By Swami Durgananda
The Beginning
In the 16th century Rajapur – about 200 km east of Allahabad – in the Banda district of Uttar Pradesh, there live a rather gullible brahamana couple: Atmaram Dube and Hulsi Devi. The year 1532. One day, at a somewhat inauspicious moment, was born to them a male child. Even at this happy moment the mother was frightened. Born after 12 months of gestation But it is believed that it was asterism mula that was on the ascent then – a period of time known as abhuktamula. According to the then popular belief, a child born during this period was destined to bring death to its parents. The only remedy, it was believed, was for the parents to abandon the child at birth – or atleast not to look at it for the first 8 years!, the baby was rather huge and had a full complement of teeth! Under which unfortunate star this child was born is not known for certain.
The utterly poor father had nothing in his house for the celebration of the child’s birth or for the naming ceremony. Meanwhile, the mother died. Weighed down circumstances and superstition, the father abandoned the child. Chuniya, the mother-in-law of the midwife who had helped him during the birth of the child, wet-nursed. Such was the child’s fate that Chuniya too died after five years and he was left wandering, looking for morsels of food here and there, taking occasional shelter at a Hanuman temple. This was the boy who would later be recognized as Sant Tulsidas and excite bhakti en masse with soul inspiring couplets
Such was the turn of events when Narharidas, a descendant of Ramanand, was commanded in a dream to pick up an abandoned boy and instruct him in the timeless story of Sri Ram. He spotted the boy, who at that time went by the name Rambola , took him to Ayodhya, and completed his sacred thread ceremony. From a reference to a tulsi leaf used during that ceremony. Narharidas named Tulsiram, which later became Tulsidas. After about 10 months of living in Ayodhya, at the confluence of the rivers Sarayu and Ghagara – where they lived together for five years. It was here that Tulisdas heard the fascinating story of Sri Ram. We can well imagine what fire must have been ignited in the boy Tulsidas when the immortal story of Sri Ram fell upon his pure heart.
Another sadhu, Shesha Sanatana by name, now came into Tulsidasa’s life and took him to Varanasi, the city of learning or light. It was here that Tulsi learned Sanskrit, including Panini’s grammar. We read that Tulsidas was extremely bright, could remember texts after hearing them only once, and became adept in Sanskrit. That he had a good command of Sanskrit can be known from his few Sanskrit writings and the Sanskrit words, apposite and accurate, thrown casually but widely into his other works.
Marriage and Renunciation
Tulsidas married a girl whose name was Ratnavali. We are told the simple couple lived at Rajapur and that their only son, Tarak died in infancy. Tulsidas was extremely devoted to his wife. This attachment may have been in the form of inchoate form of bhakti – wrongly directed towards a human being – for it was this love, when freed from human attachment that blossomed into an unbounded love for God.
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