Krishna and Romance

[vinc]

 

The Mahabharata is the original or the earliest source of Krishna. All the later works refer to the Mahabharata.

 

The Bhagavad Gita says,

 

I have no actions to perform, yet I perform all my duties.

For whatever a great man does, others also follow.

 

These are the words of a responsible and thoughtful person who had immense foresight. Such a person would not go romancing with girls and marry thousands of girls as exagerrated. It is doubtful if he had more than one wife (Rukmini). He was a very serious person who saw war as a last resort. He was always for peace.

 

The Mahabharata does not contain anything on Krishna's romance. Neither does Vishnu Purana which is perhaps the oldest and Purana. They both show Krishna as a very dignified and serious person.

 

All the other Puranas which came later introduced the romantic angle to Krishna as that was the one thing missing. Romantic movies carry a special charm. Knowing this the authors really went to work and came up with pages and pages of Krishna's exploits with the Gopikas. Gross exaggeration is what it is.

 

In those days children at the age of 7 were sent to Gurukuls for education. That would mean that Krishna romanced with the Gopikas when he was seven years old or younger !

 

Poor Krishna would be turning in his grave to read all this nonsense attributed to him.

 

Now we have several Krishna cults which focus entirely on Krishna's romantic aspects. Take away all this nonsense and their cults would go tumbling down. But who wants that ?

 

Who cares if it is true or fiction ?

 

It is frutrating to see how people stick on to these ideas knowing that it is all nonsense.

 

 

[shvu]

Hi,

 

I see what you mean.

 

The Mahabharata was not focussed on Krishna. It was more on the Kuru clans and Krishna's assistance to them. So one cannot go only by that. But the verse from the Gita does contradict Krishna's romance as described in later books.

 

Since the Puranas did not appear until much later, they must have relied on the Mahabharata for any information on Krishna. That would mean that any extra information was added by the Author and is fiction.

 

Anyway by now, I think it is known to most people that Radha and most of the romance of Krishna is all fiction. They came much later.

 

More than frustrating, it is amazing that people paid so much of importance to Radha, even after knowing that there is no mention of her in the Mahabharata, Vishnu Purana, Hari Vamsha and the Bhagavatam.

 

That is amazing.

 

Cheers

 

[animesh]

I am not sure if this is all real or fiction. But the comment by vinc indicates that he considers the stories which talk about Krishna having many wives as degrading him. But I don't think that the authors who wrote these stories were, in any way, trying to degrade Krishna. Rather than just knowing that these many authors have written about Krishna having many wives, we should also see the reason they have given for this. Based on reason, having many wives may be right or wrong. As I have read, Krishna married many ladies who were captives of Narakasur. These ladies had no-one else to turn to. So, Krishna did not do anything wrong even if he married them.

[Bhakta Shakta]

"In those days children at the age of 7 were sent to Gurukuls for education. That would mean that Krishna romanced with the Gopikas when he was seven years old or younger !"

 

Krishna's pastimes are trascendental or amaterial. They are beyond time & space, and our finite conditioned minds. Krishna's pastimes make sense because they don't make sense. His lila's are an exchange of rasa between his eternal devotees. They will not make sense to people who lack faith & bhakti. It might make sense to you to rationalize his pastimes so you can accept them, but that is not the proper method of accepting knowledge in GV as far as I know.

 

"The more heroic the God, the more the attraction. So there is nothing wrong with it. If anything, it has managed to capture the hearts of millions of people. Which is a good thing."

 

Truth is beauty.

 

"More than frustrating, it is amazing that people paid so much of importance to Radha, even after knowing that there is no mention of her in the Mahabharata, Vishnu Purana, Hari Vamsha and the Bhagavatam."

 

And that is why Mahaprabhu descended. To give us Radha-Krishna seva. Many of his theosophical concepts were unknown before he descended. That does not diminish them. He descended to freely distribute the treasure house of Krsna-prema. His philosophical-synthesis of the thesis and anti-thesis resulted in knowledge never known to man before. What's wrong with that?

[rajesh]

HARE KRISHNA to all of u,

it seems that u all have got a lot of time to waste.

i just want u all to know that KRISHNA is beyond all your imaginations, HE is beyond everything what your dirty minds can think, so please STOP ALL THIS NONSENSE and try to take out the butter by the full process not by just moving your fingers in the milk and coming to the conclusion that there is no butter in this milk. Butter will always be there whether by your nonsensical discussions you come to any other conclusions.

