Gahre Pani Paith #3

Before we come to the tilak, let me tell you two small incidents; then it will be easier to understand. Two historical facts.

In 1888, in a small family in South India, a boy was born—later he became world-famous: Ramanujan. He was born into a very poor Brahmin household and received very little formal education. Yet even in that small village, without any special schooling, Ramanujan’s genius for mathematics was unique. Those who know mathematics say that in the history of humankind there has been no greater or more original mathematician than Ramanujan. Many great mathematicians have been, but they were all well educated, trained, and had the company of other great minds—years of preparation. Ramanujan had neither preparation, nor company, nor education; he had not even passed matriculation, and somehow got a small clerical job in an office.

But news began to spread that his skill in mathematics was astonishing. Someone suggested he write to Professor Hardy at Cambridge University, one of the world’s greatest mathematicians at that time. He did not write a letter; he sent a hundred and fifty theorems in geometry. Hardy was stunned. From someone so young, such theorems could not even be imagined. He immediately invited Ramanujan to Europe. And when Ramanujan reached Cambridge, Hardy—who was then counted among the greatest mathematicians—felt himself a mere child before Ramanujan.

Ramanujan’s capacity seemed unrelated to the ordinary mind. If you are asked to solve a mathematical problem, it takes time. The intellect cannot do anything that does not take time. The intellect thinks, works it out; time passes. But Ramanujan did not take time. You would write the problem on the board here, and there Ramanujan would begin giving the answer. You could not even finish stating the problem and the answer would have come—no interval of time between question and answer.

This created a great difficulty. A problem that would take even the greatest mathematician six hours to solve—and even then it might be wrong—would require another six hours to check. Ramanujan would be given the question and would answer as if not even a moment passed between the question and the answer.

From this one thing was certain: Ramanujan was not answering through the medium of the intellect. He did not even possess a particularly large intellect; he had failed matriculation, and in ordinary life showed no special signs of cleverness in anything else. But regarding mathematics, something superhuman, something far beyond the human, was happening in his life.

Ramanujan died young. He developed tuberculosis and died at the age of thirty-six. When he lay ill in the hospital, Hardy went to see him with two or three mathematician friends. Hardy parked the car at the door and went inside. The number on the car caught Ramanujan’s eye. He said to Hardy: “How remarkable! The number of your car—such a figure does not even exist within human mathematical order. This number is of great beauty.” He then described four special properties of that number.

Ramanujan died. It took Hardy six months to prove those special properties. Of the four features Ramanujan had mentioned—glimpsed, as it were, in passing—Hardy could, after six months, prove only three; the fourth remained unproven. Hardy left in his will that after his death the search for the fourth should continue, because if Ramanujan had said it, it must be true.

Twenty-two years after Hardy’s death, that fourth property was finally proven true: Ramanujan had been right; that number had that subtle elegance.

Whenever that mathematical state would happen in Ramanujan, something would begin between his two eyes. His pupils would roll upward. In yoga, the place where his eyes turned is called the third eye, the trinetra. If that third eye begins to function—“third eye” only as a metaphor, a way of saying that a seeing from there begins—another world starts to open. As if in a house there is a small chink that opens, and the sky becomes visible; until that chink opens, the sky cannot be seen. Almost exactly between our two eyes, in the space called the brow center, there is that aperture from which we begin to see beyond this world. One thing was certain: whenever something of this kind would happen to Ramanujan, his pupils would rise. Hardy did not understand; Western mathematicians did not understand; and even in the future mathematicians will not understand.

Another incident—and then I will say something about the tilak; it will be easier to understand, because the tilak is related to that third eye.

In 1945, a man died in America—Edgar Cayce. Forty years earlier, in 1905, he fell ill and became unconscious. He lay in a coma for three days. The physicians lost hope and said, “We see no way to bring him out of the coma. The unconsciousness is so deep he may never return.”

On the third day all hope was given up; all medicines and treatments had been tried, but there was no sign of awareness. In the evening the doctors said, “We take our leave. He will die in four to six hours. And if he survives, he will be mad for life—which would be worse than death—because by now the subtle fibers of his brain are disintegrating.”

Suddenly the doctors were astonished. The comatose Cayce spoke! He had been unconscious for three days, and he spoke—as if someone suddenly spoke out of deep sleep. The astonishment grew, because the coma continued; his body was still entirely comatose. You could stab a knife into his hand and there would be no response. But speech came, and Cayce said, “Be quick! I fell from a tree and injured my spine; because of that injury I am unconscious. If I am not treated within six hours, the poison of the illness will reach my brain; then there is no point in saving me. Bring herbs of these names, prepare them like this, give them to me, and within twelve hours I will be fine.” And Cayce fell unconscious again.

The names he gave for the herbs—there was no possibility that Cayce could have known them; he had no connection with medicine. The physicians said, “We have no other option. This seems pure madness; we ourselves don’t know that such herbs would act so. But when nothing else is left, there is no harm in trying.” The herbs were found, prepared as Cayce had said, and given to him. Within twelve hours he returned to consciousness and was completely well. When he awoke he could not say that he had spoken such things, nor could he even recognize the names of the herbs he had mentioned. He said, “How could this be? I know nothing of it.”

Then a very strange phenomenon began. Cayce became adept at it and, in America, treated thirty thousand people over his life. Whatever diagnosis he gave always proved correct; whoever received diagnosis from him got well—without exception. But Cayce himself could not explain what happened to him. He could only say that whenever he closed his eyes to seek a diagnosis, his pupils rolled upward. He felt as if someone were pulling his pupils upward; then his eyes settled at the brow center. At that point he forgot this world; he did not know what then happened. He knew only that he forgot this world; what else occurred, he could not say. But until he forgot this world, the diagnosis did not come. And the diagnoses he gave were such that one or two would be enough to make you think.

