Buddhism, The Fulfillment of Hinduism – Vivekananda

Buddhism, The Fulfillment of Hinduism – Vivekananda

26th September, 1893

I am not a Buddhist, as you have heard, and yet I am. If China, or Japan, or Ceylon follow the teachings of the Great Master, India worships him as God incarnate on earth. You have just now heard that I am going to criticise Buddhism, but by that I wish you to understand only this. Far be it from me to criticise him whom I worship as God incarnate on earth. But our views about Buddha are that he was not understood properly by his disciples.

The relation between Hinduism (by Hinduism, I mean the religion of the Vedas) and what is called Buddhism at the present day is nearly the same as between Judaism and Christianity. Jesus Christ was a Jew, and Shaakya Muni (Buddha) was a Hindu. The Jews rejected Jesus Christ, nay, crucified him, and the Hindus have accepted Shaakya Muni as God and worship him.

But the real difference that we Hindus want to show between modern Buddhism and what we should understand as the teachings of Lord Buddha lies principally in this: Shaakya Muni came to preach nothing new. He also, like Jesus, came to fulfill and not to destroy. Only, in the case of Jesus, it was the old people, the Jews, who did not understand him, while in the case of Buddha, it was his own followers who did not realise the import of his teachings. As the Jew did not understand the fulfilment of the Old Testament, so the Buddhist did not understand the fulfilment of the truths of the Hindu religion. Again, I repeat, Shaakya Muni came not to destroy, but he was the fulfilment, the logical conclusion, the logical development of the religion of the Hindus.

The religion of the Hindus is divided into two parts: the ceremonial and the spiritual. The spiritual portion is specially studied by the monks.

In that there is no caste. A man from the highest caste and a man from the lowest may become a monk in India, and the two castes become equal. In religion there is no caste; caste is simply a social institution. Shaakya Muni himself was a monk, and it was his glory that he had the large-heartedness to bring out the truths from the hidden Vedas and through them broadcast all over the world. He was the first being in the world who brought missionarising into practice — nay, he was the first to conceive the idea of proselytising.

The great glory of the Master lay in his wonderful sympathy for everybody, especially for the ignorant and the poor. Some of his disciples were Brahmins. When Buddha was teaching, Sanskrit was no more the spoken language in India. It was then only in the books of the learned. Some of Buddha’s Brahmins disciples wanted to translate his teachings into Sanskrit, but he distinctly told them, “I am for the poor, for the people; let me speak in the tongue of the people.” And so to this day the great bulk of his teachings are in the vernacular of that day in India.

Whatever may be the position of philosophy, whatever may be the position of metaphysics, so long as there is such a thing as death in the world, so long as there is such a thing as weakness in the human heart, so long as there is a cry going out of the heart of man in his very weakness, there shall be a faith in God.

On the philosophic side the disciples of the Great Master dashed themselves against the eternal 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 every one, man or woman, clings so fondly. And the result was that Buddhism had to die a natural death in India. At the present day there is not one who calls oneself a Buddhist in India, the land of its birth.

But at the same time, Brahminism lost something — that reforming zeal, that wonderful sympathy and charity for everybody, that wonderful heaven which Buddhism had brought to the masses and which had rendered Indian society so great that a Greek historian who wrote about India of that time was led to say that no Hindu was known to tell an untruth and no Hindu woman was known to be unchaste.

Hinduism cannot live without Buddhism, nor Buddhism without Hinduism. Then realise what the separation has shown to us, that the Buddhists cannot stand without the brain and philosophy of the Brahmins, nor the Brahmin without the heart of the Buddhist. This separation between the Buddhists and the Brahmins is the cause of the downfall of India. That is why India is populated by three hundred millions of beggars, and that is why India has been the slave of conquerors for the last thousand years. Let us then join the wonderful intellect of the Brahmins with the heart, the noble soul, the wonderful humanising power of the Great Master.

Sisters and Brothers of America – Vivekananda

Sisters and Brothers of America

Response to Welcome

By Swami Vivekananda
At the World’s Parliament of Religions, Chicago 11th September, 1893

Sisters and Brothers of America,

It fills my heart with joy unspeakable to rise in response to the warm and cordial welcome which you have given us. I thank you in the name of the most ancient order of monks in the world; I thank you in the name of the mother of religions; and I thank you in the name of millions and millions of Hindu people of all classes and sects.

