Sri Raghunatha Dasa Goswami (1494–1586), also called as Sri Goswami, was one of the disciples of the Sri Yadunandanacharya, who was a great admirer of Sri Chaintaya Mahaprabhu. Sri Raghunatha Dasa Goswami has contributed some master piece works on Lord Krishna, and he was a famous Guru in the Gaudiya Vaishnava tradition. He is praised for his good qualities like simplicity, adjustability and generosity.
Raghunatha Dasa Goswami was born to a wealthy land lordat a village in the present-day West Bengal, and from his childhood onwards, he has shown disinterest on worldly pleasures but he concentrated more and more attention on spirituality. This caused great disturbance to his parents, who had prevented their son Raghunathadasa towards going to temples of Lord Krishna. But, however, on one fine day, the young Raghunatha managed to escape from his home and undergone holy pilgrimage to Jagannath Puri, and there he met the great Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, who was considered to be the true incarnation of Lord Krishna Bhagavan.
After meeting his Spiritual Guru, Sri Chaitanya, Raghunatha met Lord Nitai, who is considered to be the true incarnation of Lord Balaram. Nitai provided curd rice to Raghunatha along with his other followers. Raghunatha also collected food products from the nearby villages, and arranged for a grand feast to all the followers of Lord Krishna.
Everybody tasted the food with great joy and enthusiasm by considering it to be the “REAL KRISHNA PRASAD”, since the grand event was organised by the aspects of Lord Krishna and Balarama.
In the holy text, mentioning the life history of Sri Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, also called as Sri Chaitanya Charitramrutha, the details about Sri Raghunatha Dasa Goswami was also mentioned. Sri Raghunatha had led a simple spiritual life, by adopting the customs and traditions of the ancient saints, and he has made it as a regular practice, of chanting the Sri Krishna mantra, even during the time of eating and sleeping. The followers of Raghunatha had observed that even during the time of his sleeping, his lips would continuously chant the Krishna Mantra, “JAI SRI KRISHNA”.
One of the wonderful poems composed by Sri Raghunatha dasa is as follows:-
“If one’s soul has been purified by understanding Lord Krishna, who is considered to be the Supreme Brahman, he would gain anything and everything in the world. Then in that case, such kind of person would never think about his physical body!”
Raghunatha Dasa Goswami served Chaitanya Mahaprabhu for several years at Puri Jaganath, by considering him as Lord Sri Krishna. And during his later years, he lived nearby a sacred lake which is known as Sri Radha-kunda. The place where he worshipped Lord Krishna is now converted into a small temple, and it is being visited by thousands and thousands of pilgrims even at present.
“OM”
WRITTEN BY
R.HARISHANKAR