The Monk’s Podcast 90 with Garuda Prabhu – Please criticize me – I want to grow

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This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
Hare Krishna, Guru Prabhu. Welcome back to the Monks Podcast. After several months of a hiatus, I’m delighted to have you.
Thank you for sparing your time once again. Pleasure to be back, Chaitanya Charanjee. Thank you.
And, you know, the list of topics you had sent was quite provocatively fascinating. So lengthy, lengthy as well. Yeah, I could also say it was intellectually mouthwatering.
So today’s topic, this is, please criticize me. That is almost the opposite of the normal human psychology. And also to some extent, all right, opposite in the idea that devotees, we say should not criticize each other.
So, you know, can you explain how you came up with this topic? And what are your thoughts behind it? Yes. Please criticize me, Chaitanya Charanjee. I want to grow.
Okay. Those two statements go together. Please criticize me.
I want to grow. You know, there is that story of Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati, who would take a daily boat across a river. And when he got to the other end of the river, simply this effect.
There was some fellow at a distance who yelled out, you know, you sadhus, you’re all, you know, fake, you know, you’re not real sadhus. You know, you’re not genuine. You know, every day when they cross the river, this fellow will be yelling out such things, right? And then one day they were about to cross.
And one of the devotees with Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati said, you know, that devote, that fellow who would criticize us, or, you know, at the end of our ride, apparently he died. And he said, oh, my gosh, that’s terrible. I thought you’d be happy to hear that he died.
No, no more criticism. He said, no, I needed the, I depended on the criticism. He was disappointed that he had passed away because he liked the criticism that he, that was yelled at from a distance, you know, fake sadhu, not real sadhus, and so on.
Now, I don’t know that we, you know, have to exactly do that. But I sort of identify with that. I invite anyone to criticize me.
I love criticisms. Because why? Because I want to grow. You know, now, just if I may, okay.
Yeah, you go ahead, Chetan and Sharanji. If I may interrupt you now, I’m able to connect a little more with the topic. So I’ve been writing articles for BTG.
And that was my first exposure to like a review board who would review the articles and give feedback. So before that, I had published in some Indian newspapers, but even paper like Times of India, they would just give a yes or no, they would not really review the article. They either publish it or just tell you no.
But when I saw that review, I felt actually honored that all these thoughtful devotees had actually so carefully read the article and had given me some feedback for improving. And I learned a lot. And even now, although I’m one of the editors for BTG, I look forward to the reviews by others.
Because exactly what you say, it helps me to grow. But at the same time, I have seen that many other aspiring authors, they just feel that the reviews discourage them so much that they feel I should stop writing itself. And that’s why they say that I just publish on my own blog, and I won’t go to this whole review process.
So I feel that so I was thinking about the difference. So I thought of three things. And maybe you could expand.
First is that how strong is one’s desire to grow and improve? The second is that how much trust does one have in the basically, at least the intentions of the critic? If the critic is actually not our well-wisher is trying to pull us down, then it becomes even more difficult, even if there is a grain of truth in that. And third is also how the criticism is phrased. So sometimes even something spoken with good intention is may come out in a way that is become unpalatable.
So those are my thoughts. But I just thought I’d relate with you what you’re saying. And I shared that.
Thank you. Yeah, actually, those are really helpful observations about the whole nature of of of criticism and criticism in the positive sense, but also how criticism can be negative. So I thought that was those are good shortcut understandings.
But, you know, I mean, I lately or fairly recently, I found some leading devotees on Dandavats with lectures or videos or something titled Do Not Criticize Devotees. Do Not Criticize Devotees. Implicit in those titles, Caitanya Charan, is a criticism that devotees are criticizing devotees.
So in a way, it’s sort of it’s simplistic to simply say, don’t criticize devotees. And then in a way, it’s also contradictory. I’m criticizing devotees, anticipating that they’re going to criticize devotees.
So the article is telling me, don’t criticize devotees. But I have I have students. I have students I criticize, you know, their work in the university or devotee students or disciples or or people who want to learn from me.
I critique things and the intent, as you brought up very important, Caitanya Charanji, if the intent is to contribute rather than to tear down, to contribute, then this is essential. This is very important. So I think it’s simplistic to say don’t criticize.
Now, the word criticize. In English does carry the sort of definitions or the connotations or even denotations of, you know, condemn, disparage, to find fault, which is a phrase the Prabhupada will use also for the verb in Sanskrit, the verb root nind. Nind, that’s a very strong verb to criticize, to blame, to censure, to despise even, to despise, to be envious of.
I mean, that’s very powerful. And in that way, we don’t want to criticize. And and then even just in English, it has a sense of condemning or being prejudged as in prejudice.
And these are all the negative senses of criticism. And I would say that’s how I criticize criticism. OK, OK.
So these are the things to avoid in criticism. But. Can I just add a couple of things, if you don’t mind in this? Yes, please.
You know, in some ways. I don’t think I have ever given a class on avoid criticizing, but I talked about avoiding a judgmental mentality and don’t be judgmental. So two things I feel in more in a devotee community.
One is that this is not just a matter of some skill we want to improve. I want to improve my writing. I want to improve my analysis.
This is a matter of faith. And it comes much closer to the heart. So it’s like the closer we cut to the nerve, the more painful it is.
So when especially people who are venerable for us, say, if we have one spiritual master criticizing another spiritual master, then that can shake the foundations also of the faith. So I feel that criticizing skills and criticizing matters of faith, there is a categorical difference, maybe not categorical, but a substantial difference. And another point is that I don’t know whether it is a cultural issue that long ago when there was a prominent criticism by one ISKCON leader of another ISKCON leader and I knew both of them.
So one of my spiritual guides told me that he said that this should never have been done in public. He said, in our culture, if the mother and father fight, they never fight in front of the children. So, you know, they will close the door, they will even tell the children to go to the neighbor’s place or something like that.
So the conflicts will be there. It can’t be avoided. And sometimes, as you said, they’re necessary to improve.
But he said that when such kind of criticism comes out in public, then it is both damaging to the faith. And it’s also, in some ways, contrary to traditional culture. Yeah, I guess.
Yes, I think, you know, I think that’s a very good point. There are times for critique and criticism to be private. No question about it.
But there are also times for it to be public. Especially when people are being hurt by someone. They need to see someone else coming in and speaking up for them.
Protecting them. OK. So there are needs.
So sometimes we need to request accountability, especially if others are being hurt. Now, if this is a private matter and it’s more, you know, something that is, again, appropriate to discuss privately, of course, in the example of parents. Maybe disagreeing, perhaps, on parenting.
And they can get together and talk about that. That’s fine. I agree with that point.
But if another parent is being somewhat abusive to the children, then it’s possible that the children need to hear the other parent protecting them and challenging. So if it’s at that level where the children need to feel protected and need to feel that they’re being stood up for, then that’s another thing. That’s a very good difference.
Yeah. You see? You see, that’s important. So, you know, the circumstances are.
Now, you know, one time I was giving a lecture. Well, I lectured, you know, quite a bit before pre-COVID, of course, up in Potomac, Maryland. This is where I met you, Chetan and Charanjee.
Yes, I remember that. You were coming right out the front door and there you were. Yes.
Right? I wasn’t even sure who you were. We introduced ourselves to one another and it was a very nice meeting. I remember that.
Yeah. I saw you effulgent from the Vyasa Sen and I thought that I have seen you. But somehow I didn’t even imagine that a prominent scholar like you would be like one attendant in a Sunday Feast class.
Then when somebody introduced you to me, I was overwhelmed. One of the pleasantest surprises of that US visit for me. Well, I enjoyed your class.
And of course, I sat in your class to see if I could criticize it. OK, good one. Yes, there you go.
So now the thing is this. The antidote to the negative aspects of criticism is dialogue. Samvadham.
Dialogue. Look what happened when Arjuna fell into this incredible stupor of hopelessness and despair. Hmm.
Krishna immediately, you know, criticized it. Look at that. How terrible of Krishna to criticize Arjuna? How mean hearted, how mean spirited Krishna was? No, it wasn’t because it was done in a loving and understanding way.
OK, so going back to the previous example, you’re saying if we don’t criticize, then it is like sweeping the problem under the rug. And it will fester. So whereas in this case, the dialogue.
So criticism is more we could say it’s more. You could say the courage to address the issue. That’s yes.
Imagine if Krishna after Arjuna. Dumped the contents of his shattered heart. On to Krishna and then Krishna, you know, went to Bheesma and said, you wouldn’t believe what I just heard.
Oh, my God, Arjuna is in some kind of Maya. I mean, he’s terrible. He’s a coward.
You know, he doesn’t know what he’s doing. I mean, right. I mean, this is this is the gossip issue.
See, this is this is bad. No, he stayed with Arjuna and said, Arjuna. This is kind of shameful on the externally.
This is shameful behavior. Internally, I understand it because you have forgotten you have forgotten who I am. You have forgotten how much I love you, how much I am with you.
That’s why the laugh he prasanna and he laughed. Out loud. Right at the beginning of the second chapter.
And it wasn’t a mocking laugh. It was a laugh of a parent for a child who was hurt and crying, but crying needlessly. Crying needlessly.
Needlessly. Yes. And the parent sometimes goes like, oh, you know, there’s a laugh, but it’s not a mocking laugh.
It’s a loving laugh, you know, when you understand you will laugh, too, you know. That kind of thing. It was a loving laugh.
