Birhani Mandir Diyana Baar #4

Rajat Bose! The greatest calamity to befall humanity is your so‑called sadhus and renunciates. They have poisoned the human mind. They have made it sick. They have taught such things that man’s roots have been shaken loose from the earth. And when a tree’s roots loosen from the soil, its leaves wither, buds never become flowers, and fruit is out of the question. The widespread sadness in the world—behind it stands your sadhus and renunciates.

The world is not insubstantial, because it bears the signature of the Divine hand. How could it be hollow? The world is God’s expression, his song, his dance. On every leaf, every flower, every particle, you will find his imprint. Those who called it hollow declared God himself foolish, stupid. Only if God were foolish could his world be hollow. Only if he were deranged would he create something insubstantial.

And here is the irony: these same sadhus and renunciates tell you that God is the creator; he made the world; he devised this play, this leela. And if the world is hollow, how can God be substantial? If the song is deranged, the singer must be insane. If the dance is not dance but mere jumping about, then the dancer is not a dancer at all—he is sick.

Call the world hollow, and you will not be able to save your God from hollowness. Whatever you say of the world applies to your God. Whoever denies the world breaks the bridge to the Divine. With these very flowers, these very colors, we are to journey to his realm. Riding on nature’s wings we set out in search of God. This body is his; this mind is his; this world is his. Whatever of it you reject, by that much you become crippled.

Your sadhus and renunciates have crippled you. The cripple agrees to be a slave. The cripple needs someone else’s support. The cripple needs crutches. And your sadhus and renunciates became your crutches. First they crippled you—broke your legs—and then they began selling you crutches. Two halves of the same business. First they told you the world has no essence. You became dejected, despondent. Then they said there is a remedy for your sadness: come, do bhajan, do kirtan, meditate.

And I tell you: your bhajan will be false too. One who found no savor in flowers, no delight in the moon and stars—will he find anything in hollow words, “Hare Krishna, Hare Rama”? One who couldn’t see the greenness of this green earth—will he discover life’s source in words raised by his own lips? One who found no trace of him in the sun—will he find it in an idol of his own making? That which is blazing forth everywhere and is not seen—will you find it in temples and mosques? Whose Vedas waterfalls are singing, whose Quran thunders as song in the clouds, whose Gita rises and dances upon the waves of the ocean—if you did not see him there, will you find him in books printed by men, written by hand? His own written book—the world—is insubstantial, and the tomes penned by your pundits are substantial? How strange! The pundit himself is his writing, and his written world is hollow! You are hollow! Your life is hollow! Then where will you find essence? Nowhere. Then you will go door to door begging, and your life will become one long accident. That is what has happened.

But temple and mosque survive upon your sorrow. The sicker you remain, the more it serves them. The more you rot, the more they profit. If you begin to dance, if you become carefree, will you go to the temple? Will you go to the mosque? Wherever you sit, there will be your temple. Your ecstasy will be your worship. When the stream of nectar flows within, will you go asking someone, “Where is God?” Will you seek proof? The proof will be within. His light will ignite within. Then who cares for scriptures?

Only the blind worry about scriptures; only the ignorant. For one in whom even a small ray of knowing arises, all scriptures grow insipid. His own Gita begins to be born within. God begins to speak within. The Bhagavad Gita is born within. God starts humming within. The Quran begins to arise within. Why then any Quran, any Purana?

The pundit and priest can subsist only so long as you remain dead, dead-alive. In your deadness lies his exploitation. There is the hidden key.

Rajat! Here I am teaching something altogether different. So if pundits, priests, your so‑called sadhus and renunciates are angry with me, it is no surprise; the arithmetic is clear. I am cutting the roots of their trade. If you hear me, you will be free of them. If you hear me, you will no longer be their customers. If even a little of what I say is understood, you will slip out of the net of thousands of years of exploitation and slavery. And those who have sucked you dry wish to suck you still more—they want to suck you forever. They will not let you go easily. Hence they are angry with me.

My message is simply this: God needs no other proof—examine nature! Fix your eyes on a rose and peer within; his face will appear. Let the fragrance of jasmine fill your nostrils and you will find—the same wave has rippled within you.

Hum aise ahle‑nazar ko sabūt‑e‑haq ke liye
Agar rasūl na aate to subah kāfī thī

For those with eyes to see, to prove the Truth—
Had the messengers not come, the dawn was enough.

With just a little understanding, there was no need for prophets to come, no need for tirthankaras to come.

Hum aise ahle‑nazar ko sabūt‑e‑haq ke liye

To bear witness to God, to attest to the Truth, nothing else was needed—just a little understanding.

Agar rasūl na aate to subah kāfī thī

Had prophets not come, there would be no cause for worry. The morning was enough. The rising sun is sufficient proof. The evening moon is sufficient proof. The music of the stars in the sky is sufficient proof. What further proof do you need?

A seed splits and green leaves emerge—there is proof of God. What greater miracle is there? From a dead-looking seed, green leaves! Leaves upon leaves, buds appear; among green leaves, red buds! A flower blooms. The leaves had no fragrance, the soil from which they rose had no fragrance, and the flower has filled the air with perfume, saturated it! What greater miracle? For those who have eyes, hearts to feel, a little wisdom, a touch of awareness—proof of God is found in the morning, in the evening, while sitting and standing, in people’s eyes. For them, no messenger is needed.

If the world is a dream, then of what Truth are poets to sing?
Breaking his heart, what Truth’s image should the poet fashion?
What joy does the poet know that turns flowers into fruit?
Why does the crescent moon race toward the full?
From the cuckoo’s wakeful call, what story stirs in the breath?
Whose form, beyond dream, makes the night so lovely?
Why is the wind made restless by fragrance, the stars stirred by light,
The river spread by love, the shores bound by beauty?
Why do the fields ripple when the breeze fills them with longing?
Why, hearing the birds, does dawn seem to pulse in a ray of light?
Clouds, with their rains, give the earth new consecration day by day;
In moonbeams, tender new leaves loosen and fall, spent with softness.
If all this is but dream, of what Truth shall poets sing?
What message greater than Beauty could man be given?

No, no morning hymn is greater than the dawn itself. Your man‑made morning hymns are worth two pennies. Look at the dawn. Your fabricated gods are your own toys—made by your hands! Look at the world he has made. There you may catch a faint jingle of him.

And what a joke: the world is hollow, and from its stones you fashion your God. The world is hollow, and from its clay you make your deities. The world is hollow, and in this very world your sadhus and renunciates are born. If the world is hollow, how will you be substantial? If the root is hollow, how will you become essence?

No, the world is not hollow. Yes, I will tell you this: there is even greater essence than the world. But the world itself is not hollow. The world is valuable; only, do not stop there—there are greater treasures still. Beyond this world there are other worlds.

