The Sound of the Vedas

Long before Twitter and email, most information was conveyed in person, through speech. For better or worse, many of the world’s systems of communication have changed, but some oral traditions still thrive.

The Vedas comprise an oral tradition that has transmitted religious teachings for thousands of years on the Indian subcontinent. A complex system of mnemonic devices was developed to transmit the teachings from generation to generation in the belief that the potency of the mantras lies in their sound when pronounced. Vedic meditation teacher Thom Knoles explores these rich and complex texts with New York Vedanta Society Leader Swami Sarvapriyananda, in a session that seeks to understand the importance of sound in sacred practices.

About the Speakers

Thom Knoles (Maharishi Vyasananda) is a master teacher of Vedic meditation. After basing himself in Australia, Knoles became an acclaimed teacher of yoga and meditation before the age of twenty. He received an honorary doctorate from the Maharishi European Research University (MERU), a post-graduate neuroscience-and-consciousness research institute based in Switzerland, and quickly became a sought-after public speaker and educator, consulting more than forty top corporations and federal and state governments in Australia and abroad as well as government-funded meditation programs in prisons in Australia and in the United States. In the last decade, Knoles began teaching widely in the United States in addition to continuing his teacher training programs in India. This is his third appearance at the Rubin Museum. He offers courses in New York City three times a year; the next sessions starts in November.

Swami Sarvapriyananda is the Minister and Spiritual Leader of the Vedanta Society of New York. Previously, he was an Assistant Minister at the Vedanta Society of Southern California. Swami joined the Ramakrishna Math and Mission (Belur, India) in 1994 (sannyas in 2004). Before moving to the United States in 2015 he served in various capacities: Vice Principal, Deoghar Vidyapith Higher Secondary School; Principal, Shikshana Mandira Teacher Education College; Registrar, Vivekananda University; and Acharya (Spiritual Teacher), Monastic Probationers’ Training Centre at Belur Math.