Vithoba Mauli
In the mid thirteenth century, Vishal Pant, who hailed from Apegaon in Maharashtra set out on a pilgrimage to have darshan of the tirthkshetras of the south. As he stopped in Alandi to take bath in the holy Indryani river, he was observed by a kulkarni (village record keeper). This was Shidhopant, a landlord, who considered it punya to serve the bakthas of Pandarinatha Panduranga. At his request, Vishal Pant agreed to stay at his house.
One night Shidhopant had a dream where he was praying to Panduranga as he heard a divine voice ordering him to offer the hand of his eight year old daughter Rakhumabai, to Vishal Pant who had no interest whatsoever in grihasthashram. Vishal Pant agreed on the condition that if in fact it had been a divine ordain, a similar dream should occur to him too. Immediately, Shidopant placed a cot between the Tulsi plants in his garden and prayed for the same to happen. His prayer was answered and Vishal Pant had a yogi presenting himself in the dream. Having related this yogi to Shidopant, he married the young Rakhumabai. After spending happy years in Alandi, immersing themselves in kirtans and satsangs, the couple went back to Apegaon and lived with the senile parents of Vishal Pant. Unfortunately, the couple moved back to Alandi after an epidemic had caused the death of Vishal Pant’s parents.
Vishal Pant was affected by this. He kept bothering his wife and forced her to permit him to take sannyasa. According to the Dharmic tradition, a married man can renounce the worldly life and relieve himself from the shackles of samsara only with the consent of his wife. Rakhumabai told him that she would permit him only after the couple had a son. However, the impatient Vishal Pant left the house one night to Varanasi and lay at the feet of the very famous and great Swami Ramandanda to be accepted as his disciple. When Swami Ramananda inquired about his dependents, he committed the grave sin of lying to a Guru and got initiated into the ashram with the monastic name Chaitanya Swami. He was sincere, diligent and most importantly had a deep feeling of renunciation and was the foremost amongst the disciples of Swami Ramanada.
As destiny had it, Swami Ramananda left Chaitanya Swami incharge of the ashram and left for a pilgrimage to the south until the holy Rameshwaram along with a small group of disciples. The pilgrims took a halt at a Hanuman temple at the shore of a small lake in Alandi. At the same time, a young lady had come to the temple as her daily custom was to circumambulate the Ashwatha tree. At the sight of a holy man and his disciples she prostrated to Swami Ramananda who blessed her to be a mother of a son. The lady smiled gently and when inquired about it she replied that her husband had renounced grihasthashram and left for Varanasi without her consent. This lady was none other than Rakhumabai! He sent Shidopant to find out which foolish Guru had given sanyasa to his son-in-law and soon realized that it was himself and the man was his favorite disciple Chaitanya Swami!
Swami Ramananda with fury, took Rakhumabai and Shidopant to Varanasi with him and at this very sight Chaitanya Swami fell at his feet and asked for forgiveness. He was told that he would be forgiven only if he took his wife along with him to Alandi and raised a family.
Vishal Pant along with the very delighted Rakhumabai and Shidopant went to Alandi at the orders of his master but the village refused to accept a man who had taken sannyasa and come back to live with his family. They considered it similar to a man swallowing his own vomit! The family were treated as outcasts and lived in the outskirts of the village.Without a fuss, the saintly Vishal Pant lived through the embarrassments caused by the local population as they had been considered to have transgressed the laws of a dharmic society.
After twelve years, the couple had four children at intervals of two years: Nivrutti, Jnaneshwar, Sopan and Muktabai. Vishal Pant considered them to be the personification of ‘self realization’, ‘divine knowledge’, ‘the supreme path’ and ‘the ultimate goal’ respectively. Now Vishal Pant wanted his children to be accepted by the village and not be punished for no sin of theirs. The Pandits having considered this a fair argument suggested him to visit Pratisthana and consult with the priests there as they were the cream amongst the priests. The father and the children, having accepted the ordain, left for the Triyambakeshwar temple near Nashik, on the banks of the Godavari river, and performed various austerities over there.
