Samadhi Ke Sapat Dwar #7

O disciple, beware of that deadly shadow. No light of the higher self can dispel the darkness of the lower self so long as every arrogant thought has not left it, and the traveler has not declared: I have renounced this perishable body; I have destroyed the cause. Then the shadows that fall can no longer endure. For now the final great war has begun between the higher and the lower self. In this war the whole battlefield is absorbed; as if it is not there at all.

But once you pass through the gate of Kshanti—patience—then the third step is also taken. Your body becomes your servant. And now prepare for the fourth step. This is the gate of greed, which entangles the inner man.

Before you come near the goal, before your hands rise to lift the latch of the fourth gate, you must conquer all the mental modifications of your own soul and slay the thought-waves that, subtly and deceitfully, enter the luminous temple of the soul uninvited.

If you would not die at their hands, you must make your creations—your thought-children—innocent. You must understand the emptiness of that which appears complete, and the completeness of that which seems empty. O fearless mumukshu, peer into the depth of the well of your own heart—and then answer. O seer of outer shadows, know the powers of your own soul.

If you do not, you will be destroyed.

Darkness has no existence of its own; only light exists.

Yet darkness appears and seems real. And who will say there is no darkness? In experience it often feels more real than light—because light must be kindled and even then it flickers and goes out; darkness needs no lamp and yet remains. Light, however vast it seems, appears limited; darkness is boundless. It seems as if in the ocean of darkness a lamp flares and is extinguished—while the ocean remains, though in truth darkness is not. How then does darkness appear? And if darkness is not, what is this thing we call darkness? If it has no existence, why this impression—this deceptive impression of it?

Understand this a little, and you can enter this sutra.

Light is. Darkness is only the absence of light, its non-presence, its non-arrival. Hence we can light a lamp, but cannot light darkness. We can extinguish the lamp, but cannot blow out darkness. We can carry a lamp from one place to another, but cannot carry darkness from one place to another. That which is not cannot be carried. That which is not cannot be made. That which is not cannot be destroyed. Because nothing can be done with darkness, therefore darkness is not. With that which is, something can be done.

And if we wish to do something about darkness, we must do something about light. If darkness is needed, the lamp must be put out—not the darkness lit. If darkness is not desired, the lamp must be lit—not the darkness removed. There is no way to do anything to darkness. How can anything be done to that which is not? Darkness is absence; the very name of the non-arrival of light. When the eyes fail to meet light, the sensation of this failure is darkness. Darkness is an empty space. And within us there is a vast darkness.

Outer darkness we dispel by outer light; inner darkness will be dispelled only by inner light. Many people, out of ignorance, go astray. They try to attack inner darkness directly—then obstruction arises. As they strike at inner darkness, they get entangled, filled with tension, even more restless. The way to dispel inner darkness is the same: light the inner lamp. Do not talk directly of darkness; do not worry directly about darkness.

Suppose someone comes to me and says: There is much anger in me, what should I do? I say to him: Do not talk of anger at all. Let anger be. Rather, inquire how you can grow into silence. And the day you begin to be silent, anger will fade of its own accord—because anger is only absence. Someone asks: How can I be free of lust? I tell him: Do not touch it. Spread love. The more love expands, the more lust will wither and become a void.

Do not move in negation; seek the affirmative. Occupy yourself with that which truly is—and something will happen.

But most of us go astray because we get entangled with negation. We fight with shadows and then we are defeated. Then the mind concludes that the shadow must be very powerful, since it has defeated us.

Naturally the mind reasons: that by which we are beaten must be strong. But you are not defeated by a shadow, nor can you conquer a shadow. The shadow is not. By fighting the shadow, you only waste your energy. Losing your own strength, you collapse defeated. The shadow is neither hurt by you, nor does it hurt you—yet defeat happens. Man is vanquished by his own loss of power.

Dharma is affirmation. And as long as one moves by negation, the scientific process of religion does not come into his hands.

Let us understand this sutra.

O disciple, beware of that deadly shadow. No light of the higher self can dispel the darkness of the lower self until every egoistic thought has left it, and the traveler has said: I have renounced this perishable body.

What should one do to kindle that inner light?

Understand one more thing.

