Jin Sutra #2

First, neither can anyone make you blissful nor can anyone make you impoverished. Whatever you become is your own decision. You can find whatever excuses you like.

Mahavira said, “Life is futile.” He said it so that you might awaken to the Great Life. If you took it wrongly and dropped this life—and fell downward instead of rising into the Great Life—then that is on you. You were standing on a step of the ladder and Mahavira said, “Let go of this; move on.” You did let go, but you stepped back. The fault lies in your understanding.

In life, responsibility is always ours. Drop the habit of shifting it onto others. Mahavira spoke so that you would rise toward the Great Life. He criticized this life in praise of a supreme life.

This life which you call “life”—what in it deserves the name? Even if you become accomplished in it, what will you gain? If you get it, nothing is really gotten; if you lose it, nothing is truly lost. It is dreamlike. He told you to awaken from the dream. You did not wake up; you sank into a great stupor. The mistake crept into your point of view, into your interpretation. Your commentary is deluded.

Look at Mahavira himself—does he appear impoverished? And what would true richness be? Have you seen any image of the divine more beautifully glorified than Mahavira? Any presence more illumined, more resplendent? Have you seen anywhere such majesty as manifested in Mahavira? Such ecstasy, such bliss, such music playing—have you heard it anywhere else? Krishna must take up a flute for music to arise; with Mahavira, music played without a flute. Meera must dance for the music to happen; with Mahavira, a dance happened without dancing. He took no support—not even of the veena, not of dance, not of flute. Krishna appears beautiful—he wears the peacock plume. Mahavira has no prop whatsoever for beauty—unsupported, without any crutch. Yet have you ever seen such a revelation of the divine—such profundity of life, such dense bliss? Then Mahavira cannot be against life. Otherwise he would have withered, as Jain monks have withered. He cannot be against life; otherwise he would have turned ugly, as Jain monks have become. He would have shriveled. He renounced life, yet he did not shrivel. He chose death—the Great Death—yet he did not die. Death only refined him further. In accepting death, his life became even richer, a deeper rain of wealth showered upon him.

You live frightened of death. Mahavira was free even of that fear; his life became fearless. You are anxious lest your wealth be snatched away; so even if you have wealth, the anxiety that it might be taken outweighs the wealth itself. Don’t see only that Mahavira left his wealth; see that the anxiety vanished with it. When there is no wealth, where is the question of it being taken? Mahavira dropped everything that carries fear with it; he dropped all that brings worry in its wake.

But remember, the emphasis is not on renunciation. It is on what was found: a state free of worry; an incomparable peace; fearlessness. Truth manifested through Mahavira. Such a thing has happened very rarely.

If you understand Mahavira closely, first see this: there was no “reason” around him, no dramatic cause. Jesus is revered—the crucifixion is the reason. Had Jesus not been crucified, Christianity would not have arisen; hence the cross became the symbol. The suffering of Jesus drew the sympathy of millions. Suffering always attracts sympathy.

Krishna has the notes of the flute; animals dance, birds rejoice, men and women run to him. What does Mahavira have? Neither flute nor cross. Mahavira stands utterly naked—without even clothes. There is nothing around him that would draw people to him. Yet people went. Yet people bowed at those feet.

Krishna said, “Abandon all dharmas; come to me alone for refuge. Leave everything—come to my refuge!” Even then, Arjuna hesitated and hesitated to surrender. From his hesitation the Gita was born; he went on doubting.
Mahavira said, “There is no need to take refuge in anyone. Do not come to my refuge; go into your own refuge!” Yet people came to Mahavira’s feet—surely something glorious happened! People must have seen something unique!

That uniqueness has been lost from Jainism—that is another matter. Do not attribute that to Mahavira. Jainism is yours. Jainism is your interpretation of Mahavira. Jainism is not what Mahavira gave; it is what you took. What Mahavira said is one thing; what you grasped and understood is quite another. The collection of your understandings is what you call your scripture, your religion, your civilization, your culture.

Certainly—as I was saying yesterday—all twenty-four Tirthankaras of the Jains were Kshatriyas. They came from the battlefield. They came after seeing the pain of war, the violence of war, the futility of war. Their nonviolence is not the nonviolence of fear, not the nonviolence of cowards—it is the nonviolence of the brave. Seeing that there is only cowardice in violence, they renounced violence. But then what happened? Jainism was formed by merchants, by Vaishyas. You will not find Kshatriyas among the Jains; they are all shopkeepers. What a misfortune! Those whose Tirthankaras are all Kshatriyas have followers who are all shopkeepers. No—the ones who took it, took it in a different sense. They said, “We will not kill anyone, and no one should kill us; we will not quarrel and we will not get beaten.” They proclaimed, “Ahimsa paramo dharmah—nonviolence is the highest religion.” They said, “This is a wonderful thing. This is like a shield: we do not believe in killing or dying.”

But look at the Jains: is there fearlessness in their nonviolence? You will find fear—nothing but fear—twitching underneath. They are nonviolent out of fear.

They are afraid that no one should kill them, loot them, fleece them, or create trouble—so naturally they go on talking of nonviolence.

Mahavira’s nonviolence comes from an experience beyond death. As for the Jains’ nonviolence—they have not even known life, let alone the experience of death!

The fear of emptiness! Because of it people are ready to endure anything—heaven or hell, pleasure or pain—but they are not ready to disappear. Emptiness means disappearance! You are not ready to disappear here, nor there. You want to be saved. This urge to be saved is the expression of fear. The friend who has asked is ready even to cling to suffering—at least he will be! He will survive! Let it be suffering, let it be hell—but he is not ready to disappear.

And this is the supreme truth of life: so long as you cling to yourself you will keep dissolving anyway; and the day you let go, the day you consent to be nothing, in that very instant the Whole happens—instantly. In that revolution there is not even a moment’s wait. The moment you are ready to be nothing, you are total. Then no obstruction remains. Where can there be a barrier when fear has vanished? If you are willing even to be effaced, your grip is gone. One who consents to be nothing—will he cling to wealth? One who does not even hold on to himself—what will he hold on to money for? Under all grasping, the first grasp is of “me.” Why do you clutch wealth? Not for wealth itself—you clutch it to clutch yourself. Wealth promises safety, arrangements for the future. Tomorrow won’t be so scary; there is a safe, there is a bank balance. If sickness comes, old age comes, anything comes—money offers the assurance of security.

You cling to yourself; therefore you cling to wealth. You cling to yourself; therefore you clutch wife and children.

The Upanishads say: no one really loves the wife; people love themselves, therefore they love the wife. The wife is only a pretext.

You say you love someone—but what is the meaning of your love? Its meaning is only this: because of you I feel elated; because you are there I feel pleasure—but you are the means, I am the end. You love your children and cling to them—why? They are props for old age. They will lend a shoulder to your ambitions. They will fulfill your ambitions in the future. You know you will not be able to fulfill them—ambitions are endless. Desires are insatiable—there are so many! Life is so short; it slips away like water from the hand! You won’t be able to complete it, but your children will complete your memory; they will continue the lineage; they will preserve the father’s name. You will be gone, yet by leaning on the children you try to discover some kind of eternity for yourself. You think, “Another kind of immortality is not possible, let me at least live through my children; it is my blood, my genes! Even if this body does not remain, I will live through my children.”

The father lives in the son; the mother lives in the son. Thus the tradition is formed: “If we are not, at least ours will be!” So you cling to “ours.” But beneath every grasping is the grasping of “I.” One who has tried to understand will not start by dropping money—what has money to do with it! Money is secondary. The real issue is to drop the grip of “I.” You must be ready for such a moment when even if “I” is not, what harm is there? What harm? What will be erased? What will be lost? What is in your hand anyway? You are afraid to open the fist; I say your fist is empty. You say, “Then let it remain clenched—even if it hurts to keep it so—at least it is closed!” People say, “A closed fist holds a lakh!” It is empty, yet they say, “A closed fist holds a lakh!” Because if nothing is visible you can imagine there are lakhs, crores, whatever you wish. Open it—and the lakhs are gone! The fist is empty! Whether you tighten it or open it—what difference? The fist is empty.

You say, “Then suffering is better; even the semblance of pleasure is better—at least there is something!” This is the voice of the follower. The one who has asked is a Jain. This is not the voice of Mahavira. Mahavira says: renounce possession, renounce the world, renounce craving, so that in this very renouncing, what is hidden behind all of it and keeps saving itself becomes clear to you—that at the root you are saving the ego, saving yourself. Drop all the excuses and it will be seen plainly that you are busy saving yourself! But what sense is there in saving? And how will you save by saving? Either you are inherently saved—if that is your nature—or if immortality is not your very nature, then however much you save, you will not be saved!

Therefore Mahavira says: drop this frenzy! Drop this urge to survive! Drop this jeev-eshana—the lust to go on living. It is the basis of all sins. “I want to live—even if I have to kill others in order to live, I will live! I want to live—what do I care who dies!”

The entire key to Mahavira’s ahimsa (non-violence) is this: just as you want to live, so does everyone. Do to others only what you want done to you. Do not kill anyone! But the one who will not kill anyone will begin to die.

This life is a struggle. If you do not press someone’s neck, someone will press yours. Here, the best defense is attack. Ask Machiavelli! Learn ahimsa from Mahavira, and violence from Machiavelli. Machiavelli says: before anyone attacks you, attack; do not give the other the first move, otherwise in the struggle you will already be behind. Strike, strike first—before someone strikes you. This is the formula for the struggle of life, for self-preservation. The big fish eats the small fish. Become powerful and keep devouring others—there lies your life.

Mahavira asks, what will you do with such a life? What is its essence, what is its meaning? Even if you save it—what will be saved, what will you really gain?

Mahavira says: I have seen it all. This whole life is false, illusory. It is not worth killing another for. If in saving another you have to let yourself be erased—erase yourself. Nothing is really being lost. And Mahavira speaks with such assurance because he knows: that which is hidden in your innermost core has no death. What you are saving is your false image, your false notion of yourself. The ego you are saving—that will die. It is given by society; it will end with death. As you came—bare, virginal, at birth—so virginal you will depart at death. Your name, address, identity—everything will be left here. And that which goes with you even beyond death and was with you even before birth—that never dies. Stop the race to save yourself, and you will come upon That which is forever saved. Stop securing yourself, and you will discover That which is forever secure.

When I speak of becoming empty, it only means this: you are already whole. The moment you consent to be empty, your runaround ceases. When it ceases, the entire consciousness is freed from the chase and returns home. If you do not go out, where will you go? You will come home! There is no road back home—you simply stop going out, and you are home. Home is what you are; it is your craving that wanders afar.

You are sitting here listening to me; it may be you are only sitting here bodily, while your desire roams elsewhere—perhaps in Calcutta, Delhi, Bombay. To the extent your mind has gone to Bombay while listening to me, to that extent you are not here. If your whole mind has gone to Bombay, then you are not here at all. Your being here or not makes no difference. Only an effigy sits here, without life, for the life-breaths have wandered into desire. You do not actually go out; when the mind gets entangled in desire, you go out. Desire is the pathway outward. If for a single instant you do not go out—where then will you go? When all bridges to the outside are broken, all doors and gates closed, all routes futile; when you do not go into wealth, not into status, not into love, you do not go out anywhere—suddenly you will find yourself sitting at home, where you have always been, from where you have never budged for even a moment, not by a hair’s breadth, from where there is no way to depart. Mahavira calls That your nature. Mahavira calls That dharma—That which cannot be departed from, which cannot be lost even if you try, which cannot be erased even if you attempt to erase it. What slips away is other-than-you.

Your clothes can be stripped—they are not your nature. Your body can be taken—it is not your nature. Your mind can be taken—still not your nature. Beyond body and mind there is something—ineffable—which has never been snatched, nor can it be.

Clouds gather in the sky; the sky is not destroyed. For a moment it is not visible, it seems lost, hidden—but it is not annihilated. The clouds pass, the rain ends, the clouds depart—the sky stands as it is. Just so, desires gather in your inner sky—there is tumult, thunder, lightning: anger, greed, attachment, illusion—thousands of clouds. Then the day awareness awakens—the clouds are gone! You are not spoiled by them. Your virginity is such that it cannot be spoiled. Clouds will always come and go; the sky remains ever virginal. The sky does not commit adultery! Not even a line of the cloud remains, not even its shadow remains. You will not find footprints even if you try. Clouds leave no signature, no address: “I was here.” Thus your bodies are lost.

