by Suresvara Das
The year is 1972. In New Vrindaban, West Virginia, it is Srila Prabhupada’s Vyasa-puja Day.
As the sun climbs to the meridian, the thick mist shrouding the foothills gives way to a spotless blue. Inside a hilltop pavilion, hundreds of devotees and guests—politicians, journalists, and academics among them—have gathered to observe the seventy-sixth anniversary of Prabhupada’s birth. It is to the guests especially that Prabhupada directs his address:
“Ladies and gentlemen, this ceremony… Of course, those who are my students, they know what is this ceremony. Those who are visitors, for their information, I may inform you something about this ceremony. Otherwise, it may be misunderstood. An outsider may see it that, ‘Why is a person being worshiped like God?’ There may be some doubt.”
Demystifying the Guru
Doubt, indeed. The 1960s and 70s have seen a spike in the number of opportunistic gurus coming to the West, streamlining Vedic revelation to suit modern tastes and reaping the profits. To establish trust, Prabhupada begins to demystify “the guru” by connecting him to other gurus in parampara, a disciplic succession of authentic spiritual masters descending from Lord Krishna Himself, the Supreme Personality of Godhead. The demystification continues:
“On the top of the mango tree there is a very ripened fruit, and that fruit has to be tasted. So if I drop the fruit from up, it will be lost. Therefore it is handed over, after one, after one, after… Then it comes down. So all Vedic process of knowledge is taking from the authority. And it comes down through disciplic succession.”
Well aware of modern antipathy to authority, Prabhupada compares the guru to that venerable American pedestrian—the mailman:
“Just like a post peon comes and delivers you, say, one hundred dollars. So he is not delivering that one hundred dollars. Your friend has sent you one hundred dollars, and his business is to hand over that one hundred dollars as it is, without any change, without taking one dollar from it, no, or adding. No addition, no subtraction. His honesty, his perfection, is that he delivers you that hundred dollars which is sent by your friend.… He may be imperfect in so many other ways, but when he does his business perfectly, he is perfect. Similarly… we receive perfect knowledge from Krishna through the agency of spiritual master.”
Guru Is One, Gurus Are Different
The guru as God’s mailman—down to earth yet out of this world. Because they carry God’s message, all genuine gurus are in a sense “one”—that is, identical. Those guests who go on to read Prabhupada’s teachings will learn how all genuine gurus are also different, each one delivering the message, as Prabhupada writes, “according to personal capacity.”
In the very first text of the Sri Caitanya-caritamrta, the definitive biography of Lord Krsna’s golden avatar, Lord Caitanya, Srila Krishna dasa Kaviraja Gosvami begins by offering his respectful obeisances to gurun, his many spiritual masters. In the book’s Introduction, Srila Prabhupada notes:
“He uses the plural here to indicate the disciplic succession. He offers obeisances not to his spiritual master alone but to the whole parampara, the chain of disciplic succession beginning with Lord Krishna Himself.”
Later in the first chapter, text 35, Kaviraja Gosvami offers his respects to “my initiating spiritual master and all my instructing spiritual masters.” Prabhupada comments:
“A devotee must have only one initiating spiritual master because in the scriptures acceptance of more than one is always forbidden. There is no limit, however, to the number of instructing spiritual masters one may accept. Generally a spiritual master who constantly instructs a disciple in spiritual science becomes his initiating spiritual master later on.”
This indicates the natural, normative guru-disciple relationship sustainable over time. Although Prabhupada was uniquely empowered to spread Krishna consciousness worldwide in less than a dozen years, he entrusted the thousands of disciples he was initiating to the care of his local leaders and senior devotees.<sup>3</sup> To glimpse how this guru-disciple culture can become more local and sustainable, as he described it, we turn again to Sri Caitanya-caritamrta, Chapter One: “The Spiritual Masters.”
Initiating and Instructing Gurus
Since Prabhupada’s passing, the spotlight on the initiating spiritual master may have led some to believe that to initiate disciples requires more qualification than to instruct them. Prabhupada disagrees. Commenting on text 34, he writes:
“The initiating and instructing spiritual masters are equal and identical manifestations of Krsna, although they have different dealings.”
And on text 47:
“There is no difference between the shelter-giving Supreme Lord and the initiating and instructing spiritual masters. If one foolishly discriminates between them, he commits an offence in the discharge of devotional service.”
