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Arunachala! Thoujiost root out the ego of those

who meditate on Thee in the heart, Oh Arunachala!

The Mountain Path Vol. V JULY 1968 No. 3 SRI RAMANASRAMAM TIRU VAN N AMALAI THE MOUNTAIN PATH

Edited by ARTHUR OSBORNE

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Published from SRI RAMANASRAMAM, , S. India Shine as my , making me free from faults and worthy of Thy Grace, Oh Arunachala ! (A QUARTERLY) — The Marital of Letters, verse 19. " Arunachala ! Thou dost root out the ego of those who meditate on Thee in the heart, Oh Arunachala ! " —The Marital Garland of Letters, verse 1. Publisher :

T. N. Venkataraman, Vol. V JULY 1968 No. 3 President, Board of Trustees, Sri Ramanasramam, Tiruvannamalai. CONTENTS Page EDITORIAL : ' This' and 1 That' 169 The Maharshi's place in History — Arthur Osborne 172 and the — G. J. Yorke 179 Editor : About Sri Arthur Osborne, — Dr. (Miss) Bithika Mukerji .. 186 Sri Ramanasramam, Thayumanavar, a Tamil Poet-Saint Tiruvannamalai. — T. Krishnaji 191 How I came to the Maharshi — Dr. T. N. Krishnaswamy 194 Christ and Christianity as seen by a Hindu — Swami Nirmalananda 197 No mind Doctrine of Ramana Managing Editor : — R. N. Saraf 200 V. Ganesan, Problems of Right and Wrong — ' Sein ' . . 201 Sri Ramanasramam, " I " The stillness — A. R. Nikam 203 Tiruvannamalai. Eating the Mangoes — Prof. 204 Symbolism in the life of Sri — I — Dr. W. Radhakrishnayya 207 What is Self-Realisation ? — Douglas E. Harding 210 Annual Subscription : Self-Realization as taught by Sri — Arthur Osborne 212 INDIA .. Rs. 5. FOREIGN .. 12sh 6d $ 1.50 It is our Birthright — Natanananda . 213 The Yaksha Prasna Life Subscription : — (From the Mahabharata) 215 Rs. 100: £ 12-10-0 $ 30. The — Tr. by Prof. G. V. Kulkarni and Arthur Osborne 217 Single Copy : The Vadaparayana — III 220 Rs. 1.50: 3sh. 6d. $ 0.45 Garland of Guru's .Sayings 222 We insist only — Reps 223 Book Reviews 224 CONTENTS— (Contd.) Page Sty* fountain jlaftj Poetry — Richard Clancy .. 230 (A QUARTERLY) Bulletin .. 231 Introducing . . . , 235 The aim of this journal is to set Sri Ramana Mantapa Nidhi — Receipts and forth the traditional wisdom of all Payments Account and Balance Sheet . . 237 religions and all ages, especially The Traveller (Poem) as testified to by their saints and — Harindranath Chattopadhyaya . . 238 mystics, and to clarify the paths available to seekers in the condi• Notice to Subscribers . . 239 tions of our modern world. Inseeing and Outseeing — Wei Wu Wei . . 240 Letters to the Editor . . 241 Sri Ramanasramam — Life Members . . 244 The Mountain Path — Life Subscribers . . 246 Contributions for publication On Walking round Arunachala — ' David ' 248 should be addressed to ' The Editor, The Mountain Path, Sri Ramanas• GRACE IN WORDS : The Verse in Telugu and Tamil ramam, Tiruvannamalai, Madras reproduced on the fly-leaf facing the frontispiece is the State' . They should be in English facsimile of Bhagavan's own handwriting. and typed with double spacing. Contributions not published will be returned on request.

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IFMe in /acr • body is in the Self, he who thinks that the Self is within the insentient body is like one who considers the cloth of the screen which supports a cinema to be contained within the picture.

— BHAGAVAN SRI RAMANA MAHARSHI

(QUARTERLY)

Editor: ARTHUR OSBORNE

Vol. V JULY, 1968 No. 3

' THIS' AND 'THAT'

Editorial

"VI7HY should a quest be necessary ? Why whether to use them. And this power is also should a man- not grow naturally into a necessity. Having the power to direct his his true state, like a horse or an oak-tree ? faculties imposes on a man the necessity of Why should man alone, of all creatures, be doing so, since even refusal to do so would tempted to a misuse of his faculties and have be his choice or direction and not spontane• to curb his desires in order to grow to his ous, as with other creatures. true breadth and stature ? This involves the question what differentiates man from This is expressed theologically in the other creatures. Some psychologists and dogma that gave man free will, the will biologists have represented the difference to obey God or disobey, and thus to work simply as greater intelligence and ability out his own weal or woe. Intellectuals are due to a more developed brain. This is apt to scoff at such dogmas, but they are only patently untrue. Many creatures have picturesque enunciations of fundamental greater ability than man in one direction or truths. A man cannot simply use his facul• another. A hawk has keener sight, a ties naturally as a bird or animal can, migratory bird has a better memory for because there is no natural man-action as places and directions, a dog has a stronger there is natural hawk-action or sheep- sense of smell, a bat a wider range of hear• action. Man, of course, has certain natural ing. What really distinguishes man is self- instincts, just as a bird or animal has (the consciousness, that he not only is a man but instincts to eat, to procreate, to preserve his knows that he is a man, is consciously a life, for instance), but he may or may not man. This may be called greater intelli• choose to obey them in any specific situation gence, but not in the commonly under• in the complexities of life. His self-cons• stood sense of outwardly turned intelli• cious existence as man forces on him a gence. It implies the conscious use of his choice of uses for his faculties. Even the faculties, the power of deciding how and attempt to use them in what he considered 170 THE MOUNTAIN PATH July the natural way would be a choice. He would tarily given them ascendancy over higher be sure to find some one who would contest possibilities. If, in this way, he has forced it. This choice is what is called free will. his mind into a subhuman mold in this life• Free will is therefore not only a prerogative time, he must expect his body to take the but an obligation for man. same mold in the next, since the body is only a reflection or condensation of the mind. Free will, thus understood, has nothing to do with destiny. It is a power which man is Naturally this does not imply that every compelled by his own nature to use, whether one who fails to take the quest falls below the use he makes of it is predestined or not. the* human state. There are many grada• If I have to decide whether to spend this tions within that state. There is the possi• evening at a dance or in meditation or whe• bility of birth and death, birth and death, ther to strike or forgive some one who has birth and death, in an apparently endless insulted me, the responsibility of deciding and meaningless round ; but in the end every rests with me just the same whether the one is brought to the point of rising above outcome is predetermined or not. If it is the human state or falling below it. And predetermined, it is my own past habit- between each human death and rebirth there forming and character-forming decisions in are heavens and hells to reap. this and previous lifetimes which have pre• determined it ; and this decision in its turn The quest does not mean simply a cul• will help to condition my mind, thus deter• tural interest in , such as one mining future ones. In any case, since I do may take in music or philosophy ; it means not know which of two decisions is pre• a total dedication. It means making Reali• determined, I have to choose one or the zation the aim and purpose of life. And since other. eventual Realization is by nature the pur• pose of life, those who undertake the quest But, it may be said, the necessity of are the only ones who have understood life making decisions as to the use of one's aright and live it purposefully, using it faculties does not imply the necessity of a instead of being used by it. spiritual quest. All men have to make Once taken, the quest may assume forms. decisions, whereas very few set forth on the It is apt to appear primarily under the guise quest. That is only too true. As far back of getting or giving, but in fact both occur, as the Bhagavad Gita it was already said for it is only by making oneself small enough that " Out of thousands perhaps one seeks to pass through the eye of a needle that one Realization."1 What is implied is only the can expand to all infinity. On a yogic or possibility, not the necessity, of the quest. tantric path one is developing latent powers beyond the ken of the ordinary mundane The quest brings the possibility of rising person, but if the course is to succeed it above the normal human state ; but this demands the simultaneous surrender not only involves also the possibility of falling below of the indulgence of desires but of the it. This is why the Hindu and Buddhist desires themselves. On a devotional path the scriptures warn so insistently to make good perpetual craving is to love, give, surrender, use of one's human birth, because if this one to be nothing in the hands of God, but power is misused another may not be so easily pours into this nothing, this self-naughted attainable. And it is no implacable outside worshipper. It is safer to concentrate on power which thrusts a man lower down in giving. As Christ said, only he who gives the scale if he misuses his human opportuni• up his life will find it. By thus giving with• ties to rise higher ; it is the impersonal law out seeking one attains the kingdom of of cause and effect. A crow is not blame• heaven ; and Christ also said : " Attain first worthy for rapacity, nor a cat for cruelty, the kingdom of heaven and all else shall be nor a goat for lust, but a man who allows such qualities to dominate him has volun• l Bhagavad Gtta; VIII. 3, 1968 1 THIS ' AND ' THAT > 1.71

added to you." If one seeks to attain first all being absorbed, clinging tenaciously to the else the kingdom of heaven is not likely to life which Christ bade it give up. It still be added. wants its own separate individual existence, its own decisions and enjoyments. Therefore Before a man is drawn to the quest he is it may feel waves of resentment or actual directly conscious of only one being, which hostility to 1 That \ Or it may feign sub• could therefore be called 1 this ' : this which mission while actually striving to acquire wants coffee for breakfast, this which has and contain ' That'. "I sought to devour tooth-ache, this which decides to call on Thee ; come now and devour me ; then there so-and-so or to read such-and-such a book. will be peace, Arunachala ! "3 That is why Other people, things, events, are known to (except in the rarest of cases, such as that of him only indirectly, through his senses Ramana Maharshi) the quest is not a single (including his reason, which the call simple achievement. Normally ' this.' clings the ' inner sense ')• But the time may come to its separate individual life with one hand when he apprehends being of another kind : while reaching out for the vast universal potent, unconfined, awe-inspiring, which he life with the other. And the two cannot may think of as ' That \ Henceforth the co-exist. 'This' must surrender utterly to dominant theme of his life is the relationship ' That' and consent to be devoured before it between ' this ' and ' That', between the can merge in the peace of Identity. And it individual who experiences, classifies and fights against it persistently and cunningly, decides and the dimly apprehended Reality. constantly changing its ground and weapons It may be largely a matter of mental training and tactics, when dislodged from one fort• whether he regards ' That' as other than ress slipping round the rear of the attacker ' this ' or as the hidden Self of it. In any and setting up another. case, theoretical conclusions help him very little. What opens before him is a dynamic Hence the uneven course that the quest venture, the attempt to subordinate ' this' takes. It is never a gradual, smooth ascent. to ' That \ The Maharshi said : " Under It always goes in alternate waves of grace whatever name and form one may worship and deprivation, expansion and contraction, the Absolute Reality it is only a means for a phase when life is a lilt of beauty follow• realizing it without name and form. That ed by one of harsh aridity when all that was alone is true Realization wherein one knows achieved seems to have been lost and all oneself in relation to that Reality, attains grace withdrawn. That is because * this turning in love and humility to * That' peace and realizes one's identity with It."2 draws upon itself the grace which is un• The attempt to do this is the quest. interruptedly radiating from ' Thatlike Becoming convinced of the identity of ' this ' light from the sun ; then it filches the grace with ' That' is not realizing it, in fact is only for its own use or aggrandisement. Whether the preliminary position from which to set in thought or deed, it grows proud, considers out on the quest of Realization. ' This ' feels the grace its own and thus interposes its own not only the power but also the grace and dark shadow before the luminosity of pervading beauty of ' That' and is strongly ' Thatcausing an eclipse and shutting off attracted towards it. Whether it calls ' That' the flow of grace. Again and again it repeats ' God ' or ' Self ' this ' is shaken by power• this, learning only very gradually and by ful waves of love and devotion for it. The bitter experience ; and it is only when, in attraction is such that ' this ' feels itself being final desperation, it brings itself to complete drawn in to be devoured and merged in surrender that at last peace comes. Then ' That' and senses that the absorption will 'That' becomes 1 This \ There is no other. produce the peace beyond understanding ; 2 Forty Verses on Reality : V. 5. but at the same time * this' struggles against 3 The Marital Garland of Letters: 28(b). 172 July THE MAHARSHPS PLACE IN HISTORY A New Development in

By

ARTHUR OSBORNE

A NEW development has come about in Hinduism since the time of - krishna. Because, ancient as it is, Hinduism is still capable of development. That means that it is still living, for development is the quality of life, rigidity of death. It is sur• prising how little this development has been noticed ; it just seems to be taken for grant• ed. It is of fundamental importance.

In order to appreciate it one must see clearly what Hinduism is. It is a fusion between an organization of life and worship on what might be called the horizontal plane and paths to Beatitude on the vertical. Of course, not every Hindu takes a path to beatitude — he can still be a Hindu without that. But he cannot be without the hori• zontal affiliation, that is to say without either being integrated into the Hindu social sys• tem or having renounced it, like a sannyasin. And this horizontal modality of Hinduism is so complex that it would be hard for an outsider to fit into it even if he tried. As for his becoming a sannyasin, that would mean tion of life, so that people from outside the adopting the Hindu pattern of life in order Hindu community can receive spiritual to renounce it, which seems rather absurd. guidance from its without needing to integrate themselves into that community. For this reason, Hinduism is not and This is a change of tremendous importance, cannot be a proselytising religion. It is also since it enables the spiritual influence to not an intolerant religion. For those who do radiate out beyond the limits of the organi• follow a path to Beatitude there are a num• zation. For any one who is interested in ber to choose from, and, for instance, one drawing historical parallels, it is not unlike whose path is through the worship of Rama the change which St. Paul brought about will not condemn or try to convert another when, revolting against the orthodoxy of whose path is through the worship of St. Peter and St. James, he decided that those Krishna. Why should not this apply also to who came to Christ from outside Judaeism one whose path is through the worship of need not accept the Jewish law and ritual. Christ ? However, the parallel cannot be pushed too far. The circumstances were different, since What has been happening since the time what then began as a new path to Beatitude of is that the path to Beatitude for those who were seeking soon developed is being separated from the social organiza• into a religion for a whole community with 1968 THE MAHARSHI'S PLACE IN HISTORY 173

its own law and ritual and its own social naturally and without argument initiated organization. foreign disciples, even though she spoke only Bengali, which they did not know. All the What is similar is that, now as then, a other disciples approved of this and of Vive- materialistic world has broken away from kananda's rhore spectacular action in the religion and many are looking around des- West and followed in the same direction. parately for guidance. People are giving up religion and, even for those who seek, Since then this has become the regular the paths to Beatitude are becoming lost or practice with Hindu Gurus. All or almost inaccessible for the guidance is no longer all of them accept foreign disciples without reliable. Divine Providence always meets the expecting them to integrate themselves into needs of its children, but not always in the the Hindu social system or practise Hindu same way. In the time of St. Paul it did religious ritual. so through the establishment of a new reli• This practice culminated in Ramana gion ; to-day it does by making, spiritual Maharshi. There was something mysterious guidance available outside the formal struc• about the initiation he gave — no laying on ture of the religions. This is happening in of hands, no , no outer form at all ; various ways ; in the resurgence of non- only the mouna diksha, the silent initiation. denominational Christian through Although silent, this was a definite event, inspired teachers such as Joel Goldsmith, in not a gradual process. He himself confirmed the spread of in the West, not as this in various oblique ways when necessary, a creed for the many but as a path for the asserting that, from the point of view of the few, and in this new development in Hindu• disciple, the Guru-disciple relationship is a ism, making the path to Beatitude available necessity and explaining that a spiritual outside the structure of Hindu orthodoxy. practice (and he was constantly enjoining The proof that this new development in one) only has potency for those who are Hinduism is a valid and not a heretical one initiated into it. For those who experienced is that it has been brought about from above, his initiation no conformation was neces• by the Masters themselves, beginning with sary. If they were in his presence it was Ramakrishna and culminating in Ramana given through a penetrating look of terrific Maharshi. power ; if at a distance perhaps through a It was Vivekananda who was the most dream or vision, perhaps formlessly. In any spectacular in introducing this new trend case, the disciple felt taken up, swept forward with the Societies he founded in the on a wave of power, thenceforward guided West ; but it was not his innovation. Rama• and supported. And in any case there was krishna was not mistaken in saying that nothing specifically Hindu about it, nothing Vivekananda would complete his work. That to make it available to members of one com• work has two aspects ; to restore Hinduism munity only and inaccessible to others. to vigour and self-respect in India and to That was one advantage of the silent initia• make it known as a spiritual current in the tion. Now that he is no longer in the body we West, a current available to Western seekers. see another also — that it can still continue, Both were carried to completion by • whereas formal initiation could not. He nanda. himself indicated in various ways before Ramakrishna himself had no foreign dis• leaving the body that his guidance would ciples, but he dreamed once that he was in continue ; for instance, when some devotees a Western town of large, modern buildings, complained that he was leaving them with• surrounded by Westerners, and he inter• out guidance and asked what they were to preted it to mean that he would have many do without him, he replied : " You attach disciples in the West. After his Mahasama- too much importance to the body." The , his wife, Sarada Devi, whom all the implication was obvious ; the body was disciples revered as the Holy Mother, quite going, he was not. And indeed, he said 174 THE MOUNTAIN PATH July

" They say that I am going, but where would theoretical basis. To make them universally I go ? I am here." Not " I shall be" but available, outside the ritual of any religion, " I am ". The body could go, but the form• the paths the Maharshi taught were simple less Self, with which he was in constant and direct ; and therefore the doctrine on conscious identity, just is, eternally, here which they were based was universal and and now. free from philosophical technicalities. I say ' paths ' because in fact there were two. He This continued initiation and guidance is would often .say : " Ask yourself ' who am not just theory ; it happens. I will quote a I ? ' or submit ". As simple as that and he case of it described quite recently in a letter declared that these two paths both lead to the from a man in a Yorkshire village of whom same goal. we had no previous knowledge, published in the January 1967 issue of ' The Mountain The one that he offered first was always Path \ Self-enquiry. Only if some one complained that he found this too difficult or that it did "On August 13th (1966), without any not suit his temperament did he tell him in shadow of doubt, Sri Bhagavan bestowed that case to submit, assuring him that sub• his Grace on me. Instruction was also mission would lead to the same goal. Let us implicit in his Grace. And further, even therefore start with a consideration of Self- though I could not admit it to myself at enquiry and the doctrinal basis he provided once (although I knew it to be so) it was for it. initiation and an indication that a Guru- disciple relationship had been created." 1 THE PATH OF ENQUIRY

This formless initiation and guidance of Self-enquiry is not analysis ; it has nothing Bhagavan, spreading invisibly through many in common with philosophy or psychology. countries, has not been institutionalized. This The Maharshi showed this when he declar• also is in conformity with the needs of the ed that no answer the mind gives can be age, when many who respond to it would right. (And, indeed, in this it resembles a not be in a position to join an institution and Zen ). If it had a mental answer it many also would not wish to be dependent would be a philosophical conundrum, not a on one. It is supported outwardly by the spiritual practice ; and it was as a spiritual bocks on or by the Maharshi and by ' The practice that the Maharshi prescribed it. So Mountain Path ', and in some towns the fol• any one who tells you what the answer to lowers of the Maharshi meet together in a the enquiry is shows by that very fact that society where they can meditate and discuss he has not understood it. It does not mean and listen to talks. This is a great facility arguing or saying that I am not this or not where it exists, but it has nothing of the that ; it means concentrating on the pure formality or compulsion of an institution ; sense of being, the pure I-am-ness of me. and there are many for whom even member• And this, one discovers, is the same as pure ship of such a society is not available. Many consciousness, pure, formless awareness. also, by temperament, do not desire it. We see now the wisdom of Bhagavan in establish• So far is it from being a mental practice ing a path which can be followed in solitude that the Maharshi told us not to concentrate and silence, without singing or chanting, on the head while doing it but on the heart. without the knowledge of any sacred lan• By this he did not mean the physical heart guage, independent of the forms and ritual at the left side of the chest but the spiritual of any religion. heart at the right. This is not a physical organ and also not a yogic or tantric ; PATH AND DOCTRINE but it is the centre of our sense of being. The Maharshi told us so and those who have A spiritual path rests on a doctrinal basis, just as a scientific experiment does on a iThe Mountain Path, Jan. 1967, p. 85. 1968 THE MAHARSHI'S PLACE IN HISTORY 175

followed his instructions in meditation have to the cinema screen which is the support for found it to be so. The ancient Hebrews knew the pictures without which they could not of it : " The wise man's heart is at his right be seen, but which is so covered over with hand, but a fool's heart is at his left," 2 it them that it is not ordinarily noticed. Only says in the Bible. It is referred to also in very occasionally for a brief glimpse, does that ancient Advaitic scripture, the the spiritually untrained person experience Vasishta in verses which the Maharshi quot• the sheer fact of being ; and when he does ed as Nos. 22-27 in his Supplementary Forty he recalls it afterwards as having been a Verses on Reality. Concentration on the moment of pure happiness, pure acceptance, heart does not mean thinking about the heart pure rightness. Self-enquiry is the direct but being aware in and with the heart. approach to conscious being, and therefore After a little practice it sets up a current of it is necessary to suspend thinking and doing awareness that can actually be felt physi• while practising it. It may lead to a state cally though far more than physical. At first when conscious (instead of the previous un• this is felt in the heart, sometimes in the conscious) being underlies thinking and heart and head and connecting them. Later doing ; but at first they would interrupt it, it pervades and transcends the body. Per• so they have to be held off. haps it could be said that this current of awareness is the ' answer' to the question This is the path ; the doctrine on which it * Who am I ? ', since it is the wordless is based is Advaita, non-duality, which experience of I-ness. might be rendered ' Identity' or * No-other• ness '. Its scripture for the Maharshi's fol• There should be regular times for this lowers is his ' Forty Verses on Reality9 4 meditation', since the mind accustoms together with the ' Supplementary Forty itself and responds more readily. I have put Verses ' which he later added. the word 1 meditation ' in inverted commas, since it is not meditation in the usual sense In this he declares : " All religions postu• of the word but only concentration on Self late the three fundamentals ; the world, the or on being. As Bhagavan explained : individual and God." 4 " Meditation requires an object to meditate on, whereas in Self-enquiry there is only the Not all in a formal way, for there are also subject and no object."3 Good times are nontheistic religions ; but essentially this is first thing when you wake up in the morn• what we start from. Whether I am educat• ing and last thing before going to sleep at ed or uneducated, my own existence is the night. At first a good deal of time and effort basis from which I start, the direct aware• may be needed before the current of aware• ness to which everything else is added. ness is felt ; later it begins; to arise more and Then, outside myself, my mind and senses more easily. It also begins to occur sponta• report a world of chairs and tables and trees neously during the day, when one is not and sky, and other people in it. Mystics tell meditating. That explains Bhagavan's say• me that all this is illusion, -and nowadays ing that one should keep up the enquiry nuclear scientists agree with them. They constantly, not only during meditation. It say that the red book I am holding is just comes to be more and more constant and, a cluster of electrons whirling about at high when lost or forgotten, to need less and less speed, that its redness is just the way my re-awakening. optic apparatus interprets a vibration of a certain wave-length, and similarly with its A man has three modes of manifestation ; other qualities ; but anyway, that is how it being, thinking and doing. Being is the most 2 Ecclesiastes, X, 2. fundamental of the three^ because he can't 3 The Teachings of Ramana Maharshi in his own think or do unless he first is. But it is so Words, (pub. Sri Ramanasramam), Ch. V. covered over by the other two that > it is 4 Forty Verses on Reality, v. 2 (from the Col• lected Works of Ramana Maharshi? published by seldom experienced, It could be compared Sri Ramanasramam), 176 THE MOUNTAIN PATH July

