RAMANA SMRTI
Sri Ramana Maharshi
Birth Centenary Offering
1980
SRI RAMANASRAMAM
SRI RAMANA MAHARSHI:
HIS LIFE AND TEACHINGS
By A. Devaraja Mudaliar
SRI Ramana Maharshi, as he is now known, was born on the
30 December, 1879, the day of the Ardra Darshan, held to be
sacred and auspicious since it commemorates the occasion
when Lord Shiva appeared before great saints like Gautama
and Patanjali. His father was one Sundaram Iyer of Tiruchuzhi,
a village about thirty miles South-East of Madurai. Sundaram,
a pleader of respectable status held in high esteem and love
by all alike, was married to Alagammal, a pious Hindu, devout
wife and generous hostess. The child was named
Venkataraman. After a few years of schooling at Tiruchuzhi
itself, Venkataraman studied for his first form at Dindigul and
for the higher forms at Madurai. He does not seem to have
attained any special distinction at school and is reputed to
have been given more to sports than to studies. Bhagavan
once told me, “They have been writing like that, but I was
really indifferent to studies and sports alike”. He was
physically stronger than most of his companions at school.
There is nothing particular to record in his life till
November 1895. When one of his relatives spoke of his having
returned from Arunachala (another name for Tiruvannamalai),
the name for some unaccountable reason had a strange and
profound effect on him, evoking in him awe, reverence and
love combined — though this was not the first time that he
had heard it. Bhagavan has told me, “From my earliest years,
the name Arunachala was ‘shining and sounding’ within me.
There was sphurana of that name”. I asked Bhagavan what
sphurana was and he said it conveyed the idea of both sound
and sight, a sound and sight not perceptible to the ears and
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eyes but only to the heart, the psychic heart. A little later he
came across the work Peria Puranam in Tamil, which recounts
the lives of a number of Tamil saints, and was deeply moved
by a perusal of it.
In June 1896, when he was sixteen years old, the most
important event in his life took place. A sudden and great fear
came over him that he was going to die, though he was then
in normal bodily health and strength. The shock of this sudden
and overwhelming fear of death led him to a very unusual
experience which is succinctly described by the Maharshi
himself thus:
The shock made me at once introspective or introverted. I
said to myself mentally, ‘Now death has come. What does it
mean? What is it that is dying? This body dies’. I at once
dramatized the scene of death. I extended my limbs and held
them rigid as though rigor mortis had set in. ‘Well then’, said
I to myself, ‘this body is dead. It will be carried to the burning
ground and reduced to ashes. But with the death of this body,
am ‘I’ dead? Is the body ‘I’? This body is silent and inert but
I feel the full force of my personality and even the sound ‘I’
within myself, apart from my body, so ‘I’ am spirit, a thing
transcending the body’. All this was not a mere intellectual
process. It flashed before me vividly as living truth.
This experience, which might have lasted perhaps half an
hour, changed the boy completely for ever afterwards. He lost
interest in his studies, friends and relatives and even his food.
He would go frequently to the shrines of Meenakshi and
Sundareswara in the great temple in Madurai and spend long
hours in adoration before the images. He would occasionally
pray for the Lord’s grace to flow into him and make him like
one of the sixtythree saints in Peria Puranam. But, for the
most part he would be lost in the divine bliss within him while
tears flowed from his eyes.
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Observing this change in the boy, his worldly-minded elders
and especially his elder brother would rebuke him now and then.
Finally on 29 August 1896, when he was studying in the sixth
form, things came to a head. The elder brother burst out, “To one
like this (i.e., one lost in contemplation), why this sort of life
(i.e., books, school and home)”? This touched young
Venkataraman’s heart and he said to himself, “Yes, that is quite
true. What business have I here and with all these things”? and
he decided at once to leave his home and go to Arunachala. He
told his elder brother, “I must go to school now to attend a special
class”. The elder brother replied, “Then take five rupees from
the box downstairs and pay my college fees”. The young aspirant
took this as God’s provision for his train fare to Arunachala. He
searched for Tiruvannamalai in an old Atlas and spotting the
place, thought that three rupees should be enough to take him
there. So he took only this sum and started for the railway station,
leaving in a prominent place a note in Tamil, which ran:
In search of my Father and in obedience to His command,
I have left this place. This (i.e., myself) is only entering
on a good enterprise; so none need feel grieved over this
event, nor need one spend any money in search of this.
Two rupees left herewith.
He arrived at the station much later than the hour the train
was due to leave. But providentially the train too was late and
so the boy was able to catch it. He had taken a ticket only to
Tindivanam, for according to the old Atlas Tiruvannamalai was
not on the railway line and the railway station nearest to it was
Tindivanam. But an aged Moulvi sitting in the compartment
enquired of the bright youngster where he was going and told
him of the recently opened Villupuram-Katpadi link line passing
through Tiruvannamalai. The Maharshi could not remember
having seen the Moulvi in the compartment at Madurai railway
station nor his entering it at any subsequent station. Anyhow
there he was to guide him. And following this Moulvi’s advice
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the lad got down at Villupuram and after a few incidents of no
special interest reached a place called Arayaninalloor (Tirukoilur
railway station) on his way to Tiruvannamalai. Finding a
temple, viz. that of Atulyanatha Iswara, he entered it and sat in
dhyana (meditation) in a mantapa dimly lit by a flickering lamp.
While he was absorbed in dhyana he suddenly found the entire
place filled with a bright light. In wonder the young devotee
looked in the direction of the garbhagriha (the innermost
shrine), to see if the light proceeded thence. But he found no
such source for the light which in any case, disappeared soon.
The place where this vision was vouchsafed to the young swami
was the very spot where the celebrated saivite saint
Tirugnanasambandar had a vision of Lord Arunachala, also in
the form of light. The saint had installed a linga of Lord
Arunachala which is still being worshipped.
From Arayaninalloor, the young boy eventually reached
Tiruvannamalai on the morning of 1st September, 1896 and
went straight to Lord Arunachala at the temple. Though he
arrived at the temple at this unusual hour after the morning
puja, all the doors leading to the innermost shrine were open1
and he walked straight up and said, “Father, I have come
according to Thy command, Thy will be done”. The burning
sensation in the body which he had been feeling for some
days also ceased after he had thus reported his arrival. After
spending some time in dhyana there he came out. Leaving
the temple he went into the town, returned with his hair shaved
off and only a cod piece for cloth.
He originally took up residence in the temple’s thousand
pillared hall. To avoid disturbance from crowds who were
attracted by the unusual spectacle of so young a person sitting
in such deep meditation, he had to shift from place to place
both inside and outside the temple. Not less than three years
1 M.G. Shanmugan and others believe that the doors were
shut, but as Bhagavan approached, each door flew open.
