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CHAPTER 5
15 January 1975 am in Buddha Hall
ONE WHO WALKS ALONE
CONFUSED, CHOOSING FOR AND AGAINST, THE WHOLE WORLD GOES ASTRAY. CHOICELESS AND CELEBRATING GOD;
HE IS A TRUE SADHU.
PEOPLE ALL BOUND TOGETHER AS DONKEY TIED TO DONKEY. WHO HAS INNER VISION,
HE’S AUTHENTIC MAN. ONE WHO WALKS ALONE, HE ALONE FINDS TRUTH. HEART ABSORBED IN LOVE
NEVER AGAIN COMES BACK. WHOLENESS IS TOTAL VISION;
EVERYTHING IS HOLY.
SAYS KABIR: IT CAN’T BE UNDERSTOOD. THIS IS SOMETHING UNWRITTEN. NOTHINGNESS DIES, THE SOUNDLESS DIES; EVEN THE INFINITE DIES.
A TRUE LOVER NEVER DIES. SAYS KABIR: KNOW THIS.
All that we know and achieve is going to die. There is no question that one’s worldly riches will disappear, but the wealth that we store up within ourselves will also disappear. The enlightened ones have always said not to amass worldly wealth, but Kabir says that even one’s inner wealth will also die. He says that inner wealth will disappear and that you alone will be saved; he says that experience itself will die and only the experiencer will remain.
It is easy to grasp what he means as far as the riches of the outside world are concerned. We see people dying, leaving wealth, buildings, palaces and kingdoms behind them, but Kabir is saying that one’s inner riches will also have to be left behind. This is a bit subtle, and it is also final. It is the final statement; nothing more remains to be said. So it is important to understand it deeply.
No sooner do you experience something than duality sets in. As soon as you say, “I am pleased” you become two – the pleasure and you. A distinction has been created. First there is the happening, and second, there is the person to whom it has happened. But no distinction can enter into God; you alone can enter there. You cannot take anything with you. You cannot even take your spiritual experience.
NOTHINGNESS DIES, THE SOUNDLESS DIES; EVEN THE INFINITE DIES.
A TRUE LOVER NEVER DIES. SAYS KABIR: KNOW THIS.
Your meditation, your SAMADHI, your KUNDALINI – all will die. All your spiritual experiences will die. You will go alone. So do not cling to these experiences, otherwise you will create a new world for yourself. Before you were amassing wealth; now you are collecting experiences.
People come to me and they say they have experienced light within. It is enjoyable; the inner wealth is very subtle. They say they have experienced the awakening of the KUNDALINI and it is thrilling; they say they experience great peace and happiness within.
Don’t cling to these experiences either, because they are also on the outside. All experiences belong to the outside; an experience is always an experience of the other, of the outer. Don’t cling to ecstasy or peace or freedom, because as soon as you cling to something you create SAMSAR, the world. Clinging is what SAMSAR is. Don’t cling to anything. Only bear in mind that you are a separate entity, and no matter how near and deep an experience may be it is still far away. The experiencer is always aloof, afar.
You are separate from whatsoever you know, so you cannot make God your experience. God can never become the object of your experience because whatsoever becomes an object of your experience is certain to die.
NOTHINGNESS DIES, THE SOUNDLESS DIES; EVEN THE INFINITE DIES
If you say that you have experienced God then that experience will also die, that God will also die. The only man who will be saved is the man who does not create any duality, who does not know what duality is.
God is not separate from you. God is your very existence, your innermost being. He is your very self, your soul. He is the hidden sound lying deep within your being. He is your own song. And just as a dancer is not separate from his dancing, the experience of God is not separate from you. It is not even proper to call it an experience. That is why the Upanishads say that he who says, “I have known,” has not really known Him at all.
How will you know God? To know means there is some distance between the knower and the object that is known. To know a thing some distance is needed, I can see you because you are a little away from me; you can see me because I am at a little distance from you. But how will you see yourself? To see a thing you need some distance.
When you look into a mirror you stand a little away from it; if you go close and put your face against it, it will be difficult for you to see your own face. And if you are able to see a bit of your face it means your eyes are still a tiny distance from the mirror. If your eyes touch the mirror, if they become one with the mirror, then nothing whatsoever will be seen. You may experience a dim figure perhaps, because you and the mirror can never be one; there will always be some distance.
In your deepest depths you are one with God. There is not the slightest distance, not even the most minute space between you and Him. That is why the enlightened man says that as long as he was there, God was not there, and that when God was there, he was not there. Deep down within you, you and God are one.
All experiences will die and only you will be saved, so do not cling to experiences. Even yoga and meditation are to be left behind. But remember that you cannot give something up before you have possessed it. Kabir says that nothingness will die, but first you have to become emptiness, first you have to achieve nothingness. Kabir says that AUM will die and that even the infinite will die, but you still have to become infinite first. How can something that is not, die?
So after listening to this discourse do not be under the impression that it is unnecessary to meditate, that it is unnecessary to attain to AUM, that it is unnecessary to become limitless. Don’t say, “All this is going to die, so why bother trying?” You have not achieved them yet. You have to achieve them first. These words are spoken to warn you against your ego, otherwise the tiniest, most subtle experience will give birth to SAMSAR, to more worldly attachment. And you will be caught is that entanglement once again – subtly so, but trapped nonetheless.
This is what is meant by the Hindi word YOGABHRASHT, meaning one who has fallen from yoga. Such a man has achieved SAMADHI but has then fallen in love with it. He has achieved the highest peak of meditation but has become attached to it. He has failed to reach to non-attachment. He has experienced ecstasy, but he has desired to hold fast to it so as not to lose it. He needed to take one step higher – to leave yoga behind, to leave SAMADHI behind. Such a man is a YOGABHRASHT. Kabir is referring to that last step:
NOTHINGNESS DIES, THE SOUNDLESS DIES; EVEN THE INFINITE DIES.
