Thakur Sri Ramakrishna: a biography

All religions are true. The important thing is to reach the roof. You can reach it by stone stairs or by wooden stairs or by bamboo steps or by a rope. One should not think, ‘My religion alone is the right path and other religions are false.’ I had to practice each religion for a time – Hinduism, Islam, Christianity. Infinite are the paths and infinite are opinions.

- Sri Ramakrishna

In Thakur – Sri Ramakrishna: A Biography, Rajiv Mehrotra explores the ‘challenge and the riddle’ presented by the great mystic who, more than a century after his death, continues to dominate secular Hindu consciousness. Sri Ramakrishna brought a new vitality not only to the practices, rituals and symbols of the Hindu heritage but also the celebration of divinity in diverse forms, and reinforced the underlying possibility of a real harmony between all religions. It is this vision that makes him one of the great religious teachers of all time and so profoundly relevant today.

This illuminating and intimate biography is most reader-friendly and comprehensive, revealing this boundless power and magnetism of Sri Ramakrishna, as well as the Order that was inspired by his spiritual quest.

Mehrotra’s narrative gift is remarkably precise and richly evocative, integrating all details of an aspect into a visual and verbal complex of significance. This is a book for all those who want to know more about Sri Ramakrishna, as well as for anyone looking for a brilliant read.