Baul songs by Lalon on Dehatattva “Principles of the Body”

Baul (Bengali: Baul) refers to an early modern tantric and contemporary global esoteric movement that has its origins in an interconnected society of male, female, and androgynous sadhus (“renunciates”) in what is today Bangladesh and West Bengal, India. Baul songs celebrate the human body as a divine vehicle of realization and are full of wordplays and hidden puns that use religious language to describe its qualities and functions. Such songs are usually grouped in a genre called dehatattva, “principles of the body.” For more on the Bauls, see the TTD encyclopedia article. 

The most famous Baul was undoubtedly Lalon Fakir (Lālan Phakir, d. 1890), who composed numerous songs that are understood as part of the dehatattva genre. As is customary in Baul songs, Lalon inserted his name in the signature line (bhaṇitā) of the last verse of each of his songs, indicating that each of these songs was also linked to his personal experience of practices that he learned from his guru Dervish Siraj Sai and the broader community of Bauls and sadhus during his lifetime. Even today, in many Baul contexts, it is expected that one would learn the teachings of the body directly from a guru or guru-mother and seek their advice to engage in practicing them. While there are also oral teachings and information written in notebooks, committing such songs to memory was the primary way in which these teachings on the body were communicated between teachers and students and expressed in poetic form to the wider public. 

Two songs by Lalon on this theme are included here, one using predominantly Hindu and Buddhist symbols and another Muslim. However, a careful analysis of the language used reveals that the language of both religions is artfully intertwined and inextricable.