Prasthanatrayi Swaminarayan Bhashyam (Study)

by Sadhu Gyanananddas | 2021 | 123,778 words

This page relates ‘Intense Love Due to Glory’ of the study on the Prasthanatrayi Swaminarayan Bhashyam in Light of Swaminarayan Vachanamrut (Vacanamrita). His 18th-century teachings belong to Vedanta philosophy and were compiled as the Vacanamrita, revolving around the five ontological entities of Jiva, Ishvara, Maya, Aksharabrahman, and Parabrahman. Roughly 200 years later, Bhadreshdas composed a commentary (Bhasya) correlating the principles of Vachanamrut.

10.1. Intense Love Due to Glory

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Bhadreśadāsa defines the glory of Parabrahman through which the intense love rises:

bhaktistu sahajānande māhātmyajñānavibhūṣitā |
divyānanyāparā prītirlaukikabhāvavarjitā ||^[1]

“Bhakti towards Parabrahman should be coupled with the glory of Him. This love in the form of bhakti should be focused, divine, and without worldly sentiments.”

When a seeker has the resolute knowledge (mahatmyajnāna) and conviction (niścaya) of the glory of Parabrahman, the highest love for Parabrahman arises in which the seeker understands that the currently manifest form of Parabrahman (pratyakṣa-parāmātma svarūpa) is the inner self of all, omnipotent all-doer. There is no other else such as puruṣa, kāla, māyā and deities (like-brahmā etc.) as the cause, the creator and the controller of the universe. He is the Master of masters and God of the infinite number of universes. He alone is the transcendental reality endowed with the highest excellence and glory.^[2]

A person who has a profound affection for Parabrahman cannot love anything else besides Him, even if forced to do so. True devotee loves Parabrahman alone singularly. The dedicated love of the ultimate quality arises in the heart, caused by constant remembrance of the glory of Parabrahman.^[3] A bhakta possessing the deepest love for Parabrahman cannot do anything contrary to the will and command of Parabrahman.^[4] He persists incessantly drowned in Parabrahman-consciousness, and that he cannot forget Him even for a fraction of a second.^[5] Generally, love brings conditions and demands but the love for Parabrahman must be unconditional and free from demand. It must be unmatched, unmitigated, steady, and unfaltering. 293

The love based on the appealing physical qualities is not trustworthy, for it may divert onto a person or thing other than Parabrahman. The love for Parabrahman must be as intense and strong as one's love for his body and its relations.

Those bhaktas who love Parabrahman with an understanding of His divine glory become the vessel to receive the stream of intense love of Parabrahman. Bhadreśadāsa confirms

“yataste yathoktabrahmaguṇairyutā māṃ bhajante tasmānmetīva priyā iti bhāva |” (Bhagavad-Gītā 12/20, p.275)

“Those who worship me with brahmabhāva are my utmost beloved devotees.”

The most significant barrier in the way of unwavering love towards Parabrahman is our three māyic guṇas. The aspirant must rise above the influence of three guṇas, his body-awareness knowing that he is a pure ātman and loving Parabrahman alone. Such nirguṇa ātmic love alone is the true basis of bhakti. The efflorescence of nirguṇa brahmasvarūpa-prīti (non-ephemeral Akṣara-like ātmic love) has the superior quality of affiliating one to Parabrahman with intense exclusive love and undivided fidelity. In it, there is self-forgetting. He rises above from these three guṇas. Nothing lures and attracts him, for he sees Parabrahman as the supreme value and the fountainhead of all joy and happiness. He experiences unceasing novelty and ever-increasing joy of bliss in the svarūpa of Parabrahman.^[6]