More About Braj
Braj – The Past
Braj is not just a region on the map. For millions of Indians around the world, it is, even today, Krishna’s abode on earth. Krishna remains a popular deity in Hindu thought. The theology of Krishna devotion emphasizes a very personalized and unmediated devotion towards him. Consequently, the whole region has been worshipped for thousands of years.
Krishna is the topic of Braj.
Krishna manifested his divine play in this land; it is this playful nature which endears and establishes his reign over the hearts of those devoted to him throughout time and it is this which endears this land to his devotees.
Braj is the body of Krishna.
According to scholars every major forest in Braj corresponds to the various parts of Krishna’s body, hence the land is non-different from Krishna and walking about its sacred spaces is considered synonymous with being with Krishna. This is the feeling evinced throughout history by Krishna devotees and can and will be relished so long as these sites survive.
Krishna lived a simple pastoral life in Braj;according to traditional scriptures, Brajati gacchati iti brajah. “What moves around Braj is Braj: the cows, gopas, gopis, and Gopal." Krishna as Braja-bihari always plays in the land of "his own free, joyful movement". Krishna is the topic of Braj. Krishna manifested his divine play in this land; it is this playful nature which endears and establishes his reign over the hearts of those devoted to him throughout time and it is this which endears this land to his devotees.
A hundred years after Krishna left this world, Arjuna the Pandava ruler of Indraprastha (present day Delhi), brought Vajranabh, Krishna’s great- grandson, from Dwarka to Braj and appointed him king of the land of Krishna’s childhood and youth. At the time Braj, after the great war depicted in the epic Mahabharata, had been abandoned and the legendry places of Krishna had become untraceable.
Mathura, the capital of Braj during the rule of Ashoka and the Mauryas, was dominated by Buddhist influence and the sites of Krishna lila were once again neglected. The Muslim invasions and the fervour of the Moghul emperor Aurangzeb, further destroyed whatever vestiges time had left of the Braj tradition.
Between the 11th and 15th century images and deities were hidden in these kunds ;once again the forests of Braj grew thick and covered these sites.For over a thousand years the rulers of Hindu society were not Hindus. For eight hundred years Muslims ruled from Delhi. The whole surrounding region, including Vrindavan, bears the deep impression of this rule, which did nothing to foster Hindu culture, and at times bitterly suppressed it.
In the 15th century, during the great Renaissance of Europe, the Bhakti movement had spread to most of India. At this very time, Chaitanyadev of Bengal and Vallabhacarya along with their followers began another age of discovery, or rather rediscovery of the lore of Braj. Many images and deities were recovered from the kunds and installed in temples. The ban yatra to the sites of Krishna’s play were initiated by Chaitanyadev and Vallabhacarya. Narayan Bhatta, a disciple in the lineage of Chaitanyadev, was the first person to show how the geographical construct of Braj is a circle, or mandala, and was a great proponent of the yatra.
Braj- The Present
Yet what remains of Braj today has survived because factors that have lead to its destruction have been counterbalanced by efforts of restoration.
The Jat rulers of Bharatpur, the Scindias of Gwalior and the Maharajas of Jaipur continued their patronage of Braj after the reign of Aurangzeb. Their work to rebuild Braj is visible today in the art and architecture of the kunds, jal mahals, temples, ghats, and chatris that bear the distinctive imprint of their native Rajasthan. The kings of Jaipur also provided assistance when the worship of the deities was threatened and many of the sacred images were relocated to places in Rajasthan.
The Braj landscape saw much urban and agrarian development during the nineteenth and twentieth century. Nevertheless, there are some areas within Braj where both the landscape and culture have resisted major change.
At other places, however, in the absence of any systematic preservation, and after the decline of royal patronage, there has been much decay and stagnation of the kunds, groves and ancient shrines.
The threat to Braj does not come from outside invaders and tyrannical rulers but from the negligence within the devotee and pilgrim. Much of the Braj landscape has changed into obtrusive unplanned modern constructions, ubiquitous phone towers, encroachments and absence of proper infrastructure and sanitation.
Will the millions of pilgrims and devotees visiting Braj every year ever realize that none of the revered Krishna leelas were performed in the magnificent temples, lavish ashrams or guests houses that are mushrooming in the area?
However, devotees surprisingly find the ability to look beyond the destruction and concretization, and be ensconced in something far greater than themselves, feeling the enduring spirit of this sacred landscape even in the face of such large scale deterioration and destruction and in the midst of disease, despair, and filth.
The sacred landscape is rapidly disappearing
Only 3 groves or forests remain out the 137 associated with the legend of Sri Radha Krishna. Most of the kunds or water tanks, originally believed to be more than a thousand, have either silted up, been encroached upon or have been reduced to mere sludge tanks. The heritage hills of Braj, like the popular Goverdhan, are being reduced to dust through illegal mining, and large scale deforestation. Innumerable heritage buildings of Braj remain in a dilapidated condition in the absence of proper restoration efforts. Ignorance is the real reason behind this gross irregularity in the preservation and protection of this invaluable heritage.
The preservation of Braj’s natural sites, in their natural state, is the only means to uphold the memory of Krishna’s activities. As the sacred spaces of Braj were reclaimed over the last five hundred years, primarily through the efforts of Chaitanyadeva, Vallabhacharya and their followers, many of the groves and clearings around the kunds became the habitats of saints who renovated, restored and preserved them for posterity.
Without the existence of the forests, the groves, the water bodies, and the Yamuna, which are intrinsic to the legend of Krishna, the tradition that has endeared itself to millions of bhaktas or devotees will not endure in it’s original form.
It is an ongoing effort of The Braj Foundation to restore this significant and sacred landscape of its due sanctity by another phase of renewal and renovation.