DON'T MIND BUT THAT IS THE TRUTH.

HARE KRISHNA,

 

A FALLEN SOUL,

RAJESH

[Dasha]

It is true that the all mouvement Hare Krsna of Srila Prabhupada is based on this relation between Radha and Krsna. Would it be just a big swindle ? I hardly beleive.

 

I like to have the opinion of J.N.Das (if he wants too, of course) on this subject matter, because it is a little bewildering to read these assertions.

 

Thank

[shvu]

 

Hi Dasha,

 

All the above assertions are true. Anyone can pick up any of the books mentioned above to verify that for themselves. Any book talking about Radha and Krishna's romance is no older than 700 ad. If they were around, they were a well kept secret, because they have no known references.

 

While all the abover mentioned books are older than 700 ad [except the Bhagvatam, which was from around that time]. Of course, the other Puranas were existing in some form, but they evolved to their final form, much later.

 

Also note that Radha is not worshipped among the other Vaishnavas. She was not Krishna's wife anyway. The Bhagavatam too talks only about Rukmini and equates her to Shri Laxmi, who is Vishnu's consort.

 

Romance does attract people, as we see in daily life

 

Cheers

[shvu]

 

To add.

 

It is not a swindle. Prabhupada is being faithful to his System. This concept came about 1000+ years back to attract more attention towards Krishna. So it was done with a good intention.

 

The more heroic the God, the more the attraction. So there is nothing wrong with it. If anything, it has managed to capture the hearts of millions of people. Which is a good thing.

 

The only problem is that it is all fiction. But like vinc says above, Who cares ?

 

Let alone the romance and Radha, I personally don't know if Krishna himself was real or not !

 

Cheers

[viji_53]

It is really to sad to note that the scholors who understand Gita talk about Krishna's pure love as romance. For your kind information , the love that was present between Gopikas & Krishna( Radha was also one of the Gopikas) did not have lust. Our love between a boy friend & girl friend has lust in it . There is mention of Radha in Bhagavatam. As already mentioned the relationship between Radha & Krishna indicates the union of Jivatma & Paramatma. To show to the world that God is beyond lust He enacted Rasalila. Usually the romance with lust is carried out with in four walls. This Rasalila was carried out in an open ground & all the devas, kinnaras & gandarvas were watching. In Rasalila Krishna makes each Gopi to feel that He is present with her. Krishana wants His devotees to understand that He is free & can be attained easily by anybody whose love is pure devotion like Gopikas. It is really sad to to misinterpret Krishna's love with romance. May Krishna remove their ignorance!

HariBhol!

[sushil_kanoria]

pleae accept my humble obesainces & All glories to Srila Prabhupada !!!!

I have gone through the topic started by "vinc", First of all I would like to say Sukadeva Goswami(A very learned person) who narrated the whole Bhagavatam to King Parikshit, Suta Goswami & others, himself didn't uttered the name of RadhaRani, why ?? you know because he said he is not qualified to utter her name, then not to speak of us whose minds are contaminated by mundane things, A live e.g. using the world "romance" for Krishna's pure love toward his devotees.

And one more thing I would like to add is, all the 16000 wives of krishna were great sages in their past life, when they all saw Lord Rama in Trete yuga, they were so much fascinated by Rama's look that they said we would like to become his spouse, So in order to fulfill their wish, He excepted them his wife when he descended as Krishna in Dwapar yuga.

So my humble request is don't ever try to give any statement untill & unless you have done thorough study, & from your questions it appears as if you haven't gone through the literature. I am extremely sorry if I have hurt anyone which was not intentional.

 

Hari Bol,

Sushil

[gtam]

There are several bhavas for worshipping the Lord like the parental bhava,friendly bhava,love bhava,neutral bhava as in veneration etc.

Each individual have their own bhavas and the Lord resiprocates inthe the same fashion.The gopi's bhava is considered the highest for several reasons of which some are 1)they are already great saints who wanted to experience the Lord's pastimes in the feminine form,2)its mentioned inthe brahmasamhita the Lord also experiences the same pastimes in his eternal form with the gopis at GolokaVrindavana and I think the list goes on.

