Mahaveer Vani #12

The fourth step of external austerity is: renunciation of rasa.
Tradition has kept taking rasa-renunciation to mean a prohibition, a control of certain rasas, certain tastes. Rasa-renunciation is not such a gross affair. In the world of sadhana, even what appears very gross is not gross. However many gross words we employ, the matter itself is subtle. We are forced to use gross words because there are no words for the subtle. For that inner world we have no words that can point with precision. The inner world has no language. Therefore we are compelled to employ the words of the outer world. Out of that compulsion a danger is born: those words begin to be taken in their crude, outer sense. From rasa-renunciation it begins to seem as if: sometimes give up sour; sometimes give up sweet; sometimes give up ghee; sometimes give up something else. This is not Mahavira’s intent in rasa-renunciation. What Mahavira intends must be understood in two or three parts.
First, what is the whole process of rasa? When you taste something, is taste in the object? Or is taste in your sense of taste? Or is taste in the mind behind the taste-sense that experiences? Or is taste in the identification, the tadanmaya, of consciousness with that mind? Where is taste? Where is rasa? Only then will renunciation come into view.
Those who look only at the gross think that taste or rasa is in the object; therefore, drop the object. Taste is not in the object, neither is rasa. The object is only a condition, a nimitta. And if the inner process of rasa is not functioning, the object cannot even become a condition. Suppose a gallows has been pronounced on you and a sweetmeat is placed before you — even then it will not seem sweet. The sweetmeat is still sweet, but that which could enjoy the sweet has become suddenly absent. The taste-sense will still send reports because the taste-sense has no way of knowing a gallows is near; it cannot know. The sensitive elements of the taste-sense will still carry the message within that a sweet is on the tongue. But the mind will not show readiness to receive that message. Even if the mind receives it, the bridge between that mind and the consciousness behind it has broken — the relationship snapped. In the moment of death that link does not remain. So the mind may receive the report of the tongue, yet consciousness will not come to know.
For thousands of years, to alter a person’s personality, whenever some knot proved unmanageable, physicians have used shock treatment — giving you so deep a jolt — and many times a very deep tangle gets untied thereby. The whole meaning of shock treatment is only this: the bridge between your consciousness and your mind breaks for a moment. As that bridge breaks, the entire inner arrangement — sick as it was till yesterday — becomes disarranged, anarchic. And no one wants to reconstruct a sick arrangement. The total hope in shock treatment is this: once the old structure’s frame collapses, perhaps you may not be able to rebuild it.
I have heard: a renowned psychiatrist was brought a Catholic nun, a Catholic sister. For six months she had continuous hiccups that would not stop — even in sleep they continued. All medical treatment and means had been tried; the hiccups would not cease. Physicians were exhausted and said, we have no remedy left; perhaps a mind doctor might do something. So she was brought to a psychiatrist. Many of her devotees and admirers came with her. The sister entered, singing praise of the Lord — she was constantly in remembrance of the Lord. I do not know what the psychiatrist said to her, but two moments later she came out weeping. Her devotees were astonished that in a moment she returned in tears. She is crying; what the remembrance of God had not done in six months has happened — though she is crying, the hiccups have stopped.
The psychiatrist came behind. The sister had run out. Her devotees asked: what did you say to cause her so much pain? The psychiatrist said: I told her, ‘The hiccups are nothing — you are pregnant.’ Now, for a Catholic nun to be pregnant — no greater shock is possible. Her devotees said: what are you saying? The psychiatrist replied: do not panic; except for this the hiccups could not be stopped — she had endured even electric shocks. But now the hiccups have ceased. What happened?
A Catholic nun enters with a lifelong vow of brahmacharya. To be pregnant — a massive shock. The link between mind and consciousness, the bridge between consciousness and the body, snapped in an instant. Even if only for a moment it broke, the hiccups stopped, because hiccups have their own arrangement. That whole arrangement was thrown into disorder. Even hiccuping needs a certain facilitation; that facilitation was no more. The old web of hiccups — fixed for six months — was now ineffective. The body is the same; how did the hiccups vanish? No medicine was given, no treatment done — how did they vanish? Psychiatrists say: if anywhere, even for a moment, the relationship between consciousness and mind takes a slight split, a person’s personality becomes different. The old structure breaks. Rasa-renunciation is the process that breaks that structure.
Taste is not in the object; it is only a condition for rasa. Understand it this way and it will be easy. You enter this room. The walls are of one color, the floor of another, the chairs of a third, and people are wearing different colored clothes. Naturally you think these things have color. And when we go outside, the chairs will remain of one color, the wall another, the floor a third. If you think so, you are unfamiliar with one of modern science’s precious discoveries. When no one remains in this room, the objects retain no color. This is very bewildering. It does not feel believable. The mind wants to peep through a hole to check whether the color remains or not. But as soon as you peep, color begins again. Scientists say: no object has any color; the object is only a condition to produce a color in you. When you are not — when there is no observer, no one to see — the object becomes colorless.
In fact, when a ray of light falls upon an object, the object drinks the light. If it drinks all the rays, it appears black. If it releases all and drinks none, it appears white. If it releases the red ray and absorbs the others, it appears red. It is surprising that the object that appears red absorbs every color except red and releases only the red. That released red ray falls on your eye, and because of that ray the object appears red — from where it seems to be coming. But if there is no eye, who will it appear red to? An eye is needed to catch that ray — only then will it appear red. You need not even leave the room.
