Some thoughts on ekadasa bhava.

[Jagannāth Miśra Dās]

HareKrishna. Some idle thoughts, which members of this group may find entertaining; on ekādasa-bhāva and the cultivation of ones’ manjari swārupa.


Putana artfuly disguised herself as a gopi and approached Krishna with dark design, yet Govinda drunk her poison, bestowing upon her instead the eternal privilege of a nurse in Goloka. Commentators on these passages say this provides the greatest inspiration and solace for the sadhaka; as you don’t have to purify yourself first from mundane desires, as it seems that, at least as far as Krishna himself is concerned, even if you want to kill him, it doesn’t matter, just approach him, kah ba dayālum śaraṇam vrajema “is there anyone more merciful than him?” Ones’ swarupa is already given anyway in premabhakticandrika : sakhinama sangini rupātmanam vāsanamayi “According to ones vāsana (longing to lovingly assist in the līlā) one identifies oneself (rupa-atma= the form of ones’ atma) as a sangini (a female companion) of the sakhis etc. Furthermore, Bhaktivinode Thakura, in harināmacintami writes how the guru tells the sadhaka (I'm loathe to use the word “disciple” as it finds an odious parallel with Christian superstition) the ekādasa-bhāva, or the eleven conceits, and if the sadhaka somehow cannot resonate with one or any of these features, he or she may go back to the teacher and change any discordant items for something else. These eleven components, which constitute the antas cintita deha (mentally conceived gopi form) are the general way we define anyone; even in this world: what’s her name? how old is she? what does she wear? what does she do? what’s her husband’s name? Where does she live? etc. This clearly dismisses popular notions that the guru sees, as some fancy, in his meditative trance, the swarupa of the sadhaka, and then graciously reveals it. It’s obviously just a generic and flexible model, or aid, that one works with; and which can be, as Bhaktivinode Thakura writes, adjusted and adapted to fit ones’ own vāsana as one naturally progresses in līlā smarana sādhana and mānasa seva. Bhaktivinode Thakura even revealed the contents of his own ekadasa bhava, telling us, for example, the name he received was kamal manjari. Some think, perhaps showing how little they know about ekadasa bhava, that the Thakura actually is kamala manjari. The Thakura took diksa from Vipini Bihar Goswami, and in this bhajana makes public his own particular model of cultivation, which is apparently what many found objectionable, and concludes the song with a prayer to attain them.

Imputing upon oneself the imaginary disgrace of being unqualified is not going to help us either (although precisely what our disqualification is remains a mystery;) and is one really obliged to be the eternal servant of a guru in exchange for the “imaginary gift” of ekadasa-bhava, or even harinama, when everything has already clearly been freely given to us anyway? Jaya Gaura! Just get on with it; bhajana bina gati nahi; and read premabhakticandrika and prarthan.

[meeno8]

Just get on with it... Easily enough said, sir. It would seem you are not all that versed in lila-smaranam practice. You mention those 2 texts, but you really need to read a different text: Manjari-svarupa-nirupana. Your background is apparently IGM. That is to your detriment in many respects. A lot of excess baggage to shuffle off to understand mainstream CV as opposed to the heterodox (heretical) sect. At any rate that is my personal impression based on your post. Iti adi, MRD.

ps -
If you have a genuine interest in lila-smaranam, then you will need to get your siddha-pranali from a guru that is qualified to transmit that. Then there is a period of study with a qualified teacher on using a gutika or astakaliya lila-smaranam, or the lilas of the eight periods of the day/night.

[madanmohandas]

Meeno8, ( I do not know your real name)

Sounds a bit like 'ex ecclesiam nulla salus.' but that is quite natural I suppose. What is the prime source? Manjari Svarupa Nirupam is a relatively recent book. It would seem that the practice was already established before Sri Chaitanya's time as the details given in Dhyanachandra's Paddhati are quoted from SanatKumara Samhita. It seems to me that there is quite a bit of obscurantism practised in this.
As for 'easily enough said', the same might apply to 'finding a guru who is qualified to transmit it'.
Aside from that, none of the premises brought up in the original post are answered.

'Just get on with it' is the point. As far as I understand the reading, contemplation etc. of the astakaliya lila, intensely for a long time, will spontaneously furnish the sadhaka with all requisites. From my experience, or from what I've seen, proselytes take siddha pranali without a familiar knowledge of asta kaliya lila, so how would one know if it might not be a premature attempt or presumption? Well, to a limited being with meagre capacity, it becomes to complex and sophisticated and perhaps artificial and the siddha pranali chart is like some sort of certificate, without which entry is denied.

