Ep 36: Prof. Tracy Coleman: Krishna stands for women empowerment

As we celebrate the birth of Lord Krishna on Janmashtami, we should also honour him as a god who models positive masculinity, says Tracy Coleman, Professor, Department of Religion at Colorado College, US, She says, “Bold, strong, outspoken or aggressive, women are not a threat to him. He loves them as they are. In the Gita Govinda, he even submits to Radha.” Krishna, she believes, can be potentially socially transformative in empowering women by shifting the male gaze, despite being seen as a divine, all-powerful hyper masculine figure.

In her research spanning early texts such as the Harivamsa, Bhagavata Purana and the poet Jayadeva’s Gita Govinda, Tracy explores Krishna in various shades, including his playful divinity and the “viraha-bhakti” or the longing of separation he inspires, which is akin to becoming one with the universal divine.

A scholar of Hinduism and its traditions of bhakti (or devotion), especially Krishna-bhakti in the Sanskrit epics and purāṇas, her teaching and research addresses issues of women, men, and gender in religion and society. Tracy has also been the Editor in Chief of Oxford Bibliographies--Hinduism since 2016. 

Timestamps
01:00 What drew Tracy to studying Sanskrit and the Hindu “bhakti” tradition; being intrigued by poet Jayadeva's Gita Govinda
05:00 “Kama” (desire) vs “prem” (selfless love): What the early Sanskrit texts say in relation to Krisna, Radha and the gopis
09:50 Krishna as the “Yogeshwara” of Bhagavata Purana vs the sensuous lover of Gita Govinda
13:14 ‘Yoga in action’: Krishna’s “karma yoga” vs Buddha’s renunciation
20:00 The Bhagavad Gita places everyday actions in a larger context, as part of a greater cosmic plan
25:00 Krishna’s childhood, his relationship with both his mothers; the supreme god conceived as a human in the early texts
31:15 Krishna as a symbol of women’s empowerment; loves women just as they are
46:50 Play is an essential part of his divinity, signifying divine freedom and inspiring “bhakti”
52:46 “Viraha bhakti” as devotion during separation, embodied by Radha and the gopis
58:14 There is no Krishna bhakti without suffering
01:05:28 Happy Janmashtami!

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hi, Welcome to Swishing mindsets. This is anaradha and today
I'm speaking to Tracy Coleman, a professor in the Department
of Religion at Colorado College in the US. A scholar
of Hinduism and its traditions of bakti or devotion, especially
Krishna Bakti in the Sanskrit epics and Puranas. Her teaching
and research addresses issues of women, men, and gender in

(00:22):
religion and society. Tracy has also been the editor in
chief of Oxford Bibliographies Hinduism since twenty sixteen. Hi, Tracy,
I hope that introduction was good enough.

Speaker 2 (00:35):
Thanks for having me. The introduction was just fine. I
appreciate your inviting me to talk with you.

Speaker 1 (00:41):
Me too, It's my pleasure entirely. And so before we
talk about Krishna, because you know we're close to jenmasched me,
I'd like to know more about you. And you know
you've also studied Oria, a Sanskrit scholar. So what drew
you to you know all this?

Speaker 2 (01:00):
Well, it was an interesting and circuitous path to Krishna
Bukti traditions. When I was an undergraduate at a liberal
arts college, I studied French and chemistry actually in a
variety of other topics as well, and other languages. And
I was a French major. And after that I went
to I spent a year in Paris, and I got

(01:22):
a master's degree in French. And so I wasn't studying
Sanskrit texts or even religions generally at that time. But
after I did a master's degree in French in Paris,
I decided that I wanted to study religion or philosophy.
And so then I went to Harvard Divinity School and

(01:44):
I got a master's of theological studies at Harvard Divinity School.
And it was there at Harvard Divinity School that I
encountered Bukti as an academic subject in a broad ranging
class that I took on Bukti traditions with the scholar
name John Carman, who was an early scholar of Hindu
Bukti traditions. He worked in both Sanskrit and Tomil. And

(02:08):
I loved the whole class right I was. So I
was so taken by the Bukti traditions from that first
class immediately, and I was really intrigued by the Gida Govinda.
And I wrote my final paper in that class on
the Gida Govinda, and so I felt like it was
there in that moment in that class that I said this,

(02:30):
this is it, this is what I want to study,
and this is what I want to pursue. So when
I went on to get a PhD, then I got
a PhD in religious studies, and my focus was on
Sanskrit and Indian religions and Hindu traditions in particular, and
Krishna Bukhti in particular, and in the in between the class,

(02:53):
the first class on Bukti that I had and the
work that I did for my PhD, came really interested
in questions related to what the texts actually say, right,
what's the language in the text themselves? And what are
the popular interpretations of the text? Right? What do people

(03:15):
say about these texts in popular traditions and also in
scholarly commentarial literature that has been produced through the centuries.
Because I felt that the way people were interpreting the
texts in popular spaces and commentarial traditions alike didn't really
represent the text. And that's how I went to the

(03:36):
text in the first place. I wanted to see, well,
what do the text say? Because the way people are
talking about Radha and her relationship to Krishna and how
Krishna feels about Radha. It doesn't seem to me that
that's what the text is actually saying. So I wanted
to go back to the text and see what the
text were saying. And when I did that, I didn't

(03:56):
end up focusing on Radha in the guidego Vinda in
my PhD. I went I just kept going earlier. Right,
where are the earliest places where these stories of Christiana
and the Gopies appear? And what is the language that's
used to describe Krishna's interactions with the with the Gopies.
And it was a very it was a very interesting

(04:19):
journey that took me back to those early Sanskrit texts
and the questions that I the questions that that that
kind of research generated are questions that I'm still answering
now kind of decades later, Right, I'm still exploring some
of the some of those same questions and finally, I
think generating answers that are interesting and meaningful and that

(04:44):
I hope will be impactful.

Speaker 1 (04:47):
Yeah. Interesting, So you went right back to the source
of it all, right, Yeah, So what for these questions
that you wanted answers to that you're doing that prompted
you to go back to the source to see what
the original had to say.

Speaker 2 (04:59):
Well, when I read the Gitagovinda in that Bukti class,
of course, we were reading it in translation and talk
about it talking about it in the context of Bukti
more generally. But it seemed to me that Radha loved Krishna,
and Krishna loved Radha. And it seemed to me that
there was real desire and passion and longing and pain

(05:20):
that was mutual in that relationship. Right, that this was
depicting a really intense and passionate love affair and that
the feelings were mutual. But when people described Radha and
associated her with the Gopis and talked about Radhan and
the Gopis love for Krishna, they talked about it as

(05:42):
a selfless love that's all about pleasing Krishna and serving Krishna.
And that wasn't about desire, right, that it wasn't comma,
it was prima. So I had to do some philological
work on these terms and what they mean and how
they were being interpreted and used in this context and why.
But that they didn't want anything from Krishna in return.

