One Sound Across the Four Ages
Bala Kanda, Chaupai 27
Doha 27 · Movement 1 of 2
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Four ages unfold like immense landscapes beneath one sky. In the first, sages sit in meditation until centuries seem to pass without disturbing their breath. In the second, sacrificial fires blaze beneath exacting rites. In Dvapara, temples and royal sanctuaries fill with elaborate worship. Across all three times and all three worlds, the Name moves quietly among them, freeing beings from sorrow.
Then Kali appears, dark with deceit. Sin becomes an ocean, and human minds swim within it like fish that have forgotten any other element. The disciplines of former ages stand far beyond ordinary strength. Yet in that terrible season the Ram Name rises as a wish fulfilling tree, mother and father in this world and the next, granting the deepest longing and sheltering those who have no other support.
The age takes the form of Kalanemi, master of disguise, drawing travellers toward destruction with counterfeit refuge. Against him comes the Name as wise and mighty Hanuman. Deception may fill the road, but the servant of Ram has already entered the field. The Vedas, Puranas, and saints speak with one voice: every true merit ripens at last into love for Ram.
Across four ages, one sound remains standing when every harder path has closed.
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AI-created devotional illustration · Chaupai 27
Unnamed parents care gently for a child, illustrating the Name's parental-care comparison.
Source reference and artistic choices
Gita Press code81 undated · PDF pages 50, 51 · printed pages 48, 49. Reader passage: bala-kanda-chaupai-027. Printed numbering may differ.
Source facts
- Remembrance praised across ages and worlds; Name compared to wish-tree
- Name compared to mother/father caring in this life and beyond; sole support in Kali, with Hanuman/Kalanemi comparison
Artistic choices
- Unnamed family selects parental-care comparison; no literal Name turned into parents or narrated divine family
- Figures' gender, ages, appearance, clothes, jewellery, hands, poses, bench, garden, pond, pavilions and frame imagined
An imaginative interpretation, not a historical portrait or documentary evidence.
चहुँ जुग तीनि काल तिहुँ लोका। भए नाम जपि जीव बिसोका।। बेद पुरान संत मत एहू। सकल सुकृत फल राम सनेहू।। ध्यानु प्रथम जुग मखबिधि दूजें। द्वापर परितोषत प्रभु पूजें।। कलि केवल मल मूल मलीना। पाप पयोनिधि जन मन मीना।। नाम कामतरु काल कराला। सुमिरत समन सकल जग जाला।। राम नाम कलि अभिमत दाता। हित परलोक लोक पितु माता।। नहिं कलि करम न भगति बिबेकू। राम नाम अवलंबन एकू।। कालनेमि कलि कपट निधानू। नाम सुमति समरथ हनुमानू।।
In all four yugas, across all three times, throughout the three worlds, beings have found freedom from sorrow by chanting the Name. This is the testimony of the Vedas, the Puranas, and the saints alike: the fruit of every good deed is love for Ram.