When you close your eyes, objects become colorless. No color remains. This does not mean they all become the same. If they became the same, then upon opening the eyes there should be one color everywhere. They become colorless, yet their possibility for color remains — their potentiality remains. When you open the eyes, red will be red, green will be green. When you close the eyes, red will not remain red, green will not remain green. Understand it thus: the red of an object is not the object’s own property; it is a relationship between the object and your eye. Since the eye closed, the relationship is broken. There is no red chair. Red is the relationship between your eye and the chair. If there is no eye, the relationship is broken.
When you say of a thing, ‘sweet,’ then too it is a relationship between the object and your taste-sense. The object is not sweet. This does not mean there is no difference between bitter and sweet objects. A potential difference is there — the seed is different — but if it is not placed on the tongue, there is no difference. Neither is bitter bitter; you cannot say neem is bitter until you place it on the tongue. You will say: I may or may not place it, but even if I do not, neem will still be bitter. Then you are mistaken, because bitterness is a relationship between your tongue and neem. Neem has no intrinsic nature of bitterness — there is only relationship.
Understand it this way: a child is born to a woman. When a child is born, not only the child is born — the mother is born as well. Because ‘mother’ is a relationship. The woman was not a mother before the child. And if the child dies, she ceases to be a mother. Motherhood is a relationship — a name for the relationship between that child and that woman. Without the child she cannot be mother; the child also cannot be without the mother.
Keep in mind, all our rasas are relationships between objects and our tongues. But if the matter ended here, the relationship could be broken in two ways — either we numb the tongue, kill its sensitivity, burn the tongue and rasa will be destroyed. Or we abandon the object and rasa will be destroyed. If it were so simple, there would be two ways to break the relation: leave the object — as ordinarily the monk in Mahavira’s tradition does. He leaves the object and then thinks he has become free of rasa. He has not. The object still holds potential rasa and the tongue still holds potential sensitivity. The tongue is still capable of experiencing and the object of giving experience. Only the relation has been broken, so the matter has gone unmanifest. At any time it can manifest. To become unmanifest is not to be destroyed. Turn off the electric switch — electricity is not destroyed. Only the connection between current and bulb is broken. The bulb is still capable of expressing electricity; the current is still capable of lighting the bulb. Only the relation has broken; electricity is not gone. Turn the switch on — the light appears.
The person who leaves objects and thinks rasa-renunciation has happened is merely making rasa unmanifest, not renounced. Mahavira does not speak of unmanifesting rasa; he speaks of renouncing rasa. Merely unmanifest — it is not appearing now. That does not mean it is destroyed. Many things in you do not appear at many occasions. When someone places a dagger on your chest, sex does not appear — but you are not freed of it; it only hides. However hungry you are, if someone chases you with a gun, hunger subsides. That does not mean hunger has disappeared — it only hides. There is no occasion for its manifestation; the condition is not present — so it recedes. Do not mistake hiding for renunciation.
Often, whatever hides becomes more forceful and powerful. The man who eats sweets daily experiences sweetness one way; the man who has not eaten sweets for a long time — when he eats, his experience becomes more intense. It becomes more intense because the unmanifested rasa, dammed up for days, suddenly floods forth. Therefore, one who begins by renouncing objects becomes frightened of objects. He fears objects coming near, otherwise rasa might arise.
Another method is to destroy the sense itself — burn the tongue, as happens in fever or long illness, the sensitive nerves become sick, dull, asleep. But even then rasa does not end. If my eyes go blind, the longing to see forms does not end. If the longing were in the eye alone, it would be easy. With eyes removed, shattered, blinded — the longing remains. If ears go deaf, the rasa of sound does not cease. If my legs break, the urge to walk does not die. Those who know say: even if the whole body drops, the life-urge is not destroyed; otherwise rebirth would be impossible. When the entire body drops and yet we take up a new life, what will come of breaking each sense? Death kills all senses — all senses die — and yet we again create all senses, for senses are not the root. The root is behind the senses. So the one busy breaking eyes and ears is engaged in childishness. Rasa will not be destroyed that way. By destroying the sense, rasa is not destroyed; by abandoning the object, rasa is not destroyed.
Then shall we kill the mind? There are those who try to kill the mind — suppress it to annihilate it. But mind is tricky. The rule of mind is: whatever we try to destroy with the mind, the mind becomes more fascinated by it.
One morning, in Mulla’s village there is a big crowd in front of his house. He has climbed to the fifth floor, ready to jump. The police have arrived, but he has locked all the stair doors. No one can get up. The village mayor has come. The whole village is gathering below, and Mulla stands above. He says, I will jump and die. The mayor tries: think of your parents! Mulla: my parents are dead; to think of them makes it worse — I’ll die sooner. The mayor shouts: think of your wife! Mulla: don’t even remind me — or I’ll jump even quicker. The mayor: think of the law; if you attempt suicide, you’ll be trapped. Mulla: when I’ve died, who will be trapped! Let’s see. A great difficulty. The mayor cannot persuade him. Finally, in anger he says: do as you wish — jump right now and die! Mulla: who are you to advise me to die! I won’t die.
