Hazrat Inayat Khan
Vol. 11, Mysticism in Life
1. Mysticism in Life
Mysticism may be considered as the essence of all knowledge. It may be likened to the perfume of a flower, for it has a fragrance of its own. We do not see the perfume, but we see the flower, and so we will not hear many words from the mystic to explain mysticism, but we can perceive that mysticism in his atmosphere. Mysticism may also be likened to honey. Honey is purifying and so is mysticism; it purifies man of his infirmities, and it is the sweetest of all the different aspects of knowledge that exist.
To a mystic the outward forms such as rituals and ceremonies are not of the first importance; yet a mystic will take part in them, whereas the half-wise man who says, "I have advanced too far. I cannot tolerate the outer forms any more," will rebel against them. The mystic can tolerate anything, for he interprets according to his own stage of development. He can enjoy the meaning of ritual, which is something that even the people who are officiating do not always know. He may interpret a ceremony according to his own wisdom, and give an interpretation which those who perform that ceremony or those who watch it would never even have dreamt of. He sees all that he wishes to see and he knows all that he wishes to know, in the outer form as well as in the inner form.
It is a fact that mysticism cannot be defined in words in the form of doctrines, theories, or philosophical statements, for mysticism is an inner experience. In order to know an inner experience one must arrive at that experience. If we say to a person who has never had a headache in his life, "I have a headache," he will never understand it; he will not know what it is. Therefore the word mysticism means nothing; it is through the inner experience that one realizes its meaning in all its fullness. Naturally, therefore, we can find many books on psychology or philosophy, but seldom anything on mysticism; and the few there are on mysticism are generally about something quite different from what mysticism really is. The reason is that it cannot be put into a book; it cannot be expressed in words. But the very reason why it is so vague is why it so valuable, for if there is any knowledge that is worth while, if there is any science which is precious, it is the knowledge and science which one can get out of one's mystical experiences.
The difficulty is that there are half-mystics and quarter- mystics, and yet all of them are regarded as mystics, and this causes confusion. When a person says, "I am a Christian mystic, or a Jewish or a Muslim mystic," he has not yet arrived at mysticism. Mysticism cannot be divided into different sects, and the one who says, "My mysticism is different from your mysticism", has not yet arrived there, for true mystics cannot differ. Because inner experiences cannot be changed their experience is one and the same; all changes belong to the outer experiences of life. The further one progresses on the spiritual path, the more experiences one has which are similar to those of others in that advanced stage. All ideas such as that of the inner body or the hereafter are actual experiences of mystics; they are not speculations. The power of the mystic belongs to his own experience; the speculator is never satisfied with his knowledge, he is always doubting himself and wondering whether he is right or wrong.
There are seekers after mystical truth who have perhaps devoted twenty years or more to discovering some key to mysticism, and they have come back through the same door by which they entered in, saying, "I have found nothing; I have closed my eyes for years, but all in vain. Tell me what am I to see, what am I to find there?" The reason is that not only did such a person go on his search with his eyes closed, but he also closed his soul. Instead of receiving a revelation he had a double loss; he could have done much better with open eyes. Although he did not want to fool himself, which is always worth while, yet he did not want his imagination to make an effort, so his mind and his heart were closed even before he shut his eyes, and consequently nothing was open.
Imagination should not be discarded. Imagination becomes a ladder on the path of the mystic. Besides, if it were not for imagination there would have been no art, there would have been no literature, there would have been no music; these are all an outcome of imagination. When imagination can produce beauty outwardly in the form of poetry, music, art, or literature, it can produce beauty of much higher and greater value when it is directed inward. Someone may say, "If there is a God He should appear before me so that I may believe. I do not wish to take the trouble to imagine that there is one," yet if he lived on earth for thousands of years, he would remain where he is. First his imagination must help him to form an idea of the deity; then he will have made an abode for the deity to abide in. As Voltaire has said, "If God did not exist one would have to invent Him."
Naturally the mystic begins his work with the ladder of imagination, and actual experience follows. What experience does a mystic have? Does he see colors, does he communicate with spirits, does he wander in the higher worlds, does he read thoughts, does he recognize objects by psychometry, does he perform wonders? To a mystic all these things are elementary, and those who do them are half-mystics, quarter-mystics. To a mystic who is a thorough mystic it is all child's play. These things are not beyond his power; the power of the mystic can be so great and his insight can be so keen that an ordinary man cannot imagine it, yet for this very reason a mystic, who looks no different from an ordinary man, cannot profess to see or feel or know or understand any better. Naturally, therefore, the real mystic who has arrived at a certain point of understanding makes the greatest effort to keep his power and insight hidden from the eyes of all. It is the false mystic who comes forward and claims perfection and prophetic powers, and who suggests that he can work wonders.
Mysticism changes man's outlook on life. The higher a mystic reaches, the wider becomes his outlook. It is therefore very difficult for a mystic to adjust himself to the limited life of the world. He must continually speak and act differently from what he feels and knows. It is just like an actor on the stage: when he has to be a king then he acts as a king and speaks as a king, and when he takes the part of a servant he acts that part, but all the time he knows and feels that he is neither a king nor a servant; that he is an feeling of a mystic is one thing, and his outer affirmation is another.
Is this a right thing to do? Is it not a kind of hypocrisy? An outspoken person would say, "I say what I mean," just as he might say, "I tell the truth whether you like it or not, I don't mind." But it cannot be helped. In order to get away from this hypocrisy some mystics have closed their lips and have not spoken throughout their whole life; they have retired into the forest in order to get away from it. But when they live in the midst of the world they can only adopt this method: feel and know the truth, while speaking and acting as everybody else does. And if someone says that this is not right, the answer is that in the case of other people most things are wrong: knowing, acting, as well as speaking; whereas in the case of the mystic only one thing is wrong. The mystic at least feels and knows rightly; that much is to his advantage.
Imparting mysticism to a seeking soul is an automatic action on the part of the pupil and also on the part of the mystic, for what the mystic gives to the pupil is not his own, it is God's, and the pupil is a kind of vessel that receives this blessing..If the vessel is not ready or if it is filled with something else, with every desire on the part of the mystic to fill it he cannot. Therefore the whole training of mysticism is first to clean this vessel, to make it ready for the mystic to pour into it the divine knowledge which comes from within.
One might wonder whether life in the West has become too confused for real mystics to develop there. As there are tall people and short people in all parts of the world, so there are wise people and foolish people everywhere. The mystic is born with a tendency towards mysticism, and there are many who are born like this in the West. Only, in the East there are many who are interested in giving a stimulus to this tendency, whereas in the West it is the contrary; for when a person shows that tendency people laugh at him, they think it is something abnormal and they do not allow this gift with which he was born to develop in life. That is why one finds far fewer mystics in the West than in the East.
Besides, when a youth has a mystical tendency in the East he finds a teacher, a guide who can help him on, whereas in the West this is very difficult. Then generally nobody in his family knows anything about mysticism, and so they discourage him or disapprove of his tendency; and it is the same with his friends. So from all around he is pulled back instead of finding encouragement on the path. Nevertheless, a person born with a mystical tendency, however much he is pulled back, will always sooner or later try to find what he is looking for. He cannot feel satisfied because of that innate yearning.
People often ask what is the difference between mysticism and occultism. In point of fact occultism is that which the mystic shows as the result of his experience, as the outcome of his insight, as the expression of divine law. Nowadays we often hear occultism spoken of as something distinct from mysticism, but that is not so. Often a man who is a half-mystic comes forward, and then if people say that he is not a mystic, he will call himself an occultist; he must be something. This gives him a position too.
There is a story that three horsemen were coming from Delhi, and behind them there was a man riding on a donkey. Someone on the road addressed them and said, "Riders, where do you come from?" Before the three horsemen could answer, this man on the donkey said, "We four riders are coming from Delhi?
To give another example: clever and wise are not the same. It is not right to say that the wise man is not clever, though his wisdom weighs more than his cleverness. A person cannot be wise if he is not clever, only his wisdom gives his cleverness such dignity that it would be an offence to call a wise man clever. Thus a mystic is an occultist, but to call a mystic an occultist is to bring him down to a lower level; it is like calling a wise man clever. Occultism is the result of the mystic's experience. He fathoms the laws of the unseen world, and he interprets them in ordinary language; that is occultism.
The untranslatable pun is on savar, a word which means both "knight" and "rider." The claim of the man on the donkey in the story, who was a low-caste potter, became a Hindustani proverb: Chharon savar dillise a rahe hen.
2. Divine Wisdom
Nothing in the world can bring us happiness and satisfaction except divine wisdom. All other things which seem to suffice our needs will show their importance for a moment, but after that moment has passed there will be the same longing. It is only in divine wisdom that our life's purpose is fulfilled. The basis of mysticism is to be found in that saying of the Bible, "Seek ye first the kingdom of heaven, and all these things will be added unto you." Thus the search of the mystic is for that kingdom, for God, and in that search what does he find? In the search for God he finds his self.
Mysticism teaches communication with the self and enables the self to communicate with life. Also, the way to learn mysticism is quite different from the way in which one learns other things. In learning these one communicates with things, but in learning mysticism one communicates first with one's self, and this enables man to communicate with the outer life. It is not only a legend of the past that saints and sages spoke with trees and plants, with animals and birds. A soul that can communicate with life, with the self, can communicate even today with animals and birds and trees and plants.
Often people picture a mystic as a dreamer, as someone who is intoxicated, a drunken man; but in reality to the mystic everybody else is intoxicated, for the knowledge of mysticism is soberness. The mystic's consciousness makes him sober, for he begins to see things more clearly. Mostly he cannot speak about it, because his language is not always understood. People have reason to consider a mystic to be like a drunken person: he does not take notice of things that everybody else takes notice of, he does not attach any importance to things that everybody else considers important, he does not give as much thought to himself as everybody else does, he does not look at everyone in the same way as other people do, he does not judge people in the same light as everybody else judges others, he does not think of God and man in the same way as every other person does. Naturally it becomes difficult for the mystic to live in the world where his language is not understood, while he understands the language of all others. Before we have spoken to the mystic he has heard us speak; before we have expressed our thought he has read it; before we have expressed our feeling he has felt it. That is why a mystic can be in communication with another person better than one could ever imagine, and thus the best definition that can be given of mysticism is that it is communication with life.
No doubt a mystic is born a mystic; it is a certain type of mind which is born mystical; but mysticism can also be acquired. A soul who is born a mystic will from his cradle show mystic tendencies; but mysticism which is acquired is a greater achievement, for then one has made a normal progress towards divine wisdom.
Now the question is, how does man communicate with his self? By self-analysis. No doubt there is a danger in self-analysis. When a person is always wondering how wrong he is, how bad he is, how wicked he is, or how stupid he is, he will never stop worrying and troubling about himself, and the further he continues in this way, the more he will find in himself the spirit of wickedness or stupidity; perhaps throughout his whole life he will find that same spirit in himself. The mystic delves deeper in himself in order to discover what it is in him that gives him the sign of existence, what it is in him that lives and what it is that dies, what it is in his being that is limited and what it is that is beyond limitation. By meditating on this a mystic communicates with his self. And in order to communicate with others he removes the barrier which stands between one person and the other, between "I" and "you."
As to the religion and the moral of the mystic, the mystic has one moral and that is love; and he has one aim in his religion and that is to make God a reality. Therefore his God becomes a greater God than the God of millions of people who only imagine that there is a God somewhere; to him God is a reality. How can one make God a reality? Since we are able to make what is unreal a reality, it is very easy to make reality real.
There was a Brahmin who was worshipping his idol, and a man came along and said to him, "How foolish! You are a high-caste Brahmin, you have such great culture, and yet you worship a God of stone which you have made with your own hands!" The Brahmin said, "If you have faith this god of stone will become a real god to you, and if you have no faith even the formless God who is in heaven is nothing." The idea behind this is that we do not know and see the reality of God because we have made real all that is unreal before us. We are impressed by it, we live in longing for it, we pursue it, we live in it; and so from morning till evening we are, so to speak, wrapped up in this world of illusion, in all that is unreal and that covers our eyes from reality.
In order to find goodness one must find wickedness to compare it with. When we have found both, then both become clear; wickedness will show what goodness is. In order to find reality we must gather the knowledge of what is unreal, and this is not difficult. In our ordinary language we use the word false; false is that which is not real. All that is subject to change and destruction may be something in appearance, but it is never that which it pretends to be. All this existence which is before us and which is subject to change and death is not reality; it cannot be reality; but we can only see this when we have acquired some knowledge of reality,. If we do not look at it as unreal, we shall not have the desire to find what is real. We must find out what is unreal and acknowledge it as unreal; then alone can we go on to the next step which will be to find reality.
3. Life's Journey
It is the coming of the soul from its original place to manifestation and its returning again from manifestation to its original condition that makes life's journey; the meaning of life as we understand it is merely this journey. The condition of the soul before this journey and after this journey is not recognized, not acknowledged by man; in reality before this journey the soul is not a soul, nor does the soul remain as a soul after this journey. But for people who hold on to their personality and who have not yet probed the wider horizon of knowledge, it is very difficult to absorb this knowledge; and as all that they know is themselves, God being no more than an idea to them, they sometimes get disappointed and discouraged. Yet whatever conception may be given to them, it does not take away the fact that a soul only exists as an individual soul from the time it shoots out as a current through the different spheres until the time when it goes back and meets its original Being.
There is a difference between eternal and everlasting. The word "eternal" can never be attached to the soul, for that which has a birth and a death, a beginning and an end, cannot be eternal though it can be everlasting. It is everlasting according to our conception; it lasts beyond all that we can conceive and comprehend, but when we come to the eternal that is God alone.
Different spheres such as the angelic sphere and the jinn sphere are like a clay which is made for the soul to use. In other words, the soul borrows from the angelic sphere the matter of that sphere; it is called matter because there is no other term for it except the matter or substance of that sphere. Then from the sphere of the jinn it gathers the substance of that sphere, and that substance covers the substance which it has already gathered in the angelic sphere; and after this the soul gathers around itself the substance of the physical sphere. By analyzing the substance of the physical sphere we can arrive at a better conception of the idea that the whole of creation was made in order that man might be created, that all that went before was a preparation. Even the angelic sphere and the jinn sphere were preparatory stages for the soul coming towards manifestation.
Thus we come to the analysis of the four different clays of which the body of man is composed. The first clay comes from the mineral kingdom. Rocks and mountains were made first; trees and plants came afterwards; and the third process was that the same substance which first was rock and mountain and then became tree and plant, afterwards became still more living and manifested in the form of animals and birds; and it is from this same substance that the body of man was made. It is as if God had made a clay for man which was first dense in the form of a rock and in the form of a tree, then less dense in the form of an animal, until it was made still finer so that in the fourth stage it might become the substance for the body of man.
It is for this reason that man depends for his sustenance on all these substances. There is mineral substance which is good for his health, there is the vegetable kingdom on which he depends for his food, and there is the animal kingdom which also serves for his sustenance. Because his body is made of these elements it is also sustained by these elements; man is made of these four substances, the flesh, the blood, the skin, and the bone representing the four different clays.
