Birthday of Saint Goswami Tulsidas – 30-07-2017

There are conflicting reports about the birth year of Goswami Tulsidas – a realized soul, saint, poet, reformer and philosopher.  Though there are consensus about the year of his attaining Mukthi – i.e. 1623 in the month of Shraavan (July – August) on the river bank of Ganges at Assi Ghat in Varnashi, various opinions are mooted regarding the birth year of Tulsidas – according to some the year of birth was 1497 and for others the year was 1532. Hence Tulsidas had lived around 126 or 91 years depending upon how one takes his year of birth. 

His birth place is however identified at Rajapur – also known as Chitrakuta at the banks of Yamuna river in UP. Upon  his father Atmaram Dubey’s death after four days of Tulsidas’s birth, his mother – Hulsi, fearing for her life like her husband, had abandoned her child Tulsidas  and Chuniya – the female maid of his mother – took care of Tulsidas at her native place Haripur. At Tulsidas’s 5 ½ years of age, Chuniya also had died and Tulsidas was orphaned – living by begging door to door for alms.

On his birth, Tulsidas’s original name was Rambola – the reason being, he came to the world by uttering the name of Rama instead of crying. Some of Tulsidas personal biographical details are mentioned in his works Kavitavali and Vinayapatrika. It is believed that Tulsidas was the reincarnation of Valmiki – the author of Ramayana.

He was a Sarayuparina Brahmin by birth and at Ayodhya, Rambola was given the Virakta Diksha known as Vairagi initiation and got the new name Tulsidas.  At the young age of 7 years, his Upanayanam was performed at Ayodhya where his first learning started before moving over to Varanasi.

He studied over a period of 15 years Sanskrit grammar, Hindu Literature and philosophy, four Vedas, six vedengas, Jyotisha from his guru Shesha Sanatana at the Panchaganga Ghat in Varnasi.

Some are of the opinion that Tulsidas was celibate and Sanyasi from the birth. For others, Tulsidas got married in the year 1583 to Ratnavali alias Buddhimati and got a son named Tarak who died as a toddler.  Tulsidas was passionately attached to his wife and could not bear even a day’s separation from her. When his wife went to her father’s house without informing him, he stealthily went to see her at night at his father-in-law’s house.  This act of Tulsidas produced a sense of shame to his wife who remarked: “My body is but a network of flesh and bones. If you would develop for Lord Rama even half of the love that you have for my filthy body, you would certainly cross the ocean of Samsara and attain immortality and eternal bliss.” These words awakened the heart of Tulsidas to embrace the life of an ascetic.

Tulsidas had actually met Hanuman at his religious discourses and thereafter, with the guidance of Hanuman, Tulsidas could meet Rama face to face at Ramghat in Chitrakuta. 

At Ayodhya, Tulsidas started to write the Ramcharitmanas on the Ramanavami of the Chaitra month in the year 1631 and completed it in two years, seven months and twenty-six days in the year 1633 on the day of Rama-Sita Marriage in the month of Margashirsha. The epic Ramacharitmanas was duly presented to Lord Shiva and Parvati at the Kashi Vishwanth Temple, Varnasi. The epic was written in the Awadhi language as per the wishes of Lord Shiva and Parvati.

Tulsidas spent most of his life in the city of Varanasi. The Tulsi Ghat on the Ganges River in Varanasi was named after him. He founded the Sankatmochan Temple dedicated to Hanuman in Varnasi, believed to stand at the place where he had the sight of Hanuman. Tulsidas started the Ramlila plays, a folk-theatre adaption of the Ramayana.

Hanuman Chalisa – literally meaning Forty verses to Hanuman – is an Awadhi work of 40 Chaupais and two Dohas in obeisance to Hanuman. This work bears the signature of the Author Tulsidas. It is one of the most read religious texts in northern India, and is recited by millions of Hindus on Tuesdays and Saturdays.  It is believed to have been uttered by Tulsidas in a state of Samadhi at the Kumbh Mela in Haridwar.  He wrote about 18 books – 12 major books and 6 minor works – containing songs praising and worshipping of his Saguna Brahman – Rama.

As per Tulsidas, the Nirguna Brahman (quality-less impersonal absolute) and Saguna Brahman (personal God with qualities) are one and the same. It is the devotion of the devotee that forces the Nirguna Brahman which is quality-less, formless, invisible and unborn, to become Saguna Brahman with qualities. Tulsidas gives the example of water, snow and hail to explain this – the substance is the same in all three, but the same formless water solidifies to become hail or a mountain of snow – both of which have a form. 

Tulsidas said that the Nirguna Brahman resides in his heart, the Saguna Brahman resides in his eyes and the name of Rama resides on his tongue, as if a radiant gemstone is kept between the lower and upper halves of a golden casket. He held that Rama is superior to all other names of God and argues that Ra and Ma are the only consonants that are written above all other consonants the conjunct form in Sanskrit because they are the two sounds in the word Rama.

Tulsidass’s Ramcharitmanas was praised as “the bible of North India” by western Scholars. Mahatma Gandhi regarded the Ramcharitmanas as the greatest book in all devotional literature. His Ramcharitmanas was ranked along with the works of Kalidas, Vyasa, Valmiki, Homer, Goethe and William Shakespeare. It was considered that Tulsidas established a sovereign rule on the kingdom of Dharma in northern India, which was comparable to the impact of Buddha. In the words of the archaeologist F.R.Allchin, who translated Tulsidas works – Vinapatrika and Kavitavali into English, had remarked: The work of Ramcharitmanas has been compared to not only the Ramayana of Valmiki, but the Vedas themselves, the Bhagavad Gita, the Kuran and the Bible.

Tulsidas is also referred to as Bhaktasiromani, meaning the highest jewel among devotees.

Hare Rama Hare Rama Rama Rama Hare Hare

Hare Krishna Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna Hare Hare.