First: do not fight the darkness; attempt to light the lamp. Second: whatever light is lit will go out. Everything fabricated perishes. The light produced today will die tomorrow. After birth there is death. If the inner light is something we have lit—how long will it last? Where our fuel is our own self, how long can it burn? And that which we produce cannot be greater than us; it will be smaller than us. If we ourselves pass, how long will the lamp we lit endure? And whatever is our own making cannot guide us on the path.

Understand the second thing: the inner light is not to be lit. The inner light already is—only veiled, covered. It is to be unveiled, un-covered. Like a spring hidden behind a rock, pressing at the rock: Move aside from the gate so I can burst forth—so is the inner light. There is a stone at the door, blocking the way.

A wondrous fact: darkness cannot hinder light even a little. Therefore darkness is not the real enemy. Light a lamp—darkness cannot say: I will not allow it. Darkness cannot extinguish the lamp. Have you ever heard that darkness snuffed out a flame, that darkness attacked and the lamp died? Have you heard that darkness placed an obstacle? Enter a house that has been dark for a thousand years; light a small lamp there, and a thousand-year-old darkness will neither quench that new flame nor bar it from burning. Darkness does not obstruct. Then what is blocking the inner light like a stone? What stands across the spring?

Not darkness—ego, the feeling of I. And why does this feeling of I become an obstruction? As long as the idea persists that I am, we walk severed from the vastness. And the light belongs to the vast. That light is not ours. As long as we are, that light cannot manifest. We ourselves are the barrier. Buddha has said many times: apart from you, there is no obstacle. And you consider yourself a seeker; yet apart from you, there is no hindrance. You think: I will attain this truth. And you are the stumbling block. You stand in the way, in the middle; you do not let the spring break out. In the proclamation I am, the vast is suppressed. The ways of the vast are profoundly silent and humble. The vast does not force itself. It does not attack. It waits. And the voice of our I becomes the obstruction.

This sutra says: till egoistic thoughts are gone, the light by which darkness ends will not be available.

What is ego? What is that within you which you call I? Other than the word, what is there? Have you ever looked into whom you are calling I? Who is this? There is no clue at all—only a label. What is within, we do not know. A name sits on top. A child is born; we must give him a name. We must say Ram, or Krishna—something must be given. The child comes nameless. And in this world it would be awkward without a name. Without a name there would be great difficulty. A name is given: Your name is Ram. By this name others call him. But he too needs a name to call himself with—different from the name by which others call him. Because if he too says Ram, people will think he is calling someone else.

Swami Ram did that. Swami Ram stopped saying I and used Ram directly. He would say: Ram is very thirsty. The listener could not understand that he meant: I am thirsty. Who? they would ask. He would say: Ram. And they would look around to see who was being talked about.

One day Ram returned from a village and said: Today Ram was abused a lot on the way. The host asked: Who? He said: Ram. The householders said: Master, why not simply say you were abused? Ram said: But it was Ram who was abused. I stood listening and was laughing within: Well caught, Ram—well caught! And within I was telling Ram: When you seek praise, you will also be abused.

But if everyone began to use their own given names for themselves, a great complication would arise. Conversation would be hard; understanding would be confused. Therefore, to refer to oneself there is a universal label: I. Both are names. Name—for calling others; I—to indicate oneself. But they are only names. What is within—we have no idea. Then around this word I we consume and construct an entire life. I am a king, I am a beggar; I am a sannyasin, a householder; rich, poor; happy, unhappy; great, small. Around this word I we go on weaving, as a spider spins its web. The web becomes vast. Around a tiny word the whole life is spent.

This I is the obstacle to knowing, in truth, what you are. The word itself satisfied you and you think you have known yourself. To know oneself—what else is it? I am I. Nothing has been known. Only a word—and you think you know. Superficial. What lies hidden within this I?

Within this I lies light. Call it Atman, Paramatman, give it any name—but within this I is hidden the light. Behind the label the spring is concealed. Remove the label and the reality is experienced. Let the name drop and the existential is revealed. The name has become the obstruction. Because of it, going within does not happen. We stop at the door, thinking the journey is over, we have understood.

Our condition is like a man who sits down at a milestone and imagines the destination has been reached. The milestone is only a pointer. Or someone sits at the doorway and thinks he is inside the temple. The door was only an entrance. Not to stop there—one had to go beyond. Your name is only the outer shell, the circumference of your being. You have camped at the circumference and forgotten the center. And taking the circumference as the center, you have built a world. This is the meaning of ego. And until this stone of ego is removed, the treasure hidden within cannot be found.

