PART 1

ENGAGED VAISHNAVISM

THE CHAITANYA SCHOOL’S CONTRIBUTION

TO INDIA’S RELIGION OF LOVE

A THESIS PRESENTED
BY
JOSHUA M. GREENE

TO

HOFSTRA UNIVERSITY
NEW COLLEGE
IN PURSUIT OF A MASTERS DEGREE
IN INTERDISCIPLINARY STUDIES

Joshua M. Greene
74 Old Westbury Road
Old Westbury, NY 11568
 2

Tel/Fax: (516) 238-5797 Email: Joshua@strmedia.com

CONTRACT 1 - DRAFT OF NOVEMBER 2007

PRE-COLONIAL PERIOD
 3

“Work is love made visible.”

Kahlil Gibran
 4

CONTENTS_______________________________________________________

ABBREVIATIONS…………………………………………………………..p. 6

AUTHOR’S NOTE…………………………………………………………..p. 7

INTRODUCTION……………………………………………….…………..p. 11

PRELUDE…………………………………………………………………...p. 22

PASSIVE LOVE: RELIGION IN THE VEDAS…………………….….…..p. 23

ACTIVE LOVE: PURANAS AND BHAGAVAD GITA……………..……p. 39

LOVE LOST: BUDDHISM AND SHANKARA’S RESPONSE…………...p. 55

LOVE FOUND: THE BHAKTI RENAISSANCE……………….……..…..p. 70

CONCLUSION………………………………………………...……….…....p. 88

BIBLIOGRAPHY………………………………………………………...….p. 90
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ABBREVIATIONS___________________________________________________________

AV Atharva Veda

RV Rig Veda

BG Bhagavad Gita

BhP Bhagavata Purana

BS Brahma Samhita

BU Brihadaranyaka Upanishad

CB Chaitanya Bhagavata

CC Chaitanya Charitamrita

CU Chandogya Upanishad

KS Krsna-samhita

PP Padma Purana

SB Shatapatha Brahmana

SCS Sri Chaitanya-siksamrita

TU Taittiriya Upanishad
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AUTHOR’S NOTE______________________________________________________

Vaishnavism constitutes the numerically largest community within Hinduism. Delving

into Vaishnava theology is consequently not academic probing into an obscure sect but the

analysis of a living religion comprising several hundred million people with a history extending

back before recorded time.

Most scholarly books on Vaishnavism describe four principal schools (sampradayas)

which differ from one another in their systematizers’ interpretation of Vedanta. These are the Sri

sampradaya (founder: Ramanuja, 1050-1137), the Madhva sampradaya (founder: Madhva,

1197-1276), the Kumara sampradaya (founder Nimbarka, 1125-1162), and the Rudra

sampradaya (founder: Vishnu Swami, 1200-1250; also called the Vallabha sampradaya after a

more recent saint Vallabha, 1479-1533). The Chaitanya School, named after its founder (1485-

1533), is often associated with the Madhva sampradaya yet has grown to such importance that it

is often listed separately.

Vaishnava practice is called bhakti or devotional service to Krishna, God in personal

form. From 1969 to 1982, I led the life of a full-time Vaishnava bhakti monk, first in Europe,

then in India, and the last several years in America. There were perhaps two dozen of us in the

London ashram in the early 1970s, twenty men and a few women who lived on separates floor of
 7

a little building off Oxford Street. Each morning we rose at 4:00am, took cold showers, dressed

in saffron robes, and then assembled in the temple room before marble deities of Radha and

Krishna, the feminine and masculine forms of the divine. We meditated on prayer beads, studied

Sanskrit and Bengali devotional texts, and performed the traditional arati ceremony before the

deities as it has been done in India for thousands of years. None of us knew much about the

depth of our faith tradition. We had opted out of conventional society to embark on an exotic

adventure, and the little we did know about Vaishnava theology sufficed to sustain us. All of this

of course utterly baffled friends and family who were convinced we had lost our minds.

After thirteen years of ashram life, I returned to New York and began the arduous task of

applying theory to the real world. That was in 1982. Twenty-five years later, the seas have

calmed and life has established reasonable rhythms. I have kept contact with fellow students

from back then. Five or six became skilled mediators who work with NGOs around the globe. A

few others went into environmental action and are affiliated with World Wildlife Foundation

initiatives in India. A few became successful in business and use their profits to finance

construction of schools and hospitals in poverty zones. One old friend runs a program that feeds

more than 100,000 school children in the Mumbai area every day. It’s fascinating to see men and

women trained in Vaishnava faith achieve success in situations where government, business, and

military agencies have failed.

Men and women with that kind of ability are exceptional whatever their religious

background. Still, when these old friends talk about what they are doing they describe it as

applying Vaishnava theology to real life dilemmas—what I have chosen to call Engaged

Vaishnavism. And that raises questions which may be of value to other faith cultures. How do

believers move their religious convictions from internal contemplation to external engagement?
 8

Does such projection into the outer world betray the inner experience of devotion? Can believers

take an active part in the world without compromising the separation from the world necessary to

sustain devotional feelings? Can people committed to devotional life inhabit the same world they

are attempting to transcend?

Leaving temple life was not easy or pleasant. I needed a job, but after thirteen years of

Sanskrit and daily rituals my employable skills were minimal. What services did I have to offer a

company—fervent prayer? Even after landing a job at a children’s film studio, adjusting to

secular life was a constant balancing act. How far could I bend the rules before my spiritual

stamina broke down? How much socializing could I endure before unsanctified foods and

meaningless chatter started dissolving the devotional resolve I had cultivated for so long? And of

particular relevance to the document at hand, how deeply should I allow the world’s problems

affect me? Would involvement in social action be a help or a hindrance to my deepest desire,

which was and remains to develop love for God?

Wondering how to balance the material and the spiritual, the secular and the sacred is not

unique to Vaishnavas; but unlike Judaism and Christianity which have had a vested interest in

the outer world for centuries Vaishnavas face unprecedented change. What does it mean to be a

bhakta or someone dedicated to a life of devotional service in the twenty-first century? Does it

mean actively propagating a particular doctrine? Does it mean taking formal initiation into an

approved sampradaya? Does it mean performing devotional rituals? Does legitimacy as a

Vaishnava depend on strict adherence to behavioral standards? If stress pushes a practitioner to

compromise those standards, is the connection with tradition severed? And where does social

action fit? Is it extraneous to the Vaishnava experience or an integral part of it?

 9

The answers may lie in doing what is most difficult for anyone who believes deeply:

namely step aside from those convictions long enough to consider how their implementation may

have changed over time. To fulfill dharma or righteous duty today requires Vaishnavas to move

at least hypothetically away from what was in order to see what may be, as Moses did by setting

aside his worldly shoes before treading on sacred ground. It is an exercise that brings provocative

results when viewed, as has been attempted in this thesis, from Vaishnava history’s earliest days.
 10

INTRODUCTION_______________________________________________________

Indications of social action as a vehicle for religious experience are embedded in

Vaishnava texts, which hold that all beings are by nature eternal but caught up in a dreamlike

condition of repeated birth and death. Through various disciplines, practitioners can awaken

from this dreamlike state and return to their original eternal consciousness. But what happens

after enlightenment? What do “liberated beings” do? Sixteenth century Vaishnava reformer

Chaitanya Mahaprabhu’s reply was that devotional service (bhakti) to Krishna is the activity of

all beings in eternity and is best cultivated through practice in the known world. Because Krishna

is real, his creation is also real; and the love binding souls to him can be realized through

devotional service practiced here, in the world our senses can perceive. Chaitanya’s followers

consequently view the monistic goal of merging with the divinity, espoused by Acharya

Shankara in the eighth century, as an incomplete and tenuous liberation from the world of maya

(illusion).1 This first Contract includes an examination of differences between the Shankara and

Chaitanya schools and explores the Chaitanya School’s impetus for social action. Contracts Two

and Three explore the development of that ideology in India’s colonial and post-colonial periods.

1
“O lotus-eyed Lord [Krishna], non-devotees who perform severe austerities to achieve the highest position
[kaivalya or merging with the divinity] think themselves liberated but their intelligence is impure. They fall down
from their position of imagined superiority because they have no regard for Your lotus feet.” (BhP 10.2.32)
 11

The premise here is that Vaishnavism—not as a religious institution but as a unifying

vision of all creation—has unfolded over time; and that as it continues to emerge it propels

adherents into greater participation in and commitment to the work of the world. Viewed

historically, Vaishnava beliefs might seem to oppose such commitment,2 since the community

appears to have been a loose confederation of ascetics, renouncers, and worshipers of deities in

temples. Through the lens of the Chaitanya School 3 a different portrait emerges, one of a

socially active community which from its earliest days sees the deity in the hearts of all beings

and encourages the protection and forward movement of his creation.4 Still, it is only recently

that Vaishnavas have been obliged to consider how to be part of that forward movement. In our

post 9/11 world the need for religious leaders to take part in healing the world may seem self-

evident, but for a culture steeped in internal devotion it is a radical change of self-image.

That portrait of Vaishnavas as a people disengaged from the world dominated much of

nineteenth century Western scholarship, which unabashedly sought to prove the superiority of

Christianity over Hinduism and found only one virtue in studying Hindu texts, namely to

disprove their validity.5 The caricature of Vaishnavism as a sentimental detour from Vedanta

scholarship was reinforced by neo-Vedantists, as early twentieth century Hindu intellectuals

2
See for instance Norvin Hein’s essay “The Ramcaritmanas in the Life of Krsna Devotees,” in Bardwell L. Smith’s
Religious Movements and Social Identity, vol. 4 (Delhi: Chanakya Publications, 1990) in which he argues that
Krishna may offer his devotees spontaneity and playfulness, but for moral and social guidance devotees turn to
Rama. (p. 33)
3
Also known as Gaudiya Vaishnavism. The Sanskrit word Gaudiya, from the root gaur or golden, conveys a double
meaning: 1) coming from Gauda, a region of Bengal famous for its golden fields; and 2) coming from Gauranga, the
honorific title of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, the “Golden Avatar” whose movement in 16th century Bengal inaugurated
a renaissance of Vaishnavism or devotion to Vishnu (Krishna), the Supreme Being in personal form.
4
“Those who behave respectfully toward the Deity in the temple but not toward the general public are materialistic
and are in the lowest position.” (BhP 11.2.47 )
5
Speaking at Oxford in 1840, H.H. Wilson, one of the pioneers of Indology, pointed out that one should know the
Hindu doctrines in order “to confute the falsity of Hinduism and affirm to the conviction of a reasonable Hindu the
truths of Christianity.” (Essays and Lectures Chiefly on the Religion of the Hindus, II, p. 41).
 12

were known, who all but abandoned any references to personal divinity. Their desire to achieve

respect in the eyes of European modernists compelled them to harmonize the Sanskrit texts with

Enlightenment sciences such as geology and biology and denigrate devotion and worship of

deities as the residue of earlier and less civilized times. Bhakti (devotional service to the personal

Supreme Being) to their way of thinking was an undignified path, suited only for lower classes.

Some intellectuals such as Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, in an effort to appear both traditional and

modern, claimed that personalism in the Vedas was best understood allegorically.6

Today, traditional structures have earned respectability, yoga is a mainstream practice,

and multiculturalism sits at the table with other dignitaries of social discourse. Yet Vaishnava

personalism remains misunderstood even by practitioners and, notwithstanding its large number

of adherents7 has yet to make a full contribution to world affairs.

Two reasons might explain why this is so. One is an Enlightenment bias against deities as

idols, a point of view bolstered by Shankarite impersonalism which continues to influence

academic definitions of Hindu belief. The other is what might be called intellectual colonialism,

the notion that if mysticism and devotion now sit at the table of learning it is because

broadminded Western Academics extended the invitation and not because these practices have

something to offer. The work at hand does not look at this second explanation in detail, but the

impact of academic filters on mystic traditions should not be minimized. Beginning in the 1960s,

traditional religious structures began enjoying enhanced currency in academic discourse, with

6
See, for instance, his speech before the Visva Hindu Sammelan in New Delhi on December 10, 1965, in which he
interprets sacred Vedic stories as metaphors for Darwinian evolution.

7
Two-thirds of the world’s one billion Hindus identify themselves as Vaishnavas, according to Gerald Larson in
India’s Agony Over Religion (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1995), p. 20; Agehananda Bharati
in Hindu Views and Ways and the Hindu-Muslim Interface (New Delhi, India: Munshiram Manoharlal, 1981); and
Klaus Klostermaier in “The Response of Modern Vaishnavism” (Harold G. Coward, Ed., Modern Indian Responses
to Religious Pluralism, Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1987, p. 129).
 13

one qualification: the measure of their acceptability was largely the extent to which those

structures were receptive to modernization.8 This was, at best, a modified version of

ethnocentrism that effectively perpetuated a colonial bias against mystic cultures and in

particular those cultures which espouse the worship of personal deities.

The work at hand is an attempt to clarify Vaishnava belief in a personal divinity,

particularly for readers with little or no background in Vaishnavism, and to explore its

significance as an impetus to social engagement. Readers will also discover why many scholarly

accounts continue to view Vaishnava beliefs through a dark lens. For the Vaishnava community

my hope is that this thesis will clarify two central yet often overlooked principles: (1) love for

Krishna can be expressed by contributing to the progress of humanity; and (2) such contribution

must be undertaken with selfless intent.

CHAITANYA’S CONTRIBUTION

For thousands of years prior to Chaitanya, India acknowledged three major paths which

promised followers knowledge of ultimate reality: karma-kanda, the path of work as inculcated

in the original Vedas; jnana-kanda, the path of knowledge as espoused in the supplementary

Upanishads; and upasana-kanda, the path of devotion as promoted in the Itihasas (the epics

Ramayana and Mahabharata) and the Puranas (histories). Chaitanya corrected and expanded the

previously held view of devotion as different from jnana and karma by defining bhakti as

inclusive of them. All knowledge, all work, found its fulfillment when undertaken in the spirit of

devotion, as underscored in the Bhagavad Gita:

8
See for instance L. and S. Rudolph’s work The Modernity of Tradition (Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
1967), a sincere attempt to legitimize Indian political development but one which falls into this trap of assuming that
the Western model of modernization is the only authentic one.
 14

“Whatever you do, whatever you eat, whatever you offer or give away, and

whatever austerities you perform—do that, O son of Kunti, as an offering to Me.

In this way you will be freed from bondage to work and its auspicious and

inauspicious results.”9

Chaitanya’s way to God included fellowship among devotees, the development of

community, singing, dancing, feasting on sanctified foods, and cultivating a vision of the divinity

in everyone and in all of creation. Of particular importance was Chaitanya’s affirmation of deity

worship (arcana) as critical to stimulating love for God and the inclusion of the world itself as a

deity worthy of worship through devotional service. Chaitanya did not invent these principles of

Vaishnavism, which has roots in antiquity and branches across the subcontinent;10 but he and his

scholarly followers, known as the Six Goswamis of Vrindavan, offered a redefining of devotion

that brought the tradition out of its insular history and pointed to a unity of all beings in service

to Krishna.

In the years following Chaitanya’s demise in 1533 that torch of unification dimmed as

often occurs after the passing of a charismatic religious leader. Condemning deity worship as

idolatry, British missionaries pushed the groundbreaking work of the Goswamis into disrepute,

as did neo-Hindus seeking to reconcile their culture with modernity—an agenda which, for those

intellectuals who bothered to salvage personalism at all, led to separating the heroic and

religiously moral Krishna of the Gita from the morally corrupt (in their eyes) Krishna of the

9
BG 9.27-28
10
In South India, the bhakti movement particularly in the Tamil region extends as far back as the sixth century
where it was represented by the Nayanar saints. K. Ishwaran comments that the social impact of bhakti in the south
(in which he includes the Dasas of Karnataka and the later saint-poets of Maharashtra) was limited to making
religion easier to practice socially, thus lacking the global applications envisioned by Chaitanya (“Bhakti Tradition
and Modernization: The Case of Lingayatism”, in Tradition and Modernity in Bhakti Movements, pp. 74-75).
 15

Puranas. For the next 300 years, no serious attention was paid to Vaishnava doctrine except in

abstract or technical environments such as Vedantic interpretation and Sanskrit exegesis.

Chaitanya’s contributions foundered and sunk into obscurity.

Such was the state of affairs until the late 1800s when Bhaktivinode Thakur burst onto

the scene. In brilliant expository writings, this court magistrate (who was not Vaishnava by birth)

resurfaced the writings of the Goswamis, refuted prevalent objections to its emotive personalism,

and reconciled Vedanta with the bhakti of the Puranas.11 Thanks to his pioneering efforts,

Vaishnavism reemerged.

