Talk:Ramakrishna

New section

I strongly disagree with the statement regarding the ambiguous sexuality of Sriramakrishna Paramhansadev. People who are trying to ruin His world wide acceptance as the pioneer of harmonious blending of all religions, the God of universal love, for them I would like to say Father forgive them they not know what they are saying. May God enlighten these people !! who doubts on the sexuality of universal love becuase in one word Sriramakrishna is love personified. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.189.188.35 (talk) 03:09, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

Please see Wikipedia:Key policies and guidelines. — goethean ॐ 16:39, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

Intro line.

In the intro, the description of academic studies is slightly incorrect., None of the scholars directly wanted to study the sexuality; Based on their analysis, they drew their conclusions, and the conclusions differ amount the scholars. And few of the scholars have not done any orignial research ( William Radice, larson, ) they are reviewing the published stuff; Moreover, I see quite a lot of papers related to growth of a religious organisation, and similar stuff; So Need to capture this as well;

Also few of the scholars say that The Gospel of Ramakrishna has been bowlderized, but they dont consider it highly problematic as the article says. -- vineeth (talk) 10:42, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

None of the scholars directly wanted to study the sexuality

Well, that's false, because Kripal's study was specifically on sexuality.

Moreover, I see quite a lot of papers related to growth of a religious organisation, and similar stuff; So Need to capture this as well;

Please give specifics. Which scholars are you talking about? You need to add citation to reliable sources to the article that support your changes. Quoting from these sources in the footnotes ise very helpful so that we can see what you are talking about. — goethean ॐ 14:27, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

Your sources are insufficient. "A.N.Q.2008"? What in the heck is that supposed to mean? — goethean ॐ 14:32, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

Will Remove this, I think I added this by mistake... copy paste error!

"Please give specifics … You need to add citation to reliable sources …" — Nice Idea! will add the relevant stuff gradually in the article ... Regarding Kripal, he mentions (I think in the preface) that he did not set out looking for a homosexual saint, but as his research progressed, he became aware of the role of homosexuality... and his research tools were psychoanalysis, Hermeneutics... -- vineeth (talk) 16:17, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

So you are denying that his analysis is about SRK's sexuality? That's untenable. — goethean ॐ 16:44, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

I am not denying that, what Kripal says is, he arrived at RK's sexuality during his study. As indicated by kripal, initially he was not interested in finding a homoerotic saint or rather was not bothered about RK's sexuality. However , As his study progressed, Kripal indicates that became aware of the homoerotic dimension of SRK. However if kripal agrees that his initial focus was to prove homoeroticism of SRK, then the long standing debate will get some answers... and some of the allegations against him will come true! But as of now, this allegation has remained a allegation! -- vineeth (talk) 17:43, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

Please add the full bibliographical information of the books to which your references refer to the references section as soon as possible. — goethean ॐ 17:10, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

"as soon as possible" — I will definitely add it, what is the need to hurry :) -- vineeth (talk) 17:43, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

Until you do, your additions are unsourced and can be removed. — goethean ॐ 17:46, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

Thats right, very true! unlike quite a few articles I have come across, atleast this article will be scholarly and built on reliable sources! -- vineeth (talk) 18:41, 18 August 2008 (UTC)

Bibliography changes

Nvineeth, could you discus before making changes like this? The books should be grouped either chronologically or else alphabetically by the author's last name. — goethean ॐ 14:27, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

Goethean, I thought this is a minor edit... , but you have a point, sorting alphabetically seems to be a good idea.. and this is what I have observed in most of the academic journals. -- vineeth (talk) 15:39, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

NPOV

I have made additions from Reliable and Scholarly Sources that indicate that Sil's Works are "unreliable", "sleight of hand", "heady mix of tendentious argument, speculation and innuendo". Ironically, there are several references to "Vivekananda's Ramakrishna", which is a chapter in his unreliable book![1]

I just went through Jstor article of this chapter, and found it extremely funny. I could straight away identify several faults, let alone scholars like radice, and Dr.Openshaw:

• As Sil indicates , My Master to be a "shot through with the author's very personalized interpretation of Ramakrishna's preachings and teaching and his claims on behalf of the Ramakrishna phenomenon." is false! The speeches were recorded by several sources and even published in news papers, ( see New Discoveries in West) even before it was published in Complete Works.

