D. Dennis Hudson, Krishna’s Mandala: Bhagavata Religion and Beyond, New Delhi, Oxford, 2010
…Adding opening and closing sections to a text or inserting narratives or what may in origin have been commentarial remarks gradually being integrated into the text, were known procedures….—Romila Thapar, Foreword, p. ix.
Introduction, John Stratton Hawley pp. xiii-xxxiv
….Satvata–samhita, probably the oldest Pancharatra text now extant…..—p. xxiv
….He {D. Dennis Hudson} saw it {Periya Tirumoli 2.8} as recording Pallavamalla’s initiation at the hands of an unnamed Pancaratra Acharya, an act that would have had the effect of purifying him from his past sins….—p. xxiv
…Not everyone who hears the Gita might appreciate this fact—the text could be received at both exoteric and esoteric levels—but {D.} Dennis {Hudson} believed it could be understood as a Pancaratra text in which Arjuna is portrayed as an ideal ruler being taught the foundational meanings of Bhagavata religion and initiated into its ritual fold. In inviting Arjuna to move toward this new level of discipleship, Krishna takes on the role of the Bhagavata acharya, the teacher and in this case the royal preceptor. Dennis went on to propose that the eighteen chapters of the Gita—the acharya’s teachings—may have been imagined as the text befitting an eighteen-day initiation ceremony conducted in the sacrificial arena of the srauta fires in the months of Karttika and Margasirsha. At the moment of initiation, the ruler faces east; Krishna, in his role as the vyuha Vasudeva, faces west toward him, just as he does in a Pancaratra temple such as that of Vaikuntha Perumal. Dennis held that lesser rulers and teachers were intended to mimic this primordial moment (p.xxvii) whenever a ruler was guided by an acharya into becoming an initiate of the Bhagavata dharma.—pp.xxvii-xxviii
…Obviously, significant issues raised by ‘Krishna’s Mandala’ remain unresolved, since the style of analysis Dennis brought to the Gita on the basis of his work in Kanchipuram is fundamentally different from conceptual frameworks that most other scholars have brought to the text. Equally obvious, however, is the fact that Dennis’s approach brought into view vistas that had never been glimpsed by others.—p. xxviii.
…By following Krishna’s command Arjuna had, as the final verse of the Gita proclaims, given up all matters of dharma and taken refuge in Krishna alone—not just in a general sense, but by following his advice and committing this crucial and specific violation of the code of ksatriya chivalry….—p. xxix.
…Madhusudana…name from the act of ‘destroying defiled passion’, that is, purifying the passion of Brahma so that he could proceed to generate the world in the form we know it….—p. xxx.
…Pradyumna, the vyuha whose name means ‘Pre-eminently Might’…..—p. xxx
…When danger strikes, the monkey expects her baby to hold on as the two of them escape; the baby monkey participates in its mother’s saving act. With cats and kittens it is all quite different. The mother scoops up her baby in her mouth and carried it to safety; the kitten does nothing but hang there…..—p. xxxiv.
- Madhrai: The City as Goddess
….disposition (gunam)….—p. 4
…Ankayarkanni: ‘She whose eyes are those of a beautiful carp.’ The name was later rendered in Sanskrit as Minaksi: ‘she whose eyes are those of a fish’….—p. 5
…A goddess with carp eyes transposes these qualities to the divine and stresses the unblinking nature of her gaze, for gods, like fish, do not blink. Probably to symbolize their descent from this carp-eyed goddess with an unblinking gaze that is fertile, nurturing, and protective, the Pandya dynasty used the carp as its emblem from earliest known times.—p. 7
…Rohini, the star Aldebaran in a cluster of six….—p. 7
…Karttikai is the Tamil form of Krttika, the constellation of the Pleiades and ‘mother’ or Rohini….—p. 7
…annal denotes greatness or superiority….—p. 9
The Madrai Pandyas were one of several dynasties claiming descent from Pandu and kinship with the Pandavas of the Mahabharata. Their capital Madurai appears to be a local version of Mathura, known best as the capital of Vasudeva Krsna, the Pandavas’ maternal cross-cousin….—p. 12
…according to the Silpasastra, on sacred space conceived of as a person (vaastu purusa). Lying on ground with his head at the northeast and his feet at the southeast, the building as person (p.16)
Was to face east. Like a body, the house was to be longer than it was wide: the wide door on the east was its mouth, the two niches for lamps were its eyes, the windows were its nasal cavities, the central courtyard was its lungs, and the narrow exit door on the west was, presumably, its anus. That idea of a house, a temple, and a city as a person shaped the way the Pandya’s palace was built two thousand years ago….—pp. 16-17
…wifely faithfulness (Pattini)….—p. 19
…When Netunceliyan’s younger brother from the port of Korkai ascended the throne to renew the lineage and begin the city again, he worshiped Kannaki as part of his own consecration ceremonies and sacrificed one thousand goldsmiths to her in one day.{Cilappatikaram 27. 126-140. Trans. V. R. Ramachandra Dikshitar, (Madras, 1939) 1978, 361-2. 97—p. 22
