(deel 2)

Now the sutras.

[He who is meek and contented,
who has an equal vision,
whose mind is filled with the fullness of acceptance and of rest;
he who has seen Him and touched Him,
he is freed from all fear and trouble.]

Kabir is describing the person who has come to the plus point, who has become one. How will he be? He who is meek and contented… He will be meek. He will not have any ego, he will not have any sense of I – that is the meaning of meek. Says Jesus, “Blessed are the meek.” Why? Why blessed are the meek? Because they are not. Miserable are those who are because the more you are, the more miserable you will be. The more you are, the more tense; the more you are, the more anxiety; the more you are, the further away from God you are. The more you are, it means you are taking your minus, which is nothing, much too seriously. You have made too much fuss about nothing, much ado about nothing.

When you are not, God is. Meekness means, “I am not, I efface myself” and then suddenly there is contentment. If you are, you are always discontented. Because whatsoever you are, you always feel emptiness because the ego is empty, by its very nature it is empty. It is a minus thing. It is a miracle how you believe in it. It is not, it is just a shadow. If you look deeply, it disappears. If you don’t look at it, it appears. It exists only in ignorance. In light it is not found; it exists only in darkness. It is a phony thing, it only appears. It is not.

So, the egoist always finds himself empty and he wants to fill it – with money, with power, with love, attention, this and that. He always finds that everything goes on disappearing and nothing fulfills. You go on throwing anything into your ego. The whole world will disappear and you will remain as empty as ever because a minus cannot be turned into a plus. A minus remains minus, it is its nature. Once you have understood it, then you don’t try to fill it, you renounce it. You say, “This trip is over. I am no longer interested in my ego.” In that very moment contentment arises. Because when you drop the minus, the plus arises in you; it is hiding behind the minus. The minus is working as a screen, it does not allow you to see the plus.

God is everywhere, God is hiding in you, but you are too interested in the ego, you don’t look at God at all. And he is very silent, unobtrusive. He does not make any noise, his presence is almost like absence. He stands and waits.

[He who is meek and contented,
who has an equal vision...]

This equal vision is a particular concept in Indian mysticism: Sil santosh sada samadrishti. Samadrishti… It is a difficult word to translate. It means one who has come to see the one in all, whose vision has become equal. One who has come to see one in all, samadrishti. In the rock he sees God, in God he sees the rock, his vision is equal. Now he does not see two, he sees one. Once the ego is dropped, your vision becomes clear, transparent: you start looking through and through. Nothing bars the path.

[…whose mind is filled with fullness of acceptance and of rest…]
And suddenly, when the ego is not there… the constant troublemaker is not there, you are full. Full with the plus-energy of God, full of acceptance and rest.

[...he who has seen Him and touched Him...]

Kabir says, “God can not only be seen, he can be touched because he exists in everything.” When you touch a rock, you have touched him too. When you touch your woman, you have touched him too. In fact, the Upanishads say, “Annam braham.” Even food is God. The lowest is also the highest. And in the highest too you will find the lowest; they cannot be separate, they are one spectrum.

[...he who has seen Him and touched Him,
he is freed from all fear and trouble.]

And fear will only leave you when you have touched him, when you have touched the deathless. Man is mortal, the body is mortal, the mind is mortal. As man we are going to die, so as man we can never be free of fear and trouble. Only when we recognize ourselves as gods does fear disappear and trouble disappear.

People come to me every day. One of the basic problems is fear and they ask, “How can I get rid of fear?” I say to them, “You cannot get rid of fear. You will have to get rid of you.” You want to get rid of fear? That is impossible. You will have to get rid of you. When you are not, fear is not. If you are there, fear will remain; you are the source of fear. The very idea that “I am” creates fear because the very idea that “I am” creates the possibility that “I may not be. One day, I may not be.” Then the fear arises.

