The Divine Pastimes of Sri Nityanandachandra
Compiled from lectures of His Divine Grace
Srila Bhakti Sundar Govinda Dev-Goswami Maharaj
Srila Guru Maharaj, Srila Bhakti Raksak Sridhar Dev-Goswami Maharaj, composed a Sanskrit poem glorifying Sri Nityananda Prabhu called the Sriman Nityananda Dvadasakam. Within that composition Srila Guru Maharaj gave his explanation about the transcendental identity of Nityananda Prabhu, and not with one sloka, with four slokas of explanation. Srila Krishnadas Kaviraj Goswami glorified Nityananda Prabhu in the beginning of his Sri Chaitanya-charitamrta, and all the slokas he wrote referred to Nityananda Prabhu’s existence above the mundane manifestation in the Paravyoma Dham, the spiritual world. I was surprised that Srila Guru Maharaj began his explanation about Nityananda Prabhu in that way with this sloka:
yo ’nanto ’nanta-vaktrair niravadhi hari-saṁkīrtanaṁ saṁvidhatte
yo vā dhatte dharitrīṁ śirasi niravadhi kṣudra-dhūlī-kaṇeva
yaḥ śeśaś chhatra-śayyāsana-vasana-vidhaiḥ sevate te yad arthāḥ
śrī-nityānanda-chandraṁ bhaja bhaja satataṁ gaura-kṛṣṇa-pradaṁ tam
«O my heart! Please eternally serve the lotus feet of that beautiful Sri Nityanandachandra, who gives us Gaura Krishna. It is He — Nityananda Prabhu — who in the form of Anantadev perpetually performs Hari-nam-kirtan with infinite mouths; He perpetually holds on His head the earth planet like an insignificant speck of dust; and He performs the divine service of His all-in-all, Krishna, as Sesadev Ananta, taking the forms of the Lord’s paraphernalia such as the umbrella, bed, seat, and clothing.»
Srila Guru Maharaj started with this sloka because he was following the main directives of the previous Acharyas. From Vrndavan Das Thakur to Krishnadas Kaviraj Goswami, and from Srila Krishnadas Kaviraj Goswami to Srila Guru Maharaj, we are seeing the line of progress and the speciality of Srila Guru Maharaj.
His second sloka is above Brahmaloka:
aṁśair yaḥ kṣīraśāyī sakala-bhuvanapaḥ sarva-jīvāntarastho
yo vā garbhodaśāyī daśa-śata-vadano veda-sūktair vigītaḥ
bramāṇḍāśeṣa garbhā prakṛti-pati-patir jīva-saṅghāśrayāṅgaḥ
śrī-nityānanda-chandraṁ bhaja bhaja satataṁ gaura-kṛṣṇa-pradaṁ tam
«O my heart! You please eternally serve Sri Nityanandachandra, who gives us Gaura Krishna. He maintains the entire universe in His expansion of Ksirodakasayi Visnu, residing in the hearts of all living beings; His glories are sung by the Vedic hymns as the Garbhodakasayi Visnu of thousands and thousands of heads — Sahasra-sirsa-purusah; within His womb (garbha) unlimited universes are situated; He is the Master of the Lord of material nature — Karanodakasayi Visnu — in whose womb unlimited universes are situated and by whom the entire multitude of jiva-souls are sheltered.»
yasyāṁśo vyuha-madhye vilasati paramavyomni saṁkarṣaṇākhya
ātanvan śuddha-sattvaṁ nikhila-hari-sukhaṁ hymns as the Garbhodakaśāyī Viṣṇu of thousands and thousands of heads—Sahasra-śīrṣa-puruṣaḥ; within His womb (garbha) unlimited universes are situated; He is the Master of the Lord of material nature—Kāraṇodakaśāyī Viṣṇu—in whose womb unlimited universes are situated and by whom the entire multitude of jīva-souls are sheltered.” yasyāṁśo vyuha-madhye vilasati paramavyomni saṁkarṣaṇākhya ātanvan śuddha-sattvaṁ nikhila-hari-sukhaṁ chetanaṁ līlayā cha
jīvāhaṅkāra-bhāvāspada iti kathitaḥ kutrachij jīvavad yaḥ
śrī-nityānanda-chandraṁ bhaja bhaja satataṁ gaura-kṛṣṇa-pradaṁ tam
«O my heart, please eternally render divine service to that gracious giver of Gaura Krishna — Sri Nityanandachandra. In the great transcendental kingdom Paravyoma Vaikuntha, He expands into the form of Sankarsan of the first quadruple expansion, in which form He ever expands the ecstasy of the divine Pastimes of Sri Hari in the conscious plane of pure existence (suddha-sattva); within the jivas He presides as the ego, and sometimes He shows His divine Pastimes just like an ordinary jiva.»
This kind of presentation we see in the style of Srila Krishnadas Kaviraj Goswami. Kaviraj Goswami composed five slokas in Sri Chaitanya-charitamrta about Nityananda Prabhu’s identity and divine manifestation as Mulsankarsan, the Supreme Personality of Godhead’s second expansion. And why is it? Because he had felt the divine form of Nityananda Prabhu! He and Vrndavan Das Thakur have tried to give us feelings, transcendental feelings, about Nityananda Prabhu’s super-position. Before we hear about Nityananda Prabhu’s activities we shouldn’t feel anything mundane about Nityananda Prabhu. His character is composed within Goloka Vrndavan of Paravyoma Dham, within the highest aspect of the spiritual world. He is actually the Origin, the Supreme Personality of Godhead, coming down, down, down all the way to the form of Ksirodakasayi Visnu, the Supreme Soul living inside of everything in the material universe. But Nityananda Prabhu is a nondifferent form of Sri Balaram of Goloka Vrndavan and Mulsankarsan of Vaikuntha. Srila Guru Maharaj and the Acharyas want to give this consciousness to the conditioned souls to protect them from making any atmosphere of mundanity.
Then Srila Guru Maharaj continued,
śrī-kṛṣṇa-premanāmā parama-sukhamayaḥ ko ’py achintyaḥ padārtho
yad gandhāt sajjanaughā nigama-bahumataṁ mokṣam apy ākṣipanti
kaivalyaiśvarya-sevā-prada-gaṇa iti yasyāṅgataḥ prema-dātuḥ
śrī-nityānanda-chandraṁ bhaja bhaja satataṁ gaura-kṛṣṇa-pradaṁ tam
«My dear heart, please eternally worship that gracious giver of Gaura Krishna — Sri Nityanandachandra. It is He who bestows upon us pure unalloyed divine love for the Supreme Lord Sri Krishna (Sri Krishna-prema), composed of the most supreme and intense ecstasy. The love that He distributes carries an inconceivable import — it is of such ecstasy that the sadhus who may experience only a hint of its fragrance, hatefully cast away all thought of liberation in the ‘One’ as propounded in the Vedas. Furthermore, His Avatars, who bestow the divine love of service in the transcendental majesty of Vaikuntha, are but expansions of His expansion.»
By the mercy of that Nityananda Prabhu we can very easily get that Krishna-prema which gives us all transcendental happiness, joyfulness, ecstasy, everything! Wherever there is a little bit of that Krishna-prema, all the wealth of the transcendental world appears.