The avatar of Kali Yuga is Sri Gauranga Mahaprabhu. His associate, param
pujapada Sri Prabodhananda Sarasvaticaran, writes in his book Sri Radha
Rasa Sudhanidhi, verse 149:

“Hari! Hari! I have unlimitedly strong hopes to see the intimate pastimes of
Radha and Madhupati, which are not known even by demigods like Lord Brahma, by
the devotees of Lord Hari or by Govinda’s friends, as a maidservant!”

Here Goswamipada describes his desire to have darshan of Radha Madhava.
Great demigods like Brahma and Shiva, and also devotees like Prahlada,
Akrura, Uddhava, Narada, and others – even the friends of Krishna in Vraja –
to them these secret lilas are unknown. These lilas are not known to
devotees in vatsalya and sakha bhava. “But I became kinkari of Radharani.
At every moment I desire to see this, full of rasa loving pastimes. This is my
cherished desire – to see these lilas. I am kinkari of Radharani and this is my
desire.” Sripad Goswamicaran is in this verse saying “Oh Radha Madhupati!”
He brings this name ‘Madhu’, like honey – an ananda and sweetness. He is
Bhagavan. We desribed this yesterday with the words of maha janas, who
taste the sweetness of Krishna Madhupati. When they acheive spurti of this
Krishna Madhupati, for example Bilvamangala Thakur, they describe His
sweet svarup – Krishna’s sweetness, His ananda, and His beauty. Lilasuka
describes that His sweetness is a great ocean in ‘Krishna Vallabha gutika’.
Goswamipada is writing, “Who tastes a drop of this sweetness experiences
the highest ananda.” The brahmajnanis meditate on Brahman. They may
say, “Sripad, brahmananda is also sweet as an ocean of ananda.” But here it
is not Brahman which is described, but the form of Bhagavan.
He is personified adolesence and beauty. His clothes, His decorations, and His look
– it’s all amazing! His face is intoxicating all living beings, and even more this Jagad Mohan.
He charms the whole universe. Then the brahmanandi may
say, “He is the ocean of ananda!”
Lilasukha describes that this sweetness is filling all the space. Even the ocean is not a good word to descibe it. A
stream of sweetness is filling everyone with ananda. When devotes have
darshan of Krishna, they have so many emotions. Lilasukha describes his
experience. He is saying, “There are so many forms of Bhagavan, but
Krishna is the most sweet of Them.” His smile, His sweet flute playing. He is
the main hero of Vraja and nobody can be compared to Him.
He is saying that Krishna’s desire is very rare. Radha is in a special position.
Even when Madhumati Sarva Jnana and Sarva Shaktiman – the all-knowing
and all-powerful, has darshan of Radharani, He loses all the knowledge and
He forgets all His power – when He is near Radharani.
In Madhyana lila, Radharani and the sakhis are eager to meet Krishna. They
come to the bank of Radhakunda and Krishna sees them from far, shining
with golden decorations and illuminating everything around. Radharani is
shining more bright than the sun. The sun of the Creator is very bright, but
Radharani is shining with the light of millions of suns, so it is difficult to look.
But this light doesn’t hurt the eyes. It is the light of sweetness. Krishna
Himself is burnt by this light. Krishna sees this light from Radharani and He is
saying, “Who is this Goddess? Is this the deity of light?” He cannot
understand who this is at that moment. Even though He has all knowledge,
He still cannot understand who She is. He thinks, “Who is this Goddess? Is it
young Laksmi?” He is thinking like this. Then He thinks, “No, no. Who has
this type of madhurya? Laksmi doesn’t have this madhurya. So who are you,
Goddess of all sweetness? Sweetness personified, condensed sweetness has
appeared in front of Me – this great sweetness.” Krishna’s eyes cannot see.
Her mahabhava is blinding Him, not the light. His flute is falling from His
hands and He is sinking in the ocean of this sweetness. This nectar is much
brighter than any immortal nectar. He looks at Radharani and He is
wondering. He is in full senses. His mind is sharp, but He cannot understand
who She is. This is personified amrta. The principle is that Radharani is
always looking new. Anuraga means always different experience – always
different and new experience. Every moment is anuraga. The nature of
anuraga is that the experience is different every time. When Krishna sees
Radharani and She also sees Him – She is also very happy to look at
Krishna’s form – this nectar fills everything around with sweetness. So what is
He thinking? He thinks, “This is My beloved! This is My Sri Radha! But how do
I understand that this is Sri Radha? There is only one reason why I
understand that this is Sri Radha. I become fully happy. I am fully in ananda.