Besides from infancy and childhood man begins to show the qualities which he has gathered from the different spheres. For instance infancy shows the sign of the angelic world; in the form and face of the infant, in its expression, in its smiles, we can see the angelic world. An infant is like an envoy sent from heaven to the earth. And early childhood begins to show the quality of the jinn world: the inquisitive tendency to ask of everything what it is, the love for all that is good and beautiful, all that attracts the senses, these qualities of the jinn world manifest in a child. The child takes such keen notice of everything, the child remembers more than ten trained grown-up persons remember, the child is keen to understand everything that it encounters, eager to learn and happy to remember. All these are jinn qualities; afterwards, with youth, the qualities of the world become apparent.
When man advances in age he shows a return of the same qualities. First the jinn quality; when he has had all the experience of the world and has reached a certain age he becomes most keen to express all that is beautiful. At this age human beings become intelligent, they speak, they teach, they understand things which young people cannot understand; the jinn quality develops. And when he advances further in age, then the angelic quality develops, then innocence comes with its engaging smiles, then all malice and prejudice are gone and a quality of continually giving out begins to manifest. If one does not see these qualities developing in some people this is usually because they are more engrossed in the world, and then the natural development does not show itself.'
In infancy man also shows a mineral quality, and that is the slow perception of everything. An infant is living just like a rock, sitting or lying, and it does not move as quickly as an older child. In seeing, in hearing, in responding, in perceiving, in everything it has a slow rhythm; it shows the rock quality. And with childhood appears the vegetable quality: as vegetables grow so the infant grows, and as trees and plants are responsive to human sympathy so the child begins to respond. With a loving person the plant grows more quickly and flourishes better, and so the child grows up more harmoniously with a loving guardian. But where that love is not given, then just as plants and trees wither so the life of the child becomes ruined.
In youth the animal or bird quality begins to show, and that again demonstrates the continuity of the same process, the process of the angelic sphere, of the jinn plane, and of the physical world. With age it is again the same process, but the other way round: first the vegetable kingdom begins to show, a person becomes milder, more gentle, thoughtful, and considerate, just like trees compared with rocks. And as one advances so one comes closer to the mineral kingdom; then a certain exclusiveness, a remoteness, a wish for retirement, a love of solitude develop which are all qualities of the mineral kingdom.
There is another most interesting side to this subject, and that is the spiritual development. A man who develops spiritually also shows the qualities of those spheres whence he has come, and of those substances on which he has lived. For instance the first quality that a spiritually advanced person shows is that he is more perceptive, more observant, more responsive, more outgoing, more appreciative, more sympathetic, more harmonious. Where does it all come from? It comes from the animal kingdom.
As he goes further man begins to show the vegetable quality: gentleness, mildness, kindness, and above all, the bearing of fruit and giving it to all, to the deserving and to the undeserving alike. The one who can reach the branch of the tree can take the fruit. People throw stones at trees and cut them, but although no doubt this hurts "the tree, the tree does not blame them. It has borne fruit and it is willing to give it to them; and this becomes the condition of the spiritual person: willing to serve all who need his service, bearing fruits and flowers which may nourish and please others.
Afterwards man adopts the stone quality, which is to endure heat and cold and wind and storm and to stand firm through them all. The soul who has advanced further spiritually becomes like this. Everything that falls on him he accepts. He loves retirement, he loves solitude, and at the same time the world may drag him out of it and life may compel him to be in the world. But the rocks always seek the wilderness, they belong to the wilderness, they live in the wilderness; that is their seeking, that is their place.
There have been many kings and rich people in the history of the world, but they have never been so loved and honored and held in so much esteem by human beings as the spiritual souls. Why is this? Because it is out of the rock that the idol of God is made; and when man has become a rock, then he is worshipped, then he becomes a living idol. And if one asks why man has to become a rock in order to be worshipped, the answer is because the rock is not conscious of itself; that is why. People prefer to worship a rock rather than a man, so when the spiritual soul has reached the stage of becoming a rock, no more conscious of his little self, unaware of his limitation, not concerned with anything, detached from all things and beings, then that soul is to be worshipped.
There are three higher qualities which also manifest when a person becomes spiritual. The human quality manifests when he develops personality. This is the first step; when there is spiritual advancement personality blooms. The jinn quality manifests in the next stage when a spiritual man begins to teach, when he shows genius in his inspiration and in his insight into human nature, into past, present, and future. And when he reaches the stage where the angelic quality manifests, then he begins to show innocence, simplicity, love for all, sympathy, and God-consciousness. The angelic quality manifests in the spiritual man when he has withdrawn himself from the world, when he has centered his mind on the cosmos, and when his consciousness is no longer an individual consciousness. By that time he has become God-conscious.
4. Raising the Consciousness
The whole striving of the mystic is to raise his consciousness as high as possible. What this raising of the consciousness means, and how it is raised, can be better understood by the one who has begun to practice it. The best means of raising the consciousness is by the God-ideal; therefore, however much one has studied metaphysics or philosophy intellectually and found some truth about one's being, it does not suffice for the purpose of life; for the culmination of life lies in the raising of the consciousness.
We can see this tendency in the rising of the waves, always trying to reach high and higher still. When they cannot go any farther they fall, but again they rise. The tendency of the animals to stand on their hind legs is also the tendency of rising; fishes enjoy that swing of going up with the waves in the sea; the greatest joy of the bird is to be up in the sky. And man, whose soul is striving to rise, shows in his upright form that among all living beings he is the one who stands upright. All through creation this tendency shows itself; that is why the mystic uses this tendency to work towards the real purpose of life.
There are strivings which pull one down in the eyes of others and in one's own consciousness, and there are strivings which raise one in the eyes of others and in one's own consciousness. By studying this the mystic tries to raise himself in his consciousness instead of falling beneath it. He may go so far that he becomes independent of what others say, for as a man advances in the spiritual life he is less understood by others in his thought, speech, or action; but his striving is to raise himself high in his own consciousness. One might call it pride, but the proud will inherit the kingdom of heaven. It is the pride in God which makes a mystic feel the emptiness of all other things in this world, the insignificance of all the things to which most people attach such importance. It is this which raises him high in his own consciousness. To a mystic, to fall means to fall beneath his own ideal; and to rise means to climb constantly towards his own ideal. If anything he thinks or does or says brings him lower in his own estimation instead of higher, he struggles against it and calls it a fall.
There is no law governing the mystic's life other than this law, the law of conscience, a constant striving which makes him struggle joyfully against influences that pull him down and keep him beneath his ideal. No doubt once a man takes this path it means that he chooses a path of continual suffering, because everything in the world is pulling him down from that ideal; there is nothing whatever to help him. Therefore to raise oneself above the threads that pull from every side and try to drag one down to the lowest level is a struggle against the whole of life. So one should not be surprised at the custom of the dervishes, who sometimes in their assemblies, sitting on the ground under the shade of a tree or beside a river, without a mat and without proper clothes, yet address one another as "Your Majesty the King" or "Your Majesty the Emperor." For the moment it might make one laugh, but in reality they are the emperors, they are the kings, for they have striven all through life to raise their consciousness above these influences which continually drag. one down to the depths of the earth.
One might think that in a way this is pride. Indeed, it could be a form of pride if it were not offered on the altar of God. It is a pride which is won and held in high honor, and when that honor is offered on the altar of God, then this is the highest possible form of worship. There is foolish pride and there is wise pride. Foolish pride draws one to the depths of the earth and to destruction; wise pride raises one to the highest heaven, and brings upon one the bliss which belongs to the heavens. But besides pride humility has a place in the life of a Sufi, of a mystic. Its place is in willing, loving surrender. As the Emperor Mahmud Ghasnavi says in a poem, "I, the Emperor Ghasnavi, on whom thousands of slaves wait, have myself become a slave since love. has awakened in my heart.'
In devotion or love we cannot humble ourselves too much. The Persian poets such as Hafiz and Jami and many others show us the humble side of the mystic; they show how much he can humble himself. To call himself dust at the feet of the Beloved is the least he can say, to worship the ideal that he loves is the highest worship for him; it is never a humiliation. This shows that the work of the mystic is to expand the scope of life, to make its range of pitch as vast as possible. At one end of it is the greatest pride; at the other end is the greatest humility. Pride and humility are to the mystic the positive and negative forms of sentiment, of feeling. Those who proudly refrain from humility are ignorant of its blessing, for in humbleness there is a great bliss; and those who are fixed in their humility and forget that pride which wilt enrich life do not know what they are losing in their lives. Yet it is the really proud who are humble, and it is the really humble who are proud.
No doubt the raising of the consciousness can also be interpreted differently. One can say that it means raising the consciousness from this earthly plane to a higher plane, and then again to still higher planes, in order to experience the depths and the heights of life. And this gives the mystic a wide horizon in which to experience and to make experiments of all kinds. It opens up many worlds before him, the whole cosmos in which to live and move and have his being; and then to him the ordinary life will seem to be a life in a narrow, small world. It is just like living one's life in the ocean instead of in a small well. The world of the mystic becomes the whole being, the whole existence; it gives him a wide scope to live in, and it gives him the assurance of immortal life.
A man who climbs a steep mountain is always apt to slip. But if this slipping, which is natural, induces him to go down again he will never climb any more. If he slips and then tries to go on he will become more sure-footed, and will learn how to avoid slipping. Perhaps he will slip a thousand times, but a thousand times he will go forward again. It is nothing to be surprised at if a person slips; it is natural. The mountain is steep; it is natural that one should slip. The best thing one can do is to go on after every such slip, without losing courage, without allowing one's consciousness to be impressed by it; to think that it is natural and to continue the ascent.
5. The Path to God
A man who stands outside Sufism is always confused as to the Sufi's attitude towards God. He cannot make out whether the Sufi is a worshippcr of God or a worshipper of self, whether the Sufi claims himself to be God, whether he is an idolater, or whether he worships the formless God in heaven. The one who wonders like this has some reason for it, because when he sees that in this world there are believers and unbelievers, that there are some who worship God and some who do not, he cannot understand the attitude of the Sufi, he cannot decide whether the Sufi is a beginner on the spiritual path or whether he has arrived at the goal. If he calls him a beginner he cannot prove this to himself, because of the Sufi's personality which radiates God; and if he calls him someone who has arrived at the height of spirituality then he thinks, "How can a Sufi, who is supposed to be a Godrealized man, be so childlike as to worship God in the same way as everybody else does, when he says that he does not see any importance in the worship of form, that he is above it?'
Moreover, there are some attitudes of the Sufi which very much shock a religious man, an orthodox person, for the realization of the Sufi cannot always be held back. He may try to do so, but sometimes it will leap out, and then one begins to doubt whether the Sufi is really a worshipper of God or whether inwardly he feels differently towards God. The Sufi, therefore, is a riddle to a person who cannot understand him fully, to one who stands outside Sufism, for he does not know what the Sufi believes and what he does not believe.
Four Stages of God-Consciousness
There are four different stages of God-realization of the Sufi.
1. Make a God
The first and primitive stage is to make a God. If he does not make Him out of a rock or out of wood he makes Him out of his thought. He does not mind, as an idolater would not mind, worshipping the God that he has made himself. Out of what does he make Him? Out of his imagination. The man who has no imagination stands on the ground; he has no wings, he cannot fly. The Sufi imagines that in spite of all the injustice of human nature there is one just Being, and he worships this Being whom he has imagined as his God. In spite of all the unreliable lovers and beloveds, he imagines that there is a Lover and a Beloved upon whom he can always depend. He thinks,
"Notwithstanding this ever-changing and unreliable human nature that surrounds me there is a reliable, unchangeable source of love and of life before me.
He hears not only my words but every thought I have, He feels all my feelings.
He is continually with me and within me; to whichever side I turn I meet Him.
He protects me when I am asleep, when I am not conscious of protecting myself.
He is the source of my support, and He is the center of all wisdom.
He is mercy, He is compassion.
God is the greatest friend, upon whom I can always depend; and if the whole world turns away from me I shall still have that friend, a friend who will not turn away as the friends of this earthly life do after having buried their beloved friend or relation, a friend whom I shall find even in my grave. Wherever I exist I will always have this friend with me."
2. The Lover of God
And when he has passed through this stage then there comes another stage, the stage of the lover of God. In this stage he begins to look upon God as his Beloved, and only then does he begin to learn the manner of true love; for love begins in man and culminates in God, the perfect ideal and object of love. A Hindustani poet says that the first step on the path of love teaches a person to say, "I am not." As long as he thinks, "I am," he is far away from the path of love; his claim of love is false. Naturally, just as a lover is resigned to the will of the beloved, to suffer or to go through any test, so the Sufi at this stage takes all things in life as they come, courageously and bravely, meeting all difficulties and all circumstances, realizing that it all comes from the beloved God. It is in this way that contentment and resignation are learnt, that a willing surrender in love is practiced, and that love, which is a divine quality, naturally raises man to a higher standard.
One might say, how can one love God, God whom one does not know, does not see? But the one who says this wants to take the second step instead of the first; he must first make God a reality, and then God will make him the truth. This stage is so beautiful; it makes the personality so tender and gentle; it gives such patience to the worshipper of God; and together with this gentleness and patience he becomes so powerful and strong that there is nothing that he will not face courageously: illness, difficulties, loss of money, opposition--there is nothing that he is afraid of. With all his gentleness and tenderness, inwardly he becomes strong.
3. All is God
When a man has passed through this stage then there comes a third stage, and it is that he considers all earthly sources, whether favorable or unfavorable, all that comes to him, as God. If a friend comes to meet him, to the Sufi it is God who is coming to meet him; if a beggar is asking for a penny, it is God whom the Sufi recognizes in that form; if a wretched man is suffering misery, he sees also in this the existence of God. Only, the difference is that in some he sees God unconscious, in others he sees God conscious.
All those who love him, who hate him, who like or dislike him, who look upon him with admiration or contempt, he looks at with the eyes of the worshipper of God, who sees his Beloved in all aspects. Naturally when this attitude is developed he develops a saintly spirit. Then he begins to see in this world of variety the only Being playing His role as various beings, and for him every moment of his life is full of worship.
But even with this realization he will never say that he is more evolved than those who worship God in an ordinary form; he can stand with them and worship in the same manner as they, although he stands above it all; but he will never claim to do so.
4. Loss of the Self
The fourth development of the God-ideal is in the loss of the self. But which self is lost? The false self is lost, and the true self is gained. In this stage the Sufi hears through the ears of God, sees through the eyes of God, works with the hands of God, walks with the feet of God; then his thought is the thought of God and his feeling is the feeling of God. For him there is no longer that difference which a worshipper makes between himself and God.
As Khusrau the Indian poet says, "When I have become Thee and Thou hast become me, when I have become body and Thou hast become soul, then, Beloved, there is no difference between 'I' and 'Thou'."
