Swami Abhishiktananda (Dom Henri Le Saux) was a French monk who came to India in 1948 and died in 1973, aged 63. During these years he entered ever more deeply into the classical tradition of Indian spirituality, of which the advaitin Sage Sri Ramana Maharshi was for him the greatest modern example. He was thus well qualified by experience to interpret this spirituality to his fellow-Christians, and this book makes a valuable contribution to deeper understanding. The three essays printed here were written during the last eighteen months of his life. Sannyasa was written shortly before the ecumenical diksha of his disciple Ajatananda, which took place in June 1973. The Upanishads and the Advaitic Experience was a contribution sent to a Seminar on Contemplation held in Bangalore in March of that year. The Upanishads-an Introduction was drafted in the summer of 1972, and garnered the insights which had been shared with his disciple during an intense month of study at the Phul Chatti ashram. As Ajatananda says of it in his Foreword: These closely packed pages are full of inspiration and contain a profoundly original presentation of the Upanishads, an invaluabale key for those who desire to penetrate to the heart of these wonderful texts, No one who reads these pages can fail to sense something of this mystery in himself. The authenticity of Swamiji’s presentation of advaita and sannyasa is vouched for by advaitin Hindus who said, when the essays first appeared, that they could only have been written by one who had himself experienced what he wrote about.
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