presents itself to my perception. I also have enquiring into the nature of the I, the I a feeling of some vastness, some power, some perishes. With it, ' you' and ' he' also changeless Reality behind the vulnerability perish."6 However, that does not mean of the individual and the mutability of the blank annihilation ; it only means annihila• world. It is about this third factor that peo• tion of the illusion of separate identity, that ple disagree, some holding that it is the real is to say of the ego, which is the source of Self of the individual, others that it is a all suffering and frustration. Therefore the Being quite other than him, and others again verse continues : " The resultant state, that it does not exist at all. which shines as Absolute Being, is one's own natural state, the Self."7 The verse continues : " But it is only the Not only is this not a gloomy or dismal One Reality that manifests as these three." state or anything to be afraid of, but it is This implies that Self-enquiry is the quest the most radiant happiness, the most perfect of the one Reality underlying the apparent bliss. " For him who is immersed in the bliss trinity of individual, world and God. of Self-realization arising from the extinc• But the mistake inherent in dualism does tion of the ego what more is there to not consist in supposing that God is a achieve ? He does not see anything as being separate Being from you but in supposing other than the Self. Who can apprehend his that you are a separate being from God. It is State ? "8 not belief in God that is wrong but belief in Note that in speaking of the unutterable the ego. Therefore the verse continues : bliss of Self-realization Bhagavan says that "One can say, 'The three are really three it is achieved through the extinction of the only so long as the ego lasts.' " Then the ego, that is the apparent individual identity. verse turns to the practical conclusion, as So that, although nothing is lost, something Bhagavan always did in his teaching : does have to be offered in sacrifice ; and " Therefore to abide in one's own Being, while being offered it appears a terrible loss, where the 11' or ego is dead is the perfect the supreme loss, one's very life ; only after State." it has been sacrificed does one discover that And that is what one is trying to do by it was nothing and that all has been gained, Self-enquiry ; to abide as the Self, the pure not lost. This means that understanding alone Being that one essentially is, casting aside cannot constitute the path. Whatever path the illusory reality of the ego. may be followed, in whatever religion, the battle must be fought and the sacrifice made. Feeling one's insignificance before that Without that a man can go on all his life mighty Power, one may worship It in one proclaiming that there is no ego and yet of Its manifestations — as Krishna, say, or remain as much a slave to the ego as ever. Christ or Rama, but : " Under whatever Although the Forty Verses on Reality are name and form one may worship the Abso• a scripture of the Path of Knowledge, lute Reality, it is only a means for realizing Bhagavan asks in them : " If, since you are It without name and form."5 That means a single being, you cannot see yourself, how appreciating Its Infinity, realizing that It can you see God ? "9 And he goes on to alone is, and leaves no room for a separate answer : " Only by being devoured by Him." me subsisting apart from It. Therefore the This brings the path of enquiry to the verse continues : " That alone is true Rea• same point as the path of surrender, since in lization wherein one knows oneself in rela• either case the ego must be sacrificed. It is a tion to that Reality, attains peace and rea• very profound verse. It recalls the Hebrew lizes one's identity with It." 5 Ibid., v. 8. And this is done by Self-enquiry. " If the 6 Ibid., v. 14. 7 Ibid., v. 14. firsts person, I, exists, then the second and 8 Ibid., v. 31. third persons, you and he, also exist. By 9 Ibid., v. 21, 1968 THE MAHARSHFS PLACE IN HISTORY 177 saying : "No man can see God and live." Actually, the reason for disagreement is Many people see visions of God in one form only that the two declarations are inade• or another, but that is not seeing God. The quately worded. Is Supreme Being the very mind and senses of a man knot themselves Self of me or totally other than me ? We together into what wrongly supposes itself obviously cannot answer that until we know to be an individual entity separate from the who or what is the 1 me ' about whom the Universal Being which it aspires to see. But question is asked. The very Self of whom ? that Universal Being is the true Self of it. Other than whom ? So once again we are Only by surrendering their illusory indivi• driven back to Self-enquiry. I feel myself dual entity to be devoured out of existence to be an individual entity with likes and can the mind and senses become true instru• dislikes, abilities and disabilities, before a ments for perception by what is thereafter vast Presence, an illimitable Potency, which understood to be their true Self, so that, as I can only dimly apprehend. Can that pre• the Maharshi sometimes said, the only way sence be the same as Me ? It is certainly not to see God is to be God. the same as this individual entity ; but is this individual entity the reality of me ? It THE PATH OF SURRENDER was not here before birth ; it will not be here after death ; it has grown and evolved There are many who are drawn rather to and will decay and disintegrate. The mis• a path of love, devotion and surrender than take, then, as I said in speaking of verse 2 to one of inner quest, that is of Self-enquiry. ©f the Forty Verses, is not in supposing there For them too the Maharshi reduced his to be a God separate from me but in sup• teaching to the simplest essential when he posing there to be a me separate from God. said : " There are two ways ; ask yourself There are only two things to do : one is ' Who am I ?-' or submit." No matter whe• to sacrifice this apparent individual entity ther the ego submits to God with form or (as Bhagavan declared even in speaking of without form or whether in the form taught the Path of Knowledge when he said that it by one religion or another, so long as it must be devoured by God) ; the other is to utterly and completely submits. But what find out what is the reality of me. The can induce it to submit ? Not the hope of answer is not a form of words but an any heavenly reward, because that would be experience. It is better to have it than to bargaining, not submission. Only love can describe it. The individual yearns for its own evoke submission ; therefore the path of destruction in Union with the Universal. surrender is also the path of love. Bhagavan says in the Garland : " Unite with me to destroy Thee and me and bless me For people who take this path also with ever-vibrant joy, Arunachala ! " 10 The Bhagavan composed a scriptural basis for destruction of separate selves is the gateway it ; in this case The Marital Garland of to ever-vibrant joy. The whole tone of tho Letters to Sri Arunachala, that is the first two scriptures is different. Where the Forty of the Five Hymns to Arunachala. Verses were hard as granite and sharp a.« Before speaking of this path, however, let steel, the Garland is one of the great mysti• us anticipate an objection. That is that phi• cal love poems of all time. Never have I read losophers have written countless books and anything so moving and compelling, even in articles, and still do, maintaining that God is translation. either the very Self of you or totally other than you, each side denouncing the other and Death is promised, but at the same time declaring it at fault. How then can a Master resurrection : " Hast thou not bartered Thy• regard it as a mere matter of temperament self for me ? Oh, Thou art death to me, which one believes ? How can he offer a Arunachala! "n But it is I who am the choice to his followers ? Ought he not to state definitely that one is right and the other io Marital Garland of Letters, v. 56. (from the Collected Works of Ramana Maharshi). wrong ? nibid., v. 62, r 178 THE MOUNTAIN PATH July

gainer by the exchange : " Thou art the Pri• he specifically says in Self-enquiry : " As mal Being while I count not in this or the there are elaborate treatises on the elements other world. What didst Thou gain then of ashtanga yoga, only as much as is neces• by my worthless self, Oh, Arunachala ? "12 sary is written here. Any one who desires The loss of individual entity is the gain of to know more must resort to a practising Divine identity : " The moment Thou didst and learn from him in detail ",16 welcome me, didst enter into me and grant me Thy divine life, I lost my individuality, marga, on the other hand, in the Oh Arunachala ! "13 sense of disinterested, harmonious action, free from self-interest, doing what is right Thus the two paths come to the same goal. simply because it is right, regardless of The difference is rather of emphasis. In the praise or blame, profit or loss as Sri Krishna Path of Knowledge initiative is rather with taught Arjuna in the Gita, is particularly the seeker : " To seek and abide in the Rea• suited to modern tinies ; and both the paths lity that is always attained is the only that Bhagavan taught, and , Attainment."14 In the Path of Surrender the were to be combined with karma marga. It burden of initiative is thrown on the Lord, is possible to follow either of them as a though even so some effort must be made : recluse shut off from the world, but that " Weak though my effort was, by Thy Grace was not Bhagavan's teaching. Time and I gained the Self, Oh Arunachala ! "15 In again some one would ask his authorisation the same sense, Bhagavan has said (and it to renounce the world, but he did not give it. remains true now as in his lifetime) : " Sub• He always taught that the battle was to be mit to me and I will strike down the mind." fought in the life of the world, in the midst Probing into the Truth behind one's of family and professional life. " If you apparent individual entity and sacrificing renounce it will only substitute the thought that apparent entity in love to God both lead of renunciation for that of the family and to the illimitable bliss of Pure Being. Theo• the environment of the forest for that of the rising about the outcome leads nowhere. household. But the mental obstacles are always there for you. They even increase And what, it might be asked, of the other greatly in the new surroundings. Change of two paths, yoga marga and karma marga, environment is no help. The one obstacle is did Bhagavan not teach them also ? It is of the mind, and this must be overcome whether the very of this new development of in the home or the forest. If you can do it in Hinduism that ritual and technique are the forest, why not in the home ? So why simplified to the utmost to make it available change the environment ? Your efforts can to those also who are not Hindus or who, be made even now, whatever the environ• 17 being Hindus, are more or less cut off from ment." the traditional forms of Hinduism. It would 12 Ibid., v. 93. have been incongruous, therefore, if Bha• 13 Ibid., v. 95. gavan who brought this development to its 14 Forty Verses, v. 35. completion, had given instruction in a high• 15 Marital Garland, v. 45. 16 Self Enquiry, p. 25. ly technical approach such as yoga. Indeed, 17 Maharshi's Gospel, Vol. 1, p. 6.

Brahman is supreme. He is the reality — the one without a second. He is pure consciousness, free from any taint. He is tranquillity itself. He has neither beginning nor end. He does not change. He is joy forever. — Sankara. , 1968 179 ZEN AND THE VICHARA

By

G. J. YORKE

^TEN Buddhists believe that some 2,500 that. It is simple because the immediate years ago prince Gautama left home at cause is something like opening one's eyes the age of 29 to become a digambara, a and seeing a star, some 1 turning' word, wandering naked ascetic. After six years gesture or look of one's teacher, or dropping during which he mastered many of the tech• a cup and hearing it smash. At the same niques of yoga, he decided that yogic time it is appallingly difficult because it is ascetism and the trance states or the climax of many lives devoted to spiritual to which it leads were not the whole answer. struggle and the discipline of dhyana. So he left his guru, decided to wear clothes once more and, if possible, to eat at least If the Zen allegory is true, the Buddha's once a day. When he had recovered his gesture of holding up a flower instead of health he sat down under a tree and vowed preaching a sermon was the first recorded that he would not leave its shade until he instance in Buddhism of the Transmission of was enlightened. Mind. There was a sealing of mind and heart by mind and heart. On that level there was I like to think that he sat under that tree no doctrine to teach, but a mutual experi• reviewing his life and all that he had been ence was shared and acknowledged. For taught and had experienced. That he then both men the common acts of daily life had entered within himself and passed through become ultimate wisdom. the various trance states or samadhis, start• ing with those with form and then refining Ramana Maharshi put it like this : " to them into the formless and inexpressible, those who have realized the Self, as well as until he entered what the Chinese call the to those who have not, the world is# real. of Sameness or Universality. In it But to the unenlightened, Truth is adapted he was still unenlightened. In Zen idiom he to the form of the world, whereas to the was sitting on top of a pole from which he enlightened Truth shines as the formless had still to step down to extend the hand of perfection and the substratum of the compassion to all sentient beings. world."

He came out of the samadhi, opened his Zen puts it in simpler language. About eyes and saw the Morning Star. Suddenly 900 years ago two Chinese Zen masters met he was the Buddha, the Enlightened One. for the first time and one asked the other He was what he had always been, but at last three questions to see whether he was he was aware of it. enlightened. The replies show that he was. The dialogue runs : Some six months later he began to turn the wheel of the by giving his first Q. What is the world? sermon or discourse. He was back in the A. Just so. world once more. As a Chinese Q. Who are you ? put it, the wind in the trees became his A. What! What! sermon of liberation. Q. How do you receive visitors? A. We have a cup of tea. It is said that one day, instead of giving a sermon, he held up a flower and his senior Bhagavan Ramana Maharshi was like disciple Mahakashyapa smiled. Enlighten• those two Zen masters. The English novelist, ment was and is as simple and as difficult as Somerset Maugham, once visited Tiruvanna- 180 THE MOUNTAIN PATH July malai to get background for his novel The of being beaten up by a Communist gang. Razor's Edge. But on arrival at the His deathbed gatha for his successor ran Ramanashram he had a slight heart attack thus : brought on by the heat. As he was resting in a small room, Bhagavan entered and sat ' Taking pity upon ants, the shrimp jumps not into the water' on a chair; near the bed. Half an hour pass• ed and then Somerest Maugham stuttered : In other words out of compassion for the ' Oughtn't I to say something ? ' Bhagavan communist ants, the Ch'an master had not replied: "No, silence is best." Similar escaped to Hongkong or Taiwan and his revealing anecdotes are told of Sai Baba and successor carries on secretly in China today. Ramakrishna. In the 12th century a Japanese monk took of the ninth Century say the Transmission to Japan where it was that the Buddha before his death officially called Zen. There too it has been passed established the Dhyana School, which is now down from Roshi to Roshi until the present called Zen, by giving his robe to Maha- day. . The great Kashyapa in due course tested Ananda when the latter asked : When in 526 A.D. reached ' What did the Buddha transmit in addition China and was asked by the Emperor what to the robe ? ' Mahakashyapa replied by he taught, he replied : calling out : ' Ananda ! ' Ananda said : ' Yes ' and suddenly was enlightened. Maha• A special Transmission outside the Scriptures, kashyapa acknowledged the enlightenment Without dependence upon words and letters, Directly pointing to the mind and heart by saying : ' Pull down the flag-pole', by of man, which he meant that no more sermons were Seeing into one's own true nature and necessary. becoming a Buddha.

Each Patriarch or Head of the Dhyana Now the Transmission is outside the School is said to have transmitted the light Scriptures because seeing into one's real to his 'successor in a similar direct way until nature, finding out who or what one is, is a about 1,000 years later Bodhidharma, who personal experience. It is a result of doing, was a Tamil, became the 28th Patriarch and not of telling, studying or listening to lec• took the Transmission to China. There it tures. This experience is called kensho or was called Ch'an, which is the Chinese in Japanese. But to discuss kensho or transliteration of the word satori only leads people astray, for they then ' dhyana'. The Dhyana School, however, theorise about it. has left no discernible traces in India, so that Chinese and Western scholars argue The Maharshi used to say : " Preoccupa• that it was a Chinese invention. It may have tion with theory, doctrine and philosophy been, but if so it does not matter, for the can be harmful as it interferes with the allegory, if such it be, was devised by a really important work of spiritual effort by master. offering an easier alternative which is merely mental ". In China the Transmission and possibly the Robe were passed down through five Zen puts it thus : flowers are red and historical Chinese Patriarchs who are willows are green, but kensho or satori -— counted as six by the inclusion of the that is to say seeing into the Self-nature — Indian Bodhidharma. Then the Transmission is a flower in the sky, a ghost in thin air. but not the Robe passed from Ch'an master When you talk about it or seek it, it cannot to master until the present day. be found.

Some three years ago Ch'an master Hsu ' Without dependence upon words and Yun died at the ripe age of 119 as a result letters ' means that no amount of learning 1968 ZEN AND THE VICHARA 181

will help you to realize who you are or your go and find where his eyes are in order to own true nature. The Guru is within, yet see. The heart is there, always open to you you and I need a human guru to help us find if you care to enter it, always supporting that Guru within. your movements, although you may be un• aware of it. It is, perhaps, more correct to Since there is no dependence upon words say that the Self is the heart. Really the Self and letters, Zen roshis although they know is everywhere aware of itself as the Heart and quote from the Buddhist Scriptures or Self-awareness." rarely use the technical terms of . They talk, as Ramana Maharshi In other words to see into your Self you did, in simple everyday language. Thus Zen have to meditate in the heart. But no one keeps fluid and alive as each roshi coins his can tell you where that Heart is or what the own words and analogies to express the Self-nature is like. inexpressible and relate it to this world. As for ' Seeing into one's own true nature and becoming Buddha ' Bhagavan put it like ( When asked about the nature of the Buddha, he may talk about something in the this : ' The mind turned outwards results in room, of a mother-in-law leading a bride thoughts. Turned inward it becomes the on a donkey, of three pounds of flax, or even Self.' The simplest way in which you and of a piece of paper. Intuitively he hits upon I can get a feel of what this means is to take the very analogy, piece of nonsense or even the darshan of a Christian, Buddhist or apparent blasphemy which can burst the Hindu saint — of someone like the late logical bonds of the questioner's habitual Ramakrishna, Sai Baba, Ramdas or Ramana mode of thought or belief. For it is one's Maharshi. Of the gurus available today I pattern of thought which is so often a barrier suggest Ananda Mayi Ma. to one's spiritual understanding. The saints, roshis or gurus are simple peo• And so in Zen the is called ple who live an active life in the world and by 1,000 names and analogies such as the yet can sit quietly over a cup of tea. They Buddha-nature, the essence of mind, the see mountains as mountains and you and me true man of no position, a tree in the court• as we are. They weep with those who yard, a round cake that happens to be on the mourn and laugh with those who make table at the time, this or that. merry. But they are few and far between while their imitators are legion. Then, since words are inadequate to ex• press the inexpressible, gestures are used in Then what should you and I do if we their place. Ghu-chi for instance would often aspire to bodhi (Enlightenment), or answer questions by raising a finger, Lin-chi (Liberation) ? Should we burn our books would give a loud bellow or roar, while and our boats, fly to Japan and sweat in the Yeng-shen would just draw a circle in the discipline of Zen meditation under. a roshi : air — and so on in infinite variety. or give up everything to sit at the feet of someone like Ananda Mayi Ma ? One or two In most books on Zen the third line of of us may be ready to do so, if we have Bodhidharma's gatha is mistranslated worried enough over the books and find our• ' direct pointing to the mind \ But the selves in the treadmill of dogma, debate and Chinese word translated mind primarily speculation so that we know we are getting means heart. If you are centred only in the nowhere. If our frustration has given rise to mind, you depend upon name and form a red-hot iron ball of doubt which only the (nama-rupa). But to see into your real discipline of Zen or the Vichara can melt nature you have to turn inwards into your and disperse, then perhaps we are ready to heart, which does not mean your physical go. But you are not ready if you have mere• heart or the chakra. As the Maha• ly caught a touch of the general feeling of rshi used to say : " A man does not have to unease which is growing in the world today, 182 THE MOUNTAIN PATH July for this is not enough to justify throwing up stilling our desires and suppressing our egos everything to sit under a Zen roshi or a so that we realize in part who we really are. Hindu guru. Nor should one use it as an excuse to dive unaided straight out of one's The meditational disciplines of Zen and depth into the sea of meditation. To do so the Vichara are designed to free us from without a guru at one's elbow is to ask for name and form (nama-rupa), from our ten• trouble. dencies (vasanas), thoughts and emotions, so that suddenly the light of our Buddha- nature, that is of our Self, breaks through. Some people argue, quoting Ramana In Zen jargon one sees one's . Maharshi as their authority, that the Guru within is sufficient. And so it is, but only for Each one of us is an iceberg at the mercy a really spiritual person who is on the of wind and wave in the ocean of samsara. threshold of liberation. Remember that I The vast submerged mass of that iceberg and most of us are not always able to dis• represents the alaya-vijnana, the reservoir tinguish between the subtle insinuations of of our potentialities for good and evil of the ego and the enlightened promptings of which we are still almost completely un• the Guru within. So it is best to be humble aware. The water in that iceberg has been and consult a human guru until he merges frozen into a mis-shapen mass by our with the inner Guru. prarabda karma : by our heredity, environ• ment and upbringing ; by our habitual Now the Buddhist aim is to experience the thoughts and emotions : and by the fact that Great Tranquillity, Enlightenment or Libera- " for each one of us the world is still centred tion for the sake of all sentient beings. round the individual that bears our name. Ramana Maharshi put it like this : We are still ice-bound. We do not flow free• ly or live without constraint. Whether we Between the Self of Pure Consciousness and know it or not, we are each shut in a pri• the physical body there arises mysteriously the ego-sense or I-notion, a hybrid that is vate world of our own imagining. Mountains neither of them. This flourishes as an indi• to us are what we imagine them to be, not vidual being. This ego or individual being what they are. To be free and enlightened, is at the root of all that is futile and un• to see oneself and this wonderful world as desirable in life. Therefore it has to be they really are, one has first to melt that ice• destroyed by all possible means. Then that berg with the fires of compassion, faith and which ever is alone remains resplendent. meditation. This is Liberation or Enlightenment or Self-realization.' I am now going to say something of what you do and what you should not do when This has to be done now, down here in sitting in Zen meditation. But I can only Samsara and not in some future and tempo• touch on the subject as the variations in the rary heaven. But it cannot be experienced methods taught by different roshis or gurus until one has given up all that one has and and in the personal needs of each disciple are thinks that one is, and this not all are pre• endless. So I shall only recommend what pared to do. The I-thought is always, if appeals to me personally, thus painting a not there, at least only just beneath the one-sided and personal picture. surface. First let me say what you should not do What then has Zen or the Vichara to offer in Zen giving the reasons in almost direct you and me ? The answer is that level of quotation from what Ramana Maharshi said spontaneity, tranquillity and awareness to in reply to questions. which each one of us can attain while con• tinuing to live in the world with our present There is no need to induce the manifesta• commitments. Its depth will depend upon tion of any given form of shakti through how far we succeed through meditation in pranayama or any other method, because the 1968 ZEN AND THE VICHARA 183

Self — or Buddha-nature — became all is all there is to . The vichara is not these shaktis. a theme but turning inward.

You do not have to awaken In Soto Zen one's first theme, which is not deliberately or to explore the , each a mental one, is a variant of satippatthana of which has its own kind of power or know• as developed and taught by the Buddha. You ledge, because the Self-nature or essence of just watch and observe your whole breath• mind supports them all. ing process. To start with you feel the You do not try to enter any heaven or any breath as it enters and leaves the nostrils : given samadhi, for they too are supported then you follow it into and out of your body. by the Self. If you do so by chance it is That is all. You do not try to stop thoughts an experience for which you are ready and rising, but when they do you try not to you work through it. If you stay in it, you follow them. The moment you follow a train will never rise above that level and so will of thought, a feeling or an emotion, you are remain unenlightened. caught by it and are no longer watching your breath. You do not visualise your ishta-devata in order to worship at his feet, for seeing God In the process you discover various things : is only being the Self. Your own natural breath rhythm : an aware• ness first of your physical and then of your You do all you can NOT to enter Sunyata, subtle body, of your thoughts, feelings and the void, for the mind finds a void whenever emotions. In other words without delibe• it ceases to see and experience : but that is rately trying to do so, you explore the kosas not the real you. You are the constant illu• until you find that the vijnana-maya kosa is mination that lights up both experiences and only the sheath of the I and not the I itself. the void. You do all this naturally without forcing " It is unnecessary to meditate on Tat anything and, after a time, without theoris• Tvam Asi, since you are now eternally That. ing about it, if a samadhi swallows you treat 1 Why should you be for ever thinking : 1 it in the same way as an asuric revolt against am That \ Does a man have to go on think• the whole process of zazen — but with this ing ' I am a man' ? Are we not always difference, you cannot help enjoying it. You That ? ". It is the same with ' Brah- learn a little more from each experience and masmi'. does not say so. What then * walk on '. need is there for him to say it ? The real I always abides in Brahman. All you have From just sitting and watching the breath to do is to find out who you are. — which is not easy when the breathing dies down to something so nearly imperceptible Now for what one does. Bhagavan once that you lose it — you go on to what is call• put it like this : ed shihkhantaza in Soto Zen. Here you no "The Bliss of the Self can only manifest in a longer bother about the breath : you just sit mind made subtle and steady through motionless trying to be acutely aware. assiduous meditation. He who experiences Slowly you begin to appreciate what aware• that Bliss is liberated even while still alive ". ness is. As with the taste of a mango none can tell you what it is like, you have to It may be helpful to master a meditational experience it for yourself. asana, but remember that the Maharshi said : ' asana really means steadfastness in Ramana Maharshi said : " The essence of the Self and is inward.' mind is only awareness or consciousness. But when the ego overloads it, it functions In Zen one may have to master a theme, as reasoning or perceiving. The universal which in fact is not a mental one. Mastery mind, not being limited by the ego, has here means that you have to dwell on that nothing outside itself and is therefore only theme as continuously as possible. And that aware." 184 THE MOUNTAIN PATH July

One must remember, however, not to get The third is : The Sixth Patriarch asked stuck in the awareness of any given state, the head monk Myo : " Thinking neither of for on this level it is only another experi• good nor of evil, at this very moment, what ence, whereas enlightenment is an all-inclu• was your original face before your father sive state of being. and mother were born ? "

The technical term for this type of aware• In China, Hongkong, Taiwan and Vietnam ness — or silent illumination — is samatha the koan " Who am I ? ", namely the Vichara, and its main danger is that you just sit is used at this stage. But if the meditator vacantly in a happy haze, becoming a pool has been accustomed to repeating the mantra of stagnant water, a stone maiden or a piece of Amitabha Buddha he will be given the of dead wood. Long ago a young student, variant " Who is repeating the Buddha's full of the illusions that beset us all, used to name ? " I understand that this variant is sit locked in meditation every available also given by Obaku Zen roshis in Japan minute. His roshi, after observing him for today. Strictly speaking there is no answer some time, approached him one day and to a koan, but one has to arrive at a reply asked : " What are you doing ? ". " I want which shows that one has seen into it. This to become a Buddha", replied the young reply is not necessarily a logical answer and monk. The roshi without a word picked up may not even be verbal, but it holds water a brick that happened to be there and began absolutely to any one else who has also seen rubbing it. " What are you doing, master ? " into it. And so you should see your roshi asked the astonished pupil. " I am making a as regularly as possible to show him your mirror" said the old man. " But, master, latest attitude or reaction to your koan. You no amount of rubbing will make a mirror should also attend as many as possible of the out of that brick." " And no amount of seven or eight special weeks devoted ex• sitting will make a Buddha out of a clod ", clusively to koan meditation at his Sodo was the master's curt retort, with which he during the year. ended his lesson for the day.

