Ramana Maharshi’s life and teaching were inseparably bound to Arunachala, the sacred hill in Tiruvannamalai, Tamil Nadu, South India. From the time he arrived there as a youth, he remained in Tiruvannamalai for the rest of his life, allowing the hill and its environs to become the silent backdrop and living context of his Advaitic instruction. The physical setting was not incidental; it formed the very atmosphere in which seekers encountered his presence and his teaching on the Self.

In the earlier period, Ramana Maharshi lived in and around the Arunachaleswara Temple and in caves on the slopes of Arunachala, most notably Virupaksha Cave and Skandashram. These simple, secluded dwellings reflected the inwardness and austerity that characterized his mode of instruction, which often took the form of silent communion rather than discursive teaching. The caves and temple precincts thus became informal sanctuaries where aspirants gathered, drawn more by the depth of his stillness than by any outward structure.

From 1922 until his death, his residence and teaching center crystallized at Sri Ramanasramam, situated at the foot of Arunachala in Tiruvannamalai. Around this modest ashram, a more stable community of devotees formed, yet the essential simplicity of his way remained unchanged. Ramanasramam functioned less as an institution and more as a field of presence, where the physical nearness to the sage and to Arunachala itself served as a constant reminder of the non-dual truth he pointed to.

Throughout these phases—temple, caves, and ashram—the unbroken thread was his rootedness at Arunachala Hill. Tiruvannamalai thus became synonymous with his life and message, not merely as a geographical location but as a symbol of the immutable Self to which he ceaselessly directed seekers. In dwelling and teaching there, he allowed the outer landscape of Arunachala to mirror the inner ascent from individuality to the realization of pure awareness.