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Self-Realization Fellowship

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Gateway to the Self-Realization Fellowship Temple in Hollywood (Los Angeles, California)
Paramahansa Yogananda, Founder

The Self-Realization Fellowship is a worldwide spiritual organization founded by Paramahansa Yogananda in 1920[1] and based in Mount Washington [2] in Los Angeles, California.

Self-Realization Fellowship (SRF) continues disseminating Paramahansa Yogananda's teachings, including Kriya Yoga, a form of yoga the group claims originated millennia ago in India, but its core and substance is the "yoga breathing technique" called Ujjayi, as explained in Satyananda Yoga [3]. SRF publishes Yogananda teachings of home-study lessons, writings, lectures, and recorded talks; oversees temples, retreats, meditation centers, and monastic communities bearing the name Self-Realization Order; and coordinates the Worldwide Prayer Circle,[4] which it describes as a network of groups and individuals who pray for those in need of physical, mental, or spiritual aid, and who also pray for world peace and harmony.

Temples

Self-Realization Fellowship has over 500 temples, retreats, ashrams, and meditation centers around the world. In California there are temples in Berkeley, Glendale, Hollywood, Lake Shrine, Fullerton, Encinitas and San Diego. In Arizona there is a temple in Phoenix, Arizona. Retreat centers are located: in Lake Shrine, Pacific Palisades, CA, in Encinitas Retreat, Encinitas, CA, in Hidden Valley Ashram, Valley Center, CA (for men only), in Greenfield, Virginia, and in Bermersback Retreat, Germany, There are meditation centers located in 54 countries.[5] SRF also has a sister organization in India called Yogoda Satsanga Society of India, founded by Yogananda in 1917, and headquartered in Dakshineswar (near Calcutta). Yogoda Satsanga Society oversees 180 Kendras, Mandalis, Retreats, Ashrams throughout India and Nepal which includes meditation centers, 21 educational institutions, and a variety of charitable facilities.[6]

Mission

SRF's mission is to foster a spirit of greater understanding and goodwill among the diverse people and nations of the global family and help those of all cultures and creeds to realize and express more fully in their lives the beauty, nobility, and divinity of the human spirit, which mission it intends to fulfill through worldwide service.[7] Yogananda's Aims and Ideals for his organization SRF/YSS.

  • To disseminate among the nations a knowledge of definite scientific techniques for attaining direct personal experience of God.
  • To teach that the purpose of life is the evolution, through self-effort, of man’s limited mortal consciousness into God Consciousness; and to this end to establish Self-Realization Fellowship temples for God-communion throughout the world, and to encourage the establishment of individual temples of God in the homes and in the hearts of men.
  • To reveal the complete harmony and basic oneness of original Christianity as taught by Jesus Christ and original Yoga as taught by Bhagavan Krishna; and to show that these principles of truth are the common scientific foundation of all true religions.
  • To point out the one divine highway to which all paths of true religious beliefs eventually lead: the highway of daily, scientific, devotional meditation on God.
  • To liberate man from his threefold suffering: physical disease, mental inharmonies, and spiritual ignorance.
  • To encourage “plain living and high thinking”; and to spread a spirit of brotherhood among all peoples by teaching the eternal basis of their unity: kinship with God.
  • To demonstrate the superiority of mind over body, of soul over mind.
  • To overcome evil by good, sorrow by joy, cruelty by kindness, ignorance by wisdom.
  • To unite science and religion through realization of the unity of their underlying principles.
  • To advocate cultural and spiritual understanding between East and West, and the exchange of their finest distinctive features.
  • To serve mankind as one’s larger Self.[8]

However, the full or real list of SRF aims is in its Article of Incorporation as a church from 1935. The deed says the SRF church was established for the purpose of

  • acquiring property and real estate (Article 2a),
  • to teach or preach a religion [sic] known as "Self-Realization Fellowship"(Yogoda Sat-Sanga) (article 2d)
  • to make lasting youth and arrest old age (2d)
  • to teach that human life is not given for physical pleasure [2d.15]

These are found in the "SRF Article of Incorporation" (Wikisource). Why SRF leaves out "arrest old age" and the like in the ideals presented to the public today, seems to go all unclarified.

