Srila Prabhupada The Brahma Sampradaya Acharya
June 7, 2016 in Hansadutta Dasa by Yasoda nandana dasa
Submitted by: Yasoda nandana Dasa
Srila Prabhupada
The Brahma Sampradaya Acharya
by Hansadutta das
INTRODUCTION
The Brahma Sampradaya Acharya
by Hansadutta das
INTRODUCTION
When a NON-LIBERATED person takes leadership (material or spiritual) without being under the guidance of a liberated soul, the end result is always destruction and failure. Initially there maybe fabulous success, like in the case of Hitler and Napoleon or as in our ISKCON, Bhagavan, Bhavananda, Rameswara, Jayatirtha, myself [Hansadutta] and most recently Kirtanananda, but ultimately everything will collapse and the FOLLOWERS aware of the leader’s imperfections ABANDON HIM. This is not a criticism, but an observation of the facts and realisation through personal experience.
We want and we need a perfect person to follow: the ACHARYA, then others acting under his charge can be accepted as guides in as much as they are submissive and experienced under the authority of the ACHARYA.
Therefore Prabhupada emphatically advised us: “I wish that each and every centre shall keep the ACHARYA (i.e. Srila Prabhupada) in the centre and keep their separate identity.” (Srila Prabhupada’s Letters, 1967)
In our sampradaya there MUST BE AN ACHARYA at all times (living or departed), like Brahma, Narada, Vyasa, Madhvacharya, Lord Chaitanya, the six Goswamis, Bhaktivinoda Thakura, Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Thakura and Srila Prabhupada, whose commentaries on the standard Vaishnava texts the aspiring candidate can refer to as a YARDSTICK in order to ascertain the BONAFIDES of his chosen GURU (representative of the ACHARYA); otherwise the sampradaya becomes over-crowded with pretenders, and everything falls into chaos, as is the situation now—each a guru claiming to be bonafide. But the practical result is dozens of provincial camps with fanatic followers claiming allegiance to his particular leader as all in all. If the necessity of the sampradaya ACHARYA is understood, the neophyte followers in any or all camps would or will see Prabhupada as all in all and their PROVINCIAL GURU as a servant of Prabhupada, experienced to some degree and capable of helping the newcomer in the philosophical and practical application of the ACHARYA’S TEACHINGS. Just as in the UNIVERSITY the great ACHARYA EINSTEIN is understood under the guidance of an experienced professor, but the professor is never equated with such giants as Einstein, Newton, Gallileo, etc. Even if a person is a great, liberated soul, he should present himself as nothing more than representative of the acharya, if only for the sake of unity in the sampradaya.