So, again, context, intention is so important, as you have just said. So, you know, one time I was lecturing in the temple up in Potomac. That temple fits at least 300 people.
You know, when it’s a crowded day, you’ve seen. Yeah. And I said at the end, any comments or questions? Well, there were a couple.
There are always comments and questions when I lecture, probably because people have criticisms or whatever. I don’t know. Anyway, the dialogue is always lively.
But one brahmachari actually stood up. Most of the people who inquire, they sit down, they have the microphone, remember? But this brahmachari from somewhere else, I don’t know who he was. He stands up with the microphone and he says, Garuda Prabhu, why have you published, translated and published your own Bhagavad Gita when your spiritual master has already done this? I feel this is a great offense to your spiritual master.
And I feel it’s very misleading to other devotees as a senior devotee in the movement. And he went and he went on and on. Of course, the audience was looking at me like, wow.
Oh, my God. You know, they felt, oh, my gosh, senior Prabhupada disciple, the whole thing. They’re wondering.
But I was sitting there very intent on listening. I was drinking in all the nectar of criticism, you know. And I let him speak as long as he wanted to.
I did not interrupt. When he was done, I said, Chaitanya, Chaitanya Charan, I said, of course, the audience is very tense at this point, because they don’t know how I’m going to respond. So Chaitanya Charanji, what I said first was, first of all, I don’t know your name.
So may I know your name? And he told me his name. And I said, you’re obviously traveling through, right? Because I’ve never met you before. He said, yes.
I said, OK, well, I’m glad to meet you, first of all. Second of all, I so much appreciate your courageous offering of your actual feelings. About something that I’ve done, something I’ve produced.
I cannot tell you how much I appreciate that. So that requires a lot of, you could say, a lot of self-confidence on your part. You are not taking the criticism personally.
And actually, you are also lowering his defenses or lowering the temperature by all that you’re saying. It’s not easy. It’s not easy to respond like that.
There’s a good chance, Chaitanya Charanji, that I might be lowering the temperature. But I don’t know yet, because he might be very angry, you know? And he was angry. He was angry in his first words to me as he presented his case.
But I told him I appreciated that he had the courage to reveal his mind and his heart to me directly. As opposed to criticizing me behind my back. So this is a very important topic.
This is a very important point. Maybe we will take this thread later also. That when we say that, don’t criticize.
If there are some reservations or negativity in the heart, that is going to come out eventually as gossip or backbiting or something like that. That’s right. So better bring it in the front and address it.
That’s the antidote to the negative parts of criticism and dialogue. That’s the antidote to the negativity. So this is part now.
Now, if I were offended, okay, offended, then, you know, then maybe it would just worsen things. But I was not offended. In fact, I thanked him.
And the third thing I thanked him for, I said, I am really so deeply appreciative of how protective you are being for our spiritual master’s writings and his works and his teachings. Even if you’re trying to protect me or protect them from me. You know, you’re being very protective of Prabhupada’s work.
And that is also commendable. That’s amazing. I haven’t.
Last time, the audience, Chaitanya Charanjee, the audience, of course, was so much relaxed because they saw I wasn’t about to storm off the asana or start yelling. How dare you, you disrespectful, you know, Prabhupad Shishya Aparati, you know, pulling rank, all this nonsense, right? I so much appreciated it. And then I said, if I may, let me share with you how I came about writing a presentation, a translation and so on.
And one of the things I asked him, I said, did you ever read my book? He said, no. So I just know what’s there. Just knowing it’s there is a great painful.
It’s greatly painful for me to know just that it’s there. And of course, I said to him, I said, I have never meant this work to be painful for anyone. And I apologize for that.
But I think if you read what I’ve written, I think you’ll find that everything I’ve done there is supportive of what Prabhupada has written. And that was my intent. And then I mentioned at the end that Prabhupada also said there could be other Bhagavad Gitas in a conversation with Pradyumna and Radhavallabha particularly.
Back in the day, the devotees asked, Pradyumna conveys this in a memory. The devotees asked Prabhupada, what will you translate in the future? He said, oh, there’s so many books. There’s Mahabharata.
There’s Ramayana. There’s Bhagavad Gita. Devotees looked around.
Prabhupada, haven’t you already translated the Bhagavad Gita? They were hesitant to ask. This is like a little uncomfortable. I mean, you know, he said, oh, yes.
But there can be others. So now, but notice that I saved that for last. Yeah, I was just going to think about that.
So what you are doing is, in many ways, different from what a reflexive action would be. So first is to try to defend ourselves, try to criticize the other person. Or I read a recent article.
It was written by a Christian scholar. He was saying that that we shouldn’t be hiding behind Jesus in our debates. Or should we? That’s very good.
Thank you, Prabhupada. Yeah. So that’s why I presented Prabhupada last.
So can you just explain what happens by presenting it last or first? And how does that make a significant difference? OK, it makes a significant difference in just the way you just started talking about. We shouldn’t hide behind Jesus, right? In other words, let’s make this a heart to heart dialogue. Let me not use Prabhupada as gaining authenticity or gaining permission.
We can certainly bring that in. But make this a heart to heart transaction. So he expressed to me his misgivings.
I expressed to him my appreciations for what he was doing. Then we engaged in some greater understanding between the two of us. And by the way, Prabhupada says this.
OK, so if you bring in Prabhupada first, then there may not be so much of a heart to heart connection, because then it becomes more of an intellectual defense rather than a personal reciprocation. Exactly. So let’s say this devotee got up and did everything I told you he said, without giving you all the details.
You know, he gets up and my response will simply be, well, you know what? Prabhupada said this, according to Pradyumna Prabhupada said there could be others. OK, so deal with it. See, I’m using Prabhupada to separate me from the other devotee.
That’s not how Prabhupada should be used. Oh, so that means, you know, you thought you are on Prabhupada’s side, but actually it is I who am on Prabhupada’s side and I have shown that you are not on Prabhupada’s side. It becomes like Prabhupada’s codes become like a way to create a tug of war.
Yeah, right. A tug of war. You’ve got your Prabhupada, I’ve got my Prabhupada.
Let’s pull both arms and then there’s no point. You know, Prabhupada, I think just to carry this point in the Gita’s 18th chapter commentary, Prabhupada writes about how the spiritual master is the via medium between the disciple and Krishna and yet the experience is personal. So, it is a person heart to heart connection between Krishna and the devotee.
So, similarly, if you’re not like the spiritual master helps us establish the connection, but that doesn’t mean that we don’t have a personal connection. So, you are saying the same principle you can apply with other devotees also. That’s right.
Exactly. Yeah, beautiful. It’s a Sangha.
It’s about coming together, not moving apart. Oh, okay. Sangha, coming together, literally together some, right? Sangha, come to come together.
And this is also a good example of how say that the criticism is what started the dialogue. Now, the criticism could have degenerated into a, what could be a word? It could have become like a shouting match or it could have become a, it could have degenerated into something negative. But the way you handled it, that ensured that it became quite actually not only, it became heartwarming for everyone.
That’s right. That is correct. Now, let’s say I said to the Brahmachari, let’s say I became indignant.
And I said, I don’t know who you are, but you are, you have no right. You’re a junior to me. You have no right to challenge me on this.
So, please sit down or leave the temple room. Wow, that would have just, everyone would have felt so crushed. So alienated, so uncomfortable.
But as it was, everyone with my approach felt warmed, felt thrilled, felt lifted up, all of us into a community of understanding. That’s why I like the title. Please criticize me.
I have no fears. Hmm. So I want to, I want to grow.
Yes. So, you know, I have the famous example in our books of the critical devotee is Ramachandra Puri. I was thinking exactly about the same thing.
Right, right. And he had two examples of criticizing, right? One, he criticizes his spiritual master. And the second, he criticizes his godbrother, namely Chaitanya Mahaprabhu.
So again, you see that, that kind of brother. Wait, Ishwara Puri. Okay.
So like his next generation, basically. So Madhavendra Puri is the guru for Ishwara Puri. And Ramachandra Puri, right.
And then Mahaprabhu is the disciple of Ishwara Puri, right? Yeah. So next generation. Right.
Okay. Next generation. Okay.
So, so, of course, we know what happened, right? Madhavendra Puri is about to leave his body and he’s crying out for Krishna and Ramachandra Puri said, what is the matter with you? You know, a Brahman is everywhere. I mean, you know, I mean, that’s, I mean, first of all, that is one, but anyway, I mean, what could go on about how do you say something like that to your spiritual master? I mean, he has some audacious, I mean, it’s, I mean, what an example this is, right? And then if it weren’t bad enough, if that weren’t bad enough, he didn’t just find fault with Mahaprabhu Karanka. He created the fault.
He sprinkled sugar on the floor and then claimed he was, Mahaprabhu was eating too many sweets. Yeah, and he would feed devotees too much and then they would say that you eat too much. You eat too much.
Yeah. So it’s interesting that going back to your example of, please criticize me, Chaitanya, the devotees were upset, but Chaitanya Mahaprabhu remained quite respectful. Throughout.
Yes. He says, you know, he’s teaching me the duty of a Kshatriya, of a Sanyasi rather. That’s right.
And Bhaktisiddhanta was also disappointed when that fellow died. So now, although that example, if you consider, Ramachandra Puri didn’t meet a very good fate and that was because his intent was not good. But our focus can be more on the fact that Chaitanya Mahaprabhu was not hyper-defensive or counter-aggressive.
He was almost submissive, receptive. Right. Yeah.