Once you drop this idea that “I am,” then how can fear exist? You have dropped the very source of it. Then God is. And God always is. You cannot say, “God was” – that will not be a right sentence. You cannot say, “God will be” – that will be absurd. God simply is. Only is, is correct about God. One day you were not, how can you trust that one day you will not disappear again? How can you trust? You cannot remember yourself before birth, how can you trust that after death you will be? The fear cannot leave. Get rid of yourself and fear disappears.

[To him the perpetual thought of God is like sandal paste smeared on the body
— to him nothing else is delight.]

Once you have dropped your ego – the minus, that which is not –and you have come to see that which is, then God surrounds you like a fragrance, twenty-four hours. Breathe in, breathe out, and you breathe him in and you breathe him out. Open your eyes and close your eyes and you see him with open eyes and you see him with closed eyes. God surrounds you as a subtle fragrance.

[...like sandal paste smeared on the body
— to him nothing else is delight.]

And one who has known this delight of being in God, then nothing else is delight. Then all pleasures disappear. Then there is only one delight, one joy: the joy of being in God, the joy of being part of him, the joy of being a drop in his ocean, a wave in his infinity.

[His work and his rest are filled with music...]

And Kabir says, “Only such a man is a real musician.” All others are just playing. Only such a man is a real musician, he does not create music, his whole being is music. He does not play on a veena, his whole life is a veena. In fact, God plays on him and creates a thousand and one songs. God dances in him, God takes possession of him, God plays many, many games through him, with him, for him.

[His work and his rest are filled with music...]

And such a man, whether he works or he rests makes no difference, the music continues. You can see him working, you can see him resting, you can see him in the marketplace and you can see him in the monastery. Whatsoever the situation, the situation becomes irrelevant; his music is eternal. God goes on playing on his flute. Once you have dropped the ego, you have become a passage for him, a vehicle.

[His work and his rest are filled with music,
he sheds abroad the radiance of love.]

And all love before it was just a reflection. You love food, that is the first reflection. You love power, that is the second reflection. You love a woman or a man, that is the third reflection. You love, that is the fourth reflection and so on, so forth. At the seventh, you don’t love, you become love. Now love is no longer a relationship with anything – food or God – no. Love is no longer a relationship, love is your state of being. You are love.

That’s what Jesus means when he says, “God is love.” Christians have not been able to understand it rightly. They think Jesus says God is loving. Jesus is not saying that God is loving. He is simply stating, “God is love.” God is another name for love, or love is another name for God. God is not loving because if you say “God is loving,” it means sometimes he may not be loving, sometimes he may hate, sometimes he may be angry. But when you equal God and love, when it is an equation that God is love, then there is no possibility of him being anything else. At the point of sahasrar, samadhi, a man becomes love. Then there is no possibility of him being anything else, it is his state of being.

[Kabir says:
“Touch His feet, who is one and indivisible...]

This is how in the East we have become so attached to the masters. God, we cannot see. He is far away, just a dream, an idea – maybe, maybe not, who knows? But a master we can see. One who has attained sahasrar is a master, one who has dropped his minus and has become a vehicle for the plus energy of God is a master.

[Touch His feet, who is one and indivisible…]

Wherever you find somebody who has become one, who has become love, who is no longer a crowd, touch his feet. Just to show that you also desire, that you also dream, that you also are full of thirst for his state of being. Touching the feet is symbolic. Touching the feet means, “We cannot reach your ultimate, it is far away, but we can touch your feet.” A master is someone whose feet are on the ground, on earth, and whose head is in heaven. The head cannot be touched. He is rooted here, but his branches have reached God. Those branches we cannot see, they are far away, they disappeared into the clouds. Only the feet are available. But by touching the feet, we have touched even those branches which have disappeared into the clouds. The feet are the visible part. The innermost sahasrar is the invisible part. We cannot see it right now; we can trust.

