The History of Isha Messiah-Jesus the Christ [16]
The Christ of India - Swami Nirmalananda Giri
Isha's life in India
Among the Essenes of Israel at the threshold of the Christian Era,
none were better known or respected than Joachim and Anna of
Nazareth. Joachim was noted for his great piety, wealth, and
charity. The richest man in Israel, his practice was to divide his
increase into thirds, giving one third to the temples of Carmel and
Jerusalem and one third to the poor, keeping only one third for
himself. Anna was renowned as a prophetess and teacher among the
Essenes. Their daughter Mary [Miryam], who had been conceived
miraculously beneath the Holy of Holies of the Temple, had passed
thirteen years of Her life as a Temple Virgin until her espousal to
Joseph of Nazareth. Before their marriage was performed, She was
discovered to have conceived supernaturally, and in time She gave
birth to a Son in a cave of Bethlehem. His given name was Jesus
(Yeshua in Aramaic and Yahoshua in Hebrew).
This Son of Miryam was as miraculous as His Mother, and astounding
wonders were worked and manifested daily in His life-for the
preservation of which His parents took Him into Egypt for some years
where they lived with the various Essene communities there. But
before that flight, when the Child had been about three years old,
sages from India17 had come to pay Him homage and to establish a
link of communication with Him, for His destiny was to live most of
His life with them in the land of Eternal Dharma before returning to
Israel as a messenger of the very illumination that had originally
been at the heart of the Essene order. Through the intermediary of
merchants and travellers both to and from India, contact was
maintained with their destined Disciple.
At the age of twelve, during the Passover observances on Mount
Carmel (not in Jerusalem), Jesus petitioned the elders of the
Essenes for initiation-something bestowed only on adults after
careful instruction and scrutiny. Because of His well-known
supernatural character, the elders examined Him before all those
present. Not only could He answer all their questions perfectly,
when the examination was ended He began to examine them, putting to
them questions and statements that were utterly beyond their
comprehension. In this way He demonstrated that the Essene order had
nothing whatever to teach Him, and that there was no need for Him to
undergo any initiation or instruction from them.
Upon His return to Nazareth preparations were begun for His
journeying into India to formally become a disciple of those Masters
who had come to Him nine years before. The necessary preliminaries
took something more than a year, but sometime between the age of
thirteen or fourteen,18 Jesus of Nazareth set forth on a spiritual
pilgrimage that would transform Jesus the Nazarene into Isha the
Lord, the Teacher of Dharma and Messiah of Israel.
The spiritual training of Jesus
In the Himalayan fastnesses Jesus was instructed in yoga and the
highest spiritual life, receiving the spiritual name"Isha," which
means Lord, Master, or Ruler, a descriptive title often applied to
God, as in the Isha Upanishad. Isha is also a particular title of
Shiva.19
The worship of Shiva centered in the form of the natural elliptical
stone known as the Shiva Linga (Symbol of Shiva) was a part of the
spiritual heritage of Jesus, for His ancestor Abraham, the father of
the Hebrew nation, was a worshiper of that form. The Linga which he
worshipped is today enshrined in Mecca within the Kaaba. The stone,
which is black in color, is said to have been given to Abraham by
the Archangel Gabriel, who instructed him in its worship.
Such worship did not end with Abraham, but was practiced by his
grandson Jacob, as is shown in the twenty-eighth chapter of Genesis.
Unwittingly, because of the dark, Jacob used a Shiva Linga for a
pillow and consequently had a vision of Shiva standing above the
Linga which was symbolically seen as a ladder to heaven by means of
which devas (shining ones) were coming and going. Recalling the
devotion of Abraham and Isaac, Shiva spoke to Jacob and blessed him
to be an ancestor of the Messiah. Upon awakening, Jacob declared
that God was in that place though he had not realized it. The light
of dawn revealed to him that his pillow had been a Shiva Linga, so
he set it upright and worshipped it with an oil bath, as is
traditional in the worship of Shiva, naming it (not the place)
Bethel: the Dwelling of God. (In another account in the thirty-fifth
chapter, it is said that Jacob “poured a drink offering thereon, and
he poured oil thereon.” This, too, is traditional, both milk and
honey-which Shiva promised Moses would flow abundantly in Israel-
being poured over the Linga as offerings.) From thenceforth that
place became a place of pilgrimage and worship of Shiva in the form
of the Linga stone. Later Jacob had another vision of Shiva, Who
told him: "I am the God of Bethel, where thou anointedst the pillar,
and where thou vowedst a vow unto me.”20 A perusal of the Old
Testament will reveal that Bethel was the spiritual center for the
descendants of Jacob, even above Jerusalem.
