भ्रमर-गीत

Bhramara-Gītā

The Gopi's Song to the Bee

Bhāgavata Purāṇa 10.47.12-21 · with Uddhava’s reversal at 10.47.58-61

Krishna has gone to Mathura. He has been gone long enough that the gopis are dying of his absence. He sends Uddhava, his cousin, the disciple of Bṛhaspati, the philosopher among the Yadus, with a message of yogic detachment. Meditate on the formless absolute. Withdraw the senses. Know that I am the Self in all.

Uddhava arrives. He delivers the message. The gopis listen, and then a bee passes by. One gopi turns her face from Uddhava to the bee, and for ten verses she addresses the bee as if it were Krishna’s actual messenger. The Goswāmīs identify her as Rādhā. The Bhāgavata leaves her unnamed.

The ten verses move through ten distinct emotional registers, named by Rūpa Goswāmī as the ten varieties of citra-jalpa, the variegated speech of the gopi’s mahābhāva. Each verse is a different angle of the same wound. Together they refute Uddhava’s yoga not by argument but by the simple sound of a heart in love.

Part One

The Ten Gopi Verses

The ten varieties of citra-jalpa

Bhāgavata 10.47.12prajalpa: open complaint

मधुप कितवबन्धो मा स्पृशाङ्घ्रिं सपत्न्याः कुचविलुलितमालाकुङ्कुमश्मश्रुभिर्नः। वहतु मधुपतिस्तन्मानिनीनां प्रसादं यदुसदसि विडम्ब्यं यस्य दूतस्त्वमीदृक्॥

madhupa kitava-bandho mā spṛśāṅghriṁ sapatnyāḥ kuca-vilulita-mālā-kuṅkuma-śmaśrubhir naḥ vahatu madhu-patis tan-māninīnāṁ prasādaṁ yadu-sadasi viḍambyaṁ yasya dūtas tvam īdṛk

O honeybee, friend of a cheater, do not touch my feet with your whiskers, smeared with the kunkuma that rubbed onto Krishna's garland from another woman's breast. Let the lord of the Madhus carry his favor back to those proud women in Mathura. He whose messenger is one such as you would only be ridiculed in the assembly of the Yadus.

She does not even look at Uddhava. She turns to the bee. The bee is a perfect proxy for Krishna's messenger because the bee, like Krishna himself, goes from flower to flower, taking the nectar without staying. The bee even has whiskers smeared with another woman's kunkuma. The grief comes out as sarcasm, sharp and tender both. She does not say his name. She says madhu-pati, lord of the Madhus, the Mathura people he has now joined.

Bhāgavata 10.47.13parijalpa: pretended pity

सकृदधरसुधां स्वां मोहिनीं पाययित्वा सुमनस इव सद्यस्तत्यजेऽस्मान् भवादृक्। परिचरति कथं तत्पादपद्मं नु पद्मा ह्यपि बत हृतचेता ह्युत्तमःश्लोकजल्पैः॥

sakṛd adhara-sudhāṁ svāṁ mohinīṁ pāyayitvā sumanasa iva sadyas tatyaje 'smān bhavādṛk paricarati kathaṁ tat-pāda-padmaṁ nu padmā hy api bata hṛta-cetā hy uttamaḥ-śloka-jalpaiḥ

After making us drink the enchanting nectar of his lips just once, he abandoned us as quickly as you would abandon a flower. How is it then that the goddess Padmā serves his lotus feet? Alas, she too must have had her mind stolen by his deceitful words.

She turns the betrayal into a question of philosophy. If he can do this to us, how can the great goddess Lakṣmī possibly continue serving him? The pretended pity for Lakṣmī, the cosmic consort, is itself a complaint about how the universe is arranged. The Vraja-rasika tradition reads this as a small theological joke: the gopis place themselves above Lakṣmī and pity her for not knowing better.

