- Shivapuri Baba
Shivapuri Baba, also known as Swami Govindanath Bharati, was a
Hindu saint who reportedly lived from 1826 to 1963, making him 137 years old at the time of his death.According to the biography written by
John G. Bennett , "Long Pilgrimage - The Life and Teaching of the Shivapuri Baba", Shivapuri Baba was born in the Indian State of Kerala as Jayanthan Nambudiripad in 1826 and became a seeker after truth at the age of 18.He was one of the first spiritual teachers to travel to the West, where he met various European heads of state, as well as U.S. president
Theodore Roosevelt , before returning to India in 1915. [http://literature.wnso.org/2005/life_of_the_Shivapuri_baba_Mohan.htm]He spent the last decades of his life in
Nepal , where Bennett visited him twice in the early1960s .Teaching
Shivapuri Baba appears to have been the first modern
yoga master to transplant the wisdom of India to the West. He had no fewer than 18 audiences withQueen Victoria , who considered this great sage a friend.Fact|date=September 2008 He was blessed with a very long life, which, after his awakening at the age of 50, he dedicated entirely to the spiritual welfare of others.Shivapuri Baba taught that as humans we have three principal duties: first, physical duty, consists mainly in maintaining body and mind through proper livelihood, including the obligation to help one’s dependents to accomplish the same. Second, moral duty, consisting in remaining sensitive to the obligation to seek the truth 24 hours a day. Third, spiritual duty, by which he meant the worship of the Divine. He felt certain that if we attend carefully to the first two duties for a decade, we will naturally become able to fulfill the third duty. Physical discipline, he noted, brings pleasure. Moral discipline gives us serenity. Spiritual discipline yields deep peace and ultimate happiness.Fact|date=September 2008
Shivapuri Baba was dismissive of conventional yogic paths, because he saw in them potential distractions that might keep a person from performing the three duties. On closer inspection, his own sensible prescriptions are in fact a form of yoga.Fact|date=September 2008
References
* [http://namboothiri.com/articles/sivapuribaba.htm http://namboothiri.com/articles/sivapuribaba.htm]
* [http://literature.wnso.org/2005/life_of_the_Shivapuri_baba_Mohan.htm http://literature.wnso.org/2005/life_of_the_Shivapuri_baba_Mohan.htm]
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