Académique Documents
Professionnel Documents
Culture Documents
the latter discussion Rpa Kavirja and Mukundadsa developed some subtle distinctions and terminology to better characterize different stages in the
unfolding of rga-bhakti.
Who were Mukundadsa and Rpa Kavirja? We fortunately have several texts that provide us with some biographical information on them. One
of the most reliable of these texts is the Narottama-vilsa (Nv) written in
the 18th century by Narahari Cakravartin whose other works include the
Bhakti-ratnkara. Narahari's works are generally conscientious accounts of
the history of the sect after the deaths of Caitanya and his close associates.
Mukunda and Rpa Kavirja are discussed in an appendix of the Nv entitled
"Introduction to the Author."1 Another source of information on Mukunda is
a manuscript entitled, Concerning Rpa Gosvmin and Kavirja Gosvmin, in
the Phab manuscript collection2 which tells the story of how Mukunda
came to Vndvana and became a disciple of Kadsa Kavirja. A second
version of Mukunda's story which differs in a few details from the Phab
one is found in the Sahajiy work, the Vivarta-vilsa (Vv) by Akicanadsa.3
Mukundadsa, strangely enough, was neither a Bengali nor a South Indian, the two main groups from which members of the Caitanya Vaiava
community usually came. He was the son of a wealthy merchant of Multan
near Lahore in the Punjab. He was a brhmaa according to the Nv and the
Vv informs us that he came to his teacher, Kadsa Kavirja, later than
Kadsa's other disciples, probably when Kadsa Kavirja was near
the end of his life.4 The Phab ms. tells us that one day, the youthful Mukunda outfitted a fleet of boats with goods and, like most merchants
of his time, set off on a trading trip. On the way, his boats were struck by a
storm in the vicinity of Vndvana. He landed and went to pay his respect to
the deities enshrined there: Madanamohana, Gopntha and Govinda. According to this account, he became filled with devotional feelings when he
saw Govindaj. Kadsa Kavirja was present at the time and spoke to him
about Ka-bhakti and Mukunda became converted to Caitanya Vaiavism. He became a disciple of Kadsa Kavirja, gave away all the goods
in his boats to the Vaiavas of Vndvana and spent the rest of his life at
Rdhkua in Vraja (Vndvana and its surrounding regions). He studied
all the bhakti texts under Kadsa and became his favorite disciple. Just
before Kadsa died he passed on to Mukundadsa the worship of the Govardhana il (a piece of stone from the sacred mountain of Govardhana in
1 Narahari Cakravartin, Narottama-vilsa (Nv), pp. 200-206. (Muridabda: Rdhramaa
Press, 1894 ?)
2 Cited and summarized in Caitanya-parikara by Ravndrantha Miti, p. 475. and identified
in his bibliography as Phab manuscript number 195. (Calcutta: Bookland Private Ltd., ?)
3 Akicanadsa, Vivarta-vilsa (Vv), pp. 29-33. (Kalikt: Trcanda Dsa Sons, ?)
4 ibid., p. 30.
pears to be no evidence for the contention that Rpa Kavirja was a disciple
of Hemalat hkur, daughter of rnivscrya. According to the Nv,
Rpa Kavirja accompanied his teacher, Kacaraa, to Vraja and visited
all of the places of Ka's ll. He met Mukunda at Rdhkua and when
Kacaraa returned to Bengal, Rpa Kavirja, with the permission of his
teacher, remained in Vraja to study the Bhgavata and other bhakti texts with
Mukundadsa. During his residence at Rdhkua Rpa Kavirja became
an important and respected member of the community, and yet, the Nv tells
us, a few days after Mukunda's death he ran amok.
During the last days of his life, Mukunda was cared for by the granddaughter of Gagnryaa Cakravartin, Kapriy hkur. The Nv
says that she cured him of a serious case of dysentery and administered to
him with such affection that she soon became his favorite. As a result of his
affection he turned over the service of Raghunthadsa's il to her when
he was approaching death.9 Though she, too, was a respected member of
the community of Rdhkua, the Nv describes an incident that occurred
between her and Rpa Kavirja. Rpa Kavirja used to attend daily readings of the Bhgavata at Rdhkua as did most of the devotees who lived
there. One day, Rpa Kavirja failed to show respect to Kapriy Dev
and sharply criticized her for continuing to utter the names of Ka during
the reading. He asked her how one could do two things at once. How could
she pay attention to the recitation of the names of Ka and listen to the
Bhgavata also? She replied that she had no control over her tongue which
was accustomed to repeating constantly Ka's names and that her habit
did not interfere with listening to the reading. This reply angered Rpa
Kavirja which, according to the Nv, was the beginning of his downfall, the
symptoms of which were the fabrication of his own philosophy and his eventual departure from Vraja for Orissa where he died of leprosy and became
a ghost. That, the text warns us, is the result of committing an offense to
a devotee.10 Two of Rpa Kavirja's works have survived and, in spite of
his eventual isolation from the rest of the Caitanya Vaiava community, he
successfully established a following that has survived until the present day.
His surviving works are the Sra-sagraha and the Rgnug-vivtti.11
From these details of the lives of Rpa Kavirja and his teacher, Mukunda,
and the evidence of their surviving works we can form a general idea of the
points of conflict that arose between them and other members of the Caitanya tradition. It is interesting to note that though Mukundadsa is highly
9 Nv,
pp. 204-5.
pp. 205-7
11 Rpa Kavirja, Sra-sagraha, ed. by Krishnagopal Goswami Sastri (Calcutta: University
of Calcutta, 1949) and Rgnug-vivtti, ed. by Kadsa Bbj (Kusumasarovara: Kadsa
Bb, ? ).