[meeno8]

Radhe, Radhe Madanmohandas Ji. MRD stands for Minaketana Ramdas. The babajis in Braj just call me Ramdas for short.
Receiving siddha pranali is the first step, followed by learning the astakaliya lila smaranam practice to be use with the gutika meditation manual.  Reversing those steps to me makes little sense.  Can you study calculus without mastering trigonometry?  Absolutely not.  I have to get a trig book to teach myself that subject when I enrolled in calculus in college.  And it is still a very difficult advance branch of mathematics.  Luckily I had a friend who was a math minor (music major) to help me with the subject matter.  Analytic Geometry was a slam dunk for me in college to ace that course.  Then again I was writing my own geometry proofs in high school and not just memorizing the ones the teacher was writing on the blackboard.  But I digress... just an analogy by way of illustration.

Entry into astakaliya is not denied by not formally having received one's siddha pranali. The maha mantra is all powerful, hence sufficient on its own sans receiving the siddha pranali formally. The guru pranali is the actual lineage back to one of Mahaprabhu's associates. Along with that is the siddha pranali for everyone in that lineage. The one scribe/records keeper babaji at Govardhan was keeping all those for various lineages back in the 1980s in his bhajan kutir. Once receiving one's siddha pranali, one would copy down (in Bengali/Sanskrit) the whole guru pranali/siddha pranali and adding oneself at the end.

The maha mantra is so powerful that even without formal diksha with the gayatri mantras in a lineage, the sadhaka can attain RK prema.

I hope this clears up at least some of the confusion surrounding this topic.

iti, adi,
MRD

[meeno8]

... and yes MSN is a very recent text, relatively speaking. It is still authoritative and a good platform to launch one's lila smaranam practice with the Gaura-Govinda-Lilamrta Gutika as the meditation manual.  I was presented with a centuries old palm leaf handwritten gutika by a guru-bhai in Vrindavan to be picked up by me when passing through again on my way back to the States.  But I never was able to pick it up when my visa and extension ran out and I had to fly back from New Delhi or Calcutta (I forget which, since it was over 4 decades ago).  My tacit assumption is that it is now housed at the Vrindavan Research Institute for use by those who had diksha in mainstream CV and have received their siddha pranali.  Perhaps it was put on microfilm or digital media.  I have a whole collection of books on microfiche, but I don't have a microfiche reader.  I don't even know if libraries in the States have that equipment anymore.  I suspect they should, given all the old newspapers stored on that media.

[meeno8]

The pramana of scripture for mainstream CV includes the smrti, sruti, BP, et al. The writings in more recent centuries draw upon those as sources, including the Govinda-bhasya tika on the Brahma Sutras of Baladeva Vidyabhusana. The late 108 Pandit Ananta Das Babaji lectured in Braj Mandala while still with us on this earthly plane. I was present for some of those in 1980, when we were both residing at 42 Kesi Ghat Ashram in Vrindavan, which was 108 Krishnacharan Das Babaji's center. I received the siddha pranali from my diksha guru, 108 Tinkori Goswami. And I was under the tutelage of KDB for the practice of lila-smaranam.

[meeno8]

One feature of mainstream CV was throwing off the shackles of varnashram, or the caste system that propagated the sinister regime that kept people in ignorance and only provided access to bhakti and sastra to the elite. The babajis of mainstream CV dress like Islamic sufi saints, rather than the sannyasins of the Madhva sampradaya. Well, Rupa and Sanatan were part of the Mogul regime and had Muslim names before they took the names we know them by.

[meeno8]

These forums are not really for the IGM (ISCKON/Gaudiya Math) adherents. They are rather for the CV orthodoxy. IGM is the heterodoxy. That is a simple fact. However these forums are a good resource for anyone wishing to make the transition from the heterodoxy to the orthodoxy. The heterodoxy does not have any siddha-pranali or guru pranali to go with that as part of lila smaranam. There was a small group in Los Angeles in the late 1970s that formed the 'Gopi Bhava Club'. Shen Srila Prabhupad found out, he took them to task and ordered the GBC to discipline that group that he considered to be a wayward faction within ISKCON. What we in the orthodoxy have issues with is that the heterodoxy pretty much controls the narrative online for Caitanyaism at the present time. In essence we view them as having hijacked the tradition as far as doctrine. It is great that they are engaged in sravanam-kirtanam and puja, and most of the members here came from the heterodoxy. Nitai Das and I did so in the late 1970s, along with a handful of others from America and Europe.

[madanmohandas]

If it were not for what you call heterodoxy none of us would know anything about it and the what you call orthodoxy would have been very unlikely to care about 'foreigners'. And you have not really addressed the original post. It is customary for obscurantists to maintain a mystery that only they can reveal. Both Jagannath Misra das and myself have spent our entire adult life cultivating Srimad Bhagavatam, learnt Bengali and a bit of Sanskrit and JMdas knows Oriya. Personally I do not subscribe to your concept of orthodoxy. It seems to me both are artificial concepts.

As for siddha deha coming before Lila smarana,

Sr Naarada uvaaca-
hareratra gataam leelaam
srotum-icchaami tattvatah/
leelaam-ajaanataam sevyo
manasaa tu katham harih//

I desire to hear of this forsooth,
The sequence of Hari's Lila in truth;
If ignorant of this, how can there be,
Within the mind, the service of Hari?