So now, going back to an earlier point when you said somebody needs to stand up when somebody is being hurt. See, in this case, the example which you gave is actually, it’s on the border. It’s like, I talk about skills and faith.
So in this case, it’s not just a skill of writing a book. It’s your writing a book about what a spiritual master, a book on which a commentary on a book that spiritual master also has commented. So it’s an issue of both in the border, I would say, that you have the ability to write, but you also have the Adhikar, spiritual Adhikar.
But if you go a little bit deeper, say, in general, I find that criticism in the public domain often disturbs people more. So let’s extend the situation in two, three different ways. Say, if this devotee had a doubt, now there are some questions which are there in a lot of people’s minds.
And so better ask, somebody asks it and gets it addressed. Another is that there is that question is not there in anybody’s mind, but basically, a question is asked and that sows the seed of doubt. And so in that case, maybe that same thing might better be done in the, maybe privately he comes and meets you and ask you about this.
So not in this case, but say, if two different spiritual masters have different moods, different emphasis, and then one spiritual master starts criticizing the other spiritual master, so then it becomes, it becomes very disruptive. So, so even when things are being, even when there is a, somebody is being hurt, wouldn’t it be better to actually try to have a, do things in the private domain so that the possibility of a dialogue is more? Because otherwise, once it goes in the public domain, then everybody can draw whatever conclusions and they can distort and they can aggravate things. So, so in that sense, when somebody is being hurt, now again, the question comes up, how do you decide when somebody is being hurt? So one, one spiritual master might feel that the way the spiritual master is teaching, actually he’s hurting his followers because he’s not getting them to follow Prabhupada truly.
So again, there’s a subjectivity about deciding what is, what is hurtful enough to be raised in the public domain and what is, what should be reserved to the private domain. Yeah, that’s a very difficult thing to negotiate. And it’s something in which I have found myself challenged by and something that is tricky.
Your question is, you know, what part of your question was, how do you know when someone is being hurt or whether a lot of people are being hurt? When there is a leading devotee, if, if one presents oneself as a devotee responsible for something that affects so many devotees and in the process even is hurting so many devotees and even in the knowledge that he’s hurting so many devotees still does not serve serve those devotees hearts. Then there’s something wrong. Then those devotees need help being heard.
Yes. And so it’s very tricky. It’s very tricky.
You see, if, if I was unwilling to hear this devotee in the temple room, you know, how can you do this? This is painful to me that you’ve done this. And I said, well, you know what, Prabhu, your pain is absurd. I’ve been authorized to do this.
Your pain is, I’m not going to address your pain. I’m going to ignore your pain. Why? Because Prabhupada saw that I was becoming a scholar.
He, he authorized my being a scholar. He read my work. He read my master’s thesis on the Chaitanya Charita Amrita.
Really? Yeah. Oh, amazing. Yeah.
Was that also published? The master’s thesis? No, no, it was not. And it was my, really my first year of graduate school at the University of Chicago. And then while I was on my way to Harvard, I, Satsvarupa Maharaj insisted that I send the master’s thesis to him, to Prabhupada.
And that was way back in, you know, in the beginning of June or end of May. And I didn’t want to. And because Prabhupada was sickly and he was not feeling well.
And this was, would be Prabhupada’s last summer here on earth. And I didn’t want to bother Prabhupada. So Satsvarupa and I had a big fight about whether or not to, so he said, please Prabhupada, please send it to him.
So I finally sent it to Prabhupada with a cover letter to Brindavan, where Prabhupada ended up going back after he tried to come to the US, but he got as far as the UK, London, and the manor. And then he went back to Brindavan where he would stay for the remaining days of his life here. So Prabhupada was on his back, but he was going through my thesis.
And Satsvarupa happened to be his secretary at the time. So I didn’t know that. But because, you know, the secretaries would switch around, they’d rotate, you know.
So Satsvarupa, the very person who forced me to send the manuscript, the thesis to him, was there. He read my letter to Prabhupada. And Prabhupada said, please tell him I am pleased he is preaching on such a high platform.
Now, at that time, Prabhupada had every opportunity to say, no, tell him to stop writing. This is no good. He had every opportunity.
He didn’t do that. He encouraged me. So and of course, I took his appreciation, Prabhupada’s appreciation, as something I should attain, try to attain.
Not that I was preaching on such a high platform then. But something I need to keep trying to attain. So I’m still trying, Chaitanya Charanjee.
I’m still trying. So you’re phenomenally successful in what you’re doing. I think the way you are able to, you shared with me about your course also and a five-star review and the way your books are written and the kind of reviews you get.
And last time you mentioned about how you have become an authority, especially in the Raj Panchadhyay. So certainly, it’s trailblazing. Yeah.
So the point is this, that, I mean, I could have pulled rank. I could have said, Prabhupada said this. Again, I could have hidden behind Prabhupada.
I could have, you know, I mean, maybe later on in the discussion, I could have given him assurance that Prabhupada, you know, liked that I was going in this direction. I was the only devotee who expressly went back into the academics. No one else had done this.
The devotees with degrees already arrived with their degrees when they came to the movement. I arrived with no degree. I arrived with three years of undergraduate study, and then I dropped out to join the ashram.
So I went back to get the bachelor’s and then to go on to the doctorate, master’s of doctorate. So again, I mean, I could have pulled that kind of thing. Look, you know, how can you argue with someone who went to Harvard, has three degrees from Harvard? You know, no.
See, again, you can hide behind that, too. Oh, we are about Sangha, Sangha. Yeah, it’s it’s you don’t want to borrow authority from anywhere.
You want to bring your authenticity forward. Stand on your own. Yeah.
Beautiful. But but but let that let that meet the heart and the mind of the other person. So now the thing is this, we’re dealing we have a choice, especially as we advance in Krishna Bhakti.
On what platform do we want to be speaking? And we have a choice if we have the ability to be sensitive to where my audience is in receptivity. So my capacity, their receptivity, capacity as a Kanishka Bhakta, capacity as a Madhyama Bhakta, capacity as an Uttama Bhakta. Or let me put it this way.
Sometimes it’s not good to put it the way I just did. Sometimes we devotees, Chaitanya Charanjee, think that these are categories. That we fit in, you know, I’ve been a Kanishka Bhakta for so many years, and then one day I woke up and I became a Madhyama Bhakta.
I call you up, Chaitanya Charanjee, guess what? Today, I’m a Madhyama Bhakta, you know, and of course, you’ll congratulate me and so on. OK, now, it doesn’t work that way. There are parts of me that are Kanishka, parts of me that are Madhyama, parts that can’t that can be Uttama, if I really put my mind to it.
So in speaking philosophy, in presenting Krishna Bhakti, the more we are seasoned in the Krishna Bhakti practice, the more choices we have in these regards. We can be narrow-minded, open-minded, or broad-minded in our presentations. That’s beautiful.
I think we discussed this earlier once, about these three-mindedness. Right, I think we went over this, right? But the audience reception can be narrow, can be open, and can be broad. So you see, it gets complex.
I present something from a Madhyama level, and they receive it, say, on a Kanishka level. Suddenly, my Madhyama stuff has been reduced to Kanishka stuff. Oh, my gosh.
Oh, my God. What am I going to do? You know, right? Or I’m speaking, you know, the highest thing I know, right? The Uttama. I’m speaking Uttama philosophy.
And then someone takes it from a Madhyama, reduces it to a Madhyama or Kanishka. You know, a very good example of this could be how things can… Prabhupada, I think, in one of the Gita Purports says that, therefore, we should worship only Vrindavan Krishna, not even divert our minds toward Vishnu or Ram or other manifestations. Now, Prabhupada is speaking almost like in the mood of the Gopis of Vrindavan, you know, when they saw Vishnu, he doesn’t want, they don’t want to.
But if somebody takes it to Kanishka level, they may start saying, why are we having Ram deities in our temples? And if somebody is worshipping Ram since childhood, many dynasties, many generations, they say, stop worshipping that. Start worshipping Krishna. That will be like a Madhyama-Kanishka mismatch.
Sorry, Uttama-Kanishka mismatch. Yeah. It’s tricky coordinating them.
So ideally, the speaker, if someone is given a platform to speak on the asana, he or she ideally would have the capacity to speak on the highest level possible in their capacity, but yet to account for a narrow and open-minded levels of reception. Despite the broad-minded and high-minded presentation, one is able to address the narrow-minded and the open-minded. I have to even do this in the university, Chaitanya Charan.
I spent years studying comparative religion at Harvard. My degree is in comparative religion. And then I’ve been teaching for over 30 years in the university.
Now, what makes a really popular professor at the university is someone who really can speak to these different levels of understanding and receptivity. So what should come along with the capacity of speaking at very high levels is the pedagogical capacity to be sensitive. So one may speak at a high level, but one’s pedagogical capacity might be that of a Kanishka.
So there’s the presentation, but then there’s the ability to transmit and teach, which may be very low. So when you’re saying the two things, it’s like the content and the mode of presentation. So somebody might be speaking on say Rasleela, but they might speak it from a Kanishka platform.
That’s right. But they may actually have good pedagogy. They may be a very good teacher.
They may have very little knowledge of the Rasa Panchadhyayi, but they may have Madhyama, a capacity to teach. And then the audience may have a Kanishka or Madhyama level of reception. So when you say you had to do this in the… Just a minute.
