Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda - Vol-1
THE GITA I
(Delivered in San Francisco, on May 26, 1900)
[This article was recorded by Ida Ansell in shorthand. As,
however, Swamiji's speed was too great for her in her early
days, dots are put in the articles to indicate the omissions,
while the words within square brackets are added by way of
linking up the disconnected parts.]
To understand the Gita requires its historical background. The
Gita is a commentary on the Upanishads. The Upanishads are the
Bible of India. They occupy the same place as the New Testament
does. There are [more than] a hundred books comprising the
Upanishads, some very small and some big, each a separate
treatise. The Upanishads do not reveal the life of any teacher,
but simply teach principles. They are [as it were] shorthand
notes taken down of discussion in [learned assemblies],
generally in the courts of kings. The word Upanishad may mean
"sittings" [or "sitting near a teacher"]. Those of you who may
have studied some of the Upanishads can understand how they are
condensed shorthand sketches. After long discussions had been
held, they were taken down, possibly from memory. The difficulty
is that you get very little of the background. Only the luminous
points are mentioned there. The origin of ancient Sanskrit is
5000 B.C.; the Upanishads [are at least] two thousand years
before that. Nobody knows [exactly] how old they are. The Gita
takes the ideas of the Upanishads and in [some] cases the very
words. They are strung together with the idea of bringing out,
in a compact, condensed, and systematic form, the whole subject
the Upanishads deal with.
The [original] scriptures of the Hindus are called the Vedas.
They were so vast - the mass of writings - that if the texts
alone were brought here, this room would not contain them. Many
of them are lost. They were divided into branches, each branch
put into the head of certain priests and kept alive by memory.
Such men still exist. They will repeat book after book of the
Vedas without missing a single intonation. The larger portion of
the Vedas has disappeared. The small portion left makes a whole
library by itself. The oldest of these contains the hymns of the
Rig-Veda. It is the aim of the modern scholar to restore [the
sequence of the Vedic compositions]. The old, orthodox idea is
quite different, as your orthodox idea of the Bible is quite
different from the modern scholar's. The Vedas are divided into
two portions: one the Upanishads, the philosophical portion, the
other the work portion.
We will try to give a little idea of the work portion. It
consists of rituals and hymns, various hymns addressed to
various gods. The ritual portion is composed of ceremonies, some
of them very elaborate. A great many priests are required. The
priestly function became a science by itself, owing to the
elaboration of the ceremonials. Gradually the popular idea of
veneration grew round these hymns and rituals. The gods
disappeared and in their place were left the rituals. That was
the curious development in India. The orthodox Hindu [the
Mimâmsaka] does not believe in gods, the unorthodox believe in
them. If you ask the orthodox Hindu what the meaning is of these
gods in the Vedas, [he will not be able to give any satisfactory
answer]. The priests sing these hymns and pour libations and
offering into the fire. When you ask the orthodox Hindu the
meaning of this, he says that words have the power to produce
certain effects. That is all. There is all the natural and
supernatural power that ever existed. The Vedas are simply words
that have the mystical power to produce effects if the sound
intonation is right. If one sound is wrong it will not do. Each
one must be perfect. [Thus] what in other religions is called
prayer disappeared and the Vedas became the gods. So you see the
tremendous importance that was attached to the words of the
Vedas. These are the eternal words out of which the whole
universe has been produced. There cannot be any thought without
the word. Thus whatever there is in this world is the
manifestation of thought, and thought can only manifest itself
through words. This mass of words by which the unmanifested
thought becomes manifest, that is what is meant by the Vedas. It
follows that the external existence of everything [depends on
the Vedas, for thought] does not exist without the word. If the
word "horse" did not exist, none could think of a horse. [So]
there must be [an intimate relation between] thought, word, and
the external object. What are these words [in reality]? The
Vedas. They do not call it Sanskrit language at all. It is Vedic
language, a divine language. Sanskrit is a degenerate form. So
are all other languages. There is no language older than Vedic.
You may ask, "Who wrote the Vedas?" They were not written. The
words are the Vedas. A word is Veda, if I can pronounce it
rightly. Then it will immediately produce the [desired] effect.
This mass of Vedas eternally exists and all the world is the
manifestation of this mass of words. Then when the cycle ends,
all this manifestation of energy becomes finer and finer,
becomes only words, then thought. In the next cycle, first the
thought changes into words and then out of those words [the
whole universe] is produced. If there is something here that is
not in the Vedas, that is your delusion. It does not exist.
[Numerous] books upon that subject alone defend the Vedas. If
you tell [their authors] that the Vedas must have been
pronounced by men first, [they will simply laugh]. You never
heard of any [man uttering them for the first time]. Take
Buddha's words. There is a tradition that he lived and spoke
these words [many times before]. If the Christian stands up and
says, "My religion is a historical religion and therefore yours
is wrong and ours is true," [the Mimamsaka replies], "Yours
being historical, you confess that a man invented it nineteen
hundred years ago. That which is true must be infinite and
eternal. That is the one test of truth. It never decays, it is
always the same. You confess your religion was created by
such-and-such a man. The Vedas were not. By no prophets or
anything. ... Only infinite words, infinite by their very
nature, from which the whole universe comes and goes." In the
abstract it is perfectly correct. ... The sound must be the
beginning of creation. There must be germ sounds like germ
plasm. There cannot be any ideas without the words. ... Wherever
there are sensations, ideas, emotions, there must be words. The
difficulty is when they say that these four books are the Vedas
and nothing else. [Then] the Buddhist will stand up and say,
"Ours are Vedas. They were revealed to us later on." That cannot
be. Nature does not go on in that way. Nature does not manifest
her laws bit by bit, an inch of gravitation today and [another
inch] tomorrow. No, every law is complete. There is no evolution
in law at all. It is [given] once and for ever. It is all
nonsense, this "new religion and better inspiration," and all
that. It means nothing. There may be a hundred thousand laws and
man may know only a few today. We discover them - that is all.
Those old priests with their tremendous [claims about eternal
words], having dethroned the gods, took the place of the gods.
[They said], "You do not understand the power of words. We know
how to use them. We are the living gods of the world. Pay us; we
will manipulate the words, and you will get what you want. Can
you pronounce the words yourself? You cannot, for, mind you, one
mistake will produce the opposite effect. You want to be rich,
handsome, have a long life, a fine husband?" Only pay the priest
and keep quiet!
Yet there is another side. The ideal of the first part of the
Vedas is entirely different from the ideal of the other part,
the Upanishads. The ideal of the first part coincides with [that
of] all other religions of the world except the Vedanta. The
ideal is enjoyment here and hereafter - man and wife, husband
and children. Pay your dollar, and the priest will give you a
certificate, and you will have a happy time afterwards in
heaven. You will find all your people there and have this
merry-go-round without end. No tears, no weeping - only
laughing. No stomach-ache, but yet eating. No headache, but yet
[parties]. That, considered the priests, was the highest goal of
man.
There is another idea in this philosophy which is according to
your modern ideas. Man is a slave of nature, and slave eternally
he has got to remain. We call it Karma. Karma means law, and it
applies everywhere. Everything is bound by Karma. "Is there no
way out?" "No! Remain slaves all through the years - fine
slaves. We will manipulate the words so that you will only have
the good and not the bad side of all - if you will pay [us]
enough." That was the ideal of [the Mimamsakas]. These are the
ideals which are popular throughout the ages. The vast mass of
mankind are never thinkers. Even if they try to think, the
[effect of the] vast mass of superstitions on them is terrible.
The moment they weaken, one blow comes, and the backbone breaks
into twenty pieces. They can only be moved by lures and threats.
