J
Jīva Gosvāmin
Aleksandar Uskokov
Department of South Asian Languages and
Civilizations, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL,
USA
Life and Works
Jīva Gosvāmin (1517–1608) was a leading
Gauḍīya-Vaiṣṇava theologian, one of the “six
Gosvāmins of Vṛndāvana” or principal students
of Caitanya (1486–1533) who are said to have
been entrusted by Caitanya in formulating his
theology. He was a son of Vallabha and nephew
of the other two great Gauḍīya theologians, Rūpa
and Sanātana, whom he succeeded as the leader of
Caitanya’s following in Vṛndāvana, becoming
“the highest court of appeal in doctrinal matters
so long as he lived” ([5]: 150). In Vṛndāvana he
founded the Rādhā-Dāmodara temple, in whose
courtyard his tomb (samādhi) is located. His
prominent students included Śrīnivāsa Ācārya,
Narottama Dāsa, and Śyāmānanda Paṇḍita,
whom he dispatched to Bengal with his own
books and the books of the other Gosvāmins and
who organized the Caitanya movement into a
formal tradition that dominated Vaiṣṇavism in
eastern India [1–5].
Jīva Gosvāmin was highly prolific, both in
volume and genre, and his works have been
grouped in four categories:
# Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2018
P. Jain et al. (eds.), Hinduism and Tribal Religions, Encyclopedia of Indian Religions,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-024-1036-5_14-1
1. Treatises on theology and philosophy. The
main work in this category was the
Ṣaṭ-sandarbha, “The Six Weavings,” in
which he arranged verses from the Bhāgavata
Purana topically into six books, selecting
some as heading verses in a fashion that resem-
bles the adhikaraṇas of the Vedānta-sūtras,
adducing more verses from the Bhāgavata
and many other sources in their support, and
commenting extensively on both. In doing so,
he tried to establish the Bhāgavata as the ulti-
mate authority of both Vedānta and devotion to
Kṛṣṇa, a one-stop shop where any devotee can
learn all about Gauḍīya doctrine. The six books
are Tattva, Bhagavat, Paramātmā, Kṛṣṇa,
Bhakti, and Prī ti Sandarbha. The first four
deal with what he calls sambandha, Kṛṣṇa as
the ultimate reality and his relation to the world
and the individual selves; the fifth deals with
abhidheya, the process of attaining one’s rela-
tionship with Kṛṣṇa; and the fifth with
prayojana, the goal or result that is achieved
when the process bears fruit. These three cor-
respond to the more common Vedāntic classi-
fication of tattva, sādhana, and phala.
2. Scriptural commentaries. The principal among
these are (i) Krama-sandarbha, a
rearrangement of the Ṣaṭ-Sandarbha in
sequential order as a running commentary on
the Bhāgavata; (ii) Laghu-vaiṣṇava-toṣaṇī , a
commentary on the tenth book of the
Bhāgavata; and (iii) commentaries on Rūpa
Gosvāmin’s Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu and
2 Jīva Gosvāmin
Ujjvala-nī lamaṇi, called Durgama-
saṅgamanī and Locana-rocanī , respectively.
3. Works on grammar and poetics. These include
(i) Hari-nāmāmṛta-vyākaraṇa, a full Sanskrit
grammar that uses names of Kṛṣṇa as technical
terms and (ii) Bhakti-rasāmṛta-śeṣa, a work on
poetics suitable for Vaiṣṇavas, a refashioning
of Viśvanātha’s Sāhitya-darpaṇa with
Vaiṣṇava illustrations.
4. Literary works. These include (i) Mādhava-
mahotsava, a mahā-kāvya of 1192 verses deal-
ing with Kṛṣṇa consecrating Rādhā as the
queen of Vṛndāvana; (ii) Gopāla-virudāvali;
(iii) Gopāla-campū, the largest Sanskrit work
of the campū genre (a combination of prose
and poetry), a retelling of the tenth book of the
Bhāgavata; and (iv) Saṅkalpa-kalpa-druma, a
verse summary of the Gopāla-campū [1, 2, 6].
