Deepak Bara Naam Ka #4

Sahajanand! The sutra is precious, but most of its commentaries so far have been worthless. Even the Hindi meaning you’ve cited is based on those mistaken commentaries. And when a wrong interpretation is repeated long enough, it starts to feel right. Repetition has a hypnosis, a magic of its own. Adolf Hitler wrote in his autobiography Mein Kampf that a lie, if repeated again and again, becomes truth. He didn’t just write it—he proved it, turning the biggest lies into “truths” by sheer repetition. Repeat, repeat: at first people laugh, then they begin to think, and slowly they accept.

The whole art of advertising is based on this: keep repeating. Then whether it’s Hema Malini’s beauty or Parveen Babi’s—everything’s secret turns out to be Lux toilet soap. Repeat it—in newspapers, films, radio, television—and slowly people begin to believe. An unconscious imprint forms. Then you go to buy soap, and when the shopkeeper asks, “Which one?” you think you’re choosing Lux. But it’s choosing you. What you’ve been fed again and again! You say, “Give me Lux.” You think you decided, but you’re mistaken—repetition has mesmerized you.

In the early days of electric signs, the ads were static. Scientists said static doesn’t have the same effect. If “Lux Toilet” is written in lights and stays lit, you read it once. But if the letters blink on and off, you are forced to read it over and over. Even passing by in a car, as long as the sign is in view, the letters will blink ten or fifteen times—ten or fifteen repetitions, ten or fifteen imprints.

In the same way, priceless sutras have been turned into garbage by the meanings imposed on them. Not one or two days of repetition—thousands of years! So you will have to re-understand each word with me.

Vedanta. It has always been explained as “the culmination of the Vedas.” That is utterly false. The Upanishads are not the zenith of the Vedas; they are a rebellion against them. Upanishad means Vedanta—but repetition has hammered in the lie that the Upanishads are the Vedas’ culmination, like fragrance arising from flowers on the Vedic tree, with roots in the Vedas. Not true. Vedanta means: where the Vedas end. Where the Vedas cease. The journey that begins beyond scripture, beyond the Vedas, beyond words and doctrines—that is Vedanta.

The Vedas are very worldly. Occasionally a lovely sutra appears by mistake; ninety-nine percent is rubbish. The Upanishads are not the climax of that rubbish. The Upanishads openly oppose the Vedas. Krishna, in the Gita, openly opposes the Vedas. But the manner of opposing—and the centuries of whitewashing by pundits—have forced you to accept lies. Krishna said plainly: the Vedas are worldly, for the worldly-minded. Those who seek the spiritual must go beyond them.

Mahavira said the same, but more explicitly. By the time of Mahavira and Buddha, realized ones had seen what misuse the pundits had made, so to prevent it again they opposed the Vedas continuously and clearly. Result: Hindu society could not accept them; it rejected them. Had they allowed even a little room for their words to be twisted, Hinduism would have swallowed them too. But they were alert; what happened to Krishna and the Upanishadic seers should not happen to them. Their alertness prevented the Vedas from being plastered onto them. So the only recourse was to denounce them and throw them out. Buddha was virtually uprooted from India; barely a trace remained. Mahavira wasn’t uprooted as badly—his teaching was too philosophic, reaching only a few, so there was less fear. But Buddha spoke so plainly, he could reach millions—there lay the danger.

Understand Vedanta: not the Vedas’ culmination, but the ending of the Vedas—their death. What rises from their ashes is Vedanta. Not culmination—rebellion.

And it had to be so, because what are the Vedas? Open them anywhere and you’ll be surprised these words are called religion. Ordinary desires: someone prays for a bigger harvest; someone begs Indra for more rain; someone wants wealth; someone wants his cows’ udders to overflow with milk—and, not only that, his enemy’s cows’ udders to dry up! “Let it rain on my field—and not on my neighbor’s.” And this you call spirituality? These are low impulses: “Destroy my enemies, O Indra; strike them with lightning, turn them to ash.” Is this religion? This is human jealousy, enmity, violence, hostility—nothing more. Yes, a sweet sutra appears now and then, one in a hundred—the rest is trash. And in that trash even the diamonds got lost.

