UC Riverside

Despite being regularly cited as perhaps the largest and most consequential traditional order of sādhus in India, the Rāmānandī sampradāy has received relatively little scholarly attention. The Rāmānandīs trace their lineage to the 14th-15th century Vaiṣṇava saint Rāmānandī, who is said to have broken from the Śrī sampradāy of Rāmānuja and founded his own sect centered in Varanasi, amassing around a dozen prominent disciples. While Rāmānandī religiosity is generally centered around devotion (bhakti) to the divine couple Sītā-Rām (i.e., Rāmcandra, the protagonist of the Rāmāyaṇa narrative, and his wife Sītā), Peter van der Veer argues that understanding them exclusively as a ‘bhakti sect’ “hinders the correct interpretation of the present nature of this group and its internal divisions, as well of its evolution over time.”1 Indeed, tracing the origins, development, and current state of the Rāmānandī sampradāy leads one down a rich and variegated path, incorporating practices and principles from multiple spiritual disciplines.