They can never move of their own accord. They must be
frightened, horrified, or terrorised, and they are your slaves
for ever. They have nothing else to do but to pay and obey.
Everything else is done by the priest. ... How much easier
religion becomes! You see, you have nothing to do. Go home and
sit quietly. Somebody is doing the whole thing for you. Poor,
poor animals!
Side by side, there was the other system. The Upanishads are
diametrically opposite in all their conclusions. First of all,
the Upanishads believe in God, the creator of the universe, its
ruler. You find later on [the idea of a benign Providence]. It
is an entirely opposite [conception]. Now, although we hear the
priest, the ideal is much more subtle. Instead of many gods they
made one God.
The second idea, that you are all bound by the law of Karma, the
Upanishads admit, but they declare the way out. The goal of man
is to go beyond law. And enjoyment can never be the goal,
because enjoyment can only be in nature.
In the third place, the Upanishads condemn all the sacrifices
and say that is mummery. That may give you all you want, but it
is not desirable, for the more you get, the more you [want], and
you run round and round in a circle eternally, never getting to
the end - enjoying and weeping. Such a thing as eternal
happiness is impossible anywhere. It is only a child's dream.
The same energy becomes joy and sorrow.
I have changed my psychology a bit today. I have found the most
curious fact. You have a certain idea and you do not want to
have it, and you think of something else, and the idea you want
to suppress is entirely suppressed. What is that idea? I saw it
come out in fifteen minutes. It came out and staggered me. It
was strong, and it came in such a violent and terrible fashion
[that] I thought here was a madman. And when it was over, all
that had happened [was a suppression of the previous emotion].
What came out? It was my own bad impression which had to be
worked out. "Nature will have her way. What can suppression do?"
(Gita, III. 33.) That is a terrible [statement] in the Gita. It
seems it may be a vain struggle after all. You may have a
hundred thousand [urges competing] at the same time. You may
repress [them], but the moment the spring rebounds, the whole
thing is there again.
[But there is hope]. If you are powerful enough, you can divide
your consciousness into twenty parts all at the same time. I am
changing my psychology. Mind grows. That is what the Yogis say.
There is one passion and it rouses another, and the first one
dies. If you are angry, and then happy, the next moment the
anger passes away. Out of that anger you manufactured the next
state. These states are always interchangeable. Eternal
happiness and misery are a child's dream. The Upanishads point
out that the goal of man is neither misery nor happiness, but we
have to be master of that out of which these are manufactured.
We must be masters of the situation at its very root, as it
were.
The other point of divergence is: the Upanishads condemn all
rituals, especially those that involve the killing of animals.
They declare those all nonsense. One school of old philosophers
says that you must kill such an animal at a certain time if the
effect is to be produced. [You may reply], "But [there is] also
the sin of taking the life of the animal; you will have to
suffer for that." They say that is all nonsense. How do you know
what is right and what is wrong? Your mind says so? Who cares
what your mind says? What nonsense are you talking? You are
setting your mind against the scriptures. If your mind says
something and the Vedas say something else, stop your mind and
believe in the Vedas. If they say, killing a man is right, that
is right. If you say, "No, my conscience says [otherwise," it
won't do]. The moment you believe in any book as the eternal
word, as sacred, no more can you question. I do not see how you
people here believe in the Bible whenever you say about [it],
"How wonderful those words are, how right and how good!"
Because, if you believe in the Bible as the word of God, you
have no right to judge at all. The moment you judge, you think
you are higher than the Bible. [Then] what is the use of the
Bible to you? The priests say, "We refuse to make the comparison
with your Bible or anybody's. It is no use comparing, because -
what is the authority? There it ends. If you think something is
not right, go and get it right according to the Vedas."
The Upanishads believe in that, [but they have a higher standard
too]. On the one hand, they do not want to overthrow the Vedas,
and on the other they see these animal sacrifices and the
priests stealing everybody's money. But in the psychology they
are all alike. All the differences have been in the philosophy,
[regarding] the nature of the soul. Has it a body and a mind?
And is the mind only a bundle of nerves, the motor nerves and
the sensory nerves? Psychology, they all take for granted, is a
perfect science. There cannot be any difference there. All the
fight has been regarding philosophy - the nature of the soul,
and God, and all that.
Then another great difference between the priests and the
Upanishads. The Upanishads say, renounce. That is the test of
everything. Renounce everything. It is the creative faculty that
brings us into all this entanglement. The mind is in its own
nature when it is calm. The moment you can calm it, that [very]
moment you will know the truth. What is it that is whirling the
mind? Imagination, creative activity. Stop creation and you know
the truth. All power of creation must stop, and then you know
the truth at once.
On the other hand, the priests are all for [creation]. Imagine a
species of life [in which there is no creative activity. It is
unthinkable]. The people had to have a plan [of evolving a
stable society. A system of rigid selection was adopted. For
instance,] no people who are blind and halt can be married. [As
a result] you will find so much less deformity [in India] than
in any other country in the world. Epileptics and insane
[people] are very rare [there]. That is owing to direct
selection. The priests say, "Let them become Sannyâsins." On the
other hand, the Upanishads say, "Oh no, [the] earth's best and
finest [and] freshest flowers should be laid upon the altar. The
strong, the young, with sound intellect and sound body - they
must struggle for the truth."
So with all these divergences of opinion, I have told you that
the priests already differentiated themselves into a separate
caste. The second is the caste of the kings. ... All the
Upanishadic philosophy is from the brains of kings, not priests.
There [runs] an economic struggle through every religious
struggle. This animal called man has some religious influence,
but he is guided by economy. Individuals are guided by something
else, but the mass of mankind never made a move unless economy
was [involved]. You may [preach a religion that may not be
perfect in every detail], but if there is an economic background
[to it], and you have the most [ardent champions] to preach it,
you can convince a whole country. ...
Whenever any religion succeeds, it must have economic value.
Thousands of similar sects will be struggling for power, but
only those who meet the real economic problem will have it. Man
is guided by the stomach. He walks and the stomach goes first
and the head afterwards. Have you not seen that? It will take
ages for the head to go first. By the time a man is sixty years
of age, he is called out of [the world]. The whole of life is
one delusion, and just when you begin to see things the way they
are, you are snatched off. So long as the stomach went first you
were all right. When children's dreams begin to vanish and you
begin to look at things the way they are, the head goes. Just
when the head goes first, [you go out].
[For] the religion of the Upanishads to be popularised was a
hard task. Very little economy is there, but tremendous
altruism. ...
The Upanishads had very little kingdom, although they were
discovered by kings that held all the royal power in their
hands. So the struggle ... began to be fiercer. Its culminating
point came two thousand years after, in Buddhism. The seed of
Buddhism is here, [in] the ordinary struggle between the king
and the priest; and [in the struggle] all religion declined. One
wanted to sacrifice religion, the other wanted to cling to the
sacrifices, to Vedic gods, etc. Buddhism ... broke the chains of
the masses. All castes and creeds alike became equal in a
minute. So the great religious ideas in India exist, but have
yet to be preached: otherwise they do no good. ...
In every country it is the priest who is conservative, for two
reasons - because it is his bread and because he can only move
with the people. All priests are not strong. If the people say,
"Preach two thousand gods," the priests will do it. They are the
servants of the congregation who pay them. God does not pay
them. So blame yourselves before blaming the priests. You can
only get the government and the religion and the priesthood you
deserve, and no better.
So the great struggle began in India and it comes to one of its
culminating points in the Gita. When it was causing fear that
all India was going to be broken up between [the] two ...