A TRUE LOVER NEVER DIES.
Why? Love is the only experience which is not separate from you, the only experience in which you are the experience itself. When you are in love you do not feel that you are experiencing love; in a moment of ecstasy you do not feel you are experiencing ecstasy. Understand this a bit more deeply. In the moment of love a person does not feel that he is experiencing love. He only becomes aware of it when the love has gone. Then he feels that he has experienced love.
How can a man be aware in that fiery moment of love? Love is such an intoxication and the feeling of ecstasy is so deep and so extreme that no one can stand apart and think about it, no one can be aloof from it enough to look at it. As long as it lasts one is not conscious of it, but when it passes one is surprised and only then becomes aware that something was there but has now gone. Then you remember it. Then you say, “That was love.” But in the moment of ecstasy itself one is not conscious one is experiencing it.
The experience of love is like the experience of perfect health. Only when you fall ill do you remember that before you were perfectly well and healthy. You only become aware of health during sickness. If there were no illnesses in the world people would not know what health is, they would simply remain healthy and in ignorance about it. Becoming ill reminds you of health. Only when you have a headache do you become aware of your head. When it is fine you never think about it. When the body is perfectly sound a state of bodilessness happens of its own accord and you do not remember the body at all.
When love is profound you have no idea at all what is happening. Then you are in some other world. But it is not a world of knowledge or an experience, it is a world of existence. Then you are not a lover, then you are love itself. Then who is there to know this state? There is no one to stand apart, to remain aloof.
This is why Kabir says that only the lover of RAM does not die. The lover of RAM does not mean the devotees of RAM one sees here and there. Kabir is not talking about this ordinary kind of devotee.
Kabir is talking about a true lover, in the authentic sense of the word. In real love there is no longer any RAM nor any lover of RAM; there is neither God nor devotee. There is only the manifestation of RAM. When the duality is gone, when the devotee and God are both lost, then there is neither worshipper nor worshipped. The devotee and God are both lost, and the river that flows between, touching both the shores, is the love of RAM, the love of God. That love cannot die because all that is perishable is already dead and gone. With any kind of experience a very subtle ego would have lingered, but that too has gone, that too has died.
In reality, the devotee has nothing at all; he has neither yoga, nor SAMADHI, nor miracles. He is totally helpless, totally blank, totally empty. There is not even emptiness because even the experience of emptiness is gone. Through weeping and crying and emptying himself, through effacing himself, he is totally lost. No trace, no sign of him is left behind. That is why Kabir says that the whole world dies but that no one knows how to die rightly.
The man who dies in the right way does not have to die again. Only the death of the true devotee, only Kabir’s kind of death, is the right kind of death. And it is wise and correct death, because first he knew and then he died. He saw death as a step forward; he turned death into a ladder to reach the last point on the journey of life. Just as the drop loses itself and becomes the ocean, we become one with Him when we die.
The man who has surrendered himself at the feet of God is a true devotee. Although he is alive, he is as good as dead, because he has said, “Now only You are. Now I am not.” And in such a man the voice of the ego no longer arises because his own existence is lost, because he has killed himself, because he has killed his ego. Then there is no death for such a man. Then he is not – so who is there to die?
The yogi will die because he is full of ego as he practices his SADHANA. He undertakes penances, learns techniques, practices TANTRA, repeats a mantra – and so he creates an enormous paraphernalia around himself. This simply means he is still there. But the devotee has already gone. The yogi reaches in the end, but the true devotee arrives with the first step. And a yogi can fall.
We have spoken of the word YOGABHRASHT, meaning one who has fallen from yoga – but have you ever heard of BHAKTIBHRASHT, of one who has fallen from devotion! There is not such word as BHAKTIBHRASHT! It is possible for a yogi to fall back because he has to take the final step at the end of his SADHANA. Before this, there is always the possibility of a fall. But for a devotee there is no possibility of a fall. The devotee has to take the final step in the beginning; the yogi will drop his ego when he completes his SADHANA.
But what guarantee is there the yogi will be able to give up his ego? As the ego becomes finer and finer, more and more subtle, it becomes proportionately enchanting and pleasing. And the more subtle it becomes, the sweeter its net becomes. Your ego is bitter and still you are unable to let it go, so how will you be able to drop it in the final stages of yoga when there is a continuous showering of ecstasy on all sides? You did not drop it when it was poison, and now it will be as sweet as nectar. So in the final stages of yoga a moment comes when the yogi has to make a decision to drop the ego which, until then, has been the basis of all his happiness. That is why people fall from yoga. No one falls from devotion. A person on the path of devotion cannot even take the first step if there
is a possibility he will fall. And if he falls, he will immediately turn his back on that path. For a real devotee there is no question of turning back, because the first sutra of devotion is to die, to die once and for all. As Kabir asks, SO WHY DIE HUNDREDS OF TIMES A DAY? Die only once so that you can be saved from the world’s entanglements. From the very first step this is the insistence of the path of devotion.
Whether you choose the path of yoga or the path of devotion you will have to drop your ego. The only difference between the two is that yoga will try to purify you first. When your consciousness is on the point of becoming totally pure, when there is only a faint smoke-screen of ego but the fire is bright and shining, when only a few particles of dust remain, then yoga will ask you to drop the ego. Yoga will purify your ego first and then ask you to throw it away.
The path of devotion asks you to throw away the ego at the beginning, because no matter what you do you will remain impure as long as you continue living with the ego. The ego is poison, so whatever you touch will be polluted. You cannot pour nectar into a contaminated vessel, because then the nectar will be turned into poison as well. And so Kabir says:
A TRUE LOVER NEVER DIES.
