Mahaveer Meri Drishti Mein #9

Mahavira has made tireless efforts to carry what he came to know to the different planes of life. Yesterday we pondered how he communicated to the mute world below man, how he made resound, there, what he had realized. Two points were left out; they should be considered.
One: there are realms above man as well—how did Mahavira make his word reach those worlds? And what devices did he discover to reach man himself?
To carry the message to the deva-world is the simplest—though to us it may seem the most difficult. Because to accept anything like “devas” feels hard to us. What is seen we call true; what is not seen, for us, becomes untrue. And deva is the name for a mode of being which ordinarily is not visible to us. Yet with a little effort the existence of that realm can also be seen; we can also come into relatedness with it.
Ordinarily we think—as has just been asked too—that devas live somewhere else, ghosts somewhere else, and we somewhere else. This is utterly wrong. Right where we are living, exactly there are devas also, and pretas also. Pretas are those souls so degraded that they have lost the capacity to be human—and there is no way to descend further below. There is no passage downward into subhuman wombs; and they have lost the capacity to be human as well. They are in a difficulty: they cannot go to lower wombs, a human body is not available to them. Such souls will wait either until a womb suitable to them becomes available, or until a transformation occurs in their life so that they can again take birth.
Devas are those souls who have risen above man, but have not the capacity to attain moksha. This is now a life in waiting. It is not somewhere far off, not on some moon—right alongside us. Our difficulty is: if it is alongside us, we should be able to touch it, to see it. Sometimes that existence does touch us, and sometimes, in certain moments, it is even seen. Ordinarily not—because the very mode of our being and the mode of that being are fundamentally different. Hence, though present in the same place, they neither cut across one another nor displace one another.
Like in this room, lamps are burning and their light fills the room. I come and spray a perfume here. Someone might say: the room is completely full of light—where is the space for perfume? Yet the fragrance spreads through the room and fills it. Light was filling the room, and now fragrance also fills the room. The fragrance does not touch the light, nor the light the fragrance; neither obstructs the other, even though the room was already full. They have separate existences. Light has its own existence; fragrance has its own existence. They do not cut across or touch; they move parallel.
Then a third person comes, plays a vina and begins to sing. We say to him: the room is utterly full; the vina cannot be played; light occupies everything, and the fragrance has occupied every corner—where is the space for your sound? But he begins to play, and sound too fills the room.
Sound is not obstructed in the least by the presence of light or fragrance, because sound has its own existence. Sound creates its own space—its own sky. Fragrance has its sky; light has its sky. Every thing and every mode of being has its own sky and does not cut across another.
Hence, whenever we ask where devas live, where pretas dwell, we always think they are far from us. That very way of thinking is wrong. They are living exactly parallel to us, alongside us. And it is very appropriate that ordinarily they do not become visible to us—otherwise living would become very difficult. And ordinarily we do not come into their touch—otherwise life would become very difficult.
Yet in certain hours, in certain moments, they can be seen; their touch can happen; a relationship can arise. And in the lives of Mahavira, and such beings, there is a continual relationship and contact which traditions are utterly unable to explain. The dialogue is happening exactly as between two persons—Mahavira and Indra, or other devas. Nowhere in those dialogues is there any sense of a conversation in a fanciful realm. It is a face-to-face discourse.
Nor is it happening with one alone—so it is with Buddha, so with Jesus; with all such beings of the world, so with Mohammed. It appears there is also some pathway within us for relatedness with them, but it lies dormant.
Perhaps only one-third of the human brain is functioning; two-thirds are entirely inactive. This worries even scientists. If we open a man’s skull, only one-third is active; the remaining two-thirds lie inert. Nowhere else in the body is anything inactive; everything is functioning. Only two-thirds of the brain remain unused, for which there is no employment.
Scientists too have begun to think that those two-thirds must touch certain planes of life—if they become active. Let me illustrate. Your eyes see because the brain-center connected with the eyes is active. If that center becomes inactive, your eyes stop seeing. It may happen that a blind man’s eyes are perfectly healthy, but the brain-center that activates seeing is inactive; then healthy eyes will not be able to see.
A girl used to come to me. She was in love with someone. Her family refused the marriage and forbade her even to see the young man—kept her strictly confined inside the house. The next day the girl went blind. Every doctor examined her. They said the eyes are perfectly all right. Examination after examination—but it was certain she could not see. She could not see, and yet the eyes were perfectly fine.
