Let your mind be absorbed in Me. Be devoted to Me, sacrifice unto Me, and bow down to Me. Thus, having Me as your highest goal, and united with Me in mind, you shall come to Me alone.
Verse. 9-34, Srimad Bhagvad Gita
Sri Bhagwan says ( page 143, GVK, edited by Sri David Godman ) that whenever in the Gita it is said, ‘ serve Me, surrender to Me, I am everything ‘, it relates to the Atma-swarupa and not to the form wearing sankha, charka, gada, and four arms. The references made by all mahatmas to ‘I’ are to that Atma-swarupa and not to the body.
We must also remember that whenever Sri Bhagwan referred to ‘I’, It was to the ‘Atma-swarupa’ and not to His body.
Those who have drunk deeply of devotion through a mind that has become ripe through devotion will, as the reward for their devotion, crave only surging, supreme devotion (parabhakti), the ever-fresh ambrosia of devotion itself.
V. 720, GVK, edited by Sri David Godman
When you investigate you find that both parabhakti (supreme devotion ) and jnana are identical in revealing swarupa. To claim that, out of these two, one is but the means to the other is due to not knowing the real nature of either.
V. 722, GVK, edited by Sri David Godman
Sri Muruganar says in his commentary on the above Verses that since parabhakti is only the loss of the ego, this state is indeed jnana-swarupa.
Sri Bhagwan : To remain, through the power of contemplation, in the state of pure being, beyond thought, is the essential nature of supreme bhakti. ( p-314, GVK )
So, Supreme Bhakti is to remain in the state of ‘Pure Being’, beyond thought. Jnana is to merge into and abide as the Self, beyond thought. And the Self is the Pure Being. Sri Bhagwan said to Sri Dilip Kumar Roy, the famous musician in the Aurbindo Ashram, that Bhakti is the mother of Jnana but at the same time cautioned Sri Kanappa, a blind devotee against ‘devotional emotion’ as mentioned in the GVK edited by Sri Godman on page314,315. The contradictory advice given to two devotees should be understood in the light of Sri Bhagwan’s Statement that Parabhakti is to remain in the State of Pure Being.
Thank you,
Anil