Jagat

There is certainly an unexpected symmetry to these memories--a crossing over of multiple synchronicities. There are ideas that recurrently trouble us, were troubling us then and they also seem likely to continue to trouble us recurrently to arbitrary unconscious triggers like, in this case, the coincidence of dates.  The similarities, the synchronicities and so on, are only so if we notice them. Non-observation of any kind, whether it is the non-observation of scripture, the non-sensual imperception of things, the things that happen but are so far from consciousness that they do not even ruffle a hair of our heads as they pass by, equal the non-existence of synchronicity. It is just another name for a meaningful memory. An uddīpana if you will.  At any rate, the "guru issue" appears to be a recurrent preoccupation.

A lot of stuff from a wide range of preoccupations--Gītā Govinda, Vr̥ndāvana-mahimāmr̥ta, Yoga-sūtra, American politics. Quite a mishmash. I chose for the title an utterance from seven years ago, when I seem to have been having deep thoughts.

Bhagavān Madhusūdana does not manifest  in a heart polluted by materialistic attachments, for a swan is never attracted to muddy water. Speech defiled by untruth is unfit to extol Bhagavān Keśava, for the moon cannot dispel darkness when covered by clouds.

The first thing everyone asks is, "Does he belong to my club?" This is because in the first stage of sadha sanga one is busy creating his sadhaka deha, and in order to do so, he needs models to follow. A model has an external and an internal side. In the first stage, one focuses on the externals primarily to forge the identity of the sadhaka deha. This means differentiating from those who are not "in my club." The Vrindavan sampradayas came to the conclusion that "as long as you are a member of this club of clubs, i.e., you just belong to one of the clubs and you can join the club of clubs." The irony is that to establish a club you must differentiate yourself. By differentiating yourself, you become not  a part of the club. Like Gaudiya Math to Goswamis and Babajis, like Iskcon to Gaudiya Math. And so on. It usually takes a few generations to start seeing that the differences are not as important as the common elements. (FB  From six years ago)

India is in the throes of a heat wave. This is about a break in the heat eight years ago: A bit of wind and a bit of rain, Vrindavan has cooled down again. A break from the relentless heat, I feel smarter too, it's really neat. Ironically on this side of the world, the last few days were really the first real days of spring. On Sunday I went for a walk in the park and there were lots of people about, everyone has come out of hibernation. In these days of tension, a moment of relief. 

I have been posting videos of my easy reading Sanskrit classes. There are many earlier ones too from Panchatantra. I will gradually be posting these.

He is the best of the saintly who is compassionate to all, inimical towards no one, and forbearing. Truth is his very essence, and as such he is faultless, equipoised, and works for the welfare of all. His awareness is never overcome by desire, his senses are subdued, and his heart is soft.

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 ...

May 1, 2016 Part One was actually written on April 28, 2016 and is included in the memories for that day. This article also has some relation to the reflections I had on Gurus Falling From the Sky . Unfortunately some of the pages linked to in article have been lost. I would kind of like to see them--I think I wrote what I could find out about Vivekananda, Ramkrishna and Sharada Mother's visits to Vrindavan, but for some reason never crossposted to this blog. 

So I don't believe in gurus / who fall whole from the sky. / Gurus are forged in the furnace / like every other finished thing. //

Well today FB coughed up only a few memories, one of which was rather significant and never posted to my blog. I mentioned the other day that "archetypes" was a word used to diminish my credibility to devotees who are literalistic in their beliefs. On this blog, the label archetype or archetypes are used and you can see how I am using the term generally. I think this may be one of the most instructive: Archetypes: Remembering the Essence .

An old baba looked at my hand and told me I would not die in Vrindavan. Perhaps a relevant post from five years ago in view of my present circumstances. Of course I do the best I can and all the advice is respected as relevant. Krishna is indeed everywhere, just sometimes more apparent than others,

I seem to reflect quite frequently on the difficulties I have in getting my primary task done. Five years ago I was struggling with Bhakti Sandarbha and now I am struggling with Prīti Sandarbha. It seems like a dreadful bore to inflict these kinds of reflections on my readers but at least once in a while something else comes out of it -- a verse translation or something else, a realization of some kind. I really want to get Prīti Sandarbha finished this summer, but my in depth reading of the Bhāgavatam and editing the commentaries takes up a lot of my time. For the last couple of days I have been working on a small portion of the prakaraṇa that deals with rasābhāsa. I have already written one article  ( two actually ) on the subject and there will hopefully be more.  Rasābhāsa arises when the perfect ideal conditions for rasa are not met. For Jiva Goswami this is a problem, since in the Bhāgavatam we cannot have any imperfection. I have being using the word "occlusion" to tr...

