Journal of Vaishnava Studies

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
Steven J. Rosen

SENIOR EDITORS
Graham M. Schweig
Graduate Theological Union
Christopher Newport University
Rita D. Sherma
Graduate Theological Union

CONSULTING
EDITORIAL BOARD
Guy L. Beck
Tulane University
Edwin F. Bryant
Rutgers University
Gerald T. Carney
Hampden-Sydney College
Ravi M. Gupta
Utah State University
Barbara A. Holdrege
University of California, Santa Barbara
E. H. Rick Jarow
Vassar College
June McDaniel
College of Charleston
Vasudha Narayanan
University of Florida
 Vamshi Dhara sharman’s Bhāvârthadīpikāprakāśa
anD the Original-reflectiOn theOry

Jonathan Edelmann

Introduction

T he object of this article is to show that a relatively unknown scholar named

Śrī Vamīśī Dhara Śarman (Vamshi), who lived in the late nineteenth
century CE, possibly in Mathurā in North India, made a contribution to
Sanskrit commentarial literature on the Bhāgavatapurāṇa (Bhāgavata). The com-
mentarial style of reading and writing is a tradition that starts at least in the
time of Śrīdhara Svāmin in the early fifteenth century, but Śrīdhara Svāmin was
himself working in a much older tradition of commentarial writing since he was
no doubt familiar with the commentaries of Śaṅkara who wrote at least seven
or eight centuries prior. Vamshi’s specific contribution to commentaries on the
Bhāgavatapurāṇa explored in this article is the view that the highest reality tran-
scends human language and requires a re-organization of our words and concepts
to comprehend, but that the experience (upalabhyamāna) of this one being is real
and the foundation for how we read and interpret scripture. Vamshi argues that
the various qualities we attach to the singular being of God at its highest level of
being are real and irreducible to material properties, but this God manifests him-
self into a lower level of being within materiality as well.
Vamshi uses the language and mode of argumentation of a wide range of
learned disciplines in the Sanskrit tradition to make his point. The style of writ-
ing of Vamshi, however, is not unique, as remarkable as the content might be; it
is, rather, the time period in which he wrote that makes his work noteworthy.
Generally, one does not look to the late nineteenth century for new Sanskrit
books, whether in Vaishnava or in other Indic traditions. It was, for instance, in

165
166 Journal of Vaishnava Studies

1893 that Swami Vivekananda gave a lecture in English at Chicago’s Parliament of

the World’s Religions, and the general opinion is that learned discourses on Hindu
intellectual matters shifted to vernacular languages. Thus, Vamshi’s massive com-
mentary in this time period on the Bhagavata in Sanskrit is unique.
After discussing what is known of Vamshi, and after providing an overview of
his comments on the first verse of the Bhagavata, I then provide a translation and
transliteration of a selection from his commentary on Bhāgavata 1.1.1 regarding
the theology of what can be called “the original reflection.” In addition to expos-
ing readers to Vamshi’s views on these matters, the translation also demonstrates
how he attentively interprets his sources, a method that I believe exemplifies the
commentarial style.

I. Who was Vamshi Dhara Sharman?

It is difficult to find the name “Vamīśīdhara Śarman” within the histories of India,
although there are paṇḍiṭas and miśras that bear his first name. In contrast to his
near contemporary Bhaktivinoda, his name is rarely mentioned in traditional
Gauḍīya Vaishnava literature from the late nineteenth century. At this point what
we know about him is primarily confined to Kṛṣṇa Śaṅkara Śāstrī’s monumen-
tal publication, the Śrīmad Bhāgavata Purāṇa, starting in 1965 (I discuss this text
more below), a book project that resulted in a multi-volume publication of over
fourteen-thousand pages. Kṛṣṇa Śaṅkara Śāstrī’s edition of the Bhāgavata contains
all twelve books of the Bhāgavata along with multiple commentaries and some
supplements. Therein readers may know Vamshi as a loquacious commentator
on the Bhāgavata, generally occupying the second place in the list of commentar-
ies just after Śrīdhara Svāmin’s Bhāvârthadīpikā. Vamshi named his commentary
the Bhāvârthadīpikāprakāśa, or an “Illumination of Śrīdhara Svāmin’s Lamp on
Sense and Meaning.”
Vamshi’s Bhāva-artha-dīpikā-prakāśa was likely “composed in 1888-89” (Shastri
1996: XXXVIII). The only printed edition I have been able to acquire at this time
is from Kṛṣṇa Śaṅkara Śāstrī’s edition. The Bhāvârthadīpikāprakāśa is the only book
listed under Vamshi Dhara’s name in the New Catalogus Catalogorum. I believe that
Śāstrī’s edition is based on a lithographic edition of the text published in Mumbai
in the early twentieth century by Śrīveṅkateśvara. This edition is currently held by
the Leiden University Library in the Netherlands and was recently republished in
the Chaukhamba Sanskrit Pratishthan in New Delhi.
From the name of Vamshi’s text we can easily see him as presenting a sub-
commentary on Śrīdhara Svāmin. The metaphors Vamshi uses in illumination
on a lamp tell us he how he sees his relationship with Śrīdhara Svāmin. Since a
 Vamshi Dhara Sharman 167

