Swami Vivekananda humanified and humanised

Swami Vivekananda stayed at Belgaum in 1892 for nine days, with one Shri G.S. Bhate. He said to Shri Bhate, as per the latter's reminiscences of Swamiji: "... As regards food, when he was asked whether he was a vegetarian or a meat-eater, he said that as a man belonging not the ordinary order of Sannyasins but to the order of the Paramahamsas, he had no option in the matter. The Paramahamsa, by the rules of that order, was bound to eat whatever was offered, and in cases where nothing could be offered he had to go without food ..." BLOGGER'S VIEW As per Swamiji himself, a Paramahamsa was expected to accept whatever was offered. This is his justification for his eating meat in spite of being a monk. Where is the Paramahamsa order? Did Vivekananda create it? If a Paramahamsa was expected to accept what is offered by the householders, why live in a palatial bungalow and crave for turtles and shad fish?

Paramahamsa literally means Supreme Swan (Parama=Supreme, hamsa=swan). In Hindu philosophy a soul is symbolised as a swan. A paramahamsa, therefore, is a soul which has attained a state of supreme bliss. How to know whether a particular person's soul (if at all it exists) has attained/reached the supreme state of bliss? Nobody can check it. Anybody can claim that he has a soul, which has experienced the supreme bliss. There is an impression among some Hindus that 'Paramahamsa' title is conferred by some person of competent authority. We have to remember that Hinduism is not an organised religion and there are no competent authorities to award titles. Traditionally, some Monasteries used titles like 'Jagadguru (Teacher of the World)', 'Sankaracharya', and 'Paramahamsa Parivrajakacharya' etc. But even for these titles, the authority is doubtful. Somebody in the line of succession over centuries started using them and the custom glued to the in...