Talks given from 1/10/1978 to 10/10/1978
Original in Hindi
Book Chapters: 10
Year published: 1994
Source: www.oshoworld.com
[Note: This is a translation of the Hindi series MARAN HEY JOGI MARAM by GORAKH, which is in the process of being edited. It is for research only.]
Chapter No. 2 - The call of the unknown
2 October 1978 am in Buddha Hall, Pune, India
The first question:
Question 1
A FRIEND ASKS: IF EVERYTHING IN NATURE IS PURPOSELESS, WHY MAN ALONE SHOULD LIVE WITH A PURPOSE?
Undoubtedly, if you can give up all purposes, there can be no greater purpose than this. If you can be natural, it is of the highest.
But man has become so unnatural that just to return to nature he will need to have a purpose -- purpose to be natural. This is unfortunate. And what I am saying is just this: give up everything, let go. But, at the moment, purposes have gripped us so powerfully that even giving them up will have to be turned into a purpose. We will have to give them up, and to give them up we will have to make efforts, although giving up needs no efforts. What efforts are involved if you have to give up something?
It is true that there is no purpose anywhere. But why? The reason is not that nature is purposeless; the reason is that what is, is, and there is no purpose be side it, outside of it.
A flower has bloomed. It has not bloomed for anyone, nor has it bloomed for being sold in the market. It has not bloomed so that a passer by may stop and enjoy its fragrance. Neither has it bloomed to win a gold medal or a decoration like padmashree. The flower has just bloomed, because blooming is its own joy. Blooming is the purpose of blooming; it is its own significance. So you can say that it has bloomed with out any purpose. And a thing can only bloom fully if it blooms without any purpose, because where there is a purpose there is necessarily some impediment.
If a flower has bloomed for some passer by to see it, then what will happen if there is no passer by to see? In that case the flower will not bloom; it will wait for the passer by to come. But if a flower refuses for a long time to bloom, it is just possible it may not bloom even when the passer-by comes. Because by then the habit of not blooming, the habit of remaining enclosed will have become too strong.
A flower blooms fully because it has no purpose whatsoever.
Man should be like this. But the difficulty with man is that he has ceased to be natural, he has become utterly unnatural. And if he has to go back to his naturalness, his spontaneity, this going back will again be a purpose.
When I talk about purpose it is like this- If you have a thorn in your foot, it has to be taken out with the help of another thorn. Now someone comes to me and says, "There is no thorn in my foot, so why should I take it out?" I would tell him, "Since the question does not arise why should you put the question at all?" The question simply does not arise, as there is no thorn in the foot. But in case it is there, another thorn will be necessary to take it out."
The friend may also say that since one thorn was such pain why should I ask him to push another into his foot? It is true that the first thorn is causing pain, but it cannot be taken out without the other. Of course, you have to see that you don't lodge the second thorn in your flesh out of a sense of gratitude to it, that it was good enough to help you get rid of the first one. That would be harmful. Once the thorn is out, both the thorns have to be thrown away together.
Once our unnatural life becomes natural again, it is necessary to put aside the natural with the unnatural, because to be completely natural even the thought of the natural will come in the way. Then whatsoever will be, will be.
No, I do not say that a purpose is necessary. But I talk of purpose because you have already collected any number of purposes in your life. You have any number of thorns in your flesh, and these thorns can be removed only with the help of other thorns.
The same friend asks if mind (MANA), intellect (BUDDHI) mind stuff (CHITTA) and ego (ahankara) are separate entities or they are different names for the same thing. He also wants to know if they are different from the atman or the soul, or they are one with it, and whether they are conscious or unconscious. He also wants to know what is conscious and what is unconscious, and their specific places in life.
The first thing is that in this world matter and consciousness are not two separate things. What we call matter is consciousness asleep and what we know as consciousness is matter awakened. In reality matter and mind are not different; they are different manifestations of the same thing. Existence is one, and that one is God or brahman or whatsoever you want to call it. When that one is asleep it appears as matter, and when awake it is mind, or consciousness. So don't treat matter and mind as separate entities; they are only utilitarian terms. They are not really different.
Even science has come to the conclusion that there is no such thing as matter. How amusing it is that fifty years ago Nietzsche declared that God is dead, and fifty years from now science will have to declare that God may or may not be dead but matter is certainly dead. As science goes deeper and deeper into matter it finds that matter is no more and only energy remains, only energy is.
What remains after the explosion or splitting of the atom is only particles of energy. And what we know as electrons, protons and neutrons are particles of electricity. In fact, it is not correct to call them particles, because particles connote matter. The scientists had to find a new word, which is quanta, which has a different connotation altogether. Quanta is both a particle and a wave. It is difficult to comprehend how a thing could be both a particle and a wave simultaneously, but quanta is both. Sometimes it behaves as a particle -- which is matter; and sometimes it behaves as a wave -- which is energy. Wave and energy are behaviors of the same quanta.
When science dug deep it found that only energy is, and when spirituality delved deep it found that only spirit or atman or soul is. And soul is energy. The time is just around the corner when a synthesis of science and religion will be achieved, and the distance that separates them will simply disappear. When the gap between matter and God has proved to be false, the gap between science and religion cannot exist for long. If matter and mind are not two, how can religion and science be two? The separation of science and religion was dependent on the separation of matter and mind.
To me, only one is; two simply don't exist. There is no place for duality; so the question of matter and mind does not arise. If you like the language of matter, you can say that everything is matter. And if you like the language of mind or consciousness, you can say that everything is consciousness. I for one prefer the language of consciousness. But why do I prefer it? Because, in my view, one should always prefer the language of the higher, which has greater possibility; one should not prefer the language of the lower, where possibility is less and less.
We can, for instance, say that only the seed is, and not the tree. And it is not wrong to say so, be cause the tree is only a transformation of the seed. But there is a danger involved in this statement. The danger is that some seeds may say, "If we are seeds all the way up, then why seek to become trees? We will remain as we are; we will remain seeds. " So it is better if we say that only trees are, and not seeds. Then the possibility for the seed to become a tree remains.
I prefer the language of consciousness, so that what is asleep can awaken, this possibility should be available.
There is a similarity between the materialist and the spiritualist; both of them accept only one -- either matter or mind. But there is a difference too. While the materialist accepts the primary thing and is thus deprived of the ultimate, the spiritualist accepts the ultimate which includes the primary in it. It is all inclusive; it does not exclude. I love the language of spirituality; and therefore I say that everything is consciousness. Consciousness asleep is matter, and consciousness awakened is consciousness. All is consciousness.
The second thing the friend wants to know is whether mind, intellect, mind stuff, and ego -- mana, buddhi, chitta and ahankara -- are separate entities or they are one. They are not separate entities, they are many faces of the same mind. It is like you ask whether the father, the son and the husband are separate individuals -- and I say no, he is one and the same man. We know that the same person is a father in relation to his son, a son in relation to his father, and a husband in relation to his wife. The same man can be a friend to one and an enemy to another. He may be beautiful to one and ugly to another. And the same man may be a master to one and servant to another. But he is one and the same man. In case you don't know his house and some person tells you that he saw his master there, and another day another person tells you that his servant lives in that house, and yet another day a young man says that his father lives there, and again a woman informs you that her husband is the owner of that house, then you will conclude that many people -- a master, a servant, a father and a husband -- live in that particular house. But the fact is that the same person is playing different roles in relation to different persons.
Our mind behaves in many ways. When it feels arrogant and says, "I am everything and others are nothing before me," then mind appears as ego. That is one way of mind's behavior. It is ego when it says, "I am everything." When it declares, "Everyone is just zero before me," then mind is ego.
And when the mind thinks, cogitates, it is intellect. But when it does not think or cogitate, when it simply moves about, rambles without any sense of direction, when it is unfocused, it is called mind stuff, or chitta. Intellect is mind with a direction, as is the mind of a scientist sitting in his lab and thinking how to split the atom. When the mind moves about with out any purpose and aim, when it kind of dreams and daydreams, when it thinks of becoming a billionaire or the president of a country, when it is unfocused, then it is chitta or mind stuff. Then it is just waving and wavering, it is incoherent and unorganized. And when it follows a well laid system of thought it is intellect.
These are the many ways of the mind. But it is all mind.
And the friend also wants to know if mind, intellect, mind stuff and ego are separate from the soul or the atman.
Do you think that when there is a storm in an ocean the ocean and the storm are separate? When the ocean is agitated and disturbed, we call it a storm. Similarly when the soul is agitated and disturbed, when it is restless, it is called mind. And when the mind is quiet it is again soul. Mind is the restless state of the soul, and soul is the quiet and tranquil state of the mind.
In other words, when consciousness is disturbed and agitated, when it is stirred and tempestuous, it is mind. That is why so long as you are in mind you can not be aware of the atman, or the soul. And for the same reason the mind ceases to be when it is in meditation. But what does it mean to cease? It means that the waves raging in the sea of the soul have quieted down. It is only then that you know you are a soul. So long as you are disturbed and restless, you know your self only as a mind.
The restless mind appears in many forms -- some times as ego, sometimes as intellect and sometimes as mind stuff. These are the different faces of the same restless mind.
The atman and mind are not separate. The atman and the body too are not separate; because the substance, the essence, the reality is one, and all these are transformations of the same. And if you know the one, all conflicts with the body or the mind, all strife comes to an end. Once you recognize the one, then it alone remains. Then the one abides in Rama as well as in Ravana. Then you will not worship Rama and kill Ravana. Then you will either worship both or kill both; because the same dwells in both -- Rama and Ravana.
Essence is one, its expressions are infinite. Truth is one, its forms are many. Existence is one; its faces and gestures are myriad.
But you cannot understand it if you approach it as a philosophy. You can understand it only if you approach it experientially, if you know it as an experience. All this I say just to explain it to you; this explanation cannot become your knowing, your experience. You will have to know it for yourself. And when you will enter into one and know it you will exclaim, "My God, what I had known as body is you; what I had known as mind is you, and what I had known as atman is also you!"
On knowing, only one remains. And this one is so vast, so immense that all gaps between the knower and the known and knowledge disappear. There the knower and the known become one. One of the rishis, the seers of the Upanishad asks, "Who is there who knows? Who is he who is known? Who is he who saw? Who is he who was seen? Who is he who experienced? And who is he who was experienced?" No, not even this much separation remains that you can distinguish the knower from the known, that you can say there are two. Even the experiencer ceases to be. All distances, all gaps, all separations simply vanish.
But thought cannot live without creating gaps and distances. Thought is bound to create distances. It will say this is the body, this is mind, this is soul and this is God. It will differentiate between the body and mind, between soul and God. Thought will bring in gaps and divisions which are not.
Why? Because thought cannot encompass and contain the total, the whole, in one piece. It is a very small opening through which things can only be seen piecemeal. If there is a big building with only a small opening in its wall and I try to look through it, will I be able to see the whole house? No, at first a chair will be seen, then a desk, and then the master of the house, and so on and so forth. Through a small opening the house can be seen only in fragments, never the whole of it altogether, because the opening is very small. But then I break open the wall and enter the house, and now the whole house is seen together.
