THE SUFI STORY, A JOURNEY FROM MASTER TO MASTER -
THE TRAITORS
A SUFI TEACHER WAS VISITED BY
A NUMBER OF PEOPLE OF VARIOUS FAITHS WHO SAID TO HIM, "ACCEPT US AS YOUR
DISCIPLES, FOR WE SEE THAT THERE IS NO REMAINING TRUTH IN OUR RELIGIONS, AND WE
ARE CERTAIN THAT WHAT YOU ARE TEACHING IS THE ONE TRUE PATH."
THE SUFI SAID, "HAVE YOU NOT HEARD OF THE MONGOL HALAKU KHAN AND HIS INVASION
OF SYRIA? LET ME TELL YOU.
"THE VIZIER AHMAD OF THE CALIPH MUSTASIM OF BAGHDAD INVITED THE MONGOL TO
INVADE HIS MASTER'S DOMAINS. WHEN HALAKU HAD WON THE BATTLE FOR BAGHDAD, AHMAD
WENT OUT TO MEET HIM, TO BE REWARDED. HALAKU SAID, 'DO YOU SEEK YOUR
RECOMPENSE?' AND THE VIZIER ANSWERED, 'YES.'
"HALAKU TOLD HIM, 'YOU HAVE BETRAYED YOUR OWN MASTER TO ME, AND YET YOU EXPECT
ME TO BELIEVE THAT YOU WILL BE FAITHFUL TO ME.' HE ORDERED THAT AHMAD SHOULD BE
HANGED.
"BEFORE YOU ASK ANYONE TO ACCEPT YOU, ASK YOURSELF WHETHER IT IS NOT SIMPLY
BECAUSE YOU HAVE NOT FOLLOWED THE PATH OF YOUR OWN TEACHER. IF YOU ARE SATISFIED
ABOUT THIS, THEN COME AND ASK TO BECOME DISCIPLES."
WHAT IS MAN'S BASIC PROBLEM? IT IS NOT IGNORANCE, IT IS KNOWLEDGE. Knowledge is
always borrowed. It is never original. But one can believe that one knows and
can be fool others and can be befooled oneself.
Knowledge is the greatest deceptive force in the world. It makes people
cunning, hypocrites, egoists. It gives them false notions that they know -- that
they know what truth is, that they know what 'the true path' is. And because of
this, they go on missing.
They come across truth many times, but they cannot see. Their eyes are full of
knowledge, hence blind. A knowledgeable man is a blind man. He is cunning and
clever, but not intelligent. Cunningness and cleverness LOOK like intelligence,
but that is only an appearance. And don't be deceived by the appearance, because
it is there where man's basic confusion. is rooted -- in his cleverness, his
cunningness, his knowledgeability.
One has to unlearn it all, then only does one become a disciple. If you know
already, you can't be a disciple; your very knowledge will hinder you. How can
you surrender when you know? Knowledge never surrenders. It is only innocence
that is capable of that great quantum leap.
Surrender is possible only out of innocence, because out of innocence arises
trust, out of innocence is faith, out of innocence is all religion.
I have heard a beautiful anecdote:
A great Master, Zusya, went to suffer the exile in Germany. He came to a city
of Reform Jews. When they saw his ways, they mocked him and thought he was
crazy. When he came into the synagogue, some of them poked fun at him, and when
the children saw their parents ridiculing him, they thought he was crazy and
began to pull at him and tug at his belt. Then he beckoned to the children and
said, "My dear children, gather round and I will tell you something." The
children thought he would show them a trick. They all stood around him and he in
the middle. And he said to them, "My dear children, look well at me, do not take
your eyes off me."
The children, because they thought he was going to show them something, looked
steadily at him and he also looked steadily at each child separately. After that
he told them to go home.
When the children came home and were given their food, they refused to eat. One
said that the meat must not be eaten. Another asked how one could eat unclean
meat. And so all the children refused to eat. They said the dishes were unclean
and the food was unclean.
Then, as women do, one went to another and told her that all of a sudden her
son came home from the prayer house and refused to eat; whatever was given to
him, he said it was unclean. Then her neighbor said that her son too refused to
eat and shouted that everything was unclean and that one could not pray in her
house because her hair was uncovered. Then another neighbor came in and also
told such things about her son -- the whole town was amazed! Then they each
learnt that their sons were not the only ones who suddenly became pious. They
said that the visitor whom they had ridiculed and thought crazy was none other
than a saint. By looking at the children, he had instilled in them something of
his being. The parents became afraid that they had shamed him and went to beg
his forgiveness.
Zusya laughed and forgave them all. He wanted to look in their eyes too, but
they escaped as fast as they could.
In this beautiful anecdote, what happened? The children were innocent. They
were ready to look into the eyes of this strange Master. They became connected!
For a moment they were lost into the vastness of the Master; for a moment the
Master flowed in them. There was a meeting and a merging, a communion.
Just looking in their eyes for a few moments, something was transferred -- the
purity of the man, the holiness of the man. Something of his being spilled into
the eyes of the children. They were no more the same. Their vision changed.
But the grown-ups escaped. They were afraid to look into the eyes of the
Master. What was THEIR fear? They were cunning, clever, knowledgeable. They must
have thought, "It is a kind of hypnosis or something. This man is a magician or
something." They must have thought of a thousand and one things: "The time is
not ripe for us. We cannot go on this faraway journey. The moment has not come.
We will have to wait. We have to do a thousand and one other things, then...."
They were not innocent. Even their apology was out of cunningness; it was not
out of love and understanding. They were afraid: if the man is so strange and
powerful, he may do something wrong to them. Hence the apology. Not out of
understanding, not out of humbleness, but out of fear.
But the children? -- they simply got in tune with the Master!
Jesus is right when he says: Unless you are like small children you will not
enter into my kingdom of God.
