It is heard without ears

Please meditate on these words of Walt Whitman:

I think I could turn and live with animals, they ar so placid and self-contained; I stand and look at them long and long.

They do not sweat and whine about their condition.

They do not lie awake in the dark and weep for their sins; They do not make me sick discussing their duty to God.

If you look at the animals it is natural to be tempted by their silence, by their acceptance, by the peace that surrounds their being, by the non-tense, non-neurotic state of their minds. It's very natural to be tempted by the animals.

It seems man has fallen. It seems there has not been an evolution; man has not progressed -- just the contrary. For three hundred years the scientists have been telling man that there has been a great evolution and the evolution has happened in man: man has come far above the animals. Before these three hundred years Christianity was teaching to the world that man has fallen from God, and there is no evolution -- rather, a sort of involution: man has not evolved but has fallen into dark dismal depths of sin. both attitudes are extremist: the pendulum moved from the Christian attitude to the scientific attitude. Science still remains a Christian endeavor, a reaction.

In the East we have looked at things in a totally different manner. The first thing to be remember is: man is higher than animals and still man has fallen. This will look paradoxical. But the East says man has fallen because he is higher. Only the high can fall:

if you are not high, where are you going to fall to? The animals cannot fall -- there is nowhere to fall to.

When you move on heights you are taking a risk. A man who moves on plain ground cannot fall but a man who goes climbing mountains is always in danger of falling.

Animals cannot fall because they have no consciousness yet. Animals cannot commit sin because to commit sin one needs to be aware. To go astray one needs freedom; to do wrong one needs a certain growth capacity, a certain power. Only those people who are capable of doing right can do wrong. Only those people who can rise can fall. The sinners and the saints are not separate -- the saint is possible because sin is possible.

No animal is a sinner but no animal is a saint either. Have you ever heard of any animal becoming a Buddha or a Christ? Yes, they are not Judases, they are not Adolf Hitlers, they are not Joseph Stalins -- right -- but nobody is born in the world of animals as a Buddha either. Man is an adventure: risky of course, very risky, dangerous. Man is trying to rise higher and higher... and the more you rise, the more is the possibility to fall. The higher the peak, the deeper will be the valley surrounding it. Around an animal there is no valley; with man there is a valley... and the greater the man, the greater the valley, remember.

And modern man is at the peak of a big mountain, at the peak of the Everest -- hence so much trembling, anguish, anxiety. Modern man, if he falls, will fall totally. If something goes wrong with modern man, everything will go wrong. That was not so in the past.

The more you become alert, conscious, capable, the more is the danger. It grows in the same proportion.

So I tell you to meditate on these words of Walt Whitman, not to follow Walt Whitman -- because Walt Whitman is basically wrong. I can understand his temptation, but no man can become an animal again; that is not possible. And if you become an animal in the forest -- you will still be a man. There is no possibility. You can do bad, you can do good, but you cannot fall back from your consciousness: you will remain conscious.

Consciousness is such a quality that once gained, it cannot be lost; once learned, there is no way to unlearn it. It is almost as if you have become a youth and you are tempted to become a child again. Yes, you can play with the children, you can go and have fun -- but you will still remain a youth. There is no way to really become a child again. Nobody can go backwards: all movement is forwards. All movement is forwards and upwards.

To many people, Walt Whitman's temptation has appealed. It is not new: down the centuries, many people have escaped from human society to become animals again. and many have lived life almost like animals -- the people who go to the caves, the people who escape to the Himalayas, the people who hide themselves in the monasteries. They become almost animal-like, but there is nothing of worth in it. They are neither man nor animals, they are simply avoiding the risk -- and the man who avoids the risk never grows.

The path of growth is tremendously risky. One can come home... and one can go astray for ever and ever. That's the beauty too: with the risk, with the danger, is the thrill.

So when I am talking about meditation I am not saying to you, "Become like animals."

When I am talking about meditation and sannyas I am telling you, "Take more risks."

You cannot go back: the backward path is completely utterly closed. Man cannot enter into the Garden of Eden through the same gate from where Adam was expelled -- that gate is closed. Man will have to enter from another gate; he will have to find another gate to enter into the Kingdom of God. Man will have to go a long way to find another gate...

of consciousness, awareness, love, prayer.

Yes, a moment comes when a sage becomes almost like animals; but I say "almost like" - - I don't say that he becomes an animal. Yes, you can see in the eyes of a sage the same purity as is in the eyes of a cow. But a cow is a cow, and a sage is a sage. His innocence is not unconscious, his innocence is full of consciousness. He is innocent because he is conscious, the cow is innocent because the cow is not conscious. The cow is innocent because she cannot be otherwise, the saint is innocent out of his own choice -- TREMENDOUS choice. The saint can be otherwise, and he is not: it is a great achievement. The cow is silent, innocent -- she cannot be otherwise. There is no achievement in it, the cow is simply ignorant. The saint is wise. His innocence is out of wisdom -- he has learned the lesson of life. But remember, to become a cow is very cheap and easy, to become a saint is arduous.

What Kabir is going to say today in these songs is of tremendous import: try to understand it. He is not talking about falling back -- though it may look so at times -- he is telling you to go beyond. The beyond always looks like the below.

When an old man becomes really wise, he starts looking like a child; but remember, he is only LIKE children -- he is not really a child. He has passed through all the lessons of life -- good and bad, sweet and bitter. He has matured, he has seasoned. Again he is a child -- out of his own choice, out of his own understanding. The circle is complete.

