(deel 2)

Now the sutras of Tilopa...

[The practice of mantra and paramita,
instruction in the sutras and precepts,
and teaching from the schools and scriptures,
will not bring realization of the innate truth.]

No Vedas will help, no Bibles. The practice of mantra will not be of any help; rather, it can become a hindrance. What is a mantra in fact? What are you doing when you are chanting a mantra? What is Maharishi Mahesh Yogi teaching to people when he is teaching transcendental meditation? He is saying to repeat a certain word or a certain mantra continuously inside: Ram, Ram, Ram; Om, Om, Om; anything, even your own name will do; even if you repeat H₂O, H₂O, H₂O, that will do because the point is not the sound or the word. The point is that if you continuously repeat something, by the very repetition something happens. What is that?

When you repeat a certain word continuously, a rhythm is created inside: Ram, Ram, Ram, a rhythm is created, and the rhythm is monotonous. Whenever you repeat a certain word continuously, monotony happens. Repeating a certain word continuously, you start feeling sleepy. This is what hypnosis is, this is autohypnosis; repeating a mantra is auto hypnotizing. You become drunk from your own monotonous sound rhythm.

It is good! Nothing is bad in it; it gives you a good sleep, very refreshing. If you are tired, it is a good mental trick; you will feel fresh, even fresher than you can feel in ordinary sleep because the ordinary sleep cannot go as deep as mantra sleep can go. Because in ordinary sleep many thoughts continue, dreams continue, they continuously disturb. But if you continuously repeat a certain mantra, nothing else can be there, only the mantra. It takes you to very, very deep sleep. In Yoga we have a special word for it: in Sanskrit sleep is called nidra, and a sleep created by mantra chanting is called tandra. That is a deeper sleep but still sleep, it is called yoga tandra: sleep created by mantra yoga, chanting.

If you are disturbed in your sleep, TM can be helpful. That’s why in America it seems that Maharishi’s influence has been great because America is the most disturbed country as far as sleep is concerned. So many tranquilizers are being used; so many sleeping pills are being used. People have lost the natural capacity to sleep – hence the influence. In India, nobody bothers about TM because people are already sleeping so deeply that it is difficult to wake them.

A mantra gives you a subtle sleep; as far as it goes it is good, but don’t think that it is meditation; then you become a victim. Don’t think that it is a meditation; it is just a mental tranquilizer. And it is as chemical as any sleeping pill because sound changes the chemistry of your body. Sound is part of the chemistry of your body. That’s why with a certain type of music you feel very, very refreshed; the music falls on you, cleanses you, as if you have taken a bath. Sound changes the chemistry of your body. There are certain types of music which will make you very passionate and sexual; just their hitting sounds change the chemistry of your body.

A mantra is creating inner music with a single note; monotony is basic to it. And there is no need to ask Maharishi Mahesh Yogi about it – every mother in the world knows about it. Whenever the child is restless, she hums a lullaby. A lullaby is a mantra: just two or three words, even meaningless, no need for any meaning to be there. She sits by the side of the child, or takes the child near her heart – that too, the beating of the heart, is monotonous music. So whenever a child is restless, the mother puts his head on her heart, the beat of the heart becomes a mantra and the child is befooled, he falls asleep. Or, if the child has grown a little and cannot be befooled so easily, then she chants a lullaby; she goes on repeating just two or three words, monotonous, simple words. Monotony helps, the child falls asleep, nothing bad in it – better tranquilizer than any chemical pill. But still a tranquilizer, a pill, subtle, a sound pill; it affects the chemistry of the body.

So if you are disturbed in your sleep, if you have a certain degree of insomnia, a mantra is good, but don’t think that it is meditation. It will make you more and more adjusted, but it will not transform you. And the whole society is always trying to make you more adjusted to it. It has tried religion to make you adjusted to it. It has tried morality; it has tried mantra and yogas. It has tried psychoanalysis, and many types of psychiatry, to bring you back to the adjusted society. The whole goal of the society is how to create an adjusted individual. But if the whole society is wrong, being adjusted to it cannot be good. If the whole society is mad, then being adjusted to it means only becoming mad.

