As long as the spiritual master is physically present, the disciple should serve the physical body of the spiritual master, and when the spiritual master no longer physically existing, the disciple should serve the instructions of the spiritual master. SB 4.28.47

It has been some time since I’ve written this simply is as most of my thoughts are kept till the weekend and then wrote down, giving me time to read around the themes.
Last week however was very busy with one of the highlights being the “Spiritual Master and Disciple Course” undertaken at the College of Vedic Studies. OK so no new ground was covered which was a bit disappointing but highlights how important it is to have expert devotees from day one; by Krishna’s mercy for some reason I had just that.
I was however interested in the use of terms and headings especially as I re-read and made notes on the course material of note was the term “Deviant Philosophies” I think could be summed up as the cheater and the cheated; this can be said especially around initiation as some give it away freely with no true commitment or understanding required by the disciple especially the point of it being the start of a life long commitment.
However I am reminded that HDG Srila Prabhupada was also accused of being a deviant by his own god brothers but that by understanding vadic scriptures and following the instructions set out by his own Spiritual master he was able to easily defeat his accusers. The importance was simply not his own fame but the orders of his spiritual master and how best to carry them out.
We see that some claim to be actually following the orders of Srila Prabhupada whilst setting up other sampradaya’s outside of the organizational structure established by Srila Prabhupada; and that in many ways it is easy to find faults and even easier to find others who agree with us. But all these lead to us ultimately being cheated and becomes an obstacle in our spiritual life; a point my own Guru Maharaja reminded me of several years ago “any difficulty we find ourselves in are of our own making, to blame others is easy but will serve to hinder us further, the fault is ours so look and rectify it”
The course served to remind me of the importance and life long commitment involved although I feel that this should be covered as it was in my case early on in devotional
life.