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were passed in maintaining absolute silence and in deep and
all-absorbing meditation during which the young ascetic had
lost all consciousness of the body. When he was sitting in the
shrine of Pathala Lingam in a dark corner of the thousand
pillared hall, it was discovered that his seat and thighs had
been badly bitten by insects, that blood and pus were issuing
from the wounds, and yet he sat in meditation, unaware of
what was happening to the body.
Admirers gathered round and managed to keep the physical
body alive. One such admirer, Annamalai Thambiran, began
to worship the young swami, as if he were an image in a
temple, with offerings of fruit and flowers and burning of
camphor. The first day of this strange worship passed without
a protest. But when the man came there again the following
day bringing food as usual and intending to repeat his worship,
he found on the wall nearby the following words in Tamil
written in charcoal, “This (food) is service enough for this
(body)”. It thus became clear that the youthful swami was
literate. This knowledge was utilised later by another admirer,
a taluk head accountant of the place, who did satyagraha and
forced the swami to put down in writing that his name was
Venkataraman and that he hailed from Tiruchuzhi.
The news eventually reached his relations and uncle Nelliappa
Iyer came and sought to take the swami back to his place. There
was absolutely no response. Later, the mother and elder brother
came and tried their best to take the swami back home. Again
there was no response of any sort. But finally on the entreaty of
a devotee the swami wrote in Tamil on a piece of paper:
The Ruler of all controls the fate of souls, in accordance
with their past deeds, their prarabdha karma. What is
destined not to happen will not happen. Whatever is
ordained will happen do what one may to prevent it. This
is certain. Stillness then is best.
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So, the mother and brother went back. And Brahmana
Swami, as he had come to be called, stayed on beside the hill,
though shifting from one spot to another there.
In 1907, Kavyakantha Ganapathi Muni, a renowned
Sanskrit poet and scholar who had been strenuously carrying
on spiritual sadhana for some years, became a devout follower
of Brahmana Swami; and it was he and his disciples who
started the vogue of referring to the youthful swami as
Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi.
Bhagavan Ramana lived in and around the big temple for
about a year, in a suburb about a mile to the east of the temple
for about two years, and then around and in Virupaksha cave
on the hill of the holy beacon for nearly fifteen years. After
that he stayed for six years in an Ashram called Skandasram
built for him by a band of enthusiastic devotees led by one
Kandaswami. The place was rocky and covered with prickly
pear bushes. No one could have imagined it was possible to
raise a house there. But such was the ardent love and tireless
labour of the devotees that the impossible became possible.
Bhagavan has told me that it was after this Kandaswami that
the place came to be called Skandasram.
While Bhagavan was living in Virupaksha cave, he was
joined by his mother, who began cooking. Till then Bhagavan’s
devotees used to beg in the streets for food and whatever was
received was divided by all those who happened to be at the
Ashram at that moment. Bhagavan’s residence changed to
Skandasram in 1916. The mother was with him there and passed
away in May 1922. Her body was buried at the spot where the
shrine of Matrubhuteswara stands now. Bhagavan used to go
now and then to visit the Samadhi. One day in December 1922,
he went there as usual but had no urge at all to return to
Skandasram. So Bhagavan lived there for more than
twentyseven years till his Mahasamadhi in April 1950. Around
the Samadhi of the mother have come up the cluster of buildings
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which we call Sri Ramanasramam. He was accessible to all,
and lived, moved and talked like any of us. He seemed to live
in the world and yet his real being was not in it. He lived without
any sort of attachment to his surroundings. This state of being
has been compared in the books to the state of a man who is
sound asleep in a cart. Whether the cart moves or rests or has
the bullocks changed, it is all the same to the man who is
sleeping within. The jnani, whose ‘I’ has been annihilated,
whose mind or ego has been killed and who has gone to sleep
in his self, i.e. who has merged in the Self, is not affected by
what he may or may not do in this life.
It is a priceless privilege to have been a contemporary of
such a great saint and seer. It would indeed be a great tragedy
if earnest seekers failed to take advantage of this presence in
our midst while people from distant lands, almost from the
ends of the earth, have gained much from association with
him and a study of his life and teachings. It has been laid
down in our books that immeasurable spiritual gain awaits
those who practise in the presence of a Self-realized Being.
Book learning, observances, rites and rituals, japa, tapas or
yoga, pilgrimages to sacred shrines and holy waters — none
of these can equal the association with a real jnani in helping
one’s progress in the spiritual path.
We may now proceed to the central and the only teaching
which the Maharshi imparted for all seekers to try and learn
and experience for themselves.
That which shines within each one of us as ‘I am’ is the
Self. This is the sole reality and all else is simply an
appearance. In the Bible too it is said clearly and emphatically
that God told Moses, ‘I AM THAT I AM’. Verses thirteen and
fourteen of Exodus, Chapter III sum up the message of the
Maharshi, viz. that ‘I am’ is the name of God and the
consciousness ‘I am’ which each has within himself is the
voice of God or the Self.
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The Maharshi tells all earnest seekers of the truth:
At every stage and for everything you say ‘I’, ‘I’; you say, ‘I
want to know this’, ‘I feel this’, ‘I think this’, and so on. Ask
yourself who this ‘I’ is, whence this ‘I’ thought proceeds, what
is its source; keep your mind firmly fixed on this thought to the
exclusion of all other thoughts, and the process will lead you
sooner or later to the realisation of your Self.
The method is simply this: you ask yourself ‘Who am I?’
and try to keep your whole mind concentrated on getting an
answer to that question. True, various thoughts will arise
unbidden within you and assault you and try to divert your
attention. For all these thoughts, however, the ‘I’ thought is the
source and sustenance. So, as each thought arises, without
allowing it to go on developing itself, ask who gets this thought.
The answer will be ‘I’. Then ask yourself, “Who is this ‘I’ and
whence”? The Maharshi says, “Don’t be discouraged by the
variety and multitude of the thoughts which seek to distract
you. Follow the above method with faith and hope and you
will surely succeed”. And he gives an illustration:
You besiege a fort. As one soldier after another comes out,
you cut each down with your sword. When you have thus killed
the last soldier, you capture the fort. Till all thoughts are
destroyed they will keep coming out. But kill them all with the
sword, ‘Who am I?’, and finally the fortress will be yours. It is
not by simply muttering the words ‘Who am I?’ to oneself that
one can gain the end. A keen effort of the mind, complete
introversion of all the faculties, total absorption in the quest
wherefrom the ‘I’ springs — all this is needed for success.
In one of his verses the Maharshi says:
Plunge deep into yourself, in the inner most depths of your
heart, as the pearl diver holding speech and breath plunges
deep into the waters and so secure with mind alert the
treasure of the Self within.
