Manusa Bhajan Korcho O Bhai

Bhaktivinoda Thakur

Bhaktivinoda Thakur has written a song “Manusa Bhajan Korcho O Bhai”. The Official Name for this song is Baul Sangit Song 5”. This song is taken from the book Baul Sangit. Bhaktivinod Thakur says that our external body shows that we are Sri Krishna’s devotees and we talk in depth about spiritual guru’s importance. Internally we are sense gratifiers and cheating ourselves. Everything is recorded in the books of Hari Govinda. Nothing can be hidden in the court of Yamaraj. Hence give up all this and take the name of Madhava from your heart.

(1)
mānuṣa-bhajan korcho, o bhāi, bhāver gān dhore’
gupta kore’ rākhcho bhālo vyakta ha’be yamer ghare

(2)
meye hijḍe, puruṣa khojā, tabe to’ hoy karttā-bhajā,
ei chale korcho majā, maner prati cokha ṭhere’

(3)
`guru satya’ bolcho mukhe, ācho to, bhāi, jaḍer sukhe,
sańga tomār bahirmukhe, śuddha ha’be kemon kore?

(4)
yoṣit-sańga-artha-lobhe, maje to’ jīva citta-kṣobhe,
bāule ki se-sab śobhe, āguna dekhe’ phaḍiḿ mare

(5)
cāńda-bāul minati kori’ bole,—o-sab parihari’,
śuddha-bhāve bolo `hari’, jā’be bhava-sāgara-pāre

(1) O my dear brothers! You devotedly engage in the worship of the material bodies of human beings, and yet you dare to sing songs about ecstatic spiritual emotions (bhava). You expertly conceal your own secret activities, but all of them will be fully exposed in Yamaraja’s court.
(2) Considering women to be hermaphrodites and men to be eunuchs makes one a member of the Kartta-bhaja sect. On the pretext of this deviant thinking you engage in mundane sense gratification, thus deluding even your own minds.
(3) Although your mouths proclaim “the guru is reality,” O brothers, you revel in mundane sense pleasures. You freely associate with envious non-devotees how then will you ever become puriffied?
(4) The heart of the jiva becomes greatly agitated by absorption in the association of materialistic women as well as greed for wealth does a true Baul become attracted by the glitter of these worldly things? A cricket is attracted by a flame and jumps straight into it, thereby meeting death.
(5) Chand Baul very humbly suggests, “Giving up all these degrading things, please chant the name of Hari in a purified manner. Then you will surely cross beyond the ocean of material suffering.”