When you say you had to do this in your classrooms also, so are you saying that this is not just a categorization of levels of devotees, but it is like a categorization of broad human mentality itself? Yes, yes. That’s why I translate it into these categories of narrow, open, and broad. When an outsider hears something that could potentially be very incendiary, if he or she says, well, how… So an outsider could say, well, Prabhupada is a misogynist.
Okay. Very narrow-minded. But another outsider might say, well, my understanding is Prabhupada came here to teach people how to love God.
So we’d have to look into this more. You know, that’s broad-minded. See, that’s a broad-minded understanding.
To suspend judgment is a mature, uttama category. So we are not really accepting the criticism directly, nor are we getting in the mode of defending Prabhupada. They’re saying, we have to look at… So this was Prabhupada’s mission, and then let us look at it in the light of this mission.
That’s right. That’s the broad-minded outsider. The broad-minded insider.
You and I, hopefully, will present things that Prabhupada said with the broadest understanding and context of the whole of his presentation. With the ultimate intent. Just as Krishna says in the last words, he speaks to Arjuna in the Gita, 1872.
Have you heard this whole teaching with thought focused on the single highest? That is uttama presentation of philosophy. To take parts of the philosophy and just present them without that focus on the single highest point is not uttama presentation. It’s a more madhyama presentation.
And then to just take one part as if it were the whole, that is kanishka. Oh, okay. So when you’re… I’m just trying to understand the connection with the words.
When you’re saying that 1872, you’re quoting. So you are, in a sense, changing that inquiry to Arjuna into a mode in which Krishna has presented and a mode which we should also present. So Krishna has made a one-pointed presentation.
Now Krishna is asking Arjuna, have you heard in a similarly one-pointed way? So whether there is a match in there in the audience and the speaker. So even though there are diverse teachings, as you know very well, you probably know it better than I do, Chaitanya Charanjee. The Gita is a compilation of extraordinarily diverse teachings, practices, views, visions.
Krishna presents this rhetorical question to Arjuna in the very last words he speaks, instructing all of us to keep our teaching, our presentation on the single highest point, on the very summit. This is a powerful teaching in the Gita, very powerful. So in terms of criticizing, if I say something here in our talk, okay? So we’re having a nice conversation.
At least I’m enjoying it. I don’t care if you are. And I’m enjoying it.
I’m having fun. But, you know, who knows whether you are or not. But I’m having much more than fun.
Okay, good. But if I say something, if I say something that does not sound complete enough, I would hope you would say something. I would respect that coming from you, someone who’s so well read, someone who is in love with the philosophy, someone who is absorbed all the time, someone who interviews and is engaged in dialogue with so many devotees.
To me, a criticism coming from you would make my day. So, you know, every once a week, you know that I’m working on the Yoga Sutra with the Bhakti Vision, right? It’s to be published by Yale University Press. Well, once a week, I have a little group of devotees I call up on Zoom.
And I ask them to tear it apart. I share my screen. I show my translations.
And I ask them to rip it apart. Criticize the heck out of it. Really? Yeah.
Okay. I want people to criticize me. I want people to criticize my work.
Why? So it will grow. So I will grow. So it will be better.
Now, not everyone has that attitude, okay? That’s true. I even tell my disciples, don’t hold back. Challenge anything that I say that doesn’t feel quite right to you.
Don’t play this submissive thing, you know? Paripraśna, right? In the Gita 434, paripraśna. Not just praśna, paripraśna. Okay.
Every kind of inquiry, any doubt, challenge me. It’s not really a criticism. By the way, sometimes I’ve caught myself incorrect.
I said, oh my gosh, did I say that? Oh, I didn’t mean to say that. Here’s what I meant to say. Then you’re giving me a chance to rise to the occasion by criticizing.
So Prabhu, I’m sensing that when you are using the word, please criticize me, it’s more in the sense of, please question me. Because the word question has a, the word criticism has a negative connotation where it’s almost like, say, somebody’s putting themselves on a higher pedestal and looking down. Now, it doesn’t have to, but it often, because the word criticism, as it is used maybe in academia, and as it is used in the general society, they have two very different connotations.
So critical thinking or a critique or a critical review. Those are like useful abilities in the academic world. The word criticism is used in a significantly negative sense in the general world.
That’s right. That’s right. Very, very good observation.
And I’m glad you’re making that distinction, Chaitanya Charanjee. You’re right. In academics, your work is sent out for blind review and you get your criticisms.
But even in that context, those criticisms are not like gossiped behind my back. The criticisms are brought to me and now I get to respond. So again, conversation.
But you’re right. Now, when the word criticism is used in the academic setting, it’s much more neutral than it is in common parlance. And it means being analytical, analyzing something.
You’re right. So thank you for bringing that out. Yeah.
So in that sense, if you consider, please question me. Prabhupada does do that. In the morning, disciples, he would take the devil’s advocate or he’d ask his disciples to take the devil’s advocate.
And I had attended a few talks or I had connected with a few spiritual teachers before I was introduced to the Krishna Conscious Movement. So one thing that struck me was that we welcome questions so much. Not so many other teachers would welcome questions.
They would give talks, good talks, but that would be more or less it. So that questioning attitude is good. And now going a little deeper into that about some Prabhupada’s quotes, which might seem questionable.
So I also feel that there is a need for a forum where questions can be asked. Otherwise, why is Prabhupada saying like this? How can I make sense about it? So we will keep that in the heart and that will choke us and that will erode our faith in Prabhupada. So again, whenever there is a doubt or like you said, something doesn’t seem right, then there has to be a forum where questioning can be done.
Absolutely. But Chaitanya Chandraji, maybe more than you are aware, possibly, many devotees are nervous about questioning. I mean, maybe you can question the outside world and so on.
But I invite people to question me. And that’s scary, to question the devotee. What are your qualifications? I remember when my book, Dancing Divine, published by Princeton, came out in 2005.
I gave a lecture down in Alachua, a Sunday feast. There it’s very crowded at night. It’s dark.
And I was passing by some younger devotees in a group, a group of young ladies, obviously devotees. And some of them were saying, who is this Garuda? What right does he have to speak on the Rasa Panchadhyay? I think now between you and me, Chaitanya Chandraji, that is a fantastic question. But why did it not come to me? Because they are afraid.
You know, my weekly discussions with my own group of devotees has this statement. We are a community of love and trust. We value above all else, complete, honest and open dialogue, genuine sharing and freedom of thought.
Any and all questions, challenges and critiques are most welcomed. We strive to create a safe space for opening minds and hearts unfettered by dogma, doctrine and any social or institutional fears. We invite you to connect with us as you so desire.
That’s that sounds more like a free thinkers forum manifesto than a devotee sangha manifesto. Well, it’s it’s I feel that it’s so important that devotees speak their minds and hearts openly and honestly. If they have doubts, they should voice them.
And again, otherwise, see, these are thought to be criticisms and criticisms are thought to be aparads and aparads destroy devotional service. So that’s the line of thinking you see. So then there is a most devotees don’t even know what aparad means.
Exactly. So there is almost a fear that I might offend. And that’s why I don’t even question.
And then that that that prevents the growth of the heart that even prevents the growth of the head. So in that sense, I’m much I’m much more comfortable with the idea of questioning. And of course, questioning, like you said, in the in the inappropriate forum.
And so now where this goes off is so till now, I am I could say that I’m fully with you. In fact, I felt that over the years, maybe after 10 years in Krishna consciousness, I found that there are certain questions you couldn’t ask. And then when I found a forum where I could ask this question, this is liberating.
Yeah, like I got a almost a new life in my life. So in that sense, so if you’re talking about the the courage to ask questions, the openness to receive questions, and then growing that way, and that is a vital limb of bhakti that is that is not as often not addressed adequately. So so I am fully with you in that.
So but at the same time, there has to be some caution, because it’s so easy to nowadays the social media available. If I have to criticize, then I don’t criticize with any intention of having a dialogue. I criticize with the intention of just spreading the negativity around.
And I might say that I’m protecting people, because, you know, that is bad. And I’m protecting the people from the bad. So I think that is something which also so we could say that there is a excess of not questioning at all.
And there could be excess of indiscriminate criticism. So, so what we need is a discerning criticism. And I think that is that is something which is a challenge.
Yes, it is. But Chaitanya Charanjee, let me remind you what it says in the Bhakti Sutra. One of its aphorisms says that when one is very seasoned in Krishna Bhakti, that one protects and preserves the Bhakti Shastras, Shastra Rakshanam, Shastra Rakshanam.
When I see someone who is supposed to represent a leading devotee in the movement, who is supposed to represent our Krishna Bhakti tradition, and is obsessed with some kind of relatively superficial issue of the outer world, and this becomes his preoccupation. Something’s wrong. So I inquire, why are you doing this? It seems to me to be misrepresenting our Krishna Bhakti tradition.
Please explain. Now, there are several options here. One, he doesn’t write me back.
He completely ignores me. That is a response, Chaitanya Charanjee. No response is a response.
Tamasaguna response, but nonetheless a response. Just a minute. Would you always consider no response as a Tamogoni response? Because sometimes some people are just like, they exist to argue.
Oh, that’s different. That’s different. Okay.
Even if they exist to argue, look, the fellow that stood up in the temple room, Chaitanya Charanjee, he wasn’t really open to a dialogue. Let me take the higher road and turn this into dialogue. If we are advanced bhaktas, we can take gold from a dirty place.
Mahaprabhu took instruction from Ramachandra Puri about not eating too many sweets. Or too much, right? You know, if we are advanced enough, we not only can respond, we should respond. Look, I went on to a, I found by accident, a Facebook stream where people were slamming me to the ultimate.