The mind works like this. If someone tells you to die, the urge to live is born; if someone tells you to live, the urge to die arises. Mind takes rasa in the opposite. Hence, those who engage in killing the mind make the mind even more juicy. Neither by leaving objects, nor by destroying senses, nor by fighting the mind does rasa-renunciation happen. We all fight with the mind — but which rasa gets renounced? Quantities may differ, but we all are fighters with mind. We suppress and preach to the mind — it makes no difference. Whatever you preach, the mind increases its demand there. In truth, when you preach, you are already confessing you are weak and the mind is strong. Having once confessed your weakness, mind will press your neck ever more. You tell the mind: do not ask for this, do not ask for that. But do you know the rule? The more you say ‘do not ask,’ the more asking becomes attractive. It seems there must be something worth asking for. As you block the mind, its curiosity grows deeper. The more doors you close, the more it wants to open a door and peek.
So whoever fights with the mind will be busy arousing rasa. And remember: in trying to forget something with the mind, we do something profoundly anti-psychological, because every attempt to forget is a mechanism to remember. No one can make oneself forget; one can only forget — one cannot ‘do’ forgetting. If you want to forget someone, you will never manage it. Because whenever you try to forget, you remember again. To forget, you will have to first recall — and then the line of remembering becomes dense and deep.
So if you want to remember, try to forget; and if you want to forget, never try to forget — then it may be forgotten. Repetition becomes memory. Lovers suffer this in the whole world. They want to forget a lover. The more they try, the deeper the difficulty. A better trick to forget — they should marry and bring the lover home; then they will not remember at all. Mind’s rule must be understood well, otherwise great trouble arises. The so-called monks and ascetics get tangled because they do not understand this deep rule of mind. They are busy trying to forget. Lest woman be seen, they close their eyes. Lest food be seen, they shrink the senses. Lest any rasa arise, they distract the mind in the opposite direction. But through all this, wherever they remove themselves, the mind engraves deeper lines of memory.
No — no method of suppressing, preaching to, or trying to forget the mind brings rasa-renunciation. Then how does it fructify? The true transformation of rasa-renunciation occurs when the link between mind and consciousness breaks. The real event happens between mind and consciousness.
Understand a little and it will come into view.
The mind can take rasa in only that which receives the cooperation of consciousness. Where there is no cooperation of consciousness, the mind cannot taste; it is incapable. A man is running along the road. The shop windows still display what they did yesterday, but he doesn’t see them. Beautiful bodies still pass on the road, but he doesn’t notice. Lovely cars still speed by, but he doesn’t see them. His house is on fire; he is rushing. What happened? Because the house is on fire, what has happened? Things are still passing. The mind is the same, the senses are the same; the impacts upon them are the same; sensations are the same — but today his consciousness is elsewhere. Today his consciousness is not with his mind and senses. His consciousness has fled. It is where the house is burning. But when he reaches home and finds that it was someone else’s house, the news was wrong — everything returns.
Dostoevsky had been sentenced to death — a Russian thinker, writer. At the very last moment he was pardoned. At six o’clock life was to be extinguished; five minutes to six a message arrived from the Tsar granting clemency. Later Dostoevsky kept saying that in that moment, as six approached, there was no lust, no desire, no rasa — nothing. I became so quiet and so empty that I understood, in that moment, what the saints mean by Samadhi. But as soon as the Tsar’s order arrived and I was told I am released, my death sentence is canceled — suddenly, as if I fell from a peak. Everything returned. All desires; even the pettiest that had no value a moment ago — they returned. The shoe biting at my foot — I became aware again. The plan to buy a new shoe resumed — everything returned. Dostoevsky said: that summit I could not touch again — what came near the proximity of death happened suddenly that day.
What had happened? When death is so certain, consciousness drops all relations. Therefore all seekers have emphasized deeply experiencing the certainty of death. Buddha would send bhikshus to the cremation ground: for three months watch men die, burn, turn to ash — so that your own death becomes utterly certain. And when a seeker returned after three months of meditation on death, the first thing his friends would notice was rasa-renunciation. Rasa had gone. The key to rasa’s going is: the link between consciousness and mind breaks. How will that link break? How is it formed? So long as I think ‘I am mind,’ the link is there. That identity, that tadanmaya, ‘I am the mind’ — as long as it is there, the relation holds. The breaking of that relation — the knowing ‘I am not the mind’ — rasa is shattered, lost.
The process of rasa-renunciation is: sakshi-bhava toward the mind — witnessing. When you are eating, I will not tell you, do not eat this food, it is juicy. I will not tell you to burn the tongue because the tongue gives rasa. I will not tell you, do not have in the mind the experience that this is sour or sweet. I will say: eat; let the tongue taste; let the mind receive the whole message, the full sensation that it is delicious — only stand within as the witness of the whole process. Keep seeing that I am the one who sees. The mind is getting taste; the tongue is enjoying rasa; the object appears pleasing — but I stand behind, seeing. Just beyond — a step behind, seeing. I am seeing; I am the seer; I am the witness.
