What you offer, you cannot take back.
Does what we offer to God truly reach the divine? Or does it stay within our own habits, desires and tastes?
Most of us know the ritual. Something good happens, and we buy the sweets we love most. We place them at God's feet for a few moments, then eat them ourselves. Nothing reaches God. Everything returns to us.
Rangpuram began by refusing that answer.
Born in a village. Raised in service.
Our name comes from Rangpur, a village in Gujarat. At its heart is the temple of Sri Sadhi Ma. For forty years, every Sunday, nearly two thousand people have sat down there to a meal, with nothing asked of them in return. Alongside it, a great deal of quiet charity work carries on year after year.
It is the only kind of offering we have ever known: you give, and you let go.
From the Gau Shala to the flame.
Beside the temple lives our gau shala, home to Gir cows. Their dung is gathered and turned into a fine powder, the foundation of our dhup. The same powder also goes out to farms and businesses as natural fertiliser. Nothing is wasted. What the cow gives returns to the earth, and to the fire.
Why fire. Why purity.
The Rigveda opens with a hymn to Agni (Agnimīḷe purohitaṃ, RV 1.1.1), the divine priest of the yajna. Every offering, whether āhuti or dhūp, reaches the divine through him. He is the first god we call, and he is present wherever we call him.
So how can we hand him something impure?
The market is full of incense made with chemicals, with alcohol passed off as fragrance. Rangpuram goes the other way. We use no charcoal and no synthetic fragrance, and we work to keep everything we make free of chemicals and ritually pure. We would rather offer less than offer something unworthy.
Four fires. Each with an intention.
Rangpuram is built on four sacred fire forms, four ways smoke carries prayer.
Tikki
the oldest fire, pressed and slow.
Aarogya · Aishwarya
Cone
the stillness after sunset.
Shanti · Vishram
Stick
the daily practice.
Dhan · Shringar · Anurag · Anugriha · Samrudhhi
Cup
the dense, unhurried anushthan.
Suraksha · Japa
Each category also has a combo made for a full practice: Sankalpam, Dhyanam, Panchdeepam and Vandanam.
We never named a product after a flower. The fragrance gives you the memory. The name gives you the intention. Both are lit together.
Light only what is pure.
Offer only what is not meant for consumption. Let the blessing stay in the air, enter through the breath, settle in the mind, and slowly purify the way we live.
जो शुद्ध हो, उसी को प्रज्वलित करें।
हम जो ईश्वर को अर्पित करते हैं, क्या वह सच में उन तक पहुँचता है? रंगपुरम् इसी प्रश्न से जन्मा है।
गुजरात के गाँव रंगपुर में, साधी माँ के मंदिर में, चालीस वर्षों से हर रविवार लगभग दो हज़ार लोग भोजन करते हैं। यहीं हमारी गौशाला है, जहाँ गिर गायें रहती हैं, और उनके गोबर से हमारा धूप बनता है।
हमारा विश्वास सरल है: जो अर्पण हो, वह शुद्ध हो। जो शुद्ध हो, उसी को प्रज्वलित करें।