Jagat

So my spare time is being spent contemplating the question of the phenomenon of sectarianism, and thinking about remedies. Whether there is a remedy for the disease of sampradāya . Yet without  sampradāya  we have no history. And in fact, it is not untrue to say that it is through  sampradāya  that we are meant to arise above  sampradāya . No one can be without an identity, but ultimate love includes the capacity to transcend identities to find oneness everywhere. And that is really the fruit of prema , without which prema has little meaning. In other words you have to be able to find something universally true in your symbol system for you to be able to communicate with the universe, to commune with ultimate reality. So, the story I have been sitting on at Vrindavan Today for the past month or more is that the Radhavallabhi and Gaudiya rivalry is threatening to flare up again in the courts. Some disciples of the Radha Vallabha sect have filed a case against ...

In the mood of deepening our sentiments for Vrindavan, I would like to translate Hit Dhruva Das’s poem about Vrindavan. Dhruva Das lived in the first half of the 17th century. This poem was written in 1682 samvat, which is for most people these days, 1626. After Hit Harivansh himself, and Sewakji, Dhruva Das is the third great poet teacher of the Radha Vallabhi sampradaya . A few days ago it was Hit Harivansh’s appearance day, and even though it was totally unintended, I had a Hit Harivansh Chandra Goswami day. The fact is that I don’t get out of the house very much. You would think that with all my talk about Braja vasa sadhana that I do, I would occasionally visit Bihariji, Radha Vallabh or Radha Raman and Damodar… like I used to, not so long ago. I guess I am a real Vrajavasi in that I just live here. But then, living here has its benefits. I was thinking that it was Hit Harivansh’s birthday and I hadn’t written anything special for VT. And I was occupied in ...

With great amusement Radha and Krishna pick so many kinds of flowers and fruits from Vrindavan's trees and vines, praising the forest. They bathe and sport in the lakes of Vrindavan and play with the birds and other creatures there. Who then would not serve the Vrindavan forest, and dwell in this supreme, transcendental abode? rādhā-kṛṣṇau parama-kutukād yal-latā-pādapānāṁ citvā puṣpādikam uru-vidhaṁ ślāghamānau juṣāte | snānādyaṁ yat-sarasi kurutaḥ khelato yat-khagādyair vṛndāraṇyaṁ carama-paramaṁ tan na seveta ko vā ||2.10|| Commentary In my comments to the previous verse, I took a bit of a detour into my investigations of Prabodhananda Saraswati's identity and his relationship to Hit Harivansh, as well as the problem of the authorship of Rādhā-rasa-sudhā-nidhi . This is a pretty touchy subject and I would not go into the details of the whole debate. My conclusion in the end was that Prabodhananda had indeed written RRSN, but he gave it to Harivansh in a ...

From Vrindavan Today : Sometimes one gets the impression that there is a certain movement afoot. Suddenly, one figure bursts into prominence and influences the general mood of the community, sets the rhythm that others follow. When the flowers bloom and their fragrance is carried by the breezes in the spring, the bees and hummingbirds who feed on the nectar automatically swarm to the colorful garden where they are arrayed. For the past few months people have been asking me with regularity, "Have you heard Premananda Baba's Vrindavana-mahimamrita lectures? Then I started looking on the internet and saw that his enthusiasts were making his lectures available every day, so I began listening. And today, finally, I went to Shri Hit Dham on the Parikrama Marg, in the Varaha Ghat area a bit west of the Bhaktivedanta Goshala. Vishakha Dasi accompanied me and took some photos, which you can see here: Gallery . Madan Ter and Shri Hit Dham Shri Hit Dham is right next to Mad...

Yesterday I went to listen to the Bhagavatam around the corner, where a seven-day program is going on. The speaker is in the Swami Haridas line, but he is a real non-denominational Vrindavan lover and seems to have equal affection for Harivansh Goswami and Radha Vallabha as he has for Swami Haridas and Banke Bihari. He also told some Gaudiya stories, like about Shyamananda finding the nupur in Seva Kunj, and Rupa Goswami’s warning not to look at Govindaji or you would lose everything. smerāṁ bhaṅgī-traya-paricitāṁ sāci vistīrṇa-dṛṣṭiṁ vaṁśī-nyastādhara-kiśalayām ujjvalāṁ candrakeṇa | govindākhyāṁ hari-tanum itaḥ keśi-tīrthopakaṇṭhe mā prekṣiṣṭhās tava yadi sakhe bandhu-saṅge'sti raṅgaḥ ||  My friend, if you still want to find pleasure in the company of your friends and relatives, then don't look at this form of Hari called "Govinda," not far from here at Keshi Ghat, smiling, in his famous triple-crooked stance, with his big crooked glance. the red sl...

