I'm going to look into writing deep philosophical songs which are catchy. Many years ago Kripamoya told me he would like to hear pastimes or even ancient Vaishnava songs in English. I do Kirtan with guitar and pants for years. I would like to help widen the reach of the glorious sankirtana movement 💪
Listening to the part about the Tamil preachers and understanding the culture of a place... I was listening to a Christian church planting podcast and one of the preachers although he was from America he was from a different part of America than the place he wanted to start a church so before preaching he spent one year working a job in the place making friends and understanding the culture. The first person he recruited to his new church was one of his workmates. BTW My great great grandfather was a baptist preacher in South India.
The five potent forms of devotional service are: Deity worship Studying Srimad Bhagavatam Associating with devotees Chanting the Holy Name Residing in Vrindavana
The vast majority of the Indian diaspora in the west are not interested in growing and spreading the movement to westerners. They are interested in sitting back and growing as members of their own community come who are looking for a weekly community meeting hub that is close to their culture. This is why there is so much push back against anything western. Many ISKCON temples now are just community hubs for Indians. Plain and simple. They are not doing what Chaitanya and Prabhubapda would have wanted any they don't care. They dont care if the food is too spicy for westerners at a sunday feast because they are cooking for them self, not Krishna and not to bring in new western members. They simply dont care about western growth and now this conversation is becoming bigger and gaining traction they are starting to panic and double down. Don't ever stop what you guys are doing. If you are annoying and upsetting people with facts, quoting Shastra and quoting Prabhupada, then its working and needs to be kept up.
You say, "The vast majority of the Indian diaspora in the west are not interested in growing and spreading the movement to westerners. They are interested in sitting back and growing as members of their own community come who are looking for a weekly community meeting hub that is close to their culture. " Excellent point. I agree 100%. ___ ". Many ISKCON temples now are just community hubs for Indians." Many? You mean, most? __ Thank you for your encouragement!
Krishna west would be good for the anglosaxon countries of europe and anglosaxon foundation countries like america, australia, nz, england. But not for all of europe nor for rest of the world
What is considered normal dress today, especially by woman, would not even be worn by prostitutes 150 years ago. Western culture is in a constant state of flux and the way you dress will always exclude some sector of society. My question is if there is any spiritual significance to wearing robes? Does the way you dress affect your consciousness? Are we promoting Indian culture or Vedic(Arayan) culture?
A huge portion of traditional Indian dress came from Islam. There was over 700 years of Muslim rule of India. It's very hard to know what music, good and dress vedic culture had prior to that. Women can dress in modest ways using western styles.
@@nandagramecovillage3707 You are engaging with what I call the "Imitatio Krishna" argument, confusing descriptive verses and prescriptive verses (from Scripture). We do what we do because Scripture tells us. We justify our choices based on Scripture. Scripture is our true north. Therefore the onus is on you to show us prescriptive verses (not descriptive verses) that explicitly instruct us to imitate the way Krishna is described as dressing in the 10th canto of the Bhagavatam. In 20 years, I have not found a single one. Besides, even if we found one, then we would have to discuss in terms of yukta-vairagya. That's another topic.
What you say about the Western style of dressing being "always in flux" is inaccurate, I believe. For the past several centuries almost, the same style has basically been the norm. Besides, and as I mention below, the onus is on you to provide us scriptural proof to the effect that we must imitate how Krishna dresses, as described in the 10th canto of the Bhagavatam. Should we start wearing shark-shaped earrings and bangles on our feet and turbans and buffalo horns in our hips?
@@easybhakti9 prabhu, i would not imply that we should try to imitate Krishna...maybe his associates, but not God Himself. But that was not my point when replying to Arjuna. Are we antropomorphising God, or is this the ultimate reality that we want to actually be part of. Is Vedic culture not the highest expression of human existence? Do we not want to aim towards it? Goths dress all in black. Some people walk with their pants on their knees, others like to dress like hippies. It says something about their world view. If it were not for dhotis and saris there would not be a channel called Hare Krishnas in the movies, because nobody would have cared. It was their uniform. It was part of our identity. I personally almost never wear it, but to just disregard it as mundane doesn't sit right with me.
@easybhakti9 on the contrary prabhu, it seems that you are splitting hairs. In this regard you mentioned that people would not be christian if it was part of their religion to dress as Jesus did. First of all they can't say that, because it would have just been the way people would have been dressing all along, but my point is rather that even though we are aiming to transcend all material designations, we understand that what we do in this world affects our consciousness and we would like to be in the best possible place in order to take full advantage of this human form. Sounds, smells, colors...whatever it may be, affect our consciousness. Christians don't really care too much about this as their process is one of salvation. We also depend on the Maha Mantra, but our process is a bit more involved. On the other hand it should obviously not be the center of our focus while we act like thugs behind closed doors.
@@nandagramecovillage3707are you saying wearing 15th century Bengali clothes makes us think of Krishna better? The BG and SB tlak about the need for theode of goodness. You can dress in the mode if goodness in styles that are respected and appreciated in western society.
![DRESS: Looking at Prabhupada's statements in CONTEXT [we are no longer monks and nuns]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/Ui-zQyykjaY/mqdefault.jpg)
![DRESS: Looking at Prabhupada's statements in CONTEXT [we are no longer monks and nuns]](/img/tr.png)
Great conversation, thank you for having it.
