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Shri Mahavir Jain Aradhana Kendra
www.kobatirth.org
Acharya Shri Kailashsagarsuri Gyanmandir
The Vaisnava Saints of ....
713
God Sree Krsņa evokes in the hearts of men, can only be likened to that of a woman who is in love. A woman, who is in love, will forsake her children, husband, position, nay, brave scandal to possess her beloved. It is just the same with a soul which has fallen in love with Kțsna." The peculiarities of this kind of love, analogous to that of the Gopis for Kisna, are chosen for the irresistibility of the influence of the call of the Lord over His devotees, just as the Gopis, when they heard the sweet call of the fute of the Lord Kệsņa, used to be so powerfully attracted towards it that they used to forsake their duties in which they used to be engaged; they used to forsake their husbands and even their children whom they were suckling. The call of the Divine is irresistible and the devotee never hesitates to forsake anything, howsoever dear and important to him, for the sake of the union with Krsņa; such a kind of love can be most approximately obtained in a pair of lovers, and especially in the woman fallen in love with her lover. Caitanya had assumed the role of Radha to experience this kind of intensity of love for Krşņa. He preached this way of love and bhakti (devotion) for the attainment of the highest supersensuous eternal bliss in mukti or liberation, which also cannot be accomplished simply by one's own effort, but which also stands in need of the descent of the Divine grace. What, therefore, gave Caitanya power over other minds was his impassioned religious consciousness, his
1 Ghose Shishir Kumar : Lord Gauranga, Vol. II, p. 43.
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