so has "potential truth." Nothing has value. The greatest achievement that humanity can claim is a "valuableness" unto it's own particular culture or tradition. Thus nothing is of absolute value and, for the sake of "scholarship," everything is open to interpretation (speculation). What is left? A monistic, atheistic, undefinable mixed-up pile of human excreta that allows individuals the right to become mini-gods on the basis of how much well-articulated nonsense they can regurgitate in one sitting. This, my friends, is academia. This is the elite. This is what society looks up to as its teachers, mentors, and advisers. This is how the innocent are fooled. This is the battle.

All is not lost for as time waits for no man, and as Krsna is time,-- a change is underway.

Slogans

Sat, 08 Nov 2008 00:57:55 GMT

I have a dilemma. I see posts on devotee websites and bulk emails full of slogans meant to change the hearts of their audiences. Devotees are connected with Krsna so anything posted by a devotee is in some way connected with the supreme. But slogans are so close to symbols, and symbols are fine for the masses, and though there's no harm in getting the masses off of their haunches in order to do something good for themselves and others, i cannot categorize devotees as part of the masses. The masses in this day and age are...... let me put it this way - not so Krsna conscious. Any small creeper of spiritual inquiry is immediately stamped out by their desires to eat, sleep, mate and defend. That is why slogans and symbols (even mode-of-goodness ones) are good for them - they need something catchy to clear the material mist once in a while. But it's rare souls, like devotees, who begin to inquiry further. And to throw slogans at these souls is, for want of a better word, sad. My dilemma is that i want to say something about how inquiry means so much more than symbolism and sloganism, but i can't for the slogans that devotees pass on are, in a certain capacity, correct - and they do attract attention.

I guess i did say something. By the way, did the images above inspire you to read this?

Incase you thought Kali Yuga was giving everyone a break this time round

Wed, 15 Oct 2008 03:53:06 GMT

Yesterday a lady came to the Honolulu temple with her three children. All four of them were very nice and cultured; however, they had been left homeless due to the present economic climate. After they left i checked my email and had to filter out several items of spam telling me how to find foreclosures in my area. Greed and lust have broken out from their hiding places and are running amok in our sand castles. Without the KC perspective, it would be easy to get very depressed about how humanity is turning out -- shallow, cruel, and ridiculously opportunistic. Only can a person who reasons that little further, allowing the Absolute a chance to enter the equation of life, find some reason to be optimistic about human nature -- or soul nature. It's at times like this that i wish i had the intelligence and openness to be able to chant Hare Krsna incessantly. Any other future is cruel.

I have my moments

Fri, 13 Jun 2008 16:59:56 GMT

I have my moments. They are extremely rare but they are there, and they exist as a touch of Krsna's mercy. Reality as opposed to ignorance is divine, transported from a realm that can only be perceived if one is humble and ready to accept one's fate and wrongdoings. In my case, reality is perceived sporadically, like patches of a blue sky through a fog. And when I catch a glimpse I see an eternity of deeds opposed to self-realization – a mentality that is selfish, irrational, and hungry for name, fame, adoration. Obsequious and unashamed, I mount an eternal struggle for something that is detrimental to well-being, and, as a result, live in a fog while occasionally – out of Krsna's sheer unequivocal mercy upon me – I catch glimpses of the eternal - instead of relishing it's continual presence (something that I would not be unable to do had I the desire for it). It is like this for me.

Wrestling with the mind

Wed, 16 Apr 2008 01:04:27 GMT

Why is KC so simple and yet so hard? Minds are quite a handful are they not? To conquer the mind is to conquer the senses, and that would be quite an achievement. I find myself thinking back to distributing Prabhupada's books. I had the same mind, the same senses, the same three gunas, and yet somehow at that time, amidst all the same chaos and turbulence, there was an obvious trail back to Godhead and a means to traverse it. Leave the books alone for a few months and the path starts to become overgrown. Leave it too long and i'll have to wrestle with my mind to decide which way to walk is best.

Doctor Bird Cage

Mon, 25 Feb 2008 03:46:54 GMT

When i get nasty flus i try to avoid going to the doctor for various reasons. But this time, to save you graphic details of grossness, i got a flu that would have required a few weeks of work to get rid of naturally; so i decided it best that i kill it quickly with antibiotics since i couldn't afford the time lost. I ended up in a cheap clinic with a pleasant Thai doctor. I tried to keep quiet so that i could get the drugs and run but i slipped up and told him that i had just done prolotherapy on my back to try to fix a long running problem. I normally avoid telling these doctors of any alternative medicine i take because they tend to take it personally. This doctor was no different. His pleasant mood vanished as he began ranting on about liability, and quacks, and everything else to minimize or give a bad name to everything except his beloved allopathy. And as he was blabbering it again dawned on me that that these doctors care about everything except their patients health. Not once did he ask me if prolotherapy had helped me. His only concern was to protect all those years he had toiled in medical school so that he could become an absolute authority on something. This is the story of the material world. This is another twist in the story of the bird in the cage

Indian Culture: American as Apple Pie

Sat, 15 Dec 2007 03:33:29 GMT

The following is scratching the surface, but was nevertheless interesting to write. As Benjamin Franklin wrote in a letter to an acquaintance: I'm sorry, but if i had more time i would have made this shorter.

Indian Culture: American as Apple Pie

Most of us think Indian influences arrived in America during the countercultural movements of the sixties. In reality, that was only the most recent wave in the rising tide of Indiological interest stretching back centuries. I will review the history of the transference of knowledge from India to America. Each of the following cultural phenomena in America occurred in roughly the following order: cross-cultural traffic between India, Europe, and America; Transcendentalism; the Theosophical Society and Eastern gurus; Nazi Germany; the Civil Rights Movement; the Beat Generation; the widespread use of LSD; Indian influenced music; and the Hippies.

The European Connection

Indian culture was first introduced to America by the Europeans, who had been fascinated with the sub-continent since trade between the two began.

Famous depth psychologist, Carl Jung, reasoned that during the [atheistic] French Revolution, the violent and bloody rejection of the Christian religion and subsequent enthronement of the “Goddess of Reason” in Notre Dame was culturally compensated, by the first major translation of Indian philosophy in a European language (Jung, 1971, p.469). According to Jung, while the revolution raged in France, Anquetil du Perron, a Frenchman, was living in India and translating the Oupnek’hat – a collection of fifty Upanishads (Jung, 1971, p.469), which are philosophical commentaries on the Vedas, the core reglious texts of India, which will hereafter be referred to as Vedic. Acccording to Jung’s theory of the collective unconscious mind, the onslaught of atheism in France was compensated, by a fresh influx of an ancient religion. A similar compensation occurred in America in the 1960s, as we shall see.