Jesus was standing in a marketplace; a crowd was standing around him, and
somebody asked, a rabbi, "You talk so much about the kingdom of God, but WHO
will be capable enough, pure enough, virtuous enough, saintly enough, to enter
into your kingdom of God? What will be the characteristics of the people who
will be allowed in?"
Jesus looked around. The rabbi thought he would say, "People like you." And the
rich man of the town who had donated much to the synagogue and who had been a
charitable man thought he would say, "Men like you."
And there was another who had practiced all that has been told down the ages,
all the rituals, prayers. He had followed every rule and regulation. He was a
virtuous man, known as a saint. He thought, "Certainly, he is searching for me.
He will say, 'Men like you.'"
But they were all frustrated. His eyes moved... he stopped at a small child who
was just standing in the crowd. He took the child up and showed the people that
"Those who are like this small child, they will be able to enter into my kingdom
of God."
It is innocence that falls in harmony with the divine. Knowledge is a jarring
note. Knowledge is a China Wall. Knowledge is an armour, your defense against
the mysterious. But that's what happens.
People who are knowledgeable start searching for truth. And they have taken one
thing for granted, that they already know what it is. Now it is only a question
of searching. They will be able to recognize it, they know its characteristics.
It is not so. Unless you know truth, there is no way to know it. No scripture
can describe it. There is no possibility of ANYBODY giving you the knowledge of
truth. A Master never gives the knowledge of truth to you; he simply makes his
truth available to you. If you are courageous, if you are innocent, if you are
open, ready to take the jump, ready to die in the Master, then you will know
truth -- not knowledge about truth but an experience of it. Truth always comes
as an experience. It is always existential.
Remember: these are the barriers. The man who has followed all the rituals
thinks he knows. He is a great yogi. He has not been missing a single rule of
the yoga. He thinks now he is capable. He is not. It is not ritual that prepares
you. Ritualistic people are stupid people. They follow the ritual, but the
ritual is followed unconsciously. And they will find ways and means to go on
following the ritual and yet remain the same.
I have heard:
A doleful-looking customer went to the bar and ordered six whiskies. The bar
man poured them out for him in six glasses. "Now line them up in front of me,
will you?" asked the customer. He then paid for them and told him to keep the
change. He swallowed down the contents of the first glass in line and then
repeated the process with the third and fifth glasses. Then, saying,
"Goodnight," he turned to walk away.
"Excuse me," said the bar man. "You have left three glasses untouched."
"Yes, I know," he said. "The doctor said he didn't mind me taking the odd
drink."
You can always find a way. The ritualistic person remains cunning.
A politician, who had been prevailed upon to accompany a friend on a bear hunt,
had concealed his nervousness manfully, although his first night in camp was a
sleepless one. Starting forth in the mowing, the two had walked but a short
distance when they came upon fresh tracks which the enthusiastic sportsman
identified as being those of a large bear.
"Tell you what we had better do," said the politician brightly. "You go ahead
and see where he went and I'll go back and see where he came from!"
Remember that man is so cunning, so political, that he can always find a way
out of a certain ritual, rule, discipline. And he can remain untouched by it.
And he can go on doing the ritual and yet remain untransformed by it. That's why
you see so many people in the world going to the synagogue, to the church, to
the temple, to the mosque, to the gurudwara -- and still remaining the same!
Millions of people are praying, but there seems to be NO prayer in existence,
there seems to be no fragrance of prayer in the world. There is but hatred AND
hatred. There seems to be no love! How is it possible that millions of people
pray every day and there is no love flowering? So many people praying and no
compassion! Something deep down must be wrong, funda-mentally wrong.
The prayer is false. It is being done because it has to be done. It is a kind
of duty to be fulfilled, but the heart is not in it. The cunning man always
keeps his heart away from everything that he does; he only pretends. He goes
through empty gestures. And he is so cunning that he can always find a loophole
and escape through it.
The basic problem of man is not ignorance: it is knowledge. Ignorance never
makes a person cunning.
O THOSE WHO ARE REALLY READY to become disciples, they shave to drop only one
thing and that is their knowledge. They have to become ignorant again. And when
you become CONSCIOUSLY ignorant, ignorance becomes luminous. The whole point is
of consciousness. You can remain unconsciously very knowledgeable, and your
knowledge remains dark, dismal, dead. If you become consciously ignorant, even
your ignorance becomes enlightened. It is luminous. It is full of light.
And remember: when you consciously look at your life, you are bound to become
ignorant again -- because knowledge as such is not possible. Life remains a
mystery. There is no way to demystify it. That's what knowledge is trying to do:
it is a demystification of life. It tries to destroy mystery. It makes
everything clear, explained away.
The whole effort of knowledge is how to banish mystery from existence. It
cannot be banished. It is its ultimate nature. It is not an accidental quality.
Mystery is the very CORE of life. Life is mysterious -- they are synonymous.
So the man of knowledge does not destroy the mystery of life. He simply closes
his eyes with a very thick curtain of knowledge, and starts thinking he knows..
He knows nothing.
It will look strange to you and very paradoxical, but it is so. The man who
knows, knows nothing. And the man who knows that he is ignorant has started
knowing. The whole point is of consciousness.
A CONSCIOUS ignorance is what disciple hood is -- conscious ignorance. But
people are living in unconsciousness. And they go on groping. In unconsciousness
they go to the Masters, but in unconsciousness. They remain with the Masters but
fast asleep. Sooner or later they become fed up, because nothing is happening.
Nothing can happen if you remain unconscious. You cannot connect with the
Master. They remain cunning, clever, even when they are with a Master. Nothing
happens. Nothing can happen in knowledgeability.
Sooner or later they decide that this is not the right Master -- without ever
thinking, "Am I the right disciple yet?" That should be the basic question. It
is NONE of your business who is the right Master or not. And how can you decide?
You don't know what a Master is. You are not even a disciple yet! You have not
taken even the first step and you are thinking and deciding and judging about
the last step. It is better to keep quiet.
