Caitanya Caritamrta – Madhya Lila – 13.147. | HH Bhanu Swami Maharaj | ISKCON Chennai | 29 June 2025
tumi — vrajera jīvana, vraja-rājera prāṇa-dhana,
tumi vrajera sakala sampad
kṛpārdra tomāra mana, āsi’ jīyāo vraja-jana,
vraje udaya karāo nija-pada
Translation
“My dear Kṛṣṇa, You are the life and soul of Vṛndāvana-dhāma. You are especially the life of Nanda Mahārāja. You are the only opulence in the land of Vṛndāvana, and You are very merciful. Please come and let all the residents of Vṛndāvana live. Kindly keep Your lotus feet again in Vṛndāvana.”
Purport
Śrīmatī Rādhārāṇī did not express Her personal unhappiness at being separated from Kṛṣṇa. She wanted to evoke Kṛṣṇa’s feelings for the condition of all the others in Vṛndāvana-dhāma — mother Yaśodā, Mahārāja Nanda, the cowherd boys, the gopīs, the birds and bees on the banks of the Yamunā, the water of the Yamunā, the trees, the forests and all the other paraphernalia associated with Kṛṣṇa before He left Vṛndāvana for Mathurā. These feelings of Śrīmatī Rādhārāṇī were manifested by Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu, and therefore He invited Lord Jagannātha, Kṛṣṇa, to return to Vṛndāvana. That is the purport of the Ratha-yātrā car’s going from Jagannātha Purī to the Guṇḍicā temple.
HH Bhanu Swami Maharaj:
So, when the chariot goes from the main temple to Gundicha, this is taken by Caitanya Mahaprabhu as Krishna returning to Vrindavan. Of course, this is, say, the projection of Lord Caitanya’s feelings. We know that Lord Caitanya, though he is Krishna, he comes and exhibits the mood of Radha. So, when the Rath cart is returning or going to the Gundicha, Lord Caitanya, in the mood of Radha, takes that as Krishna’s promise to return to Vrindavan.
So, then Caitanya Mahaprabhu enters into that same mood as Radha. And we have a whole series of verses indicating that mood. So, this is though it is Caitanya Mahaprabhu and Krishna with the mood of Radharani, Lord Caitanya speaks. So, in separation from Krishna, any devotee will long for meeting Krishna. So, it goes not only for Radha, it goes for all the Gopis, for all the elders like Yasoda, Nanda and all the cowherd boys.
So, the joy of Prema is expressed by both of these aspects, meeting and separation. And, of course, generally we concentrate on the meeting. So, we see Krishna lived in Vrindavan and associated with the people. He associated with the Gopis in the Rasa-lila. Even there, there is separation. In the morning, when the cowherd boys come, Krishna meets them. They go out into the forest. In the evening, Krishna goes to his house. The cowherd boys go to their house, so there is separation. When Krishna leaves for the forest in the morning with the cowherd boys, there is separation from Nanda and Yasoda. And then, when Krishna returns in the evening, they again meet Krishna. Krishna meets the Gopis for Rasa-lila, but at the end of the night, they separate.
So, we have these temporary separations followed by meeting. But then, we may get prolonged separation. And that takes place when Krishna leaves Vrindavan for Mathura, when he performs earthly pastimes. And then when there is extended separation then the feelings become even more intense. And of course we will expect that when they meet again then the feelings, this will also be most intense. So, there is similarity to the relationships we have in the material world. So, there is separation and meeting in the material world also. However, there is also permanent separation and no meeting. Even if they remain together for life, they die. So, there is permanent separation there. So, there is no separation followed by union eternally in the material world relationships. However, in the spiritual world, these things go together, eternally if there is union, there is separation, there is union again. So, there is never a time when there is eternal separation. Of course we can say that in one sense yes they are separated but by the power of their meditation they can manifest Krishna within. And that is true and its only because of that, that the people of Vrindavan could maintain their lives even after Krishna left for so long. We can also say that yes if Krishna appears internally it is the same as if Krishna appears externally. And in fact it is said that the bliss of Krishna’s internal appearance in separation is greater than when they actually meet. So, that’s true. Nevertheless, we see that the people of Vrindavan are always insisting, Krishna, you must come back. One reason for that is that when we talk about Prema having meeting and separation as two components, it means actually Krishna is present or he disappears and he becomes present again. So, in other words, this separation and meeting is talking about external matters. So, in one sense, yes, no devotee is ever separated from the Lord because he always thinks of the Lord. Still, we have meeting and separation as part of Prema. So, the separation should resolve into a meeting at some point. So, there is a certain satisfaction when the meeting takes place. And thus, in the earthly pastimes of Krishna, after he leaves and goes to Mathura and then to Dwaraka, we expect that Krishna must return. But, of course, we don’t see that directly described in Bhagavatam at all.
So, we just described how Krishna met the inhabitants of Vrindavan at Kurukshetra, but then they all went back to Vrindavan. Krishna met the inhabitants of Vrindavan at Kurukshetra, but then they all went back to Vrindavan. And then, Krishna said, I cannot return because there are some more demons to kill. So, he finally killed demons up to killing Dantavakra. After that, he didn’t kill any demons. Definitely, there were more demons, but other devotees killed those demons. So, then why didn’t Krishna return? So, the answer is, he did return. So, that is described in the Padma Purana. After Krishna killed Dantavakra at the southern gate of Mathura, then he returned to Vrindavan and stayed there eternally. So, in that way, after prolonged separation, there was actually meeting again. And then, the pastimes, even though Krishna was much older at that time, pastimes continued as before with Krishna in his Kaisora period.
