The Authenticity of the Caitanya-Caritāmṛta-Mahā-Kāvya, Part I

1.

Until recently, Kavi Karnapura has generally been accepted without question as the author of a book on the life of Sri Krishna Chaitanya entitled Śrī-caitanya-caritāmṛta-mahā-kāvya [CCMK]. The date of this work is given as 1542(1) by the author himself in its final verse. In the two penultimate verses of the work, he identifies himself as the youngest son of Shivananda Sena and as a mere child (śiśu).(2)

If Kavi Karnapura is indeed the author, it is certainly a matter of great interest as he is one of the most prolific and authoritative writers amongst Chaitanya's followers. His father, Shivananda Sena, was a rich and influential devotee of Chaitanya, responsible for the management of the yearly trips to Puri that played such an important role in the latter part of the great saint's life.(3)

Unfortunately, with the exception of a few such autobiographical words in Karnapura's own compositions, such as the Ānanda-vṛndāvana-campū [AVC], Caitanya-candrodaya-nāṭaka [CCN] and Gaura-gaṇoddeśa-dīpikā [GGD] the only information that we have about Karnapura's life is from Krishnadasa Kaviraja's Caitanya-caritāmṛta [CC].

In the CC (AD 1612) it is written that on one of Shivananda's visits to Puri, Chaitanya said to him, "The next son born to you must be named Puridasa (after one of Chaitanya's associates, Paramananda Puri)." On Shivananda's next visit to Puri, he brought some of his sons with him, including the young Paramanandadasa or Puridasa. On that occasion, the young baby sucked the toe of the saint, and this was credited with the later benign effect of making him capable of speaking poetry.(4) This ability was proved on a later occasion when Shivananda came to Puri and Chaitanya asked the child to recite a verse. This he did, having composed one in the āryā metre.(5) Krishnadasa Kaviraja points out there that he was only seven years old at the time.

Another anecdote is recounted in the same place about Karnapura as a child of seven. Chaitanya gave him an initiation in the holy name, but the child refused to recite it out loud. This led to some amusement when the saint said, "I have made the whole world sing the names of Krishna, but I have failed with this child." Only Svarupa Damodar, Chaitanya's secretary, was able to comprehend that the boy was not reciting it aloud because of the scriptural prohibition on the audible recital of the mantra given by a spiritual master.

The upshot of these stories, which are at least partially confirmed in Karnapura's own works, is that Paramanandadasa Sena, or Puridasa Sena, was a precocious child, a prodigy who had had some important contact with Mahaprabhu. He received what might be termed "a special mercy" from him that was held to be the source of his talents. In his concluding verses to the CCN the poet himself admits that his outstanding ability to write poetry was due to Chaitanya Mahaprabhu's grace. (6)

In an eighteenth-century commentary to AVC, 1.4, Visvanatha Chakravarti further informs us that it was Chaitanya himself who bestowed the title karṇapūra (“a flower ornament for the ears”) on the child. (7)

2.

Krishnadasa Kaviraja's account of Karnapura's meeting with Chaitanya comes near the end of the CC. It is therefore clear that in his view Karnapura was not much older than seven when Chaitanya left the world in 1533. The CCMK is the first book attributed to this young author, dated 1464 of the Saka era, or AD 1542, when he would have been not much more than sixteen years old. The verse giving this information is confirmed in all manuscripts.

vedā rasāḥ śrutaya indur iti prasiddhe
śāke tatha khalu śucau śubhage ca masi |
vāre sudhākiraṇa-nāmny asita-dvitiyā
tithy-antare parisamāptir abhūd amuṣya ||

Further information given in the verse is that it was a Monday, the second day of the dark fortnight in the month of Asharh.

No other title is attributed to our author until considerably later than CCMK, 1572, the date of Caitanya-candrodaya-nāṭaka (CCN), another work on the life of Chaitanya, this time in the form of a play.(7a) This book is one of the principal sources of information upon which Krishnadasa Kaviraja has relied for his account of the life of Chaitanya at Puri. A great portion of CC's Madhya-līlā and some of the Antya-līlā are based on it; several of its verses have been quoted, including three glorifying Rupa Goswami.(8) In Krishnadasa Kaviraja's CC, a popular and responsible biography, this is the only book of Karnapura's that is quoted by name.

