We must be sincere We
must be sincere. If you have seen the Truth, only then ask the people to follow
you. „Dear friend, come and see and have it!“ But if you have not seen the
Truth yourself, then why, like the proverbial blind man, lead others into the pit
along with you? We must be sincere to our own selves and to our fellow men and
women. If you only know the scriptures in theory, say so. If you have seen the
Light and can rise above body consciousness, and are also competent to give
others some experience of it, well and good. Go and tell the people so. You
see, that is the difficulty. People speak so much about the scriptures. You
must have heard so many speakers holding forth on the subject. But how many of
them are there who have had the first-hand experience of Truth, and are
competent to give you also that experience? To talk of spirituality is just
like giving a learned discourse on the principles of business without having
any capital or practical capability to start the business. When
you get experience inside, however elementary it may be, you are convinced of
the Reality and can develop it to any length you may like, by regular practice. Preaching
was meant to be done only by those who had the first-hand experience of Truth.
But preaching has become a source of income; and paid service in all social
religions has made matters worse. I am not talking of any particular religion,
but what I say is true of all religions. People have made a business of
religion and so many have taken to it just as a means of livelihood. But
God´s gifts are all free. They pretend to serve Him, but at bottom it is all
mercenary. The world is full of them and that is why we are fed up with the
very word „Master“. But a real Master does not seek worldly gain. He gives
God´s gift - spirituality - freely and free of cost. He has realized God. He is
the perfect man. He has transcended the physical consciousness and has seen the
Light within. What did Kabir tell the pundit? „O learned pundit, if you want an
experience of the Reality, go to some competent living Master.“ What
sort of Master? asked the pundit. Then Kabir went on to define „Master“ as one
through whom God speaks. This is what all the Saints, including Kabir, have
said. Thus
we have in the Bible: „Holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy
Ghost“ (2 Peter 1:21). Guru Nanak says, „Poor Nanak only speaks what he is
bidden“, and „O Lalo! I only say that which my Lord speaks through me.“ A
Muslim divine also says the same thing: „The words of the Prophet are the words
of God, though they may seemingly appear to drop from a human tongue.“ You
too have the same possibility in you. But you have not yet come in contact with
the Power working in you, because you are still bound to the physical body. As
long as you do not lose this body consciousness, you cannot enter into the
Beyond. The Bible says, „Flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God.“ You
must seek out one who has risen into cosmic awareness and is a conscious
co-worker of the Divine Plan. He will no doubt be a man like any of you. But he
has realized his own Self and experienced God within. When you sit with him,
you will find him quite a different being, full of love and compassion for all:
a radiating center of the Divinity in him. The very atmosphere around him is
charged with the radioactive rays of spiritual bliss. A
man who has attained the highest degree of mastery in any field of activity
will at first appear like an ordinary man. He is essentially a man first and
last. But he has developed in his own particular way. When you sit with him,
you will find him a giant in his own field. This is exactly the case with a
Master-soul. When you meet him, you will find him just like any other man at
first sight. He himself will tell you: „I come to you as a man to man. I am a
man just like you. I had the good fortune to sit at the feet of my Master and
progressed in the spiritual way. Those who are in search of the Godway are most
welcome.“ A
doctor is a man first and then a doctor. An engineer is a man first and then an
engineer. Similarly, a spiritual man, a Master, is a man first and then a
spiritual guide. All
possibilities are within man. Great is man. He who has developed in a certain
line and has an experience of it, is able to guide you also if you are seeking
the same way. The
Master Power never leaves you. It is not the human body but the power working
through it that remains forever. Christ Power has been working through the ages
and shall continue to work; but through different divine instruments and
according to the needs of the times. The body alone perishes, but that Power
remains. Those who have really seen the Truth within can open your inner eye
and make you see it. If they give you some inner experience, however little it
may be, you can develop it. One of Christ´s parables illustrates this
beautifully: A rich man going out on a journey distributed among his servants
some talents - twenty to one, ten to another, five to the third. When he came
back, the man who had had twenty talents had made them thirty, the one with ten
had made fifteen of them, and the last who had gotten only five had never
touched them but had kept them safe buried underground. As no use was made of
them, the Master thought it prudent to withdraw them. What I mean to say is,
that when you are given some experience, you have to develop it as you do your
learning in a school. Initiation does not mean observance of any ceremony, or
ritual, or anything of the sort. It is just a practical experience of the science
spiritual. The theory is explained first, and then the experience is given, and
that is to be developed from day to day. That Master Power overhead which gives
the experience protects both within and without, and keeps a constant watch
over the disciples. You
will find that such people have been coming to the Masters and asking them as
Philip asked Jesus: "Lord, show us the Father and it sufficeth us.“ And what did he reply? He grew indignant and
said, „Have I been so long time with you, and yet thou hast not known me,
Philip? He that hath seen me hath seen the Father; and how sayest thou then,
Show us the Father? Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Fater
in me? The words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself: but the Father
that dwelleth in me, He doeth the works.“ Christ
was a conscious co-worker with the Father or Divine Power within him. Only he
who is conscious of the Power working through him can bring you in contact with
the Power within. That contact is possible only when you rise above body