2 Siva, Minaksi, Visnu, A Popular Myth in Madurai.
…The Tamil Hindu family is patrilineal and usually patrilocal….—p. 41
It is interesting to observe by way of contrast that what is here a living symbol for unity in south India would be lifeless in north India. The cross-cousin marriage custom for south Indian society is expressly forbidden as incest by the dominant kinship system of the north. If a family were to be used by northern Hindu ‘mythic consciousness’ as a symbol of unity among the gods, it would probably be a version of the joint family composed of the male members of a single patrilineage and their wives and children, i.e., in Tamil terms, a kutumbam rather than a kulam. Any representative of the wife’s patrilineage would hold only a peripheral position in the symbol, for in the ritual of marriage she has been given to her husband’s family and her own family has relinquished all claims on her. Her husband’s family is not expected to return a bride in the next generation and the two families tend to maintain formal distance from one another….—p. 42
3 Kanchipuram
…The direction of circumambulation depends on the intent of the visit, most commonly clockwise, the direction signifying emanation of the world and enjoyment of it. Unmarried devotees should walk clockwise, householders and retired meditators should walk both clockwise and counter-clock-wise, the direction of the world’s devolution and emancipation from it; renunciant ascetics should walk only counter-clockwise.—p. 59
4 Vraja among the Tamils. Bhagavatas in Early South India.
…the judgment in the Laws of Manu (10.44) (p.63) about the non-Aryan Yavanas, Dravidas, and Colas: due to a neglect of Vedic rites, they possessed ksatriya natures in sudra bodies.—pp. 63-64
The sudra status of such early Krsna devotees raises an important question about the religion’s spread. As taught in the Bhagavad–gita, the Bhagavata dharma assumes the authority of Veda, yet Veda does not allow non-Aryans direct access to the mantras that are crucial to its worship. Given that limitation, how could non-Aryans be part of such a Vedic-based religion?
The answer, I think, lies with Bhagavata teaching priests, or acaryas. They believed themselves to be in the possession of rites ‘newly’ revealed expressly to make Vedic knowledge relevant to everyone. In their view, the Bhagavata dharma was ancient teaching from the Bhagavan himself that had grown old and weak and that was then revivified for the Kali Yuga, the age when defiled passion grows stronger as the capacity to known weakens….—p. 64
…Maturai, the name of the Pandya capital, is a Tamil form of Mathura, and later Krsna devotees distinguished the ‘southern Mathura’ (ten maturai) from the ‘northern Mathura’ (vata maturai). The fact that a Dravida dynasty claiming Lunar descent from Pandu of the Mahabharata had named its capital ‘Mathura’ by the third century BCE suggests that the Krsna story had been involved in the dynasty’s self-understanding right from the beginning.—p. 66
…But when he appeared as Gopalan to the gopis, he took the tamasika lust they directed to him and turned it into sattvika love (priti, prema; see Bhagavata Purana 10.22.26; 23.32. 29.15-16; 32.17-22). In both cases, the use of lust(kama) to achieve opposite goals suggests that the stories are using ‘language in the manner of twilight ‘ (samdhya–bhasa) to describe prayogic rites: Mohini signifies the instrumental use of lust in sadhana to gain tejas for the sake of a long and prosperous life (amrta), and Krsna’s bodily stimulation of the gopis signifies rites that elicited lust in the gross body (sthula sarira) only to cook it, like grain, so that it could no longer ‘germinate’ as seed. Such desire could then be purified in the subtle body (sukisma sarira).—p. 67
…enstatic consciousness (Samadhi)….—p. 68
Kovalan and Kannaki …were taken by the cowherd woman Matari to her residence…. (p.71) … Matari…then identified each girl with a note in the seven-notes scale (Sa, Ri, Ga, Ma, Pa, Dha, Ni)….—p. 72
The group then sang and danced exploits of Krsna, Balarama, and Pinnai. Among them, a three-stanza sequence (Chilappatikaram 17.29-31) gave the Bhagavata view of Tamil kingship, which was the Vasudeva krsna acted as or through the rulers: The Pandya king was said to be Krsna in Gokula, the Cola king was said to be Krsna with the discus, and the Cera king was said to be Krsna who churned the ocean. All three identities refer to stories in the esoteric Books 7-10 of the Bhagavata Purana. The songs ended with the statement, ‘Tongues are not tongues that haven’t uttered the name “Narayana”’,{The Cilappatikaram of Ilanko Atikal: An Epic of South India, tr. By R. Parthasarathy, (New York: Columbia University Press, 1993), p. 178} 22 an apparent allusion to the eight-syllable mantra, Om namo narayanaya…..—p. 72
