THE GOSPEL OF SRI RAMAKRISHNA

Chapter 5; PART-III: THE MASTER AND KESHAB

BRAHMO DEVOTEE: "Sir, can't we realize God without complete renunciation?"

MASTFR (with a laugh): "Of course you can! Why should you renounce everything? You are all right as you are, following the middle path-like molasses partly solid and partly liquid.  Do you know the game of nax? Having scored the maximum number of points, I am out of the game.  I can't enjoy it.  But you are very clever.  Some of you have scored ten points, some six, and some five.  You have scored just the right number; so you are not out of the game like me.  The game can go on.  Why, that's fine! (All laugh.)

"I tell you the truth: there is nothing wrong in your being in the world.  But you must direct your mind toward God; otherwise you will not succeed. 

 
Do your duty with one hand and with the other hold to God.  After the duty is over, you will hold to God with both hands. 

Bondage and liberation are of the mind:

"It is all a question of the mind.  Bondage and liberation are of the mind alone.  The mind will take the colour you dye it with.  It is like white clothes just returned from the laundry.  If you dip them in red dye, they will be red.  If you dip them in blue or green, they will be blue or green.  They will take only the colour you dip them in, whatever it may be.  Haven't you noticed that, if you read a little English, you at once begin to utter English words: Foot fut it mit? Then you put on boots and whistle a tune, and so on.  It all goes together.  Or, if a scholar studies Sanskrit, he will at once rattle off Sanskrit verses.  If you are in bad company, then you will talk and think like your companions.  On the other hand, when you are in the company of devotees, you will think and talk only of God. 

"The mind is everything.  A man has his wife on one side and his daughter on the other.  He shows his affection to them in different ways.  But his mind is one and the same. 

"Bondage is of the mind, and freedom is also of the mind.  A man is free if he constantly thinks: 'I am a free soul.  How can I be bound, whether I live in the world or in the forest? I am a child of God, the King of Kings.  Who can bind me?' If bitten by a snake, a man may get rid of its venom by saying emphatically, 'There is no poison in me.' In the same way, by repeating with grit and determination, 'I am not bound, I am free', one really becomes so-one really becomes free. 

"Once someone gave me a book of the Christians.  I asked him to read it to me.  It talked about nothing but sin.  (To Keshab) Sin is the only thing one hears of at your Brahmo Samaj, too.  The wretch who constantly says, 'I am bound, I am bound' only succeeds in being bound.  He who says day and night, 'I am a sinner, I am a sinner' verily becomes a sinner. 

Redeeming power of faith

"One should have such burning faith in God that one can say: 'What? I have repeated the name of God, and can sin still cling to me? How can I be a sinner any more? How can I be in bondage any more?'

"If a man repeats the name of God, his body, mind, and everything become pure.  Why should one talk only about sin and hell, and such things? Say but once, 'O Lord, I have undoubtedly done wicked things, but I won't repeat them.' And have faith in His name."

Sri Ramakrishna became intoxicated with divine love and sang:

If only I can pass away repeating Durga's name, 
How canst Thou then, O Blessed One, 
Withhold from me deliverance, 
Wretched though I may be? .  .  .

Master's prayer:

Then he said: "To my Divine Mother I prayed only for pure love.  I offered flowers at Her Lotus Feet and prayed to Her: 'Mother, here is Thy virtue, here is Thy vice.  Take them both and grant me only pure love for Thee.  Here is Thy knowledge, here is Thy ignorance.  Take them both and grant me only pure love for Thee.  Here is Thy purity, here is Thy impurity.  Take them both, Mother, and grant me only pure love for Thee.  Here is Thy dharma, here is Thy adharma.  Take them both, Mother, and grant me only pure love for Thee.'

 (To the Brahmo devotees) "Now listen to a song by Ramprasad:

Come, let us go for a walk, O mind, to Kāli, the Wish-fulfilling Tree, 
And there beneath It gather the four fruits of life.  
Of your two wives, Dispassion and Worldliness, 
Bring alone Dispassion only, on your way to the Tree,
And ask her son Discrimination about the Truth.

When will you learn to lie, O mind, in the abode of Blessedness, 
With Cleanliness and Defilement on either side of you? 
Only when you have found the way 
To keep these wives contentedly under a single roof, 
Will you behold the matchless form of Mother Syama.

Ego and Ignorance, your parents, instantly banish from your sight; 
And should Delusion seek to drag you to its hole, 
Manfully cling to the pillar of Patience.  
Tie to the post of Unconcern the goats of Vice and Virtue, 
Killing them with the sword of Knowledge if they rebel.  
With the children of Worldliness, your first wife, plead from a goodly distance, 
And, if they will not listen, drown them in Wisdom's sea.  
Says Ramprasad: If you do as I say, 
You can submit a good account, O mind, to the King of Death, 
And I shall be well pleased with you and call you my darling. 

"Why shouldn't one be able to realize God in this world? King Janaka had such realization.  Ramprasad described the world as a mere 'framework of illusion'.  But if one loves God's hallowed feet, then-

This very world is a mansion of mirth; 
Here I can eat, here drink and make merry.  
Janaka's might was unsurpassed; 
What did he lack of the world or the Spirit? 
Holding to one as well as the other, 
He drank his milk from a brimming cup! (All laugh.)

