TO LIVE IN THE LUSH forests of Vrindavan! The river Yamuna beckoned me to her banks where once again I could live the life of a homeless wanderer, sleeping under a different tree every night. I had only the clothes on my back, two pieces of unstitched cloth, one that I wrapped around my waist to cover the lower part of my body and one that covered the upper part. Solitude was again my welcome companion.
Often I slept at Chira Ghat near an ancient kadamba tree. Aspirants to pure love of God had come since time immemorial to this holy site to hang token garments as a prayer-filled symbol for Krishna to steal away the cloak of their ignorance. The kadamba tree is considered especially sacred in Vrindavan and its blossoming flowers bring everyone joy. The kadamba flower, a bright golden ball about the size of a strawberry and covered with hundreds of tiny golden trumpet shaped petals, has an intoxicatingly sweet fragrance. Because these flowers resemble Sri Radha’s golden complexion, kadamba trees are very dear to Lord Krishna. Each night I would kneel under the tree at Chira Ghat and pray for humility and devotion. Then I would stretch my body on the riverbank, feeling the cold soil beneath my flesh as I drifted into sleep. My bedding was the sacred earth, my blanket the starry sky, and my waking call the distant ringing of temple bells.
Every morning at four o’clock I would awaken in the darkness, bow down on the riverbank in gratitude, and wade into the sacred waters for my bath. November was approaching, and the Yamuna had turned frigid. Often I stood shivering, submerged up to my neck. I recalled lyrics from a song that I had loved in my childhood: “The river Jordan is chilly and cold. It chills the body but warms the soul.” Yes, I reflected, enduring difficulty for a meaningful purpose is a sublime pleasure. Dunking my entire body under the water again and again, I meditated on purifying my body, mind, and soul. Then I stood quietly under the still-starlit sky praying for a pure heart. This was my first meditation each day. I felt so close to the Lord. Afterwards, I would climb back onto the riverbank, disrobe to my loincloth, wring the water from my dripping garments, and put them back on. Sitting down on the riverbank, I would again meditate on the Hare Krishna mantra while fingering prayer beads made of the wood of tulasi. Each day began this way, an experience I prayed never to forget.
One evening, as twilight dimmed into night, I sat under the sacred kadamba tree and composed a letter to my father. It had been two weeks since I had made the riverbank my residence.
My dear Father,
My long search has led me to Vrindavan. I have at last found something that attracts my heart as pure truth. It has taken until now to find the conditions I have been seeking. In the past couple weeks I have realized the great jewel that is to be learned in Vrindavan. Believe me when I tell you that I am not here for any pleasure or leisure. I am here with all earnestness and sincerity to carry out a mission that I cannot neglect. You know that in all my life I have never willfully hurt you. Please believe the importance of this journey to my life.
Love,
Richard
Vrindavan, October, 1971
One quiet afternoon as I walked along the bank of the river Yamuna, little barefoot boys wearing shorts and little barefoot girls in cotton blouses and skirts frolicked, laughing with wild abandon while playing cricket with sticks and balls. Other children herded cows, buffalo, goats, or sheep with slender sticks. Women passed with baskets of grains balanced on their heads, covering their faces with their saris out of shyness as I passed. To my right, under a tree, Krishnadas Babaji was sitting, softly singing the Lord’s names. Taking note of me, he patted the ground, inviting me to sit. There we watched as a boatman ferried people across the river. Then Babaji whispered, “Under this tamarind tree is a favorite meeting place for Radha and Krishna.”
Intrigued, I inquired, “Babaji, everyone around here loves Radha so much, please tell me about Her.”
His eyes filled with tears at the mere sound of Radha’s name. Closing his eyes, he leaned forward. “The scriptures and saints teach us that God is one, yet the one Lord has both a male and female nature. Krishna is the male principle and Radha is the feminine potency. In the spiritual world, the one Lord presides in these two forms. The love between Krishna, who is the beloved, and Radha, the lover, is the divine origin of all love.”
“Babaji,” I asked, “how does this love between God’s masculine and feminine nature relate to the love people share in this world?”
Krishnadas Babaji answered, “Under the veil of illusion, or maya, we forget the ecstatic love for God, which is intrinsic to our souls. Love in this world is only a reflection of it. We are searching for real love in so many ways, forgetting that it is within our hearts.” Babaji looked so meek. Raising his white eyebrows, his voice faltered. “Krishna longs to be conquered by the love of His devotee and by the supreme grace of Radha we can realize that love. She is the compassionate nature of the Absolute and the fountainhead of all spiritual love.”
The mystery of Radha, the female energy of God, had both fascinated and eluded me. After all I had experienced, after all I had read, after all the sadhus I had met, nothing had prepared me for the hidden truth of yoga’s greatest mystery: the mystery of bhakti, or devotion. And now I was learning that the keeper of this mystery was Radha. For the first time it began to dawn on me that these saints of Vrindavan had penetrated into the deepest, most confidential aspect of the spiritual journey.
The secret? That beyond worldly pleasures and beyond the liberation of oneness with God, is an eternal dance, an endless night of love, and the intoxication of one’s very soul. And the one capable of giving entry to this unbearably sweet realm was Radha.
It was their yearning to connect with Radha that allowed these yogis of Vrindavan to demonstrate such intense and genuine humility. By casting aside all interest in yogic powers, they seemed to be drowning in an ocean of divine love. My mind and heart were charmed by this rich theology known as bhakti, the yoga of unconditional love. It seemed to put so many of my mind’s questions, both asked and yet to be asked, in a comprehensive perspective. Although still apprehensive about committing myself to one particular path, I felt a yearning brewing in my heart to follow the path of Bhakti.
