The pastime of Lord Caitanya’s appearance is very special. First of all, the situation in Navadvīpa was very unusual. We know that India is the land of dharma, but we also find in Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam that there are different kinds of dharma. There is sanātana-dharma or bhāgavatadharma, the real eternal principles of religion, and there is also adharma, or irreligion. Now, increasingly around the world, there is also upadharma, which is something like dharma, but is a fake dharma or imitation dharma. Upadharma describes secondary religious principles—mostly different kinds of superficial things. 
Like people may do haṭha-yoga, some are claiming it as religion, but they are just doing it for good health. Not everyone is doing it for a spiritual purpose, although it is originally meant to be a basis for spiritual advancement. So like this there are different kinds of practices, which are actually not the real dharma.
Just before Caitanya Mahāprabhu came, people were mad about these superficial religious activities, which are actually just materialistic— not really spiritual. People were more interested in worshipping devas and devīs rather than Kṛṣṇa and Viṣṇu.
People would marry their daughters with big festivals and that was considered like a very big religious ceremony. Of course marriage is an important ceremony, but it is not the highest principle of spiritual life. The people were doing the marriage of their daughter like a big festival just to show that theirs was the richest, nicest marriage in the town— to show off that their family is more aristocratic, more glorious, more spiritual, more religious. Everyone wanted to be known as a religious person. It was not spiritual; it was just for name and fame. Then if someone was defeated—if another person held a bigger wedding and the first person had no more daughters—he would marry Śiva and Pārvatī murtis. Then someone else said, “You defeated me, now I will do in a bigger way. You are doing Śiva and Pārvatī, I will do something new that has never been done before—I will marry a male and female dog. Who can do the dog marriage?” Then another person decided he must marry a male and female cat. Like this it was going on.
All the Vaiṣṇavas were saying, “What is all this? What does this have to do with religion or spiritual life?” People were just doing big pūjās to get material benefit—hardly anyone was worshipping Viṣṇu, and no one was chanting the holy names. In fact they were saying that chanting would destroy the power of the holy name. The only time they were allowed to chant was while bathing in the Ganges. People were saying that the Ganges is pure, and otherwise in an impure state it’s not appropriate to chant. In so many ways the material atmosphere in Navadvīpa was increasing. And although superficially it was very religious, it was really zero point zero something percent—just in name it was religion. They were actually doing the fire yajña for their pet cat or dog. There was no real possibility to please Viṣṇu. Yajñas are for the pleasure of Viṣṇu—that was the problem.
Before the appearance of Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu, Advaita Gosāi appeared. He was a combined avatāra of Mahā Viṣṇu and Sadāśiva. He was thinking that in this Kali-yuga it is too difficult to give people love for Godhead. As Viṣṇu, He could kill demons and give mokṣa, but to give love, to actually to make people change, that is the most difficult thing—a miracle. So He decided that Kṛṣṇa Himself must come, because only Kṛṣṇa can give out His own love.
So Advaita started to loudly shout, “Hey Kṛṣṇa! Hey Kṛṣṇa!” and He worshipped the śālagrāma-śilā with Ganges water and Tulasī. He fasted, He prayed, He loudly shouted: “Lord please come down! If my name is Advaita, which means non-different, then let my name become true. You come down. I am requesting you please come. Gaurāṅga! Gaurāṅga! Gaurāṅga!” Śrīvāsa ṭhākura, he was also praying for Kṛṣṇa to come to correct all these irreligious acts. So the Lord agreed to come in the family of Jagannātha Miśra and Śacīmātā.
One day, Jagannātha Miśra had a dream: all of a sudden, a brilliant light came in his mind, and reached to his heart. He dreamt that Kṛṣṇa was in his heart, and then from his heart transferred over to Śacīmātā’s heart, and then entered into her womb. Normally the father and mother have relations at that time, but this was an immaculate conception, a spiritual transfer. They didn’t have any actual contact—it was a transcendental experience. In this way the Lord entered from Jagannātha Miśra to Śacīmātā.
Then Śacīmātā found that she was expecting a baby, and her husband was noticing she had become so beautiful—she looked like the goddess of fortune. People were walking up and saying, “Here my dear brāhmaṇa, take some money.” He didn’t have to beg for alms, people just walked up to him to hand over money. He was never rich before, but because the goddess of fortune had come to his house everything was becoming very auspicious.
Jagannātha Miśra said to Śacīdevī, “My dear wife, people are just coming and giving me money. What does this mean?” She said, “Maybe there is some great soul in my womb making everything auspicious. I have seen heavenly beings coming and praying to me.”
Many devas were coming and praying to Lord Caitanya, “Oṁ namo bhagavate vāsudevāya, jaya jaya śrī-caitanya jaya nityānanda, jayādvaitacandra, jaya gaura-bhakta-vṛnda! Lord Gaurāṅga! My dear Lord Kṛṣṇa, we understand you are appearing in this Age of Kali as Gaurāṅga. In every yuga you come as an incarnation. You come and give mukti, liberation, but it is very rare for you to give out love of Kṛṣṇa. But in this incarnation we understand that you are going to freely give out love of Godhead.
