Maurice Frydman E-Book

Gabriele Ebert

• Herausgeber: BoD - Books on Demand
• Kategorie: Sachliteratur, Reportagen, Biografien
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 74

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2025

Beschreibung

The Pole Maurice Frydman (1894 or 1901-1976) was an important personality, although not much is known about him. He was a close disciple of Ramana Maharshi and Nisargadatta Maharaj. It is to him that we owe the compilation of Ramana's talks in "Maharshi's Gospel" as well as the well-known book "I Am That", the translation of Nisargadatta Maharaj's talks from Marathi into English, which made Nisargadatta famous. As an electrical engineer, he came to India in the 1930s, where he set up a transformer factory in Bangalore and was a regular visitor to Ramana's ashram at weekends. As he wanted to lead the life of a sannyasin (mendicant monk), he went to Swami Ramdas, who gave him the name "Swami Bharatananda". He had a close friendship with Krishnamurti and worked in his organizations for a time. His activities also extended to Indian politics, as he was significantly involved in the so-called "Aundh experiment" of the small princely state of Aundh and helped it to democratize. He also helped plan the Dalai Lama's escape to India in 1959 and ensured that the Tibetans who had fled were given land to settle on.

Leseprobe

Inhalt

Introduction

Maurice Frydman’s life:

The later Years

Maurice Frydman and Ramana Maharshi

Maurice Frydman and Nisargadatta Maharaj

Bibliography

Introduction

Not much is known about the Pole Maurice Frydman (1894 or 1901–1976), although he was an important figure in the circle of Mahatma Gandhi, the Aundh experiment of the Indian princely state of Aundh, Ramana Maharshi, Nisargadatta Maharaj and Jiddu Krishnamurti. He promoted the exchange of literature between India and Poland, helped Tibetan refugees to find a place to stay in India after the Chinese invasion of Tibet, and was involved in planning the Dalai Lama’s flight to India. He also compiled “Maharshi’s Gospel”, a collection of questions and answers with the Maharshi, which contains many of his own questions, and translated Nisargadatta Maharaj’s conversations with visitors from Marathi tape recordings into English, resulting in the extensive work “I Am That”.

Maurice was a karma yogi who took immediate action. He left nothing biographical behind and always kept himself in the background. The sources are therefore sparse.

Apa Pant, the son of the raja of the princely state of Aundh, reports the most about him. V. Ganesan, the great-nephew of Ramana Maharshi, has dedicated a chapter to him in his book “Ramana Perya Puranam”, David Godman spoke freely about him in an interview, and Srinivasan has tried to compile the facts in an online document. There is also an account of Barry Gordon’s experiences in Maurice’s later years.

Maurice’s life is unique among the disciples of Ramana Maharshi and Nisargadatta Maharaj in its emphasis on action and is also of interest in relation to the history of India. It is therefore certainly worth a read.

Maurice Frydman’s life:

Apa Pant reports

Maurice Frydman

Apa Pant (1912-1992) was the eldest son of Bhawanrao Shriniwasrao Pant Pratinidhi, the Raja of Aundh, one of the many princely states in British India. In 1937, after his studies in England, he met Maurice Frydman for the first time and remained associated with him until his death. He regarded him not only as a friend but also as his guru and wrote a detailed article for the Ramanashram magazine “The Mountain Path”, which is reproduced here in full:1

“I must indeed have earned a great deal of punya (spiritual merit) in many a past life to have deserved to meet with such a unique guide, friend and philosopher as Swami Bharatananda, alias Maurice Frydman. Although he ever kept his personality in the background, his influence on events and individuals, always operating simultaneously at different levels of consciousness, has been incalculable.

It has been Maurice who was the active instrument for me to meet four of the greatest sages of our times. He propelled me to Sri Ramana Maharshi within a few months of my arrival from England in 1937 after the completion of my studies. With Sri J. Krishnamurti, an encounter that was to last over fifty years started at the instigation of Maurice. It was also Maurice who introduced me to Mahatma Gandhi and I thenceforth became a regular visitor at Sevagram2. And finally in 1975, only a few weeks before he left the body, his last act was that of taking me to Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj.

His life of experimentation and of experience was linked up with the message and work of these four great souls. But Maurice made us all – his friends and devotees – fellow-pilgrims on his path, urging, advising, often brow-beating us to be sincere, simple, truthful. He would steadily gaze at you, look into you, through you, with those kindly, piercing eyes silently, compassionately, and uncover instantly all your quirks and problems, physical, emotional, mental, spiritual. He would then relentlessly take you to task for your lapses and immediately offer correct, direct, but often undigestible and even disturbing advice. Revolutionary changes have been brought into many lives after a moment’s contact with Maurice Frydman.

