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R. D. Ranade, in his autobiographical essay "The Evolution of My Own Thought," discusses the factors which caused him to turn from an antipathy toward philosophy to a vital and consuming interest in the subject. He reports that the following experience played a pivotal role in this intellectual conversion: When I happened to pay a visit to Benares from Poona in October, 1908, I had been to see the remnant of the Mutt [monastery] of Samkaracharya at Benares, when on a cool evening I happened to hear the devotional songs of Sankaracharya recited at the Mutt, which made me pause and think how a so-called Advaita Philosopher could at the same time make room for devotional songs in his philosophical teaching. That to me was a crux, which impelled me to study Indian philosophy all the more. 1 By referring to this experience as a "crux, " he apparently means to say that it confronted him with a puzzling and provocative problem, one that opened up for him intriguing new vistas of thought. No matter that Sankara himself probably did not write the hymns Ranade refers to, the question that arose in his mind that evening remains impelling: "How is it that Advaitins are also bhaktas?" This is of course the problem we have been dealing with throughout this study. To the practicing Advaitin-devotee, it may appear to be of mere academic interest, but if one 356

357 approaches it, as Ranade did, from the point of view of a philosopher, one is quickly swept into direct confrontation with the most profound problems of Indian religious thought. It is indeed a crux for the tradition, generating a deep but creative internal tension that has been the stimulus for much profound religious thought and experience. We have observed how, in the late hymns of the Rgveda, the Upanisads, the Bhagavad Gita, and the Bhagavata Purana, all of which are of central importance to the tradition in its various phases, impersonalist visions of the Godhead are held together in dynamic conflict with personalist and (in the Bhagavad Gita and Bhagavata-purana) devotional spiritualities. 2 Little or no acknowledgement of the apparent contradictions involved is given; indeed there often seems to be a reckless oblivion to the paradoxical implications of such juxtapositions, if not a positive delight in them. Interpreters of these scriptures sought, however, to derive from them systems of thought exhibiting a more studied consistency. Such writers fell generally into The two broad categories, as we have seen: the non-dualists (or monists) and the theists. The former emphasized the impersonalist revelation and an intellectual mysticism. devotionalists, on the other hand, held tenaciously to the finality of the theistically oriented portions of the sacred texts and the ultimacy of the devotee's loving relation with the personal God.

358 These writers naturally sought to resolve the seeming contradictions embodied in the scriptures in favor of the views that their school of thought wished to champion. Samkara, as we have seen, explained the personalistic passages of the sruti as apara vidya, a lowerlevel wisdom that must eventually be transcended. To be sure, he regarded conventional religious practices and devotionalism as true and valid, indeed even indispensable, for the masses engaged in the active life (pravrttimarga). For such people, religious rites and bhakti had the positive value of contributing to cittasuddhi, purification of the mind. But he believed that such practices were spiritually harmful for the paramahamsa ascetics who, having completed the process of mental purification, were eligible for the path of renunciation (nivrttimarga). Religious ritual and bhakti tended to confirm the experience of duality; they encouraged false attitudes of difference between God and the Self (atmesvarabheda) and dependence on an external power (paratantrya). They therefore interfered with the practice of Self-inquiry whereby the samnyasin sought to establish himself in the truth of the ultimate identity of jiva and Brahman, as taught in the "great sayings" of the Upanisads. Action and devotion alike were consigned to the realm of maya, and as such they were not to be taken seriously by the aspirant to non-dual realization. 3 Along with this kind of "

359 thinking, which was asectic in orientation and radically opposed to common sense understandings of the world and the self, Samkara and his followers developed social attitudes that were decidedly elitist. The response of the Krsnaite tradition, the devotional movement with which we have been primarily concerned, was on the whole typical of that of the various In the sphere of practical religion, the bhakti schools. followers of the Bhagavata rejected the Advaitins' exclusivism and opened up the path of bhakti to all who were sincere. Moksa, which the Advaitins held was open only to the very few, was devalued as an incidental by-product of the devotional life; the bliss of bhakti itself was enthroned as the highest goal of life (paramapurusartha) in its place. In the realm of metaphysics, there was an attempt, especially marked in the work of the Gosvamins of the Bengal school, to give bhakti an exalted, near absolute, ontological status by identifying it with Krsna's highest Sakti, thus transferring it from the realm of the psychological to the sphere of the ultimately real. 4 Madhusudana Sarasvati has emerged in the present study as a highly sophisticated, complex thinker who sought on at least two levels to bring about a rapprochement between between these two conflicting estimates of the value of bhakti. In his earlier work, the Bhakti-rasayana, he seems to be

