Jagadānanda [1950-2024]

Jagadānanda - bitter sweet memories

Controversial as Jagadānanda [1950-2024] was, he was also a very interesting man and I learned a lot from him. 

Despite his linguistic talent it is sad that he never had the patience to translate any of the Goswamis granthas A-Z. He started many things but never finished anything but Rupa Goswami's Hamsaduta. He not only had huge linguistic talent, he had a witty style of writing too. My Gurudeva Sadhu baba did not like him and later it became clear why, when Jagadānanda started writing some really offensive things on the internet. Our relationship was chequered to say the least.

I first met Jagadānanda in Vrindavan on October 1, 1982. My diary of that day states: "While returning from darśana I meet another western bābājī in Banki Bihari Bazar — this must be Jagadānanda! I stop him and ask: "Are you Jagadānanda? I am Advaita dās, a disciple of Nikunja Gopāl Gosvāmī." I walk with him (back) to Keśī Ghāt Ṭhor, where he is staying. He finds I took dīkṣā a bit too fast.

Later I have a dispute with Jagadānanda about gaura-mantra, but I get support from our mutual friend Madhusūdana, who writes me from Navadvīpa: "Nikunja Gopāla Gosvāmī is a great devotee, an expert lecturer, a good musician and a nice person. Concerning the one-ness of Gaura and Kṛṣṇa, don't worry, Śrī Raghunātha dāsa Gosvāmī says: śacī sūnuḥ nandīśvara pati sutatve — "O mind! Know the son of mother Śacī to be the son of the king of Nandīśvara (Kṛṣṇa)!"  Jagadānanda is not satisfied though. 

Jagadānanda once tells me he visited Śrīdhara Mahārāja at Kholer Ganj when Mahārāja asked him: "What was your name again in ISKCON?" Jagadānanda: "Hiraṇyagarbha Mahārāja." "So, what happened?" "Well, as you know Hiraṇyagarbha means 'the golden egg'. Now what happened? The egg broke and Jagadānanda came out!" 

Jagadānanda comes daily to Kālidaha to teach Bengali to me, Rādhā Ramaṇa and Jagadīśa, in my room, and takes me to Jai Singh Ghera for lectures of Ananta Dās Pandit, so it is through Jagadānanda that I came to know Ananta Dās Pandit since I never heard of him before.

    Jagadānanda moves from Keśī Ghāṭa Ṭhor, where he is accused of breaking sadācāra, to Jagadīśa, who lives in a small temple between Bihārījī and Kālidaha. There he gets into a brawl with Jagadīśa about his Christian books. According to Jagadīśa, Jagadānanda was reading these books himself too; he doesn’t want to take śikṣā from Jagadānanda—"I only accept teachings from a siddha." 

Jagadānanda wants to take bhekh from Premānanda Śāstri, a very old and highly learned Bābāji who lives close to Sevā Kunja, behind Rādhā Dāmodara temple. Premānanda Śāstrī scolds him out of the door: "Idiot! What do you need bhekh for?! Aren't you living in Vraja? Isn't that enough?!"

After Ananta dās Panḍit's pāṭha in Jaisingh Ghera, Jagadānanda quickly picks up the mṛdaṅga, so that he can lead the kīrtana. In this way I hear the kīrtana-pada "Jay Jay Rādhe Kṛṣṇa Govinda" for the first time. Later, in Śṛṅgāra Bat, Jagadānanda sermons to me and Rādhā Ramaṇa: "Now we are all playing Rūpa and Sanātana here in Braj, but let's see where we are after five years!"  "Or ten..." I add. "Let's see if I can get my visa extended." Jagadānanda: "Oh, that's the least important thing!" That is an enlightening and relieving remark. Jagadānanda smiles when we complain about the large numbers of Rāmānandīs in Braj and explains: "They are here because Tulasī dās wrote his Hindi Rāmāyaṇa here."

    I sometimes visit Jagadānanda in Śṛṅgāra Baṭ, where he lives between rats and monkeys, in a small first-floor room. Once he tells me: "When I was still a sannyāsī in ISKCON, I thought Madhusūdana's escapades were amusing, and I thought the paramparā-idea was also interesting. But I felt there was more (siddha praṇālī), so I asked Madhusūdana, (looking at him over his glasses): "But there's something more, isn't there?" Madhusūdana nodded. "Do you have it?" Silence is a sign of agreement. At that moment I was ready to run out with him!" Jagadānanda beams.  

