Establishment of the WVA Interfaith Committee
One Scholar's Historical Perspective
by Bhakti Ananda Goswami
The World Vaishnava Association is
seeking to establish an Interfaith Committee, to promote the non-sectarian
mission of Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu and Sri Nityananda Rama. In the
days of Sri Sri Gaura-Nitai's Earthly pastimes, Their bhakti yoga Sankirtan
movement inaugurated an astounding non-sectarian religious revival and social
phenomenon, which has been called by scholars the “Bengali Renaissance”.
This religio-social Charismatic movement embraced, and was embraced by, not only
various branches of Vaishnavas, but Shaivites, Devi Worshipers, Buddhists,
and even Muslims. Its non-sectarian, pure bhakti appeal was so
overwhelming, that all kinds of devotees were caught up in it. Scholars
have written about this Sankirtan movement's wide-reaching social effects.
After Sri Sri Gaura-Nitai's
disappearance, Their Sankirtan movement was carried on by Their illustrious
followers, a small army of saints, whose individual histories are quite
amazing themselves. Their non-sectarian bhakti yoga movement stimulated
moral reformation, a spiritual revival of the masses, general literacy, and
produced masterpieces of devotional literature, prayers, hymns, and
liturgy. It created a revival in all of the sacred arts and sciences
in Bengal. Birth-caste barriers were eased, there was increased social
mobility, and the status of women greatly improved. Religious hostilities
were much relieved, contributing to a more peaceful and prosperous public
order.
There was a distinct difference between
this and the other great devotional revival movements of history. The earlier
Charismatic movement of the Indian Alvar saints had produced a profound effect
in its time, and other great charismatic bhakti yoga movements had swept across
India and the ancient world from age to age. These popular bhakti
devotional movements shared some core doctrines and practices with Sri
Chaitanya's and Sri Nityananda's Sankirtan movement. In addition to the
bhakti movements started by the great Indian Vaishnava acharyas like Sri
Madhvacharya and Sri Ramanujacharya, there were also great devotional
movements which swept like waves across North Africa, Europe, and
Asia. Some of these were the great Bridal Mysticism and
Caroling religious fairs of the Middle Ages’ Catholic
Europe, the Catholic rosary devotion to Jesus through Mary, and
the popular Eastern Rite Catholic and Orthodox Christian practice of constantly
reciting the Jesus Prayer. Later there was a great revival of the
rosary devotion to “Jesus living in Mary,” led by Saint Louis de
Montfort in France, which spread like wild-fire across Europe.
Beside the great Catholic revivals led by Saint Francis of Assisi and other
Christian mystics of the 11th and 12th centuries, also during that era was
the rise of the Sufi Divine Love tradition of Rumi, al Ghazali, Suhrawardi, and
the woman saint Rabi'a al-'Adawiyya. A central practice of this devotion
was the invocation of the 99 Beautiful Names of Allah. In Japan, the
Pure Land bhakti Buddhist saints Honen, Shinran, Ippen, and Nicherin eventually
popularized the constant repetition of Amitabha Buddha's (HRIH's) Name as
the “Nembutsu,” “Namu Amida Butsu,” and His “Sun-Lotus”
mantra. In Judaism, devotion to Hashem, the Holy Name, and the
Kabalistic study of Shekinah (Shakti) Bridal Mysticism also flourished from
time to time. There was also a revival of related Jewish spirituality in
the 11th and 12th centuries, with the rise of Hasidic and Mediterranean
Neo-Platonic Jewish mysticism. All of these movements were actually
historically related to Vaishnavism, and had an inner or esoteric core
of Bridal Mysticism, and an exoteric, outer Charismatic (Charisma is
ATTRACTION, KRISHNA IS ALL-ATTRACTIVE) movement aspect of devotion to the
constant invocation of Godhead through His Holy Name.
