In the life of the great Saviours and Prophets of the world
it is often found that they are accompanied by souls of high
spiritual potency who play a conspicuous part in the furtherance
of their Master's mission. They become so integral a part of
the life and work of these great ones that posterity can think of
them only in mutual association. Such is the case with Sri Ramakrishna
and M., whose diary has come to be known to the world
as the Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna in English and as Sri
Ramakrishna
Kathamrita in the original Bengali version.
Sri Mahendra Nath Gupta1,
familiarly known to the readers
of the Gospel by his pen name M., and to the devotees as Master
Mahashay, was born on the 14th of July, 1854 as the son
of Madhusudan Gupta, an officer of the Calcutta High Court,
and his wife, Swarnamayi Devi. He had a brilliant scholastic
career at Hare School and the Presidency College at Calcutta.
The range of his studies included the best that both occidental
and oriental learning had to offer. English literature, history,
economics, western philosophy and law on the one hand, and
Sanskrit literature and grammar, Darsanas, Puranas, Smritis,
Jainism, Buddhism, astrology and Ayurveda on the other — were
the subjects in which he attained considerable proficiency.
He was an educationist all his life both in a spiritual and
in a secular sense. After he passed out of College, he took up
work as headmaster in a number of schools in succession —
Narail High School, City School, Ripon College School, Metropolitan
School, Aryan School, Oriental School, Oriental Seminary
and Model School. The causes of his migration from school to
school were that he could not get on with some of the managements on
grounds of principles and that often his spiritual mood drew him
away to places of pilgrimage for long periods. He worked with
some of the most noted public men of the time like Iswar Chandra
Vidyasagar and Surendranath Banerjee. The latter appointed him as a
professor in the City and Ripon Colleges where he taught subjects like
English, philosophy, history and economics. In his later days he took
over the Morton School, and he spent his time in the staircase room
of the third floor of it, administering the school and preaching the
message of the
Master. He was much respected in educational circles where
he was usually referred to as Rector Mahashay. A teacher who
had worked under him writes thus in warm appreciation of his
teaching methods: "Only when I worked with him in school
could I appreciate what a great educationist he was. He would
come down to the level of his students when teaching, though he
himself was so learned, so talented. Ordinarily teachers confine
their instruction to what is given in books without much thought
as to whether the student can accept it or not. But M., would
first of all gauge how much the student could take in and by
what means. He would employ aids to teaching like maps,
pictures and diagrams, so that his students could learn by seeing.
Thirty years ago (from 1953) when the question of imparting
education through the medium of the mother tongue was being
discussed, M. had already employed Bengali as the medium of
instruction in the Morton School." (M —
The Apostle and the
Evangelist by Swami Nityatmananda Part I. P. 15.)
Imparting secular education was, however, only his
profession ; his main concern was with the spiritual regeneration
of man — a calling for which Destiny seems to have chosen him.
From his childhood he was deeply pious, and he used to be moved
very much by Sadhus, temples and Durga Puja celebrations.
The piety and eloquence of the great Brahmo leader of the times,
Keshab Chander Sen, elicited a powerful response from the
impressionable mind of Mahendra Nath, as it did in the case of
many an idealistic young man of Calcutta, and prepared him to
receive the great Light that was to dawn on him with the coming
of Sri Ramakrishna into his life.
This epoch-making event of his life came about in a very
strange way. M. belonged to a joint family with several collateral
members. Some ten years after he began his career as an educationist,
bitter quarrels broke out among the members of the
family, driving the sensitive M. to despair and utter despondency.
He lost all interest in life and left home one night to go into the
wide world with the idea of ending his life. At dead of night
he took rest in his sister's house at Baranagar, and in the morning,
accompanied by a nephew Siddheswar, he wandered from one
garden to another in Calcutta until Siddheswar brought him to
the Temple Garden of Dakshineswar where Sri Ramakrishna
was then living. After spending some time in the beautiful
rose gardens there, he was directed to the room of the Paramahamsa,
where the eventful meeting of the Master and the disciple
took place on a blessed evening (the exact date is not on record)
on a Sunday in March 1882. As regards what took place on the
occasion, the reader is referred to the opening section of the
first chapter of the Gospel.
