Philosophy of Education - 1
Education is the manifestation of the perfection already in man
Knowing is unveiling
Knowledge is inherent in man, no knowledge comes from outside; it is all inside. What we say a man 'knows' should, in strict psychological language, be what he 'discovers' by taking the cover off his own soul, which is a mine of infinite knowledge. We say Newton discovered gravitation. Was it sitting anywhere in a corner waiting for him? It was in his own mind; the time came and he found it out. All the knowledge that the world has ever received comes from the mind; the infinite library of the universe. The external world is simply a suggestion, the occasion, which sets you to study your own mind. The falling of an apple gave the suggestion to Newton, and he studied his own mind. He rearranged all the previous links of thought in his mind and discovered a new link among them, which we call the law of gravitation. It was not the apple nor in anything in the center of the earth.
All knowledge is within
All knowledge therefore, secular or spiritual, is in the human mind. In may cases it is not discovered, but remains covered, and when the covering is being slowly taken off, we say 'we are learning', and the advance of knowledge is made by the advance of this process of uncovering. The man from whom this veil is being lifted is the more knowing man; the man upon whom it lies thick is ignorant; and the man upon whim it has entirely gone is the all-knowing, omniscient. Like fire in a piece of flint, knowledge exists in the mind; suggestions is the friction which brings it out. What we call powers, secrets of nature and force are all within. All knowledge comes from the human soul.. man manifests knowledge, discovers it within himself, which is pre-existing, through eternity.
Infinite power is within the soul
No one was ever really taught by another. Each of us has to teach himself. The external teacher offers only the suggestion which makes the internal teacher to work and understand things. Then things will be made clearer to us by out own power of perception and thought, and we shall realize them in our own souls. The whole of the big banyan tree which covers acres of ground was in the little seed which was perhaps no bigger than one-eighth of a mustard seed. All that mass of energy was there confined. The gigantic intellect, we know, lies coiled up in the protoplasmic cell. It may seem like a paradox, but it is true. Each one of come out of one protoplasmic cell, and all the powers we possess were coiled up there. You cannot say they came from food, for if you heap up food mountains high, what power comes out of it? The energy was there, potentially no doubt, but still there. So is infinite power in the soul of the man whether he knows it or not. Its manifestation is only a question of being conscious of it.
Tuesday, 1 April 2008
Flashes from Swami Vivekananda - 4
Friday, 8 February 2008
Flashes from Swami Vivekananda - 4
Like a breeze from the Himalayas, it is bringing life into the almost dead bones and muscles, the lethargy us passing away, and only the blind cannot see, or the perverted will not see, that she is awakening, this motherland of ours, from her deep long sleep.
None can resist her any more; never is she going to sleep any more; no outward powers can hold her back any more; for the infinite giant is rising to her feet!
Tuesday, 15 January 2008
Flashes from Swami Vivekananda - 3
Today, the whole world is seeking for, is in need of, this kind of spiritual growth which releases that type of divine energy resource to match with, and to digest, the energy resources released by modern physical science and technology. The latter has annihilated physical distances between man and man, but the problem of annihilating the mental and emotional distances remains to be solved. On the other hand, that mental distance is increasing, not diminishing, in spite of scientific knowledge and technical power. This is revealed in the ever-increasing violence, crime and delinquency, even juvenile delinquency in all parts of the world.
What is the reason for highly disturbing social phenomena? Certainly, these are not physical maladies. Modern man has better physical bodies and health than in past ages, thanks to his knowledge of science of nutrition and his vastly improved techniques for increased food production. He is also immensely nourished mentally and intellectually compared to his predecessors, thanks to the explosive output of scientific knowledge; and yet, we find modern man getting increasingly alienated both from himself and from others. He is unhappy, tense, without peace, given often to inflicting violence on others or suicide on himself.
Swami Vivekananda spent four intense years in the West preaching Vedanta and helping to broaden and deepen its religion and inner-human relations. He saw the above tragic situation developing in his time, towards the end of the last century; and he warned of its intensification in the decades ahead, and emphasized the need of modern civilization to change its direction from human sensuality to human spirituality. And he preached the philosophy of Vedantic humanism, with the vision of infinite divine possibilities in man, and man's organic capacity to realize these in life. This is wisdom, this is the knowledge maturing into wisdom, that India developed in her ancient Upnishads and the Bhagvad Gita, which got retested and re-authenticated in succeeding ages by Buddha, Shankaracharya, Sri Ramakrishna, Swami Vivekananda and many other luminous sages, possessed of briliiant intellects and universal hearts. They never thought or taught in narrow terms of sects, creeds, nationalities or races. They saw man as man, saw his divine possibilities.
Extracted from Swami Vivekananda, his humanism: Moscow University Lecture by Swami Ranganathanandana