Somebody asked Sigmund Freud once, “In fact, what exactly are you doing in psychoanalysis, and what is the goal of it?”
He said – and he was a really authentic person – he said, “At the most what we can do is this: we make hysterical, unhappy people normally unhappy. That’s all: hysterically unhappy people, normally unhappy; we bring them back to the normal unhappiness, like everybody else. They were going a little too much; they were creating too much unhappiness and they were becoming neurotic. We bring them back to the normal neurosis of humanity.” Freud says, “Man can never be happy. Man can only be either neurotically unhappy or normally unhappy, but man can never be happy.”

As far as ordinary humanity is concerned, his diagnosis seems to be exactly right, but he is not aware of a Buddha or a Tilopa; he is not aware of those who have achieved a total, blissful state of being. And it is as it should be because a Buddha will not go to be treated by Freud – for what? Only hysterical persons come to Freud, and then he treats them. His whole knowledge, his whole experience, is of hysterically neurotic people. In all his forty years’ experience with patients, he has not known a single individual who is happy. So he is right, empirical. His experience shows that there are only two types of people: normally unhappy and hysterically unhappy. And at the most we can help this much: we can make you more adjusted.

Mantras, psychoanalysis, religion, morality, churches, and prayers have all been used to make you adjusted. And the real religion starts only when you start on a journey of transformation, not to be adjusted to the society, but to be in harmony with the cosmos.

To be adjusted to the society you have to fall down. It happens many times that a madman has nothing wrong in him. The madman is simply too much of an energy and he cannot adjust himself to the society – he goes astray. A madman is too much of an individual; a madman is so talented in certain things that he cannot get adjusted to the society. And you must remember all geniuses always remain maladjusted in the society, and out of one hundred geniuses, almost eighty percent always have a trip to the madhouse. They have to because they go beyond society. They have much more than ordinary society allows.

The ordinary society is like a paperweight on you: it won’t allow you to fly. A genius throws away the paperweight and would like to be on the wing and go to the farthest corner of the sky. The moment you go beyond the line of society, the boundary, you are mad. And the whole society tries to readjust you.

Tantra says readjustment, adjustment, is not the goal; it is not worth much. Transformation is the goal. What to do? Don’t try tricks to be readjusted. A mantra is a trick. If you are feeling that you cannot sleep, then don’t try to find sleep through a mantra. Rather, on the contrary, try to find what the restlessness is that is causing you sleeplessness. You may desire too much, you may be too ambitious. Your ambition won’t allow you to sleep, your restlessness continues, your desiring mind goes on and on and on, and the thinking process continues. That’s why you cannot sleep. Now there are two ways: one is of mantra and the other is of Tantra.

Mantra says: don’t bother about the causes; simply repeat a mantra and fall asleep. This is so superficial. Don’t bother about the causes, just repeat a mantra – fifteen minutes in the morning and fifteen in the evening – and you will be able to sleep; and you will feel good and you will feel healthy. But even if you feel good and healthy, what will happen out of it? There are many healthy people who sleep beautifully, but nothing has happened to them; the ultimate blooming has not come. Health is good in itself, but it cannot be the goal. To sleep is good, but cannot be the goal. Tantra says find the cause of your restlessness.

A minister in the Indian government used to come to me. He was always worried about his sleep, and he would say, “Just give me some technique so that I can sleep.” But I told him, “A politician cannot sleep – that is not possible. A politician is not meant to sleep; he is not expected to sleep. That is good, and I am not going to give you any technique. Go to Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, he will give you a technique without asking why.” And in fact he went.

Then he came after three months. He said, “You suggested and it worked! Now it is beautiful, now I can sleep.” Then I told him, “Whenever you need, and you feel that sleep is not enough, that awakening is needed, then come to me because you can sleep, but what will happen out of it? You will remain the same; in the morning you will again be on the same ambitious trip. You may think something good has happened, but only one thing has happened: now you will not be aware of the causes; they have been forced by the mantra into the deeper unconscious, and the possibility of transformation has been postponed.”

I cannot give you better sleep. I would like to give you better awakening, better awareness.

A politician continuously desires, is fighting, competing, jealous, trying to reach higher and higher in the hierarchy. In the end nothing is achieved.

