Swami Venkatesananda

Swami Venkatesananda translated a number of celebrated scriptures from Sanskrit to English. Rather than presenting these translations as continuing narratives, he presented them as "Daily Readings," taking the original text and dividing it into 366 sets of verses, together with his translation, or in the case of The Song of God, his own contemplations of these verses.

Why this format? Because he knew human nature—he was a practical sage. He knew that most well intentioned readers would enthusiastically pick up such a volume for a few sessions and then would add it to the pile of books awaiting attention. A scripture, no matter how transcendent, is daunting. But, if presented as a small bite of wisdom per day, it could readily be incorporated into even a demanding daily routine.

By studying a scripture in this manner, “By the grace of God and guru, you will receive more light from within, and greater, and ever greater, understanding of the spiritual truth revealed in the scripture” (from the Preface to The Song of God).

We have expanded daily readings beyond the usual books that were published in daily readings format (The Song of God, Insights & Inspirations, etc.) and have added passages from Enlightened Living and Kingly Secret, plus a few others, as well including passages from the Yasodhara Talks. In instances where the daily passage is from a talk, we have endeavored to include the audio of the talk from which the passage was taken. Swami Venkatesananda’s thought was that these daily readings would supplement daily contemplation, and so, he suggested reading them either before or after sitting meditation each and every day.