Thanks to the constitutional separation of church and state inaugurated by the likes of Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson and George Washington, Indian philosophy was openly and ernestly imported in the following century by the founders of the first American philosophical movement, Transcendentalism (Stillson Judah, 1967, p.23-24).

Transcendentalism

Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau are two of the most prominent figures in forming the Transcendentalist movement in America, which enthusiastically adopted much of India’s wisdom. Dr. J. Stillson Judah, professor emeritus of religion at the Graduate Theological Union at the University of California in Berkeley, writes in his book, The History and Philosophy of the Metaphysical Movements in America: “Transcendentalists believed that intuition, rather than the senses, revealed a spiritual reality and spiritual science, transcending the natural science of the physical world. This created a dichotomy between the natural and spiritual worlds – the natural world being but a shadow of the spiritual one” (Stillson Judah, 1967, p.26-27). These ideas began emerging in America roughly around 1840, when Emerson, Thoreau, and other transcendentalists, like Amos Bronson Alcott and Walt Whitman, began studying translations of the Bhagavad-Gita, the Upanishads, the Vishnu Purana, and other Oriental texts (Stillson Judah, 1967, p.31-32). Among all the Eastern texts, the Bhagavad-Gita was most influential. Emerson proclaimed it as a required reading for all those intersted in Transcendentalism (Versluis, 1993, p.197). [See Appendix A for quotes by Emerson and Thoreau on the Bhagavad-Gita.] Influenced by the Bhagavad-Gita and other Vedic texts, Emerson wrote essays such as “The Oversoul,” which were highly regarded by both academics and metaphysical societies such as The Theosophical Society (Blavatsky, 2003, p.31).

The Theosphical Society and The Guru Factor

The Theosophical Society was founded in America in 1875 by Helena Petrovna Blavatsky, Henry Steel Olcott, William Quan Judge and fourteen others. It soon spread worldwide and still functions today. Blavatsky, the Society’s main authority and a Buddhist, had been a world traveler and was able to impress others with her claims of psychic ability (Henderson, 2000, p.72). Henry Olcott previously held a number of prestigious posts in New York and had caused a stir by becoming the first well-known person of European origin to formerly convert to Buddhism along with Blavatsky (Seager, 1999, p.35). Mystical masters, or mahatmas, supposedly guided the Society telepathically by miraculously writing letters on paper placed in a special box (Williams, 2004, p.8). Whether or not the mahatmas existed, the idea of guiding gurus was very prevalent in the Society.

The Theosophical Society’s objectives were threefold:
(i) To form the nucleus of a Universal Brotherhood of Humanity without distinction of race, color, or creed.
(ii) To promote the study of Aryan and other Scriptures, of the World's religion and sciences, and to vindicate the importance of old Asiatic literature, namely, of the Brahmanical [Vedic], Buddhist, and Zoroastrian philosophies.
(iii) To investigate the hidden mysteries of Nature under every aspect possible, and the psychic and spiritual powers latent in man especially.
(Blavatsky, 1972, p. 39)

The cultural influence of the Theosophical Society is evident in the impressive list of its members, including such influetial figures as William Butler Yeats, Jack London, D. H. Lawrence, T. S. Eliot, Thomas Edison, Carl Gustav Jung, Elvis Presley, Shirley MacLaine, and Mohandas K. Gandhi (www.katinkahesselink.net/his/influencetheosophy.html/11/25/2007/10:11am) [For a fuller list see Appendix B].

Based on the philosophical foundation layed by the Theosophical Society, subsequent missionaries from India such as Swami Vivekananda, Jiddu Krishnamurti, Paramahansa Yogananda, Maharishi, and A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami, brought Vedic culture to America.

In 1893, Swami Vivekananda attended the Parliament of Religions, an interfaith dialog that was part of the World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago. After that discussion Vivekananda remained in America long enough to form The Vedanta Society, as well as influence Transcendentalists (Stillson Judah, 1967, p.41). The Vedanta Society still exists.

In 1922, Jiddu Krishnamurti, a famous writer and speaker on Indian philosophy and spiritualism, was inspired to travel and preach around America and the world as a result of a “life changing experience” (Krishnamurti, 1997, p.xvii). He was intimately connected with The Theosophical Society through his father, Narianiah, who had been one of its members in India since 1882 (Williams, 2004, p.17).

In 1920, Paramahansa Yogananda arrived in Boston as India’s delegate to an International Congress of Religious Liberals. He founded the Self-Realization Fellowship, in 1925, to promote his own brand of philosophy, yoga, and meditation (Self-realization Magazine, 1971, p.61). Yogananda wrote several books, including the very popular Autobiography of a Yogi, which remains a bestseller.

Maharishi [who was later involved with The Beatles] taught his Transcendental Meditation technique in Hawai’i in 1959, traveling on to California to continue his mission.

In 1965, A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami began the Hare Krishna movement in America to fulfill the wish of his guru, Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Thakur. Both were acclaimed and learned Vedic scholars. In the following 12 years, Bhaktivedanta Swami established over a hundred temples and farm communities throughout the world and simultaneously translated sixty volumes of Vedic texts into English.

The Theosophical Society’s interpretation of the Vedas was internationally known. Among early admirers of its ideas were members of the The Thule Society, occult architects of the German Nazi party (Levenda, 2002, p.40).

Nazi Germany

The Thule Society, which was established at the end of the World War I, founded the German Worker’s Party in 1919, whose name was changed to the National Socialist Party, or Nazi Party, by Adolf Hitler in 1920 (Ross, 1995, p.11). In A History of Nazi Involvement with the Occult, Peter Levenda states: “The rationale behind many later Nazi projects can be traced back - through the writings of von List, von Sebottendorf, and von Liebenfels - to ideas first popularized by Blavatsky…. It was, after all, Blavatsky who pointed out the supreme occult significance of the swastika.”

Hitler had also studied India independently. Trevor Ravenscroft, in The Spear of Destiny, writes, “The works of Schopenhauer and Nietzsche, which are laced with eulogistic comments regarding oriental thinking, led the youthful Hitler to a keen study of Eastern Religions and Yoga … the Rig-Veda, the Upanishads, the Gita” (1982, p.26). As Hitler rose in power, he instigated a mass migration of nearly 130,000 Jews from Germany between 1933 and 1939 (Kershaw, 2000, p.858). Among them was Leo Strauss, a political philosopher, who, after moving to America, was considered one of the founding fathers of neo-conservatism.

