Swami Ram Tirtha stressed the ideals of purity, renunciation and self-control to gain inner-freedomBeing one with the God

Swami Ram Tirtha (1873-1906) belonged to that genre of saints who became one with the Ultimate reality in their lifetime. His transparent purity, beatific smile, child-like simplicity and profound knowledge won him the admiration of his contemporaries both in India and abroad. He was compared to the sages of Upanishads like Yajnavalkya and hailed as ‘another Jesus Christ.’

Life and perceptions

Born as Tirath Ram at Murariwala, a village in district Gujranwala (now in Pakistan), in an orthodox Brahmin family which traced its ancestry to Goswami Tulsidas, Swami Ram Tirtha underwent many hardships before becoming a professor of mathematics in the Forman Christian College, Lahore. He was well acquainted with European science, philosophy and literature, as also with Persian and Urdu mystical poetry. His interest in spirituality took him to notable religious persons of his time, including Swami Vivekananda, whose inspiring lectures in Punjab motivated him to spend his life in spreading the message of Vedanta. After renouncing his worldly ties, he meditated in the Himalayas, and subsequently visited Japan and the United States, winning acclaim for his public lectures, private talks and question-answer sessions. To him, the true gauge of success was not material prosperity but soul-growth. He described modern civilization as ‘sublimely stupid and beautifully dull’ since it was moving away from the Law of universal nature.

An ardent patriot, he identified himself with his motherland. ‘The land of India is my own body, the Comorin is my feet, the Himalayas is my head. From my hair flows the Ganga, from my head comes the Brahmaputra and the Indus; the Vindhyachals are grit around my loins; the Coromandel is my left and the Malabar my left leg. I am the whole of India, and its East and West are my arms and I spread them in a straight line to embrace humanity.’ Yet his patriotism was not narrow as he strictly adhered to the Vedic ideal of vasudhaiva kutumbhakam – ‘The world is one family.’

Mystical poems

Swami Ram Tirtha believed that his creative ability did not lie in his speeches which enthralled his hearers, but in the poems and articles he wrote in the solitude of his Himalayas. His poems reveal his creative genius and lofty ideals. It stresses the divinity of human nature and oneness of mankind. ‘In one mirror there was one face. When the mirror was broken, the number of faces increased. Man is one.’

He saw his own self beaming in the whole universe. ‘I am all, nothing is other than me…I am in front and behind, above and below, manifest and hidden, lover and beloved, poet and poem, nightingale and rose.’ When someone asked, was he trying to assume the role of a prophet, he replied, that he did not need to do so, as he was god himself (aham bramasmi). To realise one’s divinity one should shed one’s lower nature. ‘Let God always speak, think and act through you,’ he advised. Ceremonial worship was of little value to him. ‘Thou art all that truly exists in the idol. Thou pervade the flowers offered before it. How can I offer the Lord to the Lord? To bring the food would be an insult. How can I offer food to Him who feeds the universe?’

Vedanta and harmony

Swami Ram Tirtha held that Vedanta was in harmony with the Law of evolution because it wanted to establish ‘real integration through formal differentiation’ unlike dogmatic religions which aimed at uniformity of belief. ‘The whole world is I, my own flesh and blood.’ To hate the other is to hate one self. So apply ‘the key of love’ to unlock the secrets of the heart, ‘martyr the ego’, and feel oneness with everyone around.

( Dr Kapoor is a noted educationist, historian and spiritualist)