The Key to the Theological Kingdom
By Srila Bhakti Raksaka Sridhara Deva Goswami
Faith in Gauranga is rare, and to have faith in Gauranga is costly. If you can somehow gather that, you will be benefited more so than you will be by directly negotiating with Krishna. But to put faith in Gauranga will be difficult until we can understand him ontologically. We cannot proceed with only the help of our worldly experience. Gauranga is not accepted by such large circle as Krishna is accepted. Many higher scriptures are in favor of Krishna-avatar, so a wide circle accepts Krishna as Lord. A narrower circle accepts Gauranga as God, and there are not so many scriptures supporting him. So, it is difficult to have faith in him. But if you can somehow come closer to Gauranga, you will be a greater gainer.
In the conception of Kaviraja Goswami, there is something more. There you will find very charming, heart-touching things that give us a clear conception. In Sanskrit, Kaviraja Goswami wrote the Govinda Lilamrta. There, he described the asta-kaliya-lila, the full twenty-four-hour engagement of the gopis with Krishna. In Bengali, he wrote Sri Caitanya-caritamrta. These two books have made him immortal and given him a very very high position amongst the sadhus. Kustari Manjari is his name in Krishna-lila, Kaviraja Goswami Prabhu.
His birthplace was between Katwa and Ekachakra, Nityananda Prabhu’s place. It is about two miles north of Bardhaman station in Jamalpur. I once went to visit that place. All through my request to ISKCON was to try to improve that place. That place is most important according to me, the place of he who has given Mahaprabhu proper to us.
If one has gone through Caitanya-caritamrta, one has everything within one’s fist—Bhagavatam, Mahabharata, the Vedas, and all the other scriptures. One will be able to attain the central truth. Nothing in the theological world will be unknown to them. One will get the clue of adjustment in the theological world. If one can go through Caitanya-caritamrta in the right way, one will have the key of the theological kingdom in one’s hand. In a gross or subtle way, all the conceptions of the theistic world have been represented in Caitanya-caritamrta in their own position. The outlook, the adjustment is such: it is fine and perfect there, in Caitanya-caritamrta.
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And to think that some “Gaudiyas” don’t accept the Caitanya-caritamrta as sastra! What a loss for them.
Yeah, that is sad. They are missing out on heaploads of nectar!