NA MAIN DHARMI NAHIN ADHARMI says Kabir: I am neither religious nor irreligious. Now, this can mean two things. It can mean that you have become an animal -- neither religious nor irreligious; you have fallen back. Or, it can mean you have transcended -- you have gone beyond religion and irreligion. They both look alike but there is immense difference.

When Kabir says I AM NEITHER PIOUS NOR UNGODLY he is saying that he has gone beyond duality. Let us try to understand. There are people who are irreligious -- they will not go to the church, they will not bow down to any god, they don't have any reverence in their heart, they never pray. They simply live an ordinary mundane life: eat, drink, and be merry. There is nothing of the transcendental in their life. If you ask them:

What is the meaning of your life? they can, at the most, shrug their shoulders... or they can find some rationalizations. But look deep into them: they don't know why they are living, for what they are living. Is there any significance? is there any song? are they waiting for something to manifest in their hearts? are they growing into some unknown dimension somewhere? No, they are just moving in a rut. Of course they are very much frustrated.

There is no greater frustration than moving in a rut -- the same, again and again... one goes on moving mechanically. By and by, all hope disappears. You know you will do the same again tomorrow: you will eat, you will go to the office, you will make love, you will go to sleep, you will fight, you will nag, you will quarrel... and the same will happen again... and so on, and so forth, dragging.... One day, one dies. So this whole life is just a dragging journey towards death -- is that all?

Look into the eyes of people who have not made any contact with deeper realms, with the depths of their own inner core: you will find them barren, you will find them desert-like, dry -- no juice flowing. No song is born out of their souls. They are being dragged by some unknown force: they are accidental. They are simply here -- not knowing why, not knowing where, not knowing from where, no knowing who they are. They remain... yes, they remain occupied in a thousand and one things, just to avoid this inner emptiness -- so they don't come across it, so they don't have to encounter it. Otherwise, it is very shocking: if you encounter your emptiness, your unfulfilled soul, then it will be difficult even to drag -- one will start thinking of committing suicide.

Gabriel Marcel has written that there is only one basic metaphysical problem, and that is suicide. It is true, it's really true. If you look into the ordinary life, the only problem is:

why do you go on living? why not commit suicide? If death is to come then why wait?

for what? Why not stop all this nonsense? Not a thing is going to happen; there is no hope. No flower is going to bloom, no spring is going to come. You will repeat the same thing again and again and again, and one day the mechanism will stop -- and there is nothing else to it. If there is no significance in your life, there cannot be any soul. Soul exists with significance.

So, there is this one type -- the irreligious. And when I talk of this first type many so- called religious people are included in it -- because they go to the church as part of the rut, and they read the bible as part of the rut, and they repeat catechisms like parrots.

They are Christians and Hindus and Mohammedans and Jainas and Buddhists -- these are again occupations of the mind, to remain occupied; they also are not religious.

Out of a hundred persons ninety-nine are irreligious. Many of them profess to be religious, but they are not -- otherwise the world would have a different quality, a different flavor: there would be celebration, there would be joy and rejoicing, there would be a totally different kind of humanity. These people talk about love and go to war. These people talk about brotherly love and kill each other and murder each other. These people are even more dangerous than the so-called plain people who say that they are irreligious.

These who are hiding behind religions -- these people are more dangerous. They deceive themselves, they deceive the whole earth.

Kabir says, "I am not irreligious." But he says, "Neither am I religious." I say ninety-nine percent of people are irreligious, one percent of people are religious -- very few people.

How will you know if somebody is religious? If you see that in his step there is a dance, know that he is religious. If you see that in his eyes there is a flame, know that he is religious. If you feel that he is not just moving in the rut, that flowers bloom in his being... that he still has hope left in him, that he still dreams, that he is still in a romantic relationship with reality, that all has not become dull and drab, that there is still poetry...

that he still laughs and laughs totally, that he still loves and gets lost into his love, that he still sings, that he still looks at the flowers and the stars... that he still has a kind of innocence, wonder, reverence, that he respects life, that he is not suicidal... and -- last but not least -- that sometimes you can find him just sitting doing nothing, and full of joy. His source of joy remains unknown. Somewhere deep in the recesses of his being he must have found a source from where the joy wells up.

If you can find a person who is capable of remaining unoccupied then he is religious. Let this be the criterion: if a person cannot remain unoccupied then he is afraid of his own being. Then he is avoiding -- he has to do something; his doing is neurotic. If you leave him alone in the room he will read the newspaper, he will open the window or close the window, he will start changing the furniture or will listen to the radio or the TV -- but he will do something. And if he cannot find anything else he will fall asleep -- but he cannot remain awake and not doing anything.

If you can find a person who is sitting awake, fully awake like a flame -- still, tranquil, unwavering -- not neurotically obsessed by any action; passive -- just enjoying his being, enjoying the moment of here and now... and you will feel a different vibe around him, of REVERENCE -- yes, that is the right word. Albert Schweitzer calls it "reverence for life": that is the quality of a religious person. If he takes a rock in his hand, he will take it as if the rock is alive -- to you it looks "as if" the rock is alive -- for him it is so: it IS alive. Even if he talks to a small child, he is full of respect -- tremendous respect -- because even the child is a presence of God, a pure presence of God. Even if he is sitting with a dog, he is sitting with God. For him there is no much difference... maybe the dog is just god read in the reverse order -- just a difference of order. You can arrange 'god' as 'dog' -- the same word; you can arrange the same word 'dog' as 'god' -- a mere question of arrangement... but nothing of much difference.

