Chapter Six: The Rasika Lineage of Rama Worship
—Galta, or Galavashrama, had formerly been controlled by Nath Siddhas. After Ramanandi Vaishnavas took possession, sweet worship became more widespread.
Devotees of this line believe that the perfected Nabhadas, his guru Agradas, and Agradas’s guru-brother Kilha Svami were connoisseurs of the sweet rasa. Such a rasika identifies inwardly as Ramachandra’s beloved or female companion, or as Janaki’s companion or maidservant. The devotee either finds happiness in Janaki’s happiness or blesses life by becoming a recipient of Ramachandra’s love. In sweet devotion grounded in the amorous rasa, the devotee worships enchanting Rama—the adolescent form beautiful as ten million Love-gods—as husband.1
Rasikas of this disposition believe Agradas practised in this very way. His spiritual name was Agra Ali. In the Bhakti-sudhā-svāda-tilaka upon the Bhaktamāla, Rupakala says that Agradas is renowned as “Agra Ali,” teacher of the amorous rasa. His Aṣṭayāma, Dhyāna-mañjarī, kuṇḍaliyās, and Padāvalī express his sweet disposition.2
Rupakala gives Agrasvami’s lineage as:
Bhagavan Ramananda
Sri Anantananda
Sri Krishnadas Payahari
Sri Agradas
Svami Nabhadas
Tradition says that Queen Janaki graciously appeared to Agrasvami and that he voluntarily relinquished his body and went to Saketa.
Anantananda’s entire disciple-line is said to practise sweet worship. Hariyananda Acharya was also a saint of this path. Yugalapriya introduces him in the Rasika Bhaktamāla:
I bow to the lotus feet of compassionate Svami Hariyananda,
who followed the tenfold secret of Sita-Rama as his very own.
Favoured by Valmiki, pure in being and an abode of sweet rasa,
he beheld the primordial secret and walked the path of earlier rasikas—