Maha Geeta #4

We can divide a human being’s life into four parts. The outermost circumference is action—the world of doing. Move a little inward and there is the world of thought. Go a little deeper and there is the world of feeling—of devotion, of love. And move yet deeper, reach the center, and there is the witness.

Witnessing is our very nature, because there is no way to go beyond it—no one has ever gone beyond it; no one ever can. A witness to the witness is impossible. The witness is simply the witness. You cannot step back behind it. There our foundation is found. Upon the foundation of witnessing stands our whole house—of feeling, of thought, of action.

Therefore there are three yogas: karma yoga, jnana yoga, and bhakti yoga. All three are methods of meditation. Through all three there is an effort to reach the witness. Karma yoga means: action plus meditation. The direct endeavor to reach the witness through action is karma yoga.

So meditation is the method, and the state of witnessing is the goal.

One thing is certain: the questioner is a hard-hearted person. In tears he saw only weakness. One thing is certain: the tears in his eyes have dried up; his eyes have become barren, like a desert—no flowers bloom there. Tears are the flowers of the eyes. The questioner’s feeling has died. His heart has become blocked. He must be living only through the intellect; he has bid farewell to feeling. He lives by thinking and reasoning. He has denied the possibilities that belong to love, compassion, and the joy of being in love with life. No stream of rasa flows. The mind has become a dry, desert-like thing. That is why the first thought that arose in him was: those who cry must be weak.

Who told you that crying is a sign of weakness? Meera wept copiously! Tears poured, stream upon stream, from Chaitanya’s eyes! No, they are not signs of weakness—they are signs of feeling; signs of the power of feeling. And remember, feeling is deeper than thought.

I have said: first the line of action, then the line of thought, then the line of feeling, and then the center of witnessing. Feeling is nearest to witnessing. Devotion is nearest to God. Action is very far. From there the journey is long. Thought too is quite far; from there also the journey is long. Devotion is very close.

Remember, tears are not necessarily because of sorrow. People are familiar with only one kind of tears—the tears of sorrow. But tears flow in compassion. Tears flow in joy. Tears flow in wonder, in a hush of “ah!” Tears are simply a sign that something is happening inside which is too much to hold—whether pain or bliss; something so much that it overflows. If sorrow is so great that it cannot be contained within, it will flow as tears. Tears are an outlet. If joy becomes dense, it too will flow as tears. Tears are an outlet.

Tears are not bound to sorrow or happiness; they belong to intensity. Whatever becomes excessive, tears will carry it away.

So those who wept must have experienced some intensity within; some wound touched their heart; they heard some subtle music of the Unknown; a ray from the far Unknown must have touched their heart; something descended into their darkness; some arrow filled their heart with pain and ecstasy together—and they could not hold back their tears.

It has nothing to do with the effect of my speaking, because you too were listening. If it were only the effect of my words, then you too would have cried—everyone would have cried. No! It is related more to the heartfulness of the listener than to my speaking. Those who could cry, cried.

And crying is great strength. Humanity has lost a very unique dimension—especially men have lost it; women have preserved a little, women are blessed. In the human eye, whether of man or woman, the tear glands are the same. Nature has made them equal. Nature’s instruction is clear: both sets of eyes are made to weep. But the male ego has gradually brought itself under rigid control. Slowly the man began to think that crying is effeminate; only women cry. Because of this, man has lost much—he has lost devotion, he has lost feeling. He has lost joy and that “ah!” of wonder. He has even lost the dignity of sorrow; sorrow too ennobles and cleanses. A great calamity has befallen the life of man for this reason.

You will be surprised: in the world, men go mad twice as often as women! And the number would rise greatly if wars were to cease; because a great deal of men’s madness is discharged in war, in large measure. If wars were to stop completely for a hundred years, there is the fear that ninety percent of men would go mad.