Thought is a very small aperture in the mind through which we try to find truth. Through thought, truth is seen in fragments; truth is fragmented. But when you drop thoughts and enter a thought free space, which is meditation, then the total is observed. And the day the whole, the total is seen, we exclaim, "Jesus, it was all one seen in infinite forms!"
But this is possible only through experience.
Another friend wants to know how many years I took to enter meditation.
Entry into meditation happens in only a moment, though one may have to wait at its door for lives. Entry is a matter of a moment. Even "moment" is not the right word, because a moment is too long. If I say that it happens in a thousandth part of a moment, that too will be wrong, because even the thousandth part is time. In fact, meditation is entry into timelessness, into the timeless. When time ceases, entry into meditation happens, meditation happens.
So if someone says that it took him an hour or a year to get into meditation, he is wrong -- because when one really enters meditation, time ceases to be, time is no more there. Meditation transcends time, it is beyond time. Of course you can spend any number of lives outside the temple of meditation, making a round of the temple for umpteen times; but that is not entry into its inner sanctuary.
I too, spent many lives going round the temple of meditation, but it was not entry. When I entered, it happened in no time, it happened without time, it happened timelessly, it happened in timelessness.
The question that you have raised is rather difficult. If one were to keep an account of the time spent on the outskirts of the temple, it will come to countless lives. Even calculation is difficult, because it is an enormously long time; it is incalculable. But if you take just the event of entry into consideration, then it can not be said in terms of time, because it happens in between two moments. It happens when a moment has passed and the next moment has yet to arrive; it happens in the gap between two moments. It always happens in the gap between two moments.
That is why it cannot be said how much time it took me to enter meditation. It takes no time at all. It cannot take time, because you cannot enter the eternal through time. What is beyond time cannot be known through time.
I understand what you say. You can loiter around the temple as much as you like. That is a kind of going in circles; one can do so. For instance, I draw a circle with a center, and ask someone to reach the center. But even if he keeps moving on the circumference for lives and lives, he will never reach the center; howsoever fast he may run, he cannot make it. Even an airplane will be of no avail. Whatever he may do -- he may spend any amount of energy he has, but if he keeps to the circumference, he will never, never reach the center. And wherever he is at the circumference, he will always be distant, equidistant from the center. So it is meaningless to know how much one ran. He is still at the circumference where his distance from the center is always the same. And strangely enough it is the same distance from him as it was when he had not even begun the race.
If one is to reach the center he can do so only by quitting the circumference. He will have to stop running and take a jump. And when he will have reached the center and you will ask him how long it took him to run in circles to reach the center, what will he say? He will say that he did lots of traveling, lots of journeying on the circumference, but he could not reach. If you ask him about the length of his journey before he made it, he will again say that any length of journeying was useless, he could not reach through journeying. He will say that he reached only when he abandoned all journeying and took a quantum leap.
So it is not at all a question of length of time and space in meditation. Meditation does not happen in time. We all have spent lots and lots of time. And we all have wasted any amount of time. And the day meditation will happen to you, you too will not be able to say how much time it took. No, it is not at all a question of time.
Someone asked Jesus, "How long can one stay in that heaven of yours?" Jesus said that it was a difficult question, and then he said, "There shall be time no longer." Jesus said to him again, "If you want to know how long you can stay in the kingdom of God you are really putting a difficult question, because there shall be time no longer. So how can time be calculated?"
It is good to understand that what we know as time is inalienably connected with our sorrow, with our unhappiness, with our misery. And there is no time in bliss; bliss is timeless. The measure of time is the measure of your misery. The more unhappy you are the longer the time is. If someone in your family is on the deathbed, awaiting his end, and it is night, that night will become much too long. Although the night will make no difference for the wall clock or the calendar on the desk, but for the man sitting at the bedside of his dying beloved, it will become so long that it will seem endless. The man wonders if the night is going to end at all, if the sun will rise and another day begin. And it seems to him that though the night is long the clock shows the same hour, and he wonders if the clock has stopped or its hands are going slow. Even if it is about time, close to morning for the date leaf of the calendar to drop, the man feels that the night is getting longer and longer; it is endless.
Bertrand Russell has said somewhere that if he was presented in a court of law for all the sins he had committed and also for the sins that he had intended to commit, but could not, even the strictest of magistrates would not convict him for more than four to five years' imprisonment; but Jesus says that sinners will suffer in hell for eternity. This is very very unjust. He says that even if the sins he had only intended to commit -- he had only thought of them -- were added to the list of sins he had actually committed, the most punishing court would not punish him for more than four to five years in prison. "But the court of Jesus would have me suffer in hell for eternity, which is too much."
Russell is dead, otherwise I would like to tell him that he failed to understand what Jesus meant to say. What Jesus is saying is this: that if one was to live in hell for a moment, the moment would seem to be eternity itself. Misery is by nature such that it seems endless, it seems it will never come to an end.
Misery lengthens time, while happiness shortens it. That is why we say that happiness is transient, momentary. It is not necessary that happiness should last only a moment, but it feels momentary because in happiness time is short; it shortens. It is not that happiness is always fleeting. It may have a longer span in time, but it always feels fleeting because in happiness, time shrinks. Even as you meet your beloved, the time for separation arrives; he seems to be leaving you the moment he arrives. No sooner the flower blooms than it begins to wither away. So the experience of happiness is always brief, because the nature of time in happiness is such. The clock remains the same and so does the calendar; they are not affected by your happiness; but for you happiness shortens time psychologically.
And time in bliss disappears altogether; it is neither shortened nor lengthened. In bliss time simply does not exist. When you will be in bliss, time will cease to be for you. In fact, time and misery are two names for the same thing. Time is another name for misery. Time and misery are synonymous. Psychologically time means misery; and that is the reason why we say that bliss is beyond time. What is beyond time cannot be found through time.
I have wandered enough, as much as any of you have done; and the interesting part of it is that this wandering is so long that it is difficult to say who has wandered less and who more. Mahavira and Buddha attained enlightenment twenty-five hundred years ago; Jesus had it twenty hundred years ago, and Shankar only ten hundred years ago. But if someone says that Shankar had to wander less by ten hundred years, he is saying it wrong, because wandering is in finite.
For example, you were in Bombay and you came here to Nargol by traveling a distance of a hundred miles. But for the star that is at an infinite distance from us, you did not travel at all. In relation to that star you are where you are. It makes no difference for that star if you have moved a hundred miles from Bombay. If you take that star into consideration you have not moved at all. Your distance from that star remains the same at Nargol as it was in Bombay. That star is so far away that these petty distances don't make a difference.
The journey of our lives, of our births and deaths is so long, so infinitely long, that it makes no difference whatsoever if one attained enlightenment twenty-five hundred years ago, another five hundred years ago, and still another only five days or five hours ago. The day we reach that center we exclaim, "Aha, Buddha is just now arriving and Mahavira also is only entering, and so also Jesus, and us too!"
But this is rather difficult to understand, because in the world we live in, time is very important to us. Time has great importance in our world. That is why the question arises how long it takes one to enter meditation. But don't raise this question. Don't talk about time. And stop wandering. Wandering will take time. Don't loiter around the temple; enter it.
But we are afraid of going inside the temple; we are afraid of what may happen there. Out here every thing is known and familiar. Our friends, relatives, wives, husbands and kids, houses and workshops are all here -- outside of the temple. Whatsoever we think to be our own is outside of the temple. And the temple has a condition that one can enter it all alone; no two persons can pass through its door together. So the question of taking with you your homes and houses, your wives and children, your property and wealth, your position and prestige, simply does not arise. Everything has to be left behind.
That is why we say that it is better we wander around awhile more. And so we wander and wander. We are waiting for the moment when the doors of the temple will open up a little wider and we will enter it with everything we have. But the doors of the temple never open up for more than one person at a time. Only one person can pass through it. And you cannot take even your position or prestige with you, because then you will be two -- you and your prestige. You cannot carry even your name with you, because then it will be two -- you and your name. You cannot carry any baggage with you; you can carry absolutely nothing. You have to go there totally naked and alone; then only you can enter.
For this reason we keep sauntering outside the temple, we pitch our camps on the outside, and we console ourselves saying that we are close to God, we are not away from him. But whether you are at a distance of a yard or a mile or a thousand miles from the temple, it makes no difference. If you are outside of it, you are outside. And if you want to go in, it can hap pen in a thousandth part of a second. It is wrong to say a thousandth part of a moment, really you can enter even without the moment.
Let this question be the last one for the moment. If you have any more questions, we will take them up in the evening. You ask whether what is known as knowledge or knowing abides only in a thought free state and it disappears in a state of thought.
Knowledge or knowing happens when thought is not. When you are free of thought you know. But having known it once, it abides in every state. It abides even in a state of thinking. Then there is no way to lose it. But its attainment is possible only in a thought free state. To attain it you have to be free of thought. Why?
The reason is that the waves of thought do not allow the mind to become a mirror. For instance, if you have to take a picture with your camera, you will have to be careful that the camera does not shake and that light does not enter it. But once the picture is taken, you can very well shake the camera and allow any amount of light to enter it. Then it does not matter. If the camera is shaken at the moment of taking the picture, everything will be ruined. Once the picture is taken, however, the matter ends. Then you can do whatever you like with the camera, you can shake and dance with it, it will make no difference to the picture.
Attainment of knowledge happens in a state of mind when nothing moves, when everything is quiet and still. Then only the picture of knowing is obtained. But after it is obtained you can do anything, you can shake and dance; it makes no difference. Knowledge is certainly attained in a thought free state; but after it is attained, thought creates no difficulty. If you think that you will achieve it through thought, then it will never happen. Thought will impede it, impede its realization. But it becomes impotent after you have realized knowledge. Then it is powerless and ineffective; it cannot do anything.
It is interesting to know that stillness of mind is primarily needed for the realization of knowledge, but once it is realized nothing is needed after it. But that is what comes later. And what comes later should not be brought in first, otherwise it will harm you. It will harm you in the sense that you may think that if thought is not going to be a problem later why should it be a problem right now? And that will really be harmful. Then we will shake the camera and everything will be in a mess. Even a shaking camera can take a picture, but it would not be a true picture, an authentic picture. Even through thought what we come across is knowledge, but it is never true knowledge, authentic knowledge, because the mind is all the time unsteady, shaking and trembling. So it distorts everything.
For instance, the moon is up in the sky and the sea below is in waves. Even the waving sea will reflect the moon but it will reflect it in fragments; instead of one moon there will be a thousand and one pieces of it scattered all over the sea. And if one has not seen the real moon in the sky he cannot have a correct picture of it from its reflections on the sea. He will see a thousand and one fragments of the moon instead. He will come across myriad silvery strands of the moon suffusing the sea, but from them he cannot have an idea of the real moon. A restless sea, a sea in turmoil cannot reflect the moon correctly. But once we get a correct image of the moon, we will see and recognize it even in the scattered waves of the ocean. We will say, "It is you."
So it is essential that for once we have a correct image of truth or God. Once we know him authentically, we can see him in every image. But without this, we cannot see him anywhere. In fact we meet God everywhere, but we cannot recognize him, we cannot say that this is he.
I would like to explain it with an anecdote, and then we will sit for meditation.
