The Object of Bhakti: Īśvara, Bhagavān, Brahman, and Divine Hierarchies

0.      See Sāṅkhya Kārikā I.1. Also see Nyāya Sūtra I.1.9 and 22; Vaiśeṣiká Sūtras V.16; Gītā VIII.15; and as early as the Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad III.7.23 and IV.4.14. See Bryant 2003, 210ff., for the distribution of these four truths throughout chapter 2 of the Yoga Sūtras. They also occur elsewhere, including Āyurveda (there is disease, disease has a cause, there is a state free of disease, there is a means to attain this state free of disease).

0.      While duḥkham is typically translated as suffering, it can mean any sort of mental in addition to physical suffering. I prefer to translate the term as “unfulfilling” since it is perhaps easier to recognize the lack of deep-level fulfillment as being sarvam—pertaining to everything one does (when in a state of ignorance of the true self).

0.      I use the term “Vedic-affiliated” for schools, such as Yoga, Sāṅkhya, Vedānta, and the bhakti traditions, that lay claim to roots in the Upaniṣads, even though they are technically post-Vedic. I qualify the Vedic schools here because Buddhist traditions do not accept an autonomous ātman (with the possible exception of an early pudgala school). The problems with using the alternative term “Hindu” are well-known (it is a term introduced by invaders, rather than an indigenous label—as an aside, the first time the term surfaces in Indic sources is in the hagiography of Śrī Caitanya, Rūpa’s own teacher). Nonetheless, the term “Hindu” can be used for ease of reference, given its by now irretractable prevalence.

0.      The ātman is the innermost self, pure consciousness, distinct from both the psychic overlay of mind and its gross material embodiment.

0.      For easily accessible primary sources on these basic points, see Dhammapada (for instance, 1, 3, 16, and throughout); Yoga Sūtras (chapter 2, especially II.2–26); and Gītā (II.62–66, V.22ff., and throughout).

0.      See, for example, Kaṭha Upaniṣad II.22 and VI.13ff.; Yoga Sūtras II.29; Gītā VI.27–28.

0.      As in the Gītā (IV.1–2, XV.15), Kṛṣṇa claims to be the origin of all these paths.

0.      It may sometimes also lead to a motivated type of bhakti that will be discussed later, such as that associated with the role of Īśvara in the Yoga Sūtras (I.23–28). See the author’s commentary on Yoga Sūtras I.23–24 for discussion.

0.      See XV.16–20, XIV.27.

0.    “Of what use are the sacred texts, austerities (tapas), the powers of speech, the control of mind (citta-vṛtti), keen intelligence, and strong senses? Of what use is the practice of yoga, or sāṅkhya (knowledge), the celibate vow of sannyāsa, or study of scripture and recitation of mantra (svādhyāya)? And what use are other attainments, unless they are offered to Hari [Kṛṣṇa]?” (IV.31.11–12).

0.    The term Īśvara is already used five times by the Atharva-Veda, circa 1000 B.C.E., and has valences of lordship in the oldest texts. See Shastri (1935) for a history of the term with relation to theism.

0.    From the classical schools of philosophy, the Mīmāṁsā school rejects the inferential necessity of positing an Īśvara. Sāṅkhya is typically (and hastily) assumed to be nontheistic, as the later Sāṅkhya Kārikā does not mention Īśvara (an assumption that can be brought into question—see, for instance, Edgerton 1924). But there were many schools of Sāṅkhya, most of which, preserved in the Purāṇas and Mokṣadharma section of the Mahābhārata, were in fact theistic (although the much later Sāṅkhya Sūtra is more explicitly nontheistic). There were thus both theistic and nontheistic Sāṅkhya strains, with—I would argue as others have done—the majority theistic.

0.    See also Bhāgavata I.2.36 and III.24.32.

0.    The d and ta endings on these two texts, respectively, reflect Sanskrit grammatical endings of the term Bhagavān, which is in the masculine, nominative case of the stem bhagavat (grammatically bhaga + vat possessive suffix = literally “one who possesses qualities”). Bhaga is an old Vedic term, used to refer to the share apportioned to the various gods in the Vedic yajña, sacrifice. By the Purāṇas, it becomes coupled with the possessive suffix and denotes the superexcellent qualities of a transcendent Being.