The Upanishads are all diamonds. No trash there.

Upanishad is itself a beautiful word. Understand it and Vedanta will be clear. Upanishad means: to sit near the Master. Simply to sit near. To sit silently by one who knows, becoming empty—and heart to heart, something stirs. In that sitting, satsang bears fruit. The unsayable is said. The unhearable is heard. The veena of the heart begins to sing. In the knower, the strings are already resonant; when the not-yet-knower draws near, his strings too begin to ring.

Musicians know: in an empty room, place two veenas. Close the doors and strike a note on one; the other, untouched, will hum in sympathy. One veena sets the air in vibration; the waves stir the sleeping music in the other—it is as if morning has come.

About a hundred and fifty years ago, a scientist first observed this principle; he didn’t name it. Some forty years ago C. G. Jung named it “synchronicity,” and gave it a scientific basis—not only for clocks, but for all dimensions of life.

Mystics have known this for millennia. Satsang’s secret is synchronicity. The true Master is the big clock, the great sitar; the disciple is the smaller one. If the disciple consents, is filled with trust, and simply sits near—even doing nothing—his strings will begin to sound.

Upanishad means: attunement. Up means near; nishad means to sit. That is the meaning of upasana too: up-asana, sitting near. And upavasa: dwelling near. How meanings get distorted! Upavasa has come to mean fasting. Upavasa means residing near the Master. Yes, sometimes in that nearness you are so nourished you forget hunger—that’s how the distortion arose. If, drowned in the Master’s joy, food is forgotten, that is upavasa; when you forcefully don’t eat, that is a hunger strike. A hunger strike is violence; upavasa is love. Between them, earth and sky.

Sohan is sitting here—ask her. When I was a guest at her home in Poona, many guests came all day because of me; she fed them all, and I would ask her, “You feed everyone—what about you?” She said, “When you are here, I don’t feel hungry. I myself am amazed—where does the hunger go? I feel so full there’s no room inside.”

Love is a greater food than food; it fills you so much hunger may not arise. From this, upavasa became wrongly equated with fasting.

Upasana—sitting near—also got distorted. Now you worship a statue: arranged plate, aarti, lamps, incense—and you call it upasana. No. Upasana is only sitting near the living Master. Just sitting near is aarti, is worship. In his nearness, your inner lamp is lit. In his nearness, the inner incense begins to burn; fragrance arises.

Vedanta was born in the Upanishads—in the intimate nearness of Master and disciple.

Vedanta means where words are not, where there is no scripture, no doctrine; where the Vedas have ended, all scriptures are left far behind—mind itself left behind! Scriptures can only be in the mind; beyond mind there are no scriptures. Vedanta is the flight beyond mind, the state of no-mind. Vedanta is meditation, samadhi.

So first understand Vedanta rightly; otherwise you will miss my meaning.

The second word is vijnana. You, Sahajanand, translated vijnana as “knowledge of nature,” because today we use “vijnana” to translate “science.” That is recent. We had no word for science; we pressed vijnana into service. But don’t impose this meaning onto the Upanishads. There, vijnana has a very direct meaning: special knowing. Vijnana means the knowing that arises within oneself—not borrowed. It has nothing to do with science; it is direct, singular, one’s own.

Vedanta and vijnana are two sides of the same coin. Vedanta is going beyond scripture—the way; vijnana is the attainment: the taste of direct realization, one’s own seeing, one’s own witness. Not belief—experience. Only then does life’s meaning become well ascertained.

Now understand the verse:

Vedanta-vijnana sunishcitārthāḥ—
One who, by the way of Vedanta, attains vijnana—such a one comes to know life’s meaning and purpose. Without that, life’s meaning is not known. But how much trash has been piled on this!

Sannyāsa-yogād yatayaḥ śuddha-sattvāḥ—
They froze the meaning of sannyas: to abandon the world. Then King Janaka wouldn’t be a sannyasin. But who has known more than Janaka? If Janaka could know while living in the world, sannyas isn’t indispensable. Yet sannyas is indeed indispensable—no one knows without it. So we must rediscover sannyas’s hidden meaning.

