Krishna-Seva: Traditional Ritual in the Practice of Bhakti Yoga

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In today's cultural atmosphere of competing spiritualities jostling with vague scepticism and strident "new atheism," we do well to listen carefully to thoughtfully articulated wisdom of bygone ages. An important voice for finding existential meaning in daily devotional practices (bhakti-yoga) can be heard in the sixteenth-century Caitanya (Gaudiya) Vaisnava tradition. In this brief but carefully crafted work, the author takes readers step-by-step through the deep reasoning behind these practices with special focus on seva- conscientious attending-to sacred temple images-concluding with a cogent explanation of why this practice is not to be mistaken for "idolatry".

Kenneth R. Valpey is a Research Fellow of the Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies and a Fellow of the Oxford Centre for Animal Ethics. He has been a practicing monastic in the Caitanya Vaisnava tradition since 1972.

Within the broad landscape of yoga traditions originating in India, bhakti-yoga-the yoga of devotion-stands out as particularly prominent. In the sixteenth century this form of yoga was made popular by a young, charismatic sage named Sri Caitanya. Traveling throughout India, he encouraged all whom he met-whether learned or unlettered, rich or poor, to practice a simple method of mantra meditation. In recent years, this practice has been popularized more widely, and even popular musicians have recorded several renditions of the chant, beginning with the Broadway musical entitled Hair. Much less known than this form of mantra meditation and less understood by most people are the various meditation centers in which the same chant is performed along with an elaborate program of daily "seva" service or attendance to the arca-vigraha, or sacred image, as an integral feature of vaidhi-bhakti-ssdhana, or the regulated practice of devotional spirituality (bhakti-yoga), also known as Vaisņavism, or the culture of participation in ultimate cosmic order, identified with the name "Vishnu".