By Adikarta das
Dear Devotees,
Hare Krishna. We just wanted to let you know about our new community in Kentucky named Cintamani Dham. We are totally ISKCON oriented, and very much believe in Srila Prabhupada’s desire for an organized movement to work cooperatively together in order to spread Krishna Consciousness. We have 250 acres of very beautiful land in Kentucky, USA. The property has mountains, springs, fertile bottom land by a fresh green/blue mountain spring fed creek, and very awesome views.
We are strong believers in Srila Prabhupada’s words as recorded in Srimad Bhagavatam Canto 8 Chapter 24 Text 6:
Sri Sukadeva Gosvami said: “O King, for the sake of protecting the cows, brahmanas, demigods, devotees, the Vedic literature, religious principles, and principles to fulfill the purpose of life, the Supreme Personality of Godhead accepts the forms of incarnations.”
Purport: The Supreme Personality of Godhead generally appears in various types of incarnations to give protection to the cows and brahmanas. The Lord is described as go-brahmana-hitaya ca; in other words, He is always eager to benefit the cows and brahmanas. When Lord Krsna appeared, He purposefully became a cowherd boy and showed personally how to give protection to the cows and calves. Similarly, He showed respect to Sudama Vipra, a real brahmana. From the Lord’s personal activities, human society should learn how to give protection specifically to the brahmanas and cows. Then the protection of religious principles, fulfillment of the aim of life and protection of Vedic knowledge can be achieved. Without protection of cows, brahminical culture cannot be maintained; and without brahminical culture, the aim of life cannot be fulfilled. The Lord, therefore, is describd as go-brahmana-hitaya because His incarnation is only for the protection of the cows and the brahmanas. Unfortunately, because in Kali-Yuga there is no protection of the cows and brahminical culture, everything is in a precarious position. If human society wants to be exalted, the leaders of society must follow the instructions of Bhagavad-gita and give protection to the cows, the brahmanas and brahminical culture.
The last sentence is particularly adamant.”If human society wants to be exalted, the leaders of society must follow the instructions of Bhagavad-Gita and give protection to the cows, the brahmanas, and brahminical culture.”
Whilst we are very committed personally to going out door to door, shop to shop, college to college, to distribute Srila Prabhupada’s books, and preach in general, we feel that this very important goal of Srila Prabhupada’s has somehow been somewhat neglected in the United States. In Hungary, having visited several times, we have been completely amazed by the superexcellence of New Vraja Dham. It is in my humble opinion the best project in ISKCON, and really sets the bar for devotees in many ways. We do realize that it will be highly unlikely that we can establish such a project here in the US, for a multitude of different reasons. The foremost reasonis the fact that Sivarama swami is a transcendental genius, and we are not. However, despite the fact that farming is not my thing, I really feel that without demonstrating the ideals emphasized in this purport we are really neglecting our duty. Whilst I try hard not to be critical, it’s hard not to be dissappointed by the general lack of interest shown by the majority of devotees in such an important limb of Vaisnava culture as cow protection. From my experience of living in Alachua, probably the largest devotee community in the world, it was often very difficult to “get rid of” our milk products from our beloved, protected cows. It was quite bewildering to be honest, that devotees generally seemed to prefer to buy milk from commercial dairies, who, as we all know, treat the cows abominally.
In one purport in the SB describing the opulence of Nanda Maharaja and the cowherd men, Srila Prabhupada pointed out how in this age the cowherds are all dressed in “niggardly dress.” For those that are not up on antique English words, niggardly means basically very poor. So this is the situation, that nowadays people do not understand the benefits of the Holy Cow, and are not prepared to pay a fair price for protected cow’s milk, including our devotees. So we feel that it is our duty to not only preach, but show in our lives that cows really are important, and that living a more simple and natural way of life is not only one of the original eight goals that Srila Prabhupada wanted, but an invaluable example for people to see.
Personally I am from London, UK and have experienced many of the different so called pleasures that big city life affords. Even, as a devotee, I have had so many wonderful highs preaching in the city, but to do both is far superior. To preach in a city is important, but to be able to actually show people that we walk the talk, by having nice farm communities seems the only way to go if we do not want to be accused of being hypocrites. The may say, “Your books talk about cow protection, but I see you all buy your milk from blood dairies.” Of course we could all become vegans and forget about it altogether, but that would seem to fly in the face of Srila Prabhupada’s words here.
