Jin Khoja Tin Paiyan #17

The first thing to understand here is that harmony among the first, second, and third bodies is essential. If these three bodies are not in a friendly, harmonious relationship with one another, kundalini awakening can be harmful. For these three to be in tune, in a kind of inner music, a few things are necessary.

Becoming aware of the first body
First, as long as we remain unconscious toward our first body, it cannot come into harmony with the subtler bodies. By unconscious I mean we are not aware of the body. We walk without knowing we are walking; we stand without knowing we are standing; we eat without knowing we are eating. We use the body almost in a kind of sleep.

If we are unconscious even toward this gross, visible body, we will be much more unconscious toward the subtler, invisible bodies. Without awareness there is no harmony: all harmony is born of awareness; in sleep, harmony breaks.

So the first step is to awaken awareness toward the body. Whatever the body does, even the smallest act, let there be remembering in it. As Buddha would say: when you walk on the road, know that you are walking; when your left foot is raised, be aware the left foot has been raised; when you turn over in sleep, know that you have turned.

There is an incident from Buddha’s days as a seeker. He was walking out of a village with a fellow seeker. They were talking. A fly sat on his neck; he continued talking and, mechanically, brushed it away with his hand. After the fly had flown, he suddenly stopped, stood still, and said, “A great mistake happened.” He then raised his hand again and brushed away the fly that was no longer there—touched the place where it had been. His companion asked, “What are you doing? There is no fly now!” Buddha said, “Now I am brushing it away as I should have—consciously. Now, as the hand is rising to brush the fly, I know it is rising to brush the fly. A moment ago I kept talking to you and drove it away mechanically. I committed a sin against my body.”

On awakening to the gross body, the feeling body begins to be sensed
If you begin to perform every action of the body with awareness, the body becomes transparent. Slowly try raising your hand from below to above with full awareness. You will feel you are separate from the hand, for that which raises it is different. That sense of difference is the beginning of the awareness of your etheric body.

Consider an orchestra in which many instruments are playing. Bring in someone who has never listened to music. He will only hear the loudest beats—the booming drum—while the soft instruments in the background will go unnoticed. As his awareness refines, he will begin to hear the background instruments; refine it more, and he will catch still subtler tones; when awareness is complete, he will begin to catch the very fine and delicate notes—and finally the gaps between the notes, the silence. Only then has he really grasped music. The ultimate is to catch the gap; only then is the grasp complete. In fact, all the notes exist to highlight that silence.

If you have seen Japanese or Chinese paintings you may be surprised: a small scene occupies a corner, while the vast canvas is left empty. This is rare in the world, because only in China and Japan did meditators paint. Ask such a painter, “What is the matter? Such a big canvas and such a small image in a corner! You could have painted it on an eighth of this canvas.” He will say, “All this empty sky is what I wanted to bring out; that small image in the corner is only to help you see the vast emptiness—for in reality, the empty sky is infinite.”

A tree stands in empty sky. In our paintings, the tree fills the canvas. In actuality, the sky should fill the canvas and the tree be merely a tiny presence somewhere in a corner. Only against the sky’s background is the tree alive in its true proportion. Our paintings lack proportion.

If a meditator creates music there will be fewer notes and more emptiness—because the note is small; the void is vast. The only significance of the note is to point to the void and pass away. As your awareness of the note deepens, so does your sensitivity to the silence.

The significance of this gross body is that it can introduce us to subtler bodies. But we cling to it—and we cling by remaining unconsciously identified with it, in a sleeping identity. If you awaken to every movement of this body, awareness of the second body begins immediately.

Awareness of feelings arising in the feeling body
The second body has its own movements; you cannot awaken to them unless you have awakened to the movements of the first body, because they are subtler. Once you are awake to the first body, you begin to pick up the motions of the second body. You will be surprised to find etheric waves in you, functioning all the time.

Anger is born in the second body; its expression is through the first. The first body is only used as an instrument. Therefore you can stop anger from reaching the first body: that is repression. The mind is filled with anger, you want to hit someone with a stick—you can stop the hand, even smile, but in the etheric body anger spreads. In repression, you prevent expression at the level of the first body, but at the source level it has already manifested.

When you become aware of the physical body’s actions, you begin to notice the movements of love, anger, hate, fear in the feeling body. Until you catch these movements at the second body, at best you can repress; you cannot be free. Many are so unconscious they don’t know even when the slap has landed that it was coming; only after the slap do they realize something happened! All feelings arise in the etheric body—that is why I call the second the feeling body.

The etheric vibrations of fear and their effect on the outer personality
When you are afraid, your etheric body immediately contracts. The sense of shrinking in fear is not of the first body—its volume does not change—but the etheric body shrinks.

If someone lives in fear, the first body begins to show the imprint of contraction. In his walk, his posture, he seems pressed down—as if weighed upon from all sides. He will not stand upright, but bent; his speech will falter; his steps will tremble; even his signature will shake.

You can generally distinguish a woman’s and a man’s handwriting: a woman finds it difficult to make firm strokes; even when shapely, a certain tremor remains—a feminine vibration—coming from her etheric body. She has been made to live in fear; society and culture have not given her inner fearlessness. That fear’s trembling pervades her whole personality. One can also read how fearful or fearless a man is from his handwriting. Physically, the fingers and the pen are the same, but in the second body the fearful vibration appears.