lamp requires no illumination because it is self-illuminating, we might see him

as trying to bring Śrīdhara Svāmin into our attention, or perhaps he is trying to
bring into our attention an understanding of Śrīdhara Svāmin’s commentary that
is thus far unnoticed. To make his argument, Vamshi Dhara frequently quotes a
wide range of Purāṇas, Tantras or Vaishnava Saṃhitās, Kośa (dictionaries), Sto-
tras (praise-poems), ritual handbooks, and many other texts. He frequently gives
detailed grammatical analysis (vyākaraṇa) of Sanskrit words in the Bhagavata and in
Śrīdhara Svāmin’s commentary.
I am not aware of whether or not Vamshi Dhara had any official affiliation
with a particular Vaishnava community, but I do know that he often quotes in
an affirmative manner Gauḍīya Vaishnava theologians like Jīva Gosvāmin and
Viśvanātha Cakravartin. He states that he had read a wide range of commentaries
on the Bhāgavata Purāṇa: Viśvanātha’s, Vijayadhvaja’s, Jīva Gosvāmin’s, and Cit-
sukha’s (the latter is now lost) (Śāstrī 1965: 7-8). It is unclear to me, however, how
well he knew them and to what extent they informed his own commentary. It is
also not clear whether he received ritual initiation (dīkṣā) or even official theologi-
cal training (śīkṣā) from a guru. Although his theology seems to be near to that of
Jīva Gosvāmin and Viśvanātha at times, nevertheless as seen in the passage below
he clearly draws extensively from Advaita theology, even if he often presents
views that contradict it or reevaluate it. I am not aware of him naming his guru
in the places one might expect from such a traditional work, e.g., his invocatory
verses, as I discuss below.
He might have lived in Mathurā, Uttar Pradesh, in North India, at some point,
as suggested here: “By the urging of the learned people of Mathura, I, Shri Vamshi
Dhara Sharman, for the satisfaction of Shri Krishna, who descended into the circle
of Mathura, have undertaken to begin a commentary on Śrīdhara’s A Lamp on
Sense and Meaning.”1 His colophon on Book 12 says he composed his commentary
while living among the people of Śrī Khaḍa, but it is not clear that he wrote all of
his commentary there or just a part of it.2
There are at least four reasons that one might study Vamshi Dhara Sharman
and why further research on his commentary should be conducted. The first
reason is that he provides a systematic and learned reading of Śrīdhara Svāmin
in the Sanskrit language. My assumption after a limited study of Vamshi Dhara is
that he wanted to argue that Śrīdhara Svāmin’s theology was a Vaishnava theol-
ogy, and that there was a learned Sanskrit readership to whom he hoped to make
this argument and who could appreciate the intellectual detail he provided, but a
full and complete study would reveal more details. Second, while one might see
Vamshi’s arguments and interpretations of Śrīdhara Svāmin as forced or moti-
168 Journal of Vaishnava Studies

vated, he is nevertheless an important voice in this history of Hindu theology

because he provides an understanding of how theologies of the Bhāgavata Purāṇa
were developed in the late 19th century, a period of time about which we know so
little in this regard. Third, one often thinks of the late 19th century as a time when
many Indian intellectuals had shifted into English discourse, but Vamshi Dhara
had produced a massive commentary in Sanskrit in India’s British colonial period,
and yet we still know very little about this commentary and the intellectual world
in which it was produced. Who were his readers? Who supported his research?
Are there other authors like him? While these questions are not addressed here,
the existence of Vamshi’s work invites us to explore the vitality of new Sanskrit
literature even within the height of the British Colonial period.
Finally, a close study of Vamshi Dhara might tell us more about how a Hindu
theologian goes about creatively and constructively reinterpreting, or interven-
ing, in a commentarial tradition. While it is unclear that Vamshi had indeed read
everything from Citsukha to Viśvanātha, it is clear he was attempting to inter-
vene within a long and learned tradition of commentary on the Bhāgavata Purāṇa.
Moreover, the breadth and depth of Vamshi’s scholarship is rich enough that
even experienced readers of Sanskrit will find it informative. The tradition Vam-
shi worked with was particularly large since he came later and thus had to read
many more commentaries to master the history of the text. This in turn tells us
something of how innovation and reconstruction occurred in Hinduism in terms
of a scholastic model, even in the late nineteenth century.

II. Overview of Vamshi Dhara Sharman’s Commentary on Bhāgavata 1.1.1

In Kṛṣṇa Śaṅkara Śāstrī’s edition, Vamśīdhara’s comments on Bhāgavata 1.1.1
are approximately thirty pages long; that is significantly longer than others, and
indeed he generally is the most lengthy. I believe his commentary here can be
divided into four different sections.