A religious person need not be in a temple or a church, but wherever he is, he is in a temple. A religious person need not be praying in a formal way, in a ritualistic way, but whatsoever he is doing, that is his prayer -- doing or not doing. Doing, he is in prayer; not doing, he is in prayer.

And Kabir says: I am not irreligious -- not difficult to understand -- but he says: Neither am I religious. Now an even higher dimension opens: the transcendental -- where a person is neither religious nor irreligious. What will this dimension be? Now even reverence or prayer or worship is no longer needed, because that too creates a difference, a distinction -- the distinction between the subject and the object, the knower and the known, the worshipper and the worshipped.

This is the transcendental ultimate, when one has become one with the whole. Now one is God and there is nothing else than God. This is the ultimate experience: AHAM BRAHMASMI -- I am God. ANA'L HAQ -- I am truth. That's what Jesus means when he says: My God and I are both one. When there is oneness, even reverence will look lacking; something is missing. When there is reverence there is a little duality, a subtle duality. Now one has come to the oceanic experience.

Kabir says: I am neither religious nor irreligious, I am transcendental. And let that be your goal, let that be your destiny -- because only then will you come to the unfoldment of your being: you will become a thousand-petaled lotus in full bloom... showering your fragrance into existence. You have come home.

I LIVE NEITHER BY LAW NOR BY SENSE...

All these sutras are to help you to go beyond duality, the dualism, the two. I LIVE NEITHER BY LAW NOR BY LICENSE... There are two types of people ordinarily:

people who live by license, by sensuality, by desire -- people who simply indulge; they don't know anything else. They are lost in very ordinary gratifications; their life is very gross. Then there is another type of people who live by law, discipline, commandment:

the people who follow the ten commandments -- who listen more to the tradition, the scripture, the society, the state, than they listen to their own desiring, body, mind. They listen to authority, they don't listen to themselves. These are the two ordinary people.

If you live by license you live a life of indulgence -- and you will be destroyed by it. If you live a life of law you will again be destroyed -- not by indulgence, this time by authority -- because nobody can give you the commandment, nobody can give you the law. Life is so spontaneous -- how can there be a fixed law to follow? And the moment you start following a fixed law you are a dead entity, not a living being. Your life is no longer a river, it has become a stagnant pool which will simply become more and more dirty, will be more and more stinking, and will disappear into mud.

Kabir says: I neither live by license nor do I live by law. Then how do you live? Kabir says: I live by spontaneity; I live by awareness. Watch it -- this is one of the most important things. Indulgence comes from your unconscious mind. Sexuality, or a lust for power, comes from your unconsciousness, from the dark parts of your being -- overpowers you, possesses you, drives you mad... and one day you simply feel your whole life is finished and you have not gained anything. Maybe you have succeeded, but still, in the ultimate analysis, ordinary success proves to be a failure -- utter failure. I always say: Nothing fails like success. You may have accumulated much money, then one day suddenly you find life is gone. Money is there, but you are gone -- so what is the point of this success? You indulge with many women, with many men: energy is wasted, and suddenly there you are -- a desert land, a wasteland; nothing has flowered, nothing has grown. That whole journey was just very very momentary, very temporal. Yes, you indulged in one thing after another -- but all those things have passed like nightmares, and your hands are empty. And those moments cannot be reclaimed. The time lost is lost forever; the energies lost are lost for ever... and people who indulge go on indulging to the very end -- even when death is knocking on the door, they are thinking of indulgence.

I have heard about an old English lord, one of the richest men of England, who married at the age of ninety -- and married a girl of eighteen.

On the first night, his servants helped him to reach the room where he was to see his wife.

In fact, a servant helped him to climb up to the bed... he was almost dead. And then he looked around and the eighteen-year-old girl was there, just facing this corpse, and he asked the girl, "One thing -- have you asked your mother about the facts of life?"

The girl said, "No sir, I haven't asked." And the old man said, "That's dashed awkward -- because I have forgotten all about it!"

A ninety-year-old man... he has forgotten all about the facts of life, and now he has got married.

To the last moment, when death is knocking, people go on thinking of indulging more and more -- they don't know any other way to be. This is one of the most penetrating things to understand: that almost ninety-nine people when they die are thinking of sex.

The priest may be repeating something else -- the priest may be reading the Bible or the Gita; people may be pouring the pure water of the Ganges into their mouths -- but they themselves are still thinking of sex, or money, or power. This is a very stupid way of living life.

Kabir says: I don't live by sense, and I don't live by law.

Then there is another way which is also stupid in the same way, but more respectable -- stupid, but more respectable: people who live by law, who always follow the authority -- the state, the priest, the church. They are people of rules and principles. They go on crushing their own desires. Desires come from the unconscious, and this law is superimposed by the society; it is not your consciousness. And this law also functions from the unconscious. That's why every religion and every society tries to condition the children, newborn children: immediately, they start trying to convert them into religion.

A new boy is born into a Jewish family, he has to be circumcised immediately: now the conditioning has started. Or, a Christian child has to be baptized: the conditioning has started. Or, the Hindu child has to pass through the thread ceremony: the conditioning has started.

During the first seven years, every society tries to condition the mind -- and conditioning means nothing but hypnosis: forcing authority, law, tradition, religion, scripture, the priest, the church, into the innermost unconscious of the child so that from there you can control him. It is an old bullock-cart way. In the future, societies will do better. They will not be doing so much work, it is unnecessary: they will find some jet-speed methods.

