Sahaj Yog #2

Anand Maitreya, the difference between a lit lamp and an extinguished one is very slight. Only an eye can see it; without eyes, a lit lamp and an unlit lamp look the same. A lamp is a lamp; if you weigh them in your hand, the lit one won’t weigh more than the unlit one—flame has no weight. And yet between the lit and the unlit there is the distance of earth and sky—but only for the one who has eyes.

So there can be a kirtan that is a lit lamp, and a kirtan that is a dead, extinguished lamp. There can be a prayer radiant with light, and there can be a prayer that is just cold ash. Someone born in a Hindu home is taught from childhood to remember Rama before sleep. He does it every night; it becomes a habit, a mechanical repetition. It is that repetition I oppose. That is ritual, because the heart is not in it.

And then there was the hunter Valya, who called out to Rama—he was illiterate, he couldn’t even remember properly whom to invoke. In calling “Rama, Rama,” he fumbled and began calling “Mara, Mara”—and calling “Mara, Mara” he attained! The hunter Valya became the sage Valmiki.

You may call “Rama” and nothing happens; Valya called “Mara, Mara” and everything happened. In his “Mara, Mara” there was the surge of the inner being, the joining of life-breath, the soul’s own cry. Where the soul’s call is joined, ritual disappears; living religion is born.

Meera sang songs—and Lata Mangeshkar also sings Meera’s bhajans; she may sing them even more beautifully, for Meera was no trained singer. Recently Kolhapur University conferred a PhD on Lata—would anyone have conferred a PhD on Meera? People gave her poison! Not degrees. Her own people, her family, tried every way to kill her—sent a snake sealed in a box, sent poison in a cup. Lata may well sing better than Meera. The art of singing is one thing; but what was in Meera’s broken words cannot be in the most exquisitely crafted song of the greatest vocalist. Meera’s lamp may have been crooked, a rough earthen lamp—but it held a flame. Your lamp may be of gold, studded with diamonds and jewels, worth a fortune—but if there is no flame, what use is it? Keep this distinction in mind and you will find it easy to understand Saraha—and me.

Yes, here too people dance and sing. In other temples also people sing and dance. But there is a great difference. Here, no one dances because he is a Hindu, no one sings because he is a Muslim, no one because he is a Christian. Here, those have gathered who are seekers of truth. Those who are not seeking truth are satisfied with the religion they got by birth. What do you ever get by birth? Only notions, not religion. By birth you inherit beliefs, not living devotion. By birth you get doctrines, not truth; scriptures, not self-knowing. By birth you receive ready-made grooves; how can the proclamation of life, the quest for nectar, be received by birth?

No one is born religious; one is born Christian, Jain, Muslim, Hindu—not religious. The search for religion is the search for one’s own innermost being. Each person has to set out on that pilgrimage. Here, only those have come together who are seeking religion, who truly want to know the divine—whatever the price.

Being with me is the beginning of paying that price. The moment you relate with me, you get into trouble; you will have a thousand hassles. From relating to me you will get no conveniences—only inconveniences. Because in relating to me you are not becoming part of a sect. You are learning madness—joining the company of lovers intoxicated with God. You will run into obstacles.

Those who related to Saraha faced them; those who related to Jesus faced them too. Today those who are “related to Jesus” face no obstacle, because they aren’t related to Jesus at all. Christianity is now a birthmark. Being “Buddhist” now also comes by birth.

Think of those born in the Hindu fold, nursed on the Vedas, the Upanishads, and the Gita, who drank the Vedas with their mother’s milk. When they walked with Buddha, they faced obstacles, because a Buddha is always an opponent of dead religions. Those who are for religion must be against dead religion. Those who are for life cannot be for the worship of corpses. They will say: this is a rotting corpse—go, burn it on the pyre! That is what Buddha said: your scriptures, your Vedas, are of no use. But those few courageous ones who went with him—do you know their difficulties? Now someone born in a Buddhist home becomes a Buddhist—do you think his attainment will be what it was for those first ones who walked with Buddha? He pays no price; he is a Buddhist for free. And can anyone ever become a Buddhist, a Jain, a Hindu for free?

Religion is not a matter of birth—it is a matter of self-discovery. Discovery is costly. Those gathered here are seekers. If they dance here, it is not out of formality. No one is giving them security for dancing, no convenience, no promise. I have not told you: dance and you will get heaven. I have not told you: meditate and you will attain moksha. I am telling you: in dancing is heaven; in meditation is moksha. Moksha is not a fruit at the end.

Where meditation’s “fruit” is moksha, meditation becomes a ritual. Then you “do it” somehow, because the mind is fixed on the outcome. Since moksha won’t be had without meditation, you also “do” meditation, but it is half-hearted. If moksha could be had without meditation, would you meditate? You toil to earn money, so you toil. But is there any joy in toil itself? If you could get the same money by less effort, would you still work as hard? And if you could get it without effort, would you work at all? You have no joy in the effort. If the fruit could be had without labor, who would labor? But one who has joy in labor says: whether the fruit comes or not, I will work. Ask the man who goes for a morning walk: what will you get out of it? He will laugh: walking is joy. His walking is not a ritual. For him, means and end are one.

Take this as the definition: when means and end are one, there is no ritual. When means and end are separate, the means becomes ritual. Whatever you can do without hankering for a result—that is religion. If you can dance, intoxicated, with joy in the dancing itself, with no eye beyond it, no desire beyond it—if the dance becomes total, drowns your whole life-breath, suffuses every breath, settles into every pore—then in this dance Meera will appear. In this song, Surdas’s verses will descend. In this simple sitting still, the dignity and majesty of Buddhahood will arise of itself.

