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THE MAGIC OF KRISHNA
By Deepa Kodikal  The reading of Srimad Bhagavatam transports one to the enthralling world of Lord Krishna, the Supreme Personality of Godhead. It is a brilliant portrayal of how the Godhead accepts life in its totality of joy and sorrow, conflict and reconciliation, the good and the bad. Lord Krishna descends on earth whenever required to remind people of life’s sublime goal, and the path of righteous living. In His own enchanting way, he invokes in us love, goodness and worship, the three cardinal principles of right living.
Of all the incarnations of the Lord, Krishna is the only one whose captivating smile is laced with mischief, and who is ever ready with good-hearted laughter even while He quickly punctures one’s ego. Laughter, the elixir of life, sets humans apart from other species, turns living into magic; Krishna induces this magic plentifully in our lives by turning the events in His life into adorable and playful happenings.
Krishna is fun-loving. By His sheer wit and a tremendous sense of humour, He transformed life in Brindavan from being fear-laden, due to Kamsa’s machinations, into a carousel of fun and gaiety. He removed drudgery from daily work, bringing in cheer and sunshine, and a right perspective on life. With His bantering and winsome ways, He stole people’s hearts. Through music and dance, He gave a new meaning to their life. Yet, skilfully and fearlessly, He foiled the many demonic attempts on His life by His cruel and bloodthirsty uncle, the usurper Kamsa. Handsome and valorous, he came to the rescue of all those who needed His strength.
Krishna appreciates the many ironies and twists of fate, and hence accepts life, flows with it, wings His way through its many vicissitudes without ever losing His composure or being embittered. Krishna teaches us by His example to look upon the brighter side of life, to be positive in our approach to it and to live life joyously.
He is also the one god who lends himself to romance even whilst retaining His child-like innocence. He is the one incarnation one can look upon as a brother, a friend, a guide, a ruler, and even as a beloved; cuddle Him as a child, play with as a young prankster, or as a romancing, dashing youth; a warrior; a messenger of compromise and peace, even whilst all along we venerate Him as the Supreme Being. One can affectionately take liberties with Him which one would not even think of with the other incarnations.
Over the years men and women alike have identified themselves with Radha and savored the nectar of love for Krishna. Men and women alike have imagined being His beloved to experience the sweetness of divine oneness. They have pined for Him, worshipped Him, offered their very being to him and loved Him as one would a living person. This love itself has been their fulfillment. But this love is not the ordinary love of mortals where the urges of human body are to be satisfied. Love of and love for Krishna is divine. It transcends one’s body and mind and reaches the realm of worship. Here love, worship, fulfillment, ecstasy, and divinity join hands to become one beatific whole.
This transcendental love for Krishna is the path to the abode of the Ultimate. Here Paramananda is one’s innate nature. One does not have to seek this total fulfillment outside of oneself. It is generated from within one’s own self.
This Paramananda is unique. It is difficult to describe its bliss. It pours forth from every pore of one’s being. Every pore, every cell of the body is set a-dancing by it, is vibrating in ecstasy with it. The whole body throbs with rapture. Pleasures of the material world pale before this divine bliss. But it is not of the body alone. It transcends the body to generate a feeling of worship.
The realm of the Ultimate is also a domain of silence. Words have no entry here. Wordless and nameless. Everything is one. The experience of this nameless oneness, the ecstasy of simply ‘being’, is in itself the feeling of worship, which in turn is part of the ecstasy. The limitless one, Lord Krishna, is always in Paramananda. It is this ananda we experience in our worship of Krishna in His transcendental aspect.
He alone is us, He has reiterated. Yet, we ourselves have drifted away from Him and sought refuge in duality. Now, endearingly, insistently, He calls us back to Him and even points out the shortest way to Him. He offers us the ecstasy of this return, the enchantment of this meeting, the irresistible allure of this merger.
The effort to return to Him is worship. There is magic on the way. The music emanating from the flute is bewitching. It draws one’s very being into a vortex of happiness. It beckons us to an ecstasy not available elsewhere, which is soul- satisfying and pleasing to the core, making the hurt, the pain, the anger and the violence of all births vanish. It infuses one with the sweet intimacy of oneness with the divine.