A third book by Karnapura, Gaura-gaṇoddeśa-dīpikā (GGD), dated AD 1576, is considered important for the reconciliation of divergent opinions on the relative importance of the Vrindavan and Navadvipa līlās of Krishna. In this book, Karnapura first expounds Svarupa Damodar Gosvami's doctrine of the Pancha Tattva, which later plays such an important role in the theology of Krishnadasa Kaviraja.(9) Biman Bihari Majumdar and, more recently, Ramakanta Chakravarty have both emphasized the salutary effects that GGD must have had on the debate between the intractable supporters of the Gauranga Nagara doctrine and the exclusively Krishna-worshipping followers of both Advaita and the Vrindavan school, among other things.(10) See my article on Kheturi for more information.

In fact, however, Krishnadasa Kaviraja has differed from Karnapura to some extent, particularly in his doctrine of Chaitanya-śakti, for Karnapura has directly identified Gadadhar with Radha, which Krishnadasa Kaviraja seems to have determinedly avoided. Meanwhile, Chakravarty has firmly placed Karnapura in the Gauranga Nagara camp.

Other than these, our author penned several undated books that parallel to some extent the works of the authors in Vrindavan. All of them were related to the activities of Radha and Krishna and are less important for the purposes of this article. One of them, Kṛṣṇāhnika-kaumudī, closely resembles in plan a work of Krishnadasa Kaviraja's, Govinda-lilāmṛta. With the information currently available, however, it is impossible to tell whether these two persons were acquainted with one another personally.

We do not know whether Karnapura ever visited Vrindavan. It is known, however, that he was present to Kheturi at the great festival held there, likely at some time in the 1570's (11), a date about which there is considerable difference of opinion.(12) We do not know when and where he died, though a memorial to him is maintained at the 64 Samadhi site near the Rangaji temple in Vrindavan.

3.

In an article entitled "Caitanya-caritāmṛta-mahā-kāvya," which appeared in the Bengali periodical Caturaṅga of May 1985, the late Dr. Tarapada Mukherjee raised a number of questions about the authenticity of CCMK, casting doubt on both the date of its composition and the name of its author. Basing the greater part of his argument on a study of the colophons of a number of old manuscripts, Mukherjee concluded that the work is a forgery dating probably from the seventh or eighth decades of the seventeenth century.

That he felt there was a problem is not altogether surprising. We have already encountered a number of forgeries and doubtful dates in the study of Gaudiya Vaishnava literature. Some of these attempts have been quite sophisticated. The most celebrated, which still has some people mystified, is Govindadāsera Kadacā, an account of Chaitanya's travels in South India in 1510-12. The first manuscript of this book was apparently discovered by a descendant of Advaita Acharya, Jay Gopal Goswami of Shantipur. It was then published several times, accepted and promoted by many reputable scholars, including Dinesh Chandra Sen.(13) This book has since been vehemently discredited, primarily on account of anachronisms in language and geographical names. (14)

Some other works, not entirely spurious, are also controversial. The Prema-vilāsa, for instance, is attributed to Nityananda Dasa, a disciple of Nityananda's wife, Jahnava. Nityananda Dasa would have been a contemporary of Krishnadasa Kaviraja, a three-time visitor to Vrindavan in Jahnava's company, as well as an associate of Virabhadra on his mission to East Bengal.(15) As such, one would judge him to be an authoritative chronicler of the early post-Chaitanya period. Nevertheless, much of what he says has raised the eyebrows of modern historians. Some has been proved completely impossible and false, with the result that Prema-vilāsa has been almost completely discredited.

Some of the misinformation that Nityananda Dasa puts forth seems to have clear propaganda purposes, but not all has yet been explained. The most famous of the disputed accounts in this book is the supposed suicide of Krishnadasa Kaviraja, who is said to have jumped into Radha Kunda upon hearing of the loss of the only existing manuscript of CC, which had been sent to Bengal with Gopala Bhatta's disciple, Srinivasa. (16) The story is anachronistic and it is hard to imagine that an author living so close to the actual events would have been able to convince anyone that Krishnadasa had sent the Caitanya-caritāmṛta back to Bengal as early as 1580 (the most probable approximate date of Srinivasa Acharya's important trip with the writings of the Gosvamis) when the book itself was not written until 1612.(17)

Another title, Karṇānanda, written by Yadunandana, the grand-disciple of the above-mentioned Srinivasa, is said by the author to have been written in 1529 Saka, i.e. AD 1607. This is disproved by the great number of quotations from the Caitanya-caritāmṛta, the date of which seems to have been established beyond any doubt.(18)

