Bhagavan
The Early Years
His given name was Venkataraman and he was born into a family of South Indian brahmins in Tiruchuzhi, a small town in Tamil Nadu. He came from a pious, middle-class family. His father, Sundaram Iyer, was, by profession, an 'uncertified pleader'. He represented people in legal matters, but he had no acknowledged qualifications to practice as a lawyer. Despite this handicap, he seemed to have a good practice, and he was well respected in his community.
Venkataraman had a normal childhood that showed no signs of future greatness. He was good at sports, lazy at school, indulged in an average amount of mischief, and exhibited little interest in religious matters. He did, though, have a few unusual traits. When he slept, he went into such a deep state of unconsciousness, his friends could physically assault him without waking him up. He also had an extraordinary amount of luck. In team games, whichever side he played for always won. This earned him the nickname 'Tangakai', which means 'golden hand'. It is a title given to people who exhibit a far-above-average amount of good fortune. Venkataraman also had a natural talent for the intricacies of literary Tamil. In his early teens he knew enough to correct his Tamil school teacher if he made any mistakes.
His father died when he was twelve and the family moved to Madurai, a city in southern Tamil Nadu. Sometime in 1896, when he was sixteen years of age, he had a remarkable spiritual awakening. He was sitting in his uncle's house when the thought occurred to him that he was about to die. He became afraid, but instead of panicking he lay down on the ground and began to analyze what was happening. He began to investigate what constituted death: what would die and what would survive that death. He spontaneously initiated a process of self-enquiry that culminated, within a few minutes, in his own permanent awakening.
In one of his rare written comments on this process he wrote: 'Enquiring within ''Who is the seer?'' I saw the seer disappear leaving That alone which stands forever. No thought arose to say ''I saw''. How then could the thought arise to say ''I did not see''.' In those few moments his individual identity disappeared and was replaced by a full awareness of the Self. That experience, that awareness, remained with him for the rest of his life. He had no need to do any more practice or meditation because this death-experience left him in a state of complete and final liberation. This is something very rare in the spiritual world: that someone who had no interest in the spiritual life should, within the space of a few minutes, and without any effort or prior practice, reach a state that other seekers spend lifetimes trying to attain.
One would say 'without effort' because this re-enactment of death and the subsequent self-enquiry seemed to be something that happened to him, rather than something he did. When he described this event for his Telugu biographer, the pronoun 'I' never appeared. He said, 'The body lay on the ground, the limbs stretched themselves out,' and so on. That particular description really leaves the reader with the feeling that this event was utterly impersonal. Some power took over the boy Venkataraman, made him lie on the floor and finally made him understand that death is for the body and for the sense of individuality, and that it cannot touch the underlying reality in which they both appear.
When the boy Venkataraman got up, he was a fully enlightened sage, but he had no cultural or spiritual context to evaluate properly what had happened to him. He had read some biographies of ancient Tamil saints and he had attended many temple rituals, but none of this seemed to relate to the new state that he found himself in.
Years later, when he was recollecting this experience he said that he thought at the time that he had caught some strange disease. However, he thought that it was such a nice disease, he hoped he wouldn't recover from it. At one time, soon after the experience, he also speculated that he might have been possessed. When he discussed the events with Narasimhaswami, his first English biographer, he repeatedly used the Tamil word avesam, which means possession by a spirit, to describe his initial reactions to the event.
The Awakening
“It was about six weeks before I left Madura for good that the great change in my life took place. It was quite sudden. I was sitting alone in a room on the first floor of my uncle’s house. I seldom had any sickness, and on that day there was nothing wrong with my health, but a sudden violent fear of death overtook me. There was nothing in my state of health to account for it, and I did not try to account for it or to find out whether there was any reason for the fear. I just felt ‘I am going to die’ and began thinking what to do about it. It did not occur to me to consult a doctor or my elders or friends; I felt that I had to solve the problem myself, there and then.
