Everything about Sri Yukteswar Giri totally explained
Sri Yukteswar Giri (also spelled Sriyukteswar Giri and Sriyukteshvar Giri) (
May 10,
1855-
March 9,
1936) is the monastic name of
Priyanath Karar, the
guru of
Paramahansa Yogananda. Sri Yukteswar was a
Jyotisha (traditional astrologer), a
yogi, and an exponent of the
Bhagavad Gita and the
Bible. He was a disciple of
Lahiri Mahasaya of
Varanasi and a member of the
Giri branch of the
swami order. Yogananda styled Sri Yukteswar
Jnanavatar, or "Incarnation of Wisdom".
Biography
Sri Yukteswar was born Priyanath Karar in
Serampore,
India to Kshetranath Karar and Kadambini. Priyanath lost his father at a young age, and took on much of the responsibility for managing his family's land holdings. A bright student, he passed the entrance exams and enrolled in Srirampur Christian Missionary College, where he developed an interest in the Bible. This interest would later express itself in his book,
The Holy Science, which discusses the unity behind the scientific principles underlying Yoga and the Bible. He also attended
Calcutta Medical College for almost two years.
After leaving college, Priyanath married and had a daughter. His wife died a few years after their marriage, and he eventually was formally intitiated into the monastic Swami order as "Sriyukteshvar Giri" (note: thus 'Sri' isn't a separate honorific, but part of his given name).
In 1884, Priyanath met
Lahiri Mahasaya, who became his Guru and initiated him into the path of
Kriya Yoga. Sri Yukteswar spent a great deal of time in the next several years in the company of his guru, often visiting Lahiri Mahasaya in Benares. In 1894, while attending the Kumbha Mela in Allahabad, he met the Guru of Lahiri Mahasaya,
Mahavatar Babaji, who asked Sri Yukteswar to write a book comparing Hindu scriptures and the Christian bible. Mahavatar Babaji also bestowed on Sri Yukteswar the title of 'Swami' at that meeting. Sri Yukteswar completed the requested book in 1894, naming it
Kaivalya Darsanam, or The Holy Science.
A Revolutionary Interlude
"Preonath Karar" has been mentioned by James Campbell Ker in the Bihar and Orissa History Sheet (p. 498) of his
Political Trouble in India, A Confidential Report, 1917, First Reprint 1973. Arun Chandra Guha writes that when
Bankimchandra Chatterjee was a Deputy Magistrate at Chinsura, patriotic literary figures like
Yogendra Vidyabhushan,
Bhudev Mukherjee,
Nabin Chandra Sen,
Hemchandra Banerjee used to meet in his house. Under their inspiration and advice, Tincowri Chatterjee started physical culture centres at Chandernagore, Chinsura and Serampore. Professor
Charu Chandra Roy organised them into revolutionary groups during the agitations against the Partition of Bengal in 1905. The famous Tantric saint Tarapada Banerjee,
alias Tara Khepa, openly advocated rebellion against British rule while holding classes on the
Gita and the
Chandi.
Mokshada Samadhyayi, Satish Sen, Preonath Karar,
Upen Banerjee,
Kanailal Datta,
Hrishikesh Kanjilal and others were members of those centres.
In 1900, Preonath Karar founded the Priyadham at Serampore, an ashram where “Hrishikesh, one of the accused in the
Alipore Bomb Case has his gymnasium.” Preonath and
Mokshada soon shifted to Benares where they contacted
Suranath Bhaduri and founded a revolutionary centre. Since Tilak’s visit to Benares in 1900, the revolutionaries found it a congenial spot for secret activity. According to G.C. Denham, Superintendent of Police, “A plan is also under consideration to get the Mussalmans of Turkey and Persia to prejudice the illiterate Muhammadan mass of this country against the English and to send two or three clever English-educated Bengalis to Kabul in guise of Mussalman
fakirs after making them versed in the Koran, and also to bring up after some time
Arabindo Ghose either to Benares or to some other place for a secret consultation between him and Suranath.”
“A few months before the session of the Surat Congress, Suranath traveled in the guise of a Tantric priest all over Bengal (…) preaching sedition… went Calcutta and stayed there for a month at the
Sandhya office… He then formed a central committee (…), Mokshada, Shyamsundar Chakravarti, Arabinda Ghose, Tara Khepa, Annada Kaviraj and others as members.” A few days before the publication of the
Yugantar, at Benares, Preonath with Hrishikesh and Suranath “convened a public meeting as well as a meeting of the pundits wherein it was settled by quotations from the Hindu Astrology and Astronomy and announced firmly that the sinful
Iron Age was now over…”
Spiritual Life
Sri Yukteswar converted his large two-story family home in Serampore into an ashram, named "Priyadham", where he resided with students and disciples. In 1903, he also established an ashram in the sea-side town of
Puri, naming it "Kararashram". From these two ashrams, Sri Yukteswar taught students, and began an organization named "Sadhu Sabha".
