This article focuses on the metaphors employed by Swami Vivekananda. The aim was to explain otherwise abstruse philosophical principles within the Hindu school of thought, with especial emphasis on Swami Vivekananda’s version of
The last conference of the Society for the Study of Christian Spirituality (SSCS), hosted by the Spirituality Association of South Africa (SPIRASA) in May 2015, saw the confluence of many disparate ideas, philosophies and paradigms within the domain of Christian spirituality. I was pleasantly surprised to note that almost every paper read was very commensurable with the
As the different streams having their sources in different places all mingle their water in the sea, so, O Lord, the different paths which men take through different tendencies, various though they appear, crooked or straight, all lead to Thee. (CW-1:7)
When I visited the
Hence, the driving force behind Vivekananda’s teachings has always been premised on the idea of religious acceptance and points out that he is proud to ‘belong to a religion which has taught the world both tolerance and universal acceptance’ (CW-1:6). In the light of this, this article focuses on some of the metaphors used by Vivekananda to foster the spirit of interreligious harmony and then explores some of the metaphors used to drive home this point. The
This article will begin with a brief outline of Swami Vivekananda’s life and work, followed by a rudimentary outline of the theoretical framework upon which the analysis of the metaphors is based. The paradigm known as cognitive linguistics (CL) serves as the framework within which a specific theory of metaphor, known as conceptual metaphor theory (CMT), is used to understand the kinds of conceptualisations which Vivekananda employed. A brief summary of the themes found in Vivekananda’s
Swami Vivekananda was a disciple of the Bengali mystic Sri Ramakrishna Paramahamsa. Their lives have both been documented extensively (cf. Dhar
Research and interviews show that many Hindus revere Vivekananda as one of Hinduism’s greatest saints. Aside from the tomes of literature making this claim, the researcher has conducted interviews with monks based in Cape Town, Johannesburg and Durban (in South Africa), New York City (in the USA) and Shillong, Kanyakumari and Rishikesh (in India), all of whom agreed on this single point. One monk referred to him as ‘a dynamic world leader’, and another praises him for having given us ‘pearls of wisdom from the ancient scriptures’, for example.
The framework within which this research is embedded is commonly known as CMT, within the paradigm of CL.
One of the key contributions which CL has made to the field of language study is the emphasis on contextually relevant language use. CL introduced a usage-based approach to language study, meaning that authentic data became the focus of study; this marked a shift away from the type of ‘armchair linguistics’, where data were created and analysed using the researcher’s intuitions (Sampson
Regarding CMT, one of the novel claims made about metaphors is that they are conceptual in nature. This idea dates back to Aristotle, who pointed out that metaphor is ‘motivated by conceptual relations’ (Turner
In the context of religious discourse, ‘grace’ can be conceptualised as an instance of metaphorical nurturance within certain denominations of Christianity (Lakoff
It is therefore with the following assumption in mind, namely that when dealing with abstract philosophico-religious themes, the need for metaphorical language would be even greater than in language used in less abstract domains, that the current study is undertaken. Hence, Vivekananda does make ample use of metaphorical language, particularly related to the metaphorical frame of water (cf. Naicker
The methodology employed is based on a field known as corpus linguistics. In this case, the corpus comprised the
Behaviour of ‘ocean’, appearing 324 times in the
After the manual reading, words which seemed be behave metaphorically were searched for using a program called AntConc (Anthony
Likewise, relevant words were searched for and their metaphorical import was grouped into the themes outlined below, which were duly expounded upon.
Distribution of frames within the
In addition to the theme of religious harmony, other themes which emerged from the analysis included:
So the idea that
Prophets such as Jesus Christ are seen as waves, for example, so
An example of a conceptual metaphor within this theme is
Spiritual life is often conceptualised as a journey, so the
Vivekananda also conceptualised his own mission as a journey, hence the metaphor
It is documented that Vivekananda had numerous visions of Buddha during his days as a wandering monk (Dhar
The various aspects of Buddhism were addressed by Vivekananda in his talks on
This concludes a very superficial overview of the key themes.