A friend told me, “We are in great difficulty. At first we thought she was pretending—because we objected to her love, she was deceiving us. But now the doctors too say the eyes are fine, yet she cannot see.”
She had mental blindness—mental blindness means the brain-center that, connected with the eyes, does the work of seeing, has shut down. As soon as she was told that the one she loves she will not be able to see any more, perhaps the brain concluded, “Then there is no meaning in seeing. If the one we love cannot be seen, what need is there to see at all?” That brain-center shut down, and the eyes ceased to see.
There are many creatures, many species, who possess that brain-center which could see, but it is inactive; hence eyes could not evolve in them. There are creatures without ears; the brain-center capable of hearing is there but inactive; so ears could not evolve. Man has five senses now because five centers in the brain are active; the remaining very large part lies inactive. Scientists now also think that if some of that remaining part becomes active, new senses will begin.
For one who has never seen light, he cannot even imagine what light is. For one who has never heard sound, he cannot even imagine what sound is. Imagine a village in which all are deaf—there the subject of sound would never be discussed. It could not be discussed, for the question does not arise—sound has never been heard. And if those deaf people find a book saying sound once existed, or exists somewhere, they would all laugh: What is this? What is sound? Where is it? How to catch it? Where will we find it? All their questions would be relevant—and yet futile.
There are many parts of our brain that are inactive; if they become active, our relatedness with the infinite possibilities of life and existence begins. For example, we constantly hear of the third eye. If the portion between our two eyes, which is presently inactive, becomes active, we begin to see things we cannot now even imagine.
If you have sat near the engines in an airplane, you have seen the radar that continuously gives pictures a hundred or a hundred and fifty miles ahead. The pilot now has no need to look outside—and looking outside has no use. The aircraft moves so fast that even if the pilot sees another plane ahead, he cannot avoid a collision; by the time he takes action, the collision will have happened. The speed is so great.
He needs to see at two hundred miles. If at two hundred miles he sees a cloud-bank, he can avoid it—and by the time he is done avoiding, the two hundred miles are past; he will be beyond, below, or above the cloud. The radar sees two hundred miles ahead: whether rain is falling, clouds are moving, an aircraft is there, an enemy, whatever it is—all that appears on the radar screen.
Man’s third eye is more astonishing than radar; there is no question of space and time—not even of two hundred miles. Once active, by becoming intent upon whatever is happening anywhere, that happening can be caught instantly. With the third eye there is also the possibility of catching many probabilities of what is going to happen; and many of what has already happened.
There is yet another brain-center—if it becomes active we can catch glimpses of the thoughts moving in another’s mind. And what is moving in our mind—if we wish to transmit it without speech, it can be transmitted. The question is how to activate other parts of our brain.
There is a brain-center which, when activated, connects us to devaloka. After that connection, our own vision puts us in difficulty, for we cannot make others believe what is happening.
Swedenborg was a wondrous man. A house eight hundred miles away caught fire at midnight; he was staying at a friend’s home, and suddenly he shouted, “Bring water! Fire!” He ran and came back with a bucket of water.
His friends asked, “Where is the fire?”
He said, “Ah! What a mistake! Put the bucket down. The fire is far away. When I saw it, it seemed so near—as if here. It is eight hundred miles away, in Vienna; such-and-such a house is burning.” They said, “Eight hundred miles! How could you see?” He replied, “I am seeing it—as if it were here.”
It took three days for news to arrive; but the fire had broken out exactly where he said. And where he had said the fire did not go beyond, there it had stopped; up to that house damage occurred and then the fire abated.
He spoke most astonishingly about devas. In Europe, he is perhaps the first who gave intimate information about devaloka. He wrote a book—Heaven and Hell—and it is a marvel, full of eye-witness accounts. But trusting such accounts does not arise for us; for us it all seems meaningless. Yet there were other events in Swedenborg’s life compelling people to concede that what he said must be true.
An emperor of Europe invited him, saying, “My wife has died. Establish contact with her and tell me what she says.” The next day Swedenborg returned: “Your wife says there is a locked cupboard—its key was lost during her lifetime. You will have to break the lock; inside is a letter addressed to you, and in it she has written such-and-such.” She had died fifteen years before. The cupboard had never been opened. It was a vast palace. The key was searched for and not found; it had been with her. The lock was broken. There, indeed, was a sealed letter written by her fifteen years earlier. When it was opened, the very wording Swedenborg had reported was inside.