In the East, touching the feet became a great symbolic act. In the West, it has never arisen because in the West, the symbology has not been worked rightly. The West has not been long in the search of the inner, so for a Westerner to touch the feet looks a little ugly, looks awkward. But in the East, it became one of the most significant symbols. The master is in the world and yet not in the world. Touching the feet, we touch the part that is still in the world, to show that “We would like to make you a bridge to the divine. Become our bridge. We can only touch the visible, but we know the invisible is there.”

[Touch His feet, who is one and indivisible, immutable and peaceful...]

Look into the master and you will find he is one. The hankering for the other is no longer there. He is in tremendous rest and union with himself. You can feel it. It is so tangible a thing. If you allow, if you are receptive, if you just sit by the side of a master, you will feel it; you will start vibrating with his rhythm. You will feel his peace, his silence, you will have a taste of it. And you will see that he is immutable, that nothing changes in him because he is joined with the eternal. And he is peaceful because there is no becoming left. He has become the being, he has become that which is the goal. He has come home.

[...who fills all vessels to the brim with joy...]

And this will be his indication. Whenever you will come to a master he will fill you with joy. You may come with sadness, you may come with misery, but he will go on pouring joy into you.

[…who fills all vessels to the brim with joy, and whose form is love.]
- These are the hints to find a master: …whose form is love.

Sadh sangat peetam… These are tremendously beautiful words, almost untranslatable.
[Go thou to the company of the good…]

No, this is not the translation. No, justice is not possible, cannot be done. Sadh sangat peetam…

A few glimpses will be good. Sadh does not mean “the good.” It is one of the meanings, but sadh simply means “the simple, the spontaneous.” When you say “the good,” the duality arises with “the bad.” No, sadh means so simple that he does not know what is good and what is bad. Sadh means so simple that he has forgotten what is right and what is wrong, he does not know what is good and what is evil. Sadh means so simple that he cannot make a distinction between the saint and the sinner. Sadh sangat peetam…

And Kabir says, “To be in the company of such simple people is to be in company with the beloved.” Sadh sangat peetam… If you can find a simple man, a master, who has forgotten duality, who has forgotten the two and has attained the alpha… One who knows only the one, who has forgotten the language of the many, sadh sangat peetam… If you can find the company of such a man, you have found the company of the beloved, you will find God through him. He will be your first approach toward God. Through him you will be anchored in God.

Sadh sangat peetam…
[Go thou to the company of the good,
where the Beloved one has his dwelling place...]

God exists in the masters. He exists everywhere, but if you cannot see him in the world, then go and find somebody where he exists so tremendously that even a blind person like you cannot avoid. Where he exists so powerfully that even a person like you, insensitive, starts feeling the vibe. God exists everywhere, but sometimes, in some people, he exists tremendously. Sometimes, somewhere, his presence becomes very, very solid. These are the people we call Buddhas, Christs, Krishnas, where he becomes very intense. These people become a concentrating force for God. Sadh sangat peetam… Find if you can, find somewhere, a man who has become a tremendous presence of God. Bathe in his presence, drink in his presence. Drink his presence.

Just the other day, I was reading a book of R. D. Laing. He remembers – he is a Scot – he remembers that he had an aunt who was a great drunkard. When I was reading, I remembered old Paritosh and I thought maybe she was also an aunt to old Paritosh. She was such a drunkard that when she gave birth to a child, the child was drunk from the very beginning. And the doctors had to take the child away because it was found that the woman’s milk contained fifty percent alcohol.

A master is so drunk with God, almost ninety-nine percent alcohol. Just being in his presence, you will start being drunk. You will start swaying, you will start losing the grip of the ego. Sadh sangat peetam… Says Kabir, “The beloved is difficult to find in the world, he is everywhere, but you are not so sensitive. You are not so aware.” He is everywhere, but right now you cannot find him everywhere. Find a man where he is pouring cats and dogs, so, howsoever insensitive you are, you will have to partake of something of it, you will become drunk.

