What I'm thinking

The Origin of the English word "Chant"

The word chant in English comes from Latin cantare. Cantare is a frequentative verb. A verb is a "doing word" - a word that signifies an action. Latin has the concept of frequentative verbs - words that signify an action along with a sense of repetition.

To form the frequentative version of a verb you take the passive past participle - in this case cantus ("was sung"), the passive past participle of canere ("to sing"), and turn it into a regular first declension verb - so: cantare - "repeatedly singing".

Cantare became the ancestor for the word "to sing" in Romance languages, losing its sense of repetition along the way. Spanish cantar and canciónero, and French chanter and chanteuse are the equivalent of English sing and singer.

The English word for cantare, cantar, and chanter is "sing" - a word of German origin (note the single syllable "frank" nature of the word).

In English the word "chant" entered English in the Middle Ages through religious Latin and the practice of Gregorian chant - Gregorian plainsong.

So "chant" in English, carries with it the idea of repetition, monotony, and a religious overtone.

In Spanish, Hare Krishna devotees say "cantamos las rondas" - literally "we sing rounds", referring to the repetition of prayers with a rosary. In English it is "we chant rounds". In Spanish, they say: "Cantamos kirtan" - "we sing kirtan". In English either "singing kirtan" or "chanting kirtan" are used, but when I discussed chanting with a classical singing teacher, her conception was that it was something like Gregorian plainsong, until I played her a recording of kirtan.

How Cantare lost its sense of "repetition" in Romance languages

Cantare, the verb that carries the idea of repeated singing, became the ancestor of the word for singing in Romance languages - cantar in Spanish, chanter in French. Why did cantare become the ancestor of the word for "sing" in the Romance languages, rather than canere? And how did it lose its sense of repetition along the way?

Cantare replaced Classical Latin's canere in daily usage in Vulgar Latin (Latin of the people - vulgaris) because it is easier to conjugate than canere.

Inflection

The frequentative verb is always first declension. Latin is an inflected language, which means that verbs take different forms depending on who is performing and when they are performed. English, in contrast, generally uses the same form of the verb (with a bunch of exceptions), modifying it with prepositions and pronouns.

For example:

English:
To sing
I sing
You sing
He sings
We sing
You all sing
They sing

Spanish:
cantar
yo canto
tu cantas
el canta
nosotros cantamos
ustedes cantan / vosotros cantáis
ellos cantan

You can see that in Spanish the verb takes a different form depending on who is performing it - so much so that you could drop the pronoun and still understand what was being said (compare: "canto, cantas, cantamos" with "sing, sing, sing"). In English there are only two forms - an inflected (modified) form for the third person singular ("he sings"), and just one form for everyone else. English is so weakly inflected that it is for all intents and purposes uninflected. Some verbs retain stronger inflection, a holdover from Old English, which was a inflected Germanic language - take "to be" for example:

To be
I am
You are
He is
We are
You are
They are

Here there are four forms of the verb in the present tense.

Languages tend toward laziness over time. I'm not sure how they get to be so complicated in the first place, unless it points to a massive energy event at some point in the past (aliens teaching humans to speak?). Anyway, leaving that aside:

Because canere is more work (memorisation) to conjugate, and cantare on the other hand is regular and belongs to the most commonly occurring class of verbs, it naturally became the word of choice.

Look at it like this: looking back at the examples of "to sing" and "to be"; do you think it would be easier to learn and use "to sing" or "to be"? To sing, of course - it's much more regular. Now, given two words that mean roughly the same thing - one regular, one irregular, which will become the word of choice? The path of least resistance, of course.

So cantare became the word of popular choice (Vulgar). As it did that, it lost its repetitive sense as a frequentative version of canere, and instead became a standalone verb meaning simply "to sing", at least in the Romance languages (Italian, Spanish, French, etc). As a late import into English via the church, which as an artificial language environment is more conservative, it retained its frequentative sense and gained a religious overtone.

