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Krishna Prem

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Sri
Krishna Prem
Krishna Prem in the early 1950s
Personal
Born
Ronald Henry Nixon

(1898-05-10)10 May 1898
Cheltenham,England
Died14 November 1965(1965-11-14)(aged 67)
Mirtola,Almora district,India
Resting placeKrishna Prem'ssamadhi mandir,Mirtola
29°38′33″N79°49′39″E/ 29.64237°N 79.82751°E/29.64237; 79.82751
ReligionHinduism
NationalityBritish, Indian
DenominationVaishnavism
SectGaudiya Vaishnavism
Notable work(s)The Search for Truth,Initiation into Yoga,The Yoga of the Bhagavat Gita,The Yoga of the Kathopanishad
Alma materKing's College, Cambridge
Organization
TempleUttar Brindaban ashram,Mirtola
Religious career
GuruSri Yashoda Mai, Sri Bal Krishna Goswami
Websitewww.mirtolareflections.com

Sri Krishna Prem(10 May 1898 – 14 November 1965), bornRonald Henry Nixon,was a British spiritual aspirant who went to India in the early 20th century. Together with his spiritual teacher Sri Yashoda Mai (1882 – 1944), he founded an ashram atMirtola,nearAlmora,India. He was one of the first Europeans to pursueVaishnaviteHinduism,and was highly regarded, with many Indian disciples. Later, according to the account of his foremost disciple SriMadhava Ashish,Krishna Prem transcended the dogmas and practices of theGaudiya Vaishnavatradition into which he had been initiated and affirmed a universal spiritual path shorn of "orthodoxy" and blind traditionalism.

Early life

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Ronald Henry Nixon[1]: 218 was born inCheltenham,England, in 1898,[2]and educated inTaunton.[1] His mother was aChristian Scientistand his father was reportedly in the glass and china business.[1]: 218 

At age 18, Nixon became a British fighter pilot in the First World War:[1][3]he was commissioned as a temporary second lieutenant on probation on 10 May 1917,[4]was confirmed in his rank on 12 June,[5]and was appointed aflying officerin theRoyal Flying Corpson 15 June.[6]On one occasion, he experienced an escape from death that he believed was miraculous, in which a "power beyond our ken" saved him from several enemy planes.[7]His experiences of death and destruction during the war filled him with a "sense of futility and meaninglessness".[1]: 218 He was transferred to the unemployed list of the Royal Air Force on 11 January 1919[8]and relinquished his temporary Army commission on 3 December that year.[9]

After the war, Nixon enrolled inKing's College, Cambridge,where he studied English literature.[1]During this period Nixon also studied philosophy, and became acquainted withTheosophy,Advaita Vedanta Hinduism,Buddhism,andPali,and developed an interest in going to India to learn more about the practical aspects of Indian religion.[1]: 218 [3]

Life in India

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In 1921, while still in England, Nixon accepted the offer of a teaching position at theUniversity of Lucknow,in northern India.[3]As it turned out, the university's vice-chancellor, Gyanendra Nath Chakravarti, was also spiritually inclined and interested inTheosophy,and offered Nixon assistance. Over time, Nixon came to regard Gyanendra's wife, Monica Devi Chakravarti, as his spiritual teacher. In 1928, Monika tookvows of renunciationin theGaudiya Vaishnavitetradition, where these vows are calledvairagya.[2]She adopted the monastic name of Sri Yashoda Mai. Soon thereafter, she initiated Nixon into vairagya, and he adopted Krishna Prem as his monastic name.[2]

Memorials of Yashoda Mai, Krishna Prem and Madhava Ashish atMirtolaAshram.