So I am not saying, get entangled in the world. I am not saying, remain in the world and stop there. I am saying: make the world a staircase. It is the staircase to his temple; do not call it hollow. But remember too: the staircase is not the temple—otherwise another mistake will be made, and you will sit on the steps. The stairs are not the temple. Yet without the stairs, you cannot reach the temple. And if you break the stairs, you will never arrive. Accept life in its total beauty. Embrace life in its entire rhythm.

Give me
Luscious lips, an innocent brow, beautiful eyes,
That I may once again be drowned in the colors.
Let my being be gathered into the embrace of your single glance;
Let me be forever safe in this sweet snare.
Lift me with the life of beauty, that I may not return
To the world’s darkness again.
Let the stains of old longings be washed from my heart;
Let me be freed from worry for sorrows yet to come.
Let my past and my future be utterly effaced.
Give me that one glance—that deathless, everlasting gaze.

Only one prayer can be made: give me that eye, give me that vision.

Give me that one glance—that deathless, everlasting gaze—

Give me that golden eye that can see you, recognize you.

Give me
Luscious lips, an innocent brow, beautiful eyes,
That I may once again be drowned in the colors—

This world is his colorfulness. It is his play, his splendor. This world is God’s majesty. Because of this majesty he is God. This is his empire. By this empire he is emperor.

That I may once again be drowned in the colors—
Let my being be gathered into the embrace of your single glance—

Take all my life into your lap.

Let me be forever safe in this sweet snare—

I wish to be lost forever in this lovely net, to drown in it, to become one with it. Granted, it is a net—but it is a very lovely one. And it is the Beloved’s net—who would not wish to be caught in it! Those who run away are deserters. Those who flee have rejected, denied God. When God casts the net, O fish, be caught in it.

One morning Jesus placed a hand on a fisherman’s shoulder. Dawn was breaking; the horizon glowed red. The fisherman had just cast his net when Jesus came up from behind and touched him. He turned and saw. Jesus said, “How long will you keep catching these ordinary fish? I will show you the way to catch men. Come with me.”

Jesus’ eyes! That sweet hour of the morning! Something happened. The fisherman left the net right there—did not even haul it in—and went with Jesus. His brother, standing in the boat beside him, casting his net, shouted, “Where are you going?”

The fisherman said, “For many days I have been catching fish; this man has caught me! I am entangled in the net of his eyes. I am going. Farewell!”

They had scarcely reached the edge of the village when a man came running and said to the fisherman, “Madman! Where are you going? Your father, who was ill, has died. Come home.”

The young man said to Jesus, “Shall I go? I’ll return after the funeral rites in three days.”

But Jesus said, “There are enough dead in the village; let the dead bury the dead. You come with me.”

And that young man did not even go to perform his father’s last rites. Listen to Jesus’ words: “There are enough dead in the village; let the dead bury the dead. You come with me.”

Your priests and pundits, your sadhus and renunciates, have filled the earth with corpses. Now and then a Jesus, a Mohammed, a Nanak, a Kabir brings a little news of life, strikes a faint tune of the Divine. But the pundits and priests cast a vast net. They smother Nanak’s tune. They smother Kabir’s tune. They lay so many layers of commentary upon what Jesus said that the truth gets lost within them; it becomes hard to find.

Let my being be gathered into the embrace of your single glance;
Let me be forever safe in this sweet snare—
Lift me with the life of beauty, that I may not return
To the world’s darkness again—

Lift me into your light, so I do not fall back into darkness, into worlds of darkness.

Above this world are other worlds—yearn for them, aspire to them. But do not reject this world. Through this world lies the means to reach those higher worlds. And the day you reach those higher worlds, you will also thank this lower world—remember. You will acknowledge your gratitude: had this lower world not been, we would never have reached the upper. When you climb by stairs and arrive above, do you not thank the stairs? When you reach the far shore by boat and step out, do you not thank the boat?

This world is a boat. The wise moor it at God’s shore. The foolish jump overboard.

I tell you: do not jump out of the boat. Give it the right direction—certainly give it direction! Give it the right speed. Hold the oars. This boat is not useless, not hollow. It can carry you to the other shore. In this very boat of the body you must travel to that shore. These very senses must become your oars. This clay hides the nectar within it; seeking in this very clay you will find the nectar.

Let the stains of old longings be washed from my heart;
Let me be freed from worry for sorrows yet to come.
Let my past and my future be utterly effaced.
Give me that one glance—that deathless, everlasting gaze—

Let the past vanish, the future vanish.

Let my past and my future be utterly effaced—

Let both become one; let there be neither past nor future—only the moment of the present remain. This pure moment of the present is prayer. This pure moment of the present is meditation, samadhi.

Give me that one glance—that deathless, everlasting gaze—

All that is needed is the eye, the vision, the awakening—not to run anywhere, not to abandon anything. For all is his—what will you abandon? What is yours to abandon?

But your sadhus and renunciates have certainly been teaching you these sorts of things. And unless you break free of them, you will never experience the visage of the Divine. I tell you: the world is not hollow; your so‑called pundits and priests are prattle—hollow. If you must renounce, renounce them. Do not renounce the world of flowers; do not renounce the world of moon and stars. This very world is the door.

And Rajat, you ask: “You have really trapped me lately; now I am in trouble. Because when I return home the same stale, threadbare life will be there.”

It will not be. Life here is the same as there; what is needed is the eye—“that deathless, everlasting gaze.” Your eye must change; then wherever you live, you will experience this very thrill. And it is the eye I am giving you. Sannyas is nothing else but your readiness to accept a new eye, to adopt a new vision. If you are ready to receive, I am ready to give. If you hold out your bowl, I will fill it. Then wherever you live: the same moon will be there, the same stars will be there, the same sun will rise, the same winds will blow, the same people will be there. The whole world is one. It is your vision that must not become stale—otherwise people seem stale. And you blame people: people are worn-out, life is threadbare, life is stale. Life never becomes stale or threadbare. Have you ever seen a drop of dew that is threadbare, or stale? No. Have you ever seen a river that is stale or threadbare? It has been flowing for centuries, yet it is not stale, not threadbare. The sun rises every day—has it ever become stale and worn? Nothing in this world is stale or threadbare—only your eye. If dust settles upon your eye, the whole world appears threadbare.

I have heard of an old woman who would stand at her window and, from behind the pane, watch the moon and stars, see the sunrise—and life seemed very threadbare. One day a guest stayed in her home. He rose and cleaned the windowpane; it was thick with dust. The window cleared, the moon and stars shone cleanly. The sun rose—rose differently, in a new way! The old woman was astonished. She thought, “I believed the world itself had become threadbare. I have lived ninety years—it’s all the same! What magic have you done? Today the moon is fresh!”

