Settlements Along the Banks of Listening
Bala Kanda, Doha 39
Doha 39 · Movement 2 of 2
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The river of sacred poetry passes between inhabited banks. Villages gather close to the reeds. Towns rise beside the ghats. Cities catch the evening light farther downstream. These are the many assemblies of listeners, each receiving the current according to its own life and capacity.
At the heart of this listening landscape stands the incomparable gathering of saints. It is Ayodhya itself, not merely another settlement but the source of auspiciousness, where attention becomes a holy city and every exchange of Ram Katha becomes service within its walls.
The river does not leave ordinary people behind. It carries the sacred story through every scale of human community.
On both banks, listening builds villages, towns, and one radiant Ayodhya.
Read the passage from the Manas
AI-created devotional illustration · Doha 39
Imagined village, town and city buildings beside a river evoke the three classes of listeners.
Source reference and artistic choices
Gita Press code81 undated · PDF pages 65 · printed pages 63. Reader passage: bala-kanda-doha-040. Printed numbering may differ.
Source facts
- Three classes of listeners compared to village, town and city communities on the river's two banks
- The assembly of saints compared to peerless Ayodhya, root of auspiciousness
Artistic choices
- Select riverbank settlements as symbolic comparison, not an actual map or authentic historic Ayodhya reconstruction
- Huts, town and city buildings, domes, pavilions, steps, pottery, fences, flowers, lotus, hills, trees, settlement layout and colours imagined; flowering grove evokes assembly without particular saints
An imaginative interpretation, not a historical portrait or documentary evidence.
श्रोता त्रिबिध समाज पुर ग्राम नगर दुहुँ कूल। संतसभा अनुपम अवध सकल सुमंगल मूल।।39।।
The three kinds of listeners' assemblies are the towns, villages, and cities along both banks. The incomparable gathering of saints is Ayodhya itself, the root of all that is auspicious.