Verse 40 of 68
Harināma Kīrtanam · Verse 40
ഝങ്കാരനാദമിവ യോഗീന്ദ്രരുള്ളിലുമി-
തോതുന്ന ഗീതികളിലും പാല്പയോധിയിലും
ആകാശവീഥിയിലുമൊന്നായ് നിറഞ്ഞരുളു-
മാനന്ദരൂപ! ഹരിനാരായണായ നമഃjhaṅkāranādamiva yōgīndraruḷḷilumi- tōtunna gītikaḷiluṁ pālpayōdhiyiluṁ ākāśavīthiyilumonnāy niṟaññaruḷu- mānandarūpa! harinārāyaṇāya namaḥ
“Like the humming sound at the heart of the great yogis, like the songs people are singing here, like the milk-ocean, like the path of the sky, all one continuous filling: bliss-form, Hari Nārāyaṇa.”
The fortieth verse names the Lord's presence as a continuous humming sound present in four locations at once: the heart of the great yogis, the songs that ordinary people sing, the milk-ocean of the cosmic Viṣṇu-image, and the path of the sky. The verse calls the Lord ānanda-rūpa, the form of bliss, and salutes him for the fourfold simultaneous filling.
If you have come to this verse looking for the Lord in one place, the verse names four. The Lord is in the silent yogi; the Lord is in the singing voice; the Lord is in the cosmic ocean; the Lord is in the air the seeker breathes. All four at once.
The Living Words
Jhaṅkāra-nādam iva yōgīndrar-uḷḷilumi-tōtunna gītikaḷilum pāl-payōdhi-yilum. Like a jhaṅkāra-sound (a humming, droning, vibrational tone), in the heart of the great yogis, in the songs sung here, in the milk-ocean. Jhaṅkāra is humming, the sound of bees; nāda is sound; yōgīndra is the lord-of-yogis; gītika is song; pāl-payōdhi is milk-ocean.
Ākāśa-vīthi-yilum onnāy niṟaññu aruḷumānanda-rūpa Hari Nārāyaṇāya namaḥ. And in the path of the sky, all in one continuous filling, O bliss-form; salutation. Ākāśa-vīthi is path of the sky; onnāy niṟaññu is as one continuous fullness; ānanda-rūpa is the form of bliss.
Scripture References
I am the sound in the ether.
रसोऽहमप्सु कौन्तेय प्रभास्मि शशिसूर्ययोः । प्रणवः सर्ववेदेषु शब्दः खे पौरुषं नृषु ।।
raso'ham apsu kaunteya prabhāsmi śaśi-sūryayoḥ | praṇavaḥ sarva-vedeṣu śabdaḥ khe pauruṣaṁ nṛṣu ||
I am the taste in waters, the light in moon and sun, the praṇava (Om) in all the Vedas, the sound in the sky, the manliness in men.
Krishna's Sanskrit naming of his presence in many fields. The verse-40 four-location *jhaṅkāra* compresses the Gītā's longer list. *Śabdaḥ khe* (the sound in the sky) is the Sanskrit form of verse-40's *ākāśa-vīthi-yilum*.
The Heart of It
The verse names four resonance-locations of the Lord's humming-sound: the inner state of the realized yogis (the silent vibration of praṇava / Om in the heart), the songs people are singing (the audible kīrtana of the bhakti-tradition), the kṣīra-sāgara (the cosmic milk-ocean on which Viṣṇu reclines on Ananta-Śeṣa), and the ākāśa (the all-pervading sky, the etheric medium in which sound itself travels). The Lord is named as the same humming presence in all four.
The Sanskrit canon's name for this is nāda-brahman, the sound-Brahman. The Lord is heard differently in each register: as silent vibration in the realized heart, as audible song in the bhakti-mouth, as cosmic Om in the milk-ocean, as etheric humming in the sky. The verse names them all and refuses to choose. Onnāy niṟaññu: as one continuous fullness.
The verse closes with ānanda-rūpa, the bliss-form. The Sanskrit canon's sat-cit-ānanda (being-consciousness-bliss) is the formal account of the Lord's nature; verse 40 names only the third: bliss. The recognition the verse asks for is that the bliss is not hidden; the bliss is filling four locations at once, and the seeker's tongue, when it joins the songs, joins the bliss-vibration the yogis are hearing in their hearts.
The seeker's tongue, when it joins the songs, joins the bliss-vibration the yogis are hearing in their hearts.
The Saints Who Walked This Road
Two saints whose practice was the verse-40 jhaṅkāra-nāda.
Nārada (already in verses 23, 30), the cosmic vīṇā-singer of the bhakti tradition, walks the worlds with his stringed instrument and produces the jhaṅkāra the verse names. The Nārada Bhakti Sūtra he composed (or that was composed in his name) declares bhakti itself as the jhaṅkāra-tone the seeker tunes himself to. The body image is the wandering ṛṣi with the vīṇā, the bhakti-tone arriving in any space the saint walks into.
Mīrābāī (already in verses 2, 25) is the modern jhaṅkāra-saint of the Hindi tradition. Her bhajans, sung for centuries in north-Indian households, are the audible registry of the verse-40 gītikaḷ (the songs people sing here). The body image is the queen with the ektārā on the road from Mewar to Vrindavan, the song carrying the same humming-tone the cosmic milk-ocean is named to carry.
The Refrain
ഹരി നാരായണായ നമഃ
Salutation to Hari Nārāyaṇa.