In these sutras of Kabir, the name RAM has no special significance. Even if you have never heard the name RAM you can still be a lover of RAM. The Sufi fakirs are lovers of RAM, although they have nothing to do with RAM of the Hindus, the Jewish fakir Hassid is also a lover of RAM. In this connection do not think of RAM as the son of Dasarath. Kabir’s use of this name has no relation to Hindu mythology whatsoever; he uses the name of RAM only to indicate the supreme, to indicate God.
Why can you not attain to the state where you can surrender yourself completely at the feet of God? Why does this not happen to you? Kabir says:
DEATH – THE WHOLE WORLD FEARS. DEATH – MY HEART OVERJOYS.
Why does this not happen to you? Why are you not overjoyed at the prospect of encountering the death the whole world fears? No one is safe from the clutches of death. Everyone has to die. Even if you run away, even if you hide yourself somewhere, at the end you will surely face the jaws of death.
Since death is such a definite part of life why not accept it in an easy and natural fashion? Why can’t you see th joy in death? Why are you running from it? Stop running.
There are some very subtle reasons why this does not happen. The first reason is that the mind is accustomed to dividing a thing in two and then looking at it. The mind is unable to look at the whole. This is the limit of the mind, that it is only able to look at part of something. If I give you a small stone you will not be able to look at it at once in its entirety. At first you will only see one side, and when you turn over it you will see the other side – but then the first side will be hidden from you. You are not even able to look at the whole of the tiniest particle of sand at one time. The capacity of the mind is such that it is only able to see a thing in an incomplete form.
The mind also clings to the part it has seen. It becomes attached to the part it has seen and rejects the other part in fear it may be opposed to the part to which it has already become attached. Because of this difficulty you pass your whole life in tension and unease. You cling to life and try to avoid death. You want to live; you do not want to die. You do not even realize that life and death are just two aspects of the same coin, and so you remain as bereft of life as you are afraid of death. But they are just two sides of the same coin! You spend your time trying to save yourself from death, but at the same time you are missing the chance to live life properly.
You will never be able to live life in its true sense in this way. Look at your past. Have you enjoyed life up to now? Or have you lived in fear? Have you lived properly or have you just been busy making arrangements to live well in the future? If you had learned how to live properly and had lived accordingly, you would most certainly have seen that death is an inevitable part of life, that there is no way to escape from it. If you want to live, then death is definitely going to be part of your life.
The mind looks at things in opposition; it sets one thing against another. The mind says that day and night are two separate things. It says that the night is dark and that the day is bright, that there is sun during the day and no sun at night. Day and night are one. The day becomes night and then the night becomes day. But you are afraid of the night and want to cling to the day.
The mind looks on love and hate as opposites, as separate. This is a mistake, a false belief, an illusion. They are but two aspects of the same coin. You want to hold onto happiness and avoid misery, but they are two sides of the same coin as well. And so you are perplexed; you are in a great dilemma. But this state of perplexity is not because of the world, it is because of your mind. The way your mind looks at things is partial, biased, prejudicial.
And what Kabir says today is relative to this. If you can see the whole, you will be liberated. Then you will be willing to meet death, because life and death are just two different names for one and the same phenomenon. They are two banks of the same river. The man who is not attached to life is not afraid of death. Such a man knows how to live and he knows how to die. He harvests joy and happiness from life and from death as well.
In asking this question, Kabir is saying he has gathered as much nectar as possible from life, that life has given him nectar in abundance:
WHEN WILL I DIE AND GIVE MYSELF IN ECSTASY COMPLETE?
Kabir says the taste of life is unique and that the grace of God is also unique. He says now he has achieved both, now he knows them both, and that he is now ready to experience the taste of death. And if the taste of life is unique, the taste of death will be even more unique because it comes at the end of life. Death is the highest climax in life. It is the highest peak, the Everest of life. And when a man can attain such happiness in life, when he can uncover so many secrets from so insignificant a life, then at life’s final peak what doors will open to him!
CONFUSED, CHOOSING FOR AND AGAINST, THE WHOLE WORLD GOES ASTRAY.
CHOICELESS AND CELEBRATING GOD; HE IS A TRUE SADHU.
The whole world looks at things incorrectly. Everyone divides everything into pros and cons; you divide the world into parts. You say, “I am in favor of this”; you say, “I am not in favor of that.” You think of happiness as being in your favor and of misery as being against you. This is the mistake you make.
CONFUSED, CHOOSING FOR AND AGAINST, THE WHOLE WORLD GOES ASTRAY.
The whole world suffers from this complexity. Be neutral; look at both sides. But to be neutral you have to be apart from the mind, outside the mind. The mind is always partial; the mind cannot look at the whole. The mind looks at one part first and then considers the unseen part as its enemy. Then it becomes involved in fighting against the part it cannot see.
There is no way for the mind to look at the whole, to look at the totality. The mind is like a flashlight, like a torch; it has a focus. When you light a torch only one specific area is lit up; the surrounding space remains in the dark. The mind is not like a lamp that brightens an entire room – consciousness is like a lamp; the mind is like a torch, like a flashlight.
As long as you look through the mind you will see two parts of one whole – you will see the bright side and the dark side. And you will always think of the dark side as your enemy simply because it is the opposite of the bright one. Heraclitus has said, “God is day and night, winter and summer, war and peace, satiety and want,” but you can only see this when there is no mind, when you become neutral. Then you will see that God is both birth and death, that God is both happiness and misery. Then you will also be able to dance in your misery, because misery is God as well. And you will also be able to bow to Satan, because Satan is also God.
If you can dance in your misery who can make you miserable? If you can bow to Satan then who can cheat you? If you can see good in bad, if you can see life in death, then there is transcendence; then you have gone beyond both. Now nothing can harm you. Now there is no need for you to pass through the cycle of birth and death. Now your lesson is over; now you have learned what was to be learned. Now there is nothing more to learn; now there is no need to return. This is one meaning of these words of Kabir.
