Chapter Seven: Literature of the Rasika Tradition

Careful handling can keep a book fit to serve readers for a long time. Remain fully vigilant in protecting it.

1. Sanskrit literature

The Rasika lineage of Rama worship is richly developed in literature, practice, and philosophy, though its materials are scattered. It has never received a fully organized form, and most of its literature has remained dispersed, confined, and neglected.

As noted earlier, one reason is that nearly all the tradition’s literature remained restricted to a very small circle. Another is scholars’ lack of respect: they viewed the tradition and its discipline with deep contempt. New scientific research, intellectual awakening, and the country’s political movements and upheavals also diverted attention. What the public most often encountered was an extremely distorted form, toward which revulsion and contempt were understandable. Yet it would be our misfortune if this left us ignorant of the tradition’s healthy form.

Every phenomenon has two sides, bright and dark. Have Christianity, Sufi practice, Buddhism, or the sweet discipline of Krishna-bhakti suffered no corruption? We are witnessing with our own eyes a terrible decline in Gandhian practice among some who call themselves Sarvodayins. Would it be correct to conclude that all these disciplines are merely symptoms of decadent life or a diseased human mind?

The same applies to sweet worship in the Ramavat tradition. It has a healthy, strong side and an unhealthy, weak one. Our concern here is to study its strong and healthy form as literature, discipline, and doctrine. Fleeing from it because of corruptions and remaining ignorant of its proper form would be unworthy of a student of literature.

The Sanskrit literature of sweet Rama worship is exceedingly rich and extensive. Only some principal works can be discussed. We begin with its Upanishadic portion.