Swami Vivekananda humanified and humanised

On 15th Nov. 1894, Swami Vivekananda wrote to Divan Haridas Viharidas Desai (apparently Divanji of Junagadh). In this letter, Vivekananda calls Indians ignorant fools and frogs in well. "... America is a grand country. It is a paradise of the poor and women. There is almost no poor in the country, and nowhere else in the world women are so free, so educated, so cultured. They are everything in society. ... And in this most hospitable country, every home is open to me ..." BLOGGER'S VIEWS Swamiji does not mention anything about the poverty of the 20 million Blacks in US. While describing a heaven where is the place for blacks and their deprivation? He remembers blacks only when he has to compare Indians with them for calling both "SLAVES" and "JEALOUS". "...I am the same here as in India, only here in this highly cultural land there is an appreciation, a sympathy which our ignorant fools never dream of. There our people grudge us monks a crum...

Mrs. Henrietta Mueller, contributed substantially to the purchase of land for the Belur Math, Howrah, Kolkata. She visited India for the purpose and stayed with Vivekananda during his intermission between the first and second visits to U.S.A.(1897 -1899). Later she was disappointed with the Math. and parted ways with Vivekananda. I furnish below a link to a newspaper clipping of "Naugatuck Daily News" dated 15th May 1899. The clipping is at the site of www.Vivekananda.net, which is a virtual gold mine for those interested in Vivekananda. www.vivekananda.net/NewspaperReports/15May99.html . Ms. Mueller was said to have commented that she was face to face with the unavoidable conclusion that it was utterly rotten from the beginning to end and full of danger to unhappy people who place their faith in it. This clipping is worth reading at www.vivekananda.net. ybrao-a-donkey's personal views, not intended to be imposed on others: -- Now it should be the turn of the Ne...

I furnish below a link to the www.vivekananda.net/NewspaperReports/16Feb1900.html . This contains a newspaper clipping of the paper "The Daily Gleaner" dated 16th Feb. 1900. The clipping explains the work done by done by Swami Abhedananda in New York. As a true monk, he tried to encourage vegetarianism. It also said a New York paper tried to scare him by giving the details of the animals slaughtered in the New York City in 1900. This clipping is worth reading. The site www.Vivekananda.net is a mine of information for those who study the life and teachings of Swami Vivekananda. BLOGGER'S VIEWs If the citizens of New York consumed 200,000 pounds of beef in 1900, what will be the City's consumption in 2007? No need to be scared. The world is real. (Advaita or Non-dual philosophy says that the world is Mithya (illusion). Is it really an illusion? It is we, who are unreal. Even our mortal bodies are real. They simply change their form into ash when burt and when...

While speaking at Shakespeare's Club of Pasadena, California, on 27th Jan. 1900 Swami Vivekananda narrated his past woes of surviving on alms: " ... So things went on and on for ten years without any light , but with my health breaking all the time. It tells on the body in the long run: sometimes one meal at nine in the evening, another time a meal at eight in the morning, another after two days, another after three days — and always the poorest and roughest thing. Who is going to give to the beggar the good things he has? And then, they have not much in India. And most of the time walking, climbing snow peaks, sometimes ten miles of hard mountain climbing, just to get a meal. They eat unleavened bread in India, and sometimes they have it stored away for twenty or thirty days, until it is harder than bricks; and then they will give a square of that. I would have to go from house to house to collect sufficient for one meal. And then the bread was so hard, it made my mouth blee...

Though Swami Vivekananda studied B.A., he did not like the idea of working for his livelihood. This can be seen in his conversation with Priya Nath Sinha, his old friend. " ... In the case of a post of twenty or thirty rupees falling vacant, five hundred B.A.s and M.A.s will apply for it! And, dear me! how curiously worded these petitions are! "I have nothing to eat at home, sir, my wife and children are starving; I most humbly implore you, sir, to give me some means to provide for myself and my family, or we shall die of starvation! ... " We can see the scorn he uses in his language. This shows that Vivekananda might not have tried for a job at all. When compared to 2007, the job opportunities for B.A. studied persons in Kolkata (at that time it was the Capital of Undivided India) of 1890s were far more. The amount of Rs. 20 or 30 per month appears too paltry for Vivekananda. In the same conversation he deplored that Indians beg the British Government for relief fr...

Samadhi is a state of ecstasy of mind. During the ecstatic state, a person is believed to go into a trance of unconsciousness. Scriptures contain many definitions and interpretations. (At this blog itself, pl. see my earlier discussion on "samadhi". I am not adding this piece there as that post will become lengthy and difficult to read.) Priya Nath Sinha and Vivekananda were boyhood friends. Before Vivekananda took to monkhood, it seems they met many times and discussed (as per the reminiscences of Shri P.N. Sinha). During the discussions Shri Sinha questioned the possibility of a person attaining the ecstatic state in this Age of Darkness and Falsity (Kali Yuga). Vivekananda replied that he attained ecstatic state frequently could take Sinha to the state of ecstasy. At that time the conversation could not go ahead and Sinha could not presss for the ecstatic state from Vivekananda. After Vivekananda returned from his first sojourn in US, he got an elevated status of a ...

-Sometimes Swami Vivekananda speaks/writes very wisely. And sometimes, he uses strange logic. When he express his modern ideas, there is no problem. The strangeness enters when he tries to support his outdated beliefs. Or sometimes, though there are good cogent/logical arguments to support his actions, probably because of lack of time, or his very nature of spontaneity, he uses a weak reason to bolster his actions. Swamiji believed in the traditional Caste system. He did not like the system of a person getting his caste by birth. The contradiction is the two things cannot go together because of divergence between theory and practice. The above comments and the following discussion is based on reminiscences recorded by Shri Priya Nath Sinha, a boyhood friend of Swamiji. In one conversation Shri Sinha questioned the justification of teaching Mantras to the Westerners. A straight reply could have been to say that they cannot be concealed from humanity; they cannot be the privilege...