WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.620 Welcome back to the Deep Dive. Today we are taking 00:00:02.620 --> 00:00:04.780 one of the most towering and frankly mysterious 00:00:04.780 --> 00:00:08.779 figures in modern spiritual history, Ramakrishna 00:00:08.779 --> 00:00:10.699 Paramahamsa, and we're just going to lay all 00:00:10.699 --> 00:00:12.960 the sources out on the table. And our mission 00:00:12.960 --> 00:00:15.619 here is to get a really deep immersion into the 00:00:15.619 --> 00:00:18.839 life of this 19th century Hindu mystic. This 00:00:18.839 --> 00:00:22.440 is a man, born Ramakrishna Chattopadhyay, who 00:00:22.440 --> 00:00:26.100 many to this day still revere as an avatar, as 00:00:26.100 --> 00:00:28.350 a divine incarnation. Right. And we're not just 00:00:28.350 --> 00:00:30.750 doing a simple biography. We're really dissecting 00:00:30.750 --> 00:00:33.369 the life of a man who somehow synthesized the 00:00:33.369 --> 00:00:36.130 world's spiritual paths. And not through, you 00:00:36.130 --> 00:00:38.770 know, academic study, but through direct, personal 00:00:38.770 --> 00:00:41.549 and often incredibly demanding experiments. The 00:00:41.549 --> 00:00:43.890 sources cover everything. I mean, from his childhood 00:00:43.890 --> 00:00:46.170 in a poor village all the way up to him becoming 00:00:46.170 --> 00:00:48.429 the central figure in what we call the Bengali 00:00:48.429 --> 00:00:50.950 Renaissance. What's so fascinating to me right 00:00:50.950 --> 00:00:52.929 from the start is how the source material frames 00:00:52.929 --> 00:00:55.649 him. He's not just a holy man. No, not at all. 00:00:55.670 --> 00:00:57.789 They call him a spiritual scientist. And his 00:00:57.789 --> 00:00:59.950 core teaching, the hypothesis he spent his whole 00:00:59.950 --> 00:01:02.070 life testing, was this idea of the essential 00:01:02.070 --> 00:01:04.670 unity of all religions. And it's so much more 00:01:04.670 --> 00:01:07.269 than just tolerance, isn't it? He wasn't just 00:01:07.269 --> 00:01:09.329 saying, you know, let's all get along. Exactly. 00:01:09.390 --> 00:01:11.430 He was demonstrating that if you follow any of 00:01:11.430 --> 00:01:14.530 these paths with absolute rigor, they lead to 00:01:14.530 --> 00:01:17.390 the exact same destination. Okay, let's unpack 00:01:17.390 --> 00:01:19.450 that right now because that is such a radical 00:01:19.450 --> 00:01:22.269 claim. It's a claim of universal validity based 00:01:22.269 --> 00:01:25.609 on his own, you know, lived experience. It is. 00:01:25.670 --> 00:01:27.650 And the most famous way he explained it was with 00:01:27.650 --> 00:01:30.609 his analogy of the lake. He said, God is one, 00:01:30.709 --> 00:01:32.629 but we have all these different names. Krishna, 00:01:32.810 --> 00:01:35.819 Shiva, Jesus, Allah. The lake with the multiple 00:01:35.819 --> 00:01:38.359 ghats. The very same. A ghat, for anyone who 00:01:38.359 --> 00:01:40.579 doesn't know, is just a set of steps leading 00:01:40.579 --> 00:01:43.359 down to the water. So Ramakrishna paints this 00:01:43.359 --> 00:01:46.299 picture of a huge cosmic lake with many of these 00:01:46.299 --> 00:01:49.400 ghats. Okay. At one ghat, he says, the Hindus 00:01:49.400 --> 00:01:51.640 come down with their pots, and they draw water 00:01:51.640 --> 00:01:54.620 and call it Jal. At another, the Muslims come, 00:01:54.719 --> 00:01:56.959 maybe with their leather bags, and they call 00:01:56.959 --> 00:02:00.019 it Tani. And Christians call it water. Precisely. 00:02:00.019 --> 00:02:02.640 And he asks this incredibly simple, powerful 00:02:02.640 --> 00:02:06.489 question. Can we imagine that it's not Jal, but 00:02:06.489 --> 00:02:09.090 only Pani or water? How ridiculous. The substance 00:02:09.090 --> 00:02:12.090 is one. The substance is one. The paths, the 00:02:12.090 --> 00:02:14.090 names, the cultures are all different. But what 00:02:14.090 --> 00:02:16.490 you're seeking, that spiritual substance, is 00:02:16.490 --> 00:02:19.330 identical. So the goal for you, our listener, 00:02:19.509 --> 00:02:21.770 as we dive in, is to really get to the bottom 00:02:21.770 --> 00:02:25.400 of how. How could one man genuinely realize God, 00:02:25.520 --> 00:02:28.520 not just through Hinduism, but through Islam 00:02:28.520 --> 00:02:31.360 and through Christianity? And what does that 00:02:31.360 --> 00:02:33.360 tell us about spiritual seeking itself? We're 00:02:33.360 --> 00:02:35.180 going beyond the metaphor and right into his 00:02:35.180 --> 00:02:37.900 method. Yeah. All right. So to begin, we have 00:02:37.900 --> 00:02:40.659 to go back to his very foundations. Kamar Pukor, 00:02:40.840 --> 00:02:44.520 Bengal, 1836. The sources paint this picture 00:02:44.520 --> 00:02:48.599 of a very poor but deeply, deeply pious Brahmin 00:02:48.599 --> 00:02:51.020 family. And that background is absolutely essential. 00:02:51.740 --> 00:02:53.860 Ramakrishna or Gadara, that was his childhood 00:02:53.860 --> 00:02:56.240 nickname, was the youngest of four. His father 00:02:56.240 --> 00:02:59.180 was Kudiram Chhatpatthaya. His mother turned 00:02:59.180 --> 00:03:01.740 Ramani Devi. And their whole life revolved around 00:03:01.740 --> 00:03:04.199 their family deity, Suragubir, which is a form 00:03:04.199 --> 00:03:06.020 of Rama. The piety was baked in, but so was the 00:03:06.020 --> 00:03:07.939 poverty. And right from the very beginning, the 00:03:07.939 --> 00:03:10.020 sources suggest something unusual about his birth. 00:03:10.219 --> 00:03:12.379 There are these supernatural visions woven into 00:03:12.379 --> 00:03:15.120 the story. Oh, absolutely. The biographies say 00:03:15.120 --> 00:03:18.699 his father, Kudiram, had a dream that... Hagavan 00:03:18.699 --> 00:03:21.860 Gadahara, a foam of Vishnu, told him he would 00:03:21.860 --> 00:03:24.780 be born as his son. Okay, wow. And even more 00:03:24.780 --> 00:03:27.060 dramatically, his mother reported having a vision 00:03:27.060 --> 00:03:29.979 at a Shiva temple. She saw a light emerge from 00:03:29.979 --> 00:03:32.620 a sacred lingam and enter her womb. So from day 00:03:32.620 --> 00:03:35.620 one, his family and his community saw him as 00:03:35.620 --> 00:03:39.099 someone with a profound spiritual destiny. Let's 00:03:39.099 --> 00:03:42.000 talk about his education or I guess his lack 00:03:42.000 --> 00:03:44.300 of it, because this is where we see his early, 00:03:44.439 --> 00:03:47.159 almost radical rejection of the way things were 00:03:47.159 --> 00:03:49.139 done. He had practically no formal schooling. 