Śrila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura on organized religion

Discussing an important article of Śrila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura in which he criticizes organized religion, comparing it to Kamsa in his efforts to bring people away from Krsna.

In the 1930s, Śrila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura wrote an article entitled “Putana,” in which he criticizes organized religion, comparing it to Kamsa in his efforts to bring people away from Krsna. At first, one could understand that this article condemns all kinds of organized religion, supporting some kind of spiritual anarchism, but an attentive look reveals that this is not the case, especially considering that Śrila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura himself created an institution, in the form of the Gaudiya Math, and instructed his disciples to maintain it. So, what is it about? In the article, he mentions that:

“King Kamsa, the typical aggressive empiricist, is ever on the lookout for the appearance of the truth for the purpose of suppressing Him before He has time to develop. This is no exaggeration of the real connotation of the consistent empiric position. The materialist has a natural repugnance for the transcendent. He is disposed to link that faith in the incomprehensible is the parent of dogmatism and hypocrisy in the guise of religion.”

In this analogy, Kamsa is compared to the inveterate materialist, who may create and profess some mundane religion while at the same time rejecting all genuine transcendental processes under the excuse of using logic and science. In this way, he professes a form of religion that actually keeps people bound to the material through dogmas, rituals, and hypocrisy.

We can see that many popular religions in the world fit into this description, using some sacred scripture and professing in the name of some revered spiritual teacher, but at the same time offering a process based on dogmas and rituals that keep people firmly rooted in their materialism, distracting them from real spiritual processes.

Such mundane religions are often controlled by people who are after power and influence and who manipulate their followers, obtaining money, adoration, and other forms of sense gratification from them. The followers, however, are generally more than happy to worship and give money to such leaders, since they augment their materialism with the idea of following some transcendental process, maintaining social status inside the group, feeling superior to others, and eventually attaining heaven or liberation. In other words, that’s the usual dynamic of the cheater and the cheated.

As he mentions, such materialistic religions have a great survival advantage over genuine spiritual processes because they offer what general people want, giving them an easy, pseudo-spiritual process instead of a genuine process that demands a change of habits and mindset. Thus, if no opposite force is applied, such false religions tend to proliferate and gradually replace all forms of genuine religion. As he mentions:

“The church that has the best chance of survival in this damned world is that of atheism under the convenient guise of theism. The churches have always proved the staunchest upholders of the grossest form of worldliness from which even the worst of non-ecclesiastical criminals are found to recoil.”

Another analogy offered in the article is the comparison of Putana with false spiritual teachers who are sheltered by such mundane religions. Putana is compared to the false guru, attracting innocent people and ministering false philosophies that result in their spiritual death. Under the protection of mundane religions, such false teachers have the opportunity to indoctrinate the children from the beginning. In this connection, he wrote:

“Putana 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.”

In this way, the article establishes the dangers of mundane religions. But what is the positive side? What is real religion? About this, he mentions that:

“The Supreme Lord Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu, in pursuance of the teachings of the scriptures enjoins all absence of conventionalism for the teachers of the eternal religion. It does not follow that the mechanical adoption of the unconventional life by any person will make him a fit teacher of religion.”

Real religion is Kṛṣṇa Consciousness, or devotional service to God. That’s the only effective process not only in this age but in all ages. Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu, as well as powerful acaryas, comes to teach this simple and sublime process, breaking with all the dogma and hypocrisy of established religions and offering pure teachings. That’s what both Śrila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura and Śrila Prabhupada came to bring.

However, no spiritual movement can flourish as a purely anarchical movement. For it to become effective, organization is necessary. Money has to be collected, temples have to be established, books have to be printed and distributed, and so on. Similarly, people willing to act as managers and teachers have to be found.

Organization and money allow a genuine spiritual movement to expand. That’s what both Śrila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura and Śrila Prabhupada were doing, and both achieved great success in spreading Krsna Consciousness in this way.

The danger is that all these facilities risk later turning the pure spiritual movement into yet another mundane religion, with the same dogmas, rituals, and hypocrisy. This can happen if materialistic people are allowed to ascend into positions of leadership and real transcendentalists are gradually kicked out. Since materialists are always attracted to positions of power and prestige, maintaining a religious institution as a purely spiritual movement is always going to be a continuous battle with ups and downs.

