Sunday, December 16, 2012

Swami Vivekananda in Parliament of Religions (contd-1)

It was only a short speech, but its spirit of universality, its

 fundamental earnestness and broadmindedness completely

 captivated the whole assembly. There were other Hindu 

delegates who stood for societies or churches or sects, but

 the Swami, who belonged to no sect but rather to India as

 a whole, proclaimed the universality of religious truths and

 the sameness of the Goal of all religious realizations. In the

 course of his illuminating addresses during the sessions of

 the Parliament, the Swami placed before the distinguished

 audience the cardinal truths of Vedanta, the universal

 religion of humanity.  

He said: “If there is ever to be a universal religion, it must


 be one which will have no location in place or time; which

 will be infinite, like the God it will preach, and whose sun will

 shine upon the followers of Krishna and Christ, on saint and

 sinners alike; which will not be Brahminic or Buddhistic


, Christian or Mohammedan, but the sum total of all these,

 and still have infinite space for development; which in its 

catholicity will find a place for every human being, from the

 lowest grovelling savage not far removed from the brute to

 the highest man towering by the virtues of his head and

 heart almost above humanity. It will be a religion which will

 have no place for persecution or intolerance in its polity

, which will recognize divinity in every man and woman, and

 whose whole scope, whose whole force, will be centred in

 aiding humanity to realize its own true, divine nature. Offer

 such a religion and all the nations will follow you.? The

 Christian is not to become a Hindu or a Buddhist

, nor a Hindu or a Buddhist to become a Christian. But each

 must assimilate the spirit of the others and yet preserve his

 individuality and grow according to his own law of growth.”  

The Parliament of Religions, he concluded, had shown to the


 world that holiness, purity, and charity were not the

 exclusive possession of any church in the world and that

 every system had produced men and women of the most

 exalted character. In the face of this evidence, if anybody 

dreamt of the exclusive survival of his own religion and the

 destruction of others, he was to be pitied and told that upon

 the banner of every religion will soon be written, in spite of

 resistance: “Help and not fight. Assimilation and not

 Destruction. Harmony and Peace and not Dissension.”
   
The effect of these mighty words was tremendous. Over the 

heads of the official representatives of the Parliament they

 were addressed to a wider public, and Swami Vivekananda

 at once became the most celebrated personality of the

 Parliament. The American press rang with his fame. The

 best known and most conservative of the metropolitan

 newspapers proclaimed him a Prophet and a Seer. The New

 York Herald referred to him as “undoubtedly the greatest

 figure in the Parliament of Religions”, and added, “After

 hearing him we feel how foolish it is to send missionaries to

 this learned nation.”  

The news of Swami Vivekananda’s unparalleled success soon 


poured into India as well. Indian journals and magazines -

 from Madras to Almora, from Calcutta to Bombay - were

 filled with the American reports of his triumph at the

 Parliament. The happiness of the monks of the Ramakrishna

 Order at Baranagore knew no bounds when they came to

 learn that it was their beloved leader who had taken the

 New World by storm. The citizens of Calcutta organized a

 great representative meeting in the Town Hall to thank the

 Swami and the American people. The name Vivekananda

 rang with acclaim throughout the length and breadth of

 Hindusthan. Everywhere he was recognized as the man who

 had come to fulfil a great need. The unknown monk without

 titles and ties blossomed into a world-figure and became

 the man of the hour. But in the midst of this recognition of

 his genius, universal applause, and immense popularity, the

 Swami was never found for a moment forgetful of his duties

 to the sunken masses of India. On the very day of his

 triumph when he was invited by a man of great wealth and

 distinction to his home and lodged in a princely room fitted

 with luxury beyond anything he could conceive, instead of

 feeling happy in this splendid environment he was

 miserable. He could not sleep, pondering, in contrast, over

 India’s plight. The bed of down became to him a bed of

 thorns. He rolled down on the empty floor and in agony of

 his heart cried, “O Mother, what do I care for name and

 fame when my motherland remains sunk in utmost poverty?

 Who will raise the masses in India? Who will give them

 bread? Show me, O Mother, how I can help them.” He

 wrote inspiring letters to his disciples and admirers in India

 to stimulate their hearts into activity and a high pitch of

 patriotic fervour. “Gird up your loins, my boys,’ he once

 wrote, “I am called by the Lord for this. The hope lies in

 you - in the meek, the lowly, but the faithful. Feel for the

 miserable and look up for help - it shall come. With a

 bleeding heart I have crossed half the world to this strange

 land seeking for help. The Lord will help me. I may perish of

 cold and hunger in this land, but I bequeath to you, young

 men, this sympathy, this struggle for the poor, the ignorant, the
 oppressed. Go down on your faces before Him and make a

 great sacrifice, the sacrifice of a whole life for them - these

 three hundred millions, going down and down every day

. Glory unto the Lord, we will succeed. Hundreds will fall in

 the struggle, hundreds will be ready to take it up. Life is

 nothing, death is nothing. Glory unto the Lord - march on

, the Lord is our General. Do not look back to see who fall -

 .forward, onward!” The Swami never forgot in the midst of 

luxury the primary idea of his mission - to save his people, to

 mobilize them to help him in his task by widening his appeal

 until it became the cause of the people, the cause of the

 poor and the oppressed of the whole world.

In order to serve the cause of his motherland he accepted

 the offer of a lecture bureau for a tour of the United States

. In the course of this apostolic campaign in America he

 began to tell of the glories of India and the greatness of

 Indian culture and spirituality.  

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