The gardener said it curtly: "Pick them yourself." Shri Atahji had been traveling to a tirtha and stopped at a royal garden of ripe mango trees. Filled with deep prema, he had set up the shodashopachar puja of Shri Yugal Sarkar right there and asked the gardener for mangoes to offer as bhog.
Atahji glanced up at the tree. At once, the branches heavy with ripe fruit bent down close to the simhasan. With perfect ease, he plucked the mangoes and offered bhog to Shri Yugal Sarkar.
The gardener ran to his king. The king came and fell at Atahji's lotus feet, rolling on the ground, absorbed in prema-bhav. "I am blessed," the king said. "Please grant me prasad." Where even Brahma and the devas bow their heads, what great thing is it for trees and kings to bow?
In a certain city of the south, there lived a devout woman of great wealth. She was a varamukhi, a courtesan. Her home and doorways were spotlessly clean and beautiful. One day, a group of saints passing through noticed the purity of the place, the lovely shade, the convenience of water, and halted there. They spread their seats on the ground and set up Thakurji's simhasans. They had stopped for no worldly reason; they simply needed a place for Bhagavan's seva.
When Varamukhiji stepped to her door during her daily routine and beheld these hansa-like saints, joy flooded her mind. A clarity rose in her buddhi. She thought: "These mahatmas do not know my caste. Surely my good fortune has dawned." She brought a tray heaped with gold coins before Shri Mahantji. With tears streaming, hands folded, she prostrated and pleaded: "Please offer bhog to Bhagavan with this. Bless this fallen one."
Mahantji asked who she was. She fell silent. Anxiety filled her chitta. He spoke again: "Have no doubt." She whispered: "One whom even men will not touch, how will Shri Raghunathji accept her?"
The saints told her: "We shall all remain here until you offer the crown with your own hands. Have a mukut made." She spent her entire fortune, every coin, and had a jewel-studded mukut crafted with great shraddha. The procession moved with singing and music and festivity. She entered the mandir without fear.
Then, at that very threshold, her monthly course began. Stricken with shame and distress, she stepped back, condemned herself, and collapsed to the ground weeping.
The all-knowing, ever-merciful Bhagavan commanded the pujari at once: "Bring Varamukhi respectfully. Let her place the mukut upon Me with her own hands." They brought her near. Her hands could not reach. And so the compassionate Dina-bandhu, ocean of kripa, bowed His own head low. The greatly fortunate woman raised her trembling hands and, with supreme devotion, placed the mukut upon Shri Sarkar.
Her prayer: "I am impure, O Prabhu, Purifier of the world, O treasure of compassion. My mind, like a bee, asks only to drink the rasa of the pollen-dust of Your lotus feet. Grant me unwavering bhakti and true satsang always."
A bhakta Brahman couple was traveling home after the gauna ceremony. On the road, thugs joined them. The Brahman asked where they were headed. "Wherever you are going," the thugs replied, steering them toward a forest path.
The Brahman hesitated. But his young bride held even greater priti and pratiti than he. She said: "One should not doubt them, for they invoke Ramji's name. Where else does one so easily hear the name of Shri Ramji?"
Moved by her faith, the Brahman relented. They entered the forest. Deep within, the thugs turned. They killed the Brahman and seized his bride. The young woman wailed, looking back again and again.
"Your husband is dead," they said. "Whom do you keep looking for?"
She answered: "I am waiting for the Lord whose name you invoked. Rama!"
At that very instant, Shri Raghunath appeared on horseback with beloved Shri Lakshmanji, armed with bow, arrow, and sword. Prabhu cut down every last villain, restored the dead Brahman to life, gave the couple His darshan, and escorted them safely home.
A certain king was so devoted to the outward marks of bhakti that whoever he saw wearing the Vaishnava tilak and the kanthi-mala of Shri Tulasiji, he treated as equal to Guru and Hari himself. No bias of caste or sect. Some jesters noticed that only those wearing kanthi-malas received honor at court, so they disguised themselves as Bhagavat sadhus. The king washed their feet with his own hands, just as he did for every bhakta. And by the prabhav of wearing that sacred garb, by the darshan and touch of true Bhagavatas, genuine bhakti took root in the jesters' hearts. They were transformed.
A certain king was an anta-nishtha bhakta, a secret Bhagavat of the highest order. He bore no outward sign of his devotion. Not his ministers, not even his queen could fathom his true nature. She lived in quiet sorrow, believing she had not been blessed with a husband who loved Bhagavan.
One night, in his sleep, the king murmured the name of Shri Vihariji.
The queen heard it. Everything was revealed. Overjoyed beyond measure, she lavished wealth and celebration upon him at dawn.
The king was struck with grief. "It is a matter of sorrow," he told her, "that today my hidden bhakti has been exposed." He resolved that since the Nama had departed from his lips, his prana too must depart. And so it happened.
Seeing her husband lifeless, the queen was shattered. She lamented: "By the kripa of Shri Sitaramji, he was such an ocean of bhav, such a king of bhaktas. And I did not understand."
Following the path her husband had walked, she became absorbed day and night in dhyana, until at last she too relinquished her prana in intense viraha.