360 writing more from the viewpoint of the devotionalist than that of the orthodox Advaitin samnyasin. Though an Advaita metaphysic is assumed, bhakti is presented as being both an independent spiritual path and itself the paramapurusartha. The realization of the highest stages of bhakti is said to include Advaitic Self-knowledge as one of its preliminary stages, brought about through devotional experience alone, without the mediation of the Upanisadic revelation. As in Vaisnava thought, there is an attempt to raise bhakti from the level of merely mental phenomena and give it true ontological status, in this case by identifying it with the reflection of bhagavat in the mind of the devotee, such a reflection being, according to the non-dualists' pratibimbavada ("reflection theory"), ultimately identical with bhagavat himself.5 The seriousness with which Madhusudana took the doctrine of bhakti as an independent path and paramapurusatha is, however, brought into question by the Gudhartha-dipika, his commentary on the Bhagavad Gita. While this later work gives much attention to bhakti, the viewpoint from which Madhusudana is writing is quite different from that adopted in the Bhakti-rasayana The teachings of the Gudhartha-dipika, consequently, differ in several important respects from those of the earlier text. The Gita commentary presents a version of Krsnaite devotionalism designed to appeal to the orthodox Samkara

361 samnyasin. The notions of bhakti as a path and as a goal in itself are abandoned. The ideal spiritual life is described one that progresses from the purificatory path of karma to the way of renunciation and knowledge, and eventually culminates in jivanmukti ("liberation-in-life"), the latter state being available only to the samnyasin engaged in Vedantic inquiry. But whereas Sankara saw bhakti as a hindrance to the highest aspirants who had taken to the path of knowledge, Madhusudana recommends it with enthusiasm as helpful at every stage of practice and a desirable enhancement of the jivanmukti experience. 6 The problem with Madhusudana's presentation, to summarize what has been presented in some detail above, is twofold. First, he neglects to deal with several important theoretical questions that this teaching on bhakti raises, such as the problem of the continued experience of devotion after enlightenment and the question of the ontological status of bhagavat vis-a-vis the nirguna Brahman. Even if we leave the more extravagant claims for bhakti made by the Bhakti-rasayana aside and consider only teachings of the Gudhartha-dipika, we are still left wishing for an explanation of the Advaitin's post-liberation vision of the flute-carrying, yellow-clad Krsna and all that such an experience implies for Advaitic theory. Second, on the socio-religious level, Madhusudana seems to violate the dominant egalitarian sentiment of the

362 Bhagavata and the devotional movements dependent on it by, at least in the Gudhartha-dipika, reserving the highest spiritual experiences--of bhakti as well as of moksa--for the Brahmin samnyasin alone. 7 While we must certainly admire the pioneering brilliance of Madhusudana's exposition, we cannot but feel that he did not say as much on the subject as he could have. This is not the place (nor has the present writer the adhikara) to suggest what those additional words might have been. In passing, however, I would mention the Upanisadic theme of the priyatva ("dearness") of the Self, along with the later notion of the atman as the paramapremaspada ("object of supreme love"), as ideas that one might have expected to be more fully developed by Madhusudana as he 8 wrote on Advaita-bhakti. It would also, it seems to me, be regretable if these were not among the essential foci of any future discussion of this question. Perhaps in this category as well should be Appaya's important idea of the enlightened jIva attaining Isvaratva (identity with the personal God) rather than merger in the impersonal Brahman. The problem, of course, is that Madhusudana himself was the last of the great expositors of classical Advaita. So we can neither look for a tradition of writers who carried on and extended Madhusudana's thinking 10 nor hope that the inquiry will be taken up again, at least in the terms used 9