consciousness and not otherwise. When
the Masters come, they tell us of God and the Godway. They remind us of the
Reality within. Man is the teacher of man. Can past Masters help us? Yes, we do
need them. They are helpful in their own way. We have respect for them, because
they gave out the Truth and their experiences of it. Those who came in contact
with them were put on the way, and they also realized the same Truth. The
scriptures are the treasures of the experiences that they had with their own
Selves and with God and we are fortunate to have them with us today. If
we had come two thousand years earlier, we would not have the New Testament
with us and I would not have given you these beautiful quotations from it. All
scriptures deal with the same Truth. But we are familiar with one or another
scripture only. When I quote the Bible to you, you have no difficulty. So it is
with people of other faiths. They follow easily what is said, when I offer
quotations to them from their respective scriptures. All these scriptures make
my task easier, as well as that of my listeners. The sacred books are just
handy aids in the hands of a man of realization for they all deal with the
selfsame subject, viz., God-realization. What
we need is someone who has the experience within himself of what is spoken of
in the scriptures and who is competent to give us some taste of that experience
right now. Call such a man what you will - pir, murshid, Saint or Master that is immaterial. We
have respect for all such persons who came in the past or who are here now in
the present age. Those who have seen the Reality can put us on the Path and
give us a first-hand experience of it. The need of such a Godman has been felt
ever since the world began. Some
people say that they don´t need any Master. Well, they will have to rely on
books, the holy scriptures. These scriptures are, of course, more reliable than
the intellectual commentaries on them by the learned. If the commentators have
seen the Truth, they will interpret the scriptures correctly, but if not, they
will confound and confuse the reader in spite of all his wits and will lead him
nowhere. When
you rely solely on books, you ultimately rely on some Master, for the
scriptures were after all written by somebody. Instead of this indirect
approach, would it not be better if you could meet a man of realization
directly? He has practical experience of what the scriptures describe and can
give you much more than you can ever get from books; he can give you first-hand
experience of the Reality itself. This aspect has been stressed by all the
Saints. They enable us to understand how we may have that experience in our
lives. In the Gospel of Matthew we have, All things are
delivered unto me of my Father, and No man knoweth the Father save the
son, and he whomsoever the son will reveal him. Thus,
the son knows the Father and the Father knows the son, and all others to whom
the son reveals Him, for he becomes a conscious co-worker with the Father, on
the Divine Plan. This is why Christ said: „I and my Father are one. It is not I
that am doing it. I am the way, the truth and the life. No man cometh unto the
Father but by me. If you had known me, ye should have known my Father also.“ In
what a forceful way he has put it: Through the man who has known the Father
(God), you can also know God. The
alphabet of the teachings of the Masters starts where the wordly philosophies
end. That is the beginning of true religion. It begins when you come above body
consciousness and not before. Naturally,
the man who has experience of the truth is the only one competent to put you on
the way. You may be able, in the company of such a righteous man, to understand
the true nature of things, the real significance of what is highly abstract. So
all Masters who have been coming from time to time have been giving out the
Truth. The question now arises: what sort of yoga (spiritual discipline) do
they teach? We have so many yogas, so many ways of coming to the home of our
Father, to reach the state of unchangeable permanence, all peace, all joy, all
happiness, which never decays and is not subject to Dissolution or Grand
Dissolution. That
was the goal which we set before us in our first meeting. I also gave
quotations from different scriptures. The ultimate goal of all religions is
God. We are worshipers of the same God, no matter whether we belong to one
country or the other, East or West, to one religion or another; for that makes
no difference. All religions say the same thing. Love God, and further, as God
resides in every heart, love all humanity. This is the best way of leading our
outer life. If followed naturally, the Kingdom of God would surely come on
earth - for which we so often pray but are disappointed. Next we have to enter into the Kingdom of God, reach our true home. The
way to it starts when we rise above body consciousness. But how are we to
achieve this? All scriptures speak of the Way that leads back to God. We have
to find this Way. There are so many different methods that we may follow! But
which of them is the most natural, the most easy and can give us the quickest
results? - so that we can realize the Truth in this very life and not have to
wait till after death. I
met a man in California who came to me and told me that his Master had said
that his inner eye had been opened. I asked him if he saw anything within, to
which he said, „No.“ I asked him, what made him believe this? He replied that
his Master had said so and therefore it must be so. I advised him not to follow
blindly but to see things for himself. Another
man came up and said, „My Master says I will have salvation after death.“ But I
asked him, „Where is the proof that you
will have it?“ People are after Truth, I tell you. I quite see the search for
Truth everywhere in the world. Men have been seeking for Truth for years and
years, through books, through rituals, and through countless other means. But
they have not gained practical experience of the Reality. I
met a very learned man in San Francisco; he is the organizer of all the
international religions conferences that are being held now in Japan, France,
Germany, and other places. He heard one of my talks in which I dealt with this
subject. At the end he admitted that what I said was true and that he had not
seen the light within. The people are after it, no doubt, and many of them are
quite sincere, broadminded and open to conviction. The
question arises: Of the many yogas, which is the best, the quickest and the
most suited to our times? The
masters teach you the most natural way. Natural ways are always the easiest.