I posted on Facebook: Message from Prabodhananda Saraswati: If you respect me, you have to respect Hit  Harivansh  Goswami. Explanation: Yesterday was my birthday, and as I had just arrived the day before from Rishikesh, I went on parikrama . Parikrama for me started near Kaliya Daha, which is where the little frequented samadhi temple of Prabodhananda Saraswati lies. I think that the coincidence of having Prabodhananda, the author of Vṛndāvana-mahimāmṛta right at the beginning of the parikrama , as the first major spot on the circuit, to be a fortuitous and particularly inspiring accident. I have cherished Prabodhananda Saraswati ever since Ananta Das Pandit Maharaj first "turned me on" to Rādhā-rasa-sudhā-nidhi more than 30 years ago. I made up my mind to do the following for my birthday: I would go to Prabodhananda's samadhi , recite a few verses from his work, and then go to Banke Bihari, Radha Vallabha, then Radha Damodar to visit the samadhis of Sri Rup...

Ashudhir Dev was the guru of Haridas, as proven in Nija-mata-siddhānta , not his father. The same is hinted (Dhvani!) in the Bhaktamāla . The hereditary Bankebihariji Gussains from Sharan Behari Goswami onwards, preach the contrary yet they have never been able to come up with hard evidence. SBG’s work does not even bear credibility in this regard. The reverend Amolakram Shastri, the Sadhus of Tatiya Sthan, the Beriwala family, etc., all are Haridasis but they offer their respect to the entire Guruparampara (i.e. Nimbarki until Swami Haridas). I could do with some enlightenment if anyone has more on the subject. That is, only if it ventures into credibility, beyond for example, the old-scholars-tale that the Haridasis were seeking to legitimize themselves (in the old days) by claiming allegiance with the Nimbarkis. (from a private correspondent). The Tatia Sthan (Lalita Prakashan) edition of Kelimāl includes a section called sampradāya-vandanā-stuti , which is headed with the f...

I had a break yesterday and plunged back into Chandidas. I was reading Biman Bihari Majumdar's edition, which has much to say for it, as he has gone deeply into the Chandidas mystery, sorting out which Chandidas is which. There are so many Chandidasas -- minimum four, probably five or more. Majumdar divides his book into four sections: definitely Chandidas, not so sure, definitely Baru Chandidas and Dina Chandidas, and ones that though ascribed or attributed are definitely not the original Chandidas. Many of the latter are signed Dvija Chandidas, who is definitely post-Chaitanya, though he shows no direct knowledge of or devotion to Chaitanya. The  rāgātmikā-padas  of the Sahajiya Chandidas are left out entirely, since everyone seems to agree that they are post-Chaitanya. Majumdar also thinks Baru Chandidas is at least contemporary with Chaitanya, which I don't agree with. Basically all the students of early Bengali literature pick over each  pada  and...

Unique features of Hit Harivansh’s method of worship. This discussion is based on Hita Dasji Maharaja’s commentary of Harivansh’s Caur ā si-pada. To be retained here, Radhavallabhis consider Rādhā-sudhā-nidhi to be HHV's writing. Other works by HHV are Caur ā si-pada and Sphuṭa-vāṇī. Hitadasji says that according to the other Vaishnava sampradayas (Rupa Goswami is obviously the source of the pūrva-pakṣa ), Krishna is the object ( vi ṣ aya ) of love and Radha and the sakhis are the  āśrayas . In HHV, this is reversed and Radha is seen as the object of love, with Krishna and the sakhis being the  āśrayas . I am curious about the difference between Krishna and sakhis as  āśrayas of love. I.e. It doesn't really make sense to consider Radha the  vi ṣ aya  because of the way she is defined, even in RRSN. (Verses to follow). As pramāṇa , he points to this verse from RRSN— premṇaḥ san-madhurojjvalasya hṛdayaṁ śṛngāra-līlā-kalā vaichitrī-paramāvadhir bhagavat p...

Prabodhananda Saraswati: From Benares to Braj (Part I) Prabodhananda Saraswati: From Benares to Braj (Part II) Prabodhananda, Hit Harivansh and the Radha-rasa-sudha-nidhi (Part I) Prabodhananda, Hit Harivansh and the Radha-rasa-sudha-nidhi (Part II) Similarities between RRSN and Prabodhānanda's works We now turn to a comparison of RRSN with Prabodhānanda's writings. In particular we shall look at the three stotra kāvya works, CCA, VMA and RRSN, which are generically similar. We shall on occasion, however, also look at some of Prabodhānanda's other metrical works, in particular SaṅgM and ARP. None of the three stotra kāvyas conform to any clear structure as a whole, though on occasion certain verse sequences may be found to have some kind of unity, either metrical or semantic. Such sequences are rather more extended in VMA, the longest work, and less so in CCA, the shortest. Each of these works, being panegyrics to their chosen object of worship have a certain styli...