A FREE DOWNLOADABLE E-MAGAZINE

Vol II * MAY 2009 * Issue V

Meditation leads to Ultimate Flowering

Introducing various Masters & Dimensions of Spiritual Sojourn

TM

Sant Kabir Jiddu Krishnamurti

Guru vs no Guru
www.taoshobuddhameditations.com
MEDITATION TIMES
A Free Downloadable Monthly E-Magazine

A PRODUCTION OF www.taoshobuddhameditations.com
Published by: www.taoshobuddhameditations.com
Country of Origin: Trinidad & Tobago, West Indies.
Chief Editor/Graphics Layout & Design: Swami Anand Neelambar
Editorial Team: Swami Anand Neelambar, Taoshobuddha, Ma Prem Sutra
Consulting Editors: Professor Rattan Lal Hangloo, Sufi Lakshmi Sahai

For Queries, Comments, and Suggestions and to submit

In This Issue Contributions, you can email the following persons:

Taoshobuddha: taoshobuddha@gmail.com

Swami Anand Neelamabr avatar411@gmail.com

 Kabir & Krishnamurti
 How shall I cross
 Life’s Innocent Questions You can also visit www.youtube.com and check our
meditations. Keyword: taoshobuddha01
 Taoshobuddha Responds
 Hadhrat Unwais Al Qarani The Meditation Times is available free to download
from www.scribd.com
 Cooking – Taoshobuddha Way
 Krishnamurti – Making of the World Order Also you can check the blog at
 Teachings of Krishnamurti http://bodhidharmameditation.blogspot.com/

 Kabir – Life and Times And visit our alternate website at

http://www.taoshobuddhameditations.myeweb.net/
 Meeting of Being & Becoming
 Kabir – the Confluence of Bhakti & Dhyan
 The Buddha Within
 Dhammapada of Buddha
In our Next Issue
Bhakti Saints
Meera, Sahajo, others

EDITORIAL
This month we enter the eternal dilemma of Guru
verses no Guru. Sant Kabir is the greatest exponent
of the path through a guru. He insists that one
cannot reach without the help of a guru.
Jiddu Krishnamurti however emphatically declares
that one does not need a guru. Both these masters
are right. It depends on whom the message is
addressed. There are those who can reach on their
own – they are the blessed few. The majority of
mankind needs the help of a guru. One can go on
groping in darkness for eternity without the
guidance of a guru.
We present the path of these two great masters and
try to bridge the two extremes.
Our way remains that of individual inclination –
whatever path appeals to you then that is the way
for you. Know that all ways leads to the same
experience.
We also celebrate the birth, enlightenment and
Samadhi of the Buddha.
We continue to promote our mantra of meditation.
KABIR & KRISHNAMURTI
S
trange, yet still not, is the theme of this issue
of MEDITATION TIMES as chosen by the
Chief Editor Swami Anand Neelambar and
the entire editorial team.
Though Kabir and Krishnamurthy are separated
from one another by almost 500 years yet still there
is no difference in their states of awareness. This
quantitative span of 500 years between them is
linear. This gap between the two is qualitative in
nature and therefore cannot be measured in terms
of any time scale.
Both Kabir and Krishnamurthy are two enlightened
ones. And lived in completely different worlds!
Thus there can be no comparison. A rose is a rose is
a rose. There can be no comparison between a rose
and a lotus. Both have their separate identities. This
is reflected through the beauty, color, fragrance and
the aura that surrounds the two flowers. The two
have grown separately. Yet still there is one thing
common between the two. The two have
blossomed and thus attained to fruition. And also
the two have blossomed from one common source
the earth. The soil and the fertilizer was the same
for the two. Yet still the two have blossomed
differently. What is more important is inner
blossoming. Both Kabir and Krishnamurthy have
blossomed and have attained to fruition. This is
benediction.
The two cannot and can never be compared. They
have expressed their views and experiences in
similar language and in an identical manner. Both
Kabir and Krishnamurthy are like two streams that
run parallel. And yet still at times they meet one
another thus defying the law of parallel running.
Such are many intersections when both meet and
then move along their own individual ways.
Through this issue our effort is to take you through
such interactions of two distinct thoughts and
expressions.
One thing that is common between the two is their
revolutionary approach. Both are nontraditional.
And iconoclastic as well! Both are non dogmatist
and insist on no dogma or creed. Yet still with the
passage of time the followers of Kabir have
encaged his teachings as creed, dogmas, and sects.
So far this has not happened with Krishnamurthy.
Although Krishnamurthy is our contemporary yet
still his teachings carry the ancient wisdom that is
blended with modern thought. This brings
aliveness and vitality to ancient teaching. It is like
presenting old wine in new bottle. With this we
will proceed in the current issue.
How shall I cross without a boat?

The ocean is vast and infinite

How can I cross without a boat?
No shore I see beyond the yonder horizon
Just a vast infinite ocean with no limits
How shall I cross without a boat?
Who is there to guide the weary seekers
Beyond the further shore?
What support is in the offering
to help one cross without a boat?

Oh weary traveler
Just hold on the floating logs
That is the grace of the Lord
So shall you cross the ocean.
Just hold on to the feet of the guru
And he will lead you across to the further shore
His Nama is the only support you need
To cross the vast infinite ocean.
Sing his glories evermore
So shall you cross the ocean.

Swami anand neelambar

 Life’s Innocent Questions
Life’s innocent questions has left me astounded
The mere simplicity of the rhetoric has left me filled with awe and wonder.
Such deep truths revealed with child-like gestures
Who can fathom the depths and profundity of such innocent questions?

From where have you come?

To where do you go?
Why are you here?
How long shall you stay?
Will you return?

These simply questions has left me astonished

I myself know not
What answer shall I give to the seekers,
Who pass my way?

To smile one must first cry

To live one must first die
To love one must first fear
To trust one must first fail

This is that, that is this

I am that that is this that.
I am He and thou art that
I am You and You are me
The question is the answer
The answer is the question.

Swami Anand Neelambar

 TAOSHOBUDDHA RESPONDS
Each day many queries come that require the
response from Taoshobuddha. Some are personal in
nature. Others are cosmic in nature. Response to such
questions can benefit the seekers world over.
In the mean time you can visit scores of videos on
www.youtube.com and www.totalbhakti.com the tag
is ‘taoshobuddha’
So too you can log on www.scribd.com tag
‘taoshobuddha’ for many scripts and previews. You
can send a query to taoshobuddha@gmail.com or
make a comment on www.scribd.com
As your query reaches Taoshobuddha response will
start happening.
Now the questions for this month.
Question 1: It is said that when man dies, his soul
leaves him for the next body. Soul accompanies
mind with its inherent samskaras. Is the soul
conscious of its spiritual state? Is Maya working
on soul too?
TAOSHOBUDDHA RESPONDS:
First this is to be understood that man exists at three
planes. These are the body, mind and the soul in the
same order. Mind is the connection between body
and the soul. Body is invisible soul and soul is
invisible body.
Soul is imperishable. It is eternal. However you are
not aware of its presence. In certain fleeting moments
you experience soul. Mind is conditionings, dogmas,
beliefs etc. The soul has no form, color, creed, religion
etc. All these things exist at the level of the mind. This
creates divisions. When someone dies the soul being
eternal remains unaffected like the drop on a lotus
leaf. Plup it slips from the leaf and dissolves into the
lake. Mind lives on.
Mind lives on like unfulfilled desires, emotions etc.
Mind is the disease. It creates divisions. In the
moments of death mind enters the new body. Mind
has to attain to the state of no mind or beyond mind.
Until this happens soul keeps on assuming new lives.
Soul remains yoked to mind and its quagmire.
Remember both body and mind is not separate from
one another. It will be better to say that man is body-
mind. When something is taken through the body
affects the mind. And whatever happens to the mind
body responds to it religiously.
Soul remains encaged in this body-mind mechanism.
It cannot free itself from this. The relationship
between soul and the body-mind mechanism can be
understood with an example to a coconut. When the
coconut is young the white jelly remains stuck to the
inner shell of the nut. You cannot remove the jelly
without breaking it. And when the coconut is dry! No
more youngness it becomes ripe then you can
separate the whole ripe jelly without breaking it.
Something like this happens between soul and the
body.
When soul is ripe there is a complete discontinuity
with the body-mind mechanism. At this stage one
gets the first experience of Satori or Samadhi.
Patanjali explains the types of Samadhi sabeej (with
seed) and nirbeej (seedless).
Is soul conscious of spirituality? Yes indeed. Soul is
the embodiment of God in finiteness. That pulsates
each finite moment to attain to its full glory. Soul
cannot manifest itself as long as one is within the
influence of the mind. Mind refers to emotions,
feelings, thinking, dogmas, conditionings etc.
Soul is not inflicted by maya. Since it is total
awareness at times it uses maya as a tool to veil the
cognition from the ordinary consciousness.
Sri Aurobindo sings in epic Savitri:
On the dumb bosom of this oblivious globe,
Although as unknown beings we seem to meet.
Our lives are not aliens nor as strangers join,
Moved to each other by causeless force!
The soul can recognize its answering soul.
Across dividing Time and, on life’s roads
 Absorbed wrapped traveller, turning it recovers
Familiar splendours in an unknown face!
Only this much for now!
LOVE
TAOSHOBUDDHA
Question 2: Why does Ego becomes bar in
spiritual journey? How one can be aware and
remove it or transform it?
The ego is one of the most fundamental problems
man has to face. The ways of the ego have to be
understood rightly otherwise you will never be able
to get rid of it. And until you get rid of the ego there is
no possibility of meeting God. It is the ego that
functions as a barrier between you and reality.
The ego functions as a barrier because it is one of the
most unreal things possible. The ego is a fiction. It is
not a reality. It is maintained by conditioning,
hypnosis and a thousand and one props. It is a fiction
because existence is one. It can have only one center,
not millions of centers.
What is the ego? The ego is the idea that ‘I am the
centre of the universe.’ ‘I’ cannot be the centre of the
universe but everybody has the idea that ‘I am the
centre of the universe.’ And the second part of the ego
is: its separativeness. It is a fiction that separates you
from the totality. It gives you the idea that you are
independent, and you are an island. And in reality
you are not. Existence is a vast infinite continent.
There are no islands. You are not separate and you
are not independent either.
And remember, when I say you are not independent I
do not mean that you are dependent. The very idea of
dependence is an outcome of ego. There is nobody to
be independent and there is nobody to be dependent.
We live in interdependence. Interdependence is
mutual existence. We are parts of each other. We are
connected to one another. The trees, the rocks, and
the rivers are all penetrating you. And you are
penetrating the rivers and the trees and the rocks.
The farthest star is connected with you. And when
you blink your eyes you change the quality of the
total existence. All is infinitely interconnected,
interwoven. Nobody is separate from one another.
So nobody can be independent and nobody can be
dependent. Independence and dependence are both
aspects of the same coin called ego. A real person is
neither of the two. A real person simply does not
exist as a person. He has no boundaries. He exists as
God, not as a person.
On one hand the ego creates separation. And on the
other hand it creates anxiety, and fear -fear of death.
The fear of death comes out of the ego, otherwise
there is no death. There has never been death. Death
exists not. If I am one with the whole then how can
death exists? The whole has never died. The whole
has always been here and the whole is going to
remain here always. The ocean never dies. Only
ripples and waves come and go. Once the wave thinks
‘I am separate from the ocean,’ then it will have great
anxiety. Then death is inevitable.
It is on the way. It is coming. And the fear and the
anxiety are there. But if the wave knows that ‘I am
not separate, how can I die? To die you have to be
separate. If I am one with the ocean, whether I am
like a wave or not like a wave does not matter. That
which exists in me is the ocean. It has been there
before me, it will be after I am gone. In fact, I never
came and I never went, it was just a manifestation of
the universe. Only then death disappears and birth
too. Otherwise the ego creates the fear that ‘I am
going to die’ and there is a constant trembling in the
heart.
You can never be at ease with the ego. Your anguish is
your ego and nothing else. If you feel the boundary
then you are limited. Then your limitation gives you
pain, and anguish. Then you want to become big. Just
see the mechanism of the ego. First the ego makes
you feel small. It creates a sort of inferiority that ‘I am
so tiny against such a big world; I have to be big - big
in money, and big in power. I have to be the president
or the prime minister or the richest man of the world,
or I have to become Alexander the Great, or
something.’ The ego makes you feel limited and
nobody likes limitation. Then the desire to become
bigger arises. And you go on becoming big but the
bigger you become, the more egoistic you get.
See the absurdity of it. The bigger you become, the
more egoistic you are. You start thinking ‘Now I am
somebody.’ And the more egoistic you become, the
smaller you feel. It is paradoxical: the bigger you
become, the smaller you feel. And again and again the
desire arises to become bigger. With the ego nobody
can become big. It is impossible.
Only by dropping the ego does one suddenly become
big. It is wrong to say one becomes big. One becomes
infinite really. Because then you do not have any
boundaries. Then if there are any boundaries to
existence those are your own boundaries and there
are none. Existence is un-bounded. It has no
possibility of ending anywhere, neither in time nor in
space. In both dimensions it is infinite, and it remains
infinitely infinite.
But do not start dropping the ego. You cannot drop it
because it is a false not a fact. If you start dropping it
you will create another fiction. And the fiction is that
you have become egoless. If you start dropping it, and
you become humble. Then you practice humility, you
will become egoistic again but in a totally new way.
You will start thinking ‘I am the most humble man in
the world, the humblest.’
This is how the human ego functions. You cannot
drop it. Because it is not! How can you drop it? You
can drop something if it exists. You cannot fight with
it. How can you fight with something which is not?
You cannot kill it either. How can you kill it when it is
not?
Then what can one do? One can only understand. One
can look into the mechanism of it. You will come to
know how this whole fiction works. Once you have
looked into the fiction through and through, from one
corner to another, from A to Z, it is not that you drop
the ego in that very insight the ego disappears. In fact,
to say that it disappears is not right it was never
there. You come to realize that you believed in a non-
entity. It was not there from the very beginning.
It is just as if you stay in a room and somebody has
told you that there is a ghost in the room. Now you
cannot sleep. It is not that the ghost is there, it is the
idea that there is a ghost and if you fall asleep there
may be some danger. The ghost may jump upon you.
May sit upon you, or drink your blood or something
else. Ghosts are always unreliable people. One never
knows what the ghost will do. You cannot sleep. In
fact you cannot afford to sleep.
The more sleepless and the more tired you become,
the more you will believe in the ghost. It is
proportional because the weaker you are, the
stronger the ghost becomes. In the middle of the
night, when the whole world has fallen asleep and
everything is silent, you will become more afraid.
Now you are absolutely alone. Everybody has fallen
asleep. Even the traffic has ceased. Now there is
nobody. If the ghost comes you are left alone. Even if
you scream nobody is going to hear you now. Now
you will be more troubled. And a small rat passes by,
or just a bird flutters outside in a tree, or a dry leaf
moving on the road in the wind that is enough! You
can lose all your consciousness.
And there was nothing from the very beginning. You
created the whole thing. You got into an idea and the
idea became a reality. Now you cannot fight with this
ghost, you only have to see whether the ghost is or is
not. You only have to understand. You have to see the
mechanism how the idea of the ghost is manipulating
you. It is just an idea. It is all your idea.
Exactly the same is the case with the ego. The ego is a
ghost. It is unreal. Utterly unreal! But it has been
deeply rooted in you for certain reasons. First, the
society needs it. Without creating a kind of ego in you,
you will be dangerous. Through the ego you can be
manipulated. Just think if you do not have any ego
nobody can frighten you. It is almost impossible. You
can only be frightened through death.
That is why Jesus was not frightened, also Mansur
was not frightened. Many Sufis have been killed.
When Mansur was being crucified, one hundred
thousand people had gathered to see. And somebody
asked because he was laughing, laughing like crazy --
somebody asked, ‘Mansur, have you gone mad? You
are being crucified, why are you laughing? This is
death. Are you not aware of the fact?’ And Mansur
said, ‘That is why I am laughing. They are killing
somebody who is not. That is the whole
ridiculousness of it. That is why I am laughing!’ It is as
if somebody is killing a wave. Maybe the wave
disappears, but how can you kill a wave? It will be
there in the ocean. It will still be there. It will be
absolutely as it was before. Only the form is not there,
but form does not matter. Mansur says, ‘They are
trying to kill somebody who is not there in the first
place, and that is why I am laughing.’
Many Sufis have been killed and they accepted death
with such joy. From where do that joy and that
courage come? It is not the courage of a soldier. No! It
is not at all. It is the courage of a man who has come
to realize that there is no ego that ‘I am not, so how
can you kill me?’ The courage of the soldier is
different from the courage of a saint. The courage of
the soldier is a well maintained courage. Deep down
he is afraid. Deep down him goes on trembling like a
small child. But he has been trained to be brave for
years. In the army he has been trained to be brave. A
soldier’s bravery is a trained attitude. It is his habit to
be brave. But deep down is the suspicion. Deep down
is the fear. Even the greatest soldiers feel fear. It is
quite natural.
The difference between the brave soldier and the
cowardly soldier is not one of fear. The difference is
only that the brave soldier goes into the war, into the
front, into death, into fire, in spite of the fear. The
coward cannot go. He escapes. But the fear is there in
both. The brave man just has an idea of bravery. He
has been conditioned. His ego has been strengthened
in such a way that he has to remain brave. It is
against his ego to escape. It is against his ego to run
away. Otherwise he goes on shaking like a leaf in a
strong wind.
The courage of a saint is totally different. It has
nothing to do with the courage of a soldier. He knows
he is not, so how can you kill him? He knows there is
no death because there has never been any birth. He
has dropped the fallacy of birth so the fallacy. Death
disappears. He has dropped the fallacy of the ego so
all other fallacies also disappear. All other fallacies
hang around the basic fallacy of the ego.
And how does one drop it? Just by seeing into the
ways of it, how it comes. You pull it out from one side,
you push it out from one door and it comes in from
another door, from the back door, in a subtler form so
you cannot recognize it. The society needs the ego,
otherwise people will be uncontrollable. The state
needs it, otherwise people will be so rebellious and
people will be so authentically themselves, that it will
be next to impossible to create slavery, to create
these automatons you see walking on the roads,
working in the offices, factories, this and that. It is a
political stratagem.
And it is utilitarian too. You have to refer to yourself
in some way. It will be confusing if you start using
your name to refer to yourself. First the society needs
to create an ego in you because only then it can
manipulate you. Then it can manage you, very easily.
How does it happen? Once the ego is created, it
becomes possible to manipulate the child. Then you
can tell him that he has to come first in the class. If he
has no ego you cannot create ambition in him. He will
laugh at the whole idea. ‘Why first? Why me first, why
not others? What is wrong if somebody else comes
first?’
Small children do not see the point because they still
do not have crystallized ego. A small child can come
from the school and happily declare to the house, ‘I
have failed again.’ He has not yet been poisoned. But
sooner or later it is going to happen. How long can he
survive without being poisoned? The whole system of
education is a subtle trick to create the ego. Hence so
much competition and ambition is there. Be the first!
Come at the top of the list. Be a gold medalist.
And this goes on and on. It does not end with school.
It continues beyond school. Even old people are
hankering for rewards, awards, Nobel prizes, and
things like that. They are still childish. Once the idea
has entered into your bloodstream that ‘I am’ then
everything is possible. You can be made afraid that if
you do not do this you will lose. And if you do this you
will profit. If you do this you will succeed, otherwise
you will fail. With the idea of the ego, fear of
punishment and greed for profit become possible.
This whole society exists in greed and fear. Once a
child has learned the ways of greed, then for his
whole life he will be rushing after money or power or
prestige. He will be losing his whole life in something
absolutely non-essential. Money is not important,
remember, money is important because you have got
the idea of the ego.
Many may people drop money, or they may renounce
money it is simply ego trip. In India it happens that
people renounce their money and they think they
have renounced something really essential. It is
nothing. Money is secondary. One never loves the
money for money's sake. Instead one loves the money
for the ego's sake. You have one million dollars, your
ego feels puffed up. And now you can renounce one
million dollars and you can go to the Himalayas but
you can still feel puffed up with the idea that ‘I have
renounced a million dollars. Many people have a
million dollars but how many renounce them?' Now
you are getting still higher. The very idea that very
few people can renounce such a lot of money with
such ease will make your ego a little bigger. So those
who renounce have very subtle egos.
If you are a president of a country and you renounce
it and you say, ‘Now I am going to become a
sannyasin and I will go to the Himalayas and
meditate’. Sitting there in a Himalayan cave you will
still enjoy the idea that nobody has ever done that
before. You renounced being president of a country
so you are the greatest monk in the world. The ego
has come, following you like a shadow. It will be there
in your Himalayan cave as well. You cannot escape
from it so easily.
It is a subtle phenomenon. It needs much awareness
to drop it. Just by running away you cannot drop it.
How can you run away from yourself? And this
mechanism is inside you, it is not outside. If it were
outside, you could drop it. But it is inside you, it has
become part of you. It is your very style. You have
lived with it for so long that you do not know how to
live without it. So whatsoever way you choose to live,
the ego will remain there hiding behind it.
The society needs it, the state needs it, the parents
need it, the leaders, and the politicians need it. The
priest also needs it. In fact everyone needs the ego.
Only you do not need it. Only you become miserable
because of it. Only because of it do you miss the
kingdom of God.
So you have to be very, very alert, otherwise the
whole society and the state and everybody is
conspiring. They want you to have the ego. You have
to decide whether you want to go into this trip or you
do not want to go into this trip. You have to see what
you have gained up to now by going into this trip.
What is your gain? What joy has arrived? What bliss
has happened? You can change. You can become the
other-worldly person. Who is not really so other
worldly? You can say, ‘In this world there is nothing,
this world is all nonsense. Death comes and
everything is taken away. I will seek some eternal
power.’ But it is still power. ‘This world’s money is
not very significant. I will seek some other kind of
treasure which is eternal, and will remain with me
perennially.’ Then again you become an egoist with
new names spiritual and, miraculous power.
There are three ways that the so-called spiritual man
can fall into the same trap again. Either he becomes
very knowledgeable then he has the ego that ‘I know
and I know much more than anybody else.’ Or he can
become an ascetic. He can torture himself. He can be
masochistic with himself. He can fast. He can start
committing a slow suicide or he can tell the world, ‘I
am the greatest mahatma. Look I have renounced all,
even my body.’
Still there is the third way. It is that he can start using
psychic energy as power. He can become a miracle
monger. There are great energies in the psyche. They
can all unfold. And when you start moving into deep
meditations they start unfolding.
The real spiritual man will not use them at all
because he knows that that will be a trap and that
trap will bring you back into the mire of the world. A
real spiritual man never uses any power. If miracles
sometimes happen around a real religious man they
happen on their own. He is not the doer.
A man came to Jesus, touched his garments, and was
healed. He wanted to thank Jesus. He was thankful, he
had been ill for years and the doctors had said that
there was no remedy for him and now he is all right.
He could not believe his own eyes. He fell at the feet
of Jesus to thank him and Jesus said, ‘Man, you need
not thank me at all. Thank God. In fact, thank yourself
it is your own faith that has healed you. I have
nothing to do with it.’
This is the quality of the real spiritual man. If
something happens he is not the doer. Yes, miracles
happen but they are not done. And when a person
starts doing them he is no longer spiritual. He has
fallen to the status of a magician. Now there is
nothing of spirituality left. Just as people want to
show their money he wants to show his psychic
powers. But the showman is there. So he is as much
part of the show business as anybody else. Around a
spiritual man miracles happen, real miracles.
Around a really spiritual person real miracles
happen. People transform, change, and people start
attaining new spaces of being. People start moving
into new dimensions of joy and life and eternity.
People start being more loving and more
compassionate. People start blooming. Fragrance
arises. People start dancing. Their heart for the first
time pulsates with celebration. These are real
miracles. People start feeling that God is, people start
trusting that God is. People start becoming aware of
who they are. People start losing their sleepiness.
Their eyes start opening. People become whole, no
longer divided within or fragmentary. Instead they
are integrated. These are real miracles. These
certainly happen.
But they are not done. Nobody is doing them. If
somebody is there to do them ego still exists. And
with the ego, the world comes in. With ego, comes in
all darkness. So you have to be alert. Nobody will be
in favor of you dropping your ego. Your wife will not
be in favor, your husband will not be in favor, your
children will not be in favor because once the
husband drops the ego he has no ambition, so the
wife will not feel good. The wife wants you to go on
and on earning money, purchasing bigger and bigger
houses, having more diamonds, more gold, more
money in the bank, bigger insurance policies and all
that.
If you lose the ego your ambition disappears. Then
you are concerned with ambition no longer, and then
you are not driving yourself mad any more. Of course
you will be healthy, but who bothers about a healthy
husband? You will not have ulcers, that are right, but
wives are not interested in whether you have ulcers
or not. They are interested in having a bigger house,
two houses one in the country, one in the city. They
are more interested in you having a yacht and things
like this. They are more interested in you having
power and prestige and pull.
You will not have ulcers once the ego disappears.
Ulcers will disappear. Ulcers are the footprints of
ambition. You may not have cancer any more. The
cancer may not be possible at all because cancer is
chronic anxiety. When anxiety becomes too much for
the body to absorb it starts moving towards death!
The body starts creating situations where it can die
easily. Cancer is an effort to die. Things have become
unbearable, now there is no point in living. You want
to die. Cancer simply shows your will to death. You
may not be courageous enough to recognize it but
your unconscious is helping you to die easily. That is
why there is no cure for cancer. The man has really
lost his joy of life. He has lost his joy of life in futile
things.
But wives are interested in bigger things. And the
husband is also interested that his wife should be
beautiful. Not that he loves his wife; she is a show-
piece. He takes her around. He can brag around that
he has the most beautiful wife in the world. He does
not care for her a bit. He may not have seen her face
for many years. She is something that helps his ego.
The ego feels very hurt when you start moving with
an ugly woman, naturally. ‘So this is what you have
got?’ There is no other interest; not at all in the
person of the woman, only in the personality and that
too for worldly ends.
This is how things are. So if you start dropping your
ego nobody is going to support you. Everybody will
be against it because everybody's interest is that you
remain egoistic. Even people who teach you to be
egoless! If you really drop the ego they will not feel
very good, because then who are they going to teach
to be egoless? Even the priest who goes on teaching
you to be egoless will be disturbed if you really
become egoless. He will not like the idea at all.
I have heard about a dog who was a kind of preacher.
He used to preach to other dogs of the town that God
has made the dog in his own image. ‘Look,’ he used to
say, ‘even the word “dog” is just made of the same
letters as God. Just see. It is God in reverse. Just a
question of changing the direction and the dog can
become God.’
And it appealed to other dogs. Only one thing was
difficult. He was very much against barking. Priests
are always against some-thing which is impossible to
stop. Now it is impossible for dogs to stop barking.
This would be too much against their dog nature.
They enjoy barking. Barking is their joy. This is their
poetry, their dance, their celebration. When they feel
happy, what else can they do? They bark. When it is
the night of the full moon, they bark. Full moon night
is a great celebration for dogs. They go almost mad. It
is beautiful what else can they do?
He was against barking. Priests are very, very
cunning in finding things which you cannot drop.
They have found sex. You cannot drop it. They are
against it. They have found taste. You cannot drop it.
They are against it. They have found all those things
which are difficult for you to drop. They are against
them. You are not going to drop them and they will go
on preaching to you, ‘Drop them!’
He preached day and night. Wherever he found a dog
barking he would immediately go and start
preaching. The dogs were tired of it although they
knew that he was right. It is useless to bark, they also
knew it, and there was no need to convince them. And
he was very logical.
But one day they decided: ‘Our leader has grown so
old and we have never given him any joy, at least for
one night we should not bark.’ It was the great
leader’s birthday so they thought, ‘This will be a good
present. Let him be happy at least once. Tonight we
are not going to bark at all.’ They all decided.
It was a full moon night and it was very difficult. It
was almost impossible. They were just lying down in
dark holes, holding themselves somehow. Probably in
yoga postures! Repressing, and the more they were
repressing, the more the bark came to their throats.
And the leader went around, and he looked, and not a
single dog was barking. He became puzzled. What has
happened? It was going to be a surprise gift, so
nobody had told him. What has happened? Have dogs
really changed? Then he became worried. ‘Then what
will I do? If they have really stopped then my whole
business has gone. Then what am I going to do?’ He
went around. He trusted dogs’ natures; they would
bark. He knew them very well. His whole life he had
been teaching and nobody had stopped barking.
Sometimes he would find a few disciples who would
stop for one or two days and then they would escape.
They would say, ‘This is too much. We do not want to
go to God. Please let us remain dogs.’
But what has happened? A miracle! He went around
and around and he saw that dogs were not even
visible and nobody was barking. And he could not
teach. And it was getting late, it was the middle of the
night, and for the first time he himself felt a great
urge to bark.
In fact, it had not been felt before because he had to
talk so much morning, evening, night that there was
no energy left to bark. For the first time he had not
found a single disciple to teach.
The energy accumulated. And a great urge to bark
arose. He was surprised because he had not barked
for many years. He had almost forgotten how to bark.
A great thrill came to him. And he decided, ‘No dog is
here why I should not try? What is wrong in it?’ And
all such thoughts come to everybody. ‘Once it is okay.
It cannot be such a sin. Not all dogs are going to hell.’
He knew that it was natural, but he had lived such an
unnatural life, the life of a priest.
So he went into a dark corner in a street and started
barking. The moment he started barking, suddenly
there was a great explosion all over the town. All the
dogs started barking. Everybody was boiling within.
And when they saw that one had broken the vow they
thought that it was somebody from amongst
themselves and they could not think that the priest
would do this. That was impossible. They had known
him for years. Somebody had broken the vow so
there was no need to repress any more. The whole
town exploded into barking. It had never been like
that!
And then out came the leader and started teaching
them again that this was not good. It is only because
of barking that we are not kings of the world,
otherwise we would be the kings of the world. Just
this one thing is destroying our potential.
Priests who go on telling you to drop your egos will
not be very happy if you drop ego. Because the
moment you drop your egos you will be beyond the
control of the priest! So you will have to move into
this direction alone, all alone. Nobody will be helping
you and everybody will be against you.
But unless you understand that the ego is your hell
you cannot be blissful.
MEDITATE OVER THE DIALOGUE BETWEEN HASAN
AND RABIA.
A PARABLE:
HASAN CAME TO RABIA ONE DAY WHEN SHE WAS
SITTING AMONG A NUMBER OF ASPIRANTS, AND
SAID, ‘I HAVE THE CAPACITY OF WALKING ON
WATER. COME, LET US BOTH GO ON TO THAT
WATER YONDER, AND SITTING UPON IT CARRY OUT
A SPIRITUAL DISCUSSION.’
RABIA SAID, ‘IF YOU WISH TO SEPARATE YOURSELF
FROM THIS AUGUST COMPANY, WHY DO YOU NOT
COME WITH ME SO THAT WE MAY FLY INTO THE
AIR AND SIT THERE TALKING?’
HASAN SAID, ‘I CANNOT DO THAT, FOR THE POWER
THAT YOU MENTION IS NOT ONE WHICH I POSSESS.’
RABIA SAID, ‘YOUR POWER OF REMAINING STILL IN
THE WATER IS ONE WHICH IS POSSESSED BY FISH.
MY CAPACITY OF FLYING IN THE AIR CAN BE DONE
BY A FLY. THESE ABILITIES ARE NO PART OF REAL
TRUTH. THESE MAY BECOME THE FOUNDATION OF
SELF-ESTEEM AND COMPETITIVENESS, BUT
DEFINITELY NOT SPIRITUALITY.’
Question 3: I would like to know the methods for
meditation. Also during meditation how to keep
the inner feelings away, and what we should
concentrate upon, sometimes my heart recites
the name of god, is it ok? Kindly give me details.
A real master cannot teach you meditation. However,
certainly in his presence you can catch meditation. In
his presence something begins to happen.
I am reminded of an anecdote from the life of
Michelangelo. Michael was a sculpturist. He used to
spend time by a shop. At the back of the shop lay a
huge piece of marble. For the shop keeper it was a
nuisance. While in conversation with Michael he
mentioned of disposing off this piece of marble.
Hearing this Michael expressed the desire to get the
piece.
Hearing this shopkeeper got elated. He not only
agreed to give Michael the piece instead offered to
transport the marble piece to his home. Michael
started working on the piece of marble. Therein he
carved the sculpture of Jesus and Mary. The body of
Jesus was brought down from the cross and it lay on
the lap of Mary. It was indeed a very lively sculpture.
When the sculpture was ready he asked the
shopkeeper to visit his place as Michael wanted to
show the shopkeeper something. So the shopkeeper
visited Michael. Tears began to flow from the eyes of
the shopkeeper. So he enquired from Michael how he
could create such a beauty out of the stone.
The reply that Michael gave is the response of a
master. No ordinary person can give such a reply.
Michael said, ‘The sculpture was hidden in the marble
piece. I did nothing to create the sculpture. I simply
chiseled out the superfluous marble that was hiding
the manifestation to the sculpture.
Such a reply only a master can give.
So too all I can do is chiseled out all that is
superfluous in you. Only then the real you can shine
in its full splendor. I cannot answer your questions.
Like a master I can only answer the questioning
mind. So that one day this questioning mind can
dissolve and real you comes on the surface.
Be aware of thoughts, feelings arise within you. When
light is thrown in your being all the ugly and dark
corners become lighted. And in that all the hidden
things begin to surface. Your mind is like a dark room
that has not been locked unattended for a long time.
Spider web, cockroaches, rats etc all have found home
in that space. Now you decided to clean the room one
day. The first thing in this regard is to bring light to
the dark room. And as soon as you turn on the light
all that was hidden will expose itself. This is what
happens when one begins meditation.
The more you grow in awareness such thoughts and
emotions will begin to be less.
I have 42 video meditations on You Tube .com and 24
on TOTAL Bhakti.com. these can be reached by using
the word ‘TAOSHOBUDDHA’. Choose one meditation
and listen to that every day at a specific time. My
voice will create grooves in your consciousness. DO
not pay attention to the words. Just allow the voice
and the subtle presence work within. Do this for a
period of 14 to 21 days and then let me know. Then
we will enter the next step.
Only this much for you for now!
Question 4: I want to practice meditation. I am
50yrs.Lot of things are coming in the mind. How
to eradicate them and go for deep silence so, that
I do not require any body for loneliness.
Mind is the disease. You cannot overcome the mind.
Certainly you can go beyond mind. You are seeking a
space within. This is meditation -the ultimate in
healing.
Begin with a simple technique.
Stand by the side of a busy road where cars or people
are passing. Observe one car passes in front of you.
Then there is a gap. Then another car passes. Or
sometimes two cars pass side by side. Between two
cars passing thare is a gap. By nature you tend to
focus on cars not on the gap. Now change the gestalt
keep your attention on the gap between two cars.
This is the gap when there is no noise or car passing.
There is utter silence. This silence or emptiness is
your being. You have to connect to this space.
However because of the noise of the minds and
thoughts impeding the mind you become unaware of
these gaps. And eventually you become completely
oblivious of this inner space. This space gets
encroached upon by thoughts.
This technique will make you aware of the gaps
between two thoughts. When you start observing the
cars or people passing by in a busy market place
slowly and slowly you will start becoming aware of
the gaps. You will realize that these gaps are getting
longer. Something is beginning to happen in your
psychology. This is the beginning of meditativeness.
First you become aware that there is a space of which
you are unaware. And then you start creating this
space within you betwen two thoughts.
The process has begun. It will take between 14 to 21
days for the process to take strides in you.
For doing this choose one spot, one time alone and
then follow this strictly. This will create an insatiable
quest in you.
All my sites can be reached by searching
'taoshobuddha'.
Question 5: Which is your date of Enlightment?
Each one of you is a Buddha. Some have blossomed
others are on the way.
To say that one is enlightened is wrong because there
is nothing but enlightenment alone. It is like placenta
wherein we float.
Yet still there has to be a day and a time when
actually such an awareness dawns on an individual. It
is in such a moment of serenity that one experiences
that he is no more a body. There comes a
discontinuity between body and the being. This is the
moment when existence pours into you in its
wholeness or totality.
I still remember the hour and the day. It was
midnight of May 12th 1972 when I was still in India.
Another time I will narrate the happening. Now from
1981 I am living in Trinidad, West Indies.