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Sri Bhagavan is, however, not at all opposed to any of the
other well-known methods, such as the karma, bhakti or raja
yogas, or to mantra japa, ceremonial worship, temple-going,
observance of rituals, or any of the different ways chosen by
devotees to attain God. He advises each to follow the method
which appeals to him best, or which he finds the easiest. He
assures us that all pilgrims treading different paths will reach
the same goal, which he insists is the realisation of Sat-Chit-
Ananda, the One without a second. All learned discussions
about advaita, dvaita or visishtadvaita he regards as futile
and unprofitable. For his view is that if the mind’s activity is
really reduced to nothing it will then get merged in the Self
and the Self will take charge thereafter.
Let us all learn and practice this straight and simple Maha
Yoga and attain peace and bliss!
Control of the Mind
“Other than inquiry, there are no adequate means for mindcontrol.
If through other means it is attempted the mind will
appear to be controlled, but will again rise up. Through the
control of breath also, the mind will become quiescent, but
only so long as the breath remains controlled; and with the
movement of breath, the mind also will start moving and will
wander as impelled by residual impressions. The source is
same for both mind and breath. Thought, indeed, is the nature
of the mind. The thought ‘I’ is the first thought of the mind;
and that is egoity. It is from that whence egoity originates
that breath also originates. Therefore, when the mind becomes
quiescent, the breath is controlled, and when the breath is
controlled, the mind becomes quiescent. But in deep sleep,
although the mind becomes quiescent, the breath does not
stop. This is because of the will of God, so that the body may
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be preserved and others may not take it as dead. In the state
of waking and in samadhi, when the mind becomes quiescent
the breath is also so. Breath is the gross form of mind. Till the
time of death, the mind keeps the breath in the body; when
the body dies the mind takes the breath (prana) along with it.
Therefore, breath-control is only an aid for mind-control
(manonigraha); it will not bring about annihilation of the mind
(manonasa). Like breath-control, meditation on some form
of God, repetition of mantras, diet-regulation, etc., are but
aids for rendering the mind quiescent for the time-being”.
— Sri Bhagavan in WHO AM I?
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HE OPENED MY HEART
By Kavi Yogi Shuddhananda Bharati
DURING my dynamic silence of thirty years, about five years
were spent in going from saint to saint, ashram to ashram.
Even samadhi was not the summum bonum of realisation. My
heart wanted something which I did not find anywhere during
my long journey from Mt. Kailas to Kanyakumari. I stood in
silence at the feet of the gigantic Gomateswara up the hill of
Shravana Belagola when I was living among the Digambari
Jain sadhus, wearing just a codpiece. At midnight a bright
face rose like the sun in the crimson dawn, and a hymn from
the Vedas came to my mind, ‘There he rises, the brilliant sun
spreading a thousand rays, the cosmic form of the effulgent
splendour, unique light, life of beings’! The crimson glory
opened two lotus eyes, then coral lips emitted pearly smiles.
I quickly remembered Ramana Maharshi and felt his inner
call. I put a semicolon to my spiritual pilgrimage and went
quickly to Arunagiri. I went up the hill, took a bath in the
waterfalls, meditated in the Virupaksha cave and came down.
Accidentally Seshadri Swami met me and smiled at me. I went
near him and in his silvery voice he declared, “Go on and on,
Shuddhananda, until you go deep in and in”. He accompanied
me a few yards and ran away saying, “Run, run, Ramana waits
for you. Go in and in”.
I reached Ramanasramam and entered the small shrine of the
Mother. There was a square room adjoining it and Nayana stood
up exclaiming, “Welcome, Welcome! Swagatam”! Ramana’s
gentle voice said, “Let Bharati come in. Bharati varattum”.
I saw no human form. I felt dazed. An effulgence
enveloped me. My mind disappeared into silence. I sat down,
closed my eyes and entered the inner cave — nihitam
guhayam. An hour passed like five minutes. I came back to
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myself, opened my eyes and saw Ramana’s lotus eyes riveted
on mine. He appeared like a linga spreading rays of burnished
gold. “Now you have felt That’, the cave is open! the ‘I’ is
the Self-nectar!’. After all these years of sadhana, here I
experienced a delightful inner reality which is beyond word
and thought — Yato vaacho nivartante aprapya manassa
saha. I caught hold of his feet and shed tears of delight
singing with Saint Manickavachakar, who sang, “Today
Thou hast risen in my heart a Sun destroying darkness”.
Blaze on, O Light Divine
Swallowing I and mine.
The Self rose like the Sun
The many merged into the ONE.
Behold the beacon of I
Inner Light of every Eye,
Towering above He, She and it,
A new dawn of inner delight.
(All songs that I dedicated to Bhagavan are contained in
my book Arul Aruvi, Torrents of Grace.)
Nayana, whom I already knew in the Gurukulam
congratulated me saying, “Like myself, you have found the
right guru in the right place! Now the cave is ready for you”.
Sri B.V. Narasimha Swami entered the room and said joyfully,
“Happy, Happy! Bhagavan has touched your heart”!
Then Niranjanananda Swami called me to the dining room.
I opened my bag and brought out ground nuts and plantains
and gave them to Bhagavan. He took one fruit and a few nuts,
and I took the rest as his prasad. That has been my diet for
many years.
The next morning after my bath I was meditating when
Ramana came and we spoke for half an hour about practical
Self-realisation. We had plenty of meetings during the nights.
Maharshi is the beacon light of hope to seekers. He kept me
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in the Virupaksha cave silent. Only Nayana, Seshadri Swami
and B.V. Narasimha Swami (who wanted to know about Sai
Baba), used to visit now and then. Ramana gave a finishing
touch to Shankara’s “Brahma Satyam, or Brahman is the
unique reality”. Bhagavan located that Brahman in the heart
and called it Heart itself:
I, I shine the Truth in the heart’s core.
That’s Brahman; be That; seek no more.
Deepam crowds disturbed my cave life in Tiruvannamalai.
Ramana made me live with Nayana in a mud cottage near the
ashram. I had the joy of hearing Vedic hymns and Nayana’s
verses all day long as I remained silent and self-immersed,
and prepared myself for the future fulfilment of my life.
The last day was fully spent at the feet of Bhagavan and
that was my golden day. What he taught me on that day
sustained me for twenty-five years:
The egoless ‘I am’ is realisation. The experience of ‘I am’ is
peace. The meaning of ‘I’ is ‘God’. The outgoing mind is
bondage, the in-going mind is freedom. The heartward mind
brings bliss. The restless worldly mind brings bondage and
misery. The triads of knower, known and knowledge are
one. You go to a cinema. Observe the projector light. If the
projector light fails the whole show stops. Be Self-centered
and finish your work in silence and come out. The world is
nothing but the objectified mind.
