Saint Rupa Goswami

Rupa Goswami (Sanskrit: रूप गोस्वामी, Bengali: রূপ গোস্বামী, IAST: Rūpa Gosvāmī; 1489–1564) was a devotional teacher (guru), poet, and philosopher of the Gaudiya Vaishnava tradition. With his brother Sanatana Goswami, he is considered the most senior of the Six Goswamis of Vrindavan associated with Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, an avatar (incarnation) of Krishna in Kali Yuga. Rūpa Gosvāmī was born in Fateyabad, Bengal in the late 15th century into family of Karnataka origin. He was the younger brother of Sanātana Gosvāmī and the elder brother of Anupama. The birth names of all three brothers are unknown. The three brothers moved to Ramakeli where Sanātana and Rūpa worked in the government of Sulṭān Ḥusayn Šāh under the titles of Sākar Mallik and Dabir Khās. Sākar Mallik and Dabir Khās began a correspondence with Kr̥ṣṇa Caitanya while working at the court, and when the latter was passing by Ramakeli on the way to Vrindavan the brothers rushed to meet him. The renounced their high statuses and Caitanya initiated them into asceticism under the names Sanātana Gosvāmī, Rūpa Gosvāmī, and Vallabha. On his return journey from Vraja, Caitanya ordered Sanātana and Rūpa to go to Vrindavan, study the devotional scriptures, recover lost religious sites and establish their greatness. The brothers arrived in a woody and uninhabited Vrindavan, where they set upon the task of rediscovering lost sacred sites in Braj, via studying the Puranic geography of Kr̥ṣṇa's life as well as developing their own stories. Caitanya later sent more devotees to Vrindavan, which lead to the formation of the Six Goswamis of Vrindavan, who created an extensive Sanskrit literature on Gauḍīya subjects of Kr̥ṣṇa, theology, ritual practice, grammar, and literary theory; the group was led by the two brothers. Rūpa is associated with two sites, one east of Nandīśvara and Sevākuñj in Vrindavan. He also discovered the mūrti of Govindadeva.