Author Archives: Dandavats

By Madhavendu das Srimati Radhika’s kunda is as precious to Krishna as Sri Radhika Herself, and, above all gopis, Sri Radha is Krishna’s most beloved. Her divine Kunda is described by great sages as similarly dear to Krishna. Once Srila Prabhupada gav…

By Damodara Dasa Sir Isaac Newton once made a remarkable model of the solar system. Thanks to a clever hand-cranking mechanism, all of the tiny spinning globes orbited a small “sun.” On entering Newton’s study, one of his colleagues, a materialist, cou…

By Sadaputa Dasa “Probability is the most important concept in modern science, especially as nobody has the slightest idea what it means. —Bertrand Russell Throughout human history, philosophers and seekers of knowledge have sought to discover a singl…

By Kesava Krsna Dasa Here is a list of some effects of eating bhoga: (1)Makes the mind wicked. (2)Causes bewilderment. (3)Destroys clear thinking. (4)Causes lust. (5)Dampens the enthusiasm for devotional service. (6)Creates material desires. (7)Causes…

By Nimai

There were about twenty tents built up at the site, each one offering different means of spiritual entertainment e.g. prasadam, clothing, kirtan, books, etc. One tent supplied constant background music and the main stage featured many exciting performances such as: dances, yoga, spiritual lectures and of course a daily drama, which was one of the highlights. Bhakti Marg Swami had quickly trained up a group of devotees to perform in two plays that were featured over the four days. The Bhakti Cloud tent was designed for young people and it featured some really good singers and talented poets. In front of the Food for Life tent, there seemed to be a never ending queue as free prasadam was distributed throughout the festival.

By Rohininandana Dasa In many places in his books Srila Prabhupada describes the wonders of prasadam, food prepared with devotion and offered to Krishna. Prabhupada discusses such merits of prasadam as how it effectively immunizes one against the conta…

By Hari Parshad Das

Being non-judgmental about Govardhana-parikrama: Sometimes devotees think that barefoot parikrama of Govardhana is superior to wearing shoes, or that walking is superior to taking a vehicle. One should not consider one type of parikrama as superior to another. Srila Jiva Goswami says in the Gopala-campu (Purva, 15): natrapy anghri-kramitavasyakatvam svacchandatvad yanam apy atra distam Translation: It is not required that the parikrama should be performed by foot. One can also take a vehicle (and obtain the same result).

By Artha Forum

The event titled “Earn with Integrity, Spend with Compassion” was very well attended with over 400 attendees from all walks of life joining the event, which was partnered with TiE Singapore and IIMPACT. The attendees, many of whom have attended multiple Artha events in past, included entrepreneurs, industrialists, corporate leaders and professionals. World renowned spiritual teacher, author and motivational speaker His Holiness Radhanath Swami was invited to be the keynote speaker for the event. Esteem panelist Rajiv Vij – Life and Executive Coach, Author and Speaker; Srinivasan Venkita Padmanabhan – President & Global Head Finance at Olam Group, Madhabi Buch – Director at Agora Advisory and Sanjiv Aiyar – President of PAN IIM Alumni and a longtime supporter of Artha Forum shared the dais.

By Parampara Vani Das

Artha Forum (the non-profit initiative for bringing ancient wisdom to modern business) held its third event in Bangalore on Friday 18th March 2016 at the Taj Vivanta Hotel, M.G. Road. The event was attended by over 100 invited guests, including many members of the event partner, the Indo-American Chamber of Commerce – Karnataka Chapter. The keynote speaker was His Holiness Bhakti Charu Swami, a Gaudiya Vaishnava sannyasi and renowned Vedic scholar and spiritual master. The evening’s proceedings began with an introduction by Sanjiv Maheshwari, Co-Founder and Director, Artha Forum. Sanjiv spoke about the increasing inequality in the world today, and the necessity for creating awareness amongst entrepreneurs to do business in a more socially and spiritually responsible way.

