ajnana timirandhasya jnananjana salakaya
cakshur unmilitam yena tasmai sri gurave namah (1)
– Narottama das Thakur (Prema Bhakti Chandrika)

“I offer my obeisances unto my Guru, who opened my eyes with the ointment pencil of divine knowledge and who dispelled the darkness of my ignorance.”

tika —
advaita prakatikrito narahari preshthah svarupa priyo
nityananda sakhah sanatana gatih sri rupa hrit ketanah
lakshmi prana patir gadadhara rasollasi jagannatha-bhuh
sangopanga saparshadah sa dayatam devah sacinandanah
tasmai sri gurave namah sri gurum prati namo’stu. kimbhutayam? yena guruna mama cakshuh netram unmilitam. mama kimbhutasya ajnana timirandhasya ajnanam eva timiram akshi rogas tenandhasya drishti sakti rahitasya. kimva ajnanam avidya tad eva timiram andhakaras tena andhasya. ajnana tamaso nama kaitavam, yatha sri caitanya caritamrite— ‘ajnana tamera nama kohiye kaitava; dharma artha kama vancha adi ei sab. tara madhye moksha vancha kaitava pradhana; yaha hoite krishna bhakti hoy antardhana. krishna bhakti badhaka joto subhasubha karma; sei eka jivera ajnana tamo dharma. kaya unmilitam jnananjana salakaya — isvarah paramah krishnah sac cidananda vigrahah anadir adir govindah sarva karana karanam ityanena. ‘krishnas tu bhagavan svayam ityanena’ ca krishna bhagavatta jnanam evanjana salaka taya. ‘krishne bhagavatta jnana samvidera sara’ iti sri caitanya caritamritokteh (1)

 

Auspicious glorification :

Sudha kanika vyakhya (commentary by Radhakunda Mahanta Sri Srimat Ananta das Babaji —

“May that Sri Sacinandana, who was revealed by Advaita Prabhu, who is very dear to Narahari, who is Sri Svarupa Damodara’s dear most, who is Nityananda’s friend, who is the shelter and goal for Sri Sanatana Gosvamipada, who is the heart’s banner of Sri Rupa Gosvami, who is the Lord of Lakshmi-devi’s heart, who enjoys blissful mellows with Gadadhara Pandita, who is the son of Sri Jagannatha Misra, and who is of divine golden complexion, along with His associates, be kind to me.”

The name of this book, composed by Srila Narottama Thakura Mahasaya, is Prema Bhakti Candrika. The ambrosial rays of the moon of love that rises within the heart of Srila Thakura Mahasaya, who is the embodiment of Srila Nitai-cand’s prema, is manifest within the world in the form of this book and will bless the people of the world, who are covered over by the deep darkness of worldly ignorance, by distributing its light of loving devotion to their hearts.
The essence of the Lord’s intrinsic potencies hladini and samvit is called bhakti. The three faculties of the Lord’s internal potency hladini, sandhini and samvit reside within Him; they cannot be found within the living beings (His marginal potency) or in the external potency maya. By the Lord’s grace the hladini and samvit faculties of the Lord’s internal potency enter into the heart of the conditioned soul, and become one with it when the sadhana bhajana of the individual soul has matured.

Then he has attained the state known as prema. Srimat Jiva Gosvamipada has written—
tasya hladinya eva kvapi sarvanandatisayini vrittir nityam bhakta-vrindeshveva nikshipyamana bhagavat prityakhyaya vartate.

atas tadanubhavena sri bhagavan api srimad bhakteshu prityatisayam bhajata iti.
– (Priti Sandarbha—Paragraph 65)

“This pleasure potency eternally resides within the Lord. When this eternal and ever-blissful faculty is thrust within the hearts of the devotees it becomes known as ‘love of God’.
Therefore the Lord Himself can also experience this love within His beautiful devotees and attain great love from it Himself.”

For instance, mercury does not mix with sulphur powder when thrown in it, but their specific forms as mercury and sulphur also disappear and create a new substance called mercury sulphate, which is an amalgamate of mercury and sulphur. In the same way, as the result of the process of hearing and chanting, the mind and heart of the practitioner meet with the transcendental form of devotion and automatically become spiritual.
When the mental faculties of the practitioner meet with the faculty of hladini, it is called prema.