How many bodies have been on this earth before you! Are you anything new? Scientists say that where you sit, at least ten corpses lie buried. In the little space you occupy, at least ten people have died, been buried, been lost. There you too will be lost. And that is only people; count the animals, the insects, flies and mosquitoes, trees and plants—wherever you sit, infinite lives have come and gone. There you too will go. You are going even now—slipping into the pit every moment. Death draws nearer. Moment by moment life empties out. The pot will be empty drop by drop. And yet—there is something in you that never empties.

Whatever has come from the world, the world will take back. But there is something with you that you received from no one—it is simply yours. That is your treasure. That is your soul.

When I say, become empty, all it means is: become empty of clouds so that you become full of sky. Become empty of the futile so that the meaningful may appear. Become empty of the outside so that the inner music may begin to be heard. You stand in the marketplace; inside the music is always playing, but you do not hear it—the market’s noise is too loud. Come inside! Close your eyes and ears a little! Leave the market! Forget the market! Then the inner music will begin to be heard—the unstruck sound will be heard.

Day and night that veena plays. Not for a single instant is there a break in that murmur. But the sound is very subtle. When you become alert in listening, when your hearing is trained, when your ears turn inward, when gradually you become skilled in catching the subtle and subtler—then, then you will hear the music of that veena which the yogis call anahata, the unstruck sound.

Every other sound is stricken—born of two things colliding. If I clap, two hands strike. With one hand there is no clap. But within you there is a sound that goes on day and night. It is not a stricken sound. It is a one-handed clap. It is not born of two things colliding, otherwise one day it would stop. When the two stop colliding, it would cease. That sound is your nature—Omkar, Pranava. It is your very nature.

Have you ever noticed? Hindu, Jain, Buddhist—these three great dharmas were born in India. Their philosophies differ—sky to earth. Their frameworks differ, their routes differ. One is the path of surrender, another of resolve; one of struggle, another of refuge—one of worship and prayer, devotion; another of meditation and samadhi. Yet one thing all three accept—Om, the sound of Om. There is no way to deny it. Whenever anyone has gone within, that sound has been heard. There has never been an exception. It is the life-sound, the Brahman-sound.

So when we say, become empty, it only means: become empty of the outer noise. And for now whatever you know is nothing but outer noise. Therefore we say, become totally empty of what you take yourself to be! Up to now you have cobbled your image out of the futile—bits of paper. The eternal has no relation with your present image. You say, this is my name, my caste, my religion, my house, my lineage, my country; I am Hindu, or Jain, or Muslim, or Christian; I am poor or rich; educated or uneducated; fair or dark; respected or insulted; saint or sinner—everything you have added comes from outside. It is what others have said, and you have assembled it.

Therefore we say, empty yourself of yourself. Remove all this rubbish. And there is no need to be afraid. Fearlessly remove the rubbish, because what is not rubbish—even if you try to remove it—you will not be able to remove it. There is no need for fear. Do not remove timidly, worrying lest the diamonds be lost. Those diamonds are such that they cannot be lost. Even if you set this house on fire, nothing is spoiled. You will come out pure, intact—because your nature does not burn.

Nainam chindanti shastrani, nainam dahati pavakah—
No sword can cut it, no fire can burn it.
Fire does not burn it; weapons do not pierce it. Immortality is your nature.

But this is the language of the follower—he gets scared. He says, “Then let me remain in the world; false though it be, at least there is some pleasure! If not fulfillment, at least there is hope—something at least!” There is suffering—no matter, at least I am! Thorns prick—no matter, I’ll wear shoes, find medicines, apply ointments, avoid thorny roads—but at least I am! But what will you do with this “I”? What will you do with this ego?

It isn’t hard to die—try it, at least once.
Why keep dying before death?

All of Mahavira’s teaching is a teaching of death—the art of becoming empty. But the art of emptiness is the very art of fullness. Choose either word you like; still, I would say: choose emptiness. If you choose fullness, you will miss—because with fullness comes greed. You will say, “Ah, then I’ll be complete—wonderful!” The ego catches the flavor! The very ego that must be dropped becomes full of the ambition to be complete! Then you will keep pumping more air into the balloon; the ego will inflate further. Intoxication with completeness will possess you. Therefore the sages speak the language of emptiness—knowing that in the end fullness happens, but it is not wise to tell you so. It is dangerous to tell you.

What Mahavira said, you have not heard as he said it; otherwise these bad days, this misery, this poverty would not have befallen. Those who throw this blame and raise such disputes—the fact they point to is there; but it points toward you, not toward Mahavira. If only you had understood Mahavira, such blessedness would have flowered in this land, such a constellation of glorious blossoms gathered here as nowhere else could be. Had you understood Mahavira, the boundless within you would have manifested; a halo of light would surround you. Even if nothing were in your hands outwardly, you would be rich. And now the situation is such that even if you have everything, your poverty does not leave you.

If you have not seen the poverty of the rich, you have seen nothing. If you have not seen the powerlessness of the powerful, you have seen nothing. If you have not seen the impotence of those in high office, you have seen nothing. What is behind the flags of swagger but weakness? The bigger the flags and higher the poles in the hand, the deeper the inner inferiority. If there is no inferiority, who wanders with rods and flags? What need is there? Whom to show? The one who has seen his own nature—nothing remains to show.

And this that you call life, this so-called acceptance of life—what is there in it that is life-like?

In a dream I had an affair of thoughts with you;
When the eyes opened there was neither life nor profit.
Mine-yours was a meeting conjured by dream. For when the eyes opened—as Tulsidas says, “No loss, no gain.” Such an account! Such trade in a dream! In the morning you find—no loss, no gain.

What you call life is a dream. Better to call it a dream. Real life you have not yet known. And what you have known is not life.

Show me a way to escape this circuit of time and space,
Show me what is gained by this futile existence!
What is gained from this futile life! Show me what is meaningful here! Show me a way to get out of this useless prison!