What profit does the Sufi derive from this loss of what he calls his outer personality? It is not really a loss of outer personality, it is an expansion of the outer personality to the width and height of the inner personality. Then man becomes God-man, Godconscious; outwardly he is in the universe, inwardly the universe is in him. Outwardly he is smaller than a drop, inwardly he is larger than the ocean; and in this realization the purpose of belief in God, of worshipping God, and of loving God is accomplished.
The Sufi says that since the whole of manifestation is the manifestation of love, and since God Himself is love, then it is natural that the same love which comes from the source returns to the source, and that the purpose of life is accomplished by it. Somebody asked a Sufi, "Why did God create the world?" and he said, "In order to break the monotony of loneliness." And how is that monotony broken? It is broken through God loving His creation and through His creatures loving God. We see the same love of God in all things: in the love of a mother for her child, in the love of a friend for his friend, in all the different aspects it is the same love manifesting. Outwardly it may seem human, but inwardly it is all divine.
If we come face to face with truth, it is one and the same. One may look at it from the Christian, from the Buddhist, or from the Hindu point of view, but in reality it is one point of view. One can either be small or large, either be false or true, either not know or know. As long as a person says, "When I look at the horizon from the top of the mountain I become dizzy; this immensity of space frightens me," he should not look at it. But if it does not make one dizzy it is a great joy to look at life from above; and from that position a Christian, Jew, Muslim, and Buddhist will all see the same immensity. It is not limited to those of any one faith or creed. Gradually, as they unfold themselves and give proof of their response to the immensity of the knowledge, they are asked to go forward, face to face with their Lord.
One should remember, however, that there are very few who enjoy reality compared with those who are afraid of it, and who, standing on the top of a high mountain, are afraid of looking at the immensity of space. It is the same sensation. What frightens them is the immensity of things; they seem lost and they hold on to their little self. The difficulty of this is that they not only die in the thought of mortality, but that even while they live it culminates in a kind of disease; and this disease is called self-obsession, obsession by the self. They can think of nothing but themselves, of their fears, doubts, and confusions, of all things pertaining to themselves; and in the end it turns them into their own enemy. First they look upon everybody else as their enemy because they are out of harmony with everybody, and in the end they are a burden to themselves. Such cases are not rare. Whatever religion they have, whatever faith they claim, they do not yet know what religion is. A man who professed to have no religion once said to me very profoundly, "I am happy, I have no fear!" He was spiritual though he did not know it.
One might ask if someone who has this realization can still have weaknesses. The weaknesses of the one who has gone along this path do not make him weak. It is his weaknesses which are weak, not he himself. Besides there is a saying in Hindi, "Never .judge the godly." As the eyes have a limit, so the mind has a limit. How can the unlimited soul, who is in the Unlimited, be judged by the man who looks at life from a narrow point of view? Those who arrive at an advanced stage never judge; it is the man who is at a lower stage who judges. The one who is on the top of the mountain judges no one, and therefore he is exempt from being judged.
Furthermore, when a person says, "I have not made a God, but want to love God," or when he says, "I have not loved God, but I want to know God, I want to see Him," or when he says, "I do not wish to see God, but I want to realize God," he is asking for something which is impossible. One can go through these stages either quickly or slowly, but one must pass through these four stages. And if a person has not the patience to pass through these four stages, he certainly cannot enjoy that pleasure, that happiness which is experienced by the traveller on the path of God.
6. The Ideal of the Mystic
An adept on the path of spiritual attainment needs an ideal to keep before him. And people often wonder when they see that a mystic who is on the esoteric path appears to have the same kind of ideal that an orthodox person has in his religious life; but although the mystic may perhaps have the religious ideal of a Lord and Saviour just like many others, yet the way he looks upon that ideal is different from the way of the world. His spiritual ideal is not a personality from a story or legend; his ideal is the Rasul, by whatever name people may know him. And who is the Rasul? The Rasul is the soul through which God Himself has attained that which is the purpose of creation, in other words the Rasul is the one who represents God's perfection through human limitation. The historical man, the man of a tradition, is the Rasul of his followers, but the adept recognizes that Rasul who is behind the picture which history or tradition makes of him.
When people argue after reading the life of one Rasul whom they consider their own, or of the Rasul of other people, the adept is not interested in this dispute; for to him it is like two artists who have made a portrait of the same person and argue saying, "Your conception is wrong, my conception is right," or, "My picture is better than yours," whereas an adept looks at the picture and says, "It is his conception." One artist may have painted Dante in one form, another paints him in a different way, but if there is a dispute about which is the real portrait of Dante, the one who has understanding will say that each is a different conception. Perhaps one appeals to one person, while another appeals to another person.
Thus the adept makes a garland of the names by which different people have called their Rasul and offers this garland to his own ideal. He says, "If there was any Buddha it is you, if there was any Christ it is you, if there was any Mohammed it is you; in you I see him. If Moses came with a message it was you who came. I see you in Solomon; and in the wonders of Krishna as well as in the splendor of Shiva I see you." Whereas others argue about the different names of the great ones and about the different conceptions that people have of them, he does not limit his ideal; he makes his ideal the Alpha and Omega, the first and the last.
A mystic can only be called a mystic when he has arrived at the stage where his ideal is larger than that which can be covered by a name. He may give any name to his ideal, but if he covers his ideal with a name he has certainly not yet arrived at the mystic stage. All the beautiful forms that exist are forms of this ideal, all the good qualities that one finds in man he gives to his ideal, and also all the different ways of expressing one's respect and devotion that he sees in the world. And in this way, as he progresses through life, he makes his ideal better and better, greater and greater, higher and higher, till the ideal is perfect.
If there seems to be a limitation in his ideal he thinks that it is his own limitation, that it is he who cannot conceive his ideal better. It is just like an artist who tries to make a statue of his beloved ideal as beautiful, as fine as he can, and at the same time he realizes that all that is lacking in it and all that remains to be done, or all the faults that it may seem to have, are his own faults, while his ideal is perfect. This is a stepping-stone for the mystic to come closer to God's shrine; by this he attains more quickly to a higher degree of perfection, for it is through love and devotion alone that man can forget himself.
As there is great joy and satisfaction in the worship of God, so there is great joy and satisfaction in adhering to one's ideal. When a person says that he will not let anyone come between him and God, he does not know what he is saying, for in the ideal it is God who is made intelligible for our own limited mind to grasp the divine ideal. If one denies the existence of the ideal, one certainly denies the reality of God, for it is really only after having attained to spiritual perfection that one may say anything --but then one does not say anything. When people say things without having thought about them, they speak before they have arrived at perfection.
No devotion given to our ideal is too great. However high we believe our divine ideal to be, it is certainly higher than that; however beautiful a picture of our ideal we make, the ideal itself is still more beautiful; and therefore a devotee always has scope for expansion, for advancement. And an adept who advances on the mystical path, with all his striving, his study of life, and his meditation, will still need a spiritual ideal to carry him through all the difficulties of the path, and to bring him to the destination which is attainment.
7. Nature
Anyone who has some knowledge of mysticism and of the lives of the mystics knows that what always attracts the mystic most is nature. Nature is his bread and wine; nature is his soul's nourishment; nature inspires him, uplifts him, and gives him the solitude for which his soul continually longs. Every soul born with a mystical tendency is constantly drawn towards nature; in nature that soul finds its life's demand, as it is said in the Vadan, "Art is dear to my heart, but nature is near to my soul."
Upon those who are without any tendency towards mysticism nature has a calming effect; to them it means a peaceful atmosphere; but to the mystic nature is everything. No wonder that the mystics, sages, and prophets of all ages sought refuge in nature from all the disturbing influences of daily life. They considered the caves of the mountains to be better than palaces; they enjoyed the shelter under a tree more than beautiful houses; they liked looking at the running water better than watching the passing crowds; they preferred the sea-shores to the great cities; they enjoyed watching the rising and the falling of the waves more than all the show that the world can produce; they loved to look at the moon, at the planets, at the stars in the sky more than at all the beautiful things made by man.
To a mystic the word nature has a wider meaning; according to the mystical point of view nature has four different aspects. The forest, the desert, hills and dales, mountains and rivers, sunrise and sunset, the moonlit night, and the shining stars are one aspect of nature. Before a mystic they stand like letters, characters, figures made by the Creator to read if one is able to read them. The sura of the Qur'an which contains the first revelation of the Prophet includes the verse, "Read in the name of your Lord . . . who taught with the pen." The mystic, therefore, recognizes this manifestation as a written book; he tries to read these characters and enjoys what they reveal to him.
To the mystic it is not only the waxing and the waning of the moon, it has some other significance for him; it is not only the rising and the setting of the sun, it tells him something else; it is not only the positions of the stars, but their action and their influence relate something to the heart of the mystic. The mountains standing so silently, the patient trees of long tradition, the barren desert, the thick forest, not only have a calming effect upon the mystic, but they express something to him. The fluttering of the leaves comes to his ears as a whisper, the murmur of the wind falls on his ears as music, and the sound of little streams of water running in the forest, making their way through rocks and pebbles, is a symphony to the ears of the mystic. No music can be greater and higher and better than this. The crashing of the thunder, the soughing of the wind, the blowing of the morning breeze, all these convey to a mystic a certain meaning which is hidden behind them; and for a mystic they make a picture off life, not a dead picture but a living picture, which at every moment continually reveals a new secret, a new mystery to his heart.
And then we come to the next aspect of nature, an aspect which manifests through the lower creation. The silent little creatures crawling on the earth, the birds singing in the trees, the lion with its wrath, the elephant with its grandeur, the horse with its grace, and the deer with its beauty, all these tell him something. He begins to see the meaning of the wrath of the lion and of the modesty of the deer; he listens to the words that come to his ears through the singing of the birds, for to him it is not a wordless song. The ancient mystics in their symbology used the head of the tiger, the form of the lion, the image of the eagle, and also pictures of the snake and the cow. They pictured them as a character which they had read through observing this aspect of nature.
There is an aspect of nature which is still more interesting, and to see it the mystic need not go away, for he sees it in the midst of the world. What is it? It is to read human nature and to watch its continual change, its progress, its degradation, its improvement. It is so interesting that in spite of all the difficulties that the world presents, one feels life worth living when one begins to notice how those who were going forward begin to go backward, and how those who were going backward begin to go forward; when one observes how a person, without sinking in the water, is drowned in life, and how a person who was drowning begins to swim and is saved; when one sees how from the top a person comes down to the bottom in a moment, and how a person who was creeping on the ground has at last arrived at the top; when one sees how friends turn into bitter enemies, and how bitter enemies one day become friends. To one who observes human nature keenly it gives such an interest in life that he becomes sufficiently strong to bear all, to endure all, to stand all things patiently. One may observe this moving picture all through life, and it is never enough; one never tires of it.
And the fourth aspect of nature is seeing the divine nature, realizing the meaning of the saying that man proposes and God disposes. When one is able to see the works of God in life, another world is opened before one; then a man does not look at the world as everybody else does, for he begins to see not only the machine going on but the engineer standing by its side, making the machine work. This offers a still greater interest, the greatest interest in life. If one were to be flayed or crucified one would not mind, for one rises above all pain and suffering, and one feels it worth while to be living and looking at this phenomenon that gives one in one's lifetime the proof of the existence of God.
It is these four aspects of life that are called nature by the mystics; to a Sufi they are his holy scripture. All the other sacred books of the world, however highly esteemed by the followers of the different religions, are interpretations of this book, given by those who were granted clear vision and who tried their best to give all they had learnt from it to humanity in our human language, which is a language of limitations.
Nature does not teach the glory of God; it need not teach this as nature itself is the glory of God. People wish to study astrology and other subjects in order to understand better, but if we study astrology then we are sure to arrive at an interpretation which is given by a man, whereas what we should read from nature is what nature gives us and not what any book teaches us. There comes a time with the maturity of the soul when every thing and every being begins to reveal its nature to us. We do not need to read their lives, we do not need to read their theories. We know then that this wide nature in its four aspects is ever-revealing and that one can always communicate with it, but that in spite of this it is not the privilege of every soul to read it. Many souls remain blind with open eyes. They are in heaven, but not allowed to look at heaven; they are in paradise, but not allowed to enjoy the beauties of paradise. It is just like a person sleeping on a pile. of gems and jewels. From the moment man's eyes open and he begins to read the book of nature he begins to live; and he continues to live for ever.
8. Ideal
Mystic is an idealist in every sense of the word: one who has no ideal cannot be a mystic. It would not be an exaggeration to say that the one who has no ideal lives without life. If there is anything in the world which we can say we live for, it is one thing only--the ideal; and when there is no ideal there is nothing to live for. In Sanskrit religion is called Dharma, which literally means duty; to give a definition of what religion is one can say that it is an unswerving progress towards the ideal. But then what is the ideal? Any ideal or every ideal that we have before us is the ideal for that moment.
Ideal can be divided into five aspects, of which the first is the ideal which one has for oneself. It might begin to show itself as a whim, as a dream, as an imagination, even as an expectation of a child. If a child says, "When I am grown-up I will have an elephant to ride upon, or a beautiful horse," this is an ideal. And this first aspect of the ideal can again be divided into three classes. The first is when one says, "I shall possess this or that--'I shall so much wealth, so many gardens, so many places, or, surround myself with so much grandeur that I shall appear quite different from anyone else." The next is when one says, "I shall be the Prime Minister or the President of the country or have a throne and crown." And the third class is when one says, "I shall keep to this particular virtue, I shall be pious", or, "I shall be good every sense of the word", or, "I shall be that which I consider good and beautiful in myself."
There was a young man in Indian history, whose name was Slivaji, and whose story is an example of this first aspect of ideal. He began his life by living on robbery, and one day he came into the presence of a sage, to ask his blessing for success in his robbery. The sage saw in his face, in Ins eyes, in his voice that here was a real jewel, that there was an ideal in him, although not yet awakened. The sage asked him, "How many men have you in your gang?" He said, "No one. I work alone." The sage said, "It is a pity. You must form a small band and keep together." He was glad to take this advice, and he formed a small band of robbers, and continued in his pursuit. He was more successful, and when he visited the sage again the latter said, "How many are there now in your gang?" He said, "Only four or five."
The sage told him that this was too few, that he should have at least fifty or a hundred men to do something really worth while. And then Shivaji, by the charm of his personality, gathered some more robbers to accompany him, and they did many really daring things. They attacked caravans, and they risked their lives, and were very successful. And one day the sage said to him, "Do you not think that it is a great pity that you, such a hero, who are willing to risk your life and who have won all these friends and made them your companions, do not try to throw out the Moguls [who were occupying the country at that time] at least from our district?" Shivaji agreed. He was prepared, he had drilled, this was something for him to think about. The first attack brought him victory. Then he made a second attack and a third, till he was the chief of the whole province. And he went to the sage to. express his gratitude. "Yes," the sage said, "be thankful but not contented, for what you have done is not enough." And one reads in the history of India that this man nourished the desire to form an Indian empire, but he did not live long enough to achieve it, although during his life he became a wonderful king and a splendid hero whom India will always remember.
The second aspect is when a person makes an ideal out of a principle; and when he succeeds in carrying out this principle throughout his life, then he has accomplished a great thing. If he has been able to live up to that principle, then he has everything. And this aspect can also be illustrated by the story of a robber.