Sannyas does not mean leaving the world. It means the dropping away—not the forced dropping—of the inessential we cling to. Know the difference. With Mahavira the empire dropped; onlookers thought he renounced it. Not really their fault: they themselves are clinging to wealth—how can they imagine wealth just drops away? Their experience—lifetimes of it—is: they want to cling more and more. So when they see someone walk away, naturally they think, “Blessed, what a renunciation! A great ascetic! He left it all. We can’t drop a penny, he dropped jewels!” But that is the spectators’ view, not Mahavira’s inner experience. Ask Mahavira: he didn’t “leave”—it left.

The difference is immense. Leaving means attachment remains; force was required, like tearing off an unripe fruit. Unripe fruit must be plucked; ripe fruit falls on its own. When ripe, its fall wounds neither tree nor fruit; the tree is simply lightened. The fall is natural, spontaneous, right—esa dhammo sanantano, thus is the eternal law. But tear an unripe fruit: the fruit is hurt—its growth is cut off; the tree too suffers.

A story: Akbar summoned a famous astrologer—he’d heard much, but hesitated to call him, for he was blunt, two plus two is four. Finally Akbar called him: “Tell me about myself.” The astrologer looked and said, “First you will die; then your sons will die; then their sons will die.” Akbar snapped, “Is this any way to speak? Others never say such things.” The astrologer replied, “They say the same, only sugar-coated. I speak the truth—and not only a prediction; it is my blessing too: may you die first, then your sons, then theirs—this is nature’s order. If your sons die before you, that’s a calamity. A father dying before his sons is natural.” Akbar was hurt—no one shows their palm to hear only of death—but the astrologer said, “It’s the only certain thing. All else is uncertain.”

When a ripe fruit falls, it is no calamity. But the unripe fruits hanging there, seeing the ripe fall, must think, “Ah! What a wondrous fruit! We want to hold on, drink a little more sap, live two more days—what a great renunciate this fruit is, kicking the tree!” Unripe fruit’s perception. What can unripe fruit say of the ripe?

A man brought a bag of money to Ramakrishna’s feet. Ramakrishna asked, “Why?” He said, “You are a great renunciate; let me honor you.” Ramakrishna said, “Take back your words! I am a great enjoyer. You are the renunciate! What upside-down talk!” The man was startled. “Paramahansadeva, are you in your senses? You an enjoyer? I a renunciate?” Ramakrishna said, “Exactly. I have dropped the worthless and am enjoying the essential. You cling to the worthless and have renounced the essential. Who is the enjoyer, who the renunciate?”

People like Ramakrishna give soul to words, because they are not pundits.

I too say: sannyas is supreme enjoyment. Those you call enjoyers, truly seen, are sannyasins in your sense. They clutch pebbles to their chest and have abandoned diamonds. They are ready to give up diamonds but not to drop pebbles. Coiled on bundles of paper currency—people say, if such folks die they become snakes. What “become”? They are already snakes—watch them hiss around their notes! Dying for paper while the supreme treasure lies within, and they won’t even glance at it. Racing outside for position and prestige.

In the midst of these madmen, when a Mahavira or Buddha appears, misunderstanding is inevitable. People will say, “What a great renunciation!” But ask Mahavira, ask Buddha—they will agree with Ramakrishna, and with me.

Sannyas means the inessential drops away. Not the world dropping away, for the world is not inessential; it contains both essence and non-essence. The sannyasin lives with such art that he enjoys the essential and lets the non-essential go. The so-called enjoyer lives so foolishly he clutches the non-essential and misses the essential. Sannyas is not leaving the world; it is the discernment of essence and non-essence—seeing essence as essence, the non-essential as non-essential.

That’s one side.