§1. Invocation
Vamshi Dhara begins An Illumination of A Lamp on Sense and Meaning in the Bhāgavata
Purāṇa (Bhāva-artha-dīpikā-prakāśa), as we might imagine, with invocatory verses
of his own composition and selection:

Om. Prosperity! Obeisance to Shri Ganesha!

To Shri Krishna, the lover of Radha,

who goes around in the arbors in the Vrinda forest,
 Vamshi Dhara Sharman 169

who is surrounded by groups of cowherd girls

—I take refuge in him, the cause of everything.

“Om. Prosperity! Obeisance to Shri Ganesha!” I, Shri Vamshi Dhara Sharman,

have produce an explanation of this for the delight of the learned.3

As suggested in his second invocation, Vamshi Dhara provides his own commen-
tary on the Gaṇeśa mantra, as I discuss below.

§2. Discussion of the Daśâkṣarīvidyā

Extending over the next five and a half pages, Vamshi Dhara gives an explana-
tion of the Dasha-akshari-vidya, “Wisdom of the Ten Syllables,” a glorification of
the god Gaṇeśa that appears first in his invocation. He offers twenty two different
explanations of the prayer and once that is over, he then offers another twenty-
six explanations. Vamshi Dhara begins by addressing an objection: Why not start
your invocation by remembering Vishnu, someone who is clearly “higher” in the
order of being than Gaṇeśa? Vamshi refers to Hemādri’s Catur-varga-cintāmaṇi
(Śiromaṇi 1878: 915) in support of his opponent’s view. The passage from Hemadri
seems to say that one should remember Śrī Vishnu since he is most auspicious.
How could one contradict that? That seems to be the task Vamshi sets for himself
and his first point is that by the remembrance of Gaṇeśa, there is remembrance of
all the gods, Vishnu included.

§3. Comments on Śrīdhara Svāmin’s Invocations

Vamshi Dhara then spends the next three pages commenting on Śrīdhara
Svāmin’s eight invocation verses (maṅgalācāraṇa). His comments on Śrīdhara Svā-
min’s first maṅgalācāraṇa gives a sense of Vamshi’s skill and creativity as a com-
mentator. Vamshi Dhara notes that it was Śrī Rāma, not Śrī Kṛṣṇa or Śrī Gaṅeśa,
to whom Śrīdhara Svāmin first offers his respects. Why would Rama come first?
It seems that Śrīdhara Svāmin’s chose deity was Śrī Nṛsiṃha, a half-man and half-
lion form of God, and of course the Bhāgavata is about Śrī Kṛṣṇa. Thus it makes
little sense that he would offer respects to Rāma first.4 Vamshi has an answer. He
says that Śrīdhara Svāmin had thought that without Rāmacandra there would
never have been a bridge to go across the ocean from India to Lanka. That would
have meant disaster since Rama is the hero who saved Sita and killed Ravana, but
in doing so he first had to built a bridge to Lanka. It is unimaginable what would
have occurred had Rama not built the bridge. Vamshi Dhara goes on to tell us
that Śrīdhara Svāmin saw it as the mercy of Rāma that he could become a bridge
builder like Rāma himself. Śrīdhara Svāmin’s bridge was not a physical bridge as
170 Journal of Vaishnava Studies

in the case of Rāma going to Lanka, but Śrīdhara Svāmin built a bridge in the form
of a commentary across the ocean-like Bhāgavata Purāṇa.5
The difficulty of crossing the ocean is apparently like the difficulty of crossing
the Bhāgavata Purāṇa. By this I think Vamshi refers to the well known difficulty
of understanding and comprehending the Bhāgavata. It has stood out among the
Puranas as being particularly difficult. Understanding it then is like the difficulty
of crossing the ocean, and just as you need some sort of bridge to cross such a vast
body of water, so you need the commentary of Śrīdhara Svāmin to cross into an
understanding of the Bhāgavata. Thus in addition to the metaphor of illuminat-
ing a lamp, Vamshi also tells us that Śrīdhara Svāmin thought of himself a bridge
builder, just as Rāma was. Thus, although all the forms of Vishnu are equal, Vam-
shi argues that Śrīdhara Svāmin offered respects of Rāma first since he wanted
to seek Rāma’s grace in building a bridge between the oceanic Bhāgavata and the
reader.