If this much witnessing deepens during the experience of rasa, you will suddenly find the senses are the same — there was no need to destroy them. The objects are the same — there was no need to flee. The mind is the same — just as sensitive, alert, alive — but the attraction of rasa is gone. That call of rasa — that craving to repeat — the attraction of rasa is to repeat it again and again, to revolve in its loop — that is gone. Completely gone. No urge for repetition remains. And we repeat even rasas that destroy life. A man drinks alcohol. He knows, hears, reads that it is poison — yet the demand of repetition remains. Mind says: repeat. A man smokes. He knows he is inviting who knows how many diseases — he knows well. He would advise another. He may forbid his son: never smoke. But he himself does. The demand for repetition is there. Even perverted rasas get coupled — and they do, by association.
Schiller, a German writer — when he wrote his first poem, apples were ripening on trees, falling below. He sat in that orchard. Some apples had fallen and rotted; the smell of rotten apples filled the air. In that very atmosphere he wrote his first poem. The birth of that first poem and the smell of rotten apples became associated. After that Schiller could not write anything unless he placed rotten apples around his table. Utter madness. He himself would say it is madness. But without that smell, poetry in me does not activate; it does not gain momentum. I remain an ordinary man — I cannot become Schiller. As soon as the smell of rotten apples fills my nostrils, I change — I become another man. Granted it is a sick business; there could be other fragrances — flowers could be kept. But no — this has become associated.
If a man smokes, the first experience of a cigarette is not pleasant — it is unpleasant. Yet even that unpleasantness, repeated and associated with some moment of pleasure, will demand repetition lifelong. And it can associate. When you smoke, in one sense you disconnect from the world. Smoking is, in a sense, masturbatory — psychologists say so. You close into yourself; nothing to do with the world; your own smoke — drawing and exhaling — sitting. The world recedes; a smoke curtain forms between you and the world. There may be a wife at home — no matter. Whether the shop runs or not — no matter. What happens where — no matter. All that matters is drawing smoke in and letting it out. You are disconnected, isolated. Alone. A certain rasa comes in aloneness; there is rasa in isolation. That is what the seeker of solitude tastes. You will be surprised to know — the rasa a seeker of solitude gets, if at some moment it sneaks into smoking, and it can, and does, because smoking also disconnects — therefore a person sitting alone soon begins to smoke. The whole periphery dissolves. He is closed.
It is like a little child lying alone, sucking his thumb. When the child sucks his thumb, he is disconnected — nothing to do with the world. Not even his mother matters now. Therefore psychologists say: do not let the child suck the thumb too much; otherwise his life’s sociability will diminish. If a child keeps sucking his thumb long, he becomes one-sided and alone. He will not be able to make friendships; there is no need for friendship — his thumb does a friend’s work. He needs no one. A child who takes much rasa from the thumb will not develop love for the mother, because the first part of love arises through the mother’s breast — there is no other medium. If he begins to derive as much rasa from his thumb as the mother’s breast gave, he becomes independent of the mother. No dependence is felt. And a child who cannot love his mother can never love anyone in the world, because the first part of love never formed. The child is closed; in a sense he is no longer a part of society.
And you will be surprised: those children who sucked their thumbs more in childhood are the very ones who, grown up, smoke. Those who sucked less, or not at all, have almost no likelihood of smoking later. Because the cigarette is a substitute for the thumb — its complement. A grown man sucking his thumb would look silly, so he invented the cigarette, the cheroot, the hookah — but he is still sucking the thumb, nothing else. As a grownup, sucking the thumb directly would look ridiculous — what will people say! So he arranged a substitute. People will only say: smoking is harmful. With thumb-sucking no one says it is harmful, but they would be alarmed to see a grown man do it. At the cigarette they will only say it is harmful; he will reply: what can I do, it is a compulsion, a habit. With the thumb he will look foolish; with the cigarette he looks sensible.
Substitutes only deceive. But once rasa associates, even the wrongest thing gets linked.
One day Mulla’s wife landed at the coffee house where he would sit drinking. He had a bottle and glass on the table. He panicked, but since the wife had come, he poured her a cup too. She had come to see what he does there. She took a sip — utterly bitter and tasteless. She set it down, made a face, and said: Mulla, is this what you drink? Mulla said: and you thought I was enjoying myself! We come here to suffer this very pain. Understood? Now never again say I go there to have fun.
The first experience of alcohol is painful, but deeper experiences of alcohol slowly become pleasant — because alcohol disconnects you from the world, from its anxieties. The world fades, you alone remain. It is very interesting that there is a subtle link between meditation and alcohol. William James — who in this century did the greatest research into the relation between religion and intoxication — said: the deep attraction of alcohol is connected somewhere to religion; otherwise it could not be so powerful. Somewhere alcohol must be doing something that satisfies man’s deep religious urge. There is a link. Hence from the Veda’s soma-rasa to Aldous Huxley’s LSD, a large part of religious humanity has used intoxicants — a large part. There is a certain harmony. Alcohol breaks you from the world so thoroughly that you become utterly alone. There is a rasa in being alone. All worries are forgotten. In a deep sense you feel care-free. You are not, really — because the alcohol will leave after a while and the worry will return — but the rasa of that care-freeness couples with alcohol. Once linked even once, you will keep drinking poison for its name all your life, however bitter it feels — because that associated rasa.