0.    The terms can even, on occasion, be used figuratively for a powerful person (such as a sage like Nārada).

0.    The term has earlier Vedic roots associated with the power of the sacrifice. The root is bṛh, to grow, increase, expand.

0.    See, for example, Kena Upaniṣad I.1–6.

0.    Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad II.3.1–2. Since “being” is a present active participle (of the root as)—that is, a never-ending ongoing state—sat is often translated as “eternal.”

0.    See Bṛhadāraṇyaka 4.3.32; Chāndogya VI.2.1; Taittirīya II.2.1 and II.8; Muṇḍaka II.1.7. Also, as a technical aside, advaita Vedānta, in its radical nondualism, would not speak of the “qualities” of Brahman, as this implies a duality between qualities (dharmas/guṇas) and quality bearers (such as substances, dharmins/guṇins/dravyas). For this school, the inherent nature of Brahman is itself sat-cit-ānanda; it has no qualities.

0.    See, for example, Muṇḍaka I.6–7.

0.    See, for example, Taittirīya II.6; Aitareya I.1ff.; Śvetāśvatara I.8ff.

0.    We will provide examples below.

0.    Such schools point to verses such as the famous sātmātattvam asi, “you are that ātman,” series of verses in the Chāndogya (VI.9ff.) and Kaṭha, “from death to death he goes, who sees here any kind of diversity” (IV.10–11; repeated from the Bṛhadāraṇyaka IV.4.19; these and translations in next note from Olivelle 1996).

0.    Verses favored by such schools point to the Śvetāśvatara, such as I.6 and 9. Rāmānuja frequently quotes verses such as “The self of yours who is present within but is different from all beings, whom all beings do not know, whose body is all beings, and who controls all beings from within—he is the inner controller [antaryāmin], the immortal” (Bṛhadāraṇyaka III.7.21); “He had this desire, ‘Let me multiply myself, let me produce offspring’” (Taittirīya II.6); and “It thought to itself, ‘Let me become many’” (Chāndogya VI.2.3).

0.    This can be readily seen by the ṭilak, sacred clay forehead marking, on pictures of Krishnamacarya, as well as on early photos of Iyengar, which denotes the school of Śrī Vaiṣṇavism, the formal name of Rāmānuja’s lineage (the philosophical name is viśiṣṭādvaita Vedānta). I personally asked Iyengar, on his last tour to the West, whether he still identified with Rāmānuja’s Vedānta lineage, Śrī Vaiṣṇavism, and whether he considered Īśvara to be Nārāyaṇa/Viṣṇu, as per the very specific theology of this lineage. He immediately and unambiguously replied in the affirmative. Since I was receiving a lot of requests to conduct yoga philosophy workshops in Iyengar yoga communities, I then asked him whether he wished for me to teach his students the viśiṣṭādvaita Vedānta position (which will be discussed later in this section) on fundamental Vedānta issues pertaining to Iśvara, Brahman, the ātman, and bhakti. He replied in the affirmative, then added that I should also teach them Śaṅkara’s advaita Vedānta and all different points of view (personal communication in the Harvard Faculty Club, 2005). I very much appreciated this response.

0.    This is especially central to the later Upaniṣads such as the Śvetāsvatāra, but emerging already in the earlier ones, too.

0.    This is called āgama, as in Yoga Sūtras I.7, or, more commonly, śabda or śruti/smṛti (or just śāstra, as in Vedānta Sūtras I.I.3). Vedānta also employs reason and arguments secondarily, which occupy the second of the four chapters of the Vedānta Sūtras.

0.    See Yoga Sūtras I.7 for a discussion of the three modes of gaining right knowledge according to Yoga, including anumāṇa and āgama. For an excellent overview of Nyāya theism in both primary and secondary sources, see Dāsti (2010) and references therein, and Patil (2009).

