[On the evening of the 20th of September, at the ‘Sārasvata-Śravaṇa-sadana’ of Śrī Gauḍīya Maṭha, after the lecture upon the article of Śrīmad Sadānanda Brahmacārī entitled “Where East and West Can Meet,” was discussed , Śrīla Prabhupāda, seated upon the ‘Śrī Sārasvata Āsana’, spoke divine hari-kathā before Śrīyukta Śambhunātha Bandyopādhyāya, Advocate Śrīyukta Ravīndranātha Rāya M.A., B.L., and other noble gentlemen. The purport of that discourse is presented below.]
(Translated from Weekly Gauḍīya, Volume 15, Issue 10)
Śrī Brahmacārī Sadānanda-jī has, for nearly one and a half years now, remained in the association of the Śrī Gauḍīya Maṭha and, in that sanctified contact, has come to imbibe a considerable amount of our teachings. The profound manner in which he has, within a very short span of time, strived to comprehend the utter futility of both bhoga (hedonism) and tyāga (renunciation), as well as of sentimentalism (bhāvukatā-vāda), is eminently praiseworthy.
In the treatise of Epiphany, the emergence of a protest against the endeavour to mix dualism of spirit and matter (cit-jada-samanvaya) appears as nothing short of a resonant echo of Gauḍīya matha siddhānta itself. Brahmacārī-jī has been able to grasp this subtle connection.
He has also realised that the nations of Europe shall never be able to apprehend the spirit—the living essence—of our message until and unless they adorn themselves with the jewel of bhakti-sadācāra, the proper conduct born of devotion. Alas! Even our own countrymen, after all these years, have failed to fathom the intent of what Śrīman Mahāprabhu truly proclaimed. The words of the Gauḍīya Maṭha remain an undeciphered scripture to them. At best, they wander helplessly through barren speculations concerning tabula rasa or impersonalism, and exhausted, fall silent.
That the divine principle (bhagavat-tattva) cannot be grasped through intellectualism—this point Brahmacārī-jī has clearly understood. The śruti affirms:
“nāyam ātmā pravacanena labhyo
na medhayā na bahunā śrutena,
yam evaiṣa vṛṇute tena labhyas
tasyaiṣa ātmā vivṛṇute tanūṁ svām.”
(Kaṭha Upaniṣad 1.2.23)
“This Self is not attained by eloquence, nor by intelligence, nor by much learning. Only to him whom He chooses does the Self reveal His own form.”
Epistemology (jñāna-mīmāṁsā) utterly fails when one seeks to ascend to Truth by the āroha-panthā, the inductive path. The consciousness of the world is bound within the current of pratyakṣa (direct perception), parokṣa (inferred or indirect knowledge), and aparokṣa (supra-sensory intuition); yet beyond all these lies the realm of adhokṣaja, the supramundane, which remains entirely outside their cognitive reach.
‘Pratyakṣa’ denotes that which one perceives through one’s own senses; ‘parokṣa’ is belief based upon the sensory perception of others; and ‘aparokṣa’—neither directly nor indirectly known—is referenced by terms such as tabula rasa, the Absolute, or Brahman. However, the final culmination of aparokṣa-vicāra is invariably nirviśeṣa-vāda—impersonalism.
The ‘Absolute’ of the impersonalists is not our ‘Absolute’. Our Absolute is none other than the sweet flute-bearing Śyāmasundara, the son of Vraja’s king Nanda Mahārāja—the Brajendra-nandana. No literature of any other school of philosophy even have hint at this reality.
The Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, employing the word adhokṣaja, directs us to that very Absolute:
bhakti-yogena manasi samyak praṇihite ’male
apaśyat puruṣaṁ pūrṇaṁ māyāṁ ca tad-apāśrayām
vayaṁ sammohito jīva ātmānaṁ tri-guṇātmakam
Paro ’pi manute ’narthaṁ tat-kṛtaṁ cābhipadyate।
anarthopaśamaṁ sākṣād bhakti-yogam adhokṣaje
lokasyājānato vidvāṁś cakre sātvata-saṁhitām।
yasyāṁ vai śrūyamāṇāyāṁ kṛṣṇe parama-pūruṣe
Bhaktir utpadyate puṁsāṁ śoka-moha-bhayāpahā॥ (Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 1.7.4–7)
“Through bhakti-yoga, when the mind was rendered pure and concentrated, he beheld the Supreme Person (puruṣaṁ pūrṇam) and also His illusory energy, which stands dependent upon Him. The jīva, bewildered by māyā, perceives himself as composed of the three guṇas, although in truth he is transcendental. Thus, misled, he accepts the unreal as reality. The cessation of all these anarthas (unwanted miseries) is possible only through bhakti-yoga unto the adhokṣaja (transcendent Lord). The wise sage Vyāsa, seeing the ignorance of the people, thus composed the Sātvata-saṁhitā (Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam). By merely hearing this work concerning Kṛṣṇa, the Supreme Person, bhakti arises in the hearts of men—dispersing grief, delusion, and fear.”
The true import of bhakti remains unknown even today to the people of Bengal. That exceedingly simple poetic utterance of Śrīla Narottama Ṭhākura Mahāśaya—
“Karma-kāṇḍa, jñāna-kāṇḍa, sakali viṣera bhāṇḍa, amṛta baliyā jebā khāya। nānā yoni bhrami’ mare, kadarya bhakṣaṇa kare, tāṅra janma adhaḥ-pāte yāya॥”
—whose purport, composed in such plain Bengali payār metre, ought to be understandable even to one with a modest elementary knowledge of the Bengali language, has tragically eluded even the most erudite scholars. This is indeed a matter of profound lamentation.
Except for the followers of the unalloyed path of devotion—the Devotional School, or akapaṭa-bhakti-mārga—none from any other philosophical tradition can truly grasp what bhakti actually is. All other streams of rational or speculative thought intrude only to eclipse their intellect, veiling it in a fog of conceptual complexity.
Even renowned Vedāntic scholars, though claiming deep understanding, have failed to discern the essential direction toward which Vedānta actually points. And for this very reason, Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu, while offering instruction to the proud Vedāntists such as Prakāśānanda Sarasvatī and his followers, humbly revealed His own simplicity and helplessness before them, declaring:
“mūrkha tumi, tomāra nāhi Vedānta-adhikāra।
kṛṣṇa-mantra japa sadā—ei mantra sāra॥
kṛṣṇa-mantra haite haibe saṁsāra-mocana।
Kṛṣṇa-nāma haite pābe Kṛṣṇera caraṇa॥”
In this way, my Gurudeva once instructed me:
“You are a fool. You have no entitlement to enter into the intricacies of Vedānta. So simply chant the Kṛṣṇa-mantra at all times—this alone is the quintessence of all mantras. It is by chanting the Kṛṣṇa-mantra that liberation from the cycle of birth and death is attained, And by chanting Kṛṣṇa’s holy name, you shall receive the shelter of His divine lotus feet.”