Geeta Darshan #8

Now let us take the sutra.

Arjuna asked: O Purushottama, by what marks is the man who has gone beyond the three gunas endowed? What is his conduct like? And by what means does a man go beyond these three gunas?

Arjuna’s inquiry is almost everyone’s inquiry. We too want to know: by what marks is the man who has gone beyond the three gunas endowed? Arjuna asks this of Krishna; Sariputta asks the Buddha; Gautama asks Mahavira. Whenever an awakened one has appeared, his disciples have certainly asked: What are the marks? Of the divine consciousness you speak, of the godliness you speak—what are its signs? How shall we recognize one who has attained to it? What will his conduct be?

It is necessary to understand this question rightly.

First: marks can be described only from the outside. And every outer recognition is provisional. Because two gunatita persons will not have identical outer marks. This has created a great difficulty.

Those who asked Mahavira for the marks cannot accept Krishna as gunatita. For Mahavira has given the marks as he experienced them, as they appeared in his life. So a follower of Mahavira knows that the one who is beyond the gunas will also renounce clothing—he will be sky-clad.

Thus in the Digambara tradition, being sky-clad is a mark of the gunatita. As long as there are clothes, there is no entry into liberation—because the very attachment to clothes shows you still wish to hide something. The gunatita hides nothing; he is like an open book.

Therefore those who learned the marks from Mahavira do not accept even the Buddha as gunatita. The Buddha lived at the same time, in the same region—Bihar—and at times even in the same village.

A follower of Mahavira does not accept the Buddha as gunatita, as sthitaprajna, because the Buddha wears a robe. Such difficulties arise. Hence Mahavira is called a Jina, a God by the Jains; the Buddha they call a great soul, a Mahatma—almost there. Someday he will surely drop the robe and in some life attain Tirthankara-hood—but not yet.

As for Krishna, there remains no way to accept him. Nor Rama. Nor Mohammed or Christ can be accepted as gunatita if one has learned the marks from Mahavira.

If you learn the marks from Krishna, difficulties also arise. For marks are provisional. Real realization will not occur until one oneself becomes gunatita. But to tell the questioner, “When you become gunatita, you will know,” is futile. He says, “I am not gunatita; that is why I am asking.” His question must be satisfied.

Therefore there are secondary, provisional marks. They can be different, and they will differ for different gunatita people. Their inner state is one; their outer expression differs—depending on a thousand causes.

But our mind insists on asking for marks, because we want to test things from the outside. We want to know who has attained. How shall we recognize? No horns sprout to make him stand out. He looks just like you. In fact, he becomes utterly ordinary, because the madness of being extraordinary is part of the ego. Such a person becomes utterly ordinary. The quest for specialness ends.

All ordinary people are in search of being extraordinary. Therefore the truly extraordinary will look absolutely ordinary.

Zen sages have counted among his qualities one: “most ordinary.” If you hear this Zen mark you will find it very difficult, because they say the first mark of the gunatita is that he is hard to recognize—he will be completely ordinary. He has no temptation to be special. He will not try to show, “I am special, I know more than you, my conduct is superior.” He won’t try.

There was a Zen monk, Nan-in. He went in search of a master. But he had heard: wherever someone claims, “I am the master,” run away. For Zen has said for centuries: the one worthy to be master will not claim it—that is his mark.

Nan-in searched. He went to many masters, but they were claimants; each tried to make him a disciple. He ran away.

One day, passing through a forest, at the mouth of a cave he saw a monk sitting. Tired and worn, he saw that the monk seemed utterly ordinary—no aura, no radiance, nothing like the halo around Krishna, Buddha, Mahavira. Nothing. An ordinary man, sitting silently, doing nothing.

Nan-in was thirsty and hungry, lost on the path. He approached. As he came nearer, he felt a quietness arising within him. He was startled. The man, as he came near, he saw had his eyes closed. He was so silent that Nan-in felt it improper to disturb him by saying, “I am thirsty.” So he sat quietly beside him, thinking: when he opens his eyes, I will speak. But sitting there, he grew so quiet that his own eyes closed. It was evening. The whole night passed.

In the morning the monk rose. He didn’t ask: who are you, how did you come? He got up, made tea, drank it—did not even say to Nan-in, “Have some tea”—and returned to sit with eyes closed.

Nan-in got up too. In the same manner he made tea, drank, and sat. This went on for seven days. On the seventh day, the monk said, “I accept you.” That man became Nan-in’s master.

Nan-in asked, “Why did you accept me?” He replied, “The one worthy to be master does not claim; and the one worthy to be disciple also does not claim. You remained silent; you did not say, ‘I have come to be a disciple.’ And you silently followed like a shadow. For seven days, whatever I did, you did. You didn’t even ask whether to do it or not.

“When I would step out, you stepped out. When I circled the hut, you circled it. When I sat, you sat.”

But Nan-in has said: after seven days there remained nothing to get. Seven days of silent being-with was enough. Most ordinary, utterly simple! There he found the master.

Every tradition counts different marks. They have to, because questioners exist. In the asking there is a small mistake—but a natural one—because we want to know what such a person is like.

Arjuna asks, “By what marks is the man who has gone beyond the three gunas endowed?”

“Marks” means what we can recognize from the outside—by which we can guess. But this gives rise to another danger.

One danger is that different religions list different marks—because each lists the marks found in its own master’s life. Hence mutual antagonism arose among religions. One religion’s Tirthankara is not accepted as another’s avatar. One’s Christ is not another’s Christ. One’s Prophet is not another’s Prophet—because the marks differ, and they do not match.