When I lament to him about the hard life in Vraja he says: "You have great attachments to bhukti and mukti." According to his diary he doesn’t think highly of me.

Jagadānanda comes daily to my room over the parikramā mārg, I see him coming from my window. Jagadānanda thinks I should read simple Bengali books. like Manindranath Guha's Bengali translation of Ānanda Vṛndāvana Campu. 

One day in Śṛṅgāra Baṭ Jagadānanda apologizes for not chanting so much: "Ah, some bābājīs tell you that you can't get Kṛṣṇa without chanting four or five lakhs. Well, I just laugh at that!" Outside of Jaisingh Ghera Jagadānanda says: "Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the kunja!"

Jagadānanda and I share our love for śāstra and we memorize entire chapters of the Bhāgavat. I am learning Gopī Gīta (Bhāgavata 10.31) and Veṇu Gīta (Bhāg. 10.21) and I tell Jagadānanda of the four Gītas. Jagadānanda knows three (Gopī Gīta, Veṇu Gīta and Yugala Gīta (Bhāg. 10.35) and I remind him of the fourth, the Mahiṣī Gīta (Bhāg. 10.90). Jagadānanda dismisses it: "That's not Vraja-bhāva." Jagadānanda points out a very interesting thing in the Bhāgavata: prathama pūrva rāga, the gopīs' first love for Kṛṣṇa, as early as during the killing of Dhenukāsura, in SB 10.15.42-43. The gopīs offer pūjā to Kṛṣṇa with the lotus flowers of their eyes as Kṛṣṇa returns with the cows in the afternoon.

October 29, 1982 — Niyam Sevā starts, my first one in Vraja. Jagadānanda goes to Rādhākuṇḍa, after getting on my case for taking prasāda (bālya bhoga) in Jaisingh Gherā without bowing down to Ananta dās Paṇḍit at the end of his lecture-series. What could I do? Offering praṇāma also means making a chat with Ananta dās Paṇḍit and I am too shy for that, plus I don’t know Bengali. 

       November 1982, Navadwip - On Jagadānanda’s desk I find two big maps with his English translations of Rūpa Gosvāmī’s Vidagdha Mādhava in the one and Lalita Mādhava in the other. Bliss!! Long cherished desires are fulfilled! Finally access to the Gosvāmīs’ books! I read both books greedily. Jagadānanda used some hippy terms in his translation, that cause loving indignation in Madhusūdana. Kṛṣṇa tells Lalitā, who asks him for a bribe, so that He can meet Rādhikā: "Look, Lalite, I'll tell you what we'll do. I meet you somewhere in a lonely place tonight and we'll do it up!" 

 Jagadānanda also wants to publish Śrī Rūpa Gosvāmī's Haṁsadūta with financial aid of Gadādhara Prāṇa, who helps translating.

 Jagadānanda and Rādhā Ramaṇa arrived from Vraja to Jagat's room in Navadvip. They wake up as I enter. Madhusūdana asks Jagadānanda about the terms he uses in his translation of Vidagdha Mādhava and Lalita Mādhava: "What's all this — spilling the beans? doing it up?" Rādhā Ramaṇa has jaṭās and a beard, like Bābā and some of my Guru-bhāis. I personally find it too austere not only to stop cutting but also combing and washing my hair. "To increase the tamo guṇa" Jagadānanda says dismissively.

Once a group of Bengalis pull my chador off my shoulder in downtown Navadwip and throw it on the dirty street as I walk past Govinda Bāri. Furiously I complain to Jagadānanda, who wisely says: "You see, they will never change. You have to change."

I read in Jagadānanda's diary: "The problem is that BS (Bhaktivedānta Svāmī) made them (his disciples) so proud (with his, and thus their, constant claims on emancipation)." 

One day Jagadānanda visits Sadhu Baba's āśrama and starts a Sanskrit recital in the godown which to my surprise seems to never end. Jagadānanda’s learning is very impressive, but he also knows how to show it off. After a while Bābā and me look at each other as if we’d better go and do something else because there seems to be no end to it. Later Bābā says: এত পড়িবার পরিশ্রম ! আমি শুধু রাধারসসুধানিধি, এই যে বিলাপ, গীত গোবিন্দ, কৃষ্ণ কর্ণামৃত, ভাগবত ও গীতা পড়ি “All that reading! I read only Rādhārasa Sudhānidhi, this here Vilāpa, Gīta Govinda, Kṛṣṇa Karṇāmṛta, Bhāgavata and Gītā.” 

