When Akbar “the Great” (ruled 1556–1605) granted permission to Hindus to rebuild their temples, the Kṛṣṇa-janma-bhūmi temple was restored to some semblance of its old magnificence. In the middle of the seventeenth century several European travelers visited Mathurā and described the temple. François Bernier only mentions “an ancient and magnificent pagan temple” in Mathurā, whereas Jean Baptiste Tavernier, a French physician, describes it at great length: “The temple is of such a vast size that, though in a hollow, one can see it five or six
kos
off, the building being very lofty and very magnificent.” It was built of the same red sandstone, of which the Fort in Agra and Delhi’s “Red Fort” are made. The temple itself was set on an octagonal sandstone plinth which “has round about it two bands of many kinds of animals, but particularly monkeys, in relief.” It had two narrow staircases leading to the main entrance and to the choir. The temple occupied only half of the platform; the other half formed a large empty place. “Like other temples, it is in form of a cross, and has a great dome in the middle with two rather smaller [domes] at the end. Outside, the buidling is covered from top to bottom with figures of animals, such as rams, monkeys, and elephants, carved in stone: and all round there are nothing but niches occupied by different monsters.” While finding it “shocking to have before one’s eyes such a host of monstrosities,” Tavernier admired the architecture of the temple. He also was shown the temple-deity,
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a statue made of black marble, accompanied by two smaller figures in white marble. The figures were dressed in embroidered robes and covered with pearls and precious stones. Inside the temple Tavernier also saw the processional chariot used to take the deity on outings.
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In 1669 the fanatical Moghul ruler Aurangzeb (ruled 1658–80) ordered the destruction of the temple. It was razed to the ground and a huge mosque was built in its place, which is still there today. As his chronicler notes in the
Ma-Asiri ‘Alamgiri:
“In the month of Ramazan, 1080 A.H. (December 1669) in the thirteenth of his reign, this justice loving monarch, the constant enemy of tyrants, commanded the destruction of the Hindu temple of Mathurā known by the name of Dehra Keśu Rai, and soon that stronghold of falsehood was levelled with the ground. On the same spot was laid, at great expense, the foundation of a vast mosque.”After briefly describing the background to the history of the building he continues: “The richly jewelled idols taken from the pagan temples were transferred to Agra, and there placed beneath the steps leading to the Nawab Begam Sahib’s mosque, in order that they might ever be pressed under foot by true believers. Mathurā changed its name to Islāmābad and was thus called in all official documents, as well as by the people.”
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When, after Aurangzeb’s death, the Mughal empire declined rapidly, Braj became part of the sphere of influence of Rājput kings, who partially restored the Hindu holy places. Sawai Jai Singh, whose name is associated with some major buildings, actively supported and reformed Hindu Religious life and kept in touch with Hindu religious leaders of the area.
The time of tribulations for the residents of Braj, however, had not ended. In 1757 Ahmad Shah Abdali, an adventurer from Aghanistan, who attempted to install himself as ruler in Delhi, in the wake of a campaign in North India, also overran Mathurā and Vrindāban and caused the worst massacre these places had ever seen. Abdali offered every one of his soldiers five rupees for every head of a Hindu – thousands were slaughtered and beheaded and their houses burnt to the ground.
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With the establishment of Mahratta supremacy over Braj later in the eighteenth century, Mathurā began to revive and new temples were built. The British, who took over by 1830, established a cantonment in Mathurā and appointed a District Magistrate. One magistrate, Frederick Growse, took an active interest in the history and culture of Braj and became instrumental in restoring many ancient Hindu temples.
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Under British rule Mathurā regained some of its ancient character as a place of Hindu pilgrimage and learning. Many new temples were built, the ghats were revived, and Hindu scholars began to settle and teach there again. Mathurā was sufficiently famous by the middle of the nineteenth century to attract the later Swami Dayānānda, who under the tutelage of Virājananda Saraswatī, one of its pandits, established the Ārya Samāj, an iconoclastic Hindu reform movement that gained great importance in the Hindu
jāgaran
of the twentieth century. Several million pilgrims visit Mathurā every year, and in spite of the visible presence of Islām – there is a mosque in the very center of Mathurā and there is, of course, the large mosque built on the Kṛṣṇa-janma-bhūmi, which has been targeted by RSS (RṣṢṭrīya Svayamsevak Sangh) activists – Mathurā has again become a major Hindu center. Its numerous large temples are always crowded at the time of worship and its many festivities attract large crowds from distant places as well. Mathurā is the seat of many Hindu centers of study and it also is the home of one of the major archeological museums of India, which houses many treasures found in and around Mathurā over the past century.