Men commit suicide more than women—twice as much. Your common assumption will be different; you may think women commit suicide more. Women talk about it more; they do not do it. They swallow some pills and lie down—but even the pills are taken in measured amounts. So women attempt suicide more often, but do not succeed. Even in that attempt there is calculation. In truth women do not want to die—their “suicide” is only a complaint, a plea. They are saying: “Such a life is not worth living; another kind of life was needed.” They are only giving you notice that you have become so stone-hearted that unless we are ready to die, you won’t even pay attention to us. They are only trying to draw your attention.

It is a sorry state when one has to resort to dying just to be noticed. Man must have become very hard, very stony.

Women do not want to die, they want to live. When they find so many obstacles on the path of life—no one to listen, no one to pay attention—then, just so that you might pay attention, they resort to this device of dying.

But when men commit suicide, they succeed. Men commit suicide in madness. More men are mentally ill. What could be the reason? There are many reasons; among them, tears too. Psychologists say: men must learn to cry again. What you call strength is not strength—it is harshness. True strength is not so hard; true strength belongs to the soft.

You have seen it: a waterfall plunging from a mountain—soft water! The rocks are very hard. The rocks must think, “We are strong; this stream is weak.” But in the end the stream wins; the rock becomes sand and flows away.

God stands with the gentle. The strength of the weak is Ram!

A flower has bloomed. Nearby lies a rock. The rock surely looks strong; the flower looks weak. But have you ever seen the power of a flower—the power of life? To whom does the rock bow its head? You don’t carry a stone to place at God’s feet. You don’t think, “The rock is so strong; let’s present it to our beloved.” You take a flower. The flower has power! It has dignity! Its tenderness is its strength. Its blooming is its strength. Its music, its fragrance, are its strength. In its seeming weakness lies its strength. It blooms in the morning and will wither by evening—that is its strength. But it blooms. The rock never blooms—it only is. The rock is dead. The flower is alive; it will die, because it has lived. The rock never dies, because it is already dead.

Become soft! Call your tears back! Let your eyes be filled again with song and poetry. Otherwise you will be deprived of many things. Then even your God will remain a web of arguments, not a felt experience of the heart; a mere doctrine, with no taste of truth and no recognition of it.

Those who wept tears are fortunate; they are strong. They did not worry about what you would say. Of course, they too worry about “what people will say.” When a person begins to sob, he worries that people will talk. It takes strength to cry—to drop the worry about what people will say. Let them talk. If we are to be defamed, let it be! Let me cry with an open heart!

When someone weeps, sobbing like a child—think a little of his strength! He did not care what you all will think. He did not care: “I am a university professor, and I am crying—what if a student sees me!” Or, “I’m such a big shopkeeper and I’m crying—what if a customer sees me!” Or, “I’m such a strong husband, and I’m crying with my wife sitting here—there’ll be trouble at home later.” Or, “I’m a father and I’m crying—what if my son sees! What if the little children see! Pull yourself together!”

The ego keeps you “together.” Egolessness weeps. The ego keeps itself always under control. Egolessness flows; there is a current in it.

“Those that once were aflame, went out; the extinguished do not kindle again.
Rahim says, but those whom love has burned—going out, they flare again.”

Coals that are lit do, at some point, go out—but once they are ashes, can you ever turn ashes back into embers?

Those that once were aflame, went out; the extinguished do not kindle again.
Rahim says: those burned by love—again and again they burn! Again and again they seem to go out, and again they ignite.

The fire of love is eternal, timeless.

Those who have listened to me with love will be able to weep. Those who have listened only with the intellect will carry away some conclusions, some knowledge. They will carry away ash—not a live ember of love. Ash that will never kindle again. Remember! It is already out! The very moment I spoke it to you, if you took it into the head it became ash; if you took it into the heart it became an ember.

So if the ember of love is born within you, it will burn, then seem to go out, and burn again. It will make you writhe—purify you. It will bring a total transformation to your life. If you could cry with an open heart, it was a sign that the ember reached the heart. If you could not, it only reached the head. A little ash will collect. You will become a little more “knowledgeable.” You will become a little more adept at explaining things to others. You will become more skilled in debate and argument. But the essential point will be missed. From where you could have brought back an ember, you will return only with ash. Call the ash “sacred ash” if you like—it makes no difference. Ash is ash.