So here we are in Kentucky! Personally I feel it would be nice to preach somewhere like California, San Francisco perhaps, or Berkeley, (which I may end up doing anyway) but such places are not ideal places to show people about how important the cow is. Kentucky has very nice land, adequate rainfall, no building codes, lots of springs, rivers, and generally the people are very open. All the so-called hip places in the United States have some defect. For instance California has very little rain along with Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona, and Texas. New Hampshire, Vermont, and New England are in my opinion too cold. Florida is too hot, and building codes are tough etc. North Carolina is either expensive or swampy, as is South Carolina. Mississippi, Louisiana, and Alabama are also too hot. So here we are in Kentucky.
We are attracting some people here, and we have several colleges in the area for preaching; at one university we collected over 250 e-mail addresses of interested students, most of whom are agnostics or atheists.
We have some accommodation available, and we are building more as we write. Visit our facebook page for more pictures and to catch a glimpse of our pioneering in progress: facebook.com/landoftouchstone.
If any of you would like to visit, or feels a calling to help establish this essential missing part of Srila Prabhupada’s mission, please let us know.
Contact Adikarta das
E-mail: akd108.1@gmail.com
606-464-8332
Hare Krishna,
Adikarta das
Pranams, Adikarta Prabhu,
It is good to see your project flourishing. We need many projects like that and many devotees willing to participate in them to make a difference in this world.
Looks like a beautiful location with lots of good farm land. Sangi seems to be happy and in his element. Best of luck to you all!
Your servant, Kula-pavana dasa
Fantastic news Adikarta Prabhu,
I wish you all success in this venture/adventure.
It is indeed very disappointing that our own congregation of devotees dont understand that protected milk has a cost about 6 times more than milk bought locally from the supermarket. I hope you will find more success there with customers who appreciate the cost of protecting cows.
Supermarket prices only come by depriving the cow of its calf, mechanical milking, killing anything that is not giving a lot of milk.
Cow Protection price gives milk to the calf for about six months, milks by hand and all the offspring and parent are cared for life in health and sickness.
Cow Protection milk is not cheap milk but it is the best milk available anywhere and it requires a persistent message of the need to support it. The costs of milk production in new vrajadhama Hungary are accepted and the departments who use it pay the proper price. The farm also has a significant income to support the whole system. Again cow protection milk is not cheap milk but it is the best milk to produce.
Hope to visit you in kentucky sometime
ys symasundara dasa
I had the opportunity to travel through Kentucky on traveling sankirtan many years ago (when I was at the St. Louis temple), and I spend a short time in Kavicandra Maharaja’s preaching center in Louisville, and we traveled around collecting at State fairs and Mammoth Caves and so on.
I remember driving through some of the hilly regions and remarking on the natural beauty and the apparent fertility of some of the farmland. There were areas of the State that seemed like heaven on earth.
Cintamini dhama-the Land of Touchstone in Kentucky looks absolutely beautiful–like a dream come true. Out here at Bhaktivan in Eastern Kansas, the one great lack is water, so don’t feel poorly that maybe it rains a lot in Kentucky. Hard work and patience and more hard work and patience will result in a really transcendental project sure to please Srila Prabhupada. What more could anybody desire? Hare Krishna. Hari Bol!
Dear Adikarta prabhu. /”\ Pranams.
Hare Krsna
Please accept my humble obeisance’s. All glories to Srila Prabhupada!
All glories to your service!!!
I have just recently set up a face book page ( Go raksya nework ) just for all those devotees in ISKCON and people outside of ISKCON who are currently engaged in full or part time cow protection, agriculture and farming work. It is a way in which we can communicate and come together in a more productive and easier way to help push forward cow protection and agriculture within our ISKCON society and to also to share our ideas and help each other in every and anyway that is possibly needed to further promote cow protection more at the fore front within ISKCON. Also globally to increase the need for cruelty free milk amongst the devotee community and other people who ultimately want to see the end to the needless slaughter of our Holy Go mata. The face book page/forum is open to all those souls who have a genuine concern for the future of our beloved go mata and to push towards the goal of self sufficiency as was Srila Prabhupada`s desire for all ISKCON farming communities.
I hope this message finds you in good health.
Jai go mata!
Hari bol.
Yours in the service of Guru and Gauranga.
