Question

Swami Vivekananda 4 pages

Answer 1

Swami Vivekananda (1863—1902) was an Indian Hindu monk and a key figure in the introduction of Indian philosophies of Vedantaand Yoga to the western world.  He was one of the most influential philosophers and social reformers in his contemporary India and the most successful and influential missionaries of Vedanta to the Western world. Indian Nobel laureate poet Rabindranath Tagore's suggested to study the works of Vivekananda to understand India. He also told, in Vivekananda there was nothing negative, but everything positive.

In last one century, hundreds of scholarly books have been written on Vivekananda, his works and his philosophy in different languages. Sister Nivedita, who was a disciple and a friend of Vivekananda, wrote two books The Master as I Saw Him and Notes of some wanderings with the Swami Vivekananda. The first one was published in 1910 and the second one was published in 1913. Sister Gargi's lifelong research work, a series of six volumes of books, Swami Vivekananda in the West: New Discoveries was first published in two volumes in 1957. In 1983-87 these series was republished in six volumes. Bengali scholar and critic Sankari Prasad Basu, who was a director of Swami Vivekananda Archives, Ramakrishna Mission Institute of Culture wrote several books on Vivekananda such as Vivekananda o Samakalin Bharatbarsha ((in Bengali) 7 volumes), Sahasya Vivekananda (in Bengali), Bandhu Vivekananda (in Bengali) etc.

Monks of Ramakrishna Math and Mission too have written several notable books on the life and works of Vivekananda. Swami Vivekananda and Modern India written by Swami Jagadiswarananda was first published in 1941. In this book the author covered the biography of Vivekananda in brief.[5] Swami Nikhilananda wrote Vivekananda: A Biographywhich was first published in 1943 from Advaita Ashrama. Yuganayak Vivekananda(in Bengali), written by Swami Gambhiranandawas first published in 1966–1967.

Answer 2

Swami Vivekananda (Bengali:  12 January 1863 – 4 July 1902), born Narendranath Datta , was an Indian Hindu monk, a chief disciple of the 19th-century Indian mystic Ramakrishna. He was a key figure in the introduction of the Indian philosophies of Vedanta and Yoga to the Western world and is credited with raising interfaith awareness, bringing Hinduism to the status of a major world religion during the late 19th century. He was a major force in the revival of Hinduism in India, and contributed to the concept of nationalism in colonial India. Vivekananda founded the Ramakrishna Math and the Ramakrishna Mission. He is perhaps best known for his speech which began, "Sisters and brothers of America ...," in which he introduced Hinduism at the Parliament of the World's Religions in Chicago in 1893.

Born into an aristocratic Bengali family of Calcutta, Vivekananda was inclined towards spirituality. He was influenced by his guru, Ramakrishna, from whom he learnt that all living beings were an embodiment of the divine self; therefore, service to God could be rendered by service to mankind. After Ramakrishna's death, Vivekananda toured the Indian subcontinent extensively and acquired first-hand knowledge of the conditions prevailing in British India. He later travelled to the United States, representing India at the 1893 Parliament of the World's Religions. Vivekananda conducted hundreds of public and private lectures and classes, disseminating tenets of Hindu philosophy in the United States, England and Europe. In India, Vivekananda is regarded as a patriotic saint and his birthday is celebrated there as National Youth Day.

In 1871, at the age of eight, Narendranath enrolled at Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar's Metropolitan Institution, where he went to school until his family moved to Raipur in 1877. In 1879, after his family's return to Calcutta, he was the only student to receive first-division marks in the Presidency College entrance examination. He was an avid reader in a wide range of subjects, including philosophy, religion, history, social science, art and literature. He was also interested in Hindu scriptures, including the Vedas, the Upanishads, the Bhagavad Gita, the Ramayana, the Mahabharata and the Puranas. Narendra was trained in Indian classical music, and regularly participated in physical exercise, sports and organised activities. Narendra studied Western logic, Western philosophy and European history at the General Assembly's Institution (now known as the Scottish Church College). In 1881 he passed the Fine Arts examination, and completed a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1884. Narendra studied the works of David Hume, Immanuel Kant, Johann Gottlieb Fichte, Baruch Spinoza, Georg W. F. Hegel, Arthur Schopenhauer, Auguste Comte, John Stuart Mill and Charles Darwin. He became fascinated with the evolutionism of Herbert Spencer and corresponded with him, translating Spencer's book Education (1861) into Bengali. While studying Western philosophers, he also learned Sanskrit scriptures and Bengali literature. William Hastie (principal of General Assembly's Institution) wrote, "Narendra is really a genius. I have travelled far and wide but I have never come across a lad of his talents and possibilities, even in German universities, among philosophical students' Some accounts have called Narendra a shrutidhara (a person with a prodigious memory)