In his book, Studies in Platonic Political Philosophy, Strauss cites the philosopher Martin Heidegger (who was both greatly influenced by Nietzsche, and involved in the Nazi Party during the war): “A dialogue between the most profound thinkers of the Occident and the most profound thinkers of the Orient ... [may be] accompanied or followed by a return of the gods. That dialogue and everything that it entails, but surely not political action of any kind, is perhaps the way” (1983, p.33-34). This “return of the gods” is not arbitrary, for Nietzsche often wrote of the East – for example, he sometimes quoted a “Brahmanic [Vedic] culture” (Nietzsche, 1968, p.110).

The Nazi Party had unknowingly facilitated the Strauss/Heidegger/Nietzsche-inspired neo-conservatives’ gleaning of knowledge from India. The same Indian culture and philosophy also affected the sixties countercultural movements in America, from which the neo-conservatives had emerged (Aronowitz, 1996, p.187). There was, therefore, an exchange of ideas and subsequent influences in the sixties that countercultural movements inherited from Nazi Germany’s interest in the occult parts of the Vedas.

Another factor which affected countercultural movements in the sixties was the Civil Rights Movement.

Civil Rights

Civil Rights leaders, Reverend Martin Luther King Jnr. and Mohandas K. Gandhi, were successful in applying Henry David Thoreau’s Vedic-inspired ideas on non-violent resistence.

In 1776 Thomas Jefferson drafted the Declaration of Independence, in which he wrote, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.” This was not taken literally by the American white majority, and so Rev. King fought to bring about a racial equality, which up to then had not been embraced. Rev. King was an ardent admirer of Gandhi (Barash, Webel, 2002, p.522). Both Rev. King and Gandhi studied non-violent civil disobedience from the pages of Henry David Thoreau’s essay, Civil Disobedience, written in 1849 (Persons, 1999, p.160). Thoreau was at that time studying the Vedas, especially Bhagavad-Gita. Civil Disobedience revolved around the idea of following your conscience, which is also encouraged in Bhagavad-Gita [18:63] (Bhaktivedanta, 1982, p.832). Thus, non-violent resistance came full circle: from India to Thoreau in America, back to India and Gandhi, and back again to America, inspiring the “sit-ins” (peaceful demonstrations) of the sixties. Thoreau’s ideas also greatly influenced a fifties generation of disaffiliated young people known as the Beat Generation.

The Beat Generation

In the 1950s, a number of dissatisfied youths rejected the “social norms” of the time and expressed their concerns through poetry, borrowing heavily from transcendentalists and Indian philosophy.

Josephine Hendin, professor of contemporary American literature, in A Concise Companion to Postwar American Literature and Culture, writes: “Historically the term Beat Generation was officially launched in a New York Times magazine article on Nov 16, 1952, by John Clellon Holmes, a beat author himself. The Beat Generation characterized a movement in progress made by a post-World War II generation of disaffiliated young people coming of age in a Cold War without spiritual values they could honor. The originator of the Beat Generation was short lived and had consisted only of a group of friends; that original group, Ginsberg, Carr, Burroughs, Huncke, and Holmes, had scattered. After the Korean War, the Beat Generation ideals were forced into the foreground again, and it was resurrected. Postwar youth had picked up the gestures and soon the “beat” sensibility, as reflected in its political and social stance, was everywhere” (2004, p.75).

The influential writers of the Beat Generation, namely, Jack Kerouac, William Burroughs, Allen Ginsberg, Gary Snyder, Neal Cassady, John Clellon Holmes, among others, had an avid interest in Eastern philosophy stemming from their natural gravitation to the writings of Carl Gustav Jung, and Transcendentalists like Emerson and Thoreau (Hopkins, 2001, p.240). Allen Ginsberg was publicly convinced that chanting the Hare Krishna mantra was a major spiritual factor in his life (Dershowitz, 2004, p.391). Gary Snyder was an initiated Buddhist.

As well as an attraction to the East, psychedelic experimentation also played a large part in psychological change and spiritual epiphany for the Beat Generation (Tarnas, 2006, p.395). Among the Beat Generation’s many experiments with “mind-expanding” substances, such as peyote and “magic mushrooms”, the invention of the “Electric Kool-Aid Acid Tests” by a group of influential Beats popularized a new recreational drug called LSD, which in turn intensified the generation’s interest in the mystical aspect of India.

LSD

Lysergic Acid, or LSD, played a part in stimulating “spiritual” and “religious” experiences. In 1943, Albert Hoffman discovered its properties after inadvertently ingesting it in Sandoz Laboratories, Switzerland (Levine, 2003, p.275). Psychiatrists became interested in the potential therapeutic use of this substance and so began a series of experiments on advanced schizophrenic patients (Dobkin de Rios, Janiger, 2003, p.5). By 1954, research into LSD was well under way in Europe and North America (Dobkin de Rios, Janiger, 2003, p.5). Experiments showed that the drug enticed creative and spiritual impetuses (Dobkin de Rios, Janiger, 2003, p.76-151). LSD became increasingly well known until it reached Harvard PhD, Dr. Timothy Leary, whose experimentation with it became part of the famous “Turn On, Tune In, Drop Out” culture of the sixties.

At the same time “The Merry Pranksters”, a group of beats led by “cult hero,” Ken Kesey, set out from California in a modified school-bus to travel the US, sharing LSD with whoever they met who was willing. This road trip and their “Electric Kool-Aid Acid Tests,” as they came to be known, was a catalyst in the subsequent spread of LSD use in America.

Marlene Dobkin de Rios and Oscar Janiger write of the effects of LSD in their book, LSD, Spirituality, and the Creative Process, “It encourages one to try to explore more in the higher regions of consciousness and to experience more inner power or even experience self-awareness for temporary periods” (2003, p.144). The use of the words consciousness and self-awareness are tacitly taken from Indian philosophy, and, so, through the use of LSD, Indic influence grew.

Indian culture reached a new level of popularity when famous musicians became influenced by the drug-induced metaphysical undercurrents of the Beat Generation, who amplified its messages with their music.

Music

Music, as one of the most powerful ways of communication, was the voice of the counterculture: imbibing and echoing its trials, tribulations, goals, and influences. Before encountering Maharishi, George Harrison, of The Beatles, had tried meeting many gurus, and he had even gone so far as climbing walls in Cornwall, Southwest England, with a local guru who was going to reveal all to him – to no avail (Davies, 1996, p.230). The Beatles met Maharishi in the London Hilton, and their positive experience with him later led them to become active with the Hare Krishnas. George Harrison recorded the Hare Krishna maha-mantra (“maha”– great, “man”– mind, “tra”– deliver) with Krishna devotees in the summer of 1969, greatly popularizing the mantra: Hare Krishna Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna Hare Hare, Hare Rama Hare Rama Rama Rama Hare Hare (Nye, 2001, p.11).

