RAMANUJA/RAMANAND

[Guest guest]

Om SrI KrishNAya namah.

SrI lakshmI nrusimha parabrahmaNE namah.

dear BhAgavatas,

namo namah.

Thanks to SrI Tandy for the info about great svAmIs like SrI

payAhArI.

It is widely believed and accepted that both TulasIdAs and mIrAbAi

belonged to the disciplic succession of SrI rAmAnanda.however, rAmcharit

mAnas by TulasIdAs does not appear to be a core VaishNavite text whose

very first SlOka is a prayer to sarasvatI and vinAyaka together (vANI

vinAyakau) and where the author says in one of the kAndas that worship of

Lord Siva is as imp as worship of Lord Rama.

most of the rAmAnandIs are not very much interested in spititual

education

and study of scriptures. they are also called bairAgIs. their slogan is

"padhE likhE babbhan kA kAm bhaj bairAgI sItArAm". This can be roughly

translated as that reading and writing alphabets like "ta, tha , da, dha,

na, pa , pha, ba, bha, ma" is useless and it is better to chant

sItArAm (my favourite slogan whenever i am bored with studies!).they do

consider SrI rAmAnujA as their pUrvAchArya and revere him a lot.I have

seen many pictures of svAmI rAmAnand at ayOdhyA and these tell us that he

is a SrI VaishNava.their tilak is also same as that of SVs.rAmAnandIs also

had a few mutts in S India like the famous HathI rAm mutt of Tirupati

which later became infamous.

for rAmANandIs, samASryaNam is not a must and doing harinAm is the

most importent thing.for rAmAnujIs it is compulsory. most of the

rAmAnandIs have "dAs" at the end of their initiated name while rAmAnujIs

normally used to have "AchArI".for rAmAnandIs, study of rAmcharitmAnas

is the most important duty.For rAmAnujIs, VAlmIki rAmAyaN is the only

authentic rAmAyaN.thus there are a few differences and first one is very

big.

there are some learned scholars among rAmAnandIs and they depend on

AchArya rAmAnuja's works only and don't have their own commentaries on

scriptures nor follow those of SankarAchArya or madhvAchArya.i know of a

school at ayOdhyA which in the past taught rAmAnuja bhAshyam to sAdhus of

both the sects.the great panchanadIya(punjAbI) "badE" sudarSanAchArya, a

disciple of Vrindavan svAmI of that time, wrote many books in sanskrit and

Hindi and this educated many rAmAnujIs and rAmAnandIs of N India to

understand the darSanam of Bhagavad rAmAnuja.

rAmAnuja dAs

V.Srimahavishnu

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V. Srimahavishnu, M.Tech (Structures)

C - 211 , Hall - IV

I.I.T. Kanpur - 208 016

INDIA

Email : vsri

s.vinjamuri

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[Guest guest]

Sri Srimahavishnu wrote a very interesting and informative

comparison of the Ramanandi sect of North India and its

relation to the Ramanuja sampradaya. I have also heard

that Sri Pillai Lokacharya occurs in one version of the

Ramananda acharya parampara.

 

I only have a comment on one small part of what Srimahavishnu

wrote:

> most of the

> rAmAnandIs have "dAs" at the end of their initiated name while rAmAnujIs

> normally used to have "AchArI".

 

In old maNipravALa texts such as the guru parampara prabhAvam

and periya thirumudi adaivu, the names of many Sri Vaishnava

acharyas also contain the suffix "dAsa", Tamilized to "dAsar".

Perhaps this was an ancient tradition passed on to the

Ramanandis in the North. Later Sri Vaishnavas have mostly

abandoned it for the now ubiquitous "ayyangaar" and "acharya",

reserving the suffix "dAsan" only for formal occasions where

humility is required.

 

dAsan,

Mani