The moon is the same; only a little dust has been wiped from the glass. There was no dust on the moon. Dust lies upon your eye; thus the world appears worn. Let the dust of the eye fall away—prejudice, the useless heap of ideas. Become, like a small child, full of wonder—that is my message. See this world with eyes brimming with wonder. See again. See yet again. And you will find it new, new every day. You will find that as your eye grows fresher, the world grows fresher. Then wherever you live, you cannot be sent to hell—because wherever you are, there will be heaven.

People say saints are sent to heaven and sinners to hell. This is utterly false. Saints are not sent to heaven—where a saint is, there is heaven. And sinners are not sent to hell—where a sinner is, there is hell. There is no need to send them anywhere. They create their own hell and their own heaven.

So, Rajat! Do not worry. If you are truly caught in this net, you will be freed from many nets. And this net is not a net of slavery. I free you. I free you from knowledge, I free you from your hollow character, I free you from your hollow notions of good and bad. I only free you. I want only this: that you learn the art of living in the present moment, forgetting past and future. Then nothing ever becomes stale. Then moment to moment the Divine arrives, and his footfall is heard. Moment to moment his music showers—and it showers so abundantly you cannot hold it in your bowl; it showers so much your hands will be too small, your bowl too small. God comes like a flood when he comes. And he longs to come every moment—give him a door, give him a way; empty yourself.

Anand Maitreya! There is not the slightest secret. The matter is absolutely straight and clear. Pornographic magazines sell because of your sadhus and renunciates! If things were up to me, porn magazines wouldn’t be able to sell anywhere in the world. If things were up to me, who would buy a porn magazine? For what purpose?

Who buys porn magazines? Those very people who have repressed their sexual desire. Those who have not honored their sexuality, not welcomed it. Those who have fallen prey to pundits, priests, sadhus and monks. They are the ones who read porn magazines—though some read them hidden inside the Gita, some inside the Quran, some bound in a Bible cover—but it’s the same people.

This whole world is full of “religious” people—so who is reading porn? The very ones who read books saying “celibacy is life” are the ones who read porn. These are not two different readerships. On one side they read that celibacy is the only life, and then they try to force celibacy upon themselves. They fail, the mind becomes agitated within; what has been suppressed starts finding new outlets. They are the ones who read porn and watch pornographic films. For them such films are written and made, obscene stories are written, songs are composed. Vulgar, crude, ugly, tasteless pictures are prepared for them.

You will be surprised to know there is no mystery here at all; the arithmetic is simple. If your sadhus, monks, renunciates were not there, the prostitute would disappear. The prostitute is the other arm of your saintly maharajahs. The two are partners in the same shop. On one side the monk, the renouncer, condemns desire; that condemnation starts the repression of desire within you. And when desire accumulates so much that you begin to boil over, some outlet has to be found. Then the prostitute appears. Then a thousand kinds of obscenities arise.

What I am saying is dangerous—dangerous because if my understanding prevails, then that very porn magazine you mentioned—I too have seen it; all the pictures are naked and crude, ugly, ungainly, tawdry; there is no sign of beauty in it—anyone would wonder, what obstacle could I be to such a magazine? Yet its editor prays to the government that I should not be given a small punishment, but the gallows! I should be sentenced to death!

But there is arithmetic in it. I want people not to repress their desire. If desire is not repressed, who will buy obscene pictures? Who will buy porn magazines? This happens only because of a repressed mind. Go, try selling a porn magazine to tribals who live naked. They will laugh heartily: “You’ve gone mad! What’s the issue here?” They have seen naked women and naked men since childhood.

Just think: someone comes to you and says, “Here is a picture of a naked cow—buy it.” You will say, “Have I gone mad? What will I do with a naked cow’s picture?” But imagine a world where cows have been made to wear clothes and where a naked cow is never seen. There people will begin to wonder what the matter is. There a picture of a naked cow will sell. If someone says, “A naked cow picture,” you’ll say, “Bring it!” You’ll be ready to pay double or four times, your curiosity aroused: “What is it?” Dress up cows—beautiful saris, blouses, veils—and take one to the market. People will start peeking, wanting to lift the veil to see, “There must be some secret!”

Whatever is hidden arouses the curiosity to see—it’s straightforward arithmetic. Put up a sign on your door: “Peeking forbidden.” Then see—no one will be able to pass without peeking! And if someone does pass, out of modesty—“What will people say?”—holding his neck stiff and walking by, his mind will keep wanting to return and peek. He will come back under some pretext, find a plausible excuse, but he will come. And if he is weak, a coward at heart, and can’t gather the courage, then in his dreams he will see that door—and in the dream he will peek.

Whatever is denied becomes delicious; prohibition is an invitation. These porn magazines... On the surface it seems the sadhus and monks are strongly opposed to them. They are opposed. Acharya Tulsi once launched an agitation against porn magazines. When one of his monk-disciples came to see me and asked for my support, I said, “I will not support it. An agitation against porn only creates more relish for it!”

I asked him, “What problem does Acharya Tulsi have with porn magazines? Does he look at them? If he doesn’t, how does he even know? On what basis is he opposed? To oppose even requires at least to see. What exactly is his difficulty?”

And this opposition is not new; it has been going on for centuries. It hasn’t ended porn magazines, nor obscene books, nor porn films. What does happen is that everything starts flowing underground. Not above the ground, but under the counter, in the basement. Go to a bookshop: the Gita, the Quran, etc., are sold on top; the “real” merchandise is hidden under the counter. The real stuff is kept under the counter!

I have heard: Mulla Nasruddin telegraphed his bookseller, “Send the complete set of Shakespeare, and all the works of Kalidasa and Bhavabhuti, and along with them some reading material as well!”

What will “reading material” be? Who reads Shakespeare? Who reads Kalidasa? People decorate their sitting rooms with these. These are not books people actually read. I have seen many drawing rooms with such books proudly displayed. And when I pulled the books out, I saw many pages were still uncut; some even still joined. No one has ever opened them. People read something else; that is sold elsewhere; it flows below the surface.

I am saying that opposing human sexuality is unscientific. In human sexuality itself lies the energy of celibacy. But celibacy is not the opposite of desire; it is desire’s ultimate flowering—just as the flower of celibacy blooms only in the soil of desire. I am saying the energy of desire and the manifestation of celibacy are two aspects of the same event. Therefore do not fight with desire; otherwise celibacy will never be attained. What you will attain is debauchery, not celibacy. The more you repress desire, the more adulterous you become. Even if not outwardly, your mind will become adulterous.

