Letters to the editor

[From https://monkeywarrior.com/detail/14761/]

NANDA-RAJA DAS - Yes, Mahārāja, I went through this. But, I don't see any good in switching to Grihastha ashram either. I'll lose many opportunities for services and a lot of time will go in earning money. Besides, controlling senses would be tougher there. I don't see a willingness in me unless that's the only option.

I always think of bouncing back. I've lived a joyful brahmachari life but that was with my brahmachari friends. Now, I only aspire for it.

HpS/ASA

AgtSP

Paoho 🐒🐒🐒🦍

Wonderful!

What happened to your brahmachari friends? Make new ones? Join our ASA Sannyasa aśrama?

What about Vanaprastha? Vaisesika, Virabahu Das, PM Modi? No kids. One kid, a Ray of Visnu? Your brother stuck in a female body. No, minimal physical contact just emotional stability. Meet once a day, week, year - both preparing for next ashrama, Goswami? She maybe even more serious, humble than you?

Wife raises dogs to sell as pets, working dogs, with enough income to cover all her, extra grhastha expenses.

Thank you.this nice dialog.

Hare Krsna. Hare Rama 🙂.

asa[e] - ramayana, bibliography

Sun, Jan 21 at 7:59 PM

1. Srila Prabhupada - BBT Publication

Based on Chapters 10 & 11 of Srimad Bhagavatam Canto 9

The Ramayana in Brief: Rescuing Sita, the Wife of Lord Rama

2. Vidwan Gauranga Dasa (JPS) - Rupa Raghunatha Vani Publications

With word for word and verse translations and purports

Sri Valmiki Ramayana: Canto 1 (3 Volumes)

Sri Valmiki Ramayana: Canto 2 (5 Volumes)

3. Bhakti Vikasa Swami - Bhakti Vikas Trust

Summary of Valmiki Ramayana (ancient and unchanged)

Ramayana: The Story of Lord Rama

4. Dr. Demian Martins - Jiva Institute

Word for word and verse translation in English and Hindi of Bala Kanda Chpater 1, 100 verses

Mula-ramayana: The Original Ramayana

5. Krishna Dharma Dasa - Mandala Publication

Novelized version of Ramayana

Ramayana: India's Immortal Tale of Adventure, Love, and Wisdom

HpS/ASA - Also available at www.vedavase.io.

6. Rancor Dasa - Mandala Publication

Summary of Ramayana w/BG Sharma illustrations

Ramayana: A Tale of Gods and Demons

7. Purnaprajna Dasa

https://blservices.com/product/ramayana-of-valmiki-purnaprajna-dasa/

HpS/ASA - Thank you Gopal! AgtSP. We read a paper copy of the "Gita Press" English edition while in Russia.

Also, Kirtananda published a copy with Sri Galim, that quoted an esteemed academic in the Preface that there here hundreds of translations of Ramayana around the world.

Radha-Krsna et al, like Rama-lila so much that they eternally play it in Kamyavan in Braja, no?

How does it fit in proportion to our Nitya seva?

A Devotee and Scientist Asks:

Hare Krishna 

HH Hanumat Preshaka Swami had to leave immediately after his discourse today, and we couldn't get to ask a question

I'm hoping someone on this forum may be able to help

We learn that truth has the attributes of 

1. Being independent...whether majority believes or disagrees with it, truth remains the truth. It doesn't need anything like proof, etc. to exist

2. Being eternal... truth is unchanging. It stays the same irrespective of time, place, or circumstances 

3. Being universal... it is applicable to everyone, everything, everywhere 

4. Being inimitable....truth cannot be manufactured

With this in mind, why is something like faith required to understand/realize truth?

After all, faith can make one accept lies to be the truth & vice versa

There are more basal things like hunger, which doesn't require anything external like faith or person to tell us we're hungry.... so why is it that for something sublime like truth, which is independent anyway, we rely on a shaky thing like faith?

-0-0-0-

Hanumatpresaka Swami (Professor H. H. Robinson)

Such and excellent and also very fundamental question. We also have been attentive to this personally, and also in our dealings in science, even in discourses with even Nobel Laureattes.

Of course, this is the general area of Epistemology, How do we Know.

Ontology has been described as, What we can Know.

Praxiology as, What we do about It.

