THE HLADINI POTENCY OF THE LORD.
10.39.53-55
Purport:
Srila Visvanatha Cakravarti explains the Lord's potencies mentioned in these verses: "Sri is the potency of wealth; Pusti that of strength; Gir, knowledge; Kanti, beauty; Kirti, fame; and Tusti, renunciation. These are the Lord's six opulences. Ila is His bhu-sakti, also known as sandhini, the internal potency of whom the element earth is an expansion. Urja is His internal potency for performing pastimes; she expands as the tulasi plant in this world. Vidya and Avidya [knowlege and ignorance] are external potencies who cause the living entities' liberation and bondage, respectively. Sakti is His internal pleasure potency, hladini, and Maya is an internal potency who is the basis of Vidya and Avidya. The word ca implies the presence of the Lord's marginal energy, the jiva-sakti, who is subordinate to Maya. Lord Visnu was being served by all these personified potencies."
10.13.57
Purport:
Krsna's power is variegated, and thus the same sakti, or potency, works in variegated ways. Vividha means "varieties." There is unity in variety. Thus yogamaya and mahamaya are among the varied individual parts of the same one potency, and all of these individual potencies work in their own varied ways. The samvit, sandhini and ahladini potencies - Krsna's potency for existence, His potency for knowledge and His potency for pleasure - are distinct from yogamaya. Each is an individual potency. The ahladini potency is Radharani. As Svarupa Damodara Gosvami has explained, radha krsna-pranaya-vikrtir hladini saktir asmat (Cc. Adi 1.5). The ahladini-sakti is manifested as Radharani, but Krsna and Radharani are the same, although one is potent and the other is potency.
10.9.20
Purport:
That exalted platform of prema is described by Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu as prema pum-artho mahan, and mother Yasoda naturally acts in such an exalted position in loving affairs. She is therefore a nitya-siddha devotee, an expansion of Krsna's hladini potency, His potency to enjoy transcendental bliss through expansions who are special devotees (ananda-cinmaya-rasa-pratibhavitabhih). Such devotees are not sadhana-siddha.
8.12.11
Purport:
As stated in the Brahma-samhita:
ananda-cinmaya-rasa-pratibhavitabhis
tabhir ya eva nija-rupataya kalabhih
goloka eva nivasaty akhilatma-bhuto
govindam adi-purusam tam aham bhajami
"I worship Govinda, the primeval Lord, who resides in His own realm, Goloka, with Radha, who resembles His own spiritual figure and who embodies the ecstatic potency [hladini]. Their companions are Her confidantes, who embody extensions of Her bodily form and who are imbued and permeated with ever-blissful spiritual rasa." (Bs. 5.37)
3.1.31
Purport:
The emperic philosophers enjoy a transcendental quality of bliss by philosophical speculation on the Supreme Truth, but beyond that pleasure is the pleasure enjoyed by Brahman in His eternal form of the Personality of Godhead. Brahman bliss is enjoyed by living entities after liberation from material bondage. But Parabrahman, the Personality of Godhead, enjoys eternally a bliss of His own potency, which is called the hladini potency. The emperic philosopher who studies Brahman by negation of the external features has not yet learned the quality of the hladini potency of Brahman. Out of many potencies of the Omnipotent, there are three features of His internal potency - namely samvit, sandhini and hladini. And in spite of their strict adherence to the principles of yama, niyama, asana, dhyama, dharana and pranayama, the great yogis and jnanis are unable toenter into the internal potency of the Lord. This internal potency is, however, easily realized by the devotees of the Lord by dint of devotional service.
Adi 4.59
radhika hayena krsnera pranaya-vikara
svarupa-sakti - hladini nama yanhara
Translation:
Srimati Radhika is the transformation of Krsna's love. She is His internal energy called hladini.
Adi 4.60
hladini karaya krsne anandasvadana
hladinira dvara kare bhaktera posana
Translation:
That hladini energy gives Krsna pleasure and nourishes His devotees.