00:03:49.360 --> 00:03:52.439 He spoke a rustic, ungrammatical Bengali. He 00:03:52.439 --> 00:03:54.419 did learn to read and write, but he absolutely 00:03:54.419 --> 00:03:57.219 hated arithmetic, just detested it. So his intelligence 00:03:57.219 --> 00:04:00.430 wasn't, you know. Not at all. It was aesthetic. 00:04:00.610 --> 00:04:02.469 It was perceptive. He was brilliant at making 00:04:02.469 --> 00:04:05.330 clay images, at acting in village plays, at painting. 00:04:05.530 --> 00:04:08.569 And he just soaked up the great epics, the Ramayana 00:04:08.569 --> 00:04:10.610 and the Mahabharata. And he saw that formal education 00:04:10.610 --> 00:04:13.849 as being corrupting. He did. He looked at the 00:04:13.849 --> 00:04:16.410 learned scholars who were all chasing wealth. 00:04:16.850 --> 00:04:19.209 And then he looked at his own father, who was 00:04:19.209 --> 00:04:23.589 so righteous and detached. For Ramakrishna, breadwinning 00:04:23.589 --> 00:04:25.629 education, as he called it, was just a trap. 00:04:25.930 --> 00:04:29.089 It was about ego, about getting ahead. And he 00:04:29.089 --> 00:04:31.550 saw it as a complete detour from the real purpose 00:04:31.550 --> 00:04:33.889 of life. And that defiance comes out in some 00:04:33.889 --> 00:04:36.389 amazing stories, like the one about the weaver 00:04:36.389 --> 00:04:38.050 woman. Oh, that's a perfect example. There was 00:04:38.050 --> 00:04:40.689 this local trader, Durgadas Pine, who enforced 00:04:40.689 --> 00:04:43.019 strict... Berta, you know, the seclusion of women. 00:04:43.199 --> 00:04:45.480 And he was very critical of women coming to hear 00:04:45.480 --> 00:04:48.319 Ramakrishna recite the Puranas. And Ramakrishna's 00:04:48.319 --> 00:04:50.480 argument was that real protection comes from 00:04:50.480 --> 00:04:53.100 devotion, not from locking people up. Exactly. 00:04:53.120 --> 00:04:55.500 So when this traitor boasted that no one could 00:04:55.500 --> 00:04:58.199 get into his inner apartments, Ramakrishna took 00:04:58.199 --> 00:05:01.139 it as a challenge. He disguised himself so perfectly 00:05:01.139 --> 00:05:04.060 as a weaver woman that he fooled the entire household, 00:05:04.259 --> 00:05:06.779 including the traitor himself. And he got inside. 00:05:07.060 --> 00:05:10.550 He got inside. And he used the opportunity to 00:05:10.550 --> 00:05:13.269 give the confined women access to his recitals. 00:05:13.490 --> 00:05:16.709 It just shows you his sharp mind, his flair for 00:05:16.709 --> 00:05:19.649 the dramatic, and this willingness to break any 00:05:19.649 --> 00:05:22.689 social rule. for a higher spiritual goal. Which 00:05:22.689 --> 00:05:25.610 sets the stage perfectly for his first big mystical 00:05:25.610 --> 00:05:27.970 experience. This happened when he was about 10 00:05:27.970 --> 00:05:30.189 or 11. It's an incredible story. He's just walking 00:05:30.189 --> 00:05:32.269 through a paddy field, eating some puffed rice 00:05:32.269 --> 00:05:35.089 from a basket. He looks up at the sky. And he 00:05:35.089 --> 00:05:39.069 sees this flock of pure white cranes flying against 00:05:39.069 --> 00:05:42.009 this backdrop of a dark, heavy rain cloud. Such 00:05:42.009 --> 00:05:45.129 a simple image. A simple image that just... detonated 00:05:45.129 --> 00:05:47.089 something inside him he said he was completely 00:05:47.089 --> 00:05:49.449 overwhelmed he lost all external awareness and 00:05:49.449 --> 00:05:51.569 he just collapsed the rice went everywhere he 00:05:51.569 --> 00:05:53.949 was just consumed by this vision of light and 00:05:53.949 --> 00:05:56.350 pure joy and his followers they immediately called 00:05:56.350 --> 00:05:59.629 this samadhi they did samadhi this state of deep 00:05:59.629 --> 00:06:02.649 meditative consciousness but this is also where 00:06:02.649 --> 00:06:05.069 that tension begins the one that follows him 00:06:05.069 --> 00:06:07.589 his whole life the spiritual versus the clinical 00:06:07.589 --> 00:06:11.459 interpretation Exactly. Later on, more naturalistic 00:06:11.459 --> 00:06:13.600 scholars would look at this and say, well, maybe 00:06:13.600 --> 00:06:16.079 it was a dissociative trance or even a form of 00:06:16.079 --> 00:06:18.600 epilepsy. And we have to hold both those possibilities 00:06:18.600 --> 00:06:21.420 as we go through the sources. Is this divine 00:06:21.420 --> 00:06:25.300 grace or is it a unique neurology? Right. Either 00:06:25.300 --> 00:06:28.420 way, that experience marked him for life. After 00:06:28.420 --> 00:06:30.639 his father died, things got worse financially, 00:06:30.839 --> 00:06:33.240 which is what brings him to Calcutta in 1852. 00:06:33.600 --> 00:06:36.399 And this leads him to the single most important 00:06:36.399 --> 00:06:40.819 place in his entire life, the Dakshinswar Kali 00:06:40.819 --> 00:06:43.920 Temple. A temple founded by Rani Razmani. She 00:06:43.920 --> 00:06:46.439 was this incredibly powerful, wealthy widow and 00:06:46.439 --> 00:06:49.040 a passionate devotee of the goddess Kali. But 00:06:49.040 --> 00:06:51.519 crucially, she was not a Brahmin. And in the 00:06:51.519 --> 00:06:53.819 rigid caste system of the time, that was a huge 00:06:53.819 --> 00:06:56.899 problem. A massive problem. The Orthodox Brahmins 00:06:56.899 --> 00:06:59.800 refused to serve as priests or even accept offerings 00:06:59.800 --> 00:07:02.279 at a temple consecrated by a non -Brahmin. It 00:07:02.279 --> 00:07:04.160 would have made the whole project invalid. So 00:07:04.160 --> 00:07:06.720 Ramakrishna's older brother, Ramkumar, finds 00:07:06.720 --> 00:07:09.899 a workaround. A clever one. He finds a scriptural 00:07:09.899 --> 00:07:12.389 loophole. That says the Rani can gift the temple 00:07:12.389 --> 00:07:14.730 property to a Brahmin who can then install the 00:07:14.730 --> 00:07:17.310 deity. And that's what they did. Ramkumar became 00:07:17.310 --> 00:07:21.069 the priest. And then Ramkumar dies in 1856 and 00:07:21.069 --> 00:07:24.110 the role falls to Ramakrishna. And ironically, 00:07:24.209 --> 00:07:26.589 he initially refused. He was a Brahmin and he 00:07:26.589 --> 00:07:29.290 felt this deep conflict about working for a patron 00:07:29.290 --> 00:07:32.769 of a lower caste. So he has this ingrained caste 00:07:32.769 --> 00:07:35.129 pride, but then he does the most radical thing 00:07:35.129 --> 00:07:37.750 imaginable to destroy it. He performs the ultimate 00:07:37.750 --> 00:07:41.100 act of ego annihilation. To conquer his own pride, 00:07:41.379 --> 00:07:43.420 he would go into the quarters of the untouchables, 00:07:43.560 --> 00:07:45.699 the temple scavengers, and he would clean their 00:07:45.699 --> 00:07:47.959 latrines. With his hands. With his hands and 00:07:47.959 --> 00:07:50.220 famously with his long hair. Using his own hair, 00:07:50.399 --> 00:07:53.540 the symbol of his bromenical status. Yes. It 00:07:53.540 --> 00:07:56.139 was a shocking, profound act designed to shatter 00:07:56.139 --> 00:07:59.220 the internal walls of shame, pride, and ego. 00:07:59.819 --> 00:08:01.879 He believed you couldn't even begin to seek God 00:08:01.879 --> 00:08:03.939 if you were still trapped by those ideas of pure 00:08:03.939 --> 00:08:06.180 and impure. This was his preparation for the 00:08:06.180 --> 00:08:08.759 fire that was coming. That act of cleansing his 00:08:08.759 --> 00:08:11.279 ego seems like it was the necessary first step 00:08:11.279 --> 00:08:13.899 for what came next. This incredibly intense, 00:08:14.079 --> 00:08:16.839 almost agonizing devotion to Kali. After seeing 00:08:16.839 --> 00:08:19.120 some deaths in his family, he became obsessed 00:08:19.120 --> 00:08:22.399 with life's impermanence. And his longing for 00:08:22.399 --> 00:08:25.899 a direct vision of Kali just consumed him. It 00:08:25.899 --> 00:08:28.259 went way beyond simple prayer. He would cry at 00:08:28.259 --> 00:08:32.019 sunset. Openly, yes. He'd cry out, Mother, another 00:08:32.019 --> 00:08:35.019 day is gone, and still I have not seen you. He 00:08:35.019 --> 00:08:37.389 was in this constant state of questioning, Are 00:08:37.389 --> 00:08:39.509 you real, mother? Or am I just mad? Is this all 00:08:39.509 --> 00:08:42.529 just poetry? The internal pressure must have 00:08:42.529 --> 00:08:45.029 been enormous. And in his quest, he literally 00:08:45.029 --> 00:08:47.370 had to cast off his social identity. He did. 00:08:47.850 --> 00:08:49.730 When he went to meditate, he would take off his 00:08:49.730 --> 00:08:52.429 clothes and his sacred thread, the Yajna Pavita. 00:08:52.870 --> 00:08:55.110 That thread is the ultimate symbol of being a 00:08:55.110 --> 00:08:57.450 Brahmin. Why did he do that? He said that to 00:08:57.450 --> 00:08:59.600 call on the mother, You have to be free from 00:08:59.600 --> 00:09:01.980 the eight servitudes, things like hatred, fear, 00:09:02.159 --> 00:09:05.320 shame, ego, vanity, and especially pride in your 00:09:05.320 --> 00:09:08.220 noble birth. Taking off the thread was a physical 00:09:08.220 --> 00:09:11.120 act of shedding that pride. This all builds to 00:09:11.120 --> 00:09:13.399 what is probably the most dramatic moment of 00:09:13.399 --> 00:09:15.840 his early life, the near suicide in the temple. 00:09:16.039 --> 00:09:18.600 The pain just became too much, a physical agony. 00:09:18.740 --> 00:09:21.909 He felt he had failed. So in total despair, he 00:09:21.909 --> 00:09:23.970 grabs the ceremonial sword hanging in the shrine, 00:09:24.210 --> 00:09:26.870 determined to end his life. But instead of death, 00:09:27.070 --> 00:09:29.929 he has this cosmic vision. An unbelievable vision. 00:09:30.190 --> 00:09:32.649 He said just before he fainted, he saw not a 00:09:32.649 --> 00:09:35.309 statue, but a boundless, infinite, conscious 00:09:35.309 --> 00:09:38.250 sea of light. He described these brilliant waves 00:09:38.250 --> 00:09:40.769 rushing towards him, crashing over him and pulling 00:09:40.769 --> 00:09:43.350 him down into the unknown bottom. So he wasn't 00:09:43.350 --> 00:09:45.830 seeing a person. He was merging with an ocean 00:09:45.830 --> 00:09:48.029 of consciousness. That's it, exactly. He lost 00:09:48.029 --> 00:09:50.690 all awareness of the outside world, and all he 00:09:50.690 --> 00:09:53.110 felt was this current of intense unknown bliss. 00:09:53.429 --> 00:09:56.370 When he came to, the only word he could say over 00:09:56.370 --> 00:09:59.850 and over was ma, mother. And from that moment 00:09:59.850 --> 00:10:02.509 on, he was utterly convinced. Utterly convinced 00:10:02.509 --> 00:10:05.250 that Kali was not a clay statue, but was pure 00:10:05.250 --> 00:10:07.529 conscious reality itself. And he was always careful 00:10:07.529 --> 00:10:09.490 to clarify that, right? That he wasn't just worshiping 00:10:09.490 --> 00:10:12.409 an idol. Meticulous about it. He said, I do not 00:10:12.409 --> 00:10:14.750 worship Kali made of clay and straw. My mother 00:10:14.750 --> 00:10:17.669 is the conscious principle. Pure Satchitananda, 00:10:17.769 --> 00:10:20.509 existence, knowledge, bliss, absolute. And he 00:10:20.509 --> 00:10:23.529 called this ultimate reality mother. Yes, because 00:10:23.529 --> 00:10:25.710 he said a child is most free with its mother. 00:10:26.250 --> 00:10:28.870 It's a relationship of pure, unconditional love. 00:10:29.309 --> 00:10:31.509 Now, in the middle of all this spiritual intensity, 00:10:31.809 --> 00:10:35.470 his family tries to ground him. They arrange 00:10:35.470 --> 00:10:38.769 a marriage. They do. In 1859, he's married to 00:10:38.769 --> 00:10:42.100 Sarada Devi. He was 23. And she was only five 00:10:42.100 --> 00:10:44.200 years old. The whole idea was to steady him, 00:10:44.340 --> 00:10:46.360 you know, give him some worldly responsibility. 