Goswami, Jiva

(ca. late 16th c.) A pivotal figure in the
Gaudiya Vaishnava religious community,
along with his uncles Sanatana Goswami
and Rupa Goswami. Although the
Gaudiya Vaishnavas were founded by the
poet-saint Chaitanya, it was the
Goswamis who brought order and systematic thinking to Chaitanya’s ecstatic devotionalism. The Goswamis were
southern brahmins by origin, but their
family had resettled in northern India.
Their lives were transformed when
Rupa and Sanatana met Chaitanya.
Chaitanya dispatched the brothers to
Brindavan, the village where the god
Krishna is believed to have spent his
childhood, with instructions to settle
there and reclaim it as a holy place. The
three Goswamis lived there for several
decades, reclaiming the sacred sites
(tirthas), having temples built, and
above all providing the ideas and institutions that defined the Gaudiya
Vaishnava community. Jiva was a versatile scholar who wrote on many different aspects of Vaishnava devotion,
but is best known for his works on
metaphysics, which provide the community’s basic philosophical underpinnings. For further information see
Sushil Kumar De, Early History of the
Vaishnava Faith and Movement in
Bengal, from Sanskrit and Bengali
Sources, 1961.