Just think about one thing again and again, remind yourself again and again:
"Am I the right disciple? Am I ready to learn? Have I dropped my knowledge? Have
I come with an open heart? Am I trying to become more conscious of what I am
doing? Is my prayer conscious? When I sit by the side of the Master, am I
sitting there consciously, alert, aware? When I listen to the Master, am I
really listening? or just hearing?"
Hearing is one thing: listening is very different. Hearing is simple; anybody
hears. Whosoever has ears can hear. Listening is rare. When your ear and your
heart are together, then listening happens. When you hear, your mind is full of
thoughts; the turmoil continues, the traffic continues. All kinds of noises,
thoughts, prejudices... through that crowd, yes, you hear, but you can't listen.
For listening, silence is needed. There should be no clouds inside you, no
thought stirring. Just a PURE silence, then listening happens.
The disciple has to ask again and again, "Am I really a disciple? Am I yet a
disciple?" And if you remain alert about that, you will find many Masters in
life. But if you are not aware of it, you may come to a Buddha and go
empty-handed.
Hank was riding the range, a-singing and a-humming. Suddenly his horse reared
and stopped. In front of them was a huge snake. Hank drew his gun and was about
to fire when the snake cried, "Don't shoot! If you spare my life, I have the
power to grant you any three wishes you make!"
"Okay," said Hank, figuring he had nothing to lose. "My first wish is a
handsome face like Paul Newman. Second I want a muscular body like Mohammed Ali.
And my last wish is to be equipped like my horse here!"
"Granted!" said the snake. "When you wake up tomorrow you'll have all those
things."
Next mowing, Hank awoke and rushed to the mirror. Sure enough, he had a face
like Paul Newman and to his delight he saw a pair of massive shoulders and arms
like Mohammed Ali. Then, glancing down in great excitement he let out a
blood-curdling howl.
"My Gawd, I clean forgot!" he babbled. "Yesterday I was riding Nellie!"
Man lives in unconsciousness, unaware. And you can even be with a Buddha and
nothing is going to happen to you. Your unconsciousness will be a mountain.
The vibes of a Buddha are very delicate. They cannot penetrate your mountains
of unconsciousness, If you are conscious, then only can those delicate vibes
penetrate you. They are subtle, they are not violent, they are not aggressive.
They will not even knock on your doors, they will not force entry into you. The
vibes of a Buddha cannot rape. They come very silently. If you are utterly
quiet, only then do you become aware of their presence. They come without any
noise... rose petals falling on the ground. Yes, just like that.
But it is very easy to decide that the Master is wrong. In fact, that helps you
to remain the way you are: what can you do? -- the Master is wrong. And then you
go on moving from one Master to another and hoping.... But you remain the same!
If you miss one Master, you will miss all of them. In fact, the more you go from
one Master to another Master, you are simply becoming more and more accustomed
to missing, you are becoming habituated to it. You are learning how to miss. If
you miss one, then to miss the other will be easier, and then to miss the third
will be even easier. And if you have been moving to many Masters, slowly slowly,
you become so efficient in missing that it is almost certain that you will never
find a Master anywhere.
That's why people can't find -- not that Masters don't exist. Life is so rich!
Existence always gives you ALL possibilities to grow. Masters are available, and
always. In no time, in no country, is it that they are not available. In no
clime. However dark is the time on the earth, the Masters are always available.
In fact, the darker it is, the more possibility there is of Masters being
available.
Krishna says: When it is dark and religion is destroyed, I will come. I always
come.
So the moments of darkness, of miserable times, are the opportunities for
Masters to bloom. The physicians happen when people are ill. Nature always
balances. It always provides for your needs.
Just watch: a woman becomes pregnant, and her whole body starts preparing for
the child. By the time the child is born, suddenly her breasts are full of milk.
The child is not born yet but food is getting ready. Nature provides all that is
needed -- even for a child who has not even asked, who cannot ask. Before the
child comes, the food has arrived. Before the hunger, the food. Before the
thirst, the water.
And before the disciple, the Master. So if you are a disciple, you are BOUND to
find a Master. It has never been otherwise. If you cannot find a Master, think
again, meditate over it -- are you a disciple? And you will find you are too
full of knowledge. That's why you cannot be a disciple.
A disciple means one who is ready to learn, and a man full of knowledge is not
ready to learn. He is ready to teach. He is not .ready to learn.
Are you a disciple? A disciple is one who is ready to surrender, to bow down,
to drop his head. Are you ready to die? Are you ready to stake all that you
have? Nobody seems to be ready to die. In fact, people need a Master, not to die
but to live for ever. They would like to become immortals. They would like to
find the elixir that will make them immortals. They would like to find something
so that they can fight with death. Yes, that is found! But you have to fulfill
the condition first. And the condition is: only those who are ready to die will
attain to life eternal.
A very ancient story, a true story, and of great significance:
In some monastery in Tibet, a monk who was thought to be dead was buried in a
crypt. After a time he regained consciousness and horror and mental conflict set
in. The crypt was opened only when a brother died, and it was impossible to call
loud enough or to knock hard enough to be heard. What, then, was the unfortunate
man to do? Was he to wait for a death of starvation and thirst, there in the
neighborhood of his dead brethren? He began to pray -- but was not prayer a
supplication that God might grant death to one of his healthy brethren? Because
the crypt would be opened only when somebody died in the monastery again. That
was the only possibility for him to get out: if somebody died immediately.
Against such horrible mental and physical agonies -- you can well complete the
picture -- our dear monk held out and remained alive. He kept himself alive by
eating insects which fell down into the crypt through? small air-hole, and he
licked the drops of moisture from the walls, dirty sewage water.
After many years, they found the unfortunate man wrapped in cloaks... When
somebody died the crypt was opened, after many years. They found the unfortunate
man wrapped in cloaks which he pulled out of the coffins, and with his white
beard reaching to the ground.
