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Chanting for Krishna

This article, "Chanting for Krishna" was published in Independent Press-Telegram, January 24, 1971, in Long Beach, California.

Youths dressed like Oriental monks, playing drums and cymbals and tambourines, swaying to their jangling rhythm, and chanting... Hare Krishna... Hare Krishna... 

It seems to be a scene from a travelogue, far away in place and time. But the youths are Americans, and the scene is occurring now in more than 25 cities across the United States, especially so in Southern California. Twice a week, they are in Long Beach at Third and Pine and at the Cal State Long Beach campus. 

I first encountered the unlikely scene in front of a department store on Wilshire Boulevard in Los Angeles. Like a dozen other passers-by, I stopped to watch. 

A young man with shaven head, sandals and robes stood apart from the chanters. He offered incense and literature to the watchers - a magazine called Back to Godhead and a book entitled Sri Isopanisad

I passed on the incense but "donated" $5 for the literature. 

Reading later, I found the group is called The International Society for Krishna Consciousness. 

Krishna was an avatar (a deity descended from heaven to earth) and the charioteer of Arjuna, the chief hero in the ature in which Krishna advises Arjuna on duty and the immortality of the soul made Krishna one of the most popular of Indian deities. Krishna himself is often believed to be the human incarnation of one of the original half dozen solar deities who, in three giant strides, daily traverse the sky in Hindu theology.

It might he said this group is a recent nonsectarian offshoot of Hindu and Brahmanical philosophies whose origins go back 5,000 years in India - recent in that the movement was founded in the Western World in July, 1966, by His Divine Grace A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada and a small number of American students. 

From his humble New York storefront beginnings the Swami and a few disciples began to spread the word through chanting. Indeed, chanting - or sankirtan, as they call it - can be said to be the basic tenet of the faith in which all other activity is subsidiary. Between 10 to 12 hours daily are spent on various street corners this way and the movement believes this alone is the most effective means of God realization. Their literature states: "The effect (of chanting) is a clearing away of the dirt from the mind engrossed in the gloom of material existence.

After reading their literature, I decided to take advantage of an invitation card to a "sumptuous 15-course spiritual feasting at 4 p.m. Sunday," hoping I could talk to some of the followers in a more relaxed setting. 

Their Los Angeles temple and world headquarters is part of a 30-center world complex with branches in seven countries. Formerly a Methodist Church, it was purchased by the group for $1.5 million. In California, there are centers also at Laguna Beach, Santa Barbara, San Diego, San Francisco and plans are underway to open a permanent branch in Long Beach. 



Reference: Independent Press-Telegram, Unknown Location, USA, 1971-01-24