Jagadānanda thinks I would learn colloquial Bengali fastest by reading ISKCON’s Bhagavad-darśana magazine. 

Once Bābā gives darśana to Jagadānanda and me in the parṇa kuṭīra. Bābā sits on the wooden bed and we on the floor as he warns Jagadānanda: “দেখ জগদানন্দ বাবা, ভাগবত জাগতিক মানুষের হৃদয়ে জাগ্রত হয় না - Look, Jagadānanda Bābā, the Bhāgavata does not awaken in the hearts of the worldly”. Jagadānanda regularly tours Bengal, reading the Bhāgavata to a few sleeping widows, without even getting his travel expenses covered. Bābā clearly does not want me to do that.

Jagadānanda tells me once: "The guru need not suffer the karma of his śiṣyas when he does harināma." If guru and/or śiṣya don’t take harināma he does not know what will happen."

When I once visit Jagadānanda, he greets me with a broad grin and the phrase advaitaṁ hariṇādvaita, Advaita, who does not differ from Hari. Once I see him in a temple in Navadvīpa with raised arms, taking part in a kīrtana. I can imagine that they call him a sahajīya in ISKCON. 

Jagadānanda sometimes visits Sadhu Baba's ashram to help me and explain the situations described in Ujjvala Nilamani I borrowed from him.

One day I meet Jagadānanda near the Janmasthāna in Prācīna Māyāpura, when I walk towards him I see he shakes his head, as if thinking: "This one is really wacky!" I realise how I must look: Long hair, beard, naked and thin body with 'Rā-Dhā' written on the chest with Rādhākuṇḍa-tilaka in Bengali script, bare foot, bare legs and only a short bhakta-dhoti above the knees. And indeed, as we cross each other he calls me 'advaita avadhūta' (instead of Nityānanda Avadhūta), a wild holy wanderer. I feel flattered actually.

June 21, 1983 — Jagadānanda and I go to Pāṇihāṭī for the Ciḍa-Dahi Utsava of Dāsa Gosvāmī. We go per train to Birganja, the birthplace of Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura, where Lalita Prasāda passed away. It used to be the Kālī-temple of Bhaktivinoda's family. On the second floor is the temple, with Bhaktivinoda's Gaura-Gadādhara deities. I ask Jagadananda why Bhakta Mā, Lalita Prasāda successor, a woman, wears a paitā (brāhmaṇa-thread). Annoyed, Jagadānanda says: "Prabhu just put it on her to show that such a thread has absolutely no value!" I ask: "Then why is he decorating his best disciple with something so useless? Why doesn't he tell everyone to take it off instead? Good riddance!"

June 22, 1983 — Arriving in Pānihāṭi for the Danda Mahotsava we must walk down a long road to reach the bank of the Gaṅgā. On the way Jagadānanda starts a kīrtana, playing karatalas. He is annoyed that the Bengali bhaktas sing in unison with him instead of following his lead, or sing a completely different tune. Due to stomach problems I can hardly relish and participate in the kīrtana, and Jagadānanda calls to me 'vanchita!', "You’re deprived!", while circumambulating the sacred tree with Gadādhara Prāṇa in the wild kīrtana. Later Jagadānanda sits himself under the Banyan-tree, exactly on Nitāi Cāṅd’s spot, showering his blessings on the devotees.

Early August 1983 Jagadānanda invites me to move in with him. I find it egocentric that Jagadānanda keeps a diary. He says, however: "This is a good way to do your own līlā smaraṇa". His diary also contains entire pages of Sanskrit and Bengali text. Somewhere he writes—"If I fall down, I wonder if I would have the courage to write it in this diary."

Jagadānanda spends one whole night composing a Sanskrit Rādhikāṣṭakam. I know some devotees who can read Sanskrit, but Jagadānanda can also compose in Sanskrit! In the morning Jagadānanda takes rest, not disturbed by the mosquitos, and I study and admire the product of his nocturnal labor, his Rādhikāṣṭakam.

Jagadānanda memorizes Saṅkalpa Kalpadruma, for ever-ready manjarī-sevā smaraṇa, and when he sees I am memorizing Vilāpa Kusumānjali he decides to do that too after Saṅkalpa Kalpadruma. He helps me translating it into English and does it very nicely. Jagadānanda has some sympathy for me because I am a book-lover like him. Since I have no ṭhākura he advises me to serve the book Bhāgavata. "Just like with a ṭhākura you can offer Him ārati and bhoga, put Him in bed, dress Him in a silken cloth, and even swing Him!" I start doing it modestly with my small Gīta Press Bhāgavata.