The material world is just a perverted reflection of the spiritual one.Its like the reflection of the mountain and the forest on the river which exactly like the same but second one is just a reflection.The bhavas experienced by the gopis seem very familiar to the one experienced by people on the material plane but definitely are different.

All the aspects of the spiritual world have its reflections here but definitely different due to the plane variation.We are in a position to understand the spiritual world more because of these aspects present in our world also.

 

In a way we all maybe are supposed to have this feminine aspect irrespective of the male and female aspect in us to develop this love towards the one Purusha also referred as the "Purushottama"

 

Thanks

 

[shvu]

 

Well Vince, That was a touchy topic to bring up on this forum. You sent quite a few people's Blood Pressure soaring.

 

Bhakta Shakta - Many of his (Chaitanya)theosophical concepts were unknown before he descended.

 

I am glad that people are aware that these concepts were not in existence prior to Chaitanya. Nice to know that at least some peope have their facts straight.

 

Bhakta Shakta - ... What's wrong with that?

 

Nothing. Like I said before, it is a good thing and I will even go as far as saying that it is a wonderful thing.

 

Rajesh - Krishna is beyond all your imaginations...

 

Yeah, Rajesh. You will spend hours imagining Krishna wearing a peacock feather and romancing with the Gopikas and call it transcendental. But if you hear anyone speak rationally about Krishna, then you will immediately switch to the 'beyond all imagination' and 'dirty minds' mode.

 

A matter of convenience. Hypocrisy would be a simple and apt word here.

 

Sushil - Suta Goswami & others, himself didn't uttered the name of RadhaRani, why ?? you know because he said he is not qualified to utter her name,

 

This is a brand new one, that I never heard before. Apparently Suta was qualified enough to utter the name of Krishna, but not that of Radha. I would be interested to know, who said this and in which book... if you don't mind ??

 

Dear Viji,

 

Krishna according to the books, did play around with his cowherd friends (Boys) as well. They used to be lost in his charms and wouldn't know how the day passed on.

 

But that was not highlighted at all. Only the Gopikas (Girls) activites were highlighted and blown to dizzying proportions.

 

Why ? I leave you to think that out for yourself.

 

Cheers

 

[vinc]

 

shvu,

 

I believe that Krishna lived as a real person. I don't know about Radha.

 

jayasriradhey,

 

such anger......are you from iskcon ? that would explain it.

 

-This DELUDED WORLD ( like those on this forum) KNOWS ME NOT,

-the Unborn,the Imperishable!!'

 

To my knowledge majority of the people here are devotees of krishna like you. Why are you calling all of them as deluded out of anger at me ?

 

Krishna when he said "delude world" did not mean this form. He meant the whole world of which you are a part too.

 

Krishna would have turned again in his grave at his devotee's anger. you remind me of vishwamitra who burnt all his tapas away because of his anger.

 

-'"FOOLS" DISREGARD ME as One clad in Human Form,

 

if you are from iskcon then I think you worship the picture of krishna and all his romantic activities. Are you willing to call yourself a fool like the Gita says ?

 

-If it is SO IMPOSSIBLE to KNOW Lord Krishna,

-WHAT to SPEAK of KNOWING HIS SOUL SRI RADHA!!!

 

krishna's soul is radha ? then who is radha's soul ? what nonsense....this is what is furstrating.

 

[shvu]

 

Hi Vince,

 

--------

 

Fools disregard me as one clad in Human Form... - The Gita

 

I think you worship the picture of krishna and all his romantic activities. Are you willing to call yourself a fool like the Gita says ?

 

----------

 

That is a terrific question !

 

But you know what? I think everyone will conveniently side-step this question. Because they have no answer to that. If anyone does come up with an answer that should be interesting.

 

Cheers

[animesh]

Really interesting:-)

 

Dear vinc,

I agree that the point raised by you is very interesting and worth pondering over. But why are you thinking that Jayasriradhey ji is angry. I read his comments again and again and I don't think he is angry with any of us. So far, the usage of words "deluded world" is concerned, I do not find anything wrong in using these words. Because these words are used for the complete material unverse.

[animesh]

Krishna has called the entire material universe as deluded. So, everybody is deluded by maya, including myself.

