Terminological Exactitude, The Renaissance and the Golden Chandelier

[Guest guest]

Namaste to all Advaitins,

 

 

TERMINOLOGICAL EXACTITUDE

 

Yesterday, Sri Sankarrmanji said that the Samkhya philosophers were

perhaps not concerned with Terminological Exactitude. But of course

they were. So were the Vedanta philosophers. As Advaitins, we like

the analogy of 'the Screen on which a movie is playing' so much that

we often forget there is a Projector. We forget that the Screen is

also the Projector. The Projector projects and he who is caught in

the thrall of avidya is bewitched by the Projection.

 

Sri Ramana Maharshi had a reason to tell people not to follow the

path of tattva-jnana. The path of 'Who am I' is a derivative of the

Vedic path brought to us by the Compassionate Sage of Arunachala as a

remedial solution for this Dark Age. Within the praxis of Vedic

structure, in which Adi Shankara wrote his bhashyas, the sadhaka

comes to Vedanta with a prior study of Nyaya and Grammar. Nyaya is

tattva-jnana. Tattva-jnana is not trash, but is something that has to

come on the path of Self-realisation. It comes as 'more and more' of

the Self is seen. The Self may be undifferentiated, but paradoxically

there is a great deal of the Self to be seen! The Self cannot be

realised without tattva-jnana because they are not two things. How

can one realise the Self and not know the things that are there in

the Self?

 

The tattvas are the plants and flowers in the Garden of the Muse in

which the Creator ecstatically dances to the tune of His own Love

Affair. Tattva-jnana is the knowledge of the Garden in which the Lord

Dances. It is the knowledge of His own inscrutable form which is

there even in His Nirguna Nature. Advaita is the embracing of the

paradox in the total bliss of Union in which even a single leaf in

the Garden does not stir.

 

 

THE RENAISSANCE

 

There is a place in Bengal that goes by the name of Nadia. Nadia was

once home to the greatest philosophers that lived on earth. It was

here that Gangesa Upadhyaya lived, and it was here that he wrote the

Tattvachintamani, a book that stands as a monument to the intellect

of man. The Tattvachintamani was the seed that sprouted to grow into

the tree of the Great Renaissance of India, a Renaissance that

spanned an arc of two hundred years; a Renaissance that was far

greater than the pathetically mundane Renaissance of Europe. The

Renaissance of India was a Celebration of the intellect of man!

 

But the historians do not know of it.

 

How did this period of such intense intellectual brilliance come to

an end?

 

About two hundred years after Gangesa, there lived another great

Nyaya philosopher, and his name was Raghunatha Shiromani. He was

perhaps the greatest logician after Gangesa, and certainly the most

radical of them all. Today Raghunatha Shiromani is known for his

book, the Deedhiti, which is an exposition of the Tattvachintamani.

It was during the time of Raghunatha Shiromani that there came to

Nadia a boy named Nimai. Nimai became a teacher of Nyaya, and within

a short time he achieved such formidable reputation that there were

few that dared to challenge him in debate. One day, Nimai and

Raghunatha Shiromani were crossing the Ganga and they found

themselves on the same boat. They had both written treatises on

Nyaya. Raghunatha Shiromani was a proud man, and quite naturally, he

was proud of his treatise. When he discovered that Nimai had also

written a treatise on Nyaya, he asked for it to be read out, and

Nimai obliged the great Raghunatha by reading his treatise to him. By

the time Nimai had finished the recitation, Raghunatha's face had

fallen and he looked quite despondent. He had realised that his

treatise would be eclipsed by the logical knife of Nimai's arguments.

When Nimai learnt the cause of Raghunatha's despondency, it is said

that he tossed his own treatise into the waters of the Ganga so that

Raghunatha may not be sorrowful of heart. The world thus lost a great

classic on Nyaya.

 

The boy Nimai went on to become Sri Krishna Chaitanya. It is natural

that he should have tossed his Nyaya treatise into the Ganga. What

use is a Nyaya treatise to a man whose all is Krishna, who lives for

Krishna, who breathes for Krishna, who is Krishna Himself come to

earth as Radha.

 

Tears made a river

and the moon-faced girl bathes in it.

O Hari, she always counts your name

like the beads of a rosary.

Kanhai, she adores you at Vrindavan

with a deep desire

in her heart.

Her life is the fuel,

her remembrance is the fire,

and she sacrifices her life

only for you.

 

 

THE GOLDEN CHANDELIER

 

Sri Krishna Chaitanya is the Golden Chandelier. He is Krishna and he

is Radha. He is the Love between them. Our dear Srinivas Kotekal once

said that Radha is a fiction. He said that She is a fiction because

She is not mentioned in the Bhagavata Purana. But that is no fault of

the Bhagavata Purana; the Purana is always speaking about Her. Radha

is so completely Krishna that She is spoken about whenever Krishna is

spoken about. Radha is the distilled form of the pure Love of

Krishna. She is the adornment of His Love. She is the Sweetness of

His Love. She is Krishna Herself and therefore Krishna is

Radhakrishna. That Radha and Krishna are separate is Unthinkable. The

play of that Unthinkable is Radha and Krishna.

 

Her locks of dark hair,

face beautiful as the moon –

and eyes like lotus blooms.

Who could believe

the darkness, full moon and the lotus living as one?