The interest members of The Beatles had in psychedelics, and subsequently Indian gurus, came from the counterculture, of which Bob Dylan was one of the band’s main influences (Taylor, 2004, p.289). It is most likely that Dylan had introduced The Beatles to hashish in a New York hotel room during an American tour in 1965 (Sounes, 2001, p.161). Dylan had been prominent in the Civil Rights movement of Martin Luther King (Trager, 2004, p.474) and was using elements of Beat poetry in his music. In Dylan’s own words, "It was Ginsberg and Jack Kerouac who inspired me first” (Farrell, 1997, p.75). He was therefore familiar with countercultural ethics and ideals, as well as the idea of non-violent resistance.

From the combination of famous musicians’ interest the counterculture, the “Electric Kool-Aid Acid Tests,” and Gandhi and Rev. King’s non-violent resistance, the Hippies were born.

The Hippies

Eric Donald Hirsch writes in his book, The Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, “Westernized social norms in the 1950s, segregation in the Deep South of the U.S., and the war in Vietnam, have all been accredited with inspiring the couterculture revolution during the sixties” (1993, p 419). As mentioned, the rebellion against “social norms” and non-violent resistance subsequently brought about a mass appeal of all things Indian. The Hippies evolved as a synthesis between the previous Beat Generation and experimental drug use. This new generation cradled an eastern inspired philosophical and metaphysical worldview which was plain for all to see.

Picture yourself walking around Height-Ashbury during the “Summer of Love,” 1967, and observe the Indian influence in the hippie generation. You see that tie-dies and paisleys are in fashion. Multi-colored folk of all races with rudraksha [Shiva] beads hanging from their necks, wearing “Legalize Marihuana” [sic] buttons on their yarn ball and tiny-bell festooned waistcoats, blouses, skirts, overalls and (even) chasubles, meander in and out, or socialize outside, stores with names like The Cosmic Yogi, filled with exotic bric-a-brac including hash pipes and statuettes of Shiva and Ganesh. The whiff of marijuana is all pervasive, except when it is in competition with the aromatheraputic smoke curls of strong incense. Jerry Garcia’s recorded voice crackles and wafts out of an open second-storey window and is accompanied by the jangling of a sitar from behind an ajar door below. A boy with long unkept hair and furry clothes sits on the sidewalk reading a scraggy copy of The Dharma Bums. His apparent blonde girlfriend, dressed in a bright sari, sits erect in meditation. On the opposite side of the steet a sombrely dressed young man in dark shades and pointed shoes stands and weaves his politically surcharged poetry of non-violence to the beat of his guitar. A girl wearing a psychedelic dress and flowers in her hair greets you with “Namaste.”

The cross-cultururism observed in the hippie generation had been brought about by centuries of American interest in Indian culture and philosophy.

Cross-culture Apple Pie

In America, India’s wisdom has been called upon time and again: from Europeans, who had found in America an open-armed acceptance and willingness to adapt and learn what they had gleaned from the East; to the Transcendentalists, who used that newfound freedom from the shackles of tradition to eloquently write about the East; to the Theosophical Society who facilitated and gave credence to the idea of guru; to the Indian gurus who brought India’s spirituality to an eager audience; to the Nazi’s interest in the Vedas, which was delivered to America via refugees; to civil-rights leaders learning from the Bhagavad-Gita; to a Beat Generation out of which, like a phoenix from the ashes of degradation and drug abuse, was born a yearning to understand eastern wisdom; to experimentation with LSD as an attempt to reach a higher consciousness; to screaming girls and groupies being replaced by the spiritual vibration of George Harrison’s “My Sweet Lord;” to the emergence of the hippies and their natural affinity to India. America’s embracing of Indian culture and philosophy has become as American as apple pie.

References

Aronowitz, S. (1996). The death and rebirth of American radicalism. New York: Routledge.
Barash, D. P. and Webel, C.P. (2002). Peace and conflict studies. Los Angeles: Sage Publications.
Bhaktivedanta, A. C. (1982). Bhagavad-gita As It Is. Philippines: The Bhaktivedanta Book Trust.
Blavatsky, H. P. (2003). Theosophical quarterly magazine, 1921 to 1922: Whitefish, MT: Kessinger Publishing.
Blavatsky, H. P./ Mills, J [ed.]. (1972). Key to Theosophy. An abridgement. Wheaton, Ill.: Theosophical Pub. House
Blume, M. (1995, July 8). A Little Meditation on the Bottom Line. International Herald Tribune. (Retrieved online 2004-04-25).
Davies, H. (1996). The Beatles. New York: W.W. Norton
Dershowitz, A. M. (2004). America on trial: Inside the legal battles that transformed our nation. New York, NY: Warner Books, Inc.
Dobkin de Rios, M. and Janiger, O. (2003). LSD, Spirituality, and the creative process. Rochester, VT: Inner Traditions / Bear & Company
Ebenstein, W. (1951). Great political thinkers, Plato to the present. New York: Rinehart
Emerson, R. W. (1894) Essays X. Philadelphia: Henry Altemus.
Emerson, R. W./ Emerson, E.W and Forbes, W.E. [eds.]. (1914). Journals of Ralph Waldo Emerson, VII [10 Vols.]. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.
Farrell, J. J. (1997). The spirit of the sixties: Making postwar radicalism. New York: Routledge.
Henderson, H. L. (2000). Theosophy and the secret doctrine condensed. San Diego: Book Tree.
Hendin, J. (2004). A concise companion to postwar American literature and culture. Boston: Blackwell Publishing
Hirsch, E. D. (1993). The dictionary of cultural literacy. Boston: Houghton Mifflin
Hopkins, D. N. (2001). Religions/globalizations: Theories and cases. London: Duke University Press.
Jung, C. G./ Campbell, J. [trans.] (1971). The portable Jung. New York: The Viking Press.
Kershaw, I. (2000). Hitler, 1936-1945: Nemesis. New York: W. W. Norton
Krishnamurti, J. (1997). Krishnamurti: Reflections on the self. Chicago: Open Court
Levenda, P. (2002). Unholy alliance: A history of Nazi involvement with the occult. London: Continuum
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Appendix A

In a letter to Max Müller on August 4, 1873, Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote, “I owed a magnificent day to the Bhagavat Geeta. It was the first of books; it was as if an empire spake [sic] to us, nothing small or unworthy, but large, serene, consistent, the voice of an old intelligence which in another age and climate had pondered and thus disposed of the same questions which exercise us." (Emerson, 1909-1914, VII: p.241-42, 511).

