Vedantavani
December 2025
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Ramakrishna Instructions to Disciples
One day, Sri Ramakrishna said to Yogananda, “Be a devotee, but don’t be a fool! If you want to buy something, go to different shops, compare prices, and take the best and cheapest. If you save money this way, give it to the poor.”
There is another example. When Maharaj (Swami Brahmananda) found a coin (a pice) that someone had lost and showed it to the Master, the latter said, “Why did you take it? You don’t need it. Why would someone who doesn’t want fish go to the fish market and bargain over prices?”
How can these contradictions be reconciled? At times, Sri Ramakrishna behaved like any other worldly man, carefully calculating everything. At other times, he exemplified the ideal of renunciation. You see, he was a man of renunciation. He represented the ideal (householder or monastic) in everything he did. That is what I would call a perfect soul.
A worldly person is greedy. And if an ordinary person feels a little renunciation, he completely loses his mind. Because we associated with Sri Ramakrishna, our eyes were opened. He showed us the ideal life by his own example.
When a devotee Mawari Laksminarayan offered Sri Ramakrishna ten thousand rupees, the Master fell unconscious. When he regained consciousness, he told the devotee to leave him. When Laksminarayan suggested giving the money to his attendant for the Master’s use, the Master exclaimed, “Oh no! He will accept it on my behalf, and I cannot bear the thought of possessing money!” The devotee then said, “Ah, I understand. You haven’t yet overcome the idea of acceptance and rejection.” The Master simply replied, “No, I haven’t.”
How wonderfully Sri Ramakrishna taught each person to address their specific needs! He illustrated this method of teaching by saying, “A mother has made different curries from one fish. She doesn’t give all her sons the same thing. She gives each one exactly what suits his stomach.” The Master also followed this practice.
Swami Yogananda once heard several men criticizing Sri Ramakrishna. He pocketed the insult and reported the incident to the Master. The Master heard about it and said, “They abused me, and you remained silent!” He then reprimanded Swami Yogananda. On another occasion, some time after this incident, Swami Niranjanananda was traveling by boat to Dakshineswar. Several passengers criticized Sri Ramakrishna. The swami was exceptionally strong, and he immediately came out of the cabin, put his legs on the deck, and began rocking.
“You are insulting Sri Ramakrishna,” he said. “I will now sink the boat. I would like to see who dares to stop me.” They were all frightened and begged him to stop. When Sri Ramakrishna heard about this incident, he said, “Fool! If they mistreat me, what does that mean to you? Let people say what they like. What do you care?”
See the joy! The teachings varied, depending on the needs of each recipient. Where else can you find a teacher like him?
Once Kali Maharaj (Swami Abhedananda) caught a fish, reasoning that the Atman is immortal—he neither kills nor is killed.
Hearing this, Sri Ramakrishna sent for him. He said to Kali Maharaj, “What you say is true. But in your state of development, before you have realized the Atman, it is not right to discriminate in that way and kill any creature. You must know that realization of the Atman is an attained state that transcends all logic and reason. He who attains that state feels compassion for all beings. A holy man is freed from all samkaras (past impressions), but the thought-wave of compassion remains with him until the very last moment of his life. Never give up the ideal of a holy man.”
[from: Sri Ramakrishna as They Saw Him]
Selection from the book by Mary Saaleman
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“We are such stuff as dreams are made on
and our little life is rounded with a sleep.”
[from Tempest, Shakespeare]
Kees Boukema
God is the whole. That encompasses not only matter, but also all consciousness, space, and time. Everything we can imagine. This makes you realize that the entire material world, not just humans, but every animal and every plant is animated, or conscious, in one way or another. To clarify this idea somewhat, Brouwer uses the concept of “emergence.” The simplest example of emergence is the heating of water. Heat is not caused by adding an ingredient to the water and thus changing its composition, but by increasing the average speed of the constituent particles, the water molecules. Spontaneous changes in more complex systems can be explained in a similar way: the interaction of the constituent parts. Think of the graceful movements of flocks of starlings, the orientation of animals, climate change. fluctuations in financial markets, etc. Thus, “consciousness” could also be the emergent result of interactions between the neurons and neurotransmitters of the human brain (Hub Zwart, Trouw, June 28, 2025).
Albert Einstein admired Spinoza’s pantheism, but even more so his contribution to modern thought, stating that the soul and the body are one and the same, not two separate entities. According to Spinoza, there is only one Substance, which explains and causes itself. It is the only thing that exists—”God or Nature.” All phenomena we encounter in daily life—not only humans, but also animals and plants—exist as modes of God, just as waves and ripples are part of the ocean. God has infinite attributes, but we humans can only experience two of them: “extension” and “thought.” For example, the human brain can be described as a complex of body cells, but also as a complex of thoughts, emotions, and memories. The mind is not a product of matter, or vice versa; they are two sides of one and the same Substance: either God/Nature.
