108 words for Gurudev – Page 2

What is rasa?

rasa [juice, nectar, transcendental taste]

Bhakti Yoga begins and ends with feelings. There is no other pure source of meaning and guidance. The path of Bhakti, through teaching of guru or others is always to find and follow the narrow path of pure feeling.

Therefore the guiding question is not ‘what should I feel?’ It is rather ‘what is this that I feel and where does it lead me?’ Thought will never lead to feeling, feeling will lead to thought and then transcend it.

In the ‘Southern Section’ of Bhakti Rasāmṛta Sindhu, Rūpa Gosvāmi defines rasa as ‘the indescribable wonderful relish that is beyond the power of human thinking and arises in the pure heart brightened by goodness’ (2.5.132).

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What is a līla?

līla [divine activity, sports, play, pastime]

We cannot know God by his words, only by witnessing his activities. Līla is the name of the activities of God done in order to be understood—and realised—by jīvas

In Vedic philosophy, God’s līla is the way that the truth about the universe can be communicated, not through high and mighty talk, but by frolicking, loving play. The Truth of the universe is a not a word, it is a feeling: love. It cannot, should not, must not be left to cold and hollow words, it must be seen in action, put into play. That is why stories are told of the pastimes of God.

Līlas can be found in religious and spiritual traditions throughout the Indian Sub-continent. The Vedas are filled with tales of divine līlas, from the Ramayana to the Puranas.

Wherever there are līlas, there is a lightness, playfulness, effortless movement, and natural emotion. Līlas are always graceful, joyous, and whimsical. They embody the way that God, the Absolute, effortlessly governs the universe, and the pleasure and happiness he takes in doing so.

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What is śaktī?

śaktī [power, energy, potency]

There is nothing without energy.

There is no heat in the fire, no movement of the water, no light, no sound. Nothing.

Without energy, there is no life in nature, no flowers that grow or trees that reach to the sky, no insects that creep, no animals that roam, no human hearts that pump warm blood through the veins.

Without energy there are no sensations, nothing to smell or taste or touch or see.

Without energy there is no feeling, no tremors of emotion, no sensations of the heart, no sensations that surprise with their appearance, and astonish through their vanishing.

And so without energy there is no soul, there is no life, there is no love.

Love is the name of energy in its highest form. It is energy that is equal to God. The desires we experience, the attractions that seize our senses are the expressions of this love, this divine love, this divinity.

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Inconceivable oneness and difference

acintya-bhedābhe [inconceivable oneness and difference]

‘Realisation’ is the name we give to our understanding of the Divine in the world. Or maybe: our understanding that the world, in all its depth and complexity, is divine.

When we say we have realised something we mean that we see and feel and grasp the reality that lies behind the facts of the world. We understand the origin and the purpose of what we experience and what we feel. It means that we do not observe the facts as facts alone, but as parts of the divine story. We understand that facts have another purpose, maybe many other purposes, and that the hidden energy behind the facts will lift and carry us to places we do not know, if we surrender to it, like clues in a detective novel we have not yet read to the last page.

Srīla Prabhupāda call this way of seeing: ‘science (vijñāna)’, ‘spiritual knowledge’ or ‘wisdom’. It means the understanding of the divine in the mundane, the reality of God.

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What is sevā? II

sevā [service, servitude, hommage, devotion]

In mundane experience sevā, or service, is a common notion. In its simplest form it is the name of a transaction. If I do something for you in exchange for som reward, be it material or immaterial, this called a service.

In material form this reward could be money or perhaps som object of value, or even another service. sevā is often done under material constraints or coercion. We render service under the power of another pressed to do what we otherwise would not do.

But in immaterial form the reward might be some form of recognition, a moral reward, or some kind of immediate satisfaction that only the recognition of another can give.

In the Bhakti tradition sevā is practice. It is service to another at thehighest level. It is the greatest gift the greatest giving of oneself, and therefore the greatest form of spiritual relation. Every spiritual relation is sevā, every sevā is spiritual relation.

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What is a mañjarī?

mañjarī [maidservant, bud, flower]

On the transcendental plane called Goloka Vrindāvan, a mañjarī is a female maidservant of Rādhā. Sheis both a servant of Rādhā but also a friend. She is friend through service and a servant through friendship. She does not serve by obligation or personal gain, but by love. The relation or Rādhā and her mañjarīs is of the most intimate kind, only surpassed by the intimacy of conjugal lovers.

What is an intimate friend? First, an intimate friend is one who has knowledge of her friend, one who shares experiences, who knows the same feelings, the same desires, one who is curious about the same things, who seeks the same things, who loves the same things, who fears the same things.

But an intimate friend is something more. An intimate friend shares not only interests and goals, tastes and preferences. She shares a world, a reality. An intimate friend is one who as the same answer to these questions: what is real? what is true? what is beautiful? and most of all, what is love?

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What is sevā? I

sevā [service, servitude, hommage, devotion]

The word sevā is often translated with the word service. Sevā is indeed service, but in the Bhakti tradition, it is much more.

In everyday experience, service is a common idea. In its most simple form it refers to a transaction: this for that. I do something for your benefit in exchange for something you do or provide for my benefit. There is an action and there is a reward, either material or immaterial. This action is commonly called a service.

In material form the benefit we gain from a service might take the form of money or some other object of value, perhaps even another service. The reward can also take an immaterial form as some kind of recognition or honour, perhaps a moral reward, or some other kind of intangible satisfaction.

Sometimes service refers to action done under material constraints of power. We render service not because we choose, but because we are subject to the power of an other.

In the Bhakti tradition sevā is the highest form of religious practice. It is the most elevated express of devotion, the purest relation to the divine.

In stark contrast to service done in the mundane, everyday mood, sevā in religious practice is action done without the expectation of reward, payment or compensation. It is action take without ego, self-less action. It is action as gift, as generosity, as love.

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