Although this tradition of Shiva [Linga] worship has faded from the
memory of the Jews and Christians, in the nineteenth century it was
evidenced in the life of the stigmatic Anna Catherine Emmerich, an
Augustinian Roman Catholic nun. On several occasions when she was
deathly ill, angelic beings brought her crystal Shiva Lingas which
they had her worship by pouring water over them. When she drank that
water she would be perfectly cured. Furthermore, on major Christian
holy days she would have out-of-body experience in which she would
be taken to Hardwar, a city sacred to Shiva in the foothills of the
Himalayas, and from there to Mount Kailash, the traditional abode of
Shiva, which she said was the spiritual heart of the world.
Isha's life in India
For the next few years the Himalayas became Jesus' well-travelled
home. During part of that time Jesus meditated in a cave north of
the present-day city of Rishikesh, one of the most sacred locales of
India, and also on the banks of the Ganges in the holy city of
Hardwar. In the years He spent in the Himalayas, He attained the
supreme heights of spiritual realization.
Having attained perfect inner wisdom in the Himalayas, Jesus
journeyed to the Gangetic plain to engage in the formal study that
would prepare Him for the public teaching of Sanatana Dharma both in
India and in the countries between India and Israel as well as in
Israel itself.
First he went to live in Benares, the spiritual heart of India, the
city most consecrated to the worship of Shiva and the major center
of Vedic learning in all of India. During His time in the Himalayas,
Jesus' endeavors had been centered almost exclusively on the
practice of yoga. In Benares Jesus engaged in intense study of the
spiritual teachings embodied in the Vedic scriptures-especially the
books of spiritual philosophy known as the Upanishads.
He then journeyed to the sacred city of Jagannath Puri, which at
that time was a great center of the worship of Shiva, second only to
Benares. In Puri Jesus officially adopted the monastic life and
lived some time as a member of the Govardhan Math,21 the monastery
founded three centuries before His birth by the foremost philosopher-
saint of India known as Adi Shankaracharya.22 There He perfected the
synthesis of yoga, philosophy, and renunciation, and eventually
began to publicly teach the Eternal Knowledge.
As a teacher Jesus was as popular as He was proficient in teaching,
and gained great notoriety among all levels of society. However,
because He insisted that all men should learn and be taught the
meaning of the Vedas and their allied scriptures and began teaching
the"lower"castes accordingly, as well as teaching that all could
attain spiritual perfection without the intermediary of external,
ritualized religion, He incurred the hatred of many
religious “professionals” in Puri who began to plot His death.
Since "His hour was not yet come,"23 He left Puri and returned to
the Himalayas where He again spent quite some time in meditation,
preparing Himself for His return to Israel. He also lived in various
Buddhist monasteries in the Himalayan region, studying the wisdom of
the Buddha.
Before beginning the long journey westward, instructions were given
Him regarding His mission in the West and the way messages could be
sent between Jesus and His Indian teachers. Jesus was aware of the
form and purpose of His life and death from His very birth, but it
was the Indian Masters who made everything clear to Him regarding
them. They promised Jesus that He would be sent a container of
Himalayan Balsam to be poured upon His head by a close disciple as a
sign that His death was imminent, even “at the door.” When Saint
Mary Magdalene performed this action in Bethany, Jesus understood
the unspoken message, saying: “She is come aforehand to anoint my
body to the burying.”24
Return to the West
Jesus then set forth on His return journey to Israel with the
blessings of the Masters to thenceforth be a Dharmacharya,25 a
missionary of Arya Dharma to the Mediterranean world, which at that
time was “The West.” All along His way, Jesus taught those who were
drawn to His spiritual magnetism and who sought His counsel in the
divine life. He promised that after some years He would be sending
them one of His disciples who would give them even more knowledge
and benefit.
Arriving in Israel, Jesus went directly to the Jordan where his
cousin John, the Master of the Essenes, was baptizing. There His
Christhood was revealed to John and those who had “the eyes to see
and the ears to hear.”26 In this way His brief mission to Israel was
begun. Its progress and conclusion are well known, so we need not
recount it here except to rectify one point after the next section.
