Mahaveer Vani #22

The nirgrantha muni renounces abrahmacharya, meaning the intercourse of sexual union, for it is not only the very root of adharma, but also the seat of great defects.

For one who is eager to purify his chitta, to seek his own true nature, adorning the body, mingling with women, and consuming delicious and nutritive foods—milk, cream, ghee, butter, various sweets—are like poison.

Sex-energy, kama-urja, is the only energy man possesses.

There is but one power within man; you may give it any name you like. That power can move in two directions.

When sex-energy moves toward the other, it becomes sexuality. When sex-energy moves toward oneself, it becomes yoga.

Energy is one; by the difference of direction, the whole of life is transformed.

Heat water to a hundred degrees and it becomes steam, grows light, capable of soaring toward the sky. Cool water below zero and it becomes ice, heavy. The earth’s gravitational pull grows weighty upon it.

Steam is water, ice is water—steam ascends toward the sky, ice falls toward the earth.

Energy is one; the directions are two.

What we call sex is the downward flow of that same X, the unknown energy. It is becoming ice below zero. Then the earth’s gravity condenses upon it. That very energy, that same X, the unknown power—if it begins to rise upward, past a hundred degrees, toward the Paramatma—it begins to ascend like steam. The pull from below vanishes. The power is one; the directions differ.

So first, it is essential to understand that the power is one. Where it takes you depends upon its use!

Second, it is essential to understand that the power is neutral. Power itself does not tell you what to do. It gives you neither motive nor movement. Power abides within you, neutral. You alone employ that power as you will; power compels you to do nothing. If you wish to let it flow downward, it will flow downward; if you wish to let it flow upward, it will flow upward. The decisive one is you, not the power. The power is in your hands. If you take it downward, you will receive the pleasures and pains of the lower; if you take it upward, you will receive the experiences of the higher.

Third, it is essential to understand that there are two means for the transformation of this power. One means is called Yoga, and one means is called Tantra. The two are opposite—indeed as opposite as possible—yet their goal is one.

Opposite paths, too, can reach a single goal. Understand this a little, and then the sutra will be easy to grasp.

Tantra holds that until the full experience of sex-energy is had, it cannot be transformed. The deeper the experience of sex, the sooner the taste for it dissolves. This is a formula wholly contrary to Mahavira.

Understand this rightly, and then Mahavira’s entirely opposite viewpoint will be easy to grasp. In contrast—placing each before the other—seeing becomes easy.

Tantra holds: we can be freed only from that which we have experienced. Why only from what we have experienced? Then would it mean that the day we experience Moksha, we will be freed from Moksha? That the day we experience bliss, we will be freed from bliss? That the day we experience the Atman, the Atman will become futile?

No. Tantra says this: If, having passed through the whole process of an experience, freedom does not happen, then know that experience to be of your nature. And if, having passed through an experience, freedom does happen, know that it was foreign to your nature.

We become free of that experience in which at first there appears to be pleasure but afterward there is sorrow. We become free of that experience whose label read “nectar,” but upon opening, poison is found. We become free of that experience that proves vain.

Hence Tantra says: a total experience of sex is essential, so that the very rasa of sex may dissolve. For the rasa of sex is delusive. The rasa is not, it only appears to be. What only appears—if one passes through its full experience—it will vanish.

In the darkness of night, a rope appears to me as a snake. However much I may run from it, it will not become a rope for me; it will remain a snake.

Tantra says: come near, light a lamp, see, know—let it be in experience that it is a rope; it is not a snake. Then fear will dissolve.

Sexual desire appears to be heaven. It appears that sexual desire contains deep bliss. If, in truth, there is bliss there, then to drop it would be madness, Tantra says. If, in truth, there is no bliss there, then it is necessary to pass through the experience and know that the rope is a rope, not a snake. And the day it is seen that the experience is blissless—not only blissless but filled with suffering—who would wish to grasp it then?

This is Tantra’s vision. This is one method. The other method is that of Mahavira—the vision of Yoga. And the two are utterly opposite—polar opposites.

Mahavira says: once an experience happens, it is difficult to be rid of it. Mahavira says: through the process of experience, a habit is formed. The more you experience, the more habit is formed. And habit has its vicious circle—its vicious circle—by and by it becomes mechanical. One experience, then a second, then this experience becomes the demand of the body down to every hair. Without this experience you do not feel well; yet with the experience you also do not feel well. You indulge, and it seems you got nothing. You abstain, and it seems something is lost. So you indulge, then regret; then a hollow space appears, and again you indulge.

Mahavira says: once an experience is undertaken, that experience becomes the maker of habit—and man lives by habit.