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BHAGAVAN RAMANA MAHARSHI
By Dilip Kumar Roy
IN Pondicherry I happened at the time to be deeply dejected. I
yearned for peace, strained to meditate for hours, studied the
scriptures, appealed to Gurudev, Sri Aurobindo. . . but all to no
avail. I then recalled the joy I had enjoyed on my first visit to
the Maharshi and decided that I must try again to reach peace
of mind with the magic touch of his blessing. But there were a
few brother disciples who warned me that it would be a faux
pas to seek from an outside saint or sage what I could not get
from my own guru. Their arguments were powerful, the more
so as they stemmed from the love-lit gospel of guruvad (the
guru principle). But after a sleepless night I resolved to take
my chance and repair to the Maharshi’s sanctuary.
This time I was the guest of a Parsi lady, one of his ardent
devotees. She led me straight to the sage and told him, “Do
you know Bhagavan, Dilip says you have a beautiful laugh”.
He laughed and we all swelled the chorus.
But my doubts still gave me no respite. In the end I argued
that my friends in Pondicherry were right, that in all crises one
should appeal, first and last, to one’s own guru and to no other.
I sat down in this distraught frame of mind and kept asking
myself how I could possibly come to port if I declined to accept
my great guru’s lead. And so when I closed my eyes to meditate,
I felt miserable. Meditate on what? To pray? To pray to whom?,
and so on till, lo, after just five minutes, the three weeks’ incubus
of gloom was lifted as though by magic and an exquisite peace
descended into me, entailing an ineffable ecstasy.
The next morning I went to him and made my obeisance.
His eyes shone like twin stars as he smiled kindly. I told him
what had come to pass — a veritable miracle — peace settling
in the heart of a storm! He nodded, pleased, but made no
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comment. I then asked him if it was true what people said
that he advocated jnana and disparaged bhakti. He smiled,
“The old misconception! I have always said that bhakti is
jnana mata (that is, bhakti, or love, is the mother of jnana,
knowledge)”. When I heard this I was thrilled and understood
at once why I had felt in him not merely a great guru, come
with his kindly light to lead us back home, but a human friend
and divine helper rolled into one.
I asked him to explain what the writer of Maha Yoga quotes
as his considered opinion that no authentic sage ever
contradicted another, all illuminates being essentially one.
He answered me this time at some length, contending that
the paths may seem diverse, but when the pilgrims reach the
goal, the perspective changes and one sees clearly, that only
those who have lagged behind quarrel about the relative merits
of different roads, and that only the goal matters. “So it is utter
folly,” he added, “to go on wrangling among ourselves, because
we were one in the beginning and shall be one again in the end.
Also, this oneness is so thrillingly real that one may say, if X
wants anything from Y then Y can hardly decline because in
giving to X, Y only gives to himself in the last analysis”.
“But Maharshi,” I asked after a hesitant pause, “why is it
that the bhakta so often turns away from the jnani, even after
they have both attained the goal?” He smiled, “But your premise
is wrong, to start with”, he said. “For, as soon as the bhakta
arrives he finds he is at one with the jnani. For then the bhakta
becomes bhakti swarupa (the essence of bhakti) even as the
jnani becomes jnana swarupa (the essence of jnana) and the
two are one, identical, although pseudo-bhaktas and pseudojnanis
may dub the idea ‘crazy’ and start pitching into one
another”. Then he added after a pause, “But such strifes break
out only among the followers of the illuminates. The Masters
always stay above the battle. I was reminded of Sri
Ramakrishna’s joke about Rama and Shiva: “Even when they
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fight”, he said, “the duel ends in perfect harmony, peace and
love. But Rama’s soldiers, the monkeys, and Shiva’s henchmen,
the ghouls, go ever on clashing and snarling and calling names”.
On my second visit I asked the Maharshi if he was against
guruvad. On this point many an exegete has written and improved
a great deal. So I wanted to have his final verdict. He said:
I have spoken about it many a time. To some the One reveals
Himself as an outer guru, to others, as an inner one. But
the function of either is identical, in the last analysis. For
the outer guru pushes you inside whereas the inner guru
draws you inside, so the two are not incompatible. Why
then all this bother about His reality one way or the other?
Many a time have I been helped by his compassion and
wonderful parables. Here are two I have savoured most.
The Maharshi often says with an amused smile that we
can hardly afford to be vain of our so called knowledge when
we don’t know even our own self, the self in whom we have
homed from our cradle. An authentic guru G told his disciple
D many a time about the tragicomedy of this human
foolhardiness. But D forgot and grew vain after ripening into
a resplendent savant. So the guru came disguised as a ne’erdo-
well and watched with him a royal procession. The king
was riding a grand caparisoned elephant and a seething crowd
flanking him on both sides, hailed and acclaimed him along
with D, entranced and proud to have been appointed the private
tutor of such an august king. G nudged him and asked him
what the ovation was about. D frowned and replied, “Don’t
you see? Our great gorgeous king mounted on such a
magnificent elephant”!
G: But who is the king and who is the elephant, sire?
D: Idiot! Have you no eyes? The one on top is the king
and his mount below is the elephant royal.
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G: But sire, what is top and what is below?
D: (Annoyed, knocked him down and, sitting on his chest,
shouted) Here, see? I am on top and you are below.
G: But sire, who are you and who am I?
D: (shivered as though galvanised) I . . . I don’t know.
G: And yet you are vain that you know all! May I ask what
is the knowledge you plume yourself on?
The second parable he related with such a lovely laughter!
I have rendered it in heroic couplets. I only regret I had no
tape-recorder at the time to register his beautiful laughter. Here
is the revealing parable:
In wrath, fierce Snake A bit the small snake B,
Who groaned and writhed and cried in agony:
“O merciful Mother! Soon I shall be dead!”
A third Snake C then drew near B and said
“Take heart, child ‘twill be all right — wait and see!”
And he sucked the poison out at once till B
Was healed — then the rattled A vindictively
Bit C who wailed: “Alas! now I shall die!”
A cursed “To hell! Do you not know that I
Am king of the snakes and so must ruthlessly
Do them to death who madly challenge me
And my royal verdicts”. With this he went away.
Now whispered B to C: “Fear not, I pray,
For I’ll now suck the poison from your wound
Until you, too, compassionate friend, come round”.
Then they, cured, thanked each other in ecstasy
And the Yogi thanked the Mother of sympathy.
I feel led to include here, a relevant excerpt from my
reminiscences about one of my dearest friends and colleagues,
the great yogi Sri Krishnaprem. He visited me more than three
decades ago at our Pondicherry Ashram, whence he repaired
to Tiruvannamalai to pay his heart’s homage to the Maharshi.
18
On his return he spoke in a moved voice about the radiant
sage and what his grace had revealed.