“The shock of the fear of death drove my mind inwards and I said to myself mentally, without actually framing the words: ‘Now death has come; what does it mean? What is it that is dying? This body dies.’ And I at once dramatised the occurrence of death. I lay with my limbs stretched out stiff as though rigor mortis had set in and imitated a corpse so as to give greater reality to the enquiry. I held my breath and kept my lips tightly closed so that no sound could escape, so that neither the word ‘I’ nor any other word could be uttered. ‘Well then,’ I said to myself, ‘this body is dead. It will be carried stiff to the burning ground and there burnt and reduced to ashes. But with the death of this body am I dead? Is the body ‘I’? It is silent and inert but I feel the full force of my personality and even the voice of the ‘I’ within me, apart from it. So I am Spirit transcending the body. The body dies but the Spirit that transcends it cannot be touched by death. That means I am the deathless Spirit.’ All this was not dull thought; it flashed through me vividly as living truth which I perceived directly, almost without thought-process. ‘I’ was something very real, the only real thing about my present state, and all the conscious activity connected with my body was centred on that ‘I’. From that moment onwards the ‘I’ or Self focused attention on itself by a powerful fascination. Fear of death had vanished once and for all. Absorption in the Self continued unbroken from that time on. Other thoughts might come and go like the various notes of music, but the ‘I’ continued like the fundamental sruti note that underlies and blends with all the other notes.1 Whether the body was engaged in talking, reading or anything else, I was still centred on ‘I’. Previous to that crisis I had no clear perception of my Self and was not consciously attracted to it. I felt no perceptible or direct interest in it, much less any inclination to dwell permanently in it.”
Arunachala
Venkataraman told no one in his family what had happened to him. He tried to carry on as if nothing unusual had occurred. He continued to attend school and kept up a veneer of normality for his family, but as the weeks went by he found it harder and harder to keep up this façade because he was pulled inside more and more. At the end of August 1896 he fell into a deep state of absorption in the Self when he should have been writing out a text he had been given as a punishment for not doing his schoolwork properly.
His brother scornfully said, 'What is the use of all this for one like this?' meaning, 'What use is family life for someone spends all his time behaving like a yogi?'
The justice of the remark struck Venkataraman, making him decide to leave home forever. The following day he left, without telling anyone where he was going, or what had happened to him. He merely left a note saying that he was off on a 'virtuous enterprise' and that no money should be spent searching for him. His destination was Arunachala, a major pilgrimage center a few hundred miles to the north. In his note to his family he wrote 'I have, in search of my father and in obedience to his command, started from here'. His father was Arunachala, and in abandoning his home and family he was following an internal summons from the mountain of Arunachala.
He had an adventurous trip to Tiruvannamalai, taking three days for a journey that, with better information, he could have completed in less than a day. He arrived on September 1st 1896 and spent the rest of his life here.
The Ashram
Adorning the foot of the Arunachala Hill, the ashram was home to Sri Ramana Maharishi from 1922 until his death in 1950. Today it is a place of devotion and meditation for hundreds of devotees and visitors. The ashram also has a publication department which publishes books in many languages, highlighting the teachings of the Maharishi.
The New Hall
The hall contains a life sized statue of Sri Raman and couch carved out from a single stone and polished like a black marble.
The Old Hall
The Old Hall is the place where devotees used to meet Sri Maharishi. It is a favorite place for visitors and inmates alike to practice meditation.
Matrubhuteshwara Temple
The sanctum sanctorum contains a sacred Shiva Lingum and Sri Chakra Meru which is sanctified by Raman Maharishi’s own touch. A special puja, called Sri Chakra Puja is conducted here on all Fridays, full moon days and first day of twelve solar months.
Sri Maharishi’s Samadhi
The shrine contains the tomb of Sri Maharishi. It is beautifully embellished with four large granite pillars which are polished to look like black marble.
The Dining Hall
The Hall has a total capacity of nearly 800 and it has a large kitchen that can cook meals and serve on special occasions like the Jayanti, during which nearly two to three thousand people gather here.
Gosala
This is ashram’s dairy and cattle farm which provide wholesome dairy products the ashram’s in-house needs.
Vedapatasala
Also known as the Yajurveda School, where students are trained in Vedas and vocational training.
The Nirvana Room
This is a small room which is located to the east of the New Hall and North of the office. This is the place where Sri Raman spent his last days. Hence it is viewed with a special reverence amongst the devotees.
Skandasramam
This is a hermitage situated on the hill which overlooks The Big Temple. This is the place where Sri Raman Maharishi lived from 1916 to 1922.
Virupaksha Cave
The cave is shaped in the form of the sacred Om and contains the Samadhi of the sage Virupaksha. Sri Raman Maharishi lived here from 1899 to 1916. The sites are preserved for the benefit of visitors to come and be a part of the divine ambience of the ashram.
Guest Rooms
Guest Rooms are places for the guests to stay and experience the divine atmosphere of the ashram. All the guest rooms are properly furnished with simple beds, bathrooms, overhead fans as well as screened windows and doors.
Dispensary
The Dispensary provide free medical aid to the visitors as well as ashram inmates.
Book Store
The book store make available, literature related to Sri Raman, including his original works, commentaries and biographies and reminiscences in different languages. The book store also has photographs, CD’s, videos and the Journal The Mountain Path which is published by Raman Ashram.
Sri Raman Library
The library has an extensive collection of books on spiritual matters which are available in different languages. Visitors are welcomed to borrow books after taking the requisite membership.