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Jesus as a Pure Devotee
In a previous article, Eswar Josyula wrote
> The question that arises in my mind is:
> Was Jesus a Pure Devotee?
> In order to be a Pure Devotee, Swami Prabhupada prescribed some
> qualifications. One of them is to have a guru-parampara. What is Jesus's
> guru-parampara going all the way to Krsna?
If Jesus was the son of God, then I would imagine that the guru-parampara
relationship would be satisfied. Krishna is the guru, and Jesus is the disciple.
I should point out that this is my own guess, but it seems reasonable.
There was an article posted a little while back on what Srila Prabhupada
said about Jesus, and that might be useful.
> The second qualification is that
> authorities declare Jesus as a Pure Devotee. Have authorities such as
> Caitanya Mahaprabhu said anything about Jesus being a devotee?
I don't know what Chaitanya Mahaprabhu said about Jesus, if anything
was said at all. I too would be interested in finding out.
> Again
> repeating what Swami Prabhupada said about a guru: a guru is one who
> simply repeats what he has heard from his guru.
> In one of his lecture tapes, Swami Prabhupada said that according to the
> vedic scriptures, if one does not base his religion on the vedas, that
> person is considered a nastik (atheist). Last year, Chinna Jeer swami
> of the Ramanuja sampradaya on his tour of U.S.A. also said the same thing
> during his lecture in Ann Arbor. It does not appear that Jesus refers to
> the vedas in his teachings.
My own personal guess, and take it for what it's worth, is that the
issue is one of what is taught, and not that the Vedas have to be mentioned
by name. I think that we would both agree that teachings can be based
on the Vedas without mentioning that Vedas by name, so I believe that
if Jesus does not refer to the Vedas explicitly, then no harm done.
> So the question again is that what is the basis on which Jesus was called
> a Pure devotee? Without going into speculative theories of mundane
> scholars, can someone present what other religious schools have said
> about this question? What is the postion of the other vaisnava sects?
> What is the position of Gaudiya Vaisnavas?
I don't think I am qualified to answer most of these questions. However,
from what little I know of Islam, they too accept Jesus as a Prophet from
God. They differ on the exact events of crucifixion, and I believe that
the common belief in Islam is that Jesus did not die on the cross, but
was rescued by God. I don't know if this is what you meant by other
religious schools, or if you wanted the answer limited to other schools
that originated in India.
-Vivek
> Thanks,
> Eswar Josyula
> 76142.1306@compuserve.com