Two of my books are available worldwide from You can also download a monthly e magazine free for
steringpublishers@gmail.com download from www.scrib.com

1. Meditation the way to self realization Only this much for now!
2. The secrets of bhakti
Love,
Only this much for now!
Taoshobuddha

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.

The priest is a businessman; his whole effort is to exploit people in the name of
religion. He oppresses people, dominates people, and of course he goes on saying, “It
is for your own sake.” He makes people afraid of hell and greedy for heavenly joys.
This is a psychological trick. He knows people are afraid, he knows people are
greedy, so these are the two things that he goes on manipulating: fear and greed. And
this is done by all the priests of all the religions in all the traditions all over the world.

OSHO – Isha Upanishad

 HADHRAT UWAIS AL-QARANI AND THE UWAISIYAH SUFI ORDER

Hadhrat Faqir Maulawi Jalalluddin Ahmad Ar-Rowi

Naqshbandi Mujaddidi Uwaisi

'Ufiyallahu 'Anhu Wali Walidaihi

Bismillaahir Rahmaanir Rahiim

Nahmaduhu Wa Nusolli 'Ala Rasulihil Karim, Amma Ba'du;

INTRODUCTION ‘The Uwaisiyah Order in Tasawwuf provides

We praise Allah! And we pray to Him! May His
blessings be upon His Beloved Prophet, Hadhrat
Sayyidina Wa Maulana Muhammad Mustafa
Rasulullah Sallallahu Ta'ala 'Alaihi Wa Alihi Wa
Ashabihi Wa Barik Wa Sallam! And may Allah's
blessings also be upon the Prophet's family, his
companions and to those who follow him with
good presence till the Day of Qiyamah. AMIN….
directly the reflexes of ENLIGHTMENT without
apparent contact thus rendering meaningless the
barriers of time, distance and space.’
It is beyond my capacity to explain it in detail but
let me share some of the knowledge and
understandings regarding this rare path with all
my readers in the light of the Prophethood and
from the sayings of the Masters who has passed
through this sacred path.

This humble and poor slave of Allah, Jalalludin HADHRAT UWAIS AL-QARANI
Ahmad has been requested to write some words RADHIYALLAHU 'ANHU
regarding the Naqshbandiyah Uwaisiyah Sufi
In a Hadits Qudsi recorded by Hadhrat Abu
path which, according to Hadhrat Shah Waliyullah
Hurairah Radhiyallahu 'Anhu, May Allah be
Ad-Dehlawi Rahmatullah 'Alaih was the most
pleased with him, the Holy Prophet Muhammad
distinguish Sufi order in the Muslim world. As
Rasulullah Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam said
Hadhrat Syeikh Maulana Abu Anees Muhammad
speaking from his Lord:
Barkat Ali Qaddasallahu Sirruhu mentions in his
book Virtues of Hadhrat Khwajah Uwais Al-Qarani
Radhiyallahu 'Anhu,
"Allah, Exalted and Mighty is He, loves of His
creation the God-fearing, the pure in the heart,
those who are hidden, and those who are innocent,
whose face is dusty, whose hair is unkempt, whose
stomach is empty, and who, if he asks permission
to enter to the rulers, is not granted it, and if he
were to ask for a gentle lady in marriage, he would
be refused, and when he leaves the world it does
not miss him, and if he goes out, his going out is
not noticed, and if he falls sick, he is not attended
to, and if he dies, he is not accompanied to his
grave."
The Companions asked him,
"O Messenger of Allah, how can we find someone
like that?"
The Holy Prophet Muhammad Rasulullah
Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam said,
"Uwais Al-Qarani is such a one."
The Holy Prophet Hadhrat Sayyidina Muhammad
Rasulullah Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam once said in
his Hadith,
"There is a man at Qaran called Uwais, who on the
Day of Resurrection will intercede for a multitude
of my Ummah (community), as many as the sheep
of Rabi'ah and Mudhar."
In another Hadith, the Holy Prophet Hadhrat
Sayyidina Muhammad Rasulullah Sallallahu
'Alaihi Wasallam said,
"Amongst my Ummah, there is a man whom his
intercessions will benefits a large amount of people
from my Ummah as many as the hairs of the sheep
from the tribes of Rabi'ah and Mudhar."
The Holy Prophet Hadhrat Sayyidina Muhammad
Rasulullah Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam once said
regarding that person who will intercedes this
Ummah,
"He is a slave amongst the slaves of Allah."
The Companions asked,
"We are all Allah's slave, but what is his name?"
The Holy Prophet Hadhrat Sayyidina Muhammad
Rasulullah Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam said,
"His name is Uwais Al-Qarani."
The Companions again asked,
"Where is he now?"
The Holy Prophet Hadhrat Sayyidina Muhammad
Rasulullah Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam said,
"He is in Qaran."
The Companions then asked,
"Has he meets you before?"
The Holy Prophet Hadhrat Sayyidina Muhammad
Rasulullah Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam said,
"Not with his physical eyes but he has already
seen me with his spiritual eyes."
Then, the Companions asked the Holy Prophet
Hadhrat Sayyidina Muhammad Rasulullah
Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam what had prevented
Hadhrat Uwais Radhiyallahu 'Anhu from joining
the group of Sahabah?
The Holy Prophet Hadhrat Sayyidina Muhammad
Rasulullah Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam said,
"There are two reasons, firstly because of his highly
intoxicated condition in love with Allah and
secondly due to his following of my Syari'ah
(religion) i.e. the responsibility to serve his mother.
His mother is a believer and too old with blind
eyes. He works as a shepherd and with his earnings
he spents for his mother."
The Companions asked,
"Is it possible for us to see him?"
The Holy Prophet Hadhrat Sayyidina Muhammad
Rasulullah Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam said to
Hadhrat Abu Bakar As-Siddiq Radhiyallahu 'Anhu,
"You will never see him but 'Umar and 'Ali will see
him. His entire body is covered with hairs. On his
left palm there is a sign as big as a Dirham that
looks like leprosy but it isn't. When you meet him,
send my salutation from me to him and tell him to
pray for my Ummah. Amongst the Awliya (saints)
of Allah there are the Atqiya (the most pious), and
he is the best."
Addressing to Hadhrat 'Umar and Hadhrat 'Ali
Radhiyallahu 'Anhuma, the Holy Prophet Hadhrat
Sayyidina Muhammad Rasulullah Sallallahu
'Alaihi Wasallam said,
"You will see him. He is a lowly man of medium
height and hairy, on his left side there is a white
spot as large as a Dirham which is not from
leprosy, and he has a similar spot on the palm of
his hand. When you see him, pass on my greeting
and ask him to pray for my Ummah."
The name Uwaisiyah is related to Hadhrat
Sayyidina Uwais Ibni Amir Ibni Jaz Ibni Malik Al-
Qarani Radhiyallahu 'Anhu (died 37 AH/ 657 CE).
He was the pioneer of the Uwaisiyah spiritual
system which focusing on having a spiritual
connections with the Holy Prophet Muhammad
Rasulullah Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam or other
prophets and saints who had passed this worldly
life, or the saints who are still alive but residing
very far and difficult to reach without meeting
them physically. In many occasions, the Uwaisi
Sufi has no living Syeikh to guide his journey but
he is guided by Allah Ta'ala or His Prophet-Saint
Hadhrat Nabi Khidhr 'Alaihissalam. This kind of
spiritual connection has no limitations in time and
space and it is well known as Nisbat Uwaisiyah.
Anyone who is a true believer can practice this
system but only a few people who really know and
understand about it.
He lives during the Prophethood era but due to
some responsibilities to serve his mother, he could
not spend most of his time away from her. Even
though he had not seen the Holy Prophet
Muhammad Rasulullah Sallallahu 'Alaihi
Wasallam physically, but he has seen the light of
spiritual reality of Muhammad in his insight. The
scholars have categorized him as the greatest
Tabi'in i.e. the greatest follower of the companions
of the Holy Prophet Muhammad Rasulullah
Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam but the Holy Prophet
Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam himself had treated
Hadhrat Uwais as one of his Sahabi (companion).
He does meet with some of the companions such as
Hadhrat Sayyidina 'Umar Ibni Al-Khattab and
Hadhrat Sayyidina 'Ali Ibni Abi Talib Radhiyallahu
'Anhuma.
Due to his love and strong intention to meet the
Holy Prophet Muhammad Rasulullah Sallallahu
'Alaihi Wasallam, his name entered the list of the
companions. The Holy Prophet Muhammad
Rasulullah Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam was
informed about his strong desire to see the Holy
Prophet but since his mother need his full attention
and constant care, he could not get much
opportunity to visit the Holy Prophet Muhammad
Rasulullah Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam in the Holy
City Al-Madinah Al-Munawwarah. His mother
was a blind old lady and need supervision by him.
Once he requested his mother for a leave to go to
the Holy City Al-Madinah Al-Munawwarah to visit
the Holy Prophet Muhammad Rasulullah
Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam. She permitted him to
go to the Holy City but warned him to come back
quickly.
She said,
"You have my permission to go, see him once and
come back straight. If the Prophet Sallallahu 'Alaihi
Wasallam is at home, you may meet with him and
if not, come back without delay."
Hadhrat Uwais Radhiyallahu 'Anhu made a
journey of three months on foot, from Yemen to the
Holy City Al-Madinah Al-Munawwarah. When he
reached the Prophet Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam
house, he knocked the door and Hadhrat 'Aishah
Radhiyallahu 'Anha, the Prophet's wife and Mother
of the believers opened the door. She told him that
Hadhrat Rasulullah Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam
was in masjid.
Hadhrat Uwais Radhiyallahu 'Anhu remembered
his promise to his mother and said to her,
"Please convey my salutations to my Beloved
Rasulullah Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam. Kindly
inform him that Uwais came from Yemen but did
not find him at home and is returning back to
Yemen, since he does not have permission from his
mother to meet him in the masjid."
When the Prophet Hadhrat Muhammad Rasulullah
Sallallhu 'Alaihi Wasallam came home from the
masjid, he found the radiance of Hadhrat Uwais
Radhiyallahu 'Anhu in his house. Hadhrat Aishah
Radhiyallahu Anha explained, what had happened
and thus conveyed the salutations of Hadhrat
Uwais Radhiyallahu Anhu. The Holy Prophet
Muhammad Rasulullah Sallallahu 'Alaihi
Wasallam asked Hadhrat 'Aishah Radhiyallahu
'Anha,
"Did you see Uwais?"
Hadhrat 'Aishah Radhiyallahu 'Anha replied,
"Yes."
After hearing this, the Holy Prophet Muhammad
Rasulullah Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam went out of
the house and called his companions to come at
him quickly. When the companions reached the
Holy Prophet Muhammad Rasulullah Sallallahu
'Alaihi Wasallam, he asked them to look at his face.
So, everyone looked at the Holy Prophet Sallallahu
Alaihi Wasallam face.
Then, the Holy Prophet Muhammad Rasulullah
Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam said,
‚'Aishah Radhiyallahu 'Anha has seen Uwais
Radhiyallahu 'Anhu and therefore, she has been
forgiven. As I see 'Aishah Radhiyallahu 'Anha, I
have been forgiven. And you have seen me,
therefore you are all forgiven."
Subhanallah, what a dignity Allah Subhanahu Wa
Ta'ala had bestowed upon Hadhrat Uwais Al-
Qarani Radhiyallahu 'Anhu that the Holy Prophet
Muhammad Rasulullah Sallallahu 'Alaihi
Wasallam himself gave his respect to Hadhrat
Uwais Al-Qarani Radhiyallahu 'Anhu.
The Holy Prophet Muhammad Rasulullah
Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam look towards Yemen
and said,
"The fragrance of our friend is reaching us."
The Holy Prophet Muhammad Rasulullah
Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam said,
"Uwais will come back to Al-Madinah Al- where they found Hadhrat Uwais were praying
Munawwarah to meet me, but we will not meet under a tree with camels grazing around him. They
physically, for I shall then be united with my Lord." approached him and greeted him, saying,

The Holy Prophet Hadhrat Sayyidina Muhammad "As-Salaamu 'Alaikum Wa Rahmatullahi Wa

Rasulullah Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam had Barakatuh."
mentioned his name many times before he passed
Hadhrat Uwais cut his prayer short, and when he
this worldly life and had instructed his companions
had finished it, returned their greeting. They asked
to find Hadhrat Uwais Al-Qarani Radhiyallahu
him,
'Anhu present his blessed cloak to him and to
request prayers from him for the forgiveness of his "Who are you?"
Ummah.
He replied,
It is mentioned in the stories of the companions
"A herdsman of camels and a hired workman for a
that the search for Hadhrat Uwais Al-Qarani
tribe."
Radhiyallahu 'Anhu has been made since the time
when the Holy Prophet Muhammad Rasulullah They said,
Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam mentioned about his
name and dignity but he could not be found. Even "We do not ask you about your tending of animals,

during the Caliphate of Hadhrat Abu Bakar As- nor about your being a hired worker, but what is

Siddiq Radhiyallahu 'Anhu, there was no traces of your name?"

