Vivekananda (1863–1902)

Swami (“master”) Vivekananda is one of the best known Hindu teachers in the Western world. A disciple of the Bengali saint Ramakrishna (1836–1886), he came to attend the World's Parliament of Religions held in Chicago in 1893. A powerful orator, his inspiring speech at this meeting led to the first formal introduction of Hinduism to the [Page 1364]Americans. Vivekananda was also a social reformer and the founder of the Ramakrishna Mission; the Vedanta Societies he inspired have branches in many parts of the world.

Born Narendra Dutta in the city of Kolkata (formerly Calcutta), Vivekananda had a traditional upbringing at home and a secular education. In 1881, he met the spiritual teacher Ramakrishna and became his disciple, giving up his educational career and eventually becoming a monk. After his father's death in 1884, Narendra had to take care of his family, but following Ramakrishna's death in 1886, he also became the leader of a small spiritual family, a monastic brotherhood comprising 15 fellow disciples. Very soon they all became renunciants. Traveling all through India, he learned about its people and also began to see how the teachings of Ramakrishna, Hindu texts, and Vedanta could be made relevant not just to his individual spiritual well-being but to all Hindus and, in fact, the whole world.

In 1893, Vivekananda sailed to America to attend the Parliament of Religions in Chicago. Due to a miscommunication, he arrived several months before the conference and had no funds for subsistence. Helped by strangers in America, he eventually attended the Parliament. He began his speech addressing the delegates as “brothers and sisters” and received a standing ovation from the delegates. Most people trace the history of Hinduism in America to this famous address. Sister Gargi (born Marie Louise Burke, 1911–2004), one of the best known biographers of Swami Vivekananda, writes that on that day, the Vedanta movement started in the West.

An eloquent speaker, Vivekananda was invited to speak at several forums in the United States. Vivekananda's primary teaching was a form of Hindu philosophy called Vedanta, based on Hindu sacred texts such as the Bhagavad Gita and the Upanishads and as interpreted by his teacher Ramakrishna. The Vedanta Society of New York was founded in 1894. He preached in America and Europe for the next several years and returned to India in early 1897. That year, in India, Vivekananda started both the Ramakrishna Mission, an organization in which monastic personnel and laypeople could come together to disseminate a practical, engaged Vedanta, and the Belur Math, a monastic order, in West Bengal.

When Vivekananda returned to America in 1899, he lectured in several organizations on topics such as “Christ, the Messenger” and “The Way to the Realization of a Universal Religion.” With his disciples, he started a number of Vedanta Societies around the country. In April 1900, Vivekananda founded the Vedanta Society of Northern California, known earlier as The Vedanta Class, and The Vedanta Society of San Francisco. The purpose of the organization was to help him in his work in India and for Americans to study Vedanta philosophy. After touring Europe, Constantinople, and Cairo later that year, Vivekananda returned to India and died when he was only 39 years old, in 1902.

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