My thanks, also, to some of the speakers on this platform who, referring to the delegates from the Orient, have told you that these men from far-off nations may well claim the honour of bearing to different lands the idea of toleration.

I am proud to belong to a religion which has taught the world both tolerance and universal acceptance. We believe not only in universal toleration, but we accept all religions as true. I am proud to belong to a nation which has sheltered the persecuted and the refugees of all religions and all nations of the earth.

I am proud to tell you that we have gathered in our bosom the purest remnant of the Israelites, who came to Southern India and took refuge with us in the very year in which their holy temple was shattered to pieces by Roman tyranny.

I am proud to belong to the religion which has sheltered and is still fostering the remnant of the grand Zoroastrian nation. I will quote to you, brethren, a few lines from a hymn which I remember to have repeated from my earliest boyhood, which is every day repeated by millions of human beings: “As the different streams having their sources in different places all mingle their water in the sea, so, O Lord, the different paths which men take through different tendencies, various though they appear, crooked or straight, all lead to Thee.”

The present convention, which is one of the most august assemblies ever held, is in itself a vindication, a declaration to the world of the wonderful doctrine preached in the Gita: “Whosoever comes to Me, through whatsoever form, I reach him; all men are struggling through paths which in the end lead to me.”

Sectarianism, bigotry, and its horrible descendant, fanaticism, have long possessed this beautiful earth. They have filled the earth with violence, drenched it often and often with human blood, destroyed civilisation and sent whole nations to despair. Had it not been for these horrible demons, human society would be far more advanced than it is now.

But their time is come; and I fervently hope that the bell that tolled this morning in honour of this convention may be the death-knell of all fanaticism, of all persecutions with the sword or with the pen, and of all uncharitable feelings between persons wending their way to the same goal.

How to see God – Ramakrishna

How to see God – Ramakrishna

M: (Mahendranath Gupta) “Is it possible to see God?”
MASTER: “Yes, certainly. Living in solitude now and then, repeating God’s name and singing His glories, and discriminating between the Real and the unreal – these are the means to employ to see Him.”

Longing and yearning

M: “Under what conditions does one see God?”
MASTER: “Cry to the Lord with an intensely yearning heart and you will certainly see Him. People shed a whole jug of tears for wife and children. They swim in tears for money. But who weeps for God? Cry to Him with a real cry.”

The Master sang:

Cry to your Mother Syama , with a real cry, O mind! And how can She hold Herself from you?
How can Syama stay away?
How can your Mother Kali hold Herself away?
O mind, if you are in earnest, bring Her an offering Of bel-leaves and hibiscus flowers;
Lay at Her feet your offering
And with it mingle the fragrant sandal-paste of Love.

Continuing, he said: “Longing is like the rosy dawn. After the dawn out comes the sun. Longing is followed by the vision of God.

“God reveals Himself to a devotee who feels drawn to Him by the combined force of these three attractions: the attraction of worldly possessions for the worldly man, the child’s attraction for its mother, and the husband’s attraction for the chaste wife. If one feels drawn to Him by the combined force of these three attractions, then through it one can attain Him.

“The point is, to love God even as the mother loves her child, the chaste wife her husband, and the worldly man his wealth. Add together these three forces of love, these three powers of attraction, and give it all to God. Then you will certainly see Him.

“It is necessary to pray to Him with a longing heart. The kitten knows only how to call its mother, crying, ‘Meow, meow!’ It remains satisfied wherever its mother puts it. And the mother cat puts the kitten sometimes in the kitchen, sometimes on the floor, and sometimes on the bed. When it suffers it cries only, ‘Meow, meow!’ That’s all it knows. But as soon as the mother hears this cry, wherever she may be; she comes to the kitten.”

Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna
By Mahendranath Gupta (“M”), His Disciple
Translated from the Bengali by Swami Nikhilananda

Devotion and Worldly Duties – Ramakrishna

Devotion and Worldly Duties – Ramakrishna

Need of holy company & Meditation in solitude

M. (Mahendranath Gupta) (humbly): “How, sir, may we fix our minds on God?”
MASTER: “Repeat God’s name and sing His glories, and keep holy company; and now and then visit God’s devotees and holy men. The mind cannot dwell on God if it is immersed day and night in worldliness, in worldly duties and responsibilities; it is most necessary to go into solitude now and then and think of God. To fix the mind on God is very difficult, in the beginning, unless one practises meditation in solitude. When a tree is young it should be fenced all around; otherwise it may be destroyed by cattle.

“To meditate, you should withdraw within yourself or retire to a secluded corner or to the forest. And you should always discriminate between the Real and the unreal. God alone is real, the Eternal Substance; all else is unreal, that is, impermanent. By discriminating thus, one should shake off impermanent objects from the mind.”

God and worldly duties

M. (humbly):”How should we live in the world?”
MASTER: “Do all your duties, but keep your mind on God. Live with all – with wife and children, father and mother – and serve them. Treat them as if they were very dear to you, but know in your heart of hearts that they do not belong to you.

“A maidservant in the house of a rich man performs all the household duties, but her thoughts are fixed on her own home in her native village. She brings up her Master’s children as if they were her own. She even speaks of them as ‘my Rāma’ or ‘my Hari’. But in her own mind she knows very well that they do not belong to her at all.

“The tortoise moves about in the water. But can you guess where her thoughts are? There on the bank, where her eggs are lying. Do all your duties in the world, but keep your mind on God.

“If you enter the world without first cultivating love for God, you will be entangled more and more. You will be overwhelmed with its danger, its grief, its sorrows. And the more you think of worldly things, the more you will be attached to them.

“You first rub your hands with oil and then break open the jack-fruit; otherwise they will be smeared with its sticky milk. Same way, first secure the oil of divine love, and then set your hands to the duties of the world.

“But one must go into solitude to attain this divine love. To get butter from milk you must let it set into curd in a secluded spot; if it is too much disturbed, milk won’t turn into curd. You must put aside all other duties, sit in a quiet spot, and churn the curd. Only then do you get butter.

“Same way, by meditating on God in solitude the mind acquires knowledge, dispassion, and devotion. But the very same mind goes downward if it dwells in the world. In the world there is only one thought: ‘woman and gold’.

“The world is water and the mind milk. If you pour milk into water they become one; you cannot find the pure milk any more. But turn the milk into curd and churn it into butter. Then, when that butter is placed in water, it will float. So also, practise spiritual discipline in solitude and obtain the butter of knowledge and love. Even if you keep that butter in the water of the world the two will not mix. The butter will float.

Practice of discrimination

“Together with this, you must practise discrimination. ‘Sensual pleasures and money’ is impermanent. God is the only Eternal Substance. What does a man get with money? Food, clothes, and a dwelling-place – nothing more. You cannot realize God with its help. Therefore money can never be the goal of life. That is the process of discrimination. Do you understand?”

M: “Yes, sir. I recently read a Sanskrit play called Prabodha Chandrodaya. It deals with discrimination.”
MASTER: “Yes, discrimination about objects. Consider – what is there in money or in a beautiful body? Discriminate and you will find that even the body of a beautiful person consists of bones, flesh, fat, and other disagreeable things. Why should a person give up God and direct the attention to such things? Why should a person forget God for their sake?”

Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna
By Mahendranath Gupta (“M”), His Disciple
Translated from the Bengali by Swami Nikhilananda

Swami Chinmayananda’s Blissful Experience – Ramana

Sri Ramana Maharshi

Swami Chinmayananda’s Blissful Experience


Swami Chinmayananda (Balakrishna Menon) was the founder of the Chinmaya Mission. He describes his experiences in the presence of Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi.

I was just emerging from high school, exams were over. On a package railway ticket I was roaming through South India. As the train steamed through the countryside at a halting speed, most of the passengers in my compartment suddenly peered through the windows in great excitement and bowed reverently to an elaborate temple beyond. Inquiring about it, I was told that it was the Tiruvannamalai Temple.

Thereafter, the talk of my fellow travellers turned to Ramana Maharshi. The word ‘Maharshi’ conjured up in my mind ancient forest retreats and superhuman beings of divine glow. Though I was at that time a convinced atheist, I was deeply drawn to visit the Maharshi’s Ashram. I chose to take the next available train to Tiruvannamalai.

