Random Musing: Why Swami Vivekananda batted for football
In popular culture, Swami Vivekananda is oft-remembered for another maxim which is widely misquoted, misused and misunderstood: “You will be nearer to heaven through football than through the study of the Gita.” It sounds like Swami Vivekananda Diego over dharma, but those who read that line and stop there prove precisely why he said it in the first place. It is as misunderstood as Karl Marx’s “religion is the opium of the masses,” which, as Kurt Vonnegut pointed out, for its time and place was like saying religion is like aspirin. It just gave people a little peace in troubled times.