He was utterly blind by now, but still alive and still hoping and praying. He
was taken out. He lived at least ten years more.
Man clings to life -- even if when to live is worse than death. Just think of
this man! eating insects, living with dead bodies, the smell. Think of that
crypt: hundreds of dead bodies around, just licking drops of moisture from the
walls, and waiting and praying for somebody to die. He went blind! Years and
years in that darkness, but still hoping to live.
Such is the desire for life. Such is the lust for life. And to be with a Master
one has to be ready to die -- not physically: metaphorically. But even the IDEA
of death makes people run away.
But to be in contact with a Master, you have to slowly slowly disappear,
metaphysically disappear: the ego has to die. Jesus says: Until you are
reborn... but how can you be reborn if you don't die? Rebirth has to be preceded
by a death. And the death has to be deeper than the bodily death, because the
bodily death is not much of a death. Soon you are born again. Here you die and,
within moments, you have entered into another womb somewhere else. There is not
even a gap: one body you lose, another body you immediately gain.
But to die in the presence of a Master is to really die, it is real suicide The
ego disappears for ever. That is the meaning of surrender It is difficult. The
disciple comes, he bows down also, but that bowing is false. He says, "I am at
your disposal," but that is an empty gesture.
After an hour's lecture on duty to King and Country, putting others before self
and so on, the education corps captain pointed to one private and said, "Right
-- you! Why should a soldier be prepared to die for his country?"
The soldier scratched his head for a minute, then grinned and said, "You're
quite right, sir -- why should he?"
Just to think of death frightens. Don't laugh at those people who escaped from
Zusya -- Zusya was death. A Master IS death. That's what ancient scriptures say:
A Master is a death. Those people escaped! The children were innocent. They were
not afraid because they didn't know what it is to look into the eyes of a
Master.
People AVOID looking into the eyes of the Master. They avoid getting too close,
because to be too close is to melt, is to disappear, never to be the same again.
Remember these things....
The story:
A SUFI TEACHER WAS VISITED BY A NUMBER OF PEOPLE OF VARIOUS FAITHS WHO SAID TO
HIM, "ACCEPT US AS YOUR DISCIPLES, FOR WE SEE THAT THERE IS NO REMAINING TRUTH
IN OUR RELIGIONS, AND WE ARE CERTAIN THAT WHAT YOU ARE TEACHING IS THE ONE TRUE
PATH."
Let us go into each important word in the story:
A SUFI TEACHER WAS VISITED BY A NUMBER OF PEOPLE OF VARIOUS FAITHS WHO SAID TO
HIM...
A SUFI TEACHER, A SUFI MASTER, is not there to destroy your religion but to
fulfill it. If he destroys anything, that means it is not religion -- that's why
he destroys it. If it is religion, he supports it, he enhances it. He is not
against any path. All paths are God's paths. So if he finds somebody is
following a path, he gives all his support. He will not take you astray from the
path that you have been following. He will strengthen it.
A Sufi Master is not a missionary. He is not interested in convert-ing people
from one religion to another. He is interested certainly in converting people
from irreligion to religion, but not from Christianity to Mohammedanism or from
Mohammedanism to Buddhism, or from Buddhism to Hinduism. A Sufi is not
interested in changing people's identities, superficial identities. It never
makes much difference. I have seen many Hindus who have become Christians --
they remain the same. Nothing ever changes. It CAN'T change! because of their
conditioning.
I used to live with a friend whose-father was converted to Christianity, but
they still think themselves Brahmins. Untouchables are not allowed in his
family. They are Christian Brahmins, but Brahmins they are. The WHOLE thing
continues.
I have seen Christians becoming Hindus. It makes no difference.
I have heard about Mulla Nasrudin, who became an atheist in his old age. One
day he was trying to convert somebody to his atheism, and was very loud. Finally
he said, "There is no God -- and Mohammed is his only prophet."
It is very difficult. You can become an atheist, but if you have been a
Mohammedan, deep down you remain a Mohammedan -- Mohammed is the only prophet.
I have heard about another atheist who was dying, and he said, "Thank God that
there is no God!"
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It is very difficult to get out of your conditioning. A Sufi Master is not
interested in changing your rituals, but he is certainly interested in giving
you more and more religious quality. It IS NOT a question of to;m: it is a
question of quality. Whether you go to the mosque or to the temple does not
matter! The real thing is prayer -- where you pray is immaterial.
Just remember always, this is the Sufi approach: where you pray is immaterial
-- prayer matters. To whom you bow down is immaterial -- bowing down matters. To
whom you surrender has no meaning -- but that you have surrendered is of immense
importance. Surrender has importance and relevance. The object of surrender is
just an excuse.
You can go to one Master, A, and surrender, or to Master B and surrender, or to
Master C and surrender -- it makes no difference. If you are surrendered, you
have started moving towards God. The Master is just an excuse. Any Master will
do. So whatsoever is your liking, whosoever is of your liking, wherever you feel
surrender is easier, surrender. The Sufi helps you to surrender, to pray. It
does not matter whether you pray in Arabic or in Sanskrit or in Hebrew, but what
you say in your prayer matters.
I have heard:
After five-year-old Matt gave a loud whistle in the middle of the minister's
sermon, his grandmother launched into scolding.
"Why on earth would you do such a thing?" she demanded.
"I've been praying for a long time that God would teach me to whistle," he
explained, "And this morning he did."
A child's prayer is a child's prayer. What can he ask? He is asking God to give
him the capacity to whistle. Just look at people's prayer, what they are asking,
and you will find it ALL childish. Somebody is asking for money... Which is
nothing but a capacity to whistle, so everybody can see who is whistling more
loudly, more sharply, so you can defeat other whistlers. That's what money is
all about: so you can whistle. Somebody is praying to be made a prime minister
or a president. That is again the same: asking to be given the capacity to
whistle so loudly that the whole country, the whole world listens.