The feeling body’s contraction in fear and expansion in love
Learn to see these inner movements: when you are in love you feel expanded. The sense of freedom in love is because you spread—there is someone before whom there is no need for fear; in whose presence you can flower as you are. Hence in love there is expansion. The gross body remains the same, but the inner body blossoms and expands.

In meditation many people feel their body become very large—as if it fills the room. The physical body remains the same, but the feeling is not false: the etheric body has no fixed boundary; it expands and contracts with feeling. It can expand to fill the cosmos or contract to fit an atom.

Expansion is the health of the feeling body
You will begin to perceive its expansions and contractions, and the conditions under which they happen. If a seeker lives in the states that bring expansion, harmony arises; if he lives in those that cause contraction, harmony between the first and second body is broken. Expansion is its natural ease; then it forms a bridge with the first body. When contracted by fear, its connectives with the first body loosen.

A sharp emotional shock makes the feeling body obvious
A man appears perfectly healthy; someone brings the news he has been sentenced to death. Suddenly the color leaves his face. Nothing has changed in the first body—blood volume is the same—but the etheric body has changed; it is preparing to leave the physical. As when a householder hears the house must be vacated—suddenly the charm goes, things become disordered. The second body begins to disengage. The hanging may be later—or not at all—but the linkage has loosened.

If a gun is pointed at your chest, or a lion leaps toward you, even before the first body is touched, the etheric body has made ready to depart; distance grows between them.

You can observe these motions with subtle attention—once you learn to observe the gross. As awareness of the two bodies’ movements becomes clear, that very awareness brings them into harmony.

Awakening in the feeling body opens the perception of the subtle body
The third body, the subtle or astral body, is subtler still. Its movements are subtler than anger, love, hate, fear. You cannot catch them until you have fully succeeded in witnessing the second body, because there is a big gap. We are asleep in the first, so the second is at least a next-door neighbor; sometimes we hear the clatter from his kitchen or the child crying. But the third is the neighbor’s neighbor; even his kitchen is never heard.

The third body’s journey is subtler. Only when you can catch feelings in the second can you begin to catch waves in the third. Waves precede feelings; condensed waves become feelings, and condensed feelings become actions. I will not know you are angry until you express it; but you can know it earlier in the feeling body. Yet even before that, at the subtle body, there are particles—wave patterns—from which the feeling arises. The astral body is a field of waves, and from it all our states take birth.

Consider: oxygen and hydrogen show no sign of “water,” and yet together they manifest water. Likewise, anger, love, fear do not appear in the astral as such, but the waves are there; when they couple with the feeling body, something appears immediately.

When you are fully awake to anger in the feeling body, you will discover something happens even before anger—anger is not the beginning; it is already a point reached.

Like a bubble rising through sand and water: in the sand you do not see it; halfway through water, still unseen; nearer the surface, it appears small; as it rises, it appears larger—not because it grows, but because it becomes visible and the pressure lessens; at the surface it is full—and bursts. Anger bursts at the surface in the first body. You can stop it in the feeling body—that is repression. But if you watch closely in the feeling body, you will be amazed: the journey began even earlier—as waves, not yet anger.

The journey of anger’s wave
As physics shows, the world is not made of separate substances but of different arrangements of waves. Coal and diamond are the same in essence; their lattice differs. Reduce any substance to the ultimate and there is electricity—energy patterns. At the top they differ; deep down they are one.

If you awaken to the feeling body and follow back, you will suddenly enter the subtle body. There you see: anger is not anger, forgiveness is not forgiveness—both are forms of the same waves. Love and hate are one in wave-nature; only configurations differ. Hence love turns to hate and hate to love. Yesterday’s friend becomes today’s enemy and then friend again—because they lie on the same spectrum, differing in degree, not in kind.

Freud sensed that we love and hate the same object. His explanation goes only so far—because he knew nothing of the other bodies. He traced it to the child’s ambivalence toward the mother—the first love-object—who sometimes soothes, sometimes scolds; thus love and hate both get associated to one object, and later all love-objects carry both feelings by association. But this is catching the bubble near bursting, on the surface. Deeper, if love and hate can coexist toward even the mother, their difference must be one of quantity, not quality. Only then is conversion possible.

The roots of all mental dualities lie in the subtle body
A person who calls me “God” in the morning calls me “devil” in the evening, and next morning again touches my feet. People say, “Don’t trust such a person.” I say, he alone is trustworthy; he is not saying two opposite things—these are steps on one ladder, differing in degree. The mind is dual; when one pole is expressed, the other waits beneath, asking for its turn. “How long will you keep saying ‘God’?” Soon it tires and “devil” pops up. They are not two.

Until mankind understands that in the third body our polarities are modes of one wave, we will not solve human problems—chief among them: we love whom we also hate; we cannot live without someone yet can kill them; our friend contains our enemy. Once it is understood that their wave-constitution is the same, the knot begins to open.