• There are several excerpts from Vivekananda's letters taken out of context, esp from Vol 5 CW.! Anybody who has read his letters knows that vivekananda used to handle the translation of several indian literatures, Bashyas, Bhagavad Gita, translation of some works from tamil to english ( in one specific instance, he tells out of desperation that he will learn tamil and translate if nobody does it!), and of course ramakrishna's biography. There are several , several letters in which he indicates his opinion of their translations and suggests several corrections. Everybody regarded him as their highest authority and they rightly did so, as Professor John Wright wrote to the chairman of the Committee of Parliament of Religions :"Here is a man who is more learned than all our learned professors put together." , "To ask you, Swami, for credentials is like asking the sun to state its right to shine!". Whats the point in quoting every single mistake that was pointed by swami vivekananda and prove that everything was "Story of Mythmaking and Propaganda"!!

• Related to the letter in which he says , "Avoid all irregular indecent expressions about sex..." is perfectly fine. How?? The Biography by Ramchandra Dutta was already published in 1890 in bengali and swami writes the letter in 1894, four years later, and its important to note this line in bold:"Avoid all irregular indecent expressions about sex etc. . ., because other nations think it the height of indecency to mention such things, and his life in English is going to be read by the whole world." Ramchandra Dutta was planning to translate his 1890 bio into english and sent his works for swami for review and swami viv., is perfectly fine in pointing out the corrections taking into mind the western decorum. (see "they lived with god") Let me quote from the essay Transformation of Ramakrishna by neevel - "Although Muller claims still to see "the irrepressible miraculising tendencies of devoted disciples", we can assume that Vivekananda, under the admonitions from the leading Indologist of the day, made every effort to make his account as factual and accurate as possible." ( I will add this stuff to main article later ). However this is also the stuff related to translation of ramana on which Sil bases his work ( see the radice's review article and the bengali version...).

• In the second letter - "..As to the wonderful stories published about Shri Ramakrishna", swamiji is indicating not to mention the stories related to miracles in the biography, and this is perfectly in sync with what max muller said him to avoid , "the miraculising tendency". But the question is whats the point of mentioning this letter in "sources of biography" section? What I see is these letters appear in the same order in Sil's Chapter of Vivekananda, there is no harm in taking stuff from reliable sources, but in this case this is not so.

• Can anybody explain the importance of this line - "Malcolm McLean of Otago University translated the entire Kathamrta as his 1983 dissertation, entitled A Translation of Sri-Sri-Ramakrsna-Kathamrta with Explanatory Notes and Critical Introduction. Only a few copies of this work exist." and this one - "Vivekananda loved the 1894 edition. "I cannot tell in words the joy I have experienced by reading the book," he wrote. However, he also offered editorial suggestions for future editions of Sen's poem." and this one - vivekananda registered his dislike of it in a letter to Swami Trigunatitananda and his subsequent exuberant praise of it in letters to Gupta". What value add does these lines do to the section??

• This particular line caught my attention - "Naransingha Sil speculates that Gupta did not dare to publish the Kathamrta while Vivekananda was still alive." , I can only laugh at this! In a letter Swamiji, after reading Gupta's work praises it [2]. To mention only vivekananda's corrections and not his praises of the works is just POV. And in Kali's Child Revisited, (published in Evam magazine, along with Kripal's response) Swami Tyagananda mentions the research work of Sunil Bihari Ghosh who has idicated that Gupta's works were already published in several magazines before the actual book was out and swami viv., was alive and breathing. For a moment lets assume that M., was scared of swamiji, then why is it so that he wasnt scared of other powerful monsatic disciples and didn't wait for their death?

• As Sil indicates, Ramchandra Dutta's biography is not "scandalous" , nine editions of this book have been published till date (I have several scholarly, reliable references to back this) , and Kripal who based this fact on Sil's allegation accepts - "I overplayed .... " ( see the reference in the article ). Even Kripal is not sure about law suite, kripal mentions - "... a likely reference to Datta's text".( see the kali's child website) ( And there are several scholarly references to indicate Kripal's reliance on unreliable stuff. Pravrajika Vrajaprana's review has a very good example for this!! I have noted several such examples at journals at jstor and other sites! ).

