Hare Krsna
Please accept my humble obeisance. All glories to Srila Prabhupada
by His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada
The Vedic scriptures provide a satisfying answer
to the question “Is God male or female?”
Prayer to Srimati Radharani
tapta-kancana-gaurangi
radhe vrndavanesvari
vrsabhanu-sute devi
pranamami hari-priye
I offer my respects to Radharani, whose bodily complexion is like molten gold and who is the Queen of Vrndavana. You are the daughter of King Vrsabhanu, and You are very dear to Lord Krsna.
(Gita Introduction)
Radharani’s Identity
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.
Srimati Radharani is a tenderhearted feminine counterpart of the supreme whole, resembling the perfectional stage of the worldly feminine nature. Therefore, the mercy of Radharani is available very readily to the sincere devotees, and once She recommends such a devotee to Lord Krsna, the Lord at once accepts the devotee’s admittance into His association.
(Srimad-Bhagavatam 2.3.23, purport)
It is not that Radharani is separate from Krsna. Radharani is also Krsna, for there is no difference between the energy and the energetic. Without energy, there is no meaning to the energetic, and without the energetic, there is no energy. Similarly, without Radha there is no meaning to Krsna, and without Krsna there is no meaning to Radha. Because of this, the Vaisnava philosophy first of all pays obeisances to and worships the internal pleasure potency of the Supreme Lord. Thus the Lord and His potency are always referred to as Radha-Krsna. Similarly, those who worship Narayana first of all utter the name of Laksmi, as Laksmi-Narayana. Similarly, those who worship Lord Rama first of all utter the name of Sita. In any case Sita-Rama, Radha-Krsna, Laksmi-Narayana the potency always comes first.
(Cc. Adi Introduction)
The Lord appears in female form if necessary, but His perpetual form is purusa because He is originally male. The feminine feature of the Lord is displayed by goddesses of fortune Laksmi, Radharani, Sita, etc. All these goddesses of fortune are servitors of the Lord; they are not the Supreme, as falsely imagined by the impersonalist.
(Srimad-Bhagavatam 4.8.47, purport)
Radharani is daivi-maya. Just like we are, in our material conditional life, we are under the material energy. Similarly, in our liberated state we have to become under the spiritual energy. That spiritual energy is Radharani.
(Lecture on Introduction to Bhagavad-gita As It Is, Los Angeles, November 23, 1968)
Srimati Radharani is the principal head of all such goddesses of fortune, and therefore She is the pleasure counterpart of the Lord and is non-different from Krsna.
(Srimad-Bhagavatam 2.4.20, purport)
Radharani is the manifestation of the pleasure potency of the Supreme Personality of Godhead. When the Supreme Lord wants to derive transcendental pleasure, He has to create a woman from His internal potency. Thus the tendency to be attracted by womanly beauty is natural because it exists in the spiritual world. In the material world it is reflected pervertedly, and therefore there are so many inebrieties.
(Srimad-Bhagavatam 3.31.38, purport)
Durga and Radharani
Devotees of Krsna try to remain under the guidance of daivi-prakrti personified, Srimati Radharani. Materialists, however, are under the control of the apara-prakrti, personified as Goddess Kali, or Durga.
(Dharma, the Way of Transcendence, Chapter 11)
Durga is the expansion of the internal energy and Radharani is the quintessence of internal energy. In that sense Durga is expansion of Radharani.
(Letter to Uddhava, May 28, 1968)
Enchanter of Krsna
The Lord sometimes becomes mad after the beauty of Radharani. Poets describe that under those circumstances, although Lord Krsna is Madana-mohana, He becomes Madana-daha, or enchanted by the beauty of Radharani. Actually the Lord’s beauty is superexcellent, surpassing even the beauty of Laksmi in VaikunTha. The devotees of the Lord in the VaikunTha planets want to see the Lord as the most beautiful, but the devotees in Gokula or Krsnaloka want to see Radharani as more beautiful than Krsna.
(Srimad-Bhagavatam 3.15.42, purport)
Extremely Compassionate
If one takes shelter of Vrndavana under Vrndavanesvari, Srimati Radharani, certainly all the problems of his life are solved very easily.
(Srimad-Bhagavatam 4.8.24, purport)
If a devotee approaches Srimati Radharani to offer some service to Krsna, even Srimati Radharani thinks that the devotee is greater than She.
(Srimad-Bhagavatam 7.1.27, purport)
The very name “Radha” suggests that Srimati Radharani is eternally the topmost mistress of the comforts of Sri Krsna. As such, She is the medium transmitting the living entities’ service to Sri Krsna. Devotees in Vrndavana therefore seek the mercy of Srimati Radharani in order to be recognized as loving servitors of Sri Krsna.
(Cc. Adi 4.56, purport)
The pure devotees of the Lord take shelter of the para prakrti, the internal potency of the Lord called Laksmidevi, Sitadevi, Srimati Radharani or Srimati Rukminidevi, and thus they become actual mahatmas, or great souls.
(Srimad-Bhagavatam 3.6.38, purport)
Radha-Krsna Affairs Not Mundane Lust
Actually Radha-Krsna is the exchange of love but not ordinary love. . . . Krsna’s embracing Radharani or His dancing with the cowherd girls in the rasa dance are generally not understood by ordinary men, because they consider these pastimes in the light of mundane lust. They foolishly think that Krsna is like themselves and that He embraces the gopis just as an ordinary man embraces a young girl. Some people thus become interested in Krsna because they think that His religion allows indulgence in sex. This is not krsna-bhakti, love of Krsna, but prakrta-sahajiya materialistic lust.
Lord Caitanya Mahaprabhu and Radha-Krsna
When Krsna desired to enjoy His pleasure potency, He manifested Himself in the separate form of Radharani, and when He wanted to understand Himself through the agency of Radha, He united with Radharani, and that unification is called Lord Caitanya.
(Cc. Adi Introduction)
Antahkrsna refers to one who is always thinking of Krsna. This attitude is a predominant feature of Srimati Radharani. Even though many devotees always think of Krsna, none can surpass the gopis, among whom Radharani is the leader in thinking of Krsna. Radharani’s Krsna consciousness surpasses that of all other devotees. Lord Caitanya accepted the position of Srimati Radharani to understand Krsna; therefore He was always thinking of Krsna in the same way as Radharani. By thinking of Lord Krsna, He always overlapped Krsna.
(Cc. Adi 3.81 purport)
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