08/02/98 - 1954 (see also VNN story #1948)

Letter from Harikesa Disciples

USA (VNN) - by Gurushakti das

Dear Godbrothers and Godsisters, PAMHO All glories to Sri Visnupada.

This letter is written from your Godbrothers Gurusakti and Padmanabha. Gurusakti has been with Sri Visnupada since one week, Padmanabha came 3 days ago.

The purpose of this writing is to help clear any misunderstandings regarding the present situation of Sri Visnupada. One of the things this letter will NOT do, is give you any final descriptions. Things are changing and none of us can forsee the future. Most of you of course know of his physical breakdown and have heard various things about what happened thereafter. What we attempt to do here is the tie all these things together and clear up any confusion.

First of all he actually left his body a few weeks ago, he died. Just as described in the SB, he systematically let everything go as he realized he was to leave his body. However after leaving the body and stopping breathing, he was called back when Kasiraja shook his body. He says because of his attachment to Kasiraja he came back. Because of having given up all the atachments to his body, the re-entry meant again an adjustment. Of course he is the same person who we always had among us. But the whole process he has undergone in the recent weeks has forced him to reevaluate his position. In another way however is not the "same" person. That is the situation has opened up parts of his personality which have been hidden to us over the years. Parts which he himself had supressed. We need no mention any details about his intense feeling for Srila Prabhupada and the endeavor for Prabhupada's mission. All these he has done without any regard for his own personal needs.

In the past few years he again started preaching the importance of Varna Asrama dharma, of which one of the basic principles is that everyone become properly situated, taking care of one's personal needs in other to be able to perform devotional service nicely. He was preaching this point and encouraging others to do this, simultaneously taking up more and more managerial responsability. One could perhaps said that he made the mistake of thinking he could manage and preach ISKCON into Varnasrama dharma. But now Krsna has made the arrangement that Sri Visnupada can became the example of this.

That means there are 2 things happening here simultaneously (not unusual for Krsna). First (as Hrdayananda Maharaja so nicely pointed out) Krsna has heard our prayers that Sri Visnupada finally stop working so hard and take care of himself. So Krsna has shown him that he needs to take care of his whole person.. Secondly, the individual menbers of ISKCON can see from this example how important it is to situate themselves properly, and take care of their individual needs in order to be able to perform a lifetime of service. It is pretty obvious that many things in ISKCON need to change and there have been many in the recent years who have been able to actually efect some of that change. But in terms of VAD we still have a long way to go. VAD cannot be managed from the GBC. It can only come if we individual devotees accept our own dharma and connect that with Krsna.

Because we have so many false conceptions about what renunciation is- even what spiritual life is/ we have not ALLOWED ourselves to do this. Thus we ourselves are standing in the way of our own dharma. There may be many specific reasons for our own personal delays-philosophical misunderstanding or social pressure are often important factors here. But now this will all be wiped away by the example of Sri Visnupada.
Now we are not talking about any DIVINE LILA here. We are talking about an extremely powerful, advanced person, who by Krsna's arrangement will be able to offer more of his own self to Krsna, by first accept that side of himself into his own life.

We are not talking here about any kind of fall-down. There is a woman involved. Her name is Monika. She is the healer who was able to give Sri Visnupada the power to remain in his body and stay with us. She is also the person whom Krsna used as the instrument to reveal to him his feelings. The feelings which he thought he should ignore inhis service to Prabhupada, but the same feelings which Krsna ultimately wants each of us to feel towards Him. He sees his meeting her as the arrangement of Srimati Radharani. Of course in this regard there is some confusion. In the several days after his death, he was sometimes in the body, sometimes not. Sometimes having spiritual visions, sometimes dealing with his intense phisical pain. During this time he made statements and did things which were very confusing to those around him. And we can be very thankful to Krsna that there were so many nice devotees who were there and continued to serve him. It's pretty difficult to imagine what really is goi
I myself have never left my body for even a moment, what to speak of all this. Sri Visnupada said that the breakdown of1987 was"peanuts" in comparison with this one. In any case because of all this confusion some of you may have even heard that he thinks he is Krsna and she is Radharani, but there is no such idea here. His behavior in the past days is completely normal. In other words a very steady positive evolution has taken place over the last weeks. After meeting her for the first time I said to Sri Visnupada, "she doesn't look like Radharani". And we all had a good laugh.
Of course he is feeling a lot of affection for Monika and may even work together with her in the future. These things are at present not yet clear. But he doesn't feel any need for ( or any identification with) the ashrama of sannyasa. At the same time there is no talk of marriage- just some working relationship. She is obviously a very powerful healer. Indeed his progress in the last few days has been remarkable. He has starting taking longer walks ( at a good pace ). Today he was even cooking for himself. No medicines have any reaction whatsoever - we went through his whole medicine box and nothing worked except one oil for headache, everything else was useless, but the treatment he gets from her are showing wonderful results - try cooking lunch for 8 people if you have a back problem! The prasadam was really good - a little to spicy for some, but really good.
Many devotees are waiting for some statement or some instruction from Sri Visnupada, but that may not come. What instructions? So many instructions are there already. They don't need any instructions. Some message? Tell them I'm trying to be happy.

There is of course a little more than that. In the last days he has often mentioned that everyone should look at themselves and evaluate their own situation. I took this instruction in 2 ways; 1) as mentioned above in terms of VAD and 2) recently he told me that he never could really differentiate among his disciples, but that now because of the recent changes he could easily see our motivations and that some are simply using him and his position for their own power and benefit. So I undestood the instruction to alsomean, "Am I one of the disciples who is trying to serve Sri Visnupada, or I using him for my sense gratification".

Finally, he does need some little time for himself now and we are confident, that if we allow him that time. We will in the future get so much in return. He is not in Maya, he is not crazy, he is just adjusting his life. Do you need to adjust yours?

If you want to talk to us, use these telephone numbers

Padmanabha (Germany)+ 49 / 8586 - 917656

Gurusakti ( France) +33 / 384728235 or 384826748