“The fire caught; songs of pain rose from the heart—
For your sorrow we became all flame.
By dint of reason we stayed only on the road—
We became the dust that trails a passing caravan.”

Those tears were the tears of a heart set aflame.

When you see someone weeping, sit by them. That moment is satsang; do not miss it. If you cannot weep yourself, at least sit beside the one who does. Take his hand in your hand—perhaps the “illness” will catch you too.

“The fire caught; songs of pain rose from the heart…”
May the fire catch! These ocher robes are symbols of fire—symbols of the fire of love.

“For your sorrow we became all flame.”
And when in your heart the pang arises, when the mood of separation is felt, when fire begins to appear in every breath—then we become all flame…

“For your sorrow we became all flame.
By dint of reason we stayed only on the road,
We became the dust that trails a passing caravan.”

Because of the intellect we went on wandering on the road, and gradually we became like the dust that rises behind a caravan. We became dust.

The intellect has never truly held anything more than dust in its hands.

“By dint of reason we stayed only on the road,
We became the dust that trails a passing caravan.
When our heart lit up, O Krishnamohan,
Boundaries vanished—we became shoreless.”

When the heart lights up, when love wounds the heart, when a live ember ignites there—

“When our heart lit up, O Krishnamohan,
Boundaries vanished—we became shoreless.”

In that moment, limits break—one becomes boundless. Tears are your first step toward the Infinite. Tears are news that you are melting, that your hard boundaries have softened a little, that you have become a little warm, that you have set aside the cold intellect a bit, that some fire has been lit, some heat has arisen. These tears are not cold. These tears are warm. They bring the news of your melting. As ice melts, so when the inner sense of “I-ness” begins to melt, tears flow.

“When we were bristling with desire, we were fire-breathing;
When love happened—we became speechless.”

When we were filled with intellect, with cravings, with thoughts, we talked a thousand talks, our tongue was sharp…

“When we were bristling with desire, we were fire-breathing;
When love happened—we became speechless.”

Those tears are signs of a speechless state. When something happens for which there is no way to say it—if you do not weep, what will you do? When the tongue cannot speak, the eyes speak with tears. When the intellect cannot say it, someone says it by dancing. Meera danced. Something happened for which words were not found; words seemed too narrow. Only tears could speak, and tears spoke.

No—do not entertain such thoughts that those people are weak. They are powerful. Their power is the power of tenderness. Their power is not of struggle and violence; it is of heartfulness. Because if you decide they are weak, then you will never allow yourself to cry. That is why I insist again and again: do not take them to be weak. Envy them. Ask again and again: what has happened that I cannot weep?

One rich in feeling is closest to his own center. And the closer one is to oneself through feeling, the more one experiences pain. The farther you are from home, the easier it is to forget home; as home draws near, the remembrance of home grows stronger. You sit having forgotten God. The word “God” enters your ears, but it creates no stir. You hear it—as a mere word.

God is not a mere word. He is not something to be merely heard. In whomever even a little fire of life still burns, the word “God” will shake him—the word alone will shake him.

“If you truly love me with all your heart,
then why do you make me weep?
In the dense darkness of light,
why do you avert your gaze from mine?
You come so near, and yet—so near—
you do not call me to your side.
Why do you linger around me?
Why do you keep coming near?

If you truly love me with all your heart,
then why do you make me weep?
In the dense darkness of light,
why do you avert your gaze from mine?”

One who is descending into feeling is so close to God that he begins to feel God’s warmth; eye meets eye; boundaries begin to overlap; transgression into one another’s territory begins.

What is being said here is not just to be said; it is to transform you. It is not merely words—it is about changing you totally, from the very root.