Mulla Nasruddin worked his whole life in politics and went to the highest post possible. Then I asked him, “What have you attained?” He said, “To be frank, I’m the greatest ladder climber in the world. That is my achievement: the greatest ladder climber.”

But even if you reach the highest rung of the ladder, what to do then? Your presidents and prime ministers have reached, they are the greatest ladder climbers, but ladder climbing is not life. And what is the point of just going on and on climbing bigger and bigger ladders?

Ambition creates restlessness. I would like you to understand your ambition. Desiring creates restlessness. I would like you to be aware of your desiring. This is the way of Tantra. When the cause disappears, the disease disappears. And if the cause disappears, then you are transformed. The disease is just a symptom – don’t try to hide the symptom; let it be there, it is good because it goes on poking, goes on hitting you and saying that something is wrong. If you cannot sleep, it is good because it shows that something is wrong in your very style of life.

I am not going to help you to attain better sleep. I will say, “Try to understand, this is a symptom.” This symptom is a friend; it is not an enemy. It is simply showing that deep down in your unconscious there are undercurrents which won’t allow you to sleep. Understand them, absorb them, go through them, transcend them; and then there will be a deep sleep, not because you have forced the symptom underground, but because the disease has disappeared. And in that sleep a totally different quality of consciousness comes into existence. Then you can be deeply asleep and still alert. It is not hypnosis then, it is not like a drunken state, it is not through a drug. And all mantras are drugs; very subtle, but still drugs. Don’t become a drug addict.

Says Tilopa:

[The practice of mantra and paramita,
instruction in the sutras and precepts,
and teaching from the schools and scriptures,
will not bring realization of the innate truth.]

Paramita is a Buddhist word; it means compassion, serving the people. Whatsoever the Christian missionaries are doing all over the world is paramita. Serve! Help! Sympathize! Be compassionate! But Tilopa says that will also not help.

I have also observed that. I know many people who are social reformers, great servants of society; they have devoted and sacrificed their whole life for the uplift of people, but no transformation has happened to them. It cannot happen because serving the people, serving the society, becomes an occupation; they become occupied.

In fact, if the society is suddenly transformed by a divine miracle, and there is no beggar to be served, no poor man to be served, no ill person, no hospitals, no mad people – if this suddenly happens, can you conceive what will happen to your great servants of the society? They will commit suicide! Not finding anybody to serve, what will they do? They will simply be at a loss. What will happen to Christian missionaries? If there is nobody to be converted and forced and led and seduced to their path; if everybody becomes Christian, what will they do? Where will they go on their great missions? They will have to commit suicide. If the revolution really happens, what will be the fate of your revolutionaries? What will they do? Suddenly out of a job, unemployed, they will start praying to God, “Bring back the old society; we need lepers to serve, we need beggars to help.”

You can be occupied either in your own business, or you can be occupied with other people, but the mind needs occupation. The mind needs that you should forget yourself and be occupied with something. This is an escape from the innate truth. And Tilopa says these are not the ways.

Tantra has a very very beautiful thing to say to you, and that is: First, before you start serving anybody else, be absolutely selfish. How can you serve anybody else unless you have attained your inner being first? Be absolutely selfish! If your own inner light is burning you may be able to help others; otherwise your service will be a mischief. And the world is so much in mischief because of so many revolutionaries, so many social reformers, so many self-appointed servants. They create mischief, they create chaos; it is natural because they have not attained to their own truth and they have started helping others. If you have a light within, you may share your light with somebody else, but if you don’t have it how can you share it? How can you share that which you don’t have?

A man came to Buddha – he must have been a very very great revolutionary, like Marcuse or others– and he asked Buddha, ”Tell me how I can serve others. I have a deep compassion in me and I would like to make everybody happy.” Buddha looked at him. It is said he became sad; Buddha became sad looking at him. The man said, ”Why have you become so sad?” Buddha said, ”It is difficult because you yourself don’t seem to be happy and you are on a mission to make everybody happy." H

How can you share that which you don’t have? First you be; and once you are then it is not a mission. Once you are blissful, then you don’t go out of your way to help others– your very being is a help wherever you are; you don’t make it a profession. The way you are, wherever you are... if you sit near a tree, you help the tree. Not consciously, not with any effort on your part, just being near the tree, and the tree responds and your inner being flows into the tree, and the tree flows into you– and you have awakened a tree. Some day this tree will become a buddha and you will be a part in it, you participated in it; and when this tree will become a buddha and the whole universe will celebrate, you will also celebrate– a part of you, you have given to the tree, you have shared.

