“If you are not ashamed”

Before I became a devotee of Prabhupada, my friends and I often expressed our determination not to “sell out.”  Selling out meant giving up our free spirit and surrendering to the demands of American society.  When I moved to the Lower East Side the expression was, “Don’t cop-out.”  Don’t give up the hip life and become an ordinary American shmo.

Swamiji’s disciples didn’t think of themselves as cop-outs, but one day a visitor to the storefront told Gargamuni dasa, “I think Hare Krishna is a cop-out.”

“What?” Gargamuni defended our position.  “You call this a cop-out?”  We’re not afraid to shave our heads and wear a dhoti and walk around the city like this, but here you are with your black denims and your shirt looking like everybody else.  You think you’re so cool, but you’re just another anonymous person on the street.”

What our visitor meant was that we had given up the “responsibilities” of hippie life – no more marijuana or LSD – and we lived in our temple in a different reality with aspirations to return to the spiritual world.  It sounded to him like a cop-out.  We had our comeback remarks, but if some of the hippies didn’t accept us, then that was a price we had to pay.

One time, when I was sitting inside the storefront, I overheard two guys who stopped to read Swamiji’s sign in the window.  One of them read aloud: “Classes in "Бхагавад-гита" – Monday, Wednesday, Friday.  Chant this transcendental sound vibration, Hare Krishna mantra.  Learn the science of Krishna from a bona fide spiritual master.”  Then he said to his friend, “What kind of word is that to use for a guru – bona fide?  It sounds like a legal term.”  They laughed at the use of the word “bona fide.”  I knew what they meant because I also used to laugh cynically at anything that was a little strange.  Their attitude was typical of middle-class Americans who had become hip and were ready to take apart anything that didn’t seem to be hip.  By laughing at Prabhupada’s use of “bona fide,” they were mocking our whole scene.  In hippie life, the worst mistake was to do anything “square.”  So by detecting this one phrase that didn’t seem to fit in with hip consciousness – “bona fide spiritual master” – they laughed and walked on, dismissing the seriousness of our movement.

From inside the storefront I thought, “You don’t understand.  Just because the Swami uses a few words differently than you doesn’t mean you have a reason to reject him.”  As Prabhupada writes in the "Шримад-Бхагаватам", he is more interested in the techniques of бхакти than in the language.  By “bona fide” he meant that a spiritual master cannot be concocted, cannot be an upstart.  He has to be genuine.  There is nothing wrong with the meaning of the words “bona fide” to define a spiritual master, but with the hippie movement, style was worth more than content.

Only among the devotees could we fully express our feelings.  “Just think – we have been taking one life after another for millions and millions of years.  We’ve been up and we’ve been down, and now we’re at the highest point we’ve ever been in millions of births.  We’re associating with the pure devotee and making progress for going back to Godhead.  Let’s not blow it!”

Prabhupada had a habit of using initials to express meanings in code form.  One of his favorites was S.R.  S.R. meant “simply rascal.”  He said that we could make a button with the letters S.R. on it and give it out to people who were rascals.  He said that even the President of India was “an S.R. man.”

Swamiji was aware that we were going through a conversion from “hippy to happy.”  He said, “You can wear your chanting beads around your neck when you go outside the temple – if you are not ashamed.”

“What does that mean, Swamiji?  S.M.?”

“Not S.M.,” said Swamiji, “I said ashamed.  If you are not ashamed.”  Prabhupada meant, “If you are not ashamed of being a devotee.”