Swami Vivekananda - Documentary Of Most Brilliant And Interesting Man

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http://youtu.be/TlwZNmgFBWM

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Left to right: Josephine MacLeod, Mrs. Ole Bull (sitting), Swami Vivekananda, Sister Nivedita.

(While in Kashmir and the surrounding area, Swami Vivekananda and his companions made many excursions to shrines, palaces, the ruins of old temples, and other places of historic interest. From Sister Nivedita's diary we learn: "The travelers left Acchabal on September 12 and slowly made their way back to Srinagar, arriving on September 15. General and Mrs. Patterson were still there. On September 20, some friends came and took photographs of them and their boats and so on before lunch. In the group photo, Sara is sitting on the ground, not at all willing to be photographed. She had a cold and her heart was heavy with grief for her granddaughter [who had recently passed away]. The next day, Vivekananda gave a ceremonious farewell banquet to General and Mrs. Patterson." Perhaps the same friends who took this photo (71) and also photo 70 of the houseboat also took the following ones (nos. 72-73) with a roll?film box camera, which had become the rage in the late 1800's. George Eastman of Rochester, New York, had come out with the first roll?film box camera in 1888. During this time in India it seems more likely that Westerners, rather than some of Swami Vivekananda's Indian friends, would have had such a luxury item like a camera.

 

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Swami Vivekananda and Narasimhacharya

This unposed snapshot is one of the first pictures of Swami Vivekananda in America. "Perhaps it is not so clear as one would like his pictures to be, but it nonetheless belongs to his history." It can be reasonably assumed that it was taken in the room marked "No. 1-keep out."

The following appeared in the Boston Evening Transcript on September 30, 1893:

There is a room at the left of the entrance to the Art Palace marked "No. 1-keep out." To this the speakers at the Congress of Religions all repair sooner or later, either to talk with one another or with President Bonney, whose private office is in one corner of the apartment. . . . The most striking figure one meets in this anteroom is Swami Vivekananda, the Brahmin monk. He is a large, well-built man, with the superb carriage of the Hindustanis, his face clean shaven, squarely molded regular features, white teeth, and with well-chiseled lips that are usually parted in a benevolent smile while he is conversing. His finely poised head is crowned with either a lemon colored or a red turban, and his cassock (not the technical name for this garment), belted in at the waist and falling below the knees, alternates in a bright orange and rich crimson. He speaks excellent English and replied readily to any questions asked in sincerity.

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The Art Institue where Swami Vivekananda made his historic speeches at the Parliament of Religions in September 1893. It was then called the Memorial Art Palace. 

 

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Interior view - the Hall of Columbus where Vivekananda spoke.

 

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541 Dearborn Street - the home of Mr and Mrs Hale where the Swami stayed shortly after the Parliament. 

 

 

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Swami Vivekananda Seated at the Chicago Parliament of World’s Religions

 

 

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Swami Vivekananda – Parliament of Religions

 

 

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The house on Risaldar Galli where Swami Vivekananda stayed in 1892.

 

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Swami Vivekananda temple Belur Math

 

 

 

 

Swami Vivekananda's room at Belur Math

 

[ChampakDas]

nice thread nice thread

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Thanks and will be continued

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LTT

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The Ghost Tamer Whom Swami Vivekananda Transformed With a Mere Touch :

 

 

 

 

 

At the time of occurrence of this incident, in the year 1893, Swamiji was away from his home in Calcutta, residing as the guest of Manmatha Babu in Madras, and preparing for his impending departure to the United States.

Being so far away from home, and having no quick means of ascertaining the truth in the ‘suicides’ statements, Swamiji at the request of his host, decided to employ some unusual means to put his mind at rest.

Here is the full story as Swami Vivekananda himself recounted, during a conversation with his disciple Sharat Chandra Chakravarty and Swami Yogananda (another direct disciple of Sri Ramakrishna):

Swami Yogananda to Swamiji: “Well, why don’t you narrate to our Bangal (East Bengali disciple) that incident of yours in Madras when you met the famous ghost-tamer?”