Buddha sat under a tree and awakening arose. You also sit under a tree so that awakening will arise. Your sitting under the tree is ritual. Sit there for lifetimes—you only waste your time, and you trouble the tree, too. The tree will tire of you; you will keep peeking with half-open eyes: has enlightenment come yet?

Buddhahood is the name of that moment in which you are utterly absorbed—then whether it is dance, silence, song, chanting, or music—it makes no difference. The essential point is one: the moment you are completely immersed, absorbed, enraptured, when nothing remains outside, everything is drowned—that plunge is religion.

You asked: You said religion is sadhana, not ritual. Of course sadhana and ritual look the same from the outside. The only difference is this: sadhana has a soul in it; ritual has none. A living man and a dead man lying side by side look alike; if the living one has practiced some yogic breath retention and lies still, even a physician might not tell which is dead and which alive. Still, the living is living and the dead is dead. Where is the difference? From the surface they look the same. If you take a photograph, both photographs will look alike, and it will be hard to tell which is alive and which dead.

Scriptures are photographs; therefore, by scriptures alone it is difficult to tell what is living and what is dead. But if you go and feel the pulse, a small sign will tell you which is alive.

In Greece there was a great sculptor. Death came to him. The story is charming. He made eleven statues of himself and hid among them. He was such an artist that people said: if the statue stands beside the original, from a distance you cannot tell which is which. He made eleven of himself and stood there. Death entered, and was startled. She had to take one—but twelve identical figures stood there. Whom to take? Whom to leave? She returned and asked God: What to do? There are twelve of them. God laughed: After all, you are Death, and you remain death. Could you not recognize such a small thing?

But Death is Death—how can she recognize life? God said: There’s a small trick; take these words with you, speak them in the middle of the hall, and the real one will step out.

Death returned. As God had said, she did. She went to each statue, looked closely, and after seeing them all, she said: Everything is perfect, except there’s one mistake. The sculptor immediately blurted: What mistake? Death said: Step out. This is the very formula God gave me—that if I say this, the living one will speak up: “What mistake?” That’s the mistake: you cannot forget yourself. Step out.

Even if a living and a dead man appear absolutely alike, they are not the same. Such is the difference between sadhana and ritual. Ritual is the corpse of sadhana from which life has flown. The cage remains; the bird has gone. The swan has flown. Once there was a swan. Once a lovely bird was in the cage; when the sun rose, a song would arise from the cage. Remember: the cage never sang—the cage cannot sing. It was the bird within that sang. The breeze would come and the wings would flutter. Now only the cage remains. The sun still rises, the wind still blows, but no wings flutter, no song is heard. The cage is still there—but what can a cage do?

Sadhana is a living event; ritual is the dead body of that very sadhana. They look alike; therefore two kinds of confusions arise. First, because they seem the same, people go on performing rituals, thinking “this too is sadhana.” After all, Meera also danced! “Pad ghunghroo baandh Meera naachi re”—so you tied on ankle-bells and you danced. But where is Meera’s life? Where is the swan? Where is that feeling, that devotion? Ankle-bells you can buy in the market. Dancing you can learn; that is not difficult. But where will you bring Meera’s soul from? Until Meera’s soul is there, no matter how much “ta ta thei thei” you do, it will remain “ta ta thei thei.” The cage is there. The sun has risen; no song will burst forth. It cannot.

So one mistake is to think ritual is sadhana. Then comes the opposite mistake: when Saraha or someone like me opposes ritual, you think sadhana is being opposed. It is the other side of the same coin. Either people think ritual is sadhana; or, when one criticizes ritual, they assume one is against sadhana. Why would Saraha oppose sadhana? He opposes ritual.

Walk with care. To walk with people like Saraha you must place your feet very carefully. It is the razor’s edge.

“The prisoners at last made use of their madness:
they smashed their heads against the prison wall
and made a window for the day.”

They were mad; they did not care for caution. By smashing their heads they broke through the wall.

Sadhana is the affair of mad lovers. Here we break walls by dashing our heads.

“One word—Hu—has a hundred ways of being called.
The peal of the bell is, as it were, the Brahmin’s adhan.”

This is a Sufi saying. “Hu” is the Sufi mantra, like Om—meaning He, That, the name of the Beloved. One word—Hu—yet there are a hundred ways to call it. The word is one, but a hundred styles of calling are possible. The style depends on the caller—because the caller’s soul stands behind that Hu.

And that priest who blows the conch in the temple, and the adhan that rises from the mosque—there is no real difference. If there is soul in the conch’s sound and soul in the adhan, they are two styles of the same call. The priest’s way of calling in the temple is to ring the bell and blow the conch; in the mosque, instead of bells there is the adhan. It is the same call. The essential question is: from whom does the call arise? Is it truly his, or is he parroting someone else? Does the voice issue from him, is it his own? Are his life-breath and being in it? If not, it is all futile. Then you can buy plastic flowers in the market, place them in the window; perhaps the neighbors will be fooled.

Mulla Nasruddin watered the flowers in his window every day. The neighbors saw him bring the watering can and pour, but no one ever saw water fall. At last one neighbor couldn’t restrain himself. He said: Forgive me, you have aroused my curiosity. I keep thinking I shouldn’t interfere, but I must ask—because I can’t sleep without knowing. You always come with the can, but I never see water come out!

Mulla said: There is no need to pour water—the flowers aren’t real anyway.

The neighbor said: Now you’ve baffled me more. If the flowers are plastic, and you don’t pour water, why this pretense of watering them?

He said: So the neighbors will think the flowers are real. If I don’t water them and they stay fresh day after day, sooner or later someone will suspect they’re plastic. So there’s no need to pour water—only to pretend to pour.

Such is your prayer: neither the flowers are real, nor the water is real, nor are you truly watering. You are deceiving the neighbors—keeping up the reputation that you are religious.

