The Guide - Science & Religion

Science & Religion

	Introduction
	Religion is not Unscientific
	Criticism of Material Science
	Science, Religion and Human Welfare

SWAMI VIVEKANANDA ON
SCIENCE AND RELIGION

by Swami Brahmeshanda

Introduction

Through an inscrutable law, East and West offer two fields of activity, one mainly in the domain of spirit, and the other largely in the domain of matter, for the glorious consummation of the ideal to which all humanity has been moving. West has mostly devoted itself to researches in the nature of material things while the East has experimented in religion to learn the laws of the realm of spirit. Both ideals are necessary for the progress of humanity.

Swami Vivekananda was most qualified and competent to suggest ways and means of striking a balance between, and to create a healthy synthesis of, the Western Science and Eastern Philosophy. He was the product of Indian culture, and was born and brought up in a religious atmosphere. As a young student he studied Western philosophy which shook his innate faith in God and the supernatural. But even the Western philosophers did not satisfy his unquenchable thirst for truth. He did not want diagrams of truth no matter how clever. He wanted The Truth. In this state of mind, as a skeptic and agnostic and yet a true seeker of truth he met Sri Ramakrishna - who represented the traditional India with its spiritual perspective, its asceticism and realization, the India of Upanishads. Vivekananda, then Narendra, came to him with all the doubts and skepticism of modern age, unwilling to accept even the highest truths of religion without verification, yet with a zeal for truth burning within. The result of the contact was the birth of a new philosophy, new religious outlook on life, in which India's ancient spiritual perspective was heightened, widened and strengthened to include modern learning. The intense activity of the West was to be combined with the deep meditation of the East. Asceticism and retirement were to be supplemented by work and service to others. From the merging of the two currents a new religion, the faith of glorious tomorrow was born in which nothing was denied, but all was fulfillment.

Religion is not Unscientific