[groups], there rose this man Krishna, and in the Gita he tries
to reconcile the ceremony and the philosophy of the priests and
the people. Krishna is loved and worshipped in the same way as
you do Christ. The difference is only in the age. The Hindus
keep the birthday of Krishna as you do Christ's. Krishna lived
five thousand years ago and his life is full of miracles, some
of them very similar to those in the life of Christ. The child
was born in prison. The father took him away and put him with
the shepherds. All children born in that year were ordered to be
killed. ... He was killed; that was his fate.
Krishna was a married man. There are thousands of books about
him. They do not interest me much. The Hindus are great in
telling stories, you see. [If] the Christian missionaries tell
one story from their Bible, the Hindus will produce twenty
stories. You say the whale swallowed Jonah; the Hindus say
someone swallowed an elephant. ... Since I was a child I have
heard about Krishna's life. I take it for granted there must
have been a man called Krishna, and his Gita shows he has [left]
a wonderful book. I told you, you can understand the character
of a man by analysing the fables about him. The fables have the
nature [of decorations]. You must find they are all polished and
manipulated to fit into the character. For instance, take
Buddha. The central idea [is] sacrifice. There are thousands of
folklore, but in every case the sacrifice must have been kept
up. There are thousands of stories about Lincoln, about some
characteristic of that great man. You take all the fables and
find the general idea and [know] that that was the central
character of the man. You find in Krishna that non-attachment is
the central idea. He does not need anything. He does not want
anything. He works for work's sake. "Work for work's sake.
Worship for worship's sake. Do good because it is good to do
good. Ask no more." That must have been the character of the
man. Otherwise these fables could not be brought down to the one
idea of non-attachment. The Gita is not his only sermon. ...
He is the most rounded man I know of, wonderfully developed
equally in brain and heart and hand. Every moment [of his] is
alive with activity, either as a gentleman, warrior, minister,
or something else. Great as a gentleman, as a scholar, as a
poet. This all-rounded and wonderful activity and combination of
brain and heart you see in the Gita and other books. Most
wonderful heart, exquisite language, and nothing can approach it
anywhere. This tremendous activity of the man - the impression
is still there. Five thousand years have passed and he has
influenced millions and millions. Just think what an influence
this man has over the whole world, whether you know it or not.
My regard for him is for his perfect sanity. No cobwebs in that
brain, no superstition. He knows the use of everything, and when
it is necessary to [assign a place to each], he is there. Those
that talk, go everywhere, question about the mystery of the
Vedas, etc., they do not know the truth. They are no better than
frauds. There is a place in the Vedas [even] for superstition,
for ignorance. The whole secret is to find out the proper place
for everything.
Then that heart! He is the first man, way before Buddha, to open
the door of religion to every caste. That wonderful mind! That
tremendously active life! Buddha's activity was on one plane,
the plane of teaching. He could not keep his wife and child and
become a teacher at the same time. Krishna preached in the midst
of the battlefield. "He who in the midst of intense activity
finds himself in the greatest calmness, and in the greatest
peace finds intense activity, that is the greatest [Yogi as well
as the wisest man]." (Ibid. IV. 18.) It means nothing to this
man - the flying of missiles about him. Calm and sedate he goes
on discussing the problems of life and death. Each one of the
prophets is the best commentary on his own teaching. If you want
to know what is meant by the doctrine of the New Testament, you
go to Mr. So-and-so. [But] read again and again [the four
Gospels and try to understand their import in the light of the
wonderful life of the Master as depicted there]. The great men
think, and you and I [also] think. But there is a difference. We
think and our bodies do not follow. Our actions do not harmonise
with our thoughts. Our words have not the power of the words
that become Vedas. ... Whatever they think must be accomplished.
If they say, "I do this," the body does it. Perfect obedience.
This is the end. You can think yourself God in one minute, but
you cannot be [God]. That is the difficulty. They become what
they think. We will become [only] by [degrees].
You see, that was about Krishna and his time. In the next
lecture we will know more of his book.
THE GITA II
(Delivered in San Francisco, on May 28, 1900)
[This article was recorded by Ida Ansell in shorthand. As,
however, Swamiji's speed was too great for her in her early
days, dots are put in the articles to indicate the omissions,
while the words within square brackets are added by way of
linking up the disconnected parts.]
The Gitâ requires a little preliminary introduction. The scene
is laid on the battlefield of Kurukshetra. There were two
branches of the same race fighting for the empire of India about
five thousand years ago. The Pândavas had the right, but the
Kauravas had the might. The Pandavas were five brothers, and
they were living in a forest. Krishna was the friend of the
Pandavas. The Kauravas would not grant them as much land as
would cover the point of a needle.
The opening scene is the battlefield, and both sides see their
relatives and friends - one brother on one side and another on
the other side; a grandfather on one side, grandson on the other
side. ... When Arjuna sees his own friends and relatives on the
other side and knows that he may have to kill them, his heart
gives way and he says that he will not fight. Thus begins the
Gita.
For all of us in this world life is a continuous fight. ... Many
a time comes when we want to interpret our weakness and
cowardice as forgiveness and renunciation. There is no merit in
the renunciation of a beggar. If a person who can [give a blow]
forbears, there is merit in that. If a person who has, gives up,
there is merit in that. We know how often in our lives through
laziness and cowardice we give up the battle and try to
hypnotise our minds into the belief that we are brave.
The Gita opens with this very significant verse: "Arise, O
Prince! Give up this faint-heartedness, this weakness! Stand up
and fight!" (Gita, II. 3.) Then Arjuna, trying to argue the
matter [with Krishna], brings higher moral ideas, how
non-resistance is better than resistance, and so on. He is
trying to justify himself, but he cannot fool Krishna. Krishna
is the higher Self, or God. He sees through the argument at
once. In this case [the motive] is weakness. Arjuna sees his own
relatives and he cannot strike them. ...
There is a conflict in Arjuna's heart between his emotionalism
and his duty. The nearer we are to [beasts and] birds, the more
we are in the hells of emotion. We call it love. It is
self-hypnotisation. We are under the control of our [emotions]
like animals. A cow can sacrifice its life for its young. Every
animal can. What of that? It is not the blind, birdlike emotion
that leads to perfection. ... [To reach] the eternal
consciousness, that is the goal of man! There emotion has no
place, nor sentimentalism, nor anything that belongs to the
senses - only the light of pure reason. [There] man stands as
spirit.
Now, Arjuna is under the control of this emotionalism. He is not
what he should be - a great self-controlled, enlightened sage
working through the eternal light of reason. He has become like
an animal, like a baby, just letting his heart carry away his
brain, making a fool of himself and trying to cover his weakness
with the flowery names of "love" and so on. Krishna sees through
that. Arjuna talks like a man of little learning and brings out
many reasons, but at the same time he talks the language of a
fool.
"The sage is not sorry for those that are living nor for those
that die." (Ibid. 11.) [Krishna says :] "You cannot die nor can
I. There was never a time when we did not exist. There will
never be a time when we shall not exist. As in this life a man
begins with childhood, and [passes through youth and old age, so
at death he merely passes into another kind of body]. Why should
a wise man be sorry?" (Ibid. 12-13.) And where is the beginning
of this emotionalism that has got hold of you? It is in the
senses. "It is the touch of the senses that brings all this
quality of existence: heat and cold, pleasure and pain. They
come and go." (Ibid. 14.) Man is miserable this moment, happy
the next. As such he cannot experience the nature of the soul.
...