Live your desire, understand it—mindfully, lovingly. Desire is a gift of the divine; there is some secret hidden in it. Seek it. As understanding grows, you will suddenly find desire beginning to dissolve. And this dissolution carries a rare beauty, because there is no repression anywhere in it—no wounds left in the psyche.

And one day, when celibacy comes naturally, spontaneously—not imposed, not forced, not brought about by effort—but as the fruit of understanding, then that celibacy has a truly wondrous flavor. I am a partisan of celibacy; but the celibacy that stands in opposition to desire is false. That is not celibacy; it is inner licentiousness with a celibacy label pasted on top. I support the celibacy that comes by passing through the lane of desire, by understanding desire—knowing it, seeing it, recognizing it—that ripens as its fruit, the final conclusion of the process of desire. And when the lotus of celibacy blooms in this way, life fills with an incomparable fragrance, with light!

If my understanding were accepted, two results would follow. First, people would become natural. And a natural person will not go to look at porn magazines and porn films; there will be no need. A natural person will gradually abandon the stupidity of always hiding the body. To keep the body always hidden is harmful; it is what sells porn magazines. Parents should sometimes bathe naked with their children, so that from childhood they understand what the body is—just a body as a body. Whatever parts you do not hide, no one becomes crazed to see. You don’t hide your hands, and there is no frenzy about hands.

In the Middle Ages, in the Victorian era, conditions in England were such that women’s legs were also hidden. They wore skirts that touched the ground and swept along, so that legs would not be seen. So pictures of legs used to sell. They don’t sell now. How could pictures of legs sell now? At least in the West no one would buy a picture of legs, because women wear such short frocks that the whole legs are visible; who will buy a picture of legs?

You’ll be amazed to know how foolish women and men were in England: they even covered the legs of chairs—because they are called “legs”! They put cloth covers over chair legs. Then it could well happen that if your hostess went inside, you would quickly lift the cover on a chair’s leg to have a peek. This too could happen; it is perfectly natural.

Mulla Nasruddin told me, “My father said to me, ‘A dirty film is showing in the neighborhood—don’t go, because you will see things there that it would have been better not to see.’” Mulla had no idea such a film was even running. When a father says this, you have to go. So I asked Mulla, “Then did you see things there that it would have been better not to see?” He said, “Yes—because my father was there too. I saw him, he saw me. It became clear that both of us saw things we shouldn’t have seen. From that day he hasn’t said anything, nor have I. We have both maintained silence.”

This obscene literature is a symptom of a sick mind. That magazine’s resentment is entirely logical. If what I am saying prevails, the life-breath of such magazines will go out. Therefore I must be hanged—otherwise these magazines won’t survive! My sannyasins cannot buy such magazines. There is no reason. If you have seen living human beings naked, why will you take interest in pictures? And if you have loved living men and women, if you have known the flavor of love, known love’s flowers and also its thorns—its joy and its sorrow—will you go to prostitutes? It is impossible.

The human being I am speaking of—if such a human appears on earth—prostitutes will disappear on their own. You will be surprised to know that in the West there are not only prostitutes (female); there are now male prostitutes as well. Because women said, “Only men going to prostitutes—this is inequality.” So in major Western cities—London, New York, Washington—there are male prostitutes. I call them vaishya. Don’t be offended; if any Vaishya is here, I don’t mean your caste of Brahmin, Vaishya, Shudra. Because veshya is the name for a woman; what do you call a man who sells his body? So I call him vaishya. Don’t file a case against me that I said something against Vaishyas! What can I do? There is no word in the language. Prostitutes have always existed; male prostitutes did not. In English there is a convenience: they say “male prostitute.” In Hindi, if you say “purush veshya,” it doesn’t sit well—because veshya by meaning is feminine.

It is like in India there are as yet no male nurses; all nurses are women. If a man does a nurse’s job, what will you call him—nursa? In the West men too have begun doing the work. Many of my sannyasins work as nurses—they are “male nurses.”

We will have to find something—if not today, then tomorrow. Vaishya fits: vaishya means “seller”; from that root comes veshya. She sells her body; now men too have started selling theirs.

This selling of the body is unbecoming. But behind this selling of the body, the hands at work are those of your great saints and pontiffs. They did not allow your life to be fulfilled naturally, so you have found back doors. Thus, the sadhus and saints are angry with me, and the sellers of obscene books are angry with me. It is indeed a great wonder!

So Anand Maitreya’s question is important: what is the secret?

The secret is clear: the two are partners—even if they do not know it. They are tied together. I will cut the root of both. They are two branches of the same tree, and I want to cut the root. I want human beings to accept desire—simply, with gratitude. Stop repressing desire. And at least in moments of leisure, people should be naked. Bathing in a river or the ocean, if people are naked; sunbathing in the garden at home, if people are naked—then gradually the mad craving in our minds to see nakedness will end. Its life-breath will depart. How could it survive? This is what I call cutting the root. Then a healthier individual and a healthier humanity can be born.

Certainly I am speaking against many vested interests. Therefore a thousand kinds of troubles are bound to come to me—natural. If they do not come, that would be a miracle!

Radharamana! Reflect on what I have just said. Why do you want to be free of it? Who told you to seek freedom from it? It is the very effort to get rid of it that is creating the turmoil.

Accept lust. It is given by nature—you did not make it. If anyone is to blame, someday, it will be God, not you. I assure you God will not ask you why you lived in sexual desire; and if he does, grab him by the collar, shake him and say, “You gave it—what fault was mine? Don’t make it!” No, God has never asked anyone such a thing. How could he?

If you fill your own picture with red and then get angry with the picture for being red, people will call you mad. You yourself filled it with red.

If anyone is at fault it is God; you are not at fault. I free you from your guilt. Drop this notion of sin.

And here is the fun—and the paradox too: if you drop the sense of sin about lust, you would long ago have been free of it; you would not have had to wait till middle age. In my view, scientifically, sexual desire begins around fourteen, ripens—and by forty-two it should end on its own, if a person accepts it and lives quietly, joyfully. It ends by itself!

Every seven years there are changes. In the first seven years, lust is completely hidden. From seven to fourteen, faint glimmers begin; the child doesn’t understand what is happening. Curiosity stirs. By fourteen, lust ripens, ready to manifest.

But the arrangement we have made is crude, unscientific. When the child is prepared by sexual energy at fourteen, we start him suppressing it. Marriage will happen at twenty-four, or twenty-five, or thirty. From fourteen to twenty-four, in that ten-year gap, what will happen to lust? The child will repress it. And repression makes him sick. Lust will enter dreams, or it will take on some perverse channel for expression.