The return to Krishna is full of dance. The dance is the rapture of ‘being’, the freedom of the flow and the movement of life, the freedom of the soul. Soaring into divinity, into unalloyed happiness, where everyone appears as Krishna Himself, the dance is a celebration of life. Krishna is the universe, Krishna is oneself. Krishna is living,Krishna is the joyance of life. Krishna is dance.
The path of return to Krishna is strewn with laughter, mischief, frolic and prance. Life is to be enjoyed, life is the ananda of ‘being’, the Paramananda of Krishna. The world must reverberate with this delight.
The turning to Krishna is the promise of many things. Felicity is assured by love and endearment, not by force and coercion. Protection is offered on the steadfast ground of faith and surrender, not of fear or dogma. Rewards are bestowed on the basis of purity, simplicity and humbleness, and not as a bribe or as a pompous show of strength. There is grandeur in Krishna’s being, a rare prodigality of generousness, an openness and compassion of heart that is truly divine in its universality.
Legend has it that lotuses would bloom, creepers would sway and trees burst forth with fruit in the wake of Krishna as He walked in the forest. Hasn’t science shown with the help of sensitive instruments how plants react to the aura of people? They actually wilt in fear as persons of ill-will pass by, but grow and bloom and sway in joy in the presence of goodness. What magical goodness must Krishna have radiated then? Are these legends mere myths or do they validate Krishna’s all-encompassing love?
Krishna was all-inclusive: He did not shun any experience in life. He knew there was a time for music and gaiety and a time for war and statesmanship. Master of all arts, whatever He did, He carried it off with style and grace, masterfully. Through music and dance, He created legends. In war and diplomacy, He cannot be faulted. He combined valour with justice, and action with forbearance. For the good of his people, he employed any means, effacing Himself completely. When He knew His army was unprepared and not a match for the powerful opponent, He, without standing on prestige, withdrew with his men and ran for cover. When, oppressed by repeated attacks by demonic might, His simple, peace loving people suffered, without fuss He shifted base to Dwarka. He took His people there and established a safe territory. Ego was absent in Him.
He has the distinction of being the only seer to expound the highest philosophy of right living, the profound Truths of our existence, on a battlefield, unmindful of the massed armies impatient to start their carnage. Nothing was untimely or inauspicious for Him. He gave us words of wisdom that have stood the test of changing civilizations over the millennia.
If he gave music and laughter to the simple cowherds, he gave the highest wisdom to the entire humanity. He gave a ‘blue-print for living’ to all who would care to follow, and an inspiration to the brave to fight for justice. If he divulged the secrets of yoga, equally He held forth on the merit of the paths of devotion, of knowledge, and of detached action.
Krishna points out to us our divine roots and our limitless potential, that of reaching the highest, of becoming one with the Lord. He brings forth the simple philosophy of love, the matrix of all life. Forbearance, doing one’s duty without resentment or resistance, performing action without an eye on the fruits of action, these simple yet sublime principles are to be made the guidelines of our lives. This attitude removes from one the ego, the pride, the ill-will and any reluctance to action. Putting into practice Krishna’s teachings clears one’s vision, brings in purity of mind, makes one perceive clearly one’s duty, and brings forth from within oneself undistorted guidance and help in the performance of action and one’s duty. Fighting for justice, for the protection of the meek and the helpless, and fighting against the self-grown demons within oneself, are given pride of place.
His aura is blue, because His abode is where there is neither darkness nor light, only the soft gray-blue luminescence of Cosmic Consciousness, which is his persona, from whence originate light and the universe. Thus, Krishna is light personified, and Krishna is also its source. Krishna is the entire cosmos, and Krishna is beyond cosmos.
Krishna is the cosmic Being, pure Consciousness and beyond, from whence even Consciousness arises. He is truly incomparable. Krishna is an entrancing paradox. He is magic. He is for us, with us, in us. He is us! He beckons us ever with the promise of the magic of His celestial love!
(For the ‘Krishna’ 2005, magazine of the Indian Express Group, produced by Jayshri Menon)
Courtesy: The Indian Express Group, Mumbai
Visit: www.spiritualorbits.com
It is with great regret that we inform that Deepa Kodikal left for her heavenly abode on 23 October, 2013. On behalf of The Mother, we offer our sincerest prayers that her soul may rest in peace.
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