Purport:
Srila Jiva Goswami has elaborately discussed the hladini potency in his Priti-sandarbha. He says that the Vedas clearly state, "Only devotional service can lead one to the Personality of Godhead. Only devotional service can help a devotee meet the Supreme Lord face to face. The Supreme Personality of Godhead is attracted by devotional service, and as such the ultimate supremacy of Vedic knowledge rests in knowing the science of devotional service.
The Supreme Personality of Godhead has three kinds of internal potency namely the hladini, or pleasure potency, sandhini, or existential potency, and samvit, or cognitive potency. In the Visnu Purana (1.12.69) the Lord is addressed as follows: "O Lord, You are the support of everything. The three attributes hladini, sandhini and samvit exist in You as one spiritual energy. But the material modes, which cause happiness, misery and mixtures of the two, do not exist in You, for You have no material qualities."
Hladini is the personal manifestation of the blissfulness of the Supreme Personality of Godhead, by which He enjoys pleasure. Because the pleasure potency is perpetually present in the Supreme Lord, the theory of the impersonalist that the Lord appears in the material mode of goodness cannot be accepted. The impersonalist conclusion is against the Vedic version that the Lord possesses a transcendental pleasure potency. When the pleasure potency of the Supreme Personality of Godhead is exhibited by His grace in the person of a devotee, that manifestation is called love of God. Love of God is another epithet of the pleasure potency of the Lord. Therefore devotional service reciprocated between the Lord and His devotee is an exhibition of the transcendental pleasure potency of the Lord.
The potency of the Supreme Personality of Godhead that always enriches Him with transcendenatl bliss is not material, but the Sankarites have accepted it as such because they are ignorant of the identity of the Supreme Lord and His pleasure potency. Those ignorant persons cannot understand the distinction between impersonal spiritual bliss and the variegatedness of the spiritual pleasure potency. The hladini potency give the Lord all transcendental pleasure, and the Lord bestows such a potency upon His pure devotee.
Purport:
Srila Visvanatha Cakravarti explains the Lord's potencies mentioned in these verses: "Sri is the potency of wealth; Pusti that of strength; Gir, knowledge; Kanti, beauty; Kirti, fame; and Tusti, renunciation. These are the Lord's six opulences. Ila is His bhu-sakti, also known as sandhini, the internal potency of whom the element earth is an expansion. Urja is His internal potency for performing pastimes; she expands as the tulasi plant in this world. Vidya and Avidya [knowlege and ignorance] are external potencies who cause the living entities' liberation and bondage, respectively. Sakti is His internal pleasure potency, hladini, and Maya is an internal potency who is the basis of Vidya and Avidya. The word ca implies the presence of the Lord's marginal energy, the jiva-sakti, who is subordinate to Maya. Lord Visnu was being served by all these personified potencies."
10.13.57
Purport:
Krsna's power is variegated, and thus the same sakti, or potency, works in variegated ways. Vividha means "varieties." There is unity in variety. Thus yogamaya and mahamaya are among the varied individual parts of the same one potency, and all of these individual potencies work in their own varied ways. The samvit, sandhini and ahladini potencies - Krsna's potency for existence, His potency for knowledge and His potency for pleasure - are distinct from yogamaya. Each is an individual potency. The ahladini potency is Radharani. As Svarupa Damodara Gosvami has explained, radha krsna-pranaya-vikrtir hladini saktir asmat (Cc. Adi 1.5). The ahladini-sakti is manifested as Radharani, but Krsna and Radharani are the same, although one is potent and the other is potency.
10.9.20
Purport:
That exalted platform of prema is described by Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu as prema pum-artho mahan, and mother Yasoda naturally acts in such an exalted position in loving affairs. She is therefore a nitya-siddha devotee, an expansion of Krsna's hladini potency, His potency to enjoy transcendental bliss through expansions who are special devotees (ananda-cinmaya-rasa-pratibhavitabhih). Such devotees are not sadhana-siddha.