CONFUSED, CHOOSING FOR AND AGAINST, THE WHOLE WORLD GOES ASTRAY.
The other meaning, the second meaning, is that you have even created FOR AND AGAINST in relation to truth. You say that someone is a Hindu, that someone is a Moslem, that someone is a Christian, that someone is a Jain, that someone is a Buddha – but God exists in all of them at one and the same time. And if, clinging to one aspect, you try to go to Him, to Him who is neutral, to Him who is hidden in all aspects, you will find yourself caught in a great dilemma. You will be caught in
a web of your own words; your principles and your scriptures will have become your chains. If you look deeply into yourself you will find that the Vedas, the Koran and the Bible are hanging like dead weights about your necks. You are being crushed by this burden.
Existence is neutral and you are biased. You say, “I am a Hindu,” but existence does not know what “I am a Hindu” means! These are all mental tricks, intellectual devices. You have created your own ideas about God – and all ideas and suppositions are of the mind! You can only meet God when there is no mind. And when there is no mind how can you be a Hindu or a Christian! People have totally missed truth, Kabir says, because of this complex web of principles, opinions, dogmas and prejudices they have woven for themselves.
CHOICELESS AND CELEBRATING GOD; HE IS A TRUE SADHU.
Real hymns of praise to God will only begin when you have become neutral, Kabir says. So bear in mind that authentic hymns of praise cannot be the prerogative of any particular religious sect. But you have made it this way. You say you are a theist, a believer, and another says he is an atheist, a non-believer. You say you are a theist and so you praise God; another says he is an atheist and does not praise God. To praise God cannot be the sole right of any religious sect.
You only become a devotee of God when you belong to no sect, when you are neither theist nor atheist, neither Hindu nor Moslem; when there are no sects, when there are no adjectives, when you stand naked before truth without prejudice or opinion, when you do not cry aloud who you are. How can “I” be given up while you can still say “I am this” or “I am that”? That “I” will remain as long as you can assert “I am Hindu” or “I am a Moslem”; “I am a Christian”, “I am a BRAHMIN” or “I am an untouchable”; “I believe in this” or “I believe in that”.
When “I” is gone who is there to care about scriptures and principles? You can only reach to God when you are naked, when you have no prejudices whatsoever. And the only man who can reach to God is the man who belongs to no sect. Everyone else will remain behind, wandering aimlessly.
Here Kabir is telling us a unique thing:
CHOICELESS AND CELEBRATING GOD; HE IS A TRUE SADHU.
Kabir is saying that the man who worships God without belonging to any sect is a true seeker. He is neither a Hindu nor a Moslem, neither a believer nor a non-believer. The true seeker has no beliefs or prejudices; he is simply a man who knows nothing but love. He is not interested in academic discussions; he is not guided by intellectual decisions, he lives by the dictates of his heart. No one has ever reached God with the help of his intellect. And now we shall try to understand the reason.
The man who reaches God does so with the help of his heart. As I have told you, the intellect can only see half of a thing, only a part; the heart can see the whole. God is whole, total; if you only see half of Him you have missed. God is total, perfect, complete, and you can only see Him through the heart. The total is only seen in its totality through the heart. That is why this is a matter for love.
Only a man who is neutral can truly worship the Lord. Do not divide yourself by beliefs. Don’t say “I believe in this” or “I believe in that”. Only say this much, “I am ignorant; how can I believe? Only the enlightened ones can have beliefs. I am ignorant; how can I assert what truth is? I shall be able to see when I know truth.” Just say this much.
Bear in mind that those who know never state they have a particular belief or hold a particular opinion. The man who has achieved truth has no need for opinions. This is the difficulty. How can someone who has not achieved truth form an opinion of it? The man who has attained truth is beyond any opinion, and the man who has not achieved truth should not form any. An ignorant person cannot have an opinion because to have an opinion means that you know something, that you believe in something, that you have reached a decision about something, that you have proven something and that now you believe it. Say this much only, “I am ignorant. How can I have an opinion? I do not know and so I am seeking. If I knew why would I seek? If I knew I would be silent.” Say only this much.
This is why so-called learned men do not even seek; they simply think they know. They have committed the scriptures to memory and repeat them like parrots. They already think they know it all, and so any possibility of a search is thwarted. If you want to stop looking then just hold fast to an opinion.
An opinion can never be complete. How can the opinion or belief of an ignorant man be complete? His opinion is like a house built on sand; it is in danger of toppling at any moment. His belief is like a palace built of cards; it will tumble down at the slightest gust of wind. And so you remain afraid to come face to face with any opposition to your beliefs. You avoid people who might shake your foundations, who might undermine your faith, who might threaten the beliefs you cherish. Of what value are such beliefs? They are not even worth two PAISE.
The faith that is afraid of being shaken is, in fact, no faith at all. That is why you refuse to listen to any discussion of views that are contrary to those you hold. A Hindu will not read a book on Mohammedanism and a Moslem will not read a book on Hinduism. That might create complications. Their faith in their beliefs might be shaken; their faith is not solid enough. Such faith is of no value at all. Let it be shaken! Let it crumble! It is good to be without belief, to be without faith, but it is important to be true, to be sincere. A shaky belief is something that has been planted in you forcibly. It is a false thing. It is not real faith; it is not true belief.
When you abandon sects you become religious. Religion is born where sects leave off. And this happens because when there are no more thoughts the heart becomes active. Love manifests when the intellect is undisturbed, when it is calm, at peace. About the manifestations of this love, Kabir has this to say:
CHOICELESS AND CELEBRATING GOD; HE IS A TRUE SADHU.
Seeker after seeker exists, SADHU after SADHU exists, but it is difficult to find a true seeker. The world is such a wonderful place that even seekers after God become entangled in supporting various religious sects! Even they take sides.