I have a bunch of realisations from this tour, as well as my world tour that immediately proceeded it. Hopefully I'll get some time to write them down in the next few weeks.

Right now, though, I'd just like to say that the principle realisation from the tour with Amala Kirtan is that ability, or even lack of ability, is secondary to quality as a human being. That was the lesson that I learned from Amala Kirtan.

A brief thought for today on Bhagavad-gita 2.2:

The Supreme Personality of Godhead said: My dear Arjuna, how have these impurities come upon you? They are not at all befitting a man who knows the value of life. They lead not to higher planets but to infamy.

- Bhagavad-gita 2.2

The Sanskrit for this verse is very nice:

Krishna delivers a Mortal Kombat combo repartee to Arjuna's presentation in the first chapter. The relevant part: anarya-jushtam asvargyam
akirti-karam.

Three terms, each begins with a, each ends with am. They roll off the tongue with both alliteration and rhyme. It's a poetical tour de force, as well as a damning condemnation:

anarya-jushtam - "worthy of the non-Aryans", in German the "untermenschen". The original Aryan master race were focused on metaphysical reality beyond the superficialities of the phenomenal world. Their gaze was focused on a future beyond this life.

asvargyam - "leading not to the heavenly planets" - part of that focus was on the destination in the next life. The Nordic "See you in Valhalla" parting before going into battle conveys the mood - our actions in this life might lead us to death, but they will carry us through it to a glorious destination beyond.

akirti-karam - "the cause of infamy". From kirti "fame", we get kirtan "glorification". Even if you aren't killed, or you don't worry about your destination in the next life, in this life you are not going to get the glory this way.

All three of these appeal to either Arjuna's innate psychology or else his cultural conditioning. It's a powerful combination, psychologically and linguistically.

Purusottama-masa - the Vedic "leap-month" that appears once every three lunar calendar years to realign the lunar and solar calendars. A time of increased spiritual focus.

Bhagavad-gita 2.1

Sanjaya said: Seeing Arjuna full of compassion, his mind depressed, his eyes full of tears, Madhusudana, Krishna, spoke the following words.

- Bhagavad-gita 2.1

The Vedic culture is not only the source of the Swastika and the actual "Aryan Race", they are also the original grammar Nazis.

In this verse we find what may superficially appear as a fault. If you cast your mind back to the encounter between Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu and Kesava Kasmiri, you may recall that the Lord identified the Sanskrit grammatical fault of punar-atta in Kasmiri's poetry. Punar-atta, meaning something like "having again", is the fault of redundancy - of unnecessary repetition.

In the case of the first verse of the second chapter of Bhagavad-gita, the redundancy is there in both the original Sanskrit and Srila Prabhupada's English translation: idam vakyam uvaca madhusudhana - "Krishna spoke the following words".

Well, what else would have done with the words? Eaten them? It would have been sufficient to say: "He said:", even "He said the following"; but "He spoke the following words"?

Each of the verses in the Gita conforms to a particular meter, and a particular rhyming structure. It's poetry, more it's a song (gita). Maybe the author had to stretch the line out to make the verse fit? However, at the same time that it is song, it is sutra - a word that means thread. The words of the text are like beads strung on a thread. From looking at the beads, you can determine the underlying thread. You don't need beads stacked back to back, just enough to be able to connect the dots. It's Vedic file compression. Punar-atta, redundant repetition, is a major style failure.

So what to make of it? "He spoke the following words".

The significance of this repetition is that His words have multiple layers of meaning. That is the meaning that is encoded within this construct.

I'm not sure who it was who came to this conclusion after pondering this verse, but this was my meditation this morning at the temple as I woke the Deities.

While doing the arati, Tirtharaj prabhu, the Temple President was singing the kirtan, and he sung the song "Hari Haraye Namah Krishna". When he got to the line "Sri Jiva Gopala Bhatta Dasa Raghunatha" I was just at the Six Goswamis on the altar, and the following, related story came to mind.