Sannyāsa-yogād yatayaḥ śuddha-sattvāḥ—
The other side is yoga. Sannyas is the dropping of the inessential; yoga is the joining with the essential. Yoga means union. The inessential drops; you join with the essential. Sannyas is negative: emptying yourself of junk—thoughts, desires, cravings. As soon as you are empty, you are joined to the divine; you disappear and only God remains. That supreme union is yoga. Yoga does not mean headstands or lotus posture. Not a physical circus. Yoga means joining, union, the supreme happening when the drop merges into the ocean and becomes ocean. Sannyas is one side, yoga the other. Like Vedanta is negative—drop words, scriptures, doctrines—and vijnana is positive—attain that special knowing that blesses life. Such a person becomes pure—of pure sattva.

Te brahmalokeṣu parānta-kāle—
But in the pundits’ hands, interpretation goes astray; they have no experience.

Te brahmalokeṣu parānta-kāle—
After death, such a person enters Brahma-loka.

Parāmṛtāḥ parimucyanti sarve—
And there, having reached Brahma-loka after dying, he is utterly liberated.

This interpretation is absolutely mistaken. If you understood my first two explanations, the meaning must change.

Te brahmalokeṣu parānta-kāle—
Brahma-loka is not a geographical place. It is the name of an inner experience when the drop, merging into the ocean, becomes the ocean: from Vedanta to vijnana, from sannyas to yoga—all this can be called Brahma-sakshatkara, realization of Brahman, entry into Brahma-loka. Don’t imagine it as geography, some realm beyond seven skies. Your Brahma-loka is within. Your innermost core is established there even now. However much you run about outside, you are still fixed on that central peg. Have you seen a potter’s wheel? The wheel spins; the axle-pin stays still. The pin is Brahma-loka; the wheel is your mind. The wheel turns and turns, the pin remains unmoving. Within you is a pin that never moves—eternal. The mind’s wheel spins on. The day it stops—even for a moment—you can see that pin which never moved, never changed.

And this does not happen after bodily death; it happens in life. But in life too there is a kind of dying: where the ego dissolves, there death happens. The verse speaks of the death of ego, not the body. If the body dies and ego remains, you will take another body. If ego dissolves and the body remains, what has the body to do with it? When the ego is gone, you are free of the body—even while living in it. That’s why Janaka is called Videha—bodiless—liberated while in the body and the world.

This notion that union happens after death is dangerous—it gives you the convenience to postpone the revolution: “It will happen after death—why hurry? We’ll see in old age—on the deathbed.” Death gives no prior notice; it comes suddenly. All your life you plan to remember God—and don’t. Then people lift your bier and chant “Ram nam satya hai”—what you were supposed to chant, others chant. And they chant for you, not for themselves. They will in turn wait for others to chant for them.

I lived many years in Jabalpur. A neighbor of mine joined every funeral. I asked him why. He had few friends; I never saw him at weddings, but always at funerals. He said, “I too must die. If I join everyone’s funeral, people will join mine. Do you want me to die like a dog, with no one to carry me?” He had no children or wife, so he feared no one would take him to the cremation ground. I said, “If you’re gone, what difference does it make who carries you, or whether four or four thousand go? You’ll be gone!” He said, “It matters—someone should chant God’s name, someone whisper the Gayatri in my ear.”

All life we postpone; at death people pour Ganges water in your mouth, recite the Gita in your ear. The man is dying—have some shame! Don’t insult him now. He didn’t do it all his life—don’t corrupt him at the end. What will he hear? He couldn’t hear while alive—now he’s drowning. It’s like someone drowning in a river while you shout Gayatri from the bank: “Brother, drown, but listen—this will help!”

Such interpretations create the excuse of postponement. Sannyas—“at seventy-five.” How many live to seventy-five? Seventy is natural. Few live beyond. And whoever has practiced postponing to seventy-five—do you think he’ll renounce suddenly at seventy-five? He’ll postpone for seventy-five lifetimes.

Habit hardens. A friend of mine drinks. His wife has been after him for thirty years to quit. She came to me: “He listens to you. If you say it once, he will quit!” I said, “You’ve said it for thirty years with no result—why waste my words?” She insisted. I said, “Do one thing: for seven days don’t mention it. If you keep silent seven days, on the eighth I will tell him.” She agreed. I told the husband too: “She has promised; note every time she slips and tell me.”