The Rothschilds are a great billionaire family in America. A woman of that family was ill, and no treatment remained; everything had been tried. She was brought to Cayce. In his “unconscious” state—unconscious from our point of view; for those who know, he was more conscious than us; in truth, until knowledge reaches the third eye, unconsciousness continues—Cayce closed his eyes and named a medicine.

The Rothschilds were billionaires. A search was made throughout America; the medicine could not be found. No one could even say such a medicine existed. Then advertisements were placed in newspapers throughout the world to find it anywhere. Some twenty days later, a man from Sweden replied that there was no such medicine; twenty years earlier his father had patented a medicine of that name, but it had never been manufactured. It had only been patented; it never reached the market. They had no stock; the father had died; the experiment never succeeded. Only the formula remained; they would send it. The formula arrived, the medicine was prepared, and the woman recovered. But that medicine did not exist anywhere in the world’s markets for Cayce to have known it.

In another case he named a drug. A great search was conducted; it could not be found. A year later advertisements for that medicine began appearing; when Cayce named it, it was still in development in a laboratory, and even its name had not been decided. Yet the very name he had given a year earlier became the name of the drug, and the patient recovered with that medicine.

Many times he named medicines that could not be found and the patients died. He would say, “I can do nothing; it is not in my hands. I do not know who speaks, who sees when I am unconscious. There is no relationship between me and that personality.” But one thing was certain: whenever Cayce spoke, his eyes had rolled upward.

When you sleep deeply, your pupils also roll up; the deeper the sleep, the higher they go. Many psychologists are now conducting experiments on sleep. The depth of your sleep can be determined by how far up the pupils have gone. The lower the pupils, the more movement there is—rapid eye movement. The greater the movement, the more rapidly you are dreaming.

This has all been established through scientific tests. They call it REM—Rapid Eye Movement. The degree of REM determines how fast your dreaming is. The lower the pupils, the greater the REM; as the pupils begin to rise, the rapid eye movement diminishes. When the eyes become completely still—at the point where both eyes seem to look toward the center—REM stops entirely; there is no movement in the pupils.

That stillness of the pupils is the deepest sleep. Yoga says that in deep sleep we reach the same place as in samadhi. The only difference is: in deep sleep we do not know it; in samadhi we do. In deep sleep the eyes rest where they also rest in deep samadhi.

I have told you these two events to indicate that between your two eyes there is a point from which this world drops away and another begins. That point is a door. On this side lies the world we know; on the other, an unknown, supernatural realm. The tilak was discovered as the symbol of that supramundane world.

So the tilak is not to be applied just anywhere. Only one who can place a hand and locate your point can tell you where to apply it. Applying a tilak anywhere has no meaning, no purpose.

And each person’s point is not in exactly the same place. This third eye between the two eyes is generally above and between them, but there are differences. If a person has done much sadhana in past lives and had small glimpses of samadhi, then accordingly that point descends; if there has been no such sadhana, the point is much higher. From the felt location of that point one can also know whether there has been some meditative work in past lives. Have you ever seen the world through the third eye? Has such an event occurred in any of your births? The place of your point will reveal whether it has or not. If it has happened often, the point will come down a great deal—almost to the level of the two eyes; it cannot come below that. If it is exactly level with the eyes, then at the slightest hint you can enter samadhi—such a slight hint that we might call it utterly unrelated.

This is why, many times, people enter samadhi for no apparent reason—and it seems strange. There is a story of a Zen nun: she was returning from the well carrying water; the pot fell, and with the breaking of the pot samadhi happened; perfect enlightenment arose. A completely irrelevant thing! A pot breaking and samadhi—what connection? In Lao Tzu’s life it is mentioned: he sat under a tree in autumn; leaves began to fall, and Lao Tzu attained supreme knowledge. What connection can falling leaves have? None. But such events can happen when, in previous lives, the journey has been so long that the third point has come exactly between the two eyes; then the final straw is enough to tip the balance. The last straw can be anything.

In the old days, whenever initiation was given—and only one who could perceive the essence of all your lifetimes could truly give it, otherwise there was no meaning—because the journey must proceed from where you already are. That tilak, if applied precisely, indicated many things. We must understand those meanings.

First, once the master has shown the exact place for the tilak, and you too begin to feel that spot—because the first purpose of the tilak is precisely this. You may not have noticed: even if you close your eyes, and someone brings a finger near the spot between your brows, you will feel within, even with closed eyes, that a finger is pointing toward the eyes. That is the perception of the third eye.

So if the tilak is placed exactly on the third eye, and of the same proportion as the expanse of that subtle area, then, leaving the rest of the body aside, the remembrance of that spot will remain with you twenty-four hours a day. That remembrance will first work in this way: your body-consciousness will begin to diminish, and the tilak-consciousness will increase. A moment comes when, in the whole body, only the tilak remains in awareness; the rest of the body is forgotten. On the day that happens, you can open that eye.

Thus, disciplines were connected with the tilak: forget the whole body; remember only the place of the tilak. Meaning: all consciousness is to shrink and be focused at the third eye. The key to opening the third eye is focused consciousness. Let all your consciousness gather there; shrink from the whole body into that small spot. Its very presence will do the work.