Show me a way to escape this circuit of time and space,
Show me what is gained by this futile existence!
What is gained from this vain running about?

Cry out that age is advancing,
Bid the sky halt this caravan of morn and eve.
Call out, tell the sky to stop now this caravan of morning and evening—allow a journey beyond time! We have lived too long in time!

Morning comes, evening falls—and life is spent!
The same morning, the same evening, the same repetition—like the ox at the oil-press going round and round, blindfolded. It seems a journey is happening, yet you reach nowhere. If there were a journey, you would reach somewhere. Think at least once—where have you reached? You have walked so much and are so tired, yet never arrive, standing where you began! What madness is this race where not a hair’s breadth of journeying happens while life after life is consumed!

Cry out that age is advancing,
Bid the sky halt this caravan of morn and eve.
But the sky does not halt the caravan of dawn and dusk—you will have to halt it yourself. This is not a matter of someone else calling. No one else can halt your caravan of mornings and evenings. The stream of morning and evening will continue; you step out of the stream. The world will keep moving—it always has. You make the leap. You stand on the shore. All that can happen is that you disentangle yourself from this tumult; you awaken from the dream.

What do you call life? That which lies between birth and death? Mahavira calls life that which is beyond birth and death. What lies between birth and death is not life—it is a long dream. At birth you fall asleep; at death you awaken—then you realize that what you called life was a dream.

The journey of life does not end;
Death only changes the road.
Death changes only the road—one life ends, another begins; the second ends, a third begins. Death only changes the road—until you awaken and step out of this current, out of this swoon and trance.

No—Mahavira has given this country neither misery nor poverty. It may be that, having heard Mahavira, the way you understood him, you sentenced yourself to poverty and misery. Mahavira gave you the key to the Great Life. Mahavira’s so-called renunciation of life—call it only this: the renunciation of illusory life. And the renunciation of the illusory is the foundation of the real. The renunciation of the illusory is the beginning of spirituality. And the attainment of true life is the fulfillment of spirituality.

It is natural, because up to now we have taken moving away from home to be life itself. That became the habit. In that we were dyed and soaked and grew up. That is what our mind has been schooled in. That is our conditioning. That is the inheritance of our actions. That is the distillate of all our lives. To go outward is all we know. We have never gone within—not even taken a single step.

So toward a direction where you have never set foot, where you have never even raised your eyes—if the mind hesitates and is afraid to go—an unfamiliar, unknown path: who knows what it may be like—that is natural. That is why people talk of spirituality but do not go; they settle for discussion and never descend.

There is no cost in discussion; it is a diversion, an entertainment. You listen, you “understand,” you read, you latch onto a scripture, you visit a temple or a mosque—but you do not go within.

That is precisely why people built temples and mosques outside: even if the craze to “go to temple or mosque” seizes you, you go outward. Lest in some craze you take a step inward and land yourself in difficulty.

The path is unfamiliar, and trackless. Then, on the outer road there is a crowd. You are not alone; everyone is with you. On the inner path you will be alone—that too is frightening. No one can go with you there—no friend, no companion, no husband, no wife, no son, no mother, no father—no one. You will have to go utterly alone. As you will go alone in death, so too you must go alone into yourself. No one can die for you, and no one can go within for you. So just as people fear death, they fear meditation. Yes, if it is about talking of meditation, they are ready. In this country ask anyone, ask whomever you like, “What is meditation?”—he will answer; “What is prayer, worship?”—he will give a discourse. There is hardly any subject people here do not “know.” Bring up Brahman, and anyone, any passerby, will trumpet his knowledge. Easy—there is no cost in it. But speak of going within: the feet wobble; panic arises.

The first panic: the way is new. The second, deeper one: you will be alone. You have never gone anywhere alone; whenever you travelled, it was with someone. You never made a journey alone, so the habit of aloneness has withered. That is why a sannyasin goes into solitude—to practice being alone. He is only practicing outer aloneness so that, little by little, the courage and skill to be inwardly alone arises. The only purpose of outer solitude is to gain a little courage to be alone. He sits in a dark cave—no one there—darkness closes in, night falls, wild animals all around—alone. Slowly he settles in. Slowly he begins to forget that “the other” is needed. Courage comes; self-trust grows: “Yes, I can be alone.” Such outer solitude then becomes a staircase leading within.

Outer solitude is not the end—it is a means. So the one who thinks, “Now that I can sit in a cave, I have attained inner knowing,” has gone astray. Sit in a cave for millions of years—nothing will happen. Sitting in a cave was only a step. Just as one who wants to swim does not jump at once into the deep; he flounders near the shore where the water is up to the throat, to the waist; there he learns. Once he learns, he goes to the deep. But if, even after learning, he keeps floundering only at the shore, then whether he learned or not is the same. You could have stood there without learning; throat-deep water was safe.

So those who have shut themselves up in caves and think they have “arrived” are also deluded.
Some are lost in the world; some are lost in renunciation.

Sannyas is only a means—to draw you a little out of the crowd; to give you a glimpse, and the confidence that there is joy even in aloneness, that there is more joy, that aloneness has its own music, its own intoxication, a bliss never known before that comes in aloneness. Sit a little in a cave, away from the marketplace, the crowd, your people, far from the worries and anxieties of the world; once you taste: “Ah! If there is so much flavor in outer aloneness, how much more must there be in inner aloneness!”—then the call of the within begins to arise. Certainly, no cave is as solitary as the inner cave. For even in a cave, trees sway outside, sounds arise, wind passes, the cuckoo sings, the lion roars—someone is there. The moon and stars are in the sky. Even if you sit in a Himalayan cave, an airplane passes by—someone is there. Nowhere are you that alone. The world sends its news in one form or another: an ant bites, a scorpion appears—you jump up. Someone is there. You are not utterly alone.

In the inner cave there is no one. No airplane passes, no ant climbs, no scorpion comes, no lion roars, no rustling of wind in trees, no murmur of water—no one at all. There, only the vast, vast, silent, dense you are. A great depth, a supremely deep emptiness is there. A peace like the peace that was when God had not even thought, “I am alone; let me create the world”—such a peace.

