Four Types of Devotees - Gita Ch7, Verse16

The following is from Swami Dayananda' Bhagavad Gita Home Study.

7-16
चतुर्विधा भजन्ते मां जनाः सुकृतिनोऽर्जुन। आर्तो जिज्ञासुरर्थार्थी ज्ञानी च भरतर्षभ॥
caturvidhā bhajante māṁ janāḥ sukṛtino'rjuna | ārto jijñāsurarthārthī jñānī ca bharatarṣabha ||
caturvidhah - four-fold; janah - people; sukrtinah - who do good actions; mam - me; bhajante - worship; arjuna - O Arjuna!; artah - the one in distress; artharthi - the one who wants security and pleasure; jijnasuh - the one who desires to know; ca - and: jnani - the one who knows; bharatarsabha –O foremost in the family of Bharata!
O Arjuna, the people, given to good actions who worship me are four-fold. They are, the one in distress, the one who wants security and pleasure, the one who wishes to know (Me), and the one who knows (Me), O foremost in the family of Bharata!

Sukrtinah janah - the people who do good deeds. As a contrast to the duskrtins who do not seek the Lord, in this verse Krsna tells us of the sukrtinah janah, those people who do good actions now, or did them in previous lives. He says, 'They seek Me - bhajante mam. And it is because of the punya earned through their good actions that they seek Me.'

TWO TYPES OF PUNYA

There are two types of punya. One gives wealth, pleasures, comfort, parentage etc. For this you do not require any culture or inner growth. There is another type of punya which is purely spiritual. And that punya-karma expresses itself no matter where one is born. Even if a person has a difficult beginning, it does not deter him at all in his seeking. Those who have this type of punya-karma, those sukrtins, worship Isvara, mam bhajante. They recognise Isvara.

FOUR TYPES OF DEVOTEES

Among those sukrtins who recognise and worship Isvara, there are four types, catur-vidhah - caturvidhah bhajante mam. Vidha means variety. Therefore, there are four varieties of devotees. All of them have sufficient recognition of Isvara to be devotees but among them there is a gradation. The degree of recognition, their attitude, approach, prayers, etc., all determine the four types. And they are, he says, 'artah jijnasuh artharthi jnani ca bharatarsabha.'

ARTAH

Arti means any sorrow or grief. Sadness, distress, discomfort, trouble are all called arti. Sankara defines arta as one who is seized by a distress, caused by a thief, tiger, or disease. Tigers were common in those days when India was full of forests; so, Sankara commonly uses the tiger as an example. When a person is seized by some distress, whom he will call as a last resort? If he has some punya-karma, there is Isvara in his life and he will call upon him. But only when he is in distress. Till then he does not think of him. But at least during that spell of distress he does think of him because he does not see anyone else who can help him. This kind of devotee is called arta, a devotee in distress.

ARTHARTHI

Artha means that which is desired. In this context it means wealth and things similar to it - power, progeny and so on. One wants all these and to get them, the artharthi invokes the grace of Bhagavan. He thinks that he cannot live happily without these things and so, he makes use of various means to get them. He uses local influence, money, etc., along with Bhagavan, because he recognises that there is always a factor over which he has no control. As a devotee, he is mature enough to recognise the chance element. That he recognises as daiva. And there is no way of having any control over it without some grace. So, whenever he wants to accomplish something, he invokes the grace of Isvara to control certain factors that he cannot control or even know. He will perform rituals in order to invoke Isvara's grace to help him gain whatever he wants. This is kamya-karma, a karma done with a desire to accomplish a given end within samsara. The one who does kamya-karma is an artharthi. But he is also an arta, a devotee in trouble. When he is in trouble, he will of course, invoke the Lord. An arta, however, is not an artharthi. Because only in distress can he think of God.