(06:03):
They only wanted to serve Krishna. They only wanted to
give selfless lead towards Krishna. And I thought to myself,
it doesn't seem like Radha in the Gida Govinda by Jayadeva, right,
not at all. In fact, she's bold, she's demanding, she's jealous,
she's angry, and she wants Krishna to love her exclusively

(06:23):
and she doesn't want him to be off frolicking with
all the other gopies. And it seemed to me that
she was feeling desire and that he's feeling desire for
her as well. So that's what I wanted to see.
Is this a kind of mutual relationship, a passionate mutual relationship,
or is it all about some kind of selfless service

(06:43):
that the Gopies and Radha feel for Krishna and they
don't want they're not asking him for anything in return.
They just want to give to him. And what I
discovered is that with respect to the gopies in the
Bagabuk in the Horrivun show sort of the earliest depiction
of the Rasalila episode, and in the Bagavadapurana as well,
the Gopies do feel kamma for Krishna, and he responds

(07:05):
to that comma right and in the Gida Goo Vinda likewise,
which I came back to much later in order to
write that piece for the Oxford volume on Radha, I
came back to the study of rad after a long
time away, and it was really interesting to do so

(07:26):
because the mutuality of the relationship struck me as even
more astonishing. Really, Krishna feels comma for Rata. In the
Gida Govinda, Krishna feels pain. Krishna suffers in separation from Rata.
So there's verra hubukti there for sure, but there's verra
hubukti on well. The term bukti is not really important

(07:47):
in the Gida Govinda, which is interesting, but there's love.

Speaker 1 (07:51):
And very senseless poem yea very simple.

Speaker 2 (07:55):
And they both suffer in separation from each other, and
Krishna suffers and separation from Radha, and Krishna loves Radha
with Kama and Prima and he longs for Radha. So
is a very interesting depiction of Krishna that Jaia Davia
certainly conceptualizes Krishna as the supreme God and the early

(08:18):
chapters in the Gitagovinda celebrate Krishna as the supreme God
who takes form in all these different of ataras and
who is an invincible masculine warrior. But Jayadeva focuses on
this very one specific episode with Radha, in which Krishna
is depicted as a very submissive, vulnerable lover in his

(08:41):
relationship with Radha. So the contrast in all these different
kinds of masculinity, all these different positions of masculinity that
Krishna occupies, they're all there represented in the Gidagovinda. But
Jayadavia is really focusing on the desirous lover Krishna, who

(09:02):
is the lover and beloved of Radha, who desires Radha,
who suffers in separation from Radha. And it's it's quite
quite remarkable. And Rada, of course powerful in the Getagovinda, right,
she's demanding, she's powerful. She wants Krishna to love her,

(09:23):
and she wants him to love her exclusively, and she
gets what she wants, right, She gets what she wants,
gets what she wants to her.

Speaker 1 (09:33):
And this is like a cleo. I mean, you're not
even interpreting it. This is what the is about, and
you know, there's gender equality there, there's democracy in there.
You know, relationship. I suppose the male gaze came in later.
You know, that's what it is.

Speaker 2 (09:48):
Really well, it's different. Even in the Baghava Dapurana, those
two traditions are very different. I mean post twelfth century
Guidagovinda in Sanskrit texts and in vernacular poetry and other compositions. Alike,
Rada becomes one of the Gopis and she is a gobi. Right.

(10:09):
Radhan Krishna have their love affair when he's growing up
in Vrudj, but she's not there in the Baghava Da Purana.
So the Bagava Da Purana and the Guidagovinda represent two
different literary traditions and they depict Krishna in some ways
very differently. So when Krishna is in the cowherd community

(10:30):
and he plays his food and he lures the gopies
to the forest and the night, he definitely pleases the gopies.
And in the Bagavat Purana as well, the gopies feel
comma for Krishna and they love Krishna and they want
him to respond to them and they want his body right,
it's also very sensual. But Krishna is depicted much more
as Yogishwrada, the lord of Yoga, the supreme god who's

(10:52):
always in control of his emotions. So he responds to
his devotees in loving ways, and he responds to their
particular This is one thing that's that's unique and powerful
about the theology of the bagavad Purana. It says that
no matter how one is is approaching Krishna, whether it's
with Kama or Prima or Croda anger, whether one is

(11:17):
an enemy or a lover or a mother, Krishna responds
to that devotion right.

Speaker 1 (11:22):
So Christian there's.

Speaker 2 (11:24):
Not one there's not only one way to approach Krishna
and to meditate on Krishna or to interact with Krishna.
And Krishna responds to people right where they are in
all these different ways. So the Gopis approach Krishna with
Kama intense passionate desire. And the Gopis are married and
the bag just as Rada has married in the Gidago Vinda.
So they rush from their homes and their husbands and

(11:45):
their children the night, and he responds to them. But
the Burana doesn't have Krishna loving the Gopies in the
same way suffering in separation from the gopis. Right, So
the mutual that's there and that's so striking in the
relationship between Krishna and Radha in the Gida goo Vinda,

(12:08):
is not there in the Bagavada Purana. Krishna response to
the gopies of course, and he plays with them and
he adores them in a in a kind of way,
but he's there's always this kind of supremacy and yoga
that characterizes his behavior, so he doesn't get entangled in
the emotionality of it the way that he does in

(12:29):
the in the Bagava Da Purana or in the Gida
goo Vinda. But eventually those traditions merge and Rada becomes
conceptualized as one of the Gopis, and she appears even
in the in artistic depictions of the Rasalila that are
based on the Bagavata Purana, even though she's not there
in the bagavat Purana. So they're two different sides of Krishna.

(12:51):
They're not totally different, but they're very different in the
way they portray Krishna as feeling desire and emotion and
suffer and pain were not right.

Speaker 1 (13:02):
You also mentioned the yoga nature of it, all right, So,
and you've said in one of your papers that you know,
Christiana signifies yoga in action and you've compared him to
the Buddha as well. So going to talk a little
about that.