A Hindu sannyasin lived near Sai Baba for long. A Hindu sannyasin... and Sai lived in a mosque. No one knew for sure whether he was a Hindu or a Mohammedan. Nothing is certain about such people. When someone made inquiries about him, he just laughed, but laughing does not say anything except that the inquirer is stupid.
Being a Hindu sannyasin he could not live in the mosque, so he chose to live in a temple outside the village. And he loved and adored Sai Baba, he was intimate with him. So every day he cooked food for Sai Baba, took it to the mosque, fed him and then returned to his temple and ate his own meal.
One day Sai Baba said to him, "Why do you come such a long way every day? You can feed me at your own place, because I happen to pass your place several times." The sannyasin said with surprise, "Do you really pass by my place? I never saw you passing." Sai Baba then said, "You should watch carefully. I pass your temple several times every day. Tomorrow I will go there, so you feed me there. You need not come here."
The next day the Hindu monk cooked food and waited for Sai Baba to come. He waited long enough, but he did not turn up. Then he was worried because it was already 2 p.m. He thought that Sai Baba must be hungry like himself, and so he took the dishes with food and ran to the mosque. He said to Sai Baba, "I waited and waited for you, but you did not turn up." Sai Baba said, "I had been to your place today, but you snubbed me and turned me away." The sannyasin said, "What do you say, that I turned you away? Only a dog had appeared." Sai Baba said, "That dog was me." This made the Hindu sannyasin very miser able and he wept a lot. He then said, "How stupid of me that you went to my place and I could not recognize you. I will not miss recognizing you tomorrow."
But the sannyasin did not recognize him again, though Sai Baba visited his place. Had he come in the form of a dog, he would not have failed to know him. But this time he was a leper who met the monk in the street. The monk told the leper, "Keep off my way. I am carrying food for Sai Baba, so keep off!" The leper grinned and moved away.
This day too the monk had waited for Sai Baba till 2 p.m. And then he had rushed to the mosque as before and said to Sai Baba, "You did not turn up again; I waited for you like anything." Sai Baba said, "I had been to your place today also, but the sea of your mind is so restless, it is full of so many ripples, that you cannot know me as the same everyday. You get shaken. Today a leper turned up and you told him to move away. Isn't it very strange that when I go to you you turn me away and then you come here and complain that I did not turn up?"
The sannyasin began to cry, and he said, "How unfortunate that I could not recognize you!" Then Sai Baba said, "How can you know me in other forms when you have not known me really?"
Once a glimpse of reality becomes available, the false just ceases to be. Once we have a glimpse of God, then God alone is, and nothing else. But that glimpse will be possible only when everything within us is still and quiet. And then there is no question. Then everything is his. Then thoughts, feelings and desires, all are his. Then anything and everything is his.
But to have this glimpse, this recognition, it is essential in the primary stage, in the first place, that thoughts, feelings and desires, all should come to a standstill.
Question 2
OSHO,
WHAT IS GOD?
Prem Sukavi,
GOD is not a person. That is one of the greatest misunderstandings, and it has prevailed so long that it has become almost a fact. Even if a lie is repeated continuously for centuries it is bound to appear as if it is a truth.
God is a presence, not a person. Hence all worshipping is sheer stupidity. Prayerfulness is needed, not prayer. There is nobody to pray to; there is no possibility of any dialogue between you and God. Dialogue is possible only between two persons, and God is not a person but a presence -- like beauty, like joy.
God simply means godliness. It is because of this fact that Buddha denied the existence of God. He wanted to emphasize that God is a quality, an experience -- like love. You cannot talk to love, you can live it. You need not create temples of love, you need not make statues of love, and bowing down to those statues will be just nonsense. And that's what has been happening in the churches, in the temples, in the mosques.
Man has lived under this impression of God as a person, and then two calamities have happened through it. One is the so-called religious man, who thinks God is somewhere above m the sky and you have to praise him. to persuade him to confer favors on you, to help you to fulfill your desires, to make your ambitions succeed, to give you the wealth of this world AND of the other world. And this is sheer wastage of time and energy.
And on the opposite pole the people who saw the stupidity of it all became atheists; they started denying the existence of God. They were right in a sense, but they were also wrong. They started denying not only the personality of God, they started to deny even the experience of God.
The theist is wrong, the atheist is wrong, and man needs a new vision so that he can be freed from both the prisons.
God is the ultimate experience of silence, of beauty, of bliss, a state of inner celebration. Once you start looking at God as godliness there will be a radical change in your approach. Then prayer is no more valid; meditation becomes valid.
Martin Buber says prayer is a dialogue; then between you and God there is an "I-thou" relationship -- the duality persists. Buddha is far closer to the truth: you simply drop all chattering of the mind, you slip out of the mind like a snake slipping out of the old skin. You become profoundly silent. There is no question of any dialogue, no question of any monologue either. Words have disappeared from your consciousness. There is no desire for which favors have to be asked, no ambition to be fulfilled. One is now and here. In that tranquility, in that calmness, you become aware of a luminous quality to existence. Then the trees and the mountains and the rivers and the people are all surrounded with a subtle aura. They are all radiating life, and it is one life in different forms. The flowering of one existence in millions of forms, in millions of flowers.
THIS experience is God. And it is everybody's birthright, because whether you know it or not you are already part of it. The only possibility is you may not recognize it or you may recognize it.
The difference between the enlightened person and the unenlightened person is not of quality -- they both are absolutely alike. There is only one small difference: that the enlightened person is aware; he recognizes the ultimate pervading the whole, permeating the whole, vibrating, pulsating. He recognizes the heartbeat of the universe. He recognizes that the universe is not dead, it is alive.
This aliveness is God!
The unenlightened person is asleep, asleep and full of dreams. Those dreams function as a barrier; they don't allow him to see the truth of his own reality. And, of course, when you are not even aware of your own reality, how can you be aware of the reality of others? The first experience has to happen within you. Once you have seen the light within you will be able to see it everywhere.
God has to be freed from all concepts of personality. Personality is a prison. God has to be freed from any particular form; only then he can have all the forms. He has to be freed from any particular name so that all the names become his.
Then a person LIVES in prayer -- he does not pray, he does not go to the temple, to the church. Wherever he sits he is prayerful, whatsoever he is doing is prayerful, and in that prayerfulness he creates his temple. He is always moving with his temple surrounding him. Wherever he sits the place becomes sacred, whatsoever he touches becomes gold. If he is silent then his silence is golden; if he speaks then his song is golden. If he is alone his aloneness is divine; if he relates then his relating is divine.
The basic, the most fundamental thing is to be aware of your own innermost core, because that is the secret of the whole existence. That's where the Upanishads are tremendously important. They don't talk about a God, they talk about godliness. They don t bother about prayer. their whole emphasis is on meditation.
Meditation has two parts: the beginning and the end. The beginning is called dhyana and the end is called samadhi. Dhyana is the seed, samadhi is the flowering. Dhyana means becoming aware of all workings of your mind, all the layers of your mind -- your memories, your desires, your thoughts, dreams -- becoming aware of all that goes on inside you.
Dhyana is awareness, and samadhi is when the awareness has become so deep, so profound, so total that it is like a fire and it consumes the whole mind and all its functionings. It consumes thoughts, desires, ambitions, hopes, dreams. It consumes the whole stuff the mind is full of.
Samadhi is the state when awareness is there, but there is nothing to be aware inside you; the witness is there, but there is nothing to be witnessed.
Begin with dhyana, with meditation, and end in samadhi, in ecstasy, and you will know what God is. It is not a hypothesis, it is an experience. You have to LIVE it -- that is the only way to know it.
Question 3
EVERY TIME I COME HERE I RETURN AGAIN WITHOUT TAKING SANNYAS. THE DESIRE TO TAKE SANNYAS ARISES IN ME MANY TIMES, BUT I AM UNABLE TO GATHER COURAGE TO DO IT. I GET SCARED THINKING, 'WILL I BE ABLE TO WALK JOYFULLY UPON THIS PATH OR WILL I HAVE TO LEAVE THE PATH HALFWAY AND THEN GO BACK?" BUT WHEN I PUT ASIDE THE IDEA OF TAKING SANNYAS, IT FEELS MEANINGLESS TO MOVE IN THE WORLD WHERE I HAVE BEEN MOVING.
WHAT SHOULD I DO? PLEASE, SHOW ME THE PATH.
Chandra Rekha, the new always seems to be frightening. The familiar even if it is painful is still familiar. One is not afraid. One feels safe with the known even if it is not joyful. One is well acquainted with it. Before descending into the unknown, descending into the unfamiliar, fear is quite natural. So don't make a problem out of fear.
Whenever someone steps forward on a new path he hesitates. But only through stepping forward on the new is there growth in life. One who keeps rotating in the old becomes a bullock in a grain mill. It is always worth considering, "Am I blissful the way I am living?" If one is not then one must take risks. New paths, new life-styles, a new search will have to be undertaken. This much is certain: you have nothing to lose. You did not find bliss through your old life style. If you had there would be no need for the new. The old has become meaningless, this much is certain. The new can turn out to be meaningful or it can turn out to be meaningless. But at least in the new there is a possibility of it being meaningful. The old has been through the press. You have seen it, understood it and lived it without receiving anything. As if one had been trying to extract oil from sand. How long will you rack your brains trying to get oil from sand?
I do not say that the new will definitely give you bliss, because bliss is less dependent on the path that on the traveller, the one who travels on it. Hence the real change is not in the path, the real change is in the traveller. But to change paths is a beginning. You are outside, so the transformation also has to begin from the outside. If you gather courage to change the outside it will strengthen your courage to change inside. And if a few drops of bliss start showering on you then the search for the new will begin with joy and eagerness.
But one thing is certain: you have nothing to lose. Don't worry unnecessarily. What have you achieved by holding on to the old? Nothing can be lost. Then what is the fear if there is nothing to lose? Either you will get something... At the most what can happen is that you will also get nothing from the new. Then you will have to search anew.
Always look at it this way: the way I have lived, the way I have thought, have I gotten anything from it or not? Think it over. Don't think what will be gained or won't be gained in the future -- the future is unknown.
Sannyas is unknown. You will know it only by entering the experiment. You will know only by tasting. Before tasting something how will you decide whether it is tasty or not? You will have to trust somebody -- somebody who has tasted it.
You often visit here Chandra Rekha. I have tasted it and I say unto you come forward, move ahead. And there are many here who are becoming ecstatic, who are dissolving. Seeing their ecstasy, their dissolving, the feeling for sannyas arises in your heart too. Otherwise why this desire for sannyas ? Your heart is already vibrating, it is only your mind that is hindering.
The mind is always traditional. The heart is always eager to go with the new and the head is always ready to stay tied to the old. The mind has nothing except the past. Whatever the mind has is a treasure of memories. It is all past. The mind has no future. Something becomes part of the mind only when it has become the past. When you have experienced something it becomes part of the mind. Mind lives in the past, in the dead. So the mind is afraid of moving into the future. But the heart is always ready to take the jump.
Your heart is full of rejoicing, your heart wants to take the step, it is the mind which is cunning. The mind says, "Stop, think, first decide: what if you move on the new path and still get nothing? What if you have to return? What if you change your life style, take so much trouble and still the reward is not worth it. Think a little, calculate, figure it out."
