Percorso
Aghori Babas
Shri Aghoreshwar – Ananya Diwas 1989
These Aghori Masters’ lives and anecdotes have been collected in Shri Aghoreshwar’s books and are taken from the disciples’ memories and people’s stories. We know very little about Aghori Masters, even about the latest ones, and most of the times what we know are only stories of local tradition. They are reported here to preserve their memory.
Saints are immortal and this is specifically true with Aughars. Kapalika yogis moving in space, beyond earthly sphere, can get in touch with that persons of high knowledge and inner development, and always guide them. Baba Kina Ramji, after taking Samadhi in Kashi, kept on appearing to sadhaks and devotees in several places such as Jagannath Puri, Ganga Sagar, Girnar and other holy places.
Aghor Atma Ramji
He belonged to a Brahmin family from Darbhanga and his clothes were rather strange. Because of the way he was dressing no one could imagine that he was an enlightened of such a level. He wore precious and expensive silk dresses, he held a valuable stick and his glasses had gold frames. Who could say he was a great saint, seeing him this way? He was known as Darbhanga Maharaj. In Gangi shmashan used to live a Bengali penitent woman, a real ascetic. When Atma Ramji came to the shmashan for the first time, she attacked him verbally, ordering him to leave but the sadhak replied: “The son of the tiger doesn’t fear his mother.” Then the Mother calmed down and let him get closer. They spent many years together in the shmashan performing sadhana. Atma Ramji took Samadhi in Darbhanga and after four or five years the Mother left for some unknown place. The shmashan keeper remembers Atma Ramji very well, adding that he had never met such an extraordinary person as him anymore.
Aghor Baba Ramnareshji in the seventies
The Venerable Paramahans (Great Swan; one who has transcended the bonds of existence) Ramnareshji was born in Bihar in 1926, in the Ara district, a few kilometres far from Gundi, Shri Aghoreshwar’s native village. He spent his childhood with his uncle who was working in Calcutta. When he was about twelve years old he went back to his village, and started to comply with Vishnuite doctrines. His school education was rather poor. In Shivpur jungle, not far from the village, used to live Baba Kripaldasji with his disciples and the young boy went often there to meet and speak with Baba about yogis’ feats. Four, five years later he undertook wheat trade between Ara and Chhapra but God (Ishwar) had decided something different. To break his earthly bonds the Divine put an obstacle on his way: he suffered a heavy loss and his mind wanted to go away from what had happened. He set off for Ara, by then disenchanted with earthly bonds, full of pessimism towards existence. In the thick dark he was a light was about to appear. In Ara he met Basgit, the dom (funeral worker) who was selling the wood in Gangi shmashan. He invited him to go and pay homage to the venerable saint Atma Ramji, who was living in that shmashan. In the depths of his despair Ramnareshji didn’t know to what else cling to. When he got there early in the morning, divine Atma Ramji was sitting on a tomb and was eating a lemon. The night before the saint had performed a special puja with the Mother (an avadhutin of the cremation ground). Mahatma gave Ramnareshji a part of the lemon who, after eating it, experienced the awakening of kundalini and attained divine enlightenment. During his whole life Atma Ramji made him practice the complete sadhana.
Baba Ramnareshji and Shri Aghoreshwar in the sixties
Shri Kaccha Baba
When he reached Kashi, a priest of pilgrims started to send him two kilos of flour a day that Baba devoured raw. Through his grace that devotee without progeny had two sons and his posterity was guaranteed.
Once this Baba ordered to clean and decorate the inside of and around his house. When the disciples asked an explanation for that necessity, He answered that everything had to be ready to welcome the Emperor. After some days George the 5th, Emperor of India, came to meet the Baba.
On another occasion he asked a disciple to bring another chair in his room. Immediately a Mahatma appeared and sat down on it, spent some time with Baba and then went away. The disciples who witnessed it were thinking about something mysterious and asked Baba who that man was. He replied: “He was an Aghoracharya coming from Girnar through the sky…”
Many devotees from Bihar and Uttar Pradesh said to have seen this Baba travelling in the sky seated on a throne. He initiated several sadhaks through the energy generating from his eyes.
Aughar Hira Ram Baba
The great sadhak Hira Ram of Ramshala, Ramgarh, was a great devotee of the Guru. On an occasion he had to live for a long time in an area mostly inhabited by prostitutes. When he got back to his Guru’s ashram, people accused him of immorality. Hira Ram took his red loincloth (langoti) off and threw it on the fire saying that if his vow of chastity had been respected, the loincloth wouldn’t have been burnt. The langoti didn’t burn and, at the request of his Guru, he took it back and wore it again.