For many pilgrims, however, Mathurā (with over a million inhabitants today) is only a transit station for Vrindāban, a small town of about 50,000 permanent residents,
c.15
km northeast of Mathurā. For Kṛṣṇa devotees Vrindāban is the religious center of the Braj maṇḍala. In traditional Kṛṣṇa lore Vrindāban
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is described as the place of Kṛṣṇa’s
līlā
, his plays with the
gopīs
, the exemplary devotees. While for most of its history Mathurā was the more important place of pilgrimage, since the sixteenth century Vrindāban became the focus of major temple building and scholarly religious activities. This had much to do with the arrival of representatives of new religious movements such as Gauḍīya Vaiṣṇavism and the Puṣṭimārga, but also with a change in the nature of pilgrimage. Mathurā, as the traditional saying quoted above indicates, was sought by pilgrims in pursuit of liberation. Vrindāban is visited in search of religious experience: the visualization of Kṛṣṇa and the participation in his love games.
Today’s Vrindāban is largely the creation of the immediate disciples of Caitanya “Mahāprabhu” (1486–1533), the founder of Gauḍīya Vaiṣṇavism. Being intoxicated with love for Kṛṣṇa,
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he eagerly sought to relive the scenes so vividly described in the
Bhāgavata-Purāṇa
and traveled with his companions from his native Bengal to the Braj Maṇḍala. He commissioned the highly educated Rūpa and Sanātana Goswāmi in 1517 to live and work in Vrindāban. Rūpa Goswāmi authored the celebrated
Bhakti-rasādmṛta-sindhu
, arguably the most important theological work of the Gauḍīya Vaiṣṇavas, and he also founded the Govinda Deva temple, one of the landmarks in Vrindāban. Sanātana Goswami, his nephew, established the Madan Mohan temple. Caitanya sent some more of his immediate disciples to Vrindāban – collectively they came to be known as the “Six Vrindāban Goswāmis” and they enjoyed high prestige among Gauḍīya Vaiṣṇavas. Among them was Gopāla Bhaṭṭa, author of the
Hari-bhakti-vilāsa
, a work detailing the Gauḍīya Vaiṣṇava ritual of worship, and founder of the Rādhāraman temple. Rāgunātha Dāsa, author of the
Vraja-vilāsa-stava
, which gives a description of the holy places of Braj, established Rādhākuṇḍ which became the center for the Bengali Gauḍīya Vaiṣṇavas in Vrindāban. Jīva Goswāmi, the author of the immense theological summa
Ṣat-sandarbha
established the Rādhā Dāmodar temple. In the eighteenth century such famous Gauḍīya Vaiṣṇava scholars as Kṛṣṇadāsa Kavirāja, Viśvanātha Cakravarti, and Baladeva Vidyābhūṣana settled in Vrindāban, enriching both the religious and the cultural life of Braj. It was one of the endeavors of these men not only to work out the theology of Gauḍīya Vaiṣṇavism, but also to teach and educate the masses. For this purpose they wrote a great number of plays, reenacting scenes from the
Bkāgavatam
, and also staging an Indian version of the medieval mystery plays, where allegories of the drama of salvation were played out by personifications of virtues and vices.
Vrindāban was chosen as home also by famous members of other sects. Thus Hit Harivaṁś, the founder of the Rādhāvallabha Sampra-dāya, and Swāmī Haridās, a gifted poet and singer of the Kṛṣṇa
līlā
, settled in Vrindāban and developed institutions of their own. Since all these scholarly theological luminaries also actively promoted new forms of worship and festivities, Vrindāban soon overflowed with dramatic religious performances and celebrations attended by rapturous crowds.