Once a scholarly devotee came to visit Rupa Goswami in Vrndavan. At that time Rupa Goswami was working on his book Bhakti-rasamrita-sindhu ("the ocean of nectar of devotional mellows"). Rupa showed him what he was writing, and asked him what he thought. The visitor replied: "Your writing is very good, but I am unsettled by what you are saying. Here you have written that karma and jñana are like demons that must be exorcised from the heart. However, Vedic scriptures teach about karma (action) and jñana (knowledge), so it seems that your writing contains the fault of sruti-sastra-nindanam 'blasphemy of Vedic literature'."

Rupa Goswami replied, "very well, your judgement is sound and I will take out this part". His visitor then took his leave to take noon bath in the nearby river. When he did so, he was approached by Rupa's young nephew Jiva, who had been listening earlier. "Excuse me," said Jiva, "but I could not help overhearing your conversation. You did not correctl interpret what was being expressed in my uncle's statement. What he wrote was that the desire for karma and jñana is unwanted, and must be exorcised from the heart. The Vedic literature does not encourage people to get into these things, but rather shows them how to do them in a way that helps them disentangle themselves and purify their hearts of the desires that impel them into them in the first place. My uncle's statement is not a blasphemy of Vedic literature, but rather points to the heart of it, and encourages his reader to give up attraction to the distracting superficialities of this world and to dive deep into the heart of reality."

"Oh, you are quite right," responded the visitor. "Your explanation has made it very clear." He returned to the house and told Rupa: "please do not remove that statement from your book - your nephew explained it to me and now I understand the subtle distinction and deep point that you are making."

Later, when the visitor had left, Rupa Goswami chastised Jiva, telling him: "You are simply proud of your learning and sharp intellect and are puffed up. If I had acquiesced to the brahmana's wish, where does it put you to then reverse that? There is no room here for this proud intellectualism! There is no place for it at all!"

Crestfallen, Jiva left Vrndavan for parts unknown. Rupa was upset at Jiva, and upset at himself, but he was steadfast in his determination that the boy should not be spoilt, and that chastising was a necessary duty.

Some time later, while continuing work on his book, Rupa inquired from his elder brother Sanatana: "What would you say is the highest religious duty?"

Sanatana replied: "Jiva-daya"

This means both "to be merciful to the living entities", and "to be merciful to Jiva". Rupa Goswami took the point, and gladly went with his brother Sanatana to retrieve their nephew Jiva from where he had ended up. They found him after some time in a cave where he had been crying for the days since Rupa had chastised him and sent him away from Vrndavana. Nearby villagers took them to the place where the mysterious renunciant had been seen and heard to be.

Is there a point to this? There are a lot, no doubt; but simply to remember these things is purifying in so many ways. Three stories of grammatical errors, or apparent errors: Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu and Kesava Kashmiri, Bhagavad-gita, and Rupa and Jiva Goswamis.

Purusottama-masa ki jay!

Back at work after two weeks away. Somehow things seem to have gone on without me... which brings to mind this poem:

There Is No Indispensable Man
by Saxon N. White Kessinger, Copyright 1959

Sometime when you're feeling important;
Sometime when your ego's in bloom
Sometime when you take it for granted
You're the best qualified in the room,

Sometime when you feel that your going
Would leave an unfillable hole,
Just follow these simple instructions
And see how they humble your soul;

Take a bucket and fill it with water,
Put your hand in it up to the wrist,
Pull it out and the hole that's remaining
Is a measure of how you will be missed.

You can splash all you wish when you enter,
You may stir up the water galore,
But stop and you'll find that in no time
It looks quite the same as before.

The moral of this quaint example
Is do just the best that you can,
Be proud of yourself but remember,
There's no indispensable man.