"But one cannot be a King Janaka all of a sudden.  Janaka at first practised much austerity in solitude. 

Solitude for householders:

"Even if one lives in the world, one must go into solitude now and then.  It will be of great help to a man if he goes away from his family, lives alone, and weeps for God even for three days.  Even if he thinks of God for one day in solitude, when he has the leisure, that too will do him good.  People shed a whole jug of tears for wife and children.  But who cries for the Lord? Now and then one must go into solitude and practise spiritual discipline to realize God.  Living in the world and entangled in many of its duties, the aspirant, during the first stage of spiritual life, finds many obstacles in the path of concentration.  While the trees on the foot-path are young, they must he fenced around; otherwise they will be destroyed by cattle.  The fence is necessary when the tree is young, but it can be taken away when the trunk is thick and strong.  Then the tree won't be hurt even if an elephant is tied to it. 

 

Malady of worldly people and its cure:

"The disease of worldliness is like typhoid.  And there are a huge jug of water and a jar of savoury pickles in the typhoid patient's room.  If you want to cure him of his illness, you must remove him from that room.  The worldly man is like the typhoid patient.  The various objects of enjoyment are the huge jug of water, and the craving for their enjoyment is his thirst.  The very thought of pickles makes the mouth water; you don't have to bring them near.  And he is surrounded with them.  The companionship of woman is the pickles.  Hence treatment in solitude is necessary. 

"One may enter the world after attaining discrimination and dispassion.  In the ocean of the world there are six alligators: lust, anger, and so forth.  But you need not fear the alligators if you smear your body with turmeric before you go into the water.  Discrimination and dispassion are the turmeric.  Discrimination is the knowledge of what is real and what is unreal.  It is the realization that God alone is the real and eternal Substance and that all else is unreal, transitory, impermanent.  And you must cultivate intense zeal for God.  You must feel love for Him and be attracted to Him.  The gopis of Vrindāvan felt the attraction of Krishna.  Let me sing you a song:

Listen! The flute has sounded in yonder wood.  
There I must fly, for Krishna waits on the path.  
Tell me, friends, will you come along or no? 
To you my Krishna is merely an empty name; 
To me He is the anguish of my heart.  
You hear His flute-notes onlv with your ears, 
But, oh, I hear them in my deepest soul.  
I hear His  flute calling: 'Radha come out! 
Without you the grove is shorn of its loveliness.' "

The Master sang the song with tears in his eyes, and said to Keshab and the other Brahmo devotees: "Whether you accept Radha and Krishna, or not, please do accept their attraction for each other.  Try to create that same yearning in your heart for God.  Yearning is all you need in order to realize Him."

Gradually the ebb-tide set in.  The steamboat was speeding toward Calcutta.  It passed under the Howrah Bridge and came within sight of the Botanical Garden.  The captain was asked to go a little farther down the river.  The passengers were enchanted with the Master's words, and most of them had no idea of time or of how far they had come. 

Keshab began to serve some puffed rice and grated coconut.  The guests held these in the folds of their wearing-cloths and presently started to eat.  Everyone was joyful.  The Master noticed, however, that Keshab and Vijay rather shrank from each other, and he was anxious to reconcile them. 

Disagreements necessary for enriching life:

MASTEIR (to Keshab): "Look here.  There is Vijay.  Your quarrel seems like the fight between Śiva and Rama.  Śiva was Rama's s guru.  Though they fought with each other, yet they soon came to terms.  But the grimaces of the ghosts, the followers of Śiva, and the gibberish of the monkeys, the followers of Rama, would not come to an end! (Loud laughter.) Such quarrels take place even among one's own kith and kin.  Didn't Rama fight with His own sons, Lava and Kusa? Again, you must have noticed how a mother and daughter, living together and having the same spiritual end in view, observe their religious fast separately on Tuesdays, each on her own account-as if the welfare of the mother were different from the welfare of the daughter.  But what benefits the one benefits the other.  In like manner, you have a religious society, and Vijay thinks he must have one too.  (Laughter.) But I think all these are necessary.  While Sri Krishna, Himself God Incarnate, played  with the gopis at Vrindāvan, trouble-makers like Jatila and Kutila appeared on the scene.  You may ask why.  The answer is that the play does not develop without trouble-makers.  (All laugh.) There is no fun without Jatila and Kutila.  (Loud laughter.)

"Ramanuja upheld the doctrine of Qualified Non-dualism.  But his guru was a pure non-dualist.  They disagreed with each other and refuted each other's arguments.  That always happens.  Still, to the teacher the disciple is his own."

All rejoiced in the Mastcr's company and his words. 

MASTER (to Keshab): "You don't look into people's natures, before you make them  your disciples, and so they break away from you. 

"All men look alike, to be sure, but they have different natures.  Some have an excess of sattva, others an excess of rajas, and still others an excess of tamas.  You must have noticed that the cakes known as puli all look alike.  But their contents are very different.  Some contain condensed milk, some coconut kernel, and others mere boiled kalai pulse.  (All laugh)

SOURCE: The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna