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Vallabhācārya

Vallabhācārya

1479 CE · Champāraṇya (Champaran)

1479–1531 CE (born 27 April 1479, Champaranya; died 1531, Varanasi)

Vallabhācārya, born to a Telugu Brāhmaṇa family at Champāraṇya (in present Chhattisgarh) while his family was on pilgrimage, founded the Puṣṭimārga, a path of devotion centered on the grace (puṣṭi) of Kṛṣṇa worshipped as the divine child Gopāla/Śrīnāthjī. His philosophy, Śuddhādvaita ('pure non-dualism'), affirms — against Śaṅkara's māyā — that the world is a real manifestation of Brahman (Kṛṣṇa) and that devotion, not world-denial, is the way. He commented on the Brahma-sūtra (the Aṇubhāṣya) and the Bhāgavata Purāṇa and composed the 'Ṣoḍaśa Grantha.' He undertook pilgrimages across India, debated scholars, and gathered disciples (the Puṣṭimārga's later 'eight-fold' poets, the aṣṭachāp, include Sūrdās). The sect's central image of Śrīnāthjī, long at Govardhan in the Vraja country, was later moved to Nathdwara in Rajasthan. He spent his last years at Varanasi, where he died in 1531.

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Champāraṇya (Champaran)

What they did here

Birthplace; born 27 April 1479 to a Telugu Brāhmaṇa family during a pilgrimage halt.

About Champāraṇya (Champaran)

Champāraṇya (Champaran) is a town in the Raipur district of Chhattisgarh, central India—distinct from the better-known Champaran in Bihar. It is traditionally held to be the birthplace of Vallabhācārya (1479–1531), founder of the Puṣṭimārga school of Kṛṣṇa devotion.

See other sages who lived in Champāraṇya (Champaran)

In the same place & time

Sages whose lives overlapped with Vallabhācārya’s in the same cities, drawn from their recorded journeys.

In the same tradition

Kabīr

The world in their lifetime

Thinkers and teachers of other traditions whose lives overlapped with Vallabhācārya’s — a glimpse of the wider world they lived in. Drawn purely from recorded birth and death years.

Works

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