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Updated 11-20-08
Bahina Bai /Bahinabai /Bahini
(c. 1628-c.1700)
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"ONE SHOULD INVESTIGATE THESE THINGS."
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Most of what we know of Bahina's life comes from her poetry. She composed 473 abhangas, brief devotional hymns in the Marathi language of Maharashtra. The first 116 of her songs narrate her present life and give a brief description of 12 previous lives; this part of her work is usually called her Atmanivedana, the story of her gradual complete self-dedication to Vishnu. In her 70s and preparing for her final death, Bahina told her story in verse to her son, who wrote it down.
Bahina was born to a brahmin family and, at the age of 5, was married to a 30-year-old brahmin, a widower and relative. When she was 9, Bahina, her immediate family, and her husband had to leave their village because of a family quarrel. After a long journey and two years in a town where her husband performed religious services, the family arrived in the holy city of Kolhapur. There Bahina heard the devotional verses of the Varkari teacher Tukaram (c.1608-1650), recited not in the Sanskrit of brahmin worship, but in the vernacular and so accessible to all.
This experience was to determine the rest of Bahina's life. Although a member of the highest (brahmin) caste, she wished to become a follower of Tukaram, of the lowest (shudra) caste; the wife and daughter of priests committed to upholding the ancient rituals wished to become a bhakta who chooses pure devotion over ritual. Her Atmanivedana tells the result.
Following the narrative section of her work are over 350 abhangas on various devotional matters: on the life of bhakti (devotion), on true brahminism, on the duties of a wife. Bahina's modern editor has arranged her poems by topic; we don't know when or in what order these were written.
Some writers on the teacher Tukaram have said that Bahina translated a Sanskrit holy work into Marathi at Tukaram's request. If so, she had received a more classical education than most brahmin women --- an unusual, but not unheard of, situation. What is clear from her poems is her willingness to question received wisdom, to express her doubts about the teachings she heard --- both priestly and bhakti.
On this page you'll find:
Links to helpful sites online.
Excerpts from translations in print.
Information about secondary sources.
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1. From Justin E. Abbott's prose translation of Bahina's verses (for more, see below, under "In print"):
(a) After a brief introduction, 33 abhangas (#s 25-36, 39-49) (note, though, that although omissions are not indicated, #s 26 and 34 are incomplete); all are from the first part of her work, the autobiographical Atmanivedana.
(b) The first two of the passages given here are from the Atmanivedana (the second is also found just above), but the last three are from the end of Bahina Bai's work, in a section on the duties of a wife.
(c) In a study by Laurence Nixon, use your browser's search function to go to "Bahina" for Nixon''s presentation of and comment on three passages in which Bahina scolds her heart about its remaining "attachment to worldly things."
2. And from other translators:
(a) After an introduction, "To leave a husband is against the teachings of the Vedas"; then click on "next" for another passage, "In worshiping Thee I can still be true to my duty." The translator of both is Mary McGee (for information on McGee's 1996 essay from which the lines are quoted, see under "Secondary sources").
(b) At the start of an 2004 essay on women writers in India, by Sherin Koshy, Bahina's lines "The Vedas cry aloud, the Puranas shout," translated by Anne Feldhaus (the Vedas and the Puranas are the earliest and the later Sanskrit scriptures.)
(c) Near the end of an essay, four lines on the divine source of Bahina's poetry in transliterated Marathi, followed by the English "loosely translated" by Anil Sivakumaran.
3. Lines from Bahina's abhangas in Marathi script.
4. For historical background:
(a) An essay, "Bhakti Poets," on those who write of a personal devotion to a deity; Bahina is among the poets discussed.
(b) A description of the Varkari followers of Vishnu in Maharashtra.
(c) Although Bahina is mentioned only once, this 2001 essay by Madhu Kishwar, "Traditional Female Moral Exemplars in India," is a useful introduction for western readers to the roles of women --- both deities and devotees.
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[This is a reprint of Justin E. Abbott's 1929 prose translation of Bahina's abhangas. Abbott also gives the Marathi text of the poems. Anne Feldhaus' 1985 foreword briefly discusses Bahina's reconciliation of the roles of wife and bhakta:]
Bahina Bai: a translation of her autobiography and verses
/ by Justin E. Abbott; foreword by Anne Feldhaus. Delhi: Motilal
Banarsidass, 1985. (xx, 301 p.: 19 cm)
LC#: PK2418.B3 Z464 1985; ISBN: 0895818221
Originally published: Poona, India: Scottish Mission Industries,
1929. (The poet-saints of Maharashtra; no. 5)
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"...in the Marathi language."
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[At Kolapur, with her parents, the 11-year-old Bahina attended kathas (readings) of the vernacular verses of the bhakta Tukaram /Tukoba, whom she had never met. It is hearing his verses that won her and would lead her to write her own. ("Vedanta" refers to the true teachings):]
The old stories of Hari, that I had often heard, my mind recollected. The... popular verses of Tukoba touched my heart through their teachings....
