Day by Day with Bhagavan
13-2-46 Morning
After parayana, Bhagavan was talking to a bearded
gentleman past middle age and yet looking sturdy and strong. I
went and sat by the side of the visitor. Bhagavan told me, “This
is Gajanan, alias Daivarata, the answers to whose questions
have been recorded in Chapter III of Ramana Gita. He was
with us at Skandasramam in 1917.” I thereupon said, “I know.
The same who was in Nepal and whose photo and letter arrived
immediately after Bhagavan was making enquiries about him
once.” For the benefit of those who might not know the incident,
Bhagavan said, “Some years ago, when Nayana’s son
Mahadevan came here, I was enquiring about this Gajanan. We
had not heard from him for about ten years. So I was making
enquiries. When we were talking, the post arrived and with it a
parcel of books. I perused the letters first and laid aside the
parcel. When we were talking about this G., the parcel was by
my side. After talking to Mahadevan, I opened the parcel and
found G’s letter and photo and books, and in the letter he had
written that, though he was in Nepal, yet he was always at my
feet. It looked as if, in answer to my question to Mahadevan as
to where G. was, G. was saying, ‘Here I am (i.e., in the picture)
at your very feet’.”
The Cocanada party requested Bhagavan to give them
hastha diksha, or to permit them to touch his feet. Bhagavan
only replied as usual, ‘Touch with your mind’.
At breakfast, Bhagavan enquired where G. was staying
and what he was going to take. It was reported G. had gone
for his bath. Bhagavan then said, “He would eat anything. If
you give him a quantity of tender margosa leaves and a chembu
of cow’s urine, he would breakfast on them. He had lived on
things like that.”
About 10-30 a.m. G. was in the hall showing a picture of
a Pasupati image in Nepal and explaining its esoteric
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significance. A Swami in orange robes, called
Jagadiswarananda, from Ujjain arrived this morning and a little
after, the letter announcing his coming here, reached Bhagavan.
The person was here before the letter.
In the night again G. was telling Bhagavan about Nepal. He
said, among other things, “There are three important shrines in
Nepal, all very sacred. The King is a very religious man and it is
the custom and tradition there for the King not to do anything or
go anywhere without first going and taking permission from the
gods in these temples. In that State, cow-killing used to be
punished with death sentence. Now the sentence is transportation
for life. If a bull is beaten and blood appears, the offender will be
punished with imprisonment for three months or so. The State
has its own coins.” Here G. showed some coins to Bhagavan.
Mr. Balaram said, “He does bhajan with great spirit and
enthusiasm. We should have it one day here.” G. said, “Oh, yes.
I can do even now. No fear, no shyness. So I can sing away. Can
we get some tinkling beads (Lwû_) for my ankles, and some
accompaniment?” Bhagavan also said, “He must have some sruti
like harmonium, some accompaniment like mridangam or ganjira
and some cymbals (jalra).” Then the talk drifted to Bhagavan
and his party going round the hill in those days. Balaram asked if
G. used to do these bhajans while resting on the way or during
walking. Bhagavan replied, “Oh, he would do his bhajan while
walking. He would jump from one side of the road to another.
He was so full of life and enthusiasm.” G. said, “I was much
younger then. But I can do it even now.” Discussing where and
when we should arrange for such a bhajan by G. we found out
that he would require a big space himself for moving about singing
and that it would be better to arrange it in the dining hall.
14-2-46
In the morning post was received a letter written in French
and Mr. Balaram translated it into English for Bhagavan. It is
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from the editors of the journal called Spirituality, which during
the war penetrated all the prisoners’ camps in Germany. They
have published a book of about 600 pages called
Reconstruction of Man. They say that their view is similar to
Bhagavan’s; they also hold that man in his egoless state, far
from losing himself in a void, finds himself as he has always
been in his profoundest depths. They say they belong to the
Vedic brotherhood of Prajapatis. They hope to go to India
next year and to visit Tiruvannamalai and Pondicherry.
In the afternoon a visitor sang some Tamil Thevarams,
etc. After parayana in the evening, Bhagavan’s old disciple
Gajanan gave us a bhajan performance in the dining hall
between 6-30 p.m. and 7-30 p.m. with Bhagavan seated at
his usual place there. The bhajan was in North Indian style;
and the way he ran and jumped about was remarkable for
one who is at least fifty years old.
15-2-46
Mr. Ramaswami Iyengar of Kumbakonam, who was
staying at Palakottu, passed away this morning at about 2 a.m.;
and Kunjuswami informed Bhagavan of the same at once. R.
passed away with Bhagavan’s name on his lips.
Bhagavan made kind enquiries about Colombo
Ramachandra’s health, as he had been suffering from sciatica
for about a week now, and was taken to the Doctor in the
Government Hospital last evening. Among the letters received
today was one from a lady, Kameswaramma, in which she asked
for Bhagavan’s opinion on the question whether the body can
be kept alive eternally. While perusing the letter, Bhagavan made
a few remarks and this led to questions from visitors. Bhagavan
repeated his well-known views on the subject, more or less to
the following effect: “As this lady writes, some have maintained
that the body can be made immortal and they give recipes,
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medical and other, for perfecting this body and making it defy
death. The Siddha school (as it is known in the south) has
believed in such a doctrine. Venkaswami Rao in Kumbakonam
started a school which believed the same. There is a Society in
Pondicherry too. There is also the school which believes in
transforming men into supermen by descent of Divine Power,
as is mentioned in this letter. But all people, after writing long
treatises on the indestructibility of their body, after giving
medical recipes and yogic practices to perfect the body and
keep it alive for ever, pass away one day!” Somebody raised
this question, “What then about those who are spoken of as
chiranjivis in our books?” Bhagavan replied, “But do they
appear in physical bodies? They only appear to you in your
dhyana.” From this the talk drifted to whether they have
individuality and Bhagavan said, “As long as you have
individuality, you can see individuality in them, not afterwards!”
In the night Gajanan (Daivarata) said to Bhagavan, “When
Nayana went to Gokarnam he went almost to every house and
offered his superb vidya to everyone. But nobody cared for it
then. But now, they come across a verse of his and they go into
raptures over it, and exclaim ‘What poetic gift!’ and if they can
get a picture of him they worship it as God. This seems to have
been the way of the world always. There is a story about
Maschendra Nath. It is said he went about saying, ‘For two
pooran polies (éWi úTô°) I shall give you Brahmam i.e.,
jnana.’ But nobody cared. At last Goraknath came along and
when he heard this offer of M., he said he would bring the
polies. He went into the city, got up a tall tree, hung from one
of the branches head downwards, had a small fire lit up
underneath, and made a chela or disciple sit by his side. The
whole town swarmed around and wondered saying, ‘What great
tapasya! Some great Mahatma has come to our place!’ People
readily offered to do various services and present many things
to the great tapasvi. The disciple explained that his Master would
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only accept a bhiksha in which a thousand persons should all
be fed with the best pooran polies. This was readily arranged
and Goraknath took two polies and ran up to Maschendra, telling
the people, ‘You feed the thousand persons. I shall go to the
Ganges and offer the polies to Ganga.’ G. told M., ‘Here Sir, I
have brought the two polies. Now give me Brahmam!’ M. took
the two polies, bit them here and there, threw the pieces to the
birds, dogs and the river, and then both M. and G. disappeared.
M. had given G. Brahmam.
“It seems to have been the way of the world always. Great
men are rarely respected and rated at their true worth in their
lives. Even Sankara was bitterly attacked during his lifetime as
a maya asura. But now he is regarded not only here, but all
over the world, as the greatest religious and philosophical
thinker the world has produced!” Bhagavan said, “There is
another similarity between Sankara and Maschendra Nath. It
is said of Maschendra also that he was enjoying the company
of a woman and forgot to return at the end of the period fixed
by him, and that thereupon his disciple Goraknath went and
sang and reminded him and brought him back, in the same way
in which Sankara’s disciples are said to have sung Guru stuti
and brought back Sankara.” Gajanan proceeded to relate that
Goraknath was greatly revered in Nepal, from the King
downward, and the State coin also bore the name of Goraknath.