In that moment you arrive where God must have been before creating the world. You touch the First. You reach that dawn when the world had not yet begun; when it had not yet manifested, lay hidden as a seed; when the cosmos was still lost in the egg; when God’s dream had not yet begun to spread. You arrive at the first step of creation. Such is the depth of the peace—endless peace, eternal peace.

Naturally, panic arises. That peace is like the peace in death. Everything is lost—so fear comes. Therefore people listen to talks about going within; they even think, “Someday we will go.”

Two people were talking, each trying to stamp his way of life on the other, boasting loudly. One said, “I get up at five every morning.” The other said, “That’s nothing; I get up at three. Rishis have always risen at three. Getting up at five—what is that? You’re lazy. I get up at three—bath, meditation, worship; then I go walking at sunrise; then I return for study of scriptures, reflection; then I go to the office; then I come back; then I go to play; then in the evening I come home—sit with the children, talk, music; and exactly at nine I go to sleep.”
The first man was amazed. He asked, “Since when have you been doing this?”
The other replied, “Don’t ask that. From tomorrow I intend to start.”

People make resolutions. “We will meditate!” The moment you say “will,” you have missed. Do it! This moment is the moment. Enter—do not make plans. Planning is the mind’s trick. The mind is very cunning: it says, “We’ll do it tomorrow.”

People come to me and say, “We want to take sannyas.” I say, “Then take it! Who is stopping you? I am not stopping you.” They say, “No—we will take it.” Then it is your choice. Do you trust tomorrow? Will there be a tomorrow? Are you so assured? If death comes in between, what will you do? Will you say, “Let me take sannyas—please wait”?

One of our sannyasins is Gita. Her father wanted to take sannyas. For about a year he had been telling me. He had been listening to me for ten years. Two months ago he came; he stayed a month; he came two or three times to see me. I asked him, “What are you waiting for now?” He said, “There is no delay—now you understand. I have to take it, and I will!” He came to see me one last time; I asked him, “Certain—tomorrow?” He said, “I am not that old yet.” But he went—and that was the last meeting. That day he left here and went straight to the hospital. That night—heart attack. He did not survive.

They postpone to tomorrow: “We will do it tomorrow.” Whoever postpones to tomorrow, in truth, does not want to do it. It is better to say, “I do not want to do it.” At least there will be honesty, truth, authenticity. But the dishonesty is immense. You say, “We will do it!” Thus you hide. You do not want to do it, yet you reassure yourself: “I am not a bad man; I am religious; of course I will do it.”

People look for excuses—who knows how many. The husband says, “My wife stops me.” Who has ever been able to stop whom? When death comes, will your wife stop it? And in other matters she cannot stop you. All her life she has been stopping you from looking at other women—she has not been able to. You say, “What to do, it is a compulsion!” But when she says, “Do not meditate,” you immediately agree: quite right—“My wife stops me; what can I do!”

Where you want to remain stuck, you find some excuse. Where you do not want to be stopped, you accept no excuse. You say, “I am helpless; passion seizes me—what can I do?” The doctor says, “Do not eat so much.” The wife restrains, the children explain, the neighbors and friends advise.

I have a friend—he keeps eating. His body has become so heavy it can hardly be managed. The doctor is worn out advising him. The last time he went to the doctor, he said, “A strange thing! At night when I sleep, my eyes remain open.” The doctor said, “Of course—they will. Your skin is stretched so tight that when you close your mouth your eyes open; when you keep your mouth open the skin slackens a bit, so your eyes can close. That is what happens!” The whole world is restraining him. He himself says he wants to stop, but “What to do—I am helpless!”

Does such helplessness ever seize you for meditation? For sannyas? For self-search? No—there you find excuses. You invent some rationale—“The children are small, I have to get them married,” as though you have to carry them around and make them grow. They will grow by themselves. Even if you do nothing, they will grow. Even if you do nothing, they will marry. Try stopping them from marrying and you will know—they will not stop at your forbidding, let alone your doing. Who has been able to stop you? How will you stop your children?

No one stops anyone, but man is dishonest. He finds ways. For what you do not want to do, you place the blame on others. What you want to do, you do. Understand this honestly.

People talk of meditation, of the soul, of the Divine. They say, “Someday we must travel—let’s prepare!” The journey never seems to happen; they keep reading the timetable. Some people only read timetables.

Go! Set out sometime! Fear is natural. You will have to go even with fear—right in the midst of fear. If you think, “When the fear is gone, then I will go,” you will never go.

We saw nothing thereafter but a twisting, writhing flame;
Up to the candle we too saw the moth go.

The moth can be seen only up to the candle. When it touches the flame—one flare, and finished.

People have seen those who go toward meditation—and then seen them vanish. Hence the panic. They saw Vardhaman going toward meditation; then a flare—Vardhaman vanished! The one who returned was someone else. Mahavira is utterly other—what has he to do with Vardhaman? Vardhaman turned to ash, burned up in meditation. They saw Siddhartha go; the one who returned—Buddha. Someone else.

That is why there is fear—you might dissolve. You certainly will! But also look at the one who returns after dissolving—how auspicious, how beautiful he is!

You have seen the moth go—see also the beauty of the flame! When the moth is lost in the light, see that light too. Then the panic will lessen. That is the meaning of the true Guru: to be near someone who is lost—so that a little courage arises in you too, a little taste for being lost. You say, “Come—let us see, let me take one step as well.”

There is dying, but beyond that dying there is an awakening. There is a crucifixion, but behind it is a resurrection. If you read only scriptures, there will be difficulty. In scriptures the story runs only up to where the moth reaches the candle. Beyond that the scripture cannot go. Find some Mahavira; find some Buddha—someone who has gone all the way; the moth that has burned, and yet from that ash a fragrance rises, a perfume, a sweetness; someone who has become a “no,” and yet in whom the supreme rain of being is pouring. Find such a one!

If you do not find a living Master, then scriptures—until a Master is found. Scriptures are a compulsion, a misfortune—groping in the dark. Reading scriptures will increase the panic; and scriptures cannot reassure you—no matter how they insist—because what trust can you place in a book? You need someone living.

That is why whenever the flame of religion sweeps the world, it is because of a living person. When Mahavira lived, hundreds of thousands went into sannyas! A fire blazed through the forest; flame-flowers bloomed on every tree! Those who had never even dreamed of it—went into sannyas.

