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 The
book Autobiography of a Yogi was the first book on Indian spiritual practices and
beliefs to become popular in the west that was written by an insider so as to say
- by an actual practicing yogi who accepted all the premises and axioms of the tradition
without expending any doubts on them, who had a typical Indian upbringing with just
a superficial western veneer. The work of Swami Vivekananda was more philosophical
intellectual keeping in mind his western listeners; this was however, a book written
in the manner it would have been written for an Indian audience. It has a peculiar
flavor as a consequence, the good Yogananda reporting miraculous events with the
bland acceptance that characterizes India but which would be regarded as
extremely suspect by rigorous scientific parameters. No book so polarized the West
about India and its culture as this one. For those who liked it, their passion went
beyond words. For those who found it an incredible mishmash, the high opinions they
had been harboring about Indian thought suddenly seemed to have become wobbly. Jung
was one of the latter, the book appalled him, and may have contributed to his oft
spoken belief that Yoga and Indian spirituality does not work in western contexts
as the unconscious assumptions and archetypes, which bring success in the discipline,
do not exist for westerners. Yet the life of Yogananda was not in the least one
of the more "improbable but true" passages of the time.
 He was born on January 5, 1893 in the town of Gorakhpur
near the Himalayas to Bengali parents. The family was large, the young Mukanda Lal
Ghosh as he was known having seven siblings. His memories of the amazing harmony
that prevailed between his parents are somewhat contradicted by his own narratives
but that is the nature of Indian memory. Parents are never viewed as anything other
than perfect in the sentimental haze of nostalgia. Interestingly he makes a claim
that as a baby he had memories of being a yogi in the Himalayas in previous lives
and also that he had multiple language memories which faded when he began to comprehend
the family's Bengali. But the parents did have one very unusual trait; they were
deeply, sincerely and committedly spiritual. Both of them were disciples of a great
yogi named Lahiri Mahashaya - who was to be the star of many of Yogananda's narratives
later on in the book. This instinctive spirituality was absorbed by the young lad
and explains a lot about his future course in life.
Lahiri Mahashaya seems to have been the first guru in modern times to initiate many
people into the ancient system of Kriya Yoga, a system that was to become a bulwark
of Yogananda's teaching too. The man was obviously a very great master and our swami
is supposed to have been saved by his miraculous intervention when he was certain
to die of Asiatic cholera.
 The
great Lahiri guru was not even alive at the time so it counts as an even greater
miracle. Lahiri Mahashaya's guru was the great deathless yogi known only as Babaji,
supposed to be one of the Masters eternally watching over the world. The cult of
Babaji has developed quite a following today but Yogananda was the first to bring
his existence to public knowledge. Incidentally Babaji was one of the most
difficult acts to swallow in the west, straining credulity and earning disbelief.
The whole book is like that, spiritual growth and practices reported calmly amidst
saints who levitate or drink acid or perform strange acts of worship in Shiva temples.
Some of these wonders our author saw on his own, for instance the yogi who had a
pet lion he had converted to vegetarianism and whose deep rumble sounded suspiciously
like Om. At other times Yogananda saw saints who had some how discovered the principle
of photosynthesis and how to activate it in their own lives, thus bypassing the
common human need to subsist on secondary sources of nourishment. The Indian
saint with this power was Nirmala Devi while the western representative was the
well-known saint Therese Neumann. It is very strange to realize that recently this
ability has begun to manifest again, in American no less, and the pioneer is again
a woman. India has always had such wonders and does not get surprised though they
run to adore and generally suffocate the poor soul who stumbles upon this spiritual
ability.
 Yogananda was a bright enough boy but not too keen on studies since
he always knew that he would become a renunciate yogi. He would not have completed
college if his guru had not insisted that is was needed for his future mission.
The first meeting with the guru is an immensely romantic tale of destiny dragging
him to a marketplace where he and the master instantly recognize each other from
their many births together. To make matters even more incredible he met
his guru, Sri Yukteshwar Giri in the sacred city of Kashi, hundreds of kilometers
from home, while the master maintained an ashram only 12 kilometers from Yogananda's
home in Calcutta. There was to be no more questing, it was the superb surrender that
is possible only in India. Yogananda was not instantly the favorite disciple
but he was always regarded as being specially gifted. Over time he naturally ascended
to being the chief disciple. His guru was a very formidable scholar and philosopher
in both the Vedanta as well as in Yoga, hence the name he conferred upon his disciple,
Yogananda, the Bliss of Yoga.
The chapters describing his tutelage in the ashram are remarkable for they describe
an enduring and ancient Indian reality, altered but little even today. This was
the sort of set up that used to produce the creative talent of India for thousands
of years. Nowadays they are slightly out of touch with reality but they still produce
many holy men. The chapters describing Kriya yoga too are of great practical and
philosophical interest. Yogananda founded a yoga school in Ranchi as his
first practical application of what he had learnt and he and the great Rabindranath
Tagore had much enjoyment in discussing their similar educational endeavors. When
he received an invitation to attend as a delegate from India the International Congress
of Religious Liberals he knew that his destiny was taking him to a land where he
was to find many disciples and establish a new body of work. However he was alarmed
at the thought of the immense public speaking he would have to do, and that too
in English a language he always had a humorously adversarial relationship with.
He got over that problem though his English defied categorization to the end of
his days. The book is written in one of the oddest vocabularies you are liable to
find, while the grammar and sentences are English, it is English working to a Bengali
rhythm. His first attempt at public speaking was on board the ship taking him to
the west and the irrepressible humor of the man, and his innate honesty, sees him
narrate the almost-fiasco with obvious glee. The swami won many converts to his
philosophy in the West, one of whom had been patiently waiting for him to turn up
for over forty ever since the great Vivekananda had predicted the coming of just
this guru. In one instance he was mugged, but his astonishing demeanor caused an
instant conversion in the attackers and they not only apologized they turned over
new leaves - thus proving Vivekananda's combative contention that evil cannot exist
in the presence of genuine holiness.
 Yogananda
made two trips between India and the west. On his return trip he was promoted to
Paramahamsa
status (see our
glossary for details on this). The death of his guru was a great
psychological blow to him but the apparent resurrection of his master consoled him.
By now he had many Self Realization Fellowship institutes in place with headquarters
in Los Angeles. He seemed to have some inkling that his time was up, for he completed
his autobiography up to the year 1951. On March 7, 1952 the great Yogi passed away.
But he was not done with his disciples. His body was kept in a casket for over two
weeks and as the astonished mortician and many dumbfounded scientists realized,
the body was showing no signs of decay. It was his last little demonstration
of the power of yoga and the fact that the flesh does not define us but only the
eternal spirit. After some time they cremated the preserved corpse but his legacy
remains.
- Rohit Arya
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