Baba Matura Ram – Krin Kund in the forties
Aghoracharya Bamakshepa of Tara Peeth
The story goes that during his childhood while he was sitting on a haystack absorbed in his thoughts (in meditation?) the hay started burning. The villagers run to put out the flames and when the fire was extinguished, the boy was still at his place miraculously unhurt. His great Guru, the great sadhak Kalashpatri, once walked on the waters of the river in flood with his karaons (wood sandals) and, by crossing it, he reached the opposite sandy bank where Bama was. Showing the boy a dried Tulsi plant, he asked him if it was dead or alive. Bama confirmed that it was completely dried and dead. “Life and Death are the same thing, my son” he answered and sprinkling some water on the plant, by a miracle it became again green and alive.
After his father’s death, the situation of his family became heavy. When his mother died it was incredible how he hoisted her on his shoulder and crossed the river Dwarika in flood to get to the cremation ground but, when he asked his younger brother to celebrate the event inviting the people of the nearest villages, everyone was puzzled because of their poor financial resources. The Baba stayed at shmashan but unknown people brought to his house all the things for the ritual in time. When it was time to feed the Brahmins, it started to rain and people manifested their disappointment. Suddenly Baba appeared at the place where the ceremony was held and the rain stopped, while it kept on falling all around.
Once a young woman came to meet Baba. She gave as a gift some porridge made with feeling and a pure mind. Accepting her offering, Baba said: “Thank you very much, Mother. You will have wealth and children.” On hearing this words the young burst into tears saying that, unfortunately, she was a widow. Baba answered: “Don’t cry, what I told you will surely happen. Mother Tara told me that you will have many children.” His words came true: a rich person married her and she had babies.
Another time the king of Darbhanga wanted to visit Baba in Tarapeeth. People told him that the king was a great devotee of Him and he had come specially to meet Him. Baba said: “Why? I am a cremation ground beggar, an ordinary person: what do Kings and Emperors have to do with me? I’d better leave this place.” People suggested the king to go to Baba alone (without his retinue), and the king did so. After this meeting Baba’s grace became manifest sending him a child and fulfilling his wishes.
Baba Dalsingar Ram’s Samadhi, on his left Baba Rajeshwaram – Krin Kund
Shri Tailang Swami
When he was a child his mother went to the temple to pray and while she was into deep concentration, she saw a ray of light coming from the statue of Shiva which, after lighting up the room, went into the child who was laying on the floor.
The child became a Baba and started to wander around holy places, getting to Rameshwaram. A poor Brahmin boy critically ill had just died and his friends were crying near the pyre, ready to be lit. Baba, moved, sprinkled some water on the boy from his kamandel while whispering some Mantras, and the young boy came back to life.
The story goes that once he would have liked to drink mother Narmada’s milk. The stream turned into milk and Khaki Baba, who was present, wished to drink that milk too but when his lips touched the milk, it turned back into water.
Another time he was sitting on Triveni ghat steps while a very heavy storm was getting closer. Ram Taran Bhattacharya invited Baba to take shelter into his house. The swami comforted and assured him that nothing could have happened to him because he had to save the passengers of a boat. Right at that moment a boat was in the middle of the river and suddenly sank. To the surprise of the witnesses on the bank, the boat resurfaced with his load of shouting and crying passengers and floated safe to the bank. When finally the passengers got off the boat, Baba was amongst them. Then he said to Ram Taran with a smile: “There is nothing astonishing, every person could wield such powers. Everything is possible after the awakening, there is nothing unnatural or magic in it. Man, losing his natural faculties, becomes unnatural and this can look as supernatural in his eyes.”
When he was arrested in Kashi because he was roaming naked around the city, he disappeared from the cell where he was imprisoned. He was taken to the judge who asked him to accept some food. Baba answered that He would have accepted his food if the judge had shared His own food with Him and immediately He defecated on the palm of His hand saying: “Sir, this is my daily food” and gave it to the judge but right when all the eyes where turning towards Him, He swallowed His faeces which had been turned into delicious food, whose fragrance spread all over the room. Judge realized that Baba was a divine being and issued an order that allowed Tailang Swami to go around naked wherever he wanted without anyone stopping him.
He used to live at Krin Kund but used to go to far-off villages to beg. Some sadhaks who were going with him said to have seen him flying seated on his Kapal. The inhabitants of the villages where he used to go told that, after begging, He used to leave the village and go away through his Kapal. This story is famous amongst Kinarami Aghoris. Then, when conflicts arose inside Kina Ram Sthal, he left Krin Kund and started to live on the banks of the Ganges in Bihar. His disciples are still present in that area. The story goes that if He had remained at Krin Kund, he would have become Mahant.
Baba Dham Ram Khandava
He was a government employee who had to give up the job right because of his sincerity and his bond with those who were practising asceticism. Twentieth-century great character, he kept a billhook tied to his hand for twenty years. After he had relieved himself, we don’t know if he washed his hands. He never took bath. He was a great, extraordinary Aghori and, in Madhya Pradesh, he has many devotees.