The meaning you are giving to dharma as “concept” is not its meaning. A concept is not dharma. The word dharma comes from the root that means: that which has held all; that which sustains all; that which carries all. Not concept—rather, that which upholds everything.

This vastness—the moon and stars, the sun, the trees and birds and human beings, the existence spreading into the infinite—what holds it all: that is dharma.

Dharma has nothing to do with concepts. Your concept may be Hindu, someone else’s Muslim, another’s Christian—dharma has nothing to do with these. These are concepts, ideas of the intellect. Dharma is the name of that fundamental truth which holds all together; without which everything would fall apart; which connects everything; which is the totality of all; the bridge of all—that!

Like when we string a garland of flowers. Imagine a heap of flowers and beside it a garland—what is the difference? The heap is chaotic; no flower is related to any other, all are unrelated. In the garland a thread is strung through. The thread is not seen; it is hidden within the flowers. But then one flower is joined to another.

In all existence, that which is strung through like a thread—its name is dharma. That which connects us to the trees, to the moon and stars; that which links the pebbles and stones to the sun; that which joins everything, the joining of all—that is dharma.

Culture is not created out of religion. Culture is made from samskaras—conditionings. Dharma is discovered only when we discard all samskaras.

Sannyas means: renunciation of samskaras.

The Hindu’s culture is different, the Muslim’s different, the Buddhist’s different, the Jain’s different. There are thousands of cultures in the world, because there are thousands of types of conditioning. Someone prays facing the east, someone else prays facing the west—this is conditioning. Someone wears these clothes, someone wears those; someone eats this kind of food, someone eats that—these are all samskaras.

Cultures will remain in the world—and they should. The more diversity there is, the more beautiful the world is. I would not want there to be only one culture in the world—that would be crude, colorless, boring. There should be Hindu culture, Muslim, Christian, Buddhist, Jain, Chinese, Russian—there should be thousands of cultures. Variety makes life beautiful. A garden should have many kinds of flowers. One kind alone would fill the garden with tedium.

So cultures should be many—they are many, and they will be many. But dharma should be one, because dharma is one. There is no other way.

Therefore I call “Hindu” a culture, “Muslim” a culture; I do not call them dharma. Fine. Cultures are beautiful. Build mosques of one style, temples of another. Temples are beautiful; mosques are beautiful. I would not want only temples to remain in the world and mosques to disappear—that would greatly diminish beauty. I would not want only Sanskrit to remain and Arabic to vanish—that would greatly diminish beauty. I would not want only the Quran to remain while the Vedas and the Gita–Upanishads disappear—the world would become very poor.

The Quran is beautiful; a unique work of literature, a great height of poetry—but it has nothing to do with dharma. The Vedas are beloved; unique proclamations; earth’s longing to touch the sky. The Upanishads are exquisitely sweet; never have sweeter utterances been given. They should not be lost. They all should remain—but as culture.

Dharma is one. Dharma is that which has held us all—the Hindu too, the Muslim too, the Christian too. Dharma is that which has held animals, humans, plants; which flows in plants like the green sap; which flows in humans like the stream of blood; which moves within you like breath; which is present within you as the witness. Dharma has held all.

So do not take dharma to be a synonym of culture. Culture has nothing to do with dharma. That is why Russia can have a culture even when there is no religion there. China has a culture; there is no religion there now. An atheist can have culture, a theist can have culture. Dharma has nothing to do with your manner of living; dharma has to do with your being. Dharma is your pure nature, your essence. Culture relates to the outer covering—conduct, behavior—how to sit, how to speak, what to say, what not to say…

No tradition is made from dharma. Dharma is not tradition. Dharma is the eternal, timeless truth. Traditions are made by man—dharma is. Traditions are human constructs, made by man. Dharma is prior to man. By dharma man has been made. Remember this distinction.