What follows is a more detailed overview of metaphors found within the theme of religious harmony.
According to the Bible, ‘All streams flow into the sea, yet the sea is never full’.
Vivekananda uses various metaphors to illustrate the theme of religious harmony, not in the sense of tolerance, but in the sense that each religion has an instrument to play in the universal orchestra of Spirituality. An example of a conceptual metaphor within this theme is
The conceptual metaphor will first be listed, followed by examples of the metaphor from the corpus. Thereafter, the import of the metaphor will be expounded upon.
Example of
The religions are all good. A bubble of air in a glass of water strives to join with the mass of air without; in oil, vinegar and other materials of differing density its efforts are less or more retarded according to the liquid. (CW-3:283)
Vivekananda spoke of religious harmony on various occasions. In his opening speech at the World Parliament of Religions, he calls for harmony amongst all religions and uses another metaphor to illustrate his point:
The seed is put in the ground, and earth and air and water are placed around it. Does the seed become the earth; or the air, or the water? No. It becomes a plant, it develops after the law of its own growth, assimilates the air, the earth, and the water, converts them into plant substance, and grows into a plant. (CW-1:19)
Similar is the case with religion. The Christian is not to become a Hindu or a Buddhist, nor a Hindu or a Buddhist to become a Christian. But each must assimilate the spirit of the others and yet preserve his individuality and grow according to his own law of growth. (CW-1:19)
Just as a bubble seems to be striving to escape from the medium in which it finds itself, so too are people striving to escape from this world. To understand this point, one needs to understand the general belief in Eastern philosophy which sees the world as a trap, and because ‘[w]e have got ourselves caught in the trap’, it is up to us to ‘work out our freedom’ (CW-1:141). We come into this world because of previous desires which bind us, and therefore we find ourselves trapped in a world full of temptations, resulting in a cycle of births and deaths; if we die with attachments and desires for material gain, we are born again and again in the world until we are able to transcend these desires.
Hence, we are all, consciously or unconsciously, striving to escape this world. The first point to note is that the viscosity of the medium in which the bubble is trapped can be seen as directly proportional to the worldliness of the individual. People who are more sense-bound are like bubbles in a dense fluid medium, making it difficult for the bubble to reach the top. This shows that regardless of one’s belief system, what binds one to earth is simply one’s desires, which leads to suffering. When one’s desires are mitigated, the fluid medium becomes less viscous, making the bubble’s path an easier one.
The bubble reaching the top is seen as the bubble reaching its goal, and becoming free from the confines of the container. Because it is the container which houses the liquid which traps the bubble, the container (tacit in this metaphor) can be seen as the world or universe which acts as the receptacle for all this activity. We are in this world only because of our desires which result from, and result in, karma which binds us to the world, so just as the bubble tries to escape and is precluded from doing so by the fluid medium, so are we all striving for freedom from the container of the world – the method is dictated by one’s own belief system, and even if one has none, we are all moving in that direction regardless. The only problem is that by being ignorant of our goal (to escape and attain freedom), we often unknowingly make the fluid more viscous, making our escape more difficult. From a non-dualistic perspective, although the world is to be transcended, Vivekananda strongly advocated sympathy for the ‘ignorant and the poor’ (CW-1:18), which is why the
Examples of
[…] there has always been an undercurrent of thought; there have been always parties of men, philosophers, students of comparative religion who have tried and are still trying to bring about harmony in the midst of all these jarring and discordant sects. (CW-2:192)
Whirls and eddies occur only in a rushing, living stream. There are no whirlpools in stagnant, dead water. (CW-2:194)
The connotation is that of an underlying Force acting to unite the disparate beliefs of the world, despite the fact they are acting ostensibly with different aims in mind. Some religious traditions conceptualise their ‘current’ as the only one, and imply that by joining them, you will float effortlessly to God, like a river does to the ocean. When their mighty current is opposed by another, a whirlpool is formed, but invariably this will pass, and the stronger current will simply overpower the weaker one(s).