Bhāgavata 10.47.14vijalpa: jealous mockery

किमिह बहु षडङ्घ्रे गायसि त्वं यदूना- मधिपतिमगृहाणामग्रतो नः पुराणम्। विजयसखसखीनां गीयतां तत्प्रसङ्गः क्षपितकुचरुजस्ते कल्पयन्तीष्टमिष्टाः॥

kim iha bahu ṣaḍ-aṅghre gāyasi tvaṁ yadūnām adhipatim agṛhāṇām agrato naḥ purāṇam vijaya-sakha-sakhīnāṁ gīyatāṁ tat-prasaṅgaḥ kṣapita-kuca-rujas te kalpayantīṣṭam iṣṭāḥ

Six-footed one, why do you sing so much here about the master of the Yadus, in front of us homeless ones? These topics are old news to us. Better you sing of him before his new beloveds, the friends of his friend Arjuna, whose chest-burning he has now relieved. They will give you what you are begging.

Now jealous mockery. He has new women in Mathura, the friend-circles of his friend Arjuna. Let the bee go sing to them, not to us. The grief becomes vinegar. We hear in this verse the gopi who has been standing in her own home for too many days listening to news from the city.

Bhāgavata 10.47.15ujjalpa: bitter satire

दिवि भुवि च रसायां काः स्त्रियस्तद्दुरापाः कपटरुचिरहासभ्रूविजृम्भस्य याः स्युः। चरणरज उपास्ते यस्य भूतिर्वयं का अपि च कृपणपक्षे ह्युत्तमःश्लोकशब्दः॥

divi bhuvi ca rasāyāṁ kāḥ striyas tad-durāpāḥ kapaṭa-rucira-hāsa-bhrū-vijṛmbhasya yāḥ syuḥ caraṇa-raja upāste yasya bhūtir vayaṁ kā api ca kṛpaṇa-pakṣe hy uttamaḥ-śloka-śabdaḥ

In heaven, on earth, in the underworld, what women can resist him? He arches his eyebrows, smiles his deceptive charm, and they all fall. Bhūti the supreme goddess herself worships the dust of his feet. So what are we, in comparison? But at least the wretched can chant his name. He is called the one of glorious renown.

She has compressed the whole cosmos into one image: women everywhere falling for the same trick of his eyebrows. Then the surprising turn at the end: at least the wretched can chant. The bitterness is not total. The name still works. Even now, in her grief, she names him Uttamaḥ-śloka, the one whose verses are highest. She has not yet stopped singing him while she is complaining about him.

Bhāgavata 10.47.16sañjalpa: doubting his motives

विसृज शिरसि पादं वेद्म्यहं चाटुकारै- रनुनयविदुषस्तेऽभ्येत्य दौत्यैर्मुकुन्दात्। स्वकृत इह विसृष्टापत्यपत्यन्यलोका व्यसृजदकृतचेताः किं नु सन्धेयमस्मिन्॥

visṛja śirasi pādaṁ vedmy ahaṁ cāṭu-kāraiḥ anunaya-viduṣas te 'bhyetya dautyair mukundāt sva-kṛta iha viṣṛṣṭāpatya-paty-anya-lokā vyasṛjad akṛta-cetāḥ kiṁ nu sandheyam asmin

Take your foot off my head! I know what you are doing. You learned diplomacy from Mukunda, and now you come as his messenger with these flatteries. But he abandoned women who for his sake gave up children, husbands, and every other relation. He is simply ungrateful. Why should I make peace with him now?

The bee has clearly placed its foot on her in some Indian gesture of supplication. She refuses it with brilliant clarity. She names what the gopis actually gave up for him: their children, their husbands, the entire social world. And she names what he did in return: he left. The verse is the sober center of the bhramara-gīta. The grief speaks plainly.

Bhāgavata 10.47.17avajalpa: cataloguing his crimes

मृगयुरिव कपीन्द्रं विव्यधे लुब्धधर्मा स्त्रियमकृत विरूपां स्त्रीजितः कामयानाम्। बलिमपि बलिमत्त्वावेष्टयद् ध्वाङ्क्षवद्- यस्तदलमसितसख्यैर्दुस्त्यजस्तत्कथार्थः॥

mṛgayur iva kapīndraṁ vivyadhe lubdha-dharmā striyam akṛta virūpāṁ strī-jitaḥ kāma-yānām balim api balim attvāveṣṭayad dhvāṅkṣa-vad yas tad alam asita-sakhyair dustyajas tat-kathārthaḥ

Like a hunter, he cruelly shot the king of the monkeys with arrows. Conquered by a woman, he disfigured another woman who came to him in love. He ate Bali's gifts and then bound him up like a crow. So let us give up all friendship with this dark-complexioned boy, even if we can never give up talking about him.