What you do for twenty-four hours a day is merely habit. It is not necessary that there be some inner inspiration for doing it. You eat at a fixed time; at that time the body says: I am hungry. It is not necessary that hunger be real. And if the clock is changed, and you usually eat at one o’clock, and you do not know the clock is deceiving you—it's only eleven but the clock shows one—your stomach will begin to report hunger. The mind heard it is one o’clock, and the habit begins to repeat itself.

At the time you usually sleep—if you do not sleep at that time—sleep disappears. If sleep were real, and you used to sleep at midnight, at one o’clock it should come with even more intensity. But if you do not sleep at twelve and it becomes one, then sleep does not come at all. That midnight sleep was habitual, not real sleep. If you feel hungry at one, and now it becomes three, you will be surprised—the hunger dies. It should grow. If hunger were real, the hunger of one should be deeper at three. But at three, hunger dies—because it was only habitual.

The more “civilized” a man becomes, the more he lives by habit. Neither true hunger remains nor true sleep. Then the sexual experience also becomes habit. Then no inner inspiration is necessary. Husband and wife become habit—and habit keeps repeating itself.

A great thinker, D. H. Lawrence, has written that marriage is less experience, more habit. The same room, the same bed, the same decor, the same wife, the same time—habit. D. H. Lawrence wrote: one thing pains me more than any other—to sleep every day on the same bed. He wrote: I would rather die anywhere than in bed. Usually ninety-nine percent of people die in bed. For man is a strange creature.

If you sit in an airplane, people say: don’t. Once in a million, someone dies in a plane. Ride a horse; people say: don’t. Sometimes, one in a thousand falls and dies. But no one tells you, don’t sleep on a bed—ninety-nine percent die in bed. The maximum accidents happen in bed. D. H. Lawrence said: the bed is a habit. And just as hunger comes at a fixed time and sleep comes at a fixed time, so sexual impulse arises at a fixed time. People keep repeating habits.

Mahavira says: experience creates habit, and man lives by habit—not by awareness. If one lived by awareness, Tantra might be right. But man lives by habit, not by awareness. Therefore, there is meaning in Mahavira’s word as well.

Mahavira says: once habit begins to form, it keeps forming. Do not put the seed in the soil, and no sprout will appear. Once you do, the sprout emerges and becomes a tree—and in the tree millions of seeds will appear. But do not put the seed in the soil; leave it aside, and no sprout will appear. Once you pass through the experience, the seed grips the earth—and then the sprout of habit begins to grow. It grows and grows.

Hence Mahavira opened the path of initiation even to children. In fact, by Mahavira’s measure, initiation should be given to the child. Now psychologists too say that after seven years of age, change becomes difficult. If the first seven—primary—years are shaped in a certain way, the man keeps living in those patterns. The first seven are a condensed story of the whole seventy. Then it keeps repeating.

It is a delightful fact—worth pondering—how astonishing habit is. You love your mother; all children do. But perhaps you have never noticed that a mother’s love too, in a scientific sense, is only habit. Lorenz worked much on this. He conducted experiments in substitute mothers.

A duckling is born. Usually, if a duckling is born, the duck meets it first. When a chick is born, the hen meets it first. Naturally, when a human child is born, the first sight and first experience is the mother.

Lorenz did experiments so that when the chick is born, it does not experience the hen; the hen is hidden. In place of the hen he put an inflated rubber balloon—the child’s first sight, the child’s first experience—and the first experience is the final experience. The first experience is the deepest, for it is the first habit. All else gets built upon it.

That chick saw the rubber balloon. It became as attached to that balloon as to a mother. Thereafter, if the balloon was flown in the air, the chick would run after it; but if the mother stood near, it would not even look at her. The mother became futile because no habit could form with her. The rubber balloon became meaningful; it became the mother.

Lorenz says: “mother” has no intrinsic meaning; she is the first habit. Yet deeper findings emerged. The chick that grew up beside the rubber balloon—its feeding and drinking given by mechanical means, with no relationship formed with the mother—something astonishing happened: no rasa arose in its mind toward females. It had no interest in hens; sex dried up in its life.

Psychologists say that the child who has no first contact with the mother cannot form deep relationships with women later in life. The mother is the first habit. Therefore every man keeps seeking his mother in his wife—knowingly or unknowingly, consciously or unconsciously. And the great difficulty is, the mother cannot be found again in the wife. Therefore peace and rest can never be found from the wife. A wife cannot be a mother; and no wife agrees to become a mother; and the difficulty is, this longing is unconscious. So even if a wife agrees to become a mother, still the husband will be unhappy.

The strong male attraction to a woman’s breasts is only the outcome of that first habit formed in relation to the mother—and nothing else. The first habit formed with the mother; the second formed with the breast. Therefore men are so eager, so avid for the breasts of the woman.