These possibilities—different layers of the brain being freed—Mahavira labored upon tirelessly, for expression. If one is to communicate with devaloka, a particular part of our brain must crack open—a doorway must open. If that door does not open, we cannot carry any message to that realm. Just as to convey to man, the door of words must be there—else it becomes very difficult—so also for that realm certain brain-doors must open. Our difficulty is that anything beyond the limits of our senses is hard for us to accept.
In the last world war, a man fell from a train. After the fall an unheard-of event occurred. Many had spoken of such things earlier, but there had been no scientific analysis. After the accident he began to see stars in the sky during the day. A brain-part that had been inactive was jolted into activity; he could see stars even in daytime. The stars do not go anywhere; they remain, but are covered by the sun’s light; our eyes are not capable of seeing them. Yet that man saw stars by day.
At first people thought he had gone mad. But the information he gave was exact; the stars were indeed there. When observatories verified that what he pointed out was there at that very moment, it became troublesome. The man panicked; life became difficult for him. Surgery had to be done on his head—so that he would stop seeing stars during the day; otherwise he would have gone mad.
Another man was wounded in the second world war and brought to a hospital. He felt as if someone nearby was playing a radio. He looked everywhere—there was no radio, and yet he could hear clearly. From the injury his hearing had become radio-sensitive: within ten miles his ears would pick up any station in that city—and there was no way to switch it off. He was about to go mad. When he started catching broadcasts, at first there was suspicion. He told the nurses and doctors. They said, “Are you mad? There is no radio here. This is a silence-zone.” He said, “This song is playing now, and after this, that program will come.” They ran to a hotel across the street, turned on a radio—the programs were exactly as he said. They coordinated it—the man caught whatever the city’s station was broadcasting. A brain-center had become active which in us is inactive. They had to operate. A radio can be switched off—he could not. It would just go on.
Our brain’s possibilities are infinite. But for us, by habit, whatever possibilities are manifest seem all—beyond them everything appears dark. It will appear dark to us—inevitably.
Just now in Russia there is a scientist, Fayadev. He has created a new wonder by sending telepathic messages across a thousand miles—and in Russia! Therefore it is significant, because Russia is not at all willing to believe such things lightly.
Fayadev sits in Moscow. A friend of his is hiding in a bush in the city of Tiflis—a thousand miles away; they are in constant contact by wireless. The friend says, “A man has sat down on bench number ten. Put him to sleep by suggestion from Moscow.” Fayadev says, “I will put him to sleep in five minutes.” Sitting in Moscow, for five minutes he concentrates his mind and sends a sharp stream of thought toward that man on bench number ten in Tiflis. The man falls asleep on the bench.
The friends say, “He might have been tired and slept spontaneously—now wake him within three minutes.” Fayadev sends a suggestion to wake. Within three minutes the man gets up. They go to him and ask—he is a stranger—“Did you feel anything?” He says, “Truly, it is strange—I did feel something. As soon as I sat on the bench, someone inside me began to say loudly, ‘Sleep! Sleep! Sleep!’ And I was not tired; I was only waiting in the garden for someone to come. But the impulse to sleep came so strongly that I slept. And just now someone said strongly, ‘Get up! Get up! In three minutes you must get up.’ I cannot make sense of what has happened!”
Fayadev performed many such experiments and established that thought-waves are communicated—without speech.
Sohan was sitting here. The first or second time I stayed as a guest at her house, at night she spread her bed under mine. She said to me, “I never ask you anything—just one question: what is your mother’s name?” I said, “Is that something to ask? Close your eyes; speak the first name that arises.” If she had said, “How will that happen? How will I know?”—then I would have explained; such a person would not be sensitive. She accepted and asked nothing. She closed her eyes and said, “Saraswati.” I said, “That is indeed my mother’s name.” She did not believe. “How can I trust this? You could say yes to any name.” I said, “That is not difficult—you can meet my mother and verify. How long can such a lie stand?” What happened? Nothing. When she lay quietly for two minutes, I went on repeating within, “Saraswati, Saraswati.” And because she was eager to know, her thoughts became quiet, and the word transferred telepathically. It echoed in her mind. She had no idea how it came.
Try a small experiment to get the feel of this. You are walking on the road; a man is walking ahead of you. Stop blinking; keep your eyes fixed on the back of his head for a while; walk silently behind him and keep looking; then say strongly in your mind: “Turn and look back!” In ninety-nine out of a hundred cases he will turn and look back—without knowing why he turned.