Those methods are available: you can insert an electrode in the brain of the child and then there is no need to condition him. From that electrode, the politician sitting in Delhi or Washington or London or Moscow, can go on ordering... and whatsoever order is received, you will feel that it is coming from your own being -- that's how you will feel.

If you are born in a Jaina family, from the very beginning you have been conditioned against non-vegetarian foods. Continuous conditioning.... I was born in a Jaina family:

from my very childhood, I was conditioned that to eat in the night is a sin. I must have been almost eighteen -- up to that time I had never eaten anything in the night -- then I went with a few of my friends on a picnic. They were all Hindus, and they were not interested in cooking food in the day. Mm? -- the day was so beautiful and the mountain was so tremendously thrilling, and I was the only one who wanted to eat in the day and they were not interested in it -- so of course I had to concede. The whole day climbing the mountain... I was dead tired and was feeling very hungry when they started cooking. The temptation was tremendous -- the flavor of the food, and the whole day's tiredness -- and I could not resist. And I started arguing in my mind..."If all these people are going to hell, okay, I will also go. And just one night? -- it is not going to be such a great sin." But my whole being revolted, because for eighteen years I had been continuously conditioned that to eat in the night is the greatest sin.

I was wavering... and they were cooking... and the flavor became more and more strong...

and then they invited me: that was too much. Deep down reluctantly -- but still I ate. You will be surprised: the whole night I could not sleep, I had to vomit three times. It was nightmarish. And they were all asleep, fast asleep, and I was puzzled: if we all have committed sin, then why are THEY not punished? only I am punished. The vomit: unless I had completely thrown out whatsoever I had eaten I could not sleep that night.

And of course, that day it looked as if Jainas are right. I had been punished, immediately punished. This is the trick of conditioning -- and it felt as if it was coming from my own heart. It was not coming from my own heart, it had nothing to do with my own heart: it was the implanted idea, the electrode, that was working and creating trouble.

This is the way of the authority, the state, the priest: they have been trying to condition the mind.

Kabir says: A few people move through sensuality, indulgence; a few people move through law, authority. Those who move through indulgence are under the bondage of nature; those who move through law are under the bondage of society. These people who move by law are very respectable citizens: in the church they will sit in the first row, in the temple they will be respected; everywhere they will be thought to be very good people -- as people SHOULD be. But they are just mummies -- dead corpses run by the state. They don't have their own soul.

I would like to say to you: There is no commandment which may not be broken -- neither those I say unto you, not those laid down by the other Buddhas. There is no commandment which may not be broken -- because a commandment is a dead thing, and you are an alive being. I am not saying, "Go and break them" -- I am simply saying there is no commandment which may not be broken. The decisive factor has to be your spontaneous awareness. You have to look into things from your own awareness -- neither from the bodily instinct nor from the social intellect -- you have to go into your being, alert, fully alert, and see what has to be done, and live through that understanding. That is the way of transcendence.

So the second sutra is the sutra for spontaneity. The first sutra is the sutra for transcendence -- and spontaneity is the way to transcendence. If one day you really want to go beyond nature and beyond society -- and God IS beyond both -- then you will have to follow a tremendously risky path: that is, of spontaneity. You will have to listen to your own heart. Society has corrupted it, so you will have to sort it out -- the wheat from the chaff. You will have to continuously be on guard, because society has been very tricky: it has put things so deep down that sometimes it appears as if it is your conscience -- it is not.

That's why everybody's conscience differs -- if you are a Christian you have a different conscience, if you are a Hindu you have another conscience, if you are a Mohammedan, still another. How can conscience be different? These consciences are false, CREATED ones. Real conscience will be the same: Hindu, Mohammedan, Christian -- it will not make any difference. The real morality is one: whether you are born in th East or in the West, whether you are a white or a black, it makes no difference.

If something makes a difference, then remember, it must be the society who has taught you, who has put things deep down in your basement of being -- and from there it goes on manipulating you. Don't be a slave to instincts and don't be a slave to the society. And then religion -- REAL religion, the transcendental religion, which is even beyond religions -- is born. And that brings truth, and that brings benediction.

I AM NEITHER A SPEAKER NOR HEARER...

You must have heard, you may have sometimes even tried... there is a silence -- when you don't speak, it surrounds you. But that is not true silence, that is just absence of speaking. In India, they call it MAUNA -- people go into silence, they stop speaking.

Once a man was brought to me: for twelve months he had been in silence, and he wanted to break his silence in my presence. So he was brought to me. I looked at him and I said, "There is no need to break it, because you never started: I can still hear you chattering."

You can ask Nirgun -- she keeps silent... but inside the chattering continues.

Still, it gives you a quality -- it is half-way. Speaking has stopped on the outside, but not on the inside. Speaking can stop on the inside too, but then one more point has to be understood: if you have stopped speaking on the inside, and still you become interested in hearing, then it is not yet perfect silence. A dog barks, and you hear. Somebody talks, and you hear. In fact, if you are keeping silence, you will become more and more interested in hearing what people are saying, what is going on all around. That will be a substitute; that's how you will satisfy your curiosity and fill your mind.

Real silence happens when you are not talking, not listening. Then you have gone really beyond the word. Kabir says:

I AM NEITHER A SPEAKER NOR A HEARER...

He says: I have become really silent. I have nothing to say, and I have nothing to hear. I am absolutely contented. There is no curiosity left.