  2010  I was thinking about Voltaire's statement: "Le mieux est l'ennemi du bien." Which I heard translated as "the IDEAL is the enemy of the good." The image of perfection, i.e., God, which is the essence of the spiritual life, of self-improvement, can at the same time destroy our attempt to make the best of what will always be flawed--our human existence. Forgiveness is the bridge between the two poles.   2017 There has been a lot about mānava-sevā = mādhava sevā , with the recent visit of Ammachi and the event at the Ramkrishna Mission hospital the other day and I have been thinking about it. Jiva Goswami in the Sandarbhas, especially in Krishna Sandarbha, discusses various ways of looking at Krishna. Kaviraj does the same thing when talking about Mahaprabhu in the early going of CC. They say, yes, however you see Krishna or Mahaprabhu is OK, because they are the root of all things, so everything is contained within them. According to your adhik...

This was a response to something an ex-devotee posted about self-love. As often is the case, something else crossed my path at about the same time, namely this verse by Haridas Shastri. It provoked certain thoughts in me that I felt worth sharing. As prayers go, it seems particularly good to me and I had  even included it in an earlier post . I wrote this comment on Facebook but never posted it on the blog, though I rather like the trend of the meditation.

2018 Today is Hit Harivanshji's appearance day. What a good fortune to live in Vrindavan. I am just sitting here in the VT office and new neighbors are celebrating his appearance. It seems we have a Radha Vallabhi family moving in next door. 2011 It may be asked that since direct perception in the philosophy of logic requires close contact between a perceiver’s senses and the object perceived (Gotama’s Nyāya-sūtra 1), how can a yogi perceive the subtle, the hidden or the distant beyond such contact? The answer is that the internal sense ( antaḥ-karaṇa ) is undivided and all-pervading. It is in close contact with all realities at all times. āgamenānumānena dhyānābhyāsa-rasena ca |  tridhā prakalpayan prajñāṁ labhate yogam uttamam || By authority ( āgama ) and by logic ( anumāna ), and through enjoyment of the practice ( abhyāsa ) of meditation ( dhyāna );  Cultivating wisdom in these three ways,  One gains the highest yoga. ( Vyāsa-bhāṣya,  YS 1.48) 2011 I must be ...

  I was remembering back to my first time in Vrindavan in the 70s and 80s. There used to be a semi-crazy guy in Loi Bazaar who was dressed as a Haridasi sadhu, but embellished with various colorful accoutrements. This is a current version, but he is not the only one. To some degree we are all crazy like that. I was walking back home in the evening through Kishore Pura, and this fellow rolls up on his motorcycle. He is covered in flashing electronic signs that say Radhe Radhe and peacock feathers everywhere, flower garlands both real and in paper. He quickly attracted a crowd of children and had them all shouting Radhe ! Radhe!

A longtime friend of mine whose FB handle is Sri Sri wrote the following. He later changed "Steven Hawkins" to "Captain Kirk" since the idea of going "where no western gaudiya has gone before" and "to a different universe" etc., do indeed seem to be more appropriate to that. Anyway, I am certainly no intellectual giant, or perhaps it is that the Gaudiya Vaishnava world is unfortunately full of intellectual pygmies. Nevertheless, I have occasionally gotten positive feedback and I do think that there is some need of a cogent intellectual defense of religion in general and Vaishnavism in particular. I am totally inadequate to the task, but perhaps I have seen some glimpses of directions that such defenses could be made -- and they are not found in the direction of blind and literal belief. There are a few other reflections later in this post.   jagadananda pabhu is the stephen hawkins of gaudiya vaishnavism......we all read him and have no idea ...

I thank God that entering Vrindavan is so arduous. Arduously pleasurable at every step. I thank God that Radha and Krishna's sweetness is infinite, and that it will take an infinity of lifetimes to relish it, but that even then I will still not be filled. And I thank God for Srila Rupa Goswami's insight into the Divine Couple. Jai Sri Radhe! May everyone see the sweet presence  of Radha and Krishna in all phenomena, in separation and union, relishing the rasa. (9 years ago)

জন্মস্থান বিষয় নিয়ে গৌডীয় মঠ আর পারম্পরিক বৈষ্ণবদের মধ্যে একটা সবচেয়ে বড় বিবাদের স্থান হয়েছে । আমরা যারা ভক্তিবিনোদ ঠাকুরের সঙ্গে জড়িত আর নিত্যানন্দ প্রভু -- জাহ্নবা মাতা -- রামাই ঠাকুরের দীক্ষা পরম্পরা আম্নায সিদ্ধ পরম্পরা মানি, বড়ই বিপদে পড়ি । এটা নিয়ে আমার বহু অনুসন্ধান আর মননের পরে এই বক্তব্য--