印度传教士赴英使命
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AI-translated. May contain errors. For accurate text, refer to the original English.
中文
……我想，在他自己的国家，斯瓦米大概会住在树下，或至多在寺庙的范围之内，剃光头发，穿着本国的服饰。但在伦敦这些都行不通，所以我发现斯瓦米的居住方式与常人无异，除了他穿着一件深橙色的长外套外，穿着也与凡人一样。他笑着说，他的衣着——尤其是戴头巾的时候——并不受伦敦街头顽童的欢迎，那些顽童的评论实在不值一提。我首先请这位印度瑜伽（Yoga）士把他的名字慢慢地拼出来……
"您认为如今人们是否过于执着于非本质的事物？"
"我认为在落后的国家是这样，在西方文明国家中较少受教育的那部分人中也是如此。你的问题暗示，在有教养的人和富人当中，情况有所不同。确实如此——富人要么沉溺于享受健康的生活，要么汲汲营营地敛聚更多财富。他们，以及忙碌人群中的大部分人，说起宗教便嗤之以鼻，认为那是无稽之谈、胡说八道，而且他们确实是这么想的。唯一时髦的'宗教'就是爱国主义和世俗礼法。人们只有在婚丧之时才踏进教堂。"
"您的教导能让他们更常去教堂吗？"
"我想不太可能。因为我与仪式和教条毫无关系；我的使命是表明宗教就是一切，存在于一切之中……我们对英国现有的体制又能说什么呢？一切迹象表明，社会主义或某种形式的人民治理——随你怎么称呼——即将登场。人民当然需要满足他们的物质需求：更少的劳作、没有压迫、没有战争、更多的食物。但若不以宗教、不以人之善性为根基，我们有什么保证这个文明或任何文明能够持久？相信我，宗教触及问题的根本。若宗教正确，则一切皆正确。"
"要将宗教的本质——即形而上学的部分——灌输到人们的头脑中，想必十分困难。那离他们的思维方式和日常生活太远了。"
"在一切宗教中，我们都是从较低的真理走向较高的真理，从来不是从谬误走向真理。万物创造的背后有一个'一'，但心灵却千差万别。'存在者唯一，圣贤名之各异。'我的意思是，人从较小的真理进步到较大的真理。最差的宗教不过是对那永恒真理表层泡沫的错误解读。人逐渐地、一点一点地领悟。即使是恶魔崇拜，也不过是对永恒不变之梵的歪曲解读。其他宗教形式或多或少包含着真理。没有哪一种宗教形式完整地拥有全部真理。"
"可否请问，您来英国传播的这个宗教是您首创的吗？"
"当然不是。我是一位伟大的印度圣人——罗摩克里希纳·帕拉马罕萨——的弟子。他并非人们所说的那种博学之人——我们的一些圣贤是那样的——但他是一位极为神圣的人，深深浸润在吠檀多（Vedanta）哲学的精神之中。当我说'哲学'时，我几乎不知道是否应该说'宗教'，因为它实际上二者兼具。您必须读一读马克斯·穆勒教授在最近一期《十九世纪》杂志上关于我的导师（Guru）的记述。罗摩克里希纳于一八三六年生于胡格利县，一八八六年去世。他对凯沙布·钱德拉·森等人的生命产生了深远的影响。通过身体的修炼和心灵的调伏，他获得了对精神世界的惊人洞察力。他的面容以孩童般的柔和、深邃的谦逊和非凡的温雅而著称。无人能对之视而不动容。"
"那么您的教导是源自吠陀（Vedas）的？"
"是的。吠檀多的意思是吠陀的终结，即第三部分——奥义书（Upanishads），包含着成熟的思想，这些思想在较早的部分中更多是以萌芽形式存在的。吠陀最古老的部分是'本集'，用非常古老的梵语写成，只有借助一部极为古老的词典——雅斯卡的《词源释义》——才能理解。"
"恐怕我们英国人多少有种想法，觉得印度有许多要向我们学习的东西；一般人对于能从印度学到什么相当无知。"
"确实如此，但学术界深知能学到多少，那些教训又是多么重要。你不会发现马克斯·穆勒、莫尼尔·威廉斯、威廉·亨特爵士或德国的东方学者们轻视印度的抽象学问。"
……斯瓦米在维多利亚街三十九号进行演讲。所有人都受到欢迎，一如古代使徒时代那样，这新的教导不收分文、无需代价。这位印度传教士体格异常健壮，他的英语造诣只能用"完美"来形容。
English
... I presume that in his own country the Swami would live under a tree, or at most in the precincts of a temple, his head shaved, dressed in the costume of his country. But these things are not done in London, so that I found the Swami located much like other people, and, save that he wears a long coat of a dark orange shade, dressed like other mortals likewise. He laughingly related that his dress, especially when he wears a turban, does not commend itself to the London street arab, whose observations are scarcely worth repeating. I began by asking the Indian Yogi to spell his name very slowly. . . .