Another point I want to mentions is related to this line - "In a review of Kali's Child, religious scholar Brian Hatcher noted that a passage in the Kathamrta in which Ramakrishna describes how he "...could not resist worshipping the penises of boys with flowers and sandalwood paste" was paraphrased by Nikhilananda as: "I practiced a number of mystic postures", this line perfectly makes sense when you are describing both points of views. This is a well know ritual in bengal and somnath bhattachary clearly explains it in his article. The texts Leelaprasanga, Kathamritha do not hide it. They mention this practice and at the same time provide the context. Quoting out of context just because it occurs in a journal is not correct. Let see what wikipedia says on profanity:Words and images that would be considered offensive, profane, or obscene by typical Wikipedia readers should be used if and only if their omission would cause the article to be less informative, relevant, or accurate, and no equally suitable alternatives are available. Including information about offensive material is part of Wikipedia's encyclopedic mission; being offensive is not. Can somebody explain me how the presence of this line is useful to the article now? However I see this as a candidate to be discussed in the section Views on Ramakrishna's Religious Experiences and Practices, and there are several reliable, scholarly references to balance this view.

There are several other mistakes that I have observed, I will change them directly,

Before I close, let me quote from max muller's book on ramakrishna:

We want to know the man who has exercised and is exercising so wide an influence, such as he was, not such as we wish him to have been. He himself never wished to appear different from what he was, and he often seems to have made himself out worse than he was. Besides, if I had done so, I know that there are men who would not have been ashamed of suspecting me of a wish to represent the religions of the East, both modern and ancient, as better than they really are. These are the very men who would find many a lesson to learn from Râmakrishna's sayings. No, I said, let the wheat and the tares remain together. Few thoughtful readers will go through them without finding some thought that makes them ponder, some truth that will startle them as coming from so unexpected a quarter. Nothing, on the other hand, would be easier than to pick out a saying here and there, and thus to show that they are all insipid and foolish. This is a very old trick, described in India as the trick of the rice-merchants who wish to sell or to buy a rice-field, and who offer you a handful of good or bad grains to show that the field is either valuable or worthless.

Until and Unless these issues are resolved, the Netural Point of View tag will remain. -- vineeth (talk) 18:45, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

I can only laugh at this!

Giggle all you want. This article will not be made into an appendage of the Ramakrishna Mission. — goethean ॐ 21:23, 21 August 2008 (UTC)

Did I mention anywhere above that the article will be made into an "appendage of the Ramakrishna Mission"? If this is your predetermined aim, then I cannot help it! Let me tell you one thing, I have absolutely no problem in mentioning Sudhir Kakar, Sil, Kripal, Hatcher, alan roland, ..... and other scholars in the article, absolutely no problem, as long as the other POV is taken into consideration. If there isn't any other POV, then let it be so, even if it sounds bad to the so called devotees, I don't care! Instead of using the journals, resources fairly, If an editor is predetermined and biased against somebody, then I cannot help it! BTW, the Kali's Child article is also full of POV, let me update it with little bit of research I have done so far. -- vineeth (talk) 05:48, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

Neutral, third party bios of Ramakrishna give little to no credibility, or such (undue) weight to Sil's and Kripal's shoddy scholarship. Even so, there are still at least as many references in the article from these conservative scholars than from Ramakrishna Mission sources. ~ priyanath ^talk 15:03, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

To clarify, when you say "conservative scholars", who you refer to...Kripal and Sil? Or Tyagananda et al? — goethean ॐ 16:25, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

Actually, stooping to the use of such name-calling was a mistake on my part, so I've struck that comment. ~ priyanath ^talk 17:14, 25 August 2008 (UTC)

New additions

What a mess. The new additions by Nvineeth are disasterous. It is comical that he thinks that you can naively refer to Romain Rolland's claims about Muller's book as absolute truth. You don't even specify who made the claim! Just "it is based on first-hand evidence", with a footnote to Rolland.