00:10:46.799 --> 00:10:49.200 But it didn't quite work out that way. Not at 00:10:49.200 --> 00:10:51.480 all. By the time she joined him at Dakshinswar 00:10:51.480 --> 00:10:54.220 when she was 18, he had fully embraced the life 00:10:54.220 --> 00:10:56.840 of a sannyasi, a total renouncer. The marriage 00:10:56.840 --> 00:10:58.899 was never consummated. Instead, he performed 00:10:58.899 --> 00:11:00.919 a ritual where he worshipped her as the divine 00:11:00.919 --> 00:11:04.399 mother. The Shodashi Puja. It's a profound, radical 00:11:04.399 --> 00:11:07.539 act. He saw her not as a wife, but as the living 00:11:07.539 --> 00:11:09.840 embodiment of the divine mother he'd been seeking. 00:11:10.240 --> 00:11:13.340 She became known as the Holy Mother and was absolutely 00:11:13.340 --> 00:11:15.740 central to the movement after his death. So the 00:11:15.740 --> 00:11:18.200 marriage failed to contain him. And what followed 00:11:18.200 --> 00:11:20.539 was this period the sources call a spiritual 00:11:20.539 --> 00:11:23.440 tempest. It sounds less like peace and more like 00:11:23.440 --> 00:11:26.580 a total physical breakdown. It was. He claimed 00:11:26.580 --> 00:11:30.179 he didn't sleep for six straight years. His eyes, 00:11:30.320 --> 00:11:33.159 he said, literally lost the power of winking. 00:11:33.559 --> 00:11:36.379 He'd look in a mirror and his eyelids just wouldn't 00:11:36.379 --> 00:11:39.409 close. And he lost all sense of his own body. 00:11:39.529 --> 00:11:42.549 To an extreme degree. His hair got matted, and 00:11:42.549 --> 00:11:44.610 birds would literally perch on his head to pick 00:11:44.610 --> 00:11:47.210 at rice grains caught in it. Snakes would crawl 00:11:47.210 --> 00:11:50.070 over his motionless body. He said at first he 00:11:50.070 --> 00:11:51.730 was terrified. He thought he had some terrible 00:11:51.730 --> 00:11:55.070 disease. But the mother comforted him. Yes. She 00:11:55.070 --> 00:11:56.690 assured him this was all part of the process. 00:11:56.929 --> 00:11:59.590 And again, you see that tension. For his followers, 00:11:59.809 --> 00:12:02.149 this was the necessary purification of the body 00:12:02.149 --> 00:12:05.370 to hold God consciousness. For a critic, it could 00:12:05.370 --> 00:12:07.149 look like a prolonged state of extreme mental 00:12:07.149 --> 00:12:09.919 illness. But it's clear that he had to go through 00:12:09.919 --> 00:12:12.200 that fire, that complete detachment from his 00:12:12.200 --> 00:12:14.500 physical self, to be ready for what he was about 00:12:14.500 --> 00:12:17.179 to do next. His body and mind were being forged 00:12:17.179 --> 00:12:19.500 into an instrument for universal exploration. 00:12:19.899 --> 00:12:21.539 And this next section is really what defines 00:12:21.539 --> 00:12:24.700 his entire legacy. These methodical, intense 00:12:24.700 --> 00:12:27.399 experiments in other religious disciplines. It 00:12:27.399 --> 00:12:31.440 started with Tantra in 1861. Yes. And his guide 00:12:31.440 --> 00:12:35.120 was a woman, an itinerant aesthetic, named Haravi 00:12:35.120 --> 00:12:38.009 Brahmani. Her arrival was so important because 00:12:38.009 --> 00:12:40.330 Ramakrishna was so far out on a limb, he was 00:12:40.330 --> 00:12:42.750 worried he was going mad. His ecstatic states 00:12:42.750 --> 00:12:45.210 were so extreme. And she told him they were authentic. 00:12:45.610 --> 00:12:48.210 She did. She was an expert in tantric and Vaishnava 00:12:48.210 --> 00:12:50.710 texts. And she confirmed that his experiences, 00:12:51.090 --> 00:12:53.730 like Mahaprabha, this supreme loving devotion, 00:12:53.929 --> 00:12:56.230 were all described in the scriptures. He wasn't 00:12:56.230 --> 00:12:58.529 crazy. He was an advanced soul. So under her 00:12:58.529 --> 00:13:02.289 guidance, he dives into tantra. Head first. The 00:13:02.289 --> 00:13:05.029 goal of Tantra is to transcend the idea of holy 00:13:05.029 --> 00:13:07.789 and unholy, to see the divine feminine power, 00:13:08.029 --> 00:13:09.870 Shakti, in everything. And he went through the 00:13:09.870 --> 00:13:12.350 practices at an incredible speed. An astonishing 00:13:12.350 --> 00:13:15.669 speed. He reportedly completed 64 major tantric 00:13:15.669 --> 00:13:17.850 sadhanas, or disciplines, in just three days 00:13:17.850 --> 00:13:20.460 each. which just shows how advanced he already 00:13:20.460 --> 00:13:22.500 was. This includes the really controversial stuff, 00:13:22.600 --> 00:13:24.519 the Vamachara, the left -hand path. It does. 00:13:25.039 --> 00:13:27.279 Vamachara uses things that are normally taboo, 00:13:27.279 --> 00:13:30.100 eating meat, fish, drinking wine, even sexual 00:13:30.100 --> 00:13:32.320 intercourse, to shock the practitioner out of 00:13:32.320 --> 00:13:34.500 their dualistic thinking of good and bad. But 00:13:34.500 --> 00:13:36.860 Ramakrishna himself warned his disciples away 00:13:36.860 --> 00:13:39.059 from that path. He did. He called it a valid 00:13:39.059 --> 00:13:42.639 road, but a dirty and dangerous one. And the 00:13:42.639 --> 00:13:45.200 biographies are very clear on this point. He 00:13:45.200 --> 00:13:47.580 himself did not need to perform the most extreme 00:13:47.580 --> 00:13:50.899 acts. His consciousness was so elevated that 00:13:50.899 --> 00:13:53.220 merely the suggestion or the intention of the 00:13:53.220 --> 00:13:55.620 act was enough to give him the spiritual result. 00:13:55.840 --> 00:13:58.559 He didn't need to physically drink wine or engage 00:13:58.559 --> 00:14:01.320 in sex to transcend the mental barrier associated 00:14:01.320 --> 00:14:04.019 with them. After Tantra, he moved on to Vaishnava 00:14:04.019 --> 00:14:06.980 Bhakti, which is all about loving devotion to 00:14:06.980 --> 00:14:09.960 Vishnu and his avatars like Rama and Krishna. 