As word of the revival spread, a number of leading dignitaries and scholars dropped their

pretensions to modernism and realigned themselves with Chaitanya’s movement. That

renaissance has continued through the work of voices both Indian and Western. My effort here is

to trace the tradition’s journey from its early days, through the Chaitanya period to the present

time, and then to offer some perspectives on resources within the tradition for addressing a world

torn by religious extremism.

“Engaged Vaishnavism” attempts to track this transition, and if one defect here stands out

among others it is depicting that transition as smooth and linear. Imagining how a tradition

unfolds over the centuries is akin to time-lapse photography. Speeded up, a flower’s transition

from seed to blossom seems impeccably choreographed. Slowed down, the arduous moments are

revealed as the sprout pushes aside pebbles, sheds old layers, and struggles upward. The work of

enlightenment is neither smooth nor linear, and neatly composed theses cannot erase the sloppy,

often painful job of slogging our way toward a better humanity.

11
Previous to Bhaktivinode’s work, notable was the work of Vishwanath Chakravarti, who wrote commentaries on
existing literature; and Baladeva Vidyabhusan, whose Govinda Bhasya commentary on the Vedanta Sutras
established Vaishnavism as a legitimate Vedantic path.
 16

Other defects mar this thesis. It does not explore fundamentalism and other radical

interpretations of religious meaning. It does not address many issues of authority such as who

speaks for a tradition: established leaders or younger scholars? It does not attempt to answer

critical questions about institutional structure. In Chaitanya’s day there were no Vaishnava

institutions; today there are dozens. Will Vaishnavism veer toward autonomous churches a la

Protestantism, each church free to interpret scripture and meaning? As well, little attention is

given here to the psychology of devotion. Two practitioners may perform the same function, one

focused on performing with love and the other on achieving a successful result—who reaches the

divinity? Do results not count at all? Where do we draw the line between the secular and the

sacred when it comes to abortion, contraception, genetic engineering, capital punishment, same

sex relationships? Is it a hard line, or do intentions play a role in determining the sacredness of

action?12

Neglecting these issues is not meant to minimize their importance. Rather the intent here

is to help clarify the role of love in the journey to enlightenment as espoused by Chaitanya. His

theology reveals an inner core to the human condition that may provide a foundation for

analyzing other critical issues. It is a theology that may also offer all people of faith a richer,

wider sense of purpose.

DATING THE TEXTS

The complexities of dating Vedic history have challenged greater minds than mine.

Klostermaier hedges his bets by a thousand years or more13 and Max Muller, admitting his

inability, shrugged and wrote, “Whatever may be the date of the Vedic hymns, whether 1500
12
Arthur Dobrin has edited a very useful volume exploring how religions view issues of morality and action
Religious Ethics: A Sourcebook (Mumbhai: Hindi Granth Karyalay, 2004).
13
See for instance his chronology in A Survey of Hinduism, pp. 480-484.
 17

BCE or 15,000 BCE, they have their own unique place and stand by themselves in the literature

of the world.”14 Others such as C. Sengupta propose precise dates based on astronomical

calculations.15 By his reckoning, the earliest solar eclipse mentioned in the Rig Veda took place

on July 25, 3928 BCE; Krishna was born on July 21, 2501 BCE; and the Kurukshetra War took

place in 2449 BCE. Most dating does not presume to such accuracy. The sages chose palm and

other leaves as media for their creations, which, unlike Egyptian stone tablets, disintegrate within

a few hundred years. Did the Puranas appear before or after the Vedas? The Atharva mentions

“the Purana” as part of its revelation;16 but the Vedas contain few details concerning specific

deities. The abundance of such detail in the Puranas leads many scholars to assume they are a

later creation.17

The intent here is to present a living tradition that views wisdom as a divine gift,

whatever its moment of origination. My chronology attempts to reconcile the best estimates of

scholarship with the best intentions of tradition, and I assume responsibility for those instances

where either has not been adequately served.

THE PROTAGONIST: KATHAM

Attempting a detached examination of bhakti or loving devotional service is like

Heisenberg’s quest to pinpoint a subatomic particle. An outsider can track its position or its

velocity but not both. Devotion, according to bhakti authorities such as Rupa Goswami (1489-

14
The Six Systems of Indian Philosophy, Varanasi: Chowkambha (1962, reprint from 1899), p. 35.
15
Ancient Indian Chronology (Calcutta: University of Calcutta, 1947)
16
AV 5.19.9
17
According to Dutch Indologist Jan Gonda their final codification occurred in pre-Buddhist times around 600 BC,
although there will always be differences of opinion regarding the antiquity of the Vedas, which tradition says
entered the world at the time of creation as a kind of blueprint or guidebook for humanity. See J. Gonda, Vedic
Literature (Samhitas and Brahmanas), History of Indian Literature, vol. 1 (Weisbaden: Harrassowitz, 1975).
 18

1588),18 should be approached from within the experience of devotion if one is to capture both its

emotive and theological dimensions. To bridge these two perspectives I have invented a hero, an

imaginary Vaishnava practitioner, whom we follow through life—or rather lives, as the literary

device has our protagonist reincarnating at key moments in the culture’s unfolding.19 This is

fitting since Vaishnava theology proposes that living beings transmigrate from one lifetime to

another, gathering lessons that inform their future progress. Self-awareness deepens in each

birth, bringing them ever closer to the Godhead.

When we first encounter our hero in 2000 BCE during the Vedic period, we see the world

through his child’s eyes, which seemed appropriate to me since his innocence might well have

complemented that of the times. We meet him next around 200 BCE,20 in a future incarnation.

This time we see the world through his eyes as a studious twenty-year-old shortly after the battle

of Kurukshetra, when the Bhagavad Gita is starting to make its mark upon Vaishnava faith and

Buddhism (according to some sources) has become a mainstream religion. Our protagonist next

appears in yet another incarnation circa 829 CE, now as a thirty-year-old in the time of Shankara

and the Advaita school. After that, he appears in sixteenth century Bengal where we join him at

age forty as a follower of Chaitanya. The second Contract will follow his progress through the

colonial period to the time of India’s independence in 1947, and the third Contract will present

him first as an older man in contemporary America and then on his deathbed 100 years in the

future at the apex of his journey to enlightenment.

18
Rupa’s work Bhakt-rasamrita-sindhu is considered the preeminent work on the science of devotion.
19
The use of imaginary characters to convey wisdom teachings is a device used prominently in the Upanisads. The
Buddhist Jataka Tales employ a similar literary device as do the Parables of Jesus. More recently, we have examples
in such works as Nietzsche’s Thus Spake Zarathustra.
20
See note on p. 17 concerning the joys of dating.
 19

Because no two individuals think alike, the beliefs and actions of this imagined

protagonist do not represent any normative model of Vaishnava behavior. Katham might be

described as a case-in-point, one person, seen across many lifetimes, in pursuit of a loving

relationship with God. Because he is a brahmin male he enjoys privileges not always available to

women or lower castes. He is born and reborn consistently within the Vaishnava community,

specifically in the Brahma-Madhva-Gaudiya sampradaya (the Chaitanya School), and his

journey ends in 2135 CE when he at last achieves his goal. What happens then reveals the

author’s musings over the shape of things to come.

The dramatic device is intended to avoid the Heisenberg-like dilemma of having to

choose between scholarship and experience, between rational and irrational thought. A character-

based approach also embodies the essence of Vaishnava ideology, namely the centrality of

personhood in the cosmic scheme.

 20

CONTRACT ONE

PRE-COLONIAL PERIOD
 21

PRELUDE _________________________________________________

Naimisharanya Forest, October 22, 2135 CE

From Lucknow the research team rode forty five miles north to the Naimisharanya site.

The taxi took about three hours and hit every pothole along the way.

The site’s history was well known to them. Legend holds that around 3000 BCE, at the

junction of two cosmic ages, Dwapara-Yuga and Kali-Yuga, a council of sages determined they

would perform a sacrifice to ensure the wellbeing of future generations. They prayed to demigod

Brahma for guidance and Brahma answered by throwing his cosmic disc to earth to indicate

where the sacrificial pit should be dug. The disc struck the earth at Naimisharanya and created a

sweet-water spring without bottom. In the early 1900s, British engineers attempted to discredit

the spring as myth, but after lowering probes more than 3,000 feet they ran out of cable and gave

up. In the past century the spring, like most sources of water in India, had become too polluted to

drink and the research team carried bottled supplies.

Site 108-SR appeared as Katham had described it from his deathbed. The tell was about

200 feet long with a slight rise toward the eastern side. From its appearance little could be

deduced concerning its genesis, except that the central indentation might indeed have been a seat

or throne. Remains of heavy stone blocks were a clear indication of construction, and the

orientation—north to south—might indicate a conscious effort to keep the sun out of the eyes of

an assembly prepared to sit day and night, listening to a tale that traced the origins of, simply,

everything.
 22

PASSIVE LOVE: RELIGION IN THE VEDAS_____________________________

Naimisharanya Forest, 2135 BCE

The forest near the river Ganges pulsed with animals, birds and serpents moving between

thick green fronds, leaping from one monarchical tree to the next, slithering across mulch thick

as a carpet. At the edge of this primeval cathedral, an assembly of 60,000 shaven-headed

brahmins chanted hymns in unison while overseeing excavation of a massive pit several hundred

feet wide and two stories deep. The seated assembly had tucked the flowing ends of their robes

into their waistbands and removed their sandals as a sign of respect for the sanctity of the place

and of the purpose that had drawn them together. Their scriptures, called the Vedas, declared that

the world had come to a critical juncture: the onset of Kali-Yuga, most degraded of the four

cosmic ages, a time of ignorance and cruelty predicted to last 432,000 years.21 Properly executed,

the offering they were about to conduct would invoke protection for humanity during the

troubled times ahead.

The excavation came to an end. The sages stacked wood in the gaping hole and over the

pyre poured clarified butter from massive golden vats. As a single voice, they ignited the pyre
21
“In this iron age of Kali men have but short lives. They are quarrelsome, lazy, misguided, unlucky and, above all,
always disturbed... Truthfulness, cleanliness, tolerance, mercy, duration of life, physical strength and memory will
all diminish because of the powerful influence of the age of Kali.” (BhP, 1.1.10, 12.2.1)
 23

with recitation of sacred sound. Fire shot up from the pit and filled the noonday sky with

crackling flames.

A middle-aged monk in saffron robes entered the arena. All rose to greet him, stopping

the sacrifice in midcourse. Terminating a ritual before its completion was scandalous, but their

gesture of respect attested to a deep understanding of the ritual’s purpose.22 Suta, they knew, was

saragrahi, an enlightened being who had realized the essence of scripture and could guide others

to their deepest meaning.23 Receiving him properly took precedent over mechanical adherence to

Vedic injunctions.

Among the thousands who had gathered to witness the sacrifice was a ten-year-old boy

named Katham, a name derived from the Sanskrit katha meaning “wise discourse.” He was a

handsome child with dark penetrating eyes and hair cut close to his scalp except for a tuft at the

back of his head. 24 Katham observed Suta with awe, knowing that some years before this

revered sage had witnessed the death of Pariksit, last of the great Vedic kings. A prophecy had

foretold Pariksit’s death from the bite of a fire-breathing snake. The king had seen a blessing in

this, a chance to quit affairs of state and prepare for his return to the eternal realm. Pariksit

exchanged royal robes for mendicant’s rags and called a small group of friends to sit with him

22
For a more detailed explanation of the difference between kratvartha, or sacrificial acts done for the sake of the
sacrifice itself, and purushartha, sacrificial acts done for the general welfare and happiness, see Gavin Flood, “The
Meaning and Context of the Purusarthas” in The Fruits of Our Desiring: An Enquiry into the Ethics of the
Bhagavadgita for Our Times, Julius Lipner ed. (Calgary: Bayeux, 1997) pp. 11-27
23
“There are many varieties of scriptures, and in all of them there are many prescribed duties, which can be learned
only after many years of study in their various divisions. Therefore, O sage, please select the essence of all these
scriptures and explain it for the good of all living beings, that by such instruction their hearts may be fully satisfied.
Knowing well that the age of Kali has already begun, we are assembled here in this holy place to hear at great length
the transcendental message of Godhead and in this way perform sacrifice.” (BhP, 1.1.11, 1.1.21)
24
Sikha, traditionally worn by brahmacharis (celibate students) as a sign of their renunciation.
 24

until the appointed moment of his death. Among the assembly was Suta, whom Katham now

greeted with folded hands along with others gathered at Naimisharanya.25

Katham was the ten-year-old son of respected brahmin parents. He attended tols, informal

classes held at the base of large shade trees where learned pundits recited the Vedic texts.

Protocol was informal in these tols: all children could attend and parents expressed their

appreciation by giving the pundits whatever they could afford: a bag of rice, a length of cloth, a

pot of yogurt or freshly churned butter. From these resident and visiting teachers Katham learned

to recite verses and perform offerings to various gods, in particular Vishnu.26 He also learned

practical skills, such as how to apply natural medicines and identify edible plants and herbs.

Like other villagers of his day Katham sensed the global but lived quite locally. His

world was constrained and peaceful. There were no institutions, and while each group had its

calling—some as farmers, some as artisans, and some like his family as teaches and keepers of

the tradition—no one was judged higher or lower. Each limb of the communal body worked in a

cooperation of skills and interests. Even beliefs, while varied in favor of this or that god, lived

within a common framework. Planting and harvesting, offering first portions with song and

dance, hospitality, and communal affections constituted the life of his people. Appreciation of

the miracle of life was their religion: Katham sensed no difference between feeling and reason,

between the mystical and the everyday. These are distinctions that academics would impose in

centuries to come.27 Katham performed each act “rationally” according to habits and knowledge,
25
The story of Suta and his recitation is recounted in first canto Bhagavata-Purana.
26
The identification by European scholars of Vishnu as a primary deity goes at least as far back as Friedrich
Schlegel who saw him as the central sun god worshipped by Vedic tribes. The notion that this Vedic monotheism
has come down from those remote times was taken up by Max Mueller, who developed it into the concept of an
Aryan people destined by history to conquer and rule the world. Quoting Rig Veda X.121, Mueller writes, “The idea
of one god is expressed with such power and decision, that it will make us hesitate before we deny to the Aryan
nations an instinctive monotheism.” (Quoted in Dalmia, p. 417)
27
“The category of religion…is simply the production of the cognitive ‘filtering out’ of abstraction of certain aspects
of a much broader cultural dynamic…. Other cultures and pre-enlightenment Western culture did not view the
 25

and “irrationally” as an offering to higher powers.28 In his world everything occurred with innate

divine purpose.

The villagers’ sense of their self worth did not depend on acquisition or ostentatious

display, and crimes were infrequent. Offenses sometimes occurred, either by mistake or intent,

but Katham’s people had antisocial behavior relatively under control. Minor transgressions were

redressed with forgiveness and a reasonable fine. Larger disputes, when they arose for instance

among neighboring tribes, took place at a remove. His people would learn of battles after they

have been settled. The consequences of warfare on the general population were negligible, and

there was never any scarcity or fear.

At the heart of his schooling was the Vedic concept of rita¸ roughly meaning divine law

or cosmic order. In his young mind this meant there were things he should do and things he

should not do. Some things should be done because they insured the wellbeing of his

community, such as fire sacrifices and chanting hymns with precise pronunciation. Some things

should not be done because they were harmful, such as breaking moral or ethical guidelines

prescribed for his people. Rita constituted the fulcrum on which his life balanced.

Along with external sacrifices, Katham learned to perform internal sacrifices by keeping

clean, controlling his appetites, and reciting the Vedic hymns. His keen ear allowed him to

imitate even slight nuances of pronunciation, and his mimicking of forest animals made him

popular among the other children. Around his village, Katham was known as a helpful boy. In

large measure this was because he felt cared for by his parents and by the gods, and that security

human social world in this manner—they simply did not carve up the world in the way that we do. Religious
phenomena were always seen as part and parcel of political, social and other cultural forms. The separation of
religion from these is founded on a secular Enlightenment approach.” (Richard King, Orientalism and Religion:
Postcolonial Theory, India and The Mystic East (London: Routledge, 1999), p. 10
28
Ibid, pp. 25-30
 26

freed him to attend to others. The secularization process had not yet occurred: nothing

differentiated his public view of the world from his private beliefs. At ten, his healthy integrated

self was stronger than that of grown adults in centuries to come.

Katham listened as those assembled at the Naimisharanya Forest posed their questions to

Suta.

“O sage, what have you ascertained to be the ultimate good for the people of the

forthcoming Age of Kali?”29

“O learned one, in the Iron Age of Kali lives will be short, quarrelsome, disturbed. Please

tell us: What is the essence of all wisdom, by which people’s hearts may be appeased?”30

“O Suta, kindly explain the teachings imparted by previous masters, teachings which

uplift by speaking and by hearing...” 31

Katham studied the mounds of fruit, spices, flowers and firewood stacked by the deep pit

and tugged at his father’s robe.