At the Ashram I was told that the Maharshi was in the hall and anybody was free to walk in and see him. As I entered, I saw on the couch an elderly man, wearing but a loincloth, reclining against a round bolster. I sat down at the very foot of the couch. The Maharshi suddenly opened his eyes and looked straight into mine: I looked into his. A mere look, that was all. I felt that the Maharshi was, in that split moment, looking deep into me – and I was sure that he saw all my shallowness, confusions, faithlessness, imperfections, and fears.

I cannot explain what happened in that one split moment. I felt opened, cleaned, healed, and emptied! A whirl of confusions: my atheism dropping away, but scepticism flooding into question, wonder, and search. My reason gave me strength and I said to myself, ‘It is all mesmerism, my own foolishness.’ Thus assuring myself, I got up and walked away.

But the boy who left the hall was not the boy who had gone in some ten minutes before. After my college days, my political work, and after my years of stay at Uttarkashi at the feet of my master, Tapovanam, I knew that what I gained on the Ganges banks was that which had been given to me years before by the Saint of Tiruvannamalai on that hot summer day – by a mere look.

During the course of a talk in 1982 the Swami said:

Sri Ramana is not a theme for discussion; he is an experience; he is a state of consciousness. Sri Ramana was the highest reality and the cream of all scriptures in the world. He was there for all to see how a Master can live in perfect detachment. Though in the mortal form, he lived as the beauty and purity of the Infinite.

Paul Brunton’s Blissful Experience – Ramana

Sri Ramana Maharshi

Paul Brunton’s Blissful Experience

I enter the hall and straight away assume my regular meditation posture. An intense interiorization of consciousness comes with the closing of eyes. The Maharshi’s seated form floats in a vivid manner before my mind’s eye. Then the picture disappears leaving me with nothing more than a strongly felt sense of his intimate presence.

Tonight I flash swiftly to a pin-point of concentration. Some new and powerful force comes into dynamic action within my inner world and bears me inwards with resistless speed. In the next stage, I stand apart from the intellect, conscious that it is thinking, and watch thoughts with a weird detachment. The power to think, which has hitherto been a matter for merely ordinary pride, now becomes a thing from which to escape, for I perceive with startling clarity that I have been its unconscious captive.

It is strange enough to be able to stand aside and watch the very action of the brain as though it were someone else’s and to see how thoughts take their rise and then die, but it is stranger still to realise intuitively that one is about to penetrate into the mysteries which hide in the innermost recesses of man’s soul. I feel like some Columbus about to land on an uncharted continent.

Finally it happens. Thought is extinguished like a snuffed candle. The mind takes its rise in a transcendental source. I remain perfectly calm and fully aware of who I am and what is occurring. Yet my sense of awareness has been drawn out of the narrow confines of the separate personality; it has turned into something sublimely all embracing. Self still exists, but it is a changed, radiant self. With it arrives an amazing new sense of absolute freedom, for thought is like a loom-shuttle which always is going to and fro, and to be freed from its tyrannical motion is to step out of prison into the open air.

I find myself outside the rim of world consciousness. The planet, which has so far harboured me, disappears. I am in the midst of an ocean of blazing light. The latter, I feel rather than think, is the primeval stuff out of which worlds are created, the first state of matter. It stretches away into untellable infinite space, incredibly alive.

I, the new I, rest in the lap of holy bliss. I have drunk the Platonic Cup of Lethe, so that yesterday’s bitter memories and tomorrow’s anxious cares have disappeared completely. I have attained a divine liberty and an almost indescribable felicity. My arms embrace all creation with profound sympathy, for I understand in the deepest possible way that to know all is not merely to pardon all, but to love all. My heart is remoulded in rapture.

With the fall of dusk I take my farewells of everyone except the Maharshi. I feel quietly content because my battle for spiritual certitude has been won, and because I have won it without sacrificing my dearly held rationalism for a blind credulity. Yet when the Maharshi comes to the courtyard with me a little later, my contentment suddenly deserts me.

This man has strangely conquered me and it deeply affects my feelings to leave him. He has grappled me to his own soul with unseen hooks that are harder than steel, although he has sought only to restore a man to himself, to set him free and not to enslave him.

