We are in a very dense darkness, in a very dense pain, in a time overfilled with sorrow. And within man, upon the veena of the human heart, no music, no song, no joy is present. When I look within you, it seems to me as if a veena, capable of birthing unearthly music, lies wasted in some dark ruin, and no music arises from it. When I look at you, it seems as if a lamp that could have dispelled the night lies unlit in some ruin. And when I look at you, it seems as if seeds which could have become flowers—and from which the whole world could have been filled with fragrance—are going to waste for want of soil.
Within us there is such potentiality—such potentiality—that we could become Paramatma. And where we stand now, even an animal... even an animal would not choose to stand there. Within us is the possibility to become Paramatma, and where we are standing, even an animal would not wish to stand. About this painful, calamitous condition—let me say something to you. And about the way across it—let me say something. Such is my intention.
My heart does not wish to speak in the fixed, bound definitions of religion. You know those very well. Nor does my heart wish to speak to you in the verbal nets of philosophy; you are already well and thoroughly acquainted with them. With scriptures, with sects, with words—you are thoroughly acquainted. But those words create no movement in your life; they do not kindle in you a thirst, they do not ignite such a flame that a revolution happens in your life and a second man is born within you. So it is better that I speak of religion, but not in the words of religion. Bound words, slowly, slowly, die; their life slips out. And those hollow words encircle our mind, and their living contact slips far away from us.
So I will speak about religion, but not in the language of religion. I will speak about religion, but not in the language of the scriptures. I will speak only of religion—but perhaps it will not even be apparent that I am speaking to you about religion.
Yesterday, as I stepped out, someone said to me, You did not say anything about Jain Dharma? I wonder—will we understand that something about religion has been said only when we take the name Jain Dharma?
Yesterday, as I went out, someone else asked, You spoke a few things about Buddha, but not about Mahavira? Are names so important? Is that which is true about Buddha not true about Mahavira? Is that which is true about Mahavira not true about Christ? But names have become very important—and the meanings behind them have become very secondary for us.
So I intend to speak neither about Mahavira, nor about Buddha, nor about Christ. In fact, so much has been said in connection with these names that the ones standing behind these names have ceased to remain religious at all—at least in our understanding. The one who clings to Christ cannot be religious; the one who clings to Mahavira also cannot be religious.
One who is religious will know, will see, that in Mahavira, in Christ, in Buddha, in Rama, in Krishna—there is no difference. He will see: these names are different, but the Truth behind these names is one. He will see: these persons are different, but what they have said and what they have given is not different. Light falls from different lamps. The lamps can be different, but the light is not different. From different lamps, darkness is dispelled. The lamps may differ, but the light does not. There is beauty in the stars, and there is beauty in the flowers, and there is beauty in certain eyes too. Eyes and stars and flowers are different, but beauty is not different. Eyes and stars and flowers are different, but beauty is not different. The life-breath is one; only the bodies are different.
The bodies of religions differ, the body of religion differs from religion to religion, but the soul of religion is one. And about that soul I wish to say something to you—not about those bodies, not about those frames, which have pressed us very hard, very hard indeed, under whose weight we fail to attain to religion.
I see clearly: the man who clings very deeply to the word Jain may become a Jain, but he will not be able to become religious. And the more he begins to become religious, the more he will find that the word Jain dissolves. To call Mahavira a Jain is to insult him. To call Buddha a Buddhist is to insult him. To call Christ a Christian is to insult him. Such unfragmented beings cannot be divided into fragments. Such unfragmented beings cannot be divided into pieces. And such supreme beings are not bound into small parts. They have no boundaries, and they have no sects. And those who stand within sects and within boundaries should know: they will end within boundaries, and they will not be able to experience the boundless. And they should know: they will perish within sects, and they will not be able to experience Truth.
So let me speak about that Truth which has no boundary. And about that Beauty which is not imprisoned by a medium. And about that Light which is not dependent upon lamps—though it is in lamps—yet is free of lamps and other than lamps.
And perhaps that Light, and the talk of that Light, and that Beauty, and the talk of that Beauty—may strike a note within you, may create a vibration upon the strings of your heart. And perhaps your sleeping veena may begin to voice itself, and in your sleeping heart a movement may be born. And in your life, a new direction, a new growth, a new momentum may arise. That movement—moving in that direction—moving from the worldly toward the otherworldly, and from body toward soul, and from the world toward Paramatma—this movement, this orientation, this turning of the face in that direction, I call being religious. About that, a few things I shall say to you today.
As I said, there is much darkness. Never before was there so much darkness. As I said, man has become very animal-like—perhaps never so much as now. In the last great war, when the atom bomb was dropped on Hiroshima, the night on which hundreds of thousands died in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the next morning someone asked Truman, some journalist asked, Did you sleep last night? Truman said, Never before have I slept so deeply. I slept with such ease.
Let us consider, let us reflect a little. If by my order a hundred thousand people had been finished—could I sleep that night? Could I sleep thereafter for the rest of my life? If after that night I were to be born again and again—could I sleep? But Truman said, I slept very deeply, free of all worry.
Shall we say that what speaks from within is human? Shall we say this is the voice of a human being? Shall we say some consciousness speaks from within? No consciousness speaks from within there—perhaps the lowest animal in us alone could say this.
And this has happened. And I do not say it only for Truman; it has happened to all of us. Something has happened to us all: we have begun to enjoy throwing thorns on the paths of others. Something has happened to us all: to snatch flowers from another’s life has become our joy.
And the man who delights in casting thorns upon another’s path—that man does not remain human. And remember also: the man who throws thorns into another’s life cannot have flowers in his own. Remember also: what we give returns to us. This world returns to us exactly what we throw toward it.
From this world we receive nothing that we have not first flung. What we cast, returns. He who casts hatred, hatred returns to him. He who casts love, love returns to him. And this entire world becomes our reflection. The face I carry begins to be reflected back to me from the people spread all around.
If we are distorted, from all sides distortions begin to enter into us. If we are filled with hate, from all sides hatred begins to pour into us. And if we have thrown thorns, then harvests of thorns become available to us—and life is destroyed.
I said this: never before has there been so much darkness, so much hatred, so much violence in the life of man. This is so today! But this does not mean we should become despairing. This does not mean I am in despair. It means only one thing: those who could become dark are in darkness by their own hand, by their own resolve, by their own cause. And if they wish, they can become filled with light. Those who stand in darkness—there is no other person responsible for their standing there; we ourselves are the cause. By our own hand we stand in the dark. And whenever our resolve awakens—when longing arises, when aspiration is born—we can enter the light.
Remember one thing: only he who has eyes knows darkness. Only he who has eyes can know darkness. The blind do not come to know darkness.
Perhaps you have thought that those who have no eyes must feel darkness as darkness—then you are mistaken. Change that notion. The blind do not know darkness. The blind cannot even know darkness—because eyes are needed. Eyes are needed even to see the dark. Not only light, darkness too requires eyes to be seen.
He who has no eyes does not see light—and does not see darkness either. If we can see darkness, then although darkness is bad, the seeing of darkness is a sign that eyes are present. Darkness being there, and the feeling of darkness, is a sign of eyes. And the eyes that can see darkness are capable of seeing light.
So darkness is not a cause for despair; darkness carries within itself a ray of hope. How can that ray of hope be born? And that eye which, looking again and again at darkness, has become merged in darkness, absorbed in darkness, embedded in darkness—how can that eye be turned toward light? About that I will say a few things to you.
The very first thing I wish to say is this: as we are born, as nature gives us birth—if we stop at that limit, we will not be able to experience Paramatma. Nature gives us birth only as a possibility. To transform that possibility into actuality we will have to do something. When nature and man’s purushartha meet, the otherworldly is born within man. When man becomes content with nature alone, the otherworldly is not born within him. When purushartha becomes active upon nature, when effort works upon nature, the unearthly is born within man.
Keep it in mind: he who is content with nature is dead. He who is content with nature has not known life. He who is content with nature will end at the level of the animal. But he who brings purushartha to bear upon nature—who joins his strength and energy to nature and uses them—will one day find that from the union of nature and purushartha the unearthly is born.
