By Kesava Krsna Dasa
It can sometimes be tough being an intellectual in Iskcon. The tendency to keep one foot in the empirical camp and the other in the devotional arena can cause incompatibilities of faith, especially when continuing to grapple with “oddities” like elephant sized mangoes, airborne mountains, talking hyenas and bodily exuded cosmic bubbles. Almost everything is interesting for an intellectual. How things work, or don’t. Statistics and comparisons, complex and more complicated, beyond comprehension and ridiculously out of bounds, all can pose challenges when faced with the “simplicity” of Krishna consciousness. And more so when fantastic and marvellous Vedic accounts remains fabulously beyond belief. Does “simple living” dull down our inquiring spirit to the point of unquestioning obedient acceptance of everything taught to us? Will “high thinking” allow us free reign to explore that which confounds the greatest material thinkers? “Prove that God exists,” Srila Prabhupada would say. This seems the most certain way of engaging a lively intellect. How many sprightly and bouncy intellectual devotees are convinced of this, especially when having to explain in terms of elephants and swans that do inter-planetary travel, and other faith shaking concepts?