Mahaveer Meri Drishti Mein #4

Hmm, hmm—this needs a bit of understanding. Let me explain it a little. Let me complete the whole point, then I will tell you.

The twenty-three Tirthankaras for this very reason seem to have become completely non-historical. There is no other reason for their appearing non-historical; they were absolutely historical persons. But because even the final thread of connection with them in the spiritual realm has grown attenuated, no relationship can now be established with them.

With Mahavira, a connection can still be established. And therefore, being the last, Mahavira has become the most important—in that current. A connection can still be established with Buddha. A connection can still be established with Jesus. A connection can still be established with Krishna. To us, twenty-five hundred years seem very long because our measure of time is very small. Once free of the body, twenty-five hundred years are as if a moment has passed. A connection can still be established with Muhammad.

So the traditions whose teachers can still be related to—those traditions spread and flourish. The traditions whose teachers can no longer be related to—those dry up and perish, because their link with the original source is broken. And that is why new teachers seem to be winning, and old teachers seem to be losing.

Now, it is quite surprising that the twenty-third Tirthankara before Mahavira was not much earlier—only a gap of two hundred and fifty years—but even with that Tirthankara it had become difficult to establish a connection. Therefore even those who had lived close to that Tirthankara had to come to Mahavira. But a basic inner opposition remained, which later helped to split the tradition into two parts. For originally those teachers were connected with Parshva, and their love, their devotion, their doorway was open toward Parshva. But since Parshva very quickly became inaccessible and no connection with him was possible, they came to Mahavira. Yet their mind, their style, their personality were attuned to Parshva. So two streams immediately began to break apart. They came near, but differences remained.

There is no reason as such. In a given tradition there are never two Tirthankaras simultaneously for one simple reason: if one Tirthankara is at work for that tradition, a second would at once dissolve—there is no need. Just as in one class there is no need to have two teachers teaching at the same hour. It is pointless—utterly pointless, meaningless. It would only create obstacles, nothing else. Imagine two or three teachers present in the same period in the same class—it would only breed confusion. One teacher is enough. Therefore, if one teacher is actively working, another—even if he could be—simply dissolves. He is not needed.

Compassion can continue working from the other side, and connections can be established from there as well.

The greatest loss that occurred when Tibet fell into China’s hands cannot be measured in material terms. The greatest loss was this: the Tibetan lamas had, each year, on one particular day, a close, living contact with Buddha. That tradition was dealt a mortal blow.

Every year, on the full-moon night of Buddha Purnima, five hundred chosen bhikshus and lamas would gather on a particular mountain near Mansarovar. It was an extremely secret arrangement. And precisely at the full-moon night, at the exact time, for thousands of years five hundred people would have a direct encounter with Buddha. That is why the Tibetan Buddhist monk was the most alive and profound; no other Buddhist monk in the world was like him—others had no living contact with Buddha. The annual condition was fulfilled without break—on Buddha Purnima. These festival days are kept for another reason too: on such days contact can be established more easily. Those days are significant in the memory of that consciousness. On those significant days compassion melts more readily and becomes eager to relate to a thirsty seeker.

It is not that Buddha necessarily appeared in his full bodily form before the five hundred. That too is possible. But do not assume that because this gross body falls, all possibilities of body fall. The subtle body can take on form at any time. And if many people yearn and concentrate in prayer, then for the subtle body to assume form is not difficult.

It would be a subtle body in such a way that if a sword were drawn through it, the sword would pass through; nothing would be cut. A body composed of extremely subtle particles—one should really call them psychic atoms. Science, up to now, has reached only the material atoms. But those who have inquired into the inner life have reported atoms that should be called psychic atoms, mind-atoms. There is also a body of mind, a mano-kaya—a kind of mental body.

So if many people aspire, and with one-pointed mind pray, and if compassion remains in a consciousness that can no longer take up a gross body, that consciousness can manifest through the mental body.

All images are, in their deepest intent, mere devices to manifest that mental body. All prayers, all longings are simply methods to melt that consciousness so that some kind of contact may be established. This belongs to the domain of very esoteric techniques.

Therefore, what goes on in temples and mosques today—though much of it has become junk—the arrangement behind it is deeply meaningful. Those who know how to use that meaningful arrangement have continued to use it, even today. Yet that possibility is gradually waning, because we are forgetting how to use it at all.

It is like this: suppose a third world war occurs, the world ends, a few people survive, and they find this electric fan of ours. They may preserve it as a relic of the past, not knowing what it was for. They may not be able to imagine that it also used to move air. Because they have lost the knowledge of electricity, the knowledge of plugs, and the intelligence to understand the fan’s inner mechanism.

They might place the fan in a museum. They may keep its wires. They may preserve a railway engine. They may even begin to worship these as relics of the past. But they would have no idea that this railway engine could pull thousands of people, because there would be no tracks left, no engineering texts left, no one to tell them how it worked. For any system depends upon thousands of specialists.

Perhaps one man survives who says, “I once sat on a train; this engine pulled the coaches.” People would say, “Then run it for us.” And he would say, “I only sat in it; I can’t run it. But I clearly remember sitting in that train; thousands of people rode in it; the train went from one village to another.” He would shout himself hoarse, he might even write books saying, “This is a railway engine; people used to sit in it; someone ran it.” But no one would listen—because he could not make it run.

In every direction—outer or inner—thousands of devices are discovered. But sometimes entire civilizations perish, lost in the darkness. They are lost when their specialists are lost. There are countless reasons for such loss.

Today the temple and the mosque remain; tantra, yantra, mantra—all remain in many forms. But their meaning is gone. There is no longer any sense of what they could do, nor of how they could do it. And just as a tribe of the future might worship a railway engine, so we worship statues in temples.

Yes, a few people retained the memory that “Something used to happen,” and they told their successors, “Something used to happen.” They still stand guard around the precincts of temples for protection. But they have nothing left to show of what happened, or what could happen. They cannot demonstrate anything.

As consciousness becomes free, all desires cease. Understand this correctly: liberation happens only to that consciousness whose desires have totally ended.

But if all desires end, what bridge will remain between the unliberated state and the liberated state? What will connect the two? The soul had known itself only through desire; if all desires end in one instant and none remains in the next, how will the soul recognize that it is the same?

Therefore, when all desires end, a single desire is left as a bridge, which I call compassion. This is its only thread to the old world, its bridge. The bridge between the unliberated soul and the liberated soul is compassion. Ultimately, even the bridge is crossed and compassion too departs.

A Tirthankara happens through the desire of compassion. And it is impossible to re-enter this momentum for more than one birth; therefore there cannot be more than one such birth. And, as I said, it is not that this happens to every enlightened one.

Many reach the state of Mahavira, but not all become Tirthankaras. The pull of liberation is so intense, the bliss of liberation so overwhelming, that only very strong ones can return—even for a single birth. And such powerful ones, on returning for that one birth, make all the arrangements—precisely that is their purpose in returning—so that when they can no longer take a body, a way to connect with them will still remain. There are many such arrangements.

For example, imagine a father with little children going on a long journey from which he will never return. He makes every arrangement for his children. He leaves word: “If you write to this address, it will reach me.” He leaves his photograph so that when they grow up they will recognize, “Ah, this is how he looked.”

He leaves behind a memory for them: “When you grow up, what I wished to tell you is written here; understand it. And whenever you want to contact me, this will be my phone number. Through this special number you can reach me. I cannot return now. Returning is impossible.”

So every compassionate teacher, returning once, arranges everything so that later on, ways to connect with him will remain. When the body is gone, what will be his code number—by what special mental tuning can contact be established with him?

The special mantras of all religions are code numbers. Through their attentive, continuous repetition, the mind attains a particular tuning; in that tuning, contact with particular teachers becomes possible. They are exact code numbers, telephone numbers—if the mind moves in that very vibration, it reaches a specific tuning. And that code number belongs to one teacher only; it will not work for another. Hence the strict insistence that these code numbers be kept utterly secret. They are given silently, in great secrecy.

To enable contact, they leave many devices: signs, images, words, mantras; special figures—call them tantras; yantras—geometric forms by concentrating upon which the mind attains a specific state, and in that state contact can be made.

But all that gets lost. Gradually the contacts cease. When all contact is broken, no means remain. Then such teachers slowly disappear, dissolve.

