BVT 9 : Bipin Bihari Goswami in the Thakur's Writings


Bhaktivinoda Thakur also mentions his spiritual master’s name in several places in his own writings to offer him respects, as is appropriate Vaishnava etiquette for an author. These appear:

(1) at the end of his commentary on the Caitanya-caritāmṛta (1894),

bipina-bihārī hari tā~ra śakti abatari
bipina-bihārī prabhu-bara
śrī-guru-gosvāmī-rūpe dekhi' more bhava-kūpe
uddharila āpana kiṅkara
Krishna is known as Bipin Bihari,
his energy descended into this world
as Bipin Bihari Goswami, my master.
Seeing me, his humble servant, in the dark well of worldly existence,
He took the form of my spiritual master and delivered me.
(Amṛta-pravāha-bhāṣya, p.1687)
(2) In Sanskrit, in his introduction to an edition of Kṛṣṇa-karṇāmṛta in 1898,

guror hareḥ padaṁ dhyātvā śrī-vipina-vihāriṇaḥ
kṛṣṇa-karṇāmṛtasyeyaṁ bhāṣā-vyākhyā viracyate
Meditating on the holy feet of my guru Sri Bipin Bihari who is Lord Hari,
I am writing this Bengali translation and explanation of the Kṛṣṇa-karṇāmṛtam.
(3) In Bhāgavatārka-marīci-mālā in 1901, one of the Thakur’s last publications.

bipina-bihārī prabhu mama prabhu-bara
śrī-baṁśī-badanānanda-baṁśa-śaśadhara
My exalted spiritual master, Bipin Bihari Prabhu,
is the brilliant moon in the family of Sri Vamsivadanananda.
(4) Bhaktivinoda Thakur makes references to his guru according to his siddha name of Bipin Bihari, which is Vilāsa Mañjarī in Siddhi-lālasā of Gīti-mālā, published in 1893. This same series of songs also give a full description of the ekādaśa bhāva as received from his guru. [See Hari- nāma-cintāmaṇi 15.58]

hena kāle kabe, bilāsa mañjarī,
anaṅga mañjarī āra
āmāre heriẏā, ati kṛpā kari',
balibe bacana sāra
At such a moment, when will Vilasa Manjari
accompanied by Ananga Manjari, take notice of me
and, turning to me with exceeding grace,
speak the very words I want to hear?
Anaṅga Mañjarī is the siddha name of Jahnava Mata, the initiating spiritual master of her adopted son Ramachandra Goswami, the founder of the Baghna Pada disciplic succession.

bilāsa mañjarī, anaṅga mañjarī,
śrī rūpa mañjarī āra
āmāke tuliẏā, laha nija pade,
deha more siddhi sāra (4)
Oh Vilasa Manjari! Oh Ananga Manjari! Oh Rupa Manjari!
Please lift me up and bring me close to your own lotus feet,
thus bestowing upon me the quintessence of eternal spiritual perfection!
In both of these songs, Bhaktivinoda follows the classical tradition established by Narottam Das of praying to his spiritual master in his siddha form as a mañjarī. It is thus clear that Bhaktivinoda had not only taken initiation, but had also received siddha-praṇāli from his guru.

In Kalyāṇa-kalpa-taru, Bhaktivinoda Thakur also offers heartfelt prayers for the association of Srimati Ananga Manjari in the spiritual world, further showing a strong affinity for Jahnava Mata, the original preceptor in Bipin Bihari Goswami's line. Such a verse would have little meaning outside the dīkṣā-sampradāya connection:

nikhila baiṣṇaba jana dayā prakāśiẏā
śrī jāhnabā pade more rākhaha ṭāniẏā

"May all the Vaishnavas show me their mercy by pulling me to Jahnava Mata's lotus feet and placing me there."