Therefore, never mistake tradition for dharma. And a religious person is never traditional. That is why Jesus had to be crucified, Mansoor had to be killed, Socrates had to be given poison—because a religious person is never conventional. A religious person is a great revolution. He is again and again the proclamation of the eternal and the timeless. Whenever anyone proclaims the eternal and the timeless, those bound to tradition, the rule-followers, are frightened. They become very uneasy. They say, this will lead to anarchy.

Anarchy is already here. What you call order, “governance”—what kind of order is that? Life is filled with quarrels. Life is filled with countless crimes. And life is filled with suffering. Yet you are frightened: there will be anarchy!

What is there in your life but hell? What fragrance of joy is there? What flowers of bliss bloom? What flute plays in your life? Only a heap of ashes! Yet you say, there will be anarchy!

A religious person is rebellious, not anarchic. Understand this.

In truth, only a religious person is a man of order, because he has joined himself to the Infinite. He has connected himself to the ultimate source of life—how can he be anarchic? Yes, his connection with you has loosened; he has stepped a little outside your structures and arrangements. He has linked himself with the Ultimate. He has severed ties with the borrowed; he has taken up the cash-in-hand. He has dropped the stale; he has joined with the fresh, the ever-new.

Your culture and civilization are like plastic flowers. The life of a religious person is like real flowers. Plastic flowers look like flowers, but are not flowers; they only seem; they look so from a distance; they are a deception.

If you speak the truth only because you were conditioned to speak truth, your truth is worth two pennies. If you refrain from meat-eating only because you were born in a Jain home and were conditioned that meat-eating is sin—conditioned so long that today even at the sight of meat you feel nauseated—do not imagine you have become religious. This is only conditioning. This person who was born in a Jain home and shudders at meat, feels sick even at the word “meat,” sees something resembling meat and feels nauseated, gets nervous even at the sight of tomatoes—this is only conditioning. Had this person been born in a meat-eating home, he would have eaten meat regularly; because there the conditioning would have been of meat, here the conditioning is against it.

Conditioning is your bondage. I am not telling you to start eating meat. I am saying: let there arise within you the same flowering of consciousness that arose in Mahavira! That was not conditioning. It was his own experience that to give pain to another is ultimately to give pain to oneself; because we are all one, interconnected. It is as if one slaps one’s own cheek. Sooner or later, whatever we have done to another will return to us. In Mahavira this realization became so deep, this awareness so embodied, that he stopped causing pain to others. Meat was abandoned—not because from childhood he had been taught that meat-eating is sin; it was dropped in the clarity of witnessing. This is dharma.

If you were born in a Jain home and you don’t eat meat, it is only conditioning. It is a plastic flower, not the real. Send this Jain to America—within a few years he begins to eat meat. Surrounded by meat-eating, at first he recoils, wrinkles his nose; then slowly he gets used to it. Watching others eating meat at the same table, little by little his nose, his nostrils become pleased with the smell of meat. Then the influence of another culture! There everyone says: Without meat you will be weak. Look what happens to you in the Olympics without meat! You cannot bring even a single gold medal. Gold is far; you don’t get even bronze. Look at your condition! A thousand years you were slaves—what strength have you? What is your average lifespan? How many thousands of diseases have you in their grip!

Certainly, in meat-eating countries the average lifespan has crossed eighty—eighty, eighty-five. Soon the average will be a hundred. Here we are stuck around thirty, thirty-five.

How many Nobel Prizes do you get? If pure vegetarianism purifies intelligence, then all the Nobel Prizes should have gone to you. Intelligence does not seem to be developing much. And the Rabindranath who did get a Nobel Prize is not a vegetarian—keep that in mind! Has any Jain received a Nobel Prize? What’s the matter? You’ve been vegetarian for two thousand years, yet in two thousand years your intelligence has not become pure?

So the meat-eater has arguments. He says, Your intellect becomes weak, because you do not get the right proteins, the right vitamins, the right strength. Your body becomes weak. Your lifespan shortens. Your strength decreases.

In America you read daily in the papers: some ninety-year-old man has married! You are amazed. You say, What kind of madness is this! But a ninety-year-old man can marry, because he is still capable in sexual energy. This is proof of vigor. A ninety-year-old man can even father a child. This is proof of vigor.

