Swami Vivekananda at 30 years of age was a philosopher incarnate but had a "fan following" similar to a modern pop star. Through his world tours, starting with Chicago, he evolved as a monk with cyclonic calibre. Now, 150 years after his birth the opium called vivekananda and spirituality sends suchayan mandal on a trip
It was "trance" that made Narendranath Dutta, a young man in North Kolkata during late 19th century, to rise in the path of spirituality and become Swami Vivekananda. Explaining the word "trance" in William Wordsworth’s poem The Excursion, Professor William Haste of General Assembly’s Institution (where Narendranath studied) wanted his students to visit Sri Ramakrishna, who was then staying at the Kali Mandir of Dakshineswar, if they wanted to understand the true meaning of the word. Since then, Narendranath met Ramakrishna often but wasn’t convinced much. In late 1881 or early 1882, when Ramakrishna told his followers about his dream and vision of Kali, young Narendra initially thought the ecstasies and visions to be "mere figments of imagination" and "hallucinations". As a member of Brahmo Samaj, he opposed idol worship, polytheism and Ramakrishna's worship of Kali. He discarded the Advaita Vedanta of "identity with the absolute" as blasphemy and madness, and often ridiculed the idea. Narendra tested Ramakrishna, who faced his arguments patiently: "Try to see the truth from all angles," he would reply.
A vocal and curious Narendranath made his guru Ramakrishna take more interest in him. It was after he renounced the world and chose to be a monk that Narendra wanted to be free of all worldly affairs and attain Nirvana. This was instantly rejected by Ramakrishna, who said, “I had thought you will be a banyan tree, under whom people will come to look for shelter and you want your own salvation.” That was an eye opener. After his guru’s death, Narendra travelled all over India as Parivrâjaka (sannyasi or wanderer) and was sorry to find poverty and superstition as the main cause of sorrow of the people. A sensitive monk clad in saffron cloth, he wanted to feed these have-nots and that was the spark in his beinghood.
Just like today’s pop stars making foreign tours, performing and making crowds go gaga, Vivekananda was no different. His charged up "performances" made the global crowd trip in a different yet fantastic way.
Earning the name
Determination is a synonym for Vivekananda. Wherever he travelled, the gift of the gab was his loyal companion, which helped him promote his message. Narendra visited Madurai and met the Raja of Ramnad Bhaskara Sethupathi, who was impressed to hear extensive discussions on Hindu philosophy from him. The Raja became his disciple and urged him to attend the Parliament of World Religions in Chicago. Narendra had a vague idea about that. He moved to Rameswaram, Pondicherry and Madras and met some disciples. A disciple, Alasinga Peruma, went door to door to collect funds to buy him a ship ticket to Chicago. The Madras disciples, the kings of Mysore, Ramnad, Khetri and other followers contributed to his journey and Narendra left Bombay for Chicago on 31 May, 1893 with the name Vivekananda (the bliss of discerning wisdom), conferred on him by Ajit Singh, the King of Khetri (Rajasthan).
In the ship he met Jamshedji Tata and suggested to him to set up a research and educational institution in India. They also discussed a plan to start a steel factory in India and the rest is history.
The rising
Vivekananda's speech that earned him fame is a future and awaited affair. Going chronologically, the letters that he scribed on board the ship to his followers were no less motivational. The explosiveness in each word of his letters helped his followers to stay motivated even when food and shelter were lacking. As his letters contained the stories of the places he was visiting en route Chicago, it also had several instances of insults that Swamiji suffered and still didn’t get deterred. His attire of saffron clothing with turban made the Americans think of him as someone "best fitted in zoo". “At Chicago fair, when I was roaming alone, someone pulled my turban from behind. I turned around and talked to that American. Realising that I knew English and could speak fluently, the man got nervous and asked me why I had worn something like this!”
Shivering in chilling winter of Boston, Swamiji daringly wrote, "Even if I die in this cold, I want you people to work on the same mission. Rome wasn’t built in a day. Meanwhile, whatever wooden plank I get, I’ll try to stay afloat.”
Swami shines
When everything was running in a bad shape, when he was rejected for lack of credentials to speak at the Parliament of Religion in Chicago, making everything fall in place was his good fortune. Disappointed to learn that he couldn’t participate, he contacted John Henry Wright of Harvard University, who invited him to speak at Harvard. After the speech, Wright said, “To ask for your credentials is like asking the sun to state its right to shine in the heavens.”
And finally, managing the green signal to speak, initially Vivekananda was confused and nervous. He didn’t have any written script to read out and invoked goddess Saraswati before speaking. By then most reputed and renowned speakers had already spoken, including two Indians, Protap Chunder Mozoomder of Bramho Samaj and Annie Besant-backed Jain scholar Virchand Gandhi.
Before he delivered the historical speech to promote Hinduism, Vivekananda had roused 7,000 people to their feet by addressing them as "My sisters and brothers of America". The audience immediately feeling the depth of his sincerity, rose to their feet and, according to reports, “went into inexplicable rapture with standing ovation and clapping that lasted for more than three minutes”. He went on, “It fills my heart with joy unspeakable to rise in response to the warm and cordial welcome, which you have given us...”
