SWAMI VIVEKANANDA ON THE VEDAS AND UPANISHADS
By Sister Gayatriprana of The
Vedanta Society of
Chapters 1 to 10 on this page
For Chapters 11 onwards click here
For chapters 17 onwards click here
PREFACE
After fourteen years of
continuous work, the compilation, Swami Vivekananda on the Vedas and Upanisads,
is now ready to come to the light of day. It began, partially as a response
to the current confusion over the coherency of Swami Vivekananda’s Neo-Vedanta
and partially as a search for the essence of his message to contemporary
humanity. As time went by, the volume of the work and a certain compelling
pattern of inner organization built up a critical mass and momentum which swept
the project forward to its present state of completion. A number of loose ends
remain untied, however. Perhaps that is a good thing, for it provides
opportunities for readers to make contributions and additions to the overall
body of the work.
The invaluable nucleus for
this work is Swami Yogeshananda’s Swami Vivekananda Quotes the Upanishads,
an unpublished compilation made from the Complete Works in 1960, before
much material now available appeared in the public domain. The swami’s work did
not include the classical four mahavakyas, which have been researched and
included in this compilation along with some other major mantras such as Saccidananda.
I am very much indebted to Swami Yogeshananda’s pioneering work.
I sincerely hope that, by
bringing this material to light on the Internet we shall, on the one hand,
receive feedback from readers everywhere, improving and strengthening the work;
and, on the other, will take a step towards establishing the Himalayan majesty
of the Vedanta, particularly in its modern incarnation of the Neo-Vedanta of
Ramakrishna-Vivekananda.
SWAMI VIVEKANANDA ON THE VEDAS AND UPANISHADS
COMPILER’S INTRODUCTION
Re-visioning the Message of Swami Vivekananda
a) The Need for a
Reassessment of Swami Vivekananda and His Neo-Vedanta
When we read about Swami
Vivekananda, in most instances we hear of his charisma, his striking
appearance, or his "cyclonic", impetuous movement to effect change in
both East and West. And, as often as not, it is conceded that he met with
conspicuous success in his undertakings (though Western intellectuals, not keen
to be beholden to the Orient, are less enthusiastic on this score than are the
Indians) This much is in the common domain.
As the dust settles on the
past hundred years, however, we are hearing more and more, even from the
precincts of the Ramakrishna Order itself, that Swami Vivekananda was "not
a systematic thinker" or, less generously, that he was
"inconsistent", "confusing", and even
"incoherent". A rather strange string of epithets for a man who is,
at the same time, touted as the eternal companion of the avatar Ramakrishna!
Can we ascribe such exalted status to one whose
thinking processes were, in the common estimation, inferior even to a merely
normal, educated person?
More insidiously, there is
also a movement afoot among orthodox, scholarly Hindus and traditionalists of
other faiths which asserts that Sri Ramakrishna, as
also Swami Vivekananda and the Order he founded are anti-intellectual and
ultimately responsible for the contemporary breakdown of the Hindu tradition.
Again, a rather odd evaluation of two personalities whose avowed mission in
life was the re-establishment of the Eternal Religion and the culture which
emanates from it!
To someone who has
benefited immensely from the so-called new (Neo-) Vedanta of
Ramakrishna-Vivekananda, such assertions come as a surprise and, at the same
time, a challenge. Why are such wild statements being made, even by swamis of
the Ramakrishna Order? Are Sri Ramakrishna and Swami Vivekananda merely
"paper tigers" with no enduring substance to them? The testimony of
one’s own life immediately cries, "No!" and a deep conviction arises
that, no matter what contradictions and inconsistencies may appear on the
surface of Neo-Vedanta, there must be a coherency, meaning and a
profoundly supportive and nurturing structure to Neo-Vedanta that, as yet, is
not fully apparent.
The material you have
before you is a first step towards an exploration of the structure of
Neo-Vedanta, a response to the oft-repeated statement that "Swami
Vivekananda was not a thinker, merely a Hindu reformer." The
possibility that he is a Vedantic acarya in the line of the Vedic rsis, Buddha
and Sri Sankaracarya is not entertained, far less explored; and therefore the
pronouncements on his "inadequacies" are self-fulfilled.
However, to be fair, it is
indeed true to say that the materials of Swami Vivekananda’s teaching, as
extant today, do not readily lend themselves to the sort of systematization
that is needed to see the inner structure of his thought. The primary reason
for this situation is that he died at the age of 39, worn out by his Herculean
labors to awaken the spiritual currents of both
b) A Basic Point of
Reference for the Assessment of Neo-Vedanta
At this juncture, what
seems to be necessary is to establish a reference point to which the whole
project of revisioning Swami Vivekananda’s message can be related. Almost
certainly the most basic and obvious one is that he perceived himself as a
Vedantin and that he believed his message to be a commentary on Sri
Ramakrishna’s re-living and re-interpreting the Upanisads in the contemporary
era. This is the matrix from which everything else emanated. Such a view is,
from one standpoint, Swami Vivekananda’s "application" to be taken
seriously as a Vedantic acarya or teacher, his "position statement"
for any further evaluation. It provides the basis, not only for a rational and
systematic assessment of his work, but also for the process of his acceptance
as a Vedantic teacher. Traditionally, any person who calls himself a Vedantic
teacher is expected to accept the Upanisads as the source of truth and to
comment upon them and their two auxiliary texts, the Bhagavadgita and
the Brahma Sutras. From that standpoint, Swami Vivekananda could be
readily dismissed as a Vedantic acarya., because he
failed to produce a written and systematic commentary on these texts.
We have already mentioned
how the swami was cheated of time to carry out this basic work, despite his
desire to do so; but not of infinite opportunities to introduce the Upanisadic
worldview into every nook and cranny of his vision of contemporary life. We
find, therefore, in the catacombs of the Complete Works, as well as in
the Ramakrishna-Vivekananda literature generally, a wealth of comments by Swami
Vivekananda on the Upanisads, Gita and Brahma Sutras, gems lying
strewn helter-skelter as the swami responded spontaneously - and gave his very
life - to the crying needs of East and West.
On pondering the problem of
the swami’s "inconsistencies" it therefore seemed an obvious first
step to gather up these gems and arrange them in the traditional patterns of
Vedanta which is, after all, the very template of Sri Ramakrishna and Swami
Vivekananda. If, under the heading of the four Vedas and their subsections,
especially the Upanisads, we could gather the scattered treasures of Swami
Vivekananda’s utterances, would we be in a better position to see the structure
and coherency of his thought? It is my hope that the reader of this compilation
is now in a position to answer that question for him- or herself. Whoever can
encompass the sheer volume of this work, amounting to nearly half of the
nine-volume Complete Works, will see how it attests to the central
position of the Vedas and Upanisads in the thought of Swami Vivekananda. Again,
the concentration of the swami’s wide-ranging and intense thought under the
rubric of a commentary on the Vedas and Upanisads puts it, as it were, in a
super-cooled crucible where its powerful internal dynamics can be more readily
studied than in the freewheeling milieu of his spontaneous utterances to an
infinite variety of people and situations. It is as if we have peeled off
several layers from the swami’s work and are laying bare the core form from
which everything else takes its origin.
Encountering such
"DNA" of Swami Vivekananda’s core thought can be nothing less than a
total experience. As one enters into his "commentaries" as presented
in this work, one find, as it were, terra firma disappearing and the rapid
unfoldment of universe after universe, each expanding infinitely and yet at the
same time as close as one’s jugular vein, to borrow a phrase from the Koran.
It is my belief that such encounters can and will open up new vistas into
what Swami Vivekananda was about, not just in the piecemeal way that tends to
result when we dabble on the surface of his vast and protean works.
c) Approaching
Neo-Vedanta as an Integral Whole
Here we are entering into
the very paradigm of the Vedanta itself, the deep matrix from which have
emanated the Upanisads, Buddha, Sri Sankaracarya and the entire galaxy of the
Vedantic tradition as we know it. The present work plugs us into the very heart
of Vedantic experience, enabling us to grasp the essence of all that preceded
Neo-Vedanta and at the same time to flow into the endless new forms that bubble
up continuously in Swami Vivekananda’s thought. This material, selected on the
basis of its conformity with the Vedantic archetype is, I believe, the basis on
which a truly critical and authentic evaluation of the structure of Neo-Vedanta
can begin to be made. This is the mode in which the compilation took form and
in which I hope readers will approach it. No doubt many a familiar or arresting
quote will attract recognition or beguile with its novelty; but my purpose is,
in fact, to go beyond individual quotes to a sense of the whole and an inkling
of the total structure. I believe that, if we grasp the gestalt itself, each
quote will then shine, not just in its own radiance, but in the radiance of the
interconnected whole. This is the best way, in my view, to reach a sense of the
consistency and cogency of the Neo-Vedanta of Ramakrishna-Vivekananda.
Approaching the work in
this spirit imposes on the compiler a rather different task than merely
providing inspirational texts for the faithful. Seeking the gestalt inevitably
imposes the mandate to be as all-inclusive as possible, even at the risk of
bringing in material, from some standpoints "peripheral". Certain
broad categories, however, should be covered:
1. East and West, the two
empirical domains of Swami Vivekananda’s work, the
mirror-image needs of which elicited from Swami Vivekananda different, but
complementary responses.
2. The integrated four
yogas, the platform from which he addressed the task of self-transformation of
contemporary humanity.
3. The concrete and the
metaphysical, the "this"-world and the "other"-world, both
of which have a valued place in Swami Vivekananda’s Neo-Vedanta and exist as
poles in his scheme of self-transcendence and self-manifestation, the two
aspects of his approach to the issue of maya at the very core of Vedanta and,
for that matter, the human condition anywhere.
4. Evolution and involution
of consciousness, the twin processes which weave together all of the phenomena related
to the three foregoing categories; the ascent to and descent from the divine
and the infinite relationships which result along their trajectories.
5. Concretizations which
encapsulate or are holograms of the Reality from which all of the above emanate,
in which they exist, and to which they return. Some examples of such holograms
would be Swami Vivekananda himself, his poems which encapsulate truth beyond
linear thinking, and some of his more aphoristic, mahavavya-like
statements which defy all logical analysis but overwhelmingly convey the
integrated truth of Vedanta.
This rather formidable list
is an attempt to cover all possible bases of human knowledge and experience. It
is not one which I preconceived and imposed on the materials, but rather the
algorithm, as you might say, which emerged from the data when it was all put
together. Its validity and applicability are questions too recondite to be
entered into here - that task will be tackled elsewhere. For the moment, I put
it on record as a set of criteria of inclusiveness and completeness with which
I have evaluated and developed this compilation. Once discovered, I consciously
applied it to the final selection and overall organization of the materials,
trying to give East and West due representation in the commentaries, as also
each of the four yogas, "this" and "the other" worlds,
evolution and involution; and finally, occasional passages of Swami
Vivekananda’s poetry which, I felt, encapsulate the very essence of his commentary
on a particular mantra.
This attempt at
inclusiveness and wholeness has necessarily meant the utilization of materials
which are not, at first sight, strictly quotes or comments directly on the
Upanisads. The bulk of such material was delivered in the West, where Swami Vivekananda
was much more freewheeling in his translations and interpretations of the
Vedantic texts than he was in
d) The Broad Picture: Swami
Vivekananda’s Introduction to the Vedas
Having laid out the
materials according to all of these criteria, I clearly sawthat Swami
Vivekananda’s "commentaries" are
power-packed, often counterintuitive, even controversial. Perhaps the main
reason for this impression is that he deals so often with what has
traditionally been considered "secular" concerns, flying in the face
of traditional religious discourse. He thus sets up a powerful voltage between
the conservative religious tradition and his deep concern with the burning
problems of the contemporary world.
So strong was this sense of
tension in the commentaries that I decided to embark on a compilation of Swami
Vivekananda’s general remarks on the Vedas and Upanisads. I thought that this
would provide, in a less aphoristic way than in the commentaries themselves,
his basic approach to Vedanta and how he integrates it with the contemporary
world. I discovered huge amounts of material which, I felt, lent itself to
presentation as a historical narrative in what I have called The
Introduction. There Swami Vivekananda traces Vedanta from its origin with
the Vedic seers and the culture that supported them to Buddha, Sri
Sankaracarya, and on to the present day. Laying out the basic tenets of Vedanta
on God, humanity and the world as well as its characteristic practices for
developing a spiritual approach to life, the Introduction traces how different
emphases and interpretations emerged in response to the unfolding historical
process. In particular, the introductory materials bring out the problems and
conditions of the modern world, and just how Sri Ramakrishna and Swami
Vivekananda propose to address them and mold them to the Vedantic paradigm.
While the commentaries can
well be read without the Introduction, especially by those thoroughly familiar
with the Neo-Vedanta of Swami Vivekananda, for others, or for those who feel
the historical dimension can deepen their appreciation, the Introduction
provides a frame of reference relating the commentaries to the whole panorama
of Vedanta - yet another gestalt in our study.
e) The Materials and How
They Have Been Put Together
1. Selection of the
Materials
Having arrived at the
criteria of selection and basic presentation, we come to the question of
precisely which materials to use in the commentaries and how to organize them.
The response to the first question was, in line with our inclusive approach, to
include all materials with credentials of authenticity. This decision spread
the net beyond the Complete Works to the writings and testimony of his
brother-disciples (including the Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna) and his
students, such as Nivedita and Sharat Chandra Chakravarty. Some interesting
accounts and observations by other friends and acquaintances pertaining to Swami
Vivekananda’s views on the Vedas and Upanisads were also included in the
biographic accounts which embellish the commentaries on some of the major
mantras.
With regard to the
deployment of appropriate passages for inclusion in the present compilation I
have differentiated between passages with formal, more or less literal quotes
of the mantras and those without. The latter groups I have called
"commentaries" rather than "quotes"; their suitability for
inclusion is, of course, open to discussion. The criteria on which such
commentaries have been included are:
1. Wording of the mantra as
a paraphrase rather than as a literal quote. As mentioned previously, there is
a definite difference between the way Swamiji translated mantras in
2. Obvious comments on the
mantra without an actual quotation or paraphrase of it - again, more common in
the West.
3. Passages which contain
unique key words, phrases or thoughts which Swamiji used in other, bona fide
translations of the same mantra - more common, again, in the West.
4. Poems or poetic passages
which seem to contain the essence of Swamiji's thoughts on any mantra, which I
have placed at the end of the comments as a "meditation".
In short, materials were
used which are cognate with the more recognizable, traditional passages. I feel
it is important to include such passages because it ensures coverage of his
message for the West, a very vital ingredient of his overall formulation of
Vedanta,
2 Assignment
of the Materials to Their Sources
In the Vedas and Upanisads
the same mantra may occur in more than one place, e.g. the parable of the two
birds we usually think of as coming from the Mundaka Upanisad occurs
originally in the Rg Veda. I have assigned such mantras to the earliest
source when Swamiji does not assign it himself, or to the source to which he
himself most often assigns it, e.g. "There the sun shines not" has
been put in the Katha Upanisad (2.2.15) rather than in the Mundaka
( 2.2.12)
In a number of places Swami
Vivekananda quotes mantras which are composites of two Upanisadic mantras, or
of the Upanisads and the Gita. These I have placed in the comments on both
sources.
3. The Organization of
the Materials
(i)
According to the Vedas
With regard to the question
of organization, I have followed the traditional division into four
Vedas, under each of which the materials appear as Samhita (especially in the Rig
Veda), occasional Aranyakas, and the main body of the work, the Upanishads,
presented in the sequence found in S. Radhakrishnan’s The Principal
Upanishads. Apart from the literary convenience of clustering materials
from the same source together, this method also seems to bring out the special
emphasis of each Veda and to demonstrate how it was developed in the Upanishads
belonging to it. It also served to concentrate in one place all of Swami
Vivekananda’s insights into five major themes of Vedanta, as follows:
Rig Veda Creation,
its presiding deities and inner workings
Shukla
Yajur Veda Human divinity,
the Self and deification of the world.
Sama Veda
Divine cosmology, universal individuality and oneness with the universe.
Atharva
Veda The keys to universal
knowledge on all levels.
Here again is the inclusive
overview this study is devoted to, an exploration of the central themes of
humanity and its relationship to God and the world.
(ii)
The Line of Thought within Each Mantra
The material accumulated
for each mantra has been organized throughout along the same basic lines
and presented in this sequence of thought:
i) A statement by Swami
Vivekananda of established facts and preceding theories on the subject of the
mantra.
ii) Swami
Vivekananda’s re-formulation of these facts and theories from the standpoint of
Neo-Vedanta, creating a different "space" to be explored.
iii) A general statement in
Swami Vivekananda’s words of the yoga or methods by which an understanding of
this new angle of vision may be obtained.
iv) An exploration of the form those
general methods take in each of the four yogas: karma - bhakti - raja - jnana,
as also the "fifth yoga" of integration of the basic four.
v) A word-picture of the
transformations brought about by the practice of the yogas according to
Ramakrishna-Vivekananda Vedanta, either in the form of Swami Vivekananda's own
experience or his vision for future humanity.
An illustration of how this
line of thought works out in practice is given immediately below in section 3, Captions
for Mantras and Headings for Sections and Subsections.
In many cases, of course,
the material is scant; sometimes only a translation of a mantra without any
commentary occurs. From there the amount of material varies enormously up to a
maximum of nearly eighty entries for Sat-chit-ananda. Naturally, the
degree of organization depends upon the amount of material for any
mantra, but the basic approach just described is used in order to create a
systematic line of approach which again, permits easier comparison of the
commentaries of different mantras.
3. Captions for Mantras
and Headings for Sections and Subsections
When the comments on the
mantra are copious or substantial the mantra has been given a caption derived
from Swami Vivekananda's own interpretation of it, e.g. I am God for Brihadaranyaka
Upanisad, 1.4.10.
Whenever there are entries
in excess of three to five under each mantra, it was felt necessary to create
sections and subsections with heading in order to keep explicit the line of
thought we have just presented in the previous section. Such headings
were made by extracting from the text itself important thoughts and phrases
which, when put together, indicate the gist of the section or subsection in
Swami Vivekananda's own words, e.g.:
Chandogya Upanisad 6.2.1, One Existence without a
Second:
a) The Proposition That the
Absolute Is Manifesting Itself as Many
1. Many Different Meanings
of the Word "Existence"
2. The Idea of God in
Advaita Is Oneness; the Idea of Many Is Caused by Our Minds
b) We See The Self According to Different Vision
c) Freeing Ourselves from
the Variety Due to Name and Form
1. We Must Free Ourselves
from Our Bodies
2. You Cannot Be Happy
unless You Serve the One in a Suffering World
3. As You Unfold Yourself
the Reflection Grows Clearer
4. In Jnana You Lose Sight
of Variety and See Only Unity
d) I Have Experienced the
Blissful Reality of the One
e) Meditation
As mentioned in the
preceding section, this sequence also demonstrates the line of thought
presented in all of the laRiger commentaries.
(iv) Numbering of Entries and Listing of
References
In order to help anyone who
would like to go to the original sources of any quote or passage of comment,
each has been assigned a number in brackets on the right hand margin.
The list of references at the end of the comments on any mantra is listed by
the same numbering system and gives not only the volume and page number of any
entry, but also it title and date, when applicable. This latter detail is to
assist readers trying to find anything, especially in the Complete Works where
it is so notoriously difficult to find anything, or in the individual version
of Inspired Talks, where date is the key to finding anything.
f) Conventions of
Language
In going through these
translations and comments of Vedic and Upanisadic mantras by Swami Vivekananda
and comparing them with versions in English by his predecessors and
contemporaries, I have discovered that in a few cases Swami Vivekananda used
the translations of others, or that such translations have been inserted by
editors in instances where Swami Vivekananda gave only the Sanskrit
original. Otherwise, Swami Vivekananda made his own translations, more often
than not extemporaneously, which are invariably simpler and more direct than
the translations of others and often radically different in the use of
language. To check the authenticity of Swami Vivekananda's own quotes as they
appear in the texts we are using, I have made every effort to find
"original sources" - either completely unedited, or from early
sources handled by editors with a light touch. I have then organized
these "corrected" versions in chronological order (when there is more
than one), along with data as to who edited the material, whether Sanskrit
was given with it, and to what kind of audience it was given, material which
will be presented as an appendix to this work. This method has made it possible
to trace which are the most authentic versions, as also the most oft-recurring,
how the swami modified his translations according to his audiences, and with
the reliable and comparable versions, just how he himself modified his use of
language with the passage of time. From this background study I have been able
to select more confidently one quotation which can be used as the "lead quote"
for each mantra, i.e. the one which most accurately expresses the swami's
interpretation of it.
Unfortunately, due to lack
of time and resources I have not been able to present the original sources of
the comments, though in many cases, these unedited sources contain many ideas
and expressions of extreme interest and different from what appears in the Complete
Works. For the sake of accuracy references to lead quotes heading up
the comments on the mantra (Reference #1) or to entries that consist only of
quotes are to the original source with which they have been brought in
line rather than the Complete Works or other heavily edited source.
Other references are to the Complete Works or other standard source In such cases, however, the quotes of the mantra have also
been adjusted to the original source, though what that source is is not
indicated in the list of references. It is to be found in the systematic
presentation of quotes and their sources which will form an appendix to this
work.
With regard to the language
of the materials generally, I have followed the following conventions:
1. Sanskrit words are
written in phonetic English spelling.
2. In referring to the
deity, capitalization has been minimized in order to preserve the flow of ideas
and language. While proper names have of course been capitalized, pronouns have
been capitalized mostly when in the nominative, e.g. I am He, unless the sense
of the sentence absolutely requires the capitalization of pronouns in other
cases. Adjectives referring to the deity have been capitalized only when used
as nouns, e.g. "There is happiness only in the Infinite" vs. "I
have seen that ancient One".
3. I have taken the liberty
of changing the punctuation of texts, especially from the Complete Works, where
often very long sentences require more than a string of commas to make sense. I
have tended to use hyphens more liberally than does the Complete Works
to indicate sudden breaks in thought which occur quite frequently in what is largely spoken materials This usage is in line with
the punctuation of the Californian material which was done in the West in the
1960s.
4. In keeping with
nineteenth century usage Swami Vivekananda routinely referred to
"man" instead of "humanity" and to the deity as
"He". I have decided to use tactful gender neutrality in this text,
as is meant for a general audience.
5. I have used
abbreviations and some other conventions for the names of the texts used in
this compilation, a list of which follows immediately.
With the principles and
methods I have just described and enumerated, I now entrust this vessel of
Swami Vivekananda’s Neo-Vedanta to the ocean of the contemporary world,
especially as it flows through the Internet, the highway of ideas today. If the
vessel is crafted properly, it will make its way steadily over the black and
troubled waters of the present day and, in doing so, will bring coherence, calm
and light to what is at present the darkness and confusion in which we are
caught up.
SWAMI VIVEKANANDA ON THE VEDAS AND UPANISHADS
INTRODUCTION
PART I: THE ORIGINS
AND SIGNIFICANCE OF THE VEDAS AND VEDANTA
Section 1: Definition and Eulogy of the Vedas and Vedanta
Chapter
1: The Vedas in Swami Vivekananda’s Own Life
Chapter
2: Some Preliminary Definitions
Chapter
3: The Glory of the Vedas
PART I, SECTION 1:
DEFINITION AND EULOGY OF THE VEDAS AND VEDANTA
Chapter 1: The Vedas in Swami Vivekananda’s Life
a) Sri Ramakrishna’s
Training of Swami Vivekananda
Sri Ramakrishna would ask
Naren to read those scriptures which treat solely of Brahman the Absolute. He
did not ask the other disciples to do this. Theirs was a different path -
theirs was the path of bhakti or love for God. But Sri Ramakrishna saw that his
was the path of jnana, or transcendental insight. His main message was to be
the incomparable glory of the Vedanta. Naren, however, would refuse to read
them. The Master would say "Well Naren! Then do just read a little of them
to me. I desire to hear them. You need not pay any attention to the text."
Yes, in that sense he would read them to the Master. Many were the times when
the Master pleaded thus, many were the times when the disciple read, and in the
reading, the ideas would burn into his soul. He lost himself in the reading.
Thus, the Yoga, the Adhyatma Ramayana, and some of the important
Upanishads were read by Naren either in the presence of the Master or by
himself.
"All this is Brahman; (Cha.Up.3.14.1);
what is perceived and what is not perceived, what is known, and what is not
known; these heaven-worlds, this mortal life, the Vedas and what are not the
Vedas, the beginning and what is not the beginning,
all this is Brahman. The soul is Brahman [Mand. Up.,2],
the gods are Brahman, the universe is Brahman, truth is Brahman, and all is
Brahman. There is nothing but Brahman. Whoso realizes this,
verily attains unto the Highest. He is freed from the deceptions of the senses
and the intellect. He sees nothing but Brahman. To him Brahman has become all
in all. As a snake throws off its skin, so does he throw off all limitations
and himself becomes the shining One. [Brih.Up.4.4.7] He himself becomes
Brahman." [Mund. .Up.3.2.9] Such is the spirit and the text of the
Upanishads; and as Naren read sublime ideas like these, his soul would soar and
soar like a great eagle, above the pettiness and the commonplaces of this
world. And the soul of Sri Ramakrishna would soar higher and higher, beyond the
confines of even the highest spiritual limitations. It would be beyond and
beyond and Beyond, until his body would become rigid in spiritual ecstasy, and
all thought was left behind and all sense-consciousness dimmed by the glory of
that indescribable effulgence of that Absolute Brahman, which only they can
know who have been utterly drowned to all objective life, and from whom all
form, thought and personality have dropped off. And Sri Ramakrishna, entering
this condition of being became a living God, become one with Brahman. What were
the Upanishads but the utterance of that consciousness into which he had
soared? Such was Naren’s training at the feet of his Master. And Naren breathed
in the pureness of that air, feeling the freedom of the Infinite in the great
depths of spiritual emotion. "Shivo’ham, Shivo’ham" (Nirvanashatkam)
"Brahman is real, Brahman alone is real, the
world is a myth. And verily, the soul itself is Brahman." [Shankaracharya:
Brahmajnanavali Mala 5.21] Thus rang the note in his soul.
Naren saw in the life of
Sri Ramakrishna the full meaning and the ripe blossoming-forth of all that the
Upanishads taught. The example of the Master, his own eagerness as a disciple,
his own great power in the spiritual faculty of understanding - these were the
factors in that making up of thought and insight which later burst forth, for
him, into the blessedness of the highest Advaita realization. Aye, he attained
that state himself where all is Brahman. And this was the greatest event in all
his life. All other realizations and events led up to and were afterwards
tributary to this. He came to accept all the gods, and "I believe in
Brahman and the gods" was his luminous declaration.
In him who became the crown
of the Vedanta, who became the spirit incarnate of the Advaita Vedanta and the
living utterance of the Upanishads, whose message was to stir the world -
verily in him, the Paramahamsa Ramakrishna, he saw the effulgence of Brahman,
verily, he saw it as his own Soul. Verily he saw this in nirvikalpa samadhi,
which is the awareness of the infinite Consciousness
and the seeing of the infinite vision.
Such was the training of
Naren. Little by little, he was lifted out of doubt into beatitude, out of
darkness into effulgence, out of anguish of mind and heart into blessedness and
bliss, out of the seething vortex of the world into the grand expanse of the
world of realization. He was taken, little by little, and by the power of Sri
Ramakrishna, out of bondage into infinite freedom. He was taken out from the
pale of a little learning into that omniscience which is the consciousness of
Brahman. He was lifted out of all objective conceptions of the Godhead into the
glorious awareness of the subjective nature of true Being,
above form, above thought, above sense, above all relative good and evil, into
the sameness and reality and the absolute - beyondness of Brahman. (1)
Sri Ramakrishna was the man
of realization. Naren aspired to be even like him. And his desire was
fulfilled. It was because he had lived in the
(b) Swami
Vivekananda’s Visions of Vedic Rishis
Swami Vivekananda always
thought of himself as a child of
In a dream or vision... he
saw sages gathered in a holy grove asking questions concerning the ultimate
Reality. A youth among them answered in a clarion voice: "Hear, ye
children of immortal bliss, even ye who dwell in higher spheres, I have found
the ancient One, knowing whom alone ye shall be saved from death over
again!" [Swet.Up.2.5 and 3.8]
Asked where he had learnt
to chant with that marvelous intonation which never failed to thrill the
listener, he shyly told of a dream or vision in which he saw himself in the
forest of ancient
"It was evening in
that age when the Aryans had only reached the
Swami Vivekananda had this
vision in his parivrajaka days, some two years after the mahasamadhi of Sri
Ramakrishna, probably in January of 1888. On that occasion he had the vision of
an old man standing on the banks of the Indus and chanting riks or Vedic
mantrams, in such a distinctly different form from the accustomed methods of
intonation that it could be compared rather to Gregorian chanting. The passage
which he heard was that salutation to Gayatri which begins: "O come, Thou
effulgent One, Thou bestower of blessings, signifier of Brahman in three
letters. Salutation be to Thee, O Gayatri, Mother of
Vedic mantrams, Thou who hast sprung from Brahman." The Swami believed
that through this perception he had recovered the musical cadences of the
earliest Aryan ancestors and thought that his own Master must have had a
somewhat similar experience in which he had caught "the rhythm of the
Vedas." He also found something remarkably sympathetic to this mode of
chanting in the poetry of Shankaracharya.(5)
c) The Education of His
Brother-Disciples
May of 1887: [After the passing away of Sri
Ramakrishna] Narendra and other members of the math often spent their evenings
on the roof [of the monastery at Baranagore]. There they devoted a great deal
of time to discussion of the teachings of Sri Ramakrishna, Shankaracharya,
Ramanuja, Jesus Christ and of the Hindu philosophy,
European philosophy, the Vedas, Puranas, and Tantras. (6)
A few days after the Master
had passed away, the mother of Swami Premananda invited Sri Ramakrishna's
monastic disciples to her village home at Antpur. Swami Vivekananda took them
all to Antpur. Their hearts were then afire with renunciation; they felt great
agony of sorrow at the loss of their Master; and all were engaged in intense
spiritual practices. The only thought they had during those days, and the only
effort they made, was for the realization of God and the attainment of peace.
When they were at Antpur, they applied themselves much more intensely to
spiritual practices. They would light a fire with logs under the open sky and
spend the nights there in japa and meditation. Swami Vivekananda would talk
with us fervently about renunciation and self-sacrifice. Sometimes he would
make his brother-disciples read the Gita, the Bhagavata, the
Upanishads, etc., and hold discussions on them. (7)
[At the Baranagore
monastery], Narendra... would illustrate the historical import of Sri
Ramakrishna’s life and teachings upon the present generation of Hindus who were
educated in Western lines of thought, and would show how his life was destined
to alter their minds and the entire character of their theological outlook,
thus bringing them back from drafting in an ever-widening radical divergence
from Hinduism into the understanding of and concurrence with the Hindu ideals
of worship and with the contents of the Upanishads. He would say to them,
"The time will come when you will see what part Ramakrishna has played in
the re-Hinduization of Hinduism and the consolidation, into a compact form, of
its essential elements."…
Through loving discipline
he infused into his brother-disciples the fire and a wider knowledge of the
mission that was before them, the mission which was
entrusted by the Master into his charge for fruition and dissemination. Most of
the sublime ideas which he gave to the world in the time of his fame were not
new to his brother-disciples, except in modes of expression, for they had heard
them in these Baranagore days, or even earlier at the garden-house at
Cossipore.
Most of all, the leader
initiated his fellow-monks into the living realities of Hinduism, making them
conscious of the values of its thought and spirit…. He made them master the
Upanishads, the Yoga Vashishtha, the Puranas, and the other Shastras,
until they knew why the rishis were so exclusive to those who were
outside the pale of Hinduism, but their wisdom was to brahmanize them and
brahmanize the shudras.(8)
[After his return to
Baranagore from his first pilgrimage to the north of
[In 1890], Swami
Vivekananda took Swami Akhandananda with him on his journey [of pilgrimage] to
At
[In December, 1890, Swami
Vivekananda and six of his brother disciples met by chance at
d) Vedic Studies in
Gujerat, 1891 - 1892
At Porbandar, Swami
Vivekananda was a guest at Sankar Pandurang’s place. He was the governor of
Porbandar (Sudampur). Swami Vivekananda said that in the whole of
Sankar Pandurang [was] a
learned pandit attached to the court of the Maharaja of Porbandar. At that time
he was translating the Vedas and he also begged the Swami to remain and to help
him in this extremely arduous task. So both worked constantly for several months,
the Swami interesting himself more and more deeply in the study and
interpretation of the Vedas, perceiving the greatness of thought contained
therein. Here also, he finished reading the Mahabhashya, the great
commentary of Patanjali on Panini’s grammar. (14)
The more he studied the
Vedas, the more he pondered over the philosophies which the Aryan rishis had
thought out, the surer he was that India was in very truth the mother of
religions, the cradle of civilization, and the fountainhead of spirituality.
But he was bitter in his soul that all this glory should seemingly lie buried
under ignorance and that the millions were unconscious of it. He knew that the
tides of the invasion of foreign cultures for centuries had incalculably swept
away many of the glories of the culture of the race in the eyes of the people
themselves, and that many of the pandits, who ought to be the custodians of
this culture, had become mere chatterers of Sanskrit grammar and philosophy and
were only as so many phonographic records of its past, without being possessed
of its sprit and of the sense of responsibility as to their adding to that
culture the fruits of original, intellectual and spiritual researches. (15)
During his stay in Khandwa,
the civil judge gave a dinner to the Bengali residents in honor of Swami
Vivekananda. Before going to attend the party, he took with him a book, which
was a collection of some of the Upanishads, saying that there should be some
reading of an interesting and instructive nature to pass the time usefully
before and after dinner. When the guests arrived, he read some of the very
intricate and abstruse passages and explained them in such a way as a boy could
understand. There was among the guests Babu Pyerlal Ganguly, a pleader, who was
held to be a more than average Sanskrit scholar of that part, who took the role
of critic. But when he went on listening to the illuminating replies and
comments of Swami Vivekananda, he felt himself vanquished. When the reading was
finished, Pyari Babu whispered to Swami's host that Swami's very appearance
foretold greatness. (16)
In the city of
In
e) Swami Vivekananda Finds His
In December of 1892,
sitting in meditation on the last stone of his motherland by the shrine of the
great Mother of the universe [Kanya Kumari], Swami Vivekananda, like another
Jacob wrestling with the angel, wrestled with his own soul, until the Spirit
gained the upper hand, going beyond the limitations of orthodox religious forms
or even the orthodox religious spirit into the great, vast heart of things. To
him religion was no longer an isolated province of human endeavor; it embraced
the whole scheme of things, not only the dharma, not only the Vedas, not only
the Upanishads, not only the meditation of the sages, not only the asceticism
of the great monks, not only the vision of the Most High, but the heart of the
people, their lives, their hopes, their misery, their poverty, their
degradation, their sorrows, their woes. And he saw that the dharma,
and even the Vedas, without the people, were as much straw in the eyes
of the Most High. That from which the Vedas have proceeded, That from which the
Soul of the people has emanated, That from which the rishis received their
inspiration and the avataras their supreme compassion, descended upon him in
all the universality and eclecticism of the mightiest insight; and he felt a
Power, greater than that of his own personality, and his soul in prophecy knew
that That Power was all-sweeping and invincible and that it should work from
within the masses in its own ways - inscrutably and perhaps slowly, but
nonetheless surely - making, above all, for the resurrection of the motherland
and the revival and progress of the people. Verily, in Kanya Kumari, the Swami
was the patriot and the prophet in one.
Thus the meditation of the
Swami was not only thought, not only idle dreaming, it was Living Power. And he
said unto himself, "Yes, I have found my mission at last! I must go to the
West to spread the light of the dharma for the good of
In
On the morning of the
thirteenth of February, 1893, Swami Vivekananda met by appointment the Prime
Minister of Hyderabad, the Maharaja, and the Peshkar… and all those noblemen
promised him their support for his proposed propaganda in
f) Upanishad Classes in
the West
Swami Vivekananda never
quoted anything but the Vedas, the Upanishads, and the Bhagavad Gita. And he
never, in public, mentioned his own Master, nor spoke in specific terms of any
part of Hindu mythology.(22)
He said, "It is only
the pure Upanishadic religion that I have gone about preaching in the
world." (23)
[In Annisquam in August of
1893]: the teaching of the Vedas, constant and beautiful, he applied to every
event in life, quoting a few verses and then translation, and with the
translation of the story giving its meaning.... In quoting from the Upanishads
his voice was most musical. He would quote a verse in Sanskrit, with
intonations, and then translate it into beautiful English, of which he had a
wonderful command. (24)
At Greenacre in August of
1894, Swami Vivekananda rolled forth the solemn poetry of the Vedas for an hour
the other night in his excellent English. (25)
December 8, 1894: "I have been here [in
On January 25, 1895, the
swami held the first of a series of parlor lectures at Mrs. Auel's residence in
The dinner at Miss Corbin’s
[in February, 1895] was a great success…. Swami Vivekananda was very fine and
spoke to the people who came after dinner most impressively. There was the most
rapt attention on the part of the 400 who seemed to feel and expressed great
delight at the change from the ordinary fashionable gathering. He has made many
new and valuable friends. Miss Corbin was too happy to express. She has offered
the conservatory - which is lovely - for classes on the Upanishads. (28)
At
From
At South Place Chapel in
During the next two days
[after Swami's talk to the Harvard Graduate Philosophical society on March 25,
1896]… Swami Vivekananda delivered his last three talks in
g) Systematizing the
Concepts of Vedanta
More and more as time went on, the Swami had found it necessary to systematize his
religious ideas. To do this he felt he would necessarily have to re-organize
the entire Hindu philosophical thought by unifying its distinctive features
around a few leading ideas of the Hindu religious systems, so as to make it
more readily intelligible to Western minds. He wanted to bring out, according
to different schools of Vedanta, the ideas of the soul and the divinity or
final goal, the relation of matter and force and the Vedantic conception of
cosmology, and how they coincided with modern science. He also intended to draw
up a classification of the Upanishads according to the passages which have a
distinct bearing on Advaita, Vishishtadvaita, and the Dvaita conceptions, in
order to show how all of them can be reconciled. His constructive genius thus
roused made him want to write a book, carefully working out all these ideas in
a definite form. (34)
To Alasinga, April 4,
1895: "Send me
the Vedanta Sutras and the commentaries of all the sects." (35)
To Alasinga, May 6,
1895: In your
[English language] journal write article after article on the three systems [of
Vedanta philosophy], showing their harmony as one following after the other,
and at the same time keep off the ceremonial forms altogether. That is, preach
the philosophy, the spiritual part, and let people suit it to their own forms.