Inside there is infinite light—but we sit with our backs turned. That which we are not, we have assumed to be ourselves; and that which we are, we have no inkling of. What do you take yourself to be? If someone asks you: Tell me something of yourself—what will you say? You will be in trouble. No one asks, because it would seem uncouth, impolite, to put someone in such difficulty.

If you are asked: What are you?—what will you say? In your introduction you will give your name. What is the value of a name? Your parents could have given you another, without any hindrance. They could have given a third—it would have worked just as well. What connection do you have with this name? Could you not be without it? If the name is removed, would you vanish?

In deep sleep the name disappears; you do not even know it. A slight blow to the memory and you may not recall your own name. What have you to do with it?

And if even the name is not yours, what else is? Will you say whose son you are, whose brother, whose husband, whose wife?

These are relationships. What do they have to do with you? You can be without them. You were without them. If they are lost tomorrow, you will not cease to be. You have your own being. What is that being? What is that existence? The one bound in relations—who is the one within who is related? None of this reveals that. You may be a shopkeeper, a doctor, a teacher, a thief, a monk; none of this tells what you are. It only says what you do. Today’s doctor can be tomorrow’s thief. From this we learn nothing about being. So what will you tell as your introduction—name, address, occupation—but none of this is you. It is all a sham. Yet we accept it as our being—and that becomes the stone. Because of this false being, the real cannot manifest. And the one who is satisfied with a counterfeit has no space left to receive the real. He believes he has found himself, known himself—nothing remains to be known.

If from Socrates till today all those who knew have repeated one thing—Know thyself—it sounds strange. For everyone thinks: I already know myself. Have you seen a man who does not? Then has Socrates lost his wits, are the Upanishadic rishis mad, Buddha and Mahavira obsessed—Know thyself? And here is no man who does not think he knows himself. Surely some mistake is happening. There is some illusion in our knowing; otherwise, why this insistence? We too feel irritated hearing it: What nonsense—know yourself. We already know: My name is this, my address this; I am son of so-and-so, brother of so-and-so, husband of so-and-so; this is my shop, this is my telephone number. This is my being. What more is there to know?

Your phone number is not you. The signboard on your shop is not you. The honorifics trailing behind your name are not you. Even your name is not you. All this is makeshift—for convenience. The world would be awkward otherwise; therefore a provisional arrangement is used.

Ego is a provisional arrangement, a device. And we cling to it as truth. Then what is hidden within cannot manifest—because we ourselves become the obstacle.

The first thing to know is: all that you have hitherto taken yourself to be—you are not. When this insight deepens, letting go of ego is not difficult—because in your hands there is nothing but a label. Mere paper currency—valid in the market, but without intrinsic substance. Awaken from this falsity.

The sutra says: Until egoistic thoughts have not left, the light of the higher self cannot dispel the darkness of the lower self. And the traveler does not say: I have renounced this perishable body; I have destroyed the cause. Then the shadows that fall can no longer endure.

The cause is ego. And ego is the cause of the feeling: I am the body. Understand this also a little.

I is only a name, a word—necessary, but utterly untrue. And this untruth has no treasure of its own, no soul; it knows nothing of the soul. But this name, this word—this hollow formality—must plant its feet somewhere. It too needs a ground to stand on. Where shall this ego stand, where place its feet? It mounts the body. The body is matter; it sets its feet upon it. The body does not protest. The ego stands upon the body and says: This is me. I—that is, my body. Then a strange web is spun—a falsehood. The body is very real. Upon something real it stands.

Remember: even falsehood requires some reality to lean on if it is to function. Falsehood has no feet; it cannot walk by itself. That is the very meaning of falsehood—that it possesses nothing, so it must borrow. Therefore the liar always does everything to convince you he is telling the truth. If you trust that it is true, the lie can work. If the slightest doubt arises that it is false, it collapses at once.

Immanuel Kant said something of great value: If everyone in the world were to lie, lying would become entirely useless. A lie works only so long as some speak truth, or there remains the hope that someone might. If all decide that whatever we say shall be a lie, there would be no way for lying to function. Great difficulties would arise; life would practically halt.

