THE LIFE WITHOUT

 

The seeker who had found a true Guide and who had begun to develop the right kind of love and faith in him, would naturally attempt to fashion his life according to his Satguru's Will, and Baba Ji laid great emphasis on the need to transform our lives. It was not necessary, he maintained, to leave the world in order to pursue the inner Path. What was needed for spiritual progress was inner detachment, and he who had surrendered himself completely to his Guru was free from all earthly ties. Some of his disciples would at times express the desire for complete renunciation, but he always kept such tendencies in check:

 

You say you wish to give up home and service and

devote yourself exclusively to Bhajan. Home or service or

wealth - are they really yours? Turn it over in your mind.

It is all a magician's game and the world is a dream.

Then why worry about clutching and relinquishing?

                             

                                  (18^th  September, 1902)

 

The ideal he always held up before his disciples was that of the royal swan that had its home in the water yet rose up from it dry and untrammeled. If he would not have his disciples attached to the world, he would not have them neglect their worldly duties either. When Baba Sawan Singh wrote that he would be taking ten days leave and spending it at Beas, Baba Ji replied:

 

When you come on ten days leave, you should first proceed straight home, and then on your way back drop in Saturday at about 5 p.m. at the Dera from where you can proceed to duty the following day after attending the Sunday Satsang. You must go home for there are many things awaiting your attention there for the last two or three years. Therefore please go straight home. I will be very pleased if you first go home and then come here.

 

When on one occasion his beloved disciple was unable to secure leave for seeing him and offered to come over nonetheless, Baba Ji was far from happy and strictly forbade any such step.  "Please never write such a thing again," he answered, "that you would come here without taking leave," and added, "The work that you are doing, that is also the work of Radhasoami, the work of the Lord."

 

However, while living in the world one had to follow a very rigorous discipline. The road to the New Jerusalem was a narrow and difficult one. "Your way of living," said the sage of Beas to his disciples, "must be different from that of other people." And how exacting was the discipline he demanded becomes clear from one of his letters:

 

You do not seem to understand that when your social duties are over, you are not to talk to anyone. In the evening between 6 and 8, you should sit for Bhajan as long as possible - be it half an hour, an hour fifteen minutes or an hour and a half and keep the surat on the inner planes. Then hold Satsang from 8 to 10 p.m., after which you may go to sleep or talk as you please. Then at 4:30 in the morning you are to sit for Bhajan and continue up to 5:30. Then throughout the day you have to attend to your social routine and may, if you like, talk during those hours. But as soon as you are free from office duties, you must not waste time in idle talk or in the company of non-satsangis. You should have your meals in private ... You are never to have meals cooked from non-satsangis in your kitchen, especially if they take meat and drink. If you associate with non-satsangis, you will have to suffer from the effects of their company.

                                 

(17^th  October, 1902)

 

Abstinence from non-vegetarian food and intoxicants was a prime condition for taking to the spiritual path. Baba Ji laid equal stress on the need for honesty. In the same letter we have quoted above, he wrote:

 

If you are offered anything free, never accept it for how will you repay it? If you do not adhere strictly to this rule, you will never attain the highest spiritually.

 

One must not be led away by the world but look upon each object with discrimination. "The entire world is tied with the ropes of the love of parents, children, wife and earthly relations," and one must free oneself from this slavery. Running away to the jungles was no solution. It had to be an inner detachment, and this inner detachment could only come through the love of a true Master. Hence the great value of Satsang, for it was only through association with him that one imbibed the true values of life, learned of the delusions of Maya, and imbibed a love that displaced the love of the world. Peace and blessing radiate from the person of a Saint and whoever came under his spell was freed from worldly tensions, ambitions and jealousies. He saw all creatures as of his own essence and knew all worldly gain to be a passing shadow. Such a man alone could cut through the meshes of Maya and reach out toward the worlds beyond.

 

Next