Vivekananda believes that this is not the correct way to view the roles of various cultures, traditions and religions. Rather, according to Vivekananda, we must accept that ‘if one religion is true, all others must be true’ (CW-1:184). He illustrates this principle in various ways, one by analogy to a hand: just as a hand requires five fingers, each with a different shape, and a different role, so too does the world require different philosophies with different ideologies to suit the temperaments, personalities and different (spiritual) evolutionary stages of the people in the world. If the whole world were to follow one ideology, and every person in the world had to start thinking uniformly, then that would be tantamount to death, and we would be nothing more than zombies.
A lively, vibrant, ‘stream’ with different ‘whirlpools’ needs to be encouraged; spiritual and intellectual life should be seen as such, and the different schools of thought should be seen as forming whirlpools which form the foundation of human activity, and should not be frowned upon. In this context, we can take certain forms of Free Masonry, paganism and Druidry as ‘sects’ which have almost died out (though that is debatable); these smaller ‘currents’, when they clashed with the ‘bigger currents’, were forced to merge, in a sense, though pockets still survive today. The more influential religions are like bigger, more powerful currents, all flowing vigorously.
Vivekananda believes that these smaller cults ought to stand the test of time, failing which they do not deserve to survive. Just as a river in the beginning may seem to not flow in unison, the closer it gets to the ocean, the more the different currents and different rivers seem to lose their differentiation – and of course once they are actually merged with the ocean, the streams, rivers, whirlpools and currents all ‘disappear’, and all discussions of differences between them become vacuous and fatuous.
Examples of
Such was the psychological area, such the sea of mind, young, tumultuous, overflowing with its own energy and self-assurance, yet inquisitive and alert withal, which confronted Vivekananda when he rose to speak. Behind him, on the contrary, lay an ocean, calm with long ages of spiritual development. (CW-1:2)
These, then, were the two mind-floods, two immense rivers of thought, as it were, Eastern and modern, of which the yellow-clad wanderer on the platform of the Parliament of Religions formed for a moment the point of confluence. (CW-1:2)
But their time is come; and I fervently hope that the bell that tolled this morning in honour of this convention may be the death-knell of all fanaticism, of all persecutions with the sword or with the pen, and of all uncharitable feelings between persons wending their way to the same goal. (CW-1:2)
I am a Hindu. I am sitting in my own little well and thinking that the whole world is my little well. The Christian sits in his little well and thinks the whole world is his well. The Mohammedan sits in his little well and thinks that is the whole world. (CW-1:8)
A river flows in a certain direction; and if you direct the course into a regular channel, the current becomes more rapid and the force is increased, but try to divert it from its proper course, and you will see the result; the volume as well as the force will be lessened. (CW-3:207)
[…] varied religions are symbolised as the differently formed vessels with which different men came to bring water from a spring. The forms of the vessels are many, but the water of truth is what all seek to fill their vessels with. (CW-3:276)
Vivekananda on various occasions spoke of religious harmony and was very passionate about this subtheme because in many ways it has been religious bigotry that has torn India apart at various times in its history. Furthermore, many battles have been fought around the world on religious grounds; though it is debatable as to what role exactly religion has played in these fights, it is clear that religion was often (mis)used as the ostensible excuse, whether justified or not. For this reason, Vivekananda was very passionate about this particular theme, and it is no wonder that he addressed it on his very first public lecture, debuting on 11th September 1893 in a historic speech at the
When Vivekananda first addressed a public audience, he was faced with a very imposing task. He was alone, in the sense that he had no ‘friends’, and furthermore, he was the only representative who did not come on behalf of any organisation – the worldwide organisation which he founded was formed much later. Furthermore, the gathering had a very Anglo-centric undertone attached to it, and many came there with missionary zeal. This zeal is conceptualised as a ‘sea’ of people who were ‘overflowing’ with enthusiasm to propagate their agenda.