All are asking for the ego, for some importance, for some superiority. All are
wanting to defeat others, all are competitors. And how can you pray if your mind
is full of competition, jeal-ousy? How can you pray if your mind is not full of
love?
The real prayer does not ask for anything. The real prayer is a thanking. It
simply gives thankfulness to God for all that he has already given. There is no
complaint in it.
A Sufi Master is one who helps you for the essential religion. And the
essential religion is one. Hinduism, Christianity, Jainism, Buddhism, Judaism --
these are forms, forms of different rituals. These are different languages, but
the message is one.
A SUFI TEACHER WAS VISITED BY A NUMBER OF PEOPLE OF VARIOUS FAITHS WHO SAID TO
HIM, "ACCEPT US AS YOUR DISCIPLES, FOR WE SEE THAT THERE IS NO REMAINING TRUTH
IN OUR RELIGIONS..."-
Now, these people have been followers of somebody else. When you go to a Sufi
Master, he will not accept you so easily -- because you have been a follower of
somebody else. What have you been doing there? If you have missed that Master,
you will miss this too. What is the point of changing? Maybe you will feel for a
few days that you are again on a kind of honeymoon, a new love affair. But if
the old love affair is finished, this too will be finished sooner or later. It
may give you a little thrill and sensation. You may start dreaming and hoping
again, but nothing is going to happen. Not essentially. Because you will go on
doing the same that you have done with your old Masters. Unless you change.
Unless you understand that there is something lacking in you, not in the Master
but in you. Unless you take the responsibility that "I have been missing," there
is no point in accepting disciples. Sufis won't accept you. But if a disciple
comes who has done all that he could do, their doors are open.
I would like you to be reminded of Gautam Buddha: he went to many Masters in
his search -- that's how a disciple should be. And he surrendered to many
Masters, and he surrendered totally. He was not holding back. Whatsoever the
Master with whom he was at that time would say, he would do it totally.
It is said that his Masters would finally say to him, "We are sorry. In fact,
we have not attained it either. We are pretenders. You have exposed us. We
cannot deceive you. We don't know a thing. Our deception goes on because people
who come to us never listen to what we say -- they never do it, so we are never
exposed. You are the first person who has done whatsoever we say, and now we are
feeling sorry for you. Excuse us. Forgive us!"
That's what the Masters said. They were not Masters. But Buddha's sincerity,
his honesty, provoked even those deceivers to feel sorry. He worked so hard. And
sometimes their demands were stupid.
For example, one Master, so-called Master, said to him, "Go on reducing your
food till you are taking only one grain of rice -- go on reducing, slowly
slowly." He did that. He became just bones; all flesh disappeared. Just a
skeleton he was. The Master must have fit.. .he was saying this to many people
but nobody had ever followed it, so there was no problem. But this man, his
sincerity, his utter devotion, his trust... When there is SO much trust, even
the people who exploit trust cannot exploit SUCH trust.
It is said he fell at Buddha's feet and said, "Excuse me. Please forgive me. I
have sinned against you and against God. I have committed a crime. I had never
thought that anybody was going to follow what I say. And I have been making such
strange demands that nobody will follow. And when nobody follows, there is no
question of ever being exposed."
That's why your so-called Masters go on demanding the impossible from you. They
will say, "Repress sex and don't ever think of any beautiful woman, not even in
your dreams." Now, first they say, "Repress sex." If you repress it, your dreams
will become full of sexuality. And then they say that even to dream about sex is
a sin -- you will never attain to God. If you follow them, you will be in
difficulty. But nobody follows.
And when people DON'T follow, they feel guilty that "We have not been following
the Master." Out of their guilt they touch his feet; out of their guilt they go
on following him.
Buddha went from one Master to another. For six years he travel led all around
the country, and it always happened his sincerity was such that each Master told
him, "Please, you forgive us and you go and search somewhere else." He searched
long and went to many people, but he never left the Master till the Master
himself said to him, "Now you leave me. It is becoming unbearable. You go on
doing whatsoever I say and nothing is happening, because what I am saying is
absolutely fabricated, guesswork. I have not known myself "
This is the way of a disciple. If such a disciple comes to a Sufi Master, he
will welcome him, he will embrace him to his heart. He will take him to his
innermost bosom. But these people were not like that. They said to the Master:
"ACCEPT US AS YOUR DISCIPLES,FOR WE SEE THAT THERE IS NO REMAINING TRUTH IN OUR
RELIGIONS..."
How can you see? You are so blind. How can you see that there is no truth in
your religions? This assertion is egoistic. A real seeker will say, "Maybe there
is, but I am blind, I cannot see it. Give me eyes! Help me to see." A real
seeker will say, "It is not that there is no truth in religions, but I have not
been able to see it. It must be my fault." He will take all the responsibility
on his own shoulders.
To throw the responsibility on somebody else is an old ego trick. Beware of it.
It never wants to take the responsibility on itself. It always goes on
complaining about others. If you are not achieving, then something is wrong
somewhere, but you are not wrong.
If you go on following whatsoever you are doing, if you do it sincerely, and
then you come to know that you have done it as totally as is humanly possible
and nothing has happened, then it is time to move. A Sufi Master accepts only
those who move in such a way. But these people were saying:
"ACCEPT US AS YOUR DISCIPLES,FOR WE SEE THAT THERE IS NO REMAINING TRUTH IN OUR
RELIGIONS, AND WE ARE CERTAIN..."
Now only stupid people can be certain about such mysteries.
Wise people will be hesitant; intelligent people will not be so certain, cannot
be. How can you be certain? And they said:
"... AND WE ARE CERTAIN THAT WHAT YOU ARE TEACHING IS THE ONE TRUE PATH."
And this they must have said to other teachers too.
Mulla Nasrudin was in love with a woman. One full-moon night, sitting on the
beach, he told the woman, "You are the most beautiful woman in the world. Never
has there been any woman so beautiful, never will there be ever."