In the deserts of Arabia there used to be a well-known robber, and when caravans passed through there they were warned beforehand that there was danger in that particular place where he lived. And once when a caravan arrived near there a man who was very anxious about his gold coins thought that it would be a good thing if he could find someone to whom he could entrust his money. He saw a tent at a distance, and when he came near he saw a most dignified man sitting there smoking his pipe. He saluted him and said, "I am anxious; I have heard that in this place there is danger of robbers, and I beg you to keep my coins in your charge." "I will do it with pleasure," said the man, and he accepted them.
And when the other rejoined the caravan he heard that there had been an attack by robbers and that they had taken all they could from everyone. He said, "Thank God for the inspiration He gave me to give my money in safe keeping!" Then later he went again to the tent to get his money back, and what did he see? He saw that this dignified man was the chief of the robbers, and that the other robbers were sitting before him dividing the spoils. He stood at a distance, fearing they would perhaps take his life now that his money was already gone. And he thought how foolish he had been to have taken the trouble to bring his money to the robbers himself! He turned to go back, but the chief called him asking, "Why did you come, and why are you leaving?" The man said, "I thought when I gave my money to you that you would return it to me, but now I realize that you belong to the robbers who have attacked the caravan." The chief said, "What has that got to do with the money you entrusted to me? The coins which you gave into my keeping are your money. It was not robbed, it was given into my charge; I give it back to you.'
This was a principle which the robber lived up to. He is a historical person, and in the end this very man became a great murshid, and those around him became his mureeds; one can find his name among the Sufis of the past. This shows how living up to one's principle makes a ladder for a person to climb to the desired goal.
The third ideal is the idea of bettering the conditions. Someone thinks, "I should like my village to be improved; I should like my town to have all comforts and facilities." Or he thinks, "I would like my fellow-citizens to be better educated, to have more happiness," or, "My nation should be honored in the world, and for the honor of my nation I will give my life." One may think of his race, another of humanity, to better its conditions, to serve it, to be its well-wisher, to bring to it all the good that is possible. The great heroes who have saved their nation through their lifelong service, who have given examples to humanity, who have sacrificed their lives for their people, all had some ideal, they all lived a life which was worth while.
As great as is a person's ideal, so great is that person. It is the ideal that makes a person great, but at the same time if he is not great his ideal cannot be great. Besides life is a small thing to offer to the ideal, and if life is a small thing, what else is more valuable? Nothing. It is the one who has no ideal who holds on to everything and says, "This is mine, and I am very anxious to keep it!" The one with an ideal is generous. There is nothing that he will keep back, for his ideal he will give everything, and it is that person who is a living being.
The fourth aspect of the ideal is when one idealizes a person. One man sees his ideal in his child, in his mother, in his father, ancestor, friend, in his beloved, or his teacher. No doubt this ideal is greater than all others, for in this ideal there is a miraculous power: it awakens life and gives life to dead things. There are however difficulties in following this ideal to the end, for when we idealize a person, naturally he cannot always come up to our expectations, for our ideal moves faster than the progress of this living being. Besides, when one idealizes a person one wishes to cover one's eyes from all his shortcomings, one wishes to see only what is good and noble in him; but there come moments when the other side of that person is also seen, for goodness cannot exist without badness and beauty cannot exist without the lack of it. Very often beauty covers ugliness and ugliness covers beauty, very often goodness covers evil and evil goodness; but both opposites are always present. If not, man would not be man.
An idealist will see all that is good and beautiful in the one he idealizes; yet he keeps the object of his ideal before his eyes. His mind can idealize, but his eyes cannot remain closed; his heart takes him to heaven, but his eyes hold him fast on earth and there is always a conflict. And when it happens that the person whom one has idealized falls short of the goodness and beauty which one had expected him to possess, then one becomes disheartened, and one wonders whether there is anything in this world that could be ideal.
We see that emotional people are apt to idealize quickly, but are also apt to cast down the object of their idealization quickly. To keep up an ideal which is living on earth and which is before one's eyes is the hardest thing there is, unless one has such balance that one will never waver and such compassion that one is able at one's own expense to add to the ideal all that it lacks. This is the only way in which one can hold on to a living ideal, otherwise what happens is that one says during the waxing of the ideal, "You are so good, you are so kind, you are so great", and during the waning of the ideal one says, "But you are unjust, you are thoughtless, you are inconsiderate; I am disillusioned. You are not what I expected you to be." It is so natural, and at the same time it is not the ideal which has fallen; the one who has fallen is the one who climbed the ladder of the ideal and went too high, and then he has to come down again till he stands on the same level as before.
Also belonging to this fourth aspect of the ideal is the idealizing of a historical or legendary person, of a dramatic character of the past, a personality who is not before one. This one can maintain better, for it gives one scope for adding all the goodness and beauty one wishes to add; and at the same time it will never disappoint one, because it will never appear different from that which one has made of it in one's heart. The gods and goddesses of the ancient Egyptians, Indians, and Greeks were made to represent certain types of character, and in order that a worshipper might be impressed by a certain character these gods and goddesses were held up as objects of devotion, as something to keep before one, as an ideal. Besides the great prophets and teachers and saviours of humanity have been the ideals made for centuries by writers, by poets, by devotees, by thinkers, as good and as beautiful as they could be made. No doubt others have looked at them differently and have held the ideal of someone else to be less than their own; nevertheless the benefit that they derived from devotion to such an ideal lay in the seeking of a character, of a certain beauty, of a virtue, which would always help them to arrive at that stage which is the desired goal of all beings.
The fifth aspect of the ideal is God, the perfect ideal, an ideal which cannot change, which cannot be broken, which remains always steady for the reason that God is not within man's reach. If God were within his reach then he would try to test Him too! It is just as well that He is not. It is in this ideal that one finds life's fulfillment, and all other ideals are but stepping-stones, steps towards this perfect ideal, an ideal which shows no sign of imperfection; for God is goodness, God is justice, God is might, God is intelligence, all-knowing, God is all beauty, God is everlasting.
To a mystic the ideal is his religion, and he looks upon every person's ideal as a religion. He respects it before weighing and measuring and analyzing what ideal it is. The ideal itself is sacred to a mystic, and thus it is the central theme of his life; it is in the ideal that the mystic finds both his way and his goal.
9. The Moral of the Mystic
When considering virtue the natural tendency is to disregard the laws which govern human nature. The mystic therefore does not take the point of view of some preachers who urge and impose upon all those who come to them that they should be good, that they should be kind, and that they should be just. A mystic recognizes that man's first response is to react in accordance with what strikes him. We already see this tendency in a child. When we smile at the child it will laugh, but if we show it a hand as if we were going to strike it the child will do the same unless it is afraid; at least its desire would be the same, it would want to hit back. Therefore there is nothing to be surprised at if Moses stood before the multitude and told them, "An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth." What else could he have said to them? "Be ye kind and saintly and most loving'? Would they have listened to that?
Even on the mystic path, the first step of an adept is to recognize fully the law of reciprocity. The difference between an adept and an ordinary person is that an ordinary person does automatically what the mystic begins to do consciously. In considering the law of reciprocity one must not overlook human nature: how a man always sees written before him in big letters what he has done, but in very small letters what the other has done. He always overestimates his own goodness, his generosity, his kindness, his service to another person; and he blinds himself to the kindness, goodness, and generosity of the other.
Thus it is seldom that people live the law of reciprocity, although everyone is sure that he returns love for love and hate for hate. Perhaps he returns hate for hate, but whether he returns love for love is another question. The reason is that the first thing man thinks of is himself, what he feels, what he thinks, what he says, what he does; and it is only his second thought that he gives to what another person says, thinks, feels, or does. So that which one thinks, says, feels, or does stands clearly and fully before one, and all that another person feels, thinks, says, or does is something that one sees from a great distance. And when it is something which concerns himself, a person very often views it with only his own interest in mind.
Once a man has begun to recognize the law of reciprocity, from that moment he begins to open his eyes to what is called justice. We have wrongly given the name justice to man-nude laws.
Justice is a sense; and when we recognize justice as a sense we begin to see justice as a living spirit. To explain this in ordinary terms: if the carpet is not laid properly there is a sense in us which tells us that it is not right, a kind of discomfort comes over us only from looking at it; or if the lamp is not standing in its usual place on the table there is a sense in us which gives us discomfort, which makes us think that it is not right, that it ought to be the other way. And it is the same with justice. It is a sense of seeing the right proportion, the right weight, the right measure. No one can live without it and be a saint; this is the first step he must take, and if he does not take this step then he will surely fall into a ditch before he arrives at saintliness. There are two ends to a line: one end is ignorance, the other end is innocence, and in between is wisdom. And as the two ends are similar, so innocence and ignorance seem to be the same; only, the difference is that in order to go from ignorance to innocence we have to cross wisdom. Very often people confuse the ignorant and the innocent soul.
Reciprocity does not mean allowing a larger measure to the other, or giving a greater weight for the money he pays; by reciprocity is meant just dealing in all the different walks of life, remembering at the same time the weak point in human nature: that man always thinks he is just though he is often far from being so.
This naturally produces in the mystic a friendly tendency. In the same way that plants grow, so this tendency grows and blossoms into beneficence. Man begins to think less of himself and of all that he does for others, and he begins to appreciate more what others do; can even arrive at the stage where he entirely forgets all that he does for another, only remembering what the other has done or is doing for him. There are some few souls here and there in the world who may not be recognized as such, but who in reality are saintly souls, in whatever guise they live. Their number is small, but they are to be found everywhere, those who do good to another, who render their services, who are kind, generous, loving, without any thought of appreciation, of thanks, of return.
One might think from a practical point of view that such a person is on the losing side. He may seem to be, but he derives pleasure from it, a pleasure that cannot be compared with the pleasure of the one who exacts his share; and no one can experience this pleasure unless he has practiced this law in his own life. One awakens to the law of beneficence by being able to admire and to appreciate, by sympathy, by being grateful. The person who thinks, "I have done some good to another, I have rendered a kind service to another, I have been of great help in the life of another", cannot understand the law of beneficence. It means to do and to forget, to serve without desiring any appreciation, to love without wishing for any return, and to do kindness even if there is no recognition on the part of the other. If we look at them from the point of view of the law of reciprocity, those who do this are not unhappy, although it might seem that they should be. There is a saying that there are some who are happy in taking and others who are happy in giving, but in the case of the latter the reward is greater and they are happier in the end.
In the law of renunciation the mystic finds the rest and peace which is the object of his journey on the spiritual path. There is nothing so difficult as renunciation. To pursue an object, to persevere on a path, and to attain to a certain thing, all these are easy in comparison with being able to renounce something which one really values. Sometimes renunciation is like death; but having once renounced, one finds oneself standing above death. Renunciation, in other words, may be called sacrifice, although sacrifice is a small word for it. Sacrifice is the beginning of renunciation, and it is its point of perfection which may be called renunciation. The saints and sages and prophets all had to go through this test and trial, and in proportion to the greatness of their renunciation, so great have these souls become. Renunciation is the sign of heroes, it is the merit of saints, it is the character of the masters, and it is the virtue of the prophets. No one can come to this unless he has passed through the laws of reciprocity and beneficence.
What must be renounced? Nothing must be renounced: it is renunciation itself. It is as Farid-ud-Din Attar, the great Persian poet, says,
'Renounce the good of the world, renounce the good of heaven,
renounce your highest ideal, and then renounce your renunciation."
Is the only way to perfection through renunciation? The way to perfection is not limited; there are many ways. No one can make a rule that one can only pass through this way and not by another way. The mystic, therefore, instead of imposing upon others or upon himself great principles and high morals, tries to pass through the laws of reciprocity and beneficence in order to arrive at the idea of renunciation.
10. Brotherhood
Brotherhood seems to be an inner inclination of man, although he continually shows the opposite inclination, just as goodness is a natural inclination of man though the opposite of goodness is more frequently to be found. Mysticism need not teach brotherhood, for a mystic becomes a brother by nature; mysticism culminates in brotherhood, a brotherhood which is unlike any other institution of brotherhood in the world.
There are several kinds of brotherhood. First there is professional brotherhood, which is seen in the unionizing of some profession or other. In appearance it is a brotherhood, but in fact the members have become brothers only because of their mutual interest in that profession. One may call them brothers, but they are certainly not twins! They have become brothers for earthly benefit, with the good motive of furthering their particular profession as much as possible. But there is another side to it: that all those who are outside that profession are not brothers; they are only cousins and it would not be wrong to profit by them, and the brothers will meet and find out how best to profit by the cousins. We find this idea in the Mahabharata, the ancient Hindu scripture, where a war is described between brothers and cousins. It is symbolical.
There is another brotherhood which may be called a federation. Those who have the same business will unite in their common interest against all those who depend upon their business or upon what they sell. As long as they can agree among themselves as how to make their efforts profitable they are brothers, but the moment the profit of one is endangered by the other their brotherhood breaks up, for it is only profit which makes them brothers.
Then there is brotherhood in the political field, calling itself one party or the other. And this brotherhood can even be seen in the form of nations. The parties are formed in order to be brothers in the fight against the cousins of the other party. Nations will remain united as brothers as long as their own interest is not harmed by the other nation, but as soon as their interest is interfered with this brotherhood can immediately break up. It does not take long to break the bonds of alliance; as soon as a question of national interest arises there is only their own benefit which comes first. Brotherhood is a word which was adopted in order to strengthen themselves in their own interest.
In still another type of brotherhood people become brothers when they belong to a certain Church, a certain religion. Those who attend that particular Church, those who follow a particular principle which was given to them, are brothers. Any other people who are perhaps following better principles are outcasts, for the very reason that they do not belong to this particular Church. No doubt this brotherhood extends more widely than the other forms.
Maybe there will arise other forms of brotherhood, but as long as a brotherhood is formed by an earthly interest divisions will always arise. It is human nature to divide into sections, into parties, yet at the same time it is the innermost nature of man to unite with others. Thus the brotherhood of the mystic is not limited to a certain section or a certain division. His brotherhood, like the human brotherhood, envelops all. To him it does not matter what Church a person belongs to or what business, what profession a person has or what his political opinion is; he does not mind, for the mystic sees brotherhood in the source of all things. Just as the children of the same parents see themselves united in the parents, so mystics see all as members of one brotherhood above and beyond every section of cast, creed, nation, or religion.
A nation is a family, a race is a family, but the brotherhood of family bonds has diminished in these days. There remain hardly any families now such as there used to be in ancient times. The family bonds were often so strong that feuds developed between rival families. For years and years families caused bloodshed, taking revenge perhaps for some wrong that somebody's grandfather had done, or for what somebody's great-grandfather had said to somebody's great-great-grandfather. We have improved since then, and we have become such a large family that whereas family feuds used to cause three deaths in fifty years, they now cause the death of millions and millions of people; this is because we have advanced in the organization of families, without first knowing how we should form a family.