As when the sun’s rays are concentrated through a small lens onto a piece of paper: gathered together, the rays produce fire. The same rays, when scattered, produce only sunlight, not fire. The same rays can create fire—when collected. When consciousness is spread over the body it serves only life’s day-to-day needs. If consciousness gathers fully at the third eye, the obstruction at that doorway—the closedness—breaks, burns, turns to ash; and we become capable of seeing that sky which is spread above us.

So the first use of the tilak was to show you the exact place in the body that you must remember twenty-four hours a day—draw your consciousness from everywhere and bring it here. One. And second: so that the master need not see you or place his hand on your forehead every day. As that point begins to descend, you will feel it, and your tilak must also come down accordingly. Each day, when you apply the tilak, you must put it exactly where the point is felt.

A master may have a thousand disciples. A disciple comes and bows; immediately the master sees where the tilak is. There is no need to ask. He sees: Is the tilak coming down or not? Is it in the same place, or has it shifted? It is a code. The disciple will come a few times a day; the master will see: the tilak! Each morning the disciple will touch his feet; the master will see whether the tilak is moving, advancing, or has halted. And on some day he may place his hand on the disciple’s forehead and check again. If the disciple does not feel the shift, it means consciousness is not gathering wholly. If the tilak is in the wrong place and the point is elsewhere, it means his consciousness—his remembering—is not catching the exact point. That too becomes clear.

As the tilak comes down, the practices of sadhana must be changed. It works almost as a chart hanging beside a hospital patient. The nurse comes, looks, notes on the chart—temperature, blood pressure, what is and is not. The doctor need not come every time; a glance at the chart suffices. But even more wondrous was this experiment: the entire indicator was written on the forehead; it conveyed all kinds of news. If used properly, the master never had to ask, “What is happening?” He knew what was happening, and what aid to give, what practice to change, which method to transform.

So, from the standpoint of sadhana, the tilak had such value. Second, the point of the third eye is also the point of will—of resolve. In yoga it is called the ajna chakra. It is called ajna—command—because whatever discipline, order, or coherence there is in our lives arises from that chakra.

Understand it like this. In all our bodies there is a sex center. The sex center is easy to understand because it is familiar to us; the ajna chakra is not familiar. All the passions and desires of our life arise from the sex center. Until that center becomes active, sexual desire does not arise. A child is born with the entire apparatus of sexuality—nothing lacking.

In some respects it is astonishing. A woman is born carrying all her ovum; no new ova are created. How many children a woman can bear—she is born carrying all her eggs—millions. On the very first day, when a baby girl is born from the mother’s womb, she carries within her the total number of eggs for her life. Each month, one egg becomes active; if it meets the male seed, unites, a child is born. Not a single new egg is produced later. Yet sexual desire does not arise until the sexual center starts functioning. Until that center is still, although the apparatus is present—complete plan, complete power—desire does not arise. Desire arises as soon as the center moves, becomes dynamic—at thirteen or fourteen years of age. The moment it becomes dynamic, the machinery that lay shut becomes fully active.

We are familiar, ordinarily, with this one center. And even that only because we do not start it; nature starts it. If we had to start it ourselves, very few in this world would become acquainted with sexuality. Nature starts it, so we come to know it exists.

Have you ever noticed? A mere thought of sex in the mind, and the entire machinery of the genitals becomes active. The thought moves in the brain; the mechanism is far away! A mere hint of sexual desire in the mind—and immediately the center is activated. In truth, any sexual thought arising in your consciousness is instantly drawn to its center. Wherever it arises in the body, it must go to its center; it has nowhere else to go. Just as water runs into a hollow, so every related thought runs to its chakra.

The place between the eyebrows that I am calling the third eye is the very location of the ajna chakra. A few things about ajna must be understood.

Those in whose lives this chakra does not begin to function remain bound in a thousand kinds of slavery; they remain slaves. Without this chakra, there is no freedom. This may sound surprising, because we have heard of many freedoms—political, economic. They are not real freedoms. For a person whose ajna chakra is not active will always remain in some slavery or other. He will escape one and fall into another; escape the second and fall into a third. He remains a slave, because he does not yet have the center from which mastery arises. He has nothing like resolve, like will. He does not possess the capacity to command himself; rather his body and senses keep commanding him. The stomach says, “I am hungry,” and he becomes hungry. The sexual center says, “Desire has arisen,” and desire arises. The body says, “I am sick,” and he becomes sick. The body says, “I have become old,” and he becomes old. The body commands, and the man obeys.

When the ajna chakra awakens, the body stops giving orders and starts taking them. The entire arrangement changes, reverses. Such a person can say to flowing blood, “Stop,” and it will stop. He can say to the heartbeat, “Be still,” and it will be still. He can say to the pulse, “Do not move,” and it will not move. He becomes master of his body, his mind, his senses. Without this chakra beginning to function, there is no mastery. The more remembrance of this chakra persists in you, the more the sense of self-mastery arises. You begin to become the master rather than the slave.

Yoga has devised many experiments to awaken this chakra. Among them the tilak is one. If, mindfully, someone keeps bringing attention back to this chakra again and again—and if the tilak is correctly placed, attention will return to it again and again. With the tilak applied, that place becomes distinct. And it is a very sensitive place. If the tilak is exactly on the right spot, you will be surprised: you will be compelled to remember it; it is perhaps the most sensitive spot on the body. To touch its sensitivity—and to touch it with particular substances—was the point.

For example, applying sandalwood paste as the tilak. After hundreds and thousands of experiments it was determined why sandalwood should be used: there is a certain resonance between sandalwood and that sensitivity. Sandalwood deepens, intensifies the sensitivity of that point. Not every substance can be used. Some substances would blunt and damage its sensitivity. Today many women apply decorative bindis from the market; they are commercial, without any scientific basis and unrelated to yoga. Such cosmetic tikas will be harmful—because the question is whether they enhance sensitivity or diminish it. If they diminish it, they will harm; if they increase it, they will benefit. Each substance has different effects; in this world, small differences make all the difference. Therefore specific substances were discovered for use.

