The Avadhut and His Twenty-Four Teachers in Nature

Description

The Avadhut is both a novel and a compendium of Eastern spiritual teachings, presented in an engaging and authentic manner. The main character, Ekanta, who has been drawn from mention of a holy man in the Srimad Bhagavatam, encounters such “teachers” as the earth, the moth, the ocean, the child, the prostitute, the elephant and the arrowmaker, inspiring vivid recollections from his life spent in the company of his own spiritual masters, illumined parents, and other enlightened beings.

Ekanta, the Avadhut, is simply a true human being, an example of what humanity once was and what it should aspire for again. Even in this day and age, such a condition is possible. The negative effects of our contemporary lifestyle such as greed, selfishness, overpowering lust and uncontrollable anger, all get gradually and naturally attenuated when one focuses on spirituality and the treasures it brings–upon the essence of life rather than the extras of life.  It is not that we need give up everything and wander the world as Ekanta did. His divine fervor and his over-powering desire for spiritual experience and God-realization drove him to it.  But we can learn profound lessons from his detachment from people, places and things and his exacting discrimination as to what is essential and what is nonessential in life.  By studying the Avadhut and his teachers we can learn to love God again, first and foremost, and see both the necessity and the efficacy of developing a lasting and ultimately satisfying relationship with the Supreme — as the personal God, the in-dwelling Self and the Absolute Being — all three. This, as I see it, is paramount and Ekanta’s example will lead us towards it.

Softcover / 6 x 9 / 712 pages / U.S. $24.95 / Kindle version
ISBN 1-891893-05-X \ 978-1-891893-05-6

“Beautiful! The Vedantic teachings of India are placed so well within the journeys of an ascetic traveling through the country of India. I cannot get over the amount of wisdom found on each page of this piece. An absolute treasure. You would do well to discover it.”

“One can spend hours lost in the beauty of this story.”  | “A timeless journey. … The Avadhut is a book that can be a companion for a lifetime.”

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