Video lecture link: https://www.facebook.com/dayanidhi.das.7/videos/1132702692225486/?app=fbl
Podcast With HH Bhanu Swami Maharaj | ISKCON Athens, Greece | July 12, 2025
Devotee 1: Please tell us how you met the devotees when you were travelling and what convinced you.
Devotee 2: What inspired you in this great mission that you are accomplishing for many years in Krishna Consciousness?
HH Bhanu Swami Maharaj: So Of course, we know the founder of our movement is Srila Prabhupad, he is called the Founder, Acharya. And those we were living between 1965 or so and 1977.. they actually, most of them got a chance to meet Srila Prabhupad. And of course, all of those devotees were very affected by Srila Prabhupad’s presence. Most of those devotees have now left their bodies. And within the next ten years, they will all be gone. So, we have to remember Srila Prabhupad, we have, of course, Prabhupad’s biography and then we have the records of different devotees and memories.
Srila Prabhupad desired the movement continue for thousands of years. He had seen the dissolution, of Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati’s Mutt. So since Prabhupad’s disappearance the whole 40 years, the movement has by good fortune continued. And one of the unifying factors of course is, loyalty to Srila Prabhupad. So, when he founded ISKCON, he also placed himself with the title ‘Founder Acharya’. So, he didn’t explain that title too much, but we can infer that the reason why he insisted on it, is that he wanted the movement to be united around his person.
We see that we have four Vaishnava Sampradayas, and they have their Founders, like Madhava and Ramanujacharya, and they give a unity to that movement. Now, of course, we are an offshoot of Madhava Sampradaya, and we are more Caitanya Sampradaya. And within that, Srila Prabhupad has established his group, and he is the Founder of that particular group called ISKCON. He is the Founder, and he is also the Acharya.
So, how is he the Acharya? So, of course, Acharya means Teacher. So, he spent most of his life translating and commenting on Bhagavad Gita, Bhagavatam and other scriptures. So, one of the unifying factors and basis of the movement, of course, is books, Srila Prabhupad’s books. But as I mentioned, when Srila Prabhupad was personally present, then he could inspire the devotees, forty or fifty years later now, he is a little bit distant, and eventually the devotees who are associated with Srila Prabhupad will be gone. So, it will be up to the second generation, and third generation, and fourth generation devotees to somehow keep the movement together under Srila Prabhupad.
So, a very important question we have to ask is, what is the relationship of these devotees now and in the future to Srila Prabhupad? Of course, the G.B.C. had made a statement that every devotee now and in the future has a direct relationship with Srila Prabhupad. Now, that should be a little obvious, if we say Prabhupad is the founder Acharya. However, after Srila Prabhupad’s disappearance, we had Gurus, and it wasn’t so obvious. So, the philosophy was, you cannot directly relate to Srila Prabhupad, you have to go to me, I’m the Guru [Laughs]. Of course, we do have parampara, one Guru, next Guru, next Guru, like that, but we cannot insist that you don’t have a direct relationship with Srila Prabhupad.
Of course, we could say, well, that looks like Ritvik philosophy [Laughs]. No, Ritvik philosophy means you take Diksha from Srila Prabhupad and you get a Diksha mantra from Srila Prabhupad, that’s not what we’re saying. Actually what we are saying is, we have a big Siksha relationship with Srila Prabhupad directly, that’s it. Of course Siksha Guru, I said but big Siksha Guru because he is also the founder Acharya [Laughs]. Of course all the devotees in ISKCON are reading Srila Prabhupad’s books, so in that sense they do have a direct relationship through his books. But hopefully, through the teachings in the books, they can also establish a relationship with Srila Prabhupad directly.
We should also think that yes, many devotees took initiation from Srila Prabhupad [not clear] some didn’t, that does not make them better devotees. Some of them didn’t stay, they left, they disappeared. So the important factor is that, somehow or other we get inspiration from Srila Prabhupad and follow his instructions. Naturally, many devotees have received the initiation, have met Srila Prabhupad, some have not met him, some have received initiation through letters, through other systems, but no one can say that we can’t have this direct relationship with Srila Prabhupad. So we cannot get direct instructions like open a temple in Bangladesh [not clear] but what we have is books !