She catalogs his crimes from his other avatāras. Rāma killed Vālin from hiding. Rāma also disfigured Śūrpaṇakhā. Vāmana bound Bali after eating his food. The verse is a deliberate, willful misreading of his lila. She is angry. She knows the orthodox justifications. She refuses them all in the moment of grief and lists his actions as a wronged lover would.

Bhāgavata 10.47.18abhijalpa: addiction to the news

यदनुचरितलीलाकर्णपीयूषविप्रुट्- सकृददनविधूतद्वन्द्वधर्मा विनष्टाः। सपदि गृहकुटुम्बं दीनमुत्सृज्य दीना बहव इह विहङ्गा भिक्षुचर्यां चरन्ति॥

yad-anucarita-līlā-karṇa-pīyūṣa-vipruṭ- sakṛd-adana-vidhūta-dvandva-dharmā vinaṣṭāḥ sapadi gṛha-kuṭumbaṁ dīnam utsṛjya dīnā bahava iha vihaṅgā bhikṣu-caryāṁ caranti

To hear about his pastimes is nectar for the ears. For those who have tasted just a single drop of that nectar, even once, the dedication to material duality is finished. Many such people have suddenly given up their poor homes and families and, themselves becoming poor, traveled here to Vrindavan to wander like birds, begging.

Now the gopi inadvertently testifies to him while she is condemning him. Hearing about him destroys the world. People become like wandering birds. Look at the gopis themselves, she half-implies. We are now those wandering birds. We can no longer return to ordinary life. The very listing of grievances has become another form of singing him.

Bhāgavata 10.47.19ājalpa: the wound of trust

वयमृतमिव जिह्मव्याहृतं श्रद्दधानाः कुलिकरुतमिवाज्ञाः कृष्णवध्वो हरिण्यः। ददृशुरसकृदेतत्तन्नखस्पर्शतीव्र- स्मररुज उपमन्त्रिन् भण्यतामन्यवार्ता॥

vayam ṛtam iva jihma-vyāhṛtaṁ śraddadhānāḥ kulika-rutam ivājñāḥ kṛṣṇa-vadhvo hariṇyaḥ dadṛśur asakṛd etat tan-nakha-sparśa-tīvra- smara-ruja upamantrin bhaṇyatām anya-vārtā

We trusted his deceitful words as if they were the truth, like the foolish wives of the black deer who trust the cruel hunter's song. We have felt again and again the sharp pain of love-fever from the touch of his nails. O messenger, please talk about something else.

The image of the deer's wives trusting the hunter is among the cruelest in Sanskrit poetry. The hunter sings to lure the deer; the deer come; the hunter kills them. The gopi names herself as one of those deer-wives. She trusted him completely and was wounded for it. Then the simple plea: tell me about anything else.

Bhāgavata 10.47.20pratijalpa: the door begins to open

प्रियसख पुनरागाः प्रेयसा प्रेषितः किं वरय किमनुरुन्धे माननीयोऽसि मेऽङ्ग। नयसि कथमिहास्मान् दुस्त्यजद्वन्द्वपार्श्वं सततमुरसि सौम्य श्रीर्वधूः साकमास्ते॥

priya-sakha punar āgāḥ preyasā preṣitaḥ kiṁ varaya kim anurundhe mānanīyo 'si me 'ṅga nayasi katham ihāsmān dustyaja-dvandva-pārśvaṁ satataṁ urasi saumya śrīr vadhūḥ sākam āste

Friend of my dear one, you have come back. Did my beloved send you again? Choose any boon you like, friend, you are honorable to me. But why do you wish to take us to him whose conjugal love is so difficult to give up, when his consort the goddess Śrī is always with him on his chest?

The shift. She calls the bee priya-sakha, dear friend. The grievance has cracked. The mere fact that the bee is from him is now a reason for tenderness. But she still names her real obstacle: Śrī, his official wife, lives on his chest. We cannot return to him. Even the longing is now structured by knowing he is unavailable.

