7. The next question is:
Did Krishna, while playing humanlike pastimes as the son of Nanda in Vrindavana know
He is God in the same way as He knew it as the son of Vasudeva in Dvaraka, or not?
If you say “yes” then I say He would not have been able to cry tears of fear while He
was being bound with ropes by Mother Yashoda.
It does not look good on learned devotees to explain that He was simply pretending to
be afraid, and that’s why He was crying tears. Only a less intelligent society would
have given such an explanation.
If intelligent devotees would give this explanation then the words of Queen Kunti in
Srimad Bhagavatam 1.8.31 “Mother Yashoda took up a rope to bind You when You
committed an offense, and Your perturbed eyes over flooded with tears, which
washed the collyrium from Your eyes. And You were afraid, trying to hide Your face,
although fear personified is afraid of you. This sight is bewildering to me” would
never contain the word ”vimoha” (enchanted).
The purport of this verse is that Kunti’s conception is aishvarya jñana. That is why
she says that even fear personified is afraid of You. With the words bhaya
bhavamaya sthitasya, that He is afraid by meditating on fear, it is proven that Kunti
finds Krishna genuinely afraid in His heart. If Kunti had thought that Krishna was
simply pretending to be afraid, then she would not have been bewildered.
And if you say “all right, so Krishna did not know that He is God, but then by whom or
what was His eternally perfect blissful omniscience covered over?” then I say: it is
the essence of Krishna's cit or knowledge potency named prema, or love of God, that
covers him over, making Him forget His actual identity.
Although He is ecstasy personified, for the sake of increasing His own ecstasy, just
as avidya, or the ignorance potency of Maya keeps all the living beings bound up in the
material world, making them experience only suffering, and the transcendental
energy yogamaya covers over the God-knowledge of Krishna's transcendental
associates in Vrindavana like Mother Yashoda, making them experience His all-sweet
humanlike pastimes.
There can be no fault in prema covering over His knowledge of His svarupa. Just as
ignorance binds up the conditioned souls with the ropes of mine-ness, giving them
simply misery and making them prisoners bound with ropes and chains that give them
much pain, so also is the body of a respectable person bound by valuable pleasuregiving
clothes and a turban and so on.
In the same way the conditioned soul’s ignorance leads to his misery and Krishna's
ignorance makes Him very happy, because He is controlled by love.
Krishna enjoys great happiness being overcome with prema, just as a honeybee feels
very happy being covered over in the whorl of a lotus. Therefore it is said, “O Lord!
Don’t leave the lotus like hearts of Your devotees!” and, “the devotees have bound
Your lotus feet with the ropes of their love.”
Just as one experiences the five kinds of misery to a greater or lesser extent
according to the amount to which one is covered over by ignorance, so also prema
covers the knowledge and prowess of both its object and subject, expanding in
innumerable ways of transcendental ecstasy.
Because their love for Krishna is mixed with knowledge of His divine prowess, the
inhabitants of Dvaraka like Devaki do not experience as much bliss as pure devotees
like Mother Yashoda and so on do.
The Vrajbasis are experiencing ever-increasing bliss, being bound to Krishna, the
object of their love, by the ropes of mine-ness, that keeps the object and subject of
that love controlled by each other.
Krishna, being bewildered by the love of Mother Yashoda and others, does not know
about His own Godhood. When some disturbance is caused by a demon or by a forest
fire, then Krishna manifests His omniscience, but that is only for the sake of
protecting His devotees, and the lila sakti then makes Him aware of His power.
Previously, in verse 1, it was already corroborated that His inconceivable potency
makes Him able to accept the service offered to Him by the practicing devotees,
even when he is bewildered by loving bliss.
In this way we have considered vidhi marga, raga marga, aishvarya and madhurya and
aishvarya jñana and madhurya jñana. The philosophy of svakiya and parakiya has been
explained in my commentary on Srila Rupa Goswami’s Ujjvala Nilamani.
There it is seen that if one worships Sri Sri Radha Krishna on the vidhi path one
attains aishvarya jñana without differentiation between svakiya and parakiya bhava in
the Goloka sphere within Maha Vaikuntha.
When one is greedy after the madhurya bhava, but one holds onto the vidhi marga,
one attains the position of associate of Satyabhama in Dvaraka’s svakiya rasa,
knowing that Radha and Satyabhama are one.
This is a blend of aishvarya jñana and madhurya jñana. And when one worships solely
on the path of raga, one attains pure madhurya and the position of associate of
Srimati Radharani in Vrindavana’s parakiya bhava.
Although Srimati Radharani is Krishna's very own pleasure potency, and Krishna also
belongs to Srimati Radharani, still one must meditate upon Sri Sri Radha Krishna
within Their pastimes, never only upon Them without Their pastimes.
None of the descriptions of these pastimes, nor any of the scriptures revealed by
the sages has corroborated a marital status for Radha and Krishna in Vrindavana.
