PUTANA

[Guest guest]

THE HARMONIST Vol. XXIX No 7

 

Shree Krsna manifests His eternal birth in the pure cognitive essence of the

serving soul who is located above all mundane limitations. A demon like King

Kamsa is the typical aggressive empiricist, ever on the lookout for the

appearance of the truth for the purpose of suppressing Him before He has

time to develop. This is no exaggeration of the real connotation of the

consistent empiric position. The materialist has a natural repugnance for

the transcendental. He is disposed to think that faith in the

incomprehensible is the parent of dogmatism and hypocrisy in the guise of

religion. He is also equally under the delusion that there is no really

dividing line between the material and the spiritual. He is strengthened in

his delusion by the interpretation of scriptures by persons who are

like-minded with himself. This includes all the lexicographic

interpreters.The lexicographical interpretation is upheld by Kamsa as the

real scientific explanation of the scriptures, and is perfectly in keeping

with his dread of and aversion for the transcendental. These lexicographical

interpreters are employed by such demons in putting down the first suspected

appearance of any genuine faith in the transcendental.

King Kamsa knows very well that if the faith in the transcendental

is once allowed to grow it is sure to upset all his empiric prospects. There

is historical ground for such misgivings. Accordingly if the empiric

domination is to be preserved intact it would be necessary not to lose a

moment to put down the transcendental heresy the instant it threatens to

make its appearance in earnest. King Kamsa, acting on this traditional fear

is never slow to take the scientific precaution of deputing empiric teachers

of the scriptures, backed by the resources of dictionary and grammar and all

empiric subtleties to put down, by the show of specious arguments based on

hypothetical principles, the true interpretation of the eternal religion

revealed by the scriptures. A demon is strongly persuaded that faith in the

transcendental can be effectively put down by empiricism if prompt and

decisive measures are adopted at the very outset. He attributes the failure

of atheism in the past to the neglect of the adoption of such measures

before the theistic fallacy has had time to spread among the fanatical

masses.

But Kamsa is found to count without his host. When Krsna is born He

is found to be able to upset all sinister designs against those who are

apprised by Himself of His Advent. The apparently causeless faith displayed

by persons irrespective of age, sex, and condition may confound all rabid

empiricists who are on principle averse to the Absolute Truth Whose

appearance is utterly incompatible with the domination of empiricism. But no

adverse efforts of the empiricists, whose rule seems till then to be

perfectly well-established over the minds of the deluded souls of this world

can dissuade any person from exclusively following the Truth when He

actually manifests His birth in the pure cognitive essence of the soul.

Putana is the slayer of all infants. The baby, when he or she comes

out of the mother's womb, falls at once into the clutches of the pseudo

teachers of religion. These teachers are successful in forestalling the

attempts of the good preceptor whose help is never sought by the atheists of

this world at the baptisms of their children. This is ensured by the

arrangements of all the established churches of the world. They have been

successful only in supplying watchful Putanas for effecting the spiritual

destruction of persons from the moment of their birth with the cooperation

of their worldly parents. No human contrivance can prevent these Putanas

from obtaining possession of the pulpits. This is due to the general

prevalence of atheistic disposition in the people of this world. The church

that has the best chance of survival in this damned world is that of atheism

under the convenient guise of theism. The churches have always proved the

staunchest upholders of the grossest forms of worldliness from which even

the worst of non-ecclesiastical criminals are found to recoil.

It is not from any deliberate opposition to the ordained clergy that

these observations are made. The original purpose of the established

churches of the world may not be always objectionable. But no stable

religious arrangment for instructing the masses has yet been successful. The

supreme Lord Shree Krishna Chaitanya in pursuance of the teaching of the

scriptures enjoins all absence of conventionalism for the teachers of the

eternal reigion. It does not follow that the mechanical adoption of the

unconventional life by any person will make him a fit teacher of religion.

Regulation is neccessary for controlling the inherent worldliness of

conditioned souls. But no mechanical regulation has any value even for such

a purpose. The bonafide teacher of the religion is neither any product nor

the favourer of any mechanical system. In his hands no system has likewise

the chance of degenerating into a lifeless arrangement. The mere pursuit of

fixed doctrines and fixed liturgies cannot hold a person to the true spirit

of doctrine or liturgy.

The idea of an organised church in an intelligible form, indeed,

marks the close of the living spiritual movement. The great ecclesiastical

establishments are the dykes and the dams to retain the current that cannot

be held by any such contrivances. They, indeed, indicate a desire on the

part of the masses to exploit a spiritual movement for their own purpose.

They also unmistakably indicate the end of the absolute and unconventional

guidance of the bonafide spiritual teacher. The people of this world

understand preventive systems, they can have no idea of the unprevented

positive eternal life. Neither can there be any earthly contrivance for the

permanent preservation of the life eternal on this mundane plane on the

popular scale.

Those are, therefore, greatly mistaken who are disposed to look

forward to the amelioration of the worldly state in any worldly sense from

the worldly success of any really spiritual movement. It is these worldly

expectants who become the patrons of the mischievous race of the

pseudo-teachers of religion, the Putanas, whose congenial function is to

stifle the theistic disposition at the very moment of its suspected

appearance. But the real theistic disposition can never be stifled even by

the efforts of those Putanas. The Putanas have power only over the atheists.

It is a thankless but salutary task which they perform for the benefit of

their willing victims.

But as soon as the theistic disposition proper makes its appearance

in the pure coginitive essence of the awakened soul the Putanas are

decisively silenced at the very earliest stage of their encounter with new

born Krishna. The would be slayer is herself slain. This is the reward of

the negative services that the Putanas unwittingly render to the cause of

theism by strangling all hypocritical demonstrations against their own

hypocrisy. But Putana does not at all like to receive her reward in the only

form which involves the total destruction of her wrong personality. King

Kamsa also does not like to lose the services of the most trusted of his

agents. The effective silencing of the whole race of the pseudo teachers of

religion is the very first clear indication of the Appearance of the

Absolute on the mundane plane. The bonafide teacher of the Absolute heralds

the advent of Krishna by his uncompromising campaign against the pseudo

teachers of religion.