If the ajna chakra can become sensitive and active, dignity and integrity begin to arise in your personality; a wholeness emerges. You begin to come together; something within you gathers—not fragmented, but whole.
In this connection you also asked about the tika; that too should be taken into consideration.
A little apart from the tilak, the use of the tika began—especially for women. The reason was the same, rooted in yogic experience. In truth, a woman’s ajna chakra is a very weak center. It has to be, because the feminine personality has been shaped for surrender; the flower of her being is surrender. If her ajna chakra were very strong, surrender would become difficult. Hence a woman keeps seeking some support or other, in some form. She cannot quite gather the full courage to stand entirely on her own. A shoulder to lean on, someone to lead, someone whose command she can accept—she feels a certain ease in that.

The lone attempt to activate women’s ajna chakra happened in this land; nowhere else did it happen. The attempt was made because without activating it, she can have no movement in the beyond, no movement in sadhana. Her ajna chakra needs to be steadily strengthened. But if it is strengthened in the ordinary way, her femininity will diminish; masculine traits will begin to appear, and her womanly nature will be reduced.

Therefore, this tika was deliberately linked to her husband. There is a reason for this linkage. The tika was not placed straight on her forehead, because that would reduce her femininity. The more self-reliant she became, the more her feminine softness and maidenly innocence would be lost. Standing by oneself requires a certain hardness.

So, with great finesse it was considered: if a straight tika is applied, it will harm the feminine principle; it will obstruct the flowering of her personality as a mother; it will obstruct surrender. Therefore, a total effort was made to connect her ajna to her husband. This way there would be a double benefit: her femininity would remain untouched, her devotion to her husband would deepen, and still her ajna chakra could be activated.

Understand it this way: the ajna chakra never goes against whomever it is related to—never. Link it to the guru, and it will not go against the guru; link it to the husband, and it will not go against the husband. Wherever the ajna is related, the personality will not move contrary to that relation. So if a woman wears the tika at the precise place on her forehead, she will be devoted to her husband, and toward the rest of the world she will be strong. This is almost like what you would quickly grasp if you understand something of hypnosis.

If you have seen a hypnotist hypnotize people—some Maxwell or anybody, or you yourself—then one thing must have surprised you: after a person is hypnotized, he will not hear anyone else’s voice, only the hypnotist’s. An astonishing thing: in a hall, thousands may shout and chatter, yet the man lying there in a trance won’t hear. But the one who hypnotized him can whisper, and he’ll hear. This is almost the same phenomenon I am explaining about the tika. The moment a person is hypnotized, his receptivity remains open only toward the hypnotizer; it closes to all else. You can do nothing with him. You can shout in his ear; he won’t hear. Beat drums; he won’t hear. But the hypnotist can softly say, “Stand up,” and he will stand at once. Only one door remains open in his consciousness; all others are shut. The ajna has become bound to the hypnotist and closed to all else.

Exactly this suggestibility, this mantra, was used in the woman’s tika. It is to be joined to her husband. Then her devotion will remain one-pointed in that single direction; she will be surrendered in that one place, and toward the rest of the world she will be free and independent. Thus, her womanhood will not be hindered. And that is why, the moment the husband dies, the tika must be removed. The moment he dies, the tika must be taken off—because now there is no one toward whom devotion is to be maintained.

People do not understand this; they think the tika is wiped off merely because the woman has become a widow. There is a purpose to removing it: now there is no question of being devoted to anyone. In truth, now she must live like a man. The more freedom she can gather now, the more beneficial for her life. Even the tiniest opening of vulnerability, any little hole through which she might again become subservient, should be closed.

The use of the tika is a very deep experiment—but only if it is at the exact spot, of the right substance, and applied in a rightly consecrated manner. Otherwise it is meaningless. If it is merely ornament, mere decoration, it has no value, no significance. Then it becomes a mere formality. Therefore, when the tika is applied the first time, there is a full ritual for it; and when the guru gives tilak the first time, there is a full ritual for that. Only with the complete rite does it bear fruit; otherwise, it does not.

Today all these things seem pointless to us. They are indeed pointless today, because there is no scientific understanding behind them. Only the outer shell remains, which we drag along reluctantly. The mind has no love for it, the soul feels nothing for it, and the key to the complete science behind it is absent. About this ajna chakra, a few more points should be understood, because they can be of use.

The line of this chakra—the ajna—the portion of our brain that is connected to it… our brain begins from here. Yet, ordinarily, half our brain still lies idle. Even in the most talented among us—the ones we call geniuses—only half the brain works; the other half does not. Physiologists are very puzzled: this half of the skull seems useless. If half of your brain were cut out, you wouldn’t even notice. You would feel no lack, because it was never used; it is as good as not there.

But scientists know nature does not make anything in vain. An error might occur with one or two individuals, but this is so with everyone: half the brain is empty, utterly inactive; there has never been any bustle there.

Yoga says the dormant half begins after the ajna chakra starts functioning. One half of the brain is connected with the chakras below the ajna; the other half is connected with the chakras above. When the lower chakras are active, one half of the brain keeps working; when work begins above the ajna, the remaining half starts.

In such matters we don’t even get an inkling until something becomes active; until then we cannot imagine it. Only when it is activated do we come to know.