The woman was thrilled. Her ego swelled up. And Mulla looked at her -- she was
a transformed being, and Mulla said "Sorry, excuse me. But let me remind you of
one thing: this thing I have been telling to many women before, and I cannot
promise you that I will not say it to other women again. You are not the only
one I am saying this to -- this I say to every woman. This has been my usual
practice."
These people who are saying to this Master, "You are the only true path," must
have said it to others too. Their words have no meaning, no significance. They
have been used again and again. They are really saying, "We are so intelligent
that we can see where truth is, who is true, who is really a Perfect Master. We
are so intelligent that we know that you are the only true path."
They are not saying anything about the Master or the truth or the true path.
They are simply saying in an indirect way, "We are so intelligent that we can
understand who you are." But you cannot deceive a Master. Whatsoever you say, he
will see through it.
To encounter a Master is to encounter a mirror. You cannot bribe a Master. You
cannot because he has no ego. You cannot buttress him. Now, this was something
great they were saying. It is almost like saying to a woman, "You are the most
beautiful woman in the world." When you say to a religious teacher, "You are the
true path," it is almost the same.
That's what the so-called teachers go on hankering for. They wait for somebody
to say it. If the Master had been a bogus one, he would have cherished these
disciples. He would have declared to his other disciples, "Look! These are the
real people I have been waiting for! These are the people who understand me."
But because a Master has no ego, he has not any self left -- Sufis called it
FANA -- he has disappeared. A Master is really a TRUE absence, a nothingness. He
reflects the disciple. There is no way to provoke his ego, because there is
none.
THE SUFI SAID, "HAVE YOU NOT HEARD OF THE MONGOL HALAKU KHAN AND HIS INVASION
OF SYRIA? LET ME TELL YOU.
"THE VIZIER AHMAD OF THE CALIPH MUSTASIM OF BAGHDAD INVITED THE MONGOL TO
INVADE HIS MASTER'S DOMAINS. WHEN HALAKU HAD WON THE BATTLE FOR BAGHDAD, AHMAD
WENT OUT TO MEET HIM, TO BE REWARDED. HALAKU SAID, 'DO YOU SEEK YOUR
RECOMPENSE?' AND THE VIZIER ANSWERED, 'YES.'
"HALAKU TOLD HIM, 'YOU HAVE BETRAYED YOUR OWN MASTER TO ME, AND YET YOU EXPECT
ME TO BELIEVE THAT YOU WILL BE FAITHFUL TO ME.' HE ORDERED THAT AHMAD SHOULD BE
HANGED."
A STRANGE STORY TO TELL TO THOSE PEOPLE who are declaring, "You are the true
path, you are the true Master." But a Master has to say the truth as it is. He
has to be absolutely frank. He cannot afford politeness. If it has to be hard
then it has to be hard. If it hurts, so it hurts. But the Master has to say it
as it is.
Now, he is saying, "You have betrayed your old Masters, and you come to me --
how can I trust you? that you will not betray me? You have not followed your old
Masters, because I can see that you are carrying junk. If you had followed any
Master, you would have become unburdened of the junk. I can see the garbage of
your knowledge.
"If you had followed any Master, then the first thing would have been to drop
knowledgeability. You have SO much know-ledge, and because of that knowledge you
are saying what is true and what is not true, and what religion to follow and
what not to follow, and what is the right path and what is not the right path.
It is according to your knowledge. You are so full of this bulls hit! How can I
think that you have followed any Master, that you have been disciples to
anybody? You have never been disciples. That much is certain. Whether those
Masters were true or not, that is not YOUR business. One thing is certain and
that is YOUR business: that you have not been disciples at all. And the same you
are going to do to me too. How can I accept you? For what should I accept you?
Just to be betrayed again?"
There is a Sufi story:
A man was in love with a woman, so much so that he was ready to do anything.
And the woman was demanding, very demanding. Finally she said, "There is only
one condition more to be fulfilled, only then will I be yours. You are too much
attached to your mother -- unless you kill her and you bring her heart on a
plate as a present to me, I cannot be yours. This is my last condition."
He had fulfilled many conditions.
He rushed home. He killed the mother. He took out her heart. And when he was
coming back, he was in such a hurry, he was in such a passionate blindness, that
he stumbled on the way. The plate fell and broke and the heart also fell and
broke into many pieces, but from those many pieces only one voice came: "My son,
walk a little more consciously."
He gathered the pieces. He was not in any mood to listen to it.
He gathered the pieces, he rushed to the woman, he offered the heart. The woman
looked at it -- she was aghast. She said, "It is finished! If you can kill your
own mother, I cannot trust you. You can kill me for any other woman. You are a
dangerous man. You simply get out of my house! NEVER come back again. The
relationship is completely finished. If you had said no, I would have been
yours, but you missed."
The story is the same, with the same flavor and the same meaning and the same
message. If you can betray your old Masters so easily and can condemn them so
easily, how can the Sufi trust you? You will do the same to him.
Do you see the point? If a man who is a Hindu easily becomes a Christian, the
Christian missionary is simply deceiving himself -- because if he was not a true
Hindu and he could deceive, how can he be a true Christian? And a true Christian
and a true Hindu are the same. The difference is only between the untrue
Christian and the untrue Hindu.
Truth is one and the true path is one. It does not belong to anybody. It is
nobody's property. It is not my path and Buddha's path and Krishna's path and
Zarathustra's path -- it is just THE path. Buddha, Zarathustra, Lao Tzu, they
have all walked on it. It is only ONE! There are not many paths really. Many
people walk on the path, but the path is one. And it is so vast that they may
not even meet each other.
The demand of the Sufi Master is very significant. You have to understand it.
He says, "You have betrayed your own Master -- you can betray me too. And I
don't want anything to do with people such as you. Go back!"
And he tells this story:
" THE VIZIER AHMAD OF THE CALIPH MUSTASIM OF BAGHDAD INVITED THE MONGOL TO
INVADE HIS MASTER'S DOMAINS."