The loosening of the family bonds is one of the things which make modern life so unnatural, although the word "unnatural" is a very strange word. What is natural and what is unnatural? Natural is that to which we are accustomed; unnatural is that to which we are not accustomed. Sometimes centuries make something natural, sometimes a few years make a thing natural, and sometimes a few months. We call something natural because we are accustomed to see it as it is, but we do not realize that it has taken perhaps many centuries, many years, or many months to make it natural to us.
Moreover, what is natural to us need not be natural to others. The present condition of the world is not to be blamed for the lack of consideration for what is called the family bond. This is a kind of development, and although it does not have perhaps the beauty which the family had, yet it has its own beauty, it has its own ways. Only, too much of any good thing is wrong. When there was such a strong family bond that it resulted in fights going on for many years, this was not a good thing, but now a kind of restaurant life has begun which will end in hotel life, and this also is going too far.
Imagine, thousands of people living in a hotel, their food never of their choice, their living organized by the hotel authorities, and when they are ill they are immediately sent to a clinic; that is their life! When they go out they go out by fifties or hundreds in large cars, and they all travel in the same ship across the sea. There is none of the joy that existed in ancient times for those who travelled in freedom. Even when people travelled in caravans, on foot, on horseback, on a camel, or on an elephant, it was something, it was a different experience. In ancient times a family lived perhaps in a small hut, but they showed one another sympathy in their time of need.
It is not that this or that is not good; it is not that this is beautiful and that has no beauty. Every period has its own conditions. Whether for earthly interest or for spiritual interest, brotherhood is nothing but the forming of a family; it only depends in whose name we form a family. It was for this reason that Jesus Christ always pointed out God as being the father, which means: do not unite because of your earthly forefathers and ancestors and fight with one another because you come from different families, but think of that Father who is the father of all men; unite in Him. No doubt people will establish the same idea in another form, depending on the times.
Mysticism makes the mystic tolerant towards other people's opinions, mysticism makes him rise above divisions, mysticism makes him assimilate all that he sees and hears, and mysticism gives him love for God whom he sees in all beings. Mysticism gives him the sympathy by which he is attracted to every person he meets, and mysticism helps him to understand and to admire all things and to appreciate all beings, and in that way to come nearer to all that exists.
The Ideal of Brotherhood
This ideal of brotherhood develops, taking different forms.
1. Respectful to All
In the first stage the mystic becomes respectful to all beings, both to the saint and the sinner, to the wise and the foolish.
2. Sympathy to All
In the next stage his sympathy goes out to everyone he meets, no matter who it is.
3. Understanding of All
The third stage is when he understands the condition of every person because of his sympathy and respect.
4. Tolerates and Forgives All
The fourth stage is when he tolerates and forgives; he cannot help doing it for the very reason that he understands. One who cannot tolerate, who cannot forgive, is not able to understand; tolerance and forgiveness come from understanding.
5. United with All
And the fifth stage is that he sees himself united with all, not only in God but even in himself; in each being he sees himself. No one can sympathize more than one sympathizes with oneself, and so it is natural that, when the self of the mystic is at the same time all people, he can then sympathize with everyone as he would with himself.
Mysticism is thus the lesson of brotherhood. All this destruction which has been caused by wars and revolutions, by the continually rising sections of humanity, fighting against one another, calling themselves federations or communities or parties or divisions, this is all caused by lack of mystical understanding. What the world needs today is not so much preaching or religious teaching; what the world needs most is the mystical outlook, to look upon the world with the mystic's attitude, and to see the whole of humanity as one, the single Being, the only Being. In order to bring this idea to the world it is not only necessary that there should be esoteric centers, but also that the message of universal brotherhood which is essential to mysticism should be given freely to all people, to those who sympathize as well as to those who are not yet ready to understand it. It is by bringing this idea to every soul one meets and can speak to that one will be able to accomplish the work which many institutions in the world today are trying to accomplish, calling themselves peace leagues and various other names.
Man may have a good motive, but a good motive can only give good results with right methods. Whenever there is a good motive but not a right method, the good motive will be of no avail; on the contrary, the good motive can bring very bad results. And throughout world history whenever real brotherhood has been taught to humanity, it has always been conveyed by the mystical ideal.
11. Love
Devotion
Mystics of all ages have been known not for their miraculous powers or for the doctrines they have taught, but for the devotion which they have shown throughout their lives. The Sufi in the East says to himself, Ishq Allah, Ma'bud Allah, which means, "God is love, God is the Beloved"; in other words, it is God who is Love, Lover, and Beloved. When we hear the stories of the miraculous powers of mystics, of their great insight into the hidden laws of nature, of the qualities which have manifested through their beautiful personality, we realize that these have all come from one and the same source, whether one calls it devotion or calls it love.
Selflessness
When we look at this subject from a mystic's point of view, we see that love has two aspects: love in itself, and the shadow of love fallen on the earth. The former is heavenly, the latter earthly. The former develops self-abnegation in a person, the latter makes him more selfish than he was before. Virtues such as tolerance, forgiveness, mercy, or compassion rise of themselves in the heart which is awakened to love; and infirmities such as jealousy, hatred, and all manner of prejudice begin to spring up when the shadow of love has fallen on the heart of the mortal. The former love raises man to immortality, the latter turns the immortal soul into a mortal being. A poet has said that the first step in love teaches selflessness; and if that is not experienced then one has taken a step in the wrong direction, although one calls it love. For man has learned from the moment he is born on earth the words "I am", and it is love alone that teaches him to say, "Thou art, not I"; for no soul can love and yet affirm its own existence.
Affection
Love in its first stage may be called affection, a tender feeling towards someone, be it mother or father or child or brother or sister, be it friend or mate. It is in affection that love begins to show itself; and even in that first awakening one will see the phenomenon of selflessness. When an innocent child comes with a sweet to its mother and offers it to her, its delight is to see the mother take it instead of itself. There we begin to see love in its incipient stage, and also selflessness taking the first step on the path of self-abnegation. One sees it in the form of the mother's compassion for her child; the self-sacrifice that she shows, staying up all night, sharing the pain of her child, being anxious every moment when the child is away, rejoicing in its pleasures and sorrowing over its troubles. In this love which is without passion, a love which only desires the child to grow and flourish and prosper while the mother's self is merged in seeing this happen, in this love there is self-abnegation.
Admiration
There is the love of a friend for his friend, the only reason for which is the admiration that one has for the other; but when there is real friendship between two people it gives them the experience of divine perfection, as in the Persian saying, "When two hearts become one they can remove mountains." To feel that there is someone in whom we can place our confidence, that there is someone who understands us, whom we can trust, upon whom we can lean and rely, to whom we can open our heart, to know that someone will sorrow in our pain more than he will sorrow for his own troubles, to know that there is someone in the world who will share all that is good and beautiful with us, imagine what a feeling it is! If we put this friend on one side of the scale and on the other side the whole world, the side where that friend is will weigh more than the other.
Adoration
And then there is the love of one's beloved mate, a beloved in whom one can see the beauty of God and hear the voice of God; one can long for that beloved, one can yearn all the time to attain to the presence of that beloved. When there is someone to long for, to think about, then one begins to realize the truth of the saying that pain is preferable to pleasure. When one begins to feel the thought of one's beloved, to feel the feelings of one's beloved, to overlook all the wrong that the beloved may have done, when one begins to see that all is right and beautiful and good in one's beloved, then one is raised to experience the paradise of which the legends speak.
Rumi says, "Whether you have loved man or whether you have loved God, if you have really loved you are brought in the end before the throne of love."
All the different aspects of love and devotion in their beginning may appear wrong or right, but if there is real love and devotion one arrives in the end at that stage which sages and masters have experienced; for love is purifying, love is strengthening, love is uplifting, and love gives life.
Eternal Love
The one who says, "I love someone, but I hate someone else," does not know what love means. How can one who loves hate? It is impossible. The heart that is tuned to love is incapable of hate, it cannot hate. If it is capable of hate it cannot love, it has never loved. The person who says that he did love his friend once, but that he no longer loves him, has never known the light of love, real love. Love is living and therefore growing; love is growing and therefore expanding; there is no limit to the expansion of love, for its source is divine and thus its expansion is perfect.
Passions that arise in their various aspects are like smoke; it is affection, it is emotion which is the glow of love, and devotion is the flame that rises out of love, that lightens the path of the seeker. As God is eternal, so love is eternal.
Love is Truth
If there is truth in anything it is in love; if there is no truth in love there is no truth in anything. If there are any morals or principles they all arise from love, for that is the only principle and moral which is real. There are many doctrines and principles made by man, but these are simply laws; love has its own law and it adheres to the law of no one.
Can a person reach perfection by love alone, without meditation? Man meditates because he cannot really love. The word love is misinterpreted, misunderstood; we use it in everyday life without knowing what it means. When once the soul begins to understand what it means, it is a word too sacred to utter; no one can profess to love, for love should make us just and able to see our shortcomings and infirmities. Once the flame of love is kindled in the heart one feels so ashamed of oneself that one can no more say, "I love." People mostly fall in love, as one says in English; but they never rise, though what is intended is to rise through love, not to fall. All inspirations are revealed and the mysteries and secrets of life manifest to the view of the one whose heart is prepared by love; all kinds of virtue spring from it.
Ecstasy
People talk of ecstasy. Some say that visionary people or those who see spirits and ghosts have ecstasies; but they do not know what ecstasy means. Ecstasy is a feeling that comes only when the heart is tuned to that pitch of love which melts it, which makes it tender, which gives it gentleness, which makes it humble.
Love of the Formless
When someone says, "I love the formless", he professes something which is inaccurate. He cannot love the formless without first having given his love a form. If he has not recognized the formless in form he has not arrived at the love of the formless, and when the beginning is not right the end cannot be right. When one has recognized the formless in form and has loved the formless in a form so that one has experienced what self-abnegation means, when one has lost oneself, then the next step is the love of the formless. And what is this love? How does it manifest?
It manifests in the love of all, making a man a fountain of love, pouring out over humanity the love that gushes from his heart, and not only to mankind; it may even reach all living beings.
12. Beauty
Harmony
Beauty, which a knower appreciates and a lover admires, is worshipped by the mystic. It is useless to try and put into words what beauty is; but if anything can explain it, it is the other word for beauty and that is harmony. It is the harmonious combination of colors, the harmonious grouping of lines, and the harmonious blending of the objects of nature which suggest to us the idea of beauty. In order to be beautiful an object must be harmonious, for in point of fact harmony is beauty. If there is anything in the world that makes man unconscious of himself, in other words that makes man lose his self-consciousness, if there is anything that makes man humble, that makes him surrender willingly, it is beauty. Beauty is something that conquers without a sword, that holds without hands, that is more tender than the petals of a flower and stronger than anything in the world. The Prophet has said, "God is Beauty, and He loves what is beautiful.'
Beauty can be divided into three different aspects.
Beauty of the Objective World
The first is the beauty of the objective world, of objects. This aspect of beauty is to be seen in nature. What attracts man unconsciously to the beauty of nature is the harmony which it expresses. The sea, the mountains, the rivers, and the blue sky, the rising and the setting sun, the crescent and the full moon, they all seem to blend together so that a divine vision is produced which begins to speak to the soul. That is why the beauty of nature is uplifting. For the mystics, the prophets, and the sages this was the means of rising to that pitch where they could feel God; then there was no longer any question of their belief in God, for they felt God in the beauty of nature.
There is the other objective beauty which is art, the creation of man. This beauty appeals to one because it is a production, an imitation of that which the soul admires; and very often those details which one cannot see clearly in nature are noticeable in art. Thus art is sometimes the finishing of the beauty which is expressed in nature. An image drawn by an artist can be more beautiful, for the reason that the artist has finished what nature had left unfinished. But who is working in the artist? The Creator Himself; what the Creator had left undone, He has finished through the artist. Therefore creations of art are also uplifting. It is most inspiring when a person listens to the song of birds, yet a song sung or composed by a human being can be still more uplifting, for man has completed that beauty; it was his mission to complete it. It is for this that the world was created, that man might finish in his own way that which was not finished in nature, so as to make beauty complete.
Beauty of the Living Being
The second aspect of beauty is personal beauty, the beauty of the living being, whether in form and feature, in thought and imagination, in merit and qualifications, or in virtue and higher qualities. What is goodness? Beauty. What is right and wrong? That which is beautiful is right, and that which lacks beauty is wrong. Is there then no such thing as what the religious people call sin and virtue? That which is beautiful is virtue, and that which lacks beauty is sin. Are these not two opposite poles? They are when we look at them as opposite poles; when we look at the two ends of a line we see that there are two ends, but when we look at the center of the line we see that it is one line. These opposite poles appear to us as two only when we look at the two ends. When the carpet on the floor is not laid down as it should be then we say it is wrong; but there is no rule as to how it should be laid; it is only the sense we have of recognizing beauty. This sense is disturbed by seeing that the carpet is not laid straight, and so what is wrong is the lack of beauty.
Beauty of God
The third aspect of beauty is the beauty of God, which means beauty in its perfection. In order to see this beauty one must develop spiritually, so that this beauty may manifest to one's view. All that seems good and beautiful one can imagine in perfection as far as one's imagination reaches, calling it the beauty of God; for beauty is only manifest to our view in its limitation; it is in God alone that we see beauty in its perfection. There is no object of which we can say that it is perfectly beautiful, nor is there anyone except in our ideal to whom we can attribute all beauty. We can make something as beautiful as possible, but in reality all beauty belongs to one only, and that is God.
Discovery of Beauty
There are two ways of discovering beauty.
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One way is to find it in the distribution of all things and beings. What one person lacks another has got; what one tree lacks the other tree has; what the river lacks the sea has, and what the desert lacks is to be found the forest; what the earth lacks is to be found in the sky. And therefore, when we take beauty as a whole, we begin to get a glimpse of what it is. Beauty is never absent, but when we take a part of it and look only at that, we shall certainly see some lack of beauty. Those who see beauty cut up in divisions, in sections, become critical. They are in pursuit of beauty, but they do not it; they find a little in one person and the lack of it in another.
But even when they find a little beauty in one person, they still find something lacking too; and when we compare this with the perfection of beauty, then the lack of beauty manifests much more to us than the beauty itself. Naturally, therefore, man becomes critical, and this tendency makes him blind to himself.
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The other way of seeing divine beauty is to close one's eyes for a moment to the dense aspect of beauty in order to see the inner beauty. For instance the one who rises above the beauty of form begins to see the beauty of thought; the one who rises above the beauty of thought begins to feel the beauty of feeling, of" sentiment, which is greater still; and the one who rises even above sentiment and sees the spiritual aspect of beauty, sees a beauty which is still greater. There is no end to the realization of the inner beauty; the inner beauty is much greater when compared with the outer beauty, yet it does not make a person turn away from the outer beauty. It only makes him appreciate it more than others do.
Once an ascetic thinker was taken to a variety show in New York, where there were all sorts of dances and acts and different amusements; and the one who took him there was eager to find out what his opinion about it was and said to him, "This must disgust you, a contemplative person, to come and see this nonsense going on on the stage." He replied, "No, never. How can it be disgusting? Is it not my Krishna who is playing there?"