Misunderstanding becomes a religion
Throughout the Gospels we see that the disciples of Jesus
consistently misunderstood his speaking of higher spiritual matters.
When he spoke of the sword of wisdom they showed him swords of metal
to assure him they were well equipped.27 When he warned them against
the"leaven"of the Scribes and Pharisees they thought he was
complaining that they did not have any bread.28 Is it any wonder,
then that he said to them: "Perceive ye not yet, neither understand?
have ye your heart yet hardened? Having eyes, see ye not? and having
ears, hear ye not? How is it that ye do not understand?”29 Even in
the moment of his final departure from them, their words showed that
they still believed the kingdom of God was an earthly political
entity and not the realm of spirit.30 This being so, the Gospels
themselves must be approached with grave caution and with the
awareness that Jesus was not the creator of a new religion, but a
messenger of the Sanatana Dharma, the Eternal Religion he had
learned in India. As a priest of the Saint Thomas Christian Church
of South India once commented to me: “You cannot understand the
teachings of Jesus if you do not know the scriptures of India.” And
if you do know the scriptures of India you can see where-however
well-intentioned they may have been-the authors of the Gospels often
completely missed the point and garbled the words and ideas they
heard from Jesus, even attributing to him incidents from the life of
Buddha (such as the Widow's Mite) and mistaking his quotations from
the Upanishads, the Bhagavad Gita and the Dhammapada for doctrines
original to him. For example, the opening verse of the Gospel of
John, which has been cited through the centuries as proof of the
unique character and mission of Jesus, is really a paraphrase of the
Vedic verse: “In the beginning was Prajapati, with Him was the Word,
and the Word was truly the Supreme Brahman.”31 Having confused
Christ with Jesus, things could only go downhill for them and their
followers until the true Gospel of Christ was buried beneath two
millennia of confusion and theological debris.
Return to India-not ascension
It is generally supposed that at the end of His ministry in Israel
Jesus ascended into heaven. But Saint Matthew and Saint John, the
two Evangelists that were eye-witnesses of His departure, do not
even mention such a thing, for they knew that He went to India after
departing from them. Saint Mark and Saint Luke, who were not there,
simply speak of Jesus being taken up into the heavens. The truth is
that He departed into India, though it is not unlikely that He did
rise up and "fly" there. This form of travel is not unknown to the
Indian yogis.
That Jesus did not leave the world at the age of thirty-three was
written about by Saint Irenaeus of Lyon in the second century. He
claimed that Jesus lived to be fifty or more years old before
leaving the earth, though he also said that Jesus was crucified at
the age of thirty-three. This would mean that Jesus lived twenty
years after the crucifixion. This assertion of Saint Irenaeus has
puzzled Christian scholars for centuries, but if we put it together
with other traditions it becomes comprehensible. Basilides of
Alexandria, Mani of Persia, and Julian the Emperor said that Jesus
had gone to India after His crucifixion.
Some Buddhist historical records about Jesus
A contemporary written record of the life and teachings of Jesus in
India was discovered in 1887 by the Russian traveler Nicholas
Notovitch during his wanderings in Ladakh. He had it translated from
the Tibetan text (the original, kept in the Marbour monastery near
Lhasa, was in Pali) and, despite intense opposition from Christians
in Russia and Europe, published it in his book The Unknown Life of
Jesus Christ.32
As would be expected, the authenticity of Notovitch's book was
attacked33 and various articles written claiming that the monks of
the Himis monastery, where Notovitch had found the manuscript, told
investigators that they knew nothing of Notovitch or the text. But
both Swami Abhedananda and Swami Trigunatitananda-direct disciples
of Sri Ramakrishna34 and preachers of Vedanta35 in America-went at
separate times to the Himis monastery. The monks there not only
assured them that Notovitch had spent some time in the monastery as
he claimed, they also showed them the manuscript-part of which they
translated for Swami Abhedananda, who knew from having read
Notovitch's book that it was indeed the same writing found in The
Unknown Life of Jesus Christ. Subsequently, Abhedananda had the
English translation of Notovitch's text printed in India where the
Christian authorities had until then prohibited both its publication
or its importation and sale.
Swami Trigunatitananda not only saw the manuscript in Himis, he also
was shown two paintings of Jesus. One was a depiction of His
conversation with the Samaritan Woman at the well. The other was of
Jesus meditating in the Himalayan forest surrounded by wild beasts
that were tamed by His very presence. A copy made from his
description is reproduced on the cover of this booklet.
Later, Dr. Nicholas Roerich, the renowned scholar, philosopher,
artist, and explorer, traveled in Ladakh and also was shown the
manuscript and assured by the monks that Jesus had indeed lived in
several Buddhist monasteries during His “lost years.”He wrote about
his own viewing of the scrolls in his book The Heart of Asia.
In 1921 the Himis monastery was visited by Henrietta Merrick who, in
her book In the World's Attic tells of learning about the records of
Jesus' life that were kept there. She wrote: “In Leh is the legend
of Jesus who is called Issa, and the Monastery at Himis holds
precious documents fifteen hundred years old which tell of the days
that he passed in Leh where he was joyously received and where he
preached.”
In 1939 Elizabeth Caspari visited the Himis monastery. The Abbot
showed her some scrolls, which he allowed her to examine,
saying: “These books say your Jesus was here.”
Robert Ravicz, a former professor of anthropology at California
State University at Northridge, visited Himis in 1975. A Ladakh
physician he met there spoke of Jesus' having been there during
His “lost years.”
In the late 1970's Edward Noack, author of Amidst Ice and Nomads in
High Asia, and his wife visited the Himis monastery. A monk there
told him: “There are manuscripts in our library that describe the
journey of Jesus to the East.”
Toward the end of this century the diaries of a Moravian Missionary,
Karl Marx, were discovered in which he writes of Notovitch and his
finding of scrolls about “Saint Issa.” (Marx's diaries are kept in
the Moravian Mission museum. The pages about Notovitch and the
scrolls have “disappeared” and their existence is now denied in an
attempt to discredit Notovitch, but before their disappearance they
were photographed by a European researcher and have been made
public.)
From all this testimony we see that Jesus studied the Buddhist
Dharma as well as the Hindu Dharma during His life in India.
Notovitch also claimed that the Vatican Library had sixty-three
manuscripts from India, China, Egypt, and Arabia-all giving
information about Jesus' life.
In 1812, Meer Izzut-oolah, a Persian, was sent to Ladakh and central
Asia by the East India Company. Though religion was not his mission,
he observed much and subsequently wrote in his book Travels in
Central Asia: “They keep sculptured representations of departed
saints, prophets and lamas in their temples for contemplation. Some
of these figures are said to represent a certain prophet who is
living in the heavens, which would appear to point to Jesus Christ.”
When Swami Abhedananda was in the Himis monastery doing his research
on the records of Jesus life in India he was told by the abbot that
Jesus had not departed from the earth at the time His Apostles saw
Him ascend, but that He had returned to India where he lived with
the Himalayan yogis for many years.
The Nathanamavali
The Bengali educator and patriot, Bipin Chandra Pal, published an
autobiographical sketch in which he revealed that Vijay Krishna
Goswami, a renowned saint of Bengal and a disciple of Sri
Ramakrishna, told him about spending time in the Aravalli mountains
with a group of extraordinary ascetic monk-yogis known as Nath
Yogis. The monks spoke to him about Isha Nath, whom they looked upon
as one of the great teachers of their order. When Vijay Krishna
expressed interest in this venerable guru, they read his life as
recorded in one of their sacred books, the Nathanamavali.36 It was
the life of Him Whom the Goswami knew as Jesus the Christ! Here is
the relevant portion of that book:
“Isha Natha came to India at the age of fourteen. After this he
returned to his own country and began preaching. Soon after, his
brutish and materialistic countrymen conspired against him and had
him crucified. After crucifixion, or perhaps even before it, Isha
Natha entered samadhi by means of yoga.37
“Seeing him thus, the Jews presumed he was dead, and buried him in a
tomb. At that very moment however, one of his gurus, the great
Chetan Natha, happened to be in profound meditation in the lower
reaches of the Himalayas, and he saw in a vision the tortures which
Isha Natha was undergoing. He therefore made his body lighter than
air and passed over to the land of Israel.
“The day of his arrival was marked with thunder and lightning, for
the gods were angry with the Jews, and the whole world trembled.