363 by Madhusudana. It goes without saying that the world, India not excepted, is much different today than in the 16 th Necessarily, therefore, further discussion of this century. question will be forced to go beyond the traditional categories of Advaitic scholasticism. It will have to take into account wider realms of thought and experience, giving cognizance both to the present day needs of the Hindu community and the unavoidable impact of the religious and philosophical experience of other traditions. Of course, it may be doubted that the problem, involving as it does the notoriously difficult task of conceptualizing ultimacy, is amenable to any rigorous philosophical or theological solution. We may be dealing here with a religious experience which exhibits in an especially provocative way a feature that seems to be common to all authentic visions of the Godhead, namely, the wellknown tendency of such experiences to strain the limitations of language, to lead the mind toward the the realm of "mystery" and "paradox." For one who wishes to speak of Advaita and at the same time retain the ultimacy of bhakti, problems of conceptualization are even greater than those found in orthodox Sankara Advaita, with its clear-cut subordination of the personal experience to the impersonal, or in theistic Vaisnavism, which, in retreating to the opposite position, shys away from mystery and paradox in

364 favor of a more anthropomorphic and, one might say, common sense view of reality. It may be that in this case resolution, if such is to be had, will come more readily through image and metaphor, after the manner of the great scriptures, than through precise metaphysical delineation. There were several devotional poets with strong non-dualist tendencies who seem to have believed that this was the case. Jnanadeva (fl. 1290) and Kabir (ca. 1398-1448) are good examples. Their approach to the problem of devotion in the context of non-dualism was in many ways more straightforward than Madhusudana's Jnanadeva, for instance, was highly literate and well able to engage in metaphysical discourse, as he proved in his Amrtanubhava. Maharashtrian saint chose the medium of poetic imagery to express his understanding of Advaita-bhakti. Nevertheless, this great Three centuries before the Bhakti-rasayana, he wrote in his Jnanesvari: As the waters of the Ganges still sparkle even after they have reached the sea, so is his enjoyment [of union with Me]. 鈥� Some may hold the opinion that when union is reached there can be no experience of it; but one might as well ask how a word can be uttered by words. . Can anything that is not space understand the nature of space? 鈥� One who has not become united with Me cannot know where I am; therefore it cannot be said that he worships Me. 鈥� Thus he who becomes one with Me enjoys Me as a young woman delights in her youth.

365 As waves delight in the embrace of the water, light rejoices in the sun and space wanders through the heavens, so when he is united with Me he worships Me without action, as gold ornaments do honor to the gold of which they are made. The fragrance of sandalwood could be said to offer its worship to the tree and the moonlight adores the moon with true joy. Similarly, though the thought of action is inconsistent with non-duality, yet there is a form of devotion in union; this cannot be described in words but only known in experience.11 cannot It would be possible to reject this approach as exhibiting a naive lack of philosophical sophistication, a surrender of the powers of thought in an acceptance of contradiction that goes beyond the tolerance even of Vedantic discourse. Or one might gladly acknowledge it as embodying an honest recognition of the mystery of the absolute and the highest human experience thereof. In either case, however, one must admire the directness and freshness of the approach. 12 The example of Jnanadeva is particularly instructive at the present juncture because this writer includes in his Amrtanubhava a systematic critique of Sankara's doctrine of maya. This does not mean that he was opposed to nondualism. On the contrary, he embraced it, but not in strictly Samkarite terms. He was instead one of the earliest exponents of a type of thinking, owing much to Kashmir Saiva sources, that gave bhakti an exalted status in the context of a tantric-style Advaita. Samkara's maya was replaced with a fully real sakti without abandoning the non-

366 dualist position, because sakti was conceived as mysteriously identical with the absolute. In such a system, it was possible to give bhakti a central place without compromising the unity or transcendence of the ultimate. The Gosvamins readily saw this, though they tried to avoid the final non-dualistic implications that were involved. 13 This kind of thinking, moreover, has had considerable influence on the Sankara tradition, especially in the modern period. Since Ramakrishna and Vivekananda, proponents of Advaita have tended to slip unannounced into a mode of discourse reminiscent of Saiva or Sakta non-dualism (i.e., one that implies the full reality of sakti) when speaking, as they often have, of the value of bhakti and the possibility of its continued experience after realization has been attained. 14 Though the idea of bhakti as paramapurusartha is absent, it has often been approached and sometimes duplicated through the notion of para bhakti ("supreme devotion")--borrowed, in an age in which liberal Advaitins have felt the need for a synthetic view of "Hinduism," from Narada's Bhaktisutras. 15 Meanwhile Madhusudana's attempt at integrating bhakti and the orthodox mayavada, although more authentic in terms of Sankara's original vision than such quasi-tantric interpretations, has languished, suffering from the twin afflictions of exaggerated praise, on one hand, and lack of

367 careful study and development, on the other. It is hoped that this study will accomplish something in the way of rectifying this neglect. Madhusudana's writings on bhakti represent an important phase of Advaitic thought, one that strains the limits of the system to their upmost and, in the process, raises important questions for the tradition as a whole. It is my feeling that a careful and creative consideration of the problems that Madhusudana's work raises would make a significant contribution to the ongoing vitality of Advaita in its modern context.

