Śrī Hanumān Chālīsā — Complete 40 Verses with Transliteration
The Hanumān Chālīsā was composed by Tulsīdāsa in the sixteenth century — in Awadhi, the vernacular Hindi dialect of the Gangetic plain, not in Sanskrit. This is not incidental. The choice of the spoken language of ordinary people was a deliberate act of democratisation: a text that anyone could memorise, chant, and carry in the body without formal scriptural training. In the four centuries since its composition it has become the most widely recited devotional text in the Hindu tradition, sung daily by hundreds of millions of people across India and the diaspora. Its forty verses are known to the barely literate and to the scholarly with equal completeness.
The theology of the Chālīsā is uncompromising in its bhakti orientation. Hanumān is not presented as a deity to be propitiated but as the ideal devotee — the one who has dissolved completely into service of Rāma and become, through that dissolution, Rāma’s most capable instrument. The opening invocation of the guru (śrī guru caraṇa saroja rāja, nija mana mukuru sudhāri) establishes the text’s own epistemological position: understanding comes not from the intellect’s effort but from the purification of the inner mirror so that what is already there can be seen clearly.
The forty verses move through Hanumān’s biography — his birth, his journey to Lanka, his burning of the city, the recovery of Sītā, his role in the battle — but the biographical material is never the point. Each episode is a teaching about the nature of bhakti-śakti: the power that becomes available when the individual will surrenders fully to the divine will. Hanumān leaps across an ocean not because he is physically extraordinary but because Rāma’s name is on his lips and Rāma’s form is in his heart and, in that condition, the ordinary limitations of embodiment simply do not apply in the same way.
The closing verses establish the protective function: whoever recites the Chālīsā is said to find all their work accomplished and all their difficulties dispersed. The tradition’s understanding of this is not magical — it is psychological and energetic. The quality of consciousness produced by forty verses of genuine bhakti changes how one meets the day and what the day returns.
The complete forty verses with transliteration are preserved below for study and recitation alongside the recording.
Dohā (Opening):
śrī guru caraṇa saroja rāja, nija mana mukuru sudhāri |
baranau raghuvara bimala jasu, jo dāyaku phala cāri ||
buddhihīna tanu jānike, sumirau pavanakumāra |
bala budhi vidyā dehu mohi, harahu kaleśa vikāra ||
Cleansing the mirror of my mind with the dust of the guru’s lotus feet, I recite the pure glory of the best of Raghus, the giver of the four fruits of life. Knowing this body to be without intellect, I recall the son of the wind. Grant me strength, wisdom, and knowledge; remove my afflictions and impurities.
Caupāīs 1–10:
jaya hanumāna jñāna guṇa sāgara | jaya kapīśa tihun loka ujāgara ||1||
rāmadūta atulita baladhamā | añjanī putra pavana suta nāmā ||2||
mahābīra bikrama bajraṅgī | kumati nivāra sumati ke saṅgī ||3||
kañcana barana birāja subesā | kānana kuṇḍala kuñcita kesā ||4||
hātha bajra aura dhvajā birājai | kāndhe mūñja janeu sājai ||5||
śaṅkara suvana kesarī nandana | teja pratāpa mahā jaga bandana ||6||
vidyāvāna guṇī ati cātura | rāma kāja karibe ko ātura ||7||
prabhu carita sunibe ko rasiyā | rāma lakhana sītā mana basiyā ||8||
sūkṣma rūpa dhari siyahi dikhāvā | bikaṭa rūpa dhari laṅka jarāvā ||9||
bhīma rūpa dhari asura saṃhāre | rāmacandra ke kāja savāre ||10||
Caupāīs 11–20:
lāya sajīvani lakhana jiyāye | śrī raghubīra harasi ura lāye ||11||
raghupati kīnhī bahuta baḍāī | tuma mama priya bharatahi sama bhāī ||12||
sahasa badana tumhāro jasa gāvai | asa kahi śrīpati kaṇṭha lagāvai ||13||
sanakādika brahmādi munīsā | nārada śārada sahita ahīsā ||14||
jama kubera digapāla jahāṃ te | kabi kobida kahi sake kahāṃ te ||15||
tuma upakāra sugrīvahi kīnhā | rāma milāya rājapada dīnhā ||16||
tumharo mantra bibhīṣana mānā | laṅkeśvara bhae saba jaga jānā ||17||
juga sahasra yojana para bhānū | līlyo tāhi madhura phala jānū ||18||
prabhu mudrikā meli mukha māhī | jaladhi lāṃghi gaye acaraja nāhī ||19||
durgama kāja jagata ke jete | sugama anugraha tumhre tete ||20||
Caupāīs 21–30:
rāma duāre tuma rakhavāre | hota na ājñā binu paisāre ||21||
saba sukha lahai tumhārī saranā | tuma rakṣaka kāhu ko ḍaranā ||22||
āpana teja samhāro āpai | tīnou loka hāṃka te kāṃpai ||23||
bhūta piśāca nikaṭa nahi āvai | mahābīra jaba nāma sunāvai ||24||
nāsai roga harai saba pīrā | japata nirantara hanumata bīrā ||25||
saṅkaṭa se hanumāna chuḍāvai | mana krama bacana dhyāna jo lāvai ||26||
saba para rāma ṭapasavī rājā | tina ke kāja sakala tuma sājā ||27||
aura manoratha jo koī lāvai | soi amita jīvana phala pāvai ||28||
cāro juga paratāpa tumhārā | hai parasiddha jagata ujiyārā ||29||
sādhu santa ke tuma rakhavāre | asura nikandana rāma dulāre ||30||
Caupāīs 31–40:
aṣṭasiddhi nava nidhi ke dātā | asa bara dīnha jānakī mātā ||31||
rāma rasāyana tumhāre pāsā | sadā raho raghupati ke dāsā ||32||
tumhāre bhajana rāmako pāvai | janama janama ke dukha bisarāvai ||33||
anta kāla raghuvara pura jāī | jahāṃ janama haribhakta kahāī ||34||
aura devatā citta na dharaī | hanumata sei sarba sukha karaī ||35||
saṅkaṭa kaṭai miṭai saba pīrā | jo sumirai hanumata balavīrā ||36||
jaya jaya jaya hanumāna gosāīn | kṛpā karahu gurudeva kī nāīn ||37||
jo sata bāra pāṭha kara koī | chuṭahi bandi mahā sukha hoī ||38||
jo yaha paḍhai hanumāna calīsā | hoya siddhi sākhī gaurīsā ||39||
tulasīdāsa sadā hari cerā | kījai nātha hṛdaya maha ḍerā ||40||
Dohā (Closing):
pavanatanaya saṅkaṭa haraṇa maṅgala mūrati rūpa |
rāma lakhana sītā sahita hṛdaya basahu sura bhūpa ||
Tulsīdāsa wrote the Chālīsā in the language of the street so it could live in the body of anyone who heard it. Four centuries later it does exactly that — a complete theology of bhakti carried in forty verses that most who chant them cannot fully translate but know, in some older way, entirely.
From the Tradition — Hanumān Chālīsā Without Distraction
Listen to the recording once through with eyes closed and no other tasks. Tulsīdāsa composed the Chālīsā in Awadhi — the language of ordinary people — precisely so it could be received without learning. The only requirement is that the mind actually be present for the forty verses rather than drifting through them. After the final chaupāī, sit for two minutes in the silence before opening your eyes.
