Prabhava (CC and other books)

Expressions researched:
"prabhava" |"prabhavah" |"prabhavas" |"prabhave"

CC Adi-lila

CC Adi 1.53, Purport:

The source of birth of the cosmic manifestation, or mahat-tattva, is the Personality of Godhead. This is confirmed throughout Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam and the Bhagavad-gītā. In the Bhagavad-gītā (10.8) the Lord says, ahaṁ sarvasya prabhavaḥ: "I am the fountainhead of all emanations." The material cosmos, being temporary, is sometimes manifest and sometimes unmanifest, but its energy emanates from the Supreme Absolute Lord. Before the creation there was neither cause nor effect, but the Supreme Personality of Godhead existed with His full opulence and energy.

CC Adi 1.53, Purport:

In the Bhagavad-gītā it is said, ahaṁ kṛtsnasya jagataḥ prabhavaḥ: the cosmic manifestation is a display of the energy of the Supreme Lord. The material elements (earth, water, fire, air, ether, mind, intelligence and false ego) display the inferior energy of the Lord, and the living entities are His superior energy.

CC Adi 2 Summary:

This chapter explains that Lord Caitanya is the Supreme Personality of Godhead Kṛṣṇa Himself. Therefore, the Brahman effulgence is the bodily luster of Lord Caitanya, and the localized Supersoul situated in the heart of every living entity is His partial representation. The puruṣa-avatāras are also explained in this connection. Mahā-Viṣṇu is the reservoir of all conditioned souls, but, as confirmed in the authoritative scriptures, Lord Kṛṣṇa is the ultimate fountainhead, the source of numerous plenary expansions, including Nārāyaṇa, who is generally accepted by Māyāvādī philosophers to be the Absolute Truth. The Lord's manifestation of prābhava and vaibhava expansions, as well as partial incarnations and incarnations with delegated powers, are also explained. Lord Kṛṣṇa's ages of boyhood and youth are discussed, and it is explained that His age at the beginning of youth is His eternal form.

CC Adi 2.97, Translation and Purport:

"The Personality of Godhead Śrī Kṛṣṇa enjoys Himself in six primary expansions. His two manifestations are prābhava and vaibhava."

Now the author of Śrī Caitanya-caritāmṛta turns to a description of the Personality of Godhead Kṛṣṇa in His innumerable expansions. The Lord primarily expands Himself in two categories, namely prābhava and vaibhava. The prābhava forms are fully potent like Śrī Kṛṣṇa, and the vaibhava forms are partially potent. The prābhava forms are manifested in relation with potencies, but the vaibhava forms are manifested in relation with excellences. The potent prābhava manifestations are also of two varieties: temporary and eternal. The Mohinī, Haṁsa and Śukla forms are manifested only temporarily, in terms of a particular age. Among the other prābhavas, who are not very famous according to the material estimation, are Dhanvantari, Ṛṣabha, Vyāsa, Dattātreya and Kapila. Among the vaibhava-prakāśa forms are Kūrma, Matsya, Nara-Nārāyaṇa, Varāha, Hayagrīva, Pṛśnigarbha, Baladeva, Yajña, Vibhu, Satyasena, Hari, Vaikuṇṭha, Ajita, Vāmana, Sārvabhauma, Ṛṣabha, Viṣvaksena, Dharmasetu, Sudhāmā, Yogeśvara and Bṛhadbhānu.

CC Adi 2.98, Purport:

The vilāsa forms are six in number. Incarnations are of two varieties, namely śakty-āveśa (empowered) and aṁśāveśa (partial). These incarnations also come within the category of prābhava and vaibhava manifestations. Childhood and boyhood are two special features of the Personality of Godhead Śrī Kṛṣṇa, but His permanent feature is His eternal form as an adolescent youth. The original Personality of Godhead Śrī Kṛṣṇa is always worshiped in this eternal adolescent form.