If both your eyes are precisely focused on the nape of the neck, any thought is instantly communicated. But your sending must be intense. If you add, “Who knows whether he will look back or not,” you have spoiled it—because that too is communicated. If you say, “Turn and look back,” and alongside, “Who knows whether he will or will not,” both go together; they cancel; he will walk straight on and not look back.
We do not have a clear sense of the further possibilities of our brain. To relate with devaloka a special brain-center must be activated. As soon as it becomes active, it is as if we have entered another world. Just as at night in sleep we enter dream—a new world; and in the morning, awake, another new world begins—so too we enter a new world. The entry is exactly like switching on a radio: the sounds were already moving here; as soon as the radio is switched on, they are caught. It is not that with switching on the radio the sounds begin; they were racing through the room—the switching on merely catches them.
Devas are present every moment. Only when a particular arrangement in your brain opens are they caught, are they seen. There is a specific yoga for breaking open that brain-center. Three points to remember. First: if a person withdraws his consciousness from the whole body and stabilizes it between the two eyes at the Ajna-chakra, then wherever attention becomes steady, the sleeping center there is immediately activated. Attention is the formula for activation. Any center upon which attention falls becomes active.
We all have one familiar example: the sex center. As soon as your attention goes toward sex—only a thought—the sex center is instantly activated. Not only in waking; if in dream too a sexual thought arises, the sex center is immediately active. Just by attention going there—just by a little fantasy rising—the sex center is activated. We have ordinary awareness of this one center—that is why I cite it. We do not ordinarily sense other centers. Even so, we have a little sense of one or two more.
For instance, you will not find anyone who speaks of love and places his hand upon his head. When speaking of love, the hand goes to the heart. Women especially—as soon as they speak of love, their hand moves to the heart. It goes as if of itself; there is the center that becomes active with the thought of love.
But if someone is worried and thinking, his hand may go to his head; he may scratch his forehead. A worried person does not wander elsewhere; where thought is active, to that region his awareness goes.
The Ajna-chakra is that place—what Lobsang Rampa and others call the third eye. If one’s entire attention becomes centered there, inwardly a piece about the size of an eye simply opens—it breaks. From outside no one may find it; inwardly, for the meditator, there is a constant sense that something is cracking there, a hole is being made, some hammering is going on.
And the day he feels the hole is made, on that very day his direct relationships are established with those beings whom we call devas or pretas—relationships which we do not have.
Hence, in the period of Mahavira’s tapas to discover a medium of expression, a great deal of time was consumed in activating and breaking open such centers. For breaking such centers, the more uninterrupted the attention, the more useful—because it is a matter of hammering. If you strike five blows and go away, when you return those five blows have been absorbed—you will have to begin again from A B C.
This is why Mahavira had to renounce food and drink for long periods, all occupations, even sleep. The hammering must be continuous, intense, direct—with no other interruption. As soon as something else enters, attention goes there; and then the work will remain incomplete. Lest the work remain incomplete, all occupations which could interfere had to be set aside. Only thus can a center be fully activated.
Therefore Mahavira stood continuously in solitude—and remember, most of Mahavira’s sadhana was done standing. Others have meditated sitting; Mahavira spent most of his meditation-time standing. His meditation-technique is also for standing. There are reasons. A man who sits can fall asleep; one who lies down can sleep. If attention is removed even for a single moment, the work is instantly undone at that chakra. The work must be continuous. Only by standing can it be done—because the chance of sleep is then minimal.
He devised many means to ward off sleep. The only reason was that even a short diversion of attention would waste much work. Fasting is very useful for escaping sleep; seventy-five percent of sleep is related to food. As soon as food enters the stomach, the brain’s energy is drawn to the stomach for digestion. Therefore after eating, sleep attacks; after heavy eating, heavier sleep attacks. The brain’s energy descends to the stomach—an emergency has come: food must be digested quickly; if it remains too long, it becomes poison; if it cools, digestion grows difficult. The stomach calls back energy from the whole body; the brain’s energy descends first—hence the eyelids droop; sleep comes.
If sleep is to be utterly broken, the stomach must be empty. On a fasting day sleep at night becomes difficult; the energy does not descend, and for those working at the Ajna-chakra the energy must remain above—only then can that chakra open. It does not open by the realization of truth; rather, to express realization through that chakra, it must be opened.