I have heard: Mulla Nasruddin once boarded a moving train. A man of the same trade, his competitor, also jumped into the compartment. Mulla thought: If I ask him—he is my rival—Where are you going? he will surely lie. Yet Mulla asked: Where are you going? The man said: I am going to Delhi. Mulla thought: Then he must be going to Calcutta. Being my competitor, he never speaks the truth; so certainly he is going to Calcutta—settled. But then it struck Mulla: The train is going to Delhi. He laughed and said: Why do you lie? You are going to Delhi, and you say you are going to Delhi so that I will think you are going to Calcutta! You are going to Delhi and you lie that you are going to Delhi—so that Mulla Nasruddin will conclude you are going to Calcutta!

Great confusion arises if all lie. No calculation works; nothing can be trusted. The world runs on a small portion of truth; lies too run on the support of truth. Ego is an outright falsehood; it has no existence. The body exists; the soul exists; ego does not. Ego is only an idea. It can function only if it sinks roots either in the soul or in the body. But it cannot root itself in the soul—because in the light of the soul, being darkness, it cannot stand. Therefore, apart from the body, it has no way. Ego buries its roots in the body. With the body’s support ego becomes believable, factual, real.

The feeling I am the body is the sensation of ego—not yours. The day ego falls away, the notion I am the body also drops. Then only that remains which you truly are. It dwells in the body—but is not the body. The body is its home, its sheath, its residence, a staging post, a temporary abode. Today it is in this house; tomorrow it will not be. It has lived in many houses, changed many; many more it will change. As garments wear out, we throw them away and take up new ones.

Ramakrishna was close to death. His wife began to weep and wail. Ramakrishna said: Why do you panic? I am not dying; only the garments are worn out. See—cancer has taken the throat, this body has decayed. To remain in this body is to live in a collapsing house that may fall any moment. Therefore I drop this worn-out sheath. I am not dying, only changing clothes.

Sharada looked into Ramakrishna’s eyes. This man was not uttering a doctrine, nor something read in scriptures: I am the soul. He spoke from experience; the glimmer of that experience shone in his eyes. When the inner light bursts forth, its reflection naturally reaches the eyes. At the final moment Ramakrishna said: I will not die; do not worry. There is no death for me—only changing clothes. And these clothes—you too will agree—have become useless, a burden; let them be changed.

Ramakrishna died—and Sharada did not become a widow. Relatives and friends gathered and said: Break your bangles, change your dress. Sharada said: He told me he would not die—and he has not. I experience that the worn-out body is gone—he is. Sharada is the only woman in India who did not become a widow when her husband died. She lived many years, her bangles remained on her hands, and tears never showed in her eyes. She lived exactly as when Ramakrishna was present. People began to think she had gone mad—because at the exact hour of Ramakrishna’s sleep she would hang the mosquito net, lay him down. At his meal time she would call him, set the plate, fan him as before.

Once Vivekananda asked her: Mother, let us concede that the body is gone and he is—but not here? Sharada laughed: Because of the body there was a question of here and there. Now that the body is gone, he is everywhere. Wherever I look, I can see him; from wherever I invite him, he is invited. The body created the hindrance that he was somewhere; now he is everywhere.

Within us also that Being is present. And over it is a heavy curtain—of falsehood. That curtain has become real with the help of the body. The body is not your enemy; the enemy is ego. You have seen a yellow vine that spreads over trees—without roots—called dodder. Ego is like the parasitic dodder. It has no roots of its own. But if it spreads over a tree, it begins to suck the tree’s sap; it lives by that. The tree slowly dries while the vine spreads—and it has no roots!

Ego is that parasitic vine. It seizes the body and sucks it. We then become antagonistic to the body, thinking the body is the problem. We think: Because of the body we cannot know the soul. This is your mistake. The body creates no obstacle. It is only a vehicle. Wherever you take it—if you take it to hell, it will go to hell; to heaven, to heaven. If you seek liberation, it will bring you to the very door. The body is merely the means. The real hindrance is not the body but ego. But it appears to be in the body, because the parasitic vine of ego envelopes the body and draws nourishment from it. Falsehood needs some support from truth.

Until ego is gone and the traveler can say: I have renounced the perishable body.

Renunciation means: I no longer take this perishable body to be me. Do not mistake renunciation to mean abandoning the body or separating from it. The insight I am not the body—that is renunciation. The realization I am not the body—that is renunciation.

I have destroyed the cause.

The cause is ego.

Therefore the shadows that fall can no longer endure—for the great war between the higher and the lower self has begun. In this great war the entire battlefield is absorbed; as if it is not there.

