Abhay composed a Bengali poem, “Vṛndāvana-bhajana.” Its opening stanzas were especially self-reflective and personal.

1

I am sitting alone in Vṛndāvana-dhāma.
In this mood I am getting many realizations.

I have my wife, sons, daughters, grandsons, everything,
But I have no money, so they are a fruitless glory.
Kṛṣṇa has shown me the naked form of material nature;
By His strength it has all become tasteless to me today.
Yasyāham anugṛhṇāmi hariṣye tad-dhanaṁ śanaiḥ:
“I gradually take away all the wealth of those upon whom I am merciful.” How was I able to understand this mercy of the all-merciful?

2

Everyone has abandoned me, seeing me penniless –
Wife, relatives, friends, brothers, everyone.
This is misery, but it gives me a laugh. I sit alone and laugh.
In this māyā-saṁsāra, whom do I really love?
Where have my loving father and mother gone now?
And where are all my elders, who were my own folk?
Who will give me news of them, tell me who?
All that is left of this family life is a list of names.

3

As the froth on the seawater mixes again in the sea,
Māyā-saṁsāra’s play is just like that.
No one is mother or father, or personal relative;
Just like the sea foam, they remain but a short time.
Just as the froth on seawater mixes again in the sea,
The body made of five elements meets with destruction.
How many bodies does the embodied soul take in this way?
His relatives are all related merely to the temporal body.

4

But everyone is your relative, brother, on the spiritual platform.
This relationship is not tinged with the smell of Māyā.
The Supreme Lord is the soul of everyone.
In relation to Him, everyone in the universe is the same.
All your relatives, brother! All the billions of jīvas.
When seen in relation to Kṛṣṇa they are all in harmony.
Forgetting Kṛṣṇa, the jīva desires sense gratification,
And as a result he is firmly grasped by Māyā. …

On an October visit to Delhi, Abhay received a donation from Kaviraj Baidya Nath Sircar, to be used for printing one thousand copies of Back to Godhead. Abhay promptly produced an October 20 issue of Back to Godhead with the donor’s name on the front page. It was the first issue in two years. Another donor, Mr. Subodh Kumar Kapoor of Ramalal Kapoor and Sons, followed Mr. Sircar’s example and donated one thousand copies for the November 20 issue.

The front-page article in the November issue was “Truth and Beauty.” An editorial in The Times of India, speculating on whether truth and beauty were compatible, had opined that truth was not always beautiful but often ugly and unpleasant. Abhay disagreed: “Truth is so beautiful that many sages, saints, and devotees have left everything for the sake of Truth. … but we are habituated to love untruth from time immemorial in the name of truth.” Abhay agreed, however, that mundane truth and beauty were incompatible. Not only was mundane truth not beautiful; it was not truth. And mundane beauty was not real beauty. To explain, Abhay told a story.

Once a man fell in love with a beautiful girl, who tried to resist the man’s advances. When he persisted, she requested that he wait for seven days, after which she would accept him. During the next seven days, the girl took a strong purgative and laxative and repeatedly passed stool and vomited. She stored the refuse in buckets. Thus “the so-called beautiful girl became lean, thin like a skeleton and turned blackish in complexion and the beautiful eye balls were pushed into the sockets of the skull.”

The man appeared on the scene well dressed and well behaved and asked the waiting girl, who was depressed in appearance, about the beautiful girl who called him there. The man could not recognise the waiting girl as the same beautiful girl whom he was asking for. The same girl however was in a pitiable condition and the foolish man in spite of repeated assertion could not recognise her. It was all due to the action of the medicine only.

At last the girl told the powerful man all the story of her beauty and told him that she had separated the ingredients of her beauty and stored them up in the reservoirs. She also told him that he could enjoy the juices of beauty stored up in the reservoirs. The mundane poetic or the lunatic man agreed to see the juices of beauty and thus he was directed tothe store of loose stool and liquid vomit which were emanating unbearable bad smell and thus the whole story of beauty liquid was disclosed to him.

Abhay went on to assert that literature which did not describe the ultimate truth and beauty of the Supreme Person was no better than stool and vomit, even though it be presented as poetry and philosophy.

