CC daily 125 – M 6.177 – Sarvabhauma’s last-ditch strategies dont last

The concept of will, heart embraces the true understanding of scripture. How that happens will be unfolded in subsequent verses. Thank you.

So, Chaitanya Mahaprabhu pointed out several questions. He pointed out many faults in his life during his life and Chaitanya Mahaprabhu presented two oppositions. He presented the opposite side and he presented an unlimited opposition.

Namely, he said that arguments against his will become the same opinion still. So, it is not very common that a person changes his opinion just after a discussion of a debate. Even if the person is non-scriptural, still a person will try to wiggle out some opposite opinion somehow or the other.

In fact, come back for another kind of learning. Now, in the past, there has been a lot of skepticism, especially in religion and scholarship today. It is linked with negativity.

That is also one reason for this. Scholarship right is under contempt. So, we have to hand it over to the party.

Overall, debates are conducted on their own. And on their own part, it is required. So, it is also a code of honor for scholars.

So, Chaitanya Mahaprabhu presented the same sort of arguments, the same kind of perceptions about the true spiritual end of each of the absolute truths. Actually, Saru Kattacharya, if you go down the route of life, again it is Amara who presented its resistance. Not only because some people are quite attached to one's opinion, even that opinion is formally accepted.

But Saru Kattacharya was not only a person who was a scholar, not just a neoliberal scholar, he was a white supremacist. He was one of the foremost scholars of science. So much so that the king of Guji, actually, he invited Saru Kattacharya to come and stay in Guji nearby.

And he wanted to hear how the king of Guji, Saru Kattacharya, was always. And people in Guji, if you go down that route, you can see how much of a relationship Saru Kattacharya has with the king of Guji. Saru Kattacharya can say something about that.

Practically, no deep theological discussions. They are largely descriptions of the various pastimes of Lord Chaitanya. And the narration of those pastimes is interspersed periodically with strong devotional realizations and philosophical assertions.

But usually, none of these are reasoned in any particular way. But instead, they are just presented as de facto truths. So, from such a mode of presentation, it becomes clear that the other works like Chaitanya Bhaga, Chaitanya Mangala, Pranayama River, Insiders, they are not meant to convince the unconvinced.

Rather, they are meant for the tasteful relishing by the convinced. Convinced here refers to the divinity of Lord Chaitanya and supremacy of his position as the absolute truth, which means that he will have the supreme intelligence. And though Saru Kattacharya was phenomenally intelligent, still, Lord Chaitanya was able to defeat him because he ultimately is the source of everyone's intelligence, including Saru Abama's intelligence too.

So, Krishnacharya Raj Goswami goes into much greater detail with respect to theological reflection in his book than do the other biographies of Lord Chaitanya. But still, even while going into theological reflection in some detail, some significant detail, still, Krishnacharya Raj Goswami is constrained by both, by all three things actually, by the fear that the book may become too long, by the fear that he is already too old and he may not live long enough to complete the book, and by the concern that over-technical analysis that goes on for a very long time may alienate readers whose benefit he desires by compiling the glories of Lord Chaitanya. Therefore, for all these purposes, for the sake of length, for the sake of time, and for the sake of audience capacities, Saru Kattacharya keeps the discussion in his book not very technical and not very detailed.

He is continuing to give a summary description in this verse too. The summary description was given in the previous verse also, and the same theme is being continued here now. Now, Lord Chaitanya is describing many different arguments, and Saru Kattacharya uses all the tricks of the trade to try to wiggle his way out.

Vitanda Chala. Vitanda is a form of argument wherein the purpose is not to come to a conceptual solution, but to simply succeed in refuting the opponent's position. This is not a constructive debate, but it is a destructive debate, where the point is not to find out what is right, but it is simply to make sure that the opponent is not proven to be wrong.

Normally, respected scholars will not use such strategies unless it is a last-ditch strategy, because nothing else is working. This is indeed the case with Saru Kattacharya, who, based on Shankara's Bhashya, and his profound scholarship, he uses various means to somehow or the other establish his position as the correct one. And when he finds that he is still not able to, what to speak of, win, even defend his position, it's like in a, say, a tennis match.

Normally, most players will play as well as they can and will try to win. But if a player finds that, oh, I'm getting defeated, especially if that player is a champion player, then the consideration of ego, the desire to save face, somehow or the other, may make the person do desperate things, make the person who is about to be defeated do desperate things, and the person may ask for some breaks, although such breaks are often seen as tactical, just before, say, the final set of the final game of a match, the person asks for some breaks, such breaks are meant to disturb the flow of the opponent's momentum, and thereby gain a greater chance of coming back into the game. Now, this is called as gamesmanship, which is actually said to be different from sportsmanship.

Sportsmanship is one has the proper spirit, whereas gamesmanship means one tries various forms of trickery. Not anything that directly breaks the rules, but still something which touches the border of those rules and letters, and also, to some extent, violates the spirit, even if it doesn't directly violate the letter. So, either way, Sarbhacharya tried such things.

तंद चल निग्रहाद अनेक उठाईल So, if we envision these two debaters, like two sword fighters, then they were both skillful and graceful, dancing back and forth, thrusting and parrying and swinging and hitting, cutting, and Sarbhacharya was trying various strategies to somehow cope with this situation, but despite his best effort, he found that he just couldn't counter Lord Chaitanya, and eventually, as we see that he will not only be defeated, but he will be transformed.