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Paramahansa Yogananda
God Talks With Arjuna
The Bhagavad Gita
Royal Science of God-Realization

579 pages (Volume 1); 539 pages (Volume 2)
published by Self Realization Fellowship
ISBN 0876120303 (Set)

«Wherever one is on the way back to God, the Gita will shed its light on that segment of the journey... It is at once a profound scripture on the science of yoga, union with God, and a textbook for everyday living.»

- Paramahansa Yogananda

Among the world's sacred writings, there is perhaps none more universal in its appeal than the Bhagavad Gita. Through the centuries, its sublime and ennobling counsel has endeared it to truth-seekers of East and West alike.

In this new edition, Paramahansa Yogananda offers a translation and commentary of wide scope and vision. Exploring the psychological, spiritual and metaphysical depths of the Bhagavad Gita - from the subtle springs of human action to the grand design of the cosmic order - he presents a sweeping chronicle of the soul's journey to enlightenment.

«For the aspiring devotee in the world and in the ashram, the call of the Bhagavad Gita is to make the heart a hermitage of God wherein, as a renunciant, one strives for inner desirelessness and nonattachment; and, as a yogi, one envelops himself in the meditative bliss of the Divine Presence and then offers his actions in selfless service to share that Presence with other seeking souls»

- Paramahansa Yogananda, The Bhagavad Gita II, 591

Paramahansa Yogananda (Mukunda Lal Ghosh) was born on January 5, 1893, in Gorakhpur, near the Himalaya mountains. In 1910, at the age of seventeen, he met the revered Swami Sri Yukteswar. In the hermitage of this master he spent a large part of the next ten years, receiving Sri Yukteswar's strict but loving spiritual discipline. After graduating from Calcutta University in 1915, Sri Yukteswar bestowed on him the name Yogananda (signifying bliss, ananda, through divine union, yoga). In 1917 Yogananda founded a school for boys, combining modern educational methods with yoga training and instructions in spiritual ideals. Three years later he came to the United States as India's delegate to the Congress of Religious Liberals in Bosten. For the next several years he lectured and spoke on many occasions in the US, emphasizing the underlying unity of the world's great religions and the means to attain direct personal experience of God. In 1927, he was received at the White House by President Calvin Coolidge, who had become interested in the newspaper reports of his activities. Paramahansa returned to India in 1935 for a long-awaited reunion with Sri Yukteswar. During this eighteen-month trip, he also travelled through Europe, giving classes and lectures in London and Rome. While in his native land, he enjoyed meetings with Mahatma Gandhi and some of India's renowned saints, including Sri Ramana Maharshi and Anandamoyi Ma. After returning to America at the end of 1936 he withdrew somewhat from nationwide public lecturing and devoted more time to writing to carry his message to future generations. His life story, Autobiography of a Yogi was first published in 1946. On March 7, 1952, Paramahansa entered mahasamadhi, the conscious exit from the body resulting in physical death.

Last Updated Wednesday, December 30, 1998