1. Bhakti and Its Three Forms

CHAPTER ONE

Bhakti and Its Three Forms

The topic of devotional service is a confidential one and therefore generally spoken of in gatherings of qualified Vaiṣṇavas. Lord Kṛṣṇa encourages devotees to share their realisations about this confidential subject while also cautioning them not to disclose its secrets to sense enjoyers, envious persons, or non-devotees. He says,

“This confidential knowledge may never be explained to those who are not austere, or devoted, or engaged in devotional service, nor to one who is envious of Me. For one who explains this supreme secret to the devotees, pure devotional service is guaranteed, and at the end he will come back to Me. There is no servant in this world more dear to Me than he, nor will there ever be one more dear.”1

Throughout Vedic literature, men and women are advised to adopt di erent kinds of purification, methods of self-realisation, and paths to liberation. Yet these pursuits are but varied ways to connect with devotional service and are not in and of themselves a means to ultimate perfection. That qualification is the exclusive prerogative of pure bhakti! Therefore, the great authority on devotion, Nārada, has proclaimed that every form of spiritual practice is absolutely dependent on devotional service:

jīvanti jantavaḥ sarve yathā mātaram āśritāḥ tathā bhaktiṁ samāśritya sarvā jīvanti siddhayaḥ

“Just as all living beings live under the shelter of their mothers, all perfections live under the complete shelter of devotional service.”2

The eminence of bhakti can be understood by a study of its ontology, in which bhakti appears to be an activity of the body, senses, and mind, but in truth is an absolute reality existing eternally beyond the modes of nature. As Śrīla Prabhupāda says,

“Devotional service, or bhakti-yoga, is the function of the internal energy.”3

Kṛṣṇa, His devotees, and the love that they share are all eternal, spiritual, and transcendental. So, too, is the service that expresses their exchanges of love, bhakti.

When, by suitable practice and purification, a conditioned soul receives the grace of Kṛṣṇa’s internal potencies in the form of pleasure and knowledge, he rises above the grasp of the material energy. At that time the living entity fully awakens to Kṛṣṇa consciousness and engages in loving devotional service. Thus it may be said that bhakti descends upon the worthy soul.

Hearing this one may ask:

“And what makes a soul worthy?”

We answer:

“Emulating the activities of eternal devotion, which then purify the heart from non-devotional constraints.”

Therefore bhakti in practice is the qualification for bhakti in perfection, the former being like the shadow of the latter. In this regard it is said, bhaktyā sañjātayā bhaktyā: 4

“Bhakti, in practice, gives rise to bhakti, in perfection.”

And it is also said, svayaṁ phala-rūpeti: 5

“Bhakti is its own fruit.”

It should be noted that perfection can only be attained by a devotional practice that is pure. For this reason, Śrīla Rūpa Gosvāmī’s Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu, the most authoritative treatise on bhakti, sets its foundation on the following definition of pure devotional service:

anyābhilāṣitā-śūnyaṁ jñāna-karmādy-anāvṛtam ānukūlyena kṛṣṇānuśīlanaṁ bhaktir uttamā

“When first-class devotional service develops, one must be devoid of all material desires, knowledge obtained by monistic philosophy, and fruitive action. The devotee must constantly serve Kṛṣṇa favourably, as Kṛṣṇa desires.”6

It is interesting to note that Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu spoke this verse to Rūpa Gosvāmī in Prayāga before Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu was composed. Therefore the definition may be considered to be absolute and eternal, only to be revealed by Rūpa Gosvāmī. A detailed analysis of this definition can be found in Bhakti-rasāmṛtasindhu-bindu, Viśvanātha Cakravartī Ṭhākura’s summary study of Rūpa Gosvāmī’s celebrated work.

What should be mentioned is that unmotivated devotional service is performed by activities of the senses and mind, as well as through expressions of spiritual sentiments. Bhakti is performed as a means for awakening perfection for the practising devotee, and it is also performed as a consequence of perfection by the perfected devotee. That is the meaning of anuśīlana, the cultivation of Kṛṣṇa consciousness. For example, the activities of devotion, like saṅkīrtana of Kṛṣṇa’s names, are both for the attainment of perfection, and as a consequence of perfection: they may appear the same externally, but for a practising devotee and a perfected devotee, the cause is di erent.

To be more clear, pure devotional service consists of the activities of cultivation for the attainment of devotion and the activities that

are a consequence of the attainment of devotion. And anuśīlana, when rising to higher stages of attainment, is twofold: through the above-mentioned two activities and through the spiritual emotions that the attainments of devotion themselves create, emotions that become especially marked at ecstatic devotion.

This cultivation favourable to Kṛṣṇa, called ānukūlyena kṛṣṇānuśīlanaṁ, is the primary characteristic, or svarūpa-lakṣaṇa, of pure devotion. The secondary characteristic, taṭastha-lakṣaṇa—which does not really define the intrinsic nature of bhakti but rather limits the definition—is its freedom from non-devotional elements.