The inability to establish definitively the authenticity of books in the Gaudiya tradition extends even to the first complete work written about the life of Chaitanya. All the biographies of Chaitanya refer to Murari Gupta's kaḍacā or notebook (MGK) as one of the most important sources of information about the great saint's early life. The printed edition of this work goes by the name of Śrī-Kṛṣṇa-caitanya-caritāmṛta-mahā-kāvya. In the introductory verses, this simple poem in quasi-Puranic style purports to be a mahā-kāvya, not a collection of notes as the word kaḍacā itself implies, even though some parts, especially those describing the later pastimes, are threadbare . Furthermore, in the first printed editions of this work, a date 1425 Saka (AD 1503) is given in the colophon, which would be completely impossible. In later editions this date was changed to 1435 (AD 1513). Since Chaitanya's life covers the span from AD 1485-1533, this date for a biography which mentions even the death of its subject is not believable even to its editor.(19)

Murari apparently received the permission of Chaitanya to write this biography in 1508-9 just prior to Chaitanya's renunciation. It has therefore been suggested that the latter portions dealing with his life outside Nabadwip were added later. It is clear from a reading of the book that the portions covering Chaitanya's life after his renunciation are less detailed and less informed than those to which Murari would have been an eyewitness. Only two manuscripts of this book have ever been found and no critical reading has been able to clarify these problems. From the standpoint of internal evidence also, certain problems present themselves in the MGK, both to the devotee and the historian. Nevertheless, the existence of other works which give direct credit to MGK for source materials and whose debt to that work are demonstrable tend to support its authenticity. In the course of our discussion we shaîl be obliged to return to some of the problems related to Murari's biography, for CCMK is both the closest to MGK in date and in content.

Last, but not least in the litany of problematic texts in the Gaudiya line, are the numerous spurious Sahajiya works ascribed to Krishnadasa Kaviraja, Narottam Dasa, Rupa and Sanatan and other reputable authors of the sampradaya. (20) These are easily identifiable by their espousal of doctrines that are clearly heterodox.

4.

Dr. Mukherjee spent many years researching the Gaudiya manuscripts found in the Vrindavan Research Institute [VRI], most of which came from the Radha Damodar temple library, i.e., Jiva Goswami's personal collection. He prepared the catalogue of Bengali manuscripts held by the VRI, a critical edition of Caitanya-caritāmṛta based on its holdings, as well as taking up extended research into legal documents related to the Gaudiya sampradaya. In this case, he based his arguments on certain unusual features of the manuscript evidence found in the Vrindavan Research Institute.

Since Dr. Mukherjee's article appeared in Bengali in a periodical that may not be easily available to the reader, and as his evidence is quite interesting in its own right, I will summarize the main points of his argument here.

(i) Mukherjee's suspicions were first raised by the claim that Rupa Gosvami had copied the text of CCMK by his own hand.

Krishnadasa Kaviraja writes about the beauty of Rupa Gosvami's hand writing.(21) At this date, such a great interest in an author's handwriting is unusual and consequently very little of the personal handwriting of any medieval Bengali writer has survived. Nevertheless, the Vrindavan Research Institute has received certain manuscripts from the Radha Damodar temple, several of which are ostensibly in Rupa's own handwriting. These manuscripts can be divided into three categories:

(a) Those which are attested by the scribe, e.g. have something like vyālekhi rūpeṇa, e.g., Vaiśākha-māhātmyam (dated 1457 Saka), no. 7688. This work contains Padma-purāṇa Pātāla-khaṇḍa, chs. 84-95. The colophon states: samāptam idam vaiśākha-māhātmyam| śri-madhusūdanāya namaḥ| svaraśara-śakre sāke māse tapasye tathāṅgi tapanasya | mādhava-māhātmyam idaṁ sundara-rūpaṁ vyālekhi rūpeṇa || śrī-govardhanāya namaḥ śrī-gopāla-caraṇāya namaḥ| śrī-harāya namaḥ|

(b) Those, which have someone else's attestation: e.g. śrīmad-rūpa-sva-hasta-likhita-nṛsiṁha-paricaryā śrīmad-rūpa-gosvāmi-likhita-jagannātha-vallabha-nāṭakam, etc.