Know this: at about eighteen sexual desire reaches its strongest surge—precisely around seventeen and a half, because midway between fourteen and twenty-one it is at its most powerful. It will never again be so powerful. And at just that time we enforce repression. Just then we say, “Put your mind on studies.” Just then we say, “Chant God’s name.” Just then we contrive every measure for suppression. Then if your children become perverted—and once perversion takes hold, it does not easily let go.

Remember, what is natural can be easily gone beyond. What is unnatural becomes hard to transcend. The unnatural becomes complex. And it is then “natural” that the unnatural will arise: a thousand perversions are possible. All humanity has become filled with perversion. As “civilization” advances, the marriage age keeps rising—only after so much education will there be marriage: somewhere between twenty-five and thirty.

Now the joke is that when lust is on the decline, then marriage happens. When lust was in its wildest surge, marriage did not happen. Now the force is waning. At seventeen and a half it touches its highest peak—this I say on the basis of scientific research—and then the descent begins. Five to seven years into the descent, marriage happens. Now there will be intercourse, but there will not be fulfillment. That fulfillment could have happened at seventeen and a half; now it cannot. Now there isn’t enough force for fulfillment. The hunger is not deep enough for satisfaction. Your lust has gone flabby. This flabby lust will hound you your whole life. Had it become fulfilled, you would have been free long ago. It will not be fulfilled now. And every time you descend into sex you will not experience joy; rather, afterwards there will be sadness: you lost energy and gained nothing—what kind of animality am I falling into! Then condemnation will thicken. The denser the condemnation, the more you will still go into it, and yet wish you hadn’t. Within you a conflict will arise, a split. One part will go and one part will pull back.

It is as if you yoked oxen to both ends of a bullock cart and lash both sides. The cart’s skeleton will tear apart. That has become your condition. That has become the condition of all humanity.

Fulfillment makes liberation possible; from unfulfillment no one is ever free.

Now day by day your lust will keep weakening, and day by day your melancholy will grow heavier. Now not at forty-two— not even at eighty-two—will freedom be possible. Now you will die weighed down by lust. And then the sayings of pundits, priests, sadhus, saints will seem perfectly right to you. Try to understand: they say lust is only suffering. And your experience will say yes, it is suffering. What a strange logic! They wove such a net that lust becomes suffering, and now your own experience says it is suffering—so the saints seem right.

Therefore people like me will not be easily understood by you, because your experience is the opposite of mine. I say: lust is supreme bliss. But you cannot agree; you will say, “To whom are you saying this?” People imagine that because they have produced children, they have known lust. To produce children you do not need to know lust. Making children is so simple—donkeys and horses are doing it! For that, no special knowledge or awareness is needed. Making children is as simple as pressing a button to turn on electricity. But do you think that because you pressed a switch and the light came on, you understood what electricity is?

What electricity is—you won’t know it by pressing a button. To know electricity is a deep journey, a long exploration. Even now scientists have not opened the mystery of what electricity is. They have learned its use, to employ it in a thousand ways. But what electricity is—science still has no answer.

And sexual desire is living electricity, living current. It is a step beyond physical electricity—more refined, further ahead. The secret of physical electricity is not yet open; the secret of biological electricity is much farther off—work has scarcely begun. But someone produces children—you can produce dozens. The more unintelligent a person, the more children he produces. What is there in producing children? But the child-producer starts believing he knows lust—and yet he has not become free till now.

You do not know lust. There is a science of knowing lust. There is an art of knowing lust. That art is called Tantra. It has very subtle methods, techniques. I want people to understand and learn the methods of Tantra. But those very people whom I want to explain to and teach—who could learn and become free of lust—are the ones who propose I be hanged. And I cannot blame them either; their experience tells them there is no joy in lust—lust is hell! Yet by calling it hell they have not become free.

Radharamana! Your state is not only yours; it is the state of about ninety-nine percent of humanity. And just as you say—that you want to express the heart’s pain which you have never expressed to anyone—there are many who do not express it to anyone. What would they do! Why cry publicly! And if they do, people will laugh—that’s the joke! If you tell someone, “I am mature in years and not free of lust,” he will say, “What! Still not free of lust?” He will act as if he is free. He will not miss the chance to place himself above you. He will belittle you so badly that what is the point of speaking?

If you go and tell a sadhu or sannyasin, “I am not yet free of lust,” he will say, “You are an animal! A creature of hell! A worm!” He will abuse you. So what is the use of speaking? Hide your pain! Hide it and die hiding it!

You are an honest man to have made this submission, but ninety-nine percent of people are in the same state. They tell no one. What is there to say? Who will understand? On the contrary people will laugh. They will insult you. Whatever reputation you have will fall. Here respect is for those who make claims. Whether the claim is true or false does not matter; only that no flaw can be picked in it. If lust is inside, let it be; outside, talk of knowledge, quote the Vedas. Outside, discourse on celibacy.

I know your sadhus and sannyasins, because when they come to me, their pain is the same. Do not think that because you are a householder your pain has not ended; your sadhus and sannyasins suffer even more than you. You at least had some outlet—things might even have resolved; they have not even that. They are burning through and through, full of fire. If the skulls of your sadhus were opened, little windows made in their heads and they were examined, you would be astonished—the infernal scenes you would see there you will not see anywhere else.

You can experiment yourself. Every day you eat; then you do not dream of food. Fast for a day; that night you will dream of food. Fast for two or four days; you will think only of food. All other thoughts will vanish. I tell you, Radharamana: even sex-thought will vanish—fast five to seven days and only food will appear. When you walk on the road, you will not see women, you will see restaurants. The letters on the hotel signs will be crystal clear; you will read the boards again and again. On the road—nothing else—this smell of fritters, that smell of pakoras: the road will seem full of aromas, one fragrance of food after another! You have walked this road all your life and never noticed these smells, because your belly was full, you were satisfied.

Right now when you walk the road, you see only women everywhere. Inside, your lust is repressed. You did well to speak, to submit. A way can be found. But to make the way, some very important points must be understood.

You said, “My mind has become fragmented.”

You have made it fragmented; it has not just “become” so! You are responsible. The blame cannot be put on anyone else. Ultimately the responsibility is one’s own. There is no point even blaming pundits and priests, because you accepted them—the responsibility for that is yours. You could have refused. I did not accept them. The many sannyasins gathering around me did not accept them. You too could have refused. But even now you are accepting them. This very question arises from their doctrine. This obstruction comes from them; the question is born from it.

You say: “On one side love for satsang and the longing to meet God, and on the other side a pull toward physical sexual desire.”