A man in Sweden fell from a train. After he was admitted to a hospital, he began to pick up radio broadcasts from stations within a ten-mile radius—right in his ear. At first he thought he was going mad. It was not clear; there was a kind of humming. But within two or three days it became clear. Alarmed, he told the doctor, “What is this? I feel as if a radio is playing at my ear.” There was no radio there. The doctor asked, “What are you hearing?” The song he described was exactly what the doctor had just heard on his own radio. “I heard that a little while ago,” said the doctor. Then the station announced the time and signed off. They brought in a radio and did tests. They found the man’s ear was functioning exactly like a radio receiver: that receptive.

He had to be operated on, otherwise he would have gone insane—there was no on-off switch; it ran round the clock. As long as the station broadcast, it ran in the man. But one thing became evident: this too is a possibility of the ear. And the same day it was concluded that before this century ends we will use the ear itself for radio. There will be no need to make and carry such big devices. A small arrangement worn on the ear, which can be switched on and off, will suffice. Just an on-off arrangement! But from that man’s accidental event, this thought was caught—purely accidental.

In this world, new phenomena and new perspectives always open accidentally. From previous knowledge we cannot anticipate them. We would never think the ear could function as a radio. But why not? The ear hears; the radio hears. The ear is receptivity, the radio is receptivity. In fact, the radio is built on the model of the ear. What further possibilities the ear may have, we cannot know until they suddenly open.

A similar incident happened in the Second World War. A man was wounded and lost consciousness. When he regained consciousness, he began to see the stars in the daytime. The stars are there in the day; they don’t go anywhere. They are in the sky; only the sun’s light hides them. The sun’s light comes in between; the stars recede behind it. The sun’s light is very strong; the stars are very far; their twinkling is lost. Though they are not smaller than the sun; some are a thousand times bigger, some ten thousand, some a hundred thousand times bigger; but the distance is immense.

It takes nine minutes for a ray from the sun to reach us. From the nearest star the ray takes forty years. Enormous distance—nine minutes and forty years! Light moves very fast—186,000 miles per second. From the sun it takes nine minutes; from the nearest star forty years. There are stars from which it takes four thousand years, four hundred thousand years, forty million years, four hundred million years. Beyond four billion years we do not keep count, because our earth is four billion years old.

Scientists say rays that started before our earth was formed will pass by after it has perished. Those rays will never even know that in between the earth came into being. They started when the earth was not; they will pass after the earth is no more; they will never know. If a traveler rode those rays, he would never discover that the earth ever existed.

In the day the stars remain where they are. That man began to see them. What happened to his eye? His eye began a new process. They had to operate, because he could not remain normal—he was troubled. But one thing became clear: the eye can see stars in the day as well. If the eye can see stars in the day, then many of its possibilities are dormant.

Each of our senses has many possibilities lying asleep. The “miracles” we see in the world are simply the sudden breaking open of some dormant possibility. A hidden possibility manifests from somewhere, and we are astonished. It is not a miracle. Equal wonders are hidden within us, but unmanifest, unopened—locked behind doors whose bolts we have yet to break.

The yogic vision—and it is not a notion of a day or two, or a year or two—has been a matured vision for at least twenty thousand years. You cannot rely much on any scientific viewpoint, because what science said six months ago it will change six months later. Yoga has a matured vision of at least twenty thousand years. The civilization we are living in is in any case not older than twenty thousand years. Though it is our illusion that ours is the first civilization on earth. Civilizations existed before us, and perished. Humanity reached heights nearly equal to ours, and sometimes higher, and was lost.

In 1924 an event occurred. In Germany, when the first institute for nuclear research was established, one morning a man calling himself Fulcanelli left a written note there. In it he said he knew certain things—and others knew them too—on whose basis he warned: do not venture into atomic research, because civilizations before ours were destroyed by pursuing this very quest. Stop this research. They investigated much, but the man could not be traced.

In 1940 Heisenberg—a great German scientist who did major work in atomic physics—received a letter at his home, again delivered by a man who handed it to the servant and left. It bore the same signature, Fulcanelli. It told Heisenberg, “Do not take on the responsibility of sin; this is not the first civilization to meddle with the atom. Many before have played with it and perished.” Still, they could not find who he was.

In 1945, when the first atom bomb fell on Hiroshima, twelve great scientists who had a hand in making the bomb received letters signed by Fulcanelli: “Look, even now, stop. Though you have taken the first step, the last is not far once the first is taken.” Oppenheimer, America’s leading atomic scientist, who had played the largest role, immediately resigned from the Atomic Commission upon receiving the letter and issued a statement: “We have sinned.” This man kept warning all along, yet no trace of him was found. It is quite possible that what he was saying was true: civilizations before have toyed with the atom.

We too, in the Mahabharata, played with the atom and were ruined. It is almost as it is with an individual: a child grows up, becomes young, and in youth repeats the very mistakes his father made. Though the father, now old, warns him, “Do not fall into these errors.” But the father too had been so advised by his old father. And it is not that the old man’s old father had no one to warn him—he too was warned. Yet in youth the same mistakes are made; in old age, the same wisdom arises. A person runs the cycle—childhood, youth, old age, death. So too a civilization advances through fixed steps and perishes. Civilizations too have childhood, youth, old age, and death.

About yoga’s twenty thousand years: I say twenty thousand because that reckoning is somewhat clear. To make it clearer we would have to know about civilizations before that. To understand one person’s youth properly, you must observe the youth of ten people; one cannot be understood alone. There is no reference. How to judge if he is right or wrong? To understand one person’s old age, you must look at twenty-five elders. One event by itself tells you nothing. But twenty thousand years of history are clear.