“Father, why do we put food into the fire?”

His father leaned over and whispered, “The fire represents the mouth of Bhagavan, the

Supreme Being. Offering him food is one way to express our feelings for him. Like coming

home and finding that mother has our meal ready. She spent time, prepared the food—is that not

a sign of love?”

Nearby, some in the assembly were leaning forward, anxious to catch every word of

Suta’s replies. Katham pulled again at his father’s robe and points. “The pundits say I must sit

with my back straight. Look—they’re doing it wrong.”

29
BhP 1.1.9
30
BhP 1.1.11
31
BhP 1.1.13
 27

Katham’s father stroked his son’s head. “Proper sacrifice is not just about postures or the

outer form of things, but their content. Did you see how the fire ceremony was interrupted when

Suta arrived?” Katham nodded and his father poked him gently in the chest.

“The greater fire is not in the pit but in your heart. Stoke that flame of love for God and

for all beings and your sacrifice will be complete.”32

Katham was pacified, but only for a moment. He tugged again and asked, “Which god?”

His father leaned down and said, “There is only the One, who acts through various

agencies.” He pointed to rows of water pots lined up by the sacrificial pit. “See there, how the

sun reflects in those pots? The sun is one, but it reflects equally in each pot. Tell that one to your

pundits,” he said with a smile. “They’ll be impressed.”

Katham thought and said, “I can see the sun. Why can’t I see God?”

A breeze wafted over the assembly, carrying the aroma of incense and puffs of sand from

the riverbank. Katham rubbed his eyes.

“My son, a tiny speck of sand can stop you from seeing things properly. We’ve been in

this world a long time, many, many births. There’s a lot of sand in our eyes.”

Katham frowned, but his father’s attention had returned to the questions and answers by

the sages. “You will remember this moment one day,” he said quietly to his son, without turning

his eyes away from the speaker. “These wonderful men and women have gathered for the benefit

of people thousands of years in the future—people they do not know and will probably never

know.”

“Then why are they doing this?” Katham asked.

32
“A devotee who faithfully engages in ritual temple worship but does not see the deity in the hearts of all living
beings is to be considered a materialistic devotee.” (BhP 11.2.47) Also, “A true yogi observes Me in all beings and
also sees every being in Me. Indeed, the self-realized person sees Me everywhere.” (BG 6.29)
 28

His father hesitated, for the answer could determine his son’s outlook on many things.

“Because people are like those pots: tiny reflections of the Supreme Being. When someone is in

trouble, they deserve our help whether we know them or not.”

If Katham had thought more about it, he might have seen the wisdom in helping people

he did not know. But concepts such as global stewardship and social action had no place in his

world. Generations would pass before such broader concepts became necessary.33

In the tols, Katham learned his lessons by hearing and repeating. There were no written

texts. His memory was keen, and he could recite many stories. He knew the story of Brahma, the

first being, who received original knowledge, Veda, within his heart. He knew the story of

Brahma’s son Narada, who traveled with mystic powers across the universe playing on his

stringed vena to spread the Vedic truths. He knew the story of Narada’s disciple Vyasa, who

lived in a Himalayan cave and divided the one original Veda into four: Rig, Sama, Yajur and

Atharva.34 Katham’s teachers had described that there were more scriptures apart from the four

Vedas, such as the Brahmanas which added details on how sacrifices are to be performed. He

knew the story called the Purusha-Sukta 35 which described the Cosmic Person.

33
The shruti texts refer to rita, or the duty of maintaining cosmic harmony. In the later smriti texts, this concept
emerges as dharma, righteous action.
34
The Rig Veda contains 1,028 such hymns addressed to various gods. The Sama Veda is a selection of verses from
the Rig Veda with musical instructions for their proper recitation. The Yajur Veda is a book of Vedic ceremonies,
with verses and prose for use by priests who perform the manual part of the sacrifices. The Atharva Veda consists of
spells and incantations. The Vedas offer no histories or doctrines but concern themselves exclusively with details for
the offering of sacrifice (yajna) that formed the core of the Vedic religion. “We have much knowledge of the
religion of the early Aryans from the 1,028 hymns of the Rg Veda, which is the oldest religious text in the world still
looked on a sacred, and which was probably composed between 1,500 and 900 B.C.” Basham, p. 232. Tradition
maintains that, while the Vedas may have been compiled at a particular date in history, the knowledge they contain
is eternal and appears in each new creation.
35
RV 10.90
 29

“Thousand-headed is the Cosmic Person, thousand-eyed, thousand-footed. He

pervaded the earth on all sides and stood beyond it by ten fingers. This is the

nature of the Cosmic Person—he is all that had been and all that is to be. He is the

lord of eternal life and grows by virtue of [ritual] food. Such is his greatness, and

yet he is more than even this. One-quarter of him is separated into all beings;

three quarters of him remain in heaven. Three-quarters of his essence went

upward, while one-quarter remained here. From this [smaller portion] he spread in

all directions, manifesting as that which eats and that which does not eat…. When

the gods performed a sacrifice by offering the Cosmic Person himself, spring was

used as clarified butter, summer the firewood, autumn the libation. It was the

Cosmic Person, born in the beginning, sacrificed upon the sacred grass. By using

him, the gods engaged in sacrifice, as did the perfected beings and the sages of

old…. That sacrifice…created the beasts of the air and those of the forests and the

villages. From that sacrifice….the mantras [Rig Veda] and the songs [Sama Veda]

were born…. The sacrificial formulae [Yajur Veda] were born from it too…. The

moon was born from his mind; from his eye, the sun; from his mouth, both Indra

and Agni; from his breath, Vayu was born. From his navel arose the air; from his

head the heaven came into being; from his feet, the earth; the [four] directions

sprang from his ear. Thus they built the worlds…. The god sacrificed with the

sacrifice to the sacrifice. These were the first holy rites…”36

36
Adapted by Steven Rosen from Walter H. Maurer, Pinnacles of India’s Past: Selections from the Rigveda
(Amsterdam: Benjamins, 1986), pp. 271-272, cited in Rosen pp. 55-56.
 30

For a ten-year-old, Katham had an impressive understanding of his community’s beliefs,

and from verses describing the Cosmic Person he had determined that there was an eternal world

three times bigger than the material world around him. The Cosmic Person had sacrificed a part

of himself so that the material world would have people and animals and food, and people were

supposed to show their thanks by giving things back to the Cosmic Person. Just as the Cosmic

Person gave something of himself for us, so we should also give something of ourselves for him.

In his naïve way, Katham had successfully isolated the heart of yajna or sacrifice: giving of

oneself to make the world sacred.

Katham could also recite a popular verse: “Truth is one, though sages call it variously,”37

although he had a hard time understanding what it meant. Among his teachers, much like today,

there were differing interpretations.38 Still, he could explain the fundamentals on which most

everyone agreed. He accepted that life did not come from material nature but from brahman, the

one energy of which everything is made and in which everything exists. He had no difficulty

acknowledging that higher powers were at work in the universe or that people in this world were

disconnected from those higher powers. He recognized those powers in the grand display of

heavenly bodies that filled the night sky and in the simple perfection of a fruit or a stream. What

or who those powers are, how he was related to them, and where that relationship would lead

him after death—these topics absorbed much of his thinking.

37
RV 1.164.46
38
Compare, for instance, Swami Tathagatananda’s emphasis on the monistic perspective of his school, the
Ramakrishna Mission, with that of Vaishnava scholar Graham Schweig’s emphasis on personalism. Swami
Tathagatananda writes, “An important aspect of Rg-Vedic culture is the absence of any demand for a single form of
God as the only acceptable form. It endows Indian spiritual culture with its unique character: Vedanta is eternally
free from the narrow, parochial ideas whose sweeping consummation is the fanaticism that menaces the world.”
(Journey of the Upanisads to the West, New York: The Vedanta Society, 2002, p. 24) Schweig sees a very different
dimension in the texts and notes, “The divinity of the Vedas enters into a variety of love relations with the Vedic
worshiper, who relates to the deity as a father, mother, or father and mother together; as a brother, son, or friend; or
as a beloved, even as a bride.” (Dance of Divine Love, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2005, p. 101)
 31

Sitting among his elders on the sandy banks of the forest, Katham listened carefully as

Suta told the story of King Pariksit’s final days.

Throughout his life, Pariksit had only one wish: to know the divine. He

never allowed wealth or privilege to distract him from that goal. Every day he

meditated and prayed. Throughout his reign, he organized festivals of sacred

music for the benefit of his citizens. When he learned he had only a short time to

live, the king did not despair over fate’s cruelty but prepared himself with a

cheerful heart.39

“Let death come at any time,” he told those gathered around him. “I am

ready. My only request is that you sing the glories of god and never stop singing.”

“We will be with you,” they said. “We will sing, and we will not stop

singing.”

They consoled one another, saying that there is no cause to lament when a

person of great devotion passes away, for he returns to the eternal realm. Still,

sorrow pulled at their hearts, for the company of such a beautiful being was rare.

The assembly gathered around the king in his final hours sang and prayed,

creating a musical passage for his eternal self out of the material world. He could

no longer eat or drink yet he felt no distress. He was the witness to his pain, and

there was no pain in witnessing.

“Your music and prayers are my nourishment,” he told the assembly.

“Kindly go on chanting.”

39
The passing of Maharaja Pariksit is recounted in second canto Bhagavata-Purana.
 32

“He has already attained eternal life,” those around him whispered. “In his

heart dwells only devotion.”

One of those in attendance knelt by the king’s side. “You will never die,”

he said through tears. “Death can never claim such a master of the self as you.

You have conquered all dangers on the path.”

The king was indeed already liberated from the material world. No plans

crowded his thoughts, no pleasures tempted his senses, no doubts troubled his

heart. He felt no fear or anger. As he listened to the chanting of god’s names, he

consecrated the elements of his body to their source: earth to earth, fire to fire,

water to water, air to air. At the appointed moment, all movement ceased. There

was silence, and as those present looked on, his soul left his body.

A friend in attendance turned to the king’s son. “It was god himself who

took your father back.”

The king’s journey was achieved, and the silence of that moment was not

empty. It was filled with symphonies of purpose and the rightness of things and

with the harmony of hearts rejoined. It was the silence only of all material sound,

and into that space flooded sacred hymns and kirtan and a chorus of welcoming

voices. It was a glorious orchestral silence that calmed the pain of those who

suffered from knowing they would never again in this life have the sweet pleasure

of his company.

News of the king’s demise spread. From all corners of the kingdom came

cries of sorrow and outpourings of affection, for Pariksit was loved by one and all.
 33

Gradually from the ashes of lament rose a bright, joyful flame of celebration. A

great being had returned home.

The story captured Katham’s heart and for the first time an idea emerged, an idea that

prompted a feeling, which in turn became a purpose in his young mind. He knew something now

that until this moment had only hovered on the periphery of conscious thought. He, too, wished

to know the divine. At the end of his life he, too, wanted to return back to the eternal realm. He

had brought a small pull-toy with him, a wooden cart. He stood up and walked to the sacrificial

pit. He placed the toy on a pile with other offerings, bowed his head to the ground, rose, and

returned to his father’s side.

In the weeks following the gathering at Naimisharanya Katham went back to playing

with friends, doing his share of chores, and attending classes. But his desire to know the divine

did not go away and led to a series of discussions with his father. What should he do to achieve

his goal? His father felt great pride. Such noble aspirations did not stir everyone, let alone a ten-

year-old. Most people around them went about their lives as people always had, tending to the

hum and drone of their petty worlds. Nor did the Vedas themselves favor such a quest for the

eternal self, dedicated as they were to rituals. The world was a dangerous place and sages,

knowing that people developed a range of psychic defenses for coping with their vulnerability,

consecrated the bulk of their teachings to relieving fear and maximizing comfort in this life. Few

people took time to puzzle out what happens next.

Most Vedic directives called for mechanical acts of sacrifice, an emphasis that would

prompt commentators in future times to conclude that the central purpose of the Vedas was to

placate the gods, primarily by members of the renounced order.40 The generally objective
40
RV X.90
 34

language of the Vedas supports this impression: perform this rite, recite these mantras, and you

will get this or that benefit. The inner core of devotion all but disappears beneath the sheer

weight and volume of these rituals. In order to surface the deeper devotional core, later keepers

of the tradition compiled supplementary texts such as the Puranas, which distilled the devotional

heart of the Vedas into more explicit language.41

Katham’s father discussed his son’s ambition with his teachers. He seems capable, they

said, of achieving true self-awareness. Do not train him in either the path of karma or jnana, they

advised as the path of karma encourages material pursuits and will only distract him. And while

he is a good student, intellectual analysis (jnana) will give him only a partial glimpse of his

original nature. Pursuing jnana might even mislead him into imagining the opposite of embodied

life to be formless. Instead, the teachers recommended bhakti, devotional service, as the best way

to reawaken Katham’s relationship with the divine.42

Katham heard his father’s explanation about serving in devotion and sighed.

“I don’t know who it is I’m supposed to serve,” he said. “The pundits tell me I am atman,

and then they give me verses like tat tvam asi: ‘You are that—’ I don’t know what that is, and

they don’t explain it very well.”

His father laughed, remembering his own confusion over the cryptic pronouncements of

the Vedas. “Tat tvam asi comes from a story,” 43 he said. “A boy asks his father, ‘If we are all

41
“The work composed of 18,000 slokas which explains the meaning of Mahabharata and the Brahma-sutras, being
full of the import of the Vedas, is the natural commentary on the gayatri-mantra and is called Bhagavata Purana. It
is the essence of all the Vedas, histories, and the Vedanta. Satisfied with the sweet taste of this work, one will have
no attraction for anything else.” Garuda Purana (quoted in Bhaktivinode, SCS, p. 22)
42
Bhaktya mam abhijanati / yavam yas casmi tattvatah / tato mam tattvato jnatva / visate tad-anantaram
“One can understand Me as I am, as the Supreme Personality of Godhead, only by devotional service. And when
one is in full consciousness of Me by such devotion, he can enter into the kingdom of God.” BhG 18.55
43
CU 6.13.1-3
 35

brahman why can’t I see brahman?’ So the father tells him to mix some salt in a pot of water.

Then he asks if the son can see the salt.

“‘No,’ the son says.

“‘Taste it,’ says the father.

“‘Very salty,’ says the son.

“ ‘So you know the salt is there. In the same way, we are separate now from brahman due

to ignorance—like salt in the sack—but still we are all brahman.’ ”

“So,” Katham said, “we disappear when we go into brahman, like salt in the water?”

“Here’s what’s interesting,” his father replied. “What happens if you leave salty water in

the sun?”

“The water disappears—and you see the salt at the bottom of the pot!”

The bhagavata community would have to wait until the sixteenth century for a more

detailed explanation of saguna bhakti,44 but Katham was inspired by his father’s simple

explanations of oneness and difference.

Future generations of scholars would say that in Katham’s time there was no clearly

defined supreme god in the main body of the Vedas. Examining later Sanskrit texts in which a

supreme god plays a more prominent role, they would conclude that worship of a personal deity

was a creation of the post-Vedic period. This is a predictable assessment, given that linguistic

changes over time do suggest linear evolution from one idea to another. Still, historian Friedhelm

Hardy underscores the risk in such chronological assessments,45 which overlook how frequently

written texts express much older ideas. Speculation about the origin of ideas in scripture may

also fall short by underestimating the likelihood of abbreviation. A book prepared by doctors for
44
The principal text is this regard is Rupa Goswami’s Bhakti Rasamrita Sindhu.
45
See for example Hardy’s introduction to Viraha-Bhakti.
 36

other doctors, for instance, will assume that readers are already familiar with basic medical

concepts and terms. That those terms occur infrequently or without definition does not negate

their importance. Nor does more elaborate treatment in later works prove the terms are later

creations.46

Whether one views the Vedas as sacred texts transmitted intact across the generations or

literature that evolved over time, there is evidence that Vedic religion was personalist in intent,

so the explanations by Katham’s father were appropriate for their time. But while appreciating

his father’s effort at explaining complex philosophy, Katham was less absorbed by the religious

ideas than by the stories that conveyed them.

As he grew older, Katham remained troubled by unresolved questions. In a universe of

light, where does darkness come from? In a world of miraculous creation, why do some people

harm others? If we are all brahman, eternal and full of knowledge, why are we here in a world of

death and ignorance? What lies beyond this one lifetime? Where does the atman go?