Painters, sculptors, cinema—all are woven around the woman’s breasts. Stories, poems, romance—all weave around the woman’s breasts. It reveals nothing else, only that—as the chick became attached to the rubber balloon—the child became attached to the breast. And even the old man is not freed from that habit. Even in old age, he is not freed from the habit of the breast. That rasa remains.

If habits are so weighty, Mahavira says: if you wish to be free of an experience, do not enter it. Once you enter, getting free becomes more and more difficult. Mahavira sees man as a machine, and ninety-nine percent of people are machines. So Mahavira says: the machine-like life should be stopped right where things begin.

Is it possible that if a person is kept away from all experiences and circumstances of sex, then the flow of sex will not arise in his life?

It is not possible that the flow of sex will not arise. One day the child will be young, full of power; energy will come; the body-machine will supply power; sex-energy will surge. Even if all circumstances of sex are blocked, the child will still be filled. But a difference will occur. That child will have no well-laid pathways of habit. The energy will surge, but there will be no pre-constructed channels for its flow. To transform that child’s energy in any direction will be easy.

For those whose channels are already carved, making new ones is difficult—because energy flows along the old channel without effort. If no channel is carved, then forging a new one is very easy, because energy longs to flow—and any path that appears, it will hasten along it.

This is Mahavira’s vision. He says: the experience of sex will lead into danger; then returning toward brahmacharya will become more and more difficult. Therefore, avoid the experience.

Understand well: avoiding experience is not suppression; it is not repression. What Freud called repression—this avoiding of experience is not that. For Mahavira, avoiding experience is not forcing the energy down; avoiding experience is giving the energy a new path. If the energy is flowing downward, and you wish to take it upward, then if no experience of flowing downward has occurred, it will be easier to make a path upward. But then all the processes of Tantra and of Mahavira’s Yoga become opposite—entirely opposite. What Tantra prescribes will be wrong for Mahavira; what Mahavira prescribes will be wrong for Tantra.

In my vision, both paths can reach. Outwardly they emphasize different points, but inwardly the emphasis is one. Let me tell you that too.

The emphasis—Tantra says: freedom from rasa will come through experience. Mahavira says: do not taste the rasa at all, then freedom will come. Yet in both, the central point is freedom from rasa. How that freedom from rasa will come—here the difference lies.

Therefore Tantra will be easier for those who are engaged in awakening awareness. For those who are not engaged in awakening awareness, Tantra will be dangerous. That is why Tantra seems to be for very few people. Its broad influence could not become widespread. Yet in the future its influence will grow, because the entire structure of society and life is becoming more and more favorable to it. And people, through experience, are becoming rasa-less.

You will be surprised to know that in those countries where there is greater sexual freedom, dispassion toward sex is growing. In those lands where sex is more enslaved, where there is greater bondage, there is greater eagerness for sex. If the whole world becomes rightly prosperous—prosperity has only two meanings, for man has only two hungers: one is the hunger of the body, fulfilled by bread, shelter, possessions; and one is the hunger of sex, fulfilled by love—if both become excessive, then the relevance of Tantra will increase. But as yet, that excess has not arisen.

And what Mahavira says is entirely opposite. In that opposition there is a fundamental point; if we note it, the sutra becomes clear.

Tantra says: that from which you wish to be freed, enter it. Mahavira says: that from which you wish to be freed, do not touch it at all—stop at the first step. For there is little assurance you will be able to stop at the last step.

Tantra says: if you would be free of alcohol, then drink—and hold awareness. Increase the quantity of alcohol only as much as awareness increases, but let awareness always remain above, and alcohol never be able to render you unconscious.

Tantrikas have done wondrous experiments. There are such tantrikas that no matter how much you intoxicate them, you cannot render them unconscious. If unconsciousness does not come, then they both have drunk and have not drunk. Alcohol entered the body, and yet it did not touch consciousness.

So Tantra says: free consciousness; let alcohol go into the body, but keep consciousness untouched.

This is difficult—the work of long sadhana. And perhaps not possible for all, though all will want to try. But to fulfill Tantra’s formula is difficult, for the formula is: if awareness does not get lost, drink.

Mahavira says: if awareness gets lost, better not to drink at all. But both agree on one point: awareness must not be lost. Mahavira says: do not drink at all—lest awareness be lost. Tantra says: drink, and raise awareness.

This applies to all matters.

Mahavira says: no meat. Tantra says: meat, too, can be used. But Tantra says: whether you eat vegetables or meat, let no inner distinction arise. That is very difficult.

Tantra says: to attain non-difference, Advaita, let there be no difference within. Eating meat or taking vegetables—let no inner difference arise. If difference arises, then meat-eating becomes dangerous. If no difference arises within at all—drink poison or nectar—let no inner difference arise. If the inner mind remains unattached, if both appear equal, then Tantra says: even meat-eating is not meat-eating.