After Krishnadas Babaji blessed me, stood up, and walked away along the riverbank, I sat there staring into the river and contemplated on this secret of the feminine divinity. In the Christian church, the adoration of Mary, the Mother of Jesus, inspired both divine love and embittered factions. And the mystery of Mary Magdalene gave rise to secret orders, veiled symbolism, and intrigue. Many Hebrews saw Shekinah as the female aspect of God or the bride of the Sabbath, as did certain students of the Kabballah. And within Islam, there were followers of the Sufi sect who honor the divine feminine in their reverence to Fatima. Now I was finding how from the Vedic, ancient scriptural perspective, Feminine Divinity had always been accepted as truth.
As I looked out onto Mother Yamuna, I pondered on how the nourishing, compassionate side of spirituality is often overruled by the elements of power and control. It impressed me how important it was to pay attention to the feminine aspect of the divine.
About the same time I left the ashram, so did my friend Asim. I supposed he felt stifled by the constant demands on him there and was impressed by how my lifestyle was simultaneously so strict yet so free. We often met to explore Krishna’s forest home together. One sunny afternoon while Asim and I talked under the shade of a banyan tree, we were struck by an overpowering presence. Turning, we discovered someone sitting right beside us. Where had he come from? His features looked simultaneously aged and youthful. A single garment made of white cotton covered his upper and lower body. Semi-matted locks of hair reached below his neck. He had large eyes and a round, bearded face, and beamed a boyish smile. “Anyone who enters Vrindavan,” he said, “is immediately connected to Krishna. Others worship God as a great king, but here in Vrindavan…”—he gazed around and stretched his hand toward the forest—“…Krishna is at home. Here we love him as a friend, as a child, as a lover.”
We looked into the forest and, from a distance we saw an animal that looked like a wild, bluish cow hidden in the trees. Everything seemed so magical. We were wonderstruck. “In the beginning,” the man continued, “we learn to love God as the all powerful creator, destroyer, and savior. But God is also the sweetest and most perfect lover. The scripture tells that in Vrindavan, playful Krishna is the essence of all beauty and sweetness.” Then, rising to his feet, this sadhu, who had mysteriously appeared as if out of thin air, said, “Come, I’ll show you places you will never forget.”
We followed eagerly behind as he strolled through the woods, along the riverbank, and from temple to temple. As we roamed, the local people and temple priests offered him honors. “Where did he go?” Asim asked suddenly. I looked around. The man was gone and we were abandoned in an ancient temple. Asim inquired of an elderly priest, “Do you know that sadhu who was with us?”
The priest’s eyes widened and his mouth opened in awe. “Oh, you don’t know?” He led us out of the crowd into a secluded chamber and whispered, “That was Sripad Baba. No one knows his age or where he resides. He is a homeless mendicant and mysteriously wanders in a God-intoxicated trance.”
Almost every day when Asim and I were together, Sripad Baba would mystically appear. How did he find us? Never did he bother to greet us. Never did he bother to say goodbye. It seemed that his power was such that he was always there with us, either visibly or invisibly.
Sripad Baba seemed to know about every hill, rock, stone, pebble, or grain of dust in all of Vrindavan and its surrounding area. We wandered with him for many days and often throughout the night. One freezing winter night, as I lay resting on the riverbank, I observed Sripad Baba standing shoulder high in the frigid waters offering prayers until sunrise.
One morning in an alleyway, an elderly widow dressed in a white sari greeted us. “I’ve observed you wandering the forest with Sripad Baba. Now you come with me.” Each step she took was laborious, her back hunched as she braced her overweight body into a bamboo cane. She hobbled along toward her home and told a story of Sripad Baba’s obscure past. Asim translated her Hindi for me. “Long ago, when Baba was a child in school, he and his friend enjoyed flying kites between their classes.” Halting, her shriveled face puckered as she poked her cane onto the walkway, frowned into our eyes, and raised her voice. “The teacher slapped their faces and scolded them.” Her body and voice now trembled. “The poor little boy was shocked; he couldn’t understand what he had done wrong. He wondered why he should continue studying if his teacher, who had mastered all of the very subjects he sought to learn, still did not know how to love. At that moment he renounced both school and home to search for God.” Turning a skeleton key to open the door of her brick hut, she glanced at us over her shoulder. “Eventually, he became the disciple of a saint in Vrindavan.”
One night, together with four others, Asim and I stole away with Sripad Baba to a secluded forest. It was about nine-thirty and night had already fallen. Beside me, on the bank of the Yamuna, sat a sadhu with a hand-carved sitar strapped to his back. Sripad Baba introduced him as a master of the instrument, a pupil of the same teacher as sitar legend Ravi Shankar. “Now, though, he is a sadhu.”
With a refined bow of the head, the sitarist greeted us then closed his eyes. The sky appeared as black as ink behind the silver moon, each star radiated a special glow, and all of these light-filled jewels above our heads danced on the river Yamuna’s sparkling current. Nearby, hidden among the branches of a kadamba, night birds crooned and, from a distance, peacocks cawed as night-blooming jasmine perfumed the mild breeze. From all of this tranquility emerged the sweet sound of the sitar. Long, weeping notes of an ancient raga harmonized with the symphony of the Vrindavan forest, each note expressing, to my ears, the musician’s yearning for God.
An overwhelming experience came upon me while listening. I felt so far from Krishna. I couldn’t find a trace of love in my heart. Bereft, I longed for that love, cried for that love, begged for that love. Suddenly, all of creation seemed irrelevant in the absence of that love. The sitar, too, wept and cried, perfectly articulating my aspirations.