1. The Glory of Shri Krishna Janmashtami
“आगरा का तो मथुरा से चलता है|”
My mother-in-law said when I asked her about when she would be celebrating the Janmashtami this year, as there are two dates. This simple statement reveals the character of Bhāratīya cetanā.
“आगरा का तो मथुरा से चलता है|”
My mother-in-law said when I asked her about when she would be celebrating the Janmashtami this year, as there are two dates. This simple statement reveals the character of Bhāratīya cetanā.
2. Agra is a much larger city than Mathura today. It has more industry, bigger population and it hosts Taj Mahal, along with many other magnificent Mughal monuments. It is truly a heritage city with un-desecrated Muslim monuments as Hindus don’t desecrate beautiful things.
3. And yet Agra is not what north Indians look upto. The quintessential spiritual epicenter of north India is Mathura by any standard. Its glory and fame comes only after Kashi and Ujjayini in north India and is more frequented by devotees than even Haridwar and Rishikesh.
4. The temple culture of north India is nowhere as developed as in Mathura. The Dhams of Mathura, Vrindavan and Gokul can still take the devotee back to the times of Krishna. Mathura gives you as complete a spiritual and religious experience as a city can give.
5. The entire city is devoted to Krishna. Krishna bhakti is palpable in every street. It starts with the greeting of Radhe Radhe. Everything is attributed to Bihari Ji: the good and the bad; the auspicious and the unfortunate. It is his will, his grace which lets everything flow.
6. The legend of Krishna is all over Mathura. The bank of Yamuna where Vasudeva made his fateful journey across the Yamuna in spate with infant Krishna in a basket on his head; the site Krishna ruled and enacted his Leelas. The sites where he walked; sat; rested.
7. Vrindavan tops even Mathura because of its compactness and its near total identification with the legend of Krishna but it is an extended part of Mathura. Krishna never leaves you when you are in this region.
8. You will find people going around Govardhan Parvata on foot, by prostrating themselves every few feet, and in many other ways. You will find people with Vaishnava tripunda greeting strangers with Radhe Radhe! Govinda! Gopala! Baanke Bihari Ki Jai! Nandalal ki Jai!
9. What is most emblematic of Krishna bhakti in Mathura is how the devotees dance their way through life, literally and figuratively. Sankirtana is where it begins but surely not where it ends. Every bhakta of Krishna hums and sways in Krishna bhakti. Almost always.
10. They won’t walk, when they go around Govardhana; they will dance their way to completion: striding, jumping, gamboling… dancing to tunes so divine they become oblivious of what goes on around them. The sweet flavor of Krishna bhakti is quite obvious in all of this.
11. And it is infectious. If you stop yourself from bursting into a self-organizing dance at all these junctures in public, then you will surely fall to it at a place in Gokul, near Mathura called Ramana Reti, where the very sand is divine.
12. In a sacred grove famous as the place where Krishna played with Gopis in his childhood, there is sand at the centre of this place and where devotees come and dance madly without stopping.
13. And it is said that the sand is therapeutic in many ways and when you come out of the sand dancing all your fatigue of going around Govardhan and other places in Mathura is gone.
14. Despite all the physical squalor the food of Mathura is really divine. You are transported to another world. And everything is pegged to some aspect of Krishna. The pedha, the rabdi, the gulab jamun, the ghevar and various other sweets.
15. This is when Mathura does not have a single big industry, a single ancient monument worth the attention of the tourist. This is despite the fact that not a single structure past 400 years survives in the city.
16. This despite the fact that Mathura was razed over and over again by the Islamic invaders. This despite the fact that it was named Islamabad by the Islamic invader Aurangzeb.
17. After all the genocides and mass massacres, all the rape and pillage that was heaped over Mathura over many hundreds of years by the Islamic invaders, it is still alive as the preeminent place of Krishna and of Hindu bhakti and spirituality in the heart of every Hindu.
18. Agra, on the other hand, despite every physical parameter of being a greater city, a more important political center recently and with a bigger population and industrial base, follows Mathura and does not lead it.
19. Agra was the capital of the most powerful Islamic empire ever created on earth. Its monuments weren’t desecrated and Muslims never had a hard time there. And despite all that, it is not Agra which is the spiritual center of north India. It is Mathura.
20. Is there a greater sign of the Hindu pulse of the country? Is there a greater sign that Hindus can keep their culture, their civilization, their bhakti and their rituals alive against any hardship?
21. We will rise again.
We will reclaim every piece of land ever lost.
We will rebuild every temple ever desecrated.
Jai Shri Krishna! श्री कृष्ण जन्माष्टमी की आप सभी को बहुत बहुत शुभकामनायें|
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We will reclaim every piece of land ever lost.
We will rebuild every temple ever desecrated.
Jai Shri Krishna! श्री कृष्ण जन्माष्टमी की आप सभी को बहुत बहुत शुभकामनायें|
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