"Existence can never be non-existence, neither can non-existence
ever become existence. ... Know, therefore, that that which
pervades all this universe is without beginning or end. It is
unchangeable. There is nothing in the universe that can change
[the Changeless]. Though this body has its beginning and end,
the dweller in the body is infinite and without end." (Ibid.
16-18.)
Knowing this, stand up and fight! Not one step back, that is the
idea. ... Fight it out, whatever comes. Let the stars move from
the sphere! Let the whole world stand against us! Death means
only a change of garment. What of it? Thus fight! You gain
nothing by becoming cowards. ... Taking a step backward, you do
not avoid any misfortune. You have cried to all the gods in the
world. Has misery ceased? The masses in India cry to sixty
million gods, and still die like dogs. Where are these gods? ...
The gods come to help you when you have succeeded. So what is
the use? Die game. ... This bending the knee to superstitions,
this selling yourself to your own mind does not befit you, my
soul. You are infinite, deathless, birthless. Because you are
infinite spirit, it does not befit you to be a slave. ... Arise!
Awake! Stand up and fight! Die if you must. There is none to
help you. You are all the world. Who can help you?
"Beings are unknown to our human senses before birth and after
death. It is only in the interim that they are manifest. What is
there to grieve about? (Ibid. 28.)
"Some look at It [the Self] with wonder. Some talk of It as
wonderful. Others hear of It as wonderful. Others, hearing of
It, do not understand." (Ibid. 29.)
But if you say that killing all these people is sinful, then
consider this from the standpoint of your own caste-duty. ...
"Making pleasure and misery the same, making success and defeat
the same, do thou stand up and fight. (Ibid. 38.)
This is the beginning of another peculiar doctrine of the Gita -
the doctrine of non-attachment. That is to say, we have to bear
the result of our own actions because we attach ourselves to
them. ... "Only what is done as duty for duty's sake ... can
scatter the bondage of Karma." (Ibid. 39.) There is no danger
that you can overdo it. ... "If you do even a little of it,
[this Yoga will save you from the terrible round of birth and
death]. (Ibid. 40.)
"Know, Arjuna, the mind that succeeds is the mind that is
concentrated. The minds that are taken up with two thousand
subjects (have) their energies dispersed. Some can talk flowery
language and think there is nothing beyond the Vedas. They want
to go to heaven. They want good things through the power of the
Vedas, and so they make sacrifices." (Ibid. 41-43.) Such will
never attain any success [in spiritual life] unless they give up
all these materialistic ideas. (Ibid. 44.)
That is another great lesson. Spirituality can never be attained
unless all material ideas are given up. ... What is in the
senses? The senses are all delusion. People wish to retain them
[in heaven] even after they are dead - a pair of eyes, a nose.
Some imagine they will have more organs than they have now. They
want to see God sitting on a throne through all eternity - the
material body of God. ... Such men's desires are for the body,
for food and drink and enjoyment. It is the materialistic life
prolonged. Man cannot think of anything beyond this life. This
life is all for the body. "Such a man never comes to that
concentration which leads to freedom." (Ibid. 44.)
"The Vedas only teach things belonging to the three Gunas, to
Sattva, Rajas, and Tamas." (Ibid. 45.) The Vedas only teach
about things in nature. People cannot think anything they do not
see on earth. If they talk about heaven, they think of a king
sitting on a throne, of people burning incense. It is all
nature, nothing beyond nature. The Vedas, therefore, teach
nothing but nature. "Go beyond nature, beyond the dualities of
existence, beyond your own consciousness, caring for nothing,
neither for good nor for evil." (Ibid. 45.)
We have identified ourselves with our bodies. We are only body,
or rather, possessed of a body. If I am pinched, I cry. All this
is nonsense, since I am the soul. All this chain of misery,
imagination, animals, gods, and demons, everything, the whole
world all this comes from the identification of ourselves with
the body. I am spirit. Why do I jump if you pinch me? ... Look
at the slavery of it. Are you not ashamed? We are religious! We
are philosophers! We are sages! Lord bless us! What are we?
Living hells, that is what we are. Lunatics, that is what we
are!
We cannot give up the idea [of body]. We are earth-bound. ...
Our ideas are burial grounds. When we leave the body we are
bound by thousands of elements to those [ideas].
Who can work without any attachment? That is the real question.
Such a man is the same whether his work succeeds or fails. His
heart does not give one false beat even if his whole life-work
is burnt to ashes in a moment. "This is the sage who always
works for work's sake without caring for the results. Thus he
goes beyond the pain of birth and death. Thus he becomes free."
(Ibid. 51.) Then he sees that this attachment is all delusion.
The Self can never be attached. ... Then he goes beyond all the
scriptures and philosophies. (Ibid. 52.) If the mind is deluded
and pulled into a whirlpool by books and scriptures, what is the
good of all these scriptures? One says this, another says that.
What book shall you take? Stand alone! See the glory of your own
soul, and see that you will have to work. Then you will become a
man of firm will. (Ibid. 53.)
Arjuna asks: "Who is a person of established will?" (Ibid. 54.)
[Krishna answers:] "The man who has given up all desires, who
desires nothing, not even this life, nor freedom, nor gods, nor
work, nor anything. When he has become perfectly satisfied, he
has no more cravings." (Ibid. 55.) He has seen the glory of the
Self and has found that the world, and the gods, and heaven are
... within his own Self. Then the gods become no gods; death
becomes no death; life becomes no life. Everything has changed.
"A man is said to be [illumined] if his will has become firm, if
his mind is not disturbed by misery, if he does not desire any
happiness, if he is free of all [attachment], of all fear, of
all anger. (Ibid. 56.) ...
"As the tortoise can draw in his legs, and if you strike him,
not one foot comes out, even so the sage can draw all his
sense-organs inside," (Ibid. 58.) and nothing can force them
out. Nothing can shake him, no temptation or anything. Let the
universe tumble about him, it does not make one single ripple in
his mind.
Then comes a very important question. Sometimes people fast for
days. ... When the worst man has fasted for twenty days, he
becomes quite gentle. Fasting and torturing themselves have been
practiced by people all over the world. Krishna's idea is that
this is all nonsense. He says that the senses will for the
moment recede from the man who tortures himself, but will emerge
again with twenty times more [power]. ... What should you do?
The idea is to be natural - no asceticism. Go on, work, only
mind that you are not attached. The will can never be fixed
strongly in the man who has not learnt and practiced the secret
of non-attachment.
I go out and open my eyes. If something is there, I must see it.
I cannot help it. The mind runs after the senses. Now the senses
must give up any reaction to nature.
"Where it is dark night for the [sense-bound] world, the self
controlled [man] is awake. It is daylight for him. ... And where
the world is awake, the sage sleeps." (Ibid. 69.) Where is the
world awake? In the senses. People want to eat and drink and
have children, and then they die a dog's death. ... They are
always awake for the senses. Even their religion is just for
that. They invent a God to help them, to give them more women,
more money, more children - never a God to help them become more
godlike! "Where the whole world is awake, the sage sleeps. But
where the ignorant are asleep, there the sage keeps awake"
(Ibid. 69.) - in the world of light where man looks upon himself
not as a bird, not as an animal, not as a body, but as infinite
spirit, deathless, immortal. There, where the ignorant are
asleep, and do not have time, nor intellect, nor power to
understand, there the sage is awake. That is daylight for him.
"As all the rivers of the world constantly pour their waters
into the ocean, but the ocean's grand, majestic nature remains
undisturbed and unchanged, so even though all the senses bring
in sensations from nature, the ocean-like heart of the sage
knows no disturbance, knows no fear." (Ibid. 70.) Let miseries
come in millions of rivers and happiness in hundreds! I am no
slave to misery! I am no slave to happiness!