I wish to write a book on this subject; therefore I wanted the three Bhashyas;
but only one volume of the Ramanuja Bhashya has reached me as yet."
(36)
By the time Swami
Vivekananda went to
To Swami
Ramakrishnananda from Caversham, Autumn, 1895: Well, you just patiently do one
thing - set about collecting everything that books, beginning with the Rig Veda
down to the most insignificant of Puranas and Tantras, have got to say about
annihilation of the universe, about race, heaven and hell, the soul,
consciousness, and intellect, etc., the sense-organs, mukti and transmigration
and suchlike things. No child's play will do - I want really scholarly work.
The most important thing is to collect the materials. (38)
To Mr. E. T. Sturdy,
If we can get it through
before we have finished the classes, and publish it by publicly holding a
service or two under it, it will go on. They want to form a congregation, and
they want ritual. (39)
[This proposal of Swami
Vivekananda was apparently never carried out]
To Mr. Sturdy from
[This was never done,
but from his lectures in
Swami Vivekananda came to
"Send Swami
Abhedananda to
His brother-disciples went
to the abode of the savant Satyavata Samashrami and purchased all the volumes
of the Vedic books, Bibliotheca Indica, compiled by him and published by
the Asiatic Society. Then Swami Abhedananda boarded the ship and his brothers gave
him a sendoff. (41)
On
Friday, August 6th, 1897... Swami Abhedananda landed at the
To Alasinga, Autumn, 1896: I am busy writing something big on the Vedanta philosophy. I
am busy collecting passages from the various Vedas bearing on the Vedanta in
its threefold aspect. You can help me by getting someone to collect passages
bearing on, first, the advaitic idea, then the vishishtadvaitic, and the
dvaitic, from the Samhitas, the Brahmanas, the Upanishads and the Puranas. They
should be classified and very legibly written with the name and chapter of the
book in each case. It would be a pity to leave the West without leaving
something of the philosophy in book form.
There was a book published
in
October 31, 1896, from
the Journal Light: We lately listened to a discourse by Swami Vivekananda.... The
subject, in the main, was the Vedas, but we got excursions on evolution, modern
science, idealism and realism, the supremacy of the Spirit, etc. On the whole,
we gathered that the speaker was a preacher of the universal religion of
spiritual ascendancy and spiritual harmony. Certain passages from the Vedas -
beautifully translated and read, by the way - were charming in their bearing
upon the humaneness and sharp reality of a life beyond the veil. One longed for
more of this.
We were much impressed with
the admission that in the Vedas there are many contradictions, and that devout
Hindus never thought of denying them nor reconciling
them. Everyone was free to take what he liked. At different stages and on
different planes, all were true. Hence the Hindus never excommunicated and
never persecuted. The contradictions in the Vedas are like the contradictions
in life - they are very real, but they are all true. This seems impossible, but
there is sound sense in it. (44)
Swami Vivekananda was
invited by the Paris Congress of the History of Religions [in the autumn of
1900] to contradict the conviction of many of the Sanskrit scholars of the West
that the Vedic religion is the outcome of the worship of the fire, the sun, and
other awe-inspiring objects of natural phenomena. He promised to read a paper
on this subject, but he could not keep his promise on account of ill health,
and only with difficulty was he able to be personally present at the Congress,
where he was most warmly received by all the Western Sanskrit scholars, whose
admiration for the swami was all the greater as they had already gone through
many of his lectures on the Vedanta. (45)
h) Beginning the
Educational Work in
1. The Monastic Order
In 1894-95 we did not know
the thoughts that were seething in Swami Vivekananda's mind day and night.
"The work!, the work!" he cried. "How to begin the work in
First, a large plot of land
on the
It was Swami Vivekananda's
great desire that the Vedas and other Shastras should be studied at the math.
Since the time the monastery was removed to Nilambar Babu's garden [in
February, 1898], he had started, with the help of his brother disciples,
regular classes on the Vedas, the Upanishads, the Vedanta Sutras, the Gita, the
Bhagavata and other scriptures and had himself taught for a time Panini's Astadhyayi.
(47)
Of Swami Vivekananda's stay
in
All through the serious
period of his [final] illness in 1901 and 1902 and even up to the very end, the
swami was eager to receive friends and visitors and to instruct his disciples,
notwithstanding the plea of his brother disciples to take perfect rest for the
sake of his health; for in the matter of teaching, he knew no limits.
Everything must be sacrificed, even the body itself....
All through the period
under description, and especially from the early part of March, 1902 until the
time he passed away [in July of the same year], in spite of his physical
afflictions, the swami was busy in many ways. Disease counted as nothing when
his mind was set upon doing something. Even unto the last day he himself
conducted numerous Vedic and question classes at the monastery, and oftentimes
the brahmacharins and even his own brother disciples came to him for spiritual
advice. He often spoke of methods of meditation and would train such as were
backward in this spiritual science. He spent hours in answering correspondence,
or in reading, noting down his thoughts for writing some book on Hindu
philosophy or on Indian history; and then, for recreation he would sing some
song or discourse with his brother disciples, giving himself up to fun and
merriment. (49)
The swami always abhorred
extremes. He protested against the too elaborate paraphernalia of daily worship
at the math in the strongest terms and insisted on his disciples devoting more
time to sacred study, religious talks and discussions, and to meditation, in
order to mold their lives and understand the spirit of Sri Ramakrishna's
teachings than to superfluous and minute details in conducting the worship. It should
be done in the simplest way with due devotion and fervor, along with the former
occupations, without taking up the whole time of the monks as it used to do. To
enforce this, he introduced the ringing of a bell at appointed times at which
the members, leaving aside - or, rather, finishing all other works - must join
the classes for study, discussion, and meditation.... About three months before
his departure he made a rule that at four o'clock in the morning a hand-bell
should be rung by someone going from room to room to awaken the members of the
Order, and that within half an hour all should gather in the chapel to
meditate. So, also, classes on the Gita, Bhagavata, Upanishads and the Brahma
Sutras, and question classes for religious discussion were regularly held.
Over and above these, Swami Vivekananda encouraged his disciples to practice
austerities.... In his charge to his disciples he repeatedly pointed out that
no monastic order could keep itself pure and retain
its original vigor as well as its power of working good, without a definite
ideal to work for, without submitting itself to rigorous discipline, vows, and
without keeping up culture and education within its fold. (50)
2. The Laity
It was on the afternoon of
the first day of May, 1897, that a representative gathering of all the monastic
and lay disciples of Sri Ramakrishna took place at Balaram Babu's house, in
response to Swami Vivekananda's invitation to them intimating his desire of
holding a meeting to found an association. He had long thought and made a plan
of bringing about close cooperation between the monastic and lay disciples of
Sri Ramakrishna and of organizing in a systematic way the hitherto unsystematic
activities, both spiritual and philanthropic, of his brother disciples.... The
future method of work was discussed, and some resolutions were passed,
comprising in the main the present principles and the aims and objects by which
the movement was to be guided....
After the resolutions were
passed, office-bearers were appointed. Swami Vivekananda himself became the
general president and he made Swami Brahmananda and Swami Yogananda the
president and vice-president respectively of the
In
During his sojourn at
Ambala in Northern India at the end of 1897, Swami Vivekananda daily held
religious conversations at all hours of the day with large numbers of people of
different creeds (which included Muslims, Brahmo, Arya Samajist and Hindu) on
Shastric and other topics and won them over completely - specially the Arya
Samajists - after hot discussions, to his ideas and methods of interpreting the
Vedas. (53)
i) Swami Vivekananda's
Last Bequest to Vedic Study
During the session of the
Indian National Congress which was held in
His last wish (and one left
unaccomplished) was to found a Vedic Institution in
On the fourth
of July [1902, the last day of his life], Swami Vivekananda went to the chapel
and meditated there for three hours. A few days earlier he had told Swami
Brahmananda, "This time I must do one thing or the other; either I must
recoup my health through meditation and japa and work with full vigor, or else
I shall give up this shattered body."... After lunch he took rest for an
hour and then grammar and yoga for two hours in a class. He gave his own
interpretation of the words sushumnah suryavasasah occurring in the
Yajur Veda, as these words had not been interpreted by commentators. Then he
went with Swami Premananda outside the math and walked two miles; and while
walking told him by way of conversation, the whole history of the growth of
civilization and of different nations of the world. (55)
Swami Premananda said,
"For some time he had a strong desire to open a
j) Expressing Vedanta in
Everyday Life
1. Through
Work
[On his way to the West,
Swami Vivekananda stopped in
During his sojourn in
Northern India at the end of 1897, [Swami Vivekananda] visited the Arya Samaj
Orphanage in Bareilly on August 10th; and on the next day, as a result of an
impressive conversation with a gathering of students on the need of
establishing a students' society which might conjointly carry out his ideas of
practical Vedanta and work for others, it was formed then and there. (58)
At the beginning of 1899,
Nag Mahashaya [a devotee of Sri Ramakrishna] came all the way from his distant
village home in Deobhog to meet with Swami Vivekananda at the new monastery [at
Belur]. It was like the coming together of two great forces, one representing
the highest ideal of the ancient garhastya dharma [householder mode of life]
and the other the ideal of a new type of monasticism - one mad with
God-intoxication, the other intoxicated with the idea of bringing out the
divine in man - but both one in the vision of sannyas and realization.
After mutual salutation and
greeting Nag Mahashay exclaimed, "Jaya Shankara! Blessed am I to see
before me the living Shiva!" and remained standing before Swami
Vivekananda with folded hands, notwithstanding his solicitations to make him
sit. On being asked about his health he said, "What is the use of
inquiring about a worthless lump of flesh and bones! I feel blissful at seeing
Shiva himself!" So saying, he fell prostrate before Swami Vivekananda, who
at once raised him up, entreating, "O, please do not do such things!"
At this time the Upanishad class was being held. Swami Vivekananda, addressing
his disciples, said, "Let the class be stopped. You all come and see Nag
Mahashay." When all had sat round the great devotee, Swami Vivekananda,
addressing them, observed, "Look, he is a householder, but he has no
consciousness whether he has a body, or not; whether the universe exists, or
not. He is always absorbed in the thought of God. He is a living example of
what man becomes when possessed of supreme bhakti." (59)
April 9, 1899: When Swami Sadananda and Sister
Nivedita went over on Saturday to report [on the plague relief work in
Calcutta], Swami Vivekananda was so touched by the news that [the monks] had
two hours of everything, from the Upanishads onwards: there could be no
religion without that activity, that manhood, and cooperation. (60)
October 18, 1899:
Ridgely Manor,
December 26, 1900: Dear Mr. Sevier [Swami Vivekananda's
devoted English disciple who dedicated his life to founding the Advaita Ashrama
at Mayavati] passed away before I [Swami Vivekananda] could arrive. He was
cremated on the banks of the river that flows by his ashrama, `a la Hindu,
covered with garlands, the brahmins carrying his body
and boys chanting the Vedas. (62)
2. Through
His Feelings
Swami Vivekananda told us
of Hrishikesh and the little hut that each sannyasin would make for himself, and the blazing fire in the evening, and all the
sannyasins sitting round it on their own little mats, talking in hushed tones
of the Upanishads - "for every man is supposed to have got the truth
before he becomes a sannyasin. He is at peace intellectually. All that remains
is to realize it. So all need for discussion has passed away; and at
Hrishikesh, in the darkness of the mountains, by the blazing fire, they may
talk only of the Upanishads. Then, by degrees, the voices die in silence. Each
man sits bolt upright on his mat and one by one they steal quietly off to their
own huts." (63)
March3, 1890: You know not... I am a very
soft-natured man in spite of the stern Vedantic views I hold. And this proves
to be my undoing. At the slightest touch I give myself away; for howsoever I
may try to think only of my own good, I slip off in spite of myself to think of
other people's interests. (64)
While in
the West Swami Vivekananda's mind had always been occupied with the study of
the history of the whole world and with the relation of the world to
Hindusthan, and of the problems and destiny of
To a Western devotee,
July 25, 1897: I am
so glad that you have been helped by Vedanta and yoga. I am unfortunately
sometimes like the circus clown who makes others laugh,
himself miserable! (66)
[In
Now, turning to Girish
Babu, Swami Vivekananda said, "What do you say, G.C.? Well, you do not
care to study all this; you pass your days with your adoration of this and that
god, eh?"
Girish Babu: What shall I study, brother? I have
neither time nor understanding to pry into all that. But this time, with Sri
Ramakrishna's grace, I shall pass by with greetings to your Vedas and Vedanta,
and take one leap into the far beyond! He puts you through all these studies
because he wants to get many things done by you. But we have no need of them.
Saying this, Girish Babu again and again touched the Rig Veda volumes to
his head, uttering, "All victory to Ramakrishna
in the form of the Veda!"
Swami Vivekananda was now
in a sort of deep reverie. Girish Babu suddenly called out to him and said,
"Well, hear me, please. You have made a good deal of study into the Vedas
and Vedanta - but say, did you find anywhere in them the way out for us from
all these profound miseries of the country, all these wailings of grief, all
this starvation, all these crimes of adultery, and many horrible sins?"
Saying this, he painted
over and over again horrid pictures of society. Swami Vivekananda remained
perfectly quiet and speechless, while at the thought of the sorrows and
miseries of his fellow men, tears began to flow from his eyes, and seemingly to
hide his feelings from us he rose and left the room.
Meanwhile, addressing the
disciple, Girish Babu said, "Did you see that, Bangal? What a great,
loving heart! I don't honor your Swami Vivekananda simply for being a pandit
versed in the Vedas; I honor him for that great heart of his which just made
him retire weeping at the sorrows of his fellow beings."
The disciple and Girish
Babu then went on conversing with each other, the latter proving that knowledge
and love were ultimately the same.
In the meantime, Swami
Vivekananda returned and asked the disciple, "Well, what was all this talk
going on between you?" The disciple said, "Sir, we are talking about
the Vedas; and the wonder of it is that our Girish Babu has not studied these
books but has grasped their ultimate truths with clean precision."
Swami Vivekananda: All truths reveal themselves to
him who has got real devotion to the guru; he has hardly any need of studies.
But such faith and devotion are very rare in this world. He who possesses these
in the measure of our friend here need not study the Shastras. But he who
rushes forward to imitate him will only bring about his own ruin. Always follow
his advice, but never attempt to imitate his ways.....
Swami Sadananda arrived
there at that moment and, seeing him, Swami Vivekananda at once said, "Do
you know, my heart is sorely troubled by the picture of the country's miseries
G.C. was depicting just now. Well, can you do anything for our country?"
Sadananda: Maharaj, let the mandate go forth. Your
slave is ready.
Swami Vivekananda: First, on a pretty small scale,
start a relief center where the poor and distressed may obtain relief and the
diseased may be nursed. Helpless people having none to look after them will be
relieved and served there, irrespective of creed or color - do you see?
Sadananda: Just as you command, sir.
Swami Vivekananda: There is no greater dharma that this
service of living beings. If this dharma can be
practiced in the real Spirit, then "liberation comes as a fruit in the
very palm of one's hand." [Shankaracharya: Hastamalaka].
Addressing Girish Babu now,
Swami Vivekananda said, "Do you know, Girish Babu, it occurs to me that
even if a thousand births have to be taken in order to relieve the sorrows of
the world, surely I will take them. If by my doing that, even a single soul may
have a little bit of his grief relieved, why, I will do it. What avails it at
all to have only one's own liberation? Everyone should be taken along with
oneself on that way. Can you say why a feeling like this comes up foremost in
my mind?
Girish Babu: Ah, otherwise why should Sri
Ramakrishna declare you to be greater than all others in spiritual competence?
(67)
[In Paris] on September 3,
1900, Swami Vivekananda was evidently still living at the [wealthy] Leggetts'
house; but within a week - the exact day is not known - he moved to the
lodgings of Jules Bois, a poor scholar.. who lived in
a flat on the fifth floor. M. Bois wrote:
Vivekananda approached me
as though we had known each other for a long time. A brief conversation
followed, at the end of which he startled me by proposing to come and live with
me. Expressing my sense of the honor his suggestion implied, I reminded him of
the luxury and attention he was enjoying and explained that I was only a young
writer who could offer him very little in the way of comfort. "I am a monk
and a mendicant", was his reply. "I can sleep on the ground or on the
floor. Our luxury will be the wisdom of the Masters. I will bring my pipe with
me and upon its incense will re the verses of the Vedas and Upanishads."
(68)
[Towards the end of his
life] man-making was now the ideal of our illustrious swami. He held classes on
the Vedas and the grammar of Panini, sat in meditation with the monks morning and evening, and received visitors from
various parts of
[The
References
1. Life, Vol.1,
Chapter 42: Initiation into Advaita Vedanta, pp. 325-327.
2. Ibid., Chapter 49: The
Great Understanding, pp.380-381.
3. Rems (Sister
Christine), pp.194-195.
4. Notes, Chapter 5:
On the Way to Baramulla, pp.53-54.
5. Life, Vol.2,
Chapter 84: Vedanta Ideas Gaining Ground, pp.376-377 (See also: Master,
Chapter 13, pp.345-346.
6. Gospel, Chapter
52: After the Passing Away, May 7, 1887, p.991.
7. Swami Vividishananda, For
Seekers of God: Belur Math, December 25, 1929, pp.227-228.
8. Life,Vol.2, Chapter 59: Life of Tapasya
at Baranagore, pp.30-31.
9. Ibid., Chapter 64: The
First Disciple, p.81.
10. Swami Akhandananda, From
Holy Wanderings to Service of God in Man, Chapter 2: Holy Wanderings of
Early Days, pp.26-27.
11. Life, Vol.2,
Chapter 67: Wanderings in the
12. Swami
Prabhananda, "An Epitome of Baranagore Math" in PB, Jan 1992, p.32.
13. Swami Akhandananda, loc.
cit., p.46.
14. Life, Vol.2,
Chapter 70: In the Province of Guzerat, p.168.
15. Ibid., p.170.
16. Ibid., p.174.
17. Life, Vol.2,
Chapter 71: In the Presidency of Bombay, p.177.
18. Ibid., p.178.
19. Life, Vol.2,
Chapter 72: The Meditation at Kanya Kumari, pp.206-207.
20. Life, Vol.2,
Chapter 74: In Madras and
21. Ibid., pp.245-246.
22. Master, Chapter
2: The Swami Vivekananda in
23. CW, Vol.6: Conversation
with Sharat Chandra Chakravarty,
24. Life (1979),
Chapter 21: On the Way to and Early Days in
25. SVW, Vol.2, Chapter 11:
Summer, 1894, p.151.
26. CW, Vol.8: Letter to
Mary Hale, p.331.
27. SVW, Vol.2, Chapter 13:
The Last Battle, p.271.
28. Ibid., Vol.3, Chapter 1:
29. Ibid., Chapter 2:
30. CW, Vol.8: Letter to
Swami Abhedananda, p.352.
31. SVW, Vol.3:
32. Ibid., Vol.4, Chapter 9:
33. Ibid., Chapter 11:
34. Life, Vol.2, Chapter 87: Establishing the American Work, p.426.
35. CW, Vol.5: Letter from
the
36. CW, Vol.5, p.82.
37. Life, Vol.2, loc.
cit., p.428.
38. CW, Vol.6, pp.339-340.
39. CW, Vol.8: Letter from
40. CW, Vol.5, pp.101-102.
41. Swami Akhandananda, loc.
cit., Chapter 3: The Inception of the Vow of Service: Study and Teaching, p.87 and CW, Vol.6: Letter to Swami
Ramakrishnananda from
42. Swami Abhedananda, Complete
Works, Vol.10: Leaves from My Diary, Record 1,
p.3.
43. CW, Vol.5: Letter from
44. SVW, Vol.4, Chapter 14:
45. CW, Vol.4: The Paris
Congress of the History of Religions, p.423.
46. Rems (Sister
Christine), pp.217-218.
47. Life, Vol.3,
Chapter 114: In the Passing of Days, p.327.
48. Ibid., Chapter 105: Life
in the Math and the Metropolis, pp.210-211.
49. Life, Vol.4,
Chapter 127: The Days of Discipline and Meditation, p.60.
50. Ibid., pp.63-64.
51. Life, Vol.3,
Chapter 100: The Founding of the Ramakrishna
52. CW, Vol. 6:
Conversation, p.495.
53. Life, Vol.3,
Chapter 104: The Further Spreading of Ideas, pp.185-186.
54. Life, Vol.4,
Chapter 124: In Buddha Gaya and
55. Swami Abhedananda, loc.
cit., Letter from Swami Saradananda, August 7, 1902, p.114.
56. Ibid.: Letter from Swami
Premananda, August 20, 1902, pp.116-117.
57. Life, Vol.2,
Chapter 76: On the Way to Lands beyond the Seas, pp.266-267.
58. Life, Vol.3, Chapter 104: Further Spreading of the Ideas: In Northern
India, p.185.
59. Ibid., Chapter 114: In
the Passing of Days, p.329.
60. LSN, Vol.1,
p.112.
61. Ibid., p.214.
62. CW, Vol.6: Letter to
Miss J. MacLeod from Belur, pp.440-441.
63. LSN, Vol.1: From
Ridgely Manor, October 7, 1899, p.222.
64. CW, Vol.6: Letter to P.
Mitra from Ghazipur, p.229.
65. Life, Vol.3,
Chapter 94: A National Reception in
66. CW, Vol.8: Letter to
Marie Halboister from Almora, p.414.
67. CW, Vol.6: Conversation,
pp.499-503.
68. SVW, Vol.6, Chapter 6:
Homeward Bound I, pp.337-338.
69. Life, Vol.4,
Chapter 127: In the Days of Discipline and Meditation, p.67.
70. CW, Vol.3: Address of
Welcome at Almora and Reply, pp.352-353.
PART I, SECTION 1: DEFINITION AND EULOGY OF THE VEDAS AND
VEDANTA
Chapter 2: Some Preliminary Definitions
a) The "Veda"
Is the Sum Total of Eternal Truths
Most of the great religions
of the world owe allegiance to certain books which they believe are the words
of God or some other supernatural beings, and which are the basis of their
religion. Now, of all these books, according to the modern savants of the West,
the oldest are the Vedas of the Hindus. A little understanding, therefore, is
necessary about the Vedas. (1)
The knowledge of God is
what is meant by the Vedas (vid - to know). (2)
Veda means the sum total of
eternal truths. (3)
Truth is of two kinds: (1)
that which is cognizable by the five ordinary senses of man and by reasonings
based thereon; (2) that which is cognizable by the subtle, supersensuous power
of yoga.
Knowledge acquired by the
first means is called science; and knowledge acquired by the second is called
the Vedas. (4)
Our own realization is
beyond the Vedas, because even they depend upon that. The highest Vedas is the
philosophy of the Beyond. (5)
With regard to the whole
Vedic collection of truths discovered by the Aryan race, this also has to be
understood that those portions alone which do not refer to purely secular
matters and which do not merely record tradition or history, or merely provide
incentives to duty form the Vedas in the real sense.
Although the supersensuous
vision of truths is to be met with in some measure in our Puranas and Itihasas
and in the religious scriptures of other races, still the fourfold scripture
known among the Aryan race as the Vedas being the first, the most complete, and
the most undistorted collection of spiritual truths, deserves to occupy the
highest place among all scriptures, command the respect of all nations of the
earth, and furnish the rationale of their respective scriptures. (6)
b) The Upanishads Are
the "New Testament" of the Vast, Traditional Vedic Literature
The Vedas are, in fact, the
oldest sacred books in the world. Nobody knows anything about the time they
were written, or by whom. They are contained in many volumes, and I doubt that
any one person ever read them all. (7)
The Sanskrit in which the
Vedas were written is not the same Sanskrit in which books were written about a
thousand years later than the Vedas - the books that you read in your
translations of poets and other classical writers of
That branch of the Aryan
race which spoke the Sanskrit language was the first to become civilized and
the first to begin to write books and literature. So they went on for thousands
of years. How many thousands of years they wrote no one knows.
There are various guesses - from 3,000 to 8,000 BC - but all of these dates are
more or less uncertain. (9)
This Sanskrit has undergone
very much change as a matter of course, having been spoken and written through
thousands of years. It necessarily follows that in other Aryan languages, as in
Greek and Roman, the literature must be of much later date than Sanskrit. Not
only so, but there is this peculiarity, that of all regular books that we have
in the world, the oldest are in Sanskrit - and that is the mass of literature
called the Vedas. There are very ancient pieces in the Babylonian or Egyptian
literature, but they cannot be called literature or books, but just a few
notes, a short letter, a few words, and so on. But as finished, cultured
literature, the Vedas are the oldest. (10)
The Vedas existed as a mass
of literature, and not as a book - just as you find
the Old Testament, the Bible. Now, the Bible is a mass of literature of different
ages; different persons are the writers, and so on. It is a collection. [In the
same way], the Vedas are a vast collection. I do not know whether, if all the
texts were found - nobody has found all the texts; nobody, even in
The Vedas are divided into
four parts. One is called the Rig Veda, another Yajur Veda, another Sama Veda,
and the fourth, Atharva Veda. Each one of these, again, was divided into many
branches. For instance, the Sama Veda had one thousand branches, of which only
about five or six remain; the rest are all lost. So with the
others. The Rig Veda had 108, of which only one remains; and the rest
are all lost. (12)
This vast mass of
literature - the Vedas - we find in three groups. The first group is the
Samhitas, a collection of hymns. The second group is called the Brahmanas, or
the [group dealing with different kinds of] sacrifice. The word brahmana [by
usage] means [what is achieved by means of] the sacrifice. And the other group
is called the Upanishads (sittings, lectures, philosophic books). Again, the
first two parts together - the hymns and the rituals - are called the Karma
Kanda, the work portion; and the second, or philosophic portion (the
Upanishads), is called the Jnana Kanda, the knowledge portion. This is the same
word as your English word knowledge and the Greek word gnos -
just as you have the word in agnostic, and so on. (13)
The Upanishads are the
Bible of India. [In relation to the Vedas] they occupy the same place as the
New Testament does [to the Old]. There are [more than] a hundred books
comprising the Upanishads, some very small and some big, each a separate
treatise.... They are [as it were] shorthand notes taken down of discussions in
[learned assemblies], generally in the courts of kings. The word Upanishad may
mean "sittings" [or "sitting near a teacher"]. Those of you
who may have studied some of the Upanishads can understand how they are
condensed shorthand sketches. After long discussions had been held, they were
taken down, possibly from memory.... The origin of ancient Sanskrit is 5,000
BC; the Upanishads [are at least] two thousand years before that. Nobody knows
exactly how old they are. (14)
It is the aim of the modern
scholar to restore [the sequence of the Vedic compositions]. The old, orthodox
idea is quite different, as your orthodox idea of the Bible is quite different
from the modern scholar’s. (15)
c) Though the Largest
Portion of the Vedas Are Lost, They Still Are a Huge Literature
Almost the largest portion
of the Vedas has been lost. The priests who carried it down to posterity were
divided into so many families; and, accordingly, the Vedas were divided into so
may parts. Each part was allotted to a family. The
rituals, the ceremonies, the customs, the worship of that family were to be
obtained from that [respective] portion of the Vedas. They preserved it and
performed the ceremonies according to that. In course of time, [some of ] these families became extinct; and with them, their
portion of the Vedas was lost, if these old accounts be true. (17)
Some of the Vedic secrets
were known to certain families only, as certain powers naturally exist in some
families. With the extinction of these families, the secrets have died away.
(18)
Many of the texts of the
Vedas are lost. They were divided into branches, each branch put into the head
of certain priests and kept alive by memory. Such men still exist. They will
repeat book after book of the Vedas without missing a single intonation. The
larger portion of the Vedas has disappeared. The small portion left makes a
whole library by itself. The oldest of these contain the hymns of the Rig Veda.
(19)
Ninety-nine percent of the
Vedas are missing; they were in the keeping of certain families, with whose
extinction the books were lost. But still, those left now could not be
contained even in a large hall.... They were written is language archaic and
simple; their grammar was very crude, so much so that it was said that some
parts of the Vedas have no meaning. (20)
You find in every nation
when a new idea, a new form, a new discovery or invention comes in, the old
things are not brushed aside all at once, but are relegated to the religion of
holiness. The ancient Hindus used to write on palm leaves and birch bark; and
when paper was invented they did not throw aside all the palm leaves, but used
to consider writing on palm leaves and birch bark holy.... So this form of
transmitting the literature of the Vedas from teacher to disciple by word of
mouth, although antiquated and almost useless now, has
become holy. The student may refresh his memory by books, but has to learn by
word of mouth of a teacher. (21)
c) Hinduism Is the
Religion of the Vedas
First, in discussing the
scriptures, one fact stands out prominently - that only those religions which
had one or many scriptures of their own as their basis advanced by leaps and
bounds and survive to the present day, notwithstanding all the persecution and
repression hurled against them. The Greek religion, with all its beauty, died
out in the absence of any scripture to support it; but the religion of the Jews
stands undiminished in its power, being based on the authority of the Old
Testament. The same is the case with the Hindu religion, with its scripture,
the Vedas, the oldest in the world. (22)
By Hinduism, I mean the
religion of the Vedas. (23)
The Hindus proper look up
to the Vedas as their religious scripture. (24)
The Hindus received their
religion through the revelation of the Vedas. (25)
The Hindus founded their
creed upon the ancient Vedas, a word derived from vid, to know.(26)
The cardinal features of
the Hindu religion are founded on the meditative and speculative philosophy and
on the ethical teachings contained in the various books of the Vedas. (27)
e) Modern Hinduism Is,
Properly, the Religion of the Vedas and Vedanta
In the Vedas we find both
[these names]: sindhu and indu for the river Indus; the Persians
transformed them into hindu and the
Greeks into indus, whence we derived the words
This word Hindu was
the name that the ancient Persians used to apply to the river Sindhu. Whenever
in Sanskrit there is an s in ancient Persian it changes into an h,
so that sindhu became hindu; and you are
all aware how the Greeks found it hard to pronounce h and dropped it
altogether, so that we became known as Indians. (29)
The word Hindu by
which it is the fashion nowadays to style ourselves, has lost all its meaning,
for this word merely meant those who lived on the other side of the river Indus
(in Sanskrit sindhu). This name was murdered into hindu
by the ancient Persians and all people living on the other side of the
river Sindhu were called by them Hindus. (30)
Now this word Hindu,
as applied to the inhabitants of the other side of the Indus, whatever might
have been its meaning in ancient times, has lost all its force in modern times;
for all the people that live on this side of the Indus no longer belong to one
religion. There are the Hindus proper, the Muslims, the Parsees, the
Christians, Buddhists and Jains. The word Hindu in its real, literal
sense ought to include all these, but as signifying the religion, it would not
be proper to call all these Hindus. (31)
With the re of Islam the
word Hindu became degraded and meant " a
dark-skinned fellow", as is the case now with the word native. (32)
Thus this word has come
down to us; and during the Muslim rule we [Indians] took up the word ourselves.
There may not be any harm in using the word, of course; but, as I have said, it
has lost its significance, for you may mark that all the people who live on
this side of the
The word Vedanta literally
means the end of the Vedas - the Vedas being the scriptures of the Hindu. (34)
The Vedanta means the end
of the Vedas, the third section, or Upanishads, containing the ripened ideas
which we find more as germs in the earlier portion. (35)
The last part of the Vedas
is called the Vedanta, meaning the end of the Vedas. It deals with the theories
contained in them, and more especially with the philosophy with which we are
concerned. It is written in Sanskrit, and, you must remember, was written
thousands of years ago. (36)
Sometimes, in the West, by
the Vedas are meant only the hymns and rituals of the Vedas. But at the present
time these parts have gone almost out of use; and usually by the word Vedas, in
It is very hard... to find
any common name for our religion, seeing that this religion is a collection, so
to speak, of various religions, of various ideas, of various ceremonials and
forms, all gathered together almost without a name, and without a church, and
without an organization. The only point where, perhaps, all our sects agree is
that we all believe in the scriptures - the Vedas. This perhaps is certain that
no man can have a right to be called a Hindu who does not admit the supreme
authority of the Vedas.... The spiritual teachings of the
Vedas known as the Upanishads and the Vedanta has always been quoted as
the highest authority by all our teachers, philosophers, and writers, whether
dualist, qualified monist, or monist.... Therefore, perhaps in modern times,
the one name which should designate every Hindu throughout the land should be Vedantist
or Vaidika, as you may put it; and in that sense I
always use the words Vedantism and Vedanta. (38)
References
1. CW, Vol.3: Vedantism,
p.118.
2. Ibid., p.119.
3. CW, Vol.6: Conversation
with Sharat Chandra Chakravarty,
4. CW, Vol.6: Hinduism and
Shri Ramakrishna, p.181.
5. Swami
Atmaghanananda, "Further Light on Swami Vivekananda's Inspired Talks"
in VK, August 1963, p.197.
6. CW, Vol.6: Hinduism and
Shri Ramakrishna, p.182.
7. CW, Vol.6: The Vedanta
Philosophy and Christianity, pp.47-48.
8. CW, Vol.9: History of the
Aryan Race, p.257
9. Ibid., p.251.
10. Ibid., p.252.
11. CW, Vol.3: Buddhistic
India, pp.512-513.
12. CW, Vol.9: History of
the Aryan Race, p.254.
13. Ibid., pp.257 - 258.
14. CW, Vol.1: The Gita I,
p.446.
15. Ibid., p.447.
16. CW, Vol.9: History of
the Aryan Race, pp.254-255.
17. Ibid., p.254.
18. CW, Vol.6: Notes Taken
Down in
19. CW, Vol.1: The Gita I,
pp.446-447.
20. CW, Vol.3: Vedantism,
p.435.
21. CW, Vol.9: The History
of the Aryan Race, p.253.
22. CW, Vol.3: The Religion
We Are Born In, p.455.
23. CW, Vol.1: Buddhism, the
Fulfillment of Hinduism, p.21.
24.SVW,
Vol.2, Chapter 9: The Eastern Tour - I, p.74.
25.Ibid.,
Chapter 13: The Last Battle, p.257
26. CW, Vol.1: The Hindu
Religion, p.329.
27. CW, Vol.4: Indian
Religious Thought, p.188.
28. CW, Vol.7: Memoirs of
European Travel, pp.357-358.
29. CW, Vol.3: Vedanta in
Its Application to Indian Life, p.228. See also: CW, Vol.3: Vedantism, p.435.
30. CW, Vol.3: Vedantism,
p.118.
31. CW, Vol.3: Vedanta in
Its Application to Indian Life, p.228.
32. CW, Vol.7: Memoirs of
European Travel, p.358.
33. CW, Vol.3: Vedantism,
p.118.
34. CW, Vol.1: The Vedanta
Philosophy, p.357.
35. CW, Vol.5: Indian
Missionary's
36. CW, Vol.2: The Way to
Blessedness, p.406.
37. CW, Vol.1: The Vedanta
Philosophy, p.357-358.
38. CW, Vol.3: Vedanta in
Its Application to Indian Life, pp. 228-229.
PART I,
SECTION 1: DEFINITION AND EULOGY OF THE VEDAS AND VEDANTA
Chapter 3: The Glory of the Vedas
a) The Vedas Are Eternal
1. The Vedas Are
Ever-Existent, Without Beginning or End
Away back, where no
recorded history - nay, not even the dim light of tradition - can penetrate,
has been steadily shining that light, sometimes dimmed by external
circumstances, at others effulgent, but undying and steady, shedding its luster
not only over India, but permeating the whole thought-world with its power,
silent and unperceived, gently, yet omnipotent, like the dew that falls in the
morning, unseen and unnoticed, yet bringing into bloom the fairest of roses:
this has been the thought of the Upanishads, the philosophy of the Vedanta.
Nobody knows when it first came to flourish on the soil of
By the word Shastras
the Vedas without beginning or end are meant.... The whole body of
supersensuous truths, having no beginning or end, and called by the name of the
Vedas, is ever-existent.(2)
The date of the Vedas has
never been fixed, can never be fixed; and, according to us, the Vedas are
eternal. (3)
We [Hindus] believe the
Vedas to be the eternal teachings of the secrets of religion. We all believe
that this holy literature is without beginning and without end, coeval with
nature, which is without beginning and without end; and that all our religious
differences, all our religious struggles, must end when we stand in the
presence of that holy book; we are all agreed that this is the last court of
appeal in all our spiritual differences. (4)
b) It Is the Spiritual
Truth Revealed by the Vedas Which Is Eternal and Is Discovered by the Seers
Q: What is the true meaning of the
statement that the Vedas are beginningless and eternal? Does it refer to the
Vedic utterances or the statements contained in the Vedas? If it refers to the
truth involved in such statements, are not the sciences, such as logic,
geometry, chemistry, etc., equally beginningless and eternal, for they contain
an everlasting truth?
A: There was a time when the Vedas
themselves were considered eternal in the sense in which the divine truths
contained therein were changeless and permanent and were only revealed to man.