Swamiji: “Once while I was putting up at Manmatha Babu’s place, I dreamt one night that my mother had died. My mind became much distracted. Not to speak of corresponding with anybody at home, I used to send no letters in those days even to our Math.

The dream being disclosed to Manmatha, he sent a wire to Calcutta to ascertain facts about the matter. For the dream had made my mind uneasy on the one hand, and on the other, our Madras friends, with all arrangements ready, were insisting on my departing for America immediately, and I felt rather unwilling to leave before getting any news of my mother.

So Manmatha who discerned this state of my mind suggested our repairing to a man (whose name was Govinda Chetti) living some way off from town, who having acquired mystic powers over spirits could tell fortunes and read the past and the future of a man’s life.

So at Manmatha’s request and to get rid of my mental suspense, I agreed to go to this man.

Covering the distance partly by railway and partly on foot, we four of us – Manmatha, Alasinga, myself, and another – managed to reach the place, and what met our eyes there was a man with a ghoulish, haggard, soot-black appearance, sitting close to a cremation ground.

His attendants used some jargon of South Indian dialect to explain to us that this was the man with perfect power over the ghosts. At first the man took absolutely no notice of us; and then, when we were about to retire from the place, he made a request for us to wait.

Our Alasinga was acting as the interpreter, and he explained the requests to us. Next, the man commenced drawing some figures with a pencil, and presently I found him getting perfectly still in mental concentration.

Then he began to give out my name, my genealogy, the history of my long line of forefathers and said that Shri Ramakrishna (Swami Vivekananda’s divine guru who had by then left his body) was keeping close to me all through my wanderings, intimating also to me good news about my mother. He also foretold that I would have to go very soon to far-off lands for preaching religion.

Getting good news thus about my mother, we all travelled back to town, and after arrival received by wire from Calcutta the assurance of mother’s doing well.”

Swamiji turning to Swami Yogananda: “Everything that the man had foretold came to be fulfilled to the letter, call it some fortuitous concurrence or anything you will.”

Swami Yogananda: “It was because you would not believe all this before that this experience was necessary for you.”

Swamiji: “Well, I am not a fool to believe anything and everything without direct proof. And coming into this realm of Mahamaya (the primordial energy that creates the Universe), oh, the many magic mysteries I have come across alongside this bigger magic conjuration of a universe! Maya, it is all Maya!

Goodness! What rubbish we have been talking so long this day! By thinking constantly of ghosts, men become ghosts themselves, while whoever repeats day and night, knowingly or unknowingly, ‘I am the eternal, pure, free, self-illumined Atman (soul)’, verily becomes the knower of Brahman (God).”

Swamiji now affectionately turning to his disciple: “Don’t allow all that worthless nonsense to occupy your mind. Always discriminate between the real (permanent) and the unreal (temporary), and devote yourself heart and soul to the attempt to realize the Atman (soul).

There is nothing higher than this knowledge of the Atman; all else is Maya, mere jugglery. The Atman is the one unchangeable Truth. This I have come to understand, and that is why I try to bring it home to you all.”

Now the story does not end here. About four years after this incident, upon returning back from his historic voyage to the United States, Swamiji once more graced the soil of India at a town called Kumbakonam, situated about 275 kms from Madras.

In this town he once more recognized the ghost tamer, Govinda Chetti, among the crowds who had come to greet him. What followed next is beautifully chronicled in the book Life of Swami Vivekananda by his Eastern and Western Disciples – Volume 2 (page 185).

Now, when the Swami was being welcomed by the people of Kumbakonam, he recognized Govinda Chetti in the crowd, and asked him to meet him later. When the ghost charmer came, the Swami said: “I know you have psychic power. It has given you money and honour; but from the spiritual point of view, are you not where you started? Has your mind progressed towards God?”

The man replied, “No it has not progressed.”

Then the Swami said to him: “If that has not happened, what have you gained by this psychic power? Once you taste the bliss of God, you will see that all these things are nothing.”

Saying this the Swami embraced him. To everybody’s astonishment, the man’s psychic powers disappeared from that day, and in their place came tremendous hankering for God, as a result of which he renounced the world. 

" Om Shanti Shanti Shanti "