Swami Abhishiktananda

His Life Told through His Letters (Revised and Updated Edition)

Abhishiktananda | Edited by James D.M. Stuart | Revised by Swāmī Ātmānanda Udāsīn

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978-1-958972-57-1
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December 2024

Epistolary biography of a bridge-building 20th century Christian-Hindu spiritual leader

This fascinating biography of Swāmī Abhishiktānanda is based on a vast collection of letters written to friends and family over his twenty-five years in India.

Swāmī Abhishiktānanda (1910-1973)—a French Catholic monk, who came to India in 1948 and settled there till the end of his life in 1973—was one of the most fascinating spiritual figures of the twentieth century and a bridge-builder between Christian and Hindu traditions. After nineteen years of living in a Benedictine monastery in France, his passionate longing to realize the Truth brought him face-to-face with Indian spirituality and paved the way for him to meet one of the greatest contemporary sages of India, Shri Ramana Maharshi.

This book illustrates the spiritual trajectory of an extraordinary pioneer of interreligious dialogue and a bridge-builder between Christian and Hindu traditions, from his first arrival in South India in 1948 towards his spiritual Awakening in Rishikesh on July 14, 1973.

Rev. Dr. James D.M. Stuart (1915-2003) went to India in 1949 to join the Brotherhood of the Ascended Christ (established by the Anglicans in Delhi, in 1877). He became the first Editorial Secretary for ISPCK, a Christian publishing house which he helped develop in India. A close friend of Swāmī Abhishiktānanda, as well as translator and editor of most of his books in English, was the Founder Secretary of the Abhishiktānanda Society, Delhi.

Swāmī Ātmānanda Udāsīn is the spiritual head of Ajatananda Ashram, an interreligious ashram in the Himalayan foothills at Rishikesh, India. Originally from Belgium, he’s been living in India for 25 years. He teaches about the Direct Path of Non-Duality in the tradition of Advaita Vedanta, and offers Satsangs and retreats in India and internationally. His Facebook channel @swamiatmanandaudasin7306, has nearly 7,000 subscribers.

“Monkfish has done a great service in re-presenting the collected letters of one of the twentieth century's great masters of the spiritual life. The existential path of Swami Abhishiktananda (Dom Henri Le Saux) took place in very particular religious and historical circumstances, but the laying bare of Swamiji’s heart in these letters lets the very personal open out to the universal search for meaning, purpose, peace. It is an inspiring chronicle of the search for the Self, the Absolute, or—as Swamiji himself calls it in his final letters—the Grail. Readers will find much to puzzle over, to smile upon, and to hasten them on their own path.” —Jacob Riyeff, OblSB, teaching associate professor at Marquette University, and translator of the poems of Abhishiktananda in In the Bosom of the Father

“Rare it is that someone will have the spiritual and intellectual creativity and courage to embark on a comparable journey to the holy darkness of the cave of the heart as Abhishiktananda did. The experience and thought of this prescient French monk and other pioneers in the realm of interreligious dialogue in Christianity of the mid-20th century remains precious to those who continue to be inspired by his legacy and spirit. What a gift it is that this voice is not muffled by the passage of time; what a treasure it is to have this new expanded version of what some consider a classic of the spiritual life.” —Cyprian Consiglio, OSB Cam, author of The God Who Gave You Birth and Rediscovering the Divine