Oh, my gosh. They called me, you know, the right hand man of the devil. Again, producing the Bhagavad Gita.
There were about six people slamming me. Just now, I wasn’t a friend of any of theirs. So I couldn’t go into the conversation and offer my services.
But I did write to each one of them. I said, I have read your thread condemning me as a devotee, condemning me as some kind of pseudo scholar, condemning my work, my life’s work, a kind of comprehensive condemnation of me and my work and my bhakti life. I said, I would like to engage in dialogue with you about it.
If you know how I can better my devotional service, if you can guide me to higher levels of performance, I would be perfectly happy to hear this. You could be my teacher. Tell me how I can perform better.
Not one of them wrote me back. So here, I was Chaitanya Charanjee, I was open. If they came back to me and said, Garuda, why don’t you be writing this? Or why don’t you be doing that? You know, you should take, you should remove.
You should go to HarperCollins. Despite the fact that you’ve sold 50,000 of the Gitas, you should remove it from the public. Give me reasons why.
If they’re good enough, I’ll do it. I’m open. Why am I open, Chaitanya Charanjee? Why? Is it because I’m humble? I don’t really consider myself terribly humble, honestly, okay? I’m, I have a big fat ego.
I have a lot I have, I can have an ego about, okay? So I don’t think it’s that. But I do understand myself to be a very tiny jiva. Very infinitesimal jiva, which means that whatever I do will always be incomplete.
Whatever I do, even if I speak uttama philosophy, even that will be incomplete because I am a little jiva. So I can, oh, what’s the correction for this? What, what is the response to this? What’s the antidote to my smallness is dialogue, is sharing. And that’s what bhakti means, is sharing.
Not one of these six critical, more than critical, condemning, name calling, but I overlooked all of that. I said, I wrote to each one. I said, you, all of you sound particularly angry and upset and you resorted to bad language and, and, and words of condemnation.
I’m writing to you to seek your guidance then. If you see things wrong in me, please elevate me. I’m here to learn.
It was sincere. Not a one wrote me back. So in a sense, it’s like nowadays in the media, there is this term called echo chambers.
People live in their own, almost alternate universes. And they don’t want to hear the opposite perspective. And they just want to hear their idea being repeated by others.
And they want to communicate only with those who have similar ideas. So in a sense, what you are saying is, when you say, please criticize me, we are basically trying to avoid, like, we all living in our own echo chambers, isolated and having our own conceptions about ourselves, misconceptions about others. That will prevent us from growing.
And we will get sultified. So in that sense, we could say that it’s, if we really want to have deep discussions with anyone, if you want to go beyond pleasantries, then there are definitely some, some uncomfortable topics that have to be discussed. Yes.
And it is, so please criticize me is basically like an invitation to, or a call to go to those deeper discussions, even if they are, even if they are uncomfortable. Yes, beautiful. I like the way you have said this.
Yes, thank you. So I mean, now I’m, I could say I’m fully on the, fully on board with what you’re saying, because please criticize me is, you know, I remember at one time, I had made a post on a particular issue, and one of the prominent conservative leaders of the movement, he had made a exactly opposite take on the same issue. And then his followers wrote to me, criticizing me, you know, how dare you oppose him, and you are offending him and this and that.
So then I wrote to him, and then he was surprisingly broad-minded. He said, this is a, this is a social issue. And, you know, I’ll be happy to have more honest differences of opinion in our movement.
Yeah. You know, if so, if somebody says that, if somebody starts going against the core siddhanta, then I’ll be criticizing, but here, this is a social issue. Different people can have different opinions on this.
So I was very, I would say, very reassured as well as delighted to see that. But that also led to some discussion again. Yes, beautiful.
That’s what it’s all about. It’s all about dialogue and connecting, not isolation. It’s about connection.
Isolation is kineshta, narrow, narrow. Madhyama is beginning, is in the, moving into a greater world of connecting. Uttama, you’re connected.
You’re, you’re, you appreciate all views and you appreciate it. That’s true. We, so now as, as advanced devotees, as, or I should say, not advanced devotees, but as who are advancing.
Okay. Yeah. Advancing.
We have choices that we can make here, Chaitanya Charanjee. We really do. Even what you’re doing here.
Okay. Okay. What are you doing here? You invited me to come and talk to you.
That, of course, that’s your first mistake, but that’s, you’ll have to deal with that later. I would love to repeat this mistake throughout my life. Well, I mean, you may end up repeating the mistake.
That’s your, again, your problem, but joking aside, what are you doing here? What you are doing here is you are receiving. I mean, I could be anybody. I could be anyone with any kind of view, very narrow view, very broad view.
Who knows? You don’t know exactly what I’m going to say when I get on here. It’s a risk. It’s a risk.
And Rupa Goswami talks about taking risk in devotional service. Now, I don’t think he meant, you know, a jumping off a bungee jump, you know, between Mount. I don’t think he talked about, you know, jumping out of an airplane with a parachute.
I don’t think he was talking about that kind of risk. He’s talking about risking the heart. Beautiful.
Open, open the heart. Take risks. Being here with you, Chaitanya Charanjee, this is a terrible risk for me.
I mean, I’m opening my heart to you. I mean, what am I thinking? You know, I mean, I should have thought about this, you know. But joking aside, we are taking risk with each other.
I’m open. You’re open back. There’s a reciprocation.
And in the process, mutual openness as bodhiyanta paraspada, then we become mutually enlightening one another. And that is Tushyanticha, Ramanticha, so enjoyable. So I’m enjoying this very much and don’t really care if you are or not.
Yeah. Yeah. Actually, these are the times when the hearts bond together.
When actually, nowadays in the mainstream world, people talk about vulnerability quite a bit, you know, the power of vulnerability. So we are making ourselves vulnerable. So I was always wondering whether there is any precedent for that in our scriptures.
But the point of taking risk is exactly the same thing. I never thought of in that context. Oh, definitely.
It’s right there in the beginning of our process. Shravanam means totally vulnerable or receptive. Kirtanam means contribution.
And we take turns like a seesaw. Did you ever have seesaws in your childhood? Yeah. You had that in India? Yes.
We also have seesaw in parks, you know? Yeah. So while one is up, one is down. The one up is vulnerable.
Like, hey, I’m hanging here. I’m in the air, you know? So I’m receptive. This is reception.
It takes a certain amount of trust. And then the person down is the one who’s kirtanam. And then he or she goes up, right? So there’s a back and forth.
It’s a beautiful balance of kirtanam and shravanam. Shravanam, kirtanam. And then when things are perfectly balanced, they become elevated to a state of Vishnu Smarna.
This is beautiful. You know, I always had this question that this guhyam akhyati pruchyati, we don’t really see examples of that in scripture. So much.
Let me clarify what I mean by this. What you said about shravanam, kirtanam, seesaw, I agree that that’s what we need for deep discussions. But most of the time, what we see in scripture is like one person is authority and other person is questioning.
So if we consider the Krishna-Arjuna discussion or Shuddha-Goswami-Panishad-Maharaj discussion, at one level, it’s heart to heart. But it is like 90% one person is speaking or 95% one person is speaking. So another person is speaking about 5% or 10%.
So that two equals sharing their heart with each other. I don’t see that. Some that is something like recorded in our scripture.
No, you do see it. You see it in the Ramananda Raya Mahaprabhu Garanga Catechism. Chapter 8, Mandya Leela.
But you know, Chaitanya Mahaprabhu puts himself in a subordinate position over there. Well, you know, it’s back and forth. You know, it’s a back and forth.
But that’s a great example of a back and forth balance the way we’re talking about. I agree with you that in the Bhagavata and the Gita Upanishad, right, that there’s more the teacher-student. OK.
I mean, look, when I teach at the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, which I’m going to be doing this semester, these are higher level students. So there’ll be more seminar-like, right? OK. But undergraduates, what do they, they don’t know.
So it’s much more top down, right? Graduate study is more, you know, it’s closer. In fact, sometimes the graduate student will bring in something I never knew. Does Graham Schweig, PhD, know everything? Well, he thinks he does, but he doesn’t.
Factually, he does not. And he loves to be surprised by a student who says, ABCD. And he goes, well, that is really something.
Thank you. Beautiful. So now, interesting, going back to Seesaw example.
So you put the person who is high up as the vulnerable. That’s the opposite of the hierarchy, you know, like, say, Shukdev Goswami sits on a high pedestal and Parikshit Maharaj is on a lower pedestal. But here, say, when somebody is high up, you can, I mean, you can easily shoot them down.
That’s right. They can fall off. And it’s interesting, the one who is higher is the, should be the authority, the most authoritative, the more authoritative we are, the greater capacity we have to hear.
Really? There’s a paradox. Reception. Prabhupada said, if we could hear the Maha Mantra just once, perfectly.
Okay, now we could put it in this sense also that, you know, it doesn’t necessarily have to mean in terms of quantity, you have to hear more. But the higher up somebody is, even the few words, they can gather a lot. Yes.
Because they can, they’re sensitized to the, not just the words, but the heart. And they have that, they themselves have a caring heart. Absolutely.
Beautiful. Absolutely. So there, you know, and as you know, there are limitations to metaphors, but you can also switch metaphors around a little bit, which we just did.
Okay. Switch the metaphor. Yeah.
And so now going back to the, this is very beautifully moving forward now. So moving forward. So now it’s time for you to criticize me.