(c) Those with handwriting that resembles the above two, such as Karnāmṛta-stotra, Krama-dīpikā (Gopāla-dhyāna), Mukunda-mālā, etc.

Rupa stayed at Radha Damodar in his last days and his samadhi is on the temple grounds. One would naturally expect that he should give his collection of manuscripts to his nephew, disciple and successor, Sri Jiva. From several dalils (testimonials) of the period, it is clear that the official library (pustak ṭhaur) of the school was there. Furthermore, the use of quotations from most of the above texts in various works by Rupa lends credence to these ascriptions. Nevertheless, there are several reasons for doubting the claims of the colophons. First, the date written in Vaiśākha-māhātmya raises a doubt. Rupa did not write the date of completion of all the books that he himself authored, so why should we believe that he would do so after simply copying a manuscript? Perhaps it was another, later Rupa (Kaviraja) who could have copied it.

(ii) A manuscript of CCMK belonging to category (b) above is the Vrindavan Research Institute's MS No. 7686. It is written in Bengali letters on 45 folios of which two are missing. At the end of the text is found the verse which has already been quoted above, and another date written in numbers, 1467 = 1545. This is presumably the date of the copying, but the scribe has not given his name or any other information. However, at the head of the manuscript, Caitanyāmṛta 2 is written in Nagari script and to its side, śrī-rūpa-gosvāmi-hasta-likhitaṁ śrī-caitanyāmṛta-kāvyam in Bengali letters. Mukherjee supposes that the Nagari dates to the attested AD 1665 indexing of the contents of the Radha Damodar library (the writing matches) and that the Bengali postdates it. He poses the question: who at this late date, long after the deaths of Jiva and Kaviraja, would be able to identify Rupa's handwriting? The writer of this anonymous attestation unfortunately did not give his sources.

In this MS the date in numbers is supplemented by the tithi: day one of the dark fortnight of Asharh, 1545, and this closely resembles the date of composition written in the verse (see section ii above). In view of the similarity one may assume that we are merely looking at versions of the same date (given the latitude that is commonly experienced when civil dates are being rendered into tithis), and that the weekday, had there been room for it, would again have been Monday. Mukherjee's suggestion seems to be that the date written in numerals is perhaps only a mistaken reading of the date given in the colophon verse.

(iii) In order for the CCMK to have been copied by Rupa within the short space of three years after its composition, the following would have had to have taken place. As we have seen, the date of CCMK's completion is 1542. Before being sent from Karnapura in Bengal to Rupa Gosvami in Vrindavan, it must presumably have first been copied by someone else. The journey itself would have taken at least six to eight weeks on foot. Upon receiving the MS Rupa would have had to drop everything, in particular his important work of composing the Ujjvala-nīlamaṇi, which one assumes was absorbing his attention at this time, in order to copy it.(22) Of course Rupa would have been interested in Chaitanya's life, but would he not rather have had someone else do the copying? Although it would not have been a physical impossibility for the above events to have taken place, it does seem an uncommonly quick succession of events for those slow moving times.(23)

(iv) These then are the preliminary doubts that are raised by Mukherjee. He thus concludes that the claim that Rupa had written this manuscript ought to be rejected unless an impartial external witness were to be found. Unfortunately, though such a witness has indeed been forthcoming, Mukherjee finds that his evidence has simply magnified his suspicions.

The evidence referred to above is found at the end of at least three manuscripts, the first of which comes from Dhaka University and is mentioned in S. K. De's edition of Padyāvali(24) It consists of the following four verses and a prose footnote to them.

caitanya-candro jagad uddidhīrṣuḥ
sva-prema-ratnaṁ vraja-sāgarottham |
dīnāya dātuṁ nija-rūpato'sau
ghurṇan ghṛṇī prādurabhūt sva-vṛndaiḥ ||1||

arvāg-jive pracura-karuṇaiḥ śrīla-rūpāgrajādyaiḥ
sammodān mat-parama-gurubhiḥ śrīla-kāśiśvarākhyaiḥ |
bhaṭṭācāryair api ca paramānanda-saṁjñair vraje'smin
śrutvā śrutvā mudita-hṛdayaiḥ śaśvad āsvāditaṁ yat ||2||

caitanya-candra-caritāmṛtam adbhutābhair
dvyaṣṭābdikair viracitaṁ kavi-karṇapūraiḥ |
rūpākhya-mat-prabhu-varaiḥ sva-karāmbujena
śāke haya-rtu-bhuvane likhitaṁ purā yat ||3||

ālokya sāmpratam anena kumedhasāpi
svapne'pi tad-ratim ṛte mṛtaka-prabheṇa |
kenāpi lubdha-manasā hata viṣṇudāsa-nāmnā
sva-jīvana-mahauṣadham ācitaṁ tat ||4||

1. The moon-like compassionate Chaitanya, desiring to save the world, became incarnate in his own form, surrounded by his associates, to give to the unfortunate the jewel of his own love.