But if you listen to the mind you will never take the step.
Just think of a child still in the mother's womb. He is about to be born. If he has a mind, if intellect had already arisen it would say, "Where are you going? This way of life, this living in the womb is so comfortable. No troubles, no worries, no responsibilities: just sleeping twenty-four hours a day. Where do you think you are going? Nobody knows what is outside -- what troubles will come, what challenges will come."
If a child has a little arithmetic, a little logic then no child will ever be born from the mother's womb. But there is no arithmetic, arithmetic comes later -- fortunately! Logic comes later. The child has only heart, eager for the new, excited.
If we follow the intellect the earth will be full of senility. This is what has happened to this country. People have tied themselves to excessive intellectuality. Hence this country has become senile. This country has lost its youth. It is living in ruins. It sings praises only to the past. It has no enthusiasm for the new. It praises fallen yellow leaves. It turns its back on the new shoots that are blooming. It worships lifeless stones, the traces of the past. It has become a blind believer. And everyone's mind has become like this.
You will have to gather courage.
And I say only this to you, even to be defeated with the new is a victory and even to win with the old is defeat. Even if one gets happiness with the old at the very most it means convenience. Even if you suffer with the new it brings growth. The suffering received with the new is the only asceticism. This is what I call asceticism. Sitting with your body smeared with ash or lying down on a bed of nails or fasting -- I don't call this asceticism. I call all these the idiocy of a sick mind.
Asceticism is one -- the courage to go with the new, the guts to descend into the unknown! Just like a little baby leaving the mother's womb.
Just two days ago on a nearby tree a bird was raising her young. The babies kept on growing day by day. Two days ago they came out of the nest for the first time. When they came out of the nest, I was standing nearby. Both of them settled on a branch -- wonderstruck, trying their wings, thinking should we go forward or not? They had never come out of their nest before, and their mother was sitting on a distant tree giving them a call, a loud call -- this is how to call children. ... she goes on calling: hearing her call they flutter their wings. But the attachment to the nest, safety... And they have never before opened their wings... Should we open them or not? Will we be able to fly or not?
Seeing their dilemma I was reminded of the dilemma of people newly taking sannyas. They try their wings the same way, think it over, get nervous, look back. But how long?
The mother kept on calling, kept on provoking, call after call. It took about half an hour, slowly slowly they fluttered their wings, moved a little further from the nest, sat on other branches of the same tree. They felt a little more confident, flew a little in the air and came back. Confidence grew further and then they flew away... They have not been seen since. For two days I have been looking, but they never came back. Why come back? The nest is left behind -- two egg shells left in it broken to pieces.
Birds who have never flown before gather courage to fly into the sky, but we have become human and still cannot gather courage.
I am calling you everyday, calling out loudly from a faraway tree. This calling continues every day .
You say: EVERY TIME I COME HERE I RETURN AGAIN WITHOUT TAKING SANNYAS. THE DESIRE TO TAKE SANNYAS ARISES IN ME MANY TIMES, BUT I AM UNABLE TO GATHER COURAGE TO DO IT.
Chandra Rekha, flutter your wings a little, get filled with the thrill of the new, gather a little courage. You have wings. I call you from the skies, I am giving you an invitation for the faraway. It is not that you do not have wings. You have wings as much as I do, only you are not confident. And how can you be confident? Fly and confidence comes.
All I can say is, with the new even suffering is sweet. And a little suffering will come with the new. Do you think those young birds who flew away did not experience pain? Gusts of wind, rain in the night, now they will have landed on some tree without their nest. Their wings will have gotten wet. They must have shivered with cold. They may even have thought to themselves, "Our nest was better, what trouble have we gotten ourselves into?" But still the joy of flying in the sky is such that all these prices can be paid. One must pay. And one who pays the price attains.
A breeze heavy with fragrance
And yet its feet are swift
What season is this?
When even pain feels intimate.
Sounds unknown adding magic to the melody of the waves
Fields shaded by wintry clouds tossing flowers
My heart today out of control
Sky soaked with songs
Who has bewitched my spirit?
Even pain feels intimate
What are you saying, O wandering ray of sadness
Why are you flowing aimlessly through the mists?
Love has a saying:
Fulfillment is love's promise always
A dream has awakened in my eyes
Even pain feels intimate
Dusk willows through the fields heavy with full youth
Like the song of a reed only my solitary voice exists
Solitude is beckoning
Piercing the body and heart
What season is this?
When even pain feels intimate.
With the new, even pain is very intimate. With the old even convenience and comfort are nothing but slow suicide. What is there to leave behind? What will you lose? You have never gotten anything so what have you got to lose?
Search and seek! And go on searching until you find. Until then do not stop your feet, do not close your wings. No matter how afraid one is, one has to try his wings, one has to fly into the sky. And the challenge is already awake in you. How long will you deny it? How long will you keep turning back?
Don't let this turning back become a habit. Don't let this turning back become your pattern. Before it becomes a habit, do something, wake up a little, gather courage.
Should you wish to cross this roaring ocean
You must take life in your own hands and plunge into the waves.
These waves come to you travelling from places far away
Bringing messages afresh from that new world.
How much longer will you sit contemplating on the beach?
Veenas taking voice call you sweetly from that other shore.
Should you wish new life, new youth, new heart
Today you must embrace the swelling ocean with your arms.
Set forth today with new confidence
Lift up your eyes towards a new history.
Let the old sky be left far behind
Adorn your world with new sky today.
Should the voices of new creation resound in your spirit
You must dress anew every cell of your body.
This pain of annihilation will become sweet song of new creation
This darkness of night will become the benediction of the sun.
Let this ancient, ruined idol of the ages crumble now
Any rock you lay your hand on will become divine.
You are kin of the Himalaya, no matter what depth the ocean
Today you must contain the boundless sky in your wings.
Should you wish to cross this roaring ocean
You must take life in your own hands and plunge into the waves.
Plunge in! Even if you are afraid of drowning, plunge in. All new swimmers feel the fear of drowning. One who has stopped on the bank out of fear of drowning, will never be able to know the joys of swimming and floating. And far away is the other shore -- and that is the destination. One has to go across, only then the meeting with the ultimate.
Sannyas is nothing but a small boat for crossing to the other shore. It is true that the other shore is hidden in the mists, it is not visible and this is why one has to join somebody who has eyes. This is why one has to be close to somebody who has eyes, so that the melodies fast asleep within you also become audible, so that the strings of your veena are also struck.
Chandra Rekha, this is why you continue to come. This coming will have no meaning if you don't drown in this juice. Then it will be like someone coming to the lake but always returning thirsty. The thirst is not quenched just by coming to the lake, one has to cup his hands, bend down, fill them with water and drink it, then the spirit will be satisfied.
Sannyas is the process of bending down, of cupping the hands.
The fourth question:
Question 4
WHY ARE PEOPLE AFRAID OF SUCH NAMES AS TANTRA, VANMARG, AGHORPANTH, AND NATHPANTH? IS THERE NO POSSIBILITY THAT THROUGH CORRECT ANALYSIS AND RIGHT PRACTICE OF THESE PATHS, PEOPLE COULD UNDERSTAND THEM IN A NEW PERSPECTIVE AND NOT CONDEMN THEM AND REMAIN OPPOSED TO THEM?
Taru has asked. And not just one, she has asked fourteen questions! I had to count them. She has never done this before. There is some connection with Gorakh... some sleeping memory has awakened, a waterfall has gushed forth.
No one is new here, everyone is ancient. Who knows how many paths you have travelled on. Who knows which masters you have been with. Your coming to me is not accidental. You have been travelling, you have been searching. This search has brought you here. Contact between me and those who have never travelled, those who have never sought, happens only with great difficulty. Even if they come, they stray off. Their coming is accidental. There is no foundation stone beneath their coming. Those who stick with me after they arrive, who stay around me -- and Taru has come and stayed -- it means that a deep thirst of their being is satisfied here. They have started getting a glimpse of what they had sought through many many doors and could not get. They are getting close to the destination.
You must have had some contact with Gorakh, Taru. You must have some connection. Questions have burst forth from her gushing out like an ancient sleeping song -- and all of them are meaningful questions. None of the questions are intellectual, they have not been asked for the sake of asking: they arose. They have not been thought up because one should ask: she could not refrain from asking! Then she must have become afraid, because of asking fourteen questions. In the end she has asked forgiveness, that I should not get angry with her. So many questions... as if she were helpless, she had to ask, she couldn't manage not to ask.
This is one question of the fourteen: WHY ARE PEOPLE AFRAID OF SUCH NAMES AS TANTRA, VANMARG, AGHORPANTH, AND NATHPANTH?
The first thing, all these names are names for Tantra. One name for Tantra is Vanmarg. Vanmarg means the path, the marg, of the left hand. You have two hands, one right, one left. These two hands are not just two hands, there are great mysteries behind them. Your right hand is connected with the left part of your brain -- crosswise. Your left hand is connected with the right part of your brain. The brain is divided in two halves. Now science has also made many investigations into this and these investigations have revealed great secrets.
Your right brain, which is connected with the left hand, is the source of poetry, of experiencing, of feeling, of art, of wisdom, bliss, ecstasy, dance, music, celebration, imagination. Whatever is sweet, whatever is feminine, whatever is beautiful, the birth of all of this is in your right brain. The left hand indicates the right brain.
Your right hand is connected with the left brain. In the left brain arise logic, mathematics, activity, efficiency, cunning, politics, diplomacy, the world, prose, science, accounting, utility, the market -- all these are connected with the left brain.
The world has always put emphasis on the right hand, because in the right hand is utility, expediency, mathematics, logic, the market, the shop, practicality. The left hand has appeared dangerous, has always appeared dangerous. How can one trust a poet? A mathematician can be trusted. How can one trust a dancer? A scientist can be trusted. But science is useful, what is the use of dance? Dance is self enjoyment.
The left hand is the symbol of your inner enjoyment. It has no goal. It has no direction. It is not going anywhere. It is just the art of living this very moment in a blissful, charmed, ecstatic way.
What is the value of poetry? It can neither feed your stomach, nor cover your body, nor make a roof over your head. So we give poets only a little respect, in a certain proportion, like they are a decoration but not necessary. We can tolerate one man becoming a poet in society, but we will not tolerate a group of them, because a poet does not seem to be of any use. What is his utility?
Somebody asked Picasso, "What is the utility of your paintings?"
Picasso hit his forehead. He said, "You don't ask flowers what their utility is. And the cuckoo sings and you don't ask her what her utility is. And when the sky is filled with stars you don't ask them what their utility is. Why ask only me?"
Poets and painters, sculptors and musicians, they have always been saying they have no utility. And life does not end with utility. Remember the words of Jesus: "Man cannot live by bread alone." He needs something more, he needs something more than bread. Bread is necessary but not sufficient. There can be no poetry without bread, it is true, but if there is just bread without poetry then living and not living are almost identical. Every day stuffing your stomach, living and finally dying. If no poetry has awakened, if no song arises, if no veena is played, if no music ever flowers on the flute, what meaning is there?
"Svanthah sukhaya ragunatha gatha -- the song of the supreme is of self enjoyment." One who is filled with self contentment is the one who becomes filled with love for that ultimate beloved.