Tibet has labored the most in this direction—in relation to the third eye. Tibet has produced a continuous stream of people who have fully used it.
Only through the breaking of the Ajna-chakra can contact with the devas be made; then there is no need of speech. An inner feeling arises here; it resonates through the Ajna-chakra and enters deva-consciousness.
I have spoken of two things. To relate with the inert we need such a loosened consciousness that identity with matter is established. To relate with planes above man we need such concentrated consciousness that the Ajna-chakra breaks. The most difficult is with man himself. For man, Mahavira tried three experiments.
The first: any man can be given a message in a hypnotic state—under hypnosis, in unconsciousness—and at that time the message is heard to the very core of his life. Since logic and thinking are not functioning, he does not resist, he does not argue. What is said is silently and wholly accepted. Even if a hypnotized person is told, “You are a horse,” he will stand on all fours and neigh. He will believe it. If it penetrates his unconscious, what we tell him he will become. If told, “You are paralyzed,” his body will at once become paralyzed; his limbs will no longer move.
Out of a hundred, thirty men can be hypnotized. Of a hundred men, thirty; of a hundred women, fifty. Of a hundred children, seventy-five. The simpler the mind, the quicker hypnosis enters.
Mahavira worked for years on carrying messages through hypnosis. But ultimately he did not use it, because though the message arrives, subtle damage occurs in the other person—his power of reasoning is weakened; he becomes dependent; slowly he begins to live in another’s hands.
I too experimented much with hypnosis for this very reason: hours of effort cannot make one thing understood, and yet in two minutes under trance it can be implanted. But I also concluded that it causes fundamental harm to a man. The message is delivered, but he begins to live as if no freedom is left—as if someone else is running him.
Ramakrishna gave his first message to Vivekananda by the method of hypnosis—by his touch Vivekananda fell into Samadhi. It was a hypnotic transmission. Therefore Vivekananda became forever the follower of Ramakrishna. And something more: the day this message by touch entered Vivekananda, a power arose in him—but it was not his own; it came into him under another’s pressure. Vivekananda was sitting in a room in Dakshineswar. There lived a devotee, Gopal Babu, who kept many images of gods and spent the whole day in worship—so many gods and only one devotee; there was always difficulty.
Vivekananda had often told him, “What nonsense—collecting stones?” The day Vivekananda first received Ramakrishna’s hypnotic message, he sat in his room and suddenly felt, “Right now if I say to Gopal Babu: ‘Tie up all your gods and throw them into the Ganges,’ it will be done.” He had then a tremendous force, capable of extension. He said—just in jest—“Gopal Babu, tie them all and throw them into the Ganges.” From the next room Gopal Babu tied all the gods in a sheet and went to throw them in the river.
Ramakrishna met him at the ghat and said, “Stop!” He brought him back, opened Vivekananda’s door and said, “I will keep your key in my hand, because you can cause mischief. What you experienced today will happen to you again only three days before your death—until then the key will remain with me.”
Vivekananda had one Samadhi through Ramakrishna’s touch; thereafter his whole life he longed and could not have it—because it was not in his hands. It was hypnotic. Three days before dying, it happened again—post-hypnotic; it was not his own. Post-hypnotic means it had been ordained in the hypnotic state that on such a day it would happen again—but the key is with me. So on that day, it happens.
I did many experiments on a child with hypnosis. I told him, “There is a book lying here. On its twelfth page, pick up a pencil and sign your name—but not today—after fifteen days, exactly at eleven in the morning. Do it; do not forget.” The matter was over. He returned to normal and went to school. Fifteen days passed; the book lay on the table. He did not sign. On the fifteenth day—his school started at ten—he said, “My head feels heavy; I do not want to go to school.” I said, “In the morning you were fine.” He said, “I am fine, but suddenly my head feels heavy; I do not want to go.” I said, “As you wish.” I was sitting in the same room; the book was on the table. The boy was lying there. Exactly at eleven he got up, took a pencil, opened the page I had indicated, and signed his name. I caught him as he was signing: “What are you doing?” He said, “I do not understand what I am doing. My head does not ache. But since morning it has been inside me: ‘Do not go to school. There is some important work today.’ And as soon as I signed, a load fell off—my head became light. I do not know why I had to sign!” It was the post-hypnotic suggestion given fifteen days earlier—taking effect fifteen days later. Ramakrishna said exactly this: three days before dying you will again have Samadhi; till then the key I keep.
