Swami Vivekananda Chicago Speech:1893

Here is the audio recording of Vivekananda's famous speech at the Parliament of the World's Religions in Chicago in 1893. Vivekananda was a Hindu monk and disciple of Sri Ramakrishna Paramahamsa. He was the first of a number of Indian gurus who began to travel to the West in the late 1800's. In the speech above, Vivekananda introduced the West to Hinduism  and called for tolerance and an end to fanaticism.

Vivekananda also set up Vedanta Societies and  Ramakrishna missions across Europe, India, and the United States. According to the Pluralism Project, "he explained that the Vedanta teachings of Ramakrishna must be applied to life, which became known as Practical Vedanta: the worshipping of the divine through the abandonment of selfish desires by serving humanity."