One night, as the family were wandering in the narrow hilly region, a tiger growled with anger and they ran for their lives. All of them had reached home safely except for Nivrutti who had lost his way. He entered a deep cave unintentionally and found a yogi there. This was Gaininath, the disciple of Gorakshanath who had foreseen his arrival. He told Nivrutti that he would give knowledge to him who in turn should pass it on to his brother Jnaneshwar, for he had a mission to fulfill in the world. Nivrutti remained there for seven days and received the essence of the true knowledge and was brimming with renewed life.
He then went back to his family who were under the impression that he had fallen prey to a hungry tiger. On his arrival the family shed tears of joy and received him with open arms. Nivrutti proceeded to initiate Jnaneshwar under the Bodhi (Odumber) tree on the banks of the river Godavari, who in turn initiated Sopan and Muktabai. Thus the relationship between the siblings had become a more divine Guru-Shishya bond. The family lived continued to live there for another year and the children had become well versed in the Marathi and Sanskrit languages. Jnaneshwar at the age of eight had realized the absolute truth, Brahman and was indeed a divine being! His heart was at complete peace. Due to the spiritual well being of the children, Vishal Pant and Rakhumabai decided to walk in the path of complete renunciation and stepped into the Triveni Sangam at Prayagraj.
The children decided to go back to Alandi and redeem the name their parents’ had acquired as their father had returned back as a grihastha after taking sannyasa. However, as they gave the letter of purification to the pundits at Alandi, they realized that their efforts were futile. There were no significant changes among the pundits at Alandi. The child saints started revolting by giving examples of children who were considered impure but grew up to become the greatest of saints like Veda Vyasa, Rishi Valmiki and perhaps even the Pandavas. Jnaneshwar said that everyone had the same atman in them including the pundits and a passing buffalo. The pundits ridiculed him and asked him if he could make the buffalo chant the vedas if perhaps both had the same supreme entity in them. The buffalo was brought into the crowd and Jnaneshwar Maharaj started chanting the vedas and gently with utmost compassion petted its forehead gently and the buffalo took over and completed chanting the verse from Rig Veda. The embarrassed pundits, with tears rolling down their cheeks, were in a state of absolute shock like how Hiranyakashipu was when Lord Narasimha came to protect his devotee Prahalad directly from a pillar. The head Pundit sought forgiveness and apologized to the divine children for their arrogance. They were also given the buffalo.
Jnaneshwar was considered to be an avatar of divine knowledge in the Vedas. Perhaps this isn’t the only occasion from our history that a small kid has astounded a set of learned ones. From Prahalda, Dhruva and Andal to Muktabai and her brothers we learn that age and gender is never a barrier to seek any knowledge.
The pundits then carried Jnaneshwar in a procession. The young family however decided to wander from place to place chanting the abhangas of Panduranga. They soon reached a town called Nevasa, on the request of the inhabitants of which they decided to have a short stint there. Here, Jnaneshwar was distressed at the fact that not many knew the teachings of the Gita and the inner truth associated with it. It was also a fact that very few except the so-called upper castes could actually comprehend the Sanskrit language. The little boy thus sitting in the Mahalasa temple surrounded by people of all sects of the society began to have satsangs in Marathi, delivering the message of Vittala which were originally in Sanskrit. This thus was the first Sanskrit to Marathi translation added with wonderful imagery and witty jokes that made the audience burst in laughter of the Gita which touched the soul of the simplest of people.The doubts of all, from scholars to peasants were cleared as he kept unwinding the message in the Gita. Perhaps one wonders what a great sense of community bonding would have been present at such Satsangas. The book, he named Bavarta Dipika (Light on the inner meaning), colloquially referred to as Jnaneshwari was thus completed when he was just 14 years old. It is also noted that a man named Sachidananda noted down the Jnaneshwari as Jnaneshwar went on reciting it.
