THE HARE KRISHNA “ENLIGHTENMENT “ SCAM

As part of his program to spread the Hare Krishna cult to the West, its founder/guru A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada did not hesitate to initiate disciples and declare as “Brahmins” ex-hippies who took to chanting with all the fervor that once characterized their drug-taking and sexual excesses. Knowledge of Vedanta was not required: all an interested party had to do was attend Bhagavad-Gita lectures, attest that he or she was chanting 16 “rounds” on their japa beads, and was also following the “four regulative principles.”

The indoctrination process included sleep deprivation—the Swami regarded more than four to six hours as sense indulgence or “Maya”—and a program of idol worship beginning at 4 a.m., followed by a lecture on his Bhagavad Gita As It Is. The exhausted and hungry devotees were then fed a meagre breakfast consisting of porridge that was poured on a paper plate on the floor and then eaten with the fingers of the right hand. The rest of the day was spent hawking the cult’s propaganda on the streets and airports, then back to the temple for more idol-worship and chanting, followed by a repast of dal and chapatis, then oblivion on a sleeping bag on the floor of a crowded, same sex ashram.

“Same-sex” is the operative term here. Technically, all sexual activity was forbidden, with a minor concession granted to married couples, who could, if they wanted a child, mate no more than once a month until conception, under the condition that they informed the entire temple assembly in the morning  that they were going to “try for a child” that night. Privacy was out of the question in the Swami’s utterly inhumane and concocted view of the practice of Gaudiya Vaishnavism.

His disciples tolerated these indignities and others because they were gullible enough to believe their guru’s claim the euphoria they experienced while chanting granted them direct access to God. Furthermore, he claimed that it was all made possible because he and only he was in a direct line of disciplic succession (“parampara”)from the linage of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, a Bengali Brahmin famous for his popularizing congregational chanting of the Hare Krishna mantra and wild dancing (“kirtan”) while dressing as if he were Krishna’s lover Radha.

Questioning or challenging the swami’s many ludicrous and bigoted statements was forbidden and grounds for immediate expulsion. This arrogance and despotism was, in turn, assumed by the Temple Presidents to whom the swami delegated the task of management. To say that they imitated him with relish is an understatement:  before long, the egomaniacal nature of their desire to control every imaginable aspect of the lives of their “godbrothers” and “godsisters” reached fever-pitch.

Soon they become petty despots, arranging marriages and concocting fund-raising schemes that were generally based on lies, harassment of the public, and often both. These practices gave rise to an unimaginable degree of corruption within ISKCON that steadily grew worse as our guru offered the highest degree of spiritual honor, the renounced order, to those disciples based on their combined ability to make money for him and open new temples.

These fraudsters have been at it since 1966 and since the death of A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami in 1977, legions of his disciples and disciples of his disciples have declared themselves gurus themselves. The subject of my next posting on this topic will reveal the core arguments these con-artists in saffron dhotis use to entrap the unwary. 

Summary:  Regardless of his philosophy, ISKCON founder A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami’s method of gaining new followers and spreading his message of easy access to the spiritual realm by way of chanting the Hare Krishna mantra took advantage of gullible people, most of whose involvement in the cult ended disastrously. Unqualified people were given influential positions based on their ability to raise as much money as possible by keeping the devotees who peddled the swami’s books as overworked and ill-fed as possible.