He has taken me into the benign presence of my spiritual self and helped me, dull Westerner that I am, to translate a meaningless term into a living and blissful experience. My adventure in self-metamorphosis is now over.

Paul Brunton’s Regard for Sri Ramana Maharshi

Sri Ramana Maharshi

Paul Brunton’s Regard for Sri Ramana Maharshi


He says:

I study him intently and gradually come to see in him the child of a remote past when the discovery of spiritual truth was reckoned of no less value than is the discovery of a gold mine today. It dawns upon me with increasing force that, in this quiet and obscure corner of South India, I have been led to one of the last of India’s spiritual supermen.

The serene figure of this living Sage brings the legendary figure of this country’s ancient rishis nearer to me. One senses that the most wonderful part of this man is withheld. His deepest soul, which one instinctively recognises as being loaded with rich wisdom, eludes one. At times he still remains curiously aloof, and at other times the kindly benediction of his interior grace binds me to him with hoops of steel. I learn to submit to the enigma of his personality, and to accept him as I find him.

I like him greatly because he is so simple and modest, when an atmosphere of authentic greatness lies so palpably around him; because he makes no claim to occult powers and hierophantic knowledge to impress the mystery-loving nature of his countrymen, and also because he is so totally without any traces of pretension and he strongly resists every effort to canonize him during his lifetime.

It seems to me that the presence of men like the Maharshi ensures the continuity down history of a divine message from regions not easily accessible to us all. It seems to me, further, that one must accept the fact that such a sage comes to reveal something to us, not to argue anything with us. At any rate, his teachings make a strong appeal to me.

He brings no supernatural power and demands no blind faith. He avoids the dark and debatable waters of wizardry, in which so many promising voyages have ended in shipwreck. He simply puts forward a way of self-analysis which can be practised irrespective of any ancient or modern theories and beliefs which one may hold, a way that will finally lead man to true self-understanding.

Prayers will be answered – Ramana

Sri Ramana Maharshi

Prayers will be answered


H. Ghosh, M.A., was Principal of Holkar College, Indore, Madhya Pradesh.

He describes:

When I first had the good fortune of being introduced to the Great Sage of Arunachala, my imagination was struck by the austerity and simplicity of his sublime countenance. This austerity is indelibly marked on his face and cannot escape the attention of even a casual observer. One great outcome of this austere simplicity is humbleness of the mind.

We are enjoined by the Maharshi to forsake, once and forever, our petty selves and to approach our divine self. The noblest pursuit, according to the Maharshi, is the pursuit of our Overself. The joys are perennial and the pursuit eternal.

Sri Bhagavan is not a mere mystic. He does not look into some future world, but gazes intently on what is real and eternal in him. Heaven to him is not a far-off place: here in your heart and nowhere, the soul of all things is to be found. Only those who have put away all selfish longings may see clearly the radiance of happiness. Something of this happiness the worst sinners among us will feel in the presence of this exalted and self- illumined Sage of Arunachala.

Many devotees go to Sri Bhagavan for a miraculous cure of their physical ailments or for a wondrous change in their worldly destiny. Sri Bhagavan rightly warns us against the allurements of miracles or clairvoyance or prophetic powers. But if anyone invokes Him in a spirit of absolute trust, his prayers will be answered.

In all humility I confess that I am the least competent to write about Sri Bhagavan. The finite can never know the Infinite and the Illimitable. A silent look or an encouraging word from Him will do much more good than all the sermonic literature of the world.

Face to Face with Ramana Maharshi
Item 27

Paul Brunton’s Meditation – Ramana

Sri Ramana Maharshi

Paul Brunton’s Meditation


During daily meditation in the potent neighbourhood of the Sage, I have learnt how to carry my thoughts inwards to an ever-deepening point. Again and again, I become conscious that he is drawing my mind into his own atmosphere during these periods of quiet repose. And it is at such times that one begins to understand why the silences of this man are more significant than his utterances.

There are moments when I feel this power of his so greatly that I know that he has only to issue the most disturbing command and I will readily obey it. But the Maharshi is the last person in the world to place his followers in the chain of servile obedience, and allows everyone the utmost freedom of action. In this respect he is quite refreshingly different from most of the teachers and yogis I have met in India.