While any form or incarnation of Lord Kṛṣṇa may be the object of a devotee’s piety, Gauḍīya Vaiṣṇavas almost always repose their devotions in the original form of Godhead, Lord Kṛṣṇa, the cowherd prince of Vṛndāvana. Śrīla Prabhupāda emphasises this conclusion:

“These words stress that one should concentrate his mind upon Kṛṣṇa—the very form with two hands carrying a flute, the bluish boy with a beautiful face and peacock feathers in His hair. There are descriptions of Kṛṣṇa found in the Brahma-saṁhitā and other literatures. One should fix his mind on this original form of Godhead, Kṛṣṇa. One should not even divert his attention to other forms of the Lord. The Lord has multiforms as Viṣṇu, Nārāyaṇa, Rāma, Varāha, etc., but a devotee should concentrate his mind on the form that was present before Arjuna. Concentration of the mind on the form of Kṛṣṇa constitutes the most confidential part of knowledge, and this is disclosed to Arjuna because Arjuna is the most dear friend of Kṛṣṇa’s.”7

But what is the purpose of pure devotion, and what is the perfection to be achieved by it?

At the dawn of creation, Lord Kṛṣṇa encouraged Brahmā, the most intelligent of all created beings, to himself search out the answer to these questions:

etāvad eva jijñāsyaṁ tattva-jijñāsunātmanaḥ

anvaya-vyatirekābhyāṁ yat syāt sarvatra sarvadā

“A person who is searching after the Supreme Absolute Truth, the Personality of Godhead, must certainly search for it up to this, in all circumstances, in all space and time, and both directly and indirectly.”8

But that truth was not so easily discerned even by the intelligence of the creator. Śukadeva Gosvāmī discloses that even with great attention and concentration of mind, Brahmā could not rise to the challenge. It was only after repeatedly scrutinising all the Vedas three times did Brahmā conclude that attraction to Kṛṣṇa was the highest perfection.

By comparison to Brahmā, the lost souls of our age are spiritually and intellectually insignificant. How, then, could they be eligible for perfection? The answer is that Caitanya Mahāprabhu made them fortunate by explicitly revealing this most elusive and confidential knowledge. He disclosed to both the qualified and the unqualified that the essence of religion is devotion to Kṛṣṇa, that the purpose of pure devotion is to awaken a ection for Kṛṣṇa, and that the supreme a ection for the Lord—called prema—is the ultimate perfection of life.

Having defined bhakti in a general way, let us consider the three forms of pure devotional service.

Bhakti-yoga, like every activity, is performed with an objective in mind. The means of attainment is sādhana, and the attainment itself is sādhya. Additionally, the aspirant is known as a sādhaka, while one who has reached the goal, a siddha. As already mentioned, and to be detailed later, the ultimate attainment of bhakti is love of Kṛṣṇa, kṛṣṇa-prema.

Let us look more closely at the grammar that governs these related terms.

The verb root sādh translates as “to attain” or “to accomplish,” and, when conjoined with the suffix ana, the resultant

noun, sādhana, is best expressed as the “means of attainment.” This same root sādh, when married with various derivatives, results in a variety of connected meanings such as sādhya, “what is to be attained;” sādhu and sādhaka, “one who strives for an attainment;” and siddha, “one who has attained the goal.”

To this point, we have only defined two kinds of bhakti: sādhanabhakti and prema-bhakti. And while it may appear obvious that these two kinds of devotional service fully describe bhakti, scriptures and ācāryas define three kinds of devotion: sādhana-bhakti, bhāva-bhakti, and prema-bhakti. Bhāva-bhakti means ecstatic devotion, or ecstatic loving devotion.

“What is the reason for this third category?”

“The reason is that the transition from practice to perfection finds an intermediate stage that is transcendental to practice yet lacks all the qualities of perfection while simultaneously displaying its beginnings. This is bhāva-bhakti!”

Closely analysed, bhāva-bhakti fits into neither the category of sādhana nor of sādhya. The reason for this becomes clear when we review the definition of all three forms of devotion.