Every major belief system in the world was represented there, and each saw it as their duty to present to this elite audience the crux of their respective belief systems. Vivekananda therefore had a rather daunting task. Vivekananda broke convention by pointing out that Hinduism is an all-embracing religion, which sees all other religions as not simply to be
Vivekananda justifies his all-embracing philosophy on Vedantic tenets, one of which is the notion of One-ness, which claims that this phenomenal world is nothing more than a manifestation of an underlying, unified consciousness; it is expected that there should be variety amid this manifestation, and various religious belief systems are amongst the things that make the world interesting. Ramakrishna was even more all-embracing and pointed out on more than one occasion that we should never condemn another’s way of life, and used a now well-known metaphor, saying that we can all enter the house of God through any entrance: whether we use the front door, the back door or the toilet door, all can enjoy being inside once there. The metaphor of the various rivers having different sources, yet all flowing towards the same ocean serves the same purpose. Although one river may flow more vigorously (which can be seen as analogous to a righteous person making quick spiritual progress), the one flowing at a slower rate will still get to the same place with the same results (as would be the case with someone who does not lead a particularly righteous life). The river itself can be seen as a set of beliefs, and the water flowing inside can be seen as the followers of that particular religion. A river which flows slower, and is shallower than others, can be seen as a path which is less conducive to spiritual progress in the sense that its followers take longer to progress. Such a river can be seen as another religion, or as a sect within Hinduism itself.
Should a river stop flowing, what would happen is that the water would evaporate and still eventually re-join the ocean, either by joining a river again, or by going straight to the ocean by another means – the water cycle, then, fits in nicely to the Vedanta’s cyclic conception of life.
Cults which are of recent origin will be like a shallow river which has a newly formed channel in which to run. If such a river flows too slowly, the water will merely evaporate before it reaches the ocean; unless this river merges itself with another river which is already flowing in an established channel.
The concept of evil can be metaphorically construed as a section of the river going off track, and perhaps forming a stagnant pool of water on the side of the river. All the water following this path will simply not progress, and will eventually evaporate and have to come back down in the form of rain to re-join another river. This is analogous to a wrong-doer dying without having gotten closer to the ‘ocean’, and the point at which he re-enters the ‘river’ will be governed by the kinds of actions he undertook when he deviated from the ‘river’. This alludes to the Eastern doctrine of karma where actions have an effect on one’s future. Good actions assist in expediting one’s journey by incurring positive karma, whereas harmful actions set one back on that journey – so one can imagine that person as setting himself back, having to join the river again at a much earlier stage of its course. Ultimately, it is people who make the religion what it is, and there is no such thing as religion-in-itself, for Vivekananda. The fact that people visit holy places with a certain mind-set, and pray and meditate in a certain way when they get there, is what makes that place holy. The longer this goes on for, and the more people who do this, the more powerful these vibrations become: ‘their holiness depends on holy people congregating there’, and it follows from this that ‘[i]f the wicked only were to go there, it would become as bad as any other place’ (CW-1:142).
Trying to divert a river into a new course altogether will be like trying to convert a whole group of people into another religion. This was largely the aim of the missionaries in India, and Vivekananda was very critical of them, and always pointed out that it can scarcely be a coincidence that throughout history, such efforts were almost always preceded by military intervention, with all its concomitant horrors. This is why Vivekananda referred to the world being at times ‘deluged’ in blood resulting from these types of things (as well as religious wars such as the crusades and the Islamic invasions of central and north Africa). That being said, he was also quick to point out that the ‘river’ of Hinduism never dried up, and even though it may have seemed to, it always burst forth with renewed vigour.
The deeper the channel in which a river flows, it follows that it would be able to hold a greater volume of water, and it would take a lot more effort to re-direct the flow of water into another channel, or for this particular river to dry up. Likewise, he pointed out the illogic in trying to convert the people of India, who have an established belief system which works for them. Furthermore, in trying to re-route a river which has been gushing along its own path for so long, it would take a lot of work, and it is more likely to sweep you off your feet and take you along with it – as happened with the two well-known scholars cited above, who were amongst those who were ‘swept off their feet’ with the current of Hindu thought.
