What is the role of women in Srila Prabhupada´s preaching mission?

Maybe it is not known to everybody that originally Srila Prabhupada wanted to follow the classical Vedic system which doesn’t permit women to live directly in the temple. It is understood that women can practice Krsna consciousness while being sheltered by their family members and their husbands in their homes, having the temple as their place of worship.

That didn’t work for Srila Prabhupada in the context with the western "culture". These girls coming and serving and joining in increasing numbers had no home to go to when it came to be Krsna conscious. And so Srila Prabhupada did something he earned criticism for even from his godbrothers. He allowed girls to come, He Himself got them married and He invented the word "brahmacarini" for those who were not married yet.

Further on He did something which was never done before: he put women directly into the preaching field. And what an asset they turned out to be!!

Specially in the feminist oriented western society a voice of a women is often more to be heard as that of a man. Srila Prabhupada’s "women" had indeed something to say.

When I joined this movement 1972, everybody was engaged in book distribution. Consequently any girl who joined along ended up with books in the street as well. The yatra I joined consisted only from brahmacarinis and brahmacaries. The only grhasta in the temple was the president and GBC who was considered entirely transcendental:-) His wife was an amazing cook and very strict leader of the new bhaktins. (Yes, women can be leaders… for women!:-)

During her presence in the yatra the mathajis were actually far better trained as brahmacaries. They were great cooks and… great book distributors. After her departure a vacuum was created and along the new GBC a question was raised who will take care of this modest army of girls travelling on sankirtan.

The finger ended up being pointed on me. Due to my at that time dormant varna propensities I, as the sankirtan leader, was unaware what I am getting into when I met once during another raging distribution marathon a confused mathaji standing in front of a shopping window, without a reason staring into it. I passed by, swinging my half empty book bag, laughing and shouting "Haribol!"

As from a coma she woke up, turned red and disappeared around the corner with her books. Few minutes later I found her again standing on the same corner, looking on the floor, obviously in need to talk to me. (Amazing how women know how to look while not looking and how to speak without speaking:-) I stopped and she asked simply if it wouldn’t be possible to join with her party next day the morning lecture. I wasn’t sure if this is possible, but seeing her condition and seeing the pile of books in her hand, I agreed.

A revolution followed. The rest of my sankirtan party, meeting me in the evening in the van, was outraged when I informed them that next morning we may have some guests in our hotel room "just for the lecture". We were all between twenty and twenty five years old, a crew of passionate brahmacaries who thought that soon due to our fierce book distribution we may take sannyas and join the Rasa lila:-) Their comment was: "But then there will be these long hairs everywhere in the room!":-) As if hotel rooms were free of hairs.

And so next morning quietly and perfectly on time a crew of four mathajis entered our room , sat down in the corner and listened. They exited as quietly as they came. The rest of the week went smoothly while we were prosecuted by the German police as usually , reaching our quotas of books being distributed as usually:-)

On Sunday, while packing the car in the temple, getting ready for the next week, I was called into the temple presidents office. He said: "I heard that you met the mathajis last week". I declared instantly the incident as "being accidental", fearing my brahmacary image to be damaged:-) "That´s OK. that´s OK, "said the temple president. "Sit down". "Listen", he continued, "we have debts", (somehow the "debt mantra" followed me through all the years I went on sankirtan:-( "And we have here four sankirtan parties with mathajis who are quite in maya. As matter of fact they didn’t hardly distribute anything. So why don´t you take next week these four vans, they can simply follow you , you give some lectures, tell them where to distribute… and that’s all."

I was alarmed: "But what about the rest of my party? I had already a revolution in the van just because of one single lecture! "Don´t worry, we take care of it" was the answer. I was allowed to take one brahmacary with me as a "body guard" and then I was asked to leave. I selected the most fanatical one I could find, a very special devotee who was so antagonistic to women that he didn’t allow them to come even close to him. (Well, he got later on married too:-)

And so I looked on Monday morning in the back mirror of my van and I saw four other vans pulling out of the parking lot of the temple, following my car. I was already aware that at least regarding one point it will be more easy management: the mathajis were far cleaner in their habits as brahmacaries, having their vans spotlessly washed and prepared. After a short lecture we went out, following a distribution schedule which started 9 a.m. and ended 7 p.m. That wasn’t anything unusual those days.

The result came almost instant. I had to quickly speed up with my distribution not to end up being embarrassed by this little brahmacarini army. One can make a simple calculation how many books were distributed a week just from these five vans as each devotee distributed minimum 400 books each. That’s eighteen devotees total times four hundred.