You sit by a river and you share; you move, your very movement becomes your compassion– it is nothing to be done. If you do, something is wrong. How can you ”do” love? It is not an act, it is a state of being. You are in love, you have the light, and your doors are open; then whosoever wants to come in, into the inner shrine of your being, is invited. And whosoever wants to light his own light from your source of light, you are ready. You never go and seek somebody to help. When you go, one thing is certain, you are not the right person. When you start doing something, one thing is certain, you are creating a mischief. You will simply poke your nose into others’ affairs. Let them be themselves. It is enough compassion on your side that you don’t disturb them. Don’t try to change them. You don’t know what you are doing.

Only one who is enlightened can help: the help flows spontaneously. It is just like a flower has bloomed– and the winds take the fragrance and they spread it all over the earth. It is very subtle and indirect; it never hits anybody directly. A real master never tries to change anybody directly; he is like a subtle fragrance, he surrounds you. If you are open, a little whiff will enter in you. If you are not open, he will wait at the door; he will not even knock, because that may also disturb your sleep. It is your sleep, you have all the right to sleep as long as you want; it is nobody’s business to awaken you. I may have become awakened; I may like you to be awakened, but that is my thing, not your thing. If you are fast asleep and dreaming beautiful dreams, who am I to disturb you? I will wait. I will surround you like a fragrance. And if that fragrance catches you, and if that fragrance brings you out of your sleep, it is okay. But it is not a direct effort, it is very very indirect. And always remember: only those people who are absolutely indirect can be of any help. Direct help is from the politician, indirect help is from the sage.

[...instruction in the sutras and precepts,
and teaching from the schools and scriptures,
will not bring realization of the innate truth.]

Why?– because it is already there. It has not to be brought in. You are seeking something which you have already there inside you in its total beauty and perfection. Nothing has to be done. Doing is absolutely irrelevant. You have just to come back home. The guest is already there, but the host is out– you are not inside. Through your desires you are moving more out and more out and more out. You would like to have a big house and a big car, and this and that, and you are moving out more and more. You have no time to come back home.

Meditation is nothing but coming back home, just to have a little rest inside. It is not the chanting of a mantra, it is not even a prayer; it is just coming back home and having a little rest. Not going anywhere is meditation, just being where you are; there is no other ”where”– just being there where you are, just occupying only that space where you are. Desire takes you on long journeys in time and space– and desire never brings you to your home; it always takes you somewhere else.

[For if the mind when filled with some desire
should seek a goal,
it only hides the light.]

That’s how you are missing– by going out you are missing, by seeking you are missing, by searching you are missing, by trying to get it you are missing. Nothing is needed on your part– the divine has given all that can be given to you. You are not sent as a beggar into the world, you are sent as emperors. Just have a look inside. Just in some moments don’t go anywhere, desireless, not thinking of the future, not thinking of the past, just remaining here and now, and suddenly it is there– it has been always there– and you start laughing.

When Lin Chi was asked that when he attained enlightenment what he did, that was the first thing he did, he said, ”What can one do? I laughed and asked for a cup of tea. I laughed! What was I doing?– seeking something which was already there.” All the buddhas have laughed, and all the buddhas have asked for a cup of tea– because what else to do? It is already there. You were unnecessarily running here and there; tired, you have come back home. A cup of tea is exactly the right thing.

[For if the mind when filled with some desire
should seek a goal,
it only hides the light.]

Your seeking creates a smoke around the flame. You go on running around and around, you stir much dust, and you create much smoke, and it is your own effort that stirs the dust and creates the smoke, and the flame becomes hidden. Rest a little, let the dust settle back to the earth. And if you are not running very fast, not in a hurry, you will not create smoke. By and by, things settle and the inner light is revealed.