The Apostle speaks rather of the song in the heart than of that which the lips utter. It is evident that all cannot sing with the voice, and even if one had musical skill there are many times and occasions in which he could not appropriately give it expression. It is also evident that the mere singing of the voice is nothing if the heart does not accompany it, at least in the ears of God and the Angels. We often ourselves speak of beautiful voices which render music exquisitely and with perfect technique, which yet to our thinking have no soul in them. We say we had much rather have less perfect execution and more sincerity of expression.

Some of you no doubt remember the story of the poor old monks in an obscure convent who used to make such bad work of singing the Magnificat at Vespers that all musically sensitive people would have been distracted by it. One evening a young brother from a distant convent came to the place and joined with the brethren in their Vesper hymn. His voice was so pure, so clear, so angelic as it seemed to them that all stopped to listen to him, and he alone sang through the Virgin's song. Then all the old monks thanked God for permitting them this once to have sent up to heaven such worthy music. That night the Angel of the Lord appeared to the venerable prior and said to him, "Why sang ye not our Lady's song to night?"

In amazement and perplexity the prior answered that indeed the Magnificat had been sung, and more beautifully than ever before. "Nay," said the Angel, "it never came up to heaven. So sweet and holy is the sound of the Vesper hymn when the brethren of this convent sing it as they are wont, the Angels of the Lord cease their own singing that they may hearken to the voices of men; but this night no sound of Magnificat came to our ears."

So the brethren learned that music is only beautiful in heaven when it comes from the heart, and for praising God the quality of man's voice is as nothing in comparison of the devotion of his spirit. Beautifully says St Augustine the same thing: Non vox sed votum non chordula musica sed cor Non cantans sed amans cantat in aure Dei. Which perhaps we may render:

Thus the mere sounds of our musical service are worth nothing with God save as they are accompanied by the deep devotion of the soul and the true melody of heaven is the sweet utterance of the love of the heart for its Lord.

- "With a song in the heart", and other sermons, preached in St. Ignatius' Church, New York, by the Rev. Arthur Ritchie, 1890

This is the fifth post in my series on Building a Krishna Conscious "Mega Church". See also the previously published Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, and Part 5.

Note: Since I wrote this a couple of weeks ago, I've been thinking about various programs that we are doing here in different venues. In the case of the temple I think Children is Function 2 after sound. In the case of the Sunday Feast and Krishnafest at our house I think that Presentations is Function 2. This doesn't mean that one is more important than the other, it's just the order of implementation. In the case of the Sunday Feast, for example, Presentations is a low-hanging fruit. On the other hand there are not facilities for easily spinning up a Children's Program there. In the case of the temple, there are plenty of children, and potential facilities for a Children's Program, so there it's both easier, and a greater imperative.

Also, someone mentioned a kitchen in response to an earlier post, the one about Sound. I have put a kitchen in a separate category of functions, and we'll come back to it later. OK, on with today's show...

Function 2 - Children

I'm going to go out on a limb here and put Children as function 2, rather than Presentations. In places like Gaura Yoga [website] and the Loft [website] in New Zealand they focus on Sound and Presentations, and have no facility for children. That works fine as center for young, single people. But eventually those young, single people are going to become married couples with children, so they will need some facility.

That doesn't mean that Gaura Yoga and the Loft will have to transform, but the organization will have to build out its capability to service those needs in some facility.

Personally, in working within an existing community, I'm focusing on sound first, then children second, rather than presentations.

My friend Krishnapada put it like this: "If McDonalds have facilities for children I think we should too".

Think about this. Let's say that you have a facility to which 400 adults and youths will come at a time. Let's say that half of them are married couples. So that's 200 people, or 100 couples. Let's say that on average they have 1 child - some will have none, some will have two or three. That's 100 children for 400 people.

Of course you could have a facility that is not child-friendly, but that's hardly making it easy, is it?

Here are two other points:

1. People sometimes ask me why I am so enthusiastic in Krishna Consciousness. It's simple. When I was a kid my mother raised me reading the Bible, and then sent me every weekend and every school holiday to a Bible camp, school holiday program, or youth group event, where they poured resources, attention, and intention into the program and the children on it. If you want to influence the value structure of a generation of devotees then you have to look after the kids. If you want to keep recruiting first generation devotees who were raised as atheists, then don't worry about them.