Only She can put Me in ananda. I can put all worlds in ananda Myself, but
who can put Me in ananda? Only She can, so it must be Her. It must be
Radha. Only Radha can make My mind happy, nobody else can. No one else
can influence Me in this way.” Krishna is experiencing and saying this. No
one but She is capable to put Krishna in this state of mind. Why is
Madhumati so sweet? Because Radha is near Him. She gives the birth to
Madhupati. She gives these feelings and so they appear in Him.
Only the kinkari of Radharani can bring and see this sweetness. The sakhi
manjaris drink Their joint sweetness. That is their special postion. They can
enjoy the joint beauty. That is the sweetness of their seva. The sakhis cannot
get this seva. It is special mercy of Mahaprabhu. Mahaprabhu Himself
experiences how He serves as a kinkari. Mahaprabhu Himself was entering
into the mood of the manjaris. The prema of the kinkaris is so pure. It is
incomparable. This gold is so pure. There is not any mix of anything else in it.
It is such pure prema! When Radha and Krishna are tired, They wait when
the manjaris will come. The kinkaris are getting the sign from the sakhis and
the kinkaris are entering into the kunja.
By the mercy of Mahaprabhu, Sripad got the emotions of the kinkaris and he
is sharing with us. In these three last verses, he is speaking in external
consciousnes of a sadhaka. He is glorifying the sweetness of Radha
Madhava. He is sharing this sweetness with us. He is seeing the spurti of
the lila. After this verse he sees this spurti. In his heart appears humbleness.
We can understand which power he has by the words of this verse. When he
is saying that this is his dearest desire, it means that right now there is no
darshan and he is very humble. It is like this when a premika has this desire.
There is this humbleness of the sadhaka and of the premika. Mahabhava also
has humbleness – different kinds of humbleness. Goswami describes this.
The stronger the prema, the stronger the humbleness.
A sadhaka who has no rati is doing his sadhana in humbleness, but
sometimes he has to create this. On the level of rati the real humbleness is
coming, which is natural. Humbleness is the protection of our bhajan. If there
is no humbleness, then pride is coming – and that kills the life of bhajan. He
who is proud cannot have bhakti. He is in samsara. The identification with
the body is coming from so many lifetimes. Sanatana Goswami is saying that
we should do our bhajan without pride. Even somebody who has left
everything may still have pratistha. It is very difficult to renounce pratistha.
Because of sadhana we may get pratistha. “I am jnani, I am pandit, my
bhajan is so strong, my behavior is perfect.” This is different aspects and types of pride.
It all destroys the sadhana and the bhakti. Even fully
renounced people who have conquered other anarthas, pride and pratistha
may stay with them. So even if you left everything, it doesn’t mean that you
left pratistha. Out of all the anarthas, the most dangerous one is this
pratistha. It is a very subtle anartha. It is very difficult to see this anartha
and very difficult to remove it. There are different types of thieves. Pratistha
steals all the bhakti. It is the biggest thief, so we must be very careful. It is
the most dangerous enemy for a life of sadhana. Das Goswamipada is
saying, “This is poison.”
The Goswamis suffer so much. They are saying, “Oh, I have pratistha, I have
greed.” This is humbleness. It is not the humbleness of the sadhaka, but it is
a much deeper. Mahaprabhu gave the right instruction, “trinad api sunicena”
to kill this big enemy of the sadhaka. He gave this “trinadi api sunicena”
verse. Be humbler than a blade of grass. Do not excpect respect, but offer
respect to everyone. Do not be jealous of vaishnavas. Do not wait for
anything like fame. Be like the tree, which gives fruits and shadow, and even
if somebody cuts the tree it tolerates. Or like the grass – if somebody sits or
walk on it, or even cut it, it is still growing. If we will have this mood of
“trinad api sunicena”, then this pratistha anartha will not touch us.
Mahaprabhu is saying, “Listen all to this very important instruction!” Krishna
das Kaviraja is telling us, “Please be careful!” In our sadhana we should
increase this “trinad api sunicena”. We should increase this mood and get rid
of that pratistha.
