The Rishi Tradition of Bharat

In the tradition of Bharat, a Rishi is a bonafide teacher, at true leader and an ultimate guru. Since time immemorial, Rishis have led the path and taught us how to live a true life.

The Rishi tradition of Bharat, like a perennial stream, has been continuously enriching the minds and imaginations of the people of this great land. Being engaged and focused in their tapasya of knowledge, the Rishis only strived for loka kalyana- the good for the world.

This book is a humble tribute to such great men and women of Bharat. The author hopes this book will inspire young and old readers to walk the path of Rishthood.

Sampadananda Mishra is a Sanskrit scholar par excellence from Odisha, specializing in grammar. He was awarded the Maharshi Badrayan Vyas Award for Sanskrit in 2012 by Pratibha Patil, the-then President of India. He was conferred Sahitya Akademi Bala Puraskar 2018 for his book Shanaih Shanaih-A book of Rhyming songs in Sanskrit.

Bharat, indeed, is the land of the Rishis. Therefore, the Bamskrti of Bharat is often called the Rishi-samskrti. The tradition of the Rishis in Bharat seems to be perennially flowing, like a stream, to enrich the mind and imagination of her common people. So, in Bharat, the Rishis are revered as supreme person- alities. Living a true life was to be learnt from the Rishis.

A Rishi is draşță as well as shrotà, a seer and hearer who hast the inner power of vision and audition to see the truth and hear the voice of the truth directly. Rishis are men of transcendental vision - krantadraşță who can see through the past, present and future, see what is inside and what is outside, what is below and what is above. So, it is possible for the Rishis to experience at the same time the inner Truth as well as see in the image its symbolic happenings.

The Rishis are completely devoted to a life of the Spirit. They follow a certain line of development by means of their strength of self-discipline and achieve a many-sided inner progress. The word 'Rishi' comes from the root 'Rish' which in Sanskrit means, 'to go, 'to move' and 'to flow. Thus, a Rishi is the one who flows or moves or is in tune with the rhythmic movement of the uni- verse. He is one with the movement. He vibrates with the vibra- tion of the movement. He knows the truth of the whole of the movement.