Verse 8.14-15

Verse 8.14: “He who, with the mind not straying elsewhere, always and continuously thinks of Me: for such a Yogin, ever diligent in application, I remain, O Son of Pritha, easy of attainment.

Verse 8.15: “Having reached Me, (they) do not become liable to re-birth, which is transient and an abode of woe: the high-souled ones who have (already) attained the summum bonum. (124)

Commentary called Jnaneshwari by Jnaneshwar:

Such God-Seekers relinquishing all sense pleasures and delights, and fettering all earthly desires, have made Me the cherished treasure of their hearts: thus they enjoy the bliss of My Divine Presence; while enjoying this bliss, no wonder that they forget even hunger and thirst; how could the lure of visible and other objects affect them? Such Souls, as have in this way united themselves to me and been merged in Me and live in Me entirely—would they, at the time of departing this life be required to remember Me for relief? Were it to be, that I should be propitious to such ones only, if and when they remember Me at the time of the fall of their bodies—of what avail then would their entire life of devotion and worship be? Any poor mortal in distress prays piteously, raising the cry of help “Hasten, Oh God, to save me”. Do I not hasten to him to soothe his pain? And if My lifelong devotees be placed in this sad plight, what worth may this strife and strain of a devoted life be? Therefore, I say, let there be no such doubt in your mind even for a moment. I am at their service and ready to relieve their distress, whenever such devotees remember me; for unbearable indeed to Me is the burden of their unswerved devoted life.

With such a debt of devotion on My head, I am at all times eager to relieve their suffering, at the time of their end, thus repaying the debt I owe to them. To protect from bodily affliction, the tender and delicate frame of these dear ones, I give them shelter in the Spiritual encasement of Self-knowledge, and then covered with the soothing and cool shade of perpetual presence of My Divine name and fixed in their mind full of Me, they are united to My essence eternal. Therefore, it never happens that My devotees ever suffer any distress at the time of their death.

I bring those, dear to Me, to My own eternal being. I get them to merge into My Divine life by making them cast off their outer bodily covers after brushing aside the dust of their conceit, and keeping untainted the purity of their pure desires. The devotees too have left (in them) no bodily attachment, and therefore, they hardly feel any pangs of separation from their bodies. Also having already become one with Me, even while in (human) body-form, they naturally have no feeling that I should get by their side at death and take them unto Myself. In truth, their very sojourn in this mortal life is only a reflection, as it were, in the waters in the form of their bodies. And just as the reflections of the moon-beams in water, abide in the moon herself with the disappearance of the water, even so with the ebbing of their bodily life, their sojourn in the mortal life abides forever in the Essence of the Eternal Self. Their existence in the world is, in fact, not real but is like reflection while the real form is only the essence of Supreme Brahman.

In this way, they having ever become My own Essence, I am always in their life and there is consequently no doubt, that with the fall of their bodies, they abide in Me. And to bodily life they never return—those who have reached the eternal abode in Me. For, verily the body is a soil in which grow trees of misery and a hot-bed of fire breeding three classes of affliction (i) physical, (ii) mental and (iii) Super-natural. It is indeed a victim (balī) offered to the carrion of Death. It breeds plenty of wretchedness, multiplies, and is the hot-bed of all evil. It is the root of all vice, the ripe fruit of wicked actions and the very image of human folly. It is the home of misery that earthly life is, the garden on which grow all lusts and passions, and the very dish in which food is given to all ills of this life.

The body again is a foul morsel of rice dish (khicaḍī), that all-destroying time has thrown after chewing. It is the ever-growing strength of the hope never-ending, and the fertile and watery soil for (the breeding of) births and deaths. It is full of delusion and error, is cast on the stuff of fancies and is as it were the very underground (grain) pit of scorpions. It is the den of the tiger, and is strumpet-like in its action on soul, and is the very tool of sense enjoyment on Sensuous pleasures. It is like the affection of a sorceress or like a sip of cool poison, or the showy (false) faith of a thug. It is like embracing a person having white leprosy or the softness of a dark-coloured snake, or the singing of an entrapper (phāsepāradhī), or the hospitality by an enemy, or the welcome from a vicious person-nay it is an ocean of evil things. It is like a dream in a dream, or a dense forest grown on (the water of) mirage, or a sky formed by the particles of smoke. To a body of this nature, never return those, who have reached (Me) and become one with the essence of My Being.