Scientists today are searching for evidence but are not looking for it. You can see a particular event but if you are not exactly trained in the science of investigation you may never find it. Arthur Conan Doyle, the creator of the fictional detective Sherlock Holmes, understood this well. In one of his adventures Holmes and a police inspector are both investigating the death of a man. His critically wounded wife was found lying next to his dead body. This is how Doy...

The Vedas do not recommend horse sacrifices nowadays, anyway. They don't work. Better to chant Hare Krishna. And, considering that Yamaraja is the universal superintendent in charge of meting out punishment to those who transgress karmic law, it's easy to appreciate the significance of the following benediction: "For a devotee who worships Lord Vishnu with offerings of malati flowers in the month of Karttika, Yamaraja orders the removal of all his sinful reactions from the account book." (Hari-bha...

One day Murari Gupta began to reflect, "If I can leave my body in the Lord's presence then that will be very good." For this purpose he fashioned a large dagger and hid it in his house. But the Supreme Lord Sri Caitanya, who is totally omniscient immediately came to his house and called, "Murari!, I have so many pastimes to complete in your company. If you go away then how will I go on? I know everything." Murari caught hold of the Lord's feet and began to cry. Thereafter Mahaprabhu consoled him and after explaining to him many things He returned to His own house. Murari ...

After two years of research, writing, and debate, the GBC recently ratified and voted into ISKCON law a Code of Ethical Behavior. We spoke with the Code’s author, Yogesvara dasa, about the background to the Code and what changes he hopes to see in Srila Prabhupada’s movement thanks to its passage. The full official Code can be found

Once, Guru-Gauranga Prabhu, Srila Prabhupada’s disciple who was based in Switzerland, arranged for His Divine Grace to meet the head of the World Health Organization (W.H.O.) in Geneva. Srila Prabhupada was so intelligent and perceptive that when he agreed to meet the person he said that no photos should be allowed. And he explained to us that the W.H.O. was trying to introduce birth control in Third World countries and considered India to be difficult because people in India understood contraceptive methods and abortion to be sinful. “So they will want to take my photo and use it to mak...

When Lord Caitanya finished His instructions to Srila Sanatana Goswami, Sanatana, being empowered and enlightened, was so transcendentally pleased that he at once fell at the feet of Lord Caitanya and said: "I am born of a very low family, and I have always associated with lowly people; therefore I am the lowest of sinners. Yet You are so kind that You have taught me lessons which are not even understood by Lord Brahma, the greatest being in this universe.

Today we have gathered for the most auspicious celebration of the appearance day of Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura. Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura was one of the most prominent acharyas in the disciplic succession after Lord Chaitanya, and his contribution to Gaudiya Vaishnavism and to the world is so great that one devotee called him the Seventh Gosvami. Much of the present Krishna consciousness movement founded by Srila Prabhupada is being conducted under the guidance of Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura, and today I will focus on some of the areas in which the International Society for Krishna Conscious...

This song was sung by Rupa Gosvami. He is the real person, actual person, to understand Radha and Krsna. So he says, "All glories to Radharani." radhe jaya jaya madhava-dayite. "She's so dear to Krsna." Krsna, everyone is trying to love Krsna, but Krsna is trying to love somebody. Now how great She is. Just try to understand. Everyone, the whole world, the whole universe, all living entities, they are trying to love Krsna. Krsna-prema. Lord Caitanya describe...

How can one understand the esoteric personality of Srimati Radharani? She is the principal inspiration for the Lord, and only confidentially revealed in the Vedic scriptures. Yet, She takes shelter within the deepest realizations of pure hearted bhakti yogis. Lord Sri Krsna is bewildered by the profound brilliance of Her transcendental qualities and thus awakens a yearning within Himself to exhibit, absorb and experience Her divine nature. The influence and presence o...

Listen and I will tell you of Lord Hari’s descent as a cowherd boy. His arrival in Gokula, and Radha’s descent as gopi. Listen and I will tell you in detail what before you heard me tell only briefly in the story of Sankhacuda’s death. Sridama quarrelled with Radha and She cursed him to become the demon Sankhacuda. Then Sridama cursed Radha: Go to a human womb in Vraja! Become a girl of Vraja and walk on the earth’s surface! Afraid of Sridama’s curse, She went to Sri Krsna ...

The divine counterpart of Sri Krishna is known as Sri Radha. Together, according to the ancient Vaishnava tradition, this dual-gendered divinity is God-male and female dimensions of the Absolute Truth. Sri Radha is the complete energy, and Sri Krishna is the complete energetic source. They are nondifferent from each other, just as musk and its scent are forever merged, or as fire and heat are inseparable. Radha and Krishna are one, yet They have assumed two separate forms to enjoy loving pastimes....

