Early History of the Vaishnava Faith and Movement in Bengal, from Sanskrit and Bengali Sources c9.s5.36

c9.s5.36

There can be no doubt that the determinative creed of the Bengal sect is that Kṛṣṇa alone is the Bhagavat or the only and most perfect god. As the trend of their exclusively Kṛṣṇaite hymns, dramas and poems, as well as Śāstric works which have Kṛṣṇa as their only theme, should indicate, Rūpa, Sanātana and Jīva, as well as Gopāla Bhaṭṭa and Raghunāthadāsa, adhere firmly to this creed. But this position, once accepted, would logically exclude every other claimant from the highest divine honour. It was, therefore, not possible from the strictly theoretical point of view to make an explicit declaration of what these personal disciples of Caitanya practically believed, namely, that Caitanya, like Kṛṣṇa himself, was the supreme deity of the creed. This inconsistency could be reconciled only by supposing, as they do suppose, that Kṛṣṇa, as the supreme being of endless incarnations, made his descent in the Kali Age in the form of Caitanya, but that he assumed the fair form as well as the fervid feelings of Rādhā, uniting in himself, for the particular purpose of relishing his own divine bliss, the two incarnated forms (to use a theological phrase) of the Sakti and the Saktimat in a kind of identity in non-identity. The Gosvāmins have taken great pains to demonstrate that Kṛṣṇa is the Bhagavat and not an incarnation, but they never make any attempt in the same way to demonstrate the creed in the case of Caitanya; for, to avoid inconsistency, they had to acknowledge that Caitanya was an incarnation, even if a unique incarnation, of Kṛṣṇa.