No religious institution can, by itself, bring people to God. The role of a bona fide religious institution is to shelter enlightened teachers who can fulfill this role. If such teachers are restrained or pushed away, the whole thing can degenerate into a lifeless body. As Śrila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura mentions:

“The bona-fide teacher of religion is neither any product of nor the favourer of, any mechanical system. In his hands no system has likewise, the chance of degenerating into a lifeless arrangement. The mere pursuit of fixed doctrines and fixed liturgies cannot hold a person to the true spirit of doctrine or liturgy.”

Apart from bad leadership, another force that gradually converts genuine spiritual movements into mundane religions is the followers themselves. The masses are generally not interested in real spirituality. On the opposite, general people are anxious to exploit spiritual movements for their own purposes, augmenting their materialism with some diluted pseudo-spiritual practice. Therefore, the tendency is that as more people join, everything becomes diluted until it becomes indistinguishable from any other mundane religion. The materialistic masses empower the Putana teachers, who in turn reinforce their materialism and dilute the spiritual process, restraining the true transcendentalists in the process. When this happens, the whole institution starts acting more like a dam that restricts the flow of devotion instead of fomenting it.

As Śrila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura mentions:

“The great ecclesiastical establishments are the dikes and the dams to retain the current that cannot be held by any such contrivances. They, indeed, indicate a desire on the part of the masses to exploit a spiritual movement for their own purpose. They also unmistakably indicate the end of the absolute and unconventional guidance of the bona-fide spiritual teacher. The people of this world understand preventive systems, they have no idea at all of the unprevented positive eternal life. Neither can there be any earthy contrivance for the permanent preservation of the life eternal on this mundane plane on the popular scale. Those are, therefore, greatly mistaken who are disposed to look forward to the amelioration of the worldly state in any worldly sense from the worldly success of any really spiritual movement. It is these worldly expectants who become the patrons of the mischievous race of the pseudo-teachers of religion, the Putanas, whose congenial function is to stifle the theistic disposition at the very moment of its suspected appearance.”

Who can stop this process? Again, the only force that can prevent that is pure devotees acting inside the institution, who can gradually elevate people by their example and words. By the actions of such pure devotees, not only the materialistic masses but the Putana teachers themselves may be converted into genuine Vaiṣnavas. As mentioned in the article:

“But as soon as theistic disposition proper makes its appearance in the pure cognitive essence, of the awakened soul, the Putanas are decisively silenced at the very earliest stage of their encounter with new-born Krishna. The would-be slayer is herself slain.”

As we can see, these are challenges that any genuine spiritual institution has to face to remain on track. This is an ongoing battle that has to be fought again and again continuously. The forces that push the institution towards degradation are continuously active, and similarly, every sincere devotee has to continuously do his or her part to counteract these forces, and the only effective weapon is genuine Krishna Consciousness.

Just like baby Krsna was able to kill Putana, awarding her a position in the spiritual world as a servant of Mother Yaśoda, pure devotees can convert even the greatest materialists into devotees and send them back to Godhead. Just like Putana, who came in disguise to try to kill Kṛṣṇa ended up being killed by Him and thus achieving liberation, inveterate materialists and false spiritual teachers who take shelter in the spiritual institution can have their material conditioning similarly destroyed if such pure devotees are present.

The original article by Śrila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura:

Sri Krishna manifest His eternal birth, the pure cognitive essence of the serving soul who is located above all mundane limitations, King Kamsa is the typical aggressive empiricist, ever on the lookout for the appearance of the truth for the purpose of suppressing Him before He has time to develop.

This is no exaggeration of the real connotation of the consistent empiric position. The materialist has a natural repugnance for the transcendent. He is disposed to link that faith in the incomprehensible is the parent of dogmatism and hypocrisy in the guise of religion. He is also equally under the delusion that there is no real dividing line between the material and the spiritual, he is strengthened in his delusion by the interpretation of scriptures by persons who are like-minded with himself. This includes all the lexicographic interpreters.

The lexicographical interpretation is upheld by Kamsa as the real scientific explanation of the scriptures, and is perfectly in keeping with his dread of and aversion for the transcendental. These lexicographical interpreters are employed by Kamsa in putting down the first suspected appearance of any genuine faith in the transcendental. King Kamsa knows very well that if the faith in the transcendental is once allowed to grow it is sure to upset all his empiric prospects.

