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By mat, February 9, 2010 3:11 pm

I’ve just returned to my Himalayan retreat in Mussoorie from a wonderful short trip to Vrindavana, the earthly playground of Sri Krishna and His bhakta’s (devotees). While there I happened to meet up with Satyaraja das (Steven Rosen) a prodigious devotee writer and publisher whom I was in communication with 20 years ago when I was coordinating the music department at the Mayapur Gurukula in West Bengal four hours north of Calcutta. Somehow or other we lost contact, but I have been avidly following his progress as a prolific writer, editor, publisher and communicator of Vaishnavism and Gaudiya Vaishnava culture through his unique and brilliant biannual publication the ‘Journal of Vaishnava Studies’.

Apart from editing and publishing these brilliant compendiums by academic scholars, he’s published 22 books dealing with interfaith conversations, ‘Om Shalom’ – ‘East West Dialogue’ and with other various topical subjects such as, ‘Vegetarianism in World Religions – ‘The Reincarnation Controversy’- ‘Vedic Archeology’, as well as his well researched, readable and informative short summaries on the lives of Sri Chaitanya and other influential saints in the Gaudiya Vaishnava tradition. In fact Satyaraja far excels other contemporary writers that deal with these fascinating subjects, not just by the vast range of pertinent topics that he covers, but also by the accessible manner with which he is able to convey complex theological and historical ideas to both students of religion, scholars and lay readers alike.

So I was excited to find out through my old friend Kiran that he was in Vrindavana on a rare visit from New York, as well as having copies of his latest books, ‘The Yoga of Kirtan’, ‘Holy Cow’ and a new edition of  ‘Journal of Vaishnava Studies’. We had a wonderful long chat over refreshments in the MVT restaurant along with our mutual friend Kiran, about all sorts of fascinating subjects, especially his timely new publication on the rapidly expanding popularity of Kirtan in the Western yoga world.

‘The Yoga of Kirtan’, ‘Conversations on the Sacred Art of Chanting’, is a collection of interviews with some of the most prominent kirtan and devotional singers in the Western World of Yoga. Satyaraja manages to skillfully direct the interviews in a format that allows the twenty one singers to tell the very personal and revealing journeys that led them to become chanters and singers of sacred sound. By telling their individual stories we get to hear all the amazing and varied ways in which spiritual seekers interact with the divine presence. Some are mature adepts in their 50’s and 60’s and a few are younger, representing a new generation of children born to parents who adopted yogic practices in the 60’s and 70’s. Due to these fascinating personal and historical anecdotes the book oozes the wonderful quality of human warmth through a revealing honesty and humility that seems to pervade and unify all the twenty one approaches expressed here.

Continue reading 'A book review of ‘The Yoga of Kirtan’ by Steven Rosen'»

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By mat, November 19, 2009 12:32 pm

I’ve been back in India for a month now, and feel I’ve just settled. Although I’ve been visiting India on a regular basis now for over thirty years, and was just here back in May, I still experience mild forms of culture shock every time I return. Each culture (East/West) is so powerfully absorbing, that spending a few months in either completely engulfs one’s being and it always takes some time to readjust to the other world. And they are like other worlds, both mysteriously cohabiting this planet together but running on very different energetic frequencies, historical backgrounds, seasonal patterns, population densities etc. etc.. The list could go on and on, East is East & West is West and all that. But as the years roll by, the cultures are definitely moving closer together despite my own perpetual culture shock syndrome. In India the pace of modernization is so rampant and upwardly mobile that it makes the West (UK) look like a Imperial Relic, floundering through the economic crisis.

My beloved Vrindavana the holy place of Krishna’s divine sports (Lilas), just three hours south of Delhi, has become a victim to this new wave of economic prosperity sweeping over India’s middle classes. Spiritual tourism has become extremely popular these days and Vrindavana has become a convenient pilgrimage destination for city dwellers wishing to escape with their families to somewhere different for the weekend. Unfortunately the infrastructure of Vrindavana is unable to cope adequately with the massive influx of Vehicles plowing into the small town. To make it even worse, work on the roads was left unfinished during the height of the popular Kartick season, thus creating even more havoc, dust, pollution and disturbance than usual.

A new bridge is also being built across the Jamuna river right next to Keshi Ghat, and none of the public seems to know who has authorized it’s construction or why it is there. Apparently there are various parties and organisations both political and non political in the Vrindavana area, that are competing with each other to implement their various agendas and blueprints for the regeneration of the area, and some seem to have more powerful connections than the others and it looks like the more questionable parties have the upper hand at present.

Let us pray to Sri Sri Radha Govinda that some sort of sincere civic sense eventually prevails and that development in the Holy Dham can move with times without completely decimating it’s remaining charm and natural beauty in the process.

Peace & Love

Mathura das