Speakers from the vyasasana

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"This is the process of questioning. No challenge." Srila Prabhupada

When you are a neophyte, it is one of the main things you learned intuitively in KC; you don't challenge the devotee giving the lecture on the Vyasasana.

"Vyāsāsana means... Just like we are teaching this bhāgavat-dharma, the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, we are following the footsteps of Vyāsadeva. So actually the preacher's seat is Vyāsadeva's āsana. It is the seat of Vyāsa. Just like in the high court, the seat of judgment. That seat, nobody else can sit on. Only the high-court judge, representative of the king or giving law to the citizens can sit down. Similarly, the vyāsāsana is occupied by the representative of Vyāsadeva, who can speak on behalf of Vyāsadeva. This is the system."

I broke that rule on three occasions. The first time it occurred was ten years after I joined the movement. Miami was the town, and Brahmananda the speaker. The second time it happened again, it was ten years later, in Bhubaneswar; Gour Govinda Maharaj was masterfully occupying Vyasa’s seat. Finally, a few years ago in Mayapur, I challenged Bhaktividya Purna Swami; he was delivering a lecture on the SB from the vyasasana.

I will tell you now about the diverse circumstances in details. 

I generally enjoyed the SB classes. Especially while traveling in America, because of the legendary devotees who were giving them. Brahmananda was such a figure.

That day, in the beginning of the 80s, he told the story of a bhakta who threw himself through one of the windows at the top of the building of the Brooklyn temple in New York, with the obvious aim of ending his life. As he described how the suicide took place, I felt embarrassed by the humour he used while narrating the story. "Boom!" When the body arrived at the end, the sound that it emitted in contact of the sidewalk made the room roaring with laughter. Brahmananda was smiling. I turned back to look at the devotees and I couldn’t believe the hilarity that had taken hold of them. 

When the time of questions came, I raised my hand and he gave me the floor. I did not go around and I told him how displaced was the way he described the death of this fellow, although he might have had a spider in his head. As an answer, he asked me gravely to come into his room after prasadam. That was all he said.

Later on that morning, my friend and I were going around an empty swimming pool, which was part of the temple property, observing and making remarks about it, when we heard someone calling us from the top of the building. It was Brahmananda on his window. “Hey, the French, come see me!” So we went to his room. We talked jokingly about everything and nothing, but the incident during the SB class was not mentioned. That was it.

Why was he sitting on the Vyasasana in the first place? He was speaking nonsense and the audience enjoyed it! Didn't Prabhupada said: "Only the high-court judge, representative of the king or giving law to the citizens can sit down."?

The second example was with Gour Govinda Swami in Bhubaneswar.

“I only remember that the next day, during his lecture, I came back on the subject of purification. This time, he lost patience and burst at me: "Stop asking these open-ending questions!" I already told the story of this encounter on my blog, I will not repeat myself here. (Gour Govinda Maharaj)

"Reading is not enough. Description means you read something; unless you fully assimilate, understand, you cannot describe it. Simply reading will not help us. When we shall be able to preach the reading matter, doesn't matter whether in the same language or in my own language; it doesn't matter. That is wanted." SP.

Reading, studying, and preaching are nice. Nevertheless, what is really wanted is that after a while we learn and “assimilate” from experience. History helps us understand the past. In this way, we don't repeat the mistakes again and again. That is the meaning of "fully assimilate". Once you have observed that foolish persons can sit on the vyasasana, you may declare as false the syllogism which concludes he is the representative of Vyasa. In that case, not challenging the speaker is irresponsible. You accept to fall under his influence by submissively hearing his nonsense. A society which allows such culture is doomed to produce brainwashed followers.

“He must have the qualification. So when one is simply proud of his high parentage, he is called dvija-bandhu.”

You may be Prabhupada's disciple, you may have had personal association with him, you may have been his cook or secretary, you cannot sit on the vyasasana if you are chronically deviant. Did I let the cat out of the bag? Certainly not. Prabhupada is constantly repeating this rule. “One must learn the transcendental subject by submissive aural reception from the right sources. Therefore these sages addressed the speaker Sūta Gosvāmī with great respect.” It is common knowledge for a devotee. 

I am speaking in this way, because I am going to write now about Bhaktividya Purna ex Swami. In my introduction, he is the third example of someone I've challenged while sitting on the vyasasana. Actually, it is improper to put Gour Govinda Maharaj in the same categories with these two ex sannyasis. Maharaj was a pure devotee of Krishna and Balarama. I was not challenging him. I simply wanted to take the opportunity of getting answers from a scholar and advanced Vaisnava on a subject that was close to my heart. These two, Brahmananda and BPVS, I challenged them openly, hoping that the audience catches their imposture. (It did not work.)

"Those who listen to the Bhāgavatam may put questions to the speaker in order to elicit the clear meaning, but this should not be done in a challenging spirit. One must learn the transcendental subject by submissive aural reception from the right sources.” SP

That's the imposture I am talking about! They were not the right sources. ISKCON has deliberately accepted "infiltrators" to sit on the vyasasana. The result is massive cognitive dissonance among the devotees. They cannot discern who is an imposter and who is a pure devotee, I mean devotees trying sincerely to be servants of Krishna. 

"Now you see, practically, this Mahābhārata was..., Mahābhārata or Bhagavad-gītā is included there. This high literature was meant for the less-intelligent class of man, and at the present moment the highest intelligent class of man cannot understand it. Now how much you have degraded, just try to understand. Which was written five thousand years ago for the less-intelligent class of man, that literature is not understandable even by the highest and, I mean, elevated, educated person in the present moment. Try to understand this point, how much you have degraded." SP

Don't think you are better, listen to Srila Prabhupada!