The Master, who divined the mood of desperation in M,
his resolve to take leave of this 'play-field of deception', put
new faith and hope into him by his gracious words of assurance: "God
forbid! Why should you take leave of this world? Do
you not feel blessed by discovering your Guru? By His grace,
what is beyond all imagination or dreams can be easily achieved!"
At these words the clouds of despair moved away from the horizon
of M.'s mind, and the sunshine of a new hope revealed to him
fresh vistas of meaning in life. Referring to this phase of his
life, M. used to say, "Behold! where is the resolve to end life,
and where, the discovery of God! That is, sorrow should be
looked upon as a friend of man. God is all good." (Ibid
P.33.)
After this re-settlement, M's life revolved around the Master,
though he continued his professional work as an educationist.
During all holidays, including Sundays, he spent his time at
Dakshineswar in the Master's company, and at times extended
his stay to several days.
It did not take much time for M. to become very intimate
with the Master, or for the Master to recognise in this disciple a
divinely commissioned partner in the fulfilment of his spiritual
mission. When M. was reading out the Chaitanya Bhagavata,
the Master discovered that he had been, in a previous birth, a
disciple and companion of the great Vaishnava Teacher, Sri
Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, and the Master even saw him 'with his
naked eye' participating in the ecstatic mass-singing of the
Lord's name under the leadership of that Divine personality.
So the Master told M, "You are my own, of the same substance — as
the father and the son," indicating thereby that M. was one
of the chosen few and a part and parcel of his Divine mission.
There was an urge in M. to abandon the household life and
become a Sannyasin. When he communicated this idea to the
Master, he forbade him saying," Mother has told me that you
have to do a little of Her work — you will have to teach Bhagavata,
the word of God to humanity. The Mother keeps a Bhagavata
Pandit with a bondage in the world!" (Ibid P.36.)
An appropriate allusion indeed! Bhagavata, the great
scripture that has given the word of Sri Krishna to mankind,
was composed by the Sage Vyasa under similar circumstances.
When caught up in a mood of depression like that of M, Vyasa
was advised by the sage Narada that he would gain peace of
mind only on composing a work exclusively devoted to the depiction
of the Lord's glorious attributes and His teachings on Knowledge
and Devotion, and the result was that the world got from
Vyasa the invaluable gift of the Bhagavata Purana depicting the
life and teachings of Sri Krishna. From the mental depression
of the modem Vyasa, the world has obtained the Kathamrita — the
Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna.
Sri Ramakrishna was a teacher for both the Orders of mankind,
Sannyasins and householders. His own life offered an ideal
example for both, and he left behind disciples who followed the highest
traditions he had set in respect of both these ways of life.
M., along with Nag Mahashay, exemplified how a householder
can rise to the highest level of sagehood. M. was married to
Nikunja Devi, a distant relative of Keshab Chander Sen, even
when he was reading at College, and he had four children, two
sons and two daughters. The responsibility of the family, no
doubt, made him dependent on his professional income, but the
great devotee that he was, he never compromised with ideals and
principles for this reason. Once when he was working as the
headmaster in a school managed by the great Vidyasagar, the
results of the school at the public examination happened to be
rather poor, and Vidyasagar attributed it to M's pre-occupation
with the Master and his consequent failure to attend adequately
to the school work. M. at once resigned his post without any
thought of the morrow. Within a fortnight the family was in
poverty, and M. was one day pacing up and down the
verandah of his house, musing how he would feed his children the
next day. Just then a man came with a letter addressed to
'Mahendra Babu', and on opening it, M. found that it was a
letter from his friend Sri Surendra Nath Banerjee, asking whether
he would like to take up a professorship in the Ripon College.
In this way three or four times he gave up the job that gave him
the wherewithal to support the family, either for upholding principles
or for practising spiritual Sadhanas in holy places, without
any consideration of the possible dire worldly consequences; but
he was always able to get over these difficulties somehow, and
the interests of his family never suffered. In spite of his disregard
for worldly goods, he was, towards the latter part of his life, in
a fairly flourishing condition as the proprietor of the Morton
School which he developed into a noted educational institution
in the city. The Lord has said in the Bhagavad Gita that in the
case of those who think of nothing except Him, He Himself
would take up all their material and spiritual responsibilities.
M. was an example of the truth of the Lord's promise.
Though his children received proper attention from him,
his real family, both during the Master's life-time and after,
consisted of saints, devotees, Sannyasins and spiritual aspirants.