So, as soon as someone goes and lives in Western culture, he hears these arguments and sees the evidence, and beholds the splendor of their vast culture. Slowly he forgets…

If Mahavira had had to go to the West, he would not have eaten meat. That flower was natural. He would have said, Fine! We will live two, four, ten years less—what harm is there! What is the profit of living long? If you live longer, what will you do? Eat a few more animals—what else! If someone had said this to Mahavira, he would have said, Just look back once: if you lived a hundred years, and the number of animals and birds you ate—line them up and look! You have devoured a whole cremation ground! You have consumed a whole settlement! Piled heaps of bones all around yourself! In one lifetime, the amount of meat one eats—the heap of thousands and hundreds of thousands of creatures would arise! Think a little: so many lives you… so many beings you have destroyed! For what? Just to live? And to live for what? To destroy more creatures?

If someone told Mahavira, You become weak, he would say, What will we do with strength? Do we want to commit violence? To kill someone? To fight a war? If someone said, Look, you were slaves for a thousand years, Mahavira would say: Two alternatives—be someone’s master or be a slave. Mahavira would say, Better to be a slave than a master—at least you did not oppress anyone, you were oppressed. Better to endure dishonesty than to become dishonest—at least you did not commit dishonesty on anyone. Better to become a victim of theft than to become a thief.

If someone told Mahavira, Look, you do not get Nobel Prizes, he would say: What shall we do with Nobel Prizes? These are toys—good for children to play with. What shall we do with them? We are after a very different award. That award is given only by the Divine, and by none else. That award is the bliss of witnessing; it is sat–chit–ananda! You keep your Nobel Prizes. Give them to children; let them play. These are toys.

No award of this world can compare with the award of inner bliss. Let the body go, let age go, let wealth go—let everything go—if only the inner nectar remains, then everything remains! He who has lost the inner has lost all. He who has saved the inner has saved all.

But ordinarily the Jain goes and returns corrupted. Why? He was already corrupt! It is not that he became corrupt—he was a paper flower, a false thing, a conditioning.

Understand the difference between culture and dharma. Dharma is your own direct experience; culture is what has been taught by others. No matter how well-organized, what is taught by another does not liberate you; it binds you.

So when I say dharma is rebellion, revolt, I mean—revolt against tradition, revolt against conditioning, revolt against spiritual slavery.

But the religious person does not become anarchic. If the religious person became anarchic, then who would bring discipline into this world? The religious person becomes supremely disciplined. But his discipline is of another kind. It comes from within and moves outward. It is not imposed by anyone. It is spontaneous. It is like a spring bubbling up from inner energy. It is like a river flowing by the energy of water; no one is pushing it.

You are like someone with a rope around his neck being dragged along, and someone from behind whipping you, so you are forced to walk.

The man who lives by conditioning is being dragged against his will, forcibly. The religious person goes dancing. Even toward death he goes dancing. You are dragged even in life. You always feel it is being forced. You always feel you are missing something; others are enjoying, others are having fun.

People come to me. They say: We are sadhus, saints, simple straight people. Such injustice is happening in the world! The dishonest are enjoying. The thieves and scoundrels are enjoying.

I tell them: The very thought that they are enjoying shows that you are neither saintly, nor holy, nor simple. You are just like them; only your courage is weak. You too would like the same enjoyment, but you fear paying the price required for that enjoyment. You are also thieves at heart, but thieving requires courage—and that courage you have lost. You too would like to heap up wealth by dishonesty, but you hold back for fear you may be caught. If you were given a firm guarantee that no one would catch you, that there would be no one to catch you, no fear of being caught—you would become a thief instantly.

A religious person feels compassion for those who are dishonest. Because he says: Poor fellows, how they are being deprived of the supreme joy! What is coming to us is not coming to them!