Speaker 2 (13:14):
Yeah, yoga in action is karma yoga specifically, And this
is a scrolling down in my notes here. This is
a really the the concept of karma yoga is central
to the bagavart Gita, and it's it's an idea, it

(13:36):
becomes a doctrine and a practice that originates there in
the Bagavargita, and it's central to the philosophy of the Bagavdita.
Karma yoga yoga in action, and it is I think,
in the context of the Bagavargita and the Mahabarata. It's
obviously a response to renuncient traditions. So it's a response

(13:58):
to the Buddha, who is a renown and it's a
response to other ascetic teachers in that time period in
the Melia in which the Mahabarata and the Ramayana also
were produced. And it is a conceptualization of yoga that
is opposed to renunciation. So the Buddha was born a

(14:19):
prince right his father expected him to become the heir
to the throne. He had a wife and his son,
and a harem of women. He was ekshatriyah, et cetera.
But he renounced all that. He renounced his kingdom, he
renounced his family, and his renunciation of his father, his kingdom,
his wife, his son, all of his social responsibilities and

(14:41):
his familial responsibilities is central to the Buddhist biography and
central to the Buddhist teaching, which is called dharma, and
dharma in the Buddhist conceptualization of things becomes the path
to moksha, liberation from sansara. So if you want to
attain the opiration from sensara, according to these yoga and

(15:02):
aesthetic traditions more generally that we're very significant at the
time that the Sanskrit epics were composed, then you have
to renounce and you have to renounce your social obligations.
You have to renounce your hasta dharma, your householder responsibilities,
your family, et cetera, and go off and meditate and
practice yoga. The Ramayana and the Mahabarata are telling people, no,

(15:27):
you can't just renounce your social responsibilities, right. You can't
just renounce your obligations to your family and to society.
You can't become a renouncer, even if you might like to,
especially if you're akshatriya, especially if you're an heir to
a throne, especially if you have social responsibilities to an

(15:47):
entire kingdom. So Karma yoga in the Baghavagita is a
response to the Buddhist dharma and to ascetic traditions that
encourage people to renounce and to renounce in the prime
of their lives. Right. So Karma yoga yoga in action says,
not only do you not need to renounce in order
to practice yoga, but you shouldn't renounce in order to

(16:10):
practice yoga. You shouldn't renounce your social obligations because and
you don't need to because you can practice yoga in action.
You can practice yoga in everyday life. So it's really
important in this context to remember that yoga is a
path to moksha. Right. Yoga is a path of salvation
like yana in the Upanishads or a Dwaita Vedanta. So

(16:32):
it's a really it's a very novel, innovative and a
very radical teaching this karma yoga that appears in the
Baga Agita because it tells it's a critical statement on
non renunciation in sharp contrast to the renuncient traditions, and
it tells people that you don't have to renounce in
order to step on the path to moksha. You can
practice yoga in the midst of your everyday life, right

(16:53):
in the midst of your daily activities. You can practice yoga.
You can be on the path to moksha, the path
to peace, and you can experience that in everyday life.
So not only should you not renounce, but you don't
need to renounce in order to step on the path
the moksha. You can practice yoga in everyday life. And
of course, within the context of the Baghabad Ghita and

(17:14):
the Mahabarata, Krishna is teaching this to Arjina, who's a
kshatriya who has to go fight a terrible battle. And
Arjina sees everyone to rate it on the battlefield and
he says, I don't want to fight those people that
I know and love and respect, And Christia says, well,
you have to because you're kshatriya. Right, but you can
fight the battle as a yogi, as a karma yogi,

(17:38):
and you can be free from the consequences of the
battle if you engage in battle as a yogi. So
the larger message that people have taken from this, and
I think this message of karma yoga is one that
has become incorporated into popular Hinduism up to the present day,
is that you can practice yoga in your everyday life.

(17:59):
If you're a or, if you're a king, if you're
a son, if you're a husband, if you're a wife,
if you're a mother, whatever you are, whatever you have
to do in order to fulfill your social obligations in
everyday life, you can still practice yoga, right. You can
still meet those social obligations, but you don't have to
retire to the forest as an aesthetic. So it's a

(18:21):
very novel conceptualization of yoga that's anti renunciation, if you will.
But it opens the path of yoga and the path
to moksha, the path to salvation to all people in
their everyday lives. So it's really really important, and it's
one that is in very sharp contrast to the Buddhist
dharma and the teachings of the Buddha that are conceptualized

(18:45):
as dharma and that are aimed at moksha. And then
the Bagavadgita also, you know, pushes that concept a little
bit further in relation to Bakhti, which really emerges as
a central theme in the Bagavad Gita. And there's some
seed versus in the bag of Akita. I think that
develop into the Bukti traditions all across the Indian subcontinent.

(19:07):
Because Krishna says, you can practice yoga in the midst
of even this terrible battle, but you can also be
a Krishna Bakta. Right, You can be a yogi and
you can surrender all your actions as a Karma Yogi
to me, Krishna. You can sacrifice your your entire life
for the divine and be my devotee in whatever circumstances

(19:30):
you find yourself, whether you're again, whether you're a warrior
fighting a terrible battle like Argina, whether you're a mother,
whether you're a king, whatever you are, you can both
practice yoga and you can be a Krishna, a Krishna
Bukdha and be on a path of salvation.

Speaker 1 (19:49):
Okay, So does that mean that you know, when you
look at Krishna in his life and message, does that
mean that you know, you practice detachment, so you have
your messy emotions, You're dealing with it. But you it's
like or you just lay your burdens on Krishna for
him to bear.

Speaker 2 (20:04):
You know, well, yeah, it's a great question. I mean,
you can lay your burdens on Krishna. And I think
it places actions of everyday people within a larger framework
that's very meaningful. Right, Why does Argina have to fight
the Mahabar to battle because he's a warrior, Because this

(20:27):
is a battle for the sake of dorma social order,
It's a battle of good versus evil. So it situates
Arjina's personal actions when he's called a battle, in a
very large and even cosmic context and gives them meaning
in a different way. So people can understand that the
actions that they have to do that they might not

(20:49):
want to do, they understand those actions as having a
larger purpose, right, being part of something that's bigger than them,
part of a family, part of a social order, part
of a community. Right, that is, it is representing good

(21:11):
against evil. And in that context, yoga is very helpful
because you can detach from the really intense emotions that
you might feel towards what you have to do. You know,
for Argina, he doesn't he doesn't want to kill, but
he also shouldn't kill because he wants to kill her
because he because he feels anger and he wants to
slay people out of anger. He's doing it for the

(21:31):
sake of dharma. So dharma also gets associated with yoga
and and action and enables people to act for the
greater good. Right, whatever people have to do, they're doing
it not just for themselves selfishly, They're doing it for
the greater good, for the good of the family, for
the good of society.

Speaker 1 (21:54):
Almost like a cosmic plan, a plan that's.

Speaker 2 (21:58):
Right, that's right. And so yoga, dharma, bukti, they're all
intertwined in the philosophy of the of the Bagavagita in
that way.