Listen. You will not get away with removing information sourced to contemporary scholars, and replace it with century-old, poorly sourced information. If you are unclear on Wikipedia policy, I beg you to consult with any number of Wikipedia administrators and ask them if what you are doing is okay. It is not. — goethean ॐ 16:40, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

If you're talking about the Biographical Sources section, I think it's possible to include elements fron Nvineeth's version, and also the previous version. The previous version was quite POV/Undue Weight because it gave the impression that the Kripal/Sil/bowdlerization 'controversy' is the driving force behind all Ramakrishna biography discussions, when it's a relatively minor (but legitimate) subtext. If you're talking about the renamed "Views on Ramakrishna’s Religious Experiences and Practices" section, Nvineeth added quite alot of well-referenced and new material on modern Ramakrishna scholarship, and the new title is a much more accurate description. And let's tone down the invective and handwringing. Nvineeth's good faith and well-referenced additions are improving the Ramakrishna related articles, and bringing a balance to them. ~ priyanath ^talk 19:21, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

"…replace it with century-old, poorly sourced information"

Who do you call poorly informed? Max Muller who had the testimonies of first hand witnesses who were both for and against ramakrishna and then wrote the book? Rolland who ensured that he was absolutely sure about the reliability and then wrote the biography? or Sil whose book is termed as unreliable by several scholars?? or Kripal, whose book still revolves in controversy and criticism?

Just a few discussion threads above you have questioned the reliability of multi-scholarly work Invading the Sacred and mentioned in archive 2 - "if you don't have reliable sources to back up your editorial opinion, you are wasting everyone's time" , which probably indicates that you are very keen on building the article on reliable sources and we all appreciate this attitude. But again, when it comes to including works by Sil, Kripal, whose reliability is clearly in doubt you are advising us to reject the "century-old" books and embrace these works whose reliability is in doubt... strange! why this double standard? or is that we should not expect any good faith edits from you, because as you indicated above - This article will not be made into an appendage of the Ramakrishna Mission. ( and neither do I want this to happen anyway, but let there be honest representation ); and further you have made several personal attacks on editors and the mission, "bunch of liars" , "nobility of character, dedication to truth and honesty, and other fine character traits". ( to mention a few )

Going by your opinion of rejecting "century-old" books, the bible should be rejected as well and the life of jesus , should be built on modern psychoanalysis!! isn't it? similarly with buddha, St.Peter, St.Theresa, Rama, ..... since all the books are very very old, let us just ignore these old books! ( pls dont indulge in personal attacks on me again, saying that this is my religious POV, this is a perfectly valid point. )

Kathamrita which is also century-old should be rejected and the works of contemporary scholars should be included! but we are forgetting something! the works of these contemporary scholars was built on kathamrita, transformation of ramakrishna, complete works etc., .... so should we refer to the original reliable sources free from distorted interpretations or those works whose reliability is in doubt.?

In fact before my edits, every single book on RK, was termed as highly-problematic? Does any editor honestly think this was correct? In am not asking to censor the POV of Sil, Kripal etc., in fact I did mention them at the relevant place, I did take care to include the letter of "bosh or rot" at the correct place! I did take care to move the relevant discussion on bowdlerization to the corresponding article...and in the reference to amiya p. sen, the date was not correct! If I wanted to censor I would have involved in endless discussion ... there are plenty of these in the archives :)

I agree with one point, the reference related to "While constructing Ramakrishna's life three classes of evidence are available" is not reliable, I mistook it to be a part of kathamrita! But still, the current categorization is perfectly valid, I don't see any disputes with the categorization. the simplest categorization could be - works by 1."devotees" , 2."scholars"; and just this reference is not strong enough to claim "POV-section". in fact this tag would have been more suitable in the previous version, where all the works were regarded "highly problematic".

"consult with any number of Wikipedia administrators "

Yes pls call the admins and other editors, I can definitely explain everything I have touched upon above in detail, I can write an essay describing the POV, undue weightage that existed before my entry into this article. What I wrote before claiming the POV, was a very small insight taken from my research, If required I will go back to the version of the article before my entry, write a dissertation mentioning POV, undue weightage, and other factual mistakes (which exists even now!)

"refer to Romain Rolland's claims about Muller's book as absolute truth."