From the sadhana of purushartha upon nature, the unearthly is born. And man ceases to remain merely man—he becomes something more. He becomes absorbed into some new realm of bliss. He can produce a very deep music, and he can know a very deep Truth. And the knowing of that Truth sets man free. The knowing of that Truth liberates man into a most astonishing realm of freedom, and establishes him in a most wondrous realm of joy.
There is something of nature within us; there must also be purushartha within us. Ordinarily our purushartha gets spent in obtaining very petty things. Ordinarily our purushartha is consumed in attaining extremely trivial things. And we fail to attain the vast and the supreme. No doubt we are striving for something or other. Our purushartha is certainly engaged somewhere.
Someone strives for wealth, someone for fame, someone for position, prestige, someone for something else. But all these endeavors are like building palaces on sand all one’s life—or like signing one’s name on the riverbank, and in the evening the winds come and erase the signatures. In the evening the winds come and erase the signatures. Such is our purushartha upon sand. Death will come and wipe it all away. All that we have done will be undone.
Petty is that purushartha which death destroys. Vast is that purushartha which death cannot destroy. Petty is that purushartha which death will erase. Vast is that purushartha which death cannot erase. And in the true sense, those are men, and in the true sense they have used the man, the inner potency, who have made such signatures as death cannot erase. Who have built such edifices—what edifice is that, what construction, what creation that death will not wipe away? To that must our purushartha be joined.
Two kinds of purushartha I have mentioned. One is petty—done for livelihood, for fame, for prestige, for wealth. The other purushartha is not for livelihood; it is for life. It is not for fame, not for wealth; it is for Truth, it is for the supreme reality of oneself, for one’s swarupa.
First of all our purushartha needs to be centered upon that point which is I am, which is my being. First of all all my powers, all my resolve, all my longings, all my desires, all my aspirations need to be gathered and focused upon that one point which is my being.
If I could open that door of mystery—if I could know, Who am I? If I could become acquainted with what my being is—if I could know which flame of life is imprisoned, captive, within this body—if within this ring of clay I could experience the supreme flame, then and only then have I taken a step toward the vast purushartha; then and only then have I taken a step toward Truth. Then and only then have I used my strength rather than wasted it.
Within man there is the possibility of infinite music—if purushartha is applied upon his nature. Look within and you will see: we almost die as we were born. We run much, we make many efforts, we labor hard—but all that labor goes to waste. We are laboring upon a medium which in itself is perishable. He who labors upon the perishable—his labor will become futile. He who labors upon the imperishable—his labor alone becomes meaningful.
We all labor, but we may choose the wrong medium. One can choose a medium which itself is perishable, momentary, mortal. If one labors upon the mortal, what wonder if that labor proves fruitless?
Labor upon amrit; only labor upon the deathless bears fruit.
So within ourselves we need to look, with mindfulness and discernment, to see what is mortal and what within us is deathless. That discernment—viveka—that distance, that discrimination—that alone transforms a person from an ordinary worldly one into a seeker. He who recognizes the mortal within, and who recognizes within that which does not die—and then joins his labor to that which does not die—such a person becomes a sadhaka. And the one who applies his labor to that which dies, the mortal, becomes worldly.
Samsara and sannyas are not a difference of location. Not a difference of house and forest. In samsara and in sannyas there is no question of dropping something and running somewhere. The difference between sannyas and samsara is to recognize, within oneself, the mortal and the immortal. Sannyas and samsara are not a doing; sannyas and samsara are a knowing. The difference between sannyas and samsara is not a difference of acts; it is a difference of knowing, of awareness, of bodh. The awareness that there is something mortal within me—I disassociate myself from that mortal. The awareness that within me is the mortal—I refuse to dedicate my labor to that mortal, and I consecrate it to that which is immortal. Dedicated to the immortal, even labor becomes immortal. United with the immortal, purushartha culminates in liberation.
How can this discernment arise within, and how can this awareness become possible within, and how can one experience the undivided consciousness within? People say there are two paths. I see only one. People say there are two, and all the sects and all the thinkers of the world speak of those two paths: one, they say, is the path of knowledge; the other, the path of love or devotion.
In my seeing the path is only one, not two. In my seeing, knowledge is incomplete if love is not in it; and love is incomplete if knowledge is not in it. Knowledge alone is incomplete—dry, arid, without juice. And love alone is blind—without eyes, without light. Blind love is incomplete; juiceless knowledge is incomplete. When knowledge and love unite, the tones of amrit begin to resound within. In my seeing, knowledge and love are to be practiced together; then the experience of amrit begins. So let me say a little about the practice of both.
First of all, knowledge is indispensable. Before we can attain amrit, the Atman, or Paramatma—knowledge is indispensable. What does knowledge mean? Knowledge does not mean that we should know many things. A person can know many things and yet be utterly ignorant. Knowing many things is a different matter. There is a difference between memory and knowledge. Our education is the education of memory, not the education of knowledge. Long ago the education of knowledge ceased. For a long time we have been trained only in memory. The whole life we are taught memory—some things are taught, we memorize them; and because we can repeat them, we fall into the illusion that we know.
If we ask you something about God, surely you will say something. If we ask about the Atman, surely you will say something. If we ask about Moksha, surely you will say something. But that is not your knowing, that is your memory. You have heard, you have read, someone has told you—but you have not known.
Memory is one thing; knowledge is entirely another. He who wants to attain the deathless must attain knowledge. He who wants to manage the inert—memory is enough. For science, memory suffices; for religion, knowledge is essential. Science runs on memory; religion runs on knowledge.
Therefore it is possible that the scientist of today can read all the scientists of the last three hundred years and know everything about them. This is easy. Therefore science has a tradition, a chain. There was Newton; later there will be Einstein. Einstein will begin from where Newton left off; where Newton’s work ends, there Einstein’s begins. After Einstein another scientist will come; he will begin from where Einstein left.
But in religion it is not so. Where Mahavira left off, you cannot begin. You will have to begin where Mahavira began. Whenever a person attains the truth of religion upon this earth, he will have to begin from the beginning. He cannot begin beyond them.
There is no tradition in religion. Religion is an individual truth; science is a social truth. A social truth can be that which runs by memory. Religion cannot be a social truth, for it runs by knowledge.
Remember: memory is others’ knowledge; knowledge is one’s own knowing. So science is memory, and religion is knowledge. Memory will not do.
I have seen it—visited many ashrams, met many sadhus—they all make people memorize scriptures; they run schools of scripture. Those who gather around them become parrots by rote. They start repeating. Ask them anything—an answer is ready for everything. Those who have not a single answer of their own collect the answers of others and begin to give them. It satisfies the ego, but no one attains knowledge.
So let me say the first thing to you: knowledge is not memory. Therefore, even if you memorize someone, even if you learn scriptures, agamas by rote, the Vedas, the Upanishads, the Gita, the Koran—commit them all to heart—it will make no difference. They will only become a burden; they cannot become your liberation. You will be like those who wander in villages carrying boats on their heads, but who have never traveled in the boat.
Boats are not to be carried on the head; you travel in them. Scriptures are not to be carried on the head; they are to be made into steps for the feet. Scriptures are not to be borne upon the head; scriptures are to become your steps. When they become steps, you walk by them. When you place them upon your head and bow, you do not walk by them—they walk by you. When scripture becomes memory, it becomes futile. And scriptural knowledge—what can it be except memory?
So I am not speaking to you for memory. I am speaking to you for knowledge. And knowledge is born in a very different way. Memory is accumulated; knowledge is born. Memory is collected; knowledge manifests. Memory is brought from outside; knowledge arises from within.
The more one empties memory, the more one becomes available to knowledge. The more the memory is emptied out, the more knowledge awakens within. As when one digs a well—ordinarily we say, We dug and brought forth water. But have you ever reflected—how can water be produced by digging? Digging does not bring water; digging only removes the soil. Water was already there; when the soil is removed, it becomes visible. By digging, water is not produced; by digging, only the earth is taken away. And if there is no water, then dig a hundred times—no water will come.
