For a few months in 1993, I attended meetings of the Hare Krishna movement (formally known as ISKCON: International Society for Krishna Consciousness), founded by A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada. The movement worships Krishna, whom devotees regard as the sole incarnation of Brahman, the ultimate reality or God. I eventually stopped attending because I found the daily practices too demanding.
Hare Krishna devotees focus on “bhakti”, or devotional service, to Krishna. Daily practices include:
Chanting the Hare Krishna mantra using prayer beads.Participating in temple worship.Reading scriptures such as the Bhagavad Gita and Srimad Bhagavatam.
Dietary and lifestyle rules are also strict. Devotees are vegetarians and avoid vegetables grown underground, like onions, garlic and sometimes potatoes. They abstain from alcohol, sexual activity outside of marriage, watching TV, going to the cinema or theatre and listening to music not related to Krishna. I found the restriction on music particularly disturbing, as listening to music is one of my greatest joys.
I was even advised to set up a small altar in my flat, with the following items on it:
Deity images or small statues of Krishna.Incense, lamps, flowers and food offerings.
This altar would be a place for prayer, chanting and offering food to Krishna. I was told to treat the images and statues as if they were incarnations of Krishna himself, and to maintain the altar with care and respect.
While I personally found these practices difficult to follow, they reflect a deeply held conviction among devotees that Krishna is a living, eternal, personal deity. Without this belief, such practices could not be sincerely maintained.
From a historical standpoint, however, Krishna’s development raises questions about the claim that he has always been a personal, eternal God. Early Vedic texts, such as the Ṛg Veda (c. 1500–900 BCE), mention deities like Indra, Agni and Varuna, but references to “kṛṣṇa” appear only as an adjective meaning “black” or “dark”, not as a divine figure. The early Upanishads (c. 900–500 BCE) focus on philosophical concepts such as Brahman and Atman, without mentioning Krishna as a historical or personal entity.
It is only in the Mahabharata (c. 400 BCE–400 CE) that Krishna takes on significance in the form of a narrative character, depicted as the charioteer and guide to Arjuna, and divine teacher of the [Bhagavad Gita]. Later, the Bhagavata Purana (c. 300–1000 CE) elaborates on his life and miracles, forming the theological and devotional framework of Gaudiya Vaishnavism, the religion formulated to worship him.
This chronological development suggests that Krishna was not a central figure in early Vedic religion. If he were as significant as later devotees claim, one might expect references to him to be found alongside the principal Vedic deities.
Gaudiya Vaishnava devotees address this textual absence by claiming that Krishna is implicitly present in the Vedas, hidden in symbolic or esoteric passages. This mirrors arguments used in other religions, such as claims that Christ is foreshadowed throughout the Old Testament.
From a critical perspective, this is a form of retroactive interpretation, in which later beliefs are projected onto earlier texts to validate a claim. The reasoning is circular: because Krishna is eternal and supreme, early texts must reflect him, even if they do not explicitly do so.
For literalistic devotees, Krishna is an eternal, historical, personal God. Historical evidence, however, indicates that the figure of Krishna, as fully formed and central, emerges only in later texts. This does not diminish the devotion or spiritual value of practices such as chanting, offering food or maintaining an altar. But it highlights that devotional authority does not rely on the earliest Vedic scriptures.