By the third day she came back: “I can neither sleep nor eat. I can’t bear the tension without saying it. I must say it!” I said, “Ponder this. He has drunk for thirty years; you have only the habit of telling him not to—no alcohol in your veins, just a futile habit—and even you can’t keep quiet for seven days. And you expect him to quit for life! Now, be sensible.”

We become habitual in everything. These wrong commentaries let people defer: “Brahma-loka is after death; nothing happens here. So why bother? Eat, drink, be merry—four days’ moonlight. We’ll settle it later. We aren’t alone—many are worse than us. If there’s a queue on Judgment Day, when will our number come?”

Mulla Nasruddin asked his mullah, “Tell me truly—will Judgment be finished in one day?” “Yes,” said the mullah, “a day has twenty-four hours.” “And all who ever lived will be there?” “Yes.” “Women too?” The mullah asked why he was so pleased. Mulla said, “With so many women there’ll be such a hullabaloo—what judgment will be possible? Who will listen? I won’t worry then. There’ll be bigger sinners than me; who will bother about poor me? I’ll hide in the crowd. It’s only twenty-four hours!”

Such illusions make postponement easy.

I say: this sutra has nothing to do with bodily death. It is about the death of ego—which is the only real death. Bodily death is none; you’ll be back. If the ego dies, you are dead; then there is no return—nirvana.

Te brahmalokeṣu parānta-kāle
Parāmṛtāḥ parimucyanti sarve—
He who dies in the ego—lets the ego die—is freed in every way, for all diseases are of the ego, all bonds are of the ego. The prison you are in is your ego. No one is stopping you; you can walk out this very moment. No guard, no jailer, no lock on the door—it’s your own construction. The moment you choose, you can step out.

A child was playing where a house was being built—piles of bricks and sand. Sitting in the sand, he began stacking bricks around himself, brick upon brick. When they reached his neck, he panicked: “Save me! I’m trapped!” He forgot he himself had stacked them. Just remove them one by one.

One morning Buddha came to speak carrying a silk handkerchief. People were surprised—he never brought anything. Before speaking he tied one knot, then another—five knots. Everyone watched: is he going to do a magic trick? Then he asked, “When I came, this kerchief had no knots; now it has five. Is it the same kerchief or a different one?” Ananda said, “Lord, you’re putting us in a bind. If we say ‘the same,’ you’ll say, ‘But look—knots!’ If we say ‘different,’ you’ll say, ‘It is the same.’ The knots don’t change the basic cloth. In one sense it’s the same; in another, not.”

Buddha said, “Between you and me there is just this much difference—accidental. I am knotless; you have knots—and you tied them.” He continued, “Now I want to untie them, just as you all have gathered to untie yours.” He grasped both ends and pulled.

Ananda cried, “Lord, what are you doing? You’ll tighten them. Don’t pull—leave the kerchief loose.” Buddha said, “Understand this second point too: whoever pulls tightens his knots. One needs relaxation, rest, no tension. Your so-called religious people are highly tense. In their zeal to untie, they pull—fasts, headstands, sacred fires: what are these but pulling? Their ego grows subtler and stronger. The knot can become so small it’s invisible—then it’s most dangerous.”

Buddha asked, “What shall I do, Ananda?” Ananda said, “First, loosen it; don’t pull. Second, before we decide how to untie, tell us how you tied them. Unless we know that, we cannot know how to undo them.”

How did you tie your knots—that’s the whole secret. See how you built your prison of bricks. From birth, the first knot society, family, education, religion, state ties is the ego. We tell the child: “Come first, win the gold medal, never lose; break, but don’t bend; uphold the family honor.” We impose ego, tie the knot. Then: “Go ahead! Be ambitious! Earn money! Fame! Status! Outshine everyone!” Everyone else is doing the same—that is how politics is born: the clash of egos. Religion is the dissolution of ego.

Just see how your knot was tied—then untying is not hard. Ambition tied it. And what is there in ambition? Suppose you gain wealth and status—what then? All will be left behind. Even if you reach the highest office, so what? What will you have? What did Alexander gain? What will you gain? But we run unconsciously, driven by other unconscious runners. Stop; rest; sit a little by the side; lighten yourself; quietly see—how is the knot tied? Competition so no one gets ahead; envy, jealousy—these tighten it. If the ego-knot does not tie, or if you untie it—that is death. One who dies thus becomes dvija, twice-born. The body remains, but death has happened and birth too. This is the death the sutra speaks of.

