Ramana Maharshi · The devotees

The devotees of Ramana Maharshi

Around the silent sage of Arunachala gathered some of the most remarkable souls of the age ~ a poet, a weaver, a soldier, a grieving mother, a builder, and many more. Their stories are the human heart of the whole teaching.

Devotees gathered in the hall at Sri Ramanasramam

You can learn a teaching from its texts. But you understand a teacher through the people who loved him ~ and in Ramana's case, the devotees who gathered at the foot of the hill are a treasury of stories as moving as any in the spiritual literature. Each found something different in him, and each shows a different face of what he was. Here they are, the ones whose stories we have told so far ~ with more to come.

The Indian devotees

Muruganar ~ the poetThe scholar-poet who drew out the teaching and sang his master in an ocean of verse. Mastan Swami ~ the weaver saintThe Muslim weaver Ramana called the ripest soul he had met. Annamalai Swami ~ the builderWho built the ashram, then was told to lay it all down and simply be. Echammal ~ grief into graceWho lost her whole family, found refuge in Ramana, and fed him daily for decades. Sivaprakasam Pillai ~ the questionerThe sincere seeker whose questions, answered in the sand, became ‘Who Am I?’. Kunju Swami ~ the attendantWho served Bhagavan for decades and preserved the small human details of daily life with him.

The Western devotees

Brunton, Chadwick, Osborne & moreHow the West found Ramana ~ and wrote him down for the world.

And close to him

Alagammal ~ his motherWho came to reclaim her son and was set free by him at her death. Lakshmi the cow & the animalsThe creatures he loved and treated as devotees ~ one Self in all.

A growing collection

More devotee stories are being added ~ Sivaprakasam Pillai (to whom “Who Am I?” was given), and others whose lives were changed at the foot of the hill.