He managed to steal the show from the local speakers, according to Robert Grant of the Ramakrishna Society. "All the other speakers that day were quite formal, the sort of 'Ladies and Gentlemen' approach. Whereas, when he got up they felt this is coming from deep within his heart, he is greeting us and showing his oneness with us... The audience could sense that here was a person, who wasn’t just speaking from a book, he was speaking from his own experience, from deep within his heart, within his soul," Grant believed.
Vivekananda closed by speaking of humanity’s history of violence and his hopes for its end. “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 civilization 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.”
A participant of that conference confessed, “When the audience was bored with the tedious eloquence of some other speakers and became restive, the president of the conference found that the best means to get them into order was to announce that Vivekananda would be the next speaker again!”
Alex Broun, the Australian playwright behind Oneness ~ Voice without Form, which tells Swami Vivekananda's story and was played at the Sydney Opera House, says his fame as a speaker elevated him to celebrity status at the time.
"He was like the Justin Timberlake of his time if you like…he was a pop star of his time. He then went on this tour around America where there were signs put up, 'Come Hear the Swami Speak', 'Come hear the Hindu Monk', and people would go and listen to him... He went to Iowa, to Chicago, the Mid West… Women loved him, he was so handsome…He had a wonderful wit and charm and exuberance."
The heartthrob
Not only was the dynamite in his speech relevant to bring a revolution among his countrymen and abroad, his 5 feet 9 inches broad physique made many of his disciples, especially women, look up to him. The Americans had the impression that monks from India are basically naked sadhus with a crippled shape and zero knowledge. The blue eyed Swami was a literal bolt from the blue!
An American disciple, Macleod Josephine wrote to her niece, Lady Sandwich in a letter in 1944, “You know Swamiji is Shankar (medieval spiritual leader) reborn.” Josephine really didn’t care how much Swami spoke. To her his physical appearance loomed larger than his spiritual and intellectual equipment. Swamiji once told an "exquisitely beautiful young lady", who was a mistress of a great many attainments and heiress to an immense fortune about Krishna and moments after she renounced the worldly affairs and retired to a solitary island intoxicated in the meditation of Lord.
Vivekananda was seen as Christ and even Krishna. An old lady had confessed, “I love the Swami talk. I can't understand much of his philosophy but his gestures and voice charm me.” A New York newspaper had described him as "an orator by Divine right". Reeves Calkin, a Vedic scholar said, “His conversation was like the Ganga at the flood. There was really no interrupting him.”
Funds for dreams
Soon after his immense popularity in Chicago, he became a full time "performer", speaking at many private lectures, mainly in Detroit, Boston, New York and Chicago. In a letter dated 10 October, 1893, he wrote, "I’m planning to stay here for some more days. I’m earning 30-80 dollars per lecture. Yesterday, I earned 87 dollars. I have a lecture every day this week.” His dream to build Ramakrishna Mission and a temple at Belur in West Bengal was his sole aim then.
He taught the West the new understanding of the oriental religion, new view of man, new principle of morality and ethics and his ideas bridged the gap between East and west. Hinduism, which was thought to be a complex ancient religion, got a renewed identity and unification with his speeches, which will later play as defence to any conflict.
During 1895-1896, he visited England twice, where he met Margaret Elizabeth Noble, an Irish lady who later became Sister Nivedita. Here also private lectures helped him raise fund. The speeches were no less explosive than that in Chicago. A woman named Edith asked him to speak on philosophy, to which Swami said, “So you want philosophy, then you must be ready for canon balls.” Frank Rhodehamel later wrote, “Then, to his word, Swamiji bombarded the audience. His stress on monism…reached a climax of explicit and impassioned expression, cannon balls flew right to left.”
“Be brave! Be strong! Be feraless!...Even though you know you are going to be killed. Don’t die of fright. Die fighting! Don’t go down till you are knocked down,” Swamiji would declare like Lord Krishna in Bhagavad Gita and that was what made him popular.
Different monk
A super cyclone of passion, Vivekananda's speeches encircled everything that class revolution of socialism and Marxism looked forward to. Only his mode of conduct was a different angle in the prism. Industrialist John D Rockefeller met the Swami, who encouraged him to devote more of his wealth to philanthropy, while scientist Nikola Tesla became interested in Vedanta philosophy’s teachings on matter and energy. Even the reclusive American author, J D Salinger would become intimately acquainted with the Ramakrishna order of monks that was established in New York City as a result of Vivekananda’s American tour.
Among those present at that conference in 1893, Annie Besant later commented, “Off the platform, his figure was instinct with pride of country, pride of race ~ the representative of the oldest of living religions… India was not to be shamed before the hurrying arrogant West by this her envoy and her son. He brought her message, he spoke in her name, and the herald remembered the dignity of the royal land whence he came. Purposeful, virile, strong, he stood out, a man among men, able to hold his own.”
Bramhachari Sandipan, a monk in Ramakrishna Mission at Narendrapur, Kolkata, believes, “Swamiji was different from other monks of that time. He would eat non-vegetarian food and smoked. To him, religion wasn’t to sit and meditate but to meditate and work. People paying for speeches was a new thing then. Now with corporate motivational speakers, you have this trend but I wonder, had Swami Vivekananda, a brand by himself, been alive it could have been a different world altogether.”
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