“Since that Spring-bringer turned his face away from the garden,
the branches forgot to sway, the buds forgot to open.”

As long as the spring of love for the Beloved is alive within you, everything is right; whatever you do is right, however you do it is right. The way you rise is worship; the way you sit is sadhana. But from the moment the remembrance of God has no color in you, no savor, when the roots are cut—since that Spring-bringer turned his face away from the garden—the branches stop swaying, the buds forget to open. From that day the branches will not dance, the buds will not open, flowers will not bloom. Then you can sit with paper pictures of flowers; worship those pictures. You are only wasting time.

My opposition is to ritual. I have no opposition to sadhana. Now there are people who worship in Sanskrit, yet they do not know Sanskrit; they don’t know the meaning of what they chant. There are people who say namaz in Arabic, yet they do not know Arabic; they don’t know what it means. Without meaning, how can your soul be in it?

“If I understand nothing,
what is the gain in reading on?
If prayers have some meaning,
why should they be in a foreign tongue?”

You are speaking someone else’s language—secondhand words. Hence everything becomes ritual.

Let me remind you again: yes, we dance here, but this dance is neither Hindu, nor Muslim, nor Christian. It is the dance of those who love to dance. This dancing has no goal beyond itself. It is its own goal. We dance out of joy; it is our celebration. It is not our worship, not our petition; it is our thanksgiving. Existence has given so much—should we not dance in gratitude? And when something arises from your gratitude, its very form, its color, its dignity, its majesty are different. Then the lamp burns. But in blind hands, a lit and an unlit lamp are the same.

There is a Zen story. A monk was returning late at night from a friend’s home. The friend said: Wait, I’ll light a lantern. Take it with you. The monk laughed: You know me—I am blind. To me there is no difference between day and night. What will I do with a lantern? For me there is only darkness; even with a lantern, what good will it do?

But the friend was logical. He said: I know you are blind; I have known you all my life. But if a lantern is in your hand—tonight is dark, rainy, clouded, the moonless night—if you carry a lantern, at least others won’t bump into you. You won’t benefit, but others will not collide with you—and that’s something, isn’t it? Half the safety is achieved.

The argument was such that the blind man agreed. He went with the lantern.

He had gone barely fifty steps when someone collided with him. The blind man was shocked. Are you blind too? In this village I’m the only blind man; where did you come from? You must be a stranger. Didn’t you see the lantern in my hand?

The other laughed: Forgive me, I’m not blind; but the lantern in your hand has gone out—and you don’t know it.

If a blind man carries a lantern, what will happen? On the way it will go out, and he will not know. In the hands of the blind, sadhanas turn into rituals—lanterns gone out. In the hands of those with eyes, even an extinguished lantern is quickly lit again.

Here we are trying to light the flame in lanterns that have been out for lifetimes, for centuries. Here we are revivifying all the methods. There is no other place on earth where Zen sadhana is alive, and Sufi sadhana is alive; where the Buddhist way is alive; where all that devotees, knowers, and yogis have contributed to the world is being brought back to life together. Extinguished lanterns are in your hands; we are trying to kindle them. We are engaged in transforming rituals back into sadhana. And you have turned every sadhana into ritual.

Who said worship has no value? Yes, what you think of as worship has no value. But that is not worship at all. Understand the word upasana. It means: to sit down close by—upa + asana.
Have you ever reflected on its meaning? How lovely it is! To sit close to whom? If you find a true master, in whom the lamp has been lit, to go and sit near him is called upasana.

These three words carry one and the same sense—upasana, upavasa, Upanishad. You will be surprised, because you have assigned them very different meanings. Upasana means: to sit near.
Upavasa also means: to dwell near. It goes a little further than upasana, because sitting near can be occasional—you meet in satsang and then you go back into the world. Upavasa means: you sit and keep sitting; you begin to dwell there. Once seated, you do not get up.
And Upanishad means: that which happens by sitting near, that transmission. That is a still further step. For merely sitting down is not enough. When, little by little, your consciousness becomes utterly empty, when sitting there you dissolve, then the Upanishad happens. Upanishad means: when, into the disciple’s emptiness, the light of the master enters. That is Upanishad.

Worship—who said it has no value? Neither Sarhapa said it, nor do I. How could anyone who knows say so? Yet Sarhapa did say, and I also say, that what you call worship is not worth two pennies.
Your worship is utterly false, merely formal, hollow. Worship does have value—but what value?

Therefore worship—lest you forget!
Knowledge estranged from action;
Knowledge is futile when action is forsaken!
Within the bond of knowledge-and-action,
Worship is sturdy and strong!
In life’s great struggle may your feet not falter!
Therefore worship—lest you forget!

The goal of knowing is far;
The progressive, valiant man moves on—
And yet, at times, the heart
Is shattered into pieces!
One remembrance alone remains—the ultimate key to liberation!
Therefore worship—lest you forget!

Let knowledge not be without action,
Let action not grow weary or mean,
Let not the light of knowing
Become tarnished or thin!
May the immortal flame shine ever fresh and new!
Therefore worship—lest you forget!

For one who has remembered the Divine, to sit near has only one meaning: therefore worship—lest you forget! And if you have forgotten, then let it bring remembrance.
Therefore worship—lest you forget!
In life’s battle may your feet not wobble!
Walk a little with those whose feet no longer wobble; then yours, too, will begin to steady.
One remembrance alone remains—the ultimate key to liberation!
Therefore worship—lest you forget!
Let some situation, some atmosphere, some field of energy go on pricking you like an arrow again and again, reminding you—
One remembrance alone remains—the ultimate key to liberation!
Therefore worship—lest you forget!
May it remain ever fresh and new; may the immortal flame go on shining!
Therefore worship—lest you forget!

