Sri Ramakrishna's Vijnana Vedanta by Swami Medhananda dt. 29-May-26

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[00:00:10]Shanti, Shanti, Shanti.

[00:00:18]Today we have assembled here for Swami Lokkeshwaranandha memorialia lecture.

[00:00:26]Before we begin our uh lecture, a very short life sketch of revery Maharaj.

[00:00:34]Swami Lokeshwaranandhi G was one of the most illustrious monks of the Ramak Krishna order. Revered for his spiritual depth, extraordinary administrative ability, humanitarian vision and scholarly contributions to Vanta and Indian philosophy. Born as Shiva Bandhubadhai with a pet name of Kanilal in present day Bangladesh. He displayed a contemplative and spiritual temperament from his childhood. His mother was his mother was Shivasini Dvi and father Vasantumar. Deeply inspired by the teachings of Sriramak Krishna and Swami Viveananda, he gradually turned away from the worldly ambitions and dedicated himself to a life of renunciation and service. He joined the Ramak Krishna order in 1933 received initiation from Swami Shivanand Gi Maharaj and later embraced Syasa under Swami Virajaanand Gi at Burmat.

[00:01:41]As a monk, Swami Lokeshwaranand gi perfectly embodied the Ramach Krishna Viveana idol of combining intense spirituality with active service to humanity. His life was marked by discipline, humility, compassion and an unshakable faith in the transformative power of education and spiritual values.

[00:02:02]He believed that service to the poor and suffering was not charity but worship of the divine present in every individual.

[00:02:10]This philosophy shaped all his works and institutions.

[00:02:15]In the early years of his monastic life, he was entrusted with relief and welfare activities in difficult regions including Burma and rural Bengal. During periods of famine, poverty and social distress, he worked tirelessly among orphans, slum dwellers and marginalized communities. His relief work during the Bengal famine and his rehabilitation efforts for underprivileged youth reflected his deep commitment to practical vanta spirituality expressed through selfless action.

[00:02:50]One of Swami Lokeshwaranandanda's greatest achievements was the transformation of the Ramak Krishna Mission Center at Nindraur near Kolkata into a major educational and social service institution. Beginning with a small students home and orphanage and dis and destitute boys, he gradually developed the institution into a vast educational complex spread over hundreds of acres. Under his leadership, arrows schools, residential colleges, vocational training institutes, agricultural and rural development centers and welfare programs for economically disadvantaged communities.

[00:03:32]His vision was not merely to impact academic education but to create complete human beings grounded in morality, discipline, service and spiritual awareness.

[00:03:45]A particularly remarkable aspect of his work was his pioneering effort in education for the visually impaired. He founded the blind boys academy at Nindraur which became one of the India's finest in institutions for visually challenged students. He ensured that these students received not only formal education but also dignity, confidence, vocational training and opportunities for independent living. His compassion toward the differently aabled and socially neglected reflected the universal humanism at the heart of his spiritual philosophy. Swami Lokeshwaranandanda also played a significant role in rural upliftment and mass education through initiatives connected with the Ramak Krishna mission Lokushik Kapurishad. He promoted literacy, vocational skills, teacher training and rural self-development programs across villages of West Bengal.

[00:04:41]He encouraged youth empowerment and self-reliance through technical education and community- based welfare activities. Apart from being a visionary, administrator and humanitarian, Swami Lokesh Parhanandi was widely respected as a scholar, thinker and prolific writer. He possessed profound knowledge of vanta, the upanishads, the Indian philosophical traditions and sought to interpret these timeless teachings in a modern and accessible language. His writings combine intellectual clarity with spiritual insight making complex philosophical concepts understandable to ordinary readers and students. Among his important literary works are eternal wisdom of India, Swami Viveanandanda, his life and message and collections of lectures and reminiscences of the direct disciples of Sri Ramak Krishna. He also translated and commented upon several major uponads including the Ishopunishad, Kotto Punishad, Kenopouishad and Chandukunishad.

[00:05:43]Drawing inspirations from the commentaries of Adish Shankarachara, he explained vantic truths with exceptional simplicity and philosophical depth. His writings emphasized harmony of religions, inner spiritual awakening, self-realization and the divinity inherited in every human being. From 1973 until his passing in 1998, he served as the head of the Ramak Krishna Mission Institute of Culture where he transformed the institution into a globally respected center for cultural dialogue, scholarship and interfaith understanding. Under his leadership, the institute expanded its library, organized seminars and language programs and became a meeting ground for scholars, thinkers and spiritual seekers from around the world. He traveled extensively across Europe, America, Russia and Asia, delivering lectures on vanta, Indian culture and universal spirituality at prestigious universities and international forums. Swami Lokkeshwaranandha's life remains a luminous example of the synthesis of monkot scholarship education and humanitarian service. Through his institutions, writings and spiritual ideals, he inspired generations of students, devotees, scholars and monks.

[00:07:08]His legacy continues to live on through the countless lives transformed by his compassion, vision and dedication to the service of humanity.

[00:07:19]Today Swami Lokeshwaranandha memorial lecture will be delivered by Swami Midhanandh Gi Maharaj we all fondly know him as Oyun Maharaj who will be speaking on Sri Ramak Krishna's Vigyan vdanta a philosophy of harmony for a divided age swami maidhanand Maharaj an acclaimed philosopher belonging to the Ramak Krishna Shongo is the author of four books karma and rebirth in Hinduism published by Cambridge University Press in 2025.

[00:07:52]Swami Viveanandanda's vanti cosmopolitanism published by Oxford University Press in 2022. Infinite paths to infinite reality, Sriramak Krishna and cross-cultural philosophy of religion published by Oxford University Press in 2018 and the dialectics of aesthetic agency reevaluating German aesthetics from Kant to Arono published by Bloomsbury in 2013.

[00:08:23]He is the editor of the Bloomsbury research handbook of Vanta.

[00:08:29]He is also the editor of two special issues of the international journal of Hindu studies. One on vantic theodicis and one on swami viveananda as a cosmopolitan thinker. He has published over 30 articles in such journals as philosophy east and west journal of Indian philosophy, religious studies, journal of consciousness studies, the moist kanian review, journal of religion, journal of world philosophies etc. He is currently working on two book projects both under a contract with Oxford University Press and all embracing oneness. Shri Orurumindu's integral advita and the legacy of Sri Ramak Krishna will be the third book in his integral advita trilogy.

[00:09:24]He is also editing the book Indian spirituality in contemporary philosophy to which 15 leading philosophers are contributing. I now request Swami Maidhanand GI to come and deliver his lecture.

[00:10:01]Mahrishna.

[00:10:18]Good evening everyone.

[00:10:21]I offer my humble pronams to revered swami tatasaran zimaraj and other senior swamies. Now for my warm namaskar to everyone here in attendance.

[00:10:32]I'm deeply honored to be delivering this swami locand memorial lecture. one of the great swamies of our order who made such a powerful and lasting contribution to this very institution, the Institute of Culture. I'm humbled that Rever Tatos Sanji invited me to speak on this occasion.

[00:10:55]One little note, please put your phones on silent if possible. Thank you.