Soon the siblings went back to their hometown, Alandi, where people received them with open arms and a sigh of relief as they thought that the siblings wouldn’t return considering the ill treatment they had to undergo. Namadev (tailor’s son), Narhari (goldsmith), Gorakhumbar (potter), Chokhamela and his wife (outcastes), Sawata (gardener), Janabai (maid) along with the siblings, themselves formed a group called the Varkaris. They thus belonged to the Vittal-Sampradhaya. They made no distinction among people and the only thing that mattered to them was the love for Vittala. They wandered the streets of Maharashtra singing the glories of Vittala and as they passed through villages, the entire folks danced in ecstasy. What they wandered singing are called the Abhangas. Eighty of Namadeva’s abhangs have found place in the holy Guru Granth Sahib. The Varkaris are the founders of what we call Hari Katha and Nama Sankirtana.
There was a yogi, master of the hatha yoga, who had lived for 1400 years contemporary to this time near Alandi who would renew his cells once a year through the practices of Hatha Yoga. He had heard about Jnaneshwar and his siblings and was keen on meeting them. Along with thousands of followers who were beating drums and blowing trumpets, the yogi, Chang Deva, dressed in animal skins, with a cobra in his hand, with a fierce tiger beside and with the objective to strike fear in the young saints came downhill to Alandi. The young saints were sitting on a wall and when they inquired about the noise in the hills, they came to know about Chang Deva approaching them. They decided to meet him themselves and as Jnaneshwar patted the wall they were sitting on gently, it took off in the skies and landed in front of Chang Deva and his followers. Everyone was astonished at the sight of a brick wall carrying four children landing from the sky. As Chang Deva got off his tiger in a state of shock, Jnaneshwar prostrated at his feet. At this very instant, Chang Deva realized that he had accumulated ego on being a great saint which itself was a sign of spiritual regress. He apologized to Jnaneshwar that instead of focusing on the absolute truth, he had wasted all his time in accumulating yogic powers which were not as significant. Jnaneshwar comforted him and the ten year old Muktabai became his guru. She taught him to rise above name and form. Till day, Chang Deva’s abhangs stand proof to his devotion and his guru.
Jnaneshwar found great company with his father’s guru, Saint Namadeva. Both left on a pilgrimage to the northern part along with a lot of Varkaris. On their return, Jnaneshwar exclaimed that he had the desire to attain samadhi at Alandi. He told his followers that his duty in the world had been completed just as Gaininath had told Nivrutti. Beside the Sidheshwar tree, Saint Namdev recounts in his abhangs, was were after bathing in the Indrayani river did Jnaneshwar sit, clad in saffron robes, smiling with compassion after bowing down to his guru and brother Nivrutti, he sat in Dhyana. The twenty one year old’s eye balls looked upward and his eyes slowly closed and life pierced out of the Brahmarandhra chakra at the top of his head. The crowd chanted ‘Jai shri Jnaneshwar’ and rained flowers at the young saint before their final prostration.
Jnaneshwar left behind his works — Jnaneshwari, Amritanubhava, several abhangs- along with sobbing followers and his siblings who wept like they had become orphans. Chang Deva was inconsolable and wept like a child. In the following one and a half years, Sopan, Muktabai, Nivrutti and Chang Deva left the world for what they knew to be the ultimate goal of human life, liberation. Today there exists a temple at the samadhi of Jnaneshwar built by saint Eknath. Namasankeerthanam was introduced to Tamil Nadu by Samarth Ramdas Maharaj, the guru of Chatrapathi Sivaji, which is today inseparable from Carnatic music. The Vittala sampradhaya was introduced in Karnataka, thanks to the efforts of the Tuluva dynasty and its prominent king, Krishnadevaraya.
The above piece on the Marathi saints focussing around Vishal Panth’s family and the origin of the Varkaris has been inspired from the book ‘Saints of Maharashtra’ written Shrimati Savitribai Kanolkar, ‘Shri Dhnyaneshwari’ transalated by D.A. Ghaisis and the film ‘Bhaktha Gnanadeva’ directed by Shri Hunsur Krishnamurthy in the Kannada language.
Author: Jayant Suresh ,ME21B2018: I love understanding Indian scriptures and am fond of Indian philosophy. I am a student of Sanskrit. I also love to learn about history and culture.