And here we stand, forgetful. We have forgotten badly. We no longer remember who we are, what we are for, from where we have come, where we are headed. What could be more unconscious than this in all existence? We are utterly unconscious. If you were to meet someone at a crossroads and ask, “Who are you?” and he merely shrugged and said, “I have no idea,” what would you think? You would think he is mad, or joking, or drunk. Ask, “Where are you coming from?” Again the shrug: “I don’t know.” “Where are you going?” Another shrug: “I don’t know.” You would be afraid of such a person, eager to get away; he seems dangerous—perhaps mad! One who does not even know who he is, from where he comes, where he goes!

But this is exactly your condition at the crossroads of life. From where do you come? Who are you? Where are you going? What is the purpose of your being? No—there is not even the leisure to think of such things.
Worship means: to sit near someone, in someone’s presence, where these matters are pondered, contemplated, meditated upon; where life’s fundamental questions pierce your very being like arrows.
Therefore worship—lest you forget!

You asked: Does worship have no value at all? It has value; but what you take to be worship has no value. What is your worship? You go to the temple, hastily ring the bell, knock your head before a stone idol, and run! You have done this so many times—what has it given you? Worshipping stones, you often become stone-like. Naturally so. You become like what you worship. So choose your object of worship carefully, for the worshiped becomes decisive. Someone worships a peepul tree and calls that upasana! Someone carves a stone idol and worships it. Someone worships scriptures! One thing or another…
Seek a living flame! If you find a Buddha somewhere, seek him. If you find a Sarhapa, seek him. Where there has been an awakening, where dawn has broken, connect yourself, build a bridge. The name of that kind of connection is discipleship. And once a link is joined to some cluster of light—that is upasana.

And you ask: If it has value, then why oppose it?
There is no opposition. The opposition is to counterfeit coins. And counterfeit coins look exactly like the genuine ones; therefore one must oppose them—again and again. Otherwise, how will the true be told from the false?

Rise higher, rise higher!
Because you are human;
You are the very life of the Divine!
Beyond the sky as well—
Rise higher, rise higher!
Abandon animal tendencies;
Turn the surge of your momentum!
O bearer of the human lineage,
Rise higher, rise higher!
Climb the peak of the horizons,
Advance, move forward!
Above smoke, rain, and cloud—
Rise higher, rise higher!

That is why there is opposition: because where you lie fallen is not your destiny. From temple-worship nothing at all will happen. This entire existence must become the temple—until then, do not stop. Until every particle becomes conscious, do not stop. This is a vast temple—the canopy of the sky, the star-filled heavens. Such a beautiful world, so incomparable; yet you do not see it—you rush toward your temple, your mosque. When will you see this temple, this mosque, this church, this gurudwara of the Divine? Will you go on worshipping temples and mosques made of human bricks, go on banging your head before stones fashioned by human hands? Rise higher, rise higher!

Therefore worship, so that someone keeps reminding you. To rise is difficult, because you will have to open wings you have not opened for who knows how many births. The infinite expanse of the sky frightens, shakes, and scares you. You have become used to hiding in nests. Hence you settle for cheap consolations. You make a little Ganesh out of clay, do your puja, and consider it settled. And if someone says, “What are you doing?” you feel hurt; your ego is bruised.

Just a few days ago I said that Mohammed opposed all idols, and rightly so, because no image can be made of the Ultimate. The Ultimate cannot be contained in any form. Yet Muslims worship the stone of the Kaaba. This is a betrayal of Mohammed—enmity toward him. I am on Mohammed’s side; that is why I said this. But Muslims gathered in the Jama Masjid saying I had opposed Mohammed, that I spoke against the stone of the Kaaba. I have not opposed Mohammed. I am his supporter; therefore I raised the question of the Kaaba stone. What difference does it make whether you worship a carved stone or an uncarved stone—the point is, you are worshipping a stone. But Muslims get angry—how astonishing! So astonishing that those who claim to follow Mohammed are offended because I spoke against the stone of the Kaaba. Then you have understood nothing of Mohammed—will you ever understand?
But the same is true of others—the Jains, the Buddhists, the Hindus, the Christians. It is a world of great surprises. Here, the followers of the awakened ones do exactly the opposite of what was taught—exactly the opposite! And yet they believe themselves to be disciples. If anyone alerts them, he seems an enemy.

Now Muslims have written to all the state governments and the central government against me, saying that I have hurt their religious sentiments, wounded their feelings, that my speaking should be stopped. If people like this were to meet Mohammed himself, they would raise just such a clamor against him too, because what I said is exactly what Mohammed said.
Such is people’s blindness.

Worship is not being opposed here. But many times it will seem to you that it is being opposed. Whenever it seems so, understand that what is being opposed is what you take to be worship. There is another kind of worship—the worship of the Buddhas—how could that be opposed? And the opposition is precisely so that true worship can become available to you.

Roshan, somewhere the foundation has gone wrong—there is a deep mistake. You say: I speak only the truth, I hear only the truth. Somewhere, in some unwatchful moment, your ego has attached itself to this truth. That is where the error has crept in. Hence the trouble; otherwise there would be none. Your truth-telling is not your joy, it is your identity-claim. And the difference is vast—huge. Understand it rightly and the disturbance will cease this very moment.

If truth-telling is your joy, this question would not arise. If you are getting so much joy from it, would you not pay a price for that joy? So relatives and friends have left—fine. You have found the real relative: Truth—your companionship with the divine is growing. If these ordinary relatives are leaving, let them. They were going to leave sooner or later; they are companions of convenience. What is the harm? One set of hassles is gone; your life will have more peace. What were they going to give you anyway?

No—inside you there must have been a secret expectation: “I speak only the truth and I hear only the truth, so all my relatives should respect me.” Hidden somewhere was the longing that my prestige should rise—why is it, instead, falling? Your ego did not get its worship.

And remember: your relatives have not decided that they will speak only the truth and hear only the truth. Let them live in their own way. Be kind to them. That is your decision, not theirs. And naturally they will feel hindered, because they live in untruth. If they want to live in untruth, it is their right, their full freedom. As you have the freedom to live in truth, they have the freedom to live in untruth.

And of course those who live in untruth cannot harmonize with one who lives in truth. There will always be friction. They will avoid you, because you will say things as they are. You will state naked truth—without even clothing it a little, without sugaring it. You will state the bitter truth as it is. And if behind your truth the ego is hiding, you will make the bitter even more bitter, the naked even more naked—because you will enjoy that.

So relatives will leave—what is the obstacle? Why are you troubled? One who has found truth as a companion needs no other company. That is enough satsang, wholly sufficient. But no—you secretly wish that the relatives should not leave. Hence your loneliness. Otherwise, one who has related himself to truth never experiences loneliness. Once joined to truth, one cannot be alone. All other bonds can snap. Someone has tied himself to a radio—one day it breaks, and he is lonely. Someone ties himself to a wife—one day she is upset and won’t speak, he is lonely. Someone ties himself to a son—the son grows up, finds his own work, builds his own world far away—loneliness. You loved someone and he died. You loved someone and she fell in love with someone else. These are townships fated to crumble, settlements destined to be laid waste.

But one who has bonded with truth has bonded with God. There is no way that can break. Wherever you are, truth is with you; satsang continues. How can you be alone?

Yet, Roshan, you feel lonely—that clearly means you have worn truth as a behavior, a vow. You have made a stubbornness out of it, an ornament for your ego. You say, “I am not ordinary; I am a truth-teller! I will speak truth even if everyone abandons me.” Then loneliness will be your experience.

Truth should not be a stubborn vow. Truth should be simple. Not an insistence, but self-experienced, spontaneous—a shadow of meditation. That is where you slipped. You have not meditated, and you have tried to impose the conduct of truth from above. Whenever conduct is imposed from outside, this is the kind of trouble that starts. And Roshan, you are a good man—I have looked into your eyes. He took sannyas two days ago—he is a good man. But you have lived in wrong notions. You are a sweet person, but your thinking process has been deluded. You have tried to be a truth-teller. But truth brought by effort is never alive. You are not simple. You are not embracing truth with a laugh; you have become very serious. You have staked everything on truth. You are trying to prove to the world: “I am a truth-teller.” What is there to prove—before the world or before God?

Take life a little as play. You have taken it too seriously—overly serious. That is where you missed. Laugh a little. Smile a little. Take life lightly. Then you will have goodwill even towards those who live in lies. Then you won’t go about exposing people’s lies for no reason. As far as possible, you will not strip someone’s untruth—because what is your need? Each person has the right and freedom to live in his own way—God-given freedom. When God has given people the right to be truthful or untruthful, who are you to snatch it? Who are you?

If one does not turn truthfulness into a stubborn vow, then in ninety-nine out of a hundred situations, on seeing another’s lie he will remain silent, ignore it—“What is it to me?” You don’t go around grabbing every one-eyed man and announcing, “You are one-eyed!” Why? What for? You don’t catch each ugly person and say, “You are ugly—go look in the mirror!” Who made you judge? And if you hold up the mirror to everyone’s face, and relatives get offended, then why be miserable? You angered them. You had the contrary expectation: that you would strip them naked, expose their truths and their lies, and they would still honor you, saying, “How kind of you to grace us!” They will take revenge; they will harm you in every way. And they are many.

But you need not take it all so gravely. Leave them to themselves—and to their God. They are answerable to God, not to you. And deep down you want people to come to you, respect you, accept and honor you—this longing persists. Perhaps behind “I speak only the truth, I hear only the truth” was the same hope: “I will become a veritable Harishchandra and people will honor me.”

This is what children are taught: at home, at school, in colleges—“Speak the truth and you will be respected.” Smart children soon realize these are things to say, not to do; the simple ones get trapped. You are simple-hearted; you got trapped. The very person preaching truth tells lies himself.

A father tells his son, “Always speak the truth.” A beggar knocks at the door; the father whispers to the son, “Tell him father isn’t home.” The son sees the point. Just now father said truth is religion; and now he says, “Tell him father isn’t home.” The boy goes out and says, “My father says to tell you my father isn’t home.” The father gets angry: “What a fool you are! Is this something to be said?”

Though the boy simply told the truth exactly as given. Children quickly learn: “Speak the truth” is a principle to preach to others—not to practice. Life is a trick: say one thing, do another.

In fact, everyone is asked to speak the truth so your lie can work. Otherwise how would your lie work? If everyone lies and thinks lying is ultimate virtue, lies become worthless. Imagine five hundred people here decide, “We will only lie,” and everyone knows that lying is virtue here. Trouble begins! You ask the time; someone says, “Nine o’clock.” You know he is lying. You ask, “Where does this road lead?” He says, “To the river.” You can be sure it does not lead to the river. If five hundred pickpockets decide together to pick pockets, pockets become impossible to pick!

There was a court case against Mulla Nasruddin: he robbed the simplest, most saintly man in the village. The magistrate said, “Nasaruddin, have you no shame? You couldn’t find anyone else to rob? You robbed the simplest man—a specimen of the Golden Age!”

Nasaruddin said, “Sir, whom else should I rob? He alone is robbable in this village. The rest are seasoned experts; understand my compulsion—if I try to rob them, they will rob me! Thank heaven there was at least one naïf; otherwise I’d have no chance.”

