Paper short abstract:

The lecture will examine S.S Cohen road from the Theosophical Society to Ramanashram, and analyze the significance of the encounters between the Theosophical Society, modern Hindu Spirituality and Jewish Nationalism.

Paper long abstract:

In 1952, S.S Cohen, who described himself as "A Jew Living in an Ashram", wrote a letter to the editor of the journal "India and Israel", concerning the question of dignity of labor in Judaism and Hinduism. Cohen, who resided at the time in Ramanashram in Tiruvannamalai, included in his letter an enthusiastic description of the recently established Jewish state and its accomplishments.

The author of the letter, S.S Cohen was born in Iraq in 1895. He arrived as a young man in India, became active in the Theosophical Society and was one of the founders of the Association of Hebrew Theosophist, in Adyar in 1925. In 1936, Cohen visited Tiruvannamalai, and became a close disciple of Sri Ramana. Cohen, who died in 1980, and was buried in Ramana's Ashram, published several books on Sri Ramana and on Advaitic Sadhana.

Notwithstanding his Theosophical convictions, and later, his adherence to Sri Ramana, Cohen was very much involved in Jewish matters, and an enthusiastic sympathizer of Zionism and the state of Israel. Cohen wrote on the persecution of the Jews in Germany, on the plights of the Jews in Poland, and on what he described as "unprecedented and unparalleled" heroism of the Jews in Israel.

The lecture will describe S.S Cohen and his road from the Theosophical Society to Ramanashram, examine Cohen's integration of Theosophical ideas, the teaching of Ramana, and Zionism, and analyze the significance of the encounters between the Theosophical Society, modern Hindu Spirituality and Jewish Nationalism.