He said, “It seems, when Goraknath was alive, the then King
of Nepal visited him. When G. was apprised of the King’s
arrival, he merely spat on the King. The King, to avert the spittle
falling on his crown, drew back a little; the spittle fell on his
feet. G. is said to have then told the King, ‘You would not let
the spittle fall on your head. If it had so fallen, you might have
become the head of a big empire. However, as it fell on your
feet, you would be the master of a small kingdom’.”
The talk then drifted to miracles done by various saints.
G. mentioned one Vasudeva Saraswati and said, “He has gone
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all over India. Bhagavan knows him. He was here too. He did
various miracles. One morning he would bathe in the Krishna
and at noon he would be found bathing in the Ganges at
Benares and at a third place in the evening!” Then G.
proceeded to speak of Samartha Rama Das and his miracles,
and told the following story: “It seems one of his disciples,
greatly devoted to him, used to grind the betel leaves and nut
in his own mouth first and then offer it to Ramdas. Some codisciples
thought this sacrilegious and went and told Ramdas,
‘Please ask him to bring the pestle and mortar with which he
daily prepares betel leaves paste for you.’ Ramdas thereupon
asked those disciples, ‘Yes, go and ask him to bring the mortar.’
They accordingly went and told that disciple, ‘Master wants
us to bring from you the mortar in which you prepare betel
leaf for him daily!’ The disciple said, ‘Wait. I shall give it to
you presently.’ So saying he took a sword, cut off his head
and gave it to the other disciples! When the disciples took the
head to the Master, the latter told them, ‘Do you now see the
bhakti of the man whom you misunderstood and maligned?
Go and put his head back again on his trunk.’ The disciples
did as directed and the man came back to life.” G. continued
and said, “The sword ‘Bhavani’ was presented to Shivaji by
Ramdas. Four men are required to handle that sword, handled
by Shivaji. It is now preserved by the British Government.”
16-2-46 Morning
G. took permission from Bhagavan to go and visit
Skandasramam. Bhagavan said, “Yes” to him and, turning to
us said, “What a difference between his state then and now! He
was with us at Melasramam (Skandasramam) for more than
six months, maybe even a year. He would take bhiksha in the
town and eat the rice even without salt.” Meanwhile another
old disciple said to Bhagavan, “There was no room in those
days close to the rock behind. Now I find a room with the rock
for its western wall. There used to be only a narrow passage
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there.” Bhagavan said, “Yes. That room is new. During the latter
part of my stay there, Vriddhachala Gurukkal of Tiruvannamalai
made that room and installed Ambika there and used to do puja
to the deity. He went in for siddhis and to show various feats
such as getting sacred ash, sugar, coins. Sometimes he used to
sit in samadhi for forty days. But latterly he was led astray by
these siddhis.”
At about 10 a.m. Bhagavan was enquiring about the
deceased Ramaswami Iyengar and what was being done about
the disposal of the body. It was reported that the body was going
to be cremated here and that the bones would afterwards be
taken and interred at Kumbakonam. Bhagavan then said, “That
is all right. It seems that is what the deceased wished should be
done.” Bhagavan said, “He i.e., R. Iyengar must be in one of
the group photos. @lúTô ú_ôWôn ¨uß ùLôi¥ÚkRôo
(He was standing gaily then).” So saying, he turned over the
book with 111 illustrations and Self-Realisation but could not
find the picture he had in mind. Thereupon he said, “It must be
somewhere, in the earlier editions or among the pictures hung
in the dining hall.”
Evening
After parayana, Bhagavan introduced G. to Sanskrit Pandit
Raju Sastri of this place and said, “He has written a work called
Pasupati Hridayam.” The book was shown to Sastri and G.
read out a few verses from it. G. also told us that the Pasupati
image in Nepal has five faces, four in the four directions and
the fifth at the top; and that the image has two arms in each
direction. Bhagavan told Sastri, “It seems there is a place called
Uttara Gokarnam in Nepal, which is an important shrine. The
Maharaja of Nepal is friendly to G. and wants him to stay there
as a head-priest or something like that.” G. said, “Yes, the
Maharaja is very kind to me. He wants me there; as what, I do
not know yet. He has some idea in his mind.”
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A party of forty ladies were ushered into the hall by the
second son of Dandapani Swami of Palani. They were
Kasiamma, present head of Subrahmanya Sastri’s Asramam
at Mettivaripalem. Guntur Dt., and some of her disciples. They
sang a few songs before Bhagavan and then left.
17-2-46 Morning
Mr. P. D. Shroff arrived from Delhi this morning. He
said to Bhagavan, “When I am away from you I feel so
miserable. While I am at Delhi, far away, I feel such a pull, as
though you are a cruel lover keeping yourself away. Then I
must come here at any cost. But when I come here you are
like an ordinary person. What is this?” Bhagavan said, “It is
always like that. When one is separated, one wants to come.”
Afternoon
A visitor asked Bhagavan, “How has srishti (creation)
come about? Some say it is due to karma. Others say it is the
Lord’s lila or sport. What is the truth?”
Bhagavan: Various accounts are given in books. But is
there creation? Only if there is creation, we have to explain
how it came about. All that, we may not know. But that we
exist now is certain. Why not know the ‘I’ and the present and
then see if there is a creation?
Some young men who had come with an introduction
from the Ramakrishna Mission at Madras asked Bhagavan,
“Which is the proper path for us to follow?”
Bhagavan: When you speak of a path, where are you
now? and where do you want to go? If these are known, then
we can talk of the path. Know first where you are and what
you are. There is nothing to be reached. You are always as
you really are. But you don’t realise it. That is all.
A little while after, one of the visitors asked Bhagavan,
“I am now following the path of japa. Is that all right?”
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Bhagavan: Yes. It is quite good. You can continue in that.
The gentleman who asked about creation said, “I never
thought I was going to have the good fortune of visiting
Bhagavan. But circumstances have brought me here and I find
in his presence, without any effort on my part, I am having
santi. Apparently, getting peace does not depend on our effort.
It seems to come only as the result of grace!” Bhagavan was
silent. Meanwhile, another visitor remarked, “No. Our effort
is also necessary, though no one can do without grace.” After
some time, Bhagavan remarked, “Mantra japa, after a time,
leads to a stage when you become Mantra maya i.e., you
become that whose name you have been repeating or chanting.
First you repeat the mantra by mouth; later you do it mentally.
First, you do this dhyana with breaks. Later, you do it without
any break. At that stage you realise you do dhyana without
any effort on your part, that dhyana is your real nature. Till
then, effort is necessary.”
In the evening Kasiamma’s party again came to Bhagavan
and after parayana sang a few stotras. Before leaving,
Kasiamma approached Bhagavan and stood before him for a
few minutes, during which Bhagavan was looking and yet
not looking at her. (I mean, he gave her one of those abstract
looks which are not unusual with him). Then the lady asked
Bhagavan, “May I have from Bhagavan’s lips some words on
svanubhava or personal experience of Self-realisation?”
Bhagavan kept quiet and after a few minutes K. and her party
took leave and went away. After she went, Bhagavan remarked,
“She was herself singing about svanubhava so far. Not that
she does not know. She wants to hear about it from me.”
18-2-46 Morning
Bhagavan was perusing a Telugu version of Tiruchuzhi
Sthala Puranam made by Nagamma from Viswanath’s Tamil
story.
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Afternoon
Old attendant and librarian T. S. Rajagopal came on a
visit, Bhagavan told me, “He is on his inspection tour (R.
recently has become an Inspector for Madras Mail with Trichy
as Headquarters). He is inspecting us now. We are getting a
copy of the Mail daily now. The local agent told us that under
orders of the Inspector he was sending us a copy.”