Still, the need to accept initiation from one guru remains. In The Nectar of Devotion, Chapter Six, Prabhupada identifies the first two principles of devotional service:
“(1) accepting the shelter of the lotus feet of a bona fide spiritual master,” and
“(2) becoming initiated by the spiritual master and learning how to discharge devotional service from him.”
Writing in Lord Caitanya’s time, Srila Narahari Sarakara likened the disciple’s fidelity to his guru to the bond between father and son:
“A faithful son may go out for earning money and subsequently bring to his father the wealth gained, and later the son may ask for some allowance from the father, and whatever he receives from the father he is entitled to spend on his own enjoyment. Similarly, a disciple may hear some instructions from another advanced Vaisnava, but after gaining that good instruction he must bring it and present it to his own spiritual master. After presenting it, he should hear the same teachings from his own spiritual master with appropriate instructions.” (Sri Krsna-bhajanamrta, text 48)
When a devotee once asked Prabhupada whether it was more important to study scripture or to serve a person whose life embodied scripture, Prabhupada replied without hesitation: the latter—because the guru “can pull your earNag3.”
The Power of Commitment
All genuine gurus are teachers. Yet their impact varies depending on the depth of their commitment. Prabhupada elaborates in his commentary to text 34:
“Gurun is plural in number because anyone who gives spiritual instructions based on the revealed scriptures is accepted as a spiritual master. Although others give help in showing the way to beginners, the guru who first initiates one with the maha-mantra is to be known as the initiator, and the saints who give instructions for progressive advancement in Krsna consciousness are called instructing spiritual masters.”
Commitment progresses—from introduction, to initiation, to ongoing instruction. And often, those who instruct us most exert the greatest influence. Even silent gurus teach by example. “Example is better than precept,” Prabhupada would say, “and actions speak louder than words.”
Once in India, a Western devotee expressed doubts about preaching in local villages because he didn’t speak the language. Prabhupada reassured him:
“Oh, they don’t care what you say. They just want to see how you behaveNag4.”
“So You, Every One of You, Become Guru”
Srila Prabhupada’s followers, gathered for his Vyasa-puja, see him seated on a crimson throne—a guru of gurus. Their commitment is new, but his to them is absolute. He makes a powerful request: become guru.
Quoting Lord Caitanya from Madhya-lila, Chapter 7, text 128:
“Instruct everyone to follow the orders of Lord Sri Krsna [as they are given in the Bhagavad-gita and Srimad-Bhagavatam]. In this way become a spiritual master and try to liberate everyone in this land.”
Prabhupada’s commentary is unequivocal:
“This is the sublime mission of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness.”
In countless lectures and letters, Prabhupada returned to this theme:
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“I want that all of my spiritual sons and daughters will inherit this title of Bhaktivedanta… Those possessing the title of Bhaktivedanta will be allowed to initiate disciples.” (Letter, 3 January 1969)
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“So you, every one of you, can become guru… You must be guru. That is success of your life.” (Conversation, Tehran, 13 March 1975)
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“There is no need of qualification… Whomever you meet, you simply instruct what Krsna has said. That’s all. You become guru.” (Lecture, Honolulu, 21 May 1976)
“Strictly Follow”
Prabhupada foresaw disorder following his passing. In Srimad-Bhagavatam 4.28.48, he warns:
“The acarya, the authorised representative of the Supreme Lord, establishes these principles, but when he disappears, things once again become disordered. The perfect disciples of the acarya try to relieve the situation by sincerely following the instructions of the spiritual master.”
Some disciples might imitate Prabhupada’s jagat-guru status, yet his greater concern was that others might never rise to offer shelter themselves. The solution? Strictly follow:
“There are persons who are less qualified or not liberated, but still can act as guru and acarya by strictly following the disciplic succession.” (Letter, 26 April 1968)
Or again:
“Although a follower may not be a liberated person, if he follows the Supreme, liberated Personality of Godhead, his actions are naturally liberated…” (Srimad-Bhagavatam 4.18.5, Purport)
Liberated or not, any guru who “strictly follows” guru and Krishna is genuine. There may be more qualified spiritual masters among us than we realise.
Conclusion: The Sum and Substance of Vyasa-puja
Pens scribbling, cameras rolling, the guests listen as Prabhupada closes:
“So this is the position of a spiritual master. Don’t misunderstand that, ‘This person is sitting very comfortably and taking all honours and contribution.’ It is needed just to teach them how to respect the representative of God. This is the sum and substance of Vyasa-puja. Thank you very much.”
first published in Back to Godhead, used with permission