Well, I think you addressed most of my criticisms because I am, my criticism was about the word criticism. There we go. And that’s the way I started myself.
That, yeah. Devotees telling devotees not to criticize. But I’m saying that this is a critical statement.
They’re assuming, they’re making the assumption I’m busy criticizing. And they’re also making the assumption that I don’t want to be criticized, which is not the fact. I want to be criticized.
Yes. True. So now, you know, there are three things we could, again, going back to the earlier point of the person should be receptive to gain criticism.
And our focus today is on that. Like, don’t become too defensive or aggressive when somebody criticizes us, because through that criticism, we will all learn. And we all, we all have so much to learn.
Right. So that’s a very important attitude with respect to, say, humility and growth from our side. Now, from the other side, I’d like to mention earlier that there is the fear that if I’m criticizing, I’m committing apartheid.
So what are the cautions that when somebody is offering criticism, what should they be careful about? Now, my understanding of apartheid is that it is not just anything that anything critical is apartheid. It is usually the intention that matters most. Now, it’s generally with the intention of pulling down somebody out of envy.
When we do act or speak, that is when it really becomes a serious apartheid. But then I could go to the other extreme. And there are examples, I think, in the Goswami’s life, where there was a lame Vaishnava who was walking along the road and Rupa Goswami was meditating on Radha Krishna.
And in the meditation, he saw something like some humorous thing Krishna did to Radha. And he started laughing. And this lame Vaishnava was walking along.
He thought that this Rupa Goswami is laughing at me. And he got hurt by that. And then Rupa Goswami’s vision disappeared.
So then the story goes that because this devotee was displeased with him, so Krishna was displeased with him and Krishna disappeared from his vision. So then he went and found that devotee and clarified what was going on. And then that devotee was pacified.
And then he again resumed his devotional meditation. See, there was dialogue. There was dialogue.
Okay, beautiful. We are bringing it back to the same point. There we go.
So you are saying that we need to also be cognizant of the fact that there’s one level of definition of aparadha is that we don’t want to hurt any devotee. So even if somebody is feeling hurt, then also we need to have a dialogue to clarify it. Yes.
So I was trying to deal with a major movement issue. And I found that a devotee who was involved, a leading devotee was involved in an issue. He felt hurt by me.
And I went to him and I tried to engage in dialogue. He refused to speak with me directly, but to just go through emails, which of course is kind of half dialogue, you know, when you’re just communicating through. So I was very disappointed.
This is a devotee with whom I’d been in constant dialogue quite a bit on and off throughout the years. I apologized to him. I said to him, if there was any way I hurt you, I apologize privately to you.
I will address it fully. I will address it fully in public if you want me to. But this does involve your hurting many devotees.
So I spill, I just, I left, I gave myself fully. I said, whatever you want to do. I apologize for any way that I overlooked something.
And if I was insensitive or, you know, unaware of something, and I’m willing to actually apologize and make up for it. It’s not about forgiveness. You know, devotees have this forgiveness thing going on.
I mean, Chaitanya Charan, if you are living in a house and I’m angry one day with you, I’m just so angry. And I take it out by burning your house down. And I realized the next day, oh, my God.
Oh, my God. I can’t believe I did what I did. So I go up to you.
I said, Chaitanya Charan, will you forgive me? I burnt your house down. I was angry with you, but I realized how awful that was. Well, will you forgive me? First of all, wait a second.
Why are we talking about you forgiving me? I burnt your house down. What I should be coming to you for is not forgiveness. I should be saying, I apologize.
And you know what? I’m going to build you another house. Forgiveness is all about me. Chaitanya Charan, forgive me.
I burnt your house down. That’s all I care about. To hell with your other house.
Look, you didn’t like that house anyway. You don’t care about having another house. You’re a Nazi or whatever.
Okay. So, you know, in other words, I can rationalize all I want. But the fact is, I burnt your house down.
Now, it’s horrible just to ask for forgiveness. I need to make this up to you. I need to build you another house.
So what you’re trying to say by this is, if somebody starts criticizing, now we’re talking about the other person’s perspective. Somebody starts criticizing and their criticism ends up becoming destructive. Then they need to take responsibility, not just apologize and think it’s done.
But they need to take responsibility. In fact, this same devotee about whom I’m speaking, which remains Namos, he was so upset with me that he started spreading very trashy thoughts about me to a few devotees. What he didn’t know is that those devotees, upon hearing these things, were so uncomfortable about hearing this that they came to me and told me what he was saying.
I then first, I said, I don’t believe you say those things. They’re outrageous. So I wrote directly to him.
I said, I have heard from several devotees that you’re saying A, B, C, and D about me. Is this true? If you don’t respond to me, I will assume that it is true and that you don’t have enough courage to face it. If you do respond, then I will take it from there.
I’ll take it from however you respond. Maybe you didn’t say these things. But I’m getting this from four different devotees.
He admitted that he was saying these things. He said, I was not myself. I was off my equilibrium.
He said, and I apologize. I said, don’t apologize to me. I don’t need your apology.
Those other devotees need your apology because you put trash in their minds. Don’t apologize to me. I don’t accept your apology.
Go to them and apologize and correct what you said. And he did, to his credit. Hmm.
Again, don’t apologize. Don’t accept my apology for burning your house down. Make sure I build you another house.
Yeah. No, no, no. Forgiveness.
Please, Chittendacharan, please forgive me for burning your house down. Please, please. It’s all about me.
It’s not about you. What about you? Where are you living? You have no house. True.
You see, it’s so, it’s so backwards. We can’t just apologize. We can’t ask for forgiveness, which is still so egocentric.
Make up for it. Do something to counter the damage you’ve done. Then there is a good platform for forgiveness.
True, fully true. You know, nowadays, forgiveness has become more about becoming free from that burden on my heart. So even if I seek forgiveness for something wrong that I have done, or even if I give forgiveness.
So I want to give forgiveness so that I don’t resent you. I want to seek forgiveness so that I don’t feel guilty. But in either case, the actual issue is necessarily being addressed.
So the issue has to be actually addressed. Right. You know, I wrote an article on the Ramayana.
So I talked about how Vali, when he realized what he had done to Ram, to his brother Sugriva. So he acknowledged his fault. Then he apologized and then he amended.
So I talk about these three things, acknowledgement, apology and amending. So the amending that he did was he had a necklace that granted him practical immortality. As long as he’s wearing the necklace, he would not die.
He could have very well given that necklace to his son Angada. But he gave it to Sugriva. Beautiful.
This is beautiful. Very good points, Chetan Charanjee. I’d like to read about this.
OK, I’ll send you that article. You have to send me. Yeah, good.
Thank you. So this is, I think, so we talked about the eagerness of the person to receive criticism and then the caution of the person in giving criticism. That’s right.
That if they’re being destructive. The sensitivity. Yeah.
So then in the process, we may very well not be sensitive. And when that is obvious, then we try to become more sensitive. But if the other person finds himself or herself too resentful, too fearful, they will go away.
Or the person who is criticizing may find it too. This is too scary. And then they go away.
The problem is when we go away, Chetan Charanjee, when we fall out of dialogue. Even the even the Vrajagopikas stepped aside and say, we’re the most fortunate women in the whole world. They stopped their interplay with Krishna to think about that and to become self-conscious.
Although appearing to be very appreciative. But they got out of the zone. Right.
Beautiful. We have to stay in the zone. The seesaw.
You one person can’t see. So have you ever tried? Yeah. Sorry.
One person can’t, of course. No, that’s right. I have tried endlessly to see saw by myself.
I cannot do it. So true. You know, going now, going back to the Vaishnavaprat point, I go earlier, like you quoted Prabhupada.
Sometimes we quote Prabhupada to to like bring Prabhupada in the middle of an honest dialogue. Yes. So sometimes the whole paranoia about Vaishnavaprat can come in the middle of an honest dialogue.
Yeah. So it’s like I have this experience that on one side, we may not want to criticize because we fear committing apartheid. And I remember one devotee spoke something very, very painful for me.
And then then they maybe after a day or two, they came back and they said, you know, you are you are a very senior devotee and I don’t want to offend you. So kindly forgive me. So I felt that that was, I mean, I appreciated whatever they did.
I said, you didn’t really hurt me. But the point was, it is not so much of, oh, I don’t want to do this fearful thing called Vaishnavaprat. It’s not that I want to connect with you.
I want to understand you. Maybe I hurt you. Maybe I misunderstood you.
So Vaishnavaprat while offering criticism and even while offering apology becomes a not Vaishnavaprat per se, but the fear of Vaishnavaprat becomes like a stumbling block for connection of the hearts. Yeah. Beautiful.
Chaitanya Charanjee, I so much appreciate your intelligent observations always. And this is just one of them. The fear of committing apartheid ironically prevents dialogue.
Exactly. And and that’s that’s not what, you know, I mean, look, if we have fear of the 10 offenses to the holy name, I mean, look, you know, I mean, one day I said, just forget it. I can’t.
I’m not going to chant. I mean, look at this. 10 offenses.
I mean, I’m going to commit these all the time, back and forth, up and down. I mean, why should I chant? Because chanting itself purifies one of the dashaparat. That’s a powerful example.
Dialogue itself dissolves the fear and the and the cause for any apartheid. It’s there. Beautiful.
You know, if somebody said that I will stop chanting because I’m committing offense, because I’m afraid of committing offenses, you would consider that absurd. But we do that with respect to dialogue. Ultimately, the purpose of apartheid, not committing Vaishnavaprat is to have loving relationships and loving relationship required dialogue.