His life exemplifies the Master's teaching that an ideal householder
must be like a good maid-servant of a family, loving and
caring properly for the children of the house, but knowing always
that her real home and children are elsewhere. During the
Master's life-time he spent all his Sundays and other holidays
with him and his devotees, and besides listening to the holy talks
and devotional music, practised meditation both on the Personal
and the Impersonal aspects of God under the direct guidance
of the Master. In the pages of the Gospel the reader gets a picture
of M.'s spiritual relationship with the Master — how from a
hazy belief in the Impersonal God of the Brahmos, he was step by
step brought to accept both Personality and Impersonality as
the two aspects of the same Non-dual Being, how he was convinced
of the manifestation of that Being as Gods, Goddesses
and as Incarnations, and how he was established in a life that
was both of a Jnani and of a Bhakta. This Jnani-Bhakta outlook and
way of living became so dominant a feature of his life
that Swami Raghavananda, who was very closely associated
with him during his last six years, remarks: "Among those
who lived with M. in latter days, some felt that he always lived
in this constant and conscious union with God even with open
eyes (i.e., even in waking consciousness)." (Swami Raghavananda's
article on M. in Prabuddha Bharata vol. XXXVII. P.
442.)
Besides undergoing spiritual disciplines at the feet of the
Master, M. used to go to holy places during the Master's life-time
itself and afterwards too as a part of his Sadhana. He was
one of the earliest of the disciples to visit Kamarpukur, the
birthplace of the Master, in the latter's life-time itself; for he
wished
to practise contemplation on the Master's early life in its true
original setting. His experience there is described as follows by
Swami Nityatmananda: "By the grace of the Master, he saw the
entire Kamarpukur as a holy place bathed in an effulgent Light.
Trees and creepers, beasts and birds and men — all were made of
effulgence. So he prostrated to all on the road. He saw a
torn cat, which appeared to him luminous with the Light of
Consciousness. Immediately he fell to the ground and saluted
it" (M — The Apostle and the
Evangelist by Swami Nityatmananda vol. I. P. 40.) He had
similar experience in Dakshineswar also.
At the instance of the Master he also visited Puri, and in the
words of Swami Nityatmananda, "with indomitable courage, M. embraced
the
image of Jagannath out of season."2
The life of Sadhana and holy association that he started
on at the feet of the Master, he continued all through his life.
He has for this reason been most appropriately described as a
Grihastha-Sannyasi (householder-Sannyasin). Though he was
forbidden by the Master to become a Sannyasin, his reverence
for the Sannyasa ideal was whole-hearted and was without any
reservation. So after Sri Ramakrishna's passing away, while
several of the Master's householder devotees considered the
young Sannyasin disciples of the Master as inexperienced and
inconsequential, M. stood by them with the firm faith that the
Master's life and message were going to be perpetuated only
through them. Swami Vivekananda wrote from America in a
letter to the inmates of the Math: "When Sri Thakur (Master)
left the body, every one gave us up as a few unripe urchins. But
M. and a few others did not leave us in the lurch. We cannot
repay our debt to them." (Swami Raghavananda's
article on M. in Prabuddha Bharata vol. XXX
P. 442.)
M. spent his weekends and holidays with the monastic
brethren who, after the Master's demise, had formed themselves
into an Order with a Math at Baranagore, and participated in
the intense life of devotion and meditation that they followed. At
other times he would retire to Dakshineswar or some garden in
the city and spend several days in spiritual practice taking simple
self-cooked food. In order to feel that he was one with all
mankind he often used to go out of his home at dead of night,
and like a wandering Sannyasin, sleep with the waifs on some
open verandah or footpath on the road.
After the Master's demise, M. went on pilgrimage several
times. He visited Banaras, Vrindavan, Ayodhya and other
places. At Banaras he visited the famous Trailinga Swami and
fed him with sweets, and he had long conversations with Swami
Bhaskarananda, one of the noted saintly and scholarly Sannyasins
of the time. In 1912 he went with the Holy Mother to Banaras,
and spent about a year in the company of Sannyasins at Banaras,
Vrindavan, Hardwar, Hrishikesh and Swargashram. But he
returned to Calcutta, as that city offered him the unique
opportunity of associating himself with the places hallowed by the
Master in his life-time. Afterwards he does not seem to have
gone to any far-off place, but stayed on in his room in the Morton
School carrying on his spiritual ministry, speaking on the Master
and his teachings to the large number of people who flocked to
him after having read his famous Kathamrita known
to English
readers as The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna.