When Chetan Natha arrived, he took the body of Isha Natha from the
tomb, woke him from his samadhi, and later led him off to the sacred
land of the Aryans. Isha Natha then established an ashram in the
lower regions of the Himalayas and he established the cult of the
lingam there.”38
This assertion is supported by two relics of Jesus which are
presently found in Kashmir. One is His staff, which is kept in the
monastery of Aish-Muqan and is made accessible to the public in
times of public catastrophe such as floods or epidemics. The other
is the Stone of Moses-a Shiva linga that had belonged to Moses and
which Jesus brought to Kashmir. This linga is kept in the Shiva
temple at Bijbehara in Kashmir. One hundred and eight pounds in
weight, if eleven people put one finger on the stone and recite "Ka"
over and over, it will rise three feet or so into the air and remain
suspended as long as the recitation continues.39 "Shiva" means one
who is auspicious and gives blessings and happiness. In ancient
Sanskrit the word ka means to please and to satisfy-that which Shiva
does for His worshipers.
The Bhavishya Maha Purana
One ancient book of Kashmiri history, the Bhavishya Maha Purana,
gives the following account of the meeting of a king of Kashmir with
Jesus sometime after the middle of the first century:
“When the king of the Sakas came to the Himalayas, he saw a
dignified person of golden complexion wearing a long white robe.
Astonished to see this foreigner, he asked, 'Who are you?' The
dignified person replied in a pleasant manner: 'Know me as Son of
God [Isha Putram], or Born of a Virgin [Kumarigarbhasangbhawam].
Being given to truth and penances, I preached the Dharma to the
mlecchas.... O King, I hail from a land far away, where there is no
truth, and evil knows no limits. I appeared in the country of the
mlecchas as Isha Masiha [Jesus Messiah] and I suffered at their
hands. For I said unto them, '"Remove all mental and bodily
impurities. Remember the Name of our Lord God. Meditate upon Him
Whose abode is in the center of the sun.”'40 There in the land of
mleccha darkness, I taught love, truth, and purity of heart. I asked
human beings to serve the Lord. But I suffered at the hands of the
wicked and the guilty. In truth, O King, all power rests with the
Lord, Who is in the center of the sun. And the elements, and the
cosmos, and the sun, and God Himself, are forever. Perfect, pure,
and blissful, God is always in my heart. Thus my Name has been
established as Isha Masiha.' After having heard the pious words from
the lips of this distinguished person, the king felt peaceful, made
obeisance to him, and returned.”41 The word mleccha is a powerfully
derogatory term meaning one who is unclean, barbaric and abhorrent,
an alien to all that is good and true. A mleccha is execrable on all
levels of his being. The fact that Jesus would refer the Israelites
themselves as "mlecchas" and Israel as "The land of the
mlecchas... where there is no truth, and evil knows no limits...the
land of mleccha darkness “indicates that He in no way identified
with either the people or the religion of Israel. He was fully a
Sanatana Dharmi-follower of the Eternal Dharma.
Another Kashmiri history, the Rajatarangini, written in 1148 A.D.,
says that a great saint named Issana lived at Issabar on the bank of
Dal Lake and had many disciples, one of which he raised from the
dead.
When teaching in Israel, Jesus told the people: “Other sheep I have,
which are not of this fold,”42 speaking of His Indian disciples. For
when Jesus came to the Jordan at the beginning of His ministry, He
had spent more years of His life in India than in Israel. And He
returned there for the remainder of His life, because in all things
He was a Son of India-the Christ of India.43
The Christ of India - Swami Nirmalananda Giri
www.atmajyoti.org/spirwrit-the_christ_of_india.asp
Notes:
16) Much of what follows regarding the life of Jesus is based on historical documentation that we hope to eventually present in book form. Other statements regarding the life of Jesus are based on oral tradition that, of course, cannot be documented.
17)"Now when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judaea in the days of Herod the king, behold, there came wise men from the east to Jerusalem, saying, Where is he that is born King of the Jews? for we have seen his star in the east, and are come to worship him.” (Matthew 2:1,2)
18) Nicholas Roerich, in his book Himalaya: A Monograph, said that according to the Tibetan scrolls he found in 1925, Isha was thirteen when He left for India. The Nathanamavali of the Nath Yogis, which we will be considering later on, says that Isha reached India when He was fourteen.
19) Shiva: A name of God meaning"One Who is all Bliss and the giver of happiness to all.”Although classically applied to the Absolute Brahman, Shiva can also refer to God (Ishwara) in His aspect of Dissolver and Liberator (often mistakenly thought of as"destroyer").
20) Genesis 31:13
21) The residence of Isha in the Govardhan Math proves that He was both an adherent of the Vedic religion and a Vedic monk (sannyasi) of the Shankaracharya tradition. In the nineteen-fifties, the former head of the Govardhan Math, and head of the entire monastic Swami Order of Shankaracharya, Jagadguru Bharat Krishna Tirtha, claimed that he had discovered “incontrovertible historical evidence” that Jesus had lived in the Govardhan Math as well as in other places of India. He was writing a book on the subject, but died before it could be finished. Unfortunately the fate of his manuscript and research is presently unknown.
22) Shankara: Shankaracharya; Adi (the first) Shankaracharya: The great reformer and re-establisher of Vedic Religion in India around 300 B.C. He is the unparalleled exponent of Advaita (Non-Dual) Vedanta. He also reformed the mode of monastic life and founded (or regenerated) the ancient Swami Order.
23) John 7:30; 8:20
24) Mark 14:8
25) Teacher of Righteousness (Dharma), a title also used by the Essenes for their master teachers.
26) Deuteronomy 29:4
27) Luke 22:36-38
28) Mark 8:15,16
29) Mark 8:17,18,21
30) Acts 1:6
31) Prajapati vai idam agra asit. Tasya vak dvitiya asit. Vag vai paramam Brahman. (Krishna Yajur Veda, Kathaka Samhita, 12.5, 27.1; Krishna Yajur Veda, Kathakapisthala Samhita, 42.1; Jaiminiya Brahmana II, Sama Veda, 2244.) Prajapati refers to God as Creator, and Brahman to God in His Absolute Transcendent Being.
32) An online version of The Unknown Life of Jesus Christ is available here on this website.
33) Immediately after the publication of the English edition of Notovitch's book, the British Government in India hired Moslems to go throughout Ladakh and neighboring areas posing as Hindus in search of further manuscripts about Jesus in India. They were to buy the manuscripts and bring them to their employers to be destroyed. Whether this shameful ruse succeeded we have no knowledge.
34) Ramakrishna: Sri Ramakrishna lived in India in the second half of the nineteenth century, and is regarded by all India as a perfectly enlightened person-and by many as an Incarnation of God.
35) Vedanta: Literally, “the end of the Vedas;” The Upanishads; the school of Hindu thought, based primarily on the Upanishads, upholding the doctrine of either pure non-dualism or conditional non- dualism. The original text of this school is Vedanta-darshana or the Brahma Sutras compiled by the sage Vyasa.
36) Regarding the Nath Yogis' tradition, Sri Pal comments: “It is also their conjecture that Jesus Christ and this Isha Nath are one and the same person.” Perhaps they were the yogis with which Isha lived either before His return to Israel or after His secret return to India after His ascension.
37) In samadhi yogis often leave their bodies, so it is not amiss to say that Jesus did indeed"die"on the cross.
38)"The cult of the lingam"refers to the Shaivite branch of Hinduism. We will speak more on that later.
39) I have met two people who have “raised the Stone of Moses.” One of them said that the number required to raise the Stone relates to their spiritual development-that he had raised it with only three others.
40) One of the fundamental practices of Hinduism is the recitation twice a day of the Savitri Gayatri Mantra, a prayer for enlightenment directed to the Solar Power.
41) Bhavishya Maha Purana 3.2.9-31
42) John 10:16
43)“[Lord Jesus] disappeared at the ages of thirteen and reappeared in his thirty-first year. During this period, from his thirteenth to his thirty-first year, he came to India and practiced Yoga....Jesus left Jerusalem and reached the land of Indus in the company of merchants. He visited Varanasi, Rajgriha and other places in India. He spent several years in Hindustan. Jesus lived like a Hindu or a Buddhist monk, a life of burning renunciation and dispassion. He assimilated the ideals, precepts and principles of Hinduism. Christianity is modified Hinduism only, which was suitable for those people who lived in the period of Christ. Really speaking, Jesus was a child of the soil of India only. That is the reason why there is so much of similarity between his teachings and the teachings of Hinduism and Buddhism.” (Swami Sivananda Saraswati in Lives of Saints)
Disclaimer: Our material may be copied, printed and distributed by referring to this site. This site also contains copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We are making such material available to our readers under the education and research provisions of "fair use" in an effort to advance freedom of inquiry for a better understanding of religious, spiritual and inter-faith issues. The material on this site is distributed without profit. If you wish to use copyrighted material for purposes other than "fair use" you must request permission from the copyright owner.