So never say, even by mistake, We dug and brought out water. By digging, water is not brought out; by digging, the soil is removed. If water is there, then its darshan happens. Knowledge has to be dug out. Knowledge is present; only the layers of soil above it must be removed. Those layers of soil are the layers of our memory.
Across infinite births we have accumulated much memory. Layer upon layer has gathered, and under the weight of memory the knowing has gone on becoming obscured. Because of the very deep layers of memory and samskaras, the light of knowledge has ceased to come out. If all the layers of memory are broken, knowledge will manifest. Not exactly be produced—but there will be the vision of knowledge. Knowledge is present. Knowledge is our very nature; it is not to be brought from anywhere else. Rather, something has come in between us and it, and therefore an obstruction has arisen.
Thus the way to bring knowledge is, in one sense, negative—just as the way to bring water in a well is negative. Negative in the sense that you do something to the soil, not to the water. When you dig a well, you do nothing to the water; you do something to the soil. Remove the soil—water appears. Just so, the way of knowledge is in one sense negative.
To bring knowledge you do nothing to knowledge itself; you only remove the memory, the samskaras, the load upon the mind-stuff. When the mind-stuff becomes unburdened, when it becomes totally unconditioned—when no samskara and no external imprint remains and the mind becomes empty—then, as when someone has wiped the dust from a mirror—the dust is wiped, the mirror is as it is. When the dust was there, it was just the same; when the dust is gone, it is just the same. Perhaps the mirror has not changed at all. The dust was on top; when it is removed from the top, the mirror is as it is. But with the dust removed, the mirror becomes clear, and reflections become possible.
Knowledge arises when the dust of memory is wiped away.
So those engaged in the sadhana of knowledge do not have to memorize scriptures. Those engaged in the sadhana of knowledge have to wipe clean whatever scriptures have accumulated within. Those engaged in the sadhana of knowledge have to become empty of all memory, so that all the layers of earth fall away and knowledge manifests.
Memory torments us in two forms, and binds us in two forms. Ordinarily our entire mind revolves in memory of the past.
You are sitting here now, but few are really here. Many are somewhere back in the past; many are somewhere in the future. Ordinarily we are not in the present. Either our mind is in the past or in the future—in memories of the past or in imaginations of the future. And the imaginations of the future are the offspring of the memories of the past. Future’s imaginations are the children of past memories. So either we are in the memories of the past, or in the future which is only the offspring of the past.
The past is dead; the future is not yet alive. We are like ghosts—our mind is ghost-like. We are in the past or in the future—and not in the present. Memory and imagination surround us, and because of their weight, knowledge cannot be born. When memory and imagination are nullified, knowledge is born. So sadhana is to let go of memory and imagination—and imagination is only a transformation of memory, its imagined form. By releasing the tensions of memory and imagination, there is the manifestation, the uprush, of knowledge within.
So remember: he who would practice knowledge must become free of the memories of the past. When past memories pursue you, salute them—and tell them not to follow. And when past memories are with you, mindfully dis-identify from them. With discernment, free yourself from them. Keep watch, with awareness, that you do not get involved in their trance. If there is a continuous endeavor, a continuous resolve—if with concentration, with involvement, there is this effort: I will not lose myself in the memories of the past; I will not allow my discernment to be crushed under the past; what has gone has gone, what has died has died—I will not drag it along with me—then slowly you will find the ash of the past dissolving. You will be able to be free of the past.
And he who is not free of the past can never attain knowledge. One must practice leaving the memories of the past. From the place where you have risen, rise—do not linger. Let what has happened, have happened; do not allow it to return into the mind. Do not give it the door for return.
We drag the dead. We collect corpses. Our mind is filled with the dead and with cadavers. Yesterday someone abused you; it still dogs you today. The day before someone honored you; it still pursues you today. Long ago someone garlanded your neck; the flowers have dried and withered, yet the mind still wears them. The past becomes a burden upon us. The small moment of the present, a little spark, gets pressed under the ash of the past and is lost.
The ash of the past must be brushed off. As one brushes ash from a coal, so must the past be brushed from the mind. What has died, has died. Past means: that which has ceased to be—let it cease to be. Do not check it. In reality it dies in the world; but in the mind it remains. And this is why the mind’s connection with the music of the world breaks. In the world, the past is not alive; every moment the world is new. But the mind is not new; the mind remains old.
Between the world and the mind there is a conflict. The mind does not attune to the music of the world—for only one reason: the world is ever new, and the mind is ever old. The mind therefore never harmonizes with the world’s song. This vast Truth pervades all around—the moon and stars, the flowers, the waves, the winds—yet the mind cannot become one with them. When it does become one, the harmony that is born connects a person to Paramatma, to the supreme Truth.
A young man once went to a sadhu. The sadhu’s ashram was near a mountain stream. That youth had toured many ashrams, traveled to many shrines, visited many tirthas. Finally he came to that sadhu and said, I am tired. I am weary and troubled. I cannot find a way. What should I do that I may enter God? The sadhu said, Truly, do you want to enter? Truly do you want to enter Paramatma? Then the door is close by—just behind our ashram. The youth was astonished.
He had wandered over many lands; he had met one mad sadhu after another—but none so mad as to say, The door by which you can enter God is behind my ashram. He could not believe it; he thought he had met a madman.
But the sadhu spoke with great assurance. He said, Come with me; behind, there is a door—go in from there. The skeptical youth followed him; there was no door. There was a mountain stream. The sadhu said, This is the door—enter through this.
The youth said, You are mad; this is a mountain stream—where is the door? And how can I enter? The sadhu said, Sit beside this stream; when your self-absorption unites with the stream, then understand: the entry into God is happening. When no distance remains between you and the stream, when you can no longer discern whether you are the stream or separate from it—and when even the sense that you are seeing the stream is gone—
Thus, the sadhana of knowledge is the immersion of the past. Let the past die—mindfully, with discernment, with heart. Keep watching this—be alert to this: is the past clutching me? Is it becoming a weight upon me?
A sadhu was approached one morning by a man who hurled abuses upon him. So enraged was he that he even spat upon the sadhu’s face. The sadhu wiped the spittle with his cloth and asked the youth, Have you anything more to say? The youth was startled. He said, What do you think—I said something? The disciples of the sadhu were enraged: What are you doing? He spat—he insulted you. The sadhu said, I do not see that he spat; I see that he said something. He was so full of anger that words could not come, so he said it by spitting. Unable to say with words, he used an act, a gesture. Therefore I ask him, Anything more to say? What else could the youth say? He went away as he had come. But at night, remorse seized him. He felt sorrow—that he had erred, that he had behaved insultingly toward one who had taken his spitting as conversation.
The next morning he came to ask forgiveness. He said to the sadhu, Forgive me, yesterday I behaved very badly with you. The sadhu said, Forgive you—for that? We did not even become angry. And I tell you—your spitting on me is not as bad as the fact that you brooded over it for twenty-four hours. The sadhu said, Your spitting was not so bad, because I wiped it off at once—I did not delay. You spat, I wiped. One must do immediately what must be done. But you brooded for twenty-four hours—that is sad. I wiped what was spat; you also could have wiped the thought that you spat.
Perhaps the youth did not understand; perhaps he never grasped what the sadhu said. But the sadhu said something very deep and of great significance. If only we could wipe—if only we could wipe whatever has happened—then we would be related to what is. If that which has passed could be wiped, then we would be related to the present. And Truth is only in the present. Truth is not in the past; Truth is not in the future. Truth is in the present.
Truth means: that which always is—and never will not be. The past becomes not. The future has not yet come. Therefore Truth can be neither in the future nor in the past. Truth always is. In this sense we call Truth sanatan—eternal. Sanatan means: neither ever past nor ever future—ever-present. Eternal, timeless, sanatan.
So he who wishes to enter the eternal of Truth must drop the imaginary encirclements of the mind called past and future. He who drops the past will be amazed: the future slips away by itself, in the same measure. In the measure the burden of the past lightens, in the same measure the future slips away on its own.
When the past becomes zero, the future becomes zero, and the present becomes full. In that moment, when the mind is free of the ash of past and future, when the layers of earth are removed, the springs of water are born. Then there is the descent of knowledge—or its ascent. Then there is the realization of knowledge. Without that knowledge no person is human in the full sense. Without that knowledge no person is fully alive.