A second, even greater danger is that, because of the marks, some people impose the marks upon themselves. They then deceive others—and also fall into self-deception. For outer marks can be entirely imitated.

If the mark be that a holy man is silent, you can be silent. If the gunatita does not speak, not speaking is no great difficulty. Whatever marks we make, people can copy them.

And remember: imitation has no real obstacle. Mahavira stood naked, so hundreds stood naked. But nakedness does not produce sky-cladness. “Digambara” means: the sky alone is my garment; I am covered by nothing else; I have become the whole existence. Only the sky is my robe.

But you can stand naked. Then tricks are needed. Where a Digambara monk stays, devotees must make arrangements. They spread straw in his room. He won’t say, “Spread it”—for if he asks, he has fallen below the mark. They spread it; he hides in the straw to sleep—because he cannot use any covering or bedding. They seal the room completely.

Mahavira did not stay in rooms; no one spread straw. And had anyone spread it, he would not hide in it. If someone else spreads it—that is their doing; you need not hide there. And who is telling you to stay in a room? If there is straw, walk out.

But this poor fellow is only naked. He still needs clothing. He feels cold and heat—and there is no objection in that. The problem is that he is pointlessly imposing a mark.

Mahavira said: When you go for alms, do not inform in advance which door you will visit. Whatever food would be cooked expressly for you, the violence involved in it will be upon you. So stand at an unknown door. Whatever has already been cooked in that house may be given. If it is in your prarabdha, someone will give; if not, return hungry—without harboring any ill will that the village is bad and none gave alms.

And Mahavira added a condition: To test whether it is in your destiny, take some sign in the morning itself. On rising, decide, “Today I will ask from that door where a bullock cart stands; in the cart there is jaggery; a bull is poking his horn into the jaggery, and the horn has jaggery smeared on it.” Take any such sign.

This was a mark of Mahavira’s own life—he wandered for three months in a village and received no food. It is strange, of course, that such a morning feeling arose. It is hard indeed that in front of some house there be a cart full of jaggery, and a bull poking his horn into it, and then that the householders agree to give—why would they be obliged? They haven’t vowed anything.

So Mahavira would say, “It is not in your fate; return.” The gunatita does not live by himself; he lives by the gunas. If nature must protect, it will.

And one day—one day it did happen. After three months, it happened exactly so.

Even today a Digambara monk does this. But his signs are fixed—two or four. All the devotees know them. They arrange the signs at their doors. The signs are simple: “a banana hanging at the door.” If there is a banana hanging, he will accept alms there. Everyone knows the monks’ signs.

Mahavira did not say, “Fix your signs.” He said, “Each morning take whatever the first inner feeling is.” Their signs are fixed. So the reverse violence becomes twenty-five-fold. For from one house they would have taken alms; but now twenty-five houses—devotees throughout the village—cook, each hanging the sign. And their signs are met every day; there is no chance of a miss for three months. Marks can be imitated.

A Buddhist monk went for alms. A crow was flying with a piece of meat; it slipped from its beak and fell into the monk’s bowl—pure coincidence. The Buddha had told the monks: whatever is put into your alms bowl, eat it; do not throw it away. The Buddha could not have imagined that someday a crow would drop a piece of meat.

Now the monk faced a dilemma. The Buddha says, “Eat what is put in your bowl.” Should he eat meat or not? It has fallen into the bowl; it is within the rule. He went and asked the Buddha: “What shall I do? A piece of meat is there. If I throw it, I break the rule by rejecting food. I did not ask for it; the crow dropped it.”

The Buddha must have thought: crows won’t do this every day; why would crows harass monks? It is a coincidence. So he said, “It is fine; whatever falls into the bowl, take it.” For if he said, “Throw it away,” then another rule is born: if you don’t like what is in the bowl, throw it. Choice begins. Then the monk will keep what he likes and throw the rest: useless wastage of food; and a habit of choosing will be born.

Today in China and Japan, meat-eating continues. Devotees put meat into the alms bowls, and all know monks prefer meat. That piece dropped by a crow opened the door. All of China and Japan—hundreds of thousands of Buddhist monks—eat meat, saying, “The rule is: do not reject what is placed in the bowl.”

Man is cunning. He can imitate; he can devise tricks; he can find all ways. Because of marks, a great mischief has happened: we can impose the marks; we can act them out.

Yet the mind keeps asking, “What are the marks?”

The marks Krishna gives are precious. Though outward, they are useful for our minds.

By what marks is he endowed? What is his conduct? By what means does a man go beyond the three gunas?

Krishna said: O Arjuna, he who does not dislike the sattva-born functioning of illumination, the rajas-born functioning of activity, or the tamas-born functioning of delusion when they arise, and does not desire them when they subside…

It is a very subtle mark—hence the danger. Because the subtler it is, the more convenient it is for you.

Krishna is saying: Whatever the gunas make happen—when tamas moves into inertia and delusion, he is not pained; when rajas leads into action, he is not pained; when sattva leads into withdrawal, he is not pleased. He is not unhappy with attachment, nor happy with detachment. He leaves both to the gunas and understands, “I am separate.”

What does this mean?

Anger arises in you; rajas is taking you toward violence. You say, “This is a mark of the gunatita—no need to feel bad now; go ahead.” Outwardly, imitation is possible. You can be angry and say, “What can I do? It is only the gunas functioning.” You can be violent and say, “What can I do? It is the gunas acting. The gunas within me did the violence.”