Otherwise, how are we going to develop that? So we are, in one sense, the fear of Vaishnavaprat is defeating the purpose of the Vaishnavaprat itself. Exactly, exactly. So we could say broadly, the Vaishnavaprat means at two extremes.
One is I try to avoid having evil intentions or envious intentions of others. And the other is I am sensitive to how my actions are affecting the other person. So we could say Vaishnavaprat extends at two levels.
But sometimes I may have to speak something that hurt others. Of course, I will try to ensure that I don’t hurt more than necessary, because some discussions are uncomfortable. Like we say, the truth is unpalatable.
But the truth doesn’t have to be spoken unpalatably. So we can. That’s right, the way it’s spoken.
Yeah, yeah. But you know, I mean, the actual meaning of aparadha is away from loving. You know, I love the way you take, sorry, I love the way you take bhakti concepts and universalize them.
Normally, the aparadha meaning we have is away from Radha. And that is true. But ultimately, what is Radha? Radha is the embodiment of love.
So suddenly they expand so much away from love. It becomes universal. Exactly.
It’s apart from love. You know, Chaitanya Charanji, you know, I, you know, Anutamaji, right? Yeah, DC area. So, you know, he has these Vaishnav Christian, Vaishnava Muslim dialogues.
Hmm. And I’ve been going to them for 20 years. Okay, so I’ve been I’m one of the main participants from the Vaishnava side, right? So at the end of these dialogues, which go on for a day or a day and a half, we generally go around and give reactions.
And what did you think? You know, the dialogue and most people say, Oh, my gosh, you know, it was wonderful. We found so many similarities and so on. And when they get to me, they’re very shocked when they get to me.
I said, I loved this dialogue. And I couldn’t stand it at the same time. The reason I can’t stand it is because the people who need the dialogue are not here.
We are already everyone here is already so capable of dialogue. I want to sit with someone that hates me. I want to sit here with someone that will make me uncomfortable.
And I want to see if we can both connect. I want to sit with a fanatic Christian who hates anyone of any other religious faith, because they’re all fake. They’re all inauthentic.
The only real religion is the faith of Jesus Christ. The faith in Jesus Christ. I want to sit with someone like that.
Instead of people, you know, you scratch my back, that’s wonderful. We think alike. I want to engage in dialogue with people that may not like what I do as a Vaishnav.
I want to sit with a Muslim. I want to sit with a Muslim who goes into the temple room and looks at the arch of vigraha and goes, Oh, my God, I don’t worship. Idolatry.
I want to I want to explain why it’s not idolatry. I want to hear what is uncomfortable to them about what I do as a devotee. And I want the challenge of seeing if I can make them receptive.
To what I feel about what they’re doing. I love that kind of challenge. Chaitanya Charanjee.
I like the hardball stuff. That’s. You know, that’s, at one sense, challenging, but when it works out, it’s almost like a breakthrough, you know, you entered a new world.
It’s wonderful. You know, when I was at the L.A. Rath Yatra. Three, three years ago.
There are these. This group of Christians, heckling the devotees and everyone on the march, you know, holding up these huge signs of hell, fire and brimstone. You’re going to hell, you know, you’re going to pay for this.
And there was one guy there who was huge, big, burly guy. I swear that the size of his bicep. Was the width of my trunk, you know, I mean.
He was and he had a bright blue T-shirt that he could barely fit in and it said, trust Jesus, right? Scary looking character. I mean, no one, anyone would. Anyway, so I say to prevent the loss of my disciple.
I say to him, I said, let’s go back to those Christians. I think I think they just need a big hug. I really do.
I just. I think they’re just feeling lonely. You know, and he said.
Gurudev, I don’t think so. I really advise against this. I think it’s dangerous.
I said, no, don’t worry you. You stay, you know, a few yards behind me. I’ll go.
You know. So, of course, he had his phone with him. And I go up to this big, burly guy that looks like he’s overqualified for football, right? In America, right? Okay.
And I go up to him and I said, you know, I go right up to him. And I said, you know, I know that you have something that you feel is very important to communicate to us. And I would really like to hear that.
Okay. But first, I really think you need a hug. I really do.
I think you’re I just think you your mother didn’t give you enough hugs. So may I give you a big hug? So I wrap my he said, Yeah, I wrap my, you know, I spread my arms as wide as I can to give some kind of embrace to this, this sequoia tree of a human. And he wraps his around me like easily, right? And we’re hugging each other.
And, and then I turn around and, and, and there’s prevent under velocity takes a shot of us with their arms around. It’s on my Facebook page, if you ever take a look at it. Amazing.
Anyway, it’s, and there we are. And he was scared. You know, when one knows how to dialogue, one can be fearless.
One can be truly fearless, connecting with other hearts with hearts that don’t really want to connect with ours. But if the love is there, you can kind of sneak in there and get and begin the dialogue, begin the dialogue, the seed of a dialogue. It’s amazing incident.
So in a sense, what you said in the, what you said in the, in the, in the Western Christian dialogue, what was not happening there, you in a sense made that happen in the Rath Yatra. That’s right. Exactly.
I want challenges. I want criticism. Please criticize me.
I can take it. I want to grow. That’s true.
And so you also gave some examples where you wanted a dialogue, but it didn’t happen because the other person was not ready. That’s right. So sometimes it just doesn’t work.
So now there’s also this understanding in Bhakti Samsindhu that we should, we grow in like-minded association. So now at one level, it’s, it’s comfortable and natural to be with like-minded devotees. And that is where we can actually easily lower our guard and open our hearts.
And there also, even if criticism comes, we can accept it. But, but if there are like extremely unlike mind, unlike-minded devotees. Yeah.
Then it becomes, it becomes much more difficult to actually even receive criticism from them. Because it’s one thing to have, say, you’re telling that, okay, this thing about you is bad or this thing you did is wrong. But it’s like, if somebody is questioning your existence itself.
So, yeah, your existence as a devotee itself is a problem. So then, then there’s a lot of hostility and bringing that hostility down takes time. Now, to some extent, you brought that down with respect to that person who asked the question, Brahmacharya, who asked the question about the Gita.
Right. But what I have noticed is that sometimes when I try to do that, the effort doesn’t seem to be worth it. Because it’s just like, it’s just like, there’s so much difference.
There’s so many mountains to literally mountains to be crossed. And there has to be some level of foundational agreement. Yeah.
And. This is a really good point. So, you know, so I, you know, I was contemplating the 1820 and 1822.
What you talked about earlier, you know, focusing only on a part as a whole and seeing. So I feel for, for criticism to move to a dialogue, there has to be first accepting and then challenging. But if it’s first challenging and then maybe you come to accepting, then it’s like first we build walls and then it becomes very difficult to take it forward.
Yeah. There is a point of no return. And one has to know when to put it on the shelf for a while.
And and then one has to, you know, and the thoughtful devotee will always reflect back and wonder, what could I have done to have made this better, a better outcome? Even if they’re the shortcut, even if it’s the other party that refuses to come into dialogue. One still asks, what could I have done to make it even easier for this fearful devotee? They’re fearful they don’t enter into dialogue because it’s it’s a fearful thing. They don’t have enough courage or or strength to enter into dialogue.
So then the question is, what could I have done to make it easier for such a fearful person to come and enter into dialogue? So it’s always a two way thing, you know. You know, sometimes they might they don’t at all seem fearful. They seem much more dismissive that you are so wrong that you are not even worth having a dialogue with.
Exactly. In English, there is a saying that this is right and this is wrong. And that is not even wrong.
That’s right. That’s that’s that’s Thomas Aguna. And that’s they they resort to that because they can’t face their own lacking.
OK, it’s a cowardly assertion that I can’t face my own shortcomings. Even if I’m if I have a lot that’s right to offer to this devotee, I still have to look at my shortcomings in not being able to coax that devotee into dialogue. What did I say? Look at my shortcomings to not.
In terms of my inability to coax that devotee into dialogue. Coax. OK, coax.
OK. Yeah. Yeah, once once I’m able to to to make it viable or to somehow to to give that devotee a sense that dialogue really is the way to go here.
As soon as there’s no as soon as dialogue is gone, there’s no relationship. No dialogue, no relationship. Yeah.
No relationship. Isolation. Isolation.
No growth. Now, and it’s I mean, it’s not only no growth individually. It’s quite often when discussion stops, then the bloodshed starts.
So things and yes, it becomes very acrimonious also. Yes. Then acrimony can set in.
Yes, exactly. So, yeah. So that’s why I put up the sign.
Please criticize me. I want to grow. Mm hmm.
So in a sense, in the sign, please criticize me itself is implicit in what kind of criticism is sought. Of course, we can’t control what kind of citizen the other will give. That’s the point.
So someone will come forward with constructive criticism. Someone will come forward and say, really, you’re just you know, everything you’re doing is ridiculous, stupid. It could be really outrageous, right? I’m ready for any criticism along that spectrum.
Mm hmm. As I did with that Facebook thread, but they wouldn’t talk with me. They wouldn’t enter into dialogue with me.
Beautiful. So going back to that earlier point of like minded association. So could we say that in general as devotees, it’s natural to seek like minded association? And that’s where we would be normally comfortable and that could be our home.
But we also need to be ready to periodically say come out of our home and associate with unlike minded devotees also. So to broaden our conceptions of bhakti. Yes.
If you’re constantly with unlike minded association, then that will also make us very unstable and insecure. It’s like we don’t have any home to go to at all. Yes.