24-2-46 Morning
About 10-30 a.m. Mrs. Taleyarkhan came near Bhagavan,
stood at his feet and asked, “May I say a few words, Bhagavan?”
and continued, “I have a great friend, Mrs. W., wife of a prominent
official in Los Angeles. In 1942, when I was here, I received a
letter from her while I was sitting in this hall. It was a heartrending
letter in which she detailed how her husband fell in love
with another woman, got a divorce decree and married the new
woman. She was a most beautiful woman, Bhagavan, and they
had already a girl about seventeen years old. She was a great
society woman and it was impossible that any event of any social
importance would take place without her being there. So she felt
the grief immensely and wrote it all. I was moved terribly and
keenly felt for her and prayed mentally to Bhagavan for her relief.
I wrote back to her, sending her a small photo of Bhagavan, and
told her, ‘Don’t be downcast. Your husband will come back to
you. I am now with such and such a great personage. I am sending
you a small picture of him. Have it on your table. I shall daily
pray to him on your behalf. You too pray to him. You will see that
you get relief.’ But the friend — what do they know about
Bhagavan and such things — was disconsolate. She wrote back,
‘What you say is impossible. He won’t come back.’ I wrote again,
‘Nothing is impossible with our Bhagavan. So just go on as I
have advised you to do.’ And now, Bhagavan, I have her letter by
air-mail today that her husband has come back to her and she is
going to set up a new home again. She writes, ‘The impossible
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has happened. Your “gentleman” (meaning Bhagavan) has really
worked a miracle. Now, I and my husband must come and see
him. We want to fly and visit your Master, though the passage
costs a lot. Please let me know whether there is a hotel there
where we can come and stay’. I have always been praying to
Bhagavan for this friend and I am glad Bhagavan has done this
for her. I feel so grateful and was moved to tears when reading
this letter here now.”
I added, “What is there impossible for Bhagavan?” and
told Bhagavan, “Only last evening Shroff was complaining
to me about his having to go to Delhi. He said, ‘It is the
hopelessness of the situation that pains me most. There does
not seem to be any chance of my coming here again. If I
was certain that once in six months or even once a year, I
could be visiting here, I would not feel the separation so
much. It is the impossibility of it all that worries me’.” And
I told Shroff the same thing that Mrs. T. told her friend:
“There is nothing impossible at all where Bhagavan is
concerned. You may get transferred to Madras. You may grow
so rich suddenly as to possess a small aeroplane of your own.
What is there that cannot happen by His grace?”
Mrs. Osborne told Bhagavan, “Kitty has written a letter
and in it has sent her love to Bhagavan.” Bhagavan, turning to
me, said, “She has become shy now. When she was going she
made her father come and tell me her message ‘I hope
Bhagavan won’t forget me’. And I told her, ‘You don’t forget
Bhagavan and Bhagavan won’t forget you’.”
25-2-46 Afternoon
Mrs. Taleyarkhan introduced a group, Miss Sen and some
others (a Captain or Major Rao, who was going to marry this
Miss Sen, and another lady from Indore) as friends of her sister
Rita. Then I told Bhagavan that this Rita has had a miracle in
her life and made Mrs. T. tell the story. Mrs. T. thereupon told
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Bhagavan the following: “Bhagavan, we got this Rita a seat in
a medical college and hospital in London for training as a nurse,
through the kind offices of Lady Willingdon who was then
Vicerine here. The matron of the hospital there, however,
disliked my sister from the beginning, because of her colour,
and treated her as dirt. My sister patiently bore all this, and
always prayed to St. Theresa in whom she had great faith. Her
troubles came to a climax in this way. When it was about a
month or so for her examination, she accidentally hurt her eye
with the spray of an acid, when she was opening a bottle of the
acid in the laboratory. The eye had to be kept in bandage for
several days and it was not yet all right even close to the
examination. But on the night before the examination, after
she had gone to sleep, my sister had the following strange
experience. She felt she heard a slight footstep and that someone
opened the door and was coming gently towards her. She could
even hear the rustle and swish of the dress as the visitor
approached. The visitor came by the bedside and removed my
sister’s bandage. My sister opened her eyes and saw her favourite
Saint Theresa standing by her with a scroll in her hand. The saint
thereon unrolled the scroll and there my sister saw all the questions
that were going to be asked in her examination next day. After
my sister had ample time to go through the questions one by one
and to remember them, the vision passed away, and my sister
got up, woke up her friend in the next room, asked her to find
from the books all the answers needed and to read them out to
her. The next day my sister also attended the examination, found
all the questions the same as revealed to her the previous night,
answered them and not only passed her examination contrary to
the expectations of her matron, but even won the gold medal for
proficiency in that year.”
When Mrs.T. concluded the above account, I said,
“Miracles have not ceased to happen. They are happening
even now to those who pray and have faith.”
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26-2-46 Morning
A visitor told Bhagavan, “Even in my dream I sometimes
feel that I am dreaming, i.e., I am conscious that it is a dream
and that a fall for instance there cannot hurt me and so on.
How is that?”
Bhagavan: How can that be? Even in a dream there must
be hurt consequent on a fall. On the other hand, if you are aware
it is a dream, you are no longer dreaming. At the best, it may be
the transition stage when you are awaking from the dream state.
Another visitor told Bhagavan that some of his dream
experiences stood very firmly rooted in his mind, while others
were not remembered at all. Bhagavan remarked, “All that we
see is a dream, whether we see it in the dream state or in the
waking state. On account of some arbitrary standards about the
duration of experience and so on, we call one experience dream
experience and another waking experience. With reference to
Reality, both the experiences are unreal. A man might have
such an experience as getting anugraha (grace) in his dream
and the effect and influence of it on his entire subsequent life
may be so profound and so abiding that one cannot call it unreal,
while calling real some trifling incident in the waking life, that
just flits by, is casual, of no moment whatever and is soon
forgotten. Once I had an experience, a vision or dream, whatever
you may call it. I and some others including Chadwick had a
walk on the hill. Returning, we were walking along a huge
street with great buildings on either side. Showing the street
and the buildings, I asked Chadwick and the others whether
anybody could say that what we were seeing was a dream and
they all replied, ‘Which fool will say so?’ and we walked along
and entered the hall and the vision or dream ceased or I woke
up. What are we to call this?”
Next the talk drifted to the Self being pratyaksha (selfevident)
and Bhagavan then related how the song Atma Vidya
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was composed. He said, “Any vidya is for the purpose of
knowing something. If it is so self-evident as to render the wellknown
classical example of hastamalakam or a gooseberry on
the palm a false analogy, as Muruganar had put it, where was
the need for Atma Vidya, whether you call it easy or not? What
Muruganar meant to say was: ‘In the classical example, a hand
is necessary, a hand that will and can feel a fruit on it, a fruit, an
eye that can see, a person that has already known what fruit it
is, and so on and so forth. But for knowing the Self, nothing at
all except the Self is needed.’ In sleep for instance nothing at
all exists for us except ourselves and we admit we existed during
that sleep. On waking we say, ‘I slept and none of us believes
there are two ‘I’s, the one that slept and the one that is awake
now. In the classical example all these must exist to make the
fruit self-evident. All these depend on or derive from the Self
and make the fruit self-evident. How much more self-evident
must the Self itself be? Anyhow there it was, Muruganar had
written the pallavi and anupallavi and wanted the charanams.
He said he could not possibly complete the song, as somehow
no more lines would come to him, and so requested me to
complete it. Thereupon I wrote this song. First I wrote only
one stanza or charanam, but Muruganar wanted at least four,
thereupon I made three more. Finally I recollected, I had not
made any mention of Annamalai and so made a fifth charanam
also and made mention of Annamalai in it, as Ponnambalam is
mentioned in the stanzas of the song in Nandanar story on which
our song is modelled.”