This brings us to the circumstances that led to the writing
and publication of this monumental work, which has made M. one
of the immortals in hagiographic literature. While many educated
people heard Sri Ramakrishna's talks, it was given to this
illustrious personage alone to leave a graphic and exact account
of them for posterity, with details like date, hour, place, names and
particulars about participants. Humanity owes this great book
to the ingrained habit of diary-keeping with which M. was endowed.
Even as a boy of about thirteen, while he was a student in the
3rd class of the Hare School, he was in the habit of keeping a
diary. "Today on rising," he wrote in his diary, "I greeted
my father and mother, prostrating on the ground before them" (Swami
Nityatmananda's 'M — The Apostle and the Evangelist' Part I. P 29.)
At another place he wrote, "Today, while on my way to school,
I visited, as usual, the temples of Kali, the Mother at Thanthania,
and of Mother Sitala, and paid my obeisance to them." About
twenty-five years after, when he met the Great Master in the
spring of 1882, it was the same instinct of a born diary-writer that
made him begin his book, 'unique in the literature of hagiography',
with the memorable words: "When hearing the name
of Hari or Rama once, you shed tears and your hair stands on
end, then you may know for certain that you do not have to
perform devotions such as Sandhya any more."
In addition to this instinct for diary-keeping, M. had great
endowments contributing to success in this line. Writes Swami
Nityatmananda who lived in close association with M., in his
book entitled M - The Apostle and Evangelist: "M.'s
prodigious
memory combined with his extraordinary power of imagination
completely annihilated the distance of time and place for him.
Even after the lapse of half a century he could always visualise
vividly, scenes from the life of Sri Ramakrishna. Superb too was
his power to portray pictures by words."
Besides the prompting of his inherent instinct, the main
inducement for M. to keep this diary of his experiences at
Dakshineswar was his desire to provide himself with a means for living
in holy company at all times. Being a school teacher, he could
be with the Master only on Sundays and other holidays, and it
was on his diary that he depended for 'holy company' on other
days. The devotional scriptures like the Bhagavata say that
holy company is the first and most important means for the
generation and growth of devotion. For, in such company man
could hear talks on spiritual matters and listen to the glorification
of Divine attributes, charged with the fervour and conviction
emanating from the hearts of great lovers of God. Such
company is therefore the one certain means through which Sraddha
(Faith), Rati (attachment to God) and Bhakti (loving devotion)
are generated. The diary of his visits to Dakshineswar provided
M. with material for re-living, through reading and
contemplation, the holy company he had had earlier, even on days when
he
was not able to visit Dakshineswar. The wealth of details and
the vivid description of men and things in the midst of which the
sublime conversations are set, provide excellent material
to re-live those experiences for any one with imaginative powers.
It was observed by M.'s disciples and admirers that in later life
also whenever he was free or alone, he would be pouring over his
diary, transporting himself on the wings of imagination to the
glorious days he spent at the feet of the Master.
During the Master's life-time M. does not seem to have
revealed the contents of his diary to any one. There is an
unconfirmed tradition that when the Master saw him taking notes,
he expressed apprehension at the possibility of his utilising these
to publicise him like Keshab Sen; for the Great Master was so
full of the spirit of renunciation and humility that he disliked
being lionised. It must be for this reason that no one knew
about this precious diary of M. for a decade until he brought
out selections from it as a pamphlet in English in 1897 with the
Holy Mother's blessings and permission. The Holy Mother,
being very much pleased to hear parts of the diary read to her
in Bengali, wrote to M.: "When I heard the Kathamrita,
(Bengali name of the book) I felt as if it was he, the Master, who
was saying all that." (Ibid Part I. P 37.)