At a subsequent time, it appears that the utterances of the
Vedic hymns with the knowledge of its meaning was important; and it was
held that the hymns themselves must have had a divine origin. At a still later
period, the meaning of the hymns showed that many of them could not be of
divine origin, because they inculcated upon mankind performance of various
unholy acts, such as torturing animals; and we can find many ridiculous stores
in the Vedas. The correct meaning of the statement "The Vedas are
beginningless and eternal" is that the law or truth revealed by them to
man is permanent and changeless. Logic, geometry, chemistry, etc., reveal also
a law or truth which is permanent and changeless and in that sense they are
also beginningless and eternal. But no truth or law is absent from the Vedas,
and I ask any one of you to point out to me any truth which is not treated of
in them. (5)
The Hindus have received
their religion through revelation, the Vedas. They hold that the Vedas are
without beginning and without end. It may sound ludicrous to this audience [in
the West] how a book can be without beginning or end. But by the Vedas no books
are meant. They mean the accumulated treasury of spiritual laws discovered by
different persons in different times. Just as the law of gravitation existed
before its discovery and would exists if all humanity
forgot it, so is it with the laws that govern the spiritual world. The moral,
ethical, and spiritual relations between soul and soul and between individual
spirits and the Father of all spirits were there before their discovery, and
would remain even if we forget them. (6)
[Vedic] principles have
existed throughout time; and they will exist. They are non-create
- uncreated by any laws which science teaches us today. They remain covered and
become discovered, but are existing through all
eternity in nature. If
The Vedas, as the Hindus
say, are eternal. We now understand what they mean by their being eternal, i.e.
that the laws have neither beginning nor end. Earth after earth, system after
system, will evolve, run for a certain time, and then
dissolve back into chaos; but the universe remains the same. Millions and
millions of systems are being born, while millions are being destroyed. The
universe remains the same. The beginning and end of time can be told as regards
a certain planet; but, as regards the universe, time has no meaning at all. So
are the laws of nature, the physical laws, the mental laws, the spiritual laws,
without beginning or end; and it is within a few years, comparatively speaking
- a few thousand years at best - that man has tried to reveal them. The
infinite mass remains before us. Therefore the one great lesson that we learn
from the Vedas, at the start, is that religion has just begun. The infinite
ocean of spiritual truth lies before us to be worked on, to be discovered, to
be brought into our lives. The world has seen thousands of prophets, and the
world has yet to see millions. (7)
The Vedas are anadi,
eternal. The meaning of the statement is not, as is erroneously supposed by
some, that the words of the Vedas are anadi, but that the spiritual laws
inculcated by the Vedas are such. These laws, which are immutable and eternal,
have been discovered at various times by great men or rishis, though some of
them have been forgotten now, while others are preserved. (8)
3. The Vedas Sprang,
Like the Breath of God, Out of the Hearts of the Sages
All... Vedantists also
believe the Vedas to be the revealed word of God, not exactly in the same
sense, perhaps, as the Christians or Muslims believe, but in a very peculiar
sense. Their idea is that the Vedas are an expression of the knowledge of God;
and as God is eternal, His knowledge is eternally with Him, and so are the
Vedas eternal. (9)
Whatever might be the idea
of modern scholars, the Hindus are not ready to admit that parts of the Vedas
were written at one time and parts written at another time. They, of course,
still hold to their belief that the Vedas as a whole were produced at the same
time - rather, if I may say so, that they were never produced, but that they
always existed in the mind of the Lord. (10)
The Hindus believe that the
Vedas are not mere books composed by men in some remote age. They hold them to
be an accumulated mass of endless wisdom, which is sometimes manifested and at
other times remain unmanifested. (11)
To the Western [mind],
their religious books have been inspired, while with us our books have been
expired; breath-like they came, the breath of God out of the hearts of the
sages they sprang, the mantra-drashtas [Brih.Up., 2.4.10]. (12)
Is God's book finished? Or
is it still a continuous revelation going on? It is a marvelous book - these
spiritual revelations of the world. The Bible, the Vedas, the Koran, and all
other sacred books are but so many pages; and an infinite number of pages
remain yet to be unfolded. I would leave it open for all of them. We stand in
the present, but open ourselves to the infinite future. We take in all that has
been in the past, enjoy the light of the present, and
open every window of the heart for all that will come in the future. (13)
b) The Vedas Are
Impersonal
1. The Vedas Deal Almost
Entirely with Philosophy
None knows by whom the
Vedas were written, they are so ancient. (14)
The mass of writings called
the Vedas is not the utterance of persons. (15)
The Upanishads do not
reveal the life of any teacher, but simply teach principles. (16)
The Upanishads contain very
little history of the doings of any man, but nearly all other scriptures are
largely personal histories. The Vedas deal almost entirely with philosophy.
Religion without philosophy runs into superstition; philosophy without religion
becomes dry atheism. (17)
The Vedanta philosophy is
very, very ancient; it is the outcome of that mass of Aryan literature known by
the name of the Vedas. It is, as it were, the very flower of all the
speculations and experiences and analyses embodied in that mass of literature,
collected and culled through centuries. This Vedanta philosophy has certain
peculiarities. In the first place, it is perfectly impersonal; it does not owe
its origin to any persons or prophet; it does not build itself around one man
as it center. Yet it has nothing to say against philosophies which do build
themselves around certain persons. In later days in
I want you to remember...
the perfectly impersonal character of the Upanishads. Although we find many
names and many speakers and many teachers in the Upanishads, not one of them
stands as an authority of the Upanishads, not one verse is based on the life of
any one of them. These are simply figures like shadows moving in the
background, unfelt, unseen, unrealized; but the real force is in the marvelous,
the brilliant, the effulgent texts of the Upanishads, perfectly impersonal. If
twenty Yajnavalkyas came and lived and died, it does not matter; the texts are
there. And yet it against no personality; it is broad and expansive enough to
embrace all the personalities that the world has yet produced and all that are
yet to come. It has nothing to say against the worship of persons or avatars or
sages. On the contrary, it is always upholding it. At the same time, it is
perfectly impersonal. It is a most marvelous idea, like the God it preaches,
the impersonal idea of the Upanishads. For the sage, the thinker, the
philosopher, for the rationalist, it is as much impersonal as any modern
scientist can wish. And these are our scriptures. (19)
2. The Authority of the
Vedas Is the Eternal, Impersonal Truth
All the other religions of
the world claim their authority as being delivered by a personal God or a
number of personal beings, angels, or special messengers of God, unto certain
persons; while the claim of the Hindus is that the Vedas do not owe their
authority to anybody; they are themselves the authority, being eternal - the
knowledge of God. They were never written, never created, they have existed
throughout time; just as creation is infinite and eternal, without beginning or
end, so is the knowledge of God without beginning and without end. (20)
The idea is that the Vedas
were never written; the idea is they never came into existence. I was once told
by a Christian missionary that their scriptures have a historical character and
therefore are true, to which I replied, " Mine have no historical
character and therefore they are true; yours being historical, they were
evidently made by some man the other day. Yours are man-made and mine are not;
their non-historicity is in their favor." Such is the relation of the
Vedas with all the other scriptures at the present day. (21)
If you tell [the orthodox
Hindus who defend the Vedas] that the Vedas must have been pronounced by man
first, [they will simply laugh]. You never heard of any [man uttering them for
the first time]. Take Buddha's words. [There is a tradition that he lived and
spoke these words] many times before. If the Christian stands up and says,
"My religion is a historical religion and therefore yours is wrong and
ours is true", the mimamsaka [orthodox Hindu] replies, "Yours being
historical, you confess that a man invented it nineteen hundred years ago. That
which is true must be infinite and eternal. That is the one test of truth. It
never decays, it is always the same. You confess your religion was created by
such-and-such a man. The Vedas were not. By no prophets or
anything.... Only infinite words; infinite by their very
nature, from which the whole universe comes and goes." In the
abstract, it is perfectly correct. (22)
Our religion preaches an
impersonal personal God. It preaches any amount of impersonal laws plus any
amount of personality, but the very fountainhead of our religion is the
Shrutis, the Vedas, which are perfectly impersonal; the persons all come in the
Smritis and Puranas - the great avataras, the incarnations of God, prophets,
and so forth. And this ought also to be observed that, except our religion, every
other religion in the world depends upon the life or lives of some personal
founder or founders. Christianity is built upon the life of Jesus Christ, Islam
upon Muhammad, Buddhism upon Buddha, Jainism upon the Jinas, and so on. It
naturally follows that there must be in all these religions a good deal of
fight about what they call the historical evidences of these great
personalities. If at any time the historical evidences about
the existence of these personages in ancient times becomes weak, the whole
building of the religion tumbles down and is broken to pieces. We Hindus
escaped this fate because our religion is not based upon persons, but upon
principles. (23)
3. The Primary
Allegiance of the Vedantist Is Always to Principles, Not Persons
Religions divide themselves
equally into three parts. There is the first part, consisting of philosophy,
the essence, the principles of every religion. These
principles find expression in mythology - the lives of saints or heroes,
demigods, or gods, or divine beings; and the whole idea of this mythology is
that of power. And in the lower class of mythologies - the primitive - the
expression of this power is in the muscles; their heroes are strong, gigantic.
One hero conquers the whole world. As man advances, he must find expression for
his energy higher than in the muscles; so his heroes also find expression in
something higher. The higher mythologies have heroes who are gigantic moral
men. Their strength is manifested in becoming moral and pure. They can stand alone, they can beat back the surging tide of selfishness
and immorality. The third portion of all religions is symbolism, which you call
ceremonials and forms. Even the expression through mythology, the lives of
heroes, is not sufficient for all. There are minds still lower. Like children
they must have their kindergarten of religion, and these symbologies are
evolved - concrete examples which they can handle and grasp and understand, which they can see and feel as material
somethings.
So, in every religion you
find there are the three stages: philosophy, mythology, and ceremonial. There
is one advantage that can be pleaded for the Vedanta: that, in
In Vedanta the chief
advantage is that it was not the work of one single man; and therefore,
naturally, unlike Buddhism, or Christianity, or Islam, the prophet or teacher
did not entirely swallow up or overshadow the principles. The principles live;
and the prophets, as it were, form a secondary group, unknown to Vedanta. The
Upanishads speak of no particular prophet, but they speak of prophets and
prophetesses. The old Hebrews had something of that idea; yet we find Moses
occupying most of the space of the Hebrew literature. Of course, I do not mean
that it is bad that these prophets should take hold of a nation; but it
certainly is very injurious if the whole field of principles is lost sight of.
(24)
Persons are but the
embodiment, the illustrations of the principles. If the principles are there,
the persons will come by the thousands and millions. If the principle is safe,
persons like Buddha will be born by the hundreds and thousands. But if the
principle is lost and forgotten and the whole of national life tries to cling
round a so-called historical person, woe unto that religion, danger unto that
religion! Ours is the only religion that does not depend on a person or
persons; it is based upon principles. At the same time, there is room for
millions of persons. There is ample ground for introducing persons; but each
one of them must be an illustration of the principles. We must not forget that.
These principles of our religion are all safe, and it should be the lifework of
every one of us to keep them safe, to keep them free from the accumulating dirt
and dust of ages. It is strange, that in spite of the degradation that seized
upon the race again and again, these principles of Vedanta were never
tarnished. No one, however wicked, ever dared to throw dirt upon them. Our
scriptures are the best preserved in the world. Compared to other books, there
have been no interpolations, no text-torturing, no destroying of the essence of
thought in them. It is there just as it was at first, directing the human mind
towards the ideal, the goal. (25)
4. The Great Body of
Eternal Truths Which Is the Vedas Is Revealed by the Enlightened Ones
Every one of the great
religions in the world, excepting our own [Vedanta], is built upon such
historical characters; but ours rests upon principles. There is no man or woman
who can claim to have created the Vedas. They are the embodiment of eternal
principles; sages discovered them; and now and then the names of these sages
are mentioned - just their names; we do not even know who or what they were. In
many cases we do not know who their fathers were, and in almost every case we
do not know when and where they were born. But what cared they, these sages,
for their names? They were the preachers of principles; and they themselves, so
far as they went, tried to become illustrations of the principles they
preached. At the same time, just as our God is an impersonal and yet a personal
God, so is our religion a most intensely personal one - a religion based upon
principles and yet with an infinite scope for the play of persons; for what
religion gives you more incarnations, more prophets and seers, and still waits
for infinitely more? The Bhagavata says that incarnations are infinite,
leaving ample scope for as many as you like to come. Therefore, if any one or
more of these persons in India's religious history, any one or more of these
incarnations, and any one or more of our prophets are proved not to have been
historical, it does not injure our religion at all; even then it remains as
firm as ever, because it is based on principles and not upon persons. It is in
vain that we try to gather all the peoples of the world around a single
personality. It is difficult to make them gather together even round eternal
and universal principles. If it ever becomes possible to bring the largest
portion of humanity to one way of thinking in regard to religion, mark you, it
must always be through principles and not through persons. Yet, as I have said,
our religion has ample scope for the authority and influence of persons. There
is that most wonderful theory of ishta which gives you the fullest and the
freest choice possible among these great religious personalities. You may take
up any one of the prophets or teachers as your guide and the object of your
special adoration; you are even allowed to think that he whom you have chosen
is the greatest of the prophets, greatest of all the avatars - there is no harm
in that - but you must keep to a firm background of eternally true principles.
(26)
If Sri Krishna and Rama and
all the saints are proved to be mythical characters, the Vedas still remain,
not as a source of blind and imperative faith, not as a rigid and inflexible
spiritual possession, but as a great body of eternal truths, of which more and
more is to come in the way of revelation by the enlightened ones. (27)
Vedanta finds veneration
for some particular person... difficult to uphold. those
of you who are students of Vedanta (and by Vedanta is always meant the
Upanishads) know that this is the only religion that does not cling to any
person. No one man or woman has ever become the object of worship among the
Vedantins. It cannot be. A man is no more worthy of worship than any bird, any
worm. We are all brothers. The difference is only in degree. I am exactly the
same as the lowest worm. You see how very little room there is in Vedanta for
any man to stand ahead of us and for us to go and worship him - he is dragging
us on and we being saved by him. Vedanta does not give you that. No book, no
man to worship, nothing. (28)
c) The Vedas Are the
Only Exponent of Universal Religion because Their Sanction Is the Eternal
Nature of Man
There is no new religious
idea preached anywhere which is not found in the Vedas. (29)
The Vedas are the only
exponent of the universal religion. (30)
You hear claims made by
every religion as being the universal religion of the world. Let me tell you,
in the first place, that there will never be such a thing; but if there is a
religion which can lay claim to be that, it is only
our religion [Vedanta] and no other, because every other religion depends upon
some person or persons. All the other religions have been built around the life
of what they think is a historical man; and what they think is the strength of
religion is really the weakness - for, disprove the historicity of the man, and
the whole fabric tumbles to the ground. Half the lives of these great founders
of religions have been broken into pieces, and the other half doubted very
seriously. As such, every truth that had its sanction only in their words
vanishes into the air. but the truths of our religion,
although we have persons by the score, do not depend upon them. (31)
There are these eternal
principles which stand upon their own foundations without depending upon any
reasoning even, much less on the authority of sages, however great, or
incarnations, however brilliant they may have been. We may remark that, as this
is the unique position in
The [Vedic] mantras are neither the property of particular persons, nor the exclusive
property of any man or woman, however great he or she may be; nor even the
exclusive property of the greatest spirits - the Buddhas or Christ - whom the
world has produced. They are as much the property of the lowest of the
low as they are the property of the Buddha, and as much the property of the
smallest worm that crawls as of the Christ, because they are universal
principles. (33)
The Vedas are not inspired,
but expired; not that they came from anywhere outside, but they are the eternal
laws living in every soul. The Vedas are in the soul of the ant, in the soul of
the god. The ant has only to evolve and get the body of a sage or rishi, and
the Vedas will come out, eternal laws expressing themselves. (34)
Cross reference to:
Mand. Up., 2
d) The Poetry of the
Vedas Is Supersensuous
1. The Vedas Are Words
of Power Being Pronounced with the Right Attitude of Mind
The Vedas, the sacred books
of the Hindus, are written in a sort of meter. (35)
All of you have heard of
the power of words, how wonderful they are! Every book - the Bible, the Koran,
and the Vedas - is full of the power of words. (36)
[Vedic] hymns are not only
words of praise, but words of power, being pronounced with the right attitude
of mind. (37)
There are one or two more
ideas with regard to the Upanishads which I want to bring to your notice, for
these are an ocean of knowledge, and to talk about the
Upanishads, even for an incompetent person like myself, takes years and not one
lecture only. I want, therefore, to bring to your notice one or two points in
the study of the Upanishads. In the first place, they are the most wonderful
poems in the world. (38)
The last Infinite is
painted in the spirituality of the Upanishads. Not only is Vedanta the highest
philosophy in the world; it is the greatest poem. (39)
[The ancient Indian
philosophers] were of a poetic nature. They go crazy over poetry. Their philosophy
is poetry. This philosophy is a poem.... All [high thought] in the Sanskrit is
written in poetry. (40)
In the old Upanishads we
find sublime poetry; their authors were poets. Plato says inspiration comes to
people through poetry, and it seems as if these ancient rishis, seers of Truth,
were raised above humanity to show these truths through poetry. They never
preached, nor philosophized, nor wrote. Music came out of their hearts. (41)
When in ancient
times...knowledge and feeling ...blossomed forth simultaneously in the heart of
the rishi, then the highest Truth became poetic, and then the Vedas and other
scriptures were composed. It is for this reason that one finds, in studying
them, that the two parallel lines of bhava [emotion] and jnana [knowledge] have
at last met, as it were, in the plane of the Vedas and combined and become
inseparable. (42)
Cross reference: Ka.
Up., 2.2.15
2. The Poetry of the
Vedas Leads You on beyond the Senses
There is no metaphysical
sublimity such as is in the Upanishads. They lead you on beyond the senses,
infinitely more sublime than the sun and stars. First they [the rishis] try to
describe God by sense sublimities, that His feet are the earth, His head the
heavens. But that did not express what they wanted to say, though it was, in a
sense, sublime. (43)
In the Samhita portion of
the Vedas, all these attempts are external. As everywhere else, the attempts to
find the solution to the great problems of life have been through the external
world. Just as the Greek or modern European mind wants to find the solution of
life and of all the sacred problems of Being by searching into the external
world, so also did our forefathers; and, just as the Europeans failed, they
failed also. But the Western people never made a move more; they remained
there, they failed in the search for the solution of the great problems of life
and death in the external world; and there they remained, stranded. Our
forefathers also found it impossible, but were bolder in declaring the utter
helplessness of the senses in finding the solution. (44)
Apart from all its merits
as the greatest philosophy, apart from its wonderful merits as theology, as
showing the path of salvation to mankind, the Upanishadic literature is the
most wonderful painting of sublimity that the world has. Here comes out in full
force that individuality of the human mind, that introspective, intuitive Hindu
mind. We have paintings of sublimity elsewhere in all nations, but almost
without exception you will find that their ideal is to grasp the sublime in the
muscles. Take, for instance, Milton, Dante, Homer, or any of the Western poets.
There are wonderfully sublime passages in them; but there is always a grasping
at Infinity through the senses, the muscles, getting the ideal of infinite
expansion, the infinite of space. We find the same attempts made in the Samhita
portion [of the Vedas]. You know some of those wonderful riks where creation is
described; the very heights of expression of the sublime in expansion and the
infinite in space are attained. But they found out very soon that the Infinite
cannot be reached in that way, that even infinite space, expansion and infinite
nature could not express the ideas that were struggling to find expression in
their minds; and so they fell back upon other explanations. The language became
new in the Upanishads; it is almost negative, it is sometimes chaotic,
sometimes taking you beyond the senses, pointing out to you something which you
cannot grasp, which you cannot sense; and at the same time you feel certain
that it is there. (45)
In the Atman they found the
solution - the greatest of all atmans, the God, the Lord of the universe, His
relation to the Atman of man, our duty to Him; and through that, our relation
to each other. And herein you find the most sublime poetry in the world, No
more is the attempt made to paint this Atman in the language of matter. Nay,
for It they have given up even all positive language.
No more is there any attempt to come to the senses to give them the idea of the
Infinite, no more is there an external, dull, dead, material, spacious,
sensuous Infinite; but instead of that comes something which is as fine as even
that mentioned in the saying: "There the sun cannot illumine, nor the
moon, nor the stars; a flash of lightning cannot illumine the place, what to
speak of this mortal fire." [Ka. Up.,2.2.15a] What
poetry in the world can be more sublime than that! Such poetry you find nowhere
else. (46)
Endless examples can be
cited, but we have no time... to do that, or to show the marvelous poetry of
the Upanishads, the painting of the sublime, the grand conceptions. But one
other idea I must note, that the language and the thought and everything else come
direct; they fall upon you like a sword-blade, strong as the blows of a hammer
they come. There is no mistaking their meanings. Every tone of that music is
firm and produces its full effect - no gyrations, no mad words, no intricacies in which the brain is lost. There are no
signs of degradation, no attempts at too much allegorizing, too much piling of
adjective after adjective, making it more and more intricate, till the whole of
the sense is lost and the brain becomes giddy, and man does not know his way
out from the maze of that literature. There was none of that yet. If it be
human literature, it must the production of a race which had not yet lost any
of its national vigor. (47)
Cross reference to:
RV, 10.129
Taitt. Up., 2.4
Ka. Up., 2.2.15
Kena 1.3
Mund. Up., 2.2.5
Mund. Up., 3.1.2
References
1. CW, Vol.3: The Vedanta in
All Its Phases, p.322.
2. CW, Vol.6: Hinduism and
Shri Ramakrishna, p.181.
3. CW, Vol.3: Vedantism,
p.118.
4. CW, Vol.3: The Common
Bases of Hinduism, pp.372-373.
5. CW, Vol.5: With the Swami
Vivekananda at Madura, pp.205-206.
6. CW, Vol.1: Paper on
Hinduism, pp.6-7.
7. CW, Vol.6: The Methods
and Purpose of Religion, pp.8-9.
8. CW, Vol.6: Notes Taken
Down in
9. CW, Vol.2: The Atman,
p.239.
10. CW, Vol.3: Vedanta in
Its Application to Indian Life, p.230.
11. CW, Vol.3: The Religion
We Are Born In, p.456.
12. CW, Vol.3: The Common
Bases of Hinduism, p.375.
13. CW, Vol.2: The Way to
Realization of a Universal Religion, p.374.
14. CW, Vol.9: The Gita-I,
p.277.
15. CW, Vol.3: Vedantism,
p.118.
16. CW, Vol.1: The Gita I,
p.446.
17. CW, Vol.7: Inspired
Talks, July 7, 1895, p.36.
18. CW, Vol.1: The Spirit
and Influence of Vedanta, pp.387-388.
19. CW, Vol.3: The Vedanta
in All Its Phases, p.332.
20. CW, Vol.3: Vedantism,
pp.118-119.
21. CW, Vol.3: The Vedanta
in All Its Phases, p.334.
22. CW, Vol.1: The Gita I,
pp.448-449.
23. CW, Vol.3: The Sages of
India, p.249.
24. CW, Vol.6: The Methods
and Purpose of Religion, pp.6-7.
25. CW, Vol.3: The Work
before Us, pp.280-281.
26. CW, Vol.3: The Mission
of the Vedanta, pp.183-184.
27. Life, Vol.2:
Chapter 74: In Madras and
28. CW, Vol.8: Is Vedanta
the Future Religion? p.124.
29. CW, Vol.6: Notes Taken
Down in
30. CW, Vol.6: Hinduism and
Shri Ramakrishna, p.181.
31. CW, Vol.3: The Work
before Us, pp.279-280.
32. CW, Vol.3: The Sages of
India, pp.250-251.
33. CW, Vol.6: The Methods
and Purpose of Religion, p.8.
34. CW, Vol.3: The Vedanta,
pp.409-410.
35. CW, Vol.4: The Ramayana,
p.63.
36. CW, Vol.4: Addresses on
Bhakti-Yoga, p.37.
37. CW, Vol.6: Thoughts on
the Vedas and Upanishads, p.86.
38. CW, Vol.3: The Vedanta
in All Its Phases, p.329.
39. CW, Vol.1: The Soul and
God, p.499.
40. Ibid., p.496.
41. CW, Vol.2: The Absolute
and Manifestation, p.140.
42. CW, Vol.5: Sayings and
Utterances, #86, pp.419-420.
43. CW, Vol.9: The Mundaka
Upanishad, p.240.
44. CW, Vol.3: The Vedanta
in All Its Phases, pp.330-331.
45. CW, Vol.3: Vedanta in
Its Application to Indian life, pp.234-235.
46. CW, Vol.3: The Vedanta
in All Its Phases, p.331.
47. CW, Vol.3: Vedanta in
Its Application to Indian Life, pp.236-237.
SWAMI
VIVEKANANDA ON THE VEDAS AND UPANISHADS
INTRODUCTION
PART I: THE ORIGINS AND
SIGNIFICANCE OF THE VEDAS AND
VEDANTA
Section 2: Vedic Culture
Chapter
4: The Vedic Rishis
Chapter
5: Some Preliminary Definitions
Chapter
6: The Work Portion of the Vedas
PART I, SECTION 2: VEDIC CULTURE
Chapter 4: The Vedic Rishis
a) The Discoverers of the Vedas Are
the Rishis, Who Come Face to Face with Spiritual Truth
The Vedas are said to have
been written by rishis. These rishis were sages who realized certain facts. The
exact definition of the Sanskrit word rishi is a seer of mantras - of the
thoughts conveyed in the Vedic hymns. These men declared that they had realized
- sensed, if that word can be used with regard to the
supersensuous - certain facts, and these facts they proceeded to put on record.
We find the same truth declared amongst both the Jews and the Christians. (1)
The word mantra
means thought out, cogitated by the mind, and the rishi is the seer of
those thoughts. (2)
A peculiarity of the
Shrutis is that they have many sages as the recorders of truth in them, mostly
men, even some women. Very little is known of their
personalities, the dates of their birth, and so forth, but their best thoughts
- their best discoveries, I should say - are preserved there, embodied in the
sacred literature of
The mass of knowledge
called the Vedanta was discovered by personages called rishis; and the rishi is
defined as a mantra-drashta, the seer of thought; not that it was his or her
own. Whenever you hear that a certain passage of the Vedas came from a certain
rishi, never think that he or she wrote it or created it out of his or her
mind; he or she was the seer of the thought which already existed; it existed
in the universe eternally. This sage was the discoverer; the rishis were
spiritual discoverers. (4)
No one has ever seen the
composer of the Vedas, and it is impossible to imagine one. The rishis were
only discoverers of the mantras or eternal laws; they merely came face to face
with the Vedas, the infinite mine of knowledge which has been there from time
without beginning. (5)
The real fact is that there
is a state beyond the conscious plane, where there is no duality of the knower,
knowledge and the instruments of knowledge, etc. When the
mind is merged, that state is perceived. I say it is perceived
because there is no other word to express that state. Language cannot express
that state. Shankaracharya styled it transcendent perception
(aparokshanubhuti). Even after that transcendent perception, avatars
descend to the relative plane and give glimpses of that - therefore it is said
that the Vedas and other scriptures have originated from the perception of the
seers. (6)
We find the word rishi
again and again mentioned in the Vedas; and it has become a common word at the
present time. The rishi is the great authority . We
have to understand that idea. The definition is that the rishi is the
mantra-drashta, the seer of thought.... The knowledge which the Vedas declare
comes through being a rishi. This knowledge is not in the senses; but are the
senses the be-all and end-all of the human being? Who dare say that the senses
are the all-in-all of humanity?...
Beyond consciousness is
where the bold seek. Consciousness is bound by the senses. Beyond that, beyond
the senses, men must go in order to arrive at the truths of the spiritual
world, and there are, even now, persons who succeed in going beyond the bounds
of the senses. These are called rishis, because they come face to face with
spiritual truths. (7)
Cross reference to:
Brih. Up., 1.4.10
b) The Competency of the
Rishis Is in Superconscious Perception, the Common Property of All
The proof... of the Vedas
is just the same as the proof of this table before me - pratyaksha,
direct perception. This I see with the senses, and the truths of spirituality
we also see in a supersensous state of the human soul. (8)
The idea is that we have to
get our knowledge or ordinary objects by direct perception and inference
therefrom, and from testimony of people who are competent. By "people who
are competent" the yogis always mean the rishis, or the seers of thought
recorded in the scriptures, the Vedas. According to them, the only proof of the
scriptures is that they were the testimony of competent persons. (9)
All human knowledge is
uncertain and may be erroneous. Who is a true witness? He is a true witness to
whom the thing said is a direct perception. Therefore the Vedas are true,
because they consist of the evidence of competent persons. But is this power of
perception peculiar to any? No! The rishi, the Aryan, the
mlechcha [a foreigner, barbarian], all alike have it. (10)
You must always remember
that in all other scriptures inspiration is quoted as their authority, but this
inspiration is limited to a very few persons, and through them the truth came
to the masses - and we all have to obey them. Truth came to Jesus of Nazareth
and we must all obey him. But the truth came to the rishis of
The rishi-state is not
limited by time or by place, by sex or race. Vatsayana boldly declared that
this rishihood is the common property of the descendants of the sage, of the
Aryan, of the non-Aryan, of even the Mlechcha. This is the sageship of the
Vedas; and constantly we ought to remember this ideal of religion in
Who are the rishis?
Vatsayana says, "He who has attained through proper means the direct
realization of dharma, he alone can be a rishi, even if he is a Mlechcha by
birth." Thus it is that in ancient times, Vashishta, born of an
illegitimate union; Vyasa, the son of a fisherwoman; Narada, the son of a
maidservant of uncertain parentage, and many others of like nature attained to
rishihood. (13)
In the Vedic or Upanishadic
age, Maitreyi, Gargi, and other ladies of revered memory have taken the place
of rishis through their skill in discussing Brahman. (14)
The discoverers of
[spiritual] laws, the rishis... we Hindus honor as perfected beings. I am glad
to [say] that some of the very greatest of them were women. (15)
It was a female sage who
first found the unity of God and laid down this doctrine in one of the first
hymns of the Vedas. [Devi Sukta] (16)
c) The Rishis Declared
Spiritual Law with the Authority of Sympathy, Patience and Self-Sacrifice.
Rishis are discoverers of
spiritual laws. (17)
The person in whom...
supersensuous power is manifested is called a rishi, and the supersensuous
truths he or she realizes by this power are called the Vedas. (18)
The injunction of the
rishis [is] the word of divine authority, the revelation of God coming through
the inspired rishi. (19)
All the great teachers of
the world have declared that they came, not to destroy but to fulfill. [Matt.,5.17] Many times
this has not been understood, and their forbearance has been thought to be an
unworthy compromise with existing popular opinions. Even now you occasionally
hear that these prophets and great teachers were rather cowardly and dared not
say and do what they thought was right: but that was not so. Fanatics little
understand the infinite power of love in the hearts of the great sages, who
looked upon the inhabitants of the world as their children. They were the real
fathers and mothers, the real gods, filled with infinite sympathy and patience
for everyone; they were ready to bear and forbear. They know how human society
should grow; and patiently, slowly, surely, went on applying their remedies,
not by denouncing and frightening people, but by gently and kindly leading them
upwards, step by step. Such were the writers of the Upanishads. (20)
We may call all that is
weak in... the scriptures weak, because they were
meant to be so by the ancient sages to help the weak, under the theory of
arundhatidarshanam.* (21)
The Indian ideal [is]
teaching through life and not through words, and that
truth bears fruit only in those lives which have become ready to receive.
Persons of that type are entirely averse to preaching what they know, for they
are for ever convinced that it is internal discipline alone that leads to
truth, and not words. Religion to them is no motive to social conduct, but an
intense search after and realization of, truth in this life. They deny
the greater potentiality of one moment over another; and, every moment in eternity
being equal to every other, they insist on seeing the truths of religion face
to face now and here, not waiting for death. (22)
Clinging on to little
enjoyments and to desire the continuation of this state of things is utter
selfishness. It arises, not from any desire for truth, its genesis is not in
kindness for other beings, but in the utter selfishness of the human heart, in
the idea, "I will have everything, and do not care for anyone else."
This is as it appears to me. I would like to see more moral men in the world,
like some of those grand old prophets and sages of ancient times who would have
given up a hundred lives if they could by so doing benefit on little animal!
Talk of morality and doing good to others! Silly talk
of the present time! (23)
* When a bride is
brought to the house of her husband for the first time he shows her a very tiny
star called Arundhati. To do this he has to direct her gaze the right way,
which he does by asking her to look at something near and something big in the
direction of the star, e.g. a branch of a tree. Next he draws her attention to
a Large, bright star observed beyond the branch and so on, till by several
steps he succeeds in leading her eyes to the right thing. This method of
leading to a subtle object through easy and gradual steps is called Arundhati
Nyaya.
4. The Pride of
the Hindus Lies in Their Glorious Rishis
The ideal man or woman of
our ancestors was the brahmin. In all our books stands
out prominently this ideal of the brahmin. In Europe
there is my Lord the Cardinal, who is struggling hard and spending thousands of
pounds to prove the nobility of his ancestors; and he will not be satisfied
until he has traced his ancestry to some dreadful tyrant who lived on a hill
and watched the people passing by and, whenever he had the opportunity, sprang
out on them and robbed them. That was the business of these nobility-bestowing
ancestors, and my Lord Cardinal is not satisfied until he has traced his
ancestry to one of these. In
One thing we may note, that
whereas you will find that good and great people of other countries take pride
in tracing back their descent from some robber baron who lived in a mountain
fortress and emerged from time to time to plunder the passing wayfarers, we
Hindus, on the other hand, take pride in being the descendants of rishis and
sages who lived on roots and fruits in mountain caves, meditating on the
Supreme.(25)
Did you ever hear of a
country where the greatest kings tried to trace their descent, not to kings,
not to robber-barons living in old castles who
plundered poor travelers, but to semi-naked sages who lived in the forest?
I am proud that I am a
countryman of [Indians]..., the descendants of the most glorious rishis the
world ever saw. Therefore, Indians, have faith in yourselves, be proud of your
ancestors, instead of being ashamed of them. (27)
e) Be You All Rishis
1.
In the remote past our
country made gigantic advances in spiritual ideas. Let us, today, bring before
our mind's eye that ancient history. But the one great danger in meditating over
long-past greatness is that we cease to exert ourselves for new things and
content ourselves with vegetating upon that bygone ancestral glory and priding
ourselves upon it. We should guard against that. In ancient times there were,
no doubt, many rishis and maharishis who came face to
face with truth. But if this recalling of our ancient greatness is to be of
real benefit, we too must become rishis like them. Ay, not only that, but it is
my firm conviction that we shall be even greater rishis than any that our
history presents to us. (28)
If there have been rishis
and sages in the past, be sure that there will be many now. If there have been
Vyasas and Shankaracharyas in ancient times, why may not each one of you become
a Shankaracharya? (29)
[The truths of the Vedas]
can be experienced only by seers of the supersensuous,
and not by common men and women [like us].... That is why, in the Vedas, the
term rishi means "the seer of the truths of the mantras", and not
[just] any brahmin with the holy thread hanging down
from his neck. The division of society into castes came later on.(30)
Whether you believe in
spirituality or not, for the sake of Indian national life you have to get hold
on spirituality and keep to it. Then stretch out the other hand and gain all
you can from other races; but everything must be subordinated to that one ideal
of life; and out of that a wonderful, glorious future India will come - I am
sure it is coming - a greater India than ever was. Sages will spring up,
greater than all the ancient sages; and your ancestors will not only be
satisfied but, I am sure, they will be proud from their positions in other
worlds to look down upon their descendants, so glorious and so great. (31)
Cross reference to:
Ka. Up., 1.3.14a
Cha. Up., 4.9.1
2. To Be a Prophet Is
the Birthright of Every Living Being
The rishis of old attained
realization, and must we fail? We are also men and women. What has happened
once in the life of an individual must, through proper endeavor, be realized in the life of others. History repeats itself.
(32)
There were times in olden
days when prophets were many in every society. The time is to come when
prophets will walk through every street in every city in the world. In olden
times, in particular, peculiar persons were, so to speak, selected by the
operations of the laws of society to become prophets. The time is coming when
we shall understand that to become religious means to become a prophet; and
none can become religious until he or she becomes a prophet. We shall come to understand
that the secret of religion is not in being able to think and say all these
thoughts but, as the Vedas teach, to realize them, to realize newer and higher
ones than have ever been realized, to discover them, bring them to society; and
the study of religion should be the training to make prophets. The schools and
the colleges should be the training ground for prophets. The whole universe
must become prophets; and until someone becomes a prophet, religion is a
mockery and a byword for him or her. We must see religion, feel it, realize it in a thousand times more intense a sense than
that in which we see the wall....
In olden times, many did
not understand what a prophet meant. They thought it was something by chance,
that just by a fiat of will or some superior intelligence someone gained
superior knowledge. In modern times we are prepared to demonstrate that this knowledge
is the birthright of every living being, whosoever and wheresoever he or she
may be; and that there is no chance in this universe. Every one who, we think,
gets something by chance, has been working for it slowly and surely through
ages. And the whole question devolves upon us: "Do we want to be
prophets?" If we want, we shall be.
This, the training of
prophets, is the great work that lies before us; consciously or unconsciously,
all the great systems of religion are working towards this one great goal, only
with this difference, that in many religions you will find they declare that
this direct perception of spirituality is not to be had in this life, that
humans must die and after their death there will come a time in another world
when they will have visions of spirituality, when they will realize things
which they now must believe. But Vedanta will ask all people who make such
assertions, "Then how do you know that spirituality exists?" And they
will have to answer that there must always have been certain particular people
who, even in this life, have got a glimpse of things which are unknown and
unknowable.
Even this makes a
difficulty. If they were peculiar people, having this power simply by chance,
we have no right to believe in them. It would be a sin to believe in anything
that is by chance, because we cannot know it. What is meant by knowledge?
Destruction of peculiarity.... Our knowledge is knowing
the principle. Our non-knowledge is finding the particular without reference to
the principle. When we find one case or a few cases separate from the principle
and without any reference to the principle, we are in darkness and do not know.
Now, if these prophets, as they say, were peculiar persons who alone had the
right to catch a glimpse of what is beyond and no one else has the right, we
should not believe in these prophets, because they are peculiar cases without
any reference to a principle. We can only believe in them if we ourselves
become prophets.... We must reason; and when reason proves to us the truth of
these prophets and great men and women about whom the ancient books speak in
every country, we shall believe in all of them. We shall believe in them when
we see such prophets among ourselves. We shall then find that they were not
peculiar people, but only illustrations of certain principles. They worked, and
that principle expressed itself naturally; and we shall have to work to express
that principle in us. They were prophets, we shall believe, when we become
prophets. They were the seers of things divine. They could go beyond the bounds
of the senses and catch a glimpse of that which is beyond. We shall believe
that when we are able to do it ourselves, and not before. (33)
If God had spoken to
Christ, Muhammad, and the rishis of the Vedas, why does he not speak also to
[us, His children]? (34)
3. Manifest the Power of
Supersensuous Perception
This rishihood, this power
of supersensuous perception of the Vedas, is real religion. And so long as this
does not develop in the life of an initiate, so long is religion a mere empty
word to him of her, and it is to be understood that he or she has not yet taken
the first step in religion. (35)
Religion is not in books,
nor in theories, nor in dogmas, nor in talking, not even in reasoning. It is being
and becoming. Ay, my friends, until each one of you has become a rishi and come
face to face with spiritual facts, religion life has not begun for you. Until
the superconscious opens for you, religion is mere talk, it is nothing but
preparation. (36)
Whoever realizes
transcendental truth, whoever realizes the Atman in his or her own nature,
whoever comes face to face with God, sees God alone in everything, has become a
rishi. And there is no religious life for you until you have become a rishi.
