Through his arguments in the Tattva Sandarbha, Jīva thus invests the entire brahmanical canon of śruti and smṛti texts with the transcendent authority of the eternal, uncreated Veda. He thereby provides the basis for his argument in the Bhagavat Sandarbha that only those names of Kṛṣṇa that are recorded in the śāstras—and especially those recorded in the Bhāgavata Purāṇa, the sovereign of all śāstras—are his sound-embodiments that contain his essence and śakti, and thus they alone are efficacious in generating direct experience of his divine presence:
It is only by means of those names (nāmans) that are celebrated in the śāstras that Bhagavān is immediately apprehended.… The self-manifesting nature (svataḥ-siddhatva) of these [names] must be recognized along with the fabricated nature of other [names].84
Jīva singles out the name “Kṛṣṇa,” Kṛṣṇa-nāman, as the most perfect and complete of Bhagavān’s many names, which is invested with the fullness of his śakti (śakti-pūrṇatā) and surpasses in its potency the names of all his vilāsas and avatāras.85 The Kṛṣṇa-nāman is the quintessential sound-embodiment that is the seed-expression of his quintessential text-embodiment, the Bhāgavata Purāṇa. Like the Bhāgavata, which is extolled as the “ripe fruit (phala) of the wish-fulfilling tree of Veda that is full of ambrosial nectar (amṛta),”86 the Kṛṣṇa-nāman is celebrated as the “sweetest of the sweet … the perfect fruit (phala) of the creeper of all the Vedas, its essential nature (svarūpa) consisting of consciousness (cit).”87 Jīva extends his arguments regarding the eternality (nityatva) of the Vedic words (śabdas) to the Kṛṣṇa-nāman and maintains that the varṇas or akṣaras, the phones or sound units that constitute the name, are eternal (nitya). He suggests, moreover, that the consummate status of the Kṛṣṇa-nāman, the sound-form of the supreme Bhagavān, surpasses even that of the syllable Om, the sound-form of Brahman, as the primordial vibration at the basis of all reality that is the most concentrated essence (sāra) of the Vedas.88
In the Kṛṣṇa Nāmāṣṭaka Rūpa also singles out the Kṛṣṇa-nāman as the most perfect of Kṛṣṇa’s names, which he celebrates in the eight verses of his hymn. According to Rūpa, the essential nature (svarūpa) of the Kṛṣṇa-nāman consists of consciousness (cit) and bliss (sukha), and its form (ākṛti) is made of transcendent sound (paramākṣara). It is this transcendent sound-body that is the “pūrṇa body of Kṛṣṇa” (Kṛṣṇa-pūrṇa-vapus), the body of the supreme Godhead in his complete fullness.89 Rūpa also connects the Kṛṣṇa-nāman to the Vedas, proclaiming that the lotus-feet of the name are “illumined by the splendor of the crown jewels of the entire śruti.”90 Moreover, Rūpa suggests that the nāman has manifold forms (aneka-svarūpa), including not only the Kṛṣṇa-nāman, the singular transcendent name, but also the many different names by which Gopāla Kṛṣṇa is venerated in the śāstras, such as Yaśodānandana (son of Yaśodā), Nandasūnu (son of Nanda), Gopīcandra (moon of the gopīs), and Vṛndāvanendra (king of Vṛndāvana).91
In the Caitanya Caritāmṛta Kṛṣṇadāsa also ascribes a special status to the Kṛṣṇa-nāman, or Kṛṣṇa-mantra, as the mahā-mantra that is the essence of all Vedic mantras (sarva-mantra-sāra) and the mahā-nāman that is the essence of all divine names.92 Kṛṣṇadāsa also follows Rūpa and Jīva in describing the Kṛṣṇa-nāman as made of consciousness (cit) and bliss (ānanda).93 In the final analysis, as I will discuss in the following section, all three Gauḍīya authorities concur that what distinguishes the Kṛṣṇa-nāman as the supreme name that is the source and essence of all divine names is its unique ontological status as the transcendent sound-body that is identical with Kṛṣṇa.
Identity of Nāman, Svarūpa, and Vigraha
In Gauḍīya representations of the internal dynamics of the Godhead in the transcendent Vraja-dhāman, Bhagavān, in his essential nature as the inexhaustible plenitude of sat, being, becomes cit, consciousness, and through awareness of his own Self bifurcates into subject (āśraya) and object (viṣaya) in order to enjoy ānanda, bliss. Through this self-referral dynamic Bhagavān revels within himself as both śaktimat and śakti, Kṛṣṇa and Rādhā, and savors the rasa, ambrosial nectar, of his own flowing bliss. The dynamism inherent in Kṛṣṇa’s enjoyment of his own bliss reverberates as a primordial vibration, which is his purṇa nāman, his transcendent name in its complete fullness. Because the name is nothing but the vibration of Kṛṣṇa’s own dynamic nature, his svarūpa-śakti, it is held to be nondifferent from him and full of sat-cit-ānanda, full of rasa, and full of śakti.