Thus knowledge is to be attained negatively. The way to attain knowledge is negative—in the sense that something must be removed, and knowledge appears. As I said, the dust must be wiped from the mirror and the mirror becomes clear. But knowledge, I have said, is incomplete—knowledge alone is incomplete.
Another thing must also be practiced—and that is love. And the sadhana of love is positive, constructive. The sadhana of knowledge is negative; the sadhana of love is positive and creative.
Knowledge is practiced as one wipes the dust from a mirror. Love is practiced as a sprout breaks from a seed. We have placed a seed in the earth; if we remove the earth, the seed will appear—but it will not become a plant. The earth is not to be removed; rather the seed must manifest its inner power, its energy, as a sprout. The seed will break forth as a sprout, rise through the soil, and then flower. The seed must throw its energy outward; then it will sprout. A mirror needs no development for itself—the dust just needs to be removed. When the dust falls away, the mirror is fine as it is. But a seed is not to remove something; it has to give birth to something from within.
Love is born like a seed, and knowledge is born as dust is wiped from a mirror. The way of love is positive; the way of love is creative. Love has to be cast forth from within; gathering all one’s powers, the energy of love has to be flung. How will this happen? Ordinarily we cast forth hatred, enmity, malice, untruth, attachment—we do not cast forth love.
I remember a sadhu. Early one morning he was in his ashram, and he told a disciple, Go—ask forgiveness from the shoes and from the door. Someone overheard and was astonished. He was telling someone: Go, ask forgiveness of the doors and the shoes. The listener was very surprised. What madness is this—asking forgiveness of shoes and doors? And then he was even more surprised to see the disciple go, ask forgiveness of the doors and the shoes, and return. The listener asked the sadhu, What kind of madness is this—must we also ask forgiveness of shoes and doors? The sadhu said, When he opened the door, he opened it with anger. He pushed it—in anger. And when he took off his shoes, there was great anger. If anger can be poured upon doors and shoes, why not love?
A pen does not work well—you throw it down in anger. A door does not open easily—you open it with rage, cursing it. If hatred and anger can be thrown upon the inert, why cannot love be thrown? The question is not whether the door will accept love or not; the question is that you have thrown it. The question is not whether the door understood your hatred or anger—the door understands nothing. But when you threw hatred, you became small. And if you throw love, you will become vast.
The more hatred one throws, the more contracted and small one becomes. The more love one throws, the more vast—more vast, more expansive—one becomes. By throwing hatred, in the end only ego remains. By throwing love, in the end there is the direct encounter with Brahman.
Love makes vast; hatred contracts. Anger makes small; non-anger makes large. And whatever the religions have called sin is sin for this reason alone—that it narrows you, makes you small, shrinks you. And whatever has been called virtue is virtue for this reason—it expands you, spreads you, makes you vast. At a certain moment your ego dissolves utterly—and the Divine remains. And those attachments and aversions that contract and diminish you—at a certain moment you are left utterly alone, a mere dot.
To be left alone in ego is to be in hell. To be alone is the only hell. He within whom only ego remains—he is in hell. And he in whom ego has been utterly dissolved—he attains Moksha. Ego is hell; egolessness—where even the point of “I” vanishes—is freedom. And the sadhana of love is constructive in this sense—it must be thrown, as a seed throws out its sprout. Continually, and with awareness, all around—toward the inert and the living—let there be the mood of love, the feeling of love. Continually, mindfully, creatively, throw love around you.
It does not occur to us—How will we throw love? It does not occur to us—How can love be thrown? Ordinarily we do not see how love can be flung. But consider: how do we throw anger? How do we throw hatred? When we cast anger, what happens?
When we cast anger, within us only the fire of anger remains—and we burn up. And from within us the flames of anger are hurled toward the one who is the center of our anger. As if flames are coursing through us—and wish to reduce to ashes the one toward whom the anger goes. In anger we become sheer flame, and we fling it toward that person. Love too can be flung like a flame—sitting, standing, walking—love can be cast in all directions.
There was a woman, Blavatsky. She lived in India long; she traveled the world. People were astonished—wherever she was, in a carriage, on a journey—she would put her hand into a sling and throw something out. People asked, What do you throw? She said, Seeds of flowers. All around her, all her life, she kept throwing seeds of flowers. People said, Absolutely mad. At the roadside, by the train track—you throw seeds; who knows how many will grow, how many will become flowers? Blavatsky said, That is not the question; I have the longing to throw flowers—that benefits me. It is not the question whether those seeds will become flowers or not—I threw flowers. The very feeling that I have thrown flowers expands me; and the feeling that I have thrown thorns contracts me. Some flower or other will arise from them, and someone, somewhere, seeing that smiling, blossoming flower, will be delighted—then my labor is worthwhile.
I do not ask you to throw seeds of flowers, but the fragrance of flowers can be thrown. Around you, you can expand and cast love. There can be many ways to throw love.
The night before last I told an incident—very ancient, from the times of the Upanishads. In an ashram three youths completed their education and were returning. On the last day, when all their learning was complete and their guru said, Now you may go—one asked, But you used to say there is still to be one final test. The guru said, Do not worry about that; if Paramatma wills, that final test will also happen. But your education in this ashram is complete; now you may go.
They rolled up their mats, took their scriptures, and at dusk—when the cow-dust rose, when the sun was setting—they took leave. They touched the guru’s feet and departed. On the path, as the sun was about to set, they saw that on a little footpath they had to cross, many thorns were scattered. The youth in front hesitated, then leapt over. The second youth behind him also hesitated, but left the footpath and passed through the neighboring field. The third youth too hesitated; he put his baggage down, gathered the thorns, and threw them into a bush. As he was putting them into the bush, all three were astonished to see the guru step out from behind the bush and say, Let the one who gathered the thorns go—his education is complete. Those who jumped over the thorns should stay—their education is not yet complete.
He who cannot remove the thorns from another’s path—he may have gained knowledge, but he has not gained love. He who could not lift the thorns from another’s path—he may have gained knowledge, but not love. And he who has not gained love cannot, in the full sense, be a man. Knowledge alone cannot make a man in the full sense. The youth who gathered the thorns passed the final test; the other two were detained.
By spreading love I mean: lift thorns from another’s path. By spreading love I mean: if you can, place a couple of flowers on another’s path. By spreading love I mean: in your feeling, in your mind, let there be friendliness—maitri—and love, and compassion toward every particle of the world. Whether that feeling benefits them is not important; that feeling will set you free. Love alone is liberation. In love alone a person is wholly liberated—because in love the ego becomes wholly absent.
So let love be spread positively, and knowledge manifest negatively.
When knowledge and love come together, music is born. When knowledge and love are harmonized, a person attains harmony with Truth. When knowledge and love are harmonized, there is the pilgrimage of knowledge within, and in conduct there is the ahimsa of love. When knowledge and love are complete, there is bliss within—and without he spreads the fragrance of that bliss.
Knowledge leads him to himself, and love leads him to the All. In the language of knowledge, he attains the Atman; in the language of love, he attains Paramatma. The language of love grasps Paramatma; the language of knowledge grasps Atman. And when love and knowledge are perfected, one knows Atman and Paramatma are not two—they are one. In the perfection of knowledge and love, one knows the ultimate Truth, not a fragmented truth.
If knowledge alone is there, one knows only the self; if love also is there, one knows the whole. If knowledge alone is there, one knows the self; if knowledge and love are both there, one becomes sarvajna—knower of all. Knowledge opens one’s own door; love opens everyone’s door. The total, undivided sadhana of knowledge and love I call the way. The paths of knowledge and love are not separate; they are one. He who practices that undivided sadhana attains the Undivided.
These few things I have said to you. May there be the light of knowledge and the fragrance of love in your life—this I wish. May there be the flame of knowledge and the joy of love in your life—this I wish. May you be filled with knowledge, and may love flow around you—this I wish.
You have listened to my words with such love, with such silence—my deep gratitude. In the end, even if you reject my knowledge, accept my love.