"Do you think that nowadays people are laying much stress on the non-essential?"
"I think so among the backward nations, and among the less cultured portion of the civilised people of the West. Your question implies that among the cultured and the wealthy, matters are on a different footing. So they are; the wealthy are either immersed in the enjoyment of health or grubbing for more. They, and a large section of the busy people, say of religion that it is rot, stuff, nonsense, and they honestly think so The only religion that is fashionable is patriotism and Mrs. Grundy. People merely go to church when they are marrying or burying somebody."
"Will your message take them oftener to church?"
"I scarcely think it will. Since I have nothing whatever to do with ritual or dogma; my mission is to show that religion is everything and in everything. . . . And what can we say of the system here in England? Everything goes to show that Socialism or some form of rule by the people, call it what you will, is coming on the boards. The people will certainly want the satisfaction of their material needs, less work, no oppression, no war, more food. What guarantee have we that this or any civilisation will last, unless it is based on religion, on the goodness of man? Depend on it, religion goes to the root of the matter. If it is right, all is right."
"It must be difficult to get the essential, the metaphysical, part of religion into the minds of the people. It is remote from their thoughts and manner of life."
"In all religions we travel from a lesser to a higher truth, never from error to truth. There is a Oneness behind all creation, but minds are very various. 'That which exists is One, sages call It variously.' What I mean is that one progresses from a smaller to a greater truth. The worst religions are only bad readings of the froth. One gets to understand bit by bit. Even devil-worship is but a perverted reading of the ever-true and immutable Brahman. Other phases have more or less of the truth in them. No form of religion possesses it entirely."
"May one ask if you originated this religion you have come to preach to England?"
"Certainly not. I am a pupil of a great Indian sage, Ramakrishna Paramahamsa. He was not what one might call a very learned man, as some of our sages are, but a very holy one, deeply imbued with the spirit of the Vedanta philosophy. When I say philosophy, I hardly know whether I ought not to say religion, for it is really both. You must read Professor Max Müller's account of my Master in a recent number of the Nineteenth Century. Ramakrishna was born in the Hooghly district in 1836 and died in 1886. He produced a deep effect on the life of Keshab Chandra Sen and others. By discipline of the body and subduing of the mind he obtained a wonderful insight into the spiritual world. His face was distinguished by a childlike tenderness, profound humility, and remarkable sweetness of expression. No one could look upon it unmoved."
"Then your teaching is derived from the Vedas?"
"Yes, Vedanta means the end of the Vedas, the third section or Upanishads, containing the ripened ideas which we find more as germs in the earlier portion. The most ancient portion of the Vedas is the Samhitâ, which is in very archaic Sanskrit, only to be understood by the aid of a very old dictionary, the Nirukta of Yâska."
"I fear that we English have rather the idea that India has much to learn from us; the average man is pretty ignorant as to what may be learnt from India."
"That is so, but the world of scholars know well how much is to be learnt and how important the lesson. You would not find Max Müller, Monier Williams, Sir William Hunter, or German Oriental scholars making light of Indian abstract science."
. . . The Swami gives his lecture at 39 Victoria Street. All are made welcome, and as in ancient apostolic times, the new teaching is without money and without price. The Indian missionary is a male of exceptionally fine physique; his command of English can only be described as perfect.
文本来自Wikisource公共领域。原版由阿德瓦伊塔修道院出版。