The two pamphlets in English entitled the Gospel of Sri
Ramakrishna appeared in October and November 1897. They
drew the spontaneous acclamation of Swami Vivekananda, who
wrote on 24th November of that year from Dehra Dun to M.:"Many
many thanks for your second leaflet. It is indeed
wonderful. The move is quite original, and never was the life of a
Great
Teacher brought before the public untarnished by the writer's
mind, as you are doing. The language also is beyond all
praise, — so fresh, so pointed, and withal so plain and easy. I cannot
express in adequate terms how I have enjoyed them. I am really
in a transport when I read them. Strange, isn't it? Our Teacher
and Lord was so original, and each one of us will have to be
original or nothing. I now understand why none of us attempted
His life before. It has been reserved for you, this great work.
He is with you evidently." (Vedanta Kesari Vol. XIX
P. 141. Also
given in the first edition of the Gospel published
from Ramakrishna Math, Madras in 1911.)
And Swamiji added a post script to the letter: "Socratic
dialogues are Plato all over — you are entirely hidden. Moreover,
the dramatic part is infinitely beautiful. Everybody likes
it — here or in the West." Indeed, in order to be unknown,
Mahendranath had used the pen-name M., under which the book
has been appearing till now. But so great a book cannot remain
obscure for long, nor can its author remain unrecognised by the
large public in these modern times. M. and his book came to be
widely known very soon and to meet the growing demand, a
full-sized book, Vol. I of the Gospel, translated
by the author
himself, was published in 1907 by the Brahmavadin Office, Madras. A
second edition of it, revised by the author, was brought out
by the Ramakrishna Math, Madras in December 1911, and
subsequently a second part, containing new chapters from the
original Bengali, was published by the same Math in 1922. The
full English translation of the Gospel by Swami
Nikhilananda
appeared first in 1942.
In Bengali the book is published in five volumes, the first
part having appeared in 1902 and the others in 1905, 1907, 1910
and 1932 respectively.
It looks as if M. was brought to the world by the Great
Master to record his words and transmit them to posterity. Swami
Sivananda, a direct disciple of the Master and the second President
of the Ramakrishna Math and Mission, says on this topic:
"Whenever there was an interesting talk, the Master would
call Master Mahashay if he was not in the room, and then draw his
attention to the holy words spoken. We did not know then why
the Master did so. Now we can realise that this action of the
Master had an important significance, for it was reserved for
Master Mahashay to give to the world at large the sayings of the
Master." (Vedanta Kesari Vol. XIX P 141.) Thanks to
M., we
get, unlike in the case of the great
teachers of the past, a faithful record with date, time, exact report
of conversations, description of concerned men and places, references
to contemporary events and personalities and a hundred
other details for the last four years of the Master's life (1882-'86),
so that no one can doubt the historicity of the Master and his
teachings at any time in the future.
M. was in every respect a true missionary of Sri Ramakrishna
right from his first acquaintance with him in 1882. As a school
teacher, it was a practice with him to direct to the Master such
of his students as had a true spiritual disposition. Though
himself prohibited by the Master to take to monastic life, he
encouraged all spiritually inclined young men he came across
in his later life to join the monastic Order. Swami Vijnanananda,
a direct Sannyasin disciple of the Master and a President of the
Ramakrishna Order, once remarked to M.: "By enquiry I
have come to the conclusion that eighty percent and more of the
Sannyasins have embraced the monastic life after reading the
Kathamrita and coming in contact with you." (M — The Apostle
and the Evangelist by Swami Nityatmananda Part I, P 37.)
In 1905 he retired from the active life of a Professor and
devoted his remaining twenty-seven years exclusively to the
preaching of the life and message of the Great Master. He
bought the Morton Institution from its original proprietors
and shifted it to a commodious four-storeyed house at 50 Amherst
Street, where it flourished under his management as one of the
most efficient educational institutions in Calcutta. He generally
occupied a staircase room at the top of it, cooking his own meal
which consisted only of milk and rice without variation, and
attended to all his personal needs himself. His dress also was
the simplest possible. It was his conviction that limitation of
personal wants to the minimum is an important aid to holy living.
About one hour in the morning he would spend in inspecting the
classes of the school, and then retire to his staircase room to
pour over his diary and live in the divine atmosphere of the
earthly days of the Great Master, unless devotees and admirers
had already gathered in his room seeking his holy company.
In appearance, M. looked a Vedic Rishi. Tall and stately
in bearing, he had a strong and well-built body, an unusually
broad chest, high forehead and arms extending to the knees.
