Once Lord Kṛṣṇa’s status was understood, the
next inquiry should be regarding the relation between the Supreme Lord and His
energies.
In the śruti it is said:
na tasya kāryaṁ karaṇaṁ ca vidyate
na tat-samaś cābhyadhikaś ca dṛśyate
parāsya śaktir vividhaiva śrūyate
svābhāvikī jñāna-bala-kriyā ca
(Śvetāśvatara Upaniṣad (6.8);
Govinda-bhāṣya, 1.1.1)
“The
Supreme Lord has no material body and senses. No one is equal or superior to
Him. It is heard from the scriptures that He has multifarious intrinsic superior
energies in the form of knowledge, power, and action. No one in the world is
His master or controller. He has no characteristic mark either.
His
energies work as multifarious agents to His supreme will, manifesting anything
material or spiritual. They are in no respect independent of Him but rather
work fully under His supervision. The different energies are thus classified:
viṣṇu-śaktiḥ parā proktā kṣetrajñākhyā
tathāparā
avidyā-karma-saṁjñānyā tṛtīyā
śaktir iṣyate
(Viṣṇu Purāṇa, 6.7.61; Govinda-bhāṣya,
2.1.30)
“Lord Viṣṇu’s energy is threefold:
one called parā (superior); another called aparā or kṣetrajñā (individual
souls); and the third one, which is different, is named avidyā (illusion) and
karma (material activities).”
The
Skanda Purāṇa also clearly distinguishes the potencies of the Lord in this way:
aparaṁ tv akṣaraṁ yā sā prakṛtir jaḍa-rūpiṇī
śrīḥ parā prakṛtiḥ proktā cetanā viṣṇu-saṁśrayā
“The inferior, imperishable energy
is material nature (prakṛti) in the form of dull matter, while the superior,
conscious energy is called Śrī, whose refuge is Lord Viṣṇu.”
Being the feminine counterpart of Lord Viṣṇu,
Lakṣmī shares His potencies and opulences:
nityaiva sā jagan-mātā viṣṇoḥ śrīr
anapāyinī
yathā sarva-gato viṣṇus tathaiveyaṁ
dvijottama
nityaiva sā jagan-mātā viṣṇoḥ śrīr
anapāyinī
yathā sarva-gato viṣṇus tathaiveyaṁ
dvijottama
(Viṣṇu Purāṇa, 1.8.17; Govinda-bhāṣya,3.3.40)
“Śrī, Lord Viṣṇu’s wife, is eternal,
inseparable, and the mother of the universe. Just as Lord Viṣṇu is
all-pervasive, so is she, O best of the twice born.”
ātma-vidyā ca devi tvaṁ
vimukti-phala-dāyinī
kā tv anyā tvām ṛte devi
sarva-yajña-mayaṁ vapuḥ
“O Goddess, you are spiritual knowledge
personified and the giver of the fruits of liberation. Who else besides you
sits on the lap of Lord Viṣṇu, the God of gods, Whose body is the embodiment of
all sacrifices and is meditated upon by the yogīs?”
These
statements defeat the wrong conception that Lakṣmī is a common living entity,
for the jīva cannot at any stage be all-pervading nor a giver of liberation.
Being the eternal companion of Lord Viṣṇu, Lakṣmī
accompanies Him wherever and whenever He incarnates to display His pastimes,
and for this purpose, She always assumes a compatible form. This fact is
clearly explained thus:
devatve deva-deheyaṁ mānuṣatve ca
mānuṣī
viṣṇor dehānurūpāṁ vai karoty eṣātmanas
tanum
(Viṣṇu Purāṇa, 1.9.143))
“When Lord Viṣṇu appears in the form
of a heavenly denizen, Goddess Lakṣmī appears in the form of a heavenly
denizen. When He appears in a human form, she appears in a human form. She
shapes her own body in conformity with the body manifested by Lord Viṣṇu.”
The internal energy of Kṛṣṇa is called
yoga-māyā or antaraṅga-śakti. This is the energy that predominates in the
spiritual world and the one that makes possible it for the Lord to enjoy
unlimited pastimes in the material world, and is known as His consort, as
stated:
śrīś ca te lakṣmīś ca patnyau
(Śukla Yajur-Veda, 31.22; Govinda-bhāṣya, 3.3.18)
“Śrī
and Lakṣmī are Your wives.”
