01Janardan Swami’s disciple
Orphaned young and raised by his grandfather Chakrapani, son of the saint Bhanudas, Eknath went as a boy to Devagiri (Daulatabad) to serve Janardan Swami, a Dattatreya devotee who was also an officer of the fort. He stayed six years. Back in Paithan he lived as a householder with his wife Girijabai. He found that the Jnaneshwari had been corrupted by copyists over three centuries, compared manuscripts, and fixed the text in 1584. The Eknathi Bhagavat, his Marathi commentary on the eleventh skandha, and the Bhavartha Ramayana followed.
02Ganga water for a donkey
The katha every Maharashtrian child knows: Eknath was carrying a kavad of Ganga water from Prayag to pour on the linga at Rameshwaram, and on the road he found a donkey dying of thirst. He gave it the water, saying the Lord of Rameshwaram had come to drink. He ate with those whom others kept at a distance, and his bharuds speak in the voices of a madman, a Mahar, a fortune-teller and a scorpion to make their point. He gave up the body in the Godavari on Phalguna Vadya Shashthi, kept since as Eknath Shashthi.
