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Research PaperEnglish

Contribution of Indian Philosophers to English Literature

* S. D. Deshbhratar April, 2012 * Asst. Prof. Dept. of English ,Kamla Nahru Mahavidyalaya, Nagpur
A B S T R A C T
Indian literature in English has become very enriched due to the contribution of so many great people who have philosophical bent of mind. Indian culture is having a depth of divine sublimity since civilization that same tradition remains prosperous even in the British reign and in Independent India.

India is a country of saints but under the influence of British language, when our great saints started enlightening the world, their words reached to Western World also. The depth of oriental Indian philosophy spread and created tremendous impact all over the world. India is having the great tradition of Philosophical writing and talking in English since Rajaram Mohan Roy upto J Krishnamurthy. There philosophical writing has become the vehicle of expression of vision of life and society. The whole credit and responsibility in terms of it goes to the great big wheels. The immortal philosophers are Swami Vivekanda, Sri Arbindo Ghosh and J Krishnamurthy: the Big three have pre-dominantly occupied the gist of entire scenario of Indian philosophy in the modern world. Swami Vivekananda Vivekananda left a body of philosophical works which Vedic scholar Frank Parlato has called, the greatest comprehensive work in philosophy ever published. His books (compiled from lectures given around the world) on the four Yogas (Raja Yoga, Karma Yoga, Bhakti Yoga, Jnana Yoga) are very influential and still seen as fundamental texts for anyone interested in the Hindu practice of Yoga. His letters are of great literary and spiritual value. He was also considered a very good singer and a poet. He had composed many songs including his favorite Kali the Mother. His language is very free flowing. His own Bengali writings stand testimony to the fact that he believed that words - spoken or written should be for making things easier to understand rather than show off the speaker or writers knowledge The French Nobel Laureate, Romain Rolland writes, His words are great music, phrases in the style of Beethoven, stirring rhythms like the march of Handel choruses. I cannot touch these sayings of his, scattered as they are through the pages of books, at thirty years

distance, without receiving a thrill through my body like an electric shock. And what shocks, what transports, must have been produced when in burning words they issued from the lips of the hero! Sri Aurobindo His own vision and philosophy of human progress and a spiritual path which he termed Integral Yoga. He wrote over a hundred poems, many plays and several books during others extended to several pages of carefully composed explanations of practical aspects of his teachings. These were later collected and published in book form in three volumes of Letters on Yoga. Sri Aurobindo worked on a poem he had started earlier. It became perhaps his greatest literary achievement, Savitri, an epic spiritual poem in blank verse of approximately 24,000 lines. One of Sri Aurobindos main philosophical achievements was to introduce the concept of evolution into Vedantic thought. Samkhya philosophy had already proposed such a notion centuries earlier. Jiddu Krishnamurti He was raised under the tutelage of Annie Besant and C.W. Leadbeater, leaders of the Society at the time, who believed him to be a vehicle for an expected World Teacher. As a young man, he disavowed this idea and dissolved the worldwide organization (the Order of the Star) established to support it. He claimed allegiance to no nationality, caste, religion, or philosophy, and spent the rest of his life traveling the world as an individual speaker, speaking to large and small groups, as well as with interested individuals. He authored a number of books, among them The First and Last Freedom, The Only Revolution , and Krishnamurtis Notebook . Krishnamurthy was a renowned writer and speaker on philosophical and spiritual subjects. Conclusion In Sanskrit the philosophy is called as Darshan Shastra which means giving the actual practical experience of science. In this vein Swami
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Vivekananda, Sir Aurobindo Ghosh and J Krishnamurthy was not simply a thinker or orator, they preached what they have experienced, that is the basic differences in Indian philosophy and Western philosophy. India is having a great tradition of enlighten philosophy (Bhuddhatva) like Charvaka, Buddha, Mahavir and many more, the real greatness lie in the eternity of that same tradition with more comprehensive and contemporary aspects with modern philosopher like Swami Vivekananda, Sir Aurobindo Ghosh and J Krishnamurthy. Swami Vivekananda preached Advaita Vedanta while Sri Aurobindo Ghosh termed the spiritual path as Internal Yoga. His central theme is the evolution of life in to a Life divine. As The Times Literary Supplement wrote of Aurobindo: In fact, he is a new type of thinker, one who combines in his vision the alacrity of the West with the illumination of the East. To study his writings is to enlarge the boundaries of ones knowledge... He is a yogi who writes as though he were standing among the stars, with the constellations for his companions. The central theme of Sri Aurobindos vision is the evolution of life into a life divine, in his own words: Man is a transitional being. He is not final. The step from man to superman is the next approaching achievement in the earths evolution. It is inevitable because it is at once the intention of the inner spirit and the logic of Natures process.

While J Krishnamurthys subject matter had evolved to encompass several new and different directions, the fundamental teachings remained unchanged. In late 1980, he took the opportunity to reaffirm the basic elements of his message in a written statement that came to be known as the Core of the Teaching. An excerpt follows: Truth is a pathless land. Man cannot come to it through any organization, through any creed, through any dogma, priest or ritual, nor through any philosophical knowledge or psychological technique. He has to find it through the mirror of relationship, through the understanding of the contents of his own mind, through observation, and not through intellectual analysis or introspective dissection. Man has built in himself images as a sense of security religious, political, personal. These manifest as symbols, ideas, beliefs. The burden of these dominates mans thinking, relationships and his daily life. These are the causes of our problems for they divide man from man in every relationship. Aurobindo Gosh and Swami Vivekanand lived and followed the path of Ashrama but J Krishnamurthy dissolved the concept of organization. In their philosophy we can say, their lie a Indian sublimity, this philosophy is as pure as crystal water and one can look into it to find the various themes and reality enshrined with vigorous and lucidity.

R E F E R E N C E
1. Gosh, Aurobindo Sri, (1969) The Life Divine III, Volume 21,22, Winconsin, Lotus Press. 2. Vivekanada Swami, (1930), Raja Yoga or Conquering the Internal Nature, Mayavati Almora, Advaita Ashram Publication. 3. Krishnamurti, J, (1991) The Origin of Conflict, Volume 6 (1949-1952), America, Kendall/Hunt Publishing. 4. Dasgupta S N, (1955) History of Indian Philosophy, Vol I and II, London, Cambridge University Press. 5. Potter K H, (1963) Presuppositions of Indian philosophy, New Jersey, Prentice Hall. 6. Hosper J, (1969) Introduction Reading in Aesthetics, New York, The Free Press. 7. Susan Langer, (1953) Feeling And Form: A Theory of Art Developed from philosophy in New Key, Routledge and Kegan Paul. 8. Elton William, (1959) Aesthetic and Language, London, Oxford.

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