Mulla is sitting sadly at his door one day. The neighbor is surprised, for for two weeks he had seemed very cheerful — more than ever before. Seeing him sad the neighbor asks: Nasruddin, you seem very down today — what’s the matter? Nasruddin says: Matter? Plenty. In the first week of this month my grandfather died and left me fifty thousand. In the second, my uncle died and left me thirty thousand. Now the third week is almost over — nothing has happened yet.
The mind demands repetition. It is not a question that someone must die for something to come. The sorrow of death has gone to one side; the happiness of fifty thousand on the other. Therefore psychologists say: only sons of poor fathers truly grieve when the father dies; sons of rich fathers only display grief. There is truth here. Because with death something else also happens with a rich father — his wealth comes into the son’s hands. He displays sorrow, but it becomes superficial. Within, some rasa comes in. And if he were to learn the father has returned to life, imagine the trouble. It just does not happen.
Mulla had such a trouble. His wife died — with difficulty, died. As the bier was being carried, it bumped into a neem tree ahead. A sound came from inside — signs of movement. They set the bier down — the wife had not died, only fainted. Mulla, beating his chest, cried. Seeing the wife alive, he became very sad — beating his chest, crying. She lived three more years, then died. When the bier was lifted, Mulla again beat his chest, crying. As they neared the same neem, he said: brothers, be careful — don’t bump again.
What a man displays need not be what is inside him. The greater probability is the opposite — he displays to cover up what is inside. If he beats his chest loudly and cries, it is not necessary there is such sorrow; perhaps he fears someone will discover there is no grief and so he beats and cries. Inside it can be otherwise. If even the wrongest thing gets rasa, its repetition begins. If even the wrong can begin, what difficulty in the right?
But when does this coupling arise? When is the link forged? It arises when one does not find oneself apart from the mind; one finds oneself as one with it. That’s the mode of joining — when we take ourselves to be the mind. When anger comes and you say, I have become angry — you do not see you are creating a link with mind. When sorrow comes and you say, I am miserable — you are in the illusion of being one with mind. When happiness comes and you say, I am happy — again you are identified with mind.
If rasa-renunciation is the sadhana, then when anger comes, say: anger is arising — I see it. Not that ‘anger is not arising to me’ — then again you are relating. Beware: if you say, no, anger is not arising to me, and it is arising — whether you relate to anger or to non-anger, in both cases rasa-renunciation will not happen. When anger comes, the practitioner of rasa-renunciation will say: anger is coming, it burns, but I am seeing.
And the truth is: you see — you never become angry. It is illusion that you become angry. You remain always the seer. When hunger arises in the stomach you do not become hunger — you only know hunger has arisen. When a thorn pierces the foot you do not become pain — you know pain is occurring.
But this knowing in you is not deep — it is very faint. So faint that when the thorn pierces hard, you forget. The deepening of this knowing is called rasa-renunciation. As this knowing deepens… then your tongue will say, very tasty. You will say: right — the tongue says it is tasty; I hear that, I see that, I understand that, but I am separate. In the midst of rasa-experience I am witness. Someone honors you, puts garlands — you know garlands are being put, someone is honoring — I see. Someone throws stones, abuses — you know abuses are being hurled, stones are being thrown — I see.
Once the link with the seer is forged and the relationship with the mind loosens, you will find: all rasas are gone. You do not need to drop objects; you do not need to cut the tongue or gouge the eyes; you do not need to impose the so-called ascetic acts on yourself — rasas disappear. And when rasas go, objects fall away by themselves. When rasas go, the senses relax by themselves. When rasas go, the mind stops demanding repetition — for it demanded only because rasa was obtained. When the master no longer enjoys rasa, the game ends. The mind is our servant — it follows behind like a shadow. Whatever we say, the mind repeats; what the mind repeats, the senses begin to demand; what the senses demand, we get busy collecting. Such is the wheel.
Break it from the first center. Still, Mahavira calls this external austerity. It is delightful. It has to be broken within, yet it is external austerity. Because that by which you break it is still of the outside — objects, senses, mind — all are alien, outer.
Remember, says Mahavira, even being a witness is outer. Therefore, when one becomes a Kevali, he is not even a witness. Witness to what? He simply is — just being. Not even a witness, because in witnessing there is duality — there is someone of whom I am witness. That someone still exists. Therefore the Kevali is not even a witness. So long as I am a knower, some ‘known’ exists; hence the Kevali is not even a knower — only knowing remains.
So Mahavira calls even this ‘outer.’ But ‘outer’ does not mean begin by leaving outer objects. Leaving outer objects will begin — as the result. If someone begins by leaving outer objects, he will get into troubles. That which he leaves will gain attraction. That from which he flees will begin to invite. That which he denies will call even louder. Fight the tongue, fight the eyes — the mind will torment more. Rasa remains intact and the sense is not near — the mind will torment more. If you suppress, expel, preach to the mind — it demands the opposite. There is only one place from which rasa breaks — sakshi-bhava. The process of rasa-renunciation is witnessing.
After rasa-renunciation Mahavira has said: kaya-klesh.
This is the most misunderstood of Mahavira’s sutras of sadhana. The words kaya-klesh are clear. It seems to mean — torment the body; give pain to the body; harass it. But Mahavira cannot be a witness to any harassment — because all harassment is violence. Even harassing one’s own body is violence, for Mahavira says: is that even ‘yours’ that you can harass it? What is truly yours there? The bloodstream in my body is as distant from me as the bloodstream in your body. The bone in my body — I am not that either. No more than I am your body’s bones. If one bone from my body and one from yours were placed before me, could I tell which is mine? I could not. A bone is only a bone — neither mine nor yours. The law by which my bone is made is the law by which your bone is made — the whole arrangement is outer.