2. The [CCMK] was listened to again and again and constantly relished here in Vraja by Rupa, his older brother Sanatana, and others who possess so much mercy for the ignorant living beings, and by my grand-spiritual-master named Kashishwar, and with delight by Paramananda Bhattacharya.

3. This CCMK was composed by the amazingly talented Kavi Karnapura when he was only sixteen years old. In the year 1467 Saka it was copied by the lotus hand of my great master named Rupa.

4. Presently this wicked-minded individual named Vishnudasa, who has no affection [for Chaitanya] even in his dreams, who is like a dead man, an unimportant person whose mind is filled with greed, has gathered it up as a great medicine that will preserve his life.' (25)

The prose sentence that follows in the Dhaka manuscript is: idaṁ kāvyaṁ śrīla-rūpa-gosvāminā caturdaśa-śata-pūrva-saptas aṣṭhitama-śaka-varṣe likhitaṁ tad-anantaraṁ śrī-viṣṇu-dāsa-gosvāminā -- "This poem was copied by Rupa Gosvami in the Saka year 1467, and afterwards by Vishnudasa Gosvami."

No Vishnudasa (Haridas Das lists nine different individuals of that name amongst the followers of Chaitanya (26)) is known who fits the description given of having Rupa as his guru and these three parama gurus. It is clear that he lives in Vraja also and has the ability to write Sanskrit verses. The description does, however, fit Krishnadasa Kaviraja himself. Mukherjee thus makes the logical leap that the one named Vishnudasa is in fact Krishnadasa.

In an age when so few people cared about the date of even the composition of a work, why should this Vishnudasa pay so much attention to the date of a manuscript's copying? Both he and his presumed disciple seem completely indifferent to the date of the composition of the work itself and yet both repeat the date of the copying, which seems to be somewhat misplaced enthusiasm.

(v) The four persons named in Vishnudasa's verses are said to have regularly and enthusiastically attending readings of CCMK. They are Rupa, Sanatana, Kashishwara, and Paramananda Bhattacarya, all of whom are prominent figures on the sixteenth-century Vrindavan scene.(27) Mukherjee feels that the idea of a group of devotees listening to Chaitanya's life-story presented in these verses is derived from CC, Ādi 8 where, in the course of glorifying the Caitanya Bhāgavata (CBh), Krishnadasa Kaviraja mentions that Haridasa Acharya and his associates listened to it constantly in the Govinda temple. Mukherjee argues that Rupa and the others mentioned were direct associates of Chaitanya, whereas Haridasa Acharya and the others listed there were of the following generation. Since they had never known the great saint personally, their attitude must have been different from that of those who had so known him. According to Krishnadasa, the book which was read in the meetings of the first generation of Chaitanya followers in Vrindavan was the Bhāgavata-purāṇa itself and not Chaitanya's life. (28)

(vi) Mukherjee then argues that one would never have suspected the authenticity of the CCMK if Vishnudasa had not gone out of his way to establish it in such an aggressive way. According to him, "If we understand that the devotees led by Rupa and Sanatana were regular listeners to the CCMK and that Rupa copied the book with his own hand then we will know that every word, every event and every character depiction has been approved by them. In such a case we would know that nothing in the book was not well received by the highest authorities of the disciplic chain."

In other words, the point of Vishnudasa's verses is purely and simply to legitimize an illegitimate work. And, since the purpose of Vishnudasa and that of the writer on the manuscript in the Radha Damodara temple was identical, we can therefore conclude that the person who wrote it was this very same person.

(vii) Finally, perhaps the most damning indictment of the CCMK is that there is no mention of it in the CC. Generally, Krishnadasa has been very conscientious about giving credit where credit is due for his quotations. He has been liberal in his use of CCN, and has not hesitated to mention it. Why then his silence on the subject of CCMK?

