Yes the word carries a negative connotation. And yet aren’t we all the time a servant and slave of our desires and passions, of various people and institutions? Being a servant and slave of God in fact frees us from all other service.
Bhakti comes from bhaj which means to take joy in God. Will this joy be complete without His service? Can love be complete without the spirit of service? That after all is the difference between the Gopis and Arjuna. Arjuna seeks to obey God’s command. That is what is meant by being a servant of God, to be in His service. Slave means to be always in the service of the Divine needing nothing except the joy of closeness and service. It is the ideal that is typified in the story of Nandi who becomes inseparable from Shiva.
Of course slave of God is one aspect of bhakti and there are several sides to the love of God. But bhakti itself requires service to be complete as we see in the life of Hanuman. Is it something lesser to be a Hanuman to the Divine?
Here are two aphorisms of Sri Aurobindo that show us the right place of the Divine Service.
‘God’s servant is something; God’s slave is greater.’
‘Discipleship to God the Teacher, sonship to God the Father, tenderness of God the Mother, clasp of the hand of the divine Friend, laughter and sport with our Comrade and boy Playfellow, blissful servitude to God the Master, rapturous love of our divine Paramour, these are the seven beatitudes of life in the human body. Canst thou unite all these in a single supreme and rainbow-hued relation? Then hast thou no need of any heaven and thou exceedest the emancipation of the Adwaitin.’