Jagadānanda: "The verse api cet sudurācāro from the Gītā (even the greatest miscreants are saints when they exclusively worship Me) actually applies to the whole of India." kṣipraṁ bhavati dharmātmā does not refer to a few seconds or minutes. It may take lifetimes." When I ask Jagadānanda about his favourite book he says: "Caitanya Caritāmṛta, because it contains the essence of all the Gosvāmīs' teachings and Vedic literature. Mahāprabhu's līlā is also most sweetly described here. I read it all the time. I could have only this book." He really knows the book through and through.

Jagadānanda once tells me: "There was once a rikshawala who used to bring bābājīs to the ponghot. When he saw how they were eating kṣīra, puris and laḍḍus without doing any work, he thought: "Why should I work like a slave for just some rice and dāl?" So he just dressed like a bābājī and joined them!"

October 1983 - Jagadānanda and Gadādhara Prāṇa arrive in Vṛndāvana. They invite themselves to come and live with Rādhā Ramaṇa and me in his tiny room in Kalidah. It is far too small for four people. We clash at once with them on gaura-tattva. Rādhā Ramaṇa and me are anti- and Jagadānanda and Gadādhara Prāṇa are pro-gaura bhajana. We ask Jagadānanda to translate Rūpa Gosvāmī's Nikunja Rahasya Stava, a detailed description of Rādhā and Kṛṣṇa’s love game, for us. He doesn’t say yes or no, but does say: "It is not sure if it is written by Rūpa Gosvāmī because it is not his style. Madhusūdana thought the Sanskrit greatly resembled Prabodhānanda Sarasvatī's style. For some reason it is also not included in Stavamālā." After a few days Jagadānanda and Gadādhara Prāṇa go to Rādhākuṇḍa for Niyam Sevā.

October 18, 1983 — On the second day of Niyam Sevā I spontaneously leave for Rādhākuṇḍa with just 3 Rs and a gāmchā with me! When I arrive Ananta dās Panditji is just giving pāṭha about Rādhā Rasa Sudhānidhi in the kīrtana-hall east of the kuṇḍa. It is so beautiful and real! With great difficulty I find a place near the entry. I see Jagadānanda sitting in the back. After pāṭh Jagadānanda grins: "He (Ananta dās Paṇḍit)'s an avatāra!" Jagadānanda manages to get me into his place in Tin Kuri Bābā's āśrama on the south bank of the kuṇḍa. He takes me to his little room on the roof of the āśrama, from where there is a sublime view of Śrī Rādhakuṇḍa. I feel blessed with this place. Jagadānanda has a small Giridhārī and two books with him like a bhāvārthānuvāda of Kṛṣṇa Bhāvanāmṛta. We all have to do 3 hours kirtan in Tinkuri Baba's place at Rādhakuṇḍa to keep our place to sleep. Jagadānanda reads and makes notes during the kīrtana. 

Once he gets up in the middle of the night to go on Girirāja Parikramā. I read in his diary: "The bābājīs are being paid for this kīrtana. That means: no money, no kīrtana." He rejects it in full, but we also need food and shelter, so we have to sing along. I suggest: "Doing kīrtana for money is not mentioned amongst the ten offences", but Jagadānanda says "It becomes a fruitive activity, which is the eighth offence—and even if you would not agree to such interpretation, and it was not mentioned amongst the ten offenses, it is obviously wrong to chant for money!" Sadhu Baba would agree on it. He takes an ice cold bath in the kuṇḍa early every morning and translates Rūpa Gosvāmī's Nikunja Rahasya Stava for us. 

One day Jagadānanda tells me I shouldn’t have taken dīkṣā from such a caste conscious brāhmaṇa and even that I should leave my Guru! (what about ācāryam mām vijānīyam?) "You shouldn't, like your Guru-bhāis, let this life pass in vain and take initiation as a mere formality or social custom (am I doing that then, doing non-stop bhajan at Rādhākuṇḍa?)." "But you are cleverly steering between the gṛhasthāśrama and the tyāgī-āśrama. You're officially not under a vow, but you have the freedom to go where you like and use all the facilities offered to sādhus in India."

Jagadānanda has big plans: In his diary I see he wants to do 3 lakhs a day — 96 round in the morning, 64 at noon and 32 in the evening.

