Word: krishna
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Barefoot, in an orange safran robe and with a short pony tail dangling from an otherwise bald head, a Hare Krishna devotee seems out of place opening the large oak door of a sober Victorian brownstone house on Commonwealth Ave. in Boston. Krishna devotees are commonly seen chanting and dancing on New York's Fifth Ave., or asking for donations in Harvard Square dressed in Santa suits around Christmas time. But this devotee stands on the threshold of Boston's Temple of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON), three blocks from the Ritz-Carlton...
Dedicated to "propagating god consciousness for the benefit of mankind," ISKCON has tried to appeal to intellectuals by emphasizing the tradition and scripture of its movement, deriving from the Vedic literature, especially the 5000 year old Bagavad-Gita. Here at Harvard, Garuda Das, a Hare Krishna priest and Divinity School student, hopes to form a Harvard-Radcliffe Vaishnava Society dedicated to exploring the religion, philosophy and culture of India's devotional tradition...
...movement also hopes to appeal to citizens other than intellectuals by selling a monthly magazine, Back to Godhead, and by offering free Sunday dinners. Garuda stresses the movement's attempt to reach a wide audience because, "There's something for everyone in Krishna consciousness...
Arriving at the Temple for the Sunday service and dinner, you first kneel to remove your shoes in the vestibule. The shoe removal is required of everyone who wishes to enter a Hare Krishna Temple. The height of the devotee who greets you is magnified as he stands before oak-paneled walls. A vertically lined robe drapes his slim frame. He looks down and grins...
Glib cynicism often greets attacks on existing society, yet the outbursts against members of groups like Hare Krishna are generally hysterical. Perhaps the contrast can be explained by the uneasiness--sometimes terror--people have felt since before the time of Socrates when faced with something they do not understand. Thus, a financier may quite coldly denounce a Marxist critique of the capitalist system, but when he is told that his son or daughter has joined a mystical Oriental sect he goes frantic trying to combat a system that baffles...