What is Religion?

Realising Spirit as Spirit

Religion is the realisation of Spirit as Spirit; not Spirit as matter. 1

We already saw in the Jan 2019 issue how Swamiji describes religion as realization. This month, he is specifying it by saying that religion is the ‘realization of Spirit as Spirit’, and not the realization of Spirit as matter. Why would anyone attempt to realize Spirit as matter? Is it even possible? Ah, but it is! This is a recurrent theme in Swamiji’s lectures – this tendency in man to idealize the real. We saw last month Swamiji saying: ‘There are two tendencies in human nature: one to harmonize the ideal with the life, and the other to elevate the life to the ideal. It is a great thing to understand this, for the former tendency is the temptation of our lives’. 2

So, now the idea is clear: We all have the powerful tendency in us to realize the Spirit as matter. We shall overcome this tendency. Then what? Swamiji explains:

‘Religion is a growth. Each one must experience it himself. The Christians believe that Jesus Christ died to save man. With the Christians, it is belief in a doctrine, and this belief constitutes their salvation. With the Hindus, doctrine has nothing whatever to do with salvation. Each one may believe in whatever doctrine he likes; or in no doctrine. What difference does it make to you whether Jesus Christ lived at a certain time or not? What has it to do with you that Moses saw God in the burning bush? The fact that Moses saw God in the burning bush does not constitute your seeing Him, does it? If it does, then the fact that Moses ate is enough for you; you ought to stop eating. One is just as sensible as the other. Records of great spiritual men of the past do us no good whatever except that they urge us onward to do the same, to experience religion ourselves. Whatever Christ or Moses or anybody else did does not help us in the least, except to urge us on.

‘The truly spiritual see Spirit as Spirit, not as matter. Spirit as such can never become matter. Spirit is always the same, changeless, eternal. 3

‘Have you realized that you are spirit? When you say, ‘I do,’ what is meant by that – this lump of flesh called the body or the spirit, the infinite, ever blessed, effulgent, immortal? You may be the greatest philosopher, but as long as you have the idea that you are the body, you are no better than the little worm crawling under your foot! No excuse for you! So much the worse for you that you know all the philosophies and at the same time think you are the body! Body-gods; that is what you are! Is that religion?

‘Religion is the realization of spirit as spirit. What are we doing now? Just the opposite, realizing spirit as matter. Out of the immortal God

we manufacture death and matter, and out of dead dull matter we manufacture spirit. …

‘You believe in God. If you do, believe in the real God. “Thou art the man, thou the woman, thou the young man walking in the strength of youth, thou the old man tottering with his stick.” 4 Thou art weakness. Thou art fear. Thou art heaven, and Thou art hell. Thou art the serpent that would sting. Come thou as fear! Come thou as death! Come thou as misery!

‘All weakness, all bondage is imagination. Speak one word to it, it must vanish. Do not weaken! There is no other way out. Stand up and be strong! No fear. No superstition. Face the truth as it is! If death comes – that is the worst of our miseries – let it come! We are determined to die game. That is all the religion I know.’ 5

‘The power which works through the formative principles of every religion in every country is manifested in the forms of religion. Principles and books, certain rules and movements – standing up, sitting down – all these belong to the same category of worship. Spiritual worship becomes materialized in order that the majority of mankind can get hold of it. The vast majority of mankind in every country are never seen to worship spirit as spirit. It is not yet possible. I do not know if there ever will be a time when they can. How many thousands in this city are ready to worship God as spirit? Very few. They cannot;

they live in the senses. You have to give them cut and dried ideas. Tell them to do something physical: Stand up twenty times; sit down twenty times. They will understand that. Tell them to breathe in through one nostril and breathe out through the other. They will understand that. All this idealism about spirit they cannot accept at all. It is not their fault’. 6

In this connection, there is an interesting correspondence between Mary Hale and Swamiji. Mary Hale was one of the four daughters of the Hale Family that first hosted Swamiji when he came to Chicago to attend The World’s Parliament of Religions. This correspondence is interesting because it happened in the form of poems! Among other things, Mary Hale wrote to Swamiji:

The lines you sent to your sisters four

Be sure they’ll cherish evermore

For you have made them clearly see

The one main truth that ‘all is He’

Immediately, Swamiji replied:

Remember pray,

That God is true, all else is nothing,

This world’s a dream

Though true it seem,

And only truth is He the living!

The real me is none but He,

And never, never matter changing! 7

1) The Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda. [hereafter CW] Vol 6: Notes of class Talks &

Lectures – Spirit and Nature 2) CW. Vol 2: Practical Vedanta – Part I 3) CW. Vol 6: Spirit and Nature 4) Cf: Shvetashvatara Upanishad: IV: 3

References

5) CW. Vol 1: Lectures and Discourses: The Gita III 6) CW. Vol 6: Lectures and Discourses: Formal

Worship 7) CW. Vol 8: Writings: Poems: An Interesting

Correspondence