Is the Hare Krishna movement a Hindu organization?
Podcast:
Excerpt from the video: Is Bhagvad Gita Hindu ? Ft. Chaitanya Charan Prabhu | DigiKarma https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n5K-UZZwXAg&t=0s
Video:
Is the Hare Krishna movement or ISKCON a Hindu movement? Are you guys Hindu?
See, Śrīla Prabhupāda himself talked about this quite a bit. Again, the two levels apply all the time — the paramārthic level and the vyāvahāric level.
At the paramārthic (absolute) level, we say that the Hare Krishna movement, or ISKCON, follows the teachings of the Bhagavad Gītā. The Bhagavad Gītā itself does not talk about any particular religion; it speaks about spirituality, spiritual values, and ultimate purposes. So from that perspective — the paramārthic perspective — the Bhagavad Gītā and its followers transcend all religions.
Now, from the vyāvahāric (practical) perspective, obviously, we don’t identify ourselves as Christians or Muslims. This practical dynamic also applies to sacred places (dhāms). For example, if you go to a holy place like Vrindavan, one of the offenses (aparāds) is to treat the dhām like an ordinary place. This means that the dhām is not just a location in India in the usual sense; it is a spiritual realm where the divine has manifested.
At the same time, if you have to place it on a geographical map, it will be placed in India — not in Pakistan, China, or Russia. Similarly, within the vyāvahāric aspect, we can say that the Hare Krishna movement exists within the broad family of traditions identified as Hinduism.
I ask this because I have seen, for example, at some place in Europe or in an airport, Hare Krishna listed as a separate religion and Hinduism as a separate religion. So I wondered — is ISKCON trying to be a separate path or a separate panth from Hinduism? The answer is no. Śrīla Prabhupāda has made statements of both kinds, and subsequently, his followers have explained this in different ways. But ultimately, it depends on context.
There is no organized or deliberate effort to separate ISKCON from Hinduism in terms of religious demographics. As far as I know, no such movement exists, and I don’t think it is there at all.