He betrayed his master. And now he wants to be rewarded. Halaku Khan did well
with him. This is the reward.
"HE ORDERED THAT AHMAD SHOULD BE HANGED."
"This man is not trustworthy. He has betrayed his master who has trusted him
for so long, maybe for years -- how can I trust this man? I cannot leave him
alone; he is dangerous. He can do the same to me and more easily, because I am a
stranger. He was not even true to his master, who was not a stranger, who had
taken him so close to himself that he could betray him and help me to destroy
his master. And now he has come to be rewarded. This man is a traitor!"
The Sufi said:
"BEFORE YOU ASK ANYONE TO ACCEPT YOU, ASK YOURSELF WHETHER IT IS NOT SIMPLY
BECAUSE YOU HAVE NOT FOLLOWED THE PATH OF YOUR OWN TEACHER. IF YOU ARE SATISFIED
ABOUT THIS, THEN COME AND ASK TO BECOME DISCIPLES."
NOT THAT HE IS SAYING, I will not accept you, but he makes a simple condition,
"Have you followed your old Master? Have you done what he was telling you to do?
Have you practiced it in any way? If you have practiced, if you have done it, if
you are certain about it, that you did it and it didn't work, you did all that
you could and it didn't work, you were not half-hearted in it, you were not
holding back, you were not clever and cunning, you were not just a spectator but
you had participated in the being of the Master, if you can be certain about
this, if you are satisfied with YOUR performance as a disciple -- then come to
me. I will accept you."
But that is something very important. This is happening nowadays very much in
the world. People go on moving from one Master to another; like driftwood they
knock on many doors. But they never knock long enough, so the door doesn't open.
They have no patience. They don't do a thing. They are simply rushing here and
there -- as if somebody ELSE is going to give them the truth. Truth is not a
thing to be given. It cannot be transferred. You have to EARN it. You have to
become PREGNANT with it. It has to be BORN in you. You have to become a WOMB for
it. It is something ALIVE. You have to pour your life energies into it. You have
to revive it within your being. You have to CREATE it. God is not sitting there
somewhere so you can go and discover him. God has to be created!
So those who are looking for God as if he is hiding somewhere, and they will go
and search and find him, they are looking in vain. You are not only to discover
God: you have to create him. Each prayerful heart creates God again and again.
It is your creation. But people go on thinking of God as if it is something like
a commodity, that you can purchase it.
A man came to Mahavir, a king. His name was Presenjit; a very famous king of
those days. And he was going to many Masters. He had been to Buddha, he had been
to Ajit Keshkambali, he had been to Prabuddha Katyana, he had been to Makkhli
Goshal, he had been to Sanjay Vilethiputta -- to MANY teachers. Then he came to
Mahavir, and he asked Mahavir, "Give me what you call meditation, DHYANA, give
it to me! And I am ready to pay for it. Whatsoever the price."
A worldly man -- only knows how to purchase a thing, thinks of everything as if
it can be purchased. If he falls in love with a woman, he purchases the woman
and misses thereby -- because love cannot be purchased. You can purchase the
body, but not the soul. Love has to be earned. You have to become worthy of it.
Now, he comes to Mahavir and asks such a stupid question. Mahavir must have
laughed. He said, "Listen. Why did you trouble Jo come so far into this forest?
In your own capital there is a man -- my disciple he is, a very poor man -- and
he would very much like to sell his meditation. He is so poor. Just go to him! I
don't need what you can give to me, so I am not in any mood to sell my
meditation to you. Go and purchase it from a very poor man. He may decide to
sell it."
It was a joke. Presenjit rushed in his chariot, went to the poor man's hut. It
was such a poor hut that he thought, "Certainly this man will sell. I can even
purchase this man -- what about the meditation!"
And the man came, a very poor man, almost naked, but utterly beautiful and
graceful, a great light within his being -- you could see it. And the king felt,
"Mahavir IS right -- this man HAS got it.
Look at his face -- so luminous!" And he said, "just tell me what you want. I
have come to purchase your meditation, your samadhi. And I am ready to give
anything you ask."
The man hesitated. What to say to the king? And the king thought, obviously,
"He is hesitating about the price." So he said, "Don't be worried. You can say
ANY amount."
But the man said, "It is not a question of price."
The king said, "Don't be worried about it at all. I can give my whole kingdom
to you, because when once I decide to purchase a thing, I always purchase it.
Just say!"
But the man said, "I am sorry to say... I don't want to say no to you, but what
are you asking? It is absurd! I cannot sell it. It is not a thing. It is not
anything objective. It HAS HAPPENED to me. Mahavir must have played a joke with
you. You go back to the Master. He has simply sent you here so that you can
under-stand that even if you give your kingdom to a poor beggar, he cannot sell
his meditation or samadhi. There is no way to purchase it. It is invaluable. And
it is not a commodity at all."
But people go on thinking God is a commodity, samadhi is a commodity,
enlightenment is a commodity: "Give us.. .!" It is not! You have to become it.
You have to be transformed. And only your effort can transform you. The Master
can show you the way, but you will have to follow.
The Sufi said:
"BEFORE YOU ASK ANYONE TO ACCEPT YOU, ASK YOURSELF WHETHER IT IS NOT SIMPLY
BECAUSE YOU HAVE NOT FOLLOWED THE PATH OF YOUR OWN TEACHER.
"That you have missed and you are not ready to say that you are not a disciple.
That you have not been a disciple. Instead you are saying that the Master is
wrong. Instead of saying 'I have not followed the path,' you are declaring that
the path is wrong and there is no more truth on it.
"IF YOU ARE SATISFIED ABOUT THIS...
"that you have done all that you could, and more is not possible for you, and
nothing has happened there, then come to me; Then I am ready to help you. But be
satisfied about that."
