Bhakthirathnakara- The ocean of Devotion

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Bhakthi rathnakara

 

In

srimadbhagvatham it is said,

 

kale khalu bhavishyanthi

naaraayaNa paraayaNaaH

 

In

Kaliyuga there will be devotees of Lord Narayana

 

kvachith kvachith maharaja

dhravideshu cha bhooriSaH

 

In some

places, abundantly in the south.

 

kavereecha mahaapuNyaa

partheechee cha mahanadhee

 

along the

river Kaveri and Mahanadhee ,

 

praayo bhakthaa bhagavathi

vaasudheve amalaasayaaH

 

devotees

of the Lord Vasudeva, with pure hearts.

 

We see that the bhakthi and bhagavatha cult spread widely

only the south along the river Kaveri

and in the regions where the river Mahandhi flows as mentioned in

srimadbhagavatham, though the devotees of the Lord were spread over the whole

of India.

 

In south we have the azvars in Tamilnadu,

Purandara dasa, Kanaka dasa among the devotees in

Karnataka, Ramadasa from Andhra and Thyagaraja, who lived on the banks of

Kaveri, though a telugu speaking Brahmin and in Kerala we had Poondhanam,

Narayana Bhattadri and others. All of themspread bhakthi through their compositions

which are immortal and serve as the medium of bhakthi till date.

 

Along the banks of Mahandhi was had several devotees of Panduranga, whose abhangs are

popular and stand as examples of bhakthi through namasankeerthana.

 

Towards north Meerabai, Tulasidas, Jayadeva, Surdas and

others spread the bhakthi movement through their bajans. We shall see the

greatness of the devotees from Mahrashtra to Orissa across the Northern India in this narration. Let us start with

Meera, who stands out due to her devotion to Krishna

was similar to Andal of Tamilnadu. Her bajans are as popular as the Thiruppavai

of Andal.