THE GITA III
(Delivered in San Francisco, on May 29, 1900)
[This article was recorded by Ida Ansell in shorthand. As,
however, Swamiji's speed was too great for her in her early
days, dots are put in the articles to indicate the omissions,
while the words within square brackets are added by way of
linking up the disconnected parts.]
Arjuna asks: "You just advised action, and yet you uphold
knowledge of Brahman as the highest form of life. Krishna, if
you think that knowledge is better than action, why do you tell
me to act?" (Gita III. 1.)
[Shri Krishna]: "From ancient times these two systems have come
down to us. The Sânkhya philosophers advance the theory of
knowledge. The Yogis advance the theory of work. But none can
attain to peace by renouncing actions. None in this life can
stop activity even for a moment. Nature's qualities [Gunas] will
make him act. He who stops his activities and at the same time
is still thinking about them attains to nothing; he only becomes
a hypocrite. But he who by the power of his mind gradually
brings his sense-organs under control, employing them in work,
that man is better. Therefore do thou work." (Ibid. 2-8.) ...
"Even if you have known the secret that you have no duty, that
you are free, still you have to work for the good of others.
Because whatever a great man does, ordinary people will do also.
(Ibid. 20-21.) If a great man who has attained peace of mind and
freedom ceases to work, then all the rest without that knowledge
and peace will try to imitate him, and thus confusion would
arise. (Ibid. 22-24.)
"Behold, Arjuna, there is nothing that I do not possess and
nothing that I want to acquire. And yet I continue to work. If I
stopped work for a moment, the whole universe would [be
destroyed]. (Ibid. 22-24.) That which the ignorant do with
desire for results and gain, let the wise do without any
attachment and without any desire for results and gain." (Ibid.
25.)
Even if you have knowledge, do not disturb the childlike faith
of the ignorant. On the other hand, go down to their level and
gradually bring them up. (Ibid. 26, 29.) That is a very powerful
idea, and it has become the ideal in India. That is why you can
see a great philosopher going into a temple and worshipping
images. It is not hypocrisy.
Later on we read what Krishna says, "Even those who worship
other deities are really worshipping me." (Ibid. IX. 23.) It is
God incarnate whom man is worshipping. Would God be angry if you
called Him by the wrong name? He would be no God at all! Can't
you understand that whatever a man has in his own heart is God -
even if he worships a stone? What of that!
We will understand more clearly if we once get rid of the idea
that religion consists in doctrines. One idea of religion has
been that the whole world was born because Adam ate the apple,
and there is no way of escape. Believe in Jesus Christ - in a
certain man's death! But in India there is quite a different
idea. [There] religion means realisation, nothing else. It does
not matter whether one approaches the destination in a carriage
with four horses, in an electric car, or rolling on the ground.
The goal is the same. For the [Christians] the problem is how to
escape the wrath of the terrible God. For the Indians it is how
to become what they really are, to regain their lost Selfhood.
...
Have you realised that you are spirit? When you say, "I do,"
what is meant by that - this lump of flesh called the body or
the spirit, the infinite, ever blessed, effulgent, immortal? You
may be the greatest philosopher, but as long as you have the
idea that you are the body, you are no better than the little
worm crawling under your foot! No excuse for you! So much the
worse for you that you know all the philosophies and at the same
time think you are the body! Body-gods, that is what you are! Is
that religion?
Religion is the realisation of spirit as spirit. What are we
doing now? Just the opposite, realising spirit as matter. Out of
the immortal God we manufacture death and matter, and out of
dead dull matter we manufacture spirit. ...
If you [can realise Brahman] by standing on your head, or on one
foot, or by worshipping five thousand gods with three heads each
- welcome to it! ... Do it any way you can! Nobody has any right
to say anything. Therefore, Krishna says, if your method is
better and higher, you have no business to say that another
man's method is bad, however wicked you may think it.
Again, we must consider, religion is a [matter of] growth, not a
mass of foolish words. Two thousand years ago a man saw God.
Moses saw God in a burning bush. Does what Moses did when he saw
God save you? No man's seeing God can help you the least bit
except that it may excite you and urge you to do the same thing.
That is the whole value of the ancients' examples. Nothing more.
[Just] signposts on the way. No man's eating can satisfy another
man. No man's seeing God can save another man. You have to see
God yourself. All these people fighting about what God's nature
is - whether He has three heads in one body or five heads in six
bodies. Have you seen God? No. ... And they do not believe they
can ever see Him. What fools we mortals be! Sure, lunatics!
[In India] it has come down as a tradition that if there is a
God, He must be your God and my God. To whom does the sun
belong! You say Uncle Sam is everybody's uncle. If there is a
God, you ought to be able to see Him. If not, let Him go.
Each one thinks his method is best. Very good! But remember, it
may be good for you. One food which is very indigestible to one
is very digestible to another. Because it is good for you, do
not jump to the conclusion that your method is everybody's
method, that Jack's coat fits John and Mary. All the uneducated,
uncultured, unthinking men and women have been put into that
sort of strait jacket! Think for yourselves. Become atheists!
Become materialists! That would be better. Exercises the mind!
... What right have you to say that this man's method is wrong?
It may be wrong for you. That is to say, if you undertake the
method, you will be degraded; but that does not mean that he
will be degraded. Therefore, says Krishna, if you have knowledge
and see a man weak, do not condemn him. Go to his level and help
him if you can. He must grow. I can put five bucketfuls of
knowledge into his head in five hours. But what good will it do?
He will be a little worse than before.
Whence comes all this bondage of action? Because we chain the
soul with action. According to our Indian system, there are two
existences: nature on the one side and the Self, the Atman, on
the other. By the word nature is meant not only all this
external world, but also our bodies, the mind, the will, even
down to what says "I". Beyond all that is the infinite life and
light of the soul - the Self, the Atman. ... According to this
philosophy the Self is entirely separate from nature, always was
and always will be. ... There never was a time, when the spirit
could be identified even with the mind. ...
It is self-evident that the food you eat is manufacturing the
mind all the time. It is matter. The Self is above any
connection with food. Whether you eat or not does not matter.
Whether you think or not ... does not matter. It is infinite
light. Its light is the same always. If you put a blue or a
green glass [before a light], what has that to do with the
light? Its colour is unchangeable. It is the mind which changes
and gives the different colours. The moment the spirit leaves
the body, the whole thing goes to pieces.
The reality in nature is spirit. Reality itself - the light of
the spirit - moves and speaks and does everything [through our
bodies, minds, etc.]. It is the energy and soul and life of the
spirit that is being worked upon in different ways by matter....
The spirit is the cause of all our thoughts and body-action and
everything, but it is untouched by good or evil, pleasure or
pain, heat or cold, and all the dualism of nature, although it
lends its light to everything.
"Therefore, Arjuna, all these actions are in nature. Nature ...
is working out her own laws in our bodies and minds. We identify
ourselves with nature and say, 'I am doing this.' This way
delusion seizes us." (Ibid. III. 27.)
We always act under some compulsion. When hunger compels me, I
eat. And suffering is still worse - slavery. That real "I" is
eternally free. What can compel it to do anything? The sufferer
is in nature. It is only when we identify ourselves with the
body that we say, "I am suffering; I am Mr. So and-so" - all
such nonsense. But he who has known the truth, holds himself
aloof. Whatever his body does, whatever his mind does, he does
not care. But mind you, the vast majority of mankind are under
this delusion; and whenever they do any good, they feel that
they are [the doers]. They are not yet able to understand higher
philosophy. Do not disturb their faith! They are shunning evil
and doing good. Great idea! Let them have it! ... They are
workers for good. By degrees they will think that there is
greater glory than that of doing good. They will only witness,
and things are done.... Gradually they will understand. When
they have shunned all evil and done all good, then they will
begin to realise that they are beyond all nature. They are not
the doers. They stand [apart]. They are the ... witness. They
simply stand and look. Nature is begetting all the universe....
