Essay name: Bhakti-rasayana by Madhusudana Sarasvati
Author:
Lance Edward Nelson
Affiliation: McMaster University / Religious Studies
This is a study and English translation of the Bhakti-rasayana by Madhusudana Sarasvati (16th century)鈥攐ne of the greatest and most vigorous exponents of Advaita after Shankara-Acharya who was also a great devotee of Krishna. The Bhaktirasayana attempts to merge non-dualist metaphysics with the ecstatic devotion of the Bhagavata Purana, by asserting that Bhakti is the highest goal of life and by arguinng that Bhakti embodies God within the devotee's mind.
Page 362 of: Bhakti-rasayana by Madhusudana Sarasvati
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knowledge, as shown in the saying, 'So long as one has not
developed love (priti) for Me, Vasudeva, one will not be
released (mucyate) from the conjunction with the body [BP
5.5.6]."65
I cannot see in these passages anything but a
rejection of one of the most central teachings of the BP
(and the BR as well), namely, the doctrine that bhakti is
the paramapuru峁Ｄ乼ha, a greater goal than liberation.
If Madhus奴dana is in fact changing his position on
the ultimate value of bhakti vis-脿-vis moksa, as he
certainly appears to be, he is saved from the two most
difficult philosophical dilemmas arising from the teaching
of the BR. These are: (1) the problem of explaining how it
is possible for devotion to continue in videhamukti
("disembodied liberation").and (2) that of establishing the
ontological parity of bhakti and moksa. Devotion now being
at its grandest only an added enhancement of the
jIvanmukta's interior bliss, neither its eternality nor its
ultimacy will require proof. So the only difficulty
remaining of those we discussed in chapter eight will be
that of justifying presence of bhakti in the condition,
admittedly temporary, of liberation-in-life.
9.7
Madhusudana's Final Intention
In the GAD, then, Madhus眉dana claims for samny膩sins
the right to enjoy bhakti without, as he did in the BR,