Speaker 1 (22:07):
Yeah, Tracy, you've spent so much time, you know, I
must in the world of Krishna and Pakti and you
know Hindu religion. Really, how do you see Krishna personally?

Speaker 2 (22:19):
Oh, that's a really hard question.

Speaker 1 (22:22):
If you will have any answer to that.

Speaker 2 (22:26):
Well, there's so many different ways. I mean, a lot
of your questions related to women, to the Gopis, to
Krishna's mothers, to Radha, but also to Karma yoga and
how he's conceptualized historically. But I was also thinking in
relation to the Bagha Agita, especially that there's the playful
side of Krishna that's represented in the stories from the

(22:48):
Baghavad Purana, Christian's childhood, Christiana's youth, Kristna's interactions with the
Gophahs and the Gopis and everyone. But then when he
grows up and leaves the cowhard community, that's when he
orchestrates the Maha bar to battle. And that's an aspect
of the Baga Agita that's really important. There's the playful, sweet,

(23:09):
loving side of Krishna, the mischievous, naughty child that everybody
loves so much, and all the traditions related to that.
But then there's Krishna is the cosmic being. Right, This
is what oh, this is what Argina sees in chapter
eleven of the Baga Agita. That Theophany and he says,
you know, I want to see you in your cosmic form.
If you think I can see you in your divine form,

(23:29):
that you have described, then let me see you as
you really are. So Krishna shows him who he really is,
and Argina is terrified, right, so because it's terrifying because
Krishna is everything in the entire cosmost including all the
violence in the cosmos and everything else. So, I mean,
I don't know, I think about all these different stories

(23:50):
when in my own research and in my teaching, so
I think, I don't know. I don't want to say
that I know exactly Krishna is or what Krishna is.
I think there's still a lot of mystery there that I.

Speaker 1 (24:06):
Just to you what it means to you, Just what
what what Krishna means to you? Really?

Speaker 2 (24:13):
M M. I mean all that I think you know,
all of those all of those things, all of those things,
all that power, and and all of the stories also
that that are that are related to women, and I
think what those stories are saying in relation to masculinity
and femininity and women in particular.

Speaker 1 (24:37):
Yes, because he embraces both masculinity and femininity. So it's yeah,
mm hmm true. So tell me. You know, we were
talking about Krishna's childhood as well, and in the pub
with you said, you know there are so many stories.
Any any story that stands out for you, any favorite
stories from there, Well, they're.

Speaker 2 (24:57):
All fun, you know, they're all fun. An these playing
he plays like a child and he has a lot
of fun. And I think you you know, you asked
about his mother's his very human connection with his mother's
and this is something that I'd like to pursue more
later in my own research.

Speaker 1 (25:17):
Because I mentioned it in passing in one of your papers.

Speaker 2 (25:20):
I remember, yeah, I mean in the earliest phill biography
of Krishna, which is the Harivanta, which is part of
the the epic Mahabarata, so written you know in the
early centuries of the Common era, the question of Krishna's
mother and Krishna's Christna's being on earth is asked explicitly

(25:43):
in relation to his becoming human. So when Janamejia is
asking by Champayana to relate all the stories of Krishna
and the Pondavas and and everything that Krishna did when
he was human, Janamijia's question is about Christian's becoming human.
Why did he become human? He's the supreme God, He's
the cosmic power. He is the creator of everything in

(26:07):
the entire cosmos and the destroyer, the supreme discus wielder,
et cetera. Why does he become human? How could he
possibly become human? And why would he become human human
and descend to this place where there's so much pain
and suffering and grief, et cetera. Why would he become human?
And in asking these questions about Krishna becoming human, he's

(26:31):
emphasizing that he enters into the womb of his mother, right,
And there is actually there's some the narrative describes kind
of the biology of Conceptionist people understood it at that time,
and they clearly understood something about the different fluids and
embryos and things like that. So in that earliest text,

(26:53):
I think there's really an emphasis on the idea that
Krishna becomes a flesh and blood human, right, that the
supreme god Vishnu, when he becomes an Avatara and enters
onto the world stage, he becomes fully human and he
is conceived, I think, in the normal way that everybody

(27:13):
else is conceived, and he he you know, he's just
stated in the in the in the uterus, in the
same way that all other human beings are are created
and born, and Johnamja is emphasizing this, right, how could
he enter into the womb of an earthly woman and
why on earth would he become a human? And there's

(27:37):
an emphasis on his humanity. And I think historically that
occurs because when we think about the text historically and
why that text is being produced in that particular time,
it's because the Buddha and other asthetic teachers who were
really powerful with human beings, right, and they were they
were human beings, but they were also conceptualized as more

(28:00):
than human, superhuman, even superior to gods, because they could
attain liberation from sensara. So the idea that the divine
becomes human in the Sanskrit texts that are produced by
brahmanical intellectuals emphasize anew this idea of God becoming human.

(28:20):
That so his relationship with his mothers, with his biological
mother is really important. I think in the Hari bunch
it's an important aspect as a critical aspect of his
becoming human in later texts, and this is some in traditions.
This is something that I'd like to study the biological
aspect of Krishna's conception and birth disappears, and even in

(28:45):
the bak of a Tapuran, it seems like there's more
of a mind born conception, right that Vasudeva somehow implants
Krishna in deve a key in a mind sort of way,
a mental way or spiritual and then he's born with
all his divine implements and forearms and things like that.

(29:05):
So the biological aspect of Krishna that is part of
his humanity disappears and sometimes gets explicitly written out of
the tradition later, but I think it's there in the Harivanshah,
and even in the later texta kind of spiritualize his
conception and his birth. They still celebrate his relationship with

(29:28):
his mother, with his foster mother Yeshodah, with all the
other Gopi mothers in Vrudj where he grows up, and
he has a really intimate relationship with those women as part.
It's an aspect of his divinity that's really important, the
intimacy that he has not only with women, also with
the Gophahs and the Gopis and with Arjina and other people.

(29:51):
But he has a special intimacy I think with women,
including his mothers, but also the Gopies as lovers and
also Radha as a lover and his wives as well.
Later in I don't think his wives get enough attention
and and I'm working on on that in a book
that I'm currently working on too. He has a very

(30:13):
intimate and loving relationship with with his wives.

Speaker 1 (30:19):
And that's that's you've got abi you've mentioned out of
your papers.

Speaker 2 (30:26):
Mm hmm. Yeah, it's an his relationships with women, positive
relationships right women, Affirming relationships with women. It's a central
aspect of Christiana's character and it begins with his mother's
and it carries on through his you know, through his
lovers and and his wives. But but it's there when

(30:47):
he interacts with people like Dropidy and Gandhari in the
Mahabarata as well.