In “Standard Morality,” Abhay explained, “Morality is the standard of activity by which the Supreme Authority is satisfied.” The scriptures contain moral codes prohibiting unholy sex relations, animal slaughter, intoxication, and gambling. Abhay attributed Mahatma Gandhi’s success as a public leader to his observance of these moral principles. Abhay also praised the Vedic system of marriage: “after the attainment of puberty a woman wants a male, and if she is not married within that time and allowed to mix up with boys, … it is quite natural that there is every chance of fall down either by the boy or the girl.” Despite changing social conditions, Abhay argued, “You cannot indulge in unholy connection with the opposite sex [just] because the social conditions have changed. Because unholy connection with woman is the beginning of all immorality.”

In “Scholars Deluded,” Abhay presented a critical review of Dr. Radhakrishnan’s edition of Bhagavad-gītā, citing specifically the thirty-fourth verse of the Ninth Chapter, wherein Lord Kṛṣṇa declares that one should always think of Him and become His devotee. Dr. Radhakrishnan had commented, “It is not the personal Krishna to whom we have to give ourselves up utterly, but the unborn, beginningless eternal who speaks through Krishna.” Although the obvious meaning of Bhagavad-gītā was that one should surrender to Kṛṣṇa, the Supreme Person, impersonalists like Dr. Radhakrishnan obscured the direct meaning with their word jugglery.

On the disappearance day of Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī, Abhay keenly felt separation from his spiritual master. He perfectly understood that Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta’s instructions were more important than his physical presence and that, in fact, the spiritual master was present within his instructions; in this way, Abhay had always been with his spiritual master. Yet on this annual day, Abhay could not help feeling loss. He remembered how in 1932 he had been a gṛhastha and a new disciple. At that time he had not been free to do as much service as now. Yet it had been in those years that he had been able to see his spiritual master, offer obeisances before him, eat the remnants of his prasādam, walk beside him, hear his voice, receive his personal glance. Abhay thought of their meetings together.

How powerful had been Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta’s mission! His presses had been running day and night, printing magazines, books, the daily Nadiyā Prakāśa. And Europe had been a promising new preaching field. With Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī Ṭhākura at the helm, the Gaudiya Math had entered into battle against māyā’s forces, and Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta had made all his disciples unafraid. Abhay had always been eager to serve his spiritual master, to serve within the Gaudiya Math with its headquarters in Calcutta. But exactly how he would serve had never been clear to him until his last letter from Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī.

Abhay looked back on the more than twenty years since his spiritual master’s disappearance. The Gaudiya Math had been undone by its leaders, and everyone else had scattered like leaves in a storm. It was an unspeakable loss. And it was an old story – how the big sannyāsīs had disregarded their spiritual master’s instructions and had intrigued, disputed, litigated. Violent party factions, false leaders claiming to be world ācārya – and which party had been right? No, both had been wrong, all wrong, because the Gaudiya Math had disintegrated. Now there were dozens of little maṭhas and no preaching, no real preaching as before, when he, Siṁha-guru, had cast fear into the Māyāvādīs, had led an army of young, powerful preachers to march throughout India and the world. And the greatest sufferers of the Gaudiya Math’s dissolution were the people, the nondevotees, who had little hope of being delivered from the batterings of māyā. Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī had begun a spiritual revolution, but that revolution had now been overthrown by māyā. The scattered particles of the Gaudiya Math had settled quietly into self-satisfied, insular, almost impotent units. And it was the people in general who suffered.

Abhay groped after memories of his spiritual master. He felt secure in that his own relationship with Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī was intact, continuing. Yet he felt helpless. He was diligently pursuing his spiritual master’s order to preach in English, yet without his spiritual master’s physical presence he felt small and very much alone. At times like this, he questioned the wisdom of having left his family and business.

Lamenting Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta’s absence and the fall of the Gaudiya Math, he composed a Bengali poem, “Viraha-aṣṭaka.”

Śrīla Prabhupāda, you are always compassionate towards the suffering jīva souls.

On this occasion of your separation, I see only dejection.

An unlimited ocean of mercy, cutting an illusion, Nityānanda distributed an ocean of flood of love of God.