There is one seeker who comes to me often. He says, “I am a Jain SADHU.” Can a SADHU also be a Jain? Such an attitude could be understood if something like a non-SADHU existed. Another man comes to me and says, “I am a Buddhist SADHU.” Look at the beauty of this – the SADHU also professes to be a Buddhist! Please leave something for those who are not SADHUS!
It is understandable that a non-SADHU can be a Buddhist or a Jain or a Hindu or a Christian – this we can tolerate; we can say, “This man has no sense; he does not know the truth” – but these men are claiming to be SADHUS as well. They have renounced the world, their homes, their wives, their children, their wealth – they have forsaken everything – but they will not give up their religion, whatever it may be. Whether such a man goes to the jungle or to the Himalayas he remains either a Jain or a Hindu or a Moslem. There is no change in him at all. Kabir says that the SADHU who has no FOR AND AGAINST in him, HE IS A TRUE SADHU.
Kabir is a rustic, a rural man, and so he uses the symbols found in the villages. He says: PEOPLE ALL BOUND TOGETHER
AS DONKEY TIED TO DONKEY. WHO HAS INNER VISION, HE’S AUTHENTIC MAN.
If you have some experience with donkeys you will understand Kabir. There were a number of donkeys in my native place and so I know what it is Kabir wants to say. If you tie a donkey to a peg stuck in the ground it is possible the donkey may run away carrying the peg along with it; if you tie one donkey to another donkey then neither of them goes anywhere at all. What happens? They cannot run away because one donkey is pulling the rope towards the left and the other is pulling it towards the right.
PEOPLE ALL BOUND TOGETHER AS DONKEY TIED TO DONKEY.
The donkeys go nowhere at all. They stand there the whole night – one moving to the left, one moving to the right. They are donkeys after all; there is no way they can go away together.
I saw this in my native village. At first I was also perplexed and could not understand why the donkeys were tied to each other in such a way, but after a while I understood that this was the easiest way to keep them safely in the shed. They might pull out a peg, so why even bother to hammer one into the ground? After a hard day’s work the potter used to come home in the evening and tie one donkey to another. This method was satisfactory; it was enough. The donkeys would never go anywhere; he would still find them there even if he didn’t return for a long time. How could they run away? They were pulling each other in opposite directions.
You may have heard the story of a very rational donkey that lived in ancient Greece. He was a great philosopher and a great logician. All donkeys are philosophers and logicians; to live by the intellect is to live like a donkey, to be stupid like a donkey.
Once this particular donkey was very hungry, and a mischievous man, deciding to have some fun with him, placed a pile of grass on each side of him. The donkey was standing in the middle and both piles were at equal distances from him. There was no rope about his neck; he was free, unfettered. But he was a rational donkey, and so he began to consider whether he should go to the right or whether he should go to the left. No rational donkey or man will take a step without thinking about it first.
His hunger grew very sharp, but still he was unable to reach a decision. Both choices seemed equal; both piles were the same distance away. First he would take a step towards the right, but then he would think, “What’s wrong with going to the left?” He would take a step to the left and then argue with himself, “What’s wrong with going to the right?”
And so the donkey could not decide. He just stood there thinking and arguing with himself.
But hunger won’t wait for you to think, to make up your mind, and at last his hunger got the best of him and he collapsed – but he kept on thinking. It is said the donkey died hungry. The piles of grass remained untouched, remained as they were, and the donkey remained in the middle. He could not decide.
CONFUSED, CHOOSING FOR AND AGAINST, THE WHOLE WORLD GOES ASTRAY.
Your condition is the same. God is piled high on both sides of you, and yet you are dying of hunger because you cannot make up your mind. You are wavering. You ask, “What should I do? Should I be a Hindu or a Moslem or a Christian or a Buddhist? In whom should I believe? Who should I worship? Which scriptures should I follow? Which temple should I attend?” Life is fleeting and you are unable to reach a decision. But the decision will never happen because the intellect’s speciality is its inability to reach a decision.
The intellect is exactly like the parliament of India. If something has to be decided there, it never gets done at all. Whenever the intellect decides upon something one part of it keeps on rejecting the decision. It will be a majority decision; it will be a decision that has not been approved by all. If there were a country called Intellect and one hundred members in its parliament, sixty would give their consent to a proposal and forty would oppose it. The forty would set forth all sorts of arguments, declaring the approval of the proposal would be harmful to the country.
All decisions of the intellect are parliamentary decisions. And the majority cannot be trusted here either. The balance of power keeps fluctuating. Today’s majority may be a minority tomorrow and again the proposals will change.
The intellect can never move beyond doubt. To be definite is not a characteristic of the intellect; it is not in its nature. On the other hand, to be doubtful is its very nature. How can doubt ever reach a decision? How can doubt ever arrive at a definite conclusion? No matter what decision is reached it will be a temporary one. There will always be an upset after a time because the opposition is forever trying to canvass votes on its own behalf and will end up being the majority by and by. And the decisions of this new majority will not last forever either. They will meet with the same fate as those of the party that was in the majority before.
The intellect can never reach unanimous decision; only the heart can do that. The intellect functions in division, in parts, and not as a whole. And those parts are always in opposition to each other. Whenever you decide to do a certain thing there will always be a thousand alternatives in front of you. But you can only act upon one decision at a time, and so no matter which decision the intellect makes, there is always some repentance involved.
Let us take an example. You have come here to listen to me. By now you could have opened your shop and done some business. You could have caught a big customer in your net; you could have made a handsome profit. But you have missed that. When you go back to your shop your neighbor will ask, “Where were you? Mr. So-and-so was here. He had some purchases he wanted to make and he inquired after you.” When you hear this you begin to regret that you came here to listen to me. Perhaps it would have been better had you gone straight to your shop. You begin to ask yourself what profit there was in hearing about Kabir. “I missed a wealthy customer,” you will say. “Who knows how big the sale might have been?” you will ask yourself.