The name ‘Velalan’ for the others may be explained as ‘he who possesses the abundance (velaanmai) that comes through sacrifice (velvu) motivated by desire (vedl)’….{Dandapani Swamikal [of Tiruvamattur], Sattiya Suttiram & Sattiya Vacakam (Published during Arulmiku. Santalinga Swamikal Gurupujai Vila at Palani-Kattaiccinampatti by A. Palaniveluttevar, 1971). [the page number from this book is not given by the author—db]….—p. 73
… ‘The Long Bardic Praise of a Donar’ (Perumpanarruppatai)….—p. 74
… ‘Man-lion initiation’ (narasimha–diksa) as taught in the Sattva–samhita…..rite purifies anyone of any caste, like the ‘Sudra’ emperor Pallavamalla, and thereby qualifies him or her to receive the three rites of consecration (diksa–traya) also taught in the Satavata–samhita…..—p. 78
…the four types of householder Bhagavatas that Krsna spelled out in Bhagavad-gita 12.6.12 in descending hierarchical order: First, the sant whose mind dwells on him alone; second, the yogi who seeks to control the mind; third, the ritualist who performs rites for him alone; and fourth, the refugee who renounces the fruit of any rite. Among them, the status of refugee represents where every Bhagavata begins….—p. 80
A refugee (prapanna)….—p. 80
Hiranyakasipu means ‘gold-covering’….—p. 82
5 The Initiation of the Emperor
…The Three Cities symbolize the three defilements (mumalam) that obscure the individual jiva and keep it embodied within samsara (anavam, kanma, maya). In the Saiva Agama, their destruction is the goal, but here in the Pancaratra Agama their destruction is only the beginning….—p. 99
7 Dating the Srimad Bhagavata Purana
…Pancaratra Agama. That Agama possessed rites that would ‘purify’ anyone stained by defilement of birth or action, qualifying (p.125) them thereafter to sponsor and participate in mantra rites based on the Veda….—pp. 125-26
…the coins issued by the Yavana king Agathocles in the second century BCE, and for the Garuda pillar donated by the Yavana ambassador, Heliodorus, at a Bhagavata temple in Vidisa in the second century BCE. They also account for the worship of Krishna and Balarama in Tamil courts from the early centuries BCE and CE.—p. 135
8 The ‘Barley-Corn’ Pattern of Bhagavad-Gita 12-16
…Purusha Narayana may be glossed to mean ‘the person (purusa) who is the dwelling place and refuge (ayana) of man (nara)’….—p. 139
9 Arjuna’s Sin The Bhagavad-Gita in Its Epic Context.
Obviously, Arjuna was not going to resolve his problem easily. If he fought and destroyed the family he would sin; if he did not fight he would be immoral and sin; yet to follow Krishna’s advice and fight without concern for the results meant becoming more than a warrior, for it meant going through and beyond the very fabric of being human. Krishna made that fact clear whenever he or Arjuna used the word papam in the following chapters.—p. 155
Arjuna’s dilemma is thus the result of his material desire. Whether from the desire not to fight to avoid destroying the family order, or from the desire to fight and win the righteous goal, he will bring sin upon himself. Moreover, as he feared, the sin of destroying the family will bring about his own destruction in this life and horrible pains of purgation in the next (1.44). Significantly, Krishna never denied that he was right, though he went on to explain a way to avoid those consequences.
Sin, Krishna explained, destroys both unified wisdom and discriminative knowledge (jnana–vijnana). Arjuna can destroy it once he has mastered his senses (3.41). Mastering his senses means mastering the desire that occupies them, because sin is generated by desire. Once he has slain desire and therefore its sin, Arjuna can then reach the Self that lies beyond his intellect (3.42-43).—p. 156
At thes in the discussion, Krishna did not offer to remove the sin Arjuna wold generate, because that would solve his problem only temporarily. After all, as he pointed out in chapter nine, people who know the three Vedas, drink soma, and are freed of sin attain Indra’s realm after addressing desiderative sacrifices to him as Vasudeva. Yet eventually even those sinless beings are reborn into the realm of mortality because desire for the desirable (kama kamah) realm of heaven had been their motivation (9.20-21)….
A permanent solution for Arjuna was to get rid of his desire….—p. 157
Given his circumstances there on the battlefield on the first day of war, all that Arjuna was qualified to be was a Refugee. It was not that he could not intellectually comprehend the nature of reality, because Krishna went on to describe it to him in great detail in chapters thirteen through eighteen. It was rather that Arjuna did not have time to pursue (p.158) the change in status from Refugee to Ritualist, and from Ritualist to Yogin, and finally to ‘wake up’ as a Sant. He had to act now. Was he going to get up off the chariot seat and fight, or not? Was he going to bring on sin by not fulfilling his dharmic role, or was he going to bring on sin by fulfilling it?