JIJNASUH

The third one is jijnasu. The order in the verse, arta, jijnasu, artharthi is for the sake of metre. But in order of their understanding the arta and the artharthi belong to one group, the jijnasu and the jnani to another. Jijnasu is the one who desires to know. What does he want to know? That is also important because even the one who does wrong actions, the duskrtin, wants to know a lot of things - like how to open locks, etc. But here, the subject matter is Isvara, the truth of Isvara, bhagavat-tattva. He is not invoking Isvara's grace for simple accomplishments. He wants to know the truth of Isvara, the ultimate cause of everything. And this jijnasu is a great devotee. He does not use Bhagavan as an accomplice for his small little pursuits; he wants to know who is Isvara. As a bhakta he invokes Isvara's grace for this. He also offers his prayers; he also performs his daily and occasional duties, nitya-naimittika-karma. But he does all this to gain a clear mind, antah-karana-suddhi, and the knowledge of Isvara.

Knowledge of Isvara is nothing but knowledge of atma. Isvara, the cause of everything happens to be in essence, oneself. If Isvara were other than atma, he would be anatma, and therefore, inert. The only conscious being is atma, and Isvara is not separate from it.

This seeming difference between Isvara and the individual is due to upadhi, as we have seen. There is only one reality and that the jijnasu wants to know. He is a devotee because he seeks the help of Isvara and performs prayerful actions to earn this help. But his actions are not for limited ends within samsara, kamya-karmas. The arta and artharthi are kamis because their karmas are kamya-karmas. The jijnasu however, is a karma-yogi; so, his is a different type of devotion. Because of his extra punya, he has discrimination, viveka, and because of that he is a jijnasu.

JNANI

And then there is a fourth bhakta. All four recognise me and to the degree they recognise me they are in union with me. The fourth one's recognition is complete; so, his identification is total. When you are a jijnasu you necessarily become a jnani, the one who knows the truth of Lord Visnu, Paramesvara, as himself. He is a real bhakta.

HOW THE JNANI'S DEVOTION DIFFERS FROM THAT OF ALL OTHERS

The jnani's devotion is what we call sadhya-bhakti. There are two types of bhakti. One is sadhana-bhakti, a devotion to Isvara as a means. This is the devotion of a jijnasu. But the bhakti of one who understands Isvara, who recognises the truth of Isvara as atma, is sadhya-bhakti. It is a bhakti that has fulfilled itself, a devotion in the form of absolute love - parama-prema-svarupa-bhakti.

What is this absolute love? Between the object of love and the person who loves, there is no difference at all. Love consumes all the differences. That is what we call absolute love and it is only in the form of knowledge. The non-difference is already accomplished because Isvara is atma. This is a fact which has only to be recognised.

When there is already non-difference, its recognition is called ananya-bhakti. Ananya means there is no other. The altar of bhakti and the seeker, the devotee, are one and the same self. That bhakti is not time-bound or comparable because it is a fact. This is the devotion of a jnani. For him, all the bhakti has fulfilled itself. So, how can we call him a bhakta? He is still a bhakta if we consider a bhakta as someone who is in union with Isvara. The other three are also in union with Isvara, but, for them, Isvara is other than themselves and therefore, remote, paroksa. For a jnani, Isvara is immediate, aparoksa. That is the only difference, and it is a great difference. Again among the three, Isvara is always paroksa for the arta and the artharthi but for a jijnasu he is paroksa only for the time being.

Paroksa means indirectly known - as omniscient, almighty and so on. The difficulty is with the little knowledge I have, how can I appreciate omniscience? And with' my limited power, how can I appreciate what is all powerful? By no stretch of the imagination is that possible. For an arta and an artharthi then, Isvara is always indirectly known, nitya-paroksa.

For the jijnasu, however, there is a possibility of Isvara becoming aparoksa and for the jnani, he is aparoksa because Isvara, the cause of everything, is non-separate from atma. Even though he is the atma, of everyone, only the jnani appreciates it. Only he has an intellect subtle enough to recognise what is true for everyone. And the jnani is distinguished here among the bhaktas as a fulfilled bhakta. The jijnasu is going to be fulfilled and even the others will be fulfilled in time. Eventually they will come to Isvara. The arta, the devotee in distress, will become an artharthi and then a jijnasu because he has devotion. His recognition of Isvara paves the way for his progress.

Bhakti, devotion, is any type of union between jiva and Isvara. By a proper action or even a thought you are uniting yourself to Isvara. But jnani doesn't try to make a bridge between jiva and Isvara. Gaining the knowledge, he finds that he is always united. There's only one thing there. That is Isvara; that is atma. There's no second thing at all to unite with. So, he is always united, nitya yukta.