0. . For primary sources, see Caitanya Caritāmṛta, ādi līlā, chapter 10, and Caitanya Bhāgavata, ādi khaṇḍa, chapter 13; for secondary sources, see Ganeri (2011, chapter 4).

0.    Yoga Sūtras I.24; Gītā 15.17.

0.    This would be the Vaiṣṇava reading of, for example, Gītā XIV.27.

0.    See I.4.20–22.

0.    Or, with the Vedāntin Madhva (and also the Nyāya school), Īśvara is at least accepted as the overseer, sustainer, and support of prakṛti, which is not created but coeternal with Him.

0.    As with the cluster of Yoga traditions, there were numerous variants of Sāṅkhya, amply attested to in the Mahābhārata epic (the Chinese Buddhist pilgrim Hsöen Tsang’s disciple in the seventh century C.E. reports eighteen schools, and the Bhāgavata Purāṇa also refers to several). Only fragments quoted by other authors have survived from the works of the original teachers of the system. The later Sāṅkhya Kārikā of Īśvarakṛṣṇa, which scholars assign to the fourth to fifth century C.E., has by default become the seminal text of the tradition, just as Patañjali’s Yoga Sūtras has become for the Yoga tradition, and represents its more developed, systematic form.

0.    Prakṛti has been called “the undifferentiated plenitude of being” (Larson 1979, 167).

0.    Sat-tva literally means “being-ness,” from the root as, “to be.” Rajas is from the root rañj, “to color” or to “redden.” Tamas is from the root tam, “to choke, block, or stop.”

0.    Without rajas, for example, one could not even blink one’s eyes, and without tamas, there would be no sleep or rest.

0.    When the guṇas maintain what we might call an “equi-tension,” prakṛti remains in a precreative state of dynamic potential called avyakta. Once the equilibrium is disrupted, however, creation takes place.

0.    The analogy of milk holds good only in terms of the evolution of by-products. Where prakṛti differs from milk is that it and its evolutes maintain their own separate identities while simultaneously producing further evolutes, unlike milk, which is itself fully transformed when producing yogurt.

0.    I have specified the Vedānta and Purāṇa traditions, as there are always exceptions to categories and terminologies: Nyāya, for example, would accept an eternal, primary, and nonderivatory Īśvara, but the earlier tradition would likely not use the term “personal” to depict Him. For this tradition, Īśvara as the nonreducible “individual” ātman who differs from other ātmans in being an omniscient Overseer would be a better way to demarcate this tradition from the monist understanding (although later Naiyāyikas were Śaivite and thus “personalists” in the sense I am using the term here).

0.    We define “monotheism” here as one personal and transcendent God as supreme cause.

0.    In his commentary of Yoga Sūtras I.24, the commentator Vyāsa, in support of one Supreme Īśvara, quips that if the various manifestations of Īśvaras were all exactly equal, and one says of an object “Let it be old” and the other says “Let it be new,” the wishes of one of them will be thwarted (which would contradict the definition of Īśvara). And if their wishes never contradict, adds the commentator Vācaspati Miśra, then what is the point of having more than one Īśvara in the first place?!

0.    Śaṅkara’s Upadeśasāhaśrī is an excellent place to encounter accessible advaita teachings from its most famous exponent, all the more since it is a text attributed to Śaṅkara’s own composition, in contrast with his other writings, which are commentaries on other preexisting Vedānta texts. For good secondary sources, see Deutsch (1969, 1971).

0.    For the enlightened state while still embodied (jīvan-mukta) in Śaṅkara, see Fort (1996).

0.    The twelfth-century commentator Madhva is a partial (and somewhat technical) exception here. Madhva does not accept Īśvara as the creator of prakṛti, although he accepts Him as the sustainer and support of both matter and the pluralist individual souls. Madhva’s philosophy is one of dualism, dvaita, where, along the lines of the Nyāya school, God, the souls, and matter are all eternal coexistents (rather than the latter being emanational from the former). Nonetheless, Īśvara is unambiguously the Supreme Controller and Overseer in his very robust form of monotheism. See Sharma (1971) and Buchta (2013).