On the surface of it, what then was
different about the Charismatic Holy Name bhakti yoga movement of Sri Chaitanya
Mahaprabhu's and Sri Nityananda Rama's Bengali Renaissance? While
all of these other movements tended to unite the various lineages and sectarian
off-shoots of the great religions, Sri Sri Gaura-Nitai's movement alone
united devotees of the Lord not only across Vaishnava sectarian boundaries, but
across the boundaries of the great religions themselves! It
also drew mere lay followers directly into the mystical core of devotion to God
in the Bridal Mysticism mood of Divine conjugal love. Such “conjugal”
mysticism was generally restricted to the priests, monks, nuns, and ascetics of
the other bhakti traditions. However, Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu and
His followers ultimately made the rarified heights of Divine Love mysticism
accessible to pious commoners, men, women and householders, initiates and lay
people alike. It was said that Sri Chaitanya and Sri Nityananda Rama
“plundered the storehouse of love of God, and distributed its treasure to all,
regardless of their qualification”! This act of God's unconditional
grace on undeserving humanity was the essence of the non-sectarian bhakti yoga
revival movement of Sri Sri Gaura-Nitai and Their saintly followers.
In the ecstatic footsteps of Sri Sri
Guru and Gauranga, for the first time, humanity had a foretaste of the
possibility of a future GLOBAL NON SECTARIAN BHAKTI YOGA MOVEMENT, WHICH COULD
EMBRACE ALL OF FAITHFUL HUMANITY IN A DEVOTIONAL UNITY OF DIVERSITY.
This unity was only possible, because the realized devotees of the various
Bridal Mysticism inner traditions could recognize RADHA-KRISHNA as their own
HOLY MOTHER and FATHER GOD, and could appreciate that here was the essence of
both their inner and outer sacred traditions presented as a NON-SECTARIAN
EXPRESSION OF PURE BHAKTI YOGA. Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu and Sri
Nityananda were not mere clever religious syncretists, Who had forged some
artificial hybrid of various traditions. They were re-presenting a common
tradition so primal and pure, that it was in fact, at the esoteric revelatory
heart of all the various great devotional traditions. Furthermore, Sri Sri
Gaura-Nitai seemed to embody in Themselves the theology and ecstatic
realization of the Primal Love tradition and the Primal Salvific
tradition. Sri Chaitanya's ecstatic private revelation of the Bridal
Mysticism of Radha and Krishna was unmatched in religious history. Sri
Nityananda Rama embodied the entire theology of Sri Krishna's first expansion,
the Second Person of the Godhead, Sri Balarama, the savior, spiritual master,
Nama-Rupa of God for Pastimes, and mercy of Godhead incarnate. Thus,
between the esoteric Bridal Mysticism of Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, and the
exoteric Rig Vedic Varnashrama Dharma Purusha (Vishnu) Mysticism of
Nityananda Balarama, all of the inner and outer traditions of the other related
great bhakti religions were comprehended. Thus there was an
undeniable theological-historical and a mystical-ecstatic reality
underlying the visible harmonization of Sri Sri Gaura-Nitai's non-sectarian
unity-in-diversity movement. The apparent exoteric “interfaith” unity
of the movement did not disappear as mere emotionality or sentiment upon close
analysis. Instead, deeper analysis revealed ever deeper layers of profound
historical, theological, and mystical connectedness between the great bhakti
religions, with Radha-Krishna and Balarama at their historical revelatory
core. This unity is what my own research as an historian of religion has
focused on for over the last 30 years.
Thus, from its very beginning, the
mission of Sri Sri Gaura-Nitai was far more than the mere perpetuation of a
single specific sectarian lineage of initiation within Vaishnavism.
Nor was it merely a mission to unite all of the orthodox Vaishnava
lineages. Rather, the complete mission of Sri Sri Guru (Nityananda Rama
and His Representatives) and Gauranga was nothing less than the global bhakti
unity of all humanity.....a unity transcendent to race, class, gender, language,
education, occupation, and even lineage, diksha or creed......a unity based on
our common heritage of adoration to the same Original Supreme Personality of
Godhead, one Father HARI, one Savior BALADEVA, one Immanent Holy Spirit
PARAMATMA , and veneration to SRI RADHA (Rhoda), Their SHAKTI (Shekinah), the
Loving Holy Mother of us all!