That is why I say the marks are outer; the real thing is inner. Only you can know whether, when anger arose, you were actually enjoying it or witnessing it. For remember: in one who witnesses anger, anger will become seedless by itself. Even if it arises, it will lack vitality—because it is we who pour life into it. There will be smoke, but no fire.

Desire may arise, but with witnessing present it cannot carry you far. It will stir a bit and subside. Without your cooperation—without losing the witness—nothing can go very far. When you join in, things go far. But this is inner; it is hard to determine from outside.

Therefore the Jains did not accept Krishna as gunatita. It is difficult. Krishna is gunatita. But the matter is inner. Though standing on the battlefield, inwardly he is not there. Amid the whole web of activity, within he remains a witness. But the Jain asks, “How are we to know that he is a witness? Who knows—perhaps he is not witnessing but relishing action?”

So the Jains say: if one is a witness to action, action should fall away. We will accept Mahavira, because he left action and departed.

But the danger is the same the other way too. Your impulses may remain; you can go to the forest. What is the difficulty? You may be sitting in meditation—and we may think you are meditating. Who knows what film runs within? What are you doing inside?

There is an account from Mahavira’s life. King Bimbisara, a great emperor of that time, came for Mahavira’s darshan. On his way he met an old friend who had once been a king—Prasanna Kumar by name—who had become Mahavira’s monk, renouncing his kingdom. He and Bimbisara had been childhood friends who studied together. Bimbisara saw Prasanna Kumar standing near a mountain cave, absorbed in meditation, like a stone statue. Bimbisara bowed his head. He thought: “I still wander in the world, and my friend has attained such purity! Naked, standing like a rock, utterly still!”

He offered obeisance without disturbing him and went to see Mahavira, who was deeper in the forest under a tree. He said, “I have a question. My friend Prasanna Kumar has become your monk. He has renounced everything. We worldly ones are ignorant, wandering. Seeing him standing there, my heart rejoiced. A feeling arose: When will such an auspicious moment come that I too renounce all and become so absorbed in peace? One question arises: as he stood there in silence, if he were to die at that very moment, in which celestial realm would he be born?”

Mahavira said, “If he were to die at this moment, he would go to heaven. But when you were bowing to him earlier—had you died then—you would have gone to hell.”

Hardly half an hour had passed! Bimbisara was startled. When he bowed, he had seen such serenity that he thought, “He is already in heaven.” And Mahavira says, “At that very time, if he had died, he would have gone straight to the seventh hell.”

Bimbisara said, “I do not understand; this is a riddle.” Mahavira said: “Your entourage was arriving before you—ministers, horses, generals. One of your ministers reached him a little earlier and said, ‘Look at Prasanna Kumar standing here like a fool. He entrusted his entire kingdom to his ministers. His son is still young. They are looting everything. The whole kingdom is being ruined. And this fool stands here!’”

Prasanna Kumar heard it. Fire flared up. He forgot he was a monk, a Digambara. His hand went to his sword—old habit. He drew it. His eyes were closed; he raised the sword and thought, “What do those ministers think? I am still alive. I will sever each head from its body.”

And while you were bowing, he was cutting off heads within. Outwardly he stood like a statue; inwardly necks were being sent rolling. A former kshatriya—“While I am alive, they deceive my son? I am still alive! What do they think? That I am a monk—what difference does that make? If I go, I will settle them all.”

Mahavira said: “If he had died at that time, he would have gone to hell.” Bimbisara said, “Then tell me the other part of the riddle—what changed so quickly?”

Mahavira said: “When he returned the sword, and his hand went to his head to set his crown right, there was no crown—only a shaven head. When his hand touched his head, he said, ‘I am mad! I have become a monk; Prasanna Kumar is dead. What sword? Whose murder? What am I killing?’ He became aware. He laughed at the mind’s foolishness. Now he is utterly a witness. The identification with the screen has broken. If he dies now, he can go to heaven.”

It is very difficult. Marks are all outside. So do not apply them to others. Apply them only to yourself—then they can be useful.

“He who, when the sattva-born illumination arises, knowledge dawns and dispassion appears; when the rajas-born activity arises, actions surge; when the tamas-born delusion arises, greed and ignorance arise—”

Whether these three move into activity or into quiescence—he neither holds activity as bad nor quiescence as good; he neither tries to avoid activity nor, when activity ceases, tries to bring it back; he does not desire that these should be, nor desire that these should not be. Whatever is happening, he silently regards it as the play of nature and watches. Krishna calls this the fundamental mark of the gunatita.

“And he who, established like a witness, cannot be shaken by the gunas, and, understanding that ‘the gunas alone act upon the gunas,’ remains established in the solid mass of Existence-Consciousness-Bliss—the Supreme—and does not move from that state.”

The gunas are active every moment. He whom they cannot make move—that is the point. Like a lamp is burning; a gust of wind comes and the flame flickers—that is our condition. Any gust of any guna and we immediately tremble. Let storms of the gunas come; within there is no trembling. Let storms come and go; you remain untouched. Neither bad nor good arises. Neither blame nor praise; no choice—choiceless, without selecting, you stand silently.

All ethics teach us to choose; religion teaches choicelessness. Ethics says: this is good, this is bad. When good arises, happily do it. When bad arises, be unhappy and refrain.