A squirrel came to Bhagavan and he was feeding it with
cashew-nut pieces as usual. Turning to me, he said, “Shroff
sent some cashew-nuts yesterday and said, ‘They were intended
for my dumb friends’.” I said, “Probably Bhagavan would object
to our calling these squirrels dumb.” Bhagavan said, “They
communicate with me. Sometimes I am in a nap. They come
and draw attention to their presence by gently biting my finger
tips. Besides, they have a lot of language of their own. There is
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one great thing about these squirrels. You may place any amount
of food before them. They will just eat what they need and
leave the rest behind. Not so the rat, for instance. It will take
everything it finds and stock it in its hole.”
I remarked, “Possibly it would be said that the squirrel is
a less intelligent creature than the rat, because it does not plan
or provide for the future but lives in the present.” Bhagavan
said, “Yes. Yes. We consider it intelligence to plan and live
wretchedly like this. See how many animals and birds live in
this world without planning and stocking. Are they all dying?”
Bhagavan then began speaking of monkeys and said,
“They too don’t build nests or stock things. They eat what they
can find, and go and perch on trees when night falls. They are
quite happy. I have known something about their organisation,
their kings, laws, regulations. Everything is so perfect and wellorganised.
So much intelligence behind it all. I even know that
tapas is not unknown to monkeys. A monkey whom we used to
call ‘Mottaipaiyan’ was once oppressed and ill-treated by a gang.
He went away into the forest for a few days, did tapas, acquired
strength and returned. When he came and sat on a bough and
shook it, all the rest of the monkeys, who had previously illtreated
him and of whom he was previously mortally afraid,
were now quaking before him. Yes. I am clear that tapas is well
known to monkeys.”
27-2-46 Morning
With the post arrived a composition from the pen of Chinta
Dikshitulu, in Telugu, entitled In the first place, Who are you,
Ramana? After perusing the letters, Bhagavan asked Balaram
to read it out in the hall and the same was done. The gist of the
paper is: ‘You ask everybody who puts a question ‘Who are
you that put this question?’ But who are you? There is sufficient
justification for one to regard you as Krishna, or as Skanda, or
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as the Goddess who became merged in Arunachala as
Ardhanariswara or again as Dakshinamurti. In fact we can go
on imagining as so many other gods also. Again, when you sit
with your palms turned to the fire by your side, you look like
giving abhaya (i.e., protection from fear). Now, is it only to
those in the hall you are giving abhaya or to all in the world? It
must be the latter. For you have come into the world to give
abhaya to all.”
1-3-46 Morning
Mr. Osborne said, “Bhagavan, last evening Nuna (i.e.
his daughter about four years old) told us, ‘Dr. Syed is my
best friend in the world.’ Thereupon we asked her, ‘What about
Bhagavan? and she replied, ‘Bhagavan is not in the world’.”
Bhagavan was surprised at this remark of the child and
involuntarily his finger rose to his nose and, holding it there,
he said, “What a sage remark for a child to make! Even great
men cannot understand what that remark means. They ought
to have asked her, ‘Where else is Bhagavan, if not in the
world’?” Thereupon Mr. Osborne said, “Yes. We did ask her.
She said, ‘Bhagavan is out of the world’.”
Dr. Syed asked Bhagavan, “Does not total or complete
surrender require that one should not have left in him the desire
even for liberation or God?”
Bhagavan: Complete surrender does require that you
have no desire of your own, that God’s desire alone is your
desire and that you have no desire of your own.
Dr. Syed: Now that I am satisfied on that point, I want to
know what are the steps by which I could achieve surrender.
Bhagavan: There are two ways; one is looking into the
source of ‘I’ and merging into that source. The other is feeling
“I am helpless by myself, God alone is all-powerful and except
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throwing myself completely on him, there is no other means of
safety for me,” and thus gradually developing the conviction
that God alone exists and the ego does not count. Both methods
lead to the same goal. Complete surrender is another name for
jnana or liberation.
3-3-46 Morning
A visitor quoted verse 33 of Ch. 3 in Bhagavad Gita and
asked Bhagavan, “Are we then to do nothing and simply allow
the senses to go their own way?”
Bhagavan: It only means actions will go on, according
to the gunas or prakriti of the man. They cannot be prevented.
But, that is the very reason why man should acquire jnana
and thus become unaffected by the consequences of such
action. The verse says, “Acquire jnana and be unattached to
the actions and their consequences.”
Bhagavan said this after saying, “Let us see in what
connection this verse occurs,” and looking up the verse in
question. Then I remembered that once before I asked Bhagavan
about this very same verse, and then Bhagavan pointed out to
me the very next verse in which we are directed not to yield to
the senses. I mentioned this for the guidance of the visitor.
Bhagavan had told me then that, if the two verses were taken
together, it could not be contended that Gita teaches ‘Don’t
restrain or attempt to restrain the senses, because what does
restraint avail?’
Evening
A visitor asked Bhagavan, “When we get a dream, we
emerge out of it without any effort on our part. If this life of
ours is a dream, as it is said to be, then how is it that we have
to make efforts and are called upon to make efforts to end this
dream and wake into jnana?”
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Bhagavan: We do not know about sleep or dream. But
we know about the present state, the waking state. Let us try
and understand it. Then all will become clear to us. Who is it
that undergoes sleep, dream and waking states? You say we
must get out of ignorance and wake into jnana. Who is it that
has the ignorance, and ignorance of what? When you enquire
into the source of ‘I’, all doubts will be set at rest.
5-3-46 Morning
Bhagavan seems to have said yesterday it would be good
if one could find out what Nuna meant or felt when she said,
‘Bhagavan is not in the world, but out of it.’ So Mr. Osborne
brought the following writing today and handed it over
to Bhagavan.
“I asked Nuna what she meant by ‘Bhagavan is not in the
world’. At first she was too shy to say anything. I said ‘You
think Dr. Syed is in the world, don’t you?’ Nuna said, ‘Yes.’
‘Where then is Bhagavan, if He is not in the world?’ I asked.
Nuna replied, ‘In the Asramam and in heaven’, and added after
a pause, ‘Bhagavan whom we cannot see is everywhere. If we
are very good we can see Him. Everybody is Bhagavan, but
not as good as Bhagavan’. How much is pure intuition and how
much is what she understood and remembers from occasional
talks, it is difficult to say. Sometimes there is no doubt that it is
mere intuition. For instance, once at Kodaikanal when saying
‘Good night’ to her I asked her whether she had been praying
and she said, ‘Now I want to sleep, sleeping is praying’.” After
seeing the above Bhagavan and Balaram were both saying,
‘Sleeping is praying is a very sane remark.’ I could not
understand, and so asked Bhagavan about it. He explained that
they understood it to mean, sleeping or stilling the mind is real
prayer. By ‘sleep’ should be understood, he told me, ‘the
sleepless sleep’ we often hear mentioned in Tamil books, e.g.
(çeLôUp çe¡f ÑLm ùTßY ùRdLôXm?) (When will I
attain the bliss of sleeping, yet not sleeping).
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Evening
When I entered the hall, Bhagavan was talking to Lakshmi,
our Venkattoo’s child, of whom I am very fond. I told Bhagavan,
“There was a proposal some time back that Lakshmi should be
left with her mother’s sister at Erukoor. They seem to have thought
the girl would be better off there, where they require a girl badly
for petting and rearing, instead of here where she would be only
one of several children. But I did not like the idea at all. When
children born somewhere in Poland and other countries come
here and grow up in the atmosphere of our Asramam, I could not
reconcile myself to the idea of our Lakshmi born here being
brought up elsewhere.”
Bhagavan said, “The Thatha (the grandfather viz., Pichu
Aiyar) went to Erukoor; and do you think she would stay there
after seeing her Thatha? If Thatha is there, then alone she would
stay there.” On this Balaram quoted from Sakuntala passages in
which Sakuntala takes leave of the hermitage and Kanva Maharshi
addresses the flowers and says, ‘She who used to water you first
before taking her food herself, she who would not pluck you
however dearly she loved flowers and liked to wear them, she is
now leaving you for her husband’s house. Bless her.’