In these twenty thousand years yoga has said one thing continuously: half the brain connected to the ajna chakra is closed; if you want to know beyond the world, that half must be activated. If you are to journey toward the divine, that half must be activated. If you are to see beyond matter, that half must be activated.

Its door is the ajna. Where you apply the tilak is only the corresponding point on the skin. About one and a half inches inside—approximately, as it varies slightly person to person—there is the point that functions as the doorway to the trans-material, trans-emotional realm.

Tibet, as we conceived the tilak, went on to develop actual operations. Only Tibet could, because it labored more on the third eye than any other culture. In truth, Tibet’s entire science and its understanding of many dimensions of life are based on the understanding of the third eye.

As I said to you about Kaysi—Kaysi is one person—Tibet for centuries did not accept a medicine unless the person prescribing it had gone into samadhi. The entire civilization functioned that way. They would ask a samadhi-immersed person for the remedy; only such a remedy would be used. Otherwise, all was groping in the dark.

They even developed operations. On that spot approximately one and a half inches within, they tried to pierce from outside with physical instruments. It can be broken from outside; it does break. But there is a difference between breaking it from outside and opening it from within; therefore India never tried to break it from outside. Let me note this for you.

Even by opening it from outside, half the brain becomes active. But there is a great likelihood that the person will misuse the new activity of this half. His consciousness has not changed—he remains the same person. No inner transformation has occurred, and yet new functions have begun in his brain. If today he can see through a wall, it is very unlikely he will look into a well to rescue someone fallen there; more likely he will dig up someone’s buried treasure. If he discovers he can command you by inner signals, it is very unlikely he will make you do something good; more likely he will make you do something harmful.

India knew such operations were possible, but never used them—because unless the inner consciousness grows to the point where one can use new powers rightly, giving new powers is dangerous. It is like placing a sword in a child’s hand. He may cut two or four people; he may even cut himself. To expect anyone’s welfare from a sword in a child’s hand is a vain hope. If inner consciousness is not developed, giving new powers is perilous.

In Tibet they tried to pierce from outside to the exact inner spot where we apply the tilak. Therefore Tibet learned many things, had many experiences; yet Tibet did not become great in a moral sense. A surprising fact: Tibet achieved much, but in moral terms did not even produce a Buddha. Its knowledge grew, its powers grew, it learned unusual things; but their use remained for small ends, not for the highest.

India never attempted any direct physical experiment. The attempt was to gather consciousness within, to concentrate it so deeply, so one-pointedly, that its very current would open the third eye; that it would open in the flow of awareness itself. To bring that current up to the third eye is a great moral undertaking—raising it so high—because ordinarily our mind flows downward.

In truth, our mind flows toward the sex center. Whatever we do—earning money, seeking position—behind it somewhere sex-desire keeps pulling us. We earn money in the hope that sex can be purchased with it; we want position in the hope that on the seat of power we will be more able to purchase sex.

That is why, in olden days, the king’s prestige was measured by how many queens he had. It was an exact measure. What else is the value of position? What will you do with it? The number of women in your harem shows how high your position is. The use of position, the use of wealth—ultimately, for sex.

Whatever we do, our energy keeps racing toward the sex center. So long as it races downward, one can be immoral. If energy is to be taken upward, the journey of sex must be transformed. If the current is to be led to the ajna chakra, the sex-journey must be turned around—the whole orientation must change. Turn your back to the lower, and face the higher—become upward-moving.

This upward journey is deeply moral. It involves struggle inch by inch, sacrifice at every step. The petty must be relinquished so that the vast can be attained. A price must be paid. And the one who, after paying such a price, reaches the ajna chakra—how can he misuse the vast power he gains? There is no question of misuse. One inclined to misuse would have perished before reaching this stage.

Therefore black magic arose in Tibet—because of operations. Less spirituality emerged, more devilish mischief—black magic. Such powers began to fall into hands…

There is a Sufi story about Jesus. Christians do not mention it; I quote it from the Sufis. Many of Jesus’ important stories are with the Muslims, not the Christians. This is one of them. Three disciples pester Jesus: “We have heard, and seen too, that you tell the dead, ‘Arise,’ and they arise. We do not want your moksha, we do not want your heaven; just teach us this trick—how a dead man is made alive.” Jesus tells them, “But you will never be able to use this mantra on yourself. You will be dead; how will you use it then? And what benefit will you get by raising another? I will teach you the device by which you will never die.” But they say, “Don’t distract us. Tell us the crux—this is what is worth knowing.”

They pressed so hard that Jesus said, “All right,” and gave them the formula by which the dead can be raised.

They ran off that very day, leaving Jesus—searching for a corpse. No time to waste; what if they forget a word of the mantra—let’s try it quickly. Unfortunately, in the village there was no dead body. As they set out toward the next village, they found a skeleton lying by the road. “Good enough,” they said. “No corpse—this will do.” They chanted the mantra—in great haste. It was a lion’s skeleton. The lion stood up and ate all three.

The Sufis say: this is what happens. Curiosity in an unethical mind leads to danger. Therefore many formulae, even when known, were repeatedly hidden so they would not fall into wrong hands. When given to ordinary people, they were given in such a way that only when one became worthy would he come upon them.

You may wonder: why am I saying all this about the tilak?

We put a tilak on every child’s forehead even though he understands nothing. One day he will understand; he will grasp the secret of the tilak. A hint is given, a mark is placed at the exact spot. Whenever his consciousness becomes capable, he will be able to use that mark. No worry: if it is put on a hundred people and does not serve ninety-nine, still no worry—if it serves even one, it is not in vain. In that hope it is placed on a hundred, so that in some moment, the memory will arise and the way will be known.

