Thakur Bhaktivinode – misunderstood

In his book Sri Krishna Samhita, Thakur Bhaktivinode presents his understanding of the historical past, including the origins of the universe and human civilisation. He explains his thinking in a sensible and reasonable way that educated readers of the modern era can appreciate.

In ancient scriptures, including the most sacred of texts, Srimad Bhagavatam, the cosmos and human history are described in ways that reflect the understanding of the natural world that people maintained in ancient times. And according to the traditional view of ancient texts, maintained by many people, the Srimad Bhagavata Purana itself was composed by Vyasa more than 5,000 years ago.

Srila Bhaktivinode Thakur, however, wrote:

পদ্মপুরাণ, স্কন্দপুরাণ, ইত্যাদি আর আর পুরাণ সকল খ্রীষ্টের ৮০০ বৎসর পরে লিখিত হয়, যেহেতু ঐ সকল পুরাণে অনেক আধুনিক মতের আলোচনা আছে। শঙ্করাচার্য্য নামক অদ্বৈতবাদীর মতপ্রচারের পর ঐ সকল গ্রন্থ হইয়াছিল। শাঙ্করভাষ্যে বিষ্ণুপুরাণের শ্লোক উদ্ধৃত হওয়ায় বিষ্ণুপুরাণ শঙ্করের পূর্ব্বে প্রচারিত ছিল, বুঝিতে হইবে।

“The Padma Purana, Skanda Purana, and the other Puranas were written after AD 800, since they discuss many later doctrines. These Puranas were composed after the spread of the teachings of Shankaracharya, the advocate of non-dualism. Since verses from the Vishnu Purana are quoted in Shankara’s commentary, we must understand that the Vishnu Purana was already in circulation before his time.”

The traditional view is that the Puranas were written more than 5,000 years ago, yet Bhaktivinode Thakur agreed with modern historians who think the Puranas were written in the medieval era, approximately 1,000 to 1,200 years ago.

One noteworthy doctrine found in the Puranas is the concept of the maha-yugas, the recurring cycles of history consisting of four ages: the Golden Age, Silver Age, Bronze (or Copper) Age, and Iron Age. According to this doctrine, there was a Golden Age (Satya-yuga) in the remote past, and since then the world has gradually become more degraded as civilisation has passed through the stages of the Silver and Bronze Ages to the present Iron Age (Kali-yuga).

Thakur Bhaktivinode presented a very different view of history in Sri Krishna Samhita, where he wrote:

“If readers consider deeply, they will perceive that the truth about the Absolute, from most ancient times until now, has gradually become more explicit, simple to understand, and condensed. As the impurities arising from circumstance and the passage of time are washed away, its beauty shines forth ever more brilliantly before our eyes. It was on the grassy banks of the Saraswati river, in the holy land of Brahmavarta, that the spiritual experience of the Absolute Truth first took birth in the human heart. Growing in power, spiritual ecstasy played in the snowy region of Badarikashrama during its childhood; on the riverbank of the Gomati, in the field of Naimish-aranya, it passed its boyhood years; in Dravida-Desh, on the delightful banks of the river Kaveri, the youthful activities of that divine spiritual principle were revealed; and upon the sanctified banks of the Jahnavi, the Ganga river at Nabadwip, its full maturity became manifest. When the entire history of the world is surveyed, it is in Sri Nabadwip Dham alone that the supreme spiritual truth attained its highest perfection. The pure and exclusive love of the individual soul for the Supreme Soul is the final attainment of spiritual realization, and unless one worships Him through the growth of that divine sentiment of love termed anuraga, the Supreme Self can never be attained.”

So there are two points of view. The world is becoming more and more degraded – this is one possibility. And then there is the opposite view.

No doubt, Srila Bhaktivinode Thakur recognised different epochs in human history. But rather than describing history as a progressive decline from a Golden Age, he recognised the gradual development of spiritual understanding through a process of growth and illumination.

Elsewhere in Sri Krishna Samhita, Srila Bhaktivinode Thakur offers an explanation of how the enormous periods of time of the maha-yugas and manvantaras came to be accepted as fact. He suggests that these systems of classification of epochs were envisioned by later generations and were not “known facts” passed down from one generation to the next over the course of millions of years.