These are not two separate things. Those who told you they are separate misled you. They are exactly the same kind of thing. The very longing with which you desired a woman—that same longing, with new wings, will desire the Divine; it is not opposite. The very lust by which you saw beauty in a woman’s face—by that you will see beauty in a lotus; it is the same longing. By that you will see beauty in a sunset, in the night stars; the same longing. And with that longing one day the whole existence will appear filled with beauty. Then the experience of God begins.

But you say: “On one side the longing for God, and on the other a pull toward sexuality.”

You have taken them to be opposites; there lies your mistake, the basic mistake. And when the basic mistake is made, whatever you do will go wrong. The first step has gone astray. These two are not opposites. They are not moving in different directions. They are stations on the same path. Sex is the first station, love the second, prayer the third—on the same road! This is my original gift to you: they are stations on one road. So do not be anxious at all.

You are fragmenting yourself by your own interpretation. Understand my interpretation—the fragmentation ends, ends this very moment. You will not need to “join the parts”; only stop breaking them. It is the same one who loves beauty who will love God. The same longing, the same love.

Granted, in woman there is a gross beauty, in man a gross beauty; and in God a subtle beauty—subtler than the subtlest. But beauty is beauty. When a diamond is first dug from the mine it looks like a stone; only a jeweler can see. And I tell you: what you are calling sexual desire is a diamond. I speak to you as a jeweler—it is a diamond. It must be cut and polished; it must be cleaned; only then will you recognize that it is a diamond.

Do you know, when the Kohinoor diamond was first found, the man who found it let his children play with it for months, thinking it was a stone—the Kohinoor! And a lovely story is connected with it. It was found at Golkonda. The man who found it was a poor farmer. He had a small field, and a little stream ran through it. In the sand of that stream one day he found this shining stone. He thought, “The children will play with it.” He gave it to the children. They played with it; it lay now in this corner, now in that. The Kohinoor—now set in the crown of England’s Queen Elizabeth, the most precious diamond in the world! For which who knows how many lost their lives—children played with it. No one knew.

And the story is marvelous: one night a wandering fakir was a guest in that farmer’s home. The fakir spoke of far lands and times, for he had roamed the world. He said to the farmer, “Why waste your life here, beating your head against soil? There are places with gold mines, diamond mines. I will give you directions—go! With this much effort you can become a millionaire.”

So he sold his field—the very field where the Kohinoor had been found. In that same field the greatest Golkonda mine was later discovered, from which came the most valuable diamonds in the world. He sold it for a pittance, for the price of a field, and set out in search. He told his wife and children, “You wait; I go in search of wealth.” Four or five years later he returned, like a beggar. The money was gone. No diamond mines anywhere; he did not become rich. Wandering, he came home. But the day he returned, his eyes opened. The diamond he had left for the children to play with—though in these four or five years he had not found mines, he had acquired discernment. He was obsessed with diamonds; he had sat with jewelers, with merchants; he had seen diamonds; he had learned to appraise. He had not found diamonds, but he had learned discernment. And with discernment he found the diamond—because discernment is the real question. He could not believe his eyes: the diamond was in his house, while he had searched the world! He tried every means to get the field back—but how could he? The news had spread: that field held the greatest Golkonda mine.

The Nizam, the ruler of Hyderabad, had so many diamonds; they all came from that mine. There were many—still are. When the Nizam of Hyderabad was in full splendor, he had so many diamonds that every year, just to give them sunlight, they had to be spread over seven terraces. They were shoveled out and shoveled back into the rooms, as if they were pebbles. All those diamonds were found in that poor farmer’s field.

Your condition is like that poor farmer’s. The little stream of sexual desire flowing through your field—there lie the diamond mines. What is needed is discernment.

Remember first: lust is a search for God. And that is why you always find—something is missing, something is missing. Because the search is for God, how will you be satisfied with the body? You need bodiless love, bodiless beauty. But you will have to make the body a staircase.

You say: “On one side love of satsang and the longing to unite with God; on the other, every moment a pull toward physical sexual desire.”

Do not put them on two sides; hold them together. They are stations of the same journey.

“Till today, into mature age, I have not been able to get free of it.”

Because of this wrong analysis freedom has not happened. If a small miscalculation is made—an inch wrong—the truth ends up thousands of miles away.

But you must be thinking freedom has not come because you did not make a full effort. It has not come precisely because you made a full effort. You have fought hard against yourself. But one is not freed by fighting. Freedom comes by awareness, by meditation.

And “freedom-from” is not the right word, because in it there is the sense that something is wrong. Do not say freedom; say transcendence, going beyond.

“Understanding comes, but remains incomplete.”

That is not understanding. It is scriptural understanding, not experiential.

“And despite many experiences of the female body, the tendency torments even more.”

Through the experience of a woman’s body a man is freed; through the experience of a man’s body a woman is freed. All experience is liberating. But the experience does not complete because within you are fighting. Even when you embrace a woman you are thinking, “Oh sinner, what are you doing! Oh infernal one, what are you doing! You will rot in hell!” Your saints preach from inside. They stand in the way with a stick. They do not let you meet. You are condemning yourself within, cursing yourself. How will understanding arise like this? It will always be partial. And partial understanding is not understanding. Understanding is either whole or not. Either ignorance or understanding—no station in between. You cannot cut understanding into pieces. Understanding is indivisible.

But I know your snag, because that is the snag of all humanity. When you are with a woman, all your saints and monks inside start declaiming against women—that “woman is the door of hell.” “Drum, peasant, Shudra, animal, woman—all deserve to be beaten!”—they start quoting. And when you are away from a woman, your lust torments you. I know your dilemma—neither of the house nor of the ghat. When you are at the riverbank, you remember the home; when you are at home, you remember the riverbank. Your state has become like the washerman’s donkey.

And this is how it goes. What comes to hand you cannot taste fully, and what is out of reach torments you: “I must have it.” When there is lack, there is demand; and when something is obtained, you cannot live it fully. So everything remains split.

“All the good sayings and teachings remain outside.”

They will remain outside. If good words come from outside, they will remain outside. If the teachings are others’, they are borrowed—so they will remain outside. The real thing arises from within; it is born within. Your “good words” are not yours—they belong to others. You have adopted them—like adopting a child. Someone adopts another’s child: by adoption she becomes a mother, by adoption you become a father.

But do you think an adopted child can truly make someone a mother? The necessary process of becoming a mother has not happened: those nine months of pregnancy, the troubles, the burden, the nausea, food not digesting, sleepless nights—who will bear those nine months of pain? Becoming a mother is not for free; a price must be paid. And on the day the child is born the pain is unbearable. By adopting you have been very clever—you have escaped all the bother.