The jāti-gosāi stopped the stream,

But coming yourself, Lord, you revealed this illusion.

So once again everyone was immersed in the flood of love,

Even one so fallen, insignificant, and sinful as I.

On the strength of Lord Caitanya’s order

You sent all of your servants door to door as gurus.

There was preaching everywhere, from the sea to the Himalayas.

Now, in your absence, everything is darkness.

O Śrīla Prabhupāda, you are always compassionate towards the suffering
jīva souls.

On this occasion of your separation, I see only dejection.

In the same way that Advaita Prabhu brought Lord Gaura,

so did Bhaktivinoda pray.

His enthusiasm brought you; on the strength of his enthusiasm you came

And made everyone understand that India is a holy land.

One who takes his birth in the land of Bhārata

Must make his life perfect and then preach to others.

This mahā-mantra message you preached everywhere.

Now in your absence, Lord, everything is darkness.

Your ocean of compassion has again been stopped.

This spear of great misery has cut through my heart.

Without Lord Caitanya’s message, there is just confusion.

Seeing this, all the Vaiṣṇavas feel pangs of separation.

The conditioned souls are all in darkness once again.

They are searching for peace, but are dying in an ocean of anxiety.

O Śrīla Prabhupāda, you are always compassionate towards the suffering jīva souls.

On this occasion of your separation, I see only dejection. …

Abhay’s was a dark view. The golden era of preaching that had flourished in the days of Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī was no longer. “By the influence of māyā,” Abhay wrote, “now everything is darkness … All devotional instructions have been destroyed. … now everything has been reversed.” Meditating on that great personality possessed of the divine power to save the entire world, Abhay expressed his feelings of weakness and helplessness: “Because of those not fixed in devotional service, many branches have spread all over … Your conclusive message did not touch the ear / Where will I get the strength for the saṅkīrtana movement?” How could he, a tiny spiritual child, survive without his spiritual father? Now who could save the world, which was so much more oppressed than ever before?

Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta had said that a dead man could not preach; only one with life could preach. As long as Abhay and others could deeply regret the Gaudiya Math’s failure, there was still life and still hope: “If everyone obtained this right and went out and made disciples, / Then the suffering souls in the world could be saved.” It was useless to cry over what his Godbrothers had done, yet in seeing and resenting it, Abhay found, within the pain of what might have been, a continuing spark of what still might be.

Abhay sent this poem and “Vṛndāvana-bhajana” to Keśava Mahārāja, who published them in the Gauḍīya Patrikā.

One night Abhay had a striking dream, the same dream he had had several times before, during his days as a householder. Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī appeared, just as Abhay had known him, the tall, scholarly sannyāsī, coming directly from the spiritual world, from Kṛṣṇa’s personal entourage. He called to Abhay and indicated that he should follow. Repeatedly he called and motioned. He was asking Abhay to take sannyāsa. Come, he urged, become a sannyāsī.

Abhay awoke in a state of wonder. He thought of this instruction as another feature of the original instruction Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī had given him at their first meeting in Calcutta, the same instruction that his spiritual master had later solidified in a letter: become an English preacher and spread Kṛṣṇa consciousness throughout the Western world. Sannyāsa was for that end; otherwise, why would his spiritual master have asked him to accept it? Abhay reasoned that his spiritual master was saying, “Now take sannyāsa and you will actually be able to accomplish this mission. Formerly the time was not right.”

Abhay deliberated cautiously. By accepting sannyāsa, a Vaiṣṇava dedicates his body, mind, and words totally to the service of the Supreme Personality of Godhead, renouncing all other engagements. He was doing that already. Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī had offered sannyāsa to his leading disciples so that they could continue his mission; they hadn’t done it. Preaching in the West had proved perilous even for the Gaudiya Math’s most recognized sannyāsīs. How could he, a mere householder, presume he could succeed where the others had failed? He was hesitant. The helpless, incapable feeling he had expressed in his “Viraha-aṣṭaka” was there. But now his spiritual master was beckoning him – over all other considerations, even over natural humility. Now, although he was elderly and alone, the desire to preach just as his spiritual master had preached remained within him, a fierce though sometimes quietly expressed determination.