This has to be understood by every disciple, every seeker. You are with me
here. If you don't go into that space that I make available for you, sooner or
later you will start thinking, "Nothing is happening. What am I doing here? I
must go and seek some other door. I must go and beg from somebody else. I must
go and learn from someone somewhere ELSE." But the space is available to you.
The door is open. And you are not walking in. You remain hanging outside. You go
on pretending in a thousand and one ways that you are moving, but you are not
moving.
The moving is possible only when you are totally with me -- if even a small
part of you is not with me, it is impossible to move in the door. You will have
to move as a total organic unity. You cannot leave your left hand outside. You
cannot leave ANYTHING outside. You will have to move in totally! Only then can
you move. You cannot move in partially, remember it.
So those who are totally with me, they have moved. And those who are going to
be totally with me, they WILL move. But there will be many also who will simply
be here partially. A little bit. Trying to judge whether it is worth taking the
risk. Hanging around. Calculating. If you are calculating, you are not a
disciple. If you are trying to figure it out, you are not a disciple. Because it
is NOT a question of figuring it out. It is so immense, you cannot figure it
out. It is so enormous, you cannot calculate about it. It is bigger than you, so
you cannot hold it in your hands. You have to be ready to disappear, to
evaporate. You have to die, and only then... the resurrection.
The disciple has to become the mythological bird, the phoenix: he has to
disappear into the fire, and out of the ashes the new will be born.
Those who are ready, those who can take the risk, those who are courageous,
only they will attain. And the remaining ones will start thinking, "Maybe this
is not the right door, this is not the right path, -this is not the right
Master. I should go somewhere else. Why am I wasting my time here?" And you will
do the same somewhere else too. And you can go on and on, life after life,
wandering and wandering, and never arriving.
This is what you have been doing in your past lives! You are not new, nobody is
new. All are old-timers. You have been here for ever and ever, from the very
beginning you have been here. I KNOW people are here who have been with
Buddha... and missed. I know people are here who have been with Rumi AND missed.
And I know, there are MANY people here who have been with Jesus AND missed.
It is not new. It is not that you are for the first time with a Master. You
have been many times. And each time you missed, you condemned the Master rather
than rethinking about your own self.
The calculating people are always ready to listen about the truth, but it has
to be abstract. When you come to the details, when they have to do something,
when the truth starts becoming a pragmatic reality, then problems arise.
There is a famous statement of Ludwig Wittgenstein: Don't look for the meaning,
look for the use. And in the same way, thousands of years before Wittgenstein,
Lao Tzu says: The mean-ing is the use. The use is the meaning. When you look for
it, you cannot see it. When you listen for it, you cannot hear it. But when you
use it, it is inexhaustible.
A Master is not there to give you a doctrine but a discipline. A doctrine is an
abstract thing. It is ABOUT God. A discipline is not about God: it is about you.
A Master is not there to philosophize, because we have more philosophy than we
need, already too much. A Master is there to help you walk. You are cripples. A
Master is there to heal, to cure you, your crippledness, your blindness, your
paralysis. He is a physician, he is not a philosopher. But people are always
ready to listen to abstract things, because those abstract things never touch
your life.
I have heard -- this story comes from the heart of China:
In a small church in a remote village, the people came to the minister
complaining that the wife of a deacon was stealing chickens from her neighbor.
They said, "You've got to do something about it."
He said, "All right, I will." That Sunday he preached on the text "You shall
not steal." At the close of the service the deacon came to him and said,
"Excellent sermon, Pastor."
But in three or four days the people came and said, "That sermon didn't do any
good at all -- she's still stealing."
So the next Sunday, the minister got more specific. He said, "You shall not
steal your neighbor's goods." At the close of the service the deacon shook hands
and said, "That's a much better sermon. You've really got to speak
specifically."
However, during the week the people said, "That didn't do any good -- she's
still stealing."
So the minister took courage in both hands and said, "You shall not steal your
neighbor's chickens."
The deacon came to him and said, "Now look, you're not supposed to be all that
specific in the pulpit."
When it comes to the small, real details of your life, you stop hearing. When
it is about abstract worlds of paradise, God, Nirvana, you are all alert. It
doesn't matter. It is beautiful philosophy. You cannot lose anything. You can
become a little more knowledgeable. But when it comes to the stealing of your
neighbor 's chickens, then it touches your life. THERE you become alert. THERE
you stop listening.
Remember: a Master is not to impart abstract truths to you but something that
has to be practiced in life, something that has to become your lifestyle.
Great courage is needed, and great endeavor, and great discipline, to change
and transform one's way of life. If you cannot, don't condemn the path you have
been following because really you have never followed it.
A man went up to the salesman at the Rolls Royce stand in the motor company's
show and asked the way to the gents' toilet.
The route was a bit complicated and the salesman deserted his post to escort
the man to the door of the toilet. Thanking him, the man asked why he had gone
to so much trouble.
"Because," answered the salesman, "yours was the first genuine inquiry I've had
all day."
If you really want to be with a Master you will have to become a genuine
inquiry. Not philosophic curiosity, but an inquiry in which your life and death
are involved. An inquiry which is going to transmute you. An inquiry that is
going to become a metamorphosis.
YOU ARE capable of flying into the sky, but you are hiding in your cocoons.
Those cocoons have to be broken -- and it hurts. And it hurts because you think
those cocoons are your defense, your safety, because you think those cocoons are
your homes. They are your prison cells.
The Master has to destroy the prison cell so the prisoner can be freed. But the
prisoner has become too identified with the prison cell, so he decorates it. He
may even hang the picture of the Master in the prison cell. He may worship the
Master, but in the prison cell. He will not listen to the Master that the prison
cell has to be broken. And unless you destroy the prison cell, and cooperate
with the Master in destroying it, you will not be free.
And to be free is the only way to know what truth is. Freedom is truth. Freedom
is God. Freedom is Nirvana.
OSHO - PERFECT MASTER VOL1
CH5.
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