Yes, there are people where God rains: Kabir, Christ, Krishna – sadh sangat peetam…
[Take all thy thoughts and love and instruction from thence...]

Be in the presence of these people and start living from their presence. Catch hold of their vibe, fall in tune with their wavelength. Find your thoughts, your love, your discipline, your instructions, from their presence, let that become your guide. The love of a master, the presence of a master, let that be your scripture. That is the Bible, alive. That is the Koran, still being recited, still being sung, not a dead thing.

Blessed are those who can find a master because they have found God. And they have found God in such a way where the first experience of the divine can become possible. Once it has happened you can look everywhere and you will find him everywhere, but first it has to happen somewhere.

[Let that assembly be burned to ashes where his name is not spoken!]

Avoid that company where God is not remembered. Escape from those people where God has become almost absent. Don’t be with those people because otherwise you will learn your discipline from them and you will learn your thoughts from them, and you will start by and by imbibing their spirit. Avoid those people who are not full of love for God, who are not singing, who are not praying, who are not meditating, who are not dancing, who are not ecstatic. Avoid.

[Tell me, how couldst thou hold a wedding feast,
if the bridegroom himself were not there?]

And if God is not there, it is futile. The feast is not possible, the ceremony is not going to happen: you will not be fulfilled. Avoid. The bridegroom is not there, how is the feast possible?

It is said, Jesus says somewhere, that one day he was staying in a house and a woman came and poured very costly perfume on his feet. Judas criticized it. You will agree with Judas; there is more possibility that you will agree with Judas. Judas must have been the first communist. He said, “This is wrong, economically wrong. Such a valuable thing wasted. We could have sold it and given the money to the poor and you allowed it. You could have stopped the woman. This is useless, why waste such valuable perfume?” Jesus looked at Judas and he said, “Soon the bridegroom will be gone, then you can do whatsoever you want to do – but right now when the bridegroom is here, let there be ceremony and let there be feast.”

Kabir says:
[Tell me, how couldst thou hold a wedding feast,
if the bridegroom himself were not there?]

Where the master is not, where God is not intensely present in somebody, all your religious ceremonies are just impotent. Go to the churches and to the temples and go to the Vatican or to Kashi, all futile. Go to a master because wherever the bridegroom is, there God is celebrating. Find somebody who has realized, there is no other way. Only an alive flame can make your life also aflame.

[Waver no more, think only of the Beloved...]

And when you come to a master, waver no more. The mind will pull you back, the mind will find a thousand and one excuses. The mind will not be ready, the ego will create rationalizations. Waver no more… because it is very rare to come across a person who has achieved. …think only of the Beloved… When you are in the presence of a master, in the presence of God himself – where God is burning very intensely and alive – then don’t think of other things. Then don’t think of the world, then don’t think of money, then don’t think of power, and then don’t think of respectability. Then only think of the Beloved and go mad.

Sadh sangat peetam… Find the company of someone who is so simple that God has chosen him to be his vehicle.

[Set not thy heart on the worship of other gods...]

When you have found a master, there is no need to worship any other god, you have found your god. All other gods are dead. When Jesus is alive, Jesus is God. In the great temple of Jerusalem there is nobody, it is empty. When Buddha is alive, then Buddha is God. Then he is the temple and he is the teertha, then the Kashi is empty and the Giranar is just a rocky place. Whenever there is a living master, God has chosen to be present there, but our minds cling to the old places.

Waver not...
[Set not thy heart on the worship of other gods...]

Be courageous enough to recognize. It is very easy to go on worshipping dead gods. Yes, once they were alive and by the time you come to know them they are gone. And then for thousands of years you will worship them. Only very few people went to Jesus. The learned ones never went, the rabbis, no; the professors, no; the scholars, no. Very simple people went to him. Now the scholars go to him – the learned people, the popes, the bishops, they go to him. Now he is a dead god.

