UPSC Articles
Guru Ravidas
Part of: Prelims and GS-I History
Context Recently, the Election Commission has postponed Punjab elections 2022 by a week to February 20 in view of Guru Ravidas Jayanti which falls on February 16.
About Guru Ravidas
- Ravidas, also called Raidas, of the 15th or 16th century, was a mystic, poet, saint of North Indian Bhakti movement
- He founded the Ravidassia religion and compiled a new holy book, Amritbani Guru Ravidass Ji.
- He was born in Varanasi into untouchable leather-working Chamar caste.
- He valued the worship of a formless God.
- Along with Kabir, he was one of the most noted disciples of Bhagat Ramanand.
- 41 verses of Bhakt Ravidas are incorporated into Sikh’s religious book, Adi Granth.
- He was vocal against the varna (caste) system
- He imagined an egalitarian society called Begumpura, means “land without sorrow”
- His disciples came to be known as Ravidas-panthis and followers came to be known as Ravidassias.
- He also mentioned ‘Sahaj’, a mystical state where there is a union of the truths of the many and the one.
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