In chapter eighteen Krishna finally offered to solve Arjuna’s problem of sin for him when he fought. All he would have to do is depend entirely on his driver and do whatever he said without acting independently from an erroneous understanding of himself:
18:57-60[Here Hopkins gives his own translation I think]
Arujna was made for fighting and by nature would inevitably fight no matter what he thought he had decided to do. As long as he was not a Sant and was not free of his desire he was bound to act according to his nature, even unwillingly. Not only that, the God of gods dwelling inside him would make things happen the way he intended, and he intended the war to take place so that the Kali Yuga would commence:
The Ruler stands in the heart-cavity of all living beings, Arjuna, revolving by creative power (maya) all living beings mounted on the yantra (of samsara) 18:61).—p. 159
The epic encloses the Bhagavad-gita within the narration of Bhisma’s downfall, climaxing in the sixth book entitled the ‘Bhisma parva’. In a surprising narrative move, however, the Bhagavad–gita does not appear as the beginning of that book when the war begins, but later on the tenth day of fighting when Bhisma falls. His downfall was so momentous that Samjaya went to the blind emperor Dhrtarastra to make his first report about the war’s course. Since Bhisma was able to choose the time of his death, the emperor was naturally astounded that he had been felled and wanted a full explanation. Samjaya then recounted the ten days of battle in detail. Only then did he report, word-for-word, the way Krishna had handled Arjuna’s fear of sin on the war’s first day.—p, 161
…Krishna’s way to bring Arjuna back to his promise illustrates his skill as acharya in motivating Arjuna his disciple. On the third and ninth days he got angry at Arjuna and moved to kill Bhisma himself. Krishna’s anger at Arjuna and his willingness to violate his own earlier promise to Arjuna and Duryodhana at Dvaraka not to cary a weapon and fight in the war prompted Arjuna to keep his promise to Krishna. After all, if Arjuna’s faithlessness to his word caused his own friend-charioteer-acharya-God to break his word, he would receive the sin of it. Since Krishna was Vasudeva he would bear Arjuna’s sin as he had promised, but Arjuna, even though he was a son of Indra, could not bear Krishna’s sin. The ruin and enormous pain it would bring him was too much to contemplate. Arjuna therefore kept his word because he desparately needed Krishna to keep his. By skilfully playing on the loving hierarchical relationship between himself as acharya and Arjuna as disciple, Krishna had manipulated Arjuna’s fear of sin to motivate him to be true to his promise and to sin without fear.—p. 163
That irony mirrors the narrative irony in the story of Arjuna from Virata’s court to Bhisma’s downfall. When Arjuna sat down in the chariot at the beginning of the Bhagavad–gita and refused to fight, he resembled prince Uttara, for like him he had refused to fight, although unlike him he did so out of compassion for the family and fear of sin, not out of immature cowardice. Yet by the time Arjuna was standing at the end of the Bhagavad–gita resolved to fight, he was a ‘female’ depending on a male. He was like Amba, because to achieve his goal, Arjuna (the ‘female’) depended on Krishna (the male) in the way Amba (the female) depended on Sikhandin (the ‘male’). When Arjuna stood behind Sikhandin to shoot Bhisma, his ‘female’ dependence on Krishna and his instrumental use of ‘Sikhandin, a male who was a ‘female’, coalesced for that instant of action into a richly complex male-female whole that cut the root of the Kuru family and opened a way for the present Kali Yuga.—p. 166
…As if to illustrate the success of Krishna’s absorption of their sins, none of the sins that killed them had to do with those committed during the war: Draupadi had favoured Arjuna among her five husbands; Sahadeva thought no one was his equal in wisdom; Nakula thought no one was a beautiful as he; Arjuna had said before the war that he would consume all their foes in one day and had not; and Bhima neglected the needs of others whenever he ate (reminding us of those sinful people who cook only for themselves in Bhagavad–gita 3.13).—p. 171
10 Antal Alvar. A Developing Hagiography
…the Vaikhanasa regards itself as ‘Vedic’ and the Pancaratra regards itself as a mixture of ‘Vedic’ and ‘tantric’.—p.175
Tamil tradition has taken her coiled hair, and as her distinguishing mark, because as a Tamil word, Goda (Goda, Kotai) means ‘woman’s hair’ or ‘garland of flower’ tied in the hair, or, metonymically, ‘a woman with a garland in her hair’ But in Sanskrit, Goda means something different: ‘the earth (go) gives (daa)’ or ‘she gives (daa) sacred words (go)’. Those differing Tamil and Sanskrit meanings contributed to the later legend of her life.
…In Bhagavata (p.181) usage, ‘Bhattar’ means ‘lord’ or ‘master’ and is used for Brahmins initiated into temple rites….—pp. 181-82
Visnucittar’s Brahmin caste was Veyar, a low-status group specializing in music rather than in Vedic ritual or scholarship, and he was noted for an ‘enjoyment’ (bhoga) of Krsna he expressed in his own poems…..—p. 182
Areca nuts =paakku….—p. 184
The manner in which she projected her own visualization onto the Madhusudana icon is illustrated by stanza 19 of the poem {Tiruppavai}, where she depicted Krsna and Pinnai lying on a bed of the ‘five finest qualities’ and addressed herself in turn to both of them: (p.184)
While a lamp stands and burns, you stretch yourself out over a smooth bed of the five finest qualities on a frame with tusks for legs, resting and holding on your full blown chest the breasts of the lovely Pinnai with clusters of flowers blooming in her coiled hair—Speak to us, please. And you with those shadowed long eyes, won’t you let your husband awake from sleep even for a moment? Look, can’t you stand a separation even for a second? That’s not your nature, not your way, O my Pavai.
