A Comprehensive Collection - Swami Vivekananda

"He""""""SWAMl S REPLY TO THE ADDRESSES. 63becoming an atheist or an agnostic even, so longas heobeyed the social regulations ? Society may punish anybody by its disapprobation for breaking any of its regulations, but no man, not even the lowest patita," is ever"shut out from Moksha." You must not mix up the twotogether. As to that, in Malabar a chandala is not allowed to pass through the same street as a high-caste man,but let him become a Mahomedan or a Christian, he isimmediately allowed to go anywhere," and this rule hasprevailed in the dominion of a Hindu sovereign for centuries. It may be queer, but it shows the idea of tolerationfor other religions even in the most untoward circumstances.The one idea whichdistinguishes the Hindu religionfrom every other in the world, the one idea to expresswhich the sages almost exhaust the vocabulary of theSanskrit language, is that man must realize God even inthis life. And the Advaita texts very logically add, toknow God is to become God."And here comes, as a necessary consequence, thebroadest and most glorious ideaby and "Vidura" "Dharmavyadhaothers. Even the other dayof inspiration, proclaimedNischaladas,"and a number ofa Tyagi of theDadupanthi sect, boldly declared in hisVicharsagar,"who has known Brahman has become Brahman. Hiswords are Yedas, and they will expel the darkness ofignorance whether expressed in Sanskrit or any populardialect."Thus to realize God, the Brahman, as the Dvaitinssay, or to become Brahman, as the Advaitins say, isthe aim and end of the whole teaching of the Vedas, andevery other teaching therein contained represents a stagein the course of our progress thereto. And the great glory