2. If you want parents to come back, then you provide something for their kids. McDonalds understand this. Krishnapada told me that his 4 year old son Shyam points to McDonalds and says: "I want to go there", just from seeing it from the outside - he's never been in. It's so attractive. McDonalds understands: get the kids, and you get the parents. Now, if you can give the children a valuable formative experience based on solid moral principles and values, what parent is going to say no to that?

For children's facilities you actually need more personnel, energy, money, and planning than you do for the adults. Children require more diversity of activities and facilities. You cannot put 400 children together in a big room for an hour and deliver one experience for them all. They need to be segregated and provided with an age-appropriate experience.

At Buckhead Community Church, which has facility for 3000 adults, they have one auditorium for the adults, and four floors of facilities for the children.

Each of those floors contains age-appropriate facilities for children from toddlers through to teenagers. On the first floor for the younger children they have a small stage/auditorium area where they do a Wiggles-type presentation [wikipedia article on the Wiggles], before splitting the children into groups in rooms where they play with toys and do other activities. In this way they have both a large group experience and a small group experience each week.

You can see a bunch of pictures and a video that I took of the young children's facilities when I visited this church in 2007 here.

At Buckhead, which is one of Andy Stanley's churches, along with Northpoint Community Church, they understand that people have different needs at each phase of life, for example, as a child, as a new believer, as a newly-wed, as an adult, as a father, etc. They distill this down to three essential messages that they repeat the these people over and over again in a variety of ways. For the youngest children it boils down to: "God Loves Me. God Made Me. Jesus Wants to Be My Friend For Ever".

Taking a cue from this, each year since he turned 5, I've taught Prahlad an additional prayer that we recite each night before sleeping. We now recite four prayers together (actually 5, because I also taught him Our Lord's Prayer from the Bible). In these prayers I have encapsulated what I discern as the essential devotional philosophical underpinnings that are most appropriate for him to imbibe at that time.

The Maha Kirtan for Kids program [poster | program] here on September 13 is the beginning of this. We've got the sound system to a certain level now, and it's time to put some energy into our program for the children.

The current temple design that we are working with has zero, as in no facility for children. It's based on a design for a bunch of single people to cram into an ashram and go out until they flame out.

A purpose-designed facility has sufficient spaces to facilitate age-appropriate programs for the number of children who come based on the number of adults who are facilitated. The program that goes on in that facility needs to dedicate sufficient resources as in personnel and money to that program to make it work.

For the older youths there is a section upstairs, as mentioned previously, with their own sound system and stage, and also break out rooms for small group discussions. It's an expanded version of a Loft preaching center, like Gaura Yoga or the Loft in New Zealand.

Conclusion: Invest heavily in children's facilities and programming.

Next: Function 3 - Presentations.

This is the fifth post in my series on Building a Krishna Conscious "Mega Church". See also the previously published Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, and Part 4.

Function 1 - Sound

The first function that the facility has to facilitate (that's why it's called a facility - it's a form that makes a particular function easy) is the chanting of the Holy Name.

The environment must be designed around sound vibration - after all, this movement is meant to be all about sound. Forget about turning to India for state-of-the-art sound design. You can get your subject matter from there, but delivery is a Western contribution.

The main space has to be acoustically designed. This is a science, but it's not rocket science. Auditoriums are tuned for sound. The space needs to be designed from the get go for acoustics, or it needs to be repurposed with acoustic materials, such as baffles and acoustic panels.

Next, it needs to be wired for sound. The model here is any environment which is purposed for sound, such as an auditorium, a concert hall, a nightclub, etc. There needs to be a multicore running down the length of the facility, either under the floor on in the wall. A multicore is a huge snake cable with thirty or forty cables inside it.

