Chapter Fourteen

Harmony — Beauty’s Necessity
From Absolute Harmony transcribed and published by Prabhu Madhura Kṛṣṇa as an illustrated limited
edition (Australia 1991).

The theistic school says, “Absolute means absolute good. It is not zero. Rather, everything is fully represented there. The whole is so great that it can accommodate all.” But Śaṅkar Āchārya sacrificed plurality and accepted only oneness, saying, “Enemies and friends all become nothing. They become jumbled together.” Such a thing is possible only in the zero-conception. But Chaitanya Mahāprabhu explained, “What Śaṅkar Āchārya gave is not proper acceptance of the revealed truth, but both variety and oneness must be recognised.”

In the Upaniṣads it is said, “There is no variegatedness.” And Śaṅkar Āchārya says, “There is no plurality but only oneness: Brahma.” But Mahāprabhu says, “No! Variety also exists.Otherwise, there would be no necessity of saying anything whatsoever, as all would unanimously agree. Rather, there is One who is the Master and all else are subordinate, and they are active in a system — the controlled and the controller.” He explained, “If you say that variety does not exist, then what is the necessity of so much discussion? To whom have you come to preach? And if there is no variety, then what is the necessity of preaching to those who are already one with you? Illusion also has its existence. Otherwise, why have you come to try to remove illusion? If māyā — misunderstanding and misconception — does not exist, then why are you preaching?”

It is a reality that there is always the possibility of misconception. Therefore, there is always the necessity of a Guru to teach the truth.

There is not only the absolute conception but also the relative, provincial conception, and they both co-exist. This is called chit-vilās: it is not the negation of a particular thing, but the adjustment of everything with the whole, the Absolute, the Centre. Variety and oneness both exist simultaneously, and this is called achintya-bhedābheda-tattva, and this is the all-accommodating conclusion of Śrī Chaitanya Mahāprabhu. Still, Śaṅkar Āchārya accepts only one part; his conception is limited and not all-accommodating.

The only origin of fear is lack of harmony. Fear is born through disappointment resulting from lack of harmony. If that does not exist, then there is no place for fear.

‘Undesirability’ is represented in Sanskrit as ‘apprehension’ or ‘fear’ and is regarded as something secondary to the Absolute. But how does it reach, and become transformed into, perfection? If we can introduce many interests into one common interest, then there is harmony — no fear — and all is perfect.

At present, we are suffering from the mania of separate interest. Only because we have deviated from our common Master, our common Guardian, we have come to suffer the disease of apprehension. If one Master is common to all, then no apprehension can arise. We will feel true unity amongst ourselves. If we fall on the ground, with the help of that same ground we can again stand.

So, forgetfulness of our Guardian is the cause of the all-disastrous situations in which we find ourselves. The only way to get out of that disaster is to be reinstated in the idea of common guardianship, and that is to be effected by the true sādhus who have not deviated from God consciousness. With their help we have to appeal to the all-controlling agency. Then, we can again be reinstated in that echelon where we have our Master under whose holy feet we are to take shelter. If we can accept this, harmony will again be installed in our lives. So, we are always to be conscious of our Guardian, the highest harmoniser — and that is true God consciousness.

Kṛṣṇa’s two mothers, Yaśodā and Devakī, do not have an open relationship with each other. Kṛṣṇa’s foster mother, Yaśodā, is always afraid that Devakī and her husband, Vasudev, may come to claim Kṛṣṇa as their child. How can it be that this happens? Similarly, the members of Rādhārāṇī’s camp consider Chandrāvalī’s camp to be an anti-party to the main group of servitors. But the indirect section is always a necessary part of the Lord’s Pastimes. Chandrāvalī has more intellect, whereas Rādhārāṇī has more sentiment. Similarly, in all rasas (devotional mellows) there is harmony and also discord. Some opposition enhances the play of dedication.

In sakhya-rasa (the mood of serving the Lord as a friend) when Kṛṣṇa began to play with His friends, the cowherd boys, there were two parties: one side with Kṛṣṇa and the other with His brother, Balarām. The cowherd boys were divided into two sections to represent opposite sides, and then they began to playfully fight. The punishment for whichever party would be defeated was that each was to carry a boy from the winning party on their shoulders. In this way a service-punishment was given.

Balarām is very strong while on the opposing party Śrīdāmā is also very strong. In fact Śrīdāma came into Kṛṣṇa’s party because Kṛṣṇa is not as strong as Balarām. In this way their playing began. When the two parties fought, Balarām generally wouldn’t accept that He was defeated. Rather, His nature was that He would become enraged.