This sutra of the Gita is the very opposite. It says: whether bad arises or good arises, do not make any decision. If bad arises, let it arise; if good arises, let it arise. Neither take pride in the good, nor condemnation in the bad. Watch both, as if you have nothing to do with either. People are walking on the road and you stand aside. The river is flowing and you stand on the bank. Clouds move in the sky and you sit below. You have no purpose in it; nothing to take or give. You are totally aloof.

Only when this aloofness descends fully can you be saved from being moved. Otherwise, everything moves you. Every event around you shakes you, changes you. Then you are not the master; you are like a flag’s cloth trembling in the winds.

There is a Zen story. At Bokuju’s monastery, a Buddhist flag flew over the temple. One day Bokuju came out and saw all the monks gathered in heated debate. The question was: Is the flag moving, or the wind moving?

Turmoil ensued. Some said, “The wind is moving—how would the flag move if the wind didn’t?” Others said, “What proof? We say the flag moves; that’s why the wind appears to move. If the flag didn’t move, the wind wouldn’t move.” Some said, “Both are moving.”

Bokuju came and said, “Disperse; go sit under your trees and meditate. Neither the flag is moving, nor the wind is moving, nor both are moving—your minds are moving. When your minds do not move, neither wind nor flag will move. Go from here and take care that your mind does not move.”

The mind will cease moving only when we stop deciding and are ready to accept; and when we know: this is the functioning of the gunas. It is happening; it has nothing to do with me. I am hidden within; it is occurring around me, not in me—outside me, not in me.

“He who, established like a witness, cannot be shaken by the gunas; who understands that the gunas act upon the gunas; who remains established in the solid Existence-Consciousness-Bliss of the Supreme and does not move from that state—”

As soon as one ceases to be moved by the gunas’ functioning—while the gunas go on trembling and he remains unshaken—a double event occurs. The moment our connection with the gunas breaks, our connection with the nirguna is made. Understand this clearly.

As long as we are tied to the gunas, the hidden nirguna—God—does not come into our awareness, because our attention is one-streamed, and it flows entirely toward the gunas. As soon as we break from the gunas, that very attention begins to flow toward the Divine.

The nirguna is hidden within us. The nirguna is what we are, and around us is the net of the gunas. If we remain bound to the gunas, there will be no awareness of the nirguna. If we are freed from the gunas, we become established in the nirguna. And establishment in the nirguna is establishment in the solid mass of Existence-Consciousness-Bliss—the Supreme.

Enough for today.

The question is important and needs to be understood very deeply. It is especially significant because in the West scientists have discovered methods by which a human being can be chemically altered, by which the physical properties of man can be changed. And certainly, his behavior will become different.

The toxic chemical substance of anger in you can be isolated. Its opposite element can be introduced into your body, which will make your behavior gentle and calm. But remember: your behavior will change—not you.

Your sexual desire can be weakened, even destroyed, without any sadhana, by mere physical alteration. Desire can be aroused, and it can be erased.

The question matters because, for the first time in human history, we now have in the West the means to change a person behaviorally without putting him into sadhana. But this change will be superficial, and it will not bring any spiritual uplift. In fact, the entire possibility of spiritual uplift will be destroyed. Uplift will not happen; and the very circumstances through which uplift could have happened will also be erased.

Your anger depends on two things. First, your body must contain the molecules, the hormones, the juices of anger. Second, there must be identification and illusion—tadatmya—binding consciousness to those juices. It depends on these two factors.

For sexual desire your body must contain the elements of sex, and there must be the urge to connect with those elements, the urge to become one with them. If the sexual elements are not present within, then even if you want to connect with them, you cannot; even if you try to descend into lust, you will not be able to. So your behavior will become like that of a celibate. Yet that celibacy will be another name for impotence. No inner revolution will take place.

It is like this: suppose there is a sword in my hand. Without a sword I cannot cut anyone’s head off. If the sword is snatched from my hand, I will not be able to cut a head. So my behavior will change; I will have no means to behead. But I was not cutting heads only because of the sword. The sword was merely a tool. Inside, I was filled with violence. Inside, I had the tendency to destroy the other—that will remain within me.

If the sword is in my hand but that inner tendency is gone, I will not cut a head. Two things are needed to cut a head: the stupor within me, and a sword in my hand. When both come together, a head falls. Remove either one, and behavior changes.

If the inner element is removed, behavior changes and the soul changes as well. If the outer element is removed, only behavior changes; the soul does not. And spiritual revolution does not come from a change in behavior. Spiritual revolution comes from a change in the soul. Behavior is only like a shadow.

Our emphasis is not that there should be celibacy in your behavior. The emphasis is that there should be celibacy within you. That inner celibacy will bring outer celibacy along like a shadow. But through chemical processes your behavior can be changed. Within, you will remain the same, because your soul will not suddenly become established in witnessing.

And remember, witnessing does not depend on any chemical substance. There is no chemical element whose injection will produce witnessing in you. Witnessing has to be cultivated through sadhana, gradually attained. It is the result of a long struggle, a culmination. Witnessing is an inner growth, a development.

Behavior can be changed by chemical substances. Therefore take note: those who think religion is merely behavior—their religion will not last long in the world. Because whatever they call religion, the scientist will be able to produce it. Such religion has reached its deathbed. Only what I call religion can endure in the future.

Those who say good behavior is religiosity—there is no hope for their religion now. Because good behavior can now be produced even by an injection. And those who say the only way to remove bad behavior is religion—they too are wrong.