00:14:10.179 --> 00:14:11.720 And he explored it through different emotional 00:14:11.720 --> 00:14:15.000 attitudes, or bhavas. First, he took on the attitude 00:14:15.000 --> 00:14:18.360 of a servant, Dasya Bhava, worshipping Rama as 00:14:18.360 --> 00:14:21.139 if he were the great devotee Hanuman. That ended 00:14:21.139 --> 00:14:24.000 with a vision of Sita, Rama's wife, merging into 00:14:24.000 --> 00:14:26.799 his own body. Then he tried being a parent. Vatsalya 00:14:26.799 --> 00:14:29.500 Bhava, yes. He had a small metal statue of the 00:14:29.500 --> 00:14:32.220 child Rama, Ramla, and he worshipped it as a 00:14:32.220 --> 00:14:34.500 mother would. He cared for it, fed it, played 00:14:34.500 --> 00:14:36.759 with it, until he felt the living presence of 00:14:36.759 --> 00:14:39.000 the child god in the statue. He said it came 00:14:39.000 --> 00:14:41.759 alive for him. And then the most radical of all, 00:14:41.879 --> 00:14:45.320 the lover's attitude, Madhura Bhava. This is 00:14:45.320 --> 00:14:47.720 where he emulated Radha and the gopis in their 00:14:47.720 --> 00:14:50.440 passionate love for Krishna. And to do this, 00:14:50.480 --> 00:14:52.919 he felt he had to completely eliminate the idea 00:14:52.919 --> 00:14:55.820 of male identity from his mind. So for several 00:14:55.820 --> 00:14:58.000 days, he dressed and lived as a woman. He lived 00:14:58.000 --> 00:15:00.360 as a woman. Completely. It was a radical method 00:15:00.360 --> 00:15:02.360 to root out what he saw as a major spiritual 00:15:02.360 --> 00:15:06.480 obstacle, the idea of sex. And that practice 00:15:06.480 --> 00:15:09.039 culminated in a vision and union with Krishna 00:15:09.039 --> 00:15:12.159 Savikalpa Samadhi. So having explored the major 00:15:12.159 --> 00:15:15.299 Hindu paths, he then does the truly unthinkable 00:15:15.299 --> 00:15:18.000 for the time. He steps outside of Hinduism entirely. 00:15:19.050 --> 00:15:22.230 In 1866, he decides to practice Islam. He just 00:15:22.230 --> 00:15:24.110 said this also is a path to the realization of 00:15:24.110 --> 00:15:27.269 God. And he was initiated into Sufism by a man 00:15:27.269 --> 00:15:29.490 named Govinda Roy. And this wasn't just a casual 00:15:29.490 --> 00:15:31.789 study. No, it was total immersion. For three 00:15:31.789 --> 00:15:34.389 days, he lived as a devout Muslim. He repeated 00:15:34.389 --> 00:15:36.470 the name of Allah. He prayed five times a day. 00:15:36.529 --> 00:15:38.549 He wore Muslim clothes. And he said he felt a 00:15:38.549 --> 00:15:41.049 complete disinclination to even look at the Hindu 00:15:41.049 --> 00:15:42.769 deities in the temple. And what was the result? 00:15:43.100 --> 00:15:46.179 After three days, he had a vision of a radiant 00:15:46.179 --> 00:15:48.399 personage with a grayed countenance and a white 00:15:48.399 --> 00:15:51.960 beard, who he identified with the prophet, merging 00:15:51.960 --> 00:15:55.799 into his body. And that experience, fascinatingly, 00:15:55.799 --> 00:15:58.460 culminated in him merging into the formless, 00:15:58.580 --> 00:16:01.179 absolute Brahman. The same goal. He reached the 00:16:01.179 --> 00:16:03.639 exact same goal. The exact same goal. And then 00:16:03.639 --> 00:16:05.440 he did it again with Christianity a few years 00:16:05.440 --> 00:16:08.500 later in 1873. He had the Bible read to him. 00:16:08.600 --> 00:16:11.240 But he had a problem with a core Christian doctrine. 00:16:11.539 --> 00:16:15.129 He did. The doctrine of sin. He couldn't stand 00:16:15.129 --> 00:16:18.230 it. He refused to listen to parts that constantly 00:16:18.230 --> 00:16:20.750 talked about humans being sinners. He argued 00:16:20.750 --> 00:16:23.289 that constantly thinking I am a sinner is the 00:16:23.289 --> 00:16:25.269 greatest sin of all because it drags the mind 00:16:25.269 --> 00:16:28.009 down. He said, you should think I've taken the 00:16:28.009 --> 00:16:30.649 name of God, therefore I am sinless. It's a focus 00:16:30.649 --> 00:16:33.549 on inherent divinity over inherent brokenness. 00:16:33.750 --> 00:16:36.789 Perfectly put. And once again, his deep engagement 00:16:36.789 --> 00:16:39.289 led to a vision. He was looking at a painting 00:16:39.289 --> 00:16:41.470 of the Madonna and Child, and he saw it come 00:16:41.470 --> 00:16:43.730 to life, the light from it entering his heart. 00:16:43.850 --> 00:16:45.929 And then a vision of Jesus himself. A few days 00:16:45.929 --> 00:16:48.870 later, yes, he saw Jesus walking towards him. 00:16:49.169 --> 00:16:51.610 Jesus embraced him and merged into his body. 00:16:52.029 --> 00:16:54.610 And once again, the result was a trance state 00:16:54.610 --> 00:16:56.950 where he identified with the absolute. He had 00:16:56.950 --> 00:16:59.990 proven his thesis three times over. So having 00:16:59.990 --> 00:17:02.230 climbed the peaks of devotional and dualistic 00:17:02.230 --> 00:17:04.950 paths, Ramakrishna turns to the final summit. 00:17:05.390 --> 00:17:07.890 the stark, non -dual path of Advaita Vedanta. 00:17:08.029 --> 00:17:10.829 And this meant a final, almost brutal confrontation 00:17:10.829 --> 00:17:13.630 with his own deepest attachment, guided by the 00:17:13.630 --> 00:17:15.849 most formidable teacher he ever met. Todopuri. 00:17:16.069 --> 00:17:19.930 He arrived at Dakshineswar in late 1864, and 00:17:19.930 --> 00:17:22.269 the sources describe him as the complete opposite 00:17:22.269 --> 00:17:25.930 of Ramakrishna. He was a tall, naked Nagasanyasi, 00:17:26.069 --> 00:17:28.650 a wandering monk who knew only Brahman. And he 00:17:28.650 --> 00:17:32.069 had no time for deities. None. He saw Ramakrishna's 00:17:32.069 --> 00:17:34.849 beloved Kali as just a delusion, a trick of Maya, 00:17:34.930 --> 00:17:37.089 the cosmic illusion. Which creates this amazing 00:17:37.089 --> 00:17:39.549 tension. Ramakrishna, the ultimate devotee of 00:17:39.549 --> 00:17:41.410 the mother, has to ask her for permission to 00:17:41.410 --> 00:17:43.849 learn from a man who says she doesn't exist. 00:17:44.269 --> 00:17:46.609 It's an incredible moment. Ramakrishna goes into 00:17:46.609 --> 00:17:48.930 the temple, asks Kali, and comes out in ecstasy, 00:17:48.930 --> 00:17:51.289 telling Toda Puri, the mother has commanded me 00:17:51.289 --> 00:17:53.750 to learn from you. So Toda agrees to initiate 00:17:53.750 --> 00:17:57.349 him into sannyasa. Full renunciation. Yes, at 00:17:57.349 --> 00:18:00.309 the Panchavati, the grove of trees. It's a total 00:18:00.309 --> 00:18:02.630 stripping away. Ramakrishna has to offer his 00:18:02.630 --> 00:18:04.750 sacred thread and a tuft of his hair into the 00:18:04.750 --> 00:18:07.230 fire, renouncing everything. Teta's instruction 00:18:07.230 --> 00:18:10.549 was simple and absolute. Brahma alone is real. 00:18:10.809 --> 00:18:13.670 Shatter the cage of name and form. Dive deep 00:18:13.670 --> 00:18:16.329 into the self. Ramakrishna sits to meditate, 00:18:16.630 --> 00:18:19.190 aiming for Nirvikalpa Samadhi, the state beyond 00:18:19.190 --> 00:18:22.240 all thought and form. but his years of devotion 00:18:22.240 --> 00:18:25.400 create one last barrier. The form of his Divine 00:18:25.400 --> 00:18:28.640 Mother Kali appears in his mind, and he can't 00:18:28.640 --> 00:18:30.900 get past it. It's too familiar, too beloved. 