What does it mean that Chaitanya is a mystic/incarnation?

I view Chai­tanya as a mys­tic, God pos­sessed man who exhib­ited great love of God and affected the lives of many oth­ers. I also view him as an incar­na­tion of Radha Krishna. I just love the open­ing chap­ters Chai­tanya Chari­ta­m­rita which describe the pur­pose of his incarnation.

Per­sons say to me, “I can accept Chai­tanya as a mys­tic or saint, but I can’t accept him as an incar­na­tion.” I say, “Does it mat­ter?” Chai­tanya came to spread love of God. If you accept him and his teach­ings and fol­low him because he is a mys­tic saint, what is the harm in that?

What does it mean to be an incar­na­tion, in-carne, in the flesh? He was a man. He had a body of flesh and bone. He walked the earth and there’s even a story of him defe­cat­ing. Who was in the flesh? Why Radha Krishna incar­nated in him? Was there an indi­vid­ual liv­ing entity in there also who became God pos­sessed? I don’t know.

Chai­tanya said it was wrong to call him God. He lived as a devo­tee of God and showed us how to love God by his exam­ple. Yet, it is also described how he man­i­fested him­self as Radha Krishna to cer­tain per­sons and other amaz­ing sto­ries. I’ve never expe­ri­enced any­thing like that, so I don’t know quite how to take them. I also know such writ­ers may be prone to embel­ish­ment and ele­vat­ing his posi­tion beyond what he ever con­cieved of.

Chai­tanya was rec­og­nized as God in his life­time by lead­ing per­sons of his day. Today, many per­sons accept Satya Sai Baba as God. So, what does it take to be an incar­na­tion in India 500 years ago? I don’t know? It remains one of those mys­ter­ies. That’s why we call it faith.

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 31st, 2006 at 05:27 and is filed under Steve's Musings. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.