In his essay, “Plato, or the Philosopher”, Emerson wrote, "In all nations there are minds which incline to dwell in the conception of the fundamental Unity. The raptures of prayer and ecstasy of devotion lose all being in one Being. This tendency finds its highest expression in the religious writings of the East, and chiefly in the Indian Scriptures, in the Vedas, the Bhagavat Geeta and the Vishnu Purana. These writings contain little else than this idea, and they rise to pure and sublime strains in celebrating it."(Emerson, 1894, p.120)

Henry David Thoreau, a fellow transcendentalist and companion of Emerson, wrote in Chapter 16 of his famous book, Walden, “In the morning I bathe my intellect in the stupendous and cosmogonal philosophy of the Bhagavat Geeta, since whose composition years of the gods have elapsed, and in comparison with which our modern world and its literature seem puny and trivial” (Thoreau, 1966, p.197).

Appendix B

Partial List of Theosophical Society members

Lyman Frank Baum – American author of The Wizard of Oz
Mohini Chatterji
William Butler Yeats – Anglo-Irish poet and playwright
George W. Russell – Irish poet, painter, and agricultural expert
Lewis Carroll – author of the Alice books, Sylvie and Bruno, etc.
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle –English author of Sherlock Holmes stories
Jack London – American novelist
James Joyce – Irish novelist
D. H. Lawrence – English novelist
T. S. Eliot – Anglo-American poet and critic
Henry Miller – Bohemian autobiographical novelist
John Boyton Priestley – English novelist and playwright
Thomas Edison – American inventor of the electric light, phonograph, etc.
Sir Alfred Russel Wallace – Naturalist
William James – philosopher and psychologist
Carl Gustav Jung – founder of analytical psychology
Rukmini Devi Arundale – Revitalized Indian arts
Beatrice Wood – artist, ceramicist
Paul Gauguin – French post impressionist painter
Gustav Mahler – symphonic composer
Alexander Nikolaievitch Scriabin – Russian composer
Elvis Presley – American rock and roll musician
Ruth Crawford-Seeg – composer
Shirley MacLaine – American film actress
Hernández Martínez – former President of El Salvador
Henry Wallace – former Vice President of the United States
Jawaharlal Nehru – first Prime Minister of India
George Lansbury – former leader of British Labour party
Mohandas K. Gandhi – Indian patriot
Matilda Joslyn Gage – American feminist
Anagarika Dharmapala – a leading figure in the Buddhist revival
D.T. Suzuki – brought Zen-Buddhism to the West

(www.katinkahesselink.net/his/influence-theosophy.html/11/25/2007/10:11am

Mangala-arati

Sun, 21 Oct 2007 01:57:19 GMT

The following is a descriptive essay written for my English class here in Honolulu. Bear in mind it was written for a non-devotee audience who are completely unfamiliar with anything that we do, plus there was a limit to the amount of words I could use. There's nothing academic about this paper but it was fun to write. And, by the way, I used a heap of artistic license since I avoided mentioning karatalas played like dustbin lids and the mad passionate drumming associated with many a present day kirtan.

Mangala-arati

Halfway up the Nuuanu Valley tucked in a huddle of bungalows, consulates and churches, is a Krishna Temple that pulsates with music from another world.
My day begins at 4:30am as I enter the temple room. It’s a long, narrow room with a soft, warm, wooden floor underfoot. The chandeliers are dimmed, stimulating a meditative atmosphere. An angelic breeze carries a bouquet of jasmine from a nearby tree and delivers it to the temple through an open window. The rustling of leaves outside accompanies Vedic mantras chanted within by three or four monks who sit and softly rock back and forth. Eye-catching paintings grace the walls like windows into a sublime land.

         I pace back and forth by an old fireplace that is now being used to store floor mats and exotic musical instruments such as traditional clay drums. I sit next to the Vyasasana, a Sanskrit word that means, “The teachers seat,” on which a deity of Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, elegant in saffron robes, rests in a lotus position.
         A loud conch shell punctuates the stillness, competing with the solemn hum of the chanters. By the third blast my mind is forced to its source behind dark oaken doors that extend across the width of the far end of the temple room. Light seeps under these doors from a realm beyond; through that gap I observe two bare feet scurrying back and forth, hurriedly making final arrangements for mangala-arati – “auspicious service.” The feet stop, and a sliding bolt triggers silence throughout the room. Hypnotically, the heavy doors gracefully glide on rollers to reveal an altar.
         “Cedarwood incense,” I tell myself, as the altar exhales its heavenly aroma on us mortals. I bow down along with everyone else, head touching the floor in respect.
         As everyone stands up one devotee hastens over to the fireplace, digs up some finger-cymbals from a pile of tambourines, shakers and other cymbals of every size, then swiftly moves to the front of the altar.
         “Samsara davanala lida loka,” he begins softly singing, while delicately striking a one-two-three, clang-clang-ring rhythm on the finger-cymbals.
         Others repeat the mantra in harmony, gently swaying back and forth to the rhythm like ripples in the ocean. A couple sing out of key, but no one is phased as expertise is not a necessity. Someone draws the window closed so as not to disturb our slumbering neighbors. Another picks up one of the two-headed horizontal drums from the fireplace, hangs its strap around his neck, and softly picks up the beat.
         A sign painted with Sanskrit lyrics is placed in front of the altar on which stand five four-foot tall Deities of the Pancha Tattva – Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, who is considered non-different to the Christian God, and His four principle associates. They are all lovingly adorned with flowing blue and red velvet gowns, shimmering jewels, and aromatic garlands, or leis, of pink and white plumeria, pure white tuberose, and golden marigolds. The three central Deities raise Their hands high in a majestic dancing pose, while the two on either wing pray reverentially with folded hands. The rest of the altar is the residence of other wonderful forms of God, all dressed to match the grand occasion.
         Floating back and forth on the altar is a pujari, a temple priest: his head is shaved clean around a pony tail, or sikha; his bare back is adorned with a white Brahmin’s thread that loops around his left shoulder and right hip; his waist is wrapped around with a simple saffron cloth, or dhoti, reaching down to his feet. In graceful circles his right hand offers different articles of worship to the Deities while his left hand rings a small hand-bell in sweet contrast to the constant rhythm of the cymbals and drum. Etched into his pujari face are lines of devotion, cleaved from years of austerity and selfless service. He offers an incense stick, and the scented smoke paints gossamer paisley patterns in the air, accentuating his mystical ambience. When he finishes offering the incense to all the Deities, he turns and makes a gesture of respect to the singing devotees.
         The music’s tempo steps up the pace, entreating devotees to step from side to side in response. Some begin to dance outright. Hands are folded in prayer or raised as an act of surrender. The women wear multicolored saris that cascade like dancing rainbow waterfalls. Most of the men wear traditional dhotis and kurtas, loose shirts that fall just above the knees. These are either saffron, declaring celibacy, or white worn by those who haven’t completely renounced. There are even occasional Hawaiian shirts and shorts to be seen.
         A ghee lamp – like a menorah holding five cotton wicks dipped in clarified butter – is lit, offered to the Deities by the pujari, and handed to one of the devotees who then conveys it to everyone else. I touch the flame and then touch my forehead in respect. A moment later I am inhaling the sweet aroma of an offered rose, the aristocrat of flowers. I glance up at the pujari cooling the Deities with a peacock-feather fan. Before I know it a half-an-hour has passed as announced by three more blasts from the conch shell. The melody ends, the song is over, and devotees bow down, touching their heads to the floor while reciting prayers. With closed eyes I hear large wooden doors gently rumbling shut. The lights go on, and again I am back in the Nuuanu Valley.