Can you pls indicate where I have mentioned that Muller's book is absolute truth? and what is the purpose of adding "citation needed" next to the citations in the section related max muller, rolland, pls explain. Yes call the admins and other editors, let they look into this disruptive editing. -- vineeth (talk) 09:20, 29 August 2008 (UTC)

I have removed the unreliable ref I had added, and incorrect fact templates. I am also removing POV tag from the section, and dont add it back saying that it is vandalism, this will not work this time. If you want to add it, pls explain the relevant points in detail and then add the tag. -- vineeth (talk) 09:30, 29 August 2008 (UTC)

What is the necessity of adding "according to x"? I think this precisely why references are used in wikipedia. -- vineeth (talk) 09:43, 29 August 2008 (UTC)

"Biographical Sources" section

After more research, I have to ask why does this article lead with a section that revolves around a dispute about sources between a few scholars? Other WP biographies begin with things like 'birth', 'early life', 'life and work', in other words: "biography". The dispute around sources revolves entirely around Kripal's book and its aftermath, which is just not notable enough to take over the lead role in a biography about Ramakrishna. Look up sources in Google Scholar and Google books for "Sri Sri Ramakrishna Paramahamsadever Jivan-vrittanta" and "Sri Sri Ramakrishna Lilaprasanga", and you'll also see that this entire section (including the previous version) is also original research. At best, this section should be significantly reduced and moved to the end of the article, or be part of the footnotes (or perhaps most encyclopedically - discussed in the references section at the end)—that's how other encyclopedia articles handle the sourcing. ~ priyanath ^talk 15:04, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

Yes, this article is primarily about the life and works of Ramakrishna, not a discussion on the sources of his biography. As I look at it, the article can be divided into two parts. Firstly, the actual biography of Ramakrishna, his views, teachings, etc., We should present an impartial biography of Ramakrishna, and provide basic information that most of his biographers agree upon. And secondly we can have information about research on Ramakrishna. As such, the biography part should come first, and then the interpretations about the personality and life of Ramakrishna. If there is any discussion about the sources of his biography, about any biographical book, it has it's place in the wikipedia article about the book. But given the nature of the biographical sources of Ramakrishna, a brief mention of different views on the biographical sources can be mentioned here towards the end of the article (preferably under a section 'Notes on biographical sources') and we can have a link to that section at the start of the biography. —SriniG (talk) 09:58, 1 September 2008 (UTC)

This section is becoming more of a collection of books on Ramakrishna. And there are still several very notable books by scholars on RK's biography... which can find a place in the section! Any new comer, who wants to know about Ramakrishna, will be interested primarily to read about the biography and teachings, and not an analysis on sources of biography. I did a small case study of other articles:

• In Jesus there are several sources — We have the bible, hagiographic books by missionaries, by scholars, and then there are books which doubt the existence of christ and the reliability of new testament ( ex:george wells ), and books which focus on eroticism of jesus (ex: tanya ). But the jesus article is built on primary, notable sources - New Testament, the bible.
• In Gautama Buddha, the description of sources is a small para in the beginning.
• In Krishna, they mention the sources in a small para - about Mahabharata, Bhagavata.,

Its better to move this section down, with a small into in the beginning Or should this section be merged with bibliography (for ex: Rolland's biblio contains a brief discussion on each book, Isherwood's biblio very neatly categorizes the sources etc., ) ? -- vineeth (talk) 15:40, 1 September 2008 (UTC)

Per consensus, I've moved the section down to the bottom of the article, where sources are typically discussed at length. It might still be helpful to have a brief paragraph about the sources at the beginning of the biography, but I don't see that this is the norm for modern biographies. It seems more typical of the type mentioned by Nvineeth—Jesus Christ, Buddha, Krishna—where the original source material (first edition of the New Testament, or a book on Buddha by a disciple, etc.) is not available. With modern biographies (examples: Ramana Maharshi, Sai Baba of Shirdi, Swami Vivekananda, Romain Rolland, Sigmund Freud) the source material is discussed merely listed at the end. ~ priyanath ^talk 22:36, 1 September 2008 (UTC)

P.S. And as SriniG points out, any lengthy discussion of specific books can be at that book's article, though a brief discussion here (at the bottom, in a sources section) might be good. ~ priyanath ^talk 15:02, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Too many details

I think we are adding too many details here that are not directly related to Ramakrishna. Some of those details can be moved to other relevant Wikipedia articles and some can be simplified. For example, the whole list of Ramakrishna's monastic disciples is not needed here, the list has its place in Apostles of Ramakrishna. This is just one example. I also think there are too many quotes in the article. I will be trying to simplify things without sacrificing on valuable details. I request the editors to be brief and concise (WP:ATE & WP:SIZE). —SriniG (talk) 12:11, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

