The phrase ‘cross-bearer’
comes from the New Testament of the Bible. Jesus Christ carried[1]
on his shoulders the heavy cross on which he was crucified. Since then the word
cross has come to symbolize suffering,
humiliation, and carrying the burden of human sufferings. Here the title refers
to the sufferings Swami Vivekananda had to undergo in his life; and an attempt
is being made to understand the significance of his struggles and conflicts-
both physical and mental.
Youth and
Discipleship:
Swami Vivekananda, then
Narendranath, experienced the first wave of inner struggle during his youth,
when his quest for Truth could not be satisfied by mere philosophies and
intellectualism, or by the devotional practices of the Brahmo-Samaj. This
search for the ultimate Truth became consuming fire- a question of life and
death for him; and it was this which made him rush one day unannounced into a
solitary retreat of Devendranath Tagore and ask pointedly: ‘Have you seen God?’
But this was only the
beginning of his ‘jarring and clashing life’,[2]
as the Swami himself labeled it. His father suddenly died when Narendranath was
still a college student, and then followed one of the most difficult periods of
his life. Being the eldest in the family, all the responsibility fell on his
shoulders. Relatives turned into enemies, sued him in the court, and tried to
snatch away a part of the ancestral property. He had to face dire poverty and
unemployment, so much so that it became difficult to make both ends meet. He
would often fast for two or three days at a stretch, and once he even fainted
due to hunger and fatigue by the roadside.
This economic crisis was
associated with psychological problems. His friends and relatives tried to
tempt him, and women to dissuade him from the idealistic way of life. Some of
them betrayed him, and even his nearest and dearest ones suspected his
character. And the worst of all, his
faith in God, a factor which had sustained him through all these tribulations,
was shaken.
Just when this hectic period
of physical and mental agonies was passing away, Sri Ramakrishna, his Guru, the
source of all his strength, solace and inspiration, the haven of his life, who
loved him more than even his parents, left the mortal coil, plunging the young
Narendranath further into an ocean of agony. He was left alone with the
responsibility of the whole Brotherhood.
The period following was
still worse. The Brotherhood shifted to a dilapidated house with cobras hissing
around, and lived a life so severe that even ghosts would have run away.
Narendranath’s mental state was correspondingly terrible, as he confessed in
one of his letters: ‘ I had to stand between my two worlds. On the one hand, I
would have to see my mother and brothers starve unto death; on the other, I
believed that this man’s [i.e his Master’s] ideals were for the good of India
As a Wandering
Monk:
Then followed the hard days
of wandering- the Parivrajaka life- about which he said: ‘…sometimes one meal
at nine in the evening, another time a meal at eight in the morning, another
after two days, another after three days- and always the poorest and roughest
thing….. and most of time walking, climbing snow peaks, sometimes ten miles of
hard mountain climbing, just to get a meal…. For months and months I existed
that way- of course it was telling on the health.’ [4]
Yes, during the Parivrajaka days Swamiji fell ill several times, and on one
occasion so seriously that he was almost dead.
Swamiji’s mind was by no
means calm. All through the Parivrajaka period he was torn between two opposite
urges, the one of retiring and remaining merged in the Absolute, and the other
his responsibility both to his brother-disciples and of doing something for the
degraded and spiritually sick masses of India
In America:
One would expect the end of
his trials and tribulations after going to the United States America North
America , he had not one friend. Further, he was rudely shocked
when he learnt that he had arrived too early for the Parliament, and that he
might not be admitted as a delegate for want of proper credentials.
It is, however, well known
how Swamiji became a world figure after his brilliant address on the first day
of the Parliament of Religions. But, on the very first night of his triumph he
wept like a child, for no longer would he remain the itinerant monk, no more
would there be the quiet, which of all things he loved most. It was to be
strenuous, ceaseless labour, involving terrible demands upon his time and
personality.