We commonly take darkness and light as opposites; in truth, darkness is the minimum of light. There is no absolute darkness without light; our instruments may fail, but the continuum is one. Think of cold and heat: not opposites but relative experiences. Warm your right hand, cool your left, then immerse both in the same water; one reports “hot,” the other “cold.” The words “hot” and “cold” are poetic; the scientific word is “temperature,” measured in degrees.

So too with light and darkness; also with love and hate—they are differences of proportion.

Freedom from duality through awakening in the subtle body
When you begin to awaken on the third plane, you arrive at a strange place: you lose the possibility of choosing between love and hate. You know they are two names of one thing; choose one and the other comes along.

Hence if you say to a person established on the third plane, “Love us,” he will ask, “Are you ready to bear the hate?” You will say, “No, we only want love.” He will say, “It’s hard to give only love—love is a configuration of the same rays, the same waves, whose other configuration is hate. One form pleases you, the other displeases you.”

Standing on the third plane, one becomes free of duality—for the first time one sees what were taken as two are one, like two branches meeting in one trunk. The madness of trying to keep one and cut off the other is seen; you cannot cut it off because the tree is one. But only by awakening on the second can you come to know the third, for on the third there are only waves—no feelings yet.

Seeing the aura upon awakening in the subtle body
Once the waves of the third are sensed, a unique experience begins: merely by looking, you can say what waves a person is vibrating with. Because you do not know your own waves, you cannot recognize another’s. Otherwise, around every face is a cluster of waves issuing from the third body. The halo we paint around the heads of Buddhas, Mahaviras, Ramas and Krishnas is a seen mandala; its colors have been perceived. With true experience of the third body, those colors become visible—not only your own, but others’ as well.

In fact, as deeply as you see your inner bodies, that deeply you see others’. Since you know only the physical, you see only the physical in others. The day you know your etheric, you begin to know others’ etheric: before you express anger, it can be seen that you will; before you express love, it can be known you are preparing to. What we call understanding another’s feelings becomes simple once you are awake to your own feeling body. On the third plane things become even clearer—colors of a person’s being become visible.

Auras of the different bodies
The choice of colors in the robes of renunciates was made by seeing the colors of the third body’s aura. Choices differed because emphasis differed. Buddha chose yellow because his emphasis was the seventh body; around one established in the seventh, the aura is yellow. Hence his bhikshus wore yellow.

But because of the yellow, Buddhist monks found it hard to remain in India. Yellow is associated with death in our collective psyche. The seventh body is the great death—hence yellow carries that tone.

Red gives the feel of life; therefore the ochre-clad sannyasin proved more attractive than the yellow-robed monk. Red is the color of blood; it belongs to the sixth, the cosmic body. At sunrise that is the color; when the sixth awakens, such hues appear in the aura.

The Jains chose white—the color of the fifth body, the soul body. Their insistence is to leave aside God and even nirvana in doctrine; up to the soul, a scientific discussion is possible. Mahavira had a very scientific mind: he would speak only as far as mathematics can reach; beyond that, he would say, “Go and see; we won’t speak.” Hence, one who avoids mysticism will not speak an inch beyond the fifth. Mahavira chose white—the fifth’s color.

The deep relation of color and personality
From the third body, these colors begin to be seen. If the eye can see them, tomorrow the camera can capture them. Then we shall have an extraordinary capacity to read personalities.

Have you seen the Lüscher Color Test? A German researcher studied colors with hundreds of thousands of people; hospitals in Europe and America use it. The colors you prefer reveal your deep personality. A certain disease prefers a certain palette; a healthy person another; a tranquil person one, an ambitious person another, a non-ambitious person yet another. From your preferences, one can infer what is radiating in your third body. It is fascinating that the colors you prefer and the color spread around you match.

The psychology of color
Color has profound meaning and use. Some colors provoke anger; red has always been the color of revolution because it is the color of anger—of blood, of killing, of erasing. If this whole room were painted red, everyone’s blood pressure would rise; live long in a red environment and your pressure cannot remain healthy. Blue lowers blood pressure; it is the color of the sky and of supreme peace. If all around is blue, your pressure drops.

Color therapy
Even in water: fill a blue bottle with water and keep it in sunlight—the water lowers blood pressure; its inner chemistry changes, it “drinks” the blue. Keep it in a yellow bottle and its personality changes; the same water in blue and in yellow, both placed in the sun—blue-bottle water resists putrefaction and stays pure longer; the yellow spoils quickly. Yellow is the color of death; it disintegrates things.

These circles of color around your personality will become visible to you on the third body. When you awaken and see across the first three, that awakened seeing itself is harmony. Then, no shaktipat can produce damaging results, because the descending energy will find a pathway through your awareness into the fourth body. If that pathway is not there, the danger is real. That is why I say our first three bodies must be capable—only then can the journey proceed.

The progressive activation of the first three bodies in biological evolution

We will have to begin by understanding a few things from a distance. I have spoken of the seven bodies. Keeping the seven bodies in view, we can divide the whole of existence into seven sections. In all existence, all seven bodies are always present—awake or asleep; active or inactive; distorted or in their intrinsic form—but present.