§4. Comments on Śrīdhara Svāmin’s Prose

In total, this section of Vamshi Dhara’s commentary is about fifteen pages long,
making it the bulk of his comments on Bhāgavata 1.1.1. He address each word in
the first verse of the Bhāgavata, and each of the sentences and most of the words
in Śrīdhara Svāmin’s commentary thereupon. There is no shortage of learning in
his commentary; indeed, Vamshi takes one across a number of classical issues in
Sanskrit literature, often with ancient histories and his own insights mixed into
the discussion. Some of the topics he dwells on, however, are as follows.
Vamshi addresses the essential and accidental properties of a thing—in short,
the definition of different types of definitions. His example of a cow’s dewlap (the
dewlap is of course the essential property or defining feature of a cow, one with-
out which the thing would no longer be itself) and of a cow’s horn (an accidental
or temporary property of a cow, one without which the cow continues to be itself)
is in some sense staid, but for a Sanskrit reader of the late nineteenth century, it
surely would have been a learned, a lucid, and in some ways a uniquely Vaishnava
discussion of a classical topic in the history of philosophy and theology. Vamshi,
however, is not only interested in distinguishing categories and refining our use
of words, but his aim is to clarify the nature of God. Here too Vamshi reviews clas-
sical issues that begin in Śaṅkara, Padmapāda, Śrīdhara, and Jīva. These are issues
about whether the quality of being the creator of the world is an essential or an
accidental property of God.
A discussion of the essential nature of God’s being then leads Vamshi into a
discussion of different senses of the word satya, a word that means “true,” “real,”
 Vamshi Dhara Sharman 171

“truth.” Again Vamshi dives into ancient texts, this time the Upanishads, to raise
issues of what we mean when we say the clay substance is more real than the var-
ious things like pots and cups that clay is formed into. His train of thought is again
focused on a theological matter: Vamshi argues that the meaning of “realness,”
that is to say “God has the quality of being real,” means that God’s existence does
not depend upon the existence of any other thing; it is self-existing being. And
the concept of a self-sustaining being brings him into an analysis of how and why
the world and the individual self are not self-sustaining. Rather, he notes, they are
dependent things.
Vamshi iterates and reiterates a number of alternative interpretations of par-
ticular words in the Bhāgavata verse. Some of the objections are restatements of
questions Śrīdhara Svāmin had about the Bhāgavata, but often Vamshi adds to the
objections and provides fuller responses to them. For example, he address a num-
ber of objections about the body of God, and how God could have a body but also
be unchanging and eternal. Vamshi is clearly aware of and steeped in the classical
discussion in the work of Śaṅkara and Śrīdhara, but he also appears to be intimate
with the views of Jīva and Viśvanātha on these matters. We get something of an
overview of arguments and counter-arguments from these authors along with
Vamshi’s own insights included.
It is because of discussions like these and so many others in the work of Vamshi
that I believe he was not only asked to write this book by the community around
him as he himself says in the Bhāvârthadīpikāprakāśa itself, but that he saw himself
as providing a general education on the history of the Bhāgavata commentar-
ies, and thus Sanskrit readers may have and could continue to benefit from his
learned overview of a long and distinguished tradition of scholarship.

III. Original-reflection theory: Śaṅkara, Padmapāda, Vopadeva, and Hemādri

Having concluded a brief summary of some points in Vamshi’s commentary on
Bhāgavata 1.1.1, here I discuss the historical context for Vamshi’s discussion of
the original-reflection theory, and that requires at least a survey of Śaṅkara’s,
Padmapāda’s, Vopadeva’s, and Hemādri’s views on this matter. Before attending
to that, I first look at the way Vamshi ties the Bhāgavata into this larger discussion
from the history of Hindu theology.
Vamshi’s immediate context of the original-reflection theory again draws
us back to the first verse of the Bhāgavata, this time on the final phrase, “We
meditate on the highest truth.” The Indian tradition broadly distinguishes lower
and higher realms of truth. The question is not so much if there is a higher and
172 Journal of Vaishnava Studies

