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Early History of the Vaishnava Faith and Movement in Bengal, from Sanskrit and Bengali Sources c6.s1.t7: Govinda-dāsa

Early History of the Vaiṣṇava Faith and Movement in Bengal, from Sanskrit and Bengali Sources c6.s1.t7

Language
English

Govinda-dāsa

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There is another interesting work, which records only two years or so of Caitanya's life, but which is refreshing for its somewhat unconventional outlook, although this has apparently banned it from orthodox as well as learned estimation. This is the so-called Kaḍacā of Govinda-dāsa Karmakāra, son of Śyāmādāsa of Kāñcana-nagara (in Burdwan) and Mādhavī. It is said that he was a blacksmith by occupation, left home owing to a quarrel with his wife Saśimukhī and became a personal servant of Caitanya a little before the time of the latter's Saṃnyāsa. He states that he kept private notes of what he saw ( कड़चा करिया रात्रि अति सगोपने ) especially during the time he accompanied Caitanya in his South and West Indian pilgrimage. The work, which was first published by Jaygopala Gosvami of Śāntipur in 1895 and reprinted in 1926 by Dinesh Chandra Sen from the University of Calcutta, has gained some notoriety from the somewhat heated controversy it has started on the question of its genuineness and authorship.¹ The question has been rendered difficult, not so much

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¹ For an exposition of the two sides of the question, see respectively Dinesh Chandra Sen's introduction and Mrinal Kanti Ghosh's Govinda-dāser Kaḍacā-rahasya (Calcutta 1937) with his introduction to the revised ed. of the Gaura-pada-taraṅgiṇī, to which further arguments are added by B. V. Das-gupta's Govindadāsa's Kaḍacā: a Black Forgery (Dacca 1938). For a review of the question see B. Majumdar, op. cit. pp. 413f.

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in Bengali. (iii) Gaurāṅga-vijaya Gīta by Paramānanda-gupta, said to have been an abridgment (saṃkṣepa) of Gaurī-dāsa's work, (iv) Caitanya-maṅgala song ( सङ्गीतप्रबन्धे ) by Gopāla-vasu. Besides these mention is also made by Jayānanda of Vṛndāvana-dāsa's biography in three parts. It is noteworthy that Jayānanda does not refer to the Sanskrit accounts of Murāri-gupta and Svarūpa-Dāmodara.

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by the refusal of orthodox recognition for its unconventional contents and its unorthodox picture of Caitanya, but by the fact that, though no particular motive for the alleged forgery is suggested, the original manuscript or manuscripts have disappeared, that no other manuscript is forthcoming, and that the printed text has undoubtedly been modified and modernised¹ (probably, as suggested, by the well intentioned but entirely misdirected zeal of its first editor) and presents an appearance of modernity. The probability of interpolation is also not excluded; as a matter of fact there are some passages which have almost identical phrasing with those in Kṛṣṇadāsa Kavirāja's work, and look suspiciously like direct incorporation.² It is difficult to pronounce a definite judgment, but it seems probable that some of the matter it contains is old; and this internal evidence itself, in the absence of other proofs, makes the genuineness of the general substance of the work extremely plausible. The other extant biographies of Caitanya are indeed vague and meagre in information regarding his South and West Indian pilgrimage, which¹ was possibly not so well known from direct evidence; but this work supplies a fairly large amount of hitherto unknown details,² which appear to have been drawn from direct evidence or experience. It certainly contains much new, but plausible, information, which has the characteristic of not being inspired by devotional propagandism, but which was probably the result of vivid personal knowledge. The work is incomplete and contains a record of barely two years' wanderings in the South and West of India, and its genuineness or otherwise would not very seriously affect the general story of Caitanya's life; but it certainly gives a most human picture of one who has been so often and so grotesquely¹ deified, and presents a plain and vivid narrative by a sincere lover of the Master, who was dominated neither by learned dogmatics nor by excessive fanatical devotion.

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¹ Even such modern words as जानाला (from Portuguese) and नेलास (from English) occur!—Surely the work as a whole cannot be taken as casual notes of an uneducated man.

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² In spite of ludicrous geographical errors, pointed out by sceptical critics, such as रसालकुराडा, a modern town named after a Madras Civil Servant, George Russell!

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¹ Apart from miracles, see, for instance, the story of Caitanya's appearance, all on fours and carrying a pot in his teeth, and his being hailed by Murāri-gupta as the veritable incarnation of the Great Boar! Also his Nṛsiṃha-āveśa and Balarāma-rūpa, described by Kavikarṇapūra and others! It is noteworthy, however, that there are passages placed in the mouth of Caitanya, even in the orthodox devout biography of Kṛṣṇadāsa, in which Caitanya disclaims all such pretensions of an Avatāra. It should be observed that, according to the report of his biographers, Caitanya did not mind divine honours before his Saṃnyāsa and actually allowed himself to be worshipped as such; but after his Saṃnyāsa he expressly deprecated such praise and worship on many occasions.

Cites (1)