Pushing up against the limits of his understanding, he grew old and approached death in

an emotional void. From childhood something had compelled him to seek God and the greater

mystery of creation. So much time had gone into the stale husk of things that often he had

thought of running away. But he had no idea where to go. The shape and direction of life’s grand

adventure eluded him.

On his deathbed, surrounded as much by his uncertainties as by family and friends, his

final thought would not leave him in peace.

46
A.L. Basham, for one, suggests that gods evolve: “There is no clearly defined creator-god in the main body of the
Rg Veda. By the end of the Rg Vedic period, however, such a god had developed…” The Wonder that was India, p.
240. Haberman, notwithstanding his wonderful books on bhakti theology and orthopraxy, also falls into step with
this notion of evolving deities, as in: “It is likely that Krishan the divine cowherd was first a minor deity associated
with the pastoral castes living in the vicinity of Mathura, but if this is true, he was soon carried by these pastoralists
to southern India…” Haberman (1994), p. 5.
 37

“I do not know who I am.”

 38

ACTIVE LOVE: BHAGAVAD GITA AND THE PURANAS_________________

Bengal, 200 BCE

Centuries passed. Katham was reborn again and again, until he appeared as the son of a

devout Bengali family some centuries after the battle of Kurukshetra. We rejoin him at this time.

He is twenty years old, and his education is about to take a giant leap forward for now he would

have to look for his deepest self not in the cloistered sanctity of a forest village but in the tumult

of urban growth.

The world around him was in constant motion. Cultures and castes had begun sharing

territories, creating an uneasy hegemony which had given rise to private property, coinage,

systems of revenue, and the construction of cities. Barely 100 years before, tribes had

consolidated to form India’s first empire, the Mauryan. Alexander’s arrival in 327 BCE carved a

highway through the mountains; trade between India and foreign nations was brisk. The busiest

market was at Sopara, a port not far from present-day Mumbai. According to Pliny, 50 million

sesterces of gold entered through this one channel alone, destined to pay Indian merchants for

“the jewels and luxury objects [which] drained all the riches out of the [Roman] Empire.” 47

47
Lokesh Chandra et al, eds., India’s Contribution to World Thought and Literature (Madras, 1970), cited in
Tathagatananda p. 99
 39

As a child, Katham played with iron pull-toys his parents bought from Persian traders. He

chased his friends around the base of a tall Garuda column erected by a Greek ambassador in

honor of Vaasudeva—Krishna, son of Vasudeva. He listened to stories from abroad and

wondered what the rest of the world looked like. He was an earnest student with a penetrating

gaze, quick mind, and unwavering sense for what was right. If ever someone needed help, he was

the first to step forward.

Around his twentieth birthday, Katham was introduced to a scholar from Kalikata, one of

three villages that would eventually merge to form the city of Calcutta. He was a forward

thinking man who stretched Katham’s horizons with new ideas and innovative texts, and over

time their friendship grew. At dinner one evening the scholar described mathematician

Yajnvalkya’s calculation that the earth was round and that the sun was “the center of the

spheres.”

“Of course, this is in keeping with Vedic descriptions,” the scholar said, “but

Yajnavalkya’s detail is stunning. He estimates, for example, that the distance from the earth to

the moon can be measured as one hundred and eight times the moon’s diameter.48 And see here,”

he said pointing to a palm leaf manuscript, “‘The sun strings these worlds—the earth, the planets,

the atmosphere itself—to himself as though on a thread.’49 Now compare that with this verse in a

recent text called Bhagavad Gita.” The scholar placed a second sheaf, this one made of banana

leaves, before Katham and pointed to a verse.

Katham read, “‘O Arjuna, there is no truth superior to Me. Everything rests upon Me as

pearls strung on a thread.’50 What is this text?”

48
Impressively close to modern measurements of 110.6 times the moon’s diameter.
49
SB 8.7.3.10.
50
BG 7.7
 40

The scholar explained that the Gita had emerged from the Kurukshetra war of a century

before and that it was a dialog which disclosed an intimate relationship between all beings and

the divinity, Krishna, the personal source of all creation. “It’s a map of the soul’s journey from

ignorance to knowledge. After acknowledging various paths—karma, jnana, and so on—the Gita

outlines a path of devotion that unites the atman with the paramatman. Basically, it says that the

inner core of all practices is love. Krishna uses the phrase ‘come to Me’ twenty-two times in

seven hundred verses. Here is Bhagavan, the Supreme personified, telling us He has everything

except one thing: our love. This, my friend, is a radical document. It takes the ambiguous

pronouncements of the Vedas and gives them tangible meaning and purpose.”

Katham read with growing excitement the Gita’s description of duty in the Vedas as an

act of love—not as obedience to authority as later generations would criticize,51 but as

recognition that the world is not different from its creator, and participating in it is an affair of

the heart. Gone were the mechanical injunctions of the Vedas: here was a living, breathing

scripture that called Katham to action. He read from the scholar’s Bengali translation:

Krishna said, “In the beginning of creation, the Lord of all creatures sent forth

generations of men and demigods, along with sacrifices for Visnu, and blessed

them by saying, ‘Be thou happy by this yajna [sacrifice] because its performance

will bestow upon you everything desirable for living happily and achieving

liberation. (3.10)… But in actuality these benefits are bestowed by Me alone.

(7.22)… For I am both the origin and dissolution of all that is material and

spiritual in this world. (7.6) O Arjuna, there is no truth superior to Me. Everything

rests upon me as pearls are strung on a thread. (7.7)… Thus a person who accepts
51
In particular, Immanuel Kant.
 41

the path of devotional service is not bereft of the results derived from studying the

Vedas, performing austere sacrifices, giving charity or pursuing philosophical or

karmic activities. Simply by performing devotional service he attains all these and

at the end he reaches the supreme eternal abode. (8.28)… For I am the Rg, the

Sama, and the Yajur Vedas (9.17)… By all the Vedas I am to be known. Indeed, I

am the compiler of Vedanta and the knower of the Vedas. (15.15) Abandon all

varieties of religion and just surrender unto Me. I shall deliver you from all sinful

reactions. Do not fear.” (18.66)

Katham felt something unfurl within him as he read. This was no dry treatise; it was a

working document on how to live every moment. Philosophy abounded in the Gita, but it was the

protagonist Arjuna’s ethical and psychological dilemma that bolted Katham to the page. As he

read, he discovered that as a warrior Arjuna was compelled by the ancient Vedic codes to protect

the innocent from ruthless forces. Yet the usurpers arrayed against him on the Kurukshetra

battlefield included family members, elders and gurus. To raise arms against such prominent

personalities was condemned by those same Vedic codes. Throughout his life Arjuna had been

both sensitive and law abiding. Faced with having to choose one over the other, he became

traumatized. His body trembled, his bow slipped from his hand, and he fell into a catatonic

withdrawal. With which part of himself should Arjuna identify: the warrior or the compassionate

human being? Which one should prevail on the brink of war? Could either of these two parts

assert itself without destroying the other?

Not everyone faces life or death choices like Arjuna, but his dilemma is universal and

Katham appreciated the genius of the Gita in positing an existential challenge at the heart of
 42

humanity’s collective condition. Commentator Graham Schweig describes this challenge as the

Gita’s foundational theme, dramatically established in the opening verse when blind King

Dhritarastra, father of the usurping Kaurava clan, asks his mystical aide Sanjaya to describe the

two armies at the moment when they assembled on the battlefield. Dhritarastra asks, “How did

they act?”

This question reveals the major theme of “action,” around which the teaching of

the Bhagavad Gita revolves: what action is, why and how we must act, our

relation to action and non-action, when action is right or wrong, and how we

should understand action in all circumstances. The blessings that surround us in

this world, symbolized by the holy place of Kurukshetra as a place of dharma; the

struggles that we face in this world, represented by the desire to fight; and how to

act in light of the tension between the two, expressed by the king’s question,

combine to make this opening verse of the Gita the “seed” verse of the whole text.

The Gita’s ultimate teaching—its response to the question of how souls should act

in this world—is that souls should at all times and in every circumstance act out

of love. By hearing Krishna’s call to love, Arjuna discovers a more elevated state

of consciousness, then an inner state of transcendence, and finally, a state of

eternal freedom in which his heart can fully love God and, consequently, all

beings. From this newfound fortitude and love, Arjuna is prepared to act, even to

fight, with full-heartedness.52

52
Graham Schweig, The Bhagavad-gita (San Francisco: Harper, 2007), p. 17
 43

Three levels of meaning form the nexus of the Gita: (1) the outer world of matter, the

sensorial plane where humanity operates under precarious conditions; (2) the inner world of

consciousness, where an individual encounters the existential challenges that move us toward

darkness or light; and (3) the innermost world of the heart, where that encounter finds its deepest

and most rewarding expression in unconditional love. By revealing Arjuna’s crisis as that of

Everyman, the Gita carries all of humanity along on his journey to the innermost world of the

heart where he (and we) regains constancy of self and the psychic strength to confront

unprecedented dilemmas.

Katham saw himself through Arjuna’s eyes. Like Arjuna, his search for life’s deepest

meaning was not a domesticated exercise but had always been a vivid call to self-transformation.

In the Gita he sensed justification and support for answering that call. The Gita’s 700 verses

revealed an extraordinary range of tools for bringing his search into the world, including a

description of the material energies and their influence on behavior; ways of discerning

consciousness in the body; insights into the nature of eternity, the supreme Self, time, and

prominent philosophies of the day; an exposition of higher and lower duties; and an analysis of

devotional service as the direct path to the heart’s innermost chamber.

The scholar pointed to several verses that gave practical ways of perceiving the divine in

the everyday. According to the Gita, Krishna is:

 The taste in water

 The sound in ether
 Ability in all beings
 The heat of fire
 The life of all that lives
 44

 The intelligence of the intelligent

 Prowess in the powerful
 Earth’s original fragrance
 The light of the sun and moon
 The strength of the strong
 Among men the monarch
 Among senses the mind
 Among weapons the thunderbolt
 Among logicians conclusive truth
 Of seasons flower-bearing spring
 Among fish the shark
 Among bodies of water the ocean
 Of immovable things the Himalayas
 Morality in those seeking victory
 The silence of secrets
 Of flowing rivers the Ganges
 Among beasts the lion53

The scholar took a sip of yogurt drink and said, “By this account, we need not concern

ourselves with escaping the material world which, as you well know, has been the popular

understanding of our bhagavata religion. In fact, this says quite the opposite: that real freedom is

not from the world but in the world. This says the world is non-different from Bhagavan, or

Krishna as he is called here. The Gita identifies him as the source of the universe54 and even goes

so far as to say that anyone who considers the universe unreal is demonic.” 55

53
Excerpted from BG chapters 9 and 10
54
BG 7.6
55
BG 16.8
 45

The scholar drew Katham’s attention to the eleventh chapter where Krishna revealed to

Arjuna his Universal Form—in effect demonstrating that the world itself is not different from

him and that he can be perceived by envisioning the world as his body:

 Hills and mountains represent the bones of the Universal Form

 Physical sound represents his sense of hearing
 Aroma is the Universal Form’s sense of smell
 Trees are the hairs on his body, clouds the hairs on his head
 The sun and moon are his eyes
 Day and night are his eyelids
 Religion is his breast, irreligion is his back
 Oceans are his waist and rivers his veins
 Twilight represents his dress
 Fire represents his mouth and the air his breathing
 The allure of material energy is his smile
 Passing ages are his movements
 Horses, mules and camels are his nails, and varieties of birds display his artistry
 The brahmins are his face, kshatriyas his arms, vaishyas his thighs and shudras
his feet.56

The scholar pointed out to Katham where the Gita analyzed current schools of philosophy

including samkhya, jnana, and karma. He pointed out verses where Krishna described himself

not only as the ultimate purpose behind these philosophies but as the compiler of the Vedas and

56
Excerpted from BG chapter 11. The net effect of these various descriptions is the sacralizing of nature and a call to
protect the world as an act of devotion. Haberman makes strong arguments to this effect in his book River of Love in
an Age of Pollution.
 46

the very goal of Vedic study and sacrifice.57 The Gita also referred to yoga, a practice Katham

did not know.

“Yoga is a system of exercises for physical and mental nourishment,” the scholar said.

“It’s been around, but only recently a friend of mine, Patanjali, systematized the fundamentals in

a treatise he calls the Yoga Sutras. I’ll introduce you, if you like. We went together to Dwarka to

see the excavations last month.58 Heck of a nice guy. In great shape.”

Katham took the leaves from his friend and sat on a prayer rug and read on. Of the Gita’s

many teachings, one stood out by virtue of its frequency: the imperative to act, to not withdraw

from life but rather act with purity of intention and love for God. Beneath this simple injunction

he sensed a web of psychic complexities, of expectations, hopes and fears, and it was on this

subconscious level of human behavior that he found the Gita shining brightest. The thrust of

Krishna’s counsel was that moral, selfless action in the world (pravritti) tempered by internal

detachment from its consequences (nivritti)—righteous action performed solely as devotional

service to God—would lead to true happiness and liberation of one’s deepest self.59

An adjunct to action appears as early as the Gita’s third chapter, where Krishna declares

that walking away from beneficial action not only reveals moral cowardice but a complete

misunderstanding of renunciation. It is not action that must be renounced but pride of ownership

over the results.60 Such appropriate renunciation (yukta vairagya) is the spirit in which God

himself operates. “I work,” Krishna tells Arjuna, “to set an example, without which the world

57
BG 15.15
58
Excavations in Dwarka, dated around 1500 BC and traditionally related to Krishna’s kingdom, have unearthed
palaces and temples of solid stone. The evidence indicates a high degree of artistic and technical skill during the
Vedic period. Klostermaier gives some attention to these findings in chapter two of his Survey of Hinduism.
59
BG 5.3
60
BG 3.9 and 5.13
 47

would collapse.” And so should Arjuna, not in the old way of Vedic sacrifice, with a view to

obtaining a desired result, but “for the good of the worlds” (lokasamgraha) without concern for

personal gain. If he does so, Arjuna’s fighting will itself be the essence of yoga and the true

meaning of wisdom. As a warrior, Arjuna’s fighting will be karma-yoga, the yoga of action. As

an enlightened being who understands the purpose behind his actions, his engagement in battle

will also be jnana-yoga, the yoga of knowledge. And because he sacrifices his own desires in

order to fulfill Krishna’s wish for a righteous war, his actions will be bhakti-yoga, the yoga of

devotion. And this, Krishna states, is true fulfillment of the Vedic injunctions.

“Men of small knowledge are very much attached to the flowery words of the

Vedas, which recommend fruitive activities for elevation to heavenly planets,

resultant good birth, power, and so forth (2.43)…. But as the functions of many

small wells are served by one great reservoir of water, so the functions of the

Vedas are served by one who knows their purpose (2.46)…. Perform your duty

with a steady mind, Arjuna, abandoning attachment to success or failure. This

equanimity is the essence of yoga…the art of all work. (2.48, 2.50)…. By fixing

your consciousness on Me, you will achieve steady intelligence (2.61)…. For one

who lives in such a state of grace the miseries of this world no longer exist (2.65)

… Living free from selfish desire and ego, such a person attains real peace (2.71)

…. In that state of full awareness one is already liberated and at the end of this life

never again returns to birth and death.” (2.72)61

61
These verses are summarized from chapter two of the Bhaktivedanta edition of Bhagavad Gita.
 48

Like many of his generation, Katham had contemplated withdrawing from the world.

Distancing himself from the fracas of family business appealed to his seeker nature. He was a

solitary pilgrim, not given to group action and convinced he would not be truly happy until he

shaved his head and became a sannyasi. Now a text born on a battlefield told him to stop running

away from himself and from the very duties that would liberate him. “One who is unattached to

the fruits of work and who works as he is obligated is in the renounced order of life,” Krishna

tells Arjuna. “He is the true mystic, not he who lights no fire and performs no work.”62

The Gita went still further in its depiction of the righteous path with a surprising

perspective on ahimsa. This, as commentators have often pointed out, is an apparent

contradiction in the Gita, for it is Krishna’s purpose to incite a soldier to do battle. How does

violence serve society? How does killing meet the imperative for nonviolence, which Krishna

mentions four times in lists of virtues?63 The answer lies in the historic context of the Gita itself,

a culturally and politically diverse environment where “nonviolence” migrated from the not-

doing of violence to acting with pure intent. Arjuna’s task is not to become an aggressor yet to

respond to aggression. Krishna provides Arjuna a new context in which to assess his response to

action, for there is no negative consequence to righteous action undertaken in a spirit of

devotion. Working for the wellbeing of the world in a spirit of devotion renders work religiously

potent. In this sense, the Gita redefines the rita (cosmic harmony) of the Vedic period with

dharma, the call to specific duties for making the world a better place.

