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Chapter One: Rāgamayī Bhakti and Its Vaishnava Tradition

—there is a special insistence upon action and religious duty, even while the mind remains directed toward bhajana. In rāgamayī-bhakti, rule and formal prescription fall away altogether. It should be understood that in rāga-bhakti injunction and prohibition are not deliberately rejected; they simply fall away of themselves, naturally. Here the devotee, moved solely by an inward feeling and according to his relationship with God, fondles his dearest beloved, the companion of his very life—sometimes becoming his friend, and sometimes his dearly beloved lady-love. In truth, rāgamayī-bhakti is a discipline of the heart. Within the heart, through the heart, the Lord of the heart is worshipped with sacred attachment. Put plainly: the natural, intense longing for God in the devotee's heart, and for the devotee in God's heart, is itself rāgamayī-bhakti.

Throughout Vaishnava literature this rāgamayī-bhakti is accorded a special importance—in some places concealed in an esoteric form, and in others openly expressed. It has been called the "supremely secret" mystery.¹ It seems necessary to explain briefly here why it is secret.

The eternal principle of Power and the Possessor of Power is different while being non-different, and non-different even while being different. In reality, they are non-different; their distinction exists for the sake of divine play. Through this very distinction, the all-pervading nirguṇa principle bears the aspects of sat, cit, and ānanda; in association with the saguṇa form, that same Power is present in the three forms of sandhinī, saṃvit, and hlādinī-śakti. Like the saguṇa form, these powers too are eternal, mutually non-different, and non-different from the Possessor of Power. This scriptural knowledge of eternal identity and eternal difference—of difference within identity and identity within difference—is a divine gift. It was received by humanity only as an apauruṣeya revelation, not as a human composition.

When, after hundreds of births, the merit produced by charity, worship, and other auspicious acts comes to fruition, the gracious Lord, in his limitless compassion, bestows devotion in the heart of a person whose inner being has become pure. It should be remembered that his compassion, rather than one's own exertion, is the principal cause of devotion. Here vaidhi-bhakti is a means to knowledge, whereas rāgānugā-bhakti arises after both knowledge and realised knowledge. Rāgānugā-bhakti is not a means but the goal. The object and support of this devotion—whose essential nature bestows supreme bliss—is the Lord himself, the very Self of the soul.

Absolute and intimate love is the essential nature of rāgānugā-bhakti. It manifests in a stainless mind after complete detachment has arisen and pure realisation has been attained. Through the observance of bhāgavata- dharma in a sinless, purified heart, the grace of God reveals an intense detachment from every worldly object; true knowledge of what is real and unreal; and accurate knowledge of the artha-pañcaka, the five truths concerning one's own nature, the nature of the Supreme, and the other related principles. Thereafter, with exclusive and unwavering attachment to the lotus feet of the Lord, devotion whose nature is supreme love—