If I could only hear a Hari-katha from Tukoba's lips, my mind would find its peace. [Abhanga #21, p.18]
It was he who... in the Marathi language, is giving to the people in verse the substance of the Vedanta. [#24, p.19]
He whose verses give the mind rest, he in his bodily form is Vitthal [Vishnu] himself. [#26, p.20]
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"We should spend our time in the study of the Vedas."
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[At first, Bahina's husband tolerated his child-wife's interest in the bhakti way of devotion, but when she had visions of Tukaram and when the people of Kolapur began to treat her as a sage, he reacted angrily. It is difficult not to sympathize with his confusion as Bahina presents it. First she tells us his words to her parents:]
"Why do these low people come to see her?...
"We are Brahmans. We should spend our time in the study of the Vedas. What is all this! The shudra Tuka! Seeing him in a dream! My wife is ruined by all this! What am I to do?...
"What care I for singing the names and praises of Hari? Even in my dreams I know not bhakti.... Who cares for the feelings of bhakti?"
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"Who will show me respect in her presence?"
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[And then she tells us his thoughts (a "Gosavin" was a follower of a local disciple of Tukaram):]
"I will abandon her, and go into a forest, for people are going to bow down to her, while she regards me as worth but a straw. They will discuss with this woman the meaning of the kathas, but she herself will consider me as a low fellow. The people make regardful enquiries about her while I, who am a Brahman, have become a fool! They are all calling her a Gosavin. Who will show me respect in her presence?" [#31-33, pp.25-26]
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"...the means of saving both the family lines."
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[After telling her husband's thought, Bahina tells her own. Although she wanted the bhakti way, she felt that she must remain united to her husband:]
...[H]olding to my own special duties, I will give my mind to listening to the Scriptures, and the winning of God. My duty is to serve my husband, for he is God to me.... I want my thought concentrated on my husband.
Supposing my husband should go away to live the ascetic's life, then... of what value would be my life among men? Can the body attain to beauty when its life has left it? What is the night without the brightness of the moon? My husband is the life; I am his body. In my husband lies all my well-being....
Vitthal who is mere stone, and Tuka of whom I have simply dreamed, why should I for these give up a sure happiness? I will give my body to the joy of rigorous service in accordance with the guidance of the Vedas. A woman who serves her husband, and is a faithful wife to him, is the means of saving both the family lines. [#35, pp.25-27]
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" She is truly a bhakta of Hari. You should... be
one also."
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[Immediately after Bahina made her self-sacrificing decision, her husband became seriously ill and had a vision of an elderly brahmin who convinced him that the way of bhakti could be accepted even by one of his own caste. The vision spoke to him:]
"What are your reasons for wanting to desert your wife? First think in your own heart what wrong she has committed, and then if true, give yourself into the hands of anger....
"If she has conducted herself without regard to her duties, then only you might abandon her, you idiot! She is one who has no worldly desires. She is truly a bhakta of Hari. You should likewise be one also." [#40, p.27-28]
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"I felt inspired to be a poetess."
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[The husband accepted his wife's way (although with at least one later instance of backsliding); the family moved to the town where Tukaram lived and taught. Here, at the temple to Pandurang (Vishnu), Bahina decided to become a poet:]
I looked upon the image of Pandurang when suddenly I felt inspired to be a poetess. I made a namaskar [obeisance] there to Tukaram, and quickly came back to where we lodged.
Says Bahini, "[This] came like the tide of the ocean, or like the words of the Gods of Thunder in the sky of my heart." [#78, p.44]
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"I wrote a hymn of praise... and offered it to him."
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[Shortly after another vision of Tukaram, Bahina wrote her first hymn:]
The next day someone in the form of Tukaram gave me three easy mantras and said to me, "You have now attained your thirteenth birth, and you have already prepared the yoga path. From now on you will have no more births. Remain in happiness, worshiping your husband...." Saying this he placed his thumb between my eyebrows and then vanished out of sight.
I then bathed in the open in the river, and again rested my eyes on Vithoba. I wrote a hymn of praise composed of five padas, and offered it to him as I worshiped him. [#98, pp.60-61]
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"Wherever we ask we find our doubts are not solved."
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[It is in the latter part of her book, which reflects her adult thought and teaching, that Bahina shows her questioning nature. The shastras are the ancient teaching; karma refers to both an individual's actions and her overall fate :]
Looking again at facts, why am I here?... Who is here as lord of the universe? The earth, water, light, air, and this ether, where were all these created?
Says Bahini, "One should investigate these things. With a lively interest one should inquire."
If we think of all these things in our minds, or look for some place where we may ask, wherever we ask we find our doubts are not solved. If we inquire of the Shastras, life is too short. One's karma is certainly entangled with karma.
Says Bahini, "How then shall I, an anxious seeker, become free from the snare of this worldly life?" [#188-189, p.99]
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[Krishna P. Bahadur has translated a selection of the abhangas from the second part of Bahina's work (omitting all of the Atmanivedana), and organizing them by theme. The detailed explanatory notes are helpful:]
Bahina Bai and her abhangas / translated into English verse
with an introduction by Krishna P. Bahadur. New Delhi: Munshiram
Manoharlal Publishers, 1998. (xi, 94 p.)
