Anecdotes of Swami Vivekananda
Chicago 1893. An Indian sanyasi rose and spoke words that thrilled the world, and awoke it to the greatness that once was India. Kanyakumari 1893. the same sanyasi sat on a rock, meditating on the waves that gently played a haunting melody on the rock — and a vision arose in the Sanyasi’s mind, a vision that stirred an ancient civilization to shake off the fog of slavery, despondency, & superstition, and emerge into the sunlight of creativity, dynamism, and spirituality.
Volumes have been written about Swami Vivekananda. Every schoolchild knows about the legendary accomplishments of the Swami. It may be worth recalling some lesser known stories of the Swami.
1. Swami Vivekananda repeatedly stated that his greatest desires were the education of Indian women, and the scientific-technical education of the country.
‘Only let the Women and the People achieve education. All further questions of their fate, they would themselves be competent to settle.’
2. In America, the Swami was once giving a talk on Sant Meerabai. He said that her husband, the King of Chittor, had offered her freedom to practice her faith, on condition she remained in the seclusion of the palace. She however, refused to be thus bound. Someone asked in astonishment, ‘But why should she not?’ His view was that Meerabai would have the comforts of the palace and at the same time would be able to follow her spiritual practices.
The Swami replied. ‘Why should she? Was she living in this mire?’ For the Swami, freedom was not in palaces or in luxury.
3. As a youth of eighteen, he visited the Dakshineshwar Temple, in a group. A member of the group suggested that Naren should sing a bhajan. Naren agreed, and sang a song written by Raja Rammohan Roy, and composed by Ajodhyanath Pakrasi. The last line was — ‘And for support keep the treasure in secret — purity.’
As Naren sang this line, Sri Ramakrishna Parahamsa cried out, ‘My boy! My boy! I have been looking for you these three years, and you have come at last!’ And the rest is history.
4. Once the Swami visited undivided Punjab. Wherever he went, he was hailed as ‘Guru Nanak and Guru Gobind.’ During the trip, he once called out to a Muslim vendor of sweets, and bought and ate sweets from his hand.
5. Swami Vivekananda loved his privacy. He would grow nervous when adoring crowds gathered to watch him, unable to tear their eyes from the radiance that flowed from his face.
6. The Swami undertook a pilgrimage to the Amarnath Cave. There was a large crowd. He entered, unnoticed, knelt three times, and withdrew. He recounted to his disciples that he had seen Lord Shiva in the brief moments when he was in the Cave. The Lord had granted him the gift of deciding when he would leave his mortal body!
7. Swami Vivekananda wrote poems. On writing a poem to Kali Devi, he fell on the floor.
8. He was once staying with a Muslim. When reproached by his disciples, he replied:
‘I am a Sannyasi. I am above your social conventions. I can dine with a sweeper. I see Brahman everywhere; for me there is nothing high or low.’
9. When he first arrived in America, and was still unknown, he was taken for a Black, and refused admission in hotels. The Swami never clarified that he was not of African blood.
‘If I am grateful to my white-skinned Aryan ancestor, I am far more so to my yellow-skinned Mongolian ancestor, and most of all, to the black-skinned Negrotoid.’
10. After His Samadhi, Sri Ramakrishna once appeared as a shining figure to Swami Vivekananda and someone who was with the Swami at the time.
11. When Naren had just joined the monastery, he was once meditating. He suddenly y cried out. ‘Where is my body?’ A devotee rushed to him and found his body prostrate and stone-cold. He massaged Naren till circulation returned, and Naren opened his eyes.
12. Swami Vivekananda appeared to Sri Aurobindo in prison, after his Samadhi, and commanded him to give up politics and devote his life to spirituality. In the words of Sri Aurobindo — ‘ I was hearing constantly the voice of Vivekananda speaking to me for a fortnight in the jail in my solitary meditation and felt his presence…The voice spoke only on a special and limited, but very important, field of spiritual experience and it ceased as soon as it had finished saying all that it had to say on that subject. He visited me for 15 days in Alipore Jail and, until I could grasp the whole thing, he went on teaching me and impressed upon my mind the working of the Higher Consciousness — the Truth-consciousness in general — which leads towards the Supermind.”
Swami Vivekananda lit the torch of Sewa Bhava, a torch which more than a hundred years later, Gurudev Sri Sri Ravi Shankar has magnified into a sun of service to all humanity!
First published in the The Art of Living magazine Rishimukh, January 2021 issue.
Copyright Bhavesh Parekh