I'm going to look into writing deep philosophical songs which are catchy. Many years ago Kripamoya told me he would like to hear pastimes or even ancient Vaishnava songs in English. I do Kirtan with guitar and pants for years. I would like to help widen the reach of the glorious sankirtana movement 💪
Amazing discussion. I’m part of a college outreach group and all of this is very applicable and edifying. Thank you.
Thank you.
Listening to the part about the Tamil preachers and understanding the culture of a place...
I was listening to a Christian church planting podcast and one of the preachers although he was from America he was from a different part of America than the place he wanted to start a church so before preaching he spent one year working a job in the place making friends and understanding the culture. The first person he recruited to his new church was one of his workmates.
BTW My great great grandfather was a baptist preacher in South India.
The five potent forms of devotional service are:
Deity worship
Studying Srimad Bhagavatam
Associating with devotees
Chanting the Holy Name
Residing in Vrindavana
thanks
pleasure.
The vast majority of the Indian diaspora in the west are not interested in growing and spreading the movement to westerners. They are interested in sitting back and growing as members of their own community come who are looking for a weekly community meeting hub that is close to their culture. This is why there is so much push back against anything western. Many ISKCON temples now are just community hubs for Indians. Plain and simple. They are not doing what Chaitanya and Prabhubapda would have wanted any they don't care. They dont care if the food is too spicy for westerners at a sunday feast because they are cooking for them self, not Krishna and not to bring in new western members. They simply dont care about western growth and now this conversation is becoming bigger and gaining traction they are starting to panic and double down. Don't ever stop what you guys are doing. If you are annoying and upsetting people with facts, quoting Shastra and quoting Prabhupada, then its working and needs to be kept up.
You say, "The vast majority of the Indian diaspora in the west are not interested in growing and spreading the movement to westerners. They are interested in sitting back and growing as members of their own community come who are looking for a weekly community meeting hub that is close to their culture. "
Excellent point. I agree 100%.
___
". Many ISKCON temples now are just community hubs for Indians."
Many? You mean, most?
__
Thank you for your encouragement!
Krishna west would be good for the anglosaxon countries of europe and anglosaxon foundation countries like america, australia, nz, england. But not for all of europe nor for rest of the world
What is considered normal dress today, especially by woman, would not even be worn by prostitutes 150 years ago. Western culture is in a constant state of flux and the way you dress will always exclude some sector of society. My question is if there is any spiritual significance to wearing robes? Does the way you dress affect your consciousness? Are we promoting Indian culture or Vedic(Arayan) culture?
A huge portion of traditional Indian dress came from Islam. There was over 700 years of Muslim rule of India. It's very hard to know what music, good and dress vedic culture had prior to that.
Women can dress in modest ways using western styles.
@ArjunaDasNZ-xk4ub but doesn't Krishna wear a yellow dhoti and Radha a blue sari?
@@nandagramecovillage3707 You are engaging with what I call the "Imitatio Krishna" argument, confusing descriptive verses and prescriptive verses (from Scripture). We do what we do because Scripture tells us. We justify our choices based on Scripture. Scripture is our true north.
Therefore the onus is on you to show us prescriptive verses (not descriptive verses) that explicitly instruct us to imitate the way Krishna is described as dressing in the 10th canto of the Bhagavatam.
In 20 years, I have not found a single one.
Besides, even if we found one, then we would have to discuss in terms of yukta-vairagya. That's another topic.
What you say about the Western style of dressing being "always in flux" is inaccurate, I believe. For the past several centuries almost, the same style has basically been the norm.
Besides, and as I mention below, the onus is on you to provide us scriptural proof to the effect that we must imitate how Krishna dresses, as described in the 10th canto of the Bhagavatam. Should we start wearing shark-shaped earrings and bangles on our feet and turbans and buffalo horns in our hips?
@@easybhakti9 prabhu, i would not imply that we should try to imitate Krishna...maybe his associates, but not God Himself. But that was not my point when replying to Arjuna.
Are we antropomorphising God, or is this the ultimate reality that we want to actually be part of. Is Vedic culture not the highest expression of human existence? Do we not want to aim towards it?
Goths dress all in black. Some people walk with their pants on their knees, others like to dress like hippies. It says something about their world view. If it were not for dhotis and saris there would not be a channel called Hare Krishnas in the movies, because nobody would have cared. It was their uniform. It was part of our identity.
I personally almost never wear it, but to just disregard it as mundane doesn't sit right with me.
Its not a good idea to compare us to christians when it comes to preaching. We believe in a precess and they only believe in a saviour
Those differences are not relevant to hoe westerners become attracted or not.
I agree with Arjuna.
You are splitting hairs here. And this hair splitting is irrelevant to the discussion at hand.
@easybhakti9 on the contrary prabhu, it seems that you are splitting hairs. In this regard you mentioned that people would not be christian if it was part of their religion to dress as Jesus did. First of all they can't say that, because it would have just been the way people would have been dressing all along, but my point is rather that even though we are aiming to transcend all material designations, we understand that what we do in this world affects our consciousness and we would like to be in the best possible place in order to take full advantage of this human form. Sounds, smells, colors...whatever it may be, affect our consciousness. Christians don't really care too much about this as their process is one of salvation. We also depend on the Maha Mantra, but our process is a bit more involved. On the other hand it should obviously not be the center of our focus while we act like thugs behind closed doors.
@@nandagramecovillage3707are you saying wearing 15th century Bengali clothes makes us think of Krishna better? The BG and SB tlak about the need for theode of goodness. You can dress in the mode if goodness in styles that are respected and appreciated in western society.