Demons in the Guise of Devotees

False Gurus, Institutions, and the Holy Name

A sastric look at the problem of false gurus and

materialistic persons donning the dress of devotees

All spiritual traditions are plagued by pretenders. Their unsavory presence is an inherent factor on the spiritual path. This article examines the tradition within Gaudiya Vaishnavism for dealing with this phenomenan. A positive discussion full of hope. Criticism and politicking are part of the problem and are never the solution. The answer is complete faith and dependence on guru, shastra and Krishna.

"Misplaced faith". A cruel fiend poses as a devoted nurse and is thus granted entrance to the room of a helpless newborn babe. Once inside, she manifests her real intention — to mercilessly kill the child by offering him her poison-coated breast. This is the false guru, Putana.

In exploring this topic, we felt a responsibility to examine the inherent problems in religious organizations frankly and philosophically, without institutional gloss or sectarian bias, through the light of Shstra and the writings of our previous acaryas. It is our hope that the message herein will inspire devotees to steadfastly serve the seva/sanga missions of their respective gurus, in spite of the Putanas and Kamsas that are inevitably found in such societies.

In the Putana story, the analogies and examples given by Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakur and Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Thakur were directed to false gurus – those who dress up like Vaisnavas, those who take advantage of the Sampradaya Acarya's position and preaching, dressing and acting so as to appear to be highly spiritually advanced persons. This charade isn't hard, if you are karmically endowed with great memory and acting abilities to pretend you're something you're not.

So it's the false gurus that the great Sampradaya Acaryas point to as being representative of or symbolically depicted by Putana. Of course, that pastime actually took place – Putana is not just a metaphor. Putana is the false guru, and she embodies one of the first big hurdles you have to overcome when you enter spiritual life. The big advantage of participating in this Krsna Consciousness movement when a Sampradaya Acarya is personally present to directly instruct and initiate, is that you're not as likely to be tempted or distracted into accepting false gurus. Of course, when Srila Prabhupada was present, just as when Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakur and Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Thakur were present, there were plenty of other alternatives to Krsna Consciousness.

Thanks to Srila Prabhupada's powerful preaching we had to make a decision, and those who made the decision to serve him and participate in his lila were saved from Putanas. But nowadays, since Srila Prabhupada's departure, our situation is just as described in the Putana story: ISKCON history shows that many of the leaders who self-promoted themselves as highly advanced were really demons in the disguise of devotees, and they caused a great deal of harm to individuals in the society.

There are hundreds of thousands of devotees who have been abused by different IskCon leaders. Ramesvara, a Zonal Acarya who unceremoniously fell down and left the movement has severly harmed all of his disciples, whom he has stolen from Srila Prabhupada. Every new (self-appointed) bogus Iskcon guru was instructing his own disciples differently. So every new candidate disciple had to accept his new guru's perspective and version of Krsna Consciousness, which was undoubtedly very different from the other bogus gurus, as well as from the instructions of Srila Prabhupada.

For many devotees, it's no secret that they encountered all sorts of problems from the ISKCON false gurus, from the kali-chelas, the demons in disguise who took ISKCON from a spiritual movement into the realm of religiosity, turning it into an ecclesiastical institution devoid of the mood and preaching of the Sampradaya Acaryas.

So all the various examples in the Putana story very aptly describe the problems created by the dubious leaders of ISKCON, which many devotees experienced directly. The illustrations given by the Sampradaya Acaryas and other sources in the Putana issue also describe, very fittingly, those presently occupying leadership posts in ISKCON.

Putana (the false guru) is the slayer of all infants. The baby, when he or she comes out of the mother’s womb, falls at once into the hands of the pseudo-teachers of religion. These teachers are successful in forestalling the attempts of the good preceptor, whose help is never sought by the atheists of this world at the baptisms of their babies. This is ensured by the arrangements of all established churches of the world. They have been successful only in supplying watchful Putanas for effecting the spiritual destruction of persons from the moment of their birth with the cooperation of their worldly parents. No human contrivance can prevent these Putanas from obtaining possession of the pulpits. This is due to the general prevalence of atheistic disposition in the people of this world.

In his Śrī Caitanya-śīkṣāmṛta (3.2), Srila Bhaktivinode Thakur has warned that devotees should be careful of such persons:

“The devotee should give up the association of the devotee-pretender, understanding him to be a materialist. Towards those who are sincere, the devotee should offerservice and respect. Meeting a true vaiṣṇava, the devotee should associate with him and serve him with his heart; to the ordinary vaiṣṇava-inclined people he should show respect. This respect is an external service. These vaiṣṇava-like people are of three types: those who fully accept the vaiṣṇava conclusions but are not practicing themselves; those who take up the vaiṣṇava signs and appearance, but are not real vaiṣṇavas, though they have respect for the vaiṣṇavas; those who are born in the families of great vaiṣṇavas, and wear the signs of a vaiṣṇava but are not real vaiṣṇavas.

A true vaiṣṇava is measured by the degree of purity and depth of devotion, and his capacity to inspire others. A person attains the status of a real vaiṣṇava as soon as a little pure devotion appears in his heart. If a person respects and takes association of the non-vaiṣṇava in the same way that he respects the true vaiṣṇava or the ordinary vaiṣṇava, then his devotion will decrease. Thus, amongst those who wear the vaiṣṇava marks and appear to be vaiṣṇavas, certain ones should be avoided. These people should be satisfied with the respect due to all human beings, which is part of the secondary rules, but they should not be accepted or respected as real vaiṣṇavas. If they happen to become pure devotees, then they are also qualified for association with other pure devotees. False vaiṣṇavas are those who wear the vaiṣṇava marks for the purpose of cheating, those who identify themselves as followers of the vaiṣṇava ācāryas for the purpose of introducing advaita philosophy to the vaiṣṇavas, and those who advertise themselves as vaiṣṇavas to gain money, position or some other material enjoyment.”

Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Saraswati Thakur Prabhupada as well as Srila A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada were not blind to such pseudo spiritualists, yet they welcomed everyone into the ranks of their movement. One may wonder why they did so. Upon contemplation, one can see that these powerful preachers took shelter of two "secret" weapons to overcome the demoniac tendencies of such dharma-dhvajī followers — the holy name and Śrīmad Bhāgavatam. They were both well aware of the supreme potency of these two items in purifying wrongs and establishing truth. As stated in Śrīmad Bhāgavatam (8.23.16):

mantratas tantrataś chidraṁ deśa-kālārha-vastutaḥ

sarvaṁ karoti niśchidram anusaṅkīrtanaṁ tava

There may be discrepancies in pronouncing the mantras and observing the regulative principles, and, moreover, there may be discrepancies in regard to time, place, person and paraphernalia. But when your Lordship’s holy name is chanted, everything becomes faultless.

They understood that as long as the holy name and Śrīmad Bhāgavatam were prominent in their society then all mistakes would ultimately be corrected. As stated in Śrīmad Bhāgavatam (1.5.11), tad-vāg-visargo janatāghaviplavo — the nature of the transcendental words of Śrīmad Bhāgavatam is that they will always bring about a revolution in the lives of the people in general. —

taken from: http://www.iskcon-truth.com/demon-disguised-devotee.html