Have you seen a forest of flame-of-the-forest? When the palash blooms, the whole woodland turns saffron, filled with flames. So it was when Mahavira walked this earth for a few days—those days were supremely fortunate. Such feet touch this earth very rarely. Those who caught even a whiff, a breeze from him—wings sprouted on them! They became moths! Then they did not worry. Seeing this man, trust arose: “All right, let us leap too!” A faith was born. Faith never arises from scriptures; at most, belief arises. For faith, someone living is needed—a proof, a presence in whom the Vedas stand up alive! A Master is needed in whom the shastras are living! Then when Mahavira disappears, people collect his words in scriptures; worship begins, recitation goes on, pandits gather, and everything goes dead—then all is cremation ground. While Mahavira lived, the Jina’s religion was living; after that, all is cemetery.

And remember—do not be disheartened; it never happens that no feet are on the earth through which the earth is blessed. Never think, “What to do—we are unfortunate; we were not in Mahavira’s time!” In Mahavira’s time too there were many as unfortunate as you who could not see him. Mahavira passed through their village and they did not see. They saw something else: “This man stands naked—immoral! Obscenity! He may be the supreme saint—but standing naked is against society.” They drove him out, stoned him. The very one at whose feet they had to be lost, they opposed. And do not think they were fools—they were you. They were just like you. There is no difference at all. And they had their reasons: “This man is anti-Veda—and the Veda is supreme knowledge!” A living Master is always anti-scripture. There is a reason: when a living event of religion is happening, do not drag in stale talk. What have you to do with stale? When fresh food is prepared, it will be the opposite of the stale, because you will throw the stale away. You say, “When the fresh is here, who will eat the stale?” You eat the stale only when the fresh is not available—out of compulsion.

When a living Master arises, people put the scriptures aside. They say, “Keep them—we will look later! Who knows when this moment will pass? Right now, what stands before us, revealed, descended—let us dance with this flame a little, play a little; let us come close. This is the opportunity for satsang; scriptures we can see later. No hurry—there are lifetimes.”

Hence whenever a living Master appears, those who uphold old scriptures become his opponents, because because of him people begin to set scriptures aside. When scriptures are set aside, the pandits are set aside, the whole business is set aside. It becomes hard. The pandits become enemies. Then when this Master dies, the same pandits who were his enemies gather at the cremation ground—to offer homage. They then make scriptures out of him. Their enmity was with the living, not with scripture. So they themselves make the scriptures.

It is amusing: Mahavira was a Kshatriya, but all his ganadharas were Brahmins! Strange—what is this? The moment Mahavira died, the Brahmins rushed in: “Good opportunity—now we can make scriptures again.” At once they set up scriptures. Jainism got constructed. Now if once again someone brings living religion, the scholars, the pandits, the worshipers of scripture, are in trouble again; their business is obstructed again. They say, “Once more, confusion!”

Remember: if you want to go within, some door or other is always open somewhere on this earth. Keep your eyes a little open—do not fill them with scriptures. Keep your mind fresh—do not load it with words. Do not be crushed under doctrines. Push aside the leaves of doctrine and keep the capacity to see the living stream. Then, somewhere, you will find a true Master. Only near him will your fear of going within disappear. For now you may keep reading scriptures, keep ringing bells in temples, keep doing worship and arranging offering trays—it is all a deception.

The heart is absorbed in the grief of the Beloved—
They pose as revelers, yet sit there drinking poison.

People pretend to be drunkards, to be intoxicated, to be in ecstasy; but look closely within and there is nothing but wounds—they are drinking poison.

In temples, mosques, churches—those whom you see swaying in worship and prayer—do not be deceived. Look a bit within them: nothing is swaying. They are doing useless calisthenics. When something moves within, then what temple and what mosque? What is the point of arranging platters of worship? Wherever such a person is, he sways. Kabir said: “Wherever I circle, that is my circumambulation; whatever I eat and drink, that is service.” God’s service is done—eat and drink joyfully; the offering is accepted. Where is there to go?

The day sweetness descends into your life, the day even a glimpse of the inner soul begins, wherever you are becomes a temple. The inner journey—your very body becomes the temple.

“Pratikraman, the return home, feels uneasy, difficult, almost impossible?” Naturally. You have never gone to that door, never tasted it; no relationship has formed; you are a stranger—hence. Practice a little. Sit near those who have already drunk. Let some of their intoxication become contagious. Move a little with them—stand, sit, circumambulate, serve. Come a little close to those who are brimming and overflowing—some splashes will surely reach you too.

That is all the effort here: that a few splashes may reach you. If even once a slight intoxication of the inner melody touches you, you will not stop; then no one will be able to stop you. In truth, no one has ever been able to stop anyone.

Now don’t turn this into a question. Dive in! Don’t worry where it’s coming from, or why it’s coming! When God happens, it happens without reason. It is not according to your bookkeeping. It doesn’t come because you did something, or because you asked.

“Though we sat apart, still the cupbearer’s eye fell upon us.
If the thirst is complete, the goblets, too, will arrive.”

Let the thirst be complete, and the cups will overflow.
“Though we sat apart, still the cupbearer’s eye fell upon us!”

If there is thirst, God seeks you out. Then there is no need to plead! No need to weep like a beggar, no need to spread your bowl!
“Though we sat apart, still the cupbearer’s eye fell upon us!”

Wherever you sit—apart or in the crowd—what does it matter! Where there is thirst, the cupbearer’s gaze reaches. Thirst itself is the invitation. Thirst itself is prayer. Those who don’t know thirst keep repeating words. Those who understand thirst drown only in thirst. They become so thirsty that there is not even a “thirsty one” inside—only thirst, from this shore to that, in every pore, in every heartbeat, in every breath.

“If the thirst is complete, the goblets, too, will arrive.”
If the thirst is total, you have prepared the cup. Now stop worrying! The wine will come. Someone will fill the cup—just be the cup!

