SUPPLEMENT ONE:

Sivananda and Omkarananda:

Divine Flower and Divine Fragrance

 

 

SIVANANDA'S whole merit stands revealed in this volume.... Today, the burning problem is constituted by the arguments advanced by materialism, mechanism, positivism, and a narrow-minded evolutionary theory. Recently, I spent a week at the Congress and the International Institute of Philosophy, and observed how these tendencies dominate not only the philosophy of Communism, but also the thoughts of many Western thinkers. To this, Sivananda's philosophy, its fundamentals and its application, as shown by Swami Omkarananda, are a powerful counter-balance, and we are in full agreement with it... In my capacity as the President of the Swiss Philosophical Society, a body of which representatives of the philosophical faculties of the Universities of Geneva, Lausanne, Neuchatel, Bern, Basel, Zurich and Fribourg, are members, and in my capacity as President of the International Parapsychological Society, and Member of other scientific unions, I feel competent to pronounce an opinion.... I have read a few of Swami Sivananda's works. But I confess that only after I had perused the first tome of the great synthesising work in three volumes by Swami Omkarananda, my eyes were fully opened to the true greatness and significance of the scholar, scientist, sage and teacher Sivananda. The comparisons Omkarananda draws between Sivananda and Plato, Kant, Leibniz, Schleiermacher and other philosophers, are very important for a better understanding between East and West. Dr. Gebhard Frei, Professor of Comparative Religion, UNIVERSITY OF ZURICH, Switzerland.

OMKARANANDA commands the intellectual energy, literary skill, spiritual brilliance and cultural background needed to answer most of the modern challenges. Dr. Edward de Betterncourt, M.A., Ph.D., D.Litt., UNIVERSITY OF SANTIAGO, South America.

THIS young sage of India, Swami Omkarananda, owns a nature characterised by transcendental tenderness, commands a wisdom beyond his years, is too highly educated for his age, and astonishes the American elite as much by his culture of the highest order as by his genius for classical literary expression in all its multiple form. Providence has, me thinks, endowed him with every excellence that entitle him to World's Presidentship. He has a valuable message for our civilization. Dr. Florence la Fontaine, Ph.D., D. Litt., INDIANA, U.S.A.

SIVANANDA'S works are profound and deeply inspiring. It has often been disputed that inspiring material of the type composed by Sivananda and his disciples is not amenable to scholastic research. This I have found to be untrue; for, such works as those of His Holiness are, in themselves, what scholars in this country call primary source material". Swami Agehananda Bharati (Professor Dr. Leopold Fischer of Vienna), UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON and SYRACUSE UNIVERSITY, NEW YORK, U.S.A.

AN ENORMOUS and wonderful work that overwhelms us with excellent philosophical knowledge, and keeps us reflecting over the extraordinary zeal, the unusual power of memory, the able survey, the deep insight and intuition, and the analysing and synthesising capacities such a work demands. Omkarananda's versatile philosophic genius, we admire not as his personal attribute, but as a manifestation of God, as an all-penetrating light of the Truth, and as an expression of Cosmic Vision. The work will be continued to be studied for centuries. .... A magnificent service to humanity as a whole. Hanna Herrmann, Winterthur, Switzerland.

Swami Omkarananda is a whole culture in himself, a culture which might be a real alternative to our own Western narrow world-view. His statements <about himself and on meditation> are genuine utterings of a real Guru whose God-given Mission (also Sivananda says, Guru is one who is sent by God) is to bring to the people the light, the truth, the peace and the joy which he himself IS. .... This Source-Book <Sivananda Literature Volume One> is an intellectual and literary achievement, to which no one can withhold either his admiration or his recognition of its value. Professor Dr. Carl-A. Keller, UNIVERSITY OF LAUSANNE & UNIVERSITY OF NEUCHATEL, Switzerland.

This wonderful treatise is an eternal monument splendid and stupendous. What sweetness is to sugar and what fragrance is to a flower, Swami Omkarananda is to Swami Sivananda; because, the former is as wonderful as the latter. The "Call Divine", Madras, India.

Four times, I got a Professorship at the Tamagawa University in Tokyo, Japan, and taught also in USA and in India. I have known the writings of Swami Omkarananda since a long time. They reach the people of all continents in many languages. I had the opportunity to meet him and his Ashram inmates personally. My impression was confirmed: Here is a man who serves and works from a high 'and powerful' spiritual vision and with all-embracing goodness for the well-being of all peoples and all nations, without any personal interest, a truly uplifting example of selflessness. Professor Dr. h.c. Werner Zimmermann, Zurich, Switzerland.

It is known that Swami Omkarananda possesses the power of an extraordinary radiation and his activities are recognized by Swiss and foreign University Professors. His institution is a school of a high spiritual order. Dr. Nello Celio, late President of the Federal Council, Federal Government of Switzerland.

Swami Omkarananda's mission is to show us new ways in the contemporary world, and to explain to us the ancient wisdom in modern language. For, on the one hand he knows the traditions of his native country India, and on the other hand, he reveals to us the beauty and the wisdom of Jesus Christ's teachings again and again, which were misunderstood and neglected too often in the Occident. Moreover, his knowledge of modern sciences is surprising. Already these capacities qualify Swami Omkarananda to be counted among the most important of the celebrated Swiss personalities as J.H. Pestalozzi, H. Dunant, C.G. Jung. Dr. Ing. H. de Witt, Physicist, Switzerland.

 

 

Continuation

 

 

Home Contents H.T. Question 1 H.T. Question 2 H.T. Question 3 H.T. Question 4 H.T. Question 5 H.T. Question 6 H.T. Question 7 H.T. Question 8 H.T. Question 9 H.T. Question 10 H.T. Question 11 Supplement One Supplement TwoSupplement ThreeSupplement Four