This is the most fundamental thing in Tantra, that it says that you are already perfect. No other vision says that. They say you have to achieve it; they say you have to go, you have to struggle, and you have to do many things and the path is arduous; and it is very very rarely that somebody reaches because the goal is very very distant; and for millions of lives one has to try, and then one reaches; perfection has to be achieved. Tantra says this is the reason why you are not achieving. Perfection has not to be achieved. It has to be simply realized that it is there.

Tantra offers you enlightenment right here and now– no time, no postponement. Tantra says if you rest, just resting will help, because by your restlessness you are creating the smoke all around, and you are in such a hurry you cannot listen. If somebody says, ”Rest,” you will say, ”There is no time to rest. I have to achieve a goal and the goal is very far. And if I rest I will miss.” Tantra says you are missing because you are running. Tantra says you are missing because you are in such a hurry.

[He who keeps tantric precepts
yet discriminates,
betrays the spirit of samaya.
Cease all activity, abandon all desire,
let thoughts rise and fall
as they will like ocean waves.
He who never harms the non-abiding
nor the principle of non-distinction,
upholds the tantric precepts.]

Very, very simple. But you are too complex, you are too puzzled inside; otherwise everything is very very easy.

[Cease all activity, abandon all desire,
let thoughts rise and fall
as they will like ocean waves.]

What does one do? If you go to the ocean you simply sit on the shore, on the beach, and you watch. The waves rise and fall, and there is a tide and there is an ebb; the ocean passes through many moods. What do you do? You simply sit and watch. Exactly is the case with the mind; it is also like an ocean– waves arise and fall. Sometimes there is a tide and much turmoil, and sometimes it is an ebb, and you feel a little silent.

In fact it is the case: the whole consciousness is like an ocean. And your mind is not only yours: your mind is part of the collective mind; all around you is the ocean of consciousness. Just like fishes in the ocean, you are fishes in the consciousness– in and out, this side and that, above and below, the ocean and the ocean waves. Who are you to disturb it? And who are you to make it quiet and silent? And how can you do it? So whenever a person becomes too interested and eager to calm down the mind, he creates many troubles for himself. It is not possible. And when you try some impossibility, you get frustrated. Then you think of a thousand and one causes why it is not happening. The simple fact is it cannot happen!

Tantra says, ”Watch it! It is none of your business that thoughts come and go. They come on their own accord, they go on their accord. Why do you get involved in them? Who are you to calm them down? They don’t belong to you; they belong to the vast ocean that surrounds you. You were not there, and they were. You will not be one day, and they will remain.”

Now science accords with this: every thought is a wave. That’s why a radio can broadcast thoughts. They pass through walls and hills and your bodies, and nothing hinders them. Something is broadcast in New York and you hear it here. Now scientists suspect that the possibility is there that soon we may be able to catch thoughts from the past, because thoughts never die. It may be possible some day to catch Tilopa saying to Naropa, ”Because of you... that which cannot be uttered, but because of your trust, I will say it.” It is possible because thoughts never die. This thought of Tilopa must be somewhere near some star. If we can catch it....

Science may be capable to some day, because when a thought is broadcast from New York, it takes time to reach Poona; it takes a few seconds, but it takes time. It travels, it will go on traveling; it will leave this earth, it will go on traveling. It will reach in a few million years some star– if we can catch it there, you can listen to it again.

Thoughts are an ocean all around you, they exist without you– you just be a witness. So Tantra says: Accept them! The tide comes, it is beautiful; the ebb comes, it is beautiful. Big, strong waves trying to reach to the sky; tremendous energy– watch it! Then comes a calm ocean, everything subsided, and the moon reflects in it, beautiful– watch it. And if you can watch you will become absolutely silent. The thoughts may go on coming to the beach, scattering on the rocks; you will remain calm and quiet; they will not affect you.

So the real problem is not thoughts, but being affected. Don’t fight with the thoughts, simply become a witness and you are not affected. And it is a richer silence, remember, and Tantra is always for richer experiences. There is a possibility of creating a dead silence, a silence that you find on the cemetery. You can force your mind so much that the whole nervous system becomes paralyzed. Then there will be no thoughts, because a very delicate nerve system is needed to receive them. The ocean will be there but you will not be receptive, your receptivity will be lost.