Sooner or later in Soto Zen one's roshi will The replies that one gives to the roshi are take one oft this samatha-type meditation 'reflections of what Buddhists call one's state which was designed by the Buddha to or degree of ignorance, or, as we say in the awaken awareness, for it by-passes the West, one's psychological attitude. The reasoning mind. But one still has to work roshi's * No' to all one's answers undermines on the mind before one can discover its this attitude and drives one further back or down into oneself. How the student reacts source. And so he gives one an iron ball to this is individual to him. Whether he upon which to chew. does or does not become aware of his idosyn- In Rinzai, as in Soto Zen, the basic atti• cracies, of all that he thinks and feels, that tude is taken for granted, but in Rinzai one he is, also depends upon him. The roshi will is guided through the early stages of sitting repeatedly tell him to have a spring cleaning, by the head monk : one does not come but whether he takes this to refer to his directly under the roshi until one is ready room, house, garden or heart, all of them or for koan meditation. When one is ready, the none, literally or metaphorically, also de• roshi will give one of the three following pends on him. Dharmakaya . If we were all the same a clear answer The first is : a monk asked Master Joshu : could be given as to what it means to ZooJc ' Has the dog Buddha-nature or not ? ' Joshu into a koan or the Vichara. But all our sur• answered: ' '. (Mu means No). face waves are different, so that there is no The second is : Hakuin Zenji used to say single answer. The '-original face' is not to his disciples : " Listen to the sound of one mine, but my approach to it is peculiar to hand clapping." me and is conditioned by my private set of 1968 ZEN AND THE VICHARA 185 delusions. If I want to find out what a thing deal with differentiation. You are resharpen- feels or tastes like, I must try to do it for ing your sword of discrimination. myself, whether it is drinking iced water or The second series which you tackle is con• looking into a koan. cerned with the study and investigation of What you should do is simple — go on words. Before you can teach Zen or under• working at your theme, koan or the vichara, stand its Scriptures, you have to penetrate as constantly as you can. Walk on. In the directly into words and understand them Words of the Maharshi : "It (the theme) thoroughly. The Lankavatara says of will become constant when the mind is this : " To penetrate into the Fundamental strengthened. Repeated practice strengthens Principle and not to penetrate into the teach• the mind and such a mind can hold on to the ings on it is like opening your eyes in the theme. Then. . . the theme will remain dark. To penetrate into both the Funda• uninterrupted, no matter what you are mental Principle and the teachings on it is doing ". And he added : " To be the Self like opening your eyes into the clear light that you really are is the only way to realize of day ". the Bliss that is yours." As Miura Roshi put it : " To illumine one's mind with old learning during the day and One cannot pass one's first or Dharmakaya to deepen one's discernment of the principle koan until one has entered or experienced by meditation in the Monks' Hall at night, for a timeless moment what Mirua Roshi this is indeed to illumine the teachings with called the undifferentiated realm of the one's own nature. Inside and outside are Dharmakaya. Hakuin Zenji said this of it : one, this and that are transcended. It is like " When activity of mind is exhausted and two mirrors mutually reflecting one another your capacity for feeling has come to a dead with no shadow between them ". end, if something should take place not un• like a cat springing upon a mouse, or the Next there is a series of koans about which mother hen hatching her eggs, then in a flash I know nothing except that they are called great livingness springs up. This is the Nanto, which means ' difficult to pass moment when the phoenix escapes from the through '. And there is a last series through golden nest, when the crane breaks the bars which you experience what is called ' the of its cage." The goose has left the bottle. reciprocal interpenetration between the apparent and the Real'. They deal with If however you think that such a glimpse what is called in Zen jargon the host and into your true nature is enough you become guest positions. Finally some roshis then a mere worm living in the mud of self- return you to the koan that you were given accredited enlightenment. All you have done at first some ten or more years ago. is to pass what is called the barrier of the The full course of training takes some*ten Patriarchs and your real training has only or fifteen years of fairly constant work begun. You have not done more than enter• under your roshi before you are authorised ing the stream. To attain enlightenment in to train others in the koan discipline. Then Rinzai Zen you have to look into and pass you have to ' mature your compassionate through another four series of koans. heart'. Having realized that Zen is 1 free• After deepening your insight into the un• dom, actuality, action and daily life, you have differentiated realm of the Dharmakaya by to live it. If, however, you fail to attract seeing into more Dharmakaya koans you disciples or, having attracted them, you fail have to come back down to earth so as to to pass on the Transmission to at least one experience the marvellous realm of differen• of thenT, so that you fail of an heir, you will tiation. This is done by concentrated reflec• learn that after all you have failed to realize tion over and over again on the koans that your intrinsic enlightenment. 186 July

ABOUT SRI ANANDAMAYI MA

By

Dr. (Miss) BITHIKA MUKERJI JUNE 1966. Hall of the Sri Anandamayi Ashram in Kishenpur, Dehradun. is just over. It is the time for conversation with Mataji.1 The hall is quite crowded with the inmates of the Ashram, guests from outside who have come to spend some time with Mataji, and visitors from the town. An old gentleman who is occupying a front seat asks permission to put a question to Mataji. She smilingly nods assent. " What have you achieved by your sddhana ? " he asks. " Here, the question of achievement or sddhana does not arise. I am what I have always been." The gentleman consults a paper and then says : " What is your message to the world ? " " What message can one give who has not achieved or learnt anything ? " The gentleman does not share the general appreciation of this prompt rejoinder. He is in earnest. The Mataji " Ma, I have travelled a long distance to see you. When I go back, my friends will " The bad-ones do not allow the good-ones ask : ' What is she like ? What did she to ue effective. However, from the ulti• say ? ' and then what am I to tell them ? I mate point of view there is no such thing want to understand your message ! " as good and evil." "Very well, tell them: 'I Jfiave a small The gentleman professes himself pleased daughter ; she prattles of whatever occurs and satisfied with this answer. to her.' You said, ' When others ask', He no doubt would have been extremely therefore I said: 'I am your child,' but surprised to hear Mataji on other occasions actually you and I are one, aren't we ? advocate the ritualistic worship of deities. There is only one all-pervading Atma, She also countenances forms of worship naught else except the ONE. You yourself which relegate ritualism to a bare minimum. are a barrier unto yourself in the form of It cannot be said that Mataji has any reli• samshdras. The destiny of every human gion, doctrine or method of her own because being is to destroy the veil that hides his she accepts and approves of all of them. She own Self. To realize the Self means to rea• would in effect say : " How can you impose lize God and to realize God is to realize limitations on the Infinite by declaring : one's Self." 1 This is the only true way' ? " " There are good as well as bad samskaras. i Sri Anandamayi Ma is generally known as Do good samskaras" also act as barriers ? " (Ma' or 'Mataji.' 1968 ABOUT SRI ANANDAMAYI MA 187

" Why should there by so many different The variety of the advice she gives would religions and sects ? Because through every explain to a large extent the difference of one of them He gives Himself to Himself, so opinion amongst her devotees about Mataji's that each person may advance according to teachings. Some will claim that she upholds his individual uniqueness . . . "2 orthodoxy : "She told me not to eat food cooked by a non-." Another will Mataji's teachings are mainly for the say : " Mataji never believed in the caste individual and as such it would be as futile system. Did she not have the temple doors to enumerate her words of guidance as to in the Ashram at Dacca opened for all, many pin point the radiating flashes of a diamond. years before such a movement started else• To each questioning person she generally where in India ? " replies according to his cultural background, his capacity to understand and also the We may hear such contradictory state• degree of his conviction. However, some ments as : " She believes in education. She generalizations may be attempted without has asked me to study hard and finish my fear of misrepresentation. educational career before I think of doing Mataji has been guiding people away from anything else," and : " Education is not the ways which lead to religious frenzy or important. She told me : ' This education extreme rigorisms. Mataji never delivers a will help you to earn material wealth only. talk. Neither does she herself perform any You must strive for spiritual wealth'." Or : ritual whatever. She usually encourages the " Mataji so strongly advises against the singing of Nama Kirtana and sometimes breaking up of a home : it is no use arguing takes active part in it. Mataji is easily able that my difficulties can be solved only by to establish rapport between herself and going away. She always exhorts me to have people of all countries, age groups and patience and forgive again and again." coming from various walks of life. And : " She has told me that no duty is binding for one who goes forth in quest of Now that she is quite well known, many God." foreign seekers after Truth, artists, jour• nalists and tourists visiting India make it a Some will assert that she upholds the ideal point to meet her. Mataji receives them as of social service, others that she advocates she receives thousands of others. The writer renunciation of the world for the sake of of this article, as one of the interpreters, has God, and each person will be correct. had numerous opportunities to watch Mataji with foreigners. She gives them the same It must be understood that all these teach• individual treatment as to persons well ings are the variations of just one theme : known to her. To superficial questions her The supreme duty of every human being is answers consist of two or three words and to strive for the realization of THAT WHICH the interview is terminated before it has IS. She knows no compromise in this. All well begun. To a few she gives detailed other obligations, namely towards family, instructions about many things. country, humanity have their places in the hierarchy of human values but they are all In a particular case the interpreter had a subsumed under the supreme duty towards strong feeling that the translation was God : "To aspire for the realization of superfluous. Mataji hardly waited for it to Truth is alone worthy of man." " It is man's be over before she would start speaking duty to bear in mind that he exists for God again. The man, looking at her face, would alone — for His service and for the realiza• nod understanding^, as if the meaning, tion of Him."3 which was already clear to him, was being confirmed by the translator. Indeed, many 2 Words of Sri Anandamayi Ma. (Published in foreigners have experienced no difficulty in 1961 by the Shree Shree Anandamayee Sangha, communicating with Mataji although she .) 3 Quoted from Matri Vani, a collection of speaks only Bengali and Hindi. Mataji's replies to letters, 188 THE MOUNTAIN PATH July

But it cannot be said that Mataji recom• pray to Him to make you a good boy or girl. mends renunciation of the world. To the oft Say : 'JLord, I don't know where you are. repeated question : " Should I renounce the Grant that I may find you.' At night, do world because this would be helpful to a life pranama again and if you have done any• of sadhanb," she has variously replied : thing wrong, ask God to let you do better " The time has not come for you to do so the next day. (2) Try to obey your parents since the question arises in your mind whe• and elders. (3) Study well. (4) Always ther you should or not." speak the truth. (5) Laugh and play, run and jump to your heart's content and if you " The call of the Divine must be felt as a can do the first four things you may be compulsion. A man who hears this call naughty and mischievous as well." leaves all behind even as a dry leaf falls from its branch." To a busy housewife she said : " You have " If renunciation does not purge one clean no time during the day but the nights are of every sense of duty and obligation, it is your own. It does not matter when or how merely a flight into another world." you remember God. Divine Grace is all- pervasive. Everyone - should constantly " A man does not debate whether he endeavour to be in readiness to receive this should escape from a holocaust." ever-present Grace." Mataji generally maintains that so long as A religious life does not mean a life of duties are meaningful they should be carried idleness. What is required is to live out meticulously and as a service to God. constantly in the presence of God. Nobody She repeats this again and again to states• need neglect any duty to practise sddhana. men, businessmen, intellectuals, ignorant, Admittedly, there are conditions that are rich, poor, old and young. " The Ashram of not conducive to a religious atmosphere. But the householder is a field of service and Mataji's counsel in general would be to every service should be performed as a make the best of the existing circumstances. worship of God." It is only she who can devise ways and " Abide by your duty. To live in the home means out of seemingly unsurmountable that he has created for himself is surely difficulties. fitting for a householder. Do not, however, Mataji is rather strict about the quality neglect the search for your real Home. Only and purity of food for persons engaged in when this has been found has one truly spiritual discipline. The general rules of come home ".4 orthodoxy are maintained in her " There are various modes of living : one because this seems a desirable arrangement is the Ashram of the householder ; another for all concerned. She sometimes says: to do service, regarding whomever one " You have come here for the purpose of serves as a manifestation of the Supreme serious sadhana. Everyone lives within an Being ; a third way is to fix Self-realization aura of his own creation. The commingling as the one and only goal and advance of natures is not conducive to progress on towards it with uninterrupted speed and this path." Such advice is for the inmates determination. In keeping with his incli• of the ashrams and for other serious minded nations and bent of mind everyone chooses devotees. She does not seek to change the one of these modes of living. God Himself customs ordinarily followed by people.

will take care of everything that concerns * -X- * a man who puts his whole trust in Him." Mataji was born in 1896 in the village of To children Mataji sometimes says some• Kheora, now in East Pakistan. Her parents, thing like this : " You are my friends, devout , named her Nirmala aren't you ? Will you do something for this Sundari. friend of yours ? (1) As soon as you wake up in the morning bow down to God and ^Matri Vani. 1968 ABOUT SRI ANANDAMAYI MA 189

By all accounts she was an extremely of dignity were always exemplary. All the obedient, helpful and radiantly happy child. years I was with him I did not even have an Her mother does not recall that Nirmala inkling of the desires which assail mankind. Sundari ever expressed a wish of her own. It is now that I hear unending tales of From her infancy she exercised unusual troubles and transgressions." attraction on all who met her. For a short Mataji was never taught any spiritual time only she was a pupil of the local practices, neither did she engage in them in village school. She was ever ready to help the accepted sense of the term. However, with the chores, not only at home but at all during the years she spent in Bajitpur and the neighbouring houses. Mataji has always Dacca (roughly from 1918-1926), she spon• approved of physical work. She herself, was taneously went not only through the varie• untiringly engaged in household work till gated sadfianas indicated in the Hindu the years 1923-24. She was able even to Scriptures but also those of other faiths. The combine the life of a hard-working house• effects of these practices manifested on her wife with that of the ascetic engaged in body. She would be in exalted states of rigorous sadhana. bhava or samadhi or her body would assume Before completing her thirteenth year, various yogic postures. She had no pre• Mataji was married to Ramani Mohan vious knowledge of such matters. She Chakravarti, known as ' Bholanath'. In watched herself go through the innumerable accordance with village customs, she stayed paths of sadhana as she watched herself per• with her husband's family for the first few forming household work. She refers to this years after marriage. When she was about period as "The play of sadhana." She has 18 years old, she went to keep house for said ... "As a rule there is a veil that Bholanath at his place of employment. separates man from his own Self. This veil The question of leading a conventional has to be worn off by practising sadhana. married life just did not arise for this un• But here, there was no veil. It was drawn usual couple. Mataji has said : " My parents only in order to be removed again. There• told me that I should respect and obey fore, what else should this be called but Bholanath and look upon him as my guar• play ?" What she has related about this dian. Consequently I gave him the respect phase of her life would fill a volume, yet and obedience due to my father. He was she says that she has not disclosed even one always like a father to me." Bholanath, by hundredth part of the entire experience. all accounts, was a remarkable man himself. The minutest details of each line of approach When the time came for them to stay were revealed to her in their true signi• together, the young husband found that he ficance. had a most extraordinary wife to look after. Mataji did not need or ask for publicity. She was gentle, hard-working and of a In fact, she tried her best to avoid it. In joyous nature, but without a trace of world• the beginning a few of Bholanath's friends ly feelings and desires. Her innocence and would come and talk to her about religious unquestioning trust in him made him the topics. All knowledge of rituals, spiritual devoted guardian he was to her throughout exercises and also philosophical evaluations his life. Mataji has a delightful sense of of such matters came unhesitatingly, clearly humour. The anecdotes of her life with her and convincingly from this untutored village relatives by marriage and also with Bhola• maiden. These friends brought others and are full of penetrating observations. gradually crowds began to assemble round About her marriage, Mataji has once said : Mataji's radiant personality, seeking advice " In the beginning Bholanath used to say : on spiritual things as well as on their own ' You are very immature and childlike. . . . problems. It will be all right when you grow up . . . but it seems I never grew up ! " More Mataji herself did not go out of her way seriously : " Bholanath's restraint and sense to talk to anyone. If Bholanath asked her 190 THE MOUNTAIN PATH July

to speak to people she would do so, not Although this little girl cannot do anything otherwise. Throughout his lifetime Mataji for anybody, people out of the goodness of never did anything without his consent. their hearts love her nevertheless." Or Bholanath occupied a peculiar position. He alternatively : " All children and unmarried looked upon Mataji as his guru and spiritual people are my friends, and married people preceptor and also received from, her the un• are my fathers and mothers and so I am tiring service of which she alone is capable. dear to all. Is it not natural to love one's After his death in 1938 at the age of 56, friend and child ? " other devotees have tried to serve Mataji and Mataji has no chosen attendants. Her com• make all arrangements for her. panions, travels, places of residence are * * * fortuitous. One is as good1 as the other. One It is difficult, indeed impossible, to under• of Mataji's favourite expressions, repeated stand Mataji because her actions and words by her again and again, is : " jo ho jay : reveal nothing about her. Usually action Whatever comes to pass is equally gives a clue to the mental make-up of a welcome". Nobody can presume to say human being. Mataji's actions arise out of that he or she is indispensable to Mataji the needs of the people around her. For or specially favoured by her. Out of the herself no action whatever is necessary. throng that surrounds her, there may be one Even bodily requirements such as food, rest, or two who understand the immeasurability sleep and so forth do not influence her be• of the personality that gives of herself freely haviour and may remain suspended for any and unstintingly to all who have need of length of time. During earlier days this was her and yet remains so remote. Her com• a more frequent phenomenon. Once she did passion for suffering humanity is unbounded. not eat or even drink water for 13 days. On Her days are more than full with assuaging the 14th day, she broke this remarkable spell the sorrows of the bereft, unlucky and of abstinence with the remark : " I just afflicted. Mataji has no mission to fulfil in wanted to see how it would be to remain the world because no lack in her requires without water. I find that even the fulfilment. This self-sufficiency makes her need for water is becoming extinct. But for personality absolutely enigmatic. From this the comfort and convenience of people a point of view her closest companion of over semblance of normal behaviour must be 40 years' standing is as distantly placed as kept up." the stranger at the fringe of the crowd. She Other similar features make it impossible passes through the multitudes mostly as an for ordinary judgement to be meaningful in on-looker. She has no fault to find with any• her case. To the question : " If you have thing or anybody but if approached in per• no mission to fulfil or message to give, why plexity she will give guidance and hope and do you tell us to worship God ? ", Mataji advice as only she can. replied : " If you do not ask, I have nothing All those who have seen Mataji will how• to say. But if you ask and if it is my mood ever subscribe to one general opinion about then I shall certainly tell you about the her : In Mataji's proximity there is no room better way of life." for pessimism, despair or depression. The Mataji herself has had no Guru and she divine presence seems to permeate the does not give formal initiation to anyone. atmosphere. The razor's edge path appears The hundreds of people flocking round her easy to traverse. The heart is buoyed on a are not bound to her even by this intangible wave of joyousness unimaginable before. It tie. The secret of her attraction she some• seems a miracle to be born a human being times explains in this way : " It is natural to whom the Kingdom of Heaven has been for people's hearts to go out to a child. My promised. Mataji's mere presence awakens body is aged but actually I am a small child in every man, woman and child a sense of and as such receive affection from all. destiny which is ANANDA. 1968 191 THAYUMANAVAR, A TAMIL POET-SAINT

By

T. KRISHNAJI

HPHE lives of mystics and poets the world the child's birth his wife died and he again over is a revelation of Divine Grace. left home in quest of God. The Mouna Sometimes this takes tangible form ; some• Guru met him, as he had promised, and gave times not. Lord Krishna bestowed Grace on him initiation into sannyas, from which there his devotee Sakku Bai, a woman mystic of is no return to family life. Maharashtra, by assuming her appearance and doing her housekeeping for her when she was away on a pilgrimage. Lord Siva, out of love and grace, attended as a mid• wife on a Vaisya girl when her mother, who was to have done so, was unavoidably absent. On account of this, he is known as Thayumanavar in Tamil, Matrubhuteswara in Sanskrit, meaning ' He who became the mother'. Under this name he is the God worshipped at the Rock Fort at Tiruchira- palli. Following the Hindu custom of naming a child after a God, a Vellala of Vedaranyam, who was a high officer under the Nayak king of Madura, named his second son ' Thayumanavar '. The child was to become famous both as poet and saint.

We are told that he early entered the ser• Thayumanavar vice of the king and, after the latter's demise, while still an adolescent, left the court to He followed the discipline of silence avoid the amorous advances of the widowed (mouna), which he describes as: "that queen. Thereafter he wandered as a state which spontaneously manifests after in quest of God and Guru. At the above- the annihilation of the ego." He says : " It mentioned temple at Tiruchirapalli he met is a state beyond light and darkness, but it Mouna Guru Arulananda Sivachari, a great is called light, since language is inadequate saint of the Saiva School. He to express it. The ego disappears and '1' asked to be taken as a disciple, but the saint spontaneously manifests in full glory." answered ' chumma iru % meaning ' be still' Ramana Maharshi particularly singled out or ' be quiet' or ' just be ' (a phrase which this verse of his for admiration. Ramana Maharshi also used on a number of occasions when some one came to him in a True spiritual silence is not easy. Thayu• restless state of mind). However, he added manavar invokes the Grace of God to hold that when the time was ripe he would ini• to it : " O Eternal ! only to remain in tiate him. Silence devoid of thought and speech is my ambition by day and night." This inner Thayumanavar then returned to family silence is beyond disputes and dialogues bet• life. He was taken back to Vedaranyam by ween the sects. quotes the his brother and there he was married and Spanish mystic (. Molinos (1640-1697),, who had a son named Kanakasabhai. Soon after paid with his life for his silent mysticism, 192 THE MOUNTAIN PATH July

as distinguishing three degrees of silence : out Him no atom could move." What, then, silence of the mouth, silence of the mind and of human intelligence or ignorance ? Or of silence of the will : to refrain from idle talk human will ? He answers unequivocally : is hard ; to quieten the gibbering mind is "Without Thee there is nothing." In some harder still ; hardest of all is to still the of his poems he uses also the language of voice of desire and aversion in the will.1 bridal mysticism. St. Antony, one of the Desert Fathers of early Christianity, says that : " He who sits Often he retired to the forest or public quiet hath escaped from three wars, hear• gardens and remained for days absorbed in ting, speaking, seeing." 2 the bliss of the Self. Tradition has it that he was sitting thus, immobile in samadhi, in Strangely enough, despite his general a public garden in Ramnad when the gar• withdrawal into silence, Thayumanavar deners, not noticing him, piled a dump of could on occasion take an active part in the dry leaves and twigs about him and set fire affairs of the world. Seeing the Portuguese tp it, and thus his - body was consumed and occupying Rameswaram, one of the four out• he merged in the Godhood. standing Hindu places of pilgrimage, he call• ed upon all the Maravars to rally to its de• Although he lived only about two hundred fence under the banner of their leader and fifty years ago, we have no precise Raghunatha Sethupathi ; and such was the knowledge of the date of his birth and force that arose in response to his appeal Mahasamadhi. There is no tradition of any that the Portuguese withdrew. It was not miracles that he worked ; his poems were that he had anything against Catholicism. his miracles. He was supremely great alike Throughout his poetry he expresses appre• as a saint and a poet. Ramana Maharshi ciation of all religions and calls for mutual often referred to him and quoted from him. tolerance and respect, but he knew that if The following is a prose translation of seven it fell to the Portuguese there would be no consecutive verses that he selected from him tolerance and this ancient pilgrim centre and that Sri Ramanasramam has printed as would be closed to the Hindus. a leaflet.

Thayumanavar is the most popular Tamil 1. The individual self known as 61' having poet-saint. His mystical and devotional arisen and caused trouble to all, uni• lyrics continue to inspire people. Their versal Maya, the diversifying agent, profundity of meaning is matched by their spontaneously follows it. Who could beauty of form, so that they appeal to simple ever describe the vast ocean of misery and learned alike. Declaring that all paths due to it ? It appears as the flesh, the culminate in a realization of the same truth, body, the outer and inner sense, the he extols Vedanta and Siddhanta alike. He all-pervading ether, air, fire, water is the great prophet of samarasa. He and earth, as mountain and forest, as equates Maya with or ignorance, say• huge visions like hills, physical and ing : " What is Maya but my ignorance ? " subtle, as forgetfulness and memory. Although proclaiming Advaita or Identity, Thus rising up, it beats upon a man, he does not decry Dwaita or Duality but wave after wave, bringing pleasure and declares : " Dwaita leads to the light of pain born of his past actions, bringing Advaita." He worships God both as Per• also their remedies known as creeds and sonal and Impersonal. Lamenting intole• religions. It brings God and the seeker rance, he declares : " The cause of innu• after God and the testimony found in merable disputes between lands and reli• learning and logic ; and all these things gions is that each claims rightful sovereignty are more numerous than the grains of for its own God." sand on the sea-shore.

In fthe completeness^ of his worship, he 1 The Perennial Philosophy, p. 225. declares with the Kenopanishad : " With- 2 The Desert Fathers by Helen Waddel, p. 67. THAYUMANAVAR, A TAMIL POET-SAINT 193

Unaccountable troubles spring up spon• 6. Yet, though all these are excluded, is it taneously, sheaf upon sheaf. How can not void but Natural, Eternal Being, one destroy them all at one blow, like inexpressible in words, not manifesting burning up a hill of in one as ago, but the Reality engulfing all, great blaze, leaving no residue of ash ? 3 having swallowed up ignorance as day To accomplish this miracle and grant me does night and absorbed all knowledge. enlightenment, Grace took on a form in Transmuting the seeker into Itself, It every respect like my own, eating and shines in Silence, Self-effulgent. sleeping, suffering and enjoying, bear• ing a name and having a human birth. 7. By Its emergence It prevents any other from appearing; all else is suddenly It appeared as the Silent Guruy like a deer used to decoy a deer. extinguished like burning camphor? leaving no ash or glow. Alone It shines, beyond the senses and apart from It claimed my body, possessions and know er-knowledge-known. It is, but very life. Eliminating the unreal, It who can speak of It, and to whom ? taught: " You are not the five senses, For when It arises the individual is nor the five elements, nor the limbs, transmuted into It. It speaks Itself. nor the mind, nor their attributes, nor all these collectively, nor the And finally, to give some slight indica• body, nor knowledge, nor ignroance. tion of the lyric beauty, this translation by You are pure consciousness, separate Prof. K. R. R. Sastry already published in from its background, like a crystal, but The Mountain Path of October 1964 : revealing it to those who look. And I am only indwelling Nature revealing I cannot worship at Thy shrine the truth to you on finding you ripe for it. Or to Thy holy symbols bow; I cannot pluck the flowers for offerings, When in each flower's heart art Thou. " If you wish to reach the Being-Con• How can I press my palms together, sciousness-Bliss at the heart of all, My body bent to worship Thee, which is also the inner abode of healing How my imperfect service offer, Grace, listen to what I tell you. May When Thou indwellest, Lord, in me ? you attain the pure Heart and abide Thou art the vastness of the Void, there for ever! May dense ignorance The elements, the primal sound, vanish for you I May you attain to The and the quest they bring, Bliss-Consciousness!" Speaking thus, The Goal beyond all seeking found. Thou art the quest and Thou the finding, Thou of all seeing art the Sight, The Guru bestowed true knowledge of Of knowing, Thou alone the knowledge, that unique Silence which destroys all Of mind and eye the inner Light, bondage, wherein there is no medita• The outer word and inner Meaning, tion, no ego, no space or time, no direc• The vocal and the silent Call. tion or association, no elimination of Oh Source of Grace in joy past thinking, error or differentiation, no expression, Lone cosmic Dancer in high Wisdom's hall! no parting of night and day, no begin- ning, middle or end, nor any aggregate 3 Camphor is burnt as a symbol of the aspirant burning up the ego, because it leaves no residue of these. of ash.

