Swami Vivekananda and the Journey of the “Hero”
A Srinivas Rao January
2013
Swami
Vivekanada’s 150 birth year celebrations conclude on 12th January
2014. I wrote this article over a period and the article was published in the “Mountain
Path” published by Sri Ramansramam in Tiruvannamalai Jan-March 2014. It is being published here with permission. An additional paragraph (second last) has been added in this version on hindsight for a more complete assessment.
This article draws its framework and argument from the
work of Joseph Campbell (1904-1987) in his path breaking book “The Hero with a
Thousand Faces”. Published in 1949 this book became one of the most influential
books of the 20th century influencing psychiatry, mythology,
anthropology, literature, filmography and other fields.
Education of youth the world over has
increasingly been skewed towards building skills and competencies to fulfilling
their economic needs and less towards a synoptic and inward awareness. In other
words while one of the first aims of education is to prepare a person for a
livelihood, there are wider aims to make him appreciate his role in society,
that he should consider himself a legatee of the range of human experience, as
a part of nature and history; that he learns to enjoy the arts and creative
pursuits in connecting himself to human culture and refinement; finally that he
ponders on the meaning and purpose of his own life. It is the latter aims that
are more enduring and timeless and don't change with age or culture. It is such
a synoptic education that develops for the youth their self worth, belonging,
autonomy, security and self awareness. The heroes whose narratives populate youthful
imagination often provide shorthand to the range of skills and capabilities,
values and identities. The ideal of the Hero across cultures show a remarkable
consistency across time and cultures. The Mahavira
or great hero of the Indian imagination has since the shramanic traditions of the axial age has been more grounded in
self conquest before he brings his light to the world. Do the lives of
individuals born in the full noontide of human history display similar patterns
to those in the pantheon of heroes mythical or otherwise who bring light and a
promise of redemption unto their fellow men? This is the question that this
note attempts to address through the life of one of India’s great modern sons, Swami
Vivekananda.
Mythmaking is a continuous process couching
in metaphor the contest of life’s great dualities, providing signposts in the
journeying of their fellowmen in their search of meaning and purpose. Inscribed
in the hearts of men down the ages the heroic firmament shines with Gilgamesh,
Prometheus, Odysseus, the Buddha, Jesus Christ, Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr, or
even Luke Skywalker, Superman and Harry Potter, embodying virtues notably of
fearlessness, honour, justice, perseverance, and most importantly service to others.
A hero maybe described as one who has done something far from the ken of human
experience, defining the limits of our aspiration and brings a message of hope
and redemption that lingers in our collective consciousness as an immortal. Who
we choose as a hero thus defines who we aspire to be and the ideals we espouse
in our self definition. Whom the youth consider worthy of emulation as a hero
is indicative of their cherished values and the health of that society. It is
in the narrating of the tales of the heroes that we revisit and re-examine our
lives quite like those who ask questions such as “What would Jesus have done?”
and provide for the young an ideal to emulate. Paradoxically with the
inexorable march of modernism, as our symbolic life as embodied in religion and
spirituality, art and culture etc. retreats unto the margins and the privacy of
our own solitude, the need for such signposts is even more acute. Thus each
culture tells its tales, by the fireside or under neon lamps, though clouded by
the mists of time and by our cynicism, of our longings and our metaphorical
journeying of the spirit. These tales are our talismans to the pervasive
cynicism of our times, as we stare vacantly at shards and clay feet around us and
as the poet puts it “these fragments I have shored against my ruins”. Our imagination hankers
for the visage of the hero who soared like the mighty Garuda to the very
heavens of our aspiration. Yet this begs an important question of whether a
hero comes into this world with a consciousness of his or her mission (which is
akin to asking a question about the dual nature of Christ, both human and
divine) or becomes the anointed one when he or she pushes at the boundaries of
human experience. In modern times it is the latter interpretation that seems
more germane. Mythical heroes may not resonate with contemporary youth given
the outmoded cosmologies they are embedded in and thus the quest for the Hero
persists in the modern world.
We shall examine the
archetype of the Hero and persuade the reader to examine the life of Swami
Vivekananda as one who shares the same characteristics. The most pertinent and
persuasive theorist of the Hero and his journey is the renowned American
mythologist Joseph Campbell who besides showing the commonalities that undergrid
all myths was a popular teacher whose ideas created a sensation in the decades
following his 1949 book “The Hero With a Thousand Faces”. Introduced to the
Eastern traditions and the life of the Buddha by J Krishnamurti in 1923 in a
chance encounter on a ship sailing to London he became a scholar of the Eastern
traditions editing at length the works of Heinrich Zimmer on Indian philosophy
and myth. Even lesser known is the fact that he was familiar with Sri
Ramakrishna and Swami Vivekananda and worked alongside Swami Nikhilananda in
the translation of “The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna” and the Upanishads.
Before we examine Campbell’s views on the myth of the Hero we shall
mention a few presuppositions that his work assumes. The first is the notion of
the archetype that exists in what Carl Jung called the collective unconscious.
Jung maintained that there is an unconscious that is common to all members of
the species consisting of archetypes that seem invariant across cultures. The
hero is one of these archetypes. Second is the notion of threshold crossing
which in Anthropology is called “rites of passage” which are rituals that
punctuate important transitions in a person’s life according to his culture. Campbell uses this idea
to demonstrate an imaginary boundary permeable only to the hero whose threshold
separates the mundane world from the numinous world into which the Hero
journeys. It is the breaking into
the threshold and the triumphal return that the hero’s journey is all about. Campbell uses comparative
mythology to make his point maintaining that there is
only one mythology that has its inflections based on historical circumstance
and the specific cultures. He
believes that in each us is the Hero whose trajectory for better or worse follows
the same path. Myths are symbols that reconcile the
challenge posed by the outside world to summon a deep response from an inner
world that is numinous, and seeks a harmony with the order of nature.
Campbell points out that there are two types of Heroes
the physical and the spiritual and he gives primacy to the latter. In the first
the hero battles or performs a courageous act and in the latter expands the
range of human experience and returns with a redemptive message. This journey
is a series like rites of passage that hurtles the individual from a
conventional safety and psychological immaturity to self reliance; a departure,
death and resurrection. The journey is punctuated with trials and tribulations
and involves losing ones self or giving up ones self for a higher end or
greater goal that is morally embedded. This leads to transformations in their
consciousness (which makes them larger than just leaders). Since the hero
returns with a message of redemption he is also very socially grounded and
compassionate like a bodhisattva. This journey is a search for the source of
life and meaning, like the finding of ones father or life giving elixir or God.
This journey is especially poignant in our times as our environment is now
mechanistic and doesn’t respond to spiritual needs (like Don Quixote's
windmills in the place of giants). This inauthenticity and loss of the
spiritual life is what heroic journeys are all about, including those which are
physical and valorous. The lives of the prophets Moses, Christ, Buddha and Mohammad
show the same structure of an archetypal adventure. The Buddha's struggle against
desire and fear, figuratively as the daughters of Mara viz. desire, fulfillment,
and regret with the very Earth as his ally and witness; his triumphal return to
a ministry marked by the turning of the wheel of the Law, death and his return
as the Maitreya is similar to Christ's journey from baptism, wanderings in the
desert, the three temptations of the Devil, his ministry, death and
resurrection. Similar also are Mohammed’s mountain meditations and fasting to
his epiphany of Gabriel commanding him to "recite" and commencing his
ministry and his ascension. This is the high adventure of the soul, in the
wasteland of materialism, the slaying of the dragon of the binding ego the
repository of wants and beliefs, and binding constraints and experience
illumination, the radiance of one eternity through all things good and evil.
The structure of this
archetypal journey trod by Moses, Buddha and Christ is what Campbell calls the ‘Monomyth’. Campbell
described 17 stages in this journey, the
call to adventure, refusal of the call, supernatural help, crossing the
threshold, belly of the whale, road of trials, meeting with the goddess,
encountering the temptress, atonement with the Father, apotheosis, the boon,
refusal to return, the magic flight, rescue from without, the return threshold,
mastery of two worlds, and freedom. There are many ways that others have
abbreviated this list including its basic tripartite structure as Departure, Initiation
and Return. A simplified version of the journey has been figuratively depicted
alongside taken from a popular guide for screenwriters “The Writer’s Journey:
Mythic Structure for Writers” by Christopher Volger (2007). The tripartite
division is where the idea of liminality or the crossing of the psychological
threshold, the conquest and the return across the threshold becomes apparent.
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In examining the life
of Swami Vivekananda along this structure one thing becomes apparent is the
larger sense of destiny that his mentor Sri Ramakrishna foresaw and chaperoned
with caution in not looking upon Naren’s self realization as an end but the
upliftment of his people as his principal mission. These twin ideals of atmano mokshartham jagadhitayacha akin
to the twin Buddhist ideals of wisdom
(prajna) and compassion (karuna) became the bedrock of the
mission. It may also be debatable whether in the life of Swamiji there is a
bimodal quest and conquest of his aspiration to nirvikalpa samadhi (super consciousness) and service to man as two
sequential quests; though we take the latter as relevant to this article. Given
the limitations of this article we assume that the readers are familiar with
Swamiji’s life in some measure. The young hero Narendranath was marked since
his childhood with exceptional abilities, a prodigious memory, a quicksilver
intellect, a compassionate heart, a mastery of music and oratorical skills, a
strong presence and handsome countenance. His call to adventure commenced with his restlessness against the
background of ritualism in the name of religion and the suffering of the people;
a yearning to shift the centre of spiritual gravity from the known to the great
unknown. His call took the form of a question that he placed in all earnestness
to the wise men of his day “Have you seen God?” the answer of which he received
with intense sincerity and conviction from an unlettered priest Sri Ramakrishna.
While being initiated to the mysteries with the experience of the void, Naren
cries unwilling to let go of his ties to his family, duty, obligations, fear
and his ideas; this was his refusal to
the call which in Jeudo-Christian lore is Lot’s wife turning into a pillar
of salt for looking back at her past. His master Sri Ramakrishna became his
guardian spirit and supernatural ally
an amulet that held him in the security of the World Womb. The death of his
Master was the cataclysmic event that pushed him and his band of brothers to form
a monastic brotherhood at Baranagore in accordance with the Master’s wishes to become
the first crossing of the threshold;
the striking out into an unknown dangerous region of liminality where rules and
limits lie suspended. The mystical Viraja
Homa marks the transition and a swallowing up into monastic rigors marked
by uncertainty of food and shelter and even clothing, incubating an inner
metamorphosis for two years, the belly of
the whale; indicative of the Jeudo-Christian myth of Jonah who having been
called by God to give His judgment to Nineveh, refused to heed the call and
fled on a boat which was swallowed into the belly of a whale for thee days and
nights which regurgitates him upon his prayer. His march as a penurious
mendicant across the sub-continent becomes the period of the road of trials and tribulations and his initiation first hand
to his country, its condition and what it stood for. This phase of the Hero’s
journey is marked by ordeals and tests though guided by advice amulets and
supernatural agents like the three temptations of the Buddha by Mara and of
Christ by the Devil. Once while at Khetri Swamiji spurned the king’s invitation
to a dance by a young girl, who desirous of meeting the young Swami burst into
a soulful protest that the philosopher’s stone discriminates not across metal
turning all alike into the purity of gold. Regretful of his error of viewing woman as temptress the Swami returns
chastised. Overcome by his exhausting journeys spanning almost 5 years he
arrives at the feet of the Virgin Goddess Kanyakumari and seeks the Mother
Goddess’ blessings and validation of his love for his people; meeting with the Goddess. With the luminosity
of her fabled nose ring she leads him into the light, of his mission to restore
the lost individuality of the nation and raise the masses. The Swami now
encounters his life mission, the Face of his Father and its terrible
intimations and his lingering skepticism to his master, filled with self doubt
whether he was up to that mission; until he saw in a dream, his Master leading
him unto the sea, beckoning him to follow; atonement
with the father. He wrote to Sri Sharada Ma, seeking her permission and
blessings which she duly conveyed with her assurance. Armed with this sword he
slays his dragons of self doubt and surrenders his ego to his unfolding
destiny. He soon is surrounded by his helpers and guardian spirits like his
princely patrons, the Maharajas of Khetri, Mysore, Ramnad and other disciples like
Alasinga Perumal who organized his journey to the Parliament of Religions at Chicago. His allies
multiplied in measure to his difficulties and included Miss Sanbourn, Prof
Wright, Mrs. Hale and many others who removed his obstacles and countered his
detractors. As he rose to render his address at the World Parliament, the very
Goddess Saraswati ignited his tongue and in just three words brought to their
feet the several thousand of the audience in rapturous applause. This was the
moment of his apotheosis and he spoke
of the Great Spirit that manifests in each religion and culture undiminished
and universal in a grand symphony leading us all unto its bosom. He traveled
extensively in the US
and Europe urging a harmonizing of the
material achievements of the West with the spiritual cultivation of the East and
the elixir born of this churning was his ultimate
boon. After three years of teaching
and interaction with scholars and eminent people he wished to return with the
Golden Fleece wondering what he might encounter on his return, skepticism of a refusal to return. This is often the
case of prophets who having seen the other shore, wishing to remain there and
not be burdened by a long ministry among their people as in the case of the
Buddha. Swamiji however returns triumphant with a host of disciples, helpers
and resources, notably Margaret Noble, Josephine McLeod, the Seviers, Mr.
Goodwin and others who bear witness to his conquest, a rescue from without. Jubilant crowds mob his arrival at Colombo
and Swamiji was forced to change his travel plans (the magical flight) and the Virgin Goddess at Cape Comorin smiled
as he crosses the return threshold and
the Rajah of Ramnad personally drew his carriage and with a blast of his conch
like the mythical Panchajanya from
Colombo to Almora proclaimed his redeeming message to his people. He established an institution as his lasting
legacy of his master’s ideals the Ramakrishna Math and Mission committing his master’s mortal relics
to a splendid shrine. With his journey to Amarnath, the Kshir Bhavani temple other places he reaffirms his deep mystical
experience of insight straddling his inner world and the outer. With his second
journey to the West he becomes the master
of both the worlds, Inner and Outer as metaphorically as East and West. He
conquers his fear of death, whose premonition he conveyed while pouring water
to wash the hands of his disciple Sister Nivedita at a Last Supper and welcomes
death ‘like a groom his bride’ in a final act of freedom. With his final mahasamadhi
he attains liberation from these earthly fetters and his tale and immortal
message continued to reverberate. His spirit descends akin to that at the Pentecost
upon his people to guide a fledgling Indian nationalism to a full attainment of
freedom and continues to light the cause of service unto others.
The life of Swami Vivekananda like those of
other great heroes of India carry a diversity and depth of meanings that have
and shall endure as they continue to inspire us. After a civilizational efflorescence
and synthesis over three millennia India was to encounter its tryst with
modernity and modernism not in the terms that the West represented itself, but
in its own idiom in the late 19th century. Swamiji and others who preceded
Gandhi sought to bring in the idea and India’s encounter with modernism in a
uniquely Indian way. Swamiji rejected the western political praxis and notions
of social reform and hearkened its own ancient ideals embedded in Vedanta of
equating the essential divinity of God and man thereby reinterpreting the
Vedantic ideal as service to man as service unto God. Swamiji thus reinvented
the religious idiom of serving the marginalized and oppressed as daridranarayan, an idea that later
Gandhi seized in his social theory and political practice. Again Swamiji showed the way of encountering
the real India not in abstract ideas and ideals but in the huts and hamlets of
the poor and sharing their frugal meal. Modernism was yet assimilated by
bringing to the common man, education, enlightenment and progress; not
necessarily through state intervention but by appealing to the common man
himself. Swamiji also sought to restore in the breast of every Indian a sense
of dignity, self confidence rooted in a civilzational consciousness that would
be celebrated by holding one’s own in the comity of nations across the world. Freedom
to him was not a mere political ideal but deeply rooted in an ancient ideal of
freeing not the individual’s body and mind from institutional and political
shackles but the liberation of the spirit. The nationalist project had several
imaginings and one of which was a virilisation of the civilizational
consciousness of Indians and this call to arms was not martial in a literal
fashion but as a call to action. Swami Vivekanada (like Swami Dayanada) also
toyed with refashioning religion on the lines of “One God One Book, One Church”
which was radical though, unfinished or even abandoned. To accomplish this in a
mere span of less than two score of years is what a hero such as Swami
Vivekananda, a true Bodhisattwa in the service of his people could accomplish
reverberating yet as we reflect in hindsight a hundred and fifty years of his
birth; a true Chiranjeevi.
Vedanta and its idea of the unity of the
individual ego and the supreme soul was an ancient insight through the
Upanishads. The uniqueness of the message of Sri Ramakrishna and Swami
Vivekananda was the presence of divinity in everything and everyone indicates an
equality that is as socially and politically potent as it was spiritually. It
was not just a social but a spiritual imperative to serve god in man than just
an intellectual appreciation of the grand unity. It was relevant for those
times mired as they were in an oppressive caste system and extremes of poverty
and ignorance, the contradiction of the religious belief with its social
practice. Swamiji’s message was the missing link that united compassion to its
ideal of unifying wisdom. Second was Swamiji’s faith in the human potential and
its divinity, and so unique as it does not dismiss the corporeal as an illusion
but on the contrary his insistence on investing all faith back from God to Man
and assert their essential equality. Thus no man errs but progresses from a
lesser truth to a higher one, keeping open the road to a diversity of faith and
practice. This dual closure of the circles was the message of the Hero, as no
prophet or guru was so revolutionary in their assertion in history ever before
or ever since. It is in this that Swami Vivekananda joins the constellation of heroes that beckon each of us
to the same journey that they have traveled since the times of Osiris, Gilgamesh,
Prometheus, Odesseus Buddha Christ and Gandhi in our own times.
Unto that master
our salutations!
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