Ramananda: The Guru Who Stopped Asking Who People Were

The traditional list of Ramananda's principal disciples is the most consequential thing about him, and it is worth setting out in full.

The twelve, as the tradition names them:

• Kabir, a weaver, from a Muslim julaha family
• Ravidas, also Raidas, a leather worker
• Sena, a barber
• Dhanna, a Jat farmer
• Pipa, a Rajput king of Gagron
• Bhavananda
• Sukhananda
• Asananda
• Surasurananda
• Paramananda
• Mahananda
• Anantananda

And two women:

• Padmavati
• Surasari

What that list is. A statement.

It contains a Muslim weaver, a leather worker from a community treated as untouchable, a barber, a farmer, a king, brahmana ascetics, and two women, all named as disciples of one teacher.

How much of it is historical. The honest answer.

• The individuals are historical. Kabir, Ravidas, Sena, Dhanna and Pipa all existed and left compositions
• Whether they were literally initiated by Ramananda is disputed. The chronology is difficult and the connection may be traditional rather than documented
• Kabir's own compositions mention Rama constantly and he is understood in some traditions to have received the name from Ramananda
• Ravidas is included in the Guru Granth Sahib, as is Kabir, as are Sena, Dhanna and Pipa, and a hymn attributed to Ramananda himself is in it, in Raga Basant

That last point is worth dwelling on. There is a composition attributed to Ramananda in the Guru Granth Sahib.

Its substance is that he had prepared to go out to worship, gathering the materials, and then found that wherever he went the Guru was already there, and that the search was unnecessary because what he was looking for was within.

So whatever the historical detail, the Sikh scripture, compiled in the early seventeenth century, includes him, alongside Kabir, Ravidas, Namdev, Sena, Dhanna, Pipa, Bhikhan, Surdas, Parmanand, Sadhna, Trilochan, Jaidev and Beni.

The Bhagat Bani. That collection in the Guru Granth Sahib is worth knowing about.

It contains compositions by fifteen bhagats who were not Sikh Gurus, from across north India, of various communities and including Muslims, gathered into the scripture of another tradition and given equal standing with the Gurus' own words.

That is one of the most striking editorial decisions in Indian religious history and it preserved a great deal that might otherwise be lost.

What the disciples did. Each is treated separately in this series, but in summary:

• Kabir produced a body of verse that is among the most quoted in north India, attacked both Hindu and Muslim ritualism, and is claimed by Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs
• Ravidas produced compositions of great directness on caste and dignity, and is the founding figure of the Ravidassia tradition
• Sena the barber, Dhanna the farmer, Pipa the king: each with compositions in the Guru Granth Sahib
• Anantananda and the brahmana disciples carried the Ramanandi monastic order forward

The two lines. This is the structural point.

The tradition splits into:

• A monastic line, through the brahmana disciples, which became the Ramanandi order, worshipping Rama and Sita with images, temples and formal initiation
• A nirguna line, through Kabir and Ravidas, which rejected image worship, ritual and caste more radically, and which fed into the Sant tradition and into Sikhi

Both trace to the same teacher, and they went in very different directions.

Whether that split is historically real or a later way of organising the material is exactly the kind of question the scholarship argues about, and a reader does not need to settle it.

What it is: the largest monastic order in India, by number of ascetics.

The scale. Estimates vary but the Ramanandi sadhus are generally reckoned in the hundreds of thousands, and the order is substantially larger than any other Vaishnava or Shaiva order.

Most people have not heard of it, and most people who have seen its sadhus did not know what they were looking at.

Where it is centred:

• Ayodhya, above all
• Varanasi
• Chitrakoot, Nashik, Ujjain, Haridwar and the Kumbh sites
• Janakpur in Nepal
• Across north and central India, with very large numbers of maths and akharas

The deity: Rama with Sita, and Hanuman.

The order's mantra is the Shad akshara, Ram Ramaya Namah, or in some lines the Rama tarak mantra.

The three branches. This is the structure and it is worth knowing.

Tyagi: the ascetics who wander, do not settle, and practise austerity. They travel, beg, and observe strict renunciation.

Naga: the militant branch. Historically an armed order, organised into akharas, which fought, protected pilgrimage routes and temples, and were involved in the politics of the period.

Rasik: the devotional branch, focused on rasa, the emotional relationship with Rama and Sita, with elaborate seva, poetry and music. The Rasik tradition in Ayodhya and Janakpur developed a devotional literature comparable to the Braj Krishna traditions.

The Naga akharas. Worth explaining since they are highly visible at the Kumbh.

• Armed ascetic orders existed in both Vaishnava and Shaiva traditions
• The Vaishnava akharas are principally Ramanandi: Digambar, Nirvani and Nirmohi
• The Shaiva akharas are the Dashanami Nagas: Juna, Niranjani, Mahanirvani and others
• They fought each other, and they fought others, and there are documented battles between akharas at Kumbh melas in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries over precedence in bathing
• Precedence at the Shahi Snan is now regulated and the order of procession is fixed

How to describe the armed history. Factually.