Slaughterhouse civilization

Sat, 01 Sep 2007 00:40:50 GMT

I'm taking classes at a community college in Hawaii. This semester i am taking "World History", which is really a bad fiction read; "Philosophy (logic)", which is the proselytizing front of agnosticism; "Food Science and Human Nutrition", which must be partially funded by the meat industry; and "English", which is a business language.

Luckily i used to like reading fiction so it's bearable in that sense.

Here comes the rain again

Sat, 04 Aug 2007 06:36:27 GMT

It's raining as i write. Actually i would say it's bucketing down. Every day like clockwork the rains come to Taipei around 1pm and subside around 3pm. The weather has it's rituals and when it performs them there is not much we can do about it. I always found the "everything came about by chance" "philosophy" on life quite ridiculous. If something was brought into existence by chance then logically it should continue to exist within the laws of chance. Does chance pack-up and leave once it has created something? Even if chance produced an alarm clock that worked like clockwork, chance should always be there to give that clock a chance to do something else. If chance created it in such a way that during rainy season it rains every day at a certain time, then chance should still exist to change that. We learn in school that the law of averages is constant. Each time we throw a die we have the same chance of getting a six. Each time you get a six, the chance of getting another six or any other number doesn't decrease. In the same way, the chances of creation should also always be constant. But in too many cases this chance has produced something that works according to rules, and then [maybe] by chance that chance simply stops being chance any more. Whatever! It's still raining as i write, by the way.

Surf's up

Fri, 03 Aug 2007 10:09:20 GMT

My body is a year older. If I were ambitious I would be worried about this. After all, if I were ambitious, my precious body would be the vehicle to take me to my ambitions and, once arrived there, also carry them. If this were the case then I would most certainly squirm at my increasing number of gray hairs and receding hairline. I would be over self-conscious of the extra baggage I carry around my waist. I would be intolerant of the ever increasing wrinkles and other youth destroying phenomena. I would find it difficult to bear my decreasing endurance levels. I would find it hard to accept my limited allotted time available here. I would find it impossible to think that I am starting to get a glimpse of my inevitable twighlight years. I would have to be illusioned to continue.

On the other hand, my present state of little ambition makes a statement to the world that this person is to be strictly avoided. Fair enough, since confidence takes a while to build up and can so easily be deflated. The fact is that it is unfortunately a struggle to work against gravity. This struggle is not a natural phenomenon and therefore precautions are taken to make the struggle as easy as possible. One of these precautions is to avoid looking down the slope of our demise and instead create a Technicolor illusion of a world full of positive people potentially gliding gracefully towards their personal ambitions. Anyone not fitting that particular job-description takes energy away from our upward motion and should be kept at a distance.

My train of thought here is inevitably hurtling towards a slight brush with the self-help genre of people. What on earth to do with self-help? It seems that every self-help technique is a subtle system of keeping those precious ambitions from slipping out of our grasps. We writhe and squirm at losing pace with the pack, but our self-help gurus tell us that these downtimes are not blemishes but beautiful ways to increasing our enchanting ambitions. Oh yes, you can turn failure into success with a simple shuffle of your thoughts – just like the iPod shuffle makes your playlist of songs ever-fresh and exciting by a simple random re-arranging of their order.

The world is hell-bent on keeping its ambitions in motion by making it well known that they are absolutely worth the extra endeavor to keep. But what happens when a spanner gets thrown in the works and it all starts to seem so futile? What happens when we look at things for what they really are, temporary? The illusion crumbles and with it any ambition to keep rolling with it. Then we are faced with a new world, one that is not as rosy as it seemed before. Self-aggrandizement becomes sickening. Gloating and obsequious individuals don't have their uses in any master plan hatched from a truckload of lust and desire marinated in raw sewage. All those pleasantries we once saw as part of our life-force shrivel into nothing, and then turn to dust.

At this point we either take the blue pill and go down and out, unfortunately remaining on the same coin but on the opposite side (this could regurgitate another wave of written thought that I will try my best to restrain), or we take the red pill and do something radical and join the Hare Krishnas or something.

Ahh, here it is finally, the part of this indeterminable muse that gets spiritual, and it looks like it's going to be one of those "wonders of spiritual life" versus "the folly of materialistic society" type bashes. But alas, on the contrary, what happens next is quite a twist to the plot, for forays into spiritual seeking can oft be surface encounters with something unknown, which then tends to lead to accidents on the royal road.

No doubt about it, spiritual life is where it's at. I'm not going to back that up with a hundred lines of stuff that you already know (the main audience here is adept at understanding this as fact since we all have – in want of, but unable to find a better word than the clichéd Californian pretext to reality – experience). But how is it that a wannabe spiritualist, replete with all spiritual motivations and an intrinsic material aversion, can again fall into the same traps as before his revolution against mundane ambition. We know that ambition cannot be taken away from us as it's part of our being, and we know that selfless ambition in loving connection with the Supreme and His devotees is a good place to build from, but ambition is ambition and the premise of doing it selflessly can be so easily and unconsciously flipped over into doing it selfishly. Comfort, subtle intoxication, unheeding the subtle approaches of lust, anger, avarice, and illusion, missing the spiritual beat whether it be hearing, chanting, remembering – all these simply rock the boat and are ready to sink us in the same motivations and ambitions we were previously illusioned by

I admit it; I'm sunk, ambitiously. I'm one of those derelicts washed up on the shore of the Hare Krishna movement – almost a beach bum for Krishna. But I must also admit that though I am unable to do anything about it, the present ambitions within the society of devotees worries me.