The gist of his message is: “Pursue the enquiry, ‘Who am I?’ relentlessly. Analyse your entire personality. Try to find out where the ‘I’ thought begins. Go on with your meditations. Keep turning your attention within. One day the wheel of thought will slow down and an intuition will mysteriously arise. Follow that intuition, let your thinking stop and it will eventually lead you to the goal.”

I struggle daily with my thoughts and cut away slowly into the inner recesses of the mind. In the helpful proximity of the Maharshi, my meditations and self-soliloquies become increasingly less tiring and more effective. A strong expectancy and a sense of being guided inspire my constantly repeated efforts.There are strange hours when I am clearly conscious of the unseen power of the Sage being powerfully impacted on my mentality, with the result that I penetrate a little deeper still into the shrouded border land of being, which surrounds the human mind….

Again and again, I am aware that the Maharshi’s mind is imparting something to my own, though no words may be passing between us.

Spirituality of my life is nearing its peak.

Dr. Paul Brunton’s Second Visit to Sri Ramana Maharshi

Sri Ramana Maharshi

Dr. Paul Brunton’s Second Visit to Sri Ramana Maharshi


The following relates to Paul Brunton’s second visit and stay near Sri Ramana, a few months later.

Whatever I am doing I never fail to become gradually aware of the mysterious atmosphere of the place, of the benign radiation which steadily percolates into my brain. I enjoy an ineffable tranquility merely by sitting for a while in the neighbourhood of the Maharshi. By careful observation and frequent analysis, I arrive in time at the complete certitude that reciprocal inter-influence arises whenever our presences neighbour each other. The thing is most suitable. But it is quite unmistakable. A force greater than my rationalistic mind awes me until it ends by overwhelming me.

The realisation forces itself through my wonderment that all my questions are moves in an endless game, the play of thoughts which possess no limit to their extent; that somewhere within me there is a well of certitude which can provide me all waters of truth I require; and that it will be better to cease my questioning and attempt to realise the tremendous potencies of my own spiritual nature. So I remain silent and wait.

I am perfectly aware that the sublime realisation which has suddenly fallen upon me is nothing else than a spreading ripple of telepathic radiation from this mysterious and imperturbable man.

The Maharshi once told me, “The greatest error of a man is to think that he is weak by nature, evil by nature. Every man is divine and strong in his real nature. What are weak and evil are his habits, his desires and thoughts, but not himself.” His words came as an invigorating tonic. They refresh and inspire me. From another man’s lips, from some lesser and feeble soul, I would refuse to accept them at such worth and would persist in refuting them. But an inward monitor assures me that the Sage speaks out of the depth of a great and authentic spiritual experience and not as some theorizing philosopher on the thin stilts of speculation.

Not a few Western minds will inevitably consider that the life of the Maharshi is a wasted one. But perhaps it may be good for us to have a few men who are apart from our world of unending activity, and survey it for us from afar. It may also be that a jungle Sage, with self lying conquered at his feet, is not inferior to a worldly fool who is blown hither and thither by every circumstance.

Day after day brings fresh indications of the greatness of this man. His silence and reserve are habitual. One can easily count up the number of words he uses in a single day.

I am learning to see that the Maharshi’s way of helping others is through unobstrusive, silent and steady outpouring of healing vibrations into troubled souls. Science will one day be required to account for this mysterious telepathic process.

It is clear that his mere presence provides many with spiritual assurance, emotional felicity and, most paradoxical of all, renewed faith in their creed. For the Sage treats all creeds alike, and honours Jesus no less than Krishna.

Dr. Paul Brunton – About Sri Ramana Maharshi

Sri Ramana Maharshi

Dr. Paul Brunton – About Sri Ramana Maharshi


Dr. Paul Brunton (1898-1981), a British journalist, attracted by Indian mysticism first visited India in 1930.

Author of eleven books, he has emphasized the value and importance of the Self within us. He is generally considered as having introduced meditation to the West. He once wrote: “Sri Ramana was a spiritual torch carried to the waiting souls in the West. I was only the unimportant ‘link-boy’, the humble carrier.”