When the ego is allowed to die, one enters Brahman. Apart from ego, there is no obstacle. “I am separate from existence”—this alone blocks. “I am one with existence”—with this awareness, no struggle, no tension, no sorrow, no defeat, no failure; the drop has become one with the ocean. Where this union is, there is Brahma-loka—and that ocean surges within you. But you, knotted up, stand outside. You do not go within.

The sutra is beautiful. But understand its meaning in my way. The commentaries so far have been fundamentally wrong.

Veer Singh! What a formidable name! No shame, no modesty. And when there is no shame or modesty, at least make it Mahaveer Singh! Why are you stuck at just Veer Singh? What kind of cowardice is this! Is there such a thing as half-and-half sannyas? Then what would be left—everyone would qualify as a sannyasin. If you neither want to wear the ochre robes nor the mala, then what is the point of sannyas? In that case, you are already a sannyasin—what need is there to take it from me! But man is amazing. The ego of being a sannyasin is sweet, and cowardice pulls you back. So you think, “All right, let me take it half-and-half.”

A mouse came out of his hole and began hopping and skipping over the feet of an elephant sunning himself. The elephant felt a bit suspicious that some creature was rustling around his feet. He startled and asked, “Hey, tiny creature, who might you be?” “Whatever praise you offer is too little,” puffed the mouse, beating his chest. What, Veer Singh, you too are talking big! However much praise one gives you, it’s too little! Half-and-half sannyas!

Seeing Chandulal still a bachelor, his friend Dhabbuji asked, “So, friend, when will you get married?”
“Consider it half done,” Chandulal replied.
“Half a marriage! How is that?” Dhabbuji asked in astonishment.
“Half in the sense that I’m ready for marriage, but no girl is ready.”

In marriage, one can at least understand a half-and-half—fine, you are ready, but the girl is not. In sannyas only you have to be ready—who else has to agree! If even this comes half-and-half, then nothing in this world could ever be whole.

Veer Singh, you aren’t Punjabi, are you? If you aren’t, then go attend Sant Maharaj’s satsang!

The company commander called Havaldar Sardar Vichittar Singh and said, “Go announce in the company that there will be a solar eclipse today; if it rains, the meeting will be held in the hall, otherwise outside.” Vichittar Singh heard some of it, not some of it—fifty-fifty, half-and-half—understood some, didn’t understand some. As expected, naturally! He went out and announced, “By order of the commander, there will be a solar eclipse today. If it rains, it’ll be in the hall; if not, it’ll be outside.”

Veer Singh, understand! Don’t misunderstand this and that. Sannyas is a state of awareness; a state of awakening. The clothes are only symbols. But they do help begin the journey. Why? Because as soon as you declare your sannyas, you become filled, inside and out, with a sense of responsibility. Your declaration gives you a responsibility: now this awareness has to be honored; now it has to be lived. To go against it will be meanness, lowness. To fall below it will be to fall in your own eyes. And I do not insist on much for sannyas. My fundamental insistence is on meditation. But a person who is not willing even to change his clothes—how on earth will he change his soul! People are unwilling to change anything at all.

Mulla Nasruddin’s beloved asked him, “If I agree to marry you, will you stop smoking?”
Mulla said, “Yes.”
“And alcohol?”
Mulla said, “Yes, that too.”
“And the habit of gossiping with friends late into the night?”
Mulla said, “Yes, yes, that too.”
“But what would you prefer to give up first?”
Mulla said, “The intention to marry.”
“If I have to give up so much, who would get into this mess!”

So I don’t ask you to give up a lot. I only ask for meditation. Because I know, if meditation happens, the rest falls away on its own. But the declaration through the robe is useful. It will keep you awake. When you go to the market to buy something, you tie a knot in your kurta; that knot keeps reminding you that you have to buy the item. These clothes are just such a knot. Wherever you go, people will ask, “Are you a sannyasin?” Wherever you go, people will look closely. They will keep reminding you again and again. A continuous remembrance remains. The rope, coming and going, leaves its mark on the well-stone. Through constant practice, even the dull-witted become wise. This is only a practice of remembrance. A small method, an expedient.