He wrote:

“It does not appear that a system of writing had yet been developed during that period (the Golden Age). Because no written records from that time existed, later generations came to regard that period as an exceedingly vast span of time. Indeed, much later, when a system of chronology was developed, it was thought that each Manu reigned for seventy-one maha-yugas (306,720,000 years). Among the kings, whoever became the lawgiver and regulator of society received the title Manu and became an object of reverence among the people.”

He continued:

“For those who tend to carry the burden of inherited traditions, bharavahi, descriptions of supernatural events are often beneficial. Accounts of extraordinary lives and divisions of time were adopted in order to inspire firm faith in the great personalities of the past. For the benefit of persons of tender faith, and with the intention of countering false chronological concepts current in other lands, the great sages did not refute the conceptions of the manvantaras and similar divisions of time. Persons of tender faith are not qualified to study this book; for this reason I have boldly expressed this interpretation.”

The original Bengali reads:

ভারবাহী জনগণের পক্ষে অলৌকিক বর্ণন অনেক স্থানে উপকারী হয়। পূর্ব্বগত মহাজনদিগের প্রতি দৃঢ়বিশ্বাস জন্মাইবার জন্য অলৌকিক জীবন বর্ণন ও কাল বিভাগ অবলম্বিত হইয়াছিল। মহর্ষিগণ কোমলশ্রদ্ধ ব্যক্তিগণের উপকারার্থে এবং দেশান্তরীয় মিথ্যা কালকল্পনা নিরস্ত করণাভিপ্রায়ে মন্বন্তরাদি কল্পনা খণ্ডন করেন নাই। কোমলশ্রদ্ধ পুরুষেরা এতদ্‌গ্রন্থের অধিকারী নহেন এই জন্যই আমি সাহস পূর্ব্বক এরূপ অর্থ প্রকাশ করিলাম।

The final sentence deserves particular attention:

কোমলশ্রদ্ধ পুরুষেরা এতদ্‌গ্রন্থের অধিকারী নহেন এই জন্যই আমি সাহস পূর্ব্বক এরূপ অর্থ প্রকাশ করিলাম।

“Persons of tender faith are not qualified to study this book; it is for this reason that I have boldly ventured to present such an interpretation.”

Here, Thakur Bhaktivinode plainly states that his book was not intended for readers whose faith was still tender or insufficiently developed. Novice readers might find their religious convictions challenged by thinking that differs from their accustomed understanding of scripture.

Thakur Bhaktivinode’s distinction between the bharavahi, those who carry the burden of inherited traditions, and the saragrahi, those who grasp the essential meaning of scripture, is fundamental to understanding his approach.

In another work, Thakur Bhaktivinode expresses a corresponding view concerning a different subject: hell.

“In the common place books of the Hindu religion in which the Raja and Tama Gunas have been described as the ways of religion, we have descriptions of a local heaven and a local hell; the heaven as beautiful as anything on earth, and the hell as ghastly as any picture of evil. Besides this heaven, we have many more places where good souls are sent up in the way of promotion. There are eighty-four divisions of the hell itself; some more dreadful than the one that Milton has described in his Paradise Lost. These are certainly poetical and were originally created by the rulers of the country in order to check evil deeds of the ignorant people who are not able to understand the conclusions of philosophy.”

In plain English, Thakur Bhaktivinode states that the hells described in religious scriptures “were originally created by the rulers of the country in order to check evil deeds of the ignorant people.”

His thinking is explicit. The hells were invented by the rulers of the country.

It is certainly worth recognising that other Acharyas have expressed different views about these subjects. But this does not justify altering or obscuring what Thakur Bhaktivinode himself wrote in his books.

When translating a book written by Thakur Bhaktivinode, the translator has a responsibility to represent the author’s actual words and ideas faithfully, even when those ideas differ from the translator’s own convictions.

In view of this, it is extremely regrettable that the widely read English translation of Sri Krishna Samhita by Bhumipati Das contains serious problems of interpretation and translation.

In numerous places, ideas appear in the English translation that are not present in the original Bengali, while important statements made by Bhaktivinode Thakur are omitted or misrepresented. The result is that readers get handed a version of Sri Krishna Samhita that reflects the translator’s thinking and not the author’s thinking.