Mahavira says: it is difficult that no difference arise. In whose life there is difference in everything, no matter how much they say, “Gold is mud to us,” still gold is gold and mud is mud. Those who cannot move an inch without difference—how can we hope they will swallow liquor and meat as if it were water? So Mahavira says: where there is danger of falling, do not go. Therefore the whole procedure will be different.

“One who knows the rasa of sex and of sensual enjoyments, one who is an experiencer of them—for him, dropping abrahmacharya and taking up the great vow of brahmacharya is extremely difficult.”

To break habit is extremely difficult—and you all know that the habit of sex is the deepest habit. A man smokes; even that is difficult to leave. All smokers think they can leave whenever they wish. They never think they are addicted, that they have become slaves to it.

Mulla Nasruddin’s doctor told him to give up alcohol, for alcohol creates addiction. Man becomes a slave. Mulla Nasruddin said: let it be—forty years I have been drinking, and have not been addicted yet; how will I be now! From experience I say: I have drunk daily for forty years, and still not addicted.

Whatever you do, you think—whenever I wish, I will leave it. It is not so easy. Even a little habit is not easy to leave. Habit is very weighty. Your soul is very weak before habit. If you try to drop a small habit, you will know how difficult it is—but sex is the deepest habit, because it is biological.

Deep within your vital force, sex-energy is hidden, for man is born of sex; his every hair is formed by sex; each cell is born from the cell of sex.

You are the expansion of sex. You are in the world because your parents, their parents, their mothers and fathers, for millions upon millions of years, have been spreading sex-energy. You are a part of it. You are the fruit of your parents’ sexual desire.

In every hair of this fruit, in every particle, sexual desire is hidden. All other habits are superficial; sexual desire is the deepest habit. Hence Mahavira says: if habit begins to be formed, it is extremely difficult. Then to drop abrahmacharya and enter brahmacharya is extremely difficult.

He does not say “impossible,” therefore Tantra is not absolutely denied. He says “difficult.” And surely, for those who find it hard to stop smoking, Mahavira is right. Those who cannot drop cigarettes and think they will drop the experience of sex—they are courting suicide. It will not be possible for them.

Hence Tantra too has strict conditions. Tantra first breaks all other habits; and when the tantric master is assured that all habits have broken, then—then he gives permission for these deep experiments.

Tantra’s conditions are severe. Tantra holds: until one begins to see the Mother in every woman—not only the mother, but until one begins to remember Tara, Durga, Devi, Bhagavati, the Supreme Mother, Jagat Janani in every woman—until then Tantra will not say that Samadhi can be attained through sexual union.

Therefore in Tantra’s preliminary processes there are experiments in seeing the Mother in the woman, seeing the Supreme Mother. Hence all tantrikas see God as Mother, not as Father. And only when the Mother begins to appear in every woman can Tantra’s experiment begin.

And the whole arrangement of Tantra’s experiment is exceedingly difficult. Difficult—because first the “woman” has to be dissolved. She must end, be absorbed—no woman present; and even then, to enter sexual union with the utmost sacred feeling. If for even a moment lust arises, the tantric experiment fails. But that is arduous. Mahavira says: it is difficult.

For the ordinary man it is far easier not to form the habit of that from which he wishes to be freed.

Why is this easier? Because when energy fills within, it longs to flow. The nature of energy is to flow. As a river flows toward the ocean, so does energy flow to meet someone.

This meeting can be of two kinds. The meeting can occur outwardly—with another—of a man with a woman, of a woman with a man. This is one flow. Another flow is inward—meeting oneself. This inner flow—if the habit of flowing outward has not been formed—the power itself will become so full that it will begin to knock at the inner doors and will begin to move within.

Brahmacharya is emphasized for this reason. The reason is that power should become so much that the power itself begins to seek its own path; and if there is no habit of flowing downward, no habit of flowing outward, no habit of flowing toward the other, then no path is found. And when no path is found and the power keeps increasing and wants to break the dam, then the seeker can easily open the path that leads within. The power itself becomes a helper in the opening.

Therefore Mahavira says: “The nirgrantha muni renounces abrahmacharya, the intercourse of mating. For this is not only the root of adharma, but the place of the greatest faults as well.”

If energy flows outward, it is the very root of adharma. For we have defined Dharma as swabhava—one’s own nature. Dharma means: to find oneself. Then adharma means: the attempt to find the other—the “other,” the attempt to possess the other. Dharma means to attain oneself; adharma means to attain the other. Therefore nothing can be more adharma than sexual desire. For sexual desire means: the search for the other. Dharma means: the search for oneself.

So Mahavira says: “It is the root of adharma, and the place of the greatest faults.”

Understand this a little.

Of the faults that arise in our lives, ninety-nine percent are related to sexual desire. If a man becomes mad for hoarding wealth, whether he knows it or not, he wants wealth so that ultimately sex can be attained through wealth.

