SOURCE: "Predetermination and Free Will in the Teaching of Ramana Maharshi (1879-1950)," in Religious Studies, Vol. 20, No. 3, September, 1984, pp. 615-26.

In the following essay, Sharma argues that Ramana Maharshi's stand on predeterminism was not as immutable as previously interpreted.

I

Ramana Maharsi is one of the lesser lights of modern Indian thought but a major figure in the context of modern Advaitic thought in Hinduism. Modern Indian thought in general is distinguished by a robust confidence in the efficacy of effort as an expression of free will, a confidence it shares with the temper of the West in general and which it may have imbibed by coming in contact with it. Modern Advaitic thought, as represented by its popular modern exponents such as S. Radhakrishnan and T. M. P. Mahadevan, shares this confidence. Ramana Maharsi, however, strikes, at least at first glance, a somewhat discordant note. The purpose...