The ‘five finest qualities’ are the elements of matter (prakrti) that correspond to the snake on which Madhusudana reclines in his feigned sleep; the bed signifies the finest level of matter of the macrocosm out of which the ‘causal’ body of the sadhaka has been woven. Pinnai on his breast corresponds to Yoga Nidra who had him under her power until she released the mantra’s potency in the ‘causal’ body consciousness. The gopis standing at the door urging Pinnai to wake Krsna up correspond to Brahma, who appealed to Yoga Nidra to arise and let the Bhagavan’s potency express itself and purify the deepest body of consciousness. For Antal, Krsna was the goal to which the mantra Om Namo Narayanaya leads, for he was, as she said in the first stanza of the poem, ‘Narayana himself’.—pp. 184-85
Through her visualizations, we may suppose, Antal gained a knowledge of herself and of Krsna in a state of consciousness that Gananath Obeyesekere has termed’ hypnomatic’.{Medusa’s Hair: An Essay on Personal Symbol and Religious Experience (Chicago and London, 1981), part five, esp. pp. 180-181.} Out of the psychic condition it generated, which Sudhir Kakar has termed ‘focussed receptivity’, she fashioned that knowledge into poems.{Shamans, Mystics and Doctors: A Psychological Inquiry into India and Its Healing Tradition (Boston, 1983), p. 177} Whether she composed them while in the intense psychic state of dhyana or after she had regained ordinary consciousness is not known. In either case, the artfulness of her poems indicates careful crafting, probably through memory rather than through writing, and it is plausible that she composed them while absorbed in dhyana, so that they would be uttered by her ‘spontaneously’, as later tradition maintained.—p. 186
…Those initiated into the rite abandon their personal names in favour of the titles ‘Sacrificer’ (Yajamaana), ‘Ritualist’ (Adhvaaryu), and ‘Reciter’ (Hotaa) and retain them throughout the ceremonies. They have temporarily ‘become’ those functional roles and act accordingly….—p. 186
…finally, through Krsna’s grace, saw him in all things and all things in him, which is the Bhagavata goal of omniscience (jnana).—p. 190
…According to the Sri Vaisnava doctrine she {Antal} represented the sesa–sesi–bhava developed by Ramanuja—all individuals are completely dependent on the Bhagavan because he is the owner (sesi) and they are the owned (sesa); and since he brings all things out of himself through his own ‘womb’, the entire universe of matter and sentient beings are but dependent modes of his own being, just as the physical body is the dependent ‘garment’ worn by the individual ‘person’ (purusa).—p. 193
…Sri Visnu (‘the pervading actor[visnu] with sovereign kingship [sri]’)….—p. 193
…As Yajnavalkya had told his wife long ago, ‘It is not for the desire (kamaya) of the husband that the husband is dear (priya); it is for the desire (kamaya) of the Self (atman) that the husband is dear (priya)’.{Brhadaranayaka Upanisad 2.4.5.}….—p. 197
11 Antal’s Desire
…Yet few know him, for the blindness of ignorance resides so deeply in consciousness that people normally assume that they and their world center in themselves, not in him. They thus cannot see him, living in a kind of sleep that they mistakenly assume is wakefulness. To counter that ignorance, the Bhagavan Narayana, who is Vasudeva, descends as avatar to awaken people to him, to stimulate a desire for the one who is already within them. Intense desire for him is all that one needs to see him, the tradition insists—‘He desires those who desire him’ (Nacciyar Tirumoli 11.10)-but in the present Kali Yuga, even so simple a thing as desire for God who resides at the center of one’s own consciousness is difficult to generate, and once generated, it is still difficult to pierce through the darkness of the ego to see him.
Narayana’s gracious response to that problem is to use the problem as the solution. Since desire to continue to be who one normally and ignorantly thinks oneself to be is the overwhelmingly dominant force in life, a propulsive thirst at the deepest levels of embodied consciousness in the soul (jiva), the Bhagavan does not destroy that desire, but uses it. He directs it to himself. By embodying himself so that people can experience him through their physical apprehensions—through touching, tasting, smelling, hearing, seeing, and thinking—he then stimulates in those bodies a desire for him. That sets up, of course, a conflict between the desire for him as a sensual object and the desire for any other.
