Swami Vivekanand - An Interesting Incident

After visiting the West, Swami Vivekanand reached Colombo, Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) on January 15, 1897. 
He reached Calcutta via Madras on 20th January 1897. Then Swami ji traveled extensively and visited many Indian states. On June 19, 1897 he reached Almora. The lectures delivered by him in this period were compiled into the book ‘Lectures from Colombo to Almora’.
The famines of 1896–97 and 1899–1900 in India – preceded by the droughts, due to the failure of monsoons affected almost the entire subcontinent, causing severe distress and mortality. These famines were officially described as the most disastrous famines of the 19th century due to their extent and severity - that killed millions of people - perhaps as many as 9 million in all.  
The famine of 1896–97 affected Bihar, Bengal, Bombay the Central Provinces, Punjab, and Burma - covering an area of 225,000 square miles and affected a population of 62 million - the estimated number of deaths was recorded as one million. 
The then British Viceroy of India, Lord George Curzon, was concerned with his budget and feared that aid to the starving would cost too much, so British aid was seriously inadequate. Despite the fact that Great Britain had been profiting greatly from its holdings in India for more than a century, the British stood aside and allowed millions of people in the British Raj to starve to death. 

Deeply affected by the widespread hunger, poverty and oppression of colonial rule, Swami Vivekananda founded the Ramakrishna Mission for social services on 1st May, 1897 in Calcutta. 

I don't remember where I read it - but there is an interesting incident that happened some time during his extensive travelling in northern India. 
Swami ji was invited to address a large number of youths – to speak about the Vedantic Advaita philosophy. During his lecture, Swami ji started talking about the then current situation of famine in western and central India - that how people were starving to death. He said it was their duty – especially of the youth to help their fellow human beings affected by the disaster - that terrible natural calamity. 
The organizers were surprised to see this switch from the original topic. 
They tried to signal him to stick to the topic but Swami ji continued with his topic of social- welfare work.
Suddenly, a priest of the temple – member of the host organization stood up in the middle of the lecture and said in a loud voice: “Swami ji – we have invited you here to talk about the Advaita philosophy – not about the famine. We want to hear about the soul – about the ultimate Truth - about the ‘Reality’. According to Advaita, the world is unreal – simply a perception of the mind. The body and the world are not our concerns since they are not ‘Real’. Remember - we are souls - not the bodies.” 

Swami ji – who was known for always staying calm and undisturbed by the interruptions - looked around and picked up the walking stick and started hitting the monk on his back.
The monk screamed in pain. 
“What is this? What are you doing?” The monk demanded.
Swami ji calmly said “What does it matter? You are not the body. The body is not real – it’s just a projection of your mind. You know you are the 'ever calm and blissful soul' which cannot be affected by my hitting your ‘unreal’ body. So, why does it matter to you?”

We don't need to know go into details of what happened next.
By doing this, Swami ji demonstrated that although the philosophical thoughts of the Vedanta and the Holy Scriptures are great to understand the underlying ‘Reality’ of the world and its perishable nature – and the nature of ‘Self’ within the body as soul - But at the same time, as long as we are living in this mortal body, we have to be practical as well. 
And this is exactly what we learn in science as well. At the atomic and sub-atomic level, the world and everything around us is not exactly the same as we see it. All physical objects that we see are simply sub-atomic particles circling around, and our mind perceives them together as an object or a physical body. 
But can we live our day to day life thinking that everything and everyone is really a bunch of atoms and sub-atomic particles moving, circling each other? 
Similarly, we cannot live by the philosophy alone. 
We have to feed the body and fulfill all its needs in order to survive.
So, there is a ‘Reality’ of Self - and there is a physical ‘Reality’ as well.
Although we know that the physical reality is fragile, temporary and perishable......
However, regardless of its perishable and ever-changing nature, for all practical purposes, it is a reality. 
                                              ‘Rajan Sachdeva’