Here is something very significant, and subtle. In this world everything exists in polarity. Everything arises with its opposite. That is the very way of being. Birth exists with death. However much we wish birth without death—it is impossible. Birth is one pole of the same phenomenon of which death is the other pole. There is no way to preserve one of the pair while destroying the other.

Even science now says that every thing demands its opposite. It has come to strange notions. A thinker has proposed: if time moves forward—past goes, present comes; present goes, future comes—then the opposite of time must also exist. Otherwise this time cannot be. There must be a reverse time: where first the future is, then the present, then the past. There should be an opposite current. We may not know it, but certainly there must be—without the countercurrent, this flow cannot be.

If there is matter, physics now posits anti-matter as well. What anti-matter would be—hard to conceive. But one thing becomes clear: science accepts that nothing can exist with a single pole. Two poles are inevitable. Imagine only men in the world, no women—not possible. Imagine only women, no men—not possible. They are polar opposites. As negative and positive electricity coexist, so do these.

Lao Tzu in China proposed long ago what has been validated in many dimensions: Yin and Yang. Yin—the feminine; Yang—the masculine. Or call Yin the negative, Yang the affirmative; Yin the earth, Yang the sky—any pair. Existence is made of two. With only one, we dissolve into shunyata. One alone has no existence.

Brahman is shunya-like because it is alone. As soon as we move from two to one, we dissolve into Brahman. It is—yet void-like; its being cannot be called thing-like. As long as we are in the realm of things, there will be opposites. If there is soul within you, there must also be something like its opposite; otherwise soul cannot be. If there are lofty urges within, there will be lowly urges as well. If there is the superior in you, there will be the inferior too. If there is a longing to soar toward heaven, there will be roots seeking hell. You are a Kurukshetra: within you are both Pandavas and Kauravas. You cannot be without this duality.

When a king builds an arch, he sets opposing bricks against each other. Those opposing bricks press into each other; the very tension creates a circle of strength, and a great building stands upon it. It will not fall, because below, the opposing bricks are creating a ring of force. That very opposition is the foundation of the building.

Within you too is an opposition. By that opposition you exist in the world. Therefore Buddha says: The day opposition is gone, do not ask whether your soul will be in liberation or not. I tell you: it will not—because for the soul to be, duality is necessary. In the non-dual, to be has no meaning, nor not-to-be. Both are meaningless. Thus Buddha chose the word Nirvana—extinction of the lamp. When the dual is gone, you too are gone. As if a brick in the arch asks: If the opposing tension between us bricks disappears, will the arch still stand? When duality goes, the arch goes. Space remains—that which was within the arch; but the arch is not. That one within you will remain; that which appeared because of the two will vanish. You know these two. Within you there is a constant higher voice. You move to steal—something within becomes hesitant. You move to kill—an inner conflict arises. You go to give—there is a lower voice that restrains you: Wait.

I have heard: Mark Twain once went to a church. The priest’s voice was sweet, his words lovely, poetic—his exposition of religion simple. Mark Twain was deeply impressed. He put his hand in his pocket: Let me give ten dollars. But ten minutes more of the sermon—and he thought: Why ten? Five will do. After all, he had told no one ten; no sin to give five. The talk went on; five became two-and-a-half, then two. He writes: When the collection plate came, I felt like taking a dollar or two out of it. I barely restrained myself from snatching some! Giving was out of the question by then.

Whenever you go to do the wholesome, a contrary force speaks; and when you go to do the unwholesome, a contrary force speaks. These are the two voices within. Whoever recognizes them clearly understands his inner duality and battlefield. And the moment one drops ego and realizes I am not the body, this war becomes explicit. On a new plane one sees: my being is divided in two. Something in me goes downward; something in me goes upward. Between these two pulls I am stretched. Because of these pulls is my agony, worry, sorrow, pain.

In this great war the entire battlefield is absorbed—as if it is not there.

The field is no more seen; only the armies on both sides are spread. But you will not see this because you are entangled in the body. To you, it is difficult even to sense what is happening in the soul hidden behind the body. Your struggle is at the bodily level—fighting outside for money, for position, for various cravings. You have no idea of the inner struggle.

Only those know the inner conflict who step away from the body, who lift their gaze inward. Then they see: outside there is a struggle, inside there is a struggle. The outer struggle is petty; the inner is vast. It is the eternal war—two forces pulling you: one upward, one downward. The moment you try to move upward, to keep balance the downward pull instantly intensifies.

A strange thing: as long as you do not wish to move upward, the downward pull is not great. The day you decide to be a saint, you will discover how strong the devil within is. As long as you do not intend to be a saint, you will not know the devil—he has no need. He is challenged only when you try to be a saint. Then you discover how much devilry is hidden within.

There are many tales: When Buddha began to enter his within, Mara—lust—attacked him. When Jesus neared divine knowing, Satan tempted him greatly. Jesus had to say: Get behind me, Satan—your temptations are nothing to me. We are puzzled: Some hallucination perhaps? Where is this Satan standing behind Jesus? Who comes to attack Buddha—what Kamadeva stands with arrows? Some hallucination, surely.

Where we are, such thinking is natural—because we have no awareness of the inner war, no sense of the inner tension. It is known only to those who choose one direction within—then the opposite direction immediately gathers force.

If you lie on the ground, you do not feel fatigue. That is why at night we lie down; fatigue vanishes. Why? When you lie down, the daylong struggle with gravity is dropped. You are no longer fighting the earth’s pull. When you stand, you fight the earth. The earth pulls downward, you strive to remain upright.

Know this: back pain afflicts only humans, not animals. The trouble of standing erect! Those who study the body say: the human spine is not yet fully straight—earth pulls it down. Yoga has devised many ways to straighten the spine for just this reason: it is a struggle with gravity. At night you lie down—the struggle ceases. Fatigue is gone. Someone may say: I ran all day; I am exhausted. You, who lay all day, may say: Nonsense! How can you be tired? I too exist.

Buddha and Mahavira are moving upright in the inner world; we lie prostrate there. They tire; they experience the opposition. As Jesus becomes Godlike, the experience of Satan arises. Satan means: the downward force within makes its last effort—Where are you going? And this duality does not vanish as long as one wants to go up; the downward pull continues. Therefore we have three words: Swarga—heaven—signifies the upward direction, the aspiration of the higher self. Naraka—hell—signifies the journey of the lower self. And Moksha—liberation—signifies that state where we seek neither upward nor downward; we seek no going at all. At that middle point is freedom.

There was a Muslim woman saint, Rabi’a. One day people saw her running through the market with a flaming torch in one hand and a pot of cool water in the other. They asked: Rabi’a, what are you doing? Have you gone mad? Where are you going? Rabi’a said: To burn your heaven and to douse your hell.

Either you go downward or you go upward—but you go. In that going is conflict. But remember: no one can suddenly arrive at the middle. If you move upward, you will begin to feel the downward forces. When the tension of up and down reaches its utmost, when the strings are pulled to the extreme, only then do you gain a complete vision of your inner architecture—that it is made of both hell and heaven. Only then do you see that within there are both Satan and God together. After this total simultaneous vision of both, release from both becomes possible. Freedom from both is true entry into godliness—into Brahman.

The sutra says: But once you pass through the gate of patience, the third step is also taken. The body becomes your servant. And now prepare for the fourth step. This is the gate of greed which snares the inner man.

The fourth gate is Vairagya—dispassion. The sutra calls it the gate of greed. We are surprised: what does dispassion have to do with greed? They seem opposites. Has the sutra blundered? Why call the gate of dispassion the gate of greed?

It has not erred—only the matter is subtle. The mind becomes disenchanted with the world: it sees its futility—everything seen, nothing found; only ashes in the hand, the begging bowl of the heart left empty; no desire, no craving fulfilled; the more demanded, the more came sorrow; the more chased, the more one strayed; much journeying—no destination. This total experience brings Vairagya. The world becomes vain.

But remember: the world becoming vain does not mean greed has become vain. Greed can take a new form. Even the dispassionate can be greedy. So at the gate of Vairagya—one greed has fallen, the worldly greed—beware lest another, the otherworldly greed, grips you. Look around and you will see this is true. Ask an ascetic: Why are you doing tapas? The greed will be exposed at once. He says: I want the eternal soul; I want heaven; I want supreme bliss; I want—something. Or: I want Paramatman. Wanting remains—whether of wealth or of God, wanting is wanting.

Greed is greed; what the object is makes no difference. Yesterday I wanted worldly rank; now I want the supreme rank, I want God. Yesterday I wanted money—now I say: this wealth is perishable; I want wealth that is eternal. Has greed decreased or increased?

