02/24/98 - 1640

Clarifying Rumors

USA (VNN) - Letter from Halayudha dasa to Virabahu dasa

Dear Virabahu Prabhu:

Please accept my humble obeisances. All glories to Srila Prabhupada, Founder Acarya of the Golden Age!

Several months ago, I wrote you regarding the problems that have arisen in our Movement subsequent to the disappearance of His Divine Grace. As a member of ISKCON'S governing body, you are the one, in this Los Angeles area, to whom problems should be addressed. I deeply regret that you have not seen fit to properly respond, except with a veiled "argumentum ad hominem," and I am very disappointed by the implications of such a response from you.

Because of the length of my original letter I have decided not to reprint it here but I shall post it in due course. However, I think your response merits being read by the Vaisnava community, so I have included it here. Sorry that I am unable to honor your request to have your response kept private. Respecting your "right" not to receive further correspondence from me, I have instead posted this letter publicly. I personally delivered my letters to you and did not make them public out of respect for you. Over the last 12 years, our relationship was, if nothing else, cordial, and I felt sure that on the strength of that, you would respond favorably. I was wrong to think so.

Here's what you wrote:

Subj: Clarifying Rumors
Date: 1/14/98
From: virabahu@compuserve.com (Virabahu Dasa)
To: HUGHJOSEPH@AOL.COM (HUGHJOSEPH)
Sent from: Santiago, Chile
Wednesday, January 14, 1998


Dear Halayuddha Prabhu,

Please accept my greetings. All glories to Srila Prabhupada.

This letter is a private one to you only, and I do not intend nor approve of it to be publicized in any way.

Regarding your statement: >>Several weeks have passed since I personally hand-delivered to >>you some correspondence. I see that you have chosen to respond >>with silence. That, as you know, constitutes a response, so we >>shall let the matter rest there for now. In time, I shall post >>the letters to the growing cyber-forum.

My silence meant that I have no interest in engaging with you in the kind of talk present in your letters. For years I had known you as a different person, and it was shocking to hear of your present ideas and see the language you are using.

I ask you respect my right to not want to have any kind of communication with you, in any shape or form, beginning with your kindly NOT replying to this note.

Thank you very much.

In the service of Srila Prabhupada, (Virabahu dasa)


I'm not sure what you mean when you say that for years you "had known me as a different person", and I'm sorry to have disappointed you. But, please tell me, what kind of person did you know me to be? A thoughtful person? A fool? A mature individual capable of rational thinking and discrimination? A blind follower, or what? Yes, I kept my opinions to myself in spite of all that I was learning about the recent 20-year history of our movement. I did not speak out although there were so many things I just could not accept. I kept hoping for things to get better. However, it is clear to me that the position of our leaders has become hardened to the point of inflexibility. You cannot hear from, or respond to anyone who has a different perspective on things. That is not to your credit.

Prabhu, my letter was a call for an accounting. Over the last 20 years there has been much turmoil in our Movement. His Holiness Tamala Krsna Maharaja has publicly stated that he and the other leaders of this Movement have done the greatest disservice to Srila Prabhupada. What have you done about it? How have you made amends? The result of this "greatest disservice" has been summed up by another of your peers, His Holiness Jayadvaita Maharaja, as follows:

"FACT: ISKCON gurus in good standing have fallen.
FACT: The ISKCON GBC has supported even fallen gurus and tried to paper over their falldowns.
FACT: ISKCON gurus have opposed, oppressed and driven out many sincere godbrothers and godsisters.
FACT: ISKCON gurus have usurped and misused money, and diverted other ISKCON resources for their own personal prestige and sense gratification.
FACT: ISKCON gurus have had illicit sexual intercourse with both women and men, and possibly children as well.
FACT: Some ISKCON gurus still in good standing have had such serious personal difficulties that the GBC has been obliged to suspend them from initiating.
FACT: Other ISKCON gurus have snapped back into line only after "narrow misses."
FACT: ISKCON gurus recently led a movement advocating a premature and inappropriate emphasis on rasika-bhakti.
FACT: Some ISKCON devotees have felt obliged to accept a new guru twice or even three times over.

In contrast, Srila Prabhupada was staunch, unfailing, always perfect in his discretion and determination. He was undisputably an exalted and empowered acarya, a pure and intimate personal associate of Krsna. Is it any wonder, then, that some devotees feel that only Srila Prabhupada can give them shelter and that no one else deserves the same surrender and trust? And when it comes to the subject of gurus, who trusts the spiritual guidance of the GBC? First the GBC gave us the "eleven pure devotees appointed by Srila Prabhupada," each deserving the fealty of his godbrothers and destined to be your guru if you joined the Hare Krsna movement in his zone. Then the GBC told us the gurus were never appointed. Or, rather, members gave us at least two different stories, some GBC men declaring emphatically that Srila Prabhupada never appointed anything more than rttviks, others sure, to this day, of having been appointed "regular gurus." The GBC itself then appointed new gurus--or did it? The word "appointed" is never used. But there are "candidates for initiating guru," votes are taken, and those who make it through the procedures become "ISKCON-approved" or "ISKCON-authorized" gurus. To boost your confidence: On one hand the GBC encourages you to be initiated by a bona fide, authorized ISKCON guru and worship him like God. On the other, it has an elaborate system of laws to invoke from time to time when your ISKCON-authorized guru falls down." (Where the Rttvik People are Right)

This is a scorecard of gross failure by any standards. I have not said these things. All I have done is joined my voice to the many who have called for an accounting. You have been the managers of this Movement for the last 20 years. Management means responsibility and responsibility means accountability. Why have you not learned this?