You need a massive mixing desk, multi-band graphic eq for the room, compressors and multi-effects units, and a number of wireless rigs. Sound is what it's all about.

The thing about technology, and this is from years of personal experience, is that there is a sweet spot that you have to reach to take advantage of it. Before you get to that sweet spot the technology creates as much interference as it does benefit. Let me give you some examples: When your microphones keep feeding back, or the cable malfunctions unless it's held at an angle, or the output of your power amp doesn't scale sufficiently, your technology gets in the way as much as facilitates. When you lay down the bucks and have a graphic eq, noise gate, a compressor, and a wireless hypercardioid mic, all that goes away, and all you get is the crisp, clear sound of the message, with no distraction by the medium. When your singers can't hear themselves and strain to sing and miss notes, when your mrdanga player can't hear what's going on and misses a change, when there is too much treble in the sound reinforcement and not enough power (bass), when the sound distribution is uneven (loud at the front and inaudible at the back), when there are speakers or ugly stands between the people and the kirtan party, technology is not helping you. When you lay down the bucks and mount speakers out of line of sight at front and back with a 180 degree phase difference, with distributed subwoofers, and provide foldback for the performers with in-ear monitors with dedicated mixes, then all that goes away and all you get is the experience of the kirtan, with no distraction by the medium.

You have to spend big on this to make it happen, and when you do, the results are awesome. No-one but the most observant goes away saying: "Wow, did you see that they were using in-ear monitors?" The technology has reached the sweet spot and become transparent. They just go away saying: "That was the best kirtan ever!" If you introduce a low level of technology then people will notice it. They'll go away complaining about the microphone or the sound.

The facility needs a dedicated sound mixing area and sound engineers. I visited Buckhead Community Church in Atlanta, Georgia, where I participated in their morning worship service (you can check out my photos and videos of the opening service here). They had two engineers working a desk halfway back in the auditorium. Basically the design there was like any number of dedicated auditoriums that I played in in bands as a teenager. In a tour of the facility afterwards I was shown an area on the third floor where the youth have their own worship service with their own band. They had their own stage, own PA system with mixing console (all smaller than the main one, but much more developed than ISKCON temple I've seeen), and their own lighting rig.

I got my start in audio engineering at the Sandringham Baptist Church on end of my block on Mt Albert Rd in Auckland, New Zealand. The church sound man, Clem, gave a number of training sessions for interested persons in the congregation, to develop a sustained sound engineering capability for the church. When you see me rolling cables using that particular technique, that's his training.

Now you can say: well, there is no way that we can do all that. But guess what: it can be done, and I'm going to prove it.

A Culture of Music

Above I mentioned getting the subject matter for the sound. Of course, any sound system is going to be worthless without something to put through it. A zero amplified even a million times is still zero. Something out of time and out of tune just sounds worse when it's miked up.

In order to field a powerful experience for people, it's necessary to have a vibrant culture of music. This takes investment of resources - time, energy, and money.

Where you spend your money and time is where you will see growth. Creating a long-term culture of music takes short to medium term investment with no immediate return.

Quality instruments need to be purchased and maintained. Events and artists need to be sponsored. Cultural exchange needs to take place. Seminars need to be held.

Australia's biggest Christian megachurch, Hillsong [website], started life in 1983 as Hills Christian Life Centre. In 1986 they started an annual music conference, called Hillsong. By the early 90s this music conference had reached a stage of momentum where CDs were released. These CDs became wildly popular and the church rebranded itself as "Hillsong", since that was what they were known for.

When I visited Buckhead Community Church in Atlanta, Georgia in 2007 I met with the music director, a hip young guy in jeans carrying an electric guitar. When I told him I was visiting from Australia he revealed that he and three other members of the church band had just returned from a visit to Hillsong.

Conclusion: Invest in sound.

Tomorrow: Function 2 - Children.

This is the fourth post in my series on Building a Krishna Conscious "Mega Church". Part 1 can be found here, Part 2 can be found here, and Part 3 can be found here.

