IMPRISONED AND BOUND BY THE CULT
DO KRISHNA CULTS BRAINWASH THEIR MEMBERS?
A MORAL PSYCHOLOGY PERSPECTIVE
The short answer is: Yes, and no.
People, and you might be one of them, assume that Krishna religions are not cults because the followers are clearly not brainwashed. They can clearly articulate their beliefs, they can defend them vehemently against criticism. In short they are able to think critically about their beliefs and if you speak with them it becomes clear they chose to believe everything they believe. You might believe that about yourself. And further you might believe that if a religion doesn’t brainwash its members then it is not a cult.
The truth is a bit more complicated than the above analysis indicates. It is true that Krishna cult members can articulately defend their beliefs, and in that sense they are not brainwashed. But there is no such thing as brainwashing. The term originally referred to prisoners returning from the Korean war who had supposedly been brainwashed into accepting communism and hating America. It turns out there were two distinct phenomena at play. Some prisoners didn’t believe what they were saying to their captors but just told them what they wanted to hear so they wouldn’t be subjected to torture. Some of the prisoner genuinely did believe that communism was superior to capitalism and that the United States was evil for participating in the war, but these people were liberals who already believed those things before they were captured. So, “brainwashing” isn’t a real phenomena.
But people do come to believe very strange things, so how does that happen? To understand what happens to someone when they join a cult, or more broadly any group with a moral or political message one needs to understand a little moral psychology. The perspective I offer here is a bit different than standard interpretations of cult groups and how people come to be indoctrinated into new belief systems by cults. I highly recommend Jonathan Haidt’s The Righteous Mind as great moral psychology primer and one of the most powerful books you could possibly read if you are interested in understanding the morality, religion, politics, and humanity itself.
People join religious or political organizations for any number of reasons. Some are even genetic in that there is a genetic predisposition to liberalism, conservatism, and libertarianism. Often times with religious cults people are going through an identity crises or a particularly difficult time in their life. Or they are just on a search for the truth, although often times that is probably a sort of identity crises. Anyhow, a person finds themselves part of a moral community, whether it is religious or political it doesn’t matter.
Once a person is a part of a community our psychology, beautifully designed by evolution, essentially turns off our rational thinking, as it applies to whether beliefs of the group are true or not. All rational thinking is dedicated not to evaluating the truth of the beliefs fo the group but to proving the beliefs to be true and proving all other beliefs to be false. And also of course to hating everyone outside the group and loving everyone in the group. A moment’s reflection on this should make it obvious why this psychological feature is useful. When you are about to go to war with the neighboring tribe it is not useful to be thinking about how maybe your tribe is wrong in the dispute and how your tribe is being greedy. They are the one’s that are being greedy, they are wrong, they deserve to die and rot in hell eternally. Kill’em!
Human beings are tribal creatures and morality, to use Haidt’s term, serves a two-fold purpose in “blinds and binds” us. It blinds us to moral truths outside the truths of our group and it binds us together with other members of group.
So, given that “brainwashing” is a red herring, what useful questions might we ask regarding whether a group is a cult.
One of the most useful things we can do is look at recruiting tactics of groups. If a group goes after lonely, vulnerable, isolated, idealistic, naive, young people then I think it is fair to say the group is a cult. Because once a person joins a religious group a person’s own moral psychology will do the rest of the work. The trick is just getting them to join.
Cults, of course, have other features. Cults harm people, either their own members, outsiders, or both. Cults indoctrinate their members into an extremely distorted view of reality. They get their members to make insane sacrifices for the sake of the leader or the group. They have leaders whom the members must submit to. Etc. etc.
Another useful question when thinking about whether an individual is “brainwashed,” is to look at their beliefs. Cults get people to believe very, very strange things. Science and philosophy, or reason, can help us figure out what we should believe. Not all belief systems are equal. Some beliefs systems are almost entirely irrational (cultic religious belief), some are mostly rational (non-cult moderate religious belief), and some are entirely rational.
If your group is on the wrong end of that spectrum you are probably in a cult of sorts. Krishna cults don’t brainwash their members in the pop culture mind control sense of the word “brainwash,” but they do use dubious tactics to bring in new members who are then indoctrinated into believing very strange things, and from there an individual’s moral psychology takes over inhibiting rational evaluation of the groups practices and beliefs.