Add to the list of "F's" (and lower) on Jayadvaita Svami's GBC scorecard, the rampant epidemic of child sexual and physical abuse that have gone on in our schools, the tip of the iceberg of which scandal we are now just beginning to see. Already, one of your own big men, Murlivadhaka dasa, has been toppled because of it. You will remember that I warned you about this in my letter. More big men are certain to follow him in due course. Add to that also, the abuse of our women, as for example in the Women's Party (Prostitution Ring) sanctioned by GBC men including Kirtanananda svami and run by devotees out of Berkeley and New Vrndavana. And what about the deviations from Srila Prabhupada's instructions on initiating new disciples, something admitted by Tamala Krsna Maharaja to be the greatest disservice to Srila Prabhupada? What about the mistreatment of His Divine Grace in Vrndavana? Who blocked his order for his disciples to come to his side? Was he poisoned? Why are you and your peers so quick to dismiss the allegation that when Srila Prabhupada said he was being poisoned, he was? Is not the "guru vakya" infallible? Is not the guru-vakya sufficient for an honest disciple? Why are you so reluctant to mount a thorough and unbiased investigation, so that the truth can be told once and for all?

Prabhu, we want answers to these questions, honest answers. The devotees are very forgiving by nature, but wrong doers must be truly repentant, not seeking to justify themselves, cover up their wrongs and attack those who ask for an accounting. You and your peers are responsible for all of ISKCON's woes by virtue of your position as the head of the Society; not the Rtviks, the Prabhupadanugas, the VNN, the women, the children, nor persons such as me, who feel themselves cheated by you of the pristine purity left us by His Divine Grace! You are responsible. You do not wish to accept any blame, but wish instead to blame the victims who are crying out in varying degrees of pain. So be it.

Recently in LA, Nirantara Prabhu wrote in his Seva-Amrita Newsletter, that devotees there would be given a scorecard by the TP which will be sent to their guru. Was this something implemented when Srila Prabhupada was manifest? Has this been conceived as an instrument of love, to encourage, uplift and motivate the devotees to become purer? Or is this another corporate, retaliatory concoction meant to keep the devotees in line, and to root out the potential of independent thinking? Can purity be legislated?

Prabhu, if you sincerely want this to be successful than my humble recommendation would be to first of all give yourselves a scorecard. Grade yourselves first. Let it start at the top. Publish the GBC/guru scorecard for the last 20 years. Give a full accounting of all that has gone on, sparing no detail as to name, date, place, time, etc. Then let the devotee community review the scorecard. Those getting "F's" must be removed along with those who have supported them and have given tacit approval for them to continue in their "failing" behavior. Only then will we know that you are all truly sincere.

You thought I was a "different person" before I spoke out against the atrocities (catalogued by Jayadvaita swami) that your management of the last 20 years has unleashed on this Movement. You cannot understand that I have spoken out because I truly care about what Srila Prabhupada has given us, and don't want to see it damaged. Our name is fast becoming 'mud' in many quarters. One very large and dynamic religious congregation in the LA area, where I have preached and led kirtanas, has officially banned Srila Prabhupada's books from its bookstore and warned its members about our Temple. You have made it so that we have firmly secured an ignominious place in the list of the world's most dangerous cults. Is this pleasing to His Divine Grace? His name has been dragged in that mud.

Many of you have placed yourselves on his level and have accepted similar worship and adoration from those that have come to receive the mercy of His Divine Grace. Just see how many have been proved unqualified. An innocent and largely ignorant public has been induced to measure "guru", not by the stellar example of Srila Prabhupada, but by his imitators. "If one ISKCON guru is like that, a fallen pedophile, or someone who gets decapitated over drugs, sex and rock n' roll, or sanctions murder, them maybe all ISKCON gurus are like that, including the original guru, Srila Prabhupada." Thus his name has been tarnished by your activities. Can you deny this? Or am I the demon for stating this?

You have treated my letter with arrogance and disdain. If you knew that I was like you now perceive me to be, I'm sure you would have long ago kicked me out of the assembly of devotees. In so doing you might have spared me the pain I feel today. But did you know Bhavananda and Kirtanananda go-dasas to be pedophiles? How long did you associate with them before this was found out and after this fact became common knowledge? Were you not "made" a guru at the same time that Bhavananda was being reinstalled as GBC/guru? How long did you know about the child abusers in our schools? Did you loudly make known the offenses to our children, vowed not to have anything to do with them while running at full tilt to the aid of the victims?

I do not hear you voice raised in protest against the disservice done to our movement by those named by Tamala Krsna maharaja, nor do I remember hearing your voice raised in disfavor of those who abused our women and children, disobeyed the instructions of Srila Prabhupada, and committed the evils enumerated by Jayadvaita swami. Instead you have supported aided and abetted the perpetrators of these dis-services, and have written a book to justify the continuation of this institutionalized malaise. However, my call for an accounting and acceptance of responsibility by our leaders, is greatly displeasing to you, and my crime of speaking out is so much worse than for example, what Murlivadhaka dasa has done or what Jagadisa dasa has done.

I am deeply mortified to have been associated with men such as you. What you have jointly done to the Movement that Srila Prabhupada has given the world, as the means of deliverance from the cycle of birth and death, and beyond that, as the only way to attain unalloyed love of Krsna, will never be forgiven.

Your fallen servant,

Halayudha dasa