A piece of metal lies there, a piece of iron lies there—the seven bodies are present in it as well; but all seven are asleep; all seven are inactive. That is why the piece of iron appears dead. A plant is there—its first body has become active, its physical body is active. Hence we begin to have the first glimpse of life in the plant, that it is alive. An animal—its second body has become active. Therefore movements begin in the animal that are not in the plant. The plant has taken root in one place; it is not mobile, because for movement the second body must awaken, the etheric body must awaken. All motion comes from it. If only the first body is awake, there will be no motion—stillness, standstill.

A plant is a standing animal. There are some plants that make slight movements. They are in the intermediate state between plant and animal; they have traveled a little. For example, in the African swamps there are plants that grasp and release with their roots, shifting a little here and there. That is the transitional link between plant and animal.

In the animal the second body is also active. Active does not mean aware; active means functioning. The animal has no idea of it. Because its second, etheric body has become active, anger arises in it, fear arises, love expresses; it runs, it saves itself, it is frightened, it hides, it attacks—and it is mobile.

In man the third body has become active—the astral body. Therefore not only does he move with the body, he moves with the psyche as well; he journeys with the mind—into the future and into the past. For animals there is no future. That is why animals are never seen worried or tense; because all worry is worry about the future—what will happen tomorrow—that is the deep anxiety. But for the animal there is no tomorrow; only today is everything. Not even today—in its sense; because one who has no tomorrow, what meaning does today have? What is, is.

In the human being an even subtler movement has come—the movement of the mind. It has come from the third, astral body. Now he imagines the future with the mind. He worries about what will happen after death; where he will go or not go after dying; where he was or was not before birth—he worries about that too.

Disembodied higher realms
The fourth body becomes active in a few human beings, not in all. And in those in whom the fourth body—the manas (mental) body—becomes active, if they die, they enter the deva-yonī, call it whatever you like—a realm where the activity of the fourth body finds great facility. Up to the third body, a person remains human, if the first three are active. From the fourth body upward, higher realms begin. But from the fourth body a distinction must be understood.

If the fourth body becomes active, the possibility of taking a (gross) body lessens, and the possibility of a disembodied existence increases. But as I said, remember the difference between active and aware. If it is merely active and not conscious, we will call that pret-yonī (the ghost realm); and if it is active and conscious, we call it deva-yonī (the deva realm). That is the only difference between a spirit and a deva. In both, the fourth body has become active; but in the spirit there is no awareness of the activity of the fourth body; he is not aware of it. The deva is aware of the activity of the fourth body. Therefore the spirit, through the activity of the fourth body, will cause all kinds of harm—to himself and to others—because unconsciousness can only harm. And the deva will bring many kinds of benefit—to himself and to others—because awareness can only benefit.

One whose fifth body has become active goes beyond the deva-yonī as well. The fifth body is the atma-body, the soul-body. And at the level of the fifth body, activity and awareness mean the same thing, because no one can reach the fifth without awareness. There, activity and awareness are simultaneous.

Up to the fourth body, one’s journey can happen even while asleep. If one awakens, the journey changes toward the deva-yonī; if one remains asleep, the journey goes toward the pret-yonī. With the fifth body, activity and awareness are one and the same, because it is the soul-body; without awareness there is no meaning to “soul.” The very meaning of soul is consciousness. Therefore another name for soul is consciousness. There is no place for unconsciousness there. So from the fifth body onwards, the two are the same; but before the fifth, the two paths diverge.

Up to the fourth body there is the gap of male and female, and up to the fourth body there is the gap of sleep and awakening. In fact, up to the fourth body are all gaps of duality and conflict. From the fifth body, all nonduality and non-conflict begin. From the fifth body, unity begins. Before that there was diversity, difference.

The human realm is a crossroads
The possibility of the fifth body is not from the deva-yonī, nor from the pret-yonī. This needs to be remembered. The fifth body is not possible from the pret-yonī because the pret-yonī is an unconscious realm; and for awareness the body that is indispensable is not there; the first body is not there—the physical body, from which awareness begins. The first step is not there, from which awareness begins. Not having that step, the spirit must return to the human realm. That is why the human realm is a kind of crossroads.

The deva-yonī is above, but not ahead. Understand the distinction well! From the human realm, the deva-yonī is higher, but not farther ahead—because to go ahead one has to return to the human realm. The spirit has to return because he is unconscious, and to break unconsciousness the physical body is absolutely necessary; the deva has to return because in the deva-yonī there is no kind of suffering. In fact it is an awakened realm; in awakening there cannot be sorrow. And where there is no sorrow there is no urgency for sadhana; where there is no sorrow there is no idea to remove anything; where there is no sorrow there is no idea to attain anything.

So the deva-yonī is a static realm, where there is no forward movement. And a characteristic of pleasure is that if you get pleasure, there remains no movement forward. When there is pain, there is always movement—because to move away from pain, to be free of pain, you search for something. When pleasure is attained, seeking stops. Hence a very strange thing, which people do not understand:

In the lives of Mahavira and Buddha there is a significant note: devas come to learn from them. And when someone asks a Buddha or a Mahavira, what is the meaning of devas coming to a human being! The deva-yonī is higher, so it seems strange that they come to a human being.