Armed ascetic orders were a real feature of Indian religious and political life from roughly the sixteenth to the nineteenth centuries. They provided military service, protected trade and pilgrimage, held property, and were participants in the politics of the period.

That is documented and is not a scandal; it is simply what these institutions were. The British disarmed them in the nineteenth century, and what survives is the ceremonial form at the Kumbh.

The Rasik tradition. The other end of the same order.

• Centred at Ayodhya and Janakpur
• Devotional poetry in Braj Bhasha and Awadhi on Rama and Sita
• The Sakhi tradition, in which the devotee takes the position of a female companion of Sita, which parallels the Krishna traditions
• Elaborate seva at the temples
• Vivaha Panchami, the marriage of Rama and Sita, celebrated at Janakpur as the great festival

Janakpur. Worth a note.

In Nepal, in the Terai, held to be Sita's birthplace and where the marriage took place. The Janaki Mandir is a very large nineteenth century temple, and Vivaha Panchami in Margashirsha draws enormous numbers from both Nepal and India.

The Rama Janaki devotional tradition there is distinct and substantial and is much less known outside the region than it should be.

The independence question. Worth stating since it is a real controversy in the order's own history.

The Ramanandi order traditionally traced itself to Ramanuja through Ramananda. In the twentieth century a substantial movement within the order argued that this was a later construction, that Ramananda's tradition was independent, and that the Ramanandis should not be subordinate to the Sri Vaishnava lineage.

That argument was conducted publicly, involved scholarship and polemic, and the majority position in the order is now that it is an independent sampradaya.

A reader does not need to take a side. What the episode shows is that lineage claims are constructed, contested and revised, which is generally true and is worth knowing.

This series has met the question repeatedly and Ramananda is where it is stated most directly, so it is worth taking stock.

What the bhakti traditions did:

• Produced saints from every community, repeatedly, across every region and every language
• Composed in vernaculars rather than Sanskrit, which removed the educational barrier
• Stated, in text after text, that birth is not the qualification
• Created spaces, including satsang, kirtan, langar and annadanam, where people ate and sang together across the usual boundaries

What they did not do:

• End the caste system
• Generally, challenge it as a social and economic arrangement rather than as a religious qualification
• Prevent their own institutions from reproducing it

The pattern that recurs. It is worth naming because it appears in every entry.

• A saint from an excluded community is honoured
• Their compositions become scripture
• Their images are carried in procession
• And their community continues to be excluded from the temples where this happens

Thiruppaan Alvar, Nandanar, Kanaka Dasa, Chokhamela, Ravidas: the same shape in five languages.

Chokhamela is the sharpest case and is covered in his own entry: he was buried at the step of the Pandharpur temple because he could not enter it, and his samadhi is there, at the step, and people bow at it before going in.

What changed it, eventually, and it is worth being accurate.

• Reform movements from the nineteenth century, many led by people from the affected communities
• Jyotirao Phule, Savitribai Phule, Periyar, Narayana Guru, Ambedkar and many others
• Temple entry movements and legislation, described in the Nandanar entry
• The Constitution: Article 15, Article 17, Article 25
• Legislation: the Protection of Civil Rights Act, the SC and ST Prevention of Atrocities Act
• And continuing enforcement, which is uneven

Ambedkar should be named here directly. He was the principal architect of the Constitution's provisions on this, he led the Mahad satyagraha for water and the Kalaram temple entry satyagraha, and he eventually concluded that the reform of Hinduism from within was not possible and converted to Buddhism with very large numbers of followers in 1956.

That conclusion is a serious position held for serious reasons, and a devotional guide that pretended it was not would be dishonest.

What a devotee can do now, practically:

• Do not participate in or accept exclusion from a temple on the basis of community. It is illegal
• Do not treat temple workers, cleaners or cooks as ritually beneath you
• Do not repeat the claim that these exclusions are required by the shastras, since the traditions' own most celebrated saints came from excluded communities
• Learn the names: Ravidas, Chokhamela, Nandanar, Thiruppaan Alvar, Kanaka Dasa, Sena, Dhanna
• Eat together. The langar and the community meal are the practical form and they have always been the point

And Ramananda's line, whether or not he said it:

Jat pat puchhe nahin koi. Let nobody ask.

That is what an order of several hundred thousand ascetics has as its founding principle, and it is a reasonable thing to hold people to.

The Ramanandi order is centred on Rama, and the Rama devotional tradition in north India is largely its work.

What the order worships:

• Rama with Sita, together
• Hanuman, extensively
• The Ramcharitmanas and the Sanskrit Ramayana
• The Rama mantra and Ram naam

Tulsidas. The connection is direct.

Tulsidas, author of the Ramcharitmanas, is placed within the Ramanandi tradition by most accounts, and the Ramcharitmanas is the single most important devotional text in north India by any measure of use.

He is treated in his own entry elsewhere in this app.

Ram naam. The practice.