What I saw from a distance couldn’t be ever copied by any man. These girls were so intense in their distribution that no man could oppose. Regardless of their size they ended up being submerged in the crowd of people, only to surface to hit their "targets". One of their smiles dissolved instantly the false ego of any macho-man.

Just to illustrate this: I saw suddenly a small mathaji stopping a rather fat German man who just exited his Mercedes car. Exactly this kind of men was never approached by me as I expected them to hiss the traditional "get lost" curse in my direction. But being caught completely by surprise this man stopped, turned red in his face and stared at our little heroin. I couldn’t hear what she is saying and so I came closer. Confused the man pulled out finally his purse and looked for some money. Holding his purse open, our sankirtan lady did something I taught devotees never to do: she simply took the purse out of his hand and while smiling she started to pull the bank notes out. "Look!" she smiled. "Here is the brown one and here is the green one!" The man stood there like hypnotized, simply watching his money to disappear. Finally the empty purse was returned to him with even a bigger smile. For his tolerance he was rewarded with a big pile of books being pushed into his hands. As if he was waking up from a dream, he regained his consciousness trying to voice finally his last complain: "But I need at least some money for petrol, I have to tank my car!"The mathaji smiled again and pet him gently on his big German beer belly. "Walking is healthy" she said and left. The man smiled in agreement, put the books in his car and indeed walked away mildly shaking his head. My only thought was: "I could never do that!"

That weekend four vans full of entirely ecstatic mathajis returned to the temple. They found themselves jumping sky high in the roaring kirtan in a rather non-orthodox way. My faith was set by providence. The temple president had for me only one comment: "One week more".

And so "one week" became a regular one month a year for many years to follow. I tried to point out mildly that I have no plans to leave my brahmacary vows, sharing my worries with the local GBC who was any time ready to support my sankirtan service. I told him: "I feel like an illustration to the story where a donkey is controlled by its master who sits on him and holds a carrot being tied to a string on front of his mouth. In this way the donkey, thinking to reach the carrot, keeps on walking. I told him: "traveling with these brahmacarinis makes me to that carrot. (We both knew by that time that women work best in a presence of a man). His answer was simple: "Its all right, just make sure that the carrot doesn’t get eaten". :-)

I never stopped wondering how me, the brahmacary who had actually a scandal free record, got himself into this situation. Years later I could understand more and I could see that all this was far from being accidental. After fifteen years I came to see that better I operate in managerial and preaching field from a more safe position, the position of a grhasta. I preached with my wife, sent to me by her spiritual master intensely for fourteen years and I never came to regret that. She was indeed a good preaching friend. The combination of married couple preaching together is a very powerful one as most of the bhakti-candidates of today are coming from an already established grhasta type of situation.

But I never lost my deepest respect for any brahmacary and any brahmacarini who gave whatever they could to Srila Prabhupada’s mission. I saw these girls crying in despair when maya tested them and I saw them being drowned in ecstasy. After all, Lord Caitanya is distributing His mercy indiscriminately and equally. Even meeting some of these heroines years later, when they as already married women carried their offspring around, none of them denied that those days were the best days of their lives.

That on some occasions they were later on turned into "collection machines" in the process of ambitiously establishing temples and projects which they hardly ever took part in, was a regretful development which today fortunately can be hardly observed anymore. Nobody could be today convinced that anything outside of distributing of Srila Prabhupada’s books, His prasadam and the Holy Name can be called "sankirtan".

There is a difference between sankirtan a money collection "sankirtan". Much of the funds these girls collected with dubious paraphernalia were not properly used. I believe that as they served their authorities with faith and devotion, Krsna blessed them nevertheless. But I also believe that it was due to this fact that despite all the warnings issued from Srila Prabhupada not to contaminate pure book distribution with a money making schemes, using all kinds of criminal methods and all kinds of variety of useless paraphernalia to extract the maximum money from conditioned souls, the leaders who insisted to continue with this absurdities in Srila Prabhupada’s absence had to accept their reactions. I believe that their conscious denial of Srila Prabhupada’s warnings contributed to their fall down.

And so even more today any mathaji contributing to Srila Prabhupada’s mission by distributing Srila Prabhupada’s books or living exemplary lives of chaste wives, or both, are respect-commanding example of how living in female body can be brought to perfection. Few of these chaste mathajis who tolerate the shortcomings of their devotee husbands and stick to their vows are known to me and I can only offer to them my respectful obeisances.

May they be followed by other women who seek progress in Krsna consciousness. There is far more to be said on this point.