By Akruranatha dasa
“And so the reliance on Property, including the reliance on governments which protect it, is the want of self-reliance. Men have looked away from themselves and at things so long, that they have come to esteem the religious, learned, and civil institutions as guards of property, and they deprecate assaults on these, because they feel them to be assaults on property.”
— Ralph Waldo Emerson, “Self Reliance” (1841)
The 19th century American philosopher and essayist, Ralph Waldo Emerson, is probably best known among devotees for having read Bhagavad-gita and corresponded with Srila Bhaktivinode Thakur. His essay “Self-Reliance” admonishes us not to merely mimic or idolize the ideas of others, but to cultivate and express our own genuine truth. In some ways it reminds me of Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakur Prabhupada’s famous essay on “Organized Religion”, in which the acarya compares the formal institutionalization of churches and priestly offices to demons like Kamsa and Putana, who want to kill baby Krishna immediately, before He has a chance to grow and threaten their possessions.
That is not to say that the Krishna consciousness movement can or should try to do without organized preaching institutions such as the Gaudiya Math, which Srila Bhaktisiddhanta took great pains to establish, or the International Society for Krishna Consciousness, which his foremost disciple Srila A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada has spread all over the world with unprecedented success. But we should always remember that the purpose of these institutions is to disseminate genuine Krishna consciousness through the fellowship and cooperation of pure devotees, rather than merely to increase the wealth and influence of yet another church or charitable society in the world.
At first blush, “self-reliance” may seem contradictory to our Vaisnava ethos of surrender to the spiritual master and regulation by the edicts of sastra. However, Emerson’s doctrine of “self-reliance” should not be seen in that way. Emerson did not reject the Bible, or fail to appreciate and honor the achievements of saints, sages and artists of the past, but rather called us to recognize that the genius of all great personalities is that they do not merely mimic and parrot the thoughts and words of others, but display the authentic realizations of their own inner being, “body and soul”, as they say. We might further observe that such originality and authenticity can only be displayed in its purest and most complete form by Vaisnava devotees, because the real, original and genuine consciousness of the soul is pure devotion to Krishna.
Once again, as it often does, Krishna consciousness here unites two seemingly contradictory ideals: genuine surrender to guru, sastra and sadhu is not an absence of self-reliance, but the only true path to perfect understanding and realization of the essential truth, “Vasudeva sarvam iti”.
A similar resolution of superficially contradictory ideas is found in the Vedic system of mandatory performance of prescribed duties according to one’s social and economic situation in terms of occupational caste (varna) and spiritual order (asrama). The whole system is arranged so that all members of society can fulfil their particular physical and emotional needs for dharma, artha and kama, while gradually coming to realize more and more their total dependence on the mercy of Lord Krishna, who is truly the owner and controller of everything (isavasyam idam sarvam).
In an online discussion Blog about Bhagavad-gita (https://www.facebook.com/BhagavadGitaDiscussion), we recently discussed verse 6.4: “”A person is said to be elevated in yoga when, having renounced all material desires, he neither acts for sense gratification nor engages in fruitive activities.”
Someone asked:
“How is that possible? I need money to eat, have a house etc, I need to fulfill my obligations to my family etc, …”
Krishna inspired me to answer:
“I would not advise you to quit what you are doing for your livelihood. Rather, I would advise to go on doing those things, but at the same time find some time to chant Hare Krishna, associate with devotees, worship the Deity.
“As you add more Krishna consciousness in your life, you will begin to see how it is actually Krishna who is maintaining your family, while you are merely carrying out your prescribed duties.
“When I joined ISKCON (1976), we encouraged people to move into the asrama and spend their time full time in sadhana and seva. We discouraged men from marriage, trying to make some young sannyasis. Of course, many of these young sannyasis were not mature enough to stay successfully in that asrama, and at times Srila Prabhupada got upset and declared he would make no more young sannyasis.
“He also told us we should learn more about varnasrama-dharma.
“Nowadays, although many temples still do provide facilities for enthusiastic young devotees to live a life of full time sadhana and seva as I did when I was a teenager, we realize that this is not a sustainable program for everyone, and most people will become householders and have ‘outside’ duties to earn a living, get the children educated, and so on.
“Srila Prabhupada wanted us to set up ISKCON as an almost self-contained, devotional society, with our own schools, farms, economy, and social system. So far we have not completely realized that ambition, though there are some very good schools and options for those who want to live a life of ‘full-time’ engagement in ISKCON.
“But we also have large ‘outside congregations’ of devotee (like myself) who have our own jobs, careers, and community engagements. Now there is even a member of the U.S. Congress who is a Hare Krishna devotee.
“My local temple does not have a regular asrama for full time members to reside in while working around the clock in Krishna’s service. Such asramas are very good training facilities, but Krishna consciousness can be practiced by congregational members, too.”
I was reading this morning Srimad-Bhagavatam, Canto Five, and came across the following in the Purport to Chapter 12, verse 16:
“… The Krishna consciousness movement is giving this chance to everyone. We are giving shelter to everyone who is serious about progressing in Krishna consciousness. We arrange for their lodging and board so that they can peacefully cultivate Krishna consciousness and return home, back to Godhead, even in this life.”
The quotation reminds us that ISKCON should maintain asramas for training full-time devotees, at least for those who meet the threshold requirement of being “serious about progressing in Krishna consciousness.”
But several pages later, in the Purport to 5.13.6, I read the following:
“To become dependent on another’s maintenance is very degrading: therefore, according to the Vedic system, everyone should live independently. Only the sudras are unable to live independently. They are obliged to serve someone for maintenance.”
Yet we know that it is the duty of independent householders to give charity for maintaining spiritual asramas where qualified brahmanas and sannyasis train our young and new members in austerity, sense control and Vaisnava philosophy and culture, so they may later become healthy and sane, “self-reliant” pillars of our Vaisnava communities.
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