The religious and political thought of Swami Vivekananda
Vivekananda's thought has been subject to many different interpretations. In the 1890s. Krishna Verma, writing for the journal Sociologist, claimed that Vivekananda was influenced by the evolutionary ideas of Herbert Spencer, which emphasized struggle and the eventual survival of the fittest. Verma therefore concluded that Vivekananda advocated what Verma called 'righteous terrorism', which was an attempt to purify the Indian race, to weed out the weak and to create a society of strong, robust individuals. In recent years, the Bharatiya Janata Party has tended to appropriate Vivekananda for its own political purposes by interpreting him as an ideologist of its brand of Hinduism. There are others who have seen Vivekananda as a socialist; an interpretation that became prominent in the twentieth century Indian nationalist movement.I wish to argue that although these and other interpretations capture important aspects of Vivekananda's thought, they do not do him full justice. My basic contention in this thesis would be that Vivekananda's project was larger than has been traditionally interpreted and largely consisted in the spiritual and political regeneration of the Indian civilization. Vivekananda thought that
Harilela, Aron
Philosophy ; Religion ; Political science ; Public administration
The religious and political thought of Swami Vivekananda. Vivekananda's thought has been subject to many different interpretations. In the 1890s. Krishna Verma, writing for the journal Sociologist, claimed that Vivekananda was influenced by the evolutionary ideas of Herbert Spencer, which emphasized struggle and the eventual survival of the fittest. Verma therefore concluded that Vivekananda advocated what Verma called 'righteous terrorism', which was an attempt to purify the Indian race, to weed out the weak and to create a society of strong, robust individuals. In recent years, the Bharatiya Janata Party has tended to appropriate Vivekananda for its own political purposes by interpreting him as an ideologist of its brand of Hinduism. There are others who have seen Vivekananda as a socialist; an interpretation that became prominent in the twentieth century Indian nationalist movement.I wish to argue that although these and other interpretations capture important aspects of Vivekananda's thought, they do not do him full justice. My basic contention in this thesis would be that Vivekananda's project was larger than has been traditionally interpreted and largely consisted in the spiritual and political regeneration of the Indian civilization. Vivekananda thought that
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