“PEOPLE EITHER LOVED BHAKTISIDDHANTA [1874–1937] for his saintly qualities and strength of character,” writes one of his biographers, “or hated him for his uncompromising critique of Vedantic monism . . . and archaic caste structures.”178 In his brief life, the tall, austere Bengali scholar created the first institution for Gaudiya Vaishnavism and paved the way for the global expansion of Krishna bhakti. Intimidated by his forceful and uncompromising style, adversaries nicknamed him “the Lion Guru.”
Bhaktisiddhanta developed his reputation from necessity: Nothing less than ramrod leadership could resurrect the Gaudiya culture—what Prabhupada called Krishna consciousness—from three hundred years of slanderous misrepresentation. Within a generation of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu’s demise in 1533, tantric opportunists had begun propagating deviant sexual practices in the name of Radha-Krishna worship. The Gaudiya community’s ecumenical acceptance of lower castes—often sincere people but lacking education—added to its tarnished reputation. His father, Bhaktivinode Thakur, head of the Gaudiya Vaishnava community, trained him from an early age to reverse that image by enrolling him in Bengal’s finest schools and introducing him to exemplars of progressive thought.
Bhaktisiddhanta admired his father’s vision for spreading Chaitanya Vaishnavism and throughout his teen years served as his assistant and organizer. Bhaktivinode’s Visva Vaisnava Raj Sabha, the Royal World Vaishnava Association, which he began in 1885, brought together intellectuals of the day, including reformist publisher Sisir Kumar Ghosh and Sanskrit scholar Bipin Bihari Goswami; and by the time Bhaktisiddhanta was twelve he was taking part in their discussions. By age thirteen he was proofreading his father’s monthly magazine Sajjana-tosani and cultivating publishing skills that would play a critical role in the worldwide expansion of Krishna consciousness.
At age seventeen, after only a few years of training in mathematics and astrology, Bhaktisiddhanta managed the impressive feat of starting his own school of astronomy, the Sarasvata Chatushpati, which held sessions in his father’s Calcutta home. The school prepared students for application to the city’s prestigious Sanskrit College and operated for nearly ten years until disagreements with the College over technicalities of astronomical calculation forced Bhaktisiddhanta to shut it down. College administrators simply could not keep up with his prodigious mind. From that experience emerged a facility for debate that became a hallmark of Bhaktisiddhanta’s pedagogy.
The young scholar’s reputation attracted the attention of Tripura’s royal family, and from 1895 to 1905 he served on retainer to the king, editing the royal family’s history and teaching Bengali and Sanskrit to the king’s sons. The post gave him access to the palace library where he researched his first book, Bonge Samajikata, “The Structure of Society in Bengal,” published in 1900, an analysis of Bengali history, which successfully rebutted European accusations that Vaishnavism lacked history, morality, and philosophical structure. By approaching the tradition’s history from both indigenous and European perspectives, Bhaktisiddhanta revealed the morality implicit in a life of devotion and established the universal structure of Chaitanya’s philosophy of divine love. This was the first in a continuous stream of books and articles that the scholarly celibate would complete in his lifetime.
As heir to his father’s place as head of the Gaudiya community, Bhaktisiddhanta enjoyed a more intimate relationship with Bhaktivinode than his twelve siblings. Until Bhaktivinode’s demise in 1914, father and son would plan and execute publications, organize gatherings of scholars, give joint lectures, and travel to places of pilgrimage. By turns dramatic and prosaic, their constant efforts to bring devotion into the twentieth century occasionally took unexpected form. Within a hundred yards of Radhakund, a bathing ghat in Vrindavan where Radha and Krishna are reputed to have met for nighttime play, Bhaktivinode purchased a small brick residence for use when he and his son went there on pilgrimage. In that house, in the holiest of Vaishnava holy places, surrounded by medieval temples and sacred spots dating to remote antiquity, Bhaktisiddhanta installed the town’s first flush toilet: a ceramic bowl, wooden seat, and flush system with rubber float and metal chain. No plaque marks the achievement. History books do not mention it. Yet as an indicator of a modernist’s mindset for India’s most ancient devotional community, the functioning commode provides a vivid image among Bhaktisiddhanta’s more erudite achievements.
