In 2018, His Holiness Kadamba Kanana Swami took us to Narada-kunda, a place to reflect on Narada Muni, a pure Vaisnava, and the meaning of true bhakti. Check out Maharaja’s full kirtan and lecture below, along with a few photos, at Narada-kunda during Parikrama 2018.
Narada Muni desired to join the pastimes of Krsna as a gopi. He went to Kusuma-sarovara, took his bath there and transformed into Narada gopi. That, of course, was very convenient for him to enter the pastimes of the gopis. When Krsna saw Naradi, He began, “My Dear Narada, how nice it is that you are here to experience the pastimes of bhakti. I request that you write a book about the nature of bhakti that you are absorbing here!” So we can see that Krsna was not fooled by Narada Muni’s disguise and the book that is then written is the Narada-bhakti-sutra.
Narada Muni is, by his consciousness, a resident of Vaikuntha who worships Krsna as the Supreme Personality of Godhead and is His representative. He is one of the mental sons of Lord Brahma who is pure and transcendental. His body is spiritual and therefore he is actually a resident of the spiritual world. As such, wherever he goes, he takes the spiritual world with him. He takes many personalities into that spiritual realm. Narada Muni acts as a spiritual master. He is the personification of the spiritual master because he is cent per cent transcendental. There is no question of any fault in Narada. Anything that Narada does is an act of mercy, even he makes politics, which he sometimes does.
Narada is basically teaching sambandha. There are three stages, sambandha, abhidheya and prayojana. In sambandha, we make a connection with Krsna and we look towards the goal. What is bhakti actually? It creates a focus, like a zoom lens. In abhidheya, we get information on the process of purification. In these verses, Narada is still defining bhakti and where it is to be found, therefore it is sambandha-jnana. An example of prayojana-jnana is when we speak about Narada being Naradi gopi and entering into the pastimes of Krsna and His gopi associates. Such Vraja bhakti or pure unadulterated love is found in five rasas as displayed by the residents of Vrndavana.