Such is the value, such the reverence for the tilak, that whenever something special happens—marriage, victory—there is tilak. Have you ever wondered why every honoring event is accompanied by a tilak? It is simply the law of association. Our mind has a curious habit: it wants to forget pain and remember pleasure. Over the long run the mind forgets suffering and remembers joy. That is why earlier days seem good to us. The old man says childhood was very delightful. It is not that childhood is delightful; the mind drops the suffering and keeps the chain of pleasures. When it looks back, it sees only joy. The pains along the way we have dropped. No child says childhood is delightful; children want to grow up quickly. Yet all the old say childhood was delightful.

Surely some mistake is happening somewhere. Ask the children what they want to be: “We want to grow up.” Ask the old what they want to be: “We want to be children.” But not a single child testifies on your side. Children want to grow up as quickly as possible—even resorting to odd means: they begin to smoke, because they see cigarettes are symbolic of grown-ups. Psychologists say seventy percent of children smoke not for any other reason, but because the cigarette is a prestige symbol—powerful, prominent people smoke. When he too blows smoke, his spine straightens within: “I am somebody.” He feels he is not insignificant.

Write on a film, “Adults only,” and all the children will sneak in wearing fake mustaches. Why? Because the urge to be big is intense. Yet the old keep saying childhood was blissful. Something is going on. It is simply this: the mind drops pain; it does not like to retain it.

Jean Piaget, a psychologist who labored for forty years on children, presented a startling key: later in life, a child retains no memory from before age five; the reason is that the life before five is so full of suffering it cannot be remembered. We would not imagine this! But Piaget speaks from rich experience.

If asked, “How far back do you remember?” you can go at most to four or five years. Why not further? Was memory not formed then? It was. Did events not happen? They did. Did no one scold or love you? All happened. Then why is there no record before four? Piaget says those days pass in such helplessness: the child feels so low, weak, inferior, pressed by all, so powerless, that he does not like to remember anything. He drops it, forgets it. “I remember nothing before four,” he says. He remembers nothing because when the father said “Sit,” he had to sit; when the mother said “Stand,” he had to stand. Everyone was big and powerful; he had no strength. A leaf blown in the wind—whoever said whatever, he was dependent on all. A mere glance would make him tremble. He had no capacity in his hands. He shut that chapter: “I was never that,” he says, and the matter ends. He does not remember before four. The interesting thing: under hypnosis you can recover it—not only before four, but also when you were in your mother’s womb. If your mother fell, the child forms a memory of the injury; that too can be recalled. But ordinarily it remains unconscious.

So linking the tilak with joy has a purposeful intent. Whenever a joyous event occurs, apply the tilak. Joy will be remembered, and along with it the tilak will be remembered. Slowly the tilak and joy become one, so the tilak can never be forgotten—it engraves itself in your memory. And whenever joy is remembered, the ajna chakra is remembered. Whenever joy is remembered, the first remembrance becomes the ajna.

And we do remember joy a lot. We live in its memory, whether it actually happened or not. We magnify it beyond what it was. Slowly we enlarge it beyond measure. We enlarge joy and diminish sorrow—by the same rule.

When you met your beloved, how much joy was there? Today, thinking of it, it seems immense. If she came right now, you would see how small it becomes! It would shrink instantly. Tomorrow, twenty-four hours later, you might again magnify it: “Ah, what bliss!”

Behind us we magnify joy; ahead, in hope, we magnify it—and go on.

The purpose of linking joy with the tilak is that when joy becomes large, the tilak also becomes large; when joy arises in memory, the tilak arises. This sharpens the remembrance of the ajna with the current of joy. And it does happen. When it happens, you have used joy to awaken the third eye. All the memories of joy become joined to the ajna chakra. Now we use the stream of pleasure to strike it. The more pathways by which the blow can be delivered, the more useful.

The countries that did not employ the tilak are precisely those that have no inkling of the third eye. Those who had even a slight intuition of the third eye used the tilak. Those who had no idea did not discover it. Understand: it is not accidental that a society suddenly appears and starts applying a mark on the brow. They are not mad. There must be a reason why that exact point between the eyebrows was chosen; it could have been anywhere else. It cannot be accidental; it stands only if there is a reason behind it.

Let me tell you two or three more points. One, you may not have noticed: whenever you are anxious, strain falls on the third eye; that is why the entire forehead wrinkles. Pressure falls exactly where the tilak is. People who worry much, think much, reflect much—inevitably furrow the brow at that very place.

And as I said earlier: those who in previous lives have put any pressure on the third eye—if you pass a hand over their foreheads at birth, you will feel the tilak. That spot is slightly sunken—just a little—exactly like a tilak. The areas on both sides will be slightly raised; at the place where effort was made in past lives there will be a slight depression. You can detect it with your fingers even with eyes closed; the site will feel distinct. Whether tilak or tika—the tika is a special application of the tilak—behind both lies the third eye.

Hypnotists perform a small experiment. Charcot in France—a great psychopathologist—worked much on this. You too can try a small experiment and you will understand Charcot. If you fix both eyes on a person’s forehead at that point from the front, he will not allow you to do so; if you stare at that spot, he will become as angry as anything—more than at anything else. It is rude; you will not be able to do it. But from behind, though it is very close to the front—just an inch and a half—from behind if you fix your gaze exactly where a line through the brow point would emerge at the back of the head, and keep both eyes fixed there, you will be astonished: within a few seconds the person will turn and look at you.