Brouwer points to two distinctions: On the one hand, the distinction between “thought” [the processing of information in our brain cells] and “consciousness” [the experience of this information processing]. On the other hand, the distinction between the emergent properties of individual particles [e.g., velocity] and those of many particles [e.g., temperature]. We can observe a person’s “thought” with a brain scan, but we cannot determine whether this person also experiences thought. We know that our “consciousness” exists, but it is a “first-person experience” that cannot be scientifically verified.
Spinoza wrote that everything can be seen not only from the perspective of matter, but also from the perspective of consciousness. Brouwer attempts to make this groundbreaking idea somewhat plausible with examples from biology and neurology, but she also knows she will never be able to prove it. See also Alan Watts, “The book on the taboo against knowing who you are” (1966) and Thomas Nagel, “What is it like to be a bat.” (1974).
Spinoza did not set out to prove the nature of God/Nature, but to understand it. From the perspective of matter, God/Nature corresponds to the multi-universe of modern cosmology: A Substance from which infinitely many things arise in infinite ways, that is what an infinite mind can grasp. God’s mind is the necessarily unfolding universe itself, seen from the inner perspective of consciousness. This is completely different from the image of God of monotheistic religions: “The universe as the creation of a personal God.”
Mr Kees Boukema is a scholar in Vedanta and Comparative philosophy. His brilliant and thorough-going articles on various philosophical and spiritual subjects are being published since the first issue of the magazine. His latest work is De Beoefening van Meditatie.
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Sri Ramakrishna on Bhakti
Devotee: “What is the way for people like us?”
Sri Ramakrishna: Bhakti is the only essential thing. Bhakti has different aspects : the sattvic, the rajasic, and tamasic. One who has sattvic bhakti is very modest and humble. But a man with tamasic bhakti is like a highwayman in his attitude toward God. He says: ‘O God, I am chanting Your name. How can I be a sinner? O God, You are my own Mother; You must reveal Yourself to me.’
{Gospel}
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Service: An Ode to the Helping Hand
Contributed by: Francis van Schaik
Selflessly doing something for someone else. A form of charity that we sometimes easily overlook. Author and columnist Sarah Domogala has written a tribute to service. How can service be an education for the heart? Sarah describes how selflessness can broaden your horizons.
Service
A friend told me how she massaged her mother’s feet, put on her socks, warmed her hands. A simple act of love that changed everything. Of all the things she could have done, she chose this: caring, being present. It touched me deeply.
When No One’s Watching
For years, I swept floors, folded laundry, put food on the table. Work that usually happens silently, when no one is watching. Until I discovered how good it feels to care with attention. To tidy up, clean, fix something that’s loose. To take responsibility for the life that happens in the house.
The Value of the Small
It seems trivial, but it is precisely this care that keeps life going. What if we had respect for the tasks that keep life moving forward? Respect for life itself, and thus for each other. The moments of invisible care (folding laundry, a clean bed, a cup of tea) form the fabric of our lives, not the successes or adventures.
Caring Together
When I care for others, my mood changes. The atmosphere in the house becomes calmer, lighter. By sharing the care, solidarity grows. Children who help out turn out to be happier later in life, I read. Service teaches us attention, perseverance, and love.
The Training of the Heart
Caring for others is not a step backward, but an education for the heart. It teaches us empathy, flexibility, and mindfulness. Not everything has to be perfect, as long as it’s done with attention. Especially in a world where everything has to be efficient, care brings peace and freedom. It is the choice for love, again and again.
What we give, we receive.
Service changes how we see the world. Receiving and giving care strengthens the invisible bond between people. Authenticity is revealed in genuine caring. Whether it’s cooking, listening, or helping: everything is equally valuable. Caring for another is caring for the whole.
Connected in Care
My friend made her mother feel seen and cherished. That’s what we all long for: for someone to stay, even when we’re struggling. As I clean the windows, I feel her gesture live on in my hands. Service brings safety, warmth, and trust. In an uncertain world, that might just be the most beautiful medicine.