Countless teachers have appeared among humankind. Each had his own work, which he completed with all his effort. Some living traditions remain in which the current still flows—for example, the Tibetan lama—the Dalai Lama. It is astonishing, though it has a great cost.

When a Dalai Lama dies, he leaves signs by which his next birth may be recognized. He leaves all the signs: “When my next birth occurs, how will you recognize me? These will be my marks. Ask me these questions; I will give you these answers. Then take it for certain that I am the same. Otherwise how will you know? How will you accept that I am the same?”

When the previous Dalai Lama died—the first guru of the one who is Dalai Lama now; it is the same soul—he left signs: “After so many years, search throughout Tibet. The boy who gives these precise answers—know that he is me.” Those matters are extremely secret, sealed answers—no one can have foreknowledge of them.

Then a search was made across Tibet. Hundreds and thousands of children were asked the same questions—but how could any child answer! This child answered everything. It was accepted that the old soul had descended into him. He was then placed in the seat; only the body became new, the soul is the same.

Teachers have done even this so they can remain useful for endless births. Even when they are lost to births, they arranged to remain useful.

So, not more than one such birth is possible. But after births cease, contact can remain for a long time. Two threads sustain it: how long the teacher’s desire of compassion lasts, and how far the connecting formulas remain clear and in living memory.

That is why, as I said yesterday, for three, four, five, six hundred years there is no need to write down what was said—because contact can be re-established repeatedly to verify: “Was this said, or not?” But when those formulas begin to weaken, and contact becomes difficult, then comes the turn to write.

Therefore, no ancient important scripture was written for hundreds of years, because up to then the formulas existed by which we could connect and ask, “Is this what was said?” There was no need to write. But when contact weakened and the last teachers began to die—those through whom contact was still possible—then it was said, “Now write it down. Write the whole thing.”

As happened among the Sikhs: after the tenth Guru, no person appeared who could be the eleventh. It became necessary to write the Granth, because there was no longer the likelihood of contact. In the line of the first ten Gurus, contact was continuously established; the thread did not break from Nanak. There was no difficulty. The tradition of seating one on the gaddi—the throne—later became a matter of self-interest, but it had profound meaning. Great meaning. Yet we can render any meaningful thing meaningless.

Take the seats of Shankaracharyas: those sitting on them now know nothing, care nothing. Their seating is now almost like a political election. Originally, the Shankaracharya would seat in his place that person with whom he could keep contact. That was the only point: to seat the one through whom he could maintain connection. Even after dying, he would not be absent from this world; a thread of relationship would remain. One person would be present through whom he would continue to work. And he would tell that person how to choose and seat the next one, so that even if that person were lost, the thread would continue.

But those threads have snapped. Now no Shankaracharya has any contact with Shankaracharya. The link is broken. So now it is all futile talk, without value. It has become merely a matter of wealth, property, position, prestige—who will sit.

Hence the quarrels, cases in court—and the court decides who is entitled to the gaddi! This is not a matter for adjudication at all. It is not a question the court can decide. Who could decide it? Only the previous teacher could decide, the one before him. And many times it has happened that the seat was handed to a person about whom no one had the slightest idea.

A master in China was dying. He had five hundred bhikshus. He sent word: “Whoever comes and writes the essence of dharma in four lines on my doorway, I will seat him in my place; my time to depart has come.” There were five hundred—great scholars among them. Everyone knew who would win, because the greatest scholar would surely win. That scholar went and wrote the master’s teaching in four aphorisms on the wall: “Man’s soul is like a mirror; upon it gathers the dust of thought and defilement. The means of wiping away that dust is dharma.” The soul is like a mirror; dust of thought and defilement gathers upon it; the means of wiping it off is dharma.

All read it and said, “Wonderful! The matter is complete. Nothing else happens in the soul—only dust gathers; one must merely wipe it off...” But the master rose in the morning—an eighty-year-old—and saw it. He said, “Which fool has spoiled the wall? Bring him here at once!”

The scholar fled immediately. He fled because he knew the master would catch him—he had written it all from books. He hadn’t even signed, fearing that if the master approved he would step forward and say, “I wrote it”; if the master disapproved, there would be no trouble. The whole monastery buzzed, “What happened? Such marvelous words!”

Twelve years earlier, a young man had come, and holding the old man’s feet had said, “I want to become a sannyasin.” The old master had asked, “Do you want to seem a sannyasin, or to be one?” The young man said, “What use is seeming? If I wanted to seem, why ask you? I could pretend. I want to be.”

The master said, “To be is very difficult. If you truly want to be, do one thing: there are five hundred monks here; go to the kitchen where the rice is hulled and the food is made, and take up the work of pounding rice. And do not come to me again. Don’t come. If needed, I will come to you. Speak to no one, chat with no one, change no clothes—just as you are, quietly pound rice behind the kitchen. Don’t come to me again. If I need you, I’ll come; if not, the matter is finished.”

For twelve years he pounded rice at the back of the ashram. People gradually forgot him, because he did nothing else. He kept pounding rice, spoke to no one. He rose in the morning and pounded rice; in the evening, exhausted, he slept. Twelve years passed. The master never came to him, nor did he ever come to ask again.

That day the whole ashram was talking of one thing, and in the kitchen the monks discussed the same. He was pounding rice. Two or three monks passed by, saying, “The master has gone too far! Such beautiful, exalted lines, and he called them trash!” The rice-pounding monk, who had silently pounded for twelve years—people had forgotten him; who would notice him when passing by? They were great monks, scholars; he was just an ordinary rice-pounder—he began to laugh while pounding. The monks stopped and looked at him: “So, you laugh too! What are you laughing at?” He said, “The master is right. What trash has been written!” They said, “You—a rice-pounder—twelve years pounding nothing but rice—and you also pronounce on this! Do you even know what dharma is?”

He said, “I do know—but I have forgotten how to write. I have come to know, but I have forgotten how to write it. How to write at all? And can dharma be written! So I keep pounding my rice. The news reached me that something was to be written on the doorway, but first, who wants the hassle of the gaddi? And second, how to write?”

The monks said—mocking him—“All right then, we’ll take you; we will write, you speak.” He said, “That can be done. With dharma it often happens: one speaks, another writes. That can be done, because then we bear no responsibility. No one can say to us, ‘You wrote it.’ We only spoke.”

They took him; he dictated and they wrote on the wall beside the four lines the master had had erased. He said, “Who says the self is like a mirror? Where there is a mirror, dust will gather. The self has no mirror—where can dust collect? Whoever knows this truth attains dharma.”

The master came running, seized him, and said, “Don’t run away—people like you tend to run. You have written the right thing.” He replied, “But I have made a mistake. I want simply to pound my rice. I don’t want to be anybody’s master.”

But the master said, “There is no other way without you. Through you, my thread of connection will remain.” He gave him his seat and said, “I knew—if anyone could write it, it would be that rice-pounder who has not returned even once in twelve years, who goes on pounding rice. He never once complained, ‘Master has not come yet; will he come when I die?’ I knew he had found it; that is why he never returned.”

The rice-pounder said, “Yes, all was found. Therefore there was no need to wait for your coming, no need for you to come. I kept pounding and pounding. For a few days old thoughts continued—there was no way for new thoughts to arise; I spoke to no one, read nothing. I just pounded rice. Do thoughts arise from pounding rice? Gradually all thoughts died; only the pounding remained. When all thoughts died and only the pounding remained, I awoke with such swiftness that there is no reckoning for it. The whole consciousness was freed.”

The teacher who has been lost leaves some paths behind out of compassion. But everything wanes. All the threads of contact slacken, and they are lost.

No, the question is always one and the same. If eating can happen without lust and craving, why not intercourse? The issue is not what is done; the issue is how it is done. If, while doing any act, a witness stands behind and sees, then no act is binding. While eating, if the witness within is seeing that eating is happening and “I am standing apart,” then the food is only going into the body. Behind it someone untouched is standing whom nothing can touch, who is only the seer of the eating.

Now note: in eating, something goes into the body; in intercourse, something goes out of the body. That too can be witnessed. The witness can be there in any act, whether inward-going or outward-going. In truth, what goes in through food is what goes out through sex in its distilled essence. But it is going and coming in the body only. And if consciousness can remain the witness, the matter is finished. Then you can pass through the river as if your feet did not get wet. The feet will get wet if you pass through a river, but utterly as if they did not. If someone remains as the witness behind, the issue is over.