“You know, Dilip, how profound is my admiration and
veneration for the sage. I whole-heartedly agree with Sri
Aurobindo’s verdict that his tapasya is a shining light of India.
So I went to Ramanasramam in Tiruvannamalai to receive
his blessing.
“When, in the evening, I entered the hall where the Maharshi
reclines daily on his couch, I sat down in silence, along with
the others, to meditate at his feet. But believe it or not, Dilip, as
soon as I sat down I heard a voice questioning me over and
over again, ‘Who are you?, ‘Who are you?’ I tried hard to ignore
it, but it went on and on like an importunate visitor, who
knocking at the door, insisted on being admitted. So, in the
end, I just had to formulate an answer, ‘I am Krishna’s servant’.
At once the question changed, like a shape-changer, into, ‘Who
is Krishna?’ I answered, ‘Nanda’s son’. No use. The question
was repeated without pause. I thought up other answers like,
‘He’s an avatar, the One-in-all, the Resident of every heart’,
and so on ... but the questioning would not cease, till at last, I
gave it up, left the hall and returned deeply disturbed, to
meditate. But I had no peace. The voice gave me no respite, till
in the end, I had to evoke Radharani who asked me very simply
what answers I had given. I told Her but She shook Her head
and then, at last, revealed it to me”.
“She did?”, I asked, thrilled.
He anticipated me, holding up his hand.
“No, Dilip, don’t ask me, please! I won’t tell you, for you
will tell everybody, don’t I know you? But listen, there are
more thrills to come”.
“Next morning”, he went on, “when I sat down again at
his blessed feet, the Maharshi suddenly gave me a lightning
19
glance and smiled. I knew at once beyond the shadow of a
doubt that he was the author of it all and that he also knew
that I had divined his part correctly. Then as I closed my eyes
to meditate, a deep peace descended into me and settled like
a block of ice as it were till my every cell was numb with an
exquisite bliss. Didn’t you have the same experience, as you
wrote to me once”?
I nodded delightedly. “Yes Krishnaprem. If my memory
doesn’t fail me, I think I wrote also in what context I had
received the boon from the Maharshi. I was so peaceless for
having gone to Tiruvannamalai, that I told myself I was a fool
to expect peace through his contact when I could not have it at
the feet of my great guru. And yet I did feel the peace percolating
through me like a scintillating light! I had an experience of
this indescribable peace three or four times previously. Only,
every time it had a different rhythm as it were, though the
melody was the same, to exploit a simile from music. What is
still more delectable is that sometimes I can almost recapture it
by meditating on his tranquil face with that faraway gaze. Once
or twice, this peace has soothed me, somewhat like the peace
that music distills. But perhaps you find this rather vague”.
“Not at all, Dilip”, he said, shaking his head and continued,
“As I meditated it was borne home to me through the mystic
silence, that though this peace stemmed ultimately from the
Lord Himself — doesn’t He say in the Gita that He Himself is
the primal source of all experience? — the peace in this instance
was transmitted through His beloved agent the Maharshi”.
“But isn’t that precisely why He sends to us, as His
deputies, the great saints and sages, messiahs and avatars?”
“Of course He does. Didn’t Ma explain to you the soulful
import of His naralila — that is, why He comes down to
earth from age to age to play hide and seek with us humans,
as a human being”?
20
He paused a little, then added with a quizzical look, “I feel
tempted to tell you the sequel”.
“Only you have misgivings about confiding in me”?, I
finished for him, laughing.
“Well, I’ll risk it”, he laughed back. “For what happened
was too wonderful to keep back. So listen with bated breath”.
I hung on his words, my heart going pit-a-pat. He said,
“As I went on imbibing this delectable peace, meditating at
his feet, I suddenly took it into my head to return the
compliment and prod him with a question in silence, ‘And
who are you, may I humbly ask?’ It so happened that the next
moment I opened my eyes involuntarily when — lo, I found
his dais empty”!
“You don’t say so”!
“Yes, Dilip”, he nodded enjoying my mystification, and
continued, “there was the dais where he had presided two seconds
before, but in the twinkling of an eye, as it were, he had vanished
— just melted into thin air! I closed my eyes once more and
then, as I looked again — lo, there he was, reclining, tranquil
and beneficent like Lord Shiva Himself! A momentary smile
flickered on his lips as he gave me a meaningful glance and then
turned towards the window, as was his wont”.
I caught my breath, “Marvellous”!
“In all conscience he is a Mahayogi, as Sri Aurobindo told
you. You see the point of the miracle, don’t you?”
“That he is beyond nama-rupa”, I hazarded. “The nameless
and formless manifesting Himself through name and form”?
“That’s right”, he answered reflectively, “or, shall I say,
the One beyond all maya, the star beyond the phantoms, the
last reality beyond the ephemera, the silence beyond the songs.
You may exploit any simile you fancy. Personally, I look upon
21
as a sign of his grace, his giving me the answer in a way only
he could have given”.
I smiled, “So, he met you more than half-way”?
“He is compassion itself, don’t you know”?
Yes, indeed. He was compassion incarnate as I have realised
many a time vividly, a realisation to which I have testified
gratefully in one of my ecstatic poems:
IN MEMORIAM
A face that’s still like the hushed cloudless blue,
And eyes that even as stars drip holiness,
Won from a Source beyond our ken, a new
Messenger Thou, in this age, of a Grace
Men ache for and, withal, are terrified
When it shines too near — wan puppets of fool senses,
They would disown the soul’s faith — even deride
The Peace they crave yet fear — for Life’s false dances
And siren tunes beguile the multitude!
And they woo mad Time’s whirls and wheels — for what?
At best a reeling moment — an interlude
Of half-lit laughter dogged by tears — of Fate!
O Son of Dawn! who only knowest the Sun,
And through His eye of Light see’st all that lies
Revealed — a flawless Plenitude which none
Save Sun-eyed children ever might surmise!
For only the chosen few so far have won
The Truth that shines beyond world’s wounds and cries;
Who hymn Thee, throned in the high dominion
Of Self’s invulnerable Verities,
Are granted a glimpse of Bliss of the Beyond,
Thou singest: Nay, ‘tis here’ — yet without Thy
Compassion’s pledge how few would understand?
Homage to Thee, O minstrel of Clarity!
Sayings from Bhagavan
Recorded in June 1918 By C.V. Subramania Aiyer
1. Turn the mind inward and rest in your own Self.
2. Mind is the cause of bondage.
3. Give up one thing after another and rest in peace.
4. What we get, we shall lose, so desire not.
5. There are two kinds of meditation. The first is to be practised
by advanced aspirants — nirguna dhyana — where one seeks
to know the Meditator himself. The second kind is to be
practised by those less advanced — a some what round about
course — saguna dhyana — where the meditator, meditation
and the object of meditation get merged ultimately into one.