Jagadānanda is making a big show-off in a kuṭīr next to the Banyan-tree opposite Kuṇḍeśvara Mahādeva, loudly crying and calling: "Rādhe Rādhe!" I see and hear it from the roof of Tin Kuri Bābā's āśrama. 

One evening, as we go to hear Ananta dāsjī's Dāma-bandhana pāṭha in the Rādhā Ramaṇa Mandir, I tell Jagadānanda: "You can never have real Kṛṣṇa conscious experiences in the company of others." Jagadānanda wholly disagrees: "It is just in the company of others that you can share Kṛṣṇa-conscious experiences." Introvert vs extrovert.

October 27, 1983 — The strict Hindu sādhu in our little room, who goes daily on Girirāja Parikramā, wants racial segregation when a Bengali bābu is pressed into it. Indian gṛhi with Indian tyāgi and Westerse gṛhī (with only a gaṁchā and 3 Rs) with Western tyāgī. Jagadānanda jumps up and leaves in protest. I come with him, but later Jagadānanda makes up with Vanamālī (“I blew it again...”), who allows him back in but not me! 

Back in Navadwip, December 1983 - At Rādhākuṇḍa Ananta dās Paṇḍit had requested Jagadānanda to translate a booklet of his guru Kunja Bihārī dās Bābājī, named Manjarī Svarūpa Nirūpaṇa (definition of the status of a manjarī), into English and the result already lies on his desk, on the usual large white sheets, writing with a fountain-pen.

December 19, 1983 — I protest against the gaura aṣṭakāla līlā the bābājīs have introduced — "Svarūpa Dāmodara, Rūpa and Raghunātha in Navadvīpa! And even as gṛhāsthas! Zigzag silken dhotīs! It's almost an insult!" "Why not?" Jagadānanda says. "This is nitya līlā, not prakaṭ līlā!" "But this līlā is not mentioned anywhere in the Gosvāmīs' books!" I protest. 

December 20, 1983 — Jagadānanda puts on big tilaka, asks me to help cooking and cleaning and, while eating his self-made khichuri on the kitchen floor, looks at me sternly and says: "You can only stay if you completely obey me. If I do anything in the household you should consider that my mercy upon you. There is no question of a friendly relationship between you and me. There is only a relationship of master (I) and servant (you) possible between us. You seem not to be good enough to live with your guru. Now you must regard me as your guru, at least as the authority in this house. You must bow down every morning for me, and if I do anything in this house you should regard this as my mercy upon you - " I don’t hear the rest anymore, I have already run out through the kitchen door, which is opened behind me, to Prācin Māyāpura to tell Bābā everything. Bābā nods his head about all this dambha and ahaṅkāra.

December 21, 1983 — Jagadānanda comes rushing into the āśrama, looks at me with startled eyes and asks: "Is your guru mahārāja here?" "Yes, he is over there", I say. He rushes past me, towards Bābā. Curiously I follow him and see him falling at Bābā’s feet to ask forgiveness: আমি আর কোনো ভজন করতে পারলাম না। এটা সব বন্ধ ছিল | আমি তখন বুঝতে পেরেছিলাম যে আমি অদ্বৈতের কাছে দাবি করে আপনার কাছে একটি অপরাধ করেছি যে সে আমাকে তার গুরু বলে মনে করে । “I could not do any bhajana any more. It was all blocked. I understood then that I had committed an aparādha to you by demanding from Advaita that he regards me as his guru." Bābā clearly won but externally He is indifferent, shrugs His shoulders and says: অপরাধ কিসের? (No offense taken) আচ্ছা, আমি পাযখানা যাচ্ছি ! OK I am going to the toilet!" Jagadānanda bows down to a few of my equally indifferent Guru-brothers and then leaves. 

February 8, 1984 — During a big kīrtana for Madan Gopāl's Mandir I am lovingly coerced to dance, though I’d rather not, since I’m tired and because my dhoti is not tied properly. When I am afraid that my dhoti, under which I wear no underwear, is falling off, making me dance naked, as a foreigner, in front of a huge crowd, I want to sit down, but the ecstatic bhaktas won’t allow that and force me to go on dancing. I get in panic but nothing happens. Later I tell Jagadānanda, who smirks and says: "You should have just kept on dancing!" and quotes the Bhāgavata: unmādavan nṛtyati loka-bāhyaḥ "The devotee dances like mad, without bothering about public opinion.” We both have a good laugh.