That being said, if we consider standard definitions of what makes a cult, which while being a little simplistic in their understanding of moral psychology can be useful, then clearly Krishna cults fit the bill. Krishna cults involve veneration of specific people, they use emotional manipulation and deception as part of their recruiting tactics, and the worldview they indoctrinate members into has all the telltale signs of a cult worldview. (Here is a simple answer to the question “What makes a cult?” by Rick Ross)
What came first Lord Caitanya, the cult of Lord Caitanya or the so called brain washed? Let those who claim to have not been brainwashed by a cult present their understanding of reality absent of a so called cult. Then we can start balanced discussions about the reality of material nature based on revealed scriptures as presented in their first printing form by His Divine Grace A. C. Bhaktivedanta swami Prabhupada. The world is comprised of a vast network of “cults” going back many thousands of years before recorded history. The dharma of sugar is sweetness. The dharma of the living entity is to love God, Krsna. We accept Srila Prabhupada as our on going authority so let us let him speak again on the matter.
From the Back To Godhead Magazine web site. Link at the bottom,
Srila Prabhupada Speaks Out on “Brainwashing”
On “Brainwashing”
Last October a Queens, New York, grand jury leveled charges of extortion and “imprisonment through brainwashing” against New York ISKCON Temple President Adi-Kesava Swami. In mid-February of this year, one month before State Supreme Court Justice John J. Leahy threw the case out of court, Adi-Kesava traveled to ISKCON’s temple in Mayapur, India, to take advice from his spiritual master, His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada. The following excerpts from their conversations on the subject of “brainwashing” are reproduced from the journal of Srila Prabhupada’s secretary.
February 17, 1977: Srila Prabhupada said, “The whole world is under a misconception, and we are giving them knowledge. And yet they say we are brainwashing. People in general do not know that the body is valuable only as long as the soul is there. Therefore, their brain is rubbish and must be washed, or human civilization is lost.”
Later Srila Prabhupada gave this argument: “We are not brainwashing, but brain-giving. Where is your brain? You must first have a brain; then we can talk of washing it. You don’t know who you are. Take a dead man and a living man—what is the difference? Because you do not know, you have no brain, and therefore you misunderstand. We can give evidence in court from the Bhagavad-gita to show this. We can prove that you have no brain. You are like the cats and dogs, even if you pose as a philosopher. For centuries this information has been missing: tatha dehantara praptih, ‘The soul is changing, one body after another.’ A person who has a brain will understand this simple logic. The body is changing from childhood to youth. When the important thing, the soul, is missing, it is a dead body. Where is your brain to understand it? Arjuna was chastised for this by Krishna, who said, ‘You have no brain, and you are lamenting about the body.’ They don’t know the real thing, despite their big talk. They say life is a combination of chemicals; but then mix them and let life come. You can’t do it. You are cheating people. You have no brain at all.”
Adi-Kesava Swami [playing the part of an opponent]: “But I have a brain; therefore, I am able to talk with you.”
Srila Prabhupada: What is the difference between that talking and the barking of a dog? A dog is alert to someone coming from a distance, even more than a man. Your talking is not proof of a brain.
Adi-Kesava Swami: “But we have art and science.”
Srila Prabhupada: Whatever you have, you cannot answer the ultimate question. Within the body is the real power. Because he is there, the body is changing. The body is like a dress. You should quote the Bhagavad-gita.
Adi-Kesava Swami: Another complaint is that they say we make a person lose his identity by brainwashing him.
Srila Prabhupada: But who are they? They do not know who they are. They are identifying the self with the body. That is brainwashing.
Adi-Kesava Swami: Well, they may say that “all this discussion of the soul is beyond our knowledge.”
Srila Prabhupada: “It is beyond our knowledge” means you can’t understand.