An interest in education resulted in Sri Yukteswar developing a syllabus for schools, on the subjects of physics, physiology, geography, astronomy, and astrology He also wrote a book for Bengalis on learning basic English and Hindi called "First Book", and wrote a basic book on astrology. Later, he became interested in the education of women, which was uncommon in Bengal at that time.
Sri Yukteswar was especially skilled in Vedic Astrology, and prescribed various astrological gemstones and bangles to his students. He also studied astronomy and science, as evidenced in the formulation of his
Yuga theory in The Holy Science.
He had only a few long-term disciples, but in 1910, the young Mukunda Lal Ghosh would become Sri Yukteswar’s most well known disciple, eventually spreading the teachings of Kriya Yoga throughout the world as
Paramahansa Yogananda. Yogananda attributed Sri Yukteswar’s small number of disciples to his strict training methods, which Yogananda said “cannot be described as other than drastic”.
Regarding the role of the Guru, Sri Yukteswar said:
Look, there's no point in blindly believing that after I touch you, you'll be saved, or that a chariot from heaven will be waiting for you. Because of the guru's attainment, the sanctifying touch becomes a helper in the blossoming of Knowledge, and being respectful towards having acquired this blessing, you must yourself become a sage, and proceed on the path to elevate your Soul by applying the techniques of sadhana given by the guru. It is in the path of meditation, truthfulness, and surrendering to God that the Guru-graced sadhaka becomes successful in attaining revelation and understanding of new methods of learning.
Author
W.Y. Evans-Wentz described his impression of Sri Yukteswar in the preface to Yogananda's :
"Sri Yukteswar was of gentle mien and voice, of pleasing presence, and worthy of the veneration, which his followers spontaneously accorded to him. Every person who knew him, whether of his own community or not, held him in the highest esteem. I vividly recall his tall, straight, ascetic figure, garbed in the saffron-colored garb of one who has renounced worldly quests, as he stood at the entrance of the hermitage to give me welcome. His hair was long and somewhat curly, and his face bearded. His body was muscularly firm, but slender and well-formed, and his step energetic."
Sri Yukteswar died at his
Puri ashram on March 9, 1936.
The Holy Science
Sri Yukteswar wrote
The Holy Science in 1894. In the introduction, Sri Yukteswar wrote:
"The purpose of this book is to show as clearly as possible that there's an essential unity in all religions; that there's no difference in the truths inculcated by the various faiths; that there's but one method by which the world, both external and internal, has evolved; and that there's but one Goal admitted by all scriptures." which produced a documentary on the topic titled The Great Year, narrated by James Earl Jones.
The theory of the Sun's binary companion expounded by Sri Yukteswar in The Holy Science has attracted the attention of David Frawley, who has written about it in a several of his books. According to Frawley, the theory offers a better estimate of the age of Rama and Krishna and other important historical Indian figures than other dating methods, which estimate some of these figures to have lived millions of years ago — belying accepted human history. Also, there's an author named Walter Cruttenden, founder of the Binary Research Institute, who wrote a book called "Lost Star of Myth and Time", which covers the Binary theory extensively.
Noted Disciples of Swami Sri Yukteswar Giri
Paramahansa Yogananda (1893 - 1952)
Motilal Mukherjee (1885-1992)
Swami Satyananda (initiated by Kebalananda) (1896-1971)
Swami Bhabananda Giri (1894-1984) [ashram:Swami Sri Yukteswar math at Chandrakona road, Midnapore, West Bengal]
Swami Paramananda (-1984)[Nimpura,Midnapore, West Bengal, India]
Swami Narayana (Swami Narayana Giri) ("Prabhujee")
Amulya Charan Santra [Kipperporecenter]
Bijoy Kumar Chatterjee
Bipin Chandra Bhumia (Dr. Bipin Bihari Bhumia)
Swami Dhirananda (Basu Kumar Bagchi), initiated by Kebalananda
Sri Sailendra Bejoy Das Gupta
Golakananda Giri
Dasarathi Chatterjee
Sri Yukteswar Giri in popular culture
Further Information
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