Osho's Commentary
We are in a very dense darkness, in a very dense pain, in a time overfilled with sorrow. And within man, upon the veena of the human heart, no music, no song, no joy is present. When I look within you, it seems to me as if a veena, capable of birthing unearthly music, lies wasted in some dark ruin, and no music arises from it. When I look at you, it seems as if a lamp that could have dispelled the night lies unlit in some ruin. And when I look at you, it seems as if seeds which could have become flowers—and from which the whole world could have been filled with fragrance—are going to waste for want of soil.
Within us there is such potentiality—such potentiality—that we could become Paramatma. And where we stand now, even an animal... even an animal would not choose to stand there. Within us is the possibility to become Paramatma, and where we are standing, even an animal would not wish to stand. About this painful, calamitous condition—let me say something to you. And about the way across it—let me say something. Such is my intention.
My heart does not wish to speak in the fixed, bound definitions of religion. You know those very well. Nor does my heart wish to speak to you in the verbal nets of philosophy; you are already well and thoroughly acquainted with them. With scriptures, with sects, with words—you are thoroughly acquainted. But those words create no movement in your life; they do not kindle in you a thirst, they do not ignite such a flame that a revolution happens in your life and a second man is born within you. So it is better that I speak of religion, but not in the words of religion. Bound words, slowly, slowly, die; their life slips out. And those hollow words encircle our mind, and their living contact slips far away from us.
So I will speak about religion, but not in the language of religion. I will speak about religion, but not in the language of the scriptures. I will speak only of religion—but perhaps it will not even be apparent that I am speaking to you about religion.
Yesterday, as I stepped out, someone said to me, You did not say anything about Jain Dharma? I wonder—will we understand that something about religion has been said only when we take the name Jain Dharma?
Yesterday, as I went out, someone else asked, You spoke a few things about Buddha, but not about Mahavira? Are names so important? Is that which is true about Buddha not true about Mahavira? Is that which is true about Mahavira not true about Christ? But names have become very important—and the meanings behind them have become very secondary for us.
So I intend to speak neither about Mahavira, nor about Buddha, nor about Christ. In fact, so much has been said in connection with these names that the ones standing behind these names have ceased to remain religious at all—at least in our understanding. The one who clings to Christ cannot be religious; the one who clings to Mahavira also cannot be religious.
One who is religious will know, will see, that in Mahavira, in Christ, in Buddha, in Rama, in Krishna—there is no difference. He will see: these names are different, but the Truth behind these names is one. He will see: these persons are different, but what they have said and what they have given is not different. Light falls from different lamps. The lamps can be different, but the light is not different. From different lamps, darkness is dispelled. The lamps may differ, but the light does not. There is beauty in the stars, and there is beauty in the flowers, and there is beauty in certain eyes too. Eyes and stars and flowers are different, but beauty is not different. Eyes and stars and flowers are different, but beauty is not different. The life-breath is one; only the bodies are different.
The bodies of religions differ, the body of religion differs from religion to religion, but the soul of religion is one. And about that soul I wish to say something to you—not about those bodies, not about those frames, which have pressed us very hard, very hard indeed, under whose weight we fail to attain to religion.
I see clearly: the man who clings very deeply to the word Jain may become a Jain, but he will not be able to become religious. And the more he begins to become religious, the more he will find that the word Jain dissolves. To call Mahavira a Jain is to insult him. To call Buddha a Buddhist is to insult him. To call Christ a Christian is to insult him. Such unfragmented beings cannot be divided into fragments. Such unfragmented beings cannot be divided into pieces. And such supreme beings are not bound into small parts. They have no boundaries, and they have no sects. And those who stand within sects and within boundaries should know: they will end within boundaries, and they will not be able to experience the boundless. And they should know: they will perish within sects, and they will not be able to experience Truth.
So let me speak about that Truth which has no boundary. And about that Beauty which is not imprisoned by a medium. And about that Light which is not dependent upon lamps—though it is in lamps—yet is free of lamps and other than lamps.
And perhaps that Light, and the talk of that Light, and that Beauty, and the talk of that Beauty—may strike a note within you, may create a vibration upon the strings of your heart. And perhaps your sleeping veena may begin to voice itself, and in your sleeping heart a movement may be born. And in your life, a new direction, a new growth, a new momentum may arise. That movement—moving in that direction—moving from the worldly toward the otherworldly, and from body toward soul, and from the world toward Paramatma—this movement, this orientation, this turning of the face in that direction, I call being religious. About that, a few things I shall say to you today.
As I said, there is much darkness. Never before was there so much darkness. As I said, man has become very animal-like—perhaps never so much as now. In the last great war, when the atom bomb was dropped on Hiroshima, the night on which hundreds of thousands died in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the next morning someone asked Truman, some journalist asked, Did you sleep last night? Truman said, Never before have I slept so deeply. I slept with such ease.
Let us consider, let us reflect a little. If by my order a hundred thousand people had been finished—could I sleep that night? Could I sleep thereafter for the rest of my life? If after that night I were to be born again and again—could I sleep? But Truman said, I slept very deeply, free of all worry.
Shall we say that what speaks from within is human? Shall we say this is the voice of a human being? Shall we say some consciousness speaks from within? No consciousness speaks from within there—perhaps the lowest animal in us alone could say this.
And this has happened. And I do not say it only for Truman; it has happened to all of us. Something has happened to us all: we have begun to enjoy throwing thorns on the paths of others. Something has happened to us all: to snatch flowers from another’s life has become our joy.
And the man who delights in casting thorns upon another’s path—that man does not remain human. And remember also: the man who throws thorns into another’s life cannot have flowers in his own. Remember also: what we give returns to us. This world returns to us exactly what we throw toward it.
From this world we receive nothing that we have not first flung. What we cast, returns. He who casts hatred, hatred returns to him. He who casts love, love returns to him. And this entire world becomes our reflection. The face I carry begins to be reflected back to me from the people spread all around.
If we are distorted, from all sides distortions begin to enter into us. If we are filled with hate, from all sides hatred begins to pour into us. And if we have thrown thorns, then harvests of thorns become available to us—and life is destroyed.
I said this: never before has there been so much darkness, so much hatred, so much violence in the life of man. This is so today! But this does not mean we should become despairing. This does not mean I am in despair. It means only one thing: those who could become dark are in darkness by their own hand, by their own resolve, by their own cause. And if they wish, they can become filled with light. Those who stand in darkness—there is no other person responsible for their standing there; we ourselves are the cause. By our own hand we stand in the dark. And whenever our resolve awakens—when longing arises, when aspiration is born—we can enter the light.
Remember one thing: only he who has eyes knows darkness. Only he who has eyes can know darkness. The blind do not come to know darkness.
Perhaps you have thought that those who have no eyes must feel darkness as darkness—then you are mistaken. Change that notion. The blind do not know darkness. The blind cannot even know darkness—because eyes are needed. Eyes are needed even to see the dark. Not only light, darkness too requires eyes to be seen.
He who has no eyes does not see light—and does not see darkness either. If we can see darkness, then although darkness is bad, the seeing of darkness is a sign that eyes are present. Darkness being there, and the feeling of darkness, is a sign of eyes. And the eyes that can see darkness are capable of seeing light.
So darkness is not a cause for despair; darkness carries within itself a ray of hope. How can that ray of hope be born? And that eye which, looking again and again at darkness, has become merged in darkness, absorbed in darkness, embedded in darkness—how can that eye be turned toward light? About that I will say a few things to you.
The very first thing I wish to say is this: as we are born, as nature gives us birth—if we stop at that limit, we will not be able to experience Paramatma. Nature gives us birth only as a possibility. To transform that possibility into actuality we will have to do something. When nature and man’s purushartha meet, the otherworldly is born within man. When man becomes content with nature alone, the otherworldly is not born within him. When purushartha becomes active upon nature, when effort works upon nature, the unearthly is born within man.
Keep it in mind: he who is content with nature is dead. He who is content with nature has not known life. He who is content with nature will end at the level of the animal. But he who brings purushartha to bear upon nature—who joins his strength and energy to nature and uses them—will one day find that from the union of nature and purushartha the unearthly is born.
