Even if some fault appeared among Vaishnavas, Shri Bavanji would never entertain it in his heart. Not even in a dream. He regarded everyone who simply wore the mala, tilak, and Vaishnava garb with affectionate respect, treating them as gurujan.
By the grace of Shri Haribhaktas and by the power of Shri Sitaram bhajan, this servant of Hari grew in saintliness just as Shri Vaman Bhagavan expanded in stature. Like his father Shri Videhji, he was supremely detached while living within his household. His mind, like a bee drunk on nectar, remained ever absorbed in the prema makaranda of Shri Ram's lotus feet.
Bringing lustre to the lineage of Shri Yoganandji, Bavanji sang the glories of Shri Sitaram day and night. A householder on the outside. A renunciate within. His heart knew only one taste.
The Dwarf Who Filled Three Worlds
Bavan Ji's very name is the teaching. The Bhaktamal verse names him and the Lord in the same breath: bavan jyon badhyo bavanoj. He grew in sainthood the way Vamana Bhagavan grew. Vamana arrived at Bali's court in a small, unhurried form. No one would have guessed what that small brahmin boy contained. The moment Bali gave his word, Vamana expanded to fill the earth, the heavens, and all the space between them. Three worlds measured in two strides. Bavan Ji's life followed the same logic. From outside he appeared ordinary: a householder, a decent man, a Vaishnava from a good family. Nothing dramatic announced itself. And yet inwardly he had expanded just as completely. The feet of his bhakti had measured out all the worlds of the heart. The Lord chose a small form to reveal everything. The bhakta chose an ordinary life to contain everything. Smallness and hiddenness are not obstacles to fullness. They may be the very shape fullness chooses to arrive in.
Bhaktamal, Chhappay 136 (Priyadas tika)
Keeping the Heart Clean of Others' Faults
Among all the qualities the Bhaktamal names in Bavan Ji, this one is placed first: he never allowed a fault seen in a fellow Vaishnava to take root in his own heart, not even in a dream. This is harder than it sounds. To watch someone stumble and not catalog the stumble, not hold it, not let it quietly color your regard for that person, not return to it when the guard of waking life relaxes at night, this requires a heart that has been thoroughly swept. The tradition calls this suddha bhakti, devotion freed of the subtle satisfaction that comes from comparing ourselves favorably to others. Bavan Ji did not simply refrain from gossip. He refused to give the fault a home inside himself at all. He understood that the mind which stores others' failures slowly becomes a storage room, cluttered and dim. The heart that stays clean of that clutter stays available for something else entirely.
Bhaktamal, tilak commentary on Chhappay 136
Offering Reverence to Every Vaishnava Form
Bavan Ji did not reserve warmth for those whose inner life he could verify. He offered genuine reverence, anuraga, heartfelt warmth, to every person who wore the mala and the tilak, the outward marks of Vaishnava belonging. He treated them all as a student treats a senior teacher. This was not a mechanical politeness. It rested on a theology he had made into lived perception: the Lord dwells as the inner witness in every being. The one who places the marks of devotion on the body is, in a sense, pointing at that presence within. To dishonor the vessel would be to dishonor the resident. Bavan Ji did not wait to verify the quality of the vessel before offering respect. He saw past the imperfect outer form to what it gestured toward. The Lord had taken that form. That was enough. Such vision does not excuse wrongdoing. It simply refuses to let another person's imperfection become a reason to close your own heart.
Bhaktamal, Priyadas tika on Chhappay 136
Householder Detachment: The Teaching of Videha Ji
Bavan Ji's father was called Videha Ji, the bodiless one, or more precisely the one who does not identify with the body. Bavan Ji inherited not only this name in his lineage but the entire practice it pointed to. True vairagya, genuine dispassion, does not require leaving the world. Videha Ji lived inside his household, attended to its duties, and yet his mind was not mortgaged to its outcomes. His real life was in the bhajan. The domestic life was the structure he inhabited. The kirtana was the ground he stood on. Bavan Ji carried this same quality into his own household. He cooked, he provided, he met the ordinary responsibilities of a householder. But he did not cling. When what came, came; when what went, went; the hand opened. The heart stayed steady. This is the teaching the tradition calls yukta vairagya, engaged detachment: remaining fully present in the world while being inwardly free of the world's claim on you.
Bhaktamal, tilak commentary on Chhappay 136
The Mind Drunk on Ram's Nectar
The verse that carries Bavan Ji's portrait uses one of the most beautiful images in Braj poetry for his inner state: raam charan makarand rahate manasa madmaati. His mind was like a bee made drunk by the nectar of Shri Ram's lotus feet. Makaranda is the deep sweet liquid at the heart of a flower. The bee that once tastes it becomes madmaati, intoxicated, absorbed, unable to leave. Not because it is forced to stay, but because nothing outside compares to what it has found inside the flower. This was Bavan Ji's relationship to the name and feet of Ram. Not a practice sustained by willpower. Not a duty performed on schedule. A drunkenness. A voluntary capture. The mind had tasted something so complete that returning to ordinary sobriety was no longer possible or desired. Household life continued around that sweetness. Bavan Ji sat at the table of the world, but he was already full. Already drunk. Already home. The bee does not decide to love the flower. It simply cannot stay away.
Bhaktamal, Chhappay 136, mool verse
Hindi text from OCR scan (Khemraj Shrikrishnadas Prakashan, CC0). May contain errors.