That is what is happening to many yogis, so-called yogis. They go on dulling their nervous systems. They eat less so that no energy moves to the brain. In fasting the energy cannot move to the brain, the body needs it first. They live in such a way that, by and by, their whole brain system becomes paralyzed, numb: sitting in one posture, monotonous; repeating a mantra, monotonous. If you continuously repeat a mantra for a few years, of course the system becomes dull, because no new sensations enter, the vitality is lost. In fact this man has not become silent– this man has become more stupid. And you will have the stupid look on many yogis’ faces. You will not see the intelligence, you will see something dull, dead; a stone-like thing has happened. They have not attained to silence– they have lost their brains. They have lost their receptivity, they have dulled themselves completely, they are dead. Nothing happens to them inside because for anything to happen a very delicate nervous system is needed– very delicate, very receptive, sensitive.

So this should be the criterion: if you see on the face of a yogi the radiance, the intelligence, awareness, sensitivity, as if something has flowered within, he is fulfilled– then only silence has happened. Otherwise, one can be silent– stupid people are, idiots are perfectly silent, because they cannot think– but what type of silence is this? An idiot is not a yogi. An idiot is simply born in such a way that his brain system is not functioning. You can do it with your own brain system by fasting, by yoga postures; you can stand on your head for hours– that will do. Shirshasan is perfect: you stand on your head for hours– that will make your nervous system dead, because your brain exists if very very minute energy and blood reaches to it, because the nerves are so delicate, so small, fragile. You cannot conceive because with the bare eye they cannot be seen. Your hair seems to be very thin, it is nothing. A nerve in the brain is just like the hair... if you put ten thousand nerves one on top of another, then they will be of the thickness of the hair. So if blood goes fast, it simply destroys them; it is like a flood.

Man attained to this brain, and no animal has attained, because man stood on the feet– that’s why the blood cannot go to the head, it is against the gravitation. The gravitation goes on pulling the blood downwards, and a very very minute part of the blood reaches to the head. That’s why that subtle system can exist. Animals cannot have it because they move on all fours and their brain remains on the same level as their body.

If you stand on your head, you do shirshasan, for a single minute it may be good, or even for a single second it may be good, because it just gives a bath; just the blood reaches, and by the time it reaches you are back to your normal posture: and it cleanses. But if you do shirshasan for minutes together or hours together, it will kill your whole brain-system. The flood is too much, the brain cannot exist. And yogis have found many ways to destroy the brain. Once it is destroyed you cannot see the ocean– but the ocean is there, thoughts are there. It is just like if your radio has gone out of order. Don’t think that broadcasts are not passing from this room, they are passing, but your receiving mechanism is not functioning. Start the radio, put it on– immediately it starts catching them.

The brain is just like a receiving center; if you destroy it you will be silent, but that silence is not of Tantra. And I don’t teach that silence– that is death. It is good in the cemetery, you are not going anywhere through it– you are wasting your life. And a very subtle instrument which can make you perfectly intelligent, an instrument which can become so perceptive that you can enjoy the whole celebration of existence, you have destroyed.

More sensitivity is needed, more poetry is needed. More life, more beauty, everything more is needed. What will you do then? Attain to Tantra silence. Watch the waves, and the more you watch, the more you will be able to see the beauty of them. The more you watch, the more subtle nuances of thought will be revealed to you. And it is beautiful– but you remain the witness. You remain on the beach; you just sit on the beach, or lie down in the sun, and just let the ocean do its own work– you don’t interfere.

If you don’t interfere, by and by, by and by, the ocean doesn’t affect you. It goes on roaring all around, but it doesn’t penetrate you. It is beautiful in itself, but it is separate, a distance exists. That distance is real meditation, the real silence. The world goes on and on, you are not affected; you remain in the world, but you are not in the world; you remain in the world, but the world is not in you. You pass through the world, untouched, unscarred. You remain virgin. Whatsoever you do, whatsoever happens to you, makes no difference: your virginity remains perfect, your innocence remains absolute, your purity is not destroyed.

[He who keeps tantric precepts
yet discriminates,
betrays the spirit of samaya.]

