{"id":8079,"date":"2026-09-23T18:30:00","date_gmt":"2026-09-23T13:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.iskconbangalore.org\/blog\/?p=8079"},"modified":"2026-09-23T18:33:39","modified_gmt":"2026-09-23T13:03:39","slug":"haridasa-thakura","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.iskconbangalore.org\/blog\/haridasa-thakura\/","title":{"rendered":"Haridasa Thakura: The Glories of Namacarya"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Haridasa Thakura was born in a Muslim family and became a great devotee of Lord Krishna. He is honored as <strong>Namacarya Haridasa Thakura<\/strong>, the teacher of chanting the Hare Krishna maha-mantra.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>The 22-Bazaar Punishment<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Because Haridasa Thakura was born in a Muslim family and was chanting Hare Krishna, the Muslim Kazi questioned him about his faith.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Haridasa Thakura mildly replied that many Hindus had become Muslims, so if he had become a Hindu, what was wrong with that?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Kazi became angry and ordered that Haridasa Thakura be caned in <strong>twenty-two bazaars<\/strong>. The punishment was intended to kill him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">It is understood that while Haridasa Thakura was being beaten, <strong>Lord Caitanya Mahaprabhu appeared on his back<\/strong>, and therefore Haridasa Thakura did not feel the suffering.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>His Unwavering Chanting<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">After leaving his home, Haridasa Thakura stayed for some time in the forest of <strong>Benapola<\/strong>. There he constructed a cottage, planted a tulasi plant and chanted the holy name before her.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">He chanted <strong>300,000 names of the Lord every day<\/strong>, throughout the entire day and night. He maintained himself by begging food from a brahmana&#8217;s house. His spiritual influence was so great that the people living nearby came to worship him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>The Attempt to Distract Haridasa Thakura<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">A landholder named <strong>Ramacandra Khan<\/strong>, who was envious of Vaishnavas, could not tolerate the respect offered to Haridasa Thakura. Since he could find no fault in his character, he planned to dishonor him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">He sent a prostitute to try to deviate Haridasa Thakura from his vows.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">When she came to his cottage, Haridasa Thakura told her that he would fulfill her desire after completing his chanting. Until then, he asked her to sit and hear the chanting of the Hare Krishna maha-mantra.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">She returned for three nights. Throughout this time, Haridasa Thakura continued chanting, while she listened.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">By his association and by hearing the holy name, <strong>her mind changed completely<\/strong>. She confessed the conspiracy and begged Haridasa Thakura for mercy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">He instructed her to give away her possessions to the brahmanas, remain in Krishna consciousness, chant the Hare Krishna maha-mantra continuously and serve tulasi.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Following his instructions, she gave up her former life, began chanting <strong>300,000 names daily<\/strong>, worshiped tulasi and lived very simply. She eventually became a celebrated devotee, and many advanced Vaishnavas came to see her.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Not Allowed to Enter the Jagannatha Temple<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Because Haridasa Thakura had been born in a Muslim family, he could not enter the <strong>Jagannatha Temple<\/strong> due to the temple restrictions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Haridasa Thakura himself considered that he was unfit to enter the temple. Lord Caitanya Mahaprabhu could have personally taken him inside, but the Lord did not want to disturb the popular custom.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Instead, Lord Caitanya told him to <strong>look at the Vishnu wheel on top of the temple and offer obeisances<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Lord Caitanya Mahaprabhu also promised to visit Haridasa Thakura <strong>every day<\/strong>. He arranged for the remnants of His food to be sent to Haridasa, so Haridasa did not have to go outside his residence to collect food.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Thus, although Haridasa Thakura could not enter the Jagannatha Temple, he received the personal association and mercy of Lord Caitanya Mahaprabhu.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/pzMGkDdfoBE?si=TO7BCTdmzpjiBRc-\" title=\"YouTube video player\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Haridasa Thakura was born in a Muslim family and became a great devotee of Lord Krishna. He is honored as Namacarya Haridasa Thakura, the teacher of chanting the Hare Krishna maha-mantra. The 22-Bazaar Punishment Because Haridasa Thakura was born in a Muslim family and was chanting Hare Krishna, the Muslim Kazi questioned him about his [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":28,"featured_media":8080,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8079","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-articles"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iskconbangalore.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8079","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iskconbangalore.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iskconbangalore.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iskconbangalore.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/28"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iskconbangalore.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8079"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.iskconbangalore.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8079\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8082,"href":"https:\/\/www.iskconbangalore.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8079\/revisions\/8082"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iskconbangalore.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8080"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iskconbangalore.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8079"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iskconbangalore.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8079"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iskconbangalore.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8079"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}