I AM NEITHER A SERVANT NOR A MASTER...

There are two types of people, again, who try to master others -- and feeling frustrated in that endeavor, one day start mastering themselves. These are the two types of people: the other-conquerors and the self-conquerors. Kabir says: I am neither. I have dropped the whole idea of conquering. There is no need to conquer anybody -- neither the other nor oneself.

The very idea of conquering is violent, foolish, creates conflict and misery. There is no need -- one should simply be. And remember, when you are neither a slave nor a master a great upsurge of freedom happens. One does not allow anybody to become your master, and one does not try to force anybody to become your slave. They both are in the same boat -- masters and slaves. Have you watched it? If you master somebody, in a deeper subtle way he has mastered you. That's what happens. The husband tries to master the wife and thinks that he has mastered his wife, but one day finds -- one day comes to a surprise -- that the wife has mastered him. All husbands go on ragging... and all husbands are henpecked.

In India, the wife calls the husband SWAMI -- "my master." And when wives in India write letters -- they rarely write -- to their husbands, they sign: Your servant. But nobody is befooled. In fact if you master somebody, in a deeper way, in a subtle way, you are being mastered by the other. The master becomes a servant of the servants because you start depending -- and dependence is really slavery.

Have you watched it? If you depend on things, things become your master. There are two types of ways of creating mastery. One is very gross -- the male way: forcibly, just by muscular power. The other is a subtler way -- the feminine way: not by muscles but by crying, weeping, and things of a different type. The man cannot understand, but the woman starts crying... or -- have you watched it? -- she may not argue, but the way she pours the tea is enough. She may not say anything against you, but the way she will pour the tea... and everything is made plain. And you cannot even argue, because she has not said anything. Her argument is very subtle.

Kabir says: If you really want to be free, don't allow anybody to become your master and don't allow yourself to become anybody's master -- you have to avoid two things. When you are neither anybody's master nor anybody's slave, freedom rises in you: your energy is free of all entanglements. It does not mean don't love -- in fact, if you love, how can you be a master? If you love, how can you reduce the other to be a slave? Love is freedom: love is rooted in freedom, love flowers in freedom. Love's ultimate fragrance is that of freedom.

Kabir is not saying: Don't love. Kabir is saying: Love so deeply that the mastery and the slavery is not created at all. He is not saying: Don't be related. Relate. But slavery and mastery? -- what type of relationship is this? This is no way to relate -- in fact this is the way to destroy all relationship, and all possibility of relationship. How can you relate with a slave? how can you relate with a master? -- impossible. The fear is there -- how will you relate? Relationship is possible when there is no fear. Relationship is possible only amongst equals.

That's why I say to you that, up to now, men and women have not been living in relationship -- because woman has never been thought equal. And relationship exists only between equal people; it cannot happen between unequal people. Unless woman is given total freedom, absolute equality, there will be no possibility to relate. Up to now, man has exploited woman, woman has exploited man; there has not been real relationship. It cannot be, because the way man has treated woman has been basically wrong. Only between two equal persons is there a possibility of relationship, because fear is not there - - one can be open, one can be true, one can be honest. Only between two equal persons, when there is no fear, is there love. Love arises when fear has left you. When fear is there, love cannot enter: they are NEVER together.

I AM NEITHER BOND NOR FREE...

And then Kabir says -- he brings in a still higher quality of freedom -- he says:

I AM NEITHER BOND NOR FREE...

Because even to feel, "I am free" means that somehow, somewhere, you are still not free.

Have you watched it? When you are really healthy you forget all about health. Unhealthy people talk much about health -- in fact, unhealthy people become interested too much in things like naturopathy, and they start reading books on nature, health, this and that. They become obsessed.

A healthy person will not bother. A healthy person is healthy -- and when you are healthy you don't think about health. In fact, to think about health is a sort of illness, perversion.

When you have a headache it's okay, you think about the headache; but when you don't have a headache do you go and declare to the world at large: "I have no headache"? Then people will think you are mad.

A really free person never goes to declare anywhere: "I am a free person." If you declare that you are a free person, somewhere deep down the bondage still persists. So Kabir says:

I AM NEITHER BOND NOR FREE, I AM NEITHER DETACHED NOR ATTACHED.

Both are wrong -- both are extremists. People are attached to money, and then they become detached from money. To have any attitude of attachment or detachment means you are still obsessed with the money. Somebody says, "I am detached from money" -- but why? What is the point of being detached from money? Is there still some fear of attachment lurking in your consciousness? -- because the idea of detachment arises only when you are attached. When you are not attached it is perfectly okay... money is money!

There are people who think that money is the only god: these are the people who are attached with money -- their only god is money. Then there are people who say that money is dirt; not much difference -- the have moved to another polarity: money is dirt.

They won't touch money. There are such mad people in India -- they are worshiped by people as sages. They are simply perverted people; they won't touch money.

Once it happened: I was staying in a village and a man came and he gave me nearabout five thousand rupees. A very rich man -- but very traditional. I told him, "Right now I don't need the money, but if I need it sometime, I will ask you." He had come to examine me -- whether I would take the money or not. But this statement was puzzling for him because I had not said that I would not take it; I said, "When I need, I will ask you." And I had not taken and not accepted because I was in no need. So he was very much puzzled.

