Another Sexy Swami

Yogi Radhanatha Meets Swami Rama

We read in The Journey Home on page 98: “It was at the (World Yoga Conference in Delhi) that I first met Swami Rama, who has since become renowned as the founder of the Himalayan Institute. A towering man with a regal stride, pristine robes and a dignified aura*, he commanded awe. His eyes were deep and dark, and his head was framed by silver hair brushed straight back to his shoulders. I was eager to learn more about him … I read everything I could get my hands on about his background.”  

(*Wow, Radhanatha reads auras, too!)

"Unpurified ego is an evil which obstructs one's own progress. But the purified ego is a means in discriminating real Self from not-self-real Self from mere self.” –Swami Rama “Living with the Himalayan Masters” (Errr thanks, Swamiji, but would you mind translating that?)

The Journey Home continues on page 99: “I was sincerely impressed with Swami Rama. When I appealed for his blessings, he said in a deep voice, ‘The foundation of your success will be to keep the company with holy people.’ He raised his open palm to me. “The blessings of the sages will carry you across all obstacles on the path.*” 

(*Truthfully, Yogi Radhanatha, the biggest obstacle in your path is your own book, The Journey Home. It looks like Swami Rama’s blessings have not manifested yet, and this article will contain a few reasons why that might be possible.)

Later in The Journey Home, on page 130, Yogi Radhanatha again recalls Swami Rama: “In New Delhi Swami Rama had given a spellbinding preview of the powers of yoga. During my time in the Himalayas, I had practiced pranayama or breathing exercises, and asanas, physical postures and silent meditation to better attune my mind and body* with the divine force of God. I had seen the incredible effects of these practices, the great benefits to health, and the ability of practitioners to modulate their physical realities.” 

(*Wait a minute, Yogi Radhnatha. How do you attune your body,   which is dead energy, to some divine force?)

However, according to many victims of Swami Rama, he was not much of a renounced yogi at all—and his showbottle yogic antics were aimed at getting plenty of free sex American style. In a December 1990 article published in The Yoga Journal entitled “The Case against Swami Rama,” the author Katharine Webster has given quite a different view that more resembles a cheater and a predator than a yog—one with a dignified aura as described in The Journey Home. 

Katharine Webster writes in her well-researched article, “Numerous former students say they left the (Himalaya) Institute because they were sexually exploited by Swami Rama or knew someone who was. Most of the women who say they were abused by Swami Rama express feelings of fear, frustration, and betrayal. When they have contacted their friends and former colleagues at the Institute, they have been discounted as liars or labeled ‘emotionally disturbed.’ So far, none of their attempts to communicate their experiences has been met by official Institute willingness to investigate their charges.”

Swami Rama’s own book of self praise is entitled Living with the Himalayan Masters. Like many of the imitation holy men who write their own praises in the form of Yoga Biographies-or Yogaphies—Swami Rama’s credentials have faltered under scrutiny. Katharine Webster continues, “Swami Rama's claims to this spiritual background have been questioned by some of his former students. Two of the guru's most devoted disciples left the Institute three years ago because they had learned while in India as part of an Institute tour group that parts of Swami Rama's official biography were fabricated. One of them, along with the other women from the tour group, attended the wedding of Swami Rama's son, although the guru is officially supposed to have been celibate since taking his Swami's vows. Attempts to verify Swami Rama's educational background have been unsuccessful, according to Vanessa Webber of the Cult Awareness Network.”

Yogi Radhanatha writes in The Journey Home that the only reason he wrote his biography of an American Swami is because he promised His Holiness Bhakti Tirtha Swami aka “Krishnapada,” that he would finally divulge his tale (no doubt for the sake of enlightening the world). After all, to quote Yogi Radhanatha, when Bhakti Tirtha advised him to write his novella—errr—biography, “His voice choked up and a tear streamed down his ebony cheek.” Well, who could resist that?

Shrila Krishnapada attired in his potentate best

That advice would not be surprising to anyone who has tried to read Bhakti Tirtha’s puerile Spiritual Warrior series. Any reader with a teaspoon of intellect can understand that his level of literary development did not venture far beyond the mental speculation of an infant. Nonetheless, Shrila Krishnapada’s counsel to Yogi Radhanatha has proven to be very, very bad advice. And that is because true Vaishnava sanyasis do not write books glorifying themselves and wherein they place the likeness of Lord Krishna next to a pile of skulls. Egomaniacs write about themselves while genuine devotees write books that glorify Lord Shri Krishna, the Supreme Personality of Godhead.

But then Bhakti Tirtha was famous for giving bad advice such as the instructions as a GBC member he gave the temple of devotees in Liberia to remain there as though nothing was happening—when an open revolution was brewing in the streets. As a result, all the temple devotees were either abducted or slaughtered wholesale, as you may read in articles like the one here (https://www.harekrsna.com/sun/editorials/03-11/editorials7090.htm), and here (http://harekrsna.com/sun/editorials/03-11/editorials7080.htm), and here (https://rodpush.wordpress.com/2016/07/25/hladini-mataji-killed-by-a-pretender-guru-in-south-africa-the-fall-of-bhakti-tirtha-swami-by-rosalba-rukmini-ramana-devi-dasi/). These testimonials are coming from a lady devotee named B. Radha Govinda (aka Shrila Prabhpada’s faithful disciple Mahameghavati dasi) who in exchange for her untiring service to the late Bhakti Tirtha in Africa became yet another countless victim of ISKCON’s GBC elite. 

The fact is that birds of a feather flock together. Therefore it cannot be much of a surprise that—considering their track record—ISKCON’s GBC members adore a hodge podge book like The Journey Home which simply glorifies one exploiter after another—from Muktananda to Satchidananda to Swami Rama—disguised as saints.