The worldly man’s greed is small; it fills with shells. Simple greed, not subtle. The monk’s greed is subtle; shells will not satisfy him. He says: These are shells; what will I do collecting them? He too wants to collect—but not shells. If there are diamonds, I will collect. But then who is more greedy: the one gathering shells, or the one who drops shells only because he wants diamonds?

Greed has changed its object and gained a new dimension.

If you read the scriptures, ninety-nine out of a hundred are scriptures of greed—stuffed with greed—spiritual greed. But can greed be spiritual? Greed is the world. The deception is that we change the commodity. To the one who asks for wealth we say: How petty your asking is! While the one who stands before God saying: I want only You—we praise him: See, he asks not for wealth but for God. There are many tales of so-called saints who stand before God and do not ask for money, position, health; they say: We want only You. But they ask. Has greed shrunk or grown? These are clever people—they ask for God, knowing all else will come trailing behind. Why ask for the rest?

I have heard: An emperor returned from a victorious campaign loaded with spoils. He sent word to his queens: What do you want? One asked for the Kohinoor; another for this or that—thousands of worldly things. But one queen said: I want only you. The emperor had taken along a faqir to consult. He told the faqir: Here is a true queen—she asked for nothing. The faqir laughed: Ask me the trick behind this. This queen is like us—clever. The rest asked for trifles; she asked for you—and with you comes all you have looted. No need to ask for the rest.

The faqir said: This queen is like us—learn our arithmetic. We ask only for God, not for the world. The whole world is His; if He is gained, nothing remains to gain. But greed has not changed—only its object.

At the gate of Vairagya one must be alert that not only the world drops but greed too. Otherwise the gate of dispassion becomes the beginning of a new greed—the birth of a new world. Then its anxiety seizes you. One man cannot sleep at night because he did not get the money he wanted; another cannot sleep because he has not yet seen God. What is the difference? Anxiety grips both, sorrow grips both; both weep and writhe. What is the difference? The man is the same—only the direction of greed has changed. And this new greed is more subtle, more dangerous. Its texture is so fine it penetrates every fiber.

The real sannyasin is not the one who drops worldly greed to cultivate the greed for liberation. The real sannyasin is one who sees the futility of greed and does not desire—even that meditation should come, even that bliss should come. Because wherever the word should is attached, nothing will come. Wanting is the mischief. We keep it and link it to new objects. When nothing is wanted—there is no sorrow. Therefore Buddha refrained even from using the word bliss.
Someone asked Buddha, “Why do you never speak of bliss?” Buddha said, “I have no wish to arouse your greed; if I say ‘bliss,’ you will take it to mean ‘pleasure,’ because you know only pleasure. So at most I can tell you this much: there will be no suffering. That there will be bliss—I cannot say; I fear your greed. I can only say that there will be no suffering.” That is why Buddha defined moksha as the cessation of suffering, not the attainment of bliss. Naturally, in this land not many could be found to follow Buddha. Today it is difficult even to find a Buddhist monk.
But Shankara could find thousands of sannyasins—and today almost all monks are, more or less, Shankara’s. What is the matter? Both are saying the same thing—Buddha and Shankara. Shankara’s opponents, Ramanuja and others, say Shankara is a hidden Buddhist, a crypto-Buddhist. “This man is not a Hindu; he is a concealed Buddhist, speaking Buddhist truths in Hindu words.” There is truth in what they say, because Shankara is saying what Buddha said. But there is one difference: where Buddha says “cessation of suffering,” Shankara says “supreme bliss.” Our greed feels at home with Shankara, not with Buddha. Buddha says “cessation of suffering.” We understand and think, all right; but only the cessation of suffering? So much trouble and effort, so much sadhana, so many arduous mountains to cross—and merely the removal of a thorn, and nothing else! The mind loses heart right there; we sit down—no lure draws us on.

But Buddha, keeping the fourth gate in mind, speaks of the cessation of suffering. Otherwise, at the fourth gate, when dispassion toward the world arises, attachment to the Divine will arise; dispassion toward the world, attachment to liberation. Then, circling back, we return to an inner world. This path is mountainous and winding; at any point you can create new circles for yourself and stop short of the summit.

Therefore it has been said with great deliberation in this sutra: “The fourth gate of dispassion is the gate of greed, which ensnares the inner man.”
It ensnares the inner man.

