Bhakti is devotion and love with respect. It is the sharing of the feeling. Bhaktham means dividing. Dividing between yourselves and god. Every feeling is an interrelation between god and human beings. This bhakti is at an ordinary man’s level only. When you get immersed in the realization of divine power, all the terms will vanish.How the human relation can be extrapolated to that of god?
We have friendship, brotherly relation, relation between lovers, parental relations, etc. This is extrapolated towards divine - human relations.
As I told you bhakti is the feeling between the bhakta and the divine power. There are five positive and one negative (sixthe) type of bhakti in sanathana dharma.
I shall try to explain these six bhakties in a common man’s language with examples.
There are saantha bhava bhakti which means the relation is silent, neither asking for something nor expecting anything from the god. Here the devotee is enjoying the feeling that I am with god. Vidura and Bishma had this type of bhakti towards Lord Krishna
The second bhakti bhava is the daasya bhava, where the god is the manager or master and you feel that you want to become the servant. This relation between god the master and you the servant is daasya bhava. Bhakti that Hanuman had towards Rama was dasya bhava bhakti.
The third bhava is sakhya bhava. Which is like the relation between two friends. God is my friend and we stay and walk together and discuss each other about everything. The relation between Arjuna and Krishna was sakhya bhava bhakti. To some extent the relation between sudhama and Krishna was also like this.
The fourth bhava bhakti is the maadhurya bhava bhakti. The relation between the 18 –20 years old Gopikas and 10 –11 years old Krishna was narrated as
madhurya bhava bhakti. Same bhakti could be seen for Bhakta Meera towards Lord Krishna. The sweet feeling in the mind.
The Vaalsalya bhava bhatkti is the fifth bhava in which the god and yourself are like the parent and child. You as the parent and god as the child. Thygaraja swamigal had the this type of relation with Lord Rama. Many ladies used to chant keerthans about Krishna as though Krishna of childhood (infant Krishna) and their relation with Krishna is like towards a small child in the hands of the mother.
The last one or sixth bhava Bhakti which is said to be negative..
It is known in many names like. Satru Bhava Bhakti or dwesha bhava bhakti or dweshya bhava bhakti etc. In this bhava you feel that god is your strong enemy. Kaamsa felt so with Krishna. Ravana felt so with Rama. Hiranyakasipu also felt so. Their mind was filled with hatred and enmity towards god or divine power. Many atheists fall under this category of negative bahakti
science in devotion
Definitely ! Bhakti has a powerful part in psychology. Faith is the basis of bhakti and every feeling of the mind can be guided and controlled by bhakti. This is particularly applicable to fear, failures, worries, complexes, tension, anger, etc., which are negative feeling in our mind.science in devotion
Bhakti gives us lot of support during crisis in our life. It gives us relief, happiness, consolation, motivation, during failures and confusions.