So, in essence, the question is of witnessing—“to be a witness,” simply that, and nothing else. Then which act it is has no relevance. The moment you become a witness to the act, the doer disappears. When the doer disappears, the deed disappears; mere action remains. And that action may arise for a thousand reasons.

So what you call progeny—absolutely, it can be without lust. And the truth is, when such offspring is conceived without lust, then only the body has served as an instrument for an action; nothing more has happened. Consciousness has not become an instrument.

Ordinarily, in sex a person gets completely lost; awareness does not remain at all—one becomes unconscious. The opposition to sex is only for this reason: the soul’s fainting is greatest in sex. If there the soul remains unfainted, the matter is over. Nothing remains to be argued.

And the question is not about food either. That too is an act. In any act—like right now you are listening to me: listening is an act. If you become a witness you will find that listening is happening, and you are also standing afar, seeing the listening. As I am speaking, if I am a witness, then I am speaking and, the whole time, I know that within me the unspeaking stands. And truly, that unspeaking one is me. What is being spoken is only an instrument, a means. That is not me.

You walk on the road, and if you awaken, you will find: walking is happening, and within something unmoving is standing—something that is not walking, has never walked, cannot walk. And if in the act of walking you become fully awake, you see that walking is happening and within someone unmoving stands. And if the awareness of this unmoving is born, some day you may say, “I never walked.” Thousands may have seen you walking, there may be records and photographs of your walking; a court may decide you did walk. It makes no difference. You will say, “It only appeared to you that I walked. But within I was unmoving; no one walked.”

So which act it is is not the important question. Are you awake within the act? If you are awake, you become different from the act. Then the act becomes a part of the vast web of the world. Just as breath moves—and if you are watching—then the movement or non-movement of breath becomes part of the cosmic order, and you stand utterly outside, seeing that breath is moving. Just as you see the sun rise and set; the sun is far, but breath is not that far either. The distance is only that much; breath is moving a little closer.

A bird is mating. That body is a little away from you, but is your body really any nearer to you than that? Seeing a bird copulate, you don’t say, “I am mating.” You say, “I am seeing; the bird is mating.” You have stepped outside. On a certain plane, the day consciousness becomes wholly a witness, this body remains no more significant than that bird standing at a distance. The same distance happens. And then you can say—“from the body it is happening.”

It seems difficult to us because we have been continually unconscious in sex, in eating—in everything.

Gurdjieff was a fakir of recent times—an extraordinary man, one of the few in this century who knew. He used to teach in ways you would not imagine. He would tell people, “Get angry!” and then contrive situations that forced them into anger. You would come, and he would create such commotion around you that you would have to get angry—shouting, aflame. Everything would be arranged to inflame you. And then suddenly he would say: “Look—what is happening!”

You are startled. Eyes red, hands trembling—and you start laughing. Your hand is still shaking, eyes still red, your lips quivering, your mind wanting to wring someone’s neck. And he says, “Look!” And you remember that he had arranged the anger. Now you see, and in a single instant you stand apart—anger remains here; you stand there. And then everything within becomes quiet, though the body is still trembling.

As when you dream at night, get frightened, wake up—hands still shaking, breath racing. You have awakened, the dream has broken, and now you know—it was only a dream; you even laugh. But the impact of the dream does not vanish instantly; the body needs time to settle.

So he devised all kinds of devices and, in the midst of them, would say, “Wake up!” If at that moment the word is heard and a person awakes…

Tantra has made many such arrangements. A naked woman is seated in front; the seeker looks, and is being lost. Hypnosis enters his eyes, he is being seduced, he is forgetting himself. Just then someone shouts, “Wake up!” In a flash he awakes and sees. Everything goes slack. The naked woman remains like a picture before him; his trembling mind and body remain at a distance; within someone has awakened and is seeing. And he laughs, “What madness was that!”

The whole array of situations can be used to awaken at any moment. There is no act in which one cannot awaken. Yes, sex is the most difficult. The reason is this: sex is an act nature has not left in human hands. If it were left to humans, perhaps no man or woman would ever willingly agree to it. If left to man, no one might agree—because it is such an absurd, futile, meaningless act. So nature has laid a very deep hypnosis within—a trance so deep that only under its spell can one do it; otherwise one would not. It would be difficult. So that trance is laid deep.

I experimented much in this area and had very surprising experiences. I had a young man with me on whom I did hypnosis experiments for years. I would hypnotize him, put him into a deep trance. A pillow lay nearby. While he was unconscious I told him: “Fifteen minutes after you awaken, you will want to kiss this pillow, and there will be no way you can refrain from kissing it. You will have to kiss it.”

Then I brought him back to waking. He came to. Everyone knew; fifteen people sitting there knew. Now the boy keeps stealing glances at the pillow, the way someone looks at a woman. Those fifteen are awake and watching. He tries to touch it stealthily if he gets a chance. In his mind the hypnosis is so deep that the pillow has acquired a sexual meaning. He himself is embarrassed—“What foolishness is this, that I look at a pillow!” But his whole mind is drifting toward it.

The pillow is here; he is sitting there. On any pretext he comes and sits closer. The pretext is entirely different; how can he say he wants to sit near the pillow? He says, “I can’t hear well from there; I’ll come sit closer to you.”

I pick up the pillow and place it to the other side. He comes and sits near the pillow again. He is very restless now. He says, “I should sit leaning against the wall; that would be better for me.” He goes and sits leaning against the wall. He is searching for the pillow. I pick it up, put it in a cupboard, and lock it. Fifteen minutes are nearly up; he is writhing with restlessness. He says, “Give me the key. My fountain pen is in that cupboard.” How can he say, “pillow”? He himself cannot think how to ask for a pillow!

We are all sitting there. He is given the key. He opens the lock, looks around, picks up his fountain pen, and, bending down, kisses the pillow—and suddenly becomes relaxed. We ask, “What are you doing?” He begins to cry: “It is beyond my understanding what I am doing. I’m distressed—what has happened to me with this pillow! But kissing it has made me feel very light.”

Such a condition can be produced toward a pillow. Hypnosis can be given toward anything.

Nature has placed such hypnosis around sex, such a trance. Under that spell the whole game runs. Therefore a person finds himself utterly helpless. When a beautiful face attracts him, he is not in his own power and awareness; he is completely unconscious.

Break this hypnosis; there are methods to break it. And the greatest method to cut hypnosis—the greatest method to break trance—is witnessing. Hypnosis breaks in a flash; it is cut clean through.

And when the trance is cut, a person like Mahavira finds no attraction in woman—no meaning at all. But a woman may find meaning and attraction. Mahavira may feel no meaning in fatherhood, but a woman may. Mahavira can pass through sex utterly as a passive onlooker. There is no difficulty in it—none at all. Once hypnosis breaks, that’s all. When the trance is gone, a person can pass through any act, seeing.

And the day one passes through sex seeing, that very day one is free of sex. Then sex has no meaning, because the hypnosis is wholly broken. But such a person also sees no reason to refuse. Keep this in mind… such a person sees no reason even to refuse. For such a person, refusal too has no meaning.

If you tell that youth, “Do you want to kiss the pillow?” he will say, “No, no, I don’t want to.” Because it sounds absurd—to kiss a pillow! He will refuse. He may even take a vow in a temple: “I swear by God I will never kiss a pillow.” But his madness toward the pillow continues. It hides even in that vow.

Therefore brahmacharya is not getting rid of sex; it is waking up from sex. That is why we call even a person like Krishna a brahmachari—one who has attained to brahmacharya. It is wondrous—his attainment is extraordinary. Thousands upon thousands of women surround him; it makes no difference. It makes no difference to Krishna. It has no relation to him.

That is why we call it lila—play. Just a play. And he is awake the whole time; it means nothing to him.

There are two ways to live life. Live asleep—and you will eat in sleep, wear clothes in sleep, love in sleep, pass through sex in sleep. The other way is to live awake—every act awake. Sex is the deepest act because biology, life-science, and all of nature are keen that the lineage continue; hence a very deep trance is laid upon it.

It seems difficult to us, but nothing is difficult for witnessing. That is why I said: Mahavira has a wife, yet is unmarried; Mahavira has a daughter, yet is childless. Mahavira has no children. Mahavira has no wife, either.

Two kinds of people are easy for us to understand. A man running toward a woman—we understand. A man running away from a woman—we also understand. Facing toward woman—we understand; turning one’s back on woman—we understand.

