The legend of Sri Ramakrishna Paramahamsa -

Pranams at the lotus feet of Thakurji!

Chapter – 8

 Gadhadhar understood that Ramkumar will not return to Padasala, finally, he joined with his elder brother in Dhakshineshwar.  Madhuranath Biswas, younger son-in-law of Rani Rasmoni took up the administration of the shrine; he used to visit the shrine on a regular basis.  Rani Rasmoni has no son; therefore he was in charge of all the properties of Rani Rasmoni.  Whenever he visits the temple, he looks at Gadhadhar, he had a great pull towards Gadhadhar, one day he asked Ramkumar ‘ Why you did not employ little priest on the temple related matter.” Ramkumar was well aware of his younger brother’s nature, he was not taking offerings of the temple, he cooks meals separately for him, and he knows that it is difficult to persuade him to do work of the shrine.   After listening to the lack of interest in Gadhadhar to do temple related works, Madhuranath decided one day he will employ him as a priest and make him serve Ma Kali.  One of these days, Ramkumar’s cousin Hridhayram came in search of a job in Dhakshineshwar.  He was just four years younger to Gadhadhar, these boys play together, work and roam around the places.  Gadhadhar brings mud from the river banks of Ganga and makes beautiful Linga.   One day Madhuranath took one of the idols and showed to Rani Rasmoni, both of them were surprised, it was difficult to find a fine idol like that in the market.  Next day Gadhadhar saw Madhuranath coming to shrine, he disappeared from his sight, Hridhayram asked why he is hiding after seeing Madhuranath, he said Madhuranath may ask him to do work in the shrine, he said Ma Kali is adorned in various precious ornaments all over the body, if anything has gone missing, he will be in trouble, Gadhadhar also said if Hridhayram take the responsibility of the ornaments, he will do the worship of Ma Kali.  Hridhayram was in urgent need of a job, he immediately agreed to take the responsibility of safekeeping of jewels of Ma Kali.  Finally, it happened the way Madhuranath wanted, Gadhadhar was appointed as a priest in the year 1855, and he started performing worship in the shrine.  Ramkumar taught the meticulous process of worship and its procedures to Gadhadhar.  One day Gadhadhar spoke to Hridhayram “It is necessary to build a Panchavati for meditation,” previously he used to sit under the Amla tree and conduct meditation, now the tree is no more, later they were five auspicious trees were planted at the instruction of Gadhadhar, thus Panchavati was constructed and became one of the famous meditation places, this was the place he used to sit for meditation.  In the meantime, his elder brother Ramkumar passed away. Eventually, all the temple related matters were fallen under the responsibility Ramkrishna, he became the priest of Ma Kali, soon his meditation process has taken him into a higher state.