But remember: on the day the child is born, along with the child another is born—the mother. The child is not born alone. Before the child, the woman was a woman, not a mother. On the day the child is born, something new is added—she becomes a mother. Two are born that day: on one side the child, on the other the mother. Then nursing the child, all his troubles, staying awake nights, waking ten times, feeding him, tying him to your very life-breath, caring in every way—all that giving, all that love, all that compassion—out of all this the mother is made. You played it clever; you did arithmetic; you saved yourself all the bother. You took a test-tube baby, or borrowed someone else’s child.

Exactly the same happens regarding knowledge. For true knowledge you have to bear many inner pains, much tapas, pass through many experiences, be refined, endure much fire. Knowledge is born within. Like a womb, knowledge is conceived within. Such knowledge liberates. With such knowledge the knower is truly born. On one side knowledge is born; on the other, the knower is born.

But you have borrowed knowledge. Where did you get these “good teachings”? You read them in books. And it may be that the ones who wrote them also read them in other books. Borrowing upon borrowing goes on. Religion is cash. Borrowed religion is not religion.

Therefore your obstacle remains, Radharamana. You say: “All the good sayings and teachings remain outside.”

They will remain outside. They are from outside; they will stay outside. How can they go inside? How will an adopted child enter the womb? A child from the womb is one thing. But how will you take an adopted child into the womb? He will remain outside. And whether the child knows it or not, you will always know he is not yours. How will you forget that? There is no way to forget it. Between you and the child there will remain a gap. The relationship will be formal; it cannot be of the soul.

Therefore I say to you: do not worry about knowledge, worry about meditation. In the womb of meditation the child of knowledge is born. It will be born within you. And only when it is born within can it be within.

You say: “All the teachings remain outside, and I remain the same.”

You will remain the same. But you are an honest man. You are saying the true thing. People do not say this. And because you have said the truth, a way will open. Now something can happen. Outside words will remain outside. You will remain the same. Revolution within will arise only when the inner lamp is lit.

I tell you: the inner lamp can be lit. There is no reason it cannot. Buddha’s was lit, Mahavira’s was lit—yours can be lit. Every person is born carrying the inner lamp. But the processes of lighting must be learned. You will need satsang. You will need the courage to walk with a living Buddha. You will have to take sannyas. You will have to become a disciple.

And remember, a true master does not teach knowledge; a true master teaches meditation. And knowledge is then born within you. A fake master teaches knowledge—and then everything remains outside.

“I remain the same”—you say—“I forget everything and become greedy. Lust surrounds the mind. Even in dreams the same goes on. By what practice can I gain freedom or equanimity?”

Not freedom. Drop the language of freedom-from. Transcendence! Not equanimity either. Transcendence! Because equanimity of that sort will be dead, lifeless. “Somehow let this fire of lust be calmed.” But this fire is precious; it is not to be calmed. With this very fire the fire of God has to be lit. From this spark the whole forest will blaze. Do not smother it. Do not turn it to ashes. In this very spark lies your future, your hope.

So not freedom, not even equanimity—transcendence. And the means of transcendence is: enter sex with awareness, enter totally. And even now it is not too late. The way you have gone, it has become late—but what’s done is done. Even now it is not too late. And if one who strayed in the morning returns home by evening, he is not called stray. If even at the last breath the transcendence of lust happens, know that you have come home.

It can happen. Lost and wandering, you have come to the right place where it can happen. But you will have to be courageous. It will not happen cheaply. If you want it to happen just by hearing my words, it will not. If you do what I say, it can.

Because neither is love blind, nor is love madness, nor is love a dream; or, if you like: love is a kind of blindness that has eyes, love is a kind of madness that holds wisdom, and love is a kind of dream within which truth is hidden.
Love is the greatest happening in this world. Whoever misses love will miss truth. Love is God. That is why I teach love.

Where they seat You and worship You, those are other temples, other shrines.
Where the mouth of the wound says to the sacrificed one, “Welcome, O slain,” those are other daggers, other spears.
For those whose very lack of attainment is the essence of longing—their sighs are of another kind, their laments are of another kind.
Those who have attained Your nearness are fortunate, yes, but those who die holding Your yearning are of another kind.
Those who never stumble—they are everything, yes, but preachers;
Those whom the Hand of Mercy itself upholds are of another kind.
The unending scorch born of the search for the candle, O Akhtar—
Those who burn up in their own fire are of another kind.

There is one kind of prayer and worship that is loveless. That is what goes on in temples, mosques, and gurdwaras. There is another kind of prayer, brimming with love, not mere formality; that is what I am teaching you.

Where they seat You and worship You, those are other temples, other shrines.
This is not that kind of temple, not that kind of sanctuary—where stone idols are set up and the worship proceeds; where God is dead and the worship is formal.
Where they seat You and worship You, those are other temples, other shrines.
Where the mouth of the wound says to the sacrificed one, “Welcome, O slain,” those are other daggers, other spears.
For those whose very lack of attainment is the essence of longing—their sighs are of another kind, their laments are of another kind.

With a platter of formalities in your hand you perform offerings, do worship, wave the lamp—but those sounds do not reach God. You light lamps of ghee; when will you light the lamp of the heart? You burn incense bought in the market; when will you kindle the incense of your very life-breath?

For those whose only longing is to find God—
Their sighs are of another kind, their cries are of another kind.
Let out such a sigh! Raise such a voice! Give such a call that every hair is involved, every particle participates; that the voice is not only of the lips, not merely from the throat, but wells up from the very life of life. Then it reaches. It surely reaches. But such a voice is the voice of love.

So I teach love, because only love can breathe life into your formalities. Only love can free you from etiquette. There is no etiquette-based relationship with God. But you have made it so even there. You go into the temple and behave very properly. When will you laugh with Him? When will you sing with Him? When will you dance with Him? When will you take His hand? When will you clasp His feet? You have banged your head enough, but within you were elsewhere. Your head struck the stone while inside you were somewhere else. When will you offer yourself?

Those who have attained Your nearness are fortunate, yes, but
Those who die with Your longing in their hearts are of another kind.
Yes, love is madness, because it gives you the courage to die, the courage to be effaced. Love makes you a moth. And only moths reach the flame. God is the flame. I make you a moth. I give you the courage to go, to burn, to die—because in that vanishing your new birth happens.

Those who never stumble—they are everything, yes, but preacher.
Understand this lovely saying! Those who never make a mistake in life are fine, good—O moralist!
Those who never stumble—they are everything, yes, but preacher.
But I am speaking of those who, if they fall, the very hand of God holds them.
Those who never stumble—they are everything, yes, but preacher.
Good people—they do not stumble, do not err, do not miss, do not sin, do not steal—but the real point is not there. The real point is that if you do stumble, God’s hand should hold you. Until His hand comes to hold you, know that your voice has not reached Him. To hold yourself together is good, fine—but only makeshift. You will become respectable, not a saint. The respectable man holds himself together. The saint leaves everything to God, and God holds him.

