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Early History of the Vaishnava Faith and Movement in Bengal, from Sanskrit and Bengali Sources c6.s1.t2: Svarūpa Dāmodara

Early History of the Vaiṣṇava Faith and Movement in Bengal, from Sanskrit and Bengali Sources c6.s1.t2

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English

Svarūpa Dāmodara

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The account of Svarūpa Dāmodara, which is probably next in date, appears to be lost. Kṛṣṇadāsa Kavirāja refers¹

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¹ दामोदर स्वरूप कड़चा अनुसारे (C-C. Madhya viii, 312) : प्रभुर मध्यशेपलीला स्वरूप दामोदर । सूत करि ग्रन्थिलेन ग्रन्थेर भितर ॥ (Ādi xiii, 16) ; दामोदर स्वरूप आर शुभ मुरारि । मुख्य मुख्य लीलासूत लिखियाछे विस्तारि ॥ (Ādi xiii, 46) : स्वरूप गोसामि आर रघुनाथ दास । एइ दुएर कड़चाते ए लीला प्रकाश ॥ (Antya xiv, 7), etc.

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II Raghunātha-dāsa also wrote a Kaḍacā; as the last passage states, it is also lost. Possibly this was no independent work of Raghunātha's, but he helped his Guru Svarūpa Dāmodara in the compiling of the latter's Kaḍacā. Nothing of Raghunātha-dāsa's writing on Caitanya remains except his Caitanyāṣṭaka and Gaurāṅga-stavakalpataru incorporated in his Stavāvalī (altogether 20 stanzas); while we have only a few doctrinal verses in the Gaura-gaṇoddeśa-dīpikā (13, 17, 149) ascribed to Svarūpa Dāmodara. These could not have been implied by the word Kaḍacā in Kṛṣṇadāsa's statement. Bimanbihari Majumdar (op. cit., p. 331) denies that any biographical account could have been written by Svarūpa Dāmodara or Raghuto it as his chief source for the middle part and last years of Caitanya's life, and describes it as a Kaḍacā. This could not have been the actual name of the work which is said to have been composed in Sanskrit. The author appears to have been originally a Navadvīpa scholar,¹ named Puruṣottama Ācārya (C-bh. Antya x. 52), a Vedāntist who subsequently became a Saṃnyāsin of the Daṇḍin order under the name of Svarūpa Dāmodara. Attaching himself to Caitanya as one of his most intimate and favourite disciples at Puri, he became thereafter an indispensable companion, keeping watchful care and regulating the life of the Master in detail.² Kavikarṇapūra in his Caitanya-candrodaya,³ as well as Caitanya's other biographers, makes him, as he really was, a great figure in Caitanya's life at Puri; and the verse viii. 10 (heloddhūlita-

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¹ This is implied by Kṛṣṇadāsa Kavirāja (Madhya x. 101-2); but Murāri does not mention him as a Navadvīpa-associate of Caitanya, while there is nothing in the works of Kavikarṇapūra, Vṛndāvanadāsa and Raghunātha-dāsa to support the view that Svarūpa Dāmodara was a native of Navadvīpa. On Puruṣottama Ācārya, see below, note 3.

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² Svarūpa was one of the few faithful followers who possessed great influence upon Caitanya, and knew his mind (C-C. Madhya xiii. 122, 134-5 etc.). Caitanya himself paid a tribute to his scholarship and devotion when he laughingly confessed to young Raghunātha that Svarūpa knew more about the Śāstras than he himself did.

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³ In his Caitanya-caritāmṛta Kāvya (xiii. 137-142) Kavikarṇapūra refers apparently to Svarūpa Dāmodara as Puruṣottama Ācārya. For the citation of a verse ascribed to Puruṣottama Ācārya in some MSS of the Padyāvalī, see S. K. De's ed. of the work, no 83 (note) and p. 212. But it is remarkable that Kavikarṇapūra does not mention Svarūpa Dāmodara's Kaḍacā, although he expressly acknowledges his indebtedness to Murāri's biographical account in his Caitanya-caritāmṛta Kāvya.

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nātha; but his arguments are not convincing. The worthless work which is sometimes printed from Baṭṭalā as Svarūpa Dāmodara's Kaḍacā cannot be seriously taken; it does not correspond to the descriptions given by Kṛṣṇadāsa, and contains wholesale appropriations even from Minanātha's work on the Kāma-śāstra; it is obviously a later Sahajiyā fabrication.

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kheḍayā), which is put in Svarūpa's mouth in the drama, is said to be Svarūpa's own composition incorporated by Kavi-karṇapūra.¹ He was well versed in Vaiṣṇava theology and practice, and had charge of young Raghunātha-dāsa's Vaiṣṇava training at Purī.² In Kavikarṇapūra's Gaura-gaṇoddeśa-dīpikā, Svarūpa Dāmodara is credited with the doctrine of Pañca-tattva,³ which established Caitanya, Nityānanda, Advaita, Gadādhara and Śrīvāsa as the five Tattvas of the faith, and exalted Caitanya as Mahāprabhu and Nityānanda and Advaita as Prabhus. This would indicate Svarūpa's attitude, if not the whole of his theology. He is said to have been so deeply attached to Caitanya that he never survived the great shock of Caitanya's death; but from Raghunātha-dāsa's reference in the Muktā-caritra (śl. 4), it is not unlikely that he passed his last days at Vṛndāvana and wrote his personal reminiscences there.

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¹ The verses 5-12 which open Kṛṣṇadāsa's Caitanya-caritāmṛta are printed in some editions of the text as quotations from the so-called Kaḍacā of Svarūpa Dāmodara (e.g. in Vaṅgavāsī ed., Mādhva Gauḍīya Maṭha ed. etc.); but in the Kālnā edition of the text this indication is omitted. The manuscripts of the text which we have consulted in the Dacca University Library do not support this attribution to Svarūpa, as there is no such heading there as svarūpa-gosvāmi-kaḍacāyām. See S. K. De in IHQ, 1933, pp. 99-100; Bimanbihari Majumdar, op. cit. p. 329, coming to the same conclusion after consulting five MSS of the work in the Vaṅgiya Sāhitya Pariṣad collection. It is probably an unjustifiable "padding" by zealous editors, of which instances are very frequent in the printed texts. The well-known verse śrī-rādhāyāḥ praṇava-mahimā is often, but wrongly, attributed to Svarūpa Dāmodara, probably because it embodies a doctrine ascribed to him.

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² The disciple acknowledges his debt in the opening verses of the Muktā-caritra, where he refers to Svarūpa, along with Rūpa and Sanātana.

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³ See above p. 32 note 2.

Cites (7)