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The narrative of this part of the Swami’s life would be incomplete without mentioning his worship of the Divine Mother. Spiritually, he seemed to possess two elements in his consciousness. He was undoubtedly born with an innate knowledge of Brahman, as Ramakrishna Paramahamsa often insisted. From a young age, he had the ability to enter a deep meditative state. His religious inclinations were highly abstract and philosophical, in contrast to those commonly labeled as ‘idolatrous.’ In his youth, and even after spending some time with Sri Ramakrishna, he formally joined the Sadharan Brahmo Samaj. While in England and America, he never preached anything dependent on a specific form of worship. His sole imperative was the realization of Brahman, adhering strictly to the Advaita philosophy and the authority of the Vedas and Upanishads.
Paraphrase: Swami Vivekananda had a deep spiritual connection with both abstract philosophy and the worship of the Divine Mother. Even though he followed the teachings of Brahman and Advaita philosophy, he frequently mentioned and showed devotion to the Divine Mother, especially in India. His spiritual journey included formal membership in the Sadharan Brahmo Samaj and his teachings in the West focused on Brahman.
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Despite his abstract philosophical inclinations, Swami Vivekananda frequently mentioned the Divine Mother in India. He spoke of Her as one would speak of a familiar household figure. He was deeply preoccupied with Her, attributing all good and evil to Her. On a solemn occasion, he gave a disciple a prayer to Her, insisting that the disciple make Her listen when reciting it. He often described Her in vivid terms, emphasizing Her dual nature of blessing and cursing, and expressed his belief in worshiping the Terrible aspect of the Divine.
Paraphrase: In India, Vivekananda often spoke of the Divine Mother as a familiar and beloved figure. He saw all events, good and bad, as Her doing. He encouraged his disciples to pray to Her with confidence. Vivekananda emphasized worshiping the fearsome aspect of the Mother, seeing both her blessings and curses as essential parts of life.
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He had a whole-hearted contempt for what he regarded as squeamishness or mawkishness. He wasted few words on me, when I came to him with my difficulties about animal sacrifice in the temple. He made no reference, as he might have done, to the fact that most of us, loudly as we may attack this, have no hesitation in offering animal sacrifice to ourselves. He offered no argument, as he easily might have done, regarding the degradation of the butcher and the slaughter-house, under the modern system. “Why not a little blood, to complete the picture?” was his only direct reply to my objections. And it was with considerable difficulty that I elicited from him, and from another disciple of Sri Ramakrishna, sitting near, the actual facts of the more austere side of Kali-worship, that side which has transcended the sacrifice of others. He told me however that he had never tolerated the blood-offering commonly made to the “demons who attend on Kali.” This was simple devil-worship, and he had no place for it. His own effort being constantly to banish fear and weakness from his own consciousness and to learn to recognise THE MOTHER as instinctively in evil, terror, sorrow, and annihilation, as in that which makes for sweetness and joy, it followed that the one thing he could not away with was any sort of watering-down of the great conception. “Fools!” he exclaimed once,-as he dwelt in quiet talk on “the worship of the Terrible”, on “becoming one with the Terrible”— “Fools! they put a garland of flowers round Thy neck, and then start back in terror, and call Thee ‘the Merciful’!” And as he spoke, the underlying egoism of worship that is devoted to the kind God, to Providence, the consoling Divinity, without a heart for God in the earthquake, or God in the volcano, overwhelmed the listener. One saw that such worship was at bottom, as the Hindu calls it, merely ‘shop- keeping,’ and one realised the infinitely greater boldness and truth of the teaching that God manifests through evil as well as through good. One saw that the true attitude for the mind and will that are not to be baffled by the personal self, was in fact the determination, in the stern words of the Swami Vivekananda, ‘to seek death not life, to hurl oneself upon the sword’s point, to become one with the Terrible for evermore!’
Paraphrase: Vivekananda disliked any form of weakness or sentimentality in worship. He didn’t entertain complaints about animal sacrifices, pointing out the hypocrisy of criticizing temple sacrifices while accepting animal slaughter for food. He rejected blood offerings to demons, seeing it as devil-worship. His goal was to eliminate fear and weakness, recognizing the Divine Mother in all aspects of life, both good and bad. He criticized those who worship only the comforting aspects of God, advocating instead for a bold acceptance of God’s terrifying forms as well.
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It would have been altogether inconsistent with the Swami’s idea of freedom, to have sought to impose his own conceptions on a disciple. But everything in my past life as an educationist had contributed to impress on me now the necessity of taking on the Indian consciousness, and the personal perplexity associated with the memory of the pilgrimage to Amarnath was a witness not to be forgotten to the strong place which Indian systems of worship held in that consciousness. I set myself therefore to enter into Kali worship, as one would set oneself to learn a new language, or take birth deliberately, perhaps, in a new race. To this fact I owe it that I was able to understand as much as I did of our Master’s life and thought. Step by step, glimpse after glimpse, I began to comprehend a little. And in matters religious, he was, without knowing it, a born educator. He never checked a struggling thought. Being with him one day when an image of Kali was brought in, and noticing some passing expression, I suddenly said “Perhaps, Swamiji, Kali is the Vision of Siva! Is She?” He looked at me for a moment. “Well! Well! Express it in your own way,” he said gently, “Express it in your own way!”
Paraphrase: Vivekananda believed in freedom of thought and did not impose his beliefs on others. Sister Nivedita, influenced by her own educational background and experiences in India, decided to embrace Kali worship to better understand Indian spirituality. Vivekananda encouraged her to find her own way of understanding the Divine Mother, showing his supportive nature in guiding others’ spiritual journeys.