His complexion was fair and his prominent eyes were always
tinged with the expression of the divine love that filled his heart.
Adorned with a silvery beard that flowed luxuriantly down his
chest, and a shining face radiating the serenity and gravity of
holiness, M. was as imposing and majestic as he was handsome
and engaging in appearance. Humorous, sweet-tongued and
eloquent when situations required, this great Maharishi of our
age lived only to sing the glory of Sri Ramakrishna day and night.
Though a very well versed scholar in the Upanishads, Gita and the
philosophies of the East and the West, all his discussions and
teachings found their culmination in the life and the message of
Sri Ramakrishna, in which he found the real explanation and
illustration of all the scriptures. Both consciously and
unconsciously, he was the teacher of the Kathamrita
— the
nectarine words of the Great Master.
Though a much-sought-after spiritual guide, an educationist
of repute, and a contemporary and close associate of illustrious
personages like Sri Ramakrishna, Swami Vivekananda, Keshab
Chander Sen and Iswar Chander Vidyasagar, he was always
moved by the noble humanity of a lover of God, which consists in
respecting the personalities of all as receptacles of the Divine
Spirit. So he taught without the consciousness of a teacher,
and no bar of superiority stood in the way of his doing the humblest
service to his students and devotees. "He was a commission of
love," writes his close devotee, Swami Raghavananda, "and
yet his soft and sweet words would pierce the stoniest heart,
make the worldly-minded weep and repent and turn
Godwards." (Prabuddha Bharata Vol. XXXVII P 499.)
As time went on and the number of devotees increased, the
staircase room and terrace of the 3rd floor of the Morton
Institution became a veritable Naimisaranya of modern
times, resounding during all hours of the day, and sometimes of
night, too, with the word of God coming from the Rishi-like face of M.
addressed to the eager God-seekers sitting around. To the
devotees who helped him in preparing the text of the Gospel,
he would dictate the conversations of the Master in a meditative
mood, referring now and then to his diary. At times in the
stillness of midnight he would awaken a nearby devotee and
tell him: "Let us listen to the words of the Master in the depths
of the night as he explains the truth of the Pranava." (Vedanta
Kesari XIX P. 142.) Swami
Raghavananda, an intimate devotee of M., writes as follows about
these devotional sittings: "In the sweet and warm months
of April and May, sitting under the canopy of heaven on the
roof-garden of 50 Amherst Street, surrounded by shrubs and
plants, himself sitting in their midst like a Rishi of old, the stars
and planets in their courses beckoning us to things infinite and
sublime, he would speak to us of the mysteries of God and His
love and of the yearning that would rise in the human heart to
solve the Eternal Riddle, as exemplified in the life of his Master.
The mind, melting under the influence of his soft sweet words of
light, would almost transcend the frontiers of limited existence and
dare to peep into the infinite. He himself would take the influence
of the setting and say,'What a blessed privilege it is to sit in such a
setting (pointing to the starry heavens), in the company of the
devotees discoursing on God and His love!' These
unforgettable scenes will long remain imprinted on the minds of his
hearers." (Prabuddha Bharata Vol XXXVII P 497.)
About twenty-seven years of his life he spent in this way in
the heart of the great city of Calcutta, radiating the Master's
thoughts and ideals to countless devotees who flocked to him, and
to still larger numbers who read his Kathamrita, the last part of
which he had completed before June 1932 and given to the press.
And miraculously, as it were, his end also came immediately
after he had completed his life's mission. About three months
earlier he had come to stay at his home at 13/2 Gurdasprasad
Chaudhuary Lane at Thakur Bari, where the Holy Mother had
herself installed the Master and where His regular worship was
being conducted for the previous 40 years. The night of 3rd June
being the Phalaharini Kali Pooja day, M. had sent his devotees
who used to keep company with him, to attend the special worship
at Belur Math at night. After attending the service at the home
shrine, he went through the proof of the Kathamrita for an hour.
Suddenly he got a severe attack of neuralgic pain, from which he
had been suffering now and then of late. Before 6 a.m. in the
early hours of the 4th June 1932, he passed away, fully conscious
and chanting: 'Gurudeva-Ma, Kole toole na-o! O Master!
O Mother! Take me in your arms!'
Sri Ramakrishna Math,
Madras,
March 1974.
SWAMI TAPASYANANDA