Letters to the editor

Dear Hanumat Presaka Maharaja!

Please accept my our humble obeisances! All glories to Srila Prabhupada! All glories to Sri Guru and Gauranga!

My name is Tirtharaja Dasa, and I serve as an (almost) a temple president of (nearly finished) ISKCON Valencia (Spain) temple. We are in the midst of construction works of the new temple and our inauguration date, by Krishna's mercy, is set to 31 of March. I am writing for two reasons, one is a recommendation letter for bhaktin Mirabai, and another one is to invite you to visit us in May, during your visit to Spain.

Yadunandana Swami asked me to do the recommendation letter and necesary formalities (the exam and so on), since Mirabai lives in Valencia. Maharaja is very much in favour of Mirabai taking the vows and your shelter through a Harinama initiation. I´m happy to recommend Mirabai Platón for Harinama initiation. As far as I know she has been chanting a minimum of 16 rounds of japa every day strictly for at least one year and following the regulative principles for more (much more) than one year. Moreover, she has successfully completed the official ISKCON initiation exam, proving sufficient philosophical knowledge. As an ISKCON devotee living outside of the temple, she has been doing regular morning programs and puja at home for many years and is active member of our community.

We would like to invite you to come and visit us during your May visit to Spain. Valencia is hour and a half by train from Madrid (AVE) and some 3 and a half hours from Barcelona by train too. If traveling by car, the distance is pretty much the same, 3 and a half to 4 hours from both cities. 

Your servant,

Tirtharaja Dasa

      HpS -  Jaya!  AGTSP  paoho.   Thank you so much.  Can you send us Mataji's full name and date of birth at [email protected] ?   Also her e-mail address?    She is on the Japa forum many days each morning.      We would like to visit Valencia.   Our visit this time is being organized by Jayanta Das.  You can talk with him and he would have the best idea of what is practical!!   BEST OF WISHES for your Temple inauguration and more and more and more success!!!

Todas las Glorias a Srila Prabhupada

Todas las Glorias  Sri Guru y Gauranga

Por favor acepte mis más humildes y respetuosas reverencias!

En este momento estoy en La Paz, aquí los devotos discípulos de Paramadveiti Swami, me solicitaron con urgencia que restaure las deidades instaladas de su templo. Estos arreglos consisten en volver a pintarlas, y arreglar varias rajaduras de las mismas, ya que son de madera. Cuando fui a revisarlas pude comprobar que efectivamente este deterioro podría agravarse ya que han estado así los últimos 3 años.

Sirva esta oportunidad, Gurumaharaja, para comunicarme con usted, y decirle que este servicio de restauración lo he venido realizando  los tres últimos años, y realmente me gustaría seguirlo realizando como un servicio a Srila Prabhupada, a Krishna, y a usted mi Maestro Espiritual, también a los devotos; es por ello Gurudeva que imploro sus bendiciones para continuar realizando este servicio con éxito. Sus bendiciones serán para mí un gran aliento, para continuar con esta labor en el futuro.

A su servicio Siempre

Narayani devi dasi

P.D. Vrisabhanu Prabhu desea aprovechar este momento para enviarle sus más respetuosas reverencias.

               HpS - ASA -  Jaya!   Muy bien!   Dos minutos pasado carta de Jiyada Nrsmha Das!     Jaya!    Somos en Bolivia.               Pienso es bueno ayudar ellos con su deidades.  Claro, co-ordinar todo con las autoridades local!   En Peru devotas de Isev estan restorando los deidades de Gaura Nitai para nosotros.  Muy interesante.             Reverencias a Vrsabhanu!    Muy pronto somos todo juntos con Krsna en Goloka con las Vacas.

hare krsna maharaj,
we know u r very very very busy. but this link will help u in ur sankhya-sound lectures..thats all we say.

bvml.org/SBRSM/tdothn.html

and we are very fortunate saint ,who implements this  the science of sound.

hare krsna
PAMHO,
horse

  HpS - Jaya!   AGTSP   paoho.  We will see you very soon!    I hope we can talk on Skype soon.   We are realizing that we can only do so much work each day.  For example, today we spent time on Youtube with the Biography of Joan of Arc. Is very useful for preaching and calmed us quite a bit.   Many clases here in Radha desa.  We investigate your link!  Thank you. 

