Urban Monk: Exploring Karma, Consciousness, and the Divine

by Gadadhara Pandit Dasa

They called the new space the Bhaktivedanta Ashram and this is where my experience as a monk in New York began.

Each morning a monk would lecture from the scriptures. There were five of us and we would rotate lecturing. I was really impressed at everyone’s ability to read a passage and give a 30-minute talk without much preparation. Even during public programs, the monks, without much preparation, would very eloquently elaborate on the philosophy in an easily understandable manner. To me, it was incomprehensible. I had turned down the offer to speak at our morning sessions, which was attended by three or four people. I was afraid I would forget what to say and would look like a total fool in front of the other monks. For most of my life, I had shied away from public speaking engagements, even to very small groups.

When I finally got up to speak, everything just flowed. No one was more surprised than I was. I had offered prayers to my teachers in my mind, and when I began speaking, all of the studying I had done started pouring out. I was able to communicate everything that I wanted to.

Teaching is one of the most important duties of being a monk. Monks in many traditions become reclusive, distancing themselves from the general populace, but for monks within the bhakti or devotional tradition, the suggestion is to remain in cities and assist others in discovering their spirituality. We are encouraged to get involved in the lives of other people and perform the sacrifice of taking on other people’s problems in order to lighten their load.

I remember standing on the sidewalk and asking myself the question, is it possible that the self is different than the body? If so, wouldn’t it mean, most of us are in some kind of illusion?

Chapter two in the Gita separates the body and soul: As a person puts on new garments, giving up old ones, the soul similarly accepts new material bodies, giving up the old and useless ones.

Chapter eight of the Gita marks another distinction between the illusory world of matter and the spiritual world. Yet there is another unmanifest nature, which is eternal and is transcendental to this manifested and unmanifested matter. It is supreme and is never annihilated. When all in this world is annihilated, that part remains as it is.

The mood of a religious practitioner described by Jesus is identical to descriptions in the Gita and the Bhagavat Purana. You have heard the law that says, ‘Love your neighbor’ and hate your enemy. But I say, love your enemies! Pray for those who persecute you! In that way, you will be acting as true children of your Father in heaven. (Matthew 5:43-45)

The Dalai Lama teaches us that the purpose of religion from the Buddhist perspective “is to facilitate love, compassion, tolerance, humility, and forgiveness.” In the 13th chapter of the Bhagavad Gita, Krishna gives items of knowledge that can help liberate the soul, “Humility; nonviolence; tolerance; simplicity…all these I declare to be knowledge…”

I remember a Hindu monk saying during a lecture that just as a dog can always recognize its owner, whether the owner is dressed in shorts, a suit, or nothing at all, so a mature spiritualist is able to recognize his or her God in the dress of another tradition.

The strand of Hinduism that I began to practice in New York before I went to India, and that I continued to practice while staying in the Mumbai and New York monasteries, is known as Gaudiya Vaishnavism. Many people in the Western world know this as the Hare Krishna movement.

This was the first time in the history of Hinduism that a large scale number of non-Hindus—Americans, Europeans, Africans, South Americans, and Asians—were adopting into their everyday lives the philosophy, ritual, and practices of ancient Hinduism. As far as I know, this was the first time within Hinduism that Indian and Western women were becoming priests and engaging in service on the altar. Prabhupada established the International Society for Krishna Consciousness in New York City in 1966.

The Hare Krishna movement is a part of Hinduism. Its official name is Gaudiya Vaisnavism. Gaudiya refers to the region of India presently known as Bengal; Vaisnava refers to one who worships the deity Vishnu or Krishna. At least half of the Hindu population would consider themselves Vaisnavas. So, basically, the Hare Krishnas are worshippers of Krishna from the Bengal region.

The first proponent of the tradition was Shri Chaitanya (1486-1534) who was born in West Bengal. He is depicted in paintings as tall and slim with a golden complexion and long black hair. His look probably appealed to the hippies of the 60s. One could say he looks like Jesus without the beard and mustache.

Krishna wore many hats: child, friend, servant, romantic lover, cowherd boy, and killer of demons. For someone coming from a Western paradigm—and even for some Hindus—Krishna can easily be passed off as a mythological figure, similar to Greek or Norse gods, now only suitable for comic books. However, hundreds of millions of people undertake severe fasts, engage in extended rituals and worship, recite extensively his activities and the verses of the Bhagavad Gita for the purpose of remembering him and his deeds.

Krishna didn’t hesitate to change his role from friend, to teacher, to servant. These descriptions of Krishna’s activities can be very difficult to comprehend, especially if one is used to the notion of a God being the supreme father who is angry, jealous, and eager to punish those who don’t follow his law. Krishna is none of these things. Rather, he can be described as a poet, a singer, dancer, and servant.