00:18:31.019 --> 00:18:33.440 He tries, but he can't make his mind go blank. 00:18:33.660 --> 00:18:36.039 He cries out to Toda, It cannot be done. I can't 00:18:36.039 --> 00:18:38.240 stop my mind from functioning. And Toda's response 00:18:38.240 --> 00:18:42.950 is, Not gentle. It's pure, cold fury. He's enraged 00:18:42.950 --> 00:18:45.230 that this illusion still has such a hold. He 00:18:45.230 --> 00:18:46.789 looks around and finds a sharp piece of glass 00:18:46.789 --> 00:18:48.809 on the ground. Wait, a piece of glass? A piece 00:18:48.809 --> 00:18:50.950 of glass. And he forcibly pierces Ramakrishna's 00:18:50.950 --> 00:18:52.910 forehead right between the eyebrows, shouting, 00:18:53.009 --> 00:18:55.910 collect the mind here to this point. Wow. That's 00:18:55.910 --> 00:18:59.109 extreme. It was the shock he needed. Ramakrishna, 00:18:59.250 --> 00:19:02.509 with this new determination, visualizes a sword 00:19:02.509 --> 00:19:05.369 of knowledge and mentally cuts the form of the 00:19:05.369 --> 00:19:08.619 mother in two. He destroys his own most cherished 00:19:08.619 --> 00:19:11.359 vision. He does. And the second that form is 00:19:11.359 --> 00:19:14.279 split, his mind rushes up and merges completely 00:19:14.279 --> 00:19:17.640 into the formless absolute. Your Vikalpa Samadhi. 00:19:17.700 --> 00:19:19.980 And Totapuri, the master who had strived for 00:19:19.980 --> 00:19:22.819 40 years, is just left in shock. Total astonishment. 00:19:23.099 --> 00:19:25.859 He finds Ramakrishna sitting motionless, completely 00:19:25.859 --> 00:19:29.200 absorbed, for three full days. He'd never seen 00:19:29.200 --> 00:19:31.339 anyone achieve it so quickly or sustain it so 00:19:31.339 --> 00:19:33.809 effortlessly. But it didn't just last for three 00:19:33.809 --> 00:19:36.450 days. The sources say it lasted for six months. 00:19:36.769 --> 00:19:39.109 Which is supposed to be physiologically impossible. 00:19:39.589 --> 00:19:41.990 The belief is that the body can't survive in 00:19:41.990 --> 00:19:44.670 that state for more than 21 days. But he stayed 00:19:44.670 --> 00:19:47.250 there. Apparently, another monk found him and 00:19:47.250 --> 00:19:49.009 understood what was happening. This monk would 00:19:49.009 --> 00:19:51.170 literally beat him with a stick to bring a flicker 00:19:51.170 --> 00:19:52.809 of consciousness back so he could force feed 00:19:52.809 --> 00:19:55.609 him. Just to keep his body alive. Exactly. Until 00:19:55.609 --> 00:19:57.930 Ramakrishna finally received a command from the 00:19:57.930 --> 00:20:01.099 mother to return. to stay in a state called Bhava 00:20:01.099 --> 00:20:03.799 Mukha, on the border between the absolute and 00:20:03.799 --> 00:20:06.240 the relative worlds, for the good of humanity. 00:20:06.640 --> 00:20:09.180 And that return led to his greatest philosophical 00:20:09.180 --> 00:20:12.019 breakthrough, the reconciliation of the formless 00:20:12.019 --> 00:20:14.720 Brahman and the personal active power of Kali, 00:20:14.859 --> 00:20:17.759 or Maya. This is where he really transforms traditional 00:20:17.759 --> 00:20:21.180 Advaita. Instead of seeing Maya as just an illusion 00:20:21.180 --> 00:20:24.480 to be rejected, he realized that Maya is Shakti, 00:20:24.480 --> 00:20:27.279 the creative power of Brahman itself. They aren't 00:20:27.279 --> 00:20:29.140 two different things. The power that creates 00:20:29.140 --> 00:20:31.519 the universe is not separate from the ultimate 00:20:31.519 --> 00:20:34.460 reality. Precisely. His great unifying statement 00:20:34.460 --> 00:20:36.640 was, the personal and the impersonal are the 00:20:36.640 --> 00:20:39.779 same thing, like milk in its whiteness. The Divine 00:20:39.779 --> 00:20:41.759 Mother and Brahman are one. You can't have one 00:20:41.759 --> 00:20:43.980 without the other. He also made Maya more practical 00:20:43.980 --> 00:20:46.819 by splitting it into two types. Avidya Maya and 00:20:46.819 --> 00:20:49.410 Vidya Maya. A vidya is the negative, stuffed 00:20:49.410 --> 00:20:53.349 greed, ego, lust that binds you. Vidya is the 00:20:53.349 --> 00:20:55.890 positive, stuffed devotion, kindness, wisdom 00:20:55.890 --> 00:20:58.809 that liberates you. The idea is to use the good 00:20:58.809 --> 00:21:01.589 maya to conquer the bad maya, and then you become 00:21:01.589 --> 00:21:04.509 free of maya's grip altogether. And in the end... 00:21:04.839 --> 00:21:07.619 Even the rigid Advaitin, Toda Puri, was humbled 00:21:07.619 --> 00:21:10.480 by this vision. Completely humbled. First, he 00:21:10.480 --> 00:21:13.000 flew into a rage when a servant used some charcoal 00:21:13.000 --> 00:21:16.119 from his sacred fire. And Ramakrishna just laughed 00:21:16.119 --> 00:21:18.559 and laughed, pointing out how the great non -dualist 00:21:18.559 --> 00:21:20.819 was caught by attachment to a fire pit. But the 00:21:20.819 --> 00:21:23.099 real breaking point was when Toda got sick. He 00:21:23.099 --> 00:21:26.539 got severe dysentery, terrible pain. In his mind, 00:21:26.619 --> 00:21:29.240 trained to escape the body, couldn't do it. The 00:21:29.240 --> 00:21:32.809 pain was too strong. In agony, he decides to 00:21:32.809 --> 00:21:35.190 commit suicide by drowning himself in the Ganga. 