A Hard Sell

By His Grace Swarup Hebel, My Godbrother

At a time when the Vietnam War was raging and the peace movement was growing with mass protests and marches, Srila Prabhupada arrived in America and presented Bhagavad-gita As It Is, a scripture in which Krishna chastises Arjuna for being a pacifist and tells him to get onto the battlefield, do his duty as a warrior and kill.

At the height of the Civil Rights movement and a time when feminism was on the rise, Srila Prabhupada came to teach that spiritually we are all equal but on the bodily platform it just isn't so.

When an entire generation was turning into bohemian hedonists with slogans like, "if it feels good, do it" and "turn on, tune in, drop out" and the battle cry was "sex, drugs and rock n' roll" Srila Prabhupada introduced bhakti-yoga, a discipline that required followers to give up illicit sex, intoxication, meat eating and gambling.

When growing long hair was so in that the musical "Hair" became a nationwide sensation, Srila Prabhupada instructed his male disciples to shave their heads and female disciples to cover their heads.

When other swamis, yogis and gurus were coming from India to the West preaching peace and love and telling their followers that we are all one and that we are all God, Srila Prabhupada called them cheaters, rascals and crows.

When the book "I'm ok, You're ok" came out, Srila Prabhupada remarked, "We say that we are ok, you are not ok."

To say the least, Srila Prabhupada's message was a hard sell given the time, place and circumstances. He was strongly advised that if he tried to impose such strict rules and regulations onto Westerners nobody would listen, he'd attract zero followers and we would tell him to go back to India.

Srila Prabhupada saw through all the superficiality and he clearly observed that young people were feeling dissatisfied and disgusted with the hypocrisy of our leaders and the materialistic society around us. We demanded change. All the experimenting with communes, drugs and sex and all the protesting and rebelling was due to deep feelings of frustration and hopelessness. He told us that we were intelligent to want something better, to want happiness and peace, but we didn't know how to achieve it. He said "I have come to give you the positive alternative."

Srila Prabhupada never compromised. He was innovative and creative and made some adjustments to accommodate and achieve success in the matter of teaching Krishna consciousness but he never compromised. He didn't have to. His genuine purity, compassion and love was the force behind the message and which attracted all of us like iron filings to a magnet. We gladly let him turn us hippies into happies with (as he would describe) shining and bright faces.

Yes, Prabhupada's message was a hard sell and he came alone, almost 70 years of age to a strange hostile environment to distribute the message of Lord Caitanya as ordered by his guru maharaja. Against all odds he captured our hearts and minds and did so without ever compromising the purity and potency of the message he came to deliver.