They turn their backs. "In the beginning, O beloved, there only
existed that Existence. Nothing else existed. And That
[brooding], everything else was created." (Chhândogya, VI. ii.
2-3.)
"Even those who know the path act impelled by their own nature.
Everyone acts according to his nature. He cannot transcend
it."(Gita, III. 33.) The atom cannot disobey the law. Whether it
is the mental or the physical atom, it must obey the law. "What
is the use of [external restraint]?" (Gita, III. 33.)
What makes the value of anything in life? Not enjoyment, not
possessions. Analyse everything. You will find there is no value
except in experience, to teach us something. And in many cases
it is our hardships that give us better experience than
enjoyment. Many times blows give us better experience than the
caresses of nature.... Even famine has its place and value....
According to Krishna, we are not new beings just come into
existence. Our minds are not new minds.... In modern times we
all know that every child brings [with him] all the past, not
only of humanity, but of the plant life. There are all the past
chapters, and this present chapter, and there are a whole lot of
future chapters before him. Everyone has his path mapped and
sketched and planned out for him. And in spite of all this
darkness, there cannot be anything uncaused - no event, no
circumstance.... It is simply our ignorance. The whole infinite
chain of causation ... is bound one link to another back to
nature. The whole universe is bound by that sort of chain. It is
the universal [chain of] cause and effect, you receiving one
link, one part, I another.... And that [part] is our own nature.
Now Shri Krishna says: "Better die in your own path than attempt
the path of another."(Ibid. 35.) This is my path, and I am down
here. And you are way up there, and I am always tempted to give
up my path thinking I will go there and be with you. And if I go
up, I am neither there nor here. We must not lose sight of this
doctrine. It is all [a matter of] growth. Wait and grow, and you
attain everything; otherwise there will be [great spiritual
danger]. Here is the fundamental secret of teaching religion.
What do you mean by "saving people" and all believing in the
same doctrine? It cannot be. There are the general ideas that
can be taught to mankind. The true teacher will be able to find
out for you what your own nature is. Maybe you do not know it.
It is possible that what you think is your own nature is all
wrong. It has not developed to consciousness. The teacher is the
person who ought to know.... He ought to know by a glance at
your face and put you on [your path]. We grope about and
struggle here and there and do all sorts of things and make no
progress until the time comes when we fall into that
life-current and are carried on. The sign is that the moment we
are in that stream we will float. Then there is no more
struggle. This is to be found out. Then die in that [path]
rather than giving it up and taking hold of another.
Instead, we start a religion and make a set of dogmas and betray
the goal of mankind and treat everyone [as having] the same
nature. No two persons have the same mind or the same body. ...
No two persons have the same religion....
If you want to be religious, enter not the gate of any organised
religions. They do a hundred times more evil than good, because
they stop the growth of each one's individual development. Study
everything, but keep your own seat firm. If you take my advice,
do not put your neck into the trap. The moment they try to put
their noose on you, get your neck out and go somewhere else.
[As] the bee culling honey from many flowers remains free, not
bound by any flower, be not bound.... Enter not the door of any
organised religion. [Religion] is only between you and your God,
and no third person must come between you. Think what these
organised religions have done! What Napoleon was more terrible
than those religious persecutions? . . . If you and I organise,
we begin to hate every person. It is better not to love, if
loving only means hating others. That is no love. That is hell!
If loving your own people means hating everybody else, it is the
quintessence of selfishness and brutality, and the effect is
that it will make you brutes. Therefore, better die working out
your own natural religion than following another's natural
religion, however great it may appear to you. (Ibid. 35.)
"Beware, Arjuna, lust and anger are the great enemies. These are
to be controlled. These cover the knowledge even of those [who
are wise]. This fire of lust is unquenchable. Its location is in
the sense-organs and in the mind. The Self desires nothing.
(Ibid. 37, 40.)
"This Yoga I taught in ancient times [to Vivaswân; Vivaswan
taught it to Manu]. ... Thus it was that the knowledge descended
from one thing to another. But in time this great Yoga was
destroyed. That is why I am telling it to you again today."
(Ibid. IV. 1-3.)
Then Arjuna asks, "Why do you speak thus? You are a man born
only the other day, and [Vivaswan was born long before you].
What do you mean that you taught him?" (Ibid. 4.)
Then Krishna says, "O Arjuna, you and I have run the cycle of
births and deaths many times, but you are not conscious of them
all. I am without beginning, birthless, the absolute Lord of all
creation. I through my own nature take form. Whenever virtue
subsides and wickedness prevails, I come to help mankind. For
the salvation of the good, for the destruction of wickedness,
for the establishment of spirituality I come from time to time.
Whosoever wants to reach me through whatsoever ways, I reach him
through that. But know, Arjuna, none can ever swerve from my
path." (Ibid. 5-8, 11.) None ever did. How can we? None swerves
from His path.
... All societies are based upon bad generalisation. The law can
only be formed upon perfect generalisation. What is the old
saying: Every law has its exception? ... If it is a law, it
cannot be broken. None can break it. Does the apple break the
law of gravitation? The moment a law is broken, no more universe
exists. There will come a time when you will break the law, and
that moment your consciousness, mind, and body will melt away.
There is a man stealing there. Why does he steal? You punish
him. Why can you not make room for him and put his energy to
work? ... You say, "You are a sinner," and many will say he has
broken the law. All this herd of mankind is forced [into
uniformity] and hence all trouble, sin, and weakness.... The
world is not as bad as you think. It is we fools who have made
it evil. We manufacture our own ghosts and demons, and then ...
we cannot get rid of them. We put our hands before our eyes and
cry: "Somebody give us light." Fools! Take your hands from your
eyes! That is all there is to it.... We call upon the gods to
save us and nobody blames himself. That is the pity of it. Why
is there so much evil in society? What is it they say? Flesh and
the devil and the woman. Why make these things [up]? Nobody asks
you to make them [up]. "None, O Arjuna, can swerve from my
path." (Ibid. 11.) We are fools, and our paths are foolish. We
have to go through all this Mâyâ. God made the heaven, and man
made the hell for himself.
"No action can touch me. I have no desire for the results of
action. Whosoever knows me thus knows the secret and is not
bound by action. The ancient sages, knowing this secret [could
safely engage in action]. Do thou work in the same fashion.
(Ibid. 14-15.)
"He who sees in the midst of intense activity, intense calm, and
in the midst of intensest peace is intensely active [is wise
indeed]. (Ibid 18.) ... This is the question: With every sense
and every organ active, have you that tremendous peace [so that]
nothing can disturb you? Standing on Market Street, waiting for
the car with all the rush ... going on around you, are you in
meditation - calm and peaceful? In the cave, are you intensely
active there with all quiet about you? If you are, you are a
Yogi, otherwise not.
"[The seers call him wise] whose every attempt is free, without
any desire for gain, without any selfishness." (Ibid. 19). Truth
can never come to us as long as we are selfish. We colour
everything with our own selves. Things come to us as they are.
