Tamil Nadu: Quest on footprints of the revolutionary Saint Ramanujar

Chennai: So much has been said or written about Saint Ramanujar and yet the final word has not been pronounced on the revolutionary saint. And 1,000 years after his incarnation, scholars having faith in an egalitarian society and religious persons are still lost in admiring this inspiring personality.

The sahasrabdhi celebrations that lasted for a year appears to have given an opportunity to the organisers – LIFCO group - to trace his historic visit to Kashmir to obtain a copy of the Brahma Sutras to give his commentary. The celebrations have led to a healthy curiosity over the revolutionary saint’s journey during his span of 120 years when he traversed the length and breadth of the country twice in his lifetime on foot. He also undertook his second trip to Kashmir seeking a copy of the Brahma Sutra when he was 80 years old. It is remarkable that he also attracted people of all castes and religion to receive his golden rath that ran during the celebrations for over a year. 

 “A major objective of the celebrations is not to deliberate how much is known about him but how well we know about this great saint who wanted to help suffering humanity,” said Radha Vijayasarathy, MD, LIFCO group. Over 2,000 persons had gathered at Coimbatore including a large number of Muslims and Christians in receiving the golden rath of Ramanujar taken around the country. In certain pockets of TN, tribals voluntarily came forward to receive the rath by garlanding the idol and seemed to display a rare affinity to the Vaishnavaite saint. This apparently indicated that some of his teachings, especially concerning inclusiveness and destroying all caste barriers and social hierarchy, appeared to attract the people most, she said and added that the rath was even taken to Agra, Delhi and Kashmir, thanks to the efforts of a retired official of the TTD.

Walked the whole of India twice
“When we contacted the Kashmir government and Banaras Hindu University, we were told that there was reference to the saint's visit to Kashmir and we were asked to contact the Thanjavur Saraswathi Mahal library for further details. During our quest to know more about the saint we learnt that there was a rare image of Ramanujar lighting a lamp and reciting the Sri Bhasyam standing near a pillar”, Radha Vijayasarathy adds. Ramanujar's disciple Kuruthalwar who read the whole text recited page by page of the Brahma Sutra that runs to 512 chapters, thus enabling his guru to give his commentary on the sacred text.

Ramanuja reached Kashmir, the place he had visited once with Kuresa, which was the Saradha Peetam, where he was helped by the goddess with Bhodhayana Vriththi. Once again there were debates with the Pandits in Kashmir and none was able to oppose him successfully. He was able to convince everyone with his arguments in support of Visishtadvait philosophy. The King of Kashmir recognised his greatness and became his disciple.

His commentary impressed Saraswathi
This is another less known fact about the popular Acharya. When he visited Saraswati Peetam, Goddess Saraswathi was so impressed with his commentary on Brahma Sutram that She named it “Sri Bhashyam” and conferred upon him the title of “Bhashyakaarar.”

 During the year-long celebration, which concluded in May, LIFCO group brought out ten tiles on saint Ramanujar, 4 CDs on his work, 3D animation DVDs on his life history for children in four languages - Tamil, Telugu, Kannada and English. About 5 lakh people had attended the exhibition Arputha Ramanujar held in Sriperumbudur. A special postal cover apart a stamp marking the 1000th year of the saint was also released.