The secret meaning of the Vedas is truth ; of truth, self-control ; of self-control, freedom from all limitations ! This is the sum of all the scriptures, *—The Mahabharata, 194 July HOW I CAME TO THE MAHARSHI

By

Dr. T. N. KRISHNASWAMI

J WAS studying medicine and my final examination was a few months ahead. Together with a few friends I set out on an excursion to Vellore. I carried my camera with me and took pictures of the old Fort ana some stone carvings of archaeological interest at Vellore. There was not much to see there, and some one suggested that the temple at Tiruvannamalai was a huge and impressive work of art. So we got in a bus for Tiruvannamalai and went round the temple, admiring the beautiful stone carv• ings and the huge towers. I had a good harvest of photographs. A by-stander sug• gested that we pay a visit to the Maharshi Who was living a couple of miles away. So we set out for the Ashram in a horse cart. I was wondering if the Maharshi would be a good subject for photography. It was evening by the time we arrived at the Ashram. The visitors had dispersed from the hall. The Maharshi had gone out, as was his habit, for a short walk on the hill. We waited for a few minutes and saw a string of people following a tall man walk• ing with a stick and holding a kamandel (vessel for water). We alerted ourselves and I asked if I could take a few photographs of the Maharshi, The reply was No, no, you The first photo by me. cannot.' , • .:. .M • i

As we were talking, the tall stately figure conscious of any holy atmosphere. Bhaga• had approached us and asked what was the van, as they called him, entered the hall and matter. Mr. Seshu , the man I had lowered himself on to the sofa which was asked for permission, pointed to me and my carefully arranged for him. He pulled out colleagues and said, ' This party are from a towel and wiped his wet feet and then he Madras and they want to take some pictures sat recumbent on the sofa, seeming quite of Bhagavan.' 1 Oh ! Is that so ? said the relaxed. It was surprising how he merged Maharshi. ' Let them.' So saying he stood into himself totally oblivious of the sur• posing for me with his hands on his hips and roundings. We entered the hall and sat a with his face in semi-profile. I lost no time. few feet off in front of him. The Maharshi I opened my camera, brought it into focus did not seem to take notice of anything and clicked 3 or 4 times, giving different around him. He wore a calm and distant apertures and different timings. I was not look. His eyes were shining and there was looking for any spiritual fare and I was not something divine about his countenance. 1968 HOW I CAME TO THE MAHARSHI 195

The hall was badly lighted for photogra• talking about you and see the coincidence, phy but still I took a few pictures of the you are here in person. You may yourself Maharshi. We then got up and mechani• receive the letter personally which they cally prostrated before him and left the have addressed ready for posting to you.' hall ; before we were out of the Ashram Whenever I went to the Ashram, though I compound, a Sanyasi clad in orange robes usually stayed there only for one brief day, came running after us and said, ' Please send a few prints to us to the Ashram address. We do not have any good picture of Bhaga• van.' This person was none other than Sri Swami, the then Sarvadhikari. I left the Ashram without giving any fur• ther thought to the matter and never suspected that it was to play a vital part in my life. I returned to Madras, developed the films and sent a few prints to the Ashram.

Then I settled down to my studies. I had almost forgotten Tiruvannamalai. One morning I received a letter inviting me to come and take a group photo with the Maharshi, as all the devotees were impressed with the good picture that I had made. I wonder• ed if this could not be put off till my examinations were over. But somehow I found myself entrain• ed for Tiruvannamalai. When I entered the Maharshi's presence, he greeted me with a smile and said : ' They want a group photo and they want you to take it for them.' I felt highly nattered and I felt that I had done right in answering their call. To have been Padmasan pose, also taken by me. the object of Maharshi's remark, *« was exquisitely pleasing. I felt quite from morning till evening, I made it a point important, arranged the group, erected my to accompany the Maharshi and take as camera and took a few pictures. Then many pictures of him as possible.1 I used to Bhagavan posed for me in the conventional wonder if such doggedness on my part would Padmasana. The Ashram has sold many not vex the Maharshi. I have snapped him thousand copies of this particular pose of walking, sitting, eating, cleaning his feet. I Bhagavan. Bhagavan sat almost statue-like, have snapped him smiling ; bursting into with a clean shaven head.

On another occasion, as I entered the hall, iMost of the photographs of the Maharshi that are available and published in our books, were the Maharshi remarked, ' Just now we were taken by Dr. T. N. Krishnaswami. 196 THE MOUNTAIN PATH July laughter ; smiling at a child ; in a medita• Sometimes I used to wonder if it was not tive mood ; iri samadhi etc. Once he was ridiculous of me to pay so much attention going up the hill when there was a slight to photography whereas his teaching was 'I drizzle and he was offered a country-made am not the body.' Was I not chasing the palmyra umbrella. I took a picture of him shadow and even trying to perpetuate it ? while he was using this. I also took another Somehow so long as I was seeing the Maha• picture of him using an ordinary umbrella; rshi, his teaching did not assume any im• As I began to take this picture, the Maha• portance to me. His person was seen and rshi was smiling broadly. felt by me and I felt drawn and attracted to him. It gave me immense pleasure to In the few hours that I spent with the take pictures of him: He was more im• Maharshi, I felt charged with an inexplica• portant to me than his teaching — every ble peace and contentment and I returned little movement, every one of his acts and home elated. The Maharshi seemed some• gestures, was highly valued by me and they one whom I knew intimately. I felt at home always carried some divine fragrance. Sim• in his presence and even expected some sort ply to watch him, no matter what he was of paternal indulgence and affection from doing, was highly gratifying. I was attract• him. I have no doubt that he did indulge ed to him like a baby to its mother. me like a loving father. It is amazing how the thousands of visitors felt at ease in his His death gave me a severe jolt. I was presence and were made to feel that personal shocked. Had I missed the opportunity of a attention was bestowed upon each one of life-time, to imbibe the teaching of the them. My short walks with the Maharshi Enlightened One ? I had done nothing in gave me the rare opportunity of listening the direction of spiritual sadhana. Had I and taking part in the conversations. One wasted all my time taking photographs, day, as we were going up the hill, he picked while I should have engaged myself in try• up a small glistening pebble from the path ing to understand and practise his teachings and held it out to me saying, ' Some one in his very presence. 'No ', I said to myself, from abroad has written asking for a stone this cannot be true. I was sure that I had taken out from a holy part of this hill. He obtained some grace from the Maharshi. He does not know that the whole hill is holy. was somehow still here. Only, we have to The hill is Siva Himself ; as we identify our• learn to feel his Presence. We would never selves with the body, so Siva has chosen to be forsaken for he had himself assured us identify Himself with this Hill. Arunachala that he was not going away. is ;pure wisdom appearing in the shape of a hill. It is out of compassion to those who Then I turned with a sad heart to study• seek Siva, that Siva has chosen to reveal ing his teachings. I began to see light in himself as a hill visible to the eye. The them. Some of the sentences touched me seeker will obtain guidance and solace by and made me feel that I was in his pre• staying near this hill.' These words sank sence, listening to him. I took heart ; the into my heart. It never occurred to me to more I read, the more intimate the Maha• weigh or examine the aptness of what was rshi became to me. His teaching pulsated said. The hill was holy. The Maharshi had with life ; I began to understand it and it said ft and that was what counted with me. mixed with my being and became my own !

Divine is he who has overcome both good and evil. — Srimad Bhagavatam. 1968 197 CHRIST AND CHRISTIANITY AS SEEN BY A HINDU SWAMI

By

SWAMI NIRMALANANDA

TF anyone were to put me the question who who crucified Him, His true humility and has had a great influence on my life, I perfect obedience serve as a model for all would unhesitatingly name the personality mankind. All the troubles of the world are of Jesus Christ. If He were to come again of our own making. Even today the wicked in our midst in flesh and blood, I would not make the innocent suffer without realizing only worship Him with my whole-hearted that an insult to one is an affront to all. adoration, but would wash His feet with However much we may deny our part, we tears of devotion. It was that immortal all are equally responsible for all the evils book, The Imitation of Christ, which in my and injustice found in the world. Christ view, would rank equal to the Bible, that came as an example to all of us so that we made me to appreciate the wonder and glory might turn from our evil ways and live as of Christ. Many years ago in my early a fine example to all others. He lived, twenties I had a unique vision of Jesus suffered and died on the Cross in vain, if Christ. Since then many a time He has we do not turn to His way of love, purity come to me in His cosmic form and I have and perfection. rejoiced to live in communion with Him, Christ is the centre of our being and He for Christ is the living Truth that makes knocks at the door of our heart calling us men free. to His way of love, peace and freedom so In quest of the historical Jesus, to imbibe that we all may live as He lived, pray as He the spirit of His wonderful personality, I prayed and love as He loved. Human life have wandered in every nook and corner of has its many problems which entail suffer• the Holy Land which remains sanctified by ings. How true is the saying of Jesus : 9 His physical presence. While walking along " In this world ye shall have tribulations.' the shores of the Lake of Galilee, at To many these wearisome burdens of life are Bethlehem, on the' Mount of Olives, in the often so heavy that they feel altogether Garden of Gethsemane and along the Via crushed and almost lost in the misery of Dolorosa (The Way of the Cross) leading to life. Christ is the beckoning hope of all the Holy Sepulchre, my mind was so much such dejected, despised and despaired souls. moved with historical reminiscences that I " Come unto me all those who are weary felt that the great drama of His life was and troubled, I shall give you rest." "Take being reenacted in front of my very eyes. my yoke upon you, for my yoke is easy and my burden is light." " I am the light of the It has been truly said that our sweetest world and he who believeth in me shall not songs are those that sing of the saddest walk in darkness." " Let your heart not be thoughts of life. In fact, the tragic ending troubled. Be of good cheer. I am with you of the life of Jesus was a triumph of Truth. always." There could be no greater assur• Only in death dan we find a new life. With• ance nor mere comforting words of hope and out crucifixion there can be no resurrection. consolation. As Jesus Himself has made it Despite His selfless love, spotless purity and clear, " it is the sick that needs the physi• noble teachings Jesus had to suffer by the cian." He did not come to call those who hand of men, their insult, torture and tor- profess to be righteous, but the erring and mentation. Yet His boundless love for all, struggling souls to a noble and happy life of His unlimited forgiveness even to those peace and perfection. 198 THE MOUNTAIN PATH J.uly

As we all do, Jesus too lived on two even our enemies, to do good to those who planes of existence : in terrestial as well as hate us and to bless those who curse us. celestial kingdoms. Because of mounting Love was the recurring theme of His whole miseries and the multifarious problems of message. It was the key to open the door of this earthly life, we all prefer to live in the Kingdom of Heaven. Above all, did He heaven experiencing the undisturbed peace not ask us ? : " Love ye one another as I and happiness in God. Yet the fact remains have loved you." How far have we been that we all are forced to come down to earth true to His words ? The frequent wars and in order to satisfy our physical needs : for revolutions in the Christian world and the our working, eating and sleeping. As smoke growing number of people who break away is contained in the fire, all worldly under• from the church having lost their faith in takings have their own limitations. Every it are clear indications that the church and action is tinged with an element of imper• Christianity have failed in their profession fection. The more one lives in his ordinary of love. mortal mind, the more he is bound to feel unhappy and disgusted with life. But the Of all religions of the world, Christianity celestial life lived in the Christ mind is the can legitimately be proud of having contri• life of perfection, freedom and happiness. buted more to the material well-being of The difference between a worldling and a mankind. By extending and imparting edu• man of God is while the former lives more in cation to the ignorant, it has helped to give the individual mind, the latter dwells often mental enlightenment and emancipation to in the universal mind. We see this clearly many enslaved millions who would have in the life of Jesus. On a few occasions we otherwise remained in ignorance and find Him uttering these words of limitations poverty. Christianity's service in the field of of a mortal being : " Why do you call me health and medical care is not a small good ? There is nothing good except my achievement. Father in heaven." " I of my own self can do nothing." " If possible, this cup may The spiritual and contemplative life of pass away from me." " Oh God, why hast Christianity can be seen in the rich tradi• Thou forsaken me ? " On all other occa• tions of the Catholic Church. But its great sions, knowing His true nature and identity drawback has been that it rigidly binds the with the Creator, He spoke the immortal mind of its followers keeping them almost words of wisdom : "I and my Father are under virtual subjugation. The Protestants, one." " I am the truth, the way and the on the other hand, have been protesting too life." " I am the light of the world." " He much. In their eagerness to be free from the who has seen me has seen the Father." etc. dogmas, rigidity and authoritarianism of the Roman Catholic Church they became too free One profound Truth which we read in the and lost contact with the Inner Life. In the Old Testament is that God is I am, as Moses field of mystical and contemplative life himself heard His voice as I am. their original contribution is very little. This I am which has always been I am is the absolute reality. ' I am before Abraham In our undue concern for material well- was." " I am the truth, the way and the being, spiritual life is being utterly neglect• life." " I am with you always." If we are ed. This is true all over the world, but in to abide in the universal Christ, we must highly prosperous Christian countries experience this I am that is ever-present of the West this is mofe true. Even in us. if we fill the whole world with money, food, hospitals and material comforts, Jesus does not call men to a particular the misery of the world would still religion or denomination but to the supreme continue, as long as man's spiritual need path of love and righteousness. The extent is not satisfied. As Jesus Himself says, to which His exhortation has gone is to love " man does not live by bread alone." It is 1968 CHRIST AND CHRISTIANITY 199

thousand times better to live in rags with have been really reactionaries because they Christ than in a palace without Him. Let reacted against certain particular situations. us not forget His words : " Blessed are the He who reacts is a reactionary. The wise poor." In the West where even the ordi- never react. But Christ was a true great re• many people have access to all sorts of luxu• volutionary. Our society is based on many ries and comforts, we find a growing num• false values. We are selfish, aggressive, ber of mental diseases, alcoholics and neuro• ambitious, competitive, hateful and nationa• tics. More and more people break away listic. These basic evils are the root causes from the church, its dogmas and doctrines. of all our problems. No improvement in the The impressive but routine ceremonies of the conditions of the world can ever happen, church, the well-sounding but repetitive long as we individually do nothing to be sermons of the priests or pastors cannot free from these vices. To fall in line with adequately satisfy man's hunger for God. the ways of society is quite easy, but not to accept their false values and yet to live in " For 2000 years we have had Christia• the world would require extraordinary nity without Christ, but hereafter we must courage. It means living dangerously. It have only Christ without Christianity." " The has been said : " When a Christian becomes difference between Christ's teachings and a true Christian, then the real revolution the Christianity of today is 1966 years ! " begins." " Christ and His teachings are like a mighty elephant, but the church and its doctrines Organized religions like organized nations like a little cage. When the upholders of can be a great curse for mankind. Each per• the church and its doctrines find that the son should be left alone to work out his mighty elephant cannot be contained in own destiny or salvation. Perfect freedom their man-made cage, they begin to cut its both inside and outside, but not liberty of limbs so that they would somehow be able the mind to do anything as one pleases, to fit it into their cage." These are harsh should be the cherished goal of human life. words, but they come from some thoughtful Without this freedom life is not worth living. and intelligent Christians of the West. When Just as a bird whether tied by a gold or iron we try to find the truth of their allegations, chain is not free to fly, so a mind fettered we cannot say that they are baseless accusa• by dogmas and doctrines, however good they tions. There is an element of truth in these may be, loses placidity and pliability which charges. are so essential for a spiritual life of en• lightenment and emancipation. Heart-breaking brutalities are spreading all over the world and the cracks of grow• Christ stands before us in His cosmic form ing unrest, decay and degeneration are and His words can still be heard ringing in visible in all countries. To build a new our mind : society the world is in urgent need of a revolution, not a revolution with guns and " Be ye holy as I AM holy, bombs, but a revolution based on spiritual Be ye universal as I AM universal, values. All the so-called revolutions Be ye pure as I AM pure, fought for man's material well-being create Be ye forgiving as I AM forgiving, more problems than they wish to eradicate. Be ye compassionate as I AM com• Many of the world's so-called revolutionaries passionate."

Heaven is the domination of sattva in the mind. Hell is the predominance of . — Srimad Bhagavatam, 200 July NO MIND DOCTRINE OF RAMANA

By

R. N. SARAF

JT would have been preposterous had it not tries to find out the ego, Bhagavan says it been true to say that there is no mind. falls down — merges in the self from which Hamana's statement on this subject is un• it had sprung. equivocal and emphatic. He definitely says Bhagavan Jnaneshwar says the same thing. there is no mind at all. The meaning is not He says : so easy or so absurd as at first appears. When the mind is denied, the phenomena " Like the blueness of the sky, or the that are taken for mind are not denied. What water in the desert ; is denied is a unitary and self-subsisting the mind springs into existence without thing. The mind is tripartite and consists any reality of its own." of knowledge, emotion and will. They are separate and exclude each other. They have The appearance is true enough as appearance a point of reference beyond themselves. but if taken as reality is wrong. How the Thus the mind is not a unitary thing and de• mind comes into existence out of nothing is pends for its existence upon something else a mystery far beyond the reach of the human other than itself. What does not exist by mind. It is but natural. Nobody can know itself is said not to exist. When we say that his own beginning. To know one's begin• water is not an element we mean that it ning one must be in being, before one has does not subsist by itself. Separating the come into being. This is absurd. So the elements that compose it would destroy it. beginning of the mind is beyond the reach So if we analyse the mind into its compon• of the mind. The mind can find out that it ents, the illusion of the mind which is pro• has no substantiality of its own by self- duced by the composition of its components inquiry. It finds out that it ceases to be in disappears. The illusion of the unity of the sleep where there are no thought, no mind is produced by the unity of the con• emotion and no will. It has no other exist• sciousness. Thoughts occur, emotions arise, ence when the memory which supplies the will decides in unintermittent succession. clue itself comes into being when the mind Consciousness reveals them as conscious comes into being. At the time of sleep the states and the conscious states produce the memory remains merged in its source, the illusion of a separate mind. Bhagavan source of all. The daily emergence of the Ramana says : mind from its source is a daily miracle. How the lost mind emerges entire can never be " The conscious states depend on the known. It is like waking to know the sleep. ego-consciousness ; The waking would destroy the sleep and the mind is nothing more than these never know it. So the mind would destroy states ; therefore the ego-conscious• itself if it tried to know how it came into ness is the mind." being and merged in the self.

The ego is nothing more than the illusory When we say that things have no colour unity of the conscious states. When the con• we substantiate the statement by showing sciousness takes off its support, these states that colour is nothing more than reflected all fall to the ground and the illusion of the light. So when we say that there is no mind is destroyed. The consciousness sus• mind we must be able to show that it is tains the ego which unifies the states. If one nothing more than a reflection. 1968 201 PROBLEMS OF RIGHT AND WRONG

By

' SE/N 9

TN the very first class of the ethics course he may be guilty of murder. One has to for my M.A. I was told that there were admit that there are no absolute uniform two ways of looking at ethics : as good and standards. When some thieves once broke bad or as right and wrong, and that the into the Ashram and began to steal the former was the more profound. This made articles there (only very few) and beat the a lasting impression on me. I felt strongly inmates, including the Maharshi, Sri Bha• that the two ought always to be the same gavan would not allow the latter to resist. but was unable to deny that they are not. He said : " Let them stick to their dharma I was given the example of a who was and we will stick to ours. Our dharma is sitting in his ashram in the forest when a to be ." That implies that dharma wealthy merchant rushed in and took refuge does not necessarily mean ' what is right', from a gang of thieves who were pursuing because the thieves' action could certainly him. They soon reached the ashram and not be called right. It may mean simply asked the rishi whether any one had come ' accepted way of life \ Then suppose a there. He admitted it and the merchant was householder had been staying with his wife dragged out and butchered. It might be and children in a house near the Ashram said that the rishi had done right in telling and the thieves had attacked him too ; the truth, but it was certainly not a good would Sri Bhagavan have allowed him to action, since it caused an innocent man's resist ? I think he would, because his death. What would Bhagavan have done ? dharma was not to be a sadhu but a house• Probably he would have sat immobile and holder and this involves having rights and abstained from answering ; but few people, property and defending them in case of even , have the power of Bhagavan's need ! silence. The question may arise, however, whether I have since learned that Lord Krishna it is good or bad to exercise one's rights himself declared at the end of the Maha- in any given circumstances. If a thief breaks that the Yuga, the fourth epoch into my house in a country where a house• of time, had now set in, when complete rec• holder has the legal right of self-defence titude would no longer be possible. One has and I am armed I may have the right to to gauge which course of action will entail shoot him, but the question still remains the greater benefit or justice and the less whether it would be a good thing to do. harm or injustice and follow it. That, however, may be beside the point, since it is confusing the adjective * right' in Some exponents of ethics go to the length the sense of 1 correct' with the noun ' right' of denying that there is any right and wrong in the sense of * legal authority' : "I have and reducing both to social conventions. For the right to beat my children but would it instance, in a country where polygamy is be right to do so ? " There is no hard and accepted a man is doing nothing wrong in fast rule. having more than one wife ; in a country where it is banned he is. Or again, in a So far as one can generalise it may be country where duelling is accepted a man best to say that what is good is concerned who kills a personal enemy in a quarrel may more with the spirit of the law and what is be not only not guilty but actually honour• right with the letter of the law. After able, whereas in a country where it is not Duryodhana had cheated the Pandavas out 202 THE MOUNTAIN PATH July

of their inheritance and his father had sent upset by what they had done, but Yudhish• them on a twelve-year exile, Lord Krishna tira boldly declared that he stood by it, even gathered his forces and, in a lightning swoop if he was to be punished for it, because it on the forest, urged Yudhishtira to turn back had done much good and saved many inno• and make an immediate attack before the cent persons from destruction. Kauravas had time to mobilise resistance and while their potential allies were still It is impossible to give a categorical alienated by the shock of their treacherous answer from a book to all such questions. conduct. Yudhishtira refused on the ground One has to do what is right to the best of that the Kaurava action had been legally one's ability but also to avoid causing un• right although morally wrong, and he necessary suffering to others. Yudhishtira therefore felt bound by it. Yudhishtira was clung to his own interpretation of what was right by the letter of the law, Sri Krishna right, even against himself, but in doing so by the spirit of the law. It was hard for he overlooked the suffering caused to Drau• Yudhishtira to see this because the letter of padi and to his brothers. Such Tightness the law was against him, and it is always can be a subtle form of egoism. Frequent harder for an honourable man to go against problems assail one in daily life and the the law when it suits his interests to do so ; interpretation is not always easy. A lawyer it makes him suspect his own motives and once asked Sri Bhagavan whether he could wonder whether he is not indulging in false continue to practise his profession, since it casuistry. sometimes led to the condemnation of his opponent, and Bhagavan said that he could. There was another occasion when Yudhish• He did what he considered right, he inter• tira was still farther from the spirit of the preted the law in the way that he considered law or from goodness, and that was when right, and there his responsibility ended. his wife, Draupadi, was declared forfeit after the infamous dicing game and dragged before There are some ethicists and psychologists the assembled kings. He could accept the who reject both the conception of right and forfeiture and submit to it as being legally wrong and that of good and bad and speak right but there was certainly no goodness only of ' socially acceptable ' and * socially in it. Even if he had brought it on him• unacceptable' actions. This is an increas• self, Draupadi had not, and what about her ingly popular attitude. Its implication is suffering ? Didn't that matter ? It did to that whatever is generally accepted is right Sri Krishna and he refused to sanction such and to be conformed with. But it is a super• legalised wrong-doing. It is noteworthy that ficial attitude because the misfit, what the in the Yaksha Prashna, the list of questions psychologists call the • socially maladjusted on dharma put to Yudhishtira, he is asked person ', may be above the generally accept• what is the typical corruption of the Kshat- ed level as well as below it ; and that is riya and he himself states that it is desertion where spiritual considerations impinge on of a dependent in time of need^ and yet ethical or psychological. The Athenians this is just what his treatment of Draupadi condemned Socrates and the Jews Christ for amounted to ! blasphemy. Both of them were put to death for militating against the socially accepted Lest this article should seem too critical code of their day. But it is the verdict of of Yudhishtira, let me mention also the Christ and Socrates which has been accept• classical case when he came out strongly on ed, and in going counter to it their judges the side of goodness against rectitude. That have in fact condemned themselves. was when Drona was using foul means to slaughter the followers of the Pandavas and, This leads us to raise the whole question on Krishna's bidding, Yudhishtira and the of the motivations of our judgements. In other four told him a lie which took away modern ethics and psychology an action is his zest in the fighting. Arjuna was very condemned primarily for external reasons, 1968 "I" THE STILLNESS 203

because of the harmful effect it will have on heaven when they saw an eagle carrying a society if freely indulged in ; but spiritual serpent in its talons to feed its young. The teachers condemn an' action primarily for first of them released it by his yogic power. internal reasons, because of the harmful He fell back to earth for having robbed the effect it will have, if persisted in, on the young egrets of their food. The second, see• man himself. One's own character is con• ing this, immediately restored it to the eagle stantly in the making. The actions that one by his yogic power, and he fell back to earth performs, good or bad, right or wrong, soli• for having deprived the serpent of its life. dify into molds or action-patterns, that is The third remained impassive and continued into vasanas, and these provide the chan• on his way to heaven. However, even though nels in which one's future actions tend to one remains aloof towards them, decisions flow. A wandering sadhu once sent a have to be taken. There are situations message asking Sri Bhagavan what his where action is incumbent as well as where future would be, and Bhagavan replied : it is redundant. " tell him that as his present is so will his Indeed, it was noticeable that when any future be." A simple and yet a profound one asked Sri Bhagavan what to do in any reply ! Whatever theories we develop we circumstance he usually sat silent, leaving cannot help modelling our future because the questioner to seek his own decision. Only our present actions are doing that automati• then, when the decision had been taken, cally. would he show by gracious approval or cold disapproval whether it was right or not. This is one more illustration that intelli• Really what we are seeking in our sadhana gence is needed. It is not easy to be rightly is , spiritual experience. Right guided. First it is necessary to understand action smoothens our way to it by what the right decision is, then to take it. removing obstructions and wrong action Both processes! are character forming. causes obstructions, but it is a living thing Neither is sufficient alone. There is a story and cannot be known vicariously or by a tkat once three rishis were ascending to set of rules.