February 19, 1977: This morning Srila Prabhupada called for all the sannyasis [fully renounced preachers of Krishna consciousness]. “Be convinced of this,” he said. “I am saying that everyone in the world has no brain, and we only are brain-giving. Why do I say this? Because I challenge the world’s scientists and great thinkers: ‘You just produce a machine like the body.’ But they cannot. This machine is produced by God. Actually, God Himself does not make this machine. His servant, the material energy, makes the machine: Just see His intelligence. ‘The Supreme Lord is seated in everyone’s heart,’ says the Bhagavad-gita. I am an ordinary man, and yet I can get things done—not directly, but by asking my disciples. So why can’t God do this? The machine of the body is made by His material nature. How is it made? They don’t know. If I challenge them to produce such a machine, they cannot. How this machine is being made by maya, or the material energy, we shall give them the brain to know. We should not be dull and simply accept whatever the scientists say, by noting, ‘Yes, you are right.’ No. At every step we must say, ‘You are wrong. You have no brain.’ “
Adi-Kesava Swami: Well, they say they have actually created a machine which is more complex than a man.
Srila Prabhupada: But that machine is worked by another man. And who made that man? They cannot even understand God’s material nature, what to speak of the Supreme.
Adi-Kesava Swami: When we argue like this, they just change the subject.
Srila Prabhupada: Why do you let them? Capture them.
Adi-Kesava Swami: Well, they will say, “You are talking of religion…
Srila Prabhupada: We are not talking of religion! You don’t know religion. We are talking of machines. An animal has no religion. Later we can talk of that. Now talk of machines. Religion is far away from you. And even if you could manufacture one living machine, these machines are now being created in such numbers that you are trying to stop their creation by abortion. So, so many are already being produced by nature. If you can create one, what will be your credit?
Adi-Kesava Swami: They will say, “We will make a better machine than God has made.”
Srila Prabhupada: Oh. You cannot capture a garter snake, and now you are saying you will catch a cobra.
Adi-Kesava Swami: “Well, you can’t make a brain either.”
Srila Prabhupada: We don’t say that we have a great brain. We are a servant. Our Master will show the brain. But you are a godless rascal. You have the onus of proof on you.
https://back2godhead.com/srila-prabhupada-speaks-out-on-brainwashing/
The International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON) is the world wide religious organization founded by His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanata Swami Srila Prabhupada for devotees / followers of the Supreme Personality of Godhead Shri Krishna. They are commonly known as Hare Krishna, because of the first two words of their principle mantra:
“Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna, Krishna, Krishna, Hare, Hare,
Hare Rama, Hare Rama, Rama, Rama, Hare, Hare.”
Krishna means “The All-Attractive,” Hare addresses the energy of God, Shri Krishna, and Rama means “The Greatest Pleasure.” Chanting the above Maha Mantra means asking the Lord shri Krishna to kindly engage the Jiva in Lord’s service because we, the Jivas, are eternal servant of the Lords. At present, we are serving our bodily needs and its extension which binds us in the Samsara cycle of repeated birth, death, old age and disease which means we are materially ( sickly )conditioned. This Hare Krishna Mantra is derived from the ancient Indian texts of knowledge called Vedas.
The sacred texts of the Bhagavad-Gita which contains conversations between Lord Shri Krishna and His Dear Friend, a soldier named Arjuna teaches that a common ISKCON followers’ expression is “We are not this body.” That is, we are all spirit souls who are temporarily trapped in a material body and its cares and woes. So, the goal is to break away from samsara (endless repetitive reincarnations) and return to the kingdom of God, Back to Godhead with the Almighty Father Shri Krishna.
So, the followers / devotees take up the practise and procedure to follow through the authorized Instructions in oder to go back Home, back to Godhead with Shri Krishna in the Vaikhuntha Loka.
Is this Practise and Procedure known as CULT ?
If the answer is YES, then, we are in sickly condition, which needs to be cured in order to go back Home to God and live there eternally happy for ever with the Almighty Father Shri Krishna in Vaikhunta ?
It is like when we are ill physically or mentally, we consult with some one authorized to cure the sickness by certain practise and procedure advised by the expert in the field.
Do you call that Practitioner as a CULT or a Cult Leader ?
If the answer is NO, then, we are the fortunate Practitioners trying to go Home back to Godhead where we belong by following the Procedure and Practise as instructed in His VANI by the Founder Acharaya His Divine Grace Srila Prabhupada of the Original ISKCON.
Then WHY CALL the Original Iskcon as a CULT ?
It has to be a FISKCON OR MISCON who are conducting their business under the name of Iskcon for a Profit, Prestige and Position. Another words, it is a BOGUS outfit which is called a CULT institution.
PLEASE BEWARE.
OM TAT SAT.
Hare Krishna. All Glories to Srila Prabhupada.