No point in getting worked up about it all. In the mean time... surf's up!

Turn the tables

Thu, 19 Jul 2007 05:15:23 GMT

If i don't write on this journal it can mean one of only two things... i'm either busy or dead.

Since i'm neither of those right now...

I just got back to Taipei from a day in Hong Kong. While i was walking about Hong Kong island i was approached by two different Buddhist monks on two different occasions for donations. I declined both but checked to see their reactions to my refusals, which turned out to be more like scowls at the loss of a gullible westerner than sincerity. If they had been gracious i would have turned around and given them something. But because of the way they reacted, i didn't trust them.

This in turn led to self reflection... how do i react when someone rejects taking a book from me? I am trying to be detached and noble in defeat but sometimes i slip up and don't react in the right way. How do others perceive my reaction?

Detachment is far from being callous and uncaring towards humanity; a rocky outcrop as shelter in shark infested waters. It doesn't mean i don't see or want to see how others perceive me. It means that i am self-satisfied and offer whatever i offer without self motivation or reward. Those "others" that i may disdain or ridicule for not being on the same page as me are, in-fact, my guides. They react and i see how i should be.

If we're lucky, Krsna turns the tables on us so that we get a glimpse into who or what we are becoming.

Please excuse me while i preach to myself

Thu, 28 Jun 2007 10:28:49 GMT

Seek not to be respected but to be respectable. It's simple isn't it? But yet so elusive to the soul in search of some comfort in this world. Being respected is dearer to the living being than life itself. For one who has been honored, dishonor is worse than death. And yet we cannot please all the people all of the time. Someone will inevitably come into our life, for however brief a moment it may be, with the express reason of making our lives as miserable as possible by treating us like we were something nasty clinging to the inside of a toilet bowl. It's inevitable, and for some of us these moments are more frequent than not.

Being attached to some dignity and simultaneously watching someone's face turn from as bright as the sun to sour grapes, just because we walked into their line of sight, can have some adverse side effects in our resolve, especially if we have never met that person before. One reason for this unsolicited adversity could be outward appearance. It's funny how something as simple as clothing can summon up so much wrath amongst people. Generally we dress to be accepted in whatever we want to be accepted in. If we're in the high-powered business world it would be considered intelligent to own the best tailored suits in order to create a mark in others. If we're fashion conscious it would behoof us to be up with the times. If we're in a casual setting then acceptance lies with being causally adorned. But when one of these worlds, without warning, steps into another then there is undoubtedly discomfort. Borders are drawn, acceptance is sought amongst ones own kind, especially at the cost of ridiculing the other -- in other words, a natural selection takes place.

But if you are not at all affected by the results of such barriers and aggressions, then, even if you are ridiculed or abused, it will make no difference. You will have transcended the dress and gained access to a place where respect is given to everyone no matter who or what they are. As Srila Prabhupada points out, one life you may be a King, the next a dog. What is the use of identifying with our dress? It dosn't make us a better person -- a better dressed person maybe, but not one that has become unblemished like the cloth one wears.

Yet the unanswered question here is how, in the midst of so much adversity, do we become respectable rather than seek respect? In the same vein we could ask how do we become tolerant? Does tolerance get given to us or are we put into situations where we have an opportunity to practice tolerance? How can we give unless we are in a situation where we can understand the value of what we have to give? Similarly, how can we become respectable if we are never given a chance to not expect respect?

Dreamless

Sun, 24 Jun 2007 02:28:30 GMT

I had a dream. I was hovering above myself as I was dying, and no one noticed. Men, women and children passed by without blinking an eye at my demise on the pavement next to them. I made no noise for fear of disturbing them. I kept to myself for want of peace. And then, just as I was breathing my final breath, a small girl stopped and looked into my eyes. She said nothing but I knew her thoughts were mirroring mine as tears appeared in the corners of her eyes. I reached for her hand but she took a step back, out of reach. And then blackness.

By this time my eyes were wide open and I was in a cold sweat on my therm-a-rest®©. It was a bad dream, I told myself, and tried to fall back to sleep again but to no avail. Death in the dream was not disturbing me, nor was it the lack of interest from the masses; it was those tears, the look in that little girl's face, and her subsequent standoffishness.

I sat up and drank some water from a glass next to me. Water - the elixir of life. Life - something we take for granted. Why is it that we need something overwhelming to happen to us in order to register that simple fact? That we can so easily go through life without blinking an eye, without even acknowledging existence let alone ponder over it. And before we know it we missed the boat and wasted a golden opportunity to understand.

I had to get up now and walk over to the window. Outside it was dark and drizzling. Small raindrops patted against the windowpane, eventually forming streams of water that glided down to the window's ledge. These streams moved slowly at first, almost uncertain, but picked up speed and confidence before moving like lightening in the final third.

The transition of movement from apprehensive to certain in those small rivulets of water seemed so brief. In the beginning it was almost meditative, soothingly melancholy, to watch an element creatively exist and awkwardly function in another element. I could keep up with it. Mother Nature weeping in kindness. But then, when it built up to breakneck speed in such a short time and quickly vanished into it's own at the end of it's journey, I had to take a step back for my eye strained in trying to keep up.

Lightening struck. And then darkness. The sudden burst of light emphasizing the blackness that followed it. It was too dark to see anything outside the window for there were no streetlights nor was their moonlight for the clouds. I went back to the therm-a-rest®© and laid down on it again. My folly was to close my eyes, for off I drifted into a deep dreamless sleep wherein I forgot everything.

Slandering the slanderers

Fri, 22 Jun 2007 14:00:03 GMT

I think this comes from the Mahabharata, which i think gets it from one of the Puranas (refs are welcomed in a comment on this posting)? Also, i thought the original was actually Atri Muni speaking? But the lesson is poignant either way. Basically he's saying, be careful about slandering others for by doing so you gain their bad qualities as well as giving them the results of your piety. This explains why some you wouldn't think should do well are in fact doing well...

Vidura said: In this connection is cited the old story of the discourse between the son of Atri and the deities called Sadhyas is as heard by us.
In days of old, the deities known by the name of Sadhyas questioned the highly wise and great Rishi of rigid vows (the son of Atri), while the latter was wandering in the guise of one depending on eleemosynary charity for livelihood.

The Sadhyas said: We are, O great Rishi, deities known as Sadhyas. Beholding thee, we are unable to guess who thou art. It seems to us, however, that thou art possessed of intelligence and self-control in consequence of acquaintance with the scriptures. It, therefore, behoveth thee to discourse to us in magnanimous words fraught with learning.