He said, "You have confused me again. I had come here with this money because my guru said, "You go, and you will see: take the money to this man -- that is the only criterion to know whether somebody has achieved or not. If he has achieved, he will say:

Keep it away, don't bring it close to me, money is dirt. He will not touch it." You have not taken -- that's okay -- but you say that if you need, you will take it?" I said, "Yes -- because money is neither God nor dirt; money is simply money. And money is a utilitarian thing -- when you need, money is valuable; when you don't need, there is no value in it. The value is not in the money; money in itself is not valuable. It is just a simple means of exchange -- and a perfectly good means of exchange. Nothing is wrong in it."

He said, "You always puzzle. Why can't you give me a certainty? -- either you take it or you refuse it."

In India there are saints whose whole sainthood depends on this phenomenon -- that they don't accept money. If you bring money to them they will be very angry. They will be enraged, they will start shouting at you: "What do you think about me? Do you think that I am so low that I will accept your money?" And you will come back full of deep respect for them. These are mad people, perverted people. They are the same people, now standing on their heads -- first they thought that money is God, now they think that money is dirt. But they cannot accept a simple phenomenon -- that money is money. It is neither God nor dirt; it is not the greatest value nor the lowest -- it is just a utilitarian means of exchange.

Kabir says:

I AM NEITHER DETACHED NOR ATTACHED.

I AM FAR FROM NONE: I AM NEAR TO NONE.

And Kabir says: Nobody is close to me and nobody is far away from me. All are the same: I look at everybody with an equal eye -- SAMADRISHTI. Nobody is mine and nobody is my enemy; nobody is my friend and nobody is the enemy. The whole existence is my home.

I SHALL GO NEITHER TO HELL NOR TO HEAVEN.

Hell means fear, projected fear. Heaven means greed, projected greed. If you think in terms of heaven and hell you are the same, you have not changed at all. A real person of understanding does not think in terms of reward and punishment -- he does not think in terms of the future at all. His life is herenow. He knows only two things: here and now -- and they are also not two, they are part of one phenomenon: herenow. He lives herenow.

People who live in the future create hell and heaven -- out of greed, heaven; out of fear, hell. Of course for yourself you create the heaven, and for the enemies you create the hell. And every religion goes on saying: Come and follow us -- otherwise you will fall into hell. If you are not a Christian then beware: Christ won't save you in the last moment. You will be thrown into hellfire, and then you will suffer. Christ is not going to save you from there, unless you declare that you are a Christian. And so are the Hindus, and so are the Mohammedans -- everybody is trying to pull you by your greed and fear.

They say: Come to us. We promise you a better heaven -- with more facilities, modern equipment, modern devices, air-conditioning and all. You come to us, and don't go to the others -- because then you will suffer hell.

I have heard: A man from the remote corners of Bastar.... Bastar is one of the most primitive parts of the world -- very poor, very primitive, illiterate people... one man came to me and he said: It happened in my village, a Hindu sannyasin was staying there and a Christian missionary came, and the Christian missionary was trying to convert the tribal people to Christianity. And he had almost succeeded -- because he did one thing. He brought a big bucket of water... because if you have to talk to the tribal primitive people you cannot argue, you have to argue in their way... he gathered the whole community around the bucket of water and then he produced two statues -- one of Christ and one of Rama. And he said: Look. And they were both alike, exactly alike -- of the same size and same weight. Then he dropped them into the water. Christ's statue started floating on the water and Rama's drowned. So he said: Look! do you understand?

And of course the primitive people understood exactly -- they were ready. They said:

Okay, so Christ saves -- because he can save himself. And Rama cannot save himself:

look! -- you will go with Rama to the very bottom of existence. And they were almost ready to become Christians -- but that Hindu sannyasin created trouble. He said: Wait.

Arrange for fire. They said: For what? He said: Water is no criterion; fire is always the criterion. Put both Christ and Rama into fire and see who is saved.

Of course the statue of Christ was of wood... and Christ got burned, poor Christ! And the community was saved.

And the man was very happy. But I said: There is no difference -- whether you are Hindus or Christians, it makes no difference. The argument is foolish, the whole argument is foolish. But this is the whole argument all over the world -- not only with primitive people, with very educated people. The real thing that is being manipulated is fear and greed: "Christ saves!" You are afraid: you have been doing wrong things in life - - everybody has. It is impossible to avoid doing wrong things, because all that is natural has been declared wrong -- so it is impossible to avoid. If you love, it is wrong. If you eat, it is wrong. If you enjoy, it is wrong. If you are happy, it is wrong. All is wrong -- in fact, to live is wrong. Commit suicide: that seems to be the only virtue. Even that is not allowed -- they say, "Don't commit suicide, otherwise THAT will be wrong." So nothing is allowed.

First, the priests make you feel guilty. They condemn everything -- this is the very rationale, this is the trick: first they condemn everything. Once they have made you afraid -- they have condemned everything and they have painted hellfire as clearly as possible, in psychedelic colors -- then the whole work is done. Then you are ready to fall into their trap, because you have to be saved now -- you have committed wrong. The hellfire is there, death is coming close, and only Christ can save, or Mahavira can save, or Buddha can save. So somewhere or other, you have to belong to somebody so you can trust that you will be saved.

Nobody can save you unless you go beyond greed and fear. No Christian, no Hindu, no Mohammedan, nobody can save you -- because greed and fear, they are your real misery.

Kabir says:

I SHALL GO NEITHER TO HELL NOR TO HEAVEN.