Now suppose you had not come here and were doing business in your shop as usual. A man, returning from this discourse, runs into your shop and says, “What are you doing sitting here? All your goods will still be here when you have gone! We have just come from hearing a discourse on Kabir. It was as if nectar poured down upon us from above. Our hearts were filled with ecstasy. What are you doing here? Why are you wasting your life?” When you hear these words your mind will immediately begin to repent once again.
There will always be alternatives and time is limited for you. Time is very short and there are thousands of things worth doing, so you will have to make a choice. But no matter which choice the intellect makes you will repent it, because you never know what would have happened had you chosen one of the alternatives. The intellect always says, “I wonder what would have happened had I done this,” or “I wonder what would have happened had I not done that.” The intellect is always scratching its wounds and repenting.
So no matter what you do, you will regret it. Whether you marry or do not marry, you will repent. Many married people come to me. They say they are caught up, entangled in the institution of marriage. “We don’t know how to get out of it,” they say, “It is a problem for us.” And those who are not married tell me they feel it is necessary to experience married life, otherwise they will never know what marriage is like. But they do not know how to move into a marriage. Young people ask me whether they should get married or not. I tell them that no matter what they do they will repent it. Whatsoever you do, this is guaranteed; the intellect always repents.
Why does this happen? This happens because the half that was rejected is waiting for the opportunity to say, “See, I warned you not to do that. You ignored my warning and did the opposite. Now you are repenting. In future, follow my advice.” You will continue to repent until you reach a decision in which you are total. Until then your life will be nothing more than repentance. This totality is only achieved when you become neutral.
CONFUSED, CHOOSING FOR AND AGAINST, THE WHOLE WORLD GOES ASTRAY. CHOICELESS AND CELEBRATING GOD;
HE IS A TRUE SADHU.
The man who has given up all taking of sides, who has dropped all divisions, and who has merged in love is the only seeker who becomes enlightened. This merger can only happen in love, because love has no relation whatsoever to the intellect. This is why the intellect says that love is blind, that love is mad; this is why it says you shouldn’t fall into the complexities of love; this is why it says when you are caught in love’s entangled web you are lost. The intellect says, “If you stay with me you will be safe. I can think; I can argue; I can discuss for and against; I will be able to help you. But if you go with the heart you will be like a blind man. With the heart there is no thinking, no deliberation, no argument. You will go mad.”
There is no greater vision, no more powerful perception than love – but the intellect says that love is blind. Those who have achieved the eye of love have seen all – but the intellect says that love is blind. And from the point of view of the intellect love is definitely blind, because the intellect says to weigh everything, to consider all the for’s and against’s before taking any action. And the heart? The heart simply steps into the darkness; the heart takes a jump without thinking about it at all.
The intellect considers the heart to be blind; that is why the intellect has suppressed it. You depend on your intellect. You also do not listen to your heart. You are afraid and so you argue. You say, “Who knows where the heart will lead me?” But Kabir says the seeker who listens to the heart is the only one who is wise, the only one who is a true seeker.
The intellect looks upon love as something one makes, as an act. The intellect considers itself to be very rational, to be very sensible indeed, but what have you ever achieved by thinking, by arguing? Whatsoever has been achieved has been achieved by those who went madly into love. Love will not only annihilate the intellect, love will efface you as well. Love is the fire in which everything is reduced to ashes. Only God will be saved. Only God cannot burn.
PEOPLE ALL BOUND TOGETHER AS DONKEY TIED TO DONKEY.
People are so tied down by their opinions, but being FOR AND AGAINST – just like donkeys are tied to each other – that they have come to a standstill; they are unable to go anywhere. They simply cannot move any more. Your whole life is like this. You spend your lives tied to things.
WHO HAS INNER VISION HE’S AUTHENTIC MAN.
Kabir says that the man with inner vision will be freed from these ropes, from this bondage. The intellect belongs to the world of thoughts, to the divisions of FOR AND AGAINST, but the man of inner vision is one who has left all intellectual divisions behind, who has gone deep within himself and reached to his very center.
At present you look at the world through the intellect. But there is another way to look at the world. And it is like this – step down from your brain and into your heart, into the center of life where your
soul is. Look at the world from there. Inner vision means looking at the world from this center; intellectual vision is looking from the periphery.
When you start to look at the world with inner vision, everything changes; a new manifestation happens. Where yesterday you only saw an object, today you see God. You will see a friend in someone you saw as an enemy yesterday. Where the day before you saw only death, today you will see a doorway to ecstasy. Whatever your intellect told you before yesterday will become meaningless to you now. Now you are looking at life from an absolutely new center.
When the perspective is changed, everything changes. For example – you are enclosed in a dark room with a hole in one wall, and you are looking out at the world through it. You will see something of course, but you will not see the whole view. But based on what your limited range has perceived, you will make decisions about the whole world. And then someone comes and takes you outside; you are taken out of the room into the open sky. You see the moon, the stars, the vast, infinite sky. Now you will be like a man who has given up looking through the intellect and begun to look at the world through his inner vision.
The intellect is just a tiny hole, so whatsoever you see through it will appear very small. It appears very small not because it is very small but because you are looking at it through a very small hole. When you can set everything aside – all opinions, beliefs and prejudices arrived at through the intellect – and become neutral; when you can stand at the center without the confines of Hindu or Moslem, then you will see the infinite sky. You will see the sky in its infinity – the sky where only love is manifest, the sky where only love dances night and day.
Bear in mind that whatever color your glasses are, that is the color you see all around you. Everything looks yellow to the patient suffering from jaundice; his eyes themselves are yellow. And the man who suffers from the intellect sees the whole world in parts, because the intellect itself is divided. The heart is undivided. The heart is whole, total. Inner vision means vision of the heart.
WHO HAS INNER VISION, HE’S AUTHENTIC MAN.
