Gahininath: The Cave Where Two Traditions Met

What happened at Trimbakeshwar

The family were doing the Brahmagiri pradakshina.

Trimbakeshwar is one of the twelve jyotirlingas, at the source of the Godavari, near Nashik, and the Brahmagiri hill above it is circumambulated as a practice, which takes hours and goes through rough country.

And in the accounts a tiger appeared.

And the family scattered.

And Nivrittinath was separated from them, and went into a cave to get away from it, and there was somebody in the cave.

Gahininath.

And he initiated the boy.

What to make of it

As hagiography it is doing something specific, and the mechanism is worth naming.

The boy did not go looking.

He was a child of a family the community had destroyed, on a pilgrimage they were probably doing because they had nothing else left to do, and he was running from an animal.

And what he found was the thing his family had been refused.

The community would not initiate him, and would not give him the thread, and would not admit him to its ritual life on any terms.

And a yogi in a cave who did not care about any of that gave him a lineage.

Which is the whole argument of everything that follows, and it is made by the shape of the story rather than by an assertion: the Naths did not ask what caste he was, and the transmission he received did not come through the institution that had refused him.

The line

And this is the part that matters historically.

Jnaneshwar states the lineage explicitly, in the Jnaneshwari, and it runs:

Adinatha, which is Shiva; Matsyendranath; Gorakhnath; Gahininath; Nivrittinath; and then himself.

Six names, and the first is a deity, and the last is a teenager in Maharashtra writing a commentary on the Gita in Marathi.

What Nivrittinath did with it

Initiated his younger brother.

Which is unusual and is stated plainly in the texts: Jnaneshwar's guru was Nivrittinath, who was his brother, and Jnaneshwar says so repeatedly and at length, and the devotion in the Jnaneshwari toward Nivrittinath is one of its most striking features.

A boy of about fourteen was the teacher of a boy of about twelve, and what came out of it is the founding text of Marathi literature.

Why this matters for the Varkari tradition

Because it means the largest living devotional movement in Maharashtra carries a Nath lineage.

The Varkari tradition is the tradition of Vitthal at Pandharpur, of the wari, the walking pilgrimage in which hundreds of thousands of people walk to Pandharpur every year, and of the whole line of Marathi saints this series has entries on: Jnaneshwar, Namdev, Eknath, Tukaram, Chokhamela, Janabai, Muktabai, Bahinabai.

And its founding text was written by a man initiated in a Nath lineage.

And you can see it in the text.

The sixth chapter of the Jnaneshwari, on meditation, contains detailed Nath yoga material: the kundalini, its rising, the centres, the internal process, described technically and at length.

And the Amritanubhava, Jnaneshwar's independent work, is a philosophical text of the same lineage.

So the Varkari tradition, which is a bhakti movement of singing, walking and community, has at its origin a text whose author had received a yogic transmission from a cave and who wrote it into the book.

Which is a combination, and it is the distinctive character of early Varkari, and it is why the tradition never had to choose between devotion and practice.

Where Gahininath is

His samadhi is at Chinchani, in Ahmednagar district, Maharashtra, and it is a Nath shrine.

And the Nath and Varkari geographies overlap across Maharashtra: Trimbakeshwar, where Nivrittinath was initiated and where his samadhi is; Alandi, where Jnaneshwar's is; Madhi, where Kanifnath's is, which this app has an entry on; Chinchani; and Pandharpur, where all of it points.

One. He did not ask.

The community had refused the boy everything on the strength of a rule about his father, and a yogi in a cave gave him a lineage without establishing anything about him first.

Which is the argument the whole story is making, and it is made by what does not happen: there is no examination, no enquiry into his family, and no condition.

Two. He was not looking.

Nivrittinath went into that cave to get away from an animal.

Which is worth having for anybody who feels that they have not sought hard enough, or that they should have started earlier, or that what they have is the result of somebody else's effort rather than their own.

The founding transmission of the Varkari tradition happened to a frightened child who was running.

Three. A ruling can be wrong, and the tradition can be the one that says so.