In the eighteenth century it became fashionable for Rājput nobles to build villas in Vrindāban. Noble ladies retired there to spend their lives participating in temple worship and composing religious lyrics. Wealthy business people had the ghats and temples repaired and expanded in the nineteenth century and Vrindāban turned into one of the busiest places of pilgrimage in the whole of India. In our own time many new foundations were established by Marwaris, new temples and pilgrim shelters were built and the small town is visited every year by some three million people from outside. Vrindāban has also become a center for politically active Hinduism: some of the prominent custodians of temples are also leaders in RSS and VHP (Viśva Hindū Pariṣad). Several modern educational institutions have opened there as well. Some of these are concerned with preserving and exploring the local heritage, such as the Vrindāban Research Institute, and the Śri Caitanya Prema Samsthāna which is undertaking a major international project of conservation and reconstruction of the Govinda Deva temple. The latter, under its scholarly director Srivatsa Goswami, organized in 1994 an international conference dealing with Braj – the holy land of Kṛṣṇa.
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In the 1950s Swami Bon Maharaj, a member of the Neo Caitanyite Gauḍīya Mission, began to develop a Vaiṣṇava Viśva-Vidyālaya (Vaiṣṇava University) on a large plot of open land, inspired by the great theological colleges he had seen in the United States. He had to scale down his venture because of lack of local support, but he succeeded in getting his Institute of Oriental Philosophy affiliated with Agra University as a recognized Post-Graduate Research Centre.
The International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON, better known as “Hare-Krishna Movement”) established a major center there too: its large and beautiful Kṛṣṇa Bālārama Mandir has become one of the major attractions of Vrindāban. It is also the site of the
samādki
(burial) of Swami Bhaktivedanta, the founder of ISKCON, who had lived for many years in Vrindāban before moving to the United States. ISKCON also opened a large boarding school attached to the temple and many married members have settled in its vicinity.
To complete the picture of Mathurā and Vrindāban: both places also have Śiva temples besides temples in which the Goddess receives worship, Muslim mosques, and Sikh gurdwaras. Mathurā also possesses two Christian Churches. Besides Mathurā and Vrindāban, a large number of other places in Braj-Maṇḍala, Kṛṣṇa’s territory, are frequented by many pilgrims. There is not sufficient space to describe in detail famous places like Govardhana, Gokula, Mahabāna and others, already mentioned in the
Bhāgavatam
. All of them have great significance for Kṛṣṇa
bhaktas
. They are on the path of the great Braj pilgrimage that is undertaken every year by a number of intrepid Kṛṣṇa devotees, lasting approximately three weeks.
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In spite of all historic tribulations, devastations and inner dissensions, Hinduism in Braj is as alive as ever, and neither a modern nor a postmodern critique of religion in general, or of Hinduism in particular, has dampened the spirits of the Brajvasis or the pilgrims from outside. If anything, the influx of pilgrims has become larger during the past decades, the number of people wishing to spend the rest of their lives in Vrindāban has increased, and the foundation of new ashrams and new temples moves ahead at an unprecedented pace. Hundreds of thousands of people still come with the expectation to have a vision of Kṛṣṇa and Rādhā, to experience the mystery of passionate love for God, to receive blessings and even to witness miracles of all sorts, about which the locals talk. The very dust of the streets of Vrindāban has been sanctified by the feet of Kṛṣṇa, the gopls and the devotees and there is a widespread belief that it can cure leprosy, when one rolls in it, as one can see many individuals doing.
VĀRĀṆASĪ
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P. V. Kane, writing in 1953 said: “There is hardly any city in the world that can claim greater antiquity, greater continuity and greater popular veneration than Banaras. Banaras has been a holy city for at least thirty centuries. No city in India arouses the religious emotions of Hindus as much as Kāśī does. To the Hindu mind it represents great and unbroken traditions of religious sanctity and learning. It is a miniature of Hindu life through the ages in all its great complexities and contradictions.”
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Vārāṇasī, the “place between Vārāṇa and Asī” (two small rivers that flow into the Ganges, one forming the northern boundary of the city, the other the southern) has not only been the Hindus’ most holy city, but has also found, throughout the last few hundred years, its Western admirers. Diana Eck expresses her admiration thus: “From its commanding position on the River Ganges, Banaras has witnessed the entire history of Indian civilization as it evolved in North India. From the ancient Āryan Kingdoms and their rivalries, through the golden Mauryan and Gupta empires, to the thousand years of Muslim and then British domination, the historical currents of the times have passed through Banaras.”
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The area now occupied by the city of Vāraṇāsī was not the original site of the famous Kāśī of ancient records. The old city was largely situated in Rājghāt, a plateau on the northern edge of present Vāraṇāsī. Archeological excavations of the site have yielded evidence of settlements going back to
c
.800 B.C.E. From then on the place was continually occupied.
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