“We are your devotees from the heavenly planets, and we came here to beg for your blessings. We don’t want material blessings, we have enough material things—in the heavenly planets we have so much sense gratification. We have only two problems: one problem is that sometimes the demons come and attack us to conquer heaven and enjoy it. Hiraṇyakaśipu, Rāvaṇa, Bali Mahārāja—many have attacked us. Sometimes we are victorious, and sometimes they defeat us—this is a big problem. Another problem is so much sense gratification.
Apsarās, handsome devas, nice rivers, gardens, mystical powers; there is so much sense gratification that we forget to serve you, we forget your loving service. We are deprived of your love because of too much sense gratification.” Prabhupāda said that many of his followers would go to heaven. It is a danger if we are not focused on serving Kṛṣṇa. But these devas who came to the Lord they were focused, they were fed up: “Now we want love of Godhead. Please help us. You are going to appear on this planet and the human beings are going to get all your mercy. Don’t deprive us of your mercy, we also want to have love for Kṛṣṇa.” Lord Caitanya would make it so that a little shadow of the devas was visible. Mother Śacī said, “What is this? Who is in my room? Nṛsiṁha protect me. Some evil spirits are coming here.” Jagannātha Miśra and Śacīmātā were comparing their notes, and they said something special is happening, the baby has been in the womb for longer than nine months. Nowadays if the baby doesn’t come in nine months immediately they would do caesarian, but the Lord was in the womb for thirteen months with no caesarian—one reason why He had to appear five hundred years ago. Mother Śacī went to her father Nīlāmbara Cakravartī, who is a great astrologer, to find out what was wrong. He said, “Everything is alright, your son will appear on a full moon day.”
On the holy day of Lord Caitanya’s appearance it was the full moon pūrṇimā day, and also a lunar eclipse. The Vedic system is that when an eclipse comes you become contaminated, so the Hindus go to a sacred river at that time and chant the holy names of the Lord to counteract the contamination. 
So almost the whole city of Navadvīpa, thousands of people, all went to the Ganges, and they were chanting, “Govinda! Govinda! Hare Kṛṣṇa! Haribol!”
The Muslims were watching, and saying, “What are these Hindus doing? They are chanting Haribol! Haribol! They are chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa!” So although they did not have faith, they were also chanting. They were making fun of the Hindus, but somehow or other they were also chanting. The sound filled the air.
Śrīvāsa ṭhākura was thinking, “They say this eclipse is inauspicious, but look how everyone is chanting the holy name. This is a very auspicious time. Everyone is chanting Haribol! Haribol!”
In this way the whole town was filled with the holy name of Kṛṣṇa coming from the Ganges, so Śrīvāsa ṭhākura and all the Vaiṣṇavas were very blissful. Normally the people wouldn’t chant loudly the names of Kṛṣṇa. Smārta-brāhmaṇas said it was offensive to chant the holy name aloud—that the name would lose potency and since the people were impure they shouldn’t chant the name aloud—but when they were in the Ganges it was allowed because the Ganges is purifying, so everyone was chanting at that time. All the Vaiṣṇavas were very happy; they could hear how everyone was chanting the holy names. They were thinking, “Why is this called an inauspicious day, this is the best day of the year—everyone is singing and dancing, chanting the holy name in the holy river.” They started dancing in ecstasy to see that everyone was chanting.
So at that time Lord Caitanya appeared to come and give His mercy. When He appeared the moon was just rising, and the whole land of India was filled with the vibration of Hare Kṛṣṇa, Hare Kṛṣṇa, Kṛṣṇa Kṛṣṇa, Hare Hare/ Hare Rāma, Hare Rāma, Rāma Rāma, Hare Hare.
The news spread that Śacīmātā had given birth to a boy and He was very beautiful, He was golden in color. So all the neighborhood ladies came by to see, 
and the brāhmaṇa ladies were putting kuśa grass on His forehead, and sprinkling Him with rice colored with turmeric powder. It was a very happy, festive time. Even some of the residents from higher planets came down to see what the Lord looked like. Devas and devīs were disguised as brāhmaṇas and brāhmaṇis. Mother Śacī was amazed, thinking, “Where have all these people come from?”
Jagannātha Miśra was a poor brāhmaṇa, but in his mind he was giving away cows and huge amounts of charity. He was in bliss to have such a beautiful child. In Śāntipura, Advaita Gosāi felt blissful and He was dancing in ecstasy. In Puliya, Haridāsa ṭhākura was chanting in bliss. Like this, all the Vaiṣṇavas were feeling so happy in their hearts because the Supreme Lord had appeared.
The next day the wife of Advaita Ācārya, Sītā ṭhākurani, came to see Lord Caitanya. She was a very aristocratic lady. Because Advaita was the leader of all the Vaiṣṇava brāhmaṇas, she came with special gifts for Lord Caitanya. She gave scented oils, auspicious grains, and for protection she gave a tiger’s claw. She was so happy to see the baby incarnation of Godhead.
Gauranga – The golden incarnation of divine love- HH Jayapataka Swami
