Month: March 2023

Of surrender and bhakti

A reader recently argued that if one works to earn a livelihood, then their bhakti is a type of mixed bhakti which cannot be classified as uttamā bhakti. The argument is two fold: 1) harboring ‘faith’ independently in one’s livelihood means bhakti becomes covered, 2) one is not […]

Śrī Jīva Goswami defines bhakti

In the Bhakti Sandarbha, Śrī Jīva Goswami describes a large number of different types of bhakti. He begins by first defining bhakti. Definitions are all-important, as stated in the principle: lakṣaṇa-pramāṇābhyāṁ vastu-siddhiḥ , na tu kevala-pratijñā-mātreṇa – An object is determined by its defining characteristics ( lakṣaṇa ) […]

Recognizing a genuine guru

From Babaji’s commentary on Anuccheda 202.4 from the Bhakti Sandarbha: The śikṣā-guru and dīkṣā-guru are one and the same person Śrī Jīva makes a distinction between the śravaṇa-guru (the inceptive instructor) and the śikṣā-guru (the formal preceptor). Usually they are the same person. First, an aspirant begins to […]