Kabir says that a man is only authentic when he possesses inner sight. Before this happens you are a man in name only. You are a man only because you have the form of a man. That is the only qualifying factor. Otherwise, there is no difference between you and the animals.
The Sanskrit word for animal, PASHU, is very interesting. It comes from the word PASH, meaning one who is tied to something, one who is in bondage. The word is very significant. PASHU does not just mean animal; it also means one who is tied up, one who is in bondage, one who is entangled. The person who achieves inner sight becomes a real man for the first time. Before that he was an animal. Now he is an authentic human being; now his animality, his bondage, is gone. Now such a man is under the open sky. Now he is no longer a prisoner; now he is liberated.
ONE WHO WALKS ALONE. HE ALONE FINDS TRUTH.
This is a very revolutionary sentence. Kabir is saying that the crowd has never been able to attain to truth. Neither the Hindus as a community nor the Moslems as a community have ever attained to truth. Whenever a man attains to truth it is done individually. The crowd has never attained. So do not be part of a crowd. Don’t say, “I am a Hindu,” because that means you are part of the Hindu community. Has any crowd, any community, any society ever attained? Whenever anyone attains – Buddha, Mahavira, Krishna, Christ, Kabir – he does it on his own. So, walk alone. You are still bereft of truth because you have remained part of a community.
It is difficult for a man to remain alone; the crowd seems to be a great help. But because of the crowd you become involved in thousands of stupid things. You do them just because it is convenient; you think because so many people are doing them they must be right. Millions of people gather in a KUMBH MELA, and so you think you should take part because millions of others are doing so. In actual fact there is no relation whatsoever between truth and the crowd. An action is not necessarily right just because it is being done by the crowd, by the community. The reality is quite the opposite – a single man can be right; a crowd can never be right. And the foolish thing is that both you and the rest of the crowd at a KUMBH MELA think there must be some great significance, some tremendous importance in taking a dip in the Ganges.
You might have heard this particular story. Once a king had a pond dug and ordered each of his subjects to pour one liter of milk into it so that the pond would eventually be filled with milk. But everyone thought, “If I pour water into the pond at night instead of milk, who will be any the wiser?” So during the night, all of his subjects poured water into the pond. When the king came to see the pond in the morning he found it filled with water. There was not a trace of milk in it anywhere.
You see, the others think the same as you. Your logic, your way of reasoning is the same as everyone else’s. Your calculations are similar; your arithmetic is the same. You are like donkeys tied together.
The crowd acts logically, rationally, but even if the whole world accepts a lie it is still not the truth. Only three hundred years ago the whole crowd believed the sun revolved around the earth. This is not true, but this is what people believed for thousands of years. When Galileo declared that the earth revolved around the sun, no one believed him. He was considered mad, insane. People said, “It is written in all the scriptures that the sun revolves around the earth!”
The words “sunrise” and “sunset” are found in all languages, and even now, even after Galileo’s discovery, they are still prevalent. Three hundred years have passed since Galileo’s death and science has now established that the sun neither rises nor sets, that the earth revolves and that the sun is stationary – but the words “sunrise” and “sunset” are still in use and will probably remain in use forever.
When Galileo was very old he was brought to trial in the court of the pope. The pope said to him, “You must ask for forgiveness, otherwise it is the gallows for you. The Bible cannot be wrong. It is written that the sun rises and that the sun sets. You cannot be wiser than Jesus.”
Galileo was a very wise and intelligent man. He said, “Since you order me, I beg your pardon. I will declare that the earth does not revolve around the sun and that the sun revolves around the earth. But my statement will not change the way things are; the sun does not revolve. What difference will anything I say make to the sun? But I shall extricate myself from this difficulty by saying it; I shall be
saved from the gallows by saying it. I see no point in opposing you, but I must say this much at least – it is the earth that revolves.”
Even if Galileo confirms that the sun revolves around the earth and the whole world believes it, how is that going to alter the truth? The truth is not decided by a majority vote.
ONE WHO WALKS ALONE, HE ALONE FINDS TRUTH.
Whenever anyone has known the truth he has known it by himself, on his own. Why is this? Is it because the crowd as a whole is incapable of rising to that height? It is very difficult even for one among millions to rise to that height. Even in thousands of years it is very difficult to find one person who reaches that height. It will even be difficult, in thousands of years, to find one man reaching that high.
And whenever a man attains to that height, society has done its best to obstruct his path. It has tried all possible ways, because it is an insult to society. Society’s ego is affected; society is hurt. That is why we crucified Jesus, gave poison to Socrates, threw stones at Buddha and insulted Kabir in every conceivable way. We cannot believe it is possible for this weaver Kabir to reach God and for us to be left behind. It is difficult for us to swallow; so we feel it is fine for us to say that he has not reached, to state that he is telling a lie, that his claim is false, that he has gone crazy. But we are not prepared to believe that he has reached God.
Society creates all sorts of obstacles to prevent you from reaching God. Society is an anchor that prevents your ship from moving any further; society is like a dead weight that stops your ship from reaching God.
The very nature of truth is such that it can only be reached in the depths of your silence. You are absolutely alone; there is no space for the other to be there at all. So many of you are sitting here in front of me. All of you meditate; all of you are moving into SAMADHI. And no sooner do you attain to SAMADHI than you alone remain, than the crowd disappears. If others sitting near you attain to it, they also become alone. You are not there for them; they are not there for you.
To be in SAMADHI is to go deeper and deeper into oneself. Being with the crowd means you are standing at the door. As you enter the inner room, the crowd, the market, the highway and all the people disappear, and you remain alone. In that great and hidden solitude your meeting with God takes place. There is no other observer, no other witness. That is why no one can produce a witness to swear that it has happened. If I say I have had a meeting with Him in that deep solitude you may ask, “Who is your witness?” My answer would be, “There is no witness at all. At that point there cannot be any witness. You either believe what I say or you disbelieve it, but no witness to testify to it can be produced.”