In the context of the Indian religious tradition we should note that from the Vedas

to the BG there is a shift in emphasis. The rta initially signified the dynamic and

62
BG 6.1
63
10.5, 13.7, 16.2, 17.14
 49

changing phenomena of a closed yet ordered universe…which subsumed humans.

In the BG, however, we find rta already displaced and the emergence of the

concept of dharma…[an] ideological transition…from the gods as maintainers of

the cosmic order to human…behavior as directly responsible for the support of

the cosmos.64

Krishna urges Arjuna to move past his fear of action.65 You are a unique being endowed

with freedom of choice, he tells Arjuna, and determining how to exercise this gift for the benefit

of the world is the work of life.66 Consciousness is by nature active, Krishna says, so you are

compelled to act.67 If you act in devotion, with selfless intent and as an expression of love for me,

I will protect you from any consequences.68 If you ask me about duty, I will answer, ‘Here is

your duty, now do it.’69 But my interest in you is different. You are mine, and I am yours. Go

past the externals. See me in everything you do and you will be sheltered in my love for you.”70

The most significant contribution of the BG consists in its assertion of the inward

orientation of the ethical subject…. Arjuna’s cry is the cry of the ethical subject—
64
Milton Eder, p. 42.
65
“Do thou fight for the sake of fighting, without considering happiness or distress, loss or gain, victory or defeat,
and by so doing you shall never incur sin.” BG 2.38
66
“I have explained to you the most confidential knowledge. Deliberate and then do what you wish to do.”
BG 18.63
67
“Everyone is forced to act according to the qualities he has acquired from the modes of material nature. No one
can refrain from doing something, not even for a moment.” BG 3.5
68
“Abandon all varieties of religion and just surrender unto Me. I shall deliver you from all sinful reaction. Do not
fear.” BG 18.66
69
“Perform your prescribe duty, for doing so is better than not working.” BG 3.8
70
“For one who sees Me everywhere and sees everything in Me, I am never lost nor is he ever lost to Me.” BG 6.30
 50

which desires to learn the dynamics of choosing itself in its concrete context.

While the upanisadic/vedantic proposition of the universality and consequent

abstraction of the atman effectively devalues the concrete human existence and its

particularity, the BG…discerns the principle of subjectivity as the ground of

decisiveness and fountainhead of human freedom.71

Here was a deeper and more broadly applicable perspective on sacrifice and renunciation

than Katham had ever known. Until now, the righteous path had always meant the objective

order of things, a morally neutral status quo. Actions in keeping with that norm were good, all

else was bad. Morality equated to conformity, and individuals had little impact on good or bad

apart from that conformity.72 In the Gita’s enlarged worldview, philosophy and psychology are

not separate: motivation and intent play a decisive part in determining the sanctity of deeds. The

individual participates in creating a balance between social cohesion and individual freedom,

between the interests of communities and those of the larger world, between humans and

humanity. “As the ignorant act attached to action,” Krishna tells Arjuna, “so the wise should act

without attachment, desiring to act for the welfare of the world.”73

From the entrance of the scholar’s cottage Katham looked out on a civilization in

transition. He saw farmers stacking varieties of produce grown with seeds from foreign lands,

craftspeople transporting textiles of exotic new design, construction engineers caucusing at

71
Braj M. Sinha, “Svadharma and Svabhava in the Bhagavadgita,” Journal of South Asian Literature, vol. 23, no. 2,
p. 144.
72
J.A.B. van Buitenen puts it this way: “These activities called dharma are imposed as a kind of natural law of all
existent beings in the universe; and a being’s initiating of such activity is not a moral act contingent on his
dispositions.” “Dharma and Moksha”, Philosophy East and West, Vol. 7, 1957, p. 36. Quoted in Braj M. Sinha,
Journal of South Asian Literature, p. 144.
73
BG 3.25
 51

roadside eateries on how to accommodate the influx of traders from abroad. Every day Katham

met people from far away places who spoke different languages and called God by different

names. The world was expanding and with it the application of his faith.

Unlike future scholars, Katham had no compulsion to pick at the Gita’s verses “as a

carcass by vultures.”74 He was not bothered by issues of “fixed-equivalent translation strategy,”75

since the Gita’s language was his own and literal meaning did not differ from contextual

meaning. Nor did he need to concern himself with “dynamic-equivalence,”76 since the Gita’s

culture was thriving around him and did not require contemporizing to achieve relevance.

Krishna’s meaning was clear, and neither commentaries nor political interpretations were

necessary. “Love Me,” Krishna tells Arjuna, “and I will protect you from all dangers. Have no

fear.”

Yet the Gita’s instructions on how to love—through sacrifice and discipline—struck

Katham as formalistic and arbitrary. What is love’s ultimate purpose, its goal? He dwelled for

days on the Gita’s eleventh chapter and Krishna’s revelation to Arjuna of his universal form:

Arjuna saw in that universal form unlimited mouths, unlimited eyes, unlimited

wonderful visions. All was wondrous, brilliant, all-expanding. If hundreds of

thousands of suns rose were to rise at one in the sky, their radiance might

resemble the effulgence of the Supreme Person in that universal form.

74
This pithy metaphor comes courtesy of Milton Eder in “A Review of Recent Bhagavadgita Studies” in the
Journal of South Asian Literature, vol. 23, no. 2, p. 32
75
J.A.B. van Buitenen concerned himself with this problem of distortion occurring when vocabularies break down
between the host and guest languages. See for instance his remarks in The Mahabharata: Volume 1 The Book of the
Beginning (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1973), pp. xxxv-xlii.
76
Eder recommends in this regard the work of Callewaert and Hemraj.
 52

Bewildered, astonished, Arjuna bowed his head to offer obeisance. “All the

planets with their demigods are disturbed at seeing Your great form with its many

faces, eyes, arms, thighs, legs, and bellies and Your many terrible teeth; and as

they are disturbed, so am I. O Lord of lords, O refuge of the worlds, I cannot keep

my balance seeing thus Your blazing deathlike faces. You are the Primal God, the

ancient Purusha; you are the foundation of this universe. Again and again I bow

to you. Thinking of You as my friend, I did not know Your glories. Please forgive

whatever I may have done in madness or in love. Seeing this universal form, I am

gladdened but also disturbed by fear. Please again reveal to me Your personal

form. I wish to see You again with a lotus flower in Your hand.” Krishna replied,

“You have been perturbed by seeing this horrible feature of Mine. Now let it be

finished.” Then he displayed his beautiful two-armed form, and Arjuna grew

calm. “This form of Mine,” Krishna said, “cannot be seen or understood simply

by studying the Vedas or by penance. Only by unqualified devotional service can

I be understood as I am…”77

The mystery of the Gita left Katham breathless, for in Krishna’s revelation lay the

suggestion but not the delivery of some deeper relationship between God and his devotee. What

does “unqualified devotion” feel like? Why does Krishna give devotional service such

prominence?

“I don’t understand,” he admitted to the scholar. “Where is Krishna taking Arjuna?” 78

77
Summary of BG chapter 11 texts 9-54.
78
Katham’s inquiry is appropriate given his Vaishnava upbringing. For others such as Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, the
advaitic position is a foregone conclusion and the Gita’s mysticism lies not in the specificity of knowing Krishna as
the supreme lovable object but in a general oneness of all mystical experience. Radhakrishnan’s philosophical
assumptions impose a predetermined value on mystical phenomena for all times and places. Kees W. Bolle has done
a worthy job of exposing the risks of such generalizations in “The Bhagavadgita Within the Study of Mysticism” in
 53

LOVE LOST: BUDDHISM AND SHANKARA’S

RESPONSE_________________

Bengal, 829 CE

To respect all life as divine, to be content with good that comes of its own accord, to

perform duty wholeheartedly and without regard for personal benefit, to work for the wellbeing

of the world—throughout his life Katham endeavored to honor the Gita’s precepts, and his

sincerity was rewarded. More than a thousand years later he was reborn as the son of Bengali

merchants, devout worshipers of Krishna, for Katham’s integrity in previous lives had earned

him this privilege.79 He studied hard, advanced in learning and reputation, and became a

respected shastri-dhara (scriptural preceptor).

By this time, the Puranas had risen to prominence as scripture of the day. These eighteen

histories offered details of this creation and of previous creations, their purpose and principles of

operation. The most intimate and devotional of the eighteen was the Bhagavata Purana (BhP),

whose 18,000 verses contained vivid descriptions of God’s personal form, the relationship of

vol. 23 no. 2 of the Journal of South Asian Literature,, pp. 1-19.

79
“The unsuccessful yogi…is born into a family of righteous people…” BG 6.41
 54

individual beings to God and his creation, and the goal of that relationship in eternity. If the

Purusha-Sukta had revealed the Cosmic Man in the Vedas as a force to be supplicated, and if the

Gita had described him as a more benign divinity to be worshiped through devotional service, the

Bhagavata-Purana disclosed his most intimate nature as lover, protector and maintainer. The

BhP’s twelve cantos (divisions) bring readers step by step from external to internal communion

with this loving personal divinity, revealing his esoteric identity in stages. In the second canto, he

is depicted as an external manifestation of God living in the hearts of all creatures, a protector

and constant companion who sees to the wellbeing of all.

“The forward steps of the Purusha are the shelter for the upper, lower and

heavenly planets, as well as for all that we need. His lotus feet serve as protection

from all kinds of fear80…. All creation—planets and stars, and all life forms from

smallest to greatest—all are under the care at every moment past, present, and

future of the Purusha, who is the external manifestation of the Supreme dwelling

within the hearts of all beings81…. As the sun maintains the universe by

expanding its radiation, so the Purusha by expanding His universal form

maintains all creation both internally and externally.”82

By the tenth canto, the BhP declares the Purusha to be an expansion of Krishna,

the original source of all creation and the ultimate object of love, and reveals details

concerning his unique loveliness, place of residence in the eternal realm called

80
BhP 2.6.7
81
BhP 2.6.13-16
82
BhP 2.6.17
 55

Vrindavan, and his loving exchanges with devotees.

It was in this highly devotional work that Katham had distinguished himself as a scholar

and practitioner. He also strove to embody its deeply devotional message in his daily life. At age

thirty, he and his wife and children lived within his maternal family’s compound, his father

having passed away when Katham was just a boy. A series of carved stone buildings surrounded

a garden courtyard of fragrant flowers and fruit trees, and at its far end stood a marble mandap

reserved for worship. Within stood a two-foot bronze deity of Krishna. Here each morning

Katham assembled with his family for prayers and readings. From the second-story roof of the

main building he could see temple domes looming up from surrounding forests. Chakras, the

cosmic wheel of Vishnu, adorned the tops of each dome, for it was state policy that every citizen

should be able to see shelter and reach a temple within a few hours’ journey.

Buddhist shrines were as numerous as temples to local gods,83 since by this time

Buddhism had become a distinct religion,84 practiced and patronized by Ashoka (c. 273-236

BCE), India’s first great emperor and third ruler of the Mauryan dynasty. Historian Richard

Eaton comments that, “In contrast to the hierarchical vision of Brahmanism, with its pretensions

to social exclusion and ritual purity, an egalitarian and universalist ethic permitted Buddhists to

expand over great distances and establish wide, horizontal networks of trade among ethnically

diverse peoples.”85

Sheltered in his youth from the world’s evils, Buddha left home and witnessed firsthand

the deterioration of Vedic ritual. Under the plea of sacrifice Brahmin priests had sanctioned

83
“Of all the religious remains of between 200 BC and AD 200 so far discovered in India those of Buddhism far
outnumber those of Brahmanism, Hinduism and Jainism, together.” Basham, p. 263.
84
There is some debate about whether Buddhism already existed at the time of the Gita or whether it came after. The
Gita makes use of terms such as brahma-nirvana and Buddhi-Yoga, but we do not know if these came from an
existing Buddhist vocabulary or whether Buddhism borrowed the terms from the Gita at a later time.
85

Eaton (1993), p. 9
 56

unrestricted animal slaughter, and to the sensitive prince this was intolerable. After his

enlightenment, to discourage such misinterpretation he rejected Vedic authority and in its place

substituted the doctrine of ahimsa, nonviolence.86 When Emperor Ashoka established Buddhism

as the imperial religion, he effectively disconnected indigenous religious practices from their

Vedic and brahminical antecedents. Violent sacrifices were replaced by gift-giving (dana), and

brahmin priests learned to reorient their duties toward ministry among non-brahmin

householders.87 Ahimsa prevailed, but at the cost of displacing the Vedas as codes of normative

behavior.

Buddha taught that life is synonymous with sorrow, suffering, and every kind of

unpleasantness. These miseries can only be overcome by relinquishing desires, including

personal ambitions, longings, and selfishness. The way to achieve this purified state is by

acknowledging the Four Noble Truths and adhering to the Noble Eightfold Path. The main thrust

of these teachings is that sorrow is inherent in life, that it is due to craving, and that craving can

be stopped by adopting moral and well-ordered behavior.

Where do these harmful cravings originate? Buddha proposed that they arise from the

mistaken idea of selfhood, from the erroneous impression that we are eternal individuals when in

fact we are a compound of ever-changing psychosomatic elements: body, feelings, perceptions,

states of mind, and awareness. There is no immortal atman, neither within the body nor within

the universe. At death, nothing passes over from one life to another. Rather, a new life arises, a

fresh link in the chain of events. Terms such as “person” and “individual” are merely convenient

labels for the current moment in this chain of events.88

86
In recent years and with the emergence of Buddhism as an active voice for social transformation, the definition of
ahimsa has undergone a shift from nonviolence to non-aggression.
87
Eaton (1993), p. 14
88
There are many forms of Buddhism; this summary seeks only to posit general ideas that run throughout.
 57

Ashoka’s conversion guaranteed Buddhism’s wide acceptance, but by the first century

CE Greeks and other foreign cultures had opened a gateway to India and were trading ideas as

well as goods. Early Christianity, too, made its first inroads at this time. Yet the main cause of

Buddhism’s disappearance from the Indian subcontinent came not from without but from within.

In the eighth century CE a brilliant scholar named Shankara appeared in the southern Tamil

country. By the time he was twenty-five, his doctrine of Advaita Vedanta had spread northward.

Pursuing adherents, Shankara traveled across India, disputing with the Buddhists, drawing large

numbers of followers, and leaving behind him an organized body of monks to carry on his

teachings.

Shankara and his disciples saw the universe of birth and rebirth as a terrible ocean

infested with sea-monster-like dangers. The great Advaitin compared conditioned, forgetful

living beings to worms being swept along from one whirlpool of that ocean to another,89

drowning and in need of rescue.90 According to Shankara’s commentaries, our attitude toward

this predicament should be tempered with fear, even loathing.91 Nature is not a covenant with the

divinity but a prison in which we prisoners suffer due to our foolish and mistaken impression that

anything here is real. Those around us, human or otherwise, are mere expressions of our illusion.

What is truly real has no shape, no form, no personality or individuality. All is brahman,

absolutely without variation, devoid of distinction. Drawing on particular verses from the Vedas

89
Pancadasi of Sri Vidyaranya Swami, edited and translated by Swami Swahananda (Madras: Sri Ramakrishna
Math, 1975), 1.30
90
Mandukya Upanisad with Gaudapada’s Karika and Sankara’s Basya 4, colophon (Ten Principal Upanishads with
Sankarabhasya. Works of Sankara in the Original Sanskrit Vol. 1 Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 1964)
91
Chandogya Upanisad with Sankara’s Bhasya, 5.10.8
 58

to support his interpretation, Shankara sites the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad, which says of

brahman: “Here there is no plurality whatsoever.”92

At its core, writes Indologist Lance Nelson, Shankara’s radical monism leads to an

estrangement from the natural world and from the bonds of friendship and love that sustain

human culture. Nelson concludes that “The goal of the Advaitin is in fact to attain a state of utter

independence (niralambata) in which spirit is no longer reliant on, or limited by, the body, the

mind, or the world of nature. Having objectified nature and reduced it to insentience, the ascetic

takes the next step: he turns his attention away from it.”93

Others disagree, theorizing that Shankara’s espousal of oneness in all creation actually

encourages an ethical conscience. Eliot Deutsch at the University of Hawaii, known for his work

on Vedanta, says that oneness “finds its natural expression in a reverence for all living things”

and for the “intrinsic spiritual worth”94 of everything in nature. Deutsch is not alone in his

conclusions.95 Indologist Lina Gupta suggests that following Shankara’s perspective leads to

treating nature with “dignity” and “righteousness.” 96

It is not difficult to see why the field is split on the social consequences of Advaita

ideology. From the Vaishnava perspective, if there was anything salutary in Shankara’s

92
BU 4.4.19. For our purposes here, no attempt is made to explain how it is possible for a reality in which everything
is brahman to create an insentient, unreal natural world. A deeper analysis would explore Shankara’s notion of
insentience (jadatva), which, contrary to samkhya, allows for brahman, which is conscious, to be the cause of a
world that is unconscious.
93
Nelson (2000), pp. 69-70
94
“Vedanta and Ecology,” Indian Philosophical Annual 7 (Madras: The Center for Advanced Study In Philosophy),
pp. 81-83
95
See for example Anantanand Rambachan, “The Value of the World as the Mystery of God in Advaita Vedanta”
(Journal of Dharma 14, July-September 1989), p. 296
96
“All parts of this Nature have intrinsic value [according to Advaita]; as such, all of Nature should be treated with
dignity, kindness, and righteousness.” Lina Gupta, (“Ganga: Purity, Pollution, and Hinduism”, appearing in
Ecofeminism and the Sacred, New York: Continuum, 1994, p. 113
 59

achievement it was reestablishing Vedic authority, albeit on impersonal footing, which paved the

way for Chaitanya in the sixteenth century.97 But that was still 800 years in the future. In 829 CE,

Katham’s community had not yet resolved its ambivalence over Shankara’s teachings.