By Keshava Murari das Arjuna and Krishna preparing for battle “The emblem of Hanuman on the flag of Arjuna is another sign of victory because Hanuman cooperated with Lord Rama in the battle between Rama and Ravana, and Lord Rama emerged victorious. Now…

ISKCON of Silicon Valley: Srila Prabhupada’s mission was to write and distribute transcendental books far and wide so that it can change people’s lives.

By Giriraj Swami “Titiksavah–the sadhu does not become disturbed. At the same time, karunikah. He is himself being disturbed, but he is merciful to others. “Just like Jesus Christ. He was being crucified, and still he was merciful: ‘God, these people…

By Brother Aelred

In this article Brother Aelred (Chaitanya Dasa) offers his observations on the effectiveness of ISKCON’s communication of its key messages. These are particularly valuable in view of Brother Aelred’s close association with ISKCON over the years and his unusual position of being both a practising Catholic monk and Vaishnava. He is frank and insightful,with a sincere desire to help devotees. As the Scottish poet Robbie Burns once said, ‘I pray to God the power to give us, to see ourselves as others see us’. When I first made contact with ISKCON, Prabhupada was still alive. At that time — 1977 — I was already ‘falling in love’ with the devotees. No doubt a percentage of that was romanticism — being attracted to the externals of exotic appearances, sounds and lifestyle. After all, the sixties ‘hippy’ movement was not so far back in time. Out of this emerges the first serious observation I wish to make. A significant number of ISKCON devotees are still effectively living in that ‘exotic space’ of the past. I have asked — as have others — whether some devotees would survive without this identity, whose elements include at least some of the Bengali cultural artefacts, the cultivated sense of being ‘different’ from mainstream society, the conviction of living in a spiritually superior movement, and so on.

By Balabhadra dasa

In the mid 80’s the farm started a program called “ADOPT-A-COW” which was to raise funds to help support the cows. By that time we had a herd of 157 cows and it was way to many cows for the land that we had to work with. We were the 1st ISKCON farm in North America to stop breeding along the commercial dairy way of doing things. It was realized that if you are not killing your unproductive cows and male offspring as a commercial dairy does, then you lose your economic profit. So it was necessary to raise funds to pay for the feed that we could not grow on the farm. My wife and I ran the “ADOPT-A-COW” program from 1988 to 1990. During this time we also were in charge of the agriculture department on the farm.

Gunacuda Dasi: Sri Mayapur International School has a service opportunity for an Early Years teacher beginning in August 2016.

By Sri Nandanandana dasa As we look around the world, or watch and read the news, practically everywhere is affected by some kind of natural disaster. Floods are displacing millions of people, forest fires are destroying thousands of acres and burning …

By Uddhava Bandhu Das

The yearly boat festival in Vrindavan, part of the Gaura Purnima celebrations, is most popular amongst the devotees. The sunken courtyard of Krishna Balaram Mandir is flooded and becomes a beautiful kund where small Radha Shyamasundara are taken on gentle ride on Their swan boat. They glide to every corner of the lake to the sounds of resounding kirtan to see all Their devotees and admirers. The surface of the temple lake is completely covered by flower petals by artisans in a beautiful flower rangoli design that mysteriously stay in place. This year’s design includes a huge lotus motif in rose petals with the ISKCON lotus-tilak symbol done in golden flower petals bordered by real floating open pink lotuses. Seven-hundred kilos of flower petals were used to decorate the temple room and used by devotees to rain down on their Lordships that created a festival for the eyes. In total, over one-hundred thousand individual flowers were used for the festival decorations, taking sixty devotees about thirty-six straight hours.

By Ravindra Svarupa dasa

In Sanskrit, the word hamsa is the name for both a bird and an advanced yogi. The bird has such estimable qualities that its very name became applied to the spiritual practitioner. In English, Prabhupada followed a well-established convention and rendered ham.sa as “swan.” The advanced yogi- or devotee is accordingly “swan-like.” For example, Prabhupada once remarked, in reference to his disciples: “So Krishna consciousness means swan-like, they should be like swans. Their behavior should be like swans. They should live in a clean place, at a refreshing place.” In this second usage, ham.sa has probably become most generally encountered when prefixed by the superlative parama, meaning “highest,” best,” and so on. Strictly speaking, paramahamsa denotes the highest of the four ranks of sannyasa (see S.B. 5.1.27, purport), but it is used in a more general sense to describe the best of the sages or devotees.

