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Chapter Two: The Nature and Scope of Madhura-rasa

—mixed, (3) accomplished, and (4) fully enriched.¹ It assumes numerous forms: seeing, touching, soft conversation, blocking the path, the rāsa dance, play in the water, play in Vrindavan, water-sports on the Yamuna, boating, the theft of the garments, stealing the flute, stealing flowers, the dāna-līlā, hide-and-seek in the bowers, drinking honey-wine, Krishna dressing as a woman, feigned sleep, dice-play, tugging at garments, marking with the nails, drinking the nectar of bimba-red lips, the unions and delights of the pleasure grove, kissing, embracing, and so on, culminating in complete sexual union. Playful dalliance gives more pleasure than the final union itself.

Divisions of līlā

Līlā has two divisions: manifest and unmanifest. There is manifest play in the forest of Vrindavan, unmanifest play in the Vrindavan of the mind, and eternal play in eternal Vrindavan. Manifest Vraja līlā itself has two kinds, however: eternal and occasional. The eight-period daily līlā of Vraja is eternal, while the killing of Putana, long journeys away, and similar events are occasional. The eight periods are the close of night, morning, forenoon, midday, afternoon, evening, dusk, and night.²

The preceding pages have presented, very briefly, the Gaudiya account of the nature of madhura-rasa. Madhura-rasa has a twofold form: in its general form it pervades everything, while in its particular form it is delimited. In its general form it is present in the Upanishads and similar scriptures. At the root is one nondual reality, but for the sake of bliss it becomes two: woman and man, or Nature and Spirit. The two complete one another, and each seeks completeness through attaining the other.³ In the same way, knower and known become one when the triad is broken. Feeling develops in proportion to the completeness of union. Complete union—unreserved and unveiled—occurs only in madhura.

The worship of madhura-rasa is present, openly or secretly, in almost every form of spiritual discipline in the world. A current of madhura-rasa flows through the experiences of Christian saints and Sufi mystics. In all worship of God with attributes, the madhura disposition arises spontaneously, for the living being seeks to give itself completely and thereby possess its heart's delight completely. It is at once an utterly common and an utterly extraordinary feature of embodied life that one wishes to become the dearest beloved of one's dear one, and seeks an exclusive claim or right over the love of the one whom one loves.⁴ In devotional practice directed to God with attributes, this desire naturally—