In this book the clear light of loving practice shines, hence it is justly called Prema Bhakti Candrika (the moonlight of loving devotion). On the one hand the greatly realised words of Srila Thakura Mahasaya in this Prema Bhakti Candrika contain the unfailing power of sadhana bhajana that will cause prema to arise promptly.
Such wonderful ambrosial instructions to enhance one’s expertise in bhajana are given in this book, that their light will instantly erase the darkness of ignorance from the heart of the practitioner of the process of hearing and chanting and will swiftly infuse loving devotion into it, taking him by the hand and bringing him to the lotus feet of his beloved Sri Radha-Krishna. Just as the moonlight will show the way to a traveller who is way-lost, and will bring him to his destination, similarly this Prema Bhakti Candrika will soothe the affliction caused by the threefold material miseries to the conditoned souls who are wandering aimlessly in the desert of the material world, and show them the way of proper worship with its moonlight, awakening their (manjari) svarupa and bringing them to the gate of Sri-Sri Radha-Madhava’s nikunja— thus the meaning of its name Prema Bhakti Candrika is significant.

In this Prema Bhakti Candrika the words of Srila Thakura Mahasaya, that carry matchless realisations and that are filled with great secrets about the sadhana bhajana of the Gaudiya Vaishnavas and difficult philosophical points, are revealed in very simple and concise Bengali language.
Hence the most valuable and essential instructions that lie at the root of the kingdom of gaudiya bhajana truly truly reside here, but one must try to understand these greatly realised teachings with the support of the grace of the great saints, and as far as possible with the aid of one’s own realisations on bhajana. Its purport is hard to gauge with the aid of mundane knowledge or intelligence. In this connection a true story is mentioned. In the past one highly educated person came from Bengal to spend his retired age in Vraja, so he came to Vrindavana and took shelter of a mahatma. The mahatma gave him a copy of Srila Thakura Mahasaya’s ‘Prema Bhakti Candrika’ and told him to always read it. Occasionally this mahatma asked this person whether he was always reading Prema Bhakti Candrika or not and whether he was able to understand it. When he was asked this, the educated person thought: “Perhaps Sri Gurudeva is so absorbed in bhajana that he has forgotten that I am a highly educated person. Why wouldn’t I be able to understand such a simple Bengali songbook?” Thinking like this he said: “Yes, I can understand it all”. One day the mahatma recited one tripadi (couplet) and asked the gentleman if he could explain it. Then the gentleman explained the couplet according to his material, intellectual understanding. Hearing this explanation the mahanubhava (greatly realized Guru) slightly smiled and said: “No my dear, this is not the meaning of all these tripadis.” And then he explained the tripadis in such a wonderful way that it transcended the gentleman’s wildest imagination. From then onwards he considered the whole Prema Bhakti Candrika to be very grave and difficult and he made a deep study of the tripadis under the guidance of Sri Gurudeva.
Taking shelter at the lotus feet of the blessed author Srila Thakura Mahasaya, and of Sri Guru and the Vaishnavas, and taking support from their grace we will try to understand the purport of these songs as far as we can.
In order to accomplish this book unhindered Srila Thakura Mahasaya praises Sri Gurudeva in his auspicious invocation, thus properly following the Vaishnava-custom.

granthera arambhe kori mangalacarana;
guru vaishnava bhagavan tinera smarana.
tinera smarane hoy vighna vinasana;
anayase hoy nija vanchita purana.
se mangalacarana hoy trividha prakara;
vastu nirdesa asirvada ara namaskara
– (C.C.)

“At the beginning of this book I make an auspicious invocation, remembering the Guru, the Vaishnavas and the Lord— these three. All obstacles are destroyed and all desires are easily conquered by remembering these three. There are three kinds of auspicious invocation — indication of the essence (target), blessing and obeisance.”

Although Srila Thakura Mahasaya is the embodiment of prema he very humbly considers himself to be an ordinary soul conditioned by maya.
Remembering the boundless grace of Sri Gurudeva he offers obeisances to him with great devotion in the part of the auspicious invocation called ‘obeisance’. “I offer my obeisances unto the lotus feet of Sri Gurudeva, who opened my eyes with the pencil that was anointed with the ointment of spiritual knowledge.”

Here the ‘darkness of ignorance’ means the deceit of the conditioned soul — desires for religious merit, economic profits, sense enjoyment and ultimate liberation.
In Sri Caitanya Caritamrita it is seen — ajnana tamera nama kohiye kaitava; dharma artha kama vancha adi se sab. tara madhye moksha vancha kaitava pradhana; yaha hoite krishna bhakti hoy antardhana. The darkness of ignorance is called ‘deceitfulness’, which includes desires for religious merit, economic profits, sense enjoyment and ultimate liberation. Amongst them, the desire for liberation is the greatest kind of cheating, for through it, devotion to Krishna disappears.” The darkness of ignorance means: ‘cheating’ or ‘duplicity’, and cheating means the desires for religiosity, economic profits, sense enjoyment and liberation. But the synonym for ‘the darkness of ignorance’ is not ‘duplicity’ or ‘cheating’, nor is the synonym for ‘cheating’ ‘the desires for religiosity, economic profits, sense enjoyment and liberation’. Still these unconnected synonyms have been linked to each other in Caitanya Caritamrita. Srila Visvanatha Cakravartipada has explained why in his comment on this verse: krishna nitya dasasya jivasya tad dasatvam vina nija sukhartham anyam sarvam kaitavam iti bhavah –
“The living entity is by nature the eternal servant of Sri Krishna, and the duty of an eternal servant is to serve his lord. When the eternal servant, the living entity, has forgotten Sri Krishna’s service he fell into the darkness of ignorance, forgetting his real nature and, becoming engrossed within bodily affairs, he seeks different kinds of personal pleasure. When we scientifically divide these different pursuits for personal happiness we come to see they are nothing else but the desires for religiosity, economic profits, sense enjoyment and liberation. Here ‘religiosity’ means sacrifices, donations, compassion and other regular religious practices practised by karmis who desire to be rewarded in heaven in the next life. The happiness in that heaven, earned through such piety, is temporary though, as the Vedas tell us — tad yatheha karmarjito lokah kshiyate, evam evatra punya jito lokah kshiyate. Therefore the conditioned and deluded souls enjoy in heaven and after their pious merit, earned through the performance of sacrifices, is depleted, they once more plunge into a terrible repetition of birth and death. Particularly maya’s ignorance will make the deluded souls enjoy heaven as a punishment for their fault of being averse to Sri Krishna. This is one of her expert tricks. Srila Kaviraja Gosvamipada has written —

krishna bhuli sei jiva— anadi bahirmukha; ataeva maya tare deya samsara duhkha
kabhu svarge uthay, kabhu narake dubay; dandya jana raja jeno nadite cubay

“Forgetting Krishna, that conditioned soul is averse to Him since beginningless time. Hence maya gives him a hard time in material life. Sometimes he ascends to heaven, and sometimes he plunges into hell, like a prisoner keelhauled by a king.”
In olden days it was a custom that a person who was punishable by the king was tied to a long rod and inundated into a deep lake or river. If he would be close to death due to suffocation he would be lifted up again. Then, when he emerged above the surface he would exclaim: “Aho! I have survived!” and feel very happy. But this happiness is actually due to the cessation of suffering, since he is being repeatedly inundated and lifted out again. Similarly, maya sometimes lifts the conditioned souls, who have forgotten Sri Krishna since beginningless time, up to heaven, and then plunges them back into hell for punishment. Therefore the practice of sacrificial piety to transport one to heaven is to be understood as deep darkness of ignorance.

artha here means the mundane sense objects such as sound, form, flavour, scent and touch that are enjoyed by the ears, eyes, nose, tongue, and skin. It can also mean lush royal wealth. kama means lust after the enjoying sense objects like form and flavour through one’s senses, without distinguishing between sin and virtue. The conditioned soul who has forgotten that he is Krishna’s eternal servant considers this false body to be ‘myself’ and all its enjoyable objects to be ‘my own’. Thus he is bound to material conditioning and remains fixed in that birth after birth. As a result of his sensual enjoyments he suffers hellish pains in birth and in death, time and again. By the Lord’s wish some may attain a human body, which is endowed with discriminative intelligence, but still this intelligence remains polluted and concealed by sensual desires and he remains constantly absorbed in bodily enjoyment. Therefore this artha and kama are the conditioned souls’ deep darkness of ignorance or its duplicity.

Pursuing dharma, artha and kama is certainly duplicious, but the main kind of deceit the conditioned soul can perform is endeavouring for liberation, merging with the non-personal brahman by destroying the bondage of ignorance. The conditioned soul who is yearning for dharma, artha and kama and who thus wanders through different species of life with a lust-stained consciousness, is still able to attain the association and the grace of a saint who will awaken the self esteem of ‘servant of Krishna’ in them and thus grant them devotion. In Sri Caitanya Caritamrita it is seen—

nitya baddha— krishna hoite nitya bahirmukha; nitya samsari bhunje narakadi dukha
sei doshe maya pisaci danda kore tare; adhyatmikadi tapa traya jari tare mare
kama krodhera dasa hoya tara lathi khay; bhramite bhramite yadi sadhu vaidya pay
tara upadesa mantre pisaci palay; krishna bhakti pay tabe krishna nikata jay
– (C.C.)

“The eternally fettered soul is eternally averse to Krishna. He eternally dwells in the mundane world, suffering in hell and elsewhere. The witch of maya punishes him for this fault and strikes him with the three kinds of suffering, like adhyatmika klesa. Being a servant of lust and anger, he gets beaten up by maya. If he meets a doctor-like saint as he wanders through this mundane hell and takes his prescription, the witch named maya will flee. Once he attains devotion to Krishna he will go to Krishna.”