From the sadhana of purushartha upon nature, the unearthly is born. And man ceases to remain merely man—he becomes something more. He becomes absorbed into some new realm of bliss. He can produce a very deep music, and he can know a very deep Truth. And the knowing of that Truth sets man free. The knowing of that Truth liberates man into a most astonishing realm of freedom, and establishes him in a most wondrous realm of joy.
There is something of nature within us; there must also be purushartha within us. Ordinarily our purushartha gets spent in obtaining very petty things. Ordinarily our purushartha is consumed in attaining extremely trivial things. And we fail to attain the vast and the supreme. No doubt we are striving for something or other. Our purushartha is certainly engaged somewhere.
Someone strives for wealth, someone for fame, someone for position, prestige, someone for something else. But all these endeavors are like building palaces on sand all one’s life—or like signing one’s name on the riverbank, and in the evening the winds come and erase the signatures. In the evening the winds come and erase the signatures. Such is our purushartha upon sand. Death will come and wipe it all away. All that we have done will be undone.
Petty is that purushartha which death destroys. Vast is that purushartha which death cannot destroy. Petty is that purushartha which death will erase. Vast is that purushartha which death cannot erase. And in the true sense, those are men, and in the true sense they have used the man, the inner potency, who have made such signatures as death cannot erase. Who have built such edifices—what edifice is that, what construction, what creation that death will not wipe away? To that must our purushartha be joined.
Two kinds of purushartha I have mentioned. One is petty—done for livelihood, for fame, for prestige, for wealth. The other purushartha is not for livelihood; it is for life. It is not for fame, not for wealth; it is for Truth, it is for the supreme reality of oneself, for one’s swarupa.
First of all our purushartha needs to be centered upon that point which is I am, which is my being. First of all all my powers, all my resolve, all my longings, all my desires, all my aspirations need to be gathered and focused upon that one point which is my being.
If I could open that door of mystery—if I could know, Who am I? If I could become acquainted with what my being is—if I could know which flame of life is imprisoned, captive, within this body—if within this ring of clay I could experience the supreme flame, then and only then have I taken a step toward the vast purushartha; then and only then have I taken a step toward Truth. Then and only then have I used my strength rather than wasted it.
Within man there is the possibility of infinite music—if purushartha is applied upon his nature. Look within and you will see: we almost die as we were born. We run much, we make many efforts, we labor hard—but all that labor goes to waste. We are laboring upon a medium which in itself is perishable. He who labors upon the perishable—his labor will become futile. He who labors upon the imperishable—his labor alone becomes meaningful.
We all labor, but we may choose the wrong medium. One can choose a medium which itself is perishable, momentary, mortal. If one labors upon the mortal, what wonder if that labor proves fruitless?
Labor upon amrit; only labor upon the deathless bears fruit.
So within ourselves we need to look, with mindfulness and discernment, to see what is mortal and what within us is deathless. That discernment—viveka—that distance, that discrimination—that alone transforms a person from an ordinary worldly one into a seeker. He who recognizes the mortal within, and who recognizes within that which does not die—and then joins his labor to that which does not die—such a person becomes a sadhaka. And the one who applies his labor to that which dies, the mortal, becomes worldly.
Samsara and sannyas are not a difference of location. Not a difference of house and forest. In samsara and in sannyas there is no question of dropping something and running somewhere. The difference between sannyas and samsara is to recognize, within oneself, the mortal and the immortal. Sannyas and samsara are not a doing; sannyas and samsara are a knowing. The difference between sannyas and samsara is not a difference of acts; it is a difference of knowing, of awareness, of bodh. The awareness that there is something mortal within me—I disassociate myself from that mortal. The awareness that within me is the mortal—I refuse to dedicate my labor to that mortal, and I consecrate it to that which is immortal. Dedicated to the immortal, even labor becomes immortal. United with the immortal, purushartha culminates in liberation.
How can this discernment arise within, and how can this awareness become possible within, and how can one experience the undivided consciousness within? People say there are two paths. I see only one. People say there are two, and all the sects and all the thinkers of the world speak of those two paths: one, they say, is the path of knowledge; the other, the path of love or devotion.
In my seeing the path is only one, not two. In my seeing, knowledge is incomplete if love is not in it; and love is incomplete if knowledge is not in it. Knowledge alone is incomplete—dry, arid, without juice. And love alone is blind—without eyes, without light. Blind love is incomplete; juiceless knowledge is incomplete. When knowledge and love unite, the tones of amrit begin to resound within. In my seeing, knowledge and love are to be practiced together; then the experience of amrit begins. So let me say a little about the practice of both.
First of all, knowledge is indispensable. Before we can attain amrit, the Atman, or Paramatma—knowledge is indispensable. What does knowledge mean? Knowledge does not mean that we should know many things. A person can know many things and yet be utterly ignorant. Knowing many things is a different matter. There is a difference between memory and knowledge. Our education is the education of memory, not the education of knowledge. Long ago the education of knowledge ceased. For a long time we have been trained only in memory. The whole life we are taught memory—some things are taught, we memorize them; and because we can repeat them, we fall into the illusion that we know.
If we ask you something about God, surely you will say something. If we ask about the Atman, surely you will say something. If we ask about Moksha, surely you will say something. But that is not your knowing, that is your memory. You have heard, you have read, someone has told you—but you have not known.
Memory is one thing; knowledge is entirely another. He who wants to attain the deathless must attain knowledge. He who wants to manage the inert—memory is enough. For science, memory suffices; for religion, knowledge is essential. Science runs on memory; religion runs on knowledge.
Therefore it is possible that the scientist of today can read all the scientists of the last three hundred years and know everything about them. This is easy. Therefore science has a tradition, a chain. There was Newton; later there will be Einstein. Einstein will begin from where Newton left off; where Newton’s work ends, there Einstein’s begins. After Einstein another scientist will come; he will begin from where Einstein left.
But in religion it is not so. Where Mahavira left off, you cannot begin. You will have to begin where Mahavira began. Whenever a person attains the truth of religion upon this earth, he will have to begin from the beginning. He cannot begin beyond them.
There is no tradition in religion. Religion is an individual truth; science is a social truth. A social truth can be that which runs by memory. Religion cannot be a social truth, for it runs by knowledge.
Remember: memory is others’ knowledge; knowledge is one’s own knowing. So science is memory, and religion is knowledge. Memory will not do.
I have seen it—visited many ashrams, met many sadhus—they all make people memorize scriptures; they run schools of scripture. Those who gather around them become parrots by rote. They start repeating. Ask them anything—an answer is ready for everything. Those who have not a single answer of their own collect the answers of others and begin to give them. It satisfies the ego, but no one attains knowledge.
So let me say the first thing to you: knowledge is not memory. Therefore, even if you memorize someone, even if you learn scriptures, agamas by rote, the Vedas, the Upanishads, the Gita, the Koran—commit them all to heart—it will make no difference. They will only become a burden; they cannot become your liberation. You will be like those who wander in villages carrying boats on their heads, but who have never traveled in the boat.
Boats are not to be carried on the head; you travel in them. Scriptures are not to be carried on the head; they are to be made into steps for the feet. Scriptures are not to be borne upon the head; scriptures are to become your steps. When they become steps, you walk by them. When you place them upon your head and bow, you do not walk by them—they walk by you. When scripture becomes memory, it becomes futile. And scriptural knowledge—what can it be except memory?
So I am not speaking to you for memory. I am speaking to you for knowledge. And knowledge is born in a very different way. Memory is accumulated; knowledge is born. Memory is collected; knowledge manifests. Memory is brought from outside; knowledge arises from within.
The more one empties memory, the more one becomes available to knowledge. The more the memory is emptied out, the more knowledge awakens within. As when one digs a well—ordinarily we say, We dug and brought forth water. But have you ever reflected—how can water be produced by digging? Digging does not bring water; digging only removes the soil. Water was already there; when the soil is removed, it becomes visible. By digging, water is not produced; by digging, only the earth is taken away. And if there is no water, then dig a hundred times—no water will come.