So Mahavira cannot ask for tormenting his own body, because he knows well what is ‘mine’ there! Everything is other there too — only a difference of distance. My body is a little less distant from me; your body a little more distant — that’s all. No other difference. Yet Mahavira’s tradition took it as ‘torment the body’ — and thus a large class of masochists, self-tormentors, got included in Mahavira’s stream. Those who relish harassing themselves gathered.
Remember: Mahavira plucked his hair out — he uprooted his hair. Because Mahavira said: to remove hair you will have to keep a tool, a razor; or depend on a barber; or stand in queues at the barber. Mahavira said: why waste time? He plucked it out. But he did not pluck because there was some rasa in pain — in truth, Mahavira felt no pain in plucking. Understand a little.
Hair and nails in your body are dead parts — not living. Nails and hair are dead; that is why cutting with scissors causes no pain. Cut a finger — it will. Hair is cut by scissors; why do you not feel pain? If it is truly your part, and living, there should be pain. But hair is cut and you do not even notice. Hair is dead. In fact, hair and nails and sweat are means by which dead cells are expelled. Dead cells are thrown out. Hair are dead cells of your body. If even pulling dead cells causes pain, it is illusion only. It is only the idea that there will be pain — therefore there is pain.
You will ask: is everyone in illusion?
Let me tell you a small scientific event to bring it into view.
In France there is a man, Lorenzo. He conducted thousands of experiments in pain-free childbirth. He has delivered a hundred thousand women without pain — without any drugs, without anesthetics, without making them unconscious. The mother is laid as she is and he delivers painlessly. He says: it is only an illusion that childbirth is painful — only an idea. Because of this idea, when labor approaches, the mother becomes afraid that pain is coming. Because pain is imagined, she tightens all her muscles.
Pain contracts — note well, happiness expands; sorrow contracts. When you are unhappy, you contract. If a man stands at your chest with a dagger, all your muscles contract within. If someone puts a garland around your neck, you expand. Never weigh yourself after being garlanded — you may weigh more. You will be surprised: it is a scientifically observed fact that Bhagat Singh’s weight increased on the gallows. Weighed in the prison and again on the gallows plank — about a pound and a half more. How? Bhagat Singh was so joyous he could expand. When you are in sorrow, you contract — for protection.
So when the mother fears pain is coming — labor is near — she has seen the screaming in hospitals and at home; she knows — she starts contracting her muscles within. When she contracts and the child pushes out, pain starts. When the pain starts, the mother’s belief is cemented — pain has begun. She contracts more. The more she contracts, the more strongly the child pushes. He has to come out. In this struggle between the two, pain is created.
Lorenzo says: this pain is created by the mother. It is suggestion, an idea. There is no need for pain. No animal has it. The wild tribals do not. The tribal woman gives birth in the jungle, puts the baby in a basket and walks home. No rest needed — because no pain, so what rest? If there is pain, a month’s rest is needed. It is entirely mental, says Lorenzo. Now Lorenzo’s method is spreading to Russia and America. He simply teaches the mother: do not tighten — relax. Cooperate with the child in coming out. Think the child is going out. You will notice some seventy-five percent of babies are born at night. They must be born at night — because the mother does not fight in sleep. By reckoning, fifty percent could be by day and fifty by night. More means the mother is doing something wrong. Or else babies are more eager to descend at night — no. The main reason is: as long as she is awake she tightens; when she sleeps she loosens. Under hypnosis, babies are born without pain — because the mother goes into deep sleep. The child is born.
Lorenzo says: cooperate with the child. He also says: the mother who did not cooperate in the birth will not be able to cooperate later either. And the child whose first exposure is of pain — with him it will be difficult to have experiences of joy, for the first experience goes deep. If the first day the child gave pain, he will give pain. The belief becomes deep. Therefore the mother keeps saying till old age, I bore you nine months and suffered. She does not forget. I bore so many pains. She rarely says I bore you nine months and had such bliss. And a mother who can say that — her joy would be boundless. But this is not a matter of saying — it is of experience. A mother who could not enjoy nine months has lost the right to be mother. If she got sorrow, she became an enemy. With him the formula of sorrow deepens. When he gives sorrow, it will come to mind; when he gives joy, it will not — choice has begun.
Lorenzo, by delivering millions without pain, has proved that pain is our idea. If childbirth can be without pain, do you think hair cannot be pulled without pain? Of course they can. Mahavira plucked and threw his hair.
But there is a band of madmen. Psychologists say there is a special class of lunatics who take pleasure in plucking hair. If such a one plucks in the marketplace, you will send him to the asylum. If he becomes a follower of Mahavira and plucks, you will touch his feet. Now if he has any shrewdness — and madmen have plenty — sometimes very intelligent people are mad. They use their intelligence fully in their madness. So hair-plucking lunatics will be delighted to stand with Mahavira. Some madmen relish nudity — psychologists call them exhibitionists. If they stood nude thus, police would arrest them. Seeing Mahavira nude, they will rejoice. They will stand nude — and you will go touch their feet. It becomes hard to determine whether they followed Mahavira because of the nudity, or became nude because they followed. Whether they enjoyed plucking and so joined Mahavira, or they joined Mahavira and discovered the secret where plucking causes no pain — hard to conclude. What happens inside a man is very hard to judge from outside.