Needless to say, Bhaktivinoda Thakur never contradicts Rupa Goswami's instructions about the dīkṣā-guru, and generic prayers to the dīkṣā-guru can also be found throughout his writings, for example.

dīkṣā guru kṛpā kari' mantra upadeśa
kariẏā dekhāna kṛṣṇa tattvera nirdeśa

"The initiating guru instructs in the mantra and thereby gives direction to the proper understanding of Krishna." (Kalyāṇa-kalpa-taru, Upadeśa 1)

Cooperation between Bhaktivinoda Thakur and his spiritual master continued on other levels to the very end of the former’s active career as a writer and preacher, which may be said to have come about in around 1907, the date of his last published work and after which his health began to deteriorate considerably and he turned inward.

Most notably, Bipin Bihari participated in the meeting of dignitaries in Krishnagar in 1893, helping Bhaktivinoda Thakur to launch the great project of establishing Chaitanya Mahaprabhu’s birthplace in Mayapur. Bipin Bihari's magnum opus, Daśa-mūla-rasa, not only quotes a verse written by Bhaktivinoda in 1896, but seems to have been inspired by it.

From the above evidence, all indications are that from 1880 up until at least 1907, the two worked together harmoniously. Nowhere has anyone been able to demonstrate that Bhaktivinoda Thakur ever said anything negative or dismissive about Bipin Bihari Goswami.

Some people say that Bhaktivinoda "did not imbibe any of the conceptions of Bipin Bihari Goswami." They argue that Bhaktivinoda placed central importance on the chanting of the Holy Names "in contrast to the stress on siddha-praṇāli given by Bipin Bihari Goswami."

This does not seem particularly persuasive, for on the one hand Bipin Bihari Goswami's first book was written in glorification of the Holy Name (Hari-nāmāmṛta-sindhu), and on the other, Bhaktivinoda himself stressed the siddha-praṇāli method of bhajana in at least three of his books: Jaiva-dharma, Caitanya-śikṣāmṛta and Harināma-cintāmaṇi, as well as in the verses from the Siddhi-lālasā prayers already mentioned above. Bhaktivinoda followed the siddha-praṇāli system himself and passed it on to his son Lalita Prasad, to whom he gave initiation.

This would then appear to be the very image of a perfectly harmonious guru-disciple relationship, and there is nothing to make us believe otherwise. Indeed, in one place, the Thakur defends his guru-paramparā in the following way:

 "Again, I have heard it said that the Goswamis of Baghnapada should not be called Goswami because they are only disciples of Jahnava Mata. We have no desire to hear false arguments of this sort. We worship all Vaishnavas as the forms of Krishna and according to necessity we offer the appropriate respect to the acharya dynasties. We cannot however offer such respect to the vamsa if they are averse to devotion or have converted to another religion. Keshto Bannerjee converted to Christianity, do we offer him the respect due to a brahmin? Similarly, if a descendant of Nityananda Prabhu or Advaita Prabhu gives up his natural religious duty, then he should not expect to get the respect due to his birth." (Śrī Jīva Gosvāmī, Sajjana-toṣaṇī 2/12)

This was written only two or three years after taking initiation, so it is clear that the Thakur's decision to take initiation from Bipin Bihari Goswami was not based on any formal belief in the magical powers of the Goswami lines, but purely on his individual merits as a pure devotee.





Other articles in the introduction

BVT 1-2 : Invocation and Introduction to the Autobiography
BVT 3 :: Modern Scholarship on Bhaktivinoda Thakur
BVT 4 :: Bhaktivinoda Thaku and his thirst for knowledge.
BVT 5 :: Bhaktivinoda Thakur and Christianity
BVT 6 :: Bhaktivinoda Thakur in Jagannath Puri
BVT 7 :: Bhaktivinoda and the Meat-eating issue
BVT 8 :: Initiation from Bipin Bihari Goswami
BVT 9 :: Bipin Bihari Goswami in the Thakur's Writings
BVT 10 :: Lalita Prasad Thakur
BVT 11 :: Bhaktivinoda Thakur and Sampradaya
BVT 12 :: The Authenticity of the Autobiography

Other articles inspired by the Autobiography:

A Bengali Zamindar's education in the 1840's
Bipin Bihari's testimonial to his best disciple Kedarnath Datta
Longfellow and Bhaktivinoda Thakur's poems

And also,

Hari-nama-cintamani related posts
Siddhi-lalasa


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