Then alone religion begins for you; now is only the preparation. Then religion
dawns upon you; now you are only undergoing intellectual gymnastics and
physical tortures. (37)
We must, therefore,
remember that our religion [Vedanta] lays down distinctly and clearly that
every one who want salvation must pass through the
stage of rishihood - must become a mantra drashta, must see God. That is salvation, that is the law laid down in our scriptures. Then
it becomes easy to look into the scriptures with our own eyes, understand the
meaning for ourselves, to analyze just what we want and to understand the truth
for ourselves. This is what has to be done. At the same time, we must pay all
reverence to the ancient sages for their work. They were great, these ancients,
but we want to be greater. They did great work in the past, but we must do
greater work than they. They had hundreds of rishis in ancient
We have to bow down to [the
memory of the rishis]. So, be you all rishis and sages; that is the secret.
More or less we shall all be rishis. What is meant by a rishi? The pure one. Be pure first, and you will have power. Simply
saying, "I am a rishi" will not do; but when you are a rishi you will
find that others obey you instinctively. Something mysterious emanates from
you, which makes them follow you, makes them hear you,
makes them unconsciously, even against their will, carry out your plans. That
is rishihood. (39)
4. Be Real Men and
Women, Be Rishis for Your Own Salvation and That of Others
The aim of this institution
[the Ramakrishna Order] is to make men and women. You must not merely learn
what the rishis taught. Those rishis are gone, and their opinions are gone with
them. You must be rishis yourselves. You are also men as much as the greatest
men that were ever born - even our incarnations. What can mere book-learning
do? What can meditation do, even? What can the mantras and Tantras do? You must
stand on your own feet. You must have this new method - the method of
man-making. The true man is he who is as strong as strength itself and
yet possesses a woman's heart. You must feel for the millions of beings around
you, and yet you must be strong and inflexible and you must also possess
obedience; though it may seem a little paradoxical, you must possess those
apparently conflicting virtues.(40)
Have faith in yourself. You
people were once Vedic rishis. Only, you have come in a different form, that is all. I see it clear as daylight that you all
have infinite power within you. Rouse that up; arise, arise - apply yourselves
heart and soul, gird up your loins. What will you do with wealth and fame,
which are so transitory? Do you know what I think? I don't care for mukti
[liberation] and all that. My mission is to arouse within you all such ideas; I
am ready to undergo a hundred thousand rebirths to train up a single man. (41)
The rishi, as he or she is
called in the Upanishads is not an ordinary man or woman, but a mantra-drashta.
He or she is a true human being who sees religion, to whom religion is
not merely book-learning, nor argumentation, nor speculation, nor much talking,
but actual realization, a coming face to face with truths which transcend the
senses. This is rishihood, and that rishihood does not belong to any age, or
time, or even to sects or caste. Vatsayana says that truth must be realized;
and we have to remember that you, and I, and every one of us will be called
upon to become rishis; and we must have faith in ourselves, we must become
world-movers, for everything is in us. We must see religion face to face,
experience it, and thus solve our doubts about it; and then, standing up in the
glorious light of rishihood, each one of us will become a giant, and every word
falling from our lips will carry behind it that infinite sanction of security;
and before us evil will vanish by itself without the necessity of cursing
anyone, without the necessity of abusing anyone, without the necessity of
fighting anyone in the world. May the Lord help us... to realize rishihood, for
our own salvation and for that of others! (42)
References
1. CW, Vol.2: The Necessity
of Religion, p.60.
2. CW, Vol.6: The Methods
and Purpose of Religion, p.8.
3. CW, Vol.3: The Sages of
India, pp.248-249.
4. CW, Vol.3: Vedantism,
p.119.
5. CW, Vol.3: The Religion
We Are Born In, p.456.
6. CW, Vol.7: Conversation
with Sharat Chandra Chakravarty at Belur, 1898, p.142.
7. CW, Vol.3: The Sages of
8. Ibid., p.253.
9. CW, Vol.1: Raja-Yoga:
Patanjali's Yoga Aphorisms, #49, p.232.
10. Master, Chapter
15: On Hinduism, p.274.
11. CW, Vol.3: The Work Before Us, p.283.
12. CW, Vol.3: The Sages of
India, p.253.
13. CW, Vol.3: The Religion
We Are Born In, pp.456-457.
14. CW, Vol.7: Conversation
with Sharat Chandra Chakravarty at Belur, 1901, pp.214-215.
15. CW, Vol.1: Paper on
Hinduism, p.7.
16. SVW, Vol.2, Chapter 13:
The Last Battle, p.269.
17. CW, Vol.6: Notes Taken
Down in
18. CW, Vol.6: Hinduism and
Shri Ramakrishna, p.181.
19. CW, Vol.4: Modern India,
p.440.
20. CW, Vol.2: Maya and the
Conception of God, pp.116-117.
21. CW, Vol.4: Reply to the
Madras Address, pp.349-350.
22. CW, Vol.4: Sketch of the
Life of Pavhari Baba, pp.291-292.
23. CW, Vol.2: Practical
Vedanta IV, p.352.
24. CW, Vol.3: The Mission
of the Vedanta, pp.196-197.
25. CW, Vol.3: Reply to the
Address of Welcome at Pamban, p.139.
26. CW, Vol.3: Reply to the
Address of Welcome at Ramnad, p.153.
27. CW, Vol.3: The Common
Bases of Hinduism, p.381.
28. CW, Vol.3: The Religion
We Are Born In, p.454.
29. CW, Vol.3: The Work Before Us, p.282.
30. CW, Vol.6: Conversation
with Sharat Chandra Chakravarty in
31. CW, Vol.3: Reply to the
Address of Welcome at Ramnad, pp.153-154.
32. CW, Vol.7: Conversation
with Sharat Chandra Chakravarty at Belur, November, 1898, p.138.
33. CW, Vol.6: The Methods
and Purpose of Religion, pp.10-13.
34. CW, Vol.8: The Love of
God - I, p.200.
35. CW, Vol.6: Hinduism and
Shri Ramakrishna, p.181.
36. CW, Vol.3: The Sages of
India, p.253.
37. CW, Vol.3: The Work Before Us, pp.283-284.
38. Ibid., p.284.
39. CW, Vol.3: The Future of
India, p.296.
40. CW, Vol.3: Sannyasa: Its
Ideal and Practice, pp.447-448.
41. CW, Vol.7: Conversation
with Sharat Chandra Chakravarty, Belur, 1899, p.176.
42. CW, Vol.3: Reply to the
Address of Welcome at Madura, p.175.
PART I, SECTION 2: VEDIC CULTURE
Chapter 5: Vedic Culture
a) The Aryans, Lovers of
Peace
1. The Ideal of the
Aryan Was the Assimilative Base of the Vast Number of Indian Races
Three mountains stand as
typical of progress - the Himalayas of the Indo-Aryan, Sinai of the Hebrew, and
The loom of the fabric of
the Aryan civilization is a vast, warm, level country, interspersed with broad,
navigable rivers. The cotton of this cloth is composed of highly civilized,
semi-civilized, and barbarian tribes, mostly Aryan. (2)
The problem [in
We [find] a multitude
surrounded by the snows of the
Community of language,
government and, above all, religion has been the power of fusion.
In other lands this has
been attempted by force, that is, the enforcement of the culture of one
race only over the rest, the result being the production of a short-lived,
vigorous national life; then, dissolution.
In
When it was a small problem
and force was sufficient to form a unity, the effect really was the nipping in
the bud of various healthy types in the germ of all the elements except the
dominant one. It was only one set of brains using the vast majority for its own
good, thus losing the major portion of the possible amount of development; and
thus, when the dominant type had spent itself, the apparently impregnable
building tottered to its ruin, e.g.
A common language would be
a great desideratum; but the same criticism applies to it - the destruction of
the vitality of the existing ones.
The only solution to be
reached was the finding of a great sacred language of which all the others
would be considered manifestations, and that was found in Sanskrit.
The Dravidian languages may
or may not have been originally Sanskritic, but for practical purposes they are
so now; and every day we see them approaching the ideal more and more, yet
keeping their distinctive vital peculiarities.
[In addition], a racial
background was found - the Aryas. (5)
The attempt at fusion
between races and tribes of various degrees of culture: just as Sanskrit has
been the linguistic solution, so the Arya is the racial solution. (6)
And at last a great nation
emerges to our view - still keeping the type of the Aryan - stronger, broader,
and more organized by assimilation. We find the central assimilate core giving
its type and character to the whole mass, clinging on with great pride to its
name of Aryan. (7)
2. Brushing Off the
Cobwebs of the "Aryan Invasion Theory"
A gentle, yet clear
brushing off of the cobwebs of the so-called Aryan theory and all its vicious
corollaries is... absolutely necessary, especially for the South [of India];
and a proper self-respect created by a knowledge of the past grandeurs of the
ancestors of the Aryan race - the great Tamils. (8)
[There has been]
speculation whether there was a distinct, separate race called the Aryas living
in
Coming to practical common
sense from so-called historical imagination: the Aryas in their oldest records
were in the land between Turkistan and the Punjab and
The Americans, the English,
the Dutch and the Portuguese got hold of the poor Africans and made them work
hard while they lived; and their children of mixed birth were born in slavery
and kept in that condition for a long period. From that wonderful example, the
mind jumps back several thousand years and fancies that the same thing happened
[in India]; and our archeologist dreams of India being full of dark-eyed
aborigines, and the bright Aryan came from - the Lord knows where. According to
some, they came from
Some say now that they
lived at the North Pole. Lord bless the Aryans and
their habitations! As for the truth of these theories, there is not one word in
our scriptures, not one, to prove that the Aryan ever came from anywhere
outside of
What your European pundits
say about the Aryans' swooping down from some foreign land, snatching away the
lands of the aborigines and settling in India by exterminating them, is all
pure nonsense, foolish talk! Strange that our Indian scholars, too, say amen to
them; and all these monstrous lies are being taught to our boys! This is very
bad indeed.
I am an ignoramus myself; I
do not pretend to any scholarship; but with the little that I understand, I
strongly protested against these ideas at the Paris Congress [in 1901]. I have
been talking with the Indian and European savants on the subject, and hope to
raise many objection to this theory in detail, when
time permits. And this I say to you, to our pundits, also: "You are
learned men; hunt up your old books and scriptures, please, and draw your own
conclusions."
Whenever Europeans find an
opportunity, they exterminate the aborigines and settle down in ease and
comfort on their lands; and therefore they think the Aryans must have done the
same! The Westerners would be considered wretched vagabonds if they lived in
their native homes, depending wholly on their own internal resources; and so
they have to run wildly about the world seeking how they can feed upon the fat
of the land of others by spoliation and slaughter; and therefore they conclude
that the Aryans must have done the same! But where is your proof?
Guess-work? Then keep your fanciful guesses to
yourselves! In what Veda, in what Sukta, do you find that the Aryans came into
3. The Hindus Are
Aryans, Whether of Pure or Mixed Blood
According to the Hindu
Shastras, the three Hindu castes - brahmana, kshatriya
and vaishya, and several nations outside of
In the opinion of modern
savants, the Aryans had reddish-white complexion, black or red hair, straight
noses, well-drawn eyes, etc.; and the formation of the skull varied a little
according to the hair. Where the complexion is dark, there the change has come
to pass owing to the mixture of the pure Aryan blood with black races. They
hold that there are still some tribes to the west of the Himalayan borders who are of pure Aryan blood, and that the rest are
all of mixed blood; otherwise, how could they be dark? But the European pundits
ought to know by this time that, in the southern part of India, many children
are born with red hair, which after two or three years turns into black, and
that in the Himalayas many have red hair and blue or gray eyes.
Let the pundits fight among
themselves; it is the Hindus who have all along called themselves Aryas.
Whether of pure or mixed blood, the Hindus are Aryas; there it rests. If the
Europeans do not like us, Aryas, because we are dark, let them take another
name for themselves - what is that to us? (12)
Whatever may be the import
of the philological terms Aryan and Tamilian, even taking for
granted that both of these grand sub-divisions of Indian humanity came from
outside the Western frontier, the dividing line has been, from the most ancient
times, one of language and not of blood. Not one of the epithets expressive of
contempt for the ugly physical features of the Dasyus of the Vedas would apply
to the great Tamilian race; in fact, if there be a toss up for good looks
between the Aryans and Tamilians, no sensible man would prognosticate the
result. (13)
We stick, in spite of our
Western theories, to that definition of the word Arya which we find in
our sacred books, and which includes only the multitude we now call Hindus.
This Aryan race, itself a mixture of the great races, Sanskrit-speaking and
Tamil-speaking, applies to all Hindus alike. That the shudras have in some
Smritis been excluded from this epithet means nothing, for the shudras were,
and still are, only the waiting Aryas - Aryas in novitiate. (14)
4. The True Aryan Is He
Who Is Born through Prayer, the Descendant of the Whole Universe
What is an Aryan? He is a
man whose birth is through religion. This is a peculiar subject, perhaps, in
the
The child whose very
conception and whose death is according to the rules of the Vedas, such is an
Aryan. (16)
He is of the "Aryan
race" who is born through prayer, and he is a
non-Aryan who is born through sensuality. (17)
Re [the theory of] the
Accado-Sumerian racial identity of the ancient Tamilians: this makes us proud
of the blood of the great civilization which flowered before all others -
compared to whose antiquity the Aryans and the Semites are babies....
As for us Vedantins and
sannyasins [monks], we are proud of our Sanskrit-speaking ancestors of the
Vedas; proud of our Tamil-speaking ancestors whose civilization is the oldest
yet known; we are proud of our Kolaran ancestors, older than either of the
above - who lived and hunted in forests; we are proud of our ancestors with
flint implements - the first of the human race; and, if evolution be true, we
are proud of our animal ancestors, for they antedated man himself. We are proud
that we are the descendants of the whole universe, sentient or insentient.
Proud that we are born, and work, and suffer - proudest still that we die when
the task is finished and enter for ever the realm
where there is no more delusion. (18)
b) The Indian Aryans
Sought, above All, to Master the Mind and Go Beyond Physical Pleasures
1. Through Culture of
the Mind and Intellect the Indian Aryans Evolved the Upanishads
We find three ideas
wherever the Aryans go: the village community, the rights of women, and a
joyful religion. The first is the system of village communities...; each man
was his own and owned the land. All these political institutions of the world
that we now see are the development of these village systems; as the Aryans
went to different countries and settled, certain circumstances developed this
institution, others that. (19)
When the Aryans reached
The Aryans were lovers of
peace, cultivators of the soil, and were quite happy and contented if only they
could rear their families undisturbed. In such a life they had ample leisure,
and therefore greater opportunity of being thoughtful and civilized. Our King
Janaka tilled the soil with his own hands, and he was also the greatest of
knowers of Truth of his time. With us, rishis, munis, and yogis have been born
from the very beginning; they have known from the first that the world is a
chimera. Plunder and fight as you may, the enjoyment that you are seeking is
only in peace; and peace, in the renunciation of physical pleasures. Enjoyment
lies, not in physical development, but in the culture of the mind and
intellect. (21)
The Upanishads were
preached and oblations offered in hermitages near which deer grazed. (22)
2. The Bold Intellectual
Analysis of the Indian Aryans Produced Great Contributions to Science
In ancient
There was an
inquisitiveness in the race to start with, which very soon developed into bold
analysis; and though, in the first attempt, the work turned out might be like
the attempts with shaky hands of the future master-sculptor, it very soon gave
way to science, bold attempts, and startling results.
Its boldness made these men
search every brick of their sacrificial altars - scan, cement, and pulverize
every word of their scriptures, arrange, rearrange, doubt, deny, or explain the
ceremonies. (24)
Vedic anatomy was no less
perfect than the Ayurvedic. There were many names for many parts of the Organs,
because they had to cut up animals for sacrifice.(25)
Their boldness turned their
gods inside out and assigned only a secondary place to the omnipotent,
omniscient, omnipresent Creator of the universe, their ancestral
Father-in-Heaven; or threw Him altogether overboard as useless and started a
world religion without Him [Buddhism], with even now the largest following of
any religion. (26)
The sea is described as
full of ships. Sea voyage was prohibited later on, partly because there came the fear that people might thereby become Buddhists.
(27)
The Vedic sacrificial altar
was the origin of geometry. (28)
The Aryans were by nature
an analytical race. In the science of mathematics and grammar, wonderful fruits
were gained, and by the analysis of the mind the full tree was developed. (29)
[The boldness of the
Aryans] evolved the science of geometry from the arrangement of the bricks to
build various altars and startled the world with astronomical knowledge that
arose from the attempts to time accurately their worship and oblations. It made
their contribution to the science of mathematics the largest of any race,
ancient or modern; and to their knowledge of chemistry, or metallic compounds
in medicine, their scale of musical notes, their invention of the
bow-instruments - all of great service in the building of the modern European
civilization. It led them to invent the science of building up the child-mind
through shining fables, of which every child in every civilized country learns
in a nursery or school and carries an impress through life. (30)
3. Poetic Insight Was
the Other Great Peculiarity of the Indian Aryans
Behind and before this
analytical keenness, covering it as in a velvet sheath,
was the other great mental peculiarity of the race - poetic insight. Its
religion, its philosophy, its history, its ethics, its politics, were all
inlaid in a flowerbed of poetic imagery - the miracle of language which was
called Sanskrit, or perfected, lending itself to expressing and
manipulating them better than any other tongue. The aid of melodious numbers
was involved even to express the hard facts of mathematics.
This analytical power and
the boldness of poetical visions which urged it onwards are the two great
internal causes in the makeup of the Hindu race. They together formed, as it
were, the keynote of the national character. This combination is what is always
making the race press onwards beyond the senses - the secret of those
speculations which are like the steel blades the artisans used to manufacture -
cutting through bars of iron, yet pliable enough to be bent into a circle.
They wrought poetry in
silver and gold; the symphony of jewels, the maze of marble wonders, the music
of colors, the fine fabrics which belong more to the fairyland of dreams than
to the real - have back of them thousands of years of working of this national
trait.
Arts and sciences, even the
realities of domestic life, are covered with a mass of poetical conceptions,
which are pressing forward till the sensuous touched the supersensuous, and the
real gets the rose-hue of the unreal.
The earliest glimpses we
have of this race show it already in possession of this characteristic, as an
instrument of some use in its hands. Many forms of religion and society must
have been left behind in the onward march before we find the race as depicted
in the scriptures, the Vedas.
An organized pantheon,
elaborate ceremonials, divisions of society into hereditary classes
necessitated by a variety of occupations, a great many necessaries and a good
many luxuries of life are already there. (31)
c) The Caste System, the
Indian Method of Social Fusion and Rejection of Competition
1. The Method of
Bringing Indian Humanity Together under the Guidance of Spirtualized Intellect
The history of
In the midst of this
madness of nature, one of the contending factions discovered a method and,
through force of its superior culture, succeeded in bringing the largest number
of Indian humanity under its sway. The superior race styled themselves the
Aryas or nobles; and their method was the varnashramacharya - the so-called
caste. (32)
The warp of Aryan
civilization is varnashrama, and its woof, the conquest of strife and
competition in nature. (33)
Of course, the men of the
Aryan race reserved for themselves, consciously or unconsciously, a good many
privileges; yet the institution of caste has always been very flexible,
sometimes too flexible to ensure a healthy uprise of the races very low in the
scale of culture. (34)
There is a theory that
there was a race of mankind in Southern India called Dravidians, entirely
differing from another race in Northern India called Aryans; and that the
Southern Indian brahmins are the only Aryans that came from the North; the
other men of Southern India belong to an entirely different caste and race to
those of Southern India brahmins. Now I beg your pardon, Mr. Philologist, this
is entirely unfounded. The only proof of it is that there is a difference of
language between the North and the South. I do not see any other difference. We
are so many northern men here [in
Would there have been this
institution of varnashrama if the Aryans had exterminated the aborigines in
order to settle on their lands?
The object of the peoples
of
The institution of caste
put, at least theoretically, the whole of
2. The Different Vedic
Castes
The very basis of Vedic
religion and Vedic society is the jati dharma, that is, one's own dharma
enjoined according to the different castes - the svadharma, that is , one's own dharma or set of duties prescribed for man
according to his capacity and position. (38)
The Vedas teach that he who
knows God is a brahmin; he who protects his fellows is
a kshatriya; while he who gains his livelihood in trade is a vaishya. (39)
The leading caste in
The Indian climate again
gave a higher direction to the genius of the race. In a land where nature was
propitious and yielded easy victories, the national mind started to grapple
with and conquer the higher problems of life in the field of thought. Naturally
the thinker, the priest, became the highest class in Indian society, and not
the man of the sword. (41)
Brahminhood was the
solution to the varying degrees of progress and culture as well as that of all
social and political problems. The great ideal of
It was the knowers [those
cultured in mind and intellect] who reclaimed the jungles for cultivation.
Then, over that cleared plot of land was built the Vedic altar; in that pure
sky of Bharata, up rose the sacred smoke of yajnas [sacrifices]; in that air
breathing peace, the Vedic mantras echoed and re-echoed - and cattle and other beasts
grazed without any fear of danger. The place of the sword was assigned at the
feet of learning and dharma. Its only work was to protect dharma and save the
lives of men and of cattle. The hero was the protector of the weak in danger -
the kshatriya. Ruling over the plough and the sword
was dharma, the protector of all. He is the King of kings; he is ever-awake,
even when the world sleeps. Everyone was free under the protection of dharma.
(43)
As, during the supremacy of
the brahmin and the kshatriya there is a
centralization of learning and advancement of civilization, so the result of
the supremacy of the vaishya is an accumulation of wealth. (44)
3. Castes Coalesce in
the Long Run in Spite of Attempts by the Higher Castes to Preserve Privilege
Though apparently different
from the social methods of other nations, on close inspection the Aryan method
of caste will not be found so very different, except on two points:
The first is, in every
other country the highest honor belongs to the kshatriya,
the man of the sword. The Pope of Rome will be glad to trace his descent to
some robber-baron on the banks of the
The greatest Indian king
would be gratified to trace his descent to some ancient sage who lived in the
forest, probably a recluse, possessing nothing, dependent upon the villagers
for his daily necessities, and all his life trying to solve the problems of
this life and the life hereafter.
The second point is the
difference of units. The law of caste in every other country takes the
individual man or woman as the sufficient unit. Wealth, power, intellect or
beauty suffices for the individual to leave the status of birth and scramble up
to anywhere he or she can.
In
Here, too, one has every
chance of rising from a low caste to a higher or the highest; only, in this
land of the birth of altruism, one is compelled to take his whole caste along
with him or her.
In India you cannot, on
account of your wealth, power, or any other merit, leave your fellows behind
and make common cause with your superiors; you cannot deprive those who helped
you to acquire the excellence of any benefit therefrom and give them in return
only contempt. If you want to re to a higher caste in
This is the Indian method
of fusion; and this has been going on from time immemorial. For in
Even so are the names such
as brahmin, kshatriya, etc. They simply represent the
status of a community, in itself continuously fluctuating, even when it has
reached the summit; and all further endeavors are towards fixity of the type by
non-marriage, by being forced to admit fresh groups from lowers castes or
foreign lands within its pale.
Whatever caste has the
power of the sword becomes kshatriya; whatever
learning, brahmin; whatever wealth, vaishya.
The groups that have
already reached the coveted goal, indeed, try to keep themselves aloof from the
newcomers by making subdivisions in the same caste; but the fact remains that
they coalesce in the long run. This is going on before our eyes all over
Naturally, a group having
raised itself up would try to preserve the privileges to itself.
Hence, whenever it was possible to get the help of a king the higher castes,
especially the brahmins, have tried to put down
similar aspirations in the lower castes, by the sword, if practicable. But the
question is: did they succeed? Look closely into your Puranas and Upapuranas,
look especially into the local khanda of the big Puranas, look round and see
what is happening before your eyes, and you will find the answer.
We are, in spite of our
various castes, and in spite of our modern system of marriage restricted within
the subdivisions of a caste (though this is not universal), a mixed race in
every sense of the word. (45)
4. There Is No Vedic
Sanction for Hereditary Barriers in the Caste System, Which Is to Be Evolved
According to Social, Not Religious, Law
The Hindus said in olden
times that life must be made easier and smoother. And what makes everything
alive? Competition. Hereditary trade kills. You are a
carpenter? Very good; your son can only be a carpenter. What are you? A blacksmith? Blacksmithing becomes a caste; your children
will become blacksmiths. We do not allow anybody else to come into that trade,
so you will be quiet and remain there. You are a military man, a fighter? Make
a caste. You are a priest? Make a caste. The priesthood is hereditary, and so
on. Rigid, high power! That has a great side, and that side is that it really
rejects competition. It is that which has made the nation live while other
nations have died - that caste. But there is a great evil; it checks
individuality. I will have to be a carpenter because I am born a carpenter; but
I do not like it. That is in the books, and that was before Buddha was born. I
am talking to you of
The doctrine of caste in
the Purusha Sukta of the Vedas does not make it hereditary. What are
those instances in the Vedas where caste has been made a matter of hereditary
transmission? (47)
Social customs as barriers
[were] founded upon the Smritis, but none from the Shrutis. The Smritis must
change with time. This is the admitted law. (48)
Caste is continually
changing, rituals are continuously changing; so are forms. It is the substance,
the principle, that does not change. It is in the
Vedas that we have to study our religion. With the exception of the Vedas,
every book must change. The authority of the Vedas is for all time to come; the
authority of every one of our other books is for the time being. For instance,
one Smriti is powerful for one age, another for another age. Great prophets are
always coming and pointing the way to work. Some prophets worked for the lower
classes, others, like Madhva, gave to women the right to study the Vedas. Caste
should not go, but should be readjusted occasionally. Within the old structures
is to be found life enough for the building of two hundred thousand new ones.
It is sheer nonsense to desire the abolition of caste. The new method is:
evolution of the old. (49)
5. When the Whole World
Will Again Attain to the Ideal of the Brahmin, Caste Will Be at an End
The general policy of our
national lawgivers was to give the priests... honor. They also had the same
socialistic plan [you in the West are just ready to try], that checks them from
getting money. What [was] the motive? Social honor.
Mind you, the priest in all countries is the highest in the social scale, so
much so in
The brahmin
or high caste person devotes the first part of his life to the study of the
Vedas or sacred books and the latter part of meditating on the divinity, being
supposed to have overcome the human in himself, and to be only a soul. (51)
Our ideal of high birth,
therefore, is different from that of others. Our ideal is the brahmin of spiritual culture and renunciation. By the brahmin ideal, what do I mean? I mean the ideal brahminness
in which worldliness is altogether absent and true wisdom is abundantly
present. That is the ideal of the Hindu race. Have you not heard it declared
that he, the brahmin, is not amenable to law, that he
has no law, that he is not governed by kings, and that his body cannot be hurt?
That is perfectly true. Do not understand it in the light thrown upon it by
interested and ignorant fools, but understand it in the light of the true and
original Vedantic conception. If the brahmin is one who has killed all
selfishness and who lives and works to propagate wisdom and the power of love -
if a country is altogether inhabited by such brahmins, by men and women who are
spiritual and moral and good, is it strange to think of that country as being
above and beyond all law? What police, what military, are necessary to govern
them? Why should they live under a government? Why should anyone govern them at
all? They are good and noble, and they are the men and women of God. These are
our ideal brahmins. (52)
The ideal of this world is that
state when the whole world will again be brahmin in
nature. When there will be no more necessity of the shudra, vaishya, and
kshatriya powers, when human beings will be born with yoga powers, when
spiritual force will completely triumph over material force, when disease and
grief will no more overtake the human body, the sense-Organs will no more be
able to go against the mind; when the application of brute force will be
completely effaced from men's memory, like a dream of primeval days, when love
will be the only motive power in all actions on this earth - then only will the
whole of mankind by endowed with brahminical qualities and attain brahminhood.
Then only the distinction of caste will be at an end, ushering in the
Satya-Yuga (Golden Age) visualized by the ancient rishis. We must adopt only
that kind of caste division which gradually leads to this goal. That division
into caste which is the best way to abolish caste should be most cordially
welcomed. (53)
c) The Mythological and
Allegorical Aryan Gods
In
Spirit-worship was the
beginning of the Hindu religion. At first the Hindus used to invoke the spirits
of their departed ancestors in some man, and then worship and offer him food.
By and by it was found that the men who acted as mediums for these disembodied
spirits suffered very much physically afterwards. So they gave up the practice
and substituted instead an effigy of grass (kushaputtali) and, invoking the
departed spirits of their ancestors in it, offered to it worship and pindas.
The Vedic invocation of the devas for worship and
sacrifice... was a development of this Spirit worship. (55)
The Samhitas... are
collections of hymns forming, as it were, the oldest Aryan literature; properly
speaking, the oldest literature in the world. There may have been scraps of
literature of older date here and there, older than that even, but not books or
literature properly so-called. As a collected book this is the oldest the world
has; and herein is portrayed the earliest feelings of the Aryans, their
aspirations, the questions that arose about their manners and methods, and so
on. At the very outset we find a curious idea. These hymn are sung in praise of
different gods, devas as they are called, the bright ones. There is quite a number of them. One is called Indra, another
Varuna, another Mitra, Parjanya, and so on. Various mythological and
allegorical figures come before us, one after the other - for instance, Indra
the thunderer, striking the serpent who has withheld the rains from mankind.
Then he lets fly his thunderbolt, the serpent is killed, and rain comes down in
showers. The people are pleased and they worship Indra with oblations. They
make a sacrificial pyre, kill some animals, roast their flesh upon spits and
offer that meat to Indra. And they had a popular plant called soma. What plant
it was nobody knows now; it has entirely disappeared; but from the books we
gather that, when crushed it produced a sort of milky juice and that was
fermented; and it can also be gathered that this fermented soma juice was
intoxicating. This they also offered to Indra and the other gods and they also
drank it themselves. Sometimes they drank a little too much, and so did the
gods. Indra on occasion got drunk. There are passages to show that Indra at one
time drank so much of this soma juice that he talked irrelevant words. So with Varuna. He is another god, very powerful, and is in
the same way protecting his votaries; and they are praising him with their
libations of soma. So is the god of war, and so on....
In some of the books you
will find that Indra has a body, is very strong, sometimes wearing golden
armor, and comes down, lives and eats with his votaries, fights the demons,
fights the snakes, and so on. Again, in one hymn we find that Indra has been
given a very high position; he is omnipresent and omnipotent, and Indra sees
the heart of every being. So with Varuna. This Varuna
is the god of the air and is in Charge of the water, just as Indra was
previously; and then, all of a sudden, we find him raised up and said to be
omnipresent, omnipotent, and so on [Atharva Veda 4.16.2]. (56)
Sometimes Indra came and
helped man; sometimes he drank too much soma. Now and again adjectives such as all-powerful,
all-pervading, were attributed to him; the same
was the case with Varuna. In this way it went on, and some of the mantras depicting
the characteristics of these gods were marvelous, and the language was
exceedingly grand. (57)
It is curious that, though
in modern times, many hideous and cruel forms of religion have crept into
In the Vedic hymns Varuna
and Indra shower the choicest gifts and blessing on devotees, a very human
idea, more human than humanity itself (59)
The invocation of the devas, or bright ones, was the basis of worship. The
idea is that one invokes and is helped and helps. (60)
d) Aryan Ideals of
Womanhood
1. The Freedom of Aryan
Woman and Their Equality with Men
The next idea of the Aryans
was the freedom of women. (61)
The great Aryans, Buddha
among the rest, have always put woman on an equal position with man. For them,
sex in religion did not exist. (62)
The earliest [Aryan] system
was a matriarchal one; that is, one in which the mother was the center, and in
which girls acceded to her station. This led to the curious system of
polyandry, where five and six brothers often marred one wife. Even the Vedas
contain a trace of it in the provision that, when a man died without leaving
any children, his widow was permitted to live with another man until she became
a mother; but the children she bore did not belong to their father, but to her
dead husband. In later years the widow was allowed to marry again, which the
modern idea forbids her to do. (63)
In ancient times the
privileges extended to women [included] coeducation. (64)
Could anything be more
complete than the equality of boys and girls in our old forest universities?
(65)
The old Aryan conception of
marriage, symbolized in the fire lighted at marriage and worshipped morning and
evening by husband and wife together, pointed to no inequality of standards of
responsibilities as between the two. (66)
According to the Aryan, a man
cannot perform a religious action without a wife. (67)
The ideal of womanhood
centers in the Aryan race of
2. Some of the Most
Beautiful Portions of the Vedas Were Written by Women
In the Vedas and Upanishads
women taught the highest truths and received the same veneration as men. (69)
Some of the most beautiful
portions of the Vedas... were written by women; there is no other bible in the
world in which they had any part. (70)
In the records of the
saints in
It was a female sage who
first found the unity of God and laid down this doctrine in one of the first
hymns of the Vedas, [the Devi Sukta]. (72)
It is in the Aryan
literature that we find women in ancient times taking the same share as men,
and in no other literature of the world. Going back to our Veda books, the
oldest literature the world possesses and composed by the common ancestors [of
India and America] (these were not written in India, perhaps on the coast of
the Baltic, perhaps in Central Asia - we do not know); their oldest portion is
composed of hymns and these are to the gods whom the Aryans worshipped. I may
be pardoned for using the word gods - the literal translation is the
bright ones. These hymns are dedicated to Fire and to the Sun, to Varuna
and other deities. The titles run: such and such a sage composed this verse
dedicated to such and such a deity. After the fourth or fifth comes a
peculiar hymn, for the sage is a woman and it is dedicated to the one god who
is at the background of all these gods….[In the Upanishads], too, we find women
prominent; a Large portion of these books are words which have proceeded out
the mouths of women. It is there recorded with their names and teachings....
There arose in
Cross reference to:
Rig Veda, 10.125,2-3
e) Sannyasins, People
Who Have Given Up the World
1. The Ideal of Personal
Purity Has Imprinted Itself Very Deeply into the Heart of the Aryan Race
The married teacher and the
celibate are both as old as the Vedas. Whether the soma-sipping rishi... was
the first in order of appearance, or the... celibate rishi was the primeval
form it is hard to decide at present.... But whatever be
the order of genesis, the celibate teachers of the Shrutis and Smritis stand on
an entirely different platform from the married ones, which is perfect
chastity, brahmacharya. (74)
On every page the Vedas
preach personal purity. The laws in this respect were extremely strict. Every
boy and girl was sent to the university, where they studied until their
twentieth or thirtieth year; there the least impurity was punished almost
cruelly. This idea of personal purity has imprinted itself very deeply into the
heart of the race, amounting almost to a mania. (75)
The disciple of old used to
repair to the hermitage of the guru, fuel in hand; and the guru, after
ascertaining his or her competence, would teach him or her the Vedas after
initiation, fastening round the waist the threefold filament of munja, a kind
of grass, as the emblem of his or her vow to keep the body, mind, and speech in
control. With the help of this girdle the disciples used to tie up their
kaupinas (loincloths). Later on, the custom of wearing the sacred thread
superseded this girdle of munja grass. (76)
2. The Freedom of Giving
Up Marriage and Property
The Indian people are
intensely socialistic. But, beyond that, there is a wealth of individualism.
They are as tremendously individualistic [as the West] - that is to say, after
laying down all these minute regulations: they have regulated how you should
eat, drink, sleep, die! Everything is regulated there;
from early morning to when you go to bed and sleep, you are following
regulations and law. Law, law, law. Do you wonder that
a nation should [live] under that? Law is death. The more of
law in a country, the worse for the country. [But to be an individual],
we go to the mountains where there is no law, no government....
[The Vedic Aryans] were
thinkers. They knew that this tremendous regulation of law would not lead to
real greatness. So they left a way out for them all. After all, they found out
that all these regulations are only for the world and the life of the world. As
soon as you do not want money [and] you do not want children - no business for
this world - you can go out entirely free. Those that go out were called
sannyasins - people who have given up. They never organized themselves, nor do
they now; they are a free order of men and women who refuse to marry, who
refuse to possess property, and they have no law - not even the Vedas bind
them. They stand on [the] top of the Vedas. They are [at] the other pole [from]
our social institutions. They are beyond caste. They have grown beyond. They
are too big to be bound by these little regulations and things. Only two things
[are] necessary for them: they must not possess property and they must not
marry. If you marry, settle down, or possess property, immediately the
regulations will be upon you; but if you do not do either of these two, you are
free. They were the living gods of the race, and ninety-nine percent of our
great men and women were to be found among them.
In every country, real
greatness of the soul means extraordinary individuality; and that individuality
you cannot get in society. It frets and fumes and wants to burst society. If
society wants to keep it down, that soul wants to burst society to pieces. And
they made an easy channel. They say, "Well, once you get out of society,
then you may teach and preach everything that you like. We only worship you
from a distance." So, there were the tremendous, individualistic men and
women; and they are the highest persons in all society. If one of those
yellow-clad shaven-heads comes, the prince, even, dare not remain seated in his
presence; he must stand. The next half hour, one of these sannyasins might be
at the door of one of the cottages of the poorest subjects, glad to get only a
piece of bread. And he has to mix with all grades; now he sleeps with a poor
man in his cottage; tomorrow [he] sleeps on the beautiful bed of a king. One
day he dines on gold plates in kings' palaces; the next day, he has not any
food and sleeps under a tree. Society looks upon these great men and women with
great respect; and some of them, just to show their individuality, will try to
shock the public ideas. But the people are never shocked so long as they keep
to these principles: perfect purity and no property. (77)
The Vedas say, "The
sannyasin stands on the head of the Vedas!" - because
he is free from churches and sects and religions and prophets and books and all
of that ilk! (78)
In the Order to which I
belong, we are called sannyasins. The word means a man who has renounced.
