CONTENTS :
- * A Human Document
* The Basic Material
* A Biographical Sketch
* Light from the Labyrinth of Legends
* More Authentic Information
* The Date of Veerabrahmam
* Were Vemana&Brahmam Contemporaries ?
* The Crisis
* The Political Crisis
* The Social Crisis
* A Religious Rebel and A Social Reformer
* The Dogma
* Precept and Practice
* The caste system & privilege of Learning
* The Reform of Dharma Peetham
* Religious Tolerance
* Ahead of Times
* Veerabrahmam and Vemana
* The Kalajnanam (Kalagnanam)
* The Musings of Mahayoga
* The Message
* Bibliography
Sri Madvirat Pothuluri Veerabrahmendra Swamy Biography
SWAMI SRI VEERABRAHMENDRA
A Monograph on Pothuluru Veerabrahmendra Swamy
As far as my knowledge goes, T.V. Raghavacharya was the earliest (1918) who took pains to find out some detsils about the date of birth and life span of Veerabrahmam. To arrive at the dates, he took into consideration the life span of lswaramma, the grand-daughter of Swamy whose annual celebration takes place on ninth day of the decreasing moon in Margasira. But in the book “Kalajnana” available in Kandimallayapalle mutt, it was written that her annual celebration would take place in the year 4871 of Kali Era which corresponds to Monday, the second day of increasing moon of Chaitra in the Vikriti year. Whether the date noted in the Kalajnana is the same as that of the actual celebration of Aradhana, T.V.R. Acharya adds, is again another point for controversy”. Therefore he took Kalajnana into consideration for purposes of calculations and supports it by another method evolved on the basis of the progressive geniology of Swamy(down to the present Principal Guru of the mutt-Sri Veerabhoga Vasanta Venkateshwara Swamy, the Pithadhipati) which extends upto eleven generations. K. Lakshminarayana aslo is in agreement with this kind of calculation and confirms that Veerabrahmam lived some 300 years ago. He records the geneology and order of principal Gurus of the Mutt.
The first principal Guru of the mutt after Veerabrahmendra Swami is 1. Potuluri Govindaswaml, who was in the serial order followed by 2. Potuluru Swamy 3. Nusumu Pedda Govindayya (son of Veeranarayanamma, the daughter of Veerabrahmam 4. Govindayya 5. Venkatadrayya 6. Pedda Virsvya 7, Chinna Virayya 8. Govinda Swami 9,Venkates¬wara Swami (Died in 1932) 10. Srinivasa Swami (DIED in 1969). The Present Principal Gum is Sri Veerabhoga Vasanta Venkateswara Swami.
From among these principal gurus, brothers took charge immediately one after the other and the total duration of eleven generations could be counted as roughly ten generations which work out to about 300 years.
Therefore, it can be taken for granted that Veera¬brahmam lived about 300 years ago.
Dr. K.V. Raghavacharya also is in agreement with this kind of calculation. In an article of his, published in Bharati of December, 1952 (a popular literary monthly in Telugu) he discussed at length the probable dates of Veerabrahmam’s birth and samadhi. The source material for his calculation was gathered from T.V. Raghavacharya’s ‘Veeracharyacharitramu’, Chatakonda Subbaiah’s Veerabrahmam gari Charitramu’, Vaddepati ‘Niranjana Sastry’s poem ‘Kalyandha Koumudi’ and ‘Kalajnanamu’ of Veerabrahmam.
Dr. K.V. Raghavacharya, a veteran scholar took pains to go through the Macanjee Kaifiats (Local records of villages) preserved in the Oriental Mss. Library of Madras to gather information required and hence he had to resort to gather internal evidence from THE ‘Kalainanamu’ and other books mentioned above.