Hadhrat Uwais Al-Qarani Radhiyallahu 'Anhu. He answered,

Only during the last days of the Caliphate of
Hadhrat 'Umar Al-Khattab Radhiyallahu 'Anhu he "Abdullah (Slave of Allah)."
was found. They said,
According to the Hadits, when people from Yemen "All the people of the heavens and the earth are the
came to the Holy City Al-Madinah Al- slaves of Allah, but what is the name in which your
Munawwarah, Hadhrat 'Umar Radhiyallahu 'Anhu mother named you?"
will asked them if they know about Hadhrat Uwais
Ibni 'Amir Radhiyallahu 'Anhu? Some of the people He said,
from Yemen know about him and his whereabouts.
"My name is Uwais. O you two, what do you want
Hadhrat 'Umar Al-Khattab and Hadhrat 'Ali Ibni
from me?"
Abi Talib Radhiyallahu 'Anhuma set out a search to
find Hadhrat Uwais Al-Qarani Radhiyallahu 'Anhu They said,
and they went to Yemen accompanied by Hadhrat
"Rasulullah Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam once spoke
Bilal Radhiyallahu 'Anhu and finally they found
to us about Uwais Al-Qarani. He gave us a
him at the Mount of 'Arafat when someone told
description of the bluish-black colour of his eyes,
them about his location.
and he told us that he has a white mark under his
Hadhrat 'Umar and Hadhrat 'Ali Radhiyallahu left shoulder. So please show us if you have this
'Anhuma then went quickly to Mount 'Arafat
mark, for then it is you for whom we are
searching."
Hadhrat Uwais Radhiyallahu 'Anhu then bared his
left shoulder, and they saw a white mark. They
then embraced him and kissed him and said,
"We declare that you are Uwais Al-Qarani, so ask
for forgiveness for us and may Allah forgive you."
Furthermore, they said,
"The Holy Prophet Muhammad Rasulullah
Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam had ordered them to
pass on his greeting to you and to request you to
pray for the forgiveness of his Ummah."
He answered,
"I cannot even forgive myself or one of Adam's
children. But there are on land and in the seas
believing men and women, Muslim men and
women, whose invocations to Allah are answered.
Indeed you are worthier than I am for this
supplication"
They replied,
"Surely this is so. We certainly supplicate but please
you pray as per the will of the Holy Prophet
Muhammad Rasulullah Sallallahu 'Alaihi
Wasallam."
Then he said,
"O you two, you know about me and I know about
my state, but who are you?"
Hadhrat Ali Radhiyallahu 'Anhu answered,
"This is the Commander of the Faithful (Al-Amir
Al-Mukminin), Umar ibn al-Khattab, and I am Ali
ibn Abu Talib."
Hadhrat Uwais Radhiyallahu 'Anhu stood up
straight and said,
"As-Salaamu 'Alaikum Ya Amir Al-Mukminin. And
you, O Ali, May Allah repay you with goodness for
this Community (Ummah)."
They said,
"May Allah repay you for yourself and your
goodness?"
Having received the blessed cloak, he went away to
a corner at some distance, placed the cloak in front
on the ground and prostrating, he prays,
"O Allah the Almighty, I shall not wear this
honourable cloak until You have forgiven the
Ummah of the Holy Prophet Muhammad
Rasulullah Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam."
As he took long in prostrating, they thought he
might have died. When they reached near him, he
raised his head from prostration and said,
"Had you not come here, I would not have raised
my head from prostration until I had the glad
tidings of forgiveness of the whole Ummah. Even
then Allah the Almighty has promised to forgive as
many sinners of the Ummah of the Holy Prophet
Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam as much as the hairs of
the sheeps of the tribes of Rabi'ah and Mudhar."
Then Hadhrat 'Umar Al-Khattab Radhiyallahu
'Anhu said to Hadhrat Uwais Al-Qarani
Radhiyallahu 'Anhu,
"Your place is here until I return to Al-Madinah
and may Allah have mercy upon you. Then I will
bring you help from my provision and some of my
clothes. This has been the meeting place between
you and me."
But Hadhrat Uwais Radhiyallahu 'anhu answered
him,
"O Commander of the Faithful, there will be no
other meeting place, in the knowledge of Allah,
between you and me, but this one. So tell me, what
should I do with your provision and what should I
do with your clothes? Do you not see that I am
wearing a woollen gown and a woollen wrapper,
so when do you see me tearing them? Or do you
see that my sandals are worn out and torn? When
do you see me out wearing them? Between your
hand and mine there is a higher barrier which
cannot be crossed by a weighty person, so leave
these things, and Allah will have mercy upon you."
When Hadhrat 'Umar Radhiyallahu 'Anhu heard
these words, he struck the ground with his stick
and shouted out at the top of his voice,
"O would that Umar had not been born by his
mother and that she had been sterile!"
He had converted into Islam during the lifetime of
the Holy Prophet Muhammad Rasulullah
Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam. He is well known
amongst the Sahabah and the Sufis for his deep
love and affection towards Allah Ta'ala and His
Beloved Holy Prophet Muhammad Rasulullah
Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam, the practice of Zuhud
(ascetism) and piety. He is the Sultan of the hidden
servants of Allah. He is the beacon light for the
seeker of spirituality. He is the elixir of the intense
devotion to the Holy Prophet Muhammad
Rasulullah Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam.
He is honoured with the title of Nafs Ar-Rahman
(The Soul of the Compassionate). He reached the
stage of the beloved of the Divine. He spent most of
his time in solitude, fasting during the day keep
awake the whole night. Normally he stood in
Iqamah (standing posture) for Solat (prayers) one
night, spent the next night in Ruku' (kneeling
posture) and spent the next night in Sajdah
(prostration). He often spent his day praying in
addition to the compulsory worship.
Hadhrat Rabi' Ibni Khathi Rahmatullah 'Alaih, a
famous Tabi'in reports,
"One day I went to meet Hadhrat Uwais Al-Qarani
Radhiyallahu 'Anhu. I saw him busy in his Fajr
(early morning) prayer. I waited for him to finish in
order meeting him. Having finished his prayer, he
got engaged is Tasbih and Tahlil and remained so
continuously until Zuhur (early afternoon) prayer.
Likewise, this lasted further until 'Asar (late
afternoon) prayer and from 'Asar to Maghrib
(sunset) prayer. Then I thought he might have a
recess in order to break his fast, but he remained
busy in Zikir (remembrance) and litanies until 'Isha
(late evening) prayer and then to the Morning
Prayer. Three days passed by this way. He slept on
the fourth night for a short while and ate a little.
Then he occupied himself in Istighfar (litanies
seeking forgiveness of Allah the Almighty) thus
uttered this words,
"O Allah the Almighty, I seek Your refuge against
the sleeping eye and stomach full of food."
When Hadhrat Rabi' Rahmatullah 'Alaih witnessed
all this, he returned and said to himself,
"This is enough for me."
He lives in a village called Qaran in Yemen. He was
a noble and very pious person. He denied all kinds
of worldly ornaments and always keeps himself far
from the crowd of people. Some of his people
consider him as a mad man due to his appearance.
He ate only a few dates for fasting during the day
and if he has more dates than what he needed, he
gave it to the poor as Sadaqah (charity).
Physically, he was a man of weak physique, middle
height, slightly off-white color, wide shoulders,
heavy beard, black eyes, sights concentrated at the
place of prostration, a domineering round face and
unruffled hair often covered with dust. He wore a
completely worn out khaki dress that consisted of
two garments, a blanket made of the camel hair and
a pair of trousers. He had on palm of his left hand a
white mark of the size of a Dirham.
His usual dress was a cloak with many patches of
cloth on it. He also has a blanket made of camel's
wool. His physical appearance looks untidy which
makes him ridiculed by the children and the adults.
That is why most of his time he keeps himself far
away from the people because in that way, he
could be near to Allah in solitude.
The Holy Prophet Muhammad Rasulullah
Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam often said to his
companions,
"I receive the breeze of Mercy (Nasim Al-Rahmah)
from the direction of the Yemen."
The Holy Prophet Muhammad Rasulullah
Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam also said,
"The most superior man amongst the generation of
the Tabi'un is Uwais. Whoever amongst you meets
him must try to seek his supplication for
forgiveness."
His love towards the Holy Prophet Muhammad
Rasulullah Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam is so great
that he always keeps himself in practicing the
Sunnah (ethics) and love to follow the Holy
Prophet Muhammad Rasulullah Sallallahu 'Alaihi
Wasallam. He is extinct in the Holy Prophet
Muhammad Rasulllah Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam.
He was completely absorbed and drowned in the
Light of Muhammadi. Let us see what he had done
in proving himself as a true believer and unparallel
follower of the Holy Prophet Muhammad
Rasulullah Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam. It was
stated in the traditions that had he heard the Holy
Prophet Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam injured his
blessed teeth in the Battle of Uhud.
Hadhrat Uwais Radhiyallahu 'Anhu said,
"When I came to know about the two teeth of the
Holy Prophet Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam having
been sacrificed, I broke and took out one tooth first.
Having done this I realized that only Allah the
Almighty knew it well, but perhaps that might not
be the tooth that had broken. Hence I broke
another, still another, thus breaking them all one by
one." Thus Hadhrat Uwais Radhiyallahu 'Anhu
broke all his teeth and was bestowed this martawa
or the benediction as embodiment of his love for
the Rasulullah Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam
THE SAYINGS OF HADHRAT
UWAIS AL-QARANI
1. I searched for honor; I found it in service to the
creatures. I searched for leadership; I found it in the
creatures' welfare. I searched for humility, I found
it in truth. I searched for the source of pride; I
found it in Faqr (poverty). I searched for a valuable
relationship in the Hereafter; I found it in Taqwa
(fear of Allah). I searched for highness; I found it in
Qanaah (contentment). I searched for peace; I
found it in Zuhud (piety).
2. He who believes in three things has Hell nearer
to him than his jugular vein; they are voluptuous
meals, expensive dress and companionship of the
rich.
3. Peace is in solitude.
4. It is imperative on you to guard your heart.
5. You need to safeguard your heart, that is, save
your heart from the thought of everything else.
Keep your desires under control of your heart and
not vice versa.
6. When you sleep, regard death nearer to your
head and when you wake up regard it in front of
you.
7. Do not regard a sin something ordinary, rather
regard it something extraordinary. This is the
reason you commit sins. If you regard a sin
something inferior, then you will also regard Allah
the Almighty inferior.
8. It is regretted at the hearts that are in doubt and
do not seek advice.
9. He who recognized Allah the Almighty, he
recognised everything and nothing remained
hidden from him.
10. Wahdat (Unity of Godhead) is nothing except
Him comes in thoughts.
11. Allah the Almighty writes recompense as many
times as Muslim men and women for he who seeks
forgiveness of the true Muslim, men and women.
12. He who has no wealth to give away in Sadaqah
(charity) should seek forgiveness of true Muslim,
men and women. This is his Sadaqah.
13. Hadhrat Abu Darda Radhiyallahu 'Anhu
reports having heard the Holy Prophet
Muhammad Rasulullah Sallallahu 'Alaihi
Wasallam as saying, "He who prays twenty five or
twenty seven times daily for forgiveness of true
Muslim men and women will be counted amongst
the people whose prayers are met with and who
are the means of livelihood of people on earth.
14. Hidden invocation is better than visiting and
meeting because Riya (show off) might enter in the
latter two.
15. My Rabb's remembrance is most exalted, His
sayings are most true, His is the most truthful
statement, His is the most beautiful writing of all.
16. My advice for you to follow is to emulate the
Almighty Allah's Book, the Holy Al-Quran, the
way of the good and to send Salawat (salutations)
to the Holy Prophet Muhammad Rasulullah
Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam.
17. I only wish that I start the prayer and spend the
night in one Sajadah (prostration) and lost control
of myself, recite repeatedly Subhana Rabbiyal A'la
(Glory be to our Lord Who is Most High).
18. If someone who is praying is hit with a bar and
has not felt it at all, this act will be demonstrative of
the humility of his prayer.
19. If someone worships Allah the Almighty to the
extent of the Heaven and the Earth, Allah the
Almighty will not approve of his worship until the
worshipper has complete belief in Him.
20. O Allah, You created me when I was not worthy
of mention; and You provided for me when I had
nothing; and I wronged my soul and sinned and
confess my guilt. If You forgive me, that will in no
way augment Your authority. You can find others
to punish besides me, but I can find no one to
forgive me but You. Truly, You are the Most
Merciful of those who show mercy.
21. The best and blessed way of belief in Allah the
Almighty: Leave alone and do not worry about that
which has already been set aside for you and whilst
praying turn your mind off the world just as he
does so at the time of his death. This state is
enjoyed only when the human being regards death
nearer to him than his jugular vein. If this is the
state, then the man would be the one who believed
in Allah the Almighty completely. Then his prayers
would be accepted and become one who would Hadhrat Sayyidina 'Isa (Jesus) 'Alaihissalam and
have the honor of nearness to Allah the Almighty. Hadhrat Shah Bahauddin Naqshband Rahmatullah
'Alaih.
THE UWAISIS IN THE NAQSHBANDIYAH
Hadhrat Imam Rabbani Mujaddid Alf Tsani Syeikh
SUFI PATH
Ahmad Faruqi Sirhindi Rahmatullah 'Alaih
The Masters of the Naqshbandiyah Sufi Order are received the spiritual power through the spiritual
Uwaisis because they received the Faidhz i.e. the connection with Hadhrat Shah Bahauddin
overflowing of the spiritual blessings and the Naqshband and Hadhrat Sayyidina 'Ali
spiritual presence of Masters before them. Hadhrat Karramallahu Wajhahu. Hadhrat Syeikh
Khwajah Abu Yazid Bistami Rahmatullah 'Alaih Sharafuddin Ad-Daghistani Rahmatullah 'Alaih
received the spiritual blessings from Hadhrat Imam was raised through the spiritual guidance of
Ja'afar Sadiq Radhiyallahu 'Anhu through the Hadhrat Sayyidina Abu Bakar As-Siddiq
Uwaisi System by meditating the spiritual presence Radhiyallahu 'Anhu and the Holy Prophet Hadhrat
of Hadhrat Imam Ja'afar Sadiq Radhiyallahu 'Anhu Sayyidina Muhammad Rasulullah Sallallahu
at his shrine. Similarly, Hadhrat Khwajah Abul 'Alaihi Wasallam.
Hassan Al-Kharqani Rahmatullah 'Alaih took
Hadhrat Syeikh 'Abdullah Ad-Daghistani was
spiritual guidance from the spiritual presence of
guided spiritually by Hadhrat Sayyidina Uwais Al-
Hadhrat Khwajah Abu Yazid Bistami Rahmatullah
Qarani Radhiyallahu 'Anhu, Hadhrat Sayyidina
'Alaih.
'Abdul Khaliq Ghujduwani Rahmatullah 'Alaih,
Hadhrat Khwajah 'Abdul Khaliq Ghujduwani Hadhrat Shah Bahauddin Naqshband Rahmatullah
Rahmatullah 'Alaih spirituality was raised up by 'Alaih and Hadhrat Sayyidina 'Ali Karramallahu
the spiritual presence of Hadhrat Sayyidina Nabi Wajhahu.
Khidhr 'Alaihissalam, Hadhrat Sayyidina Uwais
Hadhrat Syeikh Nazim received the spiritual
Al-Qarani Radhiyallahu 'Anhu, Hadhrat Sayyidina
guidance from Hadhrat Maulana Jalaluddin Rumi
Abu Bakar As-Siddiq Radhiyallahu 'Anhu and
Rahmatullah 'Alaih and Hadhrat Syeikh 'Abdul
Hadhrat Sayyidina 'Ali Karramallahu Wajhahu.
Qadir Al-Jailani Rahmatullah 'Alaih of Chistiyah
Hadhrat Shah Bahauddin Naqshband Bukhari order.
Rahmatullah 'Alaih , the founder of Naqshbandiah
THE UWAISIYAH SUFI METHOD
path, was raised by the spiritual presence and
guidance from Hadhrat Khawajah 'Abdul Khaliq Uwaisiyah is a form of spiritual connection and
Ghujduwani Rahmatullah 'Alaih, Hadhrat Uwais transmission with any of the Prophets or Saints in
Al-Qarani Radhiyallahu 'Anhu, Hadhrat Sayyidina past or present. The spirits meet in the world called
Abu Bakar As-Siddiq Radhiyallahu 'Anhu, Hadhrat 'Alam Al-Arwah (The World of Spirits) which is
Sayyidina 'Ali Karramallahu Wajhahu and from the beyond 'Alam Al-Ajsam (The Material World).
Holy Prophet Hadhrat Muhammad Rasulullah Whoever gains the spiritual connection and
Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam. spiritual knowledge from the deceased Master, is
called Uwaisi. The spiritual connection with the
Hadhrat Khwajah Ubaidullah Ahrar Rahmatullah
Friends of Allah is as powerful and effective as the
'Alaih was raised by the spiritual guidance of
physical connection. The Uwaisiyah spiritual
system focuses on having a spiritual connections
with the Holy Prophet Muhammad Rasulullah
Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam or other prophets and
great saints who had passed this worldly life, or the
true saints who are still alive but residing very far
and difficult to reach without meeting them
physically. The Uwaisi Sufi has no living Syeikh to
guide his journey but he is guided by Allah Ta'ala
or His Prophet-Saint Hadhrat Nabi Khidhr
'Alaihissalam. This kind of spiritual connection has
no limitations in time and space and it is well
known as Nisbat Uwaisiyah.
Reminiscents of Maulwi Jalaluddin
Ahmad ar Rowi
Once, this humble and poor slave of Allah was at
the Khanqah Sirajiah, Kundiyan Sharif, Mianwali,
Pakistan attending the Suhbah with my Syeikh,
Hadhrat Khwajah Khwajahgan Pir Piran Maulana
Khan Muhammad Sahib Mudda Zilluhul 'Ali in
the month of Ramadhan in the year 1999. During
that time, the elder diciples of Hadhrat Syeikh were
reading the Malfuzat (Sayings) of Hadhrat Qutub
Rabbani Shah 'Abdullah Ghulam 'Ali Dehlawi
Rahmatullah 'Alaih and he mentioned that to
establish the connection with any of the Masters in
the spiritual path in Uwaisi method, one must take
ablution perfectly and offer two Raka'ah Nafil or
Hajat prayer. After completing the prayer by
uttering Salam, one should pray to Allah, may He
bless the intention to build the spiritual connection
with His saints. After praying, one should recite
Istighfar twenty five times, Surah Al-Fatihah with
Bismillah once and Surah Al-Ikhlas thrice and send
the rewards through one's intention to the Holy
Prophet Muhammad Rasulullah Sallallahu 'Alaihi
Wasallam and also send it's reward especially to
the particular prophet or saint whom he want to
establish the spiritual connection. Then one should
sit still in Maraqba (contemplation) and focus on
that particular spiritual personality with sincere
love and affection. One should give his full
concentration focusing on the abstract image of that
particular spirit of the saint or prophet and imagine
that there is a flow of light coming from the upper
side to that particular spirit, and then imagine that
the light overflow from the heart of that particular
spirit to one's heart and keep that vision in mind
until one feels drowning in that condition. With the
grace of Allah the Almighty, the spiritual
connection will be established and he will gain the
spiritual benefits from that particular spirit such as
spiritual guidance, knowledge, power and
blessings.
When I heard about this, I think that it would be a
great opportunity for me to try it and build the
spiritual connection with all the Masters in the
Naqshbandiyah Mujaddidiyah Silsilah. But first
of all, I think maybe it will be good if I have the
spiritual connection with Hadhrat Imam At-
Tariqat Shah Bahauddin Naqshband
Rahmatullah 'Alaih because I love his Naqshband
Tariqat (Sufi Path).
So, at that night, I did as what I have heard from
the Malfuzat of Hadhrat Qutub Rabbani Shah
'Abdullah Ghulam 'Ali Dehlawi Rahmatullah
'Alaih. After I finished all the procedures, I put
myself in Maraqba the whole night concentrating
upon the blessed spirit of Hadhrat Shah
Bahauddin. [SUBHAN ALLAH!]
When I slept, a vision came to me in my dream that
I saw the spirit of Hadhrat Shah Bahauddin
Naqshband is focusing his Faidhz flowing upon me
until I felt that all the cells and nucleus in my body
is uttering the word Allah! Allah! Non stop! In that
dream, I feel the whole part of my body is shivering
while uttering Allah! Allah! It could not stop and
then I cried out loudly in that dream, "O my
Sheikh, what had happen to me? Why the whole
part of my body couldn't stop uttering Allah
Allah?" Suddenly the vision stops and when I woke
up in the morning, I can still feel the vibration in
my heart, veins, muscles and cells are still sounding
the word Allah Allah. At that time I was doing the
regular Zikir on Latifah Nafs. After I finished my
regular Zikir I went to meet my Syieikh Hadhrat
Maulana Khan Muhammad Sahib and tell him
everything what had happen to me from the
beginning.
Then he said,
"Ma Sya Allah, May Allah Ta'ala bless you."
Then he taught me how to do the Zikir in the
Latifah Qalibiyah i.e. in the subtlelities of the four
elements: Air, Fire, Water and Soil. It is also known
as Sultan Az-Zikir. From that time,
understanding about the Uwaisi system had
brought me to love and gain Faidhz from all the
Past Masters of this highest Sufi Order and all the
Masters from other Sufi Order as well, especially
the greatest spirit of the Holy Prophet Muhammad
Rasulullah Sallallahu 'Alaihi Wasallam
though I am residing far in the East. Allah Taa’la’s
qudrath is not confined to any place or time. This is
nisbete gaib.
Indeed, the Faidhz of spiritual light is from Allah
Ta'ala that He bestows it to the Holy Prophet
Muhammad Rasulullah Sallallahu 'Alaihi
Wasallam and then to the Sahabah, and then to
those who follows them till the Last Day. Anyone
can try to establish this kind of connection if they
intended to have the spiritual relationship with any
prophet or saint spiritually. Give your love and
attention to the saints and for sure they will love
you and pay their attentions towards you.
May Allah forgive this humble and poor slave if
what has been written here is not appropriate for
the public? My hope is that by understanding the
life and sayings of Hadhrat Uwais Al-Qarani
Radhiyallahu 'Anhu will encourage us to love him
and love the path he invented and thus, to develop
the Uwaisiyah spiritual system in our daily life so
that our spirit will always be guided by the true
Spiritual Masters. May Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala
forgive all my sins and all the sins of all Muslim
men and women till the day of Qiyamah.
Wallahu A'lam Bissawab Wa La Haula Wa La
Quwwata Illa Billah.
I, Taoshobuddha Naqshbandiyah Mujadadiah wa
Mazaharia confirm all that our brother Hadhrat
Faqir Maulawi Jalalluddin Ahmad Ar-Rowi
Naqshbandi Mujaddidi Uwaisi has written about
the teachings, path and the Sheikh. It was at my
request he had agreed to write this for the wider
my
seekers along the path. He is the international
contributor in the monthly e magazine
‘MEDITATION TIMES’. This union has the
blessing of Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala, Holy
Prophet Muhammad Rasulullah Sallallahu 'Alaihi
Wasallam and the sheikhs of the past and those
even
who are yet to come.
ALHAM DIL ALLAH WA RABBOOL ALMIM!
Mysticism is the experience that life is not
logic. That life is poetry! That life is not
syllogism! That life is a song. Mysticism is the
declaration that life can never really be known!
It essentially remains unknowable. One can
only live it. And also be it.
Taoshobuddha
Leaves from a Sufi Heart
volume I I
COOKING
TAOSHOBUDDHA WAY

MA PREM SUTRA

RECIPE OF THE MONTH

 VEGETABLE SAMOSA

INGREDIENTS:
FOR SHELL:

All purpose flour (Maida) 1 cup

Water to knead dough
Oil 4tbsp
Salt to taste
Ajwain (optional) 1/4th tsp.
Baking Soda (optional) one pinch

FOR STUFFING:

Potatoes (boiled, peeled & diced) 4-5 medium

Green Peas 1/2 cup
Green Chilies (finely chopped) 1-2
Ginger (crushed or finely chopped) 1/2tsp
Cumin seed whole 1tbs
Coriander finely chopped1tbsp
Few chopped Cashews (optional)
Few Raisins (optional)
crushed coriander seeds 2 Tbs
Salt to taste
Red chili powder to taste
Dry Mango powder( Amchur or anardana) (optional)* 1/2 tsp.
Cottage cheese 2Tbs

Note: You can use chaat masala, or tamarind pulp (the only problem is that tamarind
pulp will turn the mix dark)

METHODOLOGY:

SHELL:

1. Mix all the ingredients (salt, oil, Ajwain, baking soda) well except water.
2. Add a little water at a time.
3. Pat and knead well for several times into soft pliable dough.
4. Cover it with moist Muslin cloth and keep aside for 15 minutes to allow it to settle.

FOR FILLING:

1. Heat oil in frying pot. Add cumin seed and crackle these. Add chopped ginger,
and chillies. Sauté for a few mins.
2. Now add diced potatoes. Mix well and cook for a few mins.
3. Add all dry masalas (salt, chili powder, mango powder, and mix well.
4. Add green peas, cashews and raisins and mix well.
5. Add coriander and keep aside.