But it is not strange. The realm is higher, but it is static; movement has ended there; there is no movement forward from there. And if one wants to move forward, just as for a long jump one takes a few steps back and then leaps, likewise one must return from the deva-yonī, stand in the human realm, and from there the leap happens.

Return from the deva-yonī only by being bored with pleasures
One characteristic of pleasure is that there is no movement forward in it; another is that pleasure is boring. There is nothing more boring in the world than pleasure. Pain does not bore so much; there is hardly any boredom in pain. Pleasure is full of boredom. A suffering mind never gets bored.

Therefore a suffering society is not a dissatisfied society, and a suffering person is not a dissatisfied person; only a happy person is dissatisfied, and the society of the happy is a dissatisfied society. America is more dissatisfied than India. The sole reason is that we are suffering and they are happy; there is no movement ahead, and there is no pain which used to give movement; the repetition of pleasure—the same pleasure, the same pleasure day after day—becomes meaningless.

So the deva-yonī is the very peak of boredom; there is no place more boring in the world. The kind of boredom that arises on reaching there…

But it takes time for boredom to arise. And it depends on sensitivity: the more sensitive a person, the sooner he will be bored; the more insensitive, the longer it will take—perhaps he will not be bored at all. A buffalo grazes the same grass every day and never gets bored all its life. Sensitivity is rare. The more sensitivity, the sooner boredom arises; because sensitivity seeks the new—wants the new. Sensitivity is a kind of restlessness, and restlessness is a kind of life.

Thus, in one sense, the deva-yonī is a dead realm. The pret-yonī is also a dead realm; yet the deva-yonī is even more dead than the spirits’ realm, because in the world of spirits there is, in one sense, no boredom at all. There is plenty of suffering and plenty of facility to inflict suffering; there is much relish in tormenting others, and much opportunity to be tormented oneself. There is much scope for mischief. The deva-yonī is utterly peaceful—no mischief at all.

Therefore the return from the deva-yonī happens due to boredom. Ultimately the return from there is because of boredom. And note: in this sense it is higher than the human realm because sensitivity increases greatly there; the pleasures from which we do not tire in years, in that realm one gets bored after tasting them even once.

That is why you have read in the Puranas that devas long to take birth on earth. Now this seems surprising—there seems no reason for their longing. Because here on earth everyone longs to go to the deva-yonī. And there are also stories that some deva descends and comes to love a woman on earth. These stories are suggestive. Some apsara descends to earth and loves a man—also suggestive. They say: there is much pleasure in that realm, but pleasure becomes insipid—pleasure, pleasure, pleasure! In the midst of it, if there are no moments of pain, it becomes boring. And if both options were placed before us—choose endless pleasure, only pleasure forever, never a moment of pain; or choose endless pain, only pain forever—then an intelligent person would choose pain.

So from the deva-yonī one must return; from the pret-yonī one must return.

One dead in the fifth body is yoniless
The human realm is at the crossroads; from here all journeys are possible. One who attains the fifth body at the human stage need go nowhere after that; he enters the ayoni—yonilessness; he is free of wombs.

You do have the meaning of yoni in mind, don’t you?
Yoni means entering a mother’s womb—whatever class the mother belongs to. Entry into a womb—that is the meaning of yoni. Such a one does not enter any womb. One who has become available to himself—his journey ends in a sense. This person of the fifth body—that is what we call liberation, moksha.

But if he is contented with himself and stops, he can stop—he can remain for an eternity; because there is neither suffering nor pleasure here; no bondage, no pain; here there is nothing at all—only one’s own being, not the being of the All. One can remain in this state for endless time, until the urge to know the All arises within. The seed of that inquiry is within us, so it does arise.

Let the inquiry be supreme
Therefore, if the seeker already carries the longing to know the All, he avoids the inconvenience of stopping in the fifth. If you understand the whole science, the inquiry should be supreme from the beginning. If somewhere in the middle you take some resting place to be the goal, then when you reach that “goal” you will feel the matter is finished.

In the fifth body, freedom from ego; bondage to I-ness
One who has reached the fifth body need not take any realm. But he remains bound to himself—free of all else, yet bound in himself; he is not free of asmitā (I-ness), though he is free of ahamkāra (ego). Understand this well! When I say “I,” I say it to suppress some “you.” Therefore when I suppress a “you” my “I” appears very stiff; and when some “you” suppresses me, my “I” appears whining and weeping. That “I” is an effort to suppress the “you.”

So ego is always in reference to the other. Now the other is finished, there is no longer any relation with the other, no expectation of it. Asmitā is in reference to oneself. This is the difference between ego and I-ness—“you” is no longer relevant to me, but still I am. There is no claim now in the “I,” but there is my being. Now I do not say “I” against any “you,” but I am, without any “you.”

Hence I say—ego says “I,” and I-ness says “am.” That much difference. In “I am” there are both: “I” is ego; “am” is asmitā—the feeling of I-ness. Not against a you, but in favor of oneself—“I am!”

Suppose no one is left in the world—there is a third world war and all die, and I remain. Then within me ego will not remain, but I-ness will be there. I will know that I am—even though I could not tell anyone “I,” because there is no “you” left to tell. When you are absolutely alone and there is no other at all, still you are—in the sense of being.

