(Translated from Weekly Gauḍīya Patrikā, Volume 15, Issue 10) Year 1935
The realms of karma-kāṇḍa and jñāna-kāṇḍa—ritualistic piety and speculative knowledge—are verily reservoirs of poison. That these paths are, in fact, detrimental to the true cause of transcendental upliftment is something the people of this world are still unable to grasp. Yet, this very truth was so simply and clearly expressed in the sacred work of Śrīla NarottamaṬhākura Mahāśaya—Prārthanā and Prema-bhakti Candrikā—a text whose circulation and number of editions possibly surpass that of any other work in the Bengali literary canon. And still, I ask—among the numerous men of letters (academicians) in Bengal, among the many esteemed professors—have they ever made even a slight effort to penetrate the real meaning of even this one verse from that holy book? I pose this question not only to them, but to their teachers as well—have they ever sincerely attempted to understand the purport of this one bengali payār (devotional couplet)?
Both jñāna and karma— are the religions of impostors. The path of karma culminates in a craving for the perishable enjoyment of material fruits; and the path of jñāna, under the garb of bravery of False renunciation, seeks shelter in kevalādvaita-vāda, striving to dissolve all distinctions—whether internal, of the same kind, or of differing kinds (svagata, sajātiya, vijātiya)—only to ultimately embrace self-annihilation in the pursuit of the impersonal nirbheda-brahma. That is the tragic end of their endeavor.
Those who remain absorbed in deliberations concerning the auspiciousness or inauspiciousness of this outer covering—this skin-bound shell of the body—are destined to attain nothing but inauspiciousness. Their fate is foretold in words such as: “nānā yoni bhrami’ mare, kadarya bhakṣaṇa kare”—“wandering through countless wombs, they die, consuming what is vile.”
In the proclamation: “hṛṣīke govinda-sevā, nā pūjiba devī-deva”—“I shall engage all my senses in the service of Govinda; I shall not worship the various goddesses and demigods”—a thunderous refutation of henotheism (that heretical Hindu inclination of acknowledging many gods while favoring one as supreme) has been delivered. Yet, even today, this remains beyond the grasp of those who proudly parade as ‘paṇḍitas’.
And those who call themselves followers of Mahāprabhu, yet invoke or embrace the mixed moods of karma and jñāna, shall forever remain barred from entering even a single word or sentiment truly spoken by Mahāprabhu. They stand forever estranged from His heart.
The range of the ordinary human intellect extends only up to the domains of pratyakṣa (direct perception), parokṣa (inferential or mediated knowledge), and at best aparokṣa (self-realized intuitive cognition).
Some time ago, in Mathurā, I had the occasion to meet a gentleman from the Dayānandī school—he was serving as the curator of the Mathurā Museum. When the topic of the Adhokṣaja (He who lies beyond the grasp of the senses and intellect) arose, he paused, contemplated for a moment, and then inquired, “Can you show Him in the Vedas?”
We ask : But the Vedas have innumerable branches—ananta-śākhā. With our paltry and constricted vision, whatever fragment we manage to glimpse from that divine ocean, we audaciously assume it to be the summary of whole! But tell me, where is the singed tāmrapatra (manuscript)—the etched proclamation—that validates such a claim? By what authority do we declare a part as the whole? To whom does the Veda reveal itself?
“yasya deve parā bhaktir yathā deve tathā gurau
tasyaite kathitā hy arthāḥ prakāśante mahātmanaḥ”
—Is this not the very voice of śruti?
Only to that mahātmā—who has unflinching devotion unto the Lord and unto the Guru in equal measure—do the inner meanings of the Vedas unveil themselves.
But the masses? —“anucanāmāni gaṇaḥ—avidyāyām antare vartamānāḥ svayaṁ dhīrāḥ paṇḍitaṁ manyamānāḥ”—These men, reciters of the mantras, dwell entrenched in avidyā (nescience). Though they imagine themselves to be wise, calling themselves learned and discerning, in truth, they wander perpetually within the dense fog of ignorance. Can such people truly comprehend the essence of the Veda?
Only the sūrigaṇa—the seers of divine insight—behold eternally the parama-pada (supreme abode) of Lord Viṣṇu. But then arises the question—who indeed are these sūrigaṇa?
They are not those who, turning away from the nectarean bhāgavata-rasa—that ambrosial essence which has issued forth from the mouth of Śrī Śukadeva and is the ripened fruit of the nigama-kalpataru (the wish-fulfilling tree of the Veda)—seek instead to trace the truths of the Veda and Vedānta through dry rationalism and sensory-bound logic.
Such persons, having no real acquaintance with the heart of Vedic revelation, attempt to imprison the infinite science of bhagavat-tattva within the constricted containers of conceptual reason and academic taxonomy.
In doing so, they labor to bind the Supreme Reality within the morphology of mundane time and space—and thus, they are forever deprived of the direct encounter with His ontological aspect, that is, His eternal, self-effulgent, and wholly transcendental being.
It is precisely to rebuke such profound foolishness of humankind that the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, encapsulating the essence (parivṛṁhita) of the vedārtha (meaning of the Veda), repeatedly invokes the term adhokṣaja in its exposition. The essence of the subject is entirely neglected; instead, superficial inquiries dominate like: “Did the Bhāgavatam arise before the Vedas or after? If after, can it still be authoritative?” Such sterile deliberations are the preoccupation only of those who have long been, and shall ever remain, bereft of the kṛpā of the Bhagvān. The Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam is not a creation of human intellect. It exists eternally—like a thunderbolt of nectar—striking down as punishment upon the misdirected intellect (durmedhā) of fallen humanity. Its manifest and unmanifest līlās are but varied unfoldments of its eternal nature. Just as Lord Nṛsiṁhadeva emerged from within a pillar, yet the pillar itself is not to be considered His origin, so too, though the Bhāgavatam may have externally appeared in a linguistic style traceable to the post-Vedic epoch (prāg-vaidika-yuga), it is utterly absurd—and indeed, an act of envious malice—to label it “modern” and thereby “unauthoritative.” Only the nirmatsara sādhus—the saints devoid of envy—can receive the revelation of the projjhita-kaitava paramadharma (the supreme religion, purged of all cheating processes) that shines forth from Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam in their hearts.