By Kesava Krsna Dasa We never cease to be amazed or shocked. Thinking that nothing really surprises us anymore, the shock-value of what could happen to us, intrudes impolitely into our sense of peace and harmony, when fellow devotees are struck by sud…

By radhanathswami.com

On March 16th, 2016, Radhanath Swami was invited by Mr. Sanjay Kirloskar, Chairman and Managing Director of Kirloskar Group and Western Region Director of Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), to deliver the closing Key Note Address at CII’s conference on ‘Enabling Inclusive Growth Through Social Engagement’ at the Hotel Taj Palace in Mumbai. Over 300 industry leaders attended. Founded in 1895, CII is one of the largest industry bodies of India with over 200,000 companies directly or indirectly part of its membership. As per the Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) – Indian Companies Act of 2013, every organization above certain turnover is expected to reinvest at least 2% of its average net profit for the immediately preceding 3 financial years back into the society on CSR activities. The purpose of the event was two-fold – one to discuss and deliberate on groundbreaking leadership attributes and to channelize social impact. The Nobel laureate Mr. Kailash Satyarthi was invited to share his experience on social impact while Radhanath Swami was given the task to enlighten the leaders on conscious entrepreneurship and the importance of corporate ethics to support positive growth which is need of the hour around the globe.

By Achyutananda Das The Name of God can only be spoken through spiritual lips; in which case, in our Krishna Consciousness society, which preaches the group chanting of the Name of God, exactly what are we all doing? Why chant the 16-word mantra of Har…

By Radha Mohan das

As part of ISKCON’s 50th Anniversary celebrations, Bhaktivedanta Manor’s main drama group The Bhaktivedanta Players were invited to perform in ISKCON Mayapur for its huge international Gaura Purnima festival. As part of the evening stage program, they performed different dramas over five consecutive nights. This included the premier of Jaya Prabhupada: Every Town and Village which covered Srila Prabhupada’s journey to America and his time in New York with Dr Misra, in the Bowery and rounding off in 26 Second Avenue when ISKCON officially began. Other plays included Jaya Prabhupada: The Gaudiya Foundation, The Golden Avatar, Tales of Narada Muni and the highly popular Musical Ramayan. “The international stage program pulled together wonderful mixed audiences from across the ISKCON world and it was an honour to be part of it, ” said Players Director Jaya Krishna das. “…and the feedback was excellent!”

By Mukundamala Dasa Discussions about the relationship between science and religion usually end in a stalemate: Scientists accuse religionists of relying too much on faith, which they say is experimentally unverifiable, while religionists accuse scient…

By Khonika Gope-Kumar How should a devotee treat his wife? How should he address her? How should he pacify her when she is angry? How should he guide her if she makes some mistakes? Can we get some clues about these topics from Srimad Bhagvatam? One m…

By Subhag Swami

So Jayananda prabhu will be like that and then one day started ratha yatra. When he had leukaemia, blood cancer then he had money from his family members $5000 at that time it is lot of money. He insisted Prabhupada take this money. No its’ for your treatment. Prabhupada no this body I know it won’t be cured so it is better you take. Both of them having war, he say take and Prabhupada won’t take and then Prabhupada thought he accepted teachings of Teachings of Lord Chaitanya and used up the money. Again he heard again the same thing he did, another time he gave. Prabhupada appreciated and then he had to accept it.

By Mukundamala Dasa One of my friends in college was known for his immense general knowledge. He knew the names of all recent Hollywood and Bollywood movies, the actors, directors, and producers of each movie, and the winners of Oscar and Filmfare awar…

By Janmastami dasa

The Krishna Institute (KI) launches its service to the Vaishnava Community on May 21, 2016, at ISKCON of Alachua with Sacinandana Swami and Madhava Dasa. The inaugural event is the two-day interactive Dharma Workshop: Discover Your Mission in Life. Recognizing the significant contribution the KI will make to Srila Prabhupada’s mission in the USA, the International Coordinating Committee for ISKCON’s 50th Anniversary Celebrations has scheduled KI’s inauguration as a National Event.

