Editing Indian religions (section)

===== Bhakti movement =====
{{More citations needed|section|date=June 2013}}

During the 14th to 17th centuries, a great ''Bhakti'' movement swept through central and northern India, initiated by a loosely associated group of teachers or ''[[Sant (religion)|Sants]]''. [[Ramananda]], [[Ravidas]], [[Srimanta Sankardeva]], [[Chaitanya Mahaprabhu]], [[Vallabha Acharya]], [[Sur (poet)|Sur]], [[Meera]], [[Kabir]], [[Tulsidas]], [[Namdev]], [[Dnyaneshwar]], [[Tukaram]], and other mystics spearheaded the Bhakti movement in the North while [[Annamacharya]], [[Bhadrachala Ramadas]], [[Tyagaraja]], and others propagated Bhakti in the South. They taught that people could cast aside the heavy burdens of ritual and caste, and the subtle complexities of philosophy, and simply express their overwhelming love for God. This period was also characterized by a spate of devotional literature in vernacular prose and poetry in the ethnic languages of the various Indian states or provinces.