lower truth, but the question is how one should define and distinguish the two
categories of truth. One of the central questions debated among Hindu thinkers
is whether the supreme or highest being is an unqualified or a qualified being,
associated most famously with Śaṅkara and Rāmānuja respectively. Neither doubt
that the highest level of being, whatever it may be, certainly makes itself known
or revealed in this world in some type of form or body that can be adequately
characterized and cognized in language. The debate is about whether the form
of God that is talked about in language and known by language is the original or
highest, or whether it is a reflection of the original. Whatever the case may be, it is
within these ancient terms that Vamshi framed his own discussion.
The issue, however, is not so much what the Bhāgavata itself says about the
higher and the lower, or the qualified and the unqualified, but for Vamshi it
is how we make sense of Śrīdhara Svāmin’s views on this matter. Given that
Śrīdhara was likely the abbot of a Śaṅkara maṭha (monastery) in Pūri, Odisha, it
would seem likely that Śrīdhara would have argued for the unqualified concept
of God as the supreme object of meditation in the Bhāgavata and that he would
have thus also placed any linguistic representation of God within the lower cat-
egory of truth. However, Śrīdhara Svāmin’s gloss of the phrase “We meditate on
the highest truth” is not particularly helpful in clarifying his overarching theol-
ogy, for he only says that the word “highest” or “supreme” (param) refers to the
“supreme Lord” (parama-īśvaram). This leads Vamshi into a discussion of what
Śrīdhara Svāmin meant by the “supreme Lord”; he argues that the supreme Lord
is unqualified, yet experience-able, whereas the Lord (the mere ishvara) is distin-
guished into Brahmā, Vishnu, and Shiva who are reflections of the highest lord in
materiality.
His discussion is philological in the sense that attention is given to specific
words, their histories in a range of Sanskrit texts, their etymologies, their mor-
phologies, and often how these topics are addressed in classical books on gram-
mar. Furthermore, Vamshi also seems aware of what were probably advanced
level definitions of various philosophical and theological doctrines. Contemporary
textbooks on Hinduism no doubt will discuss the Hindu trinity of Brahmā the
creator, Vishnu the preserver, and Shiva the destroyer. But what does that mean?
Vamshi address the point. He argues that when Śrīdhara said “we meditate on
the supreme Lord” this refers to Shri Krishna, the one who is the source, or the
“original,” upon which all other things are based, including forms like Brahmā,
Vishnu, and Shiva. The underlying theological and philosophical question is,
“who or what is the original being upon which or by which ‘later’ or ‘lesser’ types
of being come into existence”? For example, is the world a self-existing being or
 Vamshi Dhara Sharman 173

did the world come into being by the being of another? In some sense Vamshi is
continuing his pointed discussion into how we think and speak about the world,
God, and our perception of them. And it is this that leads him into a discussion of
what is the nature of the original upon which various types of being are reflected
(bimba-pratibimba).
The original-reflection theory is original, so to speak, to Śaṅkara, not Vamshi
Dhara. It is found, for instance, in Śaṅkara’s Brahmasūtrabhāṣya, especially in his
commentary on Vedāntasūtra 2.3.46. This is in Section Seventeen (by Śaṅkara’s
division); it addresses the relation of God and soul, and Śaṅkara interprets it as a
reply to this objection: if the soul is a part (aṃśa) of God, then it would seem to
imply that God would experience the pain of human life in the world along with
the souls in the world. Śaṅkara says that we know the part possessor experiences
pain when a part is pained because Devadatta, or the Jones of Western philoso-
phy, experiences pain when a part of him is pained, like his hands or feet (Śāstrī
2002: 554-8). Thus it should seem to follow that if we are parts of God, then when
we suffer God must also suffer. While this conclusion is acceptable to many Chris-
tian theologians, and indeed many Christians would say that because God suffered
along with the suffering of Jesus, this is one reason he is worthy of our adoration
and capable of giving us salvation. The view that God suffers seems unacceptable
to Śaṅkara; brahman is at the highest level of analysis, he would say, not an expe-
riencer of anything, what to speak of an experiencer of pain or suffering.
Getting back to Vedāntasūtra 2.3.46, it seems to support Śaṅkara’s view that God
cannot suffer, for it states, “The supreme is not thus, like the light” (prakāśādivan
nevaṃ paraḥ). As is frequently the case, the passage requires a lot of background.
In his commentary, Śaṅkara first wants to establish that God and the ignorant
soul are different in one important sense: God does not identify with suffering
and other things that are not itself, whereas the ignorant individual beings, the
conditioned beings that we are, do identify with suffering and things that are not
themselves.
Śaṅkara understands identification as attributing sameness to two different
things; a father who suffers because his son has died is his example. In this case
the father has made the suffering of the child his own. “Discriminating knowl-
edge” (samyak-darśana) would help clear that up, Śaṅkara argues. It is his explana-
tion of the phrase “like the light,” however, that is relevant to this discussion. He
argues that just as we know when the sun is reflected in water the ripples of light
that occur when the water ripples is different from sun and that the sun is unaf-
fected by the rippling water, likewise God is not impacted and transformed by
the changes in its parts; the original is not affected by the reflection (Śāstrī 2000:
174 Journal of Vaishnava Studies