Of course, Bhagavatam describes that after killing Dantavakra, Krishna returned to Dwaraka again. So, how is it possible? If he went to Vrindavan and stayed there eternally, how did he go back to Dwaraka? And the answer is that Krishna expanded himself into two forms. So, in one form, he continued pastimes in Dwaraka and finally there was the disappearance of the Yadus and disappearance of Krishna. Then, there is a description of how Krishna took all the inhabitants of Vrindavan, put them in a chariot and they went up to the spiritual world.
But, then it is also said, that is one form, but actually, Krishna stayed in Vrindavan. So, this we call his Aprakata form, Aprakata pastimes. The pastimes go on in Vrindavan, but we cannot see them. So, Krishna and the Gopis and Nanda and Yasoda and all the cowherd boys are there and daily they go through the pastimes, just as previously was described in the Bhagavatam. Similarly, in Dwaraka, though it looked like everybody died, etc., no, the Yadus and Krishna eternally performed pastimes in Dwaraka. And, of course, simultaneously in the spiritual world, Krishna is in Dwaraka performing pastimes. Of course, also, in some universe, Krishna is appearing in Vrindavan performing his pastimes. He is also in Dwaraka performing pastimes.
So, Krishna has unlimited forms in which he performs all of his pastimes, the meeting and separation, in Dwaraka and in Vrindavan. So, when Krishna left Vrindavan and went away and stayed away for many years, this was a prolonged separation for all the people of Vrindavan, including the Gopis. So, it is described that during that period, due to the separation, they entered into a death-like state. It is described that during that period, due to the separation, they entered into a death-like state. Among the 33 Vyabachari Bhavas in Rasa, one of them is Riti, a death-like state. They have spiritual bodies, they never die.
Another Vyabachari Bhava is Vyaadi or sickness. And, of course, if you have a spiritual body, you really don’t get sick [Laughs]. But, these temporary feelings that look like sickness or death occur as part of Prema.
So in separation a lot of these extreme Vyabachari Bhavas appear. And then it may appear as if this state of separation is very miserable. And we see that here that Lord Caitanya is expressing that misery in the verses. So, in spite of that, because it is part of Prema, it is not real misery and lamentation. Actually, it is part of Prema and thus part of bliss. So, we see that Lord Caitanya had intense feelings of separation. And, when normal people see this, then they will think Lord Caitanya is suffering. But, that is not true. It is actually part of the feelings of separation in Prema. So, these feelings became very intense during the Ratha Yatra. Of course, there was also separation for two weeks when Jagannath was confined. Then, Jagannath appeared and He left the temple, he left Dwaraka. So, Lord Caitanya took that as a resolution of this problem of separation. So it is equivalent of Krishna after killing Dantavakra returning to Vrindavan. So when there is a meeting then there is of course great joy. However, within that joy, there is also fear and lamentation. Because then, everyone feels, yes, it is nice, but then Krishna is going to go away again [Laughs]. Because then, everyone feels, yes, it is nice, but then Krishna is going to go away again. So, that feeling reaches such a state, especially in Madhurya Rasa, that they actually feel, even though Krishna is standing before them, he seems to disappear and then they begin to feel all of these symptoms of separation. So, within meeting, there is separation and within separation, there is meeting [Laughs]. So, this is the nature of Prema. And it was exhibited by Caitanya Mahaprabhu. Hare Krishna.
Q & A
1) Maharaj, If we read Uddhava-sandesa, when Uddhava comes to Vrindavan he gets 2 visions, one is that meeting and one is separation. You explained that, separation externally and internally they are with Krishna. Is there any difference between Prema, internal and external? Because externally, they may be separated, but internally, they are with Krishna.
So, of course, from one point of view, they should actually have a physical meeting with Krishna. That’s more satisfying. And thus, they always long for that in Vrindavan. But it is also said, they were able to maintain their lives because of internal appearance of Krishna. So we cannot say one is better than the other or whatever, they are both there. Vishvanath Chakravarti explains these two visions of Vrindavan that Uddhava had in a different way. There were actually two Vrindavanas. One of course was what most people saw externally that Krishna had separated and gone to Mathura. But after several months, Krishna felt he must fulfil his promise and come back soon so then he went back. But we see Krishna stayed in Mathura, he fought with Jarasandha etc., then he went to Dwaraka, how is it possible?
So, in another form, Krishna went back and then he was with all of the inhabitants of Vrindavan. But we don’t see that, we see them lamenting all the time. So explanation is, Krishna had one form, staying in Mathura, going to Dwaraka, another form, he went back to Vrindavan. So we have the Vrajavasis lamenting for Krishna because he didn’t come back. But we have another form of all the Vrajavasis meeting Krishna and then they continue their pastimes as before. So we have two Vrindavanas, one Vrindavan with Krishna and they are continuing their pastimes, one without Krishna and they are lamenting why Krishna has gone, why he doesn’t come back. So when Uddhava went and gave the message, he saw both these forms. He saw Vrindavan, all the people happy, herding the cows etc., plus he also saw everybody lamenting, nobody cooking, nobody doing anything, lying down sick. So he saw two sets of Vrajavasis. So there is only one set of Vrajavasis meeting Krishna actually.
2) Maharaj, could we say that the feeling of separation takes place from the level of Bhava?
So Bhava is a preliminary state of Prema. And in Prema there is Rasa, but the Rasa is not fully developed in the Bhava stage. So it fully develops in Prema. So the elements with the Rasa, the five elements of Rasa, Vibhava, Anubhava, Vyabhacari Bhava, Sattvika Bhava are there, not in full intensity. In that state there may be prolonged separation. As we see in the case of Narada. He saw Krishna and then Krishna disappeared and he never saw him for the rest of his life.
Devotees: HH Bhanu Swami Maharaj Ki.. Jai !!