Sometimes a demon would enter one of the parties by taking the form of a cowherd boy. In this manner Pralambāsura and Vyomāsura mixed with the play of the cowherd boys seeking an opportunity to take a boy on their shoulders and abduct him. One day, Pralambāsura carried Balarām into the depths of the jungle. But when Balarām came to understand that He was being carried by a demon impostor, He struck him with a great blow to the head. In this way the higher conception of truth runs in order to not only remove all difficulties — personified as demons — but to positively fill up the whole heart with sweet nectar. And the sweetest nectar is personified in Kṛṣṇa.

On another occasion, Kṛṣṇa was considering the case of another miscreant, Śiśupāl, and how he could be removed. For this purpose He convened a meeting between Himself, Balarām, and Uddhava, but Balarām opposed everything Kṛṣṇa said. Whenever Kṛṣṇa wanted a policy to be adopted, Balarām would object, “What is this policy? Just leave it to Me; I shall kill him outright! What need is there of all these politics? I don’t understand.” All the while Uddhava, who by nature is not partial to violence, tried to pacify Balarām. The example of enhancement of the beauty of the Lord’s Pastimes by discord and opposition is represented very cleverly in this story in an ornamental way.

Musaladhara, a name of Balarām meaning ‘the wielder of the club-like weapon’, gives us a hint that He doesn’t delight in the finer mental level of intellect and politics. He likes to solve everything with the strike of His club. So, in Balarām we find less intelligence, but stronger force. Still, the greatest, most suble opposing forces can only be harmonised by Kṛṣṇa. Harmony means to control opposite forces.

Lord Rāmachandra expressed, “There is no greater friend than a brother to be found anywhere”, while His own brother, Lakṣmaṇ, instead stressed the opposite angle of vision: “The brother is the worst type of enemy because when he emerges from the mother’s womb, the elder brother can no longer suck her breast. Indeed the elder brother is not only deprived of his mother’s milk but he is also dispossessed of his mother’s lap, as the new brother captures that also.” So, opposite conceptions have to be accommodated.

Disciple: We are all trying to be devotees but sometimes we see that there is some differentiation made between the Western and Indian devotees.

Śrīla Guru Mahārāj: You have so many differences such as your hair, eyes, etc.!

Disciple: These are material differences.

Śrīla Guru Mahārāj: But these are all drawn from the spiritual; they cannot demand any originality of their own.

There are so many things to be understood. Even it is found that in the presence of Kṛṣṇa at Puṣkar Tīrtha, the whole of the Yadu dynasties, including such a host of great personalities, were annihilated before His very eyes. But these dynasties fought in order to reveal the deeper realities of the plane of the soul. Whatever He wills is truth proper. Can you understand this? Kṛṣṇa was a sightseer! He simply watched. How can you adjust to that? Can you understand that fighting is life?

All the Pāṇḍavas including Arjuna were submissive to King Yudhiṣṭhir, but still they sometimes revolted against him.

Peace such as in the deep slumber of brahma-nirvāṇa is wanting in vitality; it is not true lasting peace. And the Absolute Truth is not impersonal but a person.

Disciple: My desire is to see Chaitanya Mahāprabhu’s unity, to see full harmony.

Śrīla Guru Mahārāj: Harmony presupposes independent thinking, but in consonance with the common plane.

When a mother cooks food, one child may say, “This is bitter”, another may say, “This is salty”, and another, “This is sour.” So, where there are many varieties, there must be the question of life. Variety shows that life is present. In diversity there is polarity within unity. Otherwise, simply ‘unity’ means jumbling everything together — a dead unity.

Viṣṇu does not represent just one feature but He represents infinite features which accommodate infinite possibilities. Kṛṣṇa is Akhila-rasāmṛta-mūrti (the emporium of all nectarean rasas). Different groups of His servitors have so many diverse elements. Even Rādhārāṇī and Chandrāvalī compete with each other. They each head separate camps which fight in competition to satisfy Him. We have to understand how all this is possible. Mildly, with humility, we have to try to follow.

In the parliament there is an opposition party, but it is there to enhance the work of the main party. In this way the direct and the indirect combine in order to make the government complete, and if that principle is applied everywhere, it is not difficult to understand the nature of difference. We are not to try to create another world, but we are to understand what already exists. Why is it so? What is the underlying meaning behind it? What are the differences between Kṛṣṇa and Balarām? Balarām sometimes sides with Duryodhan and Kṛṣṇa sides with the Pāṇḍavas, yet Kṛṣṇa and Balarām are almost one and the same. So, how are we to understand that? What is your answer? Do you think it is all bogus?!