Therefore Radha has a parakiya relationship with Krishna, both in the prakata and
aprakata pastimes. In this way the essence of all topics has been briefly described.
7. Now it will be described how the raganuga bhakta gradually advances through the
stages of anartha nivrtti, nistha, ruci and asakti up to the stage of prema and the
direct attainment of the beloved Deity.
In the Ujjvala Nilamani it is said that, “those who are specially attracted to the mood
of the Vrajbasis and thus perform raganuga bhakti, will attain that abundance of
eagerness that is needed for performing raganuga bhajana and will take birth in Vraja
in groups of one, two or three at the same time.”
Here the word anuragaugha means “that eagerness that makes one qualified for doing
raganuga bhajana”. The anuraga mentioned here does not refer to the sthayi bhava
of that name, because the sthayi bhava named anuraga cannot be attained within a
material body.
The words “he takes birth in Vraja” means the sadhaka takes birth from the womb of
a nitya siddha gopika, just as Krishna's eternally beloved gopis appear with Him when
He descends to the earth.
After that, gradually sneha, mana, pranaya, raga, anuraga and mahabhava will become
manifest in the gopika body of that sadhaka, by hearing and chanting and seeing the
greatness of Krishna's eternally liberated gopis. These moods could not possibly
arise in the material body of the sadhaka in his previous birth.
In this way the extraordinary greatness of Krishna's beloveds in Vraja has been
shown.
In Srimad Bhagavatam it is said that the gopis attained the pinnacle of
transcendental bliss by seeing Govinda. Without Him they experienced a moment to
last a hundred ages. Their statement in Srimad Bhagavatam 10.31.15: “Without
seeing You we consider a second to last like an age” is a symptom of mahabhava.
One may ask “Why don’t you say that when the sadhaka attains the stage of prema
and leaves his body, he will take a gopika body in the spiritual world without taking
birth from the womb of a gopika, after which he manifests sneha etc, there in that
body through the association of the eternally perfect gopis?”
The answer here is:
“No, that will not happen, because then one cannot get a harmonious acquaintance
according to the human-like pastimes there, like: ‘whose daughter is this sakhi?
Whose wife is she? Whose daughter-in-law is she?’
‘Alright then’ one may say, ’then what is the harm in taking birth in the aprakata lila?’
Then the answer is no, that also cannot be. Sadhakas or materially conditioned souls
cannot enter into the transcendental manifestation named Sri Vrindavana Dhama.
Only perfected souls can enter it. Even through one’s own sadhana the moods of
sneha and so on are not easily attained.
Therefore those devotees for whom Yogamaya, for the sake of perfecting their
moods like sneha etc, arranges that prema is manifest in them after they take birth
in Krishna's materially manifest pastimes in Sri Vrindavana Dhama and before they
attain Krishna's bodily association, are taken to Krishna's materially manifest
pastimes in Vrindavana.
Because practicing devotees, karmis and perfected devotees can all be seen to enter
into the materially manifest Sri Vrindavana Dhama, it is experienced as both sadhaka
bhumi and siddha bhumi.
Then if you say, “Where will those most eager sadhakas stay after they attain prema
and until they attain a gopika body, after leaving their material bodies?”
Then I answer:
“After the sadhaka body perishes, that loving devotee, who has eagerly desired
direct devotional service for a long time, will at once, by the Lord’s grace, receive the
gift of the desired service and the audience of the Lord and his eternal associates,
just as He once bestowed direct audience to Narada Muni. He will give the sadhaka a
transcendental gopika body.
Yogamaya will make that body take birth from a gopika body in the manifest
pastimes, when Krishna descends to earth with His eternal associates.
There will not be a second delay in that, because the prakata lila goes on without
interruption.
He will take birth in that material universe where Krishna plays His manifest
Vrindavana lila at that time.
Krishna and His associates appear when the loving practicing devotee leaves his body.
Therefore, O greatly eager anuragi devotees, don’t be afraid! Be at ease! All is
auspicious for You!”
8. O Gokulananda! You are enjoying Your pastimes like a honeybee thirsty after the
buds of devotion! You are bewildered and omniscient at once! I offer my obeisances
to You!
O Lord! You personally said:
“I will give My devotees that transcendental intelligence by which they can come to
Me.”
Therefore I pray to you:
“O Vrajendranandana! Give me the intelligence by which I can attain you, as You are
adorned by the gopis’ breasts!”
That raganuga bhakti that is always fully transcendental to all scriptural injunctions
in all respects, and that is to be blamed by Bhagavad Gita verses such as, “those who
give up all scriptural injunctions to worship with mere faith” and, “food made without
regulations” has always caused disturbance, is causing disturbance and will cause
disturbance.
There is no need to say anything more.
O! The path of raganuga bhakti is hard to see even by the demigods.
The intelligent devotees will get to know this path through the diffusion of this light
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