" I " The Stillness

By A. R. Nikam

The ' Silence ' in me, This feeling of 'me' and the great Silence outside, is the ' noisy mind ' Communicate ! veiling the Great Stillness ! Only the feeling of ' me' divides their Union ! Now that I know — I am the ' Silence ' I am the ' Stillness' The ' stillness ' in me, the barrier of I, me and mine, and the great Stillness outside, that compose the mind, Communicate ! will be swept away, Only the feeling of ' me' Some day prevents their Union ! By the Great Silence, By the Great Stillness. This feeling of 'me' is ' empty sound ' * Indeed that Great Silence is Me ! veiling the Great Silence ! Indeed that Great Stillness is Me ! 204 July EATING THE MANGOES

By

Prof. EKNATH EASWARAN

TF we were given the choice between going 5. Association with similar-minded to heaven and listening to lectures people about going to heaven, Dr. is said 6. Putting the other person first to have remarked, most of us would choose 7. Some form of selfless service to attend the lectures. I know a distinguish• ed scholar who has a comprehensive collec• Is it not possible for a human being to tion of books on World Mysticism, and who attain instant Samadhi without practising lectures brilliantly on the various methods Meditation ? Yes, it is possible for a of Meditation, from the simple self-inquiry Ramakrishna or a Ramana Maharshi. But of Sri Ramana Maharshi to the mondo-koan for the vast majority of ordinary people like techniques of Rinzai Zen. He can keep an you and me the long laborious discipline of intellectual audience spellbound with his Meditation is unavoidable. In the inspiring comparative exposition of Savikalpa and words of Sri Krishna in the Bhagavdd Gita : Nirvikalpa Samadhi, and illustrate it graphi• cally from the lives of the great mystics of " Who knows the the major religions. " How long have you Knows that happiness been practising Meditation ? " I asked him Born of pure knowledge : when he was showing me round his Medita• The joy of sattwa. tion library. " I am afraid I don't find any Deep his delight time for learning to meditate," was the sim• After strict self-schooling : ple reply of this distinguished scholar in Sour toil at first the field. But at last what sweetness, The end of sorrow." When you are standing under a mango tree, Sri Ramakrishna would say to his dis• Meditation is concentration, and concen• ciples, don't waste your time and energy tration is consecration. It is only as long as counting the leaves, but climb the tree, pluck we have a grasshopper mind and live on the the mango and eat it. The mango is the surface level of consciousness that finite most luscious fruit I have tasted, and this is things — such as money or material posses• the season for them all over India. I shall sions — would seem to bring some sort of not, therefore, hesitate to repeat the words satisfaction. But as our concentration of Sri Ramakrishna, " Let us stop counting grows, it will become increasingly clear to the leaves, and start eating the mango us that our real driving need is, not for fruit." anything that is fleeting, changing or finite, but for the immortal, immutable and infinite Counting the leaves is information ; eat• Reality called God who dwells in the depths ing the mango is realization. Here is a of our consciousness. When we are letting seven-fold practical program or Sadhana our mind become many-pointed, we are which can lead us to this resplendent reali• moving away from the Lord of Love who is zation : the heart of our heart, the life of our life ; when we are making our mind one-pointed 1. Meditation we are moving closer to Him. " If the heart 2. Doing only one thing at a time wanders or is distracted," says St. Francis 3. Japam or use of the Mantram de Sales, " bring it back to the point quite 4. Discriminating restraint of the senses gently and replace it tenderly in its Master's 1968 EATING THE MANGOES 205 presence. And even if you did nothing when you are looking at the dancing pea• during the whole of your hour but bring cock, give all your attention to it so that you your heart back and place it again in our don't even hear the words of the coming Lord's presence, though it went away every Hemingway. In the words of the Buddha, time you brought it back, your hour would when you are walking, walk ; when you are be very well employed." sitting, sit — don't wobble !

The dynamic discipline of Meditation can Most of us are under the impression that be greatly facilitated if we try to do only we spend our waking hours in logical, syste• one thing at a time instead of dividing our matic thinking. If we can observe the attention among two or three things at the thoughts of even a profound scholar, we same time, as we are being conditioned to do would be surprised to find how his mind in the name of efficiency or relaxation. Con• jumps about, like a grasshopper, from centration is efficiency ; concentration is thought to thought, sometimes relevant, relaxation. Division is inefficiency ; division sometimes irrelevant, sometimes profound, is tension. has said, sometimes puerile. When the temple ele• " Concentration is the quintessence of edu• phant is being taken in procession through cation." _ the narrow lanes in the bazaars of India, his wandering trunk snatches clusters of When I was in my early teens I had just bananas from a fruit stand on one side, then discovered Washington Irving, and could not passes on to the other to pick up cocoanuts tear myself away from his delightful story from a grocery store. In this manner he of Rip Van Winkle. At breakfast I was read• weaves his way through the winding lanes, ing Rip Van Winkle and eating rice-cakes his trunk in constant motion. The mahout, with cocoanut chutney at the same time. who takes good care of the elephant, will " This is poor reading and poor eating," give the animal a bamboo stick to be held remarked my grandmother as she took away firmly in his trunk so that it may not wander my plate of rice-cakes and cocoanut chutney. from stall to stall. Whenever I go to the campus cafeteria I cannot help being surprised at the number This is exactly what the Mantra does for of students who are drinking coffee, smok• the wandering mind. Not only does the ing and reading books simultaneously. This Mantra steady the mind from wandering is going against one of the fundamental thoughts, but it can serve as a tremendous transformer when tidal waves of anger, fear principles of education which is to give all or lust rise up in our consciousness. On such our attention to one thing at one time. It occasions, instead of taking it out on those is not difficult for me to visualize my who are near and dear to us, we should go illiterate grandmother walking into the for a brisk walk, if possible, repeating the cafeteria and taking away from every stu• Mantra — Hare Ram, Jesus Jesus, Hail dent the cup of coffee and the pack of ciga• Mary, Mani Padme Hum, Barukh Ata rettes, leaving them with only their books Adonai, Allah, or any other spiritual formula to be read with undivided attention. sanctioned by the Scriptures. The rhythm of One of the valuable aids in making the the Mantra, the rhythm of the footstep, and mind one-pointed (to translate the Sanskrit the rhythm of the breath, blend into a heal• term Ekagra) is by scrupulously refraining ing harmony. from doing more than one thing at a time. When your boy friend is telling you about The intense repetition of the Mantra thus the climax of his unwritten novel, even if enables us to direct into constructive a peacock comes on the scene and starts channels the Prana or vital energy which dancing in front of you, don't look at the would otherwise have run amuck, inflicting dancing peacock, but keep both your eyes severe damage on our body and mind. It is on the future novelist. On the other hand, sometimes asked whether this does not lead 206 THE MOUNTAIN PATH July

to suppression. In suppression, as I under• custom of fasting for a day fortnightly has stand it, a wave of anger is pushed down been corroborated by a recent Russian where it continues its destructive work scientific experiment as contributing to below the surface level of consciousness. On health and longevity. the other hand, in or the repetition of the Mantra, the very power that is agitating It is not too difficult for us to exercise the mind in the form of anger begins to discriminating restraint over our senses if calm it. The power is there in both the we associate with people who are following cases ; in anger it is working against me the same way of life. You may be inclined because I am the victim ; in Japa it is work• to believe that you are the only person in ing for me because I am the victor. your community on the spiritual path, but if you look around you are likely to iind has pointed out that the others who too are engaged in the same control of the palate is a valuable aid to the search. From our own observation it may be control of the mind. In our abundant Ame• stated that there is great interest today, rican economy, under the influence of sense- particularly among the younger people, in stimulating advertisement campaigns, we the eternal verities. often find ourselves consuming articles of food that have little nutritional value and It is in the bosom of our own family that are perhaps even harmful, such as candy we have the fullest opportunity to lead the that leads to cavities. When your mind is spiritual life. We do not have to retire into craving for a log of pecan delight, say to it, the remote regions of the Rocky Mountains " You may have it in a couple of hours." It to bring about the dissolution of our ego. is the nature of the mind to keep changing This can be done beautifully and with least and you need not be surprised, therefore, if violence in the family context by putting at the end of two hours it is demanding to first the welfare of our parents, partner, go for a restless ride on a motorcycle. children and friends. This does not mean Another way of tackling a sense craving is saying " yes " all the time but saying " no " to offer it a healthier substitute — raisins with love and respect when it is necessary instead of candy, orange juice instead of in the interest of the other person. In contri• coffee. When there has been overindulgence, buting to the happiness of others we are both the body and the mind may benefit ensuring our own happiness which steadily from skipping a meal. The ancient Hindu increases as our ego diminishes.

What is true now ?

Devotee : Is the theory of Evolution true ? Bhagavan : The trouble with all of us is that we want to know the past, what we were, and also what we will be in the future. We know nothing about the past or the future. We do know the present and that we exist now. Both yesterday and tomorrow are only with reference to today. Yesterday was called ' today' in its time, and tomorrow will be called today by us tomorrow. Today is ever present. What is ever present is pure existence. It has no past or future. Why not try and find out the real nature of the present and every present existence ? 1968 207 SYMBOLISM IN THE LIFE OF SRI KRISHNA-I

By

Dr. W. RADHAKRISHNAYYA

'TVHERE are simple devotees who repeat greater and is the best loved and lovingly the stories of Sri Krishna and commonly regarded as the greatest. Indeed his marvellous doings ; there are naturalists there are some who do not consider him as who try to think out a rational explanation . They say that the word signifies for the apparent miracles and there are avatarana or descent, whereas Sri Krishna modernists who speak scornfully of what never descended from his high estate but they call • superstitions \ All these are remained in full consciousness of his superficial attitudes. In fact the exploits of Supreme Being throughout, unaffected by Sri Krishna are to be understood symboli• his environment or his own actions. Others cally. This does not necessarily mean either speak of him as the Poorna or ' Complete ' that they did not happen or that they did ; Avatar, all the other Avatars being partial. the symbolical importance of a story is The Bhagavata itself says : Krishnastu independent of its historicity. Bhagavan sway am — " Krishna is God Himself". The indications adduced for The stories of the life of Sri Krishna applying the term * God ' or 1 Bhagavan' to mostly come from the Mahabharata and the him are : Bhagavata, being the work of the great poet and consummate artist, Veda , and 1. Iswaratwa or Lordship : He could are therefore certainly not superstitious. command even the , and Indra, to do his bidding. Let us recall : the , meaning ' ancient', are ancient symbolical stories 2. Dharma : he was the supreme enshrining the inherited lore of the sanatana teacher of dharma. (Eternal) dharma set down by the great 3. Yasas : fame or renown. master, Veda Vyasa. The greatest of them 4. Sri : wealth, which he could bestow is held to be that grand epic the Maha• unasked on his devotees. bharata, incorporating the Bhagavad Gita, 5. J nana or Knowledge : he was called the Song of the Lord Krishna. Even this, the Jagat-Guru or ' World-Teacher ' however, despite its beauty, adventure and on account of his teaching in the pageantry, did not prove accessible to all, so Bhagavad Gita and the Uddhava he further added the Bhagavata. The Gita Gita. has been called the drawn from the 6. Vairagya or detachment : shown for cows of the ; and in the same instance when he laughed cheerfully spirit the Bhagavata has been called the on hearing Gandhari curse him and milk-sweet made out of the milk, the his whole dynasty. sweetened food of it being readily available. But it still is good food, for it must never be The Bhagavata, a sacred scripture written forgotten that however captivating the by a sacred author, the great Veda Vyasa, Mahabharata and the Bhagavata and other tells the life story of Sri Krishna from birth Puranas may be, their main purpose is to up to his giving up his mortal form. provide spiritual instruction. The advent of Sri Krishna was at a time A large part of both the Mahabharata and of social and moral break-up in some ways the Bhagavata is taken up with the life and reminiscent of to-day. As to-day there were teachings of Sri Krishna. He is the eighth violent and treacherous rulers and deceitful in the accepted puranic list _pf the ten double-dealers. The legend is that the earth 208 THE MOUNTAIN PATH July -

The prison grew bright with his lustre. The chains fell off. The guards, all slept. could no longer bear the weight of such a ways. The Supremo is represented as generation and, in the form of a cow with reclinging in the Ocean of Milk, that is the sad face, tearful eyes and piteous cry, infinite potentiality of the heart. approached Brahma, the Creator, for relief. Brahma saw that there was no fault in his Coming now to the actual story : Vasu- work of creation, so took her to Siva. Siva (the head of the Vasus or celestial also saw no fault in his work of destruction, benefactors) married Devaki, the queen of so the three of them repaired to , the the devas (that is of indriyas or faculties). Supreme Lord, beseeching him to put things In their previous birth they had been great right1 The Lord graciously acceded to their devotees and longed for a divine child (for request and decided to take birth in the the new life of Realization). In this life their Yadava dynasty for this purpose. He was i According to the three Gods, accordingly born as Krishna, others of the Brahma, Vishnu and Siva, constitute respectively celestials also being born to assist him and the forces of Creation, Preservation and Des• play their parts in the drama, notably Sesha truction. One or another of them is regarded as the Supreme according to the viewpoint. From who came as Krishna's elder brother the point of view of preservation and salvation Balaram. of the universe Vishnu is the Supreme, but from the point of view of the re-absorption (or des• The term used for the ' Supreme ' here is truction) of the universe in Non-Being, Siva. The Bhagavata is a Vaishnavite scripture and Vrishakapi, implying the power of entering therefore represents Vishnu as the Supreme and various bodies and instilling life into them. Krishna as the Manifestation of Vishnu. This will come as a surprise to Advaitins who are The cow represents mankind and Brahma accustomed to regard Siva as the Absolute and the mind with four faces looking all four Supreme. MEDITATION ON TRUTH 209 devotion ripened into jnana and vairagya purified ego-sense, which has the strength of (knowledge and dispassion which, when a giant. united, produce Realization). But Devaki Krishna himself, the Divine Child, was had an elder brother, Kamsa (the ego, also born a little after midnight on the eighth represented as a reincarnation of the demon day of the dark fortnight of the month of Kalanemi) who, on their wedding day, Sravana, midnight being the darkness of heard a voice declare that Devaki's eighth envelopment in and the eighth day son would kill him (an intimation that the the time of the rising moon of Enlighten-- awakening of the Self would be the end of ment. He revealed himself in his true glory him). His first impulse was to slay her but to his parents. The prison grew bright with then he relented and allowed her and Vasu- his lustre. The chains (the bondage of deva to live on condition that they were to ignorance) fell off. The guards (the im• remain prisoners (in the bondage of pulses of the ego), all slept. The prison samsara) and all their sons were to be doors stood open. took the Divine handed over to him and killed at birth. Child in his arms and walked across the flood waters of the Yamuna with him The six infants renounced by them in (untroubled by the turbulence of events). their longing for the Divine Child represent He took him to Gokula (synonymous with the jnana-indriyas (organs of cognition). the Goloka of the Puranas, the Abode of There is a remarkable addition coming later Serenity). Nanda is Ananda, the state of in the story that Krishna, after coming to Bliss. His wife Yasoda had just given birth maturity, restored life to his infant brothers, to a daughter whom Vasudeva took back in that is to say that the faculties offered up in place of Krishna. The watchmen now woke sacrifice are restored to the awakened Self. up and hastened to inform Kamsa of the birth, but the infant girl was Maya, the The seventh child was B alar am, who was power of illusion. She showed herself in smuggled out to Gokula and brought up super-human power before Kamsa and then there in the house of Nanda, where he was disappeared from his sight. Recognizing now later joined by Krishna himself. Kamsa was that his schemes had failed, Kamsa released informed that there had been a miscarriage. Vasudeva and Devaki. Balaram represents sattvic ahankara, the (To be Continued)

Meditation on Truth

Meditation on the meaning of truth as it is taught in Vedanta leads to the highest illumination. By this means, the misery of worldly life is altogether destroyed.

Faith, devotion, and constant union with God through prayer — these are declared by the sacred scriptures to be the seeker's direct means of liberation. To him who abides by them comes liberation from that bondage of physical consciousness which has been forged by ignorance. — Sankara, 210 July WHAT IS SELF-REALISATION ?

By

DOUGLAS E. HARDING

TN order to answer this question as clearly as possible, let us distinguish six pro• gressive stages :

Steps (1) Ignorance — not knowing What one is (1) to (2) Gradual (2) Understanding — knowing What one is (2) to (3) Abrupt (3) Seeing — catching sight of What one is (3) to (4) Gradual (4) Illumination — steadily seeing What (4) to (5) Abrupt (5) Self-Realisation — being Who one is (5) to (6) Gradual (6) Full Self-Realisation • Steadily seeing What one is steadily being Who one is steadily realising That one is

This table is subject to variation in indivi• possessions and power, and when those dis• dual cases. For instance, Understanding (2) appoint the pursuit of reputation and fame. may come later than Seeing (3), and Illumination (4) may come later than Self- (2) Understanding knowing What realisation (5). Again, some of the stages one is : may be telescoped, though not actually It is a decisive step in one's life when one avoided. And, of course, the titles chosen turns from the surrounding world to oneself for the six stages are rather arbitrary and at its Centre, and asks What lies here. More will not suit everybody. In fact, having set or less gradually one comes to understand up such a scheme, it is easy (and, in the that one is not the body but Consciousness end, necessary) partially to demolish it. or the Self, that one is not a thing among Before we do that, however, let us see to things but that unique No-thing which is what extent it can clear up misunderstand• the Source and Ground and Container of all ings about the nature of Self-realisation and things. One comes to know, and in the end how it may be arrived at. whole-heartedly to believe, that the Real is not what is experienced, but the Experi• (1) Ignorance — not knowing What one ence^ the One who is not in the world, but is : in whom the world is. The marks of this stage are that one believes the world is real in its own right, Profound intellectual work is characteris• that one is a body which is a part of the tic of this stage. It takes the form of ever- world, and that one's consciousness is renewed discrimination between the object dependent upon the body. or not-Self there, and the Subject or Self The activities which normally go with here, with the result that one becomes pro• this stage are the pursuit of pleasure, and gressively detached from the world and when that disappoints the pursuit of identified with the Reality it depends on. im WHAT IS SELF-REALISATION ? 211 Also appropriate to this stage are talking and (4) Illumination — Steadily seeing What reading about spiritual matters, and the one is : practice of systematic meditation. All this One's seeing needs to be practised and leads to growth of one's desire for Self-rea• stabilised, till it goes on all the while. Actu• lisation, directly experienced. ally, ' practised ' is misleading : ' enjoyed ' is nearer the mark, because seeing is so very (3) Seeing — catching sight of What one easy, natural, and agreeable. All the same, is : it can be neglected, and total dedication is Though it is a useful preparation, no indispensable. Normally, it will take years amount of understanding the Self will ever of more-or-less deliberate seeing before build up to seeing the Self. And for a very seeing becomes quite automatic, in all the good reason : seeing the Self is quite in- circumstances of daily life. In the end, there compatiable with thinking about the Self, will be no occasions which are unfavourable and is a much simpler and more direct expe• to Self-seeing. rience. Instead of knowing that right here, (5) Self-Realisation — being Who one is : on the Spot one occupies, is this brilliant Just as there is no footbridge between Clarity without so much as a speck of body- understanding the Self and seeing the Self, mind, one actually sees this Clarity, and sees so there is no footbridge between seeing the it more sharply and convincingly than one Self and being the Self : the transition is sees anything else whatever. The Self here a sudden leap, powered by Grace. No sees itself to be perfectly lucid, transparent, amount of seeing clearly What one is — obvious. In fact, mere objects out there are, namely, this Emptiness of body-mind — will by comparison, hardly seen at all : only very automatically lead to the first-hand experi• limited aspects of them are perceived, re• ence of being Who one is — namely, the One, motely and one at a time, and in the spatio- the Sole Reality, the Alone. Certainly some temporal gap between observer and observ• progress in stabilising one's Self-seeing will ed all kinds of errors are certain to creep make Self-realisation rather more likely. in. Not so Self-seeing, where Seer and see• But they are distinct and independent orders ing and seen are one and the same, coinci• of experience, and it is perfectly possible to dent, unseparated by any interval of time advance in one bound from one's initial see• or space, with the result that there is no ing of What one is to being Who one is, possibility of error. Moreover, because this without any practice of the former. This Self-seeing is seeing what has no parts or radical shift of consciousness, of identity, aspects or history, it is always a total and comes out of the blue, when it wills. perfect seeing : one cannot half see it, nor can one see half of it. To see the Self at The mark of this stage is that, instead of all is to see it entire — while the seeing merely thinking about and seeing the One, lasts. one actually feels like the One. One answers to this Name, as before one answered to a This Self-seeing is true Liberation, the human name. One directly experiences decisive step. Or rather, it is a sudden, un• what it is to be the All and the Source of premeditated leap in the dark : not the re• All. sult of intention or training or merit, but But again, this realisation is not, normally, the free gift of a Grace which is not to be constant, but a series of realisations, flashes commanded. Nevertheless this first seeing of the Supreme Identity separated by is, as a rule, a sudden flash which does not periods of Self-forgetfulness. at once issue in a steady state. It fades immediately it is not attended to, and needs (6) Full Self-Realisation — steadily being constant renewal. In a sense, therefore, this Who one is : third stage is only the beginning of the true Again, it is certainly not practice as a task spiritual life. or a duty, but as ever-renewed enjoyment, 212 THE MOUNTAIN PATH July

which leads to the permanent establishment confused ideas about Self-realisation, and of the Supreme Identity. cease (for instance) confusing the mere understanding of Stage 2 with the seeing of And probably, long before that Identity is Stage 3, or the seeing of Stage 3 with the uninterruptedly enjoyed, it will be seen to being of Stage 5 ; otherwise, we are likely include, besides seeing What one is, and to rest satisfied with a partial realisation, being Who one is, realising That one is. In or (in the case of Stage 2) with no reali• other words, though the experience of this sation at all, but only an intellectual grasp sixth stage is in the last resort perfectly of the truth. Moreover, unless we recog• simple and indivisible, yet it must somehow nise the difference between the stages of include a total amazement — amazement at gradual progress, where systematic practice the ' impossible 9 fact that one has actually is appropriate (not to say essential), and the occurred, that anything exists at all, that the stages of sudden break-through, where Self actually is. Here, one says ' I AM ! ' practice is meaningless and only Grace and that is enough. Not How I am or What counts, we are in danger of misdirecting our I am, but That I am : not what I look like, energies. or embrace, or do, but the simple and The only way to see the Self is to be astounding fact that I ALONE AM — this interested enough just to look, once and for incredible achievement of having, without all, at the Spot one occupies. And the only help or reason or cause, raised Myself out way to be the Self is to submit, once and of the chaos of non-existence and nullity for all, to the experience of Aloneness. into BEING. This alone is true spiritual These two essential leaps in the spiritual knowledge — the knowledge of the unknow• life cannot be commanded or worked up to, able Mystery, which is the Self's own won• or occur in slow motion. They are mysteri• der at Itself. ous, unpredictable gifts. On the other hand, * # * they are eminently worth knowing about, The fact that some exceptionally gifted because they are more likely to be confer• souls may be able to combine two or more red upon those who have heard of them, and of these six stages, thus abbreviating our earnestly desire them. Grace gives no com• table, does not make non-sense of the table. mand performances, but has been known to For most of us, it is essential to sort out our respond to an urgent and heartfelt invitation.

II SELF-REALIZATION AS TAUGHT BY SRI BHAGAVAN

By ARTHUR OSBORNE

;Tvhe experience of the sages is that Self- Sri Bhagavan says that in Nirvikalpa Realization is one, whether a glimpse or Samadhi the mind is temporarily immersed ultimate. The only difference is that it re• in the Self, like a bucket immersed in water, mains a glimpse when the mind is not pure which is drawn out again by the rope of enough to hold it. After such a flash sadhana mental activity. In Samadhi the may begin in true earnest to still the mind is merged like a drop of water in the mind so that thoughts, desires, vasanas, etc., limitless sea. The drop, in essence the same whatever one may call it, do not hide our as the sea, has only lost it's limitation, true nature which is ever present. having become the sea. 1968 IT IS OUR BIRTHRIGHT 213

" These distinctions in Realization are The meditation on the Self which is one• from the standpoint of the others who look self is the greatest of all meditations. All at them ; in reality, however, there are no other meditations are included in this. So distinctions in release gained through jnana." if this is gained the others are not necessary. "One should enquire into one's true nature." Sri Bhagavan wrote with the authority of The Consciousness of " I " is the subject full spiritual knowledge. Even so he would of all our actions. Enquiring into the true add : " Thus say the Sages ". Like all his nature of that Consciousness and remaining expositions Self-enquiry is concerned with as oneself is the way to understand through practical questions of the path to Self-Rea- enquiry one's true nature. lization. In reply to questions such paths as Then there would shine in the Heart a kind meditation on one's identity with the Self of wordless illumination of " I-I ". That is, and breath control are described but he him• there would shine of it's own accord the pure self prescribes only Self-enquiry or submis• Consciousness which is unlimited and one, sion to the Guru. He would say : " There the limited and the many thoughts having are two ways : ' Ask yourself — Who am disappeared. If one remains quiescent with• I ? ' or ' Submit and I will strike down the out abandoning that (experience) the egoity, ego '." the individual sense of the form I-am-the body, will be totally destroyed and at the end How to practise these paths is fully dealt the final thoughts, viz., the " I "-form also with in e The Collected Works of Ramana will be quenched like the fire that burns Maharshi \ a revised third edition of which camphor. The great sages and scriptures has recently been brought out by Sri Rama• declare that this alone is Realization. nasramam.

Ill IT IS OUR BIRTHRIGHT

By

NATANANANDA

(These were questions put by a devotee to Sri Natanananda and answered by him)

Question 1 : What is the method of attain• (c) According to this teaching of Sri ing peace ? Bhagavan, when the Self forgets that it is a separate entity different from the body and Answer 1 : (a) It is first of all necessary regards itself as the body, it is named the to know what the mind is. mind, the individual (jiva) and the ego. (b) There is no such thing as a mind (d) By regarding as the Self the body separate from the Self, one's real nature. which is not the Self, one becomes attached to (develops desires for) mother, father, " When one enquires constantly into brothers, sisters, house, lands, wealth, fame, the nature of the mind it is seen that there greatness, etc., all connected with the body. is no such thing as the mind. This is the When these desires are fulfilled there is joy direct path to be followed by all." and when they are not there is sorrow. — Upadesa Saram—v 17. (e) When the ignorance which is the " When one enquires into the nature of cause of regarding the body as the Self is the mind it is seen that the Self itself is got rid of it is fully realized that the very the mind." — Who Am I? nature of the Self is Peace. THE MOUNTAIN PATH

(f) Although a temporary state of peace Answer 3 : As has already been stated may result from practising worship (), Peace is the very nature of the Self. But it repetition of holy names or sacred sounds is covered up by thoughts. The evidence for (japa) and meditation (dhyana), one can• this is the peace which one experiences in not attain peace until one frees oneself from the state of sleep when there are no his connection with the body. thoughts. It is possible to attain, if one makes the necessary effort, a state which is (g) It is not possible to free oneself free from thoughts even while awake. from the bondage of the body all at once. Long practice is necessary. NOTE : It is needless to doubt whether one Question 2 : Is it possible (for every one) will attain Liberation in this life or not. to attain, like Sri Bhagavan, complete en• " O Son ! the first plane itself is diffi• lightenment, that is Realization of Truth and cult to gain. This gained, Liberation is as Liberation ? good as gained." Answer 2 : These (three) are not diffe• — Kaivalya Navaneeta, v. 155. rent and are not newly acquired. They are " If one associates with Sages what is ever present with all of us. If they were to the need for all these methods of discipline ? be newly acquired, they would be lost also ; When a pleasant breeze from the south is they could not then be permanent. blowing, of what use, tell me, is a fan ? 99 — Supplement to Forty Verses, 3. Even when the Self regards the body as the Self, it is in fact in its true state of According to the above conclusion of the Liberation, which is natural to it. wise the very fact that you possess a great That which makes this Truth clear and desire for Liberation and that you have be• frees the Self from ignorance is known as gun to associate with sages, is due to the Guru's Grace. grace of the Guru and a sure sign that your aspiration will be fulfilled. Liberation is the birthright of every human being. But faith and Wisdom are Question 4 : How is one to attain Self- also necessary. Realization ?