But a person for whom “woman” itself has vanished, who stands silently—that person we find very hard to understand. Neither going nor fleeing. Neither oriented toward woman nor disoriented from her. Neither in attachment nor in aversion.

Therefore, for Mahavira the word used—vitaraga—is very wondrous. Vitaraga does not mean “viragi” (renunciate). Those who take it to mean “viragi” have not understood. Vitaraga means free of raga altogether—free of both attachment and aversion. Raga and viraga are two sides of the same coin. It can happen that out of enmity toward attachment someone becomes a renunciate, and out of enmity toward renunciation someone becomes attached.

But vitaragi means one whose raga and viraga have both gone, who remains simply and naturally standing. He neither flees nor comes. He neither calls nor is afraid. Vitaraga means that in whom neither attachment nor aversion remains.

The seeker who walks behind Mahavira seizes aversion out of attachment. He converts attachment into aversion. A “viragi” is only an inverted “ragi”—doing a headstand, standing on his head. The attached says: I will touch, embrace, love, live. The renunciate says: I will not touch, I will not embrace, I will not love, I will not live. There is fear—danger of bondage. One is eager to be bound; the other is afraid of being bound. But bondage is at the center of both; both fix their gaze on bondage. That is why the attached readily worship the renunciate.

It is very difficult to recognize a vitaragi, because a vitaragi falls outside our categories and measures altogether. Put something on this pan of the scale—there is a weighing; put it on that pan—there is a weighing. Step off the scale—what weighing then? Attachment is one pan; aversion is the other. On both you can weigh. But what weighing will there be of vitaraga? How will you weigh the vitaragi?

The long persecution Mahavira faced has vitaragata as its cause. Note this well: this country has never persecuted the renunciate. In Mahavira’s time there was no lack of renunciates. The renunciate has always been honored. He has never been persecuted—because the attached cannot persecute the renunciate. The attached always worship the renunciate, for he feels, “How mired I am in filth! How freed the renunciate is from all filth!” But both the attached and the renunciate persecute the vitaragi. The attached says, “What kind of man is this!” and throws stones, “He is not a renunciate.” The renunciate says, “What sort of renunciate is this!” And he too persecutes.

Two kinds of enemies harassed Mahavira: the attached and the renunciate. The attached harassed him, stoned him, saying, “This man is not a renunciate.” The renunciate harassed him, saying, “What kind of renunciate is he!”

To recognize the vitaragi is difficult. We can recognize duality; we cannot recognize the nondual. We can recognize the divided; we cannot recognize the undivided. Mahavira’s entire disposition is vitaraga—his whole feeling is vitaraga. And in every situation. Because for a vitaragi, situation is not the issue. The attached says, “I need this situation.” The renunciate says, “I need that situation.”

The attached says: woman, wealth, money must be—without them I cannot live. The renunciate says: woman must not be, wealth must not be, money must not be—with them I cannot live. That is, both have conditions for living. One has such conditions; one has such. But both live conditionally. The vitaragi says: whatever is, is! I have nothing to do with it. He stands untouched. One who stands untouched will be unconditional. Such an unconditional person becomes very hard to recognize.

Therefore Mahavira’s age could not recognize him at all—very difficult. That is why he is continually tormented, continually persecuted.

We always persecute the man who stands apart from all our standards—whom we cannot weigh, on whom we cannot stick a label, “Who is he?” If we can stick a label, we are at ease. Label him “this” or “that,” and then we deal with the label, not the man. Once we’re certain “this man is a renunciate,” we write “renunciate”; then we do with him whatever we do with renunciates. Write “attached,” and we do what we do with the attached. But here is a man on whom it is hard to stick any label—who is he? What is he?

For years Mahavira wandered in this state—people asking, “Who is he? What kind of man is this?” And Mahavira gave no answer—he was silent. Because “who is he”—what answer is there to give? If there were a label, he would give it. So Mahavira remained continually silent. People said what they would; he stood quietly and bore it all.

He is standing near a village. A cowherd leaves his cows and bulls with him and says, “Please watch them! I’ll be back; one of my cows is missing.” Mahavira does not even say, “I won’t watch”—if he were to say that, the matter would end. He does not even say, “I will watch”—if he were to say that, the matter would end. The man could fix a label and be done. Mahavira stands as if he heard and did not hear, as if no question was asked at all.

The man goes searching. By evening he returns; the cows and bulls he left sitting behind Mahavira had risen and wandered into the forest. He asks Mahavira, “Where did they go?” Mahavira still stands as he was, for he does not keep account of coming and going. He remains as he is. The man says, “Why didn’t you say so then?” Still Mahavira stands as he is. The man concludes, “He has stolen them, hidden them; he is dishonest.” He beats him. Mahavira bears the beating—still standing as he was. A little later the cows and bulls return from the jungle at dusk. The man is stricken, asks forgiveness. Mahavira still stands as he is!

This man is in no condition, no label. Whatever is happening, he stands as he is in it. This is a wondrous phenomenon. Whatever is happening—no matter what—he has nothing to do with what is happening. He stands the same in every situation and sees everything. Such a person is very hard to understand.

Those who later wrote scriptures said, “Mahavira is very forgiving; he forgives whoever beats him.” They did not understand. Only one who gets angry then forgives. Forgiveness is the after-part of anger. To call Mahavira “forgiving” is not to understand him at all. Anger does not arise in Mahavira—who is there to forgive? Whom to forgive? Mahavira is seeing—he is seeing that this man did such-and-such: first he beat, then he asked forgiveness. He is seeing that this happened. Things are such. And he stands silently. He is simply seeing; he is not even making choices—not deciding this should have happened and that should not.

Thus, continually, continually, he has gone beyond attachment and aversion, beyond choosing, beyond good and bad, beyond what anyone says.

This vitaragata is the supreme attainment that is possible in life. That is, the ultimate point in the journey of life is the point of vitaragata. It is the last point of life, because beyond it begins the journey of liberation. Without becoming vitaraga, no one is free. The attached cannot be free; the renunciate cannot be free. Both are bound.

But we, who do not understand, take vitaraga to mean “viragi”—one who has dropped attachment. No. Viraga is still raga—just inverted raga. Vitaraga is one who has dropped raga itself.

The word raga is very good; it is worth understanding. Raga means color, coloring. We say “raga-rang”—color and mood. Viraga means the opposite coloring. Our eyes are always colored; there is some color upon the eye—some coloring. Through that color we see. So things appear to us as the color of our eye. Things do not appear as they are. Colored eyes can never see the truth.

Now a man of attachment sees a woman passing on the road—he feels heaven. A woman is only a woman. The attached feels heaven. A renunciate sits under a tree there—he feels hell is passing by; he closes his eyes. A woman is only a woman. The renunciate sees hell passing. So the renunciate writes in his books: “Woman is the gate of hell.” And the attached writes: “Woman is heaven, she alone is liberation, she alone is bliss.” Women, if they write, will write likewise.

The attached makes woman into heaven—his eye has a color. The renunciate makes woman into hell—his eye has a color. The vitaragi stands: woman is woman. She goes on her way; she goes. I stand where I am; I stand. She is neither heaven nor hell. He draws no conclusion about her, because there is no color in his eye—he is color-free. Therefore, he sees as it is. The matter ends. He projects nothing. He imposes nothing of his own. He does not say “beautiful,” nor does he say “ugly,” because beautiful and ugly are our colors which we plaster on things. Things are only things. Nothing is beautiful, nothing ugly. It is our feeling that we pour into them.

Just as we see today that in an educated, tasteful home a cactus is planted. Cactus!

The color changed. Completely changed. And every time we get bored with a color, we change it—because staring at one color for too long breeds weariness. For a thousand years we kept saying, “The rose is beautiful, the rose is beautiful,” and we got bored. “Enough—throw it out of the house.” Honoring the Brahmin for too long brought boredom too—so now seat the Shudra.

The cactus was a Shudra for many days; suddenly it has become a Brahmin. It used to live outside the village—an outcaste. As the Shudra lived, so lived the poor cactus. Overnight it turned aristocrat and came indoors.

We get bored. And the trick of boredom is that it always drives us to extremes. Whenever we tire of one thing, we move straight to its opposite.