People preach: “Speak the truth, be honest”—so that if they need to cheat, they can. The more people adopt these precepts, the more there is to exploit. But a few simple folks believe—and live hoping, “Now that I speak truth, I’ll be honored.” Speak the truth and in many places you will be insulted—else why did people give Socrates poison? He got into the tangle of truth, so they poisoned him. But Socrates’ truth was not imposed from above; therefore he was not unhappy. He drank the hemlock in joy, cheerfully. He did not complain: “How is this? The books say truth-speakers are honored—why am I being poisoned?” He drank joyfully.

The court had said to Socrates: “If you give assurance that you will stop this mischief of truth-telling, we will release you.” Socrates replied, “Then what would I live for? Speaking truth is my joy. Death is preferable to living without truth. If I stop speaking truth, what would life be for?”

This is a wholly different matter. One does not speak truth to get something; truth-telling itself is the joy. But Roshan, somewhere you are hoping to get something by it—merit, honor, respect—here or in the next world. And you also long for what comes easily to the liar. You say: “I keep working because to work truthfully and honestly demands a lot; all my time goes in work. Day and night I labor for the children; I cannot do sadhana.”

If this rose from your heart, that itself would be sadhana. What else is sadhana? Practicing truth, practicing honesty—what else would sadhana be?

No, but you want some “other” sadhana. “What to do—compelled by honesty I have no time; I barely manage to feed the children.” You are not taking joy in it. You want what the liars enjoy—leisure, no stone-breaking all day, a few tricks here and there, smuggling, a dash of politics, fun, trips to the Himalayas, pilgrimages, merit, temple-building.

You see, don’t you—how many temples Birla built! Temples have been built, but all the other goods he produced were rubbish. Look at his Ambassador car—I’ve heard that when Birla died and reached heaven’s gate, many others arrived too—it’s a big world: a priest, a monk, a saint. But the door was opened first for Birla. Angels played bands, rolled out red velvet. The saints and priests were upset: “All our lives we prayed and fasted! Why is Jugal Kishore Birla being let in first?” The angels said, “You don’t know—this man made a car such that whoever sits in it chants ‘Ram, Ram’ all the way. He caused so many to remember God! In his car everything makes a noise—except the horn. That is why we honor him so.”

He did build many temples! Whether the horn sounds or not, the temples do.

Now, Roshan, you think of building temples, earning merit, going to Haridwar, attending the Kumbh, getting a chance to go to Kashi to “turn over” and die there and straight to heaven—though such things were not going to happen. You feel it unjust: “I live truthfully and honestly; yet I cannot go to Haridwar, cannot do the Kumbh, cannot lie down in Kashi for a blessed death and straight to heaven.” If such cravings arise, they show you too wanted to live as the liars live; your taste is for that; only out of simplicity you have donned the cloak of truth. You have created an inner conflict.

Do you know the difference? Was it that sin could not happen—or that you couldn’t manage to sin?
Understand the distinction: “Sin could not be,” or, “I could not pull it off.”
Is it that you simply couldn’t lie—or that the possibility of lying never even arose? Did the truth arise within you cautiously, laboriously—or was it your very destiny?

That is the difference between morality and religion. Morality is imposed from above—hypocrisy. Religion wells up from within—spontaneous, your inner current.

Now that you have come to me, please drop these moralistic notions. Learn to be religious—and religion means: no one becomes religious by truth-telling or honesty. One becomes religious only through meditation. And the beauty is: when meditation deepens within you, truth, honesty, virtue all follow on their own. Master meditation, and the rest is mastered.

Now about meditation. You will ask again: When to meditate, where to meditate—where is the time? Honesty, truth, earning for the children—my time is consumed.

No—meditation will happen right there. Do what you are doing, but do it attentively, peacefully, silently, without tension. Whatever you do can be transformed into meditation. Every act can be meditation. Meditation simply means: whatever you do, do it in quietness and silence. Sweep the floor, cook bread, wash clothes. Roshan runs a printing press—then run the press. No problem. But do whatever you do as prayer, as worship, as meditation. God has given you this to do—do it with your whole heart, in totality.

Kabir wove cloth—and found. Gora the potter fired clay pots—and found. Raidas the cobbler made shoes—and found. There is no obstacle. Where you are, offer the act to God. And now live not from moral compulsion, but on the foundation of meditation. And remember: when small slips happen, don’t raise a storm. Take life as a play.

A doctor has a patient with cancer. If he tells him, “You have cancer,” the man who might have lived three months will die in three days. Should the doctor tell the truth or lie? Good that Roshan is not a doctor—who knows how many patients you’d kill! If he tells the truth, not only might the days shorten—more important, whatever days remain will become hellish with fear. Who will bear that burden? The truth-obsessed doctor—our Raja Harishchandra! No—the doctor says, “Don’t worry, it’s nothing serious—just a cold.” Sometimes saying “a cold” becomes the very basis of recovery. The man relaxes. Perhaps the tension and anxiety—“Do I have cancer?”—had helped produce the disease; today everyone fears cancer at the slightest symptom. The physician smiles and says, “Nothing much—will be fine in a few days.” He still treats the cancer medically, but the burden lifts from the patient’s heart. Do you think God will indict this doctor for lying? Then you have not understood life’s secret.

Life is not clean like mathematics; it is like poetry. If you clutch it too hard, you’ll be left with pebbles—life’s real secrets will slip away. Do not grasp life with such stubbornness. Untruth is not always bad—some lies are very sweet.

In the morning someone asks, “How are you?” It doesn’t mean, “Now narrate your whole story.” He only wants to hear, “All well,” and move on—he has a thousand tasks. But you are a truth-teller. “How can I say all is well? Nothing is well. Sit down! Since you have asked, I must answer truthfully.” Don’t hold life with such insistence. Take it a bit light. That is the meaning of lila—this culture found a lovely word: lila, divine play. Take it as a game. Don’t mistake the acting for the absolute.