According to WP:SIZE, "> 100 KB Almost certainly should be divided", and the current article size is 123KB. Apart from briefing the article, we can create new articles from sections like - "Ramakrishna#Ramakrishna’s impact", "Ramakrishna#Views on Ramakrishna’s Religious Experiences and Practices" ( this section is 31KB as of now, and its better if we separate this out, with brief explanation in main article ). And yes, honestly I think I added way too many details at few places, sorry for that, I will correct my mistakes slowly :) -- vineeth (talk) 15:52, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

I have merged the contents from the section Views of Ramakrishna ( the title is slightly incorrect ), into a new section Views on Ramakrishna, also will be adding more details related to "Biography and Stages of Life", "Education and Language" later, so pls delay the split for sometime., thanks! -- vineeth (talk) 16:07, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

I agree, the article is getting too long—but often that is the best way to collaborate on a long article: get all of the relevant material in one place first and then begin pruning it. Some sections could get broken off into new articles, especially "Views on Ramakrishna". I think the "Ramakrishna's Impact" section could actually have a bit more about the Ramakrishna movement today and the Ramakrishna Mission. I also think a small section, leading to another 'main article' on "Parables of Ramakrishna" would be good. Here is the relevant guideline about breaking off sections of long articles: Wikipedia:Summary style. All-in-all there is a great deal of good information being added to the article lately! ~ priyanath ^talk 17:36, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

totally disputed tags from Goethean

Main page: Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Incidents § Disruptive_edits_from_User:Goethean

Goethean, the totally disputed tag added by you , with edit summary ...This tag stays on until you start using Ramakrishna scholarship from the past 30 years is untenable. Just check the Notes section. Pls show a wikipedia guideline related to the edit summary... This will be removed. Thanks. -- vineeth (talk) 11:59, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

I have responded to your unfounded attack. Hopefully, it will bring some responsible, knowledgeable editors to this page who will support using some recent scholarship. Frankly, your tactics are despicable and you should be ashamed of yourself. — goethean ॐ 16:51, 14 September 2008 (UTC)

Thanks again for the attacks. Pls go through my arguments here, which proves my addition of recent scholarship. Even though I am not removing the "totally disputed" tag this time, its easy to prove that your addition of this tag is untenable. I would like to hear from other knowledgeable editors as well. Thanks. -- vineeth (talk) 18:27, 14 September 2008 (UTC)

Quotes and spin off article

Some suggestions:

1. Summarize what the sources say, rather than quoting. This will avoid the sin of cherry-picking quotes and force editors to present more information about the viewpoints presented
2. Move all quotes to the notes/reference section
3. Consider keeping this article to be just the biography, and move all other material to a spinoff article suchs as Views on Ramakrishna, and summarize its contents here, per WP:SUMMARY.

Happy editing. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 15:35, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Thanks Jossi, very good advice. ~ priyanath ^talk 15:48, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

I consider the "Views on Ramakrishna" to be an illegitimate section anyways. Any content in this article falls under the header "Views on Ramakrishna". That section effectively ghettoizes critical contemporary scholars whose findings the devotees and Mission dislike, and to canonize the naive devotee and Mission views in the "Biographical" section, which is actually original research, depending as it does on unmediated primary sources. The "Biography" should present the views of critical contemporary scholars on Ramakrishna. Then there will be no need for a separate section of "Oh, by the way --- this is what those crazy secular Western scholars think...if you're REALLY interested in that stuff" — goethean ॐ 17:17, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

You have a point there, Goethean. Best is always to have all significant viewpoints in one article if at all possible. One possibility is to make a demarcation between biographical information, and viewpoints that are related to Ramakrisna's work. Spin-off articles are only needed when there is too much material to deal with. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 17:23, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

There is no consensus among mainstream western scholars for the views of Kripal and Sil. In fact, several notable western scholars poke serious holes in their work. It therefore is not 'biography' but analysis and conjecture. Even their translations of the primary Bengali works on Ramakrishna have been quite credibly disputed. To place their opinions under biography would be quite incorrect. On the other hand, the biographical material of people like Isherwood, Rolland, and the other academics who are referenced in the bio section have withstood the test of time—and by a strong consensus. There is room in the article for the controversial views of Kripal and Sil, but they are properly placed in a 'views' section, since they are just that.