That is exactly what happened to me that November in 1937 when I was unexpectedly confronted with Maurice Frydman in Bangalore.

Bhawanrao Shriniwasrao Pant Pratinidhi, Raja of Aundh State, 1922

I had just returned from a four-and-a-half-year study period at Oxford and London, a very bright-eyed young lad who imagined himself to be a ‘revolutionary communist’. I wanted to fight the British Raj and establish communism in India – in fact, a new Utopia! I was my fathers, – Raj Bhawanrao’s eldest surviving son. He was 61 years old then, and I was 25. He understood my enthusiasm and also my impulsiveness. He arranged for me to get a 3-month ‘training’ in administration in Mysore State, then the most ideal and well-run of the 675 princely states of India. Father also gave me a private secretary to look after me, a chauffeur together with a new car, and a servant. Within one week of my arrival in Bangalore I was in full form and thoroughly enjoying myself with this period of ‘princely’ training.

A strict timetable of ‘visits to institutions and factories’, followed by ‘briefings and discussions’ was arranged. One such visit was to the Government Electrical Factory on the outskirts of Bangalore. Sri Bharatananda – Maurice Frydman – had been its Director and Chief Executive since 1935.

Being ‘foreign returned’ and a Prince, I was habituated to being treated very deferentially. I, on my side, always wore my best Oxford accent and a condescending princely smile with assumed courtesy. Maurice, on the other hand, was in a very bad mood. A year before, he had taken sannyas and had begun to live according to his vows. When it was reported to Sir Mirza Ismail that his brilliant and efficient Engineer-Director had shaved his head and taken sannyasa that he went to work in saffron robes, begged for his daily bread, and gave away all his wages (Rs. 3,000 per month) to the poor and needy, the Grand Vizier was furious. He sent for ‘that Mr. Frydman’ to remind him that he had hired an engineer, not a sannyasi and forbade him henceforth to wear gerua.

Maurice, on his side, preferred his resignation on the spot, saying that how and what he ate or wore was his personal matter, and that he must be free to follow his own pattern of life so long as ‘I satisfy all those concerned with the quality of my work as an engineer and manager.’ A compromise was finally reached according to which Maurice would have to wear European or Mysore dress only when a VIP visited the factory. As he had to put on a suit for my sake, Maurice was in his darkest mood!

As I got out of the car, Maurice was waiting at the doorstep, but instead of returning my smile, he gruffly said, ‘Well, young Prince, do you know anything of electricity or will I be wasting my time on you?’

I, of course, quickly stepped back into the car and started to slam the door shut, when Maurice realized his mistake and almost dragged me out of the car. ‘I did not mean to offend you. Forgive me’, he apologised, and I saw for the first time that winning smile spread over his suntanned face. Within five minutes of all this drama our vibrations had clicked. And they remained clicked for forty years, until his death on 9th March 1976, and further, till this present time.

From the word go, I was deeply impressed by Maurice’s systematic, well-ordered, highly disciplined personality. His intelligence was overpowering; his simplicity scintillating; his spontaneous, genuine love overwhelming. There was nothing false, superficial or superfluous about Maurice. His response to his environment was always razor-sharp and instantaneous, always compassionate. There was never a gap between what he saw and felt and his immediate action. If he saw a beggar in rags he gave him all his food and his shirt as well without ever theorising about it. There were no dogmas, no theories, no hypotheses; only spontaneous, direct action. He belonged to no political party, religion or ‘ism’.

Once, in Bombay in 1943, my wife Nalini, who was then practising surgery (gynaecology) in the villages of my father’s state, Aundh, was talking with him of her work-plan. She spoke of the financial difficulties of poor Aundh in acquiring even the necessary rudimentary equipment. Maurice asked, ‘How much money do you require immediately?’ Nalini said offhand, ‘Ten thousand rupees’, which was then a large sum. Next morning in walks Maurice with Rs.10,000/- in Rs. 100 notes! ‘Nalini, start work!’ he said. That was the way my guru taught: direct, compassionate action, by practical example.

Maurice Frydman was born in 18943 in the Jewish ghetto of Krakaw in Southern Poland, then a part of tsarist Russia.

From the accounts that Maurice gave out grudgingly from time to time during our long and close association, it seems that his family was very poor. His father, a devout Jew, worked in the synagogue. His mother sewed, washed clothes and cooked, and brought up her children as best she could, though there was hardly any money to do so. Maurice did not taste white bread until he was thirteen. He acquired his first toothbrush when he was fifteen!