00:21:35.230 --> 00:21:36.990 But he couldn't. The river wouldn't get deep 00:21:36.990 --> 00:21:39.490 enough. He just kept wading and wading. And in 00:21:39.490 --> 00:21:41.910 that moment of total frustration, he has this 00:21:41.910 --> 00:21:44.769 blinding vision of the divine mother, Kali, filling 00:21:44.769 --> 00:21:47.750 all in space. He realizes the Brahmin he worshipped 00:21:47.750 --> 00:21:49.690 and the mother he disdained were one and the 00:21:49.690 --> 00:21:52.650 same. He left the next day a changed man. So 00:21:52.650 --> 00:21:55.190 once he's had these incredible internal experiences 00:21:55.190 --> 00:21:57.569 and synthesized them, the question becomes, how 00:21:57.569 --> 00:21:59.809 does this get out into the world? How does it 00:21:59.809 --> 00:22:02.069 become a movement? The key was his connection 00:22:02.069 --> 00:22:05.529 to the English -educated elite of Calcutta. And 00:22:05.529 --> 00:22:07.849 the turning point was his meeting with Kishab 00:22:07.849 --> 00:22:11.670 Chandrasen in 1875. Kishab was the leader of 00:22:11.670 --> 00:22:14.930 the Brahmo Samaj, a huge religious reform movement. 00:22:15.190 --> 00:22:17.950 He was an intellectual heavyweight. So when Kishab 00:22:17.950 --> 00:22:20.089 accepted Ramakrishna's teachings, it gave him 00:22:20.089 --> 00:22:23.190 massive credibility. Huge credibility. Kishab 00:22:23.190 --> 00:22:25.630 founded a new movement, the New Dispensation, 00:22:25.789 --> 00:22:28.809 or Navavidhan, and he incorporated Ramakrishna's 00:22:28.809 --> 00:22:31.769 core ideas directly into it. Which ideas specifically? 00:22:32.190 --> 00:22:34.930 The worship of God as mother, and most radically, 00:22:35.170 --> 00:22:38.650 the idea that all religions are true. Kishab 00:22:38.650 --> 00:22:41.049 started publicizing Ramakrishna's life and teachings 00:22:41.049 --> 00:22:43.130 in his journals, which is how he became known 00:22:43.130 --> 00:22:45.950 to the Hadraluk, the educated middle class, and 00:22:45.950 --> 00:22:48.069 eventually to Europeans. And that's how he first 00:22:48.069 --> 00:22:50.150 gets noticed in the West. That's the beginning. 00:22:50.630 --> 00:22:52.849 Later, the great Indologist Max Mueller wrote 00:22:52.849 --> 00:22:55.650 an essay about him. And that really cemented 00:22:55.650 --> 00:22:57.609 his place as a world figure. But of course, the 00:22:57.609 --> 00:22:59.910 single most important person for his global legacy 00:22:59.910 --> 00:23:02.730 was his star disciple, Narendra Nath Dutta. Who 00:23:02.730 --> 00:23:05.269 we now know as Swami Vivekananda. Right. And 00:23:05.269 --> 00:23:07.430 their first meeting is a great story. It is. 00:23:08.069 --> 00:23:10.950 Vivekananda was a young, skeptical college kid 00:23:10.950 --> 00:23:14.279 at the time. His English principal, a Dr. William 00:23:14.279 --> 00:23:17.099 Hastie, was trying to explain the meaning of 00:23:17.099 --> 00:23:19.660 the word trance in a Wordsworth poem. And he 00:23:19.660 --> 00:23:21.339 couldn't explain it. He said, if you want to 00:23:21.339 --> 00:23:23.740 understand the real meaning of trance, you have 00:23:23.740 --> 00:23:27.000 to go see Ramakrishna at the Kshinsor. So Vivekananda 00:23:27.000 --> 00:23:29.140 goes looking for the definition of a word and 00:23:29.140 --> 00:23:31.940 finds his entire life's purpose. Pretty much. 00:23:32.140 --> 00:23:34.819 He was skeptical at first, but he was completely 00:23:34.819 --> 00:23:37.880 captivated by Ramakrishna. And he became the 00:23:37.880 --> 00:23:40.900 one who synthesized his master's ecstatic realizations 00:23:40.900 --> 00:23:44.960 into a cohesive modern philosophy. He created 00:23:44.960 --> 00:23:47.099 what's called Neo Vedanta. And in Ramakrishna's 00:23:47.099 --> 00:23:49.279 final days, there's this dramatic transfer of 00:23:49.279 --> 00:23:51.920 power. Yes. As he was dying of throat cancer, 00:23:52.019 --> 00:23:54.000 he formally transferred his spiritual powers 00:23:54.000 --> 00:23:57.440 to Vivekananda. He told him, keep my boys together 00:23:57.440 --> 00:24:00.660 and teach them. That small group of young monks 00:24:00.660 --> 00:24:03.170 became the seed of the Ramakrishna order. For 00:24:03.170 --> 00:24:04.670 someone who wants to get to the source of his 00:24:04.670 --> 00:24:07.009 teachings, it's the gospel of Sri Ramakrishna. 00:24:07.170 --> 00:24:09.390 What's the core message for the everyday person? 00:24:09.670 --> 00:24:13.049 The absolute core is that to realize God is the 00:24:13.049 --> 00:24:16.109 one goal in life. That's it. But he tailored 00:24:16.109 --> 00:24:19.190 the path. For his monks, he pushed them toward 00:24:19.190 --> 00:24:23.279 non -dual Advaita. But for householders? People 00:24:23.279 --> 00:24:26.079 with families and jobs, he recommended the bhakti 00:24:26.079 --> 00:24:29.180 path. The path of devotion. Yes. See God as your 00:24:29.180 --> 00:24:31.720 master and yourself as a servant. He had this 00:24:31.720 --> 00:24:34.339 great analogy for it. The sugar analogy. Exactly. 00:24:34.339 --> 00:24:37.160 The devotee of God wants to eat sugar and not 00:24:37.160 --> 00:24:40.099 to become sugar. Meaning they enjoy the sweetness 00:24:40.099 --> 00:24:42.619 of the relationship with God rather than completely 00:24:42.619 --> 00:24:45.359 merging and disappearing into the absolute. That's 00:24:45.359 --> 00:24:47.819 it. And the most practical, world -changing application 00:24:47.819 --> 00:24:49.980 of his teaching is what fuels the Ramakrishna 00:24:49.980 --> 00:24:55.139 mission to this day. Service as worship. which 00:24:55.139 --> 00:24:57.799 means not kindness or pity to living beings, 00:24:57.980 --> 00:25:00.240 but serving the living being as Shiva himself. 00:25:01.420 --> 00:25:04.319 Vivekananda took that and built a global philanthropic 00:25:04.319 --> 00:25:06.140 mission on it. Before we get to the critiques, 00:25:06.160 --> 00:25:08.480 I want to touch on his specific view of the modern 00:25:08.480 --> 00:25:10.740 work life that was emerging in Bengal under the 00:25:10.740 --> 00:25:14.339 British. He had a name for it, Chakri. low -paying 00:25:14.339 --> 00:25:18.119 clerical servitude. He saw it as profoundly corrupting 00:25:18.119 --> 00:25:21.700 and a huge roadblock to spirituality. Why? What 00:25:21.700 --> 00:25:24.519 was so bad about an office job? It was the clock, 00:25:24.599 --> 00:25:27.720 this rigid, impersonal European system of time. 00:25:27.799 --> 00:25:30.160 It forced people into this unnatural mechanical 00:25:30.160 --> 00:25:33.240 rhythm that he felt was completely at odds with 00:25:33.240 --> 00:25:35.640 the organic flow of spiritual life. So now we 00:25:35.640 --> 00:25:38.359 have to turn to the more controversial side of 00:25:38.359 --> 00:25:40.880 things, the psychoanalytic interpretations of 00:25:40.880 --> 00:25:43.309 his life. This really started when the writer 00:25:43.309 --> 00:25:45.769 Romaine Rowland described Ramakrishna's mystical 00:25:45.769 --> 00:25:48.769 states to Sigmund Freud as an oceanic sentiment. 