6. When I come to know that I was never born, I shall never
die. Death is for one who is born. I was never born. I have
no body and so I shall never die. I am everywhere; where am
I to go and where am I to come?
7. When a man’s mind is dead, he will not die again.
8. Attain the sushupti (state of sleep) in the jagrat (waking)
state, and you become a jnani.
23
IDENTITY
By Lucy Cornelssen
Question: If the ego or ‘l’ be an illusion, who then casts
off the illusion?
Answer: The ‘I’ casts off the illusion of ‘I’ and yet remains
as ‘I’. This appears to be a paradox to you; it is not so to the
jnani.1
Question: Is an intellectual understanding of the truth
necessary?
Answer: Yes. Otherwise why does not the person realise
God or the Self at once, i.e. as soon as he is told that God is
all or the Self is all? One must argue with himself and gradually
convince himself of the truth. 2
How is this? Are there not many quotations from Sri
Ramana Maharshi’s works and talks quite to the contrary,
wherein he clearly states that there is no reaching the truth by
intellect, but that intellect (or mind) has to be transcended in
order to attain to the truth? Isn’t this a flagrant contradiction?
Only apparently.
According to the highest revelations of mankind we are
the truth. Why then are we not aware of this plain fact?
Because the intellect has developed from being a useful
servant into a troublesome and tyrannic master in the house.
It will not and cannot be convinced of the higher truth, because
this is beyond its scope. However, it can be transcended and
the conviction reached that there is a higher power, and that it
will do to open the ‘Heart’ to the possibility of direct
experience.
1 Guru Ramana, 17 February, 1937.
2 Talks with Sri Ramana Maharshi, 16 December 1937.
24
Let us see. First of all, what is meant by ‘intellect’? It is a
faculty of the brain. Its roots are simply discriminating and
choosing; when mature, it is the thinking faculty. In a wider
sense we have to add two other faculties — emotion and will.
These three together are a biological mechanism of reacting
on impulses from without and within our body. It developed
with the development of the brain and nervous system and is
prompted and conditioned by the faculty of perceiving,
consciously or unconsciously, which itself is not part of that
mechanism of reacting, but is independent of it.
A newly born child reacts merely to bodily comfort and
discomfort, which means that it shows only feeling. After some
weeks or even months it starts to discriminate faces and tries to
understand things, which means it is beginning to develop its
intellect. The will is only discovered by it in its third year. In
between it has learned to speak and to discriminate among the
members of the family by name, using its own name when it
wants to point to itself. It does not talk about ‘my’ ball, or ‘my’
doll, but ‘Peter’s ball, ‘Mary’s doll. This is an important feature,
since it shows that the child has as yet no genuine feeling of ‘I’.
It takes itself as one person among other persons. And even
when after some time it starts to use the ‘I’ for itself, this is still
not a genuine ‘I’. The child has simply learnt to imitate the way
persons around itself express themselves, that everybody,
though having a name by which he or she is known and spoken
of by others, says ‘I’ when speaking of himself or herself.
During this first decade of life the child learns to
discriminate between ‘father’ and ‘mother’ and ‘mother’ and
‘I’, ‘myself’ as persons with certain qualities, everyone
occupying a certain status within the group, the family. When
the brain and nervous system of the child are nearly fully
developed, then it has a concept of itself as a clear-cut person,
boy or girl, named so-and-so, tall or short, fair or dark, clever
in school or not — in short a ‘personal I’, complete in itself.
25
However, strange to say, this young human being is not at all
happy, though not knowing why.
Parents and elders believe they know the reason, if the
boy or girl is in the period of puberty and adolescence, the
body undergoes a certain change in its metabolism.
It does, but that is quite a natural development which started
unperceived much earlier without giving trouble. The real
reason for the unbalanced mental condition of the young
person is quite different.
Brain and nervous system are more than just working
mechanisms in the service of the individual body-mind-complex;
they have a higher purpose. They are meant as a ‘wireless receiver’
for impulses from the universal Consciousness too. The mental
and emotional struggle at the time of puberty is also caused by
the first powerful impulse from cosmic Consciousness, the
mystery of identity, of the parabiological ‘I am’, which tried to
enter the individual consciousness. However the entrance is
blocked by the ‘personal I’, which is entirely an image only, a
concept, a mere construction of the intellect.
There would be no need for struggle and disturbed balance, if
young people knew what was happening, if they were prepared
to surrender to that wonder which is in store for them during this
high time of their maturity. They should have learnt to witness
what is going on within themselves. Then they would discover
that their individual consciousness has a greater Consciousness
for its source, from which now emanates a ‘greater I’ than that
by which they are more troubled than pleased, an ‘I’ without an
identity which is simply itself, omnipresent, void, silent, pure, a
glorious and mysterious peaceful joy.
Alas, the entrance is blocked, though quite unconsciously,
by sheer ignorance, which caused the growing intellect to be
busy entirely with the impulses from outside, neglecting
everything which is not sense perception.
26
In the young Venkataraman the genuine ‘I am’ broke
through the unconscious resistance by means of a dramatic
experience. What started as a sheer horror of physical death,
developed itself during the experience as the ‘death’ of the
manifold ‘personal I’ for the sake of Aham-sphurana, the ‘I’
– ’I’ or genuine identity.
In almost all other cases it succeeds only in sneaking in,
which means not being able to overwhelm and wipe out the
intellectually constructed ‘I’. Both of them get confused into
a knot of a personality which now is no longer simply false,
as it was before, but worse. It now has the spark of genuine
identity as its backbone, as it were, making it seemingly
impossible to discriminate and separate one from the other!
Never mind, there will be other opportunities later on in life
to work on the ‘wireless’ as will be shown presently.
It is to be kept in mind that according to the sages, we
always are that true identity, the Atman. It is our true nature.
The change of the situation during maturity consists merely
in the fact that the true identity is going to become conscious,
to open up the individual consciousness to the dimension of
cosmic Consciousness.
However there is the usurper intellect and the more it
develops the more it obstructs. What can we do to remove it?
Intellect will never be able to grasp the reality of an
identity beyond itself, but it can be brought to acknowledge
its own limits. We have gently to train it, not to interfere any
more; we have to keep it quiet by not listening to its arguing.
When we do not pay attention to its pros and cons it finally
gets tired and gives up. Meditation is the means of such
systematic training. But even more efficient is a mindful
awareness throughout the day. It keeps the intellect to those
areas of everyday life for which it is meant and where it is a
useful servant.
27
This is the royal means to bring it under control for the
future. Usually it is restless, the favourite vehicle of rajoguna.
But fortunately there are periods of spontaneous sattvaguna,
when even the intellect is automatically inclined to rest. These
are the moments when we may discover suddenly a free access
into the beyond, where the adhikari (the ripe one) may meet
his true identity.