Speaker 1 (30:54):
Yeah, and the women seem to have a right over him,
you know, as you've pointed out, it's he's not a
distant figure. He's I mean, there's devotion and all that.
But you know, so there's also a lot of equality,
right right, rather, yeah.

Speaker 2 (31:08):
There is a there is a lot of equality. You know.
When you asked about whether Krishna is Krishna be a
symbol for women's empowerment, and I think that the texts
are very much symbolic of women's empowerment in relation to Christna,

(31:30):
not in the sense of total liberation from gender norms
and social obligations. Right, It's always important to remember that
the Sanskrit text portray Krishna is an exemplar of dharma
shatria dharma. Right, He's a warrior, he's a supreme God,
he's a warrior, he's a prince uh and girl Hasta
dharma as well, so householder norma, and all of this

(31:53):
is in response again to the renuncient traditions that have
people renouncing their families. So women are obviously implicated in
that householder framework as well. And there is some gender
hierarchy in that householder framework even in the christianas stories
as well, but that's partly because he's depicted as the
supreme God, right even in his relationships with his wife.

(32:16):
So I don't want to say that there's no hierarchy
there at all, or there's a total reversal of the hierarchies.
And there is still a somewhat socially conservative aspect to
his empowerment of women within the framework of Dharma Shastra.
But as an exemplar of Dharma and as a heroic
masculine savior who is also the supreme God. I think

(32:40):
Krishna traditions, Christna's stories in these Sanskrit texts present an
alternative model of masculinity that's different from Buddhist traditions, that's
different from Ramayana traditions. And I think this is a
deliberate construction of a different model of masculinity. And this
is something that I have just recently seen the consistence
and see in that depiction of Krishna as a lover

(33:03):
of women, as a god who respects women no matter
how they treat him right. It took me a long
time to see this, and now I think it's one
of the most significant things that I've actually seen in
the text, and I want to talk more about it.
But in different texts from different time periods that portray
Krishna very differently, that that aspect of the model is consistent.

(33:26):
Krishna loves and respects women, all women, no matter how
they might treat him right, He loves them just as
they are, So I mean another way of looking at it.
And I was just thinking about this in response to
your question when I was kind of jotting some ideas
down in advance. The text depict him as recognizing women
in various positionalities, right, various circumstances, and all the various

(33:51):
positionalities that real women might occupy. So women of different ages,
women of different socioeconomic statuses, women of different marital statuses,
women of different classes or varna Jati's he sees them
all as they are, and he recognizes them and he
validates them in all those positionalities. He sees their different circumstances,

(34:12):
He sees their different emotions including anger, sorrow, desire, et cetera,
and he responds to those emotions right. He doesn't try
to fit them into one singular box and say, as
a woman, you have to behave in this particular way. No,
the GOPI love them would come and they say, please
give us your body, and he does it right, and
his wives interact with him in different ways, and Gondari

(34:36):
is so angry at him she curses him to die,
and he says, well, you're right. I mean, eventually your
curse is going to come true and I'm going to die,
you know, just as you say. So he legitimates women
having a variety of different emotions, even very bold emotions,
even negative emotions that are directed against him. So I

(34:58):
feel like he sees women and treats them as fully human.
He validates them in all their different circumstances, and in
doing that, he enables them to thrive as women in
all those different positionalities, right without punishing them. And with
respect to his wives, and he has many, many wives,
and some of those wives were in the position in

(35:18):
the possession of other men and demons before he took
them as his own wives in order to protect them
and please them. Right, so he didn't see them as
kind of tainted women who had already been in the
possession of other men, or women who needed to be
punished for some particular reason. No, he liberates them from
the captivity of these other demonic figures, and then he

(35:42):
protects them and he treats them in a dignified way.
The Bagavatapuranh and the Harivansa, they show him treating women
as in a dignified way, as very dignified beings. And
he loves all of his wives, and he pleases all
of his wives in every way, and he fulfills all
their desires and he never leaves them. Right, he is
absolutely their protector, which is one of the one of

(36:05):
the obligations of a husband from the classical Sanskrit text
from the Dharmashasro text. Right, women have certain obligations in
their marital relationships, and men also have certain obligations in
relation to their wives. And Krishna fulfills those obligations. He
treats women well and he does no harm to them. Right.

(36:25):
I can't think of a text where Krishna is doing
violence towards women, even when women are angry at him,
even when women curse him, like Draughbiti gets angry at
Krishna and Gandhari gets angry at Krishna, and you know,
public women, there's the there's the there's the episode in
the Harry Bunch of that I talked about in that
most recent paper that I sent to you where the

(36:47):
woman who has a crooked spine, so she has some
kind of a physical disability, but she's tasked with the
job of bringing oils, body oils and things to the king. Right,
so the Royal Pa and she encounters Krishna and Balarama
after they have left Brudge, and she encounters them on
street because she's a working woman. So she encounters them

(37:07):
in public, and Christian and Balarama say, you know what
do you have there? We need some body oils because
we're all Dustian and we need to anoint our bodies.
So she gives them. Instead of refusing them and saying, no,
these are these are oils meant for the king and
only the king, she gives them the body oils. And
then their bodies are They look all beautiful after they're

(37:30):
anointed with these really sweet smelling oils. And the woman
she says, you know, you boys are pretty handsome. You know,
why don't you hang out with me for a while,
And she basically propositions Krishna in public, and Kristna takes
that all in stride, right, Krishna and Balarama, they take
that all in stride. They laugh it off, and then

(37:51):
Krishna heals the women. The woman, even though she's propositioning
him sexually, basically saying, don't you stay here with me
for a while, you handsome man. And so instead of
punishing her for being you know, bold and aggressive and
sexually aggressive right there in a public space, Krishna heals her, right,

(38:11):
He heals her. He makes her spine straight, he makes
her beautiful, and so she can carry on with her
with her work. That has heard the Haharma and Krishna
and Balarama carry on their way, and then they go
and slay concept. So he encounters women in all these
different positions, but he never does violence to them, even

(38:33):
when they act boldly in ways that are characteristically unfeminine.
Right when you're thinking about the way, the idealized feminine
that that is there in the Sanskrit epics, Even when
women are not acting in those idealized feminine ways, women
who are strong and outspoken, women who are aggressive, women
who are in public and acting boldly in public. Krishna

(38:56):
interacts with these women as if they are people too,
and he respects them. He responds to them, He doesn't
punish them, He doesn't do any violence towards them. He
may not always give him exactly what they want in
the moment, but he certainly doesn't punish them, and he
doesn't do any violence towards them. So I think the

