Vaishnava Padavali

The padavali poetry reflects an earthy view of divine love which had its roots in the Agam poetry of Tamil Sangam literature (600 BC–300 AD) and spread into early medieval Telugu (Nannaya, Annamayya) and Kannada literatures (Dasa sahitya). These poetic themes spread rapidly as part of the Bhakti movement, which emphasized an intensely personal form of devotion inspired by the philosophy of Ramanuja and rejected caste distinctions and other Brahminical conventions associated with the theism of Adi Shankaracharya. The movement spread out and attained a pan-India status during the 13th–17th centuries.

The accompanying literary movements were marked by a shift from the classical language of Sanskrit, to the local languages (apabhramsha) or derivatives, e.g. the literary language of brajabuli adopted by Vidyapati (14th century) and Govindadas Kaviraj

History

Vidyapati in Mithila (14th century) and Chandidas (late 14th century) in Birbhum. Chandidas was among the earliest poets in the nascent Bengali language, and many of his poems deal with the Radha-Krishna theme.

In 1474, Maladhar Basu translated the 10th and 11th cantos of the Sanskrit Srimad Bhagavatam (composed c. 9th century), into the Bengali poem SriKrsnaVijay. Maladhar focused on Krishna's divine life, with the 10th canto relating the legends of Krishna as a child, and his Leela with the Gopis in Vrindavana. He was honoured by Rukunuddin Barbak Shah with the title Gunaraj Khan.

Although neither Chandidas nor Maladhar Basu were Vaishnavas, they were to lay the foundation for much of the following Vaishnava poetry in Bengal.

Vaishnavism in Bengal

Vaishnavism in Bengal was given a tremendous boost by Sri Chaitanya (1486–1533), whose intense spiritualism infected many and started a movement across many regions of India. Chaitanya emphasized the role of merely uttering God's name in obtaining emancipation, and songs, sung passionately and leading to a trance-like state, were central to the path of bhakti. Chaitanya himself wrote many (source - ? gaudiya-vaishnavas say, that Chaitanya left only one song: Shikshashtaka) songs on the Radha-Krishna theme, and certainly encouraged the composition of new songs.

Major poets in the ensuing padavali tradition included Murari Gupta (srikriShNachaitanyacharitrAmr^ta), Narahari Sarkar, Basudev Ghosh, Lochandas, Jnanadas, Govindadas, Balaram Das, Syed Sultan and Dwija Chandidas (16th century). The 17th century saw the work of Kaviranjan (chhoto Vidyapati), Kavishekhar, Radhaballabh Das, Ghanashyam Das and Ramgopal Das; and were followed in the 18th century by Vaisnavadas, Chandrashekhar, Radhamohan Thakur (padAmr^tasamudra), Narahari Chakravarty (gItachandroday), Yadunandan and others. Many of the original texts are lost (some may never have been composed, as the songs came down in the kirtan tradition). The later anthology pAdakalpataru collects about 3000 Vaishnava lyrics by 150 poets.