| Abhishiktananda | |
|---|---|
| Born | August 30, 1910 Saint Briac, Brittany, France |
| Died | December 7, 1973 Indore, Madhya Pradesh, India |
| Occupation | Benedictine monk |
Abhishiktananda (August 30, 1910, Saint Briac, Brittany - December 7, 1973, Indore, Madhya Pradesh) was the name taken by the French Benedictine monk Henri le Saux, whose religious experience in India led him to become a bridge between Hindu and Christian spirituality.[1]
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From childhood he seemed destined for a religious life and entered 'minor seminary' at the age of 11, becoming a Benedictine novice in 1930.
He left France for India in the summer of 1948, never to return to France despite his affection for his homeland. He became immersed in the atmosphere of India, in particular the Hindu perspective of Advaita. With Jules Monchanin, he founded an ashram and religious community, Shantivanam, in 1950 and became Swami Abhishiktananda, a name which means the bliss of the Anointed One (Christ or Messiah).
In his latter years though, he found himself very drawn to religious experience within solitude, spending much time in the hermit caves at Arunachala. But at no point did he disavow his Christianity, and he celebrated Mass until virtually the end of his life.
The topic of the Swamiji's encounter with Advaita bears study. Richard De Smet reports: "He had gone far into the advaitic experience and was afraid it might be impossible to be true to it as well as to his Christian faith. He felt, he said, perched up on the knife-edge between the opposite slopes of Hinduism and Christianity, and it was agony."[2] De Smet points to the Swamiji's weak theological and indological preparation as factors in this crisis: "Later on, I asked myself why I had not undergone a similar crisis in the same predicament? Perhaps I should now say, in computer language, because we had been formatted differently: he, in his minor and major seminaries and then Benedictine abbey of Kergonan, Brittany, according to a self-protective kind of Christianity, self-sufficient and self-satisfied; I, thanks to Fr Debauche and many others mentioned above, according to a form of Christianity open to all the values of the world, aware of its own limitations and eager for fraternal bonds and increments which would supply what was still missing in the incarnation of the Word. Besides this fundamental difference, there was an inequality of preparation: I had spent years in acquiring an indological competence; he, while he was in his French monastery, had been unable, unlike Fr Monchanin, to read the excellent works of the French ‘indianistes’ but only, as far as India is concerned, some superficial books, apart from the Upaniṣads in French translation. As soon as he arrived in India, he applied himself to the study of Tamil and even of Sanskrit but it was no longer easy at his age. Then, at the time of our meeting, because he was in the process of settling in the Himalaya, at Gyansu, near Uttarkashi, he devoted much of his energy to Hindi but with only a moderate success. This could contribute to explain why his relationships with Hindus were sparse (though he had fast friends among them) and why his writings were directed to the West (he wrote normally in French) and specifically to Christians."[3]
Abhishiktananda organized pro-dialogue meetings under the patronage of the Swiss Ambassador, J.-A. Cuttat. The dialogue at these meetings was largely among Christians, though the aim was to dialogue with members of other religions.[4]
In the company of Raimon Panikkar, he also trekked to Gangotri, the source of the Ganges.[5] It was Panikkar also who purchased the plot on which Abhishiktananda constructed his hermitage at Gyansu.[6] Panikkar also edited the Swamiji's journal for publication, Ascent to the Depth of the Heart.[7]
He died at the Indore nursing home, weakened by a myocardial infarction that summer, after several years in which he had lived virtually as a hermit.
After his death, the "Abhishiktananda Society" was formed that is dedicated "to make known the spiritual message of the late Swami Abhishiktananda and to coordinate the efforts of those interested in it and in its further implications", among other aims.[8]