The Essential Swami Ramdas

by Ramdas

In simple and eloquent language, Ramdas writes directly and from the heart and his message of certain deliverance through the unswerving remembrance of God is meant for all serious seekers of all religions.

Genres: Spirituality, Hinduism

216 pages, Paperback

First published February 23, 2005

Reviews

[Marianna · Rating 5 out of 5]

A wonderful gem of the nondual bhakti/devotional path. This is a book to have at one's bedside table for continuous rereading and meditating on its words over time.

[Tero · Rating 1 out of 5]

I was not left with the impression of a coherent theology behind these texts, and some of the texts, taken from various writings by the author spanning many decades, may not give a correct understanding of the author’s theological system near the end of his life. It seemed to me that the selected texts repeated themselves. God was light, love, peace, that sounds sublime language and most of the time a utopia. I found it removed of human life to think that an ordinary non-religious who may have no devotion (like me) would be able to grasp what the author writes about. Also, there is a lingering suspicion that this book has been heavily edited from the original language and through many editions. It may also not be understandable to the reader because of Hindu terminology. The author speaks throughout the book about a good and loving god, whom he equals with himself, mankind, light, poor people, or love. Now, the author dodges the problem of evil by trying to argue (unconvincingly and in a rather pedestrian style) that in a way, evil doesn’t even exist - and that because good cant be without evil, good things come from evil, for example good things come out of the suffering on civilians during war(!), he writes. He also argues that thinking is transcended by not thinking (in that case, I wonder, does deep sleep or coma ’transcend’ awaken state?). Although I did find some of the author’s writings interesting, most of the time the book was like an excerpt from some ’new age’ self-help book with little connection with lived human life. I also got the impression that the author was merely copying pieces of some doctrine into text and that he didn’t really have any answers of his own. Repeating this kind of religious fervour time and again is easy; anyone with some experience of religious language could do it with a bit of practise (and some consciousness-altering practices). Having a coherent understanding and allowing the reader to acquire a representation of the author’s philosophy of life, gained throughout the years, is what the book did not succeed in (at least for me). Granted, it might be that these selections may not represent the author’s religious beliefs fully. Many of the texts may have been (conceivably) written in some kind of monastic solitude, possibly uninformed about events taking place in the world outside. Upon learning that the excerpts were written in the 1950s, 1940s, and earlier, I became interested to learn more of the context. Now its very much left hanging in the ether, so to say, and would have benefited tremendously from some kind of biographical context in the texts. The ’biography’ of sorts in the beginning doesn’t really progress clearly, and seemed to focus on irrelevant details or even hearsay. I did find Dr. Manring’s intro quite informative and interesting, although too brief.

[Cherie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Got to know a bit more about the biography of who Swami Ramdas is, how he arrived, who he was before - interesting. Also, his little spiritual reflections were lovely and could be read as the precursor to a yoga practice.