Daily Saptaha and Rasa Lila Graces Gahvarvan

Daily Saptaha and Rasa Lila Graces Gahvarvan

For the last week in and around the Rasa Kuñja building, a daily Bhagavat discourse by Rāmajilal Śastraji and an evening rasa lila drama, enacting the Lords pastimes has graced the compound.

In the morning and afternoon, Panditji would forcefully present the siddhāntas and inspire the listeners in Kṛṣṇa katha, the 7-day discourse could be heard throughout the complex from the various speakers about. Gopis and gopas would enhance the kathas by performing a simultaneous drama performance, from the marriage of Rukmini and Kṛṣṇa to Sudāmā lila, Varāha lila, Girirāja lila and Rasa lila.

The real dessert came in the evening on a pandal stage by the local Barṣāṇā troupe under Kanhaiya Swami, who mesmerized the audience with memorized heart warming ragas and accounts, who stood to the right playing on harmonium. He would close his eyes and his sweet voice would attract, entering and the ears and heart, as the eyes focused on the local Brajabāsī actors performing with artistically done makeup, colored faces, elaborate kajal, rosy cheeks, stringy wigs, and opulent dress. Swamiji’s son played the part of Kanaiya.

The nightly audience of 300 had come consisting of a variety of Brajabāsī characters, some wearing a multicolored array of saris, this drama capturing the hearts of all, a pause in the everyday village life, a direct relation with the origins of their heritage, the Supreme Lord, His consorts, and Their enchanting rasik lilas. The children would all sit in the front, each with rapt concentrated looks, the gopis from Maan mandir to the right, pockets of village associates together, some gopas even in the trees, some reciprocating with the actors on stage, others in rapt meditation.

On a the final day Rādhā and Kṛṣṇa performed Their boating pastimes, the Trancendental Boatman reprimanded the gopis that they were too fat and best that they throw their clothes over board to counteract the sinking vessel. On stage a simple palanquin was a boat that rolled back and forth on some welded iron pump wheels, so simple but created an accurate effect, the final scene, a darshan of Their Lorships, the audience, the different genders climbed the separated steps for an intimate closing darshan.

This last week a grace had descended, another event in seva in the heart of Braja, the eternal Gahvarvan dhama.