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A LOVER OF LIGHT AMONG LUMINARIES : Dilip Kumar Roy Deliver us from our blindness grown so dear. Who knows-our Nimai might be He Himself! How can they who have not once glimpsed the King Depose he has not come incognito? So have no fear of hell nor listen, awe-struck,
To our arrogant friend, but follow your heart's one leading."13
In the due course of their conversation, there comes Sri Chaitanya, singing a song in praise of God. Keshav tries to humiliate Chaitanya by indicating his junior position in learning to himself and asks Chaitanya if he can sing a Sanskrit song or not. Politely, Sri Chaitanya replies that he can sing a hymn or two, but he cannot venture to sing in his presence. So, erudite and arrogant Keshav says:
“But I'll correct you. Ignorance is no crime, Unless, like mist, it clings to its native blur.
It's never too late to mend, my boy!"|4
But when he listens to Sanskrit couplets sung by Sri Chaitanya in flawless language, he remains wonderstruck. He asks about their authorship. When he is told that they are composed by Sri Chaitanya himself, again he is surprised. When Sri Chaitanya declares of his decision to leave the worldly life in order to sing of love of Krishna, Keshav again tries to teach him lessons of worldly wisdom and implores him not to do so. But very humbly and yet firmly Sri Chaitanya shows the appropriateness of his own supreme goal of life. Keshav becomes mellowed at Sri Chaitanya's arguments. In the end, he folds his hands to Sri Chaitanya and tears trickle down his cheeks. During their conversation, once he confesses:
"I confess I judged you harshly from reports. For I see in you potentialities Rare as diamond. If a trifle wayward, You are lovable and gifted and endowed
With humility: I was unfair to you." 15
The central issue is the conflict between Keshav's proud claim that spiritual knowledge can be attained by his scrupulous scholarship, and Sri Chaitanya's living example of true love of God which blissfully realizes its object. Roma and Murari strongly advocate Chaitanya's path of worship. Keshav on the one hand and Roma and Murari on the other, constitute the two opposed terms of conflict.
Sri Chaitanya himself enters the play in this act only to resolve the conflict He comes and conquers Keshav without hurting his pride with absolute love. Should not this act be more properly entitled, Conquest'?
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