[animesh]

Dear Viji,

I agree that even though earlier puranas do not talk about Radha, there is always some possibility that she existed. But, I am sure, you will agree that many poets have exaggerated the details of rasa-lila between Krishna and Radha. I am not pointing out anything against Krishna or Radha. I am talking about the descriptions given in various books about the rasa-lila between Krishna and Gopikas.

A parallel, I find in the descriptions given about Lord Buddha. Many authors claim that apsaras used to dance before him when he was meditating and still they could not shake him. But this is just an imagination. Because, as I have read, Gautam Buddha himself never gave any importance to such kind of talks.

[viji_53]

Dear animesh,

Rada did exist during Krishna's time & Rada was one of His favourite Devotees. He gave His flute to her when He left to Mathura to kill Kamsa. He also sends Utava to Gopis to get the bhakthi bavana from Gopis. Uthava was a Jnani. He had the theoretical knowledge that Krishna is omnipresent. Gopis had the practical knowledge that Krishna is Omnipresent. When you learn yourself, you always have that ego of I learnt. That was present with Utava. So to remove it & to make him realise how Gopis practically experience His Omnipresence He sends Utava to Gokul to meet Gopis. Before Utava leaves he asks Krishna how can those uneducated , villge girls understand that God is Omnipresent. Krishna asks him to see himself at Gokul. When he meets Gopalas, 1/4 of his ego goes off, after meeting & learning the experience of Yasoda & Nanda 1/2 his ego vanishes. He then meets Radha, she asks him what can the uneducated village girls do for him? the same words which he used are repeated by Radha. Then he realizes that where ever Krishna is present there His devotee Radha is also present. His ego completely goes from him & he becomes humble devotee like Gopis. Nobody can deny the presence of Radha during Krishna's time. Again & again I want to insist that in my opinion Radha Krishna represents the union of jivatma with Paramatma.

HariBhol!

[rajesh]

HARE KRISHNA!

dear shvu,vinc etc.

AS U SAID THAT IMAGINING KRISHNA WITH A PEACOCK FEATHER AND WITH GOPIKAS IS ALL RIGHT BUT RATIONAL TALKING IS NOT...

 

MY REPLY FOR THAT IS...

AS SOMEONE-ELSE HAS ALSO MENTIONED WE ALL ARE DELUDED AND FOOLS THAT IS RIGHT AND NO ONE CAN DENY THIS BECAUSE THAT IS IN GITA.(HAVE U SEEN JESUS? PROBABLY NO... BUT U KNOW THAT HE WAS CRUSIFIED HE WAS BORN IN A COW-SHED etc. AND U BELIEVE ALL THAT BECAUSE IT IS THERE IN SOME BOOK.)

REGARDING KRISHNA WITH PEACOCK FEATHER &..

I JUST WANT YOU TO KNOW THAT THESE ARE NOT MERE IMAGINATIONS BUT MENTIONED IN SRIMAD- BHAGWATAM(A SPOTLESS SCRIPTURE),NOW DON'T SAY THAT, PERSON WHO WROTE ALL THE SCRIPTURES WAS A COMMON AND SIMPLE MAN.

WHAT U R IMAGINING WITH YOUR MIND IS ABSOLUTELY IN THE MODE OF IGNORANCE, AS I HAVE ALREADY SAID U HAVE TO TAKE THE BUTTER OUT, WITH THE PRESCRIBED PROCESS OTHERWISE U WILL KEEP MOVING UR FINGERS IN THE MILK BUT WILL NOT BE ABLE TO GET THE BUTTER.

DONT JUST STAND ON THE BANKS AND KEEP SPECULATING THE DEPTH OF THE RIVER.

HARE KRISHNA.

 

A FALLEN SOUL(A FOOL No. 1)

RAJESH

 

[animesh]

DONT JUST STAND ON THE BANKS AND KEEP SPECULATING THE DEPTH OF THE RIVER.

HARE KRISHNA.

 

Well, I understand what you are trying to say. But everybody does this. When we say something about the universe(or a part thereof), we do not say what it really 'is'. We just tell what it 'is like'. Or, in other words, we give a model. When we say that one theory is better than another, it really means that the model given in one theory is better at explaining observations than the model given in another theory. This is true not ony for scientists but for everybody. The universe is so vast and amazing that nobody really knows the real truth. We can all merely speculate. But there is nothing wrong in speculating. We speculate about something because we are interested in that. People speculate about stories related to Krishna because they are interested in these stories.