Bhāgavata 10.47.21sujalpa: the soft confession

अपि बत मधुपुर्यामार्यपुत्रोऽधुनास्ते स्मरति स पितृगेहान् सौम्य बन्धूंश्च गोपान्। क्वचिदपि स कथा नः किङ्करीणां गृणीते भुजमगुरुसुगन्धं मूर्ध्न्यधास्यत् कदा नु॥

api bata madhu-puryām ārya-putro 'dhunāste smarati sa pitṛ-gehān saumya bandhūṁś ca gopān kvacid api sa kathā naḥ kiṅkarīṇāṁ gṛṇīte bhujam aguru-sugandhaṁ mūrdhny adhāsyat kadā nu

It is regrettable that the noble son of Nanda lives now in Mathura. Does he remember his father's house? Does he remember his cowherd friends? Does he ever, in any conversation, mention us, his maidservants? When will he place his aguru-scented arm on our heads?

And here the entire bhramara-gīta arrives. The grievance is gone. The mockery is gone. What remains is the soft, plain question: when will he come back. The gopi calls herself his kiṅkarī, his maidservant. The pride she had assumed in the earlier verses has dissolved. She is now only longing.

उद्धव

Part Two

Uddhava’s Reversal

Bhāgavata 10.47.58-61

Bhāgavata 10.47.58

एताः परं तनुभृतो भुवि गोपवध्वो गोविन्द एव निखिलात्मनि रूढभावाः। वाञ्छन्ति यद् भवभियो मुनयो वयं च किं ब्रह्मजन्मभिरनन्तकथारसस्य॥

etāḥ paraṁ tanu-bhṛto bhuvi gopa-vadhvo govinda eva nikhilātmani rūḍha-bhāvāḥ vāñchanti yad bhava-bhiyo munayo vayaṁ ca kiṁ brahma-janmabhir ananta-kathā-rasasya

Among all bodied beings on earth, only these cowherd women have actually completed their lives. They have reached the perfect love for Govinda which the sages who fear material existence, and we ourselves, are still craving. For one who has tasted the rasa of his infinite story, what is the use of being born even as a Brahman?

Uddhava arrived a teacher of the gopis. He leaves their student. The verse opens with the conclusion: among all embodied beings, only the gopis have completed their lives. The cosmic philosopher of the Yadus is putting himself below them.

Bhāgavata 10.47.59

क्वेमाः स्त्रियो वनचरीर्व्यभिचारदुष्टाः कृष्णे क्व चैष परमात्मनि रूढभावः। नन्वीश्वरोऽनुभजतोऽविदुषोऽपि साक्षा- च्छ्रेयस्तनोत्यगदराज इवोपयुक्तः॥

kvemāḥ striyo vana-carīr vyabhicāra-duṣṭāḥ kṛṣṇe kva caiṣa paramātmani rūḍha-bhāvaḥ nanv īśvaro 'nubhajato 'viduṣo 'pi sākṣāc chreyas tanoty agada-rāja ivopayuktaḥ

How extraordinary that these women, who wander the forest, who seem stained by improper behavior, have reached the perfect love for Krishna, the Supreme Soul. But it is true: the Lord himself awards his blessings even to the ignorant worshipper, just as the king of medicines works even when taken by one who does not know its ingredients.

Uddhava is genuinely puzzled. By every standard he was raised with, these women should not be capable of what they have. They are unlettered. They have transgressed every social rule. And yet they have reached what every yogi has been seeking. The verse names the reconciliation: the Lord blesses without precondition. The medicine works on the unlearned tongue.

Bhāgavata 10.47.60

नायं श्रियोऽङ्ग उ नितान्तरतेः प्रसादः स्वर्योषितां नलिनगन्धरुचां कुतोऽन्याः। रासोत्सवेऽस्य भुजदण्डगृहीतकण्ठ- लब्धाशिषां य उदगाद् व्रजवल्लभीनाम्॥

nāyaṁ śriyo 'ṅga u nitānta-rateḥ prasādaḥ svar-yoṣitāṁ nalina-gandha-rucāṁ kuto 'nyāḥ rāsotsave 'sya bhuja-daṇḍa-gṛhīta-kaṇṭha- labdhāśiṣāṁ ya udagād vraja-vallabhīnām

When the Lord danced with the gopis in the rāsa, the gopis were embraced by the arms of the Lord. This favor was never given to the goddess of fortune, never to the women of heaven whose bodies are fragrant as lotus, never even imagined by them. What of the women of this world?