This is why the left hand has always been a sign of danger. So we call those who we are afraid of Vanmargi -- 'leftist'.
You will find thousands who call me a Vanmargi. They are right. I am a Vanmargi, a 'leftist', because I am teaching you the art of Svantah sukhaya -- of self enjoyment.
Mathematics is not everything. There is a world beyond mathematics and that world brings fulfillment, there is contentment in that world, there is light in that world.
The necessities should be taken care of, it is true. But what else? When basic needs are fulfilled, what else will you do? This problem has arisen today in the West, because needs are fulfilled. The West has taken care of all the outer necessities. Try to understand the difficulty. The right brain, connected with the left hand, was not used in fulfilling the basic needs. The West denied religion, denied poetry, denied music, denied all dimensions of mystery. The West is living only on mathematics, science, matter: things which have solid proof. A continuous application for three hundred years, the application of the right hand, has made the West affluent. There is money, wealth, housing, beautiful roads, delicious and abundant food, everything is more than is needed. An age of affluence has dawned in the West. But it has come through three hundred years of continuous denial of the source of self enjoyment -- of Svantah sukhaya.
So the West has become rich, now what? Because they have lost the art of enjoying happiness, the West is dumbfounded. Where to go now? What to do? Whatever the world of work can accomplish is already complete. There is great uneasiness in the West. Western man is unable to even take Sunday as a holiday. The very habit of taking holidays has been forgotten. Work and work and work... So much emphasis has been placed on work that work is made into a god. Hence the art of play has been forgotten. Sitting gossiping and laughing, or playing on the strings of a veena, or growing grass in the garden, or lying down under the stars in ecstasy, or going out in a boat... No, all these are without meaning. For three hundred years only one thing has been taught and repeated from kindergarten to university: the value of work.
So today if someone is lying down in his boat just floating under the starry sky, he feels as if he is committing a sin: "Work is virtue, so I am committing sin." A feeling of guilt has become associated with moments of happiness. Whenever you become happy, you feel as if you are doing something wrong. What are you doing humming a song? You want to suppress the song in your throat. What will you get from it? Logic comes up, calculations arise -- what's in it for you? what is its benefit? Why are you playing the flute? Do some work.
People come to me and say, "You are teaching people meditation? What will meditation accomplish? Teach work."
Work has utility. And I do not say to drop work. But I want to say to you that the use of work is that you can be blissful in the non-work moments. The use of work is that you can be free of work. The six days that you work hard in the market are so that on the seventh day you can leisurely stretch out your legs, you can lie down in the sun, or sit down in the shade of a tree, or talk with the flowers, or gossip with the moon and stars, or sing an ecstatic song, or tie ankle bells on your feet, and dance! This is the goal of striving for six days. And if five days work is enough, work only five days, dance for two days. If four days work is enough, then three days... go on reducing this way. Work has to go on being reduced. Leisure has to go on being increased. Leisure, is the aim.
Insanity starts creeping into the life of anyone who has no rest, no meditation. The moment work is over they don't know what to do. There is a reason many people are going mad in the West, it has a reason: the days of work are over, that job is accomplished. They thought work was life, now they don't understand life and what more it can be.
The reason many people are committing suicide is the same. What is the point of living now? One has accumulated wealth penny by penny, how long can you go on accumulating? He has forgotten why he was accumulating wealth. He was accumulating wealth so that at some moment he could sit down leisurely, with no worries. He forgot, because only one part of the brain was used in accumulating. That part has been active, and the other half which has not been used, has slowly slowly filled with dust.
Vanmarga means the aim of life is not work but rest. The goal of life is not money but meditation. The goal of life is not mathematics but poetry. The highest peak of life is not attained through science, it is attained through religion.
Vanmarg has always been a word of condemnation. And it was natural in the past, there were other reasons then. The further back you go the more the world was poor, means were not available. It seems only natural that in those days of poverty people made work very significant, gave it great value. And if the people who gave value to leisure in place of work were opposed by the society it is not at all surprising. But this ancient habit has remained with us like a complex in our minds -- even now we are afraid.
The mathematical, the calculating mind is opposed to enjoying taste -- it is always against everything which gives rise to happiness inside you. It goes on fulfilling the vow of no-taste. It is against beauty, it can make ugliness spiritual. It is against health also, because health is bodily happiness.
A famous German thinker, Count Keyserling, wrote in his journal after traveling in India, "Going to India I experienced that sickness is spiritual and health is unspiritual, because health is of the body." This is why a spiritual person will not take joy in good health. He is the enemy of the body. This is why the world has become the enemy of love, because love is great happiness. We have trained ourselves to be against all these things.
Vanmarg, the left hand path, has given the opposite message. Vanmarg says: Love is prayer and love is the ultimate. And Vanmarg says nothing is to be dropped because whatever the ultimate has given can be used. Use it, and make it a step. Transform it into a step of the temple of the ultimate. Don't take it as a stone on the path, don't take it as a hindrance. Make steps and climb up. Make even sex a step, don't oppose it either.
The amazing message of Vanmarg is, that if you are intelligent you can use even poison in such a way that it becomes medicine. If you are an idiot you will make even medicine into poison. This is the fundamental sutra of Vanmarg: the intelligent makes even poison into medicine. This is intelligence. Escapists are cowards, not intelligent. Vanmarg will not run away.
Escapists have been very respected in the world. The reason is, when you look at an escapist you begin to think he is more special than you. You are mad after money and someone has kicked away his money and gone to the jungle, you are immediately impressed. You are impressed because you are so infatuated with money and this man certainly has a quality, he has kicked it away. This is why you are more impressed by Mahavira than by the enlightened King Janak. Janak's name is rarely heard. You are more impressed by Buddha because he renounced the royal palace. If you praise Krishna you do it in a quiet voice, a little frightened, a little nervously.
Even if people praise Krishna they praise the Krishna of the Geeta. Very few people have the courage to accept all of Krishna. Because Krishna seems to be just like you, or rather a little worse than you. You somehow explain to yourself, okay he was God, he must have done it, he must have danced with his girlfriends. But this man Krishna is not given his full splendor. You may want to avoid calling him god. You look for an excuse. Your mind begins to be troubled. You start feeling uneasy.
I was a visitor at someone's house -- at a Hindu family. It was a respectable family, a high caste family. It happened ten or twelve years ago. My book, "From Sex to Samadhi" had been published. The man was very upset. He said, "You should at least have given it another title. When someone reads the book he will find out what is really in it, but this title is very dangerous. You should give it some other name." Also on the first edition there is a picture of the ecstatic Tantra statues from the temples of Khajuraho printed on the cover. He said, "What got into your mind? If this is the title it should have a picture of Buddha in a state of meditation on the cover... but statues of Khajuraho? Later when someone actually reads the book, he will be very upset seeing all this."
I was sitting in their living room, I said as I looked at their wall... They had hung a big picture of Krishna in which he has stolen the clothing of naked women who are bathing in the river. And he is sitting in a tree. I said, "You keep this picture in your living room?" He looked up, he stopped for a moment. Perhaps he had never looked at the picture in this way. He said, "You are right. That picture has been hanging there since my father's time. And sometimes I am a little embarrassed, but no one pays any attention to it. Because this is God, he must be doing right. We have accepted it."
But when I went to his house again, the picture had been removed. I asked him, "What happened?"
He said, "No. Since the day you pointed it out, I have been aware of it. I began to be very upset and thought it better to remove the picture. So I disposed of it."
Even your acceptance of Krishna is incomplete. You want to select and cut many things. You are always ready to make revisions of Krishna. People believe in Krishna according to their own understanding. They believe as much as they can believe, rejecting the rest. What is the problem? The problem is, that it is clear to you that Mahavira appears to be moving opposite from you. You can respect him because you know your greed, your lust, your anger, your ardent desire, and he has renounced all of this. He is special, now there is no need for proof, but Krishna? He is standing right in the same world where you are!
To recognize Krishna one needs eyes of great depth. To recognize Mahavira is within the powers of even a blind man, there is no problem. A blind man too can recognize, yes, Mahavira has renounced everything. But until the inner eye has opened it is difficult to recognize Krishna, because he is standing right here, there is no difference. There is no difference from the outside, there is a difference from the inside. So as long as you have no ability to see within, you will not be able to understand Krishna.
Krishna is a Vanmargi, a 'leftist'. This is why the Jainas have thrown Krishna into hell. In their scriptures they threw him into hell. He is a Vanmargi. What could be more Vanmarg? A natural acceptance of life, an eager acceptance, a welcome acceptance... The ability to live life in its total creativity, courage... There is nothing bad in life. If there are thorns, they are there ready to protect the flower. Whatever exists in life is beautiful. And if there is anything we cannot see the beauty of then somehow it is our mistake. How can the ultimate make something ugly? The ultimate is manifest in all forms. In lust too the ultimate is hidden -- in kama too Rama is hidden. Very few people can muster such courage. They don't have this broad a vision.
Taru this is why people are afraid of names like Tantra, Vanmarg, Aghorpanth, Nathpanth. It is because they will shatter your established conventions. These beautiful names have become swear words. If people call someone a Vanmargi then the matter is finished. Such and such man is a Vanmargi -- means you have totally repudiated him, now there is no need for refutation. Now there is no need to go further into his arguments: what he says, why he says it. You have labelled him Vanmargi, now the man is finished.
Aghorpanth. A beautiful word like aghor has become an abuse! If you call someone an Aghorpanthi he will be ready to fight. People call someone an Aghori when they want to insult him.
Do you know the real meaning of the word aghor? Aghor means easy, simple, direct. If you call someone ghori it could be an insult. Ghor means complicated, terrible, dense. When there is a really terrible war then people say ghor-ghamaasaan -- terribly fierce. Ghor means complicated, messed up... Aghor means simple childlike innocence. But people say it when they want to insult. People say Morarji Desai is an Aghori because he drinks his own urine -- innocent? It means they are are insulting him.
Aghor can be used only for a few Buddhas. Gautam Buddha is an Aghori, Krishna is an Aghori, Christ is an Aghori, Lao Tzu is an Aghori. It can only be used for such people. Gorakh is an Aghori. Simple, innocent, straightforward... So simple that there is no opportunism in his life. The very mode of manipulating is gone.
Those who you call religious are also calculative. They look to see if they have done enough fasting to go to heaven, or are they fulfilling enough vows to go to heaven, or have they given enough charity to go to heaven? This is all calculation. This charity is part of the market. This charity is business, a trade. Sin is hidden in this virtue. The meaning of Aghor is: simple, direct -- one whose opportunism is finished, who lives like children live. Aghor is the highest state, the state of a paramahansa. But unfortunately these have become swear words.
Nathpanth: because of Gorakhnath and Gorakh's master Macchindranath this branch of Tantra began to be called Nathpanth. It's feeling is very lovely. The meaning of Nath is master, lord. What the Sufis call, "Ya Malik." Everything is his, the master's, the lord's. We too are the master's, the world too is his, everything is his. We live according to his wish. We live as he would have us live. We will not project our own will. We will not live by effort. We will flow as one flows in the current of a river, we will not swim. This is the feeling. As long as he is the master why should we bring our will in between? If our will comes, then our ego comes, if our ego comes then we are lost. So we will live without ego, as he wills...