Once he has ‘hooked’ people through their bodies by means of his bodies, he proceeds to eradicate ignorance centered on the ‘I’. Envisioned as battles against demons, he eradicates ignorance within consciousness until all competitive desires are either removed or put in their proper place. Desire for him then takes over as the only propulsive (p.210) thirst; such purified people are now qualified to see God who had been present to them all along as their own Self. As Krsna told Arjuna in Bhagavad–gita 9.29, ‘I am the same in all existing beings, none is despised by me, none is favoured, yet those who experience me because of attachment, they are in me and I am in them’. Those who experience (ye bhajanti) Krsna do so by means of an attachment (bhakti) to him that is generated by a knowledge of themselves and of him that has overcome ordinary ignorant consciousness.—pp. 210-211
…In contrast to the six {63?} Nayanar poets of the Saiva canon, who spanned a period of two hundred or more years, the historian K.V. Raman has noted that the Alvars appear to have lived within a span of three generations in the eighth and ninth centuries.{Prof. of Archaeology and Ancient History, University of Madras, in oral conversation.} ….—p.212
…the Buddhist female adept Sahajayoginicinta of the eighth century, whose Sanskrit text, ‘Realization of Reality through its Bodily Expressions’, has recently been analysed by Miranda Shaw{Passionate Enlightenment (Princeton, 1994), pp. 179-194}….In Shaw’s analysis, the Buddhist female and her male partner visualized themselves as Buddhas when they employed sexual intercourse in sadhana….—p. 217
…Bhagavatas commonly organize the year by beginning it with the month that Krsna (in Bhagavat–gita 10:33) identified as the most auspicious, Margasirsa….—p. 219
…for in Tiruppavai the envisioned gopi had said that when the body, the voice, and the mind foucs on Krsna in worship, all the sins that have come and those waiting to enter the world become ash, ‘like cotton in a fire’. Desire for Krsna is itself purifying.—p. 226
…Suddenly, her {Antal} anger interrupts in the eight stanza:
If I see Govardhana, I’ll grab my fruitless breast by the root, rip it out, and throw it on his chest, and then I’ll be free of my burning. {… Nacciyar Tirumoli, 13:8?}.-p. 230
…And in poem twelve, repeating Antal’s resove of 1.4-5 { Nacciyar Tirumoli}, she insists, ‘They will go into no other mouth than Govinda’s’ (12.4).42—p. 232
42. The word vay can mean ‘mouth’ or ‘door’. Sri Vaisnava acaryas read it to mean ‘dorr’ and interpreted Antal to mean that her breasts will go only into Krsna’s door. That interpretation preserves the erotic meaning that {Friedhelm} Hardy avoided by interpreting her breasts as intended for the mouth of baby Krsna (Viraha–Bhakti: The Early History of Krsna Devotion in South India (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1983), p. 424). I think Antal’s envisioned sexual maturation and erotic focus on the Panguni Uttaram eliminates the theme of nursing the baby Krsna. Her intent here is to give the sexually mature Krsna the pleasure of kissing her breasts and enjoying her whole body.—p. 244
…While the acarya embodies Vasudeva in his heart-louts, the initiate’s body is ritually burned and his or her soul is believed to reside in the acarya’s heart at Vasudeva’s feet. After the body is purified, the soul passes into it from Vasudeva in the acarya’s heart as a ritual rebirth. While the initiate lies beside the acarya with blindfolded eyes (like a new born, with the acarya as the mother), the acarya touches the purified body in six places. After further rites he then touches the initiate’s body four times: from the feet to the knee, from the knee to the navel, from the naval to the heart, and from the heart to the head. Antal’s reference to her belly and breasts corresponds to the navel and the heart…. —noes, 16, p. 240
Singaravelu Mudaliar in Abhithana Chintanami: The Encyclopedia of Tamil Literature [in Tamil] (New Delhi, 1982 [reprint of 1899]….—Notes, 46, p. 245
12 Bathin in Krsna: A Study in Vaisnava Theology.
…The fact that she {Antal} speaks of correct recitation rather than of correct understanding of her poems {Here the reciter of these verses, all thirty without error} as the criterion for receiving the Lord’s grace suggests that the poem itself is meant to serve as a verbal means for approaching Narayana, a means adapted to the intellectual and spiritual limitations of people living in the present age. In relation to the Lord of the Universe we are all like simple gopis; mere correct recitation of Tiruppavai is itself an act of approaching the Lord, and to this act the Lord will respond.—p. 254
Though modern scholarship places Tiruppavai {of Antal} in the ninth century, Sri Vaisnava tradition places it in the ninety-eighth year of the present Kali Yuga, or about 3,000 BC according to our calendar….—p. 254
This Sri Vaisnava doctrine of the relation of the owned to the owner, or of the servant to the master, the sesa–sesi relationship, had been expounded most authoritatively in the eleventh century by the sect’s most important acarya, Ramanuja…..-p. 257
…surrendering oneself to him (prapatti)….—p. 262
…The Lord, according to Sri Vaisnava notions of human weakness and divine grace, is both the goal of human existence (upeya, praapayam) and the means to that goal (upaaya, prapakam). The Lord alone is the means for attaining the Lord and there can be no reliance on one’s own worthiness or ability to attain him. The refugee can, however, rely on the Lord to accept him or her, for it is the duty of the master (sesi) to look after his servant (sesa). This doctrine, obviously, is quite different from doctrines of self-reliance taught by other Indian traditions such as early Buddhism, Jainism, or the Yoga of Patanjali.—p. 262
…The relationship is given by Krishna, not earned by the devotee….—p. 262
This desire, however, is not ordinary erotic desire, for it is a desire for the Lord of the Universe himself. The commentator {Periyavaccan Pillai} points this out in his explanation of the collective nature of the statement, ‘If you’re going to bathe, let us go’: ‘Seclusion is sought when one seeks the experience of something vile, but similarly, company is sought when one seeks something beyond comprehension. Thus they inform their companions.’ The gopis are going together for the bath, for union with Krishna, and in fact are waking each other up for that purpose. This indicates the extraordinary nature of the desire and union involved, for if they were desiring sexual union with an ordinary man each gopi would naturally go off alone and discourage companionship. But union with the Lord who transcends all time, space, and thought is incomprehensible, and such a transcendental goal requires the community of other loves.
