This blog is here to clarify my stance on sahajiyas and the such, should people have partial understandings or misunderstandings about things I've said in my recent semi-accidental involvements in commenting on some of the good Vaisnavas' blogs.

First of all. No, I do not believe that Jagadananda's approach in reconciling sexuality through introduction of elements of tantra and sahajiya-siddhanta is compatible with an orthodox Gaudiya Vaisnava understanding. I also do not think that either the teachers of the yore or the contemporary mainstream teachers would approve of it as a desirable development in the tradition. As for whether Bhaktivinoda would have approved of it, or have at least been appreciative of the spirit in which the initiative was made, that I could answer if I were one. A Bhaktivinoda, that is. However I am not a sahajiya, not even when the doors are closed and the lights are off, and have no immediate plans on becoming one either, and that's as much as I have to say on that as far as I am personally concerned.

That aside. I do recognize the merit in Jagat's having worked towards a solution, towards reconciling conflicting aspects of himself and his life with his spiritual aspirations. People should not lead lives of repressed and unreconciled sentiments and thoughts. One way or another, they should be worked out and peace should awaken, for without peace there is no happiness. Peace is a necessary foundation for a meaningful spiritual quest. I have no commentary to make on the potential in his innovation or its possible repercussions, not being a future-knowing God and all that.

The standard orthodox reservations have been expressed in the preceding paragraph, and if someone wants to know my standard orthodox stance, then there it is in all of its brevity. If someone assumes this sahajiya-ideology is something that should or could be incorporated into standard Gaudiya Vaisnavism, I think the hope is a deluded one. If someone thinks it's a great new development that could be meaningful to a sector of people who would otherwise be barred from substantial devotional experience, then power to him and let's hope something good comes out of it.

My personal relationships with Jagat or with any-whosoever-else-body stand on the basis of what unites us, not on what divides us. How much of the dividing substance can be reconciled is an assessment I have to make on my own for myself. Not for anyone else, and neither is it anyone else's task to re-evaluate mine, especially not of those who do not know me closely, as they are not me and as I am not them, and as we do not share the experiences and frame of reference that are the foundation for my decisions. So please brother and sister fair and dear, let's let me have my own life here and let's leave it at that.

And second of all. I do not believe in this hissing and pissing on people. It irks me when I see the inquisition go overboard, even when the object is someone with some actually pretty dumb ideas or other shortcomings. If I then put in a word in the object's defense, calling for some fairness, solidarity and kindness of spirit for the discussion, it doesn't mean that I am thereby embracing or defending the cause of the perceived heretic or other such detractor or bad boy.

Persistent discussion of others' flaws, whether out of curiosity or animosity, forms a powerful meditation. As even those who contemplated on God with hatred attained him, so those who are intent in contemplating on others' flaws with ill feeling will come to attain the same. The laws of cosmic motion insist on everything getting back at you and usually at double the velocity. That's why the sages of the bygone ages told everyone to basically mind their own businesses. And that's why I am geared toward tending to my own growth in my own atmosphere, aloof from all and everything. So much on all that.