the end Agastya became a star—Canopus, which
shines in the southern sky in India.
Further reading: G. S. Ghurye, Indian Acculturation:
Agastya and Skanda (Bombay: Popular Prakashan,
1977); E. Washburn Hopkins, Epic Mythology (Delhi:
Motilal Banarsidass, 1986); K. N. Sivaraja Pillai, Agas-
tya in the Tamil Land (New Delhi: Asian Educational
Services, 1985).
Agehananda Bharati, Swami (1923–1991)
Western Hindu monastic
Swami Agehananda Bharati was an Austrian-born
Hindu monk and an important scholar of Indian
culture and languages.
Leopold Fischer was born in Vienna, Austria,
on April 20, 1923, to a retired cavalry captain,
Hans Fischer, and his wife, Margarete. In a
youth of considerable privilege, Leopold and his
brother Hans were closer emotionally to their
governess, Frau Blumel, than to their parents,
who, according to Leopold, were not interested
in understanding and communicating with their
sons. At age 13 Leopold joined the Indian Club,
as he was already keen on India and all things
Indian, and began to study HINDI and classical
SANSKRIT; the next year he decided to become
a professional Indologist. On his 16th birthday,
after Hitler took over Austria, Fischer took an
oath to fight for India’s freedom and became
a member of Hitler’s “Free India” Legion, an
organization based on anti-British politics and
Aryan racist thought. Also on his birthday, he
took vows to become a Hindu by honoring the
five things of the cow (milk, buttermilk, butter,
urine, and dung) while renouncing the sixth
thing of the cow, namely, its flesh. He was given
the Hindu name Ramachandra by a traveling
Hindu preacher, Bhai Sachidanand. During the
war, he served with the Indian Legion of the Ger-
man army in the European theater, expanding
his language skills to include several contempo-
rary Indian languages.
In January 1949, Fischer landed in Bombay
(Mumbai), having written to many Indian con-
tacts he had made in Europe. He lived in RAMA-
KRISHNA ashrams, first in Calcutta (Kolkata), then
in Almora. After two years, he decided that the
Ramakrishna Math was not his ordained path;
nor was its founder, Swami VIVEKANANDA (1863–
1902), his ordained teacher, and he became a
novice in a Hindu monastery. He was initiated
into the Dasanami SANNYASI order of Hinduism by
Swami Vishvananda Bharati on the banks of the
Ganges at BENARES (Varanasi), where he became
Agehananda Bharati (bliss through homeless-
ness). In this initiation into monasticism (DIKSHA),
he became the first Westerner to embrace monas-
tic Hinduism fully. He then began a 1,500-mile
trek of India on foot as a mendicant monk with a
begging bowl.
Agehananda Bharati continued his scholarly
activities in such diverse subjects as cultural
anthropology, South Asian studies, linguistics,
and comparative philosophy. He taught at Delhi
University, Banaras Hindu University, and Nalanda
Institute in India; at a Buddhist academy in Bang-
kok, Thailand; and at the University of Tokyo.
In 1956, Bharati immigrated to the United
States as a research associate for Washington
University. In 1957 he joined the anthropology
faculty at Syracuse University and became the
Ford-Maxwell Professor of South Asian studies.
He became a U.S. citizen in 1968. His publica-
tions include 500 articles, essays, and books that
report on Hindu monasticism and worldview and
have been widely read by scholars and general
readers alike.
His interpretation of Hinduism through anthro-
pological and personal lenses have been influential
among Western Hindus as well as scholars.
Agehananda Bharati died of cancer at a friend’s
house in Pittsford, New York, on May 14, 1991, at
the age of 68.Further reading: Swami Agehananda Bharati, The Tan-
tric Tradition (London: Rider, 1965); ———, The LightK 14 Agehananda Bharati, Swami