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Swami Vivekananda Thoughts on God

A collection of quotes, thoughts and teachings on God by Swami Vivekananda.

This universal intelligence is what we call God. Call it by any other name, it is absolutely certain that in the beginning there is that Infinite cosmic intelligence. This cosmic intelligence gets involved, and it manifests, evolves itself, until it becomes the perfect man. Then it goes back to its own source.

That is why all the scriptures say, 'In Him we live and move and have our being.' That is why all the scriptures preach that we come from God and go back to God.

Do not be frightened by theological terms; if terms frighten you, you are not fit to be philosophers. This cosmic intelligence is what the theologians call God.

God cannot be known to the external senses. The Infinite, the Absolute, cannot be grasped. Yet although it eludes us, we may not infer its non-existence. It exists. What is it that cannot be seen by the outward eye? The eye itself. It may behold all other things, but itself it cannot mirror. This, then, is the solution. If God may not be found by the outer senses, turn your eye inward and find, in yourself, the soul of all souls. Man himself is the All. I cannot know the fundamental reality, because I am that fundamental reality. There is no duality. (Swami Vivekananda in the West: New Discoveries. 5: 186 )

Extreme love to God is Bhakti, and this love is the real immortality, getting which a man becomes perfectly satisfied, sorrows for no loss, and is never jealous.

All the great prophets, saints, and seers of the world—what did they do? In one span of life they lived the whole life of humanity, traversed the whole length of time that it takes ordinary humanity to come to perfection. In one life they perfect themselves; they have no thought for anything else, never live a moment for any other idea, and thus the way is shortened for them. This is what is meant by concentration, intensifying the power of assimilation, thus shortening the time.

That which is selfish is immoral, that which is unselfish is moral. Unselfishness is more paying, only people have not the patience to practice it.

Stick to God! Who cares what comes to the body or to anything else! Through the terrors of evil, say – my God, my love! Through the pangs of death, say – my God, my love! Through all the evils under the sun, say – my God, my love!