(39:17):
stories hold enormous potential for social transformation and for empowering women,
because I think that Kristna and I do think this
is deliberate in the text. I think that Krishna represents
a model of masculinity that's not threatened by women, a
model of masculinity that's not premised on the idea that
women are the most dangerous other, right, that women are

(39:41):
threatening to masculinity, the most dangerous threat to masculinity. So
Kristna can be masculine and feminine. Jayadeva can celebrate Krishna
as the invincible masculine warrior and the submissive, vulnerable lover. Right,
because femininity is not a threat to Christiana's masculinity. He
can occupy all those different positionalities as a masculine figure,

(40:04):
and he can respect and enjoy women who occupy a
variety of positionalities and who embody and perform femininity in
a variety of different ways. Right, So he can enjoy women,
and he can respect women, and in that model of
masculinity that doesn't conceptualize women is like the most dangerous

(40:28):
threat to masculinity. That's that's why he can enjoy women, right,
That's why he can enjoy and respect women in all
these different ways, in very sharp contrast to other conceptualizations
of masculinity that we might not mention by name here
where women represent a dangerous threat to the power and

(40:48):
prestige and purity of the men in question, and these
are you know, there are models in Buddhism and their
models in Hinduism as well. And when women represent the
most dangerous other and the most dangerous threat to men,
then those are models of masculinity that demand certain behaviors
of women. There are models of masculinity that justify controlling women,

(41:11):
policing women. There are models of masculinity masculinity that justify
violence towards women. Kristna traditions don't justify violence towards women, right,
I mean, Krishna is violent towards the female demonic figures
who come to Rudge with the purpose of destroying him
and destroying anybody else in Drudge that they might have

(41:33):
to destroy. So but even then, like even Putana, for example,
who comes to kill Krishna disguised as a mother, she
still attained salvation, right, but she's she is like ontologically demonic,
and she's there with the purpose of killing him and
killing anybody else who might be there. So when he

(41:56):
kills her, he kills her because of what her larger
purpose is in the life, larger scheme of things, but
human women, his wives, the gopies, his mothers, public women
he encounters on the on the streets, Gondhari Drapity. No, So,
I think it's it's a it's a So he's empowering
to women as a different model of masculinity, a model

(42:20):
of masculinity that respects and celebrates women for who they
are and enables women to be different. Right, there's not
Women aren't just one particular thing. Women are all different
and and that's the way they're born, and that's the
way they are in the world. And they have the
right to be different because that's who they are. And
Krishna recognizes them and all those different positionalities and he

(42:41):
loves them. I think that message of Krishna respecting and
loving women and responding to them in ways that are
that are respectful and compassionate is a consistent theme in
all of the texts that I have seen.

Speaker 1 (42:58):
Yeah, I love what you said that except women for
what they are and as people. So there's no one
way that women don't have to be perfect. You know,
they're full. I mean, they're all individual. You know, somebody
can be jealous, they can be angry all at the
same time. So it's wonderful. It's a model of masculinity
which is relevant even today.

Speaker 2 (43:16):
It is relevant even today. So if this podcast is
being produced and for the occasion of John marsh to
be in twenty twenty four, then we should celebrate the
birth of Krishna as the birth of a different model
of masculinity that is in fact respectful of women and
also potentially socially transformative in empowering women by shifting the

(43:44):
male gaze, if you will, by shifting what means to
be to be a masculine figure, and even a hyper
masculine figure. We can talk about Christian as a hyper
masculine war your savior figure. Right. But even within that
conceptualization of Christna's hyperman masculinity and divine all powerful, right
omnipotent masculinity, he still loves women. He still respects women,

(44:09):
he still recognizes women as people, and he's still able
to interact with women who are bold, strong, outspoken, aggressive, whatever.
They're not a threat to him. He can enjoy them
just as they are.

Speaker 1 (44:23):
Yeah, that's perfect. He's not threatened by independent, strong women.

Speaker 2 (44:27):
No, he likes it this way. He loves he loves
them Broadhive is strong, strong and independent, and she's very
demanding in relation to him, and he submits to her. Right.
He submits to her in the end and he says,
place your foot on my head. He completely submits to
her right. So right, there is a reversal of the

(44:49):
traditional the traditional hierarchies in the context of that very intense,
passionate love affair that they have, and that's quite radical.
But in the context the wider context of the Christnas
stories throughout the millennia, or at least throughout the centuries,
I don't know if I can talk about all the millennia,

(45:12):
but throughout the centuries, it's not exceptional. That particular episode
that Jaya David dramatizes may be somewhat exceptional in the
radical reversal there, when Christna says, you know, place your
foot on my head, right, and he submits completely to
Radha and gives her total power over him. That that

(45:34):
might be exceptional in relation to many of the stories,
but it also fits within that larger context of Christna's
relationships with women as well. Men are a different story.
Men and men. He has no problem slaying men and
deans and men who who who are strong and outspoken,

(45:57):
who criticize him, who who might quote unquote threaten him.
The men don't really threaten him, threaten him either, because
of course he always has power over them, but he's
only he's only patient with them to a certain degree
before he before he uses one of his weapons to
you know, end their lives. But no violence towards women.

(46:20):
Even that, even if we can just say that he's
a masculine savior figure whose stories do not feature violence
towards women, that is a major, a major statement about
the theology that the Christian traditions represent.

Speaker 1 (46:41):
Yeah, and you know, one more thing that we were
talking about earlier that you know, he's a playful god,
but he's a god, you know, so it kind of
goes very well together, hand in hand.

Speaker 2 (46:52):
Well, they do go together. I think that play is
that is a central aspect of Christiana's divinity. And I
think play as it's conceptualized in these texts again throughout
the centuries, is its divine play. It's a central aspect
of the divine being when the divine is acting on earth.

