Chapter Three: The Madhura Disposition in India's Inner (Esoteric) Religious Disciplines

Essential līlā and līlā of form

Vaishnava Sahajiyas accepted the eternal play of eternal Vrindavan, but held that Radha and Krishna's eternal play descends not only as the manifest play of forest Vrindavan. Krishna incarnates in every man and Radha in every woman, so the union of woman and man continually enacts the play of Radha and Krishna.

The real essence within every man is Krishna. This is his true “essential nature,” while his outward life and gross bodily activities are his “form.” In the same way, every woman is inwardly Radha; that is her real essential nature, while her outward life and activity are her form. The essential nature dwells within the form. In every man and woman, therefore, none other than Radha and Krishna conduct their sportive play.¹

Radha and Krishna's play of form and essential play are regarded respectively as natural and supranatural līlā. The Sahajiyas did not invent the method of seeing and contemplating every man as Krishna and every woman as Radha. The Tantras had already taught the contemplation of every man as Shiva and every woman as Shakti, while Buddhist thought contemplated every man as skilful means and every woman as wisdom.

It has been said that Krishna is rasa and Radha rati, Krishna desire and Radha its supreme intensification. As desire or Kandarpa, Krishna continually draws the life of every living being toward himself: “Naming her and keeping the tryst, he plays his gentle flute.” Radha is the intensification of desire who bestows the delight of bliss upon the enjoyer. The unbroken current of divine love flowing between rasa and rati, desire and its intensification, is the “innate.”

The practice of superimposition

Experiencing or contemplating man as Krishna and woman as Radha is called the practice of superimposition. Through continual pure thought and feeling, the practitioner destroys every impurity, covering, and distortion within, sacrifices the inner animal, becomes completely pure, and establishes firmly the vision of Krishna in the man and Radha in the woman.

As this vision becomes steady, the man begins to experience his real nature—his Krishnahood—and the woman her Radhahood. Their love then ceases to be the earthly affection of an ordinary man and woman and becomes the divine love of Radha and Krishna. This divine experience of love is the experience of the innate.