555-557). This is a point that Vamshi actually agrees with and he repeats Śaṅkara’s
argument nearly verbatim, but it is the nature of the original that he takes issue
with.
We might then look to the next commentary after Śaṅkara: Padmapāda’s
Pañcapādikā. Padmapāda brings out the nondual implications of the original-
reflection theory. In Chapter One of the Pañcapādikā Padmapāda argues that the
statement in the Chāndogya Upaniṣad 4.8.7, “you are that,” as well as examples
like reflections in water or mirrors—all of these are meant to show the identity
of the reflection and the original. Just as the face in the mirror is a reflection of
the original face, likewise the self is a reflection of God (Chandrasekharan: 1958:
104). It is only the essential being of the self, however, that is identical to God,
and that takes one back to discussions already covered here. From Śaṅkara
and Padmapāda, then, we have a coherent non-dualistic understanding of the
original-reflection theory (bimba-pratibimba): the individual self is a reflection of
the original brahman, and the two are in fact the same, and both are ultimately
unqualified. It is this conclusion—that the essential nature of the original or in
its highest state of being, a being beyond language and cognition—that Vamshi
denies. He argues that at the highest level of being there are no material qualities,
but the qualities the devotee experiences of the highest Lord are real beyond mat-
ter.
The discussion of Vedāntasūtra 2.3.46, however, does not speak to the person
and body of Krishna, or what is often called saguṇa brahman, i.e., the unquali-
fied God who has taken on qualities, in non-dualistic theology. For that aspect of
the original-reflection theory I turn to one of the first systematic studies of the
Bhāgavata, that of Hemādri (c.1260-1309 ad), the teacher and patron of Vopadeva.
Vopadeva and Hemādri wrote the Muktāphala and a commentary on it called the
Kaivalyadīpikā.
The first verse of the Kaivalyadīpikā seems to be another point that Vamshi
Dhara may have been attempting to refute:
I meditate on that light which opens up in the consciousness that is subdued
by cognizing the solid formation of dharma-megha, which is achieved primarily
through acts of mental purification, and which is received in this world by the
appellation Krishna since he is a reflection in the mirror of the pure being of that
light.6

There is much to be explored in the theologies of Vopadeva and Hemādri, both

of whom are still woefully understudied, but a tentative interpretation of this
passage would look at it in connection with nondualistic and yogic views. Here
 Vamshi Dhara Sharman 175

it is argued that there can be an awareness of being that comes after the perfor-
mance of a meditative practice that involves purifying the mind, and after this the
elusive state of samādhi known as dharma-megha arises (cf. Yogasūtra 4.29). Again,
this does not tell us anything about how we should understand Krishna, and
since Krishna is the primary subject-matter of the Bhāgavata, the verse needs to
tell us how we should understand the being of Krishna; that is the goal of the last
sentence of the verse. How do we talk about the light of being in this world? It is
through the name and person of Krishna, he says, and this Krishna is but a reflec-
tion (pratibimba) of the original light of being.
Vamshi Dhara’s perspective is that there are two aspects to the Godhead: the
Lord (Īśvara) and the highest Lord (Parama Īśvara). The highest Lord is qualified,
he teaches, but its qualities are not material qualities, and it is for this reason that
it is called unqualified. The Lord is qualified since it is a reflection of the highest
Lord in māyā; this Lord trifurcates himself into the triune form of Brahmā (rajas,
development), Vishnu (sattva, conservation), and Shiva (tamas, decomposition).

IV. Transliteration and Translation of Bhāvârthadīpikāprakāśa 1.1.1

Sanskrit Text
paraṃ paramêśvaraṃ bimba-bhūtam īśvaram ity arthaḥ | tena māyā-pratibimbitêśvara
vyāvṛttiḥ | dvedhā ’tra prakriyā tatrâdyā yathā avidyā-pratibimbo jīvaḥ māyā-
pratibimba īśvaraḥ | sa côpādhi-bhūta-māyāyās traiguṇyāt tat-tad-guṇa-viśiṣṭa-
māyā-pratibimba-bhedena brahma-viṣṇu-śiva-rūpo bimba-bhūtas tu paramêśvaro
nirupādhikaṃ brahmâiva sa7 câdi-nārāyaṇaḥ śrī-kṛṣṇa ity ādi-padair vyavahriyate |
śiva-purāṇâdau śivâdi-padaiś ca | sa ca na svâṃśa-māyā-pratibimbitêśvara-dharmaiḥ
sṛṣṭy-ādi-karttṛtvâdibhir abhilipyate |

dvitīyā yathā avidyā māyā ca ekâiva tat-pratibimbo jīvaḥ bimba-bhūtaṃ caitan-

yam īśvaro nirupâdhika ekâiva sṛṣṭy-ādy-āropita-dharmair brahma-viṣṇvâdi-bheda-
vyavahāra-bhāk | bimbatva-pratibimbatvābhyām anākrāntaṃ śuddha-caitanyaṃ
nirddharmakaṃ brahmêti | dvidhâiva prakriyâtra śāstre hy upalabhyate |

sarvathaitac chāstra-parama-tāt-parya-gocaro bimba-bhūta-paramêśvaro nirguṇaṃ

brahmâiva tatrôpalabhyamāna-guṇānāṃ cin-mayatvena prakṛti-pariṇāma-bhūta-
guṇâśrayatvâbhāvāt | spaṣṭaṃ cedaṃ māṃ bhajanti guṇāḥ sarve nirguṇaṃ8
nirapekṣakam | suhṛdaṃ priyam ātmānaṃ sāmyâsaṅgādayo ’guṇāḥ9 || ityâdau |
tam eva paraêśvaram eva || (Śāstrī 1965: 11)