Sādhana-bhakti is defined in this way:

kṛti-sādhyā bhavet sādhyabhāvā sā sādhanābhidhā nitya-siddhasya bhāvasya prākaṭyaṁ hṛdi sādhyatā

“When transcendental devotional service, by which love for Kṛṣṇa [bhāva] is attained, is executed by the senses, it is called sādhana-bhakti, or the regulative discharge of devotional service. Such devotion eternally exists within the heart of every living entity. The awakening of this eternal devotion is the potentiality of devotional service in practice.”9

Bhāva-bhakti is defined as:

śuddha-sattva-viśeṣātmā prema-sūryāṁśu-sāmya-bhāk rucibhiś citta-masṛṇyakṛd asau bhāva ucyate

“When devotional service is executed on the transcendental platform of pure goodness, it is like a sunray of love for Kṛṣṇa. At such a time, devotional service causes the heart to be softened by various tastes, and one is then situated in bhāva [emotion].”10

And prema-bhakti is defined as:

samyaṅ-masṛṇita-svānto mamatvātiśayāṅkitaḥ bhāvaḥ sa eva sāndrātmā budhaiḥ premā nigadyate

“When that bhāva softens the heart completely, becomes endowed with a great feeling of possessiveness in relation to the Lord, and becomes very much condensed and intensified, it is called prema [love of Godhead] by learned scholars.”11

In summary, devotion in practice is defined as activities directed to attain bhāva and not prema, because by definition the former is but a ray of love, while the latter is the full sun of love: dawn comes before sunrise. Caitanya Mahāprabhu calls bhāva, kṛṣṇe prīty-aṅkura:

“The seed of love for Kṛṣṇa.”

And He calls prema, sei ‘bhāva’ gāḍha haile dhare:

“The intensified stage of bhāva.”12

Since the development of love begins with its preliminary stage, bhāva is a third kind of devotional service. It is the immediate goal of sādhana and the precursor to prema.13 And although free from the influence of the modes of nature, bhāva lacks certain qualities of perfection.

“What, then, are those ‘lackings’ of bhāva-bhakti?”

To answer that question we should first distil the determining characteristics of these three stages of bhakti. Pure devotion has six qualities:

It gives relief from material distress; it is the beginning of all auspiciousness; its attainment derides the happiness of liberation; it is rarely achieved; it automatically places one in transcendental bliss; and, it is the only means to attract Kṛṣṇa. Sādhana-bhakti is characterised by the first two qualities, bhāva-bhakti by the first four, and prema-bhakti by all six.

Now back to our question: “What are the lackings of bhāvabhakti?”

“One is that bhāva does not immediately elevate one to transcendental pleasure, and another is that it cannot induce Kṛṣṇa to personally appear. Moreover, bhāva contains traces of unwanted habits from previously committed o ences, which generate a sense of unhappiness incongruous with perfection.

From this brief analysis it should be understood why there are three kinds of devotion and not two.

Having said that, readers may rightly wonder:

“Why is bhāva not in the category of sādhana, and why is a bhāva-bhakta not considered a sādhaka?”

The simple answer to the first question is:

“The definition of sādhana is to attain bhāva, and so sādhana cannot include bhāva.”

The answer to the second question is:

“Bhāva-bhaktas are sādhakas, but they are a di erent kind of sādhaka from the sādhana-sādhaka; they are bhāva-sādhakas.”

A bhāva-sādhaka must continue to cultivate devotional service if he is to attain prema-bhakti, so in that sense he is certainly a practitioner. But having attained bhāva, he is already transcendentally situated, so he is in a distinct category of his own, as becomes clear from Rūpa Gosvāmī’s definition of a sādhaka:

utpanna-ratayah samyaṅ nairvighnyam anupāgatāḥ kṛṣṇa-sākṣāt-kṛtau yogyāḥ sādhakāḥ parikīrttitāḥ

“Practitioners (bhāva-sādhakas) are those who have developed rati [bhāva] for Kṛṣṇa but have not completely extinguished their anarthas, and who are qualified to see Kṛṣṇa directly.”14

This book concentrates on certain aspects of sādhana-bhakti, so aside from discussing the appearance of bhāva-bhakti, we will not delve further into the two transcendental forms of devotion—bhāva and prema. In this chapter we have merely shown that there are three kinds of devotional service, and introduced them. Devotees wishing to know more are advised to study The Nectar of Devotion and Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu.

Notes

1. Bhagavad-gītā As It Is 18.67–69. 2. Bṛhan-nāradīya Purāṇa 4.30, as cited in Śrī Bṛhad-bhāgavatāmṛta 2.2.161, commentary. 3. Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 1.7.4, purport. 4. Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 11.3.31. 5. Nārada-bhakti-sūtra 30. 6. Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu 1.1.11, as cited in Śrī Caitanya-caritāmṛta, Madhya-līlā 19.167. 7. Bhagavad-gītā As It Is 18.65, purport. 8. Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 2.9.36. 9. Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu 1.2.2, as cited in Śrī Caitanya-caritāmṛta, Madhya-līlā 22.105. 10. Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu 1.3.1, as cited in Śrī Caitanya-caritāmṛta, Madhya-līlā 23.5. 11. Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu 1.4.1, as cited in Śrī Caitanya-caritāmṛta, Madhya-līlā 23.7. 12. Śrī Caitanya-caritāmṛta, Madhya-līlā 23.13. 13. Bhagavad-gītā As It Is 4.10, purport. 14. Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu 2.1.276.