METHODLOLGY

1. Divide the dough into 16 equal portions

2. Roll one portion at a time into a 5"-6" diameter circle.
3. Divide it into two parts by cutting diagonally into two semi-circle.
4. Now take one semi circle and fold it like acone using water to the straight edge.
And then fold to form a cone. This requires a little experience. It is very easy to
learn or.
5. Place a spoon of filling in the cone and seal the third side using a drop of water.
6. Heat oil in a Kadhai a shallow wok like pot and deep fry till golden brown (fry on
a medium flame).
7. Serve Samosa hot with chutney of your choice
8. Green coriander, mint or mixed chutney, tamarind chutney.
 JIDDU KRISHNAMURTHY
THE MAKING OF A WORLD TEACHER
(May 12, 1895–February 17, 1986)
J iddu Krishnamurthy is an Enlightened Master.
A contemporary of our time! Brought up in
western ways and mannerism and attire even
after enlightenment Jiddu remained a suave well
dressed, elegant gentleman. Alike contemporary
enlightened ones Jiddu did not adopt the attire of
an ascetic. Yet still his inner being was soaked with
the fragrance of the dissolution with the whole.
With pleasant expression, and a beaming glow on
face Jiddu explained the most intricate questions
that life posed with dexterity and deep insight of a
master. Anyone who just happen to catch a mere
glimpse of Jiddu cannot just pause to listen. With
Jiddu ushered a new era in inner journey.
Jiddu is recognized as a well known writer who
spoke on philosophical and spiritual matters. He
spoke on psychological revolution, the nature of
the mind, meditation, human relationships, and
how to enact positive change in society. Jiddu
stressed the need for a revolution in the psyche of
every human being and emphasized that such a
revolution cannot be brought about by any
external effort be it religious, political or social.
As early as 1889 Helena Blavatsky, founder of the
Theosophical Society, had told certain of her
students that the purpose of Theosophy was to
prepare humanity for the coming of the Lord
Maitreya (an incarnation of Buddha), the World
Teacher for the Aquarian Age. After Blavatsky's
death, Annie Besant and C.W. Leadbeater
considered it their task to carry on this work, part
of which was the preparation of a disciple who
would serve as a vehicle for the Teacher when He
appeared.
Jiddu Krishnamurthy came from a family of
Telugu-speaking Brahmins. His father, Narianiah
Jiddu, was employed as an official of the then
colonial British administration. Krishnamurti was
very fond of his mother, Sanjeevamma, who died
when he was ten. His parents were second cousins,
having a total of eleven children, only six of whom
survived childhood. They were strict vegetarians,
and were known to throw away any food that the
‘shadow of an Englishman had crossed’.
Jiddu was born on May 12, 1895 in the small town
of Madanapalle in Chittoor District in Andhra
Pradesh about a hundred and fifty miles north of
Madras. As the eighth child, who happened to be a
boy, he was, in accordance with common Hindu
practice, named after Sri Krishna.
In 1903, the family settled in Cudappah, where
Krishnamurthy during a previous stay had
contracted malaria, a disease with which he would
suffer recurrent bouts over many years. He was a
sensitive and sickly child; ‘vague and dreamy’ he
was often taken to be mentally retarded, and was
beaten regularly at school by his teachers and at
home by his father. Several decades later,
Krishnamurti reminisced about his state of mind
during childhood: ‘No thought entered his mind.
He was watching and listening and nothing else.
Thought with its associations never arose. There
was no image-making. He often attempted to think
but no thought would come.’ Writing about his
childhood and early adolescence in memoirs he
composed when he was eighteen years old,
Krishnamurthy described psychic experiences,
such as ‘seeing’ his sister, who had died in 1904,
and also his mother, who had passed away in
1905. Another aspect of his childhood was his
bond with nature that continued throughout his
life: ‘...He always had this strange lack of distance
between himself and the trees, rivers and
mountains. It wasn't cultivated.’
Krishnamurthy’s father Narianiah retired at the
end of 1907, and, being of limited means, wrote to
Annie Besant, then president of the Theosophical
Society, seeking employment at the Theosophical
headquarters estate at Adyar. Even though an
observant orthodox Brahmin, Narianiah had been
a member of the Theosophical Society since 1882.
He was eventually hired by the Society as a clerk,
and he moved his family there in January, 1909.
Narianiah and his sons were at first assigned to
live in a small cottage that lacked adequate
sanitation and which was located just outside the
Theosophical compound. As a result of poor living
conditions, Krishnamurthy and his brothers were
soon undernourished and infested with lice.
Leadbeater was aware of Buddha’s coming back
after 2500 years as Maitreya to set the wheel of
Dhamma in motion again. He needed to prepare
someone for this event. Both were the leaders of
the Society at the time. Both Leadbeater and Annie
Besant needed to groom someone to be a ‘vehicle’
for an expected World Teacher and incarnation of
Buddha to set the wheel once again in motion.
It was in April of 1909 that J. Krishnamurthy was
discovered on a private beach in Adyar near Adyar
River by Leadbeater. During his forays to the
Theosophical estate's beach at the nearby Adyar
River, Leadbeater had noticed Krishnamurthy
(who also frequented the beach with others).
Leadbeater was amazed by the ‘unique aura he
had ever seen, without a particle of selfishness in
it’. This strong impression was notwithstanding
Krishnamurthy's outward appearance, which,
according to eyewitnesses, was pretty common,
unimpressive, and unkempt. The boy was also
considered ‘particularly dull-witted’. He often had
‘a vacant expression’ that ‘gave him an almost
moronic look’. Leadbeater remained ‘unshaken’
that the boy would become ‘a great teacher.’
The pure aura of the boy attracted the attention of
Leadbeater and he thought that this boy would be
the new world-teacher. An organization was
created to celebrate the followers of this new
leader. Leadbeater choose Jiddu, his brother
Nityanand and a German boy. The three were
subsequently raised under the guidance and
protection of Annie Besant and C.W. Leadbeater.
Pupul Jayakar, in her biography of Krishnamurti
quotes him speaking of that period in his life some
75 years later: ‘The boy had always said, 'I will do
whatever you want'. There was an element of
subservience, obedience. The boy was vague,
uncertain, and woolly; he did not seem to care
what was happening. He was like a vessel, with a
large hole in it, whatever was put in, went through,
nothing remained.’
Following his ‘discovery’, Krishnamurthy was
taken under the wing of the leadership of the
Theosophical Society in Adyar and their inner
circle. Leadbeater and a small number of trusted
associates undertook the task of educating,
protecting, and generally preparing
Krishnamurthy as the ‘vehicle’ of the expected
World Teacher. Krishnamurthy (or Krishnaji as he
was often called lovingly) and his younger brother
Nitya were privately tutored at the Theosophical
compound in Madras.
The family later came to know of the plan. During
all this time, Krishnamurthy had developed a
strong bond with Annie Besant, and came to view
her as his surrogate mother. Apart from his early
close relationship with his mother, this was the
first of several important and intimate
relationships that Krishnamurthy established with
women during his lifetime. His father, pushed into
the background by the swirl of interest around
Krishnamurthy, sued the Theosophical Society in
1912 to protect his parental interests. After a
protracted legal battle Besant took custody of
Krishnamurthy and his brother Nitya. As a result
of this separation from his family and home,
Krishnamurthy and his brother became extremely
close, and in the following years they often
traveled together.
And they began to claim. This was disturbing the
plans of Annie Besant. So she carried both Jiddu
and Nitya away from Adyar to England. There he
was exposed to a comparatively opulent life
among a segment of European high society. And
they continued their education abroad. In spite of
his history of problems with school work and
concerns about his capacities and physical
condition, the fourteen year old Krishnamurti was
within six months able to speak and write
competently in English.
The Theosophical Leadership in 1911 established
a new organization called the Order of the Star in
the East, in order to prepare the world for the
aforementioned ‘coming’. Krishnamurthy was
named as its head, with senior Theosophists in
various positions. Membership was open to
anybody who accepted the doctrine of the coming
of the World Teacher. Controversy erupted soon
after, within the Theosophical Society and without,
in Hindu circles and the Indian press.
Mary Lutyens, in her biography of Krishnamurthy,
states that there was a time when he fully believed
that he was to become the World Teacher after
correct spiritual and secular guidance and
education. Another biographer describes the daily
program imposed on him by Leadbeater and his
associates, which among other things included
rigorous exercise and sports, tutoring in a variety
of school subjects, theosophical and religious
lessons, yoga and meditation, as well as instruction
in proper hygiene and the ways of British society
and culture. Unlike sports, where he showed
natural aptitude, Krishnamurthy always had
problems with formal schooling and was not
academically inclined. He eventually gave up
university education after several attempts at
admission. He did take to foreign languages,
eventually speaking several (French and Italian
among them) with some fluency. In this period, he
apparently enjoyed reading parts of the Old
Testament, and was impressed by some of the
Western classics, especially Shelley, Dostoyevsky
and Nietzsche. He also had, since childhood,
considerable observational and mechanical skills,
being able to correctly disassemble and
reassemble complicated machinery.
His public image, as originally cultivated by the
theosophists, ‘...was to be characterized by a well-
polished exterior, a sobriety of purpose, a
cosmopolitan outlook and an otherworldly, almost
beatific detachment in his demeanor.’ And in fact,
‘...All of these can be said to have characterized
Krishnamurthy's public image to the end of his
life.’ It was apparently clear early on that he
‘...possessed an innate personal magnetism, not of
a warm physical variety, but nonetheless emotive
in its austerity, and inclined to inspire veneration.’
However, as Krishnamurthy was growing up, he
showed signs of adolescent rebellion and
emotional instability, chafing at the regimen
imposed on him, and occasionally having doubts symptoms worsened, with increasing pain,
about the future prescribed him. extreme physical discomfort and sensitivity. Also
there was total loss of appetite and occasional
From the time Krishnamurthy and Nitya were
delirious ramblings. Then, he seemed to lapse into
taken to England for the first time in April 1911
unconsciousness. Actually, he recounted that he
and the start of World War I in 1914, they also
was very much aware of his surroundings and
visited several other European countries, always
while in that state. He had an experience of
accompanied by theosophist chaperones. After the
mystical union. The following day the symptoms,
war, Krishnamurthy (again accompanied by his
and the experience, intensified climaxing with a
brother) embarked on a series of lectures,
sense of ‘immense peace’.
meetings, and discussions around the world
relating to his duties as the head of the Order Of ‘..I was supremely happy, for I had seen. Nothing
the Star. In 1922, Krishnamurthy and Nitya could ever be the same. I have drunk at the clear
travelled from Sydney to California on their way to and pure waters and my thirst was appeased. ...I
Switzerland. While in California they lodged at a have seen the Light. I have touched compassion
cottage in then relatively secluded Ojai Valley, which heals all sorrow and suffering; it is not for
offered to them for the occasion by an American myself, but for the world. ...Love in all its glory has
member of the Order. At Ojai, the brothers also intoxicated my heart; my heart can never be
met Rosalind Williams, the sister of a local closed. I have drunk at the fountain of Joy and
Theosophist, who eventually became close to them eternal Beauty. I am God-intoxicated.’
both. For the first time the brothers were without
Similar incidents continued with short
immediate supervision from their Theosophical
intermissions until October, and later eventually
Society minders. They spent their time in nature
resumed regularly, always involving varying
hikes and picnics with friends, spiritual
degrees of physical pain to mark the start of ‘the
contemplation, and planning their course within
process’, accompanied by what is variably
the ‘World Teacher Project’. Krishnamurthy and
described as ‘presence’, ‘benediction’, ‘immensity’,
Nitya found the Ojai Valley to be very agreeable,
and ‘sacredness’, which was reportedly often felt
and eventually a trust, formed by supporters,
by others present.
purchased for them the cottage and surrounding
property, which henceforth became Several explanations have been proposed for the
Krishnamurthy's official place of residence. events of 1922 and ‘the processes’ in general.
Leadbeater and other theosophists, although they
It was in Ojai, in August 1922, that Krishnamurthy
expected the ‘vehicle’ to have certain paranormal
went through an intense, ‘life-changing’
experiences, were mystified by the developments,
experience. It has been simultaneously, and
and were at a loss to explain the whole thing.
invariably, characterized as a spiritual awakening,
Krishnamurthy himself told Pupul Jayakar about
a psychological transformation, and a physical
the process many decades later in 1979: ‘It was
conditioning. Krishnamurthy and those around
possible that the pain and what took place was
him would refer to it as ‘the processes’, and it
necessary as the brain was not ready. Traces of
continued, at very frequent intervals and varying
immaturity remained; the brain cells were not
forms of intensity, until his death. According to
large enough to receive the Energy. When the
witnesses, it started on the 17th, with
Energy comes pouring in and the brain is not
Krishnamurthy complaining of extraordinary pain
capable of holding it, then that Energy feels it has
at the nape of his neck, and a hard, ball-like
to polish it up. It may be its own activity.’ The
swelling. Over the next couple of days, the
‘process’, and the inability of Leadbeater to explain
it satisfactorily, if at all, had other consequences
according to biographer R. Vernon:
‘The process at Ojai, whatever its cause or validity,
was a cataclysmic milestone for Krishna. Up until
this time his spiritual progress, chequered though
it might have been, had been planned with solemn
deliberation by Theosophy's grandees.
...Something new had now occurred for which
Krishna's training had not entirely prepared him.
...A burden was lifted from his conscience and he
took his first step towards becoming an individual.
...In terms of his future role as a teacher, the
process was his bedrock. ...It had come to him
alone and had not been planted in him by his
mentors...It provided Krishna with the soil in
which his newfound spirit of confidence and
independence could take root.’
Finally, the unexpected death of his brother Nitya
on November 11, 1925 at age 27 from tuberculosis
after a long history with the disease,
fundamentally shook Krishnamurthy's belief in
Theosophy and his faith in the leaders of the
Theosophical Society. According to eyewitness
accounts, the news ‘...broke him down completely’.
He struggled for days to overcome his sorrow,
eventually ‘...going through an inner revolution,
finding new strength’. The experience of his
brother's death apparently shattered any
remaining illusions, and things would never be the
same again:
"’..An old dream is dead and a new one is being
born, as a flower that pushes through the solid
earth. A new vision is coming into being and a
greater consciousness is being unfolded. ...A new
strength, born of suffering, is pulsating in the veins
and a new sympathy and understanding is being
born of past suffering - a greater desire to see
others suffer less, and, if they must suffer, to see
that they bear it nobly and come out of it without
too many scars. I have wept, but I do not want
others to weep; but if they do, I know what it
means.
In the next few years Krishnamurthy's new vision
and consciousness continued to develop and
reached a climax in 1929, when he rebuffed
attempts by Leadbeater and Besant to continue
with the Order of the Star. Krishnamurthy
dissolved the Order at the annual Star Camp at
Ommen, the Netherlands, on August 3rd, 1929
where, in front of Annie Besant and several
thousand members, he gave a speech saying
among other things:
‘You may remember the story of how the devil and
a friend of his were walking down the street, when
they saw ahead of them a man stoop down and
pick up something from the ground, look at it, and
put it away in his pocket. The friend said to the
devil, ‘what did that man pick up?’ ‘He picked up a
piece of the truth,’ said the devil. ‘That is a very
bad business for you, then,’ said his friend. ‘Oh, not
at all,’ the devil replied, ‘I am going to help him
organize it.’
I maintain that truth is a pathless land, and you
cannot approach it by any path whatsoever, by any
religion, by any sect. That is my point of view, and I
adhere to that absolutely and unconditionally.
Truth, being limitless, unconditioned,
unapproachable by any path whatsoever, cannot
be organized; nor should any organization be
formed to lead or coerce people along a particular
path.’
And also:
‘This is no magnificent deed, because I do not
want followers, and I mean this. The moment
you follow someone you cease to follow Truth.
I am not concerned whether you pay attention
to what I say or not. I want to do a certain thing
in the world and I am going to do it with
unwavering concentration. I am concerning
myself with only one essential thing: to set man
free. I desire to free him from all cages, from all
fears, and not to found religions, new sects, nor
to establish new theories and new
philosophies.’
Following the dissolution, some Theosophists
turned against Krishnamurthy and publicly
wondered whether ‘...the Coming had gone wrong’.
Mary Lutyens states that ‘...After all the years of
proclaiming the Coming, of stressing over and over
again the danger of rejecting the World Teacher
when he came because he was bound to say
something wholly new and unexpected, something
contrary to most people’s preconceived ideas and
hopes, the leaders of Theosophy, one after the
other, fell into the trap against which they had so
unremittingly warned others.’
Jiddu had denounced all organized belief, the
notion of gurus, and the whole teacher-follower
relationship, vowing instead to work in setting
man absolutely, totally free. Mary Lutyens notes
that he never actually denied being the World
Teacher; when asked, he insisted that the question
was irrelevant. In correspondence with Lady Emily
Lutyens, who was distressed over the ending of
the Order and its World Teacher Project, he
remarked: ‘You know mum I have never denied it
[being the World Teacher], I have only said it does
not matter who or what I am but that they should
examine what I say, which does not mean that I
have denied being the W.T." When a reporter
asked him if he was the Christ, he answered "Yes,
in the pure sense but not in the traditional
accepted sense of the word." From that time, he
began to disassociate himself from the
Theosophical Society and its teachings and
practices, despite being on cordial terms with
some of its members and ex-members throughout
his life.
Krishnamurti would only refer to his teachings as
‘the’ teachings and not as ‘myhu teachings. His
concern was always about "the" teachings: the
teacher had no importance, and spiritual authority
was denounced.
‘All authority of any kind, especially in the field of
thought and understanding, is the most
destructive, evil thing. Leaders destroy the
followers and followers destroy the leaders. You
have to be your own teacher and your own
disciple. You have to question everything that man
has accepted as valuable, as necessary.’
Krishnamurthy returned all monies and properties
donated to the Order of the Star - including a castle
in Holland and around 5,000 acres (20 km2) of
land - to their donors. He subsequently spent the
rest of his life holding dialogues and giving public
talks across the world on the nature of belief,
truth, sorrow, freedom, death, the apparently
eternal quest for a spiritually-fulfilled life, and
related subjects. Following on from the ‘pathless
land’ notion, he accepted neither followers nor
worshippers, seeing the relationship between
disciple and guru as encouraging the antithesis of
spiritual emancipation - dependency and
exploitation. He constantly urged people to think
independently and clearly, and invited them to
explore and discuss specific topics together with
him, to ‘walk as two
friends’. He accepted gifts
and financial support
freely offered to him by
people inspired by his
work, and continued
with lecture tours and
the publication of books
and talk transcripts for
more than half a century.
There is much more to say. And in fact if I continue
the purpose of this issue will not serve. We are to
follow the framework of this issue as instructions
from the Chief Editor so that there is no deviation
from the actual theme. However I certainly assure
you I will come back with more on Jiddu
Krishnamurthy.
ONLY THIS MUCH FOR NOW!!!
LOVE NOW AND HERE - TAOSHOBUDDHA
 TEACHINGS OF JIDDU KRISNAMURTHY
J
iddu frequently spoke on various topics
throughout his life after enlightenment.
The most important of his talks centered
on the following subjects.
KNOWLEDGE
Krishnamurti constantly emphasized the right
place of thought in daily life. But he also
pointed out the dangers of thought and
thought process when it becomes knowledge
that acts as a calcified projection of the dead
past. According to Krishnamurti, such action
distorts our perception and full understanding
of the world we live in, and more specifically,
the relationships that define it. Because of
this one cannot live HERENOW. Some
excerpts:
‘How is the mind which functions on
knowledge? And how is the brain which is
recording all the time? To see the importance
of recording and not let it moves in any other
direction? Very simply: you insult me, you
hurt me, by word, gesture, by an actual act;
that leaves a mark on the brain which is
memory. That memory is knowledge that
knowledge is going to interfere in my meeting
you next time – obviously. ... Knowledge is
necessary to act in the sense of my going
home from here to the place I live; I must
have knowledge for this; I must have
knowledge to speak English; I must have
knowledge to write a letter and so on.
Knowledge as function, mechanical function,
is necessary. Now if I use that knowledge in
my relationship with you, another human
being, I am bringing about a barrier, a
division between you and me, namely the
observer. That is, knowledge, in relationship,
in human relationship, is destructive. That is
knowledge which is the tradition, the
memory, the image, which the mind has built
about you that knowledge is separative and
therefore creates conflict in our relationship.’
‘The brain has been trained to record for in
that recording there is safety, security, a sense
of vitality; in that recording the mind creates
the image about oneself. And that image will
constantly get hurt. Is it possible to live
without a single image about yourself, or
about your husband, wife, children, or about
the politicians, the priests, or about the ideal?
It is possible, and if it is not found you will
always be getting hurt, always living in a
pattern in which there is no freedom. When
you give complete attention there is no
recording. It is only when there is inattention
that you record. That is: you flatter me; I like
it; the liking at that moment is inattention
therefore recording takes place. But if when
you flatter me I listen to it completely without
any reaction, then there is no center which
records.’
‘The brain is the source of thought. The brain
is matter and thought is matter. Can the brain
– with all its reactions and its immediate
responses to every challenge and demand –
can the brain be very still? It is not a question
of ending thought, but of whether the brain
can be completely still. This stillness is not
physical death. See what happens when the
brain is completely still.’
Fear and Pleasure
Fear and pleasure were lifelong themes in his
public talks. The following is an excerpt from
his talk in San Diego in 1970.
‘Fear is always in relation to something; it
does not exist by itself. There is fear of what
happened yesterday in relation to the
possibility of its repetition tomorrow; there is
always a fixed point from which relationship
takes place. How does fear come into this? I
had pain yesterday; there is the memory of it
and I do not want it again tomorrow. Thinking
about the pain of yesterday, thinking which
involves the memory of yesterday’s pain,
projects the fear of having pain again
tomorrow. So it is thought that brings about
fear. Thought breeds fear; thought also
cultivates pleasure. To understand fear you
must also understand pleasure – they are
interrelated; without understanding one you
cannot understand the other. This means that
one cannot say ‘I must only have pleasure and
no fear’; fear is the other side of the coin
which is called pleasure.
Thinking with the images of yesterday’s
pleasure, thought imagines that you may not
have that pleasure tomorrow; so thought
engenders fear! Thought tries to sustain
pleasure and thereby nourishes fear.
Thought has separated itself as the analyzer
and the thing to be analyzed; they are both
parts of thought playing tricks upon it. In
doing all this it is refusing to examine the
unconscious fears; it brings in time as a means
of escaping fear and yet at the same time
sustains fear.’
MEDITATION
Krishnamurti used the term ‘meditation to
mean something entirely different from the
practice of any system or method to control
the mind, or to consciously achieve a specific
goal or state. He dealt with the subject of
meditation in numerous public talks and
discussions.
‘A mind that is in meditation is concerned
only with meditation, not with the meditator.
The meditator is the observer, the sensor, the
thinker, the experiencer, and when there is the
experiencer, the thinker, then he is concerned
with reaching out, gaining, achieving,
experiencing. And that thing which is timeless
cannot be experienced. There is no experience
at all. There is only that which is not
nameable.’
‘You know, in all this there are various
powers like clairvoyance, reading somebody’s
thought – which is the most disgusting thing
to do: it is like reading letters that are private.
There are various powers. You know what I
am talking about, don’t you? You call them
siddhis, don’t you? Do you know that all these
things are like candles in the sun? When there
is no sun there is darkness, and then the
candle and the light of the candle become
very important. But when there is the sun, the
light, the beauty, the clarity, then all these
powers, these siddhis – developing various
centers, chakras, kundalini, you know all that
business – are like candlelight; they have no
value at all. And when you have that light,
you don’t want anything else.’
‘Meditation is one of the greatest arts in life-
perhaps the greatest, and one cannot possibly
learn it from anybody, that is the beauty of it.
It has no technique and therefore no authority.
When you learn about yourself, watch
yourself, watch the way you walk, how you
eat, what you say, the gossip, the hate, the
jealousy-if you are aware of all that in
yourself, without any choice, that is part of
meditation.’
‘Man, in order to escape his conflicts, has
invented many forms of meditation. These
have been based on desire, will, and the urge
for achievement, and imply conflict and a
struggle to arrive. This conscious, deliberate
striving is always within the limits of a
conditioned mind, and in this there is no
freedom. All effort to meditate is the denial of
meditation. Meditation is the ending of
thought. It is only then that there is a different
dimension which is beyond time.’
‘Meditation is the emptying of the mind of all
thought, for thought and feeling dissipate
energy. They are repetitive, producing
mechanical activities which are a necessary
part of existence. But they are only part and
thought and feeling cannot possibly enter into
the immensity of life. Quite a different
approach is necessary, not the path of habit,
association and the known; there must be
freedom from these. Meditation is the
emptying of the mind of the known. It cannot
be done by thought or by the hidden
prompting of thought, nor by desire in the
form of prayer, nor through the self-effacing
hypnotism of words, images, hopes, and
vanities. All these have to come to an end,
easily, without effort and choice, in the flame
of awareness.’
EDUCATION
Krishnamurti founded several schools around
the world. When asked, he enumerated the
following as his educational aims:
1. Global outlook: A vision of the whole as
distinct from the part; there should never be a
sectarian outlook, but always a holistic
outlook free from all prejudice.
2. Concern for man and the environment:
Humanity is part of nature, and if nature is not
cared for, it will boomerang on man. Only the
right education, and deep affection between
people everywhere, will resolve many
problems including the environmental
challenges.
3. Religious spirit, which includes the
scientific temper: The religious mind is
alone, not lonely. It is in communion with
people and nature.
THE WORLD CRISIS
According to Krishnamurti, many problems in
the world such as poverty, war, the nuclear
threat, and other unfortunate circumstances,
have their roots in our thinking. In his view,
as we live and behave according to our
thinking so wars and governments are also a
result of our thinking! We each have our own
particular beliefs, conclusions, and
experiences, to which we cling, thereby
isolating ourselves from others. Self centered
activity is expressed outwardly as nationalism
and religious intolerance, creating a world
divided, in which we are willing to kill for the
sake of belief. Understanding our relationship
with the world crisis is necessary to
understand ourselves.[108] Some excerpts:
‘If you are not at all concerned with the world
but only with your personal salvation,
following certain beliefs and superstitions,
following gurus, then I am afraid it will be
impossible for you and the speaker to
communicate with each other. We are not
concerned at all with private personal
salvation but we are concerned, earnestly,
seriously, with what the human mind has
become, what humanity is facing. We are
concerned at looking at this world and what a
KRISHNAMURTHY
THE PULSE OF MAN’S INNER QUEST
INFLUENCE ON SPIRITUAL HORIZON
K
rishnamurthy’s influence is so
immense that it cannot be measured
objectively. His lasting influence is
hard to gauge in an objective way. There is
no organizational or other entity based on his
philosophy, whose progress can be measured.
His insistence that there be no successors or
human being living in this world has to do,
what is his role?’
“The present crisis is different because we are
dealing not with money, not with tangible
things but with ideas. The crisis is in the field
of thought, of ideas, of intellect. Before, evil
was recognized as evil, murder was
recognized as murder, but now murder is a
means to achieve a noble result. You justify
the wrong means through the intellect. When
intellect has the upper hand in human life, it
brings an unprecedented crisis. The other
cause of this unprecedented crisis is the
extraordinary importance man is giving to
sensate values - to property, to name, to caste,
to country.’
interpreters has so far prevented any
individual or group from claiming to
represent continuity, or a unique
understanding, of his philosophy.
Krishnamurti himself remarked in 1929, at
the dissolution of the Order of the Star that
he was not interested in numbers, stating: "If
there are only five people who will listen,
who will live, who their faces have turned
towards eternity, it will be sufficient.’
However, there exists, anecdotal and other
evidence suggesting that interest in him and
the teachings has not abated since his death.
Many books, as well as audio, video, and
computer materials, remain in print and are
carried by major online and traditional
retailers. The four official Foundations
continue with the maintenance of archives,
dissemination of the teachings in an
increasing number of languages, new
conversions to digital and other media,
development of websites, sponsoring of
television programs, and with organizing
meetings and dialogues of interested persons
around the world. According to
communications and press releases from the
Foundations, their mailing lists, and
individuals' inquiries, continue to grow. The
various schools and educational institutions
also continue to grow, with new projects
added alongside their declared goal of
holistic education. There are also active
unofficial Krishnamurty Committees
operating in several countries.
Since his death, biographies, reminiscences,
research papers, critical examinations, and
book-length studies of Krishnamurti and his
philosophy have continued to appear.
Cursory (and necessarily incomplete)
examination of internet search traffic and
group discussion forums indicates that
among similar topics, interest on
Krishnamurti remains high.
Because of his ideas and his era,
Krishnamurti has come to be seen as an
exemplar of those spiritual teachers who
disavow formal rituals and dogma. His
conception of truth as a ‘pathless land’, with
the possibility of immediate liberation, is
mirrored in teachings as diverse as those of
Bruce Lee , Barry Long, and the Dalai Lama.
In India, with its long tradition of wandering
‘holy’ men, hermits, and independent
religious teachers, Krishnamurti attracted the
attention (and occasionally the unwanted
admiration) of large numbers of people in
public lectures and personal interviews. He
was, and is presently, considered a ‘great
teacher’ by such diverse religious figures as
the mystic Ramana Maharshi, the spiritual
teacher Anandamayi Ma, as well as figures
more well-known to the West such as Osho.
Spiritual teacher Vimala Thakar met with
Krishnamurti in 1960. This meeting changed
her life. Although Krishnamurti had a special
tenderness for the true Sanyasi or Buddhist
monk, his criticism of their rituals,
disciplines, and practices was devastating.
As was also often the case elsewhere,
Krishnamurti additionally attracted the
interest of the mainstream religious
establishment in India. He was friendly, and
had a number of discussions with, well
known Hindu and Buddhist scholars and
leaders, including the Dalai Lama. Several of
these discussions were later published as
chapters in various Krishnamurti books.
Twentieth-century gnostic philosopher and
occultist Samael Aun Weor praised
Krishnamurty's teachings, stating that his
‘inner spirit’ was a ‘highly realized Buddha’,
although he questioned his handling by the
theosophists and its effect on his spiritual
development.
Any discussion of influence, however
expansive, deserves to be weighed against
Krishnamurty's own measure of success i.e.,
whether individuals really understand, and
therefore ‘live and breathe’, the teaching.
Regarding this measure of influence or
success, the last, and only, definitive public
statement belongs to Krishnamurti himself.
In a dismal prognosis, delivered 10 days
prior his death in 1986, his words were
simple, and emphatic: ‘NOBODY’ – among
his associates or the world at large – had
understood Krishnamurty, his life, or the
teaching.