In the West Swamiji no longer
suffered from any material wants; but in spite of popularity, he was always
miserable, because his heart was bleeding for the down-trodden masses of India America
Swamiji’s outspokenness
aroused the bitter enmity of the Christian Missionaries and fanatic Christians,
who began to vilify him both openly and in private; and some of the Indian
delegates to Parliament also joined hands with them. Moreover, he had to face
more powerful enemies in the so-called free thinkers, including the atheists,
materialists, agnostics, rationalists, and scholars well-versed in Western
philosophy and science; and it was an uphill task for him to remove their
ignorance, superstition, and perverted ideals about religion in general, and
Hinduism in particular.
In the West, on three
different occasions he was almost in the jaws of death either due to the
malicious actions of his opponents or by accident. Once in America , an attempt was made to poison him;
while in England Alps , he almost slipped from a precipice
which would have meant instantaneous death.
The Days of
Hardships in India:
The period of two years which
Swamiji spent in India India
Nor was it easy for Swamiji
to convert his brother-disciples to his ideas. The difficulty he encountered in
convincing Swami Turiyananda to go the West can be cited as the best example:
Throwing his arms around Swami Turiyananda, Swamiji said weeping like a child:
‘Dear Haribhai, can’t you see me laying down my life inch by inch in fulfilling
this mission of my Master till I have come to the verge of death! Can you look
on without helping by relieving me of a part of my great burden?’[7]
Then the strenuous journey of
Amarnath in the year 1898, in the severe cold, and the curse of fakir in Kashmir resulted in permanently damaging his health: and
till the end of his life, he always suffered from asthma, diabetes, repeated
swelling of the feet, and so on.
Meditation on
Death:
But the climax of Swamiji’s
stormy life was reached one day in the second week of September 1898, when he
mediated upon the dark, the painful and the inscrutable aspect of the Reality,
upon Death itself. His whole fame shook, a world-destroying tempest raged
within him and he had the vision of Kali, the Mighty Destructress, the Terrible
One.
Over and above this, financial
difficulties in running the Organization constantly worried him. In addition,
the work in England
Significance of Suffering in Swamiji’s Life:
Thus the life of Swami Vivekananda was
one of continuous physical and mental sufferings. At no time during his whole
life was he altogether free from them.
Why should Swamiji, the foremost
disciple of Sri Ramakrishna, the incarnation of the age, suffer so much?
Swamiji himself has given the answer of this question. Speaking as a mystic,
Swamiji said: ‘That which Sri Ramakrishna called “Kali”, took possession of my
body and soul… That makes me work and work, and never lets me keep still or
look to my personal comfort.’[8]
Swamiji was a saint of the
highest order, and suffering in the life of saints is a sign of Divine grace
which God gives only to His choicest few. Swamiji said once: ‘Suffering is the
lot of the world’s best and bravest’[9],
and ‘ I may have had Divine help- true; but oh, the pound of blood every bit of
Divine help has been to me!!’[10]
According to Swamiji, ‘There
are two sorts of persons in the world. The one- strong nerved, quiet, yielding
to nature, not given to much imagination, yet good, kind, sweet, etc… they
alone are born to be happy. There are others again with high-strung nerves,
tremendously imaginative, with intense feeling…. For them there is no
happiness…[They] will have to run between ecstasy and misery.’[11]
And Swamiji was a person of this sort. Swamiji blamed his emotional nature for
his suffering: ‘My mistakes have been great; but every one of them was from too
much love. How I hate love! Would I never had any Bhakti!... my sister committed
suicide…. And that weak heart flung me off from that prospect of peace!’[12]
Apart from his temperament,