Slanders and reproaches

The mendicant Rishi answered: Ye immortals, it has been heard by me that by untying all the knots in the heart by the aid of tranquillity, and by mastery over all the passions, and observance of true religion, one should regard both the agreeable and the disagreeable like his own self. One should not return the slanders or reproaches of others for the pain that is felt by him who bears silently, consumes the slanderer; and he that bears, succeeds also appropriating the virtues of the slanderer. Indulge not in slanders and reproaches.

Do not humiliate and insult others. Quarrel not with friends. Abstain from companionship with those that are vile and low. Be not arrogant and ignoble in conduct. Avoid words that are harsh and fraught with anger. Harsh words burn and scorch the very vitals, bones, heart, and the very sources of the life of men. Therefore, he, that is virtuous, should always abstain from harsh and angry words. That worst of men is of harsh and wrathful speech that pierces the vitals of others with wordy thorns, bears hell in his tongue, and should ever be regarded as a dispenser of misery to men. The man that is wise, pierced by another's wordy arrows, sharp pointed and smarting like fire or the sun, should, even if deeply wounded and burning with pain, bear them patiently remembering that the slanderer's merits become his.

He that waits upon one that is good or upon one that is wicked, upon one that is possessed of ascetic merit or upon one that is a thief, soon takes the colour from that companion of his, like a cloth from the dye in which it is soaked. The very gods desire his company, who, stung with reproach, returns if not himself nor causes others to return it, or who being struck does not himself return the blow nor causes others to do it, and who wishes not the slightest injury to him that injures him.

Causeless

Fri, 22 Jun 2007 13:12:48 GMT

What was my experiences in the Holy Dhama? My experiences are worthless, but one thing that's been re-emphasized from my visit there is that the Dhama is non different to the Supreme. That's why being in the presence of the Dhama means being in direct contact with Krsna.

Many years ago i rode a bus between Delhi and Agra as a traveler. I wasn't an aspiring devotee then, just someone who had left London in search of some meaning and adventure in his otherwise humdrum, run-of-the-mill life. Even though i didn't know it at the time, this trip to Agra took me for a brief few minutes through places where Krsna had enacted many of His pastimes; the heart of Braja. I was driven in-between Vrndavan and Govardhana and then along the outskirts of Mathura. I can honestly say that this seemingly passive incident in my a priori spiritual journey affected me in a positive way.

A different situation, but similar effect, happened about three years ago when i spent a couple of months at the asrama in Govardhana. My sadhana was shot from all my travels and crazy schedules, i had no taste for the Holy Name, and among many other problems i was a spiritual wreck. And yet, even though nothing improved from my endeavors and works during that stay, i still felt as if i reaped some unseen, causeless benefit from being in the presence of Giriraja. After my stay i felt somewhat rejuvenated from simply being there - i didn't do anything to bring this on apart from stay there.

This year was similar. For various reasons i had become run-down and weakened by staying in the West for a long time. Sense gratification becomes the norm in America and Europe as maya lures one like a seductress with many different dresses to suit different occasions and tendencies. I was worn out and tired. Again, it seemed that my time in the Dhama was unproductive, i know i could have achieved a lot more. But yet again, on reflection, i can see that by just having put myself in the care of the Dhama it has affected me in a deeper more subtle way without my reciprocation.

Why do we go to places of pilgrimage? In the Bhagavatam (1.13.10 purport) Prabhupada says "To go to some holy place of pilgrimage does not mean only to take a bath in the Ganges or Yamuna or to visit the temples situated in those places. One should also find representatives of Vidura who have no desire in life save and except to serve the Personality of Godhead." The Holy Dhama is recommended to be resided in for that reason. The Dhama itself, it's residents, and the pilgrims visiting are all sources of understanding the goal of life. What did Prabhupada say about the goal of life?... something about being addicted to Krsna. In some places this addiction is more contagious. We can only aspire for it by making some good choices.

Anything else dosn't cut it

Tue, 19 Jun 2007 06:12:20 GMT

I dun be as sick as a wounded dawg. Yea, I have a recurrence of bronchitis which is causing a cough from hell, plus, as if that wasn't enough, my right ear is blocked because of an infection. This is probably part of the deal of having been in India for the last 4 weeks (call it purification or karma). And so henceforth, my friends, here's another practical lesson in how the material body is not for us... Gone is skipping dainty through daffodil carpeted fields of blissful existence and joy. Imploded have the promising dreams of a healthy life in serenity and sugar candied familial love. Regurgitated are the ambrosial delicacies that were brought forth for the finer pleasures of the palate. Creamed are the memories of happiness... all that is left in their place is a deaf stupor.

In the holy words of the monty python team sometime in the 1970s; “That's nothing!” My so called cajoling with the stark inevitability of material agony is simply a stroll in the park in comparison with others' who have it much worse. One devotee here in Taipei suffered polio in early life and because of it still sustains a dysfunctional leg to this day. He learned to overcome the regret and pain associated with it, even though it also cost him the chance to pursue his dream of an occupation as a doctor, for according to Taiwanese law you can't be a doctor with such a disability. He now makes a living on the street making those little rubber stamps that Chinese people officially sign their names with. There really is no solace in material life; it leads simply to madness. But, for the majority of us, we still pray with folded hands and all sincerity that we can find some happiness in it.

Forget yoga, jnana and fruitive research. Simply meditate on the divine feet of Nanda Nandana with as much love as you can muster and beg the sublimely pure Sri for Her help. Anything else just won't do.

When you run out of ideas post a photo or two

Sun, 13 May 2007 10:41:37 GMT

Group shot of some of the Taipei devotees in the Taipei center/temple

A view of a street in Taipei... this is pretty much what i wander around in most days i'm here.

A view of another street in Taipei... get the picture?

Amitofo! One of many Buddha Temples

Had to put Giriraja in here somewhere.

A poem...

Tue, 01 May 2007 08:21:13 GMT

...called ABOU BEN ADHEM (may his tribe increase) by Leigh Hunt in 1834

Awoke one night from a deep dream of peace,
And saw- within the moonlight in his room,
Making it rich, and like a lily in bloom
An angel, writing in a book of gold.

Exceeding peace had made Ben Adhem bold,
And to the presence in the room he said,
What writest thou?? The vision raised its head,
And, with a look made of all sweet accord,

Answered, the names of those who love the Lord.
and is mine one? said Abou. Nay, not so,
Replied the angel. Abou spoke more low,
But cheerly still, and said, pray thee, then,

Write me as one that loves his fellow men.
The angel wrote, and vanish. The next night
It came again with a great wakening light,
And show the names whom love of God had blessed,
And lo! Ben Adhem name led all the rest.