Darshan with Ramana Maharshi 

“Darshan” is a term used in Hinduism to mean viewing an image of a deity or viewing a holy person. It applies in a remarkable way to the thousands of people, over time, who came to sit in darshan with Ramana Maharshi (1879-1950).

Ramana Maharshi underwent a powerful awakening when he was only seventeen, experiencing the death (as he termed it) of his sense of personal self and his firm establishment in knowledge of what he called the “Self,” usually, but also God, the Lord, Reality, one’s true nature or true being, the Heart, the Seat of Consciousness, Absolute Being, Bliss, the Master, and perhaps other terms.

If memory serves, “darshan” is a term used in Soto Zen centers to mean a private talk with the teacher. Darshan with Ramana Maharshi was vastly different. With many devotees sitting around him in his ashram in India called Tiruvannamalai, Maharshi sat in silence emanating loving energy. Sitting around Maharshi in this way was powerful for many people. For example, one devotee said that typically after sitting with Maharshi, he felt “peace in unity” for about ten days.[1]

In meetings outside of darshan, Maharshi did talk with devotees. In one such talk, someone, perhaps a social activist, asked him why he didn’t travel about and share his wisdom with “people at large.” Maharshi replied, 

What do you think of a man who listens to a sermon for an 
hour and goes away without having been impressed by it so 
as to change his life? Compare him with another who sits in
a holy presence and goes away after some time with his outlook
on life totally changed. What is the better, to preach loudly 
without effect or to sit silently sending out inner force?[2]

The opportunity to be in the presence of someone who sends out inner force in this way is not common in the West. I did have such an opportunity, however, when I attended a school called The Institute of Transpersonal Psychology many years ago in California. The coordinators of the school invited a man from India to come and sit in silence with those who wanted. I don’t know the spiritual history of this man, but as I sat with others around him, a palpable loving energy came over to me from him that affected me very powerfully. The very presence of such people can be a blessing. 

Footnotes