I have heard that we should not seek happiness in material world. But, I can not help but appreciate the beauty of the material universe. Beautiful stars in the sky, birds going towards their nests in the evening, butterflies relishing the nectar of flowers, deers running in jungle...

All this reminds me of a hindi song:

"Jiski rachna itni sundar, wo kitna sundar hoga!". (If the creation is so beautiful, how beautiful, the creator himself must be!)

 

Of course, the lyricist might be talking about somebody else, but the song is quite apt if we consider God as creator and universe as creation.

[sushil_kanoria]

Hare Krishna shvu,

So you want me to show where it is written that Suta Goswami has not uttered the name of Radha Rani.

My dear Friend, you just go through the Srimad Bhagwatam, you wont find the name of Radharani there, Why?? you know the reason which I have given earliar.

 

Hari Bol,

Sushil.

[shvu]

 

Hi Sushil,

 

Radharani is not mentioned in the Bhagavatam. Why ??

 

1. You say Suta (or Suka ?) was not worthy of uttering her name.

 

2. Or else, the character was not in existence at that time, and so was not mentioned.

 

Unfortunately, it is not just the Bhagvatam which is silent about Radha, but all the other earlier books which deal with the Life-story of Krishna. It would mean that after 1000 ad, people suddenly became worthy of uttering Radha's name freely left and right, while Suka Muni who was born a Jivan-Mukta was not worthy enough to do it. With all thse points we can safely rule out 1 as an option.

 

Coming to your point, who is worthy of uttering her name ? I don't consider myself worthy of uttering any name, but I have been doing it for long and so far no disaster has struck me. Or is it supposed to happen after I am dead and gone ?

 

Supposing the Islam people say that Suka did not mention Muhammad or Allah in the Bhagavatam because he was not worthy of uttering his name, will you buy that ?

 

btw Suka, Suta etc were not GVs. So you may not want to refer to them as Goswami.

 

Cheers

[shvu]

 

Rajesh,

 

Adam, Moses, Rama and Krishna are mythical characters (ateast, as of Jan 2001).

 

Buddha, Jesus, Mohammad and all the later people are historical characters.

 

Now I am sure you know what the difference between historical and mythical is, so I will save myself some typing here.

 

Cheers

[shvu]

 

Hi Animesh,

 

---

"Jiski rachna itni sundar, wo kitna sundar hoga!". (If the creation is so beautiful, how beautiful, the creator himself must be!)

---

 

MF Hussain has come up with some beautiful paintings. But he is not good-looking himself Same with a lot of other guys as well.

 

So perhaps we cannot use this as universal logic. What do you say ?

 

Cheers

[Dasha]

Dear shvu

 

I do not really understand what is your position in this discussion. To which point do you want to come to ? Just polemic and philosophical speculation ?

 

If Krsna DO exist, it is not since 700, 5000 or 5 billions years, it is from not human calculating time, i.e. eternity.

 

If Krsna DO NOT exist it is not a question of a few hundreds of years or to know who write about Him the first time that will change anything.

 

If it is then Who is the ORIGINAL ABSOLUTE TRUTH ?

 

It is natural to see in the Absolute Creator the top most Beauty, Intelligence etc... If we are all looking for that, that may not be without any reason.

 

Even if the Form of Krsna is just born from the imagination of some writer, this imagination sticks to everybody's idea of what ABSOLUTE BEAUTY may be.

 

If you know a better acheivement on which to meditate upon, please let me know.

 

What is the value to depreciate someone's goal if this goal bring's him to get ride of this material platform.

 

You may be right to prouve this or that but this does not make the things different from what they are.

 

It is not because someone is a big scholars that he will get liberated (which all of us would like to acheive as far as I can understand), rather even Christ use to say that the doors of heaven are open to people with children mind (which do not mean stupid !!!!!!!!!)

 

I am the first to have the tendency to speculate and have many doubts in my mind, but this does not change the fact that we have to take a path in spiritual life and follow it. Even if the goal is different from one person to another, I am sure that first of all sincerity is required, then at time, everything will be revealed.

 

As humbly as possible,

 

Dasha