Ninth Stage of Bhakti | Prem Bhakti (Part 2) | Sri Vinod Babaji Maharaj

Q: It is said that the devotee experiences extreme pain of separation when he develops Prem Bhakti. But he also relishes an inexplicable bliss in his heart. How can these opposite emotions occur together at the same time?

“Bahire vishjwala hoye, vitare aanandmay, Krishnapremar advut charit.

Ei prem aaswadan, tapta ikshu charvan, mukh jwale na jaye tyajan.

Sei prema jar mone, tar vikram sei jane, vishamrite ekatra milan.”

(Chaitanya Charitamrita 2.2.50-51)

Meaning: Externally, the devotee experiences extreme pain as if he has drunk poison and due to which his every nerve is burning. But deep in his heart, he feels an inexplicable bliss in crying for his beloved. This is the strange nature of Krishna Prem. It feels like munching on a hot sugarcane. Although the mouth gets burned, the person cannot stop eating due to its sweetness. This Prem Bhakti can be understood only by those who have achieved it. The experiences of the devotee are like poison and nectar, which have opposite effects, mixed together.

The devotee cannot remain without the contemplation of Krishna, but at the same time, the contemplation of Krishna becomes tremendously painful for the devotee because he becomes extremely desirous to see Krishna. This extreme yearning to see Krishna attracts Him towards the devotee.

“Jal binu jena mina, dukkha paye ayuhina, prem binu sei mata bhakta.

Chataka jalada gati, e-mati ekanta rati, jei jane sei anurakta.”

(Prem Bhakti Chandrika)

Explanation: The devotee feels extreme pain just like a fish which comes out of water. When the pond dries up in extreme summer, the fish writhes in mortal pain because without water it is unable to stay alive. It tries to hold on to life by moving wherever there is little water and flips from one side of its body to the other (in an attempt to submerge its gills in water). But the scorching heat of the sun dries up its gills as well as the ground. The devotee also experiences such extreme pain in his heart. The contemplation of Krishna to him is just like what water is to a fish. He cannot live without His contemplation. It is his lifeline.

Chataka is a kind of bird who drinks the water of rain only. It does not drink water from any other source. It keeps awaiting the clouds to quench its thirst. Similarly, the devotee is exclusively desirous of Prem Bhakti of Krishna only. If all the pleasurable objects and all kinds of love available in the world are brought together and offered to the devotee, he cannot even bother to look at them for a blink of an eye.

Is this an easy feat to achieve?! No pain in the world can be compared with the pain experienced by the devotee. And no pleasure in the world can be compared with the bliss in his heart. The devotee cries in extreme pain to see Krishna at the very moment. But if one day, he stops crying and his heart becomes dry, he worries, ‘Today I have not been able to cry for Krishna. My heart has become like a stone. Krishna is not merciful on me.’ This is why it is said that only those who achieved this Prem Bhakti can know its influence. Bliss and pain flow in parallel in the heart of the devotee.

“Akaitava Krishnaprem, jena Jambu-nada hem, ei prema nrloke na hoye.

Jar hoye tar na hoye viyog, viyog hoile kabhu na jiyoye.”

(Chaitanya Charitamrita 2.2.43)

‘Kaitava’ means deceptive. ‘Akaitava’ means non-deceptive. People are bound into illusory Maya through worldly so-called love. If he could be free from this worldly love, he would break free from the cycle of birth and death. Wife, children, friends, relatives – they are everything for the materialistic person. Even if there are quarrels, conflicts, miseries, poverty, etc., as soon as the evening comes, the person wants to leave work and go home. What will he get by going home? Nothing, but it is his attachment and sense of belonging that attracts his heart towards home. He is deluded that all his pleasures can come from pleasing his family and friends. There is no bigger pleasure than that. If he has children, taking them on his lap is the biggest pleasure he can think of.

But all these love relationships are deceptive. One day there is so much love between a husband and wife, but there is no guarantee whether the next day they would quarrel and get divorce. The son loves his parents so much in his childhood, but there is no guarantee whether he will become selfish in his youth and leave them to marry a girl who doesn’t want to take care of his parents. The father also ceases to love his son when he doesn’t fulfil his expectations. Therefore, all these relationships are deceptive. They look like love because they are shadows of the divine love of Krishna. But, like shadow, it's there one minute and nowhere the next.

We call someone our beloved according to the pleasure we get from that person. It is often seen that if the beauty of a woman gets destroyed somehow, her lover cannot love her in the same way as before. This is because her beauty gave pleasure to the man and aroused his feelings of love. But as soon as the beauty got destroyed, his feelings disappeared too. He didn’t love the woman but her beauty. This is not love but just delusion.

But the love for Krishna is Akaitava, non-deceptive. Anyone who achieves even a ray of that divine love sees all the pleasures of this world and heavenly realms like Swarga (abode of demi-gods) as meaningless. Also, he can tolerate any kind of misery and physical ailments possible in this body but he doesn’t consider worldly miseries as miseries and remains detached even if the world comes to an end. There is only one thing important to him, that is, Krishna Prem.