The method used by Ramakrishna was developed very far by Mahavira—but he abandoned it; he did not use it. I too think Vivekananda was harmed; he could not earn anything of his own; his own attainment remained undone; what happened, happened through another; nothing of Vivekananda’s own could happen. Therefore he was anxious, sad, troubled; in one sense miserable, and bound to Ramakrishna. In his last letters there is much pain, as if life has become futile—nothing attained.
Why did Ramakrishna do this? If Mahavira did not, why did Ramakrishna? There are reasons. Mahavira was himself very capable in speech. Ramakrishna was utterly incapable in speech. To use Vivekananda as an instrument for speech became necessary; otherwise what Ramakrishna had known would have been lost. He had no voice to carry it to the world. For that voice, using Vivekananda became necessary. Vivekananda is merely Ramakrishna’s amplifier—nothing more; he wandered the whole world in a hypnotized state, asleep; he spoke what Ramakrishna wished to have spoken. Vivekananda was used as an instrument—necessary for Ramakrishna; otherwise he would have given what he knew to no one. Ramakrishna said to Vivekananda: “I will not let you go into Samadhi; you have a great work to do.” Whenever Vivekananda asked again, “Paramahansadev, when will that joy, that light return?” he scolded him harshly: “You are greedy and selfish! You run after your own bliss? I want to make you a great tree under whose shade many may rest. You have a great work to do—who will do it?”
Mahavira had no such difficulty. He had both Ramakrishna’s experience and Vivekananda’s eloquence—no second person was needed; one person sufficed.
This has happened often. As I speak often of Gurdjieff—he used Ouspensky exactly as Ramakrishna used Vivekananda. Gurdjieff had no voice—none at all. Ouspensky had voice, intellect, logic. Gurdjieff used Ouspensky fully. Read Gurdjieff’s own book—you will understand nothing; he lacks expression. But he had everything written through Ouspensky; Ouspensky’s books are incomparable; whatever Gurdjieff wished to say he had said through Ouspensky. And this too could not be done without the use of hypnosis.
Mahavira too discovered that instrument, but saw it harms the person; and he had no wish to use anyone as an instrument—it was a matter of conveying the message within him to another. So he experimented, understood, and yet never used it.
The second path: if the other attains meditation, then everything can be conveyed in silence; the use of words is not required—for words are the most ineffective thing. Often what is not said is what is conveyed; what can be understood is conveyed; what is said is not.
Hence, to be free of words—the path of meditation. This is why Mahavira’s devotee is called shravaka—one who hears rightly, the right listener. But we all hear—are we all shravakas? No. A shravaka is one who can sit in a meditative state and hear, in that state where there is no thought, no word—only silence. One who can sit in silence and hear is a shravaka. This word is not used casually. To call a devotee shravaka—mere “listener” would not do. Shravaka means right hearing. We all hear, yet we are not shravakas. We are shravakas when we only hear and within us there is nothing—just listening.
Before Gurdjieff would give any message to Ouspensky, he had to make him a shravaka—so that he could take the message. He took Ouspensky into a forest and stayed three months. He had brought thirty people to make them right listeners. They were kept in a house closed on all sides. There was no going out; Gurdjieff alone would open from outside to enter or to leave. Food and all arrangements were there. The condition: for three months no one would read or write or speak to anyone—or even recognize anyone else. Thirty people in one house. “Consider that each of you is alone; the other twenty-nine are not here. Not even by the eyes or gesture should recognition occur. No recognition. If in the morning you sit and someone passes, let him pass; do not even think someone is passing—like wind passing. If anyone greets you, do not respond; no one is here to greet. Do not show even with your eyes that ‘you are.’ Do not smile; do not express any gesture. Whoever expresses will be turned out. In fifteen days I will sift you.”
In fifteen days he turned out twenty-seven. Three remained; among them was the Russian mathematician Ouspensky. He has written that those fifteen days were so difficult; not to acknowledge the other was so hard; he had never imagined it. But with struggle and resolve, the boundary was crossed; the thought of the other ceased. He writes, “The day the thought of the other ceased, on that very day, for the first time, the thought of myself began.” We all wish to remember ourselves, but as long as the other does not fade, how can one remember oneself? There is no space. They call it self-remembering—but how will it be, when the not-self is there twenty-four hours a day?