April, 1984 - Jagadānanda, freshly shaven, visits the ashram and, when he hears that Bābā is sitting in his private quarters, he rushes in, like a bear in the china-cabinet. A little later he emerges again and says: "Your Gurujī is steeped in meditation". Later Bābā gently asks me to ask Jagadānanda not to disturb him in his own quarters. Another embarrassing incident.

Rādhākuṇḍa, June 1985 - I get a postcard from Jagadānanda in Navadvīpa. "I'm thinking of giving up sannyāsa and going back to the west. Can we understand Camatkāra Candrikā? Even if you're in māyā, you're still very fortunate to be at Rādhākuṇḍa." Shortly after that, Jagadānanda indeed gives up sannyāsa and returns to his native Canada.

February 2000, returning to Rādhākuṇḍa after 9 years absence, I visit Anantadas ji in his ashram. We speak in Bengali; a wonderful exchange of praises starts. Panditji is surprised to hear me speaking Bengali so fluently (much better actually than in the '80s), and asks me আপনার দেশে কত বাঙ্গালী লোক আছে? ("How many Bengali people are living in your country?") কেহ নাই ("Nobody"), I reply. I then return the compliment by saying that Jagadānanda told me that I should learn Bengali by going to the lectures of one Ananta dās Paṇḍit. To this Ananta dās Paṇḍit says: "There are two foreigners who know Bengali — Jagadānanda and Advaita. Jagadānanda used to attend my pāṭhas with a khātā (notebook)."

October 2, 2003, Navadwip - First-ever darśana of Madana Gopāla Gosvāmī. He tells me that he offered Jagadānanda to do pārāyaṇa at his place but after some time he complained "Why are you sitting higher than us?" Then he told him: "I am a kulina brāhmaṇa - I should not even take water from your hand, but still I let you do pārāyaṇa here. You cannot give pārāyaṇa any more. dainya is the life of bhakti. maryādā rakṣaṇa hoy sādhura bhūṣaṇa (“Upholding etiquette is the ornament of a sadhu” Mahāprabhu told Sanātan Goswāmī in CC Antya 4). We have been doing these ceremonies here for 70 years.” Jagadānanda came back a little later and offered apologies. From Canada he wrote him: "I cannot appear before you anymore. That Jagadānanda that stood before you is no longer there."

19 February, 2004 - Ananta dās ji told his sisya Acyutananda that once Jagadānanda lectured in front of an audience of senior Vaiṣṇavas in Braja, including Ananta dās Pandit and said: “You know why I became a devotee of Mahāprabhu? Because He’s not a Hindustāni!” Ananta dās told him later that that remark was really off and he should not lecture anymore.

My last meeting with Jagadānanda in the flesh was on Sunday, December 16, 2007. My diary of that day says:

At 3 p.m. I am awoken by Sakhicharan, who comes with none other than Jagadānanda, whom I have not met in the flesh for some 23 years. He's a lot older of course, but also still very much the same guy as back then - jovial, upbeat, occasionally flashing a naughty grin while laughing loudly about his own jokes. He bows down and embraces me. He will assist Satya-Nārāyaṇ Panditji as an editor and seems to be quite in demand as a productive scholar. Interestingly he speaks about the synthesis we western Vaiṣṇavas have to make, between Indian/Hindu/Vedic culture and our efficient western cultures.

     Jagadānanda joined webforums long before me, and when we both join Gaudiya Discussions in 2002 it becomes clear how devious his thoughts were. A sample -

Jagadananda Thursday, May 18, 2017 reacting to a blog of mine from 2008 

I think that the desire to be a guru is another side of spiritual ambition, the genuine desire for spiritual achievement; one's desire to achieve the end is accompanied or sullied by the desire to be recognized for one's realization or achievements, pratishthasha. There is nobody who can claim to be free of this, except for someone on the highest stages." I think that is complete nonsense - there are 1000s of devotees with great talents who are perfectly happy in anonymity.

Overall, throughout his writings on the internet, Jagadānanda showed himself to be a rationalistic sceptic, thus committing the nāmāparādha of sruti sāstra ninda, and an avid sahajiya, a sexually obsessed monist. I have a record of my online refutations of his main apasiddhāntas and aparādhas but this would make this blog too large. Jagadānanda leaves a very mixed heritage.

adāntasyāvinītasya

vṛthā paṇḍita-māninaḥ

na guṇāya bhavanti sma

naṭasyevājitātmanaḥ

Srimad Bhagavat, 10.78.25

"His study of the scriptures is like an actor’s studying his part, for he is not self-controlled or humble and vainly presumes himself a scholarly authority, though he has failed to conquer his own mind."