But, Veer Singh, somewhere within a cowardice is hiding. You are afraid. “Let no one find out.” People ask me, “All right, we’ll wear the ochre robe—but the mala! If we keep it hidden inside, will that do?” Then what is the point of the mala? If it has to be hidden inside, better not wear it at all. What is there to hide?

Even being associated with me makes you nervous. And that association is useful. It is a challenge. It challenges whatever possibility of courage is buried in you. To be associated with me means to step into danger. And the ochre robe—they say, “Fine, we’ll wear it, but the mala is dangerous.” Because if you wear the robe alone, people will think, “Ah, a very saintly man, a mahatma,” they’ll even touch your feet. But the moment they see my mala, they won’t let you stay even in a dharamshala; they won’t let you enter the temple either. “Get up, brother, go somewhere else, move along! Keep your gracious gaze over there, don’t come here. Who wants to get into the hassle of giving you shelter!”

Recognize your cowardice!

Mulla Nasruddin said, “Last night there was a big stampede at the circus. A lion escaped from his cage.”
I asked, “Then what happened?”
He said, “Everyone ran away—except me.”
I said, “Nasruddin, I never thought you were so brave! You didn’t run?”
He said, “Not at all. I immediately jumped into the lion’s empty cage and locked the door from inside.” See the bravery! There was no place safer than that now. The lion was outside, so he jumped in and locked it from inside. Lions don’t know how to open doors, after all! “I sat there assured—let the cowards of the world run! And people agreed too, ‘He’s a brave man!’”

Sannyas, Veer Singh, is a matter of love, a matter for madmen; it is a kind of divine madness. It won’t work like this. Lovers don’t ask such things. Is love ever half-and-half! Will you sit with me half-and-half? How will you sit half-and-half? Your body will be here, your mind somewhere else—that’s the only way to be half-and-half. And if the mind isn’t here, what will I do with your body? Is this a cremation ground to gather corpses? This is a tavern, not a cremation ground.

Cremation grounds are many. In this country it’s cremation grounds everywhere. Wherever you go, you will find them. There’s no shortage of ashrams of the dead! Veer Singh, jump into some ashram of the dead and lock yourself in from inside! There is no place safer than that.

This place is not for safety. It is for danger. It is for choosing. It is for challenge. Here you will have to remain constantly alert. And this is for the crazed in love. It cannot happen without love. And love is never half, never partial; either it is or it isn’t.

Someone carries me to Him and ecstasy descends…
On my own, I feel a blush of shame to go.
So compel my heart, my friend, and take me—
Take me once more into her lane.
Perhaps it is my illusion, my fantasy…
Perhaps after me, she too will feel the ache.
He regrets now, having sent me from his door—
Now he sits waiting on my path,
Eyes laid out like a carpet.
He too once loved me—come, take me…
Take me once more into her lane.
After me, no one will come to that lane…
Who will shed blood at that threshold after me?
I dashed my head against the stone of love,
And made those feet crimson with my blood—
The door and walls still wait—come, take me…
Take me once more into her lane.
The one who filled my chest with wounds,
Who freed me from her door and made me a vagabond—
Granted that I am half-dead from her cruelties,
Still I am tough of soul—I will reach there;
I will go a hundred times—take me a hundred times—
Take me once more into her lane.
People brushed everything aside, calling me mad,
The world fastened shackles on my feet—
If you wish, take charge of my destiny, friends—
Remove these fetters from my feet,
Or drag me through the marketplace—
Take me once more into her lane.
I know her lane, I recognize it—
It is my slaughterhouse, I admit it.
To die in her lane is fate itself—
Perhaps such a death is life for the faithful.
I myself ask, I myself beg—come, take me—
Take me once more into her lane.

Madness is needed. Ecstasy is needed. Love is needed. This cannot be half-and-half. It can only be total. And here the invitation is only for those who are ready to dissolve, who are ready to die while alive. Because only then—on the ashes of your ego—will the lotus of your soul bloom.

If love is awakening in you, Veer Singh, then don’t be miserly, don’t calculate! Let at least one thing in life be beyond calculation! Do at least one thing without argument, without thinking and brooding! Because that one thing will become the boat. The thinkers stay stuck on this shore. Only the brave touch the other shore—those who leap into the unknown.

Half-and-half—what does it mean? It means, “I’ll hide it from the world.” But this is not something to hide. If the sun rises, how will it be hidden? Even a small lamp—how will you hide it; the sun is a faraway matter! If even a small lamp is lit, it cannot be concealed. And remember this too: if a lamp is lit and you cover it up, the lamp will die. If, seeing a storm blowing, you say, “Let me cover it so no gust snuffs it out,” and you put a pot over it—then perhaps it would not have gone out in the storm, but the moment you cover it, it will die. The lamp also needs to breathe. It also burns on oxygen. It too must receive air.

And when a lamp goes out in the wind, it only proves one thing: it was weak. The very same wind turns a forest fire a thousand times fiercer, and the same wind snuffs out a feeble lamp. The wind is not at fault; the question is how much strength there is within you! If it is a mere flicker, any breeze will put it out. If it is like a forest ablaze, let storms and tempests come—your fire will blaze brighter, glow more intensely.

And if even half of you is now connected to me, you will be in difficulty. You will be in a mess. You will go home and weep. You will miss it terribly. Then you will say: “Into that lane…” You will say again:

Someone carries me to Him and ecstasy descends,
On my own, I feel a blush of shame to go—
So compel my heart, my friend, and take me—
Take me once more into her lane.

Don’t run away, or you will regret it. Don’t be afraid, or you will regret it. A sense of guilt will be felt.

We came only to speak of you,
Friends came only to ache the heart.
When flowers bloom, we think—
“The time of your coming has arrived.”
We came only to speak of you,
Yet friends came only to ache the heart.
Love stands alone at the peak of sorrow—
Who will come to shoulder this burden?
Strange friends, seeing us, we
Came to remind you of something.
Now even crying makes the heart ache—
Perhaps now sense will return to its seat.
On sixteen sides of death, Faraz,
Who knows when sleep will come?

You can go back, but everything will hurt the heart. In the morning the sun will rise and the east will glow ochre—and you will remember! The tesu blossoms will bloom—and you will remember! A rose will dance in the breeze—and you will remember! Lamps will be lit outside—and you will remember! The sky will fill with moon and stars—and you will remember! Because all this could be yours too; it could have been yours.

We came only to speak of you.
Friends came only to ache the heart.
When flowers bloom, we think,
“The time of your coming has arrived.”
Love stands alone at the peak of sorrow—
Who will come to shoulder this burden?
We came to remind you of something.
Now even crying makes the heart ache—
Perhaps now sense will return to its seat.
On sixteen sides of death, Faraz—
Who knows when sleep will come!
Friends came only to ache the heart—
We came only to speak of you.

Don’t run away like that! Yes, if you don’t want to take sannyas one hundred percent, that’s perfectly fine. But fifty percent is very dangerous. If even fifty percent of it has gripped your heart, you will writhe—like a fish writhing on the sand. Here there is an ocean of ochre-clad sannyasins; here, if you drown, a bliss will come, a flow of nectar. But if you return and lie on the sand, you will carry the ache. You can carry the ocean with you—that is why I give you the ochre robe, so you become part of this vast ocean; then wherever you live, you remain a part of it. The ochre robe becomes a bridge between you and me. The ochre robe is the Upanishadic happening between us. Then even if you sit thousands of miles away, you are sitting next to me. And one who is not a sannyasin here—though sitting close—still sits far away.

But it’s your wish! I don’t insist that you take sannyas; I only remind you. My effort is no more than a reminder. I do not issue commands. Who am I to command! I only offer suggestions. And in those whose hearts are fertile, the suggestions become seeds. Then wait for the spring. Spring comes—of its own—and life fills with flowers!

Enough for today.