Srila Prabhupada explains the divine position of Sri Gadadhara Pandita

In the beginning of the Chaitanya-charitamrita, Krishnadasa Kaviraja Gosvami writes, "I offer my respects to my spiritual masters." He uses the plural here to indicate the disciplic succession. It is not that he offers obeisances to his spiritual master alone but to the whole parampara, the chain of disciplic succession beginning with Lord Krishna Himself. Thus the guru is addressed in the plural to show the author's highest respect for all the Vaishnavas. After offering obeisances to the disciplic succession, the author pays obeisances to all other devotees, God brothers, the expansions of Godhead and the first manifestation of Krishna's energy. Lord Chaitanya Mahaprabhu (sometimes called Krishna Chaitanya) is the embodiment of all of these; He is God, guru, devotee and the expansion of God. As His associate Nityananda, He is the first manifestation of energy; as Advaita, He is an incarnation; as Gadadhara, He is the internal potency; and as Srivasa, He is the marginal living entity.

Books: Sri Chaitanya- charitamrita - 1975 Edition: Cc. Introduction: In the beginning of the Chaitanya-charitamrita

Thus Krishnadasa Kaviraja Gosvami discusses Lord Chaitanya Mahaprabhu as Sri Krishna Himself, the Supreme Personality of Godhead, and Lord Nityananda as Balarama, the first expansion of Krishna. Advaitacharya, another principal disciple of Lord Chaitanya Mahaprabhu's, is accepted as an expansion of Maha-Vishnu. Thus Advaitacharya is also the Lord, or, more precisely, an expansion of the Lord. The word advaita means "nondual," and His name is such because He is nondifferent from the Supreme Lord. He is also called acharya, teacher, because He disseminated Krishna consciousness. In this way He is just like Chaitanya Mahaprabhu. Although Lord Chaitanya is Sri Krishna Himself, He appeared as a devotee to teach people in general how to love Krishna. Similarly, Advaitacharya appeared just to distribute the knowledge of Krishna consciousness. Thus He is also the Lord incarnated as a devotee. In the pastimes of Lord Chaitanya, Krishna is manifested in five different features, and He and His associates appear as devotees of the Supreme Lord in the form of Sri Krishna Chaitanya, Lord Nityananda, Advaitacharya, Sri Gadadhara, and Sri Srivasa.

In all cases, Chaitanya Mahaprabhu is the source of energy for all His devotees. Since this is the case, if we take shelter of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu for the successful execution of Krishna consciousness, we are sure to make progress. One devotional song by Narottama dasa Thakura states, "My dear Lord Chaitanya, please have mercy upon me. There is no one who is as merciful as You. My plea is most urgent because Your mission is to deliver fallen souls, and no one is more fallen than I. I beg priority.

Lord Chaitanya always chants the holy name of Krishna and describes it also, and because He is Krishna Himself, whoever meets Him will automatically chant the holy name of Krishna and later describe it to others. He injects one with transcendental Krishna consciousness, which merges the chanter in transcendental bliss. In all respects, therefore, He appears before everyone as Krishna, either by personality or by sound. Simply by seeing Lord Chaitanya one at once remembers Lord Krishna. One may therefore accept Him as Vishnu-tattva. In other words, Lord Chaitanya is Lord Krishna Himself.

Sangopangastra-parsadam further indicates that Lord Chaitanya is Lord Krishna. His body is always decorated with ornaments of sandalwood and with sandalwood paste. By His superexcellent beauty He subdues all the people of the age. In other descents the Lord sometimes used weapons to defeat the demoniac, but in this age the Lord subdues them with His all-attractive figure as Chaitanya Mahaprabhu. Srila Jiva Gosvami explains that His beauty is His astra, or weapon, to subdue the demons. Because He is all-attractive, it is to be understood that all the demigods lived with Him as His companions. His acts were uncommon and His associates wonderful. When He propagated the sankirtana movement, He attracted many great scholars and acharyas, especially in Bengal and Orissa. Lord Chaitanya is always accompanied by His best associates like Lord Nityananda, Advaita, Gadadhara and Srivasa.

Sri Chaitanya-caritamrta - 1975 Edition  The External Reasons for Lord Chaitanya's Appearance  Adi 3.52

advaita acharya, nityananda, srinivasa

gadadhara, damodara, murari, haridasa

ara yata caitanya-krsnera bhakta-gana

bhakti-bhave sire dhari sabara carana
 

SYNONYMS
 

advaita acharya—Advaita Acharya; nityananda—Lord Nityananda; srinivasa—Srivasa Pandita; gadadhara—Gadadhara Pandita; damodara—Svarupa Damodara; murari—Murari Gupta; haridasa—Haridasa Thakura; ara—other; yata—all; caitanya-krsnera—of Sri Krishna Chaitanya; bhakta-gana—devotees; bhakti-bhave—with a devotional attitude; sire—on my head; dhari—I take; sabara—of all of them; carana—the lotus feet.
 

TRANSLATION
 

Bowing down with devotion, I hold on my head the lotus feet of Advaita Acharya, Nityananda, Srivasa Pandita, Gadadhara, Svarupa Damodara, Murari Gupta, Haridasa and all the other devotees of Sri Krishna Chaitanya.
 

PURPORT
 

The author of Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita teaches us that we must offer our respectful obeisances to all such pure confidential devotees of Lord Chaitanya if we indeed want to know Him in truth.

Sri Chaitanya- charitamrita - 1975 Edition : The Confidential Reasons for Lord Chaitanya's Appearance : Adi 4.227-228

In his Anubhasya commentary Sri Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura describes the Pancha-tattva as follows: The supreme energetic, the Personality of Godhead, manifesting in five kinds of pastimes, appears as the Pancha-tattva. Actually there is no difference between them because they are situated on the absolute platform, but they manifest different spiritual varieties as a challenge to impersonalists to taste different kinds of spiritual humors (rasas). In the Vedas it is said, parasya saktir vividhaiva sruyate: "The varieties of energy of the Supreme Personality of Godhead are differently known." From this statement of the Vedas one can understand that there are eternal varieties of humors, or tastes, in the spiritual world. Sri Gauranga, Sri Nityananda, Sri Advaita, Sri Gadadhara and Srivasa are all on the same platform, but in spiritually distinguishing between them one should understand that Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu is the form of a devotee, Nityananda Prabhu appears in the form of a devotee's spiritual master, Advaita Prabhu is the form of a bhakta (devotee) incarnation, Gadadhara Prabhu is the energy of a bhakta, and Srivasa is a pure devotee. Thus there are spiritual distinctions between them.

The bhakta-rupa (Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu), the bhakta-svarupa (Sri Nityananda Prabhu) and the bhakta-avatara (Sri Advaita Prabhu) are described as the Supreme Personality of Godhead Himself, His immediate manifestation and His plenary expansion, and They all belong to the Vishnu category. Although the spiritual and marginal energies of the Supreme Personality of Godhead are nondifferent from the Supreme Personality of Godhead Vishnu, they are predominated subjects, whereas Lord Vishnu is the predominator. As such, although they are on the same platform, they have appeared differently in order to facilitate tasting of transcendental mellows. Actually, however, there is no possibility of one being different from the other, for the worshiper and the worshipable cannot be separated at any stage. On the absolute platform, one cannot be understood without the other.

Sri Chaitanya-charitamrita - 1975 Edition :
Lord Chaitanya in Five Features : Adi 7.5