Swami Vivekananda (12 January 1863-1902) was a famous disciple of Sri Ramakrishan

Paramahansa , born in an affluent family in Kolkata on 12th January, 1863. Narendranath (as he was
known before becoming a monk) had a mind of his own and a passion to serve people. Biographers
wrote that he was profoundly impressed by John Stuart Mill’s Three Essays of Religion. He studies
the works of Descartes, Spinoza, Hume, Kant, Fichte, Hegel, Schopenhauer, Comte and Darwin.”

Works of Swami Vivekananda Swami Vivekananda worked on many themes.

Karma Yoga (1896) , Raja Yoga (1896 [1899 edition]), Vedanta Philosophy: An address before the
graduate philosophical society (First published 1896) , Lectures from Colombo to Almora (1897),
Vedanta philosophy: lectures on Jnana Yoga (1902), published in his lifetime.

And some other works published posthumously including Addresses on Bhakti Yoga , Bhakti Yoga ,
Complete Works. Vol 5, The East and the West , Inspired Talks (First published 1909 ) , Narada Bhakti
Sutras - translated by Swami Vivekananda, Lectures from Colombo to Almora (1904), Para Bhakti or
Supreme Devotion , Practical Vedanta, Jnana Yoga , Raja Yoga (1920), Speeches and writings of
Swami Vivekananda; a comprehensive collection , Vivekavani (1986) – Telugu, Yoga (1987)

Indian nationalism
Swami Vivekananda believed that India is the blessed punyabhumi, the "land of virtue":
According to Swami Vivekananda it is coordinated willpower that leads to independence

Religion
Religion played a major role in Vivekananda's ideas. To Vivekananda religion was not only talk
or doctrine or theory, but realization of the best and strongest powers within oneself. He said,
[I]t is being and becoming, not hearing or acknowledging; it is the whole soul becoming changed
into what it believes. He also felt religion is the gist of all worship is to be pure and to do good to
others.

According to Swami Vivekananda, religion is the idea which is raising the brute into man, and
man unto God.
According to Swami Vivekananda "faith, faith, faith in ourselves, faith, faith in God- this is the
secret of greatness. So he told, if people have faith in three hundred and thirty millions
of Hindu mythological gods, and in all the gods which foreigners have now and still have no faith
in themselves, there will be no salvation

Vivekananda was deeply influenced by the bramho samaj, and by his guru Ramakrishna, who
regarded the Absolute and the relative reality to be nondual aspects of the same integral reality.

Universalism
Although embracing and propagating Universalism, he regarded Hinduism the best of all
religions, and Advaita Vedanta the best of what Indian religious thought had to offer. According to
Vivekananda the greatest misfortune of the world is we do not tolerate and accept other religions.
In his lecture in Parliament of religions on September 15, 1893, he told a story of a frog who lived
in a well for a long time, he was born there and brought up there and he used to think that
nothing in the world can be bigger than that. Swami Vivekananda concluded the story:
“I am a Hindu. I am sitting in my own little well and thinking that the whole world is my little well.
The Christian sits in his little well and thinks the whole world is his well. The Mohammedan sits in
his little well and thinks that is the whole world.”
According to Vivekananda we must not only tolerate other religions, but positively embrace them,
since the truth is the basis of all religions.

Society
Social service was an essential aspect of Vivekananda's ideas, and an innovation which deviated
from both Advaita Vedanta and Ramakrishna. According to Vivekananda, an important teaching
he received from Ramakrishna was that Jiva is Shiva (each individual is divinity itself). So he
stressed on Shiva Jnane Jiva Seva, (to serve common people considering them as manifestation
of God). According to Vivekananda, man is potentially Divine, so, service to man is indeed
service to God.

Swami Vivekananda called Jain monks the first great ascetics.]He praised their ancient
knowledge of presence of low form of life in water

Personal development
Character building
Swami Vivekananda realized three things are necessary to make every man great, every nation
great

 Conviction of the powers of goodness;

 Absence of jealousy and suspicion;
 Helping all who are trying to be and do good.

Education
Vivekananda believed education is the manifestation of perfection already in men. he felt
education should be man-making, life giving and character-building. To him education was an
assimilation of noble ideas.

Womanhood
Swami Vivekananda warned it is completely unfair to discriminate between sexes, as there is not
any sex distinction in atman(soul), the soul has neither sex, nor caste nor imperfection. He
suggested not to think that there are men and women, but only that there are human beings.

According to Vivekananda, the ideal of womanhood in India is motherhood – that marvelous,

unselfish, all-suffering, ever-forgiving mother. Vivekananda felt, in India, there are two great
evils – trampling on the women, and grinding through the poor through caste restrictions.

According to Swami Vivekananda, Sita is typical of India – the idealized India. Swami
Vivekananda assured if world literature of the past and world literature of the future are
thoroughly exhausted, yet, it'll not be possible to find out another Sita, because Sita is unique,
the character was depicted once for all. Swami Vivekananda felt there may have been
several Ramas, perhaps, but never more than one Sita.