Thus at the fifth body ego departs, so the greatest link of bondage falls; but I-ness remains, the sense of am-ness remains—free, independent, no bondage, no limitation. Yet I-ness has its own limitation—no limitation of an other remains, but I-ness has its own boundary.

In the sixth body, I-ness breaks or is relinquished. The sixth body is the cosmic body.

Dwij—the knower of Brahman
After the fifth body, the question of yoni ends, but births still remain. Keep that distinction in mind as well! One birth is by a womb, from someone else’s womb; and one birth is from your own womb. Hence in this land we called a brahmin dwij—twice-born. Originally, it was said of the brahma-jnani, not of the caste brahmin; there is no need to say it of the caste brahmin. The brahma-jnani was called dwij—twice-born.

One birth is that which is from the womb—received from another; and there is another birth which is from oneself. When the soul-body is attained, you will never again receive birth from another; now you will have to give birth to your own soul-body into the cosmic body. This is your inner journey: your inner womb. Now this has no relation to any outer womb or outer gestation. You will now have no parents; you yourself will be father, mother, and son. Now it is an utterly solitary journey.

So this state—when from the fifth you enter the sixth body—only then should we say one has become dwij, twice-born; not before. His second birth happens, which is ayoni—without a womb; without any other’s gestation; self-gestated.

The rishi of the Upanishad says: Remove the cover of that womb—that which you have covered with golden vessels! Remove the cover of that womb—which you have veiled with golden curtains!

The veils there are of gold indeed. That is, the veils are such that you won’t feel like breaking them; you will feel like preserving them. Asmitā is the most precious veil upon us; we ourselves will not want to let it go. There will be no other to obstruct; no one will say “stop,” no one to stop you. But the veil of one’s own being is so endearing that you will not be able to drop it.

Therefore the rishi says: Remove the golden veils and open that womb, so that a person may become twice-born.

Thus the brahma-jnani is dwij—the brahma-jnani meaning, one who has attained the sixth body. The journey from the fifth to the sixth is the journey of becoming twice-born. The womb has changed, the realm has changed; now all is without outer womb, and the womb is one’s own.

From the fifth to the sixth is birth; from the sixth to the seventh is death. Therefore we do not call that one dwij again; there is no point—because now…you understand? Now it will be easy.

From the fifth to the sixth we call “birth by oneself.” From the sixth to the seventh we call “death by oneself.” Previously you were born by others—by others’ wombs, by others’ bodies; that death too was others’.

One born of another’s womb also dies another’s death
This must be understood a little. When birth was from another, how can the death be yours? I will be born from my parents—and will I die? How is that possible? The two ends will be incongruent. When the birth is alien, the death cannot be mine; when birth is received from another, death too is of another. The difference is only that last time I appeared from one realm, this time I will enter another realm—hence it is not recognized. When I came, it was visible; when I go, it is not visible.

Do you understand? Before birth there is death. Somewhere you had died; somewhere you were born. Birth is seen; your death is not known.

Now you have received a birth from parents—a body, a frame, a mechanism to run seventy or a hundred years. This mechanism will fall. Its fall was assured the day you were born—falling! When it will fall is not important—falling is! With birth it was decided that you will die. In the very yoni that gives birth, death is hidden; only a gap of a hundred years. In those hundred years you will travel from one end to the other. And from where you came, to that very place you will return. So the birth that is from another’s yoni brings a death that is also of that other-born body; that death is alien. You have not yet been born, nor have you ever truly died; in birth there was another as medium, in death too there will be another as medium.

When from the fifth body you enter the sixth—the Brahma body from the soul-body—you will for the first time be born; you will be self-gestated; your birth will be without a womb. But then an ayoni death will also await you ahead. And where this birth takes you, death will take you beyond even that; because birth will take you into Brahman; death will take you into Nirvana.

Consciousnesses of the sixth body are the avatars, sons of God, and tirthankaras
This life can be very long; it can be endless. One whom we call “God”—if such a consciousness abides there, he becomes “God.” Such a consciousness, if it remains at rest somewhere, will be worshipped by billions; prayers will be sent to it. Those whom we call avatars, God, sons of God—they are the ones who have gone from the fifth to the sixth body; those we call tirthankaras—they too are those who have gone to the sixth body.

If they wish, they can remain in the sixth body for eternity. From this station they can do great benevolence. Harm is no longer possible—there is no question of it. From here they can be profound pointers. And there are such beings in the sixth body who continuously make efforts for the travelers behind—various kinds of efforts. From this sixth body, consciousnesses keep sending many kinds of messages.

And for those who gain even a little awareness of these sixth-body beings, there is no way to place them below “God.” They are indeed God. There is no shortcoming in their being God; the Brahma body is available to them.

Even while alive, one can enter this; even while alive, one can go from the fifth to the sixth. This body can still be present. And when, while alive, someone goes from the fifth to the sixth, we make him a Buddha, a Mahavira, a Rama, a Krishna, a Christ. Those who can see, make him so; for those who cannot see, there is no question.

To one villager Buddha appears to have become God; to another he appears—nothing special, just an ordinary man. Like us, he catches colds; like us, he falls ill; like us, he eats; like us, he walks and sleeps; like us, he dies; then what is the difference between us and him? Those who see, and those who do not—the crowd is always larger of those who do not see. Those who do see appear to be mad. And the poor fellows look mad, because they have no evidence.