Many scientists in the West are proposing that criminals should no longer be punished. This is delusion. They propose chemical treatment for criminals. They say criminals commit crimes because there is some chemical element within them that creates a deranged condition. Change that. Hanging is pointless. Keeping them in prison for years is useless. No chemical change is occurring in them. Rather, they will return more skilled and hardened as criminals. Outside they were untrained; inside they will find great masters.

A man steals; he is stealing alone, he is a novice, and he gets caught. When you put him in prison for five years, he gets to live under the tutelage of a thousand experts who are seasoned practitioners. After five years in jail he comes out a more skillful thief. He will be harder to catch.

Punishment produces no inner transformation in anyone; nor does it bring outer transformation. Only his soul becomes even harder, even more shameless.

It will not take long before scientists persuade politicians. In China and Russia, such experiments have begun with political offenders. In Russia up to Stalin’s time, any political dissenter was killed. Now they don’t kill. Now they simply have the political opponent declared insane by a hospital, which is even more dangerous. The doctors certify that there is damage in his brain.

That is enough. Then he is put in an asylum. And there the treatment of his brain begins. He is neither crazy, nor does he have any disease, nor any mental derangement. But the “treatment” is this: whatever rebellious elements are within him will be gradually pacified.

After four to six months the man comes out. His rebellion, his revolt, his state of thinking against the government—these are broken. He becomes more docile, more obedient, disciplined. This is worse than killing.

Delgado has given a suggestion to all the governments of the world: you cannot stop wars, you cannot stop crime. And five thousand years of human history say that no matter how much you preach, man cannot be changed. Accept my suggestion.

Delgado’s suggestion is that science has discovered such elements that only need to be mixed into every city’s lake. And the water for your home comes from the lake to drink. By drinking that water you will automatically become void of any tendency to fight.

But remember, by drinking such tranquilizing chemical substances and becoming calm in your urge to fight, you will not become a Buddha or a Mahavira. None of the dignity of a Buddha will manifest in you. In fact, even the little dignity that anger sometimes reveals will stop. You will become only lifeless. You will appear dull and defeated, as if the very prana have been sucked out of you. You will walk in a kind of sleep. You won’t fight because you won’t even have the energy that fighting requires.

Merely not fighting does not make one a Buddha. When non-fighting flows from Buddhahood, then there is majesty, there is dignity. When within you such a high peak is touched that fighting becomes petty and useless—

One way is that the electric bulb is burning, and we hit it with a stick and break it. The bulb will break, the light will go out. But by hitting the bulb you are not destroying electricity. You are only breaking the medium of expression. The bulb is gone; electricity is still flowing like a current. Whenever you provide a bulb again, the light will glow again. You have not destroyed the electricity, you have only broken the arrangement through which it becomes manifest. Electricity is still flowing.

These chemical atoms in your body are only media of expression. If they are removed, the hidden within you will stop manifesting. If they are put back, it will begin to manifest again.

Sadhana means we are dissolving the current itself, not breaking the bulb. There is no point in breaking the bulb. In fact, the bulb is useful; it tells you whether the current is flowing or not, whether there is current or not.

Your anger within tells you you are still sunk in ignorance. Lust tells you your life energies have not yet become aware. If we remove these elements, anger will stop manifesting and you will also stop knowing that you are in deep ignorance. It is as if a man is sick and we snatch away the symptoms of his disease so that he doesn’t even come to know he is ill.

And keep in mind, anger is an opportunity. Only the unwise say anger is simply bad; I do not say so. Anger is an opportunity; you can use it badly or well. Anger is a chance. In it you can fall into a stupor and go mad; in the very same anger you can become aware and attain buddhahood.

So it is not right to destroy the opportunity. When anger arises in you, if you identify with anger, become one with it, you may end up killing someone. But if you watch anger with awareness, the very anger that could have become murder will become the birth of new life within you. Only keep witnessing. The smoke of anger will rise. Clouds will grow thick. But you will stand apart; you will be free, beyond, separate.

This experience of separateness will not be only separation from anger; it will become the experience of separation from the body itself—because anger is arising in the qualities of the body.

Desire will arise, sexuality will arise; these too are outcomes of the body’s qualities, its own movements. The real question is whether we cooperate with them and get carried away, or break our cooperation and stand as a witness. Do we become their slaves, or do we become their masters? Do we look at them with open eyes, or do we go blindly after them?

To eliminate the opportunity is dangerous. Therefore I hold that if the scientists’ advice is accepted, people’s behavior will indeed become good, people’s conduct will become good—but souls will be utterly lost. That world will be very colorless, lackluster. In it there will be neither a Hitler-like angry man nor a Stalin-like murderer—true. But there will also not be a Buddha-like serene sage. There will be people asleep, zombie-like—unconscious, walking in a stupor, hypnotized, mechanical.

If you cannot be angry, remember: you will not be able to be compassionate either. Because compassion arises from becoming a witness to anger. And if your sexuality is broken bodily, chemically, love will never arise in you. For love is the purest transformation of lust.

If the bad is erased from you, the good will also be erased. You may not commit crimes, that is certain, but saintliness will also never be born in you. And the possibility of becoming a paramahansa within you will vanish forever.

Therefore no revolution is going to happen through chemical change. Real transformation is the transformation of consciousness, not of the body.

And whatever evils there are, do not be frightened or disturbed by them. Every so-called evil can be used in such a way that it becomes creative. There is no evil that cannot become manure, from which flowers of goodness cannot bloom. And turning evil into manure for the seeds of good—that art is called religion.

