Photo by Melanie Drury.
While in the Vrindavan mood, since I am already posting Prabodhananda Saraswati's Vṛndāvana-mahimāmṛtam on the Prema Prayojan site in Hindi, with the translation of Shyama Das (Shyamlal Hakim), I thought I would try giving an English version over here. This lengthy poem of more than 1700 verses is a celebration of Vrindavan like no other, and often describes it as almost paradise-like even in the real world of his time. Certainly reading it creates a desire, an aspiration, to both see the underlying archetypal reality and to recreate it in the "real" world.
As inadequate as it is, in the mood of Sri Saraswatipada, here it begins:
śrī-śrī-prabodhānanda-sarasvatī-kṛtam
śrī-rādhā-muralī-manohara-padāmbhojaṁ sadā bhāvayan
śrī-caitanya-mahāprabhoḥ pada-rajaḥsv ātmānam evārpayan |
śrīmad-bhāgavatottamān guṇa-nidhīn atyādarād ānaman
śrī-vṛndāvana-divya-vaibhavam ahaṁ stotuṁ mudā prārabhe ||1.1|| īśo’pi yasya mahimāmṛta-vāri-rāśeḥ
pāraṁ prayātum analambata tatra ke’nye |
kintv alpam apy aham ati-praṇayād vigāhya
syāṁ dhanya-dhanya iti me samupakramo’yam ||1.2|| śrīmad-vṛndāṭavi mama hṛdi sphorayātma-svarūpam
atyāścarya-prakṛti paramānanda-vidyā-rahasyam |
pūrṇa-brahmāmṛtam api hriyā vābhidhātuṁ na neti
brūte yatropaniṣada ihātratyā vārtā kutastyā ||1.3||
This comment about the Upanishads is interesting. In the Bhagavat-sandarbha, Srila Jiva Goswami discusses at length the prayers of the personified Upanishads from the 87th chapter of Canto X. The question that starts the chapter is, "If Brahman is ineffable and beyond the capacity of words to express, then how can the Vedic texts themselves describe It?"
Without going into the details of what is a very lengthy argument, Jiva concludes that it is possible, since the words that describe the Lord are a part of His energy and so are given the capacity to indicate Him, even if the Lord is unlimited and beyond the capacity of the mind of an individual soul to fully grasp. Jiva also says that even the negative statements like neti neti, the negative path to the Absolute, is in fact a process of describing the Lord!
śrī-vṛndāvana-mahimāmṛtam
prathamaṁ śatakam
śrī-caitanya-mahāprabhoḥ pada-rajaḥsv ātmānam evārpayan |
śrīmad-bhāgavatottamān guṇa-nidhīn atyādarād ānaman
śrī-vṛndāvana-divya-vaibhavam ahaṁ stotuṁ mudā prārabhe ||1.1||
Thinking constantly of the lotus feet of Krishna, who plays his enchanting flute, offering my soul into the dust of Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu’s lotus feet, and most respectfully bowing down to the virtuous great devotees of the Lord, I take up the composition of this hymn in praise of the transcendental glories of Sri Vrindavan.
pāraṁ prayātum analambata tatra ke’nye |
kintv alpam apy aham ati-praṇayād vigāhya
syāṁ dhanya-dhanya iti me samupakramo’yam ||1.2||
The Supreme Lord Himself is not able to cross the ocean of Vrindavan’s nectarean grandeur, so who else would dare even try? Nevertheless, overcome by intense love, and thinking that if I dive just a little into that ocean I will be made most fortunate, I undertake this daunting task.
atyāścarya-prakṛti paramānanda-vidyā-rahasyam |
pūrṇa-brahmāmṛtam api hriyā vābhidhātuṁ na neti
brūte yatropaniṣada ihātratyā vārtā kutastyā ||1.3||
O Vrindavan! Please reveal to my heart your true essence, your most amazing nature, with all its secrets of esoteric knowledge leading to supreme bliss. When the Upanishads themselves are too shy to describe the full manifestation of Brahman, and so only speak of It in negative terms, then where can we hope to find proper information about you [other than through your own merciful revelation]?
This comment about the Upanishads is interesting. In the Bhagavat-sandarbha, Srila Jiva Goswami discusses at length the prayers of the personified Upanishads from the 87th chapter of Canto X. The question that starts the chapter is, "If Brahman is ineffable and beyond the capacity of words to express, then how can the Vedic texts themselves describe It?"
Without going into the details of what is a very lengthy argument, Jiva concludes that it is possible, since the words that describe the Lord are a part of His energy and so are given the capacity to indicate Him, even if the Lord is unlimited and beyond the capacity of the mind of an individual soul to fully grasp. Jiva also says that even the negative statements like neti neti, the negative path to the Absolute, is in fact a process of describing the Lord!
Of course, the real point is that the personal form of God, his name, his abode, his pastimes all exist specifically in order to be accessible to the individual souls. They would have no purpose, indeed God Himself would have no purpose, if there was no one to relish his blissful existence in all its infinite manifestations and with its divine center in Vrindavan, the abode of love as embodied in the form of Radha and Krishna.
Anyway, here Prabodhananda ascribes the Upanishads' silence about the glories of Vrindavan and Radha-Krishna's lila to shyness (hriyā). In a later verse, he says that they all became cows in Vrindavan so they could relish the grasses here. Like the Bhagavatam says that the great sages all became birds.
Anyway, here Prabodhananda ascribes the Upanishads' silence about the glories of Vrindavan and Radha-Krishna's lila to shyness (hriyā). In a later verse, he says that they all became cows in Vrindavan so they could relish the grasses here. Like the Bhagavatam says that the great sages all became birds.
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