Mulla went to church one day to hear a famous priest. A Christian friend took him; he sat in front. Being impressive, he caught the priest’s eye again and again. When the priest began speaking on the Ten Commandments, he elaborated one: Thou shalt not steal. Mulla became very restless; sweat on his forehead. The priest thought: what is happening! He looks as if he might get up and leave. Then the priest came to the next: Thou shalt not commit adultery. Mulla began to laugh — very pleased, calm, delighted. The priest was more puzzled. When the meeting ended, he caught Mulla at a corner: what is your secret? When I said, do not steal, you were very troubled, sweating. When I said, do not commit adultery, you became very happy.
Mulla said: if you insist, I’ll tell you. When you said, do not steal, I remembered someone had stolen my umbrella — I couldn’t see it: what kind of church is this, full of thieves! But when you said, do not commit adultery, I immediately remembered where I had left the umbrella last night — no harm, no harm.
What is happening inside a man is very hard to tell by looking outside. What occurs in the subtle within is extremely difficult to catch by outer symbols. Often those who should not be excited by certain things get gathered around Mahavira — and the farther from Mahavira the larger their number. A time comes when the crowd behind Mahavira consists mostly of those excited by precisely the wrong things. What ought to excite is deep; what excites is superficial, external. People see Mahavira plucking hair, standing hungry, nude, in sun, cold, rain — so those who want to torture themselves can do so easily under Mahavira’s cover. But Mahavira is not torturing himself. Kaya-klesh for Mahavira does not mean torment.
Why then use the word? Mahavira’s meaning is: kaya-klesh is.
Understand a little.
The body is sorrow — the body itself is sorrow. With the body, happiness never comes — only sorrow comes. Therefore as the seeker advances he will begin to see many sorrows of the body that were not visible before — because he was living in his infatuations and illusions. There will be disillusionment. People come to me and say: since meditation began, a great restlessness seems to be in the mind. Meditation cannot cause restlessness. If meditation caused restlessness, then what would cause peace? I know restlessness seems to increase with meditation because the unrest you had never seen within begins to be seen. You thought it was not, because you did not see it. As meditation deepens, unrest becomes fully manifest. A hour comes when fear arises: will I go mad? If you pass that hour, unrest will end. If you do not, you will return to your world of unrest — asleep.
A man is asleep; he does not know the pain in his foot. When he wakes, he knows. But waking does not cause pain; waking allows cognition. Mahavira knows kaya-klesh will increase. As soon as one enters sadhana, his body will appear to give more sorrow — because giving happiness will cease. It never gave happiness; we only imagined it would. That was our illusion, our idea. That veil will lift; only sorrow will be seen. See that sorrow, but do not return. Mahavira says: bear this kaya-klesh. It is not giving sorrow to yourself; it is bearing it. Kaya-klesh will increase; the body’s sorrows will become apparent — its illnesses, tensions, discomforts, sickness, old age, death — all will be seen. From birth to death a long journey of sorrow will appear. Do not panic. Bear that kaya-klesh; watch it; be reconciled with it — do not run.
So kaya-klesh does not mean giving sorrow. It means: sorrow will come, will appear, will be experienced — then do not defend, accept. This is a very different meaning. Seeing it thus, the whole of Mahavira becomes different. He is not saying: torment — because he says: there is no need to torment. The body in itself torments enough; what more will you add? The body’s own sorrows are sufficient; you need not invent more. We invent pleasures so that the body’s sorrows are not noticed. We make arrangements of pleasure. Tomorrow we will arrange, the day after we will arrange. Someday happiness will come — if not today, tomorrow, the day after. We keep postponing — to forget today’s sorrow we keep fabricating tomorrow’s pleasure. To throw a curtain over today, we paint tomorrow’s colorful picture. Therefore no one wants to live in today. Today is very sorrowful. Everyone postpones to tomorrow. Today is very sorrowful. If we awaken now, all the illusions of happiness will break.
Mahavira knows: as one goes within, tomorrow breaks; one has to live today. And all sorrows will pierce deeply; from all sides sorrow will stand up; everywhere old age and death will appear; nowhere any support of happiness. The paper boats you thought would ferry you — they will sink. What you thought were supports will vanish. The illusions upon which you lived will disappear. When utterly disillusioned, you stand in the ocean sinking — no boat, no support, no shore visible — then there will be great klesh. Bear that klesh. Accept it. Know it is life’s destiny; know it is nature’s way; know it is so.
Kaya-klesh means: whatever klesh comes, accept it; know it is so. Do not try to escape. It is the trying to escape that leads into the dream of the future. Do not get into the anxiety of fabricating the opposite pleasure. That anxiety will not let you see, know, recognize. And remember, in this world whoever is to be liberated — no one is freed from pleasure; one is freed from pain. Pleasure does not exist — from what will you be freed? One is freed from sorrow; and the freedom from sorrow is hidden in the acceptance of sorrow — in acceptability, total acceptance. Kaya-klesh means: the body is sorrow — accept it wholly. Accept it so totally that the very sense of klesh dissolves. The sense of klesh will dissolve on the day acceptance is complete. Therefore Mahavira moves among all sorrows filled with bliss. Whether standing in rain or in sun, or naked, or plucking hair, or fasting — he is in no sorrow. He no longer even knows sorrow. The acceptance of kaya-klesh has become so deep that sorrow has no place. How can he say it is sorrow?
