Why should we accept the conclusions of Prabhupāda? Is this not blind faith?
In many of my articles, I raise the issue of being faithful to the teachings and philosophical conclusions elaborated by Prabhupāda in his books. At first, this may sound like some form of blind faith
Subscribe to receive new articles by e-mail. It’s free, but if you like, you can pledge a donation:
In many of my articles, I raise the issue of being faithful to the teachings and philosophical conclusions elaborated by Prabhupāda in his books. At first, this may sound like some form of blind faith that requires us to give up our critical thinking, but it actually goes deeper than that.
The Vedas explain that there are two processes for obtaining knowledge: the ascending process and the descending process. Modern academia is fundamentally based on the ascending process, using observation and technical research to create theories that explain the world. In this environment, there is no absolute truth; new theories are constantly proposed and discussed. Success in this field means to contest existing theories and offer something new, supposedly better. The reason it was organized in such a way is that in the scientific community, no one really knows. Everything is based on theories, often sustained by weak evidence, and there is a chance that even the most well-established theories may be proved wrong over time. A few decades ago, it was believed dinosaurs were reptiles; now it is believed they are birds. Tomorrow it may be something else entirely.
Schools based on the Vedas, on the other hand, are based on a different principle. Instead of pursuing answers using our senses (which are limited and imperfect), we receive knowledge from perfect sources. This is based on the understanding that the material manifestation is created by a perfect being, who possesses perfect knowledge and transmits this knowledge to us through the Vedas. Once this point is accepted, proposing new theories becomes irrelevant: the idea becomes to properly understand the perfect knowledge that is already there. As Krsna explains in the Gītā: “Just try to learn the truth by approaching a spiritual master. Inquire from him submissively and render service unto him. The self-realized souls can impart knowledge unto you because they have seen the truth.”
Any book can be misinterpreted, and this is especially true in the case of the Vedas, which transmit very deep and delicate philosophical conclusions in a very condensed way. To properly understand the conclusions of the scriptures, we rely on the paramparā system, in which the proper conclusions are transmitted by a disciplic succession, where each spiritual master has the responsibility of assuring his students get the proper understanding, and later transmit it to their own students. Success in this system is thus measured in our capacity to understand and apply the knowledge of the school we take part in, and not in creating new theories.
Before joining a school, one is free to disagree and debate as much as one wants, and in this way test the knowledge of different teachers and different schools against what he or she knows. No one is supposed to accept something blindly. We can see that when Prabhupāda met his spiritual master, Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī Thākura for the first time, he questioned him on the feasibility of spreading spiritual knowledge at the time, since India was then still under British rule. However, listening to his answer and seeing that Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta had a superior knowledge, he accepted him as his spiritual master, and from there studied under him, later becoming a spiritual master himself and teaching all of us.
One may stay for a long time on this process of inquiry, asking questions, comparing, and even challenging certain conclusions. This are all acceptable parts of the process. However, when one commits to a certain school, he or she should try to understand the philosophy from the perspective of this particular master or school. If one disagrees, one is free to leave and join another school, or even to create his own. However, to claim to be part of a certain school and at the same time disagree with its philosophical conclusions is duplicity. If one wishes to teach something else, they are free to do so, but they should not use the name or credibility of the sampradāya while rejecting its teachings.
In the paramparā system, the authority of knowledge does not come from originality, but from authenticity. One becomes authorized to teach or represent the sampradāya not by inventing something new, but by becoming a transparent medium for what has been taught by previous ācāryas, all the way to Krsna Himself. If one believes the ācārya is wrong, or that the school doesn’t properly represent the correct teachings, what is he doing there in the first place?
As Prabhupāda explains, being a spiritual master is actually very simple; one just has to be like a postman, faithfully transmitting the conclusions of the previous teachers.
Śrīla Rūpa Gosvāmī makes this same point in the Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu:
śruti-smṛti-purāṇādi-pañcarātra-vidhiṁ vinā
aikāntikī harer bhaktir, utpātāyaiva kalpate“Devotional service of the Lord that ignores the authorized Vedic literatures like the Upaniṣads, Purāṇas and Nārada-pañcarātra is simply an unnecessary disturbance in society.”
To join the disciplic succession is not a casual thing. It is a sacred vow, based on learning the truth by aligning myself with the conclusions of this lineage that comes from God Himself. I may not understand all the conclusions at the beginning, but I need to work under the concept that the words of the ācārya are correct, and the challenge is to refine my understanding, so I can properly understand and later represent them. As a student, my authority resides in properly representing the conclusions of the school, and not in my capacity of producing speculations. As soon as I start giving my own interpretations, proposing theories that diverge from the teachings, I become a fraud.
On the other hand, one should be able to present the teachings using words and examples that are appropriate to the current context, presenting the knowledge in a way that is relevant in modern times. This delicate combination between fidelity and innovation is summarized by Śrīla Prabhupāda in his commentary to SB 1.4.1:
“Personal realization does not mean that one should, out of vanity, attempt to show one’s own learning by trying to surpass the previous ācārya. He must have full confidence in the previous ācārya, and at the same time he must realize the subject matter so nicely that he can present the matter for the particular circumstances in a suitable manner. The original purpose of the text must be maintained. No obscure meaning should be screwed out of it, yet it should be presented in an interesting manner for the understanding of the audience. This is called realization.”
In conclusion, to be part of a Vedic school, especially in the line of Sri Caitanya Mahāprabhu, represented by Śrīla Prabhupāda, is to commit to studying, understanding, and then representing the conclusions of the ācāryas faithfully, without distortion, speculation, or compromise. This is the test of loyalty and integrity one has to pass to become a proper transmitter of the absolute truth.
You can also donate using Buy Me a Coffee, PayPal, Wise, Revolut, or bank transfers. There is a separate page with all the links. This helps me enormously to have time to write instead of doing other things to make a living. Thanks!