CHAPTER-7: THE MASTER AND VIJAY GOSWAMI (PART-Iv)
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| Sri Ramakrishna |
MASTER: "It
is true that one or two can get rid of the 'I' through samādhi; but these cases
are very rare. You may indulge in
thousands of reasonings, but still the 'I' comes back. You may cut the peepal-tree to the very root
today, but you will notice a sprout springing up tomorrow. Therefore if the 'I' must remain, let the
rascal remain as the 'servant I'. As
long as you live, you should say, 'O God, Thou art the Master and I am Thy
servant.' The 'I' that feels, 'I am the servant of God, I am His devotee' does
not injure one. Sweet things cause
acidity of the stomach, no doubt, but sugar candy is an exception.
"The
path of knowledge is very difficult. One
cannot obtain Knowledge unless one gets rid of the feeling that one is the
body. In the Kaliyuga the life of man is
centred on food. He cannot get rid of
the feeling that he is the body and the ego.
Therefore the path of devotion is prescribed for this cycle.
This
is an easy path. You will attain God if
you sing His name and glories and pray to Him with a longing heart. There is not the least doubt about it.
"Suppose
you draw a line on the surface of water with a bamboo stick. The water appears to be divided into two
parts; but the line doesn't remain for any length of time. The 'servant I'or the 'devotee I' or the
'child I' is only a line drawn with the ego and is not real".
The "ego of
a devotee"
VIJAY (to the Master): "Sir, you ask us to
renounce the 'wicked I'. Is there any
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| Vijay Krishna Goswami |
harm in the 'servant I'?"
MASTER: "The 'servant
I'-that is, the feeling, 'I am the servant of God, I am the devotee of
God'-does not injure one. On the
contrary, it helps one to realize God."
VIJAY:
"Well, sir, what becomes of the lust, anger, and other passions of one who
keeps the 'servant I'?"
MASTER: "If a man truly
feels like that, then he has only the semblance of lust, anger, and the
like. If, after attaining God, he looks
on himself as the servant or the devotee of God, then he cannot injure anyone. By touching the philosopher's stone a sword
is turned into gold. It keeps the
appearance of a sword but cannot injure.
"When
the dry branch of a coconut palm drops to the ground, it leaves only a mark on
the trunk indicating that once there was a branch at that place. In like manner, he who has attained God keeps
only an appearance of ego; there remains in him only a semblance of anger and
lust. He becomes like a child. A child has no attachment to the three
gunas-sattva, rajas, and tamas. He
becomes as quickly detached from a thing as he becomes attached to it. You can cajole him out of a cloth worth five
rupees with a doll worth an ānnā, though at first he may say with great
determination: 'No, I won't give it to you.
My daddy bought it for me.' Again, all persons are the same to a
child. He has no feeling of high and low
in regard to persons. So he doesn't
discriminate about caste. If his mother
tells him that a particular man should be regarded as an elder brother, the
child will eat from the same plate with him, though the man may belong to the
low caste of a blacksmith. The child
doesn't know hate, or what is holy or unholy.
"Even
after attaining samādhi, some retain the 'servant ego' or the 'devotee
ego'. The bhakta keeps this
'I-consciousness'. He says, 'O God, Thou
art the Master and I am Thy servant; Thou art the Lord and I am Thy devotee.'
He feels that way even after the realization of God. His 'I' is not completely effaced. Again, by constantly practising this kind of
'I-consciousness', one ultimately attains God.
This is called bhaktiyoga.
"One
can attain the Knowledge of Brahman, too, by following the path of bhakti. God is all-powerful. He may give His devotee Brahmajnāna also, if
He so wills. But the devotee generally
doesn't seek the Knowledge of the Absolute.
He would rather have the consciousness that God is the Master and he the
servant, or that God is the Divine Mother and he the child."
VIJAY: "But those who
discriminate according to the Vedanta philosophy also realize Him in the end,
don't they?"
Path of bhakti is
easy:
MASTER: "Yes, one may reach Him by following
the path of discrimination too: that is called Jnanayoga. But it is an extremely difficult path. I have told you already of the seven planes
of consciousness. On reaching the
seventh plane the mind goes into samādhi.
If a man acquires the firm knowledge that Brahman alone is real and the
world illusory, then his mind merges in samādhi. But in the Kaliyuga the life of a man depends
entirely on food. How can he have the
consciousness that Brahman alone is real and the world illusory? In the
Kaliyuga it is difficult to have the feeling, 'I am not the body, I am not the
mind, I am not the twenty-four cosmic principles; I am beyond pleasure and
pain, I am above disease and grief, old age and death.' However you may reason
and argue, the feeling that the body is identical with the soul will somehow
crop up from an unexpected quarter. You
may cut a peepal-tree to the ground and think it is dead to its very root, but
the next morning you will find a new sprout shooting up from the dead
stump. One cannot get rid of this
identification with the body; therefore the path of bhakti is best for the
people of the Kaliyuga. It is an easy
path.
"And,
'I don't want to become sugar; I want to eat it.' I never feel like saying, 'I
am Brahman.' I say, 'Thou art my Lord and I am Thy servant.' It is better to
make the mind go up and down between the fifth and sixth planes, like a boat
racing between two points. I don't want
to go beyond the sixth plane and keep my mind a long time in the seventh. My desire is to sing the name and glories of
God. It is very good to look on God as
the Master and oneself as His servant.
Further, you see, people speak of the waves as belonging to the Ganges;
but no one says that the Ganges belongs to the waves. The feeling, 'I am He', is not
wholesome. A man who entertains such an
idea, while looking on his body as the Self, causes himself great harm. He cannot go forward in spiritual life; he
drags himself down. He deceives himself
as well as others. He cannot understand
his own state of mind.
