Life and Work of Sri Sri Paramahansa Yogananda

LIFE AND WORK OF
SRI SRI PARAMAHANSA YOGANANDA

The ideal of love for God and service to humanity found full expression in the life of Sri Sri Paramahansa Yogananda. His goal was to unite East and West by spiritual understanding and to awaken divine yearning in all hearts. He was practical in his methods; his teachings and life bespoke the wisdom of a true man of God. He carried the maxim of “a sound mind in a sound body” a step further, emphasizing, for the attainment of lasting happiness, man’s need to commune consciously with God.

From his birth, Paramahansaji’s deepest desire was God-realization. His search for the Ultimate Goal led him to his guru, Sri Sri Swami Sri Yukteswar Giri. In the latter’s peaceful hermitage in Serampore, Paramahansaji received spiritual training for ten years. Sri Yukteswarji was a strict disciplinarian, but the young disciple’s devotion never faltered. In 1915, Paramahansaji joined the monastic Swami Order. Sri Yukteswarji reminded his disciple that, having renounced the ties with a small family of relatives, he must now assume a greater responsibility: to love and to serve as his own the larger family of humanity.

While still a young man he established his first school with seven boys, at Dihika in Bengal in 1917. His work came to the attention of Sir Manindra Chandra Nundy, the Maharaja of Kasimbazar. In 1918, the Maharaja gave his palace and 25 acres in Ranchi, Bihar, to serve as headquarters for the school, which is named Yogoda Satsanga Vidyalaya. This was founded on the educational ideals of India’s illumined rishis–sages whose forest ashrams were the ancient seats of learning.

The Ranchi institution also maintains an outdoor medical dispensary for the poor, at which thousands of persons are treated annually, and a free eye clinic.

In 1920, Paramahansaji began his mission in the West. “Spread to all people the knowledge of the self-liberating yoga techniques,” his guru Sri Yukteswarji had instructed him. Serving as the delegate from India to an International Congress of Religious Liberals. Paramahansaji gave his first speech in America “The Science of Religion” on October 6, 1920, in Boston, U.S.A. Audiences overflowed America’s largest halls.

Paramahansaji then began a series of lectures and classes that eventually took him all over the United States. His teachings on the universal science of yoga were received with unparalleled enthusiasm.

He pointed out the underlying unity of the scriptures of East and West, and taught his students the ancient yoga techniques for attaining direct personal experience of God.

He was author of many inspiring books: The Science of Religion, Scientific Healing Affirmations, Cosmic Chants, Metaphysical Meditations, Whispers from Eternity, and Autobiography of a Yogi. In lakhs of readers Paramahansaji’s words kindled a vital soul-longing for God.

Self-Realization Fellowship centers were established in many large cities, and with the help of students Paramahansaji founded in 1925 an international headquarters in Los Angeles, California. On the 12-acre estate are ashrams and office buildings for resident monastics who carry on the work of disseminating throughout the world the teachings of Paramahansaji.

In 1935, the class instructions that Sri Yoganandaji had given on his lecture tours were arranged into a series of studies, sent out weekly from Self-Realization headquarters in Los Angeles to SRF students all over the world. During the visit of Sri Yoganandaji to India in 1936, the same teachings are now disseminated in printed form by Yogoda Satsanga Society of India.

In 1935, Paramahansaji incorporated Self-Realization Fellowship as a nonsectarian, nonprofit institution. During his visit to India in 1936, Yogoda Satsanga Society of India was similarly registered in Calcutta.

In June 1935, Paramahansaji left America for eighteen months of travel in England, Scotland, Europe, Palestine, and India. His year long tour of India was a vast triumphal procession. Hundreds of thousands gathered eagerly to listen to the great Guru’s God-intoxicated words of wisdom. He visited South India, where for a month he was an official guest of the State of Mysore. He met the great saint, Sri Ramana Maharshi at Arunachala, and spent three days with Mahatma Gandhi at his ashram in Wardha.

Paramahansaji left India in August 1936, and never saw her beloved shores again. Before departing, he made legal arrangements to insure the permanency of Yogoda Satsanga Society of India.

Yogoda Satsanga Math, the registered office of Yogoda Satsanga Society of India, is situated on the banks of the River Ganga at Dakshineswar, Calcutta.

Though Paramahansaji spent the greater portion ofhis life in the West, the spiritual, humanitarian, and educational work in India was as dear to his heart as the works in America and other Western lands.

In 1937, Paramahansaji founded a Self-Realization Fellowship ashram center on a beautiful 23-acre estate in Encinitas, California. Besides the main hermitage, which overlooks the Pacific Ocean, there are: a retreat, lovely gardens, and living quarters for resident monastics. Such temples/ashrams are built in other cities in U.S.

His Autobiography of a Yogi, published in December 1946, has become a spiritual classic. It is in its tenth impression of the second English edition in India (paperedition by Jaico Publishing House of Bombay) and has been published in nineteen languages including Telugu and Urdu.

SRF now has many branch centers on six continents. The priceless training he gave to his disciples, the words of inspiration and wisdom in his books, and the many hermitages, temples, and centers he founded remain as evidence of his deep love for humanity.

Though Paramahansaji often longed to roam in simplicity by the Ganges or in the Himalayas, meditating uninterruptedly on the Cosmic Beloved, he humbly obeyed his guru’s behest to spread in the West the yoga teachings of India. With phenomenal energy and enthusiasm, he successfully assumed the tremendous burden of planning and putting into motion a worldwide organization. Through it, he made the liberating message of Self-realization and Yoga available to all men.

Sri Sri Paramahansa Yogananda entered mahasamadhi (a yogi’s final conscious exit from the body) in Los Angeles, on March 7, 1952, after concluding his speech at a banquet held in honor of H. E. Binay R. Sen, Ambassador of India.