Whoever learns the right and proper use of whatever is available in life, for him there is nothing bad in the world. He discovers light out of tamas itself. From rajas he settles into the supreme emptiness. From sattva he finds the way to go beyond the gunas.

And remember, the opposite exists—it is your test, your touchstone, your challenge, your criterion. If that opposite is destroyed, all human dignity will die. Man’s glory lies precisely in this: if he wants he can go to hell, and if he wants he can go to heaven. If all the doors to hell are broken down, then along with them all the ladders to heaven will fall away.

Remember, the same staircase by which we go down is the one by which we go up. There are not two staircases. You came up to this house by stairs. By the same stairs you will also go down. Out of fear that someone might go down by the stairs, we can demolish the stairs. But remember, then the means to go up have also ended.

Hell is the name of the very same staircase whose other name is heaven. The difference is not in the stairs; the difference is in direction. When you descend blindly into lust, you are going downward. And when you stand alert, with eyes open, in the face of lust, you begin to move upward. Stupor is descent; witnessing is ascent.

There is no substitute for sadhana, and there never can be. There is no subtle trick by which you can avoid sadhana. You will have to pass through sadhana. Without it, your refinement does not happen. Without passing through it, the center does not arise within you on the basis of which the supreme treasure of life can be attained.

Because knowledge and dispassion can also bind.

Certainly, Krishna’s statement appears paradoxical. The fruit of sattvic action is knowledge and dispassion. And Krishna also says that sattvic action binds. But ordinarily the so‑called saints explain that dispassion liberates, knowledge liberates.

So the fruits that Krishna points to are commonly understood as liberating. But remember, whatever arises from sattvic action also carries the possibility of binding. You can be bound even by knowledge.

Hence the Upanishads say: whoever declares, “I am self‑realized,” understand that he is not self‑realized. Whoever says, “I have attained dispassion,” understand that his attachment has shifted to dispassion.

Sannyas can become householdership; it is in your hands. And the life of a householder can become sannyas; it is in your hands. Ignorance can be liberating, and knowledge can become bondage; it is in your hands.

The Upanishads say that the knower understands, “I know nothing.” Socrates says, “Who is more ignorant than I?” Yet this ignorance is liberating. The realization of such ignorance means the man has become humble—utterly humble. Not even the subtlest proclamation of ego remains within. He does not even say, “I know.” He says, “I know nothing. I am not; who would know?”

And existence is a vast mystery. Only the blind can claim to know it. It is so immense that whoever truly sees it will say, “It is a mystery.” It cannot be known.

Claims to knowledge can be made only by the foolish, not by the wise. These utterances seem contradictory because we do not understand. A wise man is precisely one who has come to know that this mystery is infinite.

If the mystery is infinite, you cannot claim, “I have known it,” because whatever we know ceases to be infinite; knowing draws a boundary around it. And whatever I can know becomes smaller than me; it fits into my fist.

Science can claim to know, because its quest concerns the small. Religion cannot claim to know. In fact, in religion, while trying to know, by and by the knower himself disappears. Instead of knowledge being attained, the one who wanted to know is erased. Hence any assertion of “I” becomes bondage.

And this is why even sattvic action can bind: in sattvic action the rays of knowledge begin to descend. The mind becomes light, pure. But the mind remains. It becomes pure, light, unburdened, beautiful, fragrant. The stench is gone. It no longer gives birth to misery; it begins to give birth to happiness. In this state of happiness, the rays of life’s mystery begin to descend.

But the mind is still there; it has not yet dissolved. If you are not alert, the mind will instantly proclaim, “I have known.” With that proclamation, bondage begins. And that which could have set you free, you make into your prison. The very thing that could have carried you across, you cling to and stop—like someone who grabs hold of the boat. The boat is a means to freedom; it can carry you to the other shore. But if someone clings to the boat and refuses to get off—even after reaching the far bank—if meanwhile he becomes attached to the boat, then the boat too has become bondage.

As long as the mind remains, it can turn anything into bondage—remember this. When, for the first time, rays of the transcendental descend into the mind, it is necessary to remember that this too is the working of sattvic action. There is no need to identify with it.

Your house has windowpanes. Someone’s window glass is very dirty; no ray passes through. Even if the sun has risen outside, inside their house it remains dark. Some people’s windowpanes are a little clean; they clean them daily. When the sun rises outside, its dim glow comes into the house. Someone else’s window has such glass that it is completely transparent; if you do not touch it when you go near, you would not even know there is glass. The sun rises outside, and it feels as if it has risen within. The glass is perfectly transparent—yet it is glass, and so long as there is glass, you are confined inside the house. And so long as there is glass, the rays that come in are mixed with the glass, touched by it.

If such a pure crystal is set in your door that you do not even realize it is there, you can fall into the illusion that you have stepped outside—because the sun’s rays are pouring directly on you—and yet you are sitting inside the house!

Therefore Krishna says, even pure action binds, even sattvic action binds.

Sattvic action is like the purest glass. That too has to be shattered and you must step out. Only then are you outside the house; only then are you directly under the sun. Then the encounter is immediate; no medium remains.

As long as there is a medium, there is danger, because no medium can be relied upon. A medium will introduce some alteration. The purest medium is impure in the sense that its very presence creates a slight obstruction.

Many times it happens that a man sunk in tamas does not have the conceit that “I am something.” He feels humble—egoless in a certain sense. The person caught in rajas also does not fall into the illusion that “I have attained Brahman, I have known the truth,” because he knows he is entangled in the net of actions—just as the man with dirty glass or somewhat clean glass does not fall into the notion that he is standing under the open sky outside the house. This danger is greatest for the one of sattvic action.