B.B. Majumdar has expressed disappointment in Krishnadasa Kaviraja for having borrowed most heavily from both CCMK and CCN in the CC, Madhya 8, while stating that he has written on the basis of Svarupa Damodara's notes without giving any credit at all to Karnapura. (29) ukherjee's feeling is that Majumdar has uncritically accepted that the CCMK is genuine. This has now been placed in doubt and so the only legitimate conclusion that can be made is that the borrowing has been done in the other direction. In other words, the author of the CCMK has copied from CC.

This is given further support by the absence of any truly ancient MS for, other than the questionable one from Radha Damodar, no other manuscript of the CCMK has been discovered which dates prior to the eighteenth century, even though (unlike the MGK) there is no shortage of manuscripts of CCMK, in either Vrindavan or Bengal.

Briefly then: According to Mukherjee, there is no reason to believe that any of the information given in the verses written by Vishnudasa has any validity. Indeed they awaken suspicions about the daim that the manuscript of CCMK found in the Radha Damodara library could be genuine. The exaggerated daims on the interest of the first generation of Chaitanya disciples in this work is belied by the fact that no other work of the period, particularly the CC, mentions it. The over-emphasis on the date of the copying and the identity of the scribe are also reasons for suspicion. The closest that we come to knowing a factual date for CCMK is thus the date of the library catalogue in 1665, around which time this book must have been written and introduced into the library, probably by Vishnudasa himself and his associates.

NOTES

(1) All dates are AD unless otherwise specified; 78 years are added to Saka dates to arrive at AD, 57 subtracted from Samvat.

(2) CCMK, 20.49.

(3) Information about Shivananda Sena can be found in MGK, 4.17.6; CCN, 8.57, 9.9, 9.31-32, 10.1-6; CCMK, 13.127, 14.10-2, 20.17; CBh, 3.5.445, 3.9.491, 3.9.493; Cc 3.1.12-28, 3.10.139,
3.12.11, 3.12.44, 3.16.60.

(4) CC,Antya 11, p. 411.

(5) CC, Antya 16, p. 434. The verse 15 as follows:

śravasoh kuvalayam akṣṇor
añjanam uraso mahendra-maṇi-dāma |
vṛndāvana-ramaṇīnāṁ
maṇḍanam akhilam harir jayati ||

This verse does not appear in any of Karnapura's known works. He did write an Ārya-śataka that was published by Haridas Das from the Haribol Kutir in Nabadwip in 1953. Unfortunately it is incomplete, as the first folios of the only MS had been lost. Haridas Das placed the verse from the Caitanya-charitāmṛta at the beginning of his printed edition, assuming that this was its proper place.

(6) pp. 394-5, yasyocchiṣṭa-prasādād ayam ajani mama prauḍhimā kāvya-rūpī vāg-devyā yaḥ kṛtārthīkṛta iha samayotkīrtya tasyāvatāram | etc.

(7) The quote is: tataḥ santuṣṭena bhagavatā kavi-karṇapūra iti nāma tad-dinam ārabhya kṛtavatā. This may be doubtful. If it were true then why did the author of the Chaitanya-caritāmṛta not mention it in the course of his account of Karnapura's meetings with Chaitanya?

(7a) Karnapura quotes his own Alaṅkāra-kaustubha in CCN (3.31). So it seems he wrote that work before CCN.

(8) Madhya 19, p. 255,
priya-svarūpe dayita-svarūpe prema-svarūpe sahajābhirūpe |
nijānurūpe prabhur eka-rūpe tatāna rūpe sva-vilāsa-rūpe || CCN, 9.70. See also 9.75, 104.

(9) GGD, v.9, p. 10.
pañca-tattvātmakaṁ kṛṣṇaṁ bhakta-rūpa-svarūpakam |
bhaktāvatāraṁ bhaktākhyaṁ namāmi bhakti-śaktikam ||.
The same verse is quoted in CC, i, 1.14. There are however some important differences. That is to say, the attitude towards Gadadhara Pandit. See Jagadananda Das, 1985, 31.

(10) Chakravarty, Vaishnavism in Bengal, 1985, 20-51; Majumdar, Caitanya Cariter Upādān 1939 111-13.

(11) Narottama-vilāsa, 108.