• The repetition of the name Rama
• Written repeatedly in Ram naam notebooks, a very widespread practice
• Chanted, counted, and sung
• The Ram Ram greeting across north India
• Ram naam satya hai, said at funerals

Why the name specifically. The tradition holds the name to be identical with the deity and to be effective independently of the reciter's qualification, and the Ramcharitmanas states it directly.

The standard illustration is Valmiki, who by tradition could not say the name and was given it reversed, mara mara, which repeated becomes rama rama.

Ayodhya:

• In Uttar Pradesh, on the Sarayu
• One of the Saptapuri, the seven cities of liberation
• The Ramanandi centre, with a very large number of temples and maths
• Hanuman Garhi, the principal Hanuman temple
• Kanak Bhavan, associated with Sita
• The Sarayu ghats
• The Ram Janmabhoomi temple

On Ayodhya's recent history. It should be handled briefly and accurately.

The Ram Janmabhoomi Babri Masjid dispute ran for decades, involved the destruction of the mosque in 1992, extremely serious communal violence in which very large numbers of people were killed across India, and prolonged litigation.

The Supreme Court delivered its judgment in 2019, awarding the disputed site for the construction of a temple and directing that alternative land be provided for a mosque. The temple was subsequently built and consecrated.

What a devotional guide should say about it:

• The legal position is settled by the Supreme Court judgment
• The violence that accompanied the dispute killed a great many people of all communities and that should not be forgotten
• Devotion to Rama does not require any position on communal politics, and the overwhelming majority of Rama bhakti, historically and now, has nothing to do with it
• Tulsidas, Kabir, Ravidas and Ramananda are the tradition's actual content, and none of them is about this

The wider Rama circuit:

• Ayodhya, the birthplace
• Chitrakoot, on the Uttar Pradesh Madhya Pradesh border, where the exile began, which is quiet and very beautiful
• Nashik and Panchavati, in Maharashtra
• Hampi and Kishkindha, in Karnataka, associated with Sugriva and Hanuman
• Rameswaram, in Tamil Nadu
• Janakpur, in Nepal, Sita's birthplace
• Sri Lanka, with its own associated sites

Chitrakoot deserves the recommendation. It is much quieter than the other Rama sites, the Kamadgiri parikrama takes a couple of hours, the Mandakini is pleasant, and it is where the tradition places the most peaceful stretch of the exile.

Ramlila. Worth mentioning.

• The dramatic enactment of the Ramayana, performed across north India in the days before Dussehra
• The Ramnagar Ramlila at Varanasi, which runs for thirty one days across an entire town and is one of the great performance traditions anywhere
• UNESCO listed
• Performed by ordinary people in villages and neighbourhoods, not professionals

The Ramnagar Ramlila is the one to see. It has no stage: the town itself is the set, the audience walks between locations, and it runs for a month.

Ram naam. The tradition's whole practice, in one item.

• Repeat the name Rama
• Aloud, silently, counted on a mala, or written
• The Ram naam lekhan practice, writing the name repeatedly in a notebook, is very widespread and is used by very large numbers of people
• No initiation, no qualification, no materials beyond a pen

Why writing it works for people. Practically, it is the easiest form to sustain.

It occupies the hands, it produces a visible record, it can be done in short periods, and it does not require the concentration that silent japa does. Households keep the notebooks and they accumulate.

Hanuman practice:

• The Hanuman Chalisa, by Tulsidas, forty verses, which is probably the single most recited devotional text in India
• Tuesday and Saturday
• The Sundarakanda of the Ramcharitmanas, recited as a complete unit, which is a very common household practice

The Ramcharitmanas:

• In Awadhi, by Tulsidas
• Seven kandas
• Recited as Ramayan path, sometimes as a nine day Navahnik Parayan
• Sundarakanda alone is the most commonly recited section
• Available everywhere, in every format, with translation

Places:

• Ayodhya
• Chitrakoot, which is the recommendation
• Varanasi, Panchganga ghat, associated with Ramananda
• Janakpur, Nepal, for Vivaha Panchami in Margashirsha
• Ramnagar, Varanasi, for the Ramlila in Ashwin
• The Kumbh, where the Ramanandi akharas process

When:

• Rama Navami, in Chaitra, the birth
• Vivaha Panchami, in Margashirsha, the marriage
• Dussehra and the Ramlila season
• Diwali, which is the return to Ayodhya

And the principle from this entry, which is the thing to carry:

Do not ask.

When somebody comes to sing, to eat, to sit, to serve or to learn, the tradition's founding line for the largest ascetic order in India is that nobody should ask what community they are from.

That is a rule that can be applied immediately, costs nothing, and is the practical content of everything this batch has described.

A closing thought

A sannyasi came back from travelling and his own order told him to eat separately, because they could not be sure whose hands had touched his food while he was away.

He said that a rule which made travelling incompatible with the practice was the wrong rule, and left.

Then he took as disciples a Muslim weaver, a leather worker, a barber, a farmer, a king and two women, and taught in the language people actually spoke.

The order that came out of it is the largest in India, the weaver and the leather worker are in the scripture of a different religion, and the couplet everybody attributes to him says that nobody should ask.