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Swami Swahananda, a senior monk of the Ramakrishna Order of India, is the minister and spiritual leader of the Vedanta Society of Southern California. He received his undergraduate degree from Murari Chand College in Sylhet, India and earned an M.A.in English Literature and Language from the University of Calcutta. He joined the Ramakrishna Order in 1947 and received sannyasa, final vows, in 1956.

After joining the Order, he served in the Madras Math and, later, as editor of the Order's scholarly publication, the "Vedanta Kesari". He came to the United States in 1968 as the Assistant Minister of the San Francisco Vedanta Society and was later appointed head of the Vedanta Society of Berkeley, California. Immediately prior to coming to this country, the swami was head of the Delhi Center, the premier center of the Ramakrishna Order in the capital of India.

In December of 1976 he was transferred to Hollywood, the headquarters of the Vedanta Society of Southern California, where he remains the minister today.

In the late 1980s he was invited to lecture in Moscow and provide spiritual guidance. The swami gives lectures regularly at the Vedanta branch centers in Southern California. He also lectures in many places throughout North America.

Swami Swahananda is the author of many books and articles on religious life and spirituality including: Meditation and Other Spiritual Disciplines; Hindu Symbology and Other Essays, and Service and Spirituality.

Swami Swahananda was born in a village near Habiganj in what is now Bangladesh. He was initiated in 1937 by Swami Vijnanananda, one of Sri Ramakrishna's direct disciples.