From Yoga to Bhakti: How the Nath Sampradaya Shaped the Soul of the Varkari Panth
Maharashtra's spiritual landscape in the medieval period was
one of extraordinary richness. Two of its most significant movements — the
Varkari panth and the Nath sampradaya — did not emerge in isolation from one
another. They flowed from a common source, shaped each other, and together gave
Maharashtra a religious identity that endures to this day. Understanding their
connection is to understand the very heart of Maharashtrian devotion.
The Nath Sampradaya: Yogis Who Held the Thread
The Nath sampradaya, tracing its lineage through
Matsyendranath and Gorakshanath, was primarily a tradition of hatha yoga,
kundalini sadhana, and deep inner realization. Yet its saints were never
removed from the people. They wandered, taught, and carried within them a
profound awareness of Bhagavan as the supreme reality underlying all yogic
practice. The Nath tradition held that liberation was not merely a matter of
austerity but of direct inner experience — an experience that would deeply
inform the Varkari poets.
Jnanadev: Where Yoga Meets Bhakti
The most luminous meeting point of these two traditions is
Sant Jnanadev, also known as Jnaneshvara. Born into a family that had been
ostracized by orthodox society, Jnanadev and his siblings were raised within a
spiritual environment shaped by his elder brother Nivrittinanath, who was a
Nath yogi. Nivrittinanath had received initiation in the Nath lineage, and it
was he who became Jnanadev's guru.
Through this initiation, Jnanadev absorbed not only the
yogic metaphysics of the Nath tradition but also its spirit of direct inner
knowing. This inner knowing then became the philosophical backbone of his
monumental work, the Jnaneshvari — a commentary on the Bhagavad Gita composed
in the Marathi language. In the Bhagavad Gita itself, Bhagavan Shri Krishna
declares in Chapter 4, Verse 38:
"Na hi jnanena sadrisham pavitram iha vidyate"
"There is nothing in this world as purifying as true knowledge."
Jnanadev embodied this verse — taking the inner knowledge of
the Nath tradition and pouring it into the vessel of Vaishnava bhakti, making
it accessible to all.
Muktabai and Changdev: The Tigress and the Tiger-Rider
Among the remarkable figures that emerge from this spiritual
milieu is Muktabai, the youngest of the Jnanadev siblings and a realized saint
in her own right. It is a profound statement about the nature of true knowledge
that a young woman became the guru of one of the most celebrated yogi-poets of
the period — Changdev Maharaj.
Changdev Maharaj was a yogi of immense attainment, said to
have lived for fourteen hundred years through the power of his yogic practice.
His encounter with the Jnanadev family — and his eventual surrender to Muktabai
as his guru — is one of the most celebrated episodes in Maharashtra's spiritual
history. His epithet, Raja Bag Savar, meaning the Tiger-Riding King, reflects
his extraordinary yogic mastery and the awe he inspired. Yet even this master
of yoga recognized the higher truth of bhakti as taught by Muktabai, and became
her devoted disciple.
This episode carries deep symbolism. The tiger, in Hindu
thought, represents untamed power, fierce energy, and the rajasic force of the
world. That Changdev rides the tiger — rather than being consumed by it — shows
his mastery over the senses and vital forces. Yet his surrender to a young
girl-saint reveals that yogic power alone is not the summit. Bhakti, the path
of love and devotion, transcends even the highest yogic attainments.
Changdev and the Mahanubhava Panth: A Case of Confused
Identities
Here a fascinating complication enters the picture. Changdev
Maharaj of the Varkari panth is sometimes confused with Changdev Raul — also
known as Shri Chakrapani Maharaj — who was one of the five divine gurus of the
Mahanubhava panth. The Mahanubhava tradition, another Vaishnava bhakti movement
of medieval Maharashtra founded by Shri Chakradhara Swami, also carried deep
connections to the Nath sampradaya.
Both traditions were rooted in Maharashtra, both were
Vaishnava, both were formed in roughly the same historical period, and both
bore the imprints of Nath influence. The overlap in names, the shared
geographical and spiritual milieu, and the common Nath background make this
conflation understandable — though scholars and practitioners of each tradition
maintain their distinctness.
This convergence is not accidental. It points to the reality
that in medieval Maharashtra, the Nath sampradaya functioned as a kind of
spiritual substratum from which multiple bhakti traditions drew nourishment,
each flowering in its own unique form.
The Symbolism of Synthesis
What makes this connection between the Nath and Varkari
traditions so theologically significant is what it represents: the synthesis of
jnana, yoga, and bhakti. The Bhagavad Gita itself, in Chapter 6, Verse 47,
affirms:
"Yoginam api sarvesham mad-gatenantar-atmana,
shraddavan bhajate yo mam, sa me yuktatamo matah"
"Of all yogis, the one who worships Me with faith, his inner self
absorbed in Me — him I consider the most united with Me."
The Varkari saints, shaped by the Nath tradition, arrived at
precisely this understanding. Yoga was not abandoned — it was fulfilled in
bhakti.
Modern Day Relevance
The Varkari tradition today continues as one of the largest
living bhakti movements in the world. The annual Wari pilgrimage to Pandharpur,
where hundreds of thousands walk in procession singing the abhangas of the
saints, is a living testament to this synthesis. The songs composed by
Jnanadev, Namdev, Eknath, and Tukaram carry within them the yogic depth of the
Nath tradition, delivered in the language of pure love.
In a time when spirituality is often fragmented — yoga reduced to physical exercise, devotion separated from wisdom — the Varkari-Nath connection reminds humanity that the deepest spiritual paths are never truly separate. They are, as Maharashtra's saints discovered, one unbroken movement toward the divine.