From the age of three Katham had dedicated himself to the service of God. At age nine he

had memorized the Bhagavad Gita. By fifteen he knew hundreds of verses from the Upanishads

and had begun writing a commentary on the Bhagavata Purana. At age eighteen he married a

brahmin girl whom his mother had selected, and even though Katham and his young wife

respected the rules restricting sex to certain times of the month, within a few years they had five

healthy children. They were a close family and loved nothing better than to pack their bullock

cart with pots of fresh cooked food and head out for a day of swimming and games. Katham

served as minister to a local government official who so trusted his judgment that often Katham

made decisions on his own concerning such matters as usage of public lands and allocation of

water rights. Perhaps, he thought, his oldest son might one day join him in his practice.

It was on a balmy fall evening that Katham, mumbling Sanskrit hymns and counting their

number on his fingers, hurried down a dirt road and turned into the courtyard of a small one-

story private residence. Under one arm he cradled a cloth bundle. Cows mooed in a nearby

goshalla. Slipping off his sandals he bent down to avoid hitting his head on the low doorsill and

entered a room warmed by apple wood burning in the fireplace.

An elderly man sat on the floor perusing a sheaf of hand-written pages. His white hair

hung well below his shoulders and his beard swept the pages as he read. Hearing Katham enter,

he looked up and seeing the young man he raised his hands high above his head.

“Sadhu! Sadhu!” he joked and stood to embrace his guest. “You’re looking well.”

97
In the third Study Contract we will examine Hindutva, a political reaction that capitalized on the psychic
frustration of impersonalism to fuel a volatile pride in Indian nationalism.
 60

“Well enough, given the times,” Katham said.

“Hm. So this is to be…” the old man furrowed his brow and feigned a sober look, “a

serious meeting.”

Katham appreciated the attempt at levity. The old man had been a close friend of his

father’s, and after his father death filial affection had transferred effortlessly. For years they had

engaged in such banter, swinging from jokes and puns to complex deconstruction of scriptural

texts and back again, often blending the two in a heady stew of Sanskrit sophistry. Katham held

the man’s arms longer than greetings required. No one understood him better, and between them

there were no secrets.

“I know, I know,” the old man said, waving his guest onto a cushion by the side of his

low desk. “You’re worried about the Shankarites. The man’s not dead ten years and you want to

pull him out of the ground by his sannyasa staff and hang him from the nearest Vishnu temple.

What ever happened to ahimsa?”

“It died along with the personal God,” Katham said. “Why are people so eager to

embrace Advaita Vedanta? It’s a living hell—no personality, no qualities, no activity, nothing.”

“You just got here.”

“It’s been building all afternoon. Some Shankara brahmacharis visited me at my office

today looking for a donation. I chased them away. They were mere boys—fourteen, fifteen at

most.”

“Careful with those Advaitin celibates,” the old man said. “There are tapas-vis among

them—mystics—who will curse your whole family. Better to give them some money and let

them go. You know very well why people join up. Start by comparing Shankara’s ideas with the

Buddha’s. Both offer nondualism as their central doctrine. Shankara calls it Advaita and the
 61

Buddha called it advaya but it’s essentially the same. Both advocate a frugal, simple life. Both

encourage nonviolence. Shankara’s trick was wrapping it all up in a Vedic context. Cunning,

really, the way he glossed the texts just enough to avoid their personal implications. But people

overlook that. What they see is that he brought back old time religion. There are a lot of people

out there who have been waiting to feel that pride again. Horrible thing, nationalism. It’ll ruin us

one day.”

“Bringing back the Vedas is well and good, but at what price?” Katham demanded,

pacing the floor. “Loss of self, sacrifice of individuality—totally irresponsible. Shankara

completely ignores the dilemma of violence in his Gita commentaries. There’s no relief

whatsoever for Arjuna’s predicament. ‘We’re Advaitins! We’re beyond the prerequisites for

action!’ Where is the man’s compassion? Here is this soldier, urgently, legitimately needing to

know how he can remain a responsible member of society and not betray his own salvation.

Shankara just turns his back. Do you know what he says? That persons practicing jnana will

simply renounce work since they are free from—I’m quoting here—‘the conceit of Self in regard

to their psycho-physical organisms.’98 Who is free? That’s what I want to know. Who is making

these decisions about renouncing work and pretending to be egoless?”99

An elderly woman entered bearing a tray of tea and pastries. Katham fell silent,

embarrassed by his own grandiloquence before his friend’s wife. He touched her feet and they

shared a warm embrace. The woman patted him on the head, winked at her husband, and

returned to the depths of the house. The refreshments calmed Katham down.

98
Bhagavad-gita Bhasya 5:8-9:1
99
When Scott Stroud was still a Doctoral candidate at Temple University, he wrote an insightful paper titled
“Sankara and the Ethics of the Bhagavad Gita”, which does a fine job of explaining Shankara’s failure to reconcile
the conflicting dharmas involved in the Gita. Much like Gandhi’s avoidance of important questions about the text’s
literal storyline, Shankara’s commentary sidesteps critical issues of violence and duty.
 62

“Forgive me. It is just that I see the consequences. I have to deal with them every day.

Did you know that the Ganges has become undrinkable? People are using sacred rivers as

garbage dumps. The Yamuna is worse. And we’re losing forest land to speculators. They even

sell land to which they have no title. I’m not blaming it all on Shankara. Thieves are thieves. But

no one can deny there is a connection, this attitude of indifference…”

The old man waited patiently for Katham to finish. He pointed to the cloth package

Katham had brought. “What’s in the bag?”

A mischievous grin broke out on Katham’s face. “Something that might help. It seems

our Shankara wasn’t the uncompromising impersonalist followers would have us believe.100

These are from a friend in a nearby Shankara math—prayers by the Advaitin, prayers he uttered

throughout the day, even on his deathbed…”

“Bhaja govindam bhaja govindam bhaja govindam mudho-matre / samprapte sannihite

kale na hi na hi raksati dukrn-karane…”101 the old man sung in a high pitched voice, swinging a

hand right to left in time to the meter. “You fools!” The scholar dropped his voice a full octave

and raised a hand menacingly in the air. “Your grammatical word jugglery of suffixes and

prefixes and your philosophical speculations will not save you at the time of death. Just worship

Govinda. Worship Govinda. Worship Govinda.” Katham was stunned.

“You knew?”

“You’re not the only one with friends.”

100
Janardan Chakravarti notes: “Even the prince of Vedantic absolutism, the great Sankara, rising to the Himalayan
heights of intellectual eminence, was known to be occasionally humming in his fervently prayerful Satpadi-stotram:
satyapi vedapagame natha / tavaham na mamakinastvam / samudro hi taranga kvacana / samudro na tarangah
‘Even though the difference between you and me fades away into the vanishing point, I am yours, but you are not
mine. The waves are of the ocean, but the ocean is not the wave.’ Thus from the steepest ascent of the Kedar Vadri
down to the jutting point of the Kanya-Kumari, the great Sankara made his spiritual presence felt not only by his
sublimest-ever universalism but also by his prayerful undertone, ‘Bhaja Govindam’, ‘Gatistvam gatistvam tvameka
Bhavani,’ ‘Sankara-mauli-nivasini vimale mama matirastam tava padakamale,’ and so on.” Bengal Vaisnavism and
Sri Chaitanya (Calcutta: The Asiatic Society, 1975), p. 16
101
Dvadasamanjarika-Stotra refrain, attributed to Acharya Shankara.
 63

“And what of this,” he said, quickly turning to a parchment that lay among other others in

the cloth package, “from the Padma Purana…”

“Ah yes, the reference to Shankara as an avatara of Shiva, come to help restore the Vedic

integrity.102 Fascinating. It does seem prophetic, and quite plausible. But tell me, dear boy, do

you really think it matters?”

Katham’s face had gone from jubilation to despair. His shoulders sank and he looked out

through an open window. The sun had set and stars had made their appearance in the darkness.

My family will be wondering what’s keeping me, he thought.

“No,” he said at last, without turning from his view of the night sky. “People don’t want

the truth. They want to be let off the hook and escape judgment. No more worries about some

divine creature staring down, noting how many sacrifices they’ve sponsored, how many mantras

they’ve chanted, how much karma they still need to work off. As long as he’s dead, this great

Overseer, that’s all that counts.”

“Don’t blame the Advaitin,” the old man said with a sympathetic note. “He was simply

giving people what they wanted.” Rising from his seat, he crossed to the window and placed an

affectionate hand on Katham’s arm. “You’re a good man, with a good heart. If you take the

world’s burden on your shoulders it’ll crush you. Do your bit. That’s all anyone can ask…” He

pointed to a deity of Krishna that stood on an altar to one side of the room and added, “including

Him.”

But Katham could not let go of this concern that personhood and the embracing of

individual responsibility form the essence of humanity. Shankara may have successfully argued

that no evil deeds are done by a sannyasi who renounces the world—but what of avoiding good

102
[Shiva said to Goddess Durga] “In the age of Kali, I take the form of a brahmin and explain the Vedas through
false scriptures in an atheistic way, similar to Buddhist philosophy.” PP, Uttara Khanda 25.7
 64

deeds, what of the harm in turning one’s back on humanity by arguing that the world is an

illusion? Was that not itself evil?103

Katham said goodnight and returned home.

Time passed. Lifetimes passed.

At the beginning of the 13th century CE, Northern India came under the tyranny of

Muslim Turks. Their rule from the Sultanate of Delhi would continue uninterrupted until the

conquest by the British 500 years later. Despite occupation by Turkish invaders, communities of

Vaishnava faithful across the subcontinent continued to practice as they had for centuries. With

the waning of Vedic prescriptions for sacrifice to a multiplicity of gods, worship of Vishnu

deities increased, inspiring a variety of Vaishnava traditions and lineages. The basic questions

addressed by the heads of these schools were fundamentally the same: What is the nature of

devotion? How is devotion related to the world? In what form is devotion to be expressed?

Where does it lead?

Three hundred years after Shankara, Ramanuja (1025-1137) proposed simultaneous

difference and non-difference (visistadvaita) between living beings, the manifest world, and

brahman. For Ramanuja, the self is not identical with the divine as in Advaita philosophy.

Brahman possesses a separate existence and unique qualities. Yet Ramanuja did not promote any

single incarnation of Vishnu as supreme, and his reverential mood sidestepped more intimate

forms of devotion. Observing the rules of varnashrama constituted life’s primary duty, a

function he believed brahmins alone should be allowed to supervise.

103
How Shankara’s reductionist views—a relatively minor part of the tradition—came to dominate early Hindu
scholarship tells us much about the motives of Orientalist scholars. In the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries,
Europeans working in India such as William Jones and Henry Colebrooke equated authenticity with antiquity. Their
depiction of a golden Vedic age, and of the Vedas and Upanishads as the only authentic Hindu scriptures, is still
widely accepted in the West as canonical fact. By this erroneous theory, Vaishnava faith (based on later Puranic
texts) becomes suspect and Shankara rises to the pinnacle of Vedic commentary. Emasculating Vaishnava theism
served the colonialist agenda, as it paved the way for Christianity to displace Krishna worship as the true, world-
ordering religion for humanity. (Haberman elaborates on Orientalist motives in River of Love, ch. 1.)
 65

In the twelfth century Nimbarka proposed unity-in-difference (bhedabhed), asserting that

Krishna, the ultimate cause and all-pervading essence of everything, exists both with attributes

(saguna) and without attributes (nirguna). All of creation reflects the creator and nothing is

different from him, with one important qualification: only Krishna is unlimited, as is the ocean

compared to its waves. Nimbarka encouraged study (jnana) and devotional service (bhakti) as

the way to realizing this great truth, a devotion more pronounced than the reverence of Ramanuja

but still less than intimate.

In the thirteenth century, Madhvacharya was first to espouse worship of Krishna in his

feature as a cowherd boy in the village of Vrindavan as depicted in the Bhagavata Purana.

Madhva’s philosophy of dualism (dvaita) emphasized differences: those between living beings

and the universe, between living beings and brahman, between brahman and the manifest world,

and even between individual particles of matter. Krishna, he said, could never be equated in any

way with finite beings or with the manifest universe. While preferring to meditate on the

adorable Krishna of Vrindavan, Madhva followed in his predecessors’ footsteps by advocating

servitude as the proper mood for attaining salvation. Deeper levels of love were yet to be

revealed.

Medieval India benefited not only from contributions by Vaishnava philosophers but also

by Sikh poets and singers, for devotion lives as much in the heart as the head. The Sant tradition

has been called “the universal path to sanctity”104 and includes Vaishnavas such as Tulsidas and

most of the Sikh gurus. In Namdev (1270 – 1350 CE) the bhakti movement found one of its most

distinctive voices. The son of a tailor, by age thirty he had given up his father’s trade and was

roaming from village to village in the Punjab singing original Hindi verses (sabdas), many of

104
Charlotte Vaudeville, Sant Mat: Santism as the Universal Path to Sanctity,” in The Sants: Studies in a Devotional
Tradition of India, ed. K. Schour and W.H. McLeod (Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 1987).
 66

which were later included in the Sikh scripture Guru Granth Sahib. Initially a worshiper of the

divine in concrete form, eventually Namdev became a devotee of the divine without attributes

(nirguna) and embraced both transcendence and immanence, i.e. “everything is God,” and “foam

and water are one and the same,”105 in contrast with Vaishnavism’s basic tenet of a personal

deity.

Sant poet Kabir (1398 – 1518 CE) might even be said to have transcended bhakti itself in

such verses as:

My true guru has shown me the way: I have given up all rites and ceremonies. I

bathe no more in holy rivers. I then became aware that I alone was mad, the whole

world was sane. I had been disturbing those intelligent people! No longer could I

live in the dust of subservience; no longer do I ring the temple-bells, nor do I

enthrone a divine image. I no longer offer flowers. Mortification does not please

the Lord; we do not reach Him by going about naked and torturing ourselves.

They who are kind and righteous, who do not get entangled in this world’s

dealings, who consider all creatures on earth as their own self, they attain to the

Immortal, the true God is with them forever. Kabir says: Those attain the true

name whose words are pure, who are devoid of pride and self-deceit.106

The rise of Sikh bhakti through Namdev, Kabir and other masters who followed later

such as Farid ud-Din Attar, provides an important parallel in that both Vaishnava monotheism

and Sikh monism would in later years be condemned by neocolonial reformists, scholars whose

105
Guru Granth Sahib 93
106
Cited in Klostermaier, pp. 224-225
 67

pronouncements over time acquired the status of truth. As we will see in the next Study Contract,

these Enlightenment thinkers rejected bhakti in all its forms as religious sentimentality. In a sort

of intellectual tit-for-tat, neo-Hindu defenders of the tradition responded by stripping bhakti of its

offending components, essentially capitulating to an Enlightenment definition of religion as

historical byproduct (history being a linear interpretation of world events conducted, in large

measure, by white male Christians). This compulsion, both within and without the tradition, to

squeeze devotion into an easily grasped category relegated bhakti’s mystical dimensions to

departments of theology, anthropology, and philosophy, and removed devotion from public

discourse. Bhakti had no place in the work of society because it was deemed academically

irrelevant.107

It was about this time, toward the start of the fifteenth century, that the word “Hindu”

appeared as the name for India’s indigenous people: non-Muslims who lived by the river

Indus.108 The tragedy of this development would be felt across the centuries, for what had once

been a breathtaking universal vision of creation acquired the status of religion, something to be

rationalized, labeled, simplified, categorized, and packaged for convenient consumption.

