Sakti-tattva

Once His status was understood, the next inquiry should be regarding the relation between the Supreme Lord and His energies.

In the sruti it is said:

na tasya karyam karanam ca vidyate
na tat-samas cabhyadhikas ca drsyate
parasya saktir vividhaiva sruyate
svabhaviki jnana-bala-kriya ca
(Svetasvatara Upanisad, 6.8; Govinda-bhasya, 1.1.1)


“He does not possess bodily form like that of an ordinary living entity. There is no difference between His body and His soul. He is absolute. All His senses are transcendental. Any one of His senses can perform the action of any other sense. Therefore, no one is greater than Him or equal to Him. His potencies are multifarious, and thus His deeds are automatically performed as a natural sequence.”

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:

visnu-saktih para prokta
ksetrajnakhya tatha para
avidya-karma-samjnanya
trtiya saktir ucyate
(Visnu Purana, 6.7.61; Govinda-bhasya, 2.1.30)

"The potency of Lord Visnu is summarized in three categories: namely the spiritual potency, the living entities, and ignorance. The spiritual potency is full of knowledge; the living entitles, although belonging to the spiritual potency, are subject to bewilderment; and the third energy, which is full of ignorance, is always visible in fruitive activities."

The Skanda Purana also clearly distinguishes the potencies of the Lord in this way:

aparam tv aksaram ya
sa prakrtir jada-rupini
srih para prakrtih prokta
cetana visnu-samsraya
(Quoted by Baladeva in his Vedanta-syamantaka, 2.24)

“The Lord has a material potency and a spiritual potency. The material potency manifests an external form of dull matter. Goddess Sri is the Lord’s spiritual potency. She has a spiritual form. She takes shelter of Lord Visnu.”

Being the feminine counterpart of Lord Visnu, Laksmi shares His potencies and opulences:

nityaiva sa jagan-mata
visnoh srir anapayini
yatha sarva-gato visnus
tathaiveyam dvijottama
(Visnu Purana, 1.8.17; Govinda-bhasya,3.3.40)

"The goddess of fortune is the eternal companion of Lord Visnu. She is the mother of the universe. O best of the brahmanas, as Lord Visnu is all-pervading, so is she also."

atma-vidya ca devi tvam
vimukti-phala-dayini
ka tv anya tvam rte devi
sarvam yajna-mayam vapuh
(Ibidem, 1.9.118)

“O Goddess Laksmi, You are full of transcendental knowledge. You are the giver of liberation. Who is glorious like You? Your form is made of sacred yajnas.”

These statements defeat the wrong conception that Laksmi is a common living entity, for the jiva cannot at any stage be all-pervading nor the giver of liberation.

Being the eternal companion of Lord Visnu, Laksmi 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-deheyam
manusyatve ca manusi
visnor dehanurupam vai
karoty esatmanas tanum
(Visnu Purana, 1.9.143)

“When the Lord appears as a demigod, She (the Goddess of fortune) takes the form of a demigoddess, and when He appears as a human being, She takes a humanlike form. Thus She assumes a body corresponding to that accepted by Lord Visnu in order to assist in His pastimes.”

The internal energy of Krsna is called yoga-maya or antaranga-sakti. This is the energy that predominates in the spiritual world and the one that makes possible for the Lord to enjoy unlimited pastimes in the material world, and is known as His consort, as stated:

sris ca te laksmis ca patnyau
(Sukla Yajur-Veda, 31.22; Govinda-bhasya, 3.3.18)

"O Supreme Personality of Godhead, Sri and Laksmi are Your wives."

The internal energy is further classified into sandhini, samvit and hladini:

hladini sandhini samvit
tvayy eka sarva-samsthitau
hlada-tapakari misra
tvayi no guna-varjite
(Visnu Purana, 1.12.69; Govinda-bhasya, 3.3.42)


“O Lord, You are the support of everything. The three attributes hladini, sandhini and samvit exist in You as one spiritual energy. But the material modes, which cause happiness, misery and mixtures of the two, do not exist in You, for You have no material qualities.”

Rupa Gosvami explains in the third wave of his Bhakti-rasamrta-sindhu:

“From the existential aspect (sat) of the svarupa-sakti of the Lord, the sandhini potency is eternally extant. From the cognitive aspect (cit), the samvit potency is manifest and from the aspect of transcendental bliss (ananda), the hladini potency is present. These three aspects eternally permeate the specialized function (visesa- vrtti) of svarupa-sakti, or in other words visuddha sattva. However, sometimes the presence of the hladini aspect within visuddha-sattva becomes prominent, and the influence of the other two aspects is less. Sometimes the sandhini aspect becomes prominent, and samvit and hladini are less, and sometimes the samvit aspect becomes prominent, and hladini and sandhini are less.”

Gaudiya vaisnavism identifies Srimati Radharani as hladini sakti personified and the original source of all other incarnations of Krsna’s energy, just as He is the avatari (Govinda-bhasya, 2.3.45; 3.3.42). 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, Sri Radha and Sri Krsna are the fountainhead of all emanations. Lord Caitanya Mahaprabhu, however, is the embodiment of both of Them in a unique mood, as Krsnadas Kaviraj Gosvami explains:

radha krsna-pranaya-vikrtir hladini saktir asmad
ekatmanav api bhuvi pura deha-bhedam gatau tau
caitanyakhyam prakatam adhuna tad-dvayam caikyam aptam
radha-bhava-dyuti-suvalitam naumi krsna-svarupam
(Caitanya Caritamrta, Adi 1.5)

“The loving affairs of Sri Radha and Krsna are transcendental manifestations of the Lord’s internal pleasure-giving potency. Although Radha and Krsna are one in Their identity, They separated Themselves eternally. Now these two transcendental identities have again united, in the form of Sri Krsna Caitanya. I bow down to Him, who has manifested Himself with the sentiment and complexion of Srimati Radharani although He is Krsna Himself.”

Srimati Radharani is described as being the original source of all sakti-tattva incarnations just as Govinda is the Avatari from Whom all Visnu-tattva incarnations emanate. To support this view, the gaudiya vaisnava acaryas give the following quotations:

dve parsve candravali radhika ca (…)
yasya amse laksmi-durgadika saktih
(Purusa-bodhini Upanisad, quoted in the Prameya-ratnavali, 1.15)

“In the land of Gokula in Mathura-mandala, Lord Krsna resides. At His two sides are Radha and Candravali. Laksmi, Durga, and the Lord’s potencies are expansions of Sri Radha.”

devi krsnamayi prokta
radhika para-devata
sarva-laksmimayi sarva-
kantih sammohini para
(Gautamiya Tantra, Ibidem)

“The transcendental goddess Srimati Radharani is the direct counterpart of Sri Krsna. She is the central figure for all the Goddesses of fortune. She possesses all the attractiveness to attract the all-attractive Personality of Godhead. She is the primeval internal potency of the Lord.”

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.