In his discussion of the name in the Bhaktirasāmṛtasindhu, Rūpa invokes an unidentified verse from the Padma Purāṇa, which is also cited by Jīva and Kṛṣṇadāsa, in order to ground the ontology of the name in the scriptural authority of the śāstras:
The name Kṛṣṇa is a wish-granting gem (cintāmaṇi), has a body (vigraha) consisting of consciousness (caitanya) and nectar (rasa), and is completely full (pūrṇa), pure (śuddha), and eternally free (nitya-mukta) due to the nondifference (abhinnatva) between the name (nāman) and the possessor of the name (nāmin).94
In his commentary on this verse, Jīva explains that the name is identical with Kṛṣṇa because the Kṛṣṇa-nāman, like the svarūpa of Kṛṣṇa, consists of sat-cit-ānanda, being, consciousness, and bliss. The one reality (tattva) consisting of sat-cit-ānanda and rasa appears (root bhū + āvir) as two, but the two are nondifferent.95 In the Bhagavat Sandarbha Jīva elaborates further on the identity between Kṛṣṇa and his name, asserting that the nāman is the svarūpa of Bhagavān (bhagavat-svarūpam eva nāma) and that there is ultimately no difference (abheda) between the nāman, name, and the nāmin, possessor of the name.96
In his discussion of the ontology of the name, Jīva suggests that the form (rūpa) of the nāman is made of bliss (ānanda) like the vigraha, the absolute body of Kṛṣṇa, although he does not elaborate on the relationship between the name and the vigraha.97 A connection between the nāman and the vigraha is also suggested by Rūpa’s image of the Kṛṣṇa-nāman as the “pūrṇa body (vapus) of Kṛṣṇa”98 and the Padma Purāṇa’s image of the nāman as having a “body (vigraha) consisting of consciousness and rasa.”99 Kṛṣṇadāsa makes this connection explicit and goes even further by asserting that the nāman and the vigraha, like the nāman and the svarūpa, are in the final analysis identical:
The name of Kṛṣṇa and the svarūpa of Kṛṣṇa are the same. The name, the vigraha, and the svarūpa, these three are one rūpa; there is no division among the three; the three are the cidānanda svarūpa. There is no division in Kṛṣṇa between the body and possessor of the body, nor between the name and the possessor of the name.100
At the conclusion of his assertion that there is no difference between the nāman, the vigraha, and the svarūpa of Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇadāsa notes that “the dharma of jīvas distinguishes between name and body and svarūpa.”101 This comment highlights a crucial difference between the nature of Kṛṣṇa, the supreme Godhead, and the nature of jīvas, individual living beings. In the Gauḍīya discourse of human embodiment, as discussed in Chapter 2, jīvas are represented as part of the jīva-śakti and as therefore “on the border” (taṭasthā) between the material realm of prakṛti governed by the māyā-śakti and the transcosmic domain of Bhagavān’s essential nature in which the svarūpa-śakti operates. In this perspective the jīva’s nāman, name, and deha, body or psychophysical complex, are both material (prākṛta) products of the realm of prakṛti, whereas the jīva’s svarūpa, essential nature, is a part (aṃśa) of Bhagavān and is nonmaterial (aprākṛta) and made of cit and ānanda. Moreover, on the material plane there is no intrinsic connection between the jīva’s body and the name that is assigned to that body through the conventions of human culture. The Gauḍīya discourse of divine embodiment, in contrast, maintains that in the case of the supreme Godhead there is no difference between name, body, and essence because the nāman, vigra
ha, and svarūpa are all nonmaterial (aprākṛta) and made of sat-cit-ānanda.
Name as Avatāra
In the Gauḍīya ontology of the name, the name is represented, on the one hand, as the eternal, nonmaterial, transcendent Kṛṣṇa-nāman that is identical with Kṛṣṇa in the transcendent Vraja-dhāman and that cannot be perceived with the ordinary material senses and, on the other hand, as the diverse array of divine names that manifest on the gross material plane and that can be engaged by human beings through material faculties such as speech, hearing, and the mind. The critical strategy that the Gauḍīyas use to connect the transcendent and manifest aspects of the name is to deploy the trope of descent, avatāra: like the one vigraha that descends from the transcosmic plane to the material realm in manifold corporeal forms as svāṃśa avatāras, the one nāman descends from the transcosmic plane to the material realm in manifold sonic forms as nāma-avatāras.