Because heaven and hell are just mythological; they exist not. They exist only n your fear and greed. When fear and greed have dissolved, heaven and hell disappear. And in that state when there is no fear inside you and no greed, real paradise arises. Hindus, Jainas, Buddhists, have a better name for it: they call it MOKSHA, NIRVANA. In Christianity, Judaism, Islam, that word does not exist. Judaism, Christianity, Islam, they talk about heaven and hell -- nothing beyond. In the East, people have looked deeper. They say:

Heaven and hell are just psychological. Go beyond, go beyond the psychological -- only then do you attain the spiritual. That is NIRVANA -- where no fear exists and no greed:

where simply consciousness exists. And this is possible herenow. Heaven will be after you die, hell will be after you die. NIRVANA, MOKSHA, is possible herenow.

I DO ALL WORKS; YET I AM APART FROM ALL WORKS.

This is the meaning of becoming conscious, alert, aware. You do -- whatsoever is needed you do -- but you remember that you are not the doer, that God is the doer. You are only a vehicle, instrumental.

FEW COMPREHEND MY MEANING...

Certainly. The meaning is so deep that only a few will comprehend... but those few will immediately transcend. The very comprehension of the meaning of the words of Kabir will be a great illumination, will be a sort of satori, a glimpse of enlightenment.

... HE WHO CAN COMPREHEND IT, HE SITS UNMOVED.

And Kabir says: If you have heard me and if you have understood me, if you have looked into the reality I have been pointing at, you will sit unmoved. What does it mean when he says that you will sit unmoved if you have understood?

There are three types of people, again. First: when you listen to something you agree, you move your head in agreement -- you say, "Right." The second: you don't agree, you move your head negatively -- you say, "I don't agree." These people who agree and don't agree, cannot understand. When you say you agree, what do you mean? You mean, "I know what truth is, and you are also saying it, so I agree. You are saying something which goes according to my conviction, so I agree." When you shake your head in disagreement, what are you saying? You are saying, "You are talking nonsense. I know what is true, and I don't agree with you." The agreeing and the non-agreeing both are fools.

Kabir says: One who comprehends it, HE SITS UNMOVED. Truth is such... how can you agree with truth? how can you disagree with truth? Agreement, disagreement, is of the mind: truth is of the beyond. When truth is understood one simply remains in a tremendous silence, unmoving. There is no agreement, no disagreement. It is not a question of agreeing and not agreeing -- when truth is there you don't say yes, you don't say no. In fact, when truth is there you become so silent... all yes and no drops. Truth is so vast, you dissolve into it.

... HE WHO CAN COMPREHEND IT, HE SITS UNMOVED.

KABIR SEEKS NEITHER TO ESTABLISH NOR TO DESTROY.

And Kabir says: I am not here to establish any theory, any philosophy, any dogma. And I am not here to destroy any theory, any philosophy, any dogma. Kabir says: I am simply stating my own experience.

Kabir says: Please don't agree and disagree with me. Just listen. Listen attentively, totally.

Kabir says: Please don't be in a hurry to decide and to conclude. I am not preaching anything here, I am not trying to establish any tradition or destroy any tradition. I am simply saying something that has happened to me, that has grown in me, that I have experienced. I am simply singing my own song.

Kabir says: Listen to me as you listen to the murmur of a river... the murmur of the wind passing through the trees -- do you agree? do you disagree? AS you listen to the birds in the morning, do you agree? do you disagree? There is no question of agreement and disagreement -- it is not intellectual at all. You simply allow it... and you become silent.

Such a tremendous thing is present: how can you be so foolish as to agree or disagree?

All agreement, disagreement, is foolish, stupid. When truth knocks at your door you will simply be suddenly silent, unmoving. THAT is real agreement -- which is not of the intellect, not of the mind. That is not from you; that is from such a depth in your being that you can almost say it is from God.

THE HARP GIVES FORTH MURMUROUS MUSIC...

And says Kabir: So am I like the harp.

THE HARP GIVES FORTH MURMUROUS MUSIC; AND THE DANCE GOES ON WITHOUT HANDS AND FEET.

And look at me! I am a dancer... though my feet and hands are not moving.

... THE DANCE GOES ON WITHOUT HANDS AND FEET.

IT IS PLAYED WITHOUT FINGERS, IT IS HEARD WITHOUT EARS:

FOR HE IS THE EAR, AND HE IS THE LISTENER.

Only God is. When truth is uttered, whenever truth is uttered, the sayer and the listener are one. There is nobody to agree, and nobody to agree WITH. And you will feel this here also, many times: when you are agreeing you are missing, when you are disagreeing your are missing. People who are for me and people who are against me -- both will miss; nobody amongst them is with me. People who are simply here in my presence, with no agreement, no disagreement... sometimes truth comes. It is suddenly there... it surrounds you... it overwhelms you. It is heard -- but in that moment the sayer and the listener are not two.

Truth joins the master and the disciple. In the moment of truth the master disappears, the disciple disappears... only truth spreads all over.

IT IS PLAYED WITHOUT FINGERS, IT IS HEARD WITHOUT EARS:

FOR HE IS THE EAR, AND HE IS THE LISTENER.

THE GATE IS LOCKED...

And whenever this happens -- this moment of truth, when the master and the disciple disappear... because the master is not propounding a doctrine, and the disciple is not trying to collect some knowledge... when it happens that truth is so throbbing that in that throb, in the dance of truth, in the song of truth, the master and the disciple both dissolve, both fall in tune with that great rhythm that truth brings -- THE GATE IS LOCKED.