In order to approach God, qualities of pride, envy, greed, anger, and selfish desire must be purged since they cloud the ego. Simultaneously, humility, non-violence, forgiveness, and tolerance need to be implemented into our character in order to bring clarity into our lives. Without endeavoring to fulfill these prerequisites, God will only remain a theoretical concept.

The recommendation, which is a very difficult one, is to accept what happened and to be happy for the other person’s success. Being happy for another’s success, especially if we were competing with them is practically impossible!

The Krishna tradition, however, stood apart from the rest of Hinduism because of its strict adherence to monotheism. Within Hinduism, there are millions of gods and most Hindus offer prayers and devotion to more than one. One of the most popular ones is Ganesh, the elephant god who removes obstacles in one’s life. Then there’s Laxmi, the goddess of wealth, and Sarasvati, the goddess who bestows knowledge upon the worshipper. Siva is one of the most prominent gods, and is always seen sitting in meditation with a cobra wrapped around his neck. He is considered by many to be the most powerful deity and people will pray to him for a whole variety of things such as protection, mystic powers, etc. Women pray to him for a good husband. The Krishna tradition, however, focuses all of its worship on Krishna and is therefore considered a monotheistic faith.

There is also a story from the ancient Puranas, which parallels Einstein’s hypothetical experiment. By the power of his trained mind, a yogi exited the earthly realm for the higher planetary realms. When he arrived, the inhabitants of these higher realms told him that millions of years had instantly passed on Earth in the mere moments since he had entered the higher realms.

The understanding that time is relative is nothing new for the Hindu tradition. It was quite common knowledge for most Hindus. After their allotted span of time, they die, and then different living beings are placed into those positions to continue overseeing their duties. This is similar to any governmental post. Each person in that post serves for a certain duration and then is replaced. It’s not an eternal post.

There are also realms that go beyond the heavenly sphere. The highest realm within the material cosmos is Satyaloka, where Brahma resides. His entire life span, if calculated in terms of human years, is 311 trillion years. To him, it just feels like 100 years. Brahma takes birth from the naval of Vishnu, a manifestation of Krishna, and is given the task of creating the material universes within which lies the Earth. The material universe has the same life span as Brahma and is temporary, while the spiritual world, where Krishna resides, is eternal. Brahma overseas everything within the material sphere, including all godly beings. After his allotted life span, he also has to die.

One of my teachers told me that every man eventually wants to be a father, and that I could do that by either getting married and having kids or by nurturing others in their spiritual lives.

There’s a great quote from Sir Paul McCartney: “If slaughterhouses had glass walls, everyone would become a vegetarian.”

the Sanskrit root “yuj,” meaning to harness or bind back. Yoga means you are trying to reconnect with the divine.

In the Bhagavad Gita, Krishna offers a very salient point: “If one offers Me with love and devotion a leaf, a flower, fruit or water, I will accept it.” God isn’t looking for elaborate and complicated offerings from the devotees. Instead Krishna is looking for the love and devotion, or the bhakti, behind the offering.

Steve Jobs said it so wonderfully, “Even people who want to go to heaven don’t want to die to get there.”

Many teachers believe that we’ve existed in the material universe for millions of births. Each birth is determined by our karma. The word karma literally means “activity.” It can be understood through the old adage, “what goes around comes around,” or the biblical equivalent, “as you sow, so shall you reap.”

Karma can be divided into a few simple categories – good, bad, individual, and collective.

The natural question that arises is “Why am I getting punished for something from a previous live if I can’t even remember it?” Of course, we don’t ask ourselves why good things happen to us. We simply accept the good thinking we deserve it or that we’ve earned it. The most important lesson to learn is that we can become more mindful of our present actions to prepare our families and ourselves for a more prosperous future, both materially and spiritually.

Karma doesn’t mean we should feel indifference towards the suffering of others. Our attitude should never be “too bad, it’s their karma.” Rather, we should always strive to feel sympathy and compassion for others.

In 2002, I became the Hindu Religious Life Advisor (chaplain) at Columbia. It turns out that Columbia, like other universities, has never had a Hindu representative, and so I was the first. A few years later, Hindu students from New York University also invited me to lecture and requested for me to become their chaplain as well.

It reminds me of a conversation that takes place in the famous Hindu epic Mahabharata between a wise king and a realized sage. The sage asks the king, “What’s the most amazing thing you’ve seen in life?” The king replies, “The most amazing thing I’ve seen is that death is taking place everywhere, but no one ever thinks it’s going to happen to them.”

It is referred to as Alphabet City because the Avenues are named for letters of the alphabet, going from Avenue “A” to “D”. In the not too far past, Alphabet City was known for illegal drug activity and violent crimes. One person I talked to said that “A” stood for “alright,” “B” for “bad,” “C” for “crazy,” and “D” for “dead.” Since we were between “C” and “D,” we were somewhere between crazy and dead.

In 2005, we moved to our current location on First Avenue near Houston. It was by far the busiest location. From the outside, the building looks like just another New York brownstone—you could honestly walk right past it and not notice anything special.