Text 65

man-mana bhava mad-bhakto
mad-yaji mam namaskuru
mam evaishyasi satyam te
pratijane priyo ’si me

Translation

Always think of Me, become My devotee, worship Me and offer your homage unto Me. Thus you will come to Me without fail. I promise you this because you are My very dear friend.

Commentary by Srila Prabhupada 

The most confidential part of knowledge is that one should become a pure devotee of Krishna and always think of Him and act for Him. One should not become an official meditator. Life should be so molded that one will always have the chance to think of Krishna. One should always act in such a way that all his daily activities are in connection with Krishna. He should arrange his life in such a way that throughout the twenty-four hours he cannot but think of Krishna. And the Lord’s promise is that anyone who is in such pure Krishna consciousness will certainly return to the abode of Krishna, where he will be engaged in the association of Krishna face to face. This most confidential part of knowledge is spoken to Arjuna because he is the dear friend of Krishna. Everyone who follows the path of Arjuna can become a dear friend to Krishna and obtain the same perfection as Arjuna.

These words stress that one should concentrate his mind upon Krishna—the very form with two hands carrying a flute, the bluish boy with a beautiful face and peacock feathers in His hair. There are descriptions of Krishna found in the Brahma-samhita and other literatures. One should fix his mind on this original form of Godhead, Krishna. One should not even divert his attention to other forms of the Lord. The Lord has multiforms as Vishnu, Narayana, Rama, Varaha, etc., but a devotee should concentrate his mind on the form that was present before Arjuna. Concentration of the mind on the form of Krishna constitutes the most confidential part of knowledge, and this is disclosed to Arjuna because Arjuna is the most dear friend of Krishna’s.

Commentary by Sri Visvanatha Cakravarti Thakur

The phrase bhava mad-bhakto means "Being my devotee, think of me." The Lord says this to exclude the other possibilities. He does not mean, "Be a jnani or be a yogi and meditate on me."

Or the phrase man-mana can mean: "Give your mind as a gift to me, Syamasundara, with moon-like face, with shining locks of hair and beautiful eye brows, raining nectar in the form of glances of sweet mercy."

And then bhava mad bhaktah can mean, "And give all your senses such as the ears to me. Perform worship of me (bhava mad bhaktah) using all the senses with such services as hearing, chanting, seeing my murti, cleaning and anointing my temple, picking flowers, and offering me garlands, ornaments, umbrella and camara."

And then the Lord says, "Give me objects such as gandha, flowers, incense, lamp and naivedya. Be my worshipper. Perform my worship." (mad yaji).
And then Lord says, "O, just give my respects, (mam namaskuru) Falling on the ground with the whole body, offer respects, by touching the body to the ground with eight limbs." "Of these four - thinking of me, serving me with senses, worshipping me with items and offering respects to me - do all of them or any of them, and you will attain me (mam eva esyasi). Make an offering of your mind, your senses, or items of worship unto me, and I make an oath to you (te satyam): I will give myself to you."

The word satyam implies something of which there is no doubt. According to the Amara Kosa, satyam means an oath and truth.

"Well, the people born in the land of Mathura make such oaths in every sentence."

That is true. In that case, under oath (pratijane) I declare, "You are dear to me. No one cheats a person dear to himself."