So never say, even by mistake, We dug and brought out water. By digging, water is not brought out; by digging, the soil is removed. If water is there, then its darshan happens. Knowledge has to be dug out. Knowledge is present; only the layers of soil above it must be removed. Those layers of soil are the layers of our memory.
Across infinite births we have accumulated much memory. Layer upon layer has gathered, and under the weight of memory the knowing has gone on becoming obscured. Because of the very deep layers of memory and samskaras, the light of knowledge has ceased to come out. If all the layers of memory are broken, knowledge will manifest. Not exactly be produced—but there will be the vision of knowledge. Knowledge is present. Knowledge is our very nature; it is not to be brought from anywhere else. Rather, something has come in between us and it, and therefore an obstruction has arisen.
Thus the way to bring knowledge is, in one sense, negative—just as the way to bring water in a well is negative. Negative in the sense that you do something to the soil, not to the water. When you dig a well, you do nothing to the water; you do something to the soil. Remove the soil—water appears. Just so, the way of knowledge is in one sense negative.
To bring knowledge you do nothing to knowledge itself; you only remove the memory, the samskaras, the load upon the mind-stuff. When the mind-stuff becomes unburdened, when it becomes totally unconditioned—when no samskara and no external imprint remains and the mind becomes empty—then, as when someone has wiped the dust from a mirror—the dust is wiped, the mirror is as it is. When the dust was there, it was just the same; when the dust is gone, it is just the same. Perhaps the mirror has not changed at all. The dust was on top; when it is removed from the top, the mirror is as it is. But with the dust removed, the mirror becomes clear, and reflections become possible.
Knowledge arises when the dust of memory is wiped away.
So those engaged in the sadhana of knowledge do not have to memorize scriptures. Those engaged in the sadhana of knowledge have to wipe clean whatever scriptures have accumulated within. Those engaged in the sadhana of knowledge have to become empty of all memory, so that all the layers of earth fall away and knowledge manifests.
Memory torments us in two forms, and binds us in two forms. Ordinarily our entire mind revolves in memory of the past.
You are sitting here now, but few are really here. Many are somewhere back in the past; many are somewhere in the future. Ordinarily we are not in the present. Either our mind is in the past or in the future—in memories of the past or in imaginations of the future. And the imaginations of the future are the offspring of the memories of the past. Future’s imaginations are the children of past memories. So either we are in the memories of the past, or in the future which is only the offspring of the past.
The past is dead; the future is not yet alive. We are like ghosts—our mind is ghost-like. We are in the past or in the future—and not in the present. Memory and imagination surround us, and because of their weight, knowledge cannot be born. When memory and imagination are nullified, knowledge is born. So sadhana is to let go of memory and imagination—and imagination is only a transformation of memory, its imagined form. By releasing the tensions of memory and imagination, there is the manifestation, the uprush, of knowledge within.
So remember: he who would practice knowledge must become free of the memories of the past. When past memories pursue you, salute them—and tell them not to follow. And when past memories are with you, mindfully dis-identify from them. With discernment, free yourself from them. Keep watch, with awareness, that you do not get involved in their trance. If there is a continuous endeavor, a continuous resolve—if with concentration, with involvement, there is this effort: I will not lose myself in the memories of the past; I will not allow my discernment to be crushed under the past; what has gone has gone, what has died has died—I will not drag it along with me—then slowly you will find the ash of the past dissolving. You will be able to be free of the past.
And he who is not free of the past can never attain knowledge. One must practice leaving the memories of the past. From the place where you have risen, rise—do not linger. Let what has happened, have happened; do not allow it to return into the mind. Do not give it the door for return.
We drag the dead. We collect corpses. Our mind is filled with the dead and with cadavers. Yesterday someone abused you; it still dogs you today. The day before someone honored you; it still pursues you today. Long ago someone garlanded your neck; the flowers have dried and withered, yet the mind still wears them. The past becomes a burden upon us. The small moment of the present, a little spark, gets pressed under the ash of the past and is lost.
The ash of the past must be brushed off. As one brushes ash from a coal, so must the past be brushed from the mind. What has died, has died. Past means: that which has ceased to be—let it cease to be. Do not check it. In reality it dies in the world; but in the mind it remains. And this is why the mind’s connection with the music of the world breaks. In the world, the past is not alive; every moment the world is new. But the mind is not new; the mind remains old.
Between the world and the mind there is a conflict. The mind does not attune to the music of the world—for only one reason: the world is ever new, and the mind is ever old. The mind therefore never harmonizes with the world’s song. This vast Truth pervades all around—the moon and stars, the flowers, the waves, the winds—yet the mind cannot become one with them. When it does become one, the harmony that is born connects a person to Paramatma, to the supreme Truth.
A young man once went to a sadhu. The sadhu’s ashram was near a mountain stream. That youth had toured many ashrams, traveled to many shrines, visited many tirthas. Finally he came to that sadhu and said, I am tired. I am weary and troubled. I cannot find a way. What should I do that I may enter God? The sadhu said, Truly, do you want to enter? Truly do you want to enter Paramatma? Then the door is close by—just behind our ashram. The youth was astonished.
He had wandered over many lands; he had met one mad sadhu after another—but none so mad as to say, The door by which you can enter God is behind my ashram. He could not believe it; he thought he had met a madman.
But the sadhu spoke with great assurance. He said, Come with me; behind, there is a door—go in from there. The skeptical youth followed him; there was no door. There was a mountain stream. The sadhu said, This is the door—enter through this.
The youth said, You are mad; this is a mountain stream—where is the door? And how can I enter? The sadhu said, Sit beside this stream; when your self-absorption unites with the stream, then understand: the entry into God is happening. When no distance remains between you and the stream, when you can no longer discern whether you are the stream or separate from it—and when even the sense that you are seeing the stream is gone—
Thus, the sadhana of knowledge is the immersion of the past. Let the past die—mindfully, with discernment, with heart. Keep watching this—be alert to this: is the past clutching me? Is it becoming a weight upon me?
A sadhu was approached one morning by a man who hurled abuses upon him. So enraged was he that he even spat upon the sadhu’s face. The sadhu wiped the spittle with his cloth and asked the youth, Have you anything more to say? The youth was startled. He said, What do you think—I said something? The disciples of the sadhu were enraged: What are you doing? He spat—he insulted you. The sadhu said, I do not see that he spat; I see that he said something. He was so full of anger that words could not come, so he said it by spitting. Unable to say with words, he used an act, a gesture. Therefore I ask him, Anything more to say? What else could the youth say? He went away as he had come. But at night, remorse seized him. He felt sorrow—that he had erred, that he had behaved insultingly toward one who had taken his spitting as conversation.
The next morning he came to ask forgiveness. He said to the sadhu, Forgive me, yesterday I behaved very badly with you. The sadhu said, Forgive you—for that? We did not even become angry. And I tell you—your spitting on me is not as bad as the fact that you brooded over it for twenty-four hours. The sadhu said, Your spitting was not so bad, because I wiped it off at once—I did not delay. You spat, I wiped. One must do immediately what must be done. But you brooded for twenty-four hours—that is sad. I wiped what was spat; you also could have wiped the thought that you spat.
Perhaps the youth did not understand; perhaps he never grasped what the sadhu said. But the sadhu said something very deep and of great significance. If only we could wipe—if only we could wipe whatever has happened—then we would be related to what is. If that which has passed could be wiped, then we would be related to the present. And Truth is only in the present. Truth is not in the past; Truth is not in the future. Truth is in the present.
Truth means: that which always is—and never will not be. The past becomes not. The future has not yet come. Therefore Truth can be neither in the future nor in the past. Truth always is. In this sense we call Truth sanatan—eternal. Sanatan means: neither ever past nor ever future—ever-present. Eternal, timeless, sanatan.
So he who wishes to enter the eternal of Truth must drop the imaginary encirclements of the mind called past and future. He who drops the past will be amazed: the future slips away by itself, in the same measure. In the measure the burden of the past lightens, in the same measure the future slips away on its own.
When the past becomes zero, the future becomes zero, and the present becomes full. In that moment, when the mind is free of the ash of past and future, when the layers of earth are removed, the springs of water are born. Then there is the descent of knowledge—or its ascent. Then there is the realization of knowledge. Without that knowledge no person is human in the full sense. Without that knowledge no person is fully alive.