The person who gets bored of dance and song will run to the temple. Tired of eating, he’ll start fasting. Tired of clothes, he’ll start renouncing. Tired of wealth, he’ll turn toward religion. Weary of the tavern, he’ll go to the temple. And the man weary of the temple sets out in search of the tavern. Wherever we grow bored, we flip. Tired of attachment, we grab disattachment; tired of disattachment, we grab attachment.

If we could open the minds of the attached and the renunciate, we’d be amazed to find an inverted man inside. In the attached you’ll find a constant longing to be renunciate—even in his worst moments, the flavor of renunciation will be present.

That’s why the attached worship the renunciate: it is their deep feeling. They too wish to be that. And if we peer into the renunciate, we will find envy toward the attached. Just as the attached feels reverence for the renunciate, the renunciate carries envy toward the attached.

Hence the renunciate keeps abusing the worldly. His abuse is born of envy. Inwardly, his craving is the same. For each craving he has, he scolds the worldly: “You are committing sin; you will rot in hell.” He frightens and threatens, but inside the very same longing hums.

I meet great sadhus. In public they speak of soul and God; in private, their minds are filled with nothing but sex. They are terribly agitated: “How to get rid of this? It grips me all the time.” Outwardly, there’s talk of God and liberation 24 hours a day, but within, the whirl of desire is in full swing.

And it can happen that a man sitting in a tavern, in a prostitute’s house, many times becomes a sannyasin in his heart: “Enough—this is futile.”

The opposite keeps tugging. The attached becomes renunciate; the renunciate becomes attached. He who is attached in this life may be renunciate in the next; he who is renunciate now may be attached in the next.

I have been very surprised to find this. Recently, some deep experiments have produced strange, startling results. For example, there is a man thoroughly steeped in indulgence. Try to descend into his previous life and you’ll be shocked to discover he had been a sannyasin. And while being a sannyasin, he built up such resistance and revolt against it that this life turned into one of indulgence.

A woman used to come to me, very eager somehow to descend into her past lives. I told her often, “Drop this eagerness; you could get into difficulty.” She had a fierce urge to be a chaste, saintly woman. The urge had gripped her so strongly that I suspected in a past life she must have been a courtesan—otherwise why such a violent swing toward chastity? What we grow weary of becomes the starting point of a new birth. Still, she would not listen. I said, “All right—do the experiment.”

She practiced for six months, attempting past-life regression, recollection of former births. One day she came crying and screaming: “Make me forget somehow! I was a devadasi in a temple in the South—a prostitute. I want to forget this; I don’t even want to remember such a thing ever happened.”

I said, “Once it’s remembered, it is hard to forget.”

That is why nature has arranged it so the past does not return to memory—because in the past you were continually the opposite. People commonly think that a man who is a sannyasin in this life must have earned sannyas in a previous one. Not so. The renunciate of this life has already gone round and round the carousel of indulgence in the last life, touched the extreme, and now, bored, has seized a new arrangement in this birth.

Between attachment and renunciation we have revolved for countless lives. Not that we have only circled in attachment. Many times attachment, many times detachment; never veetarag—beyond both—and it never will be, because as the pendulum reaches one extreme, it starts its journey toward the other.

That is why I say: don’t bother about what you should become—attached or renunciate. Care about this: whatever you are, wake up in it. Drop the anxiety of becoming. That awakening will lead to veetaragata. And veetaragata is an entirely different thing.

In this very context, as I said about recollection of past births—if there is any greatest gift of Mahavira, it is jati-smaran: remembrance of past lives. His greatest gifts are those methods of meditation by which a person can descend into his former births.

And if a person descends into his past lives and comes to know even two or four, he will be astonished. He cannot remain the same man. He will find, “I have done all this many times; I have also done its opposite—over and over—and attained nothing. Each time, like the spokes of a wheel that circle and return to the same place, I too have spun around and come back to where I began.”

Many times the wheel felt, “I have reached the top,” but just when it felt so, the descent had already begun. Many times it felt, “I’ve fallen to the very bottom, to hell,” and just then the ascent began. Many times heaven touched, many times hell. Many times sorrow, many times joy. Many times attachment, many times renunciation. The cycle has spun through all dualities. If five or ten lives come back to memory, it becomes obvious that this has all happened so often that choosing within it has no meaning.

So the point of jati-smaran is this: we have already suffered these dualities many times; let us awaken from both; within the two there is no way to choose. But the law of the mind is: it chooses the opposite of what it is doing. Hence the crowd of the attached throng around the renunciates. As one chooses and practices one side, in the unconscious the opposite starts accumulating. When engaged in sex, thoughts of brahmacharya arise; when practicing brahmacharya, thoughts of sex arise. While eating, he thinks how to renounce food; when he renounces, memories of food begin to come.

Our arrangement of revolving in duality is so astonishing—and we are in only one place at a time, so the other keeps attracting us, the opposite. If two or four births come back to memory, that we have wandered on both sides, then a third way opens. And that third way is Mahavira’s way: veetaragata. These two have no meaning—then what to do, what is the third path? If not indulgence, if not yoga, what is the third?

The third path is only this: awaken to both. Then a triangle is formed. Imagine a triangle. Its lower line bears the two opposites—attachment on one side, renunciation on the other. He who is here longs to go there; he who is there longs to come here. Between these two we keep revolving. He who awakens from both reaches the apex of the triangle.

He is veetarag—beyond both. He has gone beyond both; he stands in neither attachment nor renunciation. But for those standing in attachment or in renunciation, he becomes unintelligible: “Where is this man?” Because in our definitions there are only two points—attachment and renunciation. “Where is this fellow?” He becomes hard to understand. But understanding is not the point. This man can understand both of us; we cannot understand him at all.

The experiment of jati-smaran is Mahavira’s greatest gift. And I feel no real work has been done on it; the essential thing is right there. By taking a person through that discipline, anyone can be led into veetaragata—anyone! Until one passes through that discipline, this will keep happening: if he is attached he will become renunciate; if he is renunciate he will become attached. And both are equally foolish; there is no question of choosing between them.

We see daily how we unknowingly choose the opposite. The man in the palace keeps saying, “Where is the joy of a hut here!” and envies the hut-dweller: his sleep, his ease. The man in the hut envies the palace: “What happens there doesn’t happen here; we are dying in this hut.” The hut-dweller moves toward the palace; the palace-dweller moves toward the hut. The city man runs toward a small village; the villager runs toward the big city. All the time we are headed opposite to where we are—because where we are, we grow weary, we fill with boredom; and from what we are bored, we go toward its opposite.

Just so, the East will move toward materialism, having grown weary of spirituality; and the West will move toward spirituality, bored with materialism. So in the West the pressing concern today is: What is spirituality? How can we become spiritual? And the East’s preoccupation today, entire and complete, is: How can we become scientific? How to bring wealth? Prosperity? Better houses? Better machines?

The East’s personality is going toward materialism; the West’s personality is coming toward spirituality. The same mistake. It has happened many times—within the person, within society, within nations. An extreme seizes us with the other extreme.

Mahavira says: we have circled through both extremes many times, through both opposites many times. Will we ever awaken and stand where there is no extremity, no opposition, no duality?

This state is called veetaragata. And it is present in everyone. Remember, in everyone.

For example, a man gets angry. Have you ever noticed what you do after being angry? You repent. It is hard to find a man who does not repent after anger. And if you do find one, it is astonishing. Anger—and then repentance! Repentance is the other extreme. Anger brings repentance in its wake. In repentance a man thinks, “I am a good man—see, I got angry, but I also repent.” Anger—then forgiveness arrives behind it. The opposite will keep arriving on every level of life.

Have you ever noticed that toward the one you love, your hatred begins to gather? Freud first pointed to this fact: toward the one you love, hatred begins to accumulate. Because you love, then you begin to tire of love—what will you do next? And toward the one you wholly hate, there is a great possibility that love will begin to accumulate.

There was a Jewish fakir. He wrote a book—a revolutionary one. The greatest religious leader among the Jews, the Rabbi, received the book as a gift sent through a friend. The Hasidic, rebellious fakir told the messenger, “Just do one thing: when you present the book to the Rabbi, carefully notice what he says, what he does—does he get angry, annoyed, throw the book away? What is his face like? Bring me every detail. You need not do anything—just observe.”

The man went and presented the book. “So-and-so fakir has sent this.” The Rabbi didn’t even look at it; he picked it up and threw it out the door: “Get out of here! To touch such books is sin and impiety.”