Man wants position, fame—for the sake that sex can be more easily fulfilled. Whatever else man sets out to do, hidden deep behind it is sex. It is another matter that he may not succeed at it—he may remain entangled with the means and never reach the end. But deep down, the end is one.

Why so? Because man is an expansion of sexual desire, and within man there are two hungers—as I said: when you eat food, that is the preservation of your life; when you engage in sex, that is the preservation of the race. That too is a kind of food.

If you stop eating, you will die. If you stop sexual desire, you become a cause in ending the race. Therefore Immanuel Kant, the famous German thinker, called brahmacharya immoral. He had reasons. He said: if all people practice brahmacharya, life will disappear. And Kant says: morality requires a rule that can be practiced by all. A rule that all cannot practice—and if all do practice it, the very life which is the basis and possibility of morality disappears—such a rule is immoral. Then brahmacharya cannot be practiced. If life vanishes, then a rule whose perfection destroys itself is not moral. In one sense, he is right. You kill someone—that is violence. If you restrain sexual desire, you too commit violence upon those who might have been born through that desire.

By Kant’s reckoning, brahmacharya is violence. Those who could be born—you are preventing them. So Kant says: a man who fasts is not committing such a great sin—he is doing something only to himself. Fine—he is free. But a man who remains celibate is dangerous, because it means he is devising the extinction of the race. But Kant’s way of thinking has a limit. For him there is no life other than this life; no realm of mystery beyond it.

Mahavira says: the very energy that here gives birth to beings gives birth to oneself in that realm. The energy is the same—it serves the self-birth, the rebirth of oneself.

Mahavira’s arguments are different. He says—and now science supports him—that in one act of intercourse about a hundred million sperm cells are released. So Mahavira says: in one act, a hundred million lives are released; within two hours they all die. Thus in every intercourse there is the sin of killing a hundred million lives. And if a man, with restraint, has intercourse across his life, he can manage some four thousand acts. In four thousand acts—per act a hundred million lives are destroyed—you can extend the arithmetic. Even if you beget five or ten children, it is upon the murder of billions and trillions of lives.

Life is astonishing. A hundred million sperm cells are released in intercourse, and at that very moment the struggle begins. Competition is not only in the marketplace or in Delhi. As soon as a hundred million are freed into the woman’s vagina, struggle begins among them over who will get ahead. For only one can reach the woman’s ovum. Those races in the Olympics are nothing. The greatest race—unknown to you, upon which all life depends—happens in the great invisible. These hundred million runners run. One reaches; all others die along the way—and even that one does not always reach.

As many as the present number of people on earth—that many one man can beget. Three and a half billion are alive. In the semen of a single man there are enough sperm to beget three and a half billion. In one life a man commits so many killings; all die; they cannot be saved.

Mahavira’s reckoning is that this is great violence; hence he calls abrahmacharya violence. Enormous, great violence—so many lives! All this energy can be transformed; on the basis of all this energy, one’s own new birth can happen.

Nor does Mahavira accept that the existence of this world is any necessity. If it is not, nothing is lost. For from its being, nothing comes but loss. If this earth were empty, what loss is there? If you are not, what great harm occurs? Flowers will blossom all the same; the moon will rise the same; the ocean will roar the same; the winds will blow with the same grandeur—only your houses won’t obstruct them. What difference does your being or not being make? If you are not, what happens? With your being, the earth only becomes a hell.

Mahavira says: this consciousness which daily descends into a body only creates trouble. It must be freed from the body and given birth in another realm where there is no struggle. This is all that is meant by Moksha and the world.

In the world everything is struggle—everything—whether you notice or not. Even a breath I take here—I take it by snatching someone’s breath. If I live here, I live by killing someone. To be here means to efface someone. There is no way around it; life here runs on death alone. Here violence is food. Whether one eats meat or not, kills animals and birds or not—whatever one eats, all food is violence. There is no escape from violence here. No way.

So Mahavira says: there is a realm of consciousness where there is no competition, no struggle. Remember, all struggle is because of the body. Because of the Atman there is no struggle at all. Even on this earth, those who are engaged in attaining the Atman have no struggle with anyone.

If I am obtaining wealth, I will snatch it from someone. If I am seeking beauty, I will make someone ugly. Whatever I do in the outer world, someone will be robbed, someone will chase me. But if I am meditating, if I am trying to become silent within, if I am going upon an inner pilgrimage, seeking silence, awareness—then I am not snatching anything from anyone. No one is harmed by me; rather, many can be benefitted by me.

No one was harmed by Mahavira’s being; much benefit came. But in the world, the greater the man, the more harm he does—great in any direction. His greatness depends upon snatching from others.