And the other is we just never go out of home. Yes. Precisely.
Yes, true. Thank you. And I was thinking about this point of no return, you know, that even Prabhupada, when he started ISKCON, he wanted many of his godbrothers to be involved.
He got his disciples to meet them, associate with them. And then he, in fact, wanted like a committee to be formed to over to run ISKCON also. Yeah.
So in many ways, he wanted them to be involved. Now, no, again, no offense to them. They are all great souls in their own way.
But when Prabhupada saw that they were becoming possessive and they’re trying to pull his disciples, then maybe that was a time when their dialogue, not with everyone, but with some of them, Prabhupada stopped it. And some of the other godbrothers, he always had very warm interactions. Yes, I was there for some of them.
Oh, really? OK. Yes, I was there. We went to cross the river to go to Nabadweep, to Sridhar Maharaj’s ashram.
Oh, OK. So I was right there. I was sitting right there listening to the dialogue back and forth between Sridhar Maharaj.
It must have been an amazing experience to see Prabhupada in that world. You know, Prabhupada was mostly in a mood of Acharya teaching. Yes.
Yeah, but I knew at that time, I knew no Bangla. Oh, OK. And they were talking Bangla.
Amazing. Yeah, but you could see the reactions and the, you know, the facial expressions and the body language and so on. So that was always, you know, just the darshan, just the darshan was wonderful.
With great souls. That’s always amazing. Yeah.
So. So you think we covered our topic today reasonably? I mean. Yes, quite comprehensively.
It’s nice that we. You can criticize. You can criticize if you want.
No, maybe, I mean, I was, I said, a little uncomfortable with the point of criticism, as I said earlier, but I am, my concerns are fully addressed. Yeah. So maybe I’ll try to summarize.
We did go a lot of journey. I’m not sure, but let me try. Yes.
So our topic was, you know, say, please criticize me. I want to grow. And then basically we started with how in the academic world there are reviews and the whole reviews idea is criticizing.
And then through the criticism, the manuscript becomes better. And if you want to learn, then I also shared my experience that I learned a lot by the writing of the BTG articles. And then you talked about the intent of the criticism, which is important and how it is phrased and also the receptivity of the person who is receiving it.
So the receptivity is important. And then we went into the discussion of how the mood of questioning is, if it is suppressed, then it will come off as gossip. It won’t go away.
So if somebody is having some reservations, best to address them. And you give the example of the Brahmachari asking this question about you’re writing a commentary on the Gita. And so basically, if you appreciated the question, you are not defensive and then you address the question.
So now when we are actually going to get this kind of criticism, it’s important to see that not as an attack, but as an opportunity for dialogue. And when we when then, in fact, Arjuna himself is criticized by Krishna. Arjuna is very funny.
He started to go to Bhishma and say Arjuna is in Maya. So that is beautiful. So here criticism is now, in a sense, when you see somebody doing something wrong, we want to stop them from doing it.
Or if especially they’re doing something wrong, which is going to hurt others, then for those who are being hurt, you have to stand up to them. So when I give the example of parents not fighting in front of their children, but you give the counter example that if a parent is abusive, then the other parent needs to stand up in front of the children against that abusive parent. So we have a responsibility.
What is Sanskrit word is Shastra Raksha. We have that responsibility to protect the scripture and we do that by asking questions. So criticism in the mainstream society has that sense of negativity of denigrating and condemning and so that.
But in the academic sense, it’s more of analyzing for improving. So we are talking about criticizing in that sense. And in our tradition also, we can have criticism in the sense of pariprasthana, questioning.
So questioning leads to deeper understanding. And any questioning, could have just been prashna, prashnayana, but it’s pariprasthana. Oh, OK.
Pariprasthana. Pariprasthana means any question, any question. Yeah.
So then you talked about also Prabhupada himself. He encouraged questions and we have in our tradition. So we came into the example of seesaw.
So where there is the whole point is if we are to have a dialogue, we cannot avoid having uncomfortable issues being discussed. Otherwise, it stays superficial. And so when we have those discussions, then we, if we present ourselves not as omniscient, but as wanting to learn, then quite often, and then people do soften and the dialogue can happen.
And then you also made the point that when there is criticism, we don’t say bring Prabhupada as the first line of defense, because then that prevents the heart to heart, human or devotional connection. So we authentically, we don’t borrow from authority, but we build our authenticity and then we can also bring in authority. And that same obstruction of connection can also happen if we are too much fearful of Vaishnavapradha, because we may not offer criticism or even when we apologize, we may do it, we may do it more for the fear of Vaishnavapradha, not for preventing, for preventing the damage to the relationship or repairing the damage to the relationship.
Yes. And then in that seesaw example, it’s like the example for that, Gita and Bhagavatam, we could say they are more like undergrad or preliminary student level discussions. So it’s more of vertical, but the Chaitanya Charita Amrut is more of reciprocation.
So it’s so the person up at one level is more vulnerable. And that vulnerability in Bhakti can also be seen from Rupa Goswami’s quote that taking risks in Bhakti, that risk is not like living on the edge sports or something like that. It is bearing our heart and inviting criticism, inviting feedback.
And then, so after discussing about the receptivity, because that’s how we will learn, then we talk to the other side about what is the mood while giving criticism. So we have to, at one level, we don’t want to hurt anyone, but we don’t want to paranoid about Vaishnavapradha. And if we find that we have hurt anyone, I apologize for hurting your sentiments.
At the same time, if we feel the issue is important, we can stand by the issue, but we are ready to maybe change the way we express ourselves. So we are cognizant of the other person’s emotions or the impact of our actions on their emotions. At the same time, if we have a cause to stand for, we stand for it.
And if we actually damage someone or hurt someone, then simply asking for forgiveness is self-centered. You have to actually make amends. So if I burn your house and then I say, I’m sorry.
So if XYZ criticizes you to some devotees and then comes and apologizes to you, the amending is actually apologizing and clarifying with them. So that way we fix things. And then toward the end, we discussed about Prabhupada’s example also of how Prabhupada had, you said, although you couldn’t understand the language, but you saw the warm reciprocation between him and Sridhar Maharaj.
And ultimately, if the fear of, that was a brilliant example, that just says the fear of the offense to the holy name is not meant to make us stop chanting. Similarly, the fear of Vaishnavapradha is not meant to make us stop connecting with devotees. And while connection is happening, there’s a point earlier, but we came back to it a little later also, that there is the speaker’s capacity and the audience receptivity.
And then the speaker can be narrow-minded, open-minded, broad-minded, like Kanishta Madhyama Uttama, and same as the audience. So the expert speaking will be that speaks at the broad-minded level, but also carries on people at other levels, carries together rather, people at the lower levels. And then you give the example of how Arjuna, when Krishna says in 1872 that, have you heard, with one-pointed attention.
That means Krishna is keeping his focus on that one point of getting Arjuna to the level of becoming aware of how much Krishna loves him and how much Krishna is with him. And while addressing various diverse arguments. So if we also can do that, that is the expertise of a Uttama, a Uttama Bhakta.
And so the Uttama Bhakta is basically, you talk about Kanishta, not just as a devotional categories, but as broadly human categories. And then you get the example of these Christians, that sometimes we have dialogue with people who, we don’t have dialogue with the people who, with whom, who actually need that dialogue. So then we need to have to come out of our safe zone.
So that is also an example of you taking a risk when you went and give a hug to that, that bulky, what do you say, over qualified for football. So, so when we do that, that kind of connect, when the connection happens, then that is what actually brings fulfillment to a devotee’s life. And so we can, we would naturally like to be like-minded devotees.
So that can be our home. But we also need to come out of our home and periodically associate with like-minded devotees so that we can grow and maybe we can help them also grow. So now please criticize me.
That was well done. I have to say that was an excellent summary. And if, if I’m able to share my screen, I can show you the picture.
Oh, please. That’s lovely. So you see it? That’s, trust Jesus.
It really looks, as you said, scary. It’s very scary. You see that? So did you also have a discussion with him eventually? Or it was just a hug? I did.
I did talk to him. Yeah. Oh, okay.
And, and, and, you know, we, it, it, I mean, again, dialogue, it’s amazing. I mean, would you ever think of dialoguing with anyone like that? I mean, look at that. I mean, would you go up to someone like that? I mean, it’s a little imposing, isn’t it? Oh, definitely.
I think you made that very beautiful point also. When you know how to dialogue, then you are, you, you don’t have fear because you can approach. Yeah.
That’s right. That’s true. Beautiful.
Wonderful. Wonderful. Well, as always, Chetan and Charan, I’ve really enjoyed our dialogue.
Yes, sir. And it’s been really fun, really. And again, meaningful to me.
I’ve learned things from you. And I look forward to some more. Oh, I would love to have a continued discussion.
So it is so illuminating. So inspiring. I would say three things.
It’s like, at an intellectual level, it broadens conception so much. At a devotional level, I feel that in my first and our first discussion also appreciated in that, that in you, the head and the head doesn’t compromise the heart. So we have the devotional depth that also comes in.
And also, I feel that there is just a third thing would be that we bring in real life experiences. So it’s not just like an emotion of the heart or just like intellectual conceptions. We’re actually discussing real life situations and bringing real life experiences.
So I feel it is relevant to the audience also. So thank you very much for sparing your time. And I look forward to continuing discussions soon in the future.
Thank you. Thank you, Chetan and Charanji. Hare Krishna.
Hare Krishna.