Those who never stumble—they are everything, yes, but preacher.
Those whom the Hand of Mercy itself upholds are of another kind.
The unending scorch born of the search for the candle, O Akhtar—
Those who burn up in their own fire are of another kind.

So you are right: I teach love. In one sense love is blind, because it does not speak the world’s language. Love is blind because it does not know arithmetic. Love is blind because it is a gambler, not a shopkeeper. And love is madness too. But I want to tell you: there is no greater wisdom. There is no greater sanity. Those who loved found God; those who clung to “good sense” found money and position. But wealth and status are all left behind.

Instruments lie there without musician or plectrum,
And yet the melodies seem eager to burst forth.
The same gathering, the same splendor of the gathering, and yet
How changed the manners appear.

How the world has changed! Now there are no moths here. The candle is the same. The candle burns, but there is no trace of moths. People have lost their courage. They cannot be blind in love, cannot be mad in love, cannot even dream of love.

Instruments lie there without musician or plectrum—
Therefore the veena lies there and no music rises. There is no sign of the musician—he is so unconscious.
Instruments lie there without musician or plectrum—
The players and the instruments lie empty.
And yet the melodies seem eager to burst forth.
And yet something longs to be revealed.
God still wants to sing, but you will not take up the veena. God still wants to hum in your heart, but you will not open the heart. You have become very sensible. You have become very afraid. You are busy with your security. You do not surrender.

The same gathering, the same splendor of the gathering, and yet
How changed the manners appear.
In this very gathering came Meera, came Yari, came Sahajo—people came, danced, attained—and in this same gathering you go on collecting trash!
The same gathering, the same splendor of the gathering, and yet
How changed the manners appear.
What a spectacle—that the buds are withered and yellow,
While the thorns look content and lush.
To what turn has this caravan arrived today?
Now the steps seem even more restless.
Tomorrow these very floods of fire
Will bring forth the uprising of the fresh rose.
Tomorrow these very dreams will turn into reality,
Which today look like only dreams.
Which radiant sun is about to rise?
The mirror of the heart gleams with dawn.
Smiling upon tomorrow’s horizon, O Akhtar,
Not one, but hundreds of moons appear.

So many suns are rising! Get ready. Something is about to happen on the horizon.
Smiling upon tomorrow’s horizon, O Akhtar,
Not one, but hundreds of moons appear.

Every twenty-five hundred years, a great moment of transition comes into the life of humankind—a moment of revolution—every twenty-five hundred years. Twenty-five hundred years after Krishna came Buddha. And now Buddha’s twenty-five hundred years are complete. And you know, in Buddha’s time there was a flood, a deluge of awakened ones—Zarathustra in Iran; in Greece, Heraclitus, Pythagoras, Socrates; in China, Confucius, Lao Tzu, Chuang Tzu, Lieh Tzu, Mencius; and in India, Buddha, Mahavira, Sanjaya Belatthiputta, Ajita Keshakambala, Makkhali Gosala—remarkable beings. As if the ocean had never risen so high!

The world’s cycle completes a turn in twenty-five hundred years. Another twenty-five hundred are complete. These last twenty or twenty-five years of this century are extraordinary. You are fortunate to be here in this hour. If you make use of it, you will cross. Sometimes it happens that when the winds blow in the right direction, you need not row; you only unfurl the sail and the winds carry the boat. If the winds are not favorable, then you must row, you must labor greatly. If the winds are very contrary, surely you will have to toil much; and if the winds are favorable, then without labor, with mere surrender, the happening happens.

It is the same gathering where wondrous flowers bloomed! You too can become a flower. And a very favorable time is drawing near—day by day it draws nearer. Prepare yourself!

Instruments lie there without musician or plectrum,
And yet the melodies seem eager to burst forth.
The same gathering, the same splendor of the gathering, and yet
How changed the manners appear.
What a spectacle—that the buds are withered and yellow,
While the thorns look content and lush.
To what turn has this caravan arrived today?
Now the steps seem even more restless.
Tomorrow these very floods of fire
Will bring forth the uprising of the fresh rose.
Tomorrow these very dreams will turn into reality,
Which today look like only dreams.
Which radiant sun is about to rise?
The mirror of the heart gleams with dawn.
Smiling upon tomorrow’s horizon, O Akhtar,
Not one, but hundreds of moons appear.

A rare hour, an hour of good fortune—wake up. Make use of this hour! And only lovers will be able to make use of it; that is why I teach love.

You too are right in a sense when you say love is blind and I teach love; love is madness and I teach love; love is a dream and I teach love. Your so‑called sensible people indeed call love blind. The head always calls love blind, because love belongs to the heart, not to the head. The skull is forever opposed to love, because when love arrives, the master arrives, and the skull must take service. As long as the master is not at home, the servants are the masters; but when the master enters, at once the servants must say, “Yes, sir.”

The head is master only so long as your heart sleeps. Therefore the head will oppose; it will say, “What madness! What love, what prayer, what devotion? There is no God. Where is the proof? Why get into such nonsense?” The head will surely oppose. All its power is at stake. As soon as the heart blossoms, the head is no longer powerful. As soon as love awakens, logic becomes cheap.

But I want to tell you: the mind is very dangerous as a master, but priceless as a servant. Make the mind a servant; let the heart become the master. Then your life will move in the right direction. Let direction come from the heart; let the pointer to the goal come from the heart. Let the mind arrange the journey. Let the mind find the vehicles and methods of travel, and let the heart decide where to go, in which direction, and what to attain.

The mind cannot give value to life; it can only give tools and techniques. The values of life come from the heart.

Therefore I teach love, even though your mind will call it blind. Do not listen to the mind. Those who listened to the mind wasted their lives just so.

And certainly love is madness—because the ones you call “sensible,” what is their sense? One gathers money, another rank, another reputation—and then death comes and everything lies there. What kind of sense is that? If that is sense, then love is madness.

But I tell you: love alone is wisdom, because love gathers a wealth that death cannot seize. In prayer you become the sovereign of a kingdom that cannot be singed. Your body will burn on the funeral pyre, and what you earned through the body will lie there. But that which is within the body, beyond the body, the bodiless—love comes to know and recognize That. And once recognized, your connection with the deathless is made. And suppose love is a dream—yes, for now it is, because you take trivial things as real and run madly after them—then love is a dream. But I tell you: it is a dream that can become true; a dream that can lead you right to the door of truth.

Love. Love as much as you possibly can. Love unhesitatingly, unconditionally. Love human beings, love animals, love birds, love plants, love stones. Love as much as you can. The more you lavish love, the nearer you will find God. Love is the bridge.

Enough for today.