Only hotel waiters won’t look back. Don’t run your experiments only on waiters. There is a reason: the waiter, all the time, tries to escape customers; as soon as he senses someone interested in him, he begins circling other tables. So he alone won’t look back; anyone else will.

If you practice a bit for a few days and then give a suggestion, the person will obey it. Suppose you focus from behind as before without blinking; the person turns and looks back. Then you can give a command: “Turn left.” He will turn left, and feel very uneasy—even if he needed to go right. Try it and you will be amazed.

And this is from behind, where the distance is greater. From the front the results are far more astonishing. Those who do light kinds of shaktipat do so through this chakra—nothing else. A sadhu or sannyasin who performs shaktipat on people is often only doing this: he seats you in front with eyes closed; you imagine he is doing something. He is doing nothing except fixing both his eyes on that point on your brow. Your eyes are closed—and any suggestion given to that point will immediately produce a hallucination. If told, “Within, there is light, only light,” within you there will be nothing but light. But as soon as you leave, it disappears. A faint trace may remain for two or four days; then it vanishes. That is not shaktipat; it is merely a small use of your ajna chakra.

The third eye is an extraordinary treasure, with limitless uses. The tilak is only a symbolic aid to it. When the first Christian monks came to the South, a thousand years ago, some began to apply the tilak. The matter reached the Vatican’s court, because those monks sent here had taken to wearing the sacred thread, the tilak, wooden sandals, and living like Hindu renunciates. The Vatican objected. The monks replied, “This is not wrong. By applying the tilak we are not becoming Hindu. The tilak has only revealed a secret to us which you did not know. By wearing these wooden clogs we do not become Hindu; we have discovered for the first time the Hindus’ understanding that during meditation, if there is wood under the feet, what would take months without wood can be accomplished in days. We are not becoming Hindu—but if Hindus know something, we would be foolish not to use it.”

And surely Hindus know something. That a people who for twenty thousand years have researched religion could know nothing—this would be the real miracle. For twenty thousand years, whose sages have devoted their lives in one direction, whose intelligent ones for thousands of years have labored with one aspiration—to discover the hidden truth of existence; that the invisible might become visible; the formless be recognized; the nameless entered—if after twenty thousand years of the collective genius striving in one pursuit they knew nothing, that would be astonishing. That they know something is not astonishing at all; it is natural.

But in the last two hundred years an event occurred that has troubled us. Many invasions came upon this country, but no invader struck at the right place. Some looted wealth; some seized land; some took houses and palaces. But none struck at our inner core; no one even thought of it. For the first time, Western civilization began to attack the innermost core of this land. The easiest way to do so was to sever you from your entire history—to create a gulf between you and your past. Then you would become rootless; then you would have no strength.

If today you wished to destroy Western civilization, you would not need to demolish its buildings, cinemas, hotels, or nightclubs. Let them run; it makes no difference. Destroy just five central great universities of the West, and the West’s culture would collapse. The real foundation of a culture lies in its chains of knowledge. Its roots are in continuity. You need not do more than deprive two generations of history; thereafter the chain breaks.

That is the difference between man and animal. Animals cannot progress. Why? Because they have no schools—no way to pass the old generation’s knowledge to the new. The animal child must begin life where his father began. When his child is born, he too begins where his father began. Through education, man has his child begin where he himself ends. Hence development.

All development depends on the older generation transmitting its accumulated experience to the new. Think: if the elders decide for twenty years not to tell children anything, it will not be a loss of only twenty years. What took twenty thousand years to gather will be lost. If for twenty years the older generation decides: we shall not tell the new generation anything—do not think that the loss will be only twenty years and can be made up in twenty years. No. The loss of twenty years would take twenty thousand years to repair—because a gap has arisen; all the past generations will be drowned.

In these two hundred years a vast gap has opened for India. All our ties with our own knowledge were severed; all ties were grafted onto a new knowledge that has no connection with the old. Today we think we are a very ancient nation. The truth is that now we are not more than two hundred years old—now. Now the English are older than we are. Our present knowledge is refuse, leftovers—only what the West gives us. Everything we knew before two hundred years was lost in one stroke. When the keys are lost, the outer structure feels foolish.

If you wear a tilak today you feel ashamed. If anyone asks, “What is this? Why are you wearing this tilak?” you mutter, “Oh, nothing, my father insisted,” or “What to do—just let it be somehow.” Today it is difficult to wear a tilak with joy and pride. Yes, if you have no intellect at all you can wear it—then there is no fear. But even then you are not wearing it because you know.

When the keys of knowledge fall away and the outer shell remains, it becomes hard to carry. Then a mishap occurs: the least intelligent carry it, and the intelligent stand aside. A mishap! Whereas only so long as the intelligent carry something does it remain meaningful. When knowledge’s keys are lost, the intelligent are the first to drop out; they are not willing to be fools. The fool continues—but he cannot save it. He may drag it for a while, and it will end.

Thus, often things of great value are saved by the uncomprehending, while the clever first abandon them. Life has deep twists. If we are to bridge India’s two-hundred-year gap, then we must reconsider one by one everything that today the “mindless” are carrying. They are not doing it without cause—behind them stands a long event of twenty thousand years. They cannot explain why they do it; there is no need to be angry with them. One day we may have to thank them that at least they preserved the symbol by which the secret could be rediscovered.

So today, what the utterly rustic and unlettered, those we might call ignorant, are doing in India—we must take it up anew, reconnect it with the formulas from two hundred years ago, and revive it with twenty thousand years of understanding. Then you will be astonished—utterly amazed—to see what a great self-destruction we are engaged in!