Vivekananda on the Vedas (part 227)

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Earlier postings can be seen at http://www.vivekananda.btinternet.co.uk/veda.htm

 

SWAMI VIVEKANANDA ON THE VEDAS AND UPANISHADS

By Sister Gayatriprana

part 227

 

g) The Ever-Living Vedic Religion Offers Spiritual Welfare to the West

1. Vedanta, Giving Equal Rights to All to Acquire Spirituality, May Become the Religion of the Democratic West

In [india] there is only this religion of Vedanta. Compared with Western civilization, it may be said India has got hardly anything else. But by the preaching of this universal religion of Vedanta - a religion which gives equal rights to acquire spirituality to people of all creeds and paths of religious practice - the civilized West will come to know what a wonderful degree of spirituality once developed in India and how it is still existing. By the study of this religion, the Western nations will have increasing regard and sympathy for the Indians. Already these have grown to some extent. In this way, if [the Indians] have their real sympathy and regard, [they ]will learn from them the sciences bearing upon [indian] material life, thereby qualifying themselves better for the struggle for existence. On the other hand, by learning this Vedanta from [india], Westerners will be enabled to secure their own spiritual welfare. (68)

Vedanta does not teach the idea of God at all. In place of that God who sat above the clouds and managed the affairs of the world without asking our permission, who created us out of nothing just because He liked it and made us undergo all this misery just because He liked it, Vedanta teaches that God is in everyone, has become everyone and everything. His Majesty the king has gone from the USA; the Kingdom of Heaven went from Vedanta hundreds of years ago.

India cannot give up His Majesty the king of the earth - that is why Vedanta cannot become the religion of India. There is a chance of Vedanta becoming the religion of [the USA] because of democracy. But it can only become so if Americans can and do clearly understand it, if Americans become real men and women - not people with vague ideas and superstitions in their brains - and if you want to be truly spiritual, since Vedanta is concerned only with spirituality. (69)

All the social upheavalists - at least, the leaders of them - are trying to find that all their communistic or equalizing theories must have a spiritual basis, and that spiritual basis is Vedanta only. I have been told by several leaders who used to attend my lectures that they required the Vedanta as the basis of a new order of things. (70)

In London Edward Carpenter [the philosopher and social reformer] used to call on me on many occasions and sit near me. Many other specialists and democrats also used to visit me. Finding in the religion of Vedanta a strong support for their ideals, they felt much attracted towards its teachings. (71)