Prema-bhakti:
"But it isn't any and every kind of bhakti that
enables one to realize God. One cannot
realize God without prema-bhakti.
Another name for prema-bhakti is raga-bhakti. God cannot be realized without love and
longing. Unless one has learnt to love
God, one cannot realize Him.
"There
is another kind of bhakti, known as vaidhi-bhakti, according to which one must
repeat the name of God a fixed number of times, fast, make pilgrimages, worship
God with prescribed offerings, make so many sacrifices, and so forth and so
on. By continuing such practices a long
time one gradually acquires raga-bhakti.
God cannot be realized until one has raga-bhakti. One must love God. In order to realize God one must be
completely free from worldliness and direct all of one's mind to Him.
"But
some acquire raga-bhakti directly. It is
innate in them. They have it from their
very childhood. Even at an early age
they weep for God. An instance of such
bhakti is to be found in Prahlada. Vaidhi-bhakti is like moving a fan to make a breeze. One needs the fan to make the breeze. Similarly, one practises japa, austerity, and
fasting, in order to acquire love of God.
But the fan is set aside when the southern breeze blows of itself.
Such
actions as japa and austerity drop away when one spontaneously feels love and
attachment for God. Who, indeed, will
perform the ceremonies enjoined in the scriptures, when mad with love of God?
"Devotion
to God may be said to be 'green' so long as it doesn't grow into love of God;
but it becomes 'ripe' when it has grown into such love.
"A
man with 'green' bhakti cannot assimilate spiritual talk and instruction; but
one with 'ripe' bhakti can. The image
that falls on a photographic plate covered with black film5 is retained. On the other hand, thousands of images may be
reflected on a bare piece of glass, but not one of them is retained. As the object moves away, the glass becomes
the same as it was before. One cannot
assimilate spiritual instruction unless one has already developed love of
God."
VIJAY:
"Is bhakti alone sufficient for the attainment of God, for His
vision?"
MASTER: "Yes, one can
see God through bhakti alone. But it
must be 'ripe' bhakti, prema-bhakti and raga-bhakti. When one has that bhakti, one loves God even
as the mother loves the child, the child the mother, or the wife the husband.
"When
one has such love and attachment for God, one doesn't feel the attraction of
maya to wife, children, relatives, and friends.
One retains only compassion for them.
To such a man the world appears a strange land, a place where he has
merely to perform his duties. It is like
a man's having his real home in the country, but coming to Calcutta for work;
he has to rent a house in Calcutta for the sake of his duties. When one develops love of God, one completely
gets rid of one's attachment to the world and worldly wisdom.
"One
cannot see God if one has even the slightest trace of worldliness. Match-sticks, if damp, won't strike fire
though you rub a thousand of them against the match-box. You only waste a heap of sticks. The mind soaked in worldliness is such a damp
match-stick. Once Sri Radha said to her
friends that she saw Krishna everywhere-both within and without. The friends answered: 'Why, we don't see Him
at all. Are you delirious?' Radha said,
'Friends, paint your eyes with the collyrium of divine love, and then you will
see Him.'
(To
Vijay) "It is said in a song of your Brahmo Samaj:
O
Lord, is it ever possible to know Thee without love,
However
much one may perform worship and sacrifice?
"If
the devotee but once feels this attachment and ecstatic love for God, this
mature devotion and longing, then he sees God in both His aspects, with form
and without form."
Purity of heart:
VIJAY: "How can one see God?"
MASTER: "One cannot see God without purity of heart. Through attachment to 'woman and gold' the
mind has become stained-covered with dirt, as it were. A magnet cannot attract a needle if the
needle is covered with mud. Wash away
the mud and the magnet will draw it.
Likewise, the dirt of the mind can be washed away with the tears of our
eyes. This stain is removed if one sheds
tears of repentance and says, 'O God, I shall never again do such a thing.'
Thereupon God, who is like the magnet, draws to Himself the mind, which is like
the needle. Then the devotee goes into
samādhi and obtains the vision of God.
God's grace is the ultimate help:
"You may try thousands of times, but nothing
can be achieved without God's grace. One
cannot see God without His grace. Is it
an easy thing to receive the grace of God? One must altogether renounce
egotism; one cannot see God as long as one feels, 'I am the doer.' Suppose, in
a family, a man has taken charge of the store-room; then if someone asks the
master, 'Sir, will you yourself kindly give me something from the store-room?',
the master says to him: 'There is already someone in the store-room. What can I do there?'
"God
doesn't easily appear in the heart of a man who feels himself to be his own
master. But God can be seen the moment
His grace descends. He is the Sun of
Knowledge. One single ray of His has
illumined the world with the light of knowledge. That is how we are able to see one another
and acquire varied knowledge. One can
see God only if He turns His light toward His own face.
"The
police sergeant goes his rounds in the dark of night with a lantern in his
hand. No one sees his face; but with the
help of that light the sergeant sees everybody's face, and others, too, can see
one another. If you want to see the
sergeant, however, you must pray to him: 'Sir, please turn the light on your
own face. Let me see you.' In the same
way one must pray to God: 'O Lord, be gracious and turn the light of knowledge
on Thyself, that I may see Thy face.'
"A
house without light indicates poverty.
So one must light the lamp of
Knowledge in one's heart. As it
is said in a song:
Lighting
the lamp of Knowledge in the chamber of your heart,
Behold
the face of the Mother, Brahman's Embodiment."
As
Vijay had brought medicine with him, the Master asked a devotee to give him
some water. He was indeed a fountain of
infinite compassion. He had arranged for
Vijay's boat fare, since the latter was too poor to pay it. Vijay, Balaram, M., and the other devotees
left for Calcutta in a country boat.
SOURCE: The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna
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