The devotee who holds the Lord wholeheartedly in him, is dearer to Him says Krishna in the Gita. This is the secret of the bond of bhakti that continues to raise jivatmas from bondage to liberation. The scriptural statement ‘Raso vai saha’ describes the Supreme Brahman as the only worthwhile essence of each and every aspect of the entire creation. It implies that as one begins to feel His omniscience, omnipresence and omnipotence, one is initiated into an inexplicable experience in which is subsumed the essence of all rasas. In this context, the spiritually inclined devotee who strives to know Him finds His avatars as a rich source of the experience of His divinity, mercy and accessibility, pointed out Srimati Jaya Srinivasan in a lecture.
As a child, a lover, a stealer of hearts and butter, a master-planner, a friend of the Pandavas, a great teacher of the highest philosophical truths of the Upanishads, Krishna has not only captivated devotees like Kunti, Bhishma, Uddhava, the Gopis, etc, but has inspired many poets to express their wonder at the unique manifestations of the His Paratva and Saulabhya. To Leela Suka the very essence of the Upanishads has taken the form of Krishna. Only the experience of the infinite compassion of the Lord can move one to this state of spontaneous outburst of feeling. This is the secret of devotion of the azhwars. They reach an ecstatic state when they relive the incidents in His lifetime. Periazhwar imagines himself as Yasodha and savours the simple joys of maternal love while taking care of the Lord. Nammazhwar’s hymns which are delightful word pictures of the Lord’s early life — Yasodha threatening Him with a stick for stealing ghee, the child with His lotus eyes full of tears, the vision of the Lord in bondage when Yasodha ties Him to the mortar in a cow shed — are also full of philosophical truths.