[00:11:02]I'll be speaking primarily in English, the language I'm most comfortable with, but since I'm in Kolkata, I'll also occasionally speak Bangla, sometimes a little bit of a mixture.

[00:11:17]So friends, let's take a time machine together. Let's go back to the year 1842.

[00:11:25]The young Gadada was six years old.

[00:11:29]He was a natural lover of humanities.

[00:11:33]What in the west is called humanities, what in India is often called the arts.

[00:11:39]He was a great actor, extremely creative, singer, a sculptor. He was very good at mimicry also imitating people's gestures, their behavior. And Swami G too, Swami Vanandanda when he was in college, Scottish church college, what was his major? Philosophy.

[00:11:57]So both Sharam Krishna and Swami G were great lovers of humanities and there's an irony in this nowadays in India especially humanities tends to be looked down upon science stream in German.

[00:12:26]The term for humanities is gist visa.

[00:12:31]It's a beautiful term which literally means sciences of the spirit.

[00:12:38]Sciences of the spirit. That's the deeper meaning of humanity subjects, philosophy, literature, Sanskrit and so on, history.

[00:12:50]Because there's a deep connection between humanity subjects and spirituality. It's not a coincidence that Shirram Krishna was so gifted in humanities. It's not a coincidence that Swami Vikan studied philosophy.

[00:13:04]And I'm very grateful that uh long back when I was in college at Berkeley, my dad, he made me enroll as a computer science major.

[00:13:14]Typical respectable subject for Bengales. But after a year, I changed my major thankfully to philosophy and English literature. And of course, my parents were not happy. But it was the best decision I ever made because it's because of that that I'm able to write books on Vanta on Sharam Krishna and S Vikanda these great saints that I love and because of that I can also do deep also do deep research as a kind of spiritual practice.

[00:13:50]So now that was all kind of a detour but with all that said in Swami Shahadanandanda's great biography of Sharam Krishna Lela push book he makes a general statement about this young Gadadaha's studies at the age of about six he said he had a general aversion to arithmetic he didn't like math okay but what's interesting is in another text which is much less widely read but which should be aquum shin's shriam krishna pi it's a kind of poetic biography of shriam krishna it's a beautiful text which swami vikran himself read and he praised it to the skies he wrote in a letter to shashimar swami raach krishna gi swami g said just now I read oko's book give him a hundred thousand embraces from me through his pen. Sri Ram Krishna is manifesting himself.

[00:14:50]Blessed is okay. So it's from this text that I want to read to you my very favorite passage. I hope it's on there.

[00:15:00]Yeah, forgive my pronunciation and so on.

[00:15:08]Sorry.

[00:15:12]for chai.

[00:15:55]rough translation. It's a beautiful passage full of literary subtleties and philosophical insights. In arithmetic, Shiram Krishna Gadada advanced only as far as basic addition but he could not manage to learn subtraction.

[00:16:14]Bjog addition yoga join in his nature so it came with ease. Subtraction BJ seemed base to him and thus his progress in learning subtraction took a crooked turn.

[00:16:31]For one for whom even when the infinite, the purum is taken from the infinite, the infinite remains. How could the very idea of subtraction ever enter his mind?

[00:16:43]This is a most profound arithmetic unknown to math textbooks. To grasp such truds, one needs a sound, pure, discerning intellect.

[00:16:54]Subtract the infinite Brahman from the infinite Brahman and yet that infinite Brahman still remains in hand.

[00:17:03]My entire talk today will be based on these profound verses these profound shlokas from Aqua Kumarin's Shishir Krishna. It's so packed with philosophical and literary brilliance.

[00:17:16]So let's start to unpack it a little bit. I guess the it's a little bit small, huh?

[00:17:22]First of all, he's brilliantly punning in kind of playing on the words yoga and v yoga. Yoga means what? Spiritual practice. Of course, we all know that sitting here, but it also means addition and v yoga means subtraction. Vog joction.

[00:17:41]So he's playing on this dual meaning of yoga and then v yoga.

[00:17:47]So then the line how does he read it? It has a double meaning. Sham Krishna's gadhar's mind was always in yoga but also addition was in his nature. He could only add he couldn't subtract because he was this great yogi.

[00:18:07]And then the verses take a beautiful turn when refers to the great Vic mantra which we all know that one from the infinite comes the infinite. So on when you subtract the infinite from the infinite what's left not zero the infinite.

[00:18:29]This is the mathematics of the infinite that Sharam Krishna not only taught but embodied in his own life and demonstrated experientially.

[00:18:44]So what these verses show from the punti is that Sham Krishna taught and exemplified a different kind of advita philosophy something that we're not used to. We all know Shankara Advatanta but I think we need to think more deeply reflect more deeply more profoundly about the precise nature of Shri Ram Krishna's Adwita philosophy and these verses from the punti help us to do so because these verses suggest that there are at least two kinds of adwita philosophy so we can even call this talk a tale of two adwitas.

[00:19:25]What are these two adwas?

[00:19:28]Shankara's adwa as I'll try to show today was what we can call a subtractionbased advita a subtractionbased non-dual philosophy. It's grounded in a methodology of subtraction and a realization of subtraction.

[00:19:48]And Shamram Krishna's advita philosophy was an additionbased advita, an additive advita. He subtracts nothing.

[00:19:59]It's an advita that encompasses everything. And he used a very succinct statement in Banglad to encompass his special kind of advita philosophy. He said ji don't subtract anything. Don't exclude anything. What does he mean by anything?

[00:20:20]Ja, Jagat, Ishwara, this entire world of names and forms.

[00:20:25]Why subtract these things? They're all the same. They all constitute different aspects, different parts of the same Adic truth, the same Adic totality. And he used the example of a bale fruit.

[00:20:43]If you remove the seeds, what happens?

[00:20:44]and you try to take the weight of it, you don't get the full weight of the fruit. So don't subtract anything.

[00:20:50]And what we find if we study the Kotamita the Shri Sri Ram Krishna Kotamita by Moan Gupta if we study that carefully what you'll find is that on almost every page Sri Ram Krishna himself is contrasting two kinds of Adwita philosophy again and again he contrasts Shankara's subtractionbased adwita philosophy from his own viganta philosophy which is an additionbased advita philosophy He says that both these kinds of adwatic philosophy are true from different spiritual standpoints which he calls ghana and vikana. Ganet pan.

[00:21:32]Swami Balabatani gave a a wonderful lecture a few years ago here on the stage called ganed pan Ram Krishna alo and he was discussing my book as well this infinite past book.

[00:21:46]So what does Shrirama say in the kotamita?

[00:21:49]Shranka says if you want to get to the roof you have to climb a staircase. He likens this climbing of the staircase to the process of nati ni vara in classical adwata vanta in shankara's philosophy.

[00:22:04]Brahman is not this world. Brahman is not my body. Brahman is not my mind and so on. Then he says finally you reach the roof. The roof signifies ghana gan knowledge of non-dual Brahman which is impersonal attributeless niruna brahman nirvisha brahman this is the ideal of shankara's philosophy after that process of subtraction ni is nothing but subtraction brahman is not this not this but then sharam krishna says after reaching the roof there are some people who look back on that same staircase that they had just climbed and say wait a minute the steps are made of the same materials as the roof.