[meeno8]

MSN draws upon multiple sources in CV literature as references. Siddha pranali is a standard practice which involves lila-smaranam. Personally I am not aware of going off to do some other lila-smaranam practice as a standard, although hearing about the lilas is recommended in the literature. I have nothing more to say on this matter. I have no personal opinions, just experience beginning over 43 years ago with some exposure to siddha pranali and lila smaranam using a standard gutika manual, which spells out clearly the lilas of the 8 periods of the day for meditation. It could be that some individuals conflate the standard meditation practice using the gutika having received their siddha pranali (inclusive of the entire guru pranali) with some other type of manasi-seva. I specialized in Sanskrit and medieval Bengali at University of Chicago in my graduate studies, and also spent some time learning basic Oriya grammar. I also focused on the nyaya darsana (logic philosophical system).

[madanmohandas]

Then did you not notice that the details of ekadasa bhava, lila smarana and astakaliya lila prescribed in Dhyanachandra's Paddhati are derived from the Nimbarka sect? Why do the Gaudiya sectaries almost totally ignore the Nimbarka sect? It seems to me they simply derived it from there and claim it as their own. Of course the Gaudiyas have developed it extensively with the most exquisite literature, but they did not innovate. Their sect (the Nimbarkas) is much older as well, and is supported by the Padma Purana where Shiva imparts the knowledge to Narada, who is sent to Vrindadevi to learn the Lila. It seems you have not been aware of that crucial fact. And where does Sri Chaitanya mention anything about it? I wonder if Sri Chaitanya ever intended to form a new sect, why should he? But this was the creation of the Goswamis (although even there I never saw Rupa or Sanatana mention it either)of Vrindavan who came to dominate and influence later writers. Reading the Srimad Bhagavatam, sans doctrinal annotations, it suggests nothing of it, and the Goswamis must rely on other Puranas with truncated quotations, or twist the meaning of the Bhagavatam to suit what became Gaudiya doctrine.

[Deleted]

Dear Madan Mohan Dasji,

There is an older thread on our old Gaudiya Discussions here:
gaudiyadiscussions.gaudiya.com/topic_3730.html

Yourself, our old Keshava ji who is Sri Vaishnava, and Jagat ji are also there.

[Jagannāth Miśra Dās]

May 13, 2023 13:12:37 GMT -6 meeno8 said:

Just get on with it... Easily enough said, sir. It would seem you are not all that versed in lila-smaranam practice. You mention those 2 texts, but you really need to read a different text: Manjari-svarupa-nirupana. Your background is apparently IGM. That is to your detriment in many respects. A lot of excess baggage to shuffle off to understand mainstream CV as opposed to the heterodox (heretical) sect. At any rate that is my personal impression based on your post. Iti adi, MRD.

ps -
If you have a genuine interest in lila-smaranam, then you will need to get your siddha-pranali from a guru that is qualified to transmit that. Then there is a period of study with a qualified teacher on using a gutika or astakaliya lila-smaranam, or the lilas of the eight periods of the day/night.

Very Funny.

[malati]

I have no time reading the whole of this thread. Like Meena, I'm guessing this person that created the thread is an IGM sympathizer.

First, you are not even on the level of Putana; because she shared the transcendental space with Krishna she is considered an elevated personality, at least as compared to you or me.

I'm guessing the motivation of your post is to justify your laziness and arrogance to not going and submitting yourself to a guru and trusting him of the process and practices to partake of the lila, as recommended by a guru or by the tradition.

You want to create your own sect. Fine! Do it but don't call yourself a raganuga bhakta because there are processes and practices which are based on the CV tradition.

I was given a siddha deha and bhava and it's not in a general way as I have a specific duty. I actually love the description of my personality. And that is what I am cultivating to achieve because I trust the tradition and my guru.

You may want to change your bhava and swarup given by your guru, (or maybe given by yourself to yourself which you believe should be your right given you are cultured in the democratic west), but how do you know you will be better off with another identity? If you are not happy with your current one how many times will you try to find out which one will suit you?

Sit at the feet of the guru and be humble enough to believe that in the spiritual space he knows what is truth because he has seen the truth.

If I were you, I better answer the shastra quizzes to know what the real CV teachings are, at least a representation of them.

(btw, how come we let IGMers post here and we can't do the same in your spaces? And you say your method is more democratic and trusting the guru is dictatorial?)

Radhe Radhe

[malati]

There are exchanges on Advaita das' blog related to this thread. My gut feeling is that the person who opened the thread here is the same person Advaita das is replying to, the Rahul guy.

Great comebacks from Advaita das.

2022 blog.
Siddha Pranali, Siddha deha


2014 blog with recent questions from the same person.

Siddha Pranali in shastra