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Making advancement in spiritual life requires overcoming psychosis, which always has an integral connection to the pathological mode of ignorance. Humans experience sense gratification from rage, and some of them, those of lower character, often are absorbed in psychosis. They like it. However, psychosis destroys reason, intelligence, logic, and knowledge, as the astral body’s buddhi[1] blindly serves the mind’s desire for sense gratification, culminating in a perverted pleasure.

The worst form of psychosis is that of the pseudo-spiritual or pseudo-devotional variety. It is a derangement that can disguise itself much more effectively than can the other variants. Over and above that, especially in the bhakti-yoga system (the perverted reflection of said system), it can be rationalized as a manifestation of spiritual ecstasy.

The “ecstatic kīrtan” of improperly initiated people (thinking themselves advanced in devotional life) is nothing but a psychotic, pseudo-spiritual rave in the guise of ecstatic love. This has been going on for decades throughout the world due to the manifestation of three powerful sahajiyā movements[2], all of them chock full of delusion.

Buddhi-yoga[3] was brought to the West in the mid-Sixties by a rare devotee of the Lord[4]. His movement became known as the Hare Kṛṣṇa movement of Kṛṣṇa consciousness. Although genuinely ecstatic kīrtan (or sankīrtan) was integral to its process, it required the pensive state[5] in order to produce the desired result of spiritual advancement on the path of perfection. This path is available to human beings who want to upgrade their mode of conditional life.

Buddhi-yoga is the best means for doing so. However, it loses its status (what to speak of higher intelligence, prajnā, which it is meant to ever-increasingly produce) when it degrades into psychosis on the plea of the ultimate irrationality[6] of spiritual realization.

This book gives the opportunity to clearly see these things and many related truths. As such, you’ll come to know how the aforementioned three deviations—all disguising themselves as pure devotional service—are, in essence, working against actual Kṛṣṇa consciousness.

All three are covering Kṛṣṇa consciousness in the name of spreading it. All three are engaged in hatred of Kṛṣṇa in the guise of Love. You do not love Him through the mode of ignorance. You do not love Him while absorbed in psychosis. All three are envious of the Founder-Ācārya who brought Kṛṣṇa consciousness here as an unprecedented benediction.

He did so during the hippie era, which itself was connected to various forms of psychosis produced by psychotropic drugs in combination with proto-African beat music and the lust-fervor of illicit sexual connections. The higher section of that hippie religion qualified themselves to take advantage of Prabhupāda’s movement, which was genuine and authorized when he first brought it here. By so doing, they upgraded themselves to the pensive, deliberate, intelligent mode of goodness.

He came here to make them brāhmins, and he was able to do so to a significant extent. Brāhmins are never even neurotic, what to speak of psychotic. Cultivation of higher intelligence (prajnā) via dovetailing normal intelligence is integral to the mode of goodness (buddhi-sattva). The attainment of sthita-sattva[7] by a personal transcendentalist is achieved via authorized service of the Lord (bhakti-seva). This is the means to become an advanced transcendentalist. The goal of such a spiritual process is to become siddha and a Vaiṣṇava guru.

A genuine guru in buddhi-yoga must be a very perfect man. It is difficult achievement, but attainable. However, there are prerequisites required in order to even start the process. One of those is to pull yourself out of the mode of ignorance. However, you cannot do so if you are connected to any of the deviated so-called bhakti cults. At this time, they are all-pervading throughout the Western world, along with their particular and peculiar gurus and thousands of improperly initiated disciples.

Human beings live in a very bad place. It is worse now than in previous millennia of antiquity. Compared to denizens of heaven, humanity’s casual joys here on Earth are both paltry and mixed. In this age of Kali[8], however, the pains experienced here are often as hellish as those at the base of the universe[9]. The Abrahamic religions of the Middle East and the West have not solved this violence conundrum over the past millennium, and, because of this massive failure, we are always surrounded by an environment of constant war. The modern and post-modern history of man can accurately be described as the history of war. We want peace, but what is the prescription?

In the mid-Sixties, that formula was brought to the Western world by His Divine Grace A. C. Bhaktivedānta Swāmi Prabhupāda. It entails transcendental knowledge combined with spiritual dealings and genuine rituals. It demanded a change of mentality and habit, along with a routine that was tailored to please The Supreme Transcendence by pleasing His emissary. In point of fact, Swāmi Prabhupāda, early on in his mission, wrote a small but powerful book entitled The Peace Formula.

In other words, the prescription was given, but the result and realization had to be earned. A group effort was made, a corporation was formed, an institution[10] was built and expanded, but it all came up short. Group psychosis took over. How that played out is a long story. Some but not all of that history will be detailed in this treatise.

This book is a critique. It is neither an anthology nor a comprehensive recording of all the uncountable events that took place in and around Prabhupāda’s branch of Lord Caitanya’s Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement in the guru-paramparā. It glorifies His Divine Grace (as it well should!), but it glorifies little else. Little else merits being glorified. Instead, it is a critique, a critical analysis of the persons and events which led to the current deplorable state of a doppelganger Mother Ship and its factions, all disguising themselves as the Hare Kṛṣṇa movement.

It highlights key events and people within Prabhupāda’s movement, the ones which are the most important in the estimation of your author. This treatise is not a comprehensive presentation of anything and everything, as that is not conducive to assimilating real conclusions. The purpose of this book is fulfilled when its reader comprehends, acknowledges, and assimilates what is meant to be gleaned from it.

It contains eight chapters and an Epilog; these are not presented in a haphazard manner, as there is a semi-chronological component to them. There are two appendices, as well. These include combining the End Notes with the Glossary, not all that revolutionary of a step.