The Rabbi’s wife was sitting nearby. She said, “Why do you do this? If you must throw it, wait till the man leaves, then throw it away. And there are thousands of books in the house—put this in a corner too. If you don’t want to read it, don’t. But why do this?” The Rabbi flared up, red with anger.

The messenger bowed and left. The fakir asked, “What happened?”

He said, “Such and such. The Rabbi is dangerous; his wife is very good. The Rabbi threw the book out and shouted, ‘Get away from here!’ He became fire itself.”

The fakir said, “As for the Rabbi, he and I will be reconciled someday; but with his wife, never. The Rabbi will have to read the book. He will read it; but his wife—there is no hope; she will never read it.”

The man said, “You’re speaking backwards. The Rabbi was furious, blazing.”

He replied, “Because he was furious, his fury will slacken in a little while. How long can one be angry? When someone rises to a peak of fire, he has to return to peace. When one labors, one must rest. When one wakes, one must sleep. The opposite must be entered. How long will the Rabbi remain angry? The degree must come down; he will cool, bring the book in, and read it. But his wife—there is no hope. She had no ‘degree’ at all. She did not go into anger; she will not return into forgiveness. She took things with such neutrality that no relationship with her is possible for me.”

When we are angry, forgiveness starts accumulating. When we are forgiving, anger starts accumulating. When we love, hatred begins to gather; when we hate, love begins to gather. And this is man’s duality: he loves the one he hates; he hates the one he loves. A friend is not only a friend—he is an enemy too. And an enemy is not only an enemy—he is a friend too. And so it goes on...

These days I continually observe: if someone begins to love me excessively, I know he will soon leave—his hatred will begin to accumulate. I become concerned for him: he will go, and there will be no way to return except by leaving. And if someone begins to hate me fiercely, to rage at me, I know he will come—how can he live in such hatred? He will have to return.

Mahavira says: every duality binds. It binds you to its opposite. Therefore, by awakening to duality, veetaragata becomes available. Neither lust nor brahmacharya; then true brahmacharya becomes available—because its opposite then does not arise. Neither anger nor forgiveness; then true forgiveness becomes available—because its opposite no longer occurs. Neither violence nor nonviolence; then true nonviolence becomes available—because then there is nothing opposite to it.

Hence great misunderstanding arises. It becomes difficult to understand Mahavira’s ahimsa, because Mahavira’s nonviolence is not the nonviolence that is the opposite of violence. The one who is nonviolent as the opposite of violence will become violent today or tomorrow. Mahavira’s ahimsa is hard to grasp because it is not the opposite of violence. Where neither violence remains nor nonviolence remains, what remains there—Mahavira calls that ahimsa.

When we speak on ahimsa, we can bring it to mind then. If there is anything more, ask.

I understand. This is a very good question; let us take it up. In fact, things are not as they appear to us.

The Dalai Lama is very difficult to understand, because in the language and habits of thought we carry, he certainly looks like a coward who ran away to save himself. He should have fought, struggled—why flee! That is how it appears to us, simple and straight.

But I tell you, there is much more meaning in his flight. On the surface it looks as if the Dalai ran away to save himself—how cowardly! The truth is not so small. That is only what shows on the surface. The Dalai Lama’s leaving was profoundly compassionate and immensely significant. Had he stayed to fight, in our eyes he would have looked very brave. But the Dalai Lama had to take something else with him—something we do not see—which would have been destroyed had he stayed to fight.

Understand it like this: there is a temple and a priest. And this priest is the custodian of deep treasures which, if he dies, could be lost instantly—lost in the sense that all living links to them would vanish. Before he dies it is essential that he pass on every thread, every key to someone.

The Dalai Lama holds many esoteric keys—so arcane that today perhaps only four or five people on earth can truly understand them. His escape was absolutely necessary. Tibet is not as valuable as what the Dalai Lama knows and can transmit. And Tibet’s defeat was certain.

This too is something worth grasping. Tibet’s defeat was virtually predetermined; Tibet’s submergence into China was certain. This could be visible to the Dalai Lama in a way it was not to others. And if that is seen clearly, then the right course is not to fight, but to quietly withdraw—carrying with you what is more precious to save. Tibet would not have been saved; what he carried could be, by fleeing.

And today the Dalai sits and is doing that very work. With the ten, twenty-five people he brought—the valuable ones—he is handing over all the treasure he knows. As for his dying—there is no question: he will die. He could have died in Tibet, he will die here; the issue was never to escape death.

This is not the first time such a thing has happened. In India there came a time when Buddhist monks had to flee the country. They had to run because the soil here had turned barren for their work; there was no one left to receive what they carried. It was not about saving their lives. It was about saving the seeds they held—seeds that might sprout in some other soil in Asia.

Out of great compassion they went to China, Tibet, Burma, Thailand—and there they planted the seeds. And from those seeds, today, the possibility arises that they may return to India again.

At that time they too must have looked like cowards to many: they should have stayed and fought—where was there to go! But those who truly carry something will be more concerned with preserving it than with fighting. The very tree under which the Buddha sat and attained enlightenment was destroyed; but Emperor Ashoka had sent a branch of it to Lanka. In Lanka it was kept safe. Later a branch of that branch was brought back to Bodh Gaya. The original tree was destroyed—destroyed indeed when the Buddhists were uprooted—but the lineage of life survived through that one branch.

I use the tree as a symbol. Tibet had reached a point where it would fall into Chinese hands. And nothing on earth can eradicate esoteric science as forcefully as communism can. This may not be in your awareness: wherever communism goes, it is eager to cut the roots of all inner truths and their living traditions. The first blow always falls on a land’s inner wealth.

Tibet, in this sense, was extraordinary. Cut off from the world, it lived in seclusion. It had no concern with the world’s affairs, no entanglements. In that solitude it preserved the ancient treasure of inner knowing more than any other place on earth.

So the Dalai’s flight was essential. Few will praise it, but I do. Had he stayed to fight, in worldly terms it would have been worth two pennies. He is not a coward. But what he brought out had to be replanted.

And this country has not even noticed that with the Dalai a great original branch has returned—one from which India could benefit. But the country does not care! It has no concern, no relationship with the Dalai. That he is in your land is a very significant event. It was not easy to bring him here. This is the moment, the opportunity; we could benefit. Many esoteric, many secret truths could be learned from him.

But we have no interest, no purpose in it! And we only see the surface… I do not agree. I do not agree.

Suppose I am here, and I see that this country will not be helped by what I have to offer—that the people are not receptive. Now there are many things, of various kinds. Let me tell you this: among the people who are connecting with me in this life, I recognize quite a few whom I have known in past lives. For them I would do all the work. If, tomorrow, I feel that out of forty or fifty crore people, I have relevance only to two or four hundred, then even while I keep working with the millions I will gather those two or four hundred close. And if I sense that the country is going into the hands of communists or such people as will cut the roots, I will prefer to flee anywhere with those four hundred.

Do you understand me? I would prefer to leave with those four hundred. I have no use for fifty crores. I will go with those four hundred into some distant forest. The world will think I ran away, that I didn’t stand and fight when it was time. But I will know what I must do.

The Dalai Lama left with a small group—those precious ones who could become future branches. And perhaps, two hundred years from now, a hundred years, even fifty years, the winds in Tibet may turn favorable and what he saved can be replanted there. That is his hope and aspiration, for the sake of which one endures so much hardship: that the thing be saved. And if fifty or a hundred years later—since nothing remains the same—everything changes, then one can return; the treasures can reach Tibet again.

But these truths are not visible to our eyes; this wealth is not the wealth our eyes can see. He brought with him all those priceless texts that had been preserved only in Tibetan—texts destroyed in Sanskrit but kept safe in Tibet. Those are the Dalai’s treasures; they had to be saved at any cost.

Think of the monks who fled India to Tibet or China. Here, the texts were ruthlessly wiped out; the Buddhist sutras were destroyed. Those who escaped with scriptures preserved them in Chinese, Tibetan, Burmese. Now they can be brought back. We lost immeasurable, wondrous works—burned them with our own hands.

In those days it must have seemed the same: why is Bodhidharma going to China? Is he running away from life? But Bodhidharma would not let the original branch of the Buddha’s meditation be destroyed. That entire matter depended on one man. If he had died on the way, such a vast treasure would have been lost beyond reckoning.