And make a few small mistakes too. You’ll say, “What are you advising!” Yes, I advise such things. A few small mistakes keep one human, a bit good-natured. Those who insist on being perfectly perfect become unbearable even for a couple of hours.

That is why your relatives and friends left. Good that you are in India; otherwise your wife and children would have left you too. Living with saints is hard. That is why people touch a saint’s feet quickly and say, “Maharaj, we are going now.” Live twenty-four hours with a real saint and you’ll commit suicide—because everything you do is wrong. He won’t let you stand, sit, move, even breathe. His condemning eyes will turn you into an insect. Leave something to God as well.

“The pious now take God’s mercy to be hell’s torment;
They never imagined that heaven would welcome sinners too.”

Roshan, when your pious saints arrive there and see sinners in heaven, they will be shocked. They never imagined that heaven would be given to sinners too! But God’s compassion is boundless. Give it a little chance. That is why I say: a few small mistakes are fine. Don’t make such a hullabaloo over trifles. Don’t take yourself so seriously.

People come and say, “I can’t quit smoking—and I must!” Why such gravity? If once in a while you filled yourself with a little smoke—what calamity? The air is already full of smoke—from cars, engines, factories. Everyone is smoking now; what age are you living in?

Recently New York’s air was tested; scientists were shocked: it contains more poison than a human should survive—yet people live! Humans are amazing. We didn’t even know; now perhaps we will die—now perhaps we will think it’s not right, not by the rules. For death, the amount of poison required in the air is far exceeded—especially in New York, Los Angeles, Bombay, Calcutta. And still people live.

So don’t take life so seriously. If you’ve smoked a little, what will you ruin? People take tiny things too gravely—not because they are religious, but because the ego is hurt. Someone says, “You—and you smoke?” The ego smarted. Ego creates all these questions; otherwise life should be simple.

Someone says, “I can’t stop tea.” Have you gone mad? If you ask me, I’ll say: God drinks tea too. Don’t believe me if you like. When you first meet God, He will ask, “Tea or coffee?” Then you’ll be in trouble. It is your ego that is being pricked.

Buddhist monks all over the world drink tea—no issue. In fact, tea was discovered by Bodhidharma—a Buddhist monk, not a small one, a monk of Buddha’s caliber. That’s why I say God must drink tea; if not, when Bodhidharma arrived he would have taught Him! Bodhidharma was daring. He told his disciples to drink tea—it helps meditation, because tea wards off sleep, and sleep is meditation’s biggest obstacle. Close your eyes and the nodding begins; drink tea and drowsiness vanishes. In Buddhist ashrams, tea has been part of meditation.

These are matters of attitude. Let another Bodhidharma come and declare that smoking aids meditation—nicotine is in tea and in tobacco; both increase wakefulness. We are awaiting some Bodhidharma—someone will surely come.

Take life simply. That is why I love Bodhidharma. Don’t entangle life so much. Don’t raise agitations over every small thing, otherwise you will rot in them.

Life is a celebration. Do not heap complaints on the festival. If you suppress by force, the suppressed will resurface.

“Violence may be pressed down by violence—that is possible;
But a flame cannot be quenched by a flame.”

You can press down anger with anger, brutality with brutality—that is possible—but you cannot put out fire with fire. You have been pressing and sitting on yourself. Become light. Become simple. From meditation, another truth will arise—with a different taste, a different fragrance. That truth has no insistence, no urge to impose on anyone, no drum-beating. There is no vow, “I will live truthfully no matter what.” Whatever is appropriate to time and circumstance, you will do. To live with awareness is enough. And if ever you must tell a lie, you will tell it consciously—because sometimes a lie can be dharma, and sometimes truth can be adharma.

A man is about to be hanged if you tell the truth; if you lie, his life will be saved—and the cause may be trivial. What will you do—lie or tell the truth? And even if he has killed someone, the act is already done.

An English king was sending his minister to France. The French king was a crank. The minister said, “Sire, he’s mad; I hear he’s sworn to behead any minister who comes. My head will go.” The king said, “Don’t worry—if he takes your head, I’ll have a hundred of his heads taken.” The minister replied, “That I understand—but mine won’t be included among them. Mine, once gone, is gone. Whether a hundred or a thousand of theirs roll, mine will not return—only more wives and children will weep. What will that solve?”

When one man is hanged, society is merely taking a foolish revenge—nothing else. He committed a crime—certainly; but now by committing the same act upon him, what is solved? If he has a disease, it needs treatment. What does hanging do?

Psychologists say: all criminals are psychologically ill. They need therapy. To whip them, cut off hands, or cut off heads is stupidity. When an individual does it, we call it sin; when the whole society does it—with grand courts and judges—it becomes virtue! What kind of world is this, where a murder by one is sin, and a murder by many is merit?

So if in court, Roshan, someone’s life can be saved by your lie, lie. Don’t take it so seriously. Do whatever you do with awareness—that is all. Awareness is the great thing. You have fallen into the stubbornness of truth; that is your trouble, and it will not end until you drop that stubbornness.

And take your work as sadhana. Whatever you do, offer it to God. Do it as service at His feet. Even your children are not yours—they are God’s.