In 1930, Sri Yashoda Mai and Krishna Prem together founded an ashram atMirtola,nearAlmora,in mountainous north-central India (state ofUttarakhand). The ashram "began and has continued to be"[2]aligned with strict orthodoxVaishnavism.In 1944, Yashoda Ma died and Krishna Prem succeeded her as head of the ashram.[2]He travelled little, but in 1948 he visited South India, meetingSri Ramana Maharshi,as well asSri AurobindoandMirra Alfassa( "The Mother" ).[2] Sardella states that Nixon appears to have been "the first European to embraceVaishnavismin India ".[10]: 143  Haberman states that Nixon "was perhaps the first Westerner to tread the path ofKrishna-bhakti,and was certainly the first to have any official affiliation with theGaudiya VaishnavismofBraj."[1]: 223 

Krishna Prem, despite his English origins, became widely accepted and admired in the Indian Hindu community. Brooks wrote that "Krishna Prem's evident intellectual and inspirational qualities gained him wide fame and many disciples in India, as reflected in numerous books on his life and teachings."[3]: 100  Gertrude Emerson Senwrote that "I know of no other person like Krishnaprem, himself 'foreign' to begin with, who has drawn so many Indians to himself".[1]: 220  His biographerDilip Kumar Roywrote that Krishnaprem "had given a filip [stimulus] to my spiritual aspiration".[11]

Haberman wrote that Krishna Prem "was recognized as a Hindu saint by many Indians of his day."[1]: 217 When Nixon died in 1965, he was hailed bySarvepalli Radhakrishnan,then president of India, as a "great soul".[1]: 221 Nixon's final words were "my ship is sailing".[1]: 221 

Works

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  • Krishna Prem; Madhava Ashish; Karan Singh (2004).Letters from Mirtola.Mumbai, India:Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan.ISBN9788172763565.OCLC223080940.(194 pages) (original edition 1938)
  • Krishna Prem, Sri (1988).The yoga of the Bhagavat Gita.Shaftesbury, UK: Element.ISBN9781852300234.OCLC59891805.ISBN185230023X(224 pages)
  • Krishna Prem, Sri (1976).Initiation into yoga: An introduction to the spiritual life.London: Rider.ISBN9780091256319.OCLC2440284.ISBN0091256313(128 pages)
  • Krishna Prem, Sri; Ashish Madhava (1969).Man, the measure of all things, in the stanzas of Dzyan.London: Rider.ISBN9780090978700.OCLC119543.ISBN0090978706(360 pages)
  • Krishna Prem, Sri (1955).The yoga of the Kathopanishad.London: John M. Watkins.OCLC14413144.(264 pages)
  • Krishna Prem, Swami (1938).The search for truth.Calcutta, India: Book Land.OCLC35694199.(138 pages)
  • Kaul, Narendra Nātha (1980).Writings of Sri Krishna Prem: an introduction.Bombay, India:Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan.OCLC7730748.(111 pages)

Biographical sources

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References

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  1. ^abcdefghijklHaberman, David L. (1 July 1993). "A cross‐cultural adventure: The transformation of Ronald Nixon".Religion.23(3). Routledge: 217–227.doi:10.1006/reli.1993.1020.ISSN0048-721X.
  2. ^abcdef"Krishna Prem, Sri (1898–1965) Western-born Vaishnavite Guru" inJones, Constance; James D. Ryan (2006).Encyclopedia of Hinduism.Infobase Publishing. p. 246.ISBN9780816075645.
  3. ^abcd"The Case of Sri Krishna Prem" inBrooks, Charles R. (1989).The Hare Krishnas in India.Motilal Banarsidass.pp. 98–101.ISBN9788120809390.
  4. ^"No. 30100".The London Gazette(Supplement). 29 May 1917. p. 5309.
  5. ^"No. 30181".The London Gazette(Supplement). 13 July 1917. p. 7053.
  6. ^"No. 30181".The London Gazette(Supplement). 13 July 1917. p. 7050.
  7. ^Page 17 inGinsburg, Seymour B.; Madhava Ashish (2010).The masters speak: an American businessman encounters Ashish and Gurdjieff(1st Quest ed.). Wheaton, Illinois, USA: Quest Books/Theosophical Pub. House.ISBN9780835608824.(on page 283, the quote from Nixon is cited to page 54 of Roy's biography, 1975 2nd edition)
  8. ^"No. 31162".The London Gazette.4 February 1919. p. 1801.
  9. ^"No. 32399".The London Gazette(Supplement). 22 July 1921. p. 5900.
  10. ^Sardella, Ferdinando (2013).Modern Hindu personalism: the history, life, and thought of Bhaktisiddhānta Sarasvatī.New York: Oxford University Press.ISBN9780199865901.
  11. ^quoted in Haberman, p. 221.
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