There will be numerous excerpts from Prabhupāda’s writings in this book, as there should be. These will be dominated by excerpts from his letters. Not infrequently, excerpts from purports to his massive treatises—along with excerpts from room conversations, platform lectures, and morning walks—will also be presented.

There will be some necessary reference to official documents, although I do not consider any of that to be nearly as important as the other source material. The beginning format of initial presentation under each chapter’s headline will be the same as in my previous book.

I do not expect every reader to comprehend why this new book has occult references in it. Some readers will misunderstand the imperative for my doing this, yet some clarification is still in order. Occult means hidden. There are non-spiritual principalities spurring the various deviations of what only appears to be the Hare Kṛṣṇa movement.

Some of this is going to be explained, but I cannot guarantee that every reader will be able to fully assimilate any specific reference (although I try my best to make that happen). You benefit if you are able to understand that negative occultism always permeates cult takeovers.

Although third person presentation dominates the book (as it must), first and second person pronouns and anecdotes are not eschewed. Real transcendence is just that: Personal. As such, whether or not you can relate to the periodic switches of tense, you are herein informed of them in advance. It may negatively impact the value you can glean from specific parts of the treatise; then again, it may not, and it should not.

One thing that all of you will note as you read the following chapters: There is quite a bit of repetition. Some of you will find this irritating. For example, I reproduce an important section from one of Prabhupada’s purports three times in different chapters. You may consider this to be overkill. It is not accidental, and it is not done to irritate you. It is done, because I deem it necessary to do it. It is my judgment call. More than once, I reproduce in the same chapter (discussing the origination of the living entity) an important excerpt from one of Prabhupada’s letters. You are herein, in advance, informed that there will be repetition.

As aforementioned, as far as presenting the Western Hare Kṛṣṇa history and its “highlights,” this is not my first rodeo. In 2019, a thinner book detailed what you are about to also read here. [11] No dissatisfaction was or is now felt by your author with that first work. Yet, at the beginning of 2023, I questioned whether or not a more comprehensive explanation was still required. The real explanation of the importance of returning to square one perhaps could use further explanation and review.

The answer was in the affirmative, but this was not my initiative alone. In 1986, I co-founded an unincorporated association called The Vaishnava Foundation in Northern California. In the third week of January, 1988, it was incorporated. It has had many members, and it has been no stranger to attrition over that time gap. In the first half of last year (2023), it held its Annual Meeting (via Skype) and, as always with these meetings, agenda items were discussed.

When I researched, wrote, and edited Party Men fourteen years ago, it was mostly an individual effort. One of my fellow Directors, Bhakta Ernest Dras, handled everything that I could not, and that was substantial. The book was sold (and is still being sold) on Amazon. However, it was then my personal initiative alone which brought it to fruition.

Such is not the case with this effort. The pros and cons were discussed in some detail at that 2023 Annual Meeting, and this book was and is a group effort from its inception. Although I am the author and editor, research has been conducted by the other members in good standing. This was integral to the Resolution authorizing it. Another way of saying the same thing is, to use a common trope, I wanted this time that all the members had skin in the game. They pledged to conduct rigorous research, and the Resolution for this treatise was thus approved.

My original plan was to include twenty-two chapters and an epilog, along with appendices. This was significantly modified through consolidation. The time thread is subtle. This book is best read with diligence and patience in order of presentation, i.e., do not browse it. Accreditation, definitions, and explanations are always an aid to clarification. Aside from skipping (every now and then) to the Endnotes, it is nevertheless best read in the order of the chapters as they are presented in it.

Two final points beg to be included in this Preface.

First, this one was obliquely mentioned near its beginning, viz., that of constant war. The Hare Kṛṣṇa movement was meant to be a peace movement, but it did not really play out like that, except (arguably) in its initial years. Yet, even in the early days, there were struggles between and amongst godbrothers, especially those who constituted the upper echelons of the organization. That did not set a good example, obviously. Herein is one such reference by Prabhupāda regarding this infighting:

“. . . displeasing of godbrothers has already begun and gives me too much agitation in my mind. Our Gaudīya Math people fought with one another after the demise of guru mahārāja, but my disciples have already begun fighting even in my presence . . . I am greatly concerned about it.”[12]

Presently, there is a fierce, internecine war transpiring in what only appears to be the Hare Kṛṣṇa movement. It is taking place at many levels, including the exoteric, the higher astral (of the archtypes, the laws, and the universal principles), and on the outskirts of the esoteric (but not within the pure esoteric, despite imitation of it being that).

None of this is really new for devotees who have been around for awhile, as it has been going on for decades. It is nasty, but the general public either does not care about it or does it know accurate details about it. When you finish this book, you will no longer be part of that hoi polloi.

Secondly:

idaṁ te nātapaskāya
nābhaktāya kadācana
na cāśuśrūṣave vācyaṁ
na ca māṁ yo ‘bhyasūyati

“This confidential knowledge is never at any time to be spoken to one who is not austere, to one who is not devoted, to one who is not hearing from spiritual authority nor to one who is envious of Me.”[13]

When it comes to transmitting knowledge, I am restricted as to what I can present or explain. I humbly request that you do not be discouraged by this limitation. I stretch the rubber band a bit (as far as I can) without snapping it. To employ another analogy, there is a marginal area between the sea and the land, one which is neither but both. I avoid superficial puss in this book (as far as possible), but I do not step into the water. To reiterate, this presentation is made for your edification and realization, but all such realizations you may glean from it have to be earned.

Kailāsa Candra dāsa
October, 2024