8.12.11
Purport:
As stated in the Brahma-samhita:
ananda-cinmaya-rasa-pratibhavitabhis
tabhir ya eva nija-rupataya kalabhih
goloka eva nivasaty akhilatma-bhuto
govindam adi-purusam tam aham bhajami
"I worship Govinda, the primeval Lord, who resides in His own realm, Goloka, with Radha, who resembles His own spiritual figure and who embodies the ecstatic potency [hladini]. Their companions are Her confidantes, who embody extensions of Her bodily form and who are imbued and permeated with ever-blissful spiritual rasa." (Bs. 5.37)
3.1.31
Purport:
The emperic philosophers enjoy a transcendental quality of bliss by philosophical speculation on the Supreme Truth, but beyond that pleasure is the pleasure enjoyed by Brahman in His eternal form of the Personality of Godhead. Brahman bliss is enjoyed by living entities after liberation from material bondage. But Parabrahman, the Personality of Godhead, enjoys eternally a bliss of His own potency, which is called the hladini potency. The emperic philosopher who studies Brahman by negation of the external features has not yet learned the quality of the hladini potency of Brahman. Out of many potencies of the Omnipotent, there are three features of His internal potency - namely samvit, sandhini and hladini. And in spite of their strict adherence to the principles of yama, niyama, asana, dhyama, dharana and pranayama, the great yogis and jnanis are unable toenter into the internal potency of the Lord. This internal potency is, however, easily realized by the devotees of the Lord by dint of devotional service.
Adi 4.59
radhika hayena krsnera pranaya-vikara
svarupa-sakti - hladini nama yanhara
Translation:
Srimati Radhika is the transformation of Krsna's love. She is His internal energy called hladini.
Adi 4.60
hladini karaya krsne anandasvadana
hladinira dvara kare bhaktera posana
Translation:
That hladini energy gives Krsna pleasure and nourishes His devotees.
Purport:
Srila Jiva Goswami has elaborately discussed the hladini potency in his Priti-sandarbha. He says that the Vedas clearly state, "Only devotional service can lead one to the Personality of Godhead. Only devotional service can help a devotee meet the Supreme Lord face to face. The Supreme Personality of Godhead is attracted by devotional service, and as such the ultimate supremacy of Vedic knowledge rests in knowing the science of devotional service.
The Supreme Personality of Godhead has three kinds of internal potency namely the hladini, or pleasure potency, sandhini, or existential potency, and samvit, or cognitive potency. In the Visnu Purana (1.12.69) the Lord is addressed as follows: "O Lord, You are the support of everything. The three attributes hladini, sandhini and samvit exist in You as one spiritual energy. But the material modes, which cause happiness, misery and mixtures of the two, do not exist in You, for You have no material qualities."
Hladini is the personal manifestation of the blissfulness of the Supreme Personality of Godhead, by which He enjoys pleasure. Because the pleasure potency is perpetually present in the Supreme Lord, the theory of the impersonalist that the Lord appears in the material mode of goodness cannot be accepted. The impersonalist conclusion is against the Vedic version that the Lord possesses a transcendental pleasure potency. When the pleasure potency of the Supreme Personality of Godhead is exhibited by His grace in the person of a devotee, that manifestation is called love of God. Love of God is another epithet of the pleasure potency of the Lord. Therefore devotional service reciprocated between the Lord and His devotee is an exhibition of the transcendental pleasure potency of the Lord.
The potency of the Supreme Personality of Godhead that always enriches Him with transcendenatl bliss is not material, but the Sankarites have accepted it as such because they are ignorant of the identity of the Supreme Lord and His pleasure potency. Those ignorant persons cannot understand the distinction between impersonal spiritual bliss and the variegatedness of the spiritual pleasure potency. The hladini potency give the Lord all transcendental pleasure, and the Lord bestows such a potency upon His pure devotee.
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