Yes, the word Faith has been denigrated by modern materialistic people as being Blind Faith, but this is condemned by Srila Prabhupada, and our Caitanya, Bengali, Vaisnava community. For example, it is directly declared in purport to BG As It Is 4.34.

"In this verse, both blind following and absurd inquiries are condemned."

https://vedabase.io/en/library/bg/4/34/

It is a big topic with lots written on the subject.

I would say the way Srila Prabhupada uses the word faith is a translation of the word "sraddha". In his sense he is using it like saying the Old Jeeves is a very faithful servant.

We may know something but we don't apply it. We are unfaithful.

In some ways it is the same as the word 'Bhakti' or 'Love'.

Then it becomes pretty easy, no?

If we say that the Truth cannot be known without Love, Respect, then it becomes easier approach the problem of faith and knowledge.

One class of "Scientists" take Science as dominating the material energy. Forcing her to reveal her confidential secrets and forcing her to gratify our masculine desires.

😟

In The Voice of Experience Dr. R. D. Laing gives some just astonishing quotations, statements, about this perspective in science.

Does reality have a moral and ethical component, or is it just impersonal truth that can be accessed equally by demons and atheists, or gods and heroes?

PhD means Teacher of Love of Wisdom. So if you are a PhD in physics you don't have to teach your students anything, no information or rational processes. You just have to teach them to LOVE Truth!!!

Does a prominent Research Scientist leading a large and respected team in some cutting edge area of science have'Faith' in the hypothesis they are now pursuing?

Arjuna surrendered to Krsna in BG 2, but he had lots of doubts after that.

Diksa means that you don't bring up artificial doubts to try to avoid surrender.

Diksa means that we agree to go on asking practical questions as long as the Guru keeps on supplying practical answers from empirical, logical, mystical (intuitive), resources.

No blind faith is required.

We are approaching BG with a hypothesis and testing it.

One nice question for confirmed scientific materialists is:

Do you have axiomatic faith in the postulates of Euclid? 😠

Of course, they do.

We don't have faith in the postulates of Euclid because we can see red, blue and green, empirical knowledge.

As far a rational understand goes. In science it is synonimous with Mathematics.

You can't even have enumeration without Euclids postulates, what to speak of counting, arithmetric, geometry, calculus.

Its a broad topic.

I think it was Galileo whom when asked why they BELIEVED in the postulates of mathematics, responded that because they FELT right.

Vedas say that ultimately everything is RASA.

The final evidence is Rasa.

Science is based upon a fine taste that drives us on to being more and more committed.

O.K.

Some of our ideas.

asa[e].. ug.. ai

Hare Krsna Guru Maharaja,

PAMHO, AGTSP.

Just wanted to share below insights of experts into the future world of Artificial Intelligence.

From a Linkedin Post:

Adolph Hitlers propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels purportedly said: “Repeat a lie often enough and it becomes the truth.” Gary Smith finds that “[large language models] can generate falsehoods faster than humans can correct them.”

Gary has been reporting on his humorous exchanges with ChatGPT for more than a year, sometimes asking the same questions to see if ChatGPT’s answers get better; they don’t. One of those questions involves how many bears the Russians have sent into space (correct answer is none) in which he shows that the answers are not getting logically better, but funnier.

Main article: https://mindmatters.ai/2024/01/internet-pollution-if-you-tell-a-lie-long-enough/?

Your servant

Srinivasacarya Dasa

HpS/ASA[UG] - Thank you!!! 🐻 We have learned how to do keystrokes to get the Emojis into the page. You know? .... you type ":" and then put the proper keyword afterwards eg ":bear" and you get the bear emoji.

🐻🐻🐻🐻🐻🐻🐻🐻🐻

🐻🐻🐻🐻🐦🐻🐻🐻🐻🐻

🐻🐻🐻🐻🐻🐻🐦🐻🐻🐦🐻

We remember how Srila Prabhupada was saying that all these televisions were not useful. (We understand that traveling Puppet shows and local Puppet shows are better).

He said that in the whole world maybe two, three dozen televisions were needed.

One in Moscow. One in Beijing. One in the Vatican. One in...

... people develop memories! People talk with their neighbors. Brahmanas like Vyasa deva can give people like Sanjaya TV in their hearts.

WHTSTSPS (we heard they say that srila prabhupada said) that if you follow strictly and your children follow strictly then your grandchildren will be traveling on flying carpets.