Eeasy things can be followed by anyone anywhere. Even a child should be able to
see the Light of Heaven within. There
are so many yogic practices. We have Hatha Yoga. It gives us physical fitness,
a strong body, for one thing; and for another it prepares the way for another
type of yoga, the Prana Yoga. Prana Yoga gives control over the respiratory
system in the boddy, and enables one to withdraw the motor and sensory currents
together to the seat of the soul within. The body is simply left as a clod of
earth, without breath or motion; this is technically called Kumbhak. When we
achieve this withdrawal of the pranas (vital airs), we see the Light of God and
hear the Voice of God within. This is a difficult and arduous way. Everyone is
not fit for it. Everyone cannot follow it. The body must be sound and strong.
For this we have to take to the Hatha Yoga practices for a long time to make
our body fit, and then we can take it up. Those who are physically unfit, if
they take it up, they fall a victim to different diseases. Next
there is Laya Yoga, which is concerned with the awakening of the kundalini or
the serpentine power. That is also practiced through controlling one´s
breathing. We have to awaken all centers in the body and go up step by step. There
are other forms of yoga as well, which enable one to control his mind. They ask
us to visualize within some outer object so that we may have something to
concentrate our thoughts upon. Then
there is Jnana Yoga for grasping the reality within by the sheer force of
intellect - a very difficult path indeed, I may say. Brihadaranyaka
Upanishad says, „To grasp the infinity by the finite intellect is as impossible
as to quench thirst by taking wine or to extract oil from sand.“ How
can the finite intellect grasp the all-pervading Reality within its narrow
compass? That is a sheer impossibility. This is why Confucius said: The reality
is something which cannot be grasped, cannot be understood and cannot be
comprehended. This is why he turned from the spiritual to the ethical side of
life. Can
we possibly come in contact with that Reality? All the Masters with one voice
emphatically say, „Yes!“ Guru Nanak says, „The Lord God of Nanak is visible
everywhere.“ Swami
Vivekananda, who came to America some years ago, began life as an atheist. He
would challenge people to show him God. He would question: Is there anyone who
has seen God? He was told to visit Dakshineswar (in Bengal) and meet
Ramakrishna Paramhans. He
went there, all puffed up with his intellectual attainments. Ramakrishna
appeared to him like an ordinary man. You see, the Masters do not act and pose.
They do not believe in any show. They just behave like ordinary individuals. He
found the sage first on the grassy plot adjoining his hut and put to him his
oft-repeated question: „Master, have you seen God?“ And What was the reply?
„Yes, my child, I see Him just as I see you - only more vividly.“ At these
words coming from the heart of a man of realization, Vivekananda bowed down.
And throughout the rest of his life he always declared, „Only through that
Godman was I saved.“ How
then is salvation possible? All Masters say, „If thine eye be singl, thy whole
body shall be full of light.“ For salvation then we must develop our „single
eye“. But how to find it and how to develop it? Guru Nanak tells us that the „single eye“ spoken of is not of flesh and bone, as are our outer eyes. It is the inner eye - the eye within you. And this is to be opened. But how? One who has his own eye opened and has seen the light of God is also capable of giving you first-hand inner experience of it. Seeing is believing, and when you see for your own self, you will require no further testimony. On the other hand, the blind cannot lead the blind. An awakened soul alone can awaken souls slumbering on the plane of the senses. As light comes from light, so does life from life. A man of realization can grant an experience of the Reality to others. He who has risen in Cosmic Awareness, can make others rise in that Awareness. So it is not an impossibility. All Masters have testified to this. Shamas of Tabrez says: We should be able to see God with
our own eyes and hear the voice of God with our own ears. This
is no new thing. It is the most ancient science and the most authentic. Another
Muslim Saint, Moieen-du-Din Chishti, tells us, „You have to open the inner eye
to behold the glory of God within. It is already there.“ A
true Christian must know how to cross over the body consciousness to see the
Light of God. A true Muslim must witness the glory of God from the top of Mount
Toor, which is our body. The prophet Moses used to go up Mount Sinai to hear
the Decalogue in the midst of lightning and thunder. Similarly, a tue Sikh
(Khalsa) is one who sees the light of God in his own person. The scriptures
tell us that Guru (Master) is one who
can dispel darkness in man by revealing the light of Heaven. The Christians
figuratively call this spot (where the light is seen) the mount of
transfiguration. This
is the goal before us. It is possible and within the reach of everyone. When?