The Vedic standard and the example set by the previous ācāryas was that if one wanted to lead a preaching movement, sannyāsa was required. Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta had taken sannyāsa to facilitate his missionary work. Lord Caitanya had taken sannyāsa to further the saṅkīrtana movement. Of course, Lord Caitanya was the Supreme Personality of Godhead, but when His young students had been disrespectful towards Him, treating Him as an ordinary man, He had taken sannyāsa. Because a sannyāsī is automatically respected, Lord Caitanya’s acceptance of sannyāsa was a calculated tactic; as soon as He began traveling throughout India as a sannyāsī, He immediately attracted thousands of followers to the saṅkīrtana movement.

Knowing that many cheaters would accept the saffron dress and abuse the respect given to sannyāsīs, Lord Caitanya had advised against accepting sannyāsa in the Age of Kali. He knew that cheaters, in the guise of sādhus, would act immorally, accumulate funds for their own sense gratification, and make many followers simply to enhance their own prestige. Posing as swamis, they would cheat the public. Because the people in Kali-yuga are unable to follow the rules and regulations of sannyāsa, Lord Caitanya had recommended that they simply chant Hare Kṛṣṇa. However, if a person could actually follow the rules, and especially if he had to spread the saṅkīrtana movement, sannyāsa was necessary.

Abhay first had to approach one of his Godbrothers for permission. He decided to turn to Bhaktivilāsa Tīrtha Mahārāja (formerly Kuñjavihārī), the leader of the Chaitanya Math in Calcutta. Abhay still thought of the Chaitanya Math as the headquarters of his spiritual master’s mission. During the heated legal disputes, the Chaitanya Math had been the most prized acquisition, and since 1948 it had been under the legal ownership of Bhaktivilāsa Tīrtha Mahārāja. Now, although each sannyāsī had his own place or places, the Chaitanya Math and Bhaktivilāsa Tīrtha Mahārāja legally represented the Gaudiya Math entity. Abhay felt that if he were to take sannyāsa and go preach in America, he should give the Chaitanya Math the first opportunity to support his work. In April 1959, Abhay wrote to Tīrtha Mahārāja, inquiring about sannyāsa and the Chaitanya Math’s printing some of his manuscripts. And since no one was going abroad, he volunteered to do so on behalf of the Chaitanya Math.

Bhaktivilāsa Tīrtha Mahārāja replied that Abhay should first join the Chaitanya Math. He mentioned the strife that still lingered: “Those who are acting against Chaitanya Math, they are motivated by their individual ambitions.” Anyone who was against the Chaitanya Math, he said, was acting illogically and against the instructions of Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī. So according to Tīrtha Mahārāja, the thing for Abhay to do, the thing he had neglected to do for so many years, was to join the Chaitanya Math and act under his direction. Tīrtha Mahārāja mentioned several members of the Chaitanya Math who had recently accepted the sannyāsa order, and he said that Abhay could also become one – in time. He invited Abhay to come reside at the Chaitanya Math: “The houses that we have, there are rooms that are airy and well lit. We will treat you exclusively. There won’t be any difficulty. We will take care that no inconveniences are caused.” But as for printing books:

We are eagerly awaiting to print the books like Satsandarbha, Vedanta, based on devotional service, and many other rare books by the goswamis. First we will print them. Books written by you will be checked by the editorial staff, and if the funds can be raised, then they can be printed according to priority. The books will be printed only if they are favorable for the service of the Caitanya Math. Therefore, if the fund is raised, then there is a plan to go abroad as well.

Abhay was not encouraged. The main difficulty, he felt, was the Chaitanya Math’s shortage of funds.

Śrīla Prabhupāda: I was working with my broken typewriter. I went to our Tīrtha Mahārāja: “You give me a room and print my books. Give me some money. I will join you.” I had thought, “This is Guru Mahārāja’s institution.” He did not say no, but the printing of books was a difficult task for him. He had no money. He was hardly collecting for maintaining. Printing of books is a big job, and there is no guarantee of sale.