Translation
We meditate on the highest.10 The highest Lord is the original of the Lord; that’s
176 Journal of Vaishnava Studies

the meaning. By saying this Śrīdhara excludes or separates the Lord that is a
reflection in materiality from the highest Lord. There are two methods used to
demonstrate this, i.e., that there is a difference between the Lord and the highest
Lord. The first method is that just as the individual self is a reflection in igno-
rance, the Lord is a reflection in materiality. This Lord is the form of Brahmā,
Vishnu, and Shiva by distinctions within the reflection that is materiality dis-
tinguished by one or another quality of nature since materiality, made into an
imposed property, is the three qualities of nature.11 The original, however, is the
supreme Lord, who lacks imposed properties, who is brahman, and called the origi-
nal Narayana, or Shri Krishna. This is known by the convention of words. He is
[named] by the words Shiva, and so on in the Śivapurāṇa. The supreme Lord is not
contaminated by being the agent in manifesting, etc. the world or by the qualities
of a Lord who has the reflection in materiality that is his [supreme Lord’s] own
part.

The second method used to demonstrate that that the highest has a reflection
in materiality is that just as ignorance and materiality are one, the individual
self is a reflection in them, likewise consciousness is the original. The Lord is free
from limiting conditions, singular, and participates in the conditioned world in
different forms like Brahmā, Vishnu, etc., by qualities superimposed from the
creation and so forth. Brahman, which is without qualities, a pure awareness,
is not superseded by the original or the reflection. These two views are taught
here, in this Bhāgavata.

It is all over this Bhāgavata scripture, as known through the final authorial intent
of this Bhāgavata scripture, that this highest Lord is the original, and it is the
same as brahman who is without qualities. With regard to the qualities that are
experienced of that [brahman], they are devoid of a foundation in the transfor-
mations of matter since they are made of spiritual consciousness. This is made
clear: All qualities take refuge in me, one who is without qualities and detached.
Good hearted, beloved by the souls, detached, and indifferent; these are not quali-
ties [Bhāgavata 11.13.40]. [We meditate upon] only him, only the supreme Lord.

Conclusion
There is still so much of the commentaries of the Bhāgavata Purāṇa in Kṛṣṇa
Śaṅkara Śāstrī’s edition that is untranslated, unstudied, and unexamined by schol-
ars, what to speak of the many commentaries and independent works that he was
not able to include. This article gives us a glimpse of a prolific, creative, obscure,
and yet virtually unknown Vaishnava thinker from the late nineteenth century.
We see Vamshi working systematically with Śrīdhara Svāmin from the early fif-
 Vamshi Dhara Sharman 177

teenth century, a fact that shows not only the vitality and longevity of his work,
but also the continued influence of the Bhāgavata Purāṇa on learned Sanskrit
scholars, even in the middle of the Colonial period, a time what we often think of
Sanskrit literature as nearly gone.
The translated passage above shows us something of Vamshi Dhara Sharma’s
unique character as an author. While on the one hand his two methods to dem-
onstrate or explain the original-reflection theory are in some sense taken straight
from the playbook, so to speak, of modern nondualistic (advaita) theology, on
the other hand, we see that Vamshi reaches a conclusion that echoes that of Jīva
Gosvāmin, Viśvanātha, and the other Vaishnava commentators like Madhva and
Vijayadhvaja, authors he claims to have read.
I say this because Vamshi seems to affirm, as the Advaitin might, that there
are various levels of reality or being, and that the highest level of being is beyond
qualities; that the qualified being of God is a reflection of that highest level of
being; that the created world is made of the three qualities of nature and is rooted
in ignorance and is a superimposition; and that the individual self is also a reflec-
tion of the highest level of being. These ideas are in the first two paragraphs of the
passage above and read alone it would seem to be little more than a condensed
articulation of nondualism.
In the final paragraph of the of the translated passage, however, Vamshi shifts
our perspective. Whereas it seems he was going to affirm classical and modern
nondualism, in the end he says that the highest level of being, which is unquali-
fied, is nevertheless experienced as qualified, and since it is the highest level of
being the qualities that one experiences are not a reflection or refraction; they
are real and they are the source of the reflection. This view seems to affirm a
view held by Madhva, Jīva, Baladeva, Viśvanātha, and others, namely, that when
scripture says God is unqualified, it means that God is devoid of material qualities.
But because the devotee experiences God as qualified, we should understand that
the lack of material qualities leaves space for God to have spiritual qualities. Fur-
thermore, Vamshi asserts that this is the theology of the Bhāgavata Purāṇa and of
Śrīdhara Svāmin as well.

Typesetting Commentarial Text

My translation and transliteration above follow these rules: words in a com-
mentary that are from the root text being commented upon (in this case the
Bhāgavata Purāṇa) are in bold; words in a commentary that are referring to a
previous commentary (in the case of Vamshi Dhara is was Śrīdhara Svāmin’s) are
178 Journal of Vaishnava Studies

in italics; words in a commentary that are verses, definitions, well-known axioms,

grammatical rules, and other authoritative texts are in bold-italics. I have not used
brackets to demarcate my insertions on the literal translation, but I have rather
included my insertions in the text.

