Bhagavad Gita 7.21यो यो यां यां तनुं भक्तः श्रद्धयार्चितुमिच्छति।तस्य तस्याचलां श्रद्धां तामेव विदधाम्यहम् ॥
yo yo yāṁ yāṁ tanuṁ bhaktaḥ śhraddhayārchitum
ichchhati tasya tasyāchalāṁ śhraddhāṁ tām eva vidadhāmyaham
Sanskrit recitation
What you worship shapes you · 7.20–7.30 · Teaching
Translation
Whatever form any devotee desires to worship with faith, I make that same faith of his firm and unflinching.
Hindi translation
जो-जो भक्त जिस-जिस देवताका श्रद्धापूर्वक पूजन करना चाहता है, उस-उस देवताके प्रति मैं उसकी श्रद्धाको दृढ़ कर देता हूँ।
Meaning
Tanu or body is used here in the sense of a Devata (god).The Lord, the indweller of all beings, makes the faith of that devotee who worships the lesser divinities, which is born of the Samskaras of his previous birth, steady and unswerving. (Cf.IV.11IX.22and23)
After Swami Sivananda
What you worship shapes you· 7.20–7.30→
Teachers usually read this idea across several verses together, one shared reflection covers the whole unit.
- 7.20Those whose wisdom has been taken away by this or that desire, go to other gods, following…
7.21Whatever form any devotee desires to worship with faith, I make that same faith of his…
- 7.22Endowed with that faith, he engages in the worship of that form and obtains his desired…
- 7.23Verily, the reward (fruit) that accrues to those men of small intelligence is finite. The…
- 7.24The foolish think of Me, the Unmanifest, as having manifestation, not knowing My higher,…
- 7.25I am not manifest to all, veiled as I am by the Yoga-Maya. This deluded world does not…
- 7.26I know, O Arjuna, the beings of the past, the present, and the future; however, no one…
- 7.27O Bharata, all beings are subject to delusion at birth due to the delusion of the pairs of…
- 7.28But those men of virtuous deeds, whose sins have come to an end and who are freed from the…
- 7.29Those who strive for liberation from old age and death, taking refuge in Me, realize in…
- 7.30Those who know Me with the Adhibhuta (pertaining to the elements), Adhidaiva (pertaining…
Word-by-word→
- eva
- certainly
- aham
- I
- tām
- in that
- tanum
- form
- achalām
- steady
- architum
- to worship
- bhaktaḥ
- devotee
- ichchhati
- desires
- yām yām
- whichever
- vidadhāmi
- bestow
- tasya tasya
- to him
- yaḥ yaḥ
- whoever
- śhraddhām
- faith
- śhraddhayā
- with faith
Related verses
- 18.9Whatever obligatory action is done, O Arjuna, merely because it ought to be done,…
- 16.12Bound by a hundred ties of hope, given over to lust and anger, they strive to obtain…
- 11.7Now, behold, O Arjuna, in this My body, the entire universe centered in one, including the…
- 7.12Whatever beings (and objects) that are pure, active, and inert, know that they proceed…