Śabda No. 11
Devotion.
“Through devotion, he comes to know Me fully…”
Bhakti is devotion. Kṛṣṇa says it is through devotion that one comes to know him as he truly is.
Arjuna asked his. Samvāda answers yours with the Gītā's own verses.
Samvāda is software, an AI companion tuned to the Bhagavad Gītā. It is not a person. It answers from the verse and shows you which one, and it never pretends to be Kṛṣṇa.
भक्त्या मामभिजानाति यावान्यश्चास्मि तत्त्वतः।ततो मां तत्त्वतो ज्ञात्वा विशते तदनन्तरम्।।
bhaktyā mām abhijānāti yāvān yaś cāsmi tattvataḥ tato māṁ tattvato jñātvā viśate tad-anantaram
Through devotion, he comes to know Me fully—who and what I am in reality, who I am and how I am. Knowing Me thus in truth, he forthwith enters into Me.
18.55 is verse 677 of 700, and verse 55 of 78 in chapter 18.
Bhakti (devotion), in any form, appears in 14 verses of the 700, first at 7.17 and last at 18.68.
The family of bhakta and bhakti (abhakta and vibhakta not counted), in any form, appears in 28 verses of the 700, first at 4.3 and last at 18.68.
Counted by Vāṇi on the 700-verse text at getvani.app/gita.
Near the end of the Gītā, in chapter 18, Kṛṣṇa describes how a person grows into devotion. 18.54 says that one who has realised the state of Brahman, who is tranquil, who neither grieves nor craves and who regards all beings alike, attains supreme devotion to him. 18.55 says what that devotion does: through it the person comes to know him fully, who he is and how he is, in truth, and having known him thus, enters into him. 18.56 adds that someone who takes refuge in him and keeps performing all works attains the eternal abode by his grace. So bhakti here is not only a mood. It is a way of knowing, and it goes together with work. The passage is in chapter 18, and what the Gītā says about devotion gathers more.