A third set of professed aims and ideals is found in the society's East West Magazine (Vol 3-3, March-April 1928), under the heading "AIMS AND TENETS OF THE YOGODA SAT-SANGA MOVEMENT. Included there are:

  • 1.—Universal all-round education, and establishment of educational institutions for the development of man's physical, mental and spiritual natures.
  • 4.—Intelligently maintaining the physical body on unadulterated foods, including a large percentage of raw fruits, vegetables and nuts.
  • 9.—Fighting the Satan of Ignorance—man's common enemy.
  • 13.—Realization of the truth that human life is given to man to afford him opportunity to manifest his inner divine qualities, and not for physical pleasure nor selfish gratifications.

Leadership

Daya Mata was head and President of Self Realization Fellowship from 1955 to 2010, after succeeding the previous president, Rajarsi Janakananda.[9] In the accompanied material to one of their books, SRF states:

Central to Paramahansa Yogananda's teachings, which embody a complete philosophy and way of life, are scientific techniques of concentration and meditation that lead to the direct personal experience of God. These yoga methods quiet body and mind, and make it possible to withdraw one's energy and attention from the usual turbulence of thoughts, emotions, and sensory perceptions. In the clarity of that inner stillness, one comes to experience a deepening interior peace and awareness of God's presence.[10]

On January 9, 2011, Self-Realization Fellowship announced Mrinalini Mata, as its new President. She is "one of the close disciples of Paramahansa Yogananda personally chosen and trained by him to help guide his society after his passing," and had held the position of vice-president since 1966.[11] Paramahansa Yogananda took up residence in Encinitas, California in the later years of his life.[12] A hermitage and temple were built there. It was at the SRF Encinitas hermitage that Yogananda wrote his famous Autobiography of a Yogi.

Response

Many people are touched by Yogananda's SRF teachings and want to support it. However, it should not be overlooked that some get touched and later regret it. That was, for example, true for some former SRF monastics who left the SRF premises around 2002. They were one third of all SRF monastics. Backup Site of the SRF Walrus discussion board

According to Straight Arrow Press in the United States the "proceeds from the January 14, 2002 reissue of George Harrison's 1970 song My Sweet Lord will go to the Self-Realization Fellowship, a California organization that promotes the teachings of Paramahansa Yogananda. Yogananda, who established the fellowship in 1920 spread his philosophy of yoga and meditation, is best known for his Autobiography of a Yogi. He was frequently cited by Harrison as an important spiritual influence."[13]

Ravi Shankir had met the Self-Realization Fellowship (SRF) founder Yogananda in the 1930's and gave his first U.S. concert at the SRF Encinitas Retreat, Encinitas, California in 1957. On visits to Los Angeles, George Harrison would spend time at the SRF retreat in Encinitas, overlooking the Pacific Ocean, which was only three miles from Ravi Shankar's home. The SRF organization strictly honored its members' privacy which George appreciated.[14][2]

See also

References

  1. ^ "About Self-Realization Fellowship".
  2. ^ "Self-Realization Fellowship International Headquarters".
  3. ^ Satyananda: A Systematic Course in the Ancient Tantric Techniques of Yoga and Kriya
  4. ^ Worldwide Prayer Circle
  5. ^ Self-Realization Fellowship - Online directory of all temples, centers, groups, and circles
  6. ^ "Yogoda Satsanga Society of India".
  7. ^ Los Angeles Times
  8. ^ "Aims & Ideals of Self-Realization Fellowship as Set for by Paramahansa Yogananda, Founder".
  9. ^ "Millionaire president of yoga society dies". Los Angeles Times (Feb. 21, 1955). Rajarsi [1]
  10. ^ Paramahansa Yogananda. Autobiography of a Yogi (2009). ISBN 978-0-87612-079-8
  11. ^ Landsberg, Mitchell (January 12, 2011). "Self-Realization Fellowship elects Sri Mrinalini Mata as new leader". Los Angeles Times.
  12. ^ Self-Realization Fellowship: Encinitas Temple
  13. ^ Template:Cite article
  14. ^ Template:Cite article

Further reading

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