Swaminarayan Sect

Modern religious community devoted to
the god Vishnu; its practice is based on
the life and teachings of Sahajananda
Swami (1781–1830), who was born near
the sacred city of Ayodhya in eastern
India but spent much of his life in the
western Indian state of Gujarat.
Sahajananda took initiation as an
ascetic and soon became a mahant, or
ascetic leader. His followers revered him
first as a religious preceptor (guru), and
later as a partial incarnation of the god
Krishna himself. They believed that
manifestations of the god Vishnu, such
as Krishna, are born on earth in times of
extreme trouble. It was in this latter
aspect that he was given the name
Swaminarayan (“Lord Narayan”), and
his followers believed that he was the
highest manifestation of God in human
form. The Swaminarayan sect has several million lay devotees (bhakta), most
of whom are affluent Gujarati merchants. In keeping with the community’s ascetic roots, however, its most
important figures are the ascetics who
run the organization and who serve as
teachers and advisers to them. For further
680
Svayamvara
information see Raymond Brady
Williams, A New Face of Hinduism, 1984.