In reflecting on the ontology of the name in the Bhagavat Sandarbha, Jīva maintains that “like the other avatāras of the supreme Īśvara, this [name] is an avatāra in the form of sound (varṇa-rūpeṇāvatāra).”102 Kṛṣṇadāsa suggests that the nāma-avatāra is a special form of avatāra through which Kṛṣṇa descends into the material realm in Kali Yuga in order to save the world from the darkness of ignorance: “In the Kali age, the avatāra of Kṛṣṇa is in the form of the name [nāma-rūpe Kṛṣṇa-avatāra]; from the name there is the salvation of the whole world.”103
The primordial unspoken name reverberates forth from the transcendent in discrete nāma-avatāras that find vocalized expression on the gross material plane through the vehicle of human speech. In their discussions of the mechanisms through which the nāman manifests in the material realm, the early Gauḍīya authorities repeatedly emphasize that the name is “self-manifesting” (svataḥ-siddha or svaprakāśa). Although human speech may serve as the vehicle through which the process of self-manifestation occurs, it is not the source of the manifestation. Jīva suggests that even though the name, in its essential nature as the transcendent vibration of Kṛṣṇa’s svarūpa-śakti, is beyond prakṛti and therefore beyond the range of the material senses (prākṛtendriyas), by means of its self-manifesting nature (svataḥ-siddhatva) it appears in the realm of prakṛti and becomes accessible to the senses on the gross material plane through the vehicle of human speech.104
After invoking the verse from the Padma Purāṇa, quoted earlier, that represents the Kṛṣṇa-nāman as nondifferent from Kṛṣṇa, Rūpa remarks that the name, which in its essential nature is transcendent and beyond the grasp of the material senses, spontaneously “appears” or “bursts forth” (root sphur) on the tongues of those who are devoted to the supreme Godhead.
The name and other aspects of Śrī Kṛṣṇa cannot be grasped by the senses (indriyas). It spontaneously appears (root sphur) on its own (svayam) on the tongue of one whose face is turned towards devotional service (sevā).105
In the concluding verse of the Kṛṣṇa Nāmāṣṭaka, Rūpa beseeches the Kṛṣṇa-nāman to appear on his tongue so that he can revel perpetually in the waves of its ambrosial rasa: “O Kṛṣṇa-nāman, full of sweet syrupy waves of ambrosial nectar (sudhā),…ut of love for me appear (root sphur) on my tongue forever with your rasa.”106
Kṛṣṇadāsa also emphasizes the “self-manifesting” (svaprakāśa) nature of the Kṛṣṇa-nāman, which spontaneously appears in the mouth and bursts forth (root sphur) on the tongue, finding vocalized expression through human speech and destroying all sins (pāpas) through the mere touch (root spṛś) of it on the tongue. He portrays Caitanya discussing the distinguishing marks of a Vaiṣṇava in which he states that the best among the Vaiṣṇavas is one in whose mouth the Kṛṣṇa-nāman continually vibrates, while the foremost among the Vaiṣṇavas is one whose darśana causes the Kṛṣṇa-nāman to spontaneously manifest in the mouths of others.107 Kṛṣṇadāsa suggests, moreover, that the darśana of Caitanya himself had such an effect, causing the Kṛṣṇa-nāman to spontaneously burst forth on the tongue of a Rāma bhakta and take hold there, displacing the name of Rāma. He claims that Caitanya’s presence inspired even the tongues of nonbelieving Yavanas—foreigners who are deemed mlecchas, “barbarians”—to spontaneously utter the Kṛṣṇa-nāman.108
Transformative Power of the Name
According to the Gauḍīya ontology of the name, when the Kṛṣṇa-nāman, the transcendent vibration of the svarūpa-śakti that is nondifferent from Kṛṣṇa, self-manifests on the gross material plane in an array of nāma-avatāras, each of these mesocosmic sound-embodiments of Kṛṣṇa is invested with his svarūpa and śakti, his essence and power. In the second verse of the Śikṣāṣṭaka, as we have seen, Caitanya celebrates the manifold names in which Bhagavān invests his śakti.109 The divine names, infused with Kṛṣṇa’s śakti, are ascribed transformative power. In the first verse of the Śikṣāṣṭaka, Caitanya gives poetic expression to two aspects of this transformative power that are elaborated in the formulations of Rūpa Gosvāmin, Jīva Gosvāmin, and Kṛṣṇadāsa Kavirāja: the power of the name to purify and to liberate from the bondage of material existence, and the power of the name to enliven and cultivate the ambrosial nectar of prema-rasa.110 The principal scriptural prooftext that grounds the early Gauḍīya authorities’ formulations concerning the transformative power of the name is the Padma Purāṇa verse, quoted earlier, that represents the Kṛṣṇa-nāman as pure (śuddha), eternally free (nitya-mukta), and having a body full of rasa.111 As we shall see, in the discourse of embodiment in which these formulations are embedded, the name’s functions as an instrument of purification and of liberation are subordinated to its principal function as an instrument of psychophysical transformation that serves as a means of fashioning devotional bodies through enlivening and cultivating prema-rasa.
