Happiness Is the Common Ground

1.1 The Need for Writing Prīti Sandarbha

अथ प्रीतिसन्दर्भो लेख्यः। इह खलु शास्त्रप्रतिपाद्यं परमतत्त्वं सन्दर्भचतुष्टयेन पूर्वं सम्बद्धम्। तदुपासना च तदनन्तरसन्दर्भेणाभिहिता। तत्क्रमप्राप्तत्वेन प्रयोजनं खल्वधुना विविच्यते। 

Now the treatise on love (Prīti Sandarbha) is to be written. The Supreme Reality, which is the subject matter established in the scriptures has been described here in the first four Sandarbhas and Its worship has been explained in the following one [i.e., the fifth]. Now, in keeping with the natural order of the work, we deliberate on the purpose or prayojana [of human life]. 

पुरुषप्रयोजनं तावत् सुखप्राप्तिर्दुःखनिवृत्तिश्च। श्रीभगवत्प्रीतौ तु सुखत्वं दुःखनिवर्तकत्वं चात्यन्तिकमिति।

The purpose of human life is the attainment of happiness and the elimination of pain. However, only with love forBhagavān there is the abolute attainment of happiness and freedom from suffering.

Commentary

Prīti Sandarbha is the last book of the Ṣaṭ-sandarbha or Bhāgavata Sandarbha. It is important to show the correlation or saṅgati of this book to the previous ones. Correlation is of six types, namely context, introduction, cause, occasion, common means, and common result. This is stated in the following verse:

saprasaṅga upodghāto hetutāvasarastathā
nirvāhakaika-kāryaikye ṣodhā saṅgatir iṣyate

Śrī Jīva Gosvāmī indicates that now is the occasion (avasara) for writing Prīti Sandarbha. Why is that? Because in the introductory volume of this work, Tattva Sandarbha (9), he wrote that he would first ascertain the proper authority (pramāṇa) to analyze the sambandha, abhidheya, and prayojana that had been indicated there in the previous anuccheda. In the next 17 anucchedas, he established that he would follow the Śrīmad Bhāgavatam as the most suitable source of authoritative knowledge on these subjects (pramāṇa). Then in the next 13 anucchedas he analyzed the heart of the author and the first two speakers of Śrīmad Bhāgavatam with respect to these three categories. He proposed to prove on the basis of these authorities that each individual living being is a part of Śrī Kṛṣṇa, the Original Supreme Person (sambandha), bhakti is the process to experience this relation (abhidheya), and love or prema is the ultimate purpose to be achieved (prayojana). 

Then, in Anuccheda 50 he declared that he would elaborate on these three topics in six separate treatises. In the remainder of Tattva Sandarbha and in the Paramātma, Bhagavat and Kṛṣṇa Sandarbhas he delineated the first topic of sambandha. In the fifth, he elaborated on abhidheya. And now he gets the occasion to describe the third and the last topic, which he calls prīti. Therefore, he writes, “Now, in keeping with the natural order of the work, we will deliberate on the purpose or prayojana of human life.” 

Śrī Jīva Gosvāmī has previously explained that the natural state of a jīva is to be subservient to Bhagavān. In its conditioned state, however, the jīva struggles hard without success to be the master and enjoyer of the material energy. This conditioning can only be dispelled by taking to devotion or bhakti to Bhagavān. Although there are various forms of Bhagavān, Kṛṣṇa is the supreme object (iṣṭa-devatā) of such devotion. The highest achievement of bhakti is prīti; this is the ultimate accomplishment that can be attained by a living being. 

Śrī Jīva Gosvāmī begins the discussion of this ultimate accomplishment with a very simple but profound statement: “The purpose of human life is the attainment of happiness and the elimination of pain.” This is a general statement that everyone can agree with, whether one is a theist, atheist or agnostic, rich or poor, male or female or some other gender, young or old, healthy or sick, literate or illiterate, wise or foolish. It is a common platform that no one can dispute. Whatever action one performs, one ultimately wants to feel happiness or to counteract one’s suffering through it. 

One may argue that people generally work hard to earn wealth. They take great pains to do so. Students toil for years to become qualified to get a job. People even take great risks to earn money; some even engage in illegal actions while risking their lives to do so. Thus it seems that the goal is not happiness but money. The answer to this is that money does not have any utility in and of itself. Money is only a medium of exchange used to obtain some desired object. Such an object might be a direct source of happiness such as food, or it may help to mitigate one’s suffering such as medicine. On the other hand, it may indirectly lead to happiness, such as the raw material for food like vegetables or grains, or it may help indirectly to alleviate suffering as such as that herbs that are used to make the medicine. Similarly, if we analyze all of our actions, no matter how subtle, we will find that they are meant to give us happiness or dispel our suffering, directly or indirectly. Thus Śrī Jīva Gosvāmī rightly writes that these are the dual purposes of all human action. 

The attainment of happiness and removal of suffering are also the goal of all knowledge systems, material or spiritual. As such there is no conflict in the aims of science and spirituality. The only difference is in their approach to the problem, which is of course, a big one. In the case of science and technology, the attainment of happiness and removal of suffering is aimed by bringing a change externally, and it is temporary. Spirituality, however, aims to bring a change within, and furnishes a permanent solution. Thus Śrī Jīva Gosvāmī writes, “Only with love for Bhagavān is the attainment of happiness and freedom from suffering absolute.”

Once love of Bhagavān is acquired, one remains situated in unending happiness beyond any contact with suffering. This is so because the prīti of Bhagavān is not material. The happiness that one gets from sensory objects is material, i.e., it comes from the contact of one’s senses with their corresponding objects. This contact cannot be everlasting. The two biggest pleasures in the material world are food and sex. But one cannot eat unlimitedly or go on enjoying sex without a break. One may also derive pleasure from fame and power but that is also not permanent. Famous celebrities are seen to be lonely, depressed and addicted to some intoxicant because they cannot get the kick from pwer or fame without a break. Therefore, love of Bhagavān is real prayojana, and not the pursuit of material knowledge or material objects. The latter have their utility only if they assist the former. Otherwise, it becomes a waste of time and valuable opportunity in the form of human life that could be utilized to attain prīti, the highest prayojana.