ENLIGHTENMENT – according to Dogen, and I agree with him absolutely –

IS JUST LIKE THE MOON REFLECTING ITSELF ON THE WATER. There is
no effort on the part of the water that the moon has to be reflected. There is
no commandment that has to be followed, no doctrines that have to be
practiced; no yoga postures ... so that the moon can reflect itself in the water.
There is not even a desire, not even a longing ... not even a faint longing.
And the same is the situation on the part of the moon – the moon has no
desire to be reflected. Both are desireless, but the reflection happens on its
own accord. So does enlightenment. Just in a silent, peaceful consciousness it
suddenly reflects your buddhahood.

Enlightenment is just your naturalness. This is the great contribution of Zen.

All other religions are belief systems, Zen is not. All other religions will ask
you to believe in God, in heaven, in hell. All other religions will have a
thousand and one beliefs. Zen has no belief system. Its whole effort is to
discover your natural self, which is covered with the dust of all kinds of
good intentions, of beautiful thoughts, of great beliefs. All that dust has to be
cleaned off. And then you are left alone in your naturalness.

OSHO – Zen Master Dogen

 KABIR
THE POLE STAR OF INDIAN SPIRITUAL HORIZON!
Kabir is not categorized as a Sufi or a Yogi alone. He is
all of these. In fact Kabir belongs to his own category.
Kabir is the pole star of Indian Spiritual Horizon. If
Indian spiritual horizon is aglow it is because of
Kabir. Out of him evolved many paths, traditions,
sects etc.
In fact the entire Bhakti movement pulsates the
essence of KABIR. The paths of Nanak and Mira
evolved out of Kabir. He is revered by Muslims,
Hindus, and Sikhs. He stands as a unique, saintly, yet
very human, bridge between the great traditions that
live in India. Kabir says of himself that he is, ‘at once
the child of Allah and Ram.’
BIRTH AND EARLY LIFE
Many legends are associated with the birth of Kabir.
Amidst all these legends one thing is certainly clear
each is born innocent devoid of any religion, tradition
etc. When a child is born he is innocent. Inner sky is
clear. Nothing is written. Consciousness is fresh
pulsating with TOTALITY or WHOLENESS or COSMIC
ESSENCE. Like a fresh breeze he comes into the
world to get contaminated by the essence of the
world and its dualistic phenomena. Only a rare being
maintains his innocence and cosmic essence from
birth until the end of the journey. Kabir is the
embodiment of this innocence and cosmic essence.
All the legends that are associated with the birth of
Kabir reveal this truth and the essence of human
existence. As per the historical events of Kabir, he
was born in 1398 AD. It is said that he was found
floating on a lotus leaf in a pond in Banaras by a
Muslim weaver. It is also said he belonged to a Hindu
Brahmin and so on. But even later no such claim of
his parentage was made by anyone. And Kabir was
left to be raised and brought up by the weaver Niru as
The essence of Kabir is contained even in his name.
The word KABIR DAS comes from two words KABIR
and DAS. Etymologically kabir, has an Arabic origin
which means the ‘great’. And the latter half ‘dasa’ has
its roots in Sanskrit the language of masters, sages
and Rishis of ancient India. The word ‘dasa’
etymologically means ‘slave’ or ‘servant’. What an
ensemble is Kabir. The totality of man’s inner being.
This name was not chosen purposely. It just
happened. And thus the name reflects a deep cosmic
plan. Kabir is widely acknowledged as one of the
great influences of the Bhakti movement in North
India.
his foster parents. One thing is again clear that
ultimately none is father or mother. Parents are
simply the door for the child to be born into the
world and thus continue the soul’s journey. The
weaver took the vulnerable child under his care and
following the traditional manner, gave him the name
of 'Kabir', meaning 'the great one'. Even at a young
age, Kabir displayed enormous spiritual talent.
He was born in Varanasi or Banaras, in India,
probably around the year 1440 (though other
accounts place his birth as early as 1398), to Muslim
parents. He was as is widely acknowledged born in
Year 1398 A.D. It was nearly 71 years before the
advent of Guru Nanak. Kabir Panthis the followers of
Kabir say that he lived up to the age of 120 years and
give 1518 as the year of his death. However relying
on the research of Hazari Prasad Trivedi, a British
Scholar Charlotte Vaudenville is inclined to lend
credence to these dates and has proven that 1448 is
probably the correct date of Saint Kabir's demise.
Saint Kabir 1398 A.D - 1448 A.D.
 A PRELUDE TO ADVENT OF KABIR
Kabir lived almost fifteen Century after Christ. This
was characterized as a time of great political
upheaval in India. As is true of many contemporary
religious teachers, very little reliable information
concerning Kabir's life is available, though there is no
dearth of legend gathering around him. Kabir's life
was centered on Kashi. Kashi is the most ancient city
on earth. Shankar gave the message of Bhaja
Govindam here. Buddha gave his first sermon in this
city. Tulsi Das composed the famous Hindu epic Ram
Charit Manas on the banks of holy river Ganga in this
city. The city is also called Banaras or Varanasi.
Legend has it that he was actually the son of a
Brahmin widow who abandoned him because of
social prestige and never claimed him. Kabir was
found by a Muslim weaver named Niru, who adopted
the boy and taught him the weaver's trade. Kabir
never had any formal education. He was only trained
in daily routine like way of life. From the early
childhood he engaged in the trade along with his
father.
It is not clear whether he ever married. However
tradition gives him a wife named Loi and two
children. His caste was that of Julaha and from his
sayings his caste's hereditary occupation is weaving.
On the basis of modern research, it seems quite
probable that Kabir belonged to a family of non-
celibate yogis converted, not long before and to a
considerable degree superficially to Islam. From the
writings of Kabir it seems that his knowledge of Islam
was slight. In his poetical compositions as sayings or
Bani there is abundance of Hatha yoga terminology
and a thought structure which bears obvious
resemblance to Nath Yogis.
Kabir occupies a very significant place in Bhakti
movement. Bhakti movement was started by Hindu
saints while Sufi mysticism by Muslim saints in
medieval India (1200-1700). Kabir immensely
contributed to the Bhakti Movement and is
considered a pioneer of Bhakti along with Ravidas,
Farid, and Namdev. His concept of love as a path of
suffering is an obligation to the Sufis. These and other
elements from Nath tradition, Bhakti and Sufism,
Kabir combined with his own mystical nature and
produced synthesis which is the distinctive religion
of Kabir. Bhakti movement in Medieval India is
responsible for the many rites and rituals associated
with the worship of God by Hindus, Muslims and
Sikhs of Indian subcontinent. For example, Kirtan at a
Hindu Temple, Qawalli at a Dargah by Muslims, and
singing of Gurbani at a Gurdwara are all derived from
the Bhakti movement of medieval India (800-1700).
‘The word bhakti is derived from Bhakta meaning to
serve, honor, revere, love and adore. In the religious
idiom, it is attachment or fervent devotion to God and
is defined as ‘that particular affection which is
generated by the knowledge of the attributes of the
Adorable One.’ A Tale of Mystical Love!
At the height of Mughal power, India saw a
remarkable fusion of Islamic and indigenous
traditions, giving rise to a rich composite culture.
This was reflected in all fields, including art and
architecture, dress and food habits and even in
religious forms and beliefs. One of the best
representatives of this confluence of traditions is the
Sufi-Bhakti movement, a form of personal piety that
challenged the hegemony of the religious orthodoxy
and crusaded against caste and community divisions
and meaningless ritualism.
In fifteenth century, Banaras was the seat of Brahmin
orthodoxy and their learning center. Brahmins had
strong hold on all the spheres of life in this city. Thus
Kabir belonging to a low caste of Julaha the weaver
clan had to go through immense tough time of
preaching his message. Kabir and his followers would
gather at one place in the city and meditate.
Brahmins ridiculed him for preaching to prostitutes
and other low castes. Kabir satirically denounced
Brahmins and thus won hearts of people around him.
There is no doubt that single most famous important
person from the city of Banaras today is none other
than Saint Kabir. Such has been the situation with
almost all the masters.
Kabir through his couplets not only reformed the
understanding of common villagers and low caste
people but gave them self confidence to question
Brahmins. It was 100 years after him that Tulsidas
broke the hegemony of Brahmins by writing Ram
Charit Manas, a poetical composition narrating the
life of Sri Rama at Banaras which went against the
tradition of Brahmins. Kabir was in fact first person
to go against Brahmins and be so successful. Banaras
was ruined by an attack by a Muslim invader Timur
Lang or ‘Timur the lame’ during his time. Kabir also
denounced Muslim priests and their rituals of bowing
towards Kaaba five times a day. Because of open
condemnation of established and popular religions,
Kabir became an object of the wrath of both Hindus
and Muslims in and around Banaras. Kabir travelled
in and around Banaras to preach his message.
Kabir believed in self-surrender to God through
Bhakti. The Kabir Panthis follow a life of singing the
praises of God, prayers and a simple and pure life of
devotion. Kabir recommends ceaseless singing of
God's praises. He virtually suggests withdrawal from
the world. He is against all ritualistic and ascetic
methods as means to salvation. It is true that Kabir
refers to some yogic terms in describing the
meditational and mystic methods of the yogis. But,
there is no ground to suggest that he himself
recommends the yogic path. In fact, far from
recommending yoga, he is quite strong in
condemning ascetic or yogic methods, and says that
yogis, in their meditations, become prey to Maya.
Kabir propagated ‘Where there is mercy, there is
strength, where there is forgiveness there is He.’ ‘The
man who is kind and practices righteousness, who
remains passive in the affairs of the world, who
considers creatures of the world as his own self, he
attains the immortal Being; the true God is ever with
him. Kabir suggests inward worship and
remembrance of God. For him, true worship is only
inwards. Put on the rosary inward. By counting
beads, the world will be full of light. He clearly
suggests moral discrimination between good and bad
Meaning is no more relevant in the world of beauty. And what to say about the world of
meditation? – no meaning, only significance. That’s why those who have experienced
have remained silent, or have spoken only to indicate to you the path to be silent
deeds. What can the helpless road do, when the
traveler does not walk understandingly? ‘What can
one do, if, with lamp in hand, one falls in the well?’ ‘Or
goes astray with open eyes! Discern ye now between
good and evil.’
It is not surprising that Kabir's satire was brought to
bear not simply on the vices and weaknesses of men
but reached through and beyond them to the very
system themselves. It was the authority of Vedas and
Quran that more than the authority of Brahmin or
Qazi which Kabir attacked. He rebelled against the
pretension of resolving by the means of books or by
way of authority, the mystery of human conditions
and the problem of liberation or Moksha. He spent his
last 40 days living in a place Maghar where it was
believed that if you die you will born as a Donkey in
next life.
Kabir advocated ahimsa or non-violence. His doctrine
extends even to the non destruction of flowers.
‘The life of the living you strike dead and you say
your slaughter makes it dedicated. It is blood
haunting you and those who taught you.’ ‘They fast all
day, and at night they slaughter the cow; murder on
one hand, and devotion on the other; how can this
please God? O! Quazi, by whose order doth thou use
thy knife.’ ‘When you declare the sacrifice of an
animal as your religion, what else is sin? If you regard
yourself a saint, whom will you call a butcher?’
‘The goat eats grass and is skinned, what will happen
to those who eat (goat's) meat?’ Do not kill poor jiva
or creature; murder will not be forgiven even if you
hear a million Puranas. Among the fifty
commandments laid down for the followers of Kabir,
vegetarianism is one of them. For Kabir, moral life
involves adherence to ahimsa.
Zen Master Dogen - OSHO
 KABIR AND WOMAN
Kabir’s view on woman cannot be understood on the
surface. If you look at the surface you will find Kabir
very derogatory of woman folk. This has led many
hasty ones to draw a conclusion. To understand Kabir
and his views on woman you will have to go to the
very essence of Kabir.
Out of the masculine energy evolved the tradition of
Guru Nanak as sikh religion. And Kabir’s feminine
energy evolved as Mira, Sahjo Bai and the entire
feminine effect in Bhakti. Not only these Chaitanya
Maha Prabhu and the entire Hare Krishna movement
is the outcome of this energy of Kabir.
When you look at the views of Kabir on woman you
will find strange phenomena. Accordingly in common
with all monastic, ascetic or otherworldly sects, Kabir
does not think well of women. The hymns of Kabir
are full of tirade against them. Woman is
characterized as ‘a black cobra', the pit of hell and the
MEETING HIS GURU
But early in his life Kabir became a disciple of the
Hindu Bhakti saint Ramananda. It was unusual for a
Hindu teacher to accept a Muslim student, but
tradition says the young Kabir found a creative way
to overcome all objections.
Kabir always wanted to become a disciple of
Ramananda a well known master of the time.
However, since he was a Muslim, it was next to
impossible for him to get initiation from a Hindu. So,
he took recourse to a trick. Ramananda used to pass
through steps reach to the bathing ghat for his pre-
dawn ritual ablutions every day. Kabir, one morning
lay on the steps that led to the ghat in such a way that
Ramananda stepped on him. Shocked at this incident,
he chanted 'Rama! Rama! Kabir said that since he had
received teachings from him, in the form of the words
'Rama! Rama! He was Ramananda's disciple. This
story has many versions. However one thing is
certainly clear Kabir became the disciple of
Ramananda. To explain this incident in all its essence
I have explained it in many ways. One such
explanation I give for your understanding of the
orthodoxy of the Brahmins. When Ramananda
refuse of the world.’ She is considered to be a hurdle
in the path of the spiritual progress of man. He spoke,
‘woman ruins everything when she comes near a
man; Devotion, salvation and divine knowledge no
longer enter his soul.’ His views, about woman are
also evident from all his vehement attacks against
maya. Almost everywhere he links maya to a woman
who is out to entice and entrap man, and destroy his
spiritual life. Such views about woman from a
married person are, indeed, quite uncommon. The
cosmological views of Kabir give a clear clue to his
world view. He finds Niranjana to be the creator of
the world; maya or woman. And this woman stands
between man and god. She is there to entice him
away from Him.
At the time Kabir came on the spiritual horizon it was
male dominant society because of the orthodoxy of
the Brahmins.
stepped on Kabir and he chanted Ram Ram this is an
expression of his mistake. Instead of saying sorry he
said Ram Ram. Saying this he wanted to rush for
morning ablution because he was touched by an
untouchable one. Kabir took Ramananda as his guru.
Still Ramananda did not accept him as his disciple
and insisted on taking a bath since he touched an
untouchable. At this Kabir asked a question. And
further said before you go for a bath you must answer
my question.
Kabir wanted Ramananda to answer the question,
‘You want to take a bath because you touched an
untouchable. You did not touch me. You simply
touched my body. Is man a body or soul? And if man
is soul then it cannot be untouchable because you did
not touch the soul. Soul is eternal. Body will perish.
What then is more important the soul or body.’
Hearing such question from someone whom
Ramananda was rejecting because he was
untouchable Ramananda had no answer. Ramananda
could not reply Kabir. Seeing the intelligence he
accepted Kabir as his disciple. Another significant
thing happened. Kabir became enlightened even
before Ramananda became enlightened. Impressed
with the intelligence of Kabir, Ramananda took him
as his disciple.
After his bath in the early light he noticed that on the
back of the little one's hand was written in Arabic the
name Kabir. He adopted him as son and disciple and
brought him back to his ashram, much to the
disturbance of his Hindu students, some of whom left
in righteous protest.
was equally disdainful of professional piety in any
form. This earned him the hatred and persecution of
the religious authorities in Banaras. Nearing age 60,
he was denounced before the king but, because of his
Muslim birth, he was spared execution and, instead,
banished from the region.
He subsequently lived a life of exile, traveling through
northern India with a group of disciples. In 1518, he
died at Maghar near Gorakhpur.

Not much is known about what sort of spiritual
training Kabir may have received. He did not become
a sadhu or renunciate. Kabir never abandoned
worldly life. Instead Kabir choose to live the balanced
life of a householder and mystic; tradesman and
contemplative. Kabir was married, had children, and
lived the simple life of a weaver.
Although Kabir labored to bring the often clashing
religious cultures of Islam and Hinduism together, he
There is a legend associated with Kabir’s his funeral.
Kabir's disciples disputed over his body, the Muslims
wanting to claim the body for burial, the Hindus
wanting to cremate the body. Kabir appeared to the
arguing disciples and told them to lift the burial
shroud. When they did so, they found fragrant
flowers where the body had rested. The flowers were
divided, and the Muslims buried the flowers while the
Hindus reverently committed them to fire.

KABIR THE POET

Kabir is considered to be one of the greatest poets as well as mystics ever born on Indian spiritual horizon. He
believed that human beings are equal and being one with God is the ultimate aim of every individual. His love
and devotion towards the Supreme One clearly reflects in his poetry. The Holy Guru Granth Sahib contains over
500 verses by the Kabir. The verses or dohas of Kabir are still read by people with awe and admiration.

KABIR KE DOHE
The hallmark of Kabir's works consists of his two line couplets. These two line compositions are known as the
'Kabir ke Dohe'. These reflect deep mystical understanding of the poet saint. Kabir used the method of paradox
or ulatbans to explain the most intricate matter in simple language. Only a Kabir can say such things as; fish has
climbed the tree, or there is fire in the ocean.

THE PHILOSOPHY OF KABIR

Kabir believed in the Vedantic concepts of atman. He always advocated the Impersonal Aspect of God or
Nirguna the formless and therefore, was against idol worship. According to Kabir all human beings are equal
and the caste system imposed by the society that is so widely prevalent in our country is fallacious. He said that
true guru is the one who can be attained through direct experience. The common ways of realizing God, like
chanting, austerities, etc, are worthless.

Everybody is imitating somebody else, everybody has become a carbon copy of somebody else,
everybody is almost like a broken record that has been used for centuries. Nobody has newness,
freshness – one’s own originality.

Zen Master Dogen - OSHO

 KABIR THE FORERUNNER OF SIKH RELIGION
He is one of the medieval Indian saints of Bhakti and
Sufi movement whose compositions figure in Sikh
Scripture, the Guru Granth Sahib. From among all of
them, Kabir's contribution is the largest, 227 Padas in
17 ragas and 237 slokas. Under each raga or musical
mode marking a section of the Holy Book, Kabir's
hymns appear at the head of Bhagat Bani, a generic
name for the works of contributors other than the
Gurus. There is presence of a substantial number of
Kabir's verse in the Sikh Scripture. Also
chronologically he is the predecessor of Guru Nanak,
founder of the Sikh faith. This has led some Western
scholars to describe him as the forerunner of Sikhism.
Some have even called him the preceptor of Guru
Nanak. There is, however, ample evidence to prove
that Guru Nanak and Kabir had ever met their
periods of time in fact do not coincide. Kabir's
compositions do figure in what are known as
Goindval Pothis, anthologies of the hymns of the
Gurus along with those of some of the Bhaktas
prepared in the time of Guru Amar Das-Nanak III or
the master at the third lienage. They were included in
the Guru Granth Sahib as well. But this happened
much later when Guru Arjan, the fifth in spiritual line
from the Founder, compiled the Holy Scripture.
Besides his own works and those of his four
predecessors, he entered in it hymns of some saints
and mystics, Hindu and Muslim, Kabir was one of
them.
Kabir composed no systematic treatise; rather his
work consists of many short didactic poems.Quite
often these are expressed in terse vigorous language
in the form of Padas, Dohas, and Ramainis as various
forms of poetry in Indian languages. In addition to his
REBEL SUFIS OF THE PUNJAB
The Sufi brotherhoods that arrived in South Asia
from the Middle East and Central Asia had already
been influenced by the pantheistic traditions of
South Asia, and in some cases the result was theist
fusions or Unitarian views of God. It is, however,
important to point out that some Sufi orders were
quite conservative such as the Suhrawardi and
Naqshbandia. They had a strong presence in the
Punjab. The Naqshbandi Sufi, Sheikh Ahmad al
Farooqi Ahmed Sirhindi Mujaddadi Alif-Thani, who
lived during the 16th century and is buried at
work recorded in 1604 A.D. in Guru Granth Sahib by
Guru Arjan Dev, the fifth guru, and preserved
inviolate since, two other collections exist - Kabir
Granthavali, and Bijak. In his poems, he was quick to
tell the illustrations of moral and spiritual truth in the
happenings of day to day life, and many of his similes
and metaphors are very striking.
Some of the most famous Shabads of Kabir from
Gurbani are
1. Gagan Damama Baajooh pariho nishaan-e-
ghao, khet jo maandyo surma aab jujhan ka
tao, Sura so pahchaniye jo lare deen ke het,
purja purja kate marhe kabho na chhade khet.
Guru Granth Sahib recognizes many saints of the
Bhakti movement of medieval India. Kabir, Farid,
Namdev are the
saints belonging to
this movement
which swept across
the North India
from 1100 A.D. till
1600 A.D. When
Fifth Guru Guru
Arjan dev ji
compiled Guru
Granth Sahib, he
decided to give
some recognition
to the saints of Bhakti movement that is the reason
that Guru Granth Sahib contains verses of such saints.
In some cases Guru Granth Sahib is the only voice
remained for such saints over the years.
Sirhind, played an important role in the revival of
strict Islam in the Mughal Empire and, indeed, in the
Punjab.
Kabir remained a link between Hindu Bhakti and
Islamic Sufism or mysticism, which had gained a
large following among Indian Muslims. Sufis mystics
also believed in singing hymns and in meditation
under guidance of a leader. They welcomed non-
Muslims in their hospices. Sikhism drew inspiration
from both Bhakti and Sufis.
 MEETING OF BEING AND BECOMING:
THE ESSENCE OF SPIRITUAL LIFE
THIS MEETING OF THE BEING AND THE BECOMING IS THE REAL SECRET OF SPIRITUAL LIFE.
It is said that the teachings of Jiddu had nothing
but the way of negation. As a result many find the
teachings easy to understand. Jiddu speaks of no
guru, no belief, no organization, no authority, no
discipline, no scripture and many such other
negations. People who came to Jiddu left all these
and did not feel better. No belief became another
belief. No organization became another
organization. In place of no authority Jiddu became
a new authority. Jiddu’s approach is fundamentally
psychological. His enquiry is not what to do and
what not to do instead why does one do this and
why does not give up that.
This is a deeper aspect of the teachings of Kabir
and Jiddu. This does not mean that they are
identical. Both differ significantly. They have
followed their own line of thinking. Yet still
moving along their own ways there are moments
when their approaches intersect. These meeting
points are quite interesting. Such points are worth
an enquiry.
Kabir is both traditional and nontraditional. He has
heavily condemned the traditions through his
compositions. Jiddu on the other hand is totally
nontraditional. Thus both are somewhat similar
and yet still different. And this makes it even more
interesting.
Jiddu has dealt with problems of life with the air of
negativity. Yet still his teachings are not negative
in nature. In fact his teachings are positive in
nature and their contents. Often it is said that
Jiddu brushes everything aside but then does not
give anything positive to work upon or hold on.
Most of the masters have spoken on the
significance of virtues as a positive base to work
from. Thus one gets busy in developing virtues one
after the other. Jiddu on the other hand gives an
altogether different perspective accordingly he
says:
The man who cultivates virtues is not virtuous….
In virtue there is freedom, not in becoming
virtuous.
One may wonder if in virtue there is freedom then
why becoming virtuous takes away freedom. One
generally assumes that if virtue is freedom the
becoming virtuous should equally lead to freedom.
Here Jiddu is asking a very subtle question of being
virtuous and becoming virtuous. Being and
becoming are two subtle aspects of his teachings.
Being is the quality and becoming is an attitude.
Attitude belongs to the outer dimension, while
being belongs to inner dimension of the person.
To be virtuous and to practice virtues are two
completely different things. In fact they are
contradictory. By practicing virtue one does not
become virtuous. In fact such practice inflates the
ego of the man. It will make one even more self
centered. Behind all practices of virtue there is a
motive. When there is motive behind doing
something better than the other to achieve
happiness, to become self controlled it cannot be
virtue. Virtue is a reward in itself. To be virtuous
and to strive to become virtuous are two different
things. It is in the cessation of activity of becoming
virtuous that one is really virtuous. Truly indeed it
is against all canons of religious and so called
spiritual tradition and discipline. In all the
religious disciplines the aspirant is asked to build
virtue after virtue in his character. To build virtue
one after another is considered as the central
theme of all spiritual disciplines of both east and
the west. In one of the poems Kabir says:
O teacher, what am I to do? When I conquer lust
then anger increases. When I suppress anger,
greed comes up. When I triumph over greed then
delusion crops up! When delusion is low then
pride raises its head. When pride is eliminated
then envy and jealousy surfaces! When I say that I
have conquered all the six vices then all of them
come back again and again all one by one. How am
I to be free from all of these attachments?
This is the translation of a beautiful composition of
Kabir.
AbxU maya tjI n ja$
igrh tj ke bStr ba<xa bStr tj ke )erI
kam tje se k&aex n ja$ k&aex tje te< lae-a
lae- tje Ah<kar n ja$ man bfa$ sae-a
mn bEragI maya tjI zBd me< surt sma$
khE< kbIr sunae -a$ saxae gm ibrle pa$.
In this composition Kabir is pointing to a very
pertinent and relevant psychological process.
Jiddu says that such attachments of life one cannot
get rid of gradually in course of time. Jiddu further
explains this:
If there is any interval of time between challenge
and the response, that interval creates the
problem. Whether I am investigating the cause or
trying to resolve the cause, the interval has already
created the problem.
You cannot remove vises and weaknesses one by
one. This is what Kabir emphasizes. They go
instantaneously, not in the duration of time. This is
what Jiddu says in his statement and Kabir sings in
his composition. This is not what the religious
traditions speak about. We are told that the
removal of weaknesses is a long process that
entails arduous efforts spread over a life time or
perhaps many life times.
Jiddu continues that there is only one virtue and
one vice. This is the presence of ‘I or EGO’. When
ego dissolves one enters a virtuous life. All efforts
of self improvement are made by the self itself.
Thus the so called self improving is nothing but
strengthening ego. In meeting the challenge fully
and totally and without creating an interval
between challenge and the response one creates a
climate in which problem can find no substance. In
the above composition Kabir says that it is
verbalization which gives a fresh air to the
problem. In fact it is verbalization that sustains it.
The question arises: how to stop verbalization? It
does not matter whether one struggles against a
problem or against its verbalization. The struggle
still remains. And this involves time. If time creates
disorder then such creation of disorder still
persists. And then we are caught in the same
whirlpool.
It is therefore important to understand the time.
Time denotes a movement from one position to
another. This linear movement from one position
to another is called time. It does not matter if it is
rapid or slow. But this movement has no reality. In
one of the compositions Kabir says:
One who sees the nature of the mind is above time.
To such a person time does not affect.
This is a profound truth that Kabir has spoken of.
With the advent of Albert Einstein physical science
is beginning to realize. Time has no independent
existence. It is the observer who creates time. And
therefore time varies according to the position
that the observer takes. Time is therefore the
creation of observer’s angle of perception. So
when you change the angle or gestalt of perception
time scale changes. There is no time per se.
If the time from here to there or from one position
to another is fictitious then problem has no reality.
Remember it is the angle of perception that
creates the problem. This is the reason Kabir says
‘stay still where you are’. This is the only relevant
advice that can be given for the psychological
problem that one faces in life. All human problems
are psychological in nature not physical. In the
cultivation of virtue the effort and emphasis
remains on movement from one situation to
another. The problem is neither movement from
one situation to another nor defining here or
there, instead it is actual movement.
The usual way of spiritual life requires the change
in the pattern of behavior. It is this that constitutes
the movement of spiritual or religious life. This
movement is frustrating. This requires
tremendous effort with ceaseless resistance.
Therefore the so called spiritual life is full of these
resistances as these are considered to be the
outcome of one’s will.
Remember true religious or spiritual life is not
changing one’s pattern of life or behavior. It is
concerned with motivation. If the motivation
remains unchanged and only the behavioral
pattern changes then it is like changing the pot not
the dirty water contained in it. This is what Kabir
alludes in the poem: ‘what am I to do, because
when I conquer anger lust remains’. In your so
called virtuous life there is an effort to suppress
one behavior pattern for the other. However all
suppression evokes its own problem which is even
worse.
As far as motivation is concerned both good and
bad are alike. There is no qualitative difference
between the two. These are two sides of the same
question. Mind always thinks to renounce good or
bad then what. Once again you are faced with the
same question or the same paradox. The
cultivation of virtue requires effort of the self to
continue. It appears as if virtue is a favorable
ground to inflate the ugly self. Thus to be virtuous
by a willful effort is in fact to perpetuate the evil
under the disguise of so-called good. Jiddu says:
Virtue is not denial of vice as is considered. Virtue
is a state of being. And being is not an idea. A man
who cultivates virtue is not virtuous….Self interest
cannot cultivate virtue. It can only perpetuate
itself under the mask of virtue, under the cover of
virtue there is still the activity of the self.
Virtue is not opposite of vice. Had it be so than
spiritual life would be a mere play of the
opposites? And such play is self defeating. And you
go on moving in the same ring. This is window
dressing where the same rotten stuff is displayed.
It is not like substituting good for bad.
A virtuous life is free from all motivation of good
and bad. This is what Kabir says, ‘Stand still where
you are.’ In such a state all movements cease.
Remember each movement has a motive behind
when it is consciously engineered. But when there
is no movement how can there be progress?
All movements in life are the movements of
becoming or being. The movement of becoming
requires gathering more and more to itself. This is
an exquisite movement. Often this is called
positive movement. However in reality it is a
movement of self assertion or self –acquisition.
This is the concept of the mind that lies at the very
root of becoming. When this is a conscious effort
then it moves towards a preconceived goal or
effort. Any virtuous life based on this is a
movement from known to the modified known. On
its own mind cannot get out of motivation. Mind
goes on substituting one motive with another.
Therefore the so called virtuous life remains a
modified continuity. There is no fragrance of
freshness. This remains stale.
When you are free from all motivation then inward
journey begins. But mind finds it difficult to
understand. Without motivation mind sees no
incentive. Mind finds life without motivation and
incentive stagnant. The New Testament says –
‘Look at the lilies in the field – they toil not nor do
they spin’. We are further told by the same source,
‘Even Solomon in all his glory was not half as
glorious as these lilies.’
Have you ever wondered from where did this
glory come? They toiled not nor did they spin.
Lilies have no conscious effort look good glorious
or grand. Wisdom of the mind can say this is all
about lilies but not the man. It is not realized that
the glories of becoming are nowhere near the
glories of being. Mind always wonders can such
glories be seen in the life of a man.
Shankar says – ‘The highest state is the natural
state.’ This is not the outcome of the mind. The Zen
teaching say: ‘You can become only what you are.
You cannot be what you are not. To become what
one is very strange. In one of the songs Kabir sings:

saexa shj smaix -lI
sa<$ te imln -yae ja idn te< surit n A<t clI
Aa<o n mU<dU kan n rU<xU< kaya k:q n xarU<
Ouale nyn mE< h<s h<s deoU suNdr rUp inharU<
khU< sae nam sunU< sae suimrn jae kDu krU< sae pUja
igrh %jaf @k sm deoU< -av imqa^< dUja
jh< jh< ja^< sae$ pirkrma jae kDu krU< sae seva
jb sae^< tb krU< d{fvt pUjU< AaEr n deva
zBd inrNtr mnuAa rata miln vcn ka TyagI
^Qt bEQt kbhu< n ibsrE @sI tarI lagI
khE< kbIr yh %Nmin rhnI sae prgt kir ga$
suo duo ke #k pre prm suo teih me< rha sma$.
Kabir says the experience of Samadhi is
spontaneous and natural experience. I do not close
my eyes nor do I plug my ears. With open eyes I
see His beauty and splendor too, with smile on my
face. Whatever I say is His name. Whatever I hear
is His name. And whatever I do is my worship and
my adoration. For me my home and the garden are
not different. The place where I am engaged in
performing my duties is also the place desolate
and lonely. Beyond the dualities of pain and
pleasure there is joy.
You may wonder how one can attain to this
experience. The joy of being is greater than the
pleasure of becoming. In nature we see seed
becomes a plant; bud becomes a flower; plant
becomes a tree. Even in human beings child
becomes a grown up. Then how one can deny this
process of becoming? This process is at the very
root of evolution. Remember there is a difference
between natural process of becoming and the
conscious one. The natural becoming has its roots
in the beingness of life whereas conscious
becoming has its roots in the mind and its
activities. Mind works out of concepts. Each
concept has a motivation in end and goal. These
ends and goals are formed by the mind. Mind lives
in purpose. Mind never does anything without
purpose.
The positive beingness can blossom only in the soil
of negative. But for growth soil must be free from
all weeds and overgrowth if the positive is to take
root. What is meant by the soil being made
negative? It is where the mind is emptied of all
concepts and ideas. All that is of the mind-or what
mind has conceived has to be put away. Then
alone you can come to real positive experience.
Positive and negative are not opposed to one
another. There is a relation between being and
becoming. The two are not unrelated. Negative is
the soil or the ground for the positive or flowers to
blossom. Therefore the teachings of Jiddu are not
negative. They are positive. Jiddu is only preparing
the soil or the ground for the negative to grow or
flowers to blossom. Mind only sees the beginning.
And out of haste cannot wait to see the
blossoming. In a similar expression Kabir sings:
I have woven a sheet with much care and labor. I
have woven sheet to a man who called himself
spiritual. He wore it but immediately soiled it. The
really spiritual one wore it and gave it back as
clean and unsoiled as it was when it was given to
him.
HInI HInI ibnI cdirya
Kahe kE tana kahe kE -rnI
kaEn tar se ibnI cdirya
#<gla ip<gla tana -rnI
su;mn tar se ibnI cdirya
AaQ k<vl ds croa faelE
Pa<ac tTv gun ibnI cdirya
sa<$ ke sIyt mas ds lagE
Qaek Qaek ke ibnI cdirya
Saae cadr sur nr muin AaeFI
AaeFI ke mElI kInI cdirya
das kbIr jtn se AaeFI
Jyae< kI Tyae< xir dInI cdirya.
Motivation good or bad soils the cloth of life. With
motivation there can be no real spirituality. The
mind must be cleaned of all motives. Bhagwad Gita
speaks of the nature of a spiritual man. ‘He who
has put good and bad aside or One who is beyond
the heat and cold – beyond duality?’
Jiddu says:
If the mind is seeking result however noble and
worthy, if it is concerned with becoming, it ceases
to be extensive and infinitely pliable! It must be
the unknown to receive the unknowable.
The unknown receiving the unknowable is the true
nature of virtue – the nature of spiritual life. You
may wonder if being and becoming related to one
another? Yes indeed. It is the relationship of the
unknown and the unknowable. The positive which
forever is unknown is received by the soil which is
negative. From the unknown evolves the known.
The known completely devoid of all that is known
is truly the negative soil out of which the positive
virtue is born. The so called spiritual man soils the
garment that he wears because of the conscious
and unconscious motivation.
If you are indeed to grasp the essence of the
relation between the being and the becoming you
must explore the ground where they meet.

THIS MEETING OF THE BEING AND THE BECOMING IS THE REAL SECRET OF SPIRITUAL LIFE.

Enlightenment cannot be anything else other than entertainment ... universal

entertainment, a laughter that knows no bounds, no limits. You laugh, and the trees
laugh, and the cuckoos laugh, and the clouds laugh, and the stars laugh, and the
laughter goes on spreading ….when the mind is gone you are just like a small child.
Laughter will arise without any effort on your part. At least I am a break from the
whole past, and in the future I want my people to be laughing buddhas. Serious ones
we have seen enough of, they have not been able to transform humanity. Let us try
another direction – of nonseriousness.

Acceptance is a gratitude towards existence. Anything that you don’t accept means you
are blaming existence. In all your prayers, and in all your prayer houses, what are you
doing? You are asking God, just like a beggar, “Give me this, give me that.” You don’t
trust existence, you demand. Demanding is not a quality of religious consciousness.
Hence the real religion has no way of praying. It only lives, and lives in such a way that
the very life becomes a gratitude.

Meditation, perhaps, is the only alchemy that can transform a beggar into an emperor.

Zen Master Dogen - OSHO

 KABIR
CONFLUENCE OF BHAKTI AND DHYAN
maekae kha< FU<Fe bNde mE tae tere pas me<

na mE devl na mE< msijd na kabe kElas me<

na tae kaEn ik&ya kmR me< nhI< jaeg bErag me<

oaejI haey tae tur<tE imilhaE< pl -r kI tlas me<

khE kbIr sunae -a$ saxae sb Svasae< kI Sv<as me< .

MOKO KAHAN DHUNDHE BANDE MAIN TO TERE PAAS MEIN

NA MAIN DEVAL NA MAIN MASJID NA KAABE KAILAS MEIN
NA TO KAUN KRIYA KARAM MEIN NAHI JOG BAIRAG MEIN
KHOJI HOYA TAE TURANTAI MILIHAUN PAL BHAR KI TALAS MEIN
KAHAIN KABIR SUNAU BHAI SADHO SAB SANSON KI SWANS MEIN!!!

Where do you seek me? Seek me not yonder!

I am not far from you!
Not in the mosque, Not in the Kaaba, or in Kailas seek
Also I am not in rituals and ceremonies
Also not in austerities or practice of yoga!
If your search is genuine you will find me this very moment!
Kabir laments! O seekers I dwell in the breath of breaths!!!

Kabir is the confluence of Bhakti and Dhyan.

It is when Bhakti attained to Dhyan that manifestation or embodiment is Kabir.

kbIr -iKt AaEr Xyan ka smagm hE,

kbIr Agr Xyan kI praka:Qa hE tae -iKt kI Aivrl g<ga -I.

Both Bhakti and Dhyan are two wings for the inward
journey. Bhakti and Dhyan are two doors to reach the
inner sanctum. If you start the journey through
Bhakti and when Bhakti attains fruition you will find
you have attained to Dhyan. So too if the journey
begins through the door of Dhyan at the inner door
you will find the embodiment of Bhakti waiting for
you. All the compositions of Kabir are soaked in the
awareness of understanding and inner oneness.
When you sing the compositions of a person like
Kabir you can immediately get connected to his
being. This can happen only when your heart is open
to the subtle presence of such a being.
Kabir is an enlightened master. He has known that
which is. Not only that his entire being is soaked into
such awareness. His each breath, his heart beat Instead in the open spaces not covered by mind’s
pulsates with such awareness. These are not the edifice! There alone you find reality in its glory. In
ordinary words. Through these words the very being statistical average mind finds nothing. In the barren
of Kabir overflows. These words are spontaneous soil of the mind one finds nothing but mathematical
overflow while Kabir was engaged in his daily calculations. Therefore seek not the reality in the
routine. Being in the world, and being a part of daily deserts of the mind. There one finds no oasis. It is to
household work when hands are busy weaving the be found neither in reason nor unreason. If reason is
cloth such compositions the field of an alert and
happened. To an ecstatic active mind then unreason
Kabir each thread and each is the field of a dull and
thing and being is soaked in Both Bhakti and Dhyan are two sloppy mind. Both reason
such a presence. He sees and unreason belong to
wings for the inward journey.
nothing but his beloved that the realm of the mind and
he had known as Rama all Bhakti and Dhyan are two doors its functions.
around. There is oneness
both within and without.
to reach the inner sanctum. Mind knows not the gaps
Kabir is ecstatic. There is between reason and
harmony. He is flowing with unreason. Know this void
all that is and is the very essence of this cosmos. Only as your inner space. However mind regards such
a Kabir like one can overflow totality through voids as identical with nothingness. There is a
whatever he does. fullness of the void which the mind is unable to
perceive. Blavatsky in her ‘Voice of the Silence’ says:
Kabir was illiterate. Engaged in his daily work while ‘The right perception of existing things, the
the fingers were moving through wharf and woof knowledge of the non-existence.’
Kabir used to spontaneously sing. No proper training
of music. Yet still all his compositions are musically Right perception does not lie in the network of
arranged. There is rhythm, and meter. No one is structural understanding. It is found outside all
doing anything to look after the rhythm and meter. It logical systems created by the mind. This alone has
seems the unknown and the unknowable is taking been accepted by the physical science as perception.
care of each syllable as it overflows out of an ecstatic
Kabir. Mind thinks that intellect alone can reveal to man the
mysteries of life and nature. Still there is something
Now let me take you into the actual composition. greater than intellect know this as intelligence.
Intelligence is far grater intellect. Intelligence is the
Kabir says that which is – the unknown and integration of love and reason. Intelligence is the
unknowable or reality is not to be found in the spontaneous perception of men and things.
magnificent edifices build by logic and reason.

maekae kha< FU<Fe bNde mE tae tere pas me<

na mE devl na mE< msijd na kabe kElas me<

na tae kaEn ik&ya kmR me< nhI< jaeg bErag me<

oaejI haey tae tur<tE imilhaE< pl -r kI tlas me<

khE kbIr sunae -a$ saxae sb Svasae< kI Sv<as me< .

Only this much for now!

