CHAPTER ONE

 

GURU: WHAT HE IS

 

 

'Tis much that man was made like God, before,

But, that God should be made like man, much

more....

 

God clothed Himself in vile man's flesh, that so

He might be weak enough to suffer woe.

 

JOHN DONNE

 

 

IT is well nigh impossible to know the Master and to

understand his greatness. We have not the eyes where-

with we may behold his Reality. A prophet alone can

know a prophet. We, the embodied spirits living on the

plane of the senses, simply cannot know him.

 

What Thou art we know not;

What is most like Thee?

 

Again:

 

How can the lesser the Greater comprehend?

Or finite reason reach Infinity,

For what should fathom God were more than He.

 

DRYDEN

 

In Jap Ji (the daily morning prayer of the Sikhs),

it is mentioned:

 

Unless one rises to His level, one cannot know

of Him (God).

 

A Master Soul may be likened to a skylark, which is

described as:

 

Ethereal Minstrel! Pilgrim of the Sky.

 

He who can soar as high as the skylark and follow her

course may know something of the ethereal pilgrim;

but poor crows and doves cannot. The Master is, however,

not a pilgrim of the sky, but a denizen of the highest

Spiritual Realm, and he comes down to sing to us the

"Ethereal Song," and to take us along with him to his

heavenly abode. While on earth, he is:

 

Type of the wise, who soar, but never roam;

True to the kindred points of Heaven and Home.

 

He is far beyond the limitations of the three bodies

(physical, astral, and causal) ; of the three innate,

natural and native propensities or instincts (Satva, Rajas,

and Tamas; i.e., of righteous actions, worldly actions,

and inertia or inaction, or actions born of ignorance and

darkness); of the five elements of which the entire creation

is made (earth, water, fire, air, and ether); and of the

twenty-five Prakritis (i.e., subtle forms of varying

degrees of which the elements are compounded); and

also of mind and matter.

 

Shamas-i-Tabrez therefore describes him as:

 

He is a lark that lays a golden egg;

 

that is, an egg that shines like solid gold; the reference

being to the Light of Naam or Word that is bestowed

on each individual at the time of his Initiation.

 

He rides the high heavens every morning.

When he races, he covers all the solar systems,

And when he goes to bed, he makes pillows of

the Sun and the Moon.

 

In other words, when he is not engaged in any worldly

pursuits he crosses over into higher regions for rest.

 

O Shamas-i-Tabrez! by just one kindly look,

He can give sight to thousands of stark blind

(i.e., make them seers and prophets).

 

Such Master Souls are in fact one with God, but come

down into the material world at His behest to fulfill

His divine purpose. Out of compassion for the world-

weary souls, thirsty and hungry, moaning for reunion

with the Beloved, God has to make provision for their

homecoming.

 

As man alone can be a teacher of man, God has to

send forth His Elect with a direct commission to lead

back those who will listen to God's Message. He works as

a means to an end.

 

Standing on the top of a hill, as it were, he can locate

the smoldering fires of love in the various human hearts,

and like a great and powerful magnet or lodestar, he

draws all such individual souls as come into his sphere

of influence, and by personal instruction and guidance

works out the Divine Mission.

 

Each soul gains in spiritual grace in proportion to her

receptivity. The more a person develops this receptivity,

the more he experiences grace and spiritual benefit.

Gifted with a limitless spiritual wealth he generously

bestows it on all who aspire for it. Each gets according to

his need and capability, and gradually develops the seed

sown in him.

 

Sheikh Mueen-ud-din Chishti says:

 

They (Master Souls) live in the world, but

their spirit is ever in the High Heavens;

Imprisoned in the tentacles of the body, their

spirit soars high above.

 

Maulana Rumi also says:

 

Never take a GodMan at a human level; for he

is much more than he seems.

 

Apparently, and in generalities, all men look alike,

though each differs from the other in inner development.

It is this background that helps each individual on the

spiritual path and determines the measure of every step

he takes, and, consequently, each one has his own time

factor.

 

A Master Soul in human form cannot be rightly

comprehended. He is a limitless ocean of Sat or Truth-

ever the same from the beginning of creation and from

age to age. As it is not possible to do justice to God's

greatness, so we cannot do justice to God's elect.

 

A Persian Saint tells us:

 

He is beyond comprehension, apprehension,

conception, and even conjecture. He outstrips

the faculties of sight, hearing, and

understanding. All the glories that one can sing

of him all his life cannot do any justice

to him.

 

Again:

 

If all the mountains were pounded into ink and

mixed with the waters of the oceans and the

whole earth were a sheet of Paper, one cannot

record the greatness of a Guru or Master.

 

He is the King of Spirituality, and we, groveling like

insects in the muck of the world, cannot know him and

his greatness.

 

Maulana Rumi says:

 

If I were to sing praises of His countless blessings

till Eternity, I can hardly say anything of them.

 

Whatever we say of him, we perforce do so at an intellectual

level, which has a very narrow and limited scope.

All our efforts in this direction are bound to discredit

him rather than to give him any credit.

 

Guru Arjan, therefore, says:

 

Thou art a King, and I address Thee as an

"Elder-Man";

Far from doing any honor to Thee, I bring

Thee discredit.

 

The highest and subtlest intellect attempting to describe

him is just like a toddler standing before his mother and

saying, "Oh darling, I know you!" How much can he

know of his parent when he does not know anything of

himself? His sweet lisping words cannot do any justice

to the deep motherly love and affection that lies in her

bosom. We too cannot sing the glories of the Master,

for we cannot know, at the bar of the intellect, him who

is beyond all-barriers and limitations.

 

Blessed indeed are we, for Master Souls, as and when

they do appear, at times tell us of themselves. It is from

their rare utterances that we can know something of

their greatness and of the potential power that works

through them.

 

In innumerable little ways, in parables and otherwise,

they tell us of what they are, what is their mission, from

where they come and how they carry out God's Plan.

 

It would be advisable for us to go to them and listen

to what they have to say about themselves.