What is the meaning of penance?

[Śrī JSR Prasad asked:- Sāṣṭāṇga praṇāmas Swāmi. You told that sages did penance for God to get salvation from worldly bonds. You also told that penance means love and not concentration. Please clarify this to more extent. At Your divine lotus feet, Prasad.]

Swāmi replied:- Sages thought that concentration is penance. But, love or attraction is the real penance. Penance is suffering (Tapyate iti tapaḥ). The suffering like headache and strain of eyes appears in concentration and not in love. The suffering like feeling appears only in love and attraction, but, not in concentration. The concentration is always forcible effort and not natural attraction or love. Love may result in concentration, but, concentration need not result in love. When a boy loves a girl, the boy naturally develops attraction for the girl and goes on seeing the girl for a long time and such continuous seeing is concentration. Here, the love results in concentration of seeing continuously. If the boy has no love for the girl, the boy can’t get love by continuously seeing the girl. Love for God is called devotion, which is generated from spiritual knowledge. Spiritual knowledge means the details of God.

Rukmiṇī developed love on Kṛṣṇa by hearing the details of Kṛṣṇa from sage Nārada. Knowledge is the effort and love is the final effect. The effect or goal is always greater than the effort to be put for gaining it. Hence, devotion is greater than knowledge. You shall not say that practice or Karma Yoga is greater than devotion because the practice as a proof of theoretical devotion is a part of devotion itself and is called as practical devotion. Therefore, the ultimate is only devotion, which is both theoretical and practical. Śaṇkara, who concentrated on knowledge (Jñānādeva tu kaivalyam) also told that devotion is ultimate in the spiritual path (Bhaktireva garīyasī). He also told ‘By devotion what cannot be achieved (Bhaktih kim na karotyaho!).” God also said in the Gītā that one can attain Him through love or devotion, which is concentrated only on Him (Bhaktyā tvananyayā labhyaḥ).

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