From Śrīmad Bhāgavata to Caitanya Bhāgavata

In our daily Bhāgavatam reading today, the auspicious disappearance day of Śrīvāsa Ṭhākura, we have arrived at the culmination of Śrīla Śukadeva Gosvāmī's seven-day bhāgavata-kathā to Parikṣit Mahārāja.

The timing felt incredibly fitting: After three years of reading Bhāgavatam almost every day, we had the great opportunity on this special day to seek the grace of Śrīvāsa Ṭhākura and his grand-nephew, Śrīla Vṛndāvana dāsa Ṭhākura, to embark on a fresh journey of another Bhāgavata reading – Śrī Caitanya-bhāgavata.

In his opening words to his "Gauḍīya-bhāṣya" on Śrī Caitanya-bhāgavata, Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī Gosvāmī Prabhupāda said:

Just as the pastimes of Kṛṣṇa are described in the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, in this book [Śrī Caitanya-Bhāgavata] the pastimes – particularly the Navadvīpa pastimes – of Śrī Caitanyadeva, who is non-different from the son of Nanda, are described. Śrī Caitanya-caritāmṛta deals more with Śrī Caitanya’s pastimes as a sannyāsī in Nīlācala and therefore may be accepted as a supplement to Śrīla Vṛndāvana dāsa Ṭhākura’s book.

Vyāsadeva depicted the glories and divine pastimes of Śrī Kṛṣṇacandra and His devotees in the Bhāgavatam, while Śrīla Vṛndāvana dāsa Ṭhākura, the Vyāsadeva of Śrī Caitanya's līlā, beautifully narrated the glories of Śrī Gauracandra and His devotees in the Caitanya-bhāgavata. So really, this current milestone in our daily readings does not mark the culmination of the Bhāgavata for us; rather, we have only reached the halfway point. And after Śrī Caitanya-bhāgavata, with the blessings of Guru and Gaurāṅga, we will continue on with Śrī Caitanya-caritāmṛta.

Format of the new daily reading program

The daily Caitanya-bhāgavata reading will commence on July 3, Guru-pūrṇimā Day (20 days from now), which is the day we began reading Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam three years back. The readings will be six days a week, Mon–Sat.

Although the current Bhāgavatam program has been really nice, I want to make adjustments to this new Caitanya-bhāgavata reading so that it can be a little more interactive and everyone will be able to get even more out of it. Here is the new program I'm proposing:

7 AM India time (See other time zones below)

15 mins: Jaya-dhvani, Maṅgalācaraṇa and a different Mahāprabhu kirtan each day.
15 mins: Summary of what we read the previous day(s). (Every day we'll get a different participant to do this.)

7:30–8:35 AM

45 mins: The main reading
15 mins: Discussion
5 mins: A preview of the next day's reading and topics for discussion.

Since I've never done anything like this before, I'd like to keep the program flexible so that we figure out what works best for all of us. Also, I'm thinking to do this new program on Zoom so it will be easier for us to interact with one another.

Golden Volcano of Divine Love reading

In about a week from now, we'll complete the Twelfth Canto of the Bhāgavatam and will also be celebrating Śrīla Bhaktivinoda Ṭhākura's and Gadādhara Paṇḍita's disappearance day, Guṇḍicā Mandira Mārjana, and Jagannātha Ratha-yātrā. After that, in the gap of ten days or so between the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam and Caitanya-bhāgavata readings, I am planning to do a short reading of Śrīla Bhakti Rakṣaka Śrīdhara Gosvāmī Mahārāja's beautiful book Golden Volcano of Divine Love. I think this would be the perfect way to prepare ourselves for entering Śrī Caitanya-bhāgavata.

How to join the program

If you are interested in joining this new reading group, please fill out the form below. This will help me know how you'd like to participate so I can begin making preparations.

Sunday Caitanya-bhāgavata reading

Have you seen any of the weekly Caitanya-bhāgavata videos I've been putting up on the Vine of Devotion YouTube channel? If not, you can find them all here. So far, I made five videos for the first three chapters. The purpose of this reading is to get us familiar with the flow of Caitanya-bhāgavata so we will always have a good sense of where we are in the chronology of Mahāprabhu's pastimes when we begin the slower-paced daily reading in July.

Soon I will be adding a special section on this Vine of Devotion website with chapter summaries, PDFs, audio files and other resources for this Sunday Śrī Caitanya-bhāgavata program.

I can't wait to begin this reading with you! If you have any questions, ideas, or feedback, you can let me know in the comments section below. I'd love to hear from you!

Jaya Śacīnandana Gaurahari! Jaya Śrīvāsa Ṭhākura! Jaya Śrīla Vṛndāvana dāsa Ṭhākura!

Aspiring to please Śrīla Gurudeva and the Vaiṣṇavas,
–Madhukar das