Dear GM, PAMHO AGTSP AGTYH I was recently reciting the dasavatara stotram and considering the verse about varahadeva. वसति दशनशिखरॆ धरणी तव लग्ना शशिनि कलङ्ककलॆव निमग्ना । This rose two issues that I would like to ask you about: How can I accept such an extraordinary story as anything more than a mythological account that may provide a tool for teaching humans about dharma? How should I consider other religious stories that appear to be mythological in nature but are not part of our tradition? Such as a Hopi creation story or Norse gods. How much of this is real and how much is imagination? How much of this is for the purpose of teaching us things which are beyond the realm of cognitive capability? Do some religions get it right and others get it wrong? YHS, Tcsd

HpS - ASA - AGTSP   paoho.  O.K.  Let's write on this for publication.
First, even within our own tradition, Vedic culture, there are texts for those in the mode of ignorance and those in ...   So some these are directly exaggerated to deal with really stoned dudes. Even the Bhagavatam says that some of the stories there are allegories. Others the parampara says are actual descriptions of reality but extraordinary to oue personal experience.
Appreciating the parampara, the authority, is very important in this discussion. Like last year I heard Jay Labov from the National Academy of Science saying to most people, college educated people "scientific knowledge" is "revealed knowledge" just as stories coming from different religious traditions. So we have to investigate the scientific or guru-parampara authorities. The last one in our line, Srila Prabhupada is quite accessible through his books and students if we want to investigate, and then he says that everyone of our Acharyas were greatly realized souls with no reason to accept imagination as serious fact.

Parampara, in Mathematics, Proof Through Induction.

Then we can use the available scientific and other information and try to understand these stories in the Bhagavatam.  First principle is that the SB is using a different coslmology from that which we have evolved in the West from Socrates to Plato to Aristotle to St. Thomas Aquinas, Kant, Newton, Einstein.
To see the validity of the predominating Western paradigm requires to look carefully at history. There is good literature available, authorities like Harvey Cox, Carl Jung, Marshall McLuhan, E. T. Hall.  All well respected scientist - "Quantum Questions" by Ken Wilber.   So many books which in the end demonstrate that the Wester Cosmology confronts may experiences that we can't explain and amongst all these the concept of Time we feel one of the most principle.

To many college educated Dudes, time is a line, it moves in one direciton only, it has no branches and all the steps are just the same size!!  Very German.  Yet, cross cultural studies, regular scientific studies in psychology, advanced physics, show us that there are many alternative views of time which funcition quite well andd even better in different circumstances.

So, to take the "myths" of the SB on their own terms, and not to just extract one thing out of context, like 1 + 1 = 10, and say that it is rediculous, but not to understand that the statement is made after it has been established that we are working in a base 2 number system, we see that the pastimes of Krsna were occuring at the end of the Dvapara Yuga.   For us in the Kali-yuga it is like some cockroach in the middle of Winter in New York trying to understand what things were like in the Fall.  The vegetation, atmosphere, everything, were different.

What to speak of Satya -yuga.

So many things were possible then that are not now.   Methusala in the Bible is worth finding a reading.  How old did he and his fellows live.

We could write much more but I think the idea is clear, no? If we read the SB parampara we will gradually understand the cosmology better and see how it is not only reasonable but apparently much more practical. From it come Ayurveda, Vastuveda, Jyotishveda...  Very practical and effective physical sciences.
Is O.K.?    This is just an extract, but a word to the wise is sufficient.   If you look up Carbon Dating on the WIkip. and the Britannica and follow the scholaraly links on them you will see that there are great deficiencies in the scientific "myth" about how they are establishing their dates.

We will post this on the JayaRama.us archives as, vedas-myth.docx
 

Dearest Guru Maharaja,

Please accept my humble obeisances. All glories to Srila Prabhupada. 

All glories to Hanumat Preshaka Swami!!!

Guru Maharaja, please forgive me because I forgot your appearance day.

             HpS - AGTSP!   paoho....    -/;o] -  -          Causeless mercy.

I am so sorry for being such a fool and self centered rascal. It is because of the many offences that something like this happens. I will fast tomorrow for your vyasa puja and chant as many rounds as I can.

Thank you so much for being an inspiration and father. I miss your personal association very much but for now I try to take it through your lectures and instructions. I have to work on the latter a bit more. 

I  really admire your admiration for devotees that may not be with this Isckon movement. It really shows an example for how one should still respect everyone whoever they may have been and whoever they are now. I wish to be like that one day. 

And I also admire very much your love to Srila Prabhupada. Reading the Lilamrita I am learning how much he worked to establish Krishna consciousness in the west. He was very compassionate towards all of us and he really had a mood of serving his spiritual master's instructions. His dedication to him was amazing and praiseworthy. It is otherwordly what Prabhupada did, otherwordly. All we can do is keep helping him serve his spiritual master. Just recently one young woman asked a question about how to help people. She said that she felt sad that she can't help more people than she does now. Sankarshan das prabhu's wife gave a very nice answer. She said that if we can't help someone then we give him one of Prabhupada's books so that he can help that person. I loved that so much. 

All I can do is try to help you help Srila Prabhupada.

Your aspiring servant,

Rasa-mandali devi dasi

                    HpS - !!     We need to have all kinds of BBT books on hand so that we can give them out at appropriate moments.   Eg.  leave one in the seat back pocket in the airplane when you get off!        We are in Radha-desa.  It is 3.27AM   Ananda vardhana Das is chanting japa on Japa Joe.  We finished 16 rounds!   Four more before each Gayatri!!               Super wishes for alll happiness in your life and your families life.