Purifying and Liberating Power of the Name
The early Gauḍīya authorities, like the Bhāgavata Purāṇa, emphasize the purifying and liberating power of the names of Kṛṣṇa. They extol the power of the name to cleanse the heart and mind of every form of pāpa, a term that they use to designate sin and its karmic effects. They thereby establish a direct connection between the purifying power of the name and its liberating power, for the name’s capacity to liberate jīvas from saṃsāra, the endless cycle of birth and death, derives from its power to destroy the residual karmic impressions (saṃskāras) that are the root cause of bondage.
Rūpa emphasizes that the purifying power of the name, as the sound-embodiment of Kṛṣṇa, is an expression of the pure nature of the supreme Godhead, who in his luminous purity (śuci) is celebrated as viśuddha, completely pure and free of all faults, and as pāvana, the purifier who destroys all pāpas.112 He cites in this context an unidentified verse from the Padma Purāṇa that extols the purifying power of both Bhagavān and his name:
With mind illumined by faith, worship sincerely and continually him who is a treasurehouse of qualities, the foremost of those of highest renown, the purifier (pāvana) of the pure. When even the first light of the sun of the name (nāman) rises in the cave of the heart, it destroys the darkness of the great mound of sins (pātakas).113
Rūpa suggests that the “great mound of sins” that the name has the power to destroy includes the mound of residual karmic impressions (saṃskāras) that the jīva has accumulated from sinful actions in previous births as well as in the current lifetime.114 He also maintains that the name has the capacity to liberate the jīva from the bondage of saṃsāra.115
Jīva, like Rūpa, emphasizes the purifying (viśodhana) power of the name, which is efficacious in destroying pāpas and their karmic impressions (saṃskāras), including even the gravest of sins (mahā-pātakas).116 He also reflects on the liberating power of the name, which brings fulfillment to renunciants in their quest for mokṣa and yogins in their quest for kaivalya. He invokes the Bhāgavata Purāṇa’s teaching that the name has the capacity to purify even d
og-eaters (śvādas or śva-pacas) and other outcastes and to liberate them from the bondage of saṃsāra.117
Kṛṣṇadāsa reflects at some length on the purifying and liberating power of the name. In commenting on Caitanya’s glorification of the name as “purifying the mirror of the mind,” he suggests that the process through which the name purifies the mind involves the destruction of all pāpas.118 He claims, moreover, that a single utterance of the name of Kṛṣṇa is efficacious in destroying pāpas: “One taking of the name and all your sins [pāpas] and faults [doṣas] will go; and from another name you will gain the feet of Kṛṣṇa.”119 He explicitly connects the name’s role as an instrument of purification with its role as an instrument of liberation, for by destroying all pāpas the name is endowed with the power of mukti, eliminating the root cause of bondage that binds the jīva to saṃsāra: “From a hint of the name is the destruction of all sins [pāpas].… From a hint of the name is the destruction of saṃsāra.… In a hint of the name is mukti.”120
Kṛṣṇadāsa deploys a number of strategies in order to demonstrate the name’s transformative efficacy as an instrument of social formation that serves as a means of constituting the bhakta-saṅgha, the community of Caitanya’s followers, as a distinctive type of social body that defines itself over against the brahmanical socioreligious hierarchy constituted by the norms of varṇāśrama-dharma and the Vedic recitative tradition. In the brahmanical discourse of dharma elaborated in the Dharma-Śāstras, the differential norms of varṇāśrama-dharma distinguish five separate groups with respect to their degree of participation in varṇa-dharma, the duties of the four varṇas, or social classes,121 and āśrama-dharma, the duties of the four āśramas, or stages of life:122 (1) male members of the twice-born varṇas—brahmins, kṣatriyas, and vaiśyas—who are participants in both varṇa-dharma and āśrama-dharma; (2) male śūdras, who participate in varṇa-dharma but are excluded from the āśramas; (3) women, who are similarly excluded from the āśramas but participate in certain aspects of varṇa-dharma and also have their own distinct set of duties; (4) outcastes, who are beyond the pale of both the varṇa system and the āśrama system but whose status is nevertheless defined in relation to the broader social hierarchy; and (5) non-Āryans, to whom the regulations of dharma do not apply. Among these five groups, it is the exclusive purview of the first group—male members of the twice-born varṇas—to learn and recite the Vedas and to sponsor Vedic yajñas in which recitation of the Vedic mantras assumes a central role. Members of the other four groups—śūdras, women, outcastes, and non-Āryans—are excluded from learning or reciting the Vedic mantras and from sponsoring yajñas.123
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