There is a remarkable event in the Buddha’s life. One morning he came holding a flower. He never did this. Someone had given him a flower along the way. He came, sat on the platform, and remained silent. A long time passed. The monks grew restless: why is he silent, why does he not speak? Then he smiled. Hearing his laughter, one monk, Mahakashyapa, burst out laughing loudly.

This man had never spoken before. He always remained silent. He laughed out loud. The Buddha called him, placed the flower in his hand, and said to the monks: “What I could give you in words, I have given you. What I could not give in words, I give to Mahakashyapa.”

Something was transferred—something invisible. The Buddha said, “What cannot be conveyed by words, I give to Mahakashyapa.” For thousands of years people have asked, “What was given to Mahakashyapa? What was transferred?” But if the Buddha could have said it in words, he would have said it himself. Who then could say what happened?

Mahakashyapa became the heir to the Buddha’s inner wealth—the esoteric science. He has almost no name in the scriptures, for he wrote no book; there was no reason for his name to be recorded. Yet that event is immense. And what Mahakashyapa carried, he gave from person to person—because this was a matter of transmission, not explanation. When someone was ripe, it was transferred.

In Mahakashyapa’s lineage was the monk Bodhidharma. He left India because he could not find a single person here to whom he could transfer what he had; otherwise it would die with him. He went to China and transferred it to one person there.

In China the lineage continued for a few generations, then it had to be transferred to Japan, because no one in China was available. Today it is alive in Japan. In Zen, Mahakashyapa is the first patriarch. And now it is in Japan; Suzuki is presently its last great teacher. But there is fear now—can anyone in Japan still receive it?

So Suzuki has spent his life laboring in Europe and America to find someone to whom he can transfer it. A receptive mind is needed! And hope no longer arises in Japan, which has become thoroughly materialistic; consciousness has grown heavy with inertia. With one line of development often comes a fall elsewhere. Japan is utterly modern now, ultra-modern: to whom can it be given? That old man, Suzuki, spent his life wandering in Europe. He found two or three people: in France, a Frenchman, Hubert Benoit; in America, Alan Watts. He gave it to them; now he is free. They will know and understand.

What Mahakashyapa carried is with Hubert Benoit, with Alan Watts. Some things are so secret, so deep, that a man is needed who can receive them. But we do not see how such things move, how they are passed. The one who carries them knows the pain: What to do? How to pass it on so it survives? Let me die—but what I hold must live. It is more precious than I am, it should be saved; it will serve someone for generations upon generations.

So do not take the matter the way you have. It is not so.

Generally you are right. Generally, absolutely right—absolutely right. But any act can happen in two ways: either you get immersed in the act, or you remain standing outside it.
When you get immersed in the act, you become unconscious. When you stand outside the act, you remain a witness. In the first condition, intercourse will be your need; in the second, there may be some other kind of need. And many kinds of need—as I just said, there is the matter of transferring knowledge. Now, you may be surprised that some people who reach a state where sex has become completely unnecessary may still wish to transfer the bodily potential they carry. They may not want to break that branch either; that branch, too, has value. For instance, a person like Buddha or Mahavira.
There is the journey of the soul; but a body is also needed, one that can hold such a precious soul. Such a person may not want to let even that go, because by the time a sperm cell has evolved up to a Mahavira, it is not ordinary. The soul is extraordinary—that is so—but the sperm cell that has evolved up to Mahavira is also not ordinary. They may wish to transfer that as well.
Then intercourse is not meaningful. Intercourse is not their relish. Then intercourse, like eating or bathing or sleeping or getting up or sitting down, is simply an external need and can be useful—quite useful. In fact, it may be that a thousand or two thousand years from now, when our knowledge of genetics has advanced even further—already it has advanced a lot—we might even be annoyed with Jesus: that the sperm cell whose long journey culminated so fruitfully in Jesus, why was that wealth not continued? We might be annoyed. Because it is not possible again. After millions of years of journeying, such a sperm cell, a distinctive sperm cell, is present in Jesus’ body, and with Jesus’ body that branch is lost.
Do you see what I mean? This could be so. Earlier it was not possible, but a thousand years from today, or five hundred, perhaps even fifty, it will become possible to preserve the sperm cells of very important individuals. We need to preserve the sperm cell of a man like Einstein, because such a possibility ripens with great difficulty. It is not an ordinary possibility. The sperm cell of a person like Einstein needs to be preserved. And if ever, two hundred years after Einstein’s death—now a sperm cell can be kept—there becomes available a woman of Einstein’s caliber, then by the union of her ovum with this sperm a person could be brought forth who would be as unique as even Einstein was not.
So as our understanding grows, we will not let the sperm cells of the finest people be lost; we will preserve them. In those days there was no other way; now there is this way. Now there is this possibility: intercourse is not compulsory; sperm can be preserved. Without intercourse a sperm cell can be activated, and from it offspring can be produced. But at that time this was not available.
So I think this, too, may have been in awareness. Buddha also fathered a son; Mahavira, a daughter. This consideration may have been behind it. But it is a matter of many combinations. That, too, should be conserved. But then sex is not your relish—do you understand? I am saying: when there is relish in sex, you get immersed; when there is no relish, it is no issue—then it is a purely mechanical act.

There is no such “experience” happening to you. In sum, all that happens is this: the tension of your mind relaxes when the energy goes out of the body—nothing more. You mistake that relaxation for a great experience. There is no “experience” as such. Then tension gathers again, the burden piles up again; then, through the discharge of semen, the energy goes out and you relax again. What experience do you have—none! Has any such experience ever really happened?

An experience can happen, but the means for that are different; then it is no longer a matter of sex. Biologically, it only relaxes your tension. That is why for very relaxed people it is not needed; for very tense people the need grows. The more the tension, the more the sex.

The reason there is so much sexuality in the West is nothing else: the psyche has become intensely tense. To loosen that tension, the only device left is that the energy goes out of the body. It is a release valve for your energy, nothing more. A very concentrated energy suddenly discharges; all the nerves of the body relax. When such concentrated energy leaves, relaxation is bound to happen. And this slackness that you feel—you think it is the experience of sex. It is only the relaxation at work. Two days later you are tense again, ten days later tense again, and the need to relax returns. Like the valve on your pressure cooker or heater—when it gets too hot, it lets off steam. It is only such a valve, and biology makes use of it.

In this, what “experience” is there? Nothing at all. The irony is, there is no experience whatsoever. But when tension increases, the need arises, and then it happens.

Therefore, the more relaxed and peaceful a person is, the more unnecessary it becomes. Even then, other reasons may influence them, suggest ideas, and they may use intercourse as a kind of act or technique. But as I am saying—for them there is no question of “experience” in it, no question of experience.

Understood. First, vitaragata may be difficult for millions, but it is not impossible. And the greatest reason it is difficult is that it has been assumed to be difficult—the greatest reason! When we hold the notion that something is difficult—about anything—then it becomes difficult. Our very notions make things difficult or easy. When I say it is difficult, not impossible, I mean it is not difficult because the process of vitaragata is difficult, but because our grip on attachment and on aversion is tight. Hence letting it go becomes troublesome.

It is like a man climbing a mountain, carrying a huge burden—a bundle tied to him, stones tied to him—and he is climbing. And he says, climbing the mountain is very hard. We would tell him: climbing the mountain is not as hard as your burden is; if you can drop it, you can climb the mountain very easily. The real issue is not the difficulty of the mountain, but that you are bound to a load with which you cannot climb, and you do not want to drop it; hence it keeps becoming difficult. Do you understand what I mean?

Because of the kind of mental loads each person is clutching, vitaragata seems difficult. And if one also concludes that it is difficult, then not only does he not drop the load; he clings to it even more, so that it can be proved that it is indeed utterly difficult, that the matter is not simple at all.

In truth the situation is this: attachment and aversion are what are very difficult—indeed impossible, impossible. Neither do you ever attain anything through attachment, nor do you attain anything through aversion.

I do keep saying this!
Through attachment you never attain anything; from attachment you only generate the tendency toward dispassion, and from dispassion you generate the tendency toward attachment. So what is the outcome of attachment?—only that it hands you over to dispassion. And the outcome of dispassion is that it hands you back to attachment. This is a vicious circle. Nothing is truly gained by it. In neither state can you ever attain yourself. You do not become an individual at all if you are caught in attachment and dispassion.

And those who say that freedom from attachment and aversion is vitaragata—being beyond attachment—are making a serious misinterpretation. They smuggle dispassion through; if they define vitaragata as freedom from attachment and aversion, they preserve dispassion. That is a device, a mischief.

