Ramai Pandit

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Ramai Pandit (Bengali: রামাই পণ্ডিত Ramai Ponđit) or Ramai the Wise was a mediaeval Bengali poet from the region of Bengal. The exact date of his birth is not known, but it is believed that he lived in the 13th or 14th century AD. ^[1] He is famous as the author of Shunyapurana, the Buddhist scripture of Dharma-puja, written in the 13th century AD.^{[2] [3]}

American Sanskrit scholar Edward Washburn Hopkins wrote in his "Origin and Evolution of Religion" in 1923 that,

Thus Ramai Pandit, who, in the Middle Ages, was an earthly expounder of the 19 great void I I doctrine (and was soon afterwards revered as a worker of miracles, a supernatural power), addresses this "form of the void," shunyamurti, as "sole lord of all the worlds " and begs it as " highest god" to confer boons. ^[4]

Ramai pandit advocated the worship of Dharma and the Shunya , that is, the theory of void. His son, Dharmadas converted a king of Kalinga into Buddhism. ^[5]

[edit] Works

• Dharma Puja Bidhan
• Shunya Purana

[edit] Bibliography

• Dinesh Chandra Sen, History of Bengali Language and Literature, pp. 30-37.
• B.K. Sarkar, Folklore Element in Hindu Culture, p. 192.
• Sir Charles Eliot, Hinduism and Buddhism, An Historical Sketch, Vol. 2, 1921.

[edit] References

1. ^ Bangla literature, Mohammad Daniul Huq and Aminur Rahman, article from Banglapedia.
2. ^ Shunyapurana, by Wakil Ahmed, article from Banglapedia.
3. ^ The concept of transcendency and immanence of God in the Sunya Purana, by FABRIZIO FERRARI, 17th European Conference on Modern South Asian Studies, Heidelberg, September 9 - 14, 2002.
4. ^ ORIGIN AND EVOLUTION OF RELIGION, E. Washburn Hopkins, 1923, CHAPTER XIX THE BUDDHISTIC TRINITY.
5. ^ The Cult of Jagannath, by Sushil Chandra De, Orissa Review, July 2003, page 7.