Swami Vivekananda was born Narendranath Datta (shortened to Narendra or Naren) at his ancestral home in Kolkata on 12 January 1863 during the Makar Sankranti festival. He belonged to a traditional Bengali Kayastha family and was one of nine siblings. His father, Vishwanath Datta, was an attorney at the Kolkata High Court. Durgacharan Datta, Narendras grandfather, was a Sanskrit and Persian scholar who left his family and became a monk at age twenty-five. His mother, Bhuvaneswari Devi, was a devout housewife. The progressive, rational attitude of Narendras father and the religious temperament of his mother helped shape his thinking and personality. Narendra was interested spiritually from a young age, and used to meditate before the images of deities such as Shiva, Rama, and Sita. He was fascinated by wandering ascetics and monks. Narendra was naughty and restless as a child, and his parents often had difficulty controlling him. His mother said, I prayed to Shiva for a son and he has sent me one of his demons...
Posted on: Mon, 12 Jan 2015 04:25:14 +0000
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