Balaram also quoted from some other book a passage which
says, ‘We, people of the world, have to make great efforts to
draw the mind from the objects of sense or from the world and to
fix it in the heart, on God. But you, Radha, in whose heart God is
fully caught, you have to make effort to get away from God.’
On this Bhagavan remarked, “That is the stage of the jnani.
He can’t escape the Self or go away from it. Where else to go,
as all that he knows is the Self which he himself is?”
Mr. Desai asked Bhagavan, “How is it that some saints,
who must also have realised the Self, say that it is not desirable
for one to merge in the Self, but one must have some slight
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individuality left to enjoy the bliss of the Self, just as the fly, to
enjoy the honey, should not fall into the honey and be lost in it,
but must sit on the edge and go on sipping the honey.” Thereupon
I told Mr. Desai, “Bhagavan has told us that the analogy is
wrong and misleading. The honey is something inert and
unconscious, a conscious being is required to taste it and enjoy
it. On the other hand, the Self is consciousness and bliss itself
and it is absurd to argue that when one becomes that, the Self,
one will not be able to enjoy bliss and that one must remain
separate to enjoy it.” Mr. Desai asked, “Why then have some
saints said so? That is our difficulty.” I replied, “You must ask
those saints. Bhagavan has given us his opinion quite
unambiguously that it is not necessary to remain separate to
enjoy complete bliss, and that, on the other hand, the bliss cannot
be complete till the merger in the Self is complete.”
6-3-46 Afternoon
When I entered the hall, Bhagavan was telling Balaram,
“Different books and different schools have located the
kundalini at different centres in the body. While the usual centre
with which it is associated is muladhara, there are books which
locate it in the heart, and other books which locate it in the
brain.” Thereupon I asked Bhagavan, “You say different people
or schools differ on this matter. But as Mr. Desai asked Bhagavan
yesterday, the difficulty we feel is this. If people who have mere
book or theoretical knowledge say such contradictory things,
we may simply brush them aside. But when they come from
persons whom we regard as saints who have realised the Self,
i.e., those who have had direct or immediate knowledge of the
Self, the doubt assails us, ‘Why such difference of opinion
among saints?’ Yesterday I tried to silence Desai simply by
saying, ‘If others have given opinions different from Bhagavan’s,
you must ask them why they gave such opinions, not Bhagavan.
Bhagavan has told us what is the correct opinion.’ But now, I
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too want to know why different saints differ on such important
points”. Thereupon Bhagavan was pleased to say, “They may be
Self-realised saints and they may know the truth. But they have
to suit their teaching to those who ask for it and the differences
in the teachings are to be explained by the differences in the
pakva or fitness of those to whom such teachings are addressed.”
Balaram was reading a collection of Upanishads and,
coming across a passage dealing with sahaja samadhi or sahaja
sthiti, asked me, “Did you not say that Mr. K. S. Ramaswami
Sastri once told you that he did not believe in sahaja state and
that sahaja state is not mentioned in the earlier books, but is a
later innovation? I find it mentioned here in the Varaha
Upanishads themselves.” I said, “Yes. He thought so. He argued
with me, ‘How can one be in two planes at the same time? Either
he sees the absolute and nothing else or sees the world and then
does not see the absolute. And he said that the sahaja sthiti is not
mentioned in the earlier books, but is found only in later works.”
Balaram said, “Where are these two planes for the jnani? He is
only in one plane and so there is no point in Mr. Sastri’s argument
that one can’t be in two planes at the same time.” I said, “How
can we say the jnani is not in two planes? He moves about with
us like us in the world and sees the various objects we see. It is
not as if he does not see them. For instance he walks along. He
sees the path he is treading. Suppose there is a chair or table
placed across that path. He sees it, avoids it and goes round. So,
have we not to admit he sees the world and the objects there,
while of course he sees the Self?” Bhagavan thereupon said, “You
say the jnani sees the path, treads it, comes across obstacles,
avoids them, etc. In whose eyesight is all this, in the jnani’s or
yours?” He continued, “He sees only the Self and all in the Self.”
Thereupon I asked Bhagavan, “Are there not illustrations given
in our books to explain this sahaja state clearly to us?”
Bhagavan: Why not? There are. For instance you see a
reflection in the mirror and the mirror. You know the mirror
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to be the reality and the picture in it a mere reflection. Is it
necessary that to see the mirror we should cease to see the
reflection in it? Or again take the screen illustration. There
is a screen. On that screen first a figure appears. Before that
figure on the same screen other pictures appear and the first
figure goes on watching the other pictures. If you are the
screen and know yourself to be the screen, is it necessary
not to see the first figure and the subsequent pictures? When
you don’t know the screen you think the figure and pictures
to be real. But when you know the screen and realise it is
the only reality on which as substratum the shadows of the
figure and pictures have been cast, you know these to be
mere shadows. You may see the shadows, knowing them to
be such and knowing yourself to be the screen which is the
basis for them all.
9-3-46 Morning
Dr. Masalavala, retired Chief Medical Officer of Bhopal,
who has been here for more than a month now and who is
now also in temporary charge of the Asramam Hospital in the
absence of Dr. Shiva Rao, put the following questions to
Bhagavan and got the following answers:
Question: Bhagavan says, ‘The influence of the jnani
steals into the devotee in silence.’ Bhagavan also says, ‘Contact
with great men, exalted souls, is one efficacious means of
realising one’s true being.’
Bhagavan: Yes. What is the contradiction? Jnani, great
men, exalted souls — does he (Dr.) differentiate between these?
Thereupon I said, ‘No’.
Bhagavan: Contact with them is good. They will work
through silence. By speaking, their power is reduced. Silence
is most powerful. Speech is always less powerful than silence.
So mental contact is the best.
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Question: Does this hold good even after the dissolution
of the physical body of the jnani or is it true only so long as
he is in flesh and blood?
Bhagavan: Guru is not the physical form. So the contact
will remain even after the physical form of the Guru vanishes.
Question: Similarly, does the contact of a devotee with
his Guru continue after the passing of the Guru or does it
stop? It is possible that for a ripe soul his Self may act as his
Guru after the going away of the Guru, but what is the unripe
soul to do? Bhagavan has said that an outer Guru is also needed
to push the mind of the devotee towards the Self. Can he come
in contact with another adept? Is this contact to be necessarily
physical or will a mental contact do? Which is better?
Bhagavan: As already explained, Guru not being physical
form, his contact will continue after his form vanishes. If one
jnani exists in the world, his influence will be felt by or benefit
all people in the world and not simply his immediate disciples.
All the people in the world are divided into his disciples,
bhaktas, those who are indifferent to him and those who are
even hostile to him and it is said in the following verse that all
these classes will be benefited by the existence of the jnani.
From Vedanta Chudamani:
ùS±UÚÜ ºPúWôÓ TjRÚRôº]o ¨~«p Tô®
Lù[uß SôpYûL úVô¬PjÕ Øû\«]àd¡WLm
YkÕß UÚsùLôs ºYuØjRö ùXuTYWûYØû\
«ù]Ój ÕûWlTôm. Bhagavan quoted the next verse, viz.,
ùR¬Y¬V ËYuØdRuR{ Sm×U Röt ºPodÏ Øj§Ù
UuùTôÓ Y¯TôPR{l ׬٠ØVoTjRodÏ Sp®{Ù
UYu\u ײRØß N¬RUÕ LiP ÙRôº]odϬV
×i¦V -Úl× UYu\u Y¥®{d LiÔßRu
ØRXô]Ytøp Tô®LhÏ TôY ®¬Ü ØßùUuTo. The
gist is: ‘Four classes of people are benefited by jivanmuktas.