In that moment a tremendous privacy happens. So many of you are here... but sometimes it happens to one -- and in that moment only that one is with me here, and nobody else.

And in that moment, I am with that one and with nobody else. THE GATE IS LOCKED... whenever a master and a disciple meet, the gate is locked: it is secret. They may be standing in the marketplace, but THE GATE IS LOCKED.

... BUT WITHIN THERE IS FRAGRANCE:

AND THERE THE MEETING IS SEEN OF NONE.

THE WISE SHALL UNDERSTAND IT.

Only the wise can understand it. Who are the wise? Those who are not agreeing and not disagreeing, those who have not come with any a priori, those who have not already come with a conclusion -- those who have not concluded that they are Christians, Hindus, Mohammedans, for and against, this and that -- those who have come without a conclusion; those who have come open, ready for the truth to descend: those are the wise people.

A wise person has no conclusions. He has truth but no conclusion. And a fool has many conclusions and no truth. The fool is always a great philosopher, theoretician, dogmatist, propagandist. He believes; and whenever there is conclusion doors are not open for the truth.

When you come to a master, come without conclusions. Come without your head -- leave your head where you leave your shoes. Come without your head, come without any conclusions -- because we are not trying here to convince you, for or against. Here something of a tremendously different dimension and quality is being transferred.

Something is transpiring between you and me... and that can happen only in rare moments.

When truth is so real, tangible, that you can touch it... when truth is so strong that you are lost in it... when truth comes like a flood and your small ripple is lost in it... when the master and the disciple in a certain moment of truth become one... THE GATE IS LOCKED. In that privacy of all privacies, in that secret space, the meeting happens. That meeting is seen of none: nobody can see it, because it is not an objective phenomenon.

So when you are talking to outsiders, many times you will find it difficult to talk -- because you will say something, and they will not understand. And you cannot convey -- because something that you have known, something that you have glimpsed, cannot be conveyed to an outsider. For that, great sympathy is needed, love is needed, openness is needed. When you go back, you will not be able to say what has happened to you. People will think you have gone crazy... and they are right too! You will not be able to articulate what has happened to you, because it happens in such intimacy, in such deep privacy. It is not an objective experience, it is subjective. It is absolutely subjective: only THE WISE SHALL UNDERSTAND IT.

"The wise" means one who has not determined any conclusion beforehand. The wise is one who has not invested in any conclusion, who is ready to go with truth wherever it leads. And this is the meaning of sannyas too -- the freedom from conclusions, the freedom from "isms" and ideologies, the freedom to move with truth, the freedom to accept the challenge of truth.

And let me repeat: it is not a question of agreeing or disagreeing -- hence it is crazy. I am not trying here to convince, I am not trying here to convert. Something is available here:

if you are courageous enough to open your heart you will melt into it, you will disappear into it, and you will come out of it totally liberated, totally new.

A few words from T.S. Eliot...

THERE IS ONLY THE FIGHT TO RECOVER WHAT HAS BEEN LOST AND FOUND AND LOST AGAIN AND AGAIN: AND NOW, UNDER CONDITIONS THAT SEEM UNPROPITIOUS. BUT PERHAPS NEITHER GAIN NOR LOSS.

FOR US, THERE IS ONLY THE TRYING. THE REST IS NOT OUR BUSINESS.

You just try to be without conclusions. You just try to be silent, without agreeing and disagreeing.

FOR US, THERE IS ONLY THE TRYING. THE REST IS NOT OUR BUSINESS.

If you succeed in not being in agreement or disagreement, the rest is going to happen. It has always happened. It always happens.

And a few lines from W.H. Auden...

THEREFORE, SEE WITHOUT LOOKING, HEAR WITHOUT LISTENING, BREATHE, WITHOUT ASKING:

THE INEVITABLE IS WHAT WILL SEEM TO HAPPEN TO YOU PURELY BY CHANCE; THE REAL IS WHAT WILL STRIKE YOU AS REALLY ABSURD...

Unless you are certain you are dreaming, it is...

CERTAINLY A DREAM OF YOUR OWN; UNLESS YOU EXCLAIM -- THERE MUST BE SOME MISTAKE" -- YOU MUST BE MISTAKEN.

THE INEVITABLE IS WHAT WILL SEEM TO HAPPEN TO YOU PURELY BY CHANCE... the inevitable can happen here -- and you have come here only by chance. It is a chance meeting that you are here and I am here... it is just accidental, pure chance.

THE INEVITABLE IS WHAT WILL SEEM TO HAPPEN TO YOU PURELY BY CHANCE; THE REAL IS WHAT WILL STRIKE YOU AS REALLY ABSURD...

Because the real is so vast, it cannot be contained by your categories of reason, irreason; good, bad; this, that. The real is so vast that all your categories have to dissolve into it.

THE REAL IS WHAT WILL STRIKE YOU AS REALLY ABSURD... so what is to be done? THEREFORE, SEE WITHOUT LOOKING...

What is the meaning of seeing without looking? See -- without any conclusions. When you have a conclusion you are already looking for something -- you are not seeing, you are looking for something. If you have a conclusion then your vision is not pure.

THEREFORE, SEE WITHOUT LOOKING, HEAR WITHOUT LISTENING, BREATHE, WITHOUT ASKING:

THE INEVITABLE IS WHAT WILL SEEM TO HAPPEN TO YOU PURELY BY CHANCE; THE REAL IS WHAT WILL STRIKE YOU AS REALLY ABSURD...

The Divine Melody