This is a very, very ancient order. Even Buddha, who was 560 years before
Christ, belonged to that order. He was one of the reformers of his order. That
was all. So ancient! Your find it mentioned way back in the Vedas, the oldest
book in the world.
In old
The brahmin,
the kshatriya and the vaishya all have equal rights to be sannyasins; the
traivarnikas have equal rights to the Vedas. (80)
So old
people used to become sannyasins in those early days. Later on, young people began to
give up the world. And young people are active. They could not sit down under a
tree and think all the time of their own death, so they went about preaching
and starting sects, and so on....
The order is not a church,
and the people who join the order are not priests. There is an absolute
difference between the priests and sannyasins. In
The sannyasin does not
possess property, and they do not marry. Beyond that, there is no organization.
The only bond that is there is the bond between the teacher and the taught -
and that is peculiar to
3. The Real Aim of
Sannyasa Is "For One's Highest Freedom and for the Good of the World"
The real aim of sannyasa is
"For one's highest freedom and for the good of the world." Without
having sannyasa none can really be a knower of Brahman - that is what the Vedas
and the Vedanta proclaim. (82)
The stinking monks of
certain religious sects [the Jains], who do not bathe lest the vermin on their
bodies should be killed, never think of the discomfort and disease they bring
to their fellow human beings. They do not, however, belong to the religion of
the Vedas! (83)
It is men of [sannyasa]
stamp who have been, through a succession of disciples, spreading Brahma-vidya
(knowledge of Brahman) in the world. Where and when have you heard that a man,
being the slave of lust and wealth, has been able to liberate another, or to
show the path of God to him? Without himself being free, how can he make others
free? In Veda, Vedanta, Itihasa (history), Purana (ancient tradition), you will
find everywhere that the sannyasins have been the teachers of religion in all
ages and climes.(84)
References1. CW, Vol.6: Hindu and Greek, p.85.
2. CW, Vol.5: The East and
the West, p.536.
3. CW, Vol.4:
4. CW, Vol.6: Historical
Evolution of India, p.159.
5. CW, Vol.4:
6. Ibid., #17 and 18, p.309.
7. CW, Vol. 6: Historical
Evolution of India, p.159.
8. CW, Vol.4: Aryans and
Tamilians, p.301.
9. CW, Vol.4:
10. CW, Vol.3: The Future of
India, pp.292-293.
11. CW, Vol.5: The East and
the West, pp.534-537.
12. Ibid., pp. 464-466.
13. CW, Vol.4: Aryans and
Tamilians, p.299.
14. Ibid., p.301.
15. SVW, Vol.2, Appendix C:
Women of India, p.422.
16. CW, Vol.3: The Vedanta,
p.409.
17. CW, Vol.2: Ideals of
Womanhood, p.506.
18. CW, Vol.4: Aryans and
Tamilians, p.302.
19. SVW, Vol.2, Appendix C:
Women of India, pp.411-412.
20. CW, Vol.6: Hindu and
Greek, pp.85-86.
21. CW, Vol.5: The East and
the West, p.534.
22. CW, Vol.4: The Story of
Jada Bharata, p.112.
23. CW, Vol.6: The
Historical Evolution of India, pp.161-162.
24. Ibid., p. 157.
25. CW, Vol.6: Notes Taken
Down in
26. CW, Vol.6: Historical
Evolution of India, p.157.
27. CW, Vol.6: Notes Taken
Down in
28. CW, Vol.6: Thoughts on
the Vedas and Upanishads, p.86.
29. CW, Vol.3: Vedantism,
p.434.
30. CW, Vol.6: Historical
Evolution of India, p.157.
31. Ibid., pp.158-159.
32. CW, Vol.4: Aryans and
Tamilians, p.296.
33. CW, Vol.5: The East and
the West, p.536.
34. CW, Vol.4: Aryans and
Tamilians, pp.296-297.
35. CW, Vol.3: The Future of
India, p.292.
36. CW, Vol.5: The East and
the West, p.537.
37. CW, Vol.4: Aryans and
Tamilians, p.297.
38. CW, Vol.5: The East and
the West, p.455.
39. CW, Vol.2: True
Buddhism, p.508.
40. CW, Vol.4: Aryans and
Tamilians, p.297.
41. CW, Vol. 6: The
Historical Evolution of India, p.159.
42. CW, Vol.4:
43. CW, Vol.5: The East and
the West, p.534.
44. CW, Vol.4: Modern India,
p.466.
45. CW, Vol.4: Aryans and
Tamilians, pp.297-299.
46. CW, Vol.3: Buddhistic
India, p.515.
47. CW, Vol.6: Letter to
Pramadadas Mitra from Baranagore, August 7, 1889, p.208.
48. CW, Vol.4:
49. CW, Vol.5: The Abroad
and the Problems at Home, p.215..
50. CW, Vol.3: Buddhistic
India, p.519.
51. SVW, Vol.2, Chapter 9:
The Eastern Tour -I, p.66.
52. CW, Vol.3: The Mission
of the Vedanta, p.197.
53. Swami
Vivekananda, "The Method of Work in
54. CW, Vol.8: The Essence
of Religion, p.254.
55. Life, Vol.3, Chapter 104: The Further Spreading of Ideas: In Northern
India, p.197.
56. CW, Vol.1: Vedic
Religious Ideals, pp.344-345.
57. CW, Vol.3: Vedantism,
p.437.
58. CW, Vol.9: History of
the Aryan Race, p.262.
59. CW, Vol.6:
Mother-Worship, p.147.
60. CW, Vol.6: Thoughts on
the Vedas and Upanishads, p.86.
61. SVW, Vol.2, Appendix C:
Women of India, p.412.
62. CW, Vol.8: Discourses on
Jnana-Yoga VII, p.28.
63. SVW, Vol.2, Chapter 13:
The Last Battle, p.267.
64. CW, Vol.8:
65.CW,
Vol.5: On Indian Women - The Past, Present, and Future, p.230.
66. Master Chapter
22: Monasticism and Marriage, p.418.
67. CW, Vol. 5: On Indian
Women, p.229.
68. SVW, Vol.2, Chapter 13:
The Last Battle, pp.266-267.
69. CW, Vol.8: Discourses on
Jnana-Yoga VII, p.28.
70. SVW, Vol.2, Chapter 1:
The Eastern Tour - I, p.66.
71. CW, Vol.8:
72. CW, Vol.2: Ideals of
Womanhood, p.506.
73. SVW, Vol.2, Appendix C,
Women of India, pp.412-413.
74. CW, Vol.4: The Social
Conference Address, p.304.
75. CW, Vol.2: Ideals of
Womanhood, p.505.
76. CW, Vol.6: Conversation
with Sharat Chandra Chakravarty, Alambazar Math, May 1897, p.472.
77. CW, Vol.3: Buddhistic
India, pp.516-517.
78. CW, Vol.5: Letter to
Mary Hale from
79. CW, Vol.8: My Life and
80. CW, Vol.3: My Plan of
Campaign, p.211.
81. CW, Vol.8: My Life and
82. CW, Vol.6: Conversation
with Sharat Chandra Chakravarty, p.504.
83. CW, Vol.3: Bhakti-Yoga:
The Method and the Means, p.67.
84. CW, Vol.7: Conversation
with Sharat Chandra Chakravarty, coming from
PART I, SECTION 2: VEDIC CULTURE
Chapter
6: The Work Portion of the Vedas
a) The Evolution of
Thought on the Meaning of Ritual
1. The Two Parts of the
Vedas: External Ceremonial and Spiritual Knowledge
The two great divisions of
the Vedas are the Karma Kanda - the portion pertaining to doing or work, and
Jnana Kanda - the portion treating of knowing, true knowledge. (1)
The Vedas are divided into
two portions: one, the Upanishads, the philosophical portion, the other the
work portion. (2)
The work portion contains
ceremonials, rules as to eating, living, doing charitable work, etc. The
knowledge came afterwards and was enunciated by kings. (3)
One part of the Vedas deals
with karma - form and ceremonies. The other part deals with the knowledge of
Brahman and discusses religion. (4)
2. The Idea of Sacrifice
in
The idea of sacrifice in
3. Ceremonies Are
Optional and Subject to Change
The ceremonies and fruits
of the Karma Kanda are confined within the limits of the world of maya, and
therefore they have been undergoing and will undergo transformation according
to the law of change which operates through time, space and personality. (6)
The Karma Kanda includes
various sacrifices and ceremonials, of which the larger part has fallen into
disuse in the present age. (7)
The work portion consists
of various sacrifices; most of them of late have been given up as not
practicable under present circumstance, but others remain to the present day in
some shape or other. (8)
The perfect religion is the
Vedic religion. The Vedas have two parts, mandatory and optional. The mandatory
injunctions are eternally binding upon us [and] constitute the Hindu religion.
The optional ones are not so. They have been changing and been changed by
rishis to suit the times. The brahmins at one time ate
beef and marred shudras. A calf was killed to please the guest. shudras cooked for brahmins. The food cooked by a male brahmin was regarded as polluted food. But we have changed
our habits to suit the present yuga. (9)
b) The Ceremonial Vedic
Religion was Exclusively in the Hands of the Priests,
the First Messengers from the Gods to Man
We will try to give a
little idea of the work portion. It consists of rituals and hymns, various
hymns addressed to various gods. (10)
The ritual portion is
composed of ceremonies, some of them very elaborate. A great many priests are
required. The priestly function became a science by itself, owing to the
elaboration of the ceremonials. (11)
In studying all religions
you will notice the fact that whatever is old becomes holy. For instance, our
forefathers in
Then a body of men made it
their business to carry on these sacrifices. These were the priests, who
speculated on the sacrifices, and the sacrifices became everything to them. The
gods came to enjoy the fragrance of the sacrifices, and it was considered that
everything in this world could be got by the power of sacrifices. If certain
oblations were made, certain hymns chanted, certain peculiar forms of altars
made, the gods would grant everything. (12)
The work portion was
[finally] exclusively in the hands of the priests and pertained entirely to the
sense life. (13)
The foundation of priestly
power rests on intellectual strength, and not on the physical strength of arms.
Therefore, with the supremacy of the priestly power, there is a great
prevalence of literary and intellectual culture. Every human heart is always
anxious for communication with and help from the supersensuous spiritual world.
The entrance to that world is not possible for the generality of mankind; only
a few great souls who can acquire perfect control over their sense-Organs and
who are possessed with a nature preponderating with the essence of sattva guna
are able to pierce the formidable wall of matter and come face to face, as it
were, with the supersensuous - it is only they who know the workings of the
kingdom that bring messages from it and show the way to others. These great
souls are the priests, the primitive guides, leaders, and movers of human
societies.
The priest knows the gods
and communicates with them; he is therefore worshipped as a god. Leaving behind
the thoughts of the world, he has no longer to devote himself to the earning of
his bread by the sweat of his brow. The best and foremost parts of all food and
drink are due as offerings to the gods; and of these gods, the visible proxies
on earth are the priests. It is through their mouths that they partake of the
offerings. Knowingly or unknowingly, society gives the priest abundant leisure
and he can therefore get the opportunity of being meditative and of thinking
higher thoughts. Hence the development of wisdom and learning originate with
the supremacy of priestly power.
There stands the priest
between the dreadful lion - the king - on the one hand, and the terrified flock
of sheep - the people - on the other. The destructive leap of the lion is
checked by the controlling rod of spiritual power in the hands of the priest.
The flame of the despotic will of the king, maddened in the pride of his wealth
and men, is able to burn into ashes everything that comes in his way; but it is
only a word from the priest, who has neither wealth nor men behind him, but
whose sole strength is his spiritual power, that can quench the despotic royal
will, as water the fire.
With the ascendancy of the
priestly supremacy are seen the first advent of civilization, the first victory
of the divine nature over the animal, the first mastery of Spirit over matter,
and the first manifestation of the divine power which is potentially present in
this very slave of nature, this lump of flesh, this human body. The priest is
the first discriminator of Spirit from matter, the first to help bring this
world in communion with the next, the first messenger from the gods to man, and
the intervening bridge that connects the king with his subjects. The first
offshoot of universal welfare and good is nursed by his spiritual power, by his
devotion to learning and wisdom, by his renunciation, the watchword of his life
and watered even by the flow of his own lifeblood. It is therefore that in
every land it was he to whom the first worship was offered. It is therefore
that even his memory is sacred to us. (14)
c) The Vedic Doctrine of
Karma as Applied to the Vedas
1. Purification of the
Heart by External Forms
The Vedic doctrine of karma
is the same as in Judaism and all other religions, that is to say, the
purification of the mind through sacrifices and other such external means. (15)
We had our sacrifices as
the Jews had. Our sacrifices mean simply this: Here is some food that I am
going to eat, and until some portion is offered to God, it is bad; so I offer
the food. This is the pure and simple idea. (16)
All external forms of
prayer and worship are included in the Karma Kanda. These are good when
performed in a Spirit of unselfishness and not allowed to degenerate into mere
formality. They purify the heart. (17)
As sacred
charm and strength [dwells] on Aryan altars, flaming, free. (18)
2. The Duties of
Humanity and the Origins of the Dharma Shastras
The Hindu says that what is
in the Vedas is his or her duty. (19)
Dharma is based on work.
The nature of the dharmika is constant performance of action with efficiency.
Why, even the opinion of some mimamsakas [ritualists] is that those parts of
the Vedas which do not enjoin work, are not, properly speaking, Vedas at all.
(20)
The main ideas of the Karma
Kanda, which consists of the duties of humanity, the duties of the student, of
the householder, of the recluse, and the various duties of the different
stations in life, are followed more or less down to the present day. (21)
The Samhitas of Manu
and other sages [Dharma-Shastras], following the lines laid down in the Karma
Kanda, have mainly ordained rules of conduct conducive to social welfare,
according to the exigencies of time, place, and persons. (22)
The powerful men in every
country move society whatever way they like, and the rest are only like a flock
of sheep. Now the question is this: who were these men of power in
3. The Power of Words to
Produce Certain Effects if Pronounced Correctly
The Karma-Kanda [is] the
Samhitas and Brahmanas. The Brahmanas deal with sacrifice. The Samhitas are
songs composed in chhandas known as anushtup, trishtup, jagati, etc. Generally
they praise deities such as Varuna and Indra; and the question arose who were
these deities; and if any theories were raised about them, they were smashed up
by other theories, and so it went on. (24)
The work portion consists
of rituals and hymns, various hymns addressed to various gods.... Gradually the
popular idea of veneration grew round these hymns and rituals. The gods
disappeared and in their place were left the rituals. That was the curious
development in
From the time of the Vedas,
two different opinions have been held about the mantras. Yaska and others say
that the Vedas have meanings, but the ancient mantra-shastris say that they
have no meaning, and that their use consists only in uttering them in
connection with certain sacrifices, when they will surely produce effect in the
form of various material enjoyments or spiritual knowledge. The latter arises
from the utterance of the Upanishads. (26)
The strictly orthodox
believers in the Vedas, the Karma Kanda, do not believe in God, the soul, or
anything of the sort, but that we are the only beings in the universe, material
or spiritual. When they were asked what the many allusions to God in Vedas
mean, they say that they mean nothing at all; that the words properly
articulated have a magical power, a power to create certain results. Apart from
that, they have no meaning. (27)
According to the orthodox
Hindus, the Vedas are not written words at all, but they consist of the words
themselves orally spoken with the exact enunciation and intonation. This vast
mass of religion has been written and consists of thousands upon thousands of
volumes. Anyone who knows the precise pronunciation and intonation knows the
Vedas, and no one else. In ancient times, certain royal families were the
custodians of certain parts of the Vedas. The head of the family could repeat
every word of every volume he had without missing a word or an intonation.
These men had giant intellects, wonderful memories. (28)
Those old priests with
their tremendous [claims about eternal words], having dethroned the gods, took
the place of the gods. [They said], "You do not understand the power of
words. We know how to use them. We are the living gods of the world. Pay us; we
will manipulate the words, and you will get what you want. Can you pronounce
the words yourself? You cannot, for mind you, one mistake will produce the
opposite effect. You want to be rich, handsome, have a long life, a fine
husband? Only pay the priest and keep quiet! (29)
4. The Whole Universe
Was Created by the Words of the Vedas, the Only Authentic Word of God
Those who believe in the
Hindu scriptures, the Vedas, as eternal revelations of truth, are called
orthodox, and those that stand on other authorities, rejecting the Vedas, are
heterodox in India. (30)
You see the tremendous
importance that was attached to the words of the Vedas: these are the eternal
words out of which the whole universe has been produced. There cannot be any
thought without the word. Thus, whatever there is in this world is the
manifestation of thought, and thought can only manifest itself through words.
This mass of words through which the unmanifested becomes manifest, that is
what is meant by the Vedas. It follows that the external existence of
everything [depends on the Vedas, for thought] does not exist without the word.
If the word horse did not exist, none could think of a horse. [So] there
must be [an intimate relation between] thought, word, and the external object.
What are these words [in reality?] The Vedas. They do
not call it Sanskrit language at all. It is Vedic language, divine language.
Sanskrit is a degenerate form. So are all other languages. There is no language
older than the Vedic. You may ask, "Who wrote the Vedas?" They were
not written. The words are the Vedas. A word is Veda if I can pronounce it
rightly. Then it will immediately produce the [desired] effect....
This mass of Vedas exists
eternally and all the world is the manifestation of
this mass of words. Then, when the cycle ends, all this manifestation of energy
becomes finer and finer, becomes only words, then thought. In the next cycle,
first the thought changes into words and then out of those words [the whole
universe] is produced. If there is something that is not in the Vedas, it is
your delusion. It does not exist.
Numerous books upon that
subject alone defend the Vedas....[The mimamsaka
(orthodox Hindu) says]: The sound must be the beginning of creation. There must
be germ sounds like germ plasm. There cannot be any ideas without the words....
Wherever there are sensations, ideas, emotion, there must be words. The
difficulty is when they say that these four books are the Vedas, and nothing
else. The Buddhist will then stand up and say, "Ours are the Vedas. They
were revealed to us later on." That cannot be. Nature does not go on in
that way. Nature does not manifest her laws bit by bit, an inch of gravitation
today, and [another inch] tomorrow. No, every law is complete. There is no
evolution in law at all. It is [given] once and for ever. It is all nonsense,
this "new religion and better inspiration" and all that. It means
nothing. There may be a hundred thousand laws and man may know only a few
today. We discover them - that is all. (31)
The idea about the
scriptures in
The
orthodox followers of the Vedas claim that the Vedas are the only authentic
word of God in the world; that God has spoken to the world only through the
Vedas; not only that, but that the world itself exists by virtue of the Vedas. Before the world was, the Vedas
were. Everything in the world exists because it is in the Vedas. A cow exists
because the name cow is in the Vedas; that is, because the animal we
know as a cow is mentioned in the Vedas. The language of the Vedas is the
original language of God, all other languages are mere dialects and not of God.
Every word and syllable in the Vedas must be pronounced correctly, each sound
must be given its true vibration, and every departure from this rigid exactness
is a terrible sin and unpardonable.
Thus, this kind of bigotry is
predominant in the orthodox element of all religions. But this fighting
over the letter is indulged in only by
the ignorant, the spiritually blind. All who have actually attained any real
religious nature never wrangle over the form in which the different religions
are expressed. They know that the life of all religions is the same and,
consequently, they have no quarrel with anybody because he does not speak the
same tongue. (33)
5. The Vedas Determine
Morality and Cannot Be Questioned
In
[The mimamsakas] say that
you must kill such and such an animal at a certain time if the effect is to be
produced. [You may reply], "But [there is] also the sin of taking the life
of the animal; you will have to suffer for that." They say that is all
nonsense; [they say] "How do you know what is right and what is wrong?
Your mind says so? Who cares what your mind says! What nonsense you are
talking! You are setting your mind against the scriptures. If your mind says
something and the Vedas say something else, stop your mind and believe in the
Vedas. If they say killing a man is right, that is right." If you say,
"No, my conscience says [otherwise", it won't do]. The moment you
believe in any book as the eternal word, as sacred, no more can you
question.... It is no use comparing, because - what is the authority? There it
ends. [They say], "If you think something is not right, go and get it right according to the Vedas." (35)
This is Indian orthodoxy:
the Vedas were not written by anybody, they were eternally coexistent with God.
God is infinite. So is knowledge; and through this knowledge God created this
world. Their idea of ethics is [that a thing is good] because the law says so.
Everything is bounded by that book - nothing can go beyond that, because the
knowledge of God - you cannot go beyond that....
You quote a passage from
the Vedas - "That is not good," you say. "Why?" "There
is a positive evil injunction" - the same as you see in the Old Testament.
There are a number of things in all old books, curious ideas which we would not
like in our present day. You say, "This doctrine is not at all good; why,
it shocks my ethics!" [The orthodox would reply]: "How did you get
your idea? Merely by your own thought? Get out! If it is ordained by God, what right have you to question? When the Vedas say, 'Do not do
this, this is immoral', and so on, you no more have the right to question at
all." (36)
d) The Doctrine of
Qualification of Understanding the Vedas Made Slaves of Humanity
There is another idea in
philosophy which is according to your modern ideas: humanity is a slave of
nature, and slave eternally has to remain. We call it karma. Karma means law,
and it applies everywhere. Everything is bound by karma.
"Is there no way
out?"
"No! Remain slaves all
through the years - fine slaves. We will manipulate the words so that you will
only have the good and not the bad side of all - if you will pay [us]
enough." That was the ideal of the mimsakas.
These are the ideals which
are popular throughout the ages. The vast mass of humankind
are never thinkers. Even if they try to think, the [effect of the] vast
mass of superstitions on them is terrible. The moment they weaken, one blow
comes and the backbone breaks into twenty pieces. They can only be moved by
lures and threats. They can never move of their own accord. They must be
frightened, horrified or terrorized - and they are your slaves for ever. They
have nothing else to do but to pay and obey. Everything else is done by the
priest.... How much easier religion becomes! You see, you have nothing to do.
Go home and sit quietly. Somebody is doing the whole thing for you. Poor, poor
animals! (37)
With all of my respect for
the rishis of yore, I cannot but denounce their method in instructing the
people. They always enjoined on them to do certain things but took care never
to explain to them the reason for it. This method was pernicious to the very
core; and instead of enabling men to attain the end, it laid upon their
shoulders a mass of meaningless nonsense. Their excuse for keeping the end
hidden from view was that the people could not have understood their real
meaning even if they had presented it to them, not being worthy recipients. This
doctrine of adhikarvada [special rights and privileges] is the outcome of pure
selfishness. They knew that by this enlightenment on their special subject they
would lose their superior position of instructors to the people. Hence their endeavor to support this theory. If you consider
a man too weak to receive these lessons, you should try the more to teach and
educate him; you should give him the advantage of more teaching, instead of
less, to train his intellect, so as to enable him to comprehend the more subtle
problems. These advocates of adhikarvada ignored the tremendous fact of the
infinite possibilities of the human soul. Every man is capable of receiving
knowledge if it is imparted in his own language. A teacher who cannot convince
others should weep on account of his own inability to teach the people in their
own language, instead of cursing them and dooming them to live in ignorance and
superstitions, setting up the plea that the higher knowledge is not for them.
Speak out the truth boldly, without any fear that it will puzzle the weak.
People are selfish; they do not want others to come up to the same level of
their knowledge for fear of losing their own privilege and prestige over
others. Their contention is that the knowledge of the highest spiritual truths
will bring about confusion the understanding of weak-minded people. (38)
Cross reference to:
Gita 3.26
e) When the Book Becomes
God, the Growth of Humanity Is Stunted
You find that in every
country the book becomes God. There are sects in India that believe that God
incarnates and becomes human, but even God incarnate as a human being must
conform to the Vedas; and if his or her teachings do not so conform, they will
not take him or her. Buddha is worshipped by the Hindus, but if you say to them,
" If you worship Buddha, why don't you take his
teachings?", they will say, "Because the Buddhists deny the
Vedas." Such is the meaning of book-worship.....
People do not want anything
new if it is not in the Vedas or the Bible. It is a case of nerves; when you
hear a new and striking thing, you are startled; or, when you see a new thing,
you are startled; it is constitutional. It is much more so with thoughts. The
mind has been running in ruts, and to take up a new idea is too much of a
strain; so the idea has to be put near the ruts and then we slowly take it. It
is good policy, but bad morality. (39)
The glory of human beings
is that they are thinking beings. It is the nature of humans to think and
therein they differ from animals. I believe in reason and in following reason,
having seen enough of the evils of authority, for I was born in a country where
they have gone to the extreme of authority.
The Hindus believe that the
creation has come out of the Vedas. How do you know there is a cow? Because the word cow is in the Vedas. How do you know
there is a man outside? Because the word man is there.
If it had not been, there would have been no man outside. That is what they
say. Authority with a vengeance! And it is not studied as I have studied it;
but some of the most powerful minds have taken it up and spun out wonderful
logical theories round it. They have reasoned it out, and there it stands - a
whole system of philosophy; and thousands of the brightest intellects have been
dedicated through thousands of years to the working out of this theory. Such
has been the power of authority, and great are the dangers thereof. It stunts
the growth of humanity, and we must not forget that we want growth. Even in all
relative truth, more than the truth itself we want the exercise. (40)
References
1. CW, Vol.8: Discourses on
Jnana-Yoga VII, p.24.
2. CW, Vol.1: The Gita I,
p.447.
3. CW, Vol.9: The Gita,
p.274
4. CW, Vol.7: Inspired
Talks, July 6, 1895, p.33.
5. CW, Vol.9: History of the
Aryan Race, pp. 262-263.
6. CW, Vol.6: Hinduism and
Shri Ramakrishna, p.182.
7. CW, Vol.3: Vedanta in Its
Application to Indian Life, pp.228-229.
8. CW, Vol.3: Vedantism,
p.119.
9. Sankari Prasad Basu,
"Swami Vivekananda in
10. CW, Vol.1: The Gita I,
p.447.
11. Ibid.
12. CW, Vol.2: Realisation,
pp.159-160.
13 CW, Vol.9: The Gita,
p.274
14. CW, Vol.4: Modern India,
pp.452-454.
15. CW, Vol.6: Letter to
Swami Akhandananda from Ghazipur, February 1890, p.226.
16. CW, Vol.8: Hindus and
Christians, p.209.
17. CW, Vol.8: Discourses on
Jnana-Yoga VII, p.25.
18. CW, Vol.6: A
Benediction, p.178.
19. CW, Vol.1: Karma-Yoga,
Chapter 4: What Is Duty?, p.63.
20. CW, Vol.5: The East and
the West, p.449.
21. CW, Vol.3: Vedantism,
p.119.
22. CW, Vol.6: Hinduism and
Shri Ramakrishna, p.183.
23. CW, Vol.5: The East and
the West, p.461.
24. CW, Vol.3:Vedantism, pp.435-436.
25. CW, Vol.1: The Gita I,
p.447.
26. CW, Vol.7: On Mantra and
Mantra-Chaitanya, p.408.
27. CW, Vol.9: The Gita – I,
p.277.
28. Ibid.
29. CW, Vol.1: The Gita I,
pp.449-450.
30. CW, Vol.2: The Atman,
p.238.
31. CW, Vol.1: The Gita I,
pp. 447-449.
32. CW, Vol.3: Buddhistic
India, p.513.
33. CW, Vol.6: Vedanta and
Christianity, p.47.
34. CW, Vol.2: Realisation,
p.169.
35. CW, Vol.1: The Gita I,
pp.452-453.
36. CW, Vol.3: Buddhistic
India, pp.513-514.
37. CW, Vol.1: The Gita I,
pp.450- 451.
38. CW, Vol.5: The Evils of
Adhikarvada, pp. 262-264.
39. CW, Vol.4: Addresses on
Bhakti-Yoga: The Chief Symbols, pp. 42-43.
40. CW, Vol.2: Practical
Vedanta II, pp.336-337.
BOOK I: THE ORIGIN AND SIGNIFICANCE OF THE VEDAS AND VEDANTA
Section 3: The Historical Roots of the Vedanta
Chapter 7: The Emergence of Vedanta, the Spiritual Gist and
Goal of the Vedas
Chapter 8: The Struggle to Establish the
Chapter 9: The Sources of Authority in Vedanta
PART I, SECTION 3: THE HISTORICAL ROOTS OF THE VEDANTA
Chapter 7: The Emergence of Vedanta, the Spiritual Gist and
Goal of the Vedas
a) The Crystallization
of Religion in
1. The Oppression of
Vedic Society by Regulations and Priestly Power
The work portion… pertained
entirely to the sense life. It taught to do good works and that one might go to
heaven and enjoy eternal happiness. Anything, in fact, that one might want
could be provided for one by the work or ceremonials. It provided for all
classes of people, good and bad. Nothing could be obtained through the
ceremonials except by the intercession of the priests. So, if one wanted
anything, even if it was to have an enemy killed, all one had to do was to pay
the priest and the priest, through these ceremonials, would procure the desired
results. It was, therefore, in the interests of the priest that the ceremonial
portion of the Vedas should be preserved. By it they had their living. They
consequently did all in their power to preserve that portion intact. Many of
these ceremonials were very complicated, and it took years to perform some of
them. (1)
Society [was] so oppressed
by regulations, [and] the power was in the hands of the priests. In the social
scale, the highest caste is [that of ] the priest, and
that being a business - I do not know any other word - that is why I use the
word priest. It is not in the same sense as in [the
Now, the power of the
priests increased tremendously. (2)
The priest naturally said
to himself, "Why should I part with the power that has made the devas [gods] subservient to me, has given me mastery
over physical and mental illnesses, and has gained for me the service of
ghosts, demons, and other unseen spirits? I have dearly bought this power by
the price of extreme renunciation. Why should I give to others that, to get which
I had to give up my wealth, name, fame - in short, all my earthly comforts and
happiness? Again, that power is entirely mental. And how many opportunities are
there of keeping it a perfect secret! Entangled in this wheel of circumstances,
human nature becomes what it inevitably would; being used to practice constant
self-concealment, it becomes a victim of extreme
selfishness and hypocrisy and at last succumbs to the poisonous consequences
which they bring in their train. In time, the reaction of this very desire to
concealment rebounds upon oneself. All knowledge, all wisdom is almost lost for
want of proper exercise and diffusion, and what little remains is thought to
have been obtained from some supernatural source; and therefore, far from
making fresh efforts to go in for originality and gain knowledge of new
sciences, it is considered useless and futile to attempt even to improve the
remnants of the old by cleansing them of their corruptions. Thus lost to former
wisdom, the former indomitable Spirit of self-reliance, the priest, now
glorifying himself merely in the name of his forefathers, vainly struggles to
preserve untarnished for himself the same glory, the same privilege, the same
veneration, and the same supremacy as was enjoyed by his great forefathers. (3)
2. The Tremendous Mass
of Rituals Almost Killed the True Religion
As the spiritual ideas [of
the Vedas] progressed an arithmetical progression, so
the ritualistic ideas progressed in geometrical progression. The old
superstitions... developed into a tremendous mass of rituals, which grew and
grew until it almost killed Hindu life. And it is still there, it has got hold
of and permeated every portion of our life and made us born slaves. Yet, at the
same time, we find a fight against this advance of ritual from the very
earliest days. The one objection raised there is this: that ceremonials,
dressing at certain times, eating in a certain way, and shows and mummeries of
religion like these are only external religion, because you are satisfied with the
senses and do not want to go beyond them. This is a tremendous difficulty with
us, with every human being. At best, when we want to hear of spiritual things
our standard is the senses; or someone hears about philosophy, about God, and
transcendental things, and after hearing about them for day, asks: after all,
how much money will they bring, how much sense-enjoyments will they bring? For
his enjoyment is only in the senses, quite naturally. But that satisfaction in
the senses, say our sages, is one of the causes which have spread the veil
between the truth and ourselves. (4)
In the Vedic ashwamedha
sacrifice worse things [than marrying off girls before puberty] would be
done.... All the Brahmanas mention them, and all the commentators admit them to
be true. (5)
Before [the orthodox
priests] came, the popular ideas of a God ruling the universe, and that man was
immortal, were in existence. But there they stopped. It was thought that
nothing more could be known. Here came the daring of the expounders of Vedanta.
They knew that a religion meant for children is not good for thinking men, that
there is something more to humanity and God....
The crystallization of
religion in
[When] the priests, even at
that dawn of history [were putting] most of their energies into elaborating
rituals; and when the nation began to find the load of ceremonies and lifeless
rituals too heavy - came the first philosophical speculations, and the royal
race was the first to break through the maze of killing rituals. (7)
b) The Struggle against
the Spiritual Tyranny of the Priesthood
1. The Great Conflict
between the Conservative Priests and the Kings Who Promulgated the Philosophic
Portion of the Vedas
The priests differentiated
themselves into a separate caste. The second caste was the caste of the
kings.... All the Upanishadic philosophy is from the brains of kings, not
priests. (8)
The Vedic priests based
their superior strength on the knowledge of the sacrificial mantras. By the
power of these mantras, the devas are made to come
down from their heavenly abodes, accept the drink and food offerings and grant
the prayers of the yajamanas [the men who perform sacrifices]. The kings as
well as their subjects are, therefore, looking up to these priests for welfare
during their earthly life. Raja soma [ King
soma - the Vedic name for the soma plant] is worshipped by the priests and
is made to thrive by the power of his mantras. As such, the
devas whose favorite food is the juice of the soma plant is offered in
oblation by the priest, are always kind to him and bestow his desired boons.
Thus strengthened by divine grace, he defies all human opposition; for what can
the power of rituals do against that of the gods? Even the king, the center of
all earthly power, is a supplicant at this door. A kind look from him is the
greatest help; his mere blessing a tribute to the state, preeminent above
everything else.
Now commanding the king to
be engaged in affairs fraught with death and ruin, now standing by him as his
fastest friend, with kind and wise counsels, now spreading the net of subtle,
diplomatic statesmanship in which the king is easily caught - the priest is
seen oftentimes to make the royal power totally subservient to him. Above all,
the worst fear is in the knowledge that the name and fame of the royal
forefathers and of himself and his family lie at the mercy of the priest's pen.
He is the historian. The king might have paramount power; attaining great glory
in his reign, he might prove himself as the father and mother in one to his
subjects; but if the priests are not appeased, the sun of his glory goes down
with his last breath for ever; all his worth and usefulness deserving of
universal approbation are lost in the great womb of time, like the fall of the
gentle dew in the ocean. Others, who inaugurated the huge sacrifices lasting
many years, the performers of the ashwamedha and so on - those who showered,
like incessant rain in the rainy season, uncounted wealth on the priests -
their names, thanks to the grace of the priests, are emblazoned in the pages of
history. The name of Pryadasi Dharmashoka [the Buddhist emperor], the beloved
of the gods, is nothing but a name in the priestly world, while Janamejaya, the
son of Parikshit [a performer of the snake sacrifice], is a household word in
every Hindu family. (9)
Ancient
On the one had, the
priesthood stood between the lawless social tyranny of the princes over the
masses, whom the kshatriyas declared to be their legal food. On the other hand,
the kshatriya power was the one potent force which
struggled with any success against the spiritual tyranny of the priesthood and
the ever-increasing chain of ceremonials which they were forging to bind down
the people with. (10)
Between the kings, who
promulgated that philosophic portion of the Vedas, and the priests, a great
conflict arose. The priests had the people on their side because they had all
the utility which appealed to the popular mind. The kings had all the
spirituality and none of the economic element; but as they were powerful and
the rulers of the nation, the struggle was a hard and bitter one. The kings
gradually gained a little ground, but their ideas were too elevated for the
masses, so the ceremonial or work portion always had the mass of the people
Always remember this - whenever a religious system gains ground with the people
at Large, it has a strong economic side to it. It is the economic side to a
religion that finds lodgement with the people at Large, and never its spiritual
or philosophic side. If you should preach the grandest philosophy in the
streets for a year, you would not have a handful of followers; but if you could
preach the most arrant nonsense with an economic element, you would have the
whole people with you. (11)
There [runs] an economic
struggle through every religious one. This animal called human has some
religious influence, but is guided by economy. Individuals are guided by
something else, but the mass of humankind never make a move unless economy is
[involved]. You may [preach a religion that may not be perfect in every
detail], but if there is an economic background [to it], and you have the most
[ardent champions] to preach it, you can convince a whole country....
For the religion of the
Upanishads to be popularized was a hard task. Very little economy is there, but
tremendous altruism. (12)
2. The Renunciation of
World-Weary Kings Gave Them New and Stronger Life to Replace the Decaying
Priestly Power
According to the law of
nature, whenever there is an awakening of a new and stronger life, there it
tries to conquer and take the place of the old and decaying. Nature favors the
dying out of the unfit and the survival of the fittest.....
That renunciation,
self-control and asceticism of the priest which, during his ascendancy were
devoted to the pursuit of earnest researches of truth, were on the eve of his
decline employed anew and spent solely in the accumulation of objects of
self-gratification and in the extension of privileged authority over others.
That power, the centralization of which in himself
gave him all honor and worship, had now been dragged down from its high,
heavenly position to the lowest abyss of hell. Having lost sight of the goal,
drifting aimless, the priestly power was entangled, like the spider, in the
webs spun by itself. The chain that had been forged
from generation to generation with the greatest care to be put on others' feet
was now tightened round its own in a thousand coils, and was thwarting its own
movement in hundreds of ways. Caught in the endless thread of the net of
infinite rites, ceremonies, and customs, which it spread on all sides as
external means for the purification of the body and mind, with a view to
keeping society in the iron grasp of these innumerable bonds - the priestly
power, thus hopelessly entangled from head to foot, was then asleep in despair!
(13)
On the other side, the king
was like the lion; in him were present both the good and the evil propensities
of the lord of beasts. Never for a moment were his fierce nails held back from
tearing to pieces the heart of innocent animals, living on herbs and grass, to
allay his thirst for blood when occasion arises; again, the poet says, though
himself stricken with old age and dying from hunger, the lion never kills the
weakest fox that throws itself into his arms for protection.