So of course the books we can say are more philosophical. And probably people reading the books nowadays say, this is too much philosophy for us [Laughs]. However, we should understand that, we have to get a proper understanding of everything in order to approach Krishna. Once we get the preparatory knowledge, then we do our sadhana, and we chant Hare Krishna. And then we get the mercy of Krishna. So in other words, by reading Srila Prabhupad’s books and taking inspiration from his life, somehow or other, then we become inspired to do our bhakti, such that Krishna notices us. And that could be at any time. It could be during Srila Prabhupad’s life, it could be after, it could be five generations later. So, this is how we should understand our relationship with Srila Prabhupad.
We often discuss about parampara and if we look at Bhagavad Gita, there we see the parampara is not a Diksha parampara, it’s a Siksha parampara. And some of the Siksha is not direct Siksha, it is over hundreds of years [Laughs]. So therefore, we can receive Siksha from generations back. Now, of course, we should not reject the immediate need for Guru. And of course, we say we should have a diksha Guru. When we say diksha Guru, I think we got the wrong meaning [Laughs]. Because in Caitanya Caritamrta we have two types of Guru, we have the Siksha Guru and the diksha Guru, and they are equal. They get equal respect. They are equally significant in the spiritual life of a devotee. But in our parampara we emphasize Siksha over Diksha. The line is a Siksha line. [Laughs] But generally devotees and temple presidents, they emphasize Diksha Guru [Laughs]. So of course within Diksha Guru we can say that the Diksha Guru is also a Siksha Guru definitely. But then the other aspect of the diksha Guru, to give the diksha mantra, that’s not really considered important at all. So therefore, when we say initiation, we are actually getting a Siksha Guru [Laughs].
However, that Diksha Guru may not give that much Siksha.
Devotee : Because he’s far away.
HH Bhanu Swami Maharaj : Yes, yes [Laughs]. So, of course, as I said, Prabhupad is a Siksha Guru in one sense, so we can always emphasize Srila Prabhupad. But there is always questions that arise, each person reads the book and they have so many questions [Laughs]. So for that person, the devotee should accept a living Siksha Guru [Laughs]. And that should be the line that you trace, I’ve got a Siksha Guru [Laughs]. Maybe not Diksha Guru, maybe somebody else [Laughs].
So in any case, our society is based on Srila Prabhupad, but we’re giving too much emphasis to the Diksha Guru. We should give more emphasis to the Siksha Guru than the Diksha Guru [Laughs]. So, therefore, a disciple should have a relationship with a Diksha Guru, Siksha Guru, whatever, plus a relationship with Srila Prabhupad. And just as the disciple longs for a direct relationship with his Diksha Guru whatever, which may not [Laughs] fructify so nicely, he should actually try to cultivate a direct relationship with Srila Prabhupad. So, in that way, we can carry on the movement into the future. So, that’s the introduction [Laughs].
Devotees : Jai.
Devotee 1: Now, I want to ask you what is that convinced you to embrace this Krishna consiousness movement.
Devotee 2: I Personally, I appreciate very much what you said, as a GBC, as an authority in ISKCON. So, this is very important, because the movement, if it takes this direction, there is hope for the future. Otherwise, we would ignore. Because, as you said, more Srila Prabhupad’s presence would be distant, one generation, two generation, three generation, five generation. What will happen.. Our parampara obviously is based on Siksha. We can see it in many, many, many examples. So, thank you, Maharaj, because you said this. This is very important. This is the base of Krishna consciousness. This is the hope for the future. So, can you tell us briefly what convinced you to take up Krishna consciousness in your life?