 THE BUDDHA WITHIN!
BUDDHA is the godliest and the most godless man in the whole history of man.
PRAJNAPARAMITA HRIDAYAM SUTRA
OF GAUTAMA THE BUDDHA
INTRODUCTION TO BUDDHA
These PRAJNAPARAMITA HRIDAYAM SUTRAS
belong to the seventh temple as Buddha calls
these or the seventh plane of consciousness.
These are declarations of someone who has
entered the seventh temple, the transcendental
- the absolute. That is the meaning of the
Sanskrit word, PRAGYAPARAMITA or the
wisdom of the beyond, from the beyond, in the
beyond. It refers to the wisdom that comes only
when you have transcended all kinds of
identifications - lower or higher, this worldly
or that worldly.
This May month is unique in many ways. It was on
the full moon of this month Gautam Siddhartha
became BUDDHA THE ENLIGHTENED ONE when
he was forty years of age. Forty years later again
on this day Buddha attained Mahaparinirvana.
This month one year ago on full moon a
Naqshbandi Sufi Sheikh Omkar Nath attained to
Samadhi.
I love Gautam the Buddha even more than I love
myself. He represents totality. GAUTAM BUDDHA
is like the highest peak of the Himalayas, like
Gourishanker –the abode of Shiva. The peak of
consciousness! He is one of the purest beings, one
of the most virgin souls, one of the very rare
phenomena on this earth.
The rarity is that Buddha is the scientist of the
inner world - scientist of religion. That is a rare
combination. To be religious is simple, to be a
scientist is simple - but to combine, synthesize
HG WELLS
these two polarities is incredible. It is
unbelievable, but it has happened. Buddha is the
richest human being who has ever lived. He is rich
in the sense that all the dimensions of life are
fulfilled in him. He is not one-dimensional.
There are three approaches towards truth. One is
the approach of power, another approach of
beauty, and the third is the approach of grandeur.
The scientific approach is the search for power. It
is said ‘knowledge is power’. Science has made
man very powerful, so much so that man can
destroy the whole planet earth in just a flash. For
the first time in the history of consciousness man
is capable of committing a global suicide, a
collective suicide. Science has released
tremendous power. It is continuously searching
for more and more power. This too is an approach
towards truth, but a partial one.
Then there are poets, mystics, and people with the
aesthetic sense. They look at truth as beauty.
Jalaluddin Rumi, Omar Khayyam, MahaDevi
Verma, Rabindranath Tagore and others, are the
one who think that beauty is truth. They create
new sources of beauty through art etc. The painter,
the poet, the dancer, the musician, they are also
approaching truth from a totally different
dimension than power. A poet is not like the
scientist. The scientist works with analysis, reason,
and observation in the outer world. The poet
functions through the heart. He is irrational. Trust
and love is his way towards truth. He has nothing
to do with mind and its reason. A vast majority of
religious people belong to this second dimension.
The Sufis, the Bauls all belong to the aesthetic
approach. Hence so many beautiful mosques,
churches, and cathedrals, temples of Ajanta and
Ellora all were created by religious people.
Whenever religious activity predominates, art,
music, and painting is created. The world becomes
a little more beautiful. It does not become more
powerful, instead it becomes beautiful, lovely, and
worth living.
The third approach is that of grandeur. Moses,
Abraham; Islam's Prophet Mohammed; Krishna
and Ram -- their approach is through the
dimension of grandeur. the awe that one feels
looking at this vastness of the universe. The
Upanishads, the Vedas, they all approach the world
of truth, through grandeur. They are full of
wonder. It is unbelievably there, with such
grandeur, that you can simply bow down before it
in reverence nothing else is possible. One simply
feels humble, reduced to nothing. These are the
three dimensions ordinarily available to approach
truth.
The first dimension creates the scientist. The
second approach creates the artist. And the third,
the prophets and masters! The rarity of Buddha
consists of this. His approach is a synthesis of all
the three. And not only has a synthesis instead had
it gone even beyond the three. He is a rationalist.
He is not like Jesus or Krishna. He is absolutely a
rationalist. Einstein, Newton or Edison cannot find
any flaw in his reasoning. Any scientist will be
immediately convinced of his truth. His approach
is purely logical, he convinces the mind. You
cannot find a loophole in him.
I have heard of a famous atheist, W. C. Fields. One
day his manager came into his hotel room and was
shocked to see him reading ‘The Holy Bible’.
Shocked at this gesture the manager said, ‘what
the hell are you doing? I thought you were an
atheist.’ The reply of Fields is beautiful. He replied,
‘I am just looking for loopholes and
inconsistencies, in the Bible.’
However you cannot find even a single loophole in
the Buddha. Yes, you can look for loopholes and
inconsistencies in Jesus, there are many. Simply
because Jesus believes, trusts, he has faith. He is
childlike. There is no argument in him. The proof
exists but there is no argument for it. His whole
being is his proof. However such is not the case
with Buddha. You may not be at all in harmony
with his heart. You may not even believe him. You
may not look at the proof he is. Certainly you will
have to listen to his argument. He has both the
proof and the argument. He himself is the proof of
what he is saying, and that is not all. If you are not
ready to look at him he can force you, he can
convince you. He is a rationalist.
Even an atheist like Bertrand Russell, who was,
purely logical, has once said, ‘Before Buddha I start
feeling hesitant. With Jesus I can fight.’ He has
written a book ‘Why I Am Not A Christian’. It is a
great argumentative book. It has not yet been
replied to by Christians and his argument still
holds. But before Buddha he suddenly feels
hesitant. There he is not certain of his ground.
Buddha can convince him on his own ground.
Buddha is as much an analyst as Bertrand Russell.
You need not be a religious person to be convinced
by Buddha. This is his rarity. You need not believe
at all. You need not believe in god, or soul,
anything else but still you can be with Buddha.
And being with him by and by you will come to
know the soul and the god as well.
No belief is required to travel with Buddha. You
can come with all your skepticisms. He accepts and
welcomes. He invites you to ‘Come with me.’ First
he convinces your mind, and once your mind is
convinced and you start travelling with him. Then
by and by you start feeling that he has a message
which is beyond mind. He has a message which no
reason can imprison. Therefore first he convinces
your reason.
Buddha's religion is super-rational. Yet still he is
not against reason. This has to be understood in
the very beginning. It has something to do with the
beyond, super-rational. Buddha is not against the
rational. His supra-rationality is in tune with it.
The rational and the supra-rational are continuity.
This is the rarity of Buddha.
Krishna says to Arjuna, ‘Surrender to me.’ Buddha
never says that. He convinces you to surrender.
Krishna says, ‘Surrender to me, then you will be
convinced.’ Buddha says, ‘Be convinced first, then
surrender comes like a shadow. You need not
worry about it. Do not talk about it at all.’ Because
of this rational approach he never brings any
concept which cannot be proved. He never talks
about god.
Once H. G. Wells has said about Buddha, ‘He is the
godliest and the most godless man in the whole
history of man.’ Indeed He is most godly and most
godless. You cannot find anyone godlier than
Buddha. All others simply fade before him. His
luminosity is superb and unique. His being has no
comparison, yet still he does not talk about god.
Buddha has never talked about god. Many think
that he is an atheist. No he is not. He has not talked
about god because there is no way to talk about
god. All talk about god is just nonsense.
Whatsoever you can say about god is going to be
false. God is unknown and unknowable and
therefore nothing can be said. Other seers also say
that nothing can be said about god, but at least
they say that nothing can be said about god.
Buddha is really logical. He will not say even this,
because he says, ‘Even to say that nothing can be
said about god, you have said something’. If you
say, ‘God cannot be defined,’ you have indeed
defined him in a negative way. If you say, ‘nothing
can be said,’ that too you are saying. Buddha is
strictly logical. He will not utter a single word.
Buddha is not an atheist but he never talks about
god. That is why I say he is a rarity. He brings
many people to god. He brought more people than
anybody else has done. Millions of people were
brought to become godly in his presence, but he
never uttered the word and not only god, but even
soul, or self. He has no theory about it. He simply
says, ‘I can show you the way how to go in. You go
and see.’ He says, ‘Buddhas can only indicate the
path, they cannot provide you with a philosophy.
You are there, go in and see.’
I have heard. Someone came to Buddha. He was a
great scholar, was known all over the country.
Maulingaputta was his name. He said to Buddha, ‘I
have come with dozen questions and you have to
answer them.’ Buddha responded, ‘I will answer,
but you will have to fulfill a requirement. For one
year you will have to be with me in total silence,
and only then I will answer. I can answer but you
will not receive my answers because you are not
ready. Also whatsoever I say you will misinterpret
because your inner sky is full of interpretations.
Whatsoever I say will have to pass through your
mind. For one year you just be silent so that you
can drop the knowledge. When you are empty,
whatsoever you want to ask I will answer, I
promise you. ‘While he was saying this, another
monk, Sariputta, who was sitting under another
tree, started laughing. His was a mad laughter.
Maulingaputta must have felt embarrassed. He
enquired, ‘What is the matter? Why are you
laughing?’ Sariputta replied, ‘I am not laughing
about you, I am laughing about myself. One year
ago this man deceived me as well. I had come with
many questions but he asked me to wait for one
year, so I waited. And now I am laughing because
those questions have disappeared. He goes on
asking, to bring those questions! but I cannot bring
those questions. They have disappeared as water
vapors dry in heat. Therefore if you really want
your questions to be answered, ask now, do not
wait for one year. This man is really deceptive.’
Buddha introduced many people, millions of
people, to the inner world, but in a very rational
way. This is simple. In the process of inward
journey first you become a receiver. Attain to
silence, only then communion is possible, not
before at all. Buddha never used to answer any
metaphysical questions. He was always ready to
answer any question about methodology or
tariqat. However he was never ready to answer
any questions about metaphysics.
This is his scientific approach. Science believes in
method. Science never answers the ‘why’. It always
answers the ‘how’. ‘How’ leads to methodology or
tariqat! If you ask a scientist, ‘Why is the world
there?’ he will say, ‘I do not know. But I can answer
how the world is there.’ He will not answer ‘Why is
the water there?’ But he can say how the water is
there. He can give you the method, the ‘how’, the
mechanism. He can show you how to make water,
but he cannot show you why.
His approach is very different from other atheists.
Theists require you to believe. Buddha says, ‘How
can one believe? You are asking the impossible.’
Listen to his argument. He says if somebody is
doubtful, how can he believe? If the doubt has
arisen already, how can he believe? He may
repress the doubt. He may enforce the belief. But
deep down like an undercurrent doubt will go on
flowing. Sooner or later the belief is bound to
collapse. There is no foundation to it. From the
very beginning there is doubt. And on the
foundation of doubt you have raised the whole
structure of your belief. Have you observed?
Whenever you believe, deep down there is doubt
like an undercurrent.
For those whose faith is natural, and spontaneous,
there is no question of faith. They simply believe.
They do not know even what belief is. Look at
small l children, they simply believe. But once
doubt enters, belief becomes impossible. And
doubt has to enter. It is part of growth. Doubt
makes one mature. You remain childish unless
doubt has penetrated your consciousness. Without
doubt you remain immature and will never come
to know what life is. You start knowing life only by
doubting, by being skeptical, and by raising
questions. Faith comes by destroying doubt by
argument. Just as one poison destroys the other
poison so too one doubt destroys other doubt. This
is Buddha's way. He does not say believe. He says
go deep into your doubt. Go to the very end,
unafraid. Do not repress. Travel the whole path of
doubt to the very end. And that very journey will
take you beyond it. In the process a moment comes
when doubt starts doubting itself. That is the
ultimate doubt. When doubt doubts doubt it. That
has to come if you go to the very end. You first
doubt belief. You doubt this and that. One day
when everything has been doubted, suddenly a
new, the ultimate doubt arises. And you start
doubting doubt. This is tremendously new in the
world of religion. And then doubt destroys doubt,
and faith is gained. This faith is not against doubt.
Instead this faith is beyond doubt. This faith is not
opposite to doubt. This is the absence of doubt.
Buddha says you will have to become children
again, but the path has to go through the world,
through many forests and thoroughfares of doubts,
arguments, and reasoning. And when a person
comes back home, attains back to his original faith,
it is totally different happening. He is not just a
child. He is an old man, mature, experienced, and
yet childlike.
With this as I could not contain myself from this
overflow. The very name Buddha does something
to my being and like an intoxicated one I start
overflowing irrespective of the place or person. It
reminds me of something. And as soon as this
remembrance overwhelms I am bound to allow
the overflow.
PRELUDE TO HEART SUTRA
The sutras belong to the seventh. These are
declarations of someone who has entered the
seventh temple, the transcendental - the absolute.
That is the meaning of the Sanskrit word,
PRAGYAPARAMITA or the wisdom of the beyond,
from the beyond, in the beyond. It refers to the
wisdom that comes only when you have
transcended all kinds of identifications - lower or
higher, this worldly or that worldly.
Each one of you is a Buddha within. Buddhahood is
your essential nature and also your fruition as
well. However this Buddha within is fast asleep. I
know the Buddha within you. Therefore I salute
the Buddha within you. You may not be aware of it,
you may not have ever dreamed about it - that you
are a Buddha. Remember nobody can be anything
else. The Buddhahood is the very essential core of
your being. It is not something to happen in the
future. It has happened already. It is the very
source you come from. It is the source and the goal
too. It is from Buddhahood that we move. And it is
to Buddhahood that we move. This one word,
Buddhahood, contains all - the full circle of life,
from the alpha to the omega.
But you are fast asleep. You do not know who you
are. Not that you have to become a Buddha alone,
but only that you have to recognize it. You have to
return to your own source. You have to look
within yourself. A confrontation with yourself will
reveal your Buddhahood. The day one comes to
see oneself; the whole existence becomes
enlightened that very moment. It is not that a
person becomes enlightened. How can a person
become enlightened? The very idea of being a
person is part of the unenlightened mind. It is not
that I have become enlightened. The 'I' has to be
dropped before one can become enlightened. So
how can I become enlightened? That is absurdity.
The day I became enlightened the whole existence
became enlightened. Since that moment I have not
seen anything other than Buddhas - in many
forms, with many names, with a thousand and one
problems, but Buddhas still. Buddhas within!
Therefore I salute the Buddha within you. It is to
this inner Buddha that Gautam Buddha addresses.
Again it is to these Buddhas within that Osho
overflowed. It is to these Buddhas masters, and
sheikhs go on addressing. And I am immensely
glad that you and Buddha within you surround us.
The very fact of your turning the pages of this
overflow is the beginning of the recognition. The
respect in your heart for such an overflow, the love
in your heart for a living buddha, is respect and
love for your own Buddhahood – your essential
nature. The trust in a living buddha is not trust in
something extrinsic to you. It is the self-trust. By
trusting a buddha you will learn to trust yourself.
By coming close to a buddha you will come close to
yourself. Only recognition is needed. It is like an
unlit candle coming in contact with the lit one. The
moment the unlit candle comes closer something
jumps from the lit one and lights the unlit one.
The diamond is there. Only you have forgotten
about it. Maybe you have never remembered it
from the very beginning.
There is a very famous saying of Emerson. He says
‘Man is God in ruins.’ I agree and I disagree at the
same time. The insight of Emerson has some truth
in it. Man is not as yet what he should be. There is
a fading possibility, maybe. The insight is there but
a little upside down. Man is not God in ruins as
Emerson says. Instead man is God in the making.
Man is a Buddha in seed form. The seed is there. It
has to grow first before it can blossom any
moment. This requires just a little effort, just a
little help. And the help is not going to cause it to
happen. It is already there! Your effort is only
going to reveal it to you. The help to unfold what is
there, hidden needs your effort. It is a discovery,
but the truth is already there. The truth is eternal.
Listen to these sutras because these are the most
important sutras in the entire Buddhist literature.
Hence they are called The Heart Sutra. It is the
very heart or the being of the Buddhist message.
But I would like to begin from the very beginning.
From this point only does Buddhism become
relevant? Let it be there in your heart that you are
a Buddha. I know it may look presumptuous at
least from your level of understanding. It may also
look very hypothetical for you. You cannot trust it
totally. That is natural. I understand it. Let it be
there, as a seed alone. The seed may be planted by
someone. And then it may start growing. Around
that fact many things will start happening.
Remember it is only around that fact will you be
able to understand these sutras. They are
immensely beautiful and full of energy. Though
very small, very condensed, yet still these are seed
like.
But with this soil of understanding and this vision
in the mind, that you are a Buddha - a budding
Buddha, things just have to be put in the right
order. A little more awareness is needed. A little
more consciousness is needed. The treasure is
there. You have to bring a small lamp inside your
house. Once the darkness dispels you will no
longer be a beggar. You are a Buddha, a sovereign,
an emperor that very moment. This whole
kingdom is yours and it is just for the sake of
asking; you have just to claim it.
But you cannot claim if you believe that you are a
beggar. You cannot claim it, or even dream about
claiming if you think that you are a beggar. This
idea that you are a beggar or an ignorant, or a
sinner, has been infused in you from down
through the ages that it has become a deep
hypnosis in you now. This hypnosis has to be
broken. To break it I start with: I salute the
Buddha within you. This is a devise to keep you
reminding while I am working within you for such
an understanding.
To me, you are a Buddha. All your efforts to attain
to enlightenment are ridiculous if you do not
accept this basic fact. This has to become a tacit
understanding, that you are it! This is the right
beginning. This has to remain like an
undercurrent. Otherwise you will go astray. This
is the right beginning! Start with this vision. And
do not be worried that this may create some kind
of ego - that ‘I am a Buddha.’ Hindus say ‘AHAM
BRAHMAASMI’. Do not be worried; because the
whole process of The Heart Sutra will make it
clear to you that the ego is the only thing that does
not exist. Ego is the only thing that does not exist!
Everything else is real.
There are teachers who say the world is illusory
and the soul is existential -- the 'I' is true and all
else is illusory, Maya. Buddha says just the
opposite. He says only the 'I' is untrue and
everything else is real. And I agree with Buddha
more than with others. Buddha's insight is very
deep and penetrating. Nobody else has ever
penetrated into those realms, depths and heights
of reality than Buddha.
But start with the idea, with this climate around
you, with this vision. Let it be declared to your
each cell of the body and each thought in your
mind. Let it be declared to every nook and corner
of your existence, that ‘I am a Buddha!’ And do not
be worried about the 'I'... we will take care of it.
One Naqshbandi Sufi Raghuber Dayal used to say
man ultimately becomes what one believes to be.
In the beginning this is a game. However soon it
becomes a reality. Try to pretend that you are mad
or you stammer soon it will happen.
Remember ‘I’ and Buddhahood cannot exist
together. Once the Buddhahood becomes revealed
the ‘I’ disappears. It is just like darkness
disappears when you bring a light in.
Before I take you into the sutras, it will be
necessary to understand a little framework, a little
structure. This will help in understanding the
sutra.
The ancient Buddhist scriptures talk about seven
temples. Just as Sufis talk about seven valleys,
Christians talk about seven churches and Hindus
talk about seven chakras, Buddhists talk about
seven temples.
1. The first temple is the physical,
2. The second temple is psycho-somatic,
3. The third temple is psychological,
4. The fourth temple is psycho-spiritual,
5. The fifth temple is spiritual,
6. The sixth temple is spiritual-
transcendental, and
7. The seventh temple and the ultimate - the
temple of temples - is the transcendental.
The sutras belong to the seventh. These are
declarations of someone who has entered the
seventh temple, the transcendental - the absolute.
That is the meaning of the Sanskrit word,
PRAGYAPARAMITA or the wisdom of the beyond,
from the beyond, in the beyond. It refers to the
wisdom that comes only when you have
transcended all kinds of identifications - lower or
higher, this worldly or that worldly. You are not
identified at all. There is only a pure flame of
awareness with no smoke around it. This is the
reason Buddhists worship this small book, this
very, very small book. They have called it The
Heart Sutra - the very heart of religion, the very
core.
The first temple, the physical, can correspond to
the Hindu map with the Muladhar chakra. The
second, the psychosomatic, corresponds with
Swadhisthan chakra. The third, the psychological
corresponds with Manipuri. The fourth, the
psycho-spiritual temple relates with Anahatta
chakra. The fifth the spiritual temple corresponds
with Vishudha. The sixth, the spiritual-
transcendental, relates with Agya or the third eye
center. And finally the seventh, the
transcendental, corresponds with Sahasrar – the
thousand petal center. 'Sahasrar' means one-
thousand-petal lotus. That is the symbol of the
ultimate flowering. Nothing has remained hidden,
all has become unhidden, manifest. The thousand-
petal lotus has opened. The whole sky is filled with
its fragrance, beauty, and its benediction.
In the modern times a great work has started in
search of the innermost core of the human being. It
will be good to understand how far modern efforts
lead us. It was Pavlov, B.F. Skinner and the other
behaviorists who went on circling around the
physical, the muladhar. They think man is the body
alone. In the process they get too much involved in
the first temple, they get too much involved with
the physical, and forget everything else. These
people are trying to explain man only through the
physical, the material. This attitude becomes a
hindrance because they are not open. When from
the very beginning you deny that there is nothing
other than the body, then you deny the exploration
itself. This becomes a prejudice.
A communist, a Marxist, a behaviorist, an atheist
all believe that man is only the body. And thus
their very belief closes doors to higher realities.
They become blind. And the physical is there, the
physical is the most apparent; it needs no proof.
The physical body is there, you need not prove it.
Because it need not be proved, it becomes the only
reality. That is nonsense. Then man loses all
dignity. If there is nothing to grow in or to grow
towards, there cannot be any dignity in life. Then
man becomes a thing. Then you are not an
opening. Also nothing more is going to happen to
you. If you are a body: you will eat, and you will
defecate, and you will eat and you will make love
and produce children, and this will go on and on,
and one day you die. This is mechanical repetition
of the mundane, the trivia. How can there be any
significance, any meaning, and any poetry? How
can there be any dance?
Skinner has written a book, Beyond Freedom and
Dignity. It should be called Below Freedom and
Dignity, not beyond. It is in fact below. It is the
lowest standpoint about man, the ugliest. There is
nothing wrong about the body, remember. I am
not against the body, it is a beautiful temple. The
ugliness enters when you think this is all. And
there can be no transformation.
Man can be conceived of as a ladder with seven
rungs or steps or a structure with seven stories.
However you get identified with the first rung.
Then you are not going anywhere. And the ladder
is there, and the ladder bridges this world with the
other. The ladder bridges matter with God. The
first rung is perfectly good if it is used in
relationship to the whole ladder. If it functions as a
first step it is immensely beautiful. One should be
thankful to the body. Body is the temple of the
unknown. But if you start worshipping the first
rung and you forget the remaining six, you forget
that the whole ladder exists and you become
closed, confined to the first rung. Then it is no
longer a rung at all. Remember because a rung is a
rung only when it leads to another rung. A rung is
a rung only when it is part of a ladder. If it is no
longer a rung then you are stuck with it. Hence,
people who are materialistic are always stuck.
They always feel something is missing. They do
not feel they are going anywhere. They move in
rounds, in circles, and they come again and again
to the same point. They become tired and bored.
They start contemplating how to commit suicide.
And their whole effort in life is to find some
sensations. They feel only then something new
can happen. But what 'new' can happen? All the
things that we go on being occupied with are
nothing but toys to play with.
The science, technology and all that the modern
world has provided you with is nothing but sugar
sticks, toys to play with. Modern science has given
you comforts of telephone, television and so many
other beautiful things for you. And you play
around a little bit. Then again you get fed up. You
are bored, and again they go on searching for new
toys for you to play with. This state of affairs is
ridiculous. It is so absurd that it seems almost
inconceivable how we go on living in it. We have
got caught at the first rung. And remain at this
rung for lives.
Remember that you are in the body. But you are
not the body. Let that be a continuous awareness
in you. You live in the body. And the body is a
beautiful abode. Remember, I am asking you to
become against the body. Or that you start
denying the body as the so-called spiritualists have
done down the ages. The materialists go on
thinking that the body is all that is. On the other
hand there are people who move to the opposite
extreme. And they start saying that the body is
illusory. It ceases to exist! Therefore destroy the
body. In doing the illusion is destroyed, and you
can become real indeed.
This other extreme is a reaction. The materialist
creates his own reaction in the spiritualist.
However both remain partners in the same
business. There is no difference. The body is
beautiful. It is real. The body has to be lived. The
body has to be loved. The body is a great gift of
God. Not for a single moment be against it. Also not
for a single moment think that you are only it. You
are far bigger. Use the body as a jumping board to
transcend to the other realm.
The second temple is: Psychosomatic, or
Swadisthan. Freudian psychoanalysis functions
there. It goes a little higher or deeper than Skinner
and Pavlov. Freud enters into the mysteries of the
psychological a little bit more. He is not just a
behaviorist. Still he never goes beyond dreams. He
goes on analyzing the dreams. The dream exists as
an illusion in your consciousness. It is indicative
and symbolic as well. It has a message from the
unconscious to be revealed to the conscious. But
there is no point in just getting caught in it. Use the
dream, but never become the dream. You are not
the dream.
And there is no need to make so much fuss about
it, as Freudians go on making. Their whole effort
seems to be moving in the realm of the dream
world. Try to understand this message, and there
is no need really to go to anybody else to analyze
your dream. If you cannot analyze your dream
nobody else can, because your dream is your
dream. And your dream is so personal that nobody
else can dream the way you dream. Nobody has
ever dreamed the way you dream. And nobody will
ever dream the way you dream. Therefore nobody
can explain it to you. His interpretation will be his
interpretation. Only you can look into it. And in
fact there is no need to analyze the dream. Simply
look at the dream in its totality, with clarity, with
alertness, and you will see the message. It is so
loud! There is no need to go for psychoanalysis for
three, four, five, seven years.
A person who is dreaming every night, and in the
day is going to the psychoanalyst to be analyzed,
becomes by and by surrounded by dreamy-stuff.
The first becomes too much obsessed with the
Muladhara, the physical. The second becomes too
much obsessed with the sexual. Because the
second - the realm of psychosomatic reality is
nothing but sex! The second starts interpreting
everything in terms of sex. Whatsoever you do, go
to the Freudian and he will reduce it to sex.
Nothing higher exists for him. He lives in the mud.
He does not believe in the lotus. You bring a lotus
flower to him he will look at it and reduce it to the
mud. He will say, lotus is nothing just dirty mud.
Has it not come out of dirty mud? If it has come out
of dirty mud then it has to be dirty mud therefore.
Reduce everything to its cause, and that is the real.
Then every poem is reduced to sex, everything
beautiful is reduced to sex and perversion and
repression. Michelangelo is a great artist? Even his
art has to be reduced to some sexuality. And
Freudians go to absurd lengths. They say
Michelangelo or Goethe or Byron, all their great
works of art which bring great joy to millions of
people, is nothing but repressed sex.
For psychoanalyst everything becomes perversion.
If Freudian analysis succeeds then there will be no
Kalidas, or Shakespeare, or Michelangelo, or
Mozart, or Wagner, because everybody will be
normal. These are abnormal people. These people
are psychologically ill, according to Freud. The
greatest are reduced to the lowest. Buddha is ill,
according to Freud, because whatsoever things he
is talking about, they are nothing but repressed
sex.
This approach reduces human greatness to
ugliness. Beware of it. Buddha is not ill. In fact,
Freud is ill. The silence of Buddha, the joy of
Buddha, the celebration of Buddha is not ill. It is
the full flowering of wellbeing.
But to Freud the normal person is one who never
sang a song. Who has never danced? Who has
never celebrated! Never prayed! Never meditated!
And never done anything creative is just normal.
He goes to the office, comes home, eats, drinks,
sleeps, and dies but can never leave a trace behind
of his creativity. This normal man seems to be very
mediocre, dull and dead. There is a suspicion
about Freud that because he himself could not
create as he was an uncreative person. Freud was
condemning creativity itself as pathology. There is
every possibility that he was a mediocre person.
The mediocre mind is trying to reduce all
greatness. The mediocre mind cannot accept that
there can be any greater being than him. This
hurts. Entire psychoanalysis and its interpretation
of human life is revenge from the mediocre.
Beware of it. It is better than the first. Yes, it is a
little ahead of the first, but one has to go, and go on
going, beyond and beyond.
The third is psychological temple. Adler lives in the
world of the psychological, the will to power. It is
at least something very egoistic, but at least
something. Alder is a little more open than Freud.
But the problem remains, just like Freud reduces
everything to sex, Adler reduces everything to
inferiority complex. People try to become great
because they feel inferior. A person who tries to
become enlightened is one who feels inferior.
And when Buddha attains fruition he has no ideas
of superiority. He bows down to the whole of
existence. He has not that idea of holier-than-thou
at all. Everything is holy, even the dust is divine.
No, he is not thinking himself superior. And he was
not striving to become superior. He was not feeling
inferior at all. He was born a king. So there was no
question of inferiority. He was at the top from the
very beginning. There was no question of
inferiority. He was the richest man in his country
and the most powerful as well. There was nothing
more to be attained. He was one of the most
beautiful men ever born on this earth. He had one
of the most beautiful women as his beloved. All
was available to him.
But Adler would go on searching for some
inferiority because he could not believe that a man
could have any goal other than the ego. It is better
however better than Freud, a little higher as well.
Ego is a little higher than sex. But not much higher!
The fourth is psycho-spiritual, or anahatta, the
heart center. Carl Gustav Jung, Assagioli and others
penetrate that realm. They go higher than Pavlov,
Freud and Adler. They open more possibilities.
They accept the world of the irrational, the
unconscious as well. But they do not confine
themselves to reason. They are more reasonable
people. They accept ‘unreason’ too. The irrational
is not denied instead accepted. This is where
modern psychology stops -- at the fourth rung.
And the fourth rung is just in the middle of the
whole ladder. Three rungs or layers on one side
and three on the other.
Modern psychology is not yet a complete science.
It is hanging just in the middle. It is very uncertain
about everything. It is more hypothetical than
experiential, as it is still struggling to be.
The fifth is spiritual. Islam, Hinduism, Christianity
and Sikhism the mass-organized religions remain
stuck with the fifth. They do not go beyond the
spiritual. All the organized religions, the churches,
remain at the fifth layer or rung.
The sixth is the spiritual-transcendental. This
includes yoga and other methods. All over the
world, down the ages, many methods have been
developed which are less like a church
organization. These are not dogmatic but more
experiential in nature. You have to do something
with your body and mind. You have to create a
certain harmony within yourself so that you can
ride on that harmony. You can ride on that horizon
of harmony and go far away from your ordinary
reality. Yoga can comprehend all that. This is the
sixth.
Now comes the seventh layer or rung - the
transcendental. Tantra, Tao, Zen. Buddha's
attitude is of the seventh -PRAGYAPARAMITA. It
means wisdom that is transcendental, wisdom that
comes to you only when all the bodies have been
crossed and you have become just a pure
awareness, just a witness, pure subjectivity.
Unless one reaches to the transcendental, he will
have to be provided with toys, sugar candies etc.
He will have to be provided with false meanings.
A few people remember God habitually. Others
remember God professionally. A priest remembers
professionally. He has nothing to do with God. He
is being paid for it. He has become proficient.
However no one seems to remember God in deep
love. A few people invoke his name when they are
miserable. But no one remembers him when they
are in joy - celebrating. Remember that is the right
moment to remember, because only when you are
joyous, immensely ecstatic are you close to God.
When you are in misery you are far away. In
misery you are closed. When you are happy you
are open, flowing. You can hold God's hand.
So either you remember habitually. You have been
taught from the very childhood. It has become a
kind of habit, just like smoking or drinking. If you
smoke you do not enjoy much. However if you do
not smoke you feel you are missing something. If
you remember God every morning, and evening,
nothing is attained, because the remembrance is
not of the heart. It is just verbal, and mechanical.
But if you do not remember you start feeling
something is missing. It has become a ritual.
Beware of making God a ritual, and beware of
becoming professional about it.
I have heard a very famous story from scriptures:
The story is about a famous yogi. Once, the king of
the state promised that if he could go into deep
Samadhi and remain under the earth for one year,
he would give him the best horse in the kingdom
as a reward. The king knew that the yogi had a soft
heart for horses; as he was a great lover of horses.
The yogi agreed. Accordingly he was buried alive
for a year. But in the course of the year the
kingdom was overthrown and no one remembered
to dig up the yogi. In the process ten years passed.
Then one day someone remembered the yogi. The
king sent a few men to find out. The yogi was dug
up. He was still in his deep meditation. A
previously agreed mantra was whispered in his
ear and he came out of the Samadhi. The first
thing he enquired was, about the horse.
Even after ten years of silence underneath the
earth the mind did not change. ‘Where is my
horse?’ was his first sentence after opening the
eyes. Was he thinking about God in Samadhi? He
must have been thinking about the horse. But he
was a professional. He must have learned the
technique of how to stop the breathing and how to
go into a kind of conscious death.
Remaining ten years in such deep silence and the
mind has not changed even a bit! It is exactly the
same as if these ten years had not passed by. If you
remember God technically or professionally or
habitually then nothing is going to happen.
Everything is possible, but all possibilities go
through the door heart. Heart is the door. Hence
the name of this scripture: The Heart Sutra.
Unless you do something out of love, with
involvement, commitment, sincerity, authenticity,
and your total being, nothing is going to happen.
These sutras can become a revolution. Inward
journey begins with an enquiry. When first you
ask, ‘Who am I?’ the muladhar will answer, ‘You
are a body! What nonsense! There is no need to
ask, you know it already.’ Then the second will say,
‘You are sexuality.’ Then the third will claim, ‘You
are a power-trip, an ego’ - and so on and so forth.
This enquiry ‘Who am I?’ has to continue. You can
stop only when no answer comes back, not before
this. If still answer comes that, ‘You are this, or
that,’ then know well that a certain center is
providing you with the answer. When all the six
centers have been crossed and all their answers
vanished, you still go on asking, ‘Who am I?’ and no
answer comes from anywhere, know this as utter
silence. Your question resounds in yourself: ‘Who
am I?’ and there is silence. No answer arises from
anywhere. You are absolutely present, and silent.
There is not even a single vibration. ‘Who am I?’
and silence overflows.
Then a miracle happens. You cannot even
formulate the question. Answers have become
absurd. Then finally the question also becomes
absurd. First answers disappear. Then the
question also disappears. Because both question
and answer exist in togetherness. They are like
two sides of the same coin. If one side has gone,
the other cannot be retained. First answers
disappear, and then the question as well. And with
the disappearance of question and answer, you
come to realize the transcendental.
You know, yet you cannot say you know. And there
is no way to articulate about it. You know from
your very being who you are, but it cannot be
verbalized. It is ETERNAL KNOWING. It is not
scriptural. It is not borrowed. It is not from others.
It has arisen in you.
And with this arising, you are a Buddha. And then
you start laughing because you came to know that
you have been a Buddha from the very beginning.
You had just never looked so deep. You were
running around and around outside your being.
You had never come home.
I have heard once Arthur Schopenhauer, the
philosopher, was walking down a lonely street.
Lost in thought, he accidentally bumped into
another pedestrian. Angered by the jolt and the
apparent unconcern of the philosopher, the
pedestrian shouted, ‘Well! Who do you think you
are?’
Still lost in thought the philosopher replied, ‘Who
am I? How do I wish I knew?’
No one in fact knows. Knowing this that I do not
know who I am the journey begins.
This is HOMAGE TO THE TOTALITY OF WISDOM,
THE LOVELY, and THE HOLY! This is an
invocation. All Indian scriptures begin with an
invocation for a certain reason.
The Indian understanding entails that we are him, and he has written it. But he is not the author
hollow bamboos. Through which only the infinite of it.
flows. The infinite has to be invoked. We become HOMAGE TO THE TOTALITY OF WISDOM, THE
just an instrument to it. We invoke it. We call it LOVELY, and THE HOLY!
forth to flow through us. That is why nobody
knows who wrote this Heart Sutra. It has not been
signed because the person who wrote it did not
believe that he was the writer of it. He was just Only this much for now as prelude!
instrumental. It appeared as if it was dictated to

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Cover of book on Meditation by Jiddu Krihnnamurti

 DHAMMAPADA OF BUDDHA
The sayings of the Buddha were extracted out of the stories of Buddha's life to form
The Dhammapada, which means ‘the path of dharma.’ This book consists of 423 sayings of the
Buddha, grouped into 26 categories. One must take the title of the book with utmost sincerity.
The sayings of the Buddha are not meant to be a fixed, static, unchanging doctrine,
but rather a path which anyone can follow.