If the subject classes, for
a moment, stand as impediments in the way of the gratification of the senses of
the royal lion, their death knell is inevitably tolled; if they humbly bow down
to his commands, they are perfectly safe. Not only so. Not to speak of ancient
days, even in modern times, no society can be found in any country where the
effectiveness of individual self-sacrifice for the good of the many and of the
oneness of purpose and endeavor actuating every member of the society for the
common good of the whole have been fully realized. Hence the
necessity of kings, who are the creations of society itself. They are
the centers where all the forces of society, otherwise loosely scattered about,
are made to converge, and from which they start and course through the body
politic and animate society.
As during the brahminical
supremacy, at the first stage is the awakening of the first impulse for search
after knowledge and later the continual and later the careful fostering of the
growth of that impulse, still in its infancy - so, during the kshatriya
supremacy, a strong desire for pleasure pursuits made its appearance at the
first stage and later have sprung up inventions and developments of arts and
sciences as the means of gratification. Can the king, in the height of his
glory, hide his proud head within the lowly cottages of the poor? Or can the
common good of his subjects ever minister to his royal appetite with
satisfaction?....
It was in India, again,
that the kings, having enjoyed for some time earthly pleasures to their full
satisfaction, were stricken at the latter part of their lives with heavy
world-weariness, as is sure to follow on extreme sense-gratification; and thus
being satiated with worldly pleasures, they retired in their old age into
secluded forests and there began to contemplate the deep problems of life. The
results of such renunciation and deep meditation were marked by a strong
dislike for cumbrous rites and ceremonials and an extreme devotion to the
highest spiritual truths which we find embodied in the Upanishads, Gita, and
the Jain and Buddhist scriptures. Here also was a great conflict between the
priestly and the royal powers. Disappearance of the elaborate rites and
ceremonials meant a death-blow to the priests' profession. Therefore,
naturally, at all times and in every country, the priests gird up their loins
and try their best to preserve the ancient customs and usages, while on the
other side stand in opposition kings like Janaka, backed by kshatriya prowess
as well as spiritual power….
As the priest is busy about
centralizing all knowledge and learning at a common center - to wit, himself -
so the king is ever up and doing in collecting all the earthly powers and
focusing them in a central point, i.e. his own self. Of course, both are
beneficial to society. At one time they are both needed for the common good of
society, but that is only at its infant stage. But if attempts be made, when
society has passed its infant stage and reached its vigorous youthful
condition, to clothe it by force with the dress which suited it in its infancy
and keep it bound within narrow limits, then either it bursts the bonds by
virtue of its own strength and tries to advance; or, where it fails to do so,
it retraces its footsteps and by slow degrees returns to its primitive,
uncivilized condition. (14)
3. The Kings Were More
Universal in Their Teachings, While the Priests Were Exclusive
On the one hand, the
majority of the priests, impelled by economic considerations, were bound to
defend that form of religion which made their existence a necessity of society
and assigned them the highest place in the scale of caste; on the other hand,
the king-caste, whose strong right hand guarded and guided the nation and who
now found itself as leading the higher thoughts also, were loath to give up the
first place to men who only knew how to conduct a ceremonial. (15)
Actual power was in the hands
of the second caste, the kingly caste. Not only so - they have produced all of
our great thinkers, and not the brahmins. It is
curious. All our great prophets, almost without one exception, belong to the
kingly caste. The great man
In various Upanishads we
find that the Vedanta philosophy was not the outcome of meditation in the
forests only, but that the very best parts of it were thought out and expressed
by brains which were busiest in the everyday affairs of life. We cannot
conceive of any man busier than an absolute monarch, a man who is ruling over
millions of people; and yet, somehow, some of these rulers were deep thinkers.
(17)
Brahmins and kshatriyas
have always been our teachers, and most of the Upanishads were written by
kshatriyas, while the ritualistic portions of the Vedas came from the brahmins. Most of our great teachers throughout
They speak of the
meat-eating kshatriya. Meat or no meat, it is they who
are the fathers of all that is noble and beautiful in Hinduism. Who wrote the
Upanishads? Who was Rama? Who was
c) The Ideal of
Enjoyment Is Subject to Change, but the Spiritual Ideal Is the Goal of the
Vedas
In the latter part of the
Vedas you see the highest, the spiritual. In the early portions there is the
crude part. (20)
The ideal of the first part
of the Vedas is entirely different from the ideal of the other part, the
Upanishads. The ideal of the first part coincides with [that of] all other
religions of the world except Vedanta. The ideal is enjoyment here and
hereafter - man and wife, husband and children. Pay your dollar, and the priest
will give you a certificate, and you will have a happy time afterwards in
heaven. You will find all your people there and have this merry-go-round
without end. No tears, no weeping - only laughing. No stomach-ache, but yet
eating. No headache, but yet [parties]. That, considered the priests, was the
highest goal of humanity. (21)
Therefore, in the second
portion - the Jnana Kanda - we find there is an altogether different procedure.
the first search was in external nature for the truths
of the universe; it was an attempt to get the solution of the deep problems of
life from the material world. (22)
The knowledge portion came
after the work portion and was promulgated exclusively by kings. It was called
the knowledge of kings. The great kings had no use for the work portion
with all its frauds and superstitions and did all in their power to destroy it.
This knowledge consisted of a knowledge of God, the
soul, the universe, etc. These kings had no use for the ceremonials of the
priests, their magical works, etc. They pronounced it all humbug; and when the
priests came to them for gifts, they questioned them about God, the soul, etc.;
and as the priests could not answer such questions, they were sent away. The
priests went back to their fathers to inquire about the things the kings had
asked them, but could learn nothing about them, so they came back again to the
kings and became their disciples. [Cha. Up.,
5.3.17] Very little of the ceremonials are followed today. They have been
mostly done away with, and only a few of the more simple ones are followed
today. (23)
The ceremonies and the
fruits of the Karma Kanda are confined within the limits of the world of maya,
and therefore they have been undergoing and will undergo transformation
according to the law of change which operates through time, space and
personality. Social laws and customs likewise, being based on this Karma Kanda,
have been changing and will continue to change hereafter. (24)
The spiritual portion of
our [Vedantic] religion is in the... Jnana Kanda, the Vedanta - the end of the
Vedas - the gist, the goal of the Vedas. (25)
d) The Upanishads Are
Diametrically Opposite to the Karma-Kanda in all Their Conclusions
The Upanishads are
diametrically opposite [to the Karma Kanda] in all their conclusions:
1. God, Karma and
Sacrifice
First of all, the
Upanishads believe in God, the creator of the universe, its ruler. You find later
on [the idea of a benign
The second idea, that you are all bound by the law of karma the Upanishads
admit, but they declare the way out. The goal of man is to go beyond law. And
enjoyment can never be the goal, because enjoyment can only be in nature.
In the third place, the
Upanishads condemn all the sacrifices and say that that is mummery. That may
give you all you want, but it is not desirable, for the more you get, the more
you [want], and you run round and round in a circle eternally, never getting to
the end - enjoying and weeping. Such a thing as eternal happiness is impossible
anywhere. It is only a child's dream. The same energy becomes joy and
sorrow.... Eternal happiness and misery are a child's dream..... The other
point of divergence is: the Upanishads condemn all rituals, especially those
that involve the killing of animals. They declare those all nonsense….
2. Philosophy and
Renunciation
The Upanishads believe in
[getting things right according to the Vedas, but they have a higher standard,
too]. On the one hand they do not want to overthrow the Vedas, but on the
other, they see these animal sacrifices and the priests stealing everybody's
money. But in the psychology, they are all alike All the differences have been
in the philosophy [regarding] the nature of the soul. Has it a body and a mind?
And is the mind only a bundle of nerves? Psychology, they all take for granted,
is a perfect science. There cannot be any difference there. All the fight has
been regarding philosophy - the nature of the soul, and God, and so on. (26)
The germs of all the ideas
that were developed in the Upanishads had been taught already in the Karma
Kanda. The idea of the cosmos which all sects of Vedantists had to take for
granted, the psychology of which has formed the common basis of all the Indian
schools of thought, had been worked out already and presented before the world
[Sankhyan cosmology and psychology]. (27)
You remember that the Vedas
have two parts, the ceremonial and the knowledge portions. In time ceremonials
had multiplied and become so intricate that it was almost hopeless to
disentangle them, and so in the Upanishads we find that the ceremonials were
almost done away with, but gently, by explaining them. We see that in olden
times they had these oblations and sacrifices; then the philosophers came and,
instead of snatching away the symbols from the hands of the ignorant, instead
of taking the negative position, which we unfortunately find so general in
modern reforms, they gave them something to take their place. "Here is the
symbol of fire", they said. "Very good! But
here is another symbol, the earth. What a grand, great symbol! Here is this
little temple, but the whole universe is a temple; a man can worship anywhere.
There are the peculiar figures that men draw on the earth, and there are the
altars, but here is the greatest of altars, the living, conscious human body;
and to worship at this altar is far higher than the worship of any dead
symbols." (28)
Then another great
difference between the priests and the Upanishads: the Upanishads say renounce.
That is the test of everything. Renounce everything. It is the creative faculty
that brings us into all this entanglement. The mind is in its own nature when
it is calm. The moment you can calm it, that [very] moment you will know the truth.
What is it that is whirling the mind? Imagination, creative
activity. Stop creation and you know the truth. All power of creation
must stop and then you know the truth at once. (29)
On the other hand, the
priests are all for [creation]. Imagine a species of life [in which there is no
creative activity. It is unthinkable]. The people had to have a plan [of
evolving a stable society. A system of rigid selection was adopted. For
instance,] no people who are blind and halt can be marred. [As a result], you
will find so much less deformity [in
If the performance of
yajnas is the cornerstone of the work portion of the Vedas, as surely is
brahmacharya the foundation of the knowledge portion. (31)
The spiritual portion of
the Vedas is specially studied by monks. (32)
Cross reference to:
Taitt. Up., 2.8.1
3. The Highest Is the
Knowledge of Brahman
The Upanishads point out
that the goal of man is neither misery nor happiness; we have to be the master of
that out of which these are manufactured. We must be masters of the situation
at the very root, as it were. (33)
The philosophical portion
denounced all work, however good, and all pleasure
such as loving and kissing wife, husband or children, as useless. According to
this doctrine, all good works and pleasures are nothing but foolishness and, in
their very nature, impermanent. "All this must come to an end sometime, so
end it now; it is vain" - so say the philosophical portion of the Upanishads.
It claims that all the pain in the world is caused by ignorance; therefore the
cure is knowledge. This idea of one being held down fast by past karma or work, is all nonsense. No matter how dense one may be, or
how bad, one ray of light will dissipate it all. A bale of cotton, however
Large, will be utterly destroyed by one spark. If a room has been dark for
untold ages, a lamp will end it all. So with each soul, however benighted it
may be, it is not absolutely bound down by its part
karma to work for ages to come. "One ray of light will reveal to him his
true nature." (34)
The knowledge portion deals
with the knowledge of Brahman and discusses religion. The Vedas in this part
teach of the Self; and because they do, their knowledge is approaching real
knowledge. Knowledge of the Absolute depends upon no book, nor upon anything; it is absolute in itself. (35)
Cross reference to:
Mund. Up., 1.1.5
4. Denial of the
Ultimate Authority of Any Book
The farthest that any
religion can see is the existence of a spiritual entity. So no religion can
teach beyond that point. In every religion there is the essential truth and the
non-essential casket in which this jewel lies. Believing in the Jewish book or
the Hindu book is non-essential. Circumstances may change, the receptacle is
different, but the central truth remains. The essentials being the same, the
educated people of every community retain the essentials. (36)
There is a place in the
Vedas [even] for superstition, for ignorance. The whole secret is to find out
the proper place for everything. (37)
One peculiarity of the
Vedas is that they are the only scriptures that again and again declare that
you must go beyond them. The Vedas say that they were written just for the
child-mind, and when you have grown, you must go beyond them. (38)
The rest - all these talks
and reasonings and philosophies and dualisms and monisms, and even the Vedas
themselves are but preparations, secondary things. The other is primary. (39)
Books are useless to us
until our own book opens; then all books are good so far as they confirm our
book. (40)
Our own realization is
beyond the Vedas because even they depend upon that. The highest Vedanta is the
philosophy of the Beyond. (41)
In spite of [the idea that
things exist because they are in the Vedas], look at the boldness of these
sages who proclaimed that the truth is not found by much study of the Vedas.
(42)
Do you find in any other
scripture such a bold assertion as this: not even by the study of the Vedas
will you reach the Atman? (43)
The glory of the Vedic
scriptures is unique in the history of religion, not merely because of their
great antiquity, but vastly more for the fact that they alone amongst all the
authoritative books of the world, warned man that he must go beyond all books.
(44)
Cross reference to:
Ka. Up., 1.2.23
Mund. Up., 1.1.5
Taitt. Up., 2.4, 9
5. Truth Is beyond All
System and Is Based on the Nature of Humanity Itself
Personally, I take as much
of the Vedas as agrees with reason. Parts of the Vedas are apparently
contradictory. They are not considered inspired in the Western sense of the
word, but as the sum total of the knowledge of God, omniscience, which we
possess. But to say that only those books which we call the Vedas contain this
knowledge is mere sophistry. We know it is shared in varying degrees by the
scriptures of all sects. Manu says that only that part of the Vedas which
agrees with reason is the Vedas; and many of our philosophers have taken this
view. (45)
There are truths that are
true only in a certain line, in a certain directions, under certain
circumstances, and for certain times - those that are founded on the
institutions of the times. There are other truths which are based on the nature
of humanity itself and which must endure so long as humanity itself endures.
These are the truths that alone can be universal; and in spite of all the
changes that have come to India as to our social surroundings, our methods of
dress, our manner of eating, our mode of worship - these universal truths of
the Shrutis, the marvelous Vedantic ideas, stand out in their own sublimity.
(46)
It is true that we have
created a system of religion in India which we believe to be the only rational
religious system extant; but our belief in its rationality rests upon its
all-inclusion of the searchers after God, it absolute charity towards all forms
of worship, and its eternal receptivity of those ideas tending towards the
evolution of God in the universe. We admit the imperfections of our system,
because the Reality must always be beyond all system; and in this admission lies the portent and promise of an eternal growth. Sects,
ceremonies, and books, so far as they are the means of man's realizing his own
nature, are all right; when he has realized that, he gives up everything.
"I reject the Vedas!" is the last word of the Vedanta philosophy.
Ritual, hymns and scriptures through which he has traveled to freedom vanish for
him. (47)
References
1. CW, Vol.9: The Gita,
pp.274-275
2. CW, Vol.3: Buddhistic
India, pp.518-519.
3. CW, Vol.4: Modern India,
pp.455-456.
4. CW, Vol.1: Vedic
Religious Ideals, pp. 354-355.
5. CW, Vol.6: Letter to
Swami Brahmananda, 1895, p.318.
6.CW, Vol.8: The Claims of Vedanta on the
Modern World, p.232.
7. CW, Vol.6: The Historical
Evolution of India, pp.159-160.
8. CW, Vol.1: The Gita I,
p.454.
9. CW, Vol.4: Modern India,
pp.438-439.
10. CW, Vol.4: Reply to the
Address of the Maharaja of Khetri, p.325.
11. CW, Vol.9: The Gita I,
p.276.
12. CW, Vol.1: The Gita I,
pp.454-455.
13. CW, Vol.4: Modern India,
p.456.
14. Ibid., pp.458-461.
15. CW, Vol.6: The
Historical Evolution of India, p.160.
16. CW, Vol.3: Buddhistic
India, p.520.
17. CW, Vol.2: Practical
Vedanta I, p.292.
18. CW, Vol.5: A Discussion,
p.309.
19. CW, Vol.4: What We
Believe In, p.359.
20. CW, Vol.3: Buddhistic
India, p.514.
21. CW, Vol.1: The Gita I,
p.450.
22. CW, Vol.3: The Vedanta,
pp.393-394.
23. CW, Vol.9: The Gita,
p.275.
24. CW, Vol.6: Hinduism and
Shri Ramakrishna, p.182.
25. CW. Vol.3: Vedantism,
p.119.
26. CW, Vol.1: The Gita I,
pp.451-453.
27. CW, Vol.3: The Vedanta,
p.395.
28. CW, Vol.2: Practical
Vedanta II, p.314.
29. CW, Vol.1: The Gita I,
p.453.
30. Ibid., p.454.
31. CW, Vol.4: The Social
Conference Address, p.304.
32. CW, Vol.1: Buddhism, the
Fulfillment of Hinduism, p.21.
33. CW, Vol.1: The Gita I,
p.452.
34. CW, Vol.9: The Gita,
pp.275-276.
35. CW, Vol.7: Inspired
Talks, July 6, 1895, pp.33-34.
36. CW, Vol.8: Christianity
in
37. CW, Vol.1: The Gita I,
p.457.
38. CW, Vol.5: Questions and
Answers - II, p.311.
39. CW, Vol.3: The Sages of
India, pp.254-255.
40. CW, Vol.7: Inspired
Talks, August 2, 1895, p.89.
41. Ibid.,
July 6, 1895, pp.34-35
42. CW, Vol.2: Realisation,
p.169.
43. CW, Vol.3: The Work
before Us, p.283.
44. Master, Chapter
17: The Swami's
45. CW, Vol.8: The Essence
of Religion, p.255.
46. CW, Vol.3: The Vedanta,
p.395.
47. CW, Vol.8: The Essence
of Religion, pp.254-255.
Chapter 8: The Struggle to Establish the Kingdom of the
Upanishads
a) The Revolutionizing
of Indian Society through Religion
In the Vedic and adjoining
periods the royal power could not manifest itself on account of the grinding
pressure of the priestly power. `(1)
The Upanishads had very
little kingdom, although they were discovered by kings who held all the royal
power in their hands. So the struggle... began to be fiercer. (2)
It is the evidence of
history that at a certain time every society attains its manhood, when a strong
conflict ensues between the ruling power and the common people. The life of
society, its expansion and civilization, depend on its victory or defeat in
this conflict.
Such changes,
revolutionizing society, have been happening in India again and again, only
[there] they have been effected in the name of religion, for religion is the
life of India, religion is the language of that country, the symbol of all its
movements. (3)
[A Vedantic Sanskrit
masque, Prabodha Chandrodaya, expresses the truth that we must] feed
religion and help it grow, and it will become a giant. King Desire and King
Knowledge fought, and just as the latter was about to be defeated, he was
reconciled to Queen Upanishad, and a child was born to him - Realization -
which saved the victory for him. (4)
The Charvaka, the Jain, the
Buddhist, Shankara, Ramanuja, Kabir, Nanak, Chaitanya, the Brahmo-Samaj, the
Arya Samaj - of all of these, and similar sects, the wave of religion, foaming,
thundering, surging, breaks in the front, while in the rear follows the
filling-up of social wants. If all desires can be accomplished by the mere
utterance of some meaningless syllables, then who will exert himself to go through
difficulties to work out the fulfillment of his desires? If this malady enters
into the entire body of any social system, then that society becomes slothful
and indisposed to any exertion, and soon hastens to its ruin. Hence, the slashing sarcasm of the Charvakas, who believed only in
the reality of sense-perceptions and nothing beyond. What could have
saved Indian society from the ponderous burden of omniferous ritualistic
ceremonialism with its animal and other sacrifices, which all but crushed the
very life out of it, except the Jain revolution which took its strong stand
exclusively on chaste morals and philosophical truth? Or without the Buddhist
revolution what could have delivered the suffering millions of the lower
classes from the violent tyrannies of the influential higher castes? When, in
course of time, Buddhism declined and its extremely pure and moral character
gave place to equally bad, unclean and immoral practices, when Indian society
trembled under the infernal dance of the various races of barbarians who were
allowed into the Buddhistic fold by virtue of its all-embracing Spirit of
equality - then Shankara, and later Ramanuja, appeared on the scene and tried
their best to bring society back to its former days of glory and to re-establish
its lost status. (5)
b) The Beginning of the
Triangular Fight between Ceremonialism, Philosophy and Materialism
1. The Charvakas, Who
Upheld Materialism as the Highest Goal of Life
[Besides the priests and
the kings engaged in struggle], there were others - recruited from both the
priests and the king castes - who ridiculed equally the
ritualizes and philosophers, declared spiritualism as a fraud and
priestcraft, and upheld the attainment of material comforts as the highest goal
of life. The people, tired of ceremonials, and wondering at the philosophers,
joined the materialists in masses. (6)
The Charvaka, or
materialist, basing his doctrine on the first part - the sacrificial portion -
of the Vedas, believed that all was matter and that there is neither a heaven
nor a hell, neither a soul nor a God. (7)
The Charvakas... preached
horrible things, the most rank, undisguised materialism, such as in the
nineteenth century they dare not openly preach. These Charvakas were allowed to
preach from temple to temple and city to city, that religion was all nonsense,
that it was priestcraft, that the Vedas were the words and writings of fools,
rogues, and demons, and that there was neither a God nor an eternal soul. If
there were a soul, why did it not come back after death, drawn by the love of
wife and child? Their idea was that, if there were a soul, it must still love
after death and want good things to eat and nice dress. Yet no one hurt these
Charvakas. (8)
[The Charvaka movement] was
the beginning of that caste question, and that triangular fight in
2.
i) The Reconciliation between the
Priests and the People Brought about by Krishna’s Eclectic Teachings
So the great struggle began
in
The first solution of the
difficulty attempted was by applying the eclecticism which, from the earliest
days, had taught the people to see in differences the same truth in various
garbs [Rig Veda 1.164.46] The great leader of this school, Krishna -
himself of royal race - and his sermon, the Gita have, after various
vicissitudes brought about by the upheavals of the Jains, the Buddhists, and
other sects, fairly established themselves a the "Prophet of India"
and the truest philosophy of life. (11)
This
ii) The Teaching of Motiveless Work
Brought a Momentary Lull in the Struggle between the Priests and the Kings
The tug of war [between the
brahmins and the kshatriyas had begun] in the earliest
periods of the history of the [Indian race], and throughout the Shrutis it can
be distinctly traced. A momentary lull came when Sri Krishna, leading the
faction of kshatriya power and of jnana, showed the
way to reconciliation. The result was the teachings of the Gita - the essence
of philosophy, of liberality, of religion. (13)
When the Gita was first
preached, there was going on a great controversy between two sects. One party
considered the Vedic yajnas and animal sacrifices and suchlike karmas to
constitute the whole of religion. The other preached that the killing of
numberless horses and cattle cannot be called religion. The people belonging to
the latter party were mostly sannyasins and followers of jnana. They believed
that the giving up of all work and the gaining of knowledge of the Self was the
only path to moksha [liberation]. By the preaching of his great doctrine of
work without motive, the author of the Gita put at rest the dispute of these
two antagonistic sects. (14)
If you are a strong man,
very good! But do not curse others who are not strong enough for you....
Everyone says, "Woe unto you people!" Who says, "Woe unto me
that I cannot help you. The people are doing all right
to the best of their ability and means and knowledge. Woe unto me that I cannot
lift them to where I am"?
So, the ceremonials,
worship of gods, and myths are all right, says
That priestly power which
began its strife for superiority with the royal power from the Vedic times and
continued it down through the ages, that hostility against the kshatra power,
Bhagavan Sri Krishna succeeded by his superhuman genius in putting a stop to,
at least for the time being, during his earthly existence. (17)
3. The Conservative
Force of the Ethical Principles and Good Works of the Jains
[Of the pre-Buddhistic
sects which took up whatever portion of the Vedas they liked], the Jains were
very moral atheists who, while rejecting the idea of a God, believed that there
is a soul, striving for more perfect development. (18)
The Jains... are a very ancient sect [who are] a conservative force in
They declared against the
validity of the scriptures of the Hindus, the Vedas. They wrote some books
themselves, and they said, "Our books are the only original books, the
only original Vedas, and the Vedas that are now going under that name have been
written by the brahmins to dupe the people."...
In their methods and
manners they were different.... By work, they mean doing good
to others. That has, of course, something in it; but mostly, as to the brahmins, work means to perform these elaborate ceremonials:
killing of cows and bulls, killing of goats and all sorts of animals, that are
taken fresh and thrown into the fire, and so on. "Now", declared the
Jains, "that is no work at all, because injuring others can never be any
good work." And they said, "This is the proof that your Vedas are
false Vedas, manufactured by the priests, because you do not mean to say that
any good book will order us [to be] killing animals and doing these things. You
do not believe it. So all this killing of animals and other things that you see
in the Vedas, they have been written by the brahmins,
because they alone are benefited. It is the priest only [who] pockets the money
and goes home. So, therefore, it is all priestcraft."
It was one of their
doctrines that there cannot be any God. "The priests have invented God
that the people may believe in God and pay them money. All nonsense! There is
no God. There is nature and there are souls, and that is all. Souls have got
entangled in this life and got round them the clothing of man you call a body.
Now, do good work."...
These Jains were the first
great ascetics, but they did some great work. "Don't injure any, and do good to all that you can, and that is all the morality and
ethics, and that is all the work there is and the rest is all nonsense - the
brahmins created that. Throw it all away." And then they went to work and
elaborated this one principle all through - and it is a most wonderful ideal:
how all that we call ethics they simply bring out from that one great principle
of non-injury and doing good. (19)
c) The Ancient Order of
Things Was Overwhelmed by the Buddha
1. The Social Wants at
the Time of Buddha
Buddhism was the rebellion
of the newly formed kshatriyas against Vedic priestcraft. (20)
The struggle [between the
priests and kings] began to be fiercer. Its culminating point came two thousand
years after [the Upanishads] in Buddhism. The seed of Buddhism is here, [in]
the ordinary struggle between the king and the priest; and [in the struggle]
all religion declined. One wanted to sacrifice religion and the other wanted to
cling to the sacrifices, the Vedic gods, etc. (21)
[After the lull cause by
the reconciliation effected by Sri Krishna], the ambition of the two classes -
brahmin and kshatriya - to be the masters of the poor and ignorant was [still]
there, and the strife once more became fierce. The meager literature that has
come down to us from that period brings to us but faint echoes of that mighty
past strife, but at last it broke out as a victory for the kshatriyas, a
victory for jnana, for liberty - and ceremonial had to go down, much of it
forever. This upheaval is what is known as the Buddhistic reformation. On the
religious side, it represented freedom from ceremonial; and on the political
side, overthrow of the priesthood by the kshatriyas.
It is a significant fact
that the two greatest men ancient
Though tension [in the
triangular fight between ceremonials, philosophy and materialism had been toned
down for the time being by Krishna’s teaching], it did not satisfy the social
wants which were among the causes - the claim of the king-race to stand first
in the scale of caste and the popular intolerance of priestly privilege.
The struggle [was] renewed
all along the line in the seventh century before the Christian era and finally
in the sixth, overwhelming the ancient order of things under Shakya Muni, the
Buddha. (24)
On the one hand there was
the political jealousy between the kings and priests, and then these different
dissatisfied sects [such as the Jains were] springing up everywhere. And there
was the greater problem: the vast multitudes of people wanting the same rights
as the Aryans, dying of thirst while the perennial stream of nature went
flowing by them, and no right to drink a drop of water….
In
2. Buddhism Combated Not
Only Priestcraft and Animal Sacrifice: It was the First to Break Down the Barriers of Caste
The intellectual world was
divided before Buddha came. But for a correct understanding of his religion, it
is also necessary to speak of the caste then existing.... These different
social divisions developed or degenerated into iron-bound castes and an organized
and crystallized priestcraft stood upon the necks of the nation. At this time
Buddha was born and his religion is therefore the culmination of an attempt at
religious and social reformation.
The air was full of the din
of discussion: 20,000 blind priests were trying to lead 20,000,000 blind men,
fighting amongst themselves. What was more needed at that time than for a
Buddha to preach? "Stop quarreling, throw your
books aside, and be perfect!" Buddha never fought true castes, for they
are nothing but the congregation of those of a particular natural tendency, and
they are always valuable. But Buddha fought the degenerated castes with their
hereditary privileges, and spoke to the brahmins: " True
brahmins are not greedy, nor criminal, nor angry - are you such? If not, do not
mimic the genuine, real men. Caste is a state, not an iron-bound class, and
everyone who knows and loves God is a true brahmin."
And with regard to the sacrifices, he said, "Where do the Vedas say that
sacrifices make us pure? They may please, perhaps, the angels, but they make us
no better. Hence, let off these mummeries - love God and strive to be
perfect."
Original Buddhism... was
but an attempt to combat caste and priestcraft; it was the first in the world
to stand as champion of dumb animals, the first to break down caste, standing
between human beings.(26)
Buddhism... broke the
chains of the masses. All castes and creeds alike became equal in a minute.(27)
Brahmanya power was almost
effaced from its field of work in Indian during the Jain and Buddhist
revolutions; or, perhaps, was holding its feeble stand by being subservient to
the strong, antagonistic religions. (28)
3. Buddha Broke the
Mental and Spiritual Bonds of Men by Preaching Vedanta to the Whole World
Buddha was the triumph in
the struggle that had been going on between the priest and the prophets in
At last, one man could bear
it no more. He had the brain, the power and the heart - a heart as infinite as
the broad sky. He felt how the masses were being led by the priests and how the
priests were glorying in their power, and he wanted to do something about it.
He did not want power over any one, and he wanted to break the mental and
spiritual bonds of men. (30)
What Buddha did was to
break wide open the gates of that very religion which was confined in the
Upanishads and to a particular caste. (31)
Advaita (which gets its
whole force on the subjective side of man), was never allowed to come to the
people. At first some monks got hold of it and took it to the forests, and so
it came to be called the "forest philosophy". By the mercy of the
Lord, the Buddha came and preached it to the masses, and the whole nation
became Buddhists. (32)
Shakya Muni was himself a
monk, and it was his glory that he had the largeheartedness to bring out the
truths from the hidden Vedas and throw them broadcast all over the world. (33)
Before the Buddha came,
materialism had spread to a fearful extent; and it was of a most hideous kind,
not like that of the present day, but of a far worse nature. I am a materialist
in a certain sense, because I believe that there is only One. That is what the
materialist wants you to believe; only he calls it matter and I call it God.
The materialists admit that out of this matter all hope and religion and
everything has come. I say all these have come out of Brahman. But the
materialism that prevailed before Buddha was that crude sort of materialism
which taught, "eat, drink and be merry; there is
no God, soul, or heaven; religion is a concoction of wicked priests." It
taught the morality that as long as you live, you must try to live happily;
eat, though you have to borrow money for the food, and never mind about
repaying it. That was the old materialism and that kind of philosophy spread so
much that even today it has the name of "popular philosophy". Buddha
brought the Vedanta to light, gave it to the people, and saved
How much good to the world
and its beings came out of Buddha's ["fanaticism"]! How many
monasteries and schools and colleges, how many public hospitals and veterinary
refuges were established! How developed architecture became! ... What was there
in
Shakya Muni came not to
destroy; he was the fulfillment, the logical conclusion, the logical
development of the religion of the Hindus. (36)
Buddhism, one of the most
philosophical religions in the world, spread all through the populace, the
common people of
Buddha cut through all the
excrescences [of rules and regulations promulgated by the priests]. He preached
the most tremendous truths. He taught the very gist of the philosophy of the
Vedas to one and all without distinction; he taught it to the world at Large,
because one of his great messages was the equality of humanity. Human beings
are all equal. No concession there to anybody! Buddha was the great preacher of
equality. Every man and woman has the same right to attain spirituality - that
was his teaching. The difference between the priests and the other castes he
abolished. Even the lowest were entitles to the highest attainments; he opened
the door to nirvana to one and all. His teaching was bold, even for
d) The Reasons Why
Buddhism Had to Die a Natural Death in
a) To Break the Tyranny
of Priestcraft Buddhism Swept Away the Idea of the Personal God
The aim of Buddhism was
reform of the Vedic religion, by standing against ceremonials requiring
offerings of animals, against hereditary caste and exclusive priesthood, and
against belief in permanent souls. It never attempted to destroy that religion,
or to overturn the social order. It introduced a vigorous method by Organizing a class of sannyasins into a strong monastic
brotherhood and the brahmavadinis into a body of nuns - by introducing images
of saints in the place of altar fires….
In their reaction against
the privileged priesthood, Buddhists swept off almost every bit of the old
ritual of the Vedas, subordinated the gods of the Vedas to the position of
servants to their own, human saints, and declared the "Creator and Supreme
Ruler" as an invention of priestcraft and superstition. (39)
Tyranny and priestcraft
have prevailed wherever the idea [of the personal God] existed, and until the
lie is knocked on the head, say the Buddhists, tyranny will not cease. So long
as man thinks he has to cower before a supernatural being, so long will there
be priests to claim rights and privileges to make men cower before them, while
these poor men will continue to ask some priest to act as interceder for them.
You may do away with the brahmin; but, mark me, those
who do so will put themselves in his place and be worse, because the brahmin
has a certain amount of generosity in him, but these upstarts are always the
worst of tyrannizers. If a beggar gets wealth, he thinks the whole world is a
bit of straw. So these priests there must be so long as this personal God idea
persists; and it will be impossible to think of any great morality in society.
(40)
The result of Buddha's
constant inveighing against a personal God was the introduction of idols into
2. Buddha's Rejection of
All Religious Forms Was an Impossible Ideal Which Could Only Be Carried Out
through Monasticism
Buddha is said to have
denied the Vedas because there was so much killing. (42)
Buddha wanted to make truth
shine as truth. No softening, no compromise, no pandering to the priests, the
powerful, the kings. No bowing before superstitious traditions, however hoary;
no respect for forms and books just because they came down from the distant
past. He rejected all scriptures, all forms of religious practice. Even the
very language, Sanskrit, in which religions had traditionally been taught in
India, he rejected, so that his followers would not have any chance to imbibe
the superstitions that were associated with it. (43)
Buddha made the fatal
mistake of thinking that the whole world could be lifted to the height of the
Upanishads. And self-interest spoilt all.
The great point of contrast
between Buddhism and Hinduism lies in the fact that Buddhism said,
"Realize all this as illusion", while Hinduism said, "Realize
that within the illusion is the Real." Of how this was to be done,
Hindus never presumed to enunciate any rigid law. The Buddhist command could
only be carried out through monasticism; the Hindu might be fulfilled through
any state of life. All alike were roads to the one Real.... Thus Buddhism
became the religion of a monastic order, but Hinduism, in spite of its
exaltation of monasticism, remains ever the religion of faithfulness to daily
duty, whatever it be, as the path by which man may attain God. (45)
3. Indian Buddhism's
Extreme Desire to Be of the People Debased Buddha's Pure and Glorious Ideals
We must not have an
impossible ideal. An ideal which is too high makes a nation weak and degraded.
This happened after the Buddhist and Jain reforms. On the other hand, too much
practicality is also wrong. If you have not even a little imagination, if you
have no ideal to guide you, you are simply a brute. So we must not lower our
idea, neither are we to lose sight of practicality. We must avoid the two
extremes. (46)
Buddha's work had one great
defect, and for that we Indians are suffering, even today. No blame attaches to
the Lord. He was pure and glorious; but, unfortunately, such high ideals could
not be well assimilated by the different uncivilized and uncultured races of
mankind who flocked within the fold of the Aryans. These races, with varieties
of superstition and hideous worship, rushed within the fold of the Aryan, and
for a time appeared as if they had become civilized; but, before a century had
passed, they brought out their snakes, their ghosts, and all the other things
their ancestors used to worship, and thus the whole of India became one
degraded mass of superstition. The earlier Buddhists, in their rage against the
killing of animals, had denounced the sacrifices of the Vedas, which used to be
held in every house. There would be a fire burning and that was all the
paraphernalia of worship. These sacrifices were obliterated, and in their place
came gorgeous temples, gorgeous ceremonies, and gorgeous priests - and all that
you see in
I have every respect for
and veneration of Lord Buddha but, mark my words, the spread of Buddhism was
less owing to the doctrines and the personality of the great preacher, than to
the temples that were built, the idols that were erected, and the gorgeous
ceremonials that were put before the nation. Thus Buddhism progressed. The
little fireplaces in the houses in which people had poured their libations were
not strong enough to hold their own against these gorgeous temples and
ceremonies; but later on, the whole thing degenerated. It became a mass of
corruption of which I cannot speak before this audience; but those who want to
know about it may see a little of it in those big temples, full of sculptures,
in Southern India; and that is all the inheritance we have from the Buddhists.
(48)
The exclusiveness of the
old form of Vedic religion debarred it from taking ready help from outside. At
the same time, it kept it pure and free from many
debasing elements which Buddhism, in it propagandist zeal was forced to
assimilate.
This extreme adaptability
in the long run made Indian Buddhism lose almost all its individuality, and
extreme desire to be of the people made it unfit to cope with the intellectual
forces of the mother religion in a few centuries. The Vedic party in the
meanwhile got rd of a good deal of its most objectionable features, such as
animal sacrifice, and took lessons from its rival daughter in the judicious use
of images, temple processions, and other impressive performances, and stood
ready to take within her fold the whole empire of Buddhism, already tottering
to its fall.
And the crash came with the
Scythian invasions and the total destruction of the empire of Pataliputra.
The invaders, already
incensed at the invasion of their central Asiatic home by the preachers of
Buddhism, found in the sun-worship of the brahmins a great sympathy with their
own solar religion - and when the brahminist party was ready to adapt and
spiritualize many of the customs of the newcomers, the invaders threw
themselves heart and soul into the brahmanic cause. (49)
The aims of the Buddhist
and Vedic religions were the same, but the means adopted by the Buddhists were
not right. If the Buddhist means were correct, then why has [
On the philosophic side,
the disciples of the great Master [Buddha] dashed themselves against the
theoretical rocks of the Vedas and could not crush them; and on the other side
they took away from the nation that eternal God to which everyone, man or
woman, clings so fondly. And the result was that Buddhism had to die a natural
death in
e) The Reconquest of
1. The Dissipation of
Both Priests and Kings in the Period after Buddha
It is probable that the
[Buddhist] reformers had for centuries the majority of the Indian people with
them. The older forces, however, were never entirely pacified, and they
underwent a good deal of modification during the centuries of Buddhist
supremacy. (52)
With the deluge that swept
the land at the advent of Buddhism the priestly power fell into decay and the
royal power was in the ascendant. Buddhist priests are renouncers of the world,
living in monasteries and as homeless ascetics, unconcerned with secular
affairs. They have neither the will nor the endeavor to bring and keep the
royal power under their control through the threat of curses or magic arrows.
