```json
{
    "title": "Monday Morning Greetings 2020 #7 – Rāgānugā-bhakti and the Art of Management",
    "url": "https://wavesofdevotion.com/2020/02/17/raganuga-bhakti-and-the-art-of-management/",
    "datePublished": "2020-02-17",
    "dateModified": "2020-02-16",
    "language": "en-US",
    "description": "Rāgānugā-bhakti is about doing things from the heart. Management is mostly about organization and policies. Can they be reconciled? People who have been on my retreats notice that I am…",
    "author": "Dhanurdhara Swami",
    "publisher": "Waves of Devotion"
}
```

# Monday Morning Greetings 2020 #7 – Rāgānugā-bhakti and the Art of Management

*Rāgānugā-bhakti*

is about doing things from the heart. Management is mostly about organization and policies. Can they be reconciled?

 

People who have been on my retreats notice that I am a stickler for the details of managing it.  During my Puri retreat, one younger devotee noticed how intensely I was making sure that the

*prasādam*

was served according to traditional Vaiṣṇava standards and joked that they were surprised that a Vrajavāsī was so much into

*vaidhī-bhakti*

.

[\[1\]](https://wp.me/p2zwwk-RO#_ftn1)

Although the comment was innocent, and they were, in fact, appreciating what I was doing, I could see that they had some misunderstanding about what

*rāgānugā-bhakti*

, or spontaneous devotional service, is. I quickly replied in the form of questions to help them reconcile the concepts of management and spontaneous devotion.

 

When there is good management, you don’t see the management. When there is bad management, all you see is the management. Which is more conducive to

*rāgānugā-bhakti*

?

 

When Krishna arrives home in the evening “as required according the scheduled round of each pastime”

[\[2\]](https://wp.me/p2zwwk-RO#_ftn2)

is His adherence to time an imposition on His

*līlā*

or pastimes, or an asset to it?

 

After arriving home in the evening from the cow pasture, Krishna’s mother bathes, dresses, and decorates Him so that He may join the other men and boys in the community for the scheduled milking of the cows. Was her attention to detail and time connected to her motherly devotion, or her desire to advance in religiosity by doing her duty?

 

Krishna’s day is described in books like

*Govinda-līlāmrita*

as

*aṣṭa-kālīya-līlā*

, the eight-fold daily pastimes, meaning that His daily activities are scheduled practically down to the minute. If Krishna’s activities are scheduled so rigidly by His

*līlā-śakti,*

or pastime potency, how can we say that keeping things orderly is antithetical to spontaneous devotion?

 

Śrīla Raghunātha dāsa Gosvāmī is recognized as the

*prayojana-ācārya*

, the authority on

*prema-bhakti*

. His practices, like chanting and paying hundreds of obeisances to the Vaiṣṇavas, were so fixed that they are described as like the lines on a stone. Considering whom Raghunātha dāsa Gosvāmī was, how we can divorce his mood of rigid discipline from the realm of the highest devotion?

 

*Kirtan*

is described as “when the

*bhava*

in the heart is expressed through the discipline of music”.

[\[3\]](https://wp.me/p2zwwk-RO#_ftn3)

  Is the effort to make a beautiful

*kirtan*

within the parameters of classical musical discipline enhancing or obstructing spontaneous devotion?

 

At the Ratha Yatra festival in Puri, Śrī Caitanya meticulously organized the

*kirtan*

into four parties with six chanters in each party: one lead singer and five to accompany him. He then assigned two expert

*mṛdaṅga*

players to each party. In addition, he made sure the dancing was appropriate by assigning one lead dancer to each party. Śrī Caitanya came to give

*rāgānugā-bhakti*

. Was His strict oversight of the

*kirtan*

party a result of His spontaneous devotion or something else?

 

Śrī Radha learned sixty-four arts in order to please Krishna. Among them were carpentry (

*takṣaṇa*

), engineering (

*vastu-vidyā*

), mechanics (

*yantra-mātṛkā*

), and enforcing discipline (

*vaināyikī vidyā*

). Why then can’t we manage on the platform of spontaneous devotion for the pleasure of Krishna?

 

I think it is obvious by the questions I raised that one on the level of spontaneous devotion is not limited in what one does for Krishna’s service, including regulation and organization. It is thus not the activity that makes something spontaneous devotion, but the inspiration or impetus for doing it. Can

*rāgānugā-bhakti*

be reconciled with organization and management? As long as it’s born out of the deepest intimate love for Śrī Krishna, then why not?

 

[\[1\]](https://wp.me/p2zwwk-RO#_ftnref1)

*Vaidhī-bhakti*

is devotion inspired by faith in the potency of following the rules or prescriptions of devotion.

*Rāgānugā-bhakti*

, or devotion following the eternal residents of Vṛndāvana, is devotion inspired by one’s intimate relationship with Krishna.

[\[2\]](https://wp.me/p2zwwk-RO#_ftnref2)

*Bhāg.*

10.13.23

[\[3\]](https://wp.me/p2zwwk-RO#_ftnref3)

This is a definition of

*kirtan*

from the Sikh tradition from an article by Satyahari Singh published in the

*Journal of Vaiṣṇava Studies. *