When you come in contact with some practical adept. He will be a man as any of
you are, but he has inner experience of Truth and is competent to give the same
experience to you. If he gives you some experience at the very outset, you can
expect more from him. What
type of yoga do the Masters teach? I have just mentioned certain types of yoga.
There are other types as well, which
enable us to concentrate and dwell on the lower ganglions in the body. They aim
at awakening the different supernatural powers therby. But the true aim of life
is to know one´s Self and to know God, and not to have supernatural powers. To
one who practices the highest type of yoga, by following the Path of the
Masters, all such powers come of themselves: one has not to work for them. But
a true seeker of God bypasses all such temptations. What
then is the most natural yoga? What do the Masters teach? The Path of the
Masters is known as Sehaj Yoga (the natural yoga) or the Surat Shabd Yoga (the
yoga of the Sound Current). What is surat? It is the soul within each one of
us, the outward expression of which is the attention or what is known as
consciousness, awareness or wakefulness. When you open and close your eyes
successively for some time, you will feel a kind of wakefulness and
consciousness behind the eyes. This wakefulness or consciousness is the „Self“
in you, and that you are. In the waking
state it is diffused in the body and is engaged in outer pursuits of the world
through the agency of the senses. But it can be withdrawn and concentrated
within. The Master helps in withdrawing the sensory currents, collecting them
at one center, and gives an inner contact with the „Word Power“ within - the
divine link in each one of us. This God Power
is known by different names. St. John speaks of it as the „Word“. It is
the „Holy Ghost“ of Christ. The Muslims call it Kalma or Ism-i-Azam, while the
Hindu Rishis called it Sruti or Udgit. Zoroaster gave it the name of Sarosha or
the „Creative Verbum“. Guru Nanak speaks of it as Naam. It is the great
Creative Power of God which is controlling the Universe. This Sound Principle
or „Divine harmony“ is the core of all that is. And
what is God? You find the same thing mentioned in the Bible. St. John begins
his Gospel with the memorable words, „In the beginning was the Word, and the
Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with
God. All things were made by him, and without him was not anything made that
was made. Dryden,
a great English poet, in his poetic fancy calls it „Harmony“, and ascribes the
creation to the great „Power of Music“. This
Word existed even before the Creation came into being. God
the Absolute is Wordless and Nameless. When that Absolute came into
manifestation, it was given different names as said before: Word, Kalma, Naam,
Sruti, Udgit, etc. This first and primal manifestation of the Absolute (in the
form of the Sound Principle) is the Divine Link within each one of us, and this
Power is all-pervading and everlasting. „Forever, O Lord, thy Word is settled
in heaven.“ The Bible further tells us: „By the Word of the Lord were the
heavens made.“ That is the creative power: „Upholding all things by the Word of
his power.“ The Bible calls that creative principle the „Word“. As I told you yesterday, unless you know the
specialized terminology of the Masters, you cannot know the true import of the
scriptures. The Word, as used throughout the Bible and especially by St. John,
is one example of such terms; and so
are many others in different scriptures. That Word is lasting, everlasting and
abiding forever and forever: „The grass withereth, the flower fadeth, but the
word of our God shall stand forever.“ The „Word of God“ does not mean the words
uttered by the Masters. Their words of wisdom simply express the Word of God
and its creative, controlling and sustaining power over all that is visible and
invisible. This Power existed right from the beginning. „The Word was with God
and the Word was God.“ That
Divine Link is within every man. The Epistle to the Hebrews (in the New
Testament) speaks of the Word of God as: „For the Word of God is quick (which
means living) and powerful and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even
to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit and of the joints and marrow, and is
a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.“ That power is denoted by
the term „Word“. So
God is the Nameless or the Wordless One. When that Power came into being and
assumed a manifest form, - „God-in-action“ - it became the primal cause, the
Causeless Cause, of all creation in the higher and lower spheres. And that
first manifested form of the Absolute is the only Way back to God. |