T
he Dhammapada is the best known and
most widely esteemed text in the Pali
Tipitaka. It is the sacred scriptures of
Theravada Buddhism. The work is included in the
Khuddaka Nikaya (‘Minor Collection’) of the Sutta
Pitaka. However its popularity has raised it to the
ranks of a world religious classic. Originally it was
composed in the ancient Pali language. A slim
anthology of verses Dhammapada constitutes a
perfect compendium of the Buddha's teaching. It
comprises all the essential principles elaborated at
length in the forty volumes.
According to the Theravada Buddhist tradition,
each verse in the Dhammapada was originally
spoken by the Buddha in response to a particular
episode. Accounts of these, verses, are preserved
in the classic commentary to the work, compiled
by Bhadantacariya Buddhaghosa in the fifth
century C.E. The contents of the verses, however,
transcend the limited and particular
circumstances of their origin, reaching out through
the ages to various types of people in all the
diverse situations of life. Dhammapada is a
sympathetic counselor for the intellectually
overburdened one. It’s clear and direct teachings
inspire humility and reflection. And for the earnest
seeker it is a perennial source of inspiration and
practical instruction.
Insights of Buddha have crystallized into these
luminous verses of pure wisdom. As profound
expressions of practical spirituality each verse is a
guideline to right living. The Buddha
unambiguously pointed out that whoever
earnestly practices the teachings found in the
Dhammapada will taste the bliss of emancipation.
Due to its immense importance, the Dhammapada
has been translated into numerous languages. In
English alone several translations are available,
including editions by such noted scholars as Max
Muller and Dr. S. Radhakrishnan.
From ancient times to the present, the
Dhammapada has been regarded as the most
significant expression of the Buddha's teaching
found in the Pali canon and the chief spiritual
testament of early Buddhism. In the countries
following Theravada Buddhism, such as Sri Lanka,
Burma and Thailand, the influence of the
Dhammapada is ubiquitous.
To his followers, the Buddha is neither a god,
divine incarnation, nor a prophet who bears a
message of divine revelation, instead a human
being who by his own striving and intelligence has
reached the highest spiritual attainment of which
man is capable. His function in relation to
humanity is that of a teacher — a world teacher
who, out of compassion, points out to others the
way to Nibbana (Sanskrit: Nirvana), final release
from suffering. His teaching, known as the
Dhamma, offers a body of instructions explaining
the true nature of existence and showing the path
that leads to liberation.
Free from all dogmas and inscrutable claims to
authority, the Dhamma is founded solidly upon the
bedrock of the Buddha's own clear comprehension
of reality, and it leads the one who practices it to
that same understanding which extricates the
roots of suffering.
The title ‘Dhammapada’ which the ancient
compilers of the Buddhist scriptures attached to
our anthology means portions, aspects, or sections
of Dhamma. The work has been given this title as it
contains twenty-six chapters. It spans the multiple
aspects of the Buddha's teaching offering a variety
of standpoints from which to gain a glimpse into
its heart. Whereas the longer discourses of the
Buddha contained in the prose sections of the
Canon usually proceed methodically.
Unfolding according to the sequential structure of
the doctrine, the Dhammapada lacks such a
systematic arrangement. The work is simply a
collection of inspirational verses on the
fundamentals of the Dhamma, to be used as a basis
for personal instruction. In any given chapter
several successive verses may have been spoken
by the Buddha on a single occasion, and thus
among themselves will exhibit a meaningful
development or a set of variations on a theme. But
by and large, the logic behind the grouping
together of verses into a chapter is merely the
concern with a common topic. The twenty-six
chapter headings thus function as a kind of rubric
for classifying the diverse poetic utterances of the
Master, and the reason behind the inclusion of any
given verse in a particular chapter is its mention of
the subject indicated in the chapter’s heading. In
certain cases like (Chapters 4 and 23) this may be a
metaphorical symbol rather than a point of
doctrine. There also seems to be no intentional
design in the order of the chapters themselves,
though at certain points a loose thread of
development can be discerned.
Gautama the Buddha’s whole religion can be
reduced to a single word. That word is freedom.
That is his essential message. Or his very
fragrance! Nobody else has raised freedom so high.
It is the ultimate value in Buddha's vision, the
SUMMUM BONUM.
There is nothing higher than that. And it seems
very fundamental to understand why Buddha
emphasizes freedom so much. Neither God is
emphasized nor heaven is emphasized nor is love
emphasized, but only freedom. There is a reason
for it: all that is valuable becomes possible only in
the climate of freedom. Love also grows only in the
soil of freedom.
Without freedom, love cannot grow. Without
freedom, what grows in the name of love is
nothing but lust. Without freedom there is no God.
Without freedom what you think to be God is only
your imagination, your fear, your greed. There is
no heaven without freedom. Freedom is heaven.
And if you think there is heaven without freedom,
then that heaven has no worth, no reality. It is
your fancy, it is your dream.
All great values of life grow in the climate of
freedom. Hence freedom is the most fundamental
value and also the highest pinnacle. If you want to
understand Buddha you will have to taste
something of the freedom he is talking about. His
freedom is not of the outside. It is not social; it is
not political, or economic. His freedom is spiritual.
By ‘freedom’ he means a state of consciousness
unhindered by any desire, unchained to any desire,
un-imprisoned by any greed, or lust for more. By
‘freedom’ he means a consciousness without mind,
a state of no-mind. It is utterly empty, because if
there is something, that will certainly hinder
freedom; hence it is utter emptiness. This word
‘emptiness’ or SHUNYATA has been very much
misunderstood by people, because the word has a
connotation of negativity. Whenever we hear the
word ‘empty’ we think of something negative. In
Buddha’s terminology, emptiness is not negative.
Emptiness is absolutely positive, more positive
than your so-called fullness. It is so because
emptiness is full of freedom. Everything else has
been removed. It is spacious. All boundaries have
been dropped. It is unbounded. And only in an
unbounded space, freedom is possible. His
emptiness is not ordinary emptiness. It is not only
absence of something instead it is a presence of
something invisible. Take an example: you are
empty your room. As you remove the furniture
and the paintings and the things inside, the room
becomes empty on the one hand because there is
no more any furniture, no more paintings, no more
things, nothing is left inside; but on the other hand,
something invisible starts filling it. That
invisibleness is ‘roominess,’ or ‘spaciousness’- the
room becomes bigger. As you remove the things,
the room is becoming bigger and bigger. When
everything is removed, even the walls, then the
room is as big as the whole sky.
Such is the whole process of meditation - removing
everything. Removing yourself so totally that
nothing is left behind - not even you! In that utter
silence is freedom. In this utter stillness grows the
‘One-Thousand-Petal Lotus of Freedom’. And great
fragrance is released! It is the fragrance of peace,
compassion, love, and bliss. Or if you want to
choose the word ‘God’ you can choose it. It is not
Buddha’s word, but there is no harm in choosing it.
Meditate over these beautiful sutras: THIRTY-SIX
STREAMS ARE RUSHING TOWARD YOU!
‘Thirty-six’ is only a Buddhist metaphor. It stands
for ‘many.’ Many streams are rushing towards you.
Each moment you are surrounded by a thousand
and one desires, and they are all pulling you in
different directions. You are a victim and you are
falling apart.
I have heard: a young man entered a hotel. He saw
a very beautiful woman sitting alone in the corner
drinking coffee. She was so beautiful and so
attractive that the young man could not resist the
temptation. He went close to her and asked her,
‘Can I join you?’ The woman looked at him for a
few seconds and said, ‘Do you think I am falling
apart?’ But that is exactly the case with everybody
is falling apart, even that woman.
Everybody is falling apart. You are not one. You
have become many fragments, and all the
fragments are going in different directions. That is
why there is so much misery in your life. When
your parts, which are essentially your intrinsic
parts, are being pulled in different directions you
feel the pain of it. That is what misery is: the pain
of falling into different directions simultaneously,
or rushing into different directions
simultaneously. That is what creates craziness,
and insanity.
Buddha says: THIRTY-SIX STREAMS ARE RUSHING
TOWARD YOU! Beware! Not only one but many
streams are rushing toward you. And if you do not
take care, and are not alert, you will be possessed
by them. If you remain unconscious, or you remain
sleepy, you will be defeated by those streams.
Those streams are not basically enemies to you.
They are pure energy, and energy is always
neutral. But when you are asleep those same
streams are dangerous.
When you are awake, those same streams become
great creative energies for you. They are rushing
towards Buddhas too, but in the hand of a buddha,
dust turns into gold. The touch of awareness is
alchemical. In YOUR hands, even if by chance you
come across gold, it turns into dust. You are so
asleep. In that sleepiness you impart your
sleepiness to whatsoever comes to you. Those
thirty-six streams he is talking about are gifts of
existence, gifts of great energy. It is coming from
everywhere. Now, it depends on you whether you
can transform those energies into a synthesis, and
thus transform those energies into an integrated
whole or create an orchestra out of all those
energies. Then you become a song, and you create
great music. Your life becomes a melody.
But if you cannot transform those energies, then
you will be a victim and you will be divided into so
many parts. You will lose all integrity. You will
become a crowd. You will not be an individual
anymore. THIRTY-SIX STREAMS ARE RUSHING
TOWARD YOU! DESIRE AND PLEASURE AND
LUST.... and so on, so forth.
What is desire? Desire means greed for more. It is
cannot be fulfilled. It is impossible to fulfill the
greed for more because that ‘more’ has no
limitation. ‘More’ simply means an insatiable
quest. You have ten thousand dollars you want one
hundred thousand dollars. One day you get one
hundred thousand dollars - now you want more.
You want more and more and the process
continues. Whatsoever you get, the distance
between you and your goal will always remain the
same. It is never reduced, not even by a single
inch. That is why beggars remain beggars.
However emperors are also beggars. Both are still
hankering for more.
What is the difference then? No difference as far as
the quality of their consciousness is concerned. Of
course, the beggar does not possess much and the
emperor possesses much, but that is not the point.
The distance between the beggar’s possessions
and what he wants and the emperor’s possessions destroy. He wants to kill the whole world! That
and what he wants is exactly the same. woman drove him mad and hysteric.’

One is a poor beggar; the other is a rich beggar. One is mad because he could not get her, the other
Only this much difference you can make. But both is mad because he got her. This is the whole
are beggars all the same. To be in the grip of ‘more’ history of every human being, more or less. It may
is to be really eccentric. If you cannot see it then not be so extreme, so you do not see it, but the
you are not intelligent at all. It is such a simple differences are only in degrees. The man in the
phenomenon that just a little intelligence is grip of desire is bound to become insane.
needed to see it. In your whole life you have been
And Buddha says: PLEASURE! Pleasure means
trying and it is not that you have always failed. It
that you think the body is the only source of
only LOOKS as if you have always failed. You have
happiness. That is sheer stupidity. The body’s
succeeded many times, but each time you succeed,
pleasures are momentary. They are not real
your desire for more is projected again and you
pleasures. But everybody is caught in the web of
remain in the same position: miserable, unhappy,
the body. We are born as bodies, but we need not
frustrated. If you do not get what you want, you
die as bodies. If we die as bodies, our whole life
will be frustrated. On the contrary if you get what
was a sheer wastage. You have to grow up. And
you want, you will be frustrated again. It seems
remember growing old is not growing up.
frustration is the destiny, the absolute destiny, of
Everybody grows old, but very few really a rare
the unconscious man.
one grows up indeed. One who really grows up
I have heard a psychiatrist was going around a becomes a buddha.
mental hospital. He saw one man beating himself,
Growing up means you start becoming alert about
pulling his hair. He looked very suicidal. He was
bodily pleasures. They are indeed momentary and
kept in a cell as he was dangerous. He asked the
they can change into their opposite very easily. For
superintendent, ‘What happened to this man?’ The
example, you love eating and you can go on eating
superintendent said, ‘He loved a woman, he loved
too much. Then it becomes a pain. It was pleasure
her very much, but he could not get married to her.
in the beginning, but there is a limit to that
She married someone else. Since then he has been
pleasure.
in this state. He wants to commit suicide. He does
not want to live any more. He says there is no On your tongue there are little taste buds which
meaning in life: ‘My meaning was in that woman. If experience taste. They can be operated on very
I could not get that woman, then my life is easily and then you will not feel anything at all.
finished!’ Then the whole pleasure of eating disappears. That
is what happens when you are in fever. When in
Feeling sorry for the man they moved ahead.
fever your buds become dull, and insensitive. Thus
Further down he saw another cell and a man was
you eat but you do not feel any taste. People are
inside it. He was even more ferocious, and very
living for eating. There are very few people who
hysteric. The psychiatrist enquired, ‘what is the
eat to live. Millions are living only to eat. Humanity
case history this man?’ The superintendent
can be divided into two types of mad people: first
replied, ‘This is the man who married that same
are obsessed with food; the other type is obsessed
woman! Since he has married her he wants to kill
with sex. And there is a deep relation between the
her, and if he cannot kill her then he wants to kill
two.
anyone instead. However he wants to kill and
The person who is obsessed with sex will not
bother much about food and the person who is
repressive of sex will become obsessed with food.
Whenever a country is repressive of sex it
becomes very obsessed with food. That is what has
happened all around. For centuries humanity has
been repressive of sex. This is the reason Indians
have been very inventive about food variety of
new sweets. The world is completely unaware of
all those sweets!
It is repression of sex! If your sex is not repressed
you will not eat such spicy food. The whole desire
has to move towards spicy food. But both are the
same. There is no difference. Food and sex have
one thing in common. Food is needed for the
individual’s survival. Without food you will not
survive. And sex is needed for the survival of
spices. Without sex the species will disappear.
The person who is living a natural life will neither
be obsessed with sex nor will be obsessed with
food. He will not be obsessed at all. But religions
do not allow that. You have to be obsessed with
something or other. If you are not obsessed you
will not go to the temples and the mosques and to
the churches and to the synagogues. That is the
very secret of their trade. This whole business of
religion goes on and on without any stopping. This
is so for the simple reason that you remain
obsessed with one thing or other. The person who
is obsessed with sex will be less selfish. While the
person who is obsessed with food will be more
selfish! The reason is food means your survival
and sex means survival of the species. It is better
to be sexual and to be after sexual pleasures than
to live just to eat.
When celibacy as is commonly understood for
Brahmacharya is propounded down the ages as
one of the greatest values the ultimate result has
been that everybody has become obsessed with
food. Whenever people are obsessed with food
they become selfish. Obviously they are no longer
interested in the species. Immanuel Kant, one of
the thinkers of the world, says: ‘This to me is the
fundamental criterion of all morality: that any
principle, if followed, destroys humanity. It is
immoral.’
If brahmacharya is followed by the whole
humanity it will destroy humanity. It will be a
suicidal phenomenon. According to Immanuel
Kant, brahmacharya is immoral - more immoral
than stealing, more immoral than dishonesty,
more immoral than breaking your promise, more
immoral than anything.
Immanuel Kant is right. The criterion is this: you
should think what will be the result if the principle
of celibacy is followed by everyone. It will be
suicidal. It will be a global suicide. There will be
nobody left to be celibate anymore. And the same
is true about the so-called old escapist Sanyas or
renunciation. This too is immoral. If everybody
follows the escapist idea and drops out and
escapes to the Himalayas, the whole humanity will
die.
In fact, your so-called saints live because you are
in the world and you go on supporting them. If you
are not in the world and you too has moved to the
Himalayas following your saints and mahatmas
they will be at a loss. Who will feed them? Who
will support them? They will have to commit
suicide with their followers - and the Himalayas is
a really beautiful site if you want to commit
suicide, the best place in the world.
If you could not live beautifully, at least you can
die in a beautiful place. Your so called religious
ones are supported by the worldly people. And still
they go on condemning the world. It is an immoral
act. Escapism is an immoral act. I agree with
Immanuel Kant. His criterion has something really
valuable about it. Pleasure means either the
pleasure of the tongue, food which is very childish
or the pleasure of sex, which is also very childish
because you are not just the body, you are more
than that.
Rise from pleasures to happiness. Happiness is
psychological, pleasure is physiological. Listening
to great music or reading great poetry or watching
a sunset or just enjoying a morning walk and the
wind passing through the pines and the music that
it creates the sound of running water it all thrills
you. Although it comes through the body, it
reaches deeper than food or sex. It is more
fulfilling. But that, too, is not the end because
anything that is psychological is bound to be
momentary.
Beyond happiness is bliss which is of the spirit.
Bliss is a timeless phenomenon. In bliss you go
beyond time and beyond mind and body both.
Then you know who you are. Then you function
from your center. For the first time you are not
eccentric. You are centered. For the first time you
have roots in your being. Remember those roots
connect you with God, and thus the whole. You
become holy only when you are blissful.
But pleasure prevents you. It prevents you at the
lowest. I am not against pleasure. Remember I am
not against anything. Everything has to be used as
a stepping stone for the ultimate peak. I am
exploring every possibility for the birth of a new
man who is blissful. In order to interact with
people at different planes of consciousness I use a
multidimensional approach. There is no plane at
which I do not operate. This is the effort of a living
Buddha to bring transformation.
The body is beautiful and enjoying your food is
good. Just do not be obsessed by it. But if your so
called religious ones are continuously condemning
it, you will be obsessed by it. Obsession is created
by your so-called religious ones. Whatsoever is
condemned becomes your obsession. In fact, the
more they condemn, the more attractive it
becomes, the more magnetic it becomes.
I am not against sex, but I would like you to go
beyond it. Use it as a stepping stone, use it as a
ladder. It is beautiful in itself. But remember it is
not the end, only the beginning. Do not stop at the
first ladder of your life. Life has much more. The
hidden treasures have to be discovered.
LUST! Lust is even far below pleasure. Pleasure at
least respects the other. If you love a woman, you
love her company, or a man. You respect the other.
But in lust you do not have any respect. You simply
use the other. Lust is even more degraded than
pleasure. It is falling below humanity. You are
simply using the other as a means. When you make
love to a woman without any respect towards her,
what you really are doing is nothing more than
masturbation. You are using the woman only to
deceive yourself. There is no connection between
you and her.
Going to a prostitute is not pleasure. That is lust.
You are paying. Love cannot be purchased. Only
bodies can be purchased. And remember, when
you purchase a body it is a dead body. The soul is
not there. The woman is somehow tolerating you
because she needs money. She hates you indeed.
She would like to kill you. But she is pretending to
be very loving, very affectionate, because she is
being paid for it. With her closed eyes she thinks of
other things. She simply tolerates you. You are
using her as a means, and she is using you as a
means. She wants the money, you want the body.
This is a mutual exploitation.
Buddha says: All these streams are rushing
towards you - DESIRE, PLEASURE AND LUST....
Play in your imagination with them and they will
sweep you away. And you are all full of
imagination. Making love to your wife you are not
really making love to her. You may be thinking of
Sophia Loren or someone else. And she may be
thinking of somebody else too. Both are
pretending. And nobody will know what is going
on in the mind of the other. Their imagination is
somewhere else. If you could look into the minds
of people who are making love you would be
surprised. It is very rare to find only two persons
in a single bed. You will find a crowd. At least four
are absolutely certain. It is always group sex,
because their minds are fancying, fantasizing. Even
grown-up people your so-called grownups are
really living in imagination. Not only children live
in imagination. Even old people live in
imagination.
People go on playing with toys and they never
wake up. Their imagination continues to keep
them asleep. Once again we enter the time
capsule, and journey back through the sexy sixties,
the nifty fifties, the fighting forties, the dirty
thirties, and on into the roaring twenties where we
stop. We are at that point in time when the
transplanting of monkey glands and other such
operations for the restoration of male vigor were
in vogue.
I have heard that a surgery for the restoration of
youth had just been performed on a seventy-year-
old man who had hoped that, as a result, his
chromosomes would henceforth be bouncing off
the ceiling. As he came out from under the
influence of the anesthesia he began to cry
profusely. Mrs. Wilson, the attending nurse, bent
over him, ‘Mister, it is not necessary for you to feel
worried,’ she said kindly. ‘The operation was a big
success. Take my word, when you leave here you
will feel twenty years younger. Maybe more, who
knows?’
But the poor old man only continued to wail, as
tears continued to trickle down his cheeks and
losing themselves in his long white whiskers.
‘Please do not cry,’ pleaded Mrs. Wilson. ‘The pain
will soon disappear.’ ‘Who is crying from pain?’
sobbed the patient. ‘I am afraid I will be late for
school.’ Just look deep down inside yourself and
you will find the child intact. It has not grown up.
The ordinary mental age of every human being is
not more than twelve.
Physiologically you may be eighty. Psychologically
you remain hanging around twelve. Hence, once in
a while, you start behaving like a child in spite of
yourself. If you are pushed and pulled too much
you forget that you are a grown-up person. The
child is sitting there covered by many experiences,
but those experiences have not yet been digested.
Under the disguise of knowledge that has not yet
become your wisdom as it has not been achieved
through awareness life goes on. You have been
collecting and accumulating it in your sleep. So you
have accumulated much rubbish alongside.
Yes, once in a while you may have picked up a
diamond too, not knowing that it is a diamond. You
think it to be just another colored stone. Play in
your imagination with them and they will sweep
you away.
If you allow desire, pleasure, lust, greed, anger,
jealousy, possessiveness, violence and all these
rushing streams towards you, they will sweep you
away. Therefore do not play with them in your
imagination. This way you go on strengthening
them, and you will get under their sway. And the
miracle is that everybody can understand
everybody else’s imagination, except his own.
When somebody falls in love with somebody else
you say, ‘How foolish!’
Everybody thinks this person has gone crazy.
‘Look at the face of that woman. She looks like a
Picasso painting! And why is this man crazy about
her? What does he see in her?’ And when YOU fall
in love, then it is totally different. She looks like a
Cleopatra! Nobody else will agree with you. It is
always your imagination. And the same goes on
and on in different layers, in different dimensions.
The nonsense that is written in your religious
scriptures is absolutely right. It is scientific. The
nonsense that is written in others’ scriptures is
clearly nonsense. There can be no question about
it or any doubt about it. Hindus can see all kinds of
stupidities in the Bible. And Christians see all kinds
of stupidities in Hindu scriptures. But this seems
to be really a miracle. No Hindu will see in his own
scriptures anything wrong there everything is
scientific. And not only does he think it is scientific,
he tries to prove it.
Once a Hindu monk came to me! He came with
many followers. One of his followers said, ‘He is a
very great scholar; he has written many books.
And his whole effort in his life has been to prove
that Hinduism is the only scientific religion of the
world.’ I said, ‘Can he give any example?’ He said,
‘You can ask anything and he will say why it is
scientific.’ I asked him, ‘Why do Hindus cut all their
hair but keep a small tuft as the CHOTI on the top
of their heads?’ He said, ‘Simple! Have you ever
looked at big buildings? They keep there an iron
rod.’ I could not see the point immediately. He said,
‘It is to protect the building from electricity.
Hindus discovered it long ago - if you keep a choti -
a little bunch of hair standing up on your head, it
saves you, protects you from electricity.’
Now, what nonsense he is talking! But he is known
as a great mahatma because he is helping your
egos; he is proving that your religion is scientific.
He had come to see me with all his disciples. They
were all wearing wooden slippers, - and making
great noise. The way Hindus have been using those
wooden shoes for centuries it is really difficult
because you have to hold them on with your toes,
between your toes. It is heavy. I asked him, ‘Why
this? What science is there?’ He said, ‘It keeps one
celibate. The pressure of it is such that it keeps
one’s sexual glands nonfunctional.’ Great, just
great! So I said, ‘Then India need not bother about
population. Just give wooden shoes to everybody
and let them all grow chotis so sexuality will not
affect them. They will all be saints.’
Hindus think he is doing a great service to
Hinduism. That is how it is with all the religions.
Your imagination is always truth while that of
others is only imagination.
A rabbi and a priest were discussing the
differences between the Old Testament and the
New. The priest contented that the New Testament
gave more proof of divine cooperation because of
all its purported miracles. ‘Remember,’ argued the
priest, ‘our Lord walked on water, he raised the
dead, he fed hundreds of people with a few loaves
of bread and some little fishes, he changed water
into wine, and he ascended bodily into heaven.’ ‘So
what does that prove?’ insisted the rabbi. ‘The Old
Testament includes such miracles as parting the
Red Sea, making the sun stand still, Moses
ascending bodily to Mount Sinai to talk personally
with God and to receive the dialogue from the very
hands of the Almighty.’ The priest nodded. ‘I
believe in those miracles too,’ he acknowledged.
‘But be honest about it - do you really think your
miracles have as much substance as ours?’ The
rabbi glared at him. ‘What is the matter with you?’
he snapped crossly. ‘Can’t you distinguish between
fact and fiction?’ Our fiction is a fact and your
fiction is fiction. Your fact too is fiction.
Beware of imagination. It can becloud your mind.
It can destroy your capacity to see clearly. Hence I
say: Unless you drop being Hindus,
Mohammedans, Christians, you will not be able to
see clearly. Your imagination has been
contaminated for centuries. All your ideas and
ideologies have to be put aside so that your eyes
can face and encounter truth as it is. Imagination
keeps you asleep. If you come out of your
imagination you start waking up.
Gurdjieff used to say to his disciples that the most
important thing is to remember in a dream that
‘This is a dream.’ But, how to remember it! It
seems almost impossible. How to remember in a
dream that ‘This is a dream’?
But if you practice the Gurdjieffian way, one day
you can remember it. The method is simple. You
have to go on remembering the whole day,
whatsoever you see, that ‘This is a dream.’ Walking
on the street, ‘This is a dream’. The dog barking,
‘This is a dream.’ Go on remembering the whole
day, ‘This is a dream, this is a dream....’ It takes
three to nine month for the idea to sink into your
heart. Then one day, suddenly, in your dream you
remember and you say, ‘This is a dream!’ And that
is a moment of great benediction. Immediately, the
dream disappears. The moment you say it is a
dream, it disappears and you are awake, fully
awake, and even in the middle of the night. Of
course, these trees and the people on the road are
not a dream so they do not disappear. You can go
on saying, ‘This is a dream.’ That was just a
method to practice. But when you really
remember in a dream that ‘This is a dream,’ the
dream disappears.
The dream can exist only if it is believed. The
dream disappears if you do not
believe in it. Human imagination is
intoxicating. It does not exist. It is just
a subjective phenomenon. This is
exactly the meaning of the word
MAYA. Maya is a subjective
phenomenon. It does not exist. But if
you believe, it exists. It all depends on
you. You can make it function almost
as real. And there are many things
which never exist, but you believe in
them and for you they are realities.
You are surrounded by fictions
religious, spiritual, and metaphysical.
There are so many fictions
surrounding you and you have to
wake up from all these.
POWERFUL STREAMS! Buddha says.
They are everywhere. They flow
everywhere. These streams are
powerful, and your sleep is so deep. It seems very
difficult to wake up but you can wake up. My own
observation is that these streams are powerful as
proportionate to your sleep. If you become less
sleepy they are less powerful. If you become fully
awake, their power disappears totally.
If you are intoxicated you will see the same world
but in a different way. Your imagination will get
mixed with it. You will not be able to make any
distinction between what is fiction and what is
fact. You will not have any power of
discrimination. This is what exactly makes these
streams so powerful. They flow everywhere
Buddha says.
This is Buddha’s Dhammapada.