The way to find the real ‘world’ is not merely to measure and observe what is outside us, but to discover our own inner ground.
Thomas Merton , Choosing to Love the World
One of the greatest obstacle to our flourishing in spiritual life is our attachment to the opposition between subject and object.
This mental pair is as old as Western thought. Its heavy burden places a screen between us and our understanding of the simple unity of the world, the same unity that is the foundation of Bhakti.
Bhakti is the name of a spiritual path that stands apart from all others. Rather than simply offering a new teaching to replace an old one, it invites us into an entirely new way of understanding and experiencing spirituality.
When Caitanya Mahāprabhu appeared in 1486, Vedic philosophy had become entangled inits own infinity. Though the scriptures consistently affirm that the Divine is composed of infinite being, consciousness and bliss, the seeker’s actual experience remained limited—confined to the information they could access and comprehend through writings and teachings of the brāhmaṇa class. We were finite beings tragically attracted to infinite life. Divine perfection was promised, but only through in impersonal books, lifeless rituals, and the teaching of others finite beings.
O Lord of the universe! I do not want wealth, followers or vain companions, abeautiful woman or the enjoyment of beautiful poetry! All I want is causelessdevotion unto You, birth after birth!
Śrī Śikṣāṣṭakam, Verse 4
Witnesses tell us that as a young man, Lord Caitanya—then known by his childhood name, Vishvambhara—was devoted to Vedic learning. Even at this young age, he distinguished himself as a brilliant scholar.
But around the age of 22 a new chapter came. He travelled from his birthplace in Navadvīpa to Gayā, where he met and took initiation from Īśvara Purī. When he returned to his hometown shortly afterward, he was transformed. His new life became centred around one activity: inspiring devotees by leading harināma-saṅkīrtana—the devotional chanting of the name of God.
The desire to gratify one’s own senses is kāma [lust], but the desire to please the senses of Lord Kṛṣṇa is prema [love].
Caitanya Caṛitāmṛta Ādi-Līla 4.165
If, as we learn, prema—the perfect love of God—is the highest form of being, the ultimate goal, and the very meaning of our lives, how are we to understand the impure, everyday desires we so often feel?
In addition to the many gifts and virtues inherited from the Abrahamic religions, traditions of spiritual life have long carried the burden of asceticism—the practice of renouncing worldly pleasures. The assumed nobility of austerities such as fasting, celibacy, vows of poverty, and solitude runs deep in Western religious practice, and finds its own distinct forms in Eastern traditions as well.
śṛńgāra [love, pleasure or delight that emerges between lovers, ornamentation]
In the poems and prayers of the Bhakti tradition, śṛńgāra leads a sweet yet mysterious double-life.
On the one hand, in the spiritual tradition where jewels, trimmings, and decorations meet our eyes every day, śṛńgāra is ornamentation. On the other hand, through the Bhakti practice of serving and nurturing divine love (prema), śṛńgāra refers to the deepest and sweetest emotion experienced by the heart.
How is this double-meaning possible? Only in the practice of Bhakti.
In the most evolved expressions of this practice, the two meanings of śṛńgāra shift seamlessly. The brilliant verses of Viśvanātha Cakravartī Ṭhākura, for example, move quickly from one meaning to the other.
Of all the ideas that guide us in devotional practice, bhāva and rasa are the most subtle, profound, and intimate. They describe the two purest functions of the heart: the way our heart relates to the world in its purest form (bhāva) and the flavour of the soul’s pure and natural love for the Divine (rasa).
The best English translation of ‘bhāva’ is perhaps ‘mood’. And yet there is an important difference between our everyday mood and our spiritual mood (bhāva).
In material consciousness, our mood refers to our general emotional state of mind, temperament, or attitude. Our material mood influences the temporary emotions we experience, which are shaped by the temporary conditions of the material world, our thoughts, or our bodies. Thus we speak of being in a ‘good’ mood (cheerful, excited, calm) and being in a ‘bad’ mood (grumpy, gloomy, anxious), all of which are based on our relation with our bodies and our minds.
It’s the place where mundane love meets divine love, where we reach from our material bodies to our spiritual.
If, as we believe, our souls are made of a tiny drop of the ocean of the soul of God, then the love we feel, mundane or magnificent, is an expression of the divine love in us.
We all carry this love. We all experience this love. And yet we struggle to identify ourselves with it. We struggle to understand and realise that, at the bottom, we are nothing else but this love.
Bhakti philosophy teaches that the material energy that shapes our daily lives (māyā-śakti) is there by purpose. The struggle against our material attachments is our journey of devotion. Māyā-śakti guides us. It gently loosens the guṇas, the ropes of our material attachments, all in the right time, the right way, with right intensity and feeling. Māyā-śakti is a school for lovers, taking us tenderly by the hand and guiding us back to ourselves, to our svarūpa, our soul identity, as servants of Rādhā, the servant of love for God (prema).
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).