Sri Bhagavan says:
Why is not the pure ‘I’ realised now or even remembered
by us? Because of want of acquaintance with it. It can be
recognised only if it is consciously attained. Therefore
make the effort and gain it consciously. 3
In the Mahavakya, ‘Tatwamasi’ – Thou art That – ‘That’
stands for the true identity. Sri Ramana Maharshi uses the
same ‘That’ in verse twentyseven of Reality in Forty Verses
(and later on), ‘The state in which the (personal) ‘I’ does not
arise, is the state of being That’.
Going through our most cherished memories of the past,
are there not certain situations when we were happy in a way
we have never been able to forget since? Maybe we belong to
those for whom a beautiful landscape is more than merely a
pretty picture. Maybe it was a sunset at the seashore or even
in the Himalayas, very quiet, very remote . . . Maybe we
involuntarily opened ourselves to it, so that it could enter our
very being with its timeless beauty, its surrender into a supreme
light, a supreme silence, in which all thinking and planning,
all insecurity and restlessness vanished, leaving behind a
person who had forgotten himself, being completely absorbed
by the mystery of this now and here.
This state is exactly a spontaneous revealing of ‘That’, his
true nature, his true ‘I’. It broke through because he
surrendered himself to an impression strong enough to lift up
3 Talks with Sri Ramana Maharshi, 3 January, 1937.
28
for the time being the restlessness and convulsion of the
reacting mechanism of the personal ‘I’ for the sake of the
non-reacting true ‘I’. This true ‘I’ is always only a mirror to
all impressions and happenings whereas the personal ‘I’,
responds to them by reacting.
If the person who experiences this would simply close his
eyes and direct his attention towards what is going on within
himself, then he would learn that all the beauty, the wonderful
deep and silent bliss of this hour is only his own true Being
his, true ‘I’. And he would experience that the perfect man is
not a mere theory, but a reality and at the same time the
perfectly happy man. For perfection is not a matter of qualities
but a state of Consciousness.
A person who likes music can have a similar experience
with great music. Each great piece of art can have this effect
on those who are able to tune themselves accordingly. But
even a rather dry person, somebody who takes himself to be
completely down to earth, is able to experience the true ‘I’,
simply because it is the inevitable next step of evolution, which
man is destined to recognise and to take.
It is love which is ready to receive and bless everyone and
which has the magic touch to open the gate to the true identity,
that remains locked up forever to intellect.
We have to forget the shade of egotism in human love and
leave alone the torrent of passion which some may call love. We
have to think of that feature of love which releases the radiance
of the true ‘I’. Neither passion nor infatuation reveals it, but it is
found in the hours of silence, when words are unnecessary and
thoughts about matters of day-to-day life have no strength —
hours of a timeless ‘here and now’, without past or future.
Where there is genuine self-forgetful love, there shines instead
of the habitual ‘me’, the pure, quiet, real ‘I’, and here also it is
not recognised, because the lover covers it with the beloved ‘thou’.
29
True, we have entered into these experiences more or less
unconscious of their real meaning, leaving no other result than
merely a nostalgic memory. But realising now what kind of
treasure awaits our readiness to breakthrough our ignorance,
we can even make use of an experiment which was strongly
recommended by Bhagavan Ramana Maharshi.
After having retired for the night, one has first to relax
from the restlessness and the tension of intellectual activity.
When sleep is nearing, one has to try to keep as the last thought
the resolution to meet as the first thing on awakening the
experience of the true ‘I’.
Deep and sincere longing will always succeed in this
experiment, if not immediately then after some attempts. The
first thing emerging from sleep into waking consciousness is
always the true ‘I’ pure, silent, absolute in itself, remaining all
alone for a few seconds, or even longer by practice. Other
thoughts start only a little later, testifying to the little known
fact that ‘Consciousness’ is not necessarily the same as thinking.
What is possible once even for a moment can be extended
by practice. This experiment gives you the advantage that
you now know the aim of endeavour. It will help you in your
further sadhana like leavening in the dough.
Sri Ramana Maharshi called this the ‘transitional I’ and
stressed the importance of this experience:
This transitional ‘I’ is a moment of pure awareness, which
is aware only of itself as ‘I’, pure identity in itself. 4
The ‘I’-thought’ is only limited ‘I’. The real ‘I’ is unlimited,
universal, beyond time and space. Just on rising up from
sleep and before seeing the objective world, there is a state
of awareness which is your pure Self. That must be known.5
4 Talks with Sri Ramana Maharshi, Talk No. 353.
5 Ibid, Talk No. 311
30
The moment you succeed, keep very quiet and observe:
this ‘I’ neither thinks nor wills; it has no qualities, is neither
man nor woman, has neither body nor mind; it has no trace of
the ‘person’ which you thought yourself to be up to now. It is
simply conscious of itself as ‘I am’. Not ‘I am this’, ‘I am
that’ — only ‘I am’.
But beware. It is not your ‘I-person’, who has this
‘I-Consciousness’ as an object, but this Consciousness is your
real ‘I’. This pure be-ing ‘I am’ is the first glimpse of the true
Identity, which is by nature Pure Consciousness.
To make this test of awakening in the morning is important
insofar as one knows afterwards what the goal for which we
embarked looks like. It also makes it easier to recognise it in
other circumstances. Moreover, this silent, alert awareness is
the last experience which the seeker can reach by his own
effort. For when his ‘personal I’ is wiped out, then all his
effort too has automatically reached its end. Where there is
no ‘personal I’ there cannot be any effort. What remains is a
consciousness which no longer feels but is listening within;
no longer thinks, but is silent; no longer wills, but lets happen
what will happen. It is exactly the state which reveals itself as
‘I am’, the true Identity.
Last but not the least it is this great experience of the true
identity of man which turned the schoolboy Venkataraman
into the world famous sage Ramana of Arunachala!
31
TRUDGING ALONG TO THE HOLY HILL
By Arunachala Bhakta Bhagawata
FROM the earliest years of my childhood, Sri Bhagavan has
been churning my heart with the single mission of realizing
the Self and thus becoming one with him. Sri Bhagavan
brought me into this phenomenal existence in a simple
agricultural family which named me ‘Bhagawata’, a humble
son and devotee of the Lord. My parents dreamt of the day
when their youngest son would be able to read the Hindi
Ramayana of Goswami Tulasidas. A beginning was made by
my elementary school teacher, Sri Ramapyaresinha, who not
only loved Sri Ramacharitamanasa, but worshipped it daily.
Every evening he taught us how to recite it with zeal and
instilled in us love and devotion for Sri Ramachandra and the
Divine Mother, Sita. These six years of my early education
continued to kindle the fire of devotion in me.
