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Swami Vivekananda

Swami Vivekananda

1863 CE–1902 CE · Modern · Calcutta (Kolkata)

1863–1902 CE (born 12 January 1863, Calcutta; died 4 July 1902, Belur)

Narendranāth Datta, an educated young Calcutta man, became the chief disciple of Ramakrishna in the 1880s and, taking the monastic name Vivekananda, emerged as the leading exponent of a modern, reform-minded, Advaita-centered Vedānta. After Ramakrishna's death he wandered across India as a mendicant, an itinerary that ended at Kanyakumari (Cape Comorin) at the southern tip of the subcontinent, where (tradition records) he resolved his mission on a rock offshore. He traveled to the United States and delivered celebrated addresses at the 1893 World's Parliament of Religions in Chicago, then lectured across America and Britain before returning to found the Ramakrishna Mission (1897) and its monastery at Belur. His teaching — that Advaita non-dualism is the essence of all religion and that service to humanity is worship — is enormously influential but is itself a particular modern ('Neo-Vedānta') position, not the neutral whole of Hindu thought, and should be presented as such. He died at Belur Math in 1902, aged 39.

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Did you know?

  • The monk who stopped a Chicago hall with five words

    On 11 September 1893, a 30-year-old monk from Calcutta, Swami Vivekananda, took the stage at the World's Parliament of Religions in Chicago. His opening — "Sisters and Brothers of America" — reportedly drew a sustained ovation from the several-thousand-strong audience, and his appearances there made him one of the first widely known Indian teachers in the United States.

    How we know

    Swami Vivekananda (b. 12 Jan 1863, Calcutta – d. 4 Jul 1902) delivered his opening address at the World's Parliament of Religions, Chicago, on 11 Sep 1893 (aged 30); the "Sisters and brothers of America" greeting reportedly drew a standing ovation from an audience of several thousand.

  • A Hindu society opened in Manhattan in 1894

    After speaking at the 1893 World's Parliament of Religions in Chicago, the Bengali monk Swami Vivekananda (1863-1902) stayed on in America and, in November 1894, founded the Vedanta Society of New York in two rented rooms on West 33rd Street. It is documented as the first Hindu organization established in the United States, and it remains active today, more than 130 years later.

    How we know

    Vedanta Society of New York founded by Swami Vivekananda (b. Jan 12, 1863 - d. July 4, 1902) in Nov. 1894 at 54 West 33rd St., Manhattan, after his Sept. 1893 Chicago Parliament of Religions address; documented as the first Hindu organization in the US, still operating in 2026.

  • A wandering monk's 1893 shipboard encounter with Jamsetji Tata is woven into the founding story of India's premier science institute

    In 1893, sailing from Yokohama to Vancouver aboard the SS Empress of India on his way to Chicago, Swami Vivekananda shared the steamer with the industrialist Jamsetji Tata and they discussed science and India's future. Five years later Tata wrote to him — calling himself a 'fellow-traveller' from that Japan-to-Chicago voyage — while planning the research institute that became the Indian Institute of Science.

    How we know

    Vivekananda and Tata met aboard SS Empress of India, Yokohama–Vancouver, July 1893; Tata's letter of 23 November 1898 opens 'I trust you remember me as a fellow-traveller on your voyage from Japan to Chicago' (singular — Tata identifying himself); IISc came into existence 1909 (tata.com/newsroom/jamsetji-tata-letter-to-swami-vivekananda; thebetterindia.com/127599; science.thewire.in on Vivekananda–Nivedita–Tata–IISc).

Life journeyclick any stop, or use ←/→Trace on the map →

Stop 1 of 5Born

Calcutta (Kolkata)

What they did here

Birthplace and early life as Narendranāth Datta; born into a well-off, educated family on 12 January 1863.

About Calcutta (Kolkata)

Calcutta (Kolkata) is the capital of West Bengal, on the Hooghly River in eastern India, and was the capital of British India until 1911. It was a focus of the 19th–20th-century Hindu renaissance: Swami Vivekananda was born there, and Sri Aurobindo and A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupāda were active in the city.

In Calcutta (Kolkata) at the same time

Sri Aurobindo, A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada

See other sages who lived in Calcutta (Kolkata)→

In the same place & time

Sages whose lives overlapped with Swami Vivekananda’s in the same cities, drawn from their recorded journeys.

The world in their lifetime

Thinkers, teachers, and rulers whose lives overlapped with Swami Vivekananda’s — a glimpse of the wider world they lived in. Drawn purely from recorded birth and death years.

Works

No works attributed in the corpus yet.