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Swami Vivekananda

1863-1902

Master of the Bliss of Discrimination

Vivekananda was born as Narendranath Datta (name shortened to Narendra or Naren) in a Bengali family in his ancestral home at 3 Gourmohan Mukherjee Street in Calcutta,the capital of British India, on 12 January 1863 during the Makar Sankranti festival. He belonged to a traditional family and was one of nine siblings. His father, Vishwanath Datta, was an attorney at the Calcutta High Court.Durgacharan Datta, Narendra's grandfather was a Sanskrit and Persian scholar who left his family and became a monk at age twenty-five.His mother, Bhubaneswari Devi, was a devout housewife.The progressive, rational attitude of Narendra's father and the religious temperament of his mother helped shape his thinking and personality. Narendranath was interested in spirituality from a young age and used to meditate before the images of deities such as Shiva, Rama, Sita, and Mahavir Hanuman. He was fascinated by wandering ascetics and monks.Narendra was mischievous and restless as a child, and his parents often had difficulty controlling him. His mother said, "I prayed to Shiva for a son and he has sent me one of his demons".

Biography

  • Sister Nivedita (1913). Swami Saradananda (ed.). Notes of Some Wanderings with the Swami Vivekananda. Calcutta: The Brahmachari Gonendranath Udbodhan Office.
  • Burke, Marie Louise (1957). Swami Vivekananda in the West: New Discoveries. Kolkata: Advaita Ashrama.
  • Sambudhdhananda, Swami (1963). Swami Vivekananda on Himself. Kolkata: Advaita Ashrama. ISBN 81-7505-280-5.
  • Gokhale, B. G. (January 1964). "Swami Vivekananda and Indian Nationalism". Journal of Bible and Religion. Oxford University Press. 32 (1): 35–42. JSTOR 1460427.
  • Majumdar, R. C. (1999). Swami Vivekananda: A historical review. Calcutta: Advaita Ashrama.
  • Chauhan, Abnish Singh (2004). Swami Vivekananda: Select Speeches. Prakash Book Depot. ISBN 978-81-7977-466-3.
  • Sharma, Jyotirmaya (2013). A Restatement of Religion: Swami Vivekananda and the Making of Hindu Nationalism. Yale University Press. ISBN 978-0-300-19740-2.
  • Chauhan, Abnish Singh (2006). Speeches of Swami Vivekananda and Subhash Chandra Bose: A Comparative Study. Prakash Book Depot. ISBN 978-81-7977-149-5.