Meera

Meera

1497 – 1545
Place of Birth: Kurki, district Pali, Rajasthan, Jodhpur State, Marwar

Meera, also known as Meera Bai or Mirabai (1498-1546) was a Hindu mystic poet of the Bhakti movement. She referred to the Lord, whom she saw as her husband, with different names like Satguru, Prabhu Ji, Girdhar Nagar, Krishna. She even called him the husband of her soul. Due to their mother, her in-laws disapproved of her public singing and dancing as she belonged to a Royal Family of Mewarh and was a princess. But she had too much love for her god and sacrificed everything, even her family, for god. She is a celebrated Bhakti saint, particularly in the North Indian Hindu tradition.
Meera Bai was born into a Rajput royal Rathore family of Merta, Rajasthan, India. She is mentioned in Bhaktamal, confirming that she was widely known and a cherished figure in the Bhakti movement culture by about 1600 CE. Most legends about Meera mention her fearless disregard for social and family conventions, her devotion to Lord Krishna, her treating Krishna as her husband, and she being persecuted by her in-laws for her religious devotion. She has been the subject of numerous folk tales and hagiographic legends, which are inconsistent or widely different in details. She is royal Thousands of devotional poems in passionate praise of Lord Krishna are attributed to Meera in the Indian tradition, but just a few hundred are believed to be authentic by scholars, and the earliest written records suggest that except for two poems, most were written down only in the 18th century. Many poems attributed to Meera were likely composed later by others who admired Meera. These poems are commonly known as bhajans, and are popular across India. Hindu temples, such as in Chittorgarh fort, are dedicated to Mira Bai's memory. Legends about Meera's life, of contested authenticity, have been the subject of movies, comic strips and other popular literature in modern times.