The Birth of Kirtan

The Life & Teachings of Chaitanya

Written By: Ranchor Prime, Shiva Rea, Radhanath Swami, Jai Uttal
$29.99
The Birth of Kirtan: The Life and Teachings of Chaitanya is the biography of a mystic saint who pioneered devotional yoga (Bhakti) in sixteenth-century India and started the practice of sacred chanting (kirtan) that has now spread around the world.

While Chaitanya’s practice has become a global movement over the last five hundred years, little is generally known about this spiritual reformer, as the two principal texts recounting his life were written in Bengali in the sixteenth century. In The Birth of Kirtan, Bhakti scholar and teacher Ranchor Prime adapts these two narratives into a moving and emotionally charged English-language biography for a modern audience. His poetic retelling is complemented by full-color reproductions of never-before-published nineteenth-century paintings of Chaitanya’s life.
Format: Hardbound
Publication Date: 10/16/2012
ISBN: 9781608871070
Pages: 216
Trim Size: 6 x 9

  • About the Author 
  • Press
Ranchor Prime, Author: Ranchor Prime is the author of several books on the culture and spirituality of India, speaking to Hindu environmental issues as a Hindu religious scholar. He is an advisor on religion and conservation to the Alliance of Religions and Conservation, and he is co-founder and director of Friends of Vrindavan, an environmental charity aimed at protecting sacred forests in India. He lives in London.



Shiva Rea, Contributor: Shiva Rea, M.A., is a leading teacher of prana vinyasa flow™ yoga and yoga trance dance™ worldwide. She began exploring yoga at the age of fourteen as a way to understand her name, given to her by her father, a surfer and artist. Her studies in the Krishnamacharya lineage, tantra, ayurveda, bhakti, kalaripayattu, world dance, yogic art and somatic movement infuse her approach to living yoga and embodying the flow. She is known for bringing the roots of yoga alive for modern practitioners in creative, dynamic and life-transforming ways and for offering the synthesis form of vinyasa flow out in the world. Rea resides in Venice, California.

Radhanath Swami, Contributor: New York Times best-selling author Radhanath Swami was born in Chicago in 1950. At age nineteen, he traveled overland from London to India, where he lived in Himalayan caves, learned yoga from revered masters, and eventually became a world-renowned spiritual leader in his own right. His acclaimed memoir, The Journey Home, has been translated into over twenty languages and sold in over forty countries worldwide.

Radhanath Swami presently travels in Asia, Europe, and America teaching devotional wisdom but can often be found with his community in Mumbai, where he works tirelessly to help develop communities, food distribution initiatives, missionary hospitals, schools, ashrams, emergency relief programs, and eco-friendly farms.


Jai Uttal, Contributor: For years, Jai Uttal has occupied a special place in the vanguard of the world music movement, delighting an international audience by embracing an extraordinary variety of cultures and musical traditions ranging from Appalachia, to the rock of the ’60s, to the Kirtan chants of ancient India. With MONDO RAMA, he continues to break new ground, pushing the boundaries of contemporary world fusion, yet offering his most accessible music to date, producing an infectious blend that aims Uttal right at a pop mainstream audience. Jai Uttal resides in San Anselmo, California.

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