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Paramahansa Yogananda
1893 – 1952 |
Paramahansa Yogananda was born Mukunda Lal Ghosh on January 5, 1893, in Gorakhpur, India, into a devout and well-to-do Bengali family. In 1910, at the age of 17, he met and became a disciple of the Swami Sri Yukteswar Giri. After he graduated from Calcutta University in 1915, he took formal vows as a monk of India's venerable monastic Swami Order, at which time he received the name Yogananda (signifying bliss,
ananda, through divine union,
yoga.)
In 1920 Yogananda was invited to serve as India's delegate to an international congress of religious leaders convening in Boston. That same year, he established the Self Realization Fellowship; its international headquarters is in Los Angeles, California.
Yogananda traveled and lectured extensively. He emphasized the underlying unity of the world's great religions, and taught universally applicable methods for attaining direct personal experience of God. To serious students of his teachings he introduced the soul-awakening techniques of Kriya Yoga, a sacred spiritual science originating millenniums ago in India.
One of the primary aims and goals of the Self-Realization Fellowship is: To reveal the complete harmony and basic oneness of original Christianity as taught by Jesus Christ and original Yoga as taught by Bhagavan Krishna; and to show that these principles of truth are the common scientific foundation of all true religions.
Under Yogananda’s direction, the personal guidance and instruction that he had given to students of his classes was arranged into a comprehensive series of Self-Realization Fellowship Lessons for home study.
Yogananda's life story, Autobiography of a Yogi, was published in 1946 and expanded by him in subsequent editions. A perennial best seller, the book has been in continuous publication since it first appeared and has been translated into 18 languages. It is widely regarded as a modern spiritual classic.
http://www.yogananda-srf.org/
Paramahansa Yogananda. Autobiography of a Yogi. Los Angeles: Self-Realization Fellowship, 1949.
Islam
Islam was introduced to northern India by invading armies beginning in the 11th century and later to the south by Arab traders. In 1947, India became independent from Great Britain and was divided into two countries – Hindu India and Muslim Pakistan. 138 million Muslims (13.4% of the population) still live in India, making it the largest minority religion (2001 census.)
Islam was founded in Arabia by the Prophet Mohammad in the 7th century CE. The Arabic term islam means “to surrender” and believers (Muslims) undertake to surrender to the will of Allah (God.) The will of Allah is revealed in the scriptures, the Quran. Over a period of 23 years, through the voice of the angel Gabriel, God revealed his will to Mohammad who acted as his messenger. Islam is monotheistic. God’s word is conveyed through prophets (messengers); Mohammad is the most recent.
Following Mohammad’s death, a succession of disputes split the movement, and the legacy today are the Sunnis and the Shiites. Most Muslims in India are Sunnis. The Sunnis emphasize the “well-trodden” path or the orthodox way. Shiites believe that only imans (exemplary leaders) can reveal the true meaning of the Quran.
All Muslims share a belief in the Five Pillars of Islam: the shahadah (declaration of faith: “There is no God but Allah; Mohammad is his prophet”); prayer (ideally 5 times a day); the zakat (tax) that goes to the poor; fasting (during the holy month of Ramadan); and the haj (pilgrimage) to Mecca, which every Muslim aspires to do at least once.
Islam rejects the attribution of any human form to God or that God is incarnate in any human being. These ideas are considered blasphemous. Muslims believe that all the prophets and messengers were human beings who had none of the divine qualities of God. They also believe in the “Day of Judgment” when all people will be resurrected for God’s judgment according to their beliefs and deeds.
Muslim call to prayer:
God is most great. God is most great.
I testify that there is no god but God. I testify that Muhammad is the Prophet of God.
Arise and pray; God is most great. God is most great.
There is no god but God.
The Mughals: The Muslim, Babar, came to India in 1526 at the request of an Indian governor who sought Babar's help in his fight against Ibrahim Lodi, the last head of the Delhi Sultanate. Babar defeated Lodi at Panipat and so came to establish the Mughal Empire in India. Babar’s grandson, Akbar the Great, reigned from 1556 to 1605, and extended his empire as far to the west as Afghanistan, and as far south as the Godavari river. Akbar, though a Muslim, is often remembered as a tolerant ruler, and he even started a new faith, Din-i-Ilahi, which was an attempt to blend Islam with Hinduism, Christianity, Jainism, and other faiths.
http://www.islam-guide.com/frm-ch3-2-1.htm
Smith, Huston. The World’s Religions. San Francisco: Harper, 1991.
http://www.sscnet.ucla.edu/southasia/History/Mughals/mughals.html
Sufism
Sufism, claiming to be the interior or mystical aspect of Islam, is a way of life directed toward the realization of God’s unity and presence through love, experiential knowledge, asceticism, and ecstatic union with the beloved Creator.
The root meaning of the word Sufi is suf, meaning wool. A century or two after Muhammad’s death, those within the Islamic community who bore the inner message of Islam came to be known as Sufis. Many of them donned coarse woolen garments to protest the silks and satins of sultans and califs. Alarmed by the worldliness they saw overtaking Islam, they sought to purify and spiritualize it from within.
