Vivekananda

Swami Vivekananda, born Narendranath Datta in Calcutta, was a Hindu monk and the leading disciple of Ramakrishna. His addresses at the World's Parliament of Religions in Chicago in 1893 brought Vedānta and Yoga to wide Western attention. Back in India he founded the Ramakrishna Mission, combining monastic life with social service and education. He presented Advaita Vedānta as a universal philosophy in which the different religions are paths toward the same truth, and he became a major figure of modern Indian thought and national revival.

Key ideas

• Each soul is potentially divine, and the goal is to manifest that divinity.
• The religions of the world are different paths to the same truth.
• Knowledge, devotion, work and meditation are four yogas suited to different temperaments.
• Service to human beings, especially the poor, is service to God.

Major works

• Addresses at the World's Parliament of Religions, Chicago (1893)
• Raja Yoga (1896)
• Karma Yoga (1896)
• The Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda (posthumous collection)

In the conversation

• Debate The West’s picture of ‘Indian philosophy’ is Vedanta-shaped, and it has hidden everyone else Arvind Poojary · 6 replies