Teachings of Sri Ramakrishna Paramhansa drive home the point that the human fall from divinity is due to forgetfulness of our own real nature. According to the Master, the goal of human life is to break this spell of ignorance and realize God. The Upanishads call such forgetfulness avidya. If there is any sin in human life, it is this ignorance, which has pulled us down into a state of degradation. According to Sri Ramakrishna, both vidya (knowledge) and avidya (ignorance) are in the domain of the mundane world. Vidya is like a friend, it takes us towards the highest goal of God-realization, while avidya keeps us entangled in worldly pursuits.
One of Sri Ramakrishna’s significant contributions is in focusing
on the central truth that humans are essentially divine. The traditional
schools of Vedanta give much importance to jivanmukta and samadhi, the supreme
state of realization, but do not emphasize the idea that human equality must be
achieved even in daily life on the foundation of the sameness of inherent human
divinity.
Sri Ramakrishna, however, encouraged the application of this
highest truth — experienced on mystic heights by the spiritual aspirant — even to
the ordinary levels of our existence. Truth, if it is truth
at all, ought to be manifest at every stage. We cannot make any distinction
among humans if we accept the Upanishadic doctrine that the same divine Self is
present in the hearts of all. This is the simple fact which Indians failed to
recognize for the last thousand years. The result was decadence in
India’s social fabric. It was left to Sri Ramakrishna and Swami Vivekananda to
bring this grand truth
out from the debris of dry philosophical squabbling and show the world that
even an otherwise
ordinary person is to be looked upon as divine in all conditions and stages of
life.