 

How does the Unthinkable play happen? It happens somehow. So its

story must be told. Therefore, Sri Krishna Chaitanya revolted against

the Advaita of Shankara. He adopted the Dvaita of Madhva, and then he

broke away even from Dvaita and founded the Unthinkable philosophy of

the Golden Chandelier. It is called the Vedanta of achintya-bheda-

abheda. Achintya means the Unthinkable. We say we want Oneness, and

in our hearts we want Otherness. We want Otherness so that we may

enjoy the Union of Oneness. This is the paradox at the Heart of

Reality.

 

Words of protest filled with passion,

Gestures of resistance lacking force,

Frowns transmuted into smiles,

Crying dry of tears - friend,

Though Radha seeks to hide her feelings,

Each attempt betrays her heart's

Deep love for Mura's slayer.

 

The word 'dhara' means thread. A thread unwinds and goes outward.

When the letters of 'dhara' are reversed it becomes 'radha'. Radha is

the thread going back to its source. Whoever looks at the Golden

Chandelier becomes its bond slave for ever.

 

You met me in Gokul

Where the lovely cows have their home

Where peacocks dance in gay abandon

And flirt to the notes of your flute

You smiled and came to live in my eyes

And I became your bond-slave for ever and ever

My Kahna, oh Kahna mine

 

Vrindavan is the land of flowers

Where the Yamuna flows in swift delight

There I waited for you with sleepless eyes

Till you came to keep your promise

You smiled and came to live in my eyes

And I became your bond-slave for ever and ever

My Kahna, oh Kahna mine.

 

 

So, what has the Love of Radha and Krishna to do with philosophy?

 

The Golden Chandelier is the Philosophy of the Mystery that appears

in the connotation of words. We must not be blind to the Golden

Chandelier. It is after all the Golden Wine that we all long for, and

we must look it straight in the eye just like a lover looks into the

eye of her beloved.

 

They took their cows to graze

And when their eyes met

They could no longer stay

Their love that gushed like a spring in their hearts;

They clung together; who could part

Those lovers? Krishna drove his cows away.

The cowherds laughed and said

'Krishna where have your cows gone?'

But he and Radha went on gazing

At each other, lost to all else.

 

 

Let us now look into Eye of Mystery. It is made of the Mystery of

difference. This difference is not the difference between a rose and

a lotus. A rose is forever a rose and a lotus is forever a lotus. The

Mystery is the difference between a rose and a rose and a rose and a

rose. That is why Advaita says there is no difference – because they

are all the same rose. What are these four roses? The first is the

rose that is eternally in Lord Krishna. The second is the unseen rose

in the world of deep sleep. The third is the rose seen in the world

of dreams. The fourth is the rose seen in the world of wakefulness.

They are all nothing but rose. Dvaita says that the rose in Lord

Krishna is Krishna Himself. So does Advaita. Dvaita says that the

other three roses are different than Lord Krishna. Advaita says that

the other three are also Lord Krishna. To see this sameness, Vishva

must merge into Taijasa, and Taijasa must merge into Prajna, and

Prajna must merge into Turiya.

 

Sri Krishna Chaitanya said that all four are roses, but there is an

unthinkable difference between them.

 

Sri Radha is Sri Krishna. There is no difference between them except

an Unthinkable difference.

 

 

Of all the Advaita philosophers that came after Shankara,

Madhusudhana Saraswati was perhaps the greatest of them all. There

has been no one else of his stature since then, for he was a giant

among philosophers, and it was he alone among the post-Shankara

Advaita philosophers that carried the Sword of the Order to cut

across the Darkness of Disorder until there prevailed total Silence.

His Sword demonstrated the sameness of the pratibimba and the bimba

and then there was nothing else left except the Great Oneness. And

the heart of Madhusudhana Saraswati revolted against the dryness of

philosophy that it should leave no room for the Golden Chandelier in

the Great Oneness. His heart ached for the Golden Chandelier, and the

aching of his heart was the separation asking for the Oneness that he

himself revolted against. It was all a paradox. And Madhusudhana's

heart was full of unrest and he wandered far and wide in search of

the Golden Chandelier.

 

O my confidante, who says that Madhava will come?

I do not trust

I'll come across the ocean of separation.

I passed the day thinking it a moment,

and a month passed counting the days,

now I've lost all my hope

counting months into a year.

If moonbeams burn a lotus

what will the month of May do?

If the sunrays burn the young plant,

what will the raining cloud do?

Tell me, what will my lover do

If I passed my youth in separation?

 

Madhusudhana Saraswati wandered far and wide until finally he found

the Golden Chandelier of the Love of Radha and Krishna. Then his

heart was full.

 

Warm regards,

Chittaranjan

 

 

 

Acknowledgements and notes:

 

1. The poems cited are by Vidyapati and Surdas. The poem about 'bond-

slave' is by Munshi with a few words changed to suit the cadence in

my mind.

 

2. The idea that Radha is so completely Krishna that She is spoken

about whenever Krishna is spoken about is due to Osho.

 

3. Sri Madhusudhana Saraswati is the founder of the Naga sect of

Advaita. Totapuri, the Guru of Sr Ramakrishna Paramahamsa, belonged

to this sect. The members of the Naga sect also learn the martial

arts, which was introduced during a time when the Muslims were

persecuting the Hindu sanyasins.

 

4. In my opinion, after Madhusudhana Saraswati, Advaita has had no

philosopher of his stature. Dvaita has had two, namely Sri

Jayathirtha and Sri Vyasathirtha.