‘Jambu-nada hem' means the gold that is found along the river Jambu (in Jambu dvipa, as described in Srimad Bhagvatam). There are giant trees of ‘Jambu' (blackberries) along its length and those trees have berries of the size of an elephant each. When those blackberries fall on the ground, they explode and their juice flows like a river. The places along the bank of the river where the juice dries up, it becomes pure gold of divine quality. This gold is used to make ornaments of demi-gods and goddesses.

So, here it says that Krishna Prem is like the gold found along the river Jambu. It is divine (not found in the human world) and absolutely pure.

‘Ei prema nrloke na hoye' means this love is not possible in this abode of humans. As already described, all relationships in this world are born from self-interest. Therefore, the divine love, which is absolutely devoid of self-interest and intended only to serve the beloved, is not possible in this world. The divine love cannot be described by words of human language or understood by the material intellect. It is transcendental and infinitely more blissful than Brahmanand. Whoever achieves even a ray of Krishna Prem breaks free from the cycle of birth and death.

Some people interpret this line as Krishna Prem is not possible in the human body. But the meaning is not like this. Prem Bhakti is the last stage of Bhakti that is achievable in this human body. But this line means that such love is not possible between two humans or other living beings in this world.

‘Jar hoye tar na hoye viyog' means once someone achieves this divine love, they never lose it. This is because he becomes free from Maya and henceforth, Maya cannot influence him (as explained earlier in the example of coconut in Prem Bhakti Part 1).

‘Viyog hoile kabhu na jiyoye' means if (on the will of Radha Krishna) a devotee loses this divine love, he is not able to stay alive. An example of this is “Shri Krishna Das Babaji Maharaj” of Ranbari (Vrindavan). He had attained the divine darshan of Radha Krishna in person. Once, he made up his mind to visit Dwarika Dham. Radharani came in his dream and said, “You are doing bhajan in Vraj Dham. Why do you want to go to Dwarika? Don’t go, stay and do bhajan here only.” 

But Babaji thought it was just a dream and went to Dwarika. Dwarika is also an abode of Krishna. Also, among Radharani's 1008 names, Rukmini, Satyabhama, Revati, Jambavati, Kalindi, Sulakshana, Mitravrinda, etc. are all names of Radharani. They are just different manifestations of Radharani to give pleasure to Krishna. There is no fault in visiting temples and taking Their darshan.

But in Dwarika Dham, there is a ritual that everyone who visits Dwarika has to receive the mark of Shankh (conch shell), Chakra (divine disc), Gada (mace) and Padma (lotus) on their body. So Babaji also got the mark on his arm and returned to Vraj Dham. However, his heart became devoid of Bhakti. He started feeling as if he had never done any bhajan. His heart started burning in pain of separation of the divine love. Radharani came in his dream again and said, “Why did you come to Vraj? You have become the servant of Queen Satyabhama. Go back to Dwarika. There is no need to stay here.” 

Babaji was extremely worried when he woke up. He went to Shri Jaya Krishna Das Babaji Maharaj in Kamyavan and asked him what it all meant. Jaya Krishna Das Babaji said, “Oho! You have become the maid-servant of a queen of Dwarika, while we are the maid-servants of a cow-herder maid. We cannot sit together since now you belong to a higher social class. You are worth worshipping to us. Please pardon me, but you can go from here.” Ranbari's Babaji became very sad to hear this.

Thereafter, he also went to Govardhan's Siddha Krishna Das Babaji Maharaj with the same question, but he too said the same thing as Jaya Krishna Das Babaji. Ranbari's Babaji became tremendously sorrowful and started burning in the pain of separation. He came back to Ranbari and stayed inside his kutiya (hut). His fire of separation did not only burn his heart, but, in a few days, the fire actually materialized and started burning his whole body. 

Siddha Jagannath Das Babaji Maharaj lived nearby. He saw smoke coming out of Krishna Das Babaji's kutiya and exclaimed, “Oho! Virahagni! Virahagni!” ‘Virahagni’ means fire of separation. He took a Tulasi leaf and rushed into the kutiya of Krishna Das Babaji, whose whole body had burned to ashes except his head. As soon as Jagannath Das Babaji placed the Tulasi leaf on his head, it caught fire and burned to ashes.

Such is the fire of separation. The devotee cannot live without seeing Krishna and constantly prays for His darshan, but at the same time, the contemplation of Krishna becomes tremendously painful for him. Truly, no one other than a devotee of the stage of Prem Bhakti can understand his situation. But why does Krishna play this kind of game of meeting and separation? Radha Krishna are embodiments of mercy, They do not want to give pain to Their devotees. But the truth is that the pure darshan of Radha Krishna is very powerful like high voltage transmission lines. It is not feasible for Radha Krishna to simply come and give darshan to the devotee even if They want to. But this will be explained in the next article.