Notes for the conclusion:

1 R. D. Ranade, "The Evolution of My Own Thought," in S. Radhakrishnan and J. H. Muirhead, eds., Contemporary Indian Philosophy (rev. 2 nd ed.; Unwin Ltd., 1952), p. 543. 2 See chaps. 1.4, 3.5. 3 Chap. 2. 4 Chaps. 3 and 4. London: George Allen & 5 Chaps. 5 and 7. 6 Chap. 9. 7 Chaps. 8 and 9. 8 See chaps 1.3 and 7, note 291, pt. VIII. 9 See chap. 8.3. 10 Narayana Tirtha is a possible exception. I have not studied his work, but from what Mishra says of it, it does not seem that this writer addressed any of the problems in Madhusudana's thought on bhakti that we have raised, nor does it appear that he added anything of significance to his illustrious predecessor's teaching. See Mishra, chap. 7. 11 pradhan, II, pp. 307-308. See R. D. Ranade, Mysticism in India: The Poet Saints of India (reprint ed.; Albany: State University of New York Press, 1983), p. 136. 12 Amrtanubhava 7. See Bahirat, pp. 198-228; Ranade, PP. 154-156. 13 See chap. 4.3.6, with note 106. 14 Ramakrishna proclaimed Brahman and sakti to be identical, "like fire and its power to burn" (Nikhilananda, trans., Gospel, p. 161). For him, the world did not vanish "like a dream" in the highest realization, as it did for Samkara: he saw it as a reflex of of Sakti, the Divine 525

526 鈥� 鈥� Mother. "O Mother, " Ramakrishna sang, "Thou art verily Brahman and Thou art verily Sakti. Thou art the Absolute and Thou dost manifest Thyself as the Relative" (ibid., p. 178). The jnanin lost in the unity of the nirguna Brahman is, in Ramakrishna's teaching, compared to a person who has climbed up to the roof of a house and forgotten the steps altogether. This, however, is not the most complete realization: "The vijnani, who is more intimately acquainted with Brahman, realizes something more. He realizes that the steps are made of the same materials as the roof: bricks, lime, and brick-dust. That which is realized intuitively as Brahman . is then found to have become the universe and all its living beings" (ibid., p. 155). Ramakrishna explained that it is this realization that makes bhakti possible even after enlightenment: 鈥� "The Mother has kept me in the state of a bhakta, a vijnani. That is why I joke with Rakhal and others. Had I been in the condition of a jnani I couldn't do that. "In this state I realize that it is the Mother alone who has become everything. I see Her everywhere. In the Kali temple I found that the Mother Herself had become everything--even the wicked" (ibid., 290-291). Again: "The most advanced devotees say that He Himself has become all this--the twenty-four cosmic principles, the universe, and all living beings. The devotee of God wants to eat sugar, and not to become sugar" (ibid., p. 192). In all this, we see an interesting blend of Advaita, tantrism, and even (in the sugar metaphor) Vaisnava devotionalism. While Ramakrishna did not see himself as a spokesman for the Sankara tradition per se, his vision, especially as transmitted by the more intellectual Vivekananda, has been extremely influential in modern Advaitic circles. 15 Swami Vivekananda remarks: "Sri Ramakrishna used to say that there is another stage of Bhakti which is called the Supreme Devotion (Para bhakti) i.e. to love Him after becoming established in the consciousness of Advaita and after having attained Mukti. It may seem paradoxical, and the question may be raised here why such a one who has already attained Mukti whould be desirous of retaining the spirit of Bhakti? The answer is: The Mukta or the Free is beyond all law; no law applies in his case, and hence no question can be asked regarding him. Even becoming Mukta, some, out of their own free will, retain Bhakti to taste of its sweetness" (Complete Works, V, 336-337). See Vivekananda's essay "Para-Bhakti or Supreme Devotion" (Complete Works, III, 70-100).