Theology
Jīva was a proponent of the Mīmāṁsā-Vedānta
doctrine of śāstra as a form of knowing from
linguistic utterances (śabda) that is not of the
testimonial kind. For him, scriptures were not
written by a human or divine agent, although
they could be manifested through such individ-
uals. He extended the classical scope of scriptures
(śruti) to include the epics (Rāmāyaṇa and
Mahābhārata) and the Purāṇas and advocated
for the Bhāgavata as the absolute best in the
total scriptural corpus [7–11].
The starting point of Jīva’s theology, presented
in the Ṣaṭ-sandarbha, was a verse from the
Bhāgavata Purāṇa (1.2.11) which runs:
“Knowers of reality say that reality is non-dual
consciousness, called Brahman, Paramātmā and
Bhagavān.” For Jīva, the verse says that ultimate
reality, which for convenience we may call God
here, is a single substance – not in the sense of
stuff or material but in the Aristotelian sense of
that to which accidents or attributes can be
predicated – which is in nature consciousness.
Jīva adds bliss as the second essential feature of
God, and this sets the definition in the context of
the Upaniṣads and Vedānta, sat-cit-ānanda.
That God is pure Being, consciousness, and
bliss does not mean that he is a mere substance
without any attributes, as understood in Advaita
Vedānta. Rather, it is a unique thing that is differ-
entially determined by manifestation of attributes
in accordance to the cognitive ability of the sub-
ject of knowing. It is having this difference in
mind that scriptures describe non-dual reality by
using different terms, grouped under the three
headings: Brahman, Paramātmā, and Bhagavān.
The difference among these three states of reality
is less ontological and more cognitive, and they
are more like aspects than real states. Brahman is
Being pure and simple, a substance conceptually
understood in a general, featureless way. In truth,
it is neither formless nor featureless, but it can be
understood or cognized as something in which the
difference of substance and attributes does not
obtain for the knower.
When that same substance manifests to a
knower as bearing individuality and as having
attributes, it is called Bhagavān or God proper.
Bhagavān, in other words, is Brahman in which
the difference between the substance and its attri-
butes does obtain. Jīva calls the divine attributes
as “energies,” śakti, and they belong to three
broad groups: God’s internal energy, antaraṅga-
śakti, a spiritual stuff which manifests his body,
personal features, spiritual sphere, etc., and
through which he conducts his internal affairs;
his external energy, bahiraṅga-śakti, the dull mat-
ter that is both the stuff of the phenomenal world
and the power of illusion that keeps the third,
marginal energy, taṭastha-śakti, the individual
beings, under its clutches. These three energies
are treated in detail, but we should note here that
they are ontologically real categories. In them-
selves, they are substances, but in relation to
God, they are attributes because their existence
is contingent on him as their locus and because
they manifest the features that constitute God as a
qualified unit and a person. The choice to call
these properties “energy” suggests the idea that
they are the means through which God operates:
the term needs to convey a sense of graded per-
sonality, presence, and influence, from intimate to
public, much after the fashion of a king’s own
Jīva Gosvāmin 3

person, persona, and direct and indirect exercise energy, displaying attributes for specific pastimes
of power. and relationships. Such forms are not illusory or
As śaktis, they are inherently neither the sub- adventitious but are not a different substance in an
stance nor something different from it. In episte- ontological sense either.
mological terms, they are in the domain of In a free and perhaps not too precise way, we
scriptural postulation (arthāpatti), which deals could say that Brahman is the God of the philos-
with realities that cannot be inferred because ophers, somewhat in a Spinozian sense, a sub-
there is no direct data about them but whose stance with infinite attributes, but depersonalized
existence must be accepted because without it as the ultimate basis of the world. Paramātman is
other states of affairs cannot be accounted for. the God of the theologians, the God in relation to
For these two reasons, Jīva’s doctrine is called whom it makes sense to ask questions about the
acintya-bhedābheda, inconceivable simultaneous existence of good and evil. Bhagavān is the God
identity and difference. of the faithful, a God with whom one can establish
In brief, Bhagavān is different from Brahman a loving relationship. Bhagavān includes the com-
only in the sense that the substance-attribute dif- plex of deities in the Vaiṣṇava universe but ulti-
ference does obtain for the knower. They are the mately refers to the personal divinity Kṛṣṇa [2, 6,
same substance but cognized differently. Gupta 12–15].
puts it nicely: “Brahman is Bhagavān, but with
the splendor and glory suspended” ([9]: 35). Brah-
man is but a cognitive and conceptual reduction.