In truth, there is no evidence by which to show seeing. Now, this microphone is visible to me; if it is visible to no one else here, what evidence can I give that it is visible! I will say, “It is visible.” And I will be called mad; because if it is not visible to anyone and visible to you, then your mind is cracked.

A tirthankara is hard to recognize
We measure knowledge too, at a deep level, by counting. It too has a vote—knowledge too.

So to some, Buddha appears as God; to some, he does not. One who does not see says, “What madness are you up to! This Buddha is the same who is the son of Suddhodana, so-and-so’s boy; so-and-so is his mother; so-and-so is his daughter-in-law; the same person, not someone else.” Even Buddha’s father does not see that this man has become something else. He too thinks, “He is my son,” and says, “What foolishness are you in? Come back home! What are you doing? The kingdom is being ruined; I am getting old; come back and take charge.” He too does not see what kingdom he has become the master of.

But for one who does see, he becomes a tirthankara, God, son of God—whatever. He will choose some name by which a sixth-body man can be seen even in this state.

At the border of the sixth body there is a glimpse of Nirvana
The seventh body is never available in this (gross) body. In this body the seventh is never available. In this body we can stand only at the boundary of the sixth—at most—where the seventh begins to be seen; the leap, the abyss, eternity begins to be seen; there we can stand.

Therefore, two Nirvanas are spoken of in Buddha’s life—of great significance. One Nirvana is what happened to him under the Bodhi tree on the bank of the Niranjana—forty years before his death. This is called Nirvana. On that day he stood at the boundary. And for forty years he stood there—on that boundary. Second, the day he died—that day is called Mahaparinirvana! That day he entered the seventh.

Therefore, before dying, when someone asks, “What will happen to the Tathagata after death?” Buddha says, “The Tathagata will not be.” But this does not satisfy the mind. Again and again his devotees ask, “When the great Nirvana happens to the Buddha, then what happens?” Buddha says, “Where all ‘happening’ ceases—that is called Mahaparinirvana. As long as something is happening, it is the sixth; as long as something is happening, it is the sixth—it is existence; beyond that, non-existence.”

So Buddha will no longer be. Nothing will remain. Then understand that he never was. He will depart as a dream departs. He will depart as a line drawn on sand disappears in a gust of wind; as you draw a line on water and before you even draw it, it has vanished; just so he will dissolve—nothing will remain.

But this does not satisfy the mind. Our mind wishes—somewhere, somewhere, on some plane, in some corner—far, however far, but let him be; in some form he will be; he will become formless; in shape he will be; he will become shapeless; in word he will be; he will become wordless; as being he will be; he will become emptiness.

After the seventh body there is no way to give any news. There are those standing at the boundary who see the seventh body, who see the abyss; but having gone into that abyss, there is no way to bring back news. Therefore all news about the seventh is from those standing at the edge; there is no news from one who has gone, for there is no way. It is as if we stand at the border of Pakistan and say: there is a house there, and a shop, and a man standing, and a tree, and the sun is rising—but the man stands within the border of India.

The Great Death in the seventh body
From the sixth to the seventh there is the Great Death—mahamrityu. And you will be very surprised to know that in very ancient times acharya meant one who teaches death—who teaches the Great Death. There are such aphorisms that say: Acharya means death. Therefore when Nachiketa reached Yama, he reached exactly the acharya. Yama can teach only death—nothing else. Where one is taught to dissolve, to break, to end.

But before that, one birth is essential—because as yet you are not. And what you have assumed to be your being is completely borrowed; it is not your existence. Even if you lose it, you were not its owner. It is as if I steal something and then donate it. The thing was not mine—how can the donation be mine? What is not mine I cannot give up.

Therefore, in this world, the one we call a renunciate is not a renunciate—because he is leaving what was never his. How can you be the renouncer of what was not yours? And what was not yours, you left—this claim is madness.

Renunciation happens in the passage from the sixth to the seventh; renunciation is there, because there you leave what you are. Nothing else remains with you—you alone remain, and that is what you leave. Therefore there is only one real event of renunciation: entry from the sixth to the seventh. Before that, we are talking childish talk. The man who says “mine” is mad; the one who says “all that was mine I have left” is also mad—because he is still a claimant that it was his, that he considered it his; and now he has given it to someone else, and now it has become someone else’s.

What is ours is only ourselves. But we have no knowledge of that. Therefore from the fifth to the sixth you will know who you are; and from the sixth to the seventh you will be able to renounce that which you are.

And the day someone can renounce what he is, after that there remains nothing to gain, nothing to lose. After that there is no question left. After that there is infinite silence and stillness. After that, we cannot even say “bliss,” we cannot even say “peace,” we cannot even say “truth,” “untruth,” “light”—we cannot say anything.

This will be the situation of the seven bodies.

Attaining the fifth body and awakening are one and the same.