P.S. I'll mention again that the Britannica article on Ramkrishna, updated in 2008, has not even a mention of the recent work on Ramkrishna. I'm aware that other encyclopedias are not generally used as a source, but they can provide a neutral third-party reality check, and confirm my view above—Kripal and Sil's work are not accepted by the mainstream. ~ priyanath ^talk 18:28, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

It therefore is not 'biography' but analysis and conjecture. To place their opinions under biography would be quite incorrect.

This is where you clearly veer into absolutely untenable and inappropriate original research. Excuse me, but who are you to make this claim on behalf of all Wikipedia readers and editors? How do you figure that you are a more appropriate authority than Narasingha Sil, (Oregon State University history professor and author of four books on Ramakrishna, Vivekananda, and Saradi) and Jeffrey Kripal (Rice University Religion Chair) You cite in the article that there have been critical reviews of their books. This is normal with every book published by academia. An exception are the books and web articles that you tend to favor, like the stuff funded by non-academic entrepreneurial publisher Rajiv Malhotra, which are so non-notable that there are no academic reviews of them at all, and which have a very clear ideological and religious agenda. As for your point about Britannica, there are other encyclopedias, Like Gale's Encyclopedia of Reilgion, which discuss Kripal's and Sil's books. But I'm guessing that you are well aware of that. — goethean ॐ 19:15, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

On the other hand, the biographical material of people like Isherwood, Rolland, and the other academics who are referenced in the bio section have withstood the test of time—and by a strong consensus.

You are referring to 50- to 100-year old works which are no longer relevant to discussion of Ramakrishna scholarship. Secondary sources should be cited when referring to these works. Directly using these works as sources is original research. — goethean ॐ 19:35, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

There is room in the article for the controversial views of Kripal and Sil, but they are properly placed in a 'views' section, since they are just that.

Everything in this article is equally a "View on Ramakrishna". The distinction between "controversial" views of Western scholars that you and the Ramakrishna Mission don't like on the one hand, and the views of scholars that you (and the Mission) do like, like (30-year old articles by) Schneidermann and Neeval on the other, is original research, untenable, and wrong. Please stop imposing your POV on this article. — goethean ॐ 19:32, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

There is no consensus among mainstream western scholars for the views of Kripal and Sil.

There is never consensus in academia about anything. If you would like to argue that Kripal and Sil do not qualify as reliable sources, I will refer you to WP:RS. Otherwise, the distinctions that you are making are irrelevant for this article. — goethean ॐ 19:40, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

priyanath, Goethean makes here very good points that are consistent with Wikipedia policies of NPOV, and NOR. You ought to read them carefully, and if you still disagree, I would recommend an RFC on the subject. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 04:10, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Editors, pls find my arguments below, sorry for the new section. -- vineeth (talk) 07:15, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

"Contemporary Scholars", "spin off article"

Goethean, when you say here - "Per WP:NOR, every section of the article should be referenced to contemporary works of scholarship, not primary materials ("Wikipedia articles should rely on reliable, published secondary sources")."

Wikipedia does not say anything about "contemporary scholarship", I am afraid its your own perception.

In the edit summary -

please stop removing tags. this article is not neutral, because you have removed all of the refs to major scholarship from the past 30 years and substituted refs approved by a religious organization

This is again untenable, other articles, ex : Jesus, Buddha, St.Peter can be attacked in the same way! And moreover "major scholarship from the past 30 years" are all present. "approved by a religious organization" is purely your POV, as I indicate later, these "older" books have been used in International journals.

Let me address this statement from you -

(30-year old articles by) Schneidermann and Neeval on the other, is original research, untenable, and wrong. Please stop imposing your POV on this article.

I don't know if you have read Kali's Child, this is what kripal says on Chapter 2, Page 86 -

Here I am building on the thesis of Walter G. Neevel, who in his seminal essay "The Transformation of Sri Ramakrishna"...

Let us not forget that you had added material from Neevel, not long back , this edit on 14:57, 3 May 2008. Pls dont change your statement now.

I would rather say that its your own POV. You are criticizing Schidermann, Neevel, because they don't match your POV., we all request you "Please stop imposing your POV on this article."