It is those who have touched the inner beauty who are capable of appreciating beauty in all forms; and it is not only that they appreciate it, they admire and worship it. If worship is given to anything or anyone, it is given to the God who is hidden in the form of beauty.
The poems of the Sufis of Persia and elsewhere, such as Hafiz and Jami, Rumi and Farid-ud-Din Attar, are not only philosophical statements, but they are written from beginning to end in admiration of beauty. And if one were to dive deep into their every verse, one would find that each one is equal to a hundred books full of philosophy. Why? Because their souls have been moved to dance at the sight of beauty. What they have expressed in their words is living, burning, full of" beauty. It penetrates the one who can feel it, who can admire it. Their poetry is their prayer. It might seem that it is sung to beauty, but to whom is it sung? Their song is to God.
13. Self-Knowledge
Self-Consiousness
The knowledge that the mystic seeks after is self knowledge, the knowledge of one's self, within and without, the only knowledge that is worth attaining. It is contrary to the general tendency of man; man always wants to know what is before him, and that is why he sees more faults in another and less in himself. He think that if anyone is wrong it is the other, because he is less conscious of his own mistakes.
Self-consciousness is something quite different from self- knowledge. The self-conscious one is never conscious of his real self; he is only conscious of the reflection he receives from others. "Does this person hate me?" "Does that person speak against me?" That is the thought of the self-conscious. If it is not that then he pities himself: "I am poor," "I am so wretched," "I am so miserable.'
1. Knowledge of Body
Self-knowledge can be divided into four kinds, of which the first is knowledge of this physical vehicle which we call our body: how this vehicle has again two aspects, the head and the body, the former for knowledge (for all the special organs of perception are situated in the head), the latter for action. Knowledge of the physical body does not end with the knowledge of anatomy; in this body there are also centers which are the organs of intuition. In so far as science recognizes them they are nervous centers, but what a mystic sees in them is the subtle power of perception. And therefore to a mystic the human body is a more perfect instrument than a wireless receiver, for that is a dead thing compared with the human body; the body is a living wireless receiver if it is prepared for that purpose.
And if one asks why it is necessary that one should prepare it for that purpose, this would be like asking if it is necessary that we should see with the eyes we have. The very fact that we have eyes means that we must see with them; and because of the very fact that the intuitive centers are situated in the physical body, it is necessary that man should be intuitive as well as intellectual, Besides to be intuitive and to be intellectual are not essentially two different things; they are just like the two ends of the same line.
2. Knowledge of Breathing System
The next aspect of man's being is the breathing system, which in reality is not physical. Breath as it is understood by science is the air which one inhales and its action on the lungs and other organs. But according to the mystic the breath is a formation of man, it is magnetism, it is an ethereal aspect of his being which is not only situated in the body, but which is also around the body. It is by the power of this breath that man is able to stand and walk on this ever-moving world. The moment this energy which is breath fails, man can no longer stand on the ground, even if the whole mechanism of his physical body is in perfect condition. Thus there is a part of man which lives on the ethereal magnetism that he breathes and that gives him energy and radiance.
3. Knowledge of Thinking Faculty
When we go still further we find that there is a being in us which we believe to be perhaps within our body or perhaps somewhere else. One cannot point it out, but it is there; and it is what we call mind. This thinking faculty has its seat in the physical body; but it is not limited by the physical body, it is independent of it. No doubt it functions in the organs of sense and in the nervous centers in order to perfect man's experience; nevertheless it is independent of the physical body, it is a faculty that can exist without the physical body, as the eyes can exist without spectacles: the spectacles only help the eyes to see more clearly. The mind is the surface of that part of our being of which the depths may be called heart. The mind thinks, the heart feels; the mind perceives, the heart reflects; the mind imagines, the heart enjoys. The thoughts of the mind are strengthened by the heart. Yet mind and heart are not two things; they are the two aspects of one thing, the surface and the depths.
4. Knowledge of Self
The fourth aspect of our being is beyond explanation. It is joy, happiness. Man seeks for joy, and when the circulation of the joy which belongs to the depths of man's being is congested so that he cannot feel it, then he tries to experience it in what he calls pleasure. Pleasure is the shadow of happiness, something that passes away, that does not last. Being continually occupied in seeking the wrong thing instead of looking for the right thing, man loses his hold on something that belongs to him: his happiness. He begins to look for it everywhere, wherever he thinks he can find it, but he may look for it all his life and yet it will always elude him. He thinks, "Now I have grasped it," and it is gone; he thinks, "Now I have got it," and it is lost; he thinks, "Now it is mine," and it is no longer there. For it is a shadow, and pursuit after a shadow is pursuit after nothingness. The joy becomes eclipsed because man does not know that his very being is joy, that his very self is happiness.
By looking for happiness, what does man seek after? He is seeking after his self, though he does not know it. There is nothing so easily lost as self; in one instant a person can lose it, because he is always accustomed to hold things that are in his hand, and there is only one thing that he can never hold and that is self; it instantly slips from his grasp. Naturally happiness is lost in the search for pleasure, and self becomes drowned in the pursuit of outer things. The way of the mystic is to find self in all its aspects, to learn and to understand the self within and without.
One might ask why one cannot understand self by studying human nature in general. Why must one study self by trying to understand oneself? The answer is that to study human nature is most interesting, but one can only study it well after one has studied oneself, for that enables one to understand human nature. As long as one remains ignorant of self one cannot study human nature properly. Often we hear people say, "I am so disappointed in my friends," "I am so disheartened by my neighbors," "I have lost my faith in mankind," "I can bear animals, I can stand trees and plants better than human beings; I always try to avoid places where there are people." Why do these thoughts come? Where do they come from and what causes them? It is the lack of understanding of oneself. The more one understands oneself, the more one finds that everything that is lacking in others is also lacking in oneself. Does a person become less by finding faults in himself? No, he becomes greater, for he not only finds that all the faults which are in others are also to be found in him, but that all the merits of the others are also his own merits. With faults and merits he becomes more complete; he does not become less.
What a great treasure it is when a man has realized that in him are to be found all the merits and all the faults which exist in the world, and that he can cultivate all that he wishes to cultivate, and cut away all that should be removed! It is like rooting out the weeds and sowing the seed of flowers and fruits. One finds that all is in oneself, and that one can cultivate in oneself what one wishes. A world opens for the man who begins to look within himself; for it is not a little plot of ground that he has to cultivate; he has a world to make of himself, and to make a world is a sufficient occupation to live for. What more does one want? Many think that life is not interesting because they make nothing, but they do not realize that they have to make a world, that they are making a world, either ignorantly or wisely. If they make a world ignorantly then that world is their captivity; if they make a world wisely then that world is their paradise.
Only self-realization can give man full independence. It would be no exaggeration to say that by self-realization the heart of man becomes greater than the universe. The world in which man lives like a drop in the sea then becomes a drop in the ocean of his heart. The saints and sages, the illuminated souls who have brought light to others, have been the self-realized ones. One might ask, then where is the place of God, itself-realization brings one to perfection? The answer is that God is a steppingstone to self-realization. The godly one is not always self-realized, but the self-realized one is godly. All the different ways that lead to God, different religions, faiths, occult schools, mystical paths, all these bring one in the end to the same goal, and that is self-realization. Even where there is a great difference such as that between the teachings of the Hebrews and those of Buddha, both teachings will meet in one thing, and that is self-realization.
There are four different ways by which one can attain to the knowledge of this truth.
- One person has been told that self- knowledge is the guide to perfection, and he says, "Yes, it must be so." He knows no more than that.
- There is another person who has read in this or in that book that it is self-knowledge which leads to perfection; and he thinks it must be true because it is written in a book.
- There is a third person who has reasoned it out; and by his reasoning, by synthesizing, he comes to the knowledge that it is one which has become many, that this variety is again gathered into one, and that this one is to be found in oneself. No doubt the more his reason helps him, the more he will be consoled.
- But then there is a fourth person who realizes this truth himself, not by reason but by experience, and that is the way of the mystic.
How does the mystic proceed to experience it? By the mystical process of turning the eyes within, by shutting out the outside world for a moment and going into meditation, and by realizing, "I do not exist only as a physical body, which I always see myself to be, but I also exist as a life, as a magnetism, as an energy." Meditation which lifts him, in other words the consciousness, from the physical body, helps to make it clear to the mystic that he is not only a physical body, but that he is a being of energy, of magnetism, of breath, by the touch of which the physical body lives, being attached to it. As he goes further in the meditative life, he then begins to see that the faculty of thinking, of imagining, of feeling, is independent of the first two aspects; that he himself is a thought, that he himself is a feeling, and that he himself is the creator of thought, even a creator of feeling. And as he goes still higher, he sees that he is happiness himself as well as the creator of happiness.
It is by this process that one arrives at and experiences the happiness which is in oneself and which does not depend upon anything outside. As long as that happiness is not attained, all else that is taken as a substitute for it must disappoint sooner or later; and therefore, if there is any knowledge which can be said to be the only knowledge worth attaining, it is the knowledge of self.
14. The Realization of the True Ego
The process of mystical development is the annihilation of the false ego in the real ego. Sufis call the false ego Nafs, and the real ego Allah or God. It is not that the false ego is our ego and the true ego is the ego of God; it is that the true ego, which is the ego of the Lord, has become a false ego in us. One might ask how something which is true can become false, but false and true are relative terms; in reality all is true and nothing is false. When we call something false it means that it is less true compared with that which is more true. Reality has become confused. The soul, coming from the highest source but having identified itself with a smaller domain, the domain of the body and the mind, has conceived in itself a false idea of itself; and it is this false idea which is called Nafs.
In all people the ego appears in different degrees of intensity. Where it is most intense a person appears to be egoistic; the one in whom it is less pronounced seems to be unselfish. The false ego with its greater intensity becomes not only hard on others, but also on the man himself. The lion is not only cruel to other animals, but it is also very restless itself because of the intensity and strength of its ego, whereas the lamb is much less hard on others and therefore it is not hard on itself. All manner of trouble and torture, of deceit and treachery, of cruelty and tyranny is born of the false ego.
In its intensity the ego becomes blind, blind to justice. An intense ego is also devoid of life, and therefore of love. The man who loves himself cannot love others. A curious trick of the ego is that the egoist sees in every other person a pronounced ego. "Why has this person beautiful clothes?" "Why has he got a higher rank than 1?" "Why is he more distinguished than others?" that is his continual thought. He always sees another person as having something that he ought not to have; and by this trick the false ego makes him believe that others are egoistic, when on the contrary it is he himself who is most egoistic, because his ego is hurt by the sight of the others" ego.
All the methods by which humanity tries to bring about better conditions fail if the psychology of the ego is not studied. Hardly anyone gives it a thought. In working for the construction of a new civilization many efforts are being made regardless of this principal secret of life, and in the name of reconstruction a great deal of cruelty is taking place; yet all think that they are doing it for the best for humanity. But no false ego can ever do anything for the best for humanity. One person who has risen above the false ego can do much more for the good of humanity than a thousand people blinded by their false ego, pretending to do good. Today many people, before having any idea of what to do about it, come forward and say that they want to do something good for humanity; and everybody's way of doing good is different. This may seem strange, yet if we look at life with open eyes we see a thousand examples of it. In the name of reconstruction, of bringing good to the world, of changing life's conditions, what methods people adopt! The reason is that they have begun the work of doing good too soon; one must know what kindness is before trying to be kind.
The Sufis recognize four stages in the development of the ego.
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The ordinary ego is called Ammara, which means a mechanical reaction of mind, the mind which is conditioned to react against something to the same extent: tooth for tooth and measure for measure.
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And when either suffering has developed the ego, or a person has learned to be different in life, then he becomes what the Sufis call Lauwama, which means self-disciplined. A person who wants to talk back, but thinks that it would perhaps be better if he did not; a person who would like to hit back, but at the same time thinks, "Better let it go this time", shows that he is not acting mechanically but by exerting his will. Even when he does exactly the same as the other he shows he has a will; his action is directed by his will.
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When the ego is developed still more it becomes Mutmaina. This is a certain rhythm of mind; where the mind has risen above chaotic motion and the mentality has become rhythmic, and where the reaction of the mind is not only a control, but a deliberate control. This condition of the mind is like a calm sea; all agitation that belongs to the ego has been suppressed. Suffering is the greatest teacher of the ego, and those whose personalities have become a source of consolation for others, a source of healing and upliftment, are those souls whose ego has risen above all agitation.
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When the ego is developed still further it becomes Salima, which means peaceful. According to the mystic this is the normal state for a person to be in, though if we took that point of view we would not be able to find many normal souls! In this condition we find that the world no longer has a jarring effect on us; we are above irritation, and all manner of agitation is removed. Peace is not something that can be found outside; it is within ourselves, though it is buried under the false ego. The false ego is like the tomb of a living being, not of a corpse. The living being is buried in this tomb which is made of the thoughts of "I" and "myself" and "what I am" and "why I am so." The life thus covered is suffocated, and there is a natural agitation, irritation, and unrest; for the peace which is in the depths of our being wishes to manifest to view, and the awakening of the soul depends only on the manifestation of this peace.
How many souls are searching for some outer thing that can make them spiritual: dogmas, phenomena, experiments, anything but the exploring of the self! Willing to become confused, ready to be puzzled, happy with the riddles of life, contented to go into the dark caves in order to find something! Man never values plain words, he always wants subtlety. He is pleased with something he cannot understand and thinks that it must therefore be mysticism. If one realized that spiritual development depends upon the awakening of the false ego to its true existence, its own reality, how simple the way to spiritual perfection would become! Is it not true that we make our own difficulties? Where one step is needed we would like to go a hundred steps. It is for this that the Hindus asked simple worshippers not to go directly into the temple, but to go around it a hundred times before entering, so that they felt that they had walked sufficiently to be entitled to go in.
Such is the picture of human nature. The path of the mystic is the quickest path for the very reason that he takes the path of simplicity, that he tells the truth in plain words. And yet is it really as simple as it appears to be? The beauty is that in the simplicity of the mystic there is the greatest subtlety; sometimes a thing which looks all too gross may in the end prove to be most fine.
Belief in God helps one to annihilate one's false ego; but in order to believe in God the seeker must first believe in the one who believes in God, in whom he places his confidence, in other words in his teacher. If one cannot fully believe in one's teacher one can never believe in God. That is the first step in learning to believe, and the second step is believing in the ideal. It is not necessary for the ideal to exist on earth in the form of a human being; this ideal may be in one's heart, in one's mind. And thirdly one comes to believe in God, and in that belief one loses oneself, so that God covers the believer and all there is. In this way one arrives at the perfect realization of the true ego, which is the pursuit of the mystic.
15. The Tuning of the Spirit
There are two sides to which one can look: one of these is before us and the other side is within us. The first step of the mystic is to see the side which is before him, and his second step is to look at the side which is within him. The first view, which is the minor development, is the view of the adept; and the other, the major development or stage, is the view of the mystic.
