BRS 01.02.285 - cited

Expressions researched:
"Although the dealings of the gopis with Krsna are on the platform of pure love of Godhead, such dealings are sometimes considered to be lusty" |"The pure love of the gopis has become celebrated by the name" |"as far as Radharani and Her associates are concerned, they did not desire personal sense gratification" |"the dealings of the gopis with Krsna are wrongly celebrated by many as lust" |"Bhakti-rasamṛta-sindhu" |"1.2.285"

Notes from the compiler: VedaBase query: "1.2.285"

CC Adi-lila

CC Adi 4.163, Translation and Purport:

"The pure love of the gopīs has become celebrated by the name "lust." The dear devotees of the Lord, headed by Śrī Uddhava, desire to taste that love."

This is a verse from the Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu (1.2.285).

CC Madhya-lila

CC Madhya 8.216, Translation and Purport:

“"Although the dealings of the gopīs with Kṛṣṇa are on the platform of pure love of Godhead, such dealings are sometimes considered to be lusty. But because they are completely spiritual, Uddhava and all the other dearmost devotees of the Lord desire to participate in them."

This is a quotation from the Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu (1.2.285).

Teachings of Lord Caitanya

Teachings of Lord Caitanya, Chapter 31:

When one is actually situated in that understanding, he becomes eligible to enter into the confidential pastimes of Rādhā and Kṛṣṇa. There is no alternative to understand Their confidential pastimes. This is confirmed in Govinda-līlāmṛta (10.17): "Although manifest, happy, expanded and unlimited, the emotional exchanges between Rādhā and Kṛṣṇa can only be understood by the damsels of Vraja or by their followers." Just as no one can understand the expansion of the spiritual energy of the Supreme Lord without His causeless mercy, no one can understand the transcendental sex life between Rādhā and Kṛṣṇa without following in the footsteps of the damsels of Vraja. The personal associates of Rādhārāṇī are called sakhīs, and Her near assistants are called mañjarīs. It is very difficult to express their dealings with Kṛṣṇa because they have no desire to mix with Kṛṣṇa or to enjoy Him personally. Rather, they are always ready to help Rādhārāṇī associate with Kṛṣṇa. Their affection for Kṛṣṇa and Rādhārāṇī is so pure that they are simply satisfied when Rādhā and Kṛṣṇa are together. Indeed, their transcendental pleasure is in seeing Rādhā and Kṛṣṇa united. The actual form of Rādhārāṇī is just like a creeper embracing the tree of Kṛṣṇa, and the damsels of Vraja, the associates of Rādhārāṇī, are just like the leaves and flowers of that creeper. When a creeper embraces a tree, the leaves and flowers as well as the creeper automatically embrace it. Govinda-līlāmṛta (10.16) confirms that Rādhārāṇī is the expansion of the pleasure potency of Kṛṣṇa and is compared with a creeper, and Her associates, the damsels of Vraja, are compared to the flowers and leaves of that creeper. When Rādhārāṇī and Kṛṣṇa enjoy Themselves, the damsels of Vraja relish the pleasure more than Rādhārāṇī Herself.

Although the associates of Rādhārāṇī do not expect any personal attention from Kṛṣṇa, Rādhārāṇī is so pleased with them that She arranges individual meetings between Kṛṣṇa and the damsels of Vraja. Indeed, Rādhārāṇī tries to combine or unite Her associates with Kṛṣṇa by many transcendental maneuvers, and She takes more pleasure in these meetings than in Her own meetings with Him. When Kṛṣṇa sees that both Rādhārāṇī and Her associates are pleased by His association, He becomes more satisfied. Such association and loving reciprocation have nothing to do with material lust, although it resembles the material union between man and woman. It is only because that similarity is there that such reciprocation is sometimes called, in transcendental language, transcendental lust. As explained in Gautamīya-tantra (Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu 1.2.285): "Lust means attachment to one's personal sense gratification. But as far as Rādhārāṇī and Her associates are concerned, they did not desire personal sense gratification. They only wanted to satisfy Kṛṣṇa." This is further confirmed in the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam (10.31.19) in one of the speeches of the gopīs:

yat te sujāta-caraṇāmburuhaṁ staneṣu

bhītāḥ śanaiḥ priya dadhīmahi karkaśeṣu

tenātavīm aṭasi tad vyathate na kiṁ svit

kūrpādibhir bhramati dhīr bhavad-āyuṣāṁ naḥ

"My dear friend Kṛṣṇa, You are now roaming in the forest with Your bare feet, which You sometimes keep on our breasts. When Your feet are on our breasts, we think that our breasts are too hard for Your soft feet. Now You are wandering in the forest and walking over stones, and we do not know how You are feeling. Since You are our life and soul, the displeasure You undergo in traveling over rough stones is giving us great distress." Such feelings expressed by the damsels of Vraja constitute the highest Kṛṣṇa conscious emotions. Anyone who actually becomes captivated by Kṛṣṇa consciousness approaches this level of the gopīs. There are sixty-four categories of devotional service by performance of which one can rise to the gopīs' stage of unconditional devotion. Affection for Kṛṣṇa on the level of the gopīs is called rāgānuga, spontaneous love. When one enters into a spontaneous loving affair with Kṛṣṇa, there is no need to follow the Vedic rules and regulations.

Narada-bhakti-sutra (sutras 1 to 8 only)

Narada Bhakti Sutra 7, Translation and Purport:

There is no question of lust in the execution of pure devotional service, because in it all material activities are renounced.

In pure devotional service there is no question of sense gratification. Some people mistake the loving affairs between Kṛṣṇa and the gopīs (cowherd girls) for activities of ordinary sense gratification, but these affairs are not lustful because there is no material contamination. As Rūpa Gosvāmī states in his Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu (1.2.285),

premaiva gopa-rāmāṇāṁ kāma ity agamat prathām

ity uddhavādayo 'py etaṁ vāñchanti bhagavat-priyāḥ

"Although the dealings of the gopīs with Kṛṣṇa are wrongly celebrated by many as lust, great sages and saintly persons like Uddhava hanker for such loving affairs with Kṛṣṇa." Śrīla Kṛṣṇadāsa Kavirāja, the author of Caitanya-caritāmṛta, has therefore said,

kāma, prema,-doṅhākāra vibhinna lakṣaṇa

lauha āra hema yaiche svarūpe vilakṣaṇa

"As there is a difference between iron and gold, so there is a difference between material lust and Kṛṣṇa's loving affairs with the gopīs" (CC Adi 4.164). Although such loving affairs may sometimes resemble material lust, the difference is as follows:

ātmendriya-prīti-vāñchā-tāre bali 'kāma'

kṛṣṇendriya-prīti-icchā dhare 'prema' nāma

"The desire to satisfy one's own senses is called lust, while the desire to satisfy the senses of Kṛṣṇa is called prema, love of God" (CC Adi 4.165).

The impersonalists cannot understand the principle of satisfying Kṛṣṇa's senses because they reject the Personality of Godhead. Thus they think God has no senses and therefore no sense satisfaction. But the devotees simply want to satisfy the senses of the Supreme Lord, and so they take part in the pure activities of love of Godhead. There is no question of lust in that category of pure transcendental love.

Lust leads to fruitive activity for sense gratification. There are different kinds of duties for the human being, such as political obligations, performance of Vedic rituals, obligations for maintaining the body, and social formalities and conventions, but all such activities are directed toward satisfying one's own senses. The gopīs, however, simply wanted to satisfy Kṛṣṇa's senses, and thus they completely gave up the conventional path of social restriction, not caring for their relatives or the chastisement of their husbands. They gave up everything for the satisfaction of Kṛṣṇa, showing their strong attachment to Kṛṣṇa to be as spotless as washed white cloth.

It is said that when conjugal affection between a lover and beloved comes to the point of being destroyed and yet is not destroyed, such a relationship is pure love, or prema. In the material world it is not possible to find this kind of love, for it exists only between Kṛṣṇa and His intimate devotees, such as the gopīs. The sentiment between the gopīs and Kṛṣṇa was so strong that it could not be destroyed under any circumstances. Kṛṣṇa praises the gopīs' pure love in the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam (10.32.22):

na pāraye 'haṁ niravadya-saṁyujāṁ

sva-sādhu-kṛtyaṁ vibudhāyuṣāpi vaḥ

yā mābhajan durjaya-geha-śṛṅkhalāḥ

saṁvṛścya tad vaḥ pratiyātu sādhunā

"My dear gopīs, I am not able to repay My debt for your spotless service, even within a lifetime of Brahmā. Your connection with Me is beyond reproach. You have worshiped Me, cutting off all domestic ties, which are difficult to break. Therefore please let your own glorious deeds be your compensation."