Ultimately the call for unity amongst various religions is premised on the belief ‘religion is only evolving a God out of the material man, and the same God is the inspirer of all of them’, and furthermore, though these traditions seem to adhere to mutually exclusive tenets, the ostensible contradictions simply ‘come from the same truth adapting itself to the varying circumstances of different natures’ (CW-1:15).
Vivekananda drives home the point of religious harmony by saying that:
in relative perception, truth always appears various. But the Absolute Truth is only one. Therefore we need not fight with others when we find [… them saying] something about religion which is not exactly according to our view of it. We ought to remember that both views may be true, though apparently contradictory. There may be millions of radii converging towards the same centre in the sun. The further they are from the centre, the greater is the distance between any two. But as they all meet at the centre, all difference vanishes. There is such a centre, which is the absolute goal of mankind. It is God. We are the radii. The distances between the radii are the constitutional limitations through which alone we can catch the vision of God. While standing on this plane, we are bound each one of us to have a different view of the Absolute Reality; and as such, all views are true, and no one of us need quarrel with another. (CW-4:29)
Vivekananda addressed, more often than not, a primarily Christian audience while in the West. As such, he was always sensitive to that fact, and actually never sought to proselytise anyone, premised on the philosophy of universal acceptance. It is recorded that upon the first day of commencing discourses at the Thousand Island Park, that:
He came on this first morning with the Bible in his hand and opened to the Book of John, saying that since we were all Christians, it was proper that he should begin with the Christian scriptures. (CW7:1)
After expounding upon the Bible from a Christian perspective, however, he would always tie it back to the
Vivekananda had great reverence for Jesus Christ and would often compare him to a giant wave; his advent is seen as necessary to wash away the ‘dross’ of ritualism which was so rife at the time – paving the way for a new era:
This concentrated energy amongst the Jewish race found its expression at the next period in the rise of Christianity. The gathered streams collected into a body. Gradually, all the little streams joined together, and became a surging wave on the top of which we find standing out the character of Jesus of Nazareth. (CW-4:78)
In fact, an electronic search revealed that there are a total of 553 references to Jesus Christ alone in the
Both Vivekananda and his Master, Sri Ramakrishna, have been praised by the Catholic saint and mystic Thomas Merton for their philosophy of universalism and drive for harmony amongst the religions of the world (Merton
An interesting parallel can also be drawn between St. John of the Cross’ the well-known
The Bible says in Genesis: ‘The Lord God formed man out of the dust of the ground and breathing into his nostrils the breath of life, he became a living soul’.
Likewise, the parallels to be drawn between Christian spiritualism and Hindu thought are many indeed, as what is mentioned here is simply the tip of the iceberg for illustrative purposes.
This article introduced Vivekananda, and explained how an analysis of his metaphorical language was done under various themes within the theoretical framework of CL and CMT, focusing more on three specific metaphors within the theme of
It is evident, then, that Vivekananda’s teachings in particular, and Eastern spirituality generally, is quite commensurable with Christian spirituality, and a more in-depth study of the parallels between Occidental and Oriental spiritual thought will yield very interesting insights. Allusions made at the end of the last section could be a starting point, because a more in-depth analysis is beyond the scope of this article.
The author would like to thank Celia Kourie and Pieter de Villiers for their support and mentoring.
The author declares that he has no financial or personal relationships which may have inappropriately influenced him in writing this article.
See, for example, papers such as Kurian Perumpallikunnel, ‘From holiness to wholeness’, and Kobus Kruger, ‘Love in Context’ (papers presented at the Bi-annual Meeting of the Society for the Study of Christian Spirituality, Johannesburg, South Africa 22 May 2015).
For ease of reference, ‘CW-1:7’ will refer to ‘
Swami Vimalananda, interview by author, Rishikesh, India, August 24, 2015.
Interviews by author with monks in Cape Town and Johannesburg, South Africa, during fieldwork in 2014.
Data presented here is original research done by the author and presented here for the first time (
Ecclesiastes 1:7
Genesis 14:13
Mundaka Upanishad (3.2.8), meaning the third ‘
Holy Koran, Surah 47:15.
Genesis 2:10.