In this Second Volume of Bhakti Bhajan Mala, I humbly present to you some other meaningful selections from my collection. Following your warm reception of Volume One, I have been encouraged to compile Volume Two. I tried tirelessly to maintain the original version of each Bhajan taken from the original tracks. I sincerely hope that you will enjoy this work to your heart’s content as this is specially dedicated to you.

I tried to salute and give credit to the many Saints, Sages, Lyricists, Musicians and Singers who enriched and continue to provide spiritual and moral sustenance and expose us to the unfathomable treasury of culture and divinity which belongs to humanity at large.

In Kali Yuga by simply chanting the name of God (Namasankirtan) with love and devotion one can cross the ocean of Sansara (mundane existence). Many of our Sacred Texts, Saints and Sages remind us of the importance of Namasankirtan. Let melody and harmony emanate from our hearts and let us take delight in the love that we express through singing aloud the glory of God.

Pandit Ashram Sharma

It is with great joy that I welcome and commend this inspiring collection of traditional bhajana and kirtana by Pandit Ashram Sharma. A bhajana is a song of love to God. Many of these compositions date back to the medieval period of Indian history that witnessed a great flowering of the devotional (bhakti) movement. In this collection one will find timeless compositions by saintly poets like Kabir, Surdas, Tulsidas and Mirabai. These songs are heard daily in Hindu homes and temples throughout the world. Most of the themes of these songs center around the avataras, Shri Rama and Shri Krishna. They describe the attributes of God and God’s compassionate activities. Many of these relate to God as the irresistible and attractive beloved and express an intense yearning for God’s vision (darsana). A kirtana, on the other hand, is a recitation of the various names of God, and several such names are combined and sung repeatedly.

The aim of all Hindu worship is to make living itself an act of worship. Hindu worship finds its culmination when we discover the beauty of offering every one of our actions to God and living itself becomes synonymous with the joy of worship. This supreme ideal of making life itself worship is the central theme of Shri Krishna in the Bhagavadgita (9:27):

Whatever you do, whatever you eat, whatever you offer in sacrifice or give away in alms, whatever penance you perform, offer it to Me.

Pandit Sharma’s collection of devotional songs is an expression of his own life-long bhakti. In addition, these songs are an excellent means (sadhana) for enabling us to grow towards the ideal of unceasing devotion (anapayani bhakti). While it is not possible to always be in a temple precinct or to perform traditional rituals of worship, these songs can be on our lips, heart and mind, helping us to center our daily lives in God. With the help of these songs, every act can become an offering to God.

On behalf of everyone whose religious lives will be deepened and enriched by this labor of love, I offer gratitude (dhanyavaad) to Pandit Ashram Sharma.

Anantanand Rambachan
Professor and Chair
Department of Religion
St. Olaf College, Minnesota, USA