HH Bhanu Swami Maharaj : In 1970. So, between 1970 and about 1973, there was no Srimad Bhagavatam, there was no Caitanya-caritamrta [Laughs]. So, actually, even the big Bhagavad Gita was not… So, we didn’t have that many books. So, there was not that much knowledge available in the beginning, which was from 1965 to 1970, even then [Laughs], less books. Of course there was Srila Prabhupad’s first canto printed in India by , what was the name of the company? Whatever. I don’t know. Yeah [Laughs], that was there but that was rare [Laughs]. So we didn’t have that much knowledge, so how did we become inspired [Laughs]?
Of course one was Mahamantra, we know that Srila Prabhupad started, and he started doing kirtan in Tompkins Square Park and people started coming [Laughs]. So I met devotees in Tokyo and they gave me a back to godhead magazine.
Devotee : In which year ?
HH Bhanu Swami Maharaj : 1970. But it didn’t have that much information in it , because they [not clear] have many books [Laughs]. So then I went to the temple which was like one quarter of this room [Laughs]. Of course the main thing they did of course was kirtan. Of course they also had prasadam, but it was a little bit strange because it was sweet rice and halwa and.. [Laughs].
So anyway the main thing then was kirtan. And we see the devotees in the beginning of the movement, that was their main activity, go out in the streets and do kirtan all day [Laughs]. So they took inspiration from Srila Prabhupad in Tompkins Square park and everybody was doing kirtan. However, we see that Srila Prabhupad everyday was giving Srimad Bhagavatam. And he was everyday translating. So within 4 years after that then Srimad Bhagavatam, 2nd canto, 3rd canto, 4th canto, 5th canto, 6th canto and all these cantos kept coming out and then Caitanya-caritamrta also came out. So suddenly there was much more knowledge. So as well chanting, the knowledge began to cultivate. So those 2 things were suddenly which attracted me.
And Srila Prabhupad came to Japan. He came to that little temple [Laughs] and one of the time he came, that I came there was his Vyasa puja day [Laughs] and that’s the day he criticized the temple president for not holding the ceremony properly [Laughs]. Anyway, I didn’t know what was going on, because I wasn’t even a devotee [Laughs], he was giving a lecture to Sudama, the President. His main message was you don’t concoct things. If you don’t know what to do, you please ask me [Laughs].
Devotee : In fact, then Srila Prabhupad taught and the next day he did it.
HH Bhanu Swami Maharaj : Yeah, then he told them to do it the next day. So the main thing was that they didn’t do was , of course they were, Sudama was giving some praise but the thing was that they should also offer some flowers to Srila Prabhupad and offer respect to Srila Prabhupad [Laughs]. Just like we offer in Guru puja, every morning we offer flowers, we offer respect. Of course in that time there was also no Guru Puja [Laughs]. In 1973 or 1974 that’s when it started. So anyway Srila Prabhupad established his worship also. He established his Vyasa Puja. So after Srila Prabhupad’s disappearance, what should we do? So we had Gurus then so then he said do the same thing. Don’t change anything. So worship the same as you worship Srila Prabhupad and do everything the same. This created a lot of problems also [Laughs]. So eventually we realized this is not going to work, we can’t do everything exactly like we did for Srila Prabhupad. So therefore they had to begin to modify the whole thing. So even today we’re still trying to go through modifications [Laughs].
So anyway, one of the interesting things about Srila Prabhupad was that he was actually very serious about following the tradition. That’s why he was absorbed in writing these books to carry on that tradition. And what is that tradition? Actually it is knowledge.
Caitanya Mahaprabhu said this, chant Hare Krishna. But he ordered the Goswamis to write books. Everything he said should be supported by scripture. So the works of the Goswamis have become the basis for our knowledge. And that’s what Srila Prabhupad was passing on by spending so much time translating.
Devotee 1 : Jai Srila Prabhupad ki jai, HH Bhanu Swami Maharaj ki jai.
Devotee 2 : Thank you very much Maharaj for what you said. This is coming from authority in ISKCON . Even though Maharaj is a very humble person, very simple and humble person, but this is very much the feeling, this is very much what is going on in our movement from our authorities.
Devotees: Srila Prabhupad ki jai, HH Bhanu Swami Maharaj ki jai.