India! Her Glorious Spiritual Heritage!!

Jai Jai Ramakrishna Hari Bhakta Tukaram (also known as Sant Tukaram Maharaj) was an extraordinary saint in 17th-century Maharashtra. He is among the foremost of the saints of the Varkari devotional tradition. He composed close to 4,500 devotional poems, called Abhangs. He also popularized community-oriented worship with Kirtans. His Abhang songs were devoted to Lord Vitthala of Pandharpur. Lord Vitthala is the form by which Sri Krishna is worshipped in Maharashtra. The other names for the Lord are Panduranga, Vithoba and Pandharinatha. Bhakta Tukaram was born in the  year 1608 at a village called Dehu in Poona district of Maharashtra. His family deity was Lord Vithoba of Pandharpur. The Lord pulled Tukaram towards Himself by putting him through severe misfortunes. He lost his parents at the age of 17. His sister-in-law also died about this time, and his elder brother renounced the world seeking salvation. Debtors would not repay whatever was due to him, and creditor...

Jai Sri Krishna Surdas was a very prominent devotional saint during the 16th century. Even though he was blind by birth, he composed three poetic masterpieces in Braj Bhasha, the local language of Vrindavan.  He is considered to be the foremost of the p oets the Sri Vallabha Sampradaya designates as its Aṣṭachāp. Surdas was born in Siri village near Delhi in 1478 A.D. Being blind by birth, the world including his parents, were unkind to him. In this miserable state, Surdas one day heard a group of singers passing by his house, and realised the great joy of music. At the tender age of six, he followed them. However, the group was not pleased with the idea of being burdened with the blind boy and abandoned him at a lake where they rested for the night. Surdas was now truly alone. The young boy had a natural instinct to survive and by the age of 14 he had developed a keen sixth sense, and was known as the miracle boy.  One night, Surdas dreamt of Lord Krish...

Rama Krishna Hari! Panduranga Hari! Sant Eknath was among the great rishis of Maharashtra who brought about a great spiritual renaissance during the difficult period of Islamic rule. He was a prominent Marathi Sant, scholar and religious poet of the Varkari Sampradaya. The life of Eknath acted like a bridge between his predecessors Jnaneshwar and Naamdev and his successors Tukaram and Ramdas. His teachings of philosophy and practice are a synthesis of the quest for the eternal and transcendent while living within the imminent. This great saint was born sometime around 1530 AD in Paithan, Maharashtra in a Brahmin family which had brought forth great teachers in the past. Eknath’s father, Suryanarayan, and mother, Rukmini died shortly after his birth, hence Eknath was brought up by his grandparents, Chakrapani and Saraswatibai. Throughout his childhood Eknath devoted his time significantly to devotional practices. When about twelve years old, Eknath heard about a man n...

Om Namo Bhagawate Sri Ramakrishnaya Mother India was undergoing an extremely depressing phase during the middle of the 19th century. She was severely strained under more than 1,000 years of foreign invasions. Every possible attempt was made by the Mughal, British and many other foreign rulers to somehow destroy the great religion of the ancient land. Hinduism was crumbling and had got reduced to a mass of superstitions. The great religion of the Rishis was in real danger of extinction, as had happened with other ancient cultures all over the world. The few reformers who tried to set things right were made to believe that Hinduism itself was to be blamed for all the ills plaguing the society. They started opposing various Hindu practices, particularly the concept of various Gods, and of praying to God with form. They were especially against idol worship. In this way they were inadvertently playing into the hands of the marauding conquerors. At this critical junction in the hi...