This called for special methods, and to develop and practice them the Sufis gathered around spiritual masters (sheikhs or shaykhs), forming circles, that from the 12th century onward, crystallized into Sufi orders (tariqahs.) The word for the members of these orders is faqir.
Sufi love poetry is world famous. A remarkable 8th century woman from Iraq, Rabia, wrote: “I know how it will be when I die; my beauty will be so extraordinary that God will worship me. He will not worship me from a distance, for our minds will have wed, our souls will have flowed into each other. How to say this: God and I will forever cherish Myself.” (Ladinsky translation)
Rumi (born in Afghanistan in 1207, lived in Turkey until 1273), one of the greatest poets known to history, wrote: “I resist looking at the palms of my hands sometimes. Have you ever gotten breathless before a beautiful face, for I see you there, my dear. There is a wonderful problem waiting for you that God and I share: how to keep from fainting when we see each other. In truth: how does God keep from fainting looking at Himself all day? Light is moving like a stream, and the myriad celestial beings applaud.” (Ladinsky translation)
The Chisti Order, the most widespread and influential of the Sufi Orders in the sub-continent of India, was introduced into India by Khwaja Mu'in'ud-Din Chisti, popularly known as Hazrat Gharib Nawaz which means the “Helper of the Poor.” He was born in 1142 in central Asia, and was descended from both Imam Hasan and Imam Husayn. He studied the traditional Islamic sciences of the Quran and the recorded actions and sayings of the Prophet Muhammad in the universities of Bukhara and Samarkand. However, his yearning for the inner knowledge of self-unfoldment led him to become the close follower of Khwaja Uthman Herwani, a Chisti Sufi master from the Nishapur region of Kurasan in Persia. He served this spiritual master devotedly for twenty years, accompanying him on many travels throughout central Asia and Arabia. After going on the pilgrimage to Mecca, and visiting the tomb of Muhammad in Medina, he was asked to establish Islam in India. After spending forty days in spiritual retreat next to the tomb of Shaykh Hujwiri (d. about 1075) in Lahore, Shaykh Chisti made his way to India.
Eliade, Mircea et al. The HarperCollins Concise Guide to World Religions. San Francisco: HarperCollins, 2000.
Ladinsky, Daniel. Love Poems from God, New York: Penguin Group, 2002.
http://www.nuradeen.com/nuradeen.htm
Smith, Huston. The World’s Religions. San Francisco: Harper, 1991.
Parsi
The Parsis, whose name means “Persians,” are descended from Persian Zoroastrians who immigrated to India to avoid religious persecution by the Muslims in the 10th century. They live chiefly in Bombay and in a few towns and villages mostly to the north of Bombay, but also at Karachi (Pakistan) and Bangalore (Karnataka, India.)
It is not known exactly when the founder of Zoroastrianism, Zarathushtra, or Zoroaster as the Greeks rendered the name, lived. Academic opinion, which bases its case on linguistic analysis of the oldest texts, suggests a date roughly around 1500 BCE He lived in the area that is now called Iran.
The corpus of Zoroastrian prayer texts, known collectively as the Avesta, provides both the ideas resulting from the divine revelation that came to Zoroaster and also historical background through which scholars try to contextualize his life.
Zoroaster stated that there was one creator, Ahura Mazda, the Wise Lord, at a time when it was commonplace to worship the numerous natural elements as gods in their own right. His understanding of life was based on his realization that all the manifestations of creation had to come ultimately from one all-powerful energy - God or the Self-Creator. He stated that people should use their free will to choose their own path, that of good or that of evil.
This statement includes two fundamental ideas: free will and individual responsibility for one's own actions; and the concepts of good and evil. Good and evil are understood as realities encountered in the inner mind - the conscience - that appear to operate as twin energies, equally present and both exerting a pull over us. Zoroaster's message is basically that we should be aware of the struggle these two forces engage us in and know the consequences of following one rather than the other. We are told that to follow the path of righteousness ("Asha") or purity in thought, word and deed will lead to happiness ("ushta") for both ourselves and others. The alternative choice of deceit, lies and unkindness, namely impurity of thought, word and deed, will lead to unhappiness, enmity and war. Thus Zoroastrians are engaged in an ethical dualism.
The energy of the creator is represented in Zoroastrianism by fire or the sun, both of which embody many of the characteristics of the creative force. For this reason Zoroastrians pray in front of some form of light, preferably fire or the sun, a candle or sometimes an electric light. All symbolize the creator and focus attention totally, so that thanksgiving, praise and contemplation of the wonders of creation can take place in serenity. In Zoroastrian places of worship, therefore, an urn containing fire, which is kept alive by donations of fragrant sandalwood or myrrh, is the most important feature.
Nature is central to the practice of Zoroastrianism and understanding the interdependence of human life, the seasons, and the elements lies at its core. Many important Zoroastrian annual festivals are in celebration of nature: New Year on the first day of spring (March 21); the water festival in summer; the autumn festival at the end of the season; and the mid-winter fire festival
http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9058566
http://www.w-z-o.org/