Your humble servant Bhakta Matty
Hare Krsna Adikarta Prabhu,
Cow protection is practised differently around the Iskcon world,some projects really have not understood the goal of Cow protection at all. Others have not been able to set the background dynamics in place that Cow protection really needs to function in. Mostly devotees have forgotten the Art of Cow protection and the multifaceted facilities Cow protection affords us. Even in Hungary they have still alot to learn, grass management,alternative energy requirements,community governance, etc but most importantly what is missing in iskcon Cow protection projects is the simple principle of symbiosis, dependance on Cows and land. What iskcon tries to do is marry up western lifestyles with Cow protection which is why it does not work. Cows are in the mode of goodness and our lifestyles are not. If we marry up our lifestyles with the Cows in the mode of goodness then there is a chance that cow protection will afford all those facilities.
We are not supposed to be producing milk to sell-that is a misconception in Cow protection. The fundamental purpose is to marry up the community dynamic in a symbiotic relationship to solve the economic problems of life. Its that simple. We produce milk for the community of devotees, not to sell.We are not trying to make money . Then the economic dynamic is based on the hub of cows with devotees like the spokes of a wheel relating in that symbiotic lifestyle.The community is self-evidently symbiotic with cows. If we follow the steps in a chronological way then the community that is dependant on cows and land will become economically dependant on cows and land. All other cow protection projects are just a compromise otherwise-they try to fit in to a mode of passion or ignorance system by trying to marry up western principles of economics with cow protection-that is a disaster.
All our solutions in Cow protection have to be in the mode of goodness for the symbiotic relationship to work.The cow manure has to be part of that solution through energy resources,the creation of buildings have to be community orientated,the infrastructure has to be community minded, the governance has to be community driven and on every level the mode of goodness must predominate,then you may become successful. your servant , Dusyanta dasa from stunningly beautiful Wales.
Hare Krsna.
From S. Bhagavatam 10.6.19 this encapsulates the goals of cow protection simply.
1 There are many facilities afforded by cow protection for people.
2 Cow dung is used as a fuel as well as fertiliser .
3Cow protection supplies sufficient stocks of grains.
4 Milk and milk products along with grains solve all the economic problems.
This is the quintessential truth that cow protection affords to mankind.But it appears that we have forgotten the art of cow protection.
Mostly the cow protection projects in iskcon dont reach these specified goals of cow protection.They vary in their depth of accomplishments. This means that the projects as they have conceived and executed them dont work as they should.
What needs to happen in Iskcon is to thoroughly review the whole action plan so as to address the reasons that the projects have come short on. Perhaps an independent audit would be a good idea.Understanding the concept of “solving all the economic problems” obviously has not happened. Understanding the actual backdrop of where cow protection fits into Vaisnava community is another problem. The next item is obviously the symbiotic relationship with cow protection facilities that is clearly not working. How the economic solution fits into a symbiotic vaisnava community is the model that is just not being manifest in Iskcon cow protection projects. The obvious lack of integration by vaisnava community in iskcon illustrates how the cow protection projects have exhibited exclusive tendencies where there is no integrated infrastructure from the beginning for community to follow that relationship anyways.
There seems to be a huge lack of community spirit in the cow protection projects .And that needs to be addressed at all levels in iskcon.The use of iskcon funds and donations for cow protection projects also appears to have been misunderstood. Its as if the devotees dont know what they are trying to achieve by cow protection. The goal is misplaced and they are trying to fit western principles and western styled economics into a picture of mode of goodness cow protection. The two separate conceptions will never marry up.We as humans have to change our lifestyle to mode of goodness and on every level of cow protection.Its a great disappointment for us looking into iskcon how the projects are just missing the whole point. ys,dusyanta dasa.
Hari Bol! Sacred obesciences to Srila Prabhupad! sacred and proper obesciences to Lord Krishna and Radharani.
Aadhi kartha Prabhu I wish to serve and engage in service of the cows in your dham.
Please Prabhu engage me in suitable servive of the Lord in your beautiful dham.I know reality to actual beauty takes hard work…..Thats why Kentucky is warmer than the rest of the country ….You have to be up here to realise that!
Hari Bol Prabhu…I wish to visit the dham and serve in a suitable and planned manner. Please advise us appropriately.
Thank You for visiting me during my last visit to Lexington Kentucky.
My humble Pranams,
Subadra dd
Uma Karthikeyan,
PO BOX 2488,
miNNEAPOLIS mn 55402