Even if there were any remnant of such a will, its fulfillment had become then an impossibility. For Buddhism had shaken the thrones of all
the oblation-eating gods and brought them down forever from their heavenly
positions. The state of being a Buddha was superior to the heavenly positions
of many a Brahma or an Indra, who vie with each other in offering their worship
at the feet of Buddha, the God-man! And to this Buddhahood, every man or woman
has the privilege to attain; it is open to all even in this life. From the
descent of the gods, as a natural consequence, the superiority of the priests
who were supported by them was gone.
Accordingly, the reins of
that mighty sacrificial horse - the royal power - were no longer held in the
firm grasp of the Vedic priest; and, now being free, it could roam anywhere by
its unbridled will. The center of power in that period was neither with the
priests chanting the Sama hymns and performing the yajnas according to the
Yajur Veda; nor is the power vested in the hands of the kshatriya
kings separated from each other and ruling over small, independent states. The
center of power in that age was in emperors whose
unobstructed sway extended over vast areas bounded by the ocean, covering the
whole of
During this revolution,
that perpetual struggle for supremacy between the priestly and the royal
classes, which began from the Vedic times and continued through the ages till
it reached its climax at the time of the Jain and Buddhist revolutions, had
ceased for ever. Now these two powers were friendly to each other; but neither
was there any more that glorious kshatra (warlike) valor of the kings, nor that
spiritual brilliance which characterized the brahmins; each had lost its former
intrinsic strength. As might be expected, this new union of the two forces was
soon engaged in the satisfaction of mutual self-interest, and became dissipated
by spending its vitality on extirpating their common opponents, especially the
Buddhists of the time, and on similar other deeds. Being steeped in the vices consequent
on such a union, e.g. sucking of the blood of the masses, taking revenge on the
enemy, spoliation of others' property, etc., they in vain tried to imitate the
rajusuya and other Vedic sacrifices of the ancient kings, and only made a
ridiculous farce of them. The result was they were bound hand and foot by the
formidable train of sycophantic attendance and its obsequious flatterers; and,
being entangled in an interminable net of rites and ceremonies with flourishes
of mantras and the like they soon became a cheap and ready prey to the Islamic
invaders from the West....
Brahmanya power, since the
appearance of the Rajput power (which held sway over India under the Mihira
dynasty and others), made its last effort to recover its lost greatness; and in
its effort to establish that supremacy, it sold itself at the feet of the
fierce hordes of barbarians [Scythians] newly come from Central Asia; and to
win their pleasure, introduced into the land their hateful manners and customs.
Moreover, the brahmanya power, solely devoting itself to the easy means to dupe
the ignorant barbarians, brought into vogue mysterious rites and ceremonies
backed by its new mantras, and the like; and, in doing so, itself lost its
former wisdom, its former vigor and vitality, and its own chaste habits of long
acquirement. Thus it turned the whole of Aryavarta into a deep and vast
whirlpool of the most vicious, the most horrible, the
most abominable, barbarous customs; and, as the inevitable consequence of
countenancing these detestable customs and superstitions, it soon lost all its
own internal strength and stamina and became the weakest of the weak. (53)
2. Kumarila Bhatta in
the North Led the Reaction of Vedic Ritualism against the Immoral Rites of
Degraded Buddhism
Under the sway of kings who
took up Buddhism and preached broadcast the doctrine of ahimsa (non-violence)
the performances of the Vedic yaga-yajnas became a thing of the past, and no
one could kill any animal in sacrifice for fear of the king. But subsequently
among the Buddhists themselves - who were converts from Hinduism - the best
parts of these yaga-yajnas were taken up and practiced in secret. From these
sprang up the Tantras. (54)
I think that the Tantrika
form of worship originated from the time that Buddhism began to decline and,
through the oppression of the Buddhists, people began to perform their Vedic
sacrifices in secret. They had no more the opportunity to conduct them for two
months at a stretch, so they made clay images, worshipped them, and consigned
them to the water - finishing everything in one night, without leaving the
least trace! Man longs for a concrete symbol,
otherwise his heart is not satisfied. So in every home that one-night sacrifice
began to take place. By then, the tendencies of men had become sensual.... so
the spiritual teachers of that time saw that those who could not perform any
religious rite owing to their evil propensities also needed some way of coming
round by degrees to the path of virtue. For them these queer Tantrika rites
came to be invented. (55)
Barring some of the
abominable things in the Tantra, such as the vamachara, etc., the Tantras are
not so bad as people are inclined to think There are many high and sublimes
Vedantic thoughts in them. In fact, the Brahmana portions of the Vedas were
modified a little and incorporated into the body of the Tantras. All the forms
of worship and the ceremonials of the present day, comprising the Karma Kanda , are observed in accordance with the Tantras. (56)
The Tantrika rites among
the Tibetans... arose in
Whether for good or for evil,
the Karma Kanda has fallen into disuse in India, though there are some brahmins
in the Deccan who still perform yajnas now and then with the sacrifice of
goats; and we also find here and there traces of the Vedic kriya kanda in the
mantras used in connection with our marriage and sraddha [funeral] ceremonies,
etc. But there is no chance of its being reestablished on its original footing.
Kumarila Bhatta once tried to do so, but he was not successful in his attempt.
(58)
[That] Northern reaction of
ritualism was followed by the fitful glory of the Malava empire.
With the destruction of that in a short time, northern
3. The Renewal of
Vedanta and Priestly Power from the South of
In spite of its wonderful
moral strength, Buddhism was extremely iconoclastic; and much of its force
being spent in merely negative attempts, it had to die out in the land of its
birth, and what remained of it became full of superstitions and ceremonials a
hundred times more crude than those it was intended to suppress. Although it
partially succeeded in putting down animal sacrifices of the Vedas, it filled
the land with temples, images, symbols and bones of saints.
Above all, in the medley of
Aryans, Mongols and aborigines which it created, it unconsciously led the way
to some of the hideous vamacharas [left-handed Tantra]. This was especially the
reason why this travesty of the teaching of the great Master, Buddha, had to be
driven out of
Thus, even the current of
life set in motion by the greatest soul that ever wore a human form, the
Bhagavan Buddha himself, became a miasmatic pool, and India had to wait for
centuries until Shankara arose, followed in quick succession by Ramanuja and
Madhva.
By this time an entirely
new chapter had opened in the history of
The empire of
From the very father end of
the Indian peninsula, from races alien in speech and form, from families
claiming descent from the ancient brahmins, came the
reaction against corrupted Buddhism.
What had become of the brahmins and kshatriyas of Aryavarta? They had entirely disappeared,
except here and there a few mongrel clans claiming to be brahmins
and kshatriyas; and, in spite of their inflated, self-laudatory assertions...
they had to sit in sackcloth and ashes in all humility, to learn at the feet of
the Southerners. The result was the bringing back of the Vedas to
A renascent India, bought
by the valor and blood of the heroic Rajputs, defined by the merciless
intellect of a brahmin from the same historical thought-center of Mithila
(Kumarila Bhatta), led by a new philosophical impulse organized by Shankara and
his band of sannyasins, and beautified by the arts and literature of the courts
of Malava - arose on the ruins of the old. (63)
4. The Marvelous Boy
Shankara, Having Brought the Vedas back to Life, Modern
A thousand years after
Buddha's death... the mobs, the masses, and various races had been converted to
Buddhism; naturally, the teachings of the Buddha became in time degenerated,
because most of the people were very ignorant. Buddhism taught no God, no Ruler
of the universe, so gradually the masses brought their gods and devils and
hobgoblins out again and a tremendous hotchpotch was made of Buddhism in
In spite of the preaching
of mercy to animals, in spite of the sublime ethical religion, in spite of the
hair-splitting discussions about the existence or non-existence of a permanent
soul, the whole building of Buddhism tumbled down piecemeal; and the ruin was
simply hideous. I have neither the time nor the inclination to describe to you
the hideousness that came in the wake of Buddhism. The most hideous ceremonies,
the most horrible, the most obscene books that human hands ever wrote or the
human brain conceived, the most bestial forms that ever passed under the name
of religion, have all been the creation of degraded Buddhism.
But
When Buddhism broke down
everything by introducing all sorts of foreign barbarisms into India - their
manners and customs and such things - there was a reaction, and that reaction
was led by a young monk, Shankaracharya. And [instead] of preaching new
doctrines and always thinking new thoughts and making sects, he brought back
the Vedas to life; and modern Hinduism has thus an admixture of ancient
Hinduism, over which the Vedantists predominate. But, you see, what once dies
never comes back to life, and those ceremonials of Hinduism never came back to
life. You will be astonished if I tell you that, according to the old
ceremonials, he is not a good Hindu who does not eat beef. On certain occasions
he must sacrifice a bull and eat it. That is disgusting now. However they may
differ from each other in
5. Ramanuja Opened the
Door to the Highest Spiritual Worship to All and Thus Brought the Masses back
to the Vedic Religion
Shankara showed [that the
real essence of Buddhism and Vedanta are not very different], and all the
Buddhists began to come back to the old religion. But then, they had become
accustomed to all these [Buddhist] forms. What could be done? (67)
In the Buddhist movement,
the kshatriyas were the real leaders, and whole masses of them became
Buddhists. In the zeal of reform and conversion, the popular dialects had been
almost exclusively cultivated to the neglect of Sanskrit, and the larger
portion of kshatriyas had become disjoined from the Vedic literature and
Sanskrit learning. Thus this wave of reform which came from the South,
benefited to a certain extent the priesthood, and the priests only. For the
rest of
The movement of Shankara
forced its way through its high intellectuality; but it could be of little
service to the masses, because of it adherence to strict caste-laws, very small
scope for ordinary emotion, and making Sanskrit the only vehicle of
communication. Ramanuja, on the other hand, with a most practical philosophy, a
great appeal to the emotions, an entire denial of birthright before spiritual
attainments, and appeals through the popular tongue, completely succeeded in
bringing the masses back to the Vedic religion. (69)
Shankara, with his great
intellect, I am afraid, had not as great a heart [as Ramanuja]. Ramanuja's
heart was greater. He felt for the downtrodden, he sympathized with them. He
took up the ceremonies, the accretions that had gathered, made them pure so far
as they could be, and instituted new ceremonies, new methods of worship, for
the people who absolutely required them. At the same time, he opened the door
to the highest spiritual worship from the brahmin to
the pariah. That was Ramanuja's work. That work rolled on, invaded the North,
was taken up by some great leaders there; but that was much later, during the
Muslim rule; and the brightest of these prophets of comparatively modern times
in the North was Chaitanya. (70)
In the South, the spiritual
upheaval of Shankara and Ramanuja was followed by the usual Indian sequence of
united races and powerful empires. It was the home of refuge of Indian religion
and civilization, when northern
f) Through Slow
Assimilation the Pure, Eternal Vedic Religion Has Evolved
The task before [renascent
So long it had been a
question of Aryanizing the other types that were pressing for admission and
thus of making a huge Aryan body of its different elements. In spite of
concessions and compromises, Buddhism was eminently successful and remained the
national religion of
The reaction movement, led
in close succession by Kumarila in the North and Shankara and Ramanuja in the
South, has become the last embodiment of that vast accumulation of sects and
doctrines and rituals called Hinduism. For the last thousand years or more, its
great task has been assimilation, with now and then and outburst of
reformation. This reaction first wanted to revive the rituals of the Vedas -
failing which, it made the Upanishads or the philosophic portions of the Vedas
its basis. It brought Vyasa's system of mimamsa philosophy (the Vedanta
Sutras) and
During these hundreds of
years since the time [of the great reformer Shankaracharya] to the present day,
there has been the slow bringing back of the Indian masses to the pristine
purity of the Vedantic religion. These reformers knew full well the evils which
existed, yet they did not condemn. They did not say, "All that you have is
wrong; you must throw it away". It can never be so.... Sudden changes
cannot be, and Shankaracharya knew it. So did Ramanuja. The only way left to
them was slowly to bring up the existing religion to the highest ideal. If they
had sought to apply the other method, they would have been hypocrites, for the
very fundamental doctrine of their religion is evolution, the soul going
towards the highest goal, through all these various stages and phases which
are, therefore, necessary and helpful. And who dares condemn them? (73)
In India, Kumarila again
brought into currency the Karma Marga, the way of karma only; and Shankara and
Ramanuja firmly reestablished the eternal Vedic religion, harmonizing and
balancing in due proportions dharma, artha, kama and moksha [duty, gain,
pleasure and liberation]. Thus the nation was brought to the way of regaining
its lost life; but
References
1. CW, Vol.4: Modern India,
p.447.
2. CW, Vol.1: The Gita I,
p.455.
3. CW, Vol.4: Modern India,
pp.461-462.
4. CW, Vol.7: Inspired
Talks, July 11, 1896, p.44.
5. CW, Vol.4: Modern India,
pp.462-463.
6. CW, Vol.6: The Historical
Evolution of India, p.160.
7. CW, Vol.2: True Buddhism,
p.508.
8. CW, Vol.2: Maya and the
Evolution of the Conception of God, pp.114-115.
9. CW, Vol.6: The Historical
Evolution of India, p.160.
10. CW, Vol.1: The Gita I,
pp455-456.
11. CW, Vol.6: The
Historical Evolution of India, p.160.
12. CW, Vol.1:
13. CW, Vol.4: Reply to the
Address of the Maharaja of Khetri, p.325.
14. CW, Vol.5: Work without
Motive, p.246.
15. CW, Vol.5: In Answer to Nivedita,
pp.321-322.
16. CW, Vol.1:
17. CW, Vol.4: Modern India,
p.445.
18. CW, Vol.2: True
Buddhism, p.508.
19. CW, Vol.3: Buddhistic
India, pp.521-523.
20. CW, Vol.6: Notes Taken
down in
21. CW, Vol.1: The Gita I,
p.455.
22. CW, Vol.4: Reply to the
Address of the Maharaja of Khetri, pp.325-326.
23. CW, Vol.6: The
Historical Evolution of India, pp.160-161.
24. Ibid., p.161.
25. CW, Vol.3: Buddhistic
India, p.524 and 520-521.
26. SVW, Volume 2, Chapter
13: The Last Battle, pp.274-275.
27. CW, Vol.1: The Gita I,
p.455.
28. CW, Vol.4: Modern India,
p.445.
29. CW, Vol.8: Buddha's
Message to the World, p.97.
30. Ibid., pp.96-97.
31. CW, Vol.6: Letter to
Swami Akhandananda from Ghazipur, February, 1890, p.225.
32. CW, Vol.2: The Absolute
and Manifestation, p.138.
33. CW, Vol.1: Buddhism, the
Fulfillment of Hinduism, p.22.
34. CW, Vol.2: The Absolute
and Manifestation, pp.138-139.
35. CW, Vol.7: Conversation
with Sharat Chandra Chakravarty , Belur, 1898,
pp.118-119.
36. CW, Vol.1: Buddhism, the
Fulfillment of Hinduism, p.21.
37. CW, Vol.7: Inspired
Talks, July 9, 1895, p.39.
38. CW, Vol.8: Buddha's
Message to the World, pp.97-98.
39. CW, Vol.6: The
Historical Evolution of India, p.161.
40. CW, Vol.3: The Vedanta,
p.414.
41. CW, Vol.7: Inspired
Talks, June 30, 1895, pp.21-22.
42. CW, Vol.
43. CW, Vol.8: Buddha's
Message to the World, p.100.
44. CW, Vol.8: Sayings and
Utterances #32, p.271.
45. Ibid., #34, pp.273-274.
46. CW, Vol.3: Sannyasa, Its
Ideal and Practice, p.447.
47. CW, Vol.3: The Sages of
India, pp.263-264.
48. CW, Vol.3: My Plan of
Campaign, p.217.
49. CW, Vol.6: The
Historical Evolution of India, pp.162-163.
50. CW, Vol.5: The East and
the West, p.455.
51. CW, Vol.1: Buddhism, the
Fulfillment of Hinduism, p.22.
52. CW, Vol.6: The
Historical Evolution of India, p.161.
53. CW, Vol.4: Modern India,
pp.443-445.
54. CW, Vol.3: The Religion
We Are Born In, p.458.
55. CW, Vol.7: Conversation
with Priyanath Sinha, p.276.
56. CW, Vol.3: The Religion
We Are born In, p.458.
57. CW, Vol.6: Letter to
Swami Akhandananda from Ghazipur, February, 1890, pp.224-225.
58. CW, Vol.3: The Religion
We Are Born In, pp.455-456.
59. CW, Vol.6: The
Historical Evolution of India, p.165.
60. CW, Vol.4: Reply to the
Address of the Maharaja of Khetri, p.326.
61. CW, Vol.6: The
Historical Evolution of India, p.163.
62. CW, Vol.4: Reply to the
Address of the Maharaja of Khetri, pp.326-327.
63. CW, Vol.6: The
Historical Evolution of India, p.163.
64. CW, Vol.2: The Absolute
and Manifestation, p.139.
65. CW, Vol.3: The Sages of
India, pp.264-265.
66. CW, Vol.3: Buddhistic
India, pp.535-536.
67. CW, Vol.3: The Sages of
India, p.265.
68. CW, Vol.4: Reply to the
Address of the Maharaja of Khetri, p.327.
69. CW, Vol.6: The
Historical Evolution of India, pp.164-165.
70. CW, Vol.3: The Sages of
India, pp265-266.
71. CW, Vol.6: The
Historical Evolution of India, p.165.
72. Ibid., pp.163-164.
73. CW, Vol.3: My Plan of
Campaign, pp.217-218.
74. CW, Vol.5: The East and
the West, pp.454-455
PART I, SECTION 3: THE HISTORICAL ROOTS OF THE VEDANTA
Chapter 9: The Sources of Authority in Vedanta
a) The Three Prasthanas
in the Study of the Hindu of Vedic Religion
My mind can best grasp the
religions of the world, ancient or modern, dead or living, through this
fourfold division:
1. Symbology - the
employment of various external aids to preserve and develop the religious
faculty of man.
2. History - the philosophy
of each religion as illustrated in the lives of divine or human teachers
acknowledged by each religion. This includes mythology, for what is mythology
to one race or period is, or was, history to other races or periods. Even in cases
of human teachers, much of their history is taken as mythology by successive
generations.
3.
Philosophy - the rationale, or the scope of each religion.
4. Mysticism - the
assertion of something superior to sense-knowledge and reason which particular persons,
or all persons under certain circumstances, possess; runs through the other
divisions also.
All the religions of the
world, past or present, embrace one or more of these principles, the highly
developed ones having all four. Of these highly developed religions, again,
some had no sacred book or books, and they have disappeared; but those which
were based on sacred books are living to the present day. As such, all the
great religions of the world today are founded on sacred books.
The Vedic religions
[misnamed the Hindu or Brahminic] is founded on the Vedas. (1)
In modern
The Upanishads, the
Vyasa-Sutras, and the Gita, therefore, have to be taken up by every sect in
The three Prasthanas, then,
in the different explanations of Dvaita, Vishishtadvaita, or Advaita, with a
few minor recensions, form the "authorities" of the Hindu religion.
(3)
b) The Upanishads
1. The Jnana Kanda or
Upanishads Contain the Noblest Truths Ever Preached to Humanity
All the books known by the
name of Vedanta were not entirely written after the ritualistic portion of the
Vedas. For instance, one of them - the Isha Upanishad - forms the fortieth
chapter of the Yajur-Veda, that being one of the
oldest parts of the Vedas. There are other Upanishads which form portions of
the Brahmanas or ritualistic writings, and the rest of the Upanishads are
independent, not comprised in any of the Brahmanas or other parts of the Vedas;
but there is no reason to suppose that they were entirely independent of other
parts for, as we well know, many of these have been lost entirely and many of
the Brahmanas have become extinct. So it is quite possible that the independent
Upanishads belong to some Brahmanas, which in course of time fell into disuse
while the Upanishads remained. These Upanishads are also called Forest Books or
Aranyakas. (4)
The Indian mind got all
that could be had from the external world, but it did not feel satisfied with
that; it wanted to search further, to dive into its own soul,
and the final answer came.
The Upanishads, or the
Vedanta, or the Aranyakas, or Rahasya is the name of this portion of the Vedas…
Here we at once find that
religion has got rd of all external formalities. Here we find at once that
spiritual things are told, not in the language of matter, but in the language
of the Spirit; the superfine in the language of the superfine. No more is any
grossness attached to it, no more is there any compromise with things of
worldly concern. Bold, brave beyond the conception of the present day, stand
the giant minds of the sages of the Upanishads, declaring the noblest truths
that have ever been preached to humanity, without any compromise, without any
fear. This... I want to lay before you. Even the Jnana
Kanda of the Vedas is a vast ocean; many lives are necessary to understand even
a little of it. Truly has it been said of the Upanishads by Ramanuja that they
form the head, the shoulders, the crest of the Vedas, and surely enough the
Upanishads have become the Bible of modern
In the Upanishads there are
certain passages which are called great words, which are always quoted
and referred to. (6)
2. Only the Upanishads
Have Always Ruled
At all
times in all countries the Karma Kanda, comprising the social customs and
observances, changes form. Only the Jnana Kanda endures. Even in the Vedic age you
find that the rituals gradually changed in form. But the philosophic portion of
the Upanishads has remained unchanged up till now - only there have been many
interpreters, that is all. (7) The Jnana Kanda, as embodying the spiritual
teachings of the Vedas known as the Upanishads and the Vedanta, has always been
cited as the highest authority by all our teachers, philosophers and writers,
whether dualist, qualified monist, or monist. (8)
However great may be the
merits of the Samhita and Brahmana portions of the Vedas to the ethnologists or
the philologists, however desirable may be the results that the [mantras], agnim
ile or isetvorjetva or sanno devirabhisthaye in conjunction
with which the different altars and sacrifices and libations produce - it was
all in the way of enjoyment, and no one ever contended that it could produce
Moksha [liberation]. As such, the Jnana Kanda, the Aranyakas, the Shrutis par
excellence, which teach the way to spirituality - the moksha marga - have
always ruled and will always rule India. (9)
It is the Jnana Kanda of
Vedanta only that has for all time commanded recognition for leading men across
maya and bestowing salvation on them through the practice of yoga, bhakti,
jnana, or selfless work; and, as its validity and authority remain unaffected
by any limitations of time, place, or persons, it is the only exponent of the
universal and eternal religion for all humankind. (10)
3. The Authority of the
Upanishads Is Based on Verification by Seeing Truth Directly, Which Anyone May
Do
In matters of religious
duty the Vedas are the only capable authority... The authority of the Vedas
extends to all ages, climes and persons. (11)
The Veda is our only
authority and everyone has the right to it. (12)
The Upanishads teach us all
there is of religion. (13)
The
Upanishads treat alone of [attaining life and becoming immortal]. The path of the Upanishads is a
very pure path. Many manners, customs, and local allusions cannot be understood
today. Through the Upanishads, however, truth becomes clear. (14)
One has to believe in the
Vedas. The Vedas contain the truths experienced by the sages and seers of old who went beyond the range of duality and perceived unity.
Depending on mere reasoning, we cannot pass any judgment as to whether the
waking state or the dream state is the true one. How can we know which of the
two is true so long as we cannot take our stand on something beyond both of
them, from where we can look at them objectively? All that we can say now is
that two different states are experienced. When you are
experiencing one the other seems to be false. You might have been
marketing in
Disciple: I am living now by believing in
something, but I have the Shastras for my authority. I do not accept any faith
opposed to the Shastras.
Swami Vivekananda: What do you mean by the Shastras? If the Upanishads are the authority, why not the Bible or the Zendavesta
equally so?
Disciple: Granted these scriptures are also
good authority, they are not, however, as old as the Vedas. And nowhere,
moreover, is the theory of the Atman better established than in the Vedas.
Swami Vivekananda: Supposing I admit that contention of
yours, what right have you to maintain that truth can be found nowhere except the Vedas?
Disciple: Yes, truth may also exist in
scriptures other than the Vedas, and I don't say anything to the contrary. But
as for me, I choose to abide by the teachings of the Upanishads, for I have
very great faith in them.
Swami Vivekananda: Quite welcome to that, but if
somebody else has "very great faith" in any set of doctrines,
surely you should allow him to abide by that. You will discover that, in the
long run, both he and yourself will arrive at the same
goal. (16)
Obey the scriptures until
you are strong enough to do without them; then go beyond them. Books are not an
end-all. Verification is the only proof of religious truth. Each must verify
for him- or herself; and no teacher who says, "I have seen, but you cannot",
is to be trusted - only that one who says, "You can see, too." All
scriptures, all truths are Vedas in all times, in all countries, because these
truths are to be seen, and anyone may discover them. (17)
4. All Schools of Hindu
Thought Must Be Established on the Authority of the Genuine Upanishads
You must remember that what
the Bible is to the Christians, what the Koran is to the Muslims, what the
Tripitaka is to the Buddhist, what the Zend Avesta is to the Parsees, the
Upanishads are to us [Vedantins]. (18)
The Upanishads are the
Bible of India. They occupy the same place as does the New Testament. There are
[more than] a hundred books comprising the Upanishads, some very small and some
big, each a separate treatise. (19)
The Upanishads became the
Bible of India. It was a vast literature, these Upanishads, and all the schools
holding different opinions in
It is better for us
[Hindus] to remember that in the Upanishads is the primary authority; even the Grihya
and Shrauta sutras [dharma-shastras] are subordinate to the
authority of the Vedas. They are the words of the rishis, our forefathers, and
you have to believe them if you want to become a Hindu. You may even believe
the most peculiar ideas about the Godhead, but if you deny the authority of the
Vedas, you are nastika (unorthodox). (21)
The essence of the
knowledge of the Vedas was called by the name of Vedanta, which comprises the
Upanishads; and all sects of India - dualists, qualified monists, monists, or
the Shaivites, Vaishnavites, Shaktas, Sauras, Ganapatyas, each one that dares
to come within the fold of Hinduism, must acknowledge the Upanishads of the
Vedas. They can have their own interpretations and can interpret them in their
own way, but they must obey the authority... That is why we want to use the
word Vedantist instead of Hindu. All the philosophers of
The Jnana Kanda of the
Vedas comprises the Upanishads and is known by the name of Vedanta, the
pinnacle of the Shrutis, as it is called…. The Vedanta is now the religion of
the Hindus. If any sect in
The Upanishads are many,
and said to be one hundred and eight; but some declare them to be still larger
in number. Some of them are evidently of much later date, as for instance, the Allopanisad
in which Allah is praised and Muhammad is called the Rajasulla. I have been
told that this was written during the reign of King Akbar to bring the Hindus
and Muslims together, and sometimes they got hold of some word such as Allah,
or Illa in the Samhita, and made an Upanishad on it. So in this Allopanisad,
Muhammad is the Rajasulla, whatever that may mean. There are other sectarian
Upanishads of the same species, which you find to be entirely modern; and it
has been easy to write them, seeing that this language of the Samhita portion
of the Vedas is so archaic, there is no grammar to
it.... Given that, how easy it is to write any number of Upanishads, enough to
make words look like old, archaic words, and you have no fear of grammar. Then
you bring in Rajasulla or any other "sulla" you like. In that way, many
Upanishads have been manufactured, and I am told it is being done even now. In
some parts of
c) The Vyasa Sutras: The
Philosophy of the Vyasa Sutras Is Par Excellence That of the Upanishads
All schools of philosophy
in
Vyasa' s philosophy is par excellence
that of the Upanishads. (26)
Following the Upanishads
there come other philosophies of India, but every one of them failed to get
that hold on India which the philosophy of Vyasa has got, although the
philosophy of Vyasa is a development out of an older one, the Sankhya; and
every philosophy and every system in India - I mean, throughout the world -
owes much to Kapila [the founder of Sankhya], perhaps the greatest name in the
history of India in psychological and philosophical lines.... The philosophy of
Vyasa, the Vyasa Sutras, is firm-seated and has attained the permanence
of that which it intended to present to humanity, the Brahman of the Vedantic
side of philosophy. Reason was entirely subordinated to the Shrutis; and, as
Shankara declares, Vyasa did not care to reason at all. His idea in writing the
Sutras was just to bring together, and with one thread to make a garland of the
flowers of Vedantic texts. His Sutras are admitted so far as they are
subordinate to the authority of the Upanishads, and no further.
And, as I have said, all
the sects of
If one be asked to point
out the system of thought towards which as a center all the ancient and modern
Indian thought have converged, if one wants to see the real backbone of
Hinduism in all its various manifestations, the Sutras of Vyasa will
unquestionably be pointed out as constituting all that.
Either one hears the Advaita
keshari (lion of Vedanta) roaring in peals of thunder - the asti, bhati,
priya (It exists, shines, and is beloved) - amid the heart-stopping
solemnities of the Himalayan forests, mixing with the solemn cadence of the
river of heaven; or listens to the cooing of the piya, pitam in the
beautiful bowers of the grove of Vrinda; whether one mingles with the sedate
meditations of the monasteries of Varanasi or the ecstatic dances of the
followers of the Prophet of Nadia (Sri Chaitanya); whether one sits at the feet
of the teacher of the Vishishtadvaita system with its Vadakale, Tenkale (two
divisions of the Ramanuja sect) and all the other subdivisions; or listens with
reverence to the acharyas of the Madhva school; whether one hears the martial Wa
guruki fateh of the secular Sikhs or the sermons on the Grantha Sahib of
the Udasis and Nirmalas; whether he salutes the sannyasin disciples of Kabir
with Sat sahib and listens with joy to the sakhis (bhajans); whether he
pores upon the wonderful lore of that reformer of Rajputana, Dadu, or the works
of his royal disciple, Sundaradasa, down to the great Nischaladasa, the
celebrated author of the Vichara Sagara, which book has more influence
on India than any that has been written in any language within the last three
centuries; if one even asks the Bhangi Mehtar of Northern India to sit down and
give an account of the teachings of his Lalguru - one will find that all these
various teachers and schools have as their basis that system whose authority is
the Shruti, the Gita its divine commentary, the Shariraka [Vyasa]
Sutras its organized system, and all the different sects in India, from
the Paramahamsa Parivrajakacharyas to the poor despised Mehtar disciples of
Lalguru are different manifestations. (28)
d) The Bhagavadgita: The
Gita Is the Gist of the Upanishads, Harmonizing Their Many Contradictory Parts
Next in authority is the
celebrated Gita. The great glory of Shankaracharya was his preaching of the
Gita. It is one of the greatest works that this great man did among the many
noble works of his noble life - the preaching of the Gita and writing the most
beautiful commentary upon it. And he has been followed by all the founders of
the orthodox sects in
The Gita is the gist of the
Vedas. It is not our Bible, the Upanishads are our Bible. It is the gist of the
Upanishads and harmonizes the many contradictory parts of the Upanishads. (30)
The Gita is a commentary on
the Upanishads.... It takes the ideas of the Upanishads and, in some cases, the
very words. They are strung together with the idea of bringing out in a
compact, condensed and systematic form the whole subject the Upanishads deal
with. (31)
If we study the Upanishads
we notice, in wandering through the mazes of many irrelevant subjects, the
sudden introduction of the discussion of a great truth, just as in the midst of
a huge wilderness a traveler unexpectedly comes across here and there an
exquisitely beautiful rose, with its leaves, thorn, roots, all entangled.
Compared with that, the Gita is like these truths beautifully arranged together
in their proper places - like a fine garland or a bouquet of the choicest
flowers.... The reconciliation of the different paths of dharma and work
without desire or attachment - these are the two special characteristics of the
Gita. (32)
The great poem, the Gita,
is held to be the crown jewel of all Indian literature. It is a kind of
commentary on the Vedas. It shows us that our battle for spirituality must be
fought out in this life; so we must not flee from it, but rather compel it to
give us all that it holds. (33)
e) The
Smritis, or Secondary Scriptures
1. The Vedas Delineate
the Eternal Relations of Man, the Smritis Work Out the
Details
There are two sorts of
truth we find in our Shastras: one that is based upon the eternal nature of man
- the one that deals with the eternal relation of God, soul, and nature; the
other, with local circumstances, environments of the time, social institutions
of the period, and so forth. The first class of truths is chiefly embodied in
our Vedas, our scriptures, the second in the Smritis, the Puranas, etc. (34)
Two ideals of truth are in
our scriptures: the one is what we call the eternal, and the other is not so
authoritative, yet binding under particular circumstances, times, and places.
The eternal relations which deal with the nature of
the soul, and of God, and the relations between souls and God are embodied in
what we call the Shrutis, the Vedas. The next set of truths is what we call the
Smritis, as embodied in the words of Manu, Yajnavalkya, and other writers; and
also in the Puranas, down to the Tantras. The second class of books and
teachings is subordinate to the Shrutis - the Shrutis must prevail. This is the
law. The idea is that the framework of the destiny of man has all been
delineated in the Vedas and the details have been left to be worked out in the
Smritis and Puranas. As for general direction, the Shrutis are enough; for
spiritual life, nothing more can be said, nothing more can be known. All that
is necessary has been known, all the advice that is necessary to lead the soul
to perfection has been completed in the Shrutis; the details alone were left
out, and these the Smritis have supplied from time to time. (35)
The Puranas and other
religious scriptures are all denoted by the word Smritis. Their
authority goes so far as they follow the Vedas and do not contradict them. (36)
Next to the Vedanta come
the Smritis. These also are books written by sages, but the authority of the
Smritis is subordinate to that the of the Vedanta
because they stand in the same relation with us as the scriptures of other
religions with regard to them. We admit that the Smritis have been written by
particular sages; in that sense, they are the same as the scriptures of other
religions, but these Smritis are not final authority. If there is anything in a
Smriti which contradicts the Vedanta, the Smriti is to be rejected - its
authority is gone. (37)
The Vedas, i.e. only those
portions of them which agree with reason, are to be accepted as authority.
Other Shastras, such as the Puranas, etc., are only to be accepted so far as
they do not go against the Vedas. (38)
We must remember that for
all periods the Vedas are the final goal and authority; and if the Puranas
differ in any respect from the Vedas, that part of the Puranas is to be
rejected without mercy. (39)
The Upanishads and nothing
but the Upanishads are our scriptures. The Puranas, the Tantras, and all the
other books - even the Vyasa Sutras - are of secondary, tertiary
authority, but the primary are the Vedas. Manu and the
Puranas, and all the other books are to be taken so far as they agree with the
authority of the Upanishads; and when they disagree, they are to be rejected
without mercy. (40)
The Smritis, Puranas,
Tantras - all these are acceptable only so far as they agree with the Vedas,
and wherever they are contradictory, they are to be rejected as unreliable.
(41)
2. The Smritis, Speaking
of Local Circumstances and Varying from Time to Time, Will Have an End
The Puranas, the modern
representations of the ancient narasamsi (anecdote portions of the
Vedas), supply the mythology [of the Hindu religion]; and the Tantras, the
modern representation of the Brahmanas (the ritual and explanatory portion of
the Vedas), supply the ritual. Thus the three Prasthanas, as authorities, are
common to all the sects; but, as to the Puranas and Tantras, each sect has its
own. (42)
These Smritis, we see
again, have varied from time to time. We read that such and such a Smriti
should have authority in the Satya Yuga, and such in the Treta Yuga, some in
the Dvapara Yuga, and some in the Kali Yuga, and so on. As essential conditions
changed, as various circumstances came to have their influence on the race,
manners and customs had to be changed; and these Smritis, as mainly regulating
the manners and customs of the nations,
had also to be changed from time to time. This is a point I ask you specially
to remember. The principles that agree in the Vedanta are unchangeable. Why?
Because they are all built upon the eternal principles that are in humanity and
nature; they can never change. Ideas about the soul, going to heaven, and so on
can never change; they were the same thousands of years ago, they are the same
today, they will be the same millions of years hence. But those religious
practices which are based entirely upon our social position and correlations
must change with the changes of society. Such an order, therefore, would be
good and true at a certain period and not at another. We find, accordingly,
that a certain food is allowed at one time, and not at another, because the
food was suitable for that time; but climate and other things changed, various
other circumstances required to be met, so the Smriti changed the food and
other things. Thus it naturally follows that, if in modern times our society
requires changes to be made, they must be met and sages will come and show us
the way to meet them; but not one jot of the principles of our religion will be
changed; they will remain intact. (43)
We find, then, that in all
these Smritis the teachings are different. One Smriti says this is the custom
and this should be the practice of this age. Another one says that this is the
practice of this age, and so forth. This is the achara which should be the
custom of the Satya Yuga and this is the achara which should be the custom of
the Kali Yuga, and so forth. Now this is one of the most glorious doctrines
that you have - that eternal truths, being based on the nature of humanity,
will never change so long as humanity lives. They are for all times,
omnipresent, universal virtues. But the Smritis speak generally of local circumstances,
of duties arising from different environments, and they change in the course of
time. This you have always to remember: that because a little social custom is
going to be changed, you are not going to lose your religion, not at all.
Remember these customs have already been changed. There was a time in this very
India when, without eating beef, no brahmin could remain a brahmin; you read in
the Vedas how, when a sannyasin, a king, or a great man came into a house, the
best bullock was killed; how in time it was found that, as we are an
agricultural race, killing the best bulls meant annihilation of the race.
Therefore the practice was stopped, and a voice was raised against the killing
of cows. Sometimes we find existing then what we now consider the most horrible
customs. In course of time other laws had to be made. These in turn will have
to go, and other Smritis will come. This is one fact we have to learn: that the
Vedas being eternal, will be one and the same
throughout all ages, but the Smritis will have an end. As time rolls on, more
and more of the Smritis will go, sages will come and they will change and
direct society into better channels, into duties and into paths which accord
with the necessity of the age and without which it is impossible that society
can live. (44)
3. The Puranas, Which
Were Written to Popularize the Religion of the Vedas
Then there are the Puranas.
Puranam panchalakshanam - which means the Puranas of
five characteristics: that which treats of history, of cosmology, with various
symbological illustrations of philosophical principles, and so forth.
