How can we deal with doubts rising on seeing that many leading Prabhupada disciples are no longer practicing KC?

Most of the ISKCON leaders described in the Lilamrita are not in ISKCON now. Why is that?

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
Hare Krishna.
Question. Many of the leading disciples of Shila Prabhupada who did enormous services as is described by Shila Prabhupada Nilamarath are no longer practicing Krishna consciousness also. So, this often disturbs our faith about why is it that those who were such advanced devotees fell away from the process.
Does this indicate that something is wrong in the process or how do we understand it? Answer. Shila Prabhupada himself told when the first time a devotee left Krishna consciousness, he said, we shouldn’t be surprised at who lives, we should be surprised at who stays. That’s because the process of Krishna consciousness is difficult in the sense that although by Chaitanya Mahaprabhu it is easy, Maharshi, it is easy, but it is difficult in the sense that it requires sustained commitment.
And, to maintain that sustained commitment is not easy if one doesn’t keep oneself always in the association of devotees and diligent in practising the process. So, we have to understand that whatever service anyone does, that is to their lasting credit. So those who did extraordinary service, they helped Shila Prabhupada in times of emergency and they will get the credit for that.
And if we see actually, many of those devotees who left Krishna consciousness came back also especially towards the final days of their life and they took shelter of Krishna wholeheartedly and left their bodies also in extraordinarily good consciousness. So, the point here is that everybody has conditionings and what Shila Prabhupada attempted was so extraordinary. Taking an ancient culture which was ancient philosophy and culture that was practiced in India to the West among the hippies who were extremely uncultured even from a western perspective what to speak of a Vedic perspective and then to inspire them to become devotees that was a extraordinary experiment in itself.
Actually, we should be surprised that it succeeded instead of being disturbed at why it failed. It’s amazing that even that there was as much success as there was and there was significant success. There are so many disciples of Shila Prabhupada who have practiced lifelong and who have even left their body in glorious God consciousness.
There are many pastimes describing these sort of departures of devotees and there are books like many many moons which describe their very exemplary consciousness. So, these are the successes of the movement and the fact that there are successes itself is extraordinary. Now, rather than asking why there are so many problems for seekers in Krishna consciousness, we should be asking the question in Kali Yuga where there is so much moral degradation and depravity all around us, how is it that a movement like that of ISKCON sharing pure Krishna consciousness is existing and how are so many people able to practice it and live and follow the regular principles and become purified more and more throughout their life.
So, we are in an epidemic and whoever the person may be, if that person doesn’t take the medicine properly, then that person will have to bear the consequences. what we should see these people as is, these leaders, they are like extraordinary doctors. So, they were themselves patients, by the mercy of Krishna Prabhupada, they took the process of Krishna consciousness seriously, they became doctors.
But, while going around and sharing Krishna consciousness with others, they became negligent and when they became negligent in some way, then the infection affected them and because of that they fell back. So, when we have this disease view, we use the disease metaphor to understand this, then we understand, like, if there is an area where there is an epidemic, there are so many people who are dying. Now, that there is an epidemic is a disease conditions are not maintained, if the patients are careless, if the doctors are careless, then the medical processes, the medicine is working.
Medicine has potency and it works. But, if the people practicing it are careless, the patients and the doctors, then there may be mortality, there may be death, even in the hospital. So, what we see is, are people getting cured in the hospital? If people are getting cured, that means the essential medicine works.
But, if there are people who are afflicted even in the hospital, that means there is something wrong, not with the cure, but with the hospital administration and with the people administering the medicine and taking the medicine. So, that way, we see that definitely the process of Krishna consciousness is purifying. It has remarkable potency to purify.
So, we have experienced it for some time. Even a few months if we practice, then many of the gross mental addictions they fall off, anger, greed, decrease. And if we keep practicing steadily, we do see an improvement in our inner lives.
So, the process has potency and we see that there are advanced devotees who have actually developed great levels of love of God also. But at the same time, everybody is in the epidemic zone. And if anybody stops taking the medicine and exposes oneself to the infection, then that infection will have a disastrous effect.
So, devotees, Satsvarupa Maharaj was Prabhupada’s servant, and he was very disturbed when he heard this, and he came to Prabhupada and he was disturbed. How could he have done such a thing? But Prabhupada did not blame that specific devotee. What he said is, maya is very strong, and we have to be careful.
If we are not careful, anybody can fall. So, Prabhupada did not go about specifically maligning or blaming devotees who had problems. Yes, he would guide individual devotees of how to protect themselves, and if somebody went wrong, how to correct themselves.
But beyond that, he saw the broad principle. He saw Krishna and he saw maya, and he saw that maya is very powerful and she can catch people and take her even if they are practicing devotional service. That means, this is similar to the disease and health metaphor.
As long as we take the medicine, we can be cured. If we don’t take the medicine, we get victimized and we fall by that. So, we as devotees have to be extremely careful for practicing devotional service diligently and then we will stay protected from maya.
And beyond that, if we see in any process that we go through, we always look at the successes for inspiration and we look at those who did not succeed to learn what we should not do. But if we look at only those who fail, then most people would not endeavor anything in their lives. Now, millions of people dream and aspire for Olympic gold, but how many people get it? It’s once in four years, one person in one field.
So, now all the people who are trying to seek that Olympic gold, they look at that one person who raises the medal in the sky and they aim to become like that. So, if we seek inspiration from the successes in a particular material field also, the same we should apply in the spiritual field also and look at the success and get inspiration from them. And those who have difficulties, we understand that also demonstrates the reality of the philosophy.
The reality of the philosophy is that this world is a place of temptation and danger and Maya is very strong and she can drag people away. But they also have the truth of the process that this philosophy tells us the truth but the philosophy also offers the process which can free us from Maya and if we follow it then just as in the past, people have become free, we can become free also. As Krishna said in 4.10 Many have become purified and have attained me and we can seek those who are moving towards Krishna, take inspiration and follow in their footsteps.