By Amala Prema devi dasi

The Bhakti Tree in Newcastle, NSW, Australia, the hub of loving exchanges, delicious food and transcendental sound vibrations celebrated its 1st anniversary and ISKCON’s 50th year anniversary on Friday, 18th of March. World-renowned international kirtaniya, His Grace Madhava Naidoo led the evening. More than 150 people attended the evening and enjoyed delicious prasadam. The Bhakti Tree has become a steadily growing community center, which gathered all its well-wishers, community members, volunteers, kirtan and yoga enthusiasts under the same roof on this special evening. The Bhakti Tree hosts, His Grace Abhay Charan dasa and Her Grace Jayanti devi dasi certainly made everyone feel welcomed and cared for as many expressed their heartfelt thanks to them for nurturing the seed of the Bhakti Tree and turning it into a peaceful space for all.

By Syamananda Dasa “Arjuna, his eyes blazing in anger like two red balls of copper, dexterously arrested the son of Gautami (Ashvatthama) and bound him with ropes like an animal. After binding Ashvatthama, Arjuna wanted to take him to the military camp…

By Rasa Purusa Dasa The first point is that Krishna says that He is under the control of His devotees. The story of Maharaja Ambarisha, the emperor of the entire world, is a good illustration of this. Maharaja Ambarisha was a celebrated pure devotee of…

By Baldev das

A team of dedicated devotees consisting of Bhagawan pr, Shyamananda pr, Rohinikumar pr, Raghupati pr, Rajgopal pr & others had been working hard tirelessly for 12 long years to translate Srila Prabhupada’s entire Srimad Bhagavatam in the local Marathi Language. The Wait was now over for all Marathi readers and the hard work of the translators bore fruit when the Bhaktivedanta Book trust team got all the books printed beautifully in time for the ocassion. And what else could be an apt setting for its launch – Dadar’s Shivaji Park ground. Besides being a venue for gatherings of freedom fighters, Shivaji Park is the focal point of pride for Marathi people. It was here that on 12th march 2016, HH Radhanath Swami Maharaja launched the Marathi Srimad bhagavatam set overlooking a crowd of tens of thousands in the massive pandal.

By GBC College Staff

From Beijing to Belgium, from Bulgaria to Buenos Aires, from Canada to Karnataka, from Nairobi to Naperville, from Istanbul to England, From Delhi to Gaborone, to Slovenia, to Switzerland, to Ecuador, to Romania, Poland, etc., four dozen leaders assembled in the Govardhan Ecovillage outside of Mumbai, learning for thirteen days at the GBC College for Leadership Development how to serve as Zonal Supervisors.

By Iskcon Mayapur

It all started with the festival inauguration March 5th and blissfully went on until Gaura Purnima day. Let’s not forget Jaganath Misra’s feast on 24th and 25th of March which provided a sumptuous feast for thousands of devotees and pilgrims who left completely satisfied. For almost one month, Sri Mayapur Dham was flooded, but this time not by Mother Ganga but by Thousands and Thousands of spirit souls hoping to get some Mercy from the Lord. Ratha Yatra, Boat festival, Kirtan Mela, Mini Market, Huge International presentation displaying devotional activities done by devotees in their own country around the world, stage performances, daily feasts, and of course Parikrama and Lord Gauranga’s Abhishek. There was so much to do, it was a daily dilemma to choose which activities to attend every day. We also had most ecstatic Siva Ratri celebrated at in our ISKCON Rajapur Jaganath temple, elephant procession, Daily evening Kirtan , amazing inspiring lectures by our beloved gurus and so much more. It seemed like a year of spiritual activities were compressed in one month! Mayapur is most definitely the most beautiful and inspiring place in the world.

