A comic anachronism

When the Hare Krishna movement (a.k.a. ISKCON) first came to Sweden, they created something of a moral panic. I mean, dropping out of college, shaving one's head, donning orange robes, and dancing in the streets wasn't exactly the Swedish way of life. It still isn't. Today, however, the Hare Krishnas are no longer seen as threatening. Rather, they are a tiresome, pathetic anachronism. Nobody takes them very seriously any more. They are ugly, too. How can anyone still believe that you can get anywhere by shaving your scalp, don ochre robes or a really ugly sari, and chant on main street? They feel like a throwback to a time long gone, a time...40 years ago.

This book, "The Science of Self-Realization", contains a number of conversations with the founder of the Hare Krishna movement, A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada. Or rather a number of extensive monologues. Prabhupada comes across as a particularly ignorant Hindu fundamentalist. His message is almost comic. He denies the Moon landing, since the Vedic scriptures supposedly rule out journeys to other planets. He claims that Krishna and Christ is the same person (proof: Krishna and Christ is the same name!). His view of Heaven is extremely literalist. Prabhupada actually thinks Heaven looks like an Indian pastoral, in which the blue-skinned god Krishna plays the flute for his consort Radha, who in turn gives a holy cow a garland of flowers. The ISKCON guru also claims to know the exact number of species of living organisms (the figure escapes me at the moment of writing) and says that all of them have co-existed on Earth since time immemorial. So how come scientists can't found human remains in Precambrian rock? Or dinosaur fossils in Quarternary strata? Well, they haven't been digging literally everywhere, have they? Prabhupada graciously allows that he isn't God (thank you) but does claim to be God's representative, which apparently entitles him to certain privileges above ordinary mortals. For starters, he is always surrounded by silly Western "disciples" who open his books for him! Finally, he defends slavery and claims that all the world must become Krishna conscious. Or else?

It's extremely difficult to take any of this seriously. Indeed, it's difficult to understand how anyone else can take it seriously, either. Prabhupada gives the impression of being a silly ignoramus, who nevertheless speaks with great authority, as if he actually had something worthwhile to say. His movement comes across as a more exotic version of the Flat Earth Society. His divine grace is questionable even from a Hindu perspective. He seems to suggest that only his own sectarian followers will reach Heaven. In all of his writings, Prabhupada constantly attacks Advaita Vedanta, an otherwise respectable tradition within Hinduism. He also condemns unnamed sex cults. Since Prabhupada's own tradition, the Gaudiya Vaishnavas, contain esoteric and Tantric elements, this is in effect a condemnation of the original version of it. Apparently, Prabhupada feared teaching the esoteric, "sexual" doctrines of Gaudiya Vaishnavism in the West! Instead, he fed his followers a diet of absolute literalism.

"The Science of Self-Realization" comes across as a relic of the hippie age, one of its more curious relics, to be sure. The world has moved on since then. Today, we have other fads. The book can be read as a nostalgia trip, or even as entertainment. But real seekers of the truth must look elsewhere.

And now, I'm off to Govindas for a vegetarian meal...