But as a result of thinking himself non different from brahma the person who desires liberation will lose his esteem of a relationship with Krishna as ‘the Lord of the living beings’ and ‘the Lord’s eternal servant’ forever. The great devotee of Sri Krishna also cast the company of the persons who desire liberation far away, so that they will be deprived of the grace of the devotee, which lies root at the attainment of devotion. By finally attaining oneness with brahma the possibility of awakening a relationship with Sri Krishna or attaining devotion to Him will be lost forever. For this reason the desire for liberation has been called the greatest type of duplicity and the greatest darkness of ignorance. Srila Sarvabhauma Bhattacarya was a preacher of liberation, but by the grace of Sriman Mahaprabhu he attained the relish of bhajana and said:

krishnera vigraha yei satya nahi mane; yei ninda yuddhadika kore tara sane
sei duiyer danda hoy – brahma sayujya mukti; tara mukti phala nohe – yei kore bhakti
………………………

mukti sabda kohite mone hoy ghrina trasa; bhakti sabda kohite mone hoyto ullasa
– (C.C.)

“Those who do not believe in the reality of Krishna’s form and who either blaspheme Him or combat Him will be punished with brahma sayujya mukti. But those who practice bhakti will not attain such liberation.

…………

When saying the word ‘liberation’ the mind feels disgust and fear, but when it says the word ‘devotion’ it rejoices!”

Sri Gurudeva has destroyed all the conditioned souls’ eye-diseases in the form of blindness caused by ignorance with the ointment-pencil of knowledge, and thus opened their eyes. On the ointment-pencil of divine knowledge Sri Visvanatha Cakravartipada has written the following comment: kaya unmilitam jnananjana salakaya — isvarah paramah krishnah sac cidananda vigrahah anadir adir govindah sarva karana karanam ityanena. ‘krishnas tu bhagavan svayam ityanena’ ca krishna bhagavatta jnanam evanjana salaka taya. ‘krishne bhagavatta jnana samvidera sara’ iti sri caitanya caritamritokteh— Here the word jnana means the knowledge that Sri Krishna is the Original Personality of Godhead. This is as an ointment pencil to destroy the eye-disease of ignorance. In the opening of the Brahma Samhita it is seen — ‘The Supreme Master Sri Krishna is the transcendental form of Sri Govinda. He is beginningless, is Himself the beginning of everything and He is the cause of all causes.”
This means that Sri Krishna is the original Personality of Godhead. In Srimad Bhagavata it is written — ete camsa kalah pumsah krishnas tu bhagavan svayam “Of the different forms of Godhead some are particles and others expansions, but Sri Krishna is the Original Personality of Godhead”. svayam bhagavan are the Bhagavata’s own words. This word has never been used in any other scripture nor for any other form of Godhead but Sri Krishna. With the help of that verse the greatly realised acaryas have considered the truth of Sri Krishna. In their opinion this is the root paribhasha or technical term of Srimad Bhagavata. aniyame niyama karini paribhasha — That sentence which enshrines a subject matter which was described in an irregular way into some kind of rule is called paribhasha, that which is read only once in the scriptures and through which millions upon millions of other sentences are regulated. The verse krishnas tu bhagavan svayam is found only once in the entire Bhagavata. This maha-vakya (great sentence or slogan) is like a great king who proudly and independently flies his banner of victory over the heads of all scriptural sayings. This knowledge of Sri Krishna being the Original Personality of Godhead is like an ointment pencil that cures the conditioned souls’ eye-disease of ignorance. Srila Kaviraja Gosvami has also written: krishne bhagavatta jnana – samvitera sara; brahma jnanadi sab tara paribara (C.C.)
– “The essence of knowledge is the knowledge that Krishna is the greatest Godhead. All other branches of knowledge, such as brahma jnana, are simply related to this.”

Sri Krishna is the Original Personality of Godhead, the all-worshipable principle — as soon as this knowledge awakens and the sambandha (relational-) awareness of ‘He is my eternal Lord and I am His eternal servant’ awakens, then the abhidheya (means)-awareness of ‘devotional service or bhajana is my only duty’ will awaken and the prayojana (goal)- awareness of ‘Love for His lotus feet is my only desire, for service cannot yield any happiness without love’ will also awaken. Srila Thakura Mahasaya is saying:
– “To that Sri Gurudeva, who destroyed my eye-disease of ignorance with the ointment-pencil of divine knowledge, and opened my eyes to divine knowledge that distinguishes between knowledge of relationship (sambandha), means (abhidheya) and goal (prayojana) — to that Sri Gurudeva I offer my humble obeisances.”

– Translated by my friend Sripad Advaita das