(47:13):
So and it has different senses too, So early conceptualizations
of play in the Epic Maha Barita, for example, feature
Krishna the of atara as if he's an actor on
the stage. So the a atara descends to play a
role on earth. These acting in a particular role on

(47:34):
the earthly stage. So play in the sense of drama
is there in the in the early conceptual conceptualization of
the a atara. But play it, I think also, and
maybe always in relation to the divine, signifies divine freedom.
Why is Krishna playful because he's free. So Krishna or

(47:57):
God more generally, is not bound in some sara right,
So Krishna, the divine, is not born, It doesn't become
an avatara according to past karma or kama. The divine
makes a decision to become incarnate on the earth, and
that's a decision that's made in freedom for the for
whatever purpose it may be in different of atara forms,

(48:20):
the divine makes that decision and then descends in order
to fulfill a particular purpose or mission of slaying evil
and restoring order, as Kristna is said to do in
the Harivansha and in the Mahabarita more generally. So, there's
always a lightness and a freedom about the divine, even
when the purpose is very serious, right. I mean, there's

(48:42):
nothing more serious about the slaughter that we see in
the Maha Barata. And that's also the topic of the
of the philosophy in the Baghavata. But so the purpose
can be very serious, but the divine embodiment of that
purpose is playful because it's free, so Krishna, So that freedom,

(49:02):
that divine freedom, is what enables the play in all
the different senses, whether as an actor on the stage
or a playful, naughty, mischievous child in all the later
Lela traditions in which Krishna as a baby and a
toddler is playing tricks on Yashoda, playing tricks on the
Gopies and the Gopas, and he's just playing the way

(49:23):
children play. Right. Play comes from from divine freedom, even
when there's a very specific and serious purpose that's being
fulfilled by his descent or his incarnation. And I would
also say that play is something that characterizes his intimate
relationships with people, especially when he's growing up in Frudge.

(49:46):
So his intimate relationships with his mothers and with all
the gopies is very playful. His intimate relationship with the
gopahs when they're out in the forest, raising the cows,
playing the flute, hunting, swimming, whatever they might be doing.
That playful nature comes from his divine freedom, which is
also associated with his fearlessness. Right he's because he's divine,

(50:09):
he's fearless and he doesn't so he doesn't have to
be afraid. Everything can just be fun and playful for
him and his playful nature, especially as it's depicted in
the stories of the Baghava Dapuranha that are so popular
and that become the source for so many other traditions,

(50:29):
dramatic traditions and stories, artistic traditions, et cetera up to
the present day. That playful child, that the playfulness is
part of what makes him so lovable and approachable, and
so the playful aspect of Krishna is also a means
of inspiring Bukti because it makes him approachable, it makes
him lovable, It enables intimacy with all the people that

(50:52):
he interacts with. So it's a central aspect of Bukti
traditions as well, and of course it's central him contemporary
you know, performance traditions of the Krishna Ela, et cetera.
It humanizes Christna. There's something it's it's interesting and somewhat
ironic too, because that playfulness, especially Christna as a child

(51:14):
and an adolescent, really humanizes Krishna. But I would argue
that the play at its heart is an aspect of
his divinity. It's divine freedom.

Speaker 1 (51:26):
It's it's like Sorender really yeah.

Speaker 2 (51:31):
For surrender for him or surrender for others else as well.

Speaker 1 (51:33):
I mean, you know you consider as well. Yeah right, exactly, yeah, yeah, beautifully.
But Tracy, tell me, have you ever been to.

Speaker 2 (51:42):
India or I hadn't been to India. I haven't been
to India for a while, but I would like to
go back to India. And one of the things I
did during the during the pandemic, when the American Institute
of Indian Studies was offering all of its summer courses
online and instead of in person in India as they

(52:03):
have done for some decades, I learned I started to
learn Odiya. So I was learning it one on one
with a professor in bud Swar every day for two
plus hours for a couple months during the summer. But
I have never been to Odissa and so I would

(52:26):
really like to to get back there. I mean, there
are other things I'd like to do in India, but
that's one of the one of the things I'd like
to do if I have the opportunity to go back
to India soon.

Speaker 1 (52:37):
I hope you have your opportunity soon. Please tell me
you've mentioned you've talked about Vida Bakki. Yeah, we talk
a little about that here.

Speaker 2 (52:45):
Yeah, So Vira Habakti is devotion and separation right vera
is a separation and it's characterized by pain and sorrow,
grief and suffering. So devotion and separation, and it's suffering
in separation that comes after experiencing union with Krishna. So
Radha is an exemplary, is an exemplar of via Hbakti

(53:09):
because she's had this intense, passionate union with Krishna, but
then he leaves and she suffers in separation from him.
And the Gopis as well suffer in separation from Krishna.
So it's an excruciating kind of pain in separation from
Krishna that is embodied mostly by Krishna's lovers, but not
only Kristna's lovers, because others who have intimacy with Krishna

(53:33):
suffer and separation from him as well. But it's a
test of true bakti to remain devoted even in separation,
right when the beloved disappears, you remain devoted to the beloved.
But I think in the love story of Radha in
Krishna and the vahbakti that's represented there is also a

(53:56):
way of portraying union with Brahmin because Krishna is Brahmin, right,
So the performance traditions of that love story are all
about conceptualizing Krishna as Brahmin, simultaneously conceptualizing Krishna as a
human being who's the lover of Rata. So verra h

(54:17):
Bukti is a way of dramatizing union with Krishna, who
is Bremen, and the disillusion of the ego in the
universal divine, and then the pain and suffering that one
experiences in individuality again after uniting with Krishna and then
feeling separate right, feeling individual again, feeling separate from Krishna.

(54:38):
So the cosmic vision of Krishna, the dancing in the Rasalila,
the bliss of union with Krishna, and then the crushing
suffering in separation from Krishna. The loss and the longing
that one feels, that Rata feels, that the Gopis feel
waiting for him to return and he never does. You know,

(55:00):
that is via Hbukti. And it's dramatized one way in
a love story. But I think if one thinks about
Krishna is Brahmin, right, Christiana is everything in the entire cosmos,
then it's also a way of dramatizing the human the
human condition more generally, and the pain that we feel

(55:22):
in our condition of individuality as a result of having
our separate egos. And I think it's I think it's
a message that Jayadeva communicates in the Gita, the Gita
Govinda that in the kali Yuga, right we I talked
about this a little in my in the in that
essay that I wrote on Radha or the Oxford volume.

(55:44):
In the kali Yuga, when Christiana is no longer here,
according to the stories, everybody is separate from Krishna, right,
So everybody is kind of in a condition of VIRAHBUTI
if they are Krishna Bukta's and so one can contemplate
the story of Radha and Krishna, and one can contemplate
the Krishna leland all these different stories and experience a

(56:08):
kind of of union with Krishna even though Krishna is
no longer here. So the stories, the performance traditions, dance,
et cetera, all are means to union with Krishna at
a time when Krishna is no longer here embodied, you know,
as Krishna on the earth. And so I think that

(56:32):
there's much to be said about Vera and Vera Bakti
in relation to the Krishna stories and in in relation
to these philosophies that hasn't been been said. Whether or
not I'll have time to write, you know, more about
Vira in the short life that I have, I don't know,

(56:54):
but but I think it's an interesting topic. And so
and I think that So the love story, it's absolutely
a love story, but it's it's also a religious love story.
So its meaning is much more significant beyond the unique,
the unique love story of Radhnten Christian.