Who opposed Omkar? I did? You are here, yet not present. You hear me, yet you ruminate your own notions.
I said that nothing will happen by chanting Om-Om, and you concluded I was against Omkar! I said, “Don’t chant Om-Om,” precisely because the one who chants Om-Om will never have Omkar arise within. I am a partisan of Omkar—that is why I said it.
Now this is the difficulty. Neither Muslims will understand me nor Hindus. I am a partisan of Muhammad; that is why I opposed the Kaaba. And I am a partisan of Omkar; that is why I opposed the chanting of Om. But when will you understand? Will you understand or not? When you chant Om-Om you are imposing Om-Om upon yourself from the surface mind. You do not know that within you a continuous stream of Omkar is already flowing. It has to be heard, not chanted. Omkar is heard; it is not something to be chanted. Become quiet, become silent, absolutely still; create utter hush. That much is your work. Stop the uproar of the mind, and suddenly you will find a moment when all the noise has gone, and on the pathway of the mind there is no traveler—no thought, no imagination, no desire. When the mind is thoughtless, suddenly from your innermost core Omkar will arise. It is the unstruck sound. It is not a matter of your doing.
Understand it like this: these birds—these “tee-vee tuk-tuk, tee-vee tuk-tuk”—the birds are making that sound. If you fall silent and listen, you will hear it. But what are you doing? You sit beneath the tree and keep saying, “tee-vee tut, tee-vee tut, tee-vee tut, tee-vee tut...” How will you hear? When will you hear? You will hear nothing! And when I told you, “Don’t do this tee-vee tut,” you concluded that I had opposed Omkar! Within you the sound is happening—listen. Just be silent. Silence is the only sadhana. Silence is the only method. In that silence the music will flow.
The conch is sounding; the world is full of echoes!
Far and wide resounds that one Omkar!
That one unbroken chime is throbbing everywhere!
Whose waves touch the rim of sun and moon!
The same one string is sounding—who knows which?
And all seven notes are humming in harmony!
These diverse ragas and raginis, colors and forms without end—
All sing only its song, doing its adornment!
Thunder of clouds, the ceaseless roar of waterfalls,
The cuckoo’s call, the veena’s sweet dialogue!
One imperishable Word, one joy alone—
By which the world is pervaded, from netherworld to sky!
If you contemplate sound and its echo, the world and its reflections,
Only self-realization will grant you that knowing!
Where will you go chasing words, and in which direction?
Catch the source of the word; let go the word’s tail!
The conch is sounding; through the ages the great peal has rolled!
Deathless delight pervades the four directions!
The conch is sounding; the world is full of echoes!
Far and wide resounds that one Omkar!
Omkar is indeed resounding. Omkar is the very substance of this cosmos. This world is made of Omkar; the whole universe is the resonance of Omkar. Become silent. Those who taught you to sit with a rosary in hand, to keep turning the beads and muttering “Om Om Om”—they are giving you a counterfeit coin. And if that coin catches hold of you, if it becomes your habit, then the Omkar concealed behind it will never come into your experience.
Do not grasp the word; descend into the source from which the word arises.
Where will you go chasing words, and in which direction?
Catch the source of the word; let go the word’s tail!
Move toward the spring from which words arise within you. Go to that primal origin. From where does the current of your consciousness flow? Seize that source. Enter the Gangotri. There you will find all that you seek—bliss, beauty, and truth, or, in one word, the divine.
Where one set out from—there lies his final halt.
The orchard of earned merit, the supreme good, the deathless rest;
Where one set out from—there lies his final halt.
Life-breath flows in the energy-waves of light;
One day life-breath will be absorbed back into light;
True space-time, sun and stars—the realm of light.
Where one set out from—there lies his final halt.
Every point on the circumference will be centered—believe it;
Whether the center be the Sun, or poetry, or Shiva’s Kailash;
Form ends in the formless; every name ends in the Nameless.
Where one set out from—there lies his final halt.
The wheel, the clay, the Creator, or the sturdy staff of indication;
The aggregate that appears divided into individuals;
Creation, dissolving, will say—O Void-Brahman, our salutations.
Where one set out from—there lies his final halt.
The sum of creation’s music—the void is the source of sound;
In the void, aloneness and the fullness of rasa are woven through and through;
The void is Krishna; in all that plays, he is Ram.
Where one set out from—there lies his final halt.
Rama is in all—let there be an attitude of surrender toward all;
Krishna is in all—why not a mutual belonging?
Why not, amidst the wheel of movement, become stillness and rest?
Where one set out from—there lies his final halt.
Let repose and motion meet; let inner rhythm blossom; let the circle be joy;
Let the metres be four-footed, four-armed, four-faced, the verse;
Let life be a song; fixed pitch, modulations, and the scale of notes.
Where one set out from—there lies his final halt.
We must arrive where we began. Our origin is our destination. Omkar is the origin; Omkar is the destination. But I will not tell you to get entangled in mantras that you yourself have fabricated. I will not tell you to be entangled in words. One has to go into the wordless, into the void.
The sum of creation’s music—the void is the source of sound;
In the void, aloneness and the fullness of rasa are woven through and through;
The void is Krishna; in all that plays, he is Ram.
Where one set out from—there lies his final halt.
You ask: You opposed Omkar; this hurt the mind.
If it hurt, good. That much is good, because the mind has to be erased; only by being hurt again and again will it disappear. The mind has to be struck.
But I did not oppose Omkar. Yes, in your mind there must have been an attachment to the word Om. Perhaps you have been chanting Om; that is why you were hurt, you felt wounded.
You ask: Please explain why the rishis and sages have always supported Omkar?
That is exactly what I am doing. Why bring the rishis in between? I myself am doing the same. But whenever even a little blow touches your beliefs, you flare up. You are not willing to dissolve—and without dissolving, nothing will happen. And if I do not help you dissolve, then I have no purpose. My very meaning, the very point of your being with me, is that I may dissolve you, that I may make you utterly empty, that I may make your paper blank again. Only into that blank paper does the divine descend—only in that emptiness is the music of the infinite, the beginningless, heard.
If the mind is hurt, if the mind takes a blow, understand that something meaningful has happened. Do not run away when the mind is hurt. Do not start protecting the mind. The mind is your enemy. It is from that that you have to be freed. You have to become no-mind. And the day you become no-mind, that day you have attained all.
That’s all for today.