Śrī - Śrī Prema-bhakti-candrikā of Narottama dāsa Thākūra , Translation by Gadādhara-prāna dāsa
“Sri Narottama dasa Thakura appeared in the first generation of Gaudiya Vaisnava acaryas after the departure of Sri Gaurangadeva and His associates. Studying the situation at hands in terms of desa, kala, and patra (place, time, and person), Sri Narottama adopted a simple down-to-earth writing style using the Bengali language. The purpose was to take the gist of the deep siddhantas found in the Sanskrit literatures of the Gosvamis and then explain them in a simple poetic language which would serve as an ideal tool for preaching to the masses. Sri Sri-Prema-bhakti-candrika is the ripened fruit of this attempt. For persons who neither have time for learning Sanskrit nor carefully going through the enormous stock of Vaisnava sahitya left behind by the nitya associates of Caitanya Mahaprabhu, Sri Narottama has skimmed off the cream from all of those literatures, presenting their most essential theme in Sri Prema-bhakti-candrika.
Although this book can be easily understood by nearly anyone, Sri Narottama’s simple heart-rending language is so dynamic snd filled with the deepest, most confidential secrets of Krsna-bhakti, that vastly learned scholars will also become amazed and desire to read it again and again. In other words, the most refined kernel of suddha-bhakti cultured down to its simplest form is found in this book. For this reason, on occasions when Siddha Jagannatha dasa Babaji would be asked : “How can we come to understand what prema-bhakti is?”, he would reply: “Oh brother, just go to the marketplace and spend two annas to purchase Sri-Prema-bhakti-candrika.” -From the Introduction, by Gadādhara prāna dāsa.
“Sri Narottama dasa Thakura appeared in the first generation of Gaudiya Vaisnava acaryas after the departure of Sri Gaurangadeva and His associates. Studying the situation at hands in terms of desa, kala, and patra (place, time, and person), Sri Narottama adopted a simple down-to-earth writing style using the Bengali language. The purpose was to take the gist of the deep siddhantas found in the Sanskrit literatures of the Gosvamis and then explain them in a simple poetic language which would serve as an ideal tool for preaching to the masses. Sri Sri-Prema-bhakti-candrika is the ripened fruit of this attempt. For persons who neither have time for learning Sanskrit nor carefully going through the enormous stock of Vaisnava sahitya left behind by the nitya associates of Caitanya Mahaprabhu, Sri Narottama has skimmed off the cream from all of those literatures, presenting their most essential theme in Sri Prema-bhakti-candrika.
Although this book can be easily understood by nearly anyone, Sri Narottama’s simple heart-rending language is so dynamic snd filled with the deepest, most confidential secrets of Krsna-bhakti, that vastly learned scholars will also become amazed and desire to read it again and again. In other words, the most refined kernel of suddha-bhakti cultured down to its simplest form is found in this book. For this reason, on occasions when Siddha Jagannatha dasa Babaji would be asked : “How can we come to understand what prema-bhakti is?”, he would reply: “Oh brother, just go to the marketplace and spend two annas to purchase Sri-Prema-bhakti-candrika.” -From the Introduction, by Gadādhara prāna dāsa.
“Sri Narottama dasa Thakura appeared in the first generation of Gaudiya Vaisnava acaryas after the departure of Sri Gaurangadeva and His associates. Studying the situation at hands in terms of desa, kala, and patra (place, time, and person), Sri Narottama adopted a simple down-to-earth writing style using the Bengali language. The purpose was to take the gist of the deep siddhantas found in the Sanskrit literatures of the Gosvamis and then explain them in a simple poetic language which would serve as an ideal tool for preaching to the masses. Sri Sri-Prema-bhakti-candrika is the ripened fruit of this attempt. For persons who neither have time for learning Sanskrit nor carefully going through the enormous stock of Vaisnava sahitya left behind by the nitya associates of Caitanya Mahaprabhu, Sri Narottama has skimmed off the cream from all of those literatures, presenting their most essential theme in Sri Prema-bhakti-candrika.
Although this book can be easily understood by nearly anyone, Sri Narottama’s simple heart-rending language is so dynamic snd filled with the deepest, most confidential secrets of Krsna-bhakti, that vastly learned scholars will also become amazed and desire to read it again and again. In other words, the most refined kernel of suddha-bhakti cultured down to its simplest form is found in this book. For this reason, on occasions when Siddha Jagannatha dasa Babaji would be asked : “How can we come to understand what prema-bhakti is?”, he would reply: “Oh brother, just go to the marketplace and spend two annas to purchase Sri-Prema-bhakti-candrika.” -From the Introduction, by Gadādhara prāna dāsa.