Without printing books and going to the West, sannyāsa did not have meaning for Abhay. And who knew when Tīrtha Mahārāja would sanction his taking sannyāsa? There was no point in going to Calcutta just to reside in an airy, well-lit room; that he had already in Vṛndāvana. Abhay wrote back to Tīrtha Mahārāja, mentioning his direct order from Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī to preach to the English-speaking people. He wanted to go to the West right away, and he had thought the Chaitanya Math would welcome his offer. Both Abhay and Tīrtha Mahārāja had their responsibilities, but perhaps they could work together to carry out the desire of their spiritual master. Abhay asked Tīrtha Mahārāja to reconsider. On May 7, 1959, Bhaktivilāsa Tīrtha Mahārāja wrote back.

My suggestion is don’t make any hasty decisions. For the time being you stay with us and engage yourself in the service of the society and then accept tridanda [sannyāsa]. The purpose of accepting tridanda is to serve the society.

If that is your desire then Sri Caitanya Math will decide about your going to America to preach and make all the arrangements. It can never be the principle of the society to let one act according to his individual attempt or desire. The society will decide after consulting with the heads what is to be done by whom. This is what I want to say. First of all, it is necessary to identify oneself with the society.

In order to preach in America or in other foreign countries, it is important to have a dignified organization in the background and secondly it is necessary to establish one’s self in India before going to preach in the foreign countries.

Now it is that there are no conferences or meetings in the West as before. Communication is done through the media of television.

Abhay could understand the needs and priorities of the Chaitanya Math, but he could not allow them to overrule what he considered the highest mandate: preaching as Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī had ordered. Abhay had offered his services to the leaders of the Chaitanya Math, thinking they might also see things his way. He thought that with the world’s crying need for Kṛṣṇa consciousness staring them in the face, they might see that this Abhay Bābū was convinced and enthusiastic and so should be sent right away with whatever he required. But they had other priorities.

Abhay next turned to Keśava Mahārāja in Mathurā, and Keśava Mahārāja told Abhay to take sannyāsa immediately. After corresponding with Tīrtha Mahārāja, Abhay had felt some uncertainty about accepting sannyāsa, and now that he was being encouraged so strongly, he resisted. But Keśava Mahārāja was insistent.

Śrīla Prabhupāda: I was sitting alone in Vṛndāvana, writing. My Godbrother insisted to me, “Bhaktivedanta Prabhu, you must do it. Without accepting the renounced order of life, nobody can become a preacher.” So he insisted. Not he insisted; practically my spiritual master insisted. He wanted me to become a preacher, so he forced me through this Godbrother: “You accept.” So, unwillingly I accepted.

Keśavajī Gaudiya Math was located in the midst of one of Mathurā’s downtown bazaars. Its main entrance, an arched doorway, led into a courtyard, open to the sky through a metal grating above. The architecture was similar to that of the Vaṁśī-gopālajī temple. The atmosphere was secluded, as in a monastery. Abhay was a familiar, welcomed figure here. He had lived here, written and studied in the library here, edited the Gauḍīya Patrikā, and donated the Deity of Lord Caitanya who stood on the altar beside the Deities of Rādhā and Kṛṣṇa (Śrī Śrī Rādhā Vinodavihārījī). But his visit during September of 1959 was not an ordinary one. He entered the maṭha dressed in white, Abhay Bābū, but he would soon be leaving dressed in saffron, a swami.

Abhay had been living as a renunciant for nine years; there was no need for him to observe a ceremony or to proclaim himself a sādhu by changing to saffron dress. But it was the paramparā system that a man take tridaṇḍi-sannyāsa at the end of his life. He was aware of the cheating sannyāsīs; even in Vṛndāvana he had seen so-called sādhus who did not preach but simply spent their days hunting for capātīs. Some “swamis” of Vṛndāvana even indulged illicitly in what they had supposedly come here to reject: sex life. Such persons were making a mockery of sannyāsa. And there were the caste gosvāmīs also, who lived like ordinary householders, running temples as a business to support their families and accepting honor and donations from the public on the false basis of birth. Abhay knew of these abuses of sannyāsa, but he also knew the real purpose of sannyāsa. Sannyāsa was for preaching.