If I expect that as I pass on the road you should greet me — if you do not, there will be sorrow. If I have no expectation, how can there be sorrow if you do not? If your abuse causes me sorrow, it means I expected you would not abuse. If you do not, I am happy; if you do, I am unhappy. But if I have no expectation — if I only have acceptance that if you abuse, I will accept — then I will know this is the destiny; in this moment only abuse could be born — it has occurred. Only abuse could come from you — it came. If there is no contrary desire behind it, then no sorrow remains — it becomes a fact, a facticity. Behind it there is no craving.
The sadhana of kaya-klesh begins with the acceptance of sorrow — it culminates in the immersion of sorrow. Sorrow does not get dissolved — remember — as long as life is, sorrow will be. Life is sorrow. But the day acceptance is complete, for you sorrow will not remain. If Mahavira walks, his feet will tire; if someone throws a stone, his head will bleed; if someone hammers a peg in his ear, the body will feel pain — but Mahavira will not be unhappy. He has accepted that it is so. Acceptance brings such a great transformation — such a great transfiguration — we have no idea.
A soldier goes to the battlefield; until he goes, he is frightened, very nervous, trying to be saved. But when he reaches, for a day or two he cannot sleep; he starts at sounds; bombs fall, bullets fly. But after two or four days you will be stunned — the same soldier, bombs falling, bullets flying — he sleeps. The same soldier — corpses lying — he eats. The same soldier — bullets whizzing past — he plays cards. What happened to him? Once the situation of war is accepted as a fact — all is changed.
London was bombed in the Second World War. People were worried: what will happen? After a few days, with the bombing continuing, women went to market for shopping; children to school. It got accepted — war became a fact. It is not that the corpse lying nearby is not a corpse; it is not that the man has become hard, blind, deaf. He is the same. But the acceptance of fact changes everything. As long as you refuse, the fact will torment you. The day you accept — the matter is over. If I know this — that with the body death is inevitable — then the sorrow of death is destroyed. Death will come — death is not destroyed; but it will not touch me.
The sadhana of kaya-klesh is the method of liberation from sorrow through the acceptance of sorrow. But never mistake giving pain to the body for the sadhana of kaya-klesh. The person who tortures his body is still in a longing for some pleasure. We strive only for pleasure. Remember: effort is only for pleasure. So long as we are doing any effort, it is out of a longing for pleasure. A man may torment his body in the hope that by this he will gain moksha, bliss, Atman, Paramatman — the longing for pleasure continues.
Mahavira’s kaya-klesh is not to give pain to the body for some pleasure. Traditional interpreters say: just as one bears hardship to earn wealth, so one must bear hardship to attain liberation. They are wrong. Completely wrong. As someone does exercise and gives the body strain so that health improves — in the same way one must do kaya-klesh. Wrong — completely wrong. The body is already klesh — you cannot add klesh to it. Adding is not in your hands. Understand this: if you can add sorrow to the body, then you can also diminish it. Then what error is the worldly man making, who says — you are engaged in adding; if you succeed in adding — where there were five sorrows you make ten — then why can I not reduce five to zero!
If sorrows can be added, they can be subtracted. Where adding is possible, subtracting is possible. The so-called religious man who is adding sorrow to the body and the hedonist who is trying to reduce sorrow — there is no difference between them. Their logic is the same; their faith is one. One says, we will add; the other says, we will reduce. There is no difference in their arithmetic.
Mahavira says: neither can you add nor can you subtract. What is — if you like, accept; if you like, refuse. This is what you can do. The choice is only between acceptance and refusal — not between adding and reducing. Choose acceptance — sorrow will become zero. Choose refusal — sorrow will multiply manifold. Kaya-klesh means: total acceptance — the unreserved acceptance of what is.
When pegs were hammered into Mahavira’s ears, the story says Indra came and said: Command me. We suffer much pain. People come and hammer pegs into the ears of such a desireless one as you — they harass and torment — we are hurt by it.
Mahavira said: if you are so pained by pegs hammered into my body, how much will you not be pained if pegs are hammered into yours?
Indra understood nothing. He said: of course we would hurt — then shall I start defending you? Mahavira said: do you promise your protection will reduce my sorrows? Indra: I can try — whether they will reduce, I cannot say. Mahavira said: I too tried for births upon births — they did not reduce. Now I have left trying. I will not make even this attempt — to keep you as my bodyguard. No. Go. Your mistake is the same as the one who hammered pegs. He thought, by hammering he will increase my sorrow; you think, by protecting you will reduce it. Your arithmetic is one. Leave me — whatever is, I accept. He did hammer pegs — but they did not reach me; I stand very far. I have accepted; I stand apart. Acceptance is transcendence. The moment you accept any situation, you rise above it — instantly. This is the meaning of kaya-klesh.
Mahavira’s sixth external austerity is: samlinta — effacement, absorption. We will speak of that tomorrow.
Now, sit…!