As dry leaves fly in the wind, whether they go east or west, north or south, wherever the wind carries them there is no worry. No fight, no resistance, they do not struggle to go west, saying they will not go to the east, why are you taking us east? No, what will do leaves have? A Nathpanthi is one in whom this has happened. Gorakh was like this. He lived in this spontaneous acceptance. He lived in this simplicity. But people live by the ego. The language of life of most people in the world is the language of ego. Naturally, such simple people cannot be tolerated. Others will feel a great danger with such people. If they start living so simply others feel what will happen to morality? Immorality will spread -- as if there were morality now.
These are very strange ideas. People talk as if there were justice now, then injustice would spread. Where is justice? What kind of justice? Hypocrisy in the name of morality. People are wearing false masks, people are wearing counterfeit masks. Where is morality?
But people understand that if everyone begins to be simple, begins to live easily, begins to live naturally and say it is the will of the ultimate then morality will be destroyed.
The fact is the opposite. People have become immoral by continually living by will. Who on this earth is more immoral than man? Who on this earth is more violent than man? Who on this earth murders his own kind more than man? Birds and animals at least don't kill their own species. No lion kills and eats lions. No hawk attacks hawks. Man is the only animal on this whole earth who murders his own species. And not just a few -- thousands, millions! Such joy in killing! And strangely this too is dressed up in the attire of law. Muslims call it a jihad: Christians call it a crusade. It is a holy war, so kill. Then there is no harm, the more you kill the better. The more you kill the more certain heaven is.
People fight jihads, fight crusades for centuries. They go on butchering each other in the name of God. Butcher them, in anyone's name. Sometimes butcher in the name of politics, sometimes in the name of religion, sometimes in the name of sects, sometimes in the name of scripture. These are all excuses, the object is killing. Without killing the mind will not be satisfied. What kind of mankind have we given birth to? What kind of sick minded man have we given birth to?
People are burning with sex desire. There is nothing besides sex inside of them. They sit repressing it. This is why whenever anyone says to them, accept sex naturally, it is a divine gift, there is great turmoil inside of them. Because they know that if they naturally accept sex everything will be disturbed. They have repressed so much there is a volcano burning under them. How can they accept it naturally?
Think of it as if someone has fasted his whole life, he goes on dying of hunger and you come and say to him, "Friend, accept your hunger naturally. When you feel hunger, eat." He will completely freak out. He will say, "If I accept it naturally then I will never get out of the kitchen, because I know myself, I know I am thinking of food twenty four hours a day." A fasting man thinks only of food twenty four hours a day. "... so I will not be able to get out of the kitchen. I will be stuck sitting there."
You will be surprised at what he is saying -- people who enjoy food don't sit twenty four hours a day in the kitchen. But understand what this man is saying, this poor man is also right. He thinks of food twenty four hours a day, one who fasts thinks of nothing but food.
This is why when someone like me speaks of living spontaneously people are very nervous, they are very afraid. Sometimes repressed types of people come here, and they are frightened. Because they know that if what I am saying is right, then the disease repressed within them will immediately be revealed, their life long repressed disease will immediately manifest. They will become insane. They will not be able to endure it. To save themselves from this predicament they go against me, they become opposed to me.
There is a reason for opposing me. The truth of what I am saying appears so dangerous to them -- it appears dangerous not because truth is dangerous. It appears dangerous, because until now they have lived in so much untruth that now it seems very difficult to drop untruth. And if it drops then what they have held together their whole life will break...
In their life they do not have self restraint, only a false insistence on self restraint. That man is truly disciplined who has become aware and has wholly transcended his sex desire. To him it doesn't make any difference. He will not find any objection at all to what I say. Those who take objection to what I say are only indicating their diseased minds, but they think they are saying something against me.
There was a great movement opposing Freud all over the world. But Freud was speaking simple straightforward truths of life. Freud is a Vanmargi. Freud suggested to let repressed impulses flow again. He was opposed throughout the word, all the religions opposed him. You opposed him because the ground beneath you was slipping. You will all be wrong if Freud is right. And it is better if you go on proving yourself right. And the crowd is yours. The crowd is with you. Truth is always alone. Untruth is very ancient. The crowd is happy with it. The crowd has given it company for so long. All the vested interests of the crowd have become joined with it. You are completely freaked out, you have become completely frightened. In your fear, in your freak out you start opposing. But truth is not defeated this way, truth returns again and again.
Vanmarg goes on returning again and again. Tantra will be proclaimed again and again, until man becomes spontaneous. The day man becomes spontaneous will be the day Tantra is no longer needed. Tantra is only medicine. Vanmarg, the left handed path, is only a means to bring people to the path who have gone off the other side. One who is come on the path is neither on the right nor on the left. Both left and right are his. He does not belong to either. His state is of transcendence. He has gone beyond both.
You have asked: WHY ARE PEOPLE AFRAID OF SUCH NAMES AS TANTRA, VANMARG, AGHORPANTH, AND NATHPANTH?
There is reason to fear. You have such a load of gunpowder inside of you that a tiny spark of truth and you will explode. How can you not be afraid of sparks? When you are ready to drop your gunpowder you will no longer have any fear of sparks. You are afraid of that which makes you uneasy inside. And truth makes you very uneasy. If you have made a continuing connection with untruth, if you have wedded yourself to untruth, truth will upset you very much.
Mulla Nasruddin got married. As is the Muslim custom, on the honeymoon the bride lifted her veil in front of Mulla, opened her 'burqa'. It was the first time Mulla had seen her, he had not seen her previously. He was very disappointed. He had never seen a more ugly faced woman in his life! According to the custom, the bride asked "Before whom can I remove the veil?"
Mulla replied, "You can remove it before anyone, just don't open it in front of me. Remove it in front of the whole world, remove it in front of anyone you want to, just don't remove it in front of me. If this burqa remains down now it is better."
You are afraid of this ugliness. You have veiled yourself, you don't remove it. You become angry with whoever removes your veil, whatever shows your dirtiness. You become angry with whoever shows your rubbish within. And the master has to show you your inner rubbish. If you don't see it how will you become free of it? If you are not liberated from the inner sense of worthlessness that is riding in your chest you will sink into it. You will drown in it. It will cause your drowning. The rocks you have bound to your chest have to be removed. Although you think they are philosopher's stones, they are drowning you.
Whenever there is a new declaration of truth there are waves of unrest in all direction where untruth has spread its nets. Cut the throat of truth, poison the truth, silence the voice of truth -- all these kinds of efforts start being made. And there is no reason to be angry about it. It is completely natural. It is a matter for compassion, a matter for kindness.
Buddha said to his disciples, "The people that you go to teach are the ones who will harm you. Out of kindness you go on giving truth and they will throw stones at you. So don't be angry. They are helpless: what can they do? You have come to destroy the truth they had believed for centuries. You have started shaking their house. They thought this house was their security. You have started knocking down their walls. You have started lifting their veils and showing their ugliness. They will be angry.
One disciple -- Purna -- used to to on pilgrimage, taking the Buddha's message. Buddha asked, "Where are you going?"
There was a part of Bihar called Sukha. He said, "None of your sannyasins have gone to Sukha yet, I will go there."
Buddha said, "It would be good if you don't go there. The people of that area are dangerous, this is why no one has gone. If they insult you what will happen to you?"
Purna replied, "If they insult me then I will consider myself fortunate that they didn't beat me, they only insulted me."
Buddha said, "And if they beat you what will happen to you Purna?"
Purna replied, "I will consider myself fortunate that they didn't kill me, they only beat me."
Buddha said, "One more question, if they kill you what will happen to you as you are dying?"
Purna replied, "What else could happen? These are such good people that they have released me from living in this body in which I might have committed some mistake. Now no mistake is possible. They have released me from living in this body where my foot may have gone on wrong paths, anything could happen, I could stray off. They have liberated me from this body. I will die filled with kindness for them. I will die full of gratitude for them."
Buddha said, "Then you go. Go anywhere. Wherever you go, you will find your friend, because now you cannot see any enemy." It is not that by closing eyes there are no enemies. But one who no longer sees enemies is one who can declare the truth. Enemies will arise, enemies will immediately arise. The truth always gives rise to enemies. Do we have enough understanding that we can stomach the truth? Do we have a big enough heart to allow the truth to permeate us? ... to make it a guest inside us? If we can let ourselves be a host to truth, let truth be a guest... but do we have this capacity? This is why it goes on happening, insults continue, opposition continues, but truth goes on making its declaration again and again.
And I say unto you, that truth comes from the right half of the brain, connected with the left hand. Calculation comes from the left half of the brain, which is connected with the right hand. A calculative person can never accept poetry. A person who thinks money and wealth are valuable cannot understand the value of meditation. And one for whom business is everything cannot be in the temple. And if he goes to the temple, the temple is corrupted by him.
The fifth question:
Question 5
WHAT IS THE FIRST EXPERIENCE OF SAMADHI LIKE?
You will know only if it happens. It is not that it can be said. A few indications can be given. A lamp is suddenly alight in the dark - it is like this. Or like a sick man dying and suddenly the medicine works... nearing death the medicine works and suddenly ripples of life, the thrill of life spreads again -- it is just like this. Like a corpse has come to life -- the first experience of samadhi is like this.
It is an experience of immortal nectar. It is an experience of the ultimate music. But it happens only when it happens. And only if it happens will you be able to understand. You will not be able to understand from my saying it. It is like being in love. Who can explain it to anyone? One who has not loved, one who does not know love, no matter how times you try racking your brains, how much you explain -- he will listen to everything, but he will still say I don't understand a thing. Please explain a little more.
It is like trying to explain light to the blind, or sound to the deaf -- they will not be able to understand. One whose nostrils are damaged, who cannot smell anything, how will you explain the experience of fragrance? Experience cannot be put into words, but a few indications can be given.
Songs awakened in spirit, but flowed out in feelings.
the lingering ache of the heart was
molded by devotions, nurtured by imagination;
the path was unknown to me,
I had not yet gone on it,
the narrow lane of love;
but steps suddenly went forward,
and the heart also went ahead;
all illusions from folk tradition crashed down in one moment!
Songs awakened in spirit, but flowed out in feelings.
That sweet hour was sweet mimicry of anticipation,
I was surprised, gratefully;
I cannot say: was it victory for the heart, or defeat?
the agony was tender;
the voice remained silent, but
the secret of the heart was out;
these eyes have said all I didn't want to say,
Songs awakened in spirit, but flowed out in feelings.
What imagination had tendered I found right in front of me,
that moment also came;
that beautiful image overwhelmed my heart,
the mind enchanted, too shy to look;
when I could come around
I was lost in myself
and now my spirit remains quite completely lost!
Songs awakened in spirit, but flowed out in feelings.
Like a song, suddenly awakening in your heart. Like suddenly, an uncaused cascade of juice bursting forth spontaneously within you.
the path was unknown to me,
I had not yet gone on it,
the narrow lane of love;
And suddenly love awakens... the first experience of samadhi is like this. As if it were autumn and suddenly spring comes! And where trees standing dry and barren become green, loaded with leaves, abloom with flowers -- the first experience of samadhi is like this.
but steps suddenly went forward,
And feet unexpectedly step forward in one when love has awakened or when light has arisen, or when one has heard the inner sound. Then fear does not grip one. One lets go of all fear when love has awakened. This is why mathematical, calculating people say love is blind -- because the lover goes where people with eyes are afraid to go. Where people with eyes say, Be careful! Take care! Protect yourself. Don't get into trouble! -- the lover enters there dancing and singing.