Two people were told by a religious authority that their deaths were the price of their children's acceptance, and they paid it, and it did not work.

And the Varkari literature that follows treats that ruling as the thing it exists to answer. The whole later movement, in Marathi, for everybody, with Chokhamela at the step and Janabai in the kitchen and Tukaram in the fields, is what came out of what Paithan did.

Four. The brother.

A boy of about fourteen initiated a boy of about twelve, and Jnaneshwar spends a good part of the Jnaneshwari saying so, at length, with a devotion toward Nivrittinath that is one of the book's most striking features.

And it is worth noticing what that is: the eldest of four abandoned children, holding the family together, giving the next one what he had been given.

A daily practice from this entry:

• Vitthal Vitthal, or Jai Jai Ram Krishna Hari, which is the Varkari call
• One abhang of Jnaneshwar, Namdev, Tukaram or Janabai
• If you can, the Jnaneshwari, a few verses at a time, in Marathi or in translation
• And at Trimbakeshwar or Alandi, if you go: the two ends of the same afternoon

Who: Gahininath, also Gaininath, one of the Navnath and a disciple of Gorakhnath, in this series because he initiated Nivrittinath in a cave at Trimbakeshwar, and the largest living devotional movement in Maharashtra runs through that initiation. His samadhi is at Chinchani in Ahmednagar district.

What had happened to the family: Vitthalpant of Apegaon married Rukmini, then left without telling her to take sannyasa at Kashi, and his own teacher, discovering he had a living wife, ordered him back to householder life. They had four children: Nivrittinath, Jnaneshwar, Sopan and Muktabai. The community would not accept it, because sannyasa in the classical system is irreversible: the person who takes it is ritually dead, their funeral rites are performed, and there is no procedure for returning, so a man who took it and then had children had done something for which there was no category, and the children were the problem. They were refused the thread ceremony, and with it entry into the community's ritual life, marriage prospects, participation and standing.

The ruling: the parents went to the brahmanas of Paithan, and the accounts say they were told the expiation required was their own lives and the children might then be accepted. Vitthalpant and Rukmini drowned themselves. This app says what that was: two people were told by a religious authority that their deaths were the price of their children's acceptance, and they paid it, which is a community killing people by rule, and no reading of any text justifies it. The tradition itself does not defend it, since the Varkari literature that follows treats Paithan's ruling as the thing the whole subsequent movement is a reply to. And it did not work: the children went on being refused.

The cave: the family were doing the Brahmagiri pradakshina at Trimbakeshwar, one of the twelve jyotirlingas at the source of the Godavari, when a tiger appeared and they scattered. Nivrittinath, separated, went into a cave to get away from it, and Gahininath was there and initiated him. As hagiography it is doing something specific: the boy did not go looking, he was a child of a family the community had destroyed and he was running from an animal, and what he found was the thing his family had been refused. The community would not initiate him on any terms, and a yogi in a cave who did not care about any of that gave him a lineage.

The line: Jnaneshwar states it explicitly in the Jnaneshwari, running Adinatha who is Shiva, then Matsyendranath, Gorakhnath, Gahininath, Nivrittinath and himself. Six names, the first a deity and the last a teenager writing a Marathi commentary on the Gita. Nivrittinath initiated his own younger brother, so a boy of about fourteen was the teacher of a boy of about twelve, and Jnaneshwar says so repeatedly, the devotion toward Nivrittinath being one of the Jnaneshwari's most striking features.

Why it matters: it means the Varkari tradition, the tradition of Vitthal at Pandharpur and of the wari that hundreds of thousands walk every year, carries a Nath lineage. And you can see it in the text: the sixth chapter of the Jnaneshwari, on meditation, contains detailed Nath yoga material on kundalini, its rising, the centres and the internal process, described technically and at length, and the Amritanubhava is a philosophical text of the same lineage. A bhakti movement of singing, walking and community has at its origin a book by a man who had received a yogic transmission in a cave and wrote it in, which is why the tradition never had to choose between devotion and practice.