Not that they are hidden, not at all! We hide them. We have the
brush. A thing comes, and we do not like it, and we brush a
little and then look at it. ... We do not want to know. We paint
everything with ourselves. In all action the motive power is
selfishness. Everything is hidden by ourselves. We are like the
caterpillar which takes the thread out of his own body and of
that makes the cocoon, and behold, he is caught. By his own work
he imprisons himself. That is what we are doing. The moment I
say "me" the thread makes a turn. "I and mine," another turn. So
it goes. ...
We cannot remain without action for a moment. Act! But just as
when your neighbour asks you, "Come and help me!" have you
exactly the same idea when you are helping yourself. No more.
Your body is of no more value than that of John. Don't do
anything more for your body than you do for John. That is
religion.
"He whose efforts are bereft of all desire and selfishness has
burnt all this bondage of action with the fire of knowledge. He
is wise." (Ibid. 19.) Reading books cannot do that. The ass can
be burdened with the whole library; that does not make him
learned at all. What is the use of reading many books? "Giving
up all attachment to work, always satisfied, not hoping for
gain, the wise man acts and is beyond action." (Ibid. 20.) ...
Naked I came out of my mother's womb and naked I return.
Helpless I came and helpless I go. Helpless I am now. And we do
not know [the goal]. It is terrible for us to think about it. We
get such odd ideas! We go to a medium and see if the ghost can
help us. Think of the weakness! Ghosts, devils, gods, anybody -
come on! And all the priests, all the charlatans! That is just
the time they get hold of us, the moment we are weak. Then they
bring in all the gods.
I see in my country a man becomes strong, educated, becomes a
philosopher, and says, "All this praying and bathing is
nonsense." ... The man's father dies, and his mother dies. That
is the most terrible shock a Hindu can have. You will find him
bathing in every dirty pool, going into the temple, licking the
dust. ... Help anyone! But we are helpless. There is no help
from anyone. That is the truth. There have been more gods than
human beings; and yet no help. We die like dogs - no help.
Everywhere beastliness, famine, disease, misery, evil! And all
are crying for help. But no help. And yet, hoping against hope,
we are still screaming for help. Oh, the miserable condition!
Oh, the terror of it! Look into your own heart! One half of [the
trouble] is not our fault, but the fault of our parents. Born
with this weakness, more and more of it was put into our heads.
Step by step we go beyond it.
It is a tremendous error to feel helpless. Do not seek help from
anyone. We are our own help. If we cannot help ourselves, there
is none to help us. ... "Thou thyself art thy only friend, thou
thyself thy only enemy. There is no other enemy but this self of
mine, no other friend but myself." (Ibid. VI. 5.) This is the
last and greatest lesson, and Oh, what a time it takes to learn
it! We seem to get hold of it, and the next moment the old wave
comes. The backbone breaks. We weaken and again grasp for that
superstition and help. Just think of that huge mass of misery,
and all caused by this false idea of going to seek for help!
Possibly the priest says his routine words and expects
something. Sixty thousand people look to the skies and pray and
pay the priest. Month after month they still look, still pay and
pray. ... Think of that! Is it not lunacy? What else is it? Who
is responsible? You may preach religion, but to excite the minds
of undeveloped children... ! You will have to suffer for that.
In your heart of hearts, what are you? For every weakening
thought you have put into anybody's head you will have to pay
with compound interest. The law of Karma must have its pound of
flesh. ...
There is only one sin. That is weakness. When I was a boy I read
Milton's Paradise Lost. The only good man I had any respect for
was Satan. The only saint is that soul that never weakens, faces
everything, and determines to die game.
Stand up and die game! ... Do not add one lunacy to another. Do
not add your weakness to the evil that is going to come. That is
all I have to say to the world. Be strong! ... You talk of
ghosts and devils. We are the living devils. The sign of life is
strength and growth. The sign of death is weakness. Whatever is
weak, avoid! It is death. If it is strength, go down into hell
and get hold of it! There is salvation only for the brave. "None
but the brave deserves the fair." None but the bravest deserves
salvation. Whose hell? Whose torture? Whose sin? Whose weakness?
Whose death? Whose disease?
You believe in God. If you do, believe in the real God. "Thou
art the man, thou the woman, thou the young man walking in the
strength of youth, ... thou the old man tottering with his
stick." (Shvetâshvatara, IV. 3.) Thou art weakness. Thou art
fear. Thou art heaven, and Thou art hell. Thou art the serpent
that would sting. Come thou as fear! Come thou as death! Come
thou as misery! ...
All weakness, all bondage is imagination. Speak one word to it,
it must vanish. Do not weaken! There is no other way out....
Stand up and be strong! No fear. No superstition. Face the truth
as it is! If death comes - that is the worst of our miseries -
let it come! We are determined to die game. That is all the
religion I know. I have not attained to it, but I am struggling
to do it. I may not, but you may. Go on!
Where one sees another, one hears another so long as there are
two, there must be fear, and fear is the mother of all [misery].
Where none sees another, where it is all One, there is none to
be miserable, none to be unhappy. (Chhândogya, VII. xxiii-xxiv,
(adapted)) [There is only] the One without a second. Therefore
be not afraid. Awake, arise, and stop not till the goal is
reached!
MOHAMMED
(Delivered on March 25, 1900, in the San Francisco Bay Area)
[This article was recorded by Ida Ansell in shorthand. As,
however, Swamiji's speed was too great for her in her early
days, dots are put in the articles to indicate the omissions,
while the words within square brackets are added by way of
linking up the disconnected parts.]
The ancient message of Krishna is one harmonising three -
Buddha's, Christ's and Mohammed's. Each of the three started an
idea and carried it to its extreme. Krishna antedates all the
other prophets. [Yet, we might say,] Krishna takes the old ideas
and synthesises them, [although] his is the most ancient
message. His message was for the time being submerged by the
advance wave of Buddhism. Today it is the message peculiar to
India. If you will have it so, this afternoon I will take
Mohammed and bring out the particular work of the great Arabian
prophet....
Mohammed [as] a young man ... did not [seem to] care much for
religion. He was inclined to make money. He was considered a
nice young man and very handsome. There was a rich widow. She
fell in love with this young man, and they married. When
Mohammed had become emperor over the larger part of the world,
the Roman and Persian empires were all under his feet, and he
had a number of wives. When one day he was asked which wife he
liked best, he pointed to his first wife: "Because she believed
[in] me first." Women have faith.... Gain independence, gain
everything, but do not lose that characteristic of women! ...
Mohammed's heart was sick at the sin, idolatry and mock worship,
superstitions and human sacrifices, and so on. The Jews were
degraded by the Christians. On the other hand, the Christians
were worse degraded than his own countrymen.
We are always in a hurry. [But] if any great work is to be done,
there must be great preparation. ... After much praying, day and
night, Mohammed began to have dreams and visions. Gabriel
appeared to him in a dream and told him that he was the
messenger of truth. He told him that the message of Jesus, of
Moses, and all the prophets would be lost and asked him to go
and preach. Seeing the Christians preaching politics in the name
of Jesus, seeing the Persians preaching dualism, Mohammed said:
"Our God is one God. He is the Lord of all that exists. There is
no comparison between Him and any other."
God is God. There is no philosophy, no complicated code of
ethics. "Our God is one without a second, and Mohammed is the
Prophet." ... Mohammed began to preach it in the streets of
Mecca. ... They began to persecute him, and he fled into the
city of [Medina]. He began to fight, and the whole race became
united. [Mohammedanism] deluged the world in the name of the
Lord. The tremendous conquering power! ...
You ... people have very hard ideas and are so superstitious and
prejudiced! These messengers must have come from God, else how
could they have been so great? You look at every defect. Each
one of us has his defects. Who hasn't? I can point out many
defects in the Jews. The wicked are always looking for defects.