This is why so called intelligent people say love is blind. The reality is just the opposite. No one is blinder than the intelligentsia. Only a lover has eyes. If love is not eyes, then what are eyes?
the path was unknown to me,
I had not yet gone on it,
the narrow lane of love;
but steps suddenly went forward,
and the heart also went ahead;
all illusions from folk tradition crashed down in one moment!
The first experience of samadhi is like this. All previous beliefs, all previous convictions, all previous sects and scriptures, flow away like a river in the first spate of rain that carries off all the rubbish left along its banks.
That sweet hour was sweet mimicry of anticipation,
I was surprised, gratefully;
Yes, you will remain standing in wonder. You will not be able to comprehend what is happening. Thoughts will stop. There is no opportunity to think. Something has happened beyond comprehension.
That sweet hour was sweet mimicry of anticipation,
I was surprised, gratefully;
I cannot say: was it victory for the heart, or defeat?
It is difficult to say -- who won, who lost? Now there are not two, this is why it is right to say won, right also to say lost. In one sense lost because one is obliterated. In another sense won because one has become the whole. In one sense the drop is defeated because it is obliterated, in another sense victorious because the drop has become the ocean.
I cannot say: is it victory for the heart, or defeat?
the agony was tender;
But this much is sure that the misery was very lovely, very sweet. Hasn't Gorakh said, ... SWEET IS DYING. DIE THAT DEATH GORAKH DIED AND SAW. It is very sweet and lovely, a death very sweet and lovely!
What imagination had tendered I found right in front of me,
The truth is whatever you have imagined appears small when it faces the truth. You get much more that what you asked. When it comes, it comes crashing through the roof.
that moment also came;
You could not believe it would come. It comes.
that moment also came;
that beautiful image overwhelmed my heart,
the mind enchanted, too shy to look;
One cannot believe, how can I deserve this? -- that I meet the beloved, that the union with the beloved could happen.
when I could come around
I couldn't manage to say anything, not even two words of welcome...
I was lost in myself
and now my spirit remains quite completely lost!
The first experience of samadhi is like being completely lost, missing, as if completely plundered... One doesn't know if defeated or victorious. But it is certain that the limits are broken, confinements are broken -- the whole sky has descended. Kabir has said, "The ocean has disappeared in the drop..." The limitless has entered the limited, the unseen into the seen... The invisible present in what was already visible.
The first experience of samadhi is the most valuable experience of this universe. And then there is experience after experience, lotus after lotus goes on blooming. Then there is no end, then lotuses go on blooming in a continuous series. It never happens that the experience of samadhi becomes less, it just goes on increasing. This is why god is called infinite, because the experience is never completed.
It is described in the life of Jesus that when John the Baptist -- John too was a remarkable man -- initiated Jesus... John was Jesus' master. He took Jesus to the Jordan river to baptize, to initiate by water. A great crowd had gathered because John had been saying, "The man I am waiting to baptize is coming, he'll be coming very soon, he has almost arrived." So a great crowd had gathered to see him. And when Jesus came John said, "The man I have been waiting to baptize has come. Now my work is done. Now he will take care of everything. I am already old..."
When he initiated Jesus in the river Jordan the story says a very beautiful thing -- it is symbolic -- that a white dove suddenly descended from the sky and entered into Jesus... It is symbolic. The white dove is a symbol of peace. No real dove descended from the sky and entered Jesus, but certainly an experience of pure whiteness suddenly descended in many people -- like lightning striking. Whoever had eyes... and people with vision must have gathered. Who would bother? John is baptizing Jesus in the Jordan river, who cares? The thirsty must have gathered. Those who had tasted a few drops must have gathered. Those who had been spattered with a little color must have gathered. Those who had touched John's red powder of festivity must have gathered. The must have seen something like a cluster of light descending from the sky and entering into Jesus... And John immediately said, "My work is finished. The one that I was waiting for has come. Now I can depart."
This was the first experience of samadhi for Jesus. When the first experience of samadhi happens, the vibe spreads all around while its happening. It is said, when Buddha first experienced samadhi, flowers bloomed out of season. This is also a symbol, like the dove. The dove is the Jewish symbol -- a symbol of peace. Flowers blooming is an Indian symbol -- out of season, suddenly. Whenever anyone reaches samadhi... the flower of samadhi is always a flower out of season. On this earth when is there a season for samadhi to bloom? It is perfectly normal when samadhi doesn't bloom on this earth. If samadhi blooms it is abnormal. This earth is a desert, where is there greenery here? Where does nectar flow? When it descends there are flowers out of season. It was not to be but it happened, it is a miracle! Samadhi is a miracle!
You will know it only when you experience it. Or perhaps staying near one who has experienced some day you will see a white dove descend or suddenly see flowers blooming.
In my courtyard, a white dove.
A white dove flew from high parapets, into my courtyard.
Once in the delicate dusk of summer --
I peeped into my courtyard.
A few drops like the sprinkling of fragrant pandanus water
in the body-mind of a new bride;
a rainbow gossamer on a maidens soft slender body
a white dove flew from high parapets, into my courtyard.
My hand painted with red mehendi lines, O heart --
in the garden, trees blooming madly,
a flute melody rings in my ear
the heart-longed-for guest has come home;
a thrill in my soul, a sparkle in my eye, sweet, sweeter
a white dove flew from high parapets, into my courtyard.
a beautiful golden dream --
the moon wrapped in a sari,
a song sleepily wandering,
colliding with my breath;
like a sprinkling of jasmine, heart and soul perfumed
a white dove flew from high parapets, into my courtyard.
my restless song cries out in joy
I am home, courtyard, threshold, door.
Lamps lighted, dusk falling
like the song of wedding reeds in the soul;
juicy flower-like sounds spread in the mango groves,
a white dove flew from high parapets, into my courtyard.
A white dove descends in the first experience of samadhi. Flowers bloom all around. A flute melody resounds. A reed begins to play inside. All vibrations, all tones are awakened.
a flute melody rings in my ear
the heart-longed-for guest has come home;
The awaited guest has come -- the 'atithi,' the one with no date. In this country we have called the guest the atithi because he arrives without a set date. By now the only remaining atithi is god, all other guests set a date before coming. Now they send a message ahead that they are coming. They are saying that it is not right to suddenly shove their way in. We will be coming. Take care to prepare yourselves, because nowadays no one is happy to see a guest. If a message comes first then people can get ready. The cursing and swearing can be done earlier. What has to be said to the wife can be said. What has to be said to the husband can be said. By the time they arrive politeness has returned. If they suddenly come, who knows -- the truth might come out! One has to say that it is a blessing, that seeing you our hearts are very delighted. This is not what is inside. Something else is inside. The Western custom of first informing is good so that people can get ready, can fortify their hearts.
Now god is the only remaining atithi -- he doesn't fix a date. There is no prior indication of his coming. No one can say when the first experience of samadhi will happen. Spontaneously, out of season... The truth is what happens when you are not waiting, not expecting at all. As long as you are waiting you remain tense. Tension remains in your mind. While you are watching the path you can't be total. Watching the path is also a thought and thought is the barrier. As long as you are thinking, "Now he will come", it has not happened yet, you are still surrounded by thoughts. Clouds have gathered. How can the sun come out? It comes suddenly, spontaneously -- when you are just sitting... not doing anything, not even meditating -- then the first experience of samadhi happens. Even when you are meditating somewhere a desire remains in the mind -- perhaps it will happen now, it must happen now. It hasn't happened yet, it is overdue! Complaints go on arising.
Continuing to meditate, meditating one day a moment happens when you are sitting, not even meditating, peaceful, just healthy, silently -- and it comes!
a flute melody rings in my ear
the heart-longed-for guest has come home;
a thrill in my soul, a sparkle in my eye, sweet, sweeter
my restless song cries out in joy
I am home, courtyard, threshold, door.
Lamps lighted, dusk falling
like the song of wedding reeds in the soul;
juicy flower-like sounds spread in the mango groves,
It happens. Don't ask the definition. Ask the path. Ask how it happens, don't ask what happens. It cannot be said. There is no way to talk about it. It is not something to be said, it is something to know. But the method can be told, indications can be given -- move this way, be careful that way. When the mind is without thoughts, peaceful, empty of expectation, free of desire and longing -- in that very moment. Whenever such a moment of spring is adorned within you the inner reed begins to play. Flowers bloom out of season. A ray descends from the sky and makes you forever different, changed. You can never become the same again. The first experience of samadhi -- and you are bathed!
You have been dirty for centuries. Much dust of long journeys has gathered. The first experience of samadhi carries away all the dust. All beliefs, all traps of belief are finished. You become innocent.
Did not Gorakh say it is like a small child is born within? -- in the inner silence a child's voice arises, a new arising of life.
In samadhi your death happens... DIE, O YOGI, DIE... The ego dies. You are destroyed and become the whole.
The sixth question:
Question 6
BELOVED MASTER,
A MASS OF QUESTIONS HAVE COME,
THE ANSWERS ARE SILENT.
WHO WILL KEEP THESE THORNS?
THE GARDEN IS SILENT, THE GARDENER SILENT
THE QUESTION REMAINS SILENT IN ITSELF
THE DAY IS SILENT, NIGHTS ARE SILENT
JET BLACK CLOUDS HAVE ARISEN
A COMPLETELY SILENT DARKNESS HAS COME.
MASTER, PLEASE DISPEL THIS STATE.
Kannumal. As long as there are questions, answers will remain silent. It is because of the questions that answers are silent. The answer does not come from questions. When questions have gone and the mind has become free of questions, the answer comes. In a crowd of questions the answer is lost.
You are right: A MASS OF QUESTIONS HAVE COME, THE ANSWERS ARE SILENT. The answers will remain silent. The questions are making such an uproar how should the answers speak? And remember questions are many, the answer is one. The answer is singular, questions are plural. There is a crowd of questions. Just as there are many illnesses, but health is one. There are not many kinds of health. If you tell someone you are healthy they don't ask you what kind of health, which type of healthiness. But if you tell someone you are sick they immediately ask what you are sick with. Ilnesses are many, health is one. Questions are many, the answer is one. And because of these many questions you do not grasp the one answer. You are right, there is a crowd of questions. Question upon question in all directions... questions emerging from questions, arising, disappearing, made anew. You are surrounded by questions it is true. But this is the very reason the answer is silent.
You say, A MASS OF QUESTIONS HAVE COME, THE ANSWERS ARE SILENT.
The answer is not silent. The answer too is speaking, but the answer is one and the questions are many. It is lost like a bird's peep in the band room... It is lost like someone singing softly in a noisy bazaar.
