Blog

Srila Jiva Gosvami comments that bhakti may be divided into two divisions:

(1) santata, devotional service that continues incessantly with faith and love, and

(2) kadacitki, devotional service that does not continue incessantly but is sometimes awakened.

Incessantly flowing devotional service (santata) may also be divided into two categories:

(1) service performed with slight attachment and

(2) spontaneous devotional service.

Intermittent devotional service (kadacitki) may be divided into three categories:

(1) ragabhasamayi, devotional service in which one is almost attached,

(2) ragabhasa-sunya-svarupa-bhuta, devotional service in which there is no spontaneous love but one likes the constitutional position of serving, and

(3) abhasa-rupa, a slight glimpse of devotional service.

As for atonement, if one has caught even a slight glimpse of devotional service, all needs to undergo prayascitta, atonement, are superseded. Therefore atonement is certainly unnecessary when one has achieved spontaneous love and, above that, attachment with love, which are signs of increasing advancement in kadacitki.

Even in the stage of abhasa-rupa bhakti, all the reactions of sinful life are uprooted and vanquished. Srila Jiva Gosvami expresses the opinion that the word kartsnyena means that even if one has a desire to commit sinful actions, the roots of that desire are vanquished merely by abhasa-rupa bhakti. The example of bhaskara, the sun, is most appropriate.

The abhasa feature of bhakti is compared to twilight, and the accumulation of one’s sinful activities is compared to fog. Since fog does not spread throughout the sky, the sun need do no more than merely manifest its first rays, and the fog immediately disappears. Similarly, if one has even a slight relationship with devotional service, all the fog of his sinful life is immediately vanquished.