By Caitanya Carana Dasa “Sexual addiction? What’s that supposed to mean?” “Just as alcoholics don’t have control over their desire for alcohol, sex addicts don’t have control over their sex drive. Drug addicts, for instance, are not necessarily evil o…

By Kevala Bhakti das

With recent news of the tragic passing of former Mayor of Toronto, Rob Ford, many devotees of Toronto’s Hare Krishna Community have been fondly recalling how the then-Mayor visited our annual Festival of India (Ratha-Yatra) in 2014. It was the second day of our grand two-day annual event on Centre Island and word quickly got around that the Mayor had arrived at the festival site. He first visited the Deity booth, diligently removed his shoes and then took darshan (audience) of Lord Jagannatha (Lord Krishna). He was then garlanded by one of our pujaris (priests). Mayor Ford was then brought to the main stage where he shared a proclamation from the City of Toronto, honouring our annual Festival of India (Ratha-Yatra). The highlight was the Mayor enthusiastically yelling out to the crowd, “Hare Krishna!” and receiving a jubilant “Hare Krishna” back as seen at the end of the video below! Mayor Ford then toured the rest of the festival site, indulged in some prasadam (sanctified vegetarian food) and shook hands with what seemed to be an endless throng of people! Toronto’s Hare Krishna community extends our prayers and condolences to the members of the Ford family during this difficult time. We hope that those who are mourning the loss of Rob Ford can take solace in knowing that he most certainly received great spiritual benefit by chanting the words “Hare Krishna” with all of his heart.

By Madhava Smullen

It’s hard to beat Festival of Inspiration for sheer variety. This year’s ISKCON 50 special edition of the Appalachian spiritual retreat in New Vrindaban, West Virginia will overflow with the best Krishna consciousness has to offer: seminars, kirtans, entertainment, and the tastiest prasadam this side of the spiritual world. Hundreds of devotees from all over the East Coast of the United States and Canada are expected to pour in for the May 6th to 8th weekend. Each day of the festival will begin with an extended themed Srimad Bhagavatam class. Author Yogesvara Das will speak about his new biography of Srila Prabhupada for a mainstream audience, entitled “Swami in a Strange Land.” And the class on Sunday – Mother’s Day – will focus on the importance of honoring mothers in the Vaishnava tradition.

By Vijaya das

After the departure of Aindra Prabhu, a good friend of his, Rama Raya Prabhu, had the strong feeling that his friend Aindra wanted him to chant the holy name in New York City. So this is what he and many others do, 365 days a year. There are no days off. Aindra Prabhu was originally doing harinama preaching in NYC, but Krsna has His plans, so Aindra went to Vrindavana and restarted the 24-hour kirtan that Srila Prabhupada had once instituted. Now Rama Raya and his team of chanters in NYC not only distribute the holy names but also books. Last month they distributed 2,293 books and magazines in the Big Apple. When there’s harinama and book distribution, how can Aindra Prabhu and the whole parampara not be pleased?

By Gokulananda das Lord Caitanya’s magnanimous desire was to bless the whole world with His infinite mercy by displaying His most sublime lila of tasting and widely distributing the supreme fruit of love of God, Krishna prema. He thus desired to engage…

By Jagabandhu dasa Some time ago, when listening to Srila A. C. Bhaktivedanta Prabhupada sing Chintamani… I was struck with the thought of how the Holy Name is a Deity which he was bathing with the Devotion of his Singing. From that day on I strove …

By radhanathswami.com

The Radha Gopinath Temple in Mumbai, India celebrated their annual Flower Festival on January 30th, 2016. Over two hundred western yoga teachers and students joined thousands of members of the Radha Gopinath Temple congregation for the event. Participants of the Bhakti Immersion Retreat held at Govardhan Eco Village rushed to Mumbai for the celebrations. Gaur Vani, of the music band The Hanumen, posted on the internet, “After seeing the new developments at Radhanath Swami’s Govardhan Eco Village (including life-size replicas of the holy sites of Vrindavan), tons of hugging cows, serving with villagers, and loads of kirtans and music and yoga classes we’ve come back to Mumbai for the world-famous Flower Festival….” Sixty students of Jiva Mukti Yoga’s Yoga Teachers Training also joined in.