Swami Prabhavananda - Influence

Influence

Christopher Isherwood wrote a book, My guru and his disciple, that described his more than three decades (1939–76) as a student of Prabhavananda (see also historical work by Copley).

Prabhavananda's book The Spiritual Heritage of India was reviewed in the academic journal Philosophy. The review stated that "Swami Prabhavananda has written a charming and authoritative book on the spiritual heritage of India, by which he means that heritage in consonance with the Vedic tradition and its culmination in Vedanta" (p. 376). The reviewer stated that "throughout the book breathes an air of relaxed simplicity and conviction.... I was particularly refreshed by the absence of attacks on science, materialism, naturalism, and other such means to spiritual fulfilment" (pp. 376–377).

Prabhavananda and Christopher Isherwood's translation of the Bhagavad Gita was reviewed by Time Magazine in 1945. Time described the translation as "a distinguished literary work" that was "simpler and freer than other English translations (three of which have been published in the past year).... It may help U.S. readers to understand not only the Gita itself, but also its influence on American letters through one of its greatest U.S. admirers, Ralph Waldo Emerson" (pp. 98, 100).

Prabhavananda's work was the subject of a 1979 book by Cyriac Muppathyil, published by the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome, that examined how Prabhavananda's (and Hinduism's) conception of meditation might inform the Christian practice of meditation. After surveying Prabhavananda's thought, Muppathyil examines "the merits and demerits" of his interpretation of meditation, surveys "the principles for a Christian integration of Hindu meditation," and ends by "presenting meditation as a meeting-point for Hindu-Christian dialogue" (p. 5).