LC#: PK2418.B3 A24 1998; ISBN: 8121507871
Includes bibliographical references and index
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"Even so, O heart, you crave and crave."
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[Bahina's conversion at the age of 12 did not prevent her from continuing to face human temptation:]
Plant grass-seeds in the forest?
What foolishness when the wild grass grows of itself.
So too the heart seeks pleasures of the world.
I need not go to others to learn this,
I know it myself.
Trees grow wild on hills,
Birds and beasts act as their instinct is:
Even so, O heart,
You crave and crave and never know surfeit. [#120,
p.37]
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"Not in the homes of the learned...."
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[The heart of Tukaram's teaching, and of Bahina's, is that one's relation to God is not determined by caste or wealth:]
You can't buy devotion
in the market place,
Nor by going away
to the forest quietness:
Give your heart to God
that's the only way.
Not in the homes of the learned
nor in palaces
nor in lofty mansions
does it abide:
But it dwells
in the hearts of men
who think aright. [#395,
p.63]
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"He who lives in Brahman, is a brahmin."
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[Bahina did not abandon her family's caste; she simple re-defined it (a vaidya was a physician):]
He who sings Lord Hari's praises
is said to be a Hari-devotee;
whose nature is as a saint's is
known to be a man who's saintly;
Who works in gold is a goldsmith
Who cures, a vaidya is known by all.
As a man's deeds are, so is he,
Why proclaim it from the housetop?
So, says Bahina, he who lives in
Brahman, is a brahmin. [#428,
p.70]
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"To whom shall I go to clear these doubts?"
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[Bahina thought much about the questions the sages had been worrying over for ages:]
I am not able to know where the soul is and where it is not.... what is its place of origin? What is its dwelling place? I do not know this, so what shall I accept as truth?... To whom shall I go to clear these doubts which have been vexing me for a long time? [#211, p.56]
[Her answer, a pilgrimage to a temple of Vishnu in a town dedicated to him (and still the site of the kinds of pilgrimages she describes):]
From such doubts, I flee and turn towards Pandahari. I become one with his devotees who are dancing in a procession as they proceed to him. The love of Vishnu intoxicates us and we dance the hamama and humbari dances.... Hark! the sweet strains of music and the rhythmical beats of the drums. They delight me and I experience the bliss of Brahman. [#214, p.57]
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"I have drawn the curtain of doubt and given my heart to
God."
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[Whether or not Bahina's doubts were ever resolved intellectually, she made her choice:]
I have have cast away all shibboleths
and abandoned all shame
What more can men want of me?
Of what do I need to fear?
I have drawn the curtain of doubt
and given my heart to God
Let men praise me or blame me
I will delight in my Lord
and keep away from the bustle and noise;
God's made me so, I've no choice. [#472,
p.82]
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"Let men say what they say. I'll stand by my spouse."
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[The last section of Bahina's book is titled by the editor,
"Duties of a wife." One of the last abhangas
suggests the effort involved:]
Who would burn her house
to enjoy the fire's warmth?
Let men say what they say
I'll stand my my spouse.
I will lay at God's feet
my body, mind and speech. [#471,
p.82]
[And the end of the very last:]
A woman who is devoted to her husband, or a man who is devoted
to his wife, is blessed. The three worlds, says Bahina, resound
with such a person's praises. [#473,
p.82]
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[This collection includes an essay by Mary McGee, "Bahinabai: The Ordinary Life of an Exceptional Woman, or, the Exceptional Life of an Ordinary Woman," which analyzes the autobiographical passages of Bahina's work. McGee discusses Bahina's resolution of both the conflict with her husband and the larger conflict between bhakti and orthodoxy. The notes and bibliography provide a useful summary of earlier critical thought on Bahina. (See the book's table of contents online.):]
Vaisnavi: women and the worship of Krishna / edited by Steven
J. Rosen. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass Publishers, 1996. (301 p.)
LC#: BL1175.A49 V35 1996; ISBN: 8120814371
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[In this 1982 article Anne Feldhaus discusses, in greater
detail than in her foreword to the 1985 Abbott translation (above),
Bahina's presentation of the way in which a woman could reconcile
religious devotion with the duties of a wife. Feldhaus focuses
on the poems describing Bahina's last life and give her own translation
of several passages. (See
the issue's table of contents online.):]
Feldhaus, Anne. Bahina Bai: Wife and mother. Journal of
the American Academy of Religion, 50 (1982), 591-604.
LC#: BV1460 .N23; ISSN: 0002-7189
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[Romila Thapar's history of India to 1300 provides useful background information on religious and other aspects of Indian history. Note especially pages 348-57 on the rise of the devotional movement (bhakti) of which Bahina is a later representative. The book has a helpful chronology and glossary. (See the book's table of contents online.):]
Thapar, Romila. Early India: from the origins to A.D. 1300.
Berkeley: University of California Press, 2004. (555 p.)
LC#: DS436.A3 T43 2004; ISBN: 0520238990
Includes bibliographical references and index
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Updated 11-20-08