Writer: Sarah Domogala
Contributed by Francis Schaik
From happinez
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Swami Vivekananda had a stock of funny stories, some of which he told again and again. One was about a missionary to the cannibal islands who, upon his arrival, asked the people there how they liked his predecessor and received the reply, “He was de-li-cious”. Another was about the Negro preacher, who in telling the story of the creation of Adam, said: “God made Adam and put him up against de fence to dry,” when he was interrupted by a voice from the congregation, “Hold on dere, brudder. Who made dat fence?” At this, the Negro preacher leaned over the pulpit and said solemnly: “One more question like dat, and you smashes all teology.”
Then Swamiji would tell about the woman who asked him, “Swami, are you a Buddhist?” {pronounced like bud}, and he would say wickedly but with a grave face, “No, madam, I am a florist.”
Sister Christine
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A Christmas Chronicle
Paulo J. S. Bittencourt
Professor of the History Course at UFFS – Erechim Campus
Tradition holds that in 1223, on Christmas Eve, Francis of Assisi preached about the birth of Jesus, and, to that end, decided to create a scene in which, in a straw manger, lay the “Child of Nazareth,” surrounded by an ox and a donkey.
Francis’s organic coherence is moving.
In one of the most beautiful and sensitive artistic scenes in Christian art, “the poor God”—an expression also enshrined in the literary world by the homonymous title of Nikos Kazantzakis’s novel—condenses the evangelical mottos that were most precious to him, (1) the naked, fragile, and absolutely voluntary poverty of the divine made flesh, and (2) the ode to nature, praising the sublime in all creatures.
On 24 December 1818, the Austrian priest Joseph Mohr asked the organist Franz Xaver Gruber to compose the melody for a poem he had written. Thus was born “Silent Night, Holy Night”, one of the most famous Christmas carols, translated into more than 300 languages, and known in Portuguese as “Noite Feliz”. The version known to us sings: “(…) poor little one was born in Bethlehem / Behold in the grotto, Jesus, our good”.
“Lapa” initially means “a small grotto or cavity opened in the rock”, or even a slab that, protruding, “forms a natural shelter beneath it”.
[It was tempting for me to somehow associate the figure of the Baby Jesus in the small natural grotto with the also messianic prisoner in the cave of Plato’s famous allegory, even though Christian belief tends to postulate that the son of Mary became a prisoner to free us.]
However, the word “presépio” (nativity scene) has a very different connotation. The term refers much more to a “corral” for confining farm animals, and therefore dramatizes, perhaps in a much more touching way, the connotations so exalted by Francis of Assisi that I referred to above.
The same Kazantzakis, in his epigraph to the novel “The Last Temptation of Christ,” mentions the “dual substance of Christ, the longing so human, so superhuman, that man has to reach God,” a mystery always impenetrable to the author, his “greatest anxiety and source of all joy and all anguish” since his youth, “the incessant and merciless conflict between the spirit and the flesh,” whose soul was the place where “these two armies fight and meet.”
But, for John Lennon, “so this is Christmas (war is over).” And his verse seems to evoke very well the profound meaning of the unity proclaimed by Francis, which, for me, not only calls for being an instrument of the Lord’s peace, but also, for believers and non-believers alike, for unarmed unity – in a somber Brazil that cries out for weapons when hunger for bread devastates the flesh of the poor and forests and animals burn – that umbilical unity that is celebrated and cultivated, whether between body and mind, reason and heart, or between ourselves and others, near or far, the only way, certainly, capable of redeeming us.
It is this universal meaning of Christmas that I would venture to announce even to the most devout follower of Ludwig Feuerbach’s anthropological atheism – if it is possible to intuit the matter in those terms. For those who do not believe, this is the understanding that arises from the work of hands in flesh and imagination, to which Paul Valéry refers: the reconciliation between “this finite and this infinite that we carry within ourselves, each according to its nature,” and which “must now be united in a well-ordered construction.” Finally, it is also about ecumenical unity for religious believers, an experience so dear to the late Professor Hermógenes, when, in his “Cult of the One,” upon asking Krishna for a blessing, he is blessed by Christ; upon praying to Christ, he is answered by Buddha; and upon calling upon Buddha, he is answered by Krishna. Because perhaps, as the pagan Symmachus reminded Christians in the 4th century, who often forget the inclusive devotion to diversity, one cannot arrive at such a great mystery by a single path.
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Professor Paulo Bittencourt teaches History at the UFFS, Erchim Campus, Rio Grande de Sul. “Federal University of Southern Frontier” [UFFS] is one of the best universities of Brasil with highly qualified professors at the helm. Professor Bittencourt never rejects our request for articles, though he is very busy.
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“Pray to God with tears in your eyes whenever you want illumination or find yourself faced with any doubt or difficulty. The Lord will remove all your impurities, assuage your mental anguish, and give you enlightenment.”
Mother Sri Sarada Devi