These were written to popularize the religion of the Vedas. The language in
which the Vedas are written is very ancient; and even among scholars very few
can trace the date of these books. The Puranas were written in the language of
the people of that time, what we call modern Sanskrit. They were meant, not for
scholars, but for the ordinary people; and ordinary people cannot understand
philosophy. Such things were given to them in concrete form by means of the
lives of saints and kings and great men and historical events that happened to
the race, etc. The sages made use of these things to illustrate the eternal
principles of religion. (45)
Herein lies
the difference between the scriptures of the Christians and the Buddhists and
ours: theirs are all Puranas, and not scriptures, because they describe the
history of the deluge, and the history of kings and reigning families, and
record the lives of great men, and so on. This is the work of the Puranas; and
so far as they agree with the Vedas, they are good. So far as the Bible and the
scriptures of other nations agree with the Vedas, they are perfectly good; and
when they do not agree, they are no more to be accepted. So
with the Koran. There are many moral teachings in these, and so far as
they agree with the Vedas, they have the authority of the Puranas, but no more.
(46)
Question: What does orthodoxy mean with the
Hindus?
Swami Vivekananda: In modern times it simply means
obeying certain caste laws as to eating, drinking, and marriage. After that,
the Hindu can believe in any system he or she likes. There never was an
organized church in
4. The Tantras, Which
Direct the Worship of Modern
There are still other
books, the Tantras. These are very much like the Puranas in some respects, and
in some there is an attempt to revive the old sacrificial ideas of the Karma
Kanda. (49)
The Tantras... represent
the Vedic rituals in a modified form; and before anyone jumps to the most
absurd conclusions about them, I will advise him to read the Tantras in
conjunction with the Brahmanas, especially the Adhvaryu portion. And most of
the mantras used in the Tantras will be found to be taken verbatim from their
Brahmanas. As to their influence, apart from the shrauta and smarta rituals,
all the forms of the ritual in vogue from the
Of course, I do not pretend
that all the Hindus are thoroughly acquainted with these sources of their
religion. Many, especially in lower
f) The Essence of All
Our Sacred Books
I hope and wish... that you
will reverently study the Upanishads, the Brahma Sutras, and the Bhagavadgita,
which are known as the Prasthanatraya (the three supreme sources of truth), as
also the Itihasas (epics), the Puranas, and the Agamas (Tantras). You will not
find the like of all these anywhere else in the world. Human beings alone, of
all living beings, have a hunger in their hearts to know the whence and
whither, the whys and wherefores of things. There are four key words which you
must remember, viz. abhaya (fearlessness), ahimsa (non-injury), asanga
(non-attachment), and ananda (bliss). These words really sum up the
essence of all our sacred books. Remember them. Their implication will become
clear to you later on. (51)
References
1. CW, Vol.4: Fundamentals
of Religion, pp.374-375.
2. CW, Vol.3: The Vedanta,
pp.395-396.
3. CW, Vol.4: Reply to the
Madras Address, p.335.
4. CW, Vol.1: The Vedanta
Philosophy, pp.357-358.
5. CW, Vol.3: The Vedanta,
p.394.
6. CW, Vol.9: The Mundaka
Upanishad, p.238.
7. CW, Vol.7: Conversation
with Sharat Chandra Chakravarty at Belur, 1901, p.238.
8. CW, Vol.3: Vedanta in Its
Application to Indian Life, p.229.
9. CW, Vol.4: Reply to the
Madras Address, pp.332-333.
10. CW, Vol.6: Hinduism and
Shri Ramakrishna, pp.182-183.
11. Ibid., p.181.
12. CW, Vol.3: The Religion
We Are Born In, p.457.
13. CW, Vol.8: Letter to
Mary Hale from
14. CW, Vol.6: Thoughts on
the Vedas and Upanishads, p.87.
15. Rems (Haripada
Mitra), pp.51-52.
16. CW, Vol.6: Conversation
with Sharat Chandra Chakravarty at Dakshineshwar, March, 1897, pp.470-471.
17. CW, Vol.7: Inspired
Talks, June 24, 1895, p.9.
18. CW, Vol.3: The Vedanta
in All Its Phases, p.332.
19. CW, Vol.1: The Gita I,
p.446.
20. CW, Vol.3: Vedantism,
p.438.
21. CW, Vol.3: The Vedanta
in All Its Phases, p.333.
22. CW, Vol.3: Vedantism, pp.119-120.
23. CW, Vol.3: The Religion
We Are Born In, p.456.
24. CW, Vol.3: The Vedanta
in All Its Phases, pp.328-329.
25. CW, Vol.1: The Vedanta
Philosophy, p.358.
26. CW, Vol.7: Inspired
Talks, July 7, p.36.
27. CW, Vol.3: The Vedanta
in All Its Phases, pp.327-328.
28. CW, Vol.4: Reply to the
Madras Address, pp.334-335.
29. CW, Vol.3: The Vedanta
in All Its Phases, p.328.
30. CW, Vol.9: The Gita,
p.274.
31. CW, Vol.1: The Gita I,
p.446.
32. CW, Vol.4: Thoughts on
the Gita, pp.106-107.
33. CW, Vol.8: Discourses on
Jnana-Yoga II, p.8.
34. CW, Vol.3: Reply to the
Address of Welcome at Madura, p.173.
35. CW, Vol.3: The Sages of
India, p.248.
36. CW, Vol.6: Hinduism and
Shri Ramakrishna, p.181.
37. CW, Vol.3: Vedantism,
p.120.
38. CW, Vol.5: Selections
from the Math Diary, p.315.
39. CW, Vol.3: Reply to the
Address of Welcome at Madura, p.173.
40. CW, Vol.3: The Vedanta
in All Its Phases, pp.332-333.
41. CW, Vol.3: The Religion
We Are Born In, p.457.
42. CW, Vol.4: Reply to the Madras
Address, pp.335-336.
43. CW, Vol.3: Vedantism,
pp.120-121.
44. CW, Vol.3: Reply to the
Address of Welcome at Madura, pp.173-174.
45. CW, Vol.3: Vedantism,
pp.121-122.
46. CW, Vol.3: The Vedanta
in All Its Phases, pp.333-334.
47. CW, Vol.5: A Discussion,
pp.297-298.
48. Rems. (Haripada Mitra), pp.26-27.
49. CW, Vol.3: Vedantism,
p.122.
50. CW, Vol.4: Reply to the
Madras Address, p.336.
51. Rems., (K.S.
Ramaswami Shastri), p.108.
PART
II: THE TEACHINGS AND PRACTICES OF THE VEDAS AND VEDANTA
Section 4: The
Evolution of the Vedantic Teachings on God
Chapter 10: How the
Evolution of the Teachings of the Vedas Developed the Idea of God
Chapter 11: The Atman
Chapter 12: The Last Word
of the Vedas: Abstract Unity
PART II, SECTION 4: THE EVOLUTION OF THE VEDANTIC TEACHINGS
ON GOD
Chapter 10: How the
Evolution of the Teachings of the Vedas Developed the Idea of God
a) Studying the Vedas
through the Eyeglass of Evolution
1. The Vedas Contain the
Essence of All Religion
The religion of the Vedas
is the religion of the Hindus and the foundation of all Oriental religions;
that is, all other religions are offshoots of the Vedas; all Eastern systems of
religion have the Vedas as authority. (1)
The Vedas are a series of
books which, to our minds, contain the essence of all religion; but we do not
think that they alone contain the truths. (2)
One point of difference
between Hinduism and other religions is that in Hinduism we pass from truth to
truth - from a lower truth to a higher truth - and never from error to truth.
(3)
The Sruti takes the devotee
gently by the hand and leads him or her from one stage to the other through all
the stages that are necessary to travel to reach the Absolute; and as all other
religions represent one or other of these stages in an unprogressive and
crystallized form, all the other religions of the world are included in the
nameless, limitless, eternal Vedic religion.
Work hundreds of lives out,
search every corner of your mind for ages - and still you will not find one
noble religious idea that is not already embedded in that infinite mine of
spirituality [the eternal Vedic religion. (4)
All the religious thoughts
that have come subsequent to the Vedas, in whatever part of the world, have
been derived from the Vedas. (5)
Cross reference to:
Gita 3.26
b) We Find the Whole
Process of the Growth of Religious Ideas in the Vedas
The Vedanta means the end
of the Vedas, the third section, or Upanishads, containing the ripened ideas
which we find more as germs in the earlier portion. The most ancient portion of
the Vedas is the Samhita, which is in very archaic Sanskrit, only to be
understood by the aid of a very old dictionary, the Nirukta of Yaska.
(6)
[The Vedanta philosophy] is
not philosophy in the sense that we speak of the philosophy of Kant or Hegel.
It is not one book or the work of one person. Vedanta is the name of a series
of books written at different times. Sometimes in one of these productions
there will be fifty different things. Neither are they properly arranged; the
thoughts, as it were, have been jotted down. Sometimes in the midst of other
extraneous things we find some wonderful idea. But one fact is remarkable, that
these ideas in the Upanishads would always be progressing. In that crude old
language, the working of the mind of every one of the sages has been, as it
were, painted just as it went; how the ideas were at first very crude; and they
became finer and finer until they reach the goal of Vedanta, and this goal
assumes a philosophical name. (7)
The Vedas were not spoken
by any person, but the ideas were evolving slowly and slowly until they were
embodied in book form, and then that book became the authority. Various
religions are embodied in books; the power of books seems to be infinite. The
Hindus have their Vedas, and will have to hold on to them for thousands of
years more, but their ideas about them are to be changed and built anew on a
solid foundation of rock. (8)
The Vedas should be studied
through the eyeglass of evolution. They contain the whole history of the
progress of religious consciousness, until religion has reached its perfection
in unity. (9)
Our ancient philosophers
knew what you call the theory of evolution; that growth is gradual, step by
step, and the recognition of this led them to harmonize all the preceding
systems. Thus, not one of the preceding ideas was rejected. The fault of the
Buddhist faith was that it had neither the faculty nor the perception of this
continual, expansive growth; and for this reason, it never even made an attempt
to harmonize itself with the preceding steps towards the ideal. They were
rejected as useless and harmful.
This tendency in religion
is most harmful. Someone gets a new and better idea, and then he or she looks
back on those he or she has given up and forthwith decides that they were
mischievous and unnecessary. Such a person never thinks that, however crude
they may appear from his or her present point of view, there were very useful,
that they were necessary for him or her to reach his or her present state, and
that every one of us has to grow in a similar fashion, living first on crude
ideas, taking benefit from them. and then arriving at
a higher standard.....
With blessing, and not with
cursing, should be preserved all these various steps through with humanity has
to pass. Therefore, all these dualistic systems have never been rejected or
thrown out, but have been kept intact in Vedanta; and the dualistic conception
of an individual soul, limited yet complete in itself, finds its place in
Vedanta. (10)
In the Vedas we find the
whole process of the growth of religious ideas. This is because, when a higher
truth was reached, the lower perception that led to it was preserved. This was
done because the sages realized that, the world of creation being eternal, there would always be those who needed the first
steps to knowledge; that the highest philosophy, while open to all, could never
be grasped by all. In nearly every other religion, only the last or highest
realization of truth has been preserved, with the natural consequence that the
older ideas were lost, while the newer ones were understood only by the few and
gradually came to have no meaning for the many. We see this result illustrated
in the growing revolt against old traditions and authorities. Instead of
accepting them, men and women of today boldly challenge them to give reasons
for the claims, to make clear the grounds upon which they demand acceptance.
Much in Christianity is the mere application of new names and meanings to old
pagan beliefs and customs. If the old sources had been preserved and the
reasons for the transitions fully explained, many things would have been
clearer. The Vedas preserved the old ideas and this fact necessitated huge
commentaries to explain them and why they were kept. It also led to many
superstitions, through clinging to old forms after all sense of their meaning
had been lost. In many ceremonials words are repeated which have survived from
a now-forgotten language and to which no real meaning can now be attached. (11)
c) The Upanishads,
Having Been Preserved Unmutilated, Allow Us to Trace the Historical Growth of
Spiritual Ideas
The word Upanisad
may mean sittings [or sittings near a teacher]. Those of you who
may have studied some of the Upanishads can understand how they are condensed,
shorthand sketches. After long discussions had been held they were taken down,
possibly from memory. The difficulty is that you get very little of the
background. Only the luminous points are mentioned there. The origin of ancient
Sanskrit is 5,000 BC; the Upanishads are [at least] two thousand years before
that. Nobody knows exactly how old they are. (12)
In the older Upanishads the
language is very archaic, like that of the hymn portion of the Vedas, and one
has to wade sometimes through quite a mass of unnecessary things to get at the
essential doctrines. The ritualistic literature about which I told you, which
forms the second division of the Vedas, has left a good deal of its mark on the
Chandogya Upanisad, so that more than half of it is still ritualistic.
There is, however, one great gain in studying the very old Upanishads. You
trace, as it were, the historical growth of spiritual ideas. In the more recent
Upanishads the spiritual ideas have been collected and brought into one place,
as in the Bhagavadgita, for instance - which we may, perhaps, look upon
as the last of the Upanishads - you do not find any inkling of these
ritualistic ideas. The Gita is like a bouquet composed of the beautiful flowers
of spiritual truths collected from the Upanishads. But in the Gita you cannot
study the rise of the spiritual ideas, you cannot
trace them to their source. To do that, as has been pointed out by many, you
must study the Vedas. The great idea of holiness that has been attached to
these books has preserved them, more than any other book in the world, from
mutilation. In them, thoughts at their highest and at their lowest have all
been preserved, the essential and the non-essential, the most ennobling
teachings and the simplest matters of detail stand side by side, for nobody has
dared touch them.....
We all know that in the
scriptures of every religion changes were made to suit the growing spirituality
of later times; one word was changed here and another put in there, and so on.
This, probably, has not been done with the Vedic literature; or, if ever done,
it is most imperceptible. So we have this great advantage: we are able to study
thoughts in their original significance, to note how they developed, how from
materialistic ideas finer and finer spiritual ideas are evolved, until they
attained their greatest height in Vedanta. Descriptions of some of the old
manners and customs are also there, but they do not appear much in the Upanishads.
The language used is peculiar, terse, and mnemonic.
The writers of these books
simply jotted down these lines as helps to remember certain facts which they
supposed were already well known. In a narrative, perhaps, which they are
telling, they take it for granted that it is well known to everyone they are
addressing. Thus a great difficulty arises; we scarcely know the real meaning
of any one of these stories, because the traditions have nearly died out and
the little that has remained of them has been very much exaggerated. Many new
interpretations have been put upon them, so that when you find them in the
Puranas they have already become lyrical poems. (13)
b) Vedanta Philosophy
Began When the Ancient Aryans Found No Answers in the External World and Turned
Back upon the Inside World
In the oldest parts of the
Vedas the search was the same as in other books - the search was outside. (14)
The Hindu scriptures, the
Vedas, are a vast mass of accumulation, some of them crude, until you come to
where religion is taught, only the scriptural. Now, that was the portion of the
Vedas which all [later] sects claimed to preach. Then, there are three steps in
the ancient Vedas: first, work; second, worship, third, knowledge. When a man
or woman purifies him or herself by work and worship, then God is within that
man or woman. He or she has realized God is already there. He or she can only
have seen God because the mind has become pure. Now, that mind can become
purified through work and worship. That is all. Salvation is already there, but
we don't know it. Therefore, work, worship and knowledge are the three steps.
(15)
We find that the minds of
the ancient Aryan thinkers began a new theme. They found out that in the
external world no search would give an answer to their question [about the
relationship of the external and internal world]. They might seek in the
external world for ages, but there would be no answer to their questions. So
they fell back upon this other method; according to this, they were taught that
the desires of the senses, desires for ceremonials and externalities have
caused a veil to come between themselves and the truth, and that this cannot be
removed by any ceremonial. They had to fall back upon their own minds and
analyze the mind to find the truth in themselves. The
outside world failed and they turned back upon the inside world, and then it
became the real philosophy of the Vedanta; and from here the Vedanta philosophy
begins. It is the foundation-stone of Vedanta philosophy. As we go on, we find
that all its inquiries are inside. From the very outset they seem to declare:
look not for truth in any religion; it is here in the human soul, the miracle
of all miracles - in the human soul, the emporium of all knowledge, the mine of
all existence - seek here. What is not here cannot be there. And they found
out, step by step, that which is external is but a dull reflection at best of
that which is inside. (16)
c) The Three Points on
Which All Vedantists Agree
All Vedantists agree on
three points: they believe in God, in the Vedas as revealed, and in cycles.
(17)
On one point all Vedantists
agree, and that is that they all believe in God. All these Vedantists also
believe ... that the Vedas are an expression of the knowledge of God; and as
God is eternal, His or Her knowledge is eternally with Him or Her, and so are
the Vedas eternal. There is another common ground of belief: that of creation
in cycles. (18)
The three essentials of
Hinduism are belief in God, in the Vedas as revelation, in the doctrine of
karma and transmigration. (19)
[In the] teachings of the
Upanishads there are various texts. Some are perfectly dualistic, while others
are monistic. But there are certain doctrines which are agreed to by all the
different sects of
d) The Ancient Vedic
Search for God
1. The Different Strata
of the Search
No savage can be found who
does not believe in some kind of a god. Modern science does not say whether it
looks upon this as revelation or not. Love among savage nations is not very
strong. They live in terror. To their superstitious imaginations is pictured
some malignant spirit, before the thought of which they quake in fear and
terror. Whatever [savages] like they thinks will please the evil spirit. What
will pacify them they think will appease the wrath of the spirit.
To this end they labor ever against their fellow savages.... [Historical facts
show] that savage humanity went from ancestor worship to the worship of
elements and later, to gods, such as the God of Thunder and Storms. Then the
religion of the world was polytheism. The beauty of the sunrise, the grandeur
of the sunset, the mystifying appearance of the star-bedecked skies and the
weirdness of thunder and lightning impressed primitive humanity with a force
that it could not explain and suggested the idea of a higher and more powerful
being controlling the infinities that flocked before its gaze...
Then came
another period - the period of monotheism. All the gods disappeared and blended into one, the
God of gods, the ruler of the universe. [Of God the Aryans said], "We live
and move in God He or She is motion." Then there came another period known
to metaphysics as the "period of pantheism". This race rejected
polytheism and monotheism and the idea that God was the universe, and said,
"The Soul of my soul is the only true existence. My nature is my existence
and will expand to me." (21)
In the Vedas we trace the
endeavor of that ancient people to find God. In their search for God they came
upon different strata; beginning with ancestor worship, they passed on the
worship of Agni, the fire-god, Indra, the god of thunder, and of Varuna, the
God of gods.... This anthropomorphic conception, however, did not satisfy the
Hindus; it was too human for them who were seeking the Divine. Therefore they
finally gave up searching for God in the outer world of sense and matter and
turned their attention to the inner world. Is there an inner world? And what is
it? It is Atman. It is the Self, it is the only thing
an individual can be sure of. If he or she knows him or herself he or she can
know the universe, and not otherwise. (22)
Cross reference to:
Cha. Up., 7.25.1
2. The Worship of
Ancestors and Spirits Is the Struggle to Transcend the Senses
[One]
theory of spiritualism [is] that religion begins with the worship of ancestors. Ancestor worship was among the
Egyptians, among the Babylonians, among many other races - the Hindus, the
Christians. There is not one form of religion among which there has not been
this ancestor worship in some form or other.
Before that they thought
that this body has a double inside it and that when this body dies the double
gets out and lives so long as this body exists. The double becomes very hungry
or thirsty, wants food or drink and wants to enjoy the good things of this
world. So [the double] comes to get food; and if he or she does not get it, he
or she will injure even his or her own children. So long as the body is
preserved the double will live. Naturally the first attempt, as we see, was to
preserve the body, mummify the body, so that the body will live forever.
So with the Babylonians was
this sort of spirit worship. Later on as the nations advanced, the cruel forms
died out and better forms remained. Some place was given to that which is
called heaven, and they placed food here so that it might reach the double
there. Even now pious Hindus must, one day a year at least, place food for
their ancestors. And the day they leave off [this habit] will be a sorry day
for the ancestors. So you also find this ancestor worship to be one cause of
religion. There are in modern times philosophers who
advance the theory that this has been the root of all religions. (23)
Among the ancient Hindus...
we find traces of... ancestor worship. (24)
[However], Professor Max
Muller's opinion is that not the least trace of ancestral worship could be
found in the Rig Veda. There we do not meet with the horrid sight of
mummies staring stark and blank at us. There the gods are friendly to humanity;
communion between the worshipper and worshipped is healthy. There is no
moroseness, no want of simple joy, no lack of smiles or light in the eyes....
Dwelling on the Vedas, I even seem to hear the laughter of the gods. (25)
A very good position [can]
be made out for those who hold the theory of ancestor worship as the beginning
of religion.
On the other hand, there
are scholars who, from the ancient Aryan literature show that religion
originated in nature worship. Although in
These two views, though
they seem to be contradictory, can be reconciled on a third basis which, to my mind,
is the real germ of religion, and that I propose to call the struggle to
transcend the limitations of the senses. Either human beings go to seek for the
spirits of their ancestors, the spirits of the dead - that is, they want to get
a glimpse of what there is after the body is dissolved; or they desire to
understand the power working behind the stupendous phenomena of nature.
Whichever of these is the case, one thing is certain - that they try to
transcend the limitation of the senses. Human beings cannot remain satisfied
with the senses; they want to go beyond them. (26)
All religions are more or
less attempts to get beyond nature - the crudest or the most developed,
expressed through mythology or symbology, stories of gods, angels or demons, or
through stories of saints and seers, great men and women or prophets, or
through the abstractions of philosophy - all have that one object, all are
trying to get beyond these limitations. In one word, they are all struggling
towards freedom. Human beings feel, consciously or unconsciously, that they are
bound; they are not what they want to be. It was taught to them the very moment
they began to look around. That very instant they learned that they were bound
and they also found that there was something in them which wanted to fly
beyond, where the body could not follow, but which was as yet chained down by
this limitation. Even in the lowest of religious ideas, where departed
ancestors and other spirits - mostly violent and cruel, lurking about the
houses of their friends, fond of bloodshed and strong drink - are worshipped,
even there we find that one common factor, that of freedom. People who want to
worship the gods see in them, above all thing, greater
freedom than in themselves. If a door is closed, they think the gods can get
through it, and that walls have no limitations for them. (27)
3. The Idea of Infinity
Underlay the Aryans' Perception of the Growth of God
There have been two
theories advanced in modern times with regard to the growth of religions. The
one is the spirit theory, the other the tribal theory. The tribal theory is
that humanity in its savage state remains divided into many small tribes. Each
tribe has a god of its own - or sometimes the same god divided into many forms,
as the god of this city came to that city, and so on; Jehovah of this city and
of such-and-such a mountain. When the tribes came together, one of them became
strong....
[These philosophers]
advance the theory that the root of all religions was the tribal assimilation
of gods into one. (28)
In the oldest portion of
the Vedas there is very little of spiritualism, if anything at all. These Vedic
devas were not related to spiritualism - although later on they became so; and
this idea of Someone behind them, of whom they were
manifestations, is in the oldest parts. (29)
The popular idea that
strikes one as making the mythologies of the Samhitas entirely different from
other mythologies is that, along with every one of [the Vedic] gods is the idea
of an infinity. This infinite is abstracted and
sometimes described as Aditya. At other times it is affixed, as it were, to all
the other gods....
The peculiar fact that the
Vedic gods are taken up, as it were, one after the other, raised and sublimated
till each has assumed the proportions of the infinite personal God of the
universe - calls for an explanation. Professor Max Muller creates for it a new
name, as he thinks it is peculiar to the Hindus; he calls it henotheism. We
need not go far for the explanation. It is within the book. A few steps from
the very place where we find these gods being raised and sublimated, we find
the explanation also..... The Being perceived was one
and the same; it was the perceiver who made the difference. It was the hymnist,
the sage, the poet, who sang in different languages and different words, the
praise of one and the same Being. (30)
There are various other
hymns where the same idea comes in about how this all came, just as... when
they were trying to find a governor of the universe, a personal God, they were
taking up one deva after another, raising it up to that position; so now we
shall find that in various hymns one or other idea is taken up and infinitely
expanded and made responsible for everything in the universe. One particular
idea is taken as the support in which everything rests and exists, and that
support has become all this. So on with various ideas. They tried this method
with prana, the life principle. They expanded the idea of the life principle
until it became universal and infinite. It is the life principle that is
supporting everything - not only the human body, but it is the light of the sun
and moon, it is the power moving everything, the
universal motive energy. (31)
We have seen how the idea
of the devas came. At the same time we know that these devas were at first only powerful beings, nothing
more. Most of you are horrified when reading the old scriptures, whether of the
Greeks, the Hebrews, the Persians, or others, to find that the ancient gods
sometimes did things which to us are very repugnant. But when we read these
books we entirely forget that we are persons of the nineteenth century and
these gods were beings existing thousands of years ago. We also forget that the
people who worshipped these gods found nothing incongruous in their characters,
found nothing to frighten them, because they were very much like themselves....
The great mistake is in
recognizing the evolution of the worshippers, while we do not acknowledge the
evolution of the Worshipped. He or She is not credited with the advance that
his or her devotees have made. That is to say, you and I, as representing
ideas, have grown. This may seem somewhat curious to you - that God can grow.
God cannot. God is unchangeable. In the same sense, real human beings never
grow. But humanity's ideas of God are constantly changing and expanding. We
shall see later on how the real human being behind each one of these human
manifestations is immovable, unchangeable, pure, and always perfect; and in the
same way the idea that we form of God is a mere manifestation, our own
creation. Behind that is the real God who never changes, the ever-pure, the
immutable. But the manifestation is always changing, revealing the reality
behind more and more. When it reveals more of the fact behind, it is called
progression, when it hides more of the fact behind, it is called retrogression.
Thus, as we grow, so the gods grow. From the ordinary point of view, just as we
reveal ourselves as we evolve, so the gods reveal themselves. (32)
Cross reference to:
Rig Veda, 164.46
e) The Personal God in
Vedanta
1. Vedanta Begins Where
the Idea of Monotheism First Appears
In the case of [the god]
Varuna, there is another idea, just the germ of one idea which came but was
immediately suppressed by the Aryan mind - and that was the idea of fear. In
another place we read they are afraid, they have sinned and ask Varuna for pardon
[Atharva Veda Samhita, 4.16 q.v.] These ideas
were never allowed, for reasons you will come to understand later on, to grow
on Indian soil, but the germs were there sprouting, the idea of fear and the
idea of sin. This is the idea, as you all know, of what is called monotheism.
This monotheism, you see, came to
Here Vedanta begins, where
these monotheistic ideas first appear. (34)
In the Karma-Kanda portion
of the Vedas we find the most wonderful ideas of religion inculcated, we find
the most wonderful ideas about an overruling Creator, Preserver and Destroyer
of the universe presented before us in language sometimes the most
soul-stirring. (35)
2. To
the Vedantic Mind Monotheism Was Too Anthropomorphic and Did Not Explain the
Visible World
Throughout the Samhitas, in
the first and oldest part, this monotheistic idea prevails, but we shall find
that it did not prove sufficient for the Aryans; they threw it aside, as it
were, as a and matter and turned their attention to the inner world. (38)
The ancient monotheistic
idea did not satisfy the Hindu mind. It did not go far enough, it did not
explain the visible world; a ruler of the world does not explain the world -
certainly not. A ruler of the universe does not explain the universe; and much
less an external ruler explains, one outside of it. He or She may be a moral
guide, the greatest power in the universe, but that is no explanation of the
universe. (39)Cross reference to: very
primitive sort of idea and went further on, as we Hindus think. (36)
It was first asked who
created the external world and how it came into being. Now the question is:
what is that in human beings which makes them live and move,
and what becomes of that when they die? The first philosophers studied the
material substance and tried to reach the ultimate through that. At the best,
they found a personal governor of the universe, a human being immensely
magnified, but yet to all intents and purposes a human being. But that could
not be the whole truth; at best it could only be a partial truth. We see this
universe as human beings and our God is our human explanation of the universe.
Suppose a cow were philosophical and had religion, it would have a
cow universe and a cow solution of the problem, and it would not be possible
that it should see our God. Suppose cats became philosophers; they would see a
cat universe and have a cat solution of the problem of the universe, and a cat
ruling it. So we see from this that our explanation of the universe is not the
whole of the solution (37)
The stages of growth
lead up from a multiplicity of gods to monotheism. This anthropomorphic
conception, however, did not satisfy the Hindus. It was too human for them who
were seeking the divine. Therefore they finally gave up searching for God in
the outer world of sense
Atharva Veda 4.16.2
3. The Personal God of
Hinduism Is the Highest Principle of the Universe, in Whom Humanity Can Take
Refuge
We shall see how the
[ancient Aryan thinkers] took, as it were, this old idea of God, the governor
of the universe, who is external to the universe, and first put Him or Her
inside the universe....
The Aryan mind had so long
been seeking an answer to the question, [where did the universe come from?]
from outside. They questioned everything they could find - the sun, the moon,
the stars - and they found all they could in this way. The whole of nature at
best could teach them only of a personal being who is the Ruler of the
universe; it could teach nothing further. In short, out of the external world
we can only get the idea of an architect, that which is called the design
theory. It is not a very logical argument, as we all know; there is something
childish about it, yet it is the only little bit of anything we can know about
God from the external world - that this world required a builder. But this is
no explanation of the universe: the materials of the world are before Him or
Her, and this God wanted all these materials. The worst objection is that He or
She must be limited by the materials. The builder could not have made a house
without the materials of which it is composed. Therefore, He or She was limited
by the materials; He or She could only do what the materials enabled Him or Her
to do. Therefore the God that the design theory gives is at best only an
architect - and a limited architect - of the universe; He or She is bound and
restricted by the materials. He or She is not independent at all. That much
they had found out already, and many other minds would have rested at that. In other
countries the same thing happened; the human mind could not rest there; the
thinking, grasping minds wanted to go further, but those who were backward got
hold of them and did not allow them to grow. But, fortunately, these Hindu
sages were not the people to be knocked on the head; they wanted to get a
solution, and now we find that they were leaving the external for the internal.
(40)
The Vedas are full of
passages which prove the existence of a personal God. The
rishis who, through long devotion to God, had a peep into the unknown and threw
their challenge to the world. It is only presumptuous people who have
not walked in the path described by the rishis and who have not followed their teachings, that can criticize and oppose them. No one has
yet come forward who would dare to say that he or she has properly followed
their directions and has not seen anything and these rishis are liars. There
are people who have been under trial at various times and have felt that they
have not been forsaken by God. The world is such that if faith in God does not
offer us any consolation it is better to commit suicide. (41)
All the sects in
Ishwara is to be known from
the Vedanta; all Vedas point to Him (who is the Cause, the Creator, the
Preserver and Destroyer). Ishwara is the unification of the trinity known as
Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva, which stand at the head of the Hindu pantheon. [Brahma-Sutras,
Shankaracharya’s commentary] (43)
Disciple: Is there any such statement in the
Upanishads that Ishwara is an all-powerful person? But people generally believe
in such an Ishwara.
Swami Vivekananda: The highest principle, the Lord of
all, cannot be a person. The jiva [individual soul] is an individual and the
sum total of jivas is the Ishwara.... But Brahman transcends both
the individual and collective aspects, the jiva and the Ishwara. In
Brahman there is no part; it is for the sake of easy comprehension that parts
have been imagined in it. That part of Brahman in which there is the
superimposition of creation, maintenance and dissolution of the universe, has
been spoken of as Ishwara in the scriptures, while the other, unchangeable
portion, with reference to which there is no thought of duality, is indicated
as Brahman.... When through meditation and other practices name and form are
dissolved, then only the transcendent Brahman remains. Then the separate
reality of jivas and the universe is felt no longer. Then it is realized that
one is the eternal, pure essence of Intelligence, or Brahman.....
Disciple: How then is it true that Ishwara is
an almighty person?
Swami Vivekananda: Humans are human in so far as they
are qualified by the limiting adjunct of mind. Through the mind they have to
understand and grasp everything, and therefore whatever they think is limited
by the mind. Hence it is the natural tendency of human beings to argue, from
the analogy of their own personality, the personality of Ishwara or God. Human
beings can only think of their ideal as a human being. When, buffeted by
sorrows in this world of disease and death, they are driven to desperation and
helplessness, then they seek refuge with someone, relying on whom they may feel
safe. But where is that refuge to be found?... The
means may be different in different cases. Those who have faith in a personal God
have to undergo spiritual practices holding on to that idea. If there is
sincerity, through that will come the awakening of the lion of Brahman within.
(44)
Cross reference to:
Taitt. Up., 3.1.1
Shwe. Up., 2.5, 3.8
f) The Impersonal God of
the Upanishads Is Immanent in the Whole Universe
What is the effect of
accepting... an impersonal Being, an impersonal deity? What shall we gain? Will
religion stand as a factor in human life, our consoler, helper?
What becomes of the desire of the human heart to pray for help to some being?
That will all remain. The personal God will remain, but on a better basis. It
has been strengthened by the impersonal.... Without the impersonal, the
personal cannot remain. If you mean to say there is a Being entirely separate
from this universe, who has created this universe out of nothing just by His or
Her will, , that cannot be proved. Such a state of things cannot be. But if we
understand the idea of the impersonal, then the idea of the personal can remain
there also. This universe, in its various forms, is but the various readings of
the same impersonal. When we read it with the five senses, we call it the
material world. If there be a Being with more senses than five, he or she will
read it as something else. If one of us gets an electric sense, he or she will
see the universe as something else again. There are various forms of that
Oneness of which all these various ideas of worlds are but various readings,
and the personal God is the highest reading of that impersonal that can be
attained to by the human intellect. (45)
In our thought of God there
is human limitation, personality; with Shakti [God as Mother] comes the idea of
one universal Power.... The Upanishads did not develop this thought, for
Vedanta does not care for the God idea. (46)
The God preached in the
Vedas is the formless, infinite, impersonal. (47)
What is salvation? To live with God. Where? Anywhere.
Here this moment. One moment in infinite time is quite as good as any other
moment. This is the old doctrine of the Vedas. (48)
Just as in the West we find
this prominent fact in the political development of Western races that they
cannot bear absolute rule, that they are always trying to prevent any one
person from ruling over them and are gradually advancing to higher and higher
democratic ideas, higher and higher ideas of physical liberty, so in Indian
metaphysics exactly the same phenomenon appears in the development of spiritual
life. The multiplicity of gods gave place to one God of the universe, and in
the Upanishads there is a rebellion even against that one God. Not only was
their idea of many governors of the universe ruling their destinies unbearable,
but it was also intolerable that there should be one person ruling this
universe. This is the first thing that strikes us. The idea grows and grows
until it attains its climax. In almost all of the Upanishads we find the climax
coming at the last, and that is the dethroning of the God of the universe. The
personality of God vanishes, the impersonality comes. God is no more a person,
no more a human being, however magnified and exaggerated,
who rules this universe, but has become an embodied principle in every being,
immanent in the whole universe. (49)
Unless there is unity at
the universal heart, we cannot understand variety. Such is the conception of
the Lord in the Upanishads. Sometimes it rises even higher, presenting to us an
ideal before which at first we stand aghast - that we are in essence one with
God. (50)
Cross reference to:
Brihad. Up., 1.4.10
2.3.6
Cha. Up., 6.8.7
7.15.1
References
1. CW, Vol.6: The Vedanta
Philosophy and Christianity, p.48.
2. CW, Vol.1: The Hindu
Religion, p.329.
3. CW, Vol.6: Notes Taken
Down in
4. CW, Vol.4: Reply to the
Madras Address, p.343.
5. CW, Vol.5: Selections
from the Math Diary, 315.
6. CW, Vol.5: Indian
Missionary's
7. CW, Vol.1: Vedic
Religious Ideals, p.356.
8. CW, Vol.3: Vedantism,
p.435.
9. CW, Vol.6: Notes Taken
Down in
10. CW, Vol.2: Practical
Vedanta IV, pp.346-347.
11. CW, Vol.8: Discourses on
Jnana-Yoga VII, pp.24-25.
12. CW, Vol.1: The Gita I,
p.446.
13. CW, Vol.2: The Freedom
of the Soul, pp.189-190.
14. CW, Vol.2: The Way to
Blessedness, p.412.
15. CW, Vol.3: Buddhistic
India, p.521.
16. CW, Vol.1: Vedic
Religious Ideals, p.355.
17. CW, Vol.1: The Vedanta
Philosophy, p.359.
18. CW, Vol.2: The Atman,
p.239.
19. CW, Vol.6: Notes Taken
Down in
20. CW, Vol.3: The Vedanta
in All Its Phases, pp. 334-335.
21. SVW, Vol.1,
Chapter 5: In a Southern City, pp.268-269.
22. CW, Vol.1: Vedanta as a
Factor in Civilisation, p.384.
23. CW, Vol.9: History of
the Aryan Race, p.260.
24. CW, Vol.2: The Necessity
of Religion, p.58.
25. CW, Vol.3: Vedantism,
p.436.
26. CW, Vol.2: The Necessity
of Religion, pp.58-59.
27. CW, Vol.2: Maya and
Illusion, p.103.
28. CW, Vol.9: History of
the Aryan Race, pp.259-260.
29. Ibid., p.261.
30. CW, Vol.1: Vedic
Religious Ideals, pp.345-348.
31. Ibid., p.352.
32. CW, Vol.2: Maya and the
Evolution of the Conception of God, pp.105-107.
33. CW, Vol.1: Vedic
Religious Ideals, p.346.
34. CW, Vol.2: Maya and
Freedom, p.128.
35. CW, Vol.3: The Vedanta,
p.393.
36. CW, Vol.1: Vedic
Religious Ideals, p.346.
37. CW, Vol.2: Realisation,
p.155.
38. CW, Vol.1: Vedanta as a
Factor in Civilisation, p.384.
39. CW, Vol.1: Vedic
Religious Ideals, p.350.
40. Ibid., pp.355-356 and
353-354.
41. CW, Vol.6: Notes Taken
Down in
42. CW, Vol.3: The Vedanta
in All Its Phases, pp.335-336.
43. CW, Vol.7: Inspired
Talks, July 12, 1895, p.46.
44. CW, Vol.7: Conversation
with Sharat Chandra Chakravarty at Belur Math, 1899, pp.191-192.
45. CW, Vol.1: Reason and
Religion, p.377.
46. CW, Vol.8: The Worship
of the Divine Mother, p.253.
47. CW, Vol.6: The Story of
the Boy Gopala, p.169.
48. CW, Vol.3: Buddhistic
India, p.537
49. CW, Vol.2: The Freedom
of the Soul, pp.190-191.
50. CW, Vol.1: What Is
Religion?, p.338.
Continued….
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