The Doctrine of Bhakti
The second feature of God, Paramātman or the
Supreme Self, is also Bhagavān, with the “splen-
In terms of religious practice, Jīva was an advo-
dor and glory” not suspended but rather reduced.
cate of bhakti and likely its most thorough theo-
This reduction is not merely cognitive. Para-
logian. For him bhakti was more than just a
mātman is a separate form of Bhagavān. It is a
religious process: it was an essential feature of
form, a “descent” or avatāra of Bhagavān in rela-
Bhagavān, an aspect of his internal power
tion to the external and marginal energies. It is a
(antaraṅga-śakti) that was constituted as bliss
form of God in which he appears as the efficient
(hlādinī ). It was also a natural function of the
cause of the world and as its superintendent. Para-
living being insofar as one’s constitution was to
mātman sets the world in motion by fertilizing
be prone toward Bhagavān. However, this natural
matter, the external energy, with the seeds that
tendency could be obstructed under the influence
are the individual beings, the marginal energy.
of Bhagavān’s external power (bahiraṅga-śakti),
Then, he conducts the affairs of the world by
in which case bhakti could be applied as a process,
supervising the law of karma under which the
an adoration of Bhagavān (bhagavad-upāsanā)
world operates. He does that by impelling beings
with the purpose of turning oneself toward
toward a goal that is set by their previous action.
Bhagavān.
In this sense, he is the inner dweller or controller
As a process, bhakti is of two kinds: [7] vaidhī
of the souls and matter that the Upaniṣads talk
bhakti or scripturally regulated devotion,
about. Thus, unlike Brahman, Paramātman is not
consisting of actions such as hearing about
merely a cognitive abstraction or a state that never
Bhagavān from scripture, chanting mantras, med-
truly obtains. It is a real form of God but a form for
itation on Bhagavān, etc., and useful for the begin-
a specific purpose and manifesting Godhood par-
ners and [1] rāgānugā bhakti or devotion that
tially. Indeed, God has innumerable such forms
intentionally imitates the sentiment of some eter-
for the purpose of pastime or fun (līlā), and the
nal associate of Bhagavān, useful for those whose
creation of the world does belong to the realm of
devotion has become spontaneous but should be
“divine fun.” These forms of God are not separate
molded into a specific relationship with
gods – it is the single and unique God that takes
Bhagavān.
innumerable forms manifested by his internal
4 Jīva Gosvāmin
Jīva recognized the value of the other tradi-
tional religious processes. Jñāna could lead one
to Brahman and yoga to Paramātman, wherefrom
one could further progress to Bhagavān. How-
ever, these were indirect ways and bhakti was
the only direct method. Furthermore, they could
be successful only if they already contained some
measure of bhakti.
The ultimate attainment of bhakti as a process
is achieving qualitative similarity to Bhagavān
through possessing the internal power of bliss in
minute proportion. This presupposes the attaining
of liberation but really involves a direct intuition
of Bhagavān in which he is the personal God as
the object and respondent of love, prī ti. This prī ti
is also called prema-bhakti or loving devotion,
and it can take five aspects expressing five forms
of emotional exchange with Bhagavān: neutrality,
śānta; servitude, dāsya; friendliness, maitrya;
parental affection, vātsalya; and amorous love,
mādhurya. Every devotee generally has one of
these predominant emotional relationships with
Bhagavān. This is the highest attainment of
human life, parama-puruṣārtha, a permanent yet
novel state, an actualization of an inherent poten-
tially [2, 6, 16, 17].
Cross-References
▶ Acintya-Bhedābheda-Tattva
▶ Bhāgavata Purāṇa
▶ Bhakti
▶ Bhedābheda
▶ Brahma Sūtras (Vedānta Sūtras)
▶ Brahman
▶ Caitanya (Chaitanya)
▶ Kṛṣṇa
▶ Liberation
▶ Līlā
▶ Puruṣārtha
▶ Rasa
▶ Rūpa Gosvāmin
▶ Śabda
▶ Vaiṣṇavism, Overview
▶ Vedānta, Overview
▶ Vṛndāvana (Brindavan)
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