A disturbing impartial account of Yogananda

First of all, I must warn future readers who revere Yogananda and consider him as their guru, whould find this book quite difficult to read. The author, who is a disciple of Sri Yukteshvar, presents a very impartial and honest account of Paramhansa Yogananda. This account also includes unflattering behavior by the great guru while he visited India in 1935.

Before I proceed further, one should realize that the author has great reverence for Yogananda and gives him credit where credit is due. However, the author also revels to the reader that Sri Yukteshvar was not always pleased by Yogananda's behavior when he returned to India. Of course, this new information was not available to the public in the "Autobiography of a Yogi" written by Yogananda himself.

This is an important revelation as well. This shows that if a person is Self-Realized and has attained a high spiritual understanding, he/she will still be prone to errors of judgment, behavior and understanding.

In conclusion, the reason why I gave this book a 5 star rating is because of the new and not always positive information about Yoganada. This shows that Yogananda is "human" after all. I would not recommend this book to most SRF memebrs who view Yogananda as their guru as the information would be pretty hard to digest. However, if a person who admires Yogananda and reads this book with a deep sense of understanding and still revers Yogananda, then this book is for them.

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PARAMHANSA SWAMI YOGANANDA

FOR ANYONE WHO READ YOGANANDA'S AUTOBIOGRAPHY AND OTHER WRITINGS THIS BOOK GIVES A LOT OF INSIGHT INTO HIS EARLY LIFE IN INDIA AND WHAT HE EXPERIENCED WHEN HE FIRST CAME TO AMERICA. ONE OF THE MAIN REASONS I RECOMMEND THIS BOOK IS BECAUSE IT IS WRITTEN BY SOMEONE WHO KNEW YOGANANDA IN PERSON AND SOME OF THE INFORMATION CONVEYED FALLS OUTSIDE THE "PARTY LINE" PROMULGATED BY SELF REALIZATION FELLOWSHIP; I.E. IT SHOWS THAT YOGANANDA HAD A HUMAN SIDE WITH MANY PROBLEMS AND CONFLICTS TO RESOLVE AND HOW HE HELPED AND WAS HELPED BY OTHER PEOPLE.

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