Gopala Bhatta Goswami was a young lad of seven years when he met Mahaprabhu in Sri Rangam. Mahaprabhu travelled for two years in South India, and during his trip he visited Sri Rangam.
While visiting Sri Rangam, Mahaprabhu was invited to stay in the house of Venkata Bhatta. Venkata was the head priest of the Sri Rangam temple, which is the headquarters of the Sri sampradaya of Ramanujacarya.
During His stay in Sri Rangam, Mahaprabhu converted the entire family of Venkata Bhatta from Sri Vaisnavism to Gaudiya Vaisnavism. The young Gopala Bhatta accepted initiation from Venkata’s brother, Prabodhananda Saraswati.
At this time Gopala Bhatta Goswami was just a young lad. He had a dream in which he saw a vision of the Navadvipa pastimes of Mahaprabhu and realized that the pastimes of Navadvipa are nondifferent from Vrindavana. He saw this, and the fact that Mahaprabhu is not only svayam bhagavan, but svayam sakti as well—Radha-Krishna.
Mahaprabhu then instructed him: “You stay here with your parents until they expire, and then go to Vrindavana. But in the course of going there, first go to the Himalayas, to Gandaki, and bring Salagramas from there for worship.” So through Gopala Bhatta, Mahaprabhu introduced the worship of Salagrama-sila, a vaidhi-marga Deity, into his raga-marga sampradaya.
Gopala Bhatta Goswami became very prominent in Vrindavana, yet he remained very humble, so much so that he asked Krishnadasa Kaviraja Goswami not to mention his name in his treatise Caitanya-caritamrta.
It is said in Gaura-ganoddesa-dipika that Gopala Bhatta Goswami is an incarnation of Ananga manjari. Gopala Bhatta is also a sastra-guru of our bhakti sastra. In Hari-bhakti-vilasa and Sat-kriya Sara Dipika he has given all the behavioral codes and ritualistic procedures for our sampradaya.
Although he is most well known for these works, he was also a principal contributor to Jiva Goswami’s Sat-sandarbha. In each of the six sandarbhas, Sri Jiva offers his respect to Gopala Bhatta Goswami, noting that his own work on the sandarbhas is merely what he considered a rearranging of notes gathered by Gopala Bhatta Goswami.
Perhaps Gopala Bhatta Goswami is best known for having established the Radha-Ramana Deity and temple in Vrindavana. This event is connected to the story of his collecting Salagramas at Mahaprabhu’s request. After arriving in Vrindavana, he worshipped the Salagramas, keeping them around his neck or hanging them from a tree in a basket.
When Gopala Bhatta received the offering of ornaments and clothing from one wealthy patron, he placed it before his Salagramas and lamented. He could not use the ornaments for the Salagramas, as they were suitable for a Deity.
When he awoke, he noticed that the lid of the basket hanging from the tree was half open. He thought that perhaps a snake had gotten inside, so he tried to push the lid down, but it would not go down. When he opened it up, there was Radha-Ramana! The Damodara-salagram had manifested as an eleven and one half inch Deity of Krishna in a pose playing the flute.
Source: https://ramaiswami.com/gopala-bhatta-goswami-appearance/
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