followed a period of study and sacrifice. Swami
Chinmayananda, attracted to Natrajan’s earnest-
ness and organization skills, informed him that he
would return the following year for further teach-
ings. The 22-year-old Natrajan was certain that
he was meant to pursue these teachings and thus
became an active member of the newly formed
Chinmaya Mission, an organization inspired by
the vision of Swami Chinmayananda. His previous
experience in journalism and editing put him very
close to Swami Chinmayananda.
In 1957 Natarajan gave up his work to follow
Swami Chinmayananda. In 1962 he was the sec-
ond student to be initiated into SANNYAS (renun-
ciation) by Swami Chinmayananda and was given
the name Swami Dayananda Saraswati. He would
later continue his development as a teacher under
the tutelage of several teachers, including Swami
Pranavananda of Gudiwada.
Known today as an authoritative teacher of
traditional ADVAITA VEDANTA and an accomplished
scholar of Hinduism, Swami Dayananda has con-
ducted six three-year residential courses in both
India and the United Sates, producing well over
300 Vedanta teachers around the world.
He has established three institutions: two in
India, the ARSHA VIDYA GURUKULUM in Coimbatore,
which offers three-year residential courses, and
the Swami Dayananda Ashram in Rishikesh, a
retreat center and place for continued studies,
and the Arsha Vidya Gurukulam in Saylorsburg,
Pennsylvania, which serves as a retreat center and
venue for residential courses.
Swami Dayananda is known for his scholar-
ship, his depth of understanding, and his appre-
ciation for Western culture, attributes that give
him a wide appeal. He travels the world teach-
ing in a variety of venues, including American
universities and international conventions. He
has presented papers at UNESCO and the United
Nations, where he participated in the Millennium
Peace Summit. In November 2001, in Delhi, he
convened the First World Congress for the Pres-
ervation of Religious Diversity, inaugurated by
the Dalai Lama and former Indian prime minister
Vajpayee. Swami Dayananda also actively par-
ticipated in forming the Women’s Global Peace
Initiative, which convened at the United Nations
in Geneva in October 2002.
In addition to teaching, Swami Dayananda
emphasizes a commitment to peace and social
justice. He instituted the All India Movement
(AIM) for Seva, a public service organization that
provides medical, educational, nutritional, and
social support to villagers in remote rural Indian
communities.Further reading: Padma Narasimhan, Swami Day-
ananda Saraswati (Madras: TT. Maps & Publications,
1990).death ceremony See FUNERAL RITES.
demonic beings
Much of Vedic mythology, epic mythology, and
early Puranic mythology (see PURANAS) depicts
an ongoing war between the gods (devas) and
demonic beings, called usually asuras, but some-
times rakshasas (both terms now simply mean
a “demonic being”). Indian tradition, it must be
noted, does not see the demons in completely
polarized terms, as, for instance, in Christianity,
in which Satan is an absolutely evil counterpart to
God. The asuras are known to be the sons of the
same father as the gods, and both asuras and rak-
shasas finally go to heaven after their battle with
the different gods, its being understood that they
have played a role in the glorification of God by
being his (or sometimes her) opponents.
In the VEDAS a special role is played by the
demon (asura) Vritra, a serpent being who is
the enemy of god INDRA, king of the gods. Indra
strikes Vritra with a thunderbolt to force him to
release the terrestrial waters. Sometimes Vritra in
his mountain lair holds back the summer waters
of the “seven streams” of the INDUS River, sodemonic beings 123 J