We also need association with sadhus – devotees, who will help us clear our
hearts from anarthas. When we will do sadhana, we will go into the rati stage
and then there will be natural humbleness – a very deep humbleness. There
is also hope. Sripad is hoping to have darshan of Bhagavan. When the bhava
becomes ripe – when prema is coming, this humbleness becomes even
stronger and more deep. Then this prema will reach sneha, man, pranaya, up
to mahabhava. When a devotee will be near Krishna, then the humbleness
will be even more strong.
The humbleness of the sadhaka is different. He has to develop this.
But one who has rati, there is natural humbleness. All sastras are
saying, ”The fruit of sadhana is prema.” Somebody may say,
“Humbleness is the fruit of sadhana.” To this the acaryas are saying
in return, “Prema is non-different from humbleness. The stronger
the prema, the stronger the humbleness.“ Prema and humbleness
go together. They are inter-connected.
When the humbleness comes from prema, it is very powerful and very sincere. Who has the
highest humbleness? It is the gopis – when they are in separation
from Krishna. They have the strongest prema, so they are the most
humble. Mahabhava is the highest point of prema – and that’s why
the humbleness is the highest.
In Gopal Campu it is described that in a forest fire everything is burning
around. Uddhava sees that everything is on fire when he comes to Vraja. The
gopis are on the edge of life and death. Even the birds in that fire are looking
for salvation. Everything becomes dry. When there is no water, the fish are
dying and the trees are dying. The separation Uddhava has seen in the gopis
is so strong. The new lotus is coming from water, but if the sun is rising and
the water is dried up, then the lotus is dying. It is the same with this
separation. It is so strong in the Vraja gopis. This separation gives so much
pain, so much suffering. It looks like suffering, but it is actually mahabhava.
It is happiness, a type of happiness, but it is suffering. It is ananda of
separation – and this ananda of separation is higher than ananda of meeting.
Externally it looks like they are suffering and crying. Where is their ananda?
Externally they suffer, but internally they meet Krishna. Inside they are
meeting with Him, but externally they are crying and suffering. They see
spurti in their hearts and ananda is filling their hearts. In this verse it is
saying that there is enjoyment of ananda in Vaikuntha, and the citizens of
Vraja are also enjoying ananda. But the enjoyment of the gopis and their
ananda is very difficult to understand. Only those who know this kind of
separation can know this ananda – the experience when the nectar and the
poison is mixed together. Here it looks like the brahmananda is insignificant.
This viraha rasa is so strong. That is why Mahaprabhu is saying that gopi
prema is the goal of all goals.
Prabodhananda Saraswati did not get darshan and he is suffering so much. “I
am so unfortunate“, he is saying. He is full of humbleness. He is saying, “I
am not worthy and I am fallen, but my hope is all I have.” Rupa and
Sanatana are also saying the same thing. They suffer so much because of
this hope. Goswamipada say, “I don’t have prema. I don’t have bhakti. I
don’t serve vaishnavas. I didn’t do anything good. But this hope is in me. Oh
gopis, when will I see you? I don’t deserve to get my desire fulfilled. To see
you I need prema, but I don’t have that bhakti. I don’t have kirtana bhakti or
sravana bhakti. I don’t deserve this and I don’t have any power to achieve
it.” Why is Goswamipada saying like this? It is vaishnava jnana. Further he is
saying, “I don’t have jnana and I don’t have samskaras.” What does he mean
by that? He means sravana, kirtana, smarana. He is saying,
“I don’t have any qualification.” A poor man can dream about wealth. This hope is the
same thing. “I have desire, but it brings me sorrow. I don’t have any
qualification. No prema, no sadhana, no good qualities, no intelligence. I
don’t have anything. But still I have this hope.” The principle is that the one
who is the most high, think about himself as the most fallen. The higher
devotee, the more humble. The more eagerness and cherished desire he
has, the more humbleness he has. Prabodhananda Sarasvati is saying, “Oh
Hari Hari, please fulfill my desire!” The premika has such strong desire.
Goswamipada is praying in this verse. In the next verse we will discuss about
spurti, by the mercy of Radharani.

– Compiled by Jagannatha das

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