God always happens without cause. Don’t misunderstand me. Don’t conclude, “Then why do anything?” When I say it happens without cause, I am saying that whatever you do is a mere nothing. When God happens you will know: “Ah! I did nothing!” Though you did a lot, now you will see you did nothing. What came is so vast that speaking of what you did becomes silly. You received an inexhaustible treasure; what you did were mere pennies—one is ashamed even to mention them. Will you then say to God, “Listen! How many fasts I kept, remember? How long I sat in meditation—haven’t you forgotten? How much charity I gave!”

They say a miser died and reached heaven’s gate. The gatekeeper asked, “Any merits to your name?” Listen carefully—he will ask when you go too! Don’t make the mistake this man made. If he had said, “Merits? Where! With what capacity? What did I have to give?” the gates would have opened. But he missed. He said, “Yes, I have.” The gatekeeper said, “Then wait. We’ll have to check the ledgers. A man of accounts!” They checked and found he had once given four coins to a beggar.
You’ll say, “Only that much?” But “only that much” is exactly what you have done. What have you done? Once you tossed a coin to a beggar—after having picked his pocket first; otherwise how would he be a beggar? Then, to keep him quiet so he wouldn’t make trouble, you gave him a coin—“Don’t go on strike now; be calm.” Four coins to a beggar!
The gatekeeper was perplexed. He asked his assistant, “What shall we do?” The assistant said, “Do what? Return the four coins and tell him, ‘Go to hell; accounts settled!’”

How much can your doing amount to? We sit on the ocean’s shore with teaspoons. We scoop and scoop—does the ocean spill because of that? Nothing happens.

But don’t take this to mean I am saying, “Good, then drop the bother—no need to give even four coins.” I am not saying that. I say, give—and give with an open heart! Yet remember, in the end, they were only four coins. However much you gave, even if you gave everything—still, what you had were only four coins; how could you give more than you had!

That’s why those who have attained have always felt: “I did nothing; it is grace.” Here the listener goes astray. He concludes: “Then there’s nothing to do. If it comes as grace, it will come when it comes.” But grace comes only to those who bring their total energy to it. It is received as grace, yet it is received by those who make a whole-hearted effort.

So don’t worry. Whether it came by resolve or surrender—drop that too. Why fret over how! It has come! Now dance a little! Drop thinking and celebrate a little!

“Set the goblet on the ground, pause a moment, O cupbearer—
let me first go into rapture over it, then I will lift it and drink.”

Now be overwhelmed. Say, “Set it down for a moment—first let me dance, let me be in blessed wonder over it—then I will lift it and drink.” Now dance a little!

Remember, even if grace comes for a single instant, a single particle—dance! Your dancing will increase it. It grows in celebration. It grows in your gladness, in your gratitude. Don’t shrink. Don’t start thinking: How did it come? From where? Why? What can I do to get more? In that, you will lose even what has come. The door that opened for a moment will close—closed by your thinking. Thoughts draw curtains. Dance! Sing! Hum! Go in rapture over what has come. Say to God as well, “Don’t hurry—set it down! Let me dance first. Let me be wholly offered in gratitude—then I will lift it and drink. First let me celebrate, welcome you. It has come without cause, without my doing; to grab it and gulp it would be unseemly, uncultured. Let me dance, hum, and sink into deep thankfulness.”

“I don’t know whether the grace came through resolve or surrender.”
Let it go to hell! Don’t bother to know. It has come! How to obtain something is a question only when it hasn’t come. Then one searches for means, for the way. But if the goal itself has come seeking you, now drop all worry—lest you get tangled in analysis and the goal move away. What has come of itself can also go of itself.

“…it came, and keeps coming—causeless.”
It always comes without cause. Keep the sense of causelessness alive. For the mind’s tendency is quickly to think, “What is coming is coming for a reason.”

An American multimillionaire—Morgan—used to give a beggar a hundred dollars every month. He liked the beggar; there was force in the man’s voice. When the beggar sang, well… So the owner said, “No need to come again and again—on the first of the month, just collect a hundred dollars.” For years it went on. One month, on the first, the beggar came to the office. The manager said, “From now on, fifty.” “What? Fifty? What do you mean?” “The owner’s daughter is getting married; they themselves are short of cash. Business is in loss. They’re in a bit of trouble. So—fifty.” The beggar said, “Outrageous! You’re marrying your daughter with my money? And if you incur a loss—should I suffer it? What do you think? Call the owner!”

The mind’s habit is: if you keep receiving, you begin to think it is your deservingness. What you receive for free you gradually take as your entitlement. You not only think so—you expect it. If it doesn’t come, the complaints begin.
Think of it! Where gratitude, and where complaint! Where thanksgiving, and where grievances! But the mind’s habit is like that. Because of it many people turn away from God’s door. Truth was on its way—it had almost arrived—when their arrogance arose. “If it is coming, we must have earned it! If it is coming, there must be a cause! There must be some virtue in us—only then would it come!”

Always remember: the moment you are filled with a sense of deservingness, in that very moment you become undeserving. So long as the remembrance of your unworthiness remains, your worthiness grows. Keep this paradox like a great mantra.

And none who have drunk could ever tell you the why or the what. All talk belongs to the time before drinking. Before drinking there are paths and methods. After drinking—there is mystery.

“What did we see in the brimming cup?
It is the tavern’s secret—we will not betray it.”

What have people seen in that overflowing chalice of the Divine? It cannot be said.

“It is the tavern’s secret—we will not betray it.
What did we see in the brimming cup?”

There, people fall silent.
Speech has a limit. Intellect has a limit. Up to the means is the limit of intellect. Where the goal is attained, the limit of intellect is crossed—because intellect itself is a means. When you have arrived, intellect is no longer needed.

So increase this good fortune! The art of increasing it is to let it remain causeless. Don’t seek causes. If it doesn’t make sense, relish the not-knowing. Beware—understanding may spoil it; analysis may fragment it. Let it remain a secret. Then gradually you will see that what came didn’t merely come—it made its home within you. It entered your eyes and became their light. It became the beat of your heart. And not only has it come to you; if you have drunk it rightly, through you it will overflow to others.

“We carry a garden in our eyes, O gardener—
wherever the gaze of longing rose, it became a garden.”

Wherever such a one lifts his eyes, gardens bloom.

