Jayadeva

Literary contributions

The British scholar Thomas Leverton Donaldson mentions that the Gita Govinda was known at Puri not long after its composition, for the earliest commentary on it was written in Odisha around 1190. The village of Kenduli Sasan is a location "teeming with Vaishnava ruins and temples, perhaps more than any other site in India", notes Donaldson. He also notes an upswing in Krishna images in Odishan sculpture from the late twelfth century on, "long before such images became popular in Bengal or elsewhere in India." In the Jagannatha temple of Puri, the Gita Govinda is ritually sung every night during the Badasinghara ritual from the time of Jayadeva himself. The maharis or devadasis were instructed to faithfully render and perform the Gitagovinda according to the ragas of Odissi music, as known from inscriptions. During the Badasinghara Besa, the nighttime attire, the deities wear a special kind of fabric known as the Kenduli Khandua or Gita Gobinda Khandua, in which lines of the Gita Govinda are woven into the fabric using the ikat technique. The weavers of Kenduli Sasan used to provide these fabrics and this is also a ritual in vogue from the time of the poet himself.

Odisha has a tradition of writing the Gita Govinda in different forms, like in the form of a manuscript designed to look like a fish, or one that is made as a garland made of small round pieces of palm leaf, used as a portable text for memory. Manuscripts of the Gita Govinda have been written and illustrated in Odisha in large numbers, some of them counting among the finest pieces of Indian art. Dr. Bhagyalipi Malla, curator of the manuscripts section of the Odisha State Museum, writes :

An exceptionally large number of Gitagovinda manuscripts are preserved in the Odisha State Museum, numbering two hundred and ten. These include twenty one illustrated, one hundred and eighty non-illustrated and nine manuscripts of various shapes like garland, fish and dagger. Apart from the aforesaid palm leaf manuscripts, there are several versions of the Gitagovinda written in ivory, bamboo leaf and even handmade paper. There are eighteen different commentaries preserved in the museum.

Even today, traditional craftsmen and scribes come together in Odisha to finely stitch together leaves of the palm at one end for the manuscript to open up and fall like a chart made up of folios, on which the text of the Gita Govinda is written, complete with illustrations.

A few poems of Jayadeva written in archaic Odia have been published by the Directorate of Culture, Odisha. They describe the romance of Radha-Krishna and contain ideas very similar to those used in the Gita Govinda. Jayadeva is widely considered one of the earliest musicians of Odissi music. Every night during the Badasinghara or the last ritual of the Jagannatha temple of Puri, the Gitagovinda of Jayadeva is sung, set to traditional Odissi ragas & talas, such as Mangala Gujjari. This tradition has continued unbroken since the time of Jayadeva, who himself used to sing in the temple. After the time of the poet, the singing of the Gitagovinda according to the authentic Odissi ragas & talas was instated as a mandatory sēvā at the temple, to be performed by the Maharis or Devadasis, systematically recorded in inscriptions, the Madala Panji and other official documents that describe the functioning of the temple. To this date, the Jagannath temple remains the fountainhead of Odissi music and the most ancient & authentic compositions (including a few archaic Odia Chhandas and jananas by Jayadeva himself) survive in the temple tradition, although the Devadasis are no more found owing to their systematic eradication by the British colonial régime.

Two hymns of Jayadeva, have been incorporated in the Guru Granth Sahib, the holy book of Sikhism.

The hymns are written in a mixture of Sanskrit and eastern Apabhraṃśa (i.e., Apabhraṣṭa). There are records narrating how Jayadeva's work had a profound influence on Guru Nanak (first Sikh guru) during his visit to Puri.