When people take the spiritual path they begin to interest themselves in psychology, occultism, or some other exciting subject, believing that it is the same as mysticism or esotericism; but real mysticism or esotericism begins simply with the first step, with looking outside. And at what does one look outside? At two things. One thing is that a person asks himself how all he sees affects him and what is his reaction to it all; how does his spirit react to the objects or the conditions he encounters, to the sounds he hears, to the words that people speak to him? And the second thing is to see what effect he himself has on objects, conditions, and individuals when he comes in contact with them.
One must be just to be able to analyze these things; if not, one may always look at them in a light which is favorable to oneself and unfavorable to others. We hear many people say, "That person has a bad influence upon me"; but no one says, "I have a bad influence upon that person." Most people think that everybody else is wrong and bad, and that everything undesirable is in everybody except in themselves, but to become just is the process of becoming an adept, an adept who is developing into a mystic.
After this comes the inner process, looking within; and this is a most wonderful process. As soon as a person is able to look at his spirit, he is born again; it is a new life. By looking at one's spirit one can analyze how all that one says, thinks, and feels acts upon one's spirit, and also how the spirit reacts. In this way one's life is analyzed more and more; it seems like churning one's spirit, and by this churning one brings out the cream of the spirit, and that cream is wisdom. The difference between the wise and the foolish is only this, that the foolish looks at another whereas the wise looks at himself. Besides it is most wonderful to see how the person who is most at fault sees many faults in others. Because he looks at others he has not yet been able to look at himself, but the moment he begins to look at himself he does not look at others any more; he then has so much to look at in himself that both his hands are full.
Innumerable souls die without ever coming to this experience; they never even think about it. At the same time there are free souls who may be quite young and yet have that perception; and wherever this perception is there is the living spirit, even if one funds it in a little child. That child is then as old as its grandfather; it is an "old soul" as a child which shows wisdom, depth, and subtlety is called in the East. By "old" is meant that it shows more experience; it does not take a long time to make a person old in this sense. Many become old in a very short time. There are people who from their childhood show that they are old souls; they make utterances of great wisdom, as if they had had experience on earth for hundreds of years. And sometimes people of a very advanced age may think and feel and say and do things just like a child. This shows that the age of the soul does not correspond with the time since the birth of the person on this plane.
The soul which can analyze its own spirit is sparkling, for it is that soul which will train itself and train others; but the soul which cannot analyze its own spirit cannot train others. To keep the spirit in proper condition is as difficult or even more difficult than cultivating a delicate plant in a greenhouse, where a little more sun may spoil it, a little more water may destroy it, a little more air may be bad for it. The spirit is even more delicate than that. A slight shadow of deception, a mere feeling of dishonesty, a little touch of hypocrisy can spoil it. If fear touches it, if doubt shakes it, if anger strikes deep into its root, it is spoiled. And the more delicate the spirit, the more delicate the care it needs; it must be carefully guarded in the greenhouse. A slight sense of dishonor, the least insult coming from any side, can kill it.
Apart from man, the spirit of a horse can die the day that it feels the whip; once the whip has fallen upon it its spirit may be gone. No doubt, "killing the spirit" is only a way of speaking; spirit is never killed, and yet for the spirit that is killed in the meaning of this expression it is worse than death. Death is preferable; life loses all its interest once the spirit is dead. It is better that a person should die than that his spirit should.
Nevertheless, spirit is divine and spirit is eternal, and it can always be restored if one only knows the key to it. And what is this key? If this were told, then what remains? It is not an easy thing to fund this key; it is not easy to mend the broken spirit; not everyone can raise his spirit when once it is fallen, for then it is heavier to lift than a mountain. But what one can say is that there is only one key, the first and the last, and that is found in seeking for the kingdom of God. It works as an antidote, and it helps one by tuning the spirit, by harmonizing one and putting one into rhythm. If this is combined with wisdom it is better still; that is why a person looks for a teacher on the path of wisdom, in order that the teacher may guide him to fund the key.
There is a delicacy in friendship, in all kinds of relationship; there is delicacy in meeting people. If that delicate thread is damaged or moved out of place something goes wrong. There is no more delicate machinery than the spirit of man. How careful man is with his electrical machinery! Every little wire is looked at with a magnifying glass, and every little part of it is guarded so carefully and kept so clean that no rust can come on it; no one may touch it! At the same time man has no regard for his spirit, which is the most delicate machinery of all. Once it goes wrong it may never get right again; and it is very easy for it to go wrong, while it is most difficult to repair it. For other machinery we can get spare parts, but not for this machinery when once it is broken, when once something of it is lost. And when one thinks of all the illnesses and disagreeable experiences of the outer life, what about the spirit? When once the spirit is disturbed then the whole universe is disturbed for that person.
What happens, very often unconsciously, is that there are friends who are very devoted to each other, and then there is something in the machinery that goes wrong. Perhaps neither of them knows this, but unconsciously the spirit of their friendship is destroyed; and it is most difficult to mend it. Then there is no joy of friendship any more. Friendship lasts only as long as that delicate thread exists, as long as the machinery is in proper order. Besides, all the external things of life, money, power, position, or comfort, are nothing in comparison with the condition of one's spirit. If the spirit is disturbed none of these things has any value whatever; it is all lost.
There is a story of a king who one day called a porter and gave him a command, and after having given that command he went into his room and signed his abdication of the throne. His wazirs asked him why he did this, what had gone wrong. He said, "When I was giving that porter a command I saw by his expression that it was not received in the same way as he had received my orders up till now. So something must have gone wrong in my spirit; I should no more handle the affairs of the state." It takes a long time to become fit, and it does not take a minute to become unfit. It is most difficult to collect the spirit and make it work as it ought to; the least little thing can upset it. Think of how many different parts must be made in order to make a watch go regularly, and how easy it is to drop the watch and destroy it.
There are some people who have no spirit; that is to say whose spirit is still buried. They do not care, they are quite happy, although they do not know what true happiness means. But for others who are very much aware of their spirit there is nothing more difficult than to keep it in the right condition; yet no sacrifice is too great and nothing we can do is too much to keep the spirit in tune. The mystic, therefore, trains his spirit; it is the training of his own spirit that enables a man to help the souls who come to him.
The story of Ayaz gives us an example of this. That is the way to tune the spirit: to cleanse it, to purify it, to humble it, to mold it, to efface whatever may have clouded it, and to raise it high. Everything that is necessary should be done with it. And it is not easy to handle the spirit. Many who do not know how to handle it break it, just as children break their toys, and when once the spirit is destroyed then what is left? It should be remembered that greatness and smallness, happiness and wretchedness, are all effects coming from the condition of the spirit. We are as great as our spirit, we are as wide as our spirit, we are as low as our spirit, we are as small as our spirit; spirit can make us all that we are.
Verily, if there is anything that is more necessary than all else, it is to be able to tune one's spirit.
16. The Visions of the Mystic
That which a mystic cannot see or does not see before his eyes, he sees in space; and therefore if a thousand people say, "This does not exist", yet for the mystic it does exist. While they depend upon the objective world one day to produce their thought in a material form, the mystic sees it already in space. Naturally his faith becomes more firm and powerful, whereas the faith of those who depend upon the objective world becomes weaker every time their wish does not come true. When a person says of something that it is not there, the mystic says, "It is there; it is before me; I see it." But because the other cannot see it he is confused; thus the same idea that confuses the one confirms the other in his faith. This is how a mystic builds steps to climb to his final destination, which is the real meaning of resurrection; whereas the man who has not made any steps, no sooner loses touch with the objective world than he is lost in space. And the mystic finds steps already made in space to help him in his climb upward, but the other finds himself lost when once the garb of the objective world is discarded. Then the soul feels no ground under its feet, while the mystic has already attained his goal.
When a mystic sees something before his eyes in space, does he see it in the three-dimensional space or in a space of more dimensions? This space of three dimensions is reflected by the space which is in the inner dimension. This inner dimension is different; it does not belong to the objective world; but what exists in the inner dimension is also reflected in the three dimensional space. So in reality what the mystic sees in space is something which is within; when a mystic closes his eyes he sees it within; but when he opens his eyes he sees it before him. That which he sees within himself is reflected in the outer space. When everyone else depends upon his two hands for making or preparing things, the mystic sees time preparing them; and therefore time and space are the hands and the feet of the mystic. Through space he climbs, and through time he accomplishes.
As there is a season for everything, as there is a fixed time for nature to manifest, so there is a season for every happening. Good luck, bad luck, rise, fall, health, illness, success, and failure, all depend upon a certain time. There is a time for every season as well as for every experience; and as there is a time for birth so there is a time for death. Every thought, every action, and every condition has a birth and death, and each has a fixed time. And when one has become convinced of the fact that every happening is brought about by time and is fixed at a certain time, then naturally one develops faith, and then one believes that what is not realized today will be realized tomorrow, some day.
The great drawback we find in humanity today is its lack of patience: if people can accomplish something at once then it is all right, but if not then they think that it cannot be done. Only if anything can be done quickly can it be done; if it cannot be done as quickly as one expects this means that it cannot be done at all. There are thousands of people today who already accept failure before failure becomes apparent, because they have no patience to wait for success to come. Although success may be preparing, yet they are in such haste that they would rather turn the success into a failure than wait for it; the reason is that this mystery, which is the mystery of the mystics--that everything depends upon a certain time--is forgotten by most people.
Time uses conditions to bring about certain results; and very often a seemingly bad condition is preparing a good issue, and a seemingly good condition may be preparing a bad result. Frequently, therefore, a person who depends only upon objective phenomena makes a mistake, is deluded. The mystic sees in both adverse and favorable conditions that which is going to happen. He does this by believing in the action of time and space, and by believing that there is no such thing as coincidence or accident. It is only because we are unaware of where an action has started, of what has brought it about, and of what is preparing, that we call something a coincidence or an accident; in reality there is no such thing. Every happening, whether it comes by our will or by a higher will, is prepared, is directed by wisdom. If it is not directed by our individual will it is directed by a greater wisdom, and it brings about a greater result. The mystic therefore awaits that result which is brought about by time and space through different conditions.
For the divine mind time and space exist and yet do not exist. For a great musician sound is the breath of music, and yet in order to play or to compose music he must divide sound into different grades and notes, and that produces beauty. The divine mind is also interested in this composition, this music of the whole creation; therefore it is in the division of time and space that the secret of the whole of manifestation lies. If the divine mind were not interested in the manifestation God would not have been the Creator; God is the Creator because of the interest of the divine mind in creation.
This brings us to the question of the word and silence. The mystic realizes the power of the word, and at the same time the splendor of silence. The word can do so much, but even more can be accomplished by silence. Great phenomena are produced by those mystics who know the power of the word and how to use it, but even greater miracles are performed by them through the splendor of their silence.
Life is the answer to the mystic's question. With every question that arises in the heart of the mystic he has but to look at life before him and it answers him. Even a question about some business or industry is revealed to the mystic just by looking at a tree. Someone is laughing, someone is crying, someone is talking, someone is working, and every one of those actions is an answer to what the mystic wishes to enquire into.
No sooner does a sound fall on his ears, no sooner are his eyes cast upon any object, condition, or individual, than the answer to the question which has arisen in his heart comes to him. The mystic need not go to a palmist to ask what is going to happen, he is not in pursuit of soothsayers, the mystic need not consult horoscopes; the whole of life, everything he looks at, is the answer to his question. And if he does not wish to look at the objective world he has only to close his eyes and find the answer within himself. The objective answer is waiting for him in the outer world, and the answer from the inner voice is waiting within. Thus he has two ways open to him for receiving an answer to his questions. Can one be surprised, therefore, if the mystic closes his mouth and speaks to no one for years on end? Why should he speak to anyone? What should he ask? There is nothing to ask.
In different ages and in different countries people have adopted methods such as looking at random in the scriptures to find the answer to their question, or consulting the cards, or looking in the teacup and such superstitions: anything that suggests something to them, such as seeing a black cat or a turtle or a snake, or hearing the sound of a certain bird that predicts something. The mystic does not need all this. Everything all the time is answering his questions. Life is such a mystery that there comes a time when we begin to see that every action, everything that is going on, is an answer to that which is going on within ourselves. For instance a man is walking in the street, thinking about his business or his domestic affairs, and then suddenly a horse becomes restive and breaks the carriage it was drawing, upsetting the coachman. Now these are two different things.
The man is thinking about something, and the horse with which he has nothing to do upsets the carriage. It is another thing altogether, but at the same time for the mystic everything is connected; there is no condition which is detached from another condition. Every condition has a correspondence, a relation with another condition, because for a mystic there is no divided life; there is only one life, one Being, and one mechanism which is running. And therefore a mechanism is always running in relation to another mechanism; however different and disconnected they may seem, they are not disconnected. One has only to see it, then all is revealed to one; but in order to see it one has first to open the mystic eye.
What questions has the mystic to ask? The greater the mystic, the fewer his questions. The further he goes on this path, the fewer his questions become. For the more questions one has, the more unmystical one is, because questions are born of the restlessness of the mind. The restless mind wants to find an answer somewhere; and as more peace comes, the questions become fewer. The nearer, the closer to peace one comes, the fewer will be one's questions. By finding peace, by finding light, by finding harmony and joy, questions are reduced to nothing. Then there is no longer any question. The moment the mystic has reached this stage where he has no questions, he himself becomes the answer to every question.
At one time I wanted to take a friend to meet my murshid. This friend was a very material man, restless and pessimistic and doubting and skeptical. And every day I urged him to come with me to see my murshid. "But," he asked, "what can he do for me?'I said, "You can ask him something." He said, "I have twenty thousand questions to ask, when could he answer them?" I said, "You can ask one or two of the twenty thousand, that is already something." "Well," he said, "one day I will see." And indeed, some time later he came along, but the moment he reached my murshid's presence he forgot every question and did not know what to ask. He was sitting quiet, spellbound, breathing the atmosphere of the master's presence; he had no desire to ask a question. And after the interview, when we were leaving the house of my murshid, he again began to feel inclined to ask twenty thousand questions, this time of me, and when I asked him why he had forgotten them there, he only answered, "I cannot understand why.'
Where do questions come from? Very often they come from the restlessness of the mind. And does an answer satisfy them? Never. During my travels I went thrice to San Francisco, and each time I saw a lady who always asked me the same question. And each time I answered her, and each time when I came again she asked me the same question. This meant that for fifteen years there was a question and there was an answer; but that answer was never heard. One ear heard it, and the other car let it out again; and the question remained there alive. A question is a living being, it does not wish to die; the answer kills it, and therefore those kindly souls who wish to cherish the question, keep the answer away, although the question calls out for an answer. Do not be surprised, therefore, if for twenty years a person asks a question of two thousand other people and gets two thousand answers. It does not mean that the answer he gets does not satisfy him; it only means that he does not wish to have the answer. He only wishes to cherish the question.
17. The Mystic's Nature
There are five things to consider when one is trying to understand the nature of a mystic: his temperament, his dream, his outlook, his meditation, and his realization.