A religious person does not envy the irreligious—he has compassion. In his heart he weeps that these poor ones will squander everything gathering only trinkets of silver and gold. Building houses of sand and dust, they will be finished. Where there could have been the experience of nectar, there they will wander in vain. He feels compassion. There is no question of envy, for he has something far vaster. And because of that Vastness there is a discipline in his life. Above that discipline there is no discipline.

A religious person is rebellious, but not undisciplined. His discipline is spiritual, inner. Self-discipline is his discipline.

And what you call order, what you call the system—what has this system given? Wars, violence, sins, hatred, enmity. What has it given?

An earth has been scorched for the few,
love was born only for agonies.
If friends asked for our lives—no grief;
we gave our lives for enemies.
Sinners have always saved us,
we committed sins for the virtuous.
Whenever we found questions, all wore masks;
a whole life we were given for entanglements.
We grew crowds of dreams forever,
for barren towns of the desolate.
What robbers’ world have we come to,
where hands are cut off for bangles.
Life has wrung us out so much,
we sold our eyes for a vision.

What is here? Even eyes have been sold—in the hope that someday there will be vision! Even the soul has been sold—in the hope that someday God will be found! What has been gained here? Where is the order here? What could be greater disorder than this? Everywhere hatred, everywhere enmity, everywhere throat-cutting competition, everywhere jealousy, envy. No one is anyone’s friend; everyone seems an enemy. Nothing at all is to be found—what is it you call order?

Order can be only when there is joy in life. Joy brings order like a shadow follows.

Remember, a miserable man is anarchic. A happy man cannot be anarchic. A miserable man does become anarchic—what has he received? He becomes eager to break and smash in resentment. One in whose life something has been received is so grateful toward life—how could he break and smash?

Do not mistake this system, this arrangement of deception, for order. It is the politicians’ trick. And those you think are your leaders, those you think are your guides, they are waylayers!

Come now, seek some other support, people;
the shores had grown too selfish, people.
Those whose shade you took to be a support—
those walls will suddenly collapse, people.
Surely some miracle has happened today:
from ruins themselves come the chimes, people.
If the limits of hope have broken, don’t be amazed—
the swords are out of their sheaths, people.
Who knows what will befall the boat—
the oars have fallen to the storm, people.
Who knows what will befall the boat—
the oars have fallen to the storm, people.
Thousands of helpless sighs are buried here—
these tombs are not mere heaps of stone, people.

Here the oars have fallen to the storm! Here those you think are your supports are your exploiters. And those you think are administrators are only sitting on your chest.

Have you ever noticed—whoever is in office starts talking about order! And whoever is outside the seat of power talks about revolution. The moment he is outside, he talks of rebellion—now everything is wrong, everything must be changed. And the moment he is in office, he talks of order—everything is fine; change is dangerous; we need a festival of discipline.

This has always been so in the whole world. The politician cares only for the chair; he cares neither for order nor for disorder. When he does not own the order, when power is not in his hands, then he says everything is wrong; a revolution is needed. And the moment he comes to the chair, then there is absolutely no need for revolution—because the work of revolution is complete. Its work was only this: to bring him to the chair—that work is done. After that, whoever talks of revolution is an enemy.

And the one who is talking of revolution also has nothing to do with revolution—this most astonishing thing happens in the world every day, yet man does not become wise.

All revolutionaries become anti-revolution the moment they reach the chair. And all unseated politicians become revolutionaries the moment they are unseated. The chair has its own great magic. Seated on it—order! Because now the order is in your interest. Off it—revolution! Because now revolution is in your interest.

A religious person cares neither for order nor for revolution outside. A religious person cares for self-discipline. He says: We searched for supports outside long enough; no order could come in the world—now wake up! Find your own support! Light your own lamp! With the help of others’ lamps we walked a long time and only wandered; we fell into pits and ruins, bloodied. Now light your own lamp and walk by your own support! No one outside can give you order. Give your order to yourself. Let your life be filled with the discipline of your inner being!

Hari Om Tatsat!