Although there was none near my home who could teach
me to seek the Self in a formal way, my three brothers read
and recited the Bhagavad Gita and Ramayana daily, and as a
result of their religious life I was dyed indelibly with bhakti
and jnana. The first World War and the non-cooperation
movement of Mahatma Gandhi awakened my village people.
As a result, my brothers and other village young men joined
the ranks of the national movement. Thus, both the fires of
deshamukti (national liberation) and atmamukti began to burn
brighter in my heart. Although quite young, I remained
immersed in the fast-flowing fountain of vairagya (dispassion)
and viveka (discrimination). Treading these difficult paths of
patriotism and devotion was only possible with the infinite
grace and mercy of Lord Ramana, who never allowed me to
get entangled in projects that many a time lead guileless
aspirants astray.
32
When Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi burst into my heart
on Friday, 10 October 1941 in Darjeeling in the Himalayas,
he removed the veils of forgetfulness from me and enabled
me to realize that it was he and he alone whom I had been
seeking all these years. When I saw his many pictures and
read the text of the book, A Search in Secret India, by Paul
Brunton, the old relationship was re-established. How I wished
to fly to the lotus feet of Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi on
the slopes of the holy Arunachala hill! But he did not allow
me to come to him while he was abiding in the body for the
simple reason that I might look on him as the body. Instead
he sent me into the world to work out my latencies before
returning to him. Then, exactly eleven years later, in the guest
cottage of the Quaker family of Helen and Albert Bailey, Sri
Bhagavan came to me again and revived the smouldering fire
of jnana and bhakti. Wherever he took me from then on, I
found myself in his grip.
Now in 1979, while I sit in New York in Sri Bhagavan’s
Arunachala Ashrama, Sri Bhagavan makes me dream of the
day when his temple shall rise on Fifth Avenue in this
metropolitan city so that seekers of peace and happiness may
wend their way there. Mornings and evenings shall be filled
with the recitation of the Vedas, Upanishads, Bhagavad Gita,
etc. “Abide in the Self, in the inmost recesses of the Heart”,
shall fill the temple, and people from different walks of life
shall learn to tread his direct path of Self-enquiry.
During all these sixtyseven years of my bodily sojourn, I
have been yearning for the day when I would be able to pay
my debt to the world. Unceasing abidance in the Self is the
work cut out for me, and on the sheer strength of his grace I
have all along been trudging along, trudging along to the holy
hill of the beacon light. In the midst of plenty or in the midst
of paucity, Sri Bhagavan makes me ache for mankind, but all
I can do is to contribute my mite to the world by adding a
33
grain of devotion. The mere existence of Sri Arunachala
Ashrama in the Western hemisphere speaks for itself, and if
we are able to keep the flame of devotion burning brightly in
this phenomenal existence, Sri Bhagavan will have taken the
destined work from all of us. One thing that has always been
certain is that Sri Arunachala Ashrama has been founded and
conducted by Sri Bhagavan alone, using all of us as his
ordinary instruments.
When Sri Bhagavan came into the world one hundred years
ago, he resuscitated the age-old teaching of ceaseless
inherence in the Self in the cavity of one’s heart. Anyone,
anywhere, under any circumstances can profit from his unique
instruction of returning to the source. He incarnated for the
sake of removing the dense darkness of desire, delusion, ego
and ignorance, to save us from the abysmal pit of forgetfulness.
Though sometimes he taught with words, his most potent
teaching has been his silence, from which all of us can profit
without stirring from our place of birth or work. Arunachala
Ramana teaches that no efforts ever go in vain. This teaching
is the only hope for me, and with all my limitations I continue
to call on him with his name, “Om Namo Bhagavate Sri
Ramanaya”. Sri Bhagavan is the doer and I am simply his
most infinitesimal instrument, and day and night I pray that
he allow me to do his will. May I ever abide in Bhagavan Sri
Ramana Arunachala!
34
THE GIST OF SRI
BHAGAVAN’S TEACHINGS
By K. Padmanabhan
THE two main works of Sri Ramana Bhagavan, Ulladu Narpadu
(Reality in Forty Verses), which is the siddhantha
(philosophical or theoretical) treatise, and Upadesa Saram
(Quintessence of Wisdom), which is the sadhana (practical)
treatise, elaborate his teachings. The gist of the principle and
practice of his teachings is given by him in one verse:
Hridaya Kuhara Madhye Kevalam Brahmamathram
Hyaham Aham Ithi Sakshath Atmaroopena Bhathi
Hridhvisha Manasa Swam Chinvatha Majjathava
Pavana Chalanarodhat Atma Nishto Bhavatwam.
In the inmost centre of the Heart cave Brahman alone
shines in the form of Atman (Self) with direct immediacy as
‘I’ — ‘I’. Enter into the Heart with questing mind, or by diving
deep within, or through control of breath, and abide in the
Atman, dissolving the ego.1
Sri Bhagavan, without decrying other practices or methods,
emphasises Atma Vichara, or Self-enquiry, the ‘Who am I?’
quest. He says it is not a mere method of questioning, as that
would take one nowhere, since mind cannot destroy mind by
mere thinking. The source of the mind itself is to be found,
and one has to transcend the mind to reach the thought-free
state, the state of pure Awareness. Diving deep within, one
should lose oneself in deep absorption in the Heart, the Selfeffulgent
bliss. Conviction of spiritual declarations is
intellectual and is no doubt necessary, but the Heart must
play the ultimate part for spiritual absorption.
1 Ramana Gita, Chap 2, v.2
35
According to the Upanishads, the Atman is to be seen, heard
and reflected upon, but it is not an object to be known. Sri
Bhagavan reiterates the same and wants one to realise the
Atman here and now and abide as such. Therefore the quest
of the Atman is to be purely inward, within the centre of
consciousness, so that the identity with the Universal
Consciousness gets firmly established. Reality is neither
physical nor mental, but spiritual. This knowledge gets
established only with identity. It is only when the ego dies
that the eternal Being in the core of the Heart is realised.
Atma Vichara is not a mere japa or mantra. It is listening
or enquiring within. What is needed is a mind devoid of
thoughts. Silence, paradoxical though it may seem, would be
the dynamic method of Self-enquiry for merging the mind in
the Heart. With sat-darshan or truth perception, awareness is
realised as the only true Being. It is for each one to discover
this truth for oneself.
There is no need for any prolonged study of the scriptures
or even for a guru, once you get fully convinced of the efficacy
of the vichara marga. Grace is always there to draw you from
within. It is indeed grace that initiates the vichara, aids you
to still the surface agitations, and takes you to the silence of
the Self.
(Continued ...)
My humble salutations to the lotus feet of Bhagavan Sree Ramana Maharshi
and also gratitude to Bhagavan’s great devotees for the collection)
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