Swamiji seems to have had a liking for suffering. ‘It is a mistake to hold that
with all men pleasure is the motive. Quite as many are born to seek pain. There
can be bliss in torture, too.’[13]
‘In my sane moments I rejoice here; I am glad it is I, amongst others of
nature’s sacrifices.’[14]
There can be a deeper reason
for Swamiji’s sufferings. He was a Prophet, and to be able to deliver a message
of universal applicability it was essential for him to experience personally
various types of sufferings which human beings are liable to undergo. He was a
saviour, born to redeem humanity. ‘The Cross’ not only signifies suffering and
humiliation, but redemptive sacrifice also. Swamiji was born to bear the burden
of the heavily laden willingly, lovingly and voluntarily; and thus save it from
untold sufferings of this world. Sometimes during the last years of his life he
exclaimed: ‘…. may I be born again and again, and suffer thousands of miseries
so that I may worship the only God that exits, the only God I believe in, the
sum total of all souls- and above all, my God the wicked, my God the miserable,
my God the poor of all races, of all species, is the special object of my
worship.’[15]
And at another time he said: ‘Come ye that are heavy laden and lay all your
burden on me, and then do whatever you like and be happy and forge that I ever
existed.’[16]
A study of this aspect of
Swamiji’s life is significant in various ways: Firstly, it demonstrates that
both happiness and misery, good and evil are equally real, and according to
Swamiji, both are aspects of the Divine. He said, ‘Learn to recognize the
Mother as instinctively in evil, terror, sorrow and annihilation as in that
which makes for sweetness and joy![17]
Secondly, it shows that misery is a great teacher. ‘In studying the great
characters the world has produced,’ Swamiji says, ‘….it would be found that it
was misery that taught more than happiness, it was poverty that taught more
than wealth, it was blows that brought out their inner fire more than praise.’[18]
‘Disease and misfortune come to do us good in the long run, although at the
time we feel that we are submerged for ever.’[19]
‘[Suffering is the] discipline which breaks the dream [of the world]’[20]
Thirdly, it reveals that those who want to help mankind must have a large
heart, must learn to feel. ‘First, feel from the heart,’ Swamiji said::
‘…..Feel, therefore, my would-be reformers, my would-be patriots! Do you feel?.....
Does it make you restless? Does it make you sleepless? … Has it made you almost
mad?’[21]
And lastly, in the parting advice which Swamiji gave to his monastic disciples
on the eve of his leaving for the West for the second time in the June of 1899,
Swamiji characterized renunciation as ‘the love of death’. ‘Worldly people love
life. The Sannyasin is to love death…. We must die, that is certain; let us die
then for a good cause.’[22]
According to Swamiji, the grace of the Divine Mother comes to him alone, who
can love death. Aptly has he said:
“ Who
dares misery love,
And hug the form of Death.
Dance in
Destruction’s dance,
To him the Mother comes.[23]
[1] Cf, John
19:17
[2] Swami
Nikhilananda, Vivekananda: A Biography, Mayavati: Advaita Ashram, 1971, p. 302
[3] The
Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda, Mayavati: Advaita Ashrama (hereafter Com.
Works), VIII, 1971, p. 81
[4] Com.
Works, VIII, p. 84
[5]
His Eastern and Western Disciples, The Life of Swami Vivekananda, Mayavati:
Advaita Ashrama (hereafter Life), 1974, p. 282
[6] Com.
Works, VIII, p. 494
[7] Life, p.
646
[8] Life, p.
719
[9] Com.
Works, VI, 1972, p. 419
[10] Com.
Works, VI, p. 420
[11] Com.
Works, VIII, p. 390
[12] Com.
Works, VI, p. 420
[13] Life,
p. 597
[14] Com.
Works, VI, p. 419
[15] Com.
Works, V. 1973, p. 137
[16] Com.
Works, VII, 1972, p. 521
[17] Life,
p. 597
[18] Com.
Works, I, 1972, p. 27
[19] Letters
of Swami Vivekananda, Mayavati: Advaita
Ashrama, 1970, p. 416
[20] Com.
Works, VI, p. 419
[21] Com.
Works, III, 1973, p. 225-26.
[22] Com.
Works, III, p. 446
[23] Com.
Works, IV, p. 384.