On the morning of September 17, 1959, in the fifty-by-twenty-five-foot Deity room on the second floor of the Keśavajī Math, a group of devotees sat before the Deities of Rādhā-Kṛṣṇa and Lord Caitanya. The Deities were colorfully dressed in royal clothing and silver crowns. Rādhārāṇī’s right hand faced palm-forward in benediction for the worshiper; at Her side, Her left hand held a flower for Kṛṣṇa. Kṛṣṇa stood like a dancer, placing His right leg in a casual tiptoe pose before His left, playing His long silver flute, which He held gracefully to His red lips. His long black hair reached down past His shoulders, and the garland of marigolds around His neck reached down to His knees. On His right stood the Deity of Lord Caitanya, His right arm raised, left arm at His side, His body straight, feet together. He was a soft golden color, and He had large eyes, a well-formed red mouth, and straight black hair down to His shoulders. One level below the Deities were pictures of the spiritual masters in disciplic succession: Jagannātha dāsa Bābājī, Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura, Gaurakiśora dāsa Bābājī, Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī, Bhaktiprajñāna Keśava Mahārāja.

Abhay sat on a mat of kuśa grass beside ninety-year-old Sanātana, also to receive sannyāsa that day. Sitting opposite the two candidates, Nārāyaṇa Mahārāja, Keśava Mahārāja’s disciple, prepared to conduct the ceremony of mantras and offerings of grains and ghee into the fire. Akiñcana Kṛṣṇadāsa Bābājī, Abhay’s Godbrother, known for sweet singing, played mṛdaṅga and sang Vaiṣṇava bhajanas. Sitting on a raised āsana, His Holiness Keśava Mahārāja presided. Since there had been no notices or invitations, only the maṭha’s few residents attended.

Nārāyaṇa Mahārāja chanted the required mantras and then sat back silently while Keśava Mahārāja lectured. Then, to everyone’s surprise, Keśava Mahārāja asked Abhay to speak. Abhay had not expected this. As he looked around at the gathering of devotees, he understood that the common language was Hindi; only Keśava Mahārāja and a few others spoke English. Yet he knew he must speak in English.

After Abhay’s speech, each initiate received his sannyāsa-daṇḍa, the traditional head-high staff made of four bamboo rods bound together and completely enwrapped in saffron cloth. They were given their sannyāsa garments: one piece of saffron cloth for a dhotī, one for a top piece, and two strips for underwear. They also received tulasī neck beads and the sannyāsa-mantra. Keśava Mahārāja said that Abhay would now be known as Bhaktivedanta Swami Mahārāja and that Sanātana would be Muni Mahārāja. After the ceremony, the two new sannyāsīs posed for a photo, standing on either side of their sannyāsa-guru, who sat in a chair.

Keśava Mahārāja didn’t impose any strictures on Abhay; he simply encouraged him to go on preaching. Yet Abhay knew that to become A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami did not mean merely that he was giving up family, home comforts, and business. That he had done five years ago. Changing from white cloth to saffron cloth, from Abhay Bābū to Bhaktivedanta Swami Mahārāja, had a special significance: it was the mandate he had required, the irrevocable commitment. Now it was only a matter of time before Bhaktivedanta Swami would travel to the West as Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī had ordained. This was Bhaktivedanta Swami’s realization of his new sannyāsa status.

The Gauḍīya Patrikā’s account of the sannyāsa initiation included a biographical sketch of Śrī Śrīmad Bhaktivedanta Swami Mahārāja, listing the major events of his life. The article concluded:

Seeing his enthusiasm and ability to write articles in Hindi, English, and Bengali, Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Maharaja gave him the instruction to take tridandi-sannyasa. For nearly one year he had been ready to accept sannyasa. In the month of Bhadra, on the day on which Vishvarupa accepted sannyasa, Bhaktivedanta Swami at the Shri Keshavaji Gaudiya Math accepted sannyasa from the founder of the Vedanta Samiti, Bhaktiprajnana Keshava Maharaja. Seeing him accept his asrama of renunciation, seeing this pastime for accepting the renounced order of life, we have attained great affection and enthusiasm.