Ouspensky writes, “Until then I had not understood what self-remembering would mean. I had tried many times to remember myself—nothing happened. Whom to remember? Then it dawned. When for fifteen days the other—the ‘other’—had departed, the space became empty; there remained no other possibility than the remembrance of oneself. I awoke to myself. On the sixteenth morning I rose as I had never risen before; for the first time I had the sense of myself. Until then, on waking, I had always awakened to the other; now I awakened to myself. And then it surrounded me twenty-four hours a day—there was no way to fill the space with the other.”
By the end of a month he writes: “I was astonished—days would pass and I would not notice that there is a world outside, a marketplace, people. Days would pass without my noticing. Dreams vanished. The day the other was forgotten, dreams vanished—because deep down all dreams are related to the other. The day dreams vanished, at night too my remembrance remained—everything slept and I was awake.”
Three days before the end of three months, Gurdjieff came and opened the door. Ouspensky writes: “That day I saw Gurdjieff for the first time—what a wondrous man! I had become so empty that now I could see. Eyes filled cannot see. That day I saw who he is and the fortune of being with him.” Gurdjieff sat down in front, and he suddenly heard: “Ouspensky! Did you recognize?” He looked around—Gurdjieff was sitting silently. The voice was Gurdjieff’s—no doubt. Still he remained silent. Then again the voice came: “Ouspensky, did you not recognize? Did you not hear?” He looked hard at Gurdjieff—his mouth did not move.
Then Gurdjieff smiled broadly and said, “Now there is no need of words. Now we can speak without words. You have become so silent—must I speak for you to hear? Now if I think within, you will hear. The more the silence, the subtler the waves that can be caught.”
You are running down the road. Someone tells you your house is on fire. I meet you and say, “Namaste.” Did you hear? You did not. Did you see? You did not. You are running—your house is on fire. The next day I meet you: “I greeted you on the road—there was no reply.” You say, “I did not even see you. My house was on fire—I was running. I neither saw nor could I greet.” If the house is on fire, your inner wheel is spinning so fast that joined hands will not be seen, a greeting will not be heard. If the mind’s wheel slows, slows, stops—then it is not necessary that I speak. If I simply wish that something reach you, it goes at once.
Vidyasagar wrote a memoir. The governor of Bengal wanted to give him an award. Vidyasagar was poor, used to old ways—an old Bengali kurta, dhoti, staff. His friends said, “In such attire it is not appropriate to go to the governor’s court. We will have new clothes made.” He said, “As I am, I am fine.” They did not agree; they had expensive clothes made. In the evening before the darbar, he went walking by the sea. A Muslim maulvi, staff in hand, walked with great dignity. A man came running: “Mir Sahib, hurry—your house is on fire!” Mir said, “All right,” and continued at the same pace. Vidyasagar was astonished: he heard the news, and still walked at the same pace! The messenger shouted: “Perhaps you did not understand—your house is on fire!” He said, “I understood,” and kept the pace. Vidyasagar went ahead: “This is the limit! Your house is on fire, and you keep the same pace?” He replied, “What has my pace to do with the house? Shall I change the gait of a lifetime for a house?” Vidyasagar returned home and said, “I will not wear those new clothes. Shall I change the gait of a lifetime for the governor? Here is a man whose house is on fire, and yet he does not quicken a step!” Such a man is rare; if found, he can be a shravaka. Do you understand? He can be a shravaka.
Mahavira’s ceaseless effort then turned to making man a shravaka—how to make him one who hears—how he can hear. He can hear only when the entire whirling of thought in his mind comes to a standstill. Then there is no need to speak—he will hear. The speech that is unspoken yet heard is called divya-dhvani—divine sound. It is not spoken, yet heard; not given, yet it reaches—rises within and is transmitted.
Much labor had to be done in this direction—to discover the art of making shravakas. Now we call anyone a shravaka who believes in Mahavira. After Mahavira’s death, to be a shravaka became almost impossible. Only those sitting before him—among them too, not all; many were mere listeners. The listener hears through the ear; the shravaka hears through the very life-breath. For the listener, even if words are spoken, it is not necessary he will hear; for the shravaka, words are not necessary—and yet he hears.
Therefore, among Mahavira’s greatest gifts I count the art of becoming a shravaka—the greatest of arts. Jesus could not make people understand; he only cared that he speak rightly—he did not care whether it could be heard rightly. Mohammed too did not attend to whether it could be heard; he attended to whether what he said was right. That is fine. But merely saying it rightly is not enough; the listener must be right—or the saying is wasted. You will say one thing; another will be heard, a third will be understood.