During his first visit, among many saints and yogis, Brunton also met Sri Ramana. He stayed for a few weeks in an improvised shelter very close to Sri Ramana’s Ashram.The number of full-time devotees being limited at that time, Brunton had ample opportunity of observing the Maharshi at close quarters and interacting with him. He provides a dispassionate, illuminating and intimate account of the Maharshi’s divinity and its impact in his A Search in Secret India published from London in 1934. (The experiences with Sri Ramana Maharshi alone have been published as the “The Maharshi and his Message”.)

Paul Brunton says:

There is something in this man which holds my attention as steel filings are held by a magnet. I cannot turn my gaze away from him. I become aware of a silent, resistless change, which is taking place within my mind. One by one, the questions which I prepared with such meticulous accuracy drop away. I know only that a steady river of quietness seems to be flowing near me; that a great peace is penetrating the inner reaches of my being, and that my thought-tortured brain is beginning to arrive at some rest. I perceive with sudden clarity that intellect creates its own problems and then makes itself miserable trying to solve them. This is indeed a novel concept to enter the mind of one who has hitherto placed such high value upon intellect.

I surrender myself to the steadily deepening sense of restfulness. The passage of time now provokes no irritation, because the chains of mind-made problems are being broken and thrown away. And then, little by little, a question takes the field of consciousness. Does this man, the Maharshi, emanate the perfume of spiritual peace as the flower emanates fragrance from its petals? I begin to wonder whether by some radioactivity of the soul, some unknown telepathic process, the stillness which invades the troubled water of my soul really comes from him.The peace overwhelms me.

The Maharshi turns and looks down into my face; I, in turn, gaze expectantly up at him. I become aware of a mysterious change taking place with great rapidity in my heart and mind. The old motives which have lured me on begin to desert me. The urgent desires which have sent my feet hither and thither vanish with incredible swiftness. The dislikes, misunderstandings, coldness and selfishness which have marked my dealings with many of my fellows collapse into the abyss of nothingness. An untellable peace falls upon me and I know that there is nothing further that I shall ask from life.

The Sage seems to carry something of great moment to me, yet I cannot easily determine its precise nature. It is intangible, imponderable, perhaps spiritual. Each time I think of him a peculiar sensation pierces me and causes my heart to throb with vague but lofty expectations.

I look at the Sage. He sits there on Olympian heights and watches the panorama of life as one apart. There is a mysterious property in this man which differentiates him from all others I have met.

He remains mysteriously aloof even when surrounded by his own devotees, men who have loved him and lived near him for years. Sometimes I catch myself wishing that he would be a little more human, a little more susceptible to what seems so normal to us.

Why is it that under his strange glance I invariably experience a peculiar expectancy, as though some stupendous revelation will soon be made to me? This man has freed himself from all problems, and no woe can touch him.

The Sage seems to speak not as a philosopher, not as a pandit trying to explain his own doctrine, but rather out of the depth of his own heart.

I am not religious but I can no more resist the feeling of increasing awe which begins to grip my mind than a bee can resist a flower in all its luscious bloom. The [Maharshi’s] hall is becoming pervaded with a subtle, intangible and indefinable power which affects me deeply. I feel, without doubt and without hesitation, that the centre of this mysterious power is no other than the Maharshi himself.

His eyes shine with astonishing brilliance. Strange sensation begins to arise in me. Those lustrous orbs seem to be peering into the inmost recesses of my soul. In a peculiar way, I feel aware of everything he can see in my heart. His mysterious glance penetrates my thoughts, my emotions and my desires; I am helpless before it.

At first, his disconcerting gaze troubles me; I become vaguely uneasy. I feel he has perceived pages that belong to a past, which I have forgotten. He knows it all, I am certain. I am powerless to escape; somehow, I do not want to, either.

I become aware that he is definitely linking my own mind with his, that he is provoking my heart into that state of starry calm, which he seems perpetually to enjoy. In this extraordinary peace, I find a sense of exaltation and lightness. Time seems to stand still. My heart is released from its burden of care. Never again, I feel, shall the bitterness of anger and the melancholy of unsatisfied desire afflict me. My mind is submerged in that of the Maharshi and wisdom is now at its perihelion. What is this man’s gaze but a thaumaturgic wand, which evokes a hidden world of unexpected splendour before my profane eyes?