The answer can be found. The answer is not far away. The answer is very near. You are the answer. The answer resides in your center. Let go of questions a little. Don't give importance to questions. Don't give much value to questions. Slowly slowly become disinterested in questions. Don't encourage questions, don't welcome them, ignore them. Be indifferent to questions. One who goes into questions strays off into the jungle of philosophy. Let questions come and go. Look at the crowd of questions like you look at people moving on the street -- nothing to give, nothing to take -- with detachment, standing far away... The more distance there is between you and your questions, the better. Because it is in this gap the answer will arise.
Whenever someone came to Buddha, and asked questions, Buddha said, "Stop, stay here for two years. Stay near me in silence for two years, then ask."
Once a great philosopher came to Buddha. His name was Maulungaputta. He was a well known philosopher. He had brought a mass of questions. Buddha listened to his questions and said, "Maulungaputta, do you really want the answer? If you really want it, can you pay the price?"
Maulungaputta said, "The end of my life is coming near. My whole life I have been asking these questions. I received many answers but no answer has proved to be an answer. From every answer new questions have arisen. The solution was not in any answer. What price do you ask? I am ready to pay the full price. I want only to solve these questions. I want to leave this earth with these questions solved."
Then Buddha said, "Good. People also ask questions but are not ready to pay the price. This is why I asked you. Sit in silence for two years, this is the price. Sit near me in silence for two years without saying anything. When two years have passed, I myself will tell you, 'Maulungaputta, now ask your questions.' Then you can ask what you need to ask. And I promise that I will answer everything, I will dispel all doubts. But two years completely still and silent. Don't bring it up for two years."
Maulungaputta was thinking whether to say yes or no. Two years is a long time and who knows if this man can be trusted, will he answer even after two years or not? He asked, "Do you give full assurance that you will answer after two years.
Buddha said, "I give complete assurance, if you ask I will answer. But if you do not ask, who will I answer?"
At that time there was a disciple, a bhikshu, sitting in meditation under a tree nearby. He began laughing uproariously.
Maulungaputta asked, "Why is this bhikshu laughing?"
Buddha said, "You ask him."
The bikshu said, "If you want to ask then ask now. I was deceived in the same way. He made a fool of me too. But he is telling the truth that if you ask after two years he will answer, but who asks after two years? I have sat silently for two years. Now he goes on prodding me, saying ask brother. But after two years of remaining silent nothing remains to be asked, the answer is received. If you want to ask, ask now, otherwise after two years nothing will be left to ask."
And this is exactly what happened, Maulungaputta stayed two years. When two years were over, Buddha did not forget, he remembered the exact date. Maulungaputta had forgotten when two years would be over because one whose thoughts have become slowly slowly quiet loses awareness of time. How to keep track of time, what day it is, what year it is! All was gone, all had flowed away. And what was the need? He would sit every day with the Buddha so Friday or Saturday, Sunday or Monday all were the same. June or July, hot or cold all were the same. Inside him there was only one vibe -- of peace, of silence.
Two years were over. Buddha said, "Maulungaputta, stand up."
Maulungaputta stood up. Buddha said, "Now you can ask, because I don't go back on my promise. Do you have something to ask?"
Maulungaputta started laughing and said, "That bikshu was right. Now I have nothing to ask. The answer has come. Through your grace the answer has come."
The answer has not been given but it is received. The answer does not come from outside, the answer comes from within. Think of it like digging a well. First rocks and gravel are removed, rubbish is removed, dry earth is removed then wet earth, then mud, then flowing water... The flowing water has been suppressed. The layers and layers of your questions have collected, the flowing stream is repressed beneath all this. Dig, push these questions aside. And there is only one way to push them aside: as a witness alertly watch this stream of questions. Just go on watching this stream, don't do anything. Sit every day an hour or two, let the stream flow. Don't be in a hurry to stop it today. This is why Buddha said two years. After some three months the first rustling of stillness begins. And as two years are over the experience ripens. Only if one has enough patience to sit two hours everyday, not doing anything... The whole art is hidden in this not doing anything.
People ask: How did Buddha's first samadhi happen? He was sitting under a tree, not doing anything, then it happened. For six years he did much -- great control, exercise, breath control, who knows what all he did. He had gotten tired doing everything. That night he decided before sleeping, "Now there is nothing more to do, it is enough. Nothing happens from doing." That night he stopped doing. That night he went to sleep in a complete state of non-doing, in a silent mood. In the morning he opened his eyes and samadhi was standing at the door. The guest he had been waiting for had come. The last star of dawn was disappearing and inside Buddha's last thought disappeared. Outside the sky was emptied of the last star, inside the last thought dissolved. Samadhi came, the answer came. This is why it is called samadhi, because in it is the solution, the samadhan.
Dusk came, earth and sky became silent
clouds of dust stirred up in the eyes
the eyelids blinked from the load, becoming moist.
The dusk asked, why are you sad?
I have no answer.
Night came, engulfed in blackness
in the thick dark the door of the mind opened
in the fire, sparks began laughing.
The night asked, why this burning?
I have no answer.
Sleep came, consciousness silent
the body tired and fell asleep, but the spirit
explored magic-filled lanes of dream.
Sleep asked, why this forgetting?
I have no answer.
Questions are scattered in every direction
I have no answer.
Don't cling to questions or you will not find answers. No one has found the answer moving with the help of questions. Let questions arise, this is the itching of the mind. Itching is the right word. Sometimes you feel itchiness and you scratch it -- just like this, questions are the itching of the mind. Nothing is solved by itching, but if you don't ask you will also feel uncomfortable. By itching you get a little momentary relief -- just like your answers. Grab onto one answer and get relief for a little while. Very soon questions will arise from this answer. Then relief will disappear, the search for the answer will begin again.
Kannumal, you are right:
A MASS OF QUESTIONS HAVE COME,
THE ANSWERS ARE SILENT.
WHO WILL KEEP THESE THORNS?
THE GARDEN IS SILENT, THE GARDENER SILENT
THE QUESTION REMAINS SILENT IN ITSELF
THE DAY IS SILENT, NIGHTS ARE SILENT
JET BLACK CLOUDS HAVE ARISEN
A COMPLETELY SILENT DARKNESS HAS COME.
A MASS OF QUESTIONS HAVE ARISEN,
THE ANSWERS ARE SILENT.
The answers will remain silent. Answers don't speak. When you stop speaking, you will immediately encounter them. Your voice will disappear and you will find -- emptiness speaks within you, silence speaks within you. Suddenly, in that silence is the solution, the answer to all the. In that silence is peace, is happiness, is the highest bliss.
Have you noticed? Questions arise because of suffering. Suffering gives birth to questions. When you have a headache you ask why you have a headache. When you don't have a headache you don't ask why you don't have one. When you are sick you go the the doctor and ask why you are sick What is the cause? But when you are healthy you don't go the doctor and ask why you are healthy. What is its cause? No question arises in health, the question arises in illness. Questions arise from unhappiness, questions become weak in happiness.
As soon as you become peaceful inside and you get a glimpse of a little happiness, you will be surprised -- questions disappear. Who asks, why ask? When the pain does not remain how can questions born of pain remain? They are finished by themselves.
The seventh question:
Question 7
WHAT IS PRAYER?
Prayer is a state of gratitude.
Prayer is thankfulness.
God has given so much, at the very least we can give thanks.
Prayer is a preparation to welcome him. The guest will come, the guest will have to come. Decorate the house with flowers and boughs. String flower garlands. Prepare lamps of blessing. Prayer is a preparation to welcome. Who knows when the guest will come? I will be ready.
Since I heard you will come to my door, each day I fill my house with new wreaths and flowers!
O my life, look all around -- the door, the threshold, the courtyard
I have swept the whole house in your welcome;
because your feet are delicate beloved,
the whole path is decorated with flower petals;
since I heard you will come to my courtyard,
I fill the whole street with festive spires and streamers.
Ever since I heard you will come to my door,
each day I fill my house with new wreaths and flowers!
I had thought life a rather desolate place,
I thought no song here was mine;
never did a song
burst forth from these strange lips;
ever since I heard you will sing my song,
each day I try out and bring new rhymes, new rhythms!
Ever since I heard you will come to my door,
each day I fill my house with new wreaths and flowers!
In the eyes there is a festival of new dreams,
this seven-colored-wish smiles in my heart;
how can I cut the beautiful wings of imagination,
the heart's golden bird is restless;
ever since I heard you will overwhelm my life,
every day I dream bewitching dreams!
Ever since I heard you will come to my door,
each day I fill my house with new wreaths and flowers!
Standing at the crossroads I realize,
I don't know on which path you will come;
the world says I have become your mad woman,
dark lover caress this madness;
ever since I heard you will take an unknown path,
I light lamps each day on every path!
Ever since I heard you will come to my door,
each day I fill my house with new wreaths and flowers!
Whenever the guest will come, on whichever path he will come, from whichever door he will come, prayer is the preparation for his coming! Prayer is a mood of welcoming.
Don't fall into formal prayer. Let prayer be spontaneous, direct, arising from your heart, only then will it be meaningful. Not scriptural but heartful. Then even if it is babbling...
You have seen that when a small child starts babbling the first time how sweet its babbling is. Later when he starts to speak correctly perhaps no one will pay attention to him. But babbling is so sweet that the mother is delighted and calls everyone around to hear. He doesn't say anything clearly yet. But when he starts speaking, no one bothers.
In the beginning prayer is like babbling. And remember a prayer that is babbled reaches to god, if it is from the heart, spontaneous, yours.
Whom shall I befriend today?
In the sky with billowing dark clouds,
imagination dances, becoming a peacock,
feelings pull me towards them.
Tell me, with whom shall I flow?
today, thirst is floating on my lips,
the heart sitting, silent, sad,
in the breath an agitated sigh,
will I remain in pain on the verge of death?
The language of the eyes is unknown,
my song flying like a bird,
a great dilemma in the heart,
should I endure the remorse of helplessness?
The hour of evening is impatient,
a gentle breeze dancing and turning,
a suffocating pain rising
who to tell this lingering agony to?
Whom shall I befriend today?
Tell me, with whom shall I flow?
Prayer is a submission like this. Love is from the sky... No answer comes from another direction. This is why the prayer of one who waits for an answer will quickly cease. Don't just wait for an answer, keep making your offering. Don't be concerned whether he will answer or not, whether the matter reaches to him or not, don't worry about all this. Don't even try to use your prayer to change god. Just be concerned whether your prayer is going deeper. Is my prayer soaked with my tears, soaked with my bliss? Is the mark of my smile on my prayer? And is the signature of my spirit on my prayer? Just be concerned with this. And one day suddenly prayer reaches. Your babbling is heard. And in that moment in your temple of silence that child is born. That innocent consciousness enters. The white dove descends, the first glimpse of samadhi has come... it will come, it will certainly come.
Jesus has said, what has happened to me can happen to you. I say the same to you, what has happened to me can happen to you too. What has happened to one man is the birthright of all.
Enough for today.
Chapter No. 3 - Live spontaneously
Chapter No. 4 - See the unseeable
Chapter No. 5 - Living in the heart
Chapter No. 6 - Sadhana: the fruit
of understanding
Chapter No. 7 - Wander alone
Chapter No. 8 - Come, spread this
moonlight, wrap yourself in it
Chapter No. 9 - Thought of memory-intelligence
Chapter No. 10 - Music, the easiest
method of meditation