There is historical ground for such misgivings. Accordingly if the empiric domination is to be preserved in tact it would be necessary not to lose a moment to put down the transcendental heresy the instant it threatens to make its appearance in earnest. King Kamsa, acting on this traditional fear is never slow to take the scientific precaution of deputing empiric teachers of the scriptures, backed by the resources of dictionary and grammar and all empiric subtleties to put down, by the show of specious arguments based on hypothetical principles, the true interpretation of the eternal religion revealed by the scriptures.

Kamsa is strongly persuaded that faith in the transcendental can be effectively put down by empiricism if prompt and decisive measures are adopted at the very outset. He attributes the failure of atheism in the past to the neglect of the adoption of such measures before the theistic fallacy has had time to spread among the fanatical masses.

But Kamsa is found to count without his host. When Krishna is born He is found to be able to upset all sinister designs against those who are apprised by Himself of His advent. The apparently causeless faith displayed by persons irrespective of age, sex and condition may confound all rabid empiricists who are on principle adverse to the Absolute Truth Whose appearance is utterly incompatible with the domination of empiricism.

But no adverse efforts of the empiricists, whose rule seems till then to be perfectly well-established over the minds of the deluded souls of this world can dissuade any person from exclusively in following the Truth when He actually manifests His birth in the pure cognitive essence of the soul.

Putana 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.

The church that has the best chance of survival in this damned world is that of atheism under the convenient guise of theism. The churches have always proved the staunchest upholders of the grossest form of worldliness from which even the worst of non-ecclesiastical criminals are found to recoil.

It is not from any deliberate opposition to the ordained clergy that these observations are made. The original purpose of the established churches of the world may not always be objectionable. But no stable religious arrangement for instructing the masses has yet been successful. The Supreme Lord Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu, in pursuance of the teachings of the scriptures enjoins all absence of conventionalism for the teachers of the eternal religion. It does not follow that the mechanical adoption of the unconventional life by any person will make him a fit teacher of religion.

Regulation is necessary for controlling the inherent worldliness of conditional souls.

But no mechanical regulation has any value, even for such a purpose. The bona-fide teacher of religion is neither any product of nor the favourer of, any mechanical system. In his hands no system has likewise, the chance of degenerating into a lifeless arrangement. The mere pursuit of fixed doctrines and fixed liturgies cannot hold a person to the true spirit of doctrine or liturgy.

The idea of an organised church in an intelligible form, indeed, marks the close of the living spiritual movement. The great ecclesiastical establishments are the dikes and the dams to retain the current that cannot be held by any such contrivances. They, indeed, indicate a desire on the part of the masses to exploit a spiritual movement for their own purpose. They also unmistakably indicate the end of the absolute and unconventional guidance of the bona-fide spiritual teacher. The people of this world understand preventive systems, they have no idea at all of the unprevented positive eternal life. Neither can there be any earthy contrivance for the permanent preservation of the life eternal on this mundane plane on the popular scale.

Those are, therefore, greatly mistaken who are disposed to look forward to the amelioration of the worldly state in any worldly sense from the worldly success of any really spiritual movement. It is these worldly expectants who become the patrons of the mischievous race of the pseudo-teachers of religion, the Putanas, whose congenial function is to stifle the theistic disposition at the very moment of its suspected appearance. But the real theistic disposition can never be stifled by the efforts of those Putanas. The Putanas have power only over the atheist. It is a thankless but salutary task which they perform for the benefit of their unwilling victims.

But as soon as theistic disposition proper makes its appearance in the pure cognitive essence, of the awakened soul, the Putanas are decisively silenced at the very earliest stage of their encounter with new-born Krishna. The would-be slayer is herself slain. This is the reward of the negative services that the Putanas unwittingly render to the cause of theism by strangling all hypocritical demonstrations against their own hypocrisy.

But Putana does not at all like to receive her reward in only form which involves the total destruction of her wrong personality.

King Kamsa also does not like to lose the services of the most trusted of his agents. The effective silencing of the whole race of pseudo-teachers of religion is the first clear indication of the appearance of the Absolute on the mundane plane. The bona-fide teacher of the Absolute, heralds the Advent of Krishna by his uncompromising campaign against the pseudo-teachers of religion.

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