107
It is ironic that both monotheistic and monistic bhakti found themselves equally marginalized by neocolonial
scholarship. No one, it seems, is exempt from the academy’s disdain.
108
The name had no religious significance until the late nineteenth century when British census-takers required local
inhabitants to state their religion.
 68

LOVE FOUND: THE BHAKTI RENAISSANCE___________________________

Bengal, 1509 CE

Katham had not yet achieved full liberation from birth and death. Uncertainty over what

awaited on the other side of samsara bound him to that cycle, and after many further lifetimes he

was born into “the dark period of Bengal history.”109 By now, Mughal invaders had extended a

repressive rule over the entire province, caste brahmins were enforcing draconian laws governing

Hindu social behavior, and tantric practices involving dubious sexual rites had sunk Vaishnavism

into disrepute. From without, Bengalis lived with the daily menace of forced conversion and

threats of reprisal. From within, they lived with a despair that God himself might be powerless to

intervene. If ever a place was primed for a religious revival, it was Bengal at the dawn of the

sixteenth century.

The province vibrated with activity. Sailing down the Yamuna River, which flowed into

the revered Ganges and from there to Bengal’s ports, travelers found themselves surrounded by

hundreds of vessels: twenty-six-oar frigates loaded with goods for sale and trade, flat wooden

barges stacked with fruits and vegetables, tiny fishing rigs and two-party ferries piled high with

109
Kennedy (1925), p. 1
 69

catch and handmade goods destined for market. Eager to earn profit from sales to affluent

Bengalis, traders from abroad unloaded their treasures onto the city’s wooden docks: colorful

textiles, elaborately inlaid furniture and produce bundled in tightly sewn gunny bags. From the

crowded shore, tall white cranes and Chinese geese looked on. Pelicans hovered overhead, dove

for fish and rose again into the spice-scented sky.110

Bengal’s marketplaces thrived. Bullock carts wobbled by laden with pungent jack fruit,

spicy long green peppers, gnarled ginger roots, and pyramids of nutmeg and mace. Weavers and

paper makers worked their craft before appreciative throngs, butchers slaughtered fowl and she-

goats in open-air pens, and fishermen hawked fresh catch from bamboo baskets. For those so

inclined, there were hookas of hemp and bhang. Some vendors specialized in articles of worship:

ground sandalwood paste, buttered cotton balls, camphor and rosewater. Others displayed bolts

of multicolored cottons and silks. From turban-clad jewelry merchants, wealthier citizens

purchased ruby and sapphire encrusted necklaces from Pegu, diamond earrings from Agra and

Delhi, strands of pearls collected from the Persian Sea, and long loops of glass beads and ivory

“elephants’ teeth” from Ethiopia.

The capital city Nabadvip resounded with prayers and songs of devotion to Krishna. If at

that moment Europe’s classical Renaissance was expanding cultural awareness and giving rise to

a Western scientific intellect, this was its religious equivalent. Animated philosophical

exchanges spilled out from public gathering halls, roadside eateries and mud-walled temple

compounds. Much of this perpetual blend of prayer and debate focused on Chaitanya, a young

scholar of such keen devotion and intellect. Followers agreed that if anyone could bring light into

this dark time it would be he. Had anyone ever seen such love for God? Look at his effect on

110
Dasgupta (1914), p. 114
 70

those who heard him chant the holy names. Everyone became caught up in the ecstasy of “the

Golden Avatar.”

Bengal resembled a checkerboard of small principalities, Hindu king Prataparudra’s land

bordering Muslim ruler Hussain Shah’s, and so on, each administered according to local

regulations and tax laws. Chaitanya’s apostles wandered freely across these borders, protesting

the cruelty of caste divisions and winning followers in public debate. Access to God, they

declared, is not limited to those born in higher castes. Chaitanya taught that love of God is the

birthright of all souls and does not depend on higher education or complex rituals, things only

available to the upper classes. He decried such privilege and brought the holy names into the

streets where all could join in joyful congregational chanting.

Caste brahmins pursed their lips. Their position and authority depended on birthright, and

Chaitanya’s theology threw down a glove to that convention. Behind closed doors, they

conspired with Muslim administrators to put an end to the Golden Avatar’s heresy. When Chand

Kazi and his police tried to bar public performance of kirtan, Chaitanya responded by organizing

thousands of protestors who marched through the streets singing God’s names in peaceful

defiance. Some historians cite these protests as the original model for Gandhi’s non-violent

disobedience campaigns.111

Janardan Chakravarti goes further, describing Chaitanya as “the greatest-ever humanist

that India produced.”112 Who was Chaitanya? Close associates adored him as a God-lover but

rarely spoke of divine origins,113 while others pointed to verses in smriti literature suggesting he

111
See for instance Howard Spodek, “On the Origins of Gandhi's Political Methodology: The Heritage of Kathiawad
and Gujarat,” The Journal of Asian Studies, Vol. 30, No. 2 (Feb., 1971), pp. 361-372
112
Chakravarti (1975), p. 29
113
The question of Chaitanya’s divinity—his identity in transcendence—was less of a concern among disciples to
the north in Vrindavan, where codification of his teachings into written texts focused a lens on the depth of his
devotion rather than the height of his Godhood.
 71

was the Yuga Avatar, God himself appearing to establish religious practices for the age of Kali:

“In the age of Kali, intelligent persons will perform congregational chanting to

worship the incarnation of Godhead who constantly sings the names of Krishna.

Although His complexion is not blackish, He is Krishna Himself, accompanied by

His associates, servants, accoutrements, and confidential companions.”114

Vedic rituals in previous ages had demanded much from adherents, including prolonged

meditation, costly sacrifices, and elaborate temple worship. Chaitanya assessed the general

population’s diminished capacity for such rigors and concluded that “Whatever results people

achieved in the other three yugas—Satya, Treta and Dvapara —can be achieved in Kali-Yuga by

chanting the Hare Krishna maha-mantra.115 Although Kali-Yuga is full of faults, this is its one

good quality. Simply by chanting the Hare Krishna maha-mantra, one can become free from

material bondage and promoted to the transcendental kingdom.”116 Chaitanya urged his followers

to spread the practice of chanting, in fulfillment of Krishna’s declaration in the Gita that “For

one who explains this supreme secret to the devotees, pure devotional service is guaranteed, and

at the end he will come back to me. There is no servant in this world dearer to me than he, nor

will there ever be one more dear.”117

114
BhP 11.5.32
115
hare krishna, hare krishna, krishna krishna, hare hare / hare rama, hare rama, rama rama, hare hare: “O Hare
[“Radha, the feminine personification of love for God”], O Krishna [“the most beautiful”], O Rama [“the source of
highest bliss”], kindly engage me in your service.”
116
CC Madhya 20.343-344
117
BG 18.68-69
 72

In distributing love of Godhead, Chaitanya and His associates did not consider

who was a fit candidate and who was not nor where such distribution should or

should not take place. They made no conditions. Wherever they got the

opportunity, the members of the Pancha-tattva [Chaitanya and his four principal

associates] distributed love of Godhead…. The flood of love of Godhead swelled

in all directions, and thus young men, old men, women and children were all

immersed in that inundation.118

In his early twenties on pilgrimage to Gaya, Chaitanya met Vaishnava saint Isvara Puri,

who granted him formal initiation into bhakti practices. Although history has not recorded details

of their time together, the meeting transformed Chaitanya into a lover of Krishna and an activist

for the propagation of Krishna worship. He returned to his birthplace Nabadwip, closed his tol

(Sanskrit school), and organized groups that fanned out across the countryside playing musical

instruments and chanting Krishna’s names. Chaitanya was tall and handsome, and the excitement

generated by these public appearances attracted thousands of men and women to join his

chanting parties.

At age twenty-four he entered the renounced order of life (sannyasa), shaved his head

and put on saffron cloth as tradition dictated, and moved his headquarters to Jagannath Puri. He

spent the next six years proselytizing across the Indian subcontinent, traveling as far south as

Ramesvara, as far north as Vrindavan through Kasi and Prayag (Allahabad), and across Bengal

to Ramakeli near Gauda (at the time the capital of Bengal). His mission gained momentum when

118
CC, Adi 7.30.25. Commentators such as Steven Rosen note that Chaitanya’s public sankirtan parties, also
described as mantra yoga, constitutes the only yoga process to benefit anyone other than the yoga practitioner.
 73

two Shankara Vedantists, the influential ascetic Prakasananda Saraswati and the renowned

scholar Sarvabhauma Bhattacharya, joined along with several hundred disciples.

Chaitanya passed the final twelve years of his life in Jagannath Puri, where he exhibited

extreme symptoms of ecstasy. Accounts of these years in seclusion depict s devotee at the

farthest reaches of love for God, displaying raptures of union and excruciating pangs of

separation from his beloved Krishna. His inner identification at such moments was with Radha,

Krishna’s most beloved and leader of the cowherd women (gopis) of Vrindavan village.

While Radha holds the most revered place in the Chaitanya School’s theology, her place

in Vaishnava history is obscure. Some evidence suggests that her importance began to emerge

with Jayadev Goswami’s poem Gita Govinda (twelfth century) and with Madhavendra Puri,

whose disciple Isvara Puri was Chaitanya’s initiating teacher,119 but her place was solidified by

Chaitanya’s disciples the Goswamis of Vrindavan who underscored her centrality in their many

books.

Chaitanya taught that all creation is comprised of brahman, infinite all-pervading energy,

and that Brahman emanates from the body of the personal Godhead, Krishna. God is thus both

personal and impersonal, and form within creation reflects the individuation of Krishna, who is

without origin and is the cause of all causes.120 Unlike beings who are limited by a finite form,

Krishna’s form does not limit him. Krishna and his body are non-different. His body is eternal;

non-material; and comprised of eternity (sat), knowledge (chit), and bliss (ananda).121 While
119
CC 1.9
120
“Krishna who is known as Govinda is the Supreme Godhead. He has an eternal, blissful spiritual body. He is the
origin of all. He has no other origin, and He is the prime cause of all causes.” (BS 5.1) While other deities serve in
various supporting capacities for the creation, maintenance, and dissolution of creation, they are according to
Chaitanya manifestations of Krishna and not equal or superior to him.
121
“I worship Govinda, the primeval Lord, whose transcendental form is full of bliss, truth, substantiality and is thus
full of the most dazzling splendor. Each of the limbs of that transcendental figure possesses in Himself the full-
fledged functions of all the organs and eternally sees, maintains and manifests the infinite universes, both spiritual
and mundane.” BS 5.32
 74

other aspects of God convey his features of eternity and knowledge—for instance realization of

his impersonal brahman energy, which is the goal of Shankara’s mayavada school—it is only

Krishna in his original two-armed form that conveys bliss (ananda). The Upanishads refer to

him as “the reservoir of all rasa”or blissful loving exchange.122

The Vaishnava texts place these loving exchanges in five principle categories according

to their intensity. Those devotees who are aware of Krishna but are not moved to engage in

active service experience shanta-rasa or passive love. The texts point to trees, grass, and other

conscious objects of Vrindavan as typifying the passive relationship with God. When awareness

of Krishna as the Supreme Godhead grows to the point of desiring active service, a devotee

enters dasya-rasa or servitude. This stage is characterized by reverence and deference to Krishna

as master. Arjuna’s reverence for Krishna in the Bhagavad Gita conveys a servant-to-master

love. When love for Krishna sheds such formalities, it is called sakhya-rasa or friendship such as

that exhibited by the cowherd boys of Vrindavan. Devotees in this mood consider Krishna their

equal and play with him comfortably and without the formalities of servitude. Friendship

embellished with the additional emotion of responsibility to nurture and protect is called

vatsalya-rasa or parenthood. Exemplars of this stage are Krishna’s mother Yashoda and father

Nanda. When the devotee’s emotions for Krishna move past all concern for social or familial

protocols and manifest as complete ecstatic self-surrender, that ultimate stage is called

madhurya-rasa or conjugal love. This is the emotion of the cowherd women, among whom

Radha is most prominent.

It is here, in the precarious zone of total self-surrender, that early Western scholarship

misunderstood and consequently misrepresented Vaishnava theology as licentious and immoral.

122
TU 2.7.1
 75

Deviant sects engaging in sex under the guise of madhurya-rasa fueled that misimpression, yet

the original theology contains no such taint.

The Sahajiya sects that…flourished during the last quarter of the seventeenth

century seem to be an open defiance of the Gosvamins…. A Sahajiya requires a

woman other than his married wife as a companion of his sadhana, looks upon his

companion as Radha and himself as Krsna, and imitates the love-pastimes of

Krsna with the gopis…. To approach a person other than one’s wife or husband,

as the case may be, and to imitate His lilas [pastimes or play] are strictly

forbidden by the scriptures of the orthodox sect.123

The texts describe the gopis are emanations from Krishna, his own energies. Exchanges

of love between them are no more immoral than a child’s exchange with her own reflection in a

mirror. Krishna dwells in the hearts of all beings;124 there is nothing illicit in his choosing to step

outside a devotee’s heart to embellish their loving relationship with shared activity.125

Whatever one’s position in this cornucopia of loving exchange with Krishna, Chaitanya

emphasized that no one can be satisfied without reviving that eternal blissful love. The eternal

self (atman) retains its individuality for this purpose, and all beings come under this rubric of

123
Radha Govinda Nath, p. 199
124

BG 18.61
125
The point of contention most often cited by detractors to Chaitanya theology is the rasa-lila or dance performed
by Krishna and the gopis as described in the Bhagavata Purana. It bears mentioning that at the time, Krishna was
eight years old—even by material calculation hardly old enough to sully a dance with prurient intentions. As well,
evolved devotees such as the Goswamis of Vrindavan relished discussion of the rasa-lila without falling prey to
lewd thoughts. If eroticism leads to acting out of fantasies, the lack of such behavior on the part of strict celibates is
significant.
 76

divine love. No one is exempt from this foundational vision of life as the experience of divine

love and liberation as the reawakening of that love between oneself and Krishna.126

To achieve that reawakening of love, Chaitanya stressed five activities as most important

in daily devotional sadhana: (1) keeping company with Krishna’s devotees; (2) chanting the

names of Krishna; (3) hearing narrations of Krishna’s pastimes (as described in texts such as

Bhagavata Purana); (4) residing in Vrindavan or some other holy place; and (5) worshiping the

deity of Krishna daily. It is significant that Chaitanya’s community placed no restrictions on who

could perform these functions and advocated equal place for men and women. Kennedy notes

that “Time and again in the records of this [Chaitanya Vaishnava] sect mention is made of

women who were honored for their learning and sanctity.”127 Such ecumenism was revolutionary

in a time of extreme caste brahminism and, from a historic perspective, the catalyst that

propelled Vaishnavism from insular religion to global theology. Fueling that emergence was

Chaitanya’s central credo: All living beings are by nature eternal loving servants of Krishna and

by chanting his names love for Krishna will be revived.128 Complementing this vision was

Chaitanya’s declaration that the devotee sees Krishna everywhere. While the divinity never loses

his personal identity (atman and brahman remaining qualitatively the same but quantitatively

separate), the divinity is also present within every atom.129 This doctrine of achintya-bedabeda-

126
“Pure love for Krishna is eternally established in the hearts of all living beings. It is not something to be gained
from an external source. When the heart is purified by hearing and chanting [the names of God], this love naturally
awakens.” CC Madhya 22.107
127
Report by special Government Commissioner Rev. W. Adams, cited in Kennedy (1925) p. 85
128
nitya-siddha krsna-prema ‘sadhya’ kabu naya / sravanadi-suddha-chitte karaye udaya Cc, Madhya 22.107
129
Brahma Samhita, a text thought lost before Chaitanya discovered the fifth of its 100 chapters in a South Indian
temple, states andantara-stha-paramanu-cayantra-stham: “All the universes exist in Him and He is present in His
fullness in every one of the atoms that are scattered throughout the universe, at one and the same time.” (BS 5.35)
 77

tattva (“inconceivable, simultaneous oneness and difference”) was to have profound implications

for the future role of Vaishnavas in world affairs.

Chaitanya did not write books. His disciples, however, composed an entire library on

bhakti theology which points to engagement in the world as a vital component of devotion. The

Six Goswamis of Vrindaban (as his principle disciples were known)130 outlined love for Krishna

in five primary rasas (“mellows” or moods): passive, reverential, fraternal, parental, and

conjugal. Prior to Chaitanya, most Vaishnava acharyas promoted a reverential mood inspired by

God’s majesty. The object of this reverential love is Vishnu, the recipient of sacrifice and

supplication. Chaitanya and his followers practiced a more intimate devotion inspired not by

God’s majesty but by his sweetness, with emphasis on conjugal affection as the highest state of

ecstatic divine love. The object of this intimate love is Krishna, often described as the eighth

avatara (incarnation) of Vishnu but also as avatari, the source of all incarnations .131 It is the

more intimate exchange of the higher rasas that captures Krishna’s attention.