Functions of a Krishna Consciousness Facility

I'm going to add a note in here, in response to the feedback that has been coming in about this series so far.

I mentioned earlier that I had let part of this series escape via Twitter. What I said there was: "I don't want a building that looks Indian. I'll take one designed for sound, kids, parking, and presentations, thanks".

I followed that up shortly afterward, after a bit more thought, with: "of course, if it has all that, I don't really mind what it looks like #functionbeforeform"

The point is not to say that "making something look or feel Indian" is wrong. The point is that this is not the exclusive, or even primary consideration; and if this if this is the only or primary conception of function, and other functions are neglected, then don't be surprised by the outcome that such a design produces.

It's important to remember that this is a discussion about function, and thence emergent form. Merely discussing form without a deep consideration of function will lead to a superficial analysis, and an inability to make any real difference.

That's my note. Thanks for the feedback, keep it coming in. Now back to our regularly scheduled programming...

I'm not going to go into a deep discussion about the different factors that lead me to these conclusions. Many people have their opinion, and they are welcome to them. Mainly these have been inspired by studying deep, multi-year success stories, so if you want to change my opinion, have some of those ready, or be prepared to hold you opinion strongly enough to make one.

Function 0: Parking

The zeroth function (in the sense of a precondition for the first) that the facility has to facilitate (you see where that word comes from now?) is parking. If you are expecting/want people to come, then you have to facilitate that. Take a look at any shopping center, any amusement park, any concert venue. They want people to come, they facilitate that - they make it easy.

You can get away without parking facilities, but really you want to make it easy, right? That's why you're building a facility - to facilitate certain functions. The most basic one is for people to come.

Tomorrow: Function 1 - Sound.

This is the third post in my series on Building a Krishna Conscious "Mega Church". Part 1 can be found here, and Part 2 can be found here.

A Brief Analysis of ISKCON Temple Design

Let's look now at ISKCON temple design.

Any discussion of the form of a temple design obviously requires a discussion of the function of an ISKCON temple, because one implies the other.

Let me just do two things here.

First of all, if you read anything on the Internet, you'll have read people complaining that ISKCON temples today are filled with expatriate and descendent Indian congregations, and have very few people from the native population of the host country. True? Anecdotally, and from my observation also.

Part of this may be due to the design of the temple. Allow me a flight of fantasy here. The envisioned functionality of the temple is: "Let's make something that looks really Vedic", where Vedic means Indian. In the 70s, when teenagers and youths were looking for something exotic and Indian, having the most authentic Indian-looking temple was the most effective way to attract them. In the 21st century when authentic Indian is no longer such a strong draw card, that form remains attractive to expatriate and culturally Indian persons.

In support of this idea, my second thing. Let me tell a story. It comes from, by memory, Srila Prabhupada Lilamrita. Someone may be able to provide the reference.

The devotees bought Watseka Ave, the site of the LA temple. Previously it was a church. Srila Prabhupada told the devotees to leave the chairs in to allow visitors to sit comfortably and hear lectures on Krishna Consciousness. After this he left and continued travelling. When he next returned to Watseka Ave he found the devotees had actually ripped out all the chairs and laid down a marble floor, to make a bona-fide "Vedic" (read: Indian) temple. Srila Prabhupada was very displeased with this.

The relationship between the two? A disparity in envisioned functionality of the facility, and hence emergent form. The devotees wanted the facility to fulfill the function of "bona-fide Indian experience". Srila Prabhupada wanted it to perform the function of "effective outreach facility".

The replication of this approach to functionality and form, that the form of the temple should serve the functionality of being more authentically Indian, has lead to the standard ISKCON temple form... which functions today to attract large Indian congregations and not many Westerners.

Rather than catalog a list of "all the things that are wrong" with ISKCON temple designs, I am going to go back to basics, and examine functionality first, then work forward to envision the form that follows that functionality.

Tomorrow: Functions of a Krishna Consciousness Facility.