OSWALD PEREIRA examines an interesting phenomenon, ‘export and import of our spiritual gurus’ — a strange paradox of our sages being better known in the West than in India, and the people in the country honouring them by virtue of their foreign-returned ‘glory’
In a discussion on my book, Beyond Autobiography of a Yogi, with members of the Bookworms of Delhi a couple of months ago, the question arose: “Shouldn’t we ourselves honour our spiritual gurus in India, rather than they going to the West, especially the US, becoming famous there and then returning to India, basking in their foreign-gained glory?”
The young, spiritually aware members of the book club, were unanimous and vociferous about the “need for us to first honour our gurus in India, instead of depending on the West to recognise them, and then them coming back to India with the tag of foreign approval, or perhaps, not even returning home.”
The virtual export and import of our gurus has been going on for 150 years now. It goes to show that it is not only men and women of the world in India, but renunciates as well, who seem to have been bitten by the ‘foreign-returned’ attraction.
This is a phenomenon that I have highlighted in my book, Beyond Autobiography of a Yogi.
“America discovered Vivekananda and made a gift of him to India and the world,” Swami Nikhilananda said in his book, Swami Vivekananda: A Biography. “It is one of the outstanding traits of Americans to draw out the latent greatness of other people,” Nikhilananda added.
Merwin-Marie Snell, President of the Scientific Section of the World’s Parliament of Religions, held in 1893 said: “By far, the most important and typical representative of Hinduism was Swami Vivekananda, who, in fact, was beyond question, the most popular and influential man in the Parliament. He was received with greater enthusiasm than any other speaker, Christian or pagan. The people thronged about him wherever he went and hung with eagerness on his every word. The most rigid of orthodox Christians say of him, ‘He is indeed a prince among men!’ ”
Newspapers published his speeches and they were read with warm interest all over the country. The New York Herald said of him: “He is undoubtedly the greatest figure in the Parliament of Religions. After hearing him we feel how foolish it is to send missionaries to this learned nation.”
The Boston Evening Post said: “He is a great favourite at the Parliament from the grandeur of his sentiments and his appearance as well. If he merely crosses the platform he is applauded; and this marked approval of thousands he accepts in a childlike spirit of gratification without a trace of conceit.”
I observed in Beyond Autobiography of a Yogi: “The people back home in India then didn’t seem as keen as the Americans to honour their spiritual gurus. But once yogis and sages like Vivekananda had acquired a sizeable following in the West, people in India began basking in their fame and glory.”
Nikhilananda said, “The reports of the Parliament of Religions were published in the Indian magazines and newspapers.” He added, “Swami Vivekananda’s vindication of the Hindu faith filled with pride the hearts of his countrymen from Colombo to Almora, from Calcutta to Bombay.”
I have asked in Beyond Autobiography of a Yogi: “Two questions then arise: would Vivekananda have been as recognized and well-respected today, if he hadn’t spent several years abroad, spreading the teachings of the Vedanta, principal among them being the Vedanta of love? Would Vivekananda have won the admiration of his countrymen, if he hadn’t made that landmark speech at the Parliament of the World’s Religions in September 1893, holding the audience spellbound with his call for religious tolerance and an end to fanaticism?”
The most logical response to both these questions would be that Vivekananda is what he is today, famous and respected, thanks to his long stay in America, England and Europe. The Parliament, attended by delegates of ten faiths, became a forum for inter-faith dialogue, where Vivekananda quoted a boyhood hymn: “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.”
Vivekananda’s speech was rated as among the best, if not the best, among all delegates. The Parliament’s President John Henry Barrows said “India, the Mother of religions was represented by Swami Vivekananda, the Orange-monk who exercised the most wonderful influence over his auditors.”
Like Vivekananda, Yogananda too, was better known in the USA, where he spent more than 30 of his 59 years. He, too, made an impact with his first speech in 1920 on the Science of Religion at the International Congress of Religious Liberals, in Boston, before a huge audience comprising philosophers, politicians, reformers, and religious leaders from around the world.
Yogananda affirmed that true religion is not dogmatic but universal and can be grounded in the concept of God as Bliss. He spoke of the faculty of intuition, by which God can actually be experienced, and not merely reasoned about.
Greatest of all, he told his audience that there was a practical method for awakening one’s latent intuitive powers of God-perception. That method consists of consciously controlling the life force—with techniques that comprise the Kriya Yoga science in which he initiated some 100,000 people during his lifetime.
When Yogananda returned to India in 1935 on a request from his guru Sri Yukteswar, he was given a hero’s welcome.
The question that arises again is would Yogananda have been honoured as much if he had not gained fame in the US? The answer which seems more appropriate is that his ‘warm welcome back’ in India was in no small measure due to his popularity in the US.
The same ironical ‘quote’ like in the case of Vivekananda would apply to Yogananda—that “He is America’s gift to India and the world.”
For, it seems that Yogananda was not as popular in India as he was in the US.
Kriyananda, his direct disciple who later founded Ananda Sangha to disseminate his teachings, said in his book, The New Path: “I first went to India in 1958. There, I found myself lecturing for virtually the first time, to audiences consisting mostly of people who were not familiar with either Master’s name or his teachings. It was a priceless opportunity to learn how to apply his message creatively to general audiences.”
The situation of Yogananda being better known in the US than in India, the country of his origin, doesn’t seem to have changed even today, 65 years after Kriyananda’s observation.
“I would say that Yogananda is better known in the West, but now he is going to be better known in India,’ said Nayaswami Jyotish, Spiritual Director, Ananda Sangha, during an interview with me for my book, Beyond Autobiography of a Yogi.
Jyotish expressed the hope that, “as his teachings spread and India is more receptive to his teachings, the country which has a bigger population than America, will catch up.”
Note: This article has been adapted from my book, Beyond Autobiography of a Yogi.
Order your copy of the book on
Amazon India: https://www.amazon.in/dp/8119670582
Amazon USA: https://rb.gy/np8ai1
Featured Image: Vivekananda (fourth from right at the World’s Parliament of Religions (Pic Courtesy: Wikipedia)
Oswald Pereira, a senior journalist, has written ten books, including Beyond Autobiography of a Yogi, The Newsroom Mafia, Chaddi Buddies, The Krishna-Christ Connexion, How to Create Miracles in Our Daily Life and Crime Patrol: The Most Thrilling Stories. Oswald is a disciple of Paramhansa Yogananda, and practises Kriya Yoga.
More Stories by Oswald Pereira
