Chapter One: Rāgamayī Bhakti and Its Vaishnava Tradition
—esoteric discipline possesses a literature so substantial, attractive, and powerful in its own right that no student of it will be the poorer. More and more scholars should turn to it and illuminate this neglected part of our literature. So much for that subject.
We shall now give a general introduction to the forms in which rāgamayī-bhakti developed within the various devotional traditions.
Iṣṭe svārasikī rāgaḥ paramāviṣṭatā bhavet /
tanmayī yā bhaved bhaktiḥ sātra rāgātmikoditā //
virājantīm abhivyaktaṃ vrajavāsi-janādiṣu /
rāgātmikām anusṛtā yā sā rāgānugocyate //
"The natural, spontaneous attachment to one's beloved object, producing complete absorption in it, is called rāga. Devotion completely constituted of that attachment is here called rāgātmikā. That devotion which follows the rāgātmikā-bhakti manifest among the residents of Vraja and others is called rāgānugā."[Hari-bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu, Eastern Division, Second Wave, 60 and 62.]
An intense thirst for the chosen beloved—an overpowering longing—is the essential characteristic of rāga; complete absorption in the beloved is its incidental characteristic.
The Gaudiya definition of devotion
Sri Jiva Goswami explains this in his Bhakti-sandarbha:
"Here rāga means the lover's natural love, consisting of the desire for contact with the beloved object. Just as the eye is drawn to beauty and the other senses to their corresponding objects, a similar attachment of the devotee to Sri Bhagavan is called rāga."
In other words, worldly people are naturally attracted to sense objects by a desire for contact with them—the eyes, for example, to beauty, and the ears to a sweet sound. In the same way, when attraction or thirst for Sri Bhagavan arises in a devotee, it is called rāga.
Sri Krishnadasa Kaviraja explains the same subject in the Caitanya- caritāmṛta, in terms closely resembling Sri Rupa Goswami's explanation in the Hari-bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu:
"Intense thirst for the chosen beloved is the essential characteristic of rāga; absorption in the beloved is its incidental characteristic." [Madhya-līlā 22.86]
Devotion endowed with the nature of rāga described above is called rāgātmikā-bhakti. The stream of devotion that proceeds by following it is called rāgānugā:
"Devotion filled with rāga is named rāgātmikā." [Madhya-līlā 22.86]
When a fortunate person hears of the loving service performed by the devotees of Vraja, a longing arises in the heart to obtain corresponding service. Moved by that longing, the person undertakes bhajana by accepting guidance from the dispositions of Vraja's residents. This longing is the root cause of rāgānugā-bhakti. Sri Jiva Goswami says: