Idea of God in India

The idea of God was nowhere else ever so fully developed as in this motherland of ours, for the same idea of God never existed anywhere else. Perhaps you are astonished at my assertion; but show me any idea of God from any other scripture equal to ours; they have only clan-gods, the God of the Jews, the God of the Arabs, and of such and such a race, and their God is fighting the Gods of the other races. 

But the idea of that beneficent, most merciful God, our father, our mother, our friend, the friend of our friends, the soul of our souls, is here and here alone. 

And may He who is the Shiva of the Shaivites, the Vishnu of the Vaishnavites, the Karma of the Karmis, the Buddha of the Buddhists, the Jina of the Jains, the Jehovah of the Christians and the Jews, the Allah of the Mohammedans, 
the Lord of every sect, the Brahman of the Vedantists, 
He the all-pervading, whose glory has been known only in this land -- may He bless us, may He help us, may He give strength unto us, energy unto us, to carry this idea into practice. 

  - Swami Vivekananda, 
    Address at Ramnad, Lectures From Colombo to Almora

You are Free Already

You Manufacture Your Body

The Omnipresent Lord has been hidden through ignorance, and the responsibility is on yourself. 

You have not to think that you were brought into the world without your choice and left in this most horrible place, but to know that you have yourself manufactured your body bit by bit just as you are doing it this very moment. 
You yourself eat; nobody eats for you. You assimilate what you eat; no one does it for you. You make blood, and muscles, and body out of the food; nobody does it for you. 
So you have done all the time. 

One link in a chain explains the infinite chain. If it is true for one moment that you manufacture your body, it is true for every moment that has been or will come. 
And all the responsibility of good and evil is on you. 
This is the great hope. What I have done, that I can undo.

And at the same time our religion does not take away from mankind the mercy of the Lord. That is always there. 
On the other hand, He stands beside this tremendous current of good and evil. He the bondless, the ever-merciful, is always ready to help us to the other shore, for His mercy is great, and it always comes to the pure in heart. 

                 - Swami Vivekananda, Address at Paramakudi, 
                   Lectures From Colombo to Almora

Fanatical Reforms

Harmony of Experiences

Kiss of My Love

"Let the world love its many, we have but one Beloved - the Lord. We care not what they say; we are only afraid when they want to paint our Beloved and give Him all sorts of monstrous qualities. Let them do whatever they please - for us He is only the beloved - my love, my love, my love, and nothing more."

"Who cares to know how much power, how much quality He has - even that of doing good! We will say once for all: 

We love not for the long purse, we never sell our love, we want not, we give."

"You, philosopher, come to tell us of His essence, His powers, His attributes - fool! We are here dying for a kiss of His lips."

"Take your nonsense back to your own home and send me a kiss of my Love - can you?"

"Fool! whom art thou bending thy tottering knees before, in awe and fear? I took my necklace and put it round His neck; and, tying a string to it as a collar, I am dragging Him along with me, for fear He may fly away even for a moment - that necklace was the collar of love, that string the ecstasy of love. 

Fool! you know not the secret - the Infinite One comes within my fist under the bondage of love." 

"Knowest thou not that the Lord of the Universe is the bond slave of love?" 

"Knowest thou not that the Mover of the Universe used to dance to the music of the ringing bracelets of the shepherdesses of Vrindaban?"

Excuse my mad scribbling, excuse my foolery in trying to express the inexpressible. It is to be felt only.

- Swami Vivekananda, 

in a Letter to Hale Sisters 

from Chicago (June 1894)

Glorious Soul

What a mine of strength is in this Impersonal God, when all superstitions have been thrown overboard, and man stands on his feet with the knowledge -- I am the Impersonal Being of the world! 
What can make me afraid? 
I care not even for nature's laws. Death is a joke to me. 

Man stands on the glory of his own soul, the infinite, the eternal, the deathless -- that soul which no instruments can pierce, which no air can dry, nor fire burn, no water melt, the infinite, the birthless, the deathless, 
without beginning and without end, 
before whose magnitude the suns and moons and all their systems appear like drops in the ocean, before whose glory space melts away into nothingness and time vanishes into non-existence. 

This glorious soul we must believe in. Out of that will come power.  
               
                    - Swami Vivekananda, Address at Jaffna, 
                      Lectures From Colombo to Almora

Self and soul