After the fifth body—if the fifth body has become available in the human body, and the fifth body never becomes available without awakening; if you have awakened in the fifth body (without awakening it does not become available)—then obtaining the fifth body and awakening are one and the same. Then you no longer need the earlier bodies; now you can function from the fifth body itself. You are an awakened person; now there is no difficulty. Now the earlier bodies are not needed. This question remains only up to the fourth body, always.

If in the fourth body a man becomes a deva—the fourth body has become active and awake. If the fourth body remains inactive, asleep, he becomes a preta (a ghost). In both situations you will have to return, because you have not yet come to any knowing of your own nature; as yet, even to inquire into your own nature you need the other. Only on the basis of the other will you be able to discover the self. For now, to recognize yourself you still need the other; without the other you would not even be able to recognize yourself. For now, the other will draw your boundaries and become the very reason for your recognition.

Therefore, up to the fourth body, in any case, one has to take birth. After the fifth body there is no need for birth; nor is there any meaning in it. After the fifth body, your being happens without all these four bodies. But with the fifth body a new kind of birth begins to be spoken of—the entry into the sixth body. That is another matter; for that, none of these bodies are needed.

No!
A Tirthankara has to bind a vasana.

Now, this matter is quite another thing. This point, you see, is a completely different matter. Let me say a little about it.

If a Tirthankara has to take birth—as a Tirthankara takes birth—there is a very interesting thing: before dying, he does not have to drop the fourth body. And there is a way not to drop it, a method. That way is the vasana—the urge, the seed-intention—of being a Tirthankara.

When the fourth body is about to drop, one vasana must be saved so that the fourth does not drop. After the fourth has dropped you cannot be born again; the bridge through which you could return is broken. So, before the fourth body, the vasana of being a Tirthankara has to be preserved.

That is why not all who are qualified to be Tirthankaras become Tirthankaras. Many who are qualified simply set out straight on the journey. Only a few do—and therefore their number has been fixed. The reason for fixing the number is that that many are enough; there is no need for more people to carry such a vasana. So it is fixed that for so many ages, so many Tirthankaras will suffice; for so many people, so many Tirthankaras will be enough.

Thus the Tirthankara-vasana has to be bound—and bound with great intensity, because it is the last vasana. If it slips from the hand even a little, the matter is finished. “I will teach others, I will tell others, I will explain to others; I have to come back for others”—in the fourth body, the seed of that one vasana must be powerful. If it is powerful, the descent will happen.

But that means the fourth body has not yet been dropped; the fifth body has been stepped into, but a peg has been driven into the fourth body. That peg loosens so swiftly that often it is a very difficult affair.

The process of making a Tirthankara
Therefore there is a process for making a Tirthankara. Tirthankaras are made in schools; they are not just solitary individuals. Suppose a school is practicing—some seekers are doing sadhana—and among them they find a person who has the full qualification to be a teacher: what he knows, he can say; what he knows, he can convey; he can communicate it to another. Then that school will begin to drive pegs into his fourth body and tell him, “Take care of the fourth body; do not let this fourth body end. You will need this fourth body—save it.” And he will be taught the methods for preserving it.

A Tirthankara’s rebirth out of compassion
And to preserve it demands as much effort as does not have to be made to let it go—for letting go happens very simply. When all the moorings have been pulled up, the sail is hoisted, the wind has filled it, the distant ocean is calling, and there is bliss everywhere—then to hold back that one peg, how difficult it is! It is hard even to calculate.

That is why we say of a Tirthankara: you are supremely compassionate. There is no other reason; because the great part of his compassion is precisely this—that when it was time for him to go, when every preparation to go was complete, he stayed back for those who are still on the shore, whose boats are not yet ready. His boat was completely ready. Now he bears the hardships of this shore, its dust, its abuses, its stones—and his boat was fully ready, he could have departed at any moment. He has stayed among all this for no personal need. They can even kill him. His compassion has no end.

But the vasana of that compassion is created in the school. Therefore, solitary individual seekers never become Tirthankaras. Later they do not even know when the peg has been uprooted. When the boat has started moving, only then do they realize that the matter is gone; the shore is receding. So, to keep that peg requires many other kinds of arrangements.

The contribution of other awakened ones in the descent of a Tirthankara
And to aid all this, as I said, those who are available to the sixth body—whom we might call God—also sometimes cooperate. Finding a person worthy, one who must not be allowed to leave this shore yet, they make a thousand efforts. The deities also assist—as I said, they will assist in the auspicious—they make a thousand attempts, inspiring this person: “Save this one peg. We can see this peg; you cannot—but save it.”

So the world is not anarchic, not disorderly; there are very deep orders in it—orders within orders. And many times, even after many kinds of attempts, still things go wrong. As in the case of Krishnamurti, there was great effort to drive the peg; it could not happen. A whole school worked very hard; the attempt was to drive that peg; it did not succeed. That effort failed. There were hands from behind it, too—far-reaching souls; those of the sixth body, those of the fifth, those awakened in the fourth—thousands of hands. And this was the attempt: Krishnamurti was chosen, and two or four children were chosen with the possibility that they could be made Tirthankaras. The chance was missed; it could not happen; the peg could not be driven. Therefore the benefit the world might have had from Krishnamurti as a Tirthankara could not come. But that is another matter; it has nothing to do with our point here.

We will talk again tomorrow.