And, says Tilopa, if you are trying to keep the Tantra path, the Tantra precepts, then remember, don’t discriminate. If you discriminate you may be a Tantra philosopher, but not a Tantra follower. Don’t discriminate. Don’t say this is good and that is bad. Drop all discrimination. Accept everything as it is.

[Cease all activity, abandon all desire,
let thoughts rise and fall
as they will like ocean waves.
He who never harms the non-abiding
nor the principle of non-distinction,
upholds the tantric precepts.]

One who never harms the principle of non-distinction, who never discriminates, he follows the right path.

And: [...who never harms the non-abiding...]

This is one of the most beautiful Tantra things: Tantra says remain homeless, don’t abide anywhere, don’t get identified and don’t cling to anything. Remain homeless, because in homelessness you will attain to your real home. If you start getting... abiding in this and that, you will miss the home. Don’t cling to anybody, to anything, to any relationship. Enjoy, but don’t cling. Enjoyment is not a problem; once you start clinging, once the clinging mind comes in, then you are not flowing, then a block has come in. Don’t abide anywhere, then you will abide in yourself. Don’t cling to anything, only then you will be able to rest in yourself. So two principles are very basic: don’t harm the principle of non-abiding, and don’t harm the principle of non-distinction.

[He who abandons craving
and clings not to this and that,
perceives the real meaning given in the scriptures.]

Through scriptures you cannot attain to truth. But if you attain to truth, you will understand the scriptures. Scriptures are nothing but witnesses, they bear witness. You cannot learn the truth from them, but once you know the truth, they will bear witness. All the scriptures of the world will say, ”Yes, you have attained. This is what truth is." Scriptures come from persons who have attained. Whatsoever their language and symbology, whatsoever their metaphor, once you attain you penetrate through all metaphors, symbology, all languages.

People ask me, ”What are you doing here? Sometimes you talk on Tantra and Tilopa, and sometimes you talk on yoga and Patanjali, and sometimes you talk on Lao Tzu and Chuang Tzu, the taoists and the tao, and sometimes you jump to Heraclitus and Jesus– what are you doing here?”

I am talking about the same thing. I am not talking about anything else. Heraclitus or Tilopa or Buddha or Jesus, makes no difference to me. I am talking myself. They are just excuses– because once you attain, you fulfill all scriptures of the world. Then there is no Hindu scripture, Jewish scripture, Christian scripture; then suddenly you become the culmination of all the scriptures. I am a Christian, a Hindu, a Jew, a Mohammedan, because I am no one. And the truth, once known, is beyond all scriptures. All scriptures indicate towards it, the scriptures are nothing but fingers pointing to the moon. Fingers may be millions– the moon is the same. Once you know, you have known all.

Through scriptures you will become sectarians: you will be a Christian because you cling to the Bible; you will be a Mohammedan if you cling to the Koran; you will be a Hindu if you cling to the Gita– but you will not be religious. Religiousness happens only when the truth has happened to you. Then you don’t cling to anything, and all the scriptures start clinging to you. Then you don’t follow anybody, and all the scriptures follow you, they become like your shadows. And all the scriptures are the same because they talk about the same. Their metaphors, of course, are different, their languages are different, but the experience is the same.

Says Buddha, ”You taste the ocean from anywhere, you will always find it salty.” You taste it from the Koran, or from the Bible, or from the Torah, or the Talmud. The taste is always the same. Scriptures cannot lead you. In fact, they are dead without you. When you achieve to truth, life suddenly comes to all the scriptures. Through you they become again alive, through you they are reborn.

That is what I am doing, giving rebirth to Tilopa. He has been dead for many hundreds of years. Nobody has talked about him, nobody has given him again a birth. I am giving him a rebirth. While I am here, he will be again alive. You can meet him if you are capable. He is again near here. If you are receptive, you can feel his footsteps. He is again materialized. Through me– I will give birth to all the scriptures. Through me, they can again come to this world, I can become an anchor.

That’s what I am doing. And that’s what I would like you to do in your own life, some day. When you realize, when you come to know, then bring all that is beautiful in the past back and give it rebirth, renew it, so that all those who have known can be again on the earth and travel here, and help people.

Enough for today.