00:25:49.009 --> 00:25:51.329 But later scholars took it much further. Yes. 00:25:51.609 --> 00:25:54.869 People like Sudhakar and, most famously, Jeffrey 00:25:54.869 --> 00:25:57.549 Kripal in his book Kali's Child, argued that 00:25:57.549 --> 00:26:00.069 Ramakrishna's intense visions and his famous 00:26:00.069 --> 00:26:02.710 aversion to women could be seen through a clinical 00:26:02.710 --> 00:26:05.509 lens. As symptoms of repressed homoeroticism. 00:26:05.690 --> 00:26:07.869 That was the core of Kripal's argument. It focused 00:26:07.869 --> 00:26:09.950 heavily on his teaching against Kamini Kanchana, 00:26:10.089 --> 00:26:12.569 which literally means women in gold. And Kripal's 00:26:12.569 --> 00:26:15.029 translation was key to his argument. It was. 00:26:15.109 --> 00:26:17.950 He translated it as lover in gold, suggesting 00:26:17.950 --> 00:26:20.309 it was a very personal psychological aversion 00:26:20.309 --> 00:26:23.049 to physical intimacy with women rather than a 00:26:23.049 --> 00:26:25.250 universal teaching against lust. And what was 00:26:25.250 --> 00:26:27.490 the response from the Ramakrishna order and other 00:26:27.490 --> 00:26:30.029 scholars? A very strong rebuttal. They argued 00:26:30.029 --> 00:26:32.750 it was a linguistic misconstruction. They said 00:26:32.750 --> 00:26:36.170 Ramakrishna used the word Kamini. woman, as a 00:26:36.170 --> 00:26:38.549 stand -in for lust in general, for attachment 00:26:38.549 --> 00:26:40.890 in the mind. And the sources show he taught this 00:26:40.890 --> 00:26:43.490 to women as well. They do. He warned his female 00:26:43.490 --> 00:26:45.650 disciples against Purusa Kanchana man in gold. 00:26:45.890 --> 00:26:48.109 So the argument is that the teaching was always 00:26:48.109 --> 00:26:51.029 universal, conquer lust and greed, whoever you 00:26:51.029 --> 00:26:53.789 are. And that tension remains. Is this divine 00:26:53.789 --> 00:26:56.470 grace or is it a unique and complex psychology? 00:26:56.890 --> 00:26:59.230 His legacy is big enough to contain both questions. 00:26:59.930 --> 00:27:02.509 So as we wrap up, we've traced this incredible 00:27:02.509 --> 00:27:05.589 journey of a man who was a true spiritual scientist. 00:27:06.009 --> 00:27:08.470 He validated the world's great spiritual paths, 00:27:08.589 --> 00:27:10.809 not in a library, but in the laboratory of his 00:27:10.809 --> 00:27:13.650 own body and mind. And that central synthesis, 00:27:13.829 --> 00:27:16.470 that's what we keep coming back to. His ability 00:27:16.470 --> 00:27:19.509 to just transcend the normal barriers of caste, 00:27:19.769 --> 00:27:22.829 of creed, of religious dogma, by actually living 00:27:22.829 --> 00:27:25.829 them. Intensely. It was a physical demonstration. 00:27:26.109 --> 00:27:28.589 He proved that the core experience, that God 00:27:28.589 --> 00:27:31.369 realization, was the same, whether he was approaching 00:27:31.369 --> 00:27:34.569 it as a Hindu, a Muslim, or a Christian. He gave 00:27:34.569 --> 00:27:37.130 experiential proof to that ancient Vedic saying, 00:27:37.369 --> 00:27:40.589 truth is one. The wise call it by many names. 00:27:40.950 --> 00:27:44.450 And yet, and this is so important, his universalism 00:27:44.450 --> 00:27:47.710 wasn't an invitation to just dabble. He was incredibly 00:27:47.710 --> 00:27:50.890 strict about focus. Absolutely. He told his followers, 00:27:51.009 --> 00:27:53.809 you must stick to one path with all your strength. 00:27:53.970 --> 00:27:55.650 He said you can get to the roof with stairs, 00:27:55.849 --> 00:27:58.309 a ladder, or a rope, but you can't get there 00:27:58.309 --> 00:27:59.970 if you're constantly jumping from one to the 00:27:59.970 --> 00:28:01.960 other. It's a balance between this incredibly 00:28:01.960 --> 00:28:05.019 broad vision and the need for deep, dedicated 00:28:05.019 --> 00:28:07.700 practice. And his whole life was this series 00:28:07.700 --> 00:28:10.180 of radical acts to conquer the internal self. 00:28:10.380 --> 00:28:13.240 The pride, the shame, cleaning toilets with his 00:28:13.240 --> 00:28:15.859 hair to kill his caste ego, living as a woman 00:28:15.859 --> 00:28:18.619 to kill his sexual identity. He sought the complete 00:28:18.619 --> 00:28:21.539 dissolution of the personal prideful self. Because 00:28:21.539 --> 00:28:23.960 he taught that the identity we build for ourselves, 00:28:24.299 --> 00:28:27.559 that's the biggest wall between us and that boundless 00:28:27.559 --> 00:28:29.720 sea of light he experienced. Which leaves us 00:28:29.720 --> 00:28:31.559 with the final provocative thought for you to 00:28:31.559 --> 00:28:34.680 take away. Ramakrishna's path of self -annihilation 00:28:34.680 --> 00:28:36.799 required him to break the social boundaries of 00:28:36.799 --> 00:28:40.400 his time. He performed these extreme self -effacing 00:28:40.400 --> 00:28:44.000 acts to dissolve his ego's attachments. So how 00:28:44.000 --> 00:28:46.279 does that principle translate into our modern 00:28:46.279 --> 00:28:48.740 secular world? If the goal is to dissolve the 00:28:48.740 --> 00:28:51.500 prideful personal identity, what scavenger tasks 00:28:51.500 --> 00:28:54.160 could one undertake today? What self -effacing 00:28:54.160 --> 00:28:56.500 acts could dissolve the identity ties that bind 00:28:56.500 --> 00:28:58.940 the modern self? Think about the pride we have 00:28:58.940 --> 00:29:00.880 in our social media profiles, our job titles, 00:29:00.980 --> 00:29:02.940 our political affairs. affiliations. If those 00:29:02.940 --> 00:29:04.720 are the things that separate us from a greater 00:29:04.720 --> 00:29:07.099 reality, what would it take to actually truly 00:29:07.099 --> 00:29:08.039 set them aside?