[00:22:48]That person is the vigani. The one who can climb up and down the staircase and realizes these two profound truths.

[00:22:55]Number one, that divine reality which is realized in samadi is equally saguna. It's also the personal god. He would also say the vigani realized that Brahman and are non- differentied like fire in its power to burn and the vigani also sees instead of dismissing this world as a dream as unreal the vigani sees being Brahman itself has become the 24 cosmic principles. So the world's not unreal and you don't need to subtract the world from this divine truth.

[00:23:42]So according to Sharam Krishna, two distinct advite philosophies emerge from these two different spiritual realizations. Both of them are spiritual realizations. Ghana and Vigana. And from Ghana comes Shankara's advita vanta, a subtractionbased advita philosophy. And from vigana comes Ram Krishna's own vigana vanta philosophy which is an additionbased advita philosophy jier ecti.

[00:24:11]Now again the font is very small.

[00:24:14]Anyway, so if we were to encapsulate these two Adwatic philosophies in Sanskrit formulas, this is my suggestion. It's not my suggestion. Shankara's advanta is captured in this very famous formula.

[00:24:34]We all know that.

[00:24:37]But now how could we characterize Sharam Krishna's additionbased adwita philosophy his vigyavanta I would suggest the following jagaty the ultimate reality now just compare these two different Sanskrit formulas the ultimate reality according to shankara is only brahman and he understands brahman as nidbuna brahman whereas shirram krishna understands ultimate reality as brahmachi. This phrase brahmachti is very interesting.

[00:25:12]You don't find it in the gospel itself in the katamita. I found it in only one text in shri dialogues with m the author of the katamita but it's not found in the katamita itself. He refers to the ultimate reality from Sharam Krishna's standpoint as brahma. It's a beautiful expression because the idea is the ultimate reality for Sharam Krishna is not just Brahman. It's equally shaky. So this one phrase Brahma it encompasses both the Brahman aspect nun Brahman and also Sagun Brahman. So Brahma Shaki is satya. Shamram Krishna is not putting Shaki on a lower level than Brahman.

[00:25:51]They're equally real and Jagaty because Shaki is real. This world also turns out to be of real manifestation of shi. Does this remind us of any statements from any of the great disciples of Shamram Krishna? It should.

[00:26:09]Swami Turyanand gi one of the great monastic disciples of Sham Krishna.

[00:26:14]His very last words in Bangla.

[00:26:32]Brahman is real.

[00:26:35]Everything is real.

[00:26:38]The world is real. And everything is real.

[00:26:44]Life itself is grounded in truth in reality.

[00:26:48]Swami Turyanji in his last words is articulating Shiram Krishna's addition-based adwita philosophy his vigyavanta philosophy and he does so in much greater detail actually in a letter because Swami Sharvanand asked Swami Turanji what exactly is Sharam Krishna's philosophy and he gives this beautiful response I might refer to it later in this presentation I'll share some insights with you from that letter it's a beautiful two-page Bangla letter in response to this question what exactly is Sharam Krishna philosophy written in 1919.

[00:27:21]So now you might be wondering wait a minute there's something missing because Shankara's advanta also has jivan.

[00:27:30]So Shankara's formula explains the relationship between the ja and non-dual Brahman. What is that relationship? It's one of absolute identity. The ja is none other than non-dual pure consciousness.

[00:27:43]It's a mistake to think that we're bodies and minds. We're actually non-dual pure consciousness. Now you might ask well so what formula captures this aspect of Shirram Krishna's philosophy how did Sri Ramak Krishna conceive the relationship between the ja the individual soul and the ultimate reality the divine and in fact he gives us a nice formula repeatedly in the katamita he quotes Hanuman Hanumanji addressing Rama says I'll give you the script Even though he quotes it in manga, when I identify with the physical body, I say, "Oh, I am your servant."

[00:28:27]When I identify with the jatma, the individual soul, I say, "I am an ama, a portion of you, oh Rama."

[00:28:36]When I identify with the supreme soul, the atman, then I say, "I am you and you are me." Now notice the difference between this Hanumanloka and classical says it affirms one the truth of one the ultimate truth of one relationship between ja and Brahman namely absolute identity.

[00:28:58]Shriram Krishna embraces multiple relationships with the divine affirming each of them to be equally real and equally valuable. He gives a beautiful example. If I have a flute I can do a few things with that flute. I can just play one note on that flute like that.

[00:29:16]He says boring.

[00:29:21]I mean raini. He wants to play ragas and raisin on that flute using all seven holes relating with the divine in many different ways sporting with the divine and all these different ways of relating in vishism. You find these different ways vatalyia sakya madurya and so on.

[00:29:42]So Shamram Krishna's vigyana vanta his addition-based adwita philosophy harmonizes this is what I want to show in detail today it harmonizes all the traditional vantic sraayas all the traditional vantic sects or traditions that's why I started with this beautiful sloka acharanam mahachara he was the greatest of all acharas He was the samuna acharia the acharia of harmony. He was a samvaya avatara the incarnation of harmony. Swami G emphasized that in his letters but less wellknown is that Shriarbindo was a great bhta shriam Krishna and I want to share with you a beautiful statement he made about Sharam Krishna in 1908 in an essay called spirituality and nationalism.

[00:30:39]Shriarbindo is discussing all the great avataras of the past and he says of all these souls of all these avataras Shiram Krishna was the last and greatest.

[00:30:51]For while others felt God in a single or limited aspect Sri Ram Krishna felt him in his illimitable unity as the sum of an illimitable variety.

[00:31:04]In him the spiritual experiences of the millions of saints who had gone before were renewed and united.

[00:31:11]He was summoned by abatara. So how exactly does Shiram Krishna harmonize the traditional vantic sects? This is what I want to discuss in detail a little bit. First what exactly is the nature of ultimate reality? According to Shankara as we've already discussed it's ultimately niruna brahman attributeless impersonal non-dual pure consciousness.

[00:31:34]What about the bakti schools of vanta?

[00:31:36]Swami tapasanji has a wonderful book called bakti schools of vanta because he felt that there was an overemphasis on shankara's adwita and that we neglect the devotional schools of vanta. So he devoted a whole book to it. So in that book you'll find that he explains this in detail. He says that Rammanuja school of vishta dwa vanta and mada school of dwight vanta or sometimes called madva vdanta they conceive ultimate reality as the opposite sagun brahman opposite of shankara it's sagun brahman vishnu but there are other vantic schools which are less wellknown ainta which was inspired by chaitana the vishnava school gaia we say and the suda Vanta school of bachara these are schools based on devotion toward Krishna so they take ultimate reality to be Krishna personal god but unlike ramanuja and madwa these two schools ajinta and dwa they don't deny the reality of nguna brahman they accept it but they put niduna brahman on a lower footing they make it less valuable than saguna brahman on Krishna. For instance, in Gaudia, in a vehicipal brilliance.

[00:33:07]Nirvana Brahman which is supposed to be the highest according to Shankara school is actually just the peripheral brilliance of Krishna himself. It's just a minor aspect.

[00:33:17]And Vlabachara says something similar using a different metaphor. He says that Brahman Brahman is just the foot the chamom of Krishna.

[00:33:28]Again you see this kind of hierarchy.

[00:33:30]The language is always hierarchical.

[00:33:32]They're putting Saguna Brahman above Niron Brahman but they're both equally real unlike Rammanuja school and Madva school. Now now we can appreciate what's so distinctive about Shiram Krishna's harmonizing philosophy. What does Krishna say?

[00:33:55]The same snake whether coiled up, stationary or moving around. It's the same snake either way in its static aspect or in its dynamic aspect.

[00:34:05]Fire and its power to burn.

[00:34:07]The same truth seen from different standpoints. So now how do we relate Shriram Krishna's approach to ultimate reality with these traditional schools?

[00:34:16]Well, he turns to Shankara and he says, "You're right. Ultimate reality is but don't limit the ultimate to just brah."

[00:34:25]This is one of Krishna's most repeated teachings and most important teachings.

[00:34:32]Don't limit the absolute to just brahman. And then he turns to Rammanujan Madwa and he says, "Yes, the ultimate reality is saguna brahman. It is Vishnu.

[00:34:40]I love Vishnu. But don't limit the ultimate to just Vishnu. Why only Vishnu? Why not also Christ? Why not Allah? Why not Niruna Brahman also?

[00:34:51]And then he turns to the Ainta and the Vantans and he says it's very good that you accept the reality of both Niduna Brahman and Saguna Brahman Krishna and Niduna Brahman.

[00:35:05]But why go into these hierarchies higher lower? We don't need to. It's not about a a matter of higher and lower, one being higher or better or more supreme than the other, one major, one minor and so on. It's a matter of temperament and preference whether we prefer Brahman, Nidun Brahman or Shaki and Shaki herself manifests in many forms. There's so many das and dies. What is it? It depends on our purvajamscaras. There's no higher and lower there. So Shiram Krishna unlike all of the traditional Vantic schools he affirms not only the equal reality of both Niduna Brahman and Saguna Brahman but their equal value which you don't find as far as I can tell in any of the traditional Vantic schools. This is the newness that you find in Sharam Krishna the Avatara of our age. Second big question what exactly is the status of this world?

[00:36:02]So we know of course that shankara shankara's view is jagat mitky ultimately it's an illusion doesn't exist we'll talk about that a a little later and we know that bhakti schools do not say that this world is unreal they say it's a real but it has a real but temporary existence and it has no independent existence apart from God.

[00:36:29]Okay. What is Shriram Krishna's view?

[00:36:33]Well, fortunately on December 16th, 1883, we find in the kotamita m askna this question point blank. He says, "What is answer?"

[00:37:04]He goes on like that explaining the staircase metaphor. Then he says again just a little bit later, Notice how he's contrasting this vara mara this ni kind of vara of classical subtraction based with his own standpoint which is an additionbased vigan kind of adv philosophy he says what is that that is the standpoint of the vigyani he's contrasting the subtractionbased vara of classical advant with his own additionbased vigana referring to his own spiritual experience of he says this is this is the spiritual experience of vigana which recognizes all names and forms themselves.

[00:38:10]as real manifestations of shi.

[00:38:14]So Sham Krishna actually says very explicitly that this is a different kind of advita philosophy. Where does he say it? This is also from the katamita February 25th 1885. He says even baktas have a realization of oneness.

[00:38:43]It's a beautiful metaphor. Wax. It's as if everything is made of wax. What's so what's the philosophical significance of using this wax metaphor? It means that the names and forms themselves are real manifestations. And look how beautifully it dovetales with the upanishads. In the chandishad when the question is raised how does Brahman relate to this world of names and forms the answer is like we have formless clay being shaped into different kinds of pots like we have molten gold that's shaped by the goldsmith into golden earrings golden bracelets golden necklace he's using a very similar metaphor so this wax metaphor helps us to arrive at a better and deeper and truer interpretation of the vidantic scriptures that's also Alo something that's extremely important which Swami Vikani used to emphasize.

[00:39:36]Another big question this is all philosophy so far but what about spiritual practice? What do the traditional Vantic schools say about spiritual practice? They usually have a hierarchy of yogas.

[00:39:49]So of course according to Shankara school the only direct path to moka liberation is ghani yoga the path of knowledge. According to bhakti schools obviously the highest yoga is bakti yoga the path of devotion and they and bhaktas will put the path of devotion over other paths like the path of knowledge and so they've been fighting with each other for centuries which is higher which is lower and so on what does sham krishna say kotita innumerable are the ways that lead to god there are the paths of ghana of karma and of bacti if you are sincere you will attain god in the end whichever path you follow And in other places in the karmata you also find him mentioning raji yoga as a direct and independent path. So all four of the yogas are direct and independent paths to liberation. No higher and lower totally different from all of the traditional vidantic schools. And Swami Vikananda following his guru says the following very explicitly. Each one of our yogas is fitted to make man perfect even without the help of the others because they have all the same goal in view. The yogas of work karma yoga of wisdom ghana yoga and of devotion bakti yoga are all capable of serving as direct and independent means for the attainment of moka that's why this is a svaya dashana this is a harmonizing philosophy puts all the yogas on an equal footing another big question the fourth theme that I want to discuss how exactly should we look upon other spiritual traditions and other religions.

[00:41:27]So what will help us is oh sorry I didn't show this slide but anyway I read it out. So this is the slide that I want to discuss. Alan Race a Christian theologian he came up with this what's called a three-fold typology of attitudes toward other religions which has become very famous and which is used all the time. I discuss in my work as well. He introduced this framework in 1983 and he uses these three terms. He distinguishes exclusivism, inclusivism and pluralism.

[00:41:58]What do these mean? Exclusivism is the view that only my religion leads to the highest salvation. Other religions don't.

[00:42:08]So it's the most kind of uh you can say dogmatic view. My religion alone is effective. Other religions are not at all effective. Inclusivism is a kind of middle position. Inclusivism is a view that only one religion, my religion of course, leads directly to salvation.

[00:42:26]But other religions lead somehow indirectly more slowly to the same goal.

[00:42:31]Or maybe sometimes these other religions lead to a lesser kind of salvation. It distinguishes different kinds of salvations, higher and lower, and says my religion leads to the highest salvation. Yours leads to a kind of inferior kind of salvation. There are different. So these kinds of inclusivism you'll find in different forms. One example the great Catholic theologian Khal Rana R A H N R he says you know non-Christians they'll also get saved but indirectly because they are all anonymous Christians he came up with this phrase anonymous Christians Hindus are anonymous Christians Muslims anonymous Christians Jewish people anonymous Christians Buddhists anonymous Christians but it's better to be a conscious Christian right you can get to the goal faster so there's always a higher and lower kind of hierarchical kind of language in play and on the Indian side what I want to suggest is that Shankara school of adwant is a form of inclusivism okay and we'll see why in a second because he puts the the goal of realization of nuna brahman above other forms of salvation theistic forms of liberation but finally we have this third paradigm called religious pluralism what is plural Pluralism. Pluralism is a view that more than one religion, not just my religion, but also your religion is equally capable of leading to the highest goal. No higher and lower. My religion takes me to the highest. Your religion will also take you to the highest.

[00:44:00]This is my my argument is that Sriam Krishna's philosophy is based on religious pluralism. And I want to show that in some detail. He doesn't go into these hierarchies of higher and lower.

[00:44:11]So to help us appreciate what's so radical in Sharam Krishna's religious pluralism, let's first see in what way classical Adwa vanta is more inclusivist than pluralist. This is something by the way this mountain metaphor is one that Swami Tapasani himself uses in the introduction to his book bakti school of vanta and he has a section called the patronizing attitude of adwita vanta. I recommend that you look at it. So he says that Adwitans are like they're standing at the peak of Mount Everest looking down at the base camp and saying you baktas are good too patronizing. So let's see how that works.

[00:44:51]Christians through the path of Christianity realize the Christian God.

[00:44:54]But notice they're out of luck. They haven't reached the top of the mountain.

[00:44:58]What about Muslims? And that's just giving some examples through Islam. What do they reach? They realize Allah. But too bad not the peak of the mountain.

[00:45:09]Theistic Hindus meaning Hindus who believe in the personal god through their respective paths vishnavism and so on. What do they reach? They realize different forms of the personal god but out of luck not the peak. What do they have to do to reach the peak according to shanka school?

[00:45:25]The Christians need to stop practicing Christianity. Practice Ghana yoga the path of knowledge and where do you end up? Ah you get to the peak. Wonderful.

[00:45:34]Same thing with Muslims. Stop practicing Islam. not going to get you anywhere past this point and practice ghana yoga instead and then you reach that highest peak which is realization of niruna brahman you have to transcend sagun brahman same thing with theistic Hindus stop practicing your theistic religion your japa your prayer and so on it'll just keep you stuck at that level instead practice a path of knowledge and you reach the the peak okay now by contrast Now I think we can really appreciate what's so different and radical and harmonizing about Sharam Krishna's vigana vidanta. Here's how I see Sham Krishna harmonizing the world religions in a pluralistic manner. Christians through the practice of Christianity directly reach the peak which is what what is that peak? This is important. He says the peak is the realization of the divine in any form or aspect either as nirid brahman or as shi and shaki can be realized as Christ or as Allah or as Krishna or as Ganesha and so on there's no limit.

[00:46:44]Muslims through the practice of Islam directly reach the peak which for them is realization of Allah.

[00:46:51]Hindus also reach the same peak through their respective paths.

[00:46:57]also reach the peak but for the peak is realization of niruna brahman. So that peak is actually it means different things to different practitioners but you can the the common denominator is that all of them realize the same divine in different forms and aspects and Buddhists why not they can also reach the same peak actually let's pause that yeah so now how does Sharam Krishna arrive at this beautiful harmonizing religious pluralism on the basis of vigana because it's as a vigyani that You realize God in so many different aspects. He used to say, "I am a glutton in the spiritual field.

[00:47:37]You eat, you're full, but you're not satisfied. You're going to eat a second meal and a third meal, and you're still not satisfied. Then a 10th meal, then a 15th meal." He was a glutton in the spiritual field. He couldn't get enough.

[00:47:48]So, what does it mean? He realized God as mother Kali, but he wasn't satisfied.

[00:47:53]So, then he ended up realizing that same Mother Kali, but in so many different aspects and forms. And he realized even God is Allah, as Christ. He realized Gun Brahman when he was doing advatik sadhan under totapuri and he realized Hanuman and Ganesha and so on not Ganesha but Hanuman and Sitha and so on Radha Krishna and then on the basis of these various realizations and especially the realization of Vigana he said and this is my favorite formulation of his religious pluralism because the divine is onto infinite the paths are also infinite Such a powerful and profound teaching.

[00:48:33]Because the divine is infinite, therefore there are infinite paths to the divine. That's why he called the book infinite paths to infinite reality.

[00:48:44]One of the analogies or parables that he used to explain religious pluralism was a parable of the chameleon.

[00:48:52]This chameleon's on a tree. One person goes and sees sees it as green. comes back to his friends and says, "You got to check out this green chameleon. It's really cool." And then the second guy goes to the same tree, sees a red chameleon, comes back and starts arguing with his friend. Hey, I saw a red chameleon. Why are you pulling my chain?

[00:49:09]In America, you there's an expression pulling my chain. Why are you joking with me? Okay. Another person goes, "Blue chameleon." And they start fighting with each other. Then what happens? There's a person, an unusual person, what in the US is called a tree sitter. There are these tree activists who who like kind of protect trees, you know, they don't want them to be cut down. So, there are people who actually sit on the trees so that the the the people don't cut them down. So, there's somebody there who lives in this tree, a human being who lives in this tree 24 hours a day. And he says, "Stop your fighting. I live under this tree." And I know that all of you are right because it's a chameleon and it changes colors.

[00:49:47]Sometimes it's red, sometimes green, sometimes blue, sometimes colorless.

[00:49:51]Now, what are the morals of this parable? Well, first the different colors of the chameleon, the Bhurui, correspond to different forms of the personal God, Christ, Krishna, Ganesha and so on. Second, the colorless chameleon corresponds to Nidon Brahman, the highest according to Chanka's Advatanta.

[00:50:14]But notice that in the parable, the colorless chameleon is not somehow truer or more real than the yellow chameleon or the red chameleon. They're on an equal footing. That's Shiram Krishna's religious pluralism. And fourth, this is not just a kind of dogmatic assertion. It's not just an intellectual hypothesis. It's grounded in his own experiential realization of vigana. Who represents the vigani in this chameleon parable? The person sitting under the tree. This is the realized soul who has not just realized the divine in one aspect but in multiple aspects. You see the same divine chameleon as green and red and yellow and colorless and so on.

[00:50:53]Another big question that all of these different schools of vanta ask what is the nature of ultimate liberation moka what does it look like shankara it's what sharam krishna calls becoming sugar you merge your individuality in non-dual pure consciousness and his example is imagine a salt doll it goes to measure the depth of the ocean but the moment it sets foot in the ocean what happens it melts into the ocean gul it becomes one with Brahman that's the highest goal according to Shankara's school and what does Shankara and his school say what do they say about the heaven of devotional schools Christian heaven the Islamic heaven called ja the various locas that you find in bi schools within Hinduism what does shankara say about it he says that they're not eternal they're temporary they can be very long periods of time brahma loca he says but you can't stay there eternally. Ultimately, the only eternal liberation is merging your individuality and non-dual pure consciousness. And of course, bakti schools, devotional schools, they say the opposite.

[00:52:03]The true liberation is residing in an eternal heaven ala an eternal suprahysical realm in loving communion with the personal god. This is what Sham Krishna says is eating sugar. So the theistic ideal of liberation is captured by eating sugar.

[00:52:26]The adwik the classical adwik ideal of liberation is captured in what Sharamra says is becoming sugar. But now the interesting thing about Sharam Krishna is he equally accepts both.

[00:52:38]He doesn't place either becoming sugar over eating sugar or eating sugar above becoming sugar. And this is a big difference from the traditional schools.

[00:52:45]That's why he's the vaya acharia and mahario acharana mahachario because he beautifully harmonizes the more one-sided perspectives of the different traditional vantic sraayas.

[00:53:01]And so I like to think about shriam krishna's understanding of liberation as a kind of many mansion. A metaphor used by Jesus as well a many roommed mansion.

[00:53:10]Imagine a vast building house with hundreds of rooms. Each one of those rooms represents a different state of liberation, a different form of liberation.

[00:53:20]Some people we tend to assume that liberation has to has to be the same for everybody. Why?

[00:53:27]Scholars say that's a monolithic understanding of liberation. Why should we why shouldn't there be multiple forms of liberation for different people? Why force everybody to experience the same kind of liberation? So Shirram Krishna says what form the state of liberation takes depends on your individual preferences and temperament what kind of sadena you've engaged in in the course of many lifetimes and so on but there's no higher and lower they're all equally true how do we know this he presents a beautiful analogy of an infinite ocean of satan ananda and he says imagine that because of the gentle breeze of bhaki this water forms into ice bor in different places each of Those forms of ice corresponds to different forms of the personal god Saguna Brahman. One might be the Christ iceberg. Another one is the Ganesha and so on. Then he says with the rising of the son of knowledge ganuja kihi gle all these ice forms melt. Now if he stopped there he would be vindicating shankara advita vanta. You'd be supporting classical advita because the ice forms melt which suggests that Brahman is a lower truth than Brahman.

[00:54:38]But his parable doesn't stop there. He says the ice doesn't melt at all.

[00:54:50]What an extraordinary statement.

[00:54:54]Eternal forms of the personal God.

[00:54:58]This is not accepted by classical advatant at all. But Sham Krishna affirms it not as a hypothesis but because he realized it. He realized the truth of these eternal forms of the divine which never melt. So what is he doing? He's placing the theistic ideal of an eternal heaven on the same footing as the classical adic ideal of becoming one with non-dual pure consciousness.

[00:55:22]He's the first to do this. It's remarkable and we should appreciate that if we're really followers of Sham Krishna. Let's resist the temptation to keep stuffing him into these different boxes. He was either an ad or a vishad or he's a new avatara. He's teaching us this grand harmonizing philosophy. Let's try to appreciate it.

[00:55:44]So I mentioned earlier that if you really deeply try to grasp Shiram Krishna's harmonizing philosophy, it can also shed greater light on the Vantic scriptures.

[00:55:56]It sheds new light on the vidantic scriptures. Who says this? Swami Vikanandanda. He says it again and again. He says instead of blindly relying on any of the traditional commentators, we should reinterpret the vidantic scriptures in the light of the life and teachings of Sri Ramach Krishna.

[00:56:12]We've only begun to do this.

[00:56:15]Most of the work has not yet been done.

[00:56:17]What has been done? I'll mention a couple things, some nice books. One is Swami Tapasan's book on the Bhagavad Gita. Bhagavad Gita, the scripture of mankind. It's not a full commentary unfortunately. It's not a full basha on the Gita. What it is is he gives beautiful notes on what he considers to be the most important verses shlokas of the Gita. And he often brings in Sharam Krishna. So that's one of the texts I use when I teach Bhagavat Gita in the light of Sharam Krishna. Another nice text which is less wellknown is Swami Hashanand's Sanskrit commentary on the Isha Upanishad called Vivea Suka Badini Vive Sukabadini and Swami Nittasanji the head of our Basari Bangalore MUT he translated Hashanandi Sanskrit commentary thankfully for those of us who don't know Sanskrit well into English and Chennai Mut has produced a bilingual edition of Hashanandi's commentary so on facing page one one side is the Sanskrit original and and on the other side you get the English translation. It's a beautiful little book a reinterpretation of the ishaanishad from the standpoint of Shamram Krishna. But see that's it. We don't have much more than that so far.

[00:57:27]We don't have a brahmasa from the standpoint of sharam krishna. We don't have a full commentary on the bhagavad gita in the light of shriam krishna.

[00:57:34]Most of the upishads are lacking commentaries in the light of sharam krishna.

[00:57:40]So that's part of what I would like to do. God willing a full prana bhasha starting with the gita then going to the major upanishadas and then brahmasutra I want to just give you a couple examples I already mentioned how we get we get a new understanding of this clay and pots metaphor gold and golden ornaments from the chandog if we interpret them from the standpoint of shriam krishna's vigana vanta but let me give you some other examples bhagavat gita very quickly you'll find the terms ghana and vigana paired in several places in the Bhagavad Gita especially 7.2 2 and 9.1 Ghana and Vigana and it's mysterious because Krishna doesn't define the terms so different commentators interpret them in different ways. Shankara gives what is the most common interpretation. Ghana means intellectual realization, intellectual understanding of the atman.

[00:58:33]Vigana is experiential realization of the same atman. So it's a difference between intellectual understanding and spiritual realization. Most people when they read the Gita they see Ghana and Vigana, they tend to interpret it in that way. Notam tapasi for instance he has a beautiful interpretation of ghana and vigana in these verses and he says you cannot properly understand the meaning of ghana and vigana without shiram krishna's teachings on vigana ghana should be understood in shriam krishna's sense as the realization the spiritual realization of non-dual brahman and vigana is what shriam krishna calls vigana the spiritual realization of brahmachaki manifesting as this entire universe And he gives scriptural proof.

[00:59:18]The the the the realized soul sees that vasuva is everything.

[00:59:23]This is the vigani's realization.

[00:59:28]Now I'm I'm a I'm an academic philosopher and one of the main things that philosophers do is they address objections. And so since the publication of my uh book on Sharam Krishna in 2018, infinite paths to infinite reality, I've gotten lots of objections, some of them scholarly and academic, there was a whole book symposium published uh with 13 different scholars writing responses to the book and I I wrote a final response. It's published in the International Journal of Hindu Studies.

[00:59:58]But I'm not going to discuss all that.

[00:59:59]That becomes very technical, dry. You might might put you to sleep if you're not already asleep. I hope not. So what I want to discuss is something more relevant to Bhakta's devotees followers of the Ramach Krishna Vivean on the tradition. I've heard many objections from devotees simple devotees non-academics and I want to address some of them. I haven't really in the past I would like to today if you allow me. Well one of the most common objections I hear from just ordinary people is my interpretation of Shankara is wrong.

[01:00:36]See, I'm way off in claiming that Shankara taught that this world is an illusion or unreal. Wrong. That's the wrong way to interpret Jagat Mita.

[01:00:46]Okay, then the question is, well, how should we interpret Jagat Mita? What these people say, what these objectors say, it varies. Some of them say no mita doesn't mean unreal, doesn't mean a loser. It means the world only has dependent existence. I've heard this many, many times. But what did I say earlier?

[01:01:02]Bakti schools of vanta say that this world has dependent existence on God. Is there really no difference between what Shankara said about the world and what Rammanuja and what Madva said? No.

[01:01:11]Nobody says none of the vantan say that this world has independent existence.

[01:01:15]It's a silly idea. Materialists might argue for for that position. But no vantan will say that of any stripe. What distinguishes shankarasa vidanta from the bhakti schools is that the world does not merely have dependent existence. It doesn't exist from the ultimate standpoint. How do I know that?

[01:01:33]We need to understand Shankara's overarching metaphysical framework of adasa, illusory superimposition.

[01:01:42]The only truth is non-dual pure consciousness. Brahman.

[01:01:46]Why don't we see Brahman? Because of mistakenly superimpose upon that truth of Brahman various upadis, limiting adjuncts, different things. That's why I see you in front of me. That's why I see chairs. That's why I see a laptop. I don't see Brahman. I'm I'm mistakenly superimposing all these different names and forms onto the real truth. What's the example? All of you know this. Raju Sarpa. Advatans love ropes and snakes.

[01:02:16]The only truth is a rope. But from a distance, it looks like a snake to me.

[01:02:19]And I get frightened. And then I get closer and closer and oh, I see the snake was a rope all along. There were was there ever a snake? Is it right to say that? No, no, no. The snake is not unreal.

[01:02:31]It just has dependent existence on the rope. It just doesn't exist. It never existed. It's not that it once existed, then it disappeared back into the rope.

[01:02:40]It just never was. Never was, never is, never will be. That is exactly how Shankara understands this world of names and forms. Jagat Mity. How do we know this? Well, because he says again and again, this entire world of namarupa is avidya kalpita. This is the term he uses all the time. This entire realm of names and forms is conjured up by avidya by ignorance. It only exists because we're ignorant of the highest truth of Brahman.

[01:03:10]And that's why from the ultimate standpoint, Shankara agrees with Gapada.

[01:03:15]Ajata is the ultimate truth of advanta.

[01:03:18]What is a it means none of this ever existed.

[01:03:28]From the ultimate standpoint there is no universe there's no creation no disillusion no saddaka no unbound nobody liberated that is the ultimate standpoint of you'll find it constantly in the bhashas in that raju sarpa the ropesake analogy helps us to see that another common objection I get you're wrong to say that shankara put bakti devotion on a lower footing than ghana why because he was he composed so many beautiful devotional hymns Not with my beautiful voice but anyway people who can actually sing that and so on devotional hymns. So how could he put bakti on a lower footing? Okay, a couple responses to this. First of all, scholars tend to think that he was not the author of these devotional hymns. What's the evidence for that? If you look at the literary style of the compositions, you find that it's very different from the kind of poetry that we know he composed.

[01:04:25]What is that? The poetic portion of the upadesha sasri written in a very very different poetic style. That's one reason. But even thematically the ideas are so different from what you find in his bhashas which we know he wrote. So if there's a contradiction you go with what's more reliable you go with the bhashas. Right? Okay. So the first line of response is he probably wasn't the author of these devotional hymns. But now I don't want to stop there because maybe he did write these devotional hymns. That's possible. Even if he did, there are two problems.

[01:04:58]Maybe he wrote these devotional hymns from the vyabah standpoint for the likes of us us dummies mandikaradis he would call them people who are who have impure minds who are only fit to practice bakti yoga. He's giving us encouragement. See, you guys are very very good. Bakti is great because we're at that level. We're at that lower level. So, it's also possible that he compos if he did compose these devotional hymns, he did it for these inferior spiritual aspirants who have impure minds and who are only qualified for bakti yoga. And he's praising bhti so highly to make us feel good. If he keeps putting bakti down, we won't have any incentive to practice devotion, right? And we'll never purify our minds. Now, there's another response, another thing. Even if he did compose these hymns, we still got a big problem in our on our hands.

[01:05:44]What's that problem? We know he wrote theatra.

[01:05:48]We know he wrote commentaries on the brahasutra, on the bhagavat gita, on many of the upanishads. What does he say about bhakti there? Well, let me give you one example. This is what he says about the personal god Ishwara in Brahma Bhashia 2.1.14.

[01:06:03]You can look it up. He says rulership, omniscience and omnipotence is are dependent on the upadis, the limiting adjuncts conjured up by ignorance. But from the ultimate standpoint, such terms as the ruler, the ruled, omniscience, etc. cannot be used with regard to the atman, the non-dual atman shining in its own nature after the removal of all limiting adjuncts through knowledge. This is very technical, but it's a very simple idea.

[01:06:33]The very idea of a personal God is the result of mistakenly superimposing upon non-dual impersonal Brahman the attributes of the personal God. What are those attributes? Omnipotence, omniscience and so on. But they're not true from the ultimate standpoint.

[01:06:48]That's why when we realize Brahman, all the zupadis vanish and what's left? No more personal God. What's left is non-dual pure consciousness. Another common objection I hear from devotees.

[01:07:00]No, no, no, no. But Shankara also says all the time that everything is Brahman.

[01:07:04]That's true. You're right. Everything is Brahman. But in what sense?

[01:07:09]He explains it. Let's look at what Shankara himself says. This is from his commentary on Brahma Sutra 1.3.1 which you can also look up. He says yes Chandukishad says Sarbam Kaliv Brahma one of the most famous mantras in all of the Upanishads. Everything is indeed Brahman. How should we understand that?

[01:07:27]If we follow classical advatanta he says very very precisely the purpose of this statement that everything is Brahman isam that's the original Sanskrit to dissolve this universe remember subtraction subtract all the names and forms from this world and what's left is a substratum nondual brahman get rid of the the the names and forms of chairs and people and dogs and trees what's left the same nondual brahman That's his subtractive method. That's his subtractive interpretation of Saranka Brahma. Now by contrast, how does Shriram Krishna, how might he, how would he interpret, how can we interpret Sarvankav Brahma from the standpoint of Shriram Krishna?

[01:08:12]It's an addition-based advita. All the names and forms themselves are Brahman.

[01:08:16]We don't need to subtract anything. And some of you might be familiar with a book by Satish Chandra Chhaterji called classical Indian philosophies. There's synthesis in the philosophy of Sharam Krishna. It's a it's a wonderful book and in the last chapter he shows how Sharam Krishna's vigana vidanta philosophy he doesn't use the term but this con this philosophy of Shamram Krishna how it harmonizes all of the different vantic samraayas and there he says he contrasts shankara's understanding of sabun and brahma which is a subtractionbased kind of adita from Sharam Krishna's and he says sham for shriam krishna you don't have to subtract anything all the names and forms themselves like wax everything is made of wax. Everything is Brahman. I said that I would mention Turyanji. So I'll just mention it quickly from that letter from 1919. Swami Turyanji says explaining Shriram Krishna's philosophy.

[01:09:08]This is the difference between Shankara's Advita and Shriram Krishna.

[01:09:12]Turanji himself says this everything is God. God is everything in the universe.

[01:09:18]All names and forms come from him and are in God. Waves, foam, bubbles, all these are nothing but water. I don't care if this position agrees with your vivatabada. This is a very interesting statement. Sharvanand was a scholar of Shankara and he's asking this question.