By his faith in the jivanmukta, the disciple attains mukti, the
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bhakta who worships his Guru attains merit, the indifferent
who have seen the sacred life of the jivanmukta acquire desire
for righteousness and even the sinners (i.e., the hostile in the
first verse) get rid of their sins by the mere fact of their having
had darshan of such saints.’ God, Guru and the Self are the
same. After your bhakti to God has matured you, God comes
in the shape of Guru and from outside pushes your mind inside,
while being inside as Self he draws you there from within. Such
a Guru is needed generally, though not for very rare and
advanced souls. One can go to another Guru after his Guru
passes away. But all Gurus are one, as none of them is the
form. Always mental contact is the best.
Question: My practice has been a continuous japa of
the names of God with the incoming breath and the name of
Baba (i.e., Upasani Baba or Sai Baba) with the outgoing
breath. Simultaneously with this I see the form of Baba always.
Even in Bhagavan, I see Baba. The external appearances are
also much alike. Bhagavan is thin. Baba was a little stout.
Now, should I continue this or change the method, as
something from within says that if I stick to the name and
form I shall never go above name and form? But I can’t
understand what further to do after giving up name and form.
Will Bhagavan please enlighten me on the point?
Bhagavan: You may continue in your present method.
When the japa becomes continuous, all other thoughts cease
and one is in one’s real nature, which is japa or dhyana. We
turn our mind outwards on things of the world and are therefore
not aware of our real nature being always japa. When by
conscious effort or japa or dhyana as we call it, we prevent
our mind from thinking of other things, then what remains is
our real nature, which is japa.
So long as you think you are name and form, you can’t
escape name and form in japa also. When you realise you are
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not name and form, then name and form will drop off themselves.
No other effort is necessary. Japa or dhyana will naturally and as
a matter of course lead to it. What is now regarded as the means,
japa, will then be found to be the goal. Name and God are not
different. See the teaching of Nama Dev on the significance of
God’s name, extracted in the September, 1937, issue of the Vision.
(This was read out in the hall).
Bhagavan also quoted the Bible, ‘In the beginning was
the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God.’
Question: Is liberation to be achieved before the
dissolution of the body or can it be had after death? What is
the meaning of a verse like II, 72 or VIII, 6 of the Gita?
Bhagavan: Is there death for you? For whom is death?
The body which dies, were you aware of it, did you have it,
during sleep? The body was not, when you slept, but you
existed even then. When you awoke, you got the body and
even in the waking state you exist. You existed both in sleep
and waking. But the body did not exist in sleep and exists
only in waking. That which does not exist always, but exists
at one time and not at another, cannot be real. You exist
always and you alone are therefore real.
Liberation is another name for you. It is always here and
now with you. It has not to be won or reached hereafter or
somewhere. Christ has said, “The Kingdom of God is within
you” here and now. You have no death. Thayumanavar has
sung, ‘NkRRØm úYRùUô¯—_L Á§ÚkRôÛm UWQØi
ùPuTÕ NRô¨xPo ¨{Y§p~’ (i.e., even when living
in the world those who are always in nishta do not think there
is such a thing as death).
The Gita verse only means in the context of the whole
Gita (Ch. II, for instance) that you must achieve liberation during
your lifetime. Even if you fail to do it during your lifetime, you
must think of God at least at the time of death, since one becomes
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what he thinks of at the time of death. But unless all your life
you have been thinking of God, unless you have accustomed
yourself to dhyana of God always during life, it would not at
all be possible for you to think of God at the time of death.
14-3-46
I was away at Vellore from 11th afternoon to 13th night.
During my absence one Mr. Sankara Dev from Dhulia was
here and has left. He has been writing the life of Samartha
Ramdas in Marathi, and one part of it has also been published.
It seems there was one Ananta Mauni, a disciple of Ramdas,
who is believed to have belonged originally to this place and
to have gone with Ramdas in his South Indian tour. So the
biographer was trying to gather all available information about
this Ananta Mauni. Bhagavan was not able to give any
information and so advised the visitor to go into the town
with guides from the Asramam and try to gather information.
This morning Mr. Manickam, disciple of Sivaprakasam
Pillai, arrived, bringing from Mr. S. Pillai two notebooks,
containing full notes on Reality in Forty Verses in Tamil
(Supplement not included), and the general meaning alone
for Bhagavan’s Devikalottaram and Atmasakshatkaram.
15-3-46
A visitor from Poona, who has been here for the last two
or three days, asked some questions, and Bhagavan told him,
“Mukti or liberation is our nature. It is another name for us.
Our wanting mukti is a very funny thing. It is like a man who is
in the shade, voluntarily leaving the shade, going into the sun,
feeling the severity of the heat there, making great efforts to
get back into the shade and then rejoicing, ‘How sweet is the
shade! I have after all reached the shade!’ We all are doing
exactly the same. We are not different from the reality. We
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imagine we are different, i.e., we create the bheda bhava (the
feeling of difference) and then undergo great sadhana to get
rid of the bheda bhava and realise the oneness. Why imagine
or create bheda bhava and then destroy it?”
Afternoon
Dr. Masalawala placed in Bhagavan’s hands a letter he
had received from his friend V.K. Ajgaonkar, a gentleman of
about 35 (a follower of Jnaneswar Maharaj) who is said to have
attained jnana in his 28th year. The letter said, “You call me
purna. Who is not purna in this world?” Bhagavan agreed and
continued in the vein in which he discoursed this morning, and
said, “We limit ourselves first, then seek to become the unlimited
that we always are. All effort is only for giving up the notion
that we are limited.” The letter further said, “The first verse in
the Isavasyopanishad says the world is purna. It simply cannot
be anything else, as its very existence is built on the purna.”
Bhagavan approved of this also, and said, “There is this typed
letter, for instance. To see the world alone and not the purna or
Self would be something like saying. ‘I see the letters, but not
the paper,’ while it is the existence of the paper that makes the
existence of the letters possible!” Dr. M. said, “In the letter we
see the paper. But we are able to see only the world and we
don’t see God!” Bhagavan replied: “What happens in sleep?
Where did the world go then? Then you alone or the Self alone
existed.”
The letter also said, “Jnaneswar Maharaj has said God
will never forsake his bhakta who has undivided love for him.”
Bhagavan said, “Every saint, every book says so. I have been
reading Ram Das’s writings. Here, too, so many verses end,
‘Ramachandra will never forsake his bhakta.’” So saying,
Bhagavan read out a few of those verses.
The letter went on to say, “Ramana Maharshi is an exponent
of ajata doctrine of Advaita Vedanta. Of course it is a bit difficult.”
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Bhagavan remarked on this, “Somebody has told him so. I do
not teach only the ajata doctrine. I approve of all schools. The
same truth has to be expressed in different ways to suit the capacity
of the hearer. The ajata doctrine says, ‘Nothing exists except the
one reality. There is no birth or death, no projection or drawing
in, no sadhaka, no mumukshu, no mukta, no bondage, no
liberation. The one unity alone exists ever.’ To such as find it
difficult to grasp this truth and who ask, ‘How can we ignore this
solid world we see all around us?’, the dream experience is pointed
out and they are told, ‘All that you see depends on the seer. Apart
from the seer, there is no seen.’ This is called the drishti-srishti
vada or the argument that one first creates out of his mind and
then sees what his mind itself has created. To such as cannot
grasp even this and who further argue, ‘The dream experience is
so short, while the world always exists. The dream experience
was limited to me. But the world is felt and seen not only by me,
but by so many, and we cannot call such a world non-existent’,
the argument called srishti-drishti vada is addressed and they
are told, ‘God first created such and such a thing, out of such and
such an element, and then something else, and so forth.’ That
alone will satisfy this class. Their mind is otherwise not satisfied
and they ask themselves, ‘How can all geography, all maps, all
sciences, stars, planets and the rules governing or relating to them
and all knowledge be totally untrue?’ To such it is best to say,
‘Yes. God created all this and so you see it.’” Dr.M. said, “But all
these cannot be true; only one doctrine can be true.” Bhagavan
said, “All these are only to suit the capacity of the learner. The
absolute can only be one.”