"Do not make any plan. Accept Kṛṣṇa's plan. That will be simply giving trouble to Kṛṣṇa. Therefore, a devotee does not pray even for his maintenance. That is pure devotee. He does not give trouble to Kṛṣṇa even for his bare maintenance." SP

Servant, slave, or Krishna's dog; the way to become a pure devotee!

Thus, they took advantage. When you are a brahmacari, you stay under the control of an authority. You are a grihastha, you follow the GBC's master plan, Krishna's plan. If you want to become a pure devotee, you follow Krishna's order, that is the philosophy. When Satsvarupa Maharaja sits on the vyasasana, he is repeating Prabhupada's instructions. He is a sannyasi and close associate of Srila Prabhupada. He is also one of the twelve original gurus. Once, he wrote an article in the BTG that a devotee doesn't make plans. Was my letter to the BTG questioning this principle taken as a challenge? When in Alachua I saw Nagaraj, the editor, he told me that he printed my letter in BTG because the questions were legitimate, but Satsvarupa declined answering it.

Once, I told Vishambar Maharaj that I found a nice girl, and we want to get married. He said, no, it doesn't work this way, you don't make your own plan. She should first go to the bhaktine program. Gurudeva (Bhagavan Maharaj) will decide.

Since I didn't want to submit to their plan, he asked me to leave France, and the whole yatra. No empathy, no mercy for all the years I served as a brahmacari. One month later, my future wife and I left for Canada. Pure devotional service will not be for this life.

"A wise person should not enter an assembly if he knows the participants there are committing acts of impropriety. And if, having entered such an assembly, he fails to speak the truth, speaks falsely or pleads ignorance, he will certainly incur sin." (SB. 10.44.10) There are times when we have no idea where we are going into. It was the case with this third example coming on, I challenged the speaker.

 Bhakti Vidya Purna (ex swami)

In early 2019 I was in Mayapur and I assisted in one of his classes. The room was packed, I hardly found a place to sit. I was confused about the whole situation, remembering vaguely that he had troubles in the past with affairs related to sexe and abuse. It happened in the school he was responsible for. Confused, because if that was true, he was still regarded as a leader in Mayapur, and in ISKCON. To tell you the truth, I was never a fan of his personality; he always dressed like a clown. I thought his goofiness would certainly transpire through his lecture, so I was curious to hear him and to watch the reaction of the audience during the questions period. Do they know that he is a criminal or are they just like me, ignorant about his status? What if he says weird things, will they correct him or just keep silent, respectful as is the custom? 

That's what they did. There was no spirit of contradiction or revolt in face of dogmatic inanities. Krishna is in charge! That's how they think. What was to happen happened. His reasoning sounded inconsistent; his words blatantly contradicted my experience in the Mayapur compound that I had. I felt the anger rising within me.

I explain. It was my first visit after ten years of absence. My wife, who rarely falls sick, was half dead in her room. She could not leave it, and no doctor from outside the complex would come to visit her. During one week, I knocked on every door of the administration to get some help. They had no doctor, and did not care for our situation; we were nobodies. She looked like a skeleton and I was desperate. Sometimes, I was thinking that she may pass away if nothing was done immediately. I may have come from the mangol aratik and found her without life. (A few days later, thanks Krishna, an ayurvedic consultant arrived and we succeeded to see him in his office right away. That's helped dramatically.) 

But for now, the sannyasi on the seat of Vyasa is explaining how “Mayapur is not an ordinary place, that it is Vaikuntha; outside the doors hell prevails all over”. 

I looked at the devotees around me, women and men, trying to see the effect of this statement on their faces. There were no amusing smiles, no rising eyebrows, no look at each other expressing skepticism, no disapproving head movements, no whispers between old timers or locals, no alarm ringed to their ears. 

At the end of the lecture, I asked him what exactly was his conception of Mayapur that transcends material laws and politics. I told him also about what you just read regarding my wife. I stressed the point that she was lying on her bed miserably, not able to eat -anything- for days. I was hoping that a devotee in the audience would hear my distress, knowing well that Krishna is being conscious of the situation, but acts through his devotees. 

Instead of dealing gently with me, being compassionate and empathetic like an intelligent and mature person should be, the swami got upset and mocked me without any scruples. He said I was confusing the Mayapur management, a material condition, with the spiritual realm of Vaikuntha, etc. He served me a melting pot so frequent among our generation of spiritual leaders, unfit to represente Krishna and preach a serious philosophy. They are at best good bigots, but this one will be denounced [again] a few months later as a frenzied pedophile. Anyway, I did not comprehend anything in his reply so that I can recall it here properly. The worst is that ISKCON and its members are not doing anything to protect the individuals against this debilitating case. That which is the most disturbing. The seat of Vyasa has become a sitting place for idiots and they hope to educate new generations of devotees with them! 

I left the assembly of vaishnavas without anyone asking me how he could help. (30 years ago, in Vrindavana, a German femelle devotee from the French yatra lost her mind while she was visiting the dhama. Later on we learned that she had brain cancer. The administration of the ashram we were renting the rooms asked me to take care of her as I was speaking French, which I did. But one morning, I learned that during the night she went to the river Ganges and somehow or other she was found drowned.  😔)

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