[01:09:34]What was philosophy?

[01:09:46]tak I don't care whether this agrees with your shankara's adv what is vivada that is shankara's doctrine of this world as an illusory appearance like the like the snake is an illusory appearance of the rope this whole world of names and forms is a viva an illusory appearance of Brahman and he says I don't really think that uh Krishna is uh accepts vivabad it doesn't seem like he does say who cares he's teaching a different kind of advata philosophy.

[01:10:17]It's not based on vivatada. He sees everything as a real manifestation of the divine. Another common objection I get from devotees sometimes they say you're creating a new sect this new sraaya vyan vanta you've gave it this you give this new name the shiny name with the nice vv it's callediteration in literature which means you get that v twice so it rolls off the tongue but you're creating a new sambra.

[01:10:44]How dare you Ram Krishna if we really worship him as an avatara and as a samunvi avatara the greatest avatara of our age the greatest of all avataras as swami g said as shriindu said why are we not allowing him to give us a new message why are we always trying to fit him into these traditional boxes it's very very strange this phenomenon let's try to let speak for himself and let's remember vanta is not a static.

[01:11:14]It's not a frozen tradition that's stuck in the past. It's constantly evolving.

[01:11:19]It's constantly changing based on new realizations, new insights.

[01:11:25]Sharam Krishna, Swami, Veranda, Shriarbindu and others, Ramdas, Papa Ramdas, many others.

[01:11:32]They're continuing this great vidand tradition and developing it further.

[01:11:36]Sham Krishna taught a new additionbased advita philosophy. That's what I'm trying to point out here. So it's better not to try to force Shirram's teachings into any of these sraayas in any of these boxes. And so what exactly is Vigan Vidanta? Is that not another kind of box, the Vigan Vidanta box? No, it's what Swami Vikanda called a non sectarian sect. It's a very paradoxical expression. Sri Ram Krishna's Vigana Vidanta is a non sectarian sect. It's a sect because it has very concrete doctrines and you can point out see Shirram's doctrine that Brahman and Shaki are obed it encompasses Shankara's view of Nirvana Brahman and also the theistic views of Saguna Brahman. See but it beautifully harmonizes them but it's non sectarian unlike the traditional sraayas which are more one-sided.

[01:12:27]So finally oh I I skipped some things because it's running out of time. Um, oh sorry, I should have really made Okay. Um, I wanted to mention that so far I've written two out of the three books of what I call my integral Advita trilogy.

[01:12:44]I'm developing an extended argument that Sri Ram Krishna and his disciple Swami Vikananda and more surprisingly maybe to some of you Shri Aruminda developed a new school of advita within the Vidantic tradition. You can call it by many names and the name isn't really important. That's why like I called Shirram Krishna's philosophy viganovanta but you can also call it integral advita. Why integral? Integral means all-encompassing.

[01:13:14]And that's exactly what Shamrisha said.

[01:13:15]Shodi this why integral advita. So they're developing a new school of integral adita within the tradition of vanta which doesn't mean that they all taught exactly the same thing. There might be some differences but in that same broader integral advita tradition that is an additionbased advita vanta and I wanted to con conclude on this note I really believe that our tradition is still in its infancy it's a young tradition Krishna left his body in 1886 150 years ago about less it's a very young tradition young in what sense look at Christianity from zero to now 2026 how much it developed and go back to the first few centuries of Christianity There's a beautiful book very dense and scholarly written by an Oxford professor named German McCulla called history of Christianity and he focuses on these first few centuries and he said in these first few centuries after Christ everything was up for grabs all sorts of ideas were being floated it's a very interesting view Christ even though we thought we think that he's crucified he wasn't crucified it's almost like advanta he was not crucified and so many things this world is an illusion that's also part of narcissism them and there are so many doctrines.

[01:14:27]There was no single orthodox Christianity at the time until centuries later. And even that orthodoxy changes in the course of centuries. Now where are we in the context of the Rama Krishna Vikan tradition? We're in our infancy. Just imagine go back to 125 CE common era. Where was Christianity then? That's more or less where we are now. So I believe that hundreds of years from now 500 years from now 1,000 years from now historians will be writing the history of the Ramachrishna tradition and to date from 1886 to 2026 we can divide the history of the Ramach Krishna movement so far to date into three phases. Phase one like Christianity the early history of Christianity different people are interpreting Shriram Krishna in many different ways.

[01:15:19]You find some people interpreting him as a shakta, some as a vishnava, some as a classical advitan, some as and so on.

[01:15:27]Christian Quaker, Mishra, there's a beautiful uh there's a really nice kot entry where the Christian Quaker Mishra sees Christ in Shriram Krishna. So everybody's seeing him in his own way and her own way. That was the first phase. M this is something that you have to read the kotam very carefully. But Shri Ma the author, he doesn't think that shank that Shriram Krishna was a follower of Shankara. says it in a passage called he says Krishna was not a mayadi he was a follower of Rammanuja it's very interesting Shrimma himself believed that Shriram Krishna was a follower of Rammanuja now you don't have to accept it but my point is this the direct disciples the earliest disciples of Shamram Krishna interpreted Shriram Krishna in many different ways okay Durian as we've already seen also differently now That's phase one. But then phase one is quickly overtaken by what I would call phase two which has dominated ever since. This is what I call the shankara phase in the history of the Ramach Krishna movement. The overwhelming tendency has been to interpret Shriram Krishna through the lens of Shankarachara's subtraction-based Advita philosophy.

[01:16:42]Gambiranandha's works Gabirand gandhesand gi madavanand and the list goes on and on and on with one exception one striking luminous exception swami tapasand gi if you if you study bakti schools of vanta carefully if you look at another one of his books called man god and world in sharam krishna's philosophy you're going to find that he's one of the outliers he's a renegade a philosophical renegade in really emphasizing sharam krishna's viganov vidanta a kind of more harmonizing philosophy But in general by and large what you find is we're still stuck in phase two. This kind of we're not letting Shiram Krishna speak for himself. We're always trying to fit him into this shankara box. Now what I am following in the wake of the great work of Swami Tapasan and other scholars like Satish Chandler Chatterj I am trying to usher in phase three. What do we call phase three? I would say back to Sri Ramak Krishna.

[01:17:44]Let's come back to Shriram Krishna.

[01:17:46]Swami Vanandanda used to say you can write baskets full of philosophical treaties on any one of Krishna's teachings. Where are we? What have we done so far? We're still stuck in phase two.

[01:18:06]We haven't even begun to analyze deeply Shamram Krishna's philosophical teachings. What does he mean by brushupid? What does he mean by vigana and ghana and so on and so forth? All these amazing teachings eating sugar, becoming sugar.

[01:18:18]So we need to let we need to begin to let Cham Krishna speak in his own voice.

[01:18:24]And we also need to learn how to listen properly. listen to what he's saying without superimposing our own ideas, our own preconceived frameworks. Let's try to let Sharam Krishna speak for himself and let's listen to him with humility, with reverence and with an open mind and heart. Thank you.

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