Cosmic Love and Human Apathy: Swami Vivekanand's Restatement of Religion

The truth is rarely simple. The common consensus is that Swami Vivekananda, as Sri Ramakrishna's chosen disciple, spread his master's message across the world. The fact, though, is that after Ramakrishna's death in 1886, Vivekananda not only shifted the devotional emphasis of the new monastic order from Kali to Shiva, he also embraced a world far removed from Ramakrishna's. Cosmic Love and Human Apathy is the story of this rupture. Integral to the tale is the issue of Hindu identity. The essays in this volume examine Vivekananda's formulation of Hinduism as religion: the most definitive restatement of Hinduism in modern history. Erudite yet accessible, consistently probing and skeptical of hoary traditions, controversial and thought-provoking, Cosmic Love and Human Apathy is an invaluable addition to the existing scholarship on one of India's greatest religious and social icons.