Chapter Five: Avatāra Doctrine and Rama Worship
“Raghunatha, the bee, remains immersed, having found its sweet fragrance.
O bee, who could ever sing the immeasurable magnitude of your glory?
Tulsi is truly Vrinda’s companion; by his own name, a companion of Vrinda.
Within my heart I have discerned this secret of the name ‘servant Tulsi.’”
In the Rāmacaritamānasa, Tulsidas calls the pair Sita-Rama the unity of beauty and amorous delight, and says no more. In the Gītāvalī, however, something of his inner form is unveiled when he describes the chamber of play of Sita and Rama and of Urmila and Lakshmana:
As graceful, lovely, and charming as Lakshmana is,
so is graceful Urmila, as their beautiful eyes meet at the corners.
The ocean of bliss has gathered the essence of beauty
and fashioned both from the same gold.
Speech cannot measure their beauty and love;
thought itself stands astonished and silent.
Beauty, virtue, and affection shine when they enter the chamber of play.
The women’s eyes become fruitful beholding them—and so do Tulsidas’s.1
Only a companion can receive the vision of the chamber of play. Tulsidas’s secret form—the true form of his most inward discipline—appears in the following Gītāvalī song:
Mother! I have seen one worthy of beholding—the enchanter of the mind.
Young in years, one fair and one dark, both graceful and lovely,
with charming eyes and moonlike faces, travellers upon the road.
Lovely crowns of matted hair upon their heads, adorned with flowers,
shine like tender new leaves in a bower.
Heroes dressed as sages, bearing bows and quivers upon their bodies—
who could see them upon the road and not be enchanted?
Brahma took the mould of beauty, refined it into purest gold,
and fashioned the two together.
Their lovely bodies shine, bright drops of perspiration upon them;
one glimpse dazzles the eyes—what could have become of you?
Hearing these words, all the women of Sita’s company loosened with love
and turned their hearts toward them with ever greater affection.
It seemed that the Lord, embodied grace itself, looked back;
Hari stole their hearts and carried them away.2