... Flies come and seek for the [ulcer], and bees come only for
the honey in the flower. Do not follow the way of the fly but
that of the bee....
Mohammed married quite a number of wives afterwards. Great men
may marry two hundred wives each. "Giants" like you, I would not
allow to marry one wife. The characters of the great souls are
mysterious, their methods past our finding out. We must not
judge them. Christ may judge Mohammed. Who are you and I? Little
babies. What do we understand of these great souls? ...
[Mohammedanism] came as a message for the masses. ... The
first message was equality. ... There is one religion - love. No
more question of race, colour, [or] anything else. Join it! That
practical quality carried the day. ... The great message was
perfectly simple. Believe in one God, the creator of heaven and
earth. All was created out of nothing by Him. Ask no questions.
...
Their temples are like Protestant churches. ... no music, no
paintings, no pictures. A pulpit in the corner; on that lies the
Koran. The people all stand in line. No priest, no person, no
bishop. ... The man who prays must stand at the side of the
audience. Some parts are beautiful. ...
These old people were all messengers of God. I fall down and
worship them; I take the dust of their feet. But they are dead!
... And we are alive. We must go ahead! ... Religion is not an
imitation of Jesus or Mohammed. Even if an imitation is good, it
is never genuine. Be not an imitation of Jesus, but be Jesus,
You are quite as great as Jesus, Buddha, or anybody else. If we
are not ... we must struggle and be. I would not be exactly like
Jesus. It is unnecessary that I should be born a Jew. ...
The greatest religion is to be true to your own nature. Have
faith in yourselves! If you do not exist, how can God exist, or
anybody else? Wherever you are, it is this mind that perceives
even the Infinite. I see God, therefore He exists. If I cannot
think of God, He does not exist [for me]. This is the grand
march of our human progress.
These [great souls] are signposts on the way. That is all they
are. They say, "Onward, brothers!" We cling to them; we never
want to move. We do not want to think; we want others to think
for us. The messengers fulfil their mission. They ask to be up
and doing. A hundred years later we cling to the message and go
to sleep.
Talking about faith and belief and doctrine is easy, but it is
so difficult to build character and to stem the tide of the
senses. We succumb. We become hypocrites. ...
[Religion] is not a doctrine, [not] a rule. It is a process.
That is all. [Doctrines and rules] are all for exercise. By that
exercise we get strong and at last break the bonds and become
free. Doctrine is of no use except for gymnastics. ... Through
exercise the soul becomes perfect. That exercise is stopped when
you say, "I believe." ...
"Whenever virtue subsides and immorality abounds, I take human
form. In every age I come for the salvation of the good, for the
destruction of the wicked, for the establishment of
spirituality." (Gita, IV. 7-8.)
[Such] are the great messengers of light. They are our great
teachers, our elder brothers. But we must go our own way!
VILVAMANGALA
(Found in the papers of Miss S. E. Waldo by Swami
Raghavananda when he was in the U.S.A.)
This is a story from one of the books of India, called "Lives of
Saints". There was a young man, a Brahmin by birth, in a certain
village. The man fell in love with a bad woman in another
village. There was a big river between the two villages, and
this man, every day, used to go to that girl, crossing this
river in a ferry boat. Now, one day he had to perform the
obsequies of his father, and so, although he was longing, almost
dying to go to the girl, he could not. The ceremonies had to be
performed, and all those things had to be undergone; it is
absolutely necessary in Hindu society. He was fretting and
fuming and all that, but could not help it. At last the ceremony
ended, and night came, and with the night, a tremendous howling
storm arose. The rain was pouring down, and the river was lashed
into gigantic waves. It was very dangerous to cross. Yet he went
to the bank of the river. There was no ferry boat. The ferrymen
were afraid to cross, but he would go; his heart was becoming
mad with love for the girl, so he would go. There was a log
floating down, and he got that, and with the help of it, crossed
the river, and getting to the other side dragged the log up,
threw it on the bank, and went to the house. The doors were
closed. He knocked at the door, but the wind was howling, and
nobody heard him. So he went round the walls and at last found
what he thought to be a rope, hanging from the wall. He clutched
at it, saying to himself, "Oh, my love has left a rope for me to
climb." By the help of that rope he climbed over the wall, got
to the other side, missed his footing, and fell, and noise
aroused the inmates of the house, and the came out and found the
man there in a faint. She revived him, and noticing that he was
smelling very unpleasantly, she said, "What is the matter with
you? Why this stench on your body? How did you come into the
house?" He said, "Why, did not my love put that rope there?" She
smiled, and said, "What love? We are for money, and do you think
that I let down a rope for you, fool that you are? How did you
cross the river?" "Why, I got hold of a log of wood." "Let us go
and see," said the girl. The rope was a cobra, a tremendously
poisonous serpent, whose least touch is death. It had its head
in a hole, and was getting in when the man caught hold of its
tail, and he thought it was a rope. The madness of love made him
do it. When the serpent has its head in its hole, and its body
out, and you catch hold of it, it will not let its head come
out; so the man climbed up by it, but the force of the pull
killed the serpent. "Where did you get the log?" "It was
floating down the river." It was a festering dead body; the
stream had washed it down and that he took for a log, which
explained why he had such an unpleasant odour. The woman looked
at him and said, "I never believed in love; we never do; but, if
this is not love, the Lord have mercy on me. We do not know what
love is. But, my friend, why do you give that heart to a woman
like me? Why do you not give it to God? You will be perfect." It
was a thunderbolt to the man's brain. He got a glimpse of the
beyond for a moment. "Is there a God?" "Yes, yes, my friend,
there is," said the woman. And the man walked on, went into a
forest, began to weep and pray. "I want Thee, Oh Lord! This tide
of my love cannot find a receptacle in little human beings. I
want to love where this mighty river of my love can go, the
ocean of love; this rushing tremendous river of my love cannot
enter into little pools, it wants the infinite ocean. Thou art
there; come Thou to me." So he remained there for years. After
years he thought he had succeeded, he became a Sannyasin and he
came into the cities. One day he was sitting on the bank of a
river, at one of the bathing places, and a beautiful young girl,
the wife of a merchant of the city, with her servant, came and
passed the place. The old man was again up in him, the beautiful
face again attracted him. The Yogi looked and looked, stood up
and followed the girl to her home. Presently the husband came
by, and seeing the Sannyasin in the yellow garb he said to him,
"Come in, sir, what can I do for you?" The Yogi said, "I will
ask you a terrible thing." "Ask anything, sir, I am a Grihastha
(householder), and anything that one asks I am ready to give."
"I want to see your wife." The man said, "Lord, what is this!
Well, I am pure, and my wife is pure, and the Lord is a
protection to all. Welcome; come in sir." He came in, and the
husband introduced him to his wife. "What can I do for you?"
asked the lady. He looked and looked, and then said, "Mother,
will you give me two pins from your hair?" "Here they are." He
thrust them into his two eyes saying "Get away, you rascals!
Henceforth no fleshy things for you. If you are to see, see the
Shepherd of the groves of Vrindaban with the eyes of the soul.
Those are all the eyes you have." So he went back into the
forest. There again he wept and wept and wept. It was all that
great flow of love in the man that was struggling to get at the
truth, and at last he succeeded; he gave his soul, the river of
his love, the right direction, and it came to the Shepherd. The
story goes that he saw God in the form of Krishna. Then, for
once, he was sorry that he had lost his eyes, and that he could
only have the internal vision. He wrote some beautiful poems of
love. In all Sanskrit books, the writers first of all salute
their Gurus. So he saluted that girl as his first Guru.