Endnotes
1. atha māthura-vidvaj-jana-preraṇayā śrī-vaṃśīdhara-śarmā māthura-maṇḍalāvatīrṇa-śrī-
kṛṣṇa-prītaye śrīdhara-svāmi-bhāvārtha-dīpikāraṃbha-kṛta [. . .] (Śāstrī 1965: 8).
2. śrī-khaḍa-pattana-vāstavya-paṇḍita-vaṃśīdhara-śarma-viracite śrīmad-bhāgavata-
bhāvārtha-dīpikā-prakāśe dvāda-skandhe tryodaśo ’dhyāyaḥ || (Book 12, Śāstrī 1974: 351)
3. oṃ svasti śrīgaṇeśāya namaḥ || śrī-kṛṣṇaṃ rādhikā-nāthaṃ vṛndā-vana-nikuñjagam | ballavī-
gaṇa-saṃvītam āśraye sarva-kāraṇam ||1|| oṃ svasti śrī-gaṇeśāya nama ity asya vyākṛtim | śrī-
vaṃśīdhara-śarmāhaṃ karomi viduṣāṃ mude ||2|| (Śāstrī 1965: 2)
4. ādi-madhyāvasāneṣu śrī-kṛṣṇasyaiva pratipādyatvaṃ mukhyatvenāsty atas tan-maṅgalam
evādau vidheyam asti yadvā śrīdhara-svāmino hīṣṭadevaḥ śrī-nṛsiṃho ’sti tan-maṅgalaṃ vā vid-
heyam |
5. atredam avadheyaṃ yadyapi śrī-bhagavataḥ sarvāvatāra-rūpāṇāṃ vastutas tulyataiva
tathāpi śrī-rāma-candraṃ vinā samudre setur na kutrāpy avatāre kṛto ’sti atas tat-kṛpayā mamāpi
śrī-bhāgavatārṇava-ṭīkā-rūpa-setu-karaṇaṃ bhūyād iti vimṛśyaiva śrī-rāma-nati-rūpaṃ maṅgalaṃ
kṛtam iti pratīyate | (Śāstrī 1965: 8).
6. yaj-jyotir unmiṣati cetasi dharma-megha-māta-sthuṣā-mati-vaśe parikarma-mukhyaiḥ| tac-
chuddha-sattva-mukura-pratibimba-bhāvāt kṛṣṇābhidhām upagataṃ bhuvi bhāvayema ||1|| (Bhat-
tacharyya 1944: 1). There seems to be a problem with this verse, one that I have underlined.
Bhattacharyya does not differ here from the 1922 edition of the text edited by Pandita Isvara
Chandra Sastri in the Calcutta Oriental Series (No.5). I am reading sthuṣā as sthula, solid.
7. Amended from brahmâivāsa.
8. Vamshi glosses, “without qualities means he transcends materiality,” nirguṇaṃ
māyika-guṇātītam |
9. Most editions, but not Vamshi’s, have aguṇāḥ instead of guṇāḥ, and that is the read-
ing I elected here. Śrīdhara Svāmin’s Bhāvārthadīpikā 11.13.40, for example, reads: aguṇāḥ
guṇa-pariṇāma-rūpā na bhavanti | kintu nityā ity arthaḥ || 40 || “The word ‘without qualities’
(aguṇāḥ) means there are no transformation of the qualities of nature; they are rather eter-
nal.” (Śāstrī, 11.13.40, 618-9)
10. This is a reference to the penultimate word of Bhāgavata 1.1.1 within the phrase “We
meditate on the highest truth” (satyaṃ paraṃ dhīmahi).
11. This refers to the dynamic power of creativity and development (rajas) in the form of
Brahmā, the sustaining power of existence (sattva) in the form of Vishnu, and the destruc-
tive power of deterioration and decomposition (tamas) in the form of Shiva. One might say
then that the highest Lord is refracted into the three qualities of nature as this trinity.
 Vamshi Dhara Sharman 179

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Acknowledgements
A version of this article was presented at the World Sanskrit Conference, Brit-
ish Columbia, 2018, and I wish to thank my co-panelists Professors Tomohiro
Manabe, Kiyokazu Oktita, Arun Brahmbhatt, David Buchta, and Ravi Gupta. In
addition I want to thank Professors Peter Bisschop, Elizabeth A. Cecil, and Toke
Knudson for information about Vamshi’s works. I also read this and other
Bhāgavata Purāṇa commentaries with Satya Narayana, as well as a Reading Group
called “Charting the History of Hindu Theology by Bhāgavata Purāṇa commentar-
ies” in August 2019 at the University of Florida with Ravi Gupta, Kiyokazu Oktita,
and Kenneth Valpey, as well as graduate students in the Department of Religion.