Genuine Mysticism
It is not easy to find out whether a soul is a mystic or not. But as gilt and gold are two different things, and as imitation gold does not endure when it is tested, so it is with the one who is not a true mystic. It is easy to talk as a mystic, to act as a mystic, but it is difficult to pass the test when it comes.
Once a mystic, walking in a garden, noticed a particularly beautiful rose. Attracted by its beauty he exclaimed, "Praise be to God!" and went and kissed it. His disciples, who were walking behind him, then each picked a flower and kissed it fifty times. The gardener was annoyed and came towards them grumbling, but they said that they had only followed the example of their teacher. The teacher kept silent. But when they had gone a little farther they saw a smith at work, and a hot iron was glowing in the fire. The teacher approached, spoke the same words, "Praise be to God!" and took the hot iron and kissed it. He asked the disciples, "Why do you not follow me in this?" But none of them dared to do it.
In the East when people know that somebody is a mystic, they do not try to pass judgment if he has kissed a flower or if he kisses the fire. They regard it all as belonging to the mystic temperament.
There is another story of a mystic which explains a different side of this temperament. It is about the leader of the Qadiri Sufis in Baghdad, who was one of the greatest of the world's mystics. One day at the time that he was getting ready to eat his dinner a mother came to him, very vexed with the teacher. On his table was a dish of chicken. And she said, "You have given my son a vegetarian diet, and he is becoming thinner and paler every day; and here you are eating chicken." The teacher smiled and said gently, "Good lady, look here," and he took off the cover of the dish and the chicken jumped out. And he added, "The day your son can make the chicken jump out, he may eat it too.'
One cannot pretend to be a mystic; one is born a mystic. No doubt a mystic may develop in life, that is another thing, but if one thinks that one can imitate a mystic one is mistaken, one can never do it. Mystics apart, can a person imitate a singer and sing correctly, or imitate a painter and paint well, or a poet and make poetry? Never. Either one is or one is not.
Degrees of Mysticism
As in education, in all different kinds of training, there are certain degrees one reaches as one advances, so in mysticism also there are degrees. Such names as Wali, Ghauth, Qatub, Nabi, and Rasul belong to the different degrees of masters, saints, and prophets.
The Temperament of a Mystic
The temperament of a mystic is a kingly temperament. The difference between a king and a mystic is that the mystic is a king without worry. And his main idea is that whatever happens, happens for the best; in other words, nothing really matters. For a mystic time does not exist; it is only to be found on the clock. Life for him is eternal, and the time between birth and death is an illusion. The mystic temperament is adventurous and impulsive. The mystic can readily jump into anything and come out of it again; into the water, into the fire, whatever it may be. If the mystic thinks that he must go to the south, or if he feels that he must go to the north, he will not trouble his brain by asking himself why he should go. He only knows that there is a call for him to go, and he goes; perhaps he finds the reason there.
Every good and bad experience he accepts as a lesson, and he thinks that all of them lead him onward. If it is a bad experience it is also a lesson; if it is a good experience, so much the better; but they are all leading him towards the purpose of his life. The quality of the mystic is the outgoing quality, the sympathetic, loving quality; and yet the mystic is detached and indifferent. Deep love on the one side, indifference on the other side; together they make the balance of his life. In loving another he loves God, in serving another he serves God, in helping another he helps God; and in this way he worships. In worldly life neither a rise nor a fall is very important to him, but at the same time he may experience all these things. Be not surprised if you see a mystic on the throne, adorned with gold and silver and jewels, and do not feel contempt if you see a mystic clad in rags in the form of a beggar in the street. In all conditions he is the king, and a king without a worry, a king whose kingdom will endure, a king who is never in danger of losing his kingdom.
The mystic temperament is the same as the temperament of any human being, only perhaps more intense. A mystic can be intensely pleased and he can be intensely displeased. He can feel joy deeply and he can feel sorrow very deeply, much more deeply than the average person, because he lives more and therefore his feelings are more intense. At the same time it is the self-control of the mystic that balances his pleasure and displeasure, his joy and sorrow. It may be that others cannot realize it or feel it; nevertheless, if the mystic's feelings were not delicate, and if there were no subtlety in him, he could not be a mystic. On the one hand the mystic is most subtle; on the other hand he is most simple. He can be most wise, and he can be quite innocent. People call the mystic Pit, which means old, and yet he can be like a child, like an infant. He may control giants, and yet he may be led by a little child. The words of the mystic may be simple and at the same time full of depth. His every expression is symbolical, for he sees the symbol of life in all names and forms.
The Dream of a Mystic
And now we come to the dream of the mystic. It may be that other people have seen a mystic in a trance, or meditating with closed eyes; but this is not necessary. With open eyes or with closed eyes: the mystic can dream in both ways. He may be in a crowd or in the solitude, in both places he can dream. To the mystic the dream is reality, although to another it might seem a dream. It is reality to the mystic because of his faith in what is written in the Qur'an, that when God said, "Be" it became, and also in what the Vedanta say, that manifestation is the dream of Brahma, of the Creator. The mystic, who realizes the Creator within himself, thinks that his dream is the Creator's dream: if the Creator's dream is all this which we call reality, then the dream of the mystic is the same. If it is still in the mental sphere, that does not mean that it will never materialize; it will surely materialize one day.
Yet one often sees that the mystic lives above the world, and many think that he is not conscious of the world. But they do not know that for the very reason that he lives above it he is more conscious of it. One might think that a person who is flying in an aeroplane does not know what is going on in the crowd beneath him because he is in the sky, but this is not so. One who is flying in the air is more capable of seeing what is going on below, for he can see a wider horizon than the one who is standing on the earth. Very often people misunderstand a mystic. They think that the mystic, who is dreamy, is above the things of the world, above business and industry and politics. But they are mistaken; they do not realize that a clear intelligence can do everything better if it is applied in that direction, although the question remains whether a mystic would think it worth while to put his mind to it. I was very surprised when one day Mr Ford told me, "If you had been a business-man, you would have made a tremendous success, but I am glad you are not!" Never, therefore, think that a mystic with his closed eyes or with his head turned away, is not looking at you. The mystic can sometimes be more conscious of the condition of those before him than they are themselves.
The Outlook of a Mystic
Thirdly there is the outlook of the mystic. The mystic not only sees the first reason of everything and anything; he sees the reason behind the reason, and behind that still another reason, until he touches the essence of reason, where what we call reason is lost. As far as we can see, we see only a cause, but what the mystic sees is deeper than a cause; it is the cause of all causes. And by this his outlook changes from the ordinary outlook. Thus it may happen that the language of the mystic seems gibberish; people cannot understand its wisdom because they only use their reason.
The mystic is the friend of many, but for a mystic to find a friend is difficult. It is difficult enough for anyone to feel that there is even a single person in the world who understands him, so how much more difficult must it be for the mystic! He can only try to understand himself; but if he can do that it is quite sufficient. The mystic does not concern himself much with what will be the immediate result of anything; he concerns himself with what will be the final result. This makes his point of view different from the worldly point of view. The outlook of the mystic shows him that the rise is for a fall and that the fail is for a rise; in other words, after the night comes the day, and the day awaits the night.
The Meditation of a Mystic
In regard to the meditation of the mystic one should remember that he is born with a meditative nature as an inner disposition, and every day, even without ever having learned any meditation, he has some way of meditation. No doubt every mystic finds a way and a guide and master who leads him forward, but all the time he is ready for guidance. The mystic never has to say that it is difficult for him to meditate; he is at home in meditation. It is his nature, his pleasure, his joy. Meditation is his life; in meditation he lives. And the meditation which lasts five or ten or fifteen mixtures is to the mystic only a kind of winding up. His meditation takes place every moment of the day; there is not one moment when he is not meditating, whatever he may be doing. In the crowd and in the solitude, on land and on water, in silence, and while working, in all conditions the mystic continues his eternal meditation.
The Mystic's Realization
Lastly there is the mystic's realization. It is the mystic who realizes the latent power in man, and he may realize it even to such an extent that no man could believe it if it were to be put into words. He realizes the latent inspiration in man, an inspiration which culminates in revelation, when every object and every being begins to communicate with him, when he knows and sees and understands and realizes the essence of the whole of life. The mystic knows, if anyone knows, what limitation means, for that is wherein lies his suffering, his pain; and the mystic knows what perfection means, for it is in perfection that his joy and his happiness are to be found.
18. The Inspiration and Power of the Mystic
Continuous Inspiration
The mystic, when his heart is about to mature in the mystical spheres, need not have an inspiration once in a while; his every thought, imagination, and dream have a meaning; it is all inspirational. Thus even the joke of a mystic has a meaning to it. Perhaps that joke is symbolical, maybe it expresses something that is going on somewhere, or it may be that it will produce something in the future. And even as the joke of the mystic has a meaning, influence, and effect, so every thought and imagination of a mystic has an effect. When he thinks of something it may materialize the week after, or next month or next year, or perhaps after many years, but all that a mystic says or thinks is fulfilled sooner or later.
The Picture of the Divine Beloved
People speak about truth and falsehood, but once the mystic has reached the truth all is truth to him; then everything is a phenomenon of truth, a picture of truth. For instance a person looking at a picture may distinguish light and shade, but another, instead of speaking about light and shade, will say, "This is a portrait of so and so, it is a very good picture, exactly like him." Truth is like this; and to a mystic the whole of life is the picture of the divine Beloved. He appreciates the picture as it is, accepting both its light and shade; he does not ask, as some would, why God who is perfect has not nude everything perfect; he sees the whole as a perfect whole, and every imperfection is something that goes to make the perfect whole. Therefore the mystic does not look at imperfection as imperfection, but as something that leads to perfection. And if one wonders whether a mystic sees only the outline of this existence and not the details, one may ask who can see more details than the mystic who sees the reason behind reason, the cause behind the effect, and again another cause behind every cause. He sees every object in detail, and even in that he sees the divine perfection.
Contemplation
A mystic can know the thought of another person even better than can that person who is thinking, and he can feel the feeling of another even more deeply than he. One may call this natural or supernatural. The mystic knows the attitude of a person, of which he himself is often unaware.
Space Is No Hindrance
While others go one step forward, physically or mentally, the mystic goes ten steps forward; that is why he sees what is there before the other has arrived. To a mystic space is no hindrance; space is his means of communication. A longer or shorter distance, in the physical sense of the word, is not the same from the mystical point of view, for it takes no time for the soul of a mystic to reach any part of the world. As soon as he has had the thought he is there. The three dimensions are no obstacle, no hindrance to him; all three dimensions are a capacity, an accommodation for the mystic to realize life's phenomena.
Does Not Boast
We hear stories about faqirs sticking knives into their cheeks and hairpins through their tongues, piercing their muscles, jumping into the fire, swallowing flames, eating thorns, but all this is juggling compared with the power of the mystic. People are often apt to compare a mystic with a juggler, but they are two different beings altogether. This does not mean that these jugglers have no power; they are powerful too; but their world is different, their object in life is different, and they have another sphere, another destiny, another destination. A mystic may not do any of the things that jugglers do, and yet the mystic may accomplish far greater things than the jugglers. A so-called man of common sense, who considers himself to be practical, cannot imagine the power that is at the command of the mystic. Only the non-mystic boasts of his power and shows it off to people, whereas the mystic neither speaks about it nor does he exhibit his powers before others.
Once I met a great scientist in New York, who said to me, touching his pen lying on the table, "If there is really a spiritual power, a mystic power, I would like to know if it is possible to lift this pen by this power." I said, "Do you really think that a mystic will waste his energy in making this experiment, raising a pen in space? And if he did it, what would he have gained? Would he not sooner raise a soul higher, bringing him to another sphere, raising his ideals, his aspirations, instead of trying to raise this little pen lying on the table? What will he get for it? Praise? He does not want it. That people will believe in him? He does not care. Praise is not his object nor does he care if people believe in him. Why should he trouble about these things?'
Then I told him a story of a juggler I myself had seen in the streets of India, in Baroda. A man used to sit in a corner with his mantle spread on the ground, and he had little horses and elephants and camels and dogs and cats cut out of paper and painted. They were lying on his mantle, and the man had a tambourine in his hand; people crowded round him to see the phenomena he was going to show. He would begin to sing, and after his song of introduction was ended it would seem that some life was coming into those animals. Then he would sing, "Horses, run," and as long as he repeated this the horses ran; and then he would say, "Camels, walk," and the camels would begin to walk; and when he said, "Elephants, move," the elephants would move.
Those who eat thorns or swallow different-colored balls and then take them out again to show them, what has this got to do with mysticism? It has no connection. Some of these jugglers are most powerful, but their kind of power does not belong to the higher spheres; it belongs only to their world.
Quiet Working
It is from the mystics that destiny chooses those who have to accomplish a certain work for the multitude, for humanity, for certain races; and most unassumingly, quietly, they accomplish that work without the world knowing anything about it.
Paradoxical
In the East there is a belief that a mystic should not be judged by what he says or what he does, because for all we know what he says may be only a cover over that which he is accomplishing. One might sometimes think that a mystic is very attached, but in point of fact the mystic can be the most detached person there is. At other times one may think that the mystic is most detached, but there is no doubt that the mystic can be exceedingly attached. One might think that a mystic lives in his dream, but one should know that the mystic can be more wide awake than anybody else; and if someone thinks that the mystic is very wakeful in his everyday life, he should realize that behind that wakefulness there is perhaps a deep dream which not everyone can understand. In my play The Bogeyman there is a description of the strange ways of a guru, who seems to be one thing and in reality is something quite different. It is not easy for anyone to realize the truth of this; and if people try to realize the truth they will only confuse themselves still more.
Is then a mystic's view open to his friends? It is, as the Bible is to its readers. Those who read the words of the Bible, read its words; and those who get sense out of what they read, get the sense. It is available to both. Will there always remain this distance between the mystic and the unevolved? The unevolved are distant from the mystic, but the mystic is not distant from the unevolved; the mystic remains quite close to both the evolved and the unevolved.
Simplicity and Subtlety
And the most wonderful characteristics that one can observe in a mystic are on one side extreme simplicity, and on the other side extreme subtlety. Both these characteristics are true in themselves; in the mystic his subtlety and complexity are as real as is his simplicity. The subtlety is the depth; the simplicity is the surface. This means that wisdom is covered by innocence.
The Spirit of Religion
Is a mystic religious? He is religious in the real sense of the word, even more so than an ordinary religious man. Yet mysticism is deeper than religion; in other words mysticism is the soul of religion. A person who follows a religion follows its form; the one who touches mysticism touches the spirit of religion. Religion with mysticism is living, Without mysticism it is dead.
Masters, Saints and Prophets
The great teachers and inspirers of humanity in all ages were mystics. One only has to study their lives. Whether they came as a king or as a beggar, whether they lived in the thick of worldly life or were wandering about in the forest as ascetics, whether they lived in caves or played the role of a commander, a warrior, or a statesman, in every case they were different from others. And from their childhood, from the beginning to the end of their lives, they have shown their mystical tendencies. Thus all the saints and sages and masters and prophets come from among the mystics; and if any soul rises, it is the mystical soul which rises to the higher planes of realization.
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