Disciple: I can simply say I came to the Gauḍīya Maṭh for Chaitanya Mahāprabhu’s gift of love.

Śrīla Guru Mahārāj: Yes, this is true. And love means that there is classification amongst brothers. Rūpa Goswāmī gave the explanation:

aher iva gatiḥ premṇaḥ svabhāva-kuṭilā bhavet
(Śrī Chaitanya-charitāmṛta: Madhya-līlā, 8.111)

Just as a serpent moves in a crooked way, similarly is the nature of love’s progress. The nature of affection is not straightforward because it has to accommodate everything in it. Everything possible in existence is accommodated in love. Love means sacrifice to such a high degree that it can embrace everything. The movement of love is generally crooked, and, for the satisfaction of Kṛṣṇa, it has been designed in this way by the Lord’s divine power, yogamāyā, in order to prevent any staleness or sterility from entering the Pastimes. So try to adjust to this. Don’t be eager to create another world.

To do away with opposition, greater harmony is necessary. And in the higher type of harmony, opposition even enhances the beauty of that harmony and helps it. When harmony is successful, then it is found to be the necessity of beauty. Kṛṣṇa represents beauty, and His harmonising capacity supersedes everything. There is nothing He cannot harmonise, and all enemies become friends in that harmony. In so many ways this is to be accommodated. The Lord is the centre of highest harmony; He is sweetness, He is our Master, and He is the divine love of us all.

Chandrāvalī is in opposition to Śrīmatī Rādhārāṇī yet by yogamāyā their competition produces more satisfaction for Kṛṣṇa. Everything is for Him. Through Akhila-rasāmṛta-mūrti, all possible types of ecstasy are harmonised; nothing is neglected. Justification of all existence is found there. That diversity and unity is all to satisfy His purpose. Rādhārāṇī Herself said, “The other gopīs do not know it, but I have no objection if they come forward, for My only concern is for Kṛṣṇa’s satisfaction. My concentration is always there, but the standard of their service isn’t so exclusive as to give full satisfaction to Him properly. That is My objection. They rush forward to serve Kṛṣṇa but they do not know how to fully satisfy Him. Otherwise, I would allow them to.” In this way Rādhārāṇī’s statement justified Her feeling. This statement of Rādhārāṇī, where She does not consider Her devotion to be commonplace in the company of those exclusive servitors competing for Kṛṣṇa’s affection, that is Her special beauty.

Her degree and intensity of endeavour to satisfy Kṛṣṇa is above all others. Kṛṣṇa represents the whole play; He is the centre and the source of everyone’s love. But certain servitors like Lalitā and Viśākhā are directly serving Rādhārāṇī, while there are also those in Chandrāvalī’s camp who are serving her in opposition to Rādhārāṇī. That anti-party group is essential, just as the opposition party is necessary in a democratic parliament.

What is the purpose of this world? That is known only to Him. The first verse of Śrīmad Bhāgavatam states that He alone is fully aware of the purpose of His activity. He is the Absolute Autocrat. He doesn’t have to explain Himself to anyone. Everything is for Him. Also, in some way He is for us.

ahaṁ bhakta-parādhīno hy asvatantra iva dvija
sādhubhir grasta-hṛdayo bhaktair bhakta-jana-priyaḥ
(Śrīmad Bhāgavatam: 9.4.63)

“I do not know anyone but My devotees. All the saints are my sweethearts, and I am also their sweetheart. They do not know anyone but Me, and I also do not care to know anyone but them.”

He is for the devotees, and the devotees are for Him. That is the substance and the potency, the enjoyer and the enjoyed, the positive and the negative, the served and the servitor — both combine to make the whole: the subject and the object.

No subject can exist without an object. Subject means the thinking thinker, and there must be something to be thought. Otherwise, the subject cannot exist. There must be some thinker and then recognition of a particular thing.

Disciple: Rādhārāṇī sends Her different associates to canvas on Her behalf. Does Chandrāvalī also have her associates canvassing for her?

