By Madhava Ghosh
1968 September 4 : “It is not very difficult to open a center. You can remain in any apartment as husband and wife, and invite persons there to hear your chanting and topics, that is our center, and let it be gradually improved.”
Prabhupada Letters :: 1968
Currently , ISKCON is in a holding pattern in the West, eking out an existence dependent on support from Hindus. There is nothing wrong with that; it is essential and serves a purpose. Still, it is a rear guard action. With scattered exceptions, preaching to Westerners is in decline and in many temples western brahmacaries no longer even exist.
Eastern Europe is often cited as a bright spot. I don’t doubt it is. Still, if they don’t learn from the mistakes made in America, they are simply in the part of the cycle the US was in 20 years ago, and many of the same problems will eventually rear their heads.
India seems to be thriving, and that is fine, but it wasn’t Srila Bhaktisiddhanta’s mandate to his disciple to preach in India — it was to preach to Westerners. Much of the success in India is directly attributable to Westerners going back to India and openly embracing spiritual and religious aspects that are also common to Hinduism. What happens when that reverse flow dries up?
I think there is some reason for optimism for the future of ISKCON now, but I think it will not be a opulent Deity worship centric future. I think it will take the form of a Resurgence, going back to basics.
Resurgents will be decentralized, independent, light on assets, based in RVs or rental housing. No heavy overhead or labor demands for opulent Deity worship. They will make pilgrimages to existing temples, and encourage others to do so, but not try to emulate them.
Rent an apartment, get a few cases of books from the BBT, and set up a picture of the Pancatattva and they are operational. A set of kartals or a mrdunga and and it’s off to the park or campus for sankirtan and leaflets inviting interested parties back for an informal evening of chanting and sharing prasadam.
Who will your typical resurgent be? Not whom you might expect. When Srila Prabhupada came there was him, representing the oldest generation, then a huge gap to a bunch of newly minted adults. When he left, there was a vacuum.
Jung once said that some problems are never solved, you simply outgrow them. Instead of two generations of adults, the oldest and the productive stages, raising one generation of kids, ISKCON had only one, focused on production. Now, thirty years later, you are beginning to see the oldest generation, the elders, once again starting to be represented in ISKCON.
The leading edge are in their sixties, but most are in their 50s, still working but starting to get their homes paid off and their kids through college. When they reach retirement age, and start receiving some passive income in the form of Social Security, pensions, or equity conversion, they will start looking around and want something to do.
They will be able to afford to take up the preaching lifestyle. Some will become more active in the existing old school temples, but I predict that many of them will use their independence to adopt the tactics of the Resurgency — rent, few cases of books, a picture of Panchatattva and a lot of face to face time.
Some may do it directly, some may subsidize some young devotees and give them logistical support and let them do the hands on.
The Resurgency looms.
I agree 100%with you prabhu, nice article!
param vijayate sri krishna sankirtanam
ys sudama sakha dasa
It will be a sad day when the Deities are no longer worshiped opulently.
AGSTP, PAMHO, HAre Krishna, I think the point is not that deities will not be any longer worshiped opulently, rather the center of our movement will be sankirtana movement. And based on the will of our acaryas like srila Ppada, this should be our goal, preaching and distribuiting the chanting of the holy names, and you know there is plenty of evidence of this in our sciptures, harer nama harer nama harer namaiva kevalam kalau nasti eva nasti eva nasti eva gathir anyatha, hari nama is the kali yuga dharma and there is not other way of redemption. This is our priority.
ys sudama sakha dasa
The center of the movement has always been Sankirtan. What is being proposed is neither new nor unique. Most temple activities the devotees are engaging in were originally taught personally to us by Srila Prabhupada, including Deity worship, which was very much his desire. Temple functions, that ISKCON devotees practice, can be found in books like the “Nectar of Devotion”, and other similar Vaishnava literatures, and are all authorized Vaishnava activities passed down to us by the previous acharyas.
Jayadvaita Swami has warned that it is a danger to use the scripture to pull out one verse and base an entire bend to the philosophy based on one quote. Increasing the book distribution is wonderful. Reviving Harinam Street Sankirtan is also great news. Thinking oneself, while one does these activities, to be lower than a straw in the street, and more tolerant than a tree, and ready to offer all respect to others, is the ideal consciousness.
Some Sankirtan book distributors in the past though considered themselves to be far superior devotees to all other devotees, based on taking some quotations they found out of context, while ignoring other equally important teachings. Then later this mentality developed further into feeling that the temple devotees (who did not go out on book distribution) were 2nd and even 3rd class devotees, compared to the book distributors themselves, and even treating them in this abusive way. One Sankirtan group coined the term “temple slug” to describe the devotees who served in the temple, or who worshiped the Deities. This had a devastating effect on many devotees.
This is a nice article by Madhava Ghosh. Like Sudama Sakha, I’m inspired. In a festival lecture Prabhupada said, “Not that ‘Because I am grhastha, householder, I cannot become a preacher. It is the business of the sannyasi or brahmacari.’ No. It is the business of everyone.” (9-3-71)
Moreover, devotees would do well to try to reestablish the sankirtana economy. In the 1970s, Prabhupada guided ISKCON toward a book sales economy. If devotees use their independent intelligence (dadami buddhi-yogam tam), as Madhava suggests, certainly they can figure out how to sell hundreds of millions of dollars of books instead of the $2-3 million currently sold in North America.
As Madhava is optimistic, so am I. Now is the time to reestablish a focus on bhagavata marga in North America. Niranjana Swami stated in his book distribution lecture posted on dandavats that devotees are accountable to distribute books. He explained that Mahaprabhu asked Nityananda Prabhu and Haridas Thakur to report their preaching “scores” to Him at the end of the day, and similarly, Prabhupada wanted to see the book scores. Thus, as Madhava suggests, we are not just accountable for opulent deities, but for preaching results, too. The ideal consciousness of a devotee of Mahaprabhu is that he or she seeks to offer such results to Him.
Hare Krishna.
What you describe, Madhava Ghosh prabhu, is exactly the way I used to envison ISKCON’s growth following the child abuse lawsuit if it had gone the whole way through court rather than having a settlement. Those who may be around to take advantage of the pleasant lifestyle or other mundane considerations would’ve bailed out, and the others who are thoroughly inspired by Srila Prabhupada’s teachings would have persevered and sparked new growth. Obviously that’s just a dream I had, but it made sense to me.
Hare Krishna.
Sincerely,
Pandu das
I am glad the temples have so far survived the settlement. They are a real asset.
Resurgents won’t replace temples — they will supplement them.
Good news about your dream — it could still happen! Resurgents are self reliant and not dependent on anyone’s approval or support. Support and approval are wanted and can be very useful, but not essential.
While you may not have the power to make anyone else accept your dream, on the other hand, no one can stop you from fulfilling it.
Go for it, or at least start planning on going for it at some later date.
SP waited for 40 years to make his move. Be patient and be persistent and you can make it happen.