In the world, snatching and grabbing are the rule, because the body is the beginning of snatching. From the mother’s womb it begins—snatching—and continues lifelong.

Moksha means: where consciousness is pure, free of body; where there is no struggle; where being does not depend on killing and violence against others.

So Mahavira says: the use of this energy is for entry into that realm. That entry never happens by running toward the other. And sex runs toward the other. Sex binds you to the other; sex makes you dependent on the other. Hence among those tied to sex there will always be quarrel. The meaning of quarrel is only this: no one wants to be a slave—and sex makes you a slave.

You love someone—then you become dependent upon them. Without them, the joy, the contentment, the fleeting glimpse you get—cannot be had. It is in their hands; the key is in their hands—and their key comes into your hands. Keys get exchanged. The wife’s key in the husband’s hands; the husband’s key in the wife’s hands. Surely slavery begins to be felt. He who is the cause of our joy, we become a slave to him; and he who is the cause of our sorrow, we become a slave to him too. Then rebellion against slavery runs on.

A very thoughtful psychologist has recently written a book: The Intimate Enemy. It is about the relationship of husband and wife—the inner enemy. Intimacy remains, and enmity runs as well. Enmity is inevitable. Between husband and wife, friendship is accidental; enmity is inevitable. Friendship exists only so that enmity does not break apart, so that it stays joined, keeps going. When it comes close to breaking, friendship! Then friendship patches the torn edges; then enmity begins again. Enmity is inevitable. The reason is that toward whom we become dependent, ill-will begins toward them. The desire to take revenge arises; they become the enemy.

Mahavira says: as long as we flow toward the other, we will remain slaves. Sexual desire is the greatest slavery. Therefore brahmacharya has been called the greatest freedom, and thus Mahavira made brahmacharya an essential part of Moksha.

“One who is eager to purify his chitta, to seek his own nature—for him, the adornment of the body, the mingling with women, and the consumption of delicious and nutritive food, are like poison.”

For one who would purify his chitta, who would attain his own nature—why is bodily adornment, why is the association with woman or with man, and delicious and nutritive food like poison? Why?

Let us consider the reasons rightly.

We adorn the body only because our interest is in someone else. No one adorns the body for oneself; it is always for the other. One in whom we are assured—then we cease to adorn for them. Hence other men’s wives appear more beautiful; one’s own wife not so much. For wives become assured of their husbands. Now daily adornment is no longer needed. What has been won—what is the need to win again and again? The husband sees their real face. He tires of it. The neighbors see their made-up face, prepared for going out; thus the neighbors seem to take rasa in them.

In the West, psychologists suggest that if a woman wants to keep her husband ever interested in her, she should keep winning him anew every day. Do not let victory become certain, for when victory becomes certain, the man’s rasa is lost. Man is interested in conquest.

Another’s wife—even if less beautiful—can appear more attractive. Attraction is in conquest. The more difficult the attainment, the more challenge there is.

We adorn ourselves only for others, not for ourselves. If you were left alone in a forest, think what you would do. You would not adorn yourself—or anything. To decorate means: for whom?

Therefore we had made arrangements—if the husband dies, we do not allow the widow to adorn herself, for we ask: for whom? If she were adorning herself for herself, what harm is there for a widow to adorn herself? She was adorning for her husband. Now since the husband is not, for whom? And if we see a widow adorn herself, suspicion arises that somewhere she has begun to seek a husband; thus we do not allow her to adorn. We try to make her ugly from all sides.

A great irony—is beauty for the other? In truth, beauty is a snare, a net, in which we wish to entrap someone.

Mahavira says: when there is no interest in the other, what is the purpose of adornment? Therefore Mahavira said: be as you would be if alone upon the earth. Hence Mahavira became naked. Hence Mahavira left the decoration of the body. It does not mean Mahavira became an enemy of the body. No. Nor does it mean he made his body ugly—that would be the other extreme.

If we construct beauty, it is for the other; if we construct ugliness, it is also for the other. The day the wife is angry, she will remain ugly before the husband; she will not adorn. That too is for the other. If adorning was a way to give pleasure, then remaining ugly is a way to give pain.

Mahavira dropped concern for the other. He began to live as one could live for oneself. This did not make him ugly; rather, in the true sense, for the first time a beauty blossomed that was not for the other, that arose from within, that was for oneself, that was swabhava.

Adornment is false; hence the beauty hidden in adornment is a deception. Psychologists say: the effort to adorn is the compensation for the lack of real beauty. Thus the more beautiful a woman is, the less she will adorn; the more ugly, the more she will adorn. An ugly society will be loaded with ornaments. A beautiful society will leave ornaments. We are compensating for lack—but the gaze is on the other—always on the other.