A certain shishya held his guru's words as supremely, absolutely true. Taking leave of Guruji, he set out on a task. His guru said: "Go well. When you return, I shall tell you something."
When the shishya returned, he saw people carrying the acharya's dead body in procession.
The shishya said: "Maharajji promised to tell me something. His words can never prove false." He stopped the procession. He brought everyone back along with the body.
And to vindicate that pratiti, by the kripa of Shri Sarkar, the guru arose and spoke to his faith-filled shishya the very words he had intended.
This is what is meant by pratiti and vishvas.
Nishtha: Faith That Has Weight
When Shri Atahji's request for mangoes was dismissed by the garden keeper, he did not argue, negotiate, or feel wounded. He simply turned his gaze toward the tree. That was sufficient. The branches, heavy with ripe rasalas, bent slowly downward and hovered beside the simhasan. The Bhaktamal's commentary asks the precise question: where even Brahma and the devas bow before Bhagavan, what great thing is it for a tree to bend? The miracle was not in the branch. It was in the quality of Atahji's nishtha, his living, absolute faith in the divine presence within the pratima of Shri Yugal Sarkar. His faith was not theoretical or aspirational. It had weight. It rearranged the world. A bhakta's nishtha does not require the cooperation of circumstances. Creation itself serves the bhog of the Lord when the devotee's certainty is real.
Bhaktamal of Nabhadas, Tika of Priyadas (Bhaktirasbodhini), entry on Shri Atahji
Seva Does Not Wait for Convenience
Shri Atahji was on his way to a tirtha when he passed a royal mango grove. He stopped. The beauty of the place and the readiness of the ripened fruit spoke to something within him. He could not continue his journey without first offering bhog to Shri Yugal Sarkar. He spread his seat, arranged the simhasan, and performed the full shodashopachar puja with unhurried care and complete love, every upachara offered with undivided attention. Seva is not something that waits for a designated time and a prepared setting. For Atahji, the impulse to serve Bhagavan arose in the middle of the road, and he honored it fully. The capacity to stop, to set everything down, and to serve the Lord with full concentration wherever one finds oneself is itself a form of advanced bhakti. The tirtha was still there. Shri Yugal Sarkar was already present.
Bhaktamal of Nabhadas, Tilak commentary, entry on Shri Atahji
Pratiti: Trust That Holds Beyond All Objection
The Bhaktirasbodhini places alongside Atahji's story a sequence of lives that illuminate what genuine pratiti means. A shishya returned from an errand to find people carrying his guru's dead body. He stopped the procession. His guru had promised to tell him something, and Shri Vachan, the word of a saint, cannot prove false. He stood before a corpse and did not accept death as a sufficient objection. By the kripa of Shri Sarkar, to honor that pratiti, the guru arose and spoke. This is the teaching Priyadas draws out: pratiti is not confidence that arises when circumstances are favorable. It is the trust that holds when a dead body is being carried past, the certainty that says the word was given and therefore the word will be kept. Atahji's bent branch and the guru's return from death arise from the same root. Faith does not negotiate with appearances.
Bhaktamal of Nabhadas, Bhaktirasbodhini commentary of Priyadas, entry on Shri Atahji
Dina-Bandhu Bows to Meet the Lowly
Varamukhiji spent everything she had to have a jeweled mukut made for Shri Raghunathji. She had been told by the assembled saints that she would offer the crown with her own hands. On the appointed day, dressed with care and accompanied by devotional singing, she arrived and entered the mandir. At the threshold, she was overcome by shame and fell to the ground weeping, believing she could not approach. But the antaryami, the one who sees within all hearts, acted at once. The pujari received the command to bring her forward. When her arms could not reach the murti to place the crown, Dina-bandhu, the Friend of the lowly, bowed His own head and brought it within reach. This is the nature of Bhagavan's kripa: He does not wait for the devotee to be adequate. When sincere shraddha is present, He comes down. He adjusts Himself to meet the one who cannot reach Him.
Bhaktamal of Nabhadas, Bhaktirasbodhini commentary of Priyadas, story of Varamukhi within the entry on Shri Atahji
The Name Carries What It Promises
A young bride, traveling home with her husband, found herself and her husband at the mercy of thieves deep in a forest. Her husband had been killed. The thugs asked whom she kept looking back for. She answered: 'I am waiting for the One whose name you invoked. Rama.' She called the name aloud. At that instant, Shri Raghunath appeared, armed and ready, and restored everything. Her priti and pratiti for the name of Shri Rama ran deeper than her husband's had, deeper than her fear. She did not treat the name as a metaphor or an aspiration. She treated it as a living reality whose arrival she was simply waiting for. The Bhaktamal teaches that this quality of love for the nama itself, holding it as already fully real and already on its way, is the heart of bhakti. The name carries what it promises. One only needs to call it without flinching.
Bhaktamal of Nabhadas, Bhaktirasbodhini commentary of Priyadas, story within the entry on Shri Atahji
Hindi text from OCR scan (Khemraj Shrikrishnadas Prakashan, CC0). May contain errors.