CC Adi 2.100, Purport:

The Personality of Godhead manifests Himself in six different features: (1) prābhava, (2) vaibhava, (3) empowered incarnations, (4) partial incarnations, (5) childhood and (6) boyhood. The Personality of Godhead Śrī Kṛṣṇa, whose permanent feature is adolescence, enjoys His transcendental proclivities by performing pastimes in these six forms. In these six features there are unlimited divisions of the Personality of Godhead's forms. The jīvas, or living beings, are differentiated parts and parcels of the Lord. They are all diversities of the one without a second, the Supreme Personality of Godhead.

CC Adi 5.132, Purport:

Some devotees think that Nārāyaṇa is the original Personality of Godhead and that Kṛṣṇa is an incarnation. Even Śaṅkarācārya, in his commentary on the Bhagavad-gītā, has accepted Nārāyaṇa as the transcendental Personality of Godhead who appeared as Kṛṣṇa, the son of Devakī and Vasudeva. Therefore this matter may be difficult to understand. But the Gauḍīya Vaiṣṇava-sampradāya, headed by Rūpa Gosvāmī, has established the principle of the Bhagavad-gītā that everything emanates from Kṛṣṇa, who says in the Bhagavad-gītā, ahaṁ sarvasya prabhavaḥ: (BG 10.8) "I am the original source of everything." "Everything" includes Nārāyaṇa. Therefore Rūpa Gosvāmī, in his Laghu-bhāgavatāmṛta, has established that Kṛṣṇa, not Nārāyaṇa, is the original Personality of Godhead.

CC Adi 7.105, Purport:

In this verse the words tomāra prabhāve ("Your influence") are very important. Unless one is spiritually advanced he cannot influence an audience. Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura has sung, śuddha-bhakata-caraṇa-reṇu, bhajana-anukūla. "Unless one associates with a pure devotee, he cannot be influenced to understand devotional service." These Māyāvādī sannyāsīs were fortunate enough to meet the Supreme Personality of Godhead in the form of a devotee, and certainly they were greatly influenced by the Lord.

CC Madhya-lila

CC Madhya 1.41, Purport:

There are different types of millenniums and incarnations for those millenniums. The categories called āveśa, prābhava, vaibhava and para constitute different situations for the different incarnations. According to specific pastimes, the names are spiritually empowered.

CC Madhya 17.51, Purport:

Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu appeared five hundred years ago, but it cannot be said that now the potency of the Hare Kṛṣṇa mahā-mantra is less than it was in His presence. By hearing Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu through the paramparā system, one can be purified. Therefore in this verse it is said, tathāpi tāṅra darśana-śravaṇa-prabhāve. It is not that everyone is able to see Kṛṣṇa or Śrī Kṛṣṇa Caitanya Mahāprabhu physically, but if one hears about Him through books like Śrī Caitanya-caritāmṛta and through the paramparā system of pure Vaiṣṇavas, there is no difficulty in becoming a pure Vaiṣṇava, free from mundane desires and personal motivations.

CC Madhya 20 Summary:

While discussing the Absolute Truth, Śrī Kṛṣṇa, the Lord analyzed Brahman, Paramātmā and Bhagavān, as well as the expansions of the Lord called svayaṁ-rūpa, tad-ekātma and āveśa, which are divided into various branches known as vaibhava and prābhava. Thus the Lord described the many forms of the Supreme Personality of Godhead.

CC Madhya 20.167, Translation:

"In His original form, Kṛṣṇa manifests Himself in two features—prābhava and vaibhava. He expands His one original form into many, as He did during the rāsa-līlā dance."

CC Madhya 20.168, Translation:

"When the Lord married 16,108 wives at Dvārakā, He expanded Himself into many forms. These expansions and the expansions at the rāsa dance are called prābhava-prakāśa, according to the directions of revealed scriptures."

CC Madhya 20.169, Translation:

"The prābhava-prakāśa expansions of Lord Kṛṣṇa are not like the expansions of the sage Saubhari. Had they been so, Nārada would not have been astonished to see them."