Autobiography of a Yogi

Character Guide

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Mukunda Lal Ghosh (Paramahansa Yogananda)

The author and narrator, a spiritually precocious Bengali boy who from childhood seeks a guru and direct experience of God rather than mere doctrine.

Sri Yukteswar Giri (Swami Sri Yukteswarji, Master)

A learned, disciplined Bengali swami who becomes Yogananda's principal guru, blending Western scientific rigor with Vedic wisdom at his Serampore ashram.

Lahiri Mahasaya (The Yogavatar, Shyama Charan Lahiri)

Sri Yukteswar's own guru, a householder-yogi revered as the modern reviver of Kriya Yoga, known for reconciling worldly duties with deep spirituality.

Babaji (Mahavatar Babaji)

A legendary, seemingly deathless Himalayan yogi said to have transmitted Kriya Yoga to Lahiri Mahasaya; he appears as a semi-mythic figure of great power.

Bhagabati Charan Ghosh (Father)

Yogananda's father, a devout and disciplined railway official and a disciple of Lahiri Mahasaya, whose steady faith shapes the young Yogananda's upbringing.

Ananta

Yogananda's practical, skeptical elder brother who often challenges or teases him about his spiritual ambitions in the early chapters.

Swami Pranabananda (The 'saint with two bodies')

A brother disciple of Lahiri Mahasaya encountered in Benares, renowned for an inexplicable feat suggesting bilocation.

Bhaduri Mahasaya (The Levitating Saint)

A reclusive, witty yogi who lives almost entirely indoors in meditation and offers young Mukunda early lessons on discernment between technique and true God-realization.

Mr. Wright

Yogananda's American secretary who travels with him through India, keeping a vivid travel diary quoted throughout the later narrative.

Glossary

Kriya Yoga

A specific meditation and breath-control technique, said to accelerate spiritual evolution, central to the lineage described in the book.

Guru

A spiritual teacher or master to whom a disciple owes reverence and from whom they receive direct instruction.

Swami

A title for a Hindu monk who has renounced worldly life and taken vows within a monastic order.

Samadhi

A superconscious state of divine absorption or union with God described as the culmination of yogic practice.

Ashram

A spiritual hermitage or retreat community where a guru and disciples live and study together.

Yogi

One who practices yoga, especially advanced spiritual disciplines aimed at union with the divine.

Dwapara Yuga

One of four cyclical world-ages in Hindu cosmology; Sri Yukteswar's revised theory places humanity in an ascending version of this age.

Prana / Pranayama

Prana is the subtle life force or breath-energy; pranayama is the yogic practice of controlling and regulating that life force through breath.

Kaivalya

A Sanskrit term for final liberation or 'Absoluteness,' the ultimate goal of the eightfold yogic path.

Chela

A disciple or student under the direct guidance of a guru.

Rishi

An ancient seer or sage credited with perceiving spiritual and scriptural truths directly.

Pronam

A traditional Hindu gesture of respectful greeting, hands folded and raised from heart to forehead.

Yogavatar

An honorific meaning 'incarnation of yoga,' applied in the book to Lahiri Mahasaya.

Astral body

In the book's cosmology, a subtler, energy-based body underlying the physical form, relevant to death and the afterlife realms described.

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