There is a particular irony here. Bhaktivinode Thakur explicitly wrote that this book is not meant for readers of tender faith. Yet Bhumipati Das’s translation transformed the ideas of Bhaktivinode Thakur into a book for beginners, a book that tells students: “Here is your A B C, and there is no such thing as D.”

The purpose of translating Sri Krishna Samhita should be to provide a translation so readers understand the thinking of Thakur Bhaktivinode exactly as he expressed it. A translation should not be words a translator thinks Bhaktivinode ought to have written.

Bhumipati’s translation is filled with ideas he inserted into the translation. Ideas were put in the text, and ideas were left out. It is a fact.

For example, this statement of Thakur Bhaktivinode has been entirely left out of Bhumipati’s book:

“People of tender faith (kanistha-adhikari people), are not qualified to study this book; and it is for this reason that I have boldly ventured to present such an interpretation.”

A second, and significant example:

যতদূর পারা গেল, ঘটনাসকলের ও গ্রন্থসকলের আধুনিক মতে কাল নিরূপিত হইল। সারগ্রাহী জনগণ বাদনিষ্ঠ নহেন, অতএব সদযুক্তি দ্বারা ইহার বিপরীত কোন বিষয় স্থির হইলেও তাহা আমাদের আদরণীয়। অতএব এতৎ সিদ্ধান্ত সম্বন্ধে ভবিষ্যৎ পরমার্থবাদী বা বুদ্ধিমান অর্থবাদীদিগের নিকট হইতে অনেক আশা করা যায়। আমাদের শাস্ত্রমতে কল্পবিচার ও যুগবিচার এ প্রকার নয়। আমরা শাস্ত্রবাক্যই বিশ্বাস করি। আধুনিক সিদ্ধান্তসমূহ তদধিকারীদিগের জন্যই দেখাইলাম।

An accurate English translation:

“As far as possible, we have determined the dates of historical events and the periods in which the scriptures were composed, according to modern opinion. Those who seek the essence of religion (saragrahi) are not attached to particular theories or doctrines. Therefore, even if sound reasoning should establish conclusions contrary to those presented here, we would nevertheless welcome and respect them. Accordingly, we have great hopes that future seekers of the Supreme Truth (paramartha-vadis), or intelligent scholars concerned with worldly knowledge (artha-vadis), will further investigate these conclusions. According to our scriptures, however, cosmic periods (kalpa-vichar) and ages (yuga-vichar) are understood differently from the historical chronology presented here. We accept the testimony of scripture as authoritative. The conclusions reached according to modern opinion have been presented for those qualified to consider them.”

Here is Bhumipati’s translation:

“We have thus described the dating of incidents and scriptures as far as possible according to modern opinion. Swanlike people are not interested in quarrel, therefore if some contrary conclusion is presented with proper argument, we will accept it. We hope to hear further on these conclusions from future transcendentalists or intelligent materialists. According to our scriptures, the calculation of the dates are not like this. We believe only the statements of the scriptures. I have presented the modern conclusions for the benefit of the concerned people.”

One line of this translation in particular is to be noted:

“According to our scriptures, the calculation of the dates are not like this. We believe only the statements of the scriptures.”

This view is held by many people, but Bhaktivinode didn’t preach this doctrine: “We believe only the statements of the scriptures”

Srila Bhaktivinode Thakur maintained a very different view from this. In his book The Bhagavat Lecture, he wrote: 

“Our Shastras, or in other words, books of thought, do not contain all that we could get from the infinite Father. No book is without its errors.  God’s revelation is absolute truth, but it is scarcely received and preserved in its natural purity. We have been advised in the 14th Chapter of the 11th Skandha of the Bhagavat Purana to believe that truth when revealed is absolute, but it gets the tincture of the nature of the receiver in course of time and is converted into error by continual exchange of hands from age to age. New revelations, therefore, are continually necessary, in order to keep truth in its original purity. We are thus warned to be careful in our studies of old authors, however wise they are reputed to be. Here we have full liberty to reject the wrong idea which is not sanctioned by the peace of conscience.”

The meaning is clear. If a scripture conflicts with what your conscience tells you is “true,” there is no harm in rejecting what you don’t believe.

Sri Krishna Samhita: Download PDF