(12) Chakravarty, Vaishnavism in Bengal, 231. This author prefers a date between 1610 and 1620. This is impossible as it would make Jahnava over 90-years-old and incapable of attending and playing the important role which she did according to all the accounts. I personally favor 1585 as the date, i.e., the 100th anniversary of Chaitanya’s birth. Prema-vilāsa, ch. 19, pp. 308-9; Narottama-vilāsa 101-8; Bhakti-ratnākara, 411-30.

(13) ed. D. C. Sen (Calcutta University, 1926).

(14) cf. Majumdar, Caitanya Cariter Upādān, ch. 13, pp. 414-24. Majumdar has concluded, despite the anachronisms found in this work, that there is probably some element of truth in the manuscript. Primarily, he has been led to this conclusion by his inability to find a motive on the part of Jay Gopal Gosvami (see op. cit., 420-1).

(15) cf. Nityānanda-vaṁśa-vistāra attributed to Vrindavan Dasa, ed. Nabina Candra Addhya (Calcutta, 1874).

(16) pp. 169. In Karṇānanda, ch. 7, p. 489, the author refers specifically to Prema-vilāsa, mentioning this incident in relation to Raghunatha Dasa. We know that Raghunatha was dead in 1584 which is much closer to our hypothetical date of 1575. Thus, this one serious lapse may have led to undue confusion. For Raghunatha's will and death date see Mukherjee, 1987: 324.

(17) cf. Chakravarty, op.cit., 208.

(18) cf. Mukherjee, 'Caitanya-caritāmṛter racanā-kāl evaṁ brajer gauḍīya-sampradāya', 1987.

(19) Introduction to the third edition by Mrinal Kanti Ghosh (p. xxv).

(20) cf. M. M. Basu's Post Chaitanya Sahajiya Cult contains numerous examples. Also S. B. Das Gupta, Obscure Religious Cults (Calcutta, 1947).

(21) CC, Antya 1, pp. 330-1.
kāhāṅ puṅthi likho bali eka patra nilo |
akṣara dekhiyā prabhura mane sukha hoilo ||
śrī-rūpera akṣara yena mukuṭāra pāṁti |
prīta hañā kore prabhu stuti ||

(22) The Ujjvala-nīlamaṇi is undated. Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu is dated AD 1541. Utkalikā-vallarī is the next dated work, 1549. It is assumed that UN was written between these two works.

(23) Mukherjee writes "While Rupa is absorbed in the creation of a completely new rasa-śāstra on the basis of the entire philosophy, literature and religious writings of India, he takes the time out to make a copy of a copy of the Mahākāvya. This is quite hard to believe. Indeed it is as hard to swallow as the suicide of Krishnadasa Kaviraja by jumping into Radha Kund. However, some anonymous reporter wishes us to believe in this astonishing affair." (“Caitanya-caritāmṛta mahā-kāvya," 1985, 35.)

(24) The Dhaka University Library, MS No. 2389, date unknown. The two others referred to here are Mathura Research Institute's No. 358010 and Vrindavan Research Institute No. 1147, both said by Dr. Mukherjee to be relatively recent.

(25) Mukherjee has not translated these verses, but he seems to have interpreted the word mat-parama-gurubhiḥ to refer to all the personalities mentioned. In fact, it is in apposition to Kashishwara alone, which is in the honorific plural.

(26) Haridas Das, Gauḍīya Vaiṣṇava Abhidhāna, 1957. See vol. 4, under name.

(27) BRK, 1.2024 seems to be based on Vishnudasa's verses:

lokanātha bhūgarbha paṇḍita kāśīśvara |
śrī-paramānanda kṛṣṇa-nāma vijña-vara ||
e sabāra jaiche prema ācaraṇa |
tāhā eka mukhe kichu nā yāya varṇana ||
vṛndāvana sadā sanātana rūpa saṅge |
vilasaye śrī-kṛṣṇa-caitanya-kathā raṅge ||

Paramananda Bhattacharya was a disciple of Gadadhara Pandit and a founder of the Gopinath temple in Vrindavan with Madhu Pandit (BRK, 1.267, 2.475 if.). Cf. also Sādhanā-dīpikā, 1.16 if., 1.20, p. 2. Kashishwar was the first sevāyat of Rupa's own Radha Govinda temple.

(28) Raghunath Bhatta: rūpa gosāñira sabhāya kare bhāgavata paṭhana | CC, Antya 13.126, p. 420.

(29) See discussion in Majumdar, op.cit., 184-192.

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