Question 3 : Is it possible for one to Answer 4 : Self-Realization is (nothing attain Peace ? but) utter desirelessness.

Siva and Sakti

By V. Venkataraman

Bhagavan once said to me : " Sri (Siva in the cosmic dance of creation and dissolution of the universe) and Sri Arunachala are one and the same. The former is the Lord's dynamic aspect and the latter His static. There is no difference."

On another occasion when speaking about Siva and Sakti he said " Sakti is only Siva's Grace personified." 196S 215

THE YAKSHA PRASNA

From THE MAHABHARATA (contd. from the last issue)

(Based largely on the annotated translation by K. Balasubramania Iyer published by Bharatiya Bhavan.)

Yaksha Yudhishtira

61. Renunciation of what makes one be- 61. Renunciation of pride makes one be• loved ? loved. 62. Renunciation of what frees one from 62. Renunciation of anger frees one from grief ? grief. 63. Renunciation of what makes one pros- 63. Renunciation of desire makes one perous ? , wealthy. 64. Renunciation of what makes one 64. Renunciation of grasping makes one happy ? happy.

Yaksha

65. For what reason does one make gifts to Brahmins ? 66. For what reason does one make gifts to actors and dancers ! 67. For what reason does one make gifts to dependants ? 216 THE MOUNTAIN PATH July

68. For what reason does one make gifts Yaksha to kings ? 77. What is the path to be followed ? Yudhishtira 78. What is spoken of as water ? 79. What is food ? 65. One makes gifts to a Brahmin for the 80. What is poison ? sake of dharma. 81. Tell me, what is the right time for a 66. One makes gifts to actors and dancers shraddha ? After that you may drink the for the sake of fame. water and take some away with you. 67. One makes gifts to dependants for their maintenance. Yudhishtira 68. One makes gifts to a king out of fear. 77. The way of the righteous is the path. For the sake of dharma means for the right 78. Akasa (space or ether) is spoken of performance of sacrifices and other ritu\al. as water. 79. The cow is food. Yaksha 80. Desire is poison. 69. By what is the world enveloped ? 81. When one meets a man qualified in 70. Why does it not shine ? the Vedas is the time for shraddha. 71. Why does one abandon friends ? What do you think, O Yaksha ? 72. Why does one not attain heaven ? The first answer indicates that it is no use say• ing that one path or doctrine is right and others Yudhishtira wrong. Wherever one can find a true guide is the path. It Is based on the answer found later 69. The world is enveloped in ignorance. to question 120: "Logic is inconclusive; the 70. It does not shine owing to darkness. scriptiwes are divergent; there is no whose 71. One abandons friends out of avarice. opinion is^ final; the truth of dharma lies hidden; 72 One does not attain heaven owing to therefore the only way is to follow the path Of attachment. the great." ' Nature 'on a higher plane is spoken of as Yaksha 'akasa', on a lower as water, Akasa may also symbolise Brahman and water may symbolise 73. What man can be regarded as lifeless ? man so that this answer implies the Mahavakya : 74. What kingdom can be regarded as ' That thou art\ lifeless ? The Hindus at this time were not yet vegeta• 75. What shraddha (ritual offering to the rians, nevertheless the answer to question No. 79 ancestors) can be regarded as lifeless ? goes far beyond the problem of vegetarianism. It 76. What (ritualistic sacrifice) can has affinity to answers No. 40 and 56. Simple un*- be regarded as lifeless ? corrupted natuire is food, while desire or sense- attraction is poison. Yudhishtira Why does the Yaksha follow four such funda• mental questions with an apparently trivial one 73. A poverty-stricken person can be re about the right time for performing a rite ? It garded as lifeless. is obviously a trap, and Yv\dhishtira evades it: just as the right path is that on which one can 74. A kingdom without a ruler can be re• find a qualified guide, so, he says, the time to per• garded as lifeless. form it. 75. A shraddha performed by unqualified It would be nice to think that Yudhisntira's persons may be regarded as lifeless. closing counter-question showed a sense of 76. A yajna in which remuneration is not humour and meant, " Sd you see I am not so made to those who perform it may be re• easily caught!" garded as lifeless. (To be continued in our next issUe) 1968

The Bhagayad Gita

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Translated by Prof. G. V. KULKARNI and ARTHUR OSBORNE

1 3

Sri Bhagavan said : Hear what I say briefly : What the Field This body, O Son of Kunti, is known as is, of what nature, what its modifications, the Field ; and he who is aware of it is what its source, also what He (i.e. the called the Knower of the Field by the wise. Knower of the field) is and what is His (Here ' knower ' means ' illuminer ') power.

2 4 And know that I am the Knower of the It has been sung by the Rishis in mani• field in all the fields, O Bharata. The know• fold ways in various inspired verses and also ledge of the Field and the knower of that^ expressed in the Brahma in reasoned in my opinion, is true Knowledge. and analytic texts, 218 THE MOUNTAIN PATH July

The Gita discusses this age-old crucial topic, ears everywhere. It abides in the world already handled by the Vedas, the Upanishads enveloping everything. and the Brahma Sutras or Vedanta Sutras of . Shankarcharya understands ' Brahma 14 Sutra etc.' to mean sentences indicating the Brahman in the Upanishads and not actually the Though it appears to be engrossed in the Sutras of Badarayana. qualities (or activities) of the senses, yet is free from them all ; unattached, it supports 5-6 all ; free from qualities (gunas), it enjoys The (five) great elements, ego, reason, the qualities. the unmanifest, the ten sense organs and the 15 one (mind) and the five objects of senses, desire, aversion, happiness, misery, aggre• It is within and without (all) beings, gate (the body), intelligence (the visible immovable as well as movable ; it is un• activity) and firmness — these, in brief, knowable on account of its subtlety ; it is constitute the Field and its modifications. far as well as near. This is the objective world of which the Self is aware; of these are the twenty-four principles 16 included in the Pra-kriti of the . Although undivided, it appears to be divided in beings. That is to be understood 7-11 as the support of (all) beings ; pervades Humility, lack of hypocrisy (i.e. unpre- (them) and rules (over them) — devouring tentiousness), non-violence, forgiveness, and (yet) generating. straightforwardness, service of the Guru, purity, firmness (or steadiness), self-control, 17 detachment from the objects of the senses, It is the light of all lights and is said to also absence of egoism, perception of the be beyond darkness. It is wisdom (jnana), evils of birth, death, old age, disease and the object of wisdom (jneya) and the goal misery ; non-attachment, absence of self- of wisdom, residing in the hearts of all. identification with son, wife, home etc., and constant equanimity of mind in desirable 18 and undesirable events, unflinching and unswerving devotion tq Me, resort to solitary Thus in brief the Field, the wisdom and places, distaste for the society of men, the object of wisdom have been explained. constant adherence to the Knowledge of the My devotee, having understood this, attains Self (or fixity in Self-knowledge) and per• My status. ception of philosophical truths — all this is Note: Here ends the topic of Jneya. called * wisdom' (jnana) ; what is not this is ignorance (ajnana). 19 Know that Prakriti (matter) and 12 (Spirit) are both without beginning and I shall now describe that which ought to that modifications and qualities are born of be known : (jneya) ; knowing which one Prakriti. attains immortality. It is the beginningless Supreme Brahman, wlrjch is called neither 20 Being — Sat, nor non-Being — asat, (i.e. Prakriti is said to be the cause of the which is beyond the duality of the Sat and effect (viz., the body) and the instruments Asat, the manifest and the unmanifest.) (viz., the senses1). Purusha is said to be the 13 cause of the experience of pleasure and pain.

It has hands and feet on all sides, has i Alternate rendering: cause of the generation eyes, heads and faces in all directions, has of causes and effects. 1968 THE BHAGAVAD GITA 219

21 27 Purusha residing in Prakriti enjoys the He who sees the Supreme Lord residing qualities born from Prakriti. His attach• equally in all beings — the Imperishable ment to the qualities is the cause of his birth One among the perishable, — sees (truely). in good and evil wombs. 28

22 He who sees the Lord residing equally everywhere, does not destroy the Self by And the Supreme Purusha residing in this the Self and hence reaches the highest state. body is known as the Spectator, the Per- mitter, the sustainer, the enjoyer, the 29 Supreme Lord and the Highest Self. He who sees (realizes) that actions of all kinds are being performed by Prakriti alone 23 and that the Self is inactive, (truly) sees. One who knows thus Purusha and Pra• The Self is only a witness to the dynamic show kriti together with the qualities, is never of Prakriti that is not* apart from it. born again, although engaged in all sorts of activities. 30 - When he sees the separate existence of Here ends the topic of Purusha and Prakriti. beings as rooted in the One and spread out The Gita adopts the Principles but adds from that, he attains Brahman. a higher Purusha over and above the two. Essen• tially the Gita-doctrine is non-dualistic, com• 31 prehending other principles. This eternal Supreme Self, though dwel• 24 ling in the body, O Son of Kunti, neither does (anything) nor is attached, as He is Some see the Self within oneself by medi• beginningless and has no qualities. tation. Others by the Samkhya Yoga (i.e. , the yoga of Wisdom), while 32 some others by the (the yoga Just as the all pervading ether, being of Action). subtle, is not affected, (tainted or con• taminated) (by anything) even so, the Self 25 pervading the whole body is not tainted. Some, however, not understanding (these ' Polluted' is equally good — used by some ) listen to others, who know and thus translators — lipyate. become devoted. They too, who are intent on hearing, surely cross (the ocean of) 33 death. Just as the single sun illumines this whole This stanza probably refers to Bhaktiyoga world, even so the Knower of the Field (Yoga of Devotion). The different yogas are the illumines the entire Field, O Bharata. different spiritual paths suitable to men of 34 different temperaments. In the first three, per• sonal effort is essential, while in the last sur• Those who perceive with the eye of render is more . important than effort. Their wisdom the distinction between the Field destination is, however, the same. and the Knower of the Field in this manner and also the liberation of beings from Pra• 26 kriti, reach the Supreme (Brahman). - Know, O best of , that whatever Here ends the Thirteenth chapter of the is born, immobile or mobile, is born from Bhagavad Gita, entitled " The distinction the union of the Field and the Knower of between the Field an>d the Knower of the the Field. Field." We give here the third instalment of our translation of the which was conducted daily before Bhagavan and is now before his shrine in the Ashram. It is the second part of the rrtorning chant and consists of the' first three chapters of the . We aim at a literal translation, hut the mental outlook of the ancients is so different fnora that df to-day that explanation is often needed. Some parts, for instance, are in which the actual sound value is of prime importance. Some parts are inconceivably terse and cryp- tic; where it is stated, for instance, concerning the worlds, the luminaries learning or marriage what is the original form, the evolved form, the fusion and the process (of accomplishing the fusion). This is not an expositidn in the modern sense of the word, but rather a reminder of themes for understanding or meditation. On the other hand, some passages may seem need" lessly prolix: for instance, the strange arithmetic listing various degrees of bliss as amounting each of them a hundred times the preceding one. This, of course, is to

conjure up the conviction of ' beyond all this9 in the mvM of the chanter.

TAITTIRIYA UPANISHAD May Mitra be propitious to us ! May Varuna be propitious to us ! May Indra and Brihaspati be propitious to us ! May Vishnu of the long strides be propitious to us ! 1 I bow down before Vayu. O Vayu I bow down before thee. Thou alone art the manifest Brahman.2 I will proclaim thee the law ; 3 I will proclaim thee the Truth. May That protect me ! May That protect the guru.4 May That protect me. May That pro• tect the guru. Om, Peace, Peace, Peace. 00 We will now expound the science of phonetics — vocalisation, tone,5 measure,6 force,7 uniformity8 and continuity.9 Thus is expounded the section on phonetics. May glory be on both of us ! May the lustre of Brahman illuminate both of us ! We will now expound the upanishad 10 of the samhitas,11 under 11 five heads, that is : the worlds, the luminaries, knowledge, progeny and the atma.12 These they call the great samhitas. m. 1968 THE VEDAPARAYANA 221

First concerning the worlds : earth is the May Brahmacharins of controlled mind prior form, heaven the subsequent form, come to me, Svaha ! akasa 13 their combination and air the pro• May I be renowned among men, Svaha ! cess (of combining). Thus concerning the May I be respected among the wealthy, worlds. Svaha! Now concerning the luminaries : fire is O Lord, may I enter into Thee, Svaha ! the prior form, the sun the subsequent form, O Lord, enter into me, Svaha ! water their combination, and lightning the In Thee who hast a thousand branches process. Thus concerning the luminaries. may I be cleansed, O Lord, Svaha ! As waters flow downwards, as months to Now concerning knowledge : the the year, O World-Sustainer,23 may Brahma• is the prior form, the disciple the subsequent charins come to me from all sides, Svaha ! form, knowledge their combination, and the Thou art the refuge ; enlighten me ; absorb chanting the process. Thus concerning me in Thee ! knowledge. Bhu, Bhuva, Suva : these are three sac• Now concerning progeny : the mother is red utterances.24 Besides these the Son of the prior form, the father the subsequent Mahachama taught the fourth. That is form, progeny their combination, and pro• Maha, That is Brahman, That is the Atman. creation the process. Thus concerning pro• The other gods are its members. geny. Bhu is this world, bhuva the inter-world, Now concerning the being 14 : the lower suva the upper world, and Maha the sun. jaw is the prior form, the upper jaw the All the worlds are ma'de glorious by the sun. subsequent form, speech their combination Bhu is agni,25, bhuva is vayu,26 suva is and the tongue the process. Thus concern• the sun and maha the moon. All the lumi• ing the being. naries are made glorious by the moon.27 These are the great samhitas. He who Bhu is (denotes) the mantras,28 bhuva knows15 these great samhitas as here ex• the samans,29 suva the yajus 30 and Maha is pounded is endowed with progeny, cattle, Brahman. All the Vedas are made glorious the Light of Brahman, food and the heavenly by Brahman. world.16 Bhu is prana,31 bhuva apana,32 suva

33 34 May Indra who is the lord of the Vedas,17 vyana and Maha is annam. All the who possesses innumerable forms, who has pranas are made glorious by food. * arisen from the immortal Vedas, endow me These are the four vyahritis each compris• with wisdom. O Lord ! may I possess im• ing four and becoming fourfold. He who mortality. May my body be fit ! 18 May my knows them knows Brahman. To him all tongue be honeyed ! May I hear well with the gods bring homage. my ears ! Thou art the sheath of Brahman concealed by intelligence.19 Safeguard for 1 This refers to the myth of Bali who acquired me what I have learned. powers over heaven and earth. Vishnu appeared before him as a dwarf and begged him for as Sri20 ever provides me amply and much land as he could cover in three strides. The boon was granted and the dwarf then grew to promptly with raiment, cattle, food and such immensity that he covered heaven and earth drink ; therefore bring her to me with wool- in his first two strides and for the third had no bearing animals for which I here offer obla• place left to set his foot except on Bali's head. A myth of the humbling of the ego once it grants tion in the fire. Svaha ! 21 a foothold to God. May Brahmacharins 22 come to me, Svaha ! 2 Air or wind is taken as the symbol or mani• May Brahmacharins come to me quietly, festation of Spirit. 3 The word translated 1 law ' is ' rtam' from Svaha ! which the words ' rite' and ' ritual' come. It has much the same meaning in Vedic Sanskrit as May Brahmacharins come to me from all ' dharma' has in later texts. sides, Svaha ! 4 Literally ' the speaker ' or ' chanter' (of the May self-controlled Brahmacharins come scriptures) but the meaning is the ' guru'. 5 Various distinct tones or pitches are used in to me, Svaha ! reciting Vedic mantrams, as in a tonal language. 222 THE MOUNTAIN PATH July

6 Measure or quantity in the sense of short, 21 There is no dictionary meaning of the Vedic long and still longer vowels. cry Svaha. It is somewhat akin to the Biblical 7 Stress or emphasis. ' So be it!' or * Amen \ 8 Evenness of pronunciation. 22 Celibate students.- The practiser is now a 9 Combinations of sounds. qualified guru appealing for disciples. 10 The word 'upanishad' means literally 23 in Sanskrit Dhata. ' sitting together'; here it can be understood as 24 Vyahriti. the 1 secret' or * meditation '. 25 fire. 11 The collections of Vedic hymns are called 26 air. samhita. Here it means 'combinations'. 27 Here the viewpoint is changed. It will be 12 Atma means the * self' in the sense of the seen in what follows that there are four sacred ' being'; here it is rather the physical being. < utterances, each to be meditated upon in four 13 Akasa can mean ' ether ' or ' space '. different ways. Thus they make up the sixteen 14 atma. kalas or parts of the Purusha. All this is to be 15 i.e. meditates upon. regarded as indications for meditation, not as an 16 i.e. Svarga. exposition of theory. 17 Literally ' the bull among the Vedas'. 28 The riks or verses of the Rig-Veda. 18 The body and its faculties are required for 29 The chants of the Sama-Veda. full development. so The liturgical portions of the Yajur-Veda. 19 Divine power and knowledge sprung from 31 The vital force which rises in the body. the Vedas is still only the sheath enclosing the 32 The vital force which descends. Formless Absolute of Brahman. 33 The vital force which pervades the body. 20 Sri is equivalent to Lakshmi, the spouse of 34 Food. Vishnu and Goddess of Prosperity. (To be continued)

Garland of Guru's Sayings

Translated by Prof. K. SWAMINATHAN from the Tamil of Sri MURUGANAR

64. To meet the needs of various minds 68. In mere bright presence of the Sun The Master spoke of various doctrines. The loadstone emits fire,4

Ajata 1 is the only doctrine The lotus blossoms ; He taught as from his own experience. The water-lily closes ; All creatures move or rest According to their nature. 65. This Truth supreme is what at first 2 The Lord revealed to Arjuna. 69. From His sheer potent presence

But finding His friend's mind bewildered Flows His five-fold function,5 Reeling, Krishna later spoke As the needle near the magnet trembles, Of other doctrines. And beneath the moon The moonstone drips, The water-lily blossoms 66. By their diverse cosmogonies And the lotus closes. What do the Holy Books intend ? Not to tell how the world began, 70. In the bright presence of the Lord But to start the bold enquiry. Free from any trace of thought, " How real is the world ? " Persons in accordance with their nature Aptly walk the ways of works.

67. " Him all things obey " Accomplish mighty tasks Means only that they act And, turning inward, reach As various beings, sentient and The home of freedom. insentient. 1 Ajata — No birth. Stir and move 2 In Chap. II of Bhagavad GUa. In mere presence of the thought-free 3 Cf. paragraph 15 of " Who am I ? " 4 Cf. a convex lens used to ignite cotton-wool. Sun 5 Creation, preservation, dissolution, veiling Arisen in the heavens.3 and grace. WE INSIST ONLY

Wei Wu Wei he very naughty boy. He say in July 67 Mountain Path, p 261: The apparent universe is a colossal conceptual structure in mind, extended in the basic concepts of * space' and 'duration'. It is NOT at all what he says. Wy? Because how could our dear universe be what he or me says it is ? Because what he says is itself a concept and so without validity, except to the living dead Validity is a big word meaning what you say it means to you. Sweet Wei Wu Wei is like a child asking for candy. Let's give him som. He say we do not exist. He cannot legitimately say that wy ? Be cause his statement itself disproves itself. He is there saying he does not exist. Ha ha. Ah Oh. What he mean must be this: WE DO NOT EX-IST. AND WE NEVER SHALL EX-IST. WE INSIST.

rePS 224 July

RELIGION IN A CHANGING WORLD: By S. Dr. Radhakrishnan evaluates the position of Radhakrishnan; George Allen and Unwin; religion in a changing world with remarkable Pp. 186; Price in U.K. 25s. erudition, intellectual understanding and a deep religious feeling. This book offers a solution We live in an age of transition and uncertainty, pointing beyond the doubts and insecurities of a scientific age with an anti-metaphysical bias. modern man to greater security and hope. Our When man's basic needs are satisfied and he knowledge of this world is limited. We only becomes bored with a surfeit of pleasure he may know the present or middle part which is a suc• start wondering whether there is any purpose in cession of changes. Man does not know the life. Science is making tremendous strides reach• totality of the universe. " Scientific theories are ing out for the moon and stars, bringing a nuclear not transcripts of reality. In our knowledge of age with weapons of destruction of such stagger• the physical world there is our experience on ing power as to threaten total disaster if not con• .the one side and the theory which is our crea• trolled. So the height of this technological might tion on the other. The appeal of metaphysics is has brought insecurity and bewilderment. What to a judgment more basic than either sense next ? The author says that it is a desperate experience or rational logic. We devise experi• situation and a crisis which heralds either a total ments to test the validity of working hypotheses. catastrophe or a new beginning. The human Religious ideas are also tested and judged by the individual has to be renewed if human society is lives and experience of those who adopt them. to be preserved. Having gone almost to the limit There is an essential similarity' of purpose in of our frail minds those immersed in science are seeking truth." There need be no conflict between also groping to find a meaning and a way out of the scientific and religious approach. The antago• the impasse. To quote Einstein, the greatest nism stems mainly from misunderstanding and scientist of this age, faith is not inconsistent with failure to appreciate the deepest insights of the demands of modern science : religion. Nobody doubts his own existence which " The cosmic is the strong• .means also for him the existence of the world. est and noblest mainspring of scientific This calls for enquiry both religious and scienti• research. My religion consists of a humble fic. The author affirms that through the dis• admiration of illimitable superior spirit, who covery of the intelligible world we reach the reveals Himself in the slight details we are truth. Metaphysically it is rather through the able to perceive with our frail and feeble minds. discovery of ourselves that we reach the truth. That deeply emotional conviction of the presence Ramana Maharshi says that if we succeed in of a superior reasoning power, which is revealed the quest " Who am I ?" everything else is in the incomprehensible universe, forms my idea solved. Life remains a mystery inspite of the of God," most powerful instruments devised by the human 1968 BOOK REVIEWS 225 mind by what is called scientific method and are welcome for the new vistas they open on the despite all the results of scientific research, topic. which seeks to determine the laws according to The last section in prayoga is truly a remark• which events occur. The cosmos is not a conglo• able exposition of the saptasati as a sadhana meration of accidents. To those who seek in the sastra — for secular as well as for spiritual ends. right way the harmony and intelligent force that A profound work of insight, scholarship, devo• orders the entire universe becomes apparent, an tion and soul-power. intimation of a Presence that transcends thought. M. P. . SHAKINAH. THE THREE JEWELS, An Introduction to GLORY OF THE DIVINE MOTHER (Devi Buddhism: By Bhikshu Mahatmyam) : By S. Shankaranarayanan, (Sthavira), Rider & Co., London, Pp. xii+276, Distributors: Ganesh & Co., Madras-17. 50sh. Pp. 322, Rs. 12.) Bhikshu Sangharakshita is already well-known There are many editions of the Devi Mahatmyam to Indian readers and to Buddhists the world from the Markandeya Purana, giving the text of over through his many publications, and especially the 700 verses and translation in English. But through his book. " A Survey of Buddhism" the present brightly got-up volume stands out (published by the Indian Institute of World Cul• from all of them. It is an illuminating study of ture, Bangalore), in which he traces the histori• the scripture bringing out its spiritual, occult, cal and philosophical development of Buddhism. philosophical and religious significance. The His present book The Three Jewels is con• author, Sri Shankaranarayanan, himself an upa- cerned with the fundamentals of Buddhist life and saka from a very early age and a brilliant scholar thought: the Buddha, the Dharma and the Sangha. with a genius for assimilation and unsurpassed This is a subject which, on the face of it, seems presentation of difficult subjects, is singularly to be so well-known, that people might wonder, equipped for this task. whether anything new could be said about it. But Sangharakshita has not only succeeded in In the course of a comprehensive introduction saying many new things, but in saying them in of 127 pages, the writer studies the work (Chandi a most fascinating and inspiring way. Even the or Devi, Mahatmyam) as a fine synthesis of the most familiar subjects are handled with such Vedic and the Tantric traditions. While discuss• originality and spontaneity that one begins to see ing its role as a major scripture in the Tantric them with new eyes. Only a man who has made lore, he lays bare in modern terminology the Buddhism his own way of life and who has expe• science of the mantra, the organization of the rienced every phase of it, could write in such a worlds, the Deities, the means to communicate convincing and refreshing way. Indeed, in this with them and the real significance or rituals. book Buddhism comes to life, and even the most His expositions of the meaning of bhutasuddhi, technical, philosophical or psychological terms are kavacha, argala, keelaka, nyasa etc. make this a made easy and lucid, supported by well-chosen standard work for reference. There is a detailed similies or parallels in modern thought. The description of the preliminaries that are enjoined difficult subject of trikaya, the threefold body of upon one who seeks to do the parayana, worship• the Buddha, for instance, has been illustrated in ful recitation, of the text. the following way: " Three people are looking The full text of the three episodes, charitas, is at a flower. One is a child, one a botanist, and given in bold types along with a faithful and yet one a poet. All that the child sees is an object readable translation in English. The translator of a certain shape with a pleasing bright colour. differs from some of the popular interpreters in The botanist, while not failing to observe places, e.g. tart vishannan sumn drshtva chandika its shape and colour, sees that the flower belongs prahasattvara or vidyah samastastava devi bhedah to a particular species, thrives best at a certain striyah samastah sakala jagatsu, etc. and gives time, place etc. The poet, though his eyes are as strong reasons why he does so. He draws upon keen as the child's and though he knows about Guptavati, the celebrated commentary of Bhaska- botany as much as the botanist, is not so pre• racharya on the text, and expounds the esoteric occupied with the colour of the flower or the for• significance of certain terms in a satisfying mation of its leaves and petals. He sees that the manner. His references to the writings of Vasish- flower is alive, joyously alive, even as he is alive, tha , especially his Umasahasram,, and that there works through the frail perfec• for the delineation of the matrkas, L4ttle Mothers, tion of its leaves and blossoms the same spirit of 226 THE MOUNTAIN PATH July