This is also a characteristic Sri Vaisnava doctrine: devotees of the Lord require one another, for one cannot gain access to him alone. It (p.262) is not proper to approach him individually and directly; like a king he can be approached only along with others, and then only after first approaching an intercessor. That is why the gopis finally request Nappinnai to wake Krishna up and make him available to them: like the goddess Sri in the supreme realm who must be approached first in order to gain access to Narayana, Nappinnai in Gokula must be approached first, for as Krishna’s cowherd consort she is the mediatrix (purusakara) for the gopis. Love for the Lord, therefore, is not a jealous, exclusive, or possessive love, but a love that reaches out to other lovers of the Supreme Lover and brings them together in his presence.—pp. 262-63
….as the sect {Sri Vaishnava} also teaches, all Selves are most properly understood as female in relation to the Supreme Male, this community of devotees includes all who desire the Lord….—p. 263
…He took the initiative by revealing his identity as Lord of All through performance of superhuman feats, and continues to take the initiative in his personal relations with the gopis. There is no mode of discipline the gopis can perform to attain union with him. All they can do—as a traditional Hindu wife ideally does in relation to her husband-is to make themselves available to him for his own pleasure, no matter (p.263) the intensity of their own desire for pleasure, awaiting his initiative, desiring only to please him. Krishna, in turn, will certainly give himself to them, for that is his nature as a lover.—pp. 263-64
If, however, desire is the only qualification for union with Krishna, what is meant by the austerities and devotional acts the gopis have undertaken as part of the vowed ritual? The commentator {Periyavaccan Pillai} observes that despite the fact that the ritual was undertaken as a pretext, it must not be abandoned by them once access to Krishna is gained but must be adhered to until completed. That is the nature of a vow. But the acts performed as part of it do not produce union with Krishna; the gopis are in no sense to be understood as bringing about the attainment of their goal by doing anything—service of Krishna can only be bestowed by Krishna himself.—p. 264
…He is the Supreme Lover and by doing a little service for those who desire him, he fulfils his own nature. What the gopis can do is to let themselves be served by him if that is his own pleasure. That is their service to him….—p. 265
…the commentator {Periyavaccan Pillai} says, the gopis will in fact cause the experience of Krishna or of the Self to occur in the devotee and will do so by giving these ‘gifts’ and ‘alms’ up to the limit of the recipient to receive them; ‘limit’ refers to the capacity of the student to receive, not to the capacity of the teacher to give. The Commentator also makes clear that the teacher gives this knowledge to the fullest measure possible and is indeed the cause of the experience, and yet having given all the knowledge she possesses does not feel that she has, in fact, done anything at all. Having given such all-important ‘gifts’ and ‘alms’ does not arrogate her own heart, for she sees herself merely as the instrument of the Lord’s activity, as his servant who renders him whatever he desires.—p. 265
No one is inherently fit to be with the Lord—embodied Selves are entangled in the objects of sense, have been without beginning, and the accumulated results of their previous acts so drown them in the ocean of samsara that they do not even want to desire the Lord. Only because he descended and gave the gopis the experience of his beauty and accessibility could they become entangled by him and have desire aroused within them, the desire to be with him, to give him pleasure, to serve him. And this desire which he generates is their only qualification for being with him.
All lovers of the Lord perform ritual acts of worship as part of their service to him, but such ritual acts must not be viewed either as expressing one’s inherent qualification as a person fit to serve him, or as activities through which one becomes qualified to serve him. The desire is all that is needed, and any shift to reliance on one’s own activities as qualifications—such as ritual purifications, sustained meditation, or righteous behaviour—must be guarded against even while they are (p.267) to be practiced….—pp. 267-68
…It was in response to this desire that Krishna ‘bathed’ them with the coolness of union with him, an experience in which all their past faults, and those waiting to begin, became cotton in a fire, burned up, leaving no trace whatsoever.—p. 268
…V. Srinivasan says that Ramanuja, ‘who is also known as the Tiruppavai Jeer, used to recite the Tiruppavai hymns during his outings in Sri Rangam to [for?] bhiksa.’ Ramanuja also received the title of ‘elder brother of the temple’ (koyilannan) from Antal at her shrine in Sri Villiputtur in the following way, according to tradition: In Ncciyar Tirumoli 9. 6-7, Antal expresses the desire to offer one hundred vessels of sweet rice and one hundred vessels of butter to Krishna ‘The Beautiful’ residing at Alakarkoyil. She never fulfilled this desire before merging with the Lord at Sri Rangam, but Ramanuja did so on her behalf while on a teaching tour (digvijaya) in that region. When he then went to Sri Villiputtur, Antal conferred the title upon him through the priest on duty. According to Hari Rao, the traditional history of Sri Rangam says that Antal gave the title to Ramanuja for his fulfilment of her desire, but also ‘to commemorate his management of the temple endowment’. The Yatirajavibhavam of Andhrapurna says that Ramanuja was responsible for setting up the image of Antal along with those of the alvars at Sri Rangam and lived there ‘elevated by the grace of Goda’ due to his having fulfilled her desire. See V. Srinivasan in Mythic Society, (1953) 43. 11, who cites Alkondaville Govindacharya, Life of Ramanujacarya, chap. 32, 210-11;….—Notes 20, p. 273,