The letter further said, “Avyabhicharini bhakti is the only
necessary thing.” As Dr.M. did not understand what
avyabhicharini bhakti meant, Bhagavan explained that it only
meant bhakti to God without any other thought occupying the
mind. Bhagavan said, “This word, ananya bhakti, ekagrata
bhakti, all mean the same thing.” The letter continued, “In the
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mind two things do not exist at the same time. Either God or
samsar. Samsar is already there. That is to be reduced little by
little and God is to be entered in its stead.” Bhagavan remarked
on this. “God is there already, not samsar. Only you do not see
it on account of the samsar rubbish you have filled your mind
with. Remove the rubbish and you will see God. If a room is
filled with various articles, the space in the room has not vanished
anywhere. To have space we have not to create it, but only to
remove the articles stocked in the room. Even so, God is there.
If you turn the mind inward, instead of outward on things, then
you see the mind merges in the one unity which alone exists.”
Bhagavan also agreed with the writer when he said that
to see God, Guru’s grace is necessary, for which again God’s
anugraha is necessary, which in its turn, could be had only
by upasana.
The letter conveyed the writer’s namaskar to Bhagavan.
Thereupon, Bhagavan said, “The mind merging in its source,
the one unity, is the only true namaskar.”
16-3-46
Ceylon Ramachandra sent me the five songs recently
composed by him in Tamil on Bhagavan and his grace towards
him, in saving him this time through all his serious illness,
and sent word that I should read them before Bhagavan. So at
about 10-30 a.m., I read out all the five songs, putting myself
in R.’s place and trying to render the songs with their full
bhava. The previous day, two of these songs alone were ready
and had been shown to Bhagavan by Mrs. R. Mr. Viswanath
had already written them out in the stotra book. Bhagavan
made a few corrections and divided the feet (ºo) properly,
with the sandhi properly joined and not split as R. had written.
In the evening, Mr. V. wrote down the remaining three verses
also in the book of stotras kept in the hall.
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17-3-46 Afternoon
Looking at the outgoing mail, Bhagavan remarked
“Eknath’s mother has passed away. Do you know?” Mr. R.
Narayana Aiyar replied, “Yes. I saw in The Mail an
announcement to that effect.” Bhagavan then remarked, “She
and her husband the late Dr. Nanjunda Rao came to me even
when I was in Virupakshi Cave. After that too, they came
once or twice. The last time, they came here with one
Chakkarai Ammal, a lady who had learned something and
had a following of her own and whom the doctor also
regarded as a sort of Guru. They were, I think, returning
from a pilgrimage to Benares and other places.”
18-3-46
One Mr. Girdhari Lal, an old resident of Aurobindo’s
Ashram, came here last evening and is staying at the Asramam.
He asked Bhagavan this morning. “It is said in the puranas
that the kaliyuga consists of so many thousands of years, and
that so much of it has passed and that so much yet remains,
etc. May I know when this yuga is to end?”
Bhagavan: I don’t consider time real. So I take no interest
in such matters. We know nothing about the past or the yugas
which were in the past. Nor do we know about the future. But
we know the present exists. Let us know about it first. Then all
other doubts will cease. After a pause he added, “Time and
space always change. But there is something which is eternal
and changeless. For example, the world and time, past or future,
nothing exists for us during sleep. But we exist. Let us try to
find out that which is changeless and which always exists. How
will it benefit us to know that the kaliyuga started in such and
such a year and that it would end so many years after now?”
Girdhari Lal: I know, from the standpoint of one whose
level of consciousness is beyond time and space, such
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questions are useless. But to us, struggling souls, it may be
important in this way. It is said that in the previous yugas e.g.
satya yuga, man had not fallen to the low level in which he
now is in this kaliyuga and that it was much easier for him
then to attain liberation than now.
Bhagavan: On the other hand, it is said it is much easier
to secure salvation in this yuga than in the satya yuga. Some
days or hours of penance in this yuga would secure what several
years of penance alone could have secured in those yugas. That
is what the books say. Further, there is nothing to attain and no
time within which to attain. You are always that. You have not
got to attain anything. You have only to give up thinking you
are limited, to give up thinking you are this upadhi or body.
Girdhari Lal: Then, why do these puranas give the exact
duration of each yuga in so many years?
Bhagavan: There might be an allegorical meaning in the
number of years mentioned for each yuga. Or, the immensity
of the periods of time assigned to each yuga may be a mere
device to draw man’s attention to the fact that, though he
should live up to his full span of a hundred years, his life
would be such a trifling, insignificant fraction in the entire
life of the universe, and that he should therefore take a proper
view of his own humble place in the entire scheme and not go
about with a swollen head, deeming himself as of great
importance. Instead of saying, “What is man’s life compared
to eternity?” they have taught him to consider how short his
span is. Further, it is said there is a regular cycle of such yugas.
And who knows how many such cycles have come and gone.
Again, each yuga is sub-divided into four yugas. There is no
end to all such calculations; and different schools have their
theory as to when the present kaliyuga is to end. When time
itself does not exist, as for instance in sleep, what is the use of
bothering oneself with all such questions?
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20-3-46 Morning
After I left the dining hall about 11-15 a.m. Bhagavan
sent for me there. I was surprised, because it is very unusual
for him to send for me. When I went, he told me, “Poor Mr.
Virabhadrayya (he was once Deputy Collector at Chittoor and
was last at Bellary) is no more. When the letter was shown to
me this morning, I looked for you in the hall, to tell you. But
you were not there. The son has written. It seems there was a
minor operation. We don’t know what it was.”
Again, in the afternoon, Bhagavan asked me if I was not
writing to Mr.V.’s son. I replied: “The son may not even
remember me. They may not expect any letter from me.” I
was just then reading Dialogues from the Upanishads by
Swami Sivananda Saraswati, and almost the first story there
is that of Nachiketas. So I reminded Bhagavan that, soon after
Mr. V. came to Bhagavan for the first time from Chittoor, he
wrote an article comparing Bhagavan to Nachiketas. He had
a notion that Bhagavan was an incarnation of Nachiketas.
Bhagavan said, “Yes. I remember the article. He wrote one or
two more articles also besides that one.”
Evening
Some gentlemen came and recited Sama Veda before
Bhagavan. It was very pleasant and moving to hear.
21-3-46 Morning
Balaram came across a Sanskrit poem in which the hill
called ‘Anai Malai’ (Elephant Hill) near Madura is mentioned.
He mentioned it to Bhagavan and Bhagavan said, “Yes, there is
such a hill near Madura. From a distance it looks like a big
elephant lying down.” The word ‘Anaimalai’ reminded Bhagavan
of the 1st stanza in Tirujnana Sambandar’s songs in which
‘Anaimalai’ is referred to and Bhagavan quoted the song. It begins
1
‘Uô²u úSo ®¯’ and Bhagavan explained, “The Madura
King Pandyan was inclined towards Jainism. His wife was the
daughter of the Chola King and was attached to Saivism. When
she heard of the great saint Jnana Sambandar and his doings and
of his camping at Vedaranyam, the Pandyan Queen, with the
help of a minister who was also attached to Saivism, sent an
invitation to the Saint to visit Madura and convert the Pandya to
Saivism. The Saint came accordingly. But when the queen saw
he was a mere boy of about ten or even less, she had serious
misgivings whether he could be a match for all the big Jain leaders
surrounding the King and whether by inviting this child she had
put him in jeopardy. When the Saint noticed this, he sang these
songs, addressed to the queen and assuring her, ‘I am not in any
way inferior to these Jains. The Lord is within me. Don’t,
therefore, be afraid.’
“The songs which follow mention the names of Jain leaders,
referring to them in contempt and stating, ‘I am not inferior to all
these, as the Lord is within me.’ It is amusing to read those songs.”