The true opposite of attachment is dispassion, not aversion. Aversion is actually a part of attachment, not its opposite; the real opposition is between attachment and dispassion, not between attachment and aversion. So by a trick they escaped; they safeguarded the dispassionate and turned “dispassionate” and “beyond attachment” into rungs of a ladder, as if from dispassion one then climbs to beyond-attachment.

What I am saying is: whether you go by way of attachment or by way of dispassion, the distance to being beyond attachment is the same from both.

Let us understand this. Secondly, it is not difficult—because what is natural to you cannot, in the end, be difficult; only what is acquired and contrived can be difficult. And what is natural is so bliss-filled that once even a glimpse is had, we would climb any number of mountains for it. Until that glimpse comes, there is difficulty. And that glimpse is not allowed by attachment and aversion. If they shift even a little, the glimpse begins. Like clouds covering the sky so that not even a ray of the sun is seen—let a cloud move slightly and the ray peeks through. If even the tiniest crack opens in the duality of attachment and aversion, the joy of dispassion starts flowing at once. And once it begins to flow, however long the journey, it becomes possible; it is not difficult.

But what do we do? We go from attachment to aversion and from aversion back to attachment. Both are clouds that enshroud in the same way. Therefore we never get even a moment’s chance to know it. A society of people swaying between attachment and aversion will make rules—must make them—because a person who sways like that is very dangerous; rules will have to be made for him. And who will make the rules? The same people swaying in attachment and aversion. Those who sway are dangerous; and when such people make the rules, they are even more dangerous.

It is like a madhouse: for the mad you will have to make some rules. But if the rule-makers are mad too, the rules will be even more dangerous—because the mad will make rules for the mad! The mad are dangerous as it is; when they make the rules, the danger multiplies. Society is living in just such danger.

And when we say one must move toward dispassion, we are not saying, “Break the rules.” We are not saying that. What I am saying is that for one who has moved even a little toward dispassion, rules become unnecessary—he lives in such a way that the question of causing anyone pain or hurt simply does not arise. Yes, if someone insists on taking suffering from him, that is another matter; that is their freedom.

Mahavira lives in such a way that there is no question of anyone receiving pain or pleasure from him; but if someone wants to take pain or pleasure, they take it—and the full responsibility lies with the taker. Mahavira has not given even a hand’s worth; whether someone takes pain or pleasure depends on the taker. Mahavira simply lives as he lives.

The more dispassionate the mind, the more discerning it is. Perfect dispassion is perfect discernment. And discernment needs no restraint, no rules, because discernment itself is restraint. Lack of discernment needs restraint. Therefore all the self-restrained are undiscerning. The more unintelligent one is, the tighter the restraints that must be tied. They try to compensate for a lack of intelligence with restraint. But restraint does not fill the lack of intelligence. And the society we have built so far is trying to make up for its lack of intelligence by imposing restraint. Therefore thousands of years have passed, and nothing has changed.

I am not saying that. I am not saying that. It is like the people in a madhouse saying, “If we get cured, what will happen to the madhouse?”
Then the madhouse itself will collapse, won’t it! If people become discerning, society as we have understood it will not be; there will be fundamental differences. But for the first time there will be society in the true sense.

What is it now? There is society, and there is no individual. And this society has all individuals tightly bound within its circle. Society is merely the name of an order. The order is burdensome, and the individual is weak. The order sits on the chest, and the person is crushed beneath it.

Tomorrow too there will be an order. Even if the kind of individual I am speaking of multiplies—a discerning person, imbued with dispassion, filled with the joy of life—there will still be an order. But it will not sit on the individual’s chest; it will exist for the individual.

As things stand now, the individual exists for the order. And then too there will be society, but then “society” will be the name of the interrelationship between two persons, ten persons, a thousand persons—of interrelatedness. The individual will be central; society will be secondary. Society will be only the arrangement of our mutual dealings. And the dealings of a discerning person do not run by external restraint and rules; they run by an inner discipline. So until that happens, the society we have will continue; it will go on.

It is like asking, “If everyone becomes healthy, what will happen to the doctors and hospitals?”
If people become healthy, they are no longer needed. What doctors and hospitals have to do is not something good in itself. It only seems good because we keep doing the business of being ill. It is not good, because what has to be done is merely to wipe clean the wrong we keep creating—nothing more.

So as discernment develops, as dispassion develops, there will be society, there will be interrelationships—but they will become very secondary; the individual will become primary. And his inner discipline will be the essential thing.

Therefore my point is: in the social order there should be less effort to impose restraint on the individual, and more provision to give discernment. From discernment, restraint will arise; from restraint, discernment never arises.

It will remain so. It is just like...

A policeman stands at a crossroads and therefore people keep to the left and right—there is nothing fortunate about this. People should keep to the right and left on their own, and the policeman should be sent off; we are needlessly troubling one man. And for what are we troubling him? So that he keeps making people move left and right! And how mindless are people that if there were no policeman at that crossing, they wouldn’t even keep to the left and right!

So it means that society has, till now, not even tried to produce intelligence! It is making a policeman do the work of discernment. Millions pass along this road, and one policeman has become a substitute for the discernment of millions! This policeman too is a man without discernment. Somehow he manages the left-right. But what difference does it make? People keep to their lanes a bit, and the accidents on the road are a little fewer.

But if we think that this has made up for the lack of discernment, we are mistaken. It only indicates that discernment is absent. And we should strive to bring discernment, so that we can bid this goodbye.

We should awaken such discernment that morality, restraint, and rules can gradually be dismissed. A society in which there are no rules, no imposed restraints, where people live by discernment—only then will society have truly come into being; otherwise, only a sham of society is going on.

That debate will go on among them, it will go on among them, because a thinker is not a seer. And the very thing that keeps it going—this assumption that there is a vyavahār-dṛṣṭi and a niścaya-dṛṣṭi—there is no such thing. There is only one vision: niścaya-dṛṣṭi (the definitive vision). To call vyavahāra a “vision” is like saying some people have eyesight and some have “blind eyesight.” We could say: the blind too have eyes, only they don’t see; the seeing also have eyes, only they do see—that is the only difference; otherwise, both have eyes. So you make it two kinds of eyes: a blind eye and a seeing eye.
Vyavahār-dṛṣṭi is the blind eye. It is not a vision at all. Vision is only that from which seeing happens—that is niścaya. All this talk of vyavahāra, and this splitting into two, saying “this too is a vision and it too is needed,” is merely the blind trying to console themselves. The blind man is not even willing to admit he is blind. He says, “My being blind is also very necessary; to go toward sight, my being blind is greatly needed”—that is what he is saying!
There are not two visions. There is only one. Vyavahār-dṛṣṭi is only a compromise. And their thinkers are thinkers of the blind. Thinkers belong to the blind. When eyes are found, from there seeing begins and thinking ends. There no one thinks—there one sees. And only when you split it into two, only then do the two fragments appear.
And these two fragments have done great harm. Because the one who stands on vyavahār-dṛṣṭi says, “This too is necessary; first this must be completed, only then will the other matter arise—gradually, by practice.” “By practicing vyavahār-dṛṣṭi, niścaya-dṛṣṭi will be attained”—nothing could be more mistaken. By dropping vyavahār-dṛṣṭi, niścaya-dṛṣṭi becomes available.

The conventional vision has to be dropped, because it is not vision at all—it is a counterfeit of vision. What is to be attained is the vision of certainty. And that is why I would rather not even attach those two qualifiers, because adding the word “certainty” is meaningless; it is needed only in contrast to the conventional. Therefore I say: drop blindness, let vision be available. What question of certainty? Is there any vision that is uncertain? If so, calling it vision is pointless.

And there is no such thing as a “conventional vision.” It’s like a blind man who, tapping his stick, manages to find his way and locate the door. Now that man says, “The stick is very necessary.” He is right—because he is blind. But he should note: if he says that even after gaining eyes the stick will still be needed, we will tell him, “Then you are mad; you have no idea what it means to have eyes.”

The conventional vision is our present condition—blindness. The vision of certainty is our possibility—the eyes. And the more we drop the former, the more we awaken, the more the latter becomes available. Therefore the conventional vision is not a ladder by which to reach the vision of certainty. The conventional vision is an obstacle to be broken, so that the vision of certainty can be available.