Ravidas

(ca. 1500) Sant poet-saint who lived his
life in the city of Benares and is traditionally believed to have been a younger
contemporary of the poet-saint Kabir.
The Sants were a loose group of central
and northern Indian poet-saints who
shared several general tendencies: stress
on individualized, interior religion leading to a personal experience of the
divine; disdain for external ritual, particularly image worship; faith in the power
of the divine Name; and a tendency to
ignore conventional caste distinctions.
Both tradition and references in his
poetry describe Ravidas as a leather
worker (chamar), a social group whose
contact with dead animals and their
skins rendered them untouchable. He is
believed to have supported himself by
his hereditary trade, and much of his
poetry speaks on issues of worldly birth
and status. He never denied the importance of heredity but ultimately felt that
his devotion to God had helped him to
transcend his birth and given him status
based on different criteria. His poetry
reflects this staunch personal faith, as
do his frequent warnings to his listeners
that life is short and difficult, and that
they should pay great attention to religious practice.
Given his low social status, Ravidas
was almost certainly illiterate. His poetic songs were likely first transmitted
orally, though their personal appeal
made him one of the most popular sant
poets. The two oldest attested sources
of his work are the Adigranth, the scripture for the Sikh community, and the
Panchvani collections, compiled by the
Dadupanth. In modern India, Ravidas
has also served as a model for the
depressed classes; his followers call
themselves Ravidasis. For further
information see John Stratton Hawley
and Mark Juergensmeyer, Songs of
the Saints of India, 1988; and
Winand M. Callewaert and Peter
Freidlander (trans.), The Life and Works
of Raidas, 1992.