This is a revised and expanded edition of an article that I originally wrote in 1995. It weaves together, through the lens of Vedic Astrology, the history of how the ISKCON Mayapura temple was first victimized by thieves who stole Srila Prabhupada’s childhood Deities. And, the subsequent more serious attack by a gang of dacoits who stole Srimati Radharani thinking she was made of gold resulting in many wounded and at least one death. And, how following a simple instruction from Srila Prabhupada could have prevented it all.

Anthropomorphism fails as an explanation for the many-armed divine forms described in the Vedic literature. When I joined the Hare Krishna movement, something in Srila Prabhupada's books intrigued me: God's unlimited nature went beyond merely having innumerable forms. these forms I was amazed to learn, often have numerous arms as well. India's wisdom texts. in fact, describe a wonderland of beatific multiarmed beings. There is four-armed Vishnu and His consort, e...

I oftentimes say, when devotees ask me to speak about Prabhupāda, that I can say my only qualification is that I happened to be on the planet at the same time that Prabhupāda was spreading the Kṛṣṇa Consciousness Movement. I took part in his mission, but I didn’t really have so much personal exchange or association with him. I did get the opportunity to see him many times: a few times in the United States, twice in New York as well as in Philadelphia, and al...

How Rupa and Sanatana came to give up the service of the Nawab is very interesting. One year I taught The Nectar of Devotion, Srila Prabhupada’s summary study of Rupa Gosvami’s Bhakti-rasamrta-sindhu, at the VIHE (Vrindavan Institute for Higher Education), and immediately after the course I rushed to Mayapur to accompany Radhanath Swami and Sacinandana Swami on parikrama of Gauda-mandala-bhumi, the places in Bengal where Mahaprabhu enacted His pastimes. The first place we visited was Ramakeli, the capital of Nawab Hussain Shah, where Rupa and Sanatana were engaged in service and where th...

A section of the Padma Purana glorifying the Bhagavatam presents an allegorical account of bhakti’s travels. In India’s traditional wisdom texts, bhakti, or devotion, is sometimes presented as a person. This is especially so in Gaudiya Vaishnava literature. In Kavi Karnapura’s Chaitanya-candrodaya-natakam, for example, we see bhakti personified as a character in a play. In the modern era, Bhaktivinoda Thakura’s Bhakti-tattva-viveka describes her as an embodiment of the svarupa-shakti, the internal energy of the Lord, and thus a manifestation of Sri Radha, Krishna’s ultimate spiri...

The place Srila Prabhupada called his "Western world headquarters" remains a vital oasis of Krishna consciousness. Part One: Some History Starting off in Midcity LA, 1968. ISKCON’s new center in Haight-Ashbury, San Francisco, was getting a good turnout. It was “the summer of love,” 1967, when idealistic youth gathering in the Haight to seek peace, justice, and alternative lifestyles often became overwhelmed by the area's crime, pimps, and drug dealers. Srila Prabhupada’s disciples offered hot prasadam meals at the ISKCON storefront every day, and their center became a dr...

Sometimes Srila Prabhupada affectionately spoke about his father. When he did, it was always with great fondness. "My father would make sure that whatever I wanted I would get," he said. "Even if it was in the middle of the night and I wanted puris, my father would say to my mother, 'Make him puris if he wants puris.' Sometimes my mother would resist, but my father would make her do it. It was like that. I don't know. Maybe my father knew. He was always doing things like that. Then my mother ...

For those of us who have traveled the length and breadth of India, there are many temples that have allowed us in and left indelible and inspiring memories for our spiritual progress. There have also been some temples who have kept us, as Westerners, out, or even kicked us out after we have already entered, as if they do not want to share their culture with us, or anyone they feel does not meet their requirements

From Srila Prabhupada’s teachings and Gaudiya history, it seems that there has always been a tension between two kinds of followers of Lord Caitanya’s mission—the preachers and the reclusive practitioners. These are known as the gosthy-anandi (GA) and bhajan-anandi (BA), respectively. The debate between the two centres around how they realise the confidential essence of Lord Caitanya’s teachings, Vraja-bhakti, and the failings that each sees in the other’s pr...

Srila Prabhupada gives the following information about Shri Lokanatha Goswami: "Shri Lokanatha Goswami was a personal associate of Shri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu and a great devotee of the Lord. He was a resident of a village named Talakhadi in the district of Yashodhara in Bengal. Previously he lived in Kachnapara. His father's name was Padmanabha, and his only younger brother was Pragalbha. Following the orders of Shri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, shri Lokanatha went to Vrindavana to live. He established a temple named Gokulananda.

Srila Prabhupada gave us so much, so easily. There was no fanfare, for he was graciously unassuming, seeing himself simply as an instrument and messenger of his Guru Maharaja. Our conditioned nature may sometimes have trouble with this, for that nature tends to be a little gross, doubtful and forgetful. Perhaps the preciousness and potency of what Srila Prabhupada gave us has not really impressed upon our hearts. Perhaps our enthusiasm to follow the simple things he taught us has waned with the passing of time, or been butchered by mechanical, mindless habit. And so, let’s take another loo...