Speaker 1 (57:11):
Absolutely, what you said is a human condition, you know,
because we are separate from the divine right. That's I
mean by what you have being born and living an
individual life, right, that's what that's right?

Speaker 2 (57:24):
And you know, yoga is really all about that elimination
of the ego, right, the eradication of the ego in
order to to eliminate suffering from one's life. But in
the Hindu traditions that can sceptualize yoga in that way,
you know, it's in the Bagavagita. You know, Karma yoga

(57:47):
is allied with bugti. So practicing yoga, practicing bukti yoga
is a way of uniting with Krishna. But it's a
way that also requires the eradication of the ego and
a disillusion of the individual in the divine which which
can entail suffering. And so virahbukti entails a lot of suffering.

(58:11):
And that that's one thing I think that's worthy of
emphasizing as well, that no one is a Krishnabukta without suffering.
Radha suffers, the Gopis suffer, Yesho, Dha, Vasu, Deva, Deva,
key Arjuna, they all suffer in relation to Krishna. They
all have these very intense relationships with Krishna that are

(58:35):
that represent different modes, different emotions, right, different modes of
devotion to Krishna, moods Bavas. But but they all suffer.
So so.

Speaker 1 (58:47):
Why is that, do you think? Do you have a
theory for that?

Speaker 2 (58:51):
Well, I mean in part because Krishna is is exists
way beyond the individual. So if the Gopis want Christnas
to stay with them always and only them, and Rata
wants to have Krishna all to herself, that's just never
going to happen, because he has other duties to fulfill
and his descent on earth, right, so he has to

(59:13):
leave the Gopies in order to go orchestrate the Mahabara
to battle. But he's also more than just as individual body, right,
He's the cosma. He's the cosmos. He's everything in cosmos.
So if one wants him always to be contained and
accessible in some one finite form that is playful and

(59:37):
intimate and lovable, that just won't happen. So you have
to be willing to experience that passion and intimacy with Krishna,
I think. But you also have to be willing to
let it go and also let yourself go and let
all your own individual desires for that goat in order
to experience Krishna as something bigger. The stories of Krishna

(01:00:01):
leaving to fulfill some larger purpose, some larger mission. I
think represent that the cosmic nature of Krishna as well,
and the possibility that the human being can also overcome,
you know, their own their own egos and unite with
something that's much bigger than themselves, that is the Rishi

(01:00:24):
in this cosmic form. But even that entails suffering. I mean,
look what happens to Urgina when he sees the cosmic
form of Krishna in Theophany in chapter eleven of the Bagagita.
It's terrifying. You know, the Divine in all its cosmic
you know, glory and reality is infinite and encompasses everything

(01:00:48):
and is terrifying. So so the suffering, I think is
somehow is somehow encompassed by the divine reality, which is
bigger and more mysterious than we can really ever understand
or hold. Right, possessed and pain can never completely hold

(01:01:11):
and possess Krishna forever in exactly the way we might
want to even Radha. Right, when Christna says, put your
foot on my head, she might do that, and she
he might submit to her, and she might possess him
in this wondrous way that nobody else can. But she
can't hold him in exactly that moment, that blissful moment

(01:01:34):
when he surrenders to her completely forever, because she just can't,
because that's not the nature, that's not the ultimate nature
of the divine. So she has to let that go
as well.

Speaker 1 (01:01:47):
Yeah, that's beautiful. So what is that she wants really
about the larger purpose of life? Is there anything?

Speaker 2 (01:01:57):
Well? I think the theological that there are differ different messages.
There's certain there's certainly like in the Bag of rakitin
which that divine vision is so important. You know, Christian
is telling Argina, you have obligations, right, you have social obligations,
familial obligations that you have to fulfill no matter how
terrible they might seem. And you're probably going to suffer.

Speaker 1 (01:02:20):
A lot now, because in a life can't be about suffering.

Speaker 2 (01:02:24):
Something exactly exactly. But even in the midst of that
finite life, which might entail a lot of suffering, you
can experience your connection with the divine, which transcends that
finite moment and suffering by the finite moment of bliss,
whatever it might be, you can realize your connection with

(01:02:47):
the larger divine being that is, is that you know
the cosmic, the cosmic form, so and you might even
be able to see it like Argina. You know, you
might even be able to see a cosmic from but
you have to be careful what you asked for, because
because if you ask for if you ask Christians for
something and he gives it to you, it might not

(01:03:08):
be all sweet and playful and lovable. So so, yeah,
so it's interesting. So I think the suffering is an
aspect of.

Speaker 1 (01:03:16):
There's bliss as we see how you're the professor. You're
a professor of religion, so this is so interesting. Yeah,
well interesting, So there's suffering and there's bliss and yeah,
yeah and beautiful. Anything else you'd like to add, Tracy, Well,

(01:03:38):
I think it's a lot.

Speaker 2 (01:03:39):
I think I've I think I've said a lot today
and I think I have I think I have addressed
I think I have addressed most of your questions. I mean,
you know, you ask what Christian means to me, and
I'll just say that even though I came to the
academic study of Buckti and even the study of Sanskrit
late in life, when I was a graduate student at Harvard,

(01:04:01):
I encountered the Bagavagita and other Christiana texts when I
was significantly younger. So my dad had eclectic interests in
various religious traditions, and the Baghavagita and the Apunishads were
among the texts that he was really interested in and
that he shared with me when I was quite young.
And so I guess my first encounter with Krishna in

(01:04:24):
the Baghavagita was when I was quite young and I
read that text for the first time. So there was
a long span of time between those initial readings of
the Krishna texts and my coming to them as an academic,
right in a professional way, and learning Sanskrit and meeting
the texts in their original languages. But the seeds must

(01:04:48):
have been planted, you know, in my early years when
my dad shared the Bagavagita and other texts like that
with me.

Speaker 1 (01:04:58):
I'm may be glad that what's that? I should be
glad that that happened, because we've had such a wonderful conversation, and.

Speaker 2 (01:05:07):
We've had a great conversation, and then you have enjoyed it.
And I hope this podcast will be an interesting thing.
In relation to John mash to me, and you know,
if you ever, if you're ever interested in talking about
something else later, we can.

Speaker 3 (01:05:25):
Of course, of course, definitely I would just say happy
John Mush to me, to you, Happy happy John Marsh
to me to everyone, and happy John Mush to me
to women.

Speaker 2 (01:05:37):
Yes, is I think uh a divinity a deity uh
who supports women, who loves women, and who supports women,
And those are aspects of the story that we need
to emphasize more in order to bring those aspects of
Christmas divinity into into everyday life more and more.

Speaker 1 (01:06:00):
Absolutely, happy Gen Marsh me to you two, and thank
you for doing this.