life whose creative impulse he feels pulsing in Sangharakshita succeeds in giving a convincing the depth of his own being. Despite their great and inspiring picture of the inner unity and con• differences of vision, however, the child, the sistency of Buddhist thought and life. It is due botanist, and the poet still see the same flower, to this profound understanding that he is able to not three different flowers." (p. 36). In other enter into the spirit of the without words, the trikaya doctrine does not proclaim abandoning his stand on the fundamental teach• three separate bodies, but three different aspects ings of the Buddha. These in fact were wide and of the same reality in dependence on three diffe• universal enough to accommodate a tremendous rent levels of consciousness: that of the senses, range of religious experience and philosophical that of the mind, and that of intuitive spiritual interpretation, though they were hampered when experience. By keeping in mind these three levels the free life of the early parivrajakas (who of consciousness, Sangharakshita avoids the pitfalls wandered from place to place) hardened into the of previous writers on Buddhism who, obsessed monastic institution of an organized Sangha with with the idea of scientific rationalism, tried to innumerable rules and regulations and a narrowly separate historical facts from mythological and circumscribed body of canonical scriptures and legendary elements, by discarding all supernatu• commentaries. It was in revolt against this nar• ral or miraculous events in the life of the Buddha rowing of Buddhist ideals and the splitting of as mere inventions or superstitions of credulous the Buddhist community into monks and layman, devotees. Sangharakshita rightly points out the that the great vehicle of the Mahayana with its profound psychological significance and spiritual all-encompassing, universal Ideal truth hidden in these apparently legendary came into existence: an ideal which eliminated passages: " Far from being either devotional the barrier between the monk and the house• effusions or flights of poetic fancy these legends holder as well as the duality of nirvana and in fact make up a symbolical biography of the samsara. " Therefore," in the words of the author, Buddha no less important than the historical nar• " there can in the ultimate sense be no question rative with which, in the traditional biographies, of escaping from the conditioned to the Uncon• it is interwoven, and upon the main episodes of ditioned as though they were distinct entities. which it constitutes a spiritual-cum-metaphysical Or, to speak paradoxically, in order to be truly commentary of the highest value." (p. 30). The free one has to escape not only from samsara present reviewer has always maintained that the into nirvana, but from nirvana back into samsara. Buddha was not only fully cognisant of the Vedic It is this 1 escape' or descent that constitutes the and Upanishadic traditions of his time, but that mahakaruna or Great Compassion of the Buddha, he actually had been trained in yogic practices which is in reality His realization of the non- by his brahmanical teachers Alara Kalama and duality of the conditioned and the Uncondition• Uddaka Ramaputta. This fact is born out by ed ,..' (p. 56). Out of this all-transcending the apparently fantastic story of the serpent- realization, In which Enlightenment turns into in• king Mucalinda, who protected the Buddha after finite love for all sentient beings, arises the glori• his enlightenment by winding himself in seven ous conception of the , who out of coils around the body of the Buddha and by compassion take upon themselves the limitations spreading his seven-headed hood like a canopy of conditioned life. And with this a vision of above the head of the Enlightened One. There infinite beauty is revealed which pervades all can be no doubt that here we have a description aspects of the Mahayana and percolates down into of the ascent of the kundalini, the ' serpent all forms of popular Buddhism, which are vividly power' or spiritual energy through the seven described in the last chapter of this book. The psychic centres of the body, as Sangharakshita author's awareness of the element of beauty in points out. The further fact, that the Buddha the teachings of the Buddha and of its ever increas• was described as having been in a state of bliss• ing emphasis in the scriptures of the Mahayana ful ecstasy during this even adds to the evidence dispels the misunderstanding that Buddhism re• that we are confronted here not with an outer gards ugliness as real and beauty as unreal or occurrence or a material fact, but with an inner that the higher one ascends in the spiritual life, experience which has nothing to do with mytho• the more ugliness is revealed at all levels of logy and is of far greater historical importance existence, while beauty becomes more and more than external happening. By* recognising and illusory. It is true that our scale of values understanding the psychological and symbolical changes and that many of the things which language of in their organic deve• appeared attractive and beautiful at a lower level lopment and their different cultural settings, or understanding may appear worthless from a 1968 BOOK REVIEWS 227 higher point of view, but this does not invalidate the question of " Who am I ? " arise resulting in the sense of beauty nor diminish the chance to complete and final Self-Realization. What fol• see beauty on all levels of existence. On the lowed later when he read about it in scriptures contrary, the higher we rise and the less we are or the utterances of sages was only a verifica• blinded by selfish interests and desires, the more tion of his own transcendental state arrived at we are able to appreciate beauty even in the through direct experience. simplest things and in the lowliest forms of life, Here is a description of His experience in due to our capacity to look deeper into the nature Ramana Maharshi's own words: of reality and to realize that every individual " It was about six weeks before I left Madura form is a unique expression of the Whole, due for good that the great change in my life tooK to the interwovenness of all things and states of place. It was quite sudden. I was sitting alone existence that make up the universe. Sangharak- in a room on the first floor of my uncle's house. shita supports this view by quoting the Buddha's I seldom had any sickness, and on that day there, own words from the Digha Nikaya, in which the was nothing wrong with my health, but a Sudden Buddha refutes the allegation that he had ever violent fear of death overtook me. There wasi taught such things as expressed in the following nothing in my state of health to account for* it, words wrongly attributed to him: " When one and I did not try to account for it or to find reaches up to the Release called Beautiful, and out whether there was any reason for the fear. having reached it abides therein, at such a time I just felt ' I am going to die * and began think• he regards the Whole (Universe) as ugly." And ing what to do about it. It did not occur to me the Buddha continues : " This is what I do Say. to consult a doctor or my elders or friends; I Whenever one reaches up to the Release, called felt that I had to solve the problem myself, there the Beautiful, then he knows indeed what Beauty and then. is." " The shock of the fear of death drove my mind It is the realization of this beauty, shining inwards and I said to myself mentally, without through all the manifold forms and traditions of actually framing the words; ' Now death has Buddhism, which makes this book so stimulating come, what does it mean ? What is it tnat is and enjoyable. dying ? This body dies.' And I at once drama• LAMA ANGARIKA GOVINDA. tized the occurrence of death. I lay with my limbs stretched out stiff as though rigor mortis STUDIES IN COMPARATIVE RELIGION: had set in and imitated a corpse so as to give Tomorrow Publications, London, Autumn 1967, greater reality to the enquiry. I held my breath pp. 190. 5sh. or 85 cents. and kept my lips tightly closed so that no sound This quarterly contains an article "A, Thomist could escape, so that neither the word 'I' nor Approach to the Vedanta" by Bernard Kelly in any other word could be uttered. ' Well then,' which he writes: I said to myself, ' this body is dead. It will be " It is said of Shri Rar*ana Maharshi — a saint carried stiff to the burning ground and there burnt of the Hindu 'way of knowledge' a jnani>—that and reduced to ashes. But with the death of the question which possessed his childhood was this body am I dead ? Is the body I ? It is this, ' Who am I ? \ At length, as a very young silent and inert but I feel the full force of my man he left his home and, taking nothing with personality and even the voice of the ' I' within him, lay on a tomb determined not to get up until me, apart from it. So I am .Spirit transcending he had verified the answer to his question. He the body. The body dies but the Spirit that never came back." transcends it cannot be touched by death. That means I am the deathless spirit.' All this was This statement is fallacious and does not cor• not dull thought; it flashed through me vividly respond to facts. as living truth which I perceived directly, almost The question ' Who am I ? ' never possessed his without thought-process. ' I' was something very childhood, nor even occurred to him. Nor did he real, the only real thing about my present state, lay on a tomb after leaving home, determined not and all the conscious activity connected with my to get up until he had verified the answer to the body was centred on that ' I'. From that moment question. onwards the ' I' or Self focussed attention on What actually happened was a sudden unexpect• itself by a powerful fascination. Fear of death ed spontaneous experience of death and what had vanished once and for all. Absorption in the survived it, when Ramana Maharshi was in his Self continued unbroken from that time on. teens. Only in the process of this experience did Other thoughts might co%ie and go like the vari- 228 THE MOUNTAIN PATH July cms notes of music, but the • I' continued like cessantly put their disciples on guard against the the fundamental sruti (the monotone persisting intellect. , through a Hindu piece of music) note that under^ Why should the distinction between harmony lies and blends with all the other notes. Whether and the idea that man has conceived about it be the body was engaged in talking, reading, or any• of the greatest importance ? A wise man is in thing else, I was still centred on ' I \ Previous complete harmony without any ideas about it and to that crisis I had no clear perception of my those who entertain ideas about it are obviously Self and was not consciously attracted to it. I not in harmony. felt no perceptible or direct interest in it, much When it is a question of the reality underly• less any inclination to dwell permanently in it." ing formal appearances our intellect must (The Collected Works of Ramana Maharshi, Rider abstract itself from all forms, not only " other & Co. pp. 7-9). than verbal". It must become void. Reality underlying all appearances is transcendental and LET GO: THEORY AND PRACTICE OF DE• perennial hidden only by our thoughts and ideas TACHMENT ACCORDING TO ZEN: By and all the paraphernalia of the intellect. Huber Benoit, George Allen and Unwin, We seek liberation and transcendence from our pp. 277, 30 sh. temporal limits and "the only way for us to Dr. Benoit's approach is original in the sense have done with the impression of enslavement that it is analytical from the standpoint of scien• and to know absolute bliss consists in balancing tific psychology. Man, he says, should be able the partial convergent functioning of our intellect to know immutable bliss beyond time, indepen• by its partial divergent functioning. We must dent of organic joys and sufferings and for this, develop the intellectual automatism of divergence he thinks, it is necessary that the intellect should as we have developed those of convergence ". Is develop all its possibilities completely. Having this according to Zen ? evolved through intellect to the plane of general Liberation can be gained by transcending or or pure ideas, and symbols it allows man to be• rather rejecting all intellectual automatisms, or come unidentified with his psychosomatic organ• in simple language by stilling our mind. It is ism. According to him the complete development said in the Psalms also "Be still and know that of our intellectual possibilities comprises a con- I am God ". Sri Ramana Maharshi used to quote cliation between the universal will of integration it as containing the essence of spiritual teaching. and the universal will of disintegration. Non- In Zen it is expressed as " void"; voiding the attachment will consist in balancing man's intel• mind so that our transcendental pure ever-pre• lectual gaze by developing an antagonistic and sent state is not obscured. complementary magnetism. The way of imagin• According to the author we have no need of a ing absolute harmony results in a fabulous and guide if we wish to learn not to think; for lesser unreal mental construction and a partiality to• things he can be of use. This is a fallacy. The wards joy. Psychomotive power seems to be con• highest effort a human being is capable of is to cerned more with the process of bringing to learn not to think, to still the mind so as to completion the realization of our human nature realize " voidness" a state so sublime that no than with the realization of our natural true state words can describe it; " words turn away which is divine. baffled". For this a guide, a guru Is certainly The author describes various modalities or dis• necessary. His grace and guidance is of utmost ciplines in order to become a saint or a wise importance. So say the sages who have realized man but he does not think they can ensure the the Truth. blossoming of the infinite possibilities of many. From an analytical point of looking at things This book is supposed to have been conceived one may get caught up in the complexity of a 'from the point of view of pure Zen, of the Zen world of ideas and this does not lead to detach• of Hui-neng and of Huang-Po. The author him• ment nor realization. self is aware of the fact that no Zen master has Another fallacy is to write of the " probable " treated his problem of complete development satori (enlightenment) of Buddha and Ramana which implies complete detachment in the way Maharshi. How can a man who professes to have he has done. studied the ideas of the Zen about realization, Zen masters were not in the least concerned entertain such doubts? It also remains "obvi• with the distinction between the convergent and ously unknown" to the author what exactly divergent functioning of ..the intellect. They in• happened in the mind of Sri Ramana Maharshi 1968 BOOK REVIEWS 229 during his experience of death and it was not a. THE COLLECTED WORKS OF RAMANA mental will to die " but a sudden unexpected" MAHARSHI: Edited by Arthur Osborne; spontaneous experience of death and what sur• Published by T. N. Venkataraman, President, vived it. Sri Ramanasramam, Tiruvannamalai—pp. 293. (for sale in India only) ; Price Rs. 6 (postage The author's concluding remarks about detach• extra). ment are very apt and to the point. " It is not a question of our letting such and such a thing go ; The present edition is a revised edition con• it is a question of ' letting go '". taining Spiritual Instruction, a work of Ramana Maharshi which was not included in the previ• ous two editions. MINDFULNESS OF BREATHING (Anapanasati) : Another important feature is the restoration of Translated from the Pali by Bhikku Nana- the pieces Self Enquiry and Who Am I ?, which moli, Buddhist Publication Society, Kandy, appeared in essay form in the earlier editions pp. 125, no price mentioned. to their original form as dialogues between a However excellent a translation may be it still master and his disciple. gives room for some divergences from the ori• The Maharshi was not a writer of books. He ginal intended meaning. Pali is an exception himself stated that it never occurred to him to since it has never been used outside the field of write any book or compose poems. All compo• Buddhism. So its words have the sitions of his were at the request of his de• linguistic distinction of being precise, according votees. The only poems that came to him sponta• to the translator, who first of all collected the neously and compelled composition were Eleven material from the Pali canon and its commen• Verses to Sri Arunachala and Eight Stanzas to taries for his own use. His aim was to have a Sri Arunachala, in Tamil. precise and condensed version omitting repeti• His first work in Sanskrit, Arunachala Pancha- tions and yet preserving its pattern. ratham, composed without having studied the Mindfulness of Breathing (Anapanasati) is given language was quite spontaneous and greatly great prominence in the Pali canon for mind admired by such an eminent Sanskrit scholar as training, connecting up the fundamental doctrine Kavya Kantha Ganapathi Muni, who explained to of the Four Noble Truths. Pranayama (breath him the features of the Arya metre, immediately control) is used here as a stepping stone. First before writing. Later when these verses were one gives attention to this meditation subject to about to be printed the Maharshi himself trans• counting. It should be remembered, that respira• lated them into Tamil at the request of a de• tion-mindfulness is a method of developing th0 votee. Four Foundations of Mindfulness and that this A little reflection on the curious genesis of development consists of " the constant practice these compositions will enable one to evaluate the of properly directed mindfulness and clear com• Maharshi's writings properly. They are not the prehension in the order," concentration, insight, productions of a pundit or a philosopher who has path-attainment. made a deep study of the subject from available materials. For the Maharshi left home in his There is a description of the states of the mind sixteenth year without completing his schooling. which hinder and those which help concentration and an analysis of the process of attaining full During his sojourn in Tiruvannamalai, he concentration and respiration-mindfulness with its made no systematic study of our scriptures or 16 cases which is " of great fruit, of great bene• of other philosophical works. Yet, he produced fit." The Blessed One said that Respiration- works in more than one language with unrivalled mindfulness developed and repeatedly practised clarity and literary merit on the most abstruse fulfils the four foundations of mindfulness, these aspects of Advaita Philosophy. They are sub• in turn developed and repeatedly practised fulfil jects that defy even a scholar's attempt at ex• the seven enlightenment factors, which develop• pression in easily understood language. ed and repeatedly practised perfect clear vision The Maharshi was in a state of constant absorp• and deliverance. tion in the Divine and whatever he spoke or wrote was in response to an enquiry by an earnest This anthology is a valuable work by a dis• seeker after Truth. The knowledge that flowed tinguished Pali scholar and could take the place through him was, therefore, of the nature of re• of a guide for those who follow this path. vealed* knowledge, not different from the writings LUCIA OSBORNE. in the Upanishads. We will not be guilty of ex- 230 THE MOUNTAIN PATH July

aggeration if we call all his productions sacred . use of a human form for transmission of grace. works. Such a method of approach will enable one to In- that context it is enough if the translation reach at least the fringe of his consciousness. The is free from misinterpretation ; the present work full import of his teachings will thereafter begin is free of it.-' to unfold itself gradually into the consciousness The traditional method of acquiring know• of the seeker. ledge from the writings of a Guru who has shed Therefore, to those who are attracted by the his human body is to invoke him with devotion Maharshi's teachings and who are seeking prac• and reverence before beginning to imbibe his tical guidance in the path, this book may easily teachings. For as the Maharshi said more than assume the role of the Guru, to guide them to once, a Guru is none other than God Himself, the goal. who, out of compassion for the seeker, makes SWAMI ANUANANDA.

Poetry

By Richard Clancy

'TTrlE poets are the main link externally Of the scope of things forgotten between what are called the two Black punctuated voids alone remain. There was no sleep ; no waking daily. worlds ; the inner world that we know with• A stream unbroken except by the ripples in us, and the external one that reaches us Of mind's activities in its eternal current, through our environment and the five senses. Now deep and narrow, focussed and Our brothers of the human species are the concentrate; many-tongued channel through which Or wide and shallow, soft sandy-bottomed speaks the creative mind of God, or And moving with the surface below the the Supreme Consciousness, according to streaming waters whether viewed by one kind of believer or With no impression, here and there without another. Of these voices the greatest and a stone or pebble, the most important are the poets, God's Curved, bent, and fish-peopled. poets and prophets. It is in the nature of All waters flow unceasingly from the source to the Sea's depths, the liuman brain that words are its petty- By vapours which are channels back to the coinage, and these are the poet's tools more solitary mounts — than anyone else's. Early snows, winter rains, spring showers, and the summer's sun. There is no road that does not lead from Thee, Lend us this frame festooned with centuries O God. That we may know the joys of building, The sumptuous flow of never-ending thought contriving, compounding and creating. That carves Thine image graven in our And may this moving spot contain within minds, The image of all that has been and may be. This is the manna that falls from heaven To be in all within this spot of nowness ; And feeds us in this body of light Beyond the borderless stretch of being. Though clothed in matter for a term — No tree, no plant, no rock or stone, but A term of years viewed now as days moulded, But dayless in retrospect. And contrived with love of Thee and beingness. A stream of things remembered ; All this are we, all is within. 1968 231

i Bhagavan quotes Kaivalya Navaneeta

npHE RAMANA SATSANG gatherings in the New Hall of the Ashram continue to be a regular and useful feature. These gatherings- are held on Sunday evenings and sometimes, in special cases, on other days also. Among the speakers who participated were Sri Purisai Murugesa Mudaliar who spoke on two Tamil Saints — Appudhi Adigal and , Gowri Ammaiyar — on March 23rd and 24th ; Mrs. Lucy Cornelssen our German devotee, spoke on the ' Leela of Arunachala' on March 31st; Smt. Suri Nagamma read from her recorded 1 Talks' in Telugu on some most interesting anecdotes and events from Sri Bhagavan's life (April 14 & 21) ; two Jain nuns, belonging to Therapanthi sect, Sadhvi Pattuji and Sadhvi Naginanji, spoke on Guru Bhakti and spiritual life on May 5. They are the disciples of Acharya Tulsi, founder of ' Anuvrata' movement. On the 9th June, Sri Srinivasan, Principal, Govt. Arts College, Tiru- vannamalai, gave a good account of his spiritual experiences and how Sri Bhagavan continues to and how He influenced and continues to influence help yearning souls. Sri Somasundaram Pillal everyone in their family. spoke on two Sundays and subsequently his Among these weekly participators was Sri Kunju daughter Smt. Pankajam on a Sunday, how tney Swami (for an introduction of whom see our were drawn to Sri Bhagavan most dramatically issue for April 1966, p. 217) one of the early 232 THE MOUNTAIN PATH July attendant-devotees of Sri Bhagavan, who gave his for some time. Before going he asked me to reminiscences of the Master and also narrated render such service. This I considered to be the following interesting and instructive my greatest good fortune. I felt extremely account: — happy that I had been able to do something in " It was in 1919 that I first came to Sri Bha• return for the grace which Bhagavan had shown gavan. He was then living at Skandasramam me. I did not thereafter bother myself about on the slope of the the spiritual experience. Hill Arunachala. I, however, asked Bhagavan why I could not His mother and brother lived with get the experience when I meditated in my him. Padaniswami house. Bhagavan said: " You have read used to attend to Kaivalya Navaneeta, have you not? Don't you his few personal remember what it says ?" And he took up wants. Plague had the book and read out the relevant verses.i driven away most of the inhabitants of 1 The disciple said : the town and con• " Lord, you are the Reality remaining as my sequently visitors to inmost Self, ruling me during all my countless Sri Bhagavan were incarnations ! Glory to you who have put on an external form in order to instruct me ! I do not very few. I was, see how I can repay your Grace for having therefore, left alone liberated me. Glory ! Glory to your holy feet! " with Sri Bhagavan Sri Kunju Swami " The Master beamed on him as he spoke, drew most of the time. hfrn near and said very lovingly : 1 To stay fixed in the Self, without the three kinds of obstacles He used to look at me and his eyes had, as is obstructing your experience, is the highest return well-known, a strange brilliance- and fascination you can render me '. in them. When I had looked into his eyes for "' My Lord ! Can such realisation as has trans• some time I saw a bright effulgence. I could cended the dual perception of ' You' and ' I', and found the Self to be entire and all-pervading, not say whence it came but it had the effect fail me at any time ? ' of making me forget everything. It was not like "The Master replied: "The truth that I am sleep for I was fully aware. I was also filled Brahman is realised from the scriptures or by with a strange peace and bliss. I came back to the Grace of the Master but it cannot be firm in the face of obstruction.' myself with a shudder after some time. This " Ignorance, uncertainty and wrong knowledge, experience occurred again and again — during are obstacles resulting from long-standing habits all the seventeen days that I stayed with Bha• in the innumerable incarnations of the past which gavan. I was like one intoxicated. I was abso• cause trouble and then the fruits of realisation lutely indifferent to everything. I had no curio• slip away. Therefore root them out by hearing Truth, reasoning and meditation.2 sity to see anything, no desire whatsoever. " Checked by incantations,3 fire will not scorch. What I did I did most mechanically. I would Likewise defective realisation will not put an have continued to live in this state if it had not end to bondage. Therefore devote yourself to occurred to me that it was not proper to par^ hearing the Truth, reasoning and meditation and root out ignorance, uncertainty and wrong take of the food that was offerred to Sri Bha• knowledge. gavan by his devotees without paying anything. "Ignorance veils the Truth that the Self ih I thought that he had initiated me into the expe• Brahman and shows forth multiplicity instead; rience of Brahman and that I had nothing more1 uncertainty is the confusion resulting from lack of firm faith in the words of the Master; the to gain by staying in his presence. I, there-! illusion that the evanascent world is a reality fore, returned to my native place and began to and that the body is the self is wrong knowledge. practise meditation In a room in my house all So say the sages. by myself. I could succeed to gain and retain "t Hearing the Truth is to revert the mind repeatedly to the teaching: 'That thou art'. that experience only for a few days ; it starts Reasoning is rational investigation of the meaning ed to diminish gradually and at last one day of the text, as already heard. Meditation is one- it was lost. I could not regain the experience. po'ntedness of mind. I decided ta return to Sri Bhagavan. This I did, "If every day you do these, you will surely gain liberation. and a great good fortune awaited me when I "The practice must be kept up so long as the came. sense of knower and . knowledge persists. No Palaniswami who was rendering personal 2 Sravana, , . service to Sri Bhagavan had to go on a journey 3 Sthambhana. 1968 ASHRAM BULLETIN 233

Sri Bhagavan then explained to me at great tinction of the knower, the object of knowledge length the purport of these verses. They re• and the act of knowing no longer arise. late to the doubt raised by the disciple about In view of Sri Bhagavan's explanation I the need to continue spiritual practices even decided to stay always by Bhagavan's side and after one has had the supreme exprience. The to practise sravana, manana and nididhyasana" disciple asks what he should do in return for the « * * Guru's grace which had enabled him to obtain the highest experience. The Guru replies that BRAHMANIRVANA CELEBRATIONS if he continued to abide in the supreme state At the Ashram always that would be sufficient reward. The disciple wonders whether the spiritual experi• The 18th Aradhana or anniversary of Sri ence once gained could be lost. The Guru says Bhagavan's Brahma-Nirvana was performed on that it would be until he took care to practise the 25th April, in the midst of a large gathering smvana, manana and nididhyasana, that is of devotees from all over India. hearing from the Guru the Truth, reflecting The function commenced at 7 a.m. with the over It and assimilating it. The experi• chanting of ' Arunachala Sthuthi' and ' Ramana ence would occur in the presence of the Guru, Sadguru Sthuthi'. This was followed by the but it would not last. Doubts would arise chanting of the Taittareya and Mahanarayana again and again and in order to clear them the Upanishads, the Rudra, the Chamaka, the disciple should continue to study, think and Purushasuktha etc. Ekadasa Rudra Mahanyasa practise. These would be done until the dis- Abhishekam and Sahasranama Archana were per• formed as usual. At the Arthi time the devotees effort is necessary thereafter. Remaining as pure, felt the Bliss and Presence of Sri Maharshi and a eternal consciousness untainted like the ether very happy atmosphere prevailed throughout. and thus liberated while alive, one will live for ever as THAT, after being disembodied also." Important persons who attended the function Kaivalya Navaneeta, Section I, Verses 86 to 93. included: Sardar Surjit Singh Majithia of New

ARADHANA CELEBRATIONS AT BOMBAY : Function held on May 18, 1968 at Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan Bombay to celebrate the 18th Anniversary of the Brahmanirvana of Sri Bhagavan.' From left are : M/s. Jamnadas Ladiwala, Harikishandas Aggarwal; the Minister, Bhanushankar Yagnik; Sahukar, Swami Rasajnananda and Smt. Mani Sahukar. 234 THE MOUNTAIN PATH July

