Chapter 12: Bhakti Yog – The Yoga of Devotion
भक्तियोग · 20 verses
Chapter Summary
The twelfth chapter of the Bhagavad Gita is "Bhakti Yoga". In this chapter, Krishna emphasizes the superiority of Bhakti Yoga (the path of devotion) over all other types of spiritual disciplines and reveals various aspects of devotion. He further explains that the devotees who perform pure devotional service to Him, with their consciousness, merged in Him and all their actions dedicated to Him, are quickly liberated from the cycle of life and death. He also describes the various qualities of the devotees who are very dear to Him.
Verses
- 12.1 — Arjuna said, 'Those devotees who thus, ever steadfast, worship You, and those who worship the Imperishable…
- 12.2 — The Supreme Lord Shri Krishna said: Those who, fixing their minds on Me, worship Me with supreme faith and…
- 12.3 — But those who fully worship the imperishable, the indefinable, the unmanifest, the all-pervading, the…
- 12.4 — Those who have fully subdued their senses, who remain even-minded in all circumstances, and who are…
- 12.5 — For those whose minds are attached to the unmanifested, the struggle is greater, for the path toward the…
- 12.6 — But those who worship Me, renouncing all actions unto Me, regarding Me as their supreme goal, and meditating…
- 12.7 — For those whose minds are fixed upon Me, O Arjuna, I verily become the savior from the ocean of birth and…
- 12.8 — Fix your mind on Me, and let your intellect dwell in Me; thus, you shall undoubtedly live in Me alone…
- 12.9 — If you are unable to fix your mind steadily upon Me, O Dhananjaya, then seek to reach Me through the yoga of…
- 12.10 — If you are unable even to practice Abhyasa Yoga, then be intent on performing all your actions for My sake;…
- 12.11 — If you are unable to do even this, then take refuge in union with Me, and while possessing self-control,…
- 12.12 — Better indeed is knowledge than mechanical practice; better than knowledge is meditation; better than…
- 12.13 — He who bears no hatred toward any creature, who is a friend and compassionate to all, who is free from the…
- 12.14 — Always content, steady in meditation, self-controlled, possessing firm conviction, with mind and…
- 12.15 — He by whom the world is not agitated, and who is not agitated by the world, who is freed from joy, anger,…
- 12.16 — He who is free from wants, pure, expert, unconcerned, and free from pain, renouncing all undertakings and…
- 12.17 — He who neither rejoices nor hates, neither grieves nor desires, who renounces both the auspicious and the…
- 12.18 — He who is the same to foe and friend, and also in honor and dishonor, who is the same in cold and heat, in…
- 12.19 — He to whom censure and praise are equal, who is silent, content with anything, homeless, of a steady mind,…
- 12.20 — Those who follow this immortal Dharma as described, endowed with faith, and regarding Me alone as their…