Thus knowledge is to be attained negatively. The way to attain knowledge is negative—in the sense that something must be removed, and knowledge appears. As I said, the dust must be wiped from the mirror and the mirror becomes clear. But knowledge, I have said, is incomplete—knowledge alone is incomplete.
Another thing must also be practiced—and that is love. And the sadhana of love is positive, constructive. The sadhana of knowledge is negative; the sadhana of love is positive and creative.
Knowledge is practiced as one wipes the dust from a mirror. Love is practiced as a sprout breaks from a seed. We have placed a seed in the earth; if we remove the earth, the seed will appear—but it will not become a plant. The earth is not to be removed; rather the seed must manifest its inner power, its energy, as a sprout. The seed will break forth as a sprout, rise through the soil, and then flower. The seed must throw its energy outward; then it will sprout. A mirror needs no development for itself—the dust just needs to be removed. When the dust falls away, the mirror is fine as it is. But a seed is not to remove something; it has to give birth to something from within.
Love is born like a seed, and knowledge is born as dust is wiped from a mirror. The way of love is positive; the way of love is creative. Love has to be cast forth from within; gathering all one’s powers, the energy of love has to be flung. How will this happen? Ordinarily we cast forth hatred, enmity, malice, untruth, attachment—we do not cast forth love.
I remember a sadhu. Early one morning he was in his ashram, and he told a disciple, Go—ask forgiveness from the shoes and from the door. Someone overheard and was astonished. He was telling someone: Go, ask forgiveness of the doors and the shoes. The listener was very surprised. What madness is this—asking forgiveness of shoes and doors? And then he was even more surprised to see the disciple go, ask forgiveness of the doors and the shoes, and return. The listener asked the sadhu, What kind of madness is this—must we also ask forgiveness of shoes and doors? The sadhu said, When he opened the door, he opened it with anger. He pushed it—in anger. And when he took off his shoes, there was great anger. If anger can be poured upon doors and shoes, why not love?
A pen does not work well—you throw it down in anger. A door does not open easily—you open it with rage, cursing it. If hatred and anger can be thrown upon the inert, why cannot love be thrown? The question is not whether the door will accept love or not; the question is that you have thrown it. The question is not whether the door understood your hatred or anger—the door understands nothing. But when you threw hatred, you became small. And if you throw love, you will become vast.
The more hatred one throws, the more contracted and small one becomes. The more love one throws, the more vast—more vast, more expansive—one becomes. By throwing hatred, in the end only ego remains. By throwing love, in the end there is the direct encounter with Brahman.
Love makes vast; hatred contracts. Anger makes small; non-anger makes large. And whatever the religions have called sin is sin for this reason alone—that it narrows you, makes you small, shrinks you. And whatever has been called virtue is virtue for this reason—it expands you, spreads you, makes you vast. At a certain moment your ego dissolves utterly—and the Divine remains. And those attachments and aversions that contract and diminish you—at a certain moment you are left utterly alone, a mere dot.
To be left alone in ego is to be in hell. To be alone is the only hell. He within whom only ego remains—he is in hell. And he in whom ego has been utterly dissolved—he attains Moksha. Ego is hell; egolessness—where even the point of “I” vanishes—is freedom. And the sadhana of love is constructive in this sense—it must be thrown, as a seed throws out its sprout. Continually, and with awareness, all around—toward the inert and the living—let there be the mood of love, the feeling of love. Continually, mindfully, creatively, throw love around you.
It does not occur to us—How will we throw love? It does not occur to us—How can love be thrown? Ordinarily we do not see how love can be flung. But consider: how do we throw anger? How do we throw hatred? When we cast anger, what happens?
When we cast anger, within us only the fire of anger remains—and we burn up. And from within us the flames of anger are hurled toward the one who is the center of our anger. As if flames are coursing through us—and wish to reduce to ashes the one toward whom the anger goes. In anger we become sheer flame, and we fling it toward that person. Love too can be flung like a flame—sitting, standing, walking—love can be cast in all directions.
There was a woman, Blavatsky. She lived in India long; she traveled the world. People were astonished—wherever she was, in a carriage, on a journey—she would put her hand into a sling and throw something out. People asked, What do you throw? She said, Seeds of flowers. All around her, all her life, she kept throwing seeds of flowers. People said, Absolutely mad. At the roadside, by the train track—you throw seeds; who knows how many will grow, how many will become flowers? Blavatsky said, That is not the question; I have the longing to throw flowers—that benefits me. It is not the question whether those seeds will become flowers or not—I threw flowers. The very feeling that I have thrown flowers expands me; and the feeling that I have thrown thorns contracts me. Some flower or other will arise from them, and someone, somewhere, seeing that smiling, blossoming flower, will be delighted—then my labor is worthwhile.
I do not ask you to throw seeds of flowers, but the fragrance of flowers can be thrown. Around you, you can expand and cast love. There can be many ways to throw love.
The night before last I told an incident—very ancient, from the times of the Upanishads. In an ashram three youths completed their education and were returning. On the last day, when all their learning was complete and their guru said, Now you may go—one asked, But you used to say there is still to be one final test. The guru said, Do not worry about that; if Paramatma wills, that final test will also happen. But your education in this ashram is complete; now you may go.
They rolled up their mats, took their scriptures, and at dusk—when the cow-dust rose, when the sun was setting—they took leave. They touched the guru’s feet and departed. On the path, as the sun was about to set, they saw that on a little footpath they had to cross, many thorns were scattered. The youth in front hesitated, then leapt over. The second youth behind him also hesitated, but left the footpath and passed through the neighboring field. The third youth too hesitated; he put his baggage down, gathered the thorns, and threw them into a bush. As he was putting them into the bush, all three were astonished to see the guru step out from behind the bush and say, Let the one who gathered the thorns go—his education is complete. Those who jumped over the thorns should stay—their education is not yet complete.
He who cannot remove the thorns from another’s path—he may have gained knowledge, but he has not gained love. He who could not lift the thorns from another’s path—he may have gained knowledge, but not love. And he who has not gained love cannot, in the full sense, be a man. Knowledge alone cannot make a man in the full sense. The youth who gathered the thorns passed the final test; the other two were detained.
By spreading love I mean: lift thorns from another’s path. By spreading love I mean: if you can, place a couple of flowers on another’s path. By spreading love I mean: in your feeling, in your mind, let there be friendliness—maitri—and love, and compassion toward every particle of the world. Whether that feeling benefits them is not important; that feeling will set you free. Love alone is liberation. In love alone a person is wholly liberated—because in love the ego becomes wholly absent.
So let love be spread positively, and knowledge manifest negatively.
When knowledge and love come together, music is born. When knowledge and love are harmonized, a person attains harmony with Truth. When knowledge and love are harmonized, there is the pilgrimage of knowledge within, and in conduct there is the ahimsa of love. When knowledge and love are complete, there is bliss within—and without he spreads the fragrance of that bliss.
Knowledge leads him to himself, and love leads him to the All. In the language of knowledge, he attains the Atman; in the language of love, he attains Paramatma. The language of love grasps Paramatma; the language of knowledge grasps Atman. And when love and knowledge are perfected, one knows Atman and Paramatma are not two—they are one. In the perfection of knowledge and love, one knows the ultimate Truth, not a fragmented truth.
If knowledge alone is there, one knows only the self; if love also is there, one knows the whole. If knowledge alone is there, one knows the self; if knowledge and love are both there, one becomes sarvajna—knower of all. Knowledge opens one’s own door; love opens everyone’s door. The total, undivided sadhana of knowledge and love I call the way. The paths of knowledge and love are not separate; they are one. He who practices that undivided sadhana attains the Undivided.
These few things I have said to you. May there be the light of knowledge and the fragrance of love in your life—this I wish. May there be the flame of knowledge and the joy of love in your life—this I wish. May you be filled with knowledge, and may love flow around you—this I wish.
You have listened to my words with such love, with such silence—my deep gratitude. In the end, even if you reject my knowledge, accept my love.