Why does man not adorn so much? He does something else, because women are less interested in beauty and more interested in power. Men are less interested in power and more in beauty—therefore women spend their lives in adornment; men do not care for adornment. The reason is this: for the woman, if there is power with a man, that is the cause of her interest. How much wealth he has, how robust his body is—this is valuable for the woman.

For the woman’s mind, beauty means power. For the man’s mind, beauty means grace, softness—not power. Hence man is engaged in increasing power—by whatever brings power: wealth, fame. He runs after wealth and fame. But that too is for the other.

Mahavira says: this living “for the other”—this is the world. To live for oneself is liberation. This striving to be “for the other” will bring adornment, will bring association with women—or with men, it does not matter—with the opposite sex. There will be a longing to be near the opposite sex. For only when the opposite sex is near do you feel you are. When it is not near, you become sad—you feel you are not.

Observe: if twenty men sit together and are in discussion, and a beautiful woman enters the room, the radiance of the room changes. Faces change; the heaviness of talk lightens; disputation becomes dialogue. Why? Because those twenty men, with the entry of the woman, for the first time feel they are men. The presence of the woman makes them conscious of their manhood. Their spines straighten; they sit upright; they adjust their ties; they fix their clothes. The opposite has appeared. Attraction begins.

There is attraction of the opposite. Hence if there are clubs of only men, they will be dull—utterly dull. There will be no sparkle. If there are gatherings of only women—after a little while, once the criticism of those women not present comes to an end—everything will seem futile.

Friendship between two women is difficult. Friendship can have only one cause: if a third woman is an enemy of both—no other way. Among men, friendship happens because they have many enemies all around. We make friends to fight against enemies. Among women, friendship cannot truly form. And if there is a meeting of women, there is nothing worthy of discussion; all will be shallow. But let a man enter—and the whole situation will change.

All this happens unconsciously. For this, you need do nothing consciously. Your energy does it.

We seek the other so that we may experience ourselves. We seek the opposite so that we may know ourselves.

Therefore Mahavira says: the association with the opposite—for one practicing brahmacharya, for one seeking his own nature—should be left. Even the very thought of the opposite should be left. For the Atman cannot be known through the opposite; only the body can be known through the opposite.

On the plane of body you are woman, you are man. On the plane of Atman you are neither woman nor man. If you are to seek the Atman, the opposite has no use. If you are to continue the search of the body, then without the opposite there is no use.

Scientists say that once upon a time man and woman were not separate. The story of the Bible seems very true. In the Bible there is the story: God, dwelling alone, grew bored; alone, anyone would be bored. He created Adam. Then Adam, alone, grew bored; so from his rib He created Eve—the woman.

Kierkegaard makes a deep jest. He says: at first God alone was bored. Then He created Adam. Then Adam and God both grew bored. Then He created Eve from Adam’s bone. Then Eve and Adam grew bored; they created children—Cain and Abel. Then Cain, Abel, Adam, Eve, God—all became bored. The whole family was bored. Then they created the whole world—and now the whole world is bored.

But the Bible’s story says: God made Eve from Adam’s bone. Until now it was myth; but the researches of science have proved there is a truth in it.

If we go back in life, the amoeba—the earliest sprouting of life on earth—has both woman and man together. Its body is of both. It need not go seeking a wife. Its wife is attached to it; husband and wife are one. This is the first form—the amoeba. Later, much later, the amoeba split and two parts arose.

That is why there is such attraction between woman and man. Biologically, they are two broken halves of a larger body; hence they want to come close, to unite again. Sexual union is their attempt to join. In this attempt, the momentary sense of unity they feel—that is their joy. This attempt to join is meaningful on the plane of body, for both are halves, and both feel incompleteness. But on the plane of Atman there is neither man nor woman.

Therefore Mahavira says: for one who seeks his own nature, not the body, the association with the opposite has no meaning at all; it is even a danger. For the moment the opposite is present, his body will begin to be affected. However much he restrains himself, the particles of his body will be drawn toward the opposite. That pull is like this: put a magnet near and the iron filings are drawn.

The moment a man is present, or a woman, the particles of both bodies turn toward attraction; they become eager to come closer. It is not a question of your will or unwillingness. Your biology, the structure of your body, your make-up—your very being is such that as soon as woman and man come near, the pull begins at once. You restrain that pull because she is not your wife, he is not your husband—you restrain. That is civilization, culture, rule. But the pull begins. That pull will prevent you from going to the plane of the Atman. Your energy will begin to flow downward.

Therefore Mahavira says: this association is dangerous for a seeker of brahmacharya. Delicious and nutritive food too, he says, is dangerous—poison-like. Why? Because your seminal energy is formed from your nutritive food. Your sexual desire is formed from your nutritive food.

So Mahavira says: take only as much food as will keep the body going—no more. Any extra food, which will give extra power, becomes sex-energy. Mahavira says: that extra food does not come to you; it comes to your sexual desire.