Your mind will protest; it will tell you not to believe me. Your ego will ask how such a thing can happen. You will say, “I have been left behind and this man has reached? This is not possible! This cannot be!”
If you refuse to believe that Kabir has attained, that Buddha has attained, then the doorway to attainment will be closed to you forever. But if you can accept that Kabir has attained then the door remains open to you. You will say,“If Kabir can attain, then I can attain as well. There is a possibility. When it was possible for Kabir, why should it be impossible for me?”
This is the difference between belief and disbelief. You cannot harm Kabir by your lack of belief, you can only harm yourself. By extolling Kabir you do not add to his greatness – his greatness cannot be heightened – but the quality of the belief, of the faith you have in yourself, is what opens the door of possibility for you.
ONE WHO WALKS ALONE, HE ALONE FINDS TRUTH.
This meeting will only take place when you are alone; this marriage will only take place when you are removed from the crowd; this auspicious moment will only come when you are in absolute solitude. Then the wedding guests have all gone; when the sacrificial fire is being circled there will be no one there to witness it. There will be no priest to recite the Vedic hymns, and so, Kabir says, existence itself will sing the hymns of the Vedas. There will be only God or Kabir as a witness. There will be no third party.
HEART ABSORBED IN LOVE NEVER AGAIN COMES BACK.
When the lover and the beloved meet, there is no returning. The mind becomes so engrossed in love, so much at one with love that the question of turning back does not arise at all. Poets say that the big black bee becomes so engrossed in the lotus that it forgets to fly away when the petals of the lotus begin to close. Such is the case with the lover of God; he does not notice when the petals of existence close in on him from all sides. God surrounds him on all sides, merging him within Himself, and then there is no return.
WHOLENESS IS TOTAL VISION; EVERYTHING IS HOLY.
SAYS KABIR: IT CAN’T BE UNDERSTOOD. THIS IS SOMETHING UNWRITTEN.
At this moment – when you are absolutely alone in total solitude, when you are not on the periphery, when you are standing in your soul, when you are at the center – your total vision unfolds. Then you are total. And in your total vision, totality is visible.
Wholeness is total.
Your vision is incomplete at present. And you are also incomplete because your desires are not yet entirely fulfilled. If death comes to you and says, “Come with me. Your time is up,” you will say,
“Please wait a while. Let me finish a few things. I have made a few commitments and they are not yet complete, so let me finish them.” But you will never be able to finish them altogether, because in trying to complete them you will have to make many more commitments. They will always remain incomplete. To be complete is not in the nature of SAMSAR, of the world; to remain unfulfilled is its nature.
Here in this world, no one is ever able to become completely satisfied. The only one to become complete is the one who has known this truth – that desires always remain unfulfilled. Even when desires are fulfilled it is never enough. You will only be content when you give up desiring.
As long as you are chasing shadows you will never stop running. You can set out on a pilgrimage, trying to ignore the shadow, but the shadow will even follow you there. The man who desires will always meet with dissatisfaction. Desire only begins to fall away from the man who turns his back on it. And such a man will certainly arrive at the experience of totality.
WHOLENESS IS TOTAL VISION; EVERYTHING IS HOLY.
When desire is totally absent in you, you become total. In that totality, you acquire total vision. And in this totality of vision you will experience total ecstasy. All about you, on all sides, you will glimpse God, you will glimpse the one who is total.
SAYS KABIR: IT CAN’T BE UNDERSTOOD. THIS IS SOMETHING UNWRITTEN.
“I do not understand that totality,” says Kabir. The power of understanding, the one who understands, the intellect, logic – all these have been left behind. Kabir asks who there is to understand. That is why nothing is understood.
SAYS KABIR: IT CAN’T BE UNDERSTOOD. THIS IS SOMETHING UNWRITTEN.
Kabir says he does not understand what is happening now – this falling of the total into the total, this pouring of the total into the total, this marriage of the total with the total. It is as he said in the sutra a few days ago:
KABIR SAYS: I’M TO WED. AND THE MAN’S IMMORTAL!
Kabir says he does not understand what is happening now, that it is beyond his comprehension, even beyond his imagination.
SAYS KABIR: IT CAN’T BE UNDERSTOOD.
THIS IS SOMETHING UNWRITTEN.
And this happening is such that it remains unwritten. Kabir says that if he could have read about it, he could have come fully prepared. But this kind of thing that has never been written about, never been told, never been explained by anyone before, Kabir says it is so far beyond comprehension that it must remain unwritten.
This is the finality. This is the point beyond which our comprehension is unable to reach. Truth is much greater than your understanding, yet even now you are trying to contain it in your grip; even now you are trying to hold the sky in your fist. This is what Kabir is saying:
CONFUSED, CHOOSING FOR AND AGAINST, THE WHOLE WORLD GOES ASTRAY.
This is why you are confused, why you are disturbed. By being FOR AND AGAINST you are trying to confine truth in the prison of your own beliefs. You are busy trying to understand truth, but the power of your understanding is so small, how can you attain to truth with it?
Truth is to be lived, not understood. It is possible to be truth, but truth cannot be understood. This is what Kabir means when he speaks of the arising of totality in a man; saying at the same time that the phenomenon always remains beyond comprehension.
Philosophers are busy trying to understand truth while religious people are living it. Be anxious to live in truth, but don’t try to understand it. Don’t make truth the object of some pointless exercise. No one has ever been able to understand truth; you too will fail. You can live in truth and you can be God, but you cannot know God. You can be one with God, but you cannot establish His existence. You cannot create a science of God but you can live a godly life.
SAYS KABIR: IT CAN’T BE UNDERSTOOD. THIS IS SOMETHING UNWRITTEN.
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