So whoever comes close to sattva comes close to a danger. Things have become so clear there that one can fall into the illusion, “I have come out.” And if, while still inside, this illusion arises that “I am out,” the work of coming out will stop.

And there is no certainty about glass. What is clean today will be unclean tomorrow; dust will settle on it. In a single moment what was pure can become impure. What is sattvic today may become rajasic tomorrow and tamasic the day after.

Therefore Krishna says that even sattvic action binds. Its fruits are three: pleasure, knowledge, and dispassion.

Remember, a miserable man never fully identifies with his misery. He keeps feeling, “I am separate; I am miserable.” I am separate; misery is separate.

Who will identify with misery? We know: sorrow has come and will go; I am separate. And we do our best that sorrow go as quickly as possible. But when happiness comes, we identify.

The fakir Junayd has said: the remembrance of God in sorrow has no particular value—because everyone remembers then. If someone remembers in happiness, that has value.

No one remembers in happiness, because it is precisely for happiness that we remember. When happiness itself is present, remembrance seems pointless.

From sorrow we want to be free; we want to separate. With happiness we want to join, to become one. And whatever we join with, become one with, that can become our real bondage.

Therefore do not take sorrow as sheer curse and happiness as sheer blessing. If there is understanding, sorrow can be a blessing. And if there is foolishness, happiness can be a curse. This is what usually happens. Because foolishness is common; understanding is rare. Whenever you are happy, you fall—identification happens; you clutch happiness tightly. And whatever you clutch becomes bondage.

Remember, things do not bind you; your clutching binds you. Hence happiness is bondage; knowledge is bondage—if conceit arises that “I know,” if the thought arises that “I am knowledgeable.” And it will arise, because ignorance hurts; it wounds the ego.

No one wants to accept himself as ignorant. Even the most ignorant do not want to consider themselves ignorant. The ignorant too make claims to knowledge. The most wrongheaded person searches for ways to prove himself right.

Mulla Nasruddin’s son brought home a gun. He was practicing his aim. Half his shots hit the mark. Nasruddin scolded him: “What are you doing? At least ninety percent of your shots should be accurate. Is this marksmanship? In my time, I used to hit the target a hundred percent.” The boy said, “Why don’t you try once; let me see too.”

Nasruddin was in a fix—he didn’t even know how to hold the gun properly. But a father cannot renounce the claim that he knows more than his son. He took the gun in his hands. Using the excuse that the model seemed new, he asked the boy how it is used: “In my day, different models were in vogue. But my aim is unfailing!”

He took aim. A bird was flying in the sky. He fired, with great effort and deliberation, applying all his strength and intelligence. But strength and intelligence have little to do with aim. For someone who has never aimed, it is almost impossible to hit a flying bird.

The shot went off; the bird kept flying. Nasruddin said, “Look, son, look—what a miracle! A dead bird is flying!”

Our ego stands everywhere. Even if a mistake happens, we plaster it over and make it look right.

Rabindranath’s handwritten letters have been published. When he wrote poetry, if he made an error in a word and had to strike it out, instead of crossings‑out he would draw a design or a little sketch where the cut was—so it wouldn’t look crossed out. Wherever there was a mistake and a word had to be cut, he would draw a design over it, add some color, make a picture—so his letter would look as if there were no mistakes at all; rather, as if it had been decorated.

Such is the tendency of the human mind: to decorate everywhere. Wherever something might reveal a mistake, we hide it. Our ego does not want to admit that any lack exists in us.

The ignorant also claim knowledge—indeed, perhaps only the ignorant claim knowledge. So when the first ray of knowledge begins to descend, the subtle ego accumulated over many births will try to seize it.

Gibran has written a little story: Whenever a new invention appears in the world, both the gods and the devil pounce on it to take possession. And often it is the devil who seizes it first; the gods always come late. The gods get the idea only when the devil has already set out. The devil is ever ready beforehand.

Whenever any event happens in your life, your bad part will immediately try to take possession of it. Before the good part can lay claim, the bad part will have grabbed it.

As soon as a ray of knowledge descends, the ego will grab it—“I have known.” And in that statement the ray of knowledge is lost and darkness returns. In that mood of ego, the source from which it was descending is blocked. And until that mood dissolves, the source will remain blocked.

After experimenting with meditation on hundreds and thousands of people, I have come to certain conclusions. One is this: people come to me—when they have their first experience of meditation, their elation knows no bounds; their whole heart is dancing. But whenever they come and tell me, and I see their elation, I feel afraid. I know: now it is gone; now the difficulty will begin. Because until now there was no expectation. Until now they knew nothing about it. The event happened unexpectedly, unanticipated.

And such an event happens only when there is no expectation; with expectation, a barrier arises. Now from tomorrow he will wait for it every day. His meditation will be futile now. He will sit in meditation, but he will not sit wholly. The mind will be clinging to the event that happened yesterday. And surely within a day or two he comes back to me and says, “It is not happening now!” His heart is very dejected.

That ray which had begun to rise, he has killed. He should not even have mentioned it. He should not have tried to seize it. He should have simply thanked the divine—“It is your grace, for I knew nothing. It happened—you know.” And then forgotten it. The next day the ray would have descended even deeper.

Whatever comes in life, one must learn to forget it; otherwise that very thing will become bondage. Then it becomes very difficult. Sometimes it takes years. Until the man forgets that event, the ray will not descend again. And the more he tries, the more difficult it becomes—because it had not come through his effort. It had nothing to do with his striving. It happened in your effortlessness.

You were innocent, simple; you were not asking for anything. In that guileless moment the contact was made. Now you are asking. Now you have become clever. Now you are no longer innocent. Now you have done your arithmetic: “It’s been thirty minutes of meditation—why hasn’t it happened yet!” Now, minute by minute, you are longing for the experience. Your mind is divided. You are no longer in meditation; you are hankering for an experience.

Therefore remember: whoever grabs an experience will be deprived. And sattvic experiences are so sweet that grasping them becomes effortless; letting go is very difficult, grasping is all too easy.

Zen masters, whenever a disciple comes and reports that he has had some experience, give him a beating; they raise the stick. The moment he says, “Something has happened,” they pounce on him.

It is a great act of compassion. It may look harsh to us, but it is utter compassion. Their beating—the master throwing the disciple out of the window—many times it happened that the disciple’s leg broke, his arm broke—but that is not too high a price.

As soon as he grabbed the experience, the master gave him so much pain that the experience was wiped away by that pain. Then he will be a bit hesitant to grab an experience again. And he will certainly not come to the master to report it again. Whenever the urge to seize it arises again, he will remember the master’s behavior, which shows that there was some fundamental mistake in my grasping—because the master, always calm, who had never uttered a harsh word, raised the stick, even threw me out of the window. Some terrible mistake had occurred.

Sattvic experience will give knowledge; from knowledge the ego will be aroused. Sattvic experience will give dispassion; from dispassion a great arrogance will arise.

Therefore the stiffness of a sannyasin is not found even in emperors. Watch the gait of a sannyasin—what emperor has such a stride! Because he is saying, “I have kicked it all away; this whole world is trivial, worth two pennies. We give it no value. Your palaces are nothing. Your golden spires and heaps of diamonds and jewels are pebbles and stones. We pay them no attention. We have renounced everything. Dispassion has arisen.”

This dispassion is dangerous. It is a new attachment—a reverse attachment. It is not freedom from attachment; you have clutched dispassion itself.

The mind has the habit of grasping; it does not matter what you offer it. It is a grasping instrument. Say wealth—it will grasp wealth. Say charity—it will grasp charity. Say indulgence—it will grasp indulgence. Say renunciation—it will grasp renunciation. The object is irrelevant; whatever you give, the mind will grab. And whatever the mind grabs becomes bondage.

There are hundreds of stories of renouncers who could not be liberated for lifetimes because of their very dispassion—because their arrogance was immense. In Durvasa’s dispassion there was no deficiency, yet that dispassion produced nothing but anger.

Why does Durvasa’s dispassion produce anger? Because his dispassion turned into ego within. When the ego is hurt, anger arises. If there is no ego within, there is no cause for anger.

We read stories of sages and seers who go around cursing. Those whom they cursed may perhaps have become liberated, but those who cursed will still be wandering somewhere in the world. There is no way for them to be free.

Therefore Krishna says: dispassion, knowledge, happiness—all can become bondage.

Hence one must be free from tamas, free from rajas, and also free from sattva. In essence, nothing should remain within that can serve as a handle for bondage. Only pure consciousness should remain. No guna should remain—only the state beyond qualities. This Krishna calls gunatita—beyond the gunas. This is the mark of the supreme renunciate, the one beyond attachment.

Sannyas has nothing to do with the gunas. Sannyas is related to nirguna, the quality-less. Sannyas is an inner state of feeling. It is the art of non-grasping. You do not cling to anything. You remain without holding on.

Grasping is what makes a householder. You will build houses all around; you will cling to something. You will not be able to live without supports. You will need some prop, some security for the future, some wealth—be it the wealth of merit, of good deeds, of sattva.

A sannyasin means: I will build no inner house; I will not hoard any inner wealth; I will gather no possessions; I will not think of the future. I will live in this very moment—and live as consciousness. And I will know only this much: I am a witness; an observer; a seer.

Sannyas is a state beyond the gunas. Until that arises, all sannyas is only on the surface. On the surface it merely reports the news of your aspiration—that you are searching. It does not report attainment.

It is good that you are searching. But don’t sit back assuming you have become a sannyasin. Until the realization of nirguna is there, the inner sannyasin is not yet born. Until then you are on the journey, still seeking.

This search will proceed with the help of the gunas. But the final fruit of the search goes beyond the gunas.

I do not call someone with any guna-dominance a sannyasin; I do not call even a sattva-dominant person a sannyasin. I call such a one a sadhu. Sadhu means the dominance of sattva, of the auspicious. His deeds are good, his conduct is good, his feeling is good. But he is bound by the good. There are chains on his hands—made of flowers perhaps, of gold perhaps, not of iron.

Yet a golden chain carries a danger: one tends to call it an ornament. With an iron chain, the desire to break it arises. With a golden chain, the desire to preserve it arises. And if someone says, “It is a chain,” we reply, “Forgive me, it is not a chain, it is jewelry.”

Sadhu-hood pertains to sattva. Sannyas is beyond the gunas. A sannyasin is one who has stopped identifying with body and mind. The body is a house; the mind is a house. The one who is free of these houses and is established in the inner consciousness, who holds only one feeling: my very being is sheer consciousness; alertness is my nature. Wherever I lose awareness, there I lose my nature and fall away from sannyas.