Love – The Topmost Goal

In the first 60 anucchedas of Prīti Sandarbha, Ṣrī Jīva Gosvāmī establishes that pure love for Bhagavān brings the highest happiness without any taint of suffering. Thus it is the highest goal of human pursuits. He concludes this by the following statement. I cite it here and include my commentary summarizing the essential points of the first 60 anucchedas.

तदेवं भगवत्प्रीतेरेव परमपुरुषार्थता स्थापिता।

 Thus it has been established that prīti for Bhagavān is the highest puruṣārtha.

Commentary

In the first 60 anucchedas, Śrīla Jīva Gosvāmī has established prīti as the ultimate object of human attainment (parama- puruṣārtha). As previously discussed, mokṣa or mukti was traditionally considered to be the highest puruṣārtha in India. Such being the case, Jīva Gosvāmī’s exposition in Prīti Sandarbha inculcated an entirely novel principle, based primarily on Śrīmad Bhāgavata, which he had previously established as the highest authority in the matter of the direct disclosure of the Absolute Reality, or tattva.

To establish his thesis, Jīva Gosvāmī first argued that the basic aim of human life (puruṣārtha), on which all philosophers, theologians, and even common people agree, is the attainment of happiness (sukha-prāpti) combined with the elimination of misery (duḥkha-nivṛtti) — both qualitative states being essential to the puruṣārtha’s fundamental makeup. Śrī Jīva equated this state of being to mukti, which literally means “freedom” and thus primarily denotes freedom from the inevitable miseries of the human condition. Thus mukti, in its literal sense, constitutes only one aspect of the puruṣārtha. It is purely a negative term. This is the type of mukti that is advocated as the puruṣārtha by the schools of Nyāya, Vaiśeṣika, Sāṅkhya, and Yoga. Most people, however, mistake it for the complete puruṣārtha, which entails the attainment of happiness devoid of all suffering. The absence of suffering is thus mistaken for happiness.
According to Jīva Gosvāmī’s analysis, the root cause of suffering is the beginningless absence of awareness of the Absolute Reality (parama-tattva-jñāna-saṁsargābhāva). He thus reasons that the immediate intuition of the Absolute (tattva-sākṣātkāra), which uproots the latter cause of suffering, is the actual puruṣārtha and equivalent to mukti. Elaborating further, Śrī Jīva clarifies that this tattva-sākṣātkāra is of two types — that of the unqualified Absolute (Brahman) or that of the transcendentally qualified Absolute (Bhagavān), depending on which aspect of the Absolute is focused upon as primary.

Of these two, bhagavat-sākṣātkāra is far superior to brahma- sākṣātkāra, since Bhagavān was shown to exceed Brahman significantly in both ontological and aesthetic completion. This subject was discussed at length in Bhagavat Sandarbha (Anucchedas 1–10). In brahma-sākṣātkāra, there is no distinction between the experiencer and the object of experience. It is an indeterminate state of being and thus cannot be described in positive terms. Bhagavat- sākṣātkāra, on the other hand, is a positive experience of the Absolute and not merely the removal of suffering and its causes. With this understanding, bhagavat-sākṣātkāra is concluded to be the real puruṣārtha in the most complete sense.

Śrī Jīva Gosvāmī further explains that bhagavat-sākṣātkāra is also of two types — internal and external, the latter being superior to the former because it involves all the core faculties of being and not just those pertaining to the mind. In either case, however, since divine love (prīti) for Bhagavān is the only true cause of the direct experience of Him, any such experience devoid of prīti — as may be possible for those of impure heart who see Bhagavān during His avatāric descent — is tantamount to no sākṣātkāra at all. Śrī Jīva thus concludes that the real puruṣārtha is bhagavat-sākṣātkāṛa rooted in prīti.
In light of this conclusion, Śrī Jīva also explained the meaning of the various kinds of liberation described in different scriptures, including gradual liberation (krama-mukti), immediate liberation (sadyo-mukti), living liberation (jīvan-mukti), and posthumous liberation (utkrānta-mukti). The latter category actually refers to the post-liberated condition, which has five primary divisions — namely, sāyujya (merging in the Absolute), sālokya (residence in Bhagavān’s transcendental abode), sārṣṭi (endowment with comparable divine opulences), sārūpya (endowment with a form of comparable divine splendor), and sāmīpya (proximity to Bhagavān).

Of these, sāyujya has two divisions — brahma-sāyujya and bhagavat-sāyujya, neither of which are recommended by Jīva Gosvāmī because they both negate all possible access to prīti. Of the remaining four, proximity to Bhagavān (sāmīpya) is preeminent because it allows for the fullest expression of prīti, the essence of which lies in rendering favorable service to Bhagavān. Devotees thus hanker for prīti alone and not for any of the five kinds of liberation. They may, however, accept any of the four types of mukti other than sāyujya if they prove to be beneficial for their service.

Pure devotees never pray for anything other than prīti for Bhagavān. Sometimes devotees who have already attained this supreme puruṣārtha may pray for some opulence to serve Him, and He readily fulfills their desire. But should He not do so, such liberated devotees consider this too to be the grace of Bhagavān and thus experience a surge (ullāsa) in their prīti.

Bhagavān does not entangle His devotees in material affairs by burdening them with wealth, power, or position. In fact, He gradually removes such distractions from their lives in order to evoke true humility and unconditional surrender in them and to increase their thirst for prīti. This is how Bhagavān bestows His true grace on His devotees, making them less involved in material affairs and increasing their yearning for prīti. Ultimately, all pure devotees reach the final refuge of Bhagavān and live with Him in spiritual forms that are granted to them upon attainment of the liberated status at the end of their lives in this world.