13 By Monkey or by cat? How is One Saved?
When a Bhagavata devotee went to the teaching-priest or acharya, he or she was considered a ‘refugee’ (prapanna). Most, if not all, refugees first had to be purified from sin and pollution. That was accomplished through the Man-lion Consecration (Narasimha–diksha). Once purified, the acharya disciplined the refugee over a course of days or weeks by teaching him or her rites and prayers. When the acharya judged the refugee ready, he performed the consecration or diksha proper. That liturgical sequence took several days. AT its crucial part, water was poured over the acharya to signify that Narayana now infused his body and mind. God embodied in the acharya then acted on the body and (p.276) mind of the refugee to bring about a rebirth. Importantly, the acharya spoke a mantra into the refugee’s right ear, a mantra that embodied Narayana himself. To signify the completion of that new birth, the devotee was ‘bathed’ by an unction of water. Like a mother nursing her newborn, the acharya then instructed the wet devotee in the meaning of the imparted mantra.
Like a Vishnu-house or temple, the refugee now housed God’s sonic body within his or her consciousness and was necessarily committed to a ritually pure and disciplined life called a sadhana. One who follows a sadhana is a sadhaka. As far as I can tell, most Bhagavata men and women who underwent diksha did so only once. They received the Vibhava-diksha, which consecrated them into the mantraic worship of Narayana in a visible material form (vibhava). That was worship they could perform on their own behalf (sva–artha–puja), but not as a priest on behalf of someone else (para–artha–puja). That consecration also committed them to lifelong devotion and service to their acharya and his family. Nevertheless, there were Bhagavata virtuosi who received other consecrations for differing purposes, for example the Vyuha-diksha and the Sukshma-diksha…..—p.276-77
Monkeys … have their own kingdom of Kishkinda in central India, which mediates between Rama’s Ayodhya in the human realm of the north, and Ravana’s Lanka in the demonic realm of the south. If Rama is wisdom that seeks to destroy demonic arrogance in the sadhaka’s consciousness, the monkeys are the sadhaka’s mind employed in wisdom’s service….—p. 277
…Clothed in Gold’ (Hiranyakasipu….—p. 279
…Delight (Prahalada)….—p. 279
It seems, then, that in the Bhagavata Dharma as we find it illustrated by this eighty-century {Vaikuntha Perumal temple of Kanchi}, the mother monkey and the mother cat acted together in the same forest of consciousness. ‘Other-power’ {cat} and ‘self-power’ {monkey} alternated and complemented one another as the sadhaka moved from the sleep of ignorance to the wakefulness of knowledge.
Nevertheless, by the fourteenth century, acharyas within the Sri Vaishnava Sampradaya had made those distinctions in grace an either-r matter. The disagreement continues to this day….—p. 280
…God gives moksha, however, not because of the goodness or purity of the disciple, but in response to the loving appeal of the Goddess Sri Lakshmi. When she appeals to God on behalf of Ramanuja’s disciples, God responds favourably becase he loves her too much to refuse. The Goddess promised Ramanuja that he and all his disciples will attain moksha after death in this life. The acharya Ramanuja is therefore likened to a great lion, and his disciples are likened to the insects that live in the lion’s fur: when he leaps, they go with him.—p. 281
…Purification of sins comes to them {Southern Division (Tenkalai) not through ritual acts, but through trusting in God’s gracious response to the formal act of refuge already made….—p. 281
…In Christianity, for example, most of the Eastern and Western Church appears to have combined the monkey and cat approaches in a sacramental system not unlike that of the Bhagavatas. Yet in sixteenth-century Europe, the Reformation and Counter-Reformation divided the two, with the Roman Catholics appearing as a ‘monkey’ school and the Magisterial Protestant as a ‘cat’ school. John’s own Baptist tradition exemplifies the latter.—p. 282
…The monkey mother and baby illustrate the Hindus and the Catholics. The cat mother and baby illustrate the Muslims. But a human mother and baby illustrate the Protestants: the mother embraces the baby gently in her arms while the baby clings to her in small and tentative ways.-p. 282
…A contemporary Shin Buddhist scholar beautifully stated the goal of nembutsu recitation this way:
The Pure I, which is not-I
Being in me reveals to me,
This defiled I.
Revelation of the ‘defiled I’ enables one to entrust oneself to the Amida Buddha, to awaken, as Unno state {Unno, Taitetsu. River of Fire, River of Water: An Introduction to the Pure Land Tradition of Shin Buddhism. New York: Doubleday, 1998.} , ‘to the limits of self-power so as to enter the vast universe of Other Power’. Then, like a kitten, all one can do is to let oneself be carried by the Amida Buddha’s power to the Pure Land. There, in its ideal conditions, the ‘I’ may purify itself and become a bodhisattva or a buddha.—p. 283
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