10 ibid.,
praised in the Nv, his student, Rpa Kavirja, is not. One must be wary,
however, of the Nv's representation of the incident involving Rpa Kavirja
and Kapriy Dev. Though the text is, generally speaking, historically
reliable, sometimes the sectarian biases of its author intrude into the narrative, in addition to which he wrote perhaps three quarters of a century after
the incident he describes. Nevertheless, a few important points emerge.
Rpa Kavirja, and presumably Mukunda too, very strongly favored the
extra-marital interpretation of the relationship between Rdh and Ka.
Jva Gosvmin's extensive argumentation against it in his commentary on
Rpa Gosvmin's Ujjvala-nlamai, however, makes it evident that the extramarital interpretation was already exerting influence in the last half of the
16th century. Though Jva takes special care to refute it in several parts
of his commentary, he leaves a great deal of doubt about his own views
by ending an important passage, in which he argues in favor of the marital
interpretation, with an enigmatic verse. The verse is as follows:
svecchay likhita kicitkicidatra parecchay|
yatprvparasambandha tatprvamapara param||12
Some of this was written by my own desire and some by the
desire of another. Since there is a succession of former and latter
(between the two) that (my opinion) is the former and the other
is the latter.
Though the verse is extremely laconic and unclear, it is lends itself to the
interpretation that Jva supported the marital point of view at the instance of
someone else and that he himself favored the extra-marital viewpoint, since,
in his commentary, he states the case of the extra-marital interpretation first,
as the prva-paka, and then argues against it, as was the common procedure
in polemical discussions of this sort. Some suspect this verse, of course, of
being an interpolation, but all the manuscripts seem to contain it.
Jva's defense of the marital relationship and his portrayal of it in his literary works, the Mdhava-mahotsava and Gopla-camp, gave the Vaiava
community both in Vndvana and Bengal a great deal of difficulty. Yadunandana, in his 17th century Bengali work called the Karnanda, mentions a
letter written to Jva by Rmacandra Kavirja, Govindadsa and Narottamadsa asking him which interpretation he accepted. Jva's reply is included in the text and is oddly evasive. He says that his opinion is the same
as that of his student, rnivscrya. Whatever rnivsa has taught, that
12 Jva Gosvmin, Locana-rocan, on Rpa's Ujjvala-nlamai, 1.21, p.
Haridsa arman, 1954)
8.
(Vndvana:
ciples of) Kavirja Gosvm.19 The relationship between Kapriy Dev and
Mukunda is presented in the Nv as that of a daughter for a father, and there
was probably a 20 or 30 year difference in their ages. The relationship between Rpa Kavirja and Kapriy Dev, however, was much more complex. They were approximately the same age and both lived at Rdhkua
at the same time. In addition, they both were involved with Mukunda in
their own ways and Kapriy was the granddaughter of Rpa Kavirja's
previous teacher's teacher, Gagnryaa Cakravartin. Their exchange
during the reading of the Bhgavata can be reasonably interpreted as an
attempt by Rpa Kavirja to win Kapriy over to his point of view. The
recitation of the name of Ka can be taken, in this context, as vaidhi bhakti
(enjoined devotion) and listening to the Bhgavata as rga-bhakti (passionate
devotion). Rpa Kavirja was telling Kapriy that she could not practice
vaidhi with her physical body and rga with her mental body at the same
time. The implication is that she should practice rga with both her physical body and mental body. Her reply is very interesting; she said essentially
that she was not doing two things at once. Her tongue recited the names
of Ka merely out of habit while her heart was in the reading of the Bhgavata. This may be taken as the standard response of the tradition to the
problem. The physical body continues as it always has, subject to the rules
that apply to it, while the heart is turned to the separate reality of the ll
of Ka and Rdh, in which, in one's perfected identity or mental body,
one seeks to assume the functions of one's own eternal service to Rdh and
Ka.
The clash between Rpa Kavirja and Mukunda and other elements of
the tradition climaxed long after their deaths. In the second half of the 17th
century, during the reign of Aurangzeb, a tremendous uneasiness developed
in the Vaiava community in Vndvana. King Mnasiha of Amber, a
favorite of Emperor Akbar, had built a fabulous temple for the sect's main
deity Govinda and there was fear that Akbar's great grandson, Aurangzeb,
would attack it and desecrate it. In a letter dated 1671, King Rmasiha
of Amber, advised a Vaiava named Vimaladsa to find a safe place, away
from the royal highway, for Govindaj.20 It is thought that the deity was
moved a short time later to Rdhkua and then to a village called Km
were Govindaj was being worshipped in 1674. By 1717 Govinda was in the
city of Jayapura under the direct care of King Sewai Jayasiha II.
The conclusion to the controversy initiated by Rpa Kavirja and carried on by his and Mukunda's disciples was reached with the ascendancy
of the authority of the King of Jayapura in religious matters pertaining to
19 Cited
20 Asmakumra
three terms, which are well attested in the early post-Caitanya Sahajiy texts, appear
to have developed out of Rpa Kavirja's taastha, sdhaka and siddha distinctions. See pp. 7779 in his Sra-sagraha. (Calcutta: University of Calcutta, 1949)
25 Akicanadsa, Vivarta-vilsa (Vv), pp. 108-9. (Kalikt: Trcanda Dsa and Sons, ?)
26 Haridsa Cakravart, Bhakta-mlik o bhakti-candrik, pp. i-ii. (Navadvpa: Prabhvat
Dev, 1391 [1975])
10
11