So while diksha lineages should and
must continue in all the great bhakti traditions, and while Gaudiya and other
Vaishnavas must carry on their “sectarian” sacred traditions, we Gaudiya
Vaishnavas also have another mission, which is to forge non-sectarian alliances
with all of our relatives in the great global bhakti family of SRI HARI (Jewish
and Christian ELI, Muslim ALI, Pure Land Buddhist HRIH, etc.). This
does not mean merging everyone in together and creating one super-religion by
obliterating “sectarian” differences. Instead, we must create a
unity that leaves our diversity intact, but transcends it! This is
done through the process of federation or alliance. The very
ancient great Vedic civilizations of Varnashrama Dharma unity-in-diversity
were based on regional interfaith alliances or LEAGUES OF DEVOTEES. When
His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Srila Prabhupada first conceived of
the way to globally embody Sri Chaitanya's non-sectarian movement, he called it
a League of Devotees. This league structure is the dharmic key to the
social embodiment of a non-sectarian, or super- (beyond, above) sectarian
movement. In an alliance (league) of mutually respecting Vaishnava
lineages, Indian Vaishnavism can be united, leaving all the ancient lineages
intact. In the same way, ever-increasing alliances can be formed with
other fundamentally compatible authentic bhakti lineages, respecting their
traditions, and leaving respect for their unique guru, shastra and sadhu
intact. Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu did not require anyone to leave their own
devotional tradition to take up the practices of His bhakti yoga movement.
Sita-Rama, Lakshmi-Narayana, Lakshmi-Narasimha, Durga-Shiva, Buddhist, and
Muslim devotees did not all abandon their special and even exclusive “sectarian”
love for the Lord. Instead, the inclusive ACHINTYA-BHEDABHEDA-TATTVA
doctrine of Sri Chaitanya reconciled peoples' various devotions to the Persons
of the Godhead, Their multi-Forms, and even the impersonal
Brahman. In His theology of inconceivable
oneness-and-difference, Sri Gauranga was able to reconcile all lesser
differences and even opposites, by allowing paradox to exist within the context
of a higher and greater transcendent unity in the mystery of the
Godhead.
The moral practices of Sri Sri Gaura-Nitai's
movement were also non-sectarian and universally applicable virtuous
practices of the highest personal and social ideals. Thus pious
Shaivites, Buddhists, and even Muslims were attracted to take them
up. Altogether there was no theological or moral impediment
to any devotee's non-sectarian participation in the Sankirtan
movement. Carrying on in this inclusive tradition today, the mandate
of the World Vaishnava Association Interfaith Committee therefore has the
potential to foster the global realization of an inclusive League of
Devotees. This is in keeping with the vision of my own beloved
Master, A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami. For example, when he came to
the United States in the 1960s, he invited all devotees of the Lord to
participate in the Sankirtan movement. As a devoted Christian, I was
welcome to participate in Sri Sri Gaura-Nitai's non-sectarian bhakti yoga
revival by my saintly Gaudiya Vaishnava master. He never required me to
renounce my devotion to Jesus Christ, or the practice of my Catholic
faith. Rather, he challenged me as a Christian to perfect
my moral life and devotion, rooting out anything from my life that could compete
with my love for God. Thus he was the perfect spiritual master for
me AS A CHRISTIAN, directing me into the fullness of realization in my own
Christian devotion. Such devotional inclusivity as exemplified
by His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami is true non-sectarianism, and a
model for the unity-in-diversity of all authentic bhakti yoga traditions.
So differences
in theology today need not be a barrier to our seeking to
build pious bhakti yoga alliances with members of the historically related
great religions and other sincere devotees of the Lord. The WVA is
taking the bold step to reach out to the rest of the Indian Vaishnava community,
and the rest of the devotees in the world, to begin to build such an alliance, a
non-sectarian League of Devotees of the Supreme Personality Of Godhead.
With the prayers and blessings of the Vaishnavas, Sri Sri Guru (Lord Baladeva
and Srila Prabhupada and all our acharyas), and Sri Gauranga, anything is
possible, so let us begin!
your aspiring servant, WVA-IC Interim
Coordinator, Bhakti Ananda Goswami
WVA-IC
POST OFFICE BOX 213
MYRTLE POINT, OREGON
97458 USA
email bhakti.eohn@verizon.net