Delhi, Sri H. C. Khanna and K. C. Khanna and Palghat family from Kanpur, Major I. J. Taneja from The Prem Sangh, Palghat, celebrated the Hyderabad, Mr. George Oakenfold from England, Aradhana of Sri Bhagavan with puja, Upanishad Mrs. Roda Maclver from Bombay, Dr. T. N. and Gita parayanas, Sahasranama archana, Krishnaswami, K. K. Nambiar, K. Gopala Rao and Arati. Smt. Kamala gave a and A. R. Narayana Rao's family from Madras Ham Katha performance on Guru Bliakti. and Smt. Suri Nagamma from Vijayawada. Lakshmi Ammal, a well-known Vedantin of Messages of good wishes were received from Madras, attended the function. ministers and other officials. There was feeding * * * of the poor on a large scale. In the afternoon VISITORS there was a Katha by Bangalore Sri Krishna Bhagavathar on Sri Kanakadasa. There was also Sri Champaklal and party of Bombay, who had a in the night by Brahmasri Jagadeesa visited the Ashram Iyer and party. earlier in August, 1966 (see Ashram Delhi Bulletin, Oct, '66) came for a second Gurupuja was celebrated on April 21 in the and short stay in the Satsang Hall of the Sarojini Nagar Vinayak course of which they Mandir. performed a bhajan After Vedaparayana and devotional music, in the Old Hall. It Shri M. L. Sondhi, MP., spoke on the special was highly appre• significance of Mrityunjaya and of His ciated. association with the Himalayas in the North and with Arunachala in the South, especially after the advent of Shri Ramana Maharshi, the highest Some members of embodiment of transcendental awareness in the the Prem Sangh (for modern world. a full account of Sri Champaklal whose aims and Madras ideals see our issue for July, 1964), visited the Ashram and spent ten Gurupuja was celebrated on Sunday, April 28th, days here. They alsd performed bhajans, most of with the usual Vedaparayana, devotional music, the songs of which were composed by the late etc. The principal speaker was Sri N. Subrah- Dr. Padmanabhan, the founder of Prem Sangh. manyam (" Anna") who presented the life and * * * philosophy of Bhagavan as a clear, contemporary manifestation of . Major Taneja, who is employed in Secunder- The Sabha meets every Sunday at 5 p.m. at abad, and who is a Dharmalayam, 94, Mowbray's Road, Alwarpet, regular visitor-devo• Madras-18. tee every year, spent his annual holidays at Kolar the Ashram, as usual. He daily went round The 18th Aradhana of the Mahasamadhi of Sri the Hill and he is Bhagavan was celebrated by the Sri Sankara convinced that Aru- Sangh, Kolar, Mysore State. There was a nachala-Ra?mana is special puja in the morning at the shrine of Sri vibrantly and potent• Sankara in the Sankaralaya. In the evening there ly felt in the Ash• was a ' satsang' when Sri K. Pattabhiraman, ram. His account of Advocate, spoke on Bhagavan's mission. how he came to Bha• gavan, which is very Poona interesting, will be The Mahanirvana Day of Sri, Bhagavan was" published in a later celebrated by Sri Bhau Saheb Y. N. Athavale at issue. We are very his residence in Poona in a fitting manner in the happy to have amidst Major %aneja midst of a large gathering of local devotees. us such sincere Prof. K. V. Belsare spoke about Sri Bhagavan's sadhaks like Major Taneja, who devote their time life and teachings. entirely for sadhana and for nothing else. 1968 ASHRAM BULLETIN 235

RAMANA KENDRA to all but forgotten by most. And Bhagavan him• self is, like the sun, obscured by the abundance On Sunday, May 16th, the Kendra celebrated and normality of his light. Matru-bhuteswara-puja at C-I-5, Tilak Marg. Shri V. G. Ramachandran congratulated the After Veda parayana, silent meditation and Kendra on being a "movement" rather than a devotional music, Shri A. K. Iyer spoke in Hindi centre and taking the message to various parts on the life and teachings of Sri Bhagavan. The of Delhi. significance of "Mother's Day " was explained by Sri K. Swaminathan as part of Bhagavan's pro• At the Annual Meeting held on March 3rd, foundly simple and universally acceptable 3b ri Morarji Desai was elected President of the message. Beauty is the common meaning behind Kendra, and Shri Ramdhari Sinha Dinkar and Sundara, Alagu and Ramana, but how few recog• Shri M. L. Sondhi, M.P., Vice-Presidents. Dr. C. nize this identity of father, mother and child or Ramaswamy is the new Treasurer, with Shri C. G. the splendour and the wonder hidden in our Balasubramaniam as Jt. Treasurer. Shri K. Swami• familiar human lives and relationships. The secret nathan continues as Secretary and Shri K. C. revealed by Bhagavan is the open secret known Subbiah as Jt. Secretary.

INTRODUCING

G. V. SUBBARAMAYYA

S~^. V. SUBBARAMAYYA an educationist, professor and poet is one of the older devotees whose approach to Bhagavan Sri Ramans Maharshi was exceptionally spontaneous. It was a pleasure to listen to their talk so free of constraint. There were some who trembled before Sri Bhagavan when speaking to Him. Such was His majesty. The " stars" or predominant influences in his life before the advent of Sri Bhagavan were his ancestors and nearest relatives ; his mother about whom he speaks in terms of highest praise and whose presence to-day is his greatest particularly after the death of his beloved wife, Sundaramma, who was for him the ideal of womanhood, a paragon of virtues so far advanced spiritually that her example deeply influenced and inspired his own spiritual life.

The turning point and the greatest influence was of course the coming into his life of Bha• gavan Sri Ramana Maharshi. Let's quote what he a word He is the embodiment of grace. At every himself has to say about it: "The pole star of my step in the least incidents of my life I have come life is of course my gurudev Bhagavan Sri to feel with a growing consciousness the guiding Ramana Maharshi. At a time of distress in 1933 hand of that Divine Grace that is Sri Ramana." I was drawn to Him and the very first darshan plunged me into the ocean of peace and bliss. G. V. Subbaramayya has recorded in his Ever since He has been the light of my life. He Ramana Reminiscences how a sthitaprajna or is my mother, father, guru and goal. He is my Jnani like Sri Bhagavan appears to react to the all-in-all; and in Him my little self and all its happenings of the relative world of phenomena moorings were consummated and sublimated. In that we see and experience and how a Jnani could 236 THE MOUNTAIN PATH July

Ten days before Mahasamadhi

imposed non-real ego, that makes us see and experience diversity in the one Universal Self, through the process of Self-enquiry." G. V. Subbaramayya A few days before the Mahasamadhi of Sri Bha• gavan, G. V. Subbaramayya together with another appreciate love and devotion such as G. V. of the early devotees, Narayana Iyer, (introduced Subbaramayya evinced towards Sri Bhagavan. to our readers in Jan. '68 issue, p. 83) went to see " Self-realization", Sri Bhagavan used to tell his Sri Bhagavan and implored Him for grace; devotees "is not a new acquisition but only a " Bhagavan, Abhayam yeevala" (Bhagavan, you removal of the clouds that hide the Reality that must give me protection) and quick came the we always are by the extinction of the super- reply " Yichanu" (I have given it) !

Cry of a Destitude By "Vishnu "

One day when I was sitting by the side of ing with it only the turban, so a person's Sri Bhagavan, I felt so miserable that I put bad karma will be considerably reduced the following question to him : " Is the while he is in the presence of a Jnani. A (wish) of the Jnani not capable of Jnani has no sankalpa but his sannidhi warding off the destinies of the devotees ? " (Presence) is the most powerful force. He Bhagavan smiled and said : " Does the need not have sankalpa but his presiding Jnani have a sankalpa at all ? The Jivan- presence, the most powerful force, can do mukta can have no sankalpas whatsoever. wonders, save souls, give peace of mind, even It is just impossible." liberation to ripe souls. Your prayers are not answered by him but absorbed by his pre• I continued : " Then, what is the fate of sence. His presence saves you, wards off all of us who pray to you to have grace on the karma and gives you the boons as the us and save us ? "Will we not be benefited or case may be, involuntarily. The Jnani does saved by sitting in front of you or coming save the devotees, but not by sankalpa, to you ? What use is there then for family which is non-existent in him, only through men like me to gain by coming here to you ? his presiding presence, sannidhi.99

Bhagavan turned graciously to me and I was filled with joy. Even today his pre• said : " Just as a trouble (or arrow) that sence is the most powerful thing and that comes to destroy the head goes away carry• alone, I am confident, saves me ! SRI RAMANA MANTAPA NIDHI,

SRI RAMANASRAMAM, TIRUVANNAMALAI

Receipts and Payments Account for the period from 1956 to 31-12-1967

RECEIPTS PAYMENTS* Rs. P. Rs. P. Rs. P. Rs. P. .To Athayam — Interest 5,859 73 By Mantapa Nidhi Expenses : To Donations — Mantapa Nidhi Cost of Stones 11,139 40 General 1,65,575 70 Wages for stone workers 1,09,070 13 Book Depot 15,000 00 Polishing charges 15,136 05 The Mountain Path 5,000 00 Sundry expenses 28,661 04 1,85,575 70 Supervision charges 1,165 00 To Kumbabhishekam: Vimanam workers 24,679 90 Donations 27,533 04 1,89,851 52 Pictorial Souvenir 21,204 72 By Kumbabhishekam Expenses ^2,901 11 48,737 76 By Book Depot A/c. * 4,637 31 By Closing Balances: On hand 208 47 Lakshmi Vilas Bank Ltd., S.B. A/c. 146 92 State Bank of India — Current A/c. 2,427 86 2,783 25

Total 240,173 19 Total 2,40,173 19

* Payments are inclusive of (1) Renovation and painting of Gopuram and Vimanam, and Kumbhabhishekam of Sri Mathrubhuteswara Shrine ; and (2) Construction and consecration of Sri Chinnaswami's Samadhi.

Balance Sheet as at 31st December, 1967

LIABILITIES ASSETS Rs. P. Rs. P. Rs. P. Rs. P. GENERAL RESERVE: ASSETS— Donations for Mantapa Sri Ramana Mantapam 1,89,851 52 Nidhi 1,85,575 70 BOOK DEPOT A/c. 4,637 31 ADD: Athayam 5,859 73 Surplus from Kumba• CASH & OTHER BALANCES : bhishekam A/c. 5,836 65 On hand 208 47 1,97,272 08 Lakshmi Vilas Bank Ltd., S.B. A/c. 146 92 State Bank of India- Current A/c. 2,427 86 2,783 25

Total 1,97,272 08 Total 1,97,272 08

Examined and found correct, (Sd.) T. N. VENKATARAMAN, BANGALORE, (Sd.) J. SRINIVASAN, President. Dated: 26th June, 1968. Chartered Accountant. 1-7-1968 238 July The Traveller

By Harindranath Chattopadhyaya

The traveller touches his goal when he turns empty-minded, Forgetful even of the very goal of his seeking Oblivious of way and purpose towards such self-oblivion As in which ultimately stand obliterated All codes, all roads, all standards of comprehension, Preconception, prejudice ; all sense of both mileage and measurement Cancelled completely — memory of by gone, present and future ; Sense of ancestors, contemporaries, unborn generations ; Of prayer, of worship of ecstatic genuflexion, Of saint and sinner, of poet and politician. Of cities and portals creating on vanishing hinges, Of cradles, cremations ; of abstinence, prostitution, Of account ledger and Koran and Bible and Gita, ? Of hoary cults and modernest superstitions, Of standstill techniques and staggering proud inventions, Of beloveds and rivals, of comrades and antagonists The traveller reaches his Destination only when destination Vanishes into distances, dissolving mirages Immeasureably close, without immeasurably distant Embodied in traveller-trance, invisibly enveloped, Beyond relationship — beyond being born, beyond dying. The traveller reaches his goal when he turns empty-minded Oblivious even on his quest, of both travel and traveller.

Certainly

8/ G. N. Daley

Involvement in any kind of activity is karma. Karma is ego and ego is Path. Why lengthen the Path by being attached to activity, concepts and possessions ? The feeling that ' this is mine ', ' I do this ' I feel this '

and 11 think this ' impels one to possess more, to do more, to feel more and to think more. This is time, endless Godless anarchy. Stop the mechanism, get out and JUST BE. This is NOW, eternal harmonising Love. 1968 239 THE MOUNTAIN PATH

NOTICE TO SUBSCRIBERS both Indian and Overseas

Our quarterly journal was inaugurated in 1964 with the willing co-operation of several honorary workers, and considering that it's aim is to disseminate Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi's message, along with other genuine spiritual teachings, we fixed the subscription rates at the minimum possible, viz., (original rate) Indian — Rs. 5.00 ; Foreign — Sterling £ 0-10-0 or U.S. $ 1.50.

Being a quarterly, our journal cannot claim the special postal concessions avail• able to monthly journals and periodicals issued at more frequent intervals.

Since 1964, there has been a steady rise in the cost of paper, materials and printing charges ; and the postal charges have been steeply increased twice. The devaluation of the British Pound, soon following the devaluation of the Indian Rupee has further added to our costs. We are, therefore, unwillingly compelled to REVISE the subscription rates, as follows : effective from January 1969 for renewals and new enrolments :

Annual : INLAND : Rs. 6.00 ; FOREIGN : Sterling £ 0-12-6 or U.S. $ 1.50

Per copy : „ Rs. 1.75 ; „ „. £ 0- 3-6 or 45 cents

Life: „ Rs. 125/-; „ „ £12-10-0 or U.S. $30.00

The rates for the U.S. Dollars remain unchanged.

The above are rates for despatch by surface mail and by unregistered book-post ONLY.

Registration : Rates for sending the journal by registered post are : A

Indian — Rs. 3.00 ; Foreign — 4 sh. or 50 cents.

AIR MAIL SURCHARGE : Rs. £ $ (1) Nepal, Pakistan, Ceylon 6.80

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(3) Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, U.K., Greece, Israil, Italy, Monaco, East, South and West Africa, Switzer• land . . . . 22 sh. 2.70

(4) Australia, Denmark, Netherlands, Nor• way, Poland, Spain, Sweden . . . . 30 sh. 3.60

(5) North, Central and South America, Hawaii, Fiji, New Zealand . . . . 37 sh. 4.50 240 -July INSEEING AND OUTSEEING

By

WEI WU WEI

Sri Ramana Maharshi is sometimes whose words were recorded by our con• described as a great Vedantic saint. That temporaries and are accurately reported in no doubt is true,* but is it not rather like our own tongues. To anyone who has had to describing the Ocean as the Bay of Bengal ? deal all his life with scholarly translations Of course he is called Bhagavan also, by his from ancient languages, by specialists who devotees, but did he not say " There is no understood nearly everything in question Bhagavan outside yourself " ? That is, per• except the meaning of what they were haps, one of his great statements, those in translating, the words of a contemporary which he said in half-a-dozen words every• Sage are precious indeed. thing that can be said in relative language. It would be a mistake, however, to over• So the Ocean simile will not ' hold water ', simplify the situation. In the first place the for if it applied it would require that we Maharshi in his manifestation — or Bha• should be ' Land', and thereby separate gavan via that manifestation — taught from what he is. In fact only one simile is much by ' silence ' or in the form of what applicable, only one will hold both the has been called .'.grace', and in the second Maharshi and Bhagavan, and that one is place he spoke to each devotee according to Light, for then we are ' darkness', and his degree of understanding, which means there is no such thing as darkness, for that to some he spoke as directly from pure ' darkness' is only apparent absence of light. noumenality as relative language permits, With Light there is no darkness, for light while to others he replied to questions in a is universal, and what Sri Ramana Maharshi perfectly dualistic context. Two such ans• represented conflicts with no true teaching wers to a similar question are often in any part of the world or at any period of contradictory, as they must necessarily be, suppositional * time'. Bondage to any speci• for undivided mind needs no concepts, cog• fic denomination, or to any particular mani• nition is absolute and not relative, so that festation representing a ' faith', may wrhat relatively appears to be incomprehen• obscure this fact to the blindfold, but who• sible absolutely may be apperceived as the ever can free himself will find the light truth, and what absolutely is truth appears represented by Bhagavan shining also in his relatively as incomprehensible. own vision. To whoever has apperceived what the His own way of seeing, be it traditional difference is — there is no longer any or otherwise, may suit him better, but he ' difference'. It is only when you don't cannot fail to benefit by this simple and know the difference that the apparent direct teaching via a Sage of our own times, ' difference' appears.

. ... IT HAPPEN By L. P. Yandell

What a difference between ' make ' and ' let' ! In ' make ' the arrow can miss the target ; In 'let' the target comes to meet the arrow. 1968 241

to the EDITOR

APRIL 1968 (3)

Greetings! Happy to hear from Jacqueline and Each issue of the Mountain Path makes Maha• Yvonne (see Ashmm Bulletin of April '68), who rshi more clear to me, and seems to draw me I am glad to learn, found the most understanding nearer to Him. Each article appears to have friends in our Ashram. How homesick I got for been written specially for me! And this is a the Ashram ; just wish I could be there also ! So sign of the success of The Mountain Path. also I am interested to read the various accounts A. M. SAGANE, of the visitors about their stay in the Ashram in Pandharkavda, Maharashtra. The Mountain Path, which we carry in our pub• lic Library and there are quite a few devotees * * * here in Santa Barbara who are devoted to Bhagavan. Hope sooner or later I will find (4) another opportunity to come to Ramanasramam This is my chance to say at the same time how and stay for a longer time. I am still teaching at important The Mountain Path is to us and how the Japanese Buddhist Church; an activity I delighted we are when it arrives in our mailbox. enjoy. Thank you for this unique magazine and its des• WlLHELM H. ElTEL, perately necessary message. Santa Barbara, California, USA. ROBERT HURLEY, Kyoto, Japan. * * * * * * (2) (5) Last year a friend gave me a yearly subscrip• tion to The Mountain Path. I was simply delight• Thoughts in my mind have been suspended for ed. My only wish is that I had known of its some time after naving read the poem "Silence existence sooner. It is by far the best religious and Sound" written by Walter De La Mare in periodical I have come across. It was there I the April issue. I am a dull student like a horse read of your request for material pertaining to in the field of spiritual life. The traveller knocks experiences with the Maharshi. Hence this small the door irrespective of the absence of response. contribution. One of the things I particularly I find myself in the position of the traveller per• appreciate in The Mountain Path is the great forming my duties towards God as designed by variety of points of view expressed . . . yet Him without any response, but with the positive allowing of no compromise with essentials. I also hope that it will pave the way for solace for my find the " Letters" section interesting, but espe• soul later. Please do publish such poems in cially your fine comments which are always future also. extremely valuable to me, and most helpful. Do MADHAVI, Madras. please give us more of them. We publish good poems which we receive them .MAUD A. PIGGOTT, or when occasion arises. California, U.S,A, EDITOR, * * * * * # 242 THE MOUNTAIN PATH

An1 Avatara is the incarnation of a deity, es• DIVINE EYES pecially Vishnu, not always in human shape. In Some months ago a friend passed on to me a the puranas there is mention of a fish-avatara photograph of Bhagavan, with no information, so incarnated in this form td save the seventh Manu I did not know who it was. Nevertheless, arid progenitor of the human mce from destruc• I was fascinated by the photograph and find tion by a deluge; a boar-avatara, Varaha; the myself meditating on it every night. man-lion Narasimha etc. The first five incarna• With no knowledge of the person whose photo tions are purely mythological, in the next avataras I was observing, even his name, I found the eyes the heroic and religious element are predominant coming to life and stirring my soul. They seem as for instance in Parasurama, Rama, Balarama, to unify everything — bringing me into contact etc. with all the universe in some mystical way. A Jnani is the all-pervading Brahman, or God I have never been so overwhelmed by a photo• or the Self manifested in human form to lead us graph and I feel that, in some way, the spirit of back to the inner Guru, the Self in the heart. Bhagavan is captured by his pictures and trans• If a Jnani's attention is drawrt in a certain direc• ferred to his observers. He seems to be a focus tion there is divine automatic activity out of on the eternal. Without ever having met Bha• compassion and a miracle might happen without gavan, I can well believe that he was a fully any sankalpa. Miracles can be performed with enlightened human being, where the rest of us or without sankalpas. As you yourself mention are fortunate to receive the grace of an instan• in your letter, according to what Sri Maharshi taneous (timeless) " glimpse" of reality to give said, one who has any sankalpa is no Jnani, Sai us perfect faith the rest of our days. Baba's miracles find a very good explanation in his own words: " I give people what they want I hope that I shall be able to visit your ashram in the hope that they will begin td want what sometime in the future. I want to give them." CHARLES D. HORING, California, U.S.A. EDITOR.

Many have been moved by Sri Bhagavan's * * # photographs as you have. We hope you will be able to visit ou\r ashram. The best months are RETENTION OF BREATH ? from October till the end of March with regard This; is in continuation of my letter of Nov. 14th to climate. in which I stated that I had been experiencing EDITOR. glimpses of Bliss when I do kevala kumbhakam, * * * that is absolute retention of breath. From the next day after posting that letter to you I have been experiencing a kind of burning sensation at A JNANI AND AN AVATAR A the right side of my chest. At first it lasted a very short time without causing physical pain. The What is the difference between a Jnani and an next day it spread like a wave or current up Avatara ? You have written in your ' Incredible to the head and down to the feet. I felt this Sai Baba' how Sai Baba used to command the experience only during meditation. Since then rain to stop or poison not to ' come up' or express the burning sensation has been present most of his overt sankalpa on a hundred other occasions. the day. Even in sleep I am aware of it. I am Do you think he 'possessed' a mind, or that he afraid where'this practice will lead me. I request was not a Jnani? And in case of Sri Sai you earnestly to advise mq whether it is the right Baba who is believed to be a continuity of the experience that I am having. Sai Incarnation, this sankalpa is always expressed. Sri Satya Sai Baba speaks of his san• P. SUBBARAO, Khammam. kalpa and creates a variety of objects from space as it were. I myself have experienced it You did not tell me in your previous letter and yet preserve a gift from him. Sri Maharshi thai you were practising kevala kumbhakam. has been reported to have said one who has any Bhagavan did not encourage this and there is no sankalpa is no Jnani. Would you like to account one here who gives guidance that way. If you for the miracles performed by Sri Maharshi and want t6 go that way you should find a guru who Sri Sai Baba or Sri Satya Sai Baba ? specialises in it and follow his guidance. It can B. K. MITRA, be dangerous. It is safer to concentrate on the Bhubaneshwar. heart at the right side and practise Self-enquiry. 1968 LETTERS TO THE EDITOR 243

If you concentrate on stilling the mind the If someone should knock at your door in the breathing will take care of itself and be appro• middle of the night you would become one- priately stilled if arid when necessary. If you pointed and ask with urgency " Who are you ? " start with the breathing the results may be more With even greater urgency and one-pointedness spectacular but are not so fundamental and may one should turn inwards and ask "Who am I?" be harmful. You do not know who you really are. You want EDITOR. to know. The more determined you are to know the more alive becomes this quest. It should never be repeated mechanically. One can ask * * » this question once ov twice or thrice and then be aware or meditate or remain silent. If thoughts arise ask yourself " to whom ?" and 3 WHO AM I?' again " Who am I ? " If persisted in! this quest When meditating " Who am I ?" does one with all sincerity and one-pointedness after some repeat it in repetition? Or does one repeat it a time Sooner or later there will be a response not few times and remain silent for the rest of the in so many words. From the very depth of your time in meditation ? being there will come a reply in a feeling of Self- MRS. CICELY LAMBERT, awareness of Certainty. You will know. Sydney, Australia. EDITOR.

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PONDICHERRY M. Ramana UTTAR PRADESH S. K. Nateshatyer Kanpur Pandicherry Miss Vimala Narayana Rao Dr. J. Pierry B. N. Jayasurya H. C. Khanna R. Elamboornan N. V., Raman Mr. & Mrs. Suresh Khanna N. Rangasamy Reddy, K. Parthasarathy Iyengar. Satyanarayana Tandon Thondamanathan P.O. Chamarajanagar K. C. Kapur K. Arthanathan L. N. Ganesh Bhat, N. Kanara Om Nath Rohatgi Dr. M. Satya Sundara Rao. K. D. Kher MYSORE Puttur Dr. At ma Ram, Agra K. G. Subramanya, Shimoga N. P. Mahesh, Meerut R. C. Kapur, Allahabad M. N. Chandravarkar K. Vishwanathaiah, Chintamani H. W. L. Poonja, Lucknow A. S. Pandit S. M. Deshpande, Hubli Lakshmi Narayan Joshi, A. R. Krishnaswaml G. R. Narasimhachar, Lucknow M. Sadasiva Setty, Bhadravati Maj. Hanut Singh, Chickmagaiur PUNJAB & HARYANA Babina Cantt. Mangalom N. C. Amln Ambala WEST BENGAL Vanmalidas Gokuldas Sri & Smt. K. C. Khanna Calcutta Dewan Hukum Chand Rajeev Goenka Bangalore T^aja Saheb of Mandi, Mandi V. Seshadri M. Ramana Mrs. K. Khosla, Jullundur J. C. Das Gupta . M. S. Satyanarayana Inder Singh Puri, Chandigarh Radha Charan Chetterjee Maj. K. S. Abdul Gaffar R. K. Sehgal, Amritsar Smt. Bina Das K. S. Rajasekhariah Radhika Mohan Sen D. Gurumurtht RAJASTHAN T. R. G. Krishnan Prof. S. D. Chatterjee R. V. Raghavan Jaipur M. Ramakrishna Rao M. M. Varma MADHYA PRADESH B. N. Poornachandra Sadhu Lilaram Pohumal S. K. Khare, Lagargawan

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On walking round Arunachala

By « David 5

Going round Arunachala is not unlike alert and watching them, not getting carried going to a church or temple ; it should be away by them. Thus they enable us to see done intelligently, aware of what we are our present state. That is a sort of self- doing. Bhagavan definitely assured us that confession prior to self-cleansing. The divine there is inherent power in the Hill, which power of Truth acting through Arunachala benefits us even if we do not believe in it, will help the cleansing. He adds that the just as a fire warms you whether you know process may have to go on for months or it is there or not ; but it is better if we even years. The aspirant must strive to co-operate. There may also be , men retain self-awareness and the Power will of - power, still living on the Hill, as there were in ancient times. Bhagavan said that give him glimpses of Truth in its various in his day there were. There is an old man aspects and thus encourage him on his path. in town who says that he has encountered a Furthermore, the old man says that we living on the Hill. He adds that we should sit in meditation for half an hour should walk round in a meditational mood, immediately on our return from a walk allowing thoughts to arise but remaining round the Hill,