Bhagavan added, “This was after the Saint came to
Madura. When the invitation reached Vedaranyam, and Jnana
Sambandar wanted to start for Madura, Appar
(Tirunavukkarasar) who was with Sambandar said, ‘Do not start
today. The day is not auspicious for you. They, the Jains, are
terrible and powerful persons.’ Thereupon Jnana Sambandar
sang the ‘úLô[ß T§Lm’ (Kolaru Padhikam), beginning
‘úYÙßúRô° TeLu’ in which again he says, ‘As the Lord is
within me in my heart, no days, no planets, can affect me
adversely and every day of the week is equally auspicious’.” In
the afternoon I brought the Thevaram for reference and picked
out the above two songs and Bhagavan read them, a few of
them aloud. In the Madura poem Bhagavan referred to the last
stanza and said, “When I explained the first stanza in the
morning I gave the meaning as ‘Because the Lord is within
me’ though the words only mean ‘Because there is the Lord.’ I
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was wondering whether I was justified in my interpretation. I
find in the last stanza it is clearly mentioned by the Saint himself
that what he meant was ‘Because the Lord is within me.’
Besides, the same is clear from the whole of the ‘úLô[ß
T§Lm’. Look at the last verse in the Madura decad. With what
authority he sings, ‘No harm can approach those who sing these
songs of the King of Shiyali and the master of Tamil.’ Similarly
in the last song of ‘úLô[ß T§Lm’ he says, ‘By my order
those who read these shall be saved’.”
This evening also Sama Veda was recited.
22-3-46 Afternoon
Last night, Mr. Bose, his mother, Lady C. V. Raman and
Swami Sambuddhananda of the Ramakrishna Mission,
Bombay, arrived here. The Swami quoted a verse from
Bhagavad Gita which says that one in a thousand succeeds
and knows really the tattva or entity. For some time Bhagavan
kept quiet. When the Swami wanted an answer, some of us
could not help remarking, “What is your question? What
answer do you expect?” Dr. Masalawala even pointedly asked,
“What is the motive behind this question?” Thereupon, the
Swami said, “I think our Bhagavan has attained Selfrealisation.
Such beings are walking Upanishads. So I want
to hear, from his own lips, his experience of Self-realisation.
Why are you all butting in and distracting us from the point
and purpose of my question?”
After all this, Bhagavan said, “You say you think I have
attained Self-realisation. I must know what you mean by Selfrealisation.
What idea do you have in your mind about it?” The
Swami was not pleased with this counter-question, but added,
after some time, “I mean the atman merging in the
paramatman.” Bhagavan then said, “We do not know about the
paramatman or the Universal Soul, etc. We know we exist.
Nobody doubts he exists, though he may doubt the existence
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of God. So, if one finds out about the truth or source of oneself,
that is all that is required.” The Swami thereupon said,
“Bhagavan therefore says ‘Know Thyself’.” Bhagavan said.
“Even that is not correct. For, if we talk of knowing the Self,
there must be two Selves, one a knowing Self, another the Self
which is known, and the process of knowing. The state we call
realisation is simply being oneself, not knowing anything or
becoming anything. If one has realised, he is that which alone
is and which alone has always been. He cannot describe that
state. He can only be that. Of course, we loosely talk of Selfrealisation,
for want of a better term. How to ‘real-ise’ or make
real that which alone is real? What we are all doing is, we
‘realised’ or regard as real that which is unreal. This habit of
ours has to be given up. All sadhana under all systems of thought
is meant only for this end. When we give up regarding the unreal
as real, then the reality alone will remain and we will be that.”
The Swami replied, “This exposition is all right with
reference to Advaita. But there are other schools which do not
insist on the disappearance of triputi (the three factors of
knowledge) as the condition for Self-realisation. There are
schools which believe in the existence of two and even three
eternal entities. There is the bhakta, for instance. That he may
do bhakti, there must be a God.” Bhagavan replied, “Whoever
objects to one having a God to worship, so long as he requires
such a separate God? Through bhakti he develops himself, and
comes to feel that God alone exists and that he, the bhakta,
does not count. He comes to a stage when he says, ‘Not I, but
Thou’; ‘Not my will, but Thy will.’ When that stage is reached,
which is called complete surrender in the bhakti marga, one
finds effacement of ego is attainment of Self. We need not
quarrel whether there are two entities, or more, or only one.
Even according to Dvaitis and according to the bhakti marga,
complete surrender is prescribed. Do that first, and then see for
yourself whether the one Self alone exists, or whether there are
two or more entities.”
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Bhagavan further added, “Whatever may be said to suit
the different capacities of different men, the truth is, the state
of Self-realisation must be beyond triputis. The Self is not
something of which jnana or ajnana can be predicated. It is
beyond ajnana and jnana. The Self is the Self; that is all that
can be said of it.”
The Swami then asked whether a jnani could remain with
his body after attaining Self-realisation. He said, “It is said
that the impact of Self-realisation is so forceful that the weak
physical body cannot bear it for more than twenty-one days
at the longest.” Bhagavan said, “What is your idea of a jnani?
Is he the body or something different? If he is something apart
from the body, how could he be affected by the body? The
books talk of different kinds of mukti, videha mukti (without
body), and jivan mukti (with body). There may be different
stages in the sadhana. But in realisation there are no degrees.”
The Swami then asked, “What is the best means for Selfrealisation?”
Bhagavan: ‘I exist’ is the only permanent, self-evident
experience of everyone. Nothing else is so self-evident
(pratyaksha) as ‘I am’. What people call ‘self-evident’ viz.,
the experience they get through the senses, is far from selfevident.
The Self alone is that. Pratyaksha is another name
for the Self. So, to do Self-analysis and be ‘I am’ is the only
thing to do. ‘I am’ is reality. I am this or that is unreal. ‘I am’
is truth, another name for Self. ‘I am God’ is not true.
The Swami thereupon said, “The Upanishads themselves
have said ‘I am Brahman’.” Bhagavan replied, “That is not how
the text is to be understood. It simply means, “Brahman exists
as ‘I’ and not ‘I am Brahman’. It is not to be supposed that a
man is advised to contemplate ‘I am Brahman’, ‘I am Brahman’.
Does a man keep on thinking ‘I am a man’ ‘I am a man’? He is
that, and except when a doubt arises as to whether he is an
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animal or a tree, there is no need for him to assert, ‘I am a man.’
Similarly the Self is Self, Brahman exists as ‘I am’, in every
thing and every being.”
The Swami remarked, “The bhakta requires a God to
whom he can do bhakti. Is he to be taught that there is only
the Self, not a worshipper and the worshipped?”
Bhagavan: Of course, God is required for sadhana. But
the end of the sadhana, even in bhakti marga, is attained only
after complete surrender. What does it mean, except that
effacement of ego results in Self remaining as it always has
been? Whatever path one may choose, the ‘I’ is inescapable,
the ‘I’ that does the nishkama karma, the ‘I’ that pines for
joining the Lord from whom it feels it has been separated, the
‘I’ that feels it has slipped from its real nature, and so on. The
source of this ‘I’ must be found out. Then all questions will
be solved. Whereas all paths are approved in the Bhagavad
Gita, it says that the jnani is the best karma yogi, the best
devotee or bhakta, the highest yogi and so on.”
The Swami still persisted, “It is all right to say Selfanalysis
is the best thing to do. But in practice, we find a God
is necessary for most people.”
Bhagavan: God is of course necessary, for most people.
They can go on with one, till they find out that they and God
are not different.
The Swami continued, “In actual practice, sadhakas, even
sincere ones, sometimes become dejected and lose faith in
God. How to restore their faith? What should we do for them?”
Bhagavan: If one cannot believe in God, it does not
matter. I suppose he believes in himself, in his own existence.
Let him find out the source from which he came.
Swami: Such a man will only say the source from which
he comes are his parents.
(Continued ...)
(My humble salutations to the lotus feet of Bhagavan Sree Ramana Maharshi
and also gratitude to great philosophers and others for the collection
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