Jagat

"Hear from Me how a person should worship Me with faith and devotion after first attaining the status of being twice-born, by following the scriptural injunctions appropriate for his or her own level of qualification. One endowed with devotion should worship Me in the form of the deity with the appropriate paraphernalia, in the land cleared for sacrifice, in the fire, in the sun, in water, in one’s own heart, or in the twice-born. And one should similarly worship Me as the guru without duplicity." Anuccheda 235 Vaidhī Nirguṇā Bhakti तदेवं बहुधा साधितैषा अकिञ्चनात्यन्तिकीत्यादिसंज्ञा भक्तिर्द्विविधा—वैधी रागानुगा चेति। We have thus established bhakti in many different ways. It is referred to by names such as akiñcanā, free from all dependence, and ātyantikī , the ultimate, and it has two divisions: vaidhī and rāgānugā . तत्र वैधी शास्त्रोक्तविधिना प्रवर्तिता। स च विधिर्द्विविधः—तत्र प्रथमः प्रवृत्तिहेतुः, तदनुक्रमकर्तव्याकर्तव्यानां ज्ञानहेतुश्च।...

viṣaya-viṣa-kṛmīṇāṁ bodha-mātrātma-bhājāṁ samaya-samaya-sarveśaika-bhakty-āśritānām| na nija-ruci-karaṁ vartmotsṛjantaḥ sthitāḥ smo vayam amala-sukhaugha-syandi-vṛndāvanāśāḥ || The paths followed by the worms eating the poison of the sense objects, and by those who say the self is consciousness alone, and even by those who have taken exclusive shelter of the all-powerful Supreme God,      are not appealing to us,          so we have given them up; we invest our hopes in Vrindavan,      which brings forth          gushing streams of spotless bliss. (1.86) Commentary As Prabodhananda so often does, he comes back from contemplating the good fortune of Radha's kiṅkarīs and the inability of Lakshmi Devi to enter into that rasa  to explain what he means. He does so, not by making a philosophical argument on metaphysics, but simply by stating his preference, his ruci, and to leave it at that....

I spoke at the meeting of SHEN to a group of about 40-50 people at the University of Waterloo on June 17. I used Powerpoint to help organize my ideas, many of which have previously been jotted down in these blog. It was nice to condense and clarify them in a public setting and the presentation was well received. I have tried to put it down here, but of course, it is still a condensation as many of the ideas are in need of elaboration. 1. Prema Prayojana The inspiration for this talk comes from Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, the incarnation of divine love, who appeared in Bengal in the 15th century and inspired this movement of bhakti devotion. I have posted a statement attributed to him: সন্ন্যাস মোর কিবা কাজ, আমার প্রেম প্রয়োজন sannyāsa mora kibā kāja ? āmāra prema prayojana ! "What need have I of the renounced order of life? What I need is prema !" The expression prema prayojana really has a double meaning: On the one hand, perhaps Mahaprabhu was channeling ...

In general, I have until now primarily written for an audience of people who have some experience of bhakti, i.e., either have or have had faith in the path of devotion to Krishna. This is why I am periodically asked to defend my ideas with quotations from shastra. Now, the fact of the matter is that, amongst those who have some experience of the bhakti path, there are very few who have progressed beyond the stage of vidhi-bhakti . Even those who have gone to Narayan Maharaj or some other rasika guru, only a few have taken initiation in the rāgānugā process by receiving ekādaśa-bhāva from him. Even less in number are those who have actually taken up a serious study of the līlā-granthas and practiced aṣṭa-kāla līlā smaraṇa , even briefly, what to speak of with intensity and niṣṭhā . Of those foreign students who have either done or not done these things, there are probably even a smaller number who have learned Bengali and attended Nama kirtana yajnas or listened to lila kirtan ...