Uddhava is now reaching for comparisons and finding none. Lakṣmī herself does not have what these gopis have. The women of heaven do not have it. The rāsa-dance is the singular event of all cosmic events. He cannot believe what he is concluding, but he concludes it.

Bhāgavata 10.47.61

आसामहो चरणरेणुजुषामहं स्यां वृन्दावने किमपि गुल्मलतौषधीनाम्। या दुस्त्यजं स्वजनमार्यपथं च हित्वा भेजुर्मुकुन्दपदवीं श्रुतिभिर्विमृग्याम्॥

āsām aho caraṇa-reṇu-juṣām ahaṁ syāṁ vṛndāvane kim api gulma-latauṣadhīnām yā dustyajaṁ sva-janam ārya-pathaṁ ca hitvā bhejur mukunda-padavīṁ śrutibhir vimṛgyām

Oh, let me become any creeper or shrub or herb in Vrindavan, that the dust of these gopis' feet might fall on me. They abandoned their kin and the path of the noble, both so hard to give up, and took shelter at the feet of Mukunda, the path the Vedas themselves are still searching for.

And here is the doctrinal hinge of the Bhāgavata. The cousin of Krishna, the disciple of Bṛhaspati, the philosopher of the Yadus, the highest representative of jñāna-yoga that the text contains, prays to be reborn as a creeper in Vrindavan so that the dust of these milkmaids' feet might fall on him. The path the Vedas are searching for, he says, these women took without effort.

← Previous

Gopi-Gītā

गोपी-गीत

The Gopis' Song of Longing

Sūrdās's Bhramar Gīt

सूर भ्रमर गीत

The Vernacular Bee-Song

All Eleven Texts

Veṇu-Gītā·Gopi-Gītā·Bhramara-Gītā·Sūrdās's Bhramar Gīt·Brahma Saṃhitā·Gopāla-tāpanī Upaniṣad·Rādhopaniṣad·Nārada Pañcarātra·Skanda Purāṇa·Hāla's Gāhā Sattasaī·Daśaślokī·Śikṣāṣṭakam·Caitanya Caritāmṛta·Gīta Govinda·Hit Caurāsī·Rādhā-Rasa-Sudhā-Nidhi·Premavāṭikā and Sujān Rasakhān·Padma Purāṇa·Govinda-Līlāmṛta·Yugala-Śataka·Kelimāla·Narottama Dāsa's Prārthanā·Radha in the Sources·Brahmavaivarta Purāṇa·Garga Saṃhitā·Devī Bhāgavata Purāṇa·Rādhā-Sahasranāma·Krishna-Karṇāmṛta·Stava-Mālā·The Rādhāṣṭakams·Vidagdha-Mādhava and Lalita-Mādhava·Vilāpa-Kusumāñjali·Bṛhad-Bhāgavatāmṛta·The Five Sampradāyas·The Aṣṭa-Sakhīs·The Eight Watches·Mañjarī-Bhāva·Bhakti-Rasāmṛta-Sindhu·Ujjvala-Nīlamaṇi·Sat-Sandarbhas·Hari-Bhakti-Vilāsa·Bhaiji·Theological Threads·Vidyāpati and Caṇḍīdāsa

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Krishna sent his own philosopher to teach the gopis yoga. The gopis taught him love. The Bhāgavata records it without commentary, knowing that the bare event is itself the entire teaching. Every Vraja-rasika of the past thousand years has come back to these chapters. Sūrdās gave them a Brajbhāṣā voice in his Bhramar Gīt. Bhaiji translated them into modern Hindi. The bee continues to arrive. The gopi continues to refuse and to confess. Uddhava continues to be converted.

आसामहो चरणरेणुजुषामहं स्याम्

āsām aho caraṇa-reṇu-juṣām ahaṁ syām

Let me become a creeper where they walk.