Wherever you look, there will be the spread of God. Whoever falls under your gaze will be startled. In whose heart you look deeply, some seed will split, tremble, and sprout.

But be careful—the mind’s habits are very old! The mind wants to be the doer. “I did this; behold the fruit of my deeds!”—there the slip will happen. Soon you will find: the glimpse that had come is lost; the light that shone no longer appears; the door that had opened has closed.

Let it not happen. Know yourself unworthy—ever more unworthy. Know yourself as nothing—not the doer, only the enjoyer—the enjoyer of God! Know yourself as thirsty, not entitled. Then more and more rain will pour, denser and denser clouds will gather, and you will be more and more quenched—utterly fulfilled.

It’s plain. The arithmetic is simple. When you read, only you are there; I am not. What you read is nothing but you. It becomes a game of the mind. When you listen to me, then sometimes—knowingly or unknowingly—I also slip into you. You seldom give such a chance, but now and then a lapse happens on your side. Unaware, you leave the door a little open—and I come in.

So when you are hearing me, it’s a different matter. That is why truth has always been spoken, not written. It cannot be written. Even speaking it is very difficult, yet it can still be said—at least a little can be said, a little news can be given. Because in speaking, many elements are involved that are lost in writing.

When you read a book, the book is dead. A book cannot create an atmosphere around you. A book has no living climate. It cannot generate a vibrant field around you. The atmosphere will be yours—and into that your book will enter.

When you are with me, when you are listening—if you are truly listening—then your atmosphere is not here; the atmosphere is mine, the very air here is mine. You are a guest within it. And those who are wise leave themselves right where they leave their shoes—so you cannot create a mess here; so you can be immersed wholly in me; so you are naked, uncovered, without any veil, and you can drown in me; so that, for a little while, the waves I stir around you can touch you. Speaking is merely a device. I speak so you remain occupied with listening. It’s like handing a toy to a small child who is making a fuss—“Here, play.” He gets absorbed. Without words, you would be in trouble. If I do not speak, your mind will run to a thousand places. When I speak, your mind gets engaged in the listening—but that is only on the surface; inside, something else is happening. While you are occupied here, I am feeling for your heart there. With one hand I give you the toy; with the other I palpate your heart. At times your habits—old and strong as they are—keep you tangled in the toy and your heart clamped shut. But sometimes it opens. In that instant I reach within. In that instant the “I” and the “you” dissolve. In that instant we become parts of the same field—waves of one ocean. Naturally, in that moment something can happen that a book can never do.

Besides, when you are with me, my speaking is only one small part of being with me. Nearness itself is the great event. In closeness, my waves and your waves merge in a rasa-lila, a divine dance. You dance around me; I dance around you. Something happens that naked eyes cannot see. Something happens that the eyes of skin cannot behold. Something occurs in the invisible.

You are not only what is visible. I am not confined to what you see. You do not know your invisible; I know mine. So I call to your invisible as well—and yours comes forth. A dance begins. In that dance, flowers blossom in your heart, lotuses open.

This is not merely about speaking. And these words I speak are not empty; they have arisen steeped in a profound experience, soaked and tempered in it. This is not poetry of words; it is the poetry of life. Poets say:
“From where shall I bring the manner that makes a home in the heart?
From where shall I bring the voice that truly takes effect?”
A rishi does not say this. The voice comes of itself—and settles in the heart.

“From where shall I bring the manner that makes a home in the heart?
From where shall I bring the voice that truly takes effect?”
When there is some wealth of experience within, the voice finds by itself that very manner which makes its home in the heart. It is not a matter of practice, nor of oratory, nor of any technique—no, nothing of the sort. When you come upon truth, the finding of truth is so vast that its tone, its flavor, its music, its fragrance begin to spread through every word.

“From where shall I bring the manner that makes a home in the heart?
From where shall I bring the voice that truly takes effect?”
It comes. First bring that which is to be expressed; then the voice to express it comes on its own. That is the difference between the poet and the rishi. The poet worries about the voice, the vehicle. The rishi cares for the bearer, the content. When there is truly something to say, saying happens. And if such saying happens, it is not necessary that there always be something to say. Everyone knows how to speak; but from speech alone it cannot be inferred that one has anything to say. You chatter twenty-four hours a day—with nothing behind it. Nothing to give, yet you go on speaking. That is what we call babble, prattle—there is nothing to say, but the tongue keeps running; what to do, you have no habit of silence! What to do, silence seems heavy—so you keep talking.

But there is another kind of speaking—when you have something to give. Then speech becomes a vehicle. Speech becomes a horse.

The words I send to you are like horses; and seated upon them, the rider is sometimes even visible to you. It is he who seizes your heart. He is the one who plunges you into churning.

A book cannot do this; yet even through a book it can happen—if, by and by, you become capable of hearing me. That is why I have told people that my books should remain exactly as I speak—without the slightest alteration. They should not be changed; because the mode of writing is one thing, the mode of speaking another. The spoken word is different from the written word. So I have said: let it be on the page just as it comes from my mouth—so that once your tuning with me is established, even while reading you will begin to hear me. Those who have truly heard me will not read the book while reading; they will hear me. The book will begin to speak to them. Once you give me a place in your heart, then through the book too I can come to you. Even without the book I can come—if you so much as remember me, I will be near. It depends on you.

And when I say “if listened rightly,” I mean: if listened with love, with sympathy, in cooperation with me, with trust; setting doubt aside; setting your mind aside—telling your mind, “Move, give a little space.” Then my love will both make you swoon and bring you to awareness. This swoon is such that awareness goes on increasing; and this awareness is such that a sweet swoon goes on deepening.

“Look at me too—through this pain a certain wakefulness has come;
Ah, to go mad in love is easy.”
To go mad with love is very easy. Look at me—through this very ache, a little sobriety has arisen!

The love I am giving you is a pain, a wound. Let that pain refine you. It is a fire that will burn you. Do not be afraid. Walk with me; cooperate.

“Look at me too—through this pain a certain wakefulness has come;
Ah, to go mad in love is easy.”
To go mad in love is easy, but to awaken is very difficult. This love is meaningful only if it awakens you, only if it lifts you, only if it delivers you to yourself. It is possible. My hand is extended—extend yours and hold it.

That’s all for today.