🐻

🐻🐻🐻🐻🐻🐻🐻🐻🚀... 🚀... 🚀...

asa[e] sankirtan; communicating with sannyasi partners

Tom Brown: Hare Krsna. AgtSP. HpSwami gets audio clips on WhatsApp sometimes. He has a hard time dealing with clips from H. H. Badri-Narayana Swami, Dr. Prof. Samaresh... everyone! 🙂 . . 😕 😕😕

The audio quality is not clear for his 40% diminished hearing, especially in high frequency hearing range.. They run too fast for him to understand them with Brother equally reduced short-term memory. They can't form concepts fast enough to really understand the concepts.

Reading and writing allows time for this.

Preview of geriatric psychology for some of our readers.

Statement of reality for older readers!

Old age is a good friend for a devotee.

Summarize stuff, especially for the Blog.

As, eg, several devotees are asking about working with NIOS: Land, money, men etc and HpS as old Sannyasi cannot give any perspective on these passionate, administrative, decisions without younger gentlemen sitting right in the conversations.

Thank you. 🐵🙏🐒

ASA[E] Guru-tattva.. Diksa guru retires.

Hare Krishna Guru Maharaja

Please accept my humble obeisances

All Glories to Srila Prabhupada

All Glories to your enormous service.

I hope you get much better health.

HpS - Our donkey's health is pretty good for 75-years old.

Had littel fever, probably just like you, but recovered quickly.

Hearing, sight, memory are like 40% gone. That won't come back in this life time. It is good. We want to stop watching the movie of mangos and pick real mangos for Krsna!

Would be nice if we died right after sending this letter and you died right after reading it and then we both took birth in Nabadvipa with Nimai, no!!!

We remain firm with all our vows and also with the service in the initiation committee, I wanted to apologize for my mistake in misunderstanding the words in English, I will strive to improve, in fact I am practicing English with a devotee of the Indian community 🙏.

HpS - Your English is better than my Spanish! 😄

In December we helped aspiring devotees for Hari nama initiation and brahminical initiation of Jayapataka Maharaja, we had a very good association with older devotees.

HpS/ASA - Such a nice service!

My letter is mainly addressed to you to tell you about Bhakta Carlos Rold, a devotee of many years who has always felt very enthusiastic about everything related to making your sankirtan grow.

I am a witness of how he has made an effort to qualify and prepare himself.

For a year now, he has been following the four regulative principles, maintaining his sadhana, connecting to FMP, doing practical service in the Iskcon Chile temple, singing its 16 rounds (he tells me that when he cannot finish them, he sings them the next day, adding to the corresponding ones),

he has also approved [passed] the Disciples course and is about to finish the Introduction to Bhakti yoga course.

Also Bhakta Lucciano Macchiavello would also like to formalize his entire process in a certain way, he tells me that he has known you for more than 17 years and that no one like you has understood it, he has never stopped following your institution of donating milk and butter for the deity.

Gurudeva an important question, do you think in the future granting formal Refuge and possible initiation to Bhakta Carlos Rold and perhaps formal refuge to Bhakta Lucciano Macchiavello?, Both devotees have been following his instructions for years.

Your would-be servant

Manjuali Devi Dasi

Santiago de Chile

HpS - Maybe even more than a year ago we decided that we are too old to give any more 1st initiation. The Diksa guru takes Karma. It is a job, and it is a job for a young man. Last time we did it. Few months ago. We felt really crushed.

🙂

However, that does not mean that we cannot be Guru's for Carlitos or Machaivelli.

In Srila Bhaktivinode's 'Jaiva Dharma' one fictional Sannyasi, saint, Babba Mahasai, is preaching, teaching, guiding a young man from Kolkata when he visits Nabadvipa.

Then Bobba Mahasaya tells him that he is ready for initiation, but that he, Bobba Mahasaya is 90-years old and that if he initiates him, he will die, so they should go and see Vaisnava Thakura Bobba who is only 75-years old.

Young man. 😃

VTB says that it is an honor to do the ritual if BM recommends The Young Man (35-years old).

So, that is what we feel.

Carlos and Machiavelli are our friends!

What more can we want!!?

It is an honor if we can be their friends and counselors always.

We are recommending Yadunandana Swami in Spain as a very nice Diksa guru. Radha Krsna Das in Houston.

O.K.