Swami Turiyananda: His Life and Teachings

Swami Turiyananda, with whose life and teachings the present book is concerned, was a direct sannyasin disciple of Sri Ramakrishna. The Swami was closely associated with the Great Master during the last six years of his life, and afterwards he became one of the members of the small group of monastics who organized themselves in the Master’s name under the leadership of Swami Vivekananda. Swami Turiyananda was a rare combination of extreme asceticism, sympathy, devotional fervour, Sanskrit scholarship and modern outlook. Meditation was a pastime for him, and physical hardships and ailments had hardly any depressing effect on his mind. His unfailing spirit of dependence on God enabled him to face the uncertainties of a wandering mendicant’s life even in failing health and distressing conditions. He was an example of one who possessed a body but was not possessed by it. Though a scholar, he lived without the vanity of scholarship and preferred to teach through example.