There are two kinds of people. The outward-going person, the extrovert—Jung’s term—is ensnared by the world. The inner person, the introvert—again, Jung’s term—is ensnared by inner greed: for bliss, peace, nirvana, moksha, Brahman. At the fourth gate the inner man is snared by greed.

“Before you reach the destination, before your hands are raised to lift the latch of the fourth gate, you must overcome all those mental modifications and slay the thought-waves that, subtle and crafty, slip unasked into the illumined temple of the soul.”

Before laying a hand on this fourth gate, you must understand clearly all the things in the mind that, by devices and cunning, will try to enter the temple. Greed will take on new names; passions will put on new clothes and will want to enter the temple with you. But if they come with you, the temple will vanish at once; you will have entered another house—one you yourself have built.

Only he enters the temple who leaves the mind outside. If you do not leave the mind at the temple door, you never enter the temple. You can go in and out; it makes no difference. And the mind seeks subtle pathways—so subtle that they are intricate and elude your grasp. If someone tells you, “Drop the ego,” you begin to drop the ego and grasp humility; and a day comes when you say, “On this earth no one is more humble than I.” The ego has returned from the back door.

I have heard: a man went to a tapasvi sannyasin living in the forest and said, “You truly are a renunciate; you have come to the jungle, far from the crowds. And I have heard you do not make anyone your disciple; you have no attachment to disciples. I have heard you have no desire for fame, no longing for renown.” He mentioned two or three other renunciates. And that ascetic’s spine straightened; a sparkle came into his eyes, radiance to his face. He said, “You are absolutely right. Are they sannyasins, those who desire fame and position? Look at me—here I sit in solitude in the forest. I have no ambition for position, no desire for renown; if someone comes, fine; if no one comes, fine.” Now this man has returned by a subtle path. He has made even this into a pedestal: “See, I sit here alone; no one sits at this height where I sit—far from the crowd.” Inside there will certainly be the desire that people should know that he has no desire that people should know about him. This is subtle, and in a circle it brings a man back to where he was.

“If you do not wish to die at their hands, you must render your creations—your offspring of thought—innocent, those which invisibly and unknowingly make their home among human beings, amid their worldly acquisitions; and you must understand the emptiness of what seems complete and the fullness of what seems void. O fearless seeker of freedom, peer into the depths of your own heart, and then answer. O seer of outer shadows, know the powers of your own soul.

“If you do not do this, you will be destroyed.”

And this entire progeny of your own thoughts, these subtle waves of your own greed, these fine nets of your own desire—if you do not become properly alert to them, then from the gate of dispassion you will again fall into the pit of greed. If you do not awaken, if you are not aware, you will be destroyed. And whatever you have to say concerning this, do not speak it by mere thinking; peer into the depths of your heart, as one looks into a well, and from there give the answer.

Understand this a little.

We give answers in two ways. One answer is given straight from the skull; it has no value, it is futile. Someone asks you, “Do you believe in God?” You quickly answer yes or no. If you are a theist, you say, “I believe; God is.” If you are an atheist, you say, “I do not believe; there is no God.” But have you ever paused and looked into the depths of your heart—do I believe in God? Do I know that God is? Have you ever closed your eyes, gone within, and inquired, “What feeling is there in the depth of my life?” Then perhaps you will not be able to answer quickly; perhaps you will say, “Wait—let me search for a few years; then I will answer, because right now I do not know what feeling lies in the depths of my being. Is there any resonance of God there?”

If I tell you: at the gate of dispassion, make sure greed does not seize you—then look within and see whether, in your very attempt at renunciation, some greed is not hiding; whether, if you are meditating, greed is not hidden in it; whether, if you are making even a slight search for God, greed is not concealed in that. If greed itself is hidden there, understand that that is the obstacle. There is no hindrance on God’s side to your knowing him—he is exposed, here and now. The curtain is over your eyes, not over him. And there is no obstruction to bliss; it is all around you, ready to enter through every pore. But not one pore of yours is open; all the doors are closed.

Whatever greed demands becomes an obstacle precisely there. What greed asks for—that alone turns into trouble, into blockage.

“Peer into the depths of your inner being, and then answer.”
This answer is not to be given to someone else; give it to yourself: what is my state of mind? Even if I go to the temple, am I truly going to the temple, or is the temple another marketplace where I am making bargains for the other world, drafting long-term plans? If this does not become clear, the labor is wasted, and the seeker is wasted in vain.