Both father and son must have shared a sense of historical imperative. Chaitanya’s prediction that “in as many towns and villages as there are on the surface of the earth, the Holy Name will be heard”179 was well known from available hagiographies. To prepare himself for such a historic mission, in 1905, at age thirty-one, he began the austere practice of chanting 300,000 names of Krishna daily—roughly twelve hours of prayer each day. He slept on the ground, never used a pillow, and observed severe dietary restrictions. Even his initiating teacher, Gaura Kishore Das Babaji, himself a renowned ascetic, marveled at the young man’s staunch behavior.
By 1906, Bhaktisiddhanta had begun initiating disciples of his own and, true to Chaitanya’s example, accepted qualified candidates from both Brahmin and non-Brahmin families. Stung by this threat to their control of religious authority, in August of 1911, orthodox Hindu leaders organized a conference intended to reassert the superiority of family succession. As head of the Vaishanva community, Bhaktivinode would have given the response, but the Thakur was bedridden with severe rheumatism.
Beside himself over his inability to rebut the caste Brahmins’ spurious claims, he roared out in frustration. “Is there no one in the Vaishnava world capable of presenting the logic of scripture and putting an end to their lowly activities!?”
At this outburst, Bhaktisiddhanta sat down and wrote a paper titled “Brahmana o Vaisnava” (“Brahmin and Vaishnava”) in which he condemned brahminical birthright and presented scriptural evidence of brahminhood based on personal qualities and behavior. The paper gave compelling arguments for the preeminence of daiva varnashrama (divinely ordained social structure) which encourages social authority according to ability and character and disqualifies arbitrary caste claims. Bhaktisiddhanta read the paper aloud to his father, and at its conclusion the elder devotee sat up in bed.
“Saraswati,” he said weeping, “truly, truly Saraswati.180 You are the acharya sun [the shining embodiment of sacred teachings] illuminating the face of the Vaishnava world.”
Two weeks later, on September 11, 1911, Bhaktisiddhanta presented his paper before several hundred religious leaders who had come from across India to attend the conference. After two days of discourses and debate, his concluding remarks were followed by stunned silence. The presentation had been masterful—and an embarrassment to program organizers.181
With each new stance on such polarizing issues as religious ecumenism and the right of non-Brahmins to enter restricted temples, the Gaudiya Math’s reputation for controversy grew. As a result, it was mostly in progressive urban centers such as Calcutta that the mission found a warm reception and collected the largest donations for publishing and temple construction. It was in the cities as well that Bhaktisiddhanta’s organization found its leadership: twenty celibate men whom Bhaktisiddhanta deployed across India and Europe charged with finding ways to introduce Chaitanya’s teachings among mainstream audiences.
It is reasonable to assume that the imperative to fulfill the “every town and village” prophesy factored in Bhaktisiddhanta’s decision to take formal initiation and eventually enter the renounced order (sannyasa), since the enhanced prestige would serve to bolster his authority when presenting a mature understanding of Chaitanya ideology. Bhaktisiddhanta was the only initiated disciple of the late ascetic Gaura Kishore Das Babaji, and consequently there was no one physically present who was qualified to award him sannyasa status. On March 29, 1918, he made the controversial gesture of awarding himself sannyasa status before a photo of his late spiritual master. From that time, he was known as Sri Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Goswami Maharaja.
By the time he was fifty, he had published Bengali editions of such classics as Chaitanya Charitamrita, Bhagavata Purana, and Chaitanya Bhagavata. He had also established printing presses, a daily newspaper, a weekly magazine in Bengali, a monthly magazine in English and Sanskrit, and a number of smaller magazines in local languages. In addition to this aggressive calendar of writing and publishing, he frequently lectured and organized a series of exhibitions modeled on world fairs and popular science expos.
It is no wonder that Abhay Charan found his future spiritual master so appealing when they first met in 1922.