Just a few days ago, a woman came and she said, “I love you, but there is a problem. I feel guilty because I have loved Christ from my very childhood. Now I feel guilty. Am I betraying Christ in loving you? I would like to become a sannyasin,” she said, “but I cannot. That will be a betrayal.”

God is betrayed only when you betray an alive master, never otherwise. When I am gone, let it be finished. Then go and find living masters. Then don’t think you will be betraying Bhagwan. When he is gone, he is gone. Then God has chosen some other place to manifest himself. Then don’t let me hinder you, then don’t allow me to hinder you, then don’t let this idea become a barrier. You will not be betraying me. If you cling to me when I am gone, then you will be betraying me.

Jesus is gone, now you can go on clinging. God has chosen some other place to exhibit himself, to manifest himself. Always look at the alive. God is life, he always goes on leaving the old skin and goes on moving into new spaces and finding new expressions, new songs to sing, and new dances to dance.

[Set not thy heart on the worship of other gods,
there is no worth in the worship of other masters.]

If you have found a master, then forget about all other masters because that will be a division in your head. Let your devotion be total, otherwise that will create a wavering in your mind. Forget all about others. You have found, now move into it totally, wholeheartedly.

[Kabir deliberates and says:
“Thus thou shalt never find the Beloved!”]

If you go on worshipping dead gods and if you go on wavering between too many masters, you will never be able to find God. “Thus thou shalt never find the Beloved.” Sadh sangat peetam… If you have found one, that’s enough. If you have found one person who is throbbing with God, who is radiant with God, who is pulsating with God, drown yourself in his pulsations. Become part of his being, forget all and you will find the Beloved. In fact, you have already found. In finding the master, the Beloved has already been found.

From the first chakra to the seventh, from the first love to the last, the search is one. The search is for the one. And unless that one is found there is no rest. Unless that one is found there is no peace, there cannot be; there is no contentment. And that one can be found. You just have to go on becoming more and more aware. Don’t get entangled at the lower centers. Always remember that you have to move higher, from food, move higher; from sex, move higher; from love, move higher; from meditation, move higher. Unless you have come to your ultimate flowering, the inner lotus, sahasrar, one-thousand-petaled lotus… When it opens, Kabir says, “The spring has not come and the lotus has bloomed! The spring has not come and the bee has already received the invitation from the Beloved.”

Yes, there in the innermost being it is always spring. It is never otherwise. There is only one climate, it is always spring. Just go on moving higher and higher, don’t get too entangled and obsessed with the lower. I am not condemning the lower, remember. I am simply saying that the goal will not be fulfilled. Good, enjoy food but remember God. Enjoy relationships, but remember God. Enjoy sex, but remember samadhi. Go on moving. Walk on the earth, but keep your eyes on the stars. And if you can find a man where the star is burning bright…

In the parable of Jesus it is said that when he was born, three wise men from the East went in search because they saw a star in the sky. And they were filled with joy. They were very old, they were full of joy that somewhere God had descended. They followed the star and the star moved, then just over the poor small village of Bethlehem it stopped and they found Jesus in a stable.

That star you can see whenever there is a master in the world, that star is there. Those who are wise start feeling it, they start moving. Wherever that master is, a star shines in the sky and those who are a little sensitive, those who have any inner search to seek and find, they immediately become aware of the star and they start moving. From thousands and thousands of miles away they start moving and they come to a place where the master is. When you have found that place, don’t waver.

Sadh sangat peetam… In the master you have found God himself. The master is your future. That which you can become, he has become. The master is nothing but your own unfoldment. You are a seed, he is a flower. Let the master become an invitation to you; an invitation for the inner spring, an invitation for the inner flower. The possibility is there and unless that possibility becomes actual, you will never be satisfied. Unless a man becomes God, there is no benediction, no bliss. Each is a potential God and the whole of life is a task to transform the potential into the actual. Sadh sangat peetam…

Enough for today.