For the third time I repeat, there is no guideline in wikipedia that says that "century old books", "scholarship older than 30 years" should be rejected.

Now coming to this statement of yours -

You are referring to 50- to 100-year old works which are no longer relevant to discussion of Ramakrishna scholarship. Secondary sources should be cited when referring to these works. Directly using these works as sources is original research.

I am afraid this is your original research. Rolland, Isherwood, Max Muller are reliable secondary sources. Pls stop criticizing a Noble Prize winner like Romain Rolland, because he is not inline with your POV., all these three are highly reputed scholars. Thousands of international and academic journals use these books, for example : "Culture’s influence on creativity: the case of Indian spirituality" of International Journal of Intercultural Relations , uses all the above three books.

Views of Ramakrishna

Now coming to Views of Ramakrishna part, as SriniG indicated above the biography section should "provide basic information that most of his biographers agree upon. And secondly we can have information about research on Ramakrishna." Let me give an example, recently I added Ramakrishna#Ramakrishna.27s_Tantra_Sadhana, pls read the last para carefully, "In Kali's Child, Jeffery Kripal argues that "Ramakrishna's world, then, was a Tantric world"[182]. Kripal further argues that Ramakrishna's Tantric practices were "omnipresent, defining virtually every point along Ramakrishna's spiritual development."[183] However, other scholars — Swami Tyagananda[184], Somnath Bhatacharyya[121], Hugh B. Urban[147], Narasingha Sil[185], William Radice[161] argue that Kripal's conclusions are incorrect." According to you, Lets say we added that "Ramakrishna's world, then, was a Tantric world" to the biography secion of the article, then the Biography will be fully of such statements. The Biography will read like scholar x says ding, where as scholar y says dong :) Anothe example is to take of Sil., Sil says that "Mahendranath Gupta did not dare to publish the kathamrita when Swami Vivekananda was alive", but there are other reilable sources which say that the first version of kathamrita was published in 1897 ( when swami vivekananda was alive ) and there is another reliable source which says "kathamrita" was published in different journals before 1902. So the article will be full of such "If", and "Else", "But". All the different view points should be a part of "Views of Ramakrishna" section.

What I said above equally applies to other articles:

• Rama, some scholars argue that he did not exist, and there are books that argue that a particular even happend in a different way.
• Jesus, scholars like george wells argue that New testament is not reliable, and scholar like tanya associates eroticism with several teachings of christ, but why doesnt the main article mention these? why doesnt the major encyclopedias mention this?? Because these are just different "views".

Regarding your argument on Kripal, just have a look at these,

• Merriam-Webster's Encyclopedia of World Religions By Wendy Doniger (1999) , Here its strange that even Wendy Doniger does not make any mention of Kripal!
• Holy People of the World: A Cross-cultural Encyclopedia By Phyllis G. Jestice (2004),

Thanks, -- vineeth (talk) 07:15, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

P.S : I would like to give a brief intro on the importance of the book, Life of Ramakrishna by Romain Rolland. Freud adopted the the concept of "Oceanic feeling" in the book Civilization and its Discontents from this book (you can find the reference to this in the article). The book Civilization and its Discontents forms the basis of psychoanalysis, which were used years later by Somnath Bhatacharrya, Kripal, Raab, etc., The correspondance b/w Freud, Rolland is a very interesting research subject in itself. Christopher Isherwood's book is used as a reference in several international journals , academic studies, for example : Academic American Encyclopedia by Grolier Incorporated (1996). SO there is no question of removing these references. -- vineeth (talk) 10:49, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

I would like to give a brief intro on the importance of the book, Life of Ramakrishna by Romain Rolland.

You need to clean up your vandalism before adding irrelevancies to the article. You have removed all references to contemporary scholarship from the article and replaced it with references approved by a religious organization. That is vandalism. I will be reverting your edits. — goethean ॐ 15:01, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

There is no such thing as "contemporary scholarship" in Wikipedia, User:Nvineeth has demonstrated here that he has added very recent academic research including your favourite ones , Sil and Kripal. He has also demonstrated the importance of other books., by Rolland, Muller, Isherwood. If you remove these, it will be considered as vandalism and other editors, admins will definitely revert this. Apart from allegations, you are not giving any solid reason. -- Ramashray (talk) 15:32, 16 September 2008 (UTC)