Thus, the second of Mahavira’s great donations is the art of becoming a shravaka. For perfect silence—and now you have raised the word “Pratikraman.” Pratikraman is a part of the art of becoming a shravaka. We do not understand what it means. We know “attack”—akraman. Pratikraman is the reverse: to withdraw every attack, to return. Ordinarily our consciousness is aggressive, in aggression. Pratikraman means returning—collecting consciousness back. As the sun at evening gathers his net of rays, so to call back our scattered awareness—from friend, from enemy, from wife, from son, from house, from wealth. Wherever our consciousness has driven pegs and spread out, to call back that entire spread.
Pratikraman means the coming back. Attack is going; pratikraman is returning. Wherever consciousness has gone, call it back. Buddha told a story. At dusk children were building sand-houses on the riverbank. Many children; someone builds a house, someone builds on his foot, someone digs a pit. A foot lands in someone’s house; sand-houses—they are fragile. Where there are many children, feet will land; a house collapses; there is quarrel, abuse; a child cries, “My house is destroyed! Why are you placing your feet here?” This clamour goes on—fighting, shouting.
Then evening comes; from afar, from home to home, the mothers’ call arises: “Return, return; enough playing.” And the children who were fighting—“Don’t kick my house!”—kick their own houses down and run back home. The houses remain shattered; the riverbank becomes deserted; the children have gone home—after kicking down the very houses for which they fought. Buddha says: such a moment comes in life when you yourself kick down all the sand-houses and return home.
This is pratikraman. If you continue the practice—at least for an hour daily do pratikraman—call back your consciousness from everywhere, from every sand-house, return within, keep no relation anywhere—become unattached—then pratikraman has happened. Pratikraman is the first step of meditation. For unless you return—unless you bring consciousness back—who will meditate? Right now consciousness is not present; it has gone outside, it wanders on others. If you do not call it back, how will you meditate? So pratikraman is the first step. Samayik is the second. Samayik means meditation. Samayik is a more wondrous word than “meditation.” In fact, there is no word like Samayik. “Meditation” is not so precious. The word Mahavira used is far more precious than “meditation.”
Understand this. Hidden in “meditation” is a hint—when we say “meditate,” a man asks: “On what?” In the word itself the other is lurking. When we say “enter meditation,” a man asks, “On what? Where to place attention?” The very word is other-centered. Mahavira freed Samayik totally from the “other.” Samaya means Atman; and Samayik means to be in oneself—to be in one’s own Atman.
Pratikraman is the first part: return from the other. Samayik is the second: be in oneself. Until you return from the other, how will you be in yourself? Hence the first step is pratikraman; the second, Samayik.
But the nonsense that goes on in the name of Pratikraman is not pratikraman at all. How many gods there are and where they sit—Pratikraman has nothing to do with it. From everything you must return. How many yojanas away—what has that to do with anything? That is still wandering on the other. Return from all.
Pratikraman is a wondrous thing—to delink consciousness from everywhere; to say within: the wife is not wife, the son is not son, this house is not mine, this body is not mine—to return from everywhere, cutting every tie, returning to oneself.
Once returned, the second step begins—how to abide in oneself. If you cannot abide, you will go out again. If children return home at dusk and the mother cannot engage them, they will return to the riverbank to build houses and fight again. Returning is only a process. As soon as you return, the concern is how to be absorbed—how to settle. If you do not, you will not be able to remain; you will go back. So pratikraman is only a process, not a resting. It is not a nature. If one wishes to stop at pratikraman alone, it is foolishness. Consciousness comes so quickly and departs so quickly that it is not noticed. For a moment you think, “This house—what is it to me?” You return for a moment; finding no place to settle, you go back.
Therefore the second key is Samayik. We shall speak tomorrow of Samayik—what it is, how to abide in oneself. If that becomes clear, everything becomes clear. The very center of Mahavira is Samayik. Samayik is a wondrous word. Many people have used many words in the world, but none more wondrous than this—because it has been uprooted from the other entirely. Samaya means Atman; Samayik means abiding in oneself. In it there is no “whose.” No one can ask, “Whose Samayik?” If you ask, you are asking wrongly—by the very language wrongly. One can ask “Meditation on what?”—but Samayik, whose? No one’s.