Śrīla Guru Mahārāj: Yes, there is a clash between Rādhārāṇī’s followers like Lalitā and Viśākhā and the followers of Chandrāvalī such as Śaibyā and Padmā. Śrīla Bhakti Vinod Ṭhākur has written, “As the attendant of Rādhārāṇī’s camp, I do not like to see that area in Vṛndāvan where the camp of Chandrāvalī is because Padmā’s interest is always to take Kṛṣṇa from Rādhārāṇī’s special place to Chandrāvalī’s camp, and if Kṛṣṇa goes there, then our place will become dark.” But still opposition is necessary in the development of different levels of service just as hunger or fasting is necessary for relishing food. It is all designed only to intensify the standard of service.

And what degree of attraction and service to Rādhārāṇī do we find in Lalitā Devī? If a drop of perspiration is found on the feet of Rādhā or Govinda, she prays for one hundred thousand bodies to busily remove that perspiration. This sort of intense devotion is the unit of measurement to gauge love for one’s beloved. This is the inner feeling. Waves of such nature come from within one who comes in connection with that Vṛndāvan proper.

In Goloka Vṛndāvan, the abode of Śrī Kṛṣṇa, there are so many parties. There the Pastimes appear to be similar to the competition that goes on here in this world, but the difference is all in the degree of sacrifice the devotee has for their Lord. The life of a devotee is a life of endless sacrifice.

The gopīs of Vṛndāvan are perfectly self-forgetful of their own interest and well-being; they are cent per cent devoted not only in the present but also in the eternal future. There they live in the land of mercy, beauty, charm, and affection, the plane of Absolute surrender. And that is the highest plane of our life. Nothing less than wholesale surrender is required there. As Kṛṣṇa states, “If you give yourself wholesale to Me, then I will give Myself wholesale to you.”

Śrīla Rūpa Goswāmī has given us an example of the gradation of service. When Kṛṣṇa is at the summit of Govardhan Hill and He sees Balarām and His sakhya friends playing in the pasturing ground below, He also sees Yaśodā with all her helpers busily preparing His meal. All the dāsya servitors are seen to be engaged in some arrangement under the direction of Yaśodā. Chandrāvalī, with her group, is approaching a particular meeting place, while His beloved Śrīmatī Rādhārāṇī is coming with Her friends to an appointed place to be united with Kṛṣṇa. All the different groups represented together around Govardhan are assembling there — śānta, dāsya, sakhya, vātsalya, and madhura — all are in His sight. He is overseeing everything. So, very many affectionate servitors are all vying for His attention, but His eyes are always drawn to Śrīmatī Rādhārāṇī and Her group.

Even Lakṣmī Devī — the goddess of fortune and wife of Lord Viṣṇu — wanted to participate in the Rāsa-līlā of those simple cowherd girls of Vṛndāvan, the gopīs, but She could not enter, for that market — that place of the Rāsa-līlā Pastime — is so very exclusive. Although she has all the wealth and grandeur of Lord Śrī Viṣṇu in Vaikuṇṭha, still, unsatisfied, She is running to join in that great dance in which Kṛṣṇa is at the centre.

No capitalist can enter that market and open a shop there for He has the full monopoly. There is only one commodity in the market and that commodity is Kṛṣṇa consciousness.

The earth itself feels the charming union with Kṛṣṇa by the divine touch of His feet. The birds, insects, His friends — everything in the environment — sing in His sweet play. Only unconditional exclusive divine love can enter there. So much so, the attraction of Kṛṣṇa has captured the hearts of everyone there wholesale. God’s grace is of such charming, intense nature that there is no way out but to serve the sweetness — not by fear, nor by hope, nor by the sense of duty, but all are helplessly attracted to sweet Kṛṣṇa. Living harmony reigns there in its most natural and intense form. The servants of that quarter feel they cannot live without that service. That is their food.

Śrīmatī Rādhārāṇī prays, “You have captured My heart fully. Every atom of My body wants only You, but the circumstances are so cruel that we are parted. So, I will jump into that deep well, taking My life. I pray You will come and take My position, and I will take Yours, O Kṛṣṇa, O Śrī Nanda Nandan. Then You will realise what hopelessness I am going through and will understand My trouble.”

In that self-same mood Śrī Chaitanya Mahāprabhu said, “My friends save Me by showing Me Kṛṣṇa. Otherwise, I cannot maintain My existence! What I once saw, touching My heart like lightning then withdrawing, show Me once again for I cannot tolerate the separation. How many times can one die in a second to earn that fortune, to get a moment’s perception of Kṛṣṇa? I am ready to die millions of times. My heart bursts without having a second view of that wonderful thing! I had a little experience previously, but beauty and sweetness can be so cruel! If I do not get that vision, I shall die.”