The
internal energy is further classified into sandhinī, saṁvit and hlādinī:
hlādinī sandhinī saṁvit tvayy ekā
sarva-saṁśraye
hlāda-tāpa-karī miśrā tvayi no guṇa-varjite
(Viṣṇu Purāṇa, 1.12.69; Govinda-bhāṣya,
3.3.42)
“One
single energy in the form of hlādinī, sandhinī, and saṁvit exists within You,
the resting place of everything, but the energy that causes mundane joy,
distress, and a mixture of both does not exist in You, Who are untainted by the
modes of nature.”
In
the Third wave of his Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu, Rūpa Gosvāmī explains:
“From
the existential aspect (sat) of the svarūpa-śakti of the Lord, the sandhinī
potency is eternally extant. From the cognitive aspect (cit), the saṁvit
potency is manifest and from the aspect of transcendental bliss (ānanda), the
hlādinī potency is present. These three aspects eternally permeate the
specialized function (viśeṣa- vṛtti) of svarūpa-śakti, or in other words
viśuddha-sattva. However, sometimes the presence of the hlādinī aspect within
viśuddha-sattva becomes prominent, and the influence of the other two aspects
is less. Sometimes the sandhinī aspect becomes prominent, and samvit and
hlādinī are less, and sometimes the saṁvit aspect becomes prominent, and
hlādinī and sandhinī are less.”
Gauḍīya Vaiṣṇavism identifies Śrīmatī Rādhārāṇī
as hlādinī śakti personified and the original source of all other incarnations
of Kṛṣṇa’s energy, just as He is the avatārī. The Supreme Absolute Truth must
necessarily comprise everything that might exist. Therefore God would be
incomplete if He were simply a male personality. Being eternally united and
distinct simultaneously, Śrī Rādhā and Śrī Kṛṣṇa are the fountainhead of all
emanations. Lord Caitanya Mahāprabhu, however, is the embodiment of both of
Them in a unique mood, as Kṛṣṇadās Kavirāj Gosvāmī explains:
rādhā kṛṣṇa-praṇaya-vikṛtir hlādinī
śaktir asmād
ekātmānāv api bhuvi purā deha-bhedaṁ
gatau tau
caitanyākhyaṁ prakaṭam adhunā
tad-dvayaṁ caikyam āptaṁ
rādhā-bhāva-dyuti-suvalitaṁ naumi kṛṣṇa-svarūpam
(Caitanya Caritāmṛta, Ādi 1.5)
“The loving affairs of Śrī Rādhā and Kṛṣṇa are
transcendental manifestations of the Lord’s internal pleasure-giving potency.
Although Rādhā and Kṛṣṇa are one in Their identity, They separated Themselves
eternally. Now these two transcendental identities have again united, in the
form of Śrī Kṛṣṇa Caitanya. I bow down to Him, who has manifested Himself with
the sentiment and complexion of Śrīmatī Rādhārāṇī although He is Kṛṣṇa
Himself.”
Śrīmatī Rādhārāṇī is described as being the
original source of all śakti-tattva incarnations just as Govinda is the Avatārī
from Whom all Viṣṇu-tattva incarnations emanate. To support this view, Gauḍīya
Vaiṣṇava ācāryas give the following quotations:
dve parśve candrāvalī rādhikā ca
(…) yasya aṁśe lakṣmī-durgādikā śaktiḥ
(Puruṣa-bodhinī Upaniṣad, quoted in
the Prameya-ratnāvalī, 1.15)
“Lord
Kṛṣṇa resides in the land of Gokula in Mathurā-maṇḍala. At His two sides are
Rādhā and Candravalī. Laksmī, Durgā, and the Lord’s potencies are expansions of
Śrī Rādhā.”
devī kṛṣṇa-mayī proktā rādhikā
para-devatā
sarva-lakṣmī-mayī sarva-kāntiḥ
sammohinī parā
“The
supreme goddess called Rādhikā, the superior energy, is Kṛṣṇa’s worshipper and
is non-different from Him. All Goddesses of Fortune are her expansions and her
desire to worship Kṛṣṇa is like that of all of them combined. She is always
pleasing Kṛṣṇa.”
The Supreme Lord along with His superior
energy is the instrumental cause of the material world, while his external
energy along with the marginal energy is the efficient cause.