Understand this small point.

A necessary quantum of power is needed—for walking, standing, sitting, working, speaking. A certain number of calories are needed. The body uses them. What remains beyond that goes to your sexual desire.

Remember: whenever there is something extra with us—whenever, not only in the body but outside too—if in your bank balance, after your expenses and arrangements and livelihood are met, something remains, it will go into indulgence and luxury. There is no other use for it.

The extra is always luxury. Therefore societies that grow rich become luxurious. This is a great difficulty.

The poor have their troubles; the rich have theirs. The poor lack life’s necessities; so he becomes dishonest, a thief, a criminal. The rich has more than necessary; so he becomes luxurious. Balance is very difficult.

Mahavira says: balance—samyak—food just enough for the body to function. Neither less nor more. Mahavira emphasizes samyak ahar—enough that work can go on. But we go on taking more.

Of the items he lists—milk, cream, ghee, butter—this is worth thinking about a little.

Milk is in truth a strongly sex-stimulating food—and except man, no animal on earth is so full of sexual desire, and one reason is milk. No animal, beyond a short period of childhood, drinks milk—except man. Animals have no need. The body’s work is complete. All animals drink their mother’s milk; but only man drinks the milk of other mothers—and not even that of human mothers, but of animals.

Milk is a strange thing, and in human culture it has done who knows what all—hard to reckon. It is natural that a child drink milk up to a certain age. After that, milk should cease. In truth, as long as the child can receive milk from the mother’s breast, that is right. After that, the need for milk is not natural. The child’s body is formed, constructed—the need of milk was for bone, blood, flesh—the structure completed. Now normal food will suffice. If even now milk is given, all that milk creates sexual desire. It is extra. Hence Vatsyayana in the Kama-sutra says that after each intercourse a wife should serve milk to her husband. He has said it rightly.

In forming semen, nothing produces as massively as milk. For nothing produces blood as massively as milk. Blood is formed, from blood semen is formed. So whatever is produced from milk is sex-stimulating. Therefore Mahavira said it is not useful; it is dangerous—at least for the seeker of brahmacharya it is dangerous. Then there is no contradiction between the Kama-sutra and Mahavira. What aids the seeker of enjoyment is an obstacle for the seeker of Yoga. And milk is the milk of animals. Surely, the amount of potent milk needed for their semen-energy—for their bodies—is produced by animal mothers.

When a cow produces milk, she does not produce it for the human child; she produces it for the bull. And when a human child drinks that milk and bull-like sexual desire arises in him, there is no wonder in it. That was not man’s food. Even scientists now are working on this; sooner or later we must understand: if there are many animal tendencies in man, is the cause animal milk? If his animal tendencies are greatly strengthened, is the cause animal food?

What is proper food for man is not yet clearly settled. But by scientific measure, if we examine man’s stomach—as scientists have done—they say: man’s food can only be vegetarian. For the large intestine required by herbivores—such a large intestine exists in man. Carnivores have a short intestine—like the lion, very short. For meat is already digested food; there is no need for large intestines. It is prepared food—he takes it; it is directly absorbed into the body. Only a very small digestive apparatus is needed.

Hence a delightful fact: a lion eats once in twenty-four hours—that is enough. The monkey is a vegetarian—you see him—he chews all day long. His intestine is very long; he needs food all day. So he keeps chewing.

Man too, rather than eating a lot in one sitting, should eat in small amounts many times. He is a descendant of the monkey. And the more vegetarian the food, the less sex-stimulating it is. The more non-vegetarian, the more stimulating it becomes.

Milk is part of non-vegetarian food. Milk is non-vegetarian, for it is formed from the mother’s blood and flesh. It is the purest non-vegetarian. Therefore Jains, who call themselves non-meat eaters—should not say so until they abandon milk.

The Quakers are more purely vegetarian because they do not take milk. They say: milk is animal food; it cannot be taken. But for us, milk is the most sacred, the perfect food; everything is obtained from it—but that is for the child, and that too from his own mother. Another’s mother’s milk is dangerous. And at a later age, milk, cream, ghee—all are more troubles—derived from milk. We make milk more and more concentrated—when we make cream, then butter, then ghee—ghee becomes pure sexual desire. All this is unnatural; yet man keeps consuming it. Surely, then his diet influences his conduct.

So Mahavira said: samyak ahar—vegetarian food—not highly nutritive, only so much as keeps the body going. These are rightly helpful for the seeker who has begun to come toward himself.

Power is needed for running toward the other; peace is needed for coming toward oneself. The lustful man will seek ways to increase power—how to increase potency! He will take tonics to enhance strength—how to increase! The seeker of brahmacharya will try that power become peaceful. When power becomes peaceful, it flows inward. And when peace itself becomes power, it begins to flow outward.

Enough for today.

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