I have sometimes asked myself why these disciples have been staying around the Sage for years with few conversations, fewer comforts and no external activities to attract them. Now I begin to understand – not by thought but by lightning like illuminations – that through all those years they have been receiving a deep and silent reward.

Hitherto, everyone in the hall has been hushed to a death-like stillness. At length, someone quietly rises and passes out. He is followed by another, and then another, until all have gone. I am alone with the Maharshi! Never before has this happened. His eyes begin to change; they narrow down to pinpoints. The effect is curiously like the ‘stopping down’ in the focus of a camera lens.

There comes a tremendous increase in the intense gleam which shines between the lids, now almost closed. Suddenly, my body seems to disappear, and we are both out in space! It is a crucial moment. I hesitate – and decide to break the enchanter’s spell. Decision brings power and once again I am back in the flesh, back in the hall. No word passes from him to me. I collect my faculties, look at the clock, and rise quietly. The hour of departure has arrived. I bow my head in farewell and depart.

Face to Face with Ramana Maharshi
Item 1

She found the Peace she craved – Ramana

Sri Ramana Maharshi

She found the Peace she craved


Arthur Osborne was an English writer on spirituality and mysticism, and a disciple and biographer of Sri Ramana Maharshi. From 1964, Osborne served as the founding editor of Mountain Path, a journal published by Ramanasramam. His wife, Lucia Osborne, lived there too. She was a warm-hearted lady whom devotees loved.

Their daughter, Katya Osbourne, recalls:

My own unforgettable memory happened when I was still about ten years old. A lady from Delhi came to the Asramam. In those days, all foreigners were sent to our house as my parents spoke several languages, and could understand a number of travelers. Also in those days, whether a person came from New York, New Zealand, or New Delhi, they were foreigners.

This particular lady told us her story which I thought was unutterably tragic. She had married against her parents’ wishes, but she married for love and the first days of her marriage were blissfully happy. They went to the seaside for their honeymoon and she sat on he sand while her husband went for a swim. She actually saw him being caught by a shark and killed in front of her. Since then she was a nervous wreck.

She then started a trek around all the Asramams and the holy men of India. Why? She wanted to know. How had they harmed anyone and why should they be visited by such a terrible punishment? The point came when she could not listen to any more ambiguous anodyne answers, so she had written her questions down and her list went with her whenever she came to a new holy man. No man was going to fob her off anymore. If there was an explanation she wanted to hear it, and if not why not.

What I recollect most about this lady was that she was so tense and nervous that it was a strain to be in her company. I was not an especially sensitive child, but sitting in the same room as her was excruciatingly uncomfortable. I started to escape but my mother got me.

“Take her to the Hall’, she instructed to me. I had things to do I told her, but my mother said, ‘Go’. I went.

When we got to the Asramam I pointed to the Hall where Sri Bhagavan was sitting and then took myself off, to read my book in a mango tree.

I heard the bell for lunch and dragging my feet I went to fetch the lady home for food. Never in my life, neither, before nor in all the years, have I noticed such a change in anyone, and in such a short time. The lady was relaxed and at peace.

I trailed behind her on the way back, too shy to ask her what Sri Bhagavan had said but aching to know. What oh why hadn’t I stayed in the Hall with her. Whatever words were that Bhagavan had spoken, they must surely be the most important in the world. I wanted to know them for posterity. The rest of my life could be transformed by the words I had not heard. However, I knew that my mother would ask her so I stuck around like glue in order to hear the magic formula.

My mother, of course, noticed the difference immediately. One could not miss it. She asked the all important question. What had Sri Bhagavan told her?

‘Nothing’, the lady replied. She had sat there all prepared, with her list at the ready, then Sri Bhagavan looked at her. He just looked at her, full of understanding and compassion, and she suddenly lost interest in her crusade. It did not matter any more.

She had found the peace she craved.

Nothing could be more miraculous than what happened to that lady, and nothing more typical of Sri Bhagavan. He did not say a word.

Sri Bhagavan’s touch was always exquisitely light but sure. He would hint but never be obvious, whether He was performing a ‘miracle’ or letting a person know what was best for them to do. And yet a hint from Him should never be ignored,. If He takes the trouble to make us aware, well then, we disregard it at our peril.

Katya Osbourne
Mountain Path
Sri Ramanasramam