“The entire universe is filled with the conception of My majesty, but love

weakened by that sense of majesty does not satisfy Me. If one regards Me as the

Supreme Lord and himself as a subordinate, I do not become subservient to that

love, nor can it control Me. In whatever transcendental mellow My devotees

worship Me, I reciprocate with them. That is My natural behavior…[but] if one

130
The ritual dimensions of Chaitanya’s mission formed the basis of scholarly treatises by followers Gopal Bhatta
Goswami and Sanatana Goswami. The theological and philosophical dimensions were explicated by their associates
Jiva Goswami and Sanatana Goswami, while the more theoretical and emotive elements of Chaitanya’s philosophy
were elaborated by Rupa Goswami and Raghunatha Dasa Goswami.
131
Eighth is Krishna’s popular ranking in divine descents, as for instance in 12th century poet Jayadev’s song Dasa-
Avatara. The Bhagavata Purana asserts his simultaneous identity as the source of all incarnations, as in ete camsa-
kalah pumsah / krsnas tu bhagavam svayam: “All of the [above-mentioned] incarnations are either plenary portions
or portions of the plenary portions of the Lord, but Lord Sri Krsna is the original Personality of Godhead.” (BhP
1.3.28)
 78

cherishes pure loving devotion to Me, thinking of Me as his son, his friend or his

beloved, regarding himself as great and considering Me his equal or inferior, I

become subordinate to him…. Mother sometimes binds Me as her son. She

nourishes and protects Me, thinking Me utterly helpless. My friends climb on My

shoulders in pure friendship, saying, ‘What kind of big man are You? You and I

are equal.’ If My beloved consort reproaches Me in a sulky mood, that steals My

mind from the reverent hymns of the Vedas.”132

While this intimate form of Krishna resides in the paravyoma or eternal realm outside the

manifest world, Vaishnava doctrine clearly identifies the manifest world itself as an incarnation

of the divine. This notion had been described in smriti texts, particularly in the Brihadaranyaka

Upanishad133 which was incorporated into the Satapatha Brahmana, a central scripture in

Bhagavata theology. The Brihadaranyaka describes two aspects to brahman (ultimate reality):

one with form, the other formless.134 While the manifest world may be assumed to be only a

portion of a much vaster unmanifest reality, still the world we can perceive with our senses is

fully divine.135 Voluntarily taking up the task of protecting and caring for that world in a spirit of

devotion carries equal weight with ritual devotion in temples. Both are opportunities to

demonstrate love for Krishna.

The Chaitanya’s School’s proposition that all beings are eternal servants of Krishna and

132
Cc, Adi 4.18.27
133
Oldest and largest of the 108 Upanishads
134
BU 2.3
135
Not only is this aspect of Vaishnava theology usually misunderstood by Western scholars but it is also central to
Gandhi’s claim that “all embodied life is in reality an incarnation of God,” (Gandhi, The Bhagavad Gita, p. 17) a
subject we will examine more closely in Part Three.
 79

that the world itself is divine flew in the face of popular Shankarite monism. “Brahman alone is

real,” Shankara declared. “The universe is unreal, and the individual soul is no other than the

Universal Soul.”136 It is the Chaitanya School’s apposition to this view that distinguishes it from

commonly accepted interpretations of Vedanta. From a devotional perspective, Shankara’s

doctrine destroys the possibility that gives meaning to salvation, namely the opportunity to

express love for Krishna. In Vaishnava theology atman, the eternal self—the consciousness

which energizes all physical bodies—is personal; and Krishna, the Supreme Godhead, too, is

personal. The inviolability of their personhoods allows a relationship between them to occur. The

Shankarite doctrine, which declares personhood false and bodies (including Krishna’s) only

temporary illusions, negates relationships and demeans bhakti as a temporary sentiment on the

way to formless immortality.

Shankara offered several analogies such as mistaking a rope for a snake to bolster his

argument that we live in illusion. In their extensive writings, Chaitanya’s followers pointed out

that such a mistake occurs only because snakes have a reality separate from the rope. Without the

reality existing elsewhere, such a mistake would not be possible. To Shankara’s comparison of

living beings to drops of water that merge once they are returned to the ocean, the Chaitanya

scholars replied that our senses may be too blunt to discern the difference, but a reasonable

person does not equate a drop and an ocean.137

By rebutting monistic arguments the Goswamis were not seeking to win converts so

much as alert people to the defects of monistic theory. Chaitanya never promoted “Vaishnavism”

over other religions and indeed urged others to distance themselves from all temporal

136
brahma satyah jaganmithya iti evamrupa viniscayah / soyam nitya anitya vastu vivekah samudahrtah
(Vivekacudamani, Advaita Ashram, Mayavati, 1932, 2nd edition, p. 8, verse 20).
137
Most of these rebuttals can be found in Jiva Goswami’s Sat-sandarbha.
 80

designations. “I am not a brahmin,” he said, “I am not a kshatriya, I am not a vaishya or a

shudra. Nor am I a brahmachari, a grihastha, a vanaprastha or a sannyasi.138 I identify myself

only as the servant of the servant of the servant of the lotus feet of Lord Krishna, the maintainer

of the gopis (cowherd women of Vrindaban, the exemplars of conjugal rasa).” 139

It was love of God—not religious conversion—that Chaitanya advocated, a privilege he

extended to everyone regardless of caste, since no one exists outside the foundational definition

of all beings as parts and parcels of Krishna. In Chaitanya theology, everyone has a place in

God’s plan for the world. Qualification to conduct worship, he argued, did not depend on family,

nationality, or any other worldly consideration. Practicing what he preached, Chaitanya accepted

as disciples Muslims, outcastes, and brahmins who had strayed from religious standards. All

these he trained as theological and liturgical leaders.

And everyone in his entourage attended the Rathayatra festival.

In 1509, the festival took place in the Orissan city of Puri as it had for hundreds of years.

From far-away kingdoms, Himalayan caves, neighboring kingdoms and surrounding villages

hundreds of thousands of pilgrims crushed together filling every crevice of the parade route.140

Priests in white robes carried the eight-foot wooden deity of Jagannath (“Lord of the Universe”)

from his medieval temple and placed him on a silk-domed chariot (ratha) that rested on sixteen

seven-foot-high wooden wheels. The chariot’s bright red and yellow canopy stood three stories

high. Three such chariots were prepared and thick guide ropes passed from hand to hand in

anticipation of the parade.

138
The four varnas or social orders (priest, warrior, merchant, and worker) and four ashramas or stages of life
(celibate student, married person, retired person, and renunciant).
139
Cc Madhya 13.80
140
In recent years, the Puri festival has drawn more than 2.5 million spectators and participants.
 81

Chaitanya approached, followed by thousands of devotees dancing and singing the maha-

mantra, “Hare Krishna, Hare Krishna!” Four groups led the procession, each with six chanters,

two mridanga drum players, and a dancer. Each village had organized its own kirtan party, and

the combined sound of drums and shouting and chanting was tumultuous.141

The procession began and the chariot lurched forward, wheels groaning under more than

two tons of wood and cloth housing. Seeing the smiling face of Jagannath, Chaitanya jumped

high into the air, landed, and spun like a circling firebrand. He fell and rolled on the ground and

again rose up. He stared lovingly at the face of Jagannath and his skin broke out in goose bumps,

his body hairs stood on end, his teeth chattered, and tears shot from his eyes as though from a

syringe.142

Katham walked along, singing and keeping time with his hands. At forty he was in good

health and able to keep up with the surging crowds, but he could not help stopping every few

yards and staring, hypnotized by Chaitanya’s ecstasies. The tall avatara with shaved head and

long arms seemed to change color before his eyes, now white, now pink, and as he sang foam

fell from his mouth. Chaitanya’s bliss grew at each moment, and Katham marveled as the

Golden Avatar raising his arms he recited verses in a loud voice:

“That very personality who stole away my heart during my youth is now again my

master. These are the same moonlit nights of the month of Caitra. The same

fragrance of malati flowers is there, and the same sweet breezes are blowing from

141
Chaitanya’s public chanting and the ecstasies it aroused had little precedent, but the chanting practice conformed
to the Vedic notion of yajna, sacrifice, a personal offering meant for the pleasure of God and the stability of the
world. Chaitanya took the principle of yajna and gave it contemporary relevance and an easy to apply form. His
followers tracked the scriptural authority of public chanting and created a library of bhakti literature validating its
role as a central devotional practice.
142
Chaitanya’s ecstasy during the Rathayatra festival is described in Cc Madhya, ch. 13.
 82

the kadamba forest. In our intimate relationship, I am also the same lover, yet still

my mind is not happy here. I am eager to go back to that place on the bank of the

Reva under the Vetasi tree. That is my desire.”143

Katham felt a tug on his arm. His good friend Umapati was signaling to follow him to the

sidelines. They pushed through the crowds and found a spot beneath a tree.

“It is difficult to watch him at such moments,” Umapati said. “He weeps so hard

sometimes he chokes and then falls unconscious.144 What can anyone understand of such divine

love? We are seeing it with our own eyes and cannot understand. His behavior is not of this

world.”

Katham had known Umapati for less than a year, since the day he, too, had put on the

cloth of a celibate and joined Chaitanya’s followers. In the morning hours, walking with other

new arrivals to classes and ceremonies led by senior devotees, Katham thought about the life he

had left behind, the vegetable fields he used to managed on behalf of his father, the markets his

family’s farm supplied with fresh produce, the elaborate feasts they held for neighbors at the

conclusion of each harvest. Children played games and chased each other through sweet smelling

fields of grain, and in his early years it was enough. By the time he was twenty, an ancient flame

had burst anew in his heart. It was enlightenment he wanted, not profits or routines. He grew

sullen, apathetic, to the consternation of his parents. “You’re the oldest son,” they told him. “You

have to be forbearing and responsible. You have obligations. People depend on you.” It was, he

143
This verse from Rupa Goswami’s Padyavali (382) describes Radha’s emotions upon meeting her beloved
Krishna after the Kurukshetra war. She despairs seeing him in royal dress and surrounded by elephants, horses, and
soldiers, and longs to return with him to the calm and quiet of the Vrindavan forests. The esoteric sense of the
Rathayatra parade is this call by Radha for Krishna to rejoin her in the groves of their pastoral village.
144
Cc Madhya 2.72
 83

told himself, a prosaic and unsatisfying existence. He had confronted the worst fear that life can

deliver—that it made no sense. And when that happened, any residual happiness disappeared.

When Katham was thirty-nine, some of Chaitanya’s followers had come through his

village with chanting and philosophy, and Katham felt that God had granted him a miracle, a

second chance at life. His abrupt departure to follow them shocked his family and friends. No

matter. He was a God man now.

The sun beat down and Umapati wiped his face with the edge of his saffron robe. Katham

felt drawn the older devotee as though to an old friend. The gray-haired sadhu made him laugh

with insightful thoughts about the silliness of the world, and his broad smiles kept their long

hours of discussion lively. The older devotee watched the Rathayatra crowds with a look Katham

interpreted as pride. Sensing Katham’s gaze, Umapati turned to him and said, “The future will

look back at this,” pointing with his chin, “and call it ‘history’ and use imaginative language to

explain what it was like. Or worse, they will call it ‘not-history’ and dismiss it altogether as the

raving of lunatics.”

“Why?” Katham’s innocent question made Umapati chuckle.

“There are thousands here, dancing with Mahaprabhu.145 They will go home and try to

tell their friends and family what happened, using whatever words they have to explain the

miracle of what they have seen. A handful will attempt to write about it. You’ve met

Mahaprabhu’s secretary Murari Gupta? He keeps meticulous notes. There are others as well. In

years to come people will interpret their writings as they see fit, each generation chipping away

at reality until what remains will be the dry husk of experience. We might call them ‘secondary

145
“Great Master,” an honorific title used by followers to refer to Chaitanya.
 84

witnesses’146 in honor of their effort to remember a memory—a memory seeking a memory of

another memory—but it will not hold. It makes me sad, knowing what they will miss.”

“For a happy fellow,” Katham said, “you come up with some dire predictions.”

Umapati grinned. “Here’s another one. Have you met some of the newcomers, the

Christians? Both they and our Muslim friends would have us abandon our kirtans and deity

worship. Do you know why? Because both claim that a sixteen-hundred-year-old revelation

condemns us as heretics—sixteen hundred years of incomplete, interpreted, even falsified reports

of a divine teacher and what he said. Mahaprabhu is about the same age as the Savior was,

twenty-four. History will not treat him with greater kindness.”

Imagining the disappearance of revelations to which they were witness, Katham’s eyes

welled with tears. “Is there no hope?” he asked.

Umapati saw the effect his words had worked on his friend and he went straight to the

cure. “Of course!” he cried, jumping to his feet and pulling Katham back toward the riotous

crowd. “Avoid the wranglers and chant! Chant and dance!”

Working their way forward, they looked up at the deity of Jagannath. Sunshine gleamed

off the deity’s face, and there before the chariot stood Chaitanya, “like a transcendental

Himalayan mountain bearing ecstatic emotional flower trees, all of them blooming.”147

“He’s magnificent!” Katham shouted over the noise of the crowd. “What more could

anyone want than to follow him? I have been searching for this for so long…”

146
Perhaps the most eloquent book on the intricacies of memory is Lawrence Langer’s Holocaust Testimonies: The
Ruins of Memory (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1991). Historian Geoffrey Hartman addresses the change in
terminology from “intellectual” and “scholar” to “secondary witness” in his insightful introduction to Poetics
Today: The Humanities of Testimony (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2006).
147
Cc Madhya 13.173
 85

Umapati had known excitement such as Katham’s when he was that age and put a gentle

hand on Katham’s shoulder. Leaning close, he said, “You have more to do still—here, now. If

you truly wish to follow Chaitanya, you must first learn to see what is already in front of you.

You will not find it by going away.”

Katham looked into eyes deep as pools, age rippling out around them in tiny good-

humored wrinkles. Those eyes held him in a loving yet firm grip, and Katham sensed behind

them the workings of a mind whose logic and intelligence far surpassed his own. It was true.

Umapati’s words forced Katham to admit to what he had denied for so long—that God lives in

the details of the life we have and not in an imagined life we covet. There had always been

something terrifying for Katham about his thirst for self-transformation. The urgency of it

frightened him. He had renounced his roots to take as his model the ways of renunciants who did

not owe the same allegiances, who were not accountable as he was to a family and a business. He

had been willing to do anything to break free from the mundane repetitions of life—anything

except admit the possibility that mundane was a judgment he passed on what greater, more

surrendered souls such as Umapati knew to be sacred. It was at that moment, with the sounds of

ecstatic chanting in his ears and a glorious sun drawing beads of sweat from his face that Katham

understood how much farther he still had to go.

 86

CONCLUSION________________________________________________________________

We have seen that while the context of Vaishnavism changed over the centuries, its

theological content remained unaltered. Sacrifice as understood in its earliest environment

emphasized meticulous recitation of hymns and an ascetic lifestyle. In time and with the

expansion of human groupings sacrifice required reinterpretation, to which end the Upanishads

encouraged study under a realized teacher. Later works such as the Epics, Puranas and

Bhagavad Gita added a psychic dimension to sacrifice, favoring selfless intent and devotion over

technical expertise in the execution of rituals. As outside cultures penetrated the subcontinent,

sacrifice migrated further from psychic to social arenas, with an imperative of creating harmony

among diverse peoples. To this unfolding of Vaishnava beliefs Chaitanya added a public feature

in the form of congregational chanting. His assertion that devotional service is intrinsic to the

very nature of life catapulted the community out of its isolation on the subcontinent and,

eventually, onto a global stage.

For the first time in their history, Vaishnavas were obliged to consider the significance of

bhakti outside India’s borders. What had been an internal communion between the devotee and

the divinity now affected social conditions and relations between communities. Left alone, it is

tempting to think that the dynamics of devotion would have evolved an elegant amalgam of
 87

internal and external selves; but as we shall see in Contract Two occupation, colonization, and

the polarizing of party interests made such an organic evolution impossible.

How did this secularizing process alter the experience of devotees? What were the

consequences of the inner self becoming a social agent? For the majority of Vaishnavas, for